The Birth of a Rebellion

Crimson woke up suddenly. That dream again… That face, that sound and that voice. They haunted him in his dreams, turning them into the worst nightmares…

“Perhaps if I erased those memories magically the dreams would disappear…” He said, thinking out loud, but he immediately discarded the idea. He wanted to remember what happened that day.

He got up from the bed, and stretching himself, looked outside the window. The moon rose up high in the sky, almost full. Its light got through the window, giving the room a bit of illumination.

His thoughts went back quickly to the attack that happened this night and to the logbook. Could they be related anyhow? It couldn’t be possible, as he didn’t told anypony about the books he smuggled, except Opal.

Crimson went to the living room and, with a glow of his horn, several candles levitated around him. He personally preferred the light of candles instead of the electric one. Concentrating, he ignited all the candles at the same time. That spell had always been useful, overall in the Canterlot library. You just couldn’t turn all the switches on when you wanted privacy in that library, and Crimson used to get inside the library without permission. Finally assuming that he wouldn’t get asleep again, he picked the logbook and started reading again. Just one page had almost fulfilled his expectative about what he was going to find inside, and he couldn’t wait to read some more.

The war began before the first battle, much before. In order to understand the reasons that lead to the conflict, we must go back to the origins of Equestria itself, before the rule of the Royal sisters.

After the creation of Equestria as a new nation for all ponykinds alike, discovered by the rulers of each pony nation, ponies from all around the three kingdoms migrated to this new land, attracted by the utopian histories told about it. Ponies ruled in harmony and peace and started to build new cities on the terrains that were claimed. The soil was fertile and the water clean. Nature seemed to be kind to ponies in this land, and, with the help of everypony, prosperity came.

There where several developments in the fields of magic, arts, sciences, politics, philosophy... An atmosphere of respect and unity was the perfect seed for the growth of Equestria. The land was laboured, and roads where built. Around the cave that served as a refugee to the first ponies to put their hooves on this land, a great city started to develop, eventually becoming the capital city of Equestria. Academies, concert halls, theaters… Everything was built to follow the cultural developement. A whole new architecture was developed, to suit this new land and its rich resources. Buildings of marble and stone, with gates of the finest woods, rose from the floor.

No longer focused on trying to protect ourselves from hunger and cold, ponies could concentrate on investigation and development of the pony society. A new parliament was created, having thirty parliamentary; ten unicorn, ten pegasi and ten earth ponies representatives, ruling fairly. Those ponies were chosen amongst the noble lineages of each kind, being the parliamentary seat inherited. Thought this was a great step to democracy, it wasn’t definitive. Some ponies still thought that the best way to rule ponies was through monarchy, and there were a plenty of those ponies inside the parliament itself. The only thing that withhold them from setting up a monarchy was the fact that nopony that belonged to a noble family had at that moment a lineage that included all the kinds of ponies, what made impossible the task of choosing a ruler. The parliament stayed as the sole government organ.

Thought I was interested personally on what happened in the parliament, my information was limited. I didn’t belong to a noble family, which limited my political aspirations considerably. Instead, I focused on other of the emerging knowledge sources, one in which I was pretty talented; Magic.

Joining other unicorns we formed the first official magic Academy, where unicorns from all of Equestria came to improve their talents. It was rewarding. At the academy the developments in magic grew exponetially, as new fields of investigation emerged from the curiosity of ponykind. Seeking the control of the elements of nature, the unicorns at the academy started perfecting elemental magic, one of the most basic kinds of magic, together with telekinetic magic. Though unicorns knew of this kind of magic, the level of perfection achieved in the first years the academy run was amazing. Meanwhile, politics grew more complex, as Equestria grew and prospered.

Raising his head from the book, Crimson looked through the window. The glow of dawn started to light the streets of Manehattan. He approached the window. Seeing the sunrise was a special moment for him, a peaceful moment in which he usually got to think with clearness. He suddenly remembered his pipe. Approaching the drawer of the studio’s desk, he levitated it and put inside the few tobacco left in the bag. Floating a match, Crimson turned on the tobacco, breathing out a dense cloud of smoke. He could have lighted it with magic, but this way he found it tasted better.

He approached the window again and waited patiently. Breathing slowly, the tobacco consumed inside the pipe. Suddenly, the moment he waited for came. Rising between the buildings of Manehattan, the sun came out. Its warm light illuminated the living room, cheering him up.

Crimson approached the sofa again. There laid the logbook. It seemed to have been written fast, with a rough calligraphy, but it accomplished its purpose. He wondered under which condition it was written… Thought it had given him more unknowns than answers, it was more than he expected. But something on the information that it contained shocked him. The way the author described the pony society, ruled by ponies and not by Celestia seemed… idyllic. It was like, even thought thirty different ponies governed and there were serious differences of opinion respect to the way government should be, there was peace and agreement. Also the way he described the developments achieved, thought brief, was forceful. But overall, Crimson was surprised by the way the author described some of the kinds of magic. He said that elemental magic was… basic. That wasn’t the opinion of most of the unicorns that studied magic. At least, while he stayed in Canterlot he had the opportunity of speaking about recent magic developments with several researchers of the Celestia’s School for gifted unicorns. They spoke him of the difficulty that supposed the domination of elementary magic, and here was defined as one of the most basic kinds of magic. He couldn’t imagine what the ponies that lived a thousand years ago could consider as complex.

The tobacco inside his pipe finally finished. Crimson dropped the ashes in the bin and started looking for some tobacco, until he realised that that was the last bag he had. That annoyed him quite a lot. He floated his pipe back to the drawer of his studio’s desk.

He laid on the sofa again, and with a glow of his horn, all the candles turned off simultaneously. The sunrise light was enough for reading right now, so he wouldn’t need them anymore.

Crimson floated the logbook again, so the sun ray that came through the window made the pages readable.

The growing size of Equestria meant that the workload that the Equestrian parliament had to stand increased. To reduce the amount of decisions the parliament had to manage, the first city councils arose. This was the first true step to democracy. Ponies of each city decided who their representatives on these councils were, increasing the influence of non-politician ponies on the future of Equestria. The decisions of greater importance were still managed by the Equestrian parliament, remaining as the most powerful organism of Equestria. But the direct influence that it had was reduced, something that some ponies of the noble families disliked.

The utopia kept growing in size, as the knowledge of ponykind did. The Academy grew in size and importance, as new powerful branches of magic were investigated.

Healing wounds that would kill ponies in minutes, cancelling the effects of poisons without the need of an antidote, welding broken bones in minutes… Everything was possible with the understanding of the healing magic. Developments in the control of fire magic allowed ponies to create new metals and to craft the most wonderful jewellery. Telekinetic and teleportation magic developed amazingly fast, allowing the creation of permanent teleportation portals between the different cities of Equestria’s territory.

All these discoveries brought great benefits to ponykind, but afraid the non-unicorn ponies. Some considered that the Equestria’s society began to rely too much on unicorns magic, and the growing power of our magic didn’t helped. This fear brought envy, and envy brought distrust. The parliament became more a forum rather than a government organ, discussing constantly about what eventually was called “the unicorn issue”. All investigations where interrupted, and the Academy of magic dismantled. It was shameful that the distrust that we managed to avoid came back, growing strong enough to stop the progress.

Protests started all along Equestria, as unicorns felt discriminated. The situation started to be uncontrollable, with disturbs in some of the main cities. And at that moment they appeared. The Royal sisters, Celestia and Luna, came back after defeating Discord, and what they found disturbed them. Equestria was a complete chaos. Trying to take fast control over the situation, both sisters went to the Equestria’s parliament and found one of the most humiliating scenes of pony history. The thirty representatives of ponykind were literally in middle of a clash. And in the middle of the fight, the rulers of each pony tribe fought. When they noticed the presence of the two strangers, they immediately stopped fighting. Even thought they were not alive when the princesses went to hunt Discord, the prophecy of their return was passed down through generations of ponies. Slowly, the struggle calmed down. Shocked by the presence of the princesses, all the parliamentaries went silent. But the harm was done, and Celestia took the control. She passed judgement on the situation and decided that ponies where not prepared to rule their selves, and she proclaimed Luna and herself as rulers of Equestria. This could have been easily avoided if some of the ponies at the parliament hadn’t desired a monarchy.

As the peace was restored, ponies regarded the come to the throne of the Royal sisters as a blessing and their reign consolidated. The sisters built a Palace in the Capital city, where their court was established, and ruled all Equestria from there. Nothing would be again the same. The parliament power faded out, but it remained as a consultory organ as an attempt to make the parliamentarians feel comfortable as Celestia and Luna ruled. Fearing future riots, the investigations on magic remained censored. The portals where closed, and all the progress ponykind achieved was forgotten. It was a dark moment for Equestria.

But there were several ponies that felt this wasn’t right, myself included. We started to avoid the censure, investigating magic and technology secretly, hiding from the authorities. When the censure started to cover other branches such as literature and philosophy, the hidden rebellion extended. Just in front of Celestia’s snout, a whole intellectual revolution started silently. And we were not alone. In total disagreement with the strict censure that Celestia had imposed, princess Luna supported our cause. She was captivated by the concept of democracy itself, and she started to encourage the ponies that sought any kind of forbidden knowledge to do it. The capitol city became a prosper source of culture and free thinking. Thought no documents or books were officially published concerning these investigations, the knowledge just spread as fast as lightning. Copies of forbidden books were printed and flowed through the hooves of all the ponies ready to assume the risk of reading them. It was wonderful, but couldn’t last forever. Eventually, Celestia realised what happened and found the intellectual rebellion as a threat to her authority, and decided to react with severity. She sought the source of any forbidden knowledge, reaching the core of the rebellion. She banned us from Equestria forever.

Crimson raised his head from the book, overwhelmed by what he read. He found impressive how easily Celestia and Luna got control of the situation, cancelling the power of the parliament. They managed to obtain the approval from the parliament itself to do it. It was just impressive. The intelligent movement required to achieve this would have required a deep analysis of each parliament’s opinion, and they did it just looking a hall for a few moments. That had, for sure, involved some kind of magic. Anyway, this left many questions without answers. What happened to the exiles? How did princess Luna reacted to the ban of almost half of the intellectuals of Equestria, rebels that she supported? This still didn’t explain the rise of Nightmare Moon…

Suddenly somepony knocked on the door.

“Crimson, open the door! It’s me, Opal! You’ve got to see this!” She said excited. He opened the door and she came in running him over. This was becoming a habit…

“Have you read the papers?! All of them speak about the “first” official expedition to the “Royal sisters palace”.” She said, as she showed me the Equestria daily. There, at the front page, was a photo of princess Celestia speaking to Copper Compass.

“What?!” Crimson exclaimed with a sceptical expression at his face. He couldn’t believe it. They were organising a new expedition! He wondered why Copper Compass would like to go there after what I told him. The attack of the manticores should have dissuaded him … In the fifth page there was an interview to Copper. Crimson spent a few minutes reading it, trying to discover anything useful about the route and the planning they would follow.

“I will not let him to destroy the proofs of my theory, and less to discover the library.” Crimson said to himself After scanning the text again, he found what he sought.

“I must do some packing right now, Opal” He said while he trotted to his bedroom. He opened the closet and picked some clothes and a big backpack. That backpack was the one that he used almost on every expedition he had made. It was a bit old, but it still served its purpose.

Crimson started packing everything he had that could be useful to follow Copper’s expedition across the Everfree forest. Suddenly he saw the knife. It was at the floor of the closet. Crimson remembered throwing it there last night, just after the attack… After looking it for a few seconds, he decided to take it also, hiding it inside one of the lateral pockets the backpack had. Opal came inside, with a worried expression.

“Where are you going, Crimson?” She asked, though she knew the answer.

“I can’t let them do it Opal, and you know it.” He told her, trying to sound as resolute as possible, though the idea of going back terrified him. “I’m pretty sure the Academy has organised this to cover up the fact that the history they tell isn’t true, and I can’t let them do that.”

“Are you mad?! Have you even read the main article?” It was true he hadn’t read it, as he focused on the interview to Copper. “They are going to have a complete unit of the royal guard protecting them during all the expedition. You expect to beat twenty of the best trained ponies in Equestria by yourself?”

“I have a plan” Crimson lied, as he kept packing things. He started to trot to the kitchen, in search of the few food cans he found there. Opal followed him across the house, as he picked all that could be considered as useful. As he had to safe as much space as possible, Crimson decided that he would only carry the logbook. The other books he smuggled would have to stay here… Though he couldn’t stop thinking that the burglar would have free access to anything he wanted when he left, Crimson knew that this was more important.

“Don’t lie to me, Crimson. It’s not nice” Opal said, bothered.

“And what if I do? This doesn’t concern you anyway!” He shouted.

“Hey, I’m just trying to bring you back to your senses; there is no need to be mean…”

“Opal, I’m perfectly sane. I don’t need any pony whose only objective in this life is to sell jewellery to posh ponies tells me what to do with mine!” Crimson immediately regretted saying that.

“Crimson…”

She left through the door. And he didn’t stop her.

“I am such a big mouth…”

He kept packing some things, thinking how ho could fix this, if that was even possible… Crimson could be rough sometimes, but he usually knew how to control himself, but this time he had been just offensive on purpose. Opal took care of him, and he paid her shouting at her. He hadn’t been fair.

“Crimson?” somepony asked from the open door. It was Frost Cloud “What happened here? Opal seemed really upset.”

“How can you know?” He asked.

“Well, I ran into her as I came here, and she was crying a lot.” She said with emphasis. That made him feel worse.

“I’m a big mouth Frost, just that.” He had to change of topic before it drove him mad. “Anyway, why were you dropping by?” He asked

“I read the newspapers, and I wanted to come here before you left without even saying goodbye. Again.” She said with sarcasm.

“So you thought I would leave and go with the expedition… What did Opal exactly told you about my issue with the Academy? ” Crimson asked. Probably he would have to tell her the whole story…

“Just that you had some kind of problem with the Academy and that you were here because of that” She answered.

Crimson thought for a moment. Should he tell her what happened?Would she understand? Finally, he decided that she deserved to know.

“Get in and get comfortable while I prepare some coffee. This story is long, and I don’t have much time…”

“So that’s why I’m leaving. I can’t allow the princess to hide the truth. Not after the death of all those ponies. Not after what I had to do” Crimson concluded. He had told her everything. Everything about the trip, the excessive secrecy, what he found there, including the library, the manticores attack… Everything. He even told her about the pony he had to kill, and she was horrified. Though she understood what lead Crimson to do it, she just couldn’t accept it. Anyway, she was sceptic about the idea of following the expedition.

“I must know something Crimson. Are you completely sure about what you saw there? It’s pretty obvious that the manticore attack had a profound impact on you, and that could have, combined with the herbs…”

“Wait a moment… You don’t trust me either?”

“It’s not that Crimson, I just don’t think that you should ruin your whole career for something that could have been a mirage provoked by zebra herbs and the shock of the manticore attack.”

“I think that I can take that decision by myself, Frost. I haven’t given up my whole career for a mirage, I’m not stupid. I know what I found and I know what I must do.”

“Anyway Crimson, just try to be reasonable. Tell me what you expect to do when you arrive there? You will go to the middle of the camp and just fight all the members of the expedition? Or have you got a miraculous plan to avoid them from just getting whatever they want from the ruins?”

She was right; He had no opportunity of preventing them from doing what they wanted with the sculptures, the paintings and many other texts and proofs of the long reign of Nightmare Moon on the castle, it was a full expedition with an armed guard of twenty ponies. But he could stop them from finding the library.

“I’m going anyway. Trust me when I say that it shall not be useless. One way or another I will proof that I’m right. Even though I cannot stop them from destroying proofs or manipulating them, I can safe some...”

“Crimson, don’t be stubborn! I can understand why you are angry, but you must realise that we can do nothing. They are too many, and we are only two…”

“Wait a moment… Did you just say “we”?” Crimson said, realising what she wanted to do “No way. You are not coming with me Frost Cloud. I’m not risking anyone I care for in this. This is something personal.”

“But Everfree is too dangerous to go alone…” She replied. He wasn’t going to let her finish. He had to leave, but he couldn’t allow her to come and he didn’t have any time to loose in an argument that wouldn’t end. His horn started to glow, as he casted a soporific spell. With a slight touch of his horn, Frost fell to the floor, asleep.

Crimson floated her to his bedroom and laid her on the bed. Picking his backpack from the bed, he headed to the door.

“You can’t imagine how sorry I am, Frost” Crimson said as he left the room. A painful expression formed in his face as he realised he could have lost two friends today…