From The Distinctly Overloaded Desk Of Mayor Marigold Mare

by Estee

Epoliticary

To: The Equestrian Election Commission

This is to confirm receipt of the official pouch, which was opened promptly. Additionally, as per your typical instructions, the contents have been inspected and verified. And as per standard government policy on equally-official paperwork, I have created and dated a copy of this missive, for use in the unlikely event that something should happen to my original sending.

However, regardless of the fact that I cannot enter any political race without submitting official EEC paperwork, I personally feel that it's somewhat too early to be asking whether I intend to file as a candidate for the next election. By several moons.

Regardless, please be assured that I am fully aware of the deadline, and none of the necessary paperwork had been removed from the pouch. As I am rather busy at this time, I am choosing to send in any applicable forms (should such be required) when they are ready, under separate cover.

Sincerely,
Marigold Mare (Mayor, Ponyville)

First draft. To be reviewed or rewritten prior to sending. Any copy of the final version is for official records only.

Dear Ms. Skate,

Before we reach the core of your current issue, please let me say that I hope the speed of this reply restores some small amount of your faith in the system. I just received your letter today and if all has gone well which would be a rather unusual day in Ponyville, but let's pretend there's still hope, you should have received my response via Town Hall courier well before Sun was lowered. The government is listening, and this portion does its best to answer.

I'm rather surprised that you have yet to receive any response from Disaster Relief, much less the voucher to which you are fully entitled. You'd think they'd be used to processing Ponyville-based claims by now, since we do create the majority of all such

I can settle a few of your concerns at this time. Firstly, as your home and business were officially verified as having been among those which were lost during Tirek's attack, your primary qualification for relief should already be met. Yes, you did send in your paperwork much later than everypony else, but the delay was completely understandable and that's a drastic understatement.

Let me assure you that the filing deadline is actually quite flexible, and you did get your application in well before it expired. The only effect I can perceive is that your voucher would now be part of this year's national budget. Those cases will be processed by the newest configuration of the Day Court's post-election DR committee and given the time of year, they'll be viewed by fresh eyes and unwearied faces.

But yours still should have been settled by now.

Once again: you did not miss the deadline. The committee will understand the delay. Respect it, as do I. You had a much more important matter occupying the whole of your attention. And as we haven't had the chance to speak in some time, allow me to join the herd's chorus of joy in learning that your son is going to make a full recovery.

He never should have gotten hurt in the first place.
There has to be some way of keeping it all from happening here and I can't

Additionally, please don't feel the delay in voucher receipt has been caused by something you did. I understand that you had a few issues in filling out the forms, and that's hardly uncommon. But that's why originally you sought out my staff. With their assistance and experience which has been gained through submitting more of these forms than any other place on the continent, everything should have been completed properly. There is a copy of that submission at Town Hall, and I am willing to help you review it at any time. Or we could go over your own copy of the paperwork. And if there somehow were mistakes present, then they would be errors produced by stress. DR is typically forgiving of such errors, and a corrected version can easily be sent in.

I want to help you

I can also assure you that the committee is not ignoring your case. Government policy requires all paperwork to be read. All paperwork. For example, neither the Day Court nor the Night Court can vote on any law within their respective dominions until every representative has gone through the full text of that proposal or can lie about it with a straight face. Your file will be reviewed.

There has to be some reason why you've been reined back this long and I intend to find
I will try to discover
I'm trying

I fully recognize that you can't stay with Ms. Sunrise for much longer. That, as you said, your savings are running out. But I wish to see both you and your son remain in Ponyville. Assuming, of course, that you still desire to stay.

You wouldn't be the first to leave, and with more cause than
The Day Court should have helped
I need to help
I don't know if I can

During your previous visit to Town Hall, you dealt with my staff because there's pretty much some level of disaster every week. Judging by when you signed in to the visitor logbook, I would have been speaking to Ms. Dash. Or rather, shouting as loudly as required to wake her up so she could explain her part in the latest . If you still desire a fresh perspective for the wording of your application, then I can offer you both my personal attention and direct assistance with any required rewrite (which will still not count against you for the deadline). As Ponyville is somewhat peaceful at this time for however long that can possibly last, simply drop by Town Hall and schedule an appoi

Intraoffice memo

Tripli,

I'm going to Strawberry's house so I can speak to Crimson directly. Any necessary copies to be filed when I get back.

To: Forward Bill
c/o Day Court Building #4

...and as you can probably guess, this is where my ability to ferret out information at a distance has galloped itself into the dust.

There are circumstances under which I could ask Branch to intervene: being married to Ponyville's representative within the Night Court comes with a few benefits, and I do my best to keep all of them within what the law permits.

(At least for the kinds of benefits which apply solely to the government. I know you, Bill, and the stallion who stood corral master at the wedding was absolutely smiling well before the first parenthesis reached his eyes. Regardless, thank you for preventing Branch from making a break for the horizon. The younger generation has their own Princess-based term for cold-hooved grooms now and I swear that if his had been generating any more chill, we wouldn't have had any problems before the ceremony because Princess Luna would have effectively frozen him to the floor.)

I dearly wish I could ask Branch for direct help with DR. However, the division of law dominions was made centuries ago, and disaster relief belongs to the Day.

You've always been utterly stalwart about getting our cases through the committee: it certainly helps to have you serving on it. Given the sheer amount of experience you now have on DR, it's hard to see you being removed from it any time soon. Because if there's anything Ponyville provides when it comes to disasters, it's experience. One of the few benefits we gain from what seems to be an unending supply.

Also, we're still the continental champions of the (re)construction industry. So once Crimson's case is settled, there won't be any shortage of ponies waiting to build her new house. And, given how things have been proceeding over the last few years, potentially the next, and the next.

I don't want to communicate with you through Branch: he's got enough to try and chew through in his feedbag already, especially with the new session starting up and all of the rookies claiming their benches for the first time. The opening weeks of term are always the roughest for him. And for the same reason, there are circumstances where I would be reluctant to trouble you directly -- except that as you're fully aware, this is our job. Ours, Bill. Yours and mine alike. To speak for those who feel as if their voices will never be heard.

I know DR is probably sick of seeing PONYVILLE stamped at the top of the relief forms. (Imagine how sick I am of being the one who has to keep sending them out.) But they've generally understood our situation and when that memory started to slip, you've been there to remind them.

Crimson's paperwork should be in the committee's custody. Tirek was officially acknowledged as a disaster during the last term, which means that she doesn't have to worry about waiting out the evaluation period. And still, when I compare the turnaround time to what we usually see, followed by factoring in how unusually peaceful the continent has been since the start of term... I feel that she should have received her voucher already. In fact, she's overdue by a few weeks. And counting.

It's not just getting her home back. She can't exactly build a new roller park in Strawberry's backyard. Scootaloo's already enough of a risk to every greenhouse in Ponyville: placing forty more of her in close proximity to that much glass feels like a very bad idea. Not to mention the issues in sorting out the red stains produced by fruit from those produced by, to invoke Scootaloo again, going through the walls.

If it's a matter of lost paperwork, tell me and I'll resubmit on her behalf. I trust you to speed it through from there. But if it's anything else...

Something is going on, Bill. All of my hackles are going up.

One of the mares in my herd is in trouble, and I can't do anything.

Please intervene.

Forward,

I just trotted down to the newsstand at the train station and got a copy. I usually don't pick up the Tattler. I swear the ink leaves an aftertaste in my mouth. For about six days.

But I wanted to get a look at her. And now I have. I've seen the problem. Your problem. DR's own disaster, just waiting to happen.

You were right. Minori Verdante does look like she's smirking. All the time.

In a way, it's almost funny. Just in that way where you never actually laugh. Because it's pretty common for a Day Court rookie to be assigned onto the Disaster Relief committee, isn't it? Because that's how they're supposed to tap into the heart of the virtues. Loyalty towards the citizens of their nation. Honesty regarding what truly happened in order to bring events before the committee at all. A mission to restore both laughter and magic. The offering of kindness through the medium of generosity.

And... something else.

There's no seventh Element, of course. (Another consequence of Ponyville life is dealing with all the idiots who keep showing up and trying to convince everypony that they're it.) But if there was... I think it would be empathy. The capacity for imagining what it's like to be the one in pain. To bleed for them, if only for a little while. And then, with all of the other virtues at work, to act. Making sure the bleeding stops.

There's no seventh Element. But your Ms. Verdante makes me wish there was, because saying she possesses none of the seven makes it a little more dramatic.

Just to be clear: I don't believe her act any more than you do. She isn't trying to learn every part of the job as a first-time electee who just entered the race on a whim. She has certain aspects of it mastered. Not all -- nowhere near -- but she certainly picked up on the comprehension rule, didn't she?

You can't vote on a prospective law until you've read through the text. You can't approve a relief application for a town until everypony on the committee has gone over it and right now, Crimson is Ponyville. The last session recognizing Tirek as a disaster doesn't count in that aspect: her individual claim still has to be considered for the new term.

Which means that a single mare is holding up everything, because the only thing she reads are her own press releases. Little compositions of unsubtlety which are only dispatched to a few select newspapers. The ones which are going to agree with her.

She's locked up all of Disaster Relief. And I believe you, when you say that confronting her just makes her giggle and laugh and claim that if somepony is forcing her to read something, then they must be words which she's better off not seeing.

The remainder of her excuse list for not being ready to participate was very inventive. Thank you for providing all twelve pages of it.

I also appreciate your sending the draft for the tiny. little. change she wants to force into Disaster Relief. The one where she's clearly determined to block the committee until everypony gives her what she wants. And the fact that she managed to run the proposal out to twenty boring pages indicates that somepony provided her with a few lessons on how to speak bureaucracy.

Your translation was appreciated, but unnecessary. Let's cut to the summary.

All she's asking for is that the Disaster Relief budget be divided so that every single community in the nation receives an equal share: something which would happen at the start of every term. Bits to be paid out in advance. Those communities receive no less and, as much to the point, no more. And if any given area gets through a term without expending the funds on actual disaster relief, then they can just use that money however they wish.

SHE'S FROM DRAYTON! THE SMALLEST SETTLED ZONE! THEY DON'T HAVE ANY DISASTERS BECAUSE THERE ISN'T A MONSTER WHO CAN BE BOTHERED WITH FINDING IT!

But Drayton is all she cares about, isn't it? (Presuming she can care at all and she doesn't just have a grift plan in place for 'utilizing' those freed funds.) An equal share for every community? Manehattan should be fine, as long as they can find a way to keep it down to half a bit per resident. Canterlot is just the place which allows her to prance in front of a few select photographers while openly calling the Princesses liars. For the publicity.

And Ponyville can burn through the assigned budget in one bad moon. Or week. Or, based on previous experience, about twenty seconds.

Oh, before I forget: thank you for sending me a copy of her on-the-record comments regarding Ponyville. That the only reason we would receive so much disaster relief is because there's incompetent leadership. Which permits every last one of those disasters to take place. Incompetent, corrupt leadership.

She apparently doesn't know my name, but she can record her guess as to how many bits I'm pulling for myself down to the last smidgen. Except she doesn't call it a guess. More of an accusation.

There's a saying. That in politics, every accusation is a confession. She may just be confessing in advance.

Forward... do you remember that hastily-assembled attempt I made at getting a Ponyville tourism commission together? Because we've always been in Canterlot's shadow. And let's face it: there was never a real reason to come here. In the first days of the town, we mostly had hotels because ponies who were traveling to the capital would decide to get a good night's sleep before the last push. That was our traveler traffic.

And then we got the trains. Something which brought the length of a Ponyville pause down from one night to about ten minutes, and that was if the boilers needed to be checked. I know you remember when the hotels began to close.

The commission never managed to get a motto together. Rejected attempts started with A Rustic Diversion From The Capital. Then they tried it as Rustic Relief. After a while, they reached As Long As The Train Had To Stop, Our Food Is Slightly Cheaper.

We have a motto now, in the Bearer era. An unofficial one.

Ponyville: Shopping, Lunch, And An Improvised Show! (Audience MIGHT Not Die.)

The appeal is somewhat dubious.

And yet more ponies come here now. Every moon. Some move here, because there's a lot of interesting things going on and somehow, they've decided that none of it will ever hurt them. Ask Crimson about that one. Ask her son. Ponies move here every moon, and -- ponies leave. Because they gain experience, and they're afraid that one day, the next disaster, monster, nightmare... it won't be stopped. Ryder's moving supplies store went to Sun and Moon operation two years ago and never looked back.

I know how the other communities refer to us: Chaos Central. We would have that title without Discord dropping by. And so much of it is the Bearers. A sextet which, in order to maintain the bonds between them, must reside in the same town. The Princesses have made that very clear.

The Bearers, whom I lecture, attempt to stop, try to corral, and... can't control.

Ponies move here. Ponies leave. Ponies get hurt.

The continent has been relatively peaceful for a time. A quiet start of term, and that's luck. DR doesn't have a lot of cases to consider. But every last one of them is being stalled by a single mare, until she gets what she wants. What she wants is crippling. And I am supposed to be in charge of a town which, on any given day, can break her ideal vision of our disaster relief budget. In twenty seconds, or ten, or one.

The continent can't stay lucky forever. Eventually, a community is going to be hit. I suspect Ms. Verdante, in her empathy-free cunning, is counting on that. That the cases will start to pile up in districts whose Day Court representatives are on the committee. And they'll start backing her proposed change, in the name of getting any relief for their herds at all.

I have to do something.

Dear Ms. Verdante,

I wanted to reach out to you personally --

This is my third attempt at making contact.

As I appear to have been barred from entering your office (which strikes me as an odd decision to make regarding a mare whose name you apparently claim to have never heard, especially as you've never also read anything she's sent to you)

If you would just meet with Crimson, for even five minutes

To the Equestrian Election Commission,

Yes, I opened the pouch again. Promptly. Name a single politician on the continent who doesn't open one of these pouches within seconds after receipt. Sometimes in a panic, because yours is the group which determines whether we're eligible to run again, or at all, and receiving one of the pouches in what's understandably seen as severely being out of season is the sort of thing which creates a certain degree of panic. Ponies in the grip of that level of panic tend to tear pouches open. With their teeth. This includes the unicorns, because there are certain situations for which a horn just doesn't offer enough leverage.

I am perfectly aware of the deadline to file as a candidate for the next mayoral race. I did not need this reminder, nor do I need any future reminders. Quite frankly, I have yet to make a decision on whether I should submit myself into the race, because being mayor means taking on the responsibility to look after an entire settled zone and right now, I can't even manage to help a single mare and her son, a colt who is lucky to be alive and still requires extensive physical therapy before he can truly recover himself, SOMETHING WHICH IS CLEARLY MORE IMPORTANT THAN FILING CANDIDACY PAPERWORK TOO MANY MOONS IN ADVANCE, AND YOU CAN JUST BUCK ALL THE WAY OFF --

Branch,

I don't know if I'm even going to send this letter.

It's stupid, I know. Canterlot's right there. You'd likely have it tomorrow morning without a government stamp in play. Inside of two hours with a courier, or just about instantly with Spike. But I don't know if I'm going to send it. I'm writing this because it's as close as I can come to talking with you without your being home.

Either way, at least it's not official government correspondence. (There are some things where I just don't feel like making mandatory copies.) It's just a mare talking to her spouse.

I used to tell myself that I was one of the truly lucky ones. Yes, my job kept me in Ponyville and my husband had to be in Canterlot most of the time. But Canterlot was right there. Before the trains, there were times when you got to take the day trot home. And once the rails came in... we started to lose the hotels, but I had you for more nights than ever before. You could just about commute. And a mare who had to decide what was best for her town, instead of just for her...

I know you'll be home in a few days. The start of term is rough on you, especially with your committee assignments. You have to be away for a while. Stuck in Canterlot, when I'm hitched to Ponyville. But you'll come back to me in time. You always do.

I wish you were here now. I want your voice. Your advice. Your warmth next to me in a bed which feels far too empty every night. And I wish Judi was here, but... let's be honest with each other: an adult daughter who's trying for a judgeship probably shouldn't be hearing any of this.

You shouldn't either. Plausible deniability.

So that settles it. I'm not sending this. I'm just writing on some paper and pretending it's talking to you.

Maybe it'll still help.

I haven't filed my candidacy with the EEC yet. I don't know if I'm going to. Because I feel like I lost control over Ponyville in the course of a single night, one which went on for hours longer than it should. I just didn't fully realize that at the time. This community needs somepony who can take care of it and right now, I can't even take care of a single mare and her son.

Remember when I almost wound up running unopposed in the last election? Even the marked potential candidates are afraid to try for this post. Nopony wants the responsibility for Ponyville. For the Bearers, and everything which comes with them. It's a growing community, even with all the ponies who move away. Which means half of our primary export is former population, and most of the rest is chaos. Plus a few dresses.

I don't feel like I'm doing my job.
I don't know if I can still do my job.
By the time you get home, I may not have my job.

I've been reviewing ways to get ponies taken off committees. There's only a few, they aren't fast enough, and very few legislators will invoke any for fear of eventually having those methods used against them. And I know you'd do it for me, but... Night Court.

So I think it has to be something else.

This is about one mare and her son. Not the herd. If I do this, I probably lose the herd.

Lose my post, anyway. I'm not sure if I've truly had the herd for a while now. Starting with at least six of those within it.

This is also about responsibility.

Because that's what politics is, isn't it? In the ideal, for however often that's ever been accomplished. That we don't speak for ourselves. We speak for the herd. For those who feel as if they have no voices.

The herd is made up of ponies.

There is a two-pony family. Mother and son. Uncertain and afraid and almost out of time. (I talked the bank into showing me the numbers.) Right now, that's the herd.

And if you're not willing to lose everything for your herd, then you didn't deserve to have one.

To: Minori Verdante
c/o Day Court Building #6

The spell is now beginning to take effect. That is what the sensation currently soaking into your fur means.

Continue to read. Do not move. Do not gallop. Do not cry out. The spell (or rather, curse) will take effect regardless. And reading is the only way you're going to learn how to escape.

Now that I have your attention -- because you opened the one pouch which you would HAVE to open... I would like to talk about the duties of a politician. Or rather, of a mayor.

You are a Day Court representative and, even as a rookie, I would like to think you recognize that when it comes to Drayton, you are supposed to be there to speak for all those who cannot do so for themselves. Additionally, you are present in Canterlot to provide that service for the whole of your community: not just the ponies you personally like or from whom you receive campaign contributions. I would hope that you recognize that, because a mare should generally know the exact principles which she has chosen to ignore.

But that is the duty of a Day (or Night) Court representative. It's rather more complicated for a mayor.

It was harder to communicate in the old days, did you know that? The Princess was in charge, but Canterlot was a rather long way off and hoping that she would personally do something about a situation required telling her about the problem first. It could put any number of solutions on rather extreme cross-continent time delay. And it meant that in many ways, every community was effectively its own little nation. One which, far too often, had to fend for itself, because an ally might not be able to respond in time.

So a mayor was the Princess of her herd.

She had to guide them. Protect them. Something which applied to every last pony in that herd. And do so regardless of the cost to herself, because that is what the job requires.

Yes, Ponyville is in Canterlot's shadow. In theory, even before the trains, if galloping and flight and teleports were all cut off, we just had to send up a few smoke signals and ask the pegasi for a helpful wind while hoping onto Sun that the Princess was looking in the right direction. That's still potentially hours lost. And in those hours, ponies get hurt. Unless the herd leader acts.

With you, of course, the time lost has been more towards several weeks.

Yes, my settled zone takes more funds from Disaster Relief than any other. We host the Bearers. There's a certain degree of fallout. You are using the false 'logic' which would deny future medical supplies to fighting troops because those units are using a disproportionate excess of the bandage budget and from there, cutting off combat-affected civilians from such aid is just one extra hoofstep. But as long as the Bearers are here, this is the frontline.

So I have to be mayor and battlefield general alike. A double Princess. My filly self would be thrilled.

I try to hold this community together, as best I can. I relish the days when my duties center around giving out an award or opening a festival, because that means nothing else is going wrong and when it comes to days like that? There are now very few of them. Ponies move here to witness the spectacles which replaced those quiet days, while failing to understand that they will eventually become involved. Others leave. But as long as they are here, they are part of MY herd. And I am their Princess.

So. That spray which went into your fur, at the moment you opened the Equestrian Election Commission pouch? That was the result of a joint effort between our resident zebra and Magic. (You do recall that I host Magic within my borders, correct?) A conjunctive effect, one so new as to have no counter. And here's what it does.

Within one day, the text of every form, bill, and letter which you either haven't read or deliberately ignored will be crawling across your fur.

I understand that you haven't been doing much of anything on your committees, so that text will have to take turns and even then, the font will be quite small. But I'm assured that it will be fully legible. And, unless you cooperate, permanent.

Feel the itching? How it spreads out from your soaked snout? The spell continues to take hold. The words come to your fur and skin, Ms. Verdante, your skin because shaving the fur away won't stop this. Every syllable you ignored in the name of taking away voices is going to be part of your flesh.

I suppose you'd like to know how to stop this.

Read the letters. The relief application forms which you have been delaying. Quickly. And then go vote on them, which will include passage of the NORMAL budget and a sworn-into-the-record promise to let that stand for as long as you serve. (If it helps, that shouldn't be very long at all.) The spell will know when this happens, and then it will begin to lift. You should have a few hours to get it all done before the first visible signs appear and when that happens, I will have photographers waiting outside your office and home. They are prepared, dedicated, and every last one works for the newspapers which you won't speak with.

And if you somehow still choose not to grant Crimson Skate and her son their relief, along with all of the others who await the succor granted by empathy? If you hide away, or try to escape? Then I am fully prepared to meet you in person, regardless of whether or not I have an appointment. And being barred from your office will no longer stop me.

Because if you are placed into a state in which you cannot serve for a few moons due to, just for example, hospitalization, somepony else will be placed onto the Disaster Relief committee and everything will still go through.

I'll be in prison, of course, but... a general must be willing to suffer capture so that her charges may live.

Welcome to realpolitik.

The itching is getting really bad now, isn't it? I imagine it's reached your neck now. And it's crawling.

Find your empathy, Ms. Verdante, or at least figure out how to fake it. Then go do your job.

Oh, and I had this letter treated via potion. There's a certain light sensitivity factor in play. To wit, I timed how long it would take for an ordinary pony to read the whole of this, and then bumped up the number to account for you.

You may want to back away now. This scroll is about to catch fire.

Palace Master Copy Of Received Document. (Duplicates to be made for Solar and Lunar wings.)

...and I offer my assurances to the full Diarchy that I do have copies of every letter I sent to Ms. Verdante, as per official policy regarding such government communications. So clearly I would have one for that which she merely claims I wrote, had it ever actually existed. I do feel somewhat amused by her claim, though. She makes a lot of them, don't you think? But only to certain sets of forever-twitching ears, while never truly talking to anypony else. I understand from Forward Bill that her actions during the last Disaster Relief committee session denoted the first time she tried to temporarily learn everypony else's names.

Actually, given how she speaks of you to certain parties, I'm rather surprised that she tried making a direct claim to the thrones at all.

However, I do apologize for having put my true final attempt to discuss Ms. Skate's situation (which was clearly read, and I pride myself on finally having found the right words) into the EEC pouch. I do have a copy of that one, of course. As do you, as I understand that the scroll was still in the pouch when Ms. Verdante shook it out in front of you. I do wish I knew how it had become that sticky.

The use of the EEC pouch was an accident. I certainly didn't intend to put it back into service, but we do try to recycle here. Additionally, this is a rather harried Town Hall at the best of times, and mistakes happen. Besides, there's no penalty for misuse of one. I checked.

And the claimed "conjunctive effect" spell? That doesn't even exist! I checked with both Zecora and Ms. Sparkle. They've tried to combine their respective magics before this, you know. Perhaps you even heard the fading echoes from some of the explosions, although I suspect the fuchsia smoke plumes held together longer.

But that brings us to the rigged spray at the mouth of the pouch. Consisting of the brand-new prank shop liquid which induces both itching and, if left in place for a few hours, slow-spreading fur discoloration. Well, put bluntly, I have the community which hosts the Bearers. Which very much includes Ms. Dash, who apparently decided that one of her frequent trips into my office was giving her a chance to be "funny." Please be assured that I will speak with her about that myself.

Hopefully this has settled all of your questions. If any issues remain, feel free to contact me once again. For now, I have a relief voucher to deliver. Personally.

I need a point of clarification. When you said that you would both be keeping a close watch over my career from now on, exactly how did you mean that?

I am once again requesting clarification...

First draft. To be reviewed or rewritten prior to sending.

To: The Equestrian Election Commission

Enclosed please find my official filing as a candidate in the indicated upcoming race. As per government policy, I will have made a copy for my own records.

I can't control the Bearers. I can't fully halt the disasters or stop the chaos. (The chaos recently dropped by my office for tea.)

But I feel as if there's some things I can still do here.

Sincerely,
Marigold Mare (Princess Mayor, Ponyville.)