Do you know why we don't have humans in Equestria anymore?
Yes, I am asking this seriously. You don't have to pull out any of the same old tired sayings, or that there is not any evidence that humans ever existed. This is a safe place for open and free discussion. No, that does not make it a trap. We can speak our minds here, and do it without letting our opinions be known to the masses. It's just between you and me. So, what do you think about humans? Do you have any idea what happened?
You don't?
The answer isn't simple. Humans did once live in Equestria, alongside us. We lived and loved in harmony, building great things and doing great deeds. Some of the ones who can remember say it was a golden age, where the children used to sing of prosperity and hope. They used to resent me for it, you know. We were in a bad place, and they thought that I brought about a dark age through foolish, rash action. But I had to do it... they made the first act, and I made the call. I don't regret anything.
You look lost, sorry. I will tell you the whole story, from the beginning. When I was a younger girl, Equestria was a very, very different place. A much rougher land, with few amenities. Most ponies lived in thatch cottages, and subsided on simple farming diets. Even within the nobility, there were very few literate or worldly administrators. There were no Elements of Harmony to unite us, and we relied on magic and superstition to keep everything together.
At this time, there were also more powerful forces lurking outside our view. Discord, of course, but he was not the only one. There was a sickness of the bones, infesting like a parasite until nothing was left but the mind and the eyes. It was called the bone sickness, and it devastated everything. Bandits, thieves and killers would roam every street, living outside any enlightened justice or law.
My Mother, Luna, and I did our best to fight back. We searched scrolls and wise men to help find a cure, and rallied Canterlot's Guard to eradicate the anarchy. Even with all this we barely held out. The castle remained dim, with the wax burned down to the candlesticks. Even as we pored over different spells, or enchantments, and rituals, we never found any that would work.
Until one evening, when Luna came from the hall carrying a curious volume none of us could recall seeing or even owning. It was called Of The Roots, and within it lay our salvation. It said it could bring in amazing things from every outside realm, to come and bring us aid. For days, we practiced its rituals and learned from its contents. But, things outside refused to change.
In this sorry state that the first human being arrived within Equestria, without any warning or foresight. His name was Aron, a young man who had been plucked from a street somewhere far away, and deposited here. We didn't know he had arrived until he came to one of our settlements. It was a small nameless town that was built where the town of Ponyville now stands. When my subjects first laid eyes upon him, it was... not pleasant. He had been in the woods for days, not eating anything or sleeping. The entire time he had been fleeing blindly, and to the simple ponyfolk he represented a sweaty, smelly, boogeyman. He didn't look to be very dangerous, but was cast out of town by mob rule.
Word came quickly. Within the confines of the castle walls, Luna and I consulted with Mother to see what to do. Could this be the spell working, or simply another beast wandering in from parts unknown? Luna and I debated for some time on this. She was convinced that it was here to help us, and I was certain that we needed to show caution. As we squabbled, Mother indulged us, waiting until we each had our say. When we asked her for counsel, she had a very simple idea: Ask him what he wants.
So, we did. As the other ponies hid away in thatch cottages, whispering fear and ignorance to each other, we approached him as equals. It was Luna who asked first, a simple question of identity to determine whether or not he spoke the pony tongue, and if he could, whether he would understand us. From his expression, we knew he had understood every word. Naturally, Aron didn't quite know what to make of this. Sapient magical Alicorns tend to have that effect on those who aren't used to their presence.
Initially, of course, he didn't quite trust us. We were as monstrous to him as he was to us, and even if we could speak to each other it wouldn't help if we had nothing to say. Before he would speak to us, there were demands of food, water, and shelter. His condition was dire, if not critical, so we allowed him a time to recover. On Luna's back, he rode with us to the castle. Mother, as she always did, greeted him with open arms. She fed him, and gave him space to gather his wits.
Once he could speak coherently, he accused us of imprisoning him, and demanded release. This notion was difficult to dissuade, as he continuously fought any effort we made to connect to him. Weeks went by where he might refuse to speak at all, demanding release immediately. So, despite the protests of her daughters, Mother let him go.
It took only three days for him to come back, in tears. Aron was not happy with this world, at first. Depressed and angry, he refused to let anyone but Mother into his quarters. This went on as a process for many months, trying to rehabilitate Aron while simultaneously pressing him for additional information.
Aron told us he came from a place called Canada, and that he was from another world. As he began to speak, he was at first conservative, selecting the information he regaled us with very carefully. These were the first cracks in his armor, and after the first truth came many others. He told us of his family, and his friends. A dog named Tipper. His town. Aron seemed to drain himself of all knowledge, pouring his story into our minds.
Then, he told us of the technology.
Miraculous things, which were beyond the capabilities of even our strongest magic. Metal carriers that spread like snakes across grasslands. Spacecraft which could reach even beyond the touch of Mothers domain. Electricity. Purified water. Carriages, Bessemer steel... it was too much. In return, we showed him our magic, and how we could make things he thought impossible a reality.
That wasn't all he told us. One of the devices he held was a small box, and on that box was a photograph of Luna. This was the one object which he refused to elaborate. Luna and Mother didn't press him. Said it was probably an artifact of whatever brought him here. After all, hadn't Luna spent so much time on the ritual? But, regardless, the longer he spent under our watch, the more incredible things we learned.
As we held him in the castle, word spread through the land of this new visitor. It started with peasants and farmfolk, but they spread it to their landowners, who told the nobles, who told the knights. We tried our best to limit his exposure, but it didn't really work out completely. It was far too late to stop the information from leaking. You must understand that at this point, the ponies outside the castle did not see him as their equal. Aron was seem as a curio, an oddity, even a cryptid. We kept him under constant guard, in fear of losing his incredible gifts to the mobs.
But he was not the only one. Word spread through the lands that more humans had been found, crawling out of the seas and stumbling from the woods. Luna and I set forward dauntlessly, flying overhead to see any new man on their soil. We didn't need to look very far. Output was a far cry greater than we had been led to believe. Almost everyplace had humans, corralled and locked up. It was overwhelming, they just kept coming. Day after day, more of them swarmed in. I thought it was not our salvation any longer, it was our end.
Mother and Luna disagreed that they were an evil in of themselves, but that they were creating a problem was never in doubt. Greater castles were built here, holding the multitudes within their gates. Guardsmen kept onlookers away, and it soon became part of a routine. Find any humans you can, bring them to the fortress. If it's full, we build a new one.
All the people looked very different. It wasn't as simple as searching for the ones who looked like Aron. Each one had different clothing, and came in a random selection of heights, colors, and so much else. We had a process for admitting them to the fortresses, based on these physical traits. Luna and I were manning the central area of communications. As more and more were processed, one thing caught my eye. More images of Equestrian subjects, and not just Luna. There were depictions of ordinary ponies, all across their clothing or skin. Luna and Mother protested, but this was curious. I designated one fortress to be used only by those humans who had depictions of Equestria emblazoned and illustrated across their bodies.
The human refugees were a large, disorganized mass then, confused and scared as Aron had been. In her wisdom, Mother sent him to find a human leader for us to negotiate with. Sent into every fort, he made contacts and friends to organize. In an astonishing time, he had a representative for every single spot. But still, in his searching, there had been nobody able or capable enough to take on the role of leader.
In the end, we appointed Aron as their leader. Through our negotiations with him, and his new ambassadors, we set aside lands for their kind, and spaces for us to share. They dubbed their land Sapias, and began building themselves from the little they had. We sent help, of course. Our Earth Ponies gave them stone, to build great wonders. Unicorns educated them, and gave them magic to access. Pegasi kept them safe, and taught them strength.
To thank us, they blessed our people with their technology. All the ones I have mentioned, and more... it was incredible what we could do. Communication became almost instant, transportation no longer required incredible lengths and horsepower. We went from a hardworking agrarian nations of farmland ponies to comfortable industry. The transformation was almost overnight.
With this new power, we set forth and crushed the monsters lurking on our borders, and retrieved the elements of harmony from Discord. Everyone was happy, and fulfilled. Some were unhappy with these new changed, unable to keep pace with the rapid change. Mother was among them, and preferred to stay inside the castle more and more as the technological pace picked up. Even when she saw the advanced magic we had learned from use of it, she declined. I think it was domestication that got to her. Domestication... that was a hard one to rationalize. But it was for the greater good, and I thought you of all people would understand.
Humans existed peacefully with us, living on their enclave and trading freely. Our ambassadors lived there too, relishing the power. I don't think I can understate the hope ponies were feeling. Everypony felt that we were perched on the precipice of a golden age, that all we had to do was push. Ponies would spend time in the human lands, hearing stories of their world and dreaming of how they could get there.
My one note of concern was the position of 11 ambassadors. While once it had been selected from all demographics of humankind, Aron changed this as their land continued to prosper. More and more were replaced with the strange ones, who wore the Equestrian emblazoned clothing. Luna was much less concerned about this, and Mother hardly looked up when I informed her. I wish I had made more of a fuss.
Many of our subjects would spend extraordinary amounts of time venturing into the humanity enclaves. When we asked where they were, humans always sent us letters, talking about how happy they were over on "the other side". That was when the disappearances started. I noticed a few royal ambassadors in the humanized lands had failed to return to their posts. Aron, or his son... one of those two claimed the missing ponies had been given a gift, to travel the human lands.
While troubling, we did not act then. Mother said there was no reason to doubt their word. The humans had been incredibly generous to us, and deserved the benefit of the doubt. There was no way of knowing what their intentions were, and to tamper with the birth of golden society is not a choice that was possible to make. They deserved our understanding.
Aron invited us to the land one day, for a garden party. I had expected mother to decline, and stay in as she always did. But, to my surprise, she and Luna both accepted. Alone in declining, I watched as they were flown to the Sapias lands, to see Aron for the first time in years.
They never came back.
I still don't know if the humans were telling us the truth. But I knew that I loved my sister and mother. They were not going to be taken from me lightly, kept away in another land. Gaurdsmen carried me to their fairgrounds, to confront the man called Aron. When I armies arrived, we found parades, floats, and banners, trying to show us that it was all a big party. Aron was all smiles and charm. They had only taken my family, he said, to show them the new wonders they had discovered. There were new worlds on the other side, each more amazing than the last.
We didn't believe them, and neither should anyone else. If they had been trying to create a celebration, they would not have acted in subterfuge to deprive us of our family. I demanded of him the immediate return of my mother and sister, and to leave us in peace. Aron's charms did not last then, and he promised me his word.
But, they didn't. Instead, I learned in the coming days that my sister and mother were in his hands. Wearing a shirt emblazoned with her visage, he cheered himself as the "Lunar Emperor". We mobilized against them, knowing their true intentions. As we entered, Aron sent us messages, claiming to be happy with Luna, and that she wished us to depart immediately.
They believed their ploy would cause us hesitation. It did not. We plunged into their territories dauntlessly, razing them to the ground. The humans, to their credit, recognized they were being outmatched by a god, and sought to flee into their old lands. At least they intended to. I found them escaping through an ancient arch, with inscriptions and etchings older than the earth on which they lay. Still, I followed.
What I saw on the other side of that door was utter madness. There were row after row of mirrors and glass panes, reflecting every reality which could ever occur, and some which never should have. They twisted down into oblivious space, and carried with them the thoughts of multiverse. Every sight split itself in two, then in two more, and although every copy seemed identical, they would soon be unrecognizable. It seemed every choice left a path going two ways, like roots from a tree burrowing deep into the earth.
We were atop a solid trunk, as it can be described, watching the infinite tendrils dance below us as they spread. The humans were long fled, and my mother and sister, everyone... gone. Collapsed into another world, pressed and flattened into a million pale copies of our own land.
So, I ripped and tore at this reality, breaking it underhoof and searching through it, finding the tear that led to reuniting and reunion. But it was a futile effort, and my will had all but broken when a sympathetic voice echoed from above. I met god there. They did not expect me, and told me that I did not belong in this world. There was too much crossing and interlinking going on, and they would have to purify my lands to save the lands of all the others. I was given two choices: To collapse all worlds into one, or to perpetuate the fractal multiverse which now existed. You know which one I chose.
History was not overwritten as much as it was converged into one mass, with some pieces. The missing pieces were filled in by the unfinished or broken roots, points in which no other events could occur. It has not been perfect, and even now millions of displaced or chronologically confused creatures wander the roads less traveled. Luna, bless her, has never been quite the same. She doesn't remember Mother. She remembers how it was very beautiful, over there.
I remember it. I remember that I was allowed to see the reality of where we come from. To touch what has never been seen to anypony, and to know what is truly true..
I have gazed upon the face of god, and he's a group of fanfiction writers.
Author's Note
“Sometimes there are entire chapters written beneath someone's whisper.”
― Jake Wilson, Chasing Rabbits
