//------------------------------// // Chapter 21 // Story: Foalsitting Follies // by kudzuhaiku //------------------------------// Love could not be contained by checklists, or point by point plans. It was a vast, unknown sea that could be mapped out, there were no stars to navigate by, there was only action and the experience. And, much to Twilight’s terror, she was in love. She was in love with her longtime friend and one of her best friends, although that was a bit more confusing somehow, as she sensed that it was a different sort of love, which made the experience all the more difficult to process.   So, it was with much caution and hesitation that Twilight Sparkle allowed love to happen. Love was quite different than the crush she had experienced, as this was a love reciprocated, returned, it was a love that went in both directions, that gave as well as received. And it was glorious. So much so, in fact, that it almost made up for the terror and panic it caused.   Like the cheese quesadilla that had once been her greatest fear, she found love satisfying.   Even though she worried about all of the things that might happen, or could happen, or probably would happen, even though she was scared of the consequences, Twilight decided it was time to let go and just allow this to take place, come what may. Leaning over a bit, she rested her weight against Seville, and found him to be a sturdy support. He was a veteran of this life and its hazards. Seville had endured train rides with Gosling, he had seen battle, had survived assassination attempts, he was all too aware of the risks. None of what might happen was strange to him, or unknown—in short, either through accident or on purpose, Seville had been groomed to deal with this sort of life.   So, Twilight made the choice to trust him, she had to trust that he knew what he was getting himself into, that he knew the consequences, the risks, the dangers, and wanted to proceed anyway. She wasn’t pulling him into an unfair situation that would drastically upend his life, no, she was seeking a seasoned and accomplished accomplice that knew exactly what he was getting into.   It was safe to fall in love with him, to do so without the fear that she would ruin his life.   Overhead, the Wonderbolts were wrapping up their show with rapid formation changes, an impressive display that Twilight had trouble focusing on. She was far too distracted and happy to pay attention, and she reveled in what she knew to be a most wonderful, most perfect moment. Nuance was behaving himself while clinging to her leg. His touch, his weight was pleasing to her, reassuring for some odd reason that she could not comprehend, and being this close to Seville was electric. There was something about the experience as a whole that she craved, that she wanted more of, and she didn’t want this perfect moment to end.   Rainbow Dash had done just the right thing. Leave it to a pegasus to create just the right atmosphere. Leaning against Seville, she looked up at her friend, distracted, thankful for having a most excellent wingpony. Overhead, the Wonderbolts were waving, showing off, and saying goodbye. Down below, all of Ponyville seemed wowed, but of all of the astonishment filled faces, Radiance was the one that seemed the most taken with what he had seen. Twilight just so happened to look at him at just the right moment, at just the right time, when his eyes shimmered with tears.   For some reason, Twilight thought back to that magic moment during the Summer Sun Celebration, when order and beauty had left a profound impact upon her. That was a long, long time ago, and she had grown so much since then. Perhaps Radiance was having his own life altering moment, who knew… a cutie mark might be soon to follow, though Twilight wasn’t sure how being an earth pony applied to this situation. Anything was possible though.   “Can we get ice cream?” Corbie asked, startling Twilight, who was lost in her thoughts.   “I… dunno…” Twilight drew out her words, hesitant, because she wanted Corbie to get some exercise.   “We’ve been good.” Corbie’s eyes seemed large behind her glasses, and so far, her face remained neutral. She wasn’t using weaponised cuteness, at least, not yet.   “You should be good for the sake of being good,” Twilight replied, shaking her head, “and not for the hope of a reward.”   “That’s dumb.” Corbie looked thoughtful for a moment, and it was obvious that she was struggling to come up with something better. “If we get no reward for being good, then why be good? If I’m good, I want something for it.”   Twilight wasn’t sure where to start. The grammar of the response irked her, but the idea that Corbie expected payment for being good bothered her quite a bit. Feeling eyes upon her, she looked down and saw Nuance looking up at her with an unreadable expression upon his face. Were pegasus ponies natural mercenaries and if so, why hadn’t she found out about it?   “Tell me, do your parents pay you for being good?” Twilight asked, fearing the answer.   “If they know what’s good for them,” Seville grumbled while he turned and looked away.   “Daddy says that diplomacy is the art of rewarding ponies for doing good.” Corbie blinked, and for a moment, there was something about her that was very much like her father. “I’ve heard him say that ponies want to be good, but sometimes they need, um, what’s that word...”—the filly wore a blank stare for a moment while thinking—“motor-vacation?”   “Motivation?” Twilight leaned her head down a bit to look Corbie in the eye.   “I think it was motor-vacation, but okay.” When Radiance snorted, Corbie ignored him and remained focused upon Twilight.   “Okay,” Twilight began after deciding to deal with Corbie in a more diplomatic manner, “there is something I want from you. Are you ready to negotiate?” When Spike began to chortle, Twilight shot him a scathing glance, but the dragon did not stop. She was about to say something else, when Seville started to chuckle as well, and that was the moment when Twilight began to feel annoyed.   “What are your terms?” Corbie asked.   Twilight blinked, taken off guard. She was the one that needed to be in control, but Corbie had just beaten her to the punch, and was now the one dictating the pace of things. This would not do. She realised that Corbie really was her father’s daughter, and while she wasn’t the smartest little filly, she was canny. Just what was Gosling teaching her? Or what if this was Celestia’s doing? Or Luna? Twilight hoped that she wasn’t in trouble, or in over her head. Shaking her head from side to side, she realised that worrying was unnecessary, and there was no way that she could lose, because she was in charge.   “I’m waiting.” Corbie’s ears stood up and the little filly looked quite attentive. And cute. Dangerously cute.   “We’re going to go for a walk around the lake,” Twilight said after she pulled herself together and she refused to be distracted. Now, Sumac was sniggering, and she made a mental note to increase his homework by a magnitude. She saw Corbie’s ears sag and for some reason, she now felt guilty for even suggesting it. Oh, Corbie was good. Gosling pulled this nonsense all of the time, and Twilight had difficulty dealing with it each time it happened.   “And then I get my ice cream?” Corbie clopped her front hooves together, and then gave Twilight a hopeful look.   A shrewd grimace appeared on Twilight’s face, a reflexive action from dealing with ponies like Gosling and Sumac for far too long. She had to make Corbie come around to her way of thinking somehow, to make her motivated to do this. She had an idea, and she thought that it just might save this situation.   “Yes, you will get one scoop of ice cream for every lap you take with me around the lake.”   “Hmm.” Corbie contemplated Twilight’s offer while the others present continued to laugh, much to Twilight’s ever-growing annoyance. “Toppings?”   “Toppings count as a scoop—”   “Four toppings count as a scoop.”   “No.”   “Three.”   “No.”   “Fine, two, but if you don’t say yes, I’m not walking.” Corbie’s eyes narrowed and she attempted to stare Twilight down. “Toppings are just little things, like sprinkles and nuts and stuff. I should get what I want.”   “Okay, fine, fresh fruit, if you get it, doesn’t count as a topping,” Twilight said, trying to bargain. “You can get all the fruit you want, but candied fruit doesn’t count.”   The filly’s ears angled forwards and she gave a little nod of her head. “I’ll agree, but only if you follow the same rule. Oy vey, this alte kaker, she hondles.”   “Corbie!” Seville snapped, and he was no longer laughing. “I’m telling your father!” His words made the filly flinch just a little, but not much.   “What’d she just say?” Twilight demanded, feeling out of sorts.   “Give me a lap around the lake and I’ll tell you,” Corbie offered.   Seville leaned over, placed his muzzle next to Twilight’s ear, and then told Twilight what the little filly had said. Her mouth dropped open in shock, her eyes widened, and even as she became angry, there was a part of her that wanted to laugh. She kicked her amusement down the stairs to the basement of her mind while her eyebrows furrowed downwards. “Why I oughta make you run a lap around the lake, you little stinker!”   Twilight’s words had the opposite effect of what she wanted, and Corbie began giggling.     The laps around the lake were just what Twilight needed. A bit of exercise was good for clearing one’s head and getting the blood flowing. Radiance seemed to be enjoying himself the most, having pulled ahead with Sumac and Pebble. As for Sumac and Pebble, they kept flirting with each other, which made Twilight worry about inappropriate behaviour, and she kept an eye on the two of them. Boomer, who slunk along on all fours, kept pace with Corbie. Twilight, along with Seville, who was carrying Nuance, brought up the rear. As for Spike, he was in the lake, swimming, having abandoned them to do his own thing.   The path around the lake had been covered in gravel, the good kind, made of rounded stones. Nopony liked walking on the sharp kind of gravel, except for maybe Maud and perhaps Pebble, but Twilight didn’t know for certain. One thing was for certain: most of the gravel around the lake had been made by Maud and Pebble. Twilight still remembered the dust cloud.   “Twilight?”   Turning her head, Twilight glanced at Seville, who kept pace beside her. She also saw a guard, who kept pace a few yards away, and she could hear his armor jangling. Seville appeared to be struggling, trying to say something, and for such an erudite pony that worked with words, he was having a hard time making a sentence.   “Twilight, I realise that this might be a little forwards, but at some point, I have to take you home to meet my parents,” Seville managed to say after claiming victory over his internal struggle. “I’m a bit worried about it, actually. No… no… no… I’m scared silly about it, if I am to be honest.”   “Seville, don’t be a silly pony.”   “Twilight, you don’t understand… they’re poor. They’re farmers—”   “Applejack is a farmer,” Twilight interjected.   “No…” Seville shook his head. “Twilight, they don’t own the land they farm. We’re relics of Equestria’s fading feudal era. They’re serfs… of the lowest type. We came with the land. We’re not at all like the aristocratic Oranges that live in Manehattan”—for a moment, Seville’s eyes flashed with frustration and a bit of anger—“we’re the workers that keep them wealthy. I mean, we’re all family and they’re nice enough to us considering what we are, but I…” His words trailed off into a frustrated, flatulent raspberry.   “And you think that this would bother me?” Twilight asked.   “It bothers me!” Seville blurted out, and his raised voice caused several of the guards to turn and look. “It’s why I left the farm! We were poor! We didn’t even have electricity… and now that I have money, my parents don’t want it! They’re so stuck in the mindset of what they were raised to do… they don’t want things to improve or get better… they like being serfs. They say that life is less complicated and they don’t have to worry about payments, or balancing the books, or paying taxes, or doing anything but work the land! Money is a complication that frightens them! They’re not intellectuals and I’m scared about bringing you home because you’re so much higher up in the caste system than we are.”   “Seville,” Twilight said, and her voice was soft, “for one thing, we no longer use the words ‘caste system,’ as we have grown past that as a society—”   “Some ponies still cling to it, embrace it even, and I haven’t said a single, solitary word to my parents about my hopes of getting with you because I don’t know how they would react! They’re bumpkins!” While Seville was speaking, his eyes cast a sidelong glance ahead at Sumac, and then he focused once more on Twilight Sparkle.   Taken aback, Twilight almost stumbled, but recovered. Nuance had a strange look upon his face while he clung to Seville’s neck. Try as she might, she could not make out Nuance’s bizarre expression, and the more she looked at it, the more it bothered her, because she did not know what the little enigmatic colt was thinking.   Seeing Seville’s distress, Twilight decided that it was time for a distraction bomb. “You know, Seville, it’s not fair.”   “What’s not fair?” Sure enough, Seville looked baffled.   “You’ve met my mother and father.” Twilight made her face look as serious as possible. “You are, no doubt, one of my mother’s friends, one of her inner circle. You’ve filmed that documentary with her about how our government works, and the reformation that we’ve endured as a nation. You know her better than I will probably ever know your parents, and I’m a little jealous.”   “Jealous?” Seville’s mouth fell open. “Are you kidding me, Miss Sparkle?”   “Would I do that?” she asked, and she did her best to look innocent.   “Yes,” he replied without so much as a second’s hesitation.   “Harumph!” Twilight tossed her head around, and then snorted.   “You know, working with your mother, it’s been great.” Seville turned to stare ahead, and his hooves made crunching sounds as he trotted alongside Twilight. “For the past few years, she’s told me so many embarrassing stories about you. She loves to talk about you, you know.”   Aghast, Twilight felt the skin of her stomach begin crawling. Her mother did what?   “She told me all about your Sol Benedictionem, when you received the blessing of the sun and were recognised as a noble heir to your house.” Seville was grinning now, and mischief twinkled in his eyes.   “Noooo…” Twilight felt her stomach doing flip flops. “She didn’t!”   “She did.” Seville began sniggering and kept his eyes focused straight ahead.   “No, she didn’t!” Twilight was mortified. She didn’t remember the incident, as she was too young, but it was a story that she dreaded her mother telling. It was usually enough to drive Twilight right out of the room, or make her behave as a filly, or just make her go and hide in the closet in shame. It was the worst story, and Twilight wished that she could strike it from existence.   “Your mother says that the day of your Sol Benedictionem was the day that she knew that Princess Celestia was truly a great ruler, and that was the day that your mother pledged her service to the betterment of the empire. She really loves to tell this story.”   “Noooo!” Twilight shook her head from side to side. “No! No! No! Gah!”   “What happened?” Nuance asked.   “Don’t you dare tell him!” Twilight demanded.   “A conundrum,” Pebble deadpanned from up ahead. “Does the born serf obey the direct command of his princess, behaving as a submissive lesser, or does he rise up and claim equal hoofing?”   “Pebble Pie, shut your pie hole!” Twilight did her best impression of Applejack, but felt it was lacking. Her ears were burning and she was almost certain that it was, in fact, possible to die of shame. “You pretentious little social climber, you’re the special somepony of a member of the landed elite!”   “I know, and it feels good to pull myself up out of this mire I was born into.” Turning back to face Twilight, Pebble had a smug look upon her face, the mother of all smug looks, it was the smuggiest of all smug looks that had ever been smugged. “Some of us live to escape it.”   “Gah, Pebble, you’re so frustrating!” Twilight’s voice was more whine than anything else, and it galled her that Sumac was laughing at this exchange.   In a low voice, Seville responded to Nuance, and there was no trace of laughter in his voice. “Little filly Twilight had the stomach flu, but nopony knew it just yet. When it got to the part where Princess Celestia had to kiss the spot where the umbilical cord was, Twilight exploded out of both ends. Your mother, Nuance, bless her soul, continued the ceremony as if nothing had happened, and she didn’t so much as raise an eyebrow, because that’s how strong her dedication to ceremony and tradition are.”   “Oh.” Nuance sat there, and his ears drooped.   Twilight expected Nuance to laugh, to gloat, but he didn’t. This wasn’t the reaction she expected at all. The little colt looked… sad. The embarrassment of the moment was forgotten, and she tried as hard as she could to get inside of the little colt’s head. Of course he knew the shame of being laughed at, of having embarrassing stories told about him.   “Nuance, you okay, little buddy?” Seville asked.   “I’m fine,” Nuance replied, not sounding fine at all. “You shouldn’t laugh at Twilight.”   “I’m not.” Seville drew in a deep breath, glanced at Twilight, and then worry began to creep over his face.   “I want to go home.” Nuance paused, then kept going: “I don’t want to be out in the sun. I want to lay down. I don’t feel good.”   “Nuance, you’re not even walking.” Radiance scowled back at his brother, and then snorted. “You’re faking it, you little weakling, and it isn’t fair that you’ll be getting ice cream without having to work for it.”   “Hey, Radiance, tell me something,” Pebble said, cutting in before Twilight could respond. “How does somepony fake getting punched in the face by their brother? Tell me that, will you?”   Twilight saw it. She saw it and it scared her. Rage. Pure, inarticulate rage, and Radiance’s face was now turning a frightening shade of red. For a moment, she was almost certain that Radiance was going to attack Pebble, and the little colt began to splutter because he was too angry to make words happen.   “Do it, Radiance,” Pebble said as she came to an abrupt halt on the path, which made everypony else come to a stop as well. “You’re a big strong pony when it comes to beating up weaklings, but I think you’re all talk and bluster. You’re just a bully, and I think having your posh little plot kicked would do you some good. Beating up your brother proves to everypony just how big and strong you are, right? Do you really think that you can prove yourself by doing—”   “Pebble, that’s enough.” Twilight’s tone was one of calm command.   “Just saying.” Pebble stared at Twilight, defiant. “Lock him into a room with Flurry and let nature take its course. I bet Skyla could take him too.”   “Pebble, stop.” Twilight’s voice was low, calm, but also gritty and tense.   “Fine.” Pebble bowed her head. “I’ll stop. I’ve made my point, and I suppose that will have to be enough.” Turning her head back around, she resumed trotting once more, leading the way,   “Are we still going to get ice cream?” Corbie looked worried. “I’m owed some ice cream. I did laps.”   Sighing, Twilight realised that it was time for this excursion to end. “Yes, Corbie, you’ll get your ice cream, and then we’re going home. Come on, everypony, let’s hoof it to the ice cream parlour, and let’s try to have a nice time. No more fighting, bickering, or making hurtful accusations about our brother.” She focused on Radiant as she spoke her final words, but he ignored her, as he was still staring at Pebble, seething, furious.   Things hadn’t quite worked out as planned.