Twilight showed Cordoba the flyer. “The castle is hosting a fancy party and we’re going.”
Cordoba looked at her. “Are you going to try to make it into a friendship lesson?”
“Admittedly, I just wanted to go to a fancy party. But yes, I will be. You need to learn how to be social and interact with a wide variety of ponies.”
Cordoba sighed. “Do I have to get dressed up?”
“Yes, it’s a fancy party.”
Cordoba let out another extended sigh.
Twilight shook her head. “I can’t figure out why, if you’re a robot, Valiant programmed you to act just like a teenager.”
“Such are the mysteries of life.”
“Honestly, I think a bigger mystery was why he programmed you to speak Spanish when he himself doesn’t.”
“Yes, but I don’t get why tu eres más feo que el culo de un mono.”
“I live in a library,” Twilight pointed out. “It was pretty easy for me to start learning Spanish.”
“Even better.”
Twilight realized her plan may have backfired.
Fortunately, her plan to go to the fancy party at the castle was still on track. She made Cordoba get a dress.
The one Cordoba picked out was plainly decorated, but bright orange.
“I don’t think this is the normal kind of thing worn to these kind of parties,” said Twilight. “Plus, I’m not even Rarity but I can see that clashes with your natural coloring.”
“I don’t care. I like it.”
It was Twilight’s turn to sigh. “Nevermind. Let’s do our makeup.”
“I’m already done.”
“You wear eyeliner every day,” Twilight pointed out.
“So?”
“Let’s at least do your mane.”
Twilight hummed as she considered what to do. “You don’t really have a whole lot of length. It might be best to just put it up. I could maybe find some decorative chopsticks.”
“I have eyeliner pencils,” Cordoba offered.
“Not exactly what I was looking for,” said Twilight. “Maybe they’ll do for now until I can find something else.”
As she worked, Cordoba asked, “So why are you going to all this trouble?”
“I told you. For a friendship lesson, and to go to a fancy party.”
“Why aren’t you going with your friends? Rarity has to know about the party.”
“She’s busy,” said Twilight.
“Are all your friends busy?”
“Some coincidence happened and they were all busy. Most of them wanted to go, though you know how Rainbow is about fancy parties.”
Twilight finished putting up Cordoba’s mane. “There! Now do me.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Oh, well, let me show you!” Twilight was invested in teaching as always, but there seemed to be a little extra pep in her attitude.
“What’s with you?” Cordoba asked. “Are you just really into doing girly stuff?”
“What’s wrong with that?” Twilight asked.
“Nobody’s around to see. You know I don’t care.”
“I like doing girly stuff for me,” said Twilight.
“I just said I don’t care. Whether that’s true or not, you don’t have to tell me.”
“What do you mean, ‘whether that’s true or not?’”
“You said you like doing girly stuff. That’s either true, or you’re either knowingly or unknowingly telling a falsehood to conceal the fact that you’re uncomfortable in your skin and would rather present yourself in a much different way but are constrained by societal norms.”
If it had been anybody but Twilight, that run-on sentence of a statement would have been hard to follow.
Twilight replied, “I just like being girly. Don’t read too much into it.”
Cordoba shrugged. “I suppose if you were too tomboyish, Pinkie might take it as an invitation. Anyway, gender roles aren’t really a big deal around here. My father saw to that.”
“I agree with your comment about gender roles, but fail to see how Valiant had anything to do with it.”
“Who else jacked Applejack, made Guinness a practically single father, and added and subtracted a few genitals to various deserving or undeserving ponies?”
Twilight was forced to concede the point.
Cordoba finished doing Twilight’s mane. It wasn’t perfect, but it had been her first ever attempt.
“That’s not bad, I can do some touchups,” said Twilight. “But if we want to get there on time, we should get going.”
She started for the door, but stopped and turned around. “No weapons.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You heard me. Leave all your weapons here.”
Cordoba sighed aggressively and rolled her eyes, but dropped a short sword and folding knife out from under her dress.
“Is those all your weapons?”
“All the weapons, yes.”
Something about how she said it gave Twilight pause, but she decided she didn’t want to know.
They caught a ride into Canterlot onboard Tin Mare. It was not exactly the fancy carriage one generally expected when arriving at fancy parties. Cordoba seemed to enjoy herself, though. Tin Mare was fancy, even if it wasn’t the way Twilight wanted.
And a seventeen ton death machine landing in the castle courtyard made for an entrance that was hard to beat.
Tin Mare let them off and went to park herself. Twilight finished fixing her mane after the downdraft of the rotors and walked with Cordoba towards the castle entrance. “Remember, you’re here to socialize. Be talkative, but keep your opinions to yourself. Keep your facts to yourself, come to think of it. And let me stress, no killing.”
“You keep telling me that. But sometimes I have to.”
“I’ve gone my whole life without the intention to murder anypony. You’re – however old you are – and you do it all the time.”
“I’m good at it.”
“But you shouldn’t. Talent has nothing to do with it.”
“Does that mean special talents derived from cutie marks are also meaningless?”
Twilight hesitated. “That’s…different. But honestly, special talents don’t guarantee a job and place in life. My special talent is magic and I’m both a librarian and Governor of Silent Hill.”
“Some job you’re doing of that.”
Twilight bit back a response as they entered the crowd.
Cordoba kept a suspicious look on her face. She was probably scanning for threats. If she was as sophisticated a piece of hardware as Valiant implied, surely her processor could handle multitasking. Then again, perhaps focus was sometimes a good thing. “Cracker is right behind you.”
Twilight eep’d in surprise and turned to see her acquaintance Cracker standing there. “Oh, hello. I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“I decided to come,” said Cracker. “Though it doesn’t look like this party will be very memorable.”
“Be careful what you wish for,” Twilight implored.
Cracker said goodbye and moved away to apparently find something more interesting to do. Twilight turned back around, not seeing Cordoba where she had been.
Slightly panicked, she looked around, spotting her over by the refreshments. Twilight calmed. Cordoba was probably getting some coffee. Still, a snack sounded good, and she headed over. She arrived in time to behold Cordoba pulling one of the eyeliner pencils out of her mane and attacking a stallion near the refreshments table.
Twilight yanked her off with magic, but Cordoba had already riddled her target’s jugular with the sharp point of the pencil. He breathed his last, dying in a pool of his own blood moments later, right in front of the horrified eyes of everyone at the party.
“It’s okay!” said Cordoba, so the crowd could hear. “He double-dipped the guacamole.”
