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Chapter 1: Injury2,636 words
Chapter 2: Introduction3,775 words
Chapter 3: Intervention4,094 words
Chapter 4: Irritation3,260 words
Chapter 5: Irate4,513 words

Chapter 1: Injury

It’s not the simplest job, talking with troubled ponies. It’s not that they weren’t, by and large, fundamentally good equines, no, no; rather, it was just . . . taxing, really, to hear about so much darkness and sadness that was contained within a patient’s head. And you couldn’t help them, not really, not unless one was willing to drink from the same sorrowful draught they had, and extend a hoof in sympathy.

Social osmosis ensured you could never help another without feeling the slightest bit worse about yourself; you may need to have a heart to do the job, but having one would, eventually, kill you.

Which is why, coincidentally, Compassionate Counsel was shoveling sugar-cubes into his mouth with wild abandon; distantly, Counsel knew this was merely a coping mechanism, and a childish one at that, but the voice of reason, as well as any sense of self-loathing, was drowned out by the crunching of the crystals underneath his molars.

Everypony needs something to keep sane, and really, eating sugar was hardly the worst thing Counsel could’ve been doing with his spare time between sessions; it was playing hell with his blood sugar, mind you, but otherwise careful eating had prevented him from going into diabetic shock thus far.

About 20 seconds passed like this, with little noise save for the frantic consumption of the cubes and the clinking of his cup of water being emptied and refilled as he drank from it like a fish, before he finally leaned back in his chair with a sigh and flipped through his schedule half-heartedly; ever since the Royal Transference, as most therapists called it, everything had gotten a great deal less simple.

Half-heartedly, Counsel stretched a hoof forward, intent on pressing his intercom, possibly even just having some small talk with his secretary. He swished about his leg for a few moments in vain before remembering, with a sigh, that both intercom and secretary had made a departure a few short weeks ago. It was both a business decision and a personal one; a quick glance around his progressively less decorated office easily made evident his rapidly draining funds, and frankly, Timely Response deserved better than ‘sinking with the ship,’ as it were.

“Royals,” Counsel muttered, as he filled up his glass up to the brim with water and sipped at it absentmindedly, “Be no problems at all if wasn’t for the crown's paparazzi.”

Another sip, this one made while deep in thought.

Transference. A troublesome condition, to say the least; Florence Clydesdale didn’t have a damned clue what she was getting herself into when she started treating her fellow ponies with so much care and kindness. She was by no means the first, nor the last, but she was probably the most well-known case; fundamentally sane ponies, ones that were, at least mentally, perfectly fine, started declaring their love for her left and right. And all she was doing was swapping bandages off and replacing them with clean ones, tending to them occasionally, that sort of thing; there was no romance, none at all, and yet by those patient’s accounts, there was love, almost as undeniable as it was unprovable.

Of course, eventually most of the ponies got over it and realized how silly they were acting.

Unfortunately, those were run-of-the-mill ponies; those without the power or means to actively track, say, a therapist. A therapist, whom, evidently, after having aided a certain undisclosed princess deals with her grief after losing a friend/lover, had been forced to move to Stalliongrad and change his name en-route.

Not that it mattered; Stalliongrad, for good or for ill, was an extraordinarily homogenous city, and a zebra like Farasi Husna (now, legally, Trotya Anatoli) had stuck out like a sore thumb. ‘Had’ being the key word of that sentence, as it had only taken the Crown a few short days to relocate him and pick him up with a royal coach.

It had been, by all accounts, a Night-Court coach. Counsel suppressed a sharp spike of outrage against the Lunar princess, but even as he tried to swallow his ire, it didn’t quite go away; it stuck in his throat and his stomach, a caltrop of emotion.

Counsel muttered something angry and unintelligible under his breath, which, honestly, was all he felt needed to be said about that particular aspect of the report; there was no way, in Counsel’s eyes, that Farasi could legitimately be blamed for most of these problems. Ever since Counsel had met him in Canterlot University, Farasi had always been a dutiful and hardworking stallion, as well as an upstanding and morally sound doctor; to even consider what the tabloids were saying about him would be tantamount to betrayal.

Of course, when the newspapers came out about the estimated expenses, because inevitably somepony found out about this gross exploitation of power and money, it raised more than a few eyebrows; it was hardly an extraordinary number of bits, really, but for it to all be spent in pursuit of one, rather unfortunate zebra, well. . .

Needless to say, the tabloids were, for all intents and purposes, calling Farasi Canterlot’s most expensive hooker.

Well, no, actually; that was what the ‘kind’ ones were saying; the ones that lived off of the anger and vitriol of their consumers were calling Farasi a seducer of royalty, and prognosticating the end-times, just as they had been for the last few decades. The fact they had been steadfastly incorrect in these assumptions yet continuously published them was, in Counsel’s eyes, worthy of both applause and a nice padded cell.

“And that,” Counsel murmured to himself as he flipped through his schedule for tomorrow, “should’ve been the end of that; they couldn’t let the facts get in the way of a good story, though.” His schedule was utterly empty, save for a short meeting with one of his long-time child patients that had been arranged for at the last minute.

“Poor colt must’ve gotten into another fight,” he said, sighing softly. “Still, with only one, irregular, appointment a month, I’m going to need to find another job.”

Counsel glanced around his office again, noting the small cracks in the wall that had been plastered over and over again, the permanent scuff marks that had been carved into the carpet by one of his very few Griffon patients, the windows that had been re-paned at least three separate times due to overzealous Pegasi, the fading yet still cheerful marker drawings on his wall when one of his patient's children had decided to add some color to the place. . .

It was amazing, really, how much life was contained in these simple four walls. All manner of miracles had taken place here in the last four, nearly five years, ranging from the simplistic like a foal feeling better about him or herself, to the majestic, like how a mare had turned her life around and was recovering from a nearly deadly bout of depression . . . and it had merely cost him roughly 200 bits in rent, 20 in candy for his various patients and 10 in sugar for himself, per month.

And it was all about to die.

Counsel sighed again before rolling out of his chair, trotting over to the door, and exiting. He flinched at the finality of the lights clicking off, just for a moment, before he shook his head and checked his office’s mail cabinet, not that he expected much.

“Ish prolly jus’ notses,” he muttered from the corner of his paper filled mouth, before spitting the various letters on to a table where he could actually pick through each one individually.

It was humorous, if one enjoyed cringe comedy; a mere three months ago, and these sorts of payments would’ve been, at most, a momentary inconvenience. By the sun, even two months ago and each letter would’ve only required a cursory budget balancing. But now . . .

Counsel cheerlessly checked through the few drawers in his office as he noted the rapidly mounting bills that were awaiting him at the end of the month; it wasn’t like he was expecting to find a significant amount of bits there, but he felt he might as well give the effort: it’s not like he had any other way to seriously gain the money he needed, short of taking out a loan.

He chuckled mirthlessly, more as a release of stress than anything else; once, a loan had been used to open this practice. Now, a loan was going to put it on life support.

A particularly ornate looking letter silenced his despairing laughter, though; not only was the stationary above typical paper in quality, the fluid script must’ve been written by magic or hoof, as no machine to date was capable of this degree of kerning. Furthermore, upon the letter was one of the Princess’ Auto-mailer glyphs; an expensive addition to any letter, to say the least, particularly considering it appeared to have enough charge for a return as well.

Carefully, Counsel opened the letter and read through it.

Dear Sir or Madam,

It has come to my attention that you are a psychologist of admirable quality, and that you may be capable of assisting me through what I might tentatively call a troubling time; while I feel that I’m as able as I ever will be, a number of my friends, colleagues, and staff have pointed out that I may be, perhaps, deluding myself. While I believe they are exaggerating any issues I might happen to have, they have extracted a promise from me, and I feel obligated to fulfill their wishes, if only for their own wellness of mind.

Furthermore, I understand that while fewer and fewer therapists are willing to meet face to face with their clients due to recent . . . events, you maintain your practice in the idea that direct interaction is a necessity for your line of work. Since my friends have advocated I try to emerge from the reticence that I’ve fallen into in recent years, I’m of the belief that your practice is the most ideal fit for me.

Having done some research, I’ve discovered that you’ve, several times before, let patients have their initial consultation be free of charge; is this still the case? While money is of no objection, I still feel it is prudent to ask.

Furthermore, I’m assuming there is a confidentiality agreement you have for your patients as well, and that any discussion we happen to have remains between us. If this happens to be the case, please sign the line below, and inform me of when a good time would be to come in tomorrow, and I will move the bits into your bank account for the equivalent of 10, pre-paid, sessions (technically, 11, if you still happen have to have the initial consultation free of charge).

Thank you very much for your time,

Autumn Flicker.

Counsel stared at the number at the bottom of the page for a very long minute; he was almost certain there were too many zeroes in that number, firstly, and secondly, well, there was, he felt, something intrinsically worrisome about accepting money from royals. Especially ones that seemed to be using a thesaurus, used the word 'furthermore' with reckless abandon, and wrote letters asking for appointments like they were cover letters for jobs.

And he was absolutely certain this was a royal, perhaps some upper tier duchess/duke or lower end Prince/Princess; decent staff members like the letter seemed to indicate, in any sort of role, had gotten more difficult to find nowadays considering that there were four (well. . . five, but for whatever reason the Princess of Sleep always managed to slip his mind) Alicorn princesses in Equestria and everypony and their mother was vying for one of those jobs.

In the last two centuries alone the second youngest Alicorn princess had evidently hired a small cities’ worth of ponies.

Still, though, Counsel stared at the number and at the line for his signature; hesitantly he picked up a quill, stared again at the line, again at the number, began to reach for an ink vial, and then set the quill down with a sigh as he went off to fetch a calculator; it was tempting, he had to guiltily admit, to simply sign the document and get an absurd amount of cash he was only mostly sure was incorrect, but there was an essential part of him that utterly refused to allow himself that option. Ponies relied off him for help, after all, and while Counsel was very much aware of his innumerable, though admittedly minor, flaws, he maintained the simple yet consistent belief that he, ultimately, wasn’t a scumbag.

And yes, the total was off. By two digits, no less.

Counsel stared at the number on the letter again, before scratching out the last two zeroes with a sigh; it was painful, watching a very important number like that be divided by one hundred, but at least now he wouldn’t be signing his soul over, metaphorically speaking.

Then, with a flourish, he completed the rest of the reply, (Yes, first consultation is free of charge, and yes, we have a confidentiality agreement, and yes, please come in tomorrow at 1:00 PM), sealed up the letter, and glanced at it once more, hoof hovering over the Auto-mailer stamp glyph.

This was the last chance to back out. Counsel shot a quick glance towards his office, before his lips curled into a wry grin and his hoof descended upon the insignia. Then, as the letter lit up and disappeared in a curl of purplish flame, he shrugged on his raincoat and walked out of his waiting room and into the Canterlot rain; it was chilly, but not unbearable.

* * * * * * * * * *

Elsewhere, a letter fizzled into existence, but didn’t have long before being snatched up in a telekinetic grip; tiredly, it was read, with an expression that could only be described as bored, before there was a widening of eyes when the edited numbers were seen. There was a pause as the number was reread.

“Lemme guess; this pony got your letter, saw that you had the incorrect price, and actually corrected it,” muttered a voice from what, at first glance, might’ve been mistaken for a purple and green wall. “And probably didn’t even realize it was supposed to be a trap, considering you put a false name on the letter. . . .”

“Quiet, you,” came the reply, a mixture of playful and irked.

“A promise is a promise, Twilight. And you and I both know you need to talk to somepony; you’ve gotten so . . . quiet. And, from what I’ve overheard from the maids, you’re acting a bit . . . well . . . scary. And considering I’m bigger than some buildings, and have teeth to match, and you’re considered the scarier out of the two of us, ehh. . .”

For a moment, the Alicorn sighed, before saying, “That’s not my intention.”

“I know that. Just . . . please. Trust me on this; Celestia and Luna have both done this sort of thing before, and they both agree it’s better than just trying to deal with stuff on your own. And we both know I’m not around enough to really talk to, so, yeah. For me? Please?”

The corners of the lavender alicorn’s lips twitched upward and downwards like the stalling of an engine, before she spoke; “I Pinkie Promised, didn’t I? And I don’t plan on ramming another cupcake into my eye, so you already know I’ll give it a try. I’m telling you, though, I’m fine.”

Author's Note:

Hello, hello! Let's get to the meat of this little discussion though, eh? Some of you may be reading this and be like, "WTF, 5 alicorns? Self-insert/OP-OC, Dislike to hell and back!"

Yes, 5 Alicorns. No, I'm not counting Chrysalis as one of them; this is a fanwork using Kilala97's setting as a starting point for a story that's really directed towards, well, Twilight. And Kilala97 has an Alicorn Princess called Nidra, who's the daughter of Luna, so, yeah. Five Alicorns.

If you're wondering why, though, this isn't on the Kilala97 fanpage forum/group thingy yet, that's because I'm going to wait until the 'Next Generation' show up for realz in-story before adding this story to the group.

Also. . .

I'm merely hoping that those of you who are reading this and see that some things aren't quite right considering the nature of Kilala97's world realize that it's probably because I have a plan for those bits; either as red-herrings or as Chekov's Unmentionables. So, if you think something's strange and distrust the direction I might seem to be heading, please, I ask for a small smidgeon of trust on your part. I might surprise you; I certainly hope to.

EDIT: How in the hell did I forget about Valiant Heart? Well, thankfully, he's a chap, so there's still only 5 Alicorn Princesses; still, well, that would've been embarrassing had I gone much further.

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