Life went on in the village below.
I looked out over it from the throne room, some papers laying on my throne behind me from before and for once, I was alone. The last audience had already come and gone. Flower had left for admin land, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
Somewhere I didn't particularly want to be right now.
Sunny and Sparks were leaving for their vacation in six hours or so, so I had taken a short night to spend some time with them, but the papers I got from Tight Bit after our meeting a couple of nights ago was...
...We were doing worse than I had thought.
We weren't out of money and the fact that we now grew a lot of food to complement what we could harvest and import helped a lot, but we were still bleeding heavily from other imports and the wood, fruit and other goods we did export didn't cover it. Especially with the payment to the throne on our loans.
That was before we even talked about taxes! Sure, my ponies paid taxes to Nocturnis but none of it went on to the rest of Equestria. As a new colony, we had fifteen years before they would start collecting to help us build up.
That time was coming, not fast, but it was coming. If our economy still looked like this when it did, it'd kill the town.
I knew none of my ponies were rich.
Buck, as far as I knew I only had a thousand bits to my name and that was still more than 99% of ponies living in Nocturnis. The income from the royal guard training outpost helped a lot, they brought bits straight into ponies pockets and boosted local businesses, but they also caused a lot of headaches and friction.
Maybe this entire thing had been a bad idea from the start.
Sure, all I would need to do was ask and Luna and Celestia could prop the village up forever, but that felt wrong.
Did I really buck up that badly with this place? Should I just have made a village closer to Canterlot?
Would ponies have been better off if I just left things as is?
They wouldn't be happy, but at least they wouldn't be stuck in a jungle, slowly getting poorer. What more, I wouldn't be able to get a straight answer from any of them!
If I asked if it was worth it, it would just be 'of course it is, your majesty!'
Because I was a bucking alicorn. I didn't ask to be an alicorn, I didn't ask to be a bucking prince and I definitely didn't ask to be up in charge of anything!
I could barely take care of myself! That’s why I relied on Flower so much.
Maybe a survey?
No, that won't work, it'll be official. They’ll just say everything’s great.
I sighed, leaning against the pillar. I tried to take walks around the village, meet ponies, talk to them. But they all treated me like...
Royalty.
Like ponies treating Celestia or Luna.
What I needed was to find out what the regular bat thought and felt, what their concerns, worries and hopes were. If I knew that, maybe I could come up with a way for us out of this. Normally I would talk to Sparks and Sunny, they're both smarter than me, but they're going on vacation.
I'm not putting this on their backs just before they are set to leave.
I'll talk to Celestia, she'll know better than anypony what to do. And Midnight, she's as smart as Sparks for obvious reasons.
But bucking damn it, things would be a lot easier if ponies would just talk to me like I was a regular po-
A thought struck me and my ears went straight up.
A regular pony.
I needed to talk to Midnight. Spreading my wings, I jumped off the balcony and banked, turning and flying down across to her and Sparks lab. Landing on the balcony, I looked at the signal on the wall.
It was not turned to red, so it should be safe to enter. I knocked anyway, "Midnight?"
The door opened and she blinked at me in surprise, "Page? I would have thought for sure you'd spend the rest of the night with Twi and Sunset."
"I am, but I want to run something by you real quick. I have an idea, I need you to tell me I'm being dumb."
I told her.
She blinked at me, "...A necklace that make you look like a regular batpony so you can pretend to be a new arrival and see first hoof the difficulties of the normal ponies?"
I nodded, "Correct. We'll come up with some excuse why I'm missing. Like... I'll spend a week doing special alicorn meditation or something in seclusion. You can run court while I'm away."
Midnight looked hesitant, "I don't know if this is a good idea, Page."
"Why?"
"Well, for one thing Twi will staple my ears to the floor if you get hurt and don't have your guards along," Midnight pointed out, tapping a hoof against the floor.
"It'll be fine, Amber and Thorax can keep an eye on me without being spotted," I reassured her, "And I don't want Sparks or Sunny worried, I want them to focus on their vacation. Besides, I’m not going to do anything dangerous. After coming back from the train, I’m not going to leave the village or shield."
Midnight hesitated, "Maybe."
"Can you make the necklace?" I asked, "I can't hold an illusion for that long, especially while asleep. And I need it quick, I want to be able to pretend to have gotten off the train when it leaves this morning."
"Don't want much, do you?" she asked with a frown.
I shrugged, "...So? What do you think? Dumb or not?"
Midnight sighed, "I can see the value," she admitted reluctantly, "I don't like it, but I can see the value. Alright, I'll help. Go spend time with Twi and Sunset, I'll do some research and meet you by the train when they leave."
I gave her a quick hug, "Thanks Midnight, you're the best."
She shook her head but hugged back, "You're a good pony, Page," she said and then let go, "Now get going, I have a lot of work to do."
I left.