The Dilemma of Starlight Glimmer
It wasn't difficult from there to get her back to Canterlot for a trial, as it was the closest of the two cities. Starlight was pretty cooperative throughout the whole thing, though that's probably because I had completely blocked her magic and movement. She wasn't going anywhere or doing anything without my say so.
Once we were back in Canterlot and Starlight was taken into custody by the guards on the following day, I gave Celestia a quick report on everything that had happened.
"So she was taking cutie marks and putting them in a vault in a cave?" Celestia said, shaking her head. "I cannot say I have ever heard of such a thing. Removing cutie marks is possible, as you saw, but it is a rare, very heavily guarded form of magic."
"I'd imagine so," I replied as the two of us made our way to Celestia's throne room. "It makes me wonder not only how she learned it, but how she also managed to replace it with the equality cutie mark."
"Well, that is something that we shall have to ask her."
The two of us stopped outside the door to the throne room where Celestia's new consigliere, Raven Inkwell, waited with a clipboard floating next to her. She was just as devoted as Celestia's last consigliere, but she had a touch more personality. Not by much though, if I'm being honest.
"Princes Celestia. Prince Antares." Raven tilted her head to us. "I have gathered the notes from Miss Glimmer's case. We have her statement, the statements of the stallion being taken care of by Miss Sparkle in Ponyville, and the statements of several of her townsponies."
"Excellent," Celestia said, taking the papers from Raven and flipping through them. "And how has Miss Glimmer been behaving?"
"She's fairly docile, though she has attempted to escape from her bonds many times." Raven motioned to the papers that Celestia was holding. "As you can see on page five, Miss Glimmer is an exceptionally powerful unicorn. Were it not for Prince Antares's magic, I doubt that we'd be able to keep her locked up."
I raised an eyebrow and looked over Celestia's shoulder as she scanned page five. "Really? That's... wow. It explains why she was so good at taking the cutie marks. She even kept my sister still for a little bit, though admittedly, Kristen wasn't trying to break out of Starlight's magic. I can still imagine that somepony like Twilight would actually have to exert themselves to beat her in a fight."
Celestia shrugged and flipped to the next page. "Perhaps. That does also bring up the point of what to do with her. It would be a shame to sentence a unicorn with that kind of talent to a prison cell."
"So no straitjacket, glass cell and muzzle?" I clicked my tongue. "Too bad. Doctor Hannibal Glimmer sounds... like wrapping filet mignon with a fruit roll-up. Two awesome things combined together to make a ball of disappointment."
Celestia and Raven both took a second to glance at me, but ultimately neither chose to comment. For a brief second, the only sound was Celestia flipping to the next page of the report.
"In any case, we should consider what is to be done with her, and I do not like the idea of sticking her in jail, especially since she can likely easily escape," Celestia said. "I also don't like the idea of extreme restraints."
I shrugged. "Well, she also made her own choices, and it's not like we're going to keep her in there forever. Breaking the law is still breaking the law, and she broke some pretty big ones."
"She did," Celestia admitted. "I suppose we should hear her side of things first." She nodded and floated the report over to me as we entered the throne room. "If you are ready."
"Yeah." I nodded and gave the report back to Raven. I only really needed to re-read some of the things that I missed while reading over Celestia's shoulder. Celestia sat on her throne while I borrowed Luna's for the trial, something that I'd done a few times before. It wouldn't make any sense to just bring my throne over to Canterlot whenever I needed to do this. Besides, I wasn't going to break it. With the two of us settled, Celestia nodded to her guard.
"Send her in."
The guard bowed and him and his fellow soldier lit their horns, opening up the door to the throne room. Starlight was led in, flanked by four guards. Her forelegs were still secured, and my band of magic was wrapped around her horn. She flinched when she saw the two of us, but with a gentle prodding from one of the guards, she walked to the middle of the room.
"Miss Starlight Glimmer..." Celestia began.
"Um... hi, yeah." Starlight blushed and did a quick bow.
"You have been brought before us to stand trial for your crimes against your fellow ponies," she continued. "You have several counts of unlawful imprisonment, as well as assault on a member of royalty. How do you plead?"
Starlight's mouth creased slightly and she straightened up. "Not guilty, Princess Celestia."
Celestia and I exchanged a brief look before turning back to Starlight. "Is that so, Miss Glimmer?" I said. "I seem to recall you holding my sister in your magic and attempting to forcibly remove her cutie mark. There is also the matter of the 'Re-education Rooms' that several of your townsponies informed us about."
"I was just doing what I thought was best to keep them happy," Starlight said.
"And that includes locking them in a room for several days and blasting propaganda non-stop?" I shook my head. "You seemed to have total control over these ponies."
Starlight's eyes widened and she shook her head. "No, not at all! Sure, I was the default authority, but I never tried to be a ruler. In my village I wanted all of us to be equal in how it ran as much as I could, so we would take turns being a sort of executive officer for the week, but all the decisions of that officer had to be ratified at a special bi-weekly meeting..."
"Yes, yes, I got it, Miss Glimmer," I said before she could really get going. "But I assume all decisions had to be run by you, correct?"
"Well, I mean..."
"Look, it isn't illegal for you to run your own village as a mayor or some other central authority figure," I said. "That's not the issue we're having here. The issue is the cutie mark stuff."
Starlight's expression turned into a slight glare. "They wanted to give up their cutie marks. I didn't make them, but I did say that it was a requirement to live in my village. Every cutie unmarking was consensual!"
I raised my eyebrow. "And my sister?"
Starlight's ears drooped for a brief moment, but she quickly recovered. "Well... if I'm being honest--"
"Which would be a good idea," I chimed in.
Starlight glared at me again, but didn't comment further on that. "If I'm being honest, I have to admit that I never really believed what the two of you were saying. One of our members leaves and then a few days later two ponies just happen to show up who are asking all kinds of questions? Obviously I couldn't have known that you two were... um... you, but I suspected that you had ulterior motives!"
"And that's why you brought Princess Kristen to the cave?" Celestia guessed. "You wished to remove her mark and in doing so force her to join your community, thereby protecting it?"
"Well, I mean, it doesn't sound great when you put it like that." Starlight sighed and drooped her head slightly. "Look, I understand that I might have made a few mistakes in how I ran my village, but my intentions were good, I assure you. I didn't foalnap ponies from other cities and force them to live there. Many of them were escaping things like the war or poverty."
"I could also add harboring draft dodgers to your list of charges, Miss Glimmer," Celestia pointed out.
"I wasn't going to call a group of guards to my village to drag a few poor ponies away just because they were escaping something they didn't believe in," Starlight growled. "That isn't something that I believe in, and it isn't something that anypony should do. The war was horrible, and we did need good ponies to go fight in it, but not everypony believed that they should be the ones!"
"Perhaps," I said. "However, we'll ignore that point and not add it to your list of charges. Ultimately from what I've seen and read about your village, nothing you did was illegal, except for the Re-education Room and everything that entailed and attempting to forcibly take my sister's cutie mark off. If it was truly a village of ponies who wanted to live quietly without their cutie marks then that's not illegal."
"Well, that's what it was," Starlight snapped. "It was at first, anyway! I found a like-minded hoofful of ponies who listened to my ideas about cutie marks and equality! We banded together and made our village what it was. Over time more ponies started joining until we got to where we were when you came in." Starlight sighed and flattened her ears. "I never wanted to use the rooms to remind ponies of what our village represented and meant to all of us, but as more ponies started questioning things, the more extreme measures I had to take to make sure that our wonderful, happy village wouldn't be torn apart from within."
"There were other ways to go about that," Celestia pointed out. "And even ignoring that point, a pony should be free. If they wish to change their mind and reclaim their cutie marks to seek life elsewhere, they should be able to do that."
"I was happy. We were all happy being equal," Starlight insisted. "Everything I did that you're accusing me of, I only did it to protect my village. I didn't want any internal or external strife to destroy everything that I and other ponies had worked for years to accomplish."
"I understand, but that wasn't the way to go about it," I said. "We weren't there to burn the place to the ground; we were just seeing what was going on. If you were worried that we were going to widen cracks in your society that were already there, then it might have been a good idea to see why those cracks formed and what could be done to fix them." Despite the situation, a slight smile crossed my face. "And if I may say so, I don't think that anything you tried on my sister would have possibly worked. She's really stubborn."
"Right, yeah, I get it," Starlight grumbled. She lowered her head enough that she wasn't making eye contact with us anymore. "So now what? Am I going to rot in some cell because I made a few bad decisions and went too far protecting the community I'd worked so hard to create?"
"We shall see." I frowned and tilted my head as a thought crossed my mind. "Though speaking of creation, I am curious about the cutie mark spell. That's not exactly common magic."
At this Starlight actually straightened back up and she smirked at us. "Well, that took some doing, I'll admit. Once I got the idea I picked up bits and pieces of ways it could theoretically be possible from various, unrelated spellbooks. After that it was a matter of experimentation. Mostly on myself. It took me several years, but I finally managed to do it."
I didn't miss the hint of pride in her voice when she mentioned her success in removing cutie marks. Starlight was neither weak nor dumb. Maybe not the most... erm... socially aware pony I'd ever met, but she was smart. I hadn't read up a ton on cutie mark removal magic, but I knew enough to know that Starlight's claim that it had taken her years to figure out were on the level. If she had figured it out with very little to go on, that was impressive.
Celestia was right: Starlight was very talented. Crime was crime, though, and trying to tear my sister's cutie mark off and locking ponies in rooms for three days to blast propaganda at them was definitely illegal. With that in mind, I cast a sound spell around Starlight and the guards and turned to Celestia.
"Well, any thoughts?"
"Yes. I am curious why she feels the way she does about equality and the cause of her dislike for cutie marks. Given that cutie marks are tied to the identity of a pony, one does not simply wake up one morning with hatred for them."
"That would be kind of weird and 'comic book villain-y'," I agreed. "But ultimately she frequently locked ponies in a room for days and technically assaulted my sister. She's smart and powerful, but she still broke the law. Plus everything I've read shows me that the rest of the ponies in the village are much happier now that they have their cutie marks back, so I have to wonder how much she was controlling them."
"More than she would like to admit, even to herself," Celestia said. "I do not sense real evil from her, merely misguided attempts to create a better life for herself and/or others. To come down at her with the full extent of the law would be counterproductive, I feel, as she would see it as vengeful rather than instructive, and dangerous anger and resentment would fester inside of her while she was in prison."
"So what do you suggest, then?" I asked. "We can't just let her go with a slap on the hoof and say 'don't do it again.'"
"Certainly not. Perhaps some form of probation, then?" Celestia suggested. "I think that if she learned the value of friendship she could be a great mare. Perhaps she could even take her lessons back to her village and lead it once more, but with friendship instead of terror."
"I guess." I glanced back at Starlight, who was alternating between looking at Celestia and I with an expression not unlike a chicken being led to the chopping block. "Why do I get the feeling that you've already made your mind up on this?"
"Because you're my husband, and you know me well," Celestia said with a slight smirk.
And with that, it's time for me to just let Celestia do her thing. When my wife has made up her mind, I can't do anything to stop her. She's wiser than me anyway.
Celestia lit her horn and powered down the sound spell, which made Starlight flinch now that she could actually hear us again. She took a deep breath and tried to straighten up.
"Okay, fine. How many years am I getting?"
"Five," Celestia said. Starlight's ears drooped, but I could see a glare beginning to form on her face as Celestia continued. "You shall receive a five year probationary period, during which time you will be turned over to my student Twilight Sparkle in Ponyville. You shall become her student, where you will follow her instructions and lessons."
"Wait, what?" Starlight frowned and tilted her head. "So I'm just going to become a student of somepony?"
"There are many conditions to this, Miss Glimmer," Celestia replied. "We shall, of course, discuss all of them in time, but for starters, you will not be allowed to leave Ponyville without express permission. Your magic use will also be monitored heavily. We shall be keeping a very close eye on you." Celestia's face darkened, and it freaked me out enough that I actually scooted away a few inches. "We shall take breaches of your parole very seriously, Miss Glimmer. I am taking a chance on you. Do not abuse my trust."
"Oh, um..." Starlight blinked owlishly and looked at me as though I'd veto her sentence, or at the very least explain what Celestia was thinking. Instead I just stared back at her. I wasn't going to say anything that might contradict what Celestia had in mind. That was just asking for trouble. After a few moments of getting no response from me, she looked back to Celestia. "I'll try not to get into too much trouble?"
"See that you don't. In the meantime, we shall return you back to the local prison while you await your transfer to Ponyville, and while we discuss the full terms of your parole." With that, Celestia slammed her hoof down. "That is all."
The guards led Starlight out of the room immediately after that. Just as she reached the door, she spared one last glance to the two of us, before another nudge from a guard moved her forward. Once the door had closed behind them, I let out a deep breath I didn't know I'd been holding in and stood up.
"I hope you know what you're doing with her," I grumbled.
"I'm taking, shall we say, a calculated risk. I have seen enough ponies with that kind of power go down paths they should not have because of anger and resentment." Celestia stood up and we began walking out of the throne room. "Besides, didn't you give me the quote of 'do I not destroy my enemy when I make him my friend?'"
"Yeah, yeah, but I don't trust her."
"Neither do I, Antares, at least not fully. I trust her enough to give her a chance."
"You do love your second chances," I agreed. "That aside, I bet Twilight is going to be surprised when you send her a pony on parole and tell her to reform her."
"Come now, she has her friends to aid her in that." A slightly mischievous smile crossed Celestia's face that I didn't quite like. "Besides, it's an assignment from me, and you know how she views those."
"Yeah, she gets really stressed." I rolled my eyes as the two of us made our way to the dining room. "You really are counting on her devotion to you, aren't you? You seem to be playing her a little bit."
"I'm merely using my resources, Antares," Celestia said. "Besides, I think they will both learn much from it. In the meantime..." Celestia walked over to her chair and sat down. "I'm starving."
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Booo bad show! Should have taken her cutie mark while she was on parole so she knows what it’s like to not have any of her talent .
9181609
Celestia doesn't strike me as that sadistic. And again, the whole point of the sentence was that she would be punished by losing her magic and on some level her freedom, but she wouldn't breed resentment and anger that she would carry with her until she did something truly damaging.
Awww I'm a little disappointed, I was kind of hoping Antares would wind up stuck with her.
Honestly kinda hoping that this scenario will trash the entire time travel thing Starlight did. I sorta like Glim when she's written well, and seeing her still make the mistake of getting involved with time travel when she's already Twilight's student would just be annoying.
Like, seriously. Going through with the whole time travel plot would just end up pissing off several of the most powerful beings on the planet for abusing their trust, which is certainly not a good thing when already on parole.
9181649
Well, I doubt we'll see any time travel shenanigans now unless Antares need to go back in time for some reason and Starlight provides him with the means to do it.
I know I have to accept this because it happened in the show, but It will never not bug me that Starlight glimmer is somehow able to go toe to toe with Twilight, an Alicorn whose very talent is magic...
9181674
Because Starlight's talent is magic and despite what all the fanon's and headcanon's say apparently being an Alicorn doesn't give you/make you Superman.
i think it would be fair to give someone (not twilight she'd never use it) a kill switch of some kind, not actually killing starlight but some kinda enchantment that can give her a painful backfire,
I'm really surprised Antares didn't insist that she have her magic completely sealed for at least the first year of her probation.
Also, what are your plans for Thorax and the changelings? Since the Scorpion Ponies are their natural enemy. I'm guessing that even if they are reformed like in canon. Coexistence is going to be a big problem when the scorpony population increases and they start eyeing the changelings like a spider does a fly.
9181873
Cloudsedale getting a lot of changeling ghettos. Scorpornies can't eat what they can't reach.
9182012
Until flying scorponies.
9181649
No cutie map table, no time travel (other than the original "closed loop" spell).
9182073
I missed your writing and now it shows up with two chapters
9181614
I'm actually surprised you didn't stick Antares with her. It could've been a learning experience for both of them and then have Kristen as her friend after they get over the whole cutie mark thing, I can actually see them get closer because of that actually.
Now comes the big question: does she learn her lesson and try to reform, or will we see her try to destroy the timeline again? Or at the very least try to turn Ponyville into Our Town 2.0
9182189
I imagine if she tried to turn Ponyville into "Our Town v2.0" Celestia would come down on her harder and faster than a tonne of bricks.
Which would still be nicer than what would happen to her if Antares got a whiff of her screwing with the Ponyville foals / Cheerilee.
So, Hasbro is just going to let you publish and make money off of fanfiction based on their copyrighted intellectual property? Either way, I wish you luck in your endeavor. Looking forward to more.
Keep up the great work. Deus tecum.
9182642
It isn't any different than a convention vendor hall. I'm far from the first guy to do this, and I won't be the last. I'm not selling it at Barnes and Noble. It would probably cost them more money to go after me than to ignore the 200 bucks or so I'd make. They don't care, otherwise they'd have gone after Past Sins or anything related to the numerous published Fallout: Equestria books, or Inner Glory or the Celestia Code...
Not worth the trouble. I'm not making thousands, and I did give them credit.
...
Plus I also own around half of the characters.
9182073
And now I'm terrified. Good job. Besides, those flies are prolly delicious.
I think sje got off too lightly. Also it seems odd that they didn't follow up on the whole "cutie marks are bad" thing Starlight has when they noted how odd it was.
9182642
Hasbro has given cease and desist letters to people making non profit works and much less. Pretty ballsy.
Nice job
O i like how this chapter has a good spin but still ends the same way for the most part.
9181609 The typical fan version of Celestia would have had her use a rusty razor to slice Starlight's Cutie Marks off, because millennials are taught that the whiter someone is, the more evil they are.
9181728
Fanon infects a look of communities; MLP is one of the worst when it comes to opinions tainted by fanon.
9192709 I shall use genetics to mutate myself into a Micronesian.
Then infiltrate and destroy the world! (The Plan is coming together!)
pfft, sometimes I have to wonder about you, TD... Though I can also safely assume this is some of BW's personality leaking through
while I would never completely dismiss the principle of enforcing the law, one thing I would like to comment here relates to my perspective on mercy & judgment. You cannot condemn a well-meaning-but-misguided person without condemning yourself, and to deny someone mercy when they are earnestly and sincerely repentant is a mistake that will not go well for you when you inevitably meet with your final Judgment. "Do not judge, or you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you"; "mercy triumphs over judgment" (Matthew 7)
yeah, stubborn in the "I'm the immortal, living embodiment of the ideological concept of chaos"... but no one needs to know that quite yet
I feel like they should've asked her at some point during this trial. Sure, readers already know her tragic back story, but the characters don't and would probably want to get all the information they could in order to make a decision... as is the nature of being both judge and jury, after all.
hmmhmmhmm. i see what you did there.
10228085
Wait.... is that... Calvin and Hobbes?