//------------------------------//
// Up the Apples and Pears 
// Story: Practice Makes Perfect 
// by The Great Scribbly One 
//------------------------------//

Six stammers, four times I caught my eyes wandering away from the crowd, I almost tripped on the way back inside and oh Celestia, I completely forgot the cheese!

Reaching the bottom of the main stairwell of the city hall, I took a moment to smooth down my fringe, which had been steadily fraying ever since Butter's last minute attentions. The pair of Crystal Guards who had fallen in behind me at the top stopped unobtrusively.

Portraits of mayors stretching back centuries stared down disapprovingly, or so it seemed, taking note of how GDP and stock markets declined with every reputation-tarnishing fumble I made. I'd have to find a cheesemaker if I could, to make sure they didn't think they were unappreciated and get upset at their cheesemaker meetings and go on strike... Was there a guild of cheesemakers? A union? I didn't have time to look it up, but maybe I could fix that later.

The double doors loomed ahead and I checked myself over one last time before stepping forward, dragging the weight of a country behind me. One of the Crystal Guards, part of a unit Shining had loaned us to cover the festival's security arrangements thanks to Princess Luna's ongoing work refurbishing the Royal Guard, moved ahead to open them.

The noise from the sun-drenched market hit me like a wall. It wasn't any different to what I'd heard at the window and not nearly as loud as on the balcony, but even a moment away was enough to be shocked again.

As I walked down the steps, I wondered how anypony could cheer me after that mess. Logically it meant they weren't angry at least, but then again most Ponies aren't very logical creatures.

"Boo!"

Instinctively, I reared back with a whinny from the six or seven year old colt who'd just jumped out from behind a bin to my left. Unfortunately with rear hooves on two different steps, I lost my balance despite flailing wings. The next few seconds were a blur, but I can infer that one of the guards dove forward to catch me as I fell. He didn't quite hit the mark though and we ended up thumping, rolling and clattering down the last few steps together, shattering a large flower pot at the bottom.

All the same, he might have saved my life. Hitting my head on the edge of a step or that pot would have been no joke.

I blinked spots out of my eyes, revealing the hooves of the second Guardspony. He had moved up to interpose himself like a brick wall against the crowd, who had surged forward, necks craning around his bulk. Others took to the air, further congesting the scene even as a few coppers tried to reach us.

"Are you all right, ma'am?" Came a voice from below.

I voiced the automatic response to that question before I'd really had time to consider. "Yes, I'm fine."

"Then if you wouldn't mind, ma'am?" He asked, gesturing vaguely with a hoof. He sounded somehow familiar, but the enchantments on his armour made him look like any other Crystal Guard.

"Oh, right." I said awkwardly, clambering off him, gingerly avoiding treading on pottery shards. "Um, thanks."

"All in a day's work." He replied with a grin, getting up and checking himself over. His armour had taken the brunt of the fall and was covered in dents and scrapes.

"Focus, Sentry." The other Guardspony cut in, before shoving a camera-wielding reporter back. "Give the Princess some room!"

"Yes, sarge." Sentry said, nipping up the steps to collect his spear.

The worried crowd, seeing I was on my hooves, altered in some subtle way I couldn't quite latch on to. I did my best to ignore the press (in more than one sense) as I looked around. The foal who caused it all had been hauled away by the ear by his father, while a presumable grandmother berated him. His mother seemed to be shouting apologies to the world in general.

I moved to follow them and set things straight, but another yelling reporter got in the way and in the seconds it took for the Guardsponies to shift her, the family were lost in the crowd.

Thwarted, I started answering worried inquiries with what I desperately tried to not let be nervous jabbers. Not that it mattered too much in hindsight, given that I could barely make myself heard without shouting.

"Do you need to go, ma'am?" The sergeant asked quietly in my ear, once Sentry and the police had taken most of the pressure off him.

It was very tempting, but I really was fine physically and giving up would have let everypony else down.

I drew myself up in my best impersonation of my tutor and shook my head. "I'm fine." Brushing down my battered mane, I turned back to the crowd. "I'm fine, everypony!"

I struggled to judge their reactions, but gradually, I was able to make my way forward to the produce-laden table I had been headed for before the accident. Ironically, now that near-disaster had struck, I felt far more confident than I had a moment before, like a pressure valve had been released.

Princess Celestia always focussed on foals and the elderly in these sorts of appearances, and I followed the pattern. The old mares and stallions were polite and deferential as you'd expect, even if most of the time it felt a bit less warm than with the 'real' Princess, as it were. Then again, that might have just been leftover adrenaline talking.

The foals were definitely excited to see me though, and it struck me in an odd sort of way that a lot of them either didn't remember a time when there was just the Princess, or thought it was it was normal to get a new one every couple of years, like how a leap in telescope optics had led to new moons being discovered around Eyr and Maar (the planets, that is) while I was growing up.





I had a vague idea of where to go from the event plan, but there was no specific order. My original reason for looking out over the market before the speech had been to plan out an efficient route, which I now stuck to, all the while keeping the Princess in mind. Any hope for an A grade, so to speak, was well and truly dead, but I hoped I could still pass if I just followed her lead.

The first stops took me around the regular attendees closest to the city hall, many of whom had been waiting several hours. Unfortunately, as much as it felt like my responsibility to greet as many as possible, and even avoiding staying in one place where the crowds would eventually close in and overrun me, fumbling through a couple of dozen brief conversations and tastings started to make my head spin from the constant switching of social course. Thus, I began following the flags and banners toward where the various organisations involved in the event had set themselves up, stopping here and there along the way to avoid seeming unfriendly.

A few disappointed faces rattled me, especially whenever I moved on too fast, but I kept to my internal schedule. That at least placated my nerves enough that I wasn't actively panicking at every hairpin along the route.

At those important stops, I brushed shoulders with famous musicians I had never heard of, put in a good word for Rarity with a fabric magnate and even managed to drag myself away from a conversation with Professor Right Angle, of all the amazing mares to meet in the street, about the paper I had read on the train before my plans were interrupted again.

An auburn coated Unicorn shoved her way into my path, almost knocking over a passing septuagenarian in the process. Just behind her puffed a stallion with an old hooded camera.

"Hello there ma'am! I'm Idle Gossip, from Under Wraps magazine!" The mare declared through a grin of bleached teeth. "How's Rarity doing?"

"Um, busy." I replied, taken a bit off-guard and glancing at the elderly mare who was staring daggers at the newcomer. "Do you know her?"

"We've met." Idle said, taking a note. "Do you mind a few teensy weensy questions from the press?"

I considered timings, then shook my head. "I can spare a moment."

Idle levitated a notebook and pencil out of her heavy trench coat. "What do you have to say about how Princess Luna is pushing in on Princess Celestia's secret affair?"

The half-dozen or so state secrets I'd been briefed on recently clamoured for attention, but none of them seemed to fit the bill. That made me wonder if I was looking at the bizarre question from the wrong perspective. "Pardon?"

The mare waved airily at nothing in particular. "Oh you know. We all love Princess Cadance, but she didn't just fall out of the sky."

What a weird leap of logic. "She's from a branch of the old Mi Amore dynasty who escaped Sombra's coup. Princess Celestia fostered her, which is why she calls her auntie."

She leaned forward like a character in a bad spy story and pointed her pencil at me. "You don't call her that though."

"Of course not, I was- Ghee!" I flinched when a flash exploded in my eyes.

While I blinked spots away, the camerapony stowed away the plate.

The 'journalist' ploughed on. "What do you think got Princess Luna so riled up that she would sack all her sister's strong, handsome stallions? Do you think it was because she wouldn't let her dear Blueblood go off to kick the bugs out of Olenia?"

Taking a step away from her over-minty breath, I put my hoof down in what I hoped was the right way. "That's another leading question. I'm sorry, but if you aren't going to interview in good faith, then I'll be off. Good day to you."

As I brushed past, I wished I'd just fobbed her off to begin with after what she did to that old mare. Of course in theory I knew that gossip rags existed, but surely nopony actually thought about Princess Celestia like that? It made me feel sick, sick and angry. Since quite a young age I had never quite been able to believe in the Whispering Tree, however much I wanted to. Rational motes of primordial dust just seemed more likely than creator gods and the rising Mesohippus was a brighter beacon of hope to me than falling Ancestors, but I knew for just as long that Princess Celestia was a devout Epalantilda who took the teachings to heart.

She was the best of all Ponies, an example to us all.

With my last stop before the palace in sight, I moved as fast as the crowd would let me away from that depraved mare.





Cider swished around my tongue a few minutes later, the aromatic bloom of the alcohol making the sip feel much larger in my mouth despite being drier and, thank goodness, milder than anything the Apple family made. There was a hint a bit like smoked cheese to it was well, which did wonders for clearing that nasty mint out of my nose.

"What do you think, ma'am?" Asked the genteel old Unicorn stallion who had been introduced to me as Pear Pounder.

I swallowed and looked down at the small glass in my field. Almost instinctively I wanted to swirl what was left in it. "I'm not much of a cider taster, but it's nice. I didn't know you could smoke cider."

A big purple hoof rapped against the top of the barrel. A kilderkin, if I remembered the measurements. "It's all about the wood. This here be five years aged, so it's 'ad plenty of time fer the smoked oak to seep in."

"Oh, so it's doped through chemical leeching, that makes sense." I said, flicking an ear. "I suppose you can control how smoky it tastes by how long you keep it then, and the temperature."

Bushy eyebrows worked for a moment before he nodded. "Oh, arrm. I suppose so. Not puttin' no drugs in with me apples, mind!" He added, a bit louder.

I resisted the urge to point out that technically speaking, ethanol is a drug. It helped that I was able to reason that the ethanol comes at least in part from the apples during the fermentation process, so he wasn't entirely off.

"Where was I..." Pear muttered. "Oh, yeah. You probably noticed it's not so bubbly as the stuff you'd get from the corner shop, right?"

I nodded.

"Well, that's from the age as well you see. Older the cider is, the flatter and darker. Flavour's more complicated too." He explained.

"Like the woodsmoke." I observed.

He smiled, a bit like Applejack did after an evening of applebucking. I wondered if he might be a distant relative. "That and all. You know you've got a proper old cider if there's a hint of caramel."

"That'd be a sort of slow, low temperature pyrolysis, plus some decay of long-chain molecules." I said, returning the smile.

"Arrm, yes. Suppose so." Pear said after a moment.

I realised I'd lost him, which meant it was time to pull out before things got awkward. "Well, thank you very much, that was very interesting." I said, turning toward the middle of the busy pavilion. "I shouldn't keep you though, I'm sure everypony else wants a turn!"

In the way they do, our smiles became a bit forced when a couple of cameras flashed. Taking care not to step in a sweet-smelling puddle which had somehow already managed to get on the floor, I worked my way out from behind the folding table.

"You looked like a natural." Said the surprisingly young president of the Canterlot Brewers' Association, waiting nearby.

"Thanks." I said. "The plan is just for me to go around now until it's time to head to the palace, right?"

"Yes ma'am." He confirmed, gesturing in the clockwise direction from the entryway. He picked up a few slices of white bread in his field. "You'll want these, by the way. Best stuff for resetting your palette."

"Thanks." I said, taking the bread and nibbling on some before a question came to mind. "You wouldn't happen to know if there's anything I should be careful with?"

"I'd go easy on the 'Upton Wizard Buster', that stuff's one-twenty proof. Only whisky we've got here today." The president said, gesturing toward the opposite side of the pavilion. "Otherwise though, you're clear. Nothing like that 'Knockout Punch' from down your way, at least."

I winced at the memory of the one time Rainbow managed to persuade me to try some of Granny Smith's finest, yet least well-named. Songs prominently featuring hedgehogs had been involved.

He laughed. "Yeah, I know the feeling. Brick wrapped in an apple skin, straight to the horn."

Before time could start to run away, I began the long loop from stand to stand, followed by the president. Cider didn't play as dominant a role in the festival here as it did in Ponyville, where I'm sure Rainbow was already pestering Applejack for seconds (or thirds), but this was still easily the biggest pavilion. Being acutely aware of my own, scrupulously measured alcohol tolerance, I therefore stuck to sips so I could share the royal patronage around as much as possible. Even so, I think I broke my one glass policy, but at this point I had so many worries bouncing about in my head that it didn't really register.





The Sun was sinking westward by the time I left the pavilion. The cider had done my nerves some good despite the niggling fear of another lurking disaster, but even so I wished I could simply teleport myself and the two Guardsponies directly up to the citadel gates. Sadly, magic and alcohol don't mix very well for metabolic reasons and so I had to face the crowds again.

"Do you have a moment, your Highness?" Somepony asked, just as I was starting to believe I might make a clean getaway.

I stopped staring at the ground in front of me, only to see a camera. My heart sank. "No, sorry."

The buck-toothed Unicorn looked put out and fell into step alongside me, dragging the camera's undeployed tripod behind in her field. "Is something the matter, bach? Off the record, you know."

I looked away and picked up my pace a bit. "Please just leave me alone."

She stopped without a word, though I could feel her eyes - or possibly those teeth of hers - boring into the back of my head until I reached one of the roads leading out of Highmarket.

There was a coach waiting at the junction and with a bit of help from the hoofmare, I was able to get aboard without any dress-related mishaps. Once the door closed, I did my best to sink into the cushioned bench, beneath the level of the windows while the haulers navigated their way through the streets.





I should hardly have bothered. The streets were almost deserted for most of the way and soon the carriage wheels crunched to a stop on the gravel path leading from the gates to the palace doors.

Strict Cadence was waiting among a few other parked carriages, tail lashing. "Bang on time, thank the Ancestors!"

"Is something wrong?" I asked as the hoofmare helped me down.

Strict bit his lip, looking up at the sky. "Could go either way, ma'am. There's chaos in the kitchens and I just got off the blower with the fire brigade."

Above, the carefully arranged clouds were drifting together. I felt my mane prickle. "What happened?"

"Take a look." He said, leading me around the corner of the palace and waving north-east toward the airship docks.

I couldn't see the docks themselves thanks to the citadel wall, but smoke shot eastward toward the Canterhorn like a falling pillar, the merlons and crenels creating a sawblade contrast of black and white beneath the gathering clouds. Goodness knows how many Pegasi must have been maintaining the artificial gale to carry it like that.

Of all days... I felt my fringe curling again. "Do they have the fire under control?"

Strict shrugged. "I haven't the foggiest, no pun intended. All Captain Spout told me was that something's gone up at the docks and she needs our weather team to help stop it spreading to the moorings. She's got the authority of course, but it'll be a right shame if we get rained out at the end 'cause some dockworker dropped a cigarette. It's the end which gets remembered best, you know."

I grimaced, though that at least explained the quiet streets. Rumour must have been spreading.

At that moment, Luna tore around the corner, just barely managing to avoid ploughing into us. Strict dipped his head.

She clattered to a halt and raised her visor. "There you are, Twilight Sparkle! I am heading to the docks at once!"

I had to take a step or two back from her, not because of her volume for once but rather the eye-wateringly powerful enchantments on her armour. "Please don't tell me we've been invaded."

Luna shook her head. "I would hardly face a foe without a brand. Nay, the panoply is merely a precaution against falling debris."

"I think that's the first good news I've heard all day." I said. "I'll get out of this dress and follow after."

She raised a forestalling hoof. "You will do nothing of the sort! Get you to the feast at once and bolster spirits, my skills shall suffice for this challenge." Then before either of us could respond, she slapped her visor shut and flew away, quickly dipping out of sight behind the parapet.

We both watched her go.

"Suppose we've got our marching orders." Strict said after a few seconds.

I nodded and turned toward the palace. Luna had a point, she was far more experienced with Pegasus magic than I was and probably ever will be.





A buzz of chatter thrummed through the magically lit throne room as soon as the doors closed behind me. Long tables had been set together down the middle of the hall, but unlike the biweekly open dinners, Everypony that evening was a select guest. Some I recognised, but most were complete strangers or had simply faded into the background of the court while I was growing up.

I could almost hear Applejack in my head as I walked toward the thrones: 'Rich as a triple chocolate pudding, and as much sense between them.'

Certainly my dress felt almost cheap by comparison to the ludicrous wealth on show from the more foppish displays, but it wasn't really a fair assessment. There were plenty of idiots, but I recognised professors from the university and there was plenty of business talk as I passed. Even some of the nobles engaged in less academic conversation, as much as I hate to admit it about a twit like Blueblood, I knew weren't idiots either. Blueblood was one of Shining's lecturers at RMA Canterbury and an insufferably good infantry theorist even back then, or so I'm told. Not to mention the presence of an entire Fancy Pants, who wouldn't drop the average IQ even at a faculty meeting.

Reaching the raised dais, Strict caught a glass from a passing waiter and passed it to me before I climbed the steps. Technically, I was supposed to use Princess Celestia's throne as her stand-in, but I couldn't bring myself to, instead opting to stand between the two.

It's odd how the view was so different, without her there. Almost everypony was looking at me now.

I cleared my throat, trying not to fidget as I recalled the prewritten speech. This was nothing like addressing Highmarket just a few hours earlier. The crowd there had been so enthusiastic that even with a microphone I struggled to make myself heard at the start. Here, there was an expectant silence which sent a shiver along my back. This speech at least, I could be sure was good. The Princess had written it for me.

"Um, my dear stallions and gentlemares, representatives from a dozen countries, I am pleased to welcome you all to the palace tonight to celebrate one of the oldest feasts in the calendar, older than Equestria itself. But I shan't keep you long from the delightful dinner the kitchens have prepared with a history lesson! As always, our thanks goes out to them, and to the farmers who won it from the soil for us. And let us also thank the firefighters even now risking their lives to protect our beautiful city."

There was a murmur as the more devout present passed their own thanks up the Whispering Tree. I gave them a moment as Princess Celestia had suggested, hoping my little addition hadn't come across as too clunky.

Once the majority of heads were back up, I continued. "In complicated times, it is wise now and again to stop and be grateful for the simple things we have. Gentle weather, fertile soil and peace to harvest their bounty. In this year of shocks, all too many lack these things. Therefore as winter approaches, the least we can do is reach out with compassion to them, be they Posniaks fleeing persecution from far Vartai or Olenians upon our very doorstep, whose country has been so viciously and unjustly invaded. Let us now drink the health of Queen Velvet, may she see Hjortland again soon!"

I raised the cider held in my field to the room and below there was a rattle of glass. Near the head of the long table, the doe in question stood and curtsied to me, though she didn't look too cheerful.