Steel Solstice

by Starscribe

Chapter 8: Knight

Sunset staggered from the room, feeling as though she’d been physically beaten.

There had been no violence in the history class, or at least no violence inflicted on her. She had gone into the class wondering how she would be able to tell if the king had sanitized his history or not.

As she stumbled from the room, she no longer had to wonder. She no longer let herself mingle with the crowd of builders, instead jerking herself away, backing up until she was against the wall, before turning and running away down the hall.

But of course, there was nowhere she could go to escape from the simulated people. There were enough to fill the whole building, and with far higher fidelity than the houses outside. She never saw a person repeat, at least not that she could tell. Maybe they were images of real students who had really passed through here. Maybe they weren’t. Monsters, every one of them.

Sunset ran along the hall, not sure of her destination. She no longer felt the need to continue with classes as they had been planned—she wasn’t sure she even wanted to know what the Builders had to teach her.

“I expect a monster when I talk to a dragon,” she muttered, one of her hands twitching rhythmically to a melody she couldn’t hear. “They enslave goblins, they used to eat ponies. But whatever these beings were, Clover was more than a little misled. ‘Builder’ is a poor name. ‘Human’ isn’t much better. Destroyers, perhaps. Devouring Ones.”

Sunset had come to a world expecting perfect harmony. Maybe, in some twisted way, that harmony had been achieved. The process to get there had left a trail of corpses thicker than Nightmare Moon’s. The history class had shown her video, video of a planet in flames. She saw “Federation” armies marching, with electrical devices that could kill hundreds of people by destroying the hardware in their brains. Very little of the Tower’s own military archives had been shown to her, but considering everything else Sunset had seen, she didn’t really need to know. Whatever they had done, she could trust it was just as horrifying.

Sunset stumbled out the front doors of the building. She wasn’t sure how she’d even reached them, yet she managed to stop herself from tripping as she made her way out onto the grounds. None of the fake people followed her out here, and at last she could have some privacy. So long as Jackie and her friends don’t come out of the statue again.

She made her way up to the base of the statue, staring up at the noble face of King Richard. She rested one hand on the stone, feeling its smooth, perfectly cut texture with the delicate sensing organs that humans called hands.

“You were supposed to be better than us,” Sunset muttered, her voice very quiet. “You weren’t supposed to be worse than dragons, worse than griffons, worse than the crawling chaos.” Sunset began to pace around the statue. She now recognized the species the king was riding as a horse, one of the many species these humans had enslaved. Horses at least had been treated better than most, a small comfort for her considering how close to ponies they looked. Would you have treated ponies the same way if you found your way into Equestria?

There was no answer from the stone, of course. King Richard might be the greatest ruler in human history, but he was no god. Not even Celestia could be omniscient. “Your people wanted the freedom to improve themselves,” Sunset repeated, her voice bitter as she glared up at the king again. “Why couldn’t you find a way that didn’t cost lives? Even ponies solve most of their problems without violence, what’s so hard about it? If we could figure it out... Surely you could too.”

“It’s not as easy as it sounds.” A voice spoke from behind her, a voice younger than any Sunset had heard before. She very nearly jumped from her skin as she turned around, to find a young man standing there.

This was a male child, maybe eleven years as the humans measured them, standing at least a foot shorter than she was. He wore all white, with overlapping robes of ceremonial cut and intricate black design. Sunset recognized them from the history class she’d just taken as belonging to a knight. He had a long metal scabbard on his back, so oversized on him that it looked like it might restrict his movement if he tried to twist too suddenly to one direction or the other. Yet there was no weapon there, as the knights had worn in all their pictures.

Sunset had seen many pictures of people bowing to knights like this, seen the respect and loyalty in their faces. She felt neither emotion, and did not attempt to falsify them. “Who the buck are you?”

The child blinked, though there was nothing of fear on his face. He was still young enough to be surprised, or maybe just not old enough to conceal his feelings. “Sir Charles Gray,” he answered, raising two fingers to his brow in something like a salute. “A knight in service to the Tower, not any of its lords.” He pointed with those same two fingers, at the stone just below the statue. “I am tracking a fugitive. She stole something from me, and I have reason to believe she brought it here. Have you seen any wrongdoers? Maybe wearing a large, metal sword?”

Sunset suppressed a laugh. The kid spoke like the child of one of the rich Canterlot houses once he got going. But he had a slight accent, one she couldn’t quite place. She didn’t let it bother her. “I didn’t see someone with a sword,” she said, and there was no deception in it. “But there were people here who I don’t think belonged. Not students like me.”

“Students...” Gray repeated, striding over to her and taking her arm with both of his, as Jackie had done. Yet unlike Jackie, his grip was incredibly strong, as irresistible as a vice. He was to humans what earth ponies were to unicorns, or at least it felt that way. Still, he wasn’t trying to hurt her. Only pulling over her GIO. His eyes scanned over it. Without any direct contact from his hands, the screen filled with several lines of text, in some unfamiliar language and moving far too fast for Sunset to read. Another second later and “Sir Gray” released her, retreating again. “You’re not her. Be glad, citizen. I would not have been deceived by your appearance, if it were an illusion.”

“I’m sure,” Sunset grunted, glaring down at him. “You barbarians would probably do something terrible to me, just like you do to each other.”

The knight had already been turning to leave, but he stopped then, staring at her. “What part of the Federation did you come from? Is that what the OMICRON cores told you? Said we were the barbarians?”

If glares could kill, Sunset’s surely would have. “I’m not from anywhere on your stupid planet.” She took a breath, considering the wisdom of what she was about to say. Not for very long, though. Sunset hadn’t thought about the consequences when she defied Celestia, and she didn’t really care about them now. At this point, what did she have left to lose? “I just finished learning about your history, and it’s worse than ours. I thought you must’ve mastered harmony thousands of years ago with as advanced as you are. Making pocket realities, casting age spells, replacing people’s broken parts with machines. My civilization could never do what you can. But you’ve killed more of yourselves in one year than we have in a thousand.”

The tiny knight did not get angry. His face wasn’t blank and uncomprehending, as all the recordings in the building behaved. There was no mistaking the light in his eyes. The comprehension in his face, the sadness and guilt he seemed to feel at her words.

“I don’t know who you are, citizen... But whatever independent colony you come from, we all have the same history. We all evolved from the same blood.” He closed the distance between them, walking a few steps closer. When he spoke, it sounded very much like the words of an adult issuing from his tiny body. Only the tone of his voice made him seem like a colt. “Evolution does not select for weakness. Nature has experimented with pacifists. Those species went extinct.

“Even here in the Infinite Realm, most of us aren’t any different. Freeing ourselves from the confines of death and pain only made violence more accessible. Don’t judge us harshly just because your little mining dome on some asteroid doesn’t have a violent history. You’re... You must be an independent. Split off from the Federation when the war started, right?”

He didn’t wait for her to answer. “You picked the right civilization to join. King Richard is the best, kindest, noblest ruler humanity ever had. When the ‘democratic’ Federation was using Goetic secrets, what did Richard do? He had every cultist executed. He thought it was better to fight with a disadvantage than to sacrifice our humanity to win. If it wasn’t for the Nanophage, there wouldn’t even be a Federation today. Their very survival is a monument to the lengths they’re willing to go. The Tower isn’t like that. We have no slavery, no suffering, no pain. It was hard getting here... Survival has always been rough. But we made it. I think that counts for something.”

Sunset opened her mouth to argue, but couldn’t find the words. Her objections, however rational, felt hollow in her mouth. How could she criticize Richard, who had more courage than Celestia herself? When her own sister had sold herself to Outsiders, even the Princess of the Sun had lacked the courage to kill her. Nopony’s hooves were bloodless.

The knight turned away again, walking back towards the school. “Complete your studies. If you still have doubts when you’re finished, there are knights older and wiser than myself who might explain things. Or, if we can’t, King Richard himself. Every citizen has the right to put a petition before him, if they’re willing to speak with a fork.”

Just like that, he was gone, vanishing into the building and leaving Sunset alone with her thoughts. Sunset stared after him, but she didn’t quite have the courage to follow. It didn’t matter if he looked like a child, she now knew enough about the Tower to know what knights could do. Even if Jackie had somehow managed to steal his sword...

Sunset lifted her GIO towards her, flicking the screen with one finger so it would wake from its “hibernating” state. Out of curiosity, she went over to the messaging app, and found that Jackie’s contact information was all still there, waiting for her. She pressed on the name, then typed out a quick message on the screen.

“Not ready to talk to you again yet. I just wanted to warn you that there’s a knight here. I think he’s looking for you.” Whatever else might’ve passed between them, Jackie had been a friend to Sunset when she felt overwhelmed by this strange new world. Even if this whole place didn’t really exist, or existed in a computerized pocket-dimension, that kindness still mattered. She could return it, and be damned what the knight thought about it.

Jackie replied as quickly as she had last time. “Thanks Sunny. Stay safe.” And nothing else. Not a particularly useful reply, but it wasn’t as though Sunset would’ve done what Jackie wanted at this point, anyway.

Sunset turned around to face the school, wandering back towards it. The Knight’s words hadn’t really convinced her of anything, but they had given her perspective. Clover the Clever had been wrong about humans, or at least misinformed enough to think things about them that were clearly untrue. But even given all of that, they were still a powerful race. Their technologies had been able to do things that no magic spells could do, such as sending them into orbit around their planet, beyond the reach of the magical field. Computers were another powerful innovation that magic hadn’t imitated, one with applications as far reaching as making copies of reality where nopony had to follow the rules they didn’t like.

And Sunset was inside one. Trapped until she completed her education and became a citizen. Then she could meet with the king, if she wanted. Then she could make a petition of his court, and perhaps return to Equestria. Assuming Jackie hadn’t been right about how bleak and inescapable the pocket reality really was, anyway.

Sunset stopped walking with one hand on the door. Yes, she could go back into education, graduate, and let the “Steel Tower” swallow her with all the other citizens. She could do that, or she could take control of her own future. She could use the resources these Builders had given her for her own purposes.

What if I could find the computer creating this world and bring it back to Equestria? I’d need a generator... Something to carry it... But what’s the point of making worlds so small if you can’t move them? Humans had made great strides in fields Equestria had no names for. They had discovered radio, rocketry, and radiation. Returning to Equestria as an Alicorn would bring a powerful weapon back to her kind—returning with a school to teach ponies every useful thing the humans had ever learned... Now that could make a difference.

It wouldn’t be easy, but Sunset wouldn’t have to do it alone. “Nobody cares about what happens in this old shard,” Jackie had said. “No administrators looming down our backs means we can do what we want. Remake the world.”

Sunset scrolled through her course list, dragging off everything that wasn’t directly related to computers, and the so-called art of “Datamancy,” and set herself marching through the school at a brisk trot. She didn’t bother getting out of the way of other students, letting them scatter before her as she walked. They did, not even alive enough to be annoyed as she shoved them out of her way. The projections knew their place, as well they should.

Sunset Shimmer wasn’t going to give up just because Clover had been wrong and everything she knew about humans and their civilization was a lie. She would only grow more determined. As the knight had said, nature did not evolve weakness. She would show these humans that ponies could be just as dangerous.

Comments

[djthomp]

It's always fun to see Charles again. I was wondering if he would have enough top secret knowledge to have an inkling what was really going on with Sunset and Equestria, but apparently not.

[FanOfMostEverything]

Hmm...

Well, at least Sunset's been disabused of a lot of her misconceptions. She may have picked up a few new ones along the way, but it's still a step forward. Now to see what path she takes to pursue her new goal.

[Doppler Effect]

Sunset deciding to learn everything about computers. She really is doing pretty similar to Second Chance, but in the opposite direction, isn’t she? It would be neat to see them meet up at the end of the story, to compare their experiences!

Also, am I remembering right that Clover visited before the war? Maybe Clover’s opinion wasn’t too far off for the time period she saw?

[Yami Vizzini]

And now Sunny has once again gone full alpha bitch.

Of course it happens to be Charles, out of the thousands(?) of knights who could be involved, looking just the right amount younger than his body did/will/wioll haven be in Harmony Defended, even though he’s probably been around for a lot longer and both forms are more or less chosen at will.

[Condray]

8217251
Does alpha bitch really matter when they’re actually not people though?

Also it seems ironic that seeing the Steel Tower from sorta their own perspective makes me dislike them MORE. All this is making me hope Sunset appears in some fashion in the “present,” although unless she goes really hard messing with this shard that’d be really difficult.

[mastermenthe]

What are the Goetic Secrets?

[Starscribe]

8253889
She's referring to the Lovecraftian horrors that perpetuated the human war. They were mentioned a few times in Harmony Defended, but obliquely.