The Awesome Pony Rp : Equestria Divided (IC)
Posted: Fri Jun 23, 2017 7:37 am
Equestria, the diverse, powerful and once-expansive land of ponies, has become a patchwork of states in the wake of the Fourth Pony-Changeling War. While Princesses Celestia and Luna still control the heavenly bodies of their cutie marks (as it is a little hard to divide up the light of the sun or the gravity of the moon), their political domain has been cut down to a small piece in the center of the continent (and a tiny one on the west coast). Now they have many neighbor leaders their equals--not just alicorns, but regular unicorns, earth ponies, pegasi, and even one entity who prefers the form of a draconequus. Their ideologies are diverse, economies varied, and cultures unique.
Yet there are a small but growing number that long for the old order. Many more, however, do not want to rejoin Equestria so soon, and some believe their differences, long festering for a thousand years, prove that the old order was not workable. But some of the most prominent in Equestria do not believe it, and wish to convince them otherwise...
Ponyville
In ten years Ponyville grew from a sleepy, rural village with a large crystal castle dwarfing much smaller thatched houses as, in one critic's words, "a beautiful eyesore," to a bustling city of nearly 100,000 with granite apartment blocks and a couple of mid-rise office towers seemingly trying to reach the top of the crystal castle. Its once dirt roads were now almost fully in cobblestone, and the diversity of its denizens, already remarkable for a small town, had grown even more pronounced, with at least one small neighborhood of nearly every major species, and enclaves of artists, young professionals, and businessponies forming vibrant social circles.
The crystal castle, of course, was the home of Princess Twilight Sparkle, who as the Princess of Friendship was delighted by the town's diversity and active civic culture. Now in her early thirties, she still retained her normal build despite being an alicorn for over ten years. She also retained her optimism of the power and magic of friendship. At times she wished she had done more to stop Equestria from splitting apart over what she saw as either trivial disputes, narrow-minded ideologies, or simple raw, unreasoned animus against the Other. She had met with a few activists advocating for Equestria's reunification here and there and donated to their cause, but her work as Equestria's Public Mediator for Friendship Disputes kept her from pursuing any more action personally.
She also had her children. Though not yet married, Twilight nonetheless was the mother of a tight-knit group of seven young adults and teenagers, comprising two unicorns, Bounty Hunt and Pitch Black, one changeling, Olive Oil, one griffin, Black Hawk, one bat pony, Eclipse, one zebra, Zelenka, and one earth pony, Spot. Taking care of them was demanding--especially Bounty and Pitch, both extraordinarily talented in magic, at times even more so than Twilight, who hungered for ever more complex magical lessons as the years went on. She saw all of them through their education, their sports leagues, and their journeys in identity, supporting them and providing guidance (with the occasional discipline). Yet even in the stresses in parenting, she saw in her children a microcosm of the Equestria she wished that were.
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One balmy early summer morning Twilight was in her bedroom checking her schedule for the next couple of weeks. Aside from the usual time slots for addressing neighbor nuisances or social awkwardness, she had a concert on Friday to the Ponyville Philharmonic, to which she never donated but still received free box seats in the mezzanine. Then on Saturday Pitch Black would go to his visit his biological father, Potter Black, a pegasus deputy in Equestria's Parliament, for a week. Black Hawk and Eclipse would come home from the Wonderbolts Academy for summer vacation on Sunday. She regretted not being able to go to the end-of-year demonstration exams, and planned a big party for what she heard were stellar performances. Spot would be off to Varsity Colt Scouts summer camp the week after that, to a forest just outside of Whinnyapolis that was supposedly very beautiful. She was still pondering whether it would be right for her to join up with him--she was especially close to her youngest son, and she wanted to see the pristine waterfalls and lakes that dotted the area, but she felt that he still needed to grow out of his homesickness and not delay it by propping him up. She had joined him in camp on several occasions, especially when he was a younger Colt Scout, and though she enjoyed it, it got tiring after a while, especially with Spot being a little on the "needy" side.
Her reading was interrupted by a belch in the next room. It was followed by a faint whoosh of sparkles--which told her several things.
But she let Spike tell her.
The small purple dragon assistant knocked on her door. "Come in!" she said, and immediately turned around from her table.
Spike opened it and walked in, carrying a scroll with a royal seal. He looked a little disoriented from the belch. "Ugh. I felt like I was holding it all night," he said, as he handed the scroll to Twilight.
"It is a little early..." replied Twilight. She then opened the seal and read the letter from not just a royal but her former mentor--Princess Celestia herself.
Crystalopolis, the Crystal Empire
The Crystal Empire and the Republic of Cataract were especially close allies, and President Smoky Topaz's frequent state visits to Princess Cadence's realm confirmed it. The two nations shared a progressive view of changelings (and comprehensive integration policies to match), a deep commitment to civil rights (though the Empire had a few notable exceptions), and a dedication to more equal distribution of their nation's wealth (though the Empire preferred socialism, and Cataract a neo-corporatist social market economy to achieve that). Cadence, of course, still exercised a lot of unilateral (though not limitless) legislative and executive power over her citizens, while Smoky's powers were purely executive, but the difference in political styles did not outweigh their overall outlook about their countries and their relationship with the world.
Today Smoky came to see the new supercomputer that was just installed at the Office for the Economy to help better plan resource distribution for the Empire. Her nation's engineers had built it pursuant to the Treaty of Friendship the Empire and Cataract had signed about eight years ago. Even when it was part of Equestria, the cities of Vanhoofer, Tall Tale, and Tackoma were pioneers in the still nascent field of information technology, and Cataract's liberalized regulations on the industry (having been long constrained by technoskeptics in the Agrarian and Blue parties of Equestria) and massive grants and subsidies had accelerated the development of machines with great computing power, even greater than the databases that were at bureaus in Equestria. Princess Cadence needed such power to remedy the flood of data and calculations that bureaucrats at the Economy Office warred over, and evaluating the nuances herself overwhelmed her (and she was no economist herself). For its part, the Empire would provide Cataract its military protection, freeing up billions of bits in Cataract's budget and giving the Empire military more excursion opportunities.
The two leaders were led by the Head Minister for the Economy Office, Longbasket, to a high-vaulted room with rows of cabinets filled with processor cores, its sleek metal complementing the crystal aesthetics of the room. He gave his best, least technical description of how the machine worked as he could.
"... and sometimes we'll run the allocation program in labor-hour, market simulation, and calculation-in-kind modes simultaneously, and average out all of the outputs the models suggest. I'll have to say, Madame President, your programmers have been quite remarkable and diligent in setting up the algorithms for our economists."
"Thank you," smiled Smoky.
"We haven't solved every problem, of course--innovation modeling is turning out to be a bit hard to quantify."
"Well, you can't predict what you don't know about," chuckled Smoky. "But I wish them the best of luck."
Longbasket nodded. "I do too. Well, I have a meeting coming up soon. I'd let you run a few calculations if it were up to me but of course the manual's proprietary information--and like I said, the operation's not all that intuitive." He led them back out the room, and left the two leaders for his meeting.
Princess Cadence looked back at the rows of processors, nodding in its marvels. "I'll have to thank you again, President Topaz," she said. "The Crystal Ponies take pride in their economic system, but we need to be more sophisticated in this competitive age, and I'm sure this machine will help us keep up--especially with your nation," she winked.
Smoky blushed a little. "I've always taken a win-win view of things whenever possible," she said.
"And that's what makes you such a great leader," said Cadence. "It's sad that you're going to be out so soon."
"Well, the people wanted a two term limit, and they got it," said Smoky. "I'll admit, I'm kind of jealous that you're on the Empire throne for life. But I'm sure the Cataracts will find a great successor to me."
"I hope they will," smiled Cadence. The two stood awkwardly silent for a moment, as if they realized they were getting off track. Finally, Cadence spoke up. "By the way, how are the investigations going on Baysie-Tackoma?"
"Lethe won't confirm or deny that the group crossed our borders, much less that it ordered the attack," said Smoky. "And they seem indifferent to the fact that those changelings were my citizens."
"I am not surprised," sighed Cadence. "But we shouldn't be turning a blind eye to wanton killings of changelings anywhere."
"I know. But Lethe's a real threat to us. Even Manehattan isn't going around looking for changelings to kill. It'll only be a matter of time before the All-Maker actually sends armies out to our hills and strike every colony and hive they know of."
"Well, if it does come to that, the Crystal Guard's there for you."
"Well, that's another thing," Smoky hesitated. "There's only one base in the Tackoma area, and a small one. Meanwhile there's several known sizable colonies around there, and a couple hundred Guards wouldn't be able to defend all of them fast enough. If you could send some more Guards to that area I'd greatly appreciate it. Believe it or not, one of the bigger candidates for the next presidential election is calling for Cataract raising its own army."
"I'll see what I can do," nodded Cadence. "My defense minister seems to think that an invasion of us is more likely than yours. You might want to talk to him, too." She then rubbed her chin with her hoof. "Although... we might wait until that summit that Princess Celestia's calling to see if we can't get Lethe to keep their massacres to themselves." She almost threw up upon saying that last phrase--compromise on genocide was just not tolerable to even contemplate. She knew she would do everything to cajole the All-Maker to stop calling for murder--and even that seemed like conceding too much.
Smoky frowned and raised an eyebrow. "Hmm. You think so? The All-Maker's thousands of years old; he's not going to change his ways. He's indifferent to international norms, and it's our luck he hasn't done more already. No matter what comes out of that summit, there's going to be war."
"I still have my hopes," said Cadence.
"Besides... I think that Celestia just wants to try to convince us to rejoin Equestria again. That's not going to happen on my watch, and no one I know back home wants that."
"You really don't trust her, do you?"
"She's always been a little underhooved in her dealings, as if to make up for her failings as a real leader," Smoky groaned slightly. "You remember the split-up started when she tried to sneak an exemption for the Empire in the Peace of Canterlot?"
"I don't blame her," Cadence quavered.
"Maybe, but she could have been more assertive against the Temple. I'd say they never should have been at the bargaining table in the first place."
"Well, we can't do anything about that now," replied Cadence. She didn't want to say it, but she thought Smoky's memory was clouded. Equestria had to fight both the Temple and Chrysalis' Changeling Empire, and it was just not realistic to suddenly direct all resources against the Temple, in several ways even more powerful than the Changeling Empire. Deep down, she too agreed that Celestia's compromise was a deep moral failure, but even she feared that sticking to their principles would have ended up much worse for Equestria. Ten years later, the decision was still hard to swallow.
After a moment of strained reflection, the two decided to wrap up. "I'm going to give Celestia the benefit of the doubt, and you should too. I'm sure the meeting will work out fine."
"We'll see," replied Smoky, and the two parted for the day.