The Alicorn General

by tosety

The End of Laughter

The End of Laughter

“So, what is this danger you were talking about?” Rarity asked, recovering her ability to speak after the previous revelation.

“The danger comes from how the Elements feed on and enhance that trait and eventually merge with you.”

“That don’t sound too bad” Applejack muttered to Twilight

“Let me explain what happened to Philhemina and you’ll understand a little better”
Pinkie Pie’s head snapped back to Celestia with an audible pop as her grandmare’s name was mentioned.
Celestia settled herself as she got ready to continue

“We were using the elements daily, battling bipeds, sending monsters away from populated areas, and settling disputes between ponies.

An Ursa Minor was snuffling through a village, tipping over houses and stepping

on carts in its search for food as Chrysalis swooped down and lifted it up, carrying

it with her magic to an unoccupied field. As they set it down, an Ursa Major crashed

out of the nearby forest. This time, Harmony set up the defensive shieild while Starswirl

got its attention with a magic blast from her horn. The blast, though powerful enough to

cripple a pony, was a mere tap to the Ursa and didn’t even get it angrier than it was.

Starswirl led it over to its cub then the six levitated the two back into their cave in the forest.

Twilight sat with her jaw on the floor remembering how much it took to levitate an Ursa Minor and how much larger and fiercer an Ursa Major could be

“Every day brought new challenges, and with the amazing power the Elements gave us, we were able to easily set things right and move on. What we weren't noticing was how our elements were deepening as we were gaining power. Despite the newness of Harmony’s reign and the youth of our species, we were having an easy time civilizing ourselves. It was actually through the Elements that the jealousies of wings and horns was dealt with”

“Howd’ja do that?”
Celestia glanced at Applejack with a sad smile. With a heavy sigh, she continued.

“The Unicorns were trying to give themselves wings, the Pegasi were demanding magic, and the Earth Ponies were jealous of both. Every day, there was a messenger from one of the tribes demanding that they get at least one of the traits of the other tribes. Harmony first tried to explain that it wasn’t something that could just be given out on a whim, but after they kept at it, he lost his patience and started giving a flat 'You don’t deserve it, now shut up and go back home.' It was getting so bad that the Unicorns were threatening to stop raising the sun, the pegasi were threatening to flood the Unicorn cities, and the Earth Ponies were threatening to stop growing food.”

“HEARTHSWARMING EVE!!!!! HEARTHSWARMING EVE!!!!” Pinkie bounced

“Yes and no.” Celestia said regaining her smile

“That wasn’t exactly how it happened. That story was made up shortly afterwards, but the pain of what would follow was too great for me to tell the true story, so I just let them embellish the roles of Private Pansy, Clover the Clever, and Smart Cookie and kept the true story to myself, telling it only when I felt it needed to be known. The real solution was Philhemina’s idea.”
Pinkie sat in rapt attention, her eyes wider and pupils larger than Twilight had ever seen them before

“Philly Pie saw how the Unicorns were decorating their coats with pictures of their favorite things, and decided we needed to have a visible reminder of what each of us did the best”

“Your don’t mean....” Twilight whispered
Celestia nodded

“It was Celestia’s idea to make them wait and discover their special talent first.” Luna said as she sat down on the unoccupied cushion.
Everypony’s head snapped first towards the newly arrived Luna, then to Celestia again.

“That was so they would value their special gift” Celestia said slightly defensively.

“Whatever you say, dear sister. I find you love making lessons more memorable” Luna replied with a chuckle, glancing over to where Philhemina the Phoenix sat on her perch
Twilight shifted uncomfortably and gave a half hearted laugh.

“So Philly, in true Pie style, jumps right in, casting the spell on her own and our cutie marks start appearing. I at first thought She’d ignored my contribution, but we later realized that they appeared only on those who had already come to understand what they loved.” Celestia continued

“Ah, why did you choose our...uhm...posterior?” Rarity asked with a blush

“You’ll have to ask Philly that, since it was supposed to be on our chests” Celestia said with a chuckle, but then sobered up

“But I think it was because of how the Elements were affecting her. You see, she’d been getting both stronger and goofier every day and her pranks were starting to get out of hand.” Celestia’s voice changes to a conspiratorial whisper.

“In fact, she once enchanted the moon...”
Celestia was overcome with a fit of giggles

“The moon....”
Celestia doubled over, clutching her stomach, unable to continue

“She made the moon into a perfect copy of my rump.” Luna finished with a sniff and a suppressed smile.
Rainbow Dash let out a loud guffaw.

“Ahem, well, we were about to confront her on these pranks” Celestia suppressed another chuckle “when her element took matters into it’s own hoof,”
Celestia took a second to sober up

“and glued itself to her"

“It WHAT?” the six of them respond at once.

"I didn’t see it myself, but she told me it wouldn’t come off, and the more she pulled, the firmer it stayed. She even said it was sinking into her chest.”
Every Pony stood in stunned silence at those words.

“Needless to say, she flipped out and only stopped when she was so exhausted she fell asleep. The next morning, with hair deflated, She sought out Harmony to get his help removing it.”
A tear rolled down the cheek of an uncharacteristically quiet Pinkie as Fluttershy nuzzled her in sympathy.

“So how did they get it off?” Twilight asked

“Why did you ever give me this horrid thing?”

Philhemina said with tears rolling down her cheeks

Harmony sat and looked at the necklace for a while, making calculations

and casting various information spells. Philhemina quickly got aggravated

and impatient and started pulling at the necklace. After watching her

struggle for a while, he stood up

“Stop struggling for a bit.”

Philly stopped and Harmony reached out and touched the center of the gem.

Suddenly a greyness spread first through the crystal, then through the

necklace, and finally through Philhemina herself while the necklace

unclasped itself and fell into Harmony’s surprised talons

Celestia sat for a minute to let this sink in before dropping what she thought would be the bombshell.

“This was followed by Philly’s newly gained cutie mark changing from party streamers to a rock.”

“THE ROCK FARM!”

‘Yes, Pinkie, that was when she decided her special talent must be ripening rocks”

“Why the hay would you ripen rocks?” Applejack asked

“Duh! To get all those superfabulous geodes!” Pinkie retorted

“Really, Applejack, do you know nothing about where gems come from?” Rarity questioned
Celestia ignored the conversation and continued

“Sadly, Harmony decided to take laughter for himself despite already being the element of magic."
Celestia looked down at her hooves

"And that was the beginning of Discord.