Conversation 31: Rarity
Fluttershy stared at Mary intently. “You don’t seem to be eating well, Mary,” she said in a concerned tone, sending shivers of fear down my spine.
She was wearing the new dress I made her for the wedding, the first actual entry in the Spirits of Hearth’s Warming line after Mary’s rushed prototype, in soft, very subdued green that goes so well with her mane, and I was worried I have finally crossed a line with my art, creating something ponies were never meant to wear.
On one hoof, this was the first time I have seen Fluttershy actually desire to wear anything, her freaky knowledge of sewing notwithstanding. She wanted to wear that new dress – not because she needed it for warmth, nor because it was expected of her to be dressed for the occasion, but because she enjoyed it. I had no more doubt whatsoever that the project is a success, one that will influence the world of fashion for generations to come.
But on the other hoof… Fluttershy’s Stare has always been a fearsome ability that I had some difficulty understanding, even though Twilight tried to explain how it works, citing numerous historical examples. Some poorly studied aspect of cutie mark magic. Coupled with the variable light pattern of the dress, even regular, perfectly innocent glances could now occasionally transmit the full brunt of this crushing motherly authority if Fluttershy had any reason to care about you. Sweet, kind Fluttershy cares for everypony, even when she is too shy to open her mouth about it. This scared the living daylights out of me twice this morning alone, and only Mary, mirroring the green with her gray, appeared entirely unaffected.
“Eating is bad for you,” Mary retorted didactically, raising the fork with a cherry tomato on it. Her way of dealing with Fluttershy’s concern was, evidently, to break her train of thought with absurdities. “It makes you satiated.”
Fluttershy’s eyebrows went up. “Isn’t that a good thing?”
“Not really,” Mary grinned. “It instills a false sense of well-being and hope for the future.”
Fluttershy froze with her mouth open for a moment. “It’s not healthy to be so negative,” she admonished finally.
“Maybe not,” Mary agreed. “But I find that it increases survival rates rather dramatically, when it doesn’t kill you.”
The real Princess Cadance proved to be one of the nicest ponies I have ever had the pleasure of meeting, even despite the ordeal she had just suffered through. With the events of that fateful night now firmly behind us, Pinkie Pie was now busier than ever, as her wedding reception doubled up into “Victory Celebration Party” and the guest list ballooned to the point where they were considering abandoning it entirely, to have the celebration open for any and all comers. Certainly, the city needed that, after that dreadful invasion.
Applejack, faced with the need to do much of the work involved in catering all over again, and a lot more of it this time, was likewise occupied, and had to summon even more cousins to help. I never imagined a family can possibly be so large. Rainbow Dash was out flying circles around the city tirelessly, still upset about her role in the events and blaming herself unjustly for the perceived failures. Spikey spent day after day hanging around Princes Cadance and Shining Armor, taking over much of Twilight’s duties, while Twilight herself was dealing with the shock of the events in her usual manner, by burying herself in a library. None of us had succeeded in prying her out of there so far.
But my and Fluttershy’s work was mostly done, and since we found ourselves with few opportunities to assist our friends in their tasks, we had a moment to relax and enjoy our lunch together with Mary. And while Mary was politely pretending she is enjoying it, the nagging dread was unmistakable even in a creature as different as a human.
“You don’t have to fear, nopony is going to hurt you,” Fluttershy insisted softly.
“That’s not it, Fluttershy. Hanging around Rika for long enough kind of dulls the experience,” Mary replied cryptically. “But most of this massacre happened because I wasn’t negative enough, which was a mistake.” She stared towards Fluttershy, and Fluttershy pulled back a tiny bit, folding her ears. “I’m used to thinking that correcting my mistakes is the way to go, and I don’t have that option here.”
“Some mistakes can never be corrected, darling,” I commented. “You apologize and move on. It is far more important that you wished everypony well, for most right-thinking ponies, that is more than enough.”
Mary turned to me, almost stabbing me with the glance of her golden eye. “The range of mistakes that can be corrected expands a lot when you have a time machine. I never accounted for the fact that once Chrysalis is faced with the Elements of Harmony, killing Shining Armor is the easiest way to disable them. And I did not notice this, because I imagined that every creature in Equestria is inherently less capable of murder than I am. In more accessible terms, I failed at what you would call my special talent.”
Oh. That did put things in perspective and made me shudder mentally. Just what sort of twisted horror story really is going on in her head?
“What would have happened if we didn’t know anything?” I wondered.
“A miracle,” Mary replied simply. “But a very different one. Twilight voices her concerns, but finds no support among you. Chrysalis manipulates her into making a public scene, and once everypony turns away from Twilight because of it, tosses her into one room with Cadance.”
Fluttershy gasped in shock, covering her mouth with her hooves. I remember that this was exactly the eventuality that scared her the most.
“They escape, arrive just in time for the vows,” Mary continued, “and Cadance breaks the mind control on Shining Armor with the power of love. Then they use it to fuel his shield spell and expel the entire changeling army out of the city in about three seconds. Don’t ask me how that works, by the way, I have no idea.”
Frankly, I don’t either. But while I am versed in love and romance, I’m not the alicorn princess of such, and I would really hate having to cut wing slits into all my dresses. “Surely, there are a lot of ways this miracle could have failed to be,” I noticed. “What makes you think it was possible at all?”
Mary stabbed the fork into her salad and left it standing. “This is not my story,” she intoned, looking at the fork. “Before I arrived, it was a story of the rivalry between Twilight and Trixie. Which could not have happened if this wedding failed, so I knew that without me influencing it, the wedding would have turned out well.”
“I don’t know, I think it’s shaping up nicely,” a voice said behind my back. Turning around, I saw the drab black of Rika’s dress, and my senses were assaulted with the faint aroma of her horrible perfume. I really need to talk to her about that, but truth be told, I don’t have the courage. Especially after hearing what Twilight had to say about her.
Mary stared at Rika’s face. “Flash Sentry.”
The only reply she got was a raised eyebrow.
“You just went and dropped a magical girl into the mix, consigned a pony to never ending unforeseen consequences, and that still wasn’t enough. I told you, that when this mess is over, I will start every conversation with listing the ponies who died,” Mary stated, pointing a finger at Rika. “Royal Guard, private Flash Sentry.”
A creepy grin spread across Rika’s face. “Could you repeat that?”
Instead of answering, Mary reached for her fork, clutching it in her hand as if she were about to stab somepony with it.
“Yes, I just like the sound,” Rika elaborated, her grin growing wider. Evidently, she could not hold it anymore, because she started laughing. If you can call that sound laughing. Even the horrible, melodramatic laughter of the changeling queen wasn’t so unnatural and broken.
“So you’re telling me,” she said, when she was finally done, which couldn’t have come sooner, “that the only pony who actually died was Flash Sentry? The waifu-stealer? The ship sinker? The most universally hated character in the entire tree?”
“What are you talking about?” Mary mumbled, letting go of her fork in confusion.
“Flash Sentry,” Rika said, leaning over my head and nearly brushing my horn with her chest, pressing herself towards Mary’s face, “is Twilight’s designated love interest. While he is even more decoherent than the changelings, most iterations have all the personality of a cardboard box, and at least half of them are designated victims. Guess why.”
Mary choked for words.
I took it as my cue to softly poke Rika with my horn to get her to move. “Do you mind not doing that?” I said.
“Sorry,” Rika grinned at me, before straightening out.
But I wasn’t done, not by far. “Not only you come and go without even a greeting, Rika, that would probably be expecting too much,” I said, getting off my chair to stand between her and Mary. “But what you just said was exceedingly uncouth. The least you could do is respect the dead!” I couldn’t understand half the words she used, but I was sure most of them were quite derogatory.
“Really,” Rika replied with a playful grin.
“Yes, really!” I replied, raising my voice and stomping a hoof. “You should not talk like that about a pony you haven’t even met!”
“What makes you think I haven’t?” Rika countered.
“Even if you have,” I exclaimed, “even if the stallion is indeed guilty of any crime on the high seas, it is not your place to say that, not after he died in the defense of the city!”
“That’s not what ‘ship sinker’ means,” Rika replied, grinning wider, “but whatever, I’ll come back later.”
I am not entirely unused to being photographed, so the haze from the flash of her passing cleared from my eyes quickly. “Pardon me for my outburst,” I said, returning to my chair and taking a look at Fluttershy, who was peeking at us, half-hidden under the table.
“I’m sure she just got something wrong,” Fluttershy muttered, climbing back into her chair. “They would never let a pirate join the Royal Guard.”
“I don’t see Twilight being interested in that type of pony, either,” I agreed. “She’s a late bloomer, our dear Twilight. She’s going to meet her special somepony deep within Canterlot Archives after going for days without food and water, stumbling onto a fellow lost scholar. It will be love forged in an adventure of survival within the desert of knowledge and paper dust. Rika must be thinking of some other Flash Sentry.”
That brought a smile onto Fluttershy’s muzzle, but Mary just sighed, rubbing her face with her hands. “These terms really don’t have anything to do with the sea or theft, Rarity,” she mumbled. “Just another linguistic collision.”
I felt a pinch in my heart. At least, “designated love interest” remains quite obvious. “So he was… just a Royal Guard? Somepony Twilight was fated to meet and fall in love with, and now he’s dead, and she will never even know?”
“No. Imagine that Twilight is mutually in love with a pony, who, by all accounts, does not deserve her, cannot possibly make her happy, and doesn’t match her at all, but they’re going through the motions like clockwork anyway, for no observable reason,” Mary explained. “That’s what Rika actually meant. You don’t compare a worthy stallion to a cardboard box, do you?” She sighed again, found her fork, and viciously stabbed another cherry tomato with it.
“Sweet Celestia, how dreadful that sounds,” I muttered.
“There is too much I don’t know,” Mary commented, looking at the tomato on her fork. “I didn’t even know the name until I saw it in the papers. But given what we just heard, I can at least assure you Twilight would have never met him. Not in this world. Chances are, he would be dead well before his time even if the invasion was somehow avoided.”
“That’s… so sad,” Fluttershy whispered.
“It might be, but it’s a fact,” Mary replied, biting the tomato off her fork. “And given that it was the story of a rivalry between Trixie and Twilight, I’d say Trixie has better chances anyway.”
“Oh, don’t be ridiculous, Mary,” I smiled at her. “There’s no way under Celestia’s sun that would ever work.” That strumpet has neither style nor manners, and I doubt Twilight has it in her to forgive the destruction of priceless ancient literature easily.
Mary glanced at me out of the corner of her blue eye, the barest hint of mischievous grin appearing on her face. “It did, somewhere out there.”
“You keep thinking about the most horrifying things,” I said with my best friendly smile. “Lighten up, darling. There might be a time when you have to be as negative as can be, but that time is not right now.”
Mary just shrugged and scooped up a forkful of her salad.
For a few minutes, we ate in silence, until Fluttershy finally decided to break it. “Mary… If that’s alright with you… could you tell me, what did Rika do to make you so angry?” she asked. “Promising to keep reminding her of the ponies who died sounds… so mean.”
“She knew you were outside the door when she asked me about the invasion, and she knew you could hear everything,” Mary replied with no hesitation. “That was her best attempt at being devious. She sucks at it.”
“Oh.” Fluttershy sank in her chair.
“There’s a human language, in which the words for ‘monster’ and ‘miracle’ share the same root,” Mary continued. “Rika likes to mention that, because she thinks it describes her particularly well. But much of the time, there’s more of a monster in there.”
What a ridiculous combination.
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In what language, exactly?
I'm curious or I may have forgotten
The Magical Girl's credo: To fight for those who cannot protect themselves. To display kindness to those who can't deserve it. To defend the dreams and wishes of humanity.
Except for dirty waifu-stealers. Fuck those guys.
7683322
I personally find it amusing that Rika turned that threat from Mary around. She wants to be reminded that Flash Sentry is dead at every opportunity, because it's an in-joke that keeps on being funny. Mary will end up abandoning the threat first, as she is outplayed, and Rika is monstrous enough to actually enjoy the reference.
7683488 I identify strongly with Rika on many levels.
I remember editing that chapter, and it was a beautiful moment, hilarious and tragically comic. It still makes me laugh.
Also, adorable images like this one would be impossible if not for Flash Sentry. It just wouldn't work with an OC, because they're normally even lesser than a cardboard box. Kind of warms the heart.
orig15.deviantart.net/1cff/f/2016/048/9/2/struck_by_cupid_by_dm29-d9rykhg.png
“And given that it was the story of a rivalry between Trixie and Twilight, I’d say Trixie has better chances anyway.”
And considering there's stories where they're actually long-lost sisters, that's totally Leia-Luke territory.
>That said, has anyone seen the actual body?…
For that matter, there's at least one where Chrysalis replaces Flash to get revenge on Twilight, occasionally played to the tune of Chryslight.
7682923
This is a Proto-Slavic root common to many Slavic languages, and the connection remains explicit in Russian, Macedonian and Serbo-Croatian:
чу́до / čudo – miracle.
чудо́вище, čudovište – monster.
Many Indo-European languages derive the word for “monster” from the verbs “to advise, to remind,” starting with Latin, so it’s not exactly unusual, but the relation between “miracle” and those roots is usually lost. There’s Old English “wundor” which can mean “monster” while being obviously related to “wonder,” and that’s about it. If there are any other languages in which the connection is so blatant, I didn’t find them.
Ponies in this story primarily speak Equish, which, by some
cosmic coincidenceauthorial fiatunspecified reason is almost, but not totally identical to the current state of US English, but has very different etymologies and somewhat different meanings for many words, like “crusader” or “Empire.” Different linguistic parents, so to speak. There are no similar pairs for Slavic languages in this particular Equestria, so when Rika says in Conversation 2 “a language I’m pretty sure you don’t speak,” she is correct. Mostly by accident, though…Context?
7686013
“The Mare Who Once Lived on the Moon” has one “Sergeant Sentry” accidentally flying into a communication laser beam, getting fried to death. This is especially ironic, because the laser is being used by Twilight to transmit romantic poetry to Luna at the time. This happens entirely off-camera, and gets referred to several times afterwards. As a result, while he is, technically, a named character, he doesn’t even get any lines, even the name only gets mentioned once.
It is my observation that at least half the time Flash Sentry (pony version) turns up in fanfic, he only does so to be killed off shortly, so I figured, he might as well die for a narratively useful purpose. :)
7687175
Flash does seem to have terrible luck in fanfic.
Missed this in the Que, catching up. So Rarity has created a dress that basically makes it as though looking at Fluttershy from any angle is the same as looking into her eyes vis a vi the stare. Creepy.
Poor Flash, I thought there were no pony deaths, only injuries and lots of changling deaths? Unless Flash was a changling all along?
Personally I always thought pony Flash Sentry was an intriguing character. He's the only non-Crystal Pony we've ever seen in the Crystal Guard, and he makes it into Princess Cadance's personal bodyguards. To me that suggests he's a particularly skilled guard Shining recruited to transfer north with him, possibly even someone Shining has acted as a mentor towards.
Kind of surprised Rika is so focused on Flash-hating though, it seems a little immature for her. I almost think she caused Flash's death on purpose, from the context.
7677139 I generally agree with your concept on how the EoH works. Not sure if purification would be the "default setting," the EoH were clearly built primarily to be a weapon against Discord. Did the Regal Sisters choose something much darker than purification deliberately? If so, Luna in turn being petrified and Celestia living with the guilt could be seen as some sort of karmic punishment for their lack of mercy.
In regards to humans turning into demons when they use magic in Pedestria, the physical appearance looks very similar to a bipedal version of Nightmare Moon, that can't be a coincidence.
7677179 Demon/Nightmare seems to the default setting for those not either trained in magic or bootstrapped in by those who are. Purity of heart isn't sufficient, Gloriosa was a nice camp lady who just wanted to use the magic to make camp super fun, still turned demon.
7687189
Not constantly. But often enough to scare Rarity herself. :)
Shining Armor mentioned one confirmed fatality except himself. That’s the one.
Well, yes. Shame he remained a cardboard box regardless, though.
She isn’t so much hating Flash herself, as seeing that everyone else has even less love for him than for the changelings. Rika doesn’t really care one way or another, but it does permit her to deflect Mary’s original threat, which is why she’s milking it so hard.
Not really. Simple banishment probably wouldn’t have worked to keep him out, since he demonstrates abilities for space warping that would defeat most reasonable forms of banishment. And it is pretty clear that Discord never really was particularly evil, he just has a completely orthogonal morality vector. Purifying him would be pointless, because he’s pretty pure already, just not virtuous in any reasonable way.
The final solution that Celestia ends up using is presenting him with a justification why virtue might be something he wants, and it takes a very special pony to tolerate him for long enough that he even realizes he enjoys ponies not trying to bite him.
7687233
I prefer "narratively decoherent."
Ahhh. So the effectiveness of Mary's ploy will help us determine whether or not Rika can feel guilt.
You just said they didn't pick petrification deliberately, followed by laying out why they had no choice but to deliberately pick petrification. I mean, I agree with your logic, but the first two words of your paragraph don't agree with the rest.
Yeah, but Celestia didn't forsee Fluttershy when they petrified Discord the first time (probably).
At the time of the first use of the EoH against their intended target, Discord, he was petrified. That's undeniable. What I'm saying is, given the likely fact that the EoH were built primarily as an anti-Discord weapon, either petrification is the default setting (and the Mane 6 were able to unconsciously set the EoH to stun), or the default setting is some kind of purification (as you postulated), which then means the Regal Sisters deliberately set the EoH to petrify. Now, I agree with your logic on why they had to do it, but they still made that choice.
7689106
“Not really” as in “they didn’t pick petrification because it was the darker option, they just didn’t have other working options available.”
As a side note, it’s possible that other modes of the Elements exist, and we just don’t know about them. For example, I’m not sure what does Rainbow Power do to Tirek at all. But considering the amount of fetch quests and soul searching they needed to get that bloody box to open, we can be sure this wasn’t an option for Celestia and Luna.
As a general point, we don’t know all these fine details (and we can be sure the writers never thought about them) and will have to decide something based on which character interpretation we subscribe to.
7689541 Ah, my mistake. Of course the Sisters wouldn't go out of their way to be cruel, even to Discord. Good question on Tirek though. He got drained dry of his stolen power, and thrown in Tartarus. Why did that happen instead of petrification? Why didn't Luna or Discord get that fate? Are they both too powerful for Tartarus to hold?
7689633
I only have a good guess regarding why Luna was imprisoned in the moon rather than in Tartarus: Because this is the absolute cheapest banishment option in terms of energy. She already has her own special connection with the moon. It's not unlike sending her to her room.
What exactly happens to Tirek though is pretty muddled.
:inconceivable:
Except it's within English, not English-Equish. If it were proper English, then "shipping" would have an apostrophe prefixed, because
relationshipping.Speaking of ships… what do Equestrians call the chesspieces next to the royalty?
Ha, some comments miss the notification stream entirely. That’s annoying…
7730982
Industrial fan shipping practices emerge primarily with televised media, which ponies don’t have yet, the volume of Daring Do fanfiction they have cannot possibly compare to the flood that entered our world with Star Trek. So they don’t have the relation-shipping meaning in any case, they’re on the verge of discovering it…
Good question. No canonical sources to cite. But my guess is, wizards. The Crystalling introduces the term, and from the usage, I think the best way to interpret it is that it means a professional magical researcher, possibly even the equivalent of a scientific doctorate in studies of magic.
Since the knights clearly remain knights, I don’t see why wizards wouldn’t be equivalent to bishops. Mind you, in some languages, humans call them “officers” and in others they’re “elephants…”
So, I'm done pretending Rika's a good character.
8197053
Was she ever? While it seems like she avoided going full-out Witch, insanity in a Magical Girl probably leads to basically the same practical results.
From what I've heard, before the church got involved and renamed them to "bishops", they were originally called "ships".