Questions Left Behind
Celestia sat on her throne and took her time while reading the document floating in front of her eyes. At least she pretended to read the paper as she had finished doing so minutes ago. After centuries of reading about every type of literature, from novels to taxes forms, from poetry to law edicts, she had learned to read any text that she didn't care about quite quickly. As for legal documents, she found out a long time ago that they are all the same; full of empty sentences and long unimportant words aimed more at displaying the knowledge of the writer than actually trying to convey any real meaning. A legal pony would be appalled by her attitude regarding their work and would claim that this specific kind of descriptiveness was required to prevent any juristic abuse. She would be the last to disagree, but it didn't make them any easier to read.
She signed her name at the bottom of the paper which promptly levitated to the bottom of the pile, replaced by a fresh new sheet, as inconsequential as the previous one. Her assistant, Moneypony, stood a step below her while holding the documents with her magic. Celestia suspected that she may have discovered a while ago that the Princess wasn't taking that long to read the legal words she presented her, but if she really did she never said a word about it. In some way, Celestia enjoyed the tranquility given to her by such redundant activity. Of course, she would be the last to admit that she believed anypony should be standing there to sign the endless supply of legal scrolls, but it also meant she was not required to listen or speak to anypony.
Time to herself, with her own thoughts was scarce and as time passed, she learned to cherish those rare moments. Right now, she could see the bright Sun in a cloudless day glowing behind the stained glass windows along the walls. She could drop the quill held by her magic and teleport away and nopony could stop her. She could fly up to the top of the mountain supporting the city and rest there, bathing in the celestial rays while being cooled by the breezes of the mountaintop. Most likely her assistant wouldn't even care about her boss running away for a day and would probably not even mention it. However, she would not do it, not now that the country needed display of stability more than ever.
She focused on the present paper, reading it as quickly as she could, skipping long and redundant words that were, in her opinion, placed only to fill the space. Once done, she feigned reading the paper multiple times, slower, as if each letter were of crucial importance.
No, she could not go. The resurgence of the terrorist unicorns - she still couldn't find a name to describe them properly, and if they in fact had a name, they never thought it important to tell other ponies about it - was the source of the greatest part of her concerns lately. She doubted that she had seen the last of them. Losing their leader or at least the pony she thought was leading the group, was a great blow most likely setting them back decades in whatever they were planning. More importantly, they lost a set of eyes and ears within the confine of the palace. She wasn't fool enough to believe that there weren't more ponies living or working in the castle that wouldn't do their bidding. It broke her heart to think that some ponies around her were not loyal, that some would try to hurt her if they had the chance.
Of course Shining Armor's investigation returned nothing. She never expected him to find anything as they had become expert in covering their tracks a long time ago. Her Captain of the Guard wasn't equipped, both in knowledge and experience, to deal with this kind of threat. However, she couldn't prevent him from flipping every rock and examining every blade of grass in Canterlot. Only her intelligence service - which officially didn't exist - was able to piece the coincidence together into a somewhat reliable, but completely hypothetical chain of events. While the adventure had a happy ending - for now, she reminded herself - Shining Armor's family could have died. He didn't take too well the fact that he could have lost all of them in an instant. He felt responsible for what happened and the Princess couldn't blame him for that. It was his duty to protect the city, but Celestia would be the first to admit that he had no tools to deal with enemies from within.
It had been over six months since they had taken a step out of the shadows, only to pull back to the darkness, deeper than ever. The events were enough for her own contacts across the nation to pick up a series of strange incidents that gave her a very short list of names to watch. However, she had no definitive proof of any involvement, only circumstantial evidences that pointed to the potential role taken by a number of ponies. Her lack of anything solid forced her to once again sit back and watch carefully.
Many things troubled the Princess as she kept replaying in her mind the different events of the last decades and tried to match them with the different information Twilight, Rarity, Azure or even Blueblood provided her. For one, the latter claimed to have been mind-controlled for as long as twenty years, maybe more, which was far longer than the time her agents had lost sight of the hidden group. There was always the possibility, from the chains of his own mind, that Blueblood didn't have a proper notion of the passing time, but Celestia doubted it could account for more than one or two years. Obviously Constellation needed time to reorganize and regroup them, but she couldn't believe it would take him so long. She remembered him as one of the most capable and efficient ponies she ever met. The gap of time between the two events was too large to account for a simple restructuring or retaking control.
She had hoped that they would really disappear eaten by the inertia of time, and she truly thought they were going that way up until they vanished from her surveillance. Obviously she was missing something important, something critical that happened a little over a decade ago. The old archmage was no doubt responsible for a large part of the renewal of their activity, but she had a strong feeling that it was only a catalyst and not a reason for their actions.
A more disturbing piece of the puzzle was the attack against Azure. Rarity, from her contact with the ponies behind the Guild of Designers, claimed the filly represented something wrong with the current state of the nation. From a conservative point of view, Celestia could understand that thought. Changes were never easy to accept for anypony that didn't live through a specific situation. The pain of another pony is always too easy to ignore. Even for her, the fact that her private school only used to accept unicorn was only natural and until she personally met a pony wronged by those established unofficial rules, she would have shrugged it off without a second look. However, that reason felt to her more like an excuse and way to rally other ponies to their cause. While Azure was more of a symbol than anything else, Luna's student was no real threat and her death would not change anything in the political status of the country.
From Azure's recount of her encounter with the diseased mage, the reason for the assassination was to reach for Princess Luna and for that the filly was only a means, not a goal. Had the attack succeeded, the Princess could honestly not say how her sister would have reacted. Celestia truly believed the Nightmare would never return, Luna was not a pony to make the same mistake twice, but there was the distinct possibility, had the pain been too great, that Luna wouldn't have stayed in the castle. Her sister's mental stability was of great concern to her and under too much stress Luna could very well leave for some exile to cope with the pain. If that was to happen Celestia's political standing would be greatly damaged. She could easily believe what Constellation said, but concluded that while it was most likely the truth, it was obviously not the whole truth.
From her own experience with Constellation, her first thought after learning of his existence was that he staged that attack to test the water. He was no pony to act without knowing and he may not have been confident enough in his own troops to target a pony of higher standing. A pony like him would have a contingency plan for anything and only because he greatly underestimated Twilight did she emerge victorious from their encounter. In that respect, it was the complete secrecy of the magical seal she imposed on her student that saved them.
One possibility Celestia contemplated was that all those reasons were true and each tailored for a specific part of the pony society. That, she thought, would more fit Constellation's personality. What frightened her was the high probability that there were more hidden reasons for choosing the filly as a first target. It would mean that other unknown forces were at play and could perceive the filly as a threat, even if she couldn't see how that could be. Or worse, that everything that happened so far was according to Constellation's plans.
She sighed as she reminded herself not to give in to paranoia.
She was about to sign the next paper when the doors at the far end of the room slammed open. One of her guard - an earth pony which name eluded her - dashed in. "News from Northern Equestria!" he said as quickly as he was running before remembering his place and bowing in front of his majesty. "Huh... your Highness!"
She noticed her assistant levitated the legal documents away and walked off the throne without a word, as if interruption of this kind was customary. The Princess wondered if anything could surprise or startle her.
"Yes?" Celestia asked as the soldier removed his helm.
"I'm simply to tell you, it has returned," he replied enigmatically.
The Princess understood the reference right away, as there wasn't anything that could return in the frozen wasteland that covered most of the northern part of the country, except the only thing, or city, that used to be there. It was the only thing that could return there as nopony, beside a small selection of her guards standing watch, would be crazy enough to try to live there.
She turned to her personal guard on her right. "Find Princess Cadance and Shining Armor," she ordered.
"Yes, your Highness," the pegasus replied before dashing out of the room to carry out his order.
As the guards left the throne room, she levitated a piece of paper and quickly wrote on it.
My dearest Twilight,
You must come to Canterlot at once.
Princess Celestia
As she watched the paper burn in her magical fire, sending it along her magical bond to Spike, a strange thought occurred to her; that Cadance might have something to do with the terrorists' attack. She frowned at the thought because she couldn't clearly see any logic behind it. Her subconscious was trying to tell her something, but she couldn't understand exactly what.
She shook her head to clear her mind. Obviously the pink Princess had nothing to do with the attack. In some way, she was as naive as Twilight could be. She didn't even question Celestia when the Princess asked her to act as foalsitter for a complete stranger, a purple filly Celestia spotted at a Sun ceremony - years before Twilight became her student - and wanted to keep an eye on. There was no way she would ally herself with anypony that had intentions to harm another. What was her brain trying to tell her? Could she have been part or even the trigger of some of those events?
She couldn't see how that would be possible as Cadance was a fairly new Princess and had no decision in any of Equestria's politic. She had no power, didn't want any and claimed it more than once to the news-ponies. It was by her own decision that she stayed away from any political responsibility. She felt she wasn't ready for that and didn't want to take part in it, and for that Celestia couldn't blame her. She knew that wouldn't always be the case as she recognized the hidden symbolism behind Cadance's cutie mark. A pony doesn't simply get a crystal heart as cutie mark without some deeper meanings related to it. It was most likely that the events taking place in the northern part of the country would change her stance on politics.
It was almost twelve years ago that Cadance became a Princess, and only by title. It occurred only because that young pegasus orphan gained her horn from defeating some strong love-spell user and mastering the magic of love. Cadance had no royal blood, but Celestia adopted her because she could see the potential in the young filly and...
Twelve years?
Celestia frowned once again. Her mind kept telling her there was a connection while she truly believed it was only a coincidence. How could those two events be linked? Could the unicorns be responsible for releasing Sombra? Even they never displayed any wishes for such self-destruction. It was always a possibility that the old Emperor could be victorious against Celestia and Luna since they were not linked to the Elements of Harmony anymore, but it would leave the unicorns with a leader far more vicious and completely closed to any kind of compromise. If they truly wanted that to happen, they would have targeted the current bearers of the Elements, but they did not.
The Princess closed her eyes in an attempt to focus on her thoughts. She would have much to analyze in the coming days, but for now she would have to convince Shining Armor to leave his investigation and follow his wife to the frozen north. It shouldn't be too hard, but he won't be happy about it. Telling him his sister would soon join him would no doubt push his instinct of big brother to be there for her protection.
The return of the Crystal Empire should have been cause for joy, but somehow she didn't think it was for the best. Something told her it couldn't have happened at a worst moment. Political instabilities could only serve her adversaries. She only wished that in the meanwhile she could discover the different chains linking all those events together, and hopefully before they would decide to once more step out of the shadows.
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This arc of the story is finally over. Took a while! Been really slow lately.
That extra chapter was done to bridge to the next series of events, that while related and have the same actors, are not in the same time frame and have different events taking place.
Once again, huge thanks to Shutaro for his proof-reading and feedback.
NICE ending as well as some MASSIVE openings for more where ever you decide to take anything if you do
3098762 I'm working on it. No idea when I will feel it good enough to release it.
And once again on research for an artist for a cover image.
3098726
It's a small price to pay to get a preview of the next chapter.
And I still think Celestia is unfair in judging the laws and law-ponies by the readability of their texts. It's not like she has to sign anything, after all.
3098807
It's in the nature of lawyers and lawmakers to make the language as impenetrable as possible. It was like that a thousand years ago; it's like that now.
appalled.
Guard
like
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I freaking love this story, and the one before it. It's well written, and has one of my favorite OCs, whose been a massive bout of inspiration. I can't wait to see what you do with the Crystal Empire, and if you go eventually with the MMC route. If Twilight would bring Azure Tomato with unique / interesting results?
3099070
Alternatively, if it were multiple ponies, each holding the title of "Captain of the Guard", they would be the "Captains of the Guard".
3099218
True, but in the MLPverse it's only shown one Captain at a time, and there was no current lead up to multiple Captains. Although if such a thing is introduced next story than I can see where Captains in context to the story would make sense.
3099227
Perhaps, but you're imagining a military structure with Captain being the highest rank. Captain, while an impressive rank, might not be the highest. It is open to interpretation, I think.
All I was doing in my previous comment was bringing up a common error in the pluralization of compound titles. Another example being if you have more than one individual with the title of "Surgeon General", then you have a group of "Surgeons General".
3099070 Thanks for the first two errors you spotted, fixed and updated.
However, I'm sure it's the word "live" I wanted for the last one. If you don't live through a specific situation, you don't have the same perspective as one who did.
3099243 As for the Captain vs Captains, my understanding was that Shining was the Captain of Celestia's personal guard. Like there's probably only one commanding officer for the president's personal guard. Or like an officer commanding a ship is always named "Captain" regardless of their rank. "Colonel of the Guard" doesn't sound very good. In truth, we might not know what rank Shining had.
3098937 They play a very important part in our civilization... but we don't have to like it.
3098807 I think I did tone down that idea of Celestia disliking law documents a bit. Because something is necessary, vital even, doesn't mean you have to enjoy it.
3099325
If live ... might it sound better to say live through a specific situation?
And yes the Royal Guard is a branch of the Military, like the Buckingham guards are part of the Royal Armed Forces. But while implied that Shining is Captain of the Guard, and there is only one of that rank. We aren't really given a good insight to their military. Which is sad. We need an MLP FIM War!!! InVerse.
3099428 Quite better.
I always assumed Equestria had a fully fledged army and what we saw so far is only the "royal guard" part with a little bit of the air force, the Wonderbolt being similar to the Blue Angels. I'm using a OC "General" in one or two of my random short story. He was pissed how the "royal guards" were pointless in defending the capital against the changeling invasion.
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500 likes.
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/dance
Great
Huh. I never realised the the Royal Guard that informs Celestia about the Crystal Empire was an earth pony.
Is..is..there going to be a trilogy formed here?
wat
3102916 Hmm... The "be" probably doesn't belong there.
3102144 That's the current plan.
Sweet, incoming trilogy!
...
Are you trolling me?
I ignored this story when I first saw it. I also ignored the the previous story. I thought that both stories were poorly-written. And then I actually took the time to read said stories.
Mind = BLOWN
This is why one should Never Judge a Book by Its Cover.
P.S WRITE MOAR OF THIS AWESOMENESS
3103065 3103115 Thanks a lot.
I just hope you saw some grammar improvement between the two stories, as I think my editor (Shutaro, who started helping on the second one) is doing an amazing job considering the material I'm giving him.
I know it's no excuse, but I don't speak English.
I keep learning and improving, but it's a slow process.
3103606 I see LOTS of grammar improvement. And the "not speaking English" thing is perfectly acceptable. I speak English and yet spelling and grammar are eating at my brain,
Still, can I haz new chapter?
3103606 will azure learn to perform magic on her own, is it even possible for her to do that?
3172948 My goal is not to change established canon, but to play within those limits. On top, there's lot that is not defined properly and can be "adjusted". It's generally accepted that all pony got some magic, but only unicorn can externalize it properly.
For pegasi it makes them fly faster and allow them interact with clouds.
As for earth ponies, it's the strength and the longevity. At least, that's what people like to say because the only really old pony of the show is Granny Smith.
From a story point of view, it was a somewhat failure from my part to allow her to cast spells in the first place, even with the help of a unicorn. The failure being that it wasn't needed for the story to move on. She could have given Twilight some spell diagrams and it would have worked just as well and it would have anchored her better as being talented in designing them.
So, I don't plan on making her cast spell.
3175730b ahh ok
3177771 no prob. that's about all i saw.
3177779 Bring them in if you see more!
that's it?
3189998 What is what?
3190592 The end. Kinda wanna BEG for a sequel or something.
3190666 Because that's what the last chapter is, a bridge to the sequel... I'm working on it. I separate my stories into logical structure.
3190935
YYYEEEESSSS!!!!!
3191306
^
And so a unique story ends on a sequel hook
. Still it was interesting, unique, a nice twist using an earth pony for magic work, and the hidden group was cool. It would have been amazing if the sequel to this didn't get an abortion, but ... at least we got two good stories out of it.
I could be wrong, but were you maybe looking for the word deceased there?
Well, Constellation's belief that the council were Celestia's puppets, and Celestia's belief that the council were the mystery shadow organization's puppets proves something big was going on.
Too bad this series was never finished.
10433092
Theres another story linked to this one, its called fighting destiny
10433946
But it was never finished. Barely started, even.