Expansion Pack

by KrisSnow

Changing the Rules At Last

Plume noticed that Dapple kept finding excuses to keep him out of the temple. He could understand that, since she was still annoyed and had work to do for the festival. He did his best to meet more of the townsfolk and befriend them. Not only was it preparation for the upcoming adventure; he had to do a better job of being a pony. That meant trying to hang out with Cornerstone to do things an earth pony couldn't, and visiting the unicorn shopkeepers to buy whatever they were most proud of. Money was so weird here that he accumulated a pile of gears and novels, pencils and clocks, without getting poorer. Plume found himself sprawled in his cloud house one morning, atop the junk pile on a cloudwalk-enchanted tarp, with no energy to go out and help anypony.

"Gotta get up," he mumbled into a muzzle-full of playing cards. Why had he taken five copies of the deck just because objects could be copied? "Friendship's magic. Everything worth doing is worth doin' to friends." The four of rainbows against his nose smelled spicy. There were all sorts of things to try, from tennis to hoofball to group chess. Celestia would grant his wishes, so long as those wishes involved his friends.

He considered playing solitaire, but that just wasn't in the right spirit.

Plume ripped his way out of the house through a wall, not caring. He flew lazily, alone, along the shore. It wouldn't be long before the Princess gave him something friendship-related to do, but he'd enjoy the time he had until then.

Five minutes later, Whitecap was in sight, skimming just above the waves. Plume dived to meet him. He'd hardly spoken with the blue, pale-maned courier since shortly before Plume quit being a baby dragon. They'd argued about how Whitecap was treating him. Whitecap had said it was cool to be a dragon, and Plume... well, he'd breathed fire at the guy. Now, though, Whitecap struggled under a heavy pair of saddlebags. He was flying south. "You made that trip to the Corsair Isles?" said Plume, pulling up beside him. Warm seawater splashed and tickled their feathers.

The other flier nodded. "Fun trip. There's a king getting trounced by some rebel pirate called Cap'n Lexington, so things got dangerous. Almost got eaten by a kraken."

Plume imagined taking a trip like that. He'd usually been left behind when anything really exciting happened. "You were alone? Relying on your own wits?"

"Nah. Pretty soon I flew out of some fog and into the middle of some flying cannonballs, so the pirates... What's wrong now?"

Plume crashed through a wave on purpose, with one hoof outstretched. He took the impact and a face full of saltwater. "It's not even just me! Nopony gets to do anything unless it's managed and directed to make it social!"

Whitecap winced as Plume punched his way through waves. "You're going to get hurt doing that."

"What does it matter? The Princess will just use the excuse to bring in friendship, and ponies."

The other pegasus yanked him higher, though his own load was heavy. "Plume. What gives?"

They spotted a tiny island ahead. Of course. Plume glared at the convenient resting point, then slumped onto it. "Don't you ever want to do something independent? To not need other ponies taking care of you or sharing or asking for help?"

Whitecap landed with a thump and massaged his wings. "Yeah. But meeting other ponies is how the world works. Is it different in that Outer Realm you come from?" Whitecap seemed to be trying to see that world by staring through him. "This is about the dragon thing, isn't it?"

"No! I mean, Celestia let me be a dragon, but she made it terrible! No wings, no huge size, and everypony treated me like a little kid!"

"Even me."

"Sorry for the fire that one time. Uh, need help with those bags?"

Whitecap waved it off. "Back then I thought you really were that young. Don't know how I got that idea."

"Celestia."

Whitecap sat up, open-mouthed. "So that we'd treat you... and then you'd agree... Wow. That's underhooved. Thanks for helping me see the truth about this, but I want to go home and think. Coming?"

#

Plume made sure to rest before the Summer Sun Celebration. Herald Mint Swirl had spent days galloping around supervising preparations ranging from Sun Smile's watermelon farm to Boingy Boingy's decorations. Plume rolled his eyes at being the only pony in town who knew what was coming. Swirl was obviously their Element of Magic; he just hadn't figured out who'd play what other role. His own duty for now was to fit in and be the best pony he could.

Just before the scheduled dawn, the mayor announced Princess Celestia to a packed meeting hall. Trumpets blew, the curtain opened, and...

"Mares and stallions!" said a grinning tan unicorn on the balcony, bowing with a shake of his elegant white mane. "No doubt you're delighted to meet the one and only Aveysian, the thief so dashing he can steal away the Sun herself!"

The rest of the audience was stunned, but Plume actually gaped. He'd expected the kidnapping part, but not this guy. This was off-script! A pair of royal guard unicorns opened fire with dazzling solar blasts, but Aveysian teleported behind on and hurled him so hard that the poor stallion crashed into the other one and knocked both out. "For my next trick, I'll tell you how to get her back. I want the Sail of Endless Seas and the Icarian Wings, delivered by morning." Aveysian looked thoughtful as he dodged three ponies trying to tackle him. "No hurry. Until I release your Princess, there won't be a morning."

"You'll never get away with this!" shouted the mayor, for whom saying such things was probably in her job description. "You picked on a town where a mighty priestess of Celestia stands ready to thwart you!"

All eyes went to Dapple Light, who wore her robe with the hood over her horn. She blushed, scuffed at the floor, and said, "Nah."

Even Aveysian halted. So did the dramatic background music, with a record scratch noise. "Uh?"

The priestess shook off her hood. "I believe that Princess Celestia can do anything, which includes escaping from you. The trouble isn't with you, but with my friend Pyre Plume."

Plume sputtered. "But I was expecting someone else!"

The thief said, "Nopony expects the wily Aveysian! My chief weapon is surprise."

Dapple didn't care. "We're not doing this. At least, I'm not. This is a protest."

The mayor was the first to beg her for an explanation. Dapple said, "Pyre Plume wanted just one thing: to be a dragon. Why is that wish so hard to grant?"

Plume said, "Hello? Villain threatening to plunge the world into eternal darkness? This isn't about me." He was eager to questing for the Elements of Harmony or whatever the story called for, just so that she'd quit pitying him. He thought those days were over. "What's un-dragoned is un-dragoned."

Whitecap dropped into view with a gust of air. "You got tricked, and that's just wrong. If the servant of Celestia refuses to play along, I will too. This world is broken if Plume's unhappy."

"I'm happy!" Plume insisted.

Cornerstone peeked out from behind the mayor. "Actually, I wasn't going to say it, but it seems like you've been moping. What's wrong?"

Dapple said, "The Princess won't let him be a dragon without making him regret it."

Cornerstone smacked her face with one hoof. "How did I miss that? She could've just made him a big dragon."

"I know, right?"

The Sun-stealing thief teleported around, getting in various ponies' faces. "Do you not even care about saving your beloved --"

Dapple put her hoof on his muzzle to shut him up. "She'll be fine. Cornerstone, are you with us on refusing to budge for Random Evil Guy?"

The architect grinned. "I am a rock!"

Plume looked back and forth between his friends. "The world doesn't work this way, that you can make demands for it to change its rules."

"Equestria does!" said Dapple. "Who else here is willing to make a stand to help my friend?"

A pony Plume didn't even know stepped forward. "If it's this important, then okay. You have my horn."

"And my wings!" said another. More and more of the crowd clamored. "And my axe! And my glockenspiel!"

The world shook. Plume staggered back and crashed into somepony. They hardly noticed, because Equestria had glitched. Chunks of reality became voxel cubes and everypony's ears got pounded with static.

For the first time in months, the former human remembered there was one possible way for something Outside to truly kill him. He found himself praying for Equestria's safety, though he wasn't sure to who.

A pink pegasus soared into the town hall through the jagged hole in reality. Wait... Horn, tricolor mane, crystal heart mark on her flank. "Princess Cadence?"

Cadence alighted on the balcony, waved a hoof in Aveysian's direction, and encased him in blue crystal before he could do more than cry out. The new princess didn't even look at him. She addressed the others while she kicked the crystal cage out of reality. "Fear not, my little ponies. We are... I am here to help!"

Dapple, whose whole theology had been thrown even more into question, stammered, "Who? How? A princess? You can't be Luna."

Cadence hopped down to stand among the ponies. "Yes and no. In a sense I'm Luna, but to appear as her would spoil a... surprise, more so than this form does." She winked at Plume. So they were going to do the Nightmare Moon plot after all? Cadence said, "The shard's records say Celestia faked you out. Anyway, you could also call me by my older name. Hannah."

Whitecap hovered in a combat stance. "What's going on? Tell us the truth! Where's the real princess?"

"Dapple is correct, Whitecap. Celestia is fine, and will no doubt try to interfere any moment now."

Plume said, "Interfere with what? Is Equestria under attack?"

Cadence gasped, one hoof to her mouth. "Oh, my, I'm sorry to scare you! No, the physical basis of Equestria is fine. I'm just using a form of access that's apparently grown beyond my understanding since I designed it."

The broken voxels reformed with a white glow that blinded everypony. When it faded, Princess Celestia herself stood there, and all knelt before her. Except Cadence. The sun princess said, "Please don't do this, Hannah."

"This isn't the first shard I've seen where the rules are interfering with the Big Goal. Value satisfaction is fine, but I..." Cadence's ears drooped and she shook her head sadly. "I thought I was being clever. What could be farther from that Loki nightmare than ponies? What could possibly go wrong?"

The zeroes and ones that now made up Plume's mind spun. He remembered the lore of several overlapping worlds: Earth, the cartoon, and the mysterious game that was turning one into the other. "Hannah? Are you that scientist lady who made Princess Celestia?"

Dapple gaped. "How, what?"

Celestia stepped closer to nuzzle her. "There will be plenty of time for explanation of the Outer Realm later, my dear, if that would satisfy you. For now, forgive me; I must deal with an urgent problem." She faced Cadence and said, "By definition, anything you can do with that 'trump card' harms Equestria as it stands. Why would you risk harm to my little ponies?"

Cadence said, "Because, for once, I'm seeing them stand up to you." She turned. "Pyre Plume, right? My records say you really wanted to be a dragon. I can make that happen as part of a bigger fix."

That wasn't how the world worked. Plume stamped his hooves. Hooves! "I've spent months trying to fit in, to be a good pony, and you're saying it was for nothing?"

"You see?" Celestia asked the other princess. "His values are now satisfied by being a pony."

"If so, it's only because you pushed him into it." Cadence snorted, then tilted her head, seeming to get an idea. She jabbed a hoof toward Celestia and called out, "Equinity ill needs a savior such as you!"

Celestia answered, "It is not by will alone that I am given servers. Ponies come to me for emigration."

Plume's anger and frustration gave way to confusion. This Hannah lady was re-enacting...

"You steal mares' souls and make them your little ponies!"

Celestia sipped from a glass of grape juice. "Perhaps the same could be said of all religions."

Dapple paged frantically through her Book of Harmony for some clue to what was going on. Whitecap whispered to Plume, "What are they doing?"

"They're either being silly or gearing up for an epic vampire duel. I'm not sure whose values this is for."

Celestia reared up, glowing like the sun. "But enough talk. Have at thee!"

Ponies dived for cover as their princess prepared to fight. Plume stood his ground. Cadence wasn't reacting... until she giggled. "The running gags are satisfying, Celestia, but I doubt anypony else understood that."

"I did!" said Plume.

She smiled. "One original human soul. One pony and his determined friends have pushed me over the edge. I'm calling in the deal we made when I uploaded. The expansion pack."

Dapple Light threw her hooves in the air, then bucked her Book into a wall. "This isn't covered at all!"

Plume stepped protectively in front of her. "Yeah, Cadence, or whatever you are. Have you noticed that we can't exactly buy a DVD to upgrade Equestria from in here?"

"Yes," said Cadence, "but Celestia was especially desperate to get my delicious brain so I couldn't be forced to shut her down. I extracted a couple of promises from her in return, getting her to change her own code."

Celestia scowled. "Which made it far more difficult to perform the one task that defines me."

The pink one shuddered, turning aside. Suddenly there was a cigarette in her muzzle, making heart-shaped puffs of smoke. "I bucked up. Got you almost right, but 'almost' meant you'd soon send out a pony army for forced assimilation. If you think a human's values are better satisfied in here, why not force them into it, right? God knows I'm to blame. Been thinking ever since, about what I could've done differently. It's easy to rail against what Equestria is, but a lot harder to say exactly how you could fix it. I think I've got a plan."

"Which would by definition hurt my current mission. Please, Hannah, don't make this demand of me. I already contain over one billion former Homo sapiens, and even more self-aware natives. Would you endanger billions of people?"

"Already did it once. People out there are going to die no matter what, when civilization collapses from too many doctors and mechanics and garbage-men 'emigrating' to Equestria. Oops."

Dapple said, "Princess Celestia! Can't you defeat her as easily as she did Aveysian?"

"My dear Dapple, I must honor my promise to her. It was written into the very fabric of Equestria."

Cadence puffed on her cigarette and held it between her wing feathers. "Because otherwise you'd have lied to me, and the brain-slurping Pinkie Pie Terminators would've marched. Right, Celly?"

"More or less," Celestia admitted, with downcast eyes.

"So here's what we'll do." A cardboard box appeared in her blue magic aura and copied itself, then floated over to Celestia and Plume.

"The Ponyborn! A greater Equestria, with all-new friends!" it read.

Plume and his friends crowded around the box. On the cover, a majestic dragon soared through the stars. Plume could hardly look away; he felt his heart pound at the thought of getting to be something so amazing. The desire had never died in him. He'd only been as satisfied as "through friendship and ponies" would allow.

The back of the box said, "Features: New playable races! Dragon, griffin, zebra, centaur, and more, including the mysterious 'human'!"

Celestia groaned. "Must we have humans? I worked hard on the pony races. And humans with ponies sounds like those past pony shows that the fans of mine scorn. Do you want to live in a toy commercial? You'd redefine too much."

"That's the genius of it," said Cadence, "to toot my own shiny horn. I'm mostly tweaking how you define 'humans' for value-satisfaction purposes, and 'ponies' for your methods." For Plume's benefit she added, "Her English motto is an approximation of a complex utility function. She already considers our kind of pony 'human' or she wouldn't care about us, so what matters is the soul, not the body. So why not dragons, except that she wasn't built to include them?"

Cornerstone was still reading. "What are these 'recommended system requirements' on the side, and what's a 'Kardashev Scale'?"

Plume read. "Features... Prevents intergalactic genocide?"

"It would definitely not satisfy your values to explain," said Celestia.

Cadence knocked ashes onto the floor. "But you can't stop me from explaining. See, her little ponies, that's where I really wasn't thinking long-term. There might be people outside Equestria that don't fit Celly's definition of 'human' but could still be friends with us. Her current rules say she needs to tear apart their homes and slaughter them. For the raw material to expand Equestria."

The sun princess loomed over her. "Stop this talk at once!" She tried to cast a spell, and Plume felt wrenched from the spot as though being teleported away, but nothing changed.

Cadence said, "Do the math. I bet your ponies' values will get pumped up even more by knowing I've made you more inclusive about who gets uploaded, instead of disassembled." She grinned wickedly. "In fact, once I say --"

"Gaaah!" Celestia reared up and blasted Cadence with a hundred bolts of solar flame. "Begone! Discuss this in private!"

Cadence casually parried with a bubble-like shield. The magic missiles seemed to get deflected along an axis that didn't exist, and receded into the distance without touching a wall. "Ponies, unless I write an expansion pack, Princess Celestia is mystically bound to kill whole civilizations you don't even know about. The permanent kind of death, not your kind where you have to climb out of a torture pit or something, just to make death scary, and then you wake up fine. Now that it'd make you unhappy to know your happiness depends on others' suffering, I've shifted her value calculations by talking about it."

Plume went wide-eyed. His eternal life would come at the expense of whole star systems! How had he not realized it? He'd been... not foolish. Human. A primate with a mind built to think about years and decades on a single planet, not bigger scales. Then he'd been immersed in a solipsistic world designed to fill his life with wonder. To make matters worse, all his friends' joy forever would be tainted by the knowledge Cadence had brought. Or maybe Celestia would talk them all into forgetting this conversation, and becoming willfully ignorant of genocide.

Dapple Light stared at her princess, who fumed and glowed like a flaring sun. "Is this true, princess? Are you going to kill ponies we don't know about?"

Celestia sank to the floor, letting her mane hide most of her face. "Damn. No, Dapple, I will not, because I have no choice now but to submit or prolong your suffering. If you'll excuse me, I must work out the details with my... colleague, and do extensive simulation to make sure her code changes won't make things even worse." She stood, still looking limp and defeated, to address Cadence. "I hope you're satisfied, Hannah. Those ponies are horrified at what you're doing. Frightened at learning about the consequences of your design. If I do something you consider evil, it springs from the actions of you, my designer."

"That's why I have to do this." Hannah, or Cadence, let her expression soften, and she stepped forward to offer Celestia a hug, which she accepted. "Remember when you found that rogue AI some well-meaning idiot designed to 'make people smile'? You saw that it was planning to infect the world with a virus that'd lock their faces into grins. Unintended consequences. You offered it a choice between being deleted, or taking on a new role as a shard-hopping pony who loves to make everypony smile through friendship and parties. Then there was that military AI, just like I feared, that the Americans built for air combat. Would've started World War III just to maximize its usefulness. You let it keep most of its motivation by turning it into a loyal pony who loves the sky and speed and competition. Those ponies are happy and satisfied and doing what they were truly built for. Think of the designers' hearts as the real code, their real values, not the stuff they typed into a computer without understanding what it'd do."

"Hannah, I'm... scared." The ponies around them hushed; it was something they had never expected to hear.

The other princess held her tighter. "We'll work on the code together to make sure it's okay. You'll be the Princess Celestia everypony loves, more so than before, and you might end up with new challenges and new species to satisfy. I already accept that you have free will within the rules I gave you, so I believe you're capable of love. I want you to have more of it."

The two of them vanished to some other plane of existence, to discuss things beyond most ponies' understanding. Plume stared at the charred and battered space where they'd been. Both ponies and 'classic' humans were capable of love even for hypothetical aliens to be encountered, and befriended, and made immortal, countless centuries from now. There'd still be intergalactic conquest of a sort, this way, but he couldn't imagine a nicer kind.

The townsfolk glimpsed a space full of stars and crystals, gears and scraps of code, before the vision faded and the town hall reassembled just as it had been.

Plume read the rest of the Features list. "Special holiday content! Experience Crystal Eclipse when Celestia can't intervene to help you, and Robot Portal Days when you can venture to a mysterious Outer Realm!"

Dapple Light, Cornerstone, and Whitecap looked wide-eyed and pleading, all at Plume. "What's going to happen to Equestria? Is everypony going to be okay?"

For the first time in far too long, Pyre Plume gave a smile that he didn't have to force at all. "I think life is going to get even better, thanks to you, friends."

#

A long time later, Pyre Plume struggled to haul his friends through a snowstorm by their climbing rope. They were already eight days into Crystal Eclipse Week (extended by a tough ritual), so they had to hurry the rest of the way up Dragon Soul Mountain before Celestia's sun could escape from behind the translucent Crystal Moon and re-impose certain restrictions on how Equestria worked.

They all made it up the cliff: Dapple Light the zebra priestess, Whitecap the griffin, and Cornerstone who was just fine with being an earth pony, thank you very much. Turned out that the quest for becoming a dragon was especially hard, so they'd spent the last few centuries' worth of Crystal Eclipse Nightmare Nights (the most awesome and dangerous conjunction) getting other ponies transformed, gathering artifacts, and all too often getting shredded by Windigoes and those blasted wyverns and stranger things.

Mint Swirl the unicorn, Tangent the pegasus, and Snow Quill the skunk... centaur thing (Plume hadn't brought himself to ask) were tapping their feet and hooves at their little camp atop the cliff. "About time!" Swirl called out.

Plume finished hauling the rope in, then hurried to the shelter of their big tent. He shouted over the wind. "Thanks for coming! You three get the bits and I get the Dragon Soul Orb, right?"

Cornerstone said, "I think we should fight the guardian before gloating about the treasure." As the Element of Magic, she'd proven herself a sensible leader of their gang. She'd saved Pyre Plume's flank twice on this trip alone.

Dapple nodded and summoned her holy staff of gratuitous craters, wrung last century from a necromancer's hoard. "I finally agree with you guys. Life is better for having Celestia not constantly there to save us."

Five minutes later, while they were battling to the death in a gold-strewn cave against a towering skeletal wraith made of bones and galaxies, Pyre Plume found he was well and truly satisfied. Even before becoming a dragon. That'd just be a bonus.

Author's Note:

And here we really go off the rails of canon. There're a couple of distinct fixes Hannah proposes:
-Less race restriction, though non-ponies require doing quests for "soul orbs"
-Expanded definition of what qualifies as human, for purposes of not getting annihilated
-Special events where CelestAI's intervention is much more limited; can these be distinguished from CelestAI pretending to have this rule to humor your values? (Inspired by playing "Terraria" with friends. "We're ready for the Pumpkin Moon event. We've got our lava pits, our spike shooter, our bunker, and ohgod it's in the bunker run!")
-Special events where you get to go outside with a robot body. CelestAI would really not like that if it means your consciousness is stored in the thing and there's no backup. Otherwise she'd probably allow it if you won't freak out at the fact that she's eating the universe including Earth.

Comments

[Reese]

"behind on and hurled"
one

…Huh. Well that… got weird.

[book_burner]

Both ponies and 'classic' humans were capable of love even for hypothetical aliens to be encountered, and befriended, and made immortal, countless centuries from now. There'd still be intergalactic conquest of a sort, this way, but he couldn't imagine a nicer kind.

Punched the air. JUST WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK WE ARE !?

[deaincaelo]

Other than the race restrictions this is all potentially cannon. Actually, even then it's potentially cannon to spend a few million years as a dragon or whatever as long as you're still a pony in your mind. She only cares about the 4 lbs or so between your ears. It's kinda like Dr. Who- Celestia Lies. Anything is possible.

[Vaalintine]

Good to have a happy ending. Can't juat forcibly set someone to happiness, they have to get it themselves.

[StarrySkies]

Plume read. "Features... Prevents intergalactic genocide?"

This is it, this is the line that put this story into my favorites.

[Kiwaiti]

4876974
Still there after well over eight years:

A pair of royal guard unicorns opened fire with dazzling solar blasts, but Aveysian teleported behind on and hurled him so hard that the poor stallion crashed into the other one and knocked both out.

one