A Tribute To John Lennon (10/9/1940 - 12/8/1980)

by Six String

Rating: everyone
Tags: Tragedy, Princess Celestia, Sad, Princess Luna, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 2025

Celestia finds Luna in tears listening to strange music, and offers confort to her sister, and Luna explains why she is sad.

This is dedicated to the memory of John Lennon, without whose influence, and inspiration, I would have never become a musician. In fact, the first song that I learned was "Imagine" off of John's 1971 album of the same name. Copyright laws prohibit me from including all of the lyrics to the song, but you can easily look them up elsewhere online.

It used to be an interlude to the second MLP story that I had written called "Justice Done", but since it no longer fit with the direction in which the story was heading, I decided to post it as a separate side story to my Six String Trilogy.

Published 2018-11-06 17:30:01 UTC
Last updated 2018-11-06 17:30:01 UTC

Luna Mourns

The moon hung lower than usual in the Equestrain Night sky. Lower than it should when the night wasn't even half over. This greatly concerned Celestia, the Princess of the sun greatly, so she went to her sister Luna's chambers to find out what was going on, since her sister was in charge of raising the moons, and stars, in addition to also being the guardian of dreams.

"Luna?" Celestia asked, knocking at the door.

The sun Princess received no response other than sobbing, and what sounded like strange music coming from the other side of the door. Upon opening it, she saw the source of the music was an antique magic record player that Luna had been given by Starswirl The Bearded centuries ago. Sitting by the large window, crying was Luna, her mane no longer flowing freely of its own accord, and her hear was bowed sorrowfully. Luna's shoulders heaved as she continued to weep.

"Luna, I'm here. Please tell me what's wrong," Celestia pleaded going to Luna, and wing hugging the Princess of the night.

"H-He's dead.." said Luna.

"Of whom are you speaking?"

"John.." came the teary reply.

"Who is that?"

"John Lennon," Luna said looking up at Celestia, tears streaming down the night Princess' cheeks.

"I don't know who that is."

"Do you remember the mirror that Twilight Sparkle went through to get her tiara back from Sunset Shimmer?

"Yes, I do. The mirror was brought here to Canterlot Castle about three months ago," Celestia said. "What does that have to do with this John Lennon pony?"

"Shortly after it had been brought here, I went through it just to see how many realities there are other than this one, and the alternate Equestria, but before I had gone through, I used my magic to aid me in my search."

"I found what I was looking for, but it wasn't quite what I had expected. Of course I appeared in an alleyway betweixt two rather tall buildings, in a place called 'Manhattan', which I guess is much like Manehattan here in Equestria, and quietly observed the bipedal creatures that would occasionally pass by.

"I remember Twilight speaking of them when after she had returned from visiting the alternate Equestria," said Celestia. "She called them humans."

After a few minutes, I cast an illusion spell to make myself look like one of them. They would have panicked to see an almost seven foot blue Alicorn in full Royal regalia walking among them. I heard music with a man singing, and when I went to find the source, I saw a radio sitting on the counter of the little cafe." Luna said. The music ended, and a woman's voice came out of the radio saying that the song was called 'Number 9 Dream' off of John Lennon's record album 'Shaved Fish'' played for John's 40th birthday, so I went to find out what I could about this John Lennon. The Library seemed like a good place to begin my search for information about him, so I went there."

"Did you find the information that you were looking for," asked Celestia.

"Yes." Luna stated.

"He was a famous musician who was originally from a place called Liverpool, England where he was in a band called 'The Beatles', but eventually the band broke up, and he moved to Manhattan. He was also an activist for world peace."

"Luckily, I had gold with me, so after I had done my research, I went back to the cafe, and purchased a cup of tea, much to the cafe owner's delight, since not many who come in there pay in solid pure gold. I sat at a table by the front door which was next to a large window."

"It sounds like you had fun," Celestia chimed in.

"Yes, I did. While I was drinking my tea, three humans walked in. A man wearing sunglasses, a woman, and a little boy, who must have been their son. The owner who was a rather overweight, and balding man greeted them rather boisterously. He even wished the man who had just walked in Happy Birthday. Tia, I tell you this was not just coincidence that I happened to be in that cafe when they waked in. I feel like I had been meant to to be there at that time on that particular day. I wished him Happy Birthday as well, and he, his wife, and son walked over to me.

"You met him?" asked Celestia.

"I think it was him," Luna said.

"You a fan?" the man asked with a scouser accent.

"Until today, I had never heard of you, or The Beatles," Luna told him.

"What, have you been living under a rock your whole life?" asked the man.

"Only about the last thousand years, or so of it." Luna retorted.

The man pushed down his sunglasses, and looked at Luna as though she had lost her mind.

"Seriously?"

"Not even for a moment." said Luna, grinning.

"Daft bird," muttered the man, grabbing a napkin from out of the dispenser on Luna's table, pulling out a pen, and drawing on the napkin. "So what's your name, luv."

"Luna,"

"Well, Lulu, it's a pleasure to meet your acquaintance. I'm John Lennon, and this here is my wife Yoko, and our son Sean.

"Hello," Yoko said, while Sean hid behind Yoko shyly.

After a few minutes, John slid the napkin over to Luna, and drawn on it, was a picture of an Unicorn with wings, wearing a crown, surrounded by stars, and the moon, and at the bottom is John's signature, and the date 9 October, 1980. Luna began to feel uncomfortable.

"It was lovely to meet you, but I must be going." said Luna, standing up from her chair.

"That must have been interesting," Celestia said.

"More awkward, than anything. I went to find a music shoppe where I bought a copy of every record he'd ever made. It was also a bookstore, so I found out that he written two poetry books, both of which I bought a copy of."

I returned to where the portal had been, and decided to walk through it in my human form. Luckily nothing bad happened, and I was able to turn myself back into a pony once I had returned to Equestria."

"So how did he die?" asked Celestia.

"I went there two more times to explore that world of Manhattan, and find out all that I could about it. I found out it's a borough in a larger city called New York. Did you also know that they don't have Alicorn Princesses to raise the sun, moon, and stars. The sun revolves around their planet, which spins on an axis, and the moon, and stars are always there, they just can't be seen during the day? At one point, I had even thought about sending a Royal Summons to Nimble Hooves, asking to join me. He would have liked that, and I'm sure he, and John would have talked about, and played music for hours on end."

"So why didn't you?" Celestia asked.

"I was going to, but the last time that I went to that other world, it was a rather warm day, but everyone was bundled up, because it was winter there. I could certainly feel the balminess, but I could also feel something else in the air, almost like a foreboding sense that something bad had happened."

"I quickly used my magic put up the illusion spell that I had used before, and began walking toward some of the places that I had visited before such as The public library, and Central Park. Of course the library, and the cafe were closed, because it was night time in that world. As I walked down the sidewalk, I walked passed one of their motorized carriages called automobiles that happened to also be a taxi, and the driver side window was down with a man resting his arm on the door, intently listening to the radio. I thought I had heard John's name mentioned, but I quickly dismissed it as hearing something that wasn't really being said."

"Could you please turn that up?" Luna asked the man.

"Sure," the cabbie said.

"The man turned up the radio, and that was when I heard news that I had never hoped to hear, since my first time visiting this world, and meeting John."

"What happened?" asked Celestia as Luna continued to tell the tale of her last trip to the human city of Manhattan.

"John Lennon was shot, and killed outside of his apartment building shortly before 11 pm tonight," the man on the radio said. "He was rushed to Roosevelt Hospital, and in spite of the effort on the part of the doctors there, he was pronounced dead at about 11:30."

Luna dropped to the pavement, landing on her rump, and covering her mouth with her hand.

"No.." she whispered softly as the tears begin to fall.

The cab driver saw Luna, and got out, helping her to her feet again.

"Youse okay, miss?" he asked.

"No," Luna said again looking into the cabbie's eyes.

"It's terrible, I know," said the cabbie. "I grew up with John's music, and was a fan since I was a kid."

"I'd only met him once, and that was purely by accident," Luna said. "Or perhaps it was fate that I was supposed to be there at that cafe drinking a cup of tea on his birthday to meet him, and his family."

"Youse met him?" asked the cabbie. "What was he like?"

"Charming, witty, and friendly," said Luna through her tears. "The complete opposite of what you would expect from someone who's famous the world over, and has to worry about he, and his family getting mobbed by the press, and by fans everywhere they go."

"Here, let me give ya a ride home."

"That's quite alright, sir," Luna told the cabbie, as she wiped the tears away from her eyes. "I don't live very far from here. Thank you anyway."

"No problem. Youse try to have a good night, a'ight."

"And you as well," Luna said turning, and going back the way that she had come.

"As soon as I had returned to Equestria, I ended the spell that I had put on the mirror, turned myself back into a pony again, and went to my chambers where I have been listening to his music, and crying my eyes out ever since.

"That would explain why the moon is so low in the sky," said Celestia nuzzling Luna. "You were wracked with grief, and trying to cope with the loss of someone whom you knew."

A new song on the record player began softly with a piano playing, and after a short intro, a man started to sing.

"Imagine there's no heaven,
It's easy if you try.
No hell below us,
Above us only sky.
Imagine all the people,
Living for today.

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people,
Living life in peace.
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
and the world will be as one.

The third verse went on about no possessions, no greed, no hunger, and a brotherhood of man

"How, Tia? How can someone so devoted to peace, non-violence, and love be murdered in such a horrible, brutal, and violent way?" Luna asked.

"I don't know, Luna," replied Celestia. "I wish that I did. What I do know, is that he would have made a great pony."

Luna smiled sadly, and nodded.

"Yes, he would have," she said.

Celestia, and Luna looked up into the night sky as the song finished, and in the stars, Luna saw a face that she had seen before, but not in this world. One last single solitary tear streaked down her face.

"May his soul find find eternal peace," Celestia said softly.