Heroes Never Die

by Shimmerist Ari

Part 3 - Propogandist

Being the only human volunteer in New York put Ari in a unique position, it made her stand out. Somepony high up in the SSP decided that they certainly wanted to do something with her and that something quickly took the form of Ari becoming part of their advertising campaign.

Not as in appearing in a commercial or anything. At least not yet. But they already sent her a few things to do her new job with.

The SSP sent her a bunch of gift cards which Ari used to buy this huge $3,000 printer and a bunch of printer supplies. The understanding was that she’d print out and distribute whatever Shimmerist propaganda they asked her to.

It took too long to set up with her disability, but she managed. That thing could crank out really high-quality posters and pamphlets like wildfire!

The second gift was access to all their pro-pony materials. She had high-quality pictures of some 100 pamphlets and posters to use, including the series they wanted her to start posting up:

Ponies Make it Possible

That was their human-facing slogan.

Truly equitable communal living. A world free of poverty and destitution. Literal magic granting unlimited food, freedom from disease and so much more. These a million other blessings weren’t possible, but Sunset Shimmer and her transformed ponies made them obtainable.

That was kind of a cheeky comeback to the type of people who said things like ‘Uh! Socialism and communal living just can’t work for humans! Humans tried it and it didn’t work.’ To which a Shimmerist could simply respond ‘yes’.

There were five variations of it, three for the three main tribes, then two more talking about how good the ponies had it out west. At the bottom, it said that if you wanted these benefits for yourself, if you wanted real change if you wanted to get involved you could go to a Shimmerist website linked at the bottom.

And of course, more ponies meant more possibilities… but it didn’t mention that part. It didn’t mention they were Shimmerists on the poster or anything about transforming more humans.

There were more explicitly Shimmerist posters, of course. The files were arranged by area. Mostly human areas, mixed areas, mostly pony areas, and fully Shimmerist areas each had a different message tailored to them.

The final gift she received was some train passes. Ari could ride the trains pretty much anywhere in NY or NJ she wanted for free for the next month. And if she did a good job, they’d get her a yearly pass for all this stuff instead.

It was so Ari could reach more towns and the SSP was strongly pro-public transportation in general. But it was a great perk to have.

One of the ponies from the SSP (Ari never actually met them) was scouting out the area on google maps and marking up the ideal locations for Ari to hit. Ari could just take out her phone and see where to go in any town within striking distance.

That app already existed, Ari wasn’t the only agent in their propaganda department, but nothing in New York had been targeted yet. Today, Ari would just be hitting up her own town, the places within walking distance.

They sent her some instructions on where she could and couldn’t legally wheat paste, and where it was technically illegal, but she could probably get away with it anyway. But otherwise, she’d be on her own for this first mission.

But first…

Ari put on her hoodie and went searching for another article. Ari knelt down to get something out of the bottom drawer of her dresser, where she kept her most seldom worn things.

“Never thought I’d see you again.”

She produced a face mask. Not the kind you wore for covid, but the kind you wore for riots, a black cloth with the bottom half of a skull. Ari hadn’t worn this thing since she got kicked out of Antifa. Since it was hard for her to tie things, she instead had pieces of Velcro glued onto it for easy wearing.

She really needed to thank whoever invented Velcro.

With that on and her hood up it’d be hard to identify her.

She put on her backpack, put the canister of fixing agent on her hip, and strapped a putty knife to her right hand. Then, with all her battle gear on, Ari stepped outside.

The most obvious place to hit up was that parking lot where all the homeless people lived. They were the ones who most needed to know there was a way forward.

But luck was not on Ari’s side today.

She reached where the tent city had been the past few days to find the police standing off with a bunch of protestors forming a line. The tent city wasn’t always here because… well the police cleared them out every so often like they were doing now.

Everyone was calling this ‘the homeless shuffle’. The homeless would set up a tent city somewhere, the police would break it up. But then, since they had literally nowhere to go, they’d wander around for a little while before setting up another tent city somewhere else.

There was a sanctioned tent city, where the bourgeois homeless people lived. But there was only room for 100 or 200 people there. Not nearly enough to absorb the economic cataclysm. Really, it was just a token gesture to justify all the horrible things the police and town did.

Ari wasn’t sure what these protesters were going to do. The police would clear them out and nothing would change. Protests didn’t work. The powerful didn’t care. The only place that changed, the only place that actually solved the homeless problem was the pony-majority areas out west.

Getting people to embrace Shimmerism and ponies would help a lot more than whatever this was.

An idea came to Ari just then! She had seen this before. She knew that under the big bridge was where they’d start to resettle. It was like a cycle.

So… if Ari went over there now, she could put up her propaganda unseen, and then when everyone started to shuffle in, the posters would be ready to go!

Ari ran all the way to the bridge, racing to get there before the expelled homeless, panting by the time she arrived. Only one person was there but he was passed out hard and snoring. She was basically alone.

The town put up a few spikes, denying the best sleeping area, but there was still plenty of dirt down here to settle on. It wasn’t too late.

If anything, Ari could use those spikes as a contrast between the pony and human way of doing things. On one side, the human government putting up spikes to torment you and make your life worse for the sake of their own convenience. On the other side, the ponies reaching out to those in need, offering a better world!

“Alright. Let’s see…”

Ari wiggled the putty knife, still strapped to her hand, out of its sleeve. She stuck the knife into the paste she made from flour and spread it on the wall. Now for the hard part.

Ari swung her backpack around. After some difficulty, she grabbed one of the posters with her teeth and slowly took it out. She moved her face right up next to the wall, then pressed her right forearm against it. Sliding it up…

“It more or less stuck.” Ari inspected her work. It wasn’t the best paste job and she got paste all over her sleeve, but it was there.

And she did get better from there. She plastered poster after poster around the heavily graffitied area. It seemed plenty of other people had a similar idea. Yet, unlike Ari, they were merely expressing vague ideas like ‘fuck Blackrock’ rather than offering solutions.

She encountered a surprising piece of such graffiti on the far end of the bridge. It didn’t seem to have any political stance. Just a drawing of a pony. A certain purple pony…

“Why are you doing here?!” Ari pointed her putty knife at the depiction of Purple herself. “You want to keep all the pony for yourself, huh? Well take this!”

Ari made sure to put a poster up right over Purple’s stupid face! And then three more right next to it.

“How do you like that?” Ari chuckled. This revenge was way too enjoyable for how petty it was. “You don’t want me to be a pony, but I will! Maybe. Eventually.”

Before long, she had twenty of them up in this area. She smiled at all the pictures of ponies around her!

Ari dropped off a pamphlet next to the sleeping drunk and wedge a few more around the area before running off, feeling like she’d escaped the scene of a crime!

That was scary at first, but it became fun near the end… she decided to hit a few more discrete spots, putting up ten more Ponies Make it Possible posters around town. The police were all occupied so managed to do all this unmolested in broad daylight.

And that was all the excitement she could handle for one day. Ari went back home, panting.

“I wonder how much if this sort of thing actually helps,” Ari mused.

Either way, it was kind of exciting! And if it increased her chances by even the most insignificant amount, it’d be worth it.

Comments

[Jayrus]

Definitely enjoying this fic, and hoping Ari gets her ponydom eventually.

Also hoping she gets a chance to meet Purple Smart and air her grievances. Not to mention gets to see for herself that the Bookhorse isn’t actually a heartless condescending bitch.

[singing steel]

Reject twilight embrace shimmer

[Shimmerist Ari]

11583849
Sadly these are all real-world examples.

11583851
Sunset Shimmer is my god!

11583828
Thank you thank you. Meeting Pruple would change Ari's mind about certain things. But would Purple ever even become aware of her existence? Unlikely but not impossible.

[singing steel]

11583952
Hold up now we don't wanna mix up religion and politics the last time that happened we had to kill God to reset the earth

[Shimmerist Ari]

11584044
I'll leave the religion stuff to Sunset Blessing. The SSIMG line is just meant to be a hyper-subversive anti-establishment statement not actual worship of Shim Sham.

[AvoidingFever17]

11583851
What are you some sort of leader?
Heh go ahead

[singing steel]

11584304
leader of what religion no again because again last time religion and politics merged it ended with the killing of a god and the reset of the earth

[AvoidingFever17]

“Why are you doing here?!” Ari pointed her putty knife at the depiction of Purple herself. “You want to keep all the pony for yourself, huh? Well take this!”

...
Twilight...i think its time we get you to meet up
This has to be settled
It doesnt have to be a good or bad meeting but it must occur

[AvoidingFever17]

11584308
said to the Christian...no stop that! Im different from the bad ones
You sound like a leader of shimmerists

[singing steel]

11584316
I don't know am I really the leader of the shimmerist only one person can make it Canon.....in all honesty no I'm not........yet

[AvoidingFever17]

11584403
Hopefully

[singing steel]

11584405
Although what kind of leader would I be without a cutie mark huh

[AvoidingFever17]

11584409
Heh
you don't need a cutie mark to define yourselves
DJ taught me that lesson

[singing steel]

11584411
still i dont think i am a leader of a religion but hey seems like a nice thing to do