//------------------------------//
// Cadance's Amazing Plan 
// Story: Cadance: The Shining Armor Chaser 
// by Captain-Brony 
//------------------------------//

Shining Armor walked in to the ballroom, looking left and right. Didn't seem like Cadance was anywhere around, he smiled and walked over to a couple of the guards. "Good morning, privates. How is the situation?"

"Ballroom is secure, sir. But I still don't understand, we've already checked all the buildings before."

"We must be ever diligent, evil never takes a vacation."

"Sir, permission to speak freely?"

"Granted."

"Sir, we've heard some rumors about you and Princess Cadance."

"Uh Oh." Shining Armor grimaced. "I knew it was only a matter of time. What's the word?"

"She wants to hook up with you and you hate her for it."

"Hate?" Shining Armor repeated. "Hate is kind of a strong word don't you think?!"

"Well it's true isn't it?" asked the second guard.

"I don't hate anypony! Our positions in society just conflict that's all."

The two guards shared a glace, not believing their superior officer for a moment.

"I don't hate her!" he reiterated. "Princess Cadance is a lovely pony. She's kind, generous, so sweet she'll give you a cavity, caring to a fault, smart, she always tell you the truth but only in the most gentle way possible, funny..."

Shining Armor seemed to drift out of thought and gave a content sigh.

"Uh, sir?"

He snapped back to reality. "Oh! Sorry about that! Where was I?"

One of the guards smiled. "I believe you listing to us all the many traits you 'didn't hate' about Princess Cadance."

"Right! Princess Cadance is a lovely pony, and any stallion would thank all the stars in the night sky above if she was interested in him but..."

Both of the guards stood shocked, staring behind Shining Armor with their jaws dropped.

"She's standing right behind me isn't she?"

"Not quite, sir."

Shining Armor turned around and saw not the alicorn which had been chasing him, but Princess Celestia herself.

"Princess Celestia!! Ma'am!!" Shining Armor instantly stood at attention saluting the figure head while the two guards mimicked him. Princess Celestia giggled "At ease soldiers. Shining Armor, I was wondering if perhaps I could speak to you alone?"

"Of course, ma'am." Shining Armor nodded before following Celestia out the door.

''I understand that you and my niece..."

"I swear I never lead her on!!!"

Shining Armor instantly regretted his outburst. Not only did he cut her off, but he jumped to a conclusion on her. He could easily get fired for such actions, just by being rude to the head Princess.

To his surprise she laughed at his actions.

"I see she's starting to get to you." she chuckled.

Shining Armor could only blush in response. 'Why me? What did I do to deserve all this blushing?'

"But I'm not here to talk to you about her advances towards you."

Shining Armor let out a breath he didn't even know he was holding.

"However, it does involve her. With the Grand Galloping Gala drawing ever nearer Princess Cadance is going to need a new dress, which is why I would like you to be her escort in to town."

Princess Celestia waited patiently as she let the new information process in to his brain.

"Yes, your majesty!" he saluted. "I will gather up some of the guards and..."

"Oh no, I don't believe that will be necessary. You should be all she needs."

Shining Armor blushed again and saluted. "Ma'am! With all due respect....NO!"

Celestia laughed once again. "My niece is right. You are cute when you're flustered." his blushed deepened. "However, all you are doing is helping her shop for a dress, you shouldn't be gone from your troops for too long I should think."

"But..."

"Shining Armor!" Celestia snapped. He stood at attention again. "As your commanding officer I hereby order you to take my niece dress shopping!"

Shining Armor hung his head in defeat. "Yes, your highness."





Up in her room, Cadance was going over her strategy to get Shining Armor to admit his feeling for her. At first she started out with charts and graphs but now she had a little model of Canterlot complete with little Shining Armor and Cadance figurines.

She took a moment to admire her work and grinned. "Twilight would be proud!"

She knelt down to finalize her strategy. "Okay the dress shop is the ultimate goal, but I have to warm up first with these shops first, if I'm lucky the words will slip out before the dress shop. But should the dress shop fail, I always Emergency Plan B."

Cadance picked up the figurines of her and Shining Armor. "And then Shining Armor would be all like 'I love you, Cadance!'" she made the Shining Armor figurine move as she talked. "And then I will be all like 'I knew it all along! Now we can live happily ever after in the Crystal Palace.'" she did the same for her own figurine. "And then he'll say 'Again with this Crystal Palace thing, what's up with that' and then I'll say 'I don't know! I just honestly feel that one day we'll end up in a Crystal Palace someda...'"

The sound of her bedroom door opening cut off her little 'play'. Poking her head in, it took all Princess Celestia had to keep from laughing at the site of her niece playing with little figurines of herself and the stallion she was chasing. She was currently sitting on the floor with her model in front of her, holding each figurine in one of her hooves.

"You're a little old to be playing with dolls aren't you Cadance?" chuckled Celestia.

"Auuuuuntie!!" Cadance whined. "I'm not playing, I'm strategizing!"

Celestia brought her hoof to her lips to keep her from laughing. "Well whenever you're done, I thought you should know that Shining Armor is here waiting for you."

Cadance hoofed pumped. "Yes!"




Shining Armor bitterly waited downstairs, what was it about mares that always left stallions waiting for them?! He took a breath of a sigh to calm himself down. The truth was he wasn't mad at her or even mares in general, he was mad at the situation. His fellow guards were snickering behind his back and he knew it too! Not that he could blame them, the situation was just downright embarrassing! It was as if he was ordered to take Cadance on a date.

"I'm ready!" a voice called down.

Cadance appeared at the top of the stairs with a purse on her good wing. "Notice anything different about me?"

Shining Armor squinted his eyes at her. "Are you...wearing different mascara?"

Cadance let out a high pitched squee of glee. "I knew you'd notice!!"

'This is going to be a long day.' Shining Armor thought to himself.




As he and Cadance walked down the street he couldn't but notice there was a spring in her step, which didn't spell anything good for him.

"Cadance..." he started.

She started to walk normally again. "You're calling me by my first name again. I take it you want to talk about something serious."

Shining Armor felt stunned, she was right, he hadn't been calling her by her royal title lately. A familiarity with her he wasn't even aware he had. He quickly shook himself out of his stupor, he needed to focus on what was important here.

"Cadance, I hope you still don't think that kiss from yesterday is telling you that you're going to win our little wager."

"Oh it didn't tell me that." He sighed in relief. "It told me something else entirely."

"What?!"

"It told me that you want this relationship to happen every bit as much as I do!"

"I do not!"

"Your actions spoke louder than your words, Shining Armor."

"Now you hold on a second!! I..."

"We're here!" Cadance cheerfully announced.

Shining Armor sighed in defeat. Maybe it was just better to get the whole thing over with. He walked with Cadance inside the building only to find a fast food restaurant waiting for him inside.

"What the...? Hey, this isn't a dress shop!"

"Oh didn't I tell you? I thought we could stop for lunch first, I kind of missed breakfast."

CADANCE'S AMAZING PLAN part 1

'Part 1: Soften him up in a public place to show him fun loving side, that way he can find a way to relate to me. This way he can see me more as a mare than a princess.'

"Cadance, we're supposed to be shopping for a dress!"

"Oh lighten up, Shiny. It's just a fast food place."

He sighed in defeat and followed her in. Somehow they had lucked out and there wasn't any lines for them.

"Where is everypony?"

"Oh we caught them in their slow period. Looks like it's just going to be the two of us."

Shining Armor swallowed a lump in his throat as Cadance walked up to the counter.

"Two hay burgers, two small fries, and two medium sized drinks please."

"That's a lot of food." noted Shining Armor.

"Well it's for you too, silly."

"Me?!"

"Yes." she smiled. "You." she gently pressed her hoof against his nose. "Beeeeeep."

He blushed. He wasn't sure why, but something about her action just seemed to make him blush.

"Order up!" the cashier announced.

Cadance picked up the tray. "Send the bill to the royal palace. Follow me, Button Nose."

Shining Armor blushed again but followed Cadance anyways.

She sat down at a table with only two chairs and started to eat her hay burger.

Shining Armor sat down adjacent to her but she noticed he wasn't eating.

"Well? Don't be shy, I bought them for you too."

"But I'm not hungry. I ate before we left."

Cadance swallowed her mouthful and let out a heartbroken "What?"

"I never go on duty with an empty stomach and unlike some other guards I actually enjoy my rations."

'Oh no! What am I gonna do now? My amazing plan hadn't taken this in to account. Think Cadance, think!!'

She quickly pushed his burger closer to him. "Oh but I couldn't possibly eat both of these all by myself."

He pushed it away. "Honestly, I'm so full I couldn't possibly eat a single bite."

Cadance and Shining Armor soon got in to a kind of reverse tug of war with the burger. However, Cadance pushed too hard and the burger went flying in to Shining Armor's face. The hay burger must have had extra sauce in it because his face was covered with it's condiments.

Cadance brought her hooves over her mouth. "Oh my goodness. I am so sor..." His laughter cut her off. After staring at him for a moment she found herself laughing with him, although she wasn't entirely sure what they were laughing about.

"I still don't want anything to eat, but I'll take some of those napkins you have there."




Cadance and Shining Armor were now out in the streets again, they had a good laugh back at the restaurant but Shining Armor insisted they get going. He had troops to command after all.

'Okay, part 1 was a mix blend. It didn't technically work but Shining Armor and I still had fun. However, part 2 is sure fire hit, there is no way it can fail!'

"Okay Shiny. We're here."

"What the...? Cadance this is a movie theatre!!!"

"I know, but there's this movie that gives out a special coupon for gala dresses at the end if you watch it with a date."

He blew some hair out of his face. "Let me guess, it's a romantic comedy?"

"Nope. Horror." she answered honestly.

Shining Armor couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at her. 'What's her plan this time?'

CADANCE'S AMAZING PLAN part 2

'Part 2: Use the scary movie to get cling to him during the scary parts. This way he will feel how natural it is for us to be together, then he'll start to realize we're meant to be together. Heh, I bet he'll blush so much he'll light up the whole theatre.'

As Cadanced started to giggle to herself Shining Armor took a step back.

'And now I'm starting to get concerned.'




Cadance and Shining Armor sat next to each other in the theater. Shining Armor was basically grumbling to himself while Cadance mentally prepped herself.

'Okay Cadance, you have nothing to be nervous about. You've studied this movie scene by scene, you know all the scary parts to make your move.'

The title screen of *VAMPONY vs ZOMPONY* appeared on the screen followed by a vampony suddenly appearing on the screen. As the crowd screamed Cadance tried to throw her arms around his neck but Shining Armor did something Cadance honestly didn't plan for. He sneezed. When he lurched forward she completely missed him, grasping only at air.

She sat back in her seat with a disappointed frown. 'It's okay, Cadance. It was a little much to hope for it to happen on the very first try anyways. However, I'll get him next time around, I just know it!'

Her wait for the next moment took exactly thirteen minutes, as everypony else screamed Cadance tried yet again to throw her arms around him. However, following the words of "Hey! A bit!" Shining Armor had bent down avoiding Cadance completely to get the small amount of money he had discovered.

'How is that possible?' Cadance thought to herself as she returned to her seat. 'Don't get discouraged, Cadance. You have plenty of other chances.'

However, fate seemed to be against her in this event. For on her next chance when she made a grab for him he had leaned back leaving Cadance with, once again, nothing to grab but air.

'It's not over! Not yet!!'

Cadance made several other attempts to cling to him, yet all of them failed. Her frustration on the matter was starting to get to her.

'Okay, I guess I'm just going to have to force the situation and hold his hoof!

Cadance was about to make her move but Shining Armor, for whatever reason, was now bored with the movie and chose to rest his head in the exact hoof Cadance was going to make a grab for.

To add insult to injury the credits started to roll saying that the movie was now over. Shining Armor got up from his seat and Cadance buried her face in her hooves out of frustration and embarrassment.

'This isn't fair!'





As Shining Armor and Cadance walked down the street their moods seem to be in exact opposite moods of one another. Cadance's was of depression since her movie scheme didn't work, while Shining Armor's was...

"I can't believe the coupon thing was actually real!" he beamed. "I mean I thought that was just another set up from you, but who would've thought a movie production company would actually try to bribe an audience with a coupon just to watch their horrible movie."

Shining Armor didn't like the movie, some ponies were scared by it but he trained to deal with far far worse. However, he couldn't help but feel a little happy since Cadance had actually been honest with him for a change, instead of just twisting the truth to try something with him.

"Yes well...that's cinema for you." she sighed heavily. The best lies always had a ring of truth to them. 'How could that have gone so wrong? You'd think I would have been able to cling to him just once. However, I am from done! It's time for Part 3!'

"We're here!" Cadance announced pointing at the dress shop.

CADANCE'S AMAZING PLAN part 3

'Part 3 is simple enough. Find the perfect dress to turn his head, one which matches me perfectly, which compliments my beauty, but most importantly makes Shining Armor blush like a tomato!! After he becomes captivated by my beauty I need to capitalize on it as much as I can!!'

As they walked in Cadance handed the coupon to the cashier clerk. She accepted it with a grin "Oh I see you tried our special promotion! Feel free to try on any dress in the shop."

"Thank you very much! Come on, Shining Armor."

"Excuse me?"

"Well I'm still going to need a stallion's opinion on how I actually look in the dress."

As he walked past the cashier he heard her whisper to him "Your marefriend is very lucky."

"She's not my...oh forget it!"

As he joined Cadance he found her looking over a green and sky blue dress. "This one looks like it might have potential."

She took it to the changing room which was basically a sheet covering the corner of the walls. "I'm going to change now so don't peek."

"Sure."

Cadance was surprised by his honesty in the situation...surprised and just a little bit disappointed. 'Don't you even want to peek a little bit?'

"I'm going to busy changing so I wouldn't notice you if you poked your head in, so don't peek."

"Fine."

"I have a habit of giving my full attention to the details of the dress, so don't peek."

"Fine."

"In fact I would say that..."

"CADANCE!!" Shining Armor snapped. "I don't know if you've noticed this or not, but we don't normally wear clothes!! Exactly WHAT do you think you'd be hiding from me?!"

"Well that's obvious, if you peeked you would see my............................huh. I guess you got a point Shiny."

She closed the sheet and changed in to the dress. When she stepped out she was disappointed to see Shining Armor's face didn't blush, he didn't even flinch.

'Maybe he's keeping it all bottled in somehow? I know! He'll probably stutter instead.' "Well Shiny? What do you think?"

"Looks good to me. Shall we go?"

She glared at him making him shrink a little. "I'd like to try some other ones on too, okay?!"

She tried on several other dresses but Shining Armor remained as unchanged as a sphinx.

'How is he doing this?! Do the royal guards get special training on ignoring a mare in a dress?! she stopped her mental rant for a moment to consider the thought. 'That might actually make sense. Can't have the troops distracted after all.'

"Princess Cadance," Shining Armor's voice snapped her back to reality. "I'm afraid I don't know too much about dresses, for me it was always the mare in the dress I cared about, but like I said I think I'm a poor judge in fancy dresses."

Cadance rolled her eyes, he was making this more difficult than it had to be. "Well look at it this way, you own a tuxedo right?"

"A tux? Oh I don't have one."

Cadance looked at him as if he just revealed some kind of horrible secret to her. "What? How could YOU not have a tuxedo?"

"Well the answer is actually very simple. I don't have have a tux because I'm not going to the Gala."

"WHAT?!"

"I'm on duty that night."

"NO YOU'RE NOT!!!"

"Cadance, please! Ponies are staring!"

She started to drag him off towards the stallion section of the store. "We are getting you a tux whether you like it or not!!"

Shining Armor would have objected but it was clear that she had made up her mind.

She had picked out a dark green tuxedo and handed it to him. "Here, try this one on." her voice had gone back to normal much to Shining Armor's pleasure. He would have said 'no' but this was obviously something that was important to her so how could he refuse?

As he disappeared behind the curtain for stallions Cadance let out a breath of relief. 'Okay, maybe I overreacted back there but Shining Armor needs to have a tuxedo! Especially if I want to have the Best Night Ever at the Gala, I'll talk to Auntie Celestia about getting him the night off.'

She blushed as she heard Shining Armor grunt and strain to get the tuxedo on. 'Okay, so maybe I picked a suit which was a few sizes too small to focus on his new build. So what? I'm only a pony! Being an alicorn doesn't make you perfect ya know?'

The curtain opened and Shining Armor stood in his tuxedo worth all his splendor. It hugged his body as much as Cadance thought it would.

'Worth it!!'

"I think it looks wonderful on you. What do you think?"

Shining Armor said nothing, standing as still as a statue.

"Shiny? What do you think of the tux?"

He opened his mouth but no noise came out.

"Is something wrong?"

Shining Armor fell to the ground, his face starting to turn blue.

"Oh my goodness, SHINING ARMOR!!! SOMEPONY HELP!!!"

The cashier from earlier came running over "What happened?!"

"I don't know!!" Cadance panicked. "He just stopped breathing!!"

It was then that Cadance noticed that Shining Armor was pawing at his tux collar. 'The suite is too small!! It's choking him!!'

"He needs mouth to mouth." the cashier deduced. As she leaned in to begin the procedure Cadance suddenly pushed her out of the way with a shout of "NO HE DOESN'T!!!"

Cadance quickly ripped his collar with horn opening his air flow back to normal. Shining Armor inhaled sharply as color quickly returned to his face.

"Cadance," he offered her a forgiving smile. "Next time, get my measurements right."

She smiled sadly down at him as her eyes watered up to the point of breaking, then without warning she threw herself on top of him, crying in to his shoulder.

Normally Shining Armor would have objected to such affection but by the looks of it she needed even more comfort and care then he did right now. He held her as she continued to cry, it lasted for maybe a moment or two but when she was finished a clearing of the throat brought their attention over to the cashier.

"This is touching and everything but I'm still going to need you to pay for that tuxedo you broke."





Cadance had felt quite embarrassed about their little skirmish in the dress shop. She was even having trouble looking the object of her affection in the eye. There was yet another awkward silence between the two as they walked down the street, and just like last time Shining Armor decided to break it.

"So..."

Unlike last time, however, he didn't have anything to go on.

"So..." she echoed. "I'm really sorry I almost killed you with a tuxedo."

Shining Armor chortled. "Don't worry about it. This is something we'll probably look back on one day and laugh."

Cadance let out a small laugh. "You must have known it was too small for you, why did you try to put it on anyways?"

"I was afraid you were going to freak out again if I didn't! Don't need anymore rumors going around about us!"

They shared a laugh dissolving whatever tension there was between them.

'Okay, we're both in a good mood now. It is the perfect time to put in to action Emergency Plan B!

CADANCE'S AMAZING PLAN part 4...AKA Emergency Plan B

"Shining Armor, it is starting to get late..."

He looked at the horizon and frowned at how the sun was setting. "You're right, I've been away from my troops for too long."

"Well I happen to know of a short cut. It should at least shave an hour off of our return trip."

"That would be a big help." He grinned.

"Terrific! Just follow me!"

'Emergency Plan B, I was hoping it wouldn't come to this because it seems kind of drastic. Cadance lead Shining Armor to a street which was littered with couples. 'This street is famous for mares and stallions getting together. It also has a reputation for being overly crowded meaning Shining Armor and I will get in to a lot of tight spaces. He'll see how natural it is for us to be together and then I'll hear those three magic words before you can say Crystal Palace.'

As they walked down the street her plan already started to take effect. Shining Armor couldn't help but notice that the majority of ponies on this street were couples. He suddenly felt very self conscious about being alone with Cadance.

The crowd got thicker and Cadance was practically leaning up against him. "Cadance, do you think you could..."

"I'm sorry Shining Armor, but in this crowd I have to stay close to you so we don't get separated."

Shining Armor's blush had reached a whole new level of red and Cadance was loving every minute of it.

"Isn't this nice, Shiny? Just the two of us..."

"Cadance...we've been over this..."

"But look Shiny, nopony is bothering us or spreading rumors. To them we're just another couple in the crowd, there is nothing wrong with what we have. It's only natural for there to be an attraction between us. Don't you think you could give 'us' a try?"

"Sure thing hot stuff!"

Cadance felt overjoyed, not only had her stallion finally said yes but he called her 'hot' to boot.

"Oh Shining Armor, I'm so happy I..."

"I didn't say that." he cut her off.

"Huh?"

Shining Armor pointed past her shoulder. "It was that guy!"

There stood a blue pegasus with blue hair wearing a Wonderbolt, his name was Soarin.

"Never thought I could get with a princess of all things, but if that's what you want Babe then you certainly won't hear me complain."

He gave her a wink which only made her skin crawl.

"I wasn't talking to you!!" Cadance cried.

"That doesn't matter, what does matter is that I'm here, you're here, so what's the problem?"

Shining Armor was suddenly in the space between the two winged ponies. Standing in front of Cadance to keep Soarin at bay, the look he gave him was like that a knight would give an enemy he had to kill.

"The 'problem' is that she's a princess!"

Soarin just seemed to laugh off Shining Armor's serious glare. "Oh I don't mind that at all."

"I mind!!" Shining Armor snapped. "I would expect a member of the Wonderbolts to have better behavior towards a princess."

"Wait a second...you're Shining Armor! Can't believe I didn't recognize you, dude, are you on a date with her?"

"Yes, I mean No! I mean....Grr...That's not the point!! The point is, leave her alone or you'll have me to answer to!"

Cadance felt her heart skip a beat, Shining Armor was defending her honor like something out of an old story book.

"Oh yeah, and what're you going to about it huh? In case you haven't noticed, I'm not one of your little guard ponies! You can't punish me because you aren't MY commanding officer. You have no authority over me!"

Cadance gasped. As much as she hated to admit it, Soarin had a point. He couldn't just order Soarin to go away like he would with a guard pony, this might actually lead to some kind of street fight.

"You're right, Soarin." Shining Armor grinned. "I'm not your commanding officer, so I can't punish you. However, I don't have to..."

"Come again?" Soarin really didn't like how the unicorn had phrased that. He was starting to get nervous.

"Because YOUR commanding officer is right behind you!"

"WHAT?!"

He turned around to be greeted with the sight of Spitfire looking absolutely furious at him. "Spitfire! Hi. How long have you been standing there?"

"Long enough to know you've been shirking off your training responsibilities TO FLIRT WITH MARES!!!"

The force of Spitfire's shouting was actually so strong it blew back Soarin's hair. He was really sweating now.

"When we get back, you're going to be doing so many laps YOUR WINGS WILL FALL OFF!!!" Soarin seemed completely pale, but Spitfire flew past him all the same and gave a salute to Shining Armor.

"Captain, I'm sorry if my wing pony gave you or your date any trouble. I thank you for keeping him in one place long enough for me to find him. I promise to keep him on a shorter leash from now on."

Shining Armor returned the salute. "Not at all. And just to be clear, myself and the princess are not on a date."

Spitfire smirked. "Kind of looks like a date from where I'm flying. But whatever, let me call you a chariot to get you back to the castle."

"That would be greatly appreciated."





CADANCE'S AMAZING PLAN part5........................................................................actually, the Amazing Cadance hasn't thought this far ahead yet.

'Stupid Soarin!! I almost had him!!'

Cadance paced back and forth in her room. This was starting to prove harder than she initially thought, she went over to her desk and looked at a photograph she had framed.

It was of her, filly Twilight, and a much skinnier Shining Armor. She knew what she had to do, she brought out a piece of paper, an inkwell, and a quill.

"I'm sorry Shining Armor. I was hoping it wouldn't have to come to this, but you've left me no choice."

Cadance sighed and started to write a letter. "I'm going to need..." a giant grin grew on her face. "Backup! Dear Twilight Sparkle..."