Shadow Cabinet was rudely awakened by the shock of having a glass of ice water poured onto his face. He jolted upright looking for the source of the disturbance, only to be hit by his hangover from last night. He groaned and sank back onto his pillows as the pounding in his head increased.
Positive chuckled from the doorway.
"Oh good, awake at last I see. Come on, get up, big day ahead and all that."
"Go feather yourself." came the grumbled reply from the still half asleep Cabinet laying in bed.
Positive frowned and yanked him out from under the covers.
"No but seriously, big day." he said.
Cabinet moaned and began to unsteadily get to his hooves.
"Why is it such an important day then?" Cabinet asked, but Positive had already left. He groaned and followed him out of the room.
"I'll tell you why it's such an important day after you get cleaned up. You look like shit." He called from downstairs.
Once again, Cabinet groaned before heading to the bathroom to get a shower.
Positive, satisfied that his cousin would be wide awake soon, continued to the kitchen in search of breakfast and, more importantly, coffee.
A short time later Cabinet floated into the kitchen, seemingly drawn by the rich smell of caffeine emitting from the room.
"Awake at last I see." remarked Positive, floating a steaming cup of coffee toward him from his seated position at the table
"How is it possible that you are so perky at this hour of the morning?" He asked grumpily.
Positive laughed the question off.
"Doesn't really matter. Now come on, you need to get ready for our big day today." He said with a huge smile.
"Oh yeah, that." Cabinet replied thoughtfully. "You said you'd tell me what that was about."
"The Princess wants to see you." he replied as casually as was equinely possible.
"Oh, alright then." Cabinet replied. After a few seconds he actually processed the information, his eyes went wide, and he almost spewed his coffee all over Positive.
"Hang on, WHAT?" he exclaimed.
"Probably 'cause you're a visiting semi-foreign political figure, I don't really know." Positive said with a shrug.
"It seems a little irresponsible of somepony like the princesses to only inform me about this the morning of the expected appointment" Cabinet said, beginning to calm down again
"Actually, they sent word last night."
"Then why the hay are you only telling me this now?!" Cabinet exclaimed, his temper flaring up once more
"Because I didn't want to interrupt anything" replied Positive evenly.
"What in the wide world of Equestria was so important that you delayed telling me this until now?"
"Well to put it simply; you pulled."
Cabinet facehooved. "Oh god, I had a random one night stand with a complete stranger, didn't I?"
"You say that like it's a bad thing." Positive said with a smirk.
"That's because it is a bad thing!"
"Give me one good reason why."
Cabinet opened his mouth to speak, but couldn't think of anything. He sat there for a moment, dumbfounded. After a moment he found his voice again. "So, what time do we have to leave?"
"Half past nine."
Cabinet glanced at the clock and facehooved. "Positive, you imbecile, it's already a quarter to ten."
Positive glanced over at his clock and saw that it was as he had said. He shrugged.
"Oh." he said, disinterestedly.
Cabinet groaned. "Give me a minute to get dressed and we'll go." He said as he went to his room.
"Y'know, you seem to be taking this awfully well." Positive commented, as he made sure to top off Creepy's food for the day.
"Maybe after all your horseapples I've had to deal with over the past two days I've just stopped caring." He replied from up the stairs.
Positive thought about that for a second. "Well, guess I'll just have to up my game then." Cabinet groaned as he returned, wearing a tie. "Why did you bother getting your tie on? It hardly makes a difference, we usually just walk around naked anyway." Cabinet turned to him and gave him a withering look.
"I am going to meet the princesses. I should at least look presentable." He deadpanned
"They hardly wear any clothes, just their crowns and stuff. Besides, I'm not wearing anything." Positive replied, going over to the door.
"Wait, why are you coming again? I thought they just wanted to meet with me?" Cabinet asked.
Positive shrugged in reply. Cabinet groaned and opened the door, only to be greeted by the sound of heavy rain from outside. "Wonderful." he stated.
Cabinet ran out of the door, heading at full speed toward the train station. "Cabby, wait up!" Called Positive. He took off after him, the wind whipping his unkempt mane into his eyes and making it hard to see where he was going. He tripped over a few times from runaway objects blown loose in the wind, but eventually he reached the station and caught up with his cousin. "Why did... you run off... like that?" He asked when he got there, out of breath.
"Didn't want... to get... wet." Cabinet replied, who was also panting rapidly. Positive gave him a quizzical look.
"You know, you could've just flown above the clouds if you didn't wanna get rained on." he said, poking a hoof at Cabinet's wings. Cabinet took a look at the appendages and sighed.
"I hate hangovers."
Cabinet and Positive arrived in Canterlot slightly later than they had intended to, but the next train hadn't been that much later than when they got there, so overall they weren't that late. Or that was at least how Positive saw it. Cabinet had a slightly different view.
As soon as the train pulled into the station, Cabinet had taken to the air and flown in the direction of the castle, shouting something about how late they were. Positive followed along behind him on the ground at a more leisurely pace. Thankfully, Cabinet was only slightly faster in the air than he was on the ground, as his job didn't really give him much of a chance to regularly stretch his wings. This meant that Positive had time for some sightseeing as he went along. When he saw that Cabinet had almost reached his destination, he sighed and teleported the rest of the distance. Cabinet landed in front of him with a cross expression.
"Why in Equestria didn't you tell me that you could do a teleportation spell?" He asked
Positive shrugged "Didn't ask."
Cabinet groaned and stepped past the guards and into the castle. Once inside, he was squirted in the face by a jet of mushroom soup. The floating soup turine then turned to Positive and attempted to squirt the tomato soup at him, only for him to intercept the jet of carrot and coriander in his open mouth. He thought for a second and then swallowed.
"Strawberry!" He proclaimed "My favourite!"
Cabinet looked at him and tasted some of the soup plastered on his own face. "Ah! Spicy!" He immediately yelled. Laughter echoed around them and the floating form of Discord descended from the ceiling.
"Excellent, good show!" He said, rapidly clapping his paw and claw together. "Most amusing!" He added.
Cabinet opened his mouth to speak, presumably to rant about the inappropriateness of spraying soup on one's guests, only to be intercepted by yet another jet of seemingly multi-flavoured liquid.
Positive turned to Discord. "Hey, aren't you Discord?" He asked.
Discord placed a paw on his chest and adopted a shocked expression "I'm Discord?" He said.
Another Discord appeared from around the corner and loudly proclaimed "No, I'm Discord!"
A smaller discord popped out of Positive's mane "I thought I was Discord?"
An even smaller Discord wriggled itself free from the first Discord's beard and yelled "I'm the real Discord!"
"Enough!" Exclaimed Cabinet. He took several deep breaths and attempted to calm himself.
"What's his problem?" Discord asked Positive, loudly whispering behind his claw.
"Stick so far up his ass he's practically choking on it." Positive whispered back, equally loudly.
Cabinet huffed loudly and trotted off.
"Do you think we offended him?" Discord asked Positive
"Nah, he'll be fine." Replied Positive. He looked up at Discord. "So, what're you doing, anyway?"
"Aside from being bored out of my tree?" Discord said, floating slowly down from his tree. "Nothing at all." He looked at Positive and smirked. "Actually, you don't look too boring. Want to mess with somepony?"
Positive grinned wildly. "Hay yes!" He exclaimed, bumping Discord's paw with his hoof.