Games We Play

by GJT_Productions

Never Any Easier

"It never gets any easier with time, Your Majesty?"

"No, Lieutenant Captain, it does not. But like one thousand years ago, I will do what must be done."

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The Lieutenant Captain in this case was Fidelitas, the unicorn commanding officer of the afternoon shift. Captain Gibraltar had given him "the most grim of honors" in accompanying Princess Celestia in what she was going to do now. He could see the improvised stage placed in front of the ruins of the Weather Ministry offices, the five ponies receiving Celestia's sentence - three pegasi stallions, two unicorn stallions - shackled to the stage for the arrayed crowd of pegasi to see.

The crowd, drawn almost entirely from the pegasi colony high on Canterlot's mountain, was already charged with nervous energy by the destruction of the Weather Ministry offices several days previously - many in the colony had directly or indirectly depended on Weather Ministry jobs to sustain themselves and their families, after all - and the subsequent announcement that the duties the Ministry once carried out would now be "farmed out" to the local branches. Now they absolutely buzzed knowing they were about to witness something Princess Celestia had not done in the living memory of most ponies.

At the foot of the stage, in the very front of the crowd, were pegasus mares and foals in bitter grief, knowing what was to come to the stallions on the stage. Celestia had pronounced the sentence - for the crimes of treason and conspiracy against the Princesses of Canterlot, the five "Agents of Chaos" would forfeit their lives. Fidelitas' heart bled for the mares that would be without mates and foals without fathers, but also recognized that the enemy so deeply embedded within the Guard had provoked Celestia to such measures.

The enemy within had already inflicted grievous damage - a great cost in bits for damages, the jobs and esteem of dozens of ponies, and at least two lives sacrificed to its extreme ends. Now five more lives would be taken in a necessarily-hard response, and Fidelitas could see nothing but bitterness, pain and disharmony in the future. From a very young age, Equestrians were taught that their kingdom's greatest enemy was chaos, and these enemies seemed to be deliberately courting it. Why? Only Celestia knew, it seemed.

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It was a lot for a relatively young unicorn stallion - Fidelitas was only around 30 years old - originally from a northern frontier town to handle. Fidelitas had been born and raised in Whitehorse, the northernmost settlement of any significant size in the Equestrian kingdom. Even as a colt, his combination of forest green coat, fiery red mane and ember orange eyes cut an impressive figure, although it wasn't in the same category as a stallion like Shining Armor or Fancypants.

He certainly knew he had potential right from the day he got his cutie mark - a pair of crossed swords - but in a remote settlement like Whitehorse, the only real use for his "magic sword" was in sculpting, usually ice blocks. He was training to be a sculptor in an apprenticeship when Whitehorse suffered windigo attacks and a group of Royal Guards serving in the field were sent in to help defend the town. Fidelitas performed bravely in fighting the windigos, and the Captain of the Northern Field Division made him an offer to join the Guard.

Thus began years of field training in the northern frontier forts, placed there by Celestia on the reasoning for watching for the return of the Crystal Empire. By the end of his first field tour, Fidelitas was already a Guard Upper Class, a rank usually earned by completing that first tour. Early in the second field tour, he got on Princess Celestia's radar screen by leading the effort that saved the entire Northern Division Command from being crushed to death after a massive avalanche buried most of the command center under snow. This earned him an officer's commission as a Lieutenant, and when that second field tour ended Celestia herself had Fidelitas transferred to Canterlot.

A few months after that transfer, Fidelitas found himself unexpectedly tapped to replace the retiring afternoon shift commander, and to his chagrin he found himself thrust headfirst into Canterlot's internal politics when a certain brother of Celestia's apprentice of magic ended up assigned to his new command. For around four years, he found himself suffering the shunning and even antipathy of a good proportion of the Guard ranks for "daring" to try to stand up for "Celestia's favorite". Aten's faction of disaffected pegasi in particular proved rather willing to discretely undercut his authority every chance they got.

Those years as a Lieutenant Captain hadn't made much sense to Fidelitas until the thousand year prophecy of the return of "Nightmare Moon" came true, and the subsequent chain of events showed what doubtless Celestia intended him to do: protect and incubate Shining Armor's professional future as Captain of the Guard and likely Prince of Canterlot. It also showed a shift in his priorities, as evidenced in Shining Armor now being his equal instead of subordinate.

Which leads us back to what he was doing with Celestia now: to stand firm against the enemy within and prevent it from destroying a good stallion's reputation for selfish gain. If that happened, the nightmare was likely to return, and with it the pain and grief only so recently escaped from...

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It was time. Lieutenant Captain Fidelitas escorted Princess Celestia upon the stage as one of his subordinate unicorn Lieutenants read from a parchment magically levitating in front of him: "In accordance with the decree and will of Her Most Royal Majesty Princess Celestia of Canterlot, the five stallions on this stage shall forfeit their lives in the cause of maintaining harmony in the Kingdom of Equestria. As justice is blind, so shall the one who gives the punishment be blind."

This was the cue for Fidelitas to telekinetically pull out the ceremonial blindfold and tie it over Celestia's eyes. Nominally, it was to show Celestia was merely the executioner of justice instead of also the judge and jury. In reality, it made the process a whole lot less of an ordeal on Celestia if she couldn't directly see what she was doing. Fidelitas leads Celestia over to the first stallion in the line, then gently directs her movements so that the tip of her horn touches the stallion on the flat of the back. A yellow-colored pulse is seen passing over the stallion's body, and then he goes limp, his eyes falling shut for good. It was the most humane and peaceful way to go - akin to a deliberate overdose of anesthetic - and certainly an improvement over the protocol of a thousand years ago where "the full wrath of the sun" was the usual technique in this situation.

Even a humane technique couldn't stop the wailing and screaming from the mares and foals at the foot of the stage as the procedure was repeated with each stallion down the line, and to Fidelitas it reminded him too much of the wailing and screaming of those in the long-ago fight against the windigos at Whitehorse. He does not remove the blindfold until he has carefully lead Celestia down off the stage and back out of public sight, and immediately is struck by how misty her eyes are when he does so - it took Celestia all of her self-control not to cry during the whole event.

"Oh and this is war!" Fidelitas breathlessly exclaims as he stares in shock at Celestia's pained expression. He just barely sees one tear slide down one of her cheeks and drip down, but the smallest of payments for the lives she had to take for harmony's sake...

Comments

[Iron Comet]

Kind of figured on burning at the stake or impalement or something. Thats a suprisingly gentle execution for traitors.

[GJT_Productions]

5263444 Trying to keep this T-rated here. If I went any more gory, I would have to add a tag or bump up the rating.

[TwilightTank]

DOWN WITH THE TYRANY OF THE SOLAR EMPIRE!!!!!

[redmar]

5263444 I had expected them to be turned to stone like Discord himself.