Prologue_I am Sunset. (A.K.A. In brief, Equestria explained.)
Prologue_I am Sunset. (A.K.A. In brief, Equestria explained.)
My name is Sunset Shimmer, and well, I don't know where to begin.
I guess we should start at the beginning, before I saved Canterlot High, before the Anon-A-Miss scandal, before I made friends, and before I tried to destroy said school.
Hell, we should start right at the beginning, before I even came to Canterlot, and Earth.
You see, to all intents and purposes, I am what you humans call an alien to your world.
I came from a place called Equestria, where the land is pretty much the same as Earth, just with two major differences, not to mention Dragons and Griffons.
The first difference is that there are not and have never been humans in Equestria.
The second difference, is that the main sentient race is, ponies or by the Latin name Equus Ferus Caballus.
Let me stop you right there, and correct a popular mistaken belief. No, the ponies in Equestria are not the same as ponies and horses in Earth, if my being doesn't quite convince you otherwise. Equestrian ponies are infinitely more intelligent and civilized than your average beast-of-burden.
In a way, ponies are remarkably similar to the human race, a fact that did not escape me, upon entering this strange new world.
Back where I came...come from, I was... am one of the race of Equestrian ponies.
Well, in general. More specifically, I am a Unicorn.
Let me correct another popular mistaken belief. Yes, there are different species, but despite this, we are all included in the pony category.
Come to think of it, the pony class is a fairly general class that includes many types of species. Lunar pegasi, Sirens, Alicorns to name a few.
There are three main species of pony, from which all other species and breeds originate from. These are, Unicorns, Pegasi and Earth ponies.
Yep, you guessed it, Unicorns have a horn atop their head. They... we use them to harness our inner magic.
What is magic you ask? Well, that's a good question that I'm afraid I can't provide a short and simple explanation for. I'm sure Twilight would jump at the chance to do so, I mean, she practically lives books!
To the best of my knowledge, Equestrian magic influences and is influenced by the natural environment, not like that scar-headed boy wizard movie franchise. Grr, the gaps in that plotline...
Anyway, our magic is not one specific thing. It is influenced by a variety of things in and about a Unicorn, for example; gender, age, personality, skill, even a ponies health. What magic you see depends on the Unicorn you see.
The Pegasi race are winged ponies like that one in the ancient Greek story with that half mortal god, Hercules or whatever his name was. They, alone of the three, posses the ability to fly, and boy, can they ever! Pegasi are born performers, and with the only exception I have ever recorded, my shy friend Fluttershy, they love to perform any where, anytime and for anybody. All Pegasi posses a natural confidence, but I would go so far as to say that confidence borders on cocky arrogance, though I could just be basing my theory on one certain pegasus, whom I know quite well. In Rainbow Dash's case though, she can back up her boasting because she is, to use her phrase; 'Totally awesome!'
The majority of Pegasi live in Cloudsdale, a huge air-borne metropolis responsible for maintaining the weather in Equestria, bringing us to a third (fourth, if you remember magic) difference in my world from Earth.
All of Equestria's weather, be it sun, rain, snow, even lightning, is controlled by the Pegasi. But like Earth, Equestrian weather follows the same four season year. Summer, Autumn, Winter, and my favorite, Spring.
Which leaves me to explain the Earth ponies. Unlike Unicorns and Pegasi, Earth ponies posses neither horn, nor wings but instead, posses a tremendous strength and a talent for growing food crops.
Take Applejack, for instance. She and her big brother run one of the biggest farms in Equestria called Sweet Apple Acres, where they produce an abundance of sweet and juicy apples from their apple orchard.
To top it off, you may as well know about the Alicorn race.
Alicorns are ponies who posses both the horn and wings of the Unicorn and Pegasi, but also the strength of the Earth ponies. Alicorns are not descended from any species, but are instead the ruling species. There are only three Alicorns in being, and they are all princesses, ruling Equestria together, in peace and harmony.
Princess Celestia is the supreme Princess and ruler of the sun. She raises Sun in the mornings, and lowers it at night, in preparation for her sister, Princess Luna's moon to bathe the land in it's glow.
Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, or as she prefers, Princess Cadence rules the Crystal Empire, one of many empires in Equestria. She rules there with her husband, Shining Armour, once head of Celestia's royal guard, and brother to-
Sweet Celestia! I almost forgot. There are now 4 Alicorns of Equestria. My closest friend, Princess Twilight Sparkle, A.K.A the Princess of Friendship lives in a castle overlooking the small, rural village of Ponyville that she grew to love. Together with her friends, they oversee the world of equestria and travel the lands restoring love and friendship to broken places.
Sure, your all thinking that it sounds like a strange world, but that's only because all of you have grown up on Earth. I, who was born and raise in Equestria still find things in the human world bizzare and strange.
Hands, that end in fingers, walking upright on only two feet, phones that are smart, phones in general, cars, computers, lockers, urinals, underwear! Half of it makes no sense to me, even after three years on this.
And that's only in general, even my body puzzles me at times. Of course, because of the spells that Starswirl the Bearded put upon the portal, My body had changed from a pony's to a human, including digestion, movement... and a few...other things, if you get my drift...
However, the strangest thing about planet Earth is not any of these things. It seems to be an almost mirror-world of my own, where ponies from Equestria appear as earth dimensions of themselves, including the Princess's Celestia and Luna, who in the human world, are Principal and Vice-Principal of Canterlot High.
Stranger yet, all of my friends from ponyville also exist as my friends on Earth. Thanks to mine and Twilights forays between the worlds, each party knows of and is interested in the other.
But I've been wasting your time, blabbering about my world. You probably don't care at all, am I right?
The whole reason I am writing, is to inform you and all other students who come after my time of mine and my friends deeds. Let me start again.
When I was a young filly (pre teen girl), I had attended Celestia's magical school for gifted Unicorns and I had impressed her so much, she had taken me under my wing, and became my loving and patient mentor, and I, her faithful and loyal student, and later, her prized pupil.
After each lesson with her, I would spend hours and hours of my life, shut away from all other ponies, practising my magic, honing my skills and studying relentlessly, determined to make my mentor proud of me and prove that I was ready to become the Alicorn Princess she said I would be.
I was the top of the class, every class, often being nominated and receiving marks, scholarships and prizes most ponies, even adult ponies could only dream of. Everyone would look at me and say that I was going to go on and do amazing things for Equestria and Celestia was often proud of me, heaping praise upon me and telling me all the time I was one step closer to achieving my destiny.
It was a fatal mistake on her behalf. A rare one, but a mistake nonetheless and one that was to prove my ultimate downfall. As I matured, I became, aggressive, cocky and precocious, knowing that I was the best, and I allowed my grades to slip, as I constantly studied and honed my skills, hungering for more knowledge, more power, and more responsibilities.
However, a young Princess Cadence, only just herself an Alicorn and Celestia's adviser, saw the darkness and corruption within me and convinced Celestia to hold off on making me an Alicorn and granting me access to untold power.
I grew mad and began to hate them for holding me back, for I had read and learned almost everything possible to learn from books, and I thirsted to extend my power and knowledge.
Eventually, I forsook Celestia, and Equestria, by using my magic to unleash an Ursa Major upon Canterlot.
While Celestia and Cadence eventually defetead it, much of the city was damaged, and many ponies had been injured.
Against her wishes, Celestia had had no other choice but to banish me to another world. As I was pushed in by her guards, I told her I hated her and swore revenge upon her and Equestria. The last thing I saw, before the magic of Starswirls portal sucked me in, was of Cadence supporting a bowed Celestia, and, was it tears of sadness running down the Sun Princess's face?
At first, I was nervous and scared, overwhelmed by the total alien world I had been banished to. In my first few months at the school, I was treated like an outcast an bullied mercilessly. This, plus my anger and bitter resentment of Equestria helped change me into a harder and crueller being than I used to be.
It was how I survived at Canterlot High, by becoming the tyrant of the school and keeping everyone else away from me. I made the bigger people think twice about messing with me, and the smaller people scared of my presence, just as things should have been.
Looking at it from the perspective I have now, I'm in two minds about how I felt when I was the ruler of the school . While I can say that it does sicken me now, the sadistic joy and excitement I felt when terrorizing people weaker than me, I won't deny that it did feel really good.
I guess...no, I know that it was the best thing for me that Twilight and the others saved me from total corruption, because when their so-called 'Magic of Friendship' burned the dark magic from my body, it definitely left it's mark on me, and helped change me for the better.
It's just...sometimes if only for a second or two, I still miss the power that came from ruling the school as I did. It was a simpler, more instantaneous form of self-gratification. At least I knew where I stood.
I mean, now I'm one of the heroes of the school, guardians of peace, and harmony at Canterlot. People come to me and my friends with all sorts of friendship problems, and Twilight still gives me advice, but my human friends still look to me for guidance. The whole school, students and teachers alike turn to me, in times of emergency, expecting me to have a ready-made solution.
It's not that I don't like the sudden trust and friendlier nature of students towards me, there are just... times when I wish I could go back, not even to bully, but to just be; Sunset Shimmer, the girl everyone hates, with no expectations, and no trust.
Every time a problem occurs, everyone comes to me with different opinions, demanding me to take their side.
Half the time it was something minor and completely irrelevant, like yesterday, when two girls came crying and arguing to me about how one of them thinks one thing, but the other thinks something else, and they get so caught up in their own little world that they fail to realize how petty and small their foolish worries are, in the grand scale of the world!
The other half is even worse, because people usually come to me with a legitimate friendship problem, and all people involved have a good reason to think what they think and they ask me for advice and to resolve the problem, and no matter how hard I try to make everbody involved happy, at least one person, or group becomes upset, telling me that I'm not good enough at making the right decision, and to let someone else with more experience solve the matter.
Honestly, it's more work than bullying full-time!
Since saving the school and becoming an apparent hero, I've learnt that letting people down, who've put their trust and faith in you, seems worse than stealing their lunch money, no matter how much they say it's ok.
I never thought I'd say it, but disappointing others actually hurts far more than being universally hated.
I'm not the goody two-shoes people think I am. I'm not a hero, or a saint. I'm not even particularly nice half the time.
Yeah, I saved the school, but I damn near came close to destroying it, only a couple of years prior.
I saved the world purely because I felt sorry for this world's Twilight Sparkle. I understood that feeling of being all-powerful, the agony or raw, tainted Equestrian magic running through her veins, and I wanted to offer her a helping hand, like Equestria's Twilight did for me after I was defeated.
