The table was crowded for its size and length. The last two ponies to come in for supper were Hotspur and Hush, and Hush, unable to sit in a chair, sat down on the floor. He was still at eye level with most ponies sitting in chairs. It was in this light, under these circumstances that one realised that Hush wasn’t exactly a pony. Gosling was surprised to see them, as he wasn’t expecting them to join him for the meal.
“Oh, Gosling, before I forget—”
“Yes, Twilight?” Gosling leaned forward and gave her his best smile, the smile that left a mare flustered. He laid it on thick, too, and his ears perked when Celestia began tittering at Twilight’s adorable distress.
“I sp-spoke with Zecora,” she stammered, and her ears pivoted about. “She agreed to brew a pegasus potion. In a few days, the draught will be done. It’ll make your feathers grow back, but there are side effects—”
This sounded promising, but Gosling had some concern. “Side effects?”
“Yes.” Twilight took a deep breath to recover herself, and Celestia was still tittering. “Itchiness, dizziness, possible hives, and uh, um…” Her words trailed off into an embarrassed nothingness.
“Yes?” Gosling leaned forwards, eager to hear more.
“Extreme arousal,” Twilight squeaked.
It was Luna who burst out laughing first, and she banged her hoof on the table. This set off a barrage of laughter from all around the table and Gosling himself became lost in the moment. It felt good to laugh, and he let himself go without reservation. Twilight’s face was dabbling in new colours in the visible light spectrum once again, and Celestia gave her former student a gentle pat of reassurance.
“It’s a pegasus potion, and it enhances pegasus attributes,” Twilight said, reciting facts to alleviate her nervousness. “On a non-pegasus pony, it will cause a pair of wings to grow in the span of about twenty-four hours, and these wings will endure for about sixty hours, give or take a few hours. I understand the growth is quite uncomfortable and even painful, which is why these potions are almost unheard of and quite unpopular.”
“I don’t know if I like the idea of this hoodoo potion.” Sleet was quiet and she wasn’t laughing. Some of the laughter died and Gosling’s mother looked a little nervous. “It has nothing to do with zebras, and everything to do with alchemy. It’s too random. There is no consistency between potions.”
“Sleet kinda has a point.” Twilight cleared her throat. “Two different ponies can make the exact same potion and both will come out with different results. Zecora’s potions are pretty good though, and she is consistant with herself. I had a lot of trouble with alchemy when I was in school, and now, as a teacher myself, I really, really hate alchemy because, well, how do I grade it?”
“Oh, Twilight,” Celestia sighed, “you’ve grown so much.”
“What if the potion wears off and my son’s wings fall off completely?” Sleet asked, blinking, and looking quite concerned. “I mean, that happens at the end of the potion, when it wears off, right?”
Now, Twilight looked horrified and Gosling was feeling a little apprehensive about this idea. With an odd sort of synchronicity, both turned to Celestia for reassurance, for comfort, and it was at this moment that Celestia had a frustrated maternal expression upon her face, a look that suggested that she was tired of these happenings. Her sigh, a longsuffering one, confirmed as well as reinforced her expression.
“In all my long years, I have only heard of that happening once. Maybe twice. But I’ve never actually seen it so it might just be hearsay or zebra discrimination. Something a rabble rouser might do to stir up suspicion or fear of zebras to destroy the ever so fragile harmony. Really, the zebras know their stuff and if Zecora’s potions were a danger, her reputation would precede her.” Rolling her eyes, Celestia snorted and shook her head from side to side.
“I think it would be best to change the subject,” Shining Armor suggested, and his eyes darted in Flurry Heart’s direction. “This can be discussed later.”
“Yes”—Celestia nodded, agreeing—“later.” After speaking, she looked relieved.
Gosling was about to say something to ensure the subject changed, but little Flurry had her own plans, and she blurted out the word, “Freckles!”
“Who has freckles, Flurry?” Cadance asked, and the pink pony spoke her words in such a way that her daughter’s statement was the most important thing ever said.
Flurry reacted to this, her eyes brightening and her ears pricked. Stimulated, she bounced up and down in her seat a bit, causing her high chair to clunk, and she banged her hooves against the hard wooden tray that held her in place. Looking up at her mother she replied, “Freckles all over.”
“Yes, but who?” Cadance smiled, and the rest of the table now watched, waiting.
Grinning from ear to ear, Flurry had this to say: “Gosling! Freckles! All over!”
“Oy vey, she is reaching that stage that little pegasus foals reach when they began to observe everything, every detail, no matter how minor.” Sleet, though not Flurry’s mother, looked proud and she heaved a satisfied sigh. “These are the best times.”
“Yeah!” Cadance’s over-enthusiasm caused her utterance to come out at considerable volume. “Flurry, Gosling is dappled. He has spots. He has spots like the night sky has stars. Can you say ‘dappled’ for your Mommy?”
Looking somehow regal, little Flurry considered her mother’s request. The little foal’s ears pivoted around while she considered the new word, and she turned to look at Gosling, who was some distance away. Gosling meanwhile, waited with a wide grin that left all of his teeth on display. After a short time spent in contemplation, Flurry returned her gaze to her mother.
“Dapple?”
“Rhymes with apple.” Cadance ceased being a princess at this moment and was nothing more than a proud mother. “Flurry, we must never, ever tease a pony that looks different than we do. It doesn’t matter if they are spotted, or a strange colour, dappled… or if they have stripes. A pony is a pony is a pony.”
“Dappling is caused by a mutation that manifests during embryonic development and affects a cell’s melanosome, which in turn affects the production of the black pigment eumelanin.” Twilight looked like an excited foal while she recited these facts, and her eyes kept darting over to look at Celestia. “Gosling has the silver dapple gene, which causes dilution, or hypopigmentation, of his eumelanin. Gosling should be pitch black all over, but this dilution causes the black to fade into other colours, such as platinum and silver, along with glossy and matte greys, leaving him looking quite distinguished.”
Flurry’s eyes glazed over, and she stared at her aunt with a blank expression.
Shining Armor leaned close to his daughter and there was something about his face, something about his expression. There was something that was almost… sneaky. Never taking his eyes off of his sister, he asked his daughter, “Flurry, tell Daddy what you see when you look at Auntie Twily.”
Flurry let out a burbling giggle and replied, “Egghead!”
Once more the table succumbed to laughter, except for Twilight, who fumed while giving her brother a death-glare. Flurry was banging her front hooves together, clippity-clopping one against the other, pleased that she had made everypony laugh. Nopony laughed harder than Shining Armor though, who fell back into his chair and clutched his sides.
Twilight was about to retort when the doors were flung open and supper was served.
Something was up and Gosling could feel the tension in the air. A single long cart had been wheeled in by an oily looking unicorn wearing a lopsided chef’s toque. It wasn’t every day that one saw a serving cart that had to be eight feet long. It looked like a section of a portable, rolling buffet. A cloud of steam made the cart look like a small locomotive.
Right away, the room was filled with the mouth-watering scent of garlic.
The covered serving tray was ridiculously long and Gosling knew that the tray and the lid had to have been stretched out and reshaped with magic. The pegasus felt a little bad at the moment, because every eye in the room was on the magnificent silver tray and not on him. He supposed it couldn’t be helped, and could do nothing but bear this painful moment.
“Graisseux!” Celestia’s eyes narrowed in a most dangerous manner. “We meet again.”
The oily looking unicorn was fearless and he marched over to where Celestia was sitting, the corner of his eye twitching, and his chef’s toque bounced around with each stomp of his hooves. “Princess Celestia!” The unicorn halted and drew himself up to his full height, which wasn’t much. “You have ransacked my kitchens! You have scattered my employees like frightened chickens! I now have scared, whimpering little sous-chefs who hide in the cupboards and the pantries and refuse to come out for fear of your return!”
Celestia’s perfect smile melted away like candlewax and was replaced with a scowl.
“This cannot stand!” Graisseux began an excitable shuffle and various ponies around the table gasped at his active hostility against the princess. “Your appetite cannot be contained, it seems, so I have made it my equinal mission to destroy it! We had a truce, Your Majesty, and it was most thoroughly violated!”
“So it was.” Celestia’s lips smacked together and there was nothing playful about her expression. “I dispatched many messages to the kitchens requesting more food, larger portions, and those were ignored. You left me with no other options. My hunger overcame me.”
“You went out to dinner!”
“Yes, because I could not get full at home!”
Fear drove Gosling to begin gnawing on his own lip, and he was not alone.
Lifting one regal golden-shod hoof, Celestia gestured at the cart of absurd length. “Is this to be the means of my destruction? Is this how you hope to do me in? It is only one cart, Monsieur Graisseux. Is this your declaration of war? Your déclaration de guerre? I am not impressed.”
Twilight sucked in a deep breath, and choked.
“Do you seek to do me in with some enormous canapés or crêpes?” Celestia rose from her seat and her jaw clenched with determination. She towered over the little pony below her, and looked down at him with gleaming eyes that were as pink as the dawn. “I will not be dissuaded by mere, base pastry.”
Now, the oily little unicorn smiled, and it was a horrible smile. “No, not pastry, your imminent destruction has arrived in the form of the Breadnaught! The sandwich to end all sandwiches! Never again will you sack my kitchens once you collapse in defeat!”
Pushing the little pony aside, the alabaster behemoth strode over to the cart, her hooves clicking against the floor, every eye at the table followed her, waiting, and even little Flurry seemed to understand that something big was about to go down. Celestia paused at the cart, and not waiting for Graisseux to make his presentation, she lifted the massive lid to see what lay beneath.
Gosling ceased to draw breath.
“Sacrébleu!” Luna gasped.
It was indeed, the sandwich to end all sandwiches. A baguette torpedo loaded down with hunger destroying materiel. Thin-sliced eggplant cutlets covered in breadcrumbs could be seen, forming the ‘meat’ of the sandwich. These were buried under a rich looking tomato sauce that glistened in the bright overhead lights. White cheese oozed and dribbled out the sides. The bread had been slathered in butter and dusted with savoury herbs.
“Look at it! It is magnifique! Thirty six pounds of utter magnificence! Give up now, my worthy foe!” Graisseux hurried over to Celestia’s side, moving as fast as his short legs would allow without breaking decorum. There was a manic gleam in his eyes, and his thin mustache quivered as he began to chuckle.
Gosling remembered to breathe, and he did so, gasping, almost panting.
“I am Sol Invictus!” Celestia’s voice was like thunder and she provided fabulous oration for those around the table, watching as the drama unfolded. “I am the Unconquerable Sun. No weapon formed against me has ever prospered, or known success. I am the ruination of dark kings and evil queens. Your Breadnaught does not impress me.”
Horn glowing, Celestia cast a spell, and the mighty, massive sandwich shrank down, becoming little more than a scant inch or two. What remained was lifted, held aloft, and then, without further ado or drama, The Princess of the Sun consumed the Breadnaught in one bite. She gave it a thoughtful, polite chew, and when she swallowed, Graisseux collapsed at her hooves.
The stallion began to weep.
It was then that Celestia did something strange. She sat down and wrapped her wing around the little unicorn, who sniffled and leaned up against her. She patted him, hugged him, and gave him a soft squeeze with her wing. Eyes closed, Graisseux continued to cry in defeat and Celestia clucked her tongue.
“There there,” Celestia said in a soft voice. “Oh, come now, we had fun, Graisseux. If there is anything I like more than dinner it is a good show, and in that aspect, you did a spectacular job. I enjoyed myself—”
“You did?” Graisseux lifted his head, still sniffling, and looked up at Celestia. “I did not fail?”
“Well, you failed to take into account that matter is just mostly empty space, and can be compressed.” Celestia laughed, a soft sound, and she gave the little unicorn in her embrace another squeeze. “Graisseux, you have never failed to amuse me and your food has never disappointed me. The Breadnaught was delicious. You were very, very brave to engage me, and I appreciate your effort to keep my life exciting.”
“You do?” Now, the little unicorn looked hopeful.
“Yes, I do,” she replied. “Now, Graisseux… there is the matter of a room full of ponies who are hungry and have not eaten. Do you think you can remedy this?”
“Oui, Most Majestic One!”
After one final squeeze, Celestia released her little pony. For one brief moment, distress showed on her face, but it was unseen by all but her sister, Luna. The big mare squirmed a bit, rose to her hooves, and pulled Graisseux up with her. Towering over him, she smiled down, beaming at him while he looked up at her with unabashed adoration.
“Now go, back to the kitchen with you!”