//------------------------------// // "Black Tears" vs "Bass Cannon" // Story: Battle Station Bass Canon // by book_burner //------------------------------// BATTLE STATION BASS CANNON My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.  So is ROCKING THE BUCK OUT. Written because book_burner wanted to archive YouTube links to awesome songs Place: The Crystal Empire Time: Three weeks after induction into Dudist Beach One would think that the Royal Canterlot Annual Music Contest (known to the cool ponies as the “War of the Wubs”) would actually take place in Canterlot, but, on this occasion, one would be wrong.  Really wrong.  In fact, pretty much completely wrong.  The ongoing efforts to reintegrate the Crystal Empire with the rest of Equestria had been a rousing success during the Equestria Games, and so apparently the Music Contest had been scheduled here too. Vinyl Scratch was leaning against a tree in a patch of green grass, considering this matter and watching the sun go down -- her last sunset as a pony not in for the ride of her life.  All told, holding the Contest here was a BUYSOMEORANGES cool decision.  After all, the Crystal Palace was, not to put too fine a point on it, a giant towering spire of crystal that giantly towered over all the landscape.  This was known, in everyday DJ-ing life, as “pretty metal”, or maybe a bit “the Future”. The sun was quickly slipping down towards the horizon as a glowing gold-orange ember, and day-job would soon give way to night-life all across Equestria.  Vinyl considered how Luna was gonna pull off the opening ceremony of the her Music Contest from that palace.  That, after all, would really decide whether the tower was metal or futuristic.  This was extremely important. She jerked her shades down onto her face and fastened her blue-and-white-and-black-spiketied checkered scarf around her neck. Dudist Beach had been nice enough to give her an Earth-Pony-fashioned hammerspace spell, so she was actually holding her headphones, audio connection wires, and Get Rec’d in her mane, along with the card stating her to be a Hip Indie Unicorn.  DJ-PON3 stood and trotted toward the crowd, tossing her mane to loosen up a bit. Actually, she didn’t even manage to trot that far, because the street was so packed she had to gear down into a walk.  Despite the Crystal Capital having miles upon miles of boulevards spider-webbing out from the central Capitol itself, each one with a Crystal Pavement in the middle wide enough to hold a whole street from Ponyville, and each one having half a Ponyville street’s worth of duller blue crystal as sidewalk… only one of these had actually been reserved for the ceremony.  Several others, supposedly, were gearing up for their own street fairs, which really drove home just how much Crystal Empire there actually was. The crowd itself held pretty much every kind of pony, but was primarily split into a few “factions” of a fair bunch of ponies each. There were the blatantly obvious members of the Royal Canterlot Night Orchestra in their severe uniforms, standing around trying to look stuffy for their high-and-mighty Lady Heartstrings.  They filled an entire little plaza on the left that held, of course, of all BUYSOMEAPPLES things, a tea shop. (Somewhere in that faceless mob of ponies, Vinyl knew, was the beautiful and glorious Octavia Melody waiting for Vinyl to liberate her from the cruel oppression of working for Lyra Heartstrings.  And also playing cello, though on second thought, she’d coaxed some pretty awesome tunes from that cello and probably didn’t need liberating from it.) In the next plaza up, across on the right side of the street, the Royal Canterlot Day Choir, the Crunching Pop-Rocks, were strutting their stuff -- literally.  They were pretty big on strutting, and it certainly helped that somepony had fitted their jeans and shirts just to their bodies, and then Princess Celestia had granted them a Shining Sun glamor.  The result had absolutely no effect on Vinyl whatsoever and had certainly never driven her to swoon and pass out at a concert during her teen years when the lead stallion Kick Swagger actually noticed her.  NEVER EVER AT ALL. After the group of no swooningsignificance at all to Vinyl Scratch came the Assorted Ponies, which included herself, bunched up in the crystalline main thoroughfare of the road, suspended between the Royal Sun and the Royal Moon.  The symbolism was lost on nopony, and as the official Unaligned Mere Mortals in the contest, everypony had come to the contest looking just a little bit different from each-other.  Now that Vinyl looked closely, in fact, some of them were distinctly wearing the exact kind of huge cloaks somepony would use to disguise themselves.  Were those Dudist Beach operatives, or just dorks trying to look evil, or had somepony actually evil showed up?  With Tirek having stormed through Equestria just a year and a half ago, hooded cloaks had become the big new thing among ponies desperate to come across as cool, evil, or evilly cool.  They didn’t really seem to get that you couldn’t totally change what sort of pony you are just by putting on a new outfit. The sun dipped below the horizon at last, and the moon rose in the east.  A bright blue star twinkled into being atop the spire of the Crystal Capitol.  Go time. “WE ASK YOU, OUR LITTLE PONIES,” roared Princess Luna, “WHAT IS MUSIC!?” “Music is sin!” chanted the entire Royal Night Orchestra together, “Equinity’s original sin!”  For just a moment, the entire might of that star focused solely and exclusively on them, and they… scuffed at the ground?  Had that not been part of the ceremony? Apparently not, since the Princess looked away from them and was getting on with her speech. “Since the earliest Hearth’s Warming, ponies have striven to kindle and rekindle the fires of friendship that drove off the Windigos: all our arts have ever turned towards that end. It is since our return from the moon that we have restored the ancient custom of this Royal Canterlot Music Contest.  Why is that?” Everypony stamped their hooves and cheered, though the crystalline city neither shook nor cracked.  Vinyl banged her head up and down as she stomped her hoof with everypony else: Luna knew how to put on a show. “It is in order to search for ever more musicians whose ears and voices are attuned to the song of Harmony.  So it is that we, the Diarchs Celestia and Luna, established our own Royal Day Choir and Royal Night Orchestra, that Equestria might know music as fine as the light of the sun and moon themselves, and this Contest with them! “The rules are simple!  Each musician will receive from our retainers a Golden Record bearing either our crest or that of Princess Celestia.  Each musician has the right to play with or against any others as he pleases, as long as each band in competition bets an equal number of their own such Records!  Duets, collaborations, syncopations -- all is permitted!  Thine goal is simple: reach Canterlot Castle in fourteen days with a full album of Records, for the final Princesses’ Performance! “All competitions are to be judged by an appointed member of the Equestrian Parliament from either the House of Lords or the House of Commons!  The former consist in the official membership of the Royal Night Orchestra and Day Choir.  The latter consist in... the winners of the K-COLT Grand Giveaway with Jay and the Loon in the morning!” A crowd of ponies perched atop the buildings on both sides of the street cheered. “So with the rules and format of the Contest laid out, our ponies, we once again put the question to you: WHAT IS MUSIC!?”  Princess Luna stamped her own hoof this time, and the city quaked.  High atop her spire, Vinyl could see that Luna’s muzzle had split into an ear-to-ear grin.  Vinyl grinned too.  Showmareship was magic.  “Music… is FUN!  And so we say unto you: LET THE FUN BE DOUBLED!” Everypony stormed the Crystal Tower to fetch their Records and get down to business. And it was definitely “the Future” rather than metal. Time: Like a whole BUYSOMEORANGES hour later Place: Still in line, almost under the awning of the Crystal Tower         “This line is taking FOREVER!” complained Vinyl to the heavens, the earth, and anypony who gave a buck.  She threw a hoof in the air and waved it like she just didn’t care how many other ponies around her were also waiting in line.  “What’s a girl gotta do to get her Golden Record, eh!?”         Ok, so what she actually had to do was obvious.  She had to wait in line until such time as the members of the Music Parliament handed out Golden Records to all the ponies in front of her.  This was the only fair way to do things, since they couldn’t just let the entire field of competitors stampede through grabbing Records freely for themselves.  But couldn’t they have, like, set up a vending machine or something?  Or couldn’t Princess Luna have cast a spell on everypony to just make a Golden Record follow them around until they grabbed it with their own two jaws?         No, apparently they simply could not have done that.  It would probably spoil the whole Royal Ceremony of the thing, and all the Very Important Ponies wouldn’t get to feel like they were doing everypony else a favor just by standing there and handing out disks of shiny metal that couldn’t even actually be played in a record player.  The longer she spent around them, the more she was coming to see that Dudist Beach - for all its bizarre concepts about “democracy” and “ordinary ponies making decisions” instead of magically-gifted, long-lived, and highly-educated alicorn princesses - kinda had a point about basic respect between the nobility and the common ponies. And so, Vinyl Scratch, DJ-PON3, had to wait.  In line.  For as long as it took.  With other ponies giving her the stink-eye for complaining and gesticulating, as if there was nothing innately horrible about waiting in lines.         It.Took. A. Looooooong. Time. Eventually, though, she reached the head of the line and walked into the lobby of the Crystal Tower.  Being the very center of the city and of the entire Crystal Empire, it was of course circular, and the Music Parliament had lined the entire circumference with a ring of tall benches made of, yes, clouded amethyst.  On each one stood a Member of the Music Parliament giving out Golden Records to whoever walked up to them.  Crystal Empire, so Crystal… Bleachers?  Really? “Oooooh, you want a Golden Record?  You want a golden twinkle in your eye?”  One of the MMPs off to the left was singing to her.  On the one hoof, she did want to get her Golden Record and get on with the actual music contest.  On the other hoof, showtunes. Said Parliament member was wearing a hooded cloak with a penumbra field, so she couldn’t see his face.  But he was singing.  He would be, of course.  It was just like the kind of pony who’d volunteer for Parliament to enjoy working with ponies who’d been waiting in a line. Fine then.  She pulled off her shades and trotted up to his place in the stands. “I guess I do, then,” she said.         He threw down his hood, piercing the penumbra field and showing him to be one of those real grinny-ponies who just can’t help but grin.  He had a gray pelt, a shaggy blond mane, and was utterly wall-eyed.  The poor colt.  He was probably, now that Vinyl looked at him properly, a pegasus underneath that cloak. “You never had any open doors?  Never a happy song to sing.  But suddenly half the world is yours!  What an amazing thing!” Ooooh dear.         “Uuuuuh, look,” Vinyl Scratch gibbered, scuffing the ground with a hoof, “I know I haven’t been too cheery about waiting in line, but I just really can’t stand it when I should be moving around, talking, playing, dancing.  You know, music stuff.  I mean, this contest is a mission for me.  Could you please stop the showtunes?”         The gray pegasus chirped right back at her.  “As one of K-COLT’s sweepstakes winners, this contest is a mission for me, too!”  He scrambled down behind the stands he was... standing on, and when he returned he indeed had a big, old-fashioned LP record apparently made of solid gold and gems in his mouth.   Vinyl grabbed it as quick as she could and stuck it in her hammerspace.         “Oh,” said Vinyl.  “Then where did you come from, and when will you go?  And can I call you Cotton-Eyed Joe?”         “In fact...” he said, and jumped down off the stands, making Vinyl’s ears jolt up.  He leaned over and whispered waaaay too conspiratorially.  “I’m not just here as a K-COLT winner!  I’m Joyous Showtunes Pegasus Herpy Hooves.” OOOOOOH, Vinyl realized.  Of course Dudist Beach had connections in the music industry.  Of course they could get a pony into the Music Parliament.  Wow, that was actually a bit creepy for an egalitarian organization. Herpy Hooves motioned to come with him and made to trot out back towards the rest of the city.  “We should get moving.  It’s ever so muggy in here, we have an important contact to see.  So, let’s! Get down! To business!”         “OH SWEET GODS SHOWTUNES MY HORN HURTS,” Vinyl deadpanned, and trotted out after him towards the main body of the city.  “But seriously, where are we actually going?”         “Where else does a pony meet secret contacts?  To the zoo, of course.” Time: Soon after Place: Who even planned this city!? “No, seriously, who even planned this city?” Vinyl whined.  It wasn’t even that they’d been walking for too long or too far.  It was the way the streets pretended to have a Manehattan-style grid layout when they actually didn’t, at all, and the way everything was made of uniform crystal.  And that the directions were Hubward, Rimward, Turnwise, and Widdershins, a system used by nopony outside the Crystal Empire in the entirety of ever. THUMP. “Remember,” chirped Herpy Hooves, “the Crystal Empire originally formed around the needs of ponies making pilgrimage to the site of the Crystal Heart: everypony converging on one point from all around.  So yes, it’s radial, and not actually any kind of ‘coordinate’ system.  But you should be used to streets that don’t have a neat layout: you’re from Ponyville!  Your streets are cow paths!” “Ok, yeah, but it still shouldn’t be this hard to find the zoo,” Vinyl kept on, tossing her head back.  “I mean, it’s a zoo!  It’s where you keep all the exotic Northern animals, so of course it’s gotta be loud and smelly.  And yet here we are, wandering through the entire Cultural Quarter because the maps aren’t clear and the street names repeat, so you never know where you are!” THUMP. A pony would think that in a city like this she could always just look back towards the central tower where she came from, but in fact, everything was made of crystal.  The soft moonlight and harsher mage-light of the tower spackled and scattered through every building in the city.  The effect was rather like looking up at the daylight world through a pool of water: a blanket of swaying, shimmering silver waves covered everything.  It was like trying to find your way through a dream, which was probably just what Princess Luna wanted. They would start down one way, and eventually come to the next street corner and realize they’d turned around in the opposite direction.  Then it would turn out they had just walked the length of Horseshoe Street. “Well the Crystal Zoo was supposed to be right in the Spiral Park in the Cultural Quarter, and we were going to meet our informant there.” “Actually,” Vinyl raised an eyebrow, “why would we meet a secret contact at the Crystal Zoo?  It’s pretty public there.” THUMP. “Well yeah,” answered Herpy Hooves.  “In a public place it’s much harder to tail after you, you can lose yourself more easily in the crowd, and it’s harder to spy on anypony in the noise.  This, I emphasize, is totally unlike the traditional secret meeting place, the park, where you can take a quiet walk together, feed ducks, and have every single spy in Equestria try to work out if you’re a couple or sharing confidential information after looking up your identities.” “Wow,” gawped Vinyl Scratch.  “I hadn’t realized you were so savvy at this spy stuff.” “The zoo is helped by the fact that our informant needs a classy, high-cultural sort of place to slip out to, what with being in the Royal Night Orchestra herself.  She can’t be seen anywhere that’s not sufficient to please the tastes of -” Herpy rolled his eyes “- the Laaaaady Heartstrings.” THUMP.  THUMP. “Hey, what’s that thumping?” asked Vinyl Scratch. THUMP. THUMP. CLANG! “Ooh, they’re adding in some steel drums!  I think it’s coming from the next alley over!”  Herpy Hooves looked Vinyl straight in the eyes and mouthed: “Trouble. Two streets opposite the next alley.  Walk, don’t trot.” The two ponies crept forward as slowly as they could up the road… trying not to make any noise, working their way toward the side-street on the left.  Gradually, they peaked around the corner, and found themselves espying (ahaha) the unpleasant scene of a gray mare in a fine blue waistcoat, lined in musical scores, beating up a hooded-and-cloaked stallion with a cello’s bow.  She was standing on her hind legs, and held the bow in front of her as if it was a sword.  The blood-red glint in its string betrayed that perhaps, just right now, in light of the reputation the Royal Night Orchestra had for magical instruments, the bow considered it wise to go along with her act.  Who knew what might happen if she tried to actually cut with it? “Well look at that,” whispered Herpy.  “It’s our informant.  Looks like she hadn’t got out of her present engagement to come see us yet.” “Ironically?!” bellowed Octavia Heartstrings, bow in hoof, “You came to this wine-tasting ironically?  You were only ever seeing me ironically?  Tell me, is my bow smashing into your horn ironic, YOU PIG IN EQUINE CLOTHING!?” The hooded-and-cloaked stallion backed against a wall looked unusually bulky for a unicorn, but indeed, his hood did betray the telltale spike of a unicorn’s horn, a massive one.  Vinyl could almost swear she recognized him from somewhere. “All you had to do was act as my plus-one for a single showing of stained-glass landscapes and a wine-tasting!” huffed Octavia.  “That was all.  Strictly speaking, there was no need whatsoever for you to bring up my, how did you say it to everypony else at the showing, oh, yes, right, ‘evil phase’ in conservatory when we actually had some association with each-other.  Did you possess the wisdom to stop there?  No, of course not, not in the slightest.  You continued: steady on!  You started complaining about the government of the only recently reappeared and reintegrated Crystal Empire.  And all this, every spark of decent equine contact I have ever granted you, every slightest minute we have ever spent together, you call it ironic the instant you realize your insults towards me have fallen flat?  You. Complete. And utter. Hipster!”  She leapt through the air and roundly thumped the unicorn on his horn again with a downward stroke, using the change in momentum to land a perfect forward flip. Wow, Vinyl thought.  The gods knew Octavia was a fine one, but where did she learn moves like that?  She pulled her shades on furtively: it may have been nighttime in the far North, but hay if anypony was gonna see how wide her eyes had gone. “Ah, ehhh, excuse us?” said Herpy Hooves.  Octavia froze and spun around to face Herpy and Vinyl on all fours, blushing madly as her eyes flitted from face to face. “Oh!  Oh my.  Well, if it isn’t my most engaging acquaintance DJ-PON3, and the ever-endearing Herpy Hooves, both of Ponyville.  Most pleasant to run into you both on this fine evening of the Royal Music Contest.  I had been engaged in a slight matter of removing this unsightly former associate of mine from the premises.” Vinyl Scratch raised an eyebrow and prepared to bring out her Get Rec’d. “You want some help with that?  Also, would he happen to have a Golden Record?  And just how former an associate did you say he was, again?” Octavia smiled tightly. “You know, I think he does, in fact, possess a contest token, and in fact, I do believe that, myself being a member of the Royal Night Orchestra, I can act as referee.  To address your second question, he’s so very former, my dear, that we could flirt quite unironically while you take his Golden Record.” Vinyl smirked right back at the beautiful cellist and thanked her lucky stars for this opportunity. “Hey bro!” she called over to the stallion who’d just got wailed on.  “I challenge you to a duel of the bands!  Do you accept, or are… you… chiiiiickeeeeeeen!?” Red eyes flashed from beneath the hood. “I WILL DESTROY YOU!” the stallion snarled, “AND TAKE BACK MY EX-MAREFRIEND!”  His horn pulsed like an enflamed purple bruise, and his hood flew back; he whisked a keyboard from his cloak and it erupted into drumset beats. YAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The force of his metal scream smashed Vinyl against the wall of the alley, stabbing her tailbone into her spine. Struggling to move, she managed to peer leftward at Herpy against the flow of vibration through the air: he had suffered a similar fate.  Hopefully, she thought, his lighter pegasus bones would give him a bit less pain. Octavia, on the other hand, had stood her ground. “Holy buck!” Vinyl screamed over the noise, “Octavia, you used to date King Sombra!?”  Well, she had obliquely admitted to having an ‘evil phase’ in conservatory.  Her waistcoat waved in the air as the waves and waves of dark metal washed over her, but even with Octavia looking steeled for anything, she wasn’t actually managing to strike back at Sombra. The lyrics started to fly, fast and hard as the life of a beaten-down rock farmer. When I'm in this state of mind I'm wishing I was blind. Sometimes life is more than pain, to me. So Vinyl was spread-eagled on the wall, and so was Herpy.  Sombra was actually playing a keyboard, so even if Vinyl managed to move along the wall, let alone struggle towards him, he could just keep shooting these endless waves of dark metal at her. Sombra’s got me pinned, she thought.  The only thing he’s not shooting right now is... the… ground. The ground.  That was it!  If she could channel a Bass Wave through the wall and into the ground, she could knock Sombra off his hooves and get an opening to play something back! Vinyl struggled to raise a shaking hoof towards Sombra.  The G-forces from his song were actually keeping her pinned well off the ground, but she could still just barely do it. Sombra smirked and kept singing.  The BUYSOMEPEACHES didn’t even need to use his actual hooves to play the keyboard, just his magic.  Truly, he was an evil sorcerer. I feel the power of my grief. Death would be such a relief. All the secrets that I hide would die, with me. (Oh please, as if King Sombra had any secrets.) If she could just hum something… and spark a tiny bit of magic… the built-up sound would combine with the magic and let her channel a way larger Bass Wave than she’d ever manage on her own without an instrument.  She gritted her teeth and hummed. Hm-hm-hm hmmmm hmmm! She sparked magic into her hoof, let Sombra’s dark metal slam it back against the wall, and let all the force flow into directing the wave. Depression is my only friend. Will this---- The Bass Wave’s impact knocked Sombra out of his proper, four-legged musical stance and sent his metal waves flying off The first thing the Bass Wave did was propel Vinyl down the wall to the ground, where she dropped right back onto her hooves. torture never end? Let me carry o---- The second thing it did was reach King Sombra and make him stumble for a note.  Just one note, but that was enough: Vinyl had already launched herself at him with a hoof raised to punch. But he blocked her with his keyboard with barely even an impact.  BUYSOMEORANGES if connecting her hoof with that thing didn’t hurt like hay.  Was it made of lead?  This was a musical duel: she needed to play something, and quickly! I keep crying in my dreams. Can you hear my endless screams? When I fade away I fade, away. But now, at least, she had gotten out of the blast range of that keyboard, and could at least try to play something.  She needed to do it quickly, too, because Sombra was already turning back to shoot her again.  Vinyl flipped out her Get Rec’d and her headphones... THIS FLUID ON MY CHEEK, IT DRAINS ME, I GET WEAK. MY HEART IS COLD & BLEAK BLACK BLOOD. BLACK TEARS. Casted the best amplification spell she knew on the headphones…  Positioned them around her crest, and flicked the switch that folded them together, the slightly larger left headphone now standing in front of the right one on her right shoulder to amplify the sound…  Now she just had to charge it up for a few seconds with some vibration.  Any vibration would do. Gosh, and lucky golly gee, here was Sombra waving his BUYSOMEORANGES keyboard at her again.  She was ready this time, though: it was a simple ultrasonic spell to direct the full blast of sound into her own headphones. His song honestly sounded a bit tinny this way. Life is like a masquerade. In debt to myself, but I can't pay. Aaaaand… charged.  Before he could realize what she’d done, she leaped sideways to her left, rolled as she hit the ground to overcharge a last bit of vibration, and spun on her right forehoof as she came up to position herself... Right next to his bucking face.  Vinyl grinned.  She loved this part. “Oh look,” said Vinyl with her best jerk-face on, “You’re so malevolent and Crystal Heartless!”  She clicked the ‘Play’ button on her headphones’ cord and let loose the wubs of raw. BUYSOMEAPPLES that felt good. When the wubs ran down and she got another look at Sombra, she saw that his clothes were torn to bits and he was lying unconscious on his back.  A bit overdone, but aw well: you couldn’t always leave your audience as raw as an undercooked hayburger. Oh, and Octavia had her forehooves over her ears. “You know, Vinyl,” said Herpy Hooves as he dusted himself off (more for show than anything else: the Crystal Empire was clean), “You could have come to help me rather than going straight for Sombra.”  It was amazing how unashamed he looked about rifling through Sombra’s cloak for his Golden Record, but hey, such were the privileges of the Music Parliament. “With his having a broad-range keyboard blasting dark metal everywhere at everypony!?” Vinyl waved a hoof in the traditional gesture for referring to the terminally cuckoo.  “He was so awful!  So insufferable! So… emo-kid!  ‘Look at me, I’m King SOMBERa and I wear black and red and have a name of PURE DARKNESS and play metal just so ponies will think I’m badass!  But actually I can’t feel ok about myself unless I treat other ponies as property!  I guess I’ll go enslave the Crystal Empire and treat my date as a piece of jewelry now!’  Did you even hear how he talked about Octavia!?  Ponies like that just set my teeth on edge, you know?” “Vinyl, I never knew - ” stuttered Octavia. “That I really care?” said Vinyl, sidling up cheek-to-cheek with Octavia, “Well it’s a bit early for that, don’t you think, Tavi?  Can I call you Tavi?” “ - that you suddenly acquire such a large vocabulary when you feel strongly about something, actually,” Octavia blushed.  “And it is a little too early for you to call me Tavi. “Now,” she straightened up and smoothed out her uniform, “I do believe Mr. Hooves here had arranged to meet me at the Crystal Zoo in the Cultural Quarter so that I might give him a brief interview about my experiences in the Royal Night Orchestra.  What say we keep that appointment?” “We really ought to,” said Herpy, tossing Vinyl the Golden Record she’d earned.  “We especially really ought to now that we’ve made enough noise to alert the other Night Orchestra members to our presence here.” “BUYSOMEAPPLES,” spat Octavia.  “We cannot afford to be seen by anypony else in the Night Orchestra.  It would be… impolitic.”  She gripped her cello’s bow in her jaw and shoved it well into a pocket on her uniform (which had, of course, appeared far too shallow to hold it).  “Zoos, to our great luck, contain far too many strange noises and smells for the refinement suitable to the Orchestra.  The Crystal Zoo is also a normal, public attraction, where we will not be the only ponies seeing the sights and holding conversation.”  She whipped herself around and set out trotting towards the Crystal Zoo.  “Do you understand, Vinyl Scratch?” “Nnnnooooo.  Not really.  Not really very much at all,” Vinyl answered, screwing up her muzzle in thought as she set out after Octavia. “It’s fine, Vinyl, you’re a DJ,” said Herpy Hooves, “You’re supposed to make a lot of noise for a lot of ponies.  If we asked you how to achieve secrecy, you’d probably say something like ‘hide in plain sight’.” “Well yeah!” Vinyl said, “It works at parties.” “That’s because everypony is distracted at parties.  Outside the Scene, hiding in plain sight gets you seen: just because someone didn’t expect to see you doesn’t mean they actually won’t notice you.  So instead of hiding where someone might see you, you have to hide where your pursuers won’t want to look.” “Besides,” said Octavia, actually winking for the sheer irony of it, “Since Lady Heartstrings won’t come around and interrupt us, the zoo will make for a great first date.  Now come on, before someone finds us out!” The three broke into a canter through the alleys and back streets of the Crystal Empire, not quite spooked but not quite speaking.  It took a short while before they found their way back to the main boulevards of the Cultural Quarter, but their luck stood: Octavia knew the way from there. Of course, this being the opening night of the Royal Canterlot Music Contest, the Crystal Zoo had stayed open late to pick up the extra tourist business.  They slipped inside with the crowds -- “Elephants!” cried Herpy happily as he lifted off the ground from next to the Reptile House. Fortunately, Vinyl and Octavia had fast enough reflexes to bite down on his tail and keep him with them. “There’s a reason we’re here, you know!” growled Vinyl. “Oh, fine,” said Herpy.  “I suppose there was technically a purpose to our coming here.”  He set himself back down onto the ground, jerked his tail from his comrades’ jaws, and sighed.  “We were coming to obtain intelligence from you, Octavia Melody, about the plans and preparations of the Royal Night Orchestra under the Lady Lyra Heartstrings.” “Correct,” nodded Octavia.  “On behalf of?” “The rebel organization Dudist Beach,” finished Vinyl Scratch. “Correct,” Octavia nodded again.  She pondered a minute, and shuddered.  “I have always been a good citizen and a proper pony.  I payed dutiful attention in school and practiced hard in conservatory.  My life’s goal has always been to become First Chair Cellist in the Royal Canterlot Symphony.  I was honored to play the Grand Galloping Gala and be accepted into the Royal Night Orchestra.  Do you understand?”  She had frozen her face into a mask again. “Octavia,” Herpy said, “I can absolutely reassure you that your identity does not leave this zoo.  But we have to know what Heartstrings is up to.” “Fine, fine.” Octavia gathered herself, and took a deep breath.  “I am talking to you, a clandestine organization in rebellion against the Crown, because the Lady Lyra Heartstrings has turned the Royal Night Orchestra into a cult.  She leads us in chants and rallies.  She regales us in speeches on sin, virtue, and the coming of a new world.  She calls us the vanguard who will build that new world.  She is taking us further than any else have gone in weaponizing music as a tool of both manipulation and combat.  She incites us against the Diarchy, the Minor Houses, and the Parliaments.  She has even retained a trainer in dressage.” Vinyl Scratch raised an eyebrow.  “Dressage?  Isn’t that where you canter between cones, jump over fences, and dance around a bit in a fancy dress?” “Vinyl… I will forgive your prejudice against the art thanks to our fast-growing friendship, but please do not voice such obvious misconceptions again.  Dressage is no mere dance, and you should be wary of encountering a more trained practitioner than myself!  It is the fine art of hoof-to-hoof equine combat, by which Earth Ponies have defended ourselves against wing and horn, against claw and scale, against flame-breath and mighty spell, for all the ages of our race.”  Octavia’s smile looked just a little too satisfied with that fact.  “And Lyra Heartstrings is teaching it to each and every pony in the Royal Night Orchestra, including the unicorns and pegasi.  You really should be quite afraid of what we will be when we finish that training: a trained dressage pony could turn any song you play against you, dance around any tune, counterpoint any theme.” “That’s… legitimately creepy,” said Vinyl with her jaw dropping slightly.  “Why hasn’t anypony tried to get word to the Princesses?” “A trumpeter did.  Princess Luna dismissed his concerns outright and even went so far as to silence him by means of a geas.  Most of the Orchestra now suspect that Lady Heartstrings is conspiring with Princess Luna rather than acting against her authority.”  Octavia started chattering, no longer holding in what begged to be said.  “Lady Heartstrings speaks of a grand ‘old race’, greater in its might and wisdom than equinity, and of all history since their reign being naught but decline and decay.  She tells us that if we can but weave a fine enough song, we will eventually herald in the return of that Old Race.” “Some of us are frightened, and too many are enthusiastic.”         “Ok,” said Vinyl Scratch.  “That’s really, incredibly metal.  I see why we’re wailing on Heartstrings now: you just don’t try to act out metal songs in real life.  It never works well.”         Octavia giggled.  “Oh well, I was trying to be serious.”         “Not sure how well you’ll succeed in that at the moment,” chuckled Herpy Hooves nervously.  “Though this actually corroborates a fair bit we suspected, and does indicate we have to stay away from Princess Luna for the moment.”         “Why, do you think, I can’t succeed in being serious?”         “Because we’re in the Crystal Zoo on the opening night of the Royal Canterlot Music Contest.  Because there’s elephants.”  Before anypony could stop him, Herpy leaped into the air and pulled a pose, pretending to have a microphone to his mouth.  “Because the night belongs to us!”         Vinyl Scratch dragged him physically back down with her magic.         “The singing, we'll just have to learn to put up with. The telling us to enjoy ourselves... he's kinda right.  Come on Octavia: we're in a zoo on our first date. Let’s go see some animals.”         So they did.