All the while, Princess Celestia was watching this argument take place. She was watching ever since the animals demolished the castle in their collective frenzy. Celestia decided she had to exact some tough love at the six angry mares. “Excuse me!” she bellowed.
Astonished by the shout coming from such a rare source, the six bowed down to her majesty, all ready to present the pony they thought bungled her Majestys'birthday party. Celestia raised a hoof to silence them all. “I don’t want to hear any excuses!” she started. “This isn’t just a day for me to celebrate! It’s for everyone to enjoy! I’d be content with a rusty old shack if everypony in it was enjoying themselves!”
The mares were all either looking at the ground in shame or closing their eyes in shame. “This project was made to foster the cooperation you six had for so long. I thought this party would be beyond spectacular! I thought the food would be more euphoric than any ladder I’ve ever had! I thought the banners wouldn’t be suspended as ugly, Rainbow Dash!” Rainbow Dash cringed the hardest. “You’ve ruined not only my birthday party with your incessant infighting, you’ve ruined the birthday of a new year!” Princess Celestia was seething. She then thought of something perfect for a punishment. “You six will all meet me in my master bedroom. Now.” And with that, she was off. The six slowly trailed Her Majesty in shame.
The six ponies awaited their sentence in the royal courtroom, or at least what was left of it. “Alright, this is how you will repay your debt to society,” Celestia explained, a look of pure sadism and vengeance forming on her face. “You will live out a whole day in each others’ hooves. I can’t make you do so literally,” Celestia regretted irately, “because I’m bound by the Geneighva Convention, so, unfoaltunately, I’ll have to go the metaphoalical route.”
The six traded their looks of shame for confusion. Five of the expressions were from the punishment itself. “What’s with all the filly puns all of a sudden?” Pinkie whispered to Twilight. Pinkies’ was for a different reason. “Silence, Pinkie, or I’ll banish you to processing tofu!” Pinkie gasped, then passed out. Tofu is quite bland, which Pinkie abhors. She also hates the lethal allergic reaction it gives her.
Celestia carried on. “Now then, as I was saying: The day after you return to Ponyville, you will all have to live the lives of your friends, so as to get a feel for how they live. Gain some understanding, you understand?” Celestia chuckled at her little joke at their great expense. “That includes waking up in each others' homes, eating their food, you know. Only catch: no body swapping.”
Twilight pondered, then worried, then exclaimed “Oh, like role-playing! An impression of each other!”
“Exactly, Twilight!” exclaimed Princess Celestia. Even in this storm of collective anger and shame, she was proud to have been Twilights’ personal mentor.
“Now then, who will play whom?” Celestia pondered to herself for a minute. The anxiety was unbearable. “Twilight.” Celestia quickly decided.
“Yes, Princess Celestia?” asked the ever-diligent pupil.
You will be Rainbow Dash.” The Commander of the Sun issued this with a most authoritative face. Rainbow Dash chortled under her breath as Twilight objected.
“But Prince-”
“Twilight, you will be Rainbow Dash.” and that was the end of that.
Celestia looked for another student to teach. Had to be the pony snickering at someponys’ expense. “Rainbow Dash” the Princess decreed. Rainbow Dash ceased her schadenfreude. “You are Pinkie Pie.” Rainbow Dash went through a day of trying to fill in for the mentally enigmatic Pinkie Pie, to no avail. “Rarity, you are Fluttershy.” Rarity wasn’t very distraught at this news at all. Indeed, she saw herself getting off lightly. Still into fashion, just have to tend to animals every so often, why, she was practically the only good one, evidently. Princess Celestia must have sensed the cocky thoughts emitted from Rarity. Thus, she summoned “Pinkie Pie," the pink pony was conscious and eager again. "You’re Rarity.” Celestia decreed. All of a sudden, Rarity didn’t feel so secure. Pinkie Pie, meanwhile, was just happy not to handle tofu.
Celestia wrapped up the assignments. “Fluttershy, you are Applejack.” Fluttershy shuddered at the manual labor Applejacks’ life entailed. “And Applejack,” the Sun Princess breamed at the uneasy cowpony, “you’ll have to fill in as my faithful student, Twilight Sparkle.” Applejack wasn’t very content with that news. While she found reading enjoyable from time to time, she couldn’t fathom being cooped up in a library all day organizing books.
The Princess wasn’t finished, though. She continued, “I believe a few more rules are in order. First off, if anypony, or any dragon, asks,” Celestia looked at her real pupil, “you cannot tell them why you’re impersonating each other.”
Twilight started to argue. “But don’t we owe it to everypony to tell-”
“No, you don’t.” Celestia flatly replied. “For that reason,” she continued, “you will all fix your hair, and adorn it,” Celestia looked at Fluttershy, the fake Applejack, “to look like your friends’. Just fix it, no dying.” Celestia concluded. “That is all you need to know.”
Princess Celestia let the mares reflect quietly on their respective roles for minutes. Silence was thick in the air. “Hmm,” Rarity reflected, breaking the silence. “This may be a good time to give our impressions of each other. It can only give us a more refined view of both each other, and ourselves. For example,” Rarity cleared her throat and fixed her hair into a purple, spitting image of Fluttershys’. “Um, hi. I’m, ummmm…” She looked away from the onlooking crowd, complimenting her acting techniques all the while. “Mm, Fluttershy.”
Everypony clapped, even Princess Celestia, even Fluttershy herself. Rarity continued “Um, could, er, I, uh, please, maybe, perhaps… possibly-”
“Nah jus’ get t’the cottn’-pickn’ point, Fluttershah!” the calm, yellow pegasus tried to snap. More applause ensued. The onlooking ponies were pleasantly surprised with Real Fluttershys’ bravado, as well as how the Stetson looked on her pink ponytail. Fluttershy was quite thankful Applejack let her borrow her brown cowgirl hat.
“Oooohhh, oohhh! My turn! My turn!” Pinkie Pie was cutting in, all too eager to join in the fun. She dashed into a clothing room, and came out with a stovepipe hat over her newly-coiffed mane and a monocle, in a very refined pose.
“I do say,” Pinkie started in her most over-the-top British accent, “my clothes make me feel distinguished! And my pants fancy!” Everypony was once again, quite amused. Rarity, however, found that impression mediocre at best. Everypony knows that a proper lady going for such a look would look more distinguished in a fedora.
The heavy mood surrounding everypony was lifting. Even Applejack, who wasn't the biggest fan of acting, or a lot of other impractical stuff, felt prompted to say “Heh, ya know, this might not be so bad after all!”
“Then let’s see you do it!” Rainbow Dash challenged. All eyes were on Applejack, now.
AJs’ response?
“Spike, take a note! Dear Princess Celestia:" the farm mare started. "Today I have learned that I was so engaged in moving books around in mah-my home, I have accidentally misplaced my key! Not a problem, I am used to being in my house for hours at a time.” More laughter emerged, except for Twilight, who reassured herself that she clearly gets out enough.
Rainbow Dash caught Twilight not even uttering a chuckle.
“Come on, then!” the athletic Pegasus demanded. Twilight looked at her, slightly caught off guard. “Do me, already!” Rainbow Dash was clearly waiting for this one.
Twilight shuffled her hooves and then replied “Okay, then… let’s see…” Twilight wasn’t the biggest fan of acting. She was more of a behind-the-scenes unicorn. She did act once, also at Celestias’ service. She finally imitated the pegasus. “So radical! I’m Rainbow Dash, the raddest, baddest, skyslayer that ever invented flying!” Twilights’ acting summoned a sea of guffaws.
The great reception prompted the overachieving, purple unicorn to overachieve. “My Rainbow Splash puts craters in walls! Who needs banners, anyway?” Everyone was busting a gut, except, of course, poor, regretful Rainbow Dash, who had more than enough of hearing about those stupid banners. Twilight wasn’t stopping there, though. “And I make everypony else go before me, ‘cuz I’m lazy!” and then she pretended to fall asleep and snore. Twilight wasn’t fond of being put on the spot, so shined the spotlight on Rainbow Dash.
Rainbow blinked, taken aback by the sudden shift of attention; the mixture of surprise and latent annoyance on her face was highly legible. Ten seconds later, she snapped out of it and put on her Pinkie face. “Hi everypony!” Rainbow mimicked. “This day is gonna be so super sugary awesome!” She pinkied to the kitchen, then back out with a jar of honey between her fore-hooves. “I’m hungry, again!” Rainbow yelled overenthusiastically. “I think I’ll have my 7th meal out of twenty for today.” and proceeded to chug the jar of honey. Pinkies’ face was fixed into a caustic stare. “Oh, come on, Rainbow Dash. You know I eat at least 42 square meals a day!” Rainbow Dashs’ violet eyes widened with horror while she was downing the jar of pure sweetness. How was she supposed to eat 42 meals in one day?!
Everypony else was having the time of their lives, except the now-rattled Rainbow Dash. Even the once-seething sun Princess was finding leisure in watching all of this role-playing. Celestia soon after remembered that business had to be finished. “Well, then, I hope you all have gotten a handle on who you’ll be living as. Anymore questions?” The Six all shook their heads. “Very well.” Princess Celestia exclaimed. “In that case, it’s time for all of you to return to Ponyville.” They all nodded, and then they trekked through the ruins of the Royal Palace.
Nopony said anything on the way back to Ponyville. Between newfound farm labor, learning a levitation spell, running a library with Spike, having to work with a new style, running a pancake house, and swallowing everything in a kitchen while still somehow baking something, there were new tasks to prepare for that weighed on everyponys' minds.