//------------------------------// // The Celestia Sparkle Shakeup // Story: Compilation of Miscellaneous Typed Scribblings of A Random Guy // by A Random Guy //------------------------------// The Celestia Sparkle Shakeup Written by A Random Guy For hundreds of years, Celestia has claimed to be like any other normal pony, despite being the all-powerful alicorn deity of the sun. As far as any pony knew, she slept, ate, drank, relieved herself, cooked, walked, sat, solved crimes, saved the universe, brought home all the mares, drove expensive chariots, and flew like anypony else. But in all honesty, she didn’t give a flying squirrel’s right pinky about any of that stuff. It was just all for marketing so little fillies could think they had a chance of magically becoming an alicorn princess. Now that Twilight was an alicorn, Celestia didn’t have to act normal as much anymore. Which was why it was odd that she found herself waking up from a bed in the morning. For one thing, she didn’t ever need to go to bed. Even if she looked like she was sleeping, she would be mentally awake, magically manipulating documents in her office so she wouldn’t have to deal with them when she would “wake up”. Another thing was that she was waking up to the morning. She was the sun princess, so shouldn’t she be raising the sun to make the morning appear? If so, then why was there a morning sun shining through a window and waking her up? In fact, what was with that window anyways? It was so small and tiny, not like what the window in her room should be, magnificently large and over-compensating. Was this not her room? Celestia looked around to confirm whether or not it was, in fact her room. Usually her walls were made of marble, but some mischievous pony replaced all the beautiful alabaster stone with plain wood. And her bed, what was up with her bed? Celestia was almost too big for her current bed, plus it was made out of something that felt akin to the sharp spikes usually found at the bases of cliffs. The only conclusion she could think of was that somepony set her bed on fire and replaced it with this significantly inferior piece of subpar furniture. It would be a shame if that were the case, since she would have to start another war with the Griffon Kingdom in order to justify her filling her bed with griffon plumage. A voice called from behind a door. “Hey, Twilight, are you up yet?” That voice, it was familiar to Celestia. She couldn’t place her hoof on it, but she could tell it wasn’t one of her servants. Whoever it was, it was a mystery that could be easily solved. “Hello, who’s out there?” “Uh, it’s Spike,” the voice replied. “Are you almost ready yet? We need to be at the Running of the Leaves soon.” “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” A little purple dragon opened the door and entered the room. “You know, the Running of the Leaves, the event that you’ve wanted to participate for a second time.” “I never said anything like that.” “Twilight, you did say that. You couldn’t stop bugging me about it for the past month.” The alicorn was confused by the dragon’s comment. It didn’t really matter to her, though. She just needed to correct him in a royal manner. “I’m not Twilight. I am Princess Celestia.” “No, you’re Twilight.” “Do you doubt who I am? I am the Princess of the Day, Princess Celestia.” “Alright, what did you do this time?” “What do you mean?” “The last time you acted this way was when you thought the assassin got Celestia for once.” “That was Twilight?” “Ooh boy, this’ll be a rough day.” It couldn’t be, could it? Why was Spike confusing Celestia for Twilight? She took a look at her wings to check if she was going crazy. She still had the pearly white wings of an angel, not Twilight’s lavender feathered appendages. “Look at these,” Celestia said as she poked her white wings with a hoof. “Do these look like they belong to Twilight?” “What, the purple wings? Ya, those are yours.” He walked out of the room. “Out of all the days to have a mental breakdown…” Celestia was left alone in the bedroom. She checked herself again to see if she had any trace of purple that would confuse someone with Twilight, but the only purple she could find was a streak in her flowing mane, which was a light lavender more than a Twilight purple. She concluded that this all had to be an elaborate prank. She couldn’t sense any magic, and there didn’t seem to be any signs of foul play, so she didn’t see any harm in playing along. Besides, if things got too out of hand to the point getting annoying, she could smite everyone and blame it on a random solar flare. Oh, the joys of being a god. For some reason, Twilight couldn’t get up. It wasn’t because something was holding her down. It was just that she felt too heavy to bother putting energy into getting up. She didn’t feel a need to get up. Whatever she was lying on, it was magnificent. She felt fabric conforming to her body as she lay there. The fabric was supported by something fluffy, yet firm. It almost felt like she was walking through Cloudsdale with the cloud walking spell on, except she was lying down instead of walking. The sound of something knocking on a piece of wood echoed from the distance. It was followed by a gruff string of syllables. “Princess, are you awake?” The sounds subsided, and more sensations covered Twilight. She felt warm, like she was huddled up with her mother by the fireplace reading a book. She wiggled her body around to dig herself further into the fabric and embraced the warmth. “Princess, you need to get up.” Get up… Why would she want to get up? It smelt too nice to get up. She couldn’t pinpoint what she smelt, but it did smell sweet, like the smell of nectar if the sent was softer. The sent was also accented by something small but dull to enhance the dominant smell. She thought it smelt familiar, like the day Gilda showed up to Ponyville, so maybe it was something from a griffon. There was also a tinge of iron behind the underlying smell, like the scent that comes from bl- “Princess Luna, she won’t get up.” “I can take care of this. You are dismissed.” Why must the voices talk? They interrupt the air with their blabber. It was a nuisance. But it doesn’t matter now, they were gone. Twilight was left alone again in her own thoughts. She felt like she could do anything in her current state. Wasn’t there a problem she had been trying to solve for a while? Yes there was. It all made sense now! She was looking at the problem all wrong. All she had to do was- *CLAAAANG* “AAAH!” Twilight screamed out. She wasn’t lying down anymore. The unicorn was clinging to a piece of upholstery hanging from above, as if she jumped for great heights and lashed out for the first thing she could grab on for. Twilight looked down. Directly below her, there was a bed with a pony-shaped dent in the middle of it. Off to the side was the night princess herself with a pair of symbols floating next to her. “We believe it’s time for thou to wake up, dear sister.” “Sister?” Twilight would inquire further, but she lost her grip and face planted into the bed below her. “Yes, sister. It’s how we’re related.” Twilight looked at Luna, and then shook her head in disagreement. “Oh, no, I may be a princess, but I know I’m not related to you.” Luna’s eyes rolled. “Sometimes I wish that were true.” She turned around to walk out of the room, letting the symbols drop from the air and clash against the ground. “Let’s go, a day of royal duties awaits you.” Twilight was quick to catch on. “Wait, do you think I’m Princess Celestia?” The night princess looked back at the perplexed unicorn. “Yes. Why would I think you were anyone else?” “But I’m not Celestia. I’m Twilight.” “Ah, I see. Well, whoever you think you are, you still have the royal duties of Princess Celestia to attend to.” Luna walked out of the bedroom, leaving Twilight alone once again. “Great. It’s going to be one of those days.” As far as Celestia could tell, it was about noon before she walked out of the library. She had spent the majority of the morning trying to figure out how to get ready for the day. She had to work through the awkward moments when Spike would stare at her when she combed her hair. She guessed that it was due to the dragon seeing Twilight brushing the air a foot above her head. Celestia didn’t know how this worked. But after those several hours of awkward self-grooming, she was finally following Spike through the town. From what she could tell, it was still the same old Ponyville from the last time she visited. “So, where are we starting the Running at this year?” Spike looked back at the alicorn that was following him. “We’re starting near the lake. I thought you knew this already?” “Hehe, yeah, I kind of forgot.” The little dragon shrugged. “This isn’t like you, Twilight. But then again, you usually don’t think you’re Celestia, so I’ll let it slide.” “Twilight! Spike!” a trio of voices yelled as they came running down from the hills. “Hey, it’s the CMC.” Spike waved at the incoming trio. Each member of the group skidded to a halt in front of Celestia’s hooves. “Twilight,” the orange pegasus panted. “We need to tell you something.” “Ya,” the yellow earth pony continued. “It’s something Sweetie Belle did.” “Hey, why are you blaming me for this?” “Because you broke it.” “No, I was holding it and then Scootaloo bumped into me.” “Don’t blame me. You were standing in the way. I wouldn’t’ have to run past you if I didn’t need to fix Applebloom’s chalk drawing.” “The angle was fine. You just couldn’t see straight with all the candle fumes.” Celestia decided that the self-perpetual bickering had gone on long enough and intervened before somepony got hurt. “Girls, I’m sure whatever happened, it was an accident. Now, what accidently broke?” The girls looked at each other, waiting for one of themselves to give an answer. Sweetie Belle was the one to reluctantly be pushed out by the other two to volunteer. “Well, we borrowed a magical orb from the library, and it sort of broke.” “Can I see this orb?” Applebloom took off the saddlebag off her back and opened it to allow Celestia see the thousands of tiny glass shards that filled it up. “We tried to pick up as much as possible. This is all we could find.” “That’s perfectly fine. I can fix this, in fact.” Everyone’s’ faces were engulfed by the light of Celestia’s horn. The bag filled with magic, and the glass pieces shifted and stirred in the pack. Soon, the shards merged and formed into a perfect white sphere. “There you go. Good as new. I hope you it serves you well.” “You’re not going to take it back?” “Why would I. I believe that foals should experiment with magic whenever they can, so they can develop a grasp of the world around them.” “Uh, thanks. We’ll be off then.” And so the trio ran off with the magical orb. “Twilight, did you just give them the Orb of the Depths?” “The what?” “The Orb of the Depths, you’ve been studying it for the past month. It’s supposed to be a key to unleashing an unholy terror upon the land.” “Hmm… In retrospect, that does sound like that was a bad decision. I’m sure it’ll be fine.” “If that is the key to an unholy terror, then I don’t think that’ll be the case.” “I’m sure the Elements of Harmony can solve whatever happens with that orb.” “Hey, Twilight,” another voice called out, this time from the air. “We have a bit of a problem.” The duo on the ground looked up to see a blue pegasus looking down at them. “There’s a cloaked pony walking around. I think he’s here to ruin the Running today.” “Now that’s a little harsh to judge somepony like that.” “Then you haven’t met this pony yet.” “I’m sure this pony is fine. Where is he?” Celestia and Spike walked to the direction that the pegasus directed them towards. After a small walk, the duo found the cloaked pony sitting by the town’s statue of Celestia. He sat at the statue base with his head hanging down. His cloak looked mangy and filthy. The alicorn could swear she could smell him from where she stood. Spike gave a confused look as he analyzed the stranger sitting at a focal point of the town. “Well, I can see why he would look dangerous. He’s just sitting there looking creepy.” “Spike, I believe I remember a friendship report about a similar situation like this. Something to do with a certain Zebra.” “Yes, I remember that day. And I think Rainbow does too, so why would she think he would be here to ruin the Running?” “Well, why don’t we ask him?” Celestia walked up to the stranger by the fountain, who didn’t seem to take notice in her approach. As she got closer, she began to hear a gruff snore coming from the stranger. Would it be rude to wake him up in a situation like this? “Hello, sir, how are you today?” The stranger gave no response. Celestia almost introduced herself, but stopped after she realized everypony thought she was Twilight. She mentally readjusted her introduction to fit what everypony thought she was, and continued on. “My name is Twilight Sparkle. What’s yours?” The stranger still remained unresponsive. “I don’t mean to rude, but you seem to be creeping out the local royal citizens. Maybe if you just introduced yourself, ponies would feel more secure?” Celestia only received a gruff snore as a response. “Excuse me sir,” she poke the stranger’s shoulder, “Are you alright”- Celestia jumped back as the stranger’s head popped up to look at her, his hood flying off of his head. In all honesty, Celestia wanted the stranger to put the hood back on. The stranger’s entire face was wrinkled with dirt-brown shading. Looking straight up at the alicorn princess was a triplet of yellow orbs. Surrounding the orbs were several small mandibles filled to the brim with even smaller razor sharp rusty knives. Hundreds of insect legs were sticking out all over the stranger’s face, each withering to grab at the alicorn, who was backing away really slowly. “Now, sir, ponies don’t usually introduce themselves by scaring the dickens out of other ponies.” Celestia quickened her pace backwards as the stranger gave a hissing noise in response. “Uh, Twilight, I don’t think that sir has the interests of other ponies in mind- AH!” Both Spike and Celestia tripped backwards as the stranger leaped up into the air. A pair of buzzing wings zipped him above the duo. “Squish it! Squish it!” The alicorn only felt it was safe to get up when the stranger landed on the face of her statue counterpart, and even then all she could think of was getting out of there as fast as possible. The hissing further prompted her to use her legs to run away, yet she continued to stumble before she could find any footing. After a rough start, both Spike and Celestia were running off into the distance. Celestia, being an alicorn, felt like she could run for miles yet never be far enough from the stranger. Spike, on the other hand, felt like he needed a rest before he continued running for his life. He began to lag behind the princess, putting out a word or two between each pant. “How… are you… going to… deal with… him?” “I don’t know! Let someone with a giant flyswatter take care of that. Where’s the Running of the Leaves being held at again?” “By the lake… like I said…. Good idea… we don’t want to be late.” “Late? Lord, no, that’s not why I want to go. There’s a group there, that thing can’t eat all of us at once. They’ll be a strategic distraction while we run away.” “If you think you’re Celestia, then is this how you think your mentor acts on a daily basis?” “Self-preservation is an important part of the survival of any species. I don’t see anything wrong with that. How far are we from the lake?” “Oh, I’d say a good five miles away. Hey, there’s Applejack.” “Hey Twilight, I need your help!” Celestia watched the orange earth pony trotting up to her. “Does it involve a giant insect?” “Well, no. But it involves Rarity, and I should tell her”- “Why haven’t you told her what you needed help with?” “She’s been avoiding me all day.” “Well, let’s find her and tell her what you need. Spike, bring us to Rarity.” Spike held a finger out. “Now hold on a minute. Just because I think Rarity is my special some-pony doesn’t mean I have a magical sense that can detect where she is at any time.” Before Celestia could reply, the little dragon tensed up. His finger that was held out shot to a northern direction and held its position. “Oh for crying out loud, she’s that way.” And so, Celestia, Spike, and Applejack followed the direction that the little dragon’s arm pointed them to. And low and behold, in a large group that Celestia assumed to be the gathering for the Running, was a white unicorn with a purple mane. “Now, my little pony, I want you to go to her and talk about your situation. I’m sure this can all be resolved quickly through diplomacy.” “Twilight, I think this is a situation that requires more action than words.” “That doesn’t matter. You must always start off negotiations with a base of words. That’s how I deal with most diplomats.” “Okay, here it goes. Hey, Rarity!” The unicorn looked out from the crowd to find the group at the edge of the gathering. Her eyes shifted back and forth as if she was internally debating something, but a look of authority took over once she made her decision, and walked out of the crowd. “Applejack, I need to tell you something.” “Can it wait, there’s something important we need to get to.” “Well, let’s say what we both want to say at the same time.” “Oh for Luna’s sake, fine.” “On three. One, two… three!” “I set your house on fire!” “I got engaged to Big Mac- wait, what?” The earth pony began to trot towards town. “It’s a funny story. I came by your place earlier to see if you could make me a pair of wings for the race today, just to compete with Rainbow dash. You weren’t there, so I tried to make my own pair, and, well, you know how bad I am with needles.” “You set my house on fire with needles?!” “It’s not all bad. I’m sure most of it’s still standing. What did you say about getting engaged to Big Mac?” “Well, odd story there. We were walking in opposite directions, and we tripped next to each other. I was picking up some valuables that fell out of my bag, and there just so happened to be a ring in a box I dropped. Well, when I picked it up, our eyes met, and it looked like I was proposing. And Big Mac being Big Mac, the poor guy could only say ‘Yep’.” “That doesn’t mean you’re engaged.” “That’s the problem, there were witnesses. I didn’t want to embarrass him any further. He looked all shaken up as it was.” “We’ll deal with that later. House first, wedding later.” “Right… Wait, wedding?” And so both Rarity and Applejack ran off to save the unicorn’s real estate, leaving Spike and Celestia alone with a crowd of ponies by a lake. Spike was the one to break the silence. “Hey, delusional alicorn, shouldn’t you go and help them.” “I should, but I usually have ponies to do that for me. It’s the perk of being royalty.” Twilight, despite having all the perks of royalty, didn’t know how to use them effectively. She knew how the Canterlot courts worked through her studies, but she was rather perplexed seeing the courts in practice. For one thing, she knew there was a chain of command. There was the princess at the top, various political offices below her, so on and so forth. It was supposed to be a very tight nit machine of lower offices reporting to higher offices, but Twilight didn’t see any of that really happening. Apparently the higher officials never bothered to report to the princess themselves, unless they were schmoozing. The higher officials would have the lower officials do their reporting, so Twilight would often receive multiple reports in one. The unicorn couldn’t fathom how Celestia could manage to keep track of any incoming information, especially when all the conversations were similar to her current one. “It says here that Senator Law is requesting a decrease in the average prison sentence times, and Representative Law is demanding that they stay at the current levels,” a unicorn explained as he flipped through a clipboard. Twilight did what she did best in these situations: pick apart the problem with questions. “Why is he even bringing this up? We rarely have crimes anyways.” “Law has been getting pretty paranoid of the crime as of late, so Law decided to propose the sentencing increase to meet Law’s political platform.” It was all one big ball of tangled twine to Twilight. “So Law”- “But Law wants to reject that sentencing because, believe it or not, he has an incarcerated cousin who’s waiting trail and wants to minimize that particular sentencing time.” It was a big ball of tangle twine with puzzle pieces sticking out all over it. “Then why doesn’t Law”- “Neither of them can bring this up to debate without Judge Law, and he’s occupied with the Gilda Case.” “How many Laws”- “There’s ten Laws in this case, ma’am. So now Captain Law needs to”- Twilight raised a hoof. The messenger recognized the gesture and immediately became silent. “Out of curiosity, how do you expect anypony to be able to keep track of any of this when there are several ponies with the same name?” The messenger’s eyes went wide at the question. “I don’t. I always thought you knew what was going on.” “Why in the world would you think I would be able to keep track of all of that?” The messenger seemed to shrink a bit, his voice going up an octave. “I don’t know. The nobles were always confused by it, but you always listened to information like that! I thought it was tradition or something.” “So you’re telling me for the past millennium, this government hasn’t been able to keep track of anything?” “Well, if we couldn’t keep track of it, and you couldn’t keep track of it, how has the Equestrian government survived all of these years?” Twilight shrugged. “Duct tape and wishful thinking, apparently.” The two ponies were interrupted by the doors to the throne room swinging wide open, allowing a Royal Guard to walk in. “Sorry for the intrusion, your majesty,” the Royal Guard said. “There’s an urgent matter you need to attend to in Fillydelphia.” “Give me one moment.” She turned back to the messenger. “Tell all the Laws to sort this out themselves. If nopony knew what was going on beforehand, I’m sure they can make something up that’ll solve their problem.” Twilight looked back at the Royal guard as the messenger scampered away. “What’s wrong in Fillydelphia?” “We have received reports that the harbor is filled with dead seaweed. It is making it impossible for boats to exit and enter the port.” “Has anypony been hurt?” “No, all ponies are fine. Sea trade with the city is being halted, though.” “I guess it can wait a bit. I’ll fly over and fix it after lunch.” “You’re going to fly over there and do something?” “Yes, is something wrong with that?” “No, but you usually tell me to delegate somepony to fix these kinds of problems.” “Well, in that case, send the army then.” “The army, are you sure, your majesty?” “Yep, send the army. It has a bunch of ponies in it, so they can clear the seaweed faster.” “But the army isn’t trained to do that.” “Just find the problem and deal with it. It’s not that hard. Now go and do that.” “Yes, your majesty.” The Royal Guard began walking out of the room, ordering several of the guards posted to follow him. When he was gone, and Twilight was alone, she slumped down on her throne, letting out a sigh of relief as another order of business was taken care of for the day. She was in the middle of rubbing her temples when a messenger earth pony entered the room. “Uh, Princess Celestia,” the pony started as he walked up to the princess, “I have something for you to sing. It’s from Prince Blueblood.” The messenger reached into the saddle back on his back and took out a scroll. “One thing after another. Can’t I get a break?” Twilight’s magic engulfed the scroll and pulled it through the air towards her face. She unrolled it and began to read its contents. “He wants government funds for the construction of a villa?” “If you could just sign on the dotted line, please.” “Why would I want to approve funds from the treasury for a noble’s private villa?” “I don’t know, but if you could”- The messenger was interrupted by a scroll getting chucked at his face. “I am not signing that. You can tell Prince Blueblood this is not proper use of federal money. If he does this again, I’ll be pressing embezzlement charges.” “Yes, your majesty.” He began to walk for the door. However, before he could leave, he was pushed out of the way by a unicorn that rushed in form the outside hallway. “Hey, I’m not being assaulted!” the unicorn exclaimed triumphantly. “Excuse me, but are you supposed to be in here?” the princess inquired. Ignoring Twilight, the unicorn poked his head out of the doorway and yelled down the hallway. “Hey, everyone! The guards are gone! Talk to the princess now before they come back!” Twilight gulped when she thought she heard a stampede coming down the hallway. Before she could say anything, the throne room was being flooded with random ponies. The ponies that rushed in flipped over everything that stood in their way between them and the princess. The princess was bombarded by a wall of demands, each pony yelled at the top of their lungs just to get overheard through the slog of thousands of other voices. Twilight took off into the air before the throne was swamped by a wave of pony bodies. She looked down to see a sea of chattering mouths looking back up at her with expecting gazes. Although Twilight could hear each and every demand, she couldn’t make out what they were since they were being said at the same time. “Enough!” the princess yelled out. Slowly, the demands of the crowd began to die down. After a minute, the room was completely silent. “I can see you all have something to say to me, but you can’t all say it at once. So, here’s how we’re going to do it. I’ll point my hoof at you, and you tell me what you want, then we’ll move on.” The crowd nodded with understanding, and Twilight pointed a hoof at the first pony. “Princess Celestia! I need money for my business!” “I’ll take that into consideration.” Her hoof moved to the next pony. “Princess Celestia! I need you to increase the rainfall!” She pointed to the next pony. “I need you to decrease the rainfall!” Next pony. “Extend the day, please!” Next pony. “Extend my property lease!” So on and so forth. “I want a new house!” “I want a new moose!” “Will you marry me?” “I want my boss to pay me more!” “I want my alicorn sister to stop complaining when I draw smiley faces on the sun!” “Why are you here, Luna? “I have just as much right to be here as you do, bucko!” “Alright, this is going nowhere.” Twilight threw her hoofs into the air, where she inadvertently pointed at a pegasus that was flying above her. “Can you give me a new bike?” asked the pegasus. “I said enough. We’re not doing that anymore. None of these problems need a princess to solve.” A random earth pony popped out from the crowd. “Then why are we all here?” “I don’t know why you’re here. But if you desperately need a princess, then I have a solution to all of your problems!” She rubbed her hooves together and pointed randomly to the crowd towards a unicorn mare. “You’re a princess now!” Before the new princess could celebrate, Twilight pointed to a stallion. “And you’re a princess now!” As the stallion checked to make sure he should be referred to as a prince instead, the princess in the air pointed at Luna. “And you’re a- wait, you’re already a princess.” “Oh $%# you! I make your breakfast!” Twilight stretched her limbs out for the crowd, as if she was embracing every one of them. “And by royal decree, you are all now princesses! Every pony in the land is a princess now! Now go solve your own problems.” The crowd began to empty out from the room, each member making plans for their newfound titles. Twilight continued to hover, ensuring that each pony made it out of the room. “There. That should solve my problems for a while.” From what she could gather, Celestia thought the Running of the Leaves was supposed to start around noon. It was two o’clock at this point, and nothing started yet. She was just standing with a group of ponies waiting for somepony to say start. That’s not to say she wasn’t enjoying herself. In fact, Princess Celestia was glad to be outside of the castle without anyone panicking that she wasn’t inside the castle. At least, she thought no one was panicking. The lake they were standing next to seemed to be doing its job of looking nice, so there was no reason to panic about that. Nice vista aside, it was obvious to the alicorn that something was going on, so she decided some initiative was needed. “Spike, do you know what’s going?” The little dragon shook his head. “I know as much about this as you do.” “Do you know who’s in charge? They should know what’s going on.” Spike just stared at her, as if he expected her to know everything that was going on. “Don’t give me that look. I’m having an off day. I may have forgotten a few names here and there.” “Twilight… You’re the one in charge. You volunteered months ago.” “Oh…” Then all the realization hit her in the face. “Oooohhhh. So we’ve been standing here for two hours because I haven’t done anything?” “Yep.” “Do you think I should start the event?” “Standing here won’t start anything.” “Right.” Celestia strode out of the crowd towards the starting line, where a box was lying for her to get on top of. “Attention everypony!” A sea of heads was suddenly looking at her. “Thank you for coming and thank you for your patience. We will begin momentarily. Please take your positions at the starting line.” “No you will not!” called out a white stallion, who was standing next to Celestia. He wasn’t a local pony, so nobody at the event knew who he was, except Celestia. She knew him as Prince Blueblood. “You are all hereby ordered to immediately leave Ponyville,” he continued. “It is now my private property, and you all are trespassing!” “Excuse me, Prince Blueblood,” Celestia interrupted him, “You’re not allowed to do something like that.” “Actually, I am. As of 12:36 today, I’m officially a princess. And for his first royal decree, Princess Blueblood declares Ponyville his private property.” “That’s absurd. Unless one of the real princesses tells me otherwise, you are not allowed to do this.” From the crowd, a random pony shouted at the sky, “Hey, Princess Celestia if here.” Everyone looked up to see Princess Celestia, who was actually Twilight Sparkle, fly down and land at the starting line. “Good day, my little ponies,” she beamed out to the crowd. “I hope I didn’t miss anything.” Princess Celestia, the real one posing as Twilight, grabbed the newcomer’s attention. “Princess… Twilight, correct?” Twilight nodded. “Yes, I figured you were me.” “So that’s sorted out. Now why is Prince Blueblood now Princess Blueblood?” “I declared everyone in Equestria a princess a couple of hours ago.” “You gave everyone in Equestria the absolute power of a Princess?” “Yes, was that a bad idea?” “Actually, no. If everyone’s a princess, then it all legally balances out.” Celestia (posing as Twilight) gave Princess Blueblood a nasty look. “But that does ruin the sanctity of the original princesses.” “I’ll fix that later. For now, let’s enjoy the Running of the Leaves!” “Princess! I have urgent news!” Princess Celestia, Princess Twilight, and Princess Blueblood looked up to see a Royal Guard pegasus blitzing towards the royal trio. “What’s the problem?” The pegasus landed in front of who he thought was Princess Celestia. “We sent the army to Fillydelphia like you said, and they decided poking at the water in the bay with spears would be the best way to clear the seaweed.” “Did it work?” “Well, yes and no. The seaweed’s gone, but it’s because it was stuck to the back of Godzilla.” “Godzilla?” “Yes, we angered him with the spear poking. Now he’s heading straight for Ponyville!” “Send the army to stop him then.” “We tried, but they were so awed by Godzilla that they broke out some popcorn and watched him rampage through the city.” “Wow, we have a poorly trained army.” Twilight gave a sly look to Celestia. “But to be fair, I would probably do that too if I worked for the government.” “Twilight!” A trio of fillies ran up to who they thought was Twilight. “We need our help.” Celestia (posing as Twilight) asked, “What happened this time?” “We accidentally summoned Cthulu.” “How did you manage that?” “Well, we used the orb you fixed”- “You gave them the Orb of the Depths?!” Twilight (looking like Celestia) roared against Celestia. Celestia (posing as Twilight) shrank back and shrugged. “I thought they were using it for educational purposes. Hey, look, Godzilla!” From the east side of the lake, a gargantuan reptilian body lined with giant spines towered above the tree line. Autumn leaves fell from their branches with each footstep the lizard made. “Hey, look, Cthulu!” a random pony from the crowd called out. From the west side of the lake, an enormous Lovecraftian horror stood out like a mountain above the forest. Mounds of dirt flew out from the tree line with each of its steps. Massive wings flared out as tentacles withered around from the horror’s face. Twilight leaned within earshot of Celestia. “Shouldn’t we do something about this?” “Maybe later,” the alicorn replied, throwing a hoof full of popcorn into her mouth. “You don’t get to see giant monsters fight that often. Though I guess if you’re offended by giant monster fights then you can leave. Nothing else is going to happen in this story anyways.” Both of the monsters halted when their gazes locked onto each other. They sized each other up from their respective sides of the lake, silently daring the other to make the first move. Godzilla grew impatient and started off with a roar that was so loud that it shattered the nearby trees into splinters. He leaned forward and charged full speed for his opponent. Cthulu responded with a roar of his own, which was less of a roar and more akin to the sound of millions of souls crying out at once in agony. He too leaned forward to charge at his opponent. Each monster raced to the center of the lake. Torrents of water launched into the air as both creatures stomped into the aquatic body. They rammed into each other with their own tsunamis crashing over their bodies. Godzilla gave an uppercut to Cthulu’s jaw, sending the horror reeling back. He went in for another punch, but Cthulu parried the giant lizard arm with a punch and used his octopus head to ram Godzilla in the chest. Cthulu followed by tackling his adversary, flapping his wings to give him extra force. Godzilla stumbled backwards into the lake, creating a splash so big that half of the lake’s water was sent flying across the forest. With the giant lizard pinned down, the Lovecraftian horror began to wail on him with repeated blows to the face with his massive claws. Each blow emitted a thud that shook the watching pony audience off their seats. Godzilla futilely attempted to wave off the fists, but Cthulu kept on too much pressure to allow the lizard to do anything. When it looked like the overgrown iguana was finally down for the count, his head lashed out for the next incoming fist. A set of jaws that could bite through a mountain latched onto Cthulu’s arm, halting the attack. Cthulu roared as he tried to punch Godzilla in the head to loosen his bite, but the lizard’s jaw crushed down harder. He jerked his head down and tore off his adversary’s arm, which splashed down into the lake. The Lovecraftian horror roared as he stumbled back, using his remaining arm to hold onto his wound, trying to keep millions of consumed souls from flowing out and flying off into the aether. Using this as his chance, Godzilla went in for his own barrage of punches. With his arm occupied, Cthulu had nothing to block with and could only take the punches. He retreated backwards to try to get out of the lizard’s range. He flared out his wings in preparation for flight. Godzilla saw what he was doing and grabbed Cthulu’s bat appendages. The horror saw this as an opening and used his arm to strike the lizard in the throat. The giant claws let go of the wings, and Cthulu took flight. With each flap of his wings, a gale force struck the forest below, blowing away all the leave on the trees and sending the few ponies not strapped down flying. Cthulu rose high above Godzilla’s striking range, taunting him with his own ghastly roar. The giant lizard reached down into the lake to pick up a submerged boulder. He chucked the rock at his adversary, who swung outwards to dodge the projectile. Cthulu swooped down for the forest and tore out a grove of trees with his claw. The winged horror made a wide arc around the lake, circling in closer to the gargantuan monster standing in the middle of it. Godzilla continued to chuck boulders into the air, barely missing the flying monster with every shot. After dodging several boulders, Cthulu dived for the lake. He chucked the grove of trees at Godzilla’s face, temporarily blinding him. The flying monster leveled off, lifting his mountain feet to ram into the lizard. Godzilla flew back as he took the impact in his gut. The lizard crashed into the lake shore, digging his spines deep into the earth and sending clumps of dirt flying high into the air. Cthulu’s feet landed on top of Godzilla’s claws, pinning down his main form of attack. The Lovecraftian horror reeled his arm back, winding up as much as possible for a final blow. To the ponies watching the throw down at the lake, it seemed to be the end for Godzilla. However, the giant lizard still had a trick up his sleeve. Before Cthulu could strike, he hesitated when a light appeared from the back of Godzilla’s throat. When Cthulu realized what the light was, it was too late. The Lovecraftian horror twisted his body and swung his fist with full force, but it wasn’t fast enough for Godzilla. In a single moment, the light in the back of his throat condensed into a single point. Just as Cthulu’s fist was about to make contact, a behemoth beam of light shot out from the lizard’s mouth. A shockwave blasted across the land as the beam superheated the air and cracked the sound barrier. The light burnt through Cthulu’s fist, up his arm, through his upper torso, and engulfed his octopus head. The beam left nothing when it died out, leaving only a hole where the light made contact with the monster. Cthulu’s body went limp and fell backwards, sending a splash of water across forest. Those who were remaining in the pony audience cheered as the victor rose from the shore. “Celestia, you do know we have to deal with Godzilla now, right?” Twilight’s eyes shrunk in horror. “Oh… crud.”