Day 44 of the first 3 months
It was yet another perfect day in Canterlot. The sun shimmered in the sky. The humidity was almost perfect. He was having his favorite overpriced tea. Sitting in his favorite overpriced restaurant as he watched overpriced ponies do the same below "his"special balcony. His perfect golden blonde mane was perfectly styled in the latest fashion, his. His hooficure made them shine so much that you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference between them and his porcelain tea cut. Today, was indeed perfect.
"Damn that Sentinel..." the stallion growled under his breath as his eyes narrowed.
Before the stallion laid a copy of the Equestrian Tribune. Normally, he'd never be caught dead with such a trifle thing of common life, but something had caught his eye this morning, along with his very name.
"Breaking news!!!! Prince Blueblood cracks under royal pressure!! Foal Abuser caught IN THE ACT!!" read the front page in ugly, but eye catching font, followed by "and unconfirmed reports that a innocent pot belly pig was also savagely attacked. No trace of the pig or it's body has been found in or around Canterlot Castle." He began to mentally mutterer curses about touring commoners when the memory of him bucking Sentinel through a stained glass window of one small balcony into the opposing one surfaced.
Blueblood began to seethe with anger. So much so that his vibrating hoof started to rattle the tea kettle and sugar spoon on the saucer. This... thing had come from elsewhere, into HIS home and HIS comfortable world. It showed him no respect while time and time again it would swipe it away from him just by it's very presence. The common hired help.. bah. They were overpaid for what they were worth. They would always shake enough to rattle their dishes when he blessed them with his presence. Now? Now that pig accompanied them enough that they started to think different. Like they were... important...
"I should of thrown that worthless foal off the cliff after I bucked it out the window!!!!" he yelled, forgetting that he was in public. Unlucky for Blueblood that wasn't the case for anypony else, in or out of the restaurant, as the streets were quite packed today.
Even if just a few understood the true context of the situation, it still did not merit any excuse for the actions that Blueblood had taken. It especially, without said context, wouldn't go down well with anypony else that heard.
"Monster!!" yelled one mare. Followed up by a few other names being called.
Blueblood...no... PRINCE Blueblood, has had enough with all of these things, pony or no, trying to be at his level. So in a mad rush to release some of his anger as it boiled over, he hoisted up his tea kettle and dashed to the window. Pitching the kettle as hard as his magical grasp could fling it, aiming only towards the voices that yelled monster earlier. With a shatter and a small scream, he cracked a small smile over his vic..tor...y.....
"YOU!!!!" Blueblood screamed out the window, nearly coming out of it as he leaned.
There stood the one who caused all of his pain and misery today. The one who did not belong in this world period, let alone next to even the filthiest earth pony farmer. This... thing... with Turquoise iris's, just stood there as the boiling hot tea scalded his skin having shielded the intended target. Yet it wasn't the royal guards who had rushed up to see if Sentinel was alright, or the common pony folk that had done the same that suddenly grabbed Blueblood's full attention.
"Blueblood!!!!!" yelled Princess Luna in her famous royal canterlot voice.
The day before
Laughing almost hysterically, "This will be splendid!" Prince Blueblood yelled out in glee. "You surround yourself with the lowest of the low, like a pig happily wallowing in filth." he merely grinned, "So lets see what we can do about that voice..."
Hovering before him was an old dusty tomb titled "Compulsions for everyday uses".
At the very same moment, far on the other side of the castle, a certain Princess Luna was doing something rather similar but entirely different reasons. She'd been putting so much effort into trying to help Sentinel that along with her normal duties for all of her subjects, she wasn't really able to be anything but utterly exhausted.
"We refuse to admit defeat..." Luna says in a rather sad but determined tone, "If thy ...hoomein... nightmares cannot be conquered by a pony goddess".
Take complete exhaustion, add in a lot of frustrations, and top it off with good intentions.
Luna narrows her eyes on a particular page of a research tomb, "then we shall remove the hoomein...".
Sentinel was rather tired today, but he'd been tired about every single day for 17 years.
"Comes with that special upbringing..." he would half joke half be damned to himself.
He used to say it aloud, but if he tried talking in this...equs....enus...this damn equine language then he was afraid of how butchered it come across. That and he might have to explain it. That meant charades. That meant looking really stupid. He could take involuntary stupid, but not volunteer stupid. Least not today, if he could help it.
He'd been working pretty much every ounce of free time he had trying to draw Princess Luna's night sky mural. It was going well, but at the same time, not so well. Drawings took time, he hated using trig, and the magical paint was hell to wash off himself. Couple that with spending time with the maids, butlers, landscapers, guards... he just mentally slapped himself.
"I forgot...." slapping himself again, "shit."
Today was the day that that one maidpony was going to have to do the workload on the wing with that blonde maned blowhard. He'd made it a habit to observe everything he could about these ponies and their ways, and that included the bad ones too. While the good had greatly outnumbered the bad, there were still quite a few things that seemed to keep a wall around truly trying to absorb into their culture. Some were almost... deal breakers.
The sound of someone yelling and dishes shattering brought him out of his self contained world, and eliciting a rather brisk pace towards it's origin. However when he arrived there was only the maidpony. She was doing her best, with a few tears in her eyes, to scoop up the broken shards of porcelain.
Gently poking the maidpony, "okay?" Sinclair asked in his broken equine dialect.
The mare just closed her eyes and nodded, before picking up a big scoop of shards in a dust pan as she slowly trotted off to discard what would most likely be taken out of her week payment of bits.
Sentinel just stood back up. He was rather agitated already. Now he was downright aggravated. Broken equine or not once he found either that blonde maned bastard or Celestia, he was going to give either of them a piece of his mind about this whole..
"Sentinel!" yelled Luna from the west entrance to the room.
"Sentinel!" bellowed the blonde blowhard as it enter the east entrance to the room.
All Sentinel felt was something hitting from both east and west. It didn't hurt like any attack he'd ever been hit with, but it sure was... wait... why the hell are those porcelain shards suddenly so big? Almost as big as his entire body...
"Squeeeeeeee!!!!" squealed the 5 year old looking black foal with split down the middle piggy feet.
Princess Luna, without even a moment's notice, took action....
"TIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!" she frantically screamed out as she turned and took off full gallop.
Prince Blowhard, or rather Prince Blueblood, just wasn't in the mood to let such a perfect moment go to waste. He took his time as he slowly clopped his way towards the newly christened Sentinel. Just as he got within a few inches, he took in the air of how the height difference was now reversed. Not even lowering his head, he just shifted his sight down, before speaking.
"Even as a pony.." Blueblood commented as he stepped forward, kicking Sentinel back a little "You're quite ugly."
"oink <fuck you>" was all Sentinel could, or was willing, to reply with.
Realizing that as things stood he lacked the verbal confirmation of acknowledged humiliation, he instead decided to go for more physical means to elicit a definitive response. He hoofchecked the Sentinel right in the muzzle.
But as blueblood sneered in triumph at first, it slowly turned to a seething frown. Sentinel did take a full grown stallion's hoof to the muzzle. He was, physically, the equivalent to a 5 year old foal. He also had split pig like hoofs and sounds. But he wasn't a foal, nor a pig. He was Sentinel. So instead of crying out in pain or showing any sort of anger..
"oink, oink, <If it wasn't for giving Luna more nightmares to work with, I'd visit you tonight...>"
Just as blueblood is seething with anger once more, lifting his foreleg to send another blow to a defiant Sentinel, the maidpony from earlier enters from the east side unnoticed. But while they didn't notice her, the same wasn't true for the mare. As soon as she trotted in she froze. Before her stood blueblood and some small black foal that she'd never seen before. But what really stood out was the raised foreleg and the blood dripping from the foals face. So she did was any good pony would do.
She chest checked blueblood into a wall.
Sentinel was about to oink, his limited form of communication from his already limited communication, but he didn't. He was simply impressed. The stallion was a decent bit bigger than the mare but she charged right in and checked him nonetheless. Given how his life was prior to coming to this world, he had to merely hold back a lot of what he was for the sake of trying to adapt. Since that first day coming through the portal, he'd only seen three equines truly impress him. The three called Twilight, Princess Celestia, and Princess Luna.
The first was because the mare screamed defiantly at him when he'd just arrived, even though she was so near succumbing to her wounds. He liked seeing that defiance even in the face of hopelessness, as it reminded him of many living in the Havens. Then, that Celestia was truly something else when it came to his own element, fighting alone against the odds with. The way she dashed out to get to those six bearers, he was told, was a type of honesty he could trust in. He always knew she had held back, but regardless, what she had shown caused him to be rather intimidated of her ability, and thus, respect her for it.
Princess Luna, however, was on another playing field altogether to him. She walked into nightmares. Even though she was refusing to acknowledge that his own were not of the same, and that it was actually causing her real harm to witness every night, she kept trying. What got him most, was that deep down, he knew she knew that she couldn't help. She just refused to walk away. Even when that abomination... anchored those children that had followed him from that haven to it...and...
"....oink....<Why didn't you just walk away like I told you to...>" Sentinel said to himself.
<drip....drip drip...>
Sentinel's attention was drawn to the point. Even as he saw blueblood slowly getting up after being checked across the room and into the wall, it was the noise of water drops falling that garnered his all. A few more, and it appeared as though whatever was falling was doing so from right under the maidpony's head. Now walking on four legs vs two is one hell of a rough ride, so one shouldn't laugh too hard when Sentinel wasn't so much walking but crawling using his front two legs slash pseudo arms to get a better look at the mare's face. When he got a one sided view, even a foal could of understood what was happening.
She was scared. Right out of her mind. So bad it was enough to cause tears in her large eyes and her to look like she was shivering. Most likely not of Blueblood physically, but of what attacking Blueblood meant period. She would be fired. Jailed for attacking royalty. No more bits meant nothing to buy food or pay rent. She was already having such a horrid day, and she just wanted to get through it to go home to prepare for the next blowhard day.
Sentinel was still rather stupid when it came to the equine dialect, both sending or receiving. But under the mare's breath, low as could be, just as blueblood was locking all of his legs in place... he heard her say something..
"...regret.....not....", just as Blueblood jumped forward and was about to slam his hoof down onto her head with full force while for some unknown reason to Sentinel, calling her a horse?
"SQQQUUUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!" cried the foal, in what might of been the best impersonation of a royal canterlot voice since many years prior, and many to come.
Today seemed as though it would be just another day like the one before, calm and relaxing. Orderly, even. Those three aspects were ideally what Princess Celestia wished to always be present within the confines of her solar throne room. But that was about five minutes ago. Five minutes before her sister, Princess Luna, literally burst through the double doors.
"Luna..." Celestia began to say.
"We know, we know..." Luna interrupted, "We... made a big mistake."
"Mistake?" Celestia replied, doing her best to remain calm about something potentially horrible. "Luna. We know next to nothing about Sentinel or his kind." she says as she stands up from her throne, "You intended to make him more like a pony in order to help him, this I understand." she slowly trots to Luna, keeping her understanding gaze as she does so, "but unless you know what point A was before going to B, how do you plan to make or in this case remake, it back?"
"Tia, do you take us for a fool?" Luna jousts back at the insinuation of her not thinking this entirely through, "We made sure to cast a imprinting before we tried the transmutation."
"Then why did Sentinel take on a form that you hadn't intended?" Celestia questioned.
"Because thy stupid nephew Blueblood casted at..the...same......." Luna slowly grew silent as realization sunk in.
"You/We left a foalized Sentinel in the care of Blueblood!? Both princesses of night and day yelled.
"SQQQUUUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!"
That was all that would prelude the wall next to the double doors from imploding into the room. Amongst the dust and mortar debris both Sentinel and Blueblood were going at it like they were two timberwolves.
One was physically what Luna had described, a very young black foal. It had funny pig like hoofs and was doing it's very best to bite or head butt into any part of Blueblood it could, squealing like an extremely disturbed pot belly pig. It was also bloody if the red smears when it would go skidding across the floor was any indication, but it defied all logic by showing no hesitation even against an opponent many fold it's size.
The other was a full grown stallion who was also adept at magic thanks to royal privilege and did not seem to hold anything back. It's first move after busting through the wall was to grab the foal in it's magic hold, slamming it into the ground several times before the foal somehow shifted mid slam and landed instead on it's hooves. Letting out what could only be described as the cutest/deadliest squealcry, the foal seemed to break the magic grasp before launching itself into the stallions muzzle.
But before Blueblood could charge forward after the foal that ricocheted off his face, two large white hooves slammed between him and his foe, protecting it. However the hooves hit hard enough to knock Blueblood back into the crumbled wall along with cracking the marble below them. They also sent out enough force to rattle the stained glass windows.
Princess Celestia, Solar Goddess, was so livid she wasn't even able to speak. She'd just witnessed her "nephew" violently attack a foal, maybe even to kill, and regardless of who that foal was it was still a foal. There a little openly touted fact of the Sun Goddess that all who stayed around her any decent amount of time can attest to as fact. She utterly loved foals. So it shouldn't come as any surprise when everypony in the room who while also extremely upset and disturbed at what they had just witnessed, went wide eyed and quiet as a mouse when Celestia acted.
"Don't. Move." Celestia mouthed through clenched teeth towards Blueblood, who shakily nodded as he just realized where he was and who he'd brought the fight to.
"Now Sentinel..." she began to say, somewhat calming down, before time just stopped for her and just about every other pony in the room regardless of whom. Sentinel, the foal, was pushing himself through Celestia's two forelegs, but only using his front hooves, dragging his back ones behind him.
In reality this was because Sentinel still hadn't gotten used to being a quadrupedal, and dragging with his front was easier than pushing with his back. However to everypony else, this looked very very different. Almost as if...
"LUNA!" Celestia screamed out of fear, snapping Luna out of her shock. "GO GET OUR PERSONAL DOCTORS!".
Celestia slowly dropped down onto both her fore and hind legs, letting her muzzle also drop to cradle alongside Sentinel who for all intents just oinked "<uh...>", as he was basically being comforted by one of the most powerful beings on the planet. The smell of ash and brimstone filled Celestia's nostrils as she began to weep on the foal she had found trying to crawl to safety, cradling it between her forelegs as she brought her muzzle alongside it. It was maybe 4 or 5 years old with a brilliant coat of red chestnut, of which was partially soiled with soot. She was so close that she could actually feel it's heartbeat, even as it started to slow down.
"I'm sorry little one..." Celestia cooed out between tears, "I wasn't able to make it..."
"...in time!" Luna yelled out as she teleported back into the room, several medical ponies in tow, along with what looked like both the flooring, partial wall, and a janitor.
Celestia quickly got up under the slightly surprised gaze of her sister as the medical ponies rushed in and started to examine Sentinel with as much gentleness that they could administer given the urgency. Celestia was slowly joined by Luna at her side who was, even if well hid, extremely upset at both herself and even more so at Blueblood who was also watching intently but for his own sake.
If he did indeed break Sentinel's back, regardless of the fact of him being magically changed into a foal, he wasn't going to talk his way out of this. However even if he didn't manage to break Sentinel's back, judging from the narrowed eyes from several of the guards who had already surrounded him to keep him from running, he was cooked regardless.
"Unless...." Blueblood thought.
"Princess Celestia!" called one of the doctors, "I have great news. His back isn't broken! He's rather bruised and all, but nothing that seems broken. If i hazard a guess, I'd say that he just does not know how to walk properly..."
Celestia said nothing but let out a long standing sigh of relief, along with pushing back several memories that she really didn't need to remember today. But just as a small smile crept upon her, it quickly faded, as she suddenly jerked her head up and gave Blueblooth one of the coldest looks anyponys ever seen of their solar princess.
"Explain." Celestia said, so toneless had any tears still been on her fur they'd of been frozen.
"Well...I...uh..." Blueblood stuttered, trying to come up with something that made a foal look like the bad pony, but was interrupted when a maidpony rushed in through the hole in the wall next to the doors.
"Sentinel!?" she was still calling out as she galloped in, skidding to a stop when she looked down near Princess Celestia's forelegs, "Sentinel!!!" she then rushed over past a still stuttering, and slowly freaking out, Blueblood.
"Fancy Demoiselle?" Celestia addressed the maidpony.
"Oh! Your highness!" Fancy Demoiselle acknowledged, quickly kneeling to show respect.
"That is quite alright, Fancy" Celestia said, "If I may address you as such."
"I would love that, your highness " Fancy said before looking back down at Sentinel, tears forming, before turning towards Blueblood. Her tears kept coming, but not from sadness but anger. She then, against her namesake, snorted at him.
"I can't believe you'd go after a foal like that you... you... blowhard!" Fancy yelled at Blueblood.
"Quiet you...!" Blueblood shot back as he etched forward, causing Sentinel to squeal and attempt to crawl in front of Fancy, only for Princess Celestia to gently pick him up in her magical hold and pull him closer to her.
Princess Luna, however as quiet as she may be, was not so within the inner workings of her mind. She'd been going on this entire time on what exactly transpired and why. It wasn't until Fancy had arrived that she started to get the real picture.
"Fancy." Luna addressed the maidmare, who quickly started to kneel to Luna "What we seek Fancy, if we may, is not your kneeling but the truth." Luna looked between Sentinel, Fancy, and then Blueblood. "Can you tell what thy witness..."
But Princess never got to finish.
"That.... " Fancy choked out, getting very upset, "It was my turn to do his part of the wing today. So as always I arrived on time but Prince Blueblood chased me down saying I was late and his tea was cold. He ended up smashing his tea cup into all of the dishes I had gathered and I screamed in fright..." Fancy recollected, causing both Princesses to tense up in anger. They'd both heard of such incidents but every time a pony was asked, they'd deny that they were abused by Blueblood.
"Sentinel has had a habit of escorting all of the maids and butlers when they do their rounds in the wing that Prince Blueblood resides in, since he's seen what kind of abuse we get." Fancy continued, "But today he was running late and I couldn't wait."
Both princesses gave silent nods for her to continue.
"I think Sentinel heard my scream as he rushed in right after Blueblood left. He tried to help me clean up but at that point I was so upset I kind of ignored him..." Fancy said as she gave a guilty glance to Sentinel, "After I finished putting the broken shards in the trash basket I came back to see Prince Blueblood kicking back a little black foal with a bloody muzzle!" she practically yelled near the end, getting angry once more.
"Was this when they started to fight each other?" Luna inquired, letting her emotions reside in wait for now.
Fancy merely shook her head no. "At the time It didn't register that the foal was Sentinel. But all I remember seeing was Blueblood raising his foreleg for another swing...and... I.... um..." Fancy for the first time hesitated.
"Go on my little pony, " Celestia said in her kind motherly tone, " You will not be punished, I promise you."
Gulping, Fancy shut her eyes and just threw caution to the wind, along with her inside voice.
"I chest checked him into the wall!" she yelled, or maybe squeaked, out.
"Yes!!!!" Luna cried out, before calming down just as quick, "Yes, please continue." This earned her a wide eyed angry glare from Blueblood, a slight deadpan from Celestia, and an almost unnoticeable nod in agreement from the guards.
"Yes...well um... At that point Blueblood came charging at me but the foal suddenly let out this... squeal?" Fancy rolled her eyes up, trying to rewind her memory before shuddering, "and that was when they went at it throughout the castle."
"May we ask, how did thee know it was Sentinel?" Luna asked, sincerely curious.
"The eyes." Fancy replied without hesitation, "Nopony else has eyes like those."
"oink oink<I wonder...>" was all Sentinel said, totally oblivious to what all was being said.
"Thank you Fancy for being hon....hehehehahahaha!!" Celestia, seemingly gone mad, started giggling then laughing.
With how wide everypony's eyes got watching Celestia just bust out laughing in the middle of such a situation, you'd think at least one would of noticed Sentinel wiggling and flinging all of his pig hooves against the inner wall of the golden magical grasp.
Well that was until the magical grasp popped back out of existence with Princess Celestia's mouth instead grasping the back of Sentinel's neck, before plopping him down between her jail bar like forelegs.
"Ahem....excuse me..." Celestia said, with a hint of red on her cheeks, "Thank you for your honesty, Fancy."
"Um, If I may Princess," Fancy started to say, "What exactly happened to Sentinel? Foal? Sounds like a pot belly pig?"
As Princess Celestia tried to compile what information she had, as to best answer, it was Princess Luna once again that took in an observation unseen by all but her own. Blueblood was grinning, and in turn, her eyes were narrowing.
"We may have a way to ascertain the information we lack to properly answer that, Fancy." Luna nonchalantly said.
Blueblood continued to grin, almost snickering as he had his eyes closed, until he felt what could only be described as a shadow looming over him. As he cracked open his one uninjured eye he let out a rather undignified shriek as Luna, inches away, towered over him.
Princess Luna, while the younger of the two royal princesses, was still considered just as regal and calm as Celestia. Normally, such a situation bode no different expectations. Some intimidation perhaps, but nothing over the top. But Luna had had a bad day, and a previous bad night, on top of the bad day and nights for the past month and half.
Lunging forward, pushing her muzzle against Blueblood's, backwards and into the crumbled wall debris that lay under him, she said absolutely nothing. Her eyes were wide open as piercing as the sharpest of daggers. Finally, after a few tense moments...
"You. Have. One. Chance." She growled out each word.
Blueblood, given the premise, was about to piss himself.
"NOW!!!!" Luna screamed.
"IwantedtomakehimsoundlikewhathesurroundedhimselfwithsoIusedacompulsionspelltomakehimsoundlikeapig!" Blueblood squealed out.
"If you consider all of us so filthy," Celestia's said, causing Blueblood's eyes to widen, "then it would be best if you made accommodations someplace else." She then proceed to turn her backside towards Blueblood as she picked Sentinel back up and slowly trotted back to her throne, as did everypony else.