My Little Pony: Slaves to Celestia

A story of  DYSTOPIA and  DISCOVERY

Chapter 0 – Equestria’s tarnished Golden Age

Modern Day Contemporary Equestria

The year is 1984 and it has been a long 36 years since the very last of the defenders of harmony, Applejack, passed on peacefully. Growing as old as 113, way past the life expectancy of the average pony.

The many ponies we knew and loved are gone, replaced by new and eager generations of mares and stallions.

Equestria is, simply put, a different place now, a very dark and serious place.

In the last fifty years Equestria has undergone massive changes, both on a social, political and technological level, thanks to a period known as “the Golden Age”.

The Golden Age was a time of amazing discovery and development which brought the mostly rural and traditional Equestrian Kingdom into an age of information and technology.

It was a glorious age inadvertently caused by a wondrous drug called “Party-Time Mint-als” which was engineered by one of the original six heroines of Equestria, the wielder of the element of laughter, Pinkie Pie.

This drug boosted the intelligence of the pony using it and made it more perceptive, while it was viewed with great suspicion at first the drug soon became popular with idealists and scientists all over Equestria shortly after the passing of Pinkie Pie, the day of her death came to be known as the official “start” of the Golden Age of Equestria.

The unregulated use of this drug soon resulted in discoveries that simply “bumped” the Equestrian Kingdom from an early industrial age to an advanced information age, it changed the lives of everypony, society itself changed, traditions and old norms were forgotten and left behind.

This Golden Age didn’t only affect the pony kingdom however, it soon spread to the Griffon and Zebra kingdoms as well and they too eventually benefited from all the great effects the age had to offer.

The improved technologies meant that more ponies could be sustained by the the Equestrian Kingdom, this resulted in a population boom that increased the number of ponies tenfold, mares and stallions grew confident that their children would have a secured future in the vast cities that were appearing all over Equestria and thus had little issues with finding a partner and starting large families (especially so due to ponies naturally social and cheerful nature).

This increase in everything had its drawbacks however; with the massive cities and ever growing population, the industry of Equestria found itself at a need for more resources, for more power.

The projected amount of resources believed to be available to the Equestrian industry were running dangerously low, hundreds of industries were forced to shut down, leaving hundreds of thousands of ponies unemployed.

Slums began to form in the great metropolitanian areas in the larger cities, whole blocks fell into disrepair and a state of urban decay.

Riots and civil unrest became common occurrence, crime skyrocketed and was no longer limited to simple burglary and thievery as it had been in the centuries before, actual murders and darker cases of rape began flooding in to the police departments all around the cities.

Equestria was dying. Slowly.

Tearing itself apart from the inside with consumerism and economic crisis.

Princess Luna and Celestia would be forced to search for new lands to colonize in order to restore Equestria to her former glory, problem was, no one had discovered any new land in thousands of years, what had been found had already been claimed and colonized, the continent of Equestria had been fully explored and there was no sight of other land masses in the horizons.

The Kingdom of Equestria had to brave the oceans in search of new land, of new resources to power the Equestrian machine.

It was for this scope that a special wing of the equestrian military was created, a group called the “1st Recon Battalion” whose sole purpose would be to scour the seas in search of new lands.

Recruitment was restricted to volunteer pegasi only, and the 1500 positions available were quickly filled by willing recruits.

1200 combat personnel and 300 officers, drill sergeants, logistical operators and such.

It was agreed to be the most reasonable thing to do, after all it was quicker and safer to send skilled fliers across the ocean than it was to travel it by sea, Earth Pony ships were great, and could cross large distances quickly, but without any knowledge of how big the planet was or in which direction land could be found sending boats would simply be a risky and impractical endeavor.

Besides pegasi had shown a natural affinity and eagerness for combat and fighting in general and their wings gave them an amazing advantage over wingless opponents on open fields.

They were perfect candidates for an army of scouts.

The creation and equipment of a professional army however, even a small one, is expensive, and in Equestria’s current state the kingdoms coffers lacked the proper funds to finance an ambitious project of the sort.

It wasn’t just a matter of training another 1500 soldiers.

Special lightweight equipment would have to be made to allow maximum mobility and carrying capacity at minimum weight, the soldiers would also have to undergo special training just for this sort of mission, they would need the best possible communications tech to keep in touch with each other and mission command.

They would need the best of the best, capable of defending themselves and still wing it over massive distances.

With this in mind Celestia and Luna were simply forced to ask the great corporations and companies of Equestria for help and funding, and they agreed, but on the sole condition that they themselves would be in charge of the project and all it’s details.

With Celestia’s blessing the ‘Equestrian Military Board’ was founded, led by the leaders and owners of the largest companies in Equestria, such as Stable-Tec, ENI Gas & Petrol, Angel Pharmaceuticals, Warhorse Military Industries, Apple: Foods & Farming Co. and more.

They decided on everything and were always in close consultation with the new inexperienced generals and officers of the army.

But with the companies in charge the requirements set up by Celestia and Luna for the 1st Recon Battalion’s readiness before their mission were either changed or altered.

They were given little to no armor, their armament would consist in the rapid fire sub-machine guns and light pistols of the time and they would carry a minimal amount of supplies, instead of food they were given tubes of feeding paste to conserve as much space as possible.

The companies reasoned that since they were a recon unit, meant to search for new lands and not in the engaging of prolonged conflict, they would not need proper combat training, so most combat training was all but replaced by endurance boosting training sessions.

Several cuts were made to lessen the costs of Equestria's hope.

For five long years they trained, eventually being judged to be ready for the mission by the Military Board.

The board sent the full force of 1200 pegasi in all directions.

Time passed and nearly no news were heard from the Pegasi,.

Not until one dark day when a broken and battered force returned from the west with reports of horrors and despair.

Out of the 1200 pegasi sent overseas, only 672 returned, out of those, 4 had died on the journey home, 26 were mortally wounded (and did not survive treatment in the following weeks), 76 had suffered injuries of some sort and 397 were suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder on return, having “one hundred yard stares”, blank expressions and, suffering violent and terrible nightmares (waking up screaming and kicking for help).

Some even began to panic and shake violently when staring at the ocean horizon, even if it was nowhere in the same direction as the continent they had discovered.

Accounts vary greatly depending on who you asked in the 1st Recon Battalion, but what the therapists and interrogators managed to patch up was that the battalion had discovered an absolutely MASSIVE continent, featuring biomes of all kinds and huge swaths of untouched pristine “frontier land”, like something out of a fairytale.

One of the younger pegasi had claimed that at first glance he’d thought that he had died and came to pony heaven, ‘that’s how beautiful the land was’, he had claimed.

When the company that first discovered the continent set hooves on the ground to get a closer look they initially saw nothing but pristine lands, lush forests, great fields of green grass (that thing about ‘the grass being greener on the other side’ was all true they said), even benign wildlife typical to Equestria, rabbits, deer, birds.

There was no trace of anything being wrong anywhere.

The company had set basecamp in a very large jungle some ways from the coast and radioed the other battalion companies to continue searching for another week and then regroup at basecamp on the new continent, the company had communicated coordinates and everything seemed peaceful.

They had warned that there was a storm looming in the horizon, too much for 100 pegasi to deal with, and that communication may black out due to interference.

One week had passed and searching turned out to be fruitless, the companies all headed towards the basecamp to regroup and decide on further action, it took varying amounts of time for the companies to arrive at destination, but what the second company to arrive at the new continent had discovered was beyond horrifying.

The basecamp had been turned into a bloody mess, a slaughter.

The entire camp was in complete disorder, tents, barricades, makeshift huts and such were spread all over the place, some disassembled, some destroyed, some had fallen to the stormy weather conditions.

The storm was still raging on, enveloping the camp and the surrounding area in a very gloomy and gray atmosphere and “fog”, it was impossible to see beyond the first layer of trees surrounding the camp clearing.

There was mud everywhere, mud, mixed with thick crimson pools of blood and nearly unidentifiable red goop which presumably were the spilled guts of the previous company.

On trees, barricades and stockade poles were the carved up bodies of just under half the company, desecrated, strung up, skinned, dismembered, abused, nailed up in strange positions.

Some of the bodies had various sharp objects (including but not limited to rifle bayonets, combat knives, makeshift spears, the bones of other victims) still sunk into their abused flesh.

A torn up yellow mare, identified as the company leader Captain Solar Chaser, had been found in the command tent tied to the central table by all four hooves with a full length bayoneted rifle stuck right up her... best-non-mentioned parts all the way up to the very end of the rifle stock.

Whoever had done that had then carved open part of her chest revealing the bayonet and muzzle of the rifle, likely out of sick entertainment.

It had been a gut wrenching sight to behold, the soldiers reported.

Some soldiers broke down then and there, overcome with insanity and stress, others became twisted with sickness.

It wasn’t a sight anypony was used to, or should have been used to.

It wasn’t right.

The second company had found survivors in the camp, 6 ponies, 4 stallions and 2 mares.

Only one of the stallions had been in condition to speak or even react to outside influences, he had come out mentally scarred, incapable of keeping focused eye contact with his companions, but was otherwise reported to be fine with no serious injuries and all limbs intact.

His 5 surviving company comrades had not been so fortunate.

The stallions name had been Rain Rocker, his coat color had been of a very dark shade of green, his mane and tail had been black and his cutiemark was, befittingly, a very dark cloud and raindrops, apparently representing the monsoon in the jungles dividing the zebra lands from main Equestria.

He had a surprisingly calm demeanor for having survived such a brutal and savage attack.

He had informed the second company that he had been out foraging for supplies when “they” attacked, he said that he had hid under a rotten log and that he had seen a large number of “them” pass by towards the camp.

He said that “they” had then surrounded the camp wielding blowguns in perfect silence without alerting anypony and that “they” had then showered the entire camp in thousands of tiny sharp darts, catching the camp off guard and causing widespread confusion before charging in with knives, spears and teeth screaming like madmen.

When prompted to describe who “they” were and what “they” looked like he had muttered something along the lines of “... tall… pale skin... hairy legs... bipedal.. adorned in the bones and skulls of their kin...”

Rain Rocked had then gone completely blank, staring at a nonspecific point in the tent he had been questioned in. He never recovered from this state, he died of thirst nine days after questioning, refusing to move, eat, sleep or drink.

When the rest of the companies had arrived, the camp had been cleaned up, rebuilt and the dead had been respectfully buried at the best of the battalions ability, about half of first company was unaccounted for and many murmured and questioned the decision to bury Equestrias fallen in such an evil and desecrated place so far from home.

One pegasi had openly confronted the battalion commander and has been noted (double noted, triple noted, her whole phrase had been encircled and underlined several times with an ink pen, clearly by an officer who felt exactly the same thing as her) to have said:

“I used to think that if I died in an evil place, then my soul wouldn’t make it to heaven. But now... fuck. Sir, please, I don’t care WHERE it goes, as long as it ain’t here!”

The battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel Conrad Kurtz had firmly decided that the battalion go after whatever savages did this to first company, he had been met with much a fright and worry, some had argued that they weren’t prepared for it and that they should wing it back home, they had found their land.

But Kurtz had quelled everypony’s concern by giving a very reassuring and inspiring speech that... nopony remembered.

The camp was more well defended this time, a large area surrounding the camp had been cleared of trees and foliage, and the logs had been used to build a somewhat primitive raised dirt stockade supported by the logs behind which the defenders could take cover yet still easily spot the enemy.

Kurtz left 300 men defending the camp, the rest he marched deeper into the mainland, in part following trails that gave a hint of leading somewhere and in part basing his movements on the recon his aerial scouts provided (the bulk of the force went in on foot due to the thick canopy covering visibility of the ground and making any kind of visual on the enemy impossible).

After some days of traveling through the thick forests the battalion reached a large open area full of holes and burrows, on closer inspection the holes had been decorated with bones, covered up with hay, leaves, bamboo or solid wood. Clearly someone or something was living here and Kurtz was determined to make whoever lived there PAY for their crimes.

But the field of holes didn’t give off nearly as much as there was unfortunately and it ended in disaster, the rear part of the battalion was ambushed in force by “those” humanoid savages who had stormed out of holes and tunnels who had been hidden by the thick foliage surrounding the clearing.

As they soon had discovered, several KILOMETERS of the surrounding area was ridden with tunnels and holes, all of them filled with bloodthirsty savages to the brim.

The battalion panicked and split into several groups, the rear group had been completely overrun, the unfortunate first victims being almost immediately dragged away to be eaten or tortured by the hundreds of savages not actively fighting the battalion.

One group performed an organized tactical retreat into the woods heading in an eastward direction, trying to get over a river that ran a mere 15 kilometers from the clearing.

One smaller group of about 150 pegasi lead by a particularly brash, brazen (but incredibly buff) pegasus stallion named Silvester fell back on top of a hill right in the middle of the clearing, the entire group went out in a blaze of glory, screaming off the top of their lungs, unloading mag after mag into the hordes of savages while falling one by one to the thick showers of tiny darts and arrows.

The remainders broke out into total panic and scattered in all directions, some fleeing on foot into the jungle with bands of savages in heel, others ran into the holes and tunnels, some went out with a bang chucking grenades at the savages before going out with martyrdom.

The majority of these however, abandoned their mission and simply took to the skies, heading either further inland in search of safety or towards home, in hope that no one would find out about their desertion.

The group who had retreated over the river eventually managed to return to basecamp, having lost 50 or so more men just getting from the river and back to camp.

Immediately on return the pony that was now in charge, the mare Captain Flare Flicker, sounded a full retreat back to Equestria, the former Colonel and any stragglers presumed MIA or KIA.

When questioned about Colonel Kurtz group the answer was always the same:

No one knows what happened to the commander or his group.

It had simply disappeared without a trace in the confusing retreat and had never returned to basecamp.

They never came back to Equestria.

The fallout from this horror practically broke Equestrian morale.

The news had been very grim, companies were scared away, scrapping colonization plans, the interrogators and therapists remained shaken from the stories and reports coming from there.

That the veterans were then allowed free leave and honorary discharge from the military didn’t help the situation either, as they now began spreading word of the horrors there, telling their experiences and sides of the story to the media stations and general populace.

Many veterans killed themselves after their discharge, being unable to live on having witnessed such horrors. Their suicides often becoming the local story and hype.

Celestia took this the hardest of them all however, her very behavior and composure was shaken over what had happened, the media blamed HER for everything that happened, claiming that she intentionally sent all those soldiers to their deaths, despite the Military Board being the truly responsible for this horror.

Despite being the Ruler of the Kingdom, the Bringer of the Sun and Keeper of the peace for over a thousand years she became the most hated pony in all of Equestria, practically over a week.

Only the old generations who still lived showed heart and understanding such as Applebloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, the three elderly mares in charge of Stable-Tec, one of the major investors in the project did and tried at the best of their abilities to cover for her in the media, but to no avail.

They wouldn’t listen to a word of it and still blamed Celestia for their deaths, they wanted a scapegoat and they choose her.

There had been isolated cases throughout her long years of rulership, individual unfortunate accidents, murders, killings... even the recent crimes committed on the mainland…

It is inevitable, even for such peaceful friendly beings such as ponies... but there was nothing that could be compared on this scale, and they had never been tied to a decision she made.

Celestia became utterly convinced that it was entirely her fault and that the decision of sending all of those ponies through that hell had ultimately been her decision and her decision alone.

She reasoned that it hadn’t been one pony she had sent to its death for the greater good.

These were 528 deaths, caused by her decision to search for unknown lands, to appease the companies of her kingdom... she did not make the decision to save the kingdom from certain doom or to help someone in need. No. She had sent 528 of her people to painful slow deaths and scarred the rest for life... she did this... to secure non-vital resources... for money and the illusion of helping her people live a better life...

She was an errand girl, sent by grocery clerks, to collect a bill... only to discover that she was paying for it.

Celestia was never the same after the incident, she grew ever more distant and cold to her sister and her subjects, she would often lock herself in her royal chambers, meditating on her burden.

The media never gave her quarter, they never stopped their attacks, they used every dirty trick in the trade to portray her as a villain and murderer, they had regular interviews with relatives of the fallen soldiers, these often tended to be weeping mothers or sisters crying and sobbing on national television saying things along the lines of “My son has left a hole here in Cloudsdale that nopony can fill... I miss him dearly...” there were even regular hate campaigns against Celestia, sometimes the reporters would go and “randomly” interview somepony on the street that would usually just yell loudly at the camera swearing and being hurtful all to show how disappointed and disapproving everypony was of Celestia’s supposed crime…

On top of this political tension between the ponies and zebra kingdoms had begun to arise due to the ever decreasing amount of economic resources.

This wouldn’t have been a concern since ponies were a numerical majority on the continent of Equestria, but a foolish unicorn, Twilight Sparkle, one of the greatest sorcerers ever to grace Equestria had left a legacy that had changed the political landscape of Equestria forever...

During her older days she, just like most of her other five friends, had begun aspiring towards other goals, the elements of harmony were after all not central to their lives, they all had jobs and life goals besides “keeping the peace in Equestria”.

Twilight Sparkle dedicated herself almost entirely to the study of magic, she used her natural talent for magic to become one of the greatest sorcerers in Equestria and created many new powerful spells which are still used to this day.

With the help of her friend, an unicorn stallion named Kkat, she created the “Megaspell Network” which was a spell which in itself combined the powers of other spells for a greater effect.

She created this with the intention of using it for good, multiple healing spells for example could be combined to fully heal, and even revive a recently fallen pony, something which would otherwise not be possible or require multiple spellcasters and spells to achieve.

At first it was used just for that, mass healing and revival, mainly within healthcare and the military, but others saw the potential and began to perform testing with combined offensive spells.

This would result in the megaspell weapons which became capable of unprecedented levels of destruction, their effect being strong enough to wipe out entire cities.

Inevitably these weapons had made their way into zebra hooves in a combination of espionage and immigration of unicorn sorcerers to the Zebra Empire, they had had these weapons for decades but had never had the necessity to use them.

But now things were changing, resources needed for modern day production were becoming dangerously limited, trading prices were spiking through the roof and the zebras were now beginning to send “subtle hints” about their megaspell arsenal, sending diplomats and liaisons that “suggested” that Celestia hand over certain resources to avoid any “diplomatic incidents”, and she had been forced to comply in order to avoid a war and preserve the peace.

With all this pressure on her it was no surprise that she reacted the way she did.

We all have limits of how much abuse we can take, sometimes we can’t always make the right moral decisions, mental stress sometimes clouds the border between good and evil choices and when we do reach that border even inherently good angels like Celestia can let their clouded judgment get the better of them. Everypony has a breaking point, you and I have, Celestia reached hers with a bang that changed everything.

One day Celestia was heading out to make a public appearance, to answer some of the media’s questions, in an attempt to calm the public and apologize yet again.

But it didn’t go as smoothly as she had wished it to go and one reporter went a bit too harsh on her.

She snapped.

She had had enough of the reporters harassing her and treating her like they did, so she had simply grabbed the nearest camera and with the force of all her magic rammed it right into the face of the reporter that she had taken the most offense from, turning the reporters face into a pulpy mass and killing him instantly.

Before anypony could take in the shock and realization of what had just happened Celestia had cast another spell, a magical blast of sickly green energy enveloped the press and bystanders, imbuing them with a paralyzing fear of Celestia which forced them all to bend their knees in submission.

She announced that from hereby on the Royal Kingdom of Equestria would now be a dictatorship, any more abuse from the media regarding the QUEEN or HER regime would not be tolerated, anyone resisting to this change or attempts to instigate rebellion would be executed on site, personally by the queen herself.

Anyone feeling the want or need to immediately and swiftly emigrate from Equestria would be obliged...

But everyone had known exactly where she meant by that.

She would never allow emigration into the zebra or griffon lands.

It didn’t take long after this announcement before Celestia sent a large detachment of the old Equestrian Army via large cruiser ships to conquer the continent overseas.

A mere few months after that ponies started to simply “disappear” from society, while their disappearance was never directly explained it was implied that ponies disappearing were being deported to the new continent, this went on for about a couple of years without much being said about it, everypony knew, but it became the kind of taboo subject that you never spoke about.

During these two years the Equestrian police force was gradually phased out and replaced with a much more oppressive and ruthless “Civil Protection” (sometimes refered to as Canterlot Police by outsiders). Civil Protection was an oppressive paramilitary “thought police” whose purpose was to suppress the population and act as civil spies, Civil Protection had no tolerance for criminals and political instigators and those arrested by CP were often never heard from again.

During this time her sister, princess Luna who was horrified by her kind sister’s sudden change in behavior and cruelty, desperately tried to reason with her, but to no avail.

One day, after a particularly heated disagreement Celestia banished her sister back to the moon, an action which became the center of much discussion and fear in Equestria, the first real murmurs of discontent started after that and the number of ponies disappearing increased tenfold.

For the ten years that passed since that no one moved as much as a hair or muscle in public against Queen Celestia and no one said anything about her regime or the changes she was making to Equestria, those who did “disappeared”, as with all ponies resisting her rule.

Celestia worked quickly and made much use of her powers, another major change she performed was the foundation of four new branches of the army which replaced the general army.

These new army branches were Infantry, Armor and Air Force which dealt with infantry forces, tanks and armor and aircraft respectively and Overwatch, a balanced versatile mix of infantry, light vehicles and helicopters whose task was to help in colonization efforts on the new continent.

She was often in communication with the zebras, she had let them on early on about her plan to force some of her people to colonize the savage and dangerous continent across the sea and she welcomed the zebra to take their share of the cake, in exchange for some economic collaboration until colonies were properly established.

She had become more daring in her meetings and had risked war twice already by pushing the diplomatic boundaries, but the Zebra leaders respected her and agreed to her terms, and the economic collaboration coupled with the colonization efforts overseas soon restored Equestria’s economy as was originally intended. Industries could finally reopen, new companies beginning to surface once again, unemployment rates were back to the rates of the early Golden Age.

But life under Celestia’s iron rule had become harsh and miserable, a great many freedoms were taken away from the population and the intrusive surveillance of Civil Protection was everywhere, many argued that the new economic bloom had come at too high of a price.

This constant state of unhappiness slowly corrupted the ponies of Equestria, making them a rather twisted and extreme kind no longer bound by the same social barriers and guidelines of before.

Swearing is no longer as taboo as it was merely 50 years ago, crime happens regularly, despite CP’s swift retaliation, a great deal of the populace uses some form of drug, downtown partying is out of control and the parties often end up becoming all sorts of ‘wrong’.

Robbers, murderers, rapists, junkies, addicts, madmen.

Everyone gets a free citizenship to the hell loosely known as ‘The Frontier’, with things looking so gloom and with many of the freedoms ponies took for granted not too long ago taken away many apparently don’t seem to have anything to lose, many commit crimes simply to be shipped overseas, wishing for to get as far away from Celestia as possible.

The Equestrian Kingdom is no longer the idyllic society and land we once knew it as, it has become a dystopian grim cold reality from which everypony tries to escape from one way or another.

This is the tale of evil that I wish to tell you, this is my take on pony dark/grim fics.

Welcome, welcome to My Little Pony: Slaves to Celestia.

Four CP agents wearing the iconic white metallic gas mask over a black Kevlar suit of armor are charging up the stairs of an apartment building, it’s in miserable shape, the very walls are consumed by decay, trash, needles and pests lie in every corner, it is a place for true junkies and scum.

Crackdown raids in apartments such as these were a regular occurrence; no one paid much heed to the agents.

“*Get the fuck out of the way.*” the masked gravelly voice of the lead agent crackled through his mask as he pushed a spaced out junkie down the stairs.

“*This the place?*” one of the agents asked hinting towards a half rotten door with the number tag 13 hanging upside down.

“*Yes. Stack up.*” the lead agent confirmed, the four agents formed up by the sides of the door, preparing to charge in with electric batons ready.

1... 2... 3...

*CRACK* The door fell over with a mighty thud.

“*CIVIL PROTECTION! DROP DOWN ON YOUR BELLY AND REACH YOUR HOOVES FORWARD!*”

But the resident inside did nothing, she was already on the floor, surrounded by several empty psycho stim syringes, her coat had turned into a discolored pale of red and black and she seemed to be on the verge of passing out into a psycho drug overdose.

The lead agent sheathed his baton, walked up to the mare and flipped her over on her back, she was far gone, drool was sipping from the corner of her mouth and she was bleeding from her nose and ears.

He gently shook her head to get her to regain a bit of consciousness, she opened her eyes and for a brief moment his eyes met with hers, they were of the deepest red and purple, calling helplessly for mercy.

The agent grabbed her forelegs and shackled them and then pulled her up from the floor.

“*Walk.*” the agent ordered, the pale mare wobblingly began to follow him without arguing.

“*We’ll get you fixed up back at the precinct.*”