“That was the best party ever! I am so glad you invited me Moondancer!” Trixie said sweetly, a smile plastered on her face as she walked back to her room with her two friends.
“I’m so glad you could come Trixie! I know it’s not very often that you have time to go to these little things.”
“Yeah, being Princess Celestia’s personal protege makes one pretty busy!” Trixie chuckled proudly, her calm stride becoming more of a strut.
“Wow, I’d imagine so!” Colgate agreed quickly, grinning at the pale blue unicorn. “I guess we’d better let you get back to your studies huh?”
Trixie gave a dramatic sigh. “Yes, yes, you are quite right. I have a lot ahead of me today. I’ll talk to you girls later, bye-bye!” She called back at them sweetly as she began to climb the stairs to her study.
“Bye Trixie!”
“See ya Trixie!”
She gave them one last wave goodbye halfway up the stairs, before speeding up and quickly stepping through the door and shutting it behind her. The second the door clicked shut, the smile disappeared for a disgusted and bored look to take its place.
“Ugh, bye-bye? How much more cutesy and stupid could I act?” Trixie muttered mockingly to herself, dropping the party favours to scatter across the floor.
I’ll play nice just like Celestia wants, wave and smile and act like a little darling… That’s simply the rule of politics and nobles. Celestia does it herself. She remembered with a bit of a cruel smile.
“Why helllooo~ Sir Darkfrost, so wonderful to see you again!” Trixie strutted over to a black statue, as she imitated Celestia’s voice and pose that the Princess always held when greeting a noble. “Oh, and Lady Tiara! Beautiful as always! How are the children?” She continued her act as she addressed a bust of a famous unicorn.
“Ha! You strut and stride dear Sir and Madam,” Trixie laughed, her tone now her own once again, prideful and mocking, “but I, as the Princess’s private pupil, can tell by the emptiness in her eyes that she would like nothing more than to knock you both down a notch or two! And I would like nothing more than to do it myself, now that I think about it. Hmph.”
With a small grumble she walked over to where her textbooks had been neatly stacked. Despite being on a break, she had fallen rather sorely behind in her studies of certain subjects. Even as she began to sort through the work, she was still muttering to herself about the nobles that irked her so.
“Not that I’m allowed to… Instead, I play nice, and smile pretty, and act soooo cute. But, I suppose if the Princess can do it, so can I…” As she spoke, a flash of soft magic lifted the topmost textbook to float down to eye level.
“What I’m not sure I can do is plow through this crap. Predictions and Prophecies. Who cares about this stuff, really? I just don’t get why Celestia thinks it’s so important that I read all this mythology junk… Let alone make it a required course for me…” Trixie gave a loud groan as she carried the book over to her favorite bean-bag chair. “But I suppose if she cares about this so stinking much… I’ll… try and… read the stupid thing…” She grumbled, flipping the old tome open.
She soon discovered how behind in her studies she really was, because she very quickly was in need of more and more books, as references to other legends and myths went flying over her head. Within the hour, she was surrounded by almost all of the books that used to be on her desk, as she darted from one to the other trying to figure out the various tales. Knowing Celestia I will be tested on all this… Urghh~ None of this crap makes any sense! My brain hurts! I wanna quit! I wa-
The soft flutter of fiery wings and cheerful chirrup of Sapphira broke Trixie out of her mental whining. Trixie stared at her bird for a stunned second, before a mixture of hope and worry filled her eyes and voice.
“Is that a letter for me, Sapphira?” Another chirrup answered her positively, and Trixie quickly trotted over to take the scroll that was clutched tightly in her phoenix’s talons.
“Please don’t be an exam alert, please don’t be an exam alert, please be literally anything else.” Trixie pleaded under her breath, before gently unrolling the scroll and reading it aloud out of habit.
“My Dearest Student Trixie. I am so glad that you took my advice and went to Moondancer’s party. I hope you had an enjoyable time, but you aren’t too tired to help me with the upcoming Summer Sun Celebration…” Trixie suddenly beamed. “YES! Goodbye dusty books, hello Road Trip! Where is it this year? Let’s see…” Her eyes scanned through the letter again to find the answer to her question.
“Ponyville? Never heard of it… Oops, better not say that too loud, eh Sapphira? I might get more Geography lessons if I do.” Trixie chuckled, and her bird cocked its head at her in bemusement.
Turning back to the letter, Trixie read aloud the last paragraph. “I also have one extra-special assignment for you…” Confusion and a hint of irritation was visible on her face as her eyes reached the last three words on the page.
“Make some friends.”
Even as the golden chariot winged through the sky to Ponyville, and amazing scenery passed her by, Trixie’s thoughts were still solely on the last three words of the scroll in the bag at her feet.
‘Make some friends.’ I don’t know what Celestia is going on about this time, I simply don’t. I have friends, she knows that! There’s Moondancer, and Sparkler, and… Even as she tried to convince herself otherwise, Trixie knew that Celestia was correct in her unspoken statement. What she had with those girls was not a friendship, but rather a fragile, artificial thing that was little more than the friendly exchange of greetings and praises as each acted out the manners and smiles of a noblemare’s role.
Well I don’t need friends. I’ve got Sapphira, and… Celestia, right? She always listens to me, and cheers me up when I’m scared and depressed, and when I’m so frustrated that I just end up crying, she always makes me laugh… That’s a friend too, right? That’s good enough for me then. I don’t need some dumb hick filly following me around and being all… I don’t know. I’ll help Celestia with this just as she asked me, and then I’ll go home and if Celestia’s all done with her duties as well, maybe we can even play a game together… Trixie snickered a little to herself. After a long day, that usually doesn’t take much leg pulling.
With a gentle thump the carriage landed and drew to a slow stop. Trixie took a deep breath, and grabbed her saddlebag, before hopping out. Her eyes slowly looked around Ponyville, and she began to realize that just because this was indeed a small town in comparison to Canterlot, there was still going to be plenty of walking involved today. Oh well. Trixie decided with a shrug. I guess I’ll be working off that Birthday Cake I had this morning.
“Thank you for a smooth trip, sirs.” Trixie said sweetly, to the two pegasi that had brought her. It wouldn’t do to forget her manners now, and it was obviously appreciated as the two straightened and grinned with a proud snort.
Now first things first. According to the “Official Overseer’s Checklist” that was sent with the scroll, I need to check up on the banquet preparations ASAP, which is being catered by “Sweet Apple Acres.” I have no idea where the hay that is, so I’m going to have to ask for directions. So let’s see who I can ask…
Trixie looked around at the few ponies that were wandering about, trying to guess at who would be the most helpful. As the scent of baked goods caught her nose, her eyes landed on a bright pink pony that was coming towards her. If she had to guess, this pony might very well even be working at “Sweet Apple Acres”, or at least somewhere that had to work in tandem with them. Yes, she’ll probably do nicely. Trixie decided with a nod to herself, before putting on a smile and walking over to greet the young mare.
“Hello, my name is Trixie and I was wond-“
*GASP!*
With a deafening inhale the brilliant pink pony literally lifted a foot in the air before shooting off at top speed to Faust knows where.
“Well. That was… Strange. Not to mention completely useless…” Trixie grumbled.
After a minute of standing there looking off in the direction in which the pony had shot, and feeling irritated, Trixie finally chuckled to herself and shrugged off the strange encounter with a wry smile. “Well, let’s try again shall we? Hmm. That red stallion over there is kinda cute. Can’t go too wrong with him now can we?”
Her second try was certainly successful, as not only did the red stallion know where Sweet Apple Acres was, he worked there! He was certainly a boy of few words, instead offering to personally take her there, and Trixie took him up on it. It quickly became apparent that he was just being neighborly so to speak, but that was alright. He had still saved her a good hour of wandering around, and wasn’t one of those irritating stallions that simply droned on and on about things she couldn’t give two kicks about. Far from it, he barely said ten words to her, past a polite introduction and pleasantries.
As the two stepped onto the farm, an orange blur of a cowgirl shot by them with a proud and joyful shout, before skidding to a half-stop to slam her hooves into an apple tree, perfectly shaking every ripe apple into awaiting baskets below.
“Impressive.” Trixie muttered to herself with a grin, and Big Macintosh beside her gave a small chuckle.
She grinned at her escort before walking over to the cowpony. “Good afternoon, my name is Trixie, and-“
She was quickly cut off by getting her hoof scooped up in a exuberant hoof-shake as the orange mare before her quickly introduced herself.
“Well howdy do Miss Trixie! A pleasure making your acquaintance, I’m Applejack, and we here at Sweet Apple Acres sure do like making new friends!”
Friends? I don’t think so… Trixie grimaced a little, trying to regain her balance as the exuberant hoofshake continued despite Applejack having already let go.
Big Macintosh placed a hoof atop of Trixie’s, settling it down back to normal. He gave a pointed and amused look at what Trixie was now guessing was his younger sister before resuming his walk back to the barn.
“Sorry.” AJ apologized quickly, looking a little embarrassed. “So what can I do ya for?”
“Ahem. It’s, uh… Quite alright.” Manners, remember your manners. You are here as Celestia’s student. It will not do to make a fool of yourself. Trixie cleared her throat again before speaking formally. “As I was trying to say earlier, I am here to supervise preparations for the Summer Sun Celebration this year... And according to my list, you are in charge of the food.”
“We sure as sugar are! Would you care to sample some?”
“I think that would be a lovely idea, thank… you?” Applejack had already shot off. What is with Ponyville citizens and rocketing off while one is in the middle of speaking?!
“SOUP’S ON EVERYPONY!”
Trixie’s eyes widened and her ears swiveled back as the ground began to shake beneath the charge of at least twenty ponies, most likely more. Oh… Crap. Please don’t let me get run ove-
“Eegh, woah… Oh my.” Trixie had gotten swept up in the charge and placed at a table in a single heart-beat, which had left her head spinning and her mood dropping.
With a zip from nowhere, Applejack was suddenly standing beside her. “Now why don’t I introduce ya to the Apple family?”
“No, that won’t be necessa-“
“This here’s Apple Fritter,”
You aren’t even listening to me are you?
“Apple Bumpkin, Red Gala, Red Delicious, Golden Delicious, Caramel Apple, Apple Strudel, Apple Tart,” With each ponies name, another dish would be added to the table, and Applejack would speed up in her role call until dishes were almost flying onto the table and Trixie could no longer even keep track of all the food and names that were being thrown to her.
Finally, Applejack took a huge breath and introduced the last three of her family. “Big Macintosh, Apple Bloom, annnd~!” Trixie was not pleased in the least when Applejack suddenly shoved an apple in her mouth. “Granny Smith… Up and at’em Granny, we got guests.”
Their grandmother rather sleepily got to her hooves and walked over to join everypony at the very heaped table. Trixie could hear her muttering something half-asleep, but wasn’t really paying attention to it. Applejack suddenly pulled Trixie into a half-hug.
“Why, I’d say you were already part of the family!”
Perhaps it is strange that it was those words, so friendly and good-hearted in nature that made Trixie lose her temper as she spat the apple out.
“You have got to be joking. And don’t touch me.” Trixie swatted off AJ’s foreleg, to turn and glare at both her and the table heaped full of apple sweets. “And look at all this crap! It’s nothing but apples and apples and more apples!”
“Well, we are an apple farm-“
“Yes, I am aware that you are an Apple farm, but just because you received the food order does not mean that you have to, or for that matter should, handle the whole thing yourselves! This is positively ridiculous! What if a pony at the banquet doesn’t like apples? Or what if they're allergic? Did you think of that?”
“No, uh, I guess we didn’t-“
“Of course you didn’t! I doubt you think at all! I do believe I’ll be advising Celestia to change caterers and ask somepony else to handle the banquet this year! Honestly!” With that final fume Trixie turned and stormed off the farm, leaving a somewhat hurt Applejack behind.