Applejack hadn’t gotten that much sleep the previous night, mostly because Luna was too busy to guarantee that neither the plaintiff nor the defendants (nor their lawyers) would show up in her dreams. Granted, this didn’t have any sort of physical effect on her, as she hadn’t had any biological need for sleep in twelve years, but staying awake until sunrise had been extremely dull, since the guard assigned to her for the night shift wasn’t very talkative. Merry May had tried to cheer her Princess up the next morning by pointing out an editorial in the Ponyville Express that claimed that whichever party was victorious in the accusatory stage would most likely win the whole trial. This, her seneschal claimed, was evidence that the worst would be over after today.
The Earth Goddess wasn’t nearly as optimistic about the situation as her captain, however. After all, if both parties’ cases rested on today’s proceedings, then their attorneys would no doubt tear into each other beak and claw, as the griffon idiom put it. The fact that the defense had brought a large, wheeled object wrapped in canvas into her throne room during the night didn’t bode too well either. She wasn’t certain what was underneath the tarpaulin, but if yesterday had been any indication, there was a good chance that it would disrupt her Court.
Might as well get this over with, Mara thought to herself as she ascended to her throne. “Be seated. Our Court will now continue the process of determining the burden of proof in the dispute between Diamond Tiara and FlimFlam Brothers, Inc. Today, we shall hear from witnesses who will vouch for the moral character of the defendants.” She quickly glanced over at the defendants’ attorney, whose confident, beaming smile did absolutely nothing to reassure her. “I assume these witnesses actually exist?” It was a rather sharp deviation from protocol, but Mara had ceased to care about that sort of thing in this trial.
Slim must have recognized this as a microscopically thinly veiled insult, but she brushed it off immediately. “They most certainly do, Your Most Royal Majesty, and I can assure that there is not a single pony who will leave this room with any doubts about the moral fiber of my clients.”
The Princess decided not to point out how things didn’t have to go particularly well for her clients in order for this statement to be correct, and returned to the standard protocol. “Have they agreed to testify of their own volition and without compensation?”
“Indeed, they have, Your Most Royal Majesty.”
“Then call your first witness.”
Slim stood up, ran a hoof through her lavender mane, and said, “Your Most Royal Majesty, the first witness that has come here today is famed for her innovations in the field of music, where she has melded magic and technology with artistic precision, thus enhancing the revelries of countless ponies. The defendants request the presence of Vinyl Scratch before Your Majesty’s Court.”
“Objection,” Silver Spoon said loudly, stunning everypony in the room, particularly Slim, who had obviously not anticipated this.
“Ms. Spoon,” Mara said, making every effort to hide the irritation in her voice, “what exactly are you objecting to?”
“I object to the defense’s first witness.”
Mara rapped her hoof on its armrest in an effort to keep the subsequent murmuring from escalating in volume. The throne room again fell silent, with the exception of a white unicorn with a blue mane and mirrored sunglasses who was standing in the aisle, looking confused. “Uh, does that mean I should sit back down?”
The Princess decided to ignore this question, as she had one of her own that needed answering. “Would the counsel for the plaintiff kindly explain what in tarnation she’s talkin’ about?!” She hadn’t meant to shout or to slip into her informal accent, but her patience was starting to wear thin.
The stone-faced attorney opened her briefcase and pulled out a manila file. “May it please this Court, the plaintiff would like to submit as evidence the file on Ms. Vinyl Scratch from the Canterlot Police Department. Over the past ten years, Ms. Scratch has been charged multiple times with disorderly conduct, public drunkenness, vandalism, littering, loitering, and excessive library fines. As such, she is unfit to serve as a character witness.”
Merry May passed the file to her Princess, who opened in and perused the contents. “She may have been charged with all of that, but she’s only been convicted on three counts of drunkenness and one count of vandalism. Drunkenness is a misdemeanor, and the vandalism was to deface a portrait of Prince Blueblood, who was probably asking for it anyway. I understand that the fact that she was involved in so many incidents might raise a few eyebrows, but that hardly disqualifies her from being a character witness, particularly since none of the incidents involve fraud or perjury. You can come forward, Ms. Scratch.”
The unicorn mare did so, grumbling under her breath as she took her place on the witness’ chair. Merry May walked over to perform her official duty as the Court’s marshall. “Please state your name and occupation for the Court.”
“The name’s Vinyl Scratch, and I DJ and produce electronic music under the stage name ‘DJ P0N-3.’”
“And do you promise to tell the truth to the best of your ability?”
“You bet.”
Merry May turned to Slim and nodded. “You may proceed.”
Slim walked up to her witness and began, “Now, Ms. Scratch, you have been plying your trade as a musician and composer for quite some time, if I am not mistaken.”
The white mare smiled and began bobbing her head in an extended nod. “Yeah, I’ve been doing that stuff since I got my cutie mark, but I didn’t start making a career out of it until maybe fifteen years ago.”
“I see. And can you explain the circumstances which initially thrust you into the public eye?”
“Well, I managed to get an underground following as a DJ pretty quickly with my chillout sets, but the whole ambient lounge thing was really constricting. I’d been wanting to break out and do something different, you know? Something that nopony had ever heard before. I tried mixing and matching different genres, and that got me some attention, but it never really felt original. Then I met the FlimFlams, and, well, thanks to them, my popularity shot through the roof, and I haven’t looked back since.”
“Indeed. Now, if you would be so kind as to recount your initial meeting with my clients, with particular attention paid to their subsequent influence on the musical tastes of ponies throughout Equestria, I would be most appreciative.”
“Well, I was at home, chillaxing with some minimalist classical music a friend of mine introduced me to, when all of a sudden, I hear this low bass tone just pulsing through my wall, like, drowning out everything, you know? I mean, I could actually feel the noise. I galloped to the window to see what was going on, and there were these two unicorns banging away on this big metal pipe organ type thing, only there was steam coming out of it. One of them was using magic on it, but from the looks on their faces, I don’t think that it was working the way they wanted it to. I mean, it still kind of sounded pipe organ-y, but there was a lot of rattling and squeaks and squelches and... and... WUBS!” The mare had broken out into a huge smile by the end of her statement and had spread her forelegs wide as she reveled in the memory.
Slim’s grin was equally wide as she turned to Princess Mara. “May it please the Court, the defense would like to submit as evidence a demonstration of the event Ms. Scratch described.”
“Fine,” Mara said. She figured it would be less stressful (and much faster) to just go with it instead of arguing.
Flim and Flam stood up and unfurled the canvas from the large object on wheels, which turned out to be a fairly sizable calliope. “Okay, brother of mine,” Flim said, “fire it up!” His mustachioed counterpart complied, pulling a lever and causing an engine to start chugging. Soon, steam started escaping from the pipes, creating clear metallic whistling noises. These notes soon formed themselves into a very familiar melody—in fact, Applejack had to fight the urge to sing about opportunities in her community, and if the looks on most of the spectators’ faces was any indication, she wasn’t the only one who felt that way.
However, right around the point where the first “nonpareil” would be, Flim’s horn suddenly glowed and surrounded his calliope with his magical aura. What happened next was... somewhat unexpected. Oh, all of the metaphorical bells and whistles associated with dubstep were there: the pulsating bass, the somewhat irregular rhythms, and the echoey squelches were certainly audible. But somehow, when combined with actual bells and whistles, the effect was extremely unsettling.
By the time the dust settled (and the vibrations of the calliope had in fact stirred up a surprisingly large number of infinitesimal particles around the room), many foals in the room were crying (as were quite a few adults), and there was a huge bottleneck at the exits where spectators were trying to flee for their sanity. The only pony who seemed to have genuinely enjoyed it was Vinyl Scratch, who had spent the whole time bobbing her head to something that vaguely resembled a beat. Mara was beginning to regret her decision to accept this “demonstration” as evidence without an argument.
It took nearly ten minutes to get everypony calmed down again, after which Slim continued to question the witness. “Now... you... enjoyed this particular experience when you were first exposed to it, correct?” It looked as though Slim could hardly believe the answer that Vinyl Scratch was about to give.
“Oh, yeah. I’ve always been into avant-garde stuff. Great way to get inspired, you know? Just hearing this gave me some amazing ideas of how I could incorporate it into stuff that, you know, regular ponies would like.”
“I... see. Very well, what actions did you take in order to facilitate your newfound muse?”
“Well, once things had calmed down, I went outside and talked to them. They said they were trying to make their calliope play improvised background music on cue while they were making their sales pitches or something, but the spells they were using kept interfering with the sounds coming from the pipes. So I asked them what spells they were using, and they told me. Then I asked if it would be okay to use them myself, and they said they were cool with it. A few weeks later, I’d managed to modify them so they wouldn’t short out my synthesizers, and hey presto, dubstep is born.”
“And did my clients ever try to profit off of their innovative contributions to musicology?”
“Nah. They were fine with letting me take most of the credit. I even offered to let everypony know that it was their idea in the first place, but they turned me down. This is the first time I’ve actually told the story in public, in fact. Totally humble, you know?”
“So, would you say this speaks well of their moral character?”
“Definitely.”
“You have my sincerest thanks, Ms. Scratch.” Slim turned to Silver Spoon and smirked. “The witness is yours to question.”
Silver Spoon approached the witness, who didn’t seem too happy that she had to answer questions from the mare who had basically insulted her earlier in the trial. For her part, the attorney seemed quite eager to conclude her conversation with Vinyl Scratch as quickly as possible, as she jumped right into the meat of her counterargument. “Ms. Scratch, did you inform the defendants of what you intended to do with the spell?”
“Yes.” The laid-back tone of the DJ’s voice had vanished completely, giving the surprisingly distinct impression that there was an icy glare hiding behind her sunglasses.
“Did they express any interest in your idea?”
“Not really.”
“Did they give you any assistance when you were adapting the spell for your synthesizers?”
“No, they’d already left town.”
“And during the initial composing stages? Did they provide you with any advice or feedback on how you were applying the spell to popular music?”
“No. I just said that they’d left town.”
“What about after your rise to prominence? Did they seek any help in using those techniques on their calliope?”
“If they had, I’m fairly certain they would have made a more accessible remix than the one they just played.”
“So, it was your idea to use their spells to make music, it was you who put forth the effort necessary to adapt the spells, and you were the only pony who tried to figure out how the spells could be used in a musical context. What exactly was it that they provided?”
“Uh, if they hadn’t had an accident, I’d have never gotten the idea.”
“Precisely—it was an accident, and furthermore, it was one they disowned almost immediately. What that means, Ms. Scratch, is that according to Equestrian patent law, you are the sole inventor of ‘wubs,’ not the defendants. It seems likely that their motivation for not claiming any role has less to due with humility than the fact that, from a legal perspective, they wouldn’t have had a leg to stand on, no matter what depths of ‘creativity’ their attorney might be willing to stoop to.”
Apparently, Vinyl didn’t realize that Silver Spoon had thrown in a thinly veiled insult at the defendants’ counsel, since she didn’t bother joining in the hushed whispering that resulted. Instead, she just shrugged. “I guess if you wanna be cynical, you could look at it that way. I still say they were important, and they still turned down any offers to let me publicize them. I just assumed that they didn’t want ponies associating them with music because it would take attention away from their cider. I mean, their cutie marks are apples, right?”
Silver Spoon let out a brief, frustrated breath. “That’s up to the Princess to determine. I have no further questions.”
Mara leaned back in her throne as she assessed the situation. Silver Spoon’s line of reasoning would have been fairly strong if she was defending Vinyl Scratch in an intellectual property dispute, but the DJ’s entire point had been the fact that no such dispute had ever materialized. Now, the effort she had made to have the unicorn disqualified made a lot more sense. Silver Spoon had known her argument was weak to begin with, and had (correctly) assumed that Mara’s pre-existing opinion of the defendants wouldn’t be enough to make it convincing. “You are dismissed, Ms. Scratch,” she spoke in the witness’ general direction. “Who’s up next?”
“Your Most Royal Majesty, the next pony to testify to the meritorious nature of my clients shall no doubt dazzle you with her insightfulness today as she dazzles crowds throughout Equestria with her performances. The defendants request the presence of The Great and Powerful Trixie Lulamoon before this Court.”
The usual murmurings from the crowd were a bit more animated than usual; apparently, there were many residents of Ponyville who still remembered the incident when the pale blue unicorn had attempted to make the town into her own personal fiefdom. Princess Mara, of course, was one of those residents, but she also knew full well that Trixie had been under the influence of the Alicorn Amulet at the time. In the immediate aftermath, the showmare had attempted to be more humble, and, at least in her personal life, had largely succeeded—only to discover that audiences loved the over-the-top braggadocio of her stage persona. It took her several years of trial and error, but eventually, Trixie managed to figure out how to make use of her persona without creating ill will. Essentially, she kept the “I can do anything better than you” schtick for the first part of her act, taking on improvised challenges until she was bested, which would mark the immediate transition to the “stuff I can do that you can’t” section, which these days consisted mainly of sleight-of-hoof and escapology rather than actual magic.
“Please state your name and occupation for the Court.”
“I am Trixie Lulamoon, a professional showmare.” Princess Mara silently thanked her Sisters that Trixie was referring to herself in the first person.
“And do you promise to tell the truth to the best of your ability?”
“Trixie shall.” Mara had to use all of her willpower to keep her from smacking her hoof into her forehead. She’d forgotten that the unicorn tended to switch between grammatical persons on a whim.
Merry May nodded and returned to her post. “You may proceed.”
Slim strode over to her witness. “Ms. Lulamoon, can you recall the precise moment when you first met my clients?”
“Trixie was first introduced to Flim and Flam by a mutual acquaintance soon after her graduation from Princess Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. However, two years passed before our first significant interaction. That took place soon after Trixie’s first performance in Ponyville. Due to an inconvenient run-in with an Ursa Minor, Trixie was without a traveling cart.”
“Indeed? Would you mind explaining this ‘run-in’ in more detail?”
“Actually, I would mind. Besides that, there isn’t much point in expanding on it, as I believe Princess Mara witnessed most of the pertinent details for herself.”
“Very well. So, you found yourself without a cart. With neither a stage from which you could ply your trade nor shelter from the unforgiving elements, is it safe to say you were in dire straits at this point in time?”
“I don’t know how ‘dire’ they were, but my situation had left me feeling significantly less Great and Powerful than my stage persona. I thought I would have to walk back to Canterlot to ask my parents for help. They... never really approved of my decision to go into show business, and I was worried that they would insist that I enter the civil service, as they had done, as a condition for taking me back into their home. I found that idea less than appealing, to put it lightly. It was on my journey back that I met up with Flim and Flam.”
“And exactly how did this meeting occur?”
“Well, they were traveling with their mobile cider-making machine, the Super-Duper Easy-Squeezy Something-Or-Other when they noticed Trixie by the side of the road. Naturally, these fine gentlecolts were not about to allow such a fetching mare to fend for herself without offering assistance, and they asked Trixie if she needed transportation. Soon after Trixie agreed, they recognized her and requested that she relate her history to them, which eventually led to a more thorough explanation of her rather unfortunate circumstances.”
“Please relate to this Court their reaction to your most distressing predicament.”
“They expressed great concern at Trixie’s plight, and offered her a temporary job in order to help her get back on her hooves. It seems that they were having some difficulty making some modifications to a calliope, and, knowing of Trixie’s skill, they enlisted her help in return for food, lodging, and a reasonable hourly fee.”
Slim smiled, and turned to the Princess. “May it please the Court—”
“NO.”
Apparently, Slim had never encountered the Royal Canterlot Voice before, as it took her several seconds to straighten out her now-disheveled mane and formulate a response. “I... I beg your pardon?”
Mara pointed towards the calliope from Tartarus with one of her hooves as she explained: “If you’re asking me to accept another demonstration of that contraption as evidence, then my answer is ‘No, it does not please the Court.’ I don’t care how impressive it looks. The fact that your clients paid Trixie for her services is proof enough that the job was done.”
“Oh... of course. In that case, Ms. Lulamoon, did the financial compensation for your time and energy provide the seed money necessary to get you back on the road to stardom?”
“Indeed. Trixie was able to afford a down payment on a new cart, and thanks to her talent, she was soon able to pay it off... just in time for news about the Ursa Minor to spread....”
Apparently, Slim was in no mood to draw any attention to what her witness had mumbled under her breath. “I must thank you the gracious provision of your time, Ms. Lulamoon. I have no further questions, Your Most Royal Majesty.”
Silver Spoon appeared to be much more confident as she stood up to begin her second cross-examination of the day. She picked up a piece of paper in her mouth, walked over to the witness, and set it down in front of her. “Do you recognize the object in this drawing?”
The unicorn’s posture slumped almost immediately. “Yes. That would be the Alicorn Amulet.”
“Have you ever seen the genuine artifact?”
Trixie looked somewhat insulted at the notion that she would be asked to answer that particular question in Ponyville, of all places. “Is this really necessary?”
“Please answer my question, Ms. Lulamoon.”
The showmare sighed. “I was in possession of it for a brief period of time twelve years ago. In what I can only call a feverish bout of horrendously bad judgment, I purchased it from a curio shop in Vanhoover. I was unaware of its tendency to corrupt ponies who use it, and while under its influence, I did several things which I’m not particularly proud of. Again, this is an instance where I think Princess Mara’s firsthoof knowledge would make any further explanations on my part redundant.”
Silver Spoon nodded gravely. “How did you first learn of the Amulet’s existence?”
Trixie sighed and glanced apologetically at the defendants. “Flim and Flam told me about it in the course of a conversation we had.” This particular revelation caught the attention of everypony in the room, especially the Princess.
“I see. And how did it come up? Were you simply talking about jewelry?”
The showmare seemed extremely reluctant to answer the question, as if she was convinced that her audience would read far too much into her response. She wasn’t that far off. “No. I told them of my belief that my skill in magic far surpassed that of Twilight Sparkle, and that the only reason she was able to calm the Ursa Minor was because of her advantage in terms of raw magical power. They then informed me of the Alicorn Amulet and the power it was supposed to grant to ponies that used it.”
“Did they tell you anything else about it?”
“No. At the time, I was more interested in continuing my career as a showmare. It wasn’t until the rumors of my failure with the Ursa caught up with me, making it all but impossible for audiences to take me seriously, that I considered acquiring it for myself.”
“So you started searching for the Amulet?”
“Yes. Finding it was actually the easy part. The hard part was getting the money to pay for it. I ended up taking some rather... menial jobs.”
“Like rock farming?”
“It’s not that it isn’t a noble profession!” Trixie interjected defensively. “I was generously compensated—I simply found it to be dull, and I disliked the mandatory overtime. They never mentioned that I’d be working twelve-hour shifts when they hired me! And I should point out that I never informed F—”
Silver Spoon cut her off. “Did the defendants ever discuss their invention with you?”
“What? Oh, um, yes, they did. They were quite proud of it.”
“Was there any part of their cider-making device that came off as being particularly important to the process?”
“Uh, as a matter of fact, yes. The quality control system was supposed to be what allowed them to make cider so quickly, as it let them simply dump apples into the machine while sorting out any debris and low-quality fruit.”
“Sounds like that would require sophisticated detection magic.”
“It did. They were singularly pleased with their accomplishments in this regard.”
“I’d imagine they would have done extensive testing, in that case.”
“I would assume so... they didn’t go into that much detail.” Trixie seemed unsure where this line of questioning was headed.
“Really? They never mentioned finding anything interesting during the testing phase?”
“No.”
“Then you may find this interesting.” Silver Spoon walked back to her table and returned with a slip of paper. “May it please the Court, the plaintiff would like to submit as evidence this receipt from the ‘Lost Oddity Antique & Frogurt Shop.’”
Trixie’s eyes widened as Mara looked over the slip of paper. “I’ll accept this,” the Princess said as she passed the receipt to the unicorn.
Silver Spoon smiled. “Ms. Lulamoon, are you familiar with that shop?”
“Yes... it’s where I got the Amulet...”
“And did the owner tell you where he got it?”
“No. But... but this says....”
“What does it say?”
“It says he bought it from a pair of anonymous twin unicorns.”
“That’s how he described them? As ‘twins’? No other distinguishing features?”
“Er... there’s a note here that says that... that one of them had a large mustache... and that both had apple cutie marks.” As the noise level of the room increased with shocked conversation, Silver Spoon took the receipt and handed it back to the Princess.
“I would like to specifically call the Court’s attention to the note at the bottom of the owner’s record, where he wrote a reminder to double-check the sellers’ claims before putting the item on sale. In other words, our ‘mysterious’ twins knew that they were in possession of the Alicorn Amulet, and, considering the price they extracted from him, had no doubt done extensive research to determine its value. I think it is quite likely that they knew it was powerful, and they knew it would corrupt ponies who used it, otherwise they would have used it themselves. But apparently, it did not occur to them that a pony who was desperate to become more powerful might be willing to ignore such dangers.”
“B-but, I wasn’t obsessed with power when they told me about it!”
“Ah! So you do believe that Mr. Flim and Mr. Flam were the sellers mentioned on the receipt, then?”
Trixie suddenly realized that she’d walked right into a trap. “I... I suppose so....” She slumped down in her chair, looking utterly defeated.
“Do you care to revise your statement on the defendants’ moral character?”
“I... I don’t. Flim and Flam helped Trixie out when she needed it the most. And I know as well as anypony that nopony is perfect.”
Silver Spoon smiled deviously. “Well, you are entitled to your personal opinion. I have no further questions.”
Mara looked over at the witness, who appeared to be quite downcast. “You’re dismissed, Ms. Lulamoon.” As the showmare walked back to her seat, the Princess asked, “Ms. Slim, does the defense have any more witnesses to call?”
“Just one, Your Most Royal Majesty.”
For the first time since the trial started, the Princess looked somewhat relieved. Thank Mara, it’s finally going to end. “Go ahead, then.”
“The final witness here today to attest to the strength of my clients’ moral fortitude grew up in this very town, but, thanks in no small part to the intervention of my clients, was able to overcome years of accumulated self-esteem issues to become one of the most celebrated chefs in Equestria today. The defendants request the presence of Truffle Shuffle before this Court.”
A grey earth pony with a dark brown mane pulled into a tight ponytail lumbered towards the witness stand. He was wearing a white chef’s coat and carrying a lot of extra body fat on his otherwise-normal frame, but it wasn’t until Mara saw his knife-and-fork cutie mark that she recognized the stallion as one of Apple Bloom’s former classmates.
“State your name and occupation for the Court, please,” Merry May said.
“My name is Truffle Shuffle, and I’m the executive chef at Rhododendron in Baltimare.”
“And do you promise to tell the truth to the best of your ability?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you. You may proceed.”
Slim walked towards the husky witness with a smile on her face. “Mr. Shuffle, you spent most of your foalhood here in Ponyville, correct?”
“Yes. I moved away soon after I graduated from school.”
“And was this due to some sort of emotional trauma that could scourge the memory of such an idyllic place as this?”
“Well, I suppose it could have been worse. I mean, my parents loved me, and it was a relatively safe place to grow up. Well, when it wasn’t being overrun by parasprites or Pinkie Pies or Discord, I guess. But... well, I’ve always been a bit... um, chunky, so ended up getting teased and picked on a lot. Especially by those two,” the chef added, glaring as he pointed to Diamond Tiara and her attorney.
“Mr. Shuffle,” Mara said with an audible groan, “you aren’t here to accuse the plaintiff of anything. Just stick to telling me about the defendants.”
For some reason, Slim seemed to be mildly put off by this pronouncement, but she continued with her questioning. “Could you please elucidate the manner in which you came to know the fine ponies whom I am now representing?”
“Well, it happened about a year after Princess Mara’s coronation. I was walking home from school, feeling really miserable because somepony suggested that I was a cross between a humpback whale and a stale marshmallow, and that I wouldn’t ever be able to get a job doing anything except for liposuctioning off my excess fat to make soap. I was feeling pretty bad—not exactly suicidal, mind you, but I was seriously considering stopping by Sugarcube Corner to try out the new double-deep-fried Chimicherrychanga, which I’d heard might be fattening enough to cause a heart attack.
“I was just about to make a detour there, when I heard two stallions arguing about something in the distance. I walked over to a grove of trees, and there they were, arguing over this large barrel that said ‘Umamix’ on the side. I was going to leave them alone, but one of them—the one with the moustache—spotted me and called me over.”
“And what exactly did he say to you?”
“Uh, he said I looked like a pony who appreciated good food.... I sort of broke down sobbing there.”
“Perfectly understandable, of course. How did my clients react? Did they laugh at your pain, like two petty, vindictive schoolfillies?”
“No. They tried to cheer me up. The one with the moustache introduced himself as Flam, and he said that he and his brother Flim had accidentally purchased a large supply of a particular spice mix that wouldn’t work in their cider, and they were having difficulty getting rid of it. He said that he assumed that because I ate a lot of food, I had some interest in making it, and that Umamix could make nearly any dish taste better, as long as there wasn’t too much sugar in it. They gave me some in a small bag and told me to go home and try it out.”
“Did you?”
“Yeah. I made a rhododendron salad, added the Umamix, and served it to my parents. They loved it! The next day, I went back, and they gave me the whole barrel. I spent the next few weeks experimenting, until I figured out the exact proportions of Umamix to use to make each dish as savory as possible. I even started inventing my own. Soon after that, there was a cooking contest at the town hall, and even though I was the only contestant who wasn’t an adult, I still won the whole thing. I’d finally found a purpose in life beyond simply eating food: I was going to be a chef. As soon as I graduated, I moved to Canterlot and enrolled in the Culinary Institute of Equestria. Then, I started working my way up in the business, until I was finally able to open my own restaurant in Baltimare, which I named after my first salad. It was recently given the highest possible rating by one of the leading magazines in the industry.”
“So, would you say that my clients were a positive influence on your life, then?”
“Definitely. Thanks to them, I don’t feel self-conscious about my weight. Even though I’ve never been able to get it to come off, I know that I’m special and that I’m worthwhile as a pony, and they have my eternal gratitude for making my life better in every conceivable way.”
“Thank you, Mr. Shuffle. I have no further questions.”
Silver Spoon stood up and walked over to the chef, who was glaring daggers at her. “Mr. Shuffle,” she began, “when you say that you’ve ‘never been able to get it to come off,’ I presume that means that you have attempted to employ diet and exercise regimens in an effort to lose your excess weight?”
The attorney had chosen her words very carefully, but they didn’t exactly have the desired effect. “Oh, for Luna’s sake! It was bad enough when you made fun of me when we were foals, but you have to do it now, too?”
“Mr. Shuffle, I assure that I meant no insult, and that your answer is quite pertinent to the matter at hoof,” the grey mare said as politely as she could.
Truffle Shuffle acquiesced, though he continued his glare. “I’ve made multiple attempts over the years, though it’s not easy, since I have to taste the food that I make as part of my job.”
Silver Spoon nodded. “Do you still use Umamix in your recipes today?”
“Of course,” the chef replied, though he was a bit surprised by the look of concern that passed over Flim’s face as he answered.
“Can you tell the Court exactly what it contains?”
“Not really. I import it from Neighpon, and the brand name ‘Umamix’ is the only writing on the packaging that uses Equestrian characters. However, I’m confident that it’s safe for pony consumption.”
Silver Spoon smiled. “Would you care to find out what it contains?”
“Do you know?”
“As a matter of fact, I do, thanks to the defendants. You see, before my client made her ill-fated investment in their enterprise, Mr. Flim and Mr. Flam gave her copies of the rather extensive documentation of their previous endeavors, to serve as proof of what we now know to be a nonexistent work ethic. This included a rather large file on the development of their cider recipe. As it turns out, they did indeed attempt to use Umamix to add an earthy tone to the flavor of their cider, and what’s more, they were quite successful. However, upon performing further tests of their cider’s chemical composition, they noticed something... odd. Tell me, are you familiar with Magical Sodium Glutamate?”
“MSG? Yeah, they mentioned that in culinary school. When used in moderation, it’s quite good at enhancing flavors.”
“Why only in moderation?”
“Well, for one thing, if you let the MSG overpower all the other flavors, the result is almost never palatable. For another, eating too much of it can cause excessive weight... gain....” Truffle Shuffle’s eyes widened as his voice trailed off.
Silver Spoon strolled back to her table and retrieved another file from her briefcase. “May it please the Court, the plaintiff would like to submit as evidence this copy of the defendants’ notes regarding their Umamix-enhanced cider formula.”
Mara briefly scanned over a few pages before nodding. “I’ll accept it. Continue your questioning.”
Truffle Shuffle, for his part, was still staring straight ahead, as if the neurons in his brain had elected to go on strike rather than process the information they had just received. “...effects of MSG?”
The chef blinked as the end of Silver Spoon’s question penetrated the fog in his mind. “Uh, come again?”
“Given that the defendants work in the processed food industry, would you say it’s reasonable to assume that they were fully aware of the effects of MSG?”
“I... I guess they would have to be. But... but nopony knows what’s actually in Umamix, right?”
“The evidence suggests that they used the process of elimination to deduce that the MSG in their cider came from that additive. Now, as you mentioned, when used in moderation, the effects of Magical Sodium Glutamate are so negligible that they’re hardly worth making a fuss over. Even the occasional high-MSG dish won’t have a noticeable effect if a pony has a reasonably healthy lifestyle, but, as you said, your job requires you to taste the food that you’re preparing, which means that you’ve been ingesting significant quantities of it on a daily basis for nearly twelve years. Thus, the reason I asked if you’d exercised: I would like to get some tips from you after the trial, because the fact that you are merely overweight right now as opposed to being morbidly obese means that it must be one of the best routines in the history of ponykind.”
“But... but I was already fat! Why wouldn’t they tell me it could have gotten me fatter?”
Silver Spoon shrugged. “If I could read minds, I wouldn’t have bothered to go to law school. I’m tempted to suggest that they thought it would be funny to see a chubby colt get even chubbier, but the more likely answer is that they needed to get rid of their remaining Umamix, and you were the most convenient way to do that. In other words, they just plain didn’t care.”
Truffle Shuffle had been staring at the floor for several minutes now, but as Silver Spoon finished talking, his body began shaking noticably. When he finally raised his head, his face was contorted in rage, and his next pronouncement was directed not at the plaintiff’s attorney, but at the defendants. “You... you made me fat! You monsters!” The portly chef had risen from his chair, knocking it over, and had started advancing towards the defendants’ table.
“Order! Order!” Mara called out as she rapped her hoof on her throne, but Truffle Shuffle didn’t seem to hear it. He seemed intent on taking out a dozen years of frustration on the twin unicorns, and it was only the timely intervention of Merry May that kept the confrontation from becoming physical. “Order! Mr. Shuffle, if you don’t sit down, I will cite you for contempt of Court! Now get back in that chair and finish answering Ms. Spoon’s questions!”
Reluctantly, the chef did as he was told, but the snarling look he gave to the FlimFlam brothers continued unabated.
“Mr. Shuffle, would you care to make any amendments to your testimony?”
“Yeah... I take it back! All of it! Those are two of the worst ponies in all of Equestria, and if they spend eternity burning in Tartarus, it’ll be too good for them! They’re horrible scumbags who haven’t got an honest bone in their bodies—in fact, they’re probably wearing cardboard horns right now!”
Gasps rose from the crowd as the insult filtered into the ears of impressionable foals, and it was now the defendants’ turn to rise in anger. As they began going through the motions of several obscene gestures at the impudent earth pony who would dare to question the integrity of their horns, parents who had taken their offspring to witness Equestrian civics in action began rushing for the door. “I have no further questions, Your Majesty,” Silver Spoon shouted above the rapidly rising din.
Mara’s royal hoof slammed into her armrest. “Order! Order! Dammit, this Court will come to order, or I’ll—” But at that moment, Slim accidentally bumped into the calliope, which suddenly began playing a noise that Vinyl Scratch later christened “Air Raid Siren on a G String.”
Princess Mara had had enough. Summoning her magical abilities, she lifted the machine into the air, and without bothering to put forth the necessary effort to restrain herself, crushed it into a ball of twisted metal and steam the size of an apple before hurling it out of her throne room, smashing a stained glass window depicting an ornate second-place ribbon in the process. “This Court is adjourned,” she announced, but given that half of the spectators had left, this was essentially stating what was already obvious.
—————
“Consarn it, Merry May! Gimme that bottle!”
Applejack’s seneschal, however, refused to let go of the bottle of precious alcohol. “Sorry, Princess, but if you have too much more, you’ll be too drunk to formulate your opinion.”
“That’s the idea! Now fork it over!”
“AJ, it’s not a good idea to get in the habit of drinking to relieve stress.”
“Dammit, Merry, I’m immortal! My liver can take it. Besides, if I’m hammered when I make up my mind, that oughta be reason enough for Celestia and Luna to convene the Royal Court. Why should I be the only Princess who suffers through this crap?”
Merry May slowly shook her head. She knew the Princess only wanted to vent her frustrations to somepony else. If she had really wanted the bottle of applejack, she could have easily wrested it away with her magic. “Come on, Applejack. You know that a hangover is only going to make tomorrow worse.”
The palomino alicorn sighed. “Yeah... I s’pose y’all are right about that one.” She stared at the long, overcrowded shelves of her personal law library. After all the craziness that had happened today, she had a lot of precedents to research. “Might as well get started. I gotta long night ahead of me.”