At the bottom of Stable 10, the great generator that has kept its residents alive for centuries is beginning to fail. As solutions are sought within, one pegasus sets her sights on the very ponies who built - and possibly sabotaged - her home.
Page generated in 0.04 seconds
Total duration
969 users online
381,115 hits today, 2,561,572 yesterday
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
9825033
For gunshot suicide, stick the barrel in your mouth, point to the back of your head & pull the trigger.
Otherwise, you risk just wounding yourself.
One of my brother’s first after school jobs was as a painter. First day on the job, he had to help scrape someone’s brains off the walls & ceiling before they could repaint an apartment
9866973
*blink*
I had a stud with a bloody nose in quarantine go into a sneezing fit a few years back. His stall was something out of The Shining.
...inb4 she killed or coma'd Autumn with that last head injury. WHOOPSIE.
Or hell, maybe she just knocked some of the crazy bitch out of her.
This idea that the actual background fabric of magic was broken by the bombs is something I don't recall being stated/postulated in the original FO:E (of course, it's been awhile...) An interesting idea. Gotta wonder if it's something that would heal over time, or needs intervention, or even if it could just never fully return to its pre-war state. You can potentially make something new and pretty out of shards of a shattered jewel, but you can't undo the shattering. Well...not without magic, and then you've got a bootstrap problem.
9867331
Hooves crossed Autumn has a bit of drain bramage from the whole affair.
As for the fabric of magic being damaged by the bombs, that's something I'm playing with in my story and never featured in the original FO:E. I'm very much of the mindset that the story I'm writing doesn't take place in the original canon at all. This story's in its own bubble, partly because remembering all the events of FO:E and its counterparts is borderline impossible and mostly because it frees me up to create a story without constraint. Probably not spoilers, but there's no Single Pegasus Project or Celestia-In-A-Box in this one either. The events surrounding the Mane 6 at the end of the war are not the ends they met in FO:E. ;)
I'll go more in depth on the concept of damaged magic later in the story, but an alternate description I scrapped for this chapter was comparing it to stirring up silt in clear water. When magic was stable, it could be harnessed to do amazing things. Balefire being a destructive product of violent magic, the water's been muddied making it much more difficult for unicorns to channel it.
9867443
> no Celestia-In-A-Box
aww, but she's so cute
derpicdn.net/img/view/2013/1/9/207800.gif
9867454
;) I was 100% expecting 2Snack's version with the nails.
9867506
Don't want to give Autumn any ideas.
9937393
Yeah, ran into some mental health stuff that I'm new to, but it's been getting better for the past couple weeks. On the upside, Chapter 13 is finished in draft form. Going to proofread tomorrow and see about uploading the beastie. 21,000 words by GDoc's count. So much for keeping things high and tight!
...fuck. I know that's not supposed to be a really important line or anything, but Jesus fuck.
Wait. Is that a reference to Delta Vee's Junkyard?
This chapter was brutal. Going to finish the next and take a break to consider.
9946670
I really, really enjoyed that line when I wrote it. Not in any pleasurable sense, but insofar that it really does a great job striking a tone on what kind of toll the war is taking on a society of previously worry-free ponies. I'm really glad you picked it out as noteworthy. :)
And yes, that is exactly the right JetStream. You'll be seeing a good bit more of it. Shinodage was gracious enough to give me the green light to use his characters and I'm desperately trying not to botch it!
Okay, I was not expecting Ginger to get left behind.
Adding this comment now so i don't forget when i finish the chapter.
Last chapter ended with the journal entry dated June 1064 and this chapter started with june 1065. I think you accidentally skipped a year.
11245973
Good catch! I've fixed the date, no one will ever knooooow ;)
So the ponies are going for solar. Lets hope that having magic means they can succeed where others have inevitably failed...
11246032
The diary entries at the end still say 1065
11443123
Oy vey, fixed! XD
Quite an excellent line.
One another note, I now see the journal entries go into detail on the background lore of the new setting, guess I'd better go back and give those more than a cursory glance.
The mirrors, the tower and Ginger slipped away behind her, leaving her alone to water a sky that refused to rain.
This is a HELL of a line. Absolutely phenomenal. I've really enjoyed alot of the prose you've put down, but this one evokes the exact kind of emotions I've been feeling with this chapter.
How dare you do this to me. Keep it up.
Oh, dear, things just aren't going well for Aurora, are they?
The thing I love most about this chapter is the Enclave prisoner switcharoo. When Autumn leads Aurora somewhere different from the empty water tanks, you know something's up. Then, the reveal just pulls more unexpected stuff out of the shadows! Julip's quite the interesting mare. Not very sharp, clearly, shown off by her immediate spurning of her very real shot at freedom. I expected a grudging truce, but nope, only slurs. The clever thing to do would have been to use the F&F ponies' mistake to her advantage and escape with Aurora, then kill her and return to the Enclave. Her blatant prejudice puts a halt to that, though - apparently, it's too much to swallow her pride for a chance to return to her duty. Either that, or she's less loyal than she seems. None of that is bad for the story, by the way! I'm looking forward to a possible reappearance.
Still, judging by her behavior (and mysterious past, how'd she get captured?) plus her poor attempt at getting Autumn to off her, she's got more going than it would appear. That's one tally for "violently racist Enclave", worse than we've seen from the Rangers. Let's see if the next Enclave pegasus acts the same way.
Ginger being a former slaver is something I didn't see coming, even after the cutie mark. Maybe I was just imagining it or something. It's still unclear how a pony raised to be a slaver would suddenly find her conscience and escape, but that's groundwork laid for later. Personally, I like the twist, but it comes a bit too out of nowhere. Slaves aren't even really mentioned for a good portion of the wasteland introduction period of the story. It seems exactly like something for Roach to tell Aurora about, and for Aurora to have a Stable-pony reaction to. Unless I'm remembering incorrectly, Ginger herself has nothing to say about slavery whatsoever until this arc. It makes sense that she wouldn't bring it up, but the cutie mark is so well-foreshadowed, so it'd be just delicious for there to be some separate, completely unrelated conversation about slavery. (Perhaps, say, right after they're nearly caught by the raider caravan, which is more than likely to be pulled by slaves in the first place.) That way, at the reveal, the readers have all the pieces of her backstory, they just haven't put them together yet. It'd be more satisfying and make way more sense that way, I think.
I didn't expect Aurora to leave Ginger behind, either. I thought they would escape or Ginger would die, but not this. Unexpected, yes, but that also partially invalidates all the setup and investment. There's no real payoff here, good or bad, just kicking the can down the road even after an apparent confrontation. I'm not saying it's a done thing, but keeping the Ginger-prisoner status quo runs the very real risk of hitting the same beats of 'get-Ginger-back' later on in the story, and if that's the case, there'll be a lot less emotional payoff.
A lot of teasing at future plotlines here. Solace has something to do with computers and the Enclave. Autumn has (had?) a plan to 'help people', likely involving JetStream, and that's probably why Cider wanted that pipbuck so badly. I don't remember exactly, but he said something like it'd change a lot of lives. Perhaps its related to whatever those servers in the JetStream basement/prison were, hmm? Then there's the Ministry headquarters in Mount Canter. Combine that with the Enclave-Ranger standoff, the Steel Rangers' shenanigans, and the original Stable 10 quest, there are a lot of plotlines to collide and threads to keep track of. If you're anything like me, you've got a massive document and/or excel file keeping track of all this. I've seen some good planning so far, so I have faith! I hope it stays focused around this level of complexity, though, there is such a thing as too much going on.
If I remember correctly, Kkat had each ministry's headquarters in separate locations. I'm not sure how I feel about this change. On one hand, it meant the headquarters could be explored individually and also showed the M6's separation over the course of the war. On the other, having all the ministry headquarters in Canterlot makes more sense - easier to communicate and organize between government branches during a time when that thing really counts. It also is squarely in Enclave territory and promises one extremely important location for later. I'll just have to wait and see if this story can utilize it well.
Now Aurora's made enemies of F&F, too. Not a lot of friend-making, here. If that goes too far, it'll be downright unbelievable for Aurora to pull together any meaningful support. She even asks herself why she keeps making this mistake. Hopefully, her reasoning takes a turn for the better soon. She keeps getting distracted from all her friends and family who are stuck in a slowly dying Stable. Much more of this and I'll have a hard time believing she gives much of a heck! about them at all.
The balefire bombs damaged the world's magic, somehow, hmm? Very interesting. I know the show specifies pretty clearly that pony magic comes from within, but it'd be quite easy to say balefire damaged all sources of magic, even of those who were sheltered from the blast and radiation, or that pony magic, while powered by their being, is also reliant on some external source. Ironically, the lack of natural magic implies the fate of this Equestria is much more permanent than that of Kkat's, where the world's magic is still present, but spells and techniques have been lost in the war. Personally, I very much like this change. Darker, yet darker, but not quite grimdark - still compelling!
Also:
Missing hyphen. Double also, unless there's been some serious inbreeding, Aurora is overwhelmingly likely to be a distant descendant of Roach's daughter. Cool. Triple also, there are zero pegasi in the chair, unless Aurora's in it too. Maybe change 'pegasi' to 'ponies'?
11675084
Oh, I will keep 'em coming.
I'm always happy to provide feedback. It's what I'd want, after all!
I absolutely agree with the momentum thing. A rough draft is better than an incomplete one. Just don't be afraid to come back and improve the start of this when you reach the end. I'm rooting for you!
Oh no, I wrote an essay. Quick, Lyn, hit post before it gets longer.
Wow, I haven't read anything this good in a long time. I can't put it down. The million plus word count was a little intimidating at first, but now im confident that ill burn through it in no time at all.
Wow, I almost thought aurora was gonna get away with saving ginger diplomatically/sneakylike -- that switcheroo was totally wild; I lament that she wasn't able to save ginger :/ I was on the edge of my seat the whole time and really really wish she managed to unstrap her fully and carry her out to safety