//------------------------------//
// 16: Princess Twilight Sparkle's Breakfast Court 
// Story: Seeing Sanguine 
// by Winged Cat 
//------------------------------//

Spike opened the front door as Twilight began descending down the stairs to the main room.  A table with four settings had been set up in the main room - not how Spike and Twilight usually did breakfast, but then, having company over for breakfast was itself unusual, and Spike had been in a mood to break out a bit of formality.  Rainbow Dash was already seated, mind too preoccupied to care much about the food in front of her, though she had begun placing portions of food on three of the plates in order to have something to do besides fidget.  Spike's plate was covered in tiny sapphires: while a dragon did not eat the same foods that ponies did - a large reason for the usual extreme informality of Spike's and Twilight's food service to one another - Spike felt it best for this occasion that he at least be at the same table.

Once the door was open, Sanguine bowed at the entrance, twirling both forelegs in her best imitation of Canterlot court entrance protocol.  "If it please Her Royal Highness, may I be permitted the honor of enTRYYY!"  Sanguine found herself telekinetically flung through the doorway, halted in midair, and dropped in front of the table opposite Rainbow Dash.

Twilight did not break stride but she did yawn.  "G'morning.  Still a little early, but I'm up."

Having finished serving portions, Rainbow Dash gave Sanguine a worried look.  "Uh, little hint: don't lay it on thick with Twilight.  Actually, just don't lay it on at all."

Sanguine giggled.  "But she's so silly about it!"

"I'm glad one of us finds it funny."  Twilight tried to sound annoyed, but a smile had stubbornly crept onto her face and into her voice as she made her way to the head of the table.

"So," Sanguine asked as she examined her plate's helpings of hay bacon and some sort of yellow and red concoction she did not recognized but smelled delicious, "what's the plan for today?"  Taking a tentative bite of the concoction, she judged it almost as tasty as apple fritters.

"Rainbow Dash teaches," Twilight replied as she levitated a water pitcher to pour into each of four glasses, "I chaperone.  Some of Rainbow Dash's methods can be a little...extreme, and I'd like to avoid accidents."

Rainbow Dash frowned.

"Do you have an objection?" Twilight inquired.

Rainbow Dash only needed a moment to build her courage.  "Yeah.  Yeah.  Sorry, Sanguine, but I need to say it.  'Extreme' isn't 'ripping heads off'!"

The table went silent for a moment.

"...sorry."  Rainbow Dash hung her head.  "But...it's just..."

"Tell her what else you do," Twilight interrupted.

"I find them," Sanguine offered quietly, eyes on her plate.

Rainbow Dash blinked.

Sanguine looked at her.  "I was teasing you, earlier.  You can't find the bad ponies, but I can."  Then back at her plate.  "That's why I wanted to kill most everypony around yesterday: I was practicing sensing and it got out of control.  That's also why I nearly did kill those two."  She took a bite of hay bacon, chewed, and swallowed.  "They ARE bad ponies, right?  I didn't mess that up?"

Twilight nodded.  "They lie, cheat, swindle, sell stolen goods, and that's just what I know about.  I don't know what their scam is this time but I got a letter that they were chased out of Las Pegasus and headed here."

Rainbow Dash speared a slice of the yellow-red delectable with more force than necessary.  "They nearly cheated Applejack's family out of their farm."

Sanguine looked at Rainbow Dash wide eyed.

"So yeah, they're bad ponies."  Rainbow Dash chewed angrily, or so it appeared to Sanguine.

"Mm-hmm."  Sanguine nibbled thoughtfully.  "Yesterday afternoon, did you buzz four pegasi?"

Rainbow Dash swallowed.  "Nah.  Three pegasi an' a griffon.  The sky's supposed to be clear but they were buildin' a cloud.  Why?"

Sanguine smiled.

Rainbow Dash gulped, forgetting she had just cleared her mouth.  "You FELT them get ticked off?  That's how sensitive you were?"

Sanguine nodded.  "And I felt YOU a lot more.  Are you suuure that was your only reason?"

"Err...I, I..."

Sanguine grinned at Rainbow Dash as she chopped off another bit of hay bacon, knife clinking on plate.

Rainbow Dash frowned.  "Okay now you're REALLY creeping me out!"

Sanguine continued to smile as she picked up her bacon-laden fork, only for it to suddenly float out of her grip surrounded by a purple aura.

Twilight looked at her.  "Apologize, Sanguine."

Sanguine reached for her fork, grabbing it but it would not budge from mid-air.  "What?  But-"

"NOW!"

Sanguine sat back  and sighed.  "Sorry, Rainbow Dash.  I felt a LOT lot worse ponies than you yesterday, even not counting those two."  She pulled at her fork until Twilight let it go.

"And you wanted to kill us all," Rainbow Dash concluded.

"W-well..."  Sanguine looked down.  "...yeah, kinda.  Not Fluttershy, though!  She was less than nothing!"

That got a chuckle out of Rainbow Dash.  "Yeah, I bet."

Twilight telekinetically flicked a tiny drop of water from Rainbow Dash's glass directly between her eyes.

"Hey!"  Rainbow Dash glowered at Twilight.  "Obviously Sanguine meant on her evilometer.  Fluttershy's the kindest pony we know; of COURSE she's less than zero on the opposite of that."

Sanguine furrowed her brow in thought.  "I'm not sure I'd call it an 'evilometer', exactly?  But yes, that is what I meant."

Rainbow Dash looked at Sanguine.  "Well, what does it pick up?"

"I'm...not sure?"  Sanguine shrugged.  "Con artists, obviously.  Murderers.  Bandits who threatened foals.  A necromancer who wanted to siphon life from everypony.  A dragon, but I didn't pick it up in time.  And timberwolves on a rampage."

"..."  Rainbow Dash's fork clattered to her plate from a suddenly nerveless hoof.

"What?"  Sanguine looked at the fork, then at Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow Dash looked off to the side, as if reading briefly, then looked at Sanguine intently.  "How long have you had that sense?"

Sanguine was not about to admit it, but now Rainbow Dash was starting to creep her out.  "Five weeks, but I only really knew about it yesterday when Zecora-"

"And you've run into all that in five weeks?" Rainbow Dash interrupted.

"Well, yes?"  Sanguine tried to figure out where this was headed.  "Celestia-"

"O-KAY," Twilight interrupted.  "So!  Rainbow Dash!  Maybe you can show her some stunts after breakfast?"

"Don't change the subject, Twilight," Rainbow Dash quipped without looking.  "Sanguine, Celestia what?"

Sanguine pushed her fork around on her plate, driving a concoction crumb onto a sliver of hay bacon.  "Celestia ordered me to-"

Twilight cleared her throat noisily.

Rainbow Dash finally gave her a look.  "Knock it off, Twilight."

Twilight sighed and looked at Sanguine.  "Sanguine, there are some things you REALLY shouldn't tell everypony."

Sanguine looked back.  "I know, I know.  But I trust Rainbow Dash.  Don't you?"

"Of course I do," Twilight explained.  "But I don't bother all my friends with every little deta-"

"Assassin," Rainbow Dash interrupted again.

Twilight gaped, looking at Rainbow Dash.

"That's it, isn't it?  You were Celestia's little assassin, until she couldn't handle it any more and sent you to us to learn how to make friends 'cause you really really didn't like killing ponies and she was worried you'd break."  Rainbow Dash looked at her plate.  "I wonder how she kept Luna away from you.  Luna wouldn't flinch about using assassins."

Twilight's mouth worked in silence as Sanguine nodded.

Rainbow Dash looked at Twilight.  "Aaand this is all a state secret so I do not DARE breathe one word of it to anypony who doesn't already know.  Right?"

Twilight blinked.  "...HOW?"

"Well...I could say a lucky guess which you just confirmed.  I mean, why else would she have sensed all that in just five weeks?"  Rainbow Dash grinned, letting the implication hang for just a second.  "But naw, I had more than that.  All cards on the table.  Spike, how often do you not read Celestia's letters in full to Twilight?"

"..."  Twilight looked at the young dragon at the foot of the table.

Said dragon gulped down another handful of sapphires, eyes pleading.  "W-when the letter specifically orders me not to, saying she thought it'd be better for Twilight to find out from Sanguine herself?  Twilight, I'm so sorry, but-"

Twilight raised a hoof.  "Celestia's order is Celestia's order.  You're forgiven."

Spike wiped his brow with a paw.  "Phew, thanks Twilight."

Twilight looked at Rainbow Dash.  "So how do YOU know about this?"

"Spike, you might want to do a better job of putting letters with sensitive info like that away."  Rainbow Dash gestured to an open door in the back.  "Pegasus eyesight.  I can read it from here.  Enough of it, anyway."

Spike looked where the pegasus was pointing, then facepawed, remembering the task he had rescheduled to today.  "I'll clean them up right after breakfast."  Which, he noticed, was basically done, with all plates at the table now empty.

Twilight nodded.  "WELL, now.  Spike might have been ordered not to read it to me but apparently you weren't.  Is there anything else I should know?"

"Yeah."  Rainbow Dash smiled.  "Sanguine deserves a chance to learn how to be awesome!"

Twilight tried to fit that incongruous puzzle piece into her mental picture of her mentor.  "That...doesn't sound like something Celestia would write."

"'Course not.  It's more like something I'd say.  But it IS something you needed to know."  Rainbow Dash smirked.

Twilight smiled.  "Of course it is."

"So yeah.  Stunts."  Rainbow Dash studied Sanguine's wings from across the table for a moment.  "Sanguine, how about we start with some follow-the-leader?  I'll keep to the simple stuff."