"No, we CAN'T banish the disabled!"
Princess Celestia was squeezed into one of the annoyingly small thrones in Twilight's map room, paperwork strewn all over the table and spreading onto the floor, where it lay in assorted clutters. On the opposite side of the circular table was a very disheveled looking Twilight Sparkle, and an irritated Starlight Glimmer. None of them said a word; Celestia chewed on a floating pencil.
The three had shut themselves in for most of the afternoon now, and it was steadily approaching evening. Unfortunately, no matter which idea was broached, which topic was brought up, or which argument was made, they had made little progress in their endeavour. In fact, they had achieved nothing.
Seconds bled into minutes before Starlight suddenly gasped --her eyes sparking-- then chewed on her lip for a second, seemingly about to say something, before proceeding to deflate airily. The two princesses gave her a noncommittal glance before returning to their separate musings.
Occasionally, Twilight would levitate papers around her, scrawling on them, crossing things out, scowling before screwing them up and throwing them away, just to fetch them from the bin later for a second glance.
Eventually, Celestia opened her muzzle. Her expression was quizzical, as if she had had an errant thought that she wasn't quite sure how to place. "Twilight," she started, "Could you run me through the existing formulas again?"
Twilight glanced up from her work, her mane awry and her eyelids drooping. Stifling a strong yawn, she relaxed her mental grip on the various sheets, giving Celestia her full attention. "There's no point," she said, "We've tried everything we could think of so far. We've looked at tax alterations, entitlement reform, austerity measures... Heck, we've even considered adding decimals to the bit! Unfortunately, it's all either been done before or at least tested before, and I'm starting to think that no alteration of the current variables is going to save us from the upcoming recession."
Starlight looked between them, eyebrows straight, face serious. "We need to implement something new, something innovative that will generate more income on all levels and won't raise the cost of living at an even faster rate."
Twilight turned to face her, blinking rapidly to refocus her tired eyes. "I know that, Starlight, but what? Honestly, I'm starting to think that we're all missing something really obvious here, and it's annoying the crap out of me."
"Tell me about it," Starlight nodded, her eyes travelling to the ceiling.
Throughout the short exchange, Celestia considered the input she had heard, and it began to give rise to the facilitation of her latent thoughts, which she blurted out without warning. "What if we were to repossess the homes of the deceased?"
Starlight's mouth hung open; Twilight did a double take. "Wh-What?! Celestia! That's so immoral! How could you even think about doing something like that?"
Starlight looked between the pair uneasily as Celestia dismissively waved a hoof in defense.
"I never said anything about doing it! All I'm saying is that we should consider all the possibilities, alright? We are here to find facts after all, are we not? Besides, we are all good and moral ponies," she briefly glanced at Starlight, "Well, we all try to be, at least. What harm is there in entertaining a notion that's never going to come to fruition anyway?"
"Well, what's the benefit to it?" Twilight asked.
"Considering things from another point of view! Challenging our existing conceptions and using the newfound knowledge to be creative! So, I ask you again, Twilight, what would happen if we were to repossess the homes of the deceased, for sale or re-purposing?"
Twilight frowned. "I'm not working that out, Celestia, it's silly! We would never do something like that, and it probably wouldn't work anyway, so I'm not going to look!"
Celestia raised an eyebrow. "Probably wouldn't? So you think there's a chance that it could?"
Twilight glanced at her sheet briefly, "Well, statistically speaking, I would never outright dismiss a theory before testing it... But I'm pretty sure about this one!"
"Just run the test, Twilight, and I'll stop asking."
Starlight looked to Twilight, sceptical. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt to check... It's not like we're going to really do it, is it?"
Twilight groaned, gritting her teeth. "Fine. I'll do the maths, but I'm not happy about it!"
Again, silence reigned, save for Twilight's petulant scribbling. A few minutes later, she raised her head to Celestia, a triumphant grin on her muzzle.
"Hah! I knew it wouldn't work! Repossessing those homes would cause a bigger rise in homelessness than the sales of those properties could account for, so it's an ineffective method!"
"Hmm..." Celestia stroked her chin with her pencil, "What if we were to unload the homeless elsewhere?"
Starlight's eyes widened, her face pale. "What do you mean unload? Do you mean, like, dispose of them?"
"Oh, heavens, of course not! I was simply considering the possibility of relocation."
Twilight squinted at Celestia, confusion resurfacing. "Why? What's the point in solving the issue if it's never going to be applied to anything?"
"Creating a working model for economic reform, however obscure and hypothetical it may be, is more than we've managed to do all day. Perhaps solving issues such as these will assist us in thinking of real world solutions later."
Twilight considered that for a moment. "Huh. That seems fair, I guess." Twilight turned back to her new sheets, "Okay, so finding them new homes similar to that which they had is out of the question, but if we were to build social housing --say apartment complexes, for example-- then we might be able to rehouse all that would have inherited their relative's homes for a low price, and still make a hefty amount of bits selling some of the nicer houses."
Celestia raised a hoof. "But couldn't we free up even more capital if we weren't responsible for erecting new homes?"
"Evidently, but who would be responsible for covering the cost?"
"No one," Celestia smiled.
"No one?" Starlight echoed.
"Precisely. With my power, I can simply send them to the moon, where living is free."
Twilight became almost as white as Celestia. "What the fuck, princess?!"
Starlight's eyes narrowed at her benevolent and caring ruler, her voice raising a little. "Yeah, seriously, Celestia, that's pretty screwed up."
"Hypothetical!" Celestia defended, her voice jovially musical as she waved away their concerns. "Think about it though, if homeless ponies could be sent to the moon, they could live there in stasis until homes were built for them! Plus, there's sooo much space on the moon, it really wouldn't be an issue! Gee, I bet if I started teaching the moon banishing spell to other unicorns, we could quickly and efficiently round up all the homeless and--"
"And what? Send them to the moon?!" Twilight interrupted.
"Theoretically, yes." Celestia raised an eyebrow. "What's wrong with the moon, anyway?"
"Ponies don't want to be banished to the moon!" Starlight yelled, her patience quickly evaporating.
Celestia fixed her gaze on Starlight, its intensity unwavering. "What, so it's good enough for my sister, but not for the homeless?"
"You're the one making them homeless!" Starlight cried, indignant.
Celestia looked between them, a sheepish grin on her muzzle. “So… The moon is off the table?”
“The moon was never on the table!” Twilight shouted.
Celestia began to tap her pencil against the table. It produced a woody and repetitive beat. “Hmm…” She continued tapping. “No moon… Aha! What if instead of the moon, we banished them to--”
“No banishing!” Starlight and Twilight barked in unison.
Celestia scowled. “Wow, you’ve really got me working with both hooves tied behind my back here.”
“Not being allowed to banish innocent ponies does not count as having your hooves tied, princess.”
“Alright, alright. What if we were to erect labour camps and send the--”
“Celestia,” Starlight bared her teeth, “can we please talk about changes we could implement that don’t involve the homeless?”
“Fine,” Celestia sighed, “Spoilsport. What about the Mirror Pool? If we need more labour, look no further!”
Twilight’s eyes bugged. “You do realise that the mirror pool produces fully autonomous clones that eat, think, and act just like any other pony, right? They’re not robots.”
Celestia smiled sweetly. “Yes, but surely if we never tell them any of that--”
Twilight’s ears drooped; she cast her eyes away from Celestia. “This is deplorable.”
“And the situation we’re in now isn’t much better, I assure you. Besides, I don’t see you coming up with any better alternatives.”
Twilight gave her notes a cursory glance. “Well… In theory, we could introduce a levy on toiletries, but I doubt it would go down too well with the public. We could call it a ‘luxury charge’.”
Celestia nodded. “Yes, it could work, but think bigger, bolder. What if we were to put a charge on heat?”
Twilight cocked her head. “Heat?”
Celestia nodded emphatically. “Think about it! We control the source of the entire world’s heat, and we decide how hot it is! If I so wished, I could move the sun just far enough from Equestria that it would be ten degrees colder than usual all year round, or I could raise the temperature accordingly!” Celestia rubbed her hooves together in self-satisfaction, “Think, if we were to utilise this power, we could have every nation on this earth eating out of our hooves!”
Starlight bit her lip. “That sounds like a grievous misuse of power, Celestia, are you sure you want to go through with that?”
“Well, what would you have us do? You’re quick to criticise every suggestion I make, but your only input thus far seems to be dismissal and contempt.”
“Well, in my opinion, what we need to do is work to redistribute the wealth so that every pony is entitled to the same amount, and then we’ll--”
Celestia covered her muzzle with a hoof to hide her chortling “Please, Starlight, serious suggestions only.”
“Wh-What’s not serious about that?!” Starlight flustered.
“Oh, I don’t know… What isn’t serious about doctors and cleaners getting the same wage and whatever other flowery crap I’m sure was next? What a valid point.” Celestia rolled her eyes. “Honestly, Starlight, at this point you’re here to remind us what not to do, little else.”
“Oh, because your ideas have been so much more serious than mine?!”
“Serious? No. Practical? Well there’s the difference.”
“Your idea of practicality is kidnapping and sedating ponies you’ve forced from their homes!”
“And who does that sound like?”
“Girls, please!” Twilight shouted, magically amplifying her voice. The force of her shout sent Celestia’s tapping pencil flying straight off the desk. Huffing in an attempt to catch her breath, Twilight wheezed out a few words. “Can we all stop being so needlessly abrasive and get back on topic?!”
Celestia bowed her head, clearing her throat. “Why, yes, Twilight, you’re quite right, I do believe I got a little carried away with my emotions there, I apologise for my outburst.”
Twilight nodded. “Thank you.” she turned to her side. “Starlight?” she said expectantly.
“I’m not apologising to her!”
“Good, I don’t expect you to,” Twilight smiled. “Now, let’s start from the beginning, and try not to get too distracted this time?”
“Yes, and would you two please stop looking at everything through the confining prison of morality and justice for a second?” Celestia asked. “I just want to focus on what can be done, not what we actually will do.”
The pair reluctantly nodded.
“Wonderful. Now, about euthanasia for the terminally ill…”
Twilight pushed back a long groan.
“Alright, Twilight, give me a list of what we’ve crossed out.”
Twilight pulled up a frayed sheet. “Okay… In the last three hours we’ve decided that localised brothels, child labour, forced military conscription, the deconstruction of workers rights unions, abolishing retirement age, legalising hard drugs and invading the crystal empire will NOT help the economy any more than harm it.”
“And what have we learnt from this?” Celestia asked.
“That you’re evil?” Starlight answered.
“Call me what you like, I still think banishing the disabled is a good idea.”
“When did we touch on that?!” Twilight spat.
“We didn’t. I’m bringing it up now.”
“Alright fine, I’ll check, but after this, no more. I honestly feel offended after the horrible things you’ve made us sit through today,” Twilight grumbled, drawing a nod from Starlight. She copied the method onto a separate piece of paper, drew a graph and proceeded to feed the projected data into an equation, slowly drawing up the projected results.
“...No, it couldn’t work,” Twilight glared at Celestia, “Happy now?”
“What if we were to abolish retirement ages and banish the disabled?”
“Enough!” Starlight shouted. “Twilight says it wouldn’t work, so we’re not doing it, okay?!”
Celestia’s face was hard as stone. “Wow. Trust you, Starlight.”
“Wh-what?!” Starlight seethed.
For the first time that day, Celestia was the one to raise her voice. “You mean the only reason we’re not doing it is that Twilight’s equation said it wouldn’t work? What’s wrong with you? Here I am, trying to build a hypothetical projection to help this country, and it turns out that if it had been feasible, you’d have already started building Auschwhinny!”
Starlight mumbled and stuttered, trying to come up with a defense, but Celestia swiftly cut her off.
“Just because Twilight might tell us that banishing all the disabled will help the economy doesn’t mean we’re going to do it! Honestly, it’s nice to know that it was only stolid pragmatism keeping you from completely bastardising this country… Do you not care for your fellow pony? The reason we can happily go and look at these concepts is because we know deep down that no matter what the result might be, we’re not going to do it. It may teach us something about our own situation, but to actually put those plans into effect would be morally wrong!”
Celestia paused for breath, and when she spoke again, she looked more disappointed than angry. “Heavens above, how am I supposed to know you won’t try to enact the next sick plan that crosses your mind as soon as you decide in your endless wisdom that it’s more practical and efficient? You’ve seriously worried me, Starlight.”
Starlight was utterly bewildered. “This is utterly ridiculous.” When no one budged, she sighed heavily. “Alright… Fine. I’m sorry, Celestia, I didn’t mean to come across as cold, nor throw doubt on your endless care and appreciation for all living things.”
“Thank you,” Celestia smiled. “Now, shall we wrap this up?”
“Please,” Twilight sighed.
“I think I know what we need to do,” Celestia continued, “Keep income tax steady, experiment with reasonable benefit caps, shave a little off of pensions, and dismantle the weather factory.”
Twilight cast her eyes up, thinking for a moment. “...Deal. Just let me go to bed.”
They both turned to Starlight, who paid them no mind. After a moment, Celestia spoke. “What, nothing? No grand notions about equality? No questions about where the pegasi will find work? No points regarding the Cloudsdale bureaucracy and how they might take this?”
Starlight laughed merrily. “What? I’m not a pegasus, so why should I care?”
“Good point!” Twilight jived, her laughter adding to the chorus.
“I knew you would see reason eventually,” Celestia smiled.
When the laughter had died down, she narrowed her eyes at the pair.
“Now… Get to work.”
