Day 21
The sun came up like any other day. But today was not going to end the same.
I came to the waking world with Ditzy’s mane splayed haphazardly over my muzzle. I inhaled her scent with each breath, stray hairs of her mane swaying to and from me in sync. For my part, I wasn’t on the loveseat anymore, having rolled off onto the floor sometime in the deeper part of the night. Ditzy was sprawled on the edge, a foreleg, wing, and lock of hair hanging over.
I smiled and playfully batted her mane out of my face. Her eyelids fluttered open, blinking once or twice before she mentally oriented herself. Catching sight of me below her, she smiled and deserted the loveseat entirely, landing on top of me.
“Good morning, my little stallion.”
“Good morning, Ditzy.”
After a moment of resting her head on my chest, she said, “I suppose we should get up.”
“You’re on top; I guess that’s up to you.”
“Mmm... ‘k, getting up now...” However, she made no move in that direction, instead wrapping her forelegs around me.
“Mhm...”
“Yeah.” With the help of a few flaps, she finally extracted herself off of me. I also got to my hooves, peeking out between the blinds. Celestia’s sun had detached itself from the horizon, ponies beginning to stir, and some of the more avid party goers already scurrying towards the center of town.
“Now what?” she asked, hopeful. It was the complete opposite of last night’s phrase, despite having the same grammatical makeup.
“Well, I’m not making you breakfast,” I chuckled, getting to my hooves. “What kind of thanks would that be? I did bring some, though.”
She followed me into the kitchen, where I retrieved the sack from yesterday and emptied it of its contents.
“Muffins!”
“Only the best.”
“Aww, thanks.” She hugged me again, before we sat down to eat. Our solitude didn’t last long, though. The door burst open, a bouncy unicorn filly rocketing in.
“Good morning, Mom! Hi Whooves! We were sleeping over at Carrot Top’s, and now today there’s this huge party!”
Sparkler leaned against the doorframe, smiling at her half-sister. “Come on, Dinky. You hardly slept at all last night, you were so excited.”
“I’m not tired!” protested Dinky. “Let’s go!”
Her mother and sister convinced her she needed to eat breakfast first. Caving, she scarfed down a muffin and continued to bounce, determined not to be quelled. Eventually, we headed out, joining the majority of the ponies as they migrated towards town hall. I stopped a few meters out the door, the other three mares passing me.
“You coming, Whooves?” Sparkler asked when she noticed I wasn’t following.
“Go ahead, I’ll catch up.”
“Sure?”
“Yeah.”
She shrugged and rejoined the group. I turned, trotting back past the house to the one next door. Passing a white picket fence, I moved by a garden with a notably high carrot concentration. My hoof banged on the door. It swung inward, revealing Carrot Top’s stoic face on the other side.
“Whooves.”
“Carrot Top.”
She blinked. “Did you...?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“I’m sorry about what happened to your brother.”
“It was a long time ago...” She twisted a hoof into the carpet. “And I’m sorry I treated you like a bloated parasprite. You didn’t know.”
I extended a hoof. “Friends?”
“Dang, kid, that ain’t how we do it down here in Ponyville.” She pulled me into a quite unexpected hug, before releasing me suddenly and shoving me out the door. “Now go along and get her, punk.”
I complied, trying to figure out the other possible connotations of ‘punk’ outside the ones it came with in Canterlot (they weren’t positive) as I walked. I found my way with my ears; there was some vaguely peppy music playing, perhaps ragtime, that served as a guide better than any map.
Good grief. It’s the middle of the morning and they’re already dancing. Yes, that’s right. It wasn’t one I recognized though... looked like perhaps a variety of a swing or a mild west dance. Working my way through the chaotic twirling couples, I saw the musicians plucking away on the stage, behind which the DJ was setting up her equipment, mane complementing the curly pink one bobbing beside it.
I looked around, but didn’t have a chance of spotting my group in the frenzied mass of ponies. Shrugging, I walked over to Pinkie to see if she had any plans for the day, or if it was off the wall. The latter was my guess.
“Pinkie,” I announced, dipping my head. “Ms. Scratch.”
The mare stopped what she was doing to look over her glasses at me. “Dude, that’s like... ancient.”
“Huh? What did I say?”
Vinyl shook her head, laughing it off and putting her head back down under the equipment she was working on.
Pinkie nudged me. “Don’t mind her. She’s always nervous before a show.”
There was a very painful-sounding thud as Vinyl tried to sit up. “That’s not–ow, my horn–not true!”
She stood and, with a large speaker in magical tow, drug it to its position on the stage, to the slight annoyance of the currently playing musicians.
“Is there any kind of plan in all this?” I asked, gesturing to the crowd and stage in general, where Vinyl was now pushing a subwoofer that emitted a high-pitched scraping sound every time she shoved it.
“Yep!”
“Oh really.”
“Uh huh. Games, dancing, cupcakes, and most importantly, fun!”
“I’d love to see Twilight’s version.”
She laughed. “You’d drown in ink and parchment! Anyway, you get along and have fun. And don’t forget!”
Forget what? “Wha-” Suddenly I remembered the little condition Pinkie had attached to the party yesterday. I hoped I wasn’t blushing. “Oh, that.”
Pinkie hopped away, her singing lost in the ongoings around us. “Whooves and Ditzy, sitting in a tree. B-U-C-”
“Curse your big mouth, Pinkie.”
Vinyl stepped over beside me, levitating a dozen record cases. “Now you know how I feel.”
I grunted and left the DJ to her work. The band had switched to a slower song, alternating between slow and fast tracks to let the dancers keep up with the pace. I spotted two familiar faces at one of the picnic tables that had been brought out for the occasion, and trotted towards them.
“Well hello, Whooves,” said Lyra, taking a draught from her smoothie.
Bonbon adopted a tone of a pony that has secrets to tell. “And how did it go last night?”
“Pretty well, all things considered. I think I lost her though.” I looked around in the crowd.
Bonbon gasped. “Oh no... and you consider that going well?”
“Wha...? No, not like that. I just can’t find her here.”
“Oh.” The earth pony seemed relieved, even if deprived of her drama.
A new song started, this one with a sections of horns that seemed to imply a lot of twirling. Bonbon thumped her hoof down on the table, much to the annoyance of Lyra who extracted her straw from the back of her throat.
“Hey, let’s dance hon.”
Lyra exaggeratedly looked around. “Where did that come from?”
“Oh come on, I know you know this one! I’ve heard you play it on your lyre.”
“Well, sure, but that doesn’t mean I can dance.”
“Really, it’s not that hard. In fact, it’s a bit like... well, you know... in that you just need to get a good rhythm going... except maybe I should lead.”
“You two have fun. I’m going to go stick my head in a bucket of ice,” I commented as I stood and left.
I tip-hooved between twirling couples, agility tested as I dodged side to side. It was really quite colorful... but reminded me somewhat of a mechanical potato masher. I had just finished picking my way between the last of them to come out on the other side, face to face with Sparkler’s amethyst eyes.
“Probably would have gone with hide, rather than run if I were you.”
“What?”
“But it’s good you didn’t. Now go have fun!” With that, she shoved me back into the murderous mob, where I gracelessly smacked into Ditzy face-first.
“There you are! I was wondering where you had gone off to.”
I grabbed her shoulders and pulled her out of the way, side-stepping an incoming couple.
“Okay, so you lead then? I don’t know anything about dancing.”
“Oh, bloody good,” I muttered. “Me neither.” Most of my knowledge was theoretical, leastways.
“Just let the music move you!” coached Sparkler from the sidelines.
“Oh it moves me, but it moves me ugly!” I returned, hurrying my marefriend along with the flow to avoid any collisions. It wasn’t exactly the way you were supposed to do it, but it was preventing disasters. Finally making it to the edge of the pack, Ditzy and I fell out of it, landing in a heap near the pink unicorn.
She tut-tutted. “I thought you’d know more of that, coming from Canterlot.”
“The reason they tend to avoid dancing at their parties is because they might break into a sweat,” I grunted, standing. “Besides, you’ve been there. Why don’t you show us how it’s done?”
“Okay, maybe I will.” She scanned the sidelines. “Hold on.”
Sparkler trotted over to a very bored young stallion, who was watching the ongoings with his head in his hooves. His blue eyes shot up when Sparkler approached, and though Ditzy and I were too far away to hear what was being said, his reaction was enough. He sat up, back arched, ears twitching alertly in a newfound subject of interest. A few lines were traded, before the mare nearly hauled him out of his chair and drug him out onto the designated dance floor.
I would have made a bet with anybody willing, but Ditzy was the only one close, and that wasn’t really her thing.
A few more words were exchanged, before Sparkler rolled her eyes and placed his foreleg on her hip.
Ditzy laughed quietly. “Isn’t that just like Caramel...”
I don’t know this Caramel, but I suppose he doesn’t seem like the socially outgoing type, considering he wasn’t already out there dancing. Sparkler started in on the beat, taking long and pointed strides, managing to do rotation in addition to the basic steps. The poor colt had little choice and wound up following more than leading.
The song began approaching its apex, tempo of the piece picking up. Beside me, Ditzy was stomping her hooves.
Her pounding hooves, the deep twang of the bass, the unified movement of the crowd, all in sync with the ever increasing rate of the song. Faster and faster it wound, like the suspense scene in a movie.
A giant shadow fell over the square.
The more attentive ponies slowly left off dancing, one by one pausing and looking up. The band continued to play, the fiddle having gained the primary spot by then, just seconds away from the end, and sawing away nonstop.
The silhouette of the larger-than-life pony sank to the earth gracefully, its wide wingspan keeping it from so much as having to pump once. With a delicate note, the shod hooves touched the surface of a picnic table. The song ended with a ba-dum tshhh, replaced with nothing but silence as the new arrival commanded complete attention. The sun no longer directly behind it, the figure became clear.
“Princess Celestia!” Even as the purple Bearer of Magic said it, hopping up to meet her mentor, other ponies sank in a bow. I also did so, trying to make myself less noticeable behind my marefriend.
“Please, me little ponies, do not let me interrupt the festivities! In fact, my sister and I may just join you.”
With the oddest appearance, lightning struck from clear sky, leaving an afterimage on my retina and an additional alicorn, this one dark, standing in our midst.
“...providing we are not intruding, of course,” added Luna.
Pinkie bounced above the heads of the other equines around her. “Don’t be silly! Come on, let’s have some more fun, princesses! Hey, why did the music stop?”
Vinyl glanced at the musicians on stage, who hadn’t seemed to come out of the shock of the sudden appearance of the princesses. Grinning, the unicorn lifted two records onto the turntable, flipped a few switches, and started working her magic. It didn’t even half-way resemble the previous tunes, but apparently there was a dance for it too.
My eyes shot back to Celestia, who conversed quickly and politely with Twilight Sparkle and a few of her nearby friends. Luna had taken to standing directly in front of a subwoofer, grinning whenever a new vibration set her shaking. Her sister had disentangled herself from her pupil for the moment, and was headed my way. My cover, Ditzy, moved to the side of me, assuming (not unreasonably) that she would have business to conduct with me, rather than her. My ears dropped flat as her Highness stepped directly in front of me.
“Whooves.”
This is it. “I know. I failed to send reports.” I’d been so wrapped up in my own dramas the last few days that it had completely slipped my mind. Let’s just say I would have prefered a card in the mail for a reminder. I didn’t even try to look anypony in the eyes.
“Yes, I noticed.”
There was a second of important, yet silent time.
“My job is done here, then, isn’t it?”
Celestia nodded.
“...not to interrupt,” interrupted Twilight, who seemed to have followed the alicorn, “but what mission would that be?”
Celestia’s and my eyes went wide, looking at each other, at Twilight, and back again.
The princess sighed. “Whooves was sent here as a precaution; he was to check up on your mental health.
“But I stopped sending them. I’m so-” I paused, struck in that moment with a rare instance in which realization and bravado occur simultaneously and give birth to verbal execution of the truth in our hearts and minds. Basically, another way to say I forgot who I was talking to for a second. “Y’know what? I’m not sorry. Everypony has their right to privacy, and just because the spotlight was turned on them for their virtues–virtues, mind you–doesn’t make them subject to popular opinion and criticism. They’re–or, you are,” I corrected, seeing Twilight and her friends gathered around and listening. “You are the Elements of Harmony, for Luna’s sake. They, of all ponies, would be the least likely to need help.”
Her name was oddly applicable in this context. “What did you think, that they would abuse that power? Suffer from the pressure?”
I shook my head, talking again more towards the Bearers. “You symbolize what we strive for, yet are imperfect and flawed like everypony else. Everypony.”
My breath was spent, and suddenly I realized what I’d been saying and whom I’d been saying it to. Everypony within sight stood stock still, eyes on me and the goddess of the sun. I noticed beads of sweat on my brow, partially from my rant, and partially in fear.
“A most interesting theory, Doctor. Still, it is unfortunate that you didn’t learn anything at all here. I suppose that means your place is back in Canterlot.”
“Um, actually,” I said, with a much more compliant tone, “that’s not quite true either.”
Celestia paused, hoof lifted, but waited for me to go on.
“I know I’ve only been here for three weeks, as of today. Maybe I don’t have an accurate account of my surroundings yet, but even so... I think I’ve learned more about ponies in these three weeks than I ever learned, or could learn, at the university. The thing they never teach you there, is that they’re not only logical, but also individual. Hay, we can’t even figure out anypony; how in Equestia are we going to figure everypony? If anything, that is crazy.”
The stern edge of Princess Celestia’s eyes and voice had lifted slightly. “And?”
No words came. My eyes darted to the crowd, picking out ponies I knew. Friends I know, I thought, catching sight of Lucky and Colgate, a hoof from each wrapped around the other’s as they watched the ongoings, wide-eyed. Lovers... Lyra and Bonbon, out on the stilled dance floor, Bonbon gawking after the nearby Princess Luna, her marefriend reaching over and shutting her mouth for her.
A breath of wind caught my mane, the movement in my shadow grabbing my notice.
And then there’s me. I looked down at my hoof. My boring brown hoof. Not colorful. Not cheery. Not willingly lending itself to any altruistic cause. I don’t belong here. Everypony else is a square, or a triangle, or an octagon; I’m the circle.
“...and... I’ll go pack my things.”
I could feel the eyes of the many ponies there on the back of my head as I walked away.
“Please Whooves... don’t go. You’re a good pony.”
“Oh, Pinkie,” I started, turning around momentarily. Unlike the rest of the Bearers, who wore looks more of confusion than of anything else, she looked a bit crestfallen and desaturated. “Good character and right actions are not the same. Even if you were right, everything I do makes things worse here.”
She blinked a few times, uncomprehending. I looked to other eyes, each sending a different message; Lucky, a grim but silent defiance; Colgate, nearing a desperate panic; Lyra, regrettably resolved; and Bonbon... well, she was still looking at Princess Luna.
And then there were those.
Amber, crossed, and wide enough to fill her face like a filly’s.
Utter, complete, disbelief. Shock. Even scared, they were.
I forced myself to turn away and keep walking. It wouldn’t do to hurt her more with drawn-out goodbyes and farewells. It was better if it was quick, clean, and fast, like an amputation.
Still, after all we’ve done together, trusted each other with...
Ah, well. You can’t just go tell a princess to screw themselves.
Can you?
A face-first meeting with my front door forcibly terminated any further thought on that rail. Rubbing my muzzle, I entered, looking about for the necessities. Take only what you need. I could catch the next train to Canterlot, get a hotel whilst I made arrangements to have my stuff moved and my old apartment vacated, and be back to my old life in a week’s time.
The suitcase had already acquired a choice tie, some edibles for the trip, and my hourglass when the door suffered a wood-splintering buck. The cracked wooden door was completely knocked off its lower hinge, swinging at an odd angle once or twice on the upper one before falling completely off, landing flat on the ground.
“What the hay...” I coughed, clearing the dust by waving my hoof.
“Are you a completely heartless? Or just plain dumb?”
“C-carrot Top?” I stuttered.
“Put that down,” she snapped, smacking the suitcase out of my hooves. “You ain’t going nowhere.”
I decided to refrain from pointing out the double negative.
“You’re going back there and holding your mare, and you’re never going to leave her side. Ever.” Her voice had morphed into a growling threat.
I sighed. “Believe me, there’s nothing I’d like better, but I can’t just walk in there and spit in the face of the Princess.”
Carrot Top began a nearly predator-like approach, driving me back against the wall. “I don’t care if she throws you in chains for the rest of your life. I don’t care if she feeds you to the timberwolves. Heck, I don’t care if she banishes you to the sun so you can burn for a century. I understand you want to be loyal, maybe. But your loyalty to Ditzy comes first.” She stomped her hoof. “In other words, get your flank out there or I will kick it!”
After a moment, I slowly put a hoof on her chest and pushed her away.
“Remind me to thank you one day... after you fix my door.”
She rolled her eyes, but followed me out through the empty frame.
“What, don’t trust me?” I inquired as she continued to follow me back towards the square.
“Oh I trust your intentions... let’s just say I don’t trust nothing to happen to you between here and there, even if it be nothing more than an errant thread of thought.”
“Fair enough.” I do have a tendency to overthink things.
We were nearly halfway back when I paused to listen, fancying I heard something.
“Move it, prisoner!” I glared at her. “Uh, I mean, ‘don’t you think we should keep moving?’”
“Ssh. Listen.”
It came again... the repeated tap of hooves on cobblestones. With everypony at the party, the streets were otherwise quiet.
“...Whooves?”
Carrot and I spun to see Ditzy picking up the pace towards us, lifting off at the last moment for a prolonged bound headed straight for me. “Whooves!”
My breath was forced out of my lungs as she collided with me in a head-on glomp. We slid to a tangled halt a few feet away. She was hyperventilating, making what she tried to say come in short spurts. “Why did you... what did I... I’ll come with, to Canterlot too...”
I lightly put a hoof on her lips, silencing her. Though her eyes remained wide, her breath began to stabilize.
“There’s no need for that. I’m not going anywhere.”
Another hoofstep sounded next to us. This one was very different. The kind that has a golden covering over it. “Oh, really?”
I stood, albeit on slightly shaking legs. Princess Celestia towered over me, eyebrow raised as she waited on my explanation. Shutting your eyes won’t help, I knew, but did anyway.
“I’m sorry, Your Highness, but I’m afraid my mission here isn’t complete yet... it’s just not the one I was thinking of. I’m staying.” I peaked open my eyes, dreading the look I knew I’d find on Celestia’s face.
But contrary to my expectations, she was merely smiling, benevolent as always. “Very well then. Let the party continue!”
The crowd that had followed the figurehead cheered, turning and migrating back to the square. Ditzy stood up next to me, both of us somewhat stunned at what had just transpired. Carrot Top shoved me in the shoulder. “Nice going, wise guy. Let’s get you two back to the party.”
“Uh, yeah. Just a minute.” I trotted ahead, trying to catch up with Celestia’s long strides. “Princess?”
She turned her head, noticing me. “Yes?”
“This might sound a little weird, but... why are you okay with this? It sounded before like you wanted me to go back to Canterlot.”
“If you hadn’t learned anything about friendship by now, then yes, I would have. There was only one way that would show whether or not it was empty words or a real relationship, unfortunately. That’s why I stuck with it.”
I looked down. “I... I would have tried to go, if not for Carrot Top... and Ditzy.”
“Exactly. That makes them pretty good friends, does it not?”
“Yeah, yeah it does. Still, why does that have anything to do with my failure?”
“Come again?”
“No matter which way you cut it, I did fail to send those mental reports. Doesn’t that matter?”
For the first time, I witnessed a princess stammering for an answer. Celestia’s awkward silence was alleviated soon enough, from a thunderous voice behind me that startled me into jumping a few inches.
“Thou had this planned all along, no?” Luna’s language was even more dominating in person than it was on paper. She stepped out of the shadows, meeting her sister’s eyes. “It never was about those reports.”
Celestia laughed. Actually laughed. I didn’t know such a thing could happen.
“Ah, sister, you see through me so clearly. She’s right, Whooves. That was just an excuse to get you here.”
“Then... why was I sent here?”
“The hope was that you’d pick up the lessons of friendship through the trials that the fake mission would give you.”
“...and with what better peers than the Elements of Harmony themselves?” concluded Luna as her mind actively put the puzzle pieces together.
“That’s... oddly clever.”
“Yes, she likes to think so,” commented Luna. “Come, sister, shall we try and fail to fulfill your insatiable sweet tooth?”
“Pinkie!” proclaimed Celestia.
“Yep?”
“Bring out the cupcakes!”
This was instantly followed by a massive applause from the audience of ponies attending.
“Okie dokie lokie!”
Much to my surprise, my role as a bystander quickly changed as Pinkie grabbed me by the hoof and drug me behind the musicians stage. The only light came through the cloth constructions of the platform.
“What are you doing? Why am I coming along?” I asked, without really resisting.
“Look!”
I did, and found Pinkie’s infamous (at least, in Canterlot it is) party cannon, pointing straight up and apparently loaded. Pinkie casually took a seat on top of it while she showed me how to set it off. I had a little trouble paying attention, what with wondering just exactly what made her want to sit on top.
“...so then you hit it exactly seventeen seconds after I leave! It’s always more exciting when the streamers go up while everybody’s already here!”
“...yeah. Sure.”
“Wait!”
I froze. “What? What is it?”
“Twitch-a-twitch-twitch...”
We both looked up. Odd, nothing happened. I looked at Pinkie. “Are you s-”
“Wait for it...”
Since I couldn’t see anything, I listened. A second passed, then another. “I don’t think-”
My sceptical comment was cut off as the deafening boom of Scratch’s speakers suddenly shook the air and ground. Regaining my balance, I flicked the tip of my ear in hopes that it still worked.
“Oh, silly me. It was just Vinyl!”
“What? I don’t follow.”
“She dropped the bass, of course!”
Pinkie left, prompting me to begin my mental countdown. As I hit fifteen, I realized there was no obvious button on the surface to set it off. Well, she did say to hit it...
It roared, firing a speeding rocket of a plastic bottle into the air, spewing bubbles and bubble bath the whole time. Finally, spent of its momentum and contents, the empty container fell back to earth a few feet away. I could have sworn she said something about streamers. I picked up the bottle. It was familiar. How did this get here from under Ditzy’s sink?
A stifled giggle from behind a bush caught my attention, before a little unicorn filly hopped away back to the party’s mass. I couldn’t help but smile to myself. Not a big problem. More of a Dinky problem.
I leaned against the side of a cloth-wrapped arch, watching the ponies crowd around Pinkie’s stand. Strings of lights kicked on, alerting me to the dimming sky. It’d been a longer day than it felt.
Something wet landed itself on my nose, causing me to pull my head back and try to look at it.
Bubbles. Bubbles were floating down now, numerous as snowflakes on a Hearth’s Warming snowfall. Catching the rays from the party lights, they shown their prismatic hues to the fullest. Ponies that felt them, like me, stopped to look up.
“It’s beautiful.” Ditzy had found my place, and planted herself at my side.
“Yeah...” I reached a hoof out, catching a group of six or seven large bubbles, having attached themselves to each other via surface tension. With a little boost, I sent them floating back off above the crowd. We continued to watch them drift down for minutes on end, sky darkening and joyous sounds of mirth and laughter finding their way over from the party. Vinyl Scratch had retired her heavier beats, playing slower and almost jazz-like records instead.
“...suppose we should go try Pinkie’s cupcakes?” she asked, without much conviction.
“Naw, she’s okay without us. I’m really more of a muffin pony at heart anyway, like you.”
“I’ve already got my muffin right here.”
“Ditzy... I’m probably about to say the stupidest thing I’m ever going to say...”
She looked at me, earnestly.
“And that’s a lot, coming from me. But I want you to know beforehoof, that the only reason it’s stupid is because it’s so glaringly obvious...”
The current instrumental track faded out, another sliding onto the tables.
“I love you.”
Without hesitation, we kissed, leaning passionately into each other. I could feel the heat radiated off her cheeks, her lips curving into a smile as tears of sheer happiness escaped the corners of her eyes.
And then...
♫ Love is in bloom...