Conversation Four
Celestia gave the eldest her sunniest, gentlest smile. “I'm happy you found me. I had intended to begin searching for you after breakfast, but I could see no simple way to contact you and I've heard nothing of any palace or fortress you might maintain, so I wasn't certain how to go about finding you.”
The eldest returned the smile, or showed his teeth at least. “I'll walk over there,” he pointed at the mouth of an alley about 30 or 40 yards away, “and you two can talk amongst yourselves for as long as you need. Then you'll follow me if you want to discuss what you're doing in my world, and why one of my subjects is following you around like a duckling.”
Then he walked away. Celestia watched him like a cat watching a stranger.
“So,” Mag said.
“Your regent,” said Celestia. She let go of Mag's hand.
Mag massaged her fingers. Celestia had an impressive grip. “So why can't I feel him the way I feel you?”
“You can't feel him because you've always felt him,” said Celestia. “He guided the history of your species, and every single one of you have been influenced by him in countless ways. I don't know his powers or his methods, but I can tell you that, as regent, it is he who decided what it means to be human, what it feels like from day to day.”
The eldest had reached the alley. He leaned against the wall and lit one of the cigarettes Mag had given him, looking as if he was prepared to wait forever.
“Is that right,” Mag said under her breath.
“You've lived your whole life in the shadow of his hand.” Celestia shuddered. “Skies above, his aura. It feels like delirium and cold winds.”
“'Aura.' That's another word for the thing you do? Or you both do, I guess.”
“I think humans can feel my presence in the same way I feel his, yes,” said Celestia. “I wouldn't expect a species without magic to perceive auras, but I suppose encountering a foreign regent must be like finding a patch of snow in the desert, even to a creature who has never touched the aether and doesn't understand what it is she's feeling.”
“Huh. Well, your aura reminds me of Broadway music, or possibly a children's choir, if you were wondering.”
“I know. I've been told it's a bit cloying.” A look of concentration crossed Celestia's face. After some thought, she said, “Two aliens are sitting in a bar. One alien says, “Blorp, bloop, blee noog warble.' The second says, 'Goodness, I think you've had quite enough.”
Mag nodded. “Very corny. Good job. Did it help?”
“No,” said Celestia sourly. She squared her shoulders. “I suppose we'd better just follow him.”
Mag shrugged. “Fine with me. If it makes you feel any better, you're probably just as hard for him to take as he is for you.”
“I would just as soon seem harmless, but I'll keep that in mind,” said Celestia. “And I don't suppose I could convince you to stay behind while I talk with him?”
“Are you kidding?”
“He's an exceedingly dangerous being,” said Celestia. “He smells of madness, and I'm not certain how much value he would attach to an individual subject even if he is sane. I've spoken with regents who would harm one of theirs to make a minor rhetorical point, or because it didn't occur to them not to, or because they were hungry.”
“I'm not going anywhere. If you want to get into politics then this isn't going to be the last dangerous person we talk to, so I may as well get some practice in.” Not waiting for an answer, Mag walked toward the alley.
Celestia caught up. “As you wish. I'll do what I can to protect you. I would suggest you stay silent, but I get the feeling you already have other plans.”
“What gave you that idea?”
“You're wearing your poker face again.”
***
Most of the snow had melted by this time—this was California, after all—but little drifts of dirty snow still lay in certain shadows the morning sun couldn't reach. The eldest's alley was narrow, about six feet wide, so direct light hadn't touched it yet. Snow lined the bottoms of both walls, and the pile of wet trash stuck to the fence at the back of the alley was still frozen.
The eldest glanced at Mag and Celestia and stepped into the alley without looking back, apparently trusting them to follow him. They did.
He led them to the end of the alley and to a metal door to one side. The door had no handle. The eldest laid his hand where the handle would be, flexed his hand, and pulled. There was the sound of wrenching metal and the door opened as if his hand were a magnet. Inside was a flat plane of wood. The eldest shoved it with both hands and it tipped over, revealing itself to be a rotten pressboard bookcase. Behind the bookcase was an empty room lit by a broken window covered in bars. The walls, the floor, and the ceiling were all made of discolored concrete. Five large concrete blocks had been scattered in one corner, each the size of a park bench, and there was a pile of bricks next to the door, possibly an ex-fireplace. The room was otherwise bare, and colder than a meat locker.
The eldest stepped over the bookcase, walked to the corner, and sat on one of the concrete blocks with his back to the wall. “Today,” he rasped, “this room will be my court. We won't be disturbed. Princess, you're here as a supplicant, yes?”
“Yes,” said Celestia. She sat down on another block seven feet away. Mag followed suit.
“Uncomfortable?” said the eldest.
“Not terribly,” said Celestia.
“I mean your disguise,” said the Eldest. “You're dressed up as one of mine, but you aren't. Go on and make yourself comfortable.”
Celestia changed again. Mag was ready this time, watching carefully. The shift was almost instant, but this time she saw a transitional stage with wings, arms, forelegs, and back legs, shining and many-limbed like a Hindu deity.
She fluttered her wings a bit and shifted into a cat's sitting position. Now her eyes were level with the eldest's.
“Better?” said the Eldest.
“Much. It's not a difficult spell, but it does begin to feel constraining after a while,” said Celestia.
“Good. Welcome to my court. You are Princess Celestia, and you are Margaret Taylor Wilson. Don't look startled, girl; you're mine and I know everything about you. As for myself, I am eldest of the humans, wandering king, builder of cities. My name is none of your business.” He held out the paper sack with the bottle. “No toasts.”
Celestia took it, sipped lightly from it, wiped her lips, and passed it to Mag. Mag sipped as well, and choked.
“What the hell is this? It tastes like Wild Turkey and Nyquil.” She swallowed with some difficulty and handed it back to him.
“That's because it's Wild Turkey and Nyquil,” said the eldest. He drained the bottle and tossed it over his shoulder. It broke against the wall behind him. “Introductions and shared drink, as per the old rules. We can begin.”
Celestia nodded graciously. “Thank you for hearing me. I am—”
“Sorry, sorry, one thing,” said Mag. She stood up. Celestia gave her a warning glance, but stood up alongside her. The eldest stood up as well. Mag's forehead came up to his Adam's apple.
“Just as you like,” said the eldest. He gazed down at her with his calm, hard eyes.
“Cool. You're the regent of Earth?”
“That's right.”
“Guard and guide of the humans since the beginning of the species?”
“King and builder,” growled the eldest.
“But basically yes?”
“King and builder.”
“But basically yes.”
“Speak your piece,” said the eldest.
“I just wanted to make sure, first,” said Mag, and swung her fist in an uppercut.
The eldest stepped back with a smirk. Mag swung again. He ducked a few inches to the right.
“Mag!” barked Celestia.
The eldest caught her fist. She wrested it back, but didn't swing again.
“I get that a lot,” said the eldest to Celestia. “Something on your mind, my little girl?”
“History,” Mag hissed.
“Oh, one of those talks,” said the eldest, rolling his eyes.
“The trans-Atlantic slave trade. The Trail of Tears. JFK. The first world war. Jeffrey Dahmer. Stalin. The Holocaust, for Christ's sake.” Mag poked him in the chest. “Where the fuck have you been?”
“Everywhere,” said the eldest. “Sit down before you do something stupider.”
“Stop patronizing me and answer my question."
“I did. You think I'm going to give you a full accounting of my life up to this point? I don't owe you an explanation.”
Celestia interposed herself between the two humans. They stepped back, glaring at each other.
“I think we should discuss this in a different way,” said Celestia.
“Oh, but this is the human way,” said Mag.
“Melodrama?” said the eldest.
“Fighting.”
“Mag, eldest, please sit down,” said Celestia.
Mag ground her teeth, but sat down. So did the eldest, then Celestia.
“Thank you.” Celestia laid a hoof on Mag's arm. Mag felt smooth metal warmed by body heat—a horseshoe. “Mag, you are asking what sounds like a very valid question, but I can't condone violence. You call it the human way, but I've met many people from warrior cultures, and your actions just now wouldn't have fit in among any of them. Going out without a weapon and then attacking a larger opponent unarmed? I would call this the behavior of a normally peaceful person acting out of anger, not a trained warrior expressing herself in culturally appropriate ways.”
“You were also trying to talk about something important when I changed the subject,” said Mag, squeezing her eyes shut. “Sorry.”
“You do have the right,” said Celestia, frowning at the eldest. “As for you, old one, if you don't like to be asked impertinent questions, why would you teach them to be so curious and so angry? And I, too, wish to hear your answers to her questions, because the answers may change how I approach this hearing. I'm going to step back and let her speak first. Mag, would you like to try again?”
“Hold,” said the eldest. “Princess, you asked a rhetorical question just now and I'm going to answer it. It's simple. I taught them anger and curiosity by pretending not to exist, so of course I'm not going to want to answer questions.”
“You let people kill each other because you don't want them to know you exist?” said Mag.
The eldest sneered. “What do you want me to do? Go public? You think all the wars are going to stop if I go on the news and tell people to knock it off?”
“Well...”
“Are you seriously suggesting you can't stop a war?” said Celestia, genuinely surprised.
“I don't stop wars,” said the eldest.
Celestia looked at him as if he'd just eaten a child. “For ponies' sake, why not?”
The eldest took a last drag of his cigarette and flicked the butt away. He'd smoked it down to the filter. “Because I mostly can't. Oh, I can prevent them. I prevent wars all the time. If you all built a monument for every battle I've prevented, you'd run out of space for anything else." He lifted Mag's pack of menthols to his lips, sucked one out, struck a match on a concrete block, and lit up behind a cupped hand. “Can't prevent all of them, of course. Doesn't matter what I do—sometimes someone picks the wrong place and time to mention God or communism or whatever the fuck, and then it's off to kill and die. And I'm not a wizard. I can't walk onto a battlefield and stop time, and if I could, they'd just start dying again after I left. Sometimes humans kill. It's something we do.”
“What can you do?” said Celestia. “What are your powers?”
“Rude question. What are yours?” the eldest said.
“Words and reasoning,” said Celestia.
“And personal illusions, traveling between planes of existence, flight, complete control over the aether on a cosmic scale, a solid operatic soprano, 'excellent hearing,' playing string instruments with your hooves, horn lasers, flower arranging, immortality... the list goes on and on, doesn't it?”
“Those are some of my lesser tools, but yes. And you?”
“We can't all be sun gods,” said the eldest. “Me, I see everything. The past, the future, the world.” He pointed at Mag. “Her great-great-great-great grand-niece's social security number is going to be 114-27-5890.” He gestured to the both of them. “You two talked about how the Equestrian sun orbits Equis.” He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. “The guy who owns this room on paper isn't going to notice the bag of broken glass until after he sells the building in a few years. Other than that, I can heal any wound I get, I know a few little tricks, and I've got two hands. You ever heard of chaos theory?”
“No,” said Celestia.
“Yeah,” said Mag.
“I forget how it works,” said the eldest, “but the idea is that a butterfly flapping its wings in South America can make hurricanes on the other side of the world. I know when and where every metaphorical hurricane butterfly is, so I go around smashing them.”
Celestia brightened with understanding. “Infinitesimal variables can come together to have a massive impact. You can foresee the results of all the variables, so, with enough planning, you're able to change the course of history.”
The eldest turned back to Mag. “So you get it, then? You all complained about the cold war, but it could have been a real war. You're welcome. You're mad about the Holocaust, but it could have been worse. They could have won. You're welcome. Trail of Tears? You should be grateful there are any Indians left. And this species would have died of plague a hundred times over in prehistoric times if it weren't for me. Just shut up.”
“Eldest,” said Celestia in a strange voice, “where is your brother?”
The eldest said nothing.
“You're a sibling,” said the Celestia. “This world was never made to be ruled by just one person, was it? It works, but it's lopsided and warped, like a house missing some of its supports. And there's an emptiness to you, a ragged hole in the shape of a loved one. You had a brother and now he's gone. Where is he?”
He smiled bitterly. “Am I my brother's keeper?”
Mag jumped backward off her seat, stumbled back, swallowed. “Are you saying you murdered him?”
The eldest shrugged.
“Oh, cousin, what have you done?” whispered Celestia.
“I smashed a butterfly,” said the eldest. "An important part of my job is controlling the variables in human history. My brother would have been the biggest variable, and there was only one way I could control him. It was almost the first thing I did in life. Do you know, killing a god is a lot easier when you can see every possible future? You just have to look for a future where he's dead, then see how that future came about, then make it happen.” His eyes narrowed. “What's wrong, princess? Never had to make a tough call before? Or maybe that story sounds familiar to you. You had a sister, didn't you?”
“Be careful what you say next, eldest,” said Celestia in a deadly soft voice.
Mag felt nauseous. “The oldest human, the guy who decided what it means to be human, kicked things off with a murder. That was our defining moment. It makes sense.”
“This is another reason I never explain myself,” said the eldest. “Listen to me. Live a couple of decades or walk a few miles, look around, and you'll see that right and wrong have changed a little. Walk further or live longer and even more changes. You want to know what life would be like if my brother were alive? It'd be incomprehensible to you as you are now. You'd be horrified. You wouldn't even call it civilization, and you wouldn't want to call them humans. The princess would have appeared on the lakeshore, climbed up the hill, met a few of us, and walked right back to the lake to search for a different world. I know this. I stood in that tall grass for the first time at my brother's side, looked at him, and saw. I saw all the futures of humanity, ladies, and this timeline is the only one I could stomach.”
“What, you're the good twin?” said Mag, attempting to process all this in terms she could understand.
“Hell no. I'm the murderer. He was the magical one, all glorious and perfect. His head was full of hopes and dreams, and then I strangled them out of him. Get off my back about this, but don't whitewash it, either. You know I can't enter a home? Our aether laid a punishment on me for what I did. I killed my family, so I can never have another, at least not like that. I can only wander.”
Mag's head whirled. She could just barely tolerate the idea of a flying unicorn princess, or pretend to, anyway. And this mad god fit nicely with what she knew of the world, or so she would have said if someone had described him to her a week ago as a purely hypothetical being. What she couldn't do was reconcile the idea of these two beings existing in the same multiverse. Mag sat down on the floor and pressed her hands to her eyes.
The eldest chuckled. “Let's move on before the mortal has a breakdown.”
“I have two things to say, first,” said Celestia.
“Go ahead,” said the eldest.
“One. I won't go into detail, but if you can see the future then you know I'm not bluffing when I say that, if you don't apologize to me for that comment about my sister, and to Mag for your cruelty, you won't like what follows.”
“Fine, fine,” said the eldest. “I'm sorry, Princess Celestia, for comparing the two of us. I was only saying we both know what it means to make terrible personal sacrifices for our people. Ms. Wilson, I could have dealt with your question in a kinder way, but I didn't, and for that I'm sorry. There, princess. Good enough?”
“For now,” said Celestia. “Two. In all the futures, was there a world where humanity would see your brother's murder as laudable?”
“Of course. If you can describe a world, it was a possibility at one point. Do you realize how many futures there are at any given time? In a chess game—one of the simplest worlds I've ever come across—there are 400 possible different board configurations after both players make their first move of the game. After they go a second time, it's about 200,000. After the third turn, the number is 121 million. Now imagine a board game as complicated as your world or mine, played over the course of eons. That board game is the game I'm playing every day.” He chuckled again. “Can you see why I decided to play both black and white, all those years ago? Me, I think maybe this is the world where I did the right thing. Who knows? And who cares? What's done is done. Did I answer your question?”
“To my satisfaction,” said Celestia.
“Then make your other request,” said the eldest with a languid, magisterial wave.
“Yes, I'd like to leave your company as soon as possible.”
“Then get to the point.”
Celestia sat up straighter. “I want to submit a request for safe passage and temporary residence in your world, along with any refugees I may find who would normally be under my protection. If you're willing, I would also like permission to bargain and treat with your people, helping wherever I may. I will neither make nor request any oath of fealty. I will offer no threat to your sovereignty. I—”
“Boilerplate, boilerplate,” said the eldest. “The standard refugee arrangement. Request granted. But what about your little friend? Protect her and order her around, if you like, but she's not yours.”
Mag took her hands off her eyes. “I'm not yours either, you bastard.” Celestia grinned back at her.
“You're my responsibility,” said the eldest. “That's what the word 'mine' means.”
Mag could have the rest of her philosophical crisis later. “Then I can't possibly be yours, because I'm my responsibility. I make my own decisions. Yeah, you created the world as it is. You're pretty much God. You even created me, sort of, because you made a bunch of choices about how history should go and now here I am. The only real limit on your power over the world is human nature, and you created that too, didn't you? But you know what?” She leaned against Celestia, laid a hand on her back, and rested a cheek on her neck. “Hail Satan.”
The eldest threw his head back and laughed. “Well, just call it a contract between the two of you and it'll be covered under the part of the agreement about bargaining with humans. But princess, don't ever forget that even if I gave her to you and declared you her regent, she'd still be a human. She always will be, and if you try to change that, you'll break her.” He cracked his knuckles and neck, stood, stretched his back, rolled his shoulders. Celestia stepped off her own block.
“We done here?” said the eldest.
“I'd say so,” said Celestia.
“Hopefully forever,” said Mag.
“Good. Thanks for the cigarettes,” said the eldest. “Oh, and Mag? Someone robbed your store last night because you left the door unlocked. I didn't do it.” Then he left.
Mag and Celestia stared at the door for a while. Mag covered her eyes with her hand again. Celestia folded a wing around her shoulders, and Mag pressed her face into Celestia's side.
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very good
You know, I really enjoyed this chapter. It felt like a good balance between the three different characters and most especially it made for a fascinating couple of answers about this multiverse you've set up. I look forward to more, especially if/when Meg gets curious about what the eldest meant about Celestia's sister.
I don't like this chapter at all. Making Cain a god. NO THANKS
5555766
I could go either way on this one, personally. It establishes some things and this does mean I can move on now, but I have several problems with it on a critical level.
1. I didn't engage with the Cain story as much as I really should have. That piece of lore has a massive amount of cultural resonance, so anything from the original story that I don't address, either by incorporating it or subverting it, makes the character feel incomplete. Where's the mark of Cain? Nowhere, I never mentioned it. What about the original reason for Cain killing his brother? I came up with something completely different. Jealousy should have figured into my version somehow. Then there's the fact that I turned God, arguably the most important character in Western literature, into the impersonal and mostly undefined "aether." It's like I rewrote Hamlet, but replaced Hamlet himself with a potted plant.
2. I spent too much time on a character who, in hindsight, doesn't do all that much for the story except in tone. I have to bring him back one or two more times now if I want to justify his existence on a plotting level. I don't regret coming up with him, but you could argue he's extraneous as he currently is. This is also a rather hostile, uncomfortable chapter in a few different ways because of him, which I think is part of where Admiral Q's reaction is coming from.
3. This was my least favorite chapter to write so far. The eldest is alienating even to me. Luckily the next chapter is about the more sympathetic characters.
5556352 I thought I was the only one who noticed that
5557091 yes. I personally rather not have this chapter at all
5557444 That's a legit opinion, but it's here to stay. All my problems with this chapter are in the execution of the idea, not the idea itself, and if I was going to take something out because it didn't meet my expectations then I'd be removing this entire fic. I will never be completely happy with anything I write.
e: And while it's not playing exactly the role I wanted, I can absolutely work with this.
5557091
Personally, I think you should just take a step back and not look at the eldest as Cain, but instead look at him as some kind of ur-example from which myth sprung. Personally, I'm not Christian, and the idea of a generally unspecific 'aether' is far more palatable than if you were to have made it into some kind of morality play wherein a specific mythology is the first. I have no problem seeing how something would be twisted into myth, and even within MLP itself we see something similar, what with Luna/Nightmare Moon being divorced from one another as characters in the eyes of ponies before her return.
I liked the underhandedness of the eldest's tale, because Meg would be able to pick up the references, and Celestia would need far more explanation to make it realistic if the eldest had just came out and said, "Hi, I'm Cain, the first murderer."
Obviously, if you prefer to write about sympathetic characters, all power to you, but I don't think that you should shy away from the eldest simply because he is alienating. I think his explanation for how humanity is the way it is works well both within the multiverse you've created and to resonate, on some level, with the human beings reading this fic.
5559315 This comment is so deliciously validating that it feels like such a shame I don't have a more substantive response.
Yeah, the eldest is supposed to be the origin of the Cain and Abel story rather than the actual Cain, but that's definitely where the idea of the eldest came from (well, also a little of Yaldabaoth and the Wandering Jew, but it doesn't really show), so I figured I'd get the most mileage out of this idea by making full use of the original folklore, which I didn't end up doing. But if it works for some readers then I'm extremely okay with that.
You did a pretty good job with this! The eldest is certainly someone you wouldn't want to cross even at the best of times, and the "Cain and Abel" angle makes this even more powerful. So is eldest himself going to be more of a central figure in this story? It almost feels like you are setting him up to be one of the more sinister characters in this tale, depending on what happens next.
5561021 He's a side character and a bit player for now, I'd say, though nothing is set in stone. He's got nearly nothing in common with any of the other characters so far, and probably about as much in common with the audience. When he shows up it's a little like finding a Melvins track in a Beatles mixtape.
Okay, that's an exaggeration, but not by much. He's actively hateful and he does it on purpose, while The Melvins "strive to irritate."
e: My point is that a little of him goes a long way, in terms of screen time.
5561489 Ah. In any case, I look forward to seeing what the eldest does at different points throughout the rest of the story. But it's also going to be interesting to read how Princess Celestia and Mag interact after that encounter. ;3
I was enjoying this story before, and then Mag busted out the "Hail Satan" line, and I couldn't help but laugh. Instant favourite.
I think I can get were Eldest is coming from. Unlike Celestia, his regency doesn't come with the phenomenal power Celestia and Luna's own does. He had phenomenal knowledge, and likely feels all the more impotent because of it. Worse because he knows very few people will appreciate the good he has managed to do in his existence (like Mag's reaction to him). Hell, if everyone is going to hate you anyway, why bother trying to avoid being a jerk?
Related to that, Eldest basically admitted that Youngest was the magic one. Does that mean Youngest's knowledge was of the ather and such, much as Eldest's knowledge is of the more physical world?
5556352
If you look how people behave then it's evident who the god is. It's someone who isn't very nice.
*she'd still be a human. She always will be, and if you try to change that, you'll break her.* But what if she changes that herself?
5557091
He is not Cain, he is the being Cain story is based on. He is the Proto Cain, all Cains come from him, just like a lot of heroes come from Gilgamesh. He does not feel complete, because he is not, there is one where they should be two.
Didn't she just turn back into a pony?
And I loved every little bit of it :)
'The Eldest' is perfect.
If this world was the best of all possible worlds from that point on, then we're probably absolutely horrific creatures on average. I don't even disagree with the eldest on that remark. I'm just mildly curious why he would go out of his way to preserve us if this is the case.
What if he really is Satan, and his monstrous brother was God? I mean, the devil kills far fewer people in the Bible than God was supposed to, and the idea of the Devil always struck me as being similar to the Dark Knight, Batman, etc. People call him evil because he does evil things, but they can't see the greater good behind it in their limited perspectives. He's right- he's just the one that made hard choices.
Yup, you pretty much won my wholehearted endorsement of this story.
6018471 Thanks! This chapter was difficult to do.
5986073 I once read a theory that the being Satan/the devil/Lucifer etc. described in the Bible is actually a confusion of several different characters. Satan means "Accuser," and, according to this theory, "Satan" is actually the role one of the angels plays. One of the GOOD angels. Satan's job is to question God's decisions to His face and needle Him into giving an accounting of His actions. You see him again in whatever gospel it is where he meets Jesus in the wilderness and offers him food and a kingdom and all that. Good Satan is like the prosecuting attorney of Heaven, in a way. He argues and accuses, says "prove it," demands that God defend His actions. I always liked that idea. It's got some similarity to the original role of the devil's advocate, the canon lawyer whose job it was to argue against canonization of saints. How is all of this relevant to what you're saying? It's not, or if it is relevant then it was an accident.
6019132 ha! Cain is the regent of our world. That makes entirely too much sense.
I really like the idea of the eldest. It's one of my top favorite ideas I've come across in fan fiction: that there would be a human equivalent to celestia, and that he would reflect human values just as celestia reflects pony values. It's a really cool idea.
5752208 That's actually orthodox Abrahamic religion theology. Not that Cain is the regent, or god, but that the devil took over the regency.
5986073 No... Mag just chose to follow Celestia. That was the meaning in the philosophical sense.
So... you saw the possibilities, you examined the outcomes, and you made your choices to create the one you liked best? Like the Eldest? I've heard of method acting, but not method writing.
Alondro walks by and waves, "Oh hey, Ozymandias!"
Eldest snarls, "Me dammit!"
In this world, I got him first! NOW I AM ELDEST!!! MUWAH HA HA HA!! *It should be noted that 'perfection' is HIGHLY subjective...*
So I'm guessing this story evolved on you?
Reason I ask is Celestia and Luna are both gods of Equestria, yet only Celestia survivedphysically whole at least. Earth is implied to have had 2 regents? 2 examples a ruleset doesn't make, but do most worlds have 2 gods ruling over in balance? Would this be something elaborated in story, or would it have to be a meta explanation?
7233805 Every regent is different and runs on slightly different rules, even regents from the same world. Different rules to their invincibility/immortality, their powers, how many there are per world, blah blah blah. Different weaknesses, too, and naturally they've each got a different personality and personal history.
This entire chapter I imagined the Eldest with the voice of the chariot master from Kid Icarus Uprising.
I challenge anyone to find a better voice for this guy.
I have no idea how the rest of this story goes, but damn it if you haven't absolutely won me over with this chapter. The Eldest is both disgusting/charming and absolutely fitting in his role.
Alright, I gotta complain here. (And it's on something that might be addressed later in the story. Eh) Eldest is an absolutely fucking fantastic character and I feel I'll steal him with no hesitation if I ever find the opportunity. Problem is, the way you described his abilities has a big fat logic error. If Eldest can see every variable, and he makes choices based off of that, then does anyone else in the world have choice? Is Eldest really capable of knowing the completely correct choices to make to cause any outcome, and therefore he's the only actor in a clockwork universe, or do other beings have choice and he's only acting on probabilistic chance? As described, Eldest gets to pick and choose from all the possible futures at a given time, and knows with absolute certainty what will happen in the future, which means no one else ever influences which way the future goes except him.
Now, I'm willing to doubt my conclusion, since from what I've seen so far you're a cracking author firing on all cylinders. You might deliberately have made Eldest lie about his abilities here. He might, an an example, only work off of probabilities and doesn't have complete certainty about future events. (And in which case, none of those insanely horrifying futures with Eldest's brother were a certainty.) But I often run into stories where the authors haven't though through all the timey windy stuff, so in case you haven't: My question to you is if you're going to explain how this isn't a world where everyone is just a fancy automaton that never actually makes decisions in any way, with the exception of Eldest. (Also, there are other reasons why I think that, as stated, the time shenanagins here really don't work both logically and everything else, but hopefully I've already made my point.)
Edit: Sorry, I forgot to mention again how wonderful Eldest is. He's a perfect fit for an understandable fuckup who both helps many people greatly but also makes some of the worst decisions. You can almost see why those rare terrible decisions would seem like the correct ones, and almost sympathize with him about it, but on some level you know he's just justifying his mistakes to himself. (And you can't tell that to his face, for obvious reasons.) But then again that's using the "flawed character" approach to describing a character, and I meant to compliment you on him. Eh. *Shrug*
This chapter is more magical than friendship could ever be. Mag has a beautiful personality (“Hail Satan”), and Eldest is perfect.
...
I love you for making this.