Everything Wrong
With
Princess Celestia Hates Tea (seriously, a lot)

Spoilers

(duh)

Princess Celestia Hates Tea
(Seriously, a lot.)
by Jeffrey C. Wells
www.scrivnarium.net

Four lines of introductions, two of which give us information we already know. *ding*
1.

"Of course, Mrs. Cozy," I said, plucking up my beautiful antique china cup from my beautiful antique mahogany tea table in a swirl of beautiful antique unicorn magic. "Unless my beautiful antique nostrils deceive me, this morning's selection would be a solid domestic orange pekoe, yes?"

"beautiful antique" used four times in two sentences. I get that it's probably a joke, but it's still kind of jarring. *ding* 2.
Also, "beautiful antique nostrils." *ding* 3.

I perked. "Peppermint what?"

Bowling balls. Seriously, you're talking to your tea stewardess who has done nothing but talk about tea for the past few minutes. What did you expect? *ding* 4.

"I might just take you up on that!" I called, laughing musically. "There just are some times when I can't stop at one!"

Insert Lay's Potato Chips reference here. *ding* 5.

Some days, it was all I could do to resist the temptation to delve into the time spells, go back to the dawn of pony, find the blackguard who first came up with the idea of boiling leaves and drinking it, and give her or him a good solid cuff. I suppose there's the odd chance that when I returned to the present I would find that pony civilization had crumbled and that the world now groaned under some sort of oppressive Diamond Dog regime, but it might just be worth the risk.

Insert A Sound of Thunder reference here. *ding* 6.

"Oh!" continued Twilight, heedless of my inner monologue. "And we learned a whole bunch of other lessons, too! Rarity would like to talk to you about something called 'Bollywood'

If you don't have Jai Ho stuck in your head before, you do now. *ding* 7.

Pinkie is planning on preparing a graphically-detailed report

Inappropriate hyphen. *ding* 8.

Rainbow Dash would like to petition you for an annual festival where ponies fly diamond-studded kites around in some sort of epic slash-everypony-else's-kite-up kite war, just like they do over there, which is a plan that can only end well."

"I cannot foresee any problems with that," I said, nodding.

This Celestia is a dick to kites. *ding* 9.

"Boy, you'll never believe the stuff they let you carry across borders in a diplomatic pouch! No customs or anything, and best yet, it's all perfectly legal!"

So I'm going to need you to send me on as many diplomatic missions to Mexicolt as you can for, uh, reasons. *ding* 10.

My Faithful Student is quick, eager, and perceptive

Unless you're talking about social cues, in which case she is none of these things. *ding* 11.

I once had an entire wardrobe full of Darjeeling, I thought. Stuffed absolutely to the gills. But then, last week, I got in a mood, runically sealed it and carried it out to the hazardous magical-waste depository in the dead of night and was done with it.

I've heard that PMS can be bad, but seriously... *ding* 12.

the most powerful creature in all Equestria

Whom we have never see beat anything stronger than a "Want It, Need It" spell. *ding* 13.

Twilight's face was like my beloved sun.

On fire with black spots, millions of degrees, and incinerating all it comes into contact with? *ding* 14.

Twilight's face did not move, not even a smidgen, but the light in her eyes was instantly snuffed and buried in loose clay in her psychological backyard. I felt a trapdoor open in my gut and attempted to fill the newly-exposed pit with words.

Light leaving eyes, burying things in backyards, and trapdoors opening leading to deep pits? Is this about to become a slasher fic? *ding* 15.

Well, Luna somehow got it into her head that I was a tea-drinker,

How? If you hate tea so much then she would have never seen you drink it. Given that you two are the only alicorns around, and sisters to boot, you would think that you'd know everything about each other. How can Luna not know the thing you hate the most on the Earth? How did that literally never come up in your entire lives? *ding* 16.

you know almost as well as I how delicate she can be

If that's how you want to put the whole "Nightmare Moon" debacle then I guess I won't stop you. *ding*
17.

"It wasn't too long after that that we hosted a Qilinese envoy and his retinue on a matter of trade, and you know how fond the half-dragon unicorns are of their tea,

Celestia clumsily gives Twilight information she already knows so that the readers know who the heck the Quilnese are. *ding* 18.

Soon, my entire Court was full of grown stallions and mares who had never known the Princess to be without her tea.

So then why are you drinking your tea in public? Why not drink it in private where no one can see you, then drink it in public during diplomatic events when you have your tolerance? I mean, I get the "near-constantly" bit, but does that really mean every second of every day? You really could have planned that better. *ding* 19.

I felt that to abandon it would create cracks across the public's perception of me as an unchanging bastion of light in the dark currents of time."

Why? It's just tea. Tell them you like coffee or whatever more instead. People have short memories. Heck, you're immortal. Give it a generation and the next one will see coffee as your symbol. Seriously, is Equestria doomed if you don't have your tea? *ding* 20.

I wandered over to the small balcony of the Rosewood Salon and stared down at the happy bustle of Canterlot City, watching the little ponies and their pony carts trot back and forth along the streets like some toy model.

Now we know how Celestia really sees her subjects *ding* 21.

I turned back to where Twilight had been sitting, and she was gone.

And Celestia didn't notice that she had left, or hear the sound of a door opening or whatever? It was only a minute long story, and Twilight isn't quiet at all. If she went far enough away for her not to hear Twilight leave, then she probably went far enough away that Twilight wouldn't have heard her even if she didn't leave. *ding* 22.

"Sergeant Hoplite," I said, calmly, "my wing-muscles alone have the capacity to bend tempered steel,

And you lost to Chrysalis why? To hear you say it, one little slap from your wings would have decapitated her, and you had plenty of chances to do that, so why didn't you? *ding* 23.

and I can tell you, with levels of uncomfortable detail, exactly what rather embarrassing part of your great-great-great-grandsire's anatomy was injured to earn him his Purple Heart.

Ha ha, dick jokes. *ding* 24.

"The Court doubted the suspicions of Twilight Sparkle once before, during the Royal Wedding Coup, and it was nearly the ruination of Canterlot! The Guard will not be so dishonored by you again, wretched beast!"

You know he kinda has you there, Celestia. This is a little bit on you. *ding* 25.

"You abducted my beloved Cadence and left her to die in a cold gemstone mine deep in the bowels of Canterlot Mountain! And then, you had the unmitigated gall to impersonate her and stand next to me at the altar!

If Celestia really did do all that then that beats my fanfiction. *ding* 26.

"Shining Armor, please l—"

Poink. Dismiss.

"If you would please just hear m—"

Poink. Dismiss.

"There's something very important I n—"

Poink. Dismiss.

Did I ever tell you the definition of insanity? I'm talking to the both of them here. *ding* 27.

"So what're we gonna do, y'all?" inquired Applejack, she of Honesty.

Which is useless information because 1. everybody already knows that and 2. you didn't list any of the other Elements. *ding* 28.

"Fluttershy is one of my best friends, but everypony knows she folds like an origami box."

Twilight is a dick to Fluttershys. *ding* 29.

"Really not kidding here! I assure you, my forbearance in this matter is largely due to my being rather fond of the décor in this room and not wanting it all torched and s—"

Profanity cop-out. *ding* 30.

"Are we not friends enough or something? Should we maybe sing a song? Share some secrets?"

Yes. Topic: what I do in my spare time that doesn't involve one of the other members of the group. *ding* 31.

"Fine!" I said, my eyes going wide at the one combination in this room that really could do me some damage. "Yes! I do so love tea! Mm, mm, good!"

I'd like to thank the Academy. *ding* 32.

TENS OF THOUSANDS OF GENERATIONS HAVE CRUMBLED TO DUST IN MY WAKE, AND TENS OF THOUSANDS OF GENERATIONS MORE WILL FOLLOW BEFORE I AM SPENT!

Basically, you're all ants to me. *ding* 33.

It was a good day to be a junior minister, all told, because in my growing frustration with the ridiculous predicament I found myself in, I had been swinging my approval-stamp around wild and free, as though I were threshing grain with it.

I'm not sure how we got from Celestia declaring that she doesn't like tea to her approving everything. Oh well, I guess that's why we have scene breaks. *ding* 34.

"You blame absolutely everything on paraneoplastic syndrome, Doctor," I said. "I sent one of my chambermaids to you with a troublesome stone in her hoof, and you returned her with a diagnosis of paraneoplastic syndrome."

If that's the case then why is he still working for you? Why haven't you gotten someone better? *ding*
35.

We are referring to "it would be physically impossible to cram even a single additional soul into this room" levels of fullness.

Well, then, I hope they like cleaning up blood when somepony inevitably gets trampled. Or the smell from the sweat of that many ponies packed in that tightly. *ding* 36.

Every single tea-talented pony in all Equestria had made her or his way to the capital city, overnight.

Which sounds impossible but at least the hotels and inns will have an early Hearth's Warming eve this year. *ding* 37.

I spread my wings and flapped over the crowd to my throne, waiting patiently to see what actual business could be attended to to-day.

Author uses "to-day" when all other times he uses "today." *ding* 38.

I snuck a bunch of this horrible black Nilgiri stuff from the bins in the kitchen and I brewed myself about twenty-eight cups of it and I drank it all in six minutes flat,

What size were these cups? Shot glasses? Also, in this scenario, Twilight either made and drank 28 cups in six minutes, or she made 28 cups, then drank them all in six minutes. I get that it's Twilight and she's devoted to Celestia, but even for her this is weird. And a little impossible. *ding* 39.

"But I kept drinking it!" she said, her eyes going a bit crazy. "And drinking it and drinking it and drinking it! And gradually, I started to like it, even though it turned me into an absolute raging caffeine addict! You don't know how much of my parents' care-package money went straight into my tea-strainer, Princess! It got to a point where I deliberately had to step myself down to coffee because my eyes were starting to turn yellow and I woke up every morning with the ability to hear colors!"

Good thing this story isn't called "Princess Celestia Hates Meth." *ding* 40.

"Yes," I said. "Mostly concerned with damage control from my little tea tantrum."

Tea-mper tantrum. *ding* 41.

"Yes," I said, my head high. "And I bear it all on my own back. Except Poetry Slam's thing. Which I don't understand at all."

If you never understand what he's saying, then why do you keep him on? *ding* 42.

Also, I think I understood him pretty well. *ding* 43.

"I don't want to alarm you overmuch, but I can sum up the problem we're facing here with one single word."

She leaned over the podium, resting her hooves heavily on its edges. "Discord," she said.

But like I said, I don't want to alarm you overmuch. *ding* 44.

And that means… Discord got to her, too! Clearly, a non-tea-drinking Celestia is diametrically opposed to the real Celestia we all know and love." Twilight grinned at me and snuggled up against my side.

Despite the fact that we've hit her with the Elements of Harmony twice now, which would probably remove any lingering effects. Then again, the Elements are pretty vague, but I'm still counting it as a sin. *ding* 45.

I had spent the entirety of last night reliving thousands and thousands of hateful years of tea

One night? It only took one night to relive thousands of years of tea?

So let's say that it's 4000 years she's reliving. That's 1,460,000 days. Let's say she drinks tea an average of three times a day, so she's reliving 4,380,000 tea drinking experiences. If she experienced one tea drinking experience a second, it would take just over fifty straight days of this to "cure" Celestia. If it's microseconds then 1. the memories would probably be going by too fast for her to register and 2. that would probably still take a week or two.

*ding* 46.

Having said all of that... this story is awesome. It's hysterical and I love it. *-ding* 41

FINAL SIN TALLY: 41

SENTENCE: RE-LIVING ALL TEA DRINKING EXPERIENCES FOR ALMOST TWO MONTHS

(Hell)

4046488 very well done. Do you think you could do my story i put in the requested folder by the way?

4046488 The sins were pretty good. However, there are a couple problems: one, provide a link to the story you're reviewing. two, keep some sort of sin counter handy, so the audience can keep track along with you. Otherwise, good job. Cheers