Disclaimer: There is so much >implying in this chapter it isn’t even funny. Seriously, I had to be so damn careful with this, it ain’t even funny. All the >implying. And what we’re >implying here ain’t a big ol’ joke here. Trying to explore an aspect of one of the characters’ lives the show can NEVER touch. EVER. With a 500 foot pole.
“Ah finally get to go on a date with her, and it’s nowhere near what Ah had planned.” Big Macintosh mumbled to himself as he sank further into the velvet seat, finally getting low enough that the poor pony behind him could actually see without leaning over into the seat next to him.
Fancy Pants had pointed them to a movie called “Watership Down”* as the first thing they should do while in Canterlot. Which, apparently, nopony had told him more about what the movie was about other than “rabbits.” Big Macintosh had actually read the book, and knew what happened in it; He had tried to convince Fluttershy that it really wasn’t the movie for her, but once she had heard Fancy Pants say “rabbits”, there was no convincing her otherwise.
“And here comes the vision...” He mumbled to himself, knowing full well what was going to happen next in the film.
“And the fire... it was everywhere! It was horrid! Bucks and does, all alike; slaughtered before my very eyes!”
As the scene flashed itself before them, Fluttershy soon latched onto Big Macintosh’s neck, whispering “OkyouwererightIreallydon’tlikethismoviecanwepleaseleavenow?”
He craned his neck to see how many ponies he would be disturbing if he were to stand up right now, and found there was only the one pony behind him. He whispered an excuse me and just stood right up, pulling Fluttershy-- who was still holding him in what she worried was a vice grip-- right out of her seat, and began to trot towards the aisle.
“Just keep yer’ eyes shut ‘til I tell you, all right?”
“Sounds great.”
As he stepped out of the theatre, and back out onto the streets of Canterlot, a very unsettling realization hit Big Macintosh:
There were absolutely no trees to be seen! No nature, no plants!
He knew that there was certainly going to be a lot less plant life in Canterlot; it being a city built on the side of a mountain-- but still! There was the occasional planter box outside a window, but other than Celestia’s hedge maze and Fancy Pants’ garden, there wasn’t all that much greenery to be seen.
“Are… are we finally out of the theatre?” Fluttershy mumbled, reminding him that he wasn’t just here for himself… in fact…
“Just keep yer’ eyes shut, sugarcube.”
“O-okay.”
As he surveyed the area, there seemed to be absolutely no signs or anything of the sort that would tell him where there was anything like what he was looking for, but the birds flying overhead all seemed to be headed in the same general direction.
“If Harry Trotter can follow the spiders,” he mused to himself, “Ah don’t see why birds would hurt.”
As he continued his way following the birds, Fluttershy would occasionally inquire about where they were going, only to receive a “You’ll see…” from Big Macintosh. Occasionally, the birds would take a turn far too sharp for Big Macintosh to follow, because of a building, or an overly busy road, but he would always find his way back to following the same pair. Upon entering a stretch of sidewalk that was in no way special other than a lack of ponies, he decided to take a better look at his avian guides. They were mourning doves, which was rather odd for this area of Equestria—and this time of day, for that matter. Usually, they resigned themselves to the night, and usually preferred to stay in more rural areas like Ponyville. But, at the same time, who was he to judge? He was the one following birds in the first place.
Fluttershy, for her part, didn’t seem to mind the surprise trip, from what Big Macintosh could tell, and would occasionally make some remark on some passing Swallows she heard, or the chirping of some robin chicks whose mother had decided to make a building corner their home.
The pair soon found themselves approaching a rather oddly thickly-treed area, much too thickly wooded to be a park; but the stallion wasn’t exactly satisfied with just setting down in some random patch of forest. He continued on, with his view of the doves always conspicuously left open, with a creek soon coming within earshot along the path.
“May I open my eyes yet?” Fluttershy asked as she felt Big Macintosh come to a stop.
“You certainly may.” A mares’ voice called out in answer, startling both of them to jump.
As they both began to look about for the source of the voice, they heard some movement from behind the small waterfall across the pond, and saw a lithe, snowy Pegasus with a pink mane a bit more subdued than Fluttershy’s step out.
“Pardon us, ma’am, we didn’t mean to intrude—“
“Oh no, it’s fine.” She cut him off as she leapt half-way across the pond, and then glided the rest of the way to the bank, affording Big Macintosh the chance to notice that the mare’s cutie mark was a single dove, its wings spread in flight towards the sun.
“Though, now I am curious. How did you manage to find this place?”
“Ah was just following the birds, ma’am.”
“Hmm,” She hummed wistfully to herself, as she began to stare at the sky with his answer, “I forget that those two still fly along the way for anypony willing to look.”
Big Macintosh, at this point, began to turn to leave, when he was stopped by Fluttershy hopping off.
“Excuse me,” Fluttershy called as she stepped towards the much taller mare, “but do you know why those doves are out this early?”
“My sister and I, back in our early days, would sometimes need some time alone—we just could not stand being in court for so long. So, I requested she place an enchantment on this forest—particularly, this glade that you two have found—that everypony who wanders in here will only come to if you follow the birds.”
“Now how would you do that?” Big Macintosh inquired, his own curiosity piqued. Since he hadn’t been able to take the newspapers he had found at the library home, there had been times that Twilight might ask him if he wouldn’t mind assisting with something in her own section of the library, and he would agree every time. While he himself had absolutely no real interest in the spell, he thought that if he were stuck talking with Twilight again it might make a nice conversational piece.
“An excellent question; You see, it isn’t that she made this place invisible, or anything—oh, she was nowhere near that good with her magic then,” the mare added with a chuckle, “but rather, the enchantment makes ponies’ minds actively avoid looking at this place, and instead searching for a different place, or a path around. Thus, the only way to get here is by following those birds.” Both of her audience mouthed wows in amazement.
“That’s mighty impressive, miss…” Big Macintosh began his compliment, but then trailed off, “Shoot, Ah think ya have me here, I don’t know your name.”
“You must certainly be—“ The mare started, but then looked back upon own mane and chuckled, “Oh, forgive me, I forget myself sometimes.” A bright sheen enveloped the mare, and was quickly replaced by very familiar tri-colored mane.
“Princess!” The two quickly bowed, hoping to make up for their lack of recognition.
“Oh please, my little ponies; stand.” She chuckled almost with defeat, as she saw the two still maintain a reverent pose.
“I suppose that I should probably explain why I was misrepresenting myself, shouldn’t I?”
“Well,” Fluttershy answered, her voice tinted only ever-so-slightly with curiosity, “I suppose that would be nice, but if you don’t want to, we’d understand.” Big Macintosh, hoping to not deepen the Princess’ view of him being a redneck, only nodded.
“As you two probably know by now,” she began, as she lay down with her legs folded under her, prompting her companions to make themselves comfortable, “I can afford myself very few indulgences like this; To be able to slip away from the Day Court, to relax, and unwind.” Fluttershy and Big Macintosh both nodded, prompting her to continue, “And as such, I try to make the most of them. So, in order to slip away from the—excuse my Prench, ponyrazzi**—I need to disguise myself so that they won’t continually hound me.”
A small spark from her horn set her appearance back to what they had originally met her in, “And so, since it has been so long, I have been able to simply make myself appear long before I became a princess, back when I was only a small-time duchess.”
“So, you come here on your days off?” Fluttershy prompted.
“Well, I come here for part of it. The austerity of nature always helps me unwind, unlike the rather busy halls of the Canterlot Castle.”
“Really?” Fluttershy inquired, “When you called us up to Canterlot to deal with Discord the first time, we barely ran into anypony except the guards.”
“Back when Canterlot was first being built,” Big Macintosh interjected, “and for the first few years after, the Castle’s staff was under a hundred—now, it’s almost up to a thousand, guards excluded.”
Both of the mares stare at him, one with the amusement of a mother whose child had truly accomplishment, and the other of a friend who had just spoken out of turn with the closest possible being to God.
“I—forgive me for speaking out of turn, Princess.”
“No need to ask for forgiveness, back when I would tutor Twilight she did that exact thing quite often...” She laughed as she pointed out that the shoe was on the other hoof, as it were. She didn’t know his name.
“Big Macintosh,” He answered as politely as possible.
“Hm… now I know where I have heard of you before. You are Applejack’s older brother, yes?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Oh please, while I am certain it is within your nature to be so courteous, there is no need to be so formal. That is perhaps another reason I disguise myself; ponies don’t treat me like I’m so far above them, and that I have to spoon-feed them every bit of knowledge, and anything that says otherwise is absolutely wrong.” She chuckled as she told them about how she had become so sick of the nobles always bending over sideways to appease her, that one day she had proclaimed it was now and forever going to be Cake day, and that in order to gain an audience with her, a cake of the highest magnitude was to be presented in offering. To this day, Luna still occasionally finds a cake or two stashed away in her part of the Castle.
“Which actually brings me to a question that I should have probably asked while we were on the topic—forgive my jumping topics, it has been much too long that I had a casual conversation—but how exactly did you know so much about the Canterlot Castle, Big Macintosh?”
“Without our Maw or Paw to run the farm, and just two able bodies to work, Ah had to find every way to streamline our jobs as possible.” He went on to explain that in every single article, book, or thesis he had found, the Canterlot Castle was always described as being the single most efficient operation on the planet, bar none.
Celestia purred in thought for a moment, and then looked towards Fluttershy.
“Fluttershy, I don’t mean to put you on the spot, but I have been meaning to get to know you—all of the bearers of the Elements—better, and I think there would be no better time for me to at least hear a little bit about you.”
“What would you like to know?” Celestia paused only for a moment before she thought of parents, given Big Macintosh’s recent mentioning of his.
“Well, my father, Autumn Leaf, is a jewel dealer now.” Celestia nodded, before inquiring of her mother.
“My mother...” Fluttershy began to return to her trademark scuffing the ground whenever she really didn’t wish to be a part of the current conversation.
After a few moments of seeing Fluttershy squirm, Celestia filled in the blank and asked if it was recent.
“No, and I…” Fluttershy shook a bit as she scrunched her eyes shut, “I just really—“
“There is no need, Fluttershy. While some ponies are capable of talking about it readily,” She nodded to Big Macintosh, “some ponies never feel quite comfortable. I understand.”
Big Macintosh nuzzled Fluttershy’s neck, to help her shaking calm down a bit.
Celestia clicked her tongue, as she thought of another question to ask, before her stomach voiced its protest of a lack of food, or even mid-morning tea.
“Oh, we’ve probably kept ya from gettin’ a bite, haven’t we?”
As her flush cheeks began to regain their pallidness^*, Celestia finally nodded in agreement.
“Well,” Fluttershy stood up, and began to brush herself off, “shame on us for keeping you so long. I am so sorry about this, Princess.”
“Again, especially you, Fluttershy, just call me Celestia. And—if you two wouldn’t mind joining me for lunch—it would help if you could call me by the name ‘Sol Song.’”
“We would be honored, your…” Big Macintosh stopped himself, and chuckled as he corrected to “Ah mean sure, ‘Sol Song’.”
Celestia chuckled in turn, and the trio headed off towards lunch.
---------------------------------------CfaCS----------------------------------
“So, you’re saying that if it weren’t for Big Macintosh’s quick actions, you would most certainly…?” Celestia asked as she set down her cup of Lotus tea.
“Oh yes,” Fluttershy leaned over to pick him on the nose, “He saved me in more ways than he knows.”
Celestia giggled daintily as she watched Big Macintosh flicker between absolutely freezing up and trying to form a coherent thought as Fluttershy’s coy smile grew even larger.
“Rarity taught me that one.” She murmured as she repeated the process one more time.
“Well, I’m very happy to see you two together.” Celestia purred.
“Although, um… Sol, I have a question about your…. ‘book character’.” They had decided that any questions about Celestia would be veiled as questions about Sol’s ‘book character’.”
“Yes, what is it?”
“I—oh, I can’t ask this, it’s far too embarrassing.”
“Go ahead, nothing is off limits. I mean, it is a ‘book character’ after all.” Sol gave Fluttershy a reassuring smile as she prompted her companion on.
“It’s just… your ‘character’ is over a thousand years old…”
“Yes, and what about her?”
“Well…oh, why can’t I be more straightforward like Rainbow?”
“Oh!” Sol’s cheeks only slightly tinged as she realized what Fluttershy was implying.
“And this is the part where Ah leave,” Big Macintosh scooted in his chair, “because this is making me feel just a bit uncomfortable.”
“No, please, stay, Big Macintosh. This will actually concern you in just a moment.”
“What most ponies don’t realize is that while yes, she loves her sister very much, that still leaves the other kind of love completely alone. And unlike those whose lives only span under a century, the character’s needs… for ‘love’… are still left very well intact.”
Celestia then looked to Big Macintosh, who already had a faint and very bad inkling about where this conversation was headed.
“And seeing how she is part of the royal family, and has experienced the heart-break that comes with outliving many a partner, she can’t truly stand marrying again, which leaves her in a very awkward position.” Sol’s cheeks began to flare a bit more, as she looked between her hooves and him.
“Ennnope.”
“Oh, please, hear her out, Big Macintosh!” Fluttershy pleaded.
In his usually rather quiet mind, every single thought process had turned into one, cohesive, mass of NOPE.
“Ah’ll listen. Don’t mean I have to agree to it.”
“All she would ask is one night. Not a pony else would know.” Sol began, only to be interrupted by Big Macintosh once again.
“Except her.” He deadpanned, nodding to Fluttershy.
“And I’m telling you, it would be fine with me!” Fluttershy turned Big Macintosh in his seat, to look him directly in the eye. “She has to deal with a loneliness that neither of us can possibly imagine. How could you possibly be so mean to deny her just one night?”
“Ah guess Ah don’t really have any choice in the matter, do Ah?”
With that, it seemed that any spark of hope fled Sol’s eyes, as she sighed and finally gave in.
“I can’t go through with this. It wouldn’t feel right for either of us…” As Sol began to slump over, Big Macintosh felt like his heart would snap in half as he saw just how damned miserable Celestia really was. Here was the ruler of his country, the very person he prayed to every night, asking for one small favor of him—one thing for hundreds of years of selfless devotion to ponies she had no obligation to—and he was wanting to say no out of Celestia-damned pride in keeping to the strict morals his folks had instilled.
“Look, Ah promise that by tonight, Ah’ll feel better about it, Ah promise.”
“Are…” Sol sniffled, as she came back from the tears that only hundreds of years of self-imposed composure had stopped, “Are you sure?”
Big Macintosh couldn’t swallow the lump in his throat, and thus only nodded.
“All right,” Celestia exhaled a pent-up breath as she heard the news, “Big Macintosh, I don’t think you know how much this means, to me; and I know neither of you two need any reminder of how private this must stay.”
“Oh no, we wouldn’t dream of it.” Fluttershy assured.
“Like I would want to.” Big Macintosh added in his head.
-----------------------------CfaCS--------------------
The arrangements had been made, and so Big Macintosh was going to take an “extended tour” of the castle, while Fluttershy went back to enjoy a night on the town with her father. Big Macintosh had been smuggled in by Celestia, and it was nearing time for Celestia to bring the sun down for the night to begin.
“Big Macintosh, I want you to know that at any time you feel that you want to stop—“
“All Ah need to do is ask.” Big Macintosh smiled at her, reassuring the princess that at this point, he had curtailed his reservations.
“Though, would you mind if Ah showered first?”
Celestia giggled as the stallion snapped back into a regular standing position after taking a quick whiff of himself, and told him that she only had a bath, and it was down the hall, opposite the stairs.
“And just as a word of warning: my sister hasn’t been told about our little arrangement, so you may want to avoid rehearsing any operas while in there.”
Big Macintosh thanked her, and stepped out to head towards the bathroom. As his hoof steps echoed through the hall, he still couldn’t believe the architecture around him. The hall’s style reminded him of the old Castle of the Pony Sisters—which Twilight had shown him several pictures of when she checking to see if it could be made to be structurally sound again, and turned into a museum. He had asked Celestia about it when they had come in, and she had explained that when her sister had returned, she had done as much as possible to make Luna comfortable.
“While yes, I want her to become well-acclimated,” He remembered Celestia saying, “the process of modernization can be at times stressful, frightening even—and so, her having a place to come back to that is familiar will help.”
He pushed open the stone door, and stepped into the bathroom, which only managed to further Big Macintosh’s amazement at the entire palace. This had to have been Celestia’s personal bathroom, because holy hay was it pink. The floors were granite, speckled pink and yellow, with a large golden sun centered on the floor. There was only about enough hair product to make Rarity swoon, all of it kept within a shelf that required Big Macintosh to crane his neck to see the top of, next to the tub. This, for any normal sized pony, would be a single-pony sized swimming pool. Big Macintosh began to look for any form of a coat wash, and the only one he could find was… right beyond his reach. He began to honestly weigh his options: either go without it and end up with Celestia’s time being smelly, or reach it, and have himself smell like a mare.
“Pride doesn’t always get to win, ya know that.” He muttered to himself, and as he began to look around for any kind of step-stool. As he soon found, there was only small boxes to be found, so he pulled one up to the front of the rack and brought himself on top of it. Even then, it was a stretch, but he found his balance and grabbed the bottle as quickly as possible. He hopped down from the box, and walked over to the tub, and reached in to turn on the tub. As the water began to pour in, he was amazed as he immediately began to see steam rise.
He lowered himself into the tub, and given the new perspective, he realized that even for him the golden tub was above eye level. It made sense, given who it was built for, but this was going to be ludicrous for him to get out of.
When it finally reached about his shoulder, he turned the water off, and began to scrub himself. The bubbles tickled his fur, and were as pink as Sol’s mane had been. He heard some of the water begin to fizz, and as he continued his brushing, he thought he saw something strange about his fur, but a bubble burst itself right as he began to lean closer to his lifted foreleg.
“Faust save the princess, that stuff is down-right painful!” He mumbled to himself, as he began to wipe the offending substance from his eye.
Just as his eye’s stinging began to subside, he heard a creak at the door.
“Oh, Tia,” Luna called in a sing-song as she entered into the bathroom, “I can’t tell you how wonderful a dream I had last night!”
He heard her pause for just a moment, and then snicker.
“Are you hiding from me, dearest sister?”
Oh buck. What do I do now?
“Did something happen to your fur wash, perhaps?” She began to snicker even more, as he heard her step closer and closer towards the tub.
“Did I accidentally store that fizzy wash I got from the prank store in your bottle?”
Well, better now than later.
“Nope.” He answered as he brought his head as high as he could, just to the brim of the tub.
Luna stood stock still for a moment, only to then open up into a roar of laughter.
“Oh, ‘Tia, you have certainly bested my prank!” She managed between guffaws, “And now, I think I’ll allow you to continue your bath.”
He watched Luna step out, and shut the door behind her. When he was sure she was gone, he pulled the plug to drain the tub. Once the foam had all gone down, he rinsed himself off thoroughly, and began to plan his escape. Big Macintosh knew that while he was a strong jumper, he couldn’t get the height he needed to get his forehooves over the edge with his fur completely soaked. The end of the tub nearest the faucets was a vertical drop, and none of the fixtures looked strong enough that he would be willing to gamble placing his weight on them. The opposite end wasn’t much better; it was a steep grade that he knew he would either make it up to the top, or slip, slide and smack himself against the other end.
“The hay-brained ideas I come up with…” he mumbled to himself as he trot as far from the grade as he could.
He stretched his legs, and then got himself into position to begin his sprint towards the grade. He gave the edge one more look-over, and then bolted as fast as he could. He got to the lip of the tub, and felt his hooves slip from beneath him.
Oh buck, this is going to hurt!
He shut his eyes, and braced himself for the inevitable impact. He waited a few seconds, and then opened his eyes when he realized that he wasn’t going anywhere.
“You could have just asked, and I would have helped you out, Big Macintosh.”
He breathed a sigh of relief, as he realized that… it wasn’t Celestia who saved him. Luna stood with a smirk, her legs crossed like Applejack after a well-placed buck on a tree.
“I realized it wasn’t ‘Tia when you started to drain the tub. Her baths make Spike’s look conservative in comparison.” She lifted him the rest of the way out, and levitated a towel his way.
“And you needn’t worry about explaining yourself; I wasn’t blinded when I was banished to the moon, I could see everything underneath it. That, and she told me.”
Big Macintosh unintentionally grit his teeth loud enough to be heard when he heard that.
“Though, it wasn’t intentional per se, she happens to be heavily drunk, you see.” Luna motioned for him to follow her out into the hall, while she continued.
“My sister has a very… heavy-hooved conscious, shall we say? She has had to maintain her role as an exemplar for so very long, that now she can barely handle self-indulgence such as this, even if she has been desperately wanting it.”
“So…” Big Macintosh filled in the blanks, “she drinks?”
“Indeed. While she was entertaining you in her room before this, did she stay on her balcony?”
Big Macintosh nodded, and Luna smirked at her confirmed suspicions.
“If you had stepped closer, you would have noticed that her breath smelt as if she had inhaled a brewery. And unfortunately for you, the proverbial “broom” becomes dislodged from her hindquarters, and she is rather,” Luna paused, to think of a prime example of what she was thinking, “do you remember how I spoke when I first came to your village?”
“Loud, to the point of breaking a pony’s ear drums if you weren’t careful?”
Big Macintosh’s question was answered when he heard Celestia call his name from her chamber.
“Though, I do know that by the time she begins to hiccup, she has usually forgotten all about her earlier inhibitions.”
“I... WANT *HIC* YOU IN HERE N*HIC*OW, YOU BIG LUG!”
“Best do what she says,” Luna whispered as though a normal tone could be heard through the stone doors, “and above all, thank you.”
Big Macintosh whispered a thank you to the princess who was now making a not-so-quiet sprint back to her own room, and then turned to face the door leading to Celestia’s room.
“Celestia?” He poked his head through the door, hoping that answering her would prompt her to lower her voice.
“YES!” She shouted, much to his chagrin, “MY STALLION HAS COME TO *HIC* TAKE ME!”
Celestia lay against the headboard of her bed, which dwarfed the bathtub. She waved her hoof towards him; inviting him to hop onto the bed to join her. He stepped on, and immediately sank up to his knee within its plush velvet.
“You don’t know how looooooooong I’ve wanted this…” She purred as she levitated a bottle of wine towards him. She drunkenly giggled as she offered him some wine, and after his declining, she popped the cork off anyway.
“They went all wide-eyed when I told them I wanted a bottle of vodka, no questions asked. And then SOME PONIES,” She glared at him, as though the empty bottle off the side of the bed was his fault, “Just HADDA drink it all.”
Every fiber in Big Macintosh’s being told him that getting in bed with any mare this wasted was wrong; both morally and in a very legal sense. Even if it had been agreed on before, when the mare had been well and sober.
“And ya know, I don’t think this is a real bottle.” She levitated the bottle, looking it over, and then snickering maniacally.
“I bet I could break this right now, with my head,” She looked as though she was about to crack herself over the head, when she looked at Big Macintosh.
“You wanna try?” She offered the bottle to him, and bent her head over to offer him perfect shot to whack her over the head.
“Listen, Celestia, Ah really don’t feel comfortable with—“
“Well then, HAVE SOME VODKA!”
-----------------------CfaCS--------------------------
“Oh, my head…” She murmured as her consciousness ever-so-kindly brought her to grips with the sunlight beaming through her eyelids and into her corneas. She felt a hoof draped over barrel, with another hoof underneath her head. She turned over, and began to snuggle into the other pony’s barrel, expecting it to smell of hay, dirt, or something of the like. Instead, she smelled an almost… lavender scent? It certainly wasn’t the coat wash she used—hers was all-natural, and this certainly had more than a few chemicals in it—and Big Macintosh certainly wasn’t the artificial lavender type… nor was his barrel this small. In fact…
She opened up her eyes, and was greeted with by an alabaster barrel, and a few strands of a royal purple mane hanging down.
“Ra… Rarity?” She whispered, tentatively checking to see if the pony she was with was still asleep.
“Mm… Fluttershy, I thought you might give me a few more minutes. But, I suppose the time for resting is done. I hope you slept well?”
“Rarity,” Fluttershy rolled over so that she could lay on her belly, “What happened last night?”
“Oh, well, THAT is a story worth telling!”