Trixe - Day 1
Another town, another show.
Trixie took a deep breath as she fastened the clasp of her cape. The purple, silky garment — adorned with decorative moons, suns, and stars — showed its age. It didn’t help that this was the same cape she’d worn since she first started doing magic shows as a young filly, nor that she still had no idea how to cast a half-decent garment rejuvenation-protection spell, if such a thing even existed.
And she’d be damned if she went into that prissy white unicorn’s circus-ride excuse of a shop to ask for help.
The announcer on-stage finished his introduction, calling her up.
Trixie let the breath escape her slowly. ’Manehattan is always such a tough town, especially when I play in the park.
The rumble of an eager crowd, the creak of floorboards under her hooves, the muffled calls of the announcer on the microphone… despite her veteran showmare experience, it still made her feel like her stomach was full of horseshoes. That anxiety, the slinking fear in the buildup before the performance could never be truly conquered. It was something all performers dealt with, handling the energy of wanting to have a great performance, but Trixie’s butterflies were a bit more brutal.
There was no shaking the cynic inside — the one armed with about how pathetic she truly was.
Charlatan, it said. Fraud. Weakling. Incompetent.
And this would be the show that revealed it to everypony — her fans, friends, family… and most importantly, herself.
“No! That’s not true, Trixie! You ARE the Great and Powerful!” whispered to herself, before chanting the mantra in her head for the millionth time, her tried and tested ward against those dark feelings.
The stage curtain rose to thunderous applause, and those thoughts were put on hold. The Great and Powerful Trixie had no doubts; she was perfect in every way conceivable, and with the tip of her hat, an equally jaw-dropping salvo of magical fireworks lit up the stage behind her.
The show had begun.
...
“Thank you, Manehattanites!” Trixie called, bowing as she removed her hat with a theatrical flourish, sweeping low. Raucous applause rolled through the crowd, which had grown exponentially as the show went on. Flowers and bits rained onto the stage as the ponies chanted her name over and over.
“Trixie, Trixie, Trixie!”
“Yes, yes! Thank you, thank you!” Trixie chuckled, heading toward stage left. “Please enjoy the rest of the show. Up next is…” she checked her hoof for the notes she’d received. “...uh, the styling of Octavia Melody and her string quartet.”
Trixie sighed, already missing the basking glow that came with the intoxicating approbation of a supportive crowd. Already their cheers had died down to a soft murmur as the cellist and her team of musicians made their way onto the stage. As the melodious tuning strokes of Octavia’s bow were drawn across her instrument, Trixie wondered if anypony would even remember her name by the end of the soiree.
Her head dipped down as she made her way out the back entrance to the large stage, heading toward her wagon tied up at the other side of the park. At least she’d quelled those demons for a few minutes, had stopped her anxious self-destruction for another night. The bottle of wine in her wagon would help too.
“Ex-excuse me, M-Ms. Trixie?”
She looked to her side and found a little purple unicorn filly nervously eyeing her with a notepad and pencil in her mouth. “Oh my!” Trixie smiled, flipping her hair and cape back. “Could you be a fan of the Great and Powerful Trixie?”
The filly nodded nervously. “Y-yes. I was hoping… I mean… if it’s not too much trouble, c-could…”
Trixie chuckled, sweeping the filly up into her forelegs and giving her a big hug. “Trixie always has time for her fans. They have the best taste in all of Equestria, after all.”
The filly giggled and laughed as Trixie sent her flying about in a kinetic field, before bringing her gently to rest right in front of her; no easy task, unless you were an alicorn or high-class, town-dominating unicorn.
But maybe it was easy. Maybe she was an incompetent thaumic user, only capable of simple show-magic?
The twinkle of the filly’s eyes: filled with love and admiration for her quieted the thoughts.
“Now, I could give you only an autograph...” Trixie mused aloud playfully, as she signed the filly’s pad with a flourish. “But tell me, little filly… are you a magician too?”
The filly nodded with a smile. “Yup! I’m the AMAZING Flash Star! I know three tricks.”
“Hmm… Flash Star, eh? Needs a little more pizazz… How about the Fantastic Flash Star?” Trixie sent sparks up into the night air, illuminating the filly’s name in the sky.
“That’s awesome!” Flash Star squeed, her eyes as big as saucers.
“But you know what? I think that Flash Star the Fantastic needs a new prop.” Trixie brought out her wand and offered it with reverence to the little filly, like a guard would offer a princess their sword. “Would this be of any interest?”
“W-what!? Your wand? F-for me?” The filly looked like she was about to cry.
“Of course! But you must promise to take great care of it, and dazzle me with your show when I’m back next year, Fantastic Flash Star!”
Clutching the wand to her chest like a million-bit treasure, she looked up with tears in her eyes and nodded emphatically. “I-I will!” She ran off back toward the crowd of ponies with a happy skip in her step, pausing only to look back over her shoulder at her hero.
With a happy sigh, Trixie turned away, looking back toward her wagon with no small amount of disappointment. Foals could be so lovely — so full of energy and happiness, so innocent… not crushed down by the realities of the world, surrounded by family and friends who loved them dearly…
Trixie opened the door to her wagon interior, revealing the cramped space, jammed full of various magical tricks and trappings — room enough for only one lonely showmare.
…Where had she gone wrong?
She reached under one of the cardboard boxes, picking up the half-empty bottle of wine that she knew she’d left there from the previous evening’s show. It wasn’t fancy wine; she’d always been good about living within her budget while traveling, but it was effective wine. The nomadic life tended to teach one how to be pragmatic, and she’d quickly discovered that price didn’t always reflect quality.
It also afforded her plenty of time to think. Plenty of time to reflect. Plenty of time to worry.
Maybe that’s where the doubting came from.
Things had been getting better in more recent years, yes. She’d made a new friend in Ponyville — somepony who could really understand her. She’d also managed to somewhat make amends with the ponies of that town, even the ones she’d purposefully antagonized. Even the ones who did deserve it.
An extra-long draw of her wine bottle accompanied that particular memory. Jealousy, especially when combined with an all-corrupting magical artifact, could make a mare do crazy things. A part of her relished it, though — a deep, dark part of her that she hated — despite it being the wrong thing to have done;for a time, the world had to listen to her, because she was just too great and powerful for them to ignore. Such an easy way to get everything she’d always wanted. And such a sinister way.
She shivered.
She wasn’t even really sure why she’d been so jealous of Princess Twilight. Power? Prestige? The fact that friendship and love seemed to come so quickly to her pseudo-nemesis? As it stood, Twilight was objectively the most beloved pony in Equestria, possibly even surpassing the Princess of Love herself. It wouldn’t be long before Celestia’s favored pupil was smothered in friendship from every nation. And should she wish for it, she probably wouldn’t need to try all that hard to find somepony to start a family with — Trixie had already saved the world upwards of a dozen times, so there’d be no shortage of admirers so long as she stayed in the spotlight.
Trixie, however…
What could she do? What claim to fame did she have? Sparklers and fireworks and the art of illusion, performed day after day, night after night, to town after backwater town... only to be tossed aside and forgotten like the stale popcorn that littered the showgrounds each morning. She wasn’t Twilight and never would be, and every new exploit she read in the news or heard by word of mouth only served to remind her of that.
Another swig of the red wine drowned that particular sequence of thoughts away.
When she was in one of these black moods, memories of the adoration of her fans helped. The way their eyes sparkled, the way their hooves shot up in the air, the way their tails swished merrily. It gave her confidence that she was a good pony. At least, for a little while.
Their love was a mere placeholder. A tiny sip of the acceptance she truly wanted. Somepony who would give her that affection for who she was when she was off the stage. Somepony to travel with across Equestria — to go on adventures with, to giggle with. Someone who would be there, with her, when she was alone.
Alone in her tiny wagon. Like now.
This wine was poor company.
Maybe she could try one of those dating services. Or hang out in bars and nightclubs like in one of Starlight’s steamy romance novels. Hay, maybe Trixie should just go to the town square, hike her tail up and beg.
Another swig. She jumped into her hammock with practiced ease.
Maybe going to one of those ‘town-studs’ was the only way she’d ever have someone to care about…
She shook her head to clear the thought — they were just old mare’s tales anyway. She’d have to do something though. It wasn’t like some foalish prayer to Celestia would send the love of her life knocking on her do-
*KNOCK KNOCK*
“Hello? M-ms. Trixie?”
The voice jolted her up and out of her hammock. Unfortunately, her right hoof caught in the webbing as she disembarked, sending her ass over teakettle into a pile of her famously effective smoke bombs. She froze, not moving her forelegs a millimeter, making sure to very carefully keep the pile of orb-shaped glass capsules from exploding and filling the entire wagon with the acrid diffusion.
*KNOCK KNOCK*
“Hello? Are you in?” The voice asked with hesitation. “I thought I heard something.”
Sure that her entire wagon wouldn’t be set ablaze, Trixie let out a sigh of relief and began to carefully go about getting her head out from under her plot. “What is it!? I have a permit to keep my wagon on the park grounds this year!” Shaking her completely disheveled mane out of her face, she stomped toward the door. The Manehattan park cops were always crawling up her tailhole with their ridiculous regulations: they never cut her any slack! “I swear, this is hara—”
She ripped the door open to see what was decidedly not a police officer standing there. The rusty-haired stallion looked unsure of himself, his beard-framed mouth stammering to find words as his surprised green eyes raced over her.
“Uh… I… huh…”
Trixie clicked her tongue in impatience, quickly assembling her emotional armor. “Well? What is it? The Great and Powerful Trixie was busy… perfecting the most advanced of alicorn magic!”
The stranger blinked, and then he creased his brows, apparently stunned out of his stupor. “But you’re… not an alicorn.”
“Hah!” Trixie put a hoof to her chest, “Experimenting with alicorn energies is trivial to the Great and Powerful Trixie. I have extensive experience with vast, swirling, ethereal powe—”
“Because of the time when you had the Alicorn Amulet?”
She paused, staring off into the sky with an open mouth for a moment, then brought herself and narrowed her eyes at him in guarded suspicion. She didn’t think there was anypony she hadn’t apologized to for those dark few days in Ponyville, and she’d certainly spent enough time in the town itself that she was rarely harassed for it, so she was sure that chapter of her life had been put behind her. But she supposed that maybe she should’ve seen this coming: if this was indeed what she thought it was: a Ponyville emigre who didn’t think saying sorry was enough, and preferred to settle things the old-fashioned way. “Just who are you?”
The pegasus slunk back, ears splaying against his ruffled red mane as he pointed a hoof at himself questioningly.
“Yes. You.” Trixie arched an eyebrow. “Somepony who comes knocking on my door in the middle of the night, demanding to know if I’m Trixie and dredging up the most awful event of her life... Who. Are. You?”
He shuffled his wings. And was he sweating? Trixie never understood how easily it came to some ponies, nor did she have much of a mind to tolerate those who did, even if it wasn’t their fault, strictly speaking. “I’m… sorry.”
“Well, ‘Mr. Sorry’, what exactly do you want?”
“No! I mean… I’m not that kind of sorry.” He sighed and looked to his right, casting his gaze over the empty lots on the edge of the showgrounds. Pulling the cart all by herself tended to get her to her destinations a little later than she liked, so all the best spots were usually taken by the time she arrived, just as they were here. She’d had to relocate to an empty camp-ground, far from the stage and most of the park traffic. “My name is… Bawdy Jot,” he continued, returning to her. “I’m a reporter for the Manehattan Monthly.”
Trixie cocked her head slightly, but made no comment; she wasn’t sure how to deal with this. She’d spoken with the press before, of course — trite pieces about her show and the event she was performing at, generally followed by her making a desperate pitch for some good publicity. Unfortunately, she often had to consider herself lucky if her name made it to print: they usually accredited her quotes to “a magician.”
Then she’d had the incident.
All of a sudden, she couldn’t get away from reporters. They’d hounded her every step. She begged to keep her name out of the papers, only moving from town to town seemed to work as a remedy to the unwanted public attention of ‘The World’s Most Egotistical Unicorn’. Needless to say, the headlines were not flattering.
That’s how she found herself wandering the edge of nowhere, trapped in a kind of paradox; attention is what she sought, but without any of the baggage her name had already acquired.
She’d learned her lesson when it came to the newspaper rag-merchants, going so far as to disappear for a while after helping Starlight save Equestria from the return of Queen Chrysalis. And the irony wasn’t lost on her, nor was it merciful: it had been the proudest moment of her entire life, and there she was, refusing to acknowledge her part in it.
Her. Trixie Lulamoon.
Twilight made it all look so effortless, but what did she know? She’d lived in privilege all her life, always told she was destined for greatness, groomed and tutored by Celestia herself. Of course, everypony loved her, no matter what she did. No way the press would spin their webs of lies and deceit about her. But Trixie? Oh, Trixie was fair game.
And she was beginning to regret not having brought her bottle with her to the door.
“Uh-huh…” she finally replied, eyelids lowering to halfway in a glazed look. It was better to pass this charlatan on to somepony with more patience for his tomfoolery, or else nip this weed at the bud before it sprouted. “Well, the press office for the park show organizer can be reached for—"
“Actually, I was hoping to speak to you.” The reported smiled weakly. “The Great and Powerful Tri—"
“Trixe doesn’t do interviews.”
“O-oh. Well, shoot…”
Trixie waited for him to leave.
He didn’t.
“Don’t you have someplace else to be?”
“Oh.” He blinked as if it surprised him to learn that he was acting out of the ordinary. Then he bowed his head and lowered his attention to the grass beneath his hooves and kicked at it. “Well, I was, uh… hoping to get an autograph, truth be told…”
That made her blink, her brows rising high in surprise. “A-an autograph?” And then she began frowning again. “Why?”
“Oh, uh… sorry, it’s just...” He drifted off, growing distant in his gaze as well. And then he sighed, lowering his eyes, and started to turn away. “Never mind. Forget I asked.”
This was what she wanted: to be left alone. But now she was interested — just what was this stallion after? So few adult fans ever actually made an effort to look for her after her shows... except for that creepy Saddle Arabian, Hoof’ar.
No.
Action had to be taken. She’d been trodden on by the press for far too long, and she wasn’t going to let this guy get away with what was probably a failed defamation attempt either.
“No, wait! Don’t go.”
He stopped in his tracks and peered up at her, ears attentive, but his expression still somewhat crestfallen. A dedicated con artist, it seemed — rare that one would keep their ruse up after their bluff had been called. It almost made her feel guilty — disarmed her. Almost.
“It’s no problem at all, I swear. I wasn’t expecting… a fan.” She turned around and began rummaging through the supplies inside her door. “Give me a second; I need to find a pen.”
His spirits seemed to brighten, facing her with a hopeful smile. And then he looked down and watched as he offered his notepad and pencil, almost as if he could hardly believe his luck. “You could use this.”
“Oh, how kind,” Trixie said, putting on the most flattered tone she could manage without coming off as fake. She accepted the offer with a small but gracious bow of the head and then scribbled out her signature with a flourish, the bold strokes quickly filling up the entirety of the page. “To whom should the Great and Powerful Trixie make this out to?”
“Oh, uh… Bawdy Jot.” He smiled, extending a hoof. “I’m very pleased to meet you, Miss Lulamoon.”
Trixie returned the gesture. He undoubtedly acted like a nice fellow, but so did quite a few. Maybe he thought he had her fooled, but Trixie knew better. “For my dear friend, Bawdy Jot,” she said as she wrote, looking up at him with a smile from behind the notepad.
He grinned back.
And then her smile darkened. “Now, let’s see what you really think,” she defiantly announced, snapping back to the notepad and immediately flipping through the pages, searching for any and every scrap of dirt she could find. And sure enough, she found scribblings on the next page over.
‘How did you get into stage-magic?’
‘Ask her about interesting stories about her time traveling throughout Equestria’
‘Ask her favorite trick/spell.’
‘Bring up how many foals she’s made happy throughout her tour.’
‘Find out what she likes/dislikes, her dreams, her aspirations’
‘How is she so beautiful’
Trixie stopped, and she found herself staring.
“Hey!” he yelped, snatching the notepad back and scowling at her with an open mouth as if he had more to say. But he stayed there, frozen in a look of indignation, seemingly unable to speak. And then he blinked, and the expression faded to a rattled one, and he did his best not to look at her. “I mean, uh… th-thanks for your time. I’ll… I’ll get out of your hair now.” He quickly turned and trotted urgently away through the field. “Good luck with your next show!”
She could only watch, still processing what had just happened, what she’d just seen.
She was beautiful. That was a fact. Everypony she met also knew it, they were just too afraid to admit it, especially to her face. But for a reporter, of all ponies, to jot it down and scratch it out as if it were a forbidden thought? That was bordering the absurd.
But she saw it. With her own eyes, she saw it. Clear as day, bright as the sun, even in the light of the moon. None of those questions were aimed at attacking her credibility, or her character, or seemed in any way like they had an ulterior motive in mind. And to top it all off, he asked himself why she was so beautiful.
Why, if she didn’t know any better, she’d have thought he almost genuinely…
‘Sweet Celestia…’ she murmured internally. ‘Was he actually…?’
Then she had the thought to speak out, and when she finally blinked, she scanned the grounds, only to find them empty. He was gone, and she hadn’t seen where he’d vanished to. And when she had the thought to lift her hoof and step outside and venture forth for him — for what purpose, she couldn’t be sure — the air seemed to grow colder. The world was less inviting. Empty. Imposing.
Lonely.
He hadn’t come to attack her, had he?
She’d just pushed him away.
She spun around and retreated inside, slamming the door shut behind her, slumping against it and sliding down with both forehooves to her temples. What was she supposed to feel? Disgusted? With whom? Him? Why? She wanted attention, didn’t she? It was only natural that somepony might — no, would — find her attractive, if not immediately then definitely when they gave her a chance and got to know her. He was allowed to fantasize — she’d caught herself doing the same with other ponies plenty of times, some of whom weren’t ponies at all.
Herself, then? She had every reason to be suspicious! No reporter before him had taken her all that seriously, and those who did were usually out for blood, and she was easy pickings; his profession practically demanded ruthlessness, in all its forms. How was she supposed to know that he wasn’t like the others?
How was she supposed to know he thought she was beautiful?
Could she remember his face? She had to. His name was memorable enough: Bawdy Jot. Sounded like a shot of brandy. Looked like he could do with one to calm his nerves. Redish hair, greyish coat, a pegasus to boot. Memorable enough. If he were in a crowd, she’d pick him out quite readily.
But still, he was gone, and she’d done that to him. Chased him away.
Buck.
She grabbed the bottle of wine and finished the rest of it off with a single, multi-glugging gulp, then threw it with frustration against the cardboard box filled with scarf-sleeve tricks.
What an idiot.