Chapter Four - The Night
Celestia knew that she was naturally white, but she felt pale. Everything had gone horribly wrong.
There had been plans. Canterlot had just instituted weekly emergency drills. The shelters were supposed to keep ponies safe.
“How did this happen?”
At least the screaming had stopped echoing through the vaults, but perhaps it would have been better than the damned silence. She continued pacing back and forth, until her head darted up as the great steel doors slid open and Luna entered. She had known her sister had survived, but did not know in what state.
“Oh Luna!”
Celestia’s composure finally broke and she flung herself at her younger sister.
“Sister! What happened. I was in flight to the peace talks when everything… Everything lurched. When I regained my faculties I found myself on the ground in the middle of a wasteland. I found my guards lying dead around me. When I arrived… I didn’t know if I would find anypony. The surface is an inferno.”
“They set it off. Some type of weapon.”
“Who did?”
Celestia collapsed away from Luna in a heap, “I don’t know who started it or whoes weapon it was. Whoever fired the first shot, the other side retaliated. I don’t know if I want to know. If it was our ponies, I will hate myself because I will never be able to forgive them. If it was the others… I will hate myself for hating them.”
“Where is everypony else? Surely there was time to get others into the vaults.”
Celestia wanted to bawl at the question.
“We had time to get several thousand ponies down here before the full force of the weapon hit.”
“Then where-”
“These vaults were made to keep out many things, but death itself was not one of them.”
“What do you mean?”
“We were all huddled safely behind the great doors. Twilight and myself were helping the other magi with protective spells while Cadence worked to keep everypony calm… Then they all just... died.”
“How is that even possible?”
“Damn it Luna, I don’t know.”
There was silence before Luna broached the question Celestia knew was coming, “Are Twilight and Cadence…”
“Follow me.” Celestia fought to stay off autopilot. She needed to be able to think.
They walked through the halls of the vaults. Celestia did her best to stare straight down the hall and not glance to the side. She had moved the bodies into the branching chambers. The main hall was clean and sterile. The others held only death.
“They’re in here.”
They entered through one of the doors. Twilight’s limp body lay on a cot surrounded by blood while Cadence stood over here wiping the youngest alicorn’ brow with a cloth. Cadence’s normally shining eyes were dull.
“What happened?”
“As soon as it started, I could tell something was wrong with Twilight. I think… I think she was in pain, but I can’t be sure. She has always been better than she realizes at hiding things like that from me.”
Cadence looked up with dead eyes and added, “Then it hit full force. Twilight’s barrier broke and she just started screaming. She was screaming for hours…”
“Where did all the blood come from?”
“If you scream enough you can tear up the tissue in your throat. Eventually Twilght’s screams transformed into silent coughs of blood. But you could tell she was still screaming…”
Celestia shuddered at the lack of emotion in Cadence’s voice.
“But now?”
“A few hours ago she just went catatonic. She’s been like this since. Not moving, not saying a word. We can’t even get reflexive responses. For a little while I think she forgot to breathe, or that’s what it seemed like. Aunt Celestia managed to get her breathing again though.”
Celestia watched as Luna tried to levitate the washcloth and growled when her telekinesis failed.
“My accursed magic hasn’t been working properly since I woke up in that wasteland.”
“That does not come as a surprise to me. I would suspect it won’t be working right for awhile.”
“Explain again?”
“It’s not important right now.”
Celestia watched as Luna tried to elicit a response from Twilight for hours, and felt an overwhelming sense of dread as her sister turned towards her.
“Sister, is there anything left of Twilight in this shell?”
Celestia’s composure finally well and truly shattered. She collapsed into Luna and began sobbing into her sisters mane. “I don’t know… I don’t know.”
Celestia needed to be strong. If not for Twilight, for Cadence. She could not imagine what it was like for her niece to be watching such a display of weakness, but for once she did not care.
“Sister, we should leave these vaults. Mayhaps some ponies survived, but we will not find them in here.”
“But…”
“Aunt Celestia, I think Aunt Luna is right. We can break off the handles from some halberds and turn Twilight’s cot into a stretcher easily enough.
Celestia nodded her head. They were right. At the very least things could not be much worse outside.
“Very well…”
As they were preparing to leave and gathering supplies, Celestia heard Cadence begin to scream some garbled words. She bolted down the halls smashing through the doors to where Cadence was preparing Twilight for their journey.
Her niece was leaning over her student’s body, yelling something and gesturing Luna and herself over. ”She said something!”
Celestia leaned over her students muzzle, and ignored the tickle of breath against her ear. Twilight was indeed whispering something.
True to Luna’s earlier words, Celestia’s own magic had hardly been working. However, she forced all of her will and power into a simple spell, a noise amplification spell. “Twilight, please try to say that again.”
From Twilight's ruined throat, they all heard her words, “We should leave our regalia here in the vaults. We aren’t princesses anymore… We’re just ponies now.”
Celestia looked up as another pony walked through the door. She blinked twice and then looked at her sister. The new arrival was another Luna. Her sister bristled at the second Luna and began to yell.
“Avast vagrant! What manner of treachery is this that you dare impersonate a Princess of Equestria?”
Celestia shook her head. Something seemed off.
The new Luna walked up to her sister and with a hoof shooed her away. Her sister hopped away with an indignant squawk and then suddenly disappeared into a poof of vapor. Celestia’s eyes widened at the sight and she looked to the newer Luna, the remaining Luna, as she began to speak.
“Really, sister? Is that how I still sound like in your mind? My speech is not that bad. I think I have adapted to the modern vernacular quite well… Most of the time at least.”
“I’m dreaming aren’t I?” Celestia waited until Luna nodded her head. “I thought everything seemed a bit… off.”
“Why are you dreaming about such dreary things sister?”
“We can’t all have your gift of being the master of our dreams Lulu.”
“Yes… We’ll perhaps we can talk somewhere more pleasant? I can take you to a nicer dream.”
Luna offered her hoof to Celestia, and Celestia accepted the hoof in her own.
“I think…” Celestia paused while thinking “I would like to go to Rainbow Falls, before it was a hub.”
“You know it works better if you do it. The dream will be richer and fuller.”
Celestia blinked. Had Luna just licked her lips?
There! She just did it again.
Luna’s tongue darted out and in as if in anticipation. Celestia shook her head. Her sister could be very strange at times.
“Maybe, but you can transition the dreams so much more easily than I can.”
“Tia, trust me. It is better that way.”
“I don’t know if I have ever really noticed a difference, but I suppose I can do it.”
Celestia closed her eyes and began to picture the Rainbow Falls in her mind. The trick to controlling one’s dreams was to convince oneself of a new truth. Celestia had to believe she was in Rainbow Falls. Suddenly she felt a heavy kick.
“Oww! Very funny Luna.” She kept her eyes closed and tried to suppress her feelings of inferiority. She knew that Luna had mastery of her own dreams, but that did not mean that her sister had to rub it her face.
“What’s wrong Tia?”
“You kicked me in the flank. That’s what’s wrong.”
“I assure you I did no such-”
“Ow! Something just bopped me in the nose.” Celestia opened her eyes and saw that her sister was still standing next to her.
“Sister are you alright?”
“It’s just… Do you hear-”
+++
Celestia was torn from her dream by the feeling of Twilight thrashing. In her sleep Celestia had curled around her former student serving as blanket and pillow all in one. Now she was aware that Twilight was screaming.
Shifting herself onto her rump, she pulled Twilight into what she hoped was a comforting embrace and began to coo sweet nothings into her pupils ear while running her hoof through Twilight’s mane.
As Celestia tried to soothe her student she thought she heard a whimper coming from Luna. When she looked for her sister she could see Luna’s face drooping and her eyes were wide puppy-dog eyes. Luna looked like she had just been kicked to the ground or sent to bed without dinner. Celestia decided to ignore her sister’s oddities and focused on Twilight.
Gradually the screaming died down to whimpered crying, and Celestia began to make out words. Celestia bit her lip in an attempt to feel some pain. She hated that these were the moments when Twilight seemed most lucid, but she forced herself to embrace them. They could very well be the key to fixing Twilight.
“Light it hurt. It hurt so much. It was just a tingle at first, but then it began to itch, and then it began to burn. I felt my blood boiling. They hurt me! They hurt me so much. Please make it stop. Light, make it stop.”
Celestia could do nothing for her student but simply continued to stroke her hair. “I’m here for you Twilight.”
“They hurt me. They hurt me…”
They had set fire to the magical ley lines running throughout the planet. They had killed magic.
But friendship was magic, so they had killed friendship.
But life was magic, so they had killed all life.
But Twilight Sparkle was magic, so they had…
“How long has it been?”
“Too long my student.”
“I… they are all falling through my hooves. All unsorted.”
Celestia shook her head. She had hoped for more tonight. They had been doing so well. Eventually Twilight’s breathing returned to a rhythmic pace that told Celestia that Twilight had returned to the sweet embrace of sleep.
Celestia became aware of a pair of eyes watching her from the darkness.
“It’s my fault Luna. She wanted to know her role in things and settled on friendship. She was happy with that. Was that really so bad? I mean, Cadence is attuned to love. I just thought…”
“That she had a more complicated and nuanced destiny. Just as I am attuned to dreams and the moon, and you are attuned to sun and order, you felt that Twilight had a cosmic purpose she still was yet to discover.”
Celestia numbly nodded her head. “I convinced her to start studying ley lines. I helped her with her research on attunement.”
“You were right. She took to it so easily, she was meant for it.”
“I was just afraid of losing her. I was worried friendship wouldn’t be enough. I was greedy and wanted to make sure she would be by my side forever.”
“You followed your heart sister. Nopony can fault you for that.”
“Do you want to know?”
“Know what?”
“You know what I’m talking about. You’re an incorrigible snoop.”
“If you would like to share with me.”
“I never actually told Twilight… About how I feel, I mean. We were growing closer, working together as equals. Twilight was maturing as a pony and a princess. I was… I was afraid of ruining that. Cadence’s meddling was something I could live with for a few centuries. Besides, I figured we had all the time in the world.. But then the world ended.”
“You can still tell her.”
“I… I want her to be able to understand.”
“Do not let my words from earlier make you second guess yourself. She might be understanding more than I had assumed. When I saw her dreams tonight she mentioned us all playing a game and you reading a story. The details were wrong, but…”
Celestia licked her lips. Her throat was dry. “Was that… before the nightmare?”
“Yes.” Luna nodded her head solemnly. “It was. She also told me, before I left to go to your dream that she was happy. That she was happy to be able to spend her days with you.”
Celestia looked down at her student in thought. “Just how bad are they? Her nightmares I mean.”
“Honestly sister?” Celestia nodded her head and Luna continued, “They are some of the worse I have ever seen. The terror and pain were almost overwhelming.”
“She was… She was lucid when she woke up wasn’t she?”
“It seemed like she might have been. Between the pain that is. I can take away her dreams and the memory of that pain.”
“If you do that, I risk losing what might be my only ability to bring her back. I miss her so much. Talking with her and listening to her think.”
“Celestia.. She is still alive. As long as we have that we have hope.”
“Sometimes… Sometimes I wonder if it would be better if she wasn’t. Would it have been better if I hadn’t started her breathing again? What kind of life is this? It’s so hard always taking care of her. When I have to feed her… It reminds me of when she was a filly, except it’s all so wrong. I always thought love was supposed to… make our burdens light? It’s just….”
Celestia slowly became aware of another pair of eyes looking at up her from between her hooves. Celestia clenched her legs together in a panicked hug.
“I’m sorry Twilight. I didn’t…. It’s just sometimes… Please Twilight you have to understand that I would do anything for you. I didn’t mean...”
“Celestia, you’re hurting her.”
Celestia looked at the pony she was crushing in her grip. Perhaps the blank look on her student's face was just one of discomfort, but the way in which Twilight was turning even more purple than normal could not be good.
“Twilight, I’m sorry.”
Celestia released her grip and could see dark bruising where her legs had been clutching the younger alicorn. Twilight simply stared up at her with big empty eyes. Celestia slid her student out from between her hooves and stood up backing away.
“I’m sorry.” She knew there was more than a hint of pleading in her voice.
Twilight just continued to stare. Celestia shook her head hoping that her student would look away, but still the eyes continued to watch her. Celestia could imagine them saying everything with their silence.
Celestia flung herself away from Twilight and through the door of the cottage. She ran into the darkness, her tears trailing behind her. Outside of the protection of their shelter sand began to pelt her body. The rough grit scratching her hide did little to distract her from her thoughts.
Celestia leaned against the remnants of a stone pillar across the street from the cottage. She could not go too far. She just could not stand having them watch her cry. As her heavy breathing began to calm down she heard hooves clopping on the pavement behind her.
“Sister, is everything allright?”
“No Luna, I... “ Celestia sighed and turned to face her sister. “I need to return to Canterlot.”
“Canterlot? I thought we had salvaged all that we might. Most of the city had been scorched off of the mountain. Is there something you need from the vaults?”
“My saddlebags are full. I need to go empty them.”
“Ah… The three of us can leave in the morning.”
Celestia’s eyes widened, “Did you leave Twilight alone by herself.”
“She will be fine sister. She sits in our shelter still.”
Celestia nodded her head. “I’m going alone. I can get there and back faster that way.”
“Alone? But sister-”
“I want you to take Twilight to your castle.”
“Tia… you know she will not have nightmares or even normal dreams there...”
“I’ve… I’ve been selfish. I felt so powerless to do anything. For thousands of years I ruled undisputed, unrivaled. Now I can’t even help the pony that I…” Celestia resisted the urge to cry again. “I was wrong Lulu. You were right. I thought… I thought that Twilight’s dreams could be the key to her recovery, that we needed to let them evolve naturally. I just needed so badly to be able to do something to help her. I’ve just been hurting her. Just like I hurt her tonight.”
“I… Are you sure about this? I never meant to push you into something you did not want.”
“It’s not about what I want. It’s about what is best for Twilight. Maybe, maybe she will never get better, but at least she might be happy.” Celestia wiped the tears from her eyes.
“I told you she is already happy.”
“I… I know, it’s just hard to believe that. At the very least your castle can’t hurt. We can give it some time and see what happens.”
“How long do you think you will be gone?”
“If I leave now maybe only a day, two at most.”
Luna came over and hugged her.
“I wish you the best of speed then.”
“I just want to say goodbye to Twilight before I go. I haven’t been away from her since…”
“I will take good care of her Tia. I swear it.”
“Thank you.” Celestia tightened the hug before pulling away.
Together the two of them approached the cottage as Celestia contemplated what she would say. When she passed through the door however, all her words were forgotten. Instead she could only think of one thing as a dull panic began to well up inside of her.
“Where’s Twilight?”
+++
Crystal Prices Skyrocket
Nearly five years ago the Royal Academy of Magic shocked the world with their discovery of electro-maginetic properties of crystals. Throughout history, the creation of magical artifacts has been grueling expensive work. The current revolution in both science and magic has stemmed from the ability to create magical resonances in crystals, powered by electrical currents. What some ponies have taken to calling magitech has swept the world transforming how ponies lead their lives.
Unfortunately the demand has been far outstripping supply. For the last six months the Crystal Empire has failed to meet production demands and Equestria has begun looking further abroad for a source of imports, recent reports have indicated that the situation is not likely to resolve soon.
The Ponies of Equestria for Technomagical Advancement Party has proposed expanding into the neighboring Budenny Expanse which geological surveys indicate may contain vast crystal deposits. International treaties regarding the expanse...
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5469852
One of my thought's originally had been just a day to day account, and just leaving it at that with no resolution to anything what so ever. I've decided against that, but for the
most partto a certain extent it will be through the vehicle of day-to-day life.After reading the rest (thus far) of this tale I do think Twilight will recover, but her madness will be quite epic and last a long time as she is presently shattered to pieces mentally and metaphysically. Being attuned to friendship means she was attuned to ponies themselves, and when they all died at once means her mind and magic where brutally demolished. The library in her dreams showed how her mind is, the pieces are all there but out of order, and confused. Reassembling herself is a multiple life time process, she has the time but seeing a recovered Twilight is an epilogue event not a story one. This story really feels more like setting the foundation of the recovery, Celestia and Luna fighting to keep Twilight holding on and getting her to want to begin recovering. What happens in the story is in author's hands of course, I can only offer my opinions and ideas.
Oh my, you certainly keep delivering.
I think your day to day account works very well, no matter if there will be a resolution or an open end. Your take on magitech and the your way of presenting it and the backstory itself as newsflashes from before The Fall serves its purpose nicely, a good way of including what otherwise would have been a not very engaging info dump.
Well done, take all the time you need if you keep this quality up.
On edit: hey, you got rid of the mistakes I admonished. Yay for that! The enjoyment has been doubled.
Also Luna: that need of hers to feed on dreams is a glorious concept I haven't seen before. Great idea.
So, everything went to shit when they became a democratic hyper-capitalist consumerist society and apparently started invading other lands for resources to make their lives easier? Powerful stuff, if so.
5479263 Somehow that does sound familiar. Too bad the people in that particular story never had the opportunity to fall back on the likes of Celestia and Luna. *sigh*
5479263
OK, I give up. At first I thought this was a reference to the state of modern society, but then I saw this comment by 5479481, referencing a story, and based on the thumbs ups on the original comment, I feel like I missed a reference. I've been wracking my brain trying to determine what it is, but no dice. Please put me out of my misery.
5479634
I'll be honest. Most of the time I have errors pointed out to me I sigh because they are errors I shouldn't have made or should have caught on a read through (though I am happy they have been pointed out so that I can fix them and so it becomes less likely I make them in the future). Some times it is an error I have been consistently making that as soon as I see the comment I'm like "Oh, I've been doing this wrong." (As some people have pointed out to me that it should be "yeah" and not "yea" in some of my recent fics). In both cases though the time to process is very short.
This one though... I stared at it and nothing clicked. I like to think I have a good grasp of the English language, and then something like this comes out of left field. It took me like two minutes of googling (because so many people apparently make the same mistake, my usage at first looked correct) before I got it. And now it makes perfect sense how I managed to participate in the bastardization of a perfectly workable word. This is one of those things that I have probably been doing wrong my ENTIRE life. Of course I don't feel like I can use the proper contraction "would've" because in my mind it sounds too similar to "would of" and I'll just slip back into incorrect usage. It's going to take awhile to get over this cognitive dissonance. Thank you for bringing it to my attention though.
5481279
I was talking about current sociopolitical situations across the world. I think they may have also been, but referring to the world as a 'story' in the sense that we're talking about a story here.
Also, the fact you can be upset with yourself over a mistake like 'would of' shows you're a cut above those plebs who refuse to do better. Feel better! You are capable of progress and growth! That's rarer in this world than most people realize.
5481300
OK, I had thought the word "story' might have been metaphorical, but the tense and thumb ups through me off. I thought I had missed something.
5481305
I'll track and follow, looks promising.
I think this song fit the story a little bit?
I really like this story hope to read more soon
5481279 Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to make you feel bad - I did mean the comment as a reference to our own modern day society. My apologies if that came across as an accusation of plagerism.
Your story is great and a refreshingly new take on the theme that I haven't encountered before. Do go on, I'm very much enjoying it.
Just wanted to say, loving this story so far!
Nitpicks!
emergency
whose
"worst" fits better grammatically and, I suspect, substantially.
student's
I don't understand why the two clauses are connected by "but"; they both seem to point in the same direction. Perhaps "The blank look on her student's face might or might not have been one of discomfort, but..."? Or simply change "but" to "and"? Or am I missing something?
her
(incorrect double space)
5478883
I think you might be on the wrong track. I suspect that what happened was that Twilight became attuned to magic and hence the ley lines. When whatever magitech weapon they used went off it killed most of them, but Twilight burned with the lines. So long as they exist, maybe she won't die, but something tells me soaking up the magic that's around is more sustaining than grass for her.
At least that's my guess for now.
You are just pumping out these great stories all of a sudden. Seeing things fin the Twilight chapter coming should be pretty enlightening.
5481279
Looking at that supposed error, my immediate thought was would of should be would have. Small thing that I'm not even sure is wrong, but it sounds more correct in my mind.
I have only this to say:
[youtube=nCeFbK-WEVE]