Cadet "Garden Hose" receives a simple mission: to infiltrate the Crystal Empire in the guise of a pony, replace Cadence's baby with a changeling princess, then return safely home.

It's a pity that all the advice she was given was: "When in doubt, water flowers."

Written for the S6 Premiere Short Story Contest of the SFNW group.

Special thanks to Octavia Harmony for editing.

In his influential analysis of the coup d'etat that would become known as the Rutting Revolution, Curly Marks wrote that history repeats itself — "the first time as tragedy, the second time as Prince Blueblood."

Marks actually used other words in place of the name, but this is a family-friendly publication.

* * * * *

This story is a sprawling literary mash-up of Prince Blueblood, the French Revolution, linguistic homicide, male suffrage, Prince Blueblood, educational blackmail, epically bad puns, and Prince Blueblood. Also a story about how to be a hero when you're rotten to the core. But mostly, Blueblood.

First-place winner of the "History Repeats" writeoff * Featured on Equestria Daily
"Highly Recommended (Top 15 Stories)" by Titanium Dragon * "Highly Recommended" by PresentPerfect * Rated "Definitely Read This" by Super Trampoline
"★★★★" from Louder Yay * Other word of mouth

Fluttershy just wants a little pony company. It doesn't have to be conversation. Maybe she'll just sit and sip the water as it melts off the ice cubes from her empty drink, and watch the other ponies talk. That would be nice.

Or maybe something entirely different will happen.

On EqD Oct 17, 2012.

Donut Joe keeps his store open on Hearth’s Warming Eve. And why not? He doesn’t have anywhere else to be, and neither do the tired, bitter ponies who find their way inside.

But the Eve is young, and strange things lie ahead. Who knows what might happen on a night like tonight?

(Inspired by the song "Old City Bar," by Trans-Siberian Orchestra)

Reviewed by TheifofZ here.

A special guest speaker arrives in Ponyville to teach Cheerilee's class about the inner workings of Equestria's government. And, well... it's Prince Blueblood.

Prince Blueblood asks Princess Twilight to marry him. She gives the rational response.

Back in their high school years, there was a chance meeting between Shining Armor and Prince Blueblood. These ponies couldn't be any more different, but it turns out that each of them has something to teach the other... though there's no telling whether Blueblood will listen.

This short story was written for the EFNW 2015 Pre-Con Contest, where the thematic prompt is "Making New Friends." Check it out, and best of luck to everyone who enters! Cover art is from Pika-Robo's DeviantArt page. Check it out, too!

This is a personal continuation of the excellent story " Dear Idiot" by The Descendant. It is not part of his story, but part of a personal reaction I had to it. I have expanded on the events after the end of Dear Idiot, exploring my personal feelings on the narrative.

Now Complete.

There's another friendship crisis in another far away place, this time the land of the llamas, and Twilight's magical map once again calls on a heroic pony to solve it. But this time the map doesn't call Twilight or any of her friends, this time it calls somepony else entirely.

But Trixie's true reasons for accepting the map's call may not be wholly altruistic, and it turns out she's not nearly as over being upstaged by Twilight during their past encounters as she lets on.

May the gods have mercy on those poor llamas.

Rainbow Dash is a mare of many talents, among them incredible passive observation skills. Once she no longer worried about getting her chance to ride the most amazing roller coaster that ever was like any proper Wonderbolt, she could take the time to process everything her brain noticed while she was busy.

That's when the family resemblance hit her.

Then some other things.

This is going to be awkward.

Rated Teen for frank discussion of the production of Trixie.