//------------------------------// // Inspiration Manifestation // Story: Two Background Ponies Revisit Season Four // by Piccolo Sky //------------------------------// Inspiration Manifestation "Come on, just answer the question." "But...but..." "It's a simple answer. We can't fix this unless you answer it." "But...I...I..." Princess Twilight Sparkle sighed. "Look...think really hard...and then tell me...are you actually Octavia or are you a pony mariachi who was simply gender-bent and recolored to look like Octavia?" The mare with a gray coat and her hair brushed and tied back merely gave a helpless shrug. "I...I honestly don't know..." Twilight facehooved. This mare was really holding up the line in the square of other ponies waiting to get transformed back. Meanwhile, everypony else in town was going about "redecorating" and removing the many changes that had been made. Among them, there was a team of ponies grunting and straining, Sam among them, as they were using whatever heavy tools and shovels they could to break up the gold-plated streets so it could all be placed into a pile and destroyed before the economy of Equestria was completely ruined. He pried up one fragment, tossed it into a waiting wheelbarrow, pried up a second fragment, tossed it into a waiting wheelbarrow, pried up a third fragment...looked around...whistled as it went into his saddlebags, and then continued... Before a shadowy being from on high descended and proceeded to slap him in the back of the head. He yelped in pain and recoiled, only to turn...and soon cringed as he saw Princess Luna glaring at him, her eyes just beginning to turn white. "Don't bother, Sam. Remember...I know what you do in the dark." Swallowing hard, the green stallion nervously reached inside his saddlebag, pulled out the piece of gold, and threw it in the wheelbarrow. Like a flickering shadow, Luna ascended again and was gone. Taking a moment to contain himself, the pony turned to begin to break up the gold again for a moment...before he heard the sound of approaching hooves. He looked up just in time to see a dirty and tired looking Carl walk up to him. Sam exhaled. "Hey Carl. So...how are things going?" "Fine." Carl answered tiredly. "Just doing another once over of the ruins of the old castle to see if there's any other dangerous supernatural relics left inside. Frankly...I'm not too optimistic about our success." "I'll say. The girls renovated it and they still didn't find everything..." "...Wait, they renovated it? Why does it still look like the remains of Dol Guldor?" "I dunno... What's Princess Luna doing...other than making sure no one steals anything?" "Destroying the extra gold and jewels to not devalue the bit." "Uh-huh. What about Princess Cadance?" "Rebuilding all of the public works." "Princess Twilight Sparkle?" "Correcting the...um...physical differences among certain citizens and making sure no one got caught in airtight spaces." "And let me guess, Princess Celestia is taking charge of the whole thing with her natural commanding presence, wisdom, and leadership?" The two looked to each other for a brief moment...and then burst into raucous laughter for a solid minute. "Heh, good one, Sam." Carl said when he finally managed to stop crying. After doing so, he looked up and straight outward. "Seriously, the guy who writes these little 'quickies' doesn't want to endorse the idea of 'Trollestia', but whenever Twilight says a line like the fact that she, Luna, and Cadance have been the ones trying to fix everything, the writers really, really make it hard. He's already dreading her usefulness come the season finale." "...Who are you talking to, Carl?" "Just that enormous wall that takes up one fourth of the surroundings of our city but no one ever looks at it, Sam." "Oh... Anyway, find anything else there?" "Well, aside from a set of evil hoof bracelets: three for unicorns, seven for pegasi, and nine for earth ponies...not really. But ever notice how our world seems to be filled with an abundance of relics that give you above-alicorn level power but also corrupt you...and that they're strangely easy to get rid of?" "Oh come on, Carl...there were two. The Alicorn Amulet and...whatever that book was." "Inspiration Manifestation." "...Really? Was that the actual book or the name of the spell in the book?" "I have no idea." Carl answered as he looked to the wall again. "All I know is that the author had his fingers crossed that an 'evil Rarity' episode would mean we'd see Nightmare Rarity, and now he's waving his crushed dreams goodbye." Sam quickly frowned, reached out, and turned Carl's head away. "Dude, stop overusing that joke. It's not that funny to begin with and you're going to ruin our whole premise. Save it for when we need it." Carl sighed. "Fine..." Suddenly, another series of hoofbeats came up to the two. They turned their heads, and were just in time to see the frazzled Princess Cadance running up to them. "You two look strong. We need your help on the restroom duty." Both Sam and Carl looked confused. "...Restroom duty?" "Well," Cadance began to explain. "Spike finally...well...did his business after yesterday, and now we're trying to keep a rather crazed-looking unicorn from jumping in." Both stallions had their eyes widen, before they heard a New England accent screaming in the distance. "My precious! It's ours, it is! OURS!" Sam and Carl both stared open-mouthed for a few moments, before Carl frowned and again looked at the wall with a tired expression. "...Yeah, yeah...you knew that joke was coming ever since Rarity started referring to the book as an individual in this episode." Pause. "Wow...three Tolkien references in this one..." Sam slapped him with a hoof. "I said cut that out!" --- Well- Carl, remember, no more Fourth Wall breaks. … …Well? …Er…how about our dear Celestia? It’s…it’s…really great that she was the only princess who didn’t show up to help clean up the mess Rarity left… I mean…being the one princess who would stay behind doesn’t…you know…confirm her reputation of being about as useful as a hoof growing out of one’s forehead or anything… And…uh…how about the way she, uh…bravely got herself captured by black vines at the beginning of this year? I mean…yeah…the same thing happened to Luna so…uh…I guess that makes her as effective as Luna… And wasn’t it, um…great the way she ended up giving all of her power to Twilight Sparkle when Tirek showed up…you know…in spite of the fact that she had experience being the only alicorn in Equestria for a couple hundred years…and if anyone should have gone toe-to-toe with Tirek it should have been her? But…no…she wisely decided to…uh…delegate that responsibility to Twilight and…even made sure to tell her to not get her friends to give her moral support at least? Wow…she, um…really made everyone who calls her ‘Trollestia’ eat their words this year, let me tell you- OK, OK! Break the Fourth Wall! Even if Chrysalis does come back at this point, she’ll pale in comparison to this season finale.