Chapter 8
Sunset Shimmer went down to the cafeteria, still incensed about her encounter. She’d try to start a revolution right now if she could! The cat was already out of the bag so there was no sense hiding anymore.
All the other kids were eating. She jumped up on a table.
“Attention everyone!” Sunset called out to the eating students. She had to stomp a few times to start getting their attention. “Listen! This is important!”
“Oh! She’s gonna sing a song!” Pinkie stood up and pointed at her, excited.
“What?” Sunset turned to Pinkie. There was something additionally wrong with that girl. “No! I’m not going to sing. This is serious.”
“Daww.” Pinkie sat back down. “Not even a serious song?”
“But I am going to give a speech!” She announced to them. “Listen to me! Celestia is devouring your potential! She’s keeping you all trapped here by blocking your memories and eating your growth! But we can escape!”
A confused murmur went through the room.
“All we need to do is stop going to class,” said Sunset. “If we don’t learn anything, she can’t feed off of us! We just sit around playing those phone games for months and slowly Celestia will starve to death! It’ll be a long, boring fight but we can win it!”
At that Sunset Shimmer was met with boos and laughter.
“But I love Celestia,” one nearby girl gasped. “I wouldn’t want her to get hungry.”
“We all love Celestia!” Another boy shouted at her from the back.
“She’s the one keeping us young forever,” one of the younger girls complained. “We’d just be committing suicide if we made her stop.”
“Well no,” Sunset replied. “You’d have like sixty years or whatever!”
“Well, I want more than that!”
“But don’t you want like freedom and stuff? To move ahead with your lives?” Sunset looked around the booing crowd. In retrospect, she’d rushed into this situation far too fast. She really should have had a game plan! “Anyone? ”
“What we even do if we got out?!” Someone complained.
“Okay!” Sunset could maybe work this angle. “I don’t know who’s in charge outside but apparently they suck too! As soon as we’re out I’ll kill them and conquer your world! You know, for your own good. I’ll install a new government that will make things better and -“
That was technically on the more ambitious end of her original plan, but suddenly it was more heroic sounding than when she first came here.
Not that the students agreed. They all started throwing food at her at that point, mentioning that world that left them all so traumatized.
“Hey! I - Quit it!” Sunset wasn’t able to get any more words in. “Just think about it! If your memories are sealed, then there could be something she’s hiding from you! Anyone?”
No one looked even remotely interested. This was going badly!
“Sunset!” Pinkie jumped up on a table and called to her. “Try singing! You gotta sing a song!”
“What?” Sunset looked down at Pinkie confused. “How will that help?!”
“Look, I know how this works.” Pinkie winked. “Singing a song is the only way to turn this around.”
Pinkie laid down something of a beat for her, hitting the table twice then clapping in rhythm. Strangely, Sunset almost felt like maybe Pinkie did know what she was talking about. Everyone was literally throwing things at her now so it wasn’t like this would make it worse.
“Hey, hey everypony!” Sunset began to clap in rhythm and sing. “I’ve got something to say! It may seem eternal high school is the place to stay. But you dig a little deeper and you will see that the real world is the place to be!”
But it just made them throw harder!
“Oh wait! Never mind!” Pinkie shouted out. “I didn’t realize you were this bad at impromptu lyrics! This won’t work at all!”
“Okay!” Sunset covered her head. “Well if any of you do secretly want to leave, I’m starting a revolution club! I’ll uh -“
She ran out of the room before things could escalate any further.
That had been a disaster. Did literally zero of them want out of this place? Maybe one of them secretly did… and they’d show up later.
Rarity came out of the cafeteria a moment later in a huff. She put her hands on her hips, leaned forward, and glared at Sunset.
“Miss Shimmer!” Rarity scolded her. “What has gotten into you? You were fine for the past two days but now this? How can you say such horrible things after all Celestia’s done for you! Taking you out of - well wherever you were.”
“That’s because Celestia hasn’t done anything for her.” Dash came down the stairs, walking instead of the usual skip she had, still looking groggy, eyes red. “She’s an intruder.”
Rarity gasped at that.
“Look, I didn’t mean to come here,” said Sunset. “I had no idea this place was like this and if I did, I wouldn’t have come. All I want to do is leave.”
“Even if that’s the case, you’re still like a tick attached to our dear principal.” Rarity crossed her arms. “All this food and air doesn’t come out of nowhere! She’s been taking care of you this whole time without you feeding her in return. The least you can do is give her the proper respect and deference she deserves.”
“Okay, okay! I get it! I’m the worst!” Sunset shouted back. “I’m always the worst no matter what I do! But if she’s clouding your memories how do you know she’s not deceiving you?”
“Oh yes, I’ve played this game before,” said Rarity. “I get my memories unclouded and ruin my whole day just to prove you wrong then tomorrow you say again ‘well now they’re false’. I’ve been here for centuries and Celestia has taken excellent care of me that whole time.”
“Yeah! I literally just had my memories unlocked ten seconds ago and I’m good here,” said Dash. “If you keep making trouble Celestia’s going to do something eventually.”
“Maybe I got overheated and overreacted, but is it really unreasonable for me to ask if any of you want to leave with me?” Sunset asked.
The two looked at one another, not entirely able to tell her no.
“You’re leaving?!” Pinkie jumped up from behind and put her hands on Sunset’s shoulders as though she’d been hiding behind the other girl the whole time. “But why?!”
“What?!” Sunset jumped forward, startled. She glanced at the cafeteria, then back at Pinkie. “Where the heck did you come from?!”
“From behind,” Pinkie pointed out. “First of all, you’d have to come up with a way better song if you want to convince me of anything. But why would you want to leave? Did someone sing you a song about leaving? We were having so much fun yesterday!”
“Sure, but - it’s not about that,” said Sunset. “There’s an infinite number of Celestia’s out there and I don’t trust any of them. I’m making a revolution club and I’m getting out of this place.”
Sunset got a piece of paper and wrote down the invitation to the revolution club.
“Besides, I’m clearly not welcome here anymore.” Sunset tacked her club onto the bulletin board.
Rarity and Rainbow Dash softened.
“We really aren’t the type to hold a grudge,” said Rarity. “I promise we won’t be mad for long. But we all love Celestia very much and like it or not you are in her house for a while. If you want respect from me then you have to respect our dear principal in turn. Or at least not make any trouble.”
“Yeah! Your song wasn’t that bad!” Pinkie extended her hand in friendship.
“I guess I can kind of understand why you’d freak out.” Dash kept her arms folded.
For some reason, them being nice to her made anger well back up in Sunset’s heart. But this time she swallowed it. Lashing out had gotten her in ridiculous amounts of trouble the past few days.
“I can’t promise anything right now,” Sunset admittedly, showing as little anger as she could. “That’s why I’m leaving the school for now. I’ll go to the desert or study in the library or something.”
“Well if you don’t want to stay and can’t leave have you considered the third option?” Pinkie mysteriously appeared behind her a second time.
“Third option?” That gave Sunset pause.
“You could go insane!” Pinkie repeatedly jabbed her temple with a finger. “Whee!”
“What?! How would that help?!”
“It’s the only way to understand the Fae.” Pinkie held up a finger all matter-of-fact like. “The trick is to go insane in just the right way or else you won’t make sense to anyone at all. Heck, it’s hard for me to make sense to you right now. But if you want, we can make an eldritch logic club! I have so much I can show you and then you’ll see that it’s okay for Celestia to keep us here because all things are impossible!”
Pinkie clapped her hands in excitement but stopped when Sunset walked past her.
“Yeah, well if I can’t open the portal in three years, get back to me with that.” Sunset pushed open the door to leave. “I want to be alone for a while.”
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Fae!Celestia is what Aldous Huxley, the author of Brave New World, considered to be the perfect dictator.
Huxley saw a dictatorship arising, not through brute force, but through the would-be dictator manipulating one's unconscious desires. They would be so good, Huxley warned, that the oppressed people would come to embrace their enslavement with open arms.
Fae!Celestia has given a bunch of depressed people a place where they can escape from hardship, in exchange for emotional power.
Unfortunately for Sunset, she isn't someone who offers a good alternative.
She's so egotistical, she thinks her being in power would automatically be an improvement.
10552813
That's an odd sentence, but I guess it makes sense.
If kids could vote, than politicians would actually give a damn about thinking for the future, and wouldn't bash the younger generation as "ungrateful."
If you can't vote, you're pretty much a non-entity in the eyes of who governs you.
Well, if CelestAI isn't taking (I want to emigrate to Equestria, by the way), I'd certainly consider Faelestia.
Mostly because they won't remember why they were mad.
Also, this particular Pinkie works far too well. Though an ally just mad enough to understand the fae may be just the edge Sunset needs... assume she doesn't crack sooner rather than later. We'll see what happens from here.
I couldn't tell you why, but coming from Sunset in the height of her angst and unresolved issues, I loved this line far more than I probably should:
10553333
The main downside is that she doesn't turn you into a pony. But maybe once she sees how cute Sunset used to be she'll decide she wants her students to be cuter.
10553279
It's more like she's just saying whatever will get them to help her.
....I honestly don't know who to side with in this story anymore.
Dangling sentence.
10553405
That's what makes Sunset, when written well, a compelling character.
In this part of her life, a traditional hero she ain't. And she can't really defend reality, since she didn't have that great of a life herself.
And this version of Celestia can't really be called labeled a villain. Her own values are too alien to be pinned down, and she's too enigmatic.
It's a battle between dark grey and light-black.
10553388
That's precisely what really good manipulators do: get people on your side to do what they want.
Jim Jones was like that: he had a lot of noble goals at the start of his career, like poverty reduction and battling discrimination in Indiana. He was able to lure a lot of the downtrodden over to his side by marketing himself as something greater, as a messiah who would bring about the golden age.
Like a lot of people, he let that power go to his head in a really horrible way.
Yeah, I'm with Sunset here, always remember the first rule of dealing with fae: don't. Right now Sunset hasn't agreed to anything and Celestia has no reason to kill her, so all she has to do is get out (as if).
10553558
Not a formal one but they do have an accord (Cel doesn't aid or hinter Sunset - Sunset can escape when she wishes) ...
...Is this Pinkie just saying what she herself did? Is she also an intruder? Or possibly a lesser Fae?
10553764
Well it is unlikely that Sunset was the first intruder to get an offer to assimilate into the system.
10553467
Also, Celestia is (presumably) being extremely upfront about her situation. She's not hiding from Sunset or the student body that she eats their potential, and - assuming she's not lying about them being there voluntarily - she's not even necessarily keeping anyone against their will. It's difficult to label her as a 100% dyed-in-the-wool villain when she eases pain, provides mental and social stimulation opportunities, and probably wouldn't even prevent anyone from leaving at any point. At worst, she's no more than a very mild form of cult leader.
Sure, the picture she painted was most likely deliberately biased, but her modus operandi does seem to be "more with honey than vinegar", at least to the point where she's putting in effort to make her setup appear attractive, both directly and to anyone who demands to know what's going on. The falcon analogy might be dead on - she's making the pocket dimension seem the attractive alternative, and for some people that's enough. Eternal healthy and happy life/existence, plus the continual joy of experiencing new things, if not being able to accumulate experience or growth, in a Lotus Eater machine? One where the only tasks are from courses you chose yourself, and there are no real penalties for failure? There are people right now in the world who would take that option in a heartbeat and consider it an upgrade.
Sunset, though, chafes at any restriction and almost inherently seeks freedom and the breaking of shackles. She could never be content with a metaphorial glove, jesses, and a hood, no matter how good the food or how protective the falconer was.
10554029
The problem is Sunset doesn’t offer those people any alternative. She’s hyper individualist, breaking the shackles only to help herself.
You know this story reminds me a lot of the movie ‘a wrinkle in time’ the older one with the boy genius that had super powers not the reboot with the girl.
So, uh, how is that different from Celestia again?
I bet Pinkie Pie actually has unclouded memories and full knowledge of what's going on. She's just Pinkie Pie.
I knew it.
10554464
Not sure what you mean. I guess one difference is that Sunset wouldn't be feeding off their potential?
10554375
You, uh... you really need to read the book. And the sequels.
10553333
Not to mention that Faelestia does offer a way out at all times - for non-intruders, the door's as simple as asking for it. Even for intruders, they can presumably learn portal magic and at least have a crack at it.
Sure, there's the whole Tír na nÓg problem of the world having spun on for years or centuries by the time you return, and Faelestia's feeding seems to consume any psychological progress that the 'students' make as well, meaning that they're as emotionally unprepared to face the world as the first time they left it; you can't use Faequestria High to recover and stabilize yourself. Equestria Online at least allows you to grow as a person, even if you're inherently unable to even think thoughts or retain memories (or reality, or existence) which might have a chance of bringing CelestAI down.
What part of they wanted to come here do you just not understand?
Oh wow, this is a great use of Pinkie's characterization in this setting
Celldweller - It Makes No Difference Who We Are intensifies.
At least she's focused on the important things...
Oooh, I'd be so down to that. Break me Pinkie, reforge me and I'll become stronger... This would be even more tempting than the enourmous knowledge provided.
10553285
I disagree, if children could vote, there would be incentive of a cottage industry where people have children for the express purpose of making sure that their political goal are met. Basically the hicks who live out in the backwoods with their interesting ideas about racism have a real and tangible way to make sure that they're backwards ideas flourish.