Fireworks season, Letters, and Chem Warfare · 3:49am Jul 2nd, 2019
As I write this, I’m getting ready to go see my son graduate from his Army chemical warfare training in beautiful Ft. Leonard Wood, a leisurely six hour drive from here, which we should be back from by July 4 in order to see Wamego’s fabulous fireworks (ranked #1 in Kansas). Just to let you know, Letters From a Little Princess Monster (Volume 1) is now available in paper format at the link, as well as Monster in the Twilight, but that doesn’t mean I’m done writing (no matter how much Trixie would like it). See a little snippet below the break where Trixie learns of a new Griffon diet while helping Monster pass all three of Discord’s tests.
“Not a chance,” said Tallgrass, who sat back down at the table. “That’s one solved. What’s next?”
“Candybutt.” Trixie tapped the card with the crystal heart symbol. “We don’t know enough about where she is to do anything, so…”
Trixie flipped over one of the ice cream store menus and scribbled on the back. “Most urgent. Where is Cadence? Need answer now! She could be in grave danger. Here you go, Spike.”
“On it!” Spike breathed across the menu and watched the green smoke waft off in the direction of Canterlot.
“Problem solved for now. Hopefully, she’s just in the doctor’s office, needing her hooves massaged or something. Which leaves…” Trixie picked up the last card, which felt cold in her magic even as it dripped blood onto the table. “We have an idiot magic tutor, an aerie full of griffons, and blood. I just wish Greenie would have sent some sort of message with all the historical papers he’s been sending to the library ever since—”
Realization flooded in like an icy bucket of water, and Trixie bolted to her hooves. “His letters! Be right back!”
With a blinding burst of pink light, Trixie vanished, only to reappear a few seconds later while surrounded in envelopes and smoldering sheets of notes. Patting out one small flame on her tail which indicated just how much more practice Trixie needed with her teleportation spell, she dumped the letters on the table and shoved one in each of their directions.
“Greenie is a nosy little snoop. He had to have written some sort of code into his letters. Everybody grab a stack.”
It said something that everypony in the ice cream shop, young and old, followed Trixie’s snapped command without argument, even the ones who might be considered innocent passers-by. She wasn’t quite sure what it said. Maybe that Trixie was sounding just a little off the wall, or that she had teleported twice just now without gloating about it.
“Presto,” she murmured, scanning down the sheet of Green Grass’ meticulous script. “It could take hours to figure out what he used. Maybe something with alternate prime numbers, or recursive integrals in—”
“What’s a windy-go?” asked Snails.
“Windigo,” corrected Sweetie Belle. “From the Hearth’s Warming play.”
“Oh.” Snails turned a page on Green Grass’ report, which was supposed to be used for some sort of advanced history degree he was working on, which made it obvious that the gawky young colt was just saying something random. Snips nudged a little closer to his taller friend and looked around his shoulder at the writing, which Trixie suspected they did a lot during test time at school.
“He wrote it twice on this page.”
“Give me that!” snapped Trixie, swapping her copy of Greenie’s incomprehensible historical writing for theirs. After a few minutes of examination, she was seriously beginning to doubt both of the young colts’ honesty, except for Twist speaking up suddenly.
“Thith one hath that word too.”
“So does this one,” said Featherweight.
“Where?” Trixie craned her neck to look over the shoulders of the bothersome students, although she could not see the word in question at all.
“It’s the first letter of the second word in each sentence,” explained Sweetie Belle. “See. W-i-n-d-i-g-o-y-o-u-d-u-m-b-b-i—”
“I see!” snapped Trixie, grabbing the research paper away from the young unicorn before she got more of an education than she needed. “This is bad. Really bad.”
“Ain’t that bad,” said Applejack. “Them Windigo got their flanks whupped well over a thousand years ago, and ain’t nopony seen hide nor hair—”
“Greenie’s up at Gilda’s aerie, isn’t he?” Rainbow Dash looked so pale she was nearly white. “I mean she’s cool and all that, but the griffons who run that aerie are all a bunch of horrid jerks. Still, I can’t see them doing—” Rainbow swallowed and stopped talking, although her eyes remained locked on Trixie, who had to pick up the conversation before she thought about the terrible memory that the word ‘Windigo’ had brought up.
“He’s in terrible danger. And so is every creature in Equestria.” Trixie took a short breath, considered the young eyes of Twilight’s friends, and decided to continue despite the gruesome facts. “The Windigo were not some creature that invaded the pony lands. At one time, they were ponies and griffons who… ate other ponies.”
“Gilda snuck a bottle of Minotaur rotgut into flight camp once,” said Rainbow Dash as quick as she could push the words out. “We both got blasted sick, and she told me all about it while we were throwing up. A group of griffons back then somehow thought drinking the blood of ponies would let them fly faster and higher. She didn’t say anything about pegasi, though,” she added with a quick glance at Trixie.
“Celestia told me.” Trixie took another short, gasping breath. “I made her tell me. I was trying everything I could think of to increase my magic, and she sat me down before I did something stupider than usual. A bunch of pegasi and griffons got caught up in competition. There were murders. Bloody, terrible murders. She said it was the most frustrated she had ever been, because she was not an alicorn yet, and all she wanted to do was blast the monsters with fire.”
Twilight Sparkle took that moment to bump up against Trixie’s side, which sent a cold chill down her flank. She bumped back and leaned into the young alicorn’s side, which felt as hot as a stove and provided welcome warmth while she continued. “Princess Celestia, the tea-sipping, gentle voice of reason, who refuses to even step on a beetle crossing the garden path. Nopony alive realizes just what a terrible monster she can become. I only saw a few glimpses, and I was her student for ten years. The Windigo scared the shoes off her back then, so it would be stupid to put this off while they gain power.”
“The founderth uthed the Fire of Friendthip to defeat the Windigo latht time,” said Twist. “We thee the play every year.”
“Thousand-year-old myths versus eyewitness alicorns,” countered Trixie. “We need to use the resources of all of our friends to beat this, and remember what I told Menace about asking Celestia for help after your bunch scrambled Scootaloo’s brains?”
“Ask first!” said Diamond Tiara.
“It’s easier to get forgiveness than permission,” said Trixie just as quickly as she could. “Never show all of your cards, but peek at as many of your opponent’s cards as you can. And only ask if you’re fairly sure of the answer. And above all, never panic.”
There was a swirl of magic in the ice cream shop, and a blast of air followed when Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, and a distraught Shining Armor appeared. The frazzled unicorn could have easily been the Prince of Panic, with his mane spiked in all directions, damp tracks of tears down his cheeks, and a look of pure terror in his eyes as he tackled Trixie in one long cat-like pounce.
“CADENCE!” he blurted out right into Trixie’s face. “Where’s Cadence! What did you hear? Is she here? Is she in labor? SAY SOMETHING!!”
“Perhaps if you let go of her throat,” said Princess Luna, moving forward through the rapidly scattering customers of the ice cream store. “We received your letter, and are looking for more information before Prince Armor takes the Royal Guard in search of Princess Cadenza’s kidnapper.”
“Urk!” managed Trixie in response.
“There are reports of an unnamed unicorn absconding with her at the Canterlot train station, with tickets to Yakyakistan,” continued Luna. “Orange in color, with a far darker mane, and a white blaze running down his nose. Oh, and white boots, although there is no report of his cutie mark, because he wore a dark cloak done up in stars.”
“Sunburst!” gasped Trixie through Shining Armor’s stranglehold.
Trixie has no problem abusing DragonFax, as opposed to Canon Twilight, who thinks that passing a problem on is some sort of terrible blotch on her record.
"Not my problem." Trixie tossed the paper to Spike. "Fire that sucker on to somebody who cares."
(now where in Canterlot do you think Monster is going to find an experienced military commander who knows how to do an invasion...)
Please extend my congratulations to your son and have a happy 4th of July.
Congrats to your son on graduating.
As one who lives just outside Ft Wood, it is always wonderful to see family supporting my fellow military.
5082869 Great! (Hopefully, you're not the one responsible for their web page or Facebook page, because those are both sooooo out of date. We're going to more or less get there, check into the hotel, and try to contact him to find out where and when family day and graduation is)
5082861 Thank you, thank you! We live the dream here. Small town living, big town booms.
It's not nice to tease us like this.
While at the same time giving us hope for new chapters!
Congrats to your son!
I live i Vegas so we get the big time booms too!!! I love the 4th of July!!
I'll add my congratulations to your son to those already here. :)
Huh --- was unaware that the Chemical Corps did their AIT at Leonard Wood; thought that was mostly a combat engineer training base. Also, I, too, did my basic at Fort Jackson in 1985. Bet the WWII-era barracks are still there...
Any idea yet where your son's first posting is going to be?
Add another set of congratulations on the lad's continuing success in his career. Safe road tripping to the two of you.
Enjoy your 4th and good to see a small town making a big boom.
5082914
Ft. Benning (sitting here with him now)
Egad, sometimes I'll have a window open and type something and come back an eternity later and realize I never clicked submit.
Congrats to your son!