Marked

by Eisen

Chapter 25: Reaction

Twilight very quickly ran over and ducked into an alleyway, much to the surprise of a few passerby, but this was Canterlot, so everyone had somewhere to be.

Her mind raced quickly as she tried to think of a plan to get to the peak quickly, and avoid guards. Okay, the highest concentration of opposition should be near the city center, so I'll try as straight a path as I can manage.

Having lived in Canterlot much of her life, she knew her way around pretty well, and was able to navigate proficiently, thanks in part to her incredible memory skills. And so she traveled, looking on to the peak in the distance, so close above, and yet so far away...

After about ten minutes of just sneaking about and trying to cut that straight path, she realized how fruitless it was. Even if I get near the mountain base in the city, which, given the information of my plan, will likely be heavily guarded anyway... It would be difficult to make that ascension without being detected, even if cloaked. If I were a Trident operative, I would be waiting near the base of the mountain...

Her eyes scanned the city skyline to try and find some kind of high point or perhaps an unguarded building or something she could use as a springboard... and then her eyes fell upon a tall, porcelain building, so high up that her flight to the peak would be just a few minutes.

Celestia's Spire. It seemed a mad idea when it first popped into her head... but, as she thought about it, it seemed more like a stroke of genius. For one, it would be the last place they would expect a wanted princess to be near. For another, it was the best launching point towards the peak out of all the buildings in Canterlot. Finally, so long as she cloaked, she could fly straight up without detection rather than having to fly cloaked up an uneven mountainside, under surveillance from people who could detect her without visual.

Twilight nodded to herself and, after a short moment of thinking up the map of Canterlot in her mind, she headed out. She used a network of different alleyways to get where she needed to go, only crossing the streets when she needed to, and conserving energy in preparation of the flight. Unfortunately for her, conserving energy meant no cloak yet, and especially no coat/mane disguise again, not without about an hour of recharge time. It also meant traveling through the streets left her exposed long enough to grab the attention of two guards.

"PRINCESS TWILIGHT! HALT BY ORDER OF CELESTIA!"

She bolted. Under normal circumstances, one may try blending into a crowd... but a purple alicorn moving in an odd pattern did not permit something so simple.

She ran. She ran from alley to alley, wondering how a royal arrest order could possibly have been issued already. Unless they already had one out for me the moment I was brought to the Trident HQ... She knocked over some garbage cans and such, just to try and slow them down, but apparently her brother's training regiment payed off, because they went on chasing, unfazed.

Eventually, Twilight tried something a bit more desperate. Wheeling herself around a tight corner, she twisted around and waited for the other two to arrive, and as they did, she slammed them quickly by projecting a wall force-field in front of them, and firing it forward. They were knocked out cold, and would wake up with a headache later, but would otherwise be perfectly alright.

The princess arrived near the base of the tower, after using her horn to detect local life signs, and prepared for her flight. Now, it would have been a snap to teleport up to her balcony, but she had no idea if Celestia was up there at the moment, and so attempting such a thing would be an enormous risk. Not that it matters much. She can sense energy levels without relying on visual. And so, she slowly let the cloak effect engulf her, as she sighed and launched herself straight upwards.

The air whipped past her face, and it took a lot to both focus on the invisibility cloak and fly, but the roof was fast approaching... closer... closer still! Everything was looking great, until she passed the balcony, and was halted quickly, being engulfed by a golden aura.

She decloaked with a gasp, as she was pulled just inside the tower, coming face to face with a very stern Celestia, and if there was one thing nobody ever wanted, it was to get a stern glare from the solar princess herself.

Celestia held the princess in place for a very tense moment, looking her over before speaking aloud with the words that Twilight had found to be more devastating than the glare... "I am very disappointed in you, Twilight, you did not heed my warning."

Twilight was clearly in a very bad situation, and needed to think about what to do, what to say. Trying to struggle would be fruitless: Celestia had more power than her! More power... Celestia's words suddenly clicked in her mind. "It wasn't your warning..." Twilight said quietly, almost to herself.

"What did you say?" Celestia asked sternly, her eyes narrowing as she levitated Twilight closer.

Twilight knew what to do, and she replied quickly. She respected her mentor so much... but this could be her only chance to escape... and only chance to gain another ally. "It wasn't YOUR warning! It was the Trident's warning!" she stated factually, not backing down.

She had learned much from Celestia, some of which was unintentional, like her personality traits. Celestia was fairly motherly, with the people's best interests at heart, and an absolute concern for the greater good. However, when she did act stern, she exerted her authority, and rarely was it met with anything other than submission... meaning that responding back as she did would be just the opening Twilight needed.

All that said, Celestia was in fact thrown off by not only the directness, but also her knowledge of the Trident. "But how--?" She never finished her question, as Twilight began to speak again.

Using what little time of initial confusion she had, the princess kept up the direct points. "You follow their orders because they have power over you! They have power over Luna! They control the whole kingdom!"

Celestia hardened her facial expression, and spread her wings wide in body language that denoted an exertion of authority. "No, Twilight. Luna and I control this kingdom!"

Twilight was nearly terrified, but had a small verbal opening, and fired back quickly with a powerful blow: "DO YOU?"

Celestia suddenly hesitated. She hadn't expected that one at all.

Twilight had little time, and so, with heart racing, yet face bold, she kept on. "Princess, I respect your rule so, so much, and it just burns me up inside to find that our two brave leaders are... puppets."

Something just snapped. Celestia lifted her chin and her horn brightened three fold. Her eyes began to glow solid white as she brought Twilight close. "PUPPET?" she asked, in a voice that could break lesser people.

Twilight made zero indication of fear. She should have, and every fiber of her being screamed that she should panic... but she kept a stone face, and a direct stare into the white abyss. Unmoving. Concrete. Resolute.

"A puppet?" Celestia started to glow less and less. Her wings began to droop, and her eyes slowly faded back to normal. The words really began to sink in. "A... puppet..." Celestia murmured, the aura around Twilight dimming a bit.

Celestia sat back, and looked down with a very contemplative expression. She still looked very regal, but Twilight was nevertheless concerned. This was different.

After a moment of deep thought, the solar princess spoke up, in a quiet, reserved tone. "I originally sacrificed some power to ensure true peace in Equestria, more safety for my subjects. But... since Reach has been in power... I guess a puppet is what I really have become..."

Twilight had never seen Celestia act like this before. Even with changelings, on the floor after defeat by Chrysalis, she kept a stubborn strong demeanor. However, this new mood was softer, almost more open. She felt bad for having cut her former teacher so deep.

"I suppose now, even my power to help my own subjects is limited," she somberly noted, staring off into the sky, through the balcony.

Twilight spoke up, equally soft, to offer a solution. "It doesn't have to be that way," she mentioned, cocking her head sideways a bit, despite her containment.

"It's worked like that for so long... and if I rebel, the Trident may hurt my people. I don't even know where their operating bases are located," Celestia explained, her horn just softly glowing with Twilight's containment.

"Not if they think you're still loyal," the princess offered, which drew the mentor's eyes up to meet hers.

She was silent for a tense moment, but seemed to straighten up a bit more, as she looked towards the door.

Twilight dropped to the floor, and breathed a quiet sigh of relief as she began to speak. "Thank you. Listen, I'm heading--"

"Stop, Twilight," Celestia stated, holding up a hoof without turning around.

Twilight understood perfectly. The less she knew, the better it could turn out. Something indicated that this little escape would be a one time thing until something was done to the Trident.

"Don't look back," the teacher said quietly, to which Twilight nodded, cloaked, and flew to the top of the spire.

Celestia quickly barged through the spire doors and shouted as she flew down. "Guards! Scour the city! Princess Twilight has escaped!"

Comments

[PiMan]

Most of the chapter is italic.

[56]

Twilight understands

wrong tense

[Corwyn]

YES!!! HOPE RISES ANEW!!!

[xoid]

Excellent story. Would I be correct in guessing that it’s two‐thirds complete?

P.S.: There are a plethora of minor errors in prior chapters that I can’t be bothered pointing out as that would require rereading those chapters since I was far too enthralled by the story to make a note of them. Which is surprising since even in the best stories almost any error I do spot tends to break my flow and my immersion as a consequence.

---

Corn: typos and other miscellaneous gripes.
Crusta: grammatical errors.
Crimson: homophone substitution and spelling errors.
De York: corrections.

much to the surprise of a few passerbyes

passersby

because they went on chasing, unphased

unfazed (phase and faze are two different words; the former is used to refer to a distinct stage or period of something that changes, whereas the latter refers to disconcerting somebody)

Not that it matterns much. She can sense energy levels without relying on visual.

matters (Also, you forgot to close your italics.)

meaning that responding back ash she did

as

"PUPPET?" She asked,

she

"but how--"

But

"Not if they think you're still loyal,"

Using what little time of initial confusion she had,

Unindent.

-"Don't look back,"

Nix the erroneous hyphen‐minus.

[Abalin]

7061911 Are those the true name of those colors because if so....They are incredibly strange but cool.

Also Love the story so far.

[Haysit T Ganaram]

CRUSHING verbal banter!

[Eisen]

7061911

This is some of the most thorough editing recieved to date, and this is extremely helpful! I now know that I have a bit more than just some random capitalization and typos to look out for. Thanks!

Oh, and as for your story length question, you're not far off with your estimate.

[xoid]

7061949
They are.¹ Colour names were taken from Chirag Mehta’s Name that Color program, which compiles the names from a variety of sources.

Corn (Corn is actually #E7BF05 but I used #E0C000 instead since it’s close enough and is easier to see against FiM Fiction’s blockquotes.)
Crusta (#FD7B33, have incorrectly used #FDB733 since a transposition error sneaked in.)
Crimson (#FDB733)
De York (#7AC488)

---

¹ Or at least, they’re meant to be. It would appear that at some point I’ve transposed the 7 and the B for crusta and it was, briefly, closer to yellow‐orange. Now I’m wondering how many posts I’ve made with that error… It can’t be that many since I literally copied and pasted the hexadecimal for each and the error probably slipped in when I incorrectly added a bold tag and didn’t simply Ctrl + Z it.

[Eisen]

7061911
6986538
6997296
7041473

I should really not attempt story editing at 01:00 or 02:00 in the morning.

[badninja]

I hope Twilight knows what she is doing. This plan of hers could blow up bad and she could hurt a lot of ponies.

[Hillbe]

tag teaming off the ropes....

meanwhile in Ponyville

img01.deviantart.net/24d3/i/2015/259/f/c/that_other_place_color_by_hillbe-d99t30d.jpg

[Eisen]

7067715
Oh, that. That would be writing it at around 2AM. I'll get right on the editing!