Chapter 11
“M-my name is Fluttershy, and I need to talk to you about my friends.”
The pause that followed was nearly silent, but to Fluttershy it might as well have been a hurricane for the blood pounding in her ears.
The Night-Mare glared down, perched on the edge of the balcony she had been speaking from. Her eyes searched back and forth from within her war helm, brows furrowing as if she were trying to determine the best way to violently punish the impudent pony before her.
It took every ounce of Fluttershy’s courage to not simply turn tail and run.
She hadn’t simply come on a whim. She’d spent a fair amount of time at the cottage after Zecora and the others left, agonizing over the possible ways her friends could run afoul of the numerous dangers in the Everfree, to say nothing of whatever the Sky-Mares might do to them. It didn’t help that none of them seemed to want to simply talk out the issues: Applejack and Rainbow Dash were too impulsive, Zecora for all her wisdom preferred decisive action, Apple Bloom and Spike were still too young, and Twilight Sparkle herself was a false friend that chaos seemed to follow everywhere.
Eventually, once she’d calmed down slightly, Fluttershy realized that if anypony was going to try and talk things out, it would have to be her. She would have asked Rarity and Pinkie Pie for help, but Rarity’s boutique was empty and Pinkie had been inexplicably and conspicuously absent for a few days.
Now, standing before the Night-Mare and waiting for punishment to rain down, she began to seriously reconsider whether talking was the thing to do.
The Night-Mare’s eyes narrowed. “Thy request intrigues us,” she said, her still-overpowering voice slightly softer than before. “We shall speak with thee.” Turning back to the crowd, she raised a hoof and motioned toward Fluttershy. “One of thy own hath requested an audience with us! We shall depart for a time; think on the words which we hath spoken.”
The relief rushing over Fluttershy nearly made her knees buckle. She gasped and steadied herself; it wouldn’t do to faint now, not in front of everypony.
In a graceful swoop, the Night-Mare lighted off the balcony and flared to a stop near Fluttershy. “Tell me,” she asked, “where may we speak in private?”
A pale amber pony with a streaked grey mane stepped out of the crowd. “Yes, I believe I can help with that!”
It took Fluttershy a moment to recognize the town’s most capable organizer and de facto leader, Ivory Scroll. Even in the worst times of chaos Ivory was a pinnacle of stability and calm, and Fluttershy felt a little of her anxiety dissipate.
The Night-Mare glanced over to Ivory and nodded. “What doth thou propose?”
“Over there is sort of our town hall,” Ivory said, motioning to a nearby building. “It’s not much but we have rooms you can speak privately in.”
“Very well,” the Night-Mare replied, and began to walk toward the building. “We thank thee for the use of thy ‘town hall.’ ”
“It’s no trouble at all your highness, happy to assist,” Ivory assured, quickly trying to match the Night-Mare’s stride. “But if I may, before you go— might we know what best to call you?”
Pausing mid-stride, the Night-Mare seemed to drift into thought, head tilting slightly. It was barely a moment, but just long enough for the silence to become slightly uncomfortable.
A second later, she inhaled sharply and straightened her head. “Luna,” she said. “Thou mayest call us Princess Luna. ‘Tis as well as anything in thy tongue.”
Soft murmurs rippled through the crowd. Ponies mulled over this new bit of information about the enigmatic princess who had once been merely an old mare’s tale and now walked among them in the flesh. They were understandably awed, curious, and worried about the implications.
But for Fluttershy, the hushed voices only served to remind her that she was still standing alone and vulnerable in front of a hundred or more ponies, most of whom she barely knew in passing. She felt the anxiety creeping back in, threatening to freeze her hooves in place.
“Thank you, Princess Luna,” Ivory said, bowing low, “and an honor it is to have you in our humble town.”
Princess Luna merely nodded wordlessly and began walking again, but for a split second Fluttershy thought she saw the barest hint of a self-satisfied smirk cross the alicorn’s face.
Forcing herself to move, Fluttershy began to follow the Princess toward the town hall. She made herself as small and inconspicuous as could be, avoiding eye contact with anypony even remotely near her line of sight.
When they neared the steps, the Princess magicked the doors open and stepped inside. Compared to the brilliant sunlight streaming down, the shadowed entrance to the town hall suddenly seemed to Fluttershy like a gaping cavernous maw, a deathtrap from which there would be no coming back.
She paused on the threshold and glanced over her shoulder. This would have been her last chance to back out, but the crowd had shifted, falling in behind them and blocking any immediate escape. A hundred-plus curious eyes locked on her, judging in hushed whispers. No, there was no going back now; she was stepping into an audience with the most powerful being in Ponyville, and soon the doors would be closed, leaving her alone at the mercy of Princess Luna, the Night-Mare.
A sudden wave of panic struck, threatening to undo all the progress she’d made so far. Her breathing became a series of ragged gasps. Her heart felt like it was on the verge of either stopping or exploding. She suddenly lost feeling in both forelegs but managed to lock her knees, keeping herself upright.
Squeezing her eyes shut, she thought of her friends. Applejack and Rainbow Dash, caught in a cruel imprisonment spell and possibly tortured. Zecora, plunging headlong into the Everfree to save them. Apple Bloom and Spike, blindly following into danger and possible death. She didn’t know if they might succeed, but at least here, with talking, she might have the slightest chance to beg for their lives.
The panic attack subsided slightly, not completely but just enough. With every ounce of courage and physical strength she could muster, Fluttershy stepped forward out of the warm golden sun and into the shadowy dimness of the town hall.
Behind her, the doors swung and latched shut, silencing the low, monotonous hum of the crowd. The large room was plunged into darkness, lit only by an indirect glow filtering through the upper windows.
“We had not thought to meet thee again so soon, Fluttershy,” Princess Luna said. The rolling thunder of her voice echoed off the walls, but it was still slightly restrained, less overpowering than before.
Fluttershy opened her mouth to respond, but only a gasp of dry breath emerged. She swallowed, trying to whet her mouth and throat. “A-again?”
“Verily,” Luna replied. “Thou wert present when we broke our bonds of stone, and we thank thee for thy part in our escape.”
“Um, you’re welcome, I guess, but... I don’t understand…” Fluttershy said. She racked her brain for an explanation: How could she have possibly helped the Princess escape?
“T’was thy powerful friendship which weakened the spell,” the Princess explained casually, glancing around the interior of town hall as if she were inspecting a home to buy, “we dare to say our freedom would not have been possible otherwise; it is for this reason we have agreed to an audience with thee.”
“I’m… glad I could help,” she said, trying to sound as sincere as possible. “But… like I said, I just need—”
“To ask us of thy friends, yes, we recall,” Luna finished. “Thou seekest to beg the release of Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Twilight Sparkle, dost thou not?”
“Well, I… yes, actually?” Fluttershy replied, voice weakening. The fact that the princess already knew or could guess her request didn’t bode well. “I don’t know what they could hav—”
“The answer is simple,” Luna interjected. “Twilight Sparkle hath conspired to destroy the sacred Tree of Harmony, and accordingly must needs suffer the punishment for her actions. As for Rainbow Dash and Applejack…”
She paused for a moment, and raised one hoof to gently rub against her chin. “...they hath willingly aided Twilight Sparkle’s attempts to escape, and moreover hath visited violence upon the royal body. For these things they too must be punished.”
“Punished… how…?” Thoughts of torture and death had invaded Fluttershy’s brain again.
Princess Luna’s eyes flashed angrily and she glanced away, up toward one of the high windows where the sunlight was streaming in. “That,” she growled, “is yet to be seen.”
An uneasy silence settled on the room. Fluttershy glanced down and nervously rubbed one foreleg against the other, unsure how to respond. She’d tried to come prepared with some sort of plan to plead her case, but it had been deftly pre-empted so far. She took some solace in the fact that her friends were still alive, at least. It seemed apparent that although the princess seemingly wished to punish the others, something or somepony was preventing her from doing so.
When she looked back up a minute later, Fluttershy started. Princess Luna had turned away from the upper window and was now staring intently at her, head cocked to the side curiously.
At great personal effort, Fluttershy held eye contact.
“Truly thou art curious to us, Fluttershy,” Luna said. Her voice now had a different tone to it. While still bright and powerful, there was now an unexpected air of sympathy and understanding. “In any other time, the fates of these other ponies would be at the mercy of Chaos, yet now that Order hath laid claim thou seekest seek to change its course. Tell us, why dost thou trouble thyself with such things?”
The shift in the princess’s behavior was unexpected but welcome, and Fluttershy found herself breathing a slight sigh of relief. “Well,” she said, speaking a little more confidently. “I… I suppose I can’t bear to think of them suffering. Chaos shouldn’t be an excuse for anypony to stop caring.”
Luna nodded. “Well said,” she agreed. “Praytell then: Dost thou consider thyself to be kind and compassionate toward all creatures?”
“Oh, yes!” Fluttershy replied, softly but enthusiastically. “I try to help every living thing I meet, pony or otherwise.”
“An admirable goal indeed,” Luna said. “And what of…” she paused for a moment as if thinking, then smiled slightly. “What of Rainbow Dash? What virtuous attributes doth she possess?”
Something tugged at Fluttershy’s brain worryingly, but she dismissed it. Against all her fears, she was being given an opportunity to defend her friends, to convince the princess they were good ponies who deserved to be shown mercy.
“Oh, Rainbow Dash is incredible,” she said brightly. “Not only is she the best flyer in all Discordia; she’s also brave, and she never would think of leaving another pony behind. No matter what happens, she’ll always stand side by side with a friend.”
“Wouldst thou say then that she is... loyal?”
Fluttershy nodded. “Oh yes!”
Luna leaned forward intently, smiling more broadly. “And Applejack?”
“Applejack is the most trustworthy pony I know,” Fluttershy said confidently. “You can always trust her to tell the…”
She stopped mid-sentence. The subtle tugging in her brain had suddenly turned into a full-blown alarm bell, and she began to realize why.
It was the smile. It was too broad, too intense. Where the visage of Princess Luna had seemed to be one of sympathy and understanding, now it was a face that might come creeping out of the shadows, fangs glinting like knives, eyes wide with anticipation and hunger.
It was the face of a predator.
“…truth…” the words died in Fluttershy’s throat. She had to swallow twice before speaking again, and when she did her voice was barely audible. “Um… Why do you ask?”
“Because it means the prophecies are true,” Luna said. “Now—”
Suddenly, the princess broke eye contact, and looked behind Fluttershy toward the entrance of town hall. Her horn flared with deep blue magic, and a solid thump sounded from beyond the closed door.
“Oh, I do wish I could see who she’s talking to,” Rarity whispered, craning her neck to try and see over the crowd.
“Well, if you wanted front-row seats you should have gotten here sooner,” Pinkie Pie quipped brightly. She was bouncing vertically in place, reaching nearly a full head and shoulders above everypony in the crowd. “It’s not every day a princess comes to Ponyville you know.”
“You wouldn’t be so excited if you’d been there when she woke up,” Rarity grumbled. She reared back on her hind legs, trying to get a higher angle.
“Wait, you’ve met her before?” Pinkie exclaimed. “And you didn’t think to tell me?”
“I would have told you all about it, but I couldn’t find you before now,” Rarity said. “At first I thought it was a trick when her statue started to move. Had I known what was actually happening, I daresay I’d be halfway to Westfoal right now.” She stretched even higher, still unable to see over the crowd. “Speaking of which, where have you been?”
Somehow, Pinkie seemed to shrug mid-bounce. “Nowhere, really. I got the feeling I wasn’t narratively important so I just checked out for a while.”
Rarity sighed and dropped back to all fours; she wasn’t exactly young anymore, and standing upright was terrible for her hips. “I give up. Would you be a dear and tell me what’s going on?”
“Let’s see...” Pinkie began bouncing a little higher. Each hop was punctuated by a tiny poing, and the fluffy pink curls of her mane jiggled like so many little springs. “They’re headed to the town hall... the Princess is going inside, and—”
Pinkie gasped and seemed to freeze for a split second at the top of her bounce. The next moment, she crashed ungracefully to the ground, muzzle planted firmly in the dirt. “Oof!”
Slightly taken aback, Rarity raised an eyebrow. “Whatever was that about?”
Looking up wide-eyed and slack-jawed, Pinkie didn’t immediately respond. She just starred in the direction of the town hall for several moments before turning to Rarity. “It’s… It’s Fluttershy!” she exclaimed.
The words made sense, but Rarity found it a struggle to believe she’d heard correctly. “That’s impossible!” she said, blinking rapidly. “It couldn’t be her!”
At least, that’s what she tried to say. In actuality, it came out sounding more like: “Huh? But— how? She— what!?”
Pinkie Pie frowned slightly and began extricating herself from the ground, shaking gravel off her chest and forelegs. “You know I can’t understand when you do that, but I get the distinct impression you don’t believe me.”
Rarity shook her head slightly, trying to clear the initial shock. “But.. that doesn’t make any sense!” she exclaimed. “No, there has to be something wrong. Perhaps you saw another pony who looks like her, although I can’t think of any—”
“Do you realize how long it’s been since I’ve eaten actual dirt?”
The train of Rarity’s thoughts made a valiant effort to stay on track, but derailed in a thunderous crash of screeching brakes and screaming passengers. “What?”
Pinkie Pie smacked her lips thoughtfully, a faraway expression on her face. “Gosh, it’s probably been at least three months. Last week it was straight cocoa powder, and before that it was cinnamon and oregano, and coffee grounds mixed with little jelly beans before that. Not to mention when it turns to soap or crystal or something. Then again, dirt’s probably been dirt at least a few times since then, but you don’t really notice if you’re not right down in it.”
She rubbed the last bit of soil and gravel off her muzzle and glanced at Rarity. “Still boring though. Do you think that anti-Chaos magic is gonna run out anytime soon?”
“I… can’t say I’d given it much thought,” Rarity said slowly. She made a conscious effort to recenter her mind and bring the conversation back on track. “I was slightly more concerned with why Fluttershy of all ponies would ask to speak to the Night-Mare; the poor dear was positively a wreck the last time we made that encounter.”
“Wait, so Fluttershy was with you too?”
Rarity winced internally. Pinkie probably wouldn’t take well to this; she hated missing out. “There were four of us, actually,” she admitted, trying to keep the summary brief. “Fluttershy, Zecora, Twilight Sparkle, and myself. Twilight had just come back into town, and we saw her heading into the forest so we followed her to the old castle. That’s where we saw the Night-Mare’s statue waking up.”
“Huh…” A far-away expression settled on Pinkie’s face and her eyes glazed over slightly.
For a moment Rarity waited to see what would happen next. It was common knowledge around Ponyville that Pinkie’s various behavioral quirks seemed to herald otherwise unpredictable events, such as “twitchy-tail” warning of falling objects or “itchy-neck” meaning somepony else was watching. Rarity hadn’t heard of “zone-out” yet, but that could simply mean a new facet of Pinkie-sense was about to be revealed.
However, after several moments with no apparent alteration in the surrounding environment, Rarity began to wonder if this was simply Pinkie being... Pinkie. Again.
Tentatively, she stepped forward and tapped the uncharacteristically-sedate pony on the shoulder. “Pinkie darling… are you quite all right?”
Pinkie started. “Sorry, just thinking of something. So, what do we do now?”
“Well…” Rarity said, still on-guard for any unexpected eventualities, “I was thinking perhaps we could try and get to the town hall, maybe get inside to help Fluttershy, or at least hear what she’s talking to the Night-Mare about.”
“You mean Princess Luna?”
“Yes, Princess Luna.”
Pinkie glanced around and waved a hoof. “The crowd has thinned out a bit since she left. Can’t imagine they have more important things to do right now, but whatever. Should be easy to get there now.”
It was true; Rarity could see that a portion of the ponies crowding the town center had dispersed somewhat. “Oh, that’s perfect!” she said, starting off toward the town hall. “Hopefully we can — “
“But — !” A pathetic pout crossed Pinkie Pie’s face. “What about my plan?”
Stopping cold only after only two steps, Rarity sighed. “You haven’t told me your plan,” she explained, trying to keep mild exasperation from creeping into her voice.
“Well, I’m not done planning it yet,” Pinkie explained in return. Then she cocked her head to the side, thought for a moment, and nodded. “Yeah, I suppose that means we can’t really use it. All right, let’s go with yours!”
Immediately, Pinkie took the lead and began trotting off toward the town hall. Following behind, Rarity growled under her breath. For as much as Rarity loved Pinkie Pie’s selfless devotion to bringing joy and happiness, her single-minded drive to live in the moment often seemed to leave little room for anything else.
They quickly pushed through the remainder of the crowd of ponies, most of whom were milling about aimlessly or conversing on the words of the alicorn princess. As they neared the town hall, Rarity could see other ponies peering briefly in windows or pressing ears to the walls before wandering off again, invariably looking slightly disappointed or confused. She wondered how they could be so blasé about one of their own speaking face-to-face with a pony as legendary as the Night-Mare.
The reason quickly became apparent. Rarity and Pinkie Pie reached the nearest town hall window at the same time and reared up on their hind legs, shading their eyes from the sun to see into the gloomy interior behind the glass.
“What in Discordia…?” Rarity exclaimed.
“Huh, that’s weird,” Pinkie said. She stepped back from the window and checked another. “Yep, same here!”
Where normally a pony could expect to see into the main chamber of the town hall, now Rarity could only see a shimmering, dark blue magical field, almost like a drawn curtain. A quick inspection of the other nearby windows yielded the same result, just as Pinkie had said.
“The Night-Mare must be using a spell to block them,” Rarity mused, probing the magical field with her own. Not that it did any good; she wasn’t a spell expert by any means, and couldn’t make heads or tails of the complex enchantment.
“I’ll check the door!” Pinkie said, bouncing around the corner of the building.
Rarity followed, crossing the corner just in time to see Pinkie straining against the doors, forelegs wrapped firmly around the pull-bars.
“She… sure… has… this… place… locked… down… tight!” A large vein began to pop on the side of Pinkie’s neck.
“Don’t hurt yourself, dear,” Rarity said, wrapping Pinkie in a telekinetic bubble and levitating her away. “Let me try.” She focused her magic on the space behind the door, trying to grasp blindly for a latch or crossbar that could be somehow manipulated; ponies rarely built locks that weren’t also magically secured, but the town hall was an exception because of its semi-public nature.
However, her probing revealed no mechanical force keeping the door shut. Rather, it seemed to be more of the same magical field—
With a solid thump and a surge of excruciating pain, Rarity’s world turned black.
Fluttershy’s heart leapt into her throat and adrenaline coursed into her veins. She instinctively spun toward the doors, wings flared in case she needed to make a quick escape toward the ceiling.
But there was nothing. The doors remained shut tight, unadorned except for a faint blue magical afterglow, which faded a second later.
She glanced back over her shoulder, and saw the same blue radiance dissipate from Princess Luna’s horn.
“It seems there are others keen to join us,” the princess mused. “May they consider that a warning not to interfere.”
The adrenaline in Fluttershy’s chest shifted immediately to sick worry in the pit of her stomach. “Oh no!” she whispered, folding her wings and turning toward the princess. “You didn’t hurt anypony, did you?”
Luna looked down and smiled again, that unsettling, equicidal grin that reminded Fluttershy of a stalking predator. The face made her stomach twist even further, but it wasn’t until the princess spoke that the very blood ran chill in Fluttershy’s veins.
“Dearest Fluttershy, ever the bleeding heart,” Luna said, her voice suddenly hard and cold, without the thunderous volume it had carried only seconds before. “Don't worry; your precious ponies will wake with little more than a headache.”
Somehow, the words did nothing to ease Fluttershy’s growing terror.
“Now,” the princess continued, “tell me what you know about the Elements of Harmony.”
For a brief, blissful moment, confusion replaced fear and Fluttershy stared blankly at Luna. “Um… I’m sorry, I don’t know what that means,” she whispered.
“The Elements of Harmony?” Luna repeated incredulously. “Have the prophecies really not survived Discord’s reign?” Her eyes narrowed. “You aren’t lying to me, are you?”
The fear came back with a vengeance, and Fluttershy quailed. “No!” she whimpered. “If I knew, I’d tell you, I swear.”
The princess regarded her through slitted eyes for a moment, but eventually her face relaxed. “Very well. Perhaps ignorance has made you blind.” She sat back on her haunches and seemed to grow thoughtful, gazing off into the distance for a few moments.
“In the early days of our reign, my court employed a prophet, Scrysight the Seer. I see now he was merely passable as soothsayers go, but he did privately make a few prophecies that rang true. One was to predict the coming of five Elements, pure essences of Harmony which could surpass even the divinely-mandated symmetry of Sun and Moon: Honesty, Laughter, Generosity, Loyalty and…”
She looked at Fluttershy pointedly. “...Kindness.”
Fluttershy gulped.
“Of course such a prediction was practically heresy, and I commanded Scrysight to never speak of it again.” Luna frowned. “Much later, my sister announced in public that her own seers had made shockingly similar predictions, despite never knowing of the original prophecy. And what’s more, she encouraged it!”
Growing agitated, she stood up and began pacing. “Blatantly, in front of the whole country, Solaria welcomed the very ideas that would supplant us! She, who had already upset the balance by convincing our subjects to value her precious Day above the beauty of the Night! As if they didn’t see enough—” Luna’s voice cut off abruptly and she glanced away, chest and flanks heaving with angry breaths.
But something was wrong. Through the fear and worry, Fluttershy felt a prick in her heart, a feeling she’d come to know very well over a lifetime of reaching out and becoming attuned to the needs of others.
In spite of herself she gingerly stepped forward a few paces, and upon reaching Luna’s side, reached up with one hoof. She placed it on the princess’s shoulder and felt an almost imperceptible tell-tale shuddering.
“Um,” she said gently, “are you okay?”
Instantly the muscles beneath Fluttershy’s hoof tensed. Princess Luna recoiled and snapped around with a snarl.
“DO NOT TOUCH ME!”
Fluttershy screamed and jumped backward, tumbling over herself as she scrambled across the floor. A moment later she slammed into the doors of the town hall, but when they failed to yield she spun around, expecting to see an angry alicorn bearing down on her with murderous intent.
But Luna hadn’t moved, and Fluttershy saw her initial impression had been correct. A single tear still rested on the princess’s cheek, only to be magicked away a split second later.
For a few moments they simply stared at each other. Neither pony moved, and the only sound was their respective breathing: One deep and heaving with rage, the other staccato and thin with terror.
But gradually Fluttershy realized she didn’t seem to be in immediate danger of being vaporized or physically crushed, and her heart began to slow. She focused on breathing, calming her rattled nerves. The tunnel around her vision faded, and her stomach started to unclench.
“I’m… I’m sorry…” she whispered, plaintive and submissive.
Princess Luna didn’t immediately respond. She just continued staring. But after a few seconds her shoulders relaxed, and she smiled.
Then she began to laugh.
It wasn’t an embarrassed chuckle, or a hearty belly laugh. It wasn’t even a sarcastic sympathy laugh. It was a low, quiet, mirthless imitation of a laugh that sucked the very life from the air it touched, leaving nothing but cruel, heartless malice.
And as she laughed, the smile grew. It grew past the sane limits of a normal smile, becoming almost comically wide and baring the princess’s gleaming white teeth. To Fluttershy, they might as well have been fangs, needle-sharp and dripping with venom.
“Oh, no no no, little pony,” Luna said, the laughter dying off. “There is no need to be sorry. You see, unlike my sister, I doubted the prophecy. I thought she was weak for entertaining it, and I hated that she was loved more than me. In my arrogance and wounded vanity, I left her to rule alone.
“For over two centuries I wandered, gaining knowledge and power. I thought by the time I returned, her rule would have crumbled. I would swoop in to save her, as Night brings relief from the cares of the Day. Imagine my chagrin when I returned to find her kingdom thriving and well, with her worshiped as the matriarch of all the heavens!”
The princess shook her head. “How foalish I was. Discord attacked that same day, and divided we could not stand against him. But now…”
She slowly started walking toward Fluttershy, the predatory grin growing even wider if it were possible. “Now, thanks to you, I see the error of my ways. I have slept a thousand years, walked a thousand thousand dreams, and in all my wanderings have not met a single soul like yours. My sister was right to seek the elements, but she didn’t know where to look nor what form they would take.”
Luna’s strides were long, and in mere moments her muzzle was within touching distance of Fluttershy’s own. “You are the Element of Kindness that was prophesied,” she said softly. “Honesty and Loyalty await us in Solaria’s dungeon; only Generosity and Laughter remain. Once they are found we will defeat Discord, and I will show my sister the true meaning of Harmony.”
Pinkie Pie gently poked at the light teal magical field suspending her. Some ponies didn’t like being floated around, but personally she enjoyed it. Not being a pegasus, she lacked the ability to fly, and not being a unicorn she couldn’t do spells, so it was always fun to get a taste of both those things.
Especially when it was Rarity; her magic had the best taste, somewhere between mintwheat cookies and blue cream limeades, or at least what those things tasted like on average when the Sugar Polyhedron was having a less-off-than-on day.
That reminded her, she needed to check in with Mr. and Ms. Cake. She knew it annoyed them when she didn’t get written in properly on days she was expected to work.
Suddenly her right eye spasmed for a brief second, and immediately after, her tail twitched.
Pinkie scrunched her nose in annoyance. ‘Somepony’s bad magic falling things’? What’s that supposed to mean? She wondered.
Out of the corner of her non-spastic eye (the left one) she saw something move near Rarity’s head. With a little effort, she made both eyes behave and focused.
The something looked like another magical field, only this one was dark sparkly blue and seemed to be quickly forming a bubble around Rarity’s head. In fact, it reminded her of…
Pinkie’s eyes widened. Somepony’s bad magic!
Before she could say anything, the dark magical bubble seemed to collapse inward, making a loud thump. Rarity’s head snapped forward, and like a puppet with its strings cut she collapsed limply to the floor.
Her first instinct having proven correct, Pinkie looked skyward. With how close together the Pinkie-sense warnings had been, she could expect falling things any moment now.
It took another full second before she realized that with Rarity unconscious, there shouldn’t be any magic still holding her up.
“Oof!”
Yep, still dirt.
Extricating herself from the ground for the second time today, Pinkie noted that this time she’d somehow acquired a bloody snout, which was unusual for her. She dabbed at it gently. “Nothing broken,” she observed thankfully.
Rarity, on the other hoof…
A sudden wave of panic struck her. “Oh no!” In an instant, Pinkie dashed to her friend’s side. What if she wasn’t just unconscious? What if—?
But Rarity was still breathing, and Pinkie sighed in relief. It was then that she noticed, strangely, Rarity’s snout also had a thin trickle of blood escaping one nostril.
It only took a moment for the coincidence to make sense.
“...That spell was meant for both of us,” she observed to no-pony in particular. “Rarity’s magic must have blocked some of it.”
Now though, Pinkie was left with a conundrum. Fluttershy was still inside, Rarity was unconscious outside, and she herself had been hit with a partial spell she didn’t know the full effects of. All she was sure of so far was that it knocked ponies out, and Princess Luna’s magic tasted somewhere between blue razzleberries and cocoa beans. Any one of those things could quickly become an emergency, and she needed a plan. At least, one accounting for Fluttershy and Rarity’s situations; magic tastes generally didn’t turn into emergencies.
“C’mon Pinkie,” she said to herself. “Gotta do something about this. Think!”
She knew Rarity had been knocked out trying to get into the town hall, and all the windows and doors seemed blocked, so helping Fluttershy wasn’t an option at the moment. On the other hoof, Rarity was already outside, and suffering the effects of an unknown spell. So she probably should find a unicorn with medical—
Before she could finish her thought, the doors to the town hall burst open.
Instinctively, Pinkie jumped to the side, and not a moment too soon. A huge dark blue form swooped out of the shadows at breakneck speed, throwing up a cloud of dust across the town center before soaring skyward.
Coughing and sputtering, Pinkie dashed to the edge of the dust cloud and squinted into the sky, shielding her eyes from the bright sunlight. She spotted Princess Luna, quickly becoming a dark dot in the distance as huge wings carried her toward the Everfree Forest
“Well, that changes the plan slightly,” Pinkie mused.
Immediately, she turned and rushed back to town hall, bounding over Rarity’s prostrate form and into the darkness. “Fluttershy!” she called. “Are you there?”
Only silence greeted her. Fluttershy was nowhere to be found.
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Wow...what a chapter! Looks like Luna is gonna make things a lot worse...can't wait for more!!!
if it changes that often how exactly does Pinkie know which is plain old ordinary dirt
Nightmare Moon's not doing a good job of seeming better than Discord.
Looks like Celestia was the one looking for the balance and prosperity of things. As it should be.
Huzzah! More of the awesome story with wildly swerving tone!
7332055
In previous chapters I've tried to convey that Ponyville is less chaotic than most places in Discordia, and Pinkie's also been in the non-chaotic Everfree a few times so she (like many other locals) has a somewhat stable frame of reference.
7332067
This is my first major foray into serious writing, and so I'm basically making this up as I go. Anything I could do to help level things out? I really want to improve my writing skills here.
I get the impression that's a bad thing, sorry.
How can there be a dark tag and not be grimdark?
7332563
See the story description. There's different levels of "dark", not everything has to be "blood-guts-murder-death-kill dark"
Interesting how in the prophecies Luna quoted there is no mention of a sixth Element of Harmony. I wonder how that will play out with an eventual confrontation with the Elements and Discord, and if Twilight can be brought around to the ways of Harmony by then, or if seeing the results of their failure will convince her. I'm not seeing another way for this to work out in a happy ending if Twilight remains firmly on the Dark Side.
On an unrelated note, I'm not a fan of the Pinkie Pie fourth wall breaks. I think it's ok if it's just a once-in-a-while (or once in a story really, it gets old fast) reference to the fact that they are in a story, but some so blatant as this can really interrupt the flow of reading and remove them from the story somewhat:
In some stories, for example, Twilight Hears The Narrator, this is directly made the main plot of the story, and the author's narration is literally dialogue. However, in a story like this, where I'm used to the narration being, well, narration, describing what is happening in the story, having a character suddenly interrupt the narration and converse with it, and then for the narration to reply, is quite off-putting.
Anyways, really interesting story so far, looking forward to more!
7332763
Thanks for the feedback on the fourth wall break. Rest assured this will in all likelihood be the only one such. I've always liked Pinkie with a well developed sense of meta-awareness, so this is my one big indulgence for the joke. I might sprinkle some smaller or more subtle ones in from time to time, but nothing that heavy handed.
In the more distant future, I'm aiming for a heavy revision to fix a lot of errors and unify the whole thing, so perhaps at that point it'll get nixed if I decide it's too much.
7332105 For this story? No, there's nothing you can do, but that's fine as far as I'm concerned. When it comes to tone, what you normally think about is the world in which the characters live, the way they react to it, and the narrative given by the circumstances they find themselves in. Most of the time, this means that within a particular story, the tone changes depending on the narrative and nothing else. In THIS story, it changes wildly depending on what character is being focussed on at that particular moment, as well as having a narrative that throws things like jokes or philosophy or fights up very unexpectedly. I think it's okay considering the story, but yes, it's a little bit jarring to read.
If you write other things in the future, just try to keep an eye on what you want the reader to be FEELING at any particular point. Anxious for the characters? Sad about a death? Excited for the showdown? You should ease the reader in and out of these things slowly and subtly- surprising them from time to time (to match the characters' own surprise) is fine but in this fic you go from drama to silliness to grittiness to philosophical in a heartbeat, and it reads kind of weird.
Using the archaic speech that Luna has in this story, "you" is second person plural objective, but both uses in this sentence are second person singular nominative. This sentence should be "Thou seekest to beg the release of Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Twilight Sparkle, dost thou not?"
thou seekest
While "doest" isn't necessarily incorrect, for consistency I recommend "dost".
thy precious
thou knowest
Thou art not; art thou
thee
Dropped the royal plural (although her outburst can probably be forgiven)
There are more royal plurals dropped and "you"s instead of "thou"s later, etc., but at this point you seem to have dropped into modern speech, intentionally or not, and I don't care to copy and paste each one particularly since I'm on a tablet.
Interesting. It definitely feels like Luna is a way more of a threat than Discord, but it also looks like the mane 6 are realizing that.
7333507
I see now, thanks for clarifying that. That'll be something I need to work on, because I really do try to write from the characters' perspectives, and I feel like they all perceive things very differently. That's also why Pinkie Pie has been so late coming in; I can't really relate to her very well, and thus for me it's hard to convincingly portray A) how she acts / reacts externally, and B) how she feels internally.
7333952
Thanks for the detailed corrections! I've gone through and fixed what's needed. Dropping the royal We later in the chapter is intentional though; she drops the facade, so to speak (It's happened once before with Twilight too). Her language is still a little formal, but it's meant to be significantly more modern. My intent is to show a distinct difference between "showy antiquated Luna" and "savvy modern Luna", depending on how she's presenting herself. I made a few (small) changes to hopefully make it sound a little less "ye olde english".
I liked this chapter and the revelations it brought, but Pinkie's fourth wall breaks were more than a little obnoxious. Especially when it was used as the sole reason for her absence. And when the narrative replied? Well that just dropkicked me to make absolutely sure that immersion was broken.
but what if they don't... want to defeat Discord...
I wonder what Luna will think when she finds out about the hidden sixth element... and who it is
I bet she'll put pinkie's wall breaking to shame. "A sixth element? And it is mine nemesis?! What is this a bad fanfic? I prophecy that the writer is a loveless virgin who smells of dried cheeses! Your queen commands you to let her off the ride, immediately!"
With Luna's less than subtle threat in the line about showing the world "True Harmony" I can't help but think of another story I read recently where a distant future Twilight rules the world with an iron hoof, all citizens have strict rules about nearly every facet of their lives and public executions are seen as normal.