Fifty years ago today, there was not a war. It was not one of the longest and bloodiest struggles ever known to ponykind. It did not claim the lives of hundreds upon thousands of ponies.
There is no such place as Shetland. It could not have been Ground Zero for Operation Petrichor because it never existed.
The Cloudsdale Massacre is a cheap horror flick, nothing more. Chemistry has no solid application in combat. The Non Sunt Dii has not existed since the first days of the Royal Sisters' reign.
Celestia is perfect. Celestia has never made mistakes. Celestia is not a coward.
Chapters (1)
6626343 Good suggestion. Should it be tagged for gore as well? I'm afraid I myself am quite desensitized to this sort of thing.
More? It was a hard read but worth it.
6646990 Hard read? How so? Was it a flaw with the format, the writing style, or was it just uncomfortable subject matter?
And be honest. Criticism is always welcome in this house.
6647055 Hard on the feels. It was very sad. Great story!!! Just sad.
6647137 Well, in that case, I apologize for nothing. Which part punched you the hardest?
Have no idea how I would do a sequel to this, though.
6647154 The kids and the gas. His end. Her sadness. Prequel maybe? Tell what/why lead up to lead that.
6647213 Hmmm...
I might consider it.
Glad you enjoyed the story. And by enjoyed, I mean felt the feels.
Decent read.
6664912 Decent comment.
Perfect
6696545 Thank you!
6696556 The rest of the fic is nito, but that bit of dialogue really sold the story for me, eh.
It tack a moster to kill , It tacks something worse to cover it up.
7347397 Not specifically a reference to Vietnam, no. It was just the most horrifying way to exposit about the need for gas masks.
i hope that the tear on that thumbs up doesn't make it unacceptable
7779131 Far from it. I welcome it all the more.
I liked this story (as I tend to do for stories of yours), but I’d like to mention in particular how the tone changed throughout the story. At the beginning, his living a solitary life feels almost ordinary, save the incident where he falls on his side. It makes for an interesting contrast to the section of the story from when he enters the hallway, where juxtaposition of the past and the present is used (I’m sounding far more poetic than I ought to be here).
The way Shell Shock is described near the beginning, especially the second paragraph, reminds me of a children’s storybook in a way. Maybe it’s the present tense, or maybe it’s the simpleness of the sentence structure in some parts. Either way, it’s unusual compared to the second section (that starts from “Shell Shock's trip to the market is uneventful.”)
So trauma, especially as experienced in dreams, transcends even memory loss? An intriguing justification for why the soldiers are left to remember the war instead of having the option to forget it. I suppose it could be that memory loss spells are limited in that they can’t remove the emotions that memories evoke, or maybe dreams can tap into memories even after they’ve been removed?
This was one of the two parts, the other being the pink mist scene, that evoked an emotion from me (this is coming from a person who’s quite desensitised to grim stories like this). It’s incredibly saddening to realise that, due to the memories he’s been harbouring for most of his life, he’d rather die right there and now than live any longer. His euthanasia that happens soon after honestly makes for a bittersweet ending and it wraps up the story in the perfect way.
And there’s my two bits.
Damn. That's a monster if there's ever been one. The mistakes made can only become learning if you allow them to be remembered. What she did only invites more of it in the future.
I have to wonder, what would Twilight do if she remembered the truth? Not only about the war, but about the cover up, the brainwashing? Over a hundred years after, would she insist the truth to be revealed? What if another war broke, for the same reason? Would the princess of friendship allow for it to happen again?
A prequel would be a story of war. But a sequel, one about the harsh truth of history. Those that don't learn with their mistakes shall repeat them.
"Since what? Not as if there's anything special about today." The words have the venom of a viper, a thought that makes Celestia consider the bourbon laid out between them.
and Right on cue, the snake venom does its job.
But on a more serious note, with poison/chemicals intended to kill and everything being rapidly developed (in the past), could she not have picked a better one or just shot a bolt of magic through his brain to make it painless and less obvious she came there to kill him?
7888085 Yes. She could have.
Solid fic! I honestly expected there to be more overt traces of tyrant!Celestia tropes with how the description was, but was surprised that it was far more subdued. Shell Shock is aptly named of course - perhaps a little bit too much, I mean wouldn't be named for PTSD (unless there's another meaning ponies could apply to the term) make you not want to sign up for whatever hell he got himself into? I would have liked to see some more of his friends/flashbacks or other things, but nevertheless this was still enjoyable at its current length.
Celestia, you stupid fool, you have made the same mistake again and again, and yet you still do not learn! I could actually see this as canon, given how subtly authoritarian Equestrian society is. The manipulation of history on a level that even Big Brother could not hope to reach is chilling. My only complaint is the lack of background on the conflict, how it got started, why the anti-Equestrian forces were fighting, that sort of thing. Aside from that, I couldn't find anything wrong with it. Excellent work.
I take it that this story are made to evoke feeling from the reader. This story have succeeded then.
That was precision nuke strike against my feels. This passage brought many feels for me.
These particular clauses imply a lot of the many horror that may happen in this story. Especially how war reduce a living being and its life and death into number. This passage also particularly scary for me because the one saying it is Twilight.
Congrats, King.
I kinda feel like this lost its way halfway through. The meditation on a veteran dealing with PTSD was a nice, sad slice of life segment, but then Celestia shows up, and... well, I'm not a fan of stories where she's done terrible things and covered them up like this. :/
Remember Auschwitz and how even the Allies tried to cover it up. Good story...but unfortunately I will not be able to find it within my self to recommend this to someone else, nor to read it again. Remember Auschwitz.
7347397
I was thinking more WW1, After All, the Story was Published Nov 11