Author's Note
A few notes in advance: I have never read The Conversion Bureau. So I'm not perfectly sure how some of the finer details work in that story so I'm making a few potential changes: (I say potential because I might be lucky, and it might work exactly the same way in my story as in TCB)
Equestria is on single landmass that has been teleported into the middle of the pacific ocean. (For the sake of the poor Dutch and Bangladeshi people let's suppose this haven't raised the see levels. Ponies have done just enough genocide in this universe as is.)
After the original expanding shield shield was destroyed by the Thallman generators, the ponies erected a new one, which is currently being razed by the Humans. This shield is doomed to collapse which is why new one is needed powered by the elements of harmony. This change had to be done because I couldn't justify why the humans wouldn't have just bombed Equestria into smithereens had it not been there.
A story is set in the near future. It barely ever comes up, but it's made all the new technologies more digestible for me. You can for the most part forget about it, but there is one detail which can be weird if you spot it, and I wanted to pre-empt any smarty comments from people.
I hope I haven't forgot anything if you think I did please write a comment.
Mr State.
No less than an hour after Applejack had left a new pony came in. A pony I didn’t know. Was Celestia getting this desperate? At least sending in my old friends made some sort of sense. What did they think this was going to achieve?
I lifted my head, but I didn’t open my mouth yet, if he wanted something he would tell me. I watched him fiddle around for a few seconds, he seemed awfully nonchalant for someone trying to save his country. He didn’t even look at me. He’s just looking around deep in who knew what thoughts completely disregarding the situation. For an interrogation method this was quite weak, if he didn’t feel the need to talk to me, I was certainly okay with not being worked momentarily.
I put my head down, trying to get some more rest, but my body hurt too much. Knowing I wouldn’t get any sleep any time soon I took another good look at the newcomer. The pony’s appearance was fairly mundane, a brown coat with a darker brown mane that was sorely needing a cut. And a thorough wash.
„Good evening, Mrs Fluttershy, pleasure to meet you.” He said as he did a little bow with his eyes closed.
It was odd. The guy sounded… honest. There wasn’t any sort of feigned courtesy or barely contained hatred in his voice. He was genuinely pleased to meet me. Was he some sort of royal torturer happy that he can finally flay the famous traitor alive? Was he the “drastic measures” Celestia was talking about?
“Well met sir.” I said with all the sarcasm I could force into the three little words. “Who are you?”
“Huh.” The stallion recoiled a bit looking slightly distraught. “Weird question. But I guess it’s fitting for a pony as peculiar as you.”
“How is it a weird question?”
“Well, you know social standards would dictate that I now tell you my name, which begs the question, what would you use my name for? It’s not like we’re gonna repeat each other’s names for this conversation and based on how you’ve just blew off your old friends, I’m pretty sure you intend to die here.” He stopped for a moment as if he said something wrong. “I mean not here in the cell, I don’t think they do the executions here, but in the complex.” He stopped again, but before I could have said anything his eyes got dreamy as he was looking at the ceiling and his mouth opened up a bit as if he realised something. “Unless of course you think you can get out, which is peculiar by itself. Quod Erat Demonstrandum” he finished with a shrug.
It finally clicked what was so off about his mannerisms. He never looked me into my eyes when he was talking. He was looking at me before, after, even sometimes when he stopped, but not when he was talking. It seemed oddly familiar, but for the life of me I couldn’t place it anywhere.
I must have zoned out for a second because I didn’t notice he stood up and started walking up and down as if he was giving a lecture to an audience I was merely supposed to be a part of.
“…now a more conducive question would be, by my estimation, given your situation, either what I am, or what I want.”
“So, who are you and what do you want?” I was not gonna give him what he wanted that easily. Problem was, I had no idea what that was.
He snickered briefly. “I’m Steady State, and much to the chagrin of my late father Solid State, I’m a Tenured Professor of Physics at the University of Canterlot.”
He was looking awfully young to be a tenured professor, meaning either he was some sort of genius, or the ESS agents didn’t think I knew what a tenured professor was.
“And what I want at the moment,” he stopped and shook his head. “Okay that’s deceiving… What I want most of the time, and ipso facto now, is to do cocaine, then do someone else. A female, preferably.” As his gleeful glance finished its crazed dance around the room and stopped at my eyes his pupils dilated and his face contorted into an expression of horror as if he’d just realised, he said something terrible.
“Oh no, not like that. I meant female ponies.” He stepped back looking down in shame. “Not humans. I’m not into that. Not to judge those who are, we all have our kinks and I certainly have mine, and some would be probably deemed more shameful by the general society than yours.
He stopped rather unceremoniously, looked up at the ceiling deep in thoughts and added a sentence as if he was just figuring out how wrong he was.
“Although in the current cultural climate with the war and such probably not, but I meant in more normal times.”
“So you came here to rape me?” I asked as I stood up and tried to stretch myself out. Everything hurt, but I soon might need whatever’s left of my mobility. While I didn’t think he wanted to rape anyone, but if he did, I rather fancied my chances against this wuss. Medics’ combat training was quite slim, but this idiot looked as if he hadn’t seen the sun for the last 25 years.
“Oh good heavens no!” he held his hoof up defensively. “I would never do such a thing to you! You’re not my type.”
“What is your type?” It felt somewhat amusing he didn’t feel necessary to deny he would rape someone.
“Hookers mostly. I mean at this point exclusively. I mean I had three marefriends before, but then I realised I had no need for their emotional clinginess and changed to hookers entirely.”
Now he was lying. Probably not about the hookers, but this definitely sounded like fake macho guy talk about some lame rationalisation for why he couldn’t get laid. Wait a second... Problems to connect emotionally… remarkable intelligence… inability to maintain eye contact… He was playing a high functioning autist! Maybe someone with Asperger, but he didn’t display any sort of repetitive behaviour.
But how on earth could anyone fake that? It’s an extremely complex set of behaviour and the ESS must have known I’d studied some psychology. Could he be what he says he is?
“So if you’re not here to rape me, then I can only assume you’re here to do cocaine.” I asked him, carrying his words to their logical outcome. Be it a real high functioning autist or a fake one he’d probably react to this favourably.
“Well in a roundabout way yes, you’re quite right” he nodded with a smile. “You see, you hate the Princess because she murdered billions, and betrayed everything you believed in and all that emancipatory jazz neither side seem to be able to shut up about, I hate her because she hid my cocaine. And it was the good stuff too.”
“Good stuff?”
“Human cocaine.” He answered with a shrug “Equestrian cocaine is just meh. I mean it’s still coke, it works… fine, but it’s the equivalent of jerking off instead of having sex. I guess it does the job if you have nothing else, but who would choose the first over the other?
“The same person who would choose having sex over making love I assume.” I laid into him for no particular reason. He deserved it either for what he said or what he didn’t.
“You clearly haven’t spent enough money on hookers yet. Common mistake, every beginner does it. I did it myself back when I had no money… No biggie.”
He said without losing a beat. This stallion was remarkably quick, especially if he was playing a role. There were only so many questions and retorts he could have prepared for.
“…But like with every other service you gotta pay the dough to get… the kneading? Is kneading an inuendo? Maybe for cats I guess, not for us. Then again, I guess everything is an inuendo if you say it with the right tone. Though trusting my ability to play with my voice to get a message through is a rather… optimistic proposition. Hmm where were we?”
“I have absolutely no idea.” I said, admitting I was paying about as much attention to his rambling as he was.
“Typical mare, useless at everything she would do, unwilling to everything she could do.” He muttered under his nose, his head being somewhere else.
I punched him. Hard. Only once, so he should be alright. But as the moment of red mist quickly cleared, I noticed something very strange about him. My punch barely even registered with him. He fell over, but he looked in the same direction with the exact same expression. He absent-mindedly scratched my hoofmark on his cheeks, but other than that he showed no sign of even the slightest discomfort.
“Where were we, where were we. Sweet Celestia I need my fix. Oh yes, the cocaine. No cocaine. Celest hid it. She told me I’d get it back if…
“HEUREKA!” He jumped up with a victorious smile “I finally know why you’re here!”
“As if you didn’t before.”
“Sure, I did. When I came down here, but that was minutes ago, and I have no cocaine. By the way do you have some? Oh right that would be considered contraband here. Fuck. Anyhow let’s go back to the topic before I forget about it again because let’s be honest, you’re not particularly high on my priorities list.”
“Because I’m neither a hooker nor a line of cocaine?”
“Exactly! See you’re a smart cookie!” He smiled like an over eager elementary teacher when the dull child tells him what’s 2+2 “Speaking of which. I know you’re all evil and such because they said it in the newspaper, and they would surely never lie in the newspaper, but I have a very important question to ask.”
“If that finally gets rid of you.” I answered with a morose sigh.
“Have you ever considered what you were doing might actually be moral?”
“WHAT?!”
“Moral. Near homophone of moron, though I’m sure that’s merely a coincidence, if a poetic one in our case. It means “behaving in ways considered by most to be correct and honest”
“I know what it means, you self-absorbed schmuck.” I felt my ears flattening and my hoof pawing at the stone. The words were merely seething through my teeth. “I’ve lost everyone and everything I held dear in my previous life for my beliefs. What I don’t know is, how in the ever-loving fuck did you think in that demented skull of yours that I ever even consider that what I’m doing is not the right thing.”
He tilted his head right and looked at my aggressive display with utter confusion. Then he looked at my dirty bunk and said, “So you betrayed 95% of your friends without a second thought? Holy tartaros you’re cold.”
I want to hit him again but this time he wasn’t lost in his head and between the sleep spell and my general bruisedness, my punch is slow. He dodged and I fell down, carried away by my momentum.
“Anyhow, if you did think your actions were quite moral, then, I have to conclude, that you are, in fact, a moron.”
“Being such a moron, I can hardly imagine what I did to deserve the company of such a brilliant individual as you.” I hissed as I tried to get up despite my joints’ disapproval for my plan
“I wouldn’t quite say ‘deserved’, more like ‘circumstantially happened upon the opportunity’” he said looking down at my struggle. He offered me a hoof to get up. I accepted it but by the time I was up he was looking at the wall over my left shoulder, talking. “And yes you’re definitely a moron. Because if you believed that what you did was in fact moral, and you know that there are ponies who consider it otherwise, which you do because you’ve actively contributed to the murder of bunch of them, and you know that humans are just as capable of expressing a plethora of different moral values in very broad spectrum, which you also know, because that’s what your lectures on YouTube are all about, then you must have realised there are at least a few humans who despite everything that happened, still consider the Equestrian the “right side”.”
He looked up at the ceiling like a teacher who had to explain the same thing for the fifth time for the dull child, with absolute resignation in his voice he continued.
“But no, you lulled yourself into a false sense of security undergirded by some misguided self-righteousness that no one would ever help Celestia among the Humans, even though you are the living testimony to the fact that one can in fact betray her entire species. Which makes this not only an accidental stupid act, it’s habitual, persistent moronity. Quod Erat Demonstrandum.
He was… not wrong. After seeing what happened to Rome, Mekka and all those cities… I would have never imagined there is a single human who would have sided with the Ponies. Not that it changed a whole lot.
“Okay so some rat helped you kidnap me. It’s not like I couldn’t have figured it out myself”
“Kidnap? What do you think the ESS are? Goats? Oh, right this is how humans say ponynap.” He hit his forehead. “Sweet Celestia they’re dumb. Oh, right that’s not what we should be talking about… See, I’m getting better at this” he said evidently very proud of himself.
“My heart is filled with joy.”
“Rude” he pouted. “Anyhow, do you remember what I said my profession was?”
“I wasn’t paying too much attention but you said you were a professor of something. Which is pretty meaningless given that you’re just an ESS agent.”
“Admittedly that’s an entirely plausible scenario, but regardless, have you ever wondered why would Celestia send a physicist, or an ESS agent disguised as a physicist, to talk to a war criminal? And why have said physicists/secret agent felt the need to bring attention to the fact that there are in fact traitors among Humankind?”
He stopped, waiting for me to answer him. But the truth was I was way too tired and dejected, to even try to think about what he wanted. It was obvious he was going to tell me anyway. All I could have done is save myself a few insults on the way.
The immeasurable disappointment on this faux Socrates’ face when he realised I was not going to answer him was more than worth my efforts.
“Have you ever seen a big scientific breakthrough happen because of the cooperation of the two species?”
This question sounded a lot more ominous. Though I could have guessed that after whatever they considered honey, they would try to catch this (butter)fly with vinegar. Or rather, in this case, bullshit.
“The Thalmann generators.”
“Bingo.” He nodded thrice. “Now if Humans were able create a technology that shuts down magic because they had ponies who could help them study magic what do you think ponies could come up with, when helped by humans?”
“A magic that shuts down technology? Is that what you want to use the elements for?” If that worked it could turn the war, but how did they expect to convince me about contributing to something like that?
“A great guess!” He said cheerfully, clapping his hooves. “I myself would have said a technology that enhances magic instead of disabling it, but that’s probably due to differences in our thought process.” He looked legitimately impressed with my answer. “I mean you only looked over the fact that I told you I’m a physicist, three times in the last what… ten minutes? So it was pretty easy to miss. Anyhow, the answer is Nukes.”
“Nukes?”
“Yes, turns out one of the traitors who chose the Equestrian side was a renowned nuclear scientist who now goes by the name of Winger Eugenics and he knew the process from top to bottom. Mostly. Obviously no single person can know such an intricate process completely but with his lead, a few hundred stolen books from universities, we managed to map out the basic process, after which it’s mostly just putting in a huge amount of engineering until we can make it compact and useable.” He stared at the wall mesmerised, as if he just saw something truly majestic. “It’s amazing how dangerous knowledge can be when you disseminate so freely… and how useless when you don’t.”
For a second I almost felt pity for the guy. An earth pony, he must have gone through hell and back to learn about his craft in Equestria’s snooty elitist school system, clearly taking pride in his skills, only to be asked to use his knowledge to destroy a world.
I guess that was true regardless if he was an agent or a scientist.
“Still we’ve got incredibly lucky with several things. In the Earth’s crust the fissile 235 isotope makes up about 0.7% of all the minable uranium, we’ve found ample deposits in Equestria’s crust with 10 times that ratio. It’s also lucky that North Korea was desperate enough for money to sell Equestria one of their bombs before the war. Equestria also had me. I don’t want to toot my own horns seeing how I’m an earthpony, but I doubt there would have been single other entity on this world or any other, who could reverse engineer the H-bomb based on Sakharov’s very incomplete work. I mean Winger and the others were incredibly helpful in the project, but still it was my baby.”
“So that’s the best the ESS could come up with?” I said raising my eyebrows “That you just randomly found a human who was not only Nuclear scientist and was not only willing to stand by watching you eliminate his race but was actively helping you do it?”
“Winger wouldn’t like this kind of talk.” He shook his head. “He’s a trans Pegasus, his species is pony as much as yours or mine.”
“Oh, so you already turned him and he managed to retain his mind completely. I guess we can add this to the list of lucky coincidences.”
“Well, actually due to the unpredictable effects of the serum, we convinced him to wait until finishing his work. He should be receiving the serum in a month or so. Untill then, he’s a pegasus just because he says so. I’m not sure how it works, but I owe him the professional courtesy to accept what he says about a topic I know nothing about, on account of not being a human… Or rather a pony. Oh, wait I am a pony. Fuck, I messed it up. Anyhow, he’s a pegasus. End of story.”
“Wait, does he know he can’t choose what race of pony you turn into with the serum?”
He lifted his forelegs up and shrugged very theatrically. “Honestly, I don’t know, and with me being his closest workplace associate I’m doubtful anypony does. Let’s just say we all hope his status of knowing or not knowing doesn’t change any time soon, because in that case he might get mad.”
“Can I see him?”
“Why would you want to see him?”
“Maybe I want to make sure your story is legitimate.”
“I mean I could arrange it,” he said scratching his nape “I imagine, convincing you must be pretty important to Princess Celestia if she was willing to hide my cocaine just to make me come here, but I’m not sure what would you gain from it. Unicorn mages can absolutely turn a pony into a Human, you know they can turn a pony into a human, and if the ESS managed to train one agent to be able to trick you, they can certainly train two. I reckon it’s the same reason they brought you here instead of the secret nuclear facilities. It’s unreasonable to expect you to distinguish a real nuke from a replica built in a garage, so why bother?”
“You could have arranged for a Human nuclear physicist to be with me and then he could have checked if what I see is legit.”
“The same criticism applies. How would anypony ever convince you that you see an actual human Nuclear Physicist? Also you think the Humans would just let Equestria ponynap a nuclear physicist? You know how hard those are to come by? In the middle of a war none the less. I’m honestly baffled they managed to get you here, I would’ve thought you’re under constant surveillance just in case the ponies get funny ideas about using the elements. Probably the only reason they didn’t, because I suspect that you and your alignment-ally flexible friends have told them many times that the elements are quite useless with or without you since you and your friends… just aren’t. Even then, the ESS couldn’t take your sweetheart with you. He would have been the jackpot as a second capture because he is someone you can reliably identify. At least I hope they couldn’t capture him because that would mean they’re wasting my time here instead of using him to blackmail you to do their bidding. Which you would do, instantly, with how big of a Mrs Goodie Four-Horseshoes you are.”
My heart stops for a second as I hear his words, but luckily he speaks faster than I can think, and explains away my fears. He’s right, it makes no sense not to use Martin if they had him in their grasps. Probably. Rather than pondering on this I ask a question.
“How do you want to deliver the nukes? You don’t have planes, and even if you did the UN would just shoot them down like flies.”
“Magic, duh” he shrugged.
“Magic? What about the Generators?”
“Nothing? Nukes, high tier nukes especially, blow-up thousands of meters above sea-level. There isn’t a single generator with that kind of range. Even if there was, they would have to pinpoint the exact time and location the portals appear because that’s the only time there is anything remotely magical about them.”
“They could just shoot them out with rockets.”
“Yes, probably. But the mages will drop them from 4200 meters the pressure gauges are set to set off the bomb at 4000 if they are literal gods, they might be able to shoot them down at 41 hundred so it would blow up there. Great success.”
Cold dread ran through my veins, if they could do pull it off, this really seemed like an impeccable strategy to deliver a nuke. Painful images rushed to my mind about the Crystal empire. The experts didn’t let us anywhere close to the ruins, so all I saw was the eerie purplish hue the snow got from all the crystal dust blown all over. To this day I can’t help but wonder how much of that dust was once living, breathing, loving crystal ponies.
I took a couple of deep breaths. I knew it was fake, I knew he was lying, but what if he wasn’t? Was Celestia mad enough to do this? And that was a question not a question I needed to answer. When the ship was sinking there were no levels that bitch wouldn’t stoop down to, to save herself.
And for what?
“You’ll never learn,” I growled gritting my teeth “destroying a city or two will never work. It will just unite the humans even more. Turn them more bloodthirsty. You’re just digging your own grave”
“Yes, destroying a few cities probably wouldn’t do much, but destroying a thousand? Just might. Every single city over a million population. Well technically only 706 of them have over 1 million inhabitants, but I promised the Princess a thousand 50 megaton nukes, so she’s gonna get a thousand 50 megaton nukes. You wanna hear the list? I learnt them once because the cocaine colt was late. Figured it would be a cool party trick.”
“As if you went to parties.” I say with a dark smile on my face. In a strange way this was comforting to hear. The dude just jumped the shark. Was it possible that Equestria managed to build a few nuclear devices? Maybe... but a thousand? No way, no how.
“Hey, I go to parties all the time.”
“No, just because you order two hookers, that doesn’t make it a party.”
“Huh… who would have thought?” I was annoyed by how good of an actor this idiot was I knew he was lying but he still sounded honest. Which either meant he was the best actor I’ve ever met, or he was actually honest. It was unnerving either way. “But you’re the friendship expert, I guess.” He said it with a shrug, “Note to self: Get into foursomes.”
“Yes that’s exactly my point.” I say with an eye-roll. “By the way are we done now? You told me your stupid little tale about the nukes I wanna go back to sleep.”
“Aren’t you worried Princess Celestia is about to wipe out half of your favourite pet monkeys?”
“Not really, no.” I said as I headed back to my bunk, only when I laid down did I realise, that my bucket was right next to the head place of my bunk. Not wanting smell my own excrements, I tried to push it away but it’s welded in place. I tried to move my pillow to the other side, but it’s nailed to the bed. I wasn’t sure how they managed to nail anything to a concrete slab but they sure did go the extra mile for me.
As I turned around, I saw that the agent was on the edge of talking again, which was unsurprising given that I never explained to him how I knew his little tale was a lie. Since I knew he wouldn’t let me just drift into sleep like that, I decided I would explain it to him. Not that I thought it would shut him up - for that they would have to shove a cock so far up in his ass it comes out the other end - but it would make me feel better to bring him down a peg. Or ten.
“First of all, you don’t have nukes. The UN would know about them. Second, you don’t have enough. I don’t know much about military expenses but nukes are really-really expensive. Third, even if you had enough nukes, you couldn’t deploy them. Making 1000 portals simultaneously all around the globe sounds pretty ridiculous even to me, and I know nothing about magic theory. Fourth, even if you could deploy them, you wouldn’t because the resulting fallout would wipe away you as well. Hmm… what was the phrase you said?
“Quod erat demonstrandum?”
“That’s the one.” I said with exaggerated grogginess as I closed my eyes
“First of all you used it wrong. ‘Quod erat demonstrandum’ means ‘what was to be shown’ but your point was that you are not worried, then you proceeded to “prove” Equestria can’t drop nukes on you. I understand why that would make you sleep better, and it’s quite obvious, so in the context of a normal everyday conversation this would be a rather trivial difference, but it does make the use of that phrase rather tacky. But that’s not even your most unforgivable mistake. Your “proof” was so full of holes no wonder it can’t hold any water.”
I broke out in laughter. I had to give it to the guy, he was committed to his act. For years I hadn’t seen a pony whose eyes didn’t flame with barely withheld hatred or contempt for me. But this guy, he was completely unfazed by my past. He also wasn’t grateful, he didn’t feel any sort of comradery like my sisters in the resistance, he just didn’t care. He might have been playing a role, but regardless if he was an agent or a scientist, his motivations were completely different than anybody else’s.
I sat up and looked into his eyes.
“What makes you tick, State?” I asked him just to throw a wrench into whatever plans he had.
“Seeing mistakes in differential equations” he answered without hesitation.
“No, I mean what gets you out of your bed”
“Oh… cocaine” he nodded. “Copious amounts of cocaine.”
“No it doesn’t.” I shook my head still smiling, “I’ve worked with addicts for a few months in a rehab facility in Portland. You don’t look like a Junkie.”
And for once he looked flustered. Maybe this wasn’t in my profile on which they based their story? Unlikely, I mentioned it several times in my lectures, and they saw those.
“Honestly I have you to thank that for. I mean you, as in the Resistance. Without you, there’s no Thalmann generator, and Equestria wins the war in about a year and a half. And then I wouldn’t have been assigned on the nuke project and honestly I would have probably just eaten and snorted and shat and fucked until I died. You know this mind of mine is a curse as well of a blessing, I’m not gonna venture to weigh one against the other, because that’s just foolish but it’s both. It’s like a machine always has to work. When it has a project to work on it hums nicely making problems disappear.
“When it hasn’t? It still runs with the same power but without a load it just generates noise. So much noise… it screams like a thousand starving wendigos on a cold night. Cocaine stops that. For a few hours. Usually between six and eight. Though the number is going down steadily. Fucking also does, but for a much shorter time. Have you ever tried to get it up for the sixth time that day? It’s not pretty for anypony let me tell you that.
“But when I have a car to chase, a riddle to solve. It’s like heaven, I can finally concentrate, finally I don’t feel the pain.
“Which is why this nuke project was so great. A project so preposterously over everything ponykind has ever thought to have been capable of, that nopony would have even considered it as an alternative if their plot wasn’t against the wall. Which also put a timer on the project, making it all the more challenging. Had Equestria been winning, I reckon I wouldn’t have bothered to put any effort into it even if they had asked me. I guess it’s within a pony’s nature to always root for the weaker side. In that way we are kindred spirits Mrs Shy, the only difference is, that you joined the war earlier when the other side was losing.”
“Don’t ever compare me to yourself again.”
He raised his eyebrows in surprise. “I see you have a healthy amount of humility. Really nice, as an outsider I can say that with no small amount of confidence, that it’s an underrated quality. It makes my job quite a bit easier really. I thought I would have to teach you humility given how wrong you were about Equestria’s nukes, I only have to teach you everything but. Which makes you quite a bit better than my Phd students now that I think about it.”
“Oh, tell me, how was I wrong.”
“First Equestria does have nukes. And the UN absolutely knows about them. Between their seismographs detecting the subterranean test detonations and their military satellites constantly spying on Equestria without the pony military being able to do much about them, I can’t imagine they wouldn’t put two and two together. Interestingly enough they chose not to tell either Equestria or their people about this. Meaning they are very committed to this war. Which is weird given how well-established the MAD doctrine is, so the high command’s best guess is that they think ponies are mad enough to use them as oversized land mines to impede their progress. Which now that I think about it, makes you the single most important informant the UN doesn’t have.
“Second you underestimate how much easier it is to “automate” processes if you have access to magic. Frankly the only reason progress is so slow is because we lack unicorns who are considered trustworthy enough to work on this project. Not that it’s a racial thing, we’re starved for ponies in general, but unicorns are the ones who can use the type of magic we need.
“Third, maybe if you don’t know much about pure magic, you shouldn’t make such a declaration. The bombs don’t have to be dropped all at once, although the Princesses’ window will not be large either. But between Princess Celestia the High-Sorceress of Ponyville, Archmage Starswirl and what is that name the humans call her… The Purple Angel of Death! What a dope name. Anyhow, between all of them, they assume they have enough power to deploy about eighty to hundred percent of the bombs. Which is more than enough.”
“Fourth is actually your best point, or it would be if it wasn’t for two factors. The Hydrogen bombs we made, are so called fusion bombs instead of fission bombs, meaning they’re quite clean. The amount to be used is admittedly rather excessive, but ponies are pretty resistant to radiation and Equestria has a nice 2000 km buffer zone from the closest place the high command marked for deployment, which is quite a bit.”
“Wait, that doesn’t make sense”
“It actually makes quite a bit of sense. Cancer is the abnormal cell growth in certain parts of the body. Sort of. It’s a close enough approximation for our purposes. I’m not a biologist. Since cells are roughly the same size across every living being, bigger entity means more cells more cells mean more cell divisions, more cell divisions equal more chances for something to go wrong, i. e. cancer. The fact that beings so large as dragons or whales can live means they must have some sort of inherent protection against cancer. While volumetrically speaking we are not bigger than Humans, although in certain quasi-cylindrical, dimensions we vastly outmatch them, which rather questions your preferred choice of mates but… huh. Where was I going with this?
“I don’t know, we started with cancer then somehow ended up at your dick being small.”
“Fair enough.” He said looking at the wall, he muttered for five seconds then looked up and onto the other wall and started talking. “So being equines most of the species in our evolutionary family are rather big, meaning we’re fairly protected against radiation. Or at least that’s the last theory I bothered to listen to. The evidence however is fairly clear, in the short term, nukes vaporise ponies just as well, hundred million degrees tends to do that. But in the long run, radiation is not quite harmless but the risk is… tolerable. And according to the Princess it’s preferable to whatever you pet monkeys have in store for us”
“As if you didn’t agree with her.” I said just to say something but I realised he was not wrong. The phenomenon he referred to is quite well known, it’s called Peto’s paradox. Not being a geneticist, I wouldn’t know how it worked on ponies, but it might be true.
“Not particularly. I’m rather lukewarm on this thing either way. As an accomplished nuclear scientist, I have a rather big proverbial paperclip in my back pocket with which I can get out of this situation.”
Okay the MacGyver reference was too much I had to ask.
“You know way too much about human culture for someone who should be trying not to look like a ESS agent.”
“So we’re agreeing I’m not trying to not look like an ESS agent! I’m simply not one of them. But your insistence on your delusions is of little concern in the big picture.”
“But then how do you know all this about humans?”
“I was fifteen when we came here. I went to university at MIT. At first, I was worried they were going to bully me for being years younger than them, but turned out they were bullying me for being a pony. But I can’t be very mad at them, they did introduce me to Coke. Also my line of work grants me access to the internet. Wonderfull thing really. It’s like 20 minutes to find a guy willing to sell you a kidney. Fascinating. Amazon doesn’t ship to Equestria, but if you let us not destroy the world I think we’ll figure something out in a decade or so.”
“So that’s your plan? Have them stalled for so long they’re not going to bother with winning.”
“Well Equestria also has the nukes as a threat, but yes, essentially.”
“That will never work. Not after what you’ve done.”
“Are you sure? You have any idea how much money it takes to park the entire UN fleet in the pacific? How many starving souls can be fed with that money in a world devastated by war? It won’t be short, it will take years, maybe decades but eventually they will decide they have better things to do.”
“You don’t have decades, you don’t even have years. Even if I did help, the Humans would just find a way to destroy that shield as well.”
“I doubt that. The Thalmann equation states that energy requirement of the generators is the function of the cube of the thaumaturgical factor. So if the new shield is twice as strong as the old one, then the generator has to be 8 times as powerful. If it’s ten times as strong than it takes a thousand time the power to destroy. You know the elements as well as anypony. You felt their powers coursing through your veins. How many times more powerful you felt in those moments? Now multiple that by itself thrice and then you’re starting to comprehend the enormity of the undertaking you described as some minor setback.
That couldn’t be true, could it? I knew the TG-s were always hooked to those very thick cables and providing them enough electricity on the front was a constant struggle, but even then, what he said was just absurd. But if it’s true then the new shield would be untouchable… The elements, were just too powerful, even in a weakened state.
“That fact is Equestria’s greatest saviour in this war really. A pony’s magic is a lot less scalable than electric generators, but this fact means that every little bit of extra power mustered takes ponies a long way. That’s why a powerful individual like Princess Twilight seems all that threatening to your pet humans.”
I quickly latched onto that last sentence. That idiot finally made an error in his story.
“Twilight sounded a lot less sure about the power of the shield.”
“Oh, she knows this quite well. However, she also knows what happens if she doesn’t convince you. Understandably that makes her quite nervous. Not everypony shares my levels of indifference towards every living being.”
I sighed, there was no winning against this guy. He could bend reality with his words. He knows everything including what I do and do not know… And that gave me an idea. Something that I know and he doesn’t. How someone else was also out of the know.
“No, Twilight doesn’t know. She doesn’t know anything. Her mind is regularly wiped by that bitch!”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Celestia!” I shouted. “Pinkie saw her using some strange spell on her and after that she didn’t remember what they were talking about.”
“That must be the most stupidest idea I have ever heard. And yes, I did need both superlatives to express this.” He said with his face buried in his hooves. “Do you really think if she could just erase memories, she wouldn’t do it with you, and be done with this ordeal? Have you thought about that?
“I don’t know how that bitch thinks.” I said stomping on the ground. I could feel my blood boiling by merely thinking about Celestia “Whatever I thought I knew about her went out the window when she, I don’t know, killed everyone back in Equestria!
“She most probably did not” he answered calmly, finally looking up at me. “At least if you’re talking about what I think you’re talking about.”
“What? Without her who could have moved the sun? And without the sun everyone just dies.”
He knows about this? Oh, who am I kidding with, of course he would know, and of course he would do nothing about it.
“Eh, possibly. There might be other forces left to turn the sun.”
“Like what?”
“I have no idea.” He shrugs with appalling impassivity, “I generally have very few ideas about magic. But the sun was moved before Princess Celestia. So somepony will probably take up the mantle.”
“Except there are no ponies left.”
“You do realise that you don’t know that? Or have you done a quick headcount before we came over here?”
“No but…”
“Even if Celestia did bring everypony over maybe there are others who can use magic. Changelings definitely can, and deer are rumoured to be quite capable in that department.”
“Yes and based on their history of raising the sun on their own, they’re going to just figure it out in a day or two before the ecological damage destroys everything”
“Maybe she left them instructions?” he shrugged again “Or maybe a device that contains a bit of her power, to help them over the hump.”
“Buck off, not even you can believe these theories”
“I can. And I chose not to. I have a much better one, but I wanted to see if I can improvise some half-decent plausible scenarios where not everyone in Equestria’s home dimension is doomed. Based on the number of actually meaningful counterarguments you raised I’d say I did pretty well.”
I groaned. “So, what do you actually think” I was starting to get really tired of this guy, but he was either ridiculously smart or prepared, either way it’s good to know what he thought.
“Well this is a theory. It’s nothing more but an unsubstantiable flight of speculative fancy. But it is mine, and I believe in it.
“So not long after we left Equestria I learnt about the life cycle of stars. And long story short when stars die, they tend to destroy everything around themselves. I don’t know how this concept translates into Equestria’s dimension, but if stars over there are anywhere similar to stars here, I would bet my entire coke stash that Celestia could feel that in some way. If that’s the case she may have wanted to save us from whatever happens when Equestria’s old star died.”
“But not the Changelings or the Griffs, or anyone else.”
“Or maybe not even all the ponies” he shrugged “As you know well enough, she is not omnipotent. She saved what she could. And saved her own kin first. I’m sure if she could have saved only seven ponies it would have been you six and Luna. Few possess a heart so precious as yours, most like their own more than others. The way magic works with constellations and tight time constraints, that might have been the one and only chance to send most of us here.”
“So you think the bitch who turned humans into imbecile equine monstrosities would bring us here to save us?”
“So you think it’s more likely that she’s said the truth about the reason we’ve left Equestria but has been lying about everything else ever since? I’m not an expert in hating Celestia, but it seems like you’re doing it inconsistently”
“Then call her down here. Make her explain this thing instead of you. I want to hear it from her mouth.”
“And that would convince you? By hearing it from the one pony you trust the least? What the flying fuck you expect from her? Do you think she could just conjure up some magic bauble, which would force her to tell the truth? I know it basically used to be your job description, but you can’t just expect to magically McGuffin your ass out of every situation. Even if she could do something like that, do you trust her enough that she wouldn’t tamper with that magic just to convince you? I mean not even I would bet on that and I’m the one who’s supposed to trust her.”
“So what am I supposed to trust? Your theories, that even you admit you can just pull out of your ass by the dozen?”
“That’s the point!” he shouted. “You shouldn’t trust theories, but one of them still might be the truth. And the fact is my idea is definitely not any less unlikely than your version. But you want to believe what you want to believe, because you want to believe it! Completely circular logic. Emotion is not the death of reason, but if you let the former kneel on the latter’s neck for fifteen years don’t be surprised when it suffocates. You fucking inverse Chauvinist!”
For the first time since we met, he looked legitimately angry. He started to pace up and down
“Your act all exalted like you know anything, but you know nothing. I know a lot.” He thumped his chest “I have had a doctorate since I was 17 and I spend my free time balls deep in whores or ears deep in mounds of cocaine. Not trying to redeem two worlds at once. Learn some fucking humility bitch. Oh, your fucking god! Jeecious Kreisst, or whatever you call it. Your ego already murdered at least one idiot today. So maybe, just maybe, it’s time to stop.”
My heart skips a beat. I instantly realise what he means, but I pray to God I’m wrong. “What the fuck are you talking about.”
“Twilight’s pet dragon. Thorn or whatever his name is.” He says without looking back.
“What happened to him?” I grabbed his head and turned it back to me.
“The fuck you’re asking me for?” He pushed me away with surprising force. “I’m either a nuclear physicist in which case I wouldn’t know or an ESS agent in which case I wouldn’t tell. Or maybe I’m a Cat in a sealed box but that’s hardly helpful either. All I know is he was escorted away by a bunch of darkly clad ponies to who knows where, the moment he stepped out of your cell. He’s not the first one I’ve seen this being done to, but he sure as Tartaros would be the first one I’d see return.”
“We are being watched?!” I shriek, I can’t care less how I look or sound at the moment
“I would assume?” He raises his left eyebrow in utter confusion. “You’re the number one prisoner in this nation. I don’t think you could flutter your shylashes without them making a note about it.”
A billion thoughts started to race in my head. If they’d listened to us they must have heard about Sassy. If they get her, I mean when they get her, they’re going to torture her until she gives up everything she knows about the resistance. That will implicate at least another 50 ponies, some of them may catch the drift when she disappears, and leave town, but what will happen to their families? How many innocents have I sent to their death because of my momentary stupidity. State’s right, I’m a bumbling fool, and I probably always have been.
“Huh. Fear” he said, making me realise I was silent for too long “On your face.” He pointed at me still not looking in my eyes “Not anger, not desperation, but fear. Hmmm. Interesting. One must wonder… were you stupid enough to tell him about some resistance secret that would get others in trouble? A safehouse? A contact? A plan?”
I didn’t answer. I needed to figure out something stat. I had to get them off of Sassy. As much as I could. I had to confess… something. I had to give up someone who sounded like they were higher in the food-chain than her, but by catching them they might alert Sassy. But I couldn’t make it sound like I was trying to divert attention off of Sassy, because then they would know that she’s the real deal.
I took a quick glance at State. He was quietly whistling Winter Wrap Up while examining a crack on the wall. He didn’t care. Or he pretended not to, it didn’t matter at this point. Crud, talking about anything with him takes hours. And his alleged goal was not to get information out of me, so if he wanted to achieve whatever he wanted we would have to keep up this farce, because he cleary thought this was the best way to get what he wanted.
But time was of the essence at the moment so I had to get through to somepony who would take my confession. That shouldn’t be too hard, after all, I was the number one prisoner in Equestria. All I needed was to cause some ruckus and the “real” ESS agents would be barging in an instant once their little game failed. I looked at that insufferable egotistic asshole and I felt my mouth twisting into a wicked smile.
I knew what to do.
I lunged at him, ready to rarefy his teeth but he chose this exact moment to turn around to tell me something. I missed and slammed into the wall. He looked at me surprised.
“Alright Mrs Fluttershy, you fighting back the first two times? It was ho… cute. Now it’s just annoying. So cease your pitiful attempts at assault and behave or else I’ll have to call the guards.”
Those were exactly the words I wanted to hear. My plan worked even better than I could have hoped. Again I jumped at him, he sidestepped, and before I could do anything he tapped the ground thrice, I heard the clank of the prison door and I felt a prison guard’s hooves wrapping around my body. I tried to wiggle free but I might as well struggle against hairy piece of log. I wasn’t going to move it.
“Oh now you’re angry once you’ve realised your actions have actual consequences. Pathetic. Don’t look at me like that, I didn’t kill Thorn and your little traitor friends. I’d argue you didn’t kill them either, but based on that look on your face, that is yet another point we disagree on.”
Though it took all my self-control I managed to stay silent. He took a long hard look at me thinking about something
“But I think I finally get you. Took a while admittedly, you really had me sold with this element of kindness thing. I guess it’s true what they say about not meeting your heroes. They rarely live up to their fame.”
He stopped, looked down and shook his head in utter disappointment. “To fall this short though, that’s unexpected at the very least.”
He turned away from me and looked at my bars.
“You are simply a hypocrite.” He said in a calm, almost soothing voice.
“You don’t care about your friends. You would let them all die in this pointless war as long as you can purport to be this righteous saviour. You could have tried to buy the life of all your resistance friends. You could have known the ESS was going to torture their names out of you anyway, but you didn’t. Granted you don’t trust them to keep their end of the bargain, and that’s fair, but even then, at least that would have been an attempt to make a difference.
“And yet you chose not to bargain. You could play the stupid card, and pretend you didn’t know, but as much as I go back and forth between calling you smart and stupid, you’re not that dumb. Deep down you must have known you could have tried to save your friends.”
He shook his head like a disappointed father would when he talks to his underachieving son.
“But if they’d died, because you wanted to save them, that would have been your fault. Because you would have willingly given up those names instead of having them dragged out of you by the expert hooves of the ESS.”
“That’s bull…” I tried to say, but he lifted his right hoof up and the guard suddenly tightened his grip on me so all that came out is a painful gasp. He waited a few moments as if to see whether I learnt my lesson, but soon enough he continued.
“This is why you don’t want to raise the new shield. I don’t know if you realised it, but I do know that doesn’t matter. If Equestria has nukes, we’re going to deploy them before the old shield collapses. If she doesn’t, the humans will have the ability to land here. Or because amphibious landing is the single hardest and most costly military manoeuvre, they’re just going to drop nukes on the problem.
“I know they promised not to, but you can’t tell me you think they aren’t going to go full Nuremberg on Equestria’s ass and Ex Post Facto come up with some bullshit justification why they needed to do that. You know, when you are faced with the proposition of losing several millions of your sons and daughters, that big red button starts to look awfully convenient.”
“So whether I’m lying or not, raising the shield is the better alternative.” He said with hoof held up to emphasize the importance of his point. He turned around and looked into my eyes to see the impact of his words but other than unadulterated hatred he couldn’t see much.
A smug smile crept on his face as he closed his eyes to continue
“Except for one huge white blot in the middle. Because raising the shield would mean you inadvertently save Princess Celestia from the Humans’ righteous retribution.”
I started to squirm trying to get out of the guards hold. I tried to kick him, bite him, hurt him with every cell of my body. I wanted to get out more than I ever wanted anything but he was relentless.
“You wouldn’t be able to hide behind excuses or blame others for your choice. You personally would have to make the conscious decision to save the pony whom you hate, more than you ever thought yourself capable of hating” as he talked hatred, like a snowball on a mountain, grew in his voice.
“So pray tell me, Kindness incarnate, you blame Celestia for the lives of the innocents. But how many more would you be willing to sacrifice just to see her dead? You preach of kindness but you show none if that’s what it takes to get what you want.”
He opened his eyes and for the first time he didn’t look away when he talked. The hatred in his eyes swirled so deep I couldn’t look away.
“You are one spiteful little creature, who doesn’t even have the spine to stand up for what she loathes. Instead, she wraps it into this neat rainbow coloured bundle of love and tolerance. And that makes you the most disgusting Hypocrite in two different dimensions.”
QUOD.
ERAT.
DEMONSTRANDUM.
