The only chapter.
"And they're Celestia and Luna. So it's not like you can just confront them," Twilight said. Though she wasn't exactly sure why she said it, it was such an obvious statement that it didn't really need to be called out.
"Actually, that's exactly what I was gonna do," Starlight said without hesitation.
Twilight, who was already worryingly fidgeting on her throne, leaned back in shock, just a bit too far, and tumbled off the side of her throne. As she landed on the cold hard crystal floor with a thud, the small the small crystal pony figurine she was using as a spell focus slid under the table. Had Twilight not been so preoccupied with being shocked, she would have been proud of herself for maintaining the spell on the distant musical figurine. Fortunately physical movement didn't directly translate though the spell, instead she was able to mentally keep her miniature self upright, though the counterpart figurine in Starlight's room wobbled dangerously.
"What?! Are you crazy?!" Twilight commanded the figurine to say as she picked herself up off the floor. Spike, always the helpful assistant, picked up Twilight's figurine and placed it back onto the map before he headed back under the crystal table, muttering something to himself.
Full focus back on her conversation with Starlight, Twilight gasped, realizing what she had just said. She threw her hooves up over her mouth, and then hastily sputtered out a hopefully more supportive line. "I mean, heh, you do whatever you think is best. This is your mission."
"Gee, thanks for believing in me, Twilight," Starlight said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
"I do. But the last time the princesses fought, Luna turned into Nightmare Moon, and Princess Celestia had to banish her for a thousand years! That can't happen again!" Twilight replied. She hoped Starlight would understand the gravity of the situation at hand. These weren't just two ordinary ponies, they were the princesses. The real princesses.
"Well, I can't do nothing. The princesses aren't the best at communicating with each other." Starlight said.
Twilight let out another gasp, this time it made it through the spell and was duplicated in miniature.
"Sorry. It's just, you said 'princesses' and 'aren't the best' in the same sentence, and it's making me nervous!" Twilight said.
She swore she could feel Starlight hitting her head on the table though the spell. Maybe she was going about this in the wrong way, maybe she should go to Canterlot and work with Starlight instead of trying to remotely micromanage her.
"I'm not much help, am I?" she asked sadly.
"No!"
Twilight didn't bother waiting for anything else, with that she let the spell drop and returned her full concentration back to the empty throne room.
Well, almost empty. She could hear Spike digging around underneath the massive crystal map.
"Spike?" Twilight asked, "What are you doing under there? Actually no, tell me later. Right now it's late, I've got a headache from using that spell for so long and I need to get to bed, but I want to write a letter first do you have a few minutes?
Spike stuck his head out from under the map table, for reasons unknown, he was wearing a miner's helmet, complete with a small electric light.
"Sure thing Twilight," he said before waddling out. Around his belly was a toolbelt, full of hoof tools. Twilight briefly debated asking him but then another pulse of pain shot through her skull and up her horn. It could wait for morning.
She walked to her room, with Spike in tow. There she got half of a letter dictated before she gave up entirely and dismissed Spike so she could get some sleep.
Twilight stumbled into the map room, still mostly asleep. Fortunately the rest had done her well and her headache was completely gone, all that was left now was to finish waking up. That of course, required coffee.
Spike, ever helpful, walked in moments after she sat down with a tray of food and a steaming hot mug of the glorious beverage. He set the tray down in front of her and she let the delicious aroma fill her nostrils as she added the perfect amount of milk and sugar to the drink. A sip was taken, followed by another and then a third.
The caffeine in the coffee didn't start its work immediately, but her brain knew what was coming and began to wake itself up in preparation for the jolt of energy. The gears in her brain started churning, her eyes lit up and she immediately became more aware of her surroundings.
The first thing she noticed is that Spike was, again, wearing his helmet and tool belt. This piqued her curiosity and she was about to ask what he was up to when he threw his claws to his mouth and let out a large belch. With it came a scroll that he managed to catch, he took one look at it and then handed it over to Twilight.
"Message for you, Twilight" he said politely.
"Thank you Spike," Twilight said.
"I'll be under here if you need me," Spike said. He flicked his light on and then headed back underneath the crystal map.
"Okay Spike," Twilight said as she set the scroll aside. She took a few quick bites of her breakfast and another few sips of coffee. If she was going to be reading mail she wanted to be fully awake and fed before doing so.
A few minutes later she picked up the letter again. Looking at it she noticed that it bore Celestia's royal seal. While it wasn't unusual to get mail from her former teacher, more often than not Twilight initiated the conversations. There were none currently in progress and since Twilight knew she hadn't finished her letter to Celestia last night, she was curious as to what this letter could be about. She quickly opened the scroll and began to read.
It didn't take very long because, excluding the signature, there was just a single line of text.
Twilight, please come to Canterlot immediately. It's about Starlight.
As far as she could remember she'd never seen Celestia both underline and bold something in a letter before. Something needed her attention and needed it urgently. Visions of the her conversation with Starlight the day before popped into her head. That crazy mare must have done something drastic. Twilight dropped the letter on the table and began to charge her horn.
"SPIKEINEEDTOGOTOCANTERLOTRIGHTNOW!" she blurted out before her horn finished charging and she blinked out of the room in a puff of smoke and flash of light.
A thud came from under the map, the glowing energy that formed the image of Equestria blinked out for a moment, before coming back on, this time even brighter than before.
Spike stuck his head out from under the table and glanced at the map.
"Twilight, I figured it out! The glow crystal for your cutie mark had burnt out, I just had to replace it, Spike said, proud of his work.
"Twilight?" Spike asked, as he noticed he was alone. "Twilight? Where'd you go?"
Spike wandered out of the room, looking for the young alicorn.
On the cutie map, hovering directly over Canterlot castle, both Starlight and Twilight's cutie marks danced around each other, silently twirling back and forth.
There was a pop, a flash of light and puff of smoke as Twilight appeared directly in front of both Celestia and Luna.
"I came... as fast... as I could..." Twilight said, between gasping breaths. Long distance teleports were not exactly easy, especially into Canterlot Castle, which had defenses against such things.
"See sister, we really do need to shore up some of our protection spells," Luna said, glancing at the heavily panting Twilight.
"I suppose you're right, though this is Twilight we're talking about," Celestia said.
"My point was, these spells do wear down from time to time and they need refreshing. That and sometimes they need to be reworked when somepony finds a way to bypass them," Luna said.
Twilight caught her breath and looked around the room. She was ready for danger, she was ready for disaster, she was ready for... breakfast?
She was in one of the castle's many dining rooms. In fact it was the room Celestia had breakfast in, every morning. Twilight knew this because, having grown up in the castle, she had eaten here many times before. She took a quick look and saw some of Celestia's amazingly delicious smiley face pancakes sitting at the far end of the table.
"I... " Twilight started to say, then took one last look around the room. Something had to be wrong, but whatever it was, it wasn't obvious. She focused on Celestia and Luna, the only two ponies in the room.
Celestia looked... she looked like her normal regal self. Beautiful and bright as always, she was as radiant as the morning sun.
Luna looked... tired. But that was to be expected, it was a few hours past her normal bedtime and Twilight knew Luna worked a long shift. She had to be eternally vigilant, keeping all of Equestria safe in their dreams.
Other than Luna looking a bit sleepy, everything looked normal. She gave the room one final look over and then let out a gasp as she noticed the obvious thing that she had been missing.
Starlight wasn't here.
That really made sense though, since her assumption had been Starlight did something drastic. Starlight couldn't have done something drastic if she wasn't here. But, if Starlight hadn't done something drastic, then why had Celestia summoned Twilight about Starlight?
"Thank you for coming Twilight, please take a seat," Celestia said, nodding at the table. "Do you want some pancakes?"
"Um, your letter seemed urgent, is something going on? Where's Starlight?"
"Oh, well, I suppose it is urgent," Celestia said as she took a seat at the table.
"Well, it's urgent we fill you in anyway," Luna said as pulled a chair next to Celestia.
"Is this about Starlight? She got sent here by the map. She thought you two were having a problem. I told her that was impossible. Did she do something? Was it bad?" Twilight fired off sentence after sentence without letting either Celestia or Luna get in a word edgewise.
"No, it's not impossible," Luna said. "We were having some issues. But I think we can work them out."
"But you're the Princesses!" Twilight said, not sure if she could believe Luna's statement.
"Exactly," Celestia said. "And do you know why we have the title 'princess'?"
"Because you lead Equestria?" Twilight asked. It seemed the obvious answer, so she was sure it must be wrong, even though it was right.
"When we first came to power, some ponies wanted to worship us as gods. Instead we took the title of princess because we are not gods. Luna and I may be immortal, and vastly more powerful than any other ponies, but we are not divine perfect deities. We can and do make mistakes," Celestia said.
"Like I did with when I became Nightmare Moon," Luna said, her ears drooping in sadness.
"Or like I did when I ignored the loneliness that lead to your change," Celestia said, reaching a wing around her smaller sister.
"And as we both did as we ignored each other's hard work in the last few months. Something we might have gone on doing had Starlight not pointed it out," Luna said.
"So she did confront you?" Twilight asked, shifting nervously in her seat.
"Wait, you knew what she was planning?" Celestia asked, tilting her head in confusion.
"To confront you? I didn't like the idea but it was her friendship problem to solve, I didn't want to get in her way." Twilight said.
"Twilight, you're supposed to be her teacher, part of being a teacher is letting students learn things on their own but another part is instructing them. Starlight is too new of a pupil to be entrusted to do everything on her own. There is a reason the maps sends ponies in pairs, you should have been here to help her and guide her. Think of all the lessons that we did together, how will you ever bond with your student if you always send her off alone?
"But the map didn't send me, it only sent her!" Twilight said.
Celestia merely pointed down at Twilight's cutie mark, which was flashing gently.
"That wasn't like that yesterday, I swear!" Twilight said, still staring in shock at the glowing cutie mark. She had been too frazzled to even notice it and had no idea when it had started flashing.
"Hmm, that is odd. I do believe you. Perhaps there is something wrong with the map," Celestia said. "In any case if you knew of Starlight's plan you still should have said something to her. Let that be a lesson to you as one teacher to another. You need to learn how much freedom to give your student, when it is appropriate to let them be and when it is appropriate give them firm guidance. Something Starlight clearly needed, especially when her plan something so... foalsih."
"I too must express my disappointment in thee Twilight. Casting a spell on other ponies without their permission is never acceptable. You should have taught Starlight this as one of her first lessons."
"What?! Starlight knows that already. She learned that after the mind control incident that occurred while I was giving my overview on enchanted objects in Equestria."
"Apparently, the lesson did not stick," Luna said dryly.
"Wait a minute... Starlight said she was going to confront you, not use magic on you! Did she try to mind control you into getting along?!" Twilight exploded out of her chair, her wings twitched wildly and her tail flew back and forth as she shouted at Luna, terrified of the possible answer.
"No, she cast a spell to switch our cutie marks." Celestia said with just a barely detectable hint of annoyance.
Twilight stopped mid-step and sat down on the floor hard.
"Buh..."
Before either Princess could speak up, Twilight forced herself to get up off the floor and then ran over to Celestia. She could have sworn everything looked fine before, and when she reached the Princess she let out a sigh of relief. The golden sun of Celestia's cutie mark still adorned the royal flank.
"I thought you said she switched your cutie marks."
"I said she cast a spell to do so. It didn't work." Celestia said.
"Hmm... That's odd... but good!. I just don't think I've ever seen Starlight unsuccessfully cast a spell before." Twilight said.
"Oh it wasn't a mis-cast," Luna said while holding back a yawn. "It would have worked, had it had been cast on any other ponies."
"Then why didn't it work?" Twilight asked, scratching her head with her hoof.
"Twilight, Luna and I are the most powerful ponies on the planet, by many orders of magnitude. We also have the most number of potential enemies. Some of which have similar levels of power. Do you honestly think we do not have defenses in place to prevent various forms of attack?" Celestia asked.
"I um..."
"It would be completely reckless of us to not protect ourselves. Can you imagine what kind of harm could befall this country, or even this world if any powerful unicorn could come along and tamper with our magic?" Luna asked.
She didn't want for a reply, instead she continued to talk.
"After Lord Tirek escaped Tartarus, Celestia and I worked together on a spell designed to protect our magic from being stolen or otherwise tampered with. We had designed the original version of this spell millennia ago, when we first fought Tirek. Unfortunately he was able to find a flaw it's design and was able to bypass it near the very end of the fight. I struggled to hold him back, fighting for control of my magic, were it not for a surprise attack from Celestia, he might have managed to steal my powers. With Tirek safely imprisoned in Tartarus, we never updated the spell to fix the flaw. There simply wasn't time to do so after he escaped, but after he was returned to Tartarus we updated it and in fact, made some new additions."
"Oh, well that's good. Hopefully he'll never get out again but at least you're prepared." Twilight said. "But, if Starlight failed to switch your cutie marks, then what's the problem? I'm not trying to downplay the situation, it should have been obvious to her that she should have never tried to begin with, but at least nothing bad came of it."
Celestia laughed nervously at Twilight's statement.
"Nothing bad... Right?" Twilight asked, noticing Celestia's reaction.
"Luna mentioned we updated the protection spell," Celestia said as she rested a wing on Twilight. "And that we made some additions to it. Neither of us were affected by Starlight's spell but Starlight ran afoul of the protection spell."
"What does that mean?" Twilight asked tapping her hoof impatiently.
"We were quite surprised when she simply disappeared," Luna said with a poorly suppressed giggle.
"Honestly we didn't even know what had happened at first. It took us a moment to analyze the residual magic and figure out what Starlight had done and that she had triggered the automatic response," Celestia said.
Twilight's jaw dropped open in surprise. "Residual magic? Disappeared? Oh sweet Celestia, your spell didn't kill her did you?" Twilight asked, unsure if she wanted to hear the answer.
"Oh of course not," Luna said with a giggle of her own. "We try our best not to kill our adversaries."
"Then where is she?" Twilight asked.
"Well, at the time we only knew of one being who could potentially interfere with our magic. And there's only really one place he belongs. So we figured, why not update the spell. If it detects an attack on our magic, it was designed to automatically send the attacker, presumably Tirek, back to where he belongs..." Luna said, trailing off at the end.
Twilight blinked slowly, her mind grinding away at Luna's statement. She was a smart pony and it didn't take long to figure out what had happened. Her eyes lit up... and then she lifted a hoof to her face.
"But that means..." Twilight said.
"Yes Twilight, that is why we called you here. Luna and I are going to be working though our issues but we have a task for you. You need to go get Starlight out of Tartarus."
"Shit."
The sounds of tortured screams echoed through the immense underground cavern. Far across the massive room Starlight could just make out a large cage that housed a small decrepit figure. Tirek was her guess but at this distance it was hard to tell. His cage hung from a thick chain and was suspended over a lake of fire, even if he should escape the cage, he had nowhere to go. A number of similar cells were scattered throughout the room some empty, and some occupied by unnamed horrors that made chills run up and down her spine every time she gazed in their direction.
She was lucky enough to have been placed in an empty cage, well and truly away from any of the hellfire. The downside was a lack of light, since her cage was mostly covered in the dark shadow from the massive stone staircase that lead up the the gates of Tartarus. Also, the cage was only mostly empty. The bones of some long dead monster were sitting in the far corner. She had tried to go near them to push them out of the cage but when she approached, they started to rattle and a demonic whispering appeared in her head. She had wisely decided to let them be and instead moved to the opposite corner where she had been sitting for days now. Or maybe hours, or months, possibly years?
Time seemed to pass oddly in the underworld and she had no real idea of how long she had been imprisoned. The only thing she knew is her magic didn't work down here, and she hadn't yet starved to death. Whether that was because she hadn't been there that long or because Tartarus wouldn't let her die until her imprisonment had ended, she wasn't sure.
Suddenly her cutie mark, which had been blinking on and off ever since she was forcibly removed from the capital, ceased its glow. The dim light had been her only real source in the cage and it now faded away completely, leaving her to sit in the dark.
The tortured screams grew louder.
"I guess they solved their problems," Starlight said sullenly.
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Okay, I know Starlight did some pretty messed up things in "A Royal Problem", but she did NOT deserve to get banished to Tartarus by the princesses when she was trying to help them out! I wanted Starlight to be called out, not be dealt with a punishment that was far worse than the crime she committed.
8230977
I agree! This going too far!
The title alone makes me want to break my rule of judging something before I've read it.
8230977
Not only that, but the story fails to make note of the fact that Starlight didn't resort to magic right away. She only did so after Celestia and Luna started arguing with each other and even then it was out of desperation and panic. Besides Starlight didn't really resolve the issue, the Royal Sisters did that themselves(Something that many of the episode's critics don't seem to notice).
8231056 It's not even a 'How It Should've Ended' fic, because that would imply it's the same story as the official episode, but with a different ending.
So basically, you're saying Starlight should have been sent to Tartarus for a single action born out of a moment of panic and impulse? Ouch...
I don't understand the negative votes for this story. The Sisters didn't purposely send Starlight to Tartarus after all, it was an automated thing. And they were even sending Twilight to go save Starlight.
I don't exactly understand the downvotes to the story. The Princesses didn't want to send her to Tartarus, it only happened automatically because of the magic protection they had on. It wasn't out of rage or spite or anything.
Maybe if the princesses went to get her from Tartarus themselves instead of going through the trouble to contact Twilight? I don't know.
8231107 It still ends with Starlight needlessly suffering, all because she tried to help the sisters.
My reaction in a nutshell.
Starlight gets punished for helping ponies. Yeah, that reaction works.
8231116
That doesn't change the fact that Starlight is sent to the equivalent of Hell simply because she panicked and acted without thinking things through. It is in no way an appropriate punishment to Starlight's actions and she did not deserve it at all.
8231116
8231107
Sure let's go over the reasons.
Right off the bat the title. Not even creative in the slightest. Not only that but in this fandom at this point when people tend to go "how it should've ended" implied that the show's ending was bad or faulty and it comes with incredible arrogance that they can do it better.
Then we get into the story. I love the incredibly
stupidconvenient reason for Twilight not getting summoned. This basically just screams the author is upset that Twilight didn't get sent on the mission even though anyone who knows her personality and even the show itself acknowledged that Twilight would be a poor pick for this mission. She's biased and reveres the Princesses to much to do anything.Then there is this BS about in which Celestia starts spouting about "why the map always sends two ponies". How would Celestia know why it always sends two ponies? This sounds like we're getting into author mouth-piecing and when she goes on about "Oh you should've been there to guide her", basically the author is just complaining about Twilight not being there again and ignoring how Twilight would've been a terrible pick.
And the best part is the author is specifically ignoring everything Starlight did BEFORE switching their marks which proved that she DIDN'T need Twilight there to guide her. Starlight was actually doing everything right. She wanted to get all the facts first BEFORE doing anything. She then got the two of them to air their grievances to each other rather than acting passive aggressive constantly. When the fight was escalating she tried to get them to calmly step back without using magic. It wasn't until AFTER she was shoved aside with magic and the fight started escalating that she panicked and used magic on them.
And this is a personal grievance of mine but the story also went heavy into the Alicorn Wankery that I truly hate.
8231155
"She's biased and reveres the Princesses to much to do anything."
I've said it before, but these are things that the episode could have had her confront, and thus led to character development on her part (something that, along with focus, she hasn't been allowed in what feels like a very long time). Instead, the choice was made to treat them as immutable laws of the universe, because the writers just wanted to tell a story with Starlight and didn't want to tell a story with Twilight.
8231184
Cute. Well it would be cute if they were actually trying to tell a story with Starlight but all they did was tell a story that just happened to have her in it.
The episode was far more heavily focused on Celestia and Luna and Starlight was just nothing more than the catalyst.
This wasn't exactly the best story I have read.
It's was kinda confusing with the OOCness, why Starlight got sent to Tartarus, ect.
BUT!
It was not the worst story either.
I feel like you have something good going on here. Just change around some things, and not bad!
This episode would've been better if the royal sisters handled the situation themselves instead of Starlight (or anypony else) getting shoehorned in.
It makes Celestia look bad when she acts like she doesn't care if her sister could turn back to Nightmare Moon, and surely Luna should know Celestia works hard.
Don't get me wrong, this episode wasn't bad it was just dumbed down more than I was expecting/wanting.
8231155
Actually, if you'd like to know my thoughts on the episode, I'll tell them to you. You only hit what I was thinking before I saw it. I went in thinking, what the hell is this? Twilight knows both princesses she would be a logical choice to mend a rift between Luna and Celestia.
Then I watched it, and now I don't think that at all anymore. The way Twilight was portrayed, she could never see past the perfect image of Celestia had she gone in Starlight's stead.
What I do think should have happened is Twilight AND Starlight should have gone, together. This would have been a perfect episode (even possibly better as a 2 parter) for Twilight and Starlight to bond in a actual teacher / student relationship. My big problem with what went on is that Twilight doesn't actually teach. Starlight goes off and does her thing and Twilight acts like her panicky worrisome self. She needs to grow out of this, both to realize that Celestia and Luna are not perfect and she also needs to learn that sometimes you need to take a more hands on approach for teaching.
It's true that I do not care for Starlight, but after watching the episode, I actually found myself disappointed that this wasn't a two-parter that devoted more time to Starlight / Twilight's teacher / student relationship. This would have been an excellent episode for some growth, not only with Celestia and Luna getting exposure, but for Twilight and Starlight to work together and form a better bond.
That being said, this fic wasn't supposed to be a serious alternate ending (take note, the how it should have ended series are parodies that point out flaws) . It is, in my mind, a different but not good ending that resulted from Twilight and Starlight not working together (which I see as a flaw in the episode). See the description "Just because everything worked out in the end, doesn't mean that things went well." I don't actually think Starlight belongs in hell, (which is why Twilight is on the way to rescue her)
If it makes you feel any better, in my mind, Starlight spends all of maybe 30 minutes in Tartarus before Twilight pops in and pulls her out. She just doesn't realize it because of the time thing.
Edit: some updates for clarification
8231227
This, besides what I already called out in my other comment, is one of the things that saddened me about the episode. Celestia smiling all day is tough, and Luna's dealing with Nightmares, seemed far too simple. I know they aren't going to get heavily into politics in a kids show but I hope Celestia does more than smile at charity events, and I hope Luna is involved in more than just dreams. Since she was gone for 1000 years not doing her job, it can't be *that* important, or some other pony, Celestia perhaps? handled it in her absence, so I would have liked to see more of Luna ruling in her own special way on top of just the dream thing. (Or as an alternate, go full bore Luna protecting ponies from dream demon entities, but again, what happened when she was stuck on the moon?)
8231206
A dismissive opening "cute!" I love that rhetorical trill!
8231238
Is it really that you wanted a Starlight and Twilight or are you just trying to shoehorn Twilight in simply because Starlight got sent?
The true allure and what made A Royal Problem great was that this wasn't a Starlight episode.
It was a Celestia and Luna episode. Starlight was the catalyst sure but beyond that the episode was all really Celestia and Luna.
The fandom loves Luna and the fandom has been calling for Celestia episode for ages and we got to see them and yet for some reason let's detract from that by introducing Twilight apparently by your logic.
Twilight didn't need to be there with a more hand on approach because there was no reason for it. Starlight did things right. Unfortunately the "right" method didn't work. This wasn't a fault of Starlight.
If this story was trying to be a "not serious" they you're packaging of the story was terrible because that's exactly what it comes off as. A bad fixfic.
8231152
8230977
8231074
I'm going to get the "I'm saying Starlight deserved to get sent to hell" thing out of the way with one reply.
No, she didn't
. That was kinda the point. Neither princess purposely sent her there. It was an automatic response they setup as a defensive measure against the one being they knew was capable of stealing their magic. They call this out in the story, and then send Twilight (cause that's what Celestia does) to go save Starlight.
Had this not meant to be a short one-shot and I continued it to cover the entire "episode" Twilight would have shown up moments later with Starlight spending maybe a grand total of 30 minute in Tartarus. I think if Celestia, Luna and Cadence could spend however long they were there when Tirek was running amok, Starlight can sit there for a little while. And, at the end everypony would have learned a valuable lesson. Twilight would interact with her student better (and that Celestia (and to a lesser extent, Luna) are not perfect. Starlight would (finally) learn to not cast spells on other ponies without permission, and Celestia and Luna would learn to solve their problems (and hopefully to put a few safeguards on their protection spells).
8231329
You are free to disbelieve any statements I make. I don't really care one way or another if you do believe me.
I stand by my statement of I would have liked to see more actual growth between Twilight and Starlight in a student / teacher relationship.
I certainly didn't dislike the episode, it's one of the better S7 ones, but I don't think it's perfect. My favorite parts about it were the focus we got on Celestia and Luna. My least favorite parts were how Starlight and Twilight were handled.
Starlight did not do things right, she panicked and once again, cast a spell on other ponies without their permission. In the end, everything worked out, but you can hardly call that as doing things right.
I'll quote Rainbow Dash from Every Little Thing She Does
"Well, here's a friendship lesson for ya — don't cast spells on your friends! "
Yes, she tried another method first, but when you try something and it doesn't work you aren't supposed to jump to a wrong method, you're supposed to keep trying the right way.
As for it being a fixfic, the title is a deliberate call out to a parody series, of which I'm sure you are well aware. That should make it somewhat obvious that this is not meant to be serious. Now I'll be fair, I've never written parody before, so I don't really expect my first attempt to be amazingly good or even well received, but it's not like I could have done much more to call it out. There is no satire or parody tag, and I certainly wouldn't feel comfortable tagging it as comedy because I don't feel like it's meant to be "ha ha" funny (I not even sure I can write "ha ha" funny
). I pointed out a few flaws with the episode that I felt prevented it from being a great one and ran with them to an absurd, over the top (and, to be fair, dark) conclusion.
If you don't like it, that's fine, I don't mind. But don't try to guess what's going on in my head. If you really want to know, just ask.
Edit: missed a thing, added to the post to correct it, and cleaned up post a bit.
> Sees the title
> Sees the like-dislike ratio
> Sees the comments.
Right...
I saw the like-dislike ratio and knew I needed to check this fic out. And honestly? I enjoyed it. There were parts that made me laugh, there was still a lot of Celestia and Luna and, hopefully, Starlight has learned her damn lesson. Maybe it's because I'm new to the fandom, maybe it's because I've spent my entire life avidly hating everything MLP until I finally decided to give FiM a chance, or maybe I just enjoyed a fic because you wrote it well, but this is nice. Definitely got my upvote.
Gods, I hope Tirek gets suspended over fucking hellfire. He'd deserve it... Fucking Tirek...
The dislike ratio took me by surprise as well. I enjoyed it. It made me think beyond the episode and my initial thoughts on it and reminded me how much I HATE seeing Twilight not growing beyond her panicky self...I thought Cadence taught her how to breath and calm herself, but the lesson sure didn't stick here - yes, I know it was because it was the Princesses this time but sheesh, they CAN takes care of themselves if it means keeping Equestria safe!
Both those who like and dislike the story have valid points, except that some people do seem to be forgetting that Starlight was accidentally sent to Tartarus. Of course she didn't deserve it, but the thought that Celestia and Luna took steps to protect their magic makes perfect sense. All powerful alicorn rulers would be irresponsibly foalish not to!
I like Starlight Glimmer...I don't understand why she gets so much hate and that makes me think her fans are fairly defensive of her when she gets the bad end in a story. This story is interesting as an alternate ending and IMO is in no way "bad". I hope you continue writing and are not put off by all the down votes...you have enough positive comments here to show it was worth the write and many (including me) found positive points in it.
8231501
Thanks, glad you enjoyed it.
Yeah, I'm not to fond of him myself.
8231614
I appreciate the feedback. This was never meant to be "the good ending", for that to occur, Starlight and Twilight would have had to work together. I agree with everyone who says Starlight didn't deserve to be sent to Tartarus, which is why she was sent there by accident. Had I actually thought Starlight deserved to be sent to Tartarus, I would have gone an entirely different route with how she got there.
Oh there's no worries there. While I like it when my stories are well received, ultimately, I write because I enjoy taking the crazy ideas I have bouncing around in my head and turning them into stories. I enjoyed writing this one, even if it wasn't anything like my normal style of story and I've got no plans to stop. There are definitely some improvements I could have made when writing this, but I have a feeling that the majority of the negativity is, as you said, because Starlight got a bad ending.
8231372
To be fair, how often do the characters do things right the first time? The Mane Six have made plenty of mistakes over the years, but things still turned out alright in the end. This episode is no different.
8232037
Except it wasn't the first time. She's done the whole cast a spell on ponies without permission before. She was suppose to have learned not to do that in Every Little Thing She Does. On top of that, when the mane 6 make a mistake the episode generally revolves around teaching them what they did wrong. It didn't do that this time, instead every pony seemed to affirm that Starlight made the right choice, just because things worked out in the end. I don't think "the end justifies the means" is a good lesson for Starlight.
8232086 But what Starlight did turned out to be the right call in the end, so it wasn't really a mistake. Besides, lessons don't always stick so easily. How many times did Fluttershy have to learn to be more assertive before she actually started doing so?
You know, considering how many dislikes this story has, it isn't really all that bad. Pretty meh, but not that bad.
8232094
I'm sorry but I disagree with you. It did work out, but I still don't think it was right of Starlight to do that.
Celestia and Luna aren't children, and Starlight isn't their parent, worse still they are the rulers of the nation and are sovereign over Starlight. To put it in perspective, think what would happen if an ordinary person went up to the US President and attempted to physically punish him for something they thought he was doing wrong. Even if what the President was doing was wrong, that person would be arrested, or possibly shot, on the spot.
I'll give that Fluttershy takes multiple lessons to learn to be assertive, but Fluttershy's lack of assertiveness is a personal problem. Starlight's problem has gone beyond personal. She is is affecting other ponies, and thus can't (or shouldn't) have the same leeway to learn her lesson.
Harsh. I'm sure with this anti-starlight glimmer story this fic was really made by MLP Reviewer Lily Peet.
8232135 Starlight wasn't "punishing" them. She was trying to help them, even if her actions were born out of impulse. And Celestia and Luna themselves admitted that what she did turned out to be just what they needed. Starlight's actions allowed each sister to see things from the other's point of view. Without it, they would have just kept arguing with each other.
8232138
Having never seen this reviewer before and just watched their S5 in 7 minutes, I'm still laughing.
8232155
Perhaps punishment was the wrong word. Discipline would have been better as Starlight was attempting to teach them something (what it was like to be each other). In the end though, call it what you will, discipline, magical assault, unwanted instruction, the fact still remains that she cast a spell on them without permission. This is entirely contrary to the lesson she learned in Every Little Thing She Does and there is no getting around this point.
I don't know about you, but I've had plenty of arguments with people over the years, and I haven't needed to be magically forced into seeing the other person's point of view to make amends. Celestia and Luna (especially Celestia who is supposed to be an experienced and wise ruler) should not be portrayed as to be so dumb that they can't figure out their problems without being magically forced to. They eventually would have worked through it.
8232208
They weren't being "dumb". They just didn't understand how difficult each others' routines were. And clearly, "eventually" wasn't good enough for the map, which was why it sent Starlight in the first place.
And the actual lesson Starlight learned in ELTSD was to not try and do everything at once. Attempting to complete all those friendship lessons at the same time was what caused her to resort to using magic in the first place. If she had tried focusing on one at a time, there would have been no need for her to go overboard like that.
8232232
You are mis-reading my statement. I didn't say they are dumb, I said they shouldn't be portrayed as to be so dumb as to never be able to work things out on their own. (i.e. without magical intervention)
That one 1 lesson, that episode had multiple ones.
Did you completely miss this?
Twilight Sparkle: What made you think that casting a spell on your friends to do your bidding was even remotely a good idea?
Starlight Glimmer: Well, when you put it that way, it sounds really bad.
Twilight Sparkle: That's because it is really bad!
and this?
Rainbow Dash: Well, here's a friendship lesson for ya — don't cast spells on your friends!
8232296
But the one I mentioned is the only one that can be carried into real life.
8232308
Uh, okay? I'm not sure what that has to do with anything. We're talking about lessons Starlight learned not lessons the viewer learned.
8232317
As I pointed out earlier, characters have had to relearn lessons before.
8232444
Except She's not learning the same lesson twice. The take away from this episode is the opposite from the take away from Every Little Thing She Does.
When you reduce it to its most simple form the lessons are as follows.
Every Little Think She Does: The end doesn't justify the means.
A Royal Problem: The end justifies the means.
8232473
Actually, the simplified lesson for Starlight in "A Royal Problem" was to go with her gut.
8232555
Her gut said, it's okay to force magic upon other ponies, as long as it works out in the end.
Which really boils down to: The end justifies the means.
I mean really, look at this, it isn't hard to make this connection.
Every Little Thing She Does:
Rainbow Dash: Well, here's a friendship lesson for ya — don't cast spells on your friends!
Q: What is the relevant part of Rainbow's quote?
A: Don't cast spells on your friends
A Royal Problem:
Q: What did Starlight do to the princesses?
A: She cast a spell on them.
I don't know how I can make it any more obvious.
8232575 Except, as I already pointed out, it turned out to be the right thing to do. I'm not saying it couldn't have gone horribly wrong, but it didn't.
8232600
Do you know what "The end justifies the means" means?
It's more or less saying, a good outcome excuses any wrongs committed to attain it. There was a wrong committed here, I'll once again let Rainbow Dash point out what it was.
Rainbow Dash: Well, here's a friendship lesson for ya — don't cast spells on your friends!
That things turned out okay is irrelevant in determining the morality of Starlight's actions. We've already learned in the MLP universe, you should not cast spells on your friends. (Which seems pretty obvious, even before Dash pointed it out, but now we have confirmation)
It was not the right thing to do, both from my perspective and from what was previously established in universe. That contradiction is one of my issues with the episode and one of the reasons I don't think it was a great one (I'd rate it between somewhere between decent and good)
You are free to disagree with me (and Rainbow Dash, and to a lesser extent Twilight). You are free to think it's perfectly okay to use magic as long as the outcome is good, but the fact that what Starlight did in A Royal Problem is contradictory to what was established in a previous episode is just that, a fact. It isn't subjective.
8232632
I'm well aware of what that term means. And as long as we're talking facts, Starlight's spell, impulsive and intrusive as it was, ultimately helped the sisters resolve their issues. That's more than enough reason to forgive a decision that was driven by panic and made completely on the spur of the moment.
Butthurt accusation fic written because the author can't cope with Starlight having gotten sent alone by the map and with Starlight having been able to user her magic on Celestia and Luna to switch their cutie marks.
You should feel ashamed for writing this.
8232653
Eh, I'm a bit unsure about turning the decision to forgive into a "fact" that's a personal matter between the person (or pony) who committed the transgression and the affected party.
That being said, I'm sure Celestia and Luna would both forgive Starlight (in fact, we can safely say they did since neither of them stayed angry at Starlight)
But, our entire discussion stemmed from your original post:
The answer, as I stated in my first reply, is no. Had I wanted Celestia and Luna to not forgive Starlight, I would have written something more along the lines of Celestia and Luna banishing Starlight to Tartarus for committing treason for attacking royalty. (One could make that argument that tampering with the Princesses magic is treason, regardless of the outcome) In this story neither Celestia nor Luna meant for Starlight to be sent to Tartarus. It was, as I and a few others readers have pointed out, an accident. One that Celestia immediately went to remedy (in her normal way, by getting Twilight to do it)
8231074
And an action that was the right choice. If Starlight hadn't switched their cutie marks, Luna would probably sit on the moon again by now for another 1,000 years.
I'm so baffled that this still happens. Starlight already didn't deserve hatred right from the start, but after all she did, it makes even less sense.
That's really just stubbornness anymore. *shakes head*
8232689
I doubt I'll ever feel ashamed for anything I write. In fact I rather enjoyed writing this fic. It got me to think about the episode even more than I already had. As for my reasons, I've already pointed them out in multiple comments, you are free to believe me or not believe me.