Dreams of the Past
Princess Celestia reclined against her cushioned throw rug, listening intently as Princess Luna described what she had seen on the remains of the alien ship. The lunar princess was especially careful to emphasis the sheer number of bodies she had seen – easily into the thousands, on both sides. Even the worst wars in Equestria’s history, Luna noted, had not been as bloody as one mere battle of these Clone Wars. Princess Celestia looked both alarmed and disgusted by what her sister described.
And then Luna told Celestia of the ship’s bridge, and what she had seen there.
“He lied to us, sister!” she fumed. “We welcomed him into our midst, and he lied to us!”
“We lied to him as well,” Celestia pointed out.
“That’s different! We lied to protect our people. He lied to cover up his own murders!” Luna’s face was a mask of righteous anger. “I saw them, Tia! Bodies everywhere! And not just the soldiers, the crewmen as well! Cut down while they were unarmed, helpless! By these.”
Luna’s magic lifted up a certain souvenir she had obtained from her exploration of the Fateful: a working blaster rifle, prided from the metal fingers of downed commando droid. She tossed a metal plate into the air and telekinetically pulled the trigger, sending a red blaster bolt up after it. It burned a hole clean through the thick plate and impacted on the ceiling in a shower of sparks, leaving a very nasty-looking burn whole.
Celestia took a moment to consider her sister’s revelations before answering her. Her head stared down at her hooves and the floor beneath them.
“Thank you for discovering all of this, Lulu,” she said in a low voice, before sighing wearily and looking up to meet her sister’s gaze. “But what does this truly change?’
Luna was aghast at what she had heard. Didn’t Tia see?! Couldn’t she understand?! This General Grievous was a murderer, a monster who butchered the helpless without pity or remorse! They now knew that a viper of the worst sort rested in their home, and Celestia didn’t understand how that changed things?! Luna’s insides were aflame with righteous fury. She burned to call down magic from the heavens and smite the wretched murderer from existence in a blazing column of light!
Celestia doubtless saw this in her sister’s eyes, or perhaps simply knew her well enough to guess how she was feeling.
“Lulu,” she said. “Tell me how you think this changes our situation.”
“Now we know the character of this monster we have so foolishly welcomed into our land! He is a villain worse even than Lord Tirek!”
“And how does that make a difference to where we stand? Think, Lulu, think. If he is the one this Confederacy chooses to lead its military forces, how do you think it will react if it learns that we welcomed him to our world with imprisonment or execution?”
Luna paused. In her anger, she truly had not considered what she and Celestia had already concluded. She had wished only for justice for the victims of Grievous’ crimes.
“They need not know,” she said, defensively. “We are quite capable of ensuring nopony finds him ever again!”
“And you know that for a fact, do you?” Celestia asked. “You know what magicks, what technologies the Confederacy of Independent Systems has at its disposal for locating its general?”
“I…” Luna hesitated.
“And you know for certain that should they track him here and not be able to find him, they will not react by destroying our planet, just in case?” the white alicorn demanded. “Are you willing to bet every life in Equestria on that?”
Luna gritted her teeth. Celestia was right, damn her. She didn’t want it to be the case, but her logical mind told her that it was. Celestia was always right. Luna had always known it, and in her more candid moments even admitted it. Once, she had even been driven mad and embraced darkness out of the jealously she had engendered.
But Luna had learned since her long imprisonment on the moon – learned humility, and how to admit when she was in the wrong.
“I just…” she said, hanging her head. “I just…”
Celestia smiled sadly, getting to her hooves and putting one comforting hoof on her sister’s shoulder. “You just want justice.”
Luna nodded.
“And justice is a fine thing to want, sister mine. But we must not allow anger, even the most righteous of anger, to blind us to consequences for all we hold dear. We must keep our heads.”
Luna nodded as the two embraced. But though her outer self and her mind embraced her sister’s firm logic, her heart was not mollified. Grievous had committed crimes beyond the pale of all forgiveness, and she yet heard the voices of the slain, crying out to her for justice.
She wanted Grievous to suffer.
The next several days were yet another exercise in frustration for General Grievous’ already notoriously irritable mind. Word got out, as he had hoped, that he had “heroically” come to the rescue of some of the local children, but it not seem to open any doors for him. Or, to be more accurate, any doors that he had wanted open. Instead, it had opened the floodgates.
Ponies were coming from far and wind to see him. It had not taken long for the word of the first ever alien to visit Equestria to get around. Not just in Ponyville, but across the nation and even beyond it. Many were scared of his appearance, but upon hearing inflated tales of his heroism in the Everfree, concluded that it was safe to be around him. And take pictures. And ask for autographs. And interviews. And write newspaper articles. And propose book deals. Soon it came to the point where the general hadn’t a moment’s peace the instant he stepped outside – or even in front of a window. The boldest ones would even follow him into the Everfree. That meant even his work on the escape pods had to be halted, lest they be located and similarly swarmed over. Who knew what damage hundreds of untrained idiots could do to irreplaceable technology? And to Grievous’ infinite ire, he couldn’t simply solve the problem by killing everyone.
Not that the thought wasn’t tempting.
To invite death here by starting violence would be pointless. He would die a wretched death far from his true enemies. The Jedi, if they ever heard of what had become of him, would laugh. His honored ancestors would look upon his soul in shame. The only death he could accept would be in proper battle against the filthy Jedi who had brought his homeworld to ruin. By these thoughts, he controlled his inclination to deal with the crowds that besieged him with indiscriminate murder.
So passed several of General Grievous’ first days on Equestria: caged in a crystal palace, bored, and irritable. As when Twilight had claimed that she had no spell that would allow him to read the local language, he opted to pass the time by attempting to learn the written language of Equestria for himself. Even with the computers slaved to his brain, it was very different from anything else he knew. Learning to read would take some time.
Eventually, it came to pass that even the prodigious stamina afforded to Grievous by his cyborg body was not enough, and he was required to enter one of his rare periods of sleep.
And when he did, there was a certain pony waiting for him.
General Grievous dreamed.
No, that wasn’t right. His name was not Grievous, it was Qymaen jai Sheelal, warrior of the Kaleesh. He was on his harsh homeworld, battling against revolting mantis-like Huk invaders. With his rifle in his hands, and the sword-wielding Ronderu lij Kummar at his side, the Kaleesh fought back against the ravenous insects. The greedy bugs sought only to conquer and pillage everything that was not their own. The warriors of Kalee were neither wealthy nor technologically advanced, but they were brave, and they fought for their homes and young ones.
And then Ronderu was dead, slain by the Huk far from her mate. Her body washed out to sea, beyond Qymaen’s reach. And then he was no longer Qymaen, he was Grievous, the undisputed leader of his people. His loss and sorrow fueling his wrath, Grievous led the Kaleesh to victory after victory against the Huk. Not only did he push them off of Kalee, he chased them back to their own planets. There, he visited the just revenge of his people on the insects, tearing down their cities, poisoning their waters, putting to death every single insect he could get his four-fingered hands on. Wherever his armies marched, the Huk were cast down and butchered like the filthy animals that they were.
The scene shifted. Grievous was on the verge of total victory, of driving the insects into oblivion. But then they came.
Jedi.
The Huk, cringing cowards that they were, had appealed to the Galactic Republic for aid. They had claimed themselves the victims of Kaleesh aggression, and they had greased the palms of so many of the Republic’s degenerate “leaders” that they had been believed. The Republic Senate had dispatched the Jedi and their paramilitaries to end the conflict. The Jedi, with their lightsabers and their Force, had proved unstoppable. The Kaleesh were forced back, and the subjected to devastating financial sanctions.
After the war, Grievous looked upon his people and saw only ruin. Their best and brightest lost in the war and their cut off, the Kaleesh were reduced to poverty and destitution. Grievous knew in his heart who was responsible: the Jedi. They had done this to his people. They and their Republic, which claimed to serve to serve justice but dealt only in corruption. When the InterGalactic Banking Clan offered to take on the planet’s debts in return for his service as their leg-breaker, Grievous out of desperation accepted.
The scene shifted again. Grievous was in his shuttle, the Martyr. Without warning, an explosion wracked the aircraft. Grievous felt his bones break, muscles tear, and skin catch flame before merciful unconsciousness hit.
Then he was floating in a tank, his legs and skin and hands gone. His body was kept alive only by extreme medical treatments. Count Dooku, a Jedi who had abandoned the Order for its failure to hold the Republic to any standard, explained to him what had happened. The corrupt Jedi, he said, had still feared that Grievous might one day seek righteous vengeance against them, and had tried to kill him by treachery. But by his indomitable will, he had survived.
Then San Hill, the chairman of the IGBC, was before him. He had a proposal, he said. He would return Grievous to life, with a new body. A better body. And all he asked in return was that the proud warrior of Kalee take his revenge against the Jedi and Republic that had so wronged him. Without hesitation, he agreed.
And so General Grievous was born anew.
But throughout all of his dream, Grievous never once noticed a certain dark blue alicorn in the distance.
Watching.
Far from where the cyborg general endured his troubled sleep, the Venator-class Star Destroyer Peacemaker floated serenely through the vacuum of space. Around the great behemoth flew patrols of Z-95 Headhunter and ARC-170 starfighters, ever alert for Separatist forces that could choose any moment to spring an ambush, especially this far in to the Outer Rim. Inside, thousands of clones in armor and uniforms worked around the clock to keep the ship’s many systems up to speed and battle-ready. Like all its kind, the Star Destroyer was a floating city unto itself.
On the command bridge of the Peacemaker, Jedi Council Master Obi Wan Kenobi was pouring over a holographic map of surrounding sectors, his brow creased into a frown and his hands stroking his neatly-trimmed brown beard. Several points were glowing on the map in front of him, and he was obviously considering the markings and what they meant.
“Something’s… not right,” he muttered, frowning.
“Sir?” asked Commander Cody, the clone trooper who had served as Kenobi’s second-in-command since early days of the Clone Wars.
“It’s Grievous,” Kenobi answered without looking away.
Cody nodded understandingly. Grievous and Kenobi had crossed blades on more than one occasion in the past. Kenobi had been instrumental in destroying the cyborg’s massive superweapon battleship, the Malevolence. In return, it had only been a few short months since Grievous had boarded and forced Kenobi to self-destruct his previous flagship, the Negotiator. Those were hardly the only times they had clashed – there had been battles on Saleucami, Kamino, and many other locales – to the point that Kenobi was said to be Jedi that Grievous hated more than any other.
“He hasn’t been seen on the battlefield in quite some time,” Kenobi continued. “That’s not like him at all. He doesn’t like to be away from the war.”
Cody didn’t quite grasp where his general was going, but he knew him well enough to know that the Jedi was using the clone for a sounding board.
“Do you think he might have been injured in battle, sir?” Cody asked.
“That’s just it,” Kenobi tapped a single point on the hologram, which magnified into a map of a single star system. “The last confirmed sighting of his flagship, the Invisible Hand, was here in the Ariadana system when it ambushed Master Ceidia’s task force. Since then, it’s gone off the grid.”
“Do we know why?”
“That’s the interesting bit,” Obi Wan answered. “According to the fightercraft that managed to escape the system, Master Ceidia’s ship - the Fateful - was hit by several waves of boarders before the battle’s end. We don’t know for certain that Grievous was with them in person, but it would definitely be his style.”
Cody nodded. He had been present when the cyborg general had boarded the Negotiator, after all.
“So, what? Did the ship self-destruct?” Cody asked, feeling embarrassed for the lack of knowledge. He made a mental note to check the after-action report later.
“No. In fact, it made an emergency jump to hyperspace, following no known route.”
“So, you think Grievous is dead, then?” Uncalculated hyperjumps could take you absolutely anywhere, and death was a very realistic possibility.
Kenobi shook his head. “No, I’m certain we would have sensed something if that had happened.” A slight glimmer appeared in his blue eyes. “But I do think he’s vulnerable. If the Separatists had found him, he would be back in the fight. We can conclude from the fact that he isn’t that Count Dooku’s henchmen have yet to locate him. I’m certain they’re searching.”
“I see,” Cody said.
“But if we can find him first…” Obi Wan ran his fingers through his beard once more. “Capturing General Grievous could be the key we’ve been looking for to putting an end to this war for good… and revealing its true architects.”
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All it takes is one bad day... Luna's seeing first hand the culmination of a life devolving into a series of them. So the question is... how much of this wrath is pure sadism, and how much is well and truly justified?
Is it just me or did Celestia's and Luna's relationship suddenly take an Obi-Wan Kenobi/Anakin Skywalker feel?
I think that Luna is the only one against General Grievous. Strange isn't it?
I found this story in the scroling titel thingy at the homepage. I think that means it is fetured.
I wonder what the ponies will do about Grievous, now that Luna knows his past.
Again, all that comes to mind with Luna's ridiculous rage boner here is 'so fucking what?'. When you're riding inside a several billion ton weapon, any man capable of pushing buttons and sitting at a keyboard is an enemy combatant, and just as dangerous as the guy pointing a gun at you. Is she having a fit because she's mad he would kill enemy combatants during a battle? Are you fucking kidding me, miss 'wipe out all life over jealousy'?
Her anger and affront just seem really forced. She's reduced to the level of a bratty kid throwing a tantrum because she doesn't like the new kid in class. It feels a lot like the author here is just reaching for reasons to have somebody dislike him, and it's really reaching.
The only other thing that really comes to mind as an explanation is that she's just xenophobic. She automatically moves against him because he's a different species than she's used to dealing with, and fighting against a species she knows.
Gaaaaaah too good want moar.
In the end, grievous is going to kill someone. Well, many people and/or ponies.
5519065
yeah but still...
Well if read closely, Luna is in Grivies dream, and she sees what have happened to him, what made him into what he is. And in the end he wished good for his own people, and as they say the road to hell paved out with good intentions.
I think she be devastated by the sheer amount of death she see in this said dream, be it inflicted by the Republic, or by the Separatist. And as Sarah Kerrigan would say, we are all covered in blood in the end, some more then another~
Celestia have the wisest approach here for the time being, as go and oppose him would result in a blood sheed right away. While wait out until either faction arrives that might be less than what Grievous could inflict much much more from now until either superpower arrives to claim him.
Best course of action for Luna and Celestia, not confront him at all and wait it out, and do some subtle preparations for a conflict to arise soon to minimise the possible damage.
I wonder will Lulu see things differently.
5518922
As with most villains that is what it takes, one really bad very horrible mind warping day to turn anyone into a monster. How it goes about varies greatly sure but the recipe is rather simple
Take one guy add a dash of -insert horrible fate or event here- mix well and then stand WAY back and watch the fireworks kiddies.
Grievous sadly got the fun job of being cooked...then re-heated...then some extra spice added...and reheated again.
Huh reminds me of Thanksgiving leftovers that get cooked over and over again for the following few days and just gets worse and worse...
5519116
5519175
5519295
There is the clones from Star Wars, made of flesh and blood, and there is the clones from the Mirror Pond, which were magical constructs and not really living beings, as stated officially by Hasbro people (but I don't remember where).
Even if not officially explained, do you think they would really have Twilight kill living clones of Pinkie in a show for children?
Obi-Wan has now made an appearance! I think he might soon come to Equestria soon.
5519423
Sure, everyone is entitled to his/her own opinion and reactions on things.
5518922
Couldn't it be both? Sadism is when an individual takes pleasure in the suffering of others. So could it be considered jusified to take pleasure in the suffering of those who have wronged you immensely?
5519035
He killed all those enemy combatants! He must be a villian
Does Luna know what war is, or not?
fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2011/294/7/f/emperor_luna_by_tess_27-d4djtkl.png
People seem to be hammering on Luna's reaction to the ship, and they seem to forget that Luna's reaction would be influenced by the different cultural background. We can say with near certainty that Equestria is a place with little conflict, and so people (or ponies) coming from such a background would naturally look down with disgust at some of the more brutal aspects of war (and even by our standards what Grevious did is still pretty brutal). It's like the way we would look down on the burning of entire cities during war when back in the in the early Iron age such practices were the norm in war, different backgrounds produce different reactions to events.
All right!
Obi-wan Kenobi is here :)
And we got to see the past of how Grevious became. Well Grevious XD.
I don't know it that's his actual pst but i'll take it :).
And now we wait for the one character I am wating for.
Anakain Skywalker. Hell yeah
5519035
... Or she comes from a culture where the bloodiest wars of all time lasted a few weeks and claimed a couple hundred lives. A culture where killing is is regarded as at the very best an extremely distasteful but necessary evil under the absolute worst of circumstances involving defense of self or others. Her people are peaceful herbivores; cutting someone down while they're helpless is about the most morally repugnant thing they can think of.
It's worth noting that Tirek, who is roughly the local equivalent of Satan, killed not one single person during his attempted takeover. Every one of his victims lived, and yet he's regarded as one of the worst of the worst. Now here comes this creepy alien military leader who in one battle slaughtered more people than ever died in any of Equestria's entire wars. Including those he was perfectly capable of taking captive.
Now do you see why she might find him offensive?
5519683
I would think that knowing someone had killed as many people as the General had would just negate all the feelings of wrongness from the act. Even in today's culture, If someone ended up killing, like, over 1,000 people, we're almost going, "Well done, chap!" You kill 1 person, you go to jail, you kill 5 people, you get executed, you kill 10 people, and they put you into a lead box and stare at you through a tiny hole, and more than 10, we just can't deal with.
If I ever met someone who had killed 1,000 people, I would be all, "Wow, you killed 1,000 people?! You must get up very early in the morning. Wake up, death, death, death, death, lunch, death, death, quick shower, death, death, afternoon tea..."
That Luna... my god... if she only knew that the republic really is corrupted and those soliders that were killed on the ship were clones... okay they have feelings and all, but, the republic made them just to fight and die for them e.e
Anywyas, good story! Love it
5519718
The republic didn't make them. The clones were commissioned by an old jedi, can't remember his name at the moment, and are in fact a hidden weapon of the Sith. Order 66 anyone?
5519683 how would that work? That's barely a battle and more a small skirmish! Real battles and sieges contained thousands! You needed that many because the opposing side might have that many... Oh... Are they only counting Pony deaths? Friggin ponies! So damn racist XD
5519683 That doesn't mean she doesn't come across as pretty infantile. Don't get me wrong, I really like the fic, it's just that she's trying way too hard to create a conflict in this.
She sees that both sides in that fight fought to the death, but is massively offended that he won? I understand that she hasn't experienced war, but to the point where she's offended that he wouldn't simply lie down and die in a war?
You. Are. AWESOME!!!!!!! That was a great twist. And wonderful writing like always.
Shit's going to hit the fan. I don't know why, but I feel it in the force.
Also good chapter.
5519683
I just want to mention that Tirek had been gathering his powers ever since Cerberus took off and ended up in Ponyville (Probably searching for Tirek) which had to be months if not a year or 2 between when he got discovered and when he escaped. So it's very likely he might have killed ponies and hid the bodies since they would have noticed ponies without magic in them and, unless it disappears on death as well, missing an Emblem. During the actual takeover he might not have killed anybody due to him wanting to rule them all though, excluding any collateral damage. Even if he hadn't been able to steal their magic until the point when he was discovered, there's still that first one that was in Celestia/Luna's 'dream' that we don't know what he did with the body since he was still trying to not be found, plus any others he might have found before Discord found him. That's just speculation though and something I felt I should mention (For one reason or another. Though I think I started rambling somewhere in here).
Has anyone here read the Darth Plagueis novel? I am considering doing a fic where Darth Plagueis deduces that Sidious plans to betray him and flees into the Unexplored Regions of space and ends up in Equestria.
I find Luna's reaction ok, because I think she's a nice character from a light-toned show, witnessing the scale of darkness reached by Star Wars' Clone wars.
5519943
There is no official statement (or none that I know of) that Tirek killed ponies. From what I understood, the ponies we see him drain from their magic are his first pony victims, which may be when Celestia and Luna have that vision, perhaps due to some magic connection with their ponies. Before that, he only drained magic from animals, as he wasn't powerful enough to deal with ponies yet.
5520084 Yeah, I do.
I am enjoy the crossover but I am having trouble with the whole Grievous guy. I know this is silly but I have no idea who he is (back than and still to this day
) Over all a nice crossover :)
General Grievous goes to Equestria? This is everypony's reaction...
It's normal to read Kenobi's lines in the James Arnold Taylor voice, right?
5520107
He's on the cover for goodness sake.
5519990 10/10 would read. If I recall canon, Sidious slays Plagueis the night after being elected Supreme Chancellor of the Republic, but unsure if this is correct.
If Luna doesn't have at least some sympathy for Grievous after seeing his dream, then she is a hypocrite. She almost did something horrble for even less of a good reason than Grievous. Nightmare Moon would have killed all Equestria for petty reasons, while Grievous' reasons were his people being slaughtered. Who's the true monster, huh Luna?
5519843
She's offended that:
a) He boarded a ship and killed thousands of people when he was perfectly capable of winning without killing at least some of them.
b) He lied to them about it.
5520547 They started it!
But seriously, one thing about ships like that is that just about everyone is an enemy combatant. How many buttons do you need to press to open an airlock or two, turn on some ray shielding or activate the self-destruct systems? It's a perfectly practical, if not wise, course of action. Hell, look at what happens in the movies when he DOESN'T go for the immediate 'kill them all' tactics! They instantly escape and crash his ship!
But yeah. Cellybeans is right. She is in NO place to get mad at him for lying.
5520329 BLAAAARRRRGHH
5520569
Luna doesn't know that. And in any case, he anger is mostly reflexive - he killed a lot of helpless people, therefore he is bad. She has absolutely no context for the idea of total war. In every single one of Equestria's wars, they always took prisoners. Killing them all was never on the table.
moar
I ponder if Luna will uncover that the bomb on Grevious' shuttle was actually of the Sith's doing, and he's being as mis-lead as everyone else in the war. Hopefully if she does it'll be soon, while Celestia and Grevious are conducting themselves in the correct way, forcing a stalemate is never a good long term solution.
5520833
It means what it says. Capturing General Grievous could allow the Jedi to finally uncover the ones truly responsible for starting the Clone Wars.
5520970 you absolutely do not have to watch the entire series to understand this
Again a nicely done chapter.
For the life of I can't understand why people are all up 'n' nuts about this whole thing with Luna? Quite unnecessary in my opinion.
Seeing as you have proven yourself to be a competent writer. 
And that I already had a good idea of how that part was going to play out.
In addition, nicely handled character progression. I also got to learn new Star Wars lore, which was fun.
And finally, OMYGOSH OMYGOSH OMYGOSH!!!!!! OBI-WAN KENOBI!!!!
Hope we get more chapters with him and Commander Cody.
You know what this needs? Clone troopers in full armor wearing party hats over the helmets and in full friendly conversation with all of the droids, also in party hats, whilst General Grievous and Obi-Wan Kenobi have a rap battle in the middle of it all. All set up by Pinkie, of course.
5521579 i would like to see the princesses and mane 6 fight grievous. they would get owned so badly
This needs to have grievous turning into a big softy (don't tell him I called him a softy) for all the ponies, where some crazy things happen