CHAPTER THE ONE IN CANTERLOT
"THE GREAT SIDE CHARACTER ENSEMBLE"
or
"IT'S HEADCANON CHALLENGING TIME"
"Sir?"
Nonagon's head slumped. He took several seconds to blink, letting his cheek skim the surface of the desk. A sound passed through his lips that was almost a greeting but more like a snore, dissolving into a faint muttering about paperwork.
"Sir!" A sky-blue hoof smashed into the desk in front of his face, causing Nonagon to jolt back and nearly fall out of his chair. When he regained his balance, he found a set of furious green eyes just inches from his own. "I am here to volunteer!" the mare barked. "Are you going to facilitate that? Or do you require a replacement?"
"Uh... yeah! Yeah, I'm awake. I can do that." Nonagon blinked rapidly and scrambled about the papers in front of him, pretending that he remembered where the relevant form was. "Sorry," he said, stifling another yawn. "It was a really long walk to get here."
The sign on his desk read Nonagon's Volunteer and Missing Foal Rescue Centre. The sign outside said the same thing, with the slogan Are you ready to be a hero? carved underneath. The room in between was well-lit and needlessly spacious, with extravagant plants in every corner and gigantic clocks on every wall. Each of these had stopped close to noon when the sky had turned dark, but Nonagon suspected that the positions of the hands was close to being accurate again. The room was technically the reception area for an investment banker's office near the heart of Canterlot, but for the first time in its existence groups of ponies were walking into it looking like they actually wanted to be there. Volunteers of all shapes and sizes milled about in the large space, some forming a crude line that stretched all the way to the door but others comforting each other by the gold filigree waiting chairs too delicate to be sat on. Loud and concerned chatter filled the room, turning into a hushed echo as it rebounded off the curved ceiling. As a headquarters for the new objective, it was perfect.
"Ah, here we are." Nonagon beamed and produced a paper with a crude chart on it from the pile of identical copies he had strewn about his desk. He picked up what had once been a delicate fountain quill from the inkpot beside him and crunched the top half between his teeth. "Name?" he said.
The blue mare slowly backed down from the desk. "Nurse Tenderheart," she stated.
"Good." A few crude scratches made their way onto the page. "Occupation?"
She eyed his penmanship with disdain. "Nurse."
"Cutie mark?"
"Nurse."
"Special talent?"
"Nurse."
"Experience and education?"
"Nurse."
"Areas of interest?"
"Nurse." Her voice started to grow louder.
"Skills relevant to volunteer activities?"
"Nurse."
"Dream job?"
"Nurse." Her tail twitched.
"Preferred position within this group?"
"Nurse."
"Do you have any history with drugs or-"
"NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURSE!" Tenderheart bellowed, blowing Nonagon's mane back. She pointed a hoof aggressively at her nurse bonnet and held her glare, daring him to ask another question.
"...Well." Nonagon steadied himself and attempted to straighten the single page in his hooves. "You, um, appear to have the qualifications we're looking for. Please, have a seat by the chairs and I'll let you know as soon as you have an opening I can fill." He brushed his mane back into place and put on his professional face, managing to hold it for a whole two seconds until his brain caught up with his mouth. "Er..."
Nurse Tenderheart pierced him with a look that could drop birds from the sky, but she still whirled away and huffed off in the direction of the chairs. Nonagon buried his face in his hooves and spat the quill messily onto the desk. "Ugh, why couldn't I have gotten this over with in the form of a montage?" he groaned. "I wouldn't have done all the work in between story segments if I'd known it was going to be all this work." Still, he rang the little bell that he'd stolen from the hotel across the street and called out to the line. "Next!"
It was a mint green unicorn who broke away from the line next, a cream-coloured earth pony right behind her. She approached the desk nervously, stuttering as she spoke. "H-hi. I, uh, I w-w-was w-wondering-"
"Finally!" Nonagon belted. "Somepony I can work with!"
He drew stares as he leaped onto the desk, scattering papers everywhere. "Lyra Heartstrings!" he yelled excitedly, pointing into the startled mare's face. "Or Lyra, or just Heartstrings, or what the flip ever. You're the excitable and bouncy one and kind of a genius, depending on the writer, and socially oblivious to match. You've got an obsession with humans that borders on the fetishistic but so long as we don't probe too deeply it'll stay cute instead of disturbing. You're a total raging lesbian for her-" He gestured to the other mare. "-who totally reciprocates, in every possible meaning of the term." He winked and forcefully nudged her as she started to shake. "Her name is Bon Bon, and she's comparatively sane and kind of motherly, depending on the writer, and makes candies for a living despite the fact that Sugarcube Corner basically has a total monopoly on that market. She can reign you in when you go off the rails and usually has some kind of secret, but it won't come up for like six chapters so we'll be totally safe until then."
He jumped down from the desk, strangling the pair of them into a hug and smooshing their faces together. "This is perfect!" he shouted. "Do you have any idea how easy you two are to write? All I have to do is throw you onto the page and people will instantly think of the relationship they've seen in other, better fanfics, which cuts my workload in freaking half. All the character establishment and setup for the emotional stuff's already been done. It's like you're barely even real ponies! You're like visual cheat sheets to make people love me!" He beamed and threw his head back. "We are back in business, baby!"
There was a long, choking- and spittle-ridden pause before the two mares could get enough leverage to push away from him. Then the cream mare spoke in the most obnoxious voice he'd ever heard. "Um, yeah, my name is Sweetie Drops, and, like, none of that was true."
Nonagon's smile froze on his face. He slowly twisted his head toward the first mare, whose legs were shaking. "Wh-wh-why would you s-say that ab-about me?" she stuttered. Tears started to spill down her face. "Why would you say that!?"
"...Oh, cheese." Nonagon's eye twitched. "I'm so, so sorry, you looked exactly like-" She turned and fled from the room, pushing ponies aside as she stumbled back onto the street. Nonagon stared after her, then turned his ghastly smile back to Sweetie Drops. "Aren't you going to go after her?" he said.
"Why should I? I'm just here to check in for the night."
"Check in? This is..." Nonagon sighed and turned away. "Ma'am, the hotel is across the street."
"Well why didn't ya say so?" She spun away with her nose in the air, but paused to get one last shot off. "Oh, and by the way, these are little bow ties, not candy," she said, brushing her flank. "But I'll forgive ya. If ya looked any closer, I'd have to, like, tell my husband to kill you."
Nonagon waited until she was out of sight, then turned back to the desk and winced so hard that he smacked his forehead against its edge. "Why does the universe hate me?" he whined to himself.
"Amusing as that was," a male voice stated from behind him, "I can't help but feel that you set yourself up for that. Rather cheapens it, don't you think?"
Nonagon turned around. He ran his eyes up and down the dark blue unicorn in front of him. "And you are?"
"Noteworthy, my good sir."
Nonagon checked him out again. "Um, no you're not," he corrected. "Noteworthy is an earth pony."
The stallion drew himself up. "I should think that I know who I am."
"Whatever." Nonagon pinched the bridge of his nose and awkwardly waved to the left. "Just wait over there. I can not deal with you right now. Alert me if anyone important shows up."
"Mister?" a new voice squeaked from below.
"What?" Nonagon snarled. He looked down to see a tiny pink filly poking at his leg. "Um..."
"Mister?" The filly looked up at him with big, puppy-dog eyes. "I can't find my mom."
"Oh." Nonagon looked around desperately. The ponies he'd already spoken to that night were avoiding his gaze. "Um... look, kid, listen," he tried. "The missing foal thing was really more for PR reasons, and I haven't really been looking-"
She widened her eyes at him.
"I mean, it's not that I don't want to help, I just haven't really vetted enough responsible adults yet, and-"
Those big, soulful eyes.
"We don't really have the facilities to-"
Those big, soulful, watering eyes.
"I'd have to mock up another type of form-"
Those big, soulful, watering, quivering eyes.
"I-"
EYES.
"All right, all right. We can see if anyone here's seen her." He took her hoof and helped her climb onto his back. "Notesworth, take over," he called. "I'll just be five minutes."
"Very well." Noteworthy reappeared and took Nonagon's place behind the desk. "Though I'm fully aware that that mispronunciation of my name was intentional."
"Yeah, it was."
Nonagon took a breath and lurched into the crowd. Colours surrounded him, and voices, and so many different mane styles that he could barely detect any repetition. Some wore clothes, some didn't, and a unique cutie mark graced every flank that was visible. Two dolphins, a star, a scroll, a ship, a brain in a jar. He shut his eyes before the details could overwhelm him. "What does your mom look like?" he asked.
"She's purple," the pink filly said. "And her mane is purple, and her cutie mark is purple. And she has a big tummy, and she smells like grapes, and..."
The words started to blur together, becoming part of the dozens of conversations happening simultaneously. Every voice had a backstory, a childhood, a place in the world. Every image was symbolic. Every interaction was worthy of a whole page to itself. "Maybe... maybe she's outside," Nonagon huffed, focusing heavily on the sound of his hooves hitting the floor. "Maybe she just needed... some air..."
He forced his way through and burst out onto the street. The buildings here were rounded and immaculate, seemingly growing out of the mountain into gilded marble spires. Even the cobblestones had the same pristine, natural quality to them. The only thing that seemed out of place was his own, hoof-painted sign, which covered the office's window. The night sky was still covered in broiling clouds, and the city's usual smell of stone and flowers was tainted by ash. There were no other ponies in sight, and the city fell quiet as the door swung closed. That was it. That was all the detail there was.
Nonagon took a deep breath as his mind cleared. He felt the filly curl up into a little ball on his back. "So many characters," he muttered. "Why the heck does this world have to be so big?"
Suddenly, a noise to his right startled him. Twilight Sparkle winged out of the sky and loudly touched down on the street, Fluttershy following close behind her. "What the hay is this?" she demanded.
"Ah, there you are!" Nonagon exclaimed, instantly feeling his good mood returning. "Just the purple mare I was hoping to see."
"Mommy?" the filly gasped, bounding up onto his head.
There was an awkward pause. "One of the two purple mares I was hoping to see," Nonagon clarified.
"Just what do you think you're doing?" Twilight demanded while Fluttershy scooped the filly from Nonagon's head. She shook a flier with another copy of his sign on it at him. "What is all this? Why is this? How is this!?"
"I know some guys," Nonagon said with a shrug, deftly not answering the question. "And I'm just doing my part to help the community."
Twilight pointed angrily. "There is an actual rescue centre two streets away," she said. "One with food, and beds, and actual staff from the Royal Guard. If you wanted to help, why didn't you just go there?"
"Twilight, Twilight, Twilight," Nonagon said, shaking his head. "You're not seeing the big picture."
He threw a foreleg over her shoulders, inwardly rejoicing when she only stiffened uncomfortably a little, and led her down the street. "Look, sugarplum," he continued-
"Don't call me that."
"-you and I both know that the Royal Guards aren't going to do anything. Nothing was ever accomplished by a large group of ponies working together over a long period of time."
"That's completely untrue."
"Nothing that matters. Everything that's ever changed this world has been accomplished by a small number of individuals across an equally small number of events. It doesn't even take any skills, just being in the right place at the right time. Half the time the only trial is getting the masses to do what you want - removing the useless weight from the equation. Heck, your whole shtick is being more important than everyone else."
"I am not more important than everypony else."
"Whatever you say, Princess."
Twilight ruffled her wings, but she held in a lecture and delivered a stern question instead. "So is that what you're doing here? Removing useless weight?"
"More like sifting through it." Nonagon spun away from her, practically dancing, and looked her in the eyes. "Think back on every adventure you've ever been on. How do you think they make other ponies feel? Small. Weak. Insignificant. If you've ever taken part in a crowd scene, you know deep down that nothing you do will ever have real value. And at that other shelter, those guards will be taking steps to keep it that way. They'll be telling other ponies to stay indoors, hide themselves away - to, whatever else they do, not participate. They're streamlining the world for you so you heroes can have your spotlight. Well, it doesn't have to be that way.
"Sure, not all of us are cut out to be main characters. I can live with that. But sometimes, it takes nothing more than a single line to completely steal the show. And right here, ponies are getting those lines. Most of them won't make the cut. They'll fade into the background, just like the majority of everyone who's ever lived. But just for tonight, and just for a second, some of them can feel like they're contributing to the world. Like they matter. And I'd take that over cowering in a basement, waiting for Twilight Sparkle to do her job again."
He fixed her with his cocky smile full-force. "Sure, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm just wasting time. But maybe, somewhere in there is a diamond waiting to be found. And if I can put just the right team together... then hey, who knows?" He shrugged. "Maybe you won't have to be better than everyone else any more."
Twilight stared at him hard, her lips pursing in angry thought. Fluttershy came out the door and edged up beside her. "This little one's parents aren't inside," she said. "We should bring her to the big shelter and look there."
"...Yeah. Let's do that." Twilight glared once more and walked away.
Fluttershy moved after her. "Is it, um... is it okay to leave him in charge?" she stage-whispered to her friend.
"I doubt there's anypony in there who can't look after themselves. If he doesn't figure it out, they will."
With a small sigh of triumph and relief, Nonagon went back inside. He edged his way around the corners of the room, accidentally taking the long way around, and arrived back at his desk, where Noteworthy was speaking in hushed tones to a turquoise pegasus in a beret. "How's it coming, Notesworth?" he said.
"It's..." Noteworthy gave him a strange look "It's, er, coming along."
"Good, good." Nonagon bumped him out of the chair and took his place. "And what's your name?" he said, smiling charmingly to the mare across the desk.
She grinned cheerily back at him. "Well, uh, I don't really have one yet!"
Nonagon stared at her blankly. "Notesworth, go finish the interview with her over there," he said.
"Er... Over where?"
"Somewhere I'm not. Next!" He took great delight in ringing the bell. "Oh, Celestia, Narrator, whoever," he begged with his head in his hooves, "let the next one be the one who makes this all worth it."
"Well, I can't make any promises, but I have been called that before."
Nonagon's eyes snapped open. He lowered his forelegs slowly, staring with dawning realization at the stallion in front of him. "You," he said.
"Oh, you know who I am?" The stallion beamed in mock disappointment. "Can't we do the introduction anyway? You'll say 'Name?' and I'll say 'The Doctor' and you'll say 'Doctor who?' - that's my favorite part - and I'll say 'No, just the Doctor' and you'll give me a funny little look... That's right, that one. That's half the reason I introduce myself any more these days. Well, that and to be polite. If I feel like it."
Nonagon's breath twisted up inside his throat. Something that was barely half-articulate to begin with lost all form as it left his mouth, coming out as a strangled "Ogh."
"Now, I was in the neighborhood and I happened to overhear that you were looking for volunteers of more than just the usual sort, isn't that right? Well, I believe I may be just the character you're looking for. I have a history with this sort of thing, you see; being in the right place at the right time, always knowing just what to say, being terribly important more by way of convenience than everything else. I've solved bigger problems than this without having to actually do anything."
"Get out," Nonagon whispered.
"And I mean that about not having to do anything," the Doctor continued. "Often my only real contribution will be identifying the villain, or giving the villain someone to explain their plan to. Aside from that, I'll just be the spark that starts something that would have happened without me anyway. And the rest of the time, it usually has to do with control panels. Do you have any idea how many alien races there are out there who build control panels that can be easily manipulated by hooves? It's as if they're asking to be interfered with."
"Get out," Nonagon repeated, louder.
"And while I can't quite claim to know which iteration of this character I'm supposed to represent, you can rest assured that so long as I'm here, you won't have to worry at all. I'll just step in, say a few catch phrases, do a lot of running, and let everyone tell me how clever I am, and the problem will just set itself up for me to resolve it. It's as if any suspense or tension is sucked out of the room as soon as I walk in the door. You won't even notice that anyone else is there!"
"GET OUT!" Nonagon roared, rearing up menacingly. "Get out of this room, get out of this city, get out of this story, and never come back here again!"
The Doctor stopped, for once in his life completely at a loss for words. "Are... are you sure?"
"Yes." Nonagon settled down, glaring fiercely. "You aren't welcome here. Get out."
"Well, if you're sure." The Doctor reached into a hidden pocket and produced a small, folded piece of paper. "But if you ever find that you're in need of me..." He slid the paper onto the desk. "I hope that this will change your mind." With that, he calmly turned and walked out the door.
Nonagon glared after him for a long while. He slowly picked up the paper and unfolded it, reading what was written on it twice. Then he scrunched it up and hurled it to the ground, stomping on it for good measure as he leaped out of his seat. He became aware of a lot of baffled stares being leveled at him and twisted his head arrogantly away. "I'll just be another minute," he grunted in the general direction of no one at all as he marched to the end of the room and disappeared further into the building.
The pegasus without a name fell hard against the wall, allowing Noteworthy to catch her. "I don't understand," she murmured as conversation started to return to the room. "Why doesn't Nonagon like the Doctor?"
Noteworthy mused over this. "Well," he said, "it seems to me-"
"Are you freaking kidding me!?" Nonagon screamed, only being slightly muffled by the building's thick walls. "What, was he mad that I didn't cream my frigging panties over him like every other fangirl? Am I supposed to be impressed by that level of fluffy writing? If I have to read just one more totally overblown introduction, I'll..."
"Ah," Noteworthy said with a nod over Nonagon's continued ranting. "It appears his 'beef', as t'were, isn't so much with the character of the Doctor himself as with his fans."
The pegasus gasped slowly, taking her time to process this. "You mean he's..."
"It appears so."
"He hates..."
"Without using any specific terms... Yes."
"And if I have to see just one more gifset about those stupid companions, I'll..."
The pegasus lurched angrily to her hooves. "Why, that ungrateful, hypocritical ass!"
"A sad case," Noteworthy sighed, "but perhaps, to him, necessary."
"Why, I oughta go in there and give him a piece of my-"
"No!" Noteworthy grunted, catching her as she surged forward. "He mustn't suspect. No matter how difficult he becomes, he absolutely can not know the truth."
The pegasus struggled for a second more, then gave Noteworthy a wicked smirk. "I wasn't necessarily going to say 'mind'."
"You sicken me."
"Why thank you, Doctor-Sensei! Let me bathe you with my tongue, Doctor-Sensei! Ooh, your plot hole is so big!"
"Alright, now he's getting into sarcastic honorifics. He must be wrapping up." Noteworthy straightened up and dragged the unnamed pegasus around to his side. "Look natural. And for the Narrator's sake, behave yourself."
"No promises," she retorted with a lecherous grin.
"SUE!" Nonagon belted out. A few seconds later, he reemerged with a pleasant smile and his mane freshly combed. "Just needed a drink of water," he explained to the dozens of perplexed stares on him, then calmly walked back to his desk and sat down. "Next!"
A wall-eyed pegasus trotted up to the desk. "Um..." she mumbled, looking like she'd forgotten why she was there.
"Yes!" Nonagon leaped up and rapidly shook her hoof. "Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. Can't be any mistake this time, am I right? Of course I'm right. I've been wanting to work with you for ages. Oh, but of course, my manners. Let's get right to it." He sat down and leaned eagerly over the desk, not even bothering to produce a form. "Name?"
"D-"
"Of course it is, of course. Now, just to get everything out of the way early, and just to make sure we're all on the same page about where this story is going, just a few quick questions, no trouble at all..." He flipped one form over to its blank side and picked up his mangled quill again. "Settle this for me, and please, don't hold back: Are you retarded or not?"
In an instant, the entire room went silent.
He wasn't sure who punched him, but there were a lot fewer ponies in the room by the time stars stopped spinning around his head. In fact, at first he could only make out one, who obscured his vision further by pressing an ice pack against his blackening eye. She pinned him down as he tried to squirm away from the biting coldness. "If you don't want it there, there's only one other place I'm going to suggest you shove it," she snapped.
The world swayed as Nonagon managed to stand up perfectly straight. He held the ice pack in place and examined his surroundings. Aside from Nurse Tenderheart, the only other ponies left were Noteworthy and the unnamed pegasus. "That's it?" he groaned, not even trying to hide his disappointment. "All that searching, and all I'm left with is the freaking... the freaking blue crew?"
The pegasus giggled, while Noteworthy furrowed his brow, just slightly. "It... appears so," he said.
"Well, what am I supposed to do with you?" He stormed into the middle of the room and surveyed them: Tenderheart glaring at him, Noteworthy watching him with concern, the pegasus grinning at him with feigned shyness. "You're not important to anyone," he complained. "I'm not going to win anyone's heart by hanging around you. No one cares about who you are. You're just a bunch of no-name background ponies with no established personalities or backstories."
He slowly marched up to Nurse Tenderheart and then, to her immense shock, wetly kissed her cheek and hugged her. "You're perfect," he said, sounding genuinely happy for the first time that night. "Now come on. If this scene's over, that means the action's about to begin. Let's try and get some good seats." Then he skipped out of the building and exited the scene completely.
Tenderheart stared after him with slowly-returning fury. Noteworthy approached her and put a steadying hoof on her shoulder, but it wasn't enough to keep her from growling. "I'm going to kill him," she said. "I'm literally going to kill him."
"We need him alive," Noteworthy ordered.
"And functional," the pegasus added, licking her lips.
"You're both wrong. All we need are his words." Tenderheart broke away from them both and stalked forward. "Now come on. For all his posturing, he's right. We genuinely do need good seats."
The trio left, following the hoofsteps of their new leader. With no one left to need them, the lights in the office went out, one by one. Save for exactly one.
---
"So now you understand," Celestia said.
Treehouse sat in the middle of the carpet in her study, absorbing all that he had been told. "Wow," he said. "I had no idea the complete history of Paradigm would be so long or so meaningful."
"And we hope that you have listened well," Luna said, circling ominously behind him, "for the tale is both too long and too meaningful for us to ever tell a second time. Hold on well to every detail, for they shall not be spoken again." She paused. "Nor shall they become relevant. In truth, none of what we have just told you will have any bearing on the story to follow. If, in reality, you have spent this entire time daydreaming and eating thine complimentary peanuts, it will have no impact on your abilities."
"Huh?" Treehouse said, bits of shell falling from his lips as he turned. "But if none of this matters, why did we spend the past eleven hours talking about it?"
"We did not wish you to feel left out," Celestia said gently. She crossed over to the window and gently parted a curtain. "And now, I believe, it is time."
As if on cue, a royal guard barged in through the door. "My princesses! And hero," he added in an impossibly gruff voice. "Something is happening in the central plaza."
"As I thought." Celestia closed the curtain. "Iron Rod, leave us. Paradigm will wait."
The guard stood stunned, then stomped in protest. "My lady, this catastophe cannot wait-"
"Paradigm will wait for us, Iron Rod. It is his way. Dismissed."
With gritted teeth but a professional posture, the guard retreated to the hall. Luna eyed her sister with an implied sigh. "Iron Rod?" she said.
"Would you believe I hired him for his voice?" Celestia turned away and walked to her desk, where a plain white envelope was waiting. "Consider this your first true lesson, Treehouse," she said. "Paradigm's strength lies in his accordance with patterns, but he is also bound to them. For all his power, he is incapable of making an entrance unless there is someone of importance there to witness it. And right now, the most important ponies in all the land are the three of us."
"Really?" Treehouse got up, stretching. "But why? What about Princess Twilight, or..." He almost said another name, but it grew into a lump in his throat. "Or a friend," he continued, almost silently.
"Her time will come later, if at all. Right now, Paradigm is here for us. And that is because we are the only three ponies..." Celestia focused light in her horn and magically held up the envelope. "...who know about this."
Treehouse tried to stare with the suitable amount of awe, but found that he couldn't. Even by the standards of envelopes, this one was especially plain. "What is it?" he asked. "You didn't mention anything about that in your story."
"Suffice to say it is something that Paradigm wants," Luna said. "Something that he will stop at nothing to get. And that is why we are entrusting it to you." She added her magic to Celestia's own and, grim with the significance of the action, together they placed it into Treehouse's grasp. "Do not open it. Do not tell anyone that you have it, not even your closest companions. All of Equestria depends on you keeping this secret."
Treehouse wrinkled the paper back and forth. It felt like there was something inside, but it was impossible to tell what. "I can do that," he said, embracing his destiny. "On my life, I won't tell a soul. It's not like anyone's listened to anything I've had to say before now."
"Then this world is safe." Celestia touched her horn to each of his shoulders, signifying something that was, to him, completely meaningless. "Now go. Flee this city. We will buy you time."
The two princess began to walk away, leaving Treehouse on his own with the envelope. "Hey, wait!" he called after them. "Flee to where? Where is safe any more? And even if I keep this secret, how am I supposed to stop Paradigm?"
"You will know," Celestia said. Then she and her sister bowed their heads and left the room.
In a mild panic, Treehouse sat down. He turned the envelope over repeatedly in his hooves, finding that he was drawn to examining its surface, searching for any imperfection. There was nothing notable about it at all. Like himself, the envelope defied description. "What would Nonagon do?" he asked himself, finally letting the name grace his mouth. And when the answer came, he gripped the envelope between his teeth with a fire in his eyes and raced after the princesses.