Captains, Queens, and Princesses

by protopony

Part 1 : Broken Roads

Author's Note:

2/18/2019
Minor edits

I consider the death of King Sombra one of my greatest failures.

I was so optimistic, so sure of myself. Why shouldn’t I be? I had defeated Nightmare Moon. Stood against her in single combat. Redeemed her. Celestia admitted she had no idea that Luna, her sister, was even still trapped inside that monster. I had done it, I had arrived, I had surpassed my mentors exceptions. She was proud of me, she…she smiled at me.

I peaked. It was all downhill from there.

I should have noticed with how I started to handle Discord. My arrogance, my hubris. Discord was a god! A literal god of chaos and I stood there like I had a chance, like I was a force to be reckoned with. It’s lucky that he’s more trickster than destroyer I’ll say that much. Only the timely intervention of Celestia saved us, saved me.

Then the Wedding. I’m still so ashamed at how I acted, how I threw the biggest fit that’s probably ever been thrown in the throne room. Once again I was sure that I alone had the answers. That I was right while everypony around me was wrong. I set the advice of my friends aside, I set them aside and nearly ruined every relationship I’d ever made.

I should have realized that my friends were the constant in all of those cases. That’s why we always get separated. Even the villains know we’re strongest together. They were always there and always willing to help. I should have learned from them. I should have elevated them as much as they elevated me, as much as I elevated Celestia. But I didn’t learn.

Had I always been so blind? So full of myself?

Sombra was different. He wanted to subjugate the entire world. Was that worse than freezing it by bringing eternal night? He didn’t fool around either, not at all like Discord. He didn’t try to break our wills or torture our minds. He wasn’t protecting his brood, or ensuring the survival of his line, like Chrysalis. He went right for the crystal heart so he could win. Was that more or less merciful than the others?

It didn’t matter. I still didn’t learn. After seeing, after knowing how important the six of us are together I insisted that I do it alone. I almost doomed the whole empire, maybe even Equestria herself, perhaps the world. For what? Because Celestia told me too? Because I had to prove something to her? Because I had to prove something to myself? Was my self-worth really so wrapped up in how Celestia saw me that I’d doom us all for just a chance to please her?

Unfortunately the answer was yes. I tried! Oh, how I tried to solve the riddles, find the heart, restore the heart. Confront Sombra. Redeem him if I could, imprison him if I couldn't. Nopony told me, “Kill if necessary.” Was on that list.

We killed him. We ended his life. It took far too long for that to set in. I was so disappointed that I had failed Celestia I didn’t think about him until months after the whole incident. All that guilt and anxiety hit me at once. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I when I did the nightmares came. Trapped in that crystal prison watching helplessly as the dark king took my friends one by one. Then he’d come for me, and begin to laugh as those crystals grew larger and larger until they crushed me. Then the dreams got worse. We started to win those dream battles and ever so slowly Sombra's scream of rage at being defeated got more pained and desperate. We were hurting him torturing him. It wasn’t long before he was crying for mercy and begging to be spared.

I asked myself countless questions during those months. It was Shining and Cadence who actually did the deed. Did that mean I was innocent? Or maybe it absolved me altogether? Shiny was a soldier, one of the best. I knew that he’d gone on deployments and maneuvers. Diamond dogs and griffins did occasionally attack our supply lines and outposts. It would be foalish to think that he’d never taken a single life, even by accident. Yes Shining must have done it? Or perhaps it was Cadence’s fault, she had hinted that her past was sordid and not everything was sunshine and ladybugs. Maybe it was her fault?

Besides the evil king was really asking for it. He wanted to enslave us or worse. He wouldn’t have listened to me or changed his ways. He wanted to rule the empire and Equestria. He deserved it. He didn’t give us a choice.

If he had, I’d have done my best. Nopony is beyond redemption, all can change if they want to. If only I’d been given the chance to show him. I’d helped Luna, surely Sombra wasn’t as bad as Nightmare Moon. Where were those dreams, I wondered. The ones where I’d traded my simple life as Ponyville's librarian for one teaching the king in the north all the things he didn’t know. Kindness and understanding. Friendship and Love. Ethics and Economics. Vocabulary and sentence structure.

Thinking those things actually helped. Imagining my life as some twisted version of “The King and I”. Kept the dark feelings and the nightmares at bay. If only all of life's problems could be helped by the correct application of musical theater.

Ultimately this failure, this…crime? Has defined me more than I care to admit. There has to be a way to save everypony. No creature should be left out in the dark and cold where so many corrupting shadows wait to turn that fear, anger, and depression into suffering and hardship. My old graduating class at Celestia's school was one taste of casting that darkness out and replacing it with genuine friendship and comradery. And even though that wasn’t the success that I needed, it was Moondancer who took that final leap across the chasm of fear to take back what I’d removed from her life.

Which brings me to my biggest challenges: Starlight and Fizzlepop. I can’t help but see how both of their lives were defined by the lack of friendship. Without her best friend Starlight would have destroyed everything even unto time itself. Tempest helped the Storm King enslave the entire nation not just for the promise of her horn restored but in retaliation for the betrayal she suffered from her friends as a foal.

What happens if I fail either of them? Will they fall back into their old ways? Will my betrayal doom all the world? Am I doing the right thing? Am I the right pony to teach them about friendship when it’s clear that I myself haven’t even learned these lessons?

I suppose that I can only continue to learn with each and every friend I have and hope and trust that WHEN problems arise we can work them out like friends should and not hide the parts we don’t want others to see.

Just like I’m doing.

-Twilight Sparkle

Comments

[zimmerwald1915]

Oh get over yourself, Twilight. You've led a charmed life, and will keep getting unearned rewards and accolades until the show ends. No one buys that you have any problems - or that the ones you've made up in your head amount to anything.