//------------------------------//
// Hosting Acquaintances of a Greater Social Standing at a Musical Event 
// Story: Vacation to a Pleasant Country Retreat 
// by Sixes_And_Sevens 
//------------------------------//

There was a moment of absolute silence. Then the hammering started on the door at the bottom of the stairs. “Okay,” Romana said, not quite disguising the quake in her voice. “I give it about… half an hour before they break that door down, and I’m not quite sure about the herd outside. Ideas, anypony?”
Ditzy closed her eyes tight. “Missing something…” she muttered. “Something, something…”
Scootaloo, hiding wide-eyed in the bushes from beings that heard her from several meters away.
Dash, faltering in the sky when Rarity screamed.
Romana, discovering the unusually small audio receptors.
Ditzy’s eyes went wide. “Noise! They’re sensitive to noise! That’s why the robots have smaller audio receptors, so they can minimize the input, but they can’t do that with pony bodies!”
Ruby looked up at the mare, impressed. “Are you sure?”
The pegasus nodded vigorously. Romana glanced at the door. “Only one way to find out.” She reached into her mane. “Sonic pick!” she said, triumphantly pulling out… nothing. She stared at her hoof. “Oh.”
Up in the rather wrecked apartment upstairs, a shiny silver stick lay atop the kitchen table beside part of a mechanical dog.
Romana rubbed at her mane awkwardly. “Um… plan B. Anypony, plan B?”
Nopony said anything. The blue unicorn sat down heavily. “Well. I’ll be honest, I never thought it would end this way. Dying in the Time War was pretty likely, or getting killed by Faction Paradox. A Dalek raid, conceivably. I’d even accept dying in the Tharil Rebellion. But robot crabs in a small village? Really?”
“Aw, come on,” Dash said. “We can’t just give up, there has to be some way to make enough noise… Pinkie? You got an airhorn?”
The party pony shook her head sadly.
Hyacinth looked around, her mouth a thin line. “Come on,” she said with false heartiness. “Brave heart. There’ll always be a Princess…”
“Hyacinth, not now,” Rose groaned, but the others had all turned to stare.
“Do you… always sing like that?” Scootaloo asked carefully.
The earth mare preened. “Naturally, dear.”
Slowly, Romana began to grin. “Tell me, my good mare, do you happen to know… opera?”




“Where should we set down, Commander?” The lead pegasus pulling the cart had to nearly shout to make herself heard over the roar of the wind.
Fleur scanned the ground. “I see nothing in particular,” she admitted.
“Oh no?” Fancy asked, pointing in the opposite direction. “And what do you call that?”
Fleur and the Doctor turned. An enormous crowd of ponies and little silver things were gathered around a building. None of them seemed to be moving. Fleur gestured to the soldiers indicating that they should land in the vicinity of the herd. As they drew closer, however, they started to hear something. Fleur frowned. “What is zat noise? It sounds very familiar…”
The Doctor furrowed his brow. “Like somepony… singing?”
Fancy Pants went even paler than usual. “Oh, no. Not her. Not the Bucket Mare!”
Fleur winced. “It is Bouquet, I believe.”
“...Sirs? Ma’am? You might want to take another look at that crowd…”
Fancy saw it first. “Good grief! I see they aren’t enjoying that music any more than we are.”
Indeed, all of the assembled ponies had their hooves to their ears, and the little crabs were jumping around like fleas. Fleur gnawed slightly at her lower lip. “Zey may still be dangerous. Land on top of ze roof,” she ordered, pointing at the building.
“Ma’am, yes, ma’am.”
The crowd did not react noticeably when the chariot settled down on the roof. The inhabitants of the structure, however, did. “What was that?” one cried.
“A higher insurance premium,” another grumbled.
“Hello?” the Doctor called. “Are you alright in there?”
“Doctor?”
“Ditzy! Are you okay?”
“I think so. I guess you found out about the infestation, huh?”
“There was an isolated case in Canterlot. At least, I hope it was isolated. GUIDE is looking for any other affected areas. Look, can we come in?”
“The window’s open.”
“...Right.” The Doctor looked at the pegasus soldiers. “Could you…”
They glanced at each other, and then at Fleur. She nodded once, sharply. The duo dove forward, grabbing the Doctor and Fancy. The mustachioed stallion let out a displeased shriek as they all flew through the air. An instant later, he found himself flat on his face on the floor. “Ouch,” Fancy Pants grumbled, straightening up. “Cheeky…”
Hyacinth broke off in her singing for a moment, beaming at the unicorn. “Why, Sir Fancy Pants, how delightful to see you again—”
“Hyacinth, the music,” Daisy warned.
“Oh! Of ~coooourse…” Hyacinth warbled into a shiny piece of equipment that the Doctor recognized.
“A sonic? Romana, did you give this mare a sonic?”
“Only as a loaner,” the blue unicorn protested. “Here, Ditzy, you explain, I’ll take control of the modulator…”
The grey pegasus rushed forward to wrap her wings around the Doctor. “I’m so glad you’re back,” she sighed. “We were doing our best, but…”
The Doctor chuckled. “Looks like you had the situation pretty well in hoof, actually. Why don’t you tell me what all this does?”
“Well, we worked out that the crabs had little tiny audio receptors, right? And when they’re in pony bodies, they can hear really well, better than ordinary ponies can. So that means that their brains must be uniquely designed to pick up sound around them, or vibrations or something. So, well, we decided to give them more vibrations than they could handle, and… tah-dah!” She giggled weakly. “So now, we have to go and find all the townsponies and get them back in their proper bodies. And then figure out what to do with the crabs. Um, Romana already tried negotiating with them, and they kind of… refused.”
“H’m. What are they called, do you know? Might’ve met them before…”
“They’re called the… break ya tours?”
“Brachyura?”
“Yeah, that. Do you know who they are?”
The Doctor frowned. “Yes, I’m afraid I do. Nasty bunch of seafood. They enslaved their planet’s populace and set up as the standard evil upper class. I overthrew them, of course.”
“Of course,” Ditzy said with mock seriousness. “So, what should we do with them?”
“Not sure. We’ll figure it out as we go,” the Doctor replied breezily. “Anyway, you’re okay, and that’s the— where’s Dinky?”
Ditzy’s lips tightened into a hard white line. “I don’t know,” she said quietly. “But I am going to find out, and if those crabs have hurt her…”
The Doctor nodded grimly. “Right. Well, we’d best get looking, then. An opera can only go on for so long with one soloist, and we’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”
“Oh, have we?” Romana asked smoothly, pulling out a cobbled-together device. “Daisy, take over for me on the frequency modulator. Here, Doctor, take a look at this.”
The tan stallion squinted at the boxy object. “Brainwave detector? Picks up on thought patterns? Based on standard brain scan technology. Oh, good job, Romana!”
“We helped!” Scootaloo said, nudging Ruby Pinch in the side. The pink unicorn blushed and grinned broadly.
“Well, well done all of you. Now, we just have to get over the crowd and follow the signal… Hold on, is that the train station?”
“Looks like it,” Fancy Pants agreed, leaning over.
“Hurry, whatever it is you’re going to do,” Dash said, sitting up painfully. “I dunno how much longer Hyacinth is gonna hold out.”
“Right.” The Doctor stuck his head out of the window. “Get us to the train station! Hurry!” He clung tightly to the windowsill as Ditzy swooshed by him, winging rapidly toward the tracks.
“Really hurry!” the Doctor shouted.
Ditzy beat her wings fiercely against the wind, pressing forth toward the train station. She heard other wings flapping frantically behind her. She grinned. Really, the Doctor was almost too predictable. “Ditzy… wait! Watch out!” she heard a voice call from a distance.
The grey pegasus’s mane furrowed and she glanced back. It wasn’t the Doctor that was flying behind her. It was easily half the weather patrol, their forehooves clapped over their ears, but their wings completely free. Ditzy’s eyes went wide. “Uh-oh.”
Quickly, she dove toward the ground, then sprung back up at the last possible second. The other pegasi followed, and while a few crashed into the ground, the rest mimicked Ditzy’s motions.
Ditzy frowned. “Alright. We’ll do this the hard way.” She spun in the air, diving down and around obstacles which collapsed behind (and occasionally on top of) her. Blossomforth found herself stuck in a fruit stand, Cloudkicker struggled to free herself from a bicycle rack. At there were still three ponies after her. Ditzy scrunched up her nose. “Hmph.” The pair of pegasi guards drew up next to her.
The Doctor waved her in frantically. “Let’s go, come on…”
Ditzy shook her head. “You go ahead. I’ll keep them off your tail.”
“What? No, I can’t let you—”
“I’ve held out this long,” Ditzy said, eyeing the remaining pursuers. “I can stay up a little longer, don't you think?”
“Of course I do!” the Doctor said. “But I’m not going to risk losing you again!”
Ditzy stared at him for a moment. “Together, then,” she said. “I’ve got an idea that’s just about crazy enough to work.”
The Doctor grinned. “My favorite sort.”
The male guard glanced back, brow raised. “If you two are about done flirting, can we start escaping now?”
“Right, yeah, sorry,” the Doctor said, blushing.
Ditzy smiled and pecked his cheek. “Now, when I give the signal, use the sonic. You’ll know what to do, promise.”
She pushed off from the side of the cart. “Hey, you crabs! Come and get me! One time I ate seafood at a Griffish restaurant!”
The Doctor watched her shrink as the chariot soared away. “I just want her to be safe…”
The female guard chuckled. “I think she can take care of herself, don’t you?”
The Time Lord gave a half-grin. “Heh. I s’pose she can, at that.”




“Dah...shing through the... snow…” Hyacinth gasped. She had long since run out of opera songs and moved onto Hearth's Warming carols. “Inna... one... horse... opensleigh...”
Romana stared down at the crowd below, then glanced toward the horizon. “Hurry up, hurry up, hurry up…” she muttered.
Rose poured a little water down Hyacinth’s throat. “Just a little longer,” she said encouragingly. “Almost there, I promise!”
“Rose… remember… what Mummy used to sing to us?” Hyacinth murmured. “Before we went to sleep?”
“I… think so?”
Hyacinth nodded. “Sing… with me?”
Rose hesitated for a moment, but then hummed a faint, low note. “The Sun has gone to sleep now, the moon is in the sky. It’s time to tuck in flower beds, and close your sleepy eye…”
Lily joined in. “The Sun, so hot, is gone now, the Moon now lights the ground, And little sleepy flowers close their petals all around.”
Hyacinth, having taken a large gulp of water, joined in once more. “So let day’s troubles end now, as we slip into night, the gardener will protect you from painful bugs and blight.”
Daisy eyed her sisters for a long second, letting her gaze linger for slightly longer on Hyacinth. Romana glanced back. “They’re snapping out of it,” she warned.
“So go to sleep, my little seeds, the gardener protects you from the weeds,” Daisy concluded.
Hyacinth smiled slightly. “Thank— I mean, thank you.” she crooned, setting down her water glass. “Now, let me see… Ah! Jingle bells jingle bells, jingle all the way— OH!”
When the mare cut off abruptly, everypony turned to stare. A pegasus mare stood over Hyacinth’s prone form. The interloper wore a pair of earplugs and a sinister smirk. Civil and Berry were keeled over against the wall, silvery crabs attached to their necks.
“Cyseyes,” Scootaloo cursed quietly, as the ponies below began to rise unsteadily to their hooves once more. Berry and Civil too rose up, staring with blank eyes and faces at the assembled.