Silky Apron slowly followed Dusty Shelves as she was cautious not being used to her new body. She was definitely not used to being a mare, let alone being, and continued to follow her through the castle. The maid's uniform swished around her body; she continued to trot along, hoping to avoid the eye contact of other passabyers. The maids eventually found Celestia, and she was just trotting down the hall with her head held high. The two mares performed curtsies (with Silky's being rather awkward and she stumbled abit as she did so) as the princess approached. With the alicorn looking down at them with a smile she said, "Oh, hello, Steel Horn and Dusty Shelves; how are you two?"
"Doing well, princess," the two mares chimed together as they rose up. Celestia then looked over Silky Apron with a smile and said, "I see that we have a new maid in our ranks?"
Dusty adjusted herself before saying, "yes, I am here to talk about that, seeing that she was a former male royal guard, and I believe she needs to be turned back to normal immediately!"
Celestia took out the contract that Steel Horn signed with his new name, "Silky Apron," "ah yes, because of the series of allegations of sexual misconduct, you have been demoted to a maid for a week as it states here."
Silky looked over the unfolded scroll out before her; she seemed somewhat confused as she stammered, "yes, but I…I don't remember…."
The princess looked down and said, "Well, I think being a maid will do you good and understand how to have the shoe fit on her hoof."
Dusty Shelves grumbled under her breath as she got up and glared at Silky Apron. "Well, I can't say I completely disagree with your decision Princess Celestia. But you have to admit this is absolutely absurd."
"What do I do? I don't know how to be a maid!" Silky Apron whined.
"Well, you'll be back to full stallion in a week. Besides, this is about rehabilitation afterall," Princess Celestia added as she trotted down the hall.
Silky Apron looked somewhat flustered as the princess trotted off. When Celestia was no longer in sight Dusty just threw her hooves in the air and shouted,"Just wonderful! Now I have another imbecile guard to deal with!”
Just then three mares, Mop Head, Soap Suds, and Amber, were now all coming back from their shopping trip when they stumbled on the other maids. They were all laughing and chatting together as they seemed to have a good time together. Dusty glared at them, then shouted, "alright, that's it!"
"Tomorrow Princess Celestia will be at a meeting all day in the Crystal Empire! I want you three to be cleaning her room, and I want it spotless! You all can just do that tomorrow and stay out of my hair!" the maid snarled as she stomped down with a hoof.
"Wait, you want us to do that all by ourselves!?" Silky Apron cried in horror, somewhat stunned at this sudden turn of events.
"Yes, and I don't want to hear any complaining! You all should be grateful Princess Celestia hasn't sacked you yet! So prove that you deserve to be maids!" Dusty snapped back; she then stomped off as a cruel smirk grew on her face.
The other maids looked relatively confused as Mop Head understood secretly what Dusty was doing; she's putting them in a position where if they screw up and do a horrible job or make Princess Celestia's room worse, they will be punished and force her to fire them all or have them turned back to royal guards. She was setting them up to fail, and they would have to try to navigate through this trial tomorrow. Mop Head loved being a maid and, at the very least, wanted to get her fellow guards' ponies to be back to stallions.
"Ok, look, I get that this will be a tough task ahead, but I think we can do this." Mop Head said with a look of worry on her face. She turned to her fellow maids and said, "let's just do our best tomorrow! Ok!"
"Ok…" Amber mumbled with a smirk as she dragged Silky Apron away, and then they went off as Mop Head eyed her as Soapy trotted over. "You know Dusty is setting you up, right!?"
"I know, but I don't have a choice," Mop Head grumbled; she then looked over at Silky Apron and how she was whispering something to Amber and said, "also, I don't like how Princess Celestia has turned another guard into a maid. We need to know why she's doing this? Something is going on."
"Right, so you accepted because you want to investigate!" Soapy then hugged her friend with her hooves and nuzzled her.
"Well, I wish you luck!" the mare chirped as she trotted off alongside her friend.
The following morning the maids were going about cleaning Princess Celestia's room. They were going about vacuuming her room (full of white feathers, light rainbow-colored hair, and cake crumbs); they went about fixing her bed, cleaning her bathroom, and just mostly sprucing the room up. The task wasn't too hard, but they were all anxious because this was the princess's chambers, and they all wanted to make sure the room was spotless. While Mop Head was dusting the bedside chamber, she accidentally found the princess's diary set aside in the bedside drawer. As much as she wanted to respect Princess Celestia's privacy she wanted to see if it can reveal why she was turning guards into maids. With sweat forming on her brow the nervous unicorn took the diary and snuck off into the bathroom to read it.
Meanwhile, Amber then had an idea to get back at the princess; she saw Philomena on her perch, calmly preening herself. Anger seemed to boil up in her as she started shouting and waving her hooves, freaking the bird out as it flew upward and squawked at her. The pegasus had a smirk grow on her face as she exclaimed, "Ha, take that!"
Philomena squawked back, but Amber kept chasing the phoenix until it flew out through the door. Silky threw her hooves over her mouth, looking, and gasped, "why did you do that for!?"
"Why not!? Princess Celestia turned us into maids and was supposed to just accept that!?" Amber shouted back.
Silky stomped and snapped, "I get that she's gone too far with punishing us!? But this is insane! You just let Philomena loose! She's done nothing to you!"
"Like I care! I'll fry that bird and feed it to that stuck-up princess if I can!" Amber shouted back.
Silky got furious, seeing that they may have issues taking a pillow. "Go get Philomena back right now!"
"No," Amber snapped,"I'll go get her stupid bird back when she turns us back into stallions."
The pegasus then shoved her muzzle into her friend's face. "What Steel!? You finally grow a spine!"
Silky stood up with the pillow getting more furious. "I used to just go along with everything you said because I was scared you would target me. But this time, I'm standing my ground!"
The newly formed maid slapped her friend with the pillow, and Amber roared, “you’re dead!” As she took another pillow and smacked her back. The two soon had a pillow fight getting feathers all over the room; they tackled each other and rolled around the room. Mop Head, hearing the commotion, came back into the room and gasped upon what she saw, and shouted, "girls!?"
The other two maids stopped fighting to see the mess they made with goose feathers covering the room. Amber burst into laughter, getting up on her hooves and snickered, "this is perfect! Let Celestia come back to this mess!"
"Are you bucking, kidding me!" Mop Head shouted. "Look; obviously, something is off with Princess Celestia, but this is insane!? If she comes back and sees her room like this, she'll make sure you won't be able to get a job again!? Let alone be guards!"
The two stopped as Silky got up and curtseyed as she apologized. "I should be the most furious with her, but I'm not. I know that she has every right to have me and Amber fired, and the fact that she's even giving us a chance is good. But I didn't have a say in being a maid."
Mop Head nodded, pointing to the diary. "Look, I was reading this, and I'm learning that something is going on at the spa. Every day she goes there, she comes back with an idea to turn one of her guards into a maid. Princess Celestia says she's fighting the thoughts, but something is wrong. I believe she's being brainwashed."
The other maids paused as Mop Head continued. "Princess Celestia says she's having headaches, throws up a lot, and constantly needs to go to the spa. These are similar symptoms former Captain Shining Armor had when he was being brainwashed by the Changeling Queen Chrysalis.
Amber paused, being somewhat surprised, and shouted, "wait…so…she doesn't want us to be maids? It's a changeling manipulating her!?"
"Maybe, and if that's true, we may be the only ones who know; we have to investigate that spa and help her, if not take down the changeling manipulating her." She closed the diary and said, "that means we need to keep our cover as maids and not be fired! So I suggest you two start cleaning this place up and find Philomena before she comes back from her trip."
Silky nodded as she performed a curtsy, "you're absolutely right. I'm sorry for causing all of this mess."
A smile grew on Amber's face as she said, "yeah, if we save her, then we'll be heroes like Twilight and her friends!"
Mop Head rolled her eyes. "Amber, we can't let anypony know anything. This changeling could have spies; if they learn we know something, they can brainwash us or have us foalnapped. So stop thinking of yourself for once and go find Philomena; that's an order."
"Fine! But if we do save Princess Celestia from some changeling conspiracy, I better get some compensation for it!" Amber snapped back as she stomped off. Meanwhile, Silky trotted over and whispered, "um…after we finish cleaning up this mess would it be ok if I bake Celestia a cake?"
"You bake?" Mop Head asked with a surprised look on her face.
Silky Apron bowed her head, looking somewhat embarrassed. She explained, "yes, I was always afraid of doing it as a stallion. I thought the other guards would laugh and tease me for dabbling in baking but as a mare…."
Mop Head rolled her eyes again, "Silky, I'm learning a lot being a mare. You as a stallion should be comfortable doing whatever, so even when you turn back into a royal guard, you should bake cakes whenever you want."
Silky lowered her head and scratched the ground with a hoof as she never expressed this side of her. Still being cautious, the mare asked, "So, is it ok if I go bake a cake?"
"Yes, go bake a cake if Amber fails to find Philomena maybe we can get Celestia to clam down a bit!" Mop Head exclaimed as she pushed Silky out the door; the mare smiled back and performed a curtsey. The maid then looked around the princess’s room covered in goose feathers. She gave a long sigh shaking her head as she said, "well, I better get to cleaning all this up myself."
While Mop Head went to cleaning up the princess's room. Amber was hunting down Philomena looking all over the palace, and eventually makes her way to the garden outside. The maid spotted the phoenix sitting in a tree. The mare atarted to feel bad about what she did to Celestia's pet and sighed, "hey Philomena, I'm sorry for scaring you and being a bitch. Can you come down from there?"
The phoenix just glared at her, seeming to be still angry. Amber flashed her wings, flew up towards her, and asked, "look, come down and come back with me? I'm not going to hurt you."
Philomina shook her head as Amber pulled on her mane, then shouted, "I'm trying to be nice and help you out! I'm sorry ok!?"
The phoenix eyed her, seeming to distrust her; she flapped her wings and landed in a fountain nearby. There Philomina started to bathe and groom herself, and Amber slowly came over and watched her clean herself. A thought crossed her mind to try bonding with the bird. She sat down nearby on the fountain and watched her preen, and it was rather lovely thinking about her own mother who would preen her as a child."I preened my mother before, believe it or not. So I got some experince."
The maid then started to groom the phoenix while getting the dirt and bent wings out from her, then cleaned her back and chest. After that, Amber helped the phoenix onto her back. She trotted off to some mangos that fell on the ground. The pegasus then heard the phoenix squawking and flapping her wings. The mare turned around and knew subconsciously that Philomina was looking rather hungry. She then bent down and helped smash the mangos up with her hooves, and the bird chirped happily as she fluttered down and started to peck at the seeds now soaked in the mango juice. Amber stood by and watched over her; she looked over the guards walking by, eyeing her and giving her bedroom eyes as some even whistled at her. The pegasus started to feel rather angry being objectivified. At the same time she was beginning to reflect a little on her behavior. How she treated mares just the same, if not worse. Amber blinked realizing that for once in her life, she was reflecting on her past behavior.
Meanwhile, Silky Apron snuck off into the kitchen, trying to find Luna, who was looking rather tired of getting a snack. The princess of the night gave her a long look before she grumbled, "Oh no, she did it again."
"Yes, I'm a former royal guard," Silky mumbled as she looked somewhat embarrassed seeing Princess Luna recognized immediately she wasn’t a maid.
"That's it. I need to talk to her! She is going way too far!" the princess of the night shouted.
As she knew the truth of why Celestia was turning them into maids, Silky shook her head and lowered her voice, "Princess Luna, I don't mean to alarm you, but we found out that she could be getting brainwashed."
Luna scratched her chin with a hoof and asked, "hmmm, you think it's a changeling?"
"Well, that's what we think; my friends and I will investigate later, but um… let's just say that despite me not completely agreeing with the princess, I want to do something for her that I was too cowardly to do as a stallion."
She got the ingredients for a cake from the various pantries, sugar, flour, eggs, milk, and butter from the fridge. Luna then put a hoof to her mouth and laughed, "you bake!?"
"Yes," Silky said. "Well…um…Princess Luna, would you mind helping me bake a cake for your sister? "Also, I wouldn't mind baking one for you as well?"
"Oh really!?" Luna chimed. "Well, if I know her, she likes vanilla with strawberry frosting and some of those cute hard candies." Then, the princess placed a hoof to her chest and said," as for me I'll take dark chocolate with some marshmallows and hot fudge drizzled over it."
"Oh, that sounds exciting!" Silky chimed as she went to work pouring the ingredients into a bowl while Luna assisted her with getting the oven prepped and getting out other ingredients, such as marshmallows, chocolate, and candy. They both went to work baking the cakes for the rest of the evening.
The following morning Amber, Silky, and Mop Head were all somewhat nervous as they ate breakfast together, all looking rather shy with each other. They all did their best to clean up Princess Celestia's bedroom, and they left her a lovely cake, and Amber took Philomena back to her room. But they were still all nervous about what happened and if they would be sacked for letting Philomena loose. Then they heard the clops coming close over to her, and the three maids all looked across the room. Standing with Princess Celestia looking rather regal, Dusty kept giving them this evil smirk as Princess Celestia came into the dining hall and chimed, "Silky, Amber, and Mop Head, please come to my chambers immediately."
"Yes, princess," the four mares chimed together. They followed her into the room as she rubbed her head with a hoof. As they went inside, she sighed, "mares, I have to ask who cleaned my room yesterday!?"
"I apologize, princess; it was those guards you turned into maids. I assure you that whatever they did, I'll take responsibility. They should be punished; I suggest firing them, seeing how incompetent they are."
Princess Celestia turned her head and se her gaze right at them and said."Well, that's good to hear seeing they are probably the best maids i've ever had!"
The maids looked rather asstonished by Princess Celestia's reaction as Dusty shifted about in her uniform and scoffed, "that's absurd! They let Philomena loose and had a pillow fight! Such inc-"
"Dusty Shelves!?" Princess Celestia shouted she then glared right at the old mare and continued, "you have no right to fire anypony without my approval! And don't think I haven't heard the rumors of how you set ponies up for failure or punish them unnecessarily.”
“But princess I!”
“Dusty, as of today, you will no longer be the head maid of the new division, which I'm calling the maids of honor!" The old maid was somewhat stunned at the alicorn's outburst; she curtsied and trotted out of the room in silence. The princess of the sun turned her attention to the younger mares and with a smile said, "that honor will be given to you Mop Head."
The maid blinked as Celestia turned her attention to her. "You have proven to clean my room and help Amber show compassion to Philomena and helped Silky have the courage to bake me such a lovely cake," She winked at Silky and added, "which was rather delicious, I might add."
Silky lowered her gaze with her cheeks flushing pink as Mop Head curtseyed and said, "thank you, princess, I appreciate you giving me such an honor, but unlike me, I want to stay a maid while Amber and Silky wish to turn back into stallions. As much as I understand why you turned them into maids, there's something wrong in doing this against their will."
Celestia lowered her head, looking somewhat ashamed as she said, "yes, my sister spoke with me last night…something is wrong with me…I don't know what, but I didn't mean to change any of you into maids. Everytime I've done so it was like something came over me like somepony was controlling my mind. I don't know how else to describe it."
Both Amber and Silky looked at each other with worried looks, while Mop Head, despite feeling nervous, wanted to see what they can do to help and said, "Princess Celestia, I don't mean to overstep; if something is going on, can we help?"
"Yes, I'm making this task force; I believe that somepony is trying to invade like the changelings, and I'm their target," Celestia added. "However, I believe these two wish to be stallions again I'm sure."
Silky lowered her head, seeming too embarrassed to say anything immediately. Meanwhile, Amber took a hoof over her mouth and cleared her throat, "Princess Celestia, as much as I would love to be a stallion again. I would rather keep my cover as a maid and assist in hunting down whoever is messing with you."
The newly turned maid added, "yes, there's obviously something going on here. If we turn back to stallions, the invaders will be tipped off so that we might know what's going on. We talked about it last night and we both agree that it would be best if we stay like this."
The princess looked somewhat surprised as she said, "Well, I admit that's brave of you…however that means you three need to be assigned to me at all times. I don’t trust myself seeing how I turned not one but three of my guards into maids," She rose up and held her head high and said, "henceforth, starting today you three will be my personal maids. We need to find out who is brainwashing me and stop them before they do it to my sister or others in the palace!"
"Yes, princess!" all three maids chimed together as they all looked at each other with worried looks. Obviously, they had no idea what they signed up for and what being Princess Celestia's personal maids would entail.