16. Your Most Intense Obsessions
I.D. INJECTOR DOE
That Indestructible Something
By Chatoyance
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16. Your Most Intense Obsessions
"Don't bend; don't water it down;
don't try to make it logical;
don't edit your own soul according to the fashion.
Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly."
- Franz Kafka
Digging out of the hidden sinkhole was more difficult that getting into it in the first place. It wasn't that Michel was unable to use his diamond dog abilities effectively, rather it was that the entire area was now swarming with humans.
Gregoria could sense their weight and movements on the blackened surface of the land above, and there was a lot of activity going on. "I think... lots of cars, or trucks, or something. All I know is that there are a lot of heavy things moving around. And stomping, walking - there are lots of human boots up there. All over!"
"Makes sense." Damon crouched low in the hard-packed tunnel that Michel had been excavating. "Probably a whole army of reporters, news crews, crowds of lookey-loos come to see the destruction - oh, and police too. To keep the gawkers back. Big explosion like that? It's gonna be the hot item for a few days at least."
"Michel... how long do you think you can keep going?" Gregoria had reason to be concerned, they were all desperately hungry, and Michel was doing all of the work. Worse, the only source of water was a thousand feet down a curving tunnel. Just getting a drink was a serious trek.
"I'm... I'm kind of reaching the end, to tell the truth. I don't feel so good. I'm thirsty, but I don't think I can face another run down and back up." Michel sagged where he sat. "I... am so tired. And hungry. Fuck am I hungry."
Gregoria's ears went flat briefly, and then recovered. She was slowly getting used to the diamond dog's non-pony swearing. For a brief moment, she felt conflicted again - her human mind still resented the demands of her pony brain. On the other hoof, her pony brain - and powers - were the most valuable thing she currently possessed. "Hey! I just thought of something. I'm an earthpony!"
Michel raised his troll-like head and stared at Gregoria in Damon's silvery light. "Just figured that out, Ms. Smartypants?"
Gregoria made a face. "No, what I mean is, I can grow stuff! Why can't I just grow some food, right here, right now?" She set her hooves wide and stared at the dirt in the dim light. "Grow! Grass! I command you!"
Nothing happened. Michel smirked. "Seeds? You're magic, but you aren't that magic. Also, grass is good enough for you barnyard types, but I'm a dog, remember? We only eat grass when we're sick."
Gregoria stopped her pointless performance and let her ears fall sideways in defeat. "Hadn't thought of that. Fudge."
"Language, pony! Behave your fucking self, okay?" Michel clearly enjoyed seeing the unicorn and the earthpony jerk and cringe. "Alright then, pick a place, close as possible please, where I can go for the surface. We need to get out of here now. I can't do this much longer. It's walkies time." He grinned at that. If he was stuck being some kind of a dog, then he intended to have some fun with it.
"Yeah... I agree. Is there any place we can surface that is hidden, or safe or..." Damon was looking straight at Gregoria along with Michel now.
"I have no idea! I can't tell stuff above the ground. You want to know if there is a big chunk of quartz to our left? I can confirm that. It's huge. Wanna know if the burned-out tree behind and to the right has really deep roots, guess what, it does! But I can't tell you who's looking at what up there!" Gregoria's stomach made a sound like a bear being slowly turned inside out.
The dog and the pony stared with wide eyes.
"What? I'm really, really hungry!" Gregoria stared back.
"Um... O...kay.... then. Up it is!" Michel began digging at a sharp vertical angle, aiming for the surface.
"But... wait! We don't know what's up there!" Damon moved behind Michel, up the ramp of the tunnel, trying to provide light.
"We know what's down here. Shit all." Michel dug faster, forcing Damon to back down again, his muzzle covered in dirt and bits of root fiber.
While the diamond dog burrowed, Gregoria sniffed at the bits of roots. She nibbled at one. "Huh." It wasn't bad. It wasn't good, but... it wasn't bad. "Appetizers!"
"I already have enough of an appetite, thank you." Damon tried to ignore Gregoria's nibbling, but his nose kept insisting that if it wasn't proper food, it was at least digestible. Soon both ponies were scraping through Michel's mine tailings for bits of the crunchy root.
"Sunlight!" Michel's whispered word was followed by the sound of beeps and squawks from a police radio, and the murmurings and chatter of a crowd. In the distance, a news reporter spoke almost certainly to a camera.
"...since the large chemical tank exploded, utterly destroying the small farm. Currently no casualties have been reported, though property as far as..."
Damon leaned close to Gregoria. "Called it. Spin doctors for the win!"
The inside-out bear in Gregoria's stomach growled. "You said it would be a... wait, you did say they'd call it a chemical explosion. Huh." The bear was apparently trying to turn itself right-side out again. "You're pretty good."
Damon smiled. "I knew someone in the news industry. Some things are true. If they don't matter."
"I think we're under a truck. Or something." Michel slowly widened the opening of his tunnel. As Gregoria worked her way up behind the diamond dog, she could see the underside of some large vehicle, daylight from the grass reflecting off the undercarriage.
"Peek. See if we can get out." Gregoria gave Michel a gentle jab with a hoof.
Michel carefully raised his eyes and muzzle over the lip of the tunnel. In all directions, the burned, blackened grass had cars parked on it. The wheels of dozens or more could be seen in every direction. Three cars down were four pairs of feet, moving away. They must have just driven in. Six cars away a vast crowd was gathered, talking and milling around.
"It's like a parking lot up here. Not many people close by. I think we can leave unnoticed. Come on!" Michel dug toward the nearest side of the vehicle he had come up underneath, and crawled out into the blinding day. His eyes stung from the painful brilliance of it.
Gregoria and Damon followed, Damon swearing in pastry when his horn caught on a part of a wheel well. All four lay low on the cinerated stalks.
"Smells like hay bar-b-que." Gregoria nibbled a Cajun-styled stick of Timothy grass and spit out ashes. "Yuk. Definitely overdone."
"Um... I don't mean to be the bearer of bad news, but... clothing?" Damon studied the crowd of feet in the distance, under several cars, watchful for any that might move in their direction.
Gregoria looked at Damon, then herself, and then Michel. Only Michel was wearing anything, and what he had was pajamas. With little pictures of bunnies on them. Presumably that was the size that fit. Or else Michel was... interesting.
There was no need to cater to human sensibilities in the off hours at Crown's ranch. It had become habit that when the human team went home for the night, or if they were away entirely - as they had been - that everypony could enjoy the comfort of their own coats. When the humans left the farm, Damon, Gregoria, Rachel, and Joanna would race to dump their duds. Clothing was binding and sweaty - with a pony coat, it was like wearing clothes over clothes.
"Chocolate Cheesecake!" Gregoria's tail flicked in annoyance. "Bananna Cream Pie!"
"Language...???" Michel chuckled. What had happened to the equine's brains was hilarious to him.
"Sorry... I..." Gregoria caught herself and grimaced at the diamond dog. "Sweet Muffin of Apple Dumpling Cinnamon Pudding!" It sounded like she meant it, too.
"Come on, ponies. Let's see if we can't sneak our way out of this. Keep an eye open for clothing to steal in the cars." Michel began to move out, on all fours, crawling rather than walking. He was surprisingly adept at quadrupedal locomotion. It kept his head down.
Gregoria felt the pony brain object within her. "Steal? I'm not stealing clothing!"
"Fuckin' ponies." Michel peeked around a van and motioned for the others to follow as he dashed across rows of cars.
The open window of an SUV provided the opportunity for some light burglary. Gregoria found a sun dress thrown in her face. Damon had an oversized tee shirt dumped at his feet. "What?"
"Which would you rather feel bad about - taking some human's spare tee, or being discovered by them while you sat in jail for public nudity?" Michel gave the two ponies a humorless look.
Damon levitated the sun dress to help Gregoria wriggle through it, and then did the same with the tee for himself. "I don't like this."
"I don't either!" Gregoria joined in.
"You don't have to. Fuckin' ponies." Michel peeked inside other cars as they fled. A Dodge truck bed provided a ratty pair of jeans, which Damon accepted with a grumble. He had to hike them high, and still he found himself tripping on the legs.
At the end of the mass of vehicles, Damon called a halt while he used his horn to tie knots in the legs of the old jeans, so he wouldn't keep tripping on the dragging ends. "Now where?"
Michel looked around. One dirt road led past burned forest to the highway. Then it was eight miles to town. In the distance, unburned forest stood across the interstate. "There." He pointed with a claw as he stood up. "First those trees. Then town."
The three bedraggled unhumans made it to the highway and then to the next section of forest without incident. Several cars drove past them as they walked, but they were mostly ignored. The few stares they got were attributed by Gregoria to how dirty they were. They all were caked with soil. That and the bunny pajamas.
"What's in the forest?" Damon shrugged with his ears, looking around at the infestation of trees and bushes.
"Food, dolt." Michel took off his pajamas. "You two play bunny. I've got some hunting to do. Don't wander." With that, Michel was off into the woods as if he knew what he was doing.
"Wait... he's going to go eat... animals?" Gregoria was horrified. "Proper little werewolf, isn't he?"
"I think he used to go hunting when he was a kid or something." Damon began sniffing around for things he could eat.
"But... disease! Parasites! Tics!" Gregoria's stomach demanded food. The tall stems nearby smelled like a buffet.
"Have you been sick once, since turning?" Damon began stuffing his muzzle with forest salad.
"But...mmnff" Gregoria chewed, happily, "Mnn... no. Course not." Clover? She loved clover!
"Crown says we're immune. To everything." Damon took another huge mouthful of stems. "Probably."
"Probably?" Gregoria's ears met her skull. "Probably isn't good enough against trichinosis."
"There's parasites hiding on plants too. You better hope probably is enough." Damon chewed with vigor, his stomach rumbling in delight and need.
Gregoria froze in mid chew of a large mouthful of tender clover. "Pffarathites? Ong Pfantfth?" She stood there wondering if she should spit out the banquet she had been enjoying. In the end, her rumbling supreme mistress, Pony Stomach Queen Of Abdomen, won. 'Probably' was good enough. For now, anyway.
──── ∆ ────
"I honestly do not advise this. I understand how you feel, I know what a loss this is but frankly I think you are overestimating your own abilities. There is no denying that you have powers beyond those of human beings but that does not make you a match for a trained, capable and dedicated military presence. I beg you to accept that there is heroic, and there is hopeless, and I don't believe you can succeed here. You will be captured, or killed. Our friends would not want that. Would you want that to happen to them, if the situation was reversed? Don't do this. Please."
Malus Crown's softly glowing green eyes pleaded with them as much as his strange, eerie voice. Only now had his initial rage at Gregoria and Damon's plan died down to begging. He had started with incredulous shouts, now he was left with mere reason, something that seldom works on the young or the desperate.
Gregoria, Damon and Michel had not made it to the town, and apparently this was a very fortunate thing. Rather than them saving Crown from capture, Crown had rescued them. The town was a trap, with agents and devices everywhere. Malus had been alerted that something had gone terribly wrong from afar. Apparently he monitored everything that transpired on his farm, a fact which - while beneficial and obviously necessary - thoroughly disturbed the three of them when it was revealed.
They had been picked up by Guillaume, driving a school bus. He had switched them to the tight confines of a Volkswagon Beetle inside of a tunnel, leaving the bus behind. Then it had been a three hour drive to one of Crown's safe houses, 'Bolt Hole 23'. Gregoria's mind reeled at the idea that Crown had at least twenty-three safe houses.
They had been fed - properly - and watered and even reassured that their forest snack would leave no permanent damage to their transformed bodies. Damon had been right - the changed were safe, as far as Crown could tell, from the diseases that plagued ordinary terrestrial life. Their transformed biology was different in some fundamental way that left bacteria, molds, viruses, and parasites unable to affect it.
They were, he hastened to add after hearing of their scheme to save Rachel, Chelsea and Randal, still vulnerable to bullets. And nerve agents (probably). And radiation, heat, cold, electricity, sharp spiky pits - and severe, brutal beatings just to begin a list they should really think about.
"Rachel is my best friend, mister Crown." Gregoria hung her pony head. "I wasn't a good person before I changed. I wasn't a good friend to her. I was an total Marzipan Chorley Cake, to put it bluntly. She took me in, helped me, forgave me - she was a pony before she became a pony, mister Crown. I would... I would... " Gregoria swallowed, and took a breath, knowing her next words were literally true. "I would rather die, than turn my back on her now. I will get her back, or I will die trying."
Damon nodded at Gregoria's words with awe. "I didn't get to know Rachel as well as Gregoria here, but I knew Chelsea, and Randal too, a bit anyway. They could be us. They are us, they're Equestrian, part of the same injection. We're all we have, Crown. In the whole world, we're all we have. There isn't a real Equestria, just us misfits. If we don't help each other, then we truly are nothing."
"Miss Samson, Mister Knight, I truly do admire your courage and your loyalty, but..." Crown looked surprised to be interrupted.
"These two are fuckin' insane. But they won't make it ten feet without me." Michel shook his head and stared at the unicorn and especially the earthpony. "I want you to know I hate you for this. Fuck you to hell, ponies, you hear me? None of this 'swirly sugar candy' shit. Fuck. You. To. Hell. With razors. But... you gotta understand... if you do this insane thing, you are killing me, you are dooming me, because I will be rodgered with a wire brush before I let you try this without a dog that can dig." Michal's claws clutched air and released. "You just think twice and then twice again before you commit us to anything, understand?"
Gregoria was too busy trying to not look like she had tears running down her cheeks to flinch at the diamond dog's obscenities. Damon stared at the ground and pawed the tiles of the safe house floor with a hoof as if he were trying to dig a ditch.
"Well, shit." Mr. Malus Crown sagged back and crossed his perforated forelegs.
Of course he could swear human-style, mused a shocked Gregoria. He was patterned after the image of a villain, after all.
──── ∆ ────
"Okay. Let's go over this again." Mr. Crown had done his best to prepare the three for their perilous task. They had moved from the safe house to a property Crown owned near Las Vegas in Pahrump, in the desert beyond the town. Crown had made use of his team to acquire information that was beyond the reach of most people, dangerous information that despite the risks he was taking, might be entirely wrong anyway. He had provided Gregoria, Damon and Michel with equipment and supplies. And of course, transportation.
Gregoria had come to the conclusion that deep down, Malus Crown had always wanted to take the fight back to those that stole away the changed. "A jag, or ridge in the mountain, part of it touches the dry flat of Papoose Lake, or comes close. It has at least nine big rollup hanger doors, angled to match the rise of the mountain. They're textured to look like sand and stuff. The place runs right through the ridge, dug right through it. On the other side from the doors, pretty far away, there might be a chain link fence, and supposedly a dirt road, but don't go that way because that's where they used to shuttle some of their staff before the tunnel was finished."
Malus nodded. "Good, so far, go on."
Gregoria swallowed, trying to get things perfect. "The whole thing is probably at least six hundred feet long, and it's made to not be visible. There is probably an underground rail or highway that runs through a tunnel, that's how they get people there now, so there probably isn't even the road anymore. The facility has at least four levels. One is at ground level, where the hangers are, then there are three below that. The tunnel road is on the second or third level down, and runs all the way to Groom Lake.
"Um... The facility is called 'Doughboy', but it's real name is S4B. It is sometimes called 'Majik Castle', or the 'M-12 Mine'. Everything, everywhere above ground is watched, all the time. The ground is probably monitored too, through ground-penetrating sonar and maybe other stuff. You can't walk on the surface without your every hoofstep being sensed. You can't fly, because they have autoturrets built to look like boulders. There is a nerve agent minefield, or several. There may be additional, buried protection or barriers, so we have to be constantly alert, even when digging." Gregoria tapped a hoof. "Oh! never dig constantly or in the same direction for too long. And never, ever, ever go above ground."
The large, dark Changeling shook its angular head in despair. "You did listen to your own words there, right? I just need to be sure you understand what you just repeated to me."
Damon scowled. "Crown, come on. You're just badgering us now. We get it, really we do. It's the Death Star, manned with wall-to-wall Darth Vader clones. It's Mordor, and we're unarmed hobbits and there is no distraction at the Black Gates to save us. We get it." The unicorn put a foreleg over Gregoria's withers. "We're going anyway."
Crown looked at his ebony, swiss-cheese hooves. "Michel, if you back out, they have to as well. They know they can't do this without you. Do you really intend to facilitate this insanity?"
Michel stared at the sky through the window of the old bus. "When it started, I was in the barn. I heard this music, it was like music, I don't know what the fuck it was, it tinkled. Like bells or something. And then the light started, gold light, it came through the rear door of Chelsea's cottage. Everything it touched, turned into that show. I watched the hay fork on the wall turn from rust to perfect. The wood stopped being old and shitty. The bales turned golden - hell, they even looked tasty to me."
"Michel..."
Michel bared his sharp fangs. "It spread, quick like, and I wanted to run into it. I wanted to run into it so bad, so fuckin' bad. Because in there, through there? In there was home, Crown. Home. No bastards, no assholes, no monsters - and don't give me that look. I'd take an army of your kind over an army with guns and heads filled with nationalistic bullshit. At least the Changelings only wanted to live. Let me tell you something - "
Crown fidgeted.
" - That Rachel, she did that. I ran, I ran like a coward. Maybe that was right, at the time. But the only way I'll ever get a second chance at home, is if we get our Celestia back. Do you understand, Crown? You talk 'injectors' and 'John Does' and how we're all refugees from nowhere, but this time, it's different. This time we have one changed, one of us refugees that can actually give us our nowhere. You think about that, Crown. This world so fuckin' great you're happy to sneak around for the rest of your life in it? Or would you rather live in Equestria? She can't change us back, but she could make this world our world. She could give us home."
Gregoria gasped at that. This was the reason Michel was helping?
The meaning hit Gregoria almost like a physical impact. To save Rachel meant potentially ending the reign of Man on earth. If she lost it again - or did it deliberately - there might not be an earth. The entire Earth simulation that was existence might be changed into an Equestria simulator instead. It was one thing to face never being human again, but to choose ponydom for every self-aware person in the entire world? To choose which world would be the real one? Just so a few wouldn't have to be misfits? Would it even be allowed by who or whatever was running the simulation of existence?
"It's happened before. They know that. They won't give up Rachel without a fight." Crown spoke with measured gravity.
"What do you mean, happened before?" Damon's tail swished nervously, his ears were back.
"The human world. Naked ape world. Brutal, unforgiving Earth. It replaced the last one." Crown sighed. "Sometime probably around eighteen-sixty, the world changed into the one we see out there." An ebony Changling hoof pointed at the desert. "The British took Beijing in ironclad ships to win the opium wars, and in the process cracked the belief that held the old world together. A Victorian materialist, a profit-mad rationalist, bone-sure that the universe was a big ticking clock was the John Doe Injector. It was a nearly complete reset. The old world faded away, and we ended up with our Blind Watchmaker universe of humans, unforgiving physics, and permanent death. A world for profiteers and merchants. A world for scientists and rationalists. A human world."
"What... what was there before?" Gregoria was stunned. Why hadn't he told them this before? Then again, she'd never even considered the possibility of such a thing until Rachel went Akira... there was no way to even know to ask Crown about such cosmic matters. How much more was the Changling keeping to himself?
Malus Crown looked sad. "You've known your whole life. Fairy tales, Gregoria. Lung Dragons and Ki-rin and pixies and fairy bands riding in finery between the worlds. Thomas The Rhymer and The Great Spirit and Coyote and The Great Buffalo. Kachinas and Devas and spirits and reincarnation. What we think of as the different races of Mankind were anthropomorphic animal people. Not humans. The change rippled forward and backward in time from some nameless Victorian soldier, and changed the entire simulation."
Damon's mouth dropped open. Michel grinned. Gregoria shook her mane to clear her spinning head.
Crown brightened. "Before that, I can't be certain, but I think everything was like dinosaurs, or birds, only intelligent, and very, very alien. At least we can kind of understand the fairy tale version of the world. I suspect that started about twenty-thousand years ago, in a big war that nearly killed their world, and led to the fairy tale one. Then the Victorian change, that made the reality we know today. And Rachel... maybe Rachel is the next complete re-write of the simulation. Maybe. Maybe."
"It can't be accidental." Damon shook his head. "The bug, the thing that lets injectors happen at all. It's not a bug, Crown. It can't be a bug. This universe, our simulation... its been deliberately built to allow it to change. That's got to be it!" Damon's eyes grew wide. "We're in an evolving program - a simulation that is... trying to make something. Generations come and go, and occasionally the universe changes and the game changes and... maybe the point is to finally make a decent game!"
Crown shook his head. "Who knows? I don't. I really don't!" Gregoria had stared at Crown, doubting him. "Seriously, I don't know any more than what I have just told you, and most of that is speculative at best. Why do you think I never mentioned it? It's beyond the pale, it's not something I can prove. I feel reasonably sure this is the true story of history, but - so what? It's just crazy talk until..."
"Until Rachel happened." Gregoria double checked the pack on her back. Canteens, food concentrate, assorted tools - nothing had fallen out. Everything was still properly packed. "Enough metaphysical Punschkrapfen. You know what?"
Crown looked puzzled.
"I don't care anymore if Rachel changes the world into Equestria or leaves it be. Only one thing matters, only one thing ever mattered, even though I was too human once to see it." Gregoria stepped out of the air-conditioned car and set her hooves on alkali and sand. "Friendship." Gregoria stared at the forbidding scrub-brush and rock ahead. "Friendship... is magic."
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I am rather glad that Gregoria did come to realize magic of friendship... albeit the manifestation of it is rather physical (yes, I am aware of how ironic that is given the context of the story.) She had to step out of the physics to see the metaphysics...
I've always appreciated the Japanese view on natural deities when it comes to how an intelligent living being should assume about the potentials that exist in all the being in nature.
It becomes that much easier to interpret your presentation of the pony viewpoint when I can think about how that sentiments to an inanimate object would have been enough to render.. imprint life upon the said object.
Odd that this is really understandable to a point, yet we humans have made it totally incompatible with reality through the dogma of the scientific methods...
(We stop questioning by enforcing a method to answer questions. Way to go)
The world did change in the Victorian era, didn't it? Every advancement of mankind quashed a myth and legend designed to explain the phenomenon we now understood. Magic is the unknown, the explanation for what we don't know, but science is repeatable, predictable. Technology is what we grew up with, and boring because of how commonplace it is. But if I take this cell phone back to the past, I would be called a wizard and feared for it.
(I should really stop posting these comments at three in the morning.)
2739892
Well, the world did change with the era of enlightenment. It was a time when the leading minds were highly optimistic in the ability of rational expression through scientific method. There were thinkers that held that it was possible to completely grasp everything from celestial mechanics to mortality.
I am not sure if it makes sense to draw any sort of demarcation line between magic and science, for they both must be established part of the whole system. Honestly, microscopic, temporal, interstellar and the substomic realms could be called magical, since we can never really really manipulate or interact with them on a daily basis... yet we live with them while utilizing what little we know of them in our everyday lives.
Chat, have you been reading The Archdruid Report? Because this story is bringing in fictionalized versions of so many of the topics he discusses, it isn't even funny. You two are on the same wavelength or something.
I can't help but wonder just how far ahead you've been planning things.
I mean, from chapters 1 to 8, the progressions seem fairly natural, but from that point on, it seems like with every chapter you ask yourself 'how can I make this as fudge-covered banana-shortcake insane as possible'.
Not that this is, by any means, a bad thing.
I can't help but wonder how the pastry method of cursing determines severity. Is it higher caloric load? Flavors the curser particularly dislikes? Or just some neural circuit with a dessert menu choosing at random?
In any case, excrement is speeding towards the rotary cooling device, and I'm eagerly looking forward to impact. That said, I get the feeling this is going to set off quite a bit of controversy over whether our heroes have the right to change the world. I'm staying out of that as much as I can.
2740424
Pants-On-Head-Crazy.
"Broham, you never go fully pony. Its like going full retard. You just don't do it."
"Yeah, I know that. But I don't think anyone told her that."
"Wait what? Lemme see. Oh. Oh hell..."
Normally, such a tactic is, or can be, a bad thing. In this case. Its seeing just how far down the rabbit hole can go. (Not how far it actually does.)
Hehehe.
You know, I wonder when Luna will come into play.
Also makes me wonder if, in this universe, the NMM rebellion will be nothing but a big act carried out by Luna and Celestia, to ensure the FiM storyline happens. By the time NMM's return rolls around, every mortal who could remember what the world used to be like will be dead, and the Equestrian reality will be firmly entrenched.
Also, I don't remember Chrysalis and Luna ever being in the same scene. Hmm...
Of course, all in the name of Equestria!
Don't you mean "incinerated"?
2740465
Everyone thinks they have the right to change the world. That's the way the world works now: a few powerful people—a tiny, tiny minority—deciding how things are going to be for everyone else. What was the first thing Gregoria did after accepting their pony powers, after seeing what Rachel could do? She thought about how to use them to get what she wanted. She wants to use Rachel to change the world, because she's decided she knows what's best.
Power corrupts, and I think the way the pony mind reconciles itself with this is the honest belief that they're being selfless, even though they'd still be dominating their will over the will of others. It's not an evil, it's just the way life works in this world, even as a pony. We all live at the expense of something else.
An awesome twist would be Rachel finally using her Celestia-like powers to cover the world in the blink of an eye, but to her horror finds out that Gregoria misinterpreted seeing the dog jump into Equestria, and like in the Chatoverse TCB, the golden wall actually obliterates humans who touch it.
Well, I always dislike misanthropy, and the thought that humans are bad...
But this story is just a story, and as such is fiction, so I shall enjoy it nonetheless.
Also, this game like universe is very odd indeed...
PEOPLE USED TO BE ANTHRO ANIMALS FTW!
2740821
Nope. It's a real word. Just not commonly in use.
2740288
I've not heard of this, but I will check it out!
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I don't bother myself with whether my story universes are 'moral' any more than the real universe we live in concerns itself with whether it is 'moral'.
I just extrapolate, and have the characters act naturally according to their own beliefs and limited knowledge. It's like running a simulation, for me, when I write.
Which means - even I don't know how this crazy train is going to end!
2740424 2740497
This is Bloomers-On-Head crazy time, the pants have already come off, boys!
Said the thing, take a shot.
I was actually having a discussion with a friend of mine yesterday over the concept of good and evil, and whether there were truly any good or evil actions. His stance was that good and evil are terms that cannot actually be applied to actions: Intentions and consequences can be good and evil, but actions themselves are only ever neutral. By that logic, if the ponies succeed in transmogrifying Earth, then by default their actions were 'good' (they wanted a peaceful life, they pulled it off, and the newly-ponified earth is not at all complaining) while if they fail, they are 'evil' (they were dangerous radicals who tried to destroy the world for entirely selfish reasons).
I do not actually prescribe to that moral theory, but it's an interesting lens to look through.
Still, putting all that aside, I think Gregoria is the most sympathetic person in this scenario, and not just because she's the focus character. I find Gregoria easier to side with because she seems to be the one and only person who's interested in helping her friend. Sure, the others have their reasons to help - to remake the world, to band with others of their kind, to prevent the abuse of Celestia's power, to understand what's going on - but at the root of all those issues is a living, breathing person. Not a MacGuffin, but a person named Rachel. She may be the catalyst here, she may have the power to change the world... but not a single person has actually stopped to think about what SHE wants. They're mostly considering what they can get from her, something that rather ironically shadows the motivations of the opposition. I'm with Gregoria... tentatively... because of everyone who has put in their two cents, she's the only one who seems to be doing this for entirely selfless reasons. She wants to help her friend. I can get behind that, for now.
... Mind you, they seem to be jumping to the conclusion that Earth and Equestria are mutually exclusive, right now. That may be, and dramatic convention means that yeah, they probably are... but it's at least worth trying to have your cake and eat it too, I think. If at all possible, the optimal solution would be keeping Earth and spinning off Equestria in its own space.
Now I wonder what happened to Joanna. Considering she was already a pony, does being in the Equestrian Zone actually affect her? I hope we can see the answer some time. :)
Little bit of editing to be done, in this chapter and some previous -- you've been inconsistent with the spelling of Michel's name. It's "Michel" most often, "Michal" sometimes, and every once in a while, "Michael."
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Oh, Chocolate. I'll go and fix it. Cinnamon Swirl!
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Mr. Bean is always welcome!
So the British invasion of Hong Kong caused the end of a world?
I can get behind that notion. Though I have to wonder why to decide on that moment. There is the detail that the British Empire was called "The Empire the Sun Never Set Upon." That it created the universe/generation/version of reality that created Celestia could be a link.
Personally, I would have gone with the 30 Years War, lots of violence, lots of new ideas being tossed around, including the beginnings of the enlightenment. Not to mention the English Civil War coinciding with it, so one could still blame the British.
Though I suppose, if the world is reset, that would turn it into the "Bittish Isles" wouldn't it?
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I chose that moment because I feel that, in a fundamental way, it expresses a 'Day The Universe Changed' for the oldest, most influential continuous civilization that we, in Western accepted recorded history, know of.
The Chinese felt that they were the center of the universe, and the only civilized nation on the planet. They had sent an expedition in 1421, Admiral Zheng's massive fleet, to explore the entire world. Admiral Zheng visited every continent, and mapped the earth, and he found nothing but barbarians compared to Chinese technology. They genuinely felt themselves to be the only true power in the universe.
Along comes upstart England, who wants to sell drugs. China sees opium as destructive and says no. That should be that. But - Opium Wars! The English send an ironclad ship right up to the imperial city and essentially conquer China, just like that. (well, not just like that exactly - there was some bloody screwing around first, but... considering that a handful of ships took the largest nation on earth at the time in like, a few weeks...) Chinese technology never advanced. An iron ship was unbeatable. The barbarians didn't just conquer them and force them to agree to more opium trade - they did it with style, supreme technological might, and an alien worldview that provided real-world power that the Confucian world view could never hope to offer.
China wasn't just conquered by a ship powered by steam and covered with iron plates - it was defeated by an alien way of describing reality itself.
In that instant, an entire universe died. The Celestial Bureaucracy of the Gods, died. The very truth of the world died. The barbarians were the masters now, and the unchanged Chinese became peasants and barbarians next to Victorian technology. That some Chinese killed themselves rather than face this existential horror only underscores the severity of what it meant to them.
I think about that little moment in history sometimes, when I read a scientist - or a theologian - who is Absolutely Certain... of anything.
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One way to look at this is the ability of the current reality meme to absorb fundamental change. At some point it becomes so resistant to modification (even minor ones) that reality becomes brittle, and the world literally breaks creating room for an injection of a new reality. In the specific case in your comments, the Chinese world view had become very fixed in the late 17th century and even without the arrival of Europeans had significantly ossified. The British invasion and sack of Beijing was such a great a shock to the established reality that over a hundred years later the Chinese still talk about its impact. So I think it a very reasonable major inflection point for a world change. Good call, Chat!
I am both excited and nervous about where this could be leading. Not many chapters left, no idea what to expect. This has been a rollercoaster of emotion so far, with more than a few loops.
Ya know... compared to this, the ending of "Big O" makes sense.
Now that's an interesting idea from Michael. The simulation is aiming for a perfect solution; that it is allowing itself to evolve towards perfection by creating self-modifying code that creates different algorithms during their run-time and that these are evolutionarily selected by letting them run in the main system and see which one performs the best.
"was more difficult that" should be "was more difficult than"
I suggest changing "and there is hopeless" to "and then there's hopeless".
Right, I ought to have time for one more chapter tonight. Maaaaybe two, if I don't find much to comment on.
"swearing in pastry"
:D
Oh, Mr. Crown is still free!
Hm, actually, how is he getting love at the moment? The puppies have all been, um, incinerated.
…Though, hey, if you're going to build at least twenty-three safehouses, why not stock them with Emergency Puppy Supplies? I was forgetting just how many resources Mr. Crown had.
"The entire Earth simulation that was existence might be changed into an Equestria simulator instead."
And now I'm imagining the hyperintelligent pandimensional sysadmin coming into work the next day and dropping their cheese in surprise when they check the monitors.
Huh. The world already having been completely rewritten is quite interesting.
…Wait.
"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.
There is another which states that this has already happened." :D
Of course, this would be more discovering what the world was going to be rather than what it was at the time, but still.
The details of the rewriting are also interesting.
…Aaaand I probably don't have time for the next chapter tonight, strictly speaking, but eh, I've got non-decaffeinated tea if I lose too much sleep. :D
"Perceive" is still misspelled.
As pointed out previously, the mice are anachronistic and typing on a MacIntosh with hooves is easy because of sticky keys:
When Apple designed the 1st MacIntosh, most users never used mice beforehand. Usability-Research showed that multiple mouse-buttons just confuse users. Apple decided to release the 1st MacIntoshes with 1-button mice (MacIntosh Mouse (M0100)), but supporting multibutton mice.
About 1990, users were familiar enough with multibutton mice, but Apple decided to continue to ship MacIntoshes with 1-button mice because it fit their advertisements about MacIntoshes being so easy that one requires only 1 button. MacIntoshes continued to support multibutton mice
In 2000, Apple released an optical mouse using USB with no apparent button. This mouse had an hard shell with pivot-points, springs, and a contact in the front. One clicked it by pressing down the front. The whole mouse was a button.
In 2005, Apple released the Apple Mighty Mouse. It connected using BlueTooth and used LaserTracking. It had a ScrollBall for scrolling both vertically and horizontally and 4 buttons. The ScrollBall was clickable, thus making a 5th button. So it had 5 buttons. All of the buttons were hidden, so it had visual continuity with previous mice. It also came in USB.
In 2009, Apple released Magic Mouse. Magic Mouse is a touch-sensitive mouse. One can setup as many virtual mouse-buttons as one likes, as well as supporting gestures, pinching, expanding, scrolling, rotation, et cetera. It is a wireless mouse using BlueTooth and LaserTracking.
For supporting typing with 1 hand while mousing with the other, the function-keys on MacIntoshes are sticky. One can hit the function key, release the key and then hit the alphanumeric key.
Ugh, it's 4AM in the morning and I have an alarm in the morning, yet I can't stop reading. Muffin, Chatoyance, I have forgotten your powers!
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Thank you for reading my words!
I can't stop myself from recalling this part of your work while reading this non-fiction:
https://systemicdisorder.wordpress.com/2021/04/07/us-capitalism-innocence-myth/
If only more fiction was THAT loaded! Thank you for being.. You
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History helps ground a story, I think.
Georgia has changed.
CK class reality restructuring events incoming?
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Oh - Gregoria has changed! I was trying to work out how the US state had anything to do with this!
I think the events of this story would make a decent SCP entry - though it would not be a containable one. The reality alterations come from moments of extreme trauma during historical events. I don't know what the SCP listing for such a thing would be, but I can see it would be impossible to protect anyone from, and impossible to prevent or contain.
Unless, of course, the world somehow became kind, peaceful, fun, and beautiful.
Kind of like an idealized version of Equestria, really. Hmmm... maybe the changes are gravitating towards a base stable state?