• Published 24th Jun 2017
  • 2,615 Views, 29 Comments

Luna's Interrogations - charredenay



Admittedly, Luna should have told somepony, but it was such a unique opportunity.

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Chapter Two: Academic Purposes

Princess Luna couldn't help but chuckle nervously, "Our apologies. We didn't mean to say that out loud."

"You didn't say anything."

"What is she talking about?"

“This is a strange conversation.”

"Why is she avoiding my question?”

"That's kind of rude --”

“Was already strange but I mean…”

"-- after I answered all of her questions.”

The princess felt one of her eyes twitch but she did her best not to have an outburst at the presumptuous tone of that last thought, “Wilson, does your kind possess some manner of passive telepathy?” she asked carefully.

“Not that I know of,” he answered without hesitation.

”That's another weird question to ask out of the blue.

”Why would she ask that?

Her anger at the possibility that he had been playing her for a fool quickly evaporated and was replaced with confusion, “Then, how do you know the name, Twilight Sparkle?”

“Well, I only asked because that picture appeared,” he said, raising his hand and making a gesture with it that Luna guessed was pointing.

“The one behind you.”

The lunar princess turned her head only to discover, floating behind her, a portrait of said alicorn smiling innocently, with the words ‘Twilight Sparkle’ written in a fine gold script on the box at the bottom of its frame. As she laid her eyes upon it, Luna couldn't help but wilt visibly at the sight.

“Oh, buck.”

Luna ended her self-dubbed ‘Dream-Interrogation’ spell, the blackness quickly giving way to the light of the her bedroom where she sat next to Wilson's prone form. Looking down at him, she found that the tears he had shed in the dream had counterparts in the waking world.

How splendid, a reminder of yet another of our failures today.

Sighing, the princess reached down with a hoof and gently wiped the tears away.

“I'm sorry, Wilson, but you might have to endure more of that pain in the future, for both our sakes.”

Resolutely, Luna turned and walked to her desk. In hindsight, using barely tested magic was already fraught with dangers and gambles, even without the additional variables that using it on an entirely new species entailed.

Truly, we should be grateful that this was all that went wrong.

Luna stopped dead in her tracks on the way to her destination.

And that he spoke fluent Equestrian.

She couldn't resist smacking her forehead with a hoof.

Gadzooks! With the number of things we overlooked it was absolutely miraculous that anything went right at all.

Fortunately, Luna still had options, not the least of which was her original dream-walking spell. However, the unexpected result of her interrogation immediately brought a different possibility to mind in particular.

Evening is not for a several hours yet, but it would be best not to doddle.

Reaching her desk, Luna extracted a quill and two pieces of parchment from its drawers and set about writing a letter while drawing up a magical formula at the same time.

Dear Princess Twilight,

I have been working on a somewhat experimental application of magic and I am interested to hear your input on the subject. What I'm speaking of combines the Zone of Truth spell invented by Circumspect Silver in the year 747 A.D. as well as my personal talent for dream-walking.

While it does seem to produce the desired results for the most part, meaning the subject speaks truthfully in the dream, it fails to restrict the subject from conversing unsolicited. Another notable issue is that it opens the caster’s subconscious to the subject by way of producing mental images to the same effect as it does with the intended target.

I am curious to see if perhaps you might be able to think of some solution for these issues. I have included in the scrolls I've sent you the details of Silver’s original spell’s casting and formula as well as a summary of the combination’s intended effects.

Ever thankful, Princess Luna.

Gathering the two scrolls together and wrapping them in her letter, Luna sealed the scroll with her wax insignia and sent the whole lot off with a quick spell.

That task complete, Luna set about completing some paperwork her scribes had brought for her approval, but not before double checking to be sure that the sleeping spell she had cast upon Wilson would last well into the night, when she would have ample time and mana to cast it again.

She had only finished three documents before a thought occurred to her, causing her to levitate his body and move him to the floor next to her bed so that the bed concealed him from the room's entrance. With a nod of approval at her own cleverness, she set herself back to work.

It only took the completion of three more documents for another doubt to come to her. This time, she stood from her desk and trotted to her door. Opening it, she poked her head out and addressed one of her guards, “Tell the maids and kitchen staff that we require the utmost privacy today. They will skip any cleaning and leave my meals out here in the hall until we have ordered otherwise. Are we clear?”

The guardpony said nothing, simply saluting in confirmation.

“Very good. Carry on.”

Retreating back into her quarters, Luna shut and locked the doors. With another nod of approval at her own thoughtfulness, she trotted back to her desk and set herself back to work once more.

She had barely made it through three more documents when she was interrupted by the appearance of a scroll above her desk. It appeared at just the right place to knock into her quill as she was signing the latest page, butchering her signature.

“Sun and stars!” Luna said in exasperation as she lifted the scroll to her eyes, “Who dares to--?”

She stopped short when she saw Twilight’s royal seal holding the scroll shut.

“Oh.”

Looking at her clock, Luna realized it had only been ten minutes since she’d sent off her letter.

That was quick. If she has already discovered a solution, she is even more of a genius than we had thought.

Quickly undoing the purple wax, Luna opened the letter and read it.

We need to talk.

Luna blinked once, twice, turned the scroll over to see if anything was written on the back, turned it back around, blinked a third time, and then snorted in confusion.

Curious. What could she wish to discuss that could not be done by letter? Is she worried it might be intercepted? Or perhaps it is another matter altogether?

After scanning the page for more information one final time in vain, she set it down on her desk, and prepared a teleportation spell.

Whatever the case maybe, it would still be best to get through it quickly.

With a small pop she was gone.

With a second pop she reappeared at the foot of the front staircase of the foyer of Twilight’s castle. Upon closer inspection, it seemed that Twilight had apparently taken to converting it into a proper throne room, complete with a crystalline throne at the top of the staircase and lo and behold, there sat the Princess of Friendship herself. She was draped over her throne's left arm, reading a book, accompanied by a large stack of more books on the floor at it’s side.

So engrossed was Twilight with the tome before her, she had not even noticed Luna's entrance. Even so, her nonchalant attitude did little to alleviate the feeling of smallness that overcame Luna at the sight before her.

Methinks Tia's knack for intimidation has rubbed off on Twilight a tad too well.

Luna cleared her throat loudly to draw Twilight’s attention.

Looking up from her book and down at Luna Twilight’s expression immediately soured, “Luna.”

The sour look and curt greeting only served to increase the heavy atmosphere in the room, but Luna did her best to ignore it and greeted her fellow princess as cordially as she could, “Ahem. Hail, Twilight! How are you this afternoon? We hope all is well.”

Twilight, for her part, seemed willing enough to play along.

“Oh, yes. Everything is going great!” she answered with faux cheerfulness, “Today Spike woke up extra early to surprise me and Starlight with a pancake breakfast, Starlight’s friendship studies are going even better than I'd hoped, and I even got to start reading the newest Daring Do novel today.”

Luna gulped nervously. Feeling that the other horseshoe was bound to drop shortly but not knowing exactly when, she had no choice but to continue, “T-truly? We are happy to hear that.”

“Yes, I was having a wonderful day,” Twilight nodded happily, before her tone took a complete turnaround. “Right up until somepony sent me a letter detailing an extremely unethical magic spell.”

“W-wha? Un-unethical?” Luna sputtered indignantly.

“What would you call it, Luna?”

Luna opened her mouth to retort, but quickly stopped herself. In truth, she had spent almost no time considering the moral implications and now that she did, she was having difficulty mounting a sufficient argument in her defense. To be fair, when Luna first had the idea, time for a lively debate on its morality had been a luxury she and Celestia could not afford.

They had captured one of King Sombra’s generals acting as his spy inside Equestria’s borders. The pegasus in question was a mare as twisted and evil as Sombra himself and was also deeply infatuated with him, making it impossible to pry information from her willingly. To make matters worse, Sombra had blessed her with a spell that made her impervious to all physical pain, which made her into both the perfect spy and the worst prisoner at the same time.

Equestria desperately needed to know if Sombra was planning an invasion without him learning what they knew, so her ‘dream-interrogation’ had been a godsend. Luna was able to get the mare to admit that Sombra was indeed planning an invasion (and quite soon, in fact) and together with her sister, she immediately flew to the Crystal Empire to launch the preemptive assault that ultimately culminated in Sombra’s thousand year banishment. Had it not been for the spell, the general would have likely taken the knowledge with her all the way to the grave and thousands of ponies would have lost their lives in the defense of Equestria.

Of course, that information will do little to save me from Twilight’s wrath today.

“Surreptitious?” she answered weakly.

“Very cute,” Twilight replied, rolling her eyes.

“Please accept our apologies, Twilight, but we’ve been gone for a thousand years, ponies ideas of right and wrong have shifted a great deal, in many ways that we are still ignorant of. Perhaps you could enlighten us as to the ethical issues that this magic creates?”

“Where do I even start?” Twilight huffed, rubbing the base of her horn. “Firstly, without even going into this situation specifically, your dream-walking ability is already rife with its own issues. Dreams are where ponies’ conscious and subconscious minds intermingle after all, so they’re extremely personal and should be private.”

“Scootaloo and Applebloom did not seem to mind our presence.”

“Scootaloo and Applebloom are just fillies, Luna. Their dreams are probably occupied with the tamest of personal issues. Imagine if you stepped into a more adult-themed dream. Imagine accidentally walking in on mine while I'm dreaming about Ra --” Twilight stopped talking and shoved a hoof in her mouth.

Seeing a possible way out of her scolding, Luna jumped on the opportunity, “Hmmmm? Dreaming about who now? And what sort of adult-themed dreams are we talking about, specifically?”

“None of your beeswax and you know what I’m talking about,” she snapped pointing an accusatory hoof at Luna, but she quickly steered the conversation back on course, “And even disregarding those issues, there's also the fact that this new spell’s victims don’t even realize that they’ve been interrogated. They wake up thinking they had a dream about a weird one-sided conversation with you or worse just forget it entirely.”

To be fair, that was the intended effect.

Apparently finishing her rant, Twilight began rubbing the base of her horn again and said, “Look, just please tell me you haven't used this spell on anypony yet.”

“Nooooo… Nay, we have not. Not once.”

“Luna!” Twilight slammed the hoof she been using to rub her head into the seat of her throne to look indignantly at her.

“Well, I’m sorry, Twilight, but we weren't blessed with thine treasured guidance a millennia ago as thee had not been polite enough to be born yet.”

The half-truth seemed to soften Twilight’s mood, “Okay, okay, but at least tell me you haven't used it since you came back from the moon.”

That question caused Luna to hesitate. On the one hoof, she could say no, and that would be the end of her scolding, but she would be no closer to solving the problem with the spell, which would likely mean a swift end to her interrogations with Wilson. On the other, however, the whole truth would probably also lead to a quick halt of them as well, especially if Twilight felt the need to inform Celestia of her machinations, though Luna was now having difficulty rationalizing why she was still keeping Wilson’s existence a secret.

“Luna?”

Gods, she sounds just like Mother.

“We have used it on one pony who volunteered to help test it,” she said quickly, thinking on her hooves. “...For purely academic purposes, we assure you.”

Raising an eyebrow, Twilight regarded her slightly for several moments, seemingly weighing the truth of Luna’s words. Eventually, she relented with a sigh, “Alright. I suppose I of all ponies can't blame you for experimenting with new forms of magic.”

“So you'll help us work on the spell?” Luna asked hopefully.

“As long as you only use it on volunteers and publish a scientific paper on your findings,” Twilight’s smile became a smirk, “And credit me as a co-author.”

“Errrr… Done.”

I suppose I’ll have to start recording what I’m doing, to satisfy her if such a paper can be published later.

“Great!” Twilight said, using a levitation field to produce what Luna had to assume were the scrolls she had sent earlier from behind her throne, “Now the main technical issue with the actual magic that I can see is the use of this ‘Zone of Truth’ spell. Honestly, it's not really the best spell suited to the task.”

“Oh?” Luna asked, glad to be moving the conversation onto actually solving her dilemma.

“Yeah. The thing is, Circumspect Silver invented it for the expressed purpose of casting it in his parlor to stop guests from lying to him. He didn't really care much about extracting information, just preventing deception. So really your version was more of a 'Dream Honest Conversation' spell."

He was always a bit paranoid.

"Not to mention the fact that the spell also affects everypony within its range, including the caster, which may partially explain why the caster's subconscious becomes exposed as well," Twilight continued, having fully engaged her 'science mode', “Actually, several much better truth spells were invented while you were away on the moon. Most of them during times of war, of course. In fact, I know Celestia used one of them herself about 300 years after your banishment, though the details of the event are somewhat hard to pin down due to conflicting accounts. Why don't we ask her what she thinks?”

“No!” Luna said, perhaps a bit too quickly.

Twilight tilted her head in confusion.

“She… my sister is a mare of very rigid morals and she would likely not see the scientific value of this avenue of research,” Luna said hastily. “I’m sure she would stop us on the ethical grounds alone, even if we pursued a perfectly moral method of experimentation. We should keep her in the dark about this for now. Once we have some notable findings, it will be easier to convince her to let us continue unabated.”

Not to mention she would want to oversee the whole affair.

“I don't know…” she seemed to hesitate.

“Listen to me well, Twilight Sparkle. It is easier to ask for forgiveness than it is to ask for permission.”

Twilight’s eyes narrowed, “That sounds like something a pony who gets into a lot of trouble would say.”

“Many did characterize me as a ‘problem foal' in my youth,” Luna chuckled.

“Alright fine. I’ll keep this from Celestia for now,” she said with a roll of her eyes as a quill and notebook teleported to her side and she began to make notes, “It’s going to take me a while to come up with a suitable replacement for the ‘Zone of Truth’ spell anyway, since most of the ones I know off the top of my head require the subject to be awake.”

“Thank you. Is there anything you want us to do to help?”

“No, no. This will probably just take a few hours of research. I'll send a letter if and when I find something,” she answered, not bothering to look up from her notebook.

“In that case, we bid thee farewell,” Luna said, charging a teleportation spell but paused when a wicked thought occurred to her.

“Oh, and Twilight?” Luna said with a suitable grin.

“Hmmm?” she asked, looking up.

“We believe Rainbow Dash would make a fine wife for you.”

Luna was gone before Twilight could begin to sputter out a response but not before her face turned a lovely shade of red.

Comments ( 14 )

Can we stop with gay main 6 when it has nothing to do with plot.

Maybe Luna just knows Twilight well, but... why does she know it's Rainbow when it could've been Rarity too? Anyway, awesome story

Why didn't you respond to Xzrea's comment?

8300429
Oh it does have to do with plot, just not the plot of the story.

8254044

8300494
My apologies. I didn't answer before because I wasn't sure if I was going to go into the details of the spell in this latest chapter and whether or not I should answer anyways, but in the end I scrapped detailing the spell in the story to streamline it a bit so I might as well answer your questions now.

1. No it doesn't cause everyone to use the same language. English just sounds like Equestrian. It might be a little lazy of me, but translation as a source of conflict isn't something I am interested in exploring in this story. Maybe I will in another story, but it would just slow down the story I am currently trying to tell.

2. Circumspect Silver's "Zone of Truth" works much like the spell of the same name in Dungeons and dragons, only difference being that it affects everyone within the caster's immediate line of sight instead of an area of some arbitrary number of feet squared. Any subject in this range is compelled to speak only truthfully and cannot lie.
Before casting this Luna has to use a spell that causes a dreamless sleep which I havent felt the need to name yet, so they can appear in a featureless void instead of some crazy dreamscape and also allows the subject to project their emotions and subconscious thoughts onto the void as images. Then she casts the "Zone of Truth" and enters into the subjects dream. These 3 effects in tandem are what constitute this interation of the dream-interrogation spell. Obviously this didn't work as intended, so at this point I am not sure if we will see this version used again in the story at this point.

As for preventative measures, yes you do wanna avoid getting captured but should I feel Luna needs to use this version again she might find that other obstacles present themselves, particularly "lucid dreaming" since ponies haven't seemed to grasp the concept fully yet.

Again sorry for not answering right off.

8300429
I needed something to move the conversation along to the next point quickly. Sorry if that upsets you, but rest assured I don't intend to explore romance much further in this story.

Comment posted by charredenay deleted Jul 17th, 2017

8255135
I will endeavour to do my best, but my best isn't always fast.

8255102
Thank you. It was a bit troublesome to express that the whispers are different from his actual voice so I'm glad it didn't throw you off for long.

8254324

8255106

8255133
Yes it's a very common name, but it also suits this character somewhat so I didn't even think twice about using it.

8300479
She doesn't "know" anything. She guessed. Didn't even think about it. Could actually be some stallion whose name begins with Ra...

Rainy Day?
Rare Stone?
Raucous Maker?

I don't even know if these are actual ponies.

It's Hard for me to picture Luna being intimidated by Twilight in any way or form.

8301285
She was intimidated by her resemblance to her sister, an authority figure in her life. For many people that alone is enough to make them fearful.

Very enjoyable, adding to favorites.

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