NNNRRRRRAAAAAAGGGGHHHH-I WANT TO PUNCH GENERAL ESTEEM IN THE FACE!!!!
Author: AestheticB
Long ago, in the magical land of Equestria, there lived a powerful King and his dark Queen. Immortal and ignorant, their end came at the hooves of their daughters, Celestia and Luna, who sought to build a better future for ponykind.
Now ponykind’s old gods have returned.
Twilight Sparkle is trapped inside her own mind, slave to a cruel and impulsive consciousness built from everything she is not. Powerless and voiceless, she must find a way to stop the being that calls itself Nihilus from destroying everything she holds dear.
Luna is tasked with assembling the remaining Elements of Harmony in hopes of freeing their leader. For if ponykind is to have any hope, it is in Twilight Sparkle. And if Twilight Sparkle is to have any hope, it is in her five friends.
Facing her father in mortal combat, Celestia must do everything she can to ensure that ponykind has the tools to survive before she falls. With inevitable defeat bearing down upon her, she makes the first move in the oldest and deadliest game known to creation.
Will the Drill Sergeant be able to contain his Command Hand of Fury long enough to give this fic its due? Find out after the jump!
The Immortal Game (Word Count: 297,261) (Holy crap!)
Heya, folks! Okay, this is an old one that just recently finished... after over a year. Wow, and I felt bad when I went a week without updating my story! Anywho, if you didn't know, the original title of this was Ponies Make War, and aren't you glad he changed it? No offense author, but the word "ponies" is like "bunnies" or "puppies," it's impossible to use in any kind of foreboding way. If I had clicked on Ponies Make War, I would have expected a light-hearted comedy romp about a water balloon fight breaking out at a picnic.
STORY: Everything you love about Equestria is BUBAR (and yes, I did just ponify the oldest military slang around. You're welcome). Celestia and Luna's mommy and daddy, King Titan and Queen Terra, return and proceed to have the mother of all dysfunctional family reunions. Seriously, these ponies make the Manson family look like the Cleavers. Celestia is imprisoned and tortured, Titan starts messing with... basically everything in the world, Luna escapes, and she and the Mane Six must become warriors and fight a guerrilla-style war against a literal god and his army of mindless puppets for the fate of Equestria. What follows is basically the darkest, grimmest story that I am willing to read. This fic touches on things that I usually can not handle reading about: mind control, subjugation, manipulation, torture, excessive violence, and general bad feelings. The hitch is it's presented in such a compelling way and wrapped is an exceedingly tight narrative that you can't help but love it... kinda. I have two big issues with the story:
1. The plot line with Rarity and her father. Okay, spoilers that is totally not a spoiler, General Esteem is Rarity's birth father. From what we see, he wasn't exactly father of the year material: he beat them, forced her to learn the art of bladecasting and sparred with her until he almost killed her, and probably killed his wife/Rarity's mom, which is why she and Sweetie ended up with Magnum. This isn't an issue. In fact, it's a prime source for some great character moments for Rarity. The problem is, when the time comes to finish Esteem's arc, and I will not tell you if he lives or dies, but when that time comes, it is resolved not by Rarity, but by Twilight. Now, I understand that Twilight had good motivation for hating Esteem; what he did to her was... ugh, but that was over the course of several months. Rarity had to deal with him for years! He killed her mother, abused her and her sister! Why didn't she get to end his run in the story? We are presented with all this pain and trauma that she suffered at his hooves, but the only "final showdown" she gets is they have their epic sword battle, she almost loses, then gets in a one-liner before running off! Granted, it's an awesome one-liner, the kind that is still sore after the weekend, but still Esteem, for the most part, shrugs it off, so in reality, she had no impact! I get that the author wanted a reason for Rarity to be a BAMF with a blade, but why bring this up at all if we don't get the catharsis of seeing her finally beat him? I get that Twilight is the focus of the story as a whole, but that doesn't mean she's the only one with an axe to grind.
It's a trope that I find very irritating: that only the main character can solve any problem. All the other girls get their moments to shine, yes, but when it comes down to the wire, Twilight always deals the finishing blow. If I'm being honest, it's almost a bit insulting to the other characters. They grow into these strong, capable warriors, but at the end of the day, Twilight is the one who gets to end the fights. Look, I can think of a bunch of great reasons as to why Rarity is OP with a blade without needlessly tying her to one of the main villains. It just seemed like a pointless plot thread as it is presented.
2. This story is all about showing the girls reacting to the horrors of war, which is awesome. Taking characters we know and love and putting them in situations that they can never be in in the show is why I love fan fiction. But there is one horror that the author skips around: none of the Mane Six ever kill a living pony, with a few notable exceptions. No, see they kill "puppets," constructs made by Queen Terra and not actually living things. This makes me scratch my head a bit. This had to be a conscious decision by the author, he had to plan for them to never be forced to kill large amounts of ponies. He puts the girls through the wringer in a big way; Twilight and Rainbow Dash are subjected to the most violating form of subjugation, Applejack has to deal with the trauma of basically dying over and over again, but he doesn't have them kill. Why? Is it because you want them to save that last bit of innocence? So, we can beat, torture and mind rape them, but don't have them kill. This is a big cop-out in my opinion. I can tell you that one of the hardest things about combat is having to take another human being's life. It is, arguably, the most horrible of the "horrors of war," and to allow the girls to skip it is kinda cheap.
My only other issue is with the "official" ending, being that the epilogue that just recently came out. It further makes it look like all the other Mane Six are irrelevant, or not as important. As for Twilight, well... once more, I spoil nothing, but... really, guy? We're gonna end with that tired trope? I have my ideas on better ways, but I make it a rule never to say how a fic should have ended. Things in the middle is one thing, but I will never second guess an author for his choice in ending... mostly.
CHARACTERS: All of the canon characters are handled superbly. As I said, the story as a whole is focused on Twilight, and her character growth is excellent. Seeing the girls reacting to the trauma they go through is very touching and striking, almost to the point where it seems a bit excessive, but only because they are so in character that you hate seeing bad things happen to them, another sign that the author is on his game. My only true issue with the characters is when Twilight finishes off one main villain a bit too sadistically, and takes a bit too much pleasure in doing so. I get that she's pissed, but I can't see her being that violent, even with all she's been through.
But, the best part of this section, and where this story truly succeeds, is the villains. They are pitch perfect, completely despicable and unsympathetic. King Titan is cold and uncaring, as you would imagine a god would be. Queen Terra is savage and cruel, having been driven insane by Titan subjecting her to... the Insanity. Hmm, what a coinkydink. Nihilus is sadistic and wild, taking great pleasure in torturing Twilight. But the crowning achievement in the villain department is General Esteem. He is, in my humble opinion, the single most loathsome character I have ever read in poni fiction. His every action is an affront to ponykind. He is ruthless, devious, manipulative and frigid. Even months after I first read it, when I think about the things he did to Twilight and the girls, I get mad, like hand-shaking mad, and once you learn his true role in this series of events, you will, too. The author created a character that succeeds in hitting every button you have in making you hate this guy...
...which is also the problem with him. The only way to make him so perfect was to make him completely over the top. For real, Jim Carrey, Robin Williams, and Dana Carvey in an Alabama meth lab couldn't be as over the top as this guy. It's nothing you really notice when reading, another sign of the author's competence, but when you walk away and think about it for a few minutes, it really takes the piss out of him. Example: one of the things that makes ponies so scared of him is that he filed his teeth down to fangs and he eats meat. At first glance, that's so cool, and intimidating. But when you think about it for a bit, you realize that he's an herbivore... that eats meat. He must get the most wicked-bad gas you could ever imagine! Seriously, no wonder his troops charge valiantly into battle, they're trying to get away from his stank ass!
Esteem: Cadet!
Cadet: Yes, General?
Esteem: I want you to take your forces into the city and—
pooooot
Esteem: ...that was the cushion I'm laying on.
Cadet: Of cou—coughhack—Of course it was, sir. Oh dear god, my eyes, they burn!
Now, you may look at his actions and say, "Oh, well, he's crazy." No, no, no, no! Nihilus is crazy. Queen Terra is crazy. This guy is batsh*t! One of the things he loves the most is to be covered in the blood of his enemies. And at one point, he smears blood all over Rarity... then apologizes because it doesn't match her mane.
o_O
We're supposed to be afraid of this guy?! He's like two steps away from building sand castles with his own poop!
STYLE AND GRAMMAR: Grammar is spotless, from what I can see, which is to be expected. This was one of the first big fics on Equestria Daily, so you know this guy knows what he's doing.
The only points I really take off for style related to the fact that he has a tendency to over explain things, to the point where it breaks the flow of the story. Example: Queen Terra is having the epic final battle with Twilight Sparkle, and Twi starts building her "God Killing Weapon." Now, I get that we need to see how she does this, but it goes on WAY too long, like a page and a half of laying out how this works. It really interrupted the battle with this awkward science lesson that didn't add enough to the overall narrative to warrant it.
OVER ALL AWESOMENESS: Now, reading all the things I just typed, you must think, "Wow, he must hate this story!"
No. Not just no, but hell no. Not just hell no, but emphatically hell no.
See, every story has flaws, even the best-selling novels. The question is do those flaws override the enjoyability of the story? And for this story the answer is unquestionably, undeniably hell no. I can say without hesitation that this is one of the top five, if not top three stories in the Brony fandom. The pace is amazing, the plot is gripping, the characters are epic. From the second the hammer drops, like six or seven paragraphs into the first chapter, you are going to be on the edge of your seat.
I've harped many times that a story needs to hook you emotionally, and that is where this story stands above most others. This fic is going to get to your heart and your head. When I first reads this, the first time we met Nihilus and she did what she did to who she did it to (spoilers, lawlz), I had to get up, go outside and smoke a cigarette to calm myself down. I was so angry, I felt bad that I was getting that worked up over a fictional character. Of course, the flipside of that is that upon completion of the Nihilus story arc, I was bouncing up and down in my chair, screaming, "YES! YES!! BUCK YEAH, MOTHERBUCKER!! TASTE THE RAINBOW, BEEYOTCH!!!" And before you ask, yes, that did happen at work, and yes, the privates were staring, and yes, I smoked the crap out of them.
Y'all, I'm gonna be real with you: this story inspired me. Like, after I read it, I felt like I needed to go practice and study, that I had to step my game up if I wanted to write like this. It didn't inspire me to want to write poni fiction, but it did inspire me to want to write poni fiction better.
Y'all, I'm gonna be real with you: this story inspired me. Like, after I read it, I felt like I needed to go practice and study, that I had to step my game up if I wanted to write like this. It didn't inspire me to want to write poni fiction, but it did inspire me to want to write poni fiction better.
Yes, it has issues, but you would be doing yourself a serious disservice if you didn't read this one. Fair warning, it is about as Grimdark as you can get without getting into "Cupcakes" territory, with scenes of torture, bloody violence, and mental subjugation. The actions taken by the villains with make your blood boil, the things the girls are forced to do will make you want to weep. But if you can tough it out, the triumphs are so satisfying that it's all worth while. So, what other rating could this possibly get besides...
AestheticB, congratulations, you wrote one of the finest stories I've read in the fandom. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've gotten so worked up by thinking about General Esteem that I need to go break off some privates.
What? I quit smoking, how else am I supposed to relieve stress?
PONY STRONG, HOOAH!
From front to rear, disappear!
