Rio de Janero, the new Brazillian Empire The clouds were being generous today, Brazil not being Equestria no Pegasi kept the sky clear, the wind had done that all on its own, the clear blue sky letting the sun shine through the wide ornate windows of the office of Dom Pedro V, the current and probably last Emperor of Brazil, the head of state of the new Brazilian Empire. He glanced over the latest acquisitions, the Mona Lisa had finally turned up in the hands of a street peddler five years after it had gone missing and someone had discovered a set of Andy Warhols in a storage unit they’d bought, probably taken during the frantic evacuation of California ten years ago, the last heavily settled place outside South America that Equestria had consumed. Now they were all alone, the Empire of Brazil was a superpower by fiat of it being the only ‘power’ left whose head of state didn’t raise the sun and moon every day. Setting down his pen Pedro granted himself a moment to reflect on how things had come to this When this country broke with its Portuguese motherland it had been am Empire under the guidance of two great men, his idol Dom Pedro II had always been considered the father of Brazil even after the fall of the monarchy. Brazil had gone through the same fate as the other south American nations, one coup after another, foreign manipulation in the Cold War and several dictatorships, it had finally thrown off the shackles and begun to develop on its own, his country had begun to emerge as a power in the world Then the goddamn talking ponies showed up Equestria just appeared one day, no-one knew how, no-one knew why, no-one even know what it was and it was just suddenly there a hundred miles off the coast of the Bahamas in the Atlantic. The first attempts to breach the barrier, his grandma had told him, were met with failure, the UAVs crashed into the Atlantic anyone who passed through suddenly lost radio contact, then the first ones appeared. The USS George Washington found a pale blue pony, that wasn’t the weirdest part, it had wings with feathers and made biologists the world over either start crying in frustration or dropping their jaws to the floor in disbelief, but that wasn’t the weirdest part. It had a winged lightning bolt on its rump which somehow grew into the fur and made even more biologists jaw drop but that wasn’t the weirdest part. No, the weirdest part was that she had been calling out for help in perfect English After they fished her out she explained a great deal and after a few tense standoffs with other flying ponies, pegasi wearing golden armor who’d been sent out to search for her they’d gotten a dialogue going between the UN and the Principality of Equestria and its envoys, Princess Miamore Cadence and her husband Shining Armor on behalf of Cadences aunts, the rulers of Equestria, Princesses Celestia and Luna. Equestria swiftly applied for and was admitted to the UN, Equestrian embassies to individual countries soon popped up and they quickly endeared themselves to the countries that had opened their boarders, humans had been reading, watching and writing about aliens for years, most people were just relieved that they weren’t the Borg. Ponies began visiting universities and not just as students, a unicorn named Lyra Heartstrings was even named Professor of Equine Studies at Harvard University, for the first few years humankind and ponykind enjoyed a real honeymoon, he wished he could’ve been alive then, it had to have been a wonderful time, comparable to when they’d first landed on the moon, human endeavor and enterprise expanding even further than it had before Then what had seemed like such a good story, a first encounter with sentient alien life who hadn’t wanted to invade them or wipe them out, who held high principles so similar to that of most of the world took a turn for the worse. Cadence announced at the UN that the magical barrier that separated Equestria from the rest of the planet had begun to expand and that it was slowly but surely increasing in speed, in time, Equestria would consume the Earth and humans, unable to tolerate the high levels of magic, would be wiped out. Governments were outraged, some screeching blue bloody murder and accusing Equestria of trying to conquer the world, others and threatened war but were talked down by their peers as Cadence pledged the full attention of Equestrias finest minds would be diverted to stopping the expansion. The Princess was as good as her word and the best and brightest ponies joined a massive think-tank, the UN Department of Human Salvation, or UNDHS for short. They worked for years as the barrier spread, it didn’t expand evenly though, for a year it crept slowly out then jumped in jolts, gobbling up a slew of territory at a time, the Bahamas were the first to be lost, the UK evacuating every Bahamian it could before the barrier devoured the islands. After five years the UNDHS finally admitted they had no way to stop the barrier, humanity was doomed. But then hope appeared Princess Celestia made her first appearance at the UN shortly afterwards. She apologized for the barriers expansion and asked humanity to forgive her, the thought of beings of whatever race suffering when she could do nothing filled her with sadness, it had placated some of Equestrias detractors. Then she announced the formation of the now infamous Pony Conversion Bureaus or PCBs, any human who wanted to survive the coming apocalypse could go there and be transformed via magic into a pony and then would be allowed to settle in Equestria with no strings attached. At first there were few takers but after the barrier reached the coast of Africa more and more began to consider their options, the Last Exodus had begun. Entire towns fled through desperate for any chance to survive, that none of the previous waves of refugees had kept up contact with their former nations didn’t seem to occur to some, indeed it didn’t occur to anyone. Celestia had been universally praised for her kindness and compassion, first by the ponies, then by the governments of the world for her promises to allow the humans of every country to retain as much of their culture and national identity as they could, she got the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Nobel Peace Prize, she was made a Dame by the Queen, in short she got every prize and award humanity could throw at her. Then after her ‘most faithful student’ had done the unthinkable and emigrated Celestia broke off all contact with the human race, the PCBs were still operating and shifting to the countries still left but no-one heard a peep from the Sun God for years after Twilight appeared at the UN and requested US citizenship, a few ponies followed her and why they’d done what they did was never revealed to the public, it was like she was sulking As the barrier expanded faster and faster the other continents were devoured, all except one, South America, which was left untouched. For their part the various countries of the world carried on as best they could until almost all their territory was on the pony side of the barrier, then they usually packed up what they had left entered the PCBs themselves with the plan of continuing their society on the other side of the barrier, others chose to flee somewhere else. Eventually South America was, for whatever reason, the only place left to run to and Brazil, the strongman of the continent ascended to superpower status. In order to better negotiate what was going to have to be done, the final Exodus of the last humans, the country’s government proclaimed a revival of the Empire and the President at the time, Pedros grandfather was proclaimed Emperor Pedro III of Brazil, the crown jewels and regalia were broken from the museum they’d rested in. By the time of the Empire even South America had begun to feel the bite of the barrier, even now Brazil, the only country left, was reduced to a rump of the Atlantic coast, like the last Roman Emperors Dom Pedro V didn’t rule much of an Empire. Pedro V reached out and grasped a heavy silver frame set on the edge of his large desk, in it was a picture of his grandfather and the new Royal Family just after his coronation, he could only remember little bits and pieces of it being so young but he could see himself in his miniature soldiers uniform, also with the family was a unicorn. Her coat had faded from lavender to a pale lilac in her old age and her mane was streaked with gray but Pedro would never forget his grandma Twilight, the old pony who’d babysat him as a child and was his teacher and in time, is best friend, her death had been the final straw, the thing that had provoked Celestia to break her decades long isolation and resume contact ten years ago Pedro picked up his pen and signed his royal assent to the latest appropriations bill then prepared for his meeting with Princess Celestia. The Sun Princess had announced she was going to visit the Empire of Brazil the week before, not if she could but that she was going to, it seemed she’d finally dropped all pretense. The alien invasion was nearly complete, she effectively ruled the world now, the god-sovereign of Earth, no, Equestria. It was nearly time to talk about the Final Exodus Two hours later he was sitting in his throne in the throne room, outside, the flag of the Empire flew above those of the surviving nations that were little more than skeleton governments-in-exile. He glanced over at his wife and gave her a reassuring smile, she and her son, Crown Prince Pedro Luis returned it before the doors swung open and the god-monarch trotted in. Pedro rose in respect and Celestia bowed low “Your Majesty” “Your Imperial Highness, I would prefer we speak in private” Pedro nodded and walked side-by-side with the Princess to his office
Any recommendation for improvement? I've been busy setting the scene for Pedro and Celestia's talk so far, trying to explain how and why things are as they are
More proofreading would help. There's plenty of awkward sentences. Look at this one: "Entire towns field through desperate for any chance to survive; that none of the previous waves of refugees had kept up contact with their former nations didn’t seem to occur to some, indeed it didn’t occur to anyone." Entire towns field? Through desperate for any chance to survive? Is there a reason you used a semicolon instead of just ending the first sentence? And that last bit about "didn't occur to some, indeed didn't occur to anyone" would be a lot better as just "didn't occur to anyone" since "didn't occur to some" is awkward to start and implies did occur to others. That's just one of the worse sentences, not the only one that needs work.
Part two is up, feedback as always is greatly appreciated, this is a story I want to be done right Canterlot Castle, 0 AEA (After Earth Arrival Twilight passed by the guards, including her brother who she gave a small smile to, and bowed low before Celestia seated on her high throne. After the mysterious barrier appeared around Equestria and cut it off from the other nations everypony was in a state of panic, those they’d sent out to explore hadn’t come back and strange machines had broken through only to crash soon after “Princess, I came as soon as I could” “And I thank you for it Twilight Sparkle, I wanted to let you know in person that they found Rainbow Dash, she’s safe” Twilight breathed a sigh of relief and visibly relaxed “Thank goodness, we’ve all been really worried about her, where is she?” Twilight saw Celestia do something she’d never seen her do, she hesitated. From the very first time she saw her raise the sun as a little filly throne that always struck Twilight was how completely unflappable Celestia was, she always had an answer for everything, she was always patient, she was always calm, she always had a plan and always knew what to do, her dad once said she had the best poker face in Equestria. Even when Chrysalis and Discord appeared she’d been shaken but she had a plan, she never let on that she was at a loss. Now, she didn’t see to know what to say and that worried her more than it should “That...is why I summoned you here. Tell me Twilight, do you remember the old myths about hu-mans?” “Yes, they’re old mares tales, they appear in a few books in the library but only one pony ever borrows them, why?” “Because according to the message Rainbow Dash sent back, she’s found them. Equestria has been transported to the human world, Earth” Twilight went into overdrive “What? Really? Omigosh omigosh omigosh this is incredible, what’s Earth like? What language do they speak? Did Rainbow see any of their machines? Did...” she fell silent at a raised hoof from the Princess, behind them Shining Armor couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle, Twily was still the same pony he’ always known, give her a chance to learn something new and she went crazy “Rainbow Dash is safe aboard a human warship, they want to make contact with us, the machines that crashed were theirs and they were trying to find out what was beyond the barrier, something is making them stop working once they cross” “And you want me to find out what and fix it?” “I’m afraid not” “Do you want me to go as an envoy to meet them?” “Not exactly, Princess Cadence and your brother will be the official envoys but I want you to go with them. The old myths didn’t always paint humans in a favorable light, their capacity for evil was very prominent” “I remember” Twilight remembered the myths, which predated the Princesses and the Three Tribes, they spoke of human hunting ponies, of enslaving ponies and working them, sometimes to death, to build things and farm the lands, in some parts of Equestria they were bogeymen to keep little fillies in line “We need to make sure they aren’t a threat to Equestria, there’s no pony whose opinion I trust more than yours, I know this is sudden and it might be dangerous but for Equestria, will you take on this duty Twilight Sparkle?” “I will Princess, I will” Dom Pedro V’s office, present day The Emperor settled into the chair behind his desk while Celestia took a seat on a large fluffy cushion that had been set up beforehand, her hair shimmered in the light from the sun outside and her fur seemed to be unnaturally white, everything about the Sun Princess seemed alien to Pedro, in all his forty years on (what was for the moment still) this Earth it was probably the magic, the thing that was so utterly alien to humanity and as the most magical pony, Celestia appeared as utterly alien, everyone who’d met her going back to her appearances at the UN and visits to its member countries gave off a sense that something just wasn’t...right about her despite how nice she was, they should have seen that as a warning Celestia turned her gaze up to a photo hanging on the wall, it had been done when Pedro was a teenager, him and his parents and siblings all in their royal best and by their side was Twilight Sparkle who, having long since given up trying to stop the spread of the barrier had settled in the Empire and become a close friend of the family “She looks so happy” the Princess noted “She was, that was taken after I graduated high school top of my class, in no small part thanks to her help” the faintest glimmer of a smile played at the edge of the Princesses mouth “She must have been proud” “She was” even after everything that had happened to him since Dom Pedro smiled proudly, his marriage, coronation, the birth of his only child and that moment were the happiest times in a life he’d known would very likely be cut short, with recent estimates that the barrier would consume Brazil soon, one way or another, he was going to be the last Emperor and the last human leader, ever. His smile faded and his eyes lost their glimmer, Celestia thought she knew why “I miss her too, she didn’t deserve her end, I wish she were still with us” for once they could agree on something, being the Element of Magic had given her a longer lifespan than most ponies, almost twice as long in fact, but when the reaper called she’d still had to answer like every mortal “Unfortunately she’s not so let’s get down to business, the barriers going to consume the Empire soon isn’t it?” “Yes, within the week in fact” that knowledge had shocked him, he’d known the end was close but now that he knew how close, it still sent him reeling, humanity had a doomsday clock whose remaining time could be measured in days “And I’m guessing you’re here to offer us all the chance to go through the conversion bureau, right?” “Actually with what my mages have told me the final burst will envelop your Empire completely, they think it might convert everything in its path” “So we’ll all become ponies whether we like it or not?” “Maybe, I don’t know, some of you might, some might die or be erased from existence, we’re not sure” “I’m sure you’d love that” “Please, I beg you, tell your people, give them a final chance before it’s too late” Pedro sighed, she still didn’t get it, after everything Twilight had taught her Canterlot Castle, 1 AEA Twilight faced the Princess, finishing what she’d called her ‘Great Friendship Report’, it hadn’t been as good as she’d hoped “So, it’s that bad then?” “Yes, from what I’ve been able to study humans are every bit as bad as we feared”Twilight began re-showing images and evidence from her report to get her point across The first was an old print taken from an engraving, it showed humans that were very gaunt, almost skeletons dressed in rags, shambling along “Their most powerful nations starved those they ruled for greed and profit, in this case the British Empire starved Ireland, hundreds of thousands died and hundreds of thousands more had to leave to survive. Even today the population of the country isn’t up to what it should have been, many just didn’t care” she’d known from her history books that ponies had gone through hardships in the past but never willfully had they been starved, Celestia would have never allowed it The next was a church made of red brick in a tropical region, bones and bodies purifying and dried into mummies by the hot sun were scattered outside, one spread out in a perverse mockery of Christ on the cross, the red soil of Africa was stained a dark brown by gallons of blood that had been spilled there “They kill each other based on ethnic hatred, in this place, Rwanda, they murdered up to a million humans in four months, even women and children, they chopped them up like apples for crab-apple salad” having said that, Twilight knew she’d never be able to fully enjoy dinner with the Apple family again The next few were a series of grainy black and white photographs, one showed a massive pair of industrial chimneys similar to ones that had begun popping up in Fillydelphia, Stalliongrad and Detrot, both were belching smoke, others were of mounds of shoes, glasses and other personal items, the final one was of a gate with the words ‘Arbeit macht frei’ on it “They commit genocide on industrial scale. The Nazi party killed over six million people in an event the humans call the Holocaust, those piles all belonged to people they gassed at this camp the humans call Auschwitz, six million Princess” The final image was of a cloud, one shaped like the mushrooms Celestia enjoyed grilled and served with a nice side salad, it was jet black and though she couldn’t be sure how, she could feel immense power behind it “And possess weapons that could wipe Canterlot off the face of Equestria, if they saw us as a big enough threat...Princess I don’t know how to say this but they’re bad, bad to the bone, what are we going to do?” “There is a solution” her horn glowed and the walls, windows, floor and ceiling of the room began to be covered by a pale golden aura “Twilight what I’m about to tell you must never leave this room, you are my student and I trust you greatly but I need to know you won’t tell anyone what I’m about to tell you, promise me, my most faithful student” “I swear Princess” “As you know, the barrier is slowly expanding, turning more of Earth into Equestria” “It’s moving at a glacial place, half an inch a year, it will take millions of years to even reach their Bahamas” Twilight parroted the study that Celestia and the UN top officials had commissioned, since it was so slow no-one involved felt the need to go public with it out of fear of the backlash it could cause “That pace could be accelerated” Twilight couldn’t believe what she’d just heard, Celestia...lying? “Princess humans can’t survive in Equestria, they can’t take the magic levels here” “I’m aware of that, we’ve accepted and transformed a few humans into ponies, we can expand that program and any who are willing can be converted, Equestria will get bigger and it will have plenty of space to spare” “I...” Twilight trailed off, in her mind she saw the images and reports of the great evil lurking behind the happy welcoming veneer the humans had put on, she’d had plenty of examples of their capacity for evil and the few converts they’d already taken in had helped her find plenty more. Also, Celestia was treating her, well, more maturely now, since she’d gone to the human world with her brother and Cadence and visited all their countries she’d been representing Equestria, she’d grown up and now the Princess was treating her like the mature pony she’d become, like an equal What if she said no? What if Celestia was disappointed in her? What if she thought she wasn’t mature and didn’t want to take the necessary steps to safeguard Equestria? Was she willing to give that up? And what she already knew... “Twilight?” “I...I agree Princess, this is the right thing to do but what about those who don’t want to convert to being ponies? The ones who don’t want to embrace our society, we can’t, I can’t let anyone or anypony die because of that” “Don’t worry Twilight, they’ll be the same as the once were, only ponies, they’ll be able to re-establish their countries if they want to, I give you my word” “Alright, I’ll help however I can Princess” Celestia beamed at her “I’m glad Twilight, and proud” at those words Twilight beamed back Dom Pedro V’s office, present day Pedros sigh was noticed by the Princess “You doubt my sincerity” “Well you haven’t given us much cause to trust you now have you your highness?” what was going to happen next was something many of his predecessors, both Emperors and Presidents had been aching to put to Celestia, the truth. He’d long thought Celestia knew that they knew, what with Twilight having defected there was no way she wouldn’t have told them if the humans hadn’t guessed already, still, it had been the elephant in the room whenever the ponies were discussed. And now he’d finally be able to air the allegation his predecessors had so ached to “you know, since you tamper with our minds once we convert into ponies and become your pretty prancing ponified peons” He’d not been sure what he’d expected from Celestia once he’d told her they knew what she’d done, maybe she’d get angry and sink into denial, maybe she’d begin a big villain speech and show the demon they knew lurked beneath the veneer of a saint, maybe she’d just destroy the palace with her magic, he’d imagined it a hundred different ways and he knew his father, grandfather and the Presidents before him had done so too. What she did do was something he’d never expected her to. Her saintly veneer remained, she kept her composure, aside from a twitch that he thought might have been the makings of a snarl or grimace her happy sunny demeanor didn’t change, she could have been discussing the weather or what to have for lunch except this was her copping to genocide “So you know then? I always thought you did, partly why I never came here after Twilight left” her voice held no emotion hen talking about her ‘most faithful student’, it was in the regal tone all monarchs used when giving speeches. He wasn’t going to let Twilight, the mare he’d known as a grandmother, the one who cried every night for what she’d done and who tried and tried and tried to reverse it in vain, to remain as an unpleasant memory buried at the back of Celestias mind like her other mistakes “You have no idea, no idea whatsoever how much Twilight suffered for what you did” “She chose to help me, I never made her” “She was your ‘most faithful student’, she thought the sun revolved around you, hell it actually does, if you said jump you know damn well she’d only ask how high you wanted her to leap. You pressed a very talented, very optimistic and very kind young woman” “Mare” “Woman” he placed as much emphasis on that as possible “to be an accomplice to your crime, to commit genocide, don’t try and paint her as a ready and willing accomplice, she deserves better than that and we both know it” “I…” no, he wasn’t letting her off the hook for this even if she could vaporize him where he sat, Twilight deserved better than to be written off as a pawn to justify her teachers guilty conscience “What, you abused her trust, you used her up and tossed her away when she tried to defy you, how very human of you your highness” that got her goat (heh, goat) her eyes glowed and Pedro felt the temperature of the room rise despite the cooling fans and the open windows “How dare you…”
I like Pedro's little rant to the Princess. Worth the impending doom she's about to bring, I suspect.
Damn, Pedro has the epic comebacks, must admit, I expected them to be nice to each other at first for a while, but I do like how it turned out.
I have. Once more, does a hate fic of a humanity hate fic make a right? No. If this was about tastefully exploring if the human condition was tied to our physical forms or such, I wouldn't have a problem. But it's not.
TCB is awful in every way, it says how much they hate humanity and how we suck, so of course we humans have to respond in kind and say how their version of the ponies are just as bad, you know pointing out the hypocrisy.
No, you don't. All that is being done here is replacing one pile of shit with another. It's not witty, and it just looks like a childish whine. Yes, TCB as written is made of stupid. But there are ways to call it out without being stupid in return.
This one IS calling it out, this isn't a HUMANITY FUCK YEA! This is the last human leader giving a epic verbal smack down to TCB Celestia, how is that being stupid? He's pointing out the problems with the original fic.
Who doesn't write stupidfic about 'waaa, TCB ponies are racist and badly written'. And it's themed with my story.
The theme is true, this fic doesn't sound like whining and looks like Darth will point out the problems like a professional, and ironically you sound like the whiny one here.
It's whining. If he wanted to prove TCB wrong and point out how stupid it sounds, just ponify the earth and watch as everybody gives a shit for a few weeks before getting on with their slightly stranger lives.
And Richardson's now on Ignore. Still, Darth's probably going to handle this in a calm, mature manner...
But that doesn't point about the problems with the fic, this does, TCB is full of mass hypocrisy, if pointing it out is whining, then all debates are whine fests.
I just want to know why half of it reads like an after action report, and where the character development, struggle and conflict is.
Where does you see Darth whining? TCB fic have a lot of problem but the most glaring one is blatant misanthropy. Here, Darth tried to work out pony in a manner that is more cannon compliant. Complaining and protesting against something is whining only when you are stupid or/and childish about it. What I see here is a more intelligent take on TCB plot without making either side a caricature. Sure, Celestia is a antagonist but she has a real reason here thought not a good one. Ponifying Earth is not what TCB do, they are ponifying and mind raping Earth. So the alternative you propose isn't a TCB fic and is actually done by someone here with code geass, it's an paradigm shift which has little to do with TCB fics. This is not a hate fic of TCB and Darth don't want to prove TCB wrong, he want to make a good TCB fic. If you have a problem with the plot said so, complaining about the fic because you don't want to see a TCB is whining, complaining about the fic with argument about plot or how the fic don't show what the author want to show is constructive. And given that's Darth principal objective seem to write a good TCB without Humanity!Fuck YES, Evil!Human nor Evil!Pony, he seems to be on the right way. Thought I agree it read a bit too much like a after-action. I like the way Pedro talk to Celestia. He doesn't rant, he calmly say what he thinks.
I'm enjoying this fic and look forward to more. I agree that the reliance on flashback and recollections cuts opportunities for character development, but it also condenses a story that would otherwise take a very long time to tell. I believe that this is intended as a short rebuttal of the TCB scenario, not as an epic, so short is fine by me.
