Letters From a Friend

by moviemaster8510

9/20/15

Twilight,

It unfortunately does get worse from there. I know it wouldn’t be fair to you (and it certainly wouldn’t be fair to the countless casualties of the next hundred and fifty years) to sugarcoat this fact.

Just to prep you for what’s ahead, there’s going to be two globe-spanning wars, an attempted genocide, a nearly half-century arms race that could have spelled the literal end of the world, groups of people fighting and dying for their basic human rights, and honestly just a slew of other things that I can hardly fit in this letter.

If your next question is how are things today for my world, all I can truly say at that point is better. Better than they were before, but still a long ways to go from ideal.

I’m certain the textbooks can clue you in on all of this better than I could, but our cultural climate that stemmed from the parts of our history you still have yet to read are precisely why I’m wary about sharing your existence with others of my kind. I can hope in the hopefully-near future, we’ll have matured as a species to be welcome you ponies as warmly as we’ve welcomed each other, and ultimately, I’d like to think most humans are just like me and want to make peace and friendship, but it’s clearly not a risk I’m willing to take just yet.

If this letter scared you at all, you’re more than welcome to stop where you are and save yourself something far more horrifying than Stephen King could pen up.

I don’t mean to scare you, especially out of our writing to each other, but I feel that, as your friend, and as a somewhat ambassador to my kind, I owe you as much of the truth as you’re willing to handle.

I really do hope to continue writing to you, Twilight, and I hope you can forgive me if this letter or anything else you read that I’ve sent hurts you. Please know I’d never want that for you.

Sincerely,
Toby

P. S. I was just about to put this letter in an envelope when I stopped and thought I could end it on a more positive, so I’ll let the words of another do that instead (and you’ll learn about him soon enough down the road too).

“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it—always."

— Mahatma Gandhi

Author's Note:

Hey everyone, so sorry about the sheer lack of activity on this story. I’ve currently been roughing through a part in my other ongoing story that had been getting a bit monotonous, and I wanted to finish that off before I got back into this. I’m still working on the other story rather extensively (especially that it’s almost 90% to completion at this point), but the hardest part of it seems to have been finished up, so I hope to put some time into this story more a little more often now.

Thanks for your patience after such a dramatic pause.

Comments

[Golden_Reflection]

That is just fine, as long as you do what you can, We will be happy as will everyone else, I believe.

[Viper Pit]

Fun fact their was a global flu during ww2 that had more casualties then the war itself some may know it as the Spanish flu or even the forgotten plague but it effected a lot of lives

[howard035]

I'm loving this story, but the whole "humans are far too violent for ponies to handle" trope has kind of worn thin at this point.

Let's remember that Equestria is the nation with a secret agency that abducts enemies of Equestria and quitely locks them up in a black-site prison named Tartarus, and said agency was shut down for political deniability by Celestia. A world where a violent conqueror who lived up to Blitzkrieg (German for Lightning War) in a literal sense and was stopped only a year ago, and a few months ago a world war almost started over some missing students.

Has Twilight not been sharing recent history of her own nation with our human protagonist? Because if she has, he'd be a lot less reticent of sharing recent human history with her.

[Silentwoodfire]

Ahhh Gandhi.....

I dare you guys to look him up in the Civ 4 steam reviews. I DARE you all!

[moviemaster8510]

9227389 Alright, be sure to call me when any of those events reach a death-toll in the millions.

[RustDust]

I'd be interested in seeing Twilight giving her world's history to even the atrocity odds. Though that's up to your discretion since you may need to take some liberties with the lore and whatnot. Maybe if Celestia ever gets in on this then she can reveal that Equestria has had similar incidents but she censored all of them out of fear, but after hearing about human society may reconsider.

[Von Snootingham]

9227485
Our words are backed with NUCLEAR WEAPONS.

[Seirs]

9227358
Actually that was at the very end of WW 1 in 1918. But yeah that was another bit of nasty on top of all that.

[Viper Pit]

9227797
Thanks for the correction

[AlanSmithy]

9227389
Hey when humans stop being garbage, maybe stories will stop talking about how garbage we are.

[howard035]

9227964 Sure, but ponies are just as garbage, and it apparently doesn't stop them from being shocked at our history.

[AlanSmithy]

9227971
No they aren't. Their worst examples are pale imitations of idealized versions of our history. At least generally. Maybe the canon of this story is darker but even that's nowhere close. To say nothing of modern atrocities.

[howard035]

9227996 I'm not sure what you mean by "modern," since the examples Twilight is so shocked by happened many decades ago on earth, and the examples I brought up happened a few months ago in Equestria. And come on, "modern" atrocities aren't really worse than atrocities that were committed since the dawn of time (and apparently also happened in Equestria back then), except for scale and our ability to keep better records. Genghis Khan killed 10% of the world's population back in his day. And around the same time pure hatred from the three tribes of ponies was so terrible it led the survivors to emigrate to a new continent.

[Allsmiles]

(I both approve of him not sugar-coating things, and of him leaving that positive message from Gandhi... one of the few men we respect and know for peace, instead of violence.)

[Yutah123]

“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it—always."

— Mahatma Gandhi

Wait, can this possibly be real? Eep! My suggestion from “Moon 3063, Day 27” was used! Or maybe the author already had it in mind, but regardless, I’ll still be happy.

And while I would have liked a little mention, that’s not the point. I think.

9200222

[Drachos]

9227389
Here is something (specifically 2 points)you are not considering.

First, Equestria has or had a clear isolationist policy. The hippogriffs are Equestria's closest ally, yet Celestia isn't aware they have already fallen to the storm king... and in fact based off the state of Hippogriffia did so a long time ago.

This is reinforced by the fact that every book about Griffonstone mentions its former glory. Twilight, a major scholar, has a view of that nation that's decades out of date.

The other fact is that its implied that until the return of Nightmare Moon, Equestria had, had 1000 years of peace, and while that peace has ended, no threat to the kingdom has lasted more then a Week, and in fact excluding Tirek, no threat had lasted more then 48 hours.

The only thing even CLOSE to the Nazi's or Slavery (Sombra's reign over the Crystal Ponies) happened over 1000 years ago and is IMPLIED to have ended very quickly by Celestia and Luna,1 year MAYBE a decade, tops.

And the evidence of this event is not public knowledge. Twilight knew nothing of Sombra or the Crystal Empire.

The over a Century plus of the Atlantic Slavery with literally common public support of the practice is a very different beast.

As for world wars....the Windigos event is similar and we have a limited time scale on that event...except it happened literally 1 time, the kill rate is lower AND it happened over well over 1000 years ago. Before Discord, Celestia or Luna.

We by contrast have had 5. First the Mongol invasions, (Consuming Asia, Europe and Africa), the 30 years war (Europe, and South America), the 7 years war ( Every Continent INCLUDING North America, the only World War where a battle occured on North American Soil.), World War 1 and World War 2 (Both taking place in Europe, Asia and Africa.)

The MINIMUM total death toll from these wars is 100,000,000 lives lost. Most of that is caused by WW2 and the Mongol conflict under Genghis Khan, but the Windigos event is a 1 off event over a millennium ago, that had no where near the death toll and STILL was enough to end all hostilities between the 3 tribes....forever.

So, yeah, when viewed through that lens we are barbaric. Through a combination of having gods as rulers, propaganda and isolationism, to even a scholarly pony like Twilight, war and tyrany for Equestria ended in the equivalent of 1018 AD.

[BronyWriter]

an attempted genocide

Several, really.

[Genesis1212]

Love will win in the end Twilight!

[TerrorCooper]