The most powerful sorcerer in history rescues a young Princess from her own curiosity, and helps her found a new Empire. But the sorcerer has her own reasons for doing so -- and they're not nice reasons...
In canon, Sacanas is only mentioned in passing as the creator of the Staff of Sacanas, used by Tempest Shadow in her attempt to conquer Equestria. Yet what kind of sorcerer would fashion a staff designed to steal the magic of alicorns? Why was Tempest, while wielding the Staff and its power, so implacably, coldly vicious? And why does history seem to say so little about such a powerful mage? There's a backstory here, and this is my take on it...
One final note: I do not agree with or defend the opinions expressed here. My intent is merely to explore the question: can a pony somehow end up doing all the right things, for all the wrong reasons?
Oh boy. This is going to be a rollercoaster, isn't it?
Been looking forward to this story~
"Why was Tempest, while wielding the Staff and its power, so implacably, coldly vicious?"
Did you miss Tempest's backstory? If she was ridiculed for her broken horn after her friends abandoned her. It's not much of a stretch that she does what she does, and the Staff had nothing to do with it.
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I think it's more than that, which is what prompted this story. Compare Tempest before the Storm King betrays her and Twilight rescues her, and then afterwards. Suddenly, she's a totally different pony: reasonable, selflessly loyal, even regretful. And consider some of her lines during the Movie, how she speaks them:
"All this power... wasted on parties... when there are far greater uses..."
"That Princess... is not going to stop me... from getting my horn back!"
"Silly little ponies... trusting strangers? Big mistake... big!"
"I'd like to show everypony what I can really do..."
It seems to me like there's more than mere redemption here. It's almost as if at the end she's thrown off a darker influence (with Twilight's help, of course). Perhaps a lingering influence from the former owner of the Staff and her armor? It's worth exploring, at least...
The Heart shatters
An empty void, filled with with a presence, broken at the core
The void was filled and so the once-hollow pony changed for the better, but what filled the void was broken and twisted at the core
The shattered heart was filled in turn, However forever twisted by its Breaking
The shattered heart and hollow heart had filled Each other with a power so great it filled the sky, but never forget the twisted core, almost unseen
The once hollow heart was now overflowing, with power so great it sought to fill both hearts
The heart so bright had filled the broken heart, but the broken heart was twisted, the light it shined was a twisted sickly light, in its own way devoted to the heart it filled the twisted heart held the bright by strings, however it the twisted heart had bound itself to the bright with once shattered chains, once love, now devotion fused by Vengance
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What do you think?
Oh, the irony of Sacanas resenting alicorns, and founding the Crystal Empire to get away from them, only for an alicorn to rule the Empire 1000+ years later.
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Depends how you count the time they were locked away following Sombra's downfall -- from the Crystal Ponies' perspective it might have been much shorter than that...
Huh. That's going to make the future appearances of the Storm Beasts...
Difficult to explain, to say the least.
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Recall that the Storm King was pretty keen on finding magic artifacts and/or sources of magic.
Kind of strange, given that he apparently didn't understand how they worked:
"Where am I supposed to be looking? I never understand how this spell works... Tempest!"
Might have been another reason for that...
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I just assumed he saw Tempest in action and was like "Yeah! Bring on the power!"
If their entire biology is sustained by magic, I think he would know more about it, not less.
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Knowing of a thing is not the same as knowing about it -- and management likes to keep to the former. After all, they pay underlings to handle the techy details...
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I mean it's your story. I just think it's a odd choice.
It doesn't explain them interacting with physical phenomenon very well, or why Grubber and the Storm King are so different from the rest of their species.
And it's not necessarily going to make the Storm King smashing any less gruesome, whether the guy deserves it or not.
There's a argument that he does, but frankly that holds true for Discord too (at least in the prime universe).
YIKES. Talk about trauma. That's a heck of a cold open.
You cheeky bastard, how did you know I love Tempest Poppins?
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Grin. I was hoping someone would notice that... Sacanas is evil Mary Poppins, at least at first...
Honestly, the way Sacanas used and "befriended" Palladium/Amore seems awfully familiar somehow... inspired by Rasputin and Tsar Nicholas II perhaps?
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I mean yeah, being frozen in time kinda does that too ya. But with NMM not occurring yet it's still gonna be at least 1000 years chronologically.
Iridia
I absolutely adore deep-lore pony history stories like this.
How did she NOT go back and burn that village to the ground?!
When the Storm King was introduced in the movie, I didn't particularly care for him. I felt his loony attitude was lesser than Tempest's calm and cold command. In discussions with others it was brought up that his constant shifting from happy and silly to angry to ambivalent would make him a dangerous enemy because one would never know exactly where to step.
That said, this story offers some very interesting ideas, although (and this is just a thought, nothing against the writer) maybe make Sarcanas a little bit more distinct from Tempest, like she has an odd affinity for escargot or something.
Begun, the Storm Beast Wars have.
Sacanas would have a heart attack if she saw the Crystal Empire and modern Equestria.
Which is fully possible. I mean, sorcerer of her prowess...
So...
Was that city always there beneath the snow, or did Palladium create it?
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I thought about that myself, and realized it was pretty much spelled out in this one line:
And consider what she tells Princess Amore at the end about this moment. Burning down the town would be way too rational a move at this point...
Love to mend a broken heart.
I was afraid of this.
Did she hire those thugs to attack the princess, too? Or arrange for the griffin attack?
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To me, it made for a more interesting dynamic between the two of them. The Storm King liked to see himself as the swaggering executive type, the guy-in-charge who has "people" (or ponies) to handle the tedious details of making things work. But Tempest is not merely an underling: it almost feels like she's playing him right back. She puts up with him, makes a show of flattery and servitude, merely to get what she wants. Though there's a hint of fanaticism, too, in that she seems to be driven by a darker, more far-reaching purpose, perhaps even not clear to Tempest herself -- which I take to be Sacanas's lingering influence, by way of the artifacts the sorcerer left behind.
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It's not stated explicitly, but I take it as given that she'd give things a nudge in the direction she wanted them to go, if they weren't going that way already...
Hmm...I don't know if I like the implications there at the end. Unless, this is all in her head like she's a powerful sorceress no doubt, but maybe not quite to the God-like ability where she's able to manipulate thousands of ponies/see the future. There's also the possible suggestion that Amore/Palladium was actually the supposedly dead daughter from the prologue...that someone would be so twisted they'd manipulate their flesh and blood child...🥶, unless of course Sarcanas was never a normal flesh and blood Unicorn...so many questions and not very many answers.
Saving and Faving. Would you terribly mind if I asked a couple VAs I know about doing a dramatic reading of this most intriguing story?
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My take on it is that at the end, Sacanas believes that she's "won", has accomplished everything she set out to do. Yet at the same time, she believes she's somehow "undone" the original tragedy that started all this -- which of course she hasn't. How she views the world is seriously broken, and has been all along. The outcome is positive, for both her and for Palladium/Amore, yet there'll be trouble down the line at some point. Amore won't be a trusting child forever. But that's another story...
By all means, a reading would be great. I'd be really interested to see who you can find to do Sacanas. It would have to be someone who can do Tempest Shadow at her worst: that coldly scheming, yet subtle vindictiveness that seems to drive her throughout most of the Movie.
Well, sad to say, but my opinion is that she's crazy. And not in an interesting way. Just in the plain old self-delusional way, in which she re-contextualizes everything that happens to her, because she can't face her grief, so she's decided to deal with it by claiming to no longer have a heart. Come across a filly in need of help? Well, obviously, that was all part of the plan! She couldn't possibly care for anyone. Break down and admit that you care for her, that you're broken, that you need help? All an act! That couldn't really be true. That would mean that she's never stopped grieving, and people with hearts don't do that.
TL;DR: "Nothing to see here, all part of the plan!"
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Why didn't she also try to indoctrinate the princess with her racist ideology, given how much she was grooming her already?
Now THIS was the change I was hoping for! And, oddly enough, the concept of trauma making someone literally incapable of feeling the emotion of love may very well have some basis in reality. I wish I knew the actual physiology behind that...
...OH. I hereby rescind my prior jubilation. Dang it, Sacanas, you were SO CLOSE! You were ALMOST a person!
...Huh, so this is what Klein felt when dealing with Kirito's sociopathy.
And. Here. We. Go...
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Oh she was... but you might not have noticed it:
And you can tell it's having at least some effect:
This is the insidious thing about racist thought, which can make it difficult to call out, and also difficult to realize you're taking it in. You don't tell someone "be racist" flat out -- instead, you model that kind of thinking, that world-view, and others wind up emulating the example, sometimes even without realizing it.
Wow.
Okay.
First; I have a different take on this.
"The greatest of lies are the ones we tell ourselves..."
I believe Secanas HAS had a change of heart and outlook. But she can't let her change truly permeate her. The loss of her filly, her memory? It would be a betrayal in her mind.
So...she maintains the illusion in her head. She will ALWAYS have the animas, the illusion that what motivates her is having that weapon close to hoof. But it short-circuits; because even if it IS hers, it will not sally forth unless Palladium so wishes it...
It's never going to be glitter-filled rainbow Alicorn facts that smell like vanilla for her. Never. There’s been too much...she would board the ships with the Elves to sail West if it weren’t for a certain Princess. Or rampage unchecked in Canterlot until she died or got a one-way ticket to Moon....
Luna could let hers go. Secanas...never...
Replace scientist for mage, and this is really salient.
I think her mommy instincts reawoken and after what happened last time she will do everything it won't happen again :P
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Juuuust wait... nothing is quite as it seems with a mage like Sacanas...
This story is so good it made me racist. 10/10. Would read again.
Tragic but heartwarming. I'd like to believe she actually has feelings and cares in her own disturbed way, but that doesn't change her actions.
In the end it really sounds like she did all the right things for all the wrong reasons. A figure of myth, awe and tragedy. Bravo wordsmith, bravo!
Oh, no! The sisters have come to town.