The music swelled. The credits rolled. The lights in the theater brightened. Luna blinked, and turned to her sister.
"Tia," she said, "what happened next?"
Celestia smiled her usual inscrutable smile. "That's all there is. The movie is over."
"But the documentary merely showed us a portion of those ponies' lives."
Celestia cleared her throat. Dragging Luna to her first-ever movie had already been a surreal enough experience. The idea that tales could be told of fictional characters — an idea merely eight hundred years old — could wait until later. "That was long ago. The, ah … 'documentary' is all we know of them."
Luna nodded. "Unfortunate," she said, projecting disappointment in her tone, standing up and walking away.
Celestia didn't notice the gleam in her eye.
* * *
"Oh yes, a little bit lower …" Establishing Shot groaned, as the pink and blue spa ponies dug their hooves into his back.
"Of course, master," the pink one giggled. "And maybe … lower still …"
"We just want to be good ponies," her sister added, rubbing a hoof over his sensitive mark.
"Oh, you are, you are …" Shot said, caressing the pink one's face as he rolled over onto his back, staring up straight into the face of the Princess of the Night. "BWAAAAH!"
"Salutations!" she said cheerfully.
He shot bolt upright, hooves shooting between his hind legs to cover himself up. "Who are you what is this it's not what it looks like don't tell my wife I —"
"Tis alright!" the princess said brightly. "Thou art dreaming, Establishing Shot. We did not wish to disturb thee, but we have an inquiry which simply could not be delayed."
He scooted off the table and threw a towel around his flanks. "Um, okay, sure, yes, your majesty, um … seriously what are you doing here?"
"Thou recorded a historical documentary titled To Serve The Night, regarding one of our faithful servants in the era after our departure."
His eyes widened at the title. "I … ah … yes?"
"What happened to Dark Tail and Light Flanks after the end of the documentary?"
"They, um, they …" He swallowed. "Well, your majesty, I mean, it's a romance, certain things can be implied that we can't show on the screen …"
She tilted her head. "Whyever not?"
"Um. Film ratings?"
Her eyebrows lifted. "Are modern audiences truly so different? The missing scenes would have vastly increased the popularity of thy documentary, in times before."
"Well, yes, but, um, there might have been foals watching."
She stared back blankly. "How else will they be educated in the realities of lovemaking?"
This wasn't working. Muzzle beet red, he lunged for a lie. "Um … we ran out of film?"
The princess' face brightened. "Oh! It is quite fortunate, Establishing Shot, that that is a difficulty readily remedied, here in the world beyond the veil of sleep." Her horn shimmered. A camera appeared in his forehooves. "We shall use our magic to transfer thy recordings back to the waking world!"
"Recordings of …" He stared uncomprehendingly.
Her horn shimmered. A night-blue unicorn mare and cream-white pegasus stallion appeared in the spa room, disoriented, blinking.
Shot swallowed through a dry throat. "Um. Your highness, a film requires a crew of hundreds. Makeup artists —" Luna's horn shimmered, and the actor and actress instantly looked like they did in the film — "and set designers —" and they were on the windswept moors of the Trottish Haylands — "and … and …"
Luna smiled, almost predatorially. She cantered around behind Establishing Shot, gesturing to the dark-and-light pair.
"Restart thy recording of thy documentary, Establishing Shot." She leaned forward. "Now kiss."
* * *
Twilight stared at the screen, open-mouthed.
"And that," Celestia said evenly, "was why the Director's Cut of To Serve The Night was put in the restricted wing of the Archives."
Ooh, I always love these short story collections. Can't wait to check it out!
Are we talking like , or more ?
2848089
I'm thinking it was more .
2848394
well it certainly couldn't have been ...
maybe ?
I'd say you succeeded. *Grins*
How did you find the time to do this?!
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From The Stars was written within two hours at the con. The others were all done months ago (the conbook story I couldn't publish until after EFNW, the others I was hanging onto until I had a short story collection in which to put them). There are some more on the way once I get back to my home computer.
2859103
I didn't find the ending that abrupt, to be honest; then again, I can't be trusted when it comes to making sure the audience understands what's going on.
Given your appreciation of ponies with horns & wings, then, I expect the next short to feature either Princess Skyla or Erroria. Given FiM's trajectory of one new princess per season (Luna 4 s1, Cadence 4 s2, Twilight 4 s3 -- Celestia as the only unadded princess is naturally the best), one of them's bound to become canon.
Fair enough. I confess to being skewed on the matter anyway given my British English indoctrination.
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> I expect the next short to feature either Princess Skyla or Erroria.
I think that can be arranged. FIMFiction does have a Horror tag, right? If I'm going to include sanity-destroying Chthonian monstrosities I've gotta get that correct.
Er... you were supposed to hold off on post-con publication of Breaking the News until the 15th, though I won't be too harsh about that. However, I'd like to direct everypony to the fact that the PDF of the Everfree NW 2013 conbook is now available on the website. Huzzah!
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My mistake - I think the embargo date was only mentioned once, once upon a time in the submission guidelines, and I simply forgot. I appreciate your tolerance and I'll be more careful next year.
Great that the PDF is available, though!
:D
I may need to make a special new category of favourites just for this collection...
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Great to hear you're enjoying them! I should be posting a few more minifics from the Writeoffs to this collection in the near future, so keep an eye out.