“So, let me get this straight…” Cadance leaned forward, rubbed her chin. “Aunt Luna is some sort of doppelganger from the future?”
“I think multiversal imposter would be a more accurate term,” Twilight said. “I mean, if she killed herself, then it may have split the timeline somehow.”
“That sounds rather complicated,” Cadance said. “Doesn’t time magic always stabilize or something?”
“All pony-made spells do.” Twilight rubbed her chin, and for a moment the two ponies synced up perfectly. “There’s no telling how Discord’s magic works, though. I doubt it follows the same rules.”
“You two are missing the point.” Celestia barely whispered it, but the other two stopped talking and chin-rubbing immediately. She didn’t look up from the table, but her face reflected clearly in the marble. “She claimed she was some sort of…amalgamation of Luna and Nightmare Moon. That she caused the entire planet to go extinct, and that she came to the conclusion that killing herself was the best way to undo it all.”
Celestia looked up. “Doesn’t that disturb either of you?”
Twilight glanced to the side, blushed slightly. “Honestly, I’m not sure it does.”
Celestia’s glare still made Twilight uncomfortable whenever it came out. Celestia silently reprimanded herself, sheathed her unpleasant stare. She occasionally forgot that Twilight was her equal now.
Twilight coughed into her hoof. “I mean, yes, obviously she lied about it. But now that I think about it, it makes sense. When we confronted her in Ponyville, all that time ago, I never really felt like I was in danger. She never felt like a threat, even though I knew she was dangerous.”
Cadance nodded. “And she does love all of us. I can sense it every time I’m near her. Obviously we don’t know her as well as you, auntie, but—”
Celestia’s hooves slammed onto the table. The sharp clack echoed through the room. “Do you mean to tell me, that both of you are perfectly alright with a murderer going unnoticed in our midst for so long? With betraying all of our trust? The trust of all our subjects?”
Her mane rippled, she leaned forward. “What if she were to decide somepony else was a threat to Equestria? What if she murdered them too? Would she be dangerous then?”
“She didn’t interrupt my wedding, even when it had been infiltrated by destructive insects,” Cadance said. “I’m not condoning what she did, but it’s not the same. Tirek… Tirek came very close to winning…”
Celestia turned to Twilight. “And what about you, Twilight? Do you agree with Cadance that Luna’s actions were reasonable? That taking a life was a justifiable response?”
“I…I don’t know.”
Celestia leaned over the table, and it creaked under weight. “You two are so forgiving, despite the scale of her treason. Perhaps you two are colluding with her? Perhaps you are amalgamations from another time as well?”
“Aunt Celestia!” Cadance stood up, and slammed her own hooves on the table. The marble shuddered, nearly broke, but stayed resolute despite the two alicorns pressing onto it. “I know you are upset, but think about what you just said!”
Celestia glanced down at the table. Her reflection stared back at her: hairs askew in her mane, her teeth clenched.
“I…I’m sorry, you’re right. It’s just, I don’t…” Celestia slumped back into her chair, cradled her head with one hoof. Her mane rippled and spilt across the table. “I don’t know how to react to this, how to handle it, what to say.” She shifted her head, rested it on her other hoof as well. “It’s like that changeling attack all over again. The unknown has paralyzed me, crippled me, except now it involves my sister.”
Celestia saw Twilight and Cadance share a look. Even without years of reading body language, the pity felt like a kick to the stomach.
“We understand, auntie.”
“Yes, it’s certainly a difficult situation.”
“Don’t lie to me,” Celestia snapped. “You don’t understand, you can’t understand.” She wrenched her head out of her hooves, forced herself to look at the other two. “When you are immortal, there are precious few constants. Luna and I have spent eons together, and now, suddenly, she isn’t who she was. All that trust and all those memories have been shattered in an instant. If she’s a lie then…then everything else might be.”
Silence soaked the room. Twilight and Cadance glanced at each other again. Celestia saw pity mingle with confusion and sadness in their faces.
Twilight tried to say something, but her sentence came out as a stutter. She swallowed and tried again, her still voice cracking. “What about us? Are we inconstant lies, too?”
The pain in Twilight’s voice sounded genuine enough. Celestia lowered her head. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean, I don’t…” She stood up. “I’m sorry, telling the both of you this was a mistake. I should have composed my own feelings better before burdening you with this. I need to be alone.” She rushed out the explanation, then rushed out the door, slammed it behind her. She leaned against the wall, and she could hear Cadance and Twilight whispering in the room. She tried to imagine what they were saying, but nothing came to her. Just a memory of the pain in Twilight’s voice.
Well, when the choice is between a monster hell bent on destroying every life in the world. And the lives of an entire nation, yeah I think it is. I think Celestia needs to realize that not every threat can be reasoned with/imprisoned. Sometimes, you need a way to make it final.
Besides, they freaking killed Sombra. She ain't chewing out Twilight for doing that.
5896472
And if it was just Tirek that died, she'd be reacting a lot differently. She's the one who said Luna having their confrontation in the dungeon was being melodramatic.
But... hearing that her Luna is dead, that's a different matter. Even if she could acknowledge somewhere that it had to be done, it's made a lot harder because it means she's been living with an imposter, Luna's killer, for years without realizing.
Considering that Celestia had already made the choice between her sister and the rest of the world, I imagine she would be more accepting of such things.
calling it now, Celestia somehow does what Luna did and ruins the world similarly
That moment when Celestia realizes she taught a sociopath and later turned her into an alicorn.
What the hell broke Celestia so fast? She is probably confused as fuck since her sister is dead and still alive, just different. But this is a strange rage that is coming over her. Nightmare influence since canon-Luna was killed so long ago?
5898008
Have you ever read "Hell of a Time"?
Celestia is getting dangerously close to Nightmare Sun here.
5898601
You mean "Solar Flare"?
Huh
5896472 Sombra was kind of a shadow lich thing though. 5896602 also makes a good point.
5896929 The show makes it look like Celestia banishing Luna to the moon was more of an accident than anything, though. She doesn't actually engage Nightmare Moon before using the Elements.
It might do Celestia good to talk to alt!Luna for a while. Just how different are their pasts, presents and time-lines? It sounds to me as if Luna did her best to prevent any differences in the events leading up to the confrontation with Celestia, then she just deliberately threw the fight. It's possible that this is the divergence point. If so, then there is functionally no difference at all between the two versions of Luna in question except for some piddling 'brane of origin issues that you couldn't even detect without a quantum resonance sensor.
And the fact that this Luna has learnt a terrible form of wisdom on the graves of billions.
Oddly enough, I think that Celestia might actually empathise with that particular burden.
"What I did, I did without choice..."
5896929
She sent Luna to the moon. No matter what she could do, she couldn't kill her. And she did everything in her power to try to save her sister, not even fighting back after Luna took her wing.
So no.
I doubt she'd understand having to kill her sister.
5896472
Okay.
Kill your sister. It's the only way to save the world.
Kill your mother, it's the only way to save the world.
Kill your father, it's the only way to save the world.
Killing a stranger for the greater good is one thing. Killing a loved one is entirely another. Not because one is more moral than the other, but because one is more personal.
Now imagine someone else made that decision for you. Without seeing any effort made to save your loved one's life, they killed them. Then they put on a disguise, and pretended to be them. They didn't tell you. And then you find out the truth, that you've been living a lie.
Imagine all of that.
Now, imagine that it isn't some idealized version of you who doesn't suffer from emotions, because we both know that that's what you're doing. You're imagining yourself as a perfect, emotionless being capable of making the important decisions with no difficulties, and thus showing your own imperfections to the world. Because anyone who could kill a loved one with no hesitation, for any reason, is not worth loving.
5900761 You my friend, are amazing. I couldn't have put it in better words! Keep rocking the world.
5900761
sociopaths need love too
maybe?
actually, I want to make that a question instead of a statment
5898601 Daymare Sun you mean
5898400 I loved that fic!
Hmmm... Justified to kill Tirek?
I'll pull a Lelouch vi Britannia on this:
"Those who should kill are those who are prepared to be killed."
Aaand there's the existential crisis here. Time for things to get really wonky.
Emotional aspects aside, Celestia is going to have to deal with the fact that the sister that was born in the same universe as her fell onto the deep end, and it took an extradimensional intervention of a guilt-ridden sister of an alternate future to veer it on a brighter course.
Sometimes I wonder whether sapience can be defined as the ability to occasionally refrain from using deadly force.
In any case, as a ruler of a nation under attack, it would be difficult to judge NMM's action against Tirek as wrong.
And why would Celestia act as though killing in defense of Equestria was inexcusable?
There are sharp, edged weapons and armor to protect one from them in use by the Equestrian military, and there are castles built as fortresses. Such things aren't invented without reason. The pegasus tribe were warriors, but the unicorn tribe was not overcome, and the earth ponies may not have all been slaves. There had to be battles. It would be astonishing if in all that time, nopony ever killed another in war.
The only downside was that the Mane six would never go sparkle-pony on Tirek, and Twilight would never get a crystal castle. Given that the castle came with that wretched table-map, that might be a good thing.
Rather than enjoying the past as Luna after killing Luna, NightMareMoon, forced her sister to banish her to the Moon for a Millennium for punishing herself for her crimes. Tirek posed an existential threat to Equestria. As Malcome Reynolds says, "¡If someone tries to kill you, try to kill him right back!".
Wait so, um, exactly what time did Nightmare come back? Was it before Luna got banished to the moon, or after and Luna was falling for Nightmare's lies again?
7325999 Before Luna got banished. She played the part, as she explained last chapter.
According to the comics, Discord's magic works like that as well.
Starlight Glimmer's spells seems to be able to alter the timeline, but it's interesting to note that when all the time-traveling was done, the timeline was exactly the same as it had been before they started...
5896472
First of all, the Crystal Heart 'killed' Sombra, not Candence/Twilight and co, and the comics say he survived anyway.
7732351 I'm sorry, but I will have to disagree with you there.
the 'intention' is all that is needed to have officially killed somebody.
The crystal heart is the gun. Twilight and Cadence were both a munitions and trigger puller.
Dost that nother sound like they killed him to you?
Oh well, I'm too busy fussing over a mentally unbalanced Celestia right now to be bothered by your negligible ramblings on the taking of a life.
Oh, by the by, I also agree with Kat.
just look at us americans.
more improrantky, look at our government and military.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure the phrase "shoot first,ask questions later" was not a spawn of diplomacy or democracuy.
Dangerously close to what a tyrant might say. Accusing anyone with a different opinion of "colluding" with the (perceived) enemy. I understand she's upset, and that lashing out occurs in times of high stress, but Cadance's outrage was fully warranted with that kind of accusation.
I'm just going to assume that there's some timey wimey reason why alt!Luna couldn't have either subdued Luna, or gone and helped Celestia subdue her.
Hmm, this is actually a very interesting point of view that's barely developed. There is a 5k word story in here somewhere.
The closest thing I can think of that's already written is the ending of chapter titled "Calm" in JoeShogun's "Nine Days Down", where the only precious constant crumbles and the protagonist is left in a world that's actively out to get them and absolutely nothing can be trusted. That's by far the darkest moment of the entire fic.
8957326 I would recommend Where Have the Stars Gone? or Red Apples. They each handle the idea of Celestia and Luna's relationship in very different ways, but the idea of constancy is a major theme of both.
Daybreaker ... is it coming?
"I genuinely thought an immortal would be better. Oh well, I suppose not everyone can hold, nor even comprehend the outlook of a God. Pitiful mortal. Death has exonerated you from its strings yet you refuse to cast away the despair it entails. Foolish, is a one word essay."
9750251
“Many foolishly believe immortality to be a gift...when it is in fact, a curse. Happiness can never truly belong to ones such as us, and many are consumed. Rage, hate, malice, insanity, or some other reason, many get consumed. Rare are the ones with the will and heart to endure such a curse. Even I myself find myself asking what the point is. I am one of the lucky few who have a true purpose to keep me anchored when amongst mortal beings. Pity those who are immortal...for only Time, Fate, and Destiny can tell if they will endure.”
Excerpt - Crimson Chronicles
(Still in Writing Process)
5896472
“Despite what your momma told you, violence DOES solve problems.”
-Chris Kyle
Strangely fitting quote considering what ‘Luna’ did leading up to this...
8143152
Nightmare influence was too strong and she already tried everything she could think of to avoid that fate.
7732346
Was it or did they just return to original time and the others still exist outside their awareness.
10852449
I mean, short of more canon on the subject we can't answer that definitively... but the strong impression I had gotten was that history had changed, not "shifted onto a different track", and they were changing it back.
She sure displays a lot of neurotic behavior over the death of a "life sucker". It's like she wasn't a few thousand years old and has seen milllions of deaths and sociopaths during that time. It's like she has no frame of reference at all.
The more intelligent displays in #3 "You too will deteriorate" is why it's one of my absolute favorite mysteries since I first read it a few years ago. This #2, and the previous #1 were good, mostly because they rode on the emotional wave of awesomeness induced by #3, which was the first one I read.
.
5896472
Im not sure thats quite right. They opposed Sombra and he sort of got killed fighting them. Its not the same as assassinating someone half a world away.