//------------------------------//
// Meanwhile... 
// Story: If Solaris had a Text-to-Speech Device 
// by Jay David 
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Twilight sighed as she rested her head against the edge of the Friendship Map. "I had so many questions to ask! I could have written a whole book about the things I might have learned!"

Applejack, sitting not that far away, raised an eyebrow to her. "Er, no offense, Twi, but the last time ya made a book it didn't really work out all that well fer us."

Twilight leaned back into her chair, groaning in frustration. "Ugh! I know! But this is the father of Celestia we're talking about! An alicorn from a time we barely have any records of! Think of what kind of ancient, lost knowledge we could have gleaned!"

Rarity, who had just finished drawing down the last touches of a new dress design she'd brought with her to the meeting, looked to her alicorn friend with a smile. "Trust me, dear, you're better off up here than down there in those dreadful catacombs. Why, the fact that you managed to emerge without being covered in cobwebs is nothing short of a miracle in and of itself!"

Fluttershy then frowned to her. "Hey now! Those spiders are just doing their job by making those!"

Rarity softened in her tone as she looked over to her animal-loving colleague. "Apologies, Fluttershy. No offense intended."

Fluttershy opened her mouth to speak again, only to be stopped by the sound of furious scribbling nearby. She turned her head, as did everypony else, to seer that it was Pinkie, frantically writing something down on paper while her tongue was sticking out of the side of her mouth. "Um...Pinkie? What are you doing?"

Pinkie, looking up, grinned widely in that usual way of hers. "Well, I got to thinking. The six of us are basically in charge of Equestria, right?"

"...Yes?" Applejack answered warily.

"Well them," Pinkie continued. "How about we go ahead and introduce a bunch of new laws and stuff?"

Twilight, having finally lifted her head up from the table, looked to her friend with some small measure of concern. "What did you have in mind?"

Taking on a more mischievous look, Pinkie raised the paper she'd been writing on, holding it high for all to see. "How's this? We make it illegal for anypony to be grumpy on any day that happens to be somepony else's birthday?"

Twilight blinked. "Pinkie...every day is somepony's birthday,"

Putting the paper down, Pinkie nodded firmly. "Exactly! With one stroke, we make everypony happy all the time! It's genius!"

Understandably, and unsurprisingly, Twilight buried her face in her hooves, after which she began to rub her temples in a doomed effort to alleviate her stress. "Pinkie...I appreciate the sentiment, but we can't force ponies to be happy all the time."

But Pinkie waved her off. "Pfft! That's quitter talk!"

Spike, who had just arrived onto the scene with a bowl of oats for his lifelong friend, offered it to her. After seeing her smile in appreciation and accepting it off him, the young drake glanced around. "Say...aren't we missing somepony?"

Applejack chuckled, then leaned back into her own chair. "Eyup. She should be arrivin' right about...now."

Sure enough, her instincts proved correct, as the doors of the castle burst open to reveal a very triumphant-looking Rainbow Dash, who darted over to her chair and sat herself down before speaking up to the rest of them. "Oh yeah! Another day, another victory for Rainbow Dash and the Wonderbolts!"

Fluttershy smiled to her childhood friend. "Another mission done already?"

Rainbow cackled. "You bet! We've been getting a tonne of orders from Canterlot lately. Find this, find that. No idea who's been asking for all that stuff, but I hope they're happy with us right now."

"Word on the street is that you've been set some rather dangerous tasks of late," Rarity remarked. "You're not worried?"

Rainbow shrugged. "Nah. Not really. I mean, yeah, it was kinda weird being asked out of the blue to find magical stuff and lost treasures and the like..." She then regained her famous smirk. "But don't worry. For I, Rainbow Dash, am on their team these days. So things went about as easily as you'd expect."

Applejack frowned to her. "Careful there, Dash. Yer head might not fit through the door if ya let it swell up like that."

The two mares shared a laugh together shortly afterwards, during which time Spike looked over to Twilight, poking her in the side to get her attention. "So...Celestia and Luna's dad?"

Twilight smiled to him. "You heard right, Spike. An alicorn of an era older than any of us even knew about. Before Celestia, before Starswirl, before any of it."

"So...what's he like?" Spike asked.

Here, Twilight halted, blushing slightly. "I...might have possibly been asking too many questions to really get a gauge on his personality."

Spike put his hands on his hips and shook his head, disappointed but not in any way surprised by Twilight's apparent reaction to the old king. After giving her a moment to get her silent embarrassment out of the way, the youngster started tapping his chin. "Let's see...old, magical royalty. Big, mythic figure. Used to be in charge but has spent thousands of years as a skeleton in a glorified basement." After a moment, he shrugged. "My guess? He's really bitter and cranky about everything his daughters are telling him about the modern day. Like those old folks who always complain about things used to be better in their day?"

Twilight looked to him with incredulity. "Oh come now, Spike. This is the stallion who brought up Celestia and Luna, remember? He's bound to have more dignity and class to him than that." She sat upright, regaining a smile for herself. "An alicorn's parent is likely refined, wise, brimming with untold charisma and respectability."

It was now Spike's turn to look to her with some skepticism. "Really? You mean like how our Dad is whenever he gets onto an impromptu dance floor?"

Thinking on that, Twilight forced a cough and glanced away, unwilling to look him in the eye. "Yes...well...good point."