Time: 47 hours before arrival at Equestria
“Is my mane straight?” asked Twilight, as she trotted nervously after Pinkie. “Is there a manebrush somewhere? Or a comb? I can't go and talk to the Princess if my mane's not straight.”
“I don't think the Princess will mind,” said Spike, from his seat on Twilight's back.
“And a shower.” said Twilight. “There's got to be a shower somewhere in this place, I feel like I haven't showered in a week, I certainly can't talk to the Princess when I smell like this.”
“Yeah, we're all a bit stinky.” nodded Pinkie. “Stinky Pinkies aren't the best Pinkies. There might be a shower, maybe the aliens will know. I thought I found one earlier, but I pushed all the buttons I could see and I couldn't get the water started.”(1)
“Rarity.” said Twilight. “Rarity will have found out about showers. And manebrushes. I need to talk to Rarity before I can talk to Celestia.”
* * *
Var'aQ marched onto the bridge, carrying Rainbow Dash over his shoulder. He tossed the pegasus – fairly gently – onto a handy chair and sat down in the pilot's seat. “You're not bad,” he said, glancing over the displays, “for a beginner.”
“My entire body,” groaned Rainbow, slumped over the arm of the chair, “is one giant bruise.”
“You're surprisingly fast,” continued Var'aQ, ignoring the complaint, “your agility is top-notch, you are a good deal stronger than you look, and the ability to fly gives you a notable advantage. Also, the fact that you are so different to the average warrior makes you harder for an unprepared combatant to read your body language.”
Rainbow blinked, unsure of what to say.
“Having said that,” continued Var'aQ, “you telegraph your moves well in advance, you have next to no understanding of tactics, and you fall into the simplest of traps. You would benefit from some basic training. It will hurt, but it will hurt less than the pain of seeing those you love killed by a threat you could not defeat.”
Rainbow groaned.
* * *
45 hours before arrival at Equestria
“I'm afraid that that's the best I can manage with the tools at hand, darling.” said Rarity, inspecting Twilight's mane. “At the very least, I've got all the tangles out, but until we can figure out where the showers are on this vessel and how they work, there's not really much I can do about the smell.”
“If there even are showers.” grumbled Twilight.
“There must be, darling.” said Rarity. “I ran across one of the aliens earlier, and he didn't smell of sweat at all, so there must be some means of keeping oneself clean hidden somewhere in this horrible place.”
“Maybe the aliens don't sweat at all?” suggested Sweetie Belle, who was lying draped across her big sister's back.
“Of course they do.” said Rarity, firmly.
“Maybe it's because they don't have fur.” suggested Spike. “Scales are a lot easier to clean, after all.”
“Ah think y'all are makin' a big deal about nothin'.” volunteered Applejack. “There's nothin' wrong with a bit of sweat, it shows a pony's been workin' hard.”
“Besides,” added Applebloom, “Ah don't think anypony can smell through that magic window in any case. I mean, it's kinda like a window that's closed – y'can't smell through that.”
“Yeah!” agreed Pinkie. “All you gotta do is not mention how you smell, and Celestia won't even notice!”
Twilight took a deep breath. “Maybe you're right.” she said, giving in at last.
* * *
44 hours and 30 minutes before the ship's arrival at Equestria
“We toyed with the idea of worldwide political unity once.” said Celestia. “About, oh, five hundred years ago. It was Prince Regal's idea – as I recall, his intention was to, as he put it, 'foist all the idiotic paperwork onto the lesser races without giving them any actual power'.” She levitated her teacup to take a sip. “Of course, he was a little more diplomatic about it when actually talking to the griffins and minotaurs in person. Nonetheless, the attempt was rather doomed to failure from the beginning, as I'm sure you can imagine.”
“I really can't imagine an alliance on that basis taking off.” said the Admiral, nodding. “Although, in the right political environment, something like that could -”
There was a beeping noise from his side of the subspace link.
“Ah – perhaps we should continue this discussion later.” he said. “It seems we have an incoming message from the Ferengi ship.”
“I do hope it's Twilight.” said Celestia. “If she sleeps much longer, I'm going to start worrying.”
“Let us see, shall we?” said the Admiral. “Splitscreen.”
Instantly, Celestia's screen showed a division down the middle – on the left-hand side, the Admiral remained, while on the right-hand side, the bridge of the Ferengi ship was visible. The top of the Klingon pilot's head could be seen at the lower edge of the screen, but Celestia ignored him in favour of the small group of ponies standing in the middle of the screen, just in front of the Captain's chair, in the centre of that group being a visibly nervous purple pony.
“Twilight.” said Celestia, with a little smile. Her student looked surprisingly neat and well-presented; no doubt Rarity had lent a hoof in that.
“Princess.” said Twilight, with a much broader smile of her own.
“I am glad to see that you are well.” said Celestia, calmly. “Have you learnt anything about friendship over these last few days?”
“Oh yes.” said Twilight, nodding. She took a deep breath. “I've learnt that there are times when you're facing a task that may seem insurmountable, and it might seem like you can't do it, and you're going to fail your friends in some way. But you have to try, and you have to keep going. And with good friends by your side to encourage you –” Twilight reached out to place one foreleg around Rainbow's shoulders(2) and another around Rarity's – “and to help you keep going, you can surprise yourself, and everypony else, with what you can accomplish.”
Celestia nodded. “An important lesson.” she said, then changed the subject. “Have you met Sunek yet?”
“Not yet.” said Twilight, cautiously.
“It might be a good idea if you would.” said Celestia. “I have a decision that I need to make, and I would like to have your opinion.”
“Of course, Princess!” said Twilight, barely refraining from jumping up and down in excitement.
“Excellent.” said Celestia. “If you need me for anything else, feel free to call me from the bridge, or to send a letter via Spike.”
“Of course, Princess.” repeated Twilight, firmly.
(1) This was partly because the shower in question was a sonic shower, but mainly because Pinkie had neglected to put a coin in the relevant slot.
(2) Rainbow only winced slightly