Indignation, Part 1
Princess Celestia wakes from her six year long coma to find a world changed for the better, just not in the way she hoped.
The cool winds swept across the wide untamed expanse of the African serengeti, the ocean of grass swayed and flowed like rippling waves in the gentle breeze. Nature sounds and other noise of the wilds had softened as day shifted into night, punctuated by the warm orange glow of the sky as the sun slowly descended upon the horizon.
A lone unicorn mare stood upon the very edge of that horizon, watching wistfully as the beauty of the landscape put her at ease. With a heavy sigh she turned around and smiled, her form obscured by the light of the sun to be little more than an abstract silhouette.
"Mom..." she whispered.
"SUNSET!"
Celestia eyes opened wildly as the scream that escaped her lips echoed across the air with all the force of a bomb going her off. She catapulted up from where she laid, head snapping violently to and fro as she struggled to gather her bearings. Her mind was still trapped in a haze and she stumbled about off her bed, completely oblivious to the wires and pads stuck to her nor the machines connected to them.
Dumbly, she shambled forward towards the light, her eyes open half-lidded and legs weak. An unheard voice calls out to her, a voice of a daughter long lost, and she wearily calls back.
"Sun... set..." Celestia mutters, putting one hoof in front of the other. "Sunset... I'm here..."
She marches a few more paces but immediately comes to a dead end when her face collides with an invisible wall. She stumbles a few steps backwards, bewildered by the strange phenomena. Blinking rapidly, her vision slowly begins the clear and the light from before wasn't nearly as harsh.
When the world finally ceased to be a bright blurry mess, and the ringing in her ear quieted to a tolerable hum, Celestia found herself dead center in a waking nightmare.
As it was she was encaged in some sort of strange cylindrical cell in a facility equally as alien, surrounded at all sides by a gamut of worried scientists and security officers, both human and pony. They all watched her through the impact glass with varying levels of wariness; some were terrified, others nervous, but after a brief moment they collected themselves and resumed their task as if they didn't have the living avatar of the sun standing thirty feet away from them.
One of the scientists shuffled over to a nearby security officer and spoke to him in a nervous tone, "Get Professor Thalmann, now."
The name, Thalmann, triggered something within Celestia. It alone caused a flurry of emotions to rush through her mind. Confusion, panic, fear and rage violently swirled within her like a hurricane, her head frantically snapping to and fro each onlooker in a drunken stupor as she desperately attempts to make sense of the situation.
She was dead, wasn't she?
She, Twilight and the rest of her loyal subjects had been decimated alongside Canterlot, dying a defiant death all in the name of the Equestrian ideal. Equestria was broken but unbowed, having denied humanity the satisfaction of conquering her home. At least, they should've been.
Nothing made any sense. Why was she here? Why was she conscious? Unless... No. Elysium didn't exist. She was sure of it. That afterlife nonsense was nothing more than fantastical hogwash she had perpetuated in order to maintain the moral purity of her ponies, a mere flight of fancy dressed up as religious dogma. By that same principle Tartarus or some other purgatory shouldn't have been real either.
So, if she wasn't dead, then that could only mean...
"...No," Celestia muttered, pupils shrinking to pinpricks. The weight of the horrible revelation came crashing down atop of her and the blood in her veins turned to ice. She furiously rubbed at her eyes with her hooves, hoping to wipe away the horrible reality around her. When she reopened them she was once again greeted with the same view, only this time her jailors stared at her like she was some out of control zoo animal, to her dismay.
"No... No, no, no! This can't be!?" With trembling hooves she reached up to her chest, feeling the bundle of wires and tubing dangling off of her before tearing them off in a frenzy.
She grunted in pain but soldiered on, the sudden burst of adrenaline coursing through her made her numb as she reeled back and furiously slammed herself against the walls of her cell. She expected to be free as a result of her prodigious strength but was rebuffed as the portion of the wall she struck glowed briefly before reciprocating the same amount of force back unto her. The resulting feedback sent her reeling back, a look of shock flashed across her face.
"RAAAAAGH!" Celestia roared as she bucked her hind legs towards the wall, only to be rebuffed once more. This time the feedback came back at her tenfold, sending her flying against the other side of the cell, crashing against her bed and various medical equipment and scattering them across the floor where she laid beside it in a messy heap.
"Grrr... What manner of human technological abomination is this?!" She cried, scrambling back on all fours. Her frustration mounting, she leveled her horn towards the cell wall and willed a powerful arcane blast into existence.
Nothing of the sort happened.
In fact, she didn't even have a horn.
Upon the realization of her lack of magical powers another wave of panic washed over her as her hooves shot up to her forehead where with a sinking heart she felt a rough jagged stump where her glorious horn should've been. It was then that it occurred to her that her own innate magical nature was also being suppressed, no doubt by the magic killers that had caused her and her people so much grief throughout the war. That infernal machine was anathema as it cut away at her soul like a knife to flesh, leaving her as weak as the average pony.
She had no time to process her hapless situation, only a need to escape and fulfill her ambitions in short order no matter the cost.
Celestia leveled a glare towards the humans observing her and, with a tone equal parts prideful and desperate laced in her voice, demanded them to free her, "HUMAN VERMINS! RELEASE ME THIS INSTANT BEFORE I TURN ALL OF YOU AND THIS HORRID FACILITY INTO GLASS UPON THE EARTH!"
She slammed her hooves against the cell wall for effect, hoping to cow her captors into submission with her intimidating presence. To her shock her observers weren't afraid of her in the slightest, rather, they found themselves amused by her predicament, staring at her in a way that said 'are you serious?' The humans either ignored her outright or pointed and laughed at her pathetic state. Their reaction was baffling as only an inches worth of material separated them from a fiery demise. She was a force to be reckoned with, yet the sheer indignity she received infuriated her to no end.
"YOU DARE REFUSE TO ACKNOWLEDGE ME!?" Celestia screamed, pressing her face up against the wall, glaring at her gleeful audience with baleful eyes. "I DO NOT DESERVE TO BE YOUR PRISONER! I AM THE MIGHTY! I AM THE STRONG! I AM YOUR SALVATION! I WILL BE TREATED AS SUCH! YOU HUMAN WRETCHES OWE ME THIS!" She ranted, but was continued to be treated very much in the same way a petulant child throwing a temper tantrum would be. Desperation creeping up her back she turned to the ponies in the room, a pleading, yet willful, look in her eyes.
"PONIES! MY LOYAL SUBJECTS! CHILDREN OF MY OWN BLOOD, YOUR CREATOR!" She cried out, putting on her most authoritative demeanor. "HEAR THE ORDER OF YOUR PRINCESS AND OBEY! TURN AGAINST YOUR HUMAN MASTERS AND FREE ME FROM MY PRISON! DO SO AND I WILL ABSOLVE YOU OF YOUR BETRAYAL TO THE EQUESTRIAN IDEAL AND UPLIFT YOU ALL AS SAINTS WHO FREED THE GODDESS OF THE SUN! ACT NOW AND WE WILL BEGIN ANEW WITH ANOTHER GLORIOUS CRUSADE TO MAKE UP FOR THE FAILURE OF THE LAST! THE FUTURE IS AT HOOF!"
The ponies nearby wore expressions of disgust and contempt as she concluded her desperate spiel. They didn't directly engage her, merely mumbling something about tyrannical despots and insane ramblings beneath their breath as they hurriedly turned away and left the room, leaving Celestia to wallow in her own failure.
"No! NO! Get back back here, I command you! You will obey me or there will be dire consequences! Don't leave me here you treacherous heretics! Not with these filthy mongrels! Not with the monsters that slaughtered your kin en masse!? I will not be abandoned! I WILL NOT BE DENIED! OBEY ME YOU MISERABLE INGRATES! OBEEEEY ME!" Celestia screeched as she began wildly slamming her hooves against the cell wall with callous disregard for her own well being. She raged and roared like an feral animal, thrashing about to where her hooves began to bleed and her throat grew shrill and hoarse. "GAAAAAAAH! LET ME OUT! I DON'T BELONG IN HERE LIKE SOME RAT IN A CAGE! LET ME OUUUUUUUUUT! I AM PRINCESS CELESTIA! RULER OF EQUESTRIA! SCION OF THE SUN! HERALD OF HARMONY! I AM-!"
"Bah! Gott im himmel! What damnable caterwauling have I walked into?!" A gravelly voice cut through the noise, causing Celestia to momentarily cease her outrage.
There, standing with his back ramrod straight and hair grey as the mist wafting off his electronic cigarette was none other than Professor Alric Thalmann, the man responsible for the creation of the Thalmann generator and its namesake. He looked as old and as cantankerous as he always been, with his permanent scowl and myriad of deep wrinkles, only now he was sporting some sort of cybernetic rig throughout his entire back. He stood in the doorframe of the room, one hand in his pocket and the other idly adjusting the e-cig on the corner of his mouth, all the while glaring at Celestia like a strict headmaster who'd just caught a student running in the hallways.
"Tsk, so they weren't pulling my leg when they told me you were finally awake. ScheiBe, what a pain in the ass," he cursed as he entered the room, pulling up a nearby chair and deliberately scraping across the floor with an unsettling screech that caused everyone in the room to wince. He planted it in front of Celestia's cell and sat down rather awkwardly. Instead of walking around and sitting down like a normal person, he, with mild difficulty, pulled himself over the back of the chair and sat down leisurely with one leg propped up atop the other. He turned to his staff and addressed them all the while maintaining eye contact with Celestia.
"Send word to the UN," he began, taking a long enthusiastic drag from his e-cig before continuing, "tell them 'Professor Thalmann's favorite song is ''Here Comes The Sun' by Die Kafer.' I'm sure they'll be thrilled to know. And I don't have to tell you this, but try to be discreet as possible. We can't have any of this leak out before the big announcement."
"Understood, sir," a security officer acknowledged and left the room to relay the message.
"As for everyone else, resume monitoring of the prisoner as normal. Make sure all security measures are functioning at maximum capacity and that redundant systems are always on standby. I'm going to have a little chat with our... guest," The staff complied to Thalmann's orders and returned to their posts as he narrowed his gaze on Celestia.
"Well, well. Good morning, Celestia. Welcome back to the waking world, It's finally time for you to smell the ashes."
"You..." Celestia seethed hatefully as she scanned the man sitting casually before her. "That name. That accursed name, Thalmann..." she uttered it in a deep hiss, her voice dripping with venom, "It was you, wasn't it! You're the one responsible for Equestria's downfall! You created that infernal magic killer that led to the death of my sister, the destruction of the Crystal Empire and the raping of my lands! All of Equestria's miseries came to be because of YOU!" She slammed her hooves upon the cell wall, shaking with uncontrollable rage. In that moment every inch of her wanted nothing more than to wrap her hooves around that man's throat and slowly strangle the life from him.
"Ah, there it is," Thalmann, in a surprising twist, quipped as he smiled a gnarled root of a smile. He broke out into a hearty chuckle, causing Celestia to gape incredulously at Thalmann's flippant remark. This man was responsible for the death of million of innocent ponies and he has the gall to laugh it all off? The audacity!
"You dare..." Celestia whispered darkly. "You dare to laugh at the deaths of countless millions?! YOU DARE TO MOCK THEIR SACRIFICE!?"
"Oh, no," Thalmann waved dismissively before breaking out into a throaty coughing fit, wheezing and sputtering into his hand as a sickly opaque grey fluid coated his palms. He recovered quickly yet retained his jarringly jovial demeanor, having wiped away the mess on his lab coat. "Oh, no, no, no. I'm not laughing at that. I'm laughing at the fact that you are every little bit as conceited, sanctimonious, self-righteous, manipulative, egotistical and morally disingenuous as people know you to be. I just find it amusing you're at least so consistent in your personality. Because honestly it's nice to deal with something familiar, wouldn't you agree?"
"What are you implying?" Celestia scowled.
"Oh? Did the wise and omnipotent Goddess of the pony people fail to understand the idiotic musings of a violent ape?" Thalmann taunted.
"Spare me your drivel and answer the damned question!"
"Ah, so angry, so violent. You're everything I expected to be and more," Thalmann teased playfully before his expressed hardened to the same glower he was known for. "But alas, if you wish to know so badly, then allow me to spell it out for you: Celestia, you are everything you blame humans to be and more."
His words set Celestia off. She rushed at him with renewed vigor, throwing herself at the wall over and over again only to be knocked back each time all the while Thalmann watched with quiet satisfaction as she failed to reach him.
"LIES! HUMAN LIES! " She bellowed. "I AM NOTHING LIKE YOU VERMINOUS FILTH! I AM ALL YOU COULD EVER WANT AND HOPE TO ACHIEVE! I AM THE ZENITH OF MORAL AND CULTURAL EXCELLENCE THAT ALL CREATURES AND CIVILIZATIONS STRIVE FOR!" She paused, panting heavily as she leered at Thalmann. "Compared to you pathetic lot, we ponies are the blessed people, the chosen of the universe for which all things are measured by. And I am at the center. I am what makes ponykind special in this cold uncaring universe!"
"Please, you're not special, Celestia," Thalmann retorted bluntly, not even missing a beat with his delivery. Celestia's eyes widened at his continued defiance of her presence but lacked the energy to rant again.
"Tsk," Celestia turned away, "I wouldn't figure an ignorant monkey like you could never understand me."
"Oh, I understand alright," Thalmann took a moment to huff his e-cig. "I understand that you're bland, vanilla, droll, pedestrian, cookie cutter, mediocre. You claim to be better than everyone else, you claim to have cultivated the greatest society to ever have existed before or after you when in reality you and that gilded cage you call Equestria are just another addition to the long list of 'accomplishments' misguided leaders, tyrants, despots and dictators have achieved throughout human history. So when I say you're nothing, I mean it. Because I've seen it all before, and at this point nothing surprise me anymore. Not even you."
"...Is there a reason we're even having conversation?" Celestia muttered disdainfully. "I doubt you've come here to get your jollies off at looking down on me."
"Well, that's one reason," Thalmann quipped, blowing a puff of vapor. "But the other is to get you prepped for you trial."
Celestia whipped her head around so fast it was a miracle her neck didn't twist all the way around. "Trial? You seek to put me, Princess Celestia, on trial?" The thought alone was laughable to her.
"That's usually what happens to someone when they commit crimes, or rather war crimes in your case," Thalmann coughed, "After which you will be deemed guilty of all charges and summarily executed in that order. Hopefully."
Celestia chuckled humorlessly at the thought of her own death. It was a bitter feeling, yet she chose to humor the good professor anyway, "...Killing me won't change anything," she whispered spitefully. "So, you've won. Equestria is destroyed, the last of my faithful subjects eradicated along with Canterlot. The dream of spreading friendship and harmony beyond our borders dies with me, but what does it matter?" She began to pace back and forth, trying to regain some semblance of her regality.
"You humans will go back to killing yourselves the moment I'm slain, and the pony heretics living fat lazy lives in your lands will follow suit with your species' eventual demise. This is a hollow victory, nothing more, nothing less. Humanity is still fated for destruction at their own hands and you monkey people threw away any hope for salvation the moment you rejected the ponification potion and embraced conversion. So go ahead, by all means. Put me on trial, declare me guilty, have me executed. This. Changes. Nothing." She seethed.
There was a moment of silence between the two after Celestia finished speaking. Thalmann and Celestia locked eyes with one another in a staring contest to see who would blink first. Curiously, it was Thalmann who was the first to blink, sighing heavily to himself and running his hand across his hair as Celestia looked on with a smug sense of satisfaction. She had thought to have disturbed him with the reality of his situation, but as she would immediately find out it wasn't the case.
"Excuse for a second, my e-cig is running on empty," Thalmann replied flippantly as he pulled out his charger pack from his lab coat pocket, inserted his current cigarette for recharging and pulled out a fresh one. "Usually I'd prefer the real thing, but with all the sensitive equipment around me having it caked with the tacky residue from tobacco smoke would be bad. Thankfully the water vapor from electronic cigarettes don't have that same issue." He took a few puffs from his new e-cig, savoring the flavor and annoying Celestia with his antics.
He then popped the big question he should've started with since his conversation started. "...Celestia, how long do you think you were in a coma for?"
Celestia was taken aback by the question. It was so sudden, yet it made her reassess her situation. "I... A-a coma?" She stammered.
"Yes, you were in a coma," Thalmann replied a matter o'factly. "You fell into a coma during the siege of Canterlot, moments after the barrier fell."
Panic stirred within Celestia. She knew something had been wrong the moment she woke up, only now had it finally hit her just how severe her predicament was. It all came flooding back to her, her final moments before darkness overtook her. The sight of the human forces on the horizon of Canterlot, her last conversation with Twilight, all of it. She sure that was the end.
"Did you honestly think that you woke up the day after you passed out?" said Thalmann. "Perhaps that's unrealistic for me to assume. Perhaps you believed it was a week, maybe a month or two. That would sound much more reasonable, unfortunately for you that isn't the case."
"...How long?" She demanded, growing paler than she thought possible. "Answer me, how long was I in a coma?!"
Thalmann sighed heavily, "...Six years."
Six years.
She'd been comatose for six terribly long years.
Celestia felt her heart hammer in a chest like a jackhammer the longer it took for her to process the information. But what does this have to do with anything? She was to be put on trial, yes, but what was going on in Thalmann's head? Why speak the way he does, what does he know that she doesn't! The unknown was too much absorb all at once.
"...W-why does this matter?" Celestia stammered. "What does it matter that I was comatose for that long! I-it should be irrelevant! Equestria is no more! Twilight, my pupil, and our faithful subjects, they were all destroyed along with Canterlot, as it should!"
Thalmann raised an eyebrow, his lips curled into the barest facsimile of a smirk. It was so faint of an emotional expression yet it couldn't have felt more predatory than it did right then and there. "Oh, come now, Celestia.You're alive. Think about it."
Celestia's pupils shrank to pinpricks. The pieces of the puzzle had all fallen into place and while she still couldn't make out the big picture she didn't like what she was seeing. She was alive. She had already established that earlier but acknowledged it entirely for the wrong reason. As it was, there was only one other explanation for her being here and it was the worse possible outcome she could hope to conceive. "No... No, that would never happen. I made sure of it! But... S-she wouldn't... SHE COULDN'T!"
"...She did," Thalmann announced, lazily leaning back into his chair. "Mere days after you were rendered comatose, Twilight Sparkle, then acting princess of Equestria, surrendered and ceded control of the country over to UN occupational forces. Shortly after, she complied to all of the UN's terms of surrender. And if you recall, the terms included turning you over to us," he explained as Celestia listened on in horror.
"...B-betrayal," Celestia muttered, her face the very picture of fear. "C-corruption... Taint... Blasphemy... Malversation! HOW COULD SHE?!"
Rage erupted from the depths of Celestia's soul. Unfettered and destructive. Though her body ached and moved sluggishly, a new surge of adrenaline drove her to lash out at her cell at the expense of her body and mind. She rammed herself towards Thalmann, the wall between them absorbed her attack and sent her flying back, but she held her ground this time. She slid back on all fours, welling deep grooves into the floor. Undeterred and fueled by madness she charged again and again, making a mess of everything, including herself.
"GRAAAAAH! WHY?!" She bellowed. "WHY WOULD SHE DO THIS?!" Celestia continued to thrash, the room rumbled and shook even though the thalmann generators were working overtime to keep her abilities suppressed. She was like a great beast struggling against the chains holding her down. The cell's housing began to buckle, there were panels becoming warped and loose parts being knocked around. Looks of apprehension began cropping up on the staffs' faces, they feared for the worst but Thalmann remained as nonchalant and as stone-faced as ever.
"WE SHOULD'VE ALL DIED TOGETHER! THERE IS NO FUTURE LIKE THIS! NO HOPE! SHE WOULD POISON EVERYTHING THAT WE ALL HAVE PAINSTAKINGLY BUILT UP TOGETHER?!"
"SHE SHOULD'VE KNOWN BETTER! I TAUGHT HER AS SUCH! HUMANITY IS A BLIGHT THAT RUINS EVERYTHING THEY TOUCH! NOW EQUESTRIA IS CONDEMNED TO A SLOW DEATH AT THEIR HANDS! OUR PEOPLE WILL FOREVER BE CORRUPTED BY THEIR ABBERANT INFLUENCE! EVERYTHING I'VE DONE, THE TIME I'VE SPENT, THE SACRIFICES I MADE TO ENSURE EQUESTRIA'S CULTURAL PROSPERITY HAS AMOUNTED TO NOTHING BECAUSE OF HER! NOTHIIIING!" Her raging continued. Warning lights started going off, flashing sporadically as a siren began blaring throughout the room.
An automated voice sounded itself.
"WARNING."
"ESCAPE ATTEMPT IN PROGRESS."
"CELL INTEGRITY AT: 73%"
"INTERNAL CELL TEMPERATURE AT: 76* FAHRENHEIT AND RISING."
"KINETIC ABSORBERS: FAILING."
"LOSS OF STAGE 1 INERTIAL DAMPENERS IMMINENT."
"PLEASE NOTIFY THE SITE DIRECTOR IMMEDIATELY."
"ALL SECURITY PERSONNEL REPORT TO CONTAINMENT FACILITY SIGMA LAMBDA AT ONCE."
"THIS IS NOT A DRILL."
Thalmann sighed to himself. As everyone else broke out into a cold sweat, he himself couldn't be bothered to dignify Celestia's outrage with a response. Rather, he began searching his coat pockets like a smoker looking for a cigarette lighter until he found what he was looking for. He pulled out a small remote no bigger than a smartphone and pushed the big button on it.
"The prisoner is being uncooperative," he mumbled, as the ceiling in Celestia's cell opened up to reveal a pair of mechanical arms armed with some strange dish looking device. Celestia paused in her outrage and sneered at the sight of the strange apparatus.
"BAH! MORE HUMAN MACHINERY! YOU COULDN'T HAVE WON WITHOUT IT!" She mocked. "WITHOUT YOUR PATHETIC TECHNOLOGICAL CRUTCH YOU HUMANS ARE-!" Cutting her off short Thalmann pushed another button on the remote, the arms honed in on Celestia and let loose a highly concentrated wave of anti-magical energies that assaulted her at all sides. The sound it made was like a banshee's wail, and it punctuated even further by Celestia's own wail of pain.
"GRAAAAAAAAAAH!?" Celestia screamed, the waves immediately forced her onto her haunches, gripping tightly at her head as the mother of all migraines blended her grey matter. The sensation she felt throughout her entire body could only be described as torturous. This type of pain was beyond what she knows, everything else that had come before paled in comparison to the unmitigated agony she was experiencing now. Her head felt like it was slowly splitting open right down the middle. There were thousands of flensing needles dancing about beneath her skin, threatening to rip her asunder. "AAAAAAAAAAAH! W-WHAT IS THIS?! WHAT HORROR HAVE YOU SUBJECTED ME TO YOU MONGREL FILT- AAAAAAAAAAAH!"
"Oh, this?" Thalmann pointed to the mechanical arms. "It doesn't have a name but they're one of kind. It's based upon the original Project J.G.W. prototypes and specifically manufactured to my exact specifications with the sole purpose of acting as a defensive countermeasure for your prison. You see, we learned the energy emitted by the generators can do more than just suppress a pony's innate magic. If you overcharge it and adjust the frequency to the proper spectrum you can turn the generators into, and forgive my crass summation, a death ray that is lethal to ponykind. Fortunately for you, it was deemed too expensive, too impractical and too inhumane to field as a weapon during the war and was banned from ever being created, save for this lone exception."
He tapped at his temple, staring down on a screaming, writhing Celestia as blood began pouring out from her nose and eyes in long unbroken streaks. "Feel that? All those little capillaries in your head, every little blood vessel, like tubes of concrete. Right now every inch of your body is being forcibly agitated on a cellular level, resulting in uncontrollable muscle movements and violent spasm that are tearing you apart from the inside out. A minute from now, your skin will start to sear as if cooked over an open flame. In three, your organs will begin to liquify and spill from out from any orifice. In five, the force of your spasming would snap your spine clean in half and shatter your bones..."
"W-WAIT! WAIT!" Celestia cried in desperation, weakly raising a hoof pleadingly, an action that caused searing pain to run up her foreleg. "STOP! I-I SUBMIT MYSELF TO YOU! YOU HEAR?! I S-SUBMIT! TURN IF OFF! P-PLEASE, I BEG OF YOU, TURN IT OFF!?"
"...Hmph," Thalmann wrinkled his nose, staring at his remote for a few extra seconds before rolling his eyes deciding that Celestia had had enough. "Only because you said please." Thalmann pushed a button on his remote and the device turned off. It then receded back into the ceiling and the room was engulfed in a pregnant silence as Celestia writhed pitifully upon the ground, too weak to move on her own, too traumatized to speak. "You know, I wasn't actually going to kill you. My job is to look after you until the world is prepared to kill you."
He stood up from his chair and casually checked his watch, "Oh, would you look at that, it's lunch time. I must admit, speaking with you has left me rather famished. Someone, get the maintenance crew down here and have them repair the cell. Tell them to reinforce it as well. We wouldn't want our guest to ruin her special dwellings again, now, do we? In the meantime, I suggest you rest, Celestia. Try to think about all that's transpired. You have much to reflect on. I'll have the staff provide you with a meal and some reading material, have you catch up on current affairs. We'll chat again in a few hours. Auf wiedersehen."
With that, Professor Thalmann turned on his heels and left the room no worse for wear, leaving Celestia to her own thoughts as she laid about on the cold floor. The pain had subsided quicker than she had expected, but her ego and willpower were in shambles.
What kind of world has she woken up in?
She knew nothing about it.
Absolutely nothing at all.
...She was afraid.
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Thalmann wins perfectly there. That is all.
An excellent chapter!
An excellent X-Com reference!
This is truly a good read, thank you so much. Not many(if any) have actually written about what Xenolestia waking in such a situation, but you have exceeded my expectations and more.
This is the chapter I've been waiting for. PLEASE also do the Twilight v Celestia final confrontation, but from Celestia's POV.
11074820
A legend.
😁 Good. She should be afraid, especially with what comes later in Truth. She can act all high and mighty as she wants and blame others, but deep down, she's nothing more than a petulant child throwing a raging tantrum. I can only wish that Canon Celestia can witness this.
This really makes makes me wonder how much of Celestia's actions in Truth were genuine. I do think that Celestia did care about her ponies (just not as much as she liked to think) but not as much as she cared about the society she made.
11074830
Canon Celestia seeing this all go down:
i.ibb.co/PrjbXw0/D852-C6-FC-109-F-4-CB5-9746-2-D039-BF11-BEE.jpg
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😂😂
11074831
I guess we'll know more in part 2
good.
11074831
"How do Twilight and my ponies dare to refuse dying for my sake?"
That's how much Celestia loves them.
I guess she has yet to learn how much her subjects, specially Twilight, found out during all these years: the fate of Equus, Celestia's secret plans (from her own hoof- writting), Camp Canary, etc ...
By the time Sparkle went to visit her, Tia was aware yelling and demanding was useless.
Somewhat odd given Tartatus seems to be a physical location in Equestria, Tyrek was imprisoned there. I guess that place might just be named after supernatural location where ponies think they go to once they die if they're bad.
11074820
Eh, I kinda think havin' him hack up grey sludge from his lungs kinda ruins the effect. In truth, he's really not that much further from death than Celestia, and, like Celestia, it's a result of his own actions. In a way, she's right; without human's advanced technology, he probably would be dead by now, and, had Equestria appeared just a few years later, perhaps humanity along with him.
All because of smoking.
11074993
Inventions like that are rarely the job of one person - IIRC a team of researchers, both ponies and humans created the generators. If Equestria appeared or the war started later, when he was dead, someone else probably would have been in his place. Maye it would have taken humans longer, but I think they would have built the anti-magic devices anyway,
11074993
11075023
The main contributor to the generator was not Thalmann but Moondancer. For understandable motives, she refused to take the credit.
Not so high and mighty now are you, Celestia?
To be honest, I think good doctor "does so love his vork" a little too much here.
But I do like how he goads Celestia into revealing her actual motives. Perhaps her reaction to learning that humans managed to defy her claims yet again by showing mercy and working to integrate post-war Equestria will be even more telling.
11075181
I wonder if Discord disclosed the details of his last conversation with Celestia.
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11074874
Y'all tbh
Despite everything, I can’t help but pity her like Fluttershy, she was right, given power at a young age (at least in this universe) messed her up considerably. Now she’s in the first real “timeout” she’s had in millennia waiting for one heck of a punishment. I’m with a lot of other there people, Truth might have been her putting on a brave face, for herself and to lesser degree Twilight. If everything going to plan there’s nothing to fear right? But the truth was her plan had long since fallen apart. I do hope this story has some reactions from various characters, seeing her imprisoned and waiting for death.
Also love how she says technology is a crutch…. Meanwhile that’s exactly what magic is for her ponies. Though the difference between them is rather stark, magic can only be used “actively” by a minority of the population, meanwhile technology can be used by everyone. Additionally you have the question of what happens if you take them both away? Take away magic (not block, more like what happened with Tirek), they become weak and helpless, I’m honestly wondering if they would have survived long as a species in that state. But take away technology and people will eventually rebuild and rediscover, might take awhile but it will happen. Yes many would die too, but I think p me their chances would be better collectively then ponies in this case. Additionally I think magic actually made them stagnate, what do you guys think?
Can’t wait to see her reaction when she discovers that all her ponies (not counting the fanatic EFF) all curse her name, want her dead, and are now living peaceful happy lives amongst humans.
11075206
God bless NPH
11075212
I think you hit it spot on, because as we saw with gen 5, without the use of magic, ponies finally innovated more and became more technologically advance
"Malversation"?
That's awesome.
I actually learned a new word on this site. Where did you pull that one from?
11075479
I was looking up synonyms for corruption and i stumbled upon it in the thesaurus. Having the power of synonyms is a helluva drug
Seems like Celestia got to experience the Valhen Special
11075233
I'm guessing that's probably a big contribution to her reaching the state we see her in 'Truth'.
11077237
Please, Tia can count her blessings Moira isn't the one in charge of her well-being.
i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/076/653/5a3
11078507
“Tell us how to make plasma rifles.”
Too much shouting, too much rage, too much arrogance. I expected something quieter since I saw Celestia be calmer when she talked to Twilight after she woke up.
11081639
Makes sense though because probably after talking with the good doctor and understanding everything that happened in six years she resigns herself to her fate.
11074831
This is pretty much the vibes I got off her. She wasn't so much about protecting Equestria and the ponies as she did the idea of Equestria she had in her head. A perfect little society where nothing goes astray or different. It blinded her to the petty corruptions in the court and Equestrian society, too small for her to notice but ones that the Mane Six kept bumping into during the show's time. That the Mane Six solved them allowed her to overlook the fact these corruptions and imperfections happened to exist in her supposedly "perfect" society.
Celestia is the sort who, to quote Superman: Red Son, would want to put the whole world in a bottle. A small, limited safe space where nothing changes, a place to show things off like a model sailboat in a jar. Humanity was too big for said bottle, nor would it consent to being put in said bottle, so Celestia tried to cut them down to size so they would fit. Problem is, she preached the whole "Harmony and Friendship" spiel so long that ponies who genuinely believed in harmony and friendship, and not just parroting whatever their Princess-Goddess told them, saw past the lies and nonsense and actually tried to give humans a fair chance, and they did. Celestia's grand plan fell apart when she ran into something she couldn't control, and the lies eventually collapsed, leaving her face-to-face with stark reality.
I like to believe this version of Celestia was once a genuinely good ruler, trying to rule through wisdom and kindness. But along the way, whether it became convenient to act like she had supreme moral authority, or because she genuinely believed she was the chosen protector and savior of all, she let it go to her head, and therein lies the tragedy. What could have been a good and fair ruler became a self-obsessed tyrant.
The other reason she went to war with humanity was pointed out in "Decision" that Celestia's pride caused all this. Not only did humans kill and eat her beloved Sunset (who I believe Celestia remembers more as a beloved martyr than an actual pony - seriously, had she not died the way she did, would Celestia even remembered her so vividly?), but the humans wouldn't know who she was, which is a painful slap to a parent as you'd expect. Then they rejected her "perfect" solution that she'd devised to "redeem" them for what they did (to her and Sunset, that is), which was a further slap to her inflated ego (and inflated egos are also the more easily wounded). So naturally, she wanted to punish them all for their "sins" against her, feeding off her self-deluded belief in godhood, or at least being the special ruler of Equestria.
Which is why the loss of her status and the love of her ponies was the biggest, most painful humiliation she had to endure by the time of Truth. In the end, she really was nothing special. Just a pony who lucked into great power, and then proceeded to commit every sin in the tyrant's checklist.
11074888
I think that's the biggest sin she committed here. She doesn't genuinely care about her ponies, only about her precious "perfect" society. Maybe she did once, but since ponies come and go while she's immortal and unaging, they've all become a blur to her, so she treats them all alike; as cogs in her "perfect" nation. Which is ironic for all her ranting about the evils of human machinery, she's basically turned her whole nation into one, for the sole purpose of proving herself right. Which is why she was so harsh on rebellious ponies and dissidents; she had given them everything, so how dare they refuse her logic and argue with her?!
11075212
I wanted to say that, but you put it better than I could.
11088164
I agree, it’s likely Celestia internalized what happened to Sunset, while she blames humans, she might also blame herself. As she was the one who let her end up in the situation that got her killed, parents tend to focus on failures and not successes. So when one (that we know of) her children was killed on the line of duty of course she takes it more personally then the ones that just “wear out”. Especially if theirs a convenient scapegoat for her negative feelings.
The irony is that the tribe who wronged her likely went extinct, considering it was at least several hundred years ago. The combination of inter tribal war fair, colonization, slave trade, etc likely reduced them to a forgotten group to history. It wouldn’t surprise me if they even were wiped out after eating Sunset because of their overconfidence. Because after eating the magic beast who could stand against them?
11083140
I still wanted less of this. It's tiring and didn't appeal to me at all.
11090031
i dunno man sounds like a you problem
11090754
No shit Sherlock did you learn that by reading my comment? Shocker!
11090972
Is there a link to such a fanfic?
11092270
if you're gonna cry about it, don't read it.
easy solution
11092670
Your comment is fucking stupid. How am I going to tell if I don't like it if I don't read it? Just stop talking.
11092918
*your
:)
11093026
You must be a pathetic person if those are the Ws you're looking for. Bye troll.
11093408
👍
To think, everything could have been so much better if Celestia told everyone about dying sun...
I'm looking forward to Celestia's reaction when she sees how peacefully humans and ponies have been co-existing while she was in a coma, something she thought to be impossible.
Wow... I always assumed that the one good thing you could say about Negotiation-verse Celestia is that she kept her dignity. She'd refuse to admit she was wrong, but she seemed to plead guilty and face certain death with surprising decorum. But here she's simply a sociopathic petulant brat unable to cope with the fact her toys lost. Even her taunts of 'Technology being a crutch.' sounds like a child saying how their favorite superhero would win if the other didn't have that dumb cheating power. She's not Superman red-son, she's not Vader, she's not even Dr. Doom, she's Chris Chan with the powers of a lower case god.
Besides the humans, the ones I feel truly the worst for are Cadance and Luna. Think of not only having her be in control of your social life and politics but your private life as well. Not just having the final say in your taxes but in how you eat, how you socialize and how you act at all times. I wonder how much the Nightmare Moon incident was at least understandably motivated if not justified. I wonder how much of Luna and Cadance's compliance were just being broken and guilt tripped, and desperate attempts to please a parental figure respectively.
11150181
The Celestia who was met by Twilight Sparkle for last time had spent plenty of time eating a healthy diet of humble pie.
And I disagree with the interpretation of Celly being a moster from the begining whose mask got chipped until it fell apart. I believe she was once a genuinely benevolent, if flawed, ruler.
Dude no offense or anything but um can you tell us why you take so long writing chapters now like you used to release chapters in a few days or weeks but its been 2 months no hate or anything im just wondering if something is affecting you
11158609
picked up the warhammer age of sigmar dominion box set with a buddy, been busy snipping and painting minis. Then we got into dropfleet commander, and I'm working through my entire box of shame collected over the course of several years. Feelsbadman
11162279
I juggled around with that idea before but never got around to it