“And thus I clothe my naked villany
With odd old ends stolen out of holy writ;
And seem a saint, when most I play the devil.”
― William Shakespeare, King Richard III
Chapter 2
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Twilight Sparkle’s bleary eyes were assaulted by the early sunlight streaming in through her bedroom window. She rubbed her eyes as Spike snored on at the hoof of her bed. She sighed, wishing for just a few more minutes of sleep. Even though she was used to getting up as soon as Celestia's sun rose, it didn’t mean she liked it. The heavy eyelids, the slow response of her limbs: none of it was appreciated by the drowsy pony. Nevertheless, the purple pony started putting breakfast together for herself. It was grits for the third time this week; even though she was the princess’s most trusted student, she didn’t get much funding for anything other than books.
As Twilight made her way back from the small kitchen in the back of the library, she pulled a few books off the countless shelves. Today she had decided to read something different. Normally she read factual books or occasionally a Daring Do novel, but she decided to give romance a try so she picked one about a pegasus down on his luck, who moves to Ponyvile and falls in love with the local weather pegasus. She started eating and reading when she heard a knock at the door. Who would come by this early in the morning? she thought. Everypony’s normally still asleep at this hour. She opened the door to see a royal guard standing in front of her.
“Miss Sparkle,” he said in a quiet tone so as to not wake her neighbors. “Have you seen the ponies Snips and Snails recently?”
The purple pony pondered this for a moment. Come to think of it, she hadn’t seen either of them for quite some time. Ponyvile was a fairly small town and it was hard to not see everypony in a single day, especially those two. They were hard to miss what with their... unique stature, and... special ways.
“As a matter of fact, I haven’t. Why, has something happened?” The concern in her voice was fairly clear. While Twilight wasn’t a huge fan of the pair, she certainly didn’t wish ill on anypony.
“Well, nopony has seen them, so we’re doing a door-to-door search for them.”
"Oh dear, can you tell me more, perhaps over some coffee?"
"Well I shouldn't, but you are Celestia's personal protege; what you say is law." He grinned, happy enough with the lame excuse. Twilight opened the door wider and he walked in. He followed the unicorn into he kitchen where there was a small table.
"Cream? Sugar?" she asked.
"One of each please." He responded. After a moment Twilight gave him the coffee and sat down.
"So how long have you been going door to door this morning?" She asked.
"Well me and a few other solders have been going at it for almost two hour but we haven't found anything. Although most of us weren't expecting to find a trace."
"Why's that?" He froze with his mug halfway to his partly open mouth. He slowly set it down and found words.
"I'm sorry I really shouldn't be talking about this with you."
"Whatever do you mean?" she asked with an air of annoyance. "If you can tell the princess something you should be able to tell me too. I'm practically her third in command after Luna." The stallion knew he was on thin ice here so he tried to delicately let her down.
"Has Celestia ever shown you exactly what she does to run the kingdom? Has she ever brought you to her side and explained anything she does to you?"
"She's taught me so much about magic. She pra..."
"No" he interrupted, causing Twilight to look at him clearly annoyed. "Ugh, I'm sorry I'm not trying to be rude but... It seems to me she's only ever thought you about magic and not about the kingdom because there are some things even she doesn't want you to know." Across the table Twilight was becoming ever more confused and annoyed as the conversation went on.
"So your telling me... She hides things from me?"
"Not really hide. It's just..." he paused searching for words. "She's just trying to protect you. I've... I've got to go." He said, trying to find an easy way out. "I think I heard my captain calling." The mare raised an eyebrow. She looked at his uniform which that he was the captain of his squad, but there was something different about his uniform.
"What's that symbol there?" She asked pointing to an embroidered set of light blue circles.
"Nothing!" he answered quickly. "Goodbye!" he yelled as he practically galloped out the door, almost upsetting the kitchen table in the process.
That was strange. Twilight thought as she slowly rose to her hooves, heading towards the bathroom. I don't know quite what to think about that. He seemed to think that Celestia hides things from me. I expect him to know a lot because of his high rank but still... After tidying up her hair she headed towards the door, ready to gather her friends to discuss what she had just learned. Maybe I’m overreacting, and not thinking straight. Maybe I should talk to the others about this over the picnic we’re having today, get another set of views on everything. There’s nothing to be worried about, right?
Upon opening the door, the sun greeted her, now just past the horizon.
“Maybe I should wait until it’s not dawn.” She said to herself, grinning with amusement.
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Later that day, Twilight and her five friends went out to Fluttershy’s cottage for a picnic. The weather was mostly clear, with a few clouds overhead drifting lazily in the morning breeze. Rainbow Dash flew up and landed on a cloud.
“C’mon!” Dash yelled down at the others.”We’re almost there; hurry up!”
“There’s no hurry, Rainbow. It's still early," Applejack dryly pointed out as Dash slowly glided back to the ground.
Rainbow just kept flying farther ahead of her friends, then falling back so as to not get to far ahead.
“I’m super-duper uber excited about this picnic! It’s been soooooo long since we one!” Pinkie exclaimed happily, bouncing around like an electronic pogo stick powered by a car battery.
“Pinkie, we had one last week,” Twilight reminded her, shaking her head. She could never wrap her head around how the pink pony thought and acted.
“Oopsie,” Pinkie said, giggling in spite of herself. “Silly me!”
As they arrived at their destination, Rarity pulled out a blanket from her picnic basket and magically laid it on the ground before setting the basket down. Twilight went about arranging dishes, while Applejack and Pinkie went about setting up the food. Once that was done they started to eat and talk.
"So, the reason I wanted to have this picnic today was to discuss some thoughts I've been having recently."
"Please tell me it's not another stallion," Applejack said, rolling her eyes.
"Of course not silly! This isn't that kind of story!" Pinkie replied giggling.
"Pinkie Pie... You are so random!" Dash said before breaking down laughing.
"Girls!" Twilight yelled, somewhat annoyed.
"What I was TRYING to talk about was how the princesses govern us!"
All were quiet for a moment.
"What do you mean?” replied the cyan pegasus. “That's the princesses' jobs. Why does matter how they do it if everypony’s happy?"
Twilight sighed, and recounted the events that had taken place earlier that day.
"After he left I got to thinking, what does that mean? I always thought of me and the princess as very close. Why would she hide anything from me? To protect me? She always said that she was always trying to protect everypony, but she never what she was protecting us from. She can't be protecting us from other kingdoms, there are literary non left in the world besides Equestria. Then I thought, what if shes protecting us from herself?
“Now dear, that can’t be true,” replied Rarity. “Celestia would never harm anypony? I mean, it's not like she's evil like some of the rulers of the old kingdoms...” the unicorn trailed off. She brought a hoof up to her chin, thinking over her, and her friend’s words.
“Well, wha' would she be hidin’ some part of herself from us?” asked Applejack, the interest in her voice fairly clear.
“I don’t know, but if she's hiding something it it’s probably nothing to good. Ponies don’t just hide things for no reason.” Twilight reasoned. Everypony sat in silence for a bit, wondering what could be so important until Twilight spoke up again. "What does this mean for how they rule us? If we question a leader shouldn't we question their methods? Shouldn't we know what she's doing about Equestria since it effects us directly?"
“Well, I think it’s better we don’t know,” stated Rainbow. The others looked at her questioningly.
"Now why would y’say that, Rainbow?" asked the orange earth pony.
"Well, do we really want to know everything?” the pegasus asked. “Life is a lot simpler just going about our lives without worrying about what doesn't need to be worried about... it’s kind of like the Celestia is a big sister watching over us."
"I don’t like the idea that they might be able to see everything we're doing," Fluttershy added quietly. "Oh, I'm sorry. Was I interrupting?"
"I'd rather have the freedom to do what I want than be controlled all the time," Twilight argued.
"But it's so much safer when we don't have to make unneeded decisions that put us at risk!"
"I don't care if it's safer! I'd rather be able to say what I want to say. I don't want anarchy, but freedom never hurt anypony, right?"
"I wouldn’t say that. Even though I think it's cool idea to be completely free, tons of ponies would take advantage of it, and think of all the dumb things ponies would do!"
"Stop it!" shrieked Pinkie. "Stop being used to convey an age-old argument!"
"What’n tarnation are you talkin' 'bout Pinkie?" Applejack asked.
"Um, I have an idea I’d like to share,” the Fluttershy quietly stated, before quickly adding, “I mean, if that's okay with all of you, of course."
“Go right ahead, darling; we’re listening," said Rarity.
"Well... I think we should go see Zecora. She's not from Equestria originality, being a Zebra and all. I'm sure she'd have a different take on everything." As she spoke, her voice grew quieter, and by the last word, she was barely audible.
"That's a great idea Fluttershy!" Twilight exclaimed. The others nodded in agreement.
"Oh, thanks," the timid pony replied with a weak smile.
"Well let’s get to it!" Rainbow Dash yelled.Abandoning their half eaten food, the group packed up and headed for Zecora's hut in the Everfree forest.