Luna and the Moose: A Tale of the Night Court

by shallow15

On the Search for the Moose (Encounter 3)

The Canterlot Royal Library was the most extensive in Equestria. It was well known that both princesses prized knowledge and intellectual curiosity and the library was a reflection of that sentiment. Books filled the towering shelves in every one of the twenty-four rooms that comprised the library. There were books on everything from baking and crop rotation to esoteric fields like dimensional harmonics and ballistic paper airplane construction, not to mention a substantial collection of popular fiction. The library was a symbol of the age of enlightenment that the princesses had brought to the land.

Several volumes on the cultivation of household plants were being devoured by the moose when Night Audit arrived. Two of the night porters were standing at a respectful distance from it, uncertain how to approach it. Night Audit walked over to them.

“How long has it been here?” he asked.

“Not sure, Mr. Night Audit,” one of the porters replied. “We just found it in here after we heard Miss Bookbinder scream.”

Night Audit's eyebrows raised. Miss Bookbinder (and Celestia help you if you left out the “Miss”) was the night librarian, and had made it quite clear that she disapproved of anyone outside of the princesses showing up in the library after dark, much less at three-thirty in the morning. Many members of the night staff had learned this the hard way and had suffered the full force of Miss Bookbinder's true power: an unparalleled mastery of insults and withering sarcasm.

“If Miss Bookbinder actually screamed,” said Night Audit, “then the moose must have given her quite a shock.”

“Shock nothing,” came a stern voice. “It is eating the books!”

Night Audit and the porters turned to see a lemon-colored unicorn with a green mane done up in a severe bun. Hard ice blue eyes peered over a pair of half-moon spectacles. Despite the severity of her appearance, Miss Bookbinder was quite young, only a year or two younger than Night Audit. However, she carried herself with the fierce primness of a much older mare.

“Ah, Miss Bookbinder, I'm glad to see you're all right.”

“Spare me the banal pleasantries, Mr. Audit,” snapped Miss Bookbinder. “I want that thing out of my library, immediately!”

“We're working on it, Miss Bookbinder,” Night Audit said. “I'm just waiting for some assistance.”

“Of course. Assistance,” the librarian snorted. “Let it just devour the entire section on botany. It's not like any of the volumes are hundreds of years old and are irreplaceable... oh wait, yes, they are!”

Night Audit suppressed a sigh of exasperation and opened his mouth to reassure Miss Bookbinder, but before he could say anything, there was a crash from down the corridor and Star Cluster's voice echoed towards them.

“Sorry!”

Miss Bookbinder's eyes widened and she grabbed Night Audit by the shoulders. “Not her! Not here! Anypony but her!”

The night guard rounded the corner and landed next to the librarian and the clerk. “Hey, guys! You wanted to see me? Oh, hey, you found it!”

“No!” Miss Bookbinder shouted. “No no no! Not you! Not now, not ever!”

Night Audit blinked. “Is there something I should know?”

“This irresponsible nag is banned from my library!”

“Oh, come on,” Star Cluster said. “That was months ago, Booksy!”

“That's 'Miss Bookbinder' to you!”

“The chocolate sauce washed out!”

“And what about the marshmallow fluff? How do you get marshmallow fluff on every copy of every volume of the Encyclopedia Equestria?”

“Ladies!” Night Audit said, raising his voice. “If you don't mind, we have a slightly larger problem to deal with.”

“Right,” Star Cluster said. “What do you need me to do?”

“Do you still have that tether Princess Luna gave you?”

Star Cluster rummaged under her armor and withdrew the glowing magical item. “Right here?”

Night Audit peered back through the door. The moose had turned its attention to another shelf, its back to the doorway. Night Audit frowned in thought, then turned back to Star Cluster, the porters, and Miss Bookbinder.

“Star Cluster, I need you to take to the air, and loop the tether around its neck when I give you the signal. You two,” he gestured to the porters, “be ready to block the door with that shelf in case it tried to make a break for it.”

“Absolutely not!” Miss Bookbinder replied. “That thing has already destroyed I don't know how many priceless volumes, and I will not have one of my shelves used as some sort of makeshift barricade that will probably get obliterated when Doofus McButterhooves here invariably scares it off!”

“One time!” Star Cluster protested. “One time I dropped a book from the top shelf--”

“And it just happened to be the last existing volume of Flank Spear's lost folios!”

“How can they be lost if they were here in the library?”

“Well, thanks to you, they're lost now!” Miss Bookbinder snarled.

Night Audit stepped between the two mares. “Enough! Miss Bookbinder, we will do our best to keep any damage to a minimum and I can assure you Princess Luna will authorize funds to make any repairs. Star Cluster, use utmost care when tethering the moose.”

Star Cluster saluted, stuck her tongue out at Miss Bookbinder, and took to the air, flying through the door and high above the moose. She tied a loop in the tether and slowly lowered toward the moose, which finished the book it had been eating, then started in on Silver Quill's Ponderous Prose for Perfect Ponies.

As the moose began to raise its head after snagging the book in its teeth, Star Cluster twirled the tether over her head like a lasso and hurled it downward. The tether looped around the moose's antlers and snapped tight around them. Star Cluster let out a triumphant laugh and swooped down, the tether wrapped tightly around one hoof.

“And once again, the talented rookie night guard proves her worth and outwits her nemesis, thus proving that nothing and nopony can defeat her. Not even an overly tricky moose!”

The moose snorted and raised its head sharply, staring at the night guard. The sudden movement startled Star Cluster and she grinned wildly, trying to look non-threatening. The hot breath of the moose rushed through the coat on her belly. The moose's eyes widened and then it vanished, leaving Star Cluster with the tether dangling from her hoof.

“What in the world?” Miss Bookbinder asked. “What just happened?”

“The same thing that's been happening to us all night,” Night Audit answered.

“Why is there even a moose in the castle?”

“It's the pet of the ambassador form the Minotaur Nations. He sent it ahead of him, but it got loose somehow. And we have very little time before the ambassador arrives and Princess Luna has to greet him. We need to to capture the blasted thing and keep it in one place.”

Star Cluster landed next to them. “Sorry, I thought I had it that time.”

“It's fine,” Night Audit sighed. He turned to the night porters. “Help Miss Bookbinder clean up this mess. Star Cluster, we need to find Princess Luna.”

As the two ponies prepared to leave, Miss Bookbinder dashed in front of them.

“Wait! The moose is from the Minotaur Nations?”

“Yes,” Night Audit answered, taken aback by the librarian's sudden change in mood. “Why?”

Miss Bookbinder gave them a superior smile. “Because I think I know what's going on. Follow me.”

The clerk and the guard followed Miss Bookbinder through the shelves, finally coming to a halt a few aisles over from the botany section. Miss Bookbinder pulled a ladder closer to them and began to climb.

“I pulled some material on the Minotaur Nations for Princess Celestia a few months ago. I glanced through it and I remember something about the moose from that area.” She pulled a book bound in green-leather from the shelf with her magic and climbed back down. She opened the book and flipped a few pages before floating it in front of Night Audit.

“There. Page 343, second paragraph. I think you'll find it interesting.”

Night Audit frowned and scanned the page. He blinked and looked up. “This can't be right.”

“What is it?” Star Cluster leaned over and read the passage. Then she too looked up with an incredulous expression. “You have got to be kidding me.”

Comments

[Themaskedferret]

*Grins* Oh you are bloody evil

Also you put cop when you mean copy while discussing marshmallow fluff on encyclopedias

[Seether00]

Is it a chocolate mousse?

[Georg]

That's a fast moving moose.

[Mecha G]

I thought this fic was dead.