//------------------------------// // Mwa ha ha! // Story: Special Delivery // by ILurvTrixie //------------------------------// The postmaster eyed the... exuberantly wrapped box in front of him, before turning a weather eye on the bearer of it. "And where is this special delivery to, miss...?" The very slightly purple grey unicorn filly with a top hat, dark cape, and ridiculous handlebar mustache looked around nervously. "I'm Anne Nonnymus. Yeah." "Anne Ominous?" The postmaster made a slight attempt to keep himself from snarking at the filly's disguise and name. "Nonnymus. And it's to Princess Celestia." "Uh huh. And is it rush?" "No, no no no. It's the last delivery. Very last. Last special delivery for today." "Uh huh. That'll be 25 bits." "...Huh. Okay!" The mysterious filly smiled happily as she hoofed over the money, and waved as she headed out to the main street. She stroked her mustache and cackled. "Mwa ha ha! Mwaaaa ha ha!" This was quickly followed by some more fitting filly-ish giggles as Dinky trotted off to return her perfect disguise to Pinkie and Spike. This was going to be great! "Hey Postmark." Derpy's wings drooped involuntarily as she returned to the Ponyville postal dispatch. "Hey Derpy. Finished the rounds?" "As usual. Give me a second to catch my breath and I'll grab the special deliveries." Postmark nodded, carefully arranging the orders by town. "Why are the Canterlot deliveries last?" Derpy started filling her pack with the local special deliveries. "Special request that a box be delivered last." "Last, not first?" "Yeah, I thought it was weird, but it was your little girl, so." "Sparkler had mail?" "Nah, Dinky! She looks good in a mustache." Derpy blinked a few times at that, but resumed working rather than further question the normal madness of Ponyville. Celestia, the radiant ruler of Equestria; the immortal alicorn goddess of the sun; yea, the warmth of life, the bringer of summer, mother of the glorious orb, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. She, the grand co-ruler of Equestria, was bored utterly mindless. The white alicorn with gentle pink eyes and a radiant shifting pastel rainbow mane had refined her expression to not reveal potentially scandalous details such as that to those speaking with her, no matter how much they deserved such obvious disapproval. She allowed her attention to focus momentarily on the noble currently trying to filibuster in a new tax, specifically, a tax on baked goods that did not use his family owned brand of flour. "—truly the greatest of works are ever to be found, blessed by the radiance of your sun, ground by hard working earth ponies, it is something of a crime that ponies would even think of using such lesser products. Why my grandfather, when he founded this company—" His grandfather had never been this much of a windbag. She gently checked her tongue with a slight bite, smiled genteelly and nodded as appropriate, once more allowing her mind to wander. Perhaps the most frustrating aspect was not that she was trapped. No, the worst aspect was that she knew what was coming after this. Blueblood had chased off another of his maids. The position paid remarkably well for the work, simply because of the...environmental hazard represented by the prince. This, still, did not help things. If anything, Blueblood seemed to take great efforts to 'test' his servants. Never mind they were castle employees, the prince claimed dominion over all he could see. Celestia once more reminded herself to try and bump his rehabilitation higher up her schedule. Stuck between a rock and a hard place. Should she actually voice her opinion of just how utterly worthless, pointless, and quite obviously biased this tax was, the noble would leave, but the incredibly put out Blueblood would come in. But her other option was to sit here, in perpetua, hoping for a pony filled with nothing but hot air to reach his limits. She would have sighed, if it would not have made the noble begin his latest section of conversation again. She'd made that mistake roughly three hours ago. And she had over an hour of polite smiling to go until she could excuse herself to lower the sun. There seemed to be some wisdom to the old saying: 'Tartarus is other ponies.' There was a knocking on the door. The noble found himself at a loss for words, as Celestia focused her attentions on the massive wooden portal. "Enter." While she would've granted entry to the guards even without the need for an excuse, internally she sang and danced in joy at a valid excuse to perhaps completely derail the current situation. A familiar grey pegasus mailmare with rolling eyes entered, carrying a box by the bow in her teeth. She was flanked on either side by standard royal guardsmen. Celestia smiled a warm smile at the bringer of sweet shocked silence. "Good evening Derpy. A special delivery?" The wall-eyed mare nodded cheerfully, as Celestia raised a regal eyebrow at the guards. They both nodded shortly, showing the box had already passed the various forms of inspection to make it this far. "I do apologize for the interruption Sir Mills, but I do try to handle my mail immediately, especially special deliveries." The noble nodded blankly, harrumphing a few times to emphasize his complete lack of enthusiasm for this disruption of his narrative. Her magical aura engulfed the box, and the regent of the sun levitated her prize over to her, carefully undoing the obviously well intended triply taped wrapping paper and roughly tied bow. The glitter covered wooden box within raised both regal eyebrows in response. With a careful hoof, Celestia cracked the lid open, and gazed at the two pristine muffins, each with a small heart shaped depression formed by the dollop of raspberry jelly near the top. Her eyebrows, still elevated from the previous element, did not seek to resume normal duties as of yet. A carefully folded sheet of looseleaf paper, obviously torn from a school writing book of some kind, sat in a convenient holder just before the two treats. Celestia carefully levitated it out, noting the hoofwork of the crayon drawings and pen writing. She unfolded the document, and began to read. Dear Miss Princes Celestia, Hi! I'm Dinky! My mom is a great pony but like you she's got to work all the time. So I think you two should get married so you both don't have to work so much. But my friends say youve got to be spesial someponies first so please do that. Some colorful crayonwork depicted a rather familiar gray mare with asynchronous eyes, as well as an arrow from a proudly scrawled 'Mom'. I helped make these muffins for you two to have a romantick dinner. My momma makes the best muffins and those are almost like cakes so I hope you like them as much as cakes. Please be nice to my mom cause she just got off work and I made sure this was her last delivery so she might be tired. Sweetie says that her sisters books say that sleeping together is something that happens with spesial someponies so if you want to do a sleepover with my mom thats okay. Another drawing showed a curled up grey mare and a curled up large white alicorn. Celestia had to admit the filly had some crayon skills. So please have a good dinner and be the best spesial someponie for my mom. I'm sure she'll be the best spesial someponie for you to. Bye! Dinky Celestia wasn't quite sure which emotion was going to win reigning control over her face, as she was sure her confusion had been overwhelmed by her amusement, and both of those had been ambushed by her embarrassment. She couldn't even recall the last time she'd had a special somepony. And here some little filly was playing matchmaker? Oh, there was an addendum towards the bottom. P.S. Be nice to my mom or I'll call you mean names. P.P.S. I won't really but Scoots said I should say I would so you'd know this was cerious. Please don't be sad. P.P.S.S. This is Dinky. Not Scoots. Okay bye. Celestia barely held down her laughter. A very inelegant snort managed to worm its way out of her carefully maintained mask of elegance. The fractures in the mask were becoming larger as her lips twitched and her ears flicked back and forth, trying to withhold the sheer emotions. She cleared her throat a few times, magically refolding the letter and returning it to the box. Calm. Composed. Self assured. Princess Celestia nodded gently to Sir Mills. "I'm terribly sorry Sir Mills, but something of some importance has come up. Would I be able to speak with you again tomorrow?" He blustered, rather expectedly. "But your highness! What could possibly be more important—" "I'm afraid a rather 'cerious' problem has arisen sir, and I need to turn my attentions to it." The homophone revealed no intent, although she barely managed to keep the corners of her mouth from quirking up. "You see, I've received a missive from one of those agents who you claim is producing sub-par wares." She carefully opened the box, floating the muffin container at the now visibly deflating noble. "They are asking for a fair assessment. So I can but give them one. You understand, I'm sure?" His expression had collapsed, and his eyes kept darting around guiltily. "O-of course, your highness! That's.. that's fair... I could.. hardly bring such sweeping change about without.. being fair." His rictus smile was terrifying, though also gratifying to the princess. Nobles were such a cowardly and predictable lot... "Well then, I'll see you tomorrow! Do have your bakers prepare something exciting." The princess smiled warmly as the noble withdrew. Hurriedly she closed the box again, moving next to Derpy, who simply looked up at the alicorn in mild confusion. "Follow me please, Derpy." "Uh, okay princess." Derpy smiled innocently, and followed the Princess as she lead the way out of the throne room. Unsurprisingly, the princess' previous assessment of waiting problems had panned out. "Auntie, I really must—" "Hello Blueblood, terribly sorry, need to talk to this mare. I'll be handling interviews for a new maid soon, bye." Celestia kept walking at a steady clip, bringing her past the spoiled prince with alacrity. His mouth dropped in surprise. "B-But Auntie Celestia!" "Sorry Blueblood, things to do. Sun's coming down soon, too!" Derpy's rolling eyes caught the edges of Blueblood's frustrated snarl. "Fine. Early tomorrow then! But I expect to be listened to!" As the prince stormed off, the mailmare turned a confused expression on Celestia. "Um...?" "Sorry Derpy, you just handily rescued me from two aggravations. Blueblood knows better than to interrupt me when I have something else to do, and Sir Mills... well, I'm certain he hadn't expected any kind of resistance to his plans. Many nobles don't. Part of what makes dealing with them such a chore." "That's great and all princess, but... um...?" "Oh, right. Sorry." Celestia smiled as she reopened the muffin box, and floated Dinky's letter to her mother. "I believe we're supposed to enjoy some muffins. Although if you want something a bit different, I can ask the chefs to whip something up." "I..." Derpy blushed vividly as she read. "I am so sorry princess." "Don't be! I appreciate the sentiment, even if it is a little unexpected. And she is right that we could probably use a bit of a break. So, dinner, and a guest room?" "Thank you princess." Derpy lowered her gaze to the floor, trying not to think about how awkward this was. "Oh come now. Enough with formality for today. I've got an hour before the sun goes down, and I'd rather be doing that with a smile. Let's chat." The princess and the mailmare advanced to one of the small rooms set aside for the staff to eat in. The princess was hardly going to have a formal dinner if she could help it. "Mm!" Celestia favored the muffin with a smile. "Well, I must admit this is the best muffin I've ever had." "Thank you pr- Celestia." Derpy hadn't touched her muffin, and was still sporting a small embarrassed flush. Celestia sighed out a world weary breath. "You know, I don't know where this resurgence of formality came from. I've always asked my little ponies to treat me normally. It's like that 'I'll get banished and imprisoned in the place I get banished to' thing that's come up recently." Derpy blinked, but giggled. "Well, that last one is a bit of Twilight's fault. She seems to have very high expectations of herself for meeting your goals." "That mare." Celestia smiled, taking another bite of the muffin. Well crafted, moist, light, sweet, delicate blend of flavors. Dinky certainly wasn't lying about her mother's muffins. Derpy shifted slightly, finally starting to consider the food item before her. "And, well, I think the nobles kind of push for the extra formality. Maybe not intentionally, but since they want anyone who's not a noble to treat them better, and you're obviously higher than the nobles..." She trailed off, taking a bite out of her own muffin. Celestia tapped a hoof to her chin. "We'd probably be better off without any nobles around. I should just send them all to the sun." Derpy looked up in shock and horror, before noticing the teasing smile on Celestia's face. "Really, I just said I don't know where that banished thing comes from, and you go thinking I'd really do it?" Derpy's rolling eyes came to a small focus as she frowned at her muffin. "I guess the problem is just that you could. And whether you want it to or not, that makes it, even jokingly, a bit scary." Celestia sighed once more. "I suppose it does. I spend so much time managing and juggling and trying to get things done normally.. I feel like I'm fading into the background. Before long ponies will only remember me for raising the sun and the summer sun celebration. And from there it's not a large leap to assume I'll become something of a boogie monster in stories, especially in towns that aren't holding the celebration." She stared at her muffin contemplatively before getting up. "Milk. This muffin would go rather well with some milk. Would you like some too, Derpy?" "Yes please." Derpy watched the princess moving around the room, checking the cabinets for glasses by hoof. "Princess?" "Yes Derpy?" The mailmare got off her seat, walking over to where the princess was searching, and wrapped her hooves and wings around her front in a hug. "You remember we love you right?" Celestia was a bit stunned, but her expression quickly shifted to warmth. "Of course, why—?" "Because I don't want you becoming a nopony. Or a boogie monster. Or anything like that. And you know what happened to Luna. And you know you don't have to let yourself fade away. We love you. We want to see you, talk to you... The only way ponies will feel more comfortable around you is if they see you more." She gave the princess a small squeeze, staring up with her rolling yellow eyes. "Okay?" Small tears had gathered in the corners of Celestia's eyes. It was hard not to feel comforted in the arms of a mother. She returned the hug gently. "Of course my little pony. I love you all as well. And I'll consider the advice." The rest of the 'romantic dinner' passed in silence, delicious muffins and cold milk, simple and elegant.