//------------------------------// // The Trial Of Quizzical Greystone // Story: Thweet Geniuth // by JMac //------------------------------// Thweet Geniuth Chapter 9  The Trial Of Quizzical Greystone   Quiz was bedridden for 5 days.  It went against the bedside manners of the staff of the Ponyville Hospital to discuss just how close a call a patient had experienced.  So nopony talked about it. Quiz awoke late on the second day and declared that, while she was very tired, she wanted to go home.  To prove that all her faculties were still intact, Quiz summoned three of her magic blackboards and did a different quadratic equation on each of them, simultaneously. When she got one of the three problems incorrect Quiz agreed that perhaps she had better stay and rest a bit longer. She then fell fast asleep for another day. Bon Bon’s kitchen was almost undamaged, but the customer service area in the front of the shop was completely destroyed.  The Cakes offered her a little counter space at Sugar Cube Corner so Bon Bon was able to stay in business.  The repairs would be financed by a modest settlement with the painters and shipping company who had trapped everypony in the kitchen.  Also, the painter’s and shipper’s liability coverage, as well as Bon Bon’s insurance, were all held by companies wholly owned by the Greystone family.  A quiet word from Quiz to her parents expedited the whole process. While Quiz did not have many friends, she did have many well-wishers.  Ponyville was filled with parents of foals who Quiz had tutored to their first straight A report cards.  Quiz’s hospital room was soon filled with bouquets, all in the muted pastel shades Quiz preferred.  In fact, the Ponyville florists were soon cleaned out of such flowers.  Roseluck was heard to complain, “I don’t have any beige flowers, and I’m going to hurt the next pony who asks for that!  I’ll eviscerate anypony who asks for gray!” The exception was Snips and Snails, who went in halves for a garish red and purple display (which just happened to be marked down that day). The Ponyville Fire Brigade awarded Quiz a honorary firefighter’s badge.  After some debate, they gave one to Sweetie Belle as well (even though she’d actually started the fire).  Twilight and Rarity made it very, very, very clear that the badges were honorary, and no filly was going to be responding to any fire bells. Unfortunately, at the same time she had inspire many well-wishers, Quiz was also responsible for sending the local rumor mill into overdrive.  Everypony had soon heard the “Sweetie Belle walks through walls” story.  Twilight had made the mistake of mentioning in public that she worried that this was “just the tip of the iceberg.”  The fillies were all keeping the rest secret; this freed the rumor mongers to make things up.  A spell failure while walking through walls could get a pony cut in half.  What could be worse than that?  What wouldn’t the girls admit?  The stories became darker with each retelling. A clever pony, who did not wish Quiz and her friends well, could certainly use this rumor mill to her advantage. # “Excuse me, I couldn’t help but notice how smartly dressed you are,” said Rarity to the mare browsing in her shop.  “Is that the newest thing from Manehattan?” “Why, yes, it is.  Thank you for noticing,” said the mare.  She was unusually tall, and very pretty.  “You must be Rarity.” “I am.” “Is it true you have a little sister who has been influenced by that Quizzical Greystone filly?” asked the mare, gravely.  “It must be very distressing for you.” “Yes, well, it is troubling,” said Rarity.  “’Influenced’ may be a bit strong a word, mind you.  On the other hoof, perhaps it isn’t.” “It’s hard to imagine how a unicorn, supposedly a properly trained and educated unicorn at that, could behave so irresponsibly,”  said the mare.  “To have family involved with her must weigh heavily on your mind.” “Oh, you do understand!  It is a heavy burden!” cried Rarity, striking a dramatic pose to show how she suffered.  “I can hardly think of anything else!   So, are you interested in purchasing that jacket?” #                      “Here you go,” said Applejack, handing the pretty stranger the apple she’d just bought.  “And here’s your change.”                      “Thank you.  Say, are you Applejack?  Isn’t your little sister one of the girls that Quizzical Greystone filly got into trouble?”                      “Well, that’s mostly true,” said Applejack.  “Though, I can’t say as Quiz is all to blame, all by herself…”                      “Oh, some young unicorns think they know everything,” the mare continued.  “But you would think a good earth pony would have the sense not to get involved.  Do you think your sister really knows how dangerous playing with magic is?”                      “That is something I have been pondering on,” admitted Applejack. #                      “There, everything’s in order,” said Derpy, stamping the envelope she had just been handed.  “I’ll get this straight off to Manehattan.”                      “Thank you so much,” said the tall mare.  “Say, don’t you have a daughter who’s been listening to that Quizzical Greystone filly?” #                      Chisel Greystone VII sat as his daughter’s bedside; stroking her mane with one hoof, while in the other hoof he held his latest dispatch from the home office.  He read to Quiz about a promising new marble deposit they had discovered, much as the father of another foal would read a bedtime story.  Beryl Greystone took this occasion to suggest to Twilight Sparkle the idea of stepping outside for a bit of air.                      “My little heroine,” said Beryl, taking a seat on a bench in the hospital’s front lawn.  “Of course she doesn’t see it that way.  ‘My actions can hardly be called heroic, as I was delirious.’” Her imitation of Quiz was spot on.                      “How do you handle her, Mrs. Greystone?” asked Twilight, taking a seat beside her.                      “First, please do call me Beryl, Twilight.  But to answer your question, I suppose I do as little as possible.  Quizzical has always wanted very badly to be no trouble at all.  This isn’t as comforting as it sounds, for it is a symptom of how my daughter is not like other little ponies.  But it has meant that I have rarely had to be firm with her.”                      Twilight sighed.  “I’ve been very firm with her lately.  Quiz must hate that.”                      “Funny you should say that,” said Beryl, smiling gently.  “In her last letter Quizzical mentioned how ‘Miss Twilight has been very stern, and I know she dislikes this.  I hate that I have troubled her so, and I must try harder to behave for her.’  I think you and my daughter might need to have a long talk.”                      While Twilight pondered this Beryl continued.  “Now, as you have no doubt noticed, my Quizzical has an aptitude for accident.  So, those rare times when Quiz was a bother tended to be catastrophic.  Tell me, how many near drownings do you think it would take to teach an intelligent filly a healthy respect for water?  Four, apparently.”                      “Four!?” gasped Twilight.                      “And to this day I cannot promise you that Quiz will not spy a rock sample she finds interesting in the bed of a swiftly moving stream and be swept away yet again.  Oh, and swimming lessons did not prove to be an answer.  Perhaps I should call it five near drownings.”                      Twilight made a mental note to watch Quiz in the Spring when the streams were running fast.  “What do you do with her?”                      “Even in such cases I was not overly firm,” confessed Beryl.  “I feared to.  I know I could keep my daughter safe if I ranted and lectured until I’d drilled the curiosity out of her; but wouldn’t that be a terrible thing to do?  But these new misadventures are different.  For the first time she’s involved other fillies.  That is not acceptable.  I have heard that young Sweetie Belle protests that walking through walls was her idea and not Quizzical’s, and that she was just goofing off.  Well, if a magic experiment involves one filly who has studied theory at the Academy in Canterlot and another filly who has never cast a spell in her life which girl do you hold most to blame?”                      “But she’s still so young!” protested Twilight.  “It isn’t fair to hold Quiz responsible.”                      “Again, I quote my daughter, ‘Some mares have been holding Miss Twilight responsible for my behavior.  This is terribly unfair.  If I cannot be held responsible for myself I should not have been allowed to leave Canterlot.’  Really, you and Quizzical need to have a long talk, Twilight.  At any rate, Quiz’s error comes of a fundamental misunderstanding of her fellow fillies.  They aren’t given to careful experimentation, as she is.  A filly exposed to magic for the first time will see it as a toy, and will want to play.  Quiz should have predicted Sweetie Belle’s ‘goofing off.’  Quiz must learn – because a filly cannot walk halfway through a wall, such a mistake does not leave you a second chance.  And there must be some punishment to drive this lesson home.”                      “What do you want to do?”                      “Well, I find myself agreeing with my daughter.  This is not your responsibility, Twilight.  I will be punishing her.  Since we only have one thing left to take from her, Quiz will not be allowed to go to Manehattan for the candy making contest.  I will explain this to her, I believe Quiz will understand.”                      “Is that really necessary?” asked Twilight; even though this was exactly the action she was planning to take herself.                      “I think so.  You may reverse my ruling if you think it’s best, just don’t do so lightly,” said Beryl.  “But I do ask one thing of you, Twilight.”                      “Certainly.  Just name it.”                      “We must return to Canterlot soon after Quiz is released this afternoon.  Business demands it.  I will leave Quiz with you at a time when many of your friends and neighbors are angry with her for influencing their young ones.  Will you speak to them on my daughter’s behalf?”                      “Of course, Beryl,” said Twilight.  “I want to be fair about this.  No pony is going to be cruel to Quiz.” #                      No sooner had Quiz been declared fit enough to leave the hospital than Rarity called for a meeting.  That evening Twilight found the front room at her library filled with upset mares and embarrassed fillies.                      “Do we really have to do this?” wailed Twilight.  “Quiz has already been disciplined…”                      “Yes, but perhaps not enough for our satisfaction,” said Rarity.  “And we have the other fillies’ involvement to discuss.”                      “Can’t this wait?  Quiz still needs to rest…”                      “Oh, we won’t be interfering with her recuperation, I’m quite sure,” said Rarity.  “And no, this cannot wait.  I, for one, will not be able to rest easily until this matter is settled.”                      “We’ll try to make this quick, Twi,” said Applejack.  “But we got some questions need answerin’.”                      “We insist,Twilight, Dear,” said Rarity, with a smile that looked like the prelude to somepony getting bitten.                      Well, at least you left your torches and pitchforks at home, thought Twilight.  “You don’t actually have a say in Quiz’s punishment, Rarity.”                      “I. Do Not.  AGREE!” shrieked Rarity.   “She took things such as musical magic focusing and using gems as power amplifiers; things you and I do not understand; things the finest minds in Equestria do not fully understand; and she played with them in my parlor as if they were just a board game!  With.  My.  SISTER!”                      “Now, calm down, Dearie,” said Applejack.  “Twi, what’s got us most riled up is what came after the walkin’ through walls.  That’s a big mystery, and none of us like that.  We’d feel a whole passel better if we had a little truth about that.”                      “I strongly doubt that,” muttered Rarity.                      “And just how are we going to get at the truth?” exclaimed Twilight.  “That secret is protected by a Pinkie Promise.”  As upset as they were, the adults would never force the fillies to break their word.  Twilight continued to be amazed by how seriously Ponyvillians took a Pinkie Promise.                      “That’s why I’m here,” said Pinkie Pie.  “You can’t break a Promise, but you can tweak it a bit.  I’m going to adjudicate just how much the girls can say.”                      “Tweak the Promise?” asked Twilight, sensing a headache coming on.                      “Oh, yeah,” said Pinkie, nodding enthusiastically.  “For instance, the girls can’t admit if there was an experiment out on the barrens, but they can mention an ‘alleged’ experiment and maybe something that ‘hypothetically’ could have happened.  But not too many details.” Pinkie waved a warning hoof in the air.  “We take a Pinkie Promise seriously here in Ponyville.”                      “I’ve noticed,” grumbled Twilight, holding her head in her hooves.  “Celestia help me, please let this be the craziest thing I hear tonight.”                      “We should start with you, Twi,” said Applejack.  “We know you’ve been studyin’ on this.”                      “I’ve investigated a bit, yes,” said Twilight.  In fact she had been obsessively looking into the ‘alleged experiment’ but she’d made no real headway.  “I don’t have enough findings to present my research…”                      “Nonsense, Darling,” said Rarity.  “Please, do share.”                      “Fine,” said Twilight.  She didn’t have any results, but she’d gathered a lot of data.  Maybe, if I throw enough numbers at them they’ll get bored and leave.  Twilight summoned a magic blackboard.  She wasn’t as good with the spell as Quiz yet, but she achieved the effect she was looking for – a bewildering mass of equations.  “As you can all obviously see, there are still too many unknowns to draw any conclusions.”                      This was actually obvious to nopony, save one.                      “Oh, my,” gasped Quiz, “I do wish you had shared this with me before, Miss Twilight.  This is truly fascinating.”                      Twilight had been admiring her young assistant’s restraint; Quiz had stood her ground when her every instinct must have been to slip away and hide.  Unfortunately, now that she was given mathematics to distract her, Quiz completely forgot her predicament.   “I can help with the unknowns in this thrust equation.  Let the ‘hypothetical projectile’ be 28 pounds… distance is less certain… between 50 and 75 pony-lengths I would guess…”                      “Quiz you are not helping…” Twilight stopped dead.  “Fifty to 75 pony-lengths?!!”                      “I can only estimate,” said Quiz, sheepishly.  “Assume the hypothetical projectile’s flight was interrupted by a bush.”                      “That’s too much information, Quizzical,” said Pinkie.                      On several levels, thought Twilight.                      “So, Quiz, how much do you weigh?” asked Applejack.                      “Um… well… 28 pounds, actually…”                      “Hypothetical projectile, huh?” said Applejack.  “Ah think I’ve heard enough.”                      “Wait, wait, there’s more,” said Twilight, hoping to change the subject.  The display shifted, and became a map.  “I paced the area with a thaumometer.  This shows that even a month later there was still residual arcane radiation…” Oh, darn!  That was definitely not the best thing to show them.                      “Is that a lot?” asked Derpy.                      “Yes, it is.” “No, that is actually surprisingly low.” Twilight and Quiz answered simultaneously.                      “Quizzical, you aren’t very good at this,” said Pinkie.  “I don’t often say this to ponies, but I have to tell you – you should stop talking.”                      Yes, please! thought Twilight.  How can I defend you if you get me as upset as everponey else?                      “Now see, this proves what I was trying to tell you all the way over here, Big Sis,” said Apple Bloom, stepping up to the map.  “All this stuff about how Quiz is reckless and irresponsible is just silly!  Quiz is the carefullest, most fussiest pony in the whole world; she thinks about the little details that the little details have!  And there’s the proof.”                      “What are you talkin’ about, Girl?” demanded Applejack.                      “Right there!” cried Apple Bloom, stabbing at the map with a hoof.  “Where Twilight’s drawn all those zeros.  She didn’t find anything there with her thawmy-thingy.  There’s just tons and tons of rock between that spot and… any alleged bad stuff.  That’s where Quiz would have put us… if we actually ever did anything.”                      “And where was Quiz?” asked Applejack.                      “Pardon?”                      “While y’all were down in your safe place, where was Quiz?” Applejack asked again.  The fillies fell silent.  Applejack noticed that the question made one of the girls much more uncomfortable than the others.  “Sweetie Belle, where was Quiz?”                      “Too close,” whispered Sweetie Belle.  She began to tear up.  “Way too close.”                      “We should stop now,” said Derpy.  “I don’t want to talk about this anymore.  We all know what we want to do, don’t we?”                      “Yeah, there’s no call to be makin’ anymore fillies cry,” said Applejack.  “Ah think this is settled.”                      “Just one moment,” said Bon Bon.  She had been standing off to the side, fuming, through the entire proceeding.  Her bandaged tail no doubt did nothing to improve her mood.  “Before we pass judgment there is still one thing that’s been left unsaid, and I think it’s important that I say it now.”  She then went to Quiz, and enveloped the little filly in a huge hug.  “Thank you, Quiz.  Thank you so much for everything you’ve done for us.”                      Quiz went stiff as a board.  “Well… um… oh, dear me… you are… welcome… Miss Bon Bon.”                      “Yes, I know, you hate to be touched.  I’ll let you go, now,” said Bon Bon.  She turned and gave Sweetie Belle a big hug as well.  When she was finished Bon Bon addressed the room.  “There.  Now go on and punish them, since I can’t say anything to stop you.”                      “Alright,” said Applejack.  “You girls know this ain’t a court of law.  We don’t need a confession, we don’t actually need any evidence.  And sometimes, in foal rearing, it’s more important to keep you safe than to be fair.  You girls are separated from Quiz for the time being.  You are not to speak to her.  We are also extending your grounding to include Twist’s contest.  None of you are takin’ that trip to Manehattan.”                      “I do not feel this is sufficient,” snapped Rarity.                      “Well, it isn’t as if you can do any more,” Bon Bon snapped back.                      “We can’t, but Princess Luna could.”                      “What?!” Twilight stamped her hooves.  “I will protest that as strongly as I am able.”                      “I didn’t agree to that,” said Derpy.  “That’s just mean.”                     “Ah, won’t sign off on that either,” said Applejack.                      “She did just about the most dangerous thing I have ever heard of any pony doing!” screamed Rarity.  “For fun!  How can you all tolerate that?”                      “Maybe it’s because we look Quiz in the eyes when we talk about her, Rarity,” said Derpy.  “Quiz isn’t evil.  She isn’t even bad.”                      “Well, yes,” muttered Rarity.  Then she rallied, and was off again.  “I can’t have it.  I  just.  Can’t.  Have it!”                      “What are they talking about, Quiz?” whispered Sweetie Belle.                      “Rarity must be planning to contact Princess Luna, objecting to my behavior.  This would likely get me recalled to Canterlot.”                      Quiz couldn’t stand it any longer.  As the mares continued to argue, Quiz quietly slipped away and snuck back to her bedroom.  There she did something she could never do in front of witnesses.  Quiz had a good cry.