Lemur Rambles: Miscellany · 10:24am Mar 19th, 2016
Since I'm on a roll, I figured I'd bring you a different kind of Lemur Rambles today. This isn't about any one particular fic, but rather about some of my favorite scenes/moments from all across the Lemuriffic playing field. This is simply stuff that I feel deserves a second look, regardless of the source material. I might do more Lemur Rambles in the future like this, assuming it goes anywhere.
Enjoy, or not. There is no farts.
From "Never" Chapters VII and VIII
“I will follow your wisdom to the very end, my Princess,” Felicity breathily exclaimed. “Please, I beg of you, don't be mad at me for wanting to stay your apprentice longer.”
Celestia lovingly stroked her mane. “Never,” she breathed, speaking with the eloquence of a eulogy. She steeled her shaking lungs for Felicity's sake. And when she looked out upon the veil of stars...
...they all seemed somehow closer than every apprentice she had ever once held, and just as numerous. Princess Celestia stood on the bow of the Dawnmist, staring out at the gray expanse into which her Father once dove, never to return, so that she wondered if she too had become the master of a domain as insignificant as a blink in a cosmic equine's eye.
Old Skirts purple is the purplest. Still, for all of the criticisms and rebukes drawn against such a style, I'm still proud of little snippets like this. Overdrawn or not, I feel like I occasionally got the tone just right. Gone are the days when I'd look at something I just hammered together into paragraph form and thought to myself: "Shiet... that's actually pretty snazzy for language's sake." Maybe it's a good thing I've turned from a Faulknerish try-hard to a Hemmingwayish blow-hard. Who knows.
From "End of Ponies" Chapter Thirty-Four: Pinkamena Pie's Defunct
“So I'm gonna finish making pastries for the event tonight and time's-a-wasting!” Pinkie Pie giggled, then in a deep low voice she melodramatically chirped: “'I have a rendezvous with doughnuts, at some disputed bakery.' Heeheehee! Wanna come with?! Orphans and doughnuts always make for a great combination!”
For all of my hating on Pinkie Pie, I discover two things about her in my stories. 1) People tend to like the way I write her. 2) I oftentimes find myself giggling at the lines I give her. Though I think I enjoy writing Rarity's dialogue the most out of all the Mane Six, sometimes Pinkie Pie belches some real gems... at least when I twist it with my own brand of humor (aka, some obligatory reference to something, usually obscure). F'naa.
From "Background Pony" Chapter X: Green Is the New Pink
“Perhaps it would be in your best interest, friend Pinkie...” Zecora winced and side-stepped away from her. “To bring this issue to Nurse Redheart immediately.”
“Why? Does she need a shot too? I should tell her about Berry Punch, ‘cuz that mare is always talking about taking shots. Say, that reminds me, Zecora! If zebras come from a desert land, why are they always talking in rhyme? Wouldn’t they get extra thirsty?”
I tapped her pink shoulder.
Pinkie blinked. “My shoulder is talking to me.” She spun around and looked at me with wide eyes. “Oh! Uhm, hi!” Her face scrunched up adorably in thought. “Uhmm... 'Something something something cheese is bad,' right?”
“You're just the mare I'm looking for,” I said with a smile.
She raised an eyebrow. “I am?”
“She is?” Zecora remarked. Upon the receiving end of my prolonged stare, the shaman fidgeted before nervously blurting, “Show biz!” With a wave of her hoof, she made a swift exit.
For the moment, let's ignore the fact that this is from the worst chapter of Background Pony ever.
I lurve Zecora as a character. I lurve her aura of wisdom, her togetherness, her altruism, and her moral centeredness.
What I don't lurve quite so much is writing her dialogue. Don't get me wrong. Sometimes it can be a fun challenge. But most of the time it makes it super... super time-consuming to write scenes with her. On top of that, I appear to really suck at rhyming, and so I cheat a lot with her dialogue. I can't count how many times I've just wanted to scream "fuck it" and have her talk normally... but then it would be OoC, so... meh.
This scene is an example of my taking a stab at how Zecora is... like... legally bound to never not rhyme... ever. A random statement catches her off guard, so she blirts two syllables and... has to accommodate for it with a stupid, impromptu, and completely out-of-place rhyme. Oh lulzzzz...
It's become something of a running gag between myself and a certain other zebra. Oftentimes whenever I see someone in Noble J00ry or Skype in general "remove" a comment, I spontaneously type "Show biz!" as a way of poking fun at the goof. F'naa.
From "I Met a Pony In Hell and We Kicked Ass Together" Chapter Ten: The One Where I'm Viggo Mortensen and She's Miranda Otto
It was around that time that two bolts flew into the incubus' flaming shoulders. Babellyon roared in more annoyance than pain. He stumbled back with the sword, looking every which way, until—
“Hey! Handsome!”
He turned and gawked at me.
I marched towards him with the crossbow in one hand and my sword in the other. “Get the fuck away from my little pony!” I shouted with an iron frown.
It's a guilty habit of Chromosome... er... I mean of myself to find ways of inserting the title "My Little Pony" into the dialogue of my stories. This bit from Shawn in "I Met a Pony In Hell" is probably my favorite. I always think about Ponky and how he supposedly laughed his head off over the moment when he first read it.
Pinkamena stood in the purchasing lane, flanked by gossip magazines, candy bars and tiny nick-nacks. A cigarette butt burned at the end of her hoof. Beside her, Chancellor Puddinghat stood quietly with a packet full of double-a batteries in her grasp. Gentle 80s muzak wafted out of the crackling speakers of the supermarket overhead. Bright lights flickered occasionally as an elder sales clerk struggled to swipe the preceding customer's bundle of paper towels over a scanner for the umpteenth time in a row.
Puddinghat's bloodshot eyes blinked. Her nostrils flared as she shifted her weight from one pair of hooves to the other. Beside her, Pinkamena stared in a trance at anorexic photos of Kolt Kardashian and Paris Hiltrot. The ballad skipped momentarily through the speakers above as the lights flickered again. Lethargically, both Pinkies glanced out the row of sliding glass doors along the front of the supermarket.
Outside in the streets of the Maretropolis, Citizens ran screaming from ten-legged dragons while flaming spiders descended from burning lengths of silk. Portals opened and crimson biplanes flew out, shooting lasers at robot cowboys riding woolly mammoths. Skyscrapers crumbled as giant chickens with rocket launcher eyes wrestled with one another.
The lights flickered again. Several beeping noises emanated from the point of sales as the clerk swung the same roll of paper towels over the scanner again and again and again. Adjusting her bifocals, the old mare sighed and reached for a nearby intercom. "I'll need to call for managerial assistance."
The sleeping customer was drooling at this point.
The mare's voice crackled over the intercom, interrupting the skipping 80s ballad: "Supervisor assistance to Register Four. Supervisor assistance to Register Four, please. Thank you."
As soon as she hung up, a wall exploded behind a dairy section from a blue portal opening. Several helmeted ponies with iron crosses spilled out, firing lugers at a swarm of attacking ninja pegasi while their battle rampaged across the cereal aisle.
"So, uhm..." Puddinghat squirmed where she stood in the checkout line. "How's the weather where you're from?"
"Dismal," Pikamena grunted, gazing across more paparazzi regalia. "Nature casts its facade over everypony as a bitter preview to the infinitesimal nature of mortal life."
"Oh really?" Puddinghat murmured. She looked off as two mutant gorillas wrestled through the frozen dinner section. "That's interesting..."
"You're simply programmed to say that." Pinkamena took a drag of her cigarette, exhaled a cloudy ring, and muttered, "Everypony that pretends to be happy is just a part of the machine. To cling to joy is to hug the last bitter breaths before death takes us to the true encompassing of our futile existences. We were dead long before we were born and we shall remain dead long after. Life, in essence, is brutal happenstance, an accidental cluster of complex chemicals with the pretentious assumption that it has any greater worth than an inert rock or clump of dirt. Any god, religion, politic, or philosophy you might subscribe to is just a distraction from the fact that there is no point. We are all comprised of dead matter, and soon even our words will crumble into ash and dust."
"You don't say..." Puddinghat fiddled with a plastic-wrapped hoof filer while a tyrannosaur loomed overhead, swinging a screaming octopus in its jaws. "That must be bad for the sinuses."
"Every time we breathe, it is only poisoning ourselves in anticipation of life's one sweet release." She puffed on the cigarette. "That's why I smoke. I am embracing my own fate. It's an affirmative statement, in its purest, fatalist form."
"Yeah. Uh huh." Puddinghat smiled. "Would you like to get some ice cream while we wait for the supervisor to ring the customer through ahead of us?"
"Everything is pointless, even ice cream," Pinkamena grumbled. "Besides, orange sherbet hasn't existed for centuries."
"Nuh uh!" The Chancellor pointed down the nearest aisle. "I just saw some! It's on sale: two bits per tub!"
Pinkamena dropped the cigarette. She stared blankly into space. Her left eye twitched. Suddenly, her entire body jolted upwards in a bounce. A bright blue sheen erupted in her eyes and her buzzed mane turned a neon shade of pastel pink. "I love sherbet!" Pinkamena grinned a crescent moon. "It's so super duper terrifically special! Heeeheeehee! I can't wait to feel it melting all over my tongue again! Woooohooo!"
"Well, go on ahead! I'll wait for ya!" Puddinghat ducked a screaming, flaming goose and grabbed the packaged hoof filer off the shelf. "I think I just found what I was looking for!" She turned and spoke to the elder clerk. "By the way, do you accept MasterColt?"
I've written a lot of crack!fics. Really, I have.
For some reason, Crisis of Infinite Pinkies holds a special place in my heart, despite the fact that it's an L-Day fic. Maybe because it's essentially a story request given by Ponky, and I filled it with tons and tons of inside gags that only the Ponkster and his Wonderfolk of 2012 would get. Most likely it's because, despite the absurd nature of the prompt, I found a way to make it my story and make it fun to write. The story features several Pinkie Pie doppelgangers being brought together to combat a situation upon which the entire multi-verse hinges. But then, as the story carries you, we discover that all of these extremely different and bizarre Pinkie Pies are really just past/future versions of themselves randomly shuffled together. It's kind of mind-bending in a way, and I enjoyed writing something that was unashamedly positive and cheerful and just... "fun" for a change.
This scene is one of my most favorite things I've ever written. If not for the glacial pacing or the sheer absurdity of what's going on around Puddinghat and Pinkamena, then it's for how I blatantly lampooned my own psuedo-philosophical existential ramblings as evident all throughout the likes of EoP and BP. As extreme and melodramatic and angsty as Pinkamena's dialogue is, it reflects a lot of my own legit atheist and nihilistic beliefs. What better an opportunity to make light of all that than through a poni poni poni fic? Sometimes, despite the depths to which we might carry our philosophical world views, it all comes down to the simpler things... like our childish love of sherbet.
From "Twistclops" ... enough said
Sweetie Belle leaned in from the wagon. “Hey, uhm, can I remove my helmet now too?”
Apple Bloom shook her head. “No, Sweetie Belle. Just...” She sighed, her ears drooping. “Just keep it on...”
“Yaaay!” Sweetie Belle reared her hooves with joy. “I'm fashionable!”
If nothing else I've ever written sums up my opinion about Sweetie Belle, then let this moment be the one.
From "Sweetie Brick" Chapter 6: Pencil Sharpening
"Alright, my little ponies!" Cheerilee trotted across the front of the classroom with a brilliant smile. "Open the brown envelopes and pull the sheets out, but keep them face-down across your desk! You've prepared for this test long and hard, and now's the morning we've all been waiting for! This is for your futures, remember?" Her eyes twitched as a strand of hair or two popped loose from her fuchsia bangs. "This is totally not for school funding or an improved curriculum, but this is for your bright and sh-shiny futures! Heeheehee! Got it?"
Students stared, blinked, drooled.
"Good! Now pull out your number two pencils and wait for my instructions--"
"Uhhhh..." Snips blinked and raised his hoof. "Teach?"
"Yes, Snips?"
He waved his blunt stick of a pencil. "There's something wrong with my pencil!"
Cheerilee stared at him. She sighed, face-hoofed, and fought to keep smiling. "That's because you've forgotten to sharpen it, Snips. Now be a good colt and quietly use the sharpener in the back."
"Uhhhhhhhhh-okay!" Nervously, the colt hopped out from behind his desk and galloped across the room. He stood before Sweetie Belle who was hanging horizontally from a spindle fastened to the wall. Plucking the pencil from his mouth, he reached a hoof forward, lifted her tail, and stuck the blunt end in.
"Eeep!" Sweetie Belle blushed deeply. Snips grasped her horn and spun her whole body several times with a muffled squeaking sound. At last, he let go of her and trotted away with a fully sharpened pencil.
"Ahem..." Cheerilee cleared her throat loudly and pointed toward the back of the room. "Snips..."
The colt blinked, then gasped knowingly. He turned around, trotted back, slid a small trash can underneath Sweetie Belle's tail, and gave her head several heavy slaps. A ribbon of loose pencil shavings fell into the can. Dutifully, Snips trotted back and sat at his desk.
"Alright, class, now let's begin."
Or perhaps there's this one.
I swear, I giggle every time I think of this fucking "chapter." Not only is it wrong in every sense of the term, but the gag piles up on itself with Cheerilee forcing Snips to go back to Sweetie Belle so he can slap the pencil shavings out of her. F'naaaaaaaa. I should have written more installments of this stupid thang.
From "Colgate Is Best Pony"
"I am concluding, my love! Oh yes! Affirmative! Concurring!" Flip flip flip. "Emphatic assertion! Ohhhhhhhh books books books books books!"
This is the only line from the scene I'm including, because the whole thing is a Rated M debacle.
I've technically written one clop scene during my entire MLP tenure... and I am fucking proud of it.
Don't get me wrong. It's... not really explicit. At its worst, there are scientific and biological terms for horse anatomy used very unimaginatively, courtesy of a very enamored and adorkable Twilight Sparkle. The sequence consists of Minuette--drunk with exhaustion--having just received Twilight Sparkle's confession of true love. Assuming Minuette is reciprocal, Twilight then proceeds to make love to her in a method that is... never fully described to us, because Minuette--as a barely awake and unreliable narrator--can scarcely keep up with what's actually happening. This was my way of avoiding really gross details, which I didn't want to write anyway. I'd argue that the sequence is actually very much PG-13, and that's the beauty of it. There's so much that's not said. All we know is that things are getting more and more increasingly ridiculous and it means the world to Twilight Sparkle and Minuette couldn't care less. It's like the masturbation scene from Being There between Peter Sellers and Shirley MacLaine. Every time I think about it, it just makes me fucking crack up. I kinda wish this story got more attention, because--for a crack!fic--there's a certain amount of surmounting awesomeness to it. The main protagonist suffers simply because all of the best case scenarios imaginable are happening to her, and yet all she wants to do is fall asleep.
Alas, it was merely an exercise in April Fool's stupidity, and thus has been forgotten in the annals of brony time. Still, if anyone is willing to give it a shot, somewhere out there you can find a scene with Twilight locking hooves with Minuette, struggling to hold a thesaurus in one fetlock so that she can "talk dirty" in the most "scientifically accurate" fashion while she "concludes." O lawd.
From "Odrsjot" Chapter 140: Don't Steal Her Thunder
"So, we just gotta put the book on the pedestal, r-right?!" Kera cried out from Zaid's backside.
"Something like that!"
"Rainbow Dash! I thought you've done this before!"
Rainbow nodded in mid-glide. "I have! Only, there wasn't a book involved previously!"
"Uhm..."
"Look..." Rainbow hovered low above the pedestal, shrugging. "How hard can it be?" Nightshade, Zaid, and Kera caught up. "Okay. So, like, let's do this crap already! Zaid?"
"Right!" The stallion nodded. "I hoof you the book!"
"No..." Rainbow glared. "You hoof me the filly who then hoofs me the book!"
"Alright! Alright!" Zaid gently let Kera off, careful not to desposit her too close to the bridge's precarious edge. "It's all cool! I'm pretty self-aware of my supporting characterness!" He nudged Kera Rainbow's way.
"You ready for this, Rainbow?" Kera held the book out.
"Look, I've never been much for ceremony." Rainbow grunted as she grabbed the book from the foal's hooves. "At my Hearth's Warming Pageant, I bucked Chancellor Puddinghat off the stage."
"Really?"
"No, but that would have been a lot more awesome." Rainbow pivoted, faced the platform, and shoved the book at it. "Zoop!"
Flassssh! The book bounced off.
"Gaaah!" Rainbow reeled in midair. The tome went plunging towards the black abyss below.
Odrsjot is arguably the most epic book of the Austraeoh series. I mean "epic" by Peter Jackson standards. We have a gigantic battle between technologically advanced Ledomaritans and magically empowered Xonan warriors. There's a veritable No Pony's Land stretching around a gigantic gash in the earth where the machine layer of the world has been exposed in all its archaic glory. Dozens upon dozens of characters have rotated around a gigantic quest to deliver this sacred book to a special pedestal. The entire world depends on it. There's a horrible chaos dragon named Nevalamas that's been feeding off the bodies and souls of innocent equines, and she's doing battle with a bunch of zealots in a skystone powered aircraft while another psychopath in a flying battleship prepares to wage war on everything that moves.
After one hundred and forty chapters of buildup, Rainbow Dash and her closest allies reach their destination...
...and she limply tosses the book at her target while belching "Zoop."
Sometimes the best way to cap off epic awesomeness is with epic stupidity. Long live the Noble Jury.
From "Appledashery" Chapter 259: Miracle Breakfast
“Uhm...” Rainbow glanced up from poking at a bowl of porridge. “What's the projector for?”
“And after ze photo session, I, Photo Finish, vill show you ze Canter Park! It's ein herrliche Stück grün smack dab in ze middle of Manehattan!” She trotted around the table, pouring milk into Hans' and Hans' glasses. “Ze Hanses and I lofe to relax on ze park benches and vatch squirrels murder birds for bread.”
“Sounds... uh... awesome...” Rainbow gulped, her eyes narrowing on the white sheet erected before the table. “What's with the projector?”
“And aftervards, another photo shoot! Zis time by ze Haydson! Mmmmm... seagull vings make for a fine background to ze monochrome magiks! Don't you agree, Meine kleine Jungs?”
“Ja, Mutter!” the Hanses collectively throated, munching between words in perfect unison. Their eyes glued patiently to the sheet in front of them. “Ve are ready for ze mornink epiphany!”
“The morning what-now?”
“A day is like life!” Photo said, merrily trotting about the table. “It shtarts all golden and new! Zen it languishes srough optimistik blue shkies. Zen, in a natural cykle, it returns to darkness! Nein, I vould be a kriminal for not showink meine handsome Hanses ze beauty and ze tragedy of life in a blink!” She stood by the projector, grinning. “First! Life! In full bloom!” She cranked the thing and flipped it on. “Rejoice in the beginnink of all sings, meine Kinder!”
“Oh, hey!” Rainbow glanced up from fidgeting with her brown suspenders. “Breakfast and a movie! That's... uh... kinda snazzy.”
“Ja,” one of the Hanses nodded, munching on a muzzle full of oat-meal. “Ziz is Gustav's favorite part.”
“I am Gustav,” the other Hans said.
“Okaaaaay...” Rainbow turned to look at the flickering image broadcasting on the sheet. “Uhhh... hey! Jecuzzi party! Killer!” She blinked, then leaned forward. “Say, Photo, is that you?”
“Ja, Fraulein!”
“Why... are you just sitting in a big bath of cranberry juice?”
“Nein! It is a horse trough of vater!”
“Water?”
“And zat is nothink but ze glorious color of ze foalink.”
“Ah. Okay.” Rainbow nodded—then twitched. “Wait... the foaling?”
“Whoops! Ach Je!” Photo flipped another switch. “I forgot to turn ze sound on!” Click!
A warbling recording of Photo's hellish screams echoed across the room, making every breakfast plate and watcher pitcher rattle madly.
Rainbow winced, stretching her long-sleeved hooves to her ears. “Grrggh—What in the name of Celestia's sky muzzle is that?!”
“Ze nature of music!” Photo said, grinning wide. She had to yell to be heard above the sound of... her own yells. “Ze beauty of kreation is most exkuisite!” She leaned in to nuzzle the Jaeger Hans. “Don't you agree, Meine kleinen Prinzen?”
“Ja, mutter.” Both colts stared at the projection, scarfing down their breakfast.
“Oops! I forgot to revind all ze vay! It makes no difference.” Photo waved. “Zere are shtill five rounds of ze labor pains left to go.”
“Hrhhhkkk!” Rainbow clamped a hoof over her mouth as her blue cheeks turned green.
“In about two minutes, Gustav shall come floatink to ze top to join me in ze shkreams of life!” Photo beamed, squatting down to a seat across from Rainbow. She waited for the butter knife to rattle towards her before using it to slather margarine on a slice of toast. “Since konception, I knew zat an undervater birth vould be die gesündeste! But I did not vish to share zis magic alone! So I infited all meine friends to join me and hold hoofes around ze horse trough! Zey gave me ze spirit energy to surfife ze infersion of meine womb. Ja, most graceful.” She munched on a slice of bread, pointed, and gulped her morsel down. “Ah! Zere's Kurt, my manedresser right now. Vait... nein, zat's Natasha, fomitink. Silly fraulein.”
“Natasha is veak, mutter!”
“Sehr gut, Hanses! Zat is vy she is nefer infited to ze annual feast of livink!”
“What... urp...” Rainbow grimaced, teetering nauseously in her seat. “... is the f-feast of living?”
“Vonce a year meine foals and I shlice off a tiny piece of ze Hanses refrigerated placenta and shvallow it down vith ze grape juice!” Photo gulped another bite and smiled proudly at her sons. “In acht Jahre, you vill be old enough for vine! Isn't zat wunderbar?”
“Ja, mutter!”
With a gurgling sound, Rainbow collapsed out of her chair and landed on the floor.
“Mutter. Your guest is makink fine art on ze floor!”
“Ja. In your lederhosen too!”
“Mein Gott...” Photo glanced down at the floor, shrugged, and returned to watching the projection. “Poor graceful Awesometopialander.” A smirk. “At least it vill save her ze trouble ven we got to photograph ze cow carcasses later.” She gasped suddenly. “Sieh mal! Gustav! You are crownink!”
Alright, so some explanation is in order.
Lemme set the scene for you: At this point in the fic, for some reason or another, Rainbow Dash has to get ahold of a chaos shard that is hidden somewhere in Photo Finish's possession--presumably inside a vault that only the photographer knows the combination to. Rainbow decides to do this under the guise that she's a Duchess from another kingdom. She invites herself into Photo Finish's personal life and wins her trust. The photographer lets her stay at her uptown Manehattan apartment along with her two twin sons who are the quintessential stereotypes of brainwashed Hitler youths. Together, the four ponies are having breakfast, when Photo Finish whips out this home movie of... her foaling her twins underwater from the bottom of a giant horse trough. They proceed to watch this while eating (as it is their daily routine), and Rainbow Dash does her damned best to keep from throwing up.
Most people who read this reacted in a way best encapsulated by a single picture.
The most horrifying thing about this chapter is that it's based in reality. This is a scene that I've wanted to write since mid 2011. One morning, while waiting at the drive-thru teller of a bank for my job, I was listening to WPRK (Central Florida College Radio - based at Rollins College). It's pretty much the only radio station I live to because it has almost zero commercials and they play a lot of alternative rock and experimental shiet. Anyways, the shows on WPRK rotate every hour or two, with amateur DJs jumping in and out. And while I happened to be stuck in the drive thru, the DJ was this seriously hippy Generation Y-er who had brought her kid into the studio during her broadcast. And the kid's super polite and all, just sorta... sitting in the background and eating cheerios and only talking when being spoken to. And, like, instead of playing music the DJ rambles on and on about how she gave birth to her kid underwater in a gigantic metal horse trough surrounded by all her close friends holding hands... and stuff. On top of that, they had a camera standing up in the corner of the room, recording the whole event. And every morning while having breakfast, she'll play footage of the kid's own birth so that the girl can watch herself crowning or something. "You were watching yourself just this morning, weren't you, honey?" "Mmmhmm. Yes, Mommy. (MUNCH MUNCH)." And I'm just sitting there in the drive-thru, my jaw dropping more and more, praying to god they'll play Animal Collective or something already so I can get the images out of my head. Alas, reality is stranger than fiction.. or at the very least more giggle-inducing.
And no, the DJ didn't eat the placenta. That's another element of reality that you'll have to ask Tom Cruise about.
From "Pony World Problems" Chapter 10: Stallionsky and Haytch"
"HIC! I am Spartacolttt!" Flash Sentry wheezed, standing on the table and beating his chest. "Burn Roam! HIC! Burn all of Roam down, ya Apple Shaxon melon fuuuuuuuuu—"
"You—HIC!—tell 'em, General!" Shining Armor sputtered, clinging to a half-empty mug and laughing hysterically. "Hahahahaha—HIC!—haaaaaa!"
"Whoops!" Flash teetered backwards, his forelimbs waving for balance. "Holy snoopies!"
"It's a long way to the floor! Don't flash the ladies, Flash! HIC! Get it?!"
"Hopahhhh—!" Flash plummeted backwards, landing on the booth's couch cushions and rattling a half-dozen empty mugs on the table in front of him from the impact. "Snkkktt—ha ha ha ha!" He grinned rosily. "Brad fall downnnnn!"
"Ha ha ha! BRAD!" Shining Armor laughed, dribbled, and pounded the table several times with his hoof. "Where'd you get a—HIC!—nickname like that?!"
"Back in—HIC!—basic!"
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah." Flash smiled, eyes fluttering. "Big Radical Ass Diaper."
"Snkkkt—Hah hah hah hah!"
Flash hugged himself, squirming. "Heeheeheehee!"
"Oh... ohhhhhh that's rich!"
"Yeah!" Flash lapped thirstily at his mug. "I'm full of 'em!"
"I bet you are!" Shining paused to belch. "That's why you needed the diaper!"
"Hoooooo-ho ho ho ho!" Flash teetered and wheezed. "...did I fall down just now?"
"Yup."
"You sure?"
"Pretty sure."
"Hmmmph..." Flash Sentry pouted into his mug. "I wish I had wings so that wouldn't happen."
"Hmmph..." Shining swallowed another gulp of cider down and patted Flash's wings. "You can borrow mine, buddy... ol' chum."
Flash's eyes sparkled. "Really?"
"Only, I left them at Princess Celestia's throneroom."
"What were you—HIC—doing in Princess Celestia's throneroom?"
"She was gonna make me a princess," Shining said, tapping his horn with a drunken grin. "Only I walked out on her about two minutes into the lame-ass song."
"Hah hah hah!"
"Heh heh heh heh hehhhh..." Shining sighed, rotating the mug around in his hooves. "So, instead, I had to go and marry a Princess in order to be good at anything—HIC!—and everything."
"Oh no." Flash shook his head rapidly, scooting up in his seat. "Oh no no no no no no no—"
"Oh yes yes yes yes yes yes—"
Flash teetered over, slapping a hoof on Shining's shoulder. "You love and—HIC!—adore Princess Meat A-Mormon Caduceus!"
"I never said I didn't love Concordance!"
"I just wanna make sure you remember it as I—HIC!—rememberrrr it!" Flash's eyes blinked unevenly as he wheezed. "You married the pretty pink princess pony! You love her enough to bathe your mane in apricots!"
"Oh yes..." Shining gave a lopsided grin. "So quoth Marlowe."
"Marlowe?"
"Hrmmf... yes... Apricots, Now!"
"Hah hah hah hah!" Flash laughed into Shining's shoulder.
"Heh heh heh heh!" Shining bellowed. "Mareland Brandoats was such a manure bag!"
"But you love herrrrrrrrrrrrrr..." Shining slurred. "Everypony loves herrrrrrrr..."
Shining squinted blearily at the pegasus for a brief moment. "Youuuuu d-don't—HIC—love my wife, do you?"
"Nonsense..." Flash teetered. "I'm already married—HIC!—to Justice!"
"Good soldier." Shining patted his head.
Flash blinked. "...and to pizza."
"I'll drink to that."
"I'll drink to you drinking to that."
"Mrmmmfff..." Shining's voice echoed into his mug. He leaned back, cider dribbling off his chin as he exhaled. "But... thing is... I love Cadance for Cadanccccce..." He teetered in his seat while gesturing in midair. "The Cadance from high school... the Cadance who babysat for Twilylylylyly... HIC!" He sniffled. "The Cadance who kissed my ear in home room and wore the skirt."
"What skirt?"
"Cadance used to wear a skirt to class every—HIC!—day. Drove me banamanamanamanas."
"Did it flounce."
"You're damn right it damn flounced!" Shining wheezed. "You think she's the Princess of Starch?!"
"But she's still a Princess."
"I know. HIC!" Shining sighed. "And I coulda done just as well without the crown and the wings and the apricots... but she's she, and her's her, and me can't be I without I being hers..." He groaned. "Just wish it d-didn't have to be the hallmark of my career, is all..."
"Hay... mark...?"
"Face it," Shining grumbled. "I'm only—HIC!—Captain of the Guard at the Crystal Palace because Cadance is running the—HIC!—show!"
"Are you sssssserioussss?" Flash frowned.
"And here... and today..." Shining glared into the sea of empty mugs. "In Ponyville, I had my chance... my one chance away from Cadance and away from the Crystal Empire to show—HIC!—that I h-have what it takes to be a good soldier and defend harmony in Equack—... Equino—... Equable—... y'know, that big horse horse kindgom we all live in."
"Ecuador."
Shining slapped the table. "That's the one!"
"Now you—HIC!—Now you listen to me, Cap'n my Cap'n!" Flash scooted closer. "You're making a molehill of a mountain! You—HIC!—hear me?!"
"Hear you?! Lieutenant, I can smell you! Heheheheh!"
"I am super serial killer right now!" Flash frowned, then repeatedly patted Shining's chest. "You have my rrrrrrespect!"
"Nawwwww..."
"You do! HIC! My respect! My admiration! Tartarus, my Celestia-damned flower wreath if I had any to give!"
"Well, stop losing at races! Hah hah hah hah!"
"Heeheehee! But for realsies, Shinesies..." Flash beat his own chest. "What I have in here..." He patted Shining's chest. "Is what you have in here."
"Guts?"
"Fuzzy guts!" Flash frowned. "The kind that take no crap from sp-sp-spiders!" He fought a bubble of bile rising in his throat, belched it down, and continued. "And it ain't from marrying pretty pink princess ponies or being elected to crystal age of empires. No... no no no no it comes from being a stallion..." He slapped Shining's shoulder. "A stallion one can respect! And I rrrrrrrrespect yousa!"
"Awwwwww... Loot inn nuts, you're just saying that."
"I'm saying it because it's—HIC!—truth!" Flash leaned back, grimacing. "You wanna know what really sucks?"
"I was put on this earth to know what—HIC!—really sucks!" Shining waved a forelimb. "Open your heart trunk to my skull bowl."
"I-I coulda been a colonel by now!"
"Pffft! What?! You?! You big baby!"
"No—for show glow, snow blow!" Flash blinked tiredly, but nevertheless rambled on. "I coulda gotten promoted three times in the last year! I c-coulda been ordering you to nuzzle smelly perfumed ponies in the grass all afternoon!"
"Heh heh—HIC!—heh heh..."
"But that never happened! And you know why?!" Flash held a hoof up. "Because of one mistake! One screw-up!"
"And what did you screw, Lieutenant?"
"All I did was bump into her! One time!" Flash frowned. "I-I thought she was—HIC!—the librarian or something! How was I to nose sh-she was supposed to be the lavender princess come down softly?!"
"You mean Twily?"
"Yes! Lavender down!" Flash sneered. "All I does was bump into hers once. I thought nothing of it! But nooooooooooooooo!" He hiccuped. "All over the Kingdom it's 'Twilight this' and 'Flash Sentry that!' In the locker-room it's 'Twilight that' and 'Flash Sentry this!' All over the pink aisle at the toy store—"
"I get the—HIC!—picture."
"Well I wish somepony would erase that picture!" Flash frowned. "Somepony with power and respect like yo-yo, you you!"
"You really didn't know she was an alicorn?"
"She d-didn't look like one!" Flash cackled. He held his hooves wide. "Her belly was like this." He pressed them together. "Not like this!"
"Wh-what are you saying, Lieutenant?"
"She didn't have the nose and wasp body thang... y'know..." Flash stuck his muzzle out and sucked in his chest. "The anorexic ribcage thingy. Friggin' snakes with limbs, I swear to Luna."
"My wife is not anorexic!" Shining Armor lisped. "Nor is she a snake!"
"...a fuzzy pink snake?"
"Well, okay."
"Heeheeheee..."
"But don't you go s-saying bad things about her!" Shining grumbled, then smiled. "You know she loves you."
"Pfffft... I'm n-not stepping on nopony's fetlocks—"
"Not like that, ya spruced moose!" Shining squeezed Flash's shoulder. "But like a little brother... the little brother. HIC! The little brother I never haddddddddd..."
"Awwwwwwww... shucked corn..." Flash waved, smiling. "You're making me blush."
"I mean it..." Shining sniffled, leaning in to hug Flash close. "You're him! You're my little bro..."
"Snkkkt... C-Cap'n!" Flash hissed, eyes bulging. "C-can't... br-breathe..."
"The one I always wanted to play ball with," Shining sobbed. "Instead of just watching you sit in a tiny little book fort getting all smart and huffing friendship until you sprouted wings! But my lil bro, bro!" He slapped Flash's back. "I love ya, dude!"
"I-I love you too, Captain!" Flash sputtered. "I-I also love br-breathing!"
"Whoops..." Shining leaned back, straightening Flash's armor. "I didn't—HIC!—d-didn't mean to crush ya there, pegasissy."
"No harm done done, dum dum..."
"Oh gosh..." Shining giggled in an off tone. "Did I just take advantage of you?"
"Pffft. As if. I'd just suplex you."
"Yeah."
"Yeah."
"It's a good thing we're not drinking."
"Yeah..."
Then, from a distance, there was an enormous rumbling sound. The night-lit windows rattled while the light fixtures across the ceiling flickered.
Shining blinked. "Earthquake."
"Yeah."
Once more, the floor of Sugarcube Corner shook, this time accompanied by a roar.
"An angry earthquake."
Flash Sentry yawned. "Yeah..."
"Oh my goodness! Oh my goodness!" Cup Cake galloped up to the window, peering straight out. "Is that what I think it is?!"
"We have 'em in the Crystal Empire all the time," Shining Armor said with a dull smile while Flash sleepily laid his head against his shoulder. "So many—HIC!—foreign dignitaries joke that one day the arctic shell will collapse into the ocean... but they're alllllllllll just jealous."
"It is! It is!" Cup Cake backtrotted from the window, cowering. "A hydra has come to town!" She slid under a table, sobbing. "I d-don't want to be gobbled up! I'm still a new mother!"
"Heh... nothing's going to gobble you up," Shining Armor slurred. "Especially a hydra that doesn't exist... because this is Ponyville!"
Stomp! Stomp! Stomp! STOMP! The tip of a scaley orange tail smashed through the wall of Sugarcube Corner, shattering the windows instantly. CRASSSSSH!
"Holy hayrashes!" Shining Armor jumped straight up. "A hydra!"
"Nrnnngh—Snkkkt!" Flash Sentry snapped awake. "Guhh! D'uhhhh—I j-just bumped into her, I swear! Only thing I've ever stolen is my drill sergeant's valuable time!" He blinked at the settling debris. "Huh?"
"A hydra, Lieutenant!"
"A hydra lieutenant?!" Flash gulped. "Not a hydra corporal?!"
"Move! Move, soldier!" Shining Armor scoot-scoot-scooted out of the booth. "That's an order!"
"Okay! Okay!" THUD! Flash fell off the seat and face-planted to the floor. "I'mff mffvinfff."
Abominable roars echoed across the town outside, scaring the crickets into silence.
"Quick!" Shining plowed through several empty mugs, only to slam into one table after another. "Ooomf! Before it—HIC!—attacks any more innocent ponies!"
"C-Captain!"
"Yes, Lieutenant?! What is it?!"
"I... I-I can't..." Flash winced, struggling to shove his front left hoof down his empty helmet. "I-I can't get my—HIC!—shoe on!"
"Forget it, soldier!" The Captain grabbed Flash in a beam of magic and floated him at leg's length. "If a hydra stomps on you, your hooves are as good as gone in any case!" He leapt out the window, incidentally knocking Flash's grunting figure into several exposed support beams. "We must engage the enemy for he is here!"
This is one of my most beloved chapters to anything. I knew it about halfway through writing it. I think everything came together right, especially considering the plot of the story and the characters involved.
I've said before that I really, really enjoy writing Flash Sentry... mostly because it's so easy to piss readers off, and yet you get to force them to look beyond their own hate and digest the story for its own merit. This is my first time pairing him up with Shining Armor, which is always something I've imagined doing but never got the chance to actually do until this fic.
I blame the art of dm29 for making me develop a new appreciation of Flash Sentry, not to mention this gorgeous head canon of Flash Sentry, Shining Armor, Princess Cadance, and Twilight Sparkle all forming a very special circle of friendship. It's like two couples--one young and one old--mirroring each other as they grow up. And while Cadance can be a mentor to Twilight, who says Shining can't be a mentor to Flash?
There's something adorable about the two stallions being written/illustrated together, especially considering that both are outrageously dwarfed by the success, power, and station of their significant others. Think about it. Shining Armor is only a prince because of his marriage to Princess Cadance. Flash Sentry--assuming he plans to go steady with Twilight--is fated to be overshadowed in exactly the same way. Both are guardians, archetypes of "knights in shining armor" (literally) who are inevitably nothing compared to their female counterparts. It's emasculating in just the right way to still be subtle and innocent and... well... cute. The fact that Shining Armor ranks higher than Flash Sentry is grounds for comedy gold, because here we have a situation in which he can actually exude dominance over somepony else with seemingly no prejudice. But, given a very mundane situation--such as patrolling Ponyville for a day--the entire effort seems completely inane and unnecessary. I lurve the idea that two stallions with a lot to prove find themselves falling flat on their faces.
In this scene, they just freaking give up and drown all of their troubles in alcohol. It was a great chance to let two extremely anxious characters vent, as well as to take several stabs at the crazy Flash Sentry hate in the fandom. I also love that I decided to cast Flash Sentry as sort of a handsome idiot (who means well) in this fic. It's just a situation with two bro's letting loose all of their gripes and trouble, and making a silly scene of themselves in the process. I think I caught on pretty well with the tone early on in the scene, and then I let the rest of it just write itself. Friggin' fun as Hell.
I can only hope I get to write these two again in the future... maybe something more serious. Who knows.
From "Appledashery" Chapter 855: Heartlessstrings
Lyra guzzled her drink down, lowered the glass, and belched. "Have you considered hanging yourself?"
"Lyra!" Bon Bon gasped while Caramel spat out half his pina colada.
"What?!" Lyra wiped her muzzle dry. "It's a viable option!" She pointed at Rainbow dash. "Her misery would end. Her mood swings would end. And she'd stop building the mother of all bar tabs!"
"But... it... that..." Bon Bon gnashed her teeth. "No! Ponies don't hang themselves!"
"Some of them should." Lyra pointed with a smirk. "You met a couple." Her teeth showed. "Don't lie and say you haven't."
"I don't care! And it's not even funny!" Bon Bon folded her forelimbs with a heavy pout. "Doesn't matter how dark a world we live in! Suicide is... is... mmm... not magic!"
"Pffft... whatever." Lyra rolled her eyes. "Her funeral." She licked the rim of the glass. "Or not. Eh... you get my meaning." She waved her hoof at the bar tender across the way. "Another shot of rum, Barabbas!"
"Sure thing, Miss Heartstrings. H-hey! I rather like that one!"
Vinyl muttered, "I knew a pony once who came to one of my raves and the song I was playing stopped him from drinking arsenic at the bar."
"Oh! That sounds so touching!" Caramel smiled, his eyes sparkling. "Did he ever tell you just what it was that changed his decision?"
"Nope."
"Why not?"
"'Cuz he jumped off a bridge last spring."
"Oh..." Caramel looked down into his drink, swiveling it. "Uhm... can we talk about Rainbow's depression again?"
"Mmmmm..." Rainbow lifted her bleary head. "I'm not depressed, you guys."
"Bull hockey," Lyra spat.
"Seriously..." Rainbow rubbed her face. "Only pathetic losers get depressed."
"You, ma'am, are depressed with a capital D," Lyra grunted. "And I don't mean the good kind of D, like Princess Caramel here should be getting."
"Yeah, I—" Caramel did a double-take. "Wait, what?"
"But I mean the kind where you're stuck where you're at doing crap-all and the world appears to be moving on at a thousand miles per hour without you," Lyra muttered. "And if you're not planning on ending it, then you gotta stop moping around in the trenches and come out to charge across no-mare's-land."
"I'm not moping around. I'm not depressed! Life just... sucks, is all!" Rainbow frowned. "If I was depressed, don't you think I'd be at least crying?"
"I've got news for ya, speedy." Lyra pointed. "Depression is about lying on your butt. Plain and simple. You don't laugh. You don't cry. You don't want to do anything except sit in place and wait for death to take its course."
"Pffft... since when you were such a big expert, music-maker."
"Cuz I've been there, champ." Lyra shrugged. "Hell, we all have."
"I've not!" Bon Bon said with a grin.
Lyra glared at her. "Honey, were you foaled?"
"Uhm... yes?"
"Then you were born there. Face it. Depression's a natural state. It's the highs that are mutant freaks of emotional happenstance, not the lows." A fresh drink was placed before her. "Thanks, Spartacus." She took a meager sip, exhaled, then gestured before the pegasus. "Why do you think I take liquid depressants on a regular basis? I'm seeking clarity. And at the end of that, a buzz. It's like a chemical roller coaster where you hug your liver and pray to keep your skull intact. For what it's worth."
"Mrmmmfff... please..." Rainbow Dash rubbed her head. "I don't need any of your psuedo-philosophical mumbo jumbo."
"Heh... don't knock it until you tried it, babe." Lyra winked, took another sip, and belched. "But..." She squinted as she waved the funk out of her face. "...if you wanna really get depressed, then try being an artist for a damn week. Heh... bet no flight through Ghastly Gorge—no matter how death-defying—is nearly that scary."
"Sometimes, I wonder..." Rainbow glanced aside. "...what if my friends go through this kind of garbage."
"I-I think we're pretty well-to-do, Rainbow Dash," Caramel said with a smile.
Lyra nudged him. "Lower your skirt, girl. She means her real friends."
Caramel hung his head, ears drooping. "Oh..."
"Like Rarity, for example. When is she ever going to get a clean break in life?" Rainbow hiccuped, then shrugged. "Poor mare breaks her back sewing this and that. And even after showcasing her stuff at the Gala and with Sapphire Shores and with Hoity Toity she still is a virtual unknown between here and Canterlot!" Rainbow frowned. "How's that even fair?"
"See, Rainbow?" Bon Bon raised her eyebrows. "Even your fellow peers have issues that drag them down to the depths. And yet—with the strength of each other to lean on—they persevere!"
"Pfft... yeah..." Rainbow rolled her eyes. "Except one of my friends I have this horrible crush on. Another I used to crush super-hard on." She stifled a burp. "And the others are totally friggin' clueless!"
"Then clue them in," Vinyl droned. "Stop trotting about in the dark."
"And how's that going to make them understand me any better?!" Rainbow shrugged. "Take Rarity for example! Even with all of her failures, she still has this... this crazy dream that she holds onto!"
"Like what?" Caramel blinked.
"Pfft... I dunno. She expects Prince Charming to come and whisk her off her hooves. Even when no dude has ever so much as batted an eye at her, she still thinks that stallions are someday gonna be clambering about to marry her or some crud!"
"So what's the problem with having something to look forward to?" Bon Bon shrugged. "Even if it is a silly dream?"
"Cuz it's stupid, that's why!" Rainbow's nostrils flared. "I learned pretty early on that hoping for something was pointless... like wishing my Mom back or... dreaming away dad's illness."
"And yet you've spent the better part of an entire year daydreaming about Applejack," Vinyl Scratch said, raising an eyebrow over her shades. "Is it just me, or do you enjoy sabotaging yourself, Rainbow?"
Bon Bon and Caramel winced.
Lyra drank from her glass.
Rainbow... sighed, and leaned against the tabletop again. "Ouch."
"You want my advice?" Vinyl muttered.
Rainbow buried her muzzle in her forelimbs. "After that? Mrmmmff... no."
"Try daydreaming something else for a change." Vinyl scribbled across her music sheets. "Something realistic. Something corporeal. Something you can touch, taste, and pursue with vigor... so that you can drag your life out of the muck and back to a new, waking reality."
"Mrmmmfff... like what?"
Lyra slapped her empty glass down. "We need to get you laid, ya moron!"
"Eughhh..." Bon Bon face-hoofed. "...Lyra."
"Uhm..." Caramel fidgeted. "Would it count if I batted an eye at Rarity?"
"Wasn't her. It was her dresses." Lyra licked her glass again. "Admit it."
"Yeah. Okay." Caramel sighed. "Let's get Rainbow laid."
This is probably the most unfriendly, heartless, anti-brony chapter of any MLP fic ever. And I don't care. I friggin' love it.
I love how simultaneously dark, philosophical, and absurd the dialogue gets. From the very first line, my attitude was pretty much just "fuck it," and everything else slipped out like a dictionary having the runs. The characters and plot will only make sense to those actually reading Appledashery. For everyone else reading the snippet, here's a bit of a sneak peak at the utter masochism that is the 800+ chapter exercise in masochism.
It's worth mentioning that every time that I write Lyra, I try to characterize her a little bit differently. In Background Pony, of course, she's a selfless philosophical altruist. In The Things Tavi Says, she's your typical fanon silly unicorn, but with a caring heart. In I Met a Pony In Hell, she's super innocent and feeble. Then, here in Appledashery, she's a crude, sarcastic, self-centered douchebag with an impulsive potty mouth. I dunno about you, but I find it refreshing to always rely on a background character who's so open to interpretation that you can just about do anything with the unicorn... and I pretty much have done everything with her. Yaaay minty green mare.
That about does it for now. Next Lemur Rambles will likely be about a single fic, like normal. But maybe I'll find the gumption to produce something like this again someday. Thanks for tolerating my words, and here's to a good rest-of-March.
-SS&E
Nothing on Things Tavi Says? I'm sad.
Seriously, it would have taken me multiple days to write this. It's so long that someone is going to quote me and add "That's what he said."
I'm not even going to scroll up, No one has the time.
3815652
Dude he did a whole blog post about it last week.
3815671 Aw. Give KMCA some space. He's an idiot.
Infinite Pinkies is weird, its like its almost exactly like the one shot high school paper a few of the guys from my class brought ut with a short story about Jesus and followers waiting in an airport. Except without the lasers, raptors, ninjas etc.
Id put tehir names down, but if Google was anyway as good as my old code, they would be linked and cross referenced here and to other stuff within seconds, and no general DJ wants that. Especially when they do weddings, and kiddy birthday parties.
the utter masochism that is the 800+ chapter exercise in masochism.
Yep, seems right to me.
I do highly approve of that approach to Flash.
That was really interesting. I'll have to come back to this when I've read a couple of the things I don't want to get spoiled on.
orig04.deviantart.net/df8f/f/2015/161/2/b/amethyst_wtf_by_happyswitch-d8ws5yc.png
Not gonna lie, I was equal parts amused and horrified by both the Appledashery snippets, even if I had already read them.
Re-reading BP is sounding better and better all the time. But then so are a lot of other things...
(what was the last estimate you heard for how long it takes to catch up on Austraeoh?)
I read "HIC" as an acronym until about the end of this part, and was increasingly confused. Then I couldn't unsee it as that, and that just made the whole thing even better.
I've only written merely a few paragraphs of Zecora dialog myself, and I still felt that way.
3815671 3815673 Or he didn't see the notification... So yeah, idiot.
3815880
depending on how fast you read and how many breaks you need, anywhere from a week to a year. (probably closer to a month if you read at a decent pace)
I really enjoyed the photo finish arc of appledashery. sadly that it's also where I left off on the story.... and then started reading Austreoh ... I'd like to finish both. Maybe when college work isn't killing me so much, though.
I enjoyed it. The comic relief was a nice break from all the depression. The Discord chapter was the one I had the toughest time getting through.
This part was embarrassing and awkward on an epic scale. I liked it, and the whole story for that matter. It was aggressively silly, perhaps the craziest of all my favorite fan fics.
Boy, I did not need to be reminded of that birthing scene, though now I can blame reality and not you.
3816013 am I the only person who doesn't mind writing her?