A Cavalcade of Cards

by QueenMoriarty

You Put THAT in Your Deck?

On the everything-torn plane of Zendikar, the assembled heroes of the Gatewatch stood atop the wreckage of Sea Gate. They stared out across the drained expanse of the Halimar basin, transfixed by the sight of a terrifying new arrival to the plane.

The words of the oath were still fresh on their lips. The weight of their task had scarcely had time to settle on their shoulders, and already it was rocked by uncertainty. When they had felt space distort and crack, they had expected one of the Eldrazi titans to pop into existence, or else an unprecedented swarm of the reality-eating spawn. But the thing that hung in the air before them was something much worse, if only because it was completely unexpected.

Nissa was the first one to summon up the courage to speak. "Is that... a horse?"

"Worse," Gideon said, his voice just barely holding onto its steadfast timbre. "It's a pony."

That got a groan out of the entire Gatewatch. Despite the near-omnipresence of horses in the Multiverse, and the presence of ponies in basically every plane where horses had been domesticated, the word 'pony' had only one meaning to a planeswalker, and that was to refer to the denizens of Ungula.

"I swear, if she tries to invite the Eldrazi to a tea party, I will burn her mane off." Chandra ignited her fist for emphasis, and looked about ready to hurl a fireball before Jace stuck his arm out in front of her.

"It wouldn't do a damned thing." The telepath's eyes glowed blue, and faint whorls formed in the space between him and the pony. "That's Princess Celestia, the sun-marshal. Your fire would barely tickle her." The glow faded for a second, and Jace looked around at the bemused faces of his fellows. "What?"

"You've spent enough time there to recognize the residents?" Gideon raised an eyebrow, and looked as though he was trying very hard not to laugh. Nissa was unsuccessfully suppressing a giggle, while Chandra was laughing as hard as she could. Jace put on his best grouchy face, which was really just a pout that was trying too hard.

"Look, you try constantly reading the minds of everyone around you and see if you don't form an eidetic memory!"

Gideon smiled, then reached over and gave Jace a way-too-hard pat on the shoulder. "Alright, Beleren, just chill. We can tease you about Ungula later." And just like that, his face was right back to that of a serious war commander. "Now, scan her mind and see if you can find out what she wants."

Jace nodded, and the blue glow erupted from his eyes once again. A few minutes passed, during which Nissa couldn't help but notice that the so-called princess was getting closer. Then Jace stopped glowing, and threw up.

"That bad, huh?" Nissa cast a minor healing spell, earning her a weak smile from Jace.

"Not as bad as some folks I've had to read. Now, do you guys want the good news or the bad news?"

Chandra's hair burst into flame and her eyes glowed red. "That's two cliches in as many hours, Jace. I hear one more, I will burn your hair off."

"Noted." Jace snapped his fingers, dispelling Chandra's fiery aura.

"Stop playing around, Beleren," Gideon grunted. "Give us the bad news first."

"Alright. So, the bad news is that she's just as crazy as the Eldrazi, most of our magic is going to bounce off of her, she'd maybe get winded if you threw an entire mountain at her, she can read minds too so she just read my mind and now knows everything I know about all of us, and perhaps worst of all..."

The sun above them flared as though going supernova, and a giant laser of pure white mana came searing down through the air towards them. The Gatewatch just barely managed to dodge the blast, and were left hovering in the air as the laser tore through what little was left of Sea Gate. When the light died down, there wasn't a single brick left of the once-mighty structure, and the river that had once fed the waterfall now simply stopped and hung motionless when it reached the place where it should fall.

"Unlike the Eldrazi, she's aware of the world around her. Which includes us."

As if on cue, Celestia began to accelerate, closing the distance between her and the planeswalkers. They readied their magic, filled with more than a little blind terror.

"You mentioned there was good news," Gideon prompted Jace, though it didn't sound as though his heart was in it.

"Relatively speaking. The other big difference between her and the Eldrazi is that she isn't indestructible. She's only extremely hard to kill."

"Well, when you put it like that..." Chandra glowed like the inferno at the heart of the sun. "Suddenly I feel so much more confident."

---

Meanwhile, at other places...

---

In the snowy mountains of Tarkir, hidden away between two blessed peaks, the dragonlord Ojutai laughed.

It was a strange sound, having more in common with birdsong than the reptilian screeching one might expect. It did not boom so much as whistle, in a frequency just high enough that it kept rattling around in your skull for quite a while after you had stopped hearing it.

A lot like everything else the dragonlord said, really.

"Friendship?" he said, in that strange combination of gestures and guttural sounds that made up the local Draconic language. "What need do I have of friendship? Do you think my followers so unfaithful that I require an alliance with a tribe of horses from beyond the veil? Do I seem so ignorant to your dear little minds that I must seek the counsel of those who know nothing of my struggles? Or am I simply your final attempt at diplomacy, and you are so disheartened by the foolishness of my rivals that you have convinced yourselves that I am just as much a hopeless case as the rest of them?"

Princess Twilight Sparkle and Applejack the Very Good Farmer stared at the dragonlord, waiting only somewhat patiently for him to stop his blustering. When he finally finished his ridiculous combination of growling and dancing, Twilight took a few steps forward and began to relay her own message. Her horn glowed, and she conjured up the spectral image of a dragon almost the same size as Ojutai. While she spoke the words, her construct performed the gestures.

"We meant no insult in our proposition, O dragonlord. We seek diplomacy for diplomacy's own sake. Ours is a social race, and much of our culture is defined by one's ability to maintain peaceful relations with as many others as possible. I owe most all of my renown to my exceptional skill at resolving the problems between friends, or indeed enemies, to the point where I bear the title of Princess of Friendship."

"And in your own way, I am sure that that title is a source of great pride and awe amongst your own kind." Ojutai's words seemed more reserved, now that he had been convinced that the ponies weren't trying to insult him. "But I and my disciples have no need of alliances. As you have said, the way between our worlds is seldom open, so even if I believed you could be of some tactical use, you are unreliable as allies. And as repositories of knowledge that I do not possess, you have little to offer, as most everything you know can only apply to your own world."

At that, Applejack grit her teeth and stormed forward, growling out a flawless pronunciation and waving around her makeshift claw-gauntlets when the words required her to do so. "I don't see any farms in your lands, bird-dragon. If you are unwilling to seek counsel from those of your fellow dragonlords that know the ways of the land, there is a way in which we can help you."

Ojutai bristled at the insult, and when next he opened his mouth, the mountain winds seemed to triple in coldness. "You would do well not to mock your elders, farmer."

"Perhaps I would, if your words did not lead me to believe you were naught but an overgrown hatchling." Applejack was grinning now, and Twilight was wondering whether she should be backing away slowly or teleporting as fast as she could.

Ojutai cocked his head to one side, and gave a tiny chuckle. "I must say, I have never encountered so arrogant a morsel as you. Perhaps I shall send you to Atarka as a peace offering."

"She's already eaten," Applejack countered with a near-instant whip of her tail. "I made the trees bear more fruit than her entire clan could pluck in their entire lifetimes."

"Hardly an impressive feat. Atarka's minions scarcely have enough wisdom between them to fashion anything more complex than a sharpened rock." Ojutai reared up on his hind legs, a gesture usually reserved for the end of conversations. "I grow weary of you, ponies. But it has been a long time since I had so passionate a debate, and for that I do owe you some measure of gratitude. So then, a final chance. One last clever little trick. Offer some proof of your worth as an ally."

Twilight Sparkle grinned, and choked out the only word of Draconic she needed. "Gladly." She then turned to face the sky, so full of clouds and sunshine, and screamed. She screamed until her face broke apart and tentacles poured out, screamed until the sound ceased to be anything that Ojutai's ears had ever heard before, screamed until the sky echoed back with a silence so deafening that the dragonlord at first thought he had been struck deaf.

And then, the sky opened. Four blue hands reached through the crack between two clouds, curled their fingers around the sky as though holding onto something, and then pulled apart. Beyond the sky, there waited a thing for which Ojutai had no name. It had a form like unto a man, yet it seemed to have no flesh to hide its visceral muscles or its exposed bones. Despite its four hands, it only possessed two arms, which split at what might normally be called the elbows. Where Ojutai might have expected legs on a man, there was instead a mass of innumerable tentacles, red and blue and thrashing like the heart of the Dragon Tempests themselves. It had a head without eyes or mouth or anything save an exposed skull that seemed reminiscent of a helmet. Well, that and one other thing, which seemed the most unusual part of the entire thing to the eyes of the dragonlord.

"Is that... a tiara?" Ojutai said, pointing vaguely in the direction of the towers of gold and steel that ringed the top of the impossible creature's head. Twilight Sparkle and Applejack both nodded, and their grins threatened to slice their heads in half. In the case of Twilight, that seemed incredibly likely.

"Allow me to introduce Princess Ulamog, Of the Ceaseless Hunger." Applejack's pronunciation dripped with a confidence that no dragon had ever heard spoken by one so clearly mortal. "She loves to make friends. Even friends that can do nothing for her, which is basically all of her friends. And there's nothing she'd love more than to forgive you for insulting us like you did and make you her friend. Don't you want to be her friend?"

Arrogant and cocky though he was, Ojutai knew when to pick his battles. So he did the smart thing, and made friends with Princess Ulamog.

"Three down," Twilight whispered to Applejack on their way down the mountain. "Two to go," replied Applejack.

Author's Note:

The strategy for playing Princess Ulamog is as follows:

1. Announce that you have Princess Ulamog in your pony tribal deck.
2. Whenever you draw Princess Ulamog, announce that it is in your hand.
3. Throughout the game, casually mention that you don't want to play Princess Ulamog because that would just spoil the fun.
4. Subtly imply which actions your opponent might be considering could result in you playing Princess Ulamog. Some subtle action like a nervous tic is recommended.
5. Never play Princess Ulamog again, but occasionally do that nervous tic.
6. Win every game forever.

Comments

[FanOfMostEverything]

The question is, did Celestia agree to this? Whether she did or didn't, there's an interesting story to be had.

As for Princess Ulamog, I'd really like to read the sort of friendship reports he gets.

[Pretentious Narwhal]

All hail princess Ulamog!

[Malandy]

What the heck?! Nice Gatewatch and everyone's personalities. What happened to Princess Celestia?

[devas]

7652294

Well, she is now part of the Eldrazi. This brings to mind several questions, but we will do our best not to answer them.

[Bugsydor]

I understand what is going on, but my brain is still filled with wat.

[PresentPerfect]

Applejack the Very Good Farmer

For some reason, I really love this.

I have no idea what else was going on in this story, though. c.c

[FanOfMostEverything]

9995302
Basically, Celestia swapped places with an eldritch horror, with each doing what the other had been up until then. For Celestia, that meant destroying a world. For Ulamog, devourer of worlds, that meant ruling over the ponies. And anything else that it feels like befriending.

Also eating at least twice as much cake as Celestia. Well, maybe twice as much.

[Viddaric]

See, shit like this is why I don't play MTG anymore, and even when I did, I hated Commander.