The Conversion Bureau - The Return of the King
Love Me Tender by Dan's Comments
Disclaimer: My Little Ponies is the property of Hasbro, Inc.
Godzilla is the property of Toho Company Ltd.
Making landfall south of Smokey Mountain put me a long way from Los Pegasus. But Canterlot or specifically, the Canterhorn was my aim. I'd spent several weeks getting things ready, hiding myself and my intentions. Now is the time to advertise, I thought as I watched the effect of my approach. I'd slowed my speed dramatically, and rose slowly out of the sea. The surge was only a few feet, and I advanced inland with no casualties. The sound of wood scraping across sand caught my attention.
I turned very carefully, and saw the dory with the lights at the bow and stern aimed down to attract fish, and the little colt in the middle of the boat staring at me. I checked myself carefully, and found the fish hooks caught on my hip. Pulling them out proved beyond my dexterity. Instead, I snapped the line and proceeded forward leaving the colt and boat behind. No terrified scream followed me. I looked at the bright moon light and wondered how long my luck would last.
Conflict will come, but the ponies will have not a leg to stand on claiming I either provoked or escalated it, I thought as I advanced through the woods with the Unicorn Range in the distance. I walked softly, and tried to keep an eye out for villages, homes and even occupied carts as I walked. The ponies will panic enough once they spot me, I thought, Better it happens farther inland. The closer I can get to my goal before they start throwing bodies at me, the better.
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But one set of eyes had already seen him, and she was desperately spreading the alarm.
Luna woke Celestia out of a sound sleep. "Discord lied," Luna paused, "Of course he did, but Celestia, there is a giant lizard, and it is headed this way!" Luna blurted out to the sleepy Solar Diarch.
"Wha?" Celestia said, and Luna repeated herself, careful to annunciate each word clearly.
"I've called out the Guard, and sent the Wonderbolts to investigate. It seems to be avoiding any settlements, but it will be in sight by morning, and here by midday at the latest," Luna said. She stepped back, allowing her sister a chance to analyze the situation.
"Have one of the Wonderbolts hang back, I want to know what it does when they attack," Celestia said.
Luna stared. "Perhaps I have not made clear how immense this creature is."
"The Wonderbolts will attack it, and I want to know what it does," Celestia repeated.
Luna nodded, leaving Celestia's chambers and moved off to give the orders. I'm sending those foals to their deaths, she thought as she sent one of her thestral Night Guard to take the order to carry out an attack on something that dwarfed most dragons. She idly considered that the thestral she'd chosen was a Newfoal. She looked around her guards, and noted the few Newfoals among them were actually excited by the news spreading through the darkened capital.
They know, she realized and pointed at several of them.
"Come with me, I want to know what this creature can do. Stories, legends, myths, anything to give us a clue," she ordered.
"Unless you have a giant butterfly handy," one eager, coltish guard said, "You're going to need an Oxygen Destroyer."
"What in the name of Harmony is an Oxygen Destroyer?" she asked.
Luna turned a very pale shade of teal when the guard told her. She was very glad they had destroyed the ability of humans to feel anger when they had converted them to ponies. She couldn't conceive of a more horrific weapon.
"And it's better if you use it underwater. If you use it on land, you'll turn an entire city-sized patch into a ghost town," another guard offered, "Then fifty years later, the Destroyah will be born."
Luna almost didn't want to hear. From her 'eye' of the moon, she watched the creature pick its way forward. She wondered what hope they had against it. Then she watched it emit a long flame from its mouth and its bulk lifted from the ground.
"Tell me everything," she told them.
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I picked myself up off the ground and ruefully looked at the rather mashed terrain where I'd landed. Well, it's good to know. Rocket-zilla sort of works, I thought as I tried to decide if a powered jump and a less than soft landing were worth it. Keep your options open. There's also the need for lessons that will let the Newfoals know they have something to offer me. Give them a sense of power when dealing with me.
The butter-yellow pegasus arrowing toward me told me that trouble was finally showing its head.
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Fluttershy let her bat friends lead her towards the 'living mountain'. She'd heard the earthquake and now she saw they had exaggerated not one bit. Her terror grew, until the creature stopped, and seemed to be waiting for her. At least it's not a dragon, she thought, then she gathered her courage and approached.
"Uh, excuse me," she said, and shied as the creature regarded her.
She took a deep breath. "Uh, if it's not too much trouble, would you be able to head out around Saddle Lake. I'm afraid you're shaking things up. I know you don't really want to scare anypony, so would you mind going around?" She smiled to the creature.
It pointed towards Canterlot in the distance.
"Oh, the lake isn't that big, you can get around it to Canterlot," she assured it, "But you might want to keep your distance if you don't want to scare anypony important."
He nodded his agreement and headed towards Saddle Lake, rather than heading towards Ponyville, and scaring everypony and possibly shaking up the dam outside of town.
The creature's odd gait reminded Fluttershy of something. Then she heard the footfalls. They were far softer than they should have been. She smiled. What a thoughtful monster.
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I continue using the 'mine-walker' pace of keeping my weight on my back foot and advancing my unladen foot, then putting my weight on it. It slowed my approach, but 'slow' still exceeded 30 mph/48 kph. That put my arrival at the Canterhorn at an hour before dawn.
My foot encountered something, and I bent down to get a better look at it. Something screamed over my head like a swarm of artillery shells. I straightened up to glance around, looking for the guns. Only to have the same sound scream by in front of me. I looked around and tried to see the guns.
Unable to find the artillery, I continued my advance although I hastened my steps. Ducking occasionally to see where the shots were coming from. Did she lead me into some kind of ambush? I wondered as I continued to advance. It bothered me no end that I could be under this kind of fire and still be unable to see the muzzle flashes in the darkness.
Long-range rockets? They could fire them from Canterlot and they'd burn out before I spotted them, I thought as I raised up to peer into the darkness to see them. Nothing, this is weird.
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Fleetfoot's jaw had dropped so much, she was afraid it would detach and fall off. Eleven passes her fellow Wonderbolts had made. As if some instinct, and senses keener than a pony's, warned it and it had deftly dodged their every attack. A counterattack never came.
She turned to the thestral Night Guard. "Take what we've seen to the Princess. It is advancing on Canterlot, and there seems nothing we can do to stop it."
"What would happen if you actually had hit it all those times?" the guard asked.
When Fleetfoot glared, the guard took off into the night. A high, wingover pass sailed directly over the creature's head as it stooped, as if to look across the face of Saddle Lake. Fleetfoot sighed, torn between joining her friends in this ridiculous dance, or staying back as ordered, to pray it continued to take no offensive action.
She looked at the lake and an idea occurred to her. Let's see what this thing's character really is. She stripped off her blue Wonderbolt's uniform, swung wide around the creature and dove into the lake.
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Ah screaming, it couldn't last, I thought as I advanced. I could easily pick out the source of the splashing, someone in the lake. This is going to move me into Gamera territory dammit. But much of the gestalt would not permit a call for help to go unheeded. I frankly agreed.
Dipping both massive hands in the lake, the struggling pegasus, and a fair amount of lake water was transferred on shore and set down on the bank. I stepped over the pegasus and wished there was someone to contact to get the pony some help. With artillery whizzing around like angry gnats, opening the distance seemed the best policy.
Canterlot was still a distance away, and I wanted to be on my way back 'home' before daybreak. The panic I'd cause on being seen would help no one.
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Soarin' landed near Fleetfoot who was staring at the monster who still bobbed and wove like a master to keep away from the other Wonderbolts.
"Are you insane?" Soarin' asked.
"He saved me," she said quietly, "He didn't have to, he didn't hesitate, and he didn't have to be so careful. He just did it."
"Well I can tell you what Spitfire is going to do if you don't get back in the air and track that thing. It's less than an hour from Canterlot, and who knows what it's going to do there."
"I don't think it means to hurt anypony," Fleetfoot said.
Soarin' shook his head. "It's a little big for a first date, isn't it." Her glare sent Soarin' scurrying off into the sky.
Angrily, Fleetfoot snorted. It could have hurt me, and it didn't. It could have ignored me, and it didn't. What is it, and what does it want?
She shook out her wings and clumsily clawed her way into the air to follow it. She could see that Canterlot was preparing its defenses. The great dome shield formed over the city, but in Celestia's colors rather than Shining Armor's. If she thinks that'll stop it, Fleetfoot shook her head and chuckled as she fell into formation as the Wonderbolts quit trying to dive-attack the thing and just followed it.
I'm not a particular fan of the Humans Acting Villainously genre but so far this looks like a fun ride. It helps that it features a protoganist whose goals are not limited to a tour of destruction, no matter how overpowered he is. That he is actually concerned about minimizing damage and panic reactions only adds to that.
Including Sunset Shimmer and mentioning Tirek was a nice touch and very effective for providing context as to when this story takes place. The encounter with Fluttershy, too, was as good as such a scene can be.
Will chapter length and time between updates stay this short?
And some minor typos
4764488 It depends if author cares shit about people wanting updates or not. Hell, he is updating at rate i could update all my four stories, i just lack the interest to give a fuck. Hey author, YOUR THE BEST AUTHOR EVER!!!! THANKS FOR THIS STORY, IT'S GREAT!!!
4764568
Nope. Dates of industrialization.
As someone who HATES the whole conversion bureau thing, I am loving this fic. MOAR PLEASE!
yes!!! celestia will soon learn not to underestimate the king! update soon plz!
Dan_s Comments, I love your work with Cultural Artifacts and "I am not Spartacus" and am eagerly awaiting updates on both, but DAMN this story is ALSO interesting! If you need a breather from those other 2, this is a wonderful side project :>
Heh. This just gets better and better. Gamera reference was hilarious, especially considering Screwattack's upcoming Deathbattle release.
I like the way you're using the character. As a note, Mothra is a moth, not a butterfly. But otherwise, so far so good.
4764488 The LoHAV stories I like are when the human is basically screwed over by the ponies and can't deal with them by any other means. Darth Vulcan for example tries to 'play nice' and gets screwed over at every turn, when he's a bastard he wins and does his victims some real permanent good.
That's what I was aiming for here. Of course thre's going to be a problem, but it's going to be the ponies fault.
Chapter length is goign to stay small. The updates are going to come as quick as I can manage, but I have work on the weekdays. Glad you likes the little tidbits.
Fixed the typos.
4764538 Thanks, I am trying.
4766357 I enjoy poking holes in that genre, and the 'I'm superior because I'm a pony' ethos. Considering the things we've learned the pones have done, they are arguably worse than us.
4766771 I wouldn't go that far. Experience why, yes. Learn from it, not quite yet. Chapter 4 is almost done.
4766950 Not so much a breather as my muse shoved this to the front of the line and said 'Nothing else for you until you write this.' So I'm writing.
4767638 Thanks. Personality wise this one is closest to the Legendary character, who didn't go out of his way to destroy property. But would if that was necessary.
And the one reporting was an overexcited fanboy, so a few in accuracies are bound to crop up.
4767800
Ah. Makes sense.
time to kill the Princess's
4767800 Small details are what breaths life into a story. If only the actions/thougts of the protoganist and antagonist were shown to the reader, the story would quickly turn stale. Context, world building and by showing how things look from the sidelines expand a story's setting, turning it into a place where people actually live instead of just a stage.
Something has been bugging me, though. I know it is currently of little consequence to the plot but what exactly does the world this is set in look like? The default TCB has Equestria (as in only the nation where the ponies live) pop up as an island in the middle of an ocean on Earth, leaving behind other regions of their homeworld. Rainbow having to travel across an ocean to the pony homeland suggests that this part is set on their world unless it too was taken along for the ride to Earth. No mention of the cleansed human lands has been made at all, nor where the vast numbers of newfoals have been allocated to other than a few as part of the background here and there. So far everything points towards Earth still being very much seperated from the ponies home world.
For this story, though, none of this matters.
4768293 Maybe Rarity will make that for Fleetfoot and Godzilla's wedding.
4768692 To quote Jafar 'Abject humiliation.'
4768747 Considering that the original was set before the Hearth's Warming Day was revealed and the Hasbro map that shows the other lands across the sea:media-cache-ec0.pinimg.com/736x/63/4a/41/634a419a0ea9f209fa9ebc2b02892a8c.jpg they don't touch on that. I'm assuming the original pony homeland was in the Western Sea. The path Godzilla took was paralleling the trainline north of Whitetail Wood and Ponyville.
How Earth fits in, I haven't figured out. Considering how avaricious Xenolestia usually is portrayed, the world may resemble s figure-8 with Equestria being the point of intersection between the two worlds. So if a griffon or dragon wanted to go to Earth, they'd first have to go to Equestria.
I also suspect that Earth is very sparsely inhabited. Ponies couldn't live there. Even without humans, Earth is too turbulent and too violent for Equestrians. Bears aren't going to have teaparties. Hurricanes can be bigger than the land of Equestria itself. The sun and the moon operate without the influence of magic users. That's ignoring earthquakes, volcanoes, tornadoes, etc. We are a product of our environment, and Mother Nature is a pitiless bitch.
4769262
I believe TCB: Not Alone did something very similar. The only practical way I can imagine for this to work is "if you leave Equestria from location X in direction Y you will enter Earth." It also means that any information regarding humanity and the conversion process had to trickle through Equestria before it could reach any of the other lands on their homeworld.
This is one of the things that will never cease to amuse me whenever the TCB is mentioned. Ultimately Celestia cannot win anything from converting mankind and scrubbing any trace of it from the planet. Earth is not the peaceful garden she and her ponies reside in. Any attempt at colonization will come with hardships and costs they are not used to. Worse yet, they have to feed millions upon millions of newfoals, something I doubt their agriculture is up.
No, Fluttershy. Godzilla can be considered worse.
...Though not this version, he takes his actions into account and avoids collateral damage to buildings/towns when possible.
You know I just realized a couple things.
1.> This is the only CB story I've read were people became things other than ponies (Griffins and a diamond Dog were mentioned in Ch. 1)
2.> Why are there Newfoals in the guard? If they're incapable of aggression, wouldn't that mean they couldn't do anything in a serious situation? Wouldn't that just make them fodder?
4776072
1. Yes, I like that aspect as well.
2. Just because you're a manufactured pacifist, doesn't mean you can't serve a useful purpose in an armed force. Field medical personnel, spotters and scouts, builders (like the SeaBees), Chaplains, administrative personnel... the list goes on. Hell, even a pacifist can carry ammo, canteens, and food. An army travels on its stomach and all that.
Or alternatively, imagine a being that can't feel anger, or sorrow, or any negative emotions, but CAN follow orders, and do its job, which might include killing other intelligent beings. Imagine that because of what was done to it, it can't feel sorrow, or remorse, or anger over what it is called to do. I can't think of anything more terrifying, frankly.
Well if there's one good thing you can say about Godzilla, you can say he's considerate of others feelings.
4794873 the unfeeling soldier. Perfect sniper. No hesitation, no remorse. Just, click, click, boom.
T-THis is a LoHAV story? he... HE is a villain?! a true godzilla would have exploded her, lake and all!
6245702 Godzilla bipolar like that. Some days he protects man from giant monsters, other days he fucks us up.
6544283
Godzilla does what he wants...
i'm honestly confused here, isn't Zilla supposed to be 'I don't take shit from no one, i'm gonna save the human species', or just neutral? cuz he wants to make a newfoal branch, away from Equestria, that's the same as the revolutionary war, but without the war, if it's going to be a real revolution, or the usurping of tyranny, there will always be bloodshed, but that's my opinion, I'm just confused is all
7813169
really depends on which version of Godzilla you are talking about sometimes he is helpful, sometimes neutral, and other times murder everything
10443785
He's an assembly of humans with a thick layer of Godzilla. Like a haggis.