Chapter 14: It's Hard When Things Get Messy
For the first time in weeks, the acoustics department at Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns stirred with its usual level of activity. Vinyl poured over her box of sapphires, searching for a good crystal candidate for today’s experiments. With the holidays behind her and the new semester a little over two weeks away, it seemed like everything had gone back to normal.
A strangeness pervaded the mundanity. Everything had settled back down so quickly, at least when considering the alternative. Her year should’ve started in complete chaos. There was no reason for the new normal to feel so much like the old one. Fleur was across the room, working on her vocal modulation spellcrafting, while Vinyl was back to delving into Cacophony’s theories like nothing had ever happened, but so much had.
She had almost lost everything thanks to the meddling of spiteful, rich ponies, but she had also been saved by the meddling of another one. It had only cost her independence, or rather, her semblance of that little lie she still bothered to cling to. For all the talk of earning her place in Canterlot, the knowledge of one pony keeping her afloat terrified her. And now both ponies were acutely aware of it.
Aside from her work on the Drive, everything she thought she had earned could be traced back to Fancy Pants. The grant paying her tuition from the ESPA was started by his parents and he was still maintaining it. Even before she’d lost it, her funding from Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns had also been tinged by generous donations from said stallion. Fancy Pants held every card, even the cards she hadn’t known existed, and had drawn another from the deck by providing her room and board for what amounted to a work-study program.
It was that last little bit that Vinyl needed to frame very carefully for Fleur.
“A ‘practical accreditation process’ at Pantsy’s place?” Fleur asked as she paused and put down her own work.
“Yep,” Vinyl replied simply. At least, that was the angle Steeplechase had suggested in order to keep the other archivists at bay.
The DJ chose a crystal from her batch and picked it up in a hoof. She adjusted the aperture of her jeweler's loupe and began searching the crystal’s surface for microfractures and other anomalies. By keeping herself busy, she was hoping against hope that mentioning it off-hoof would be casual enough to stop Fleur from asking questions.
Feeling Fleur’s eyes still boring into the back of her head, she risked sharing a few more details. “I just didn’t want you to be surprised if you trotted by the old apartment and found somepony else living there.”
The DJ thanked Luna’s lucky stars that Fleur and Éclair had gone to Prance for the holidays. It had given her plenty of time to practice her side of the story. She’d almost lost everything, and those two were the last ponies that needed to know. She just needed to keep her eyes to herself and for Fleur to stop prying for details before the curious mare could raise any other red flags.
“It was his idea. Lets me mess around with the record collection whenever I have spare time between school and the Drive. Also, it lets me save a few bits since I lost my grants.” When Vinyl heard the clops of hooves approaching on the softwood floor, she knew she was in for an extended Fleur-y encounter.
“Does that mean you’re quitting after the bake sale? Here I was looking forward to watching you burn pastries until Maman fired you.”
Vinyl bit her tongue before she could ask how Fleur had come to the correct conclusion. She hated how sharp her friend could be when she wanted. Catching sight of a flaw in the crystal, Vinyl carefully brushed a crack with resin and rubbed the excess away to make the surface as smooth as possible. “Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“Don’t say it like that, Vy. I was very confident in your ability to burn things.” Fleur assured her friend with a hug from behind, causing Vinyl’s brush to jostle in her hooves. Vinyl tried keeping her eyes fixated on her work, but Fleur was making it difficult by hanging off the DJ’s neck with a flippant disregard for personal space. “I guess that would explain why Professor Arpeggio’s been so excited. He and Steeplechase have always been pushing for you to go for that certification since you know the spells already. Why the change of heart, though?”
“Job opportunities,” she answered simply, omitting her desperation for money to live.
“Really? But you told me that you wouldn’t be caught dead working in an old, stuffy library.” Fleur craned her neck further towards Vinyl’s working face.
“Did I say that?” Vinyl did her best to keep her voice even. That was the sloppiest deflection so far, and she was quickly running out of rehearsed material. She tapped the crystal in her hooves with a tuning fork, testing its frequency. The note was a little too sharp for her liking, but it was workable.
“You can’t be serious.” Fleur scoffed and trotted around to her friend. Alarm bells started ringing in Vinyl’s head. “Kinda hard to forget Steeplechase swooping down from the stacks with that death glare of his. It was very bold of you to say in the middle of the Society’s library when you know he hears everything. So, what changed?”
“I thought maybe working with normal crystal harmonics outside the lab would give me some new ideas.” Vinyl had suppressed her voice from rising into a question, but she didn’t have to look to know Fleur wasn’t buying her excuse. She started etching the crystal’s interior lattice work with cacophony runes, hoping the sensitive work would make Fleur drop the subject and give her some space. “Fancy asked me to do all of it, so I’ll have plenty of practice.”
Fleur nodded along, but then paused with realization. “Wait. Did you say ‘all of it?’”
Her friend’s sudden question nearly caused Vinyl to drop the crystal. “Uh… yeah?” she answered as she scanned the incomplete rune for imperfections. It was salvageable, but she couldn’t have her attention divided by her friend. She shot the larger unicorn a look as she lifted her fragile work, hoping said friend would take the hint and drop the subject.
“When you have ‘spare time?’” Fleur added in disbelief; taking the cue, crumpling it in her hooves, and tossing it in the trash.
“Fleur, I really need to focus here. It’s not a big deal, anyway. Can’t this wait?”
“It couldn’t be a bigger deal! You do know Daddy’s and Auntie’s old collection is stupidly huge, right? And Pantsy expects you to tackle that nightmare of a closet all by yourself just, whenever?”
“Relax, Fleur. Steeplechase is going to be teaching me the ESPA storage protocols, but it’ll just be me in there with the records.”
Fleur stared in bewilderment at Vinyl’s laxness. “And that’s supposed to make it better? Vy, that’s gonna take you forever! Sweet Celestia, what is even running through that royally stupid crowned flank of his?”
Vinyl sighed. Not wanting to risk further damaging a serviceable crystal, she put it down and turned to give her friend her full attention. She might as well get some answers for herself if Fleur wasn’t going to let things go. “I thought maybe you could tell me. It was kinda out of nowhere.”
Fleur sat down and rocked back and forth as she gave the question some thought. “If Pantsy stuck with you without credentials, then it’s probably those flank crowns’ fault. Anytime he comes out of left field with something, it’s usually a Kingmaker decision.”
“So, you and your mom had nothing to do with Fancy choosing me for this?” Vinyl asked while side-eying her friend for any hint of a lie.
“I know he didn’t ask me about anything like that. And for Maman, she wouldn’t even know enough to talk to him about what you’re doing here. It’s weird. Pantsy can spot magical talent from a mile away thanks to that talent of his, but he’s always been hopeless when it comes to understanding the stuff himself. Poor lug just can’t get a feel for the aetherial, if you know what I mean.
“I remember this one time when I was a filly, I scraped a knee pretty bad in the park. He used his kerchief to stop the bleeding by hoof. Couldn’t even focus enough to cast a simple levitation spell when under pressure. Still, I guess I should just be glad Pantsy is finally fulfilling Daddy’s and Auntie’s wishes, even if he is being ridiculous. He’s been dragging his hooves on giving it to the Society for years. Please tell me you’re at least gonna try putting it all into cacophony crystals.”
“And here I thought you didn’t want me trying to get kicked out of Fancy’s place.”
“No, but it’d be more fun!” Fleur bubbled like a filly, pushing her cheeks together in childlike wonderment. Vinyl swore she could see explosions and faerie fire storms shimmering in her friend’s eyes.
“The scary thing is, I can’t tell if you’re joking.” Vinyl shook her head and picked up her project for the day and started working on it once more. “Either way, potential for greater storage capacities kind of falls flat when there’s the higher potential for explosive cascade failures around one-of-a-kind master records.”
Even if he had requested her experimental storage methods, there was no way in Tartarus she was going to risk damaging anything in that vintage wonderland of a studio. She was going to do the whole thing the old-fashioned way, one record to crystal at a time.
“You know,” Fleur started as she leaned onto her shorter friend’s back, to Vinyl’s annoyance, “if he had asked me, I would’ve told him to look elsewhere, just to spare you a couple years of digging through an old closet you’re probably gonna hate.”
“What makes you say that?” Vinyl wasn’t sure to feel hurt or not by the admission.
“For one, the music is swing and disco. Not exactly bringing the bass you like.”
“Believe it or not, my taste is more refined than constant bass drops, Fleur.” The DJ rolled her eyes at her friend and shook her off her back. “Pretty sure I wouldn’t be in the Society if I just wanted to blast pony’s brains out.”
“Okay. Then how about number two? The rest is probably just a bunch of super-boring stuff. Half-sung songs with mistakes, interrupted recording sessions, times they just let the record roll on accident.”
“That’s why archivists do their thing, Fleur.”
“Which. You. Aren’t.” Fleur booped her friend’s nose thrice, eliciting a grumble from the DJ. “Look, I snuck in there a couple of times to listen to some of it after Daddy died. It was… nice, you know? Hearing his voice again, but Auntie’s hoarding was kind of intense. I mean, think if somepony was listening to us just jabbering on right now.”
“But we aren’t famous musicians, Fleur. What’d be the point?”
“So? What difference would it make if we were?” Fleur cleared her throat, stood at full attention, and regarded her friend with a haughty aloofness that bordered on contempt. “Imagine if we spake to thee regarding clouds covering of our moon and more inane musings on yon weather, would thy willfully and joyfully harken to our prattling on?”
“That,” Vinyl pointed to her friend as a smile split her face. “is a frighteningly good Princess Luna.”
Fleur puffed out her chest and started levitating her mane, waving it like a flag in the wind. “A thousand laudations, noble discus spinner, for thy appreciation of our sexy royal voice!”
“Sexy?”
“Oh, hay yeah! Princess Luna’s depth is downright sultry. I could listen to her for hours,” Fleur exclaimed excitedly. She put a hoof to her chin and smirked as she reapplied her lunar tones. “Mayhaps we were too quick to judge partaking in such potentially divine recordings.”
“Princess Celestia’s voice is pretty deep, too, but I don’t remember you going crazy over her.”
“Yeah, but she’s all motherly and reserved.” Fleur blew a razzberry and waved a dismissive hoof at the very notion. “Princess Luna has a lot more energy and pop. Plus, Princess Celestia doesn’t slip into that absolutely adorkable old speak. She’s a lot less fun.”
‘Adorkable’ gave the DJ some pause, but she was more curious about the subtext of her other claim. “You have a Princess Celestia too?”
Fleur closed her eyes and pulled a stool over to herself. Slowly, she lowered herself to her stand-in throne with regal grace. She sparked her mane to life again with the magical flag waving and opened her eyes with a smile as serene as a still pond. “Of course, my little pony. Have I never shown it to you?”
Seeing the solar princess’ pristine mannerisms on her mischievous friend made Vinyl’s skin crawl, but the voice behind it was surprisingly lackluster. “The act’s spot on, but that doesn’t really sound like her.”
“Everypony is a critic, but I suppose you’re right, Vinyl Scratch. Her graceful highness is slightly airy and more melodious despite her much larger size.” The not-princess laughed daintily into her hoof, but never broke her pacifying grin. Fleur snatched a notebook labeled “Princesses” with her magic from her desk and flipped through several pages of spellwork and character notes until she landed on her details about Celestia.
“I have to cast a few of my vocal modulation spells to get Celestia completely right. Damn cheating changelings and their freebies…” Fleur seethed, momentarily breaking character before wiping the anger away.
“On the other hoof…” Fleur popped back up to her full height and looked into the middle distance, keeping her face stern with authority. “Princess Luna’s sharpness bears a similar cadence to our natural voice. We have endeavored to refine our impression of her lunar highness since our serendipitous meeting at the Moondance.”
The Moondance. With everything that had happened in the past few days, Vinyl had almost forgotten how much she had screwed up her first and second impressions with the lunar princess. Now that she thought about it, Fancy was a retired, knighted diplomat who still visited the royal sisters if the Moondance itself was any indication. Was she going to have to deal with royalty now that she was living at Fancy’s mansion? She hadn’t even considered that when she’d accepted the job.
“Anyway.” Fleur threw her impressions to the wind and leaned over her friend’s shoulder. “My point is, that old record collection is going to be an absolute snoozefest if it’s anything like the stuff I’ve heard. I mean, I’m glad you seem happy about it, but I don’t think I’d have the patience for it.”
“I seriously doubt your patience for anything,” Vinyl added with a knowing smirk. “Besides, it’s good practice for normal crystal lattice work. And, if it’s as boring as you say it is, maybe clearing my head will give me some time to think about other stuff. Or you could come hang out while I work.”
“That’s not gonna happen,” Fleur huffed as she fell back onto the stool. “Unless you wanna try storing them on a few cacophony crystals to add a little excitement, I’m good. You’re probably in for plenty of good napping material.”
“Thanks. I knew I could count on you,” Vinyl said flatly. It was probably for the best though. Fancy Pants seemed pretty adamant about not letting anypony in on the project, and Fleur would be an unpredictable wild card.
“But, hey, umm… If you do, you know, find anything nice from Daddy, you’ll tell me, right?” Fleur absently clopped her hooves together and looked away, unable to meet Vinyl in the eyes. “Please?”
Vinyl was taken slightly aback, not by the request, but Fleur’s demeanor. She always wore her bravado around her barrel and brushed anypony foolish enough to stand against her aside. It was rare to see the proud mare show weakness unless she was in trouble. Even then, the only pony able to rein Fleur in like this was Éclair.
No, that wasn’t right. Thinking back to the Festival of Flakes, Fancy’s harsh rebuking had reduced Fleur to a quivering filly almost immediately. That made a lot more sense now knowing he was her older half-brother. Vinyl wondered how many layers there were to Fleur’s act.
“Of course, Fleur. I wouldn’t hold out on you.”
The relief behind Fleur’s smile practically lit up the room and she pulled her best friend into a tight hug. “Thanks, Vy. You’re the best.”
“Ain’t no contest, right?”
“Friends,” the larger unicorn finished their saying and squeezed tighter. After a few moments, the hug was dragging on a little too long for Vinyl’s liking. She tried wiggling out of her friend’s grasp, but Fleur wasn’t too keen on letting her go.
“Hey, Fleur? Can I get back to work?”
Fleur nodded, but kept a firm hold. The DJ tried to push away, but the actress’ superior physical strength kept her in check.
“That means I need to be able to reach the table with my hooves, you know,” Vinyl said with an awkward laugh. Fleur gasped and shook her head vigorously, refusing to let go. Vinyl’s limbs went limp as she sighed in resignation. “How much longer is this going to take?”
“We caught up on our holidays, now I’m catching up on my Vinyl snuggles.” Fleur shook her friend like a plushy bear. “I just wuv you sho much!”
The smaller unicorn grumbled, hoping the clingy mare’s grip wouldn’t last too much longer. After about thirty more seconds with no signs of stopping, the DJ tapped her friend’s foreleg. “Compromise. Let’s have a collaboration day and you can hang off me all afternoon if you let me work.”
“We accept the terms of thy surrender,” Fleur replied in her best Princess Luna impression. “Come to think of it, we wished to attempt a new vocal technique with thy help, fair ‘Deejay Pawn Three.’”
“You just had to hear that one, didn’t you?” Vinyl complained as she buried her embarrassment in her friend’s chest.
“Verily. Now, help us take our Princess Luna to the next level, kay Vy?”
A horrific scream pierced the air as a reverberating explosion rattled the audio lab. Moments later, a panicked clattering of hooves sounded as Professor Arpeggio burst through the door to check the source of the piercing sound.
“Vinyl! Fleur! Are you two okay?”
“That could’ve gone better,” Vinyl remarked from her new topsy-turvy perspective of the world.
Arpeggio's eyes surveyed the room. The crystal focus at the center contained the usual pile of pulverized sapphire dust sitting in containment after a failure. That was normal. Vinyl was lying upside down on her neck half-wedged into the foam wall, while Fleur was hobbling on her hooves with the poise and grace of a newborn giraffe. Her mane stood completely on end, blown back like the Bride of Frankenstallion. Arpeggio rushed to catch Fleur before she fell over. His initial fears were allayed by the laughter and manic grin splitting her face.
“That. Was. Awesome!” Fleur whooped with unsteady glee. “Let’s do that again!”
“Let’s not and say we did,” Vinyl groaned as the foam boards finally dislodged her and she tipped over on her side. Her world was still spinning after another cacophonous failure.
Thanks to the containment spells and wards on their focusing station, any shrapnel was well-contained. It just wasn’t calibrated to withstand the force of a shrieking princess, and consequently caused a secondary blast wave. Even though she wasn’t wounded, after suddenly rolling backwards like a rampaging wagon wheel, Vinyl didn’t feel like getting up until she was certain she’d keep her breakfast down.
Arpeggio sighed as he held Fleur in his foreleg. “Would somepony mind explaining exactly what that horrid scream was?”
Fleur arched back up and pressed her face into the professor’s. “It wasn’t a scream. It was the Royal Canterlot Voice!” Fleur shouted between crazed giggles into Arpeggio’s face, still punch-drunk from taking the feedback burst in the face. Seeing as she was fine, he dropped her to the ground and went over to check Vinyl.
“If you want the full story, Fleur wanted to try imitating something she had heard the princesses could do and I had an idea for a new runic sequence that looked promising. Fleur recorded her Princess Luna impression and we tried drawing it out of the crystal multiple times to amplify it. Let’s just say, Cacophony’s spellwork cacophonied again, and the results nearly shattered our eardrums.”
Arpeggio glowered and turned back to his other student. “Fleur de Lis!”
“Oh, Profeggio Arpessor! When did you get here?” she giggled while sprawled on the floor.
“What did I say about trying to imitate the Royal Canterlot Voice?”
“‘Think about it?’” she answered dumbly.
“Which I clearly prefaced with a ‘don’t even,’ Miss de Lis!”
“But come on, Professor! Wouldn’t it be so cool to shout somepony down like a princess? I can see it now.” Fleur popped up from the floor and leaned over the professor, waving her shakey hoof across an invisible canvas she painted with her words. “Somepony cuts you off on Mane Street when you’re pulling a cart and you just yell ‘Hey! I’m trottin’ here!’ to knock them clean off their hooves.”
“Trium-vocalization, or the Royal Canterlot Voice, is a combination of the three primal tribal magicks, and is to only be used by alicorns, Miss de Lis.” The professor heaved a patient sigh. “That verbal arcane power is reserved for edicts and serious matters. Not road rage!”
Fleur clicked her tongue, sobering up from her act. “Relax, Professor. It wasn’t tribal magic or anything, we just tried to layer it a bunch of times over and over and it blew up in our faces.” Fleur cast a spell to clean herself off and right her mane back into its unblasted state. Arpeggio scowled at his student, seeing as how she hadn’t even remotely acknowledged the point he made.
“Be that as it may, it is not a suitable use of voice modulation magic. I’d reject such an ill-thought performance proposal before it left this department.”
“Oh, come on!” Fleur complained as she crossed her forelegs and pouted.
“Oh, right. The showcase is coming up,” Vinyl remarked as she righted herself from the floor and shook the lingering vertigo from her head.
The ESPA’s biannual Performance Showcases were right around the corner. The last month had been so hectic, she’d forgotten all about it. While some ponies paid dues monetarily, others maintained their memberships by applying their craft for the Society’s benefit. Vinyl fell into the latter category. Both her membership and financial aid status were tied to contributing to regular performances and showing progress on her research. It wasn’t much to ask, considering she earned her CSGU tuition by showing off to the Society.
“Indeed. I was going to remind you both since the proposal due date is fast approaching. You need to get yours submitted and approved by the board before I can send them over to the Society for final verification.” Arpeggio regarded Fleur with disappointment. “Proposals that I approve of, that is.”
“Lighten up, Teach. It’s not even that big of a deal.” Fleur waved a dismissive hoof at the rejection.
“Studying how to better imitate royalty is not groundbreaking research. At worst, it’s a capital offense. You might as well be pressing bottle caps into bits in front of the Royal Guard. You can act like the princesses on stage all you want; in fact, you’ll probably land plenty of parts as a princess for any dramas about either of the two sisters. But showcasing a method of faking a royal decree is not a ‘performance’ I will condone.”
Fleur’s eyes searched over her stalwart professor and her ears drooped under his pressure. She looked down at the floor, her breath quickening as she slowly clenched her teeth tighter and tighter. To Vinyl’s and Arpeggio’s surprise, her nostrils started to flare as her playful anger gave way to legitimate rage.
“What the hay is your problem?” Fleur stomped the floor in palpable frustration. “Why are you so against me on this? It’s not like I’m trying to get myself banished or anything. I need to wow them this time, and this is the only thing I’ve got! You know as well as I do that my normal junk isn’t gonna cut it now!”
“What are you talking about?” Arpeggio asked earnestly as he approached his student. “Miss de Lis, Your exquisite speech spellcrafting has always impressed me. The time you fooled everypony into thinking you were Sapphire Shores giving a surprise concert was nothing short of extraordinary. I was hoping you’d figure out how to emulate Countess Coloratura or show your progress on your masculine vocal masking.”
“Like any of that even matters anymore,” Fleur growled bitterly.
“Why would you say that?”
Fleur trotted over to her workspace in a huff and started rifling through her drawers. Settling on a thin, black book, she grabbed it with her magic, flipped it open to reveal the first page, and threw it on the center table.
“Them!”
Arpeggio and Vinyl looked to see it was covered with rough drawings of changelings with haphazard notes jotted down. Flipping through the pages revealed personal interviews and news clippings from the invasion and its aftermath. There were all sorts of photos, blurry and pristine, alongside sketches of changelings from every angle. The best picture was a Ponaroid snap of a changeling mid-transformation getting ready to pounce on a cornered stallion.
“I work so hard, and then these things just come and crash a wedding!”
Fleur had mentioned the species more than once since the invasion. Vinyl had chalked her friend’s hatred of them up to one of her running gags, not thinking that it could come from someplace deeper. The performer messed around so much, it was hard to tell when something truly upset her. Fleur was the filly who cried timberwolf.
“How would you feel, huh?” Fleur asked as she pointed at another changeling drawing. “Somepony—or whatever those stupid things are—just comes along and rips your whole field of study out from under you with magic you’ve never even heard of?”
“I’d probably be pretty excited if it panned out,” Arpeggio replied evenly, giving Vinyl a quick, meaningful look. “But given the context clues,I suppose the feeling would be similar to a unicorn wanting to fly or commune more closely with nature.”
“You think I’m… This isn’t wing envy or earth jealousy! Those aren’t even comparable!” Fleur roared as she slammed her rear hoof into the ground and snorted. “I’ve worked hard for years to even get close to safely pitch-shifting my voice to do convincing male characters, but then these things have the nerve to suddenly pop into existence? What the hay am I supposed to do, huh? There’s an entire species out there that makes my special talent absolutely worthless!”
“Hey!” Vinyl barked angrily at her friend for using the W-word against herself. “That’s not true, Fleur! You’re a great actress. You do more than just voices.”
“Yeah? Well, so what?” Fleur spat back. She whipped around to stare Vinyl in the face, only to have her spite melt under the DJ’s hot gaze. “T-they’re the best method actors ever by default. How am I supposed to compete with somepony that can literally assume their role? I might as well be sucking helium in comparison.”
“From what little we understand of them, Miss de Lis,” the Professor said as he looked over the copious notes in front of him, “I believe there is a key difference you are overlooking.”
“Oh really? And that would be, what? My pretty face?” She plastered a faux-smile for Arpeggio and struck a show-stopping model runway pose before sinking back into a scowl. “Newsflash, Professor, they can copy that too.”
“Sure, they can copy it.” Professor Arpeggio placed a supportive hoof on Fleur’s shoulder. “In fact, they can probably copy everything you do. But, you know what? There is no copying you. You have something to give through your performances. They can only pretend and take away from their audience. Don’t compare your gifts to those who abuse their abilities for personal gain.”
“But…” Fleur looked away, and recomposed herself. She turned back to the professor with pleading puppy-dog eyes and shed a few crocodile tears for good measure. “But I like abusing mine, too.”
“I know you do. By Celestia, how I know you do.” Arpeggio sighed in relief as he shook his head. He couldn’t help but laugh at his student’s antics. “Your spellwork is phenomenal, but you are the key to your performances, Miss de Lis. The impressions are not only amazing because of their accuracy, but because of your delivery. Somepony foolish enough to try copying the incomparable Fleur de Lis would fall face-first into the uncanny valley.”
Fleur’s face softened as she ran her foreleg over her eyes in a flash. She quickly pulled the professor into an unexpected hug, which he returned with a pat on her back after the surprise subsided. Vinyl smiled at the sight until she felt a familiar aura encircling her. She was pulled into the gravitational well of Fleur’s embrace, dragging her hooves along the floor the entire way.
“Oh, come on!” Vinyl complained as Fleur locked her into place again. She tried to free herself from the group hug, but then stopped struggling when she felt the slight tremble in her friend’s forelegs. With a sigh, she hugged her clingy friend back to let Fleur savor the warmth of their support.
“I love you guys,” Fleur whispered as she nuzzled Vinyl’s cheek.
Vinyl said nothing, but leaned into the nuzzle to let Fleur know she cared.
If you find a simple mistake in the GSP (Grammar, Spelling, or Punctuation), please let me know through a private message rather than leaving it in the comment section. Thank you for reading!
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Ha ha, yeah, that'd be pretty nuts, wouldn't it? Ha....
She knows!
PSA: Since my chapters got out of hand anyway, I restored the original length of Chapter 1 to its full length by combining both Chapter 1 and 2 together as they were originally written. I explain my reasoning in this blog post: Chapter 15 err... 14 is here!
TLDR; I was afraid of a 9K word count chapter, and I split it where I could on release. I broke my word count limit with later chapters, so I decided to restore the original length of Chapter 1.
Oh come now, referencing Lone Digger and not using the right video?
[Youtube]8kvWWOHL7Cg[/youtube]
11085927
If the story was rated M, I wouldn't have any issue linking the animated music video. I do like that original one, but it's setting is problematic. In hindsight, I should probably change Wonderland as well.
Good Lord that gave me a good laugh.
11085976
Fair enough, I forgot to check which video you shared as the official video is an animated that's more violent that the MLP one I shared
An entire chapter of Fleur antics? How you spoil us, Lord Regulus.
11122617
Sometimes there's more slice-of-life than drama. Can't just let the story continue without some attention to Fleur de Lis' side of the story.
Nice silly chapter, love us some Fleur moments!
Huzzah! Luna and Celestia cameos in the mansion!
OH, OH, is the princess of the night going to get some role in singing in the next few chapters or in the future? Though this also begs the question, Wouldn't Cadence love to get involved and sing some? She's got a really good voice too!
I mean, there are people who practice being living statues, but they don't complain about weeping angels (from Dr. Who). Why? Because although Weeping angels are better at being living statues, they're prone to murder. The same applies here; Fleur, you will never be as good an imitator as a species evolved to become doppelgangers, but you will probably inflict FAR less genocide than they ever will
Mama
Boy that sounds like in the movie My Little Pony new generation that's how the Earth and Pegasus think about unicorns how they use their magic
If Only They knew about Princess Celestia personality and how much she actually want to have fun and excitement and sometimes she could be a jokester
Okay so it looks like vinyl and fleur de lis are working on a project while talking about vinyls new job with fancy pants and they talked about how she will work so hard on those Crystal records or something like those things and she want to see if they can record things and Fleur use the Royal Canterlot voice which that's a big No-No because she overdid it and basically blew up the crystal and a professor who came in after the explosion wondering if anybody was okay which yes they are little days but okay and apparently he told him not to use that under any circumstances but she really want to improve her acting but ever since the changeling invasion it felt like her acting was not worth it which vinyl did not like take care of that from her but the professor gave her some encouragement that she can do this which that was pretty sweet and again I really do love fleur de lis and her craziness as I said it's a new fresh take on of her
Now I want a story set in this universe a few years in the future in which a reformed changeling wants to get into theater and asks Fleur to be their acting coach.
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Italic words are Prench (French) words said in a word said in common tongue (English in this case). When in Fancy's perspective, any speech quotes in ~tildes~ are said entirely in Prench, but understood by the character.
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Thus an alicorn of Royal Canterlot Voice will be born.