That very same morning, in a small run-down house in Hoofington, another lavender pony lay in bed. This mare, however, was not up at sunrise, but asleep on her stomach, drooling onto her pillow. An hour later, she was still asleep, until a red unicorn stallion with a red beard and sticks of dynamite for a cutie mark walked in and shouted:
"Rise and shine, Princess!"
The mare's only response was a groan. The old stallion shook his head with a smile.
"Come on, sweetheart," he said, nudging her gently. "You'll be late for work if you don't get up!"
She groaned again, but this time put her pillow over her head. The stallion sighed, as he had hoped it wouldn't resort to this. His horn glowed with a yellow aura and sparks emitted from it, creating a loud, crackling sound.
"Gah!" the mare screamed as she fell out of bed.
She scrambled to rise so she could glare at the older pony.
"Okay, okay! I'm up! Geez, Dad! You didn't have to destroy my ears!"
Her father smirked. "You left me with no choice. Now get yourself cleaned up and get some breakfast." He chuckled as he walked away. "I really misnamed you, didn't I? I should've called you Night Owl."
The lavender pony rolled her eyes as she groggily walked over to her vanity. It wasn't a vanity, really, just a small wooden table with a dusty old mirror hanging over it. She gazed at her reflection and grumbled. There were bags under her purple eyes, her dark blue mane was so messy she could barely see her horn, and her short tail was twisted in a knot.
"You don't look so good, Dawn," she groaned, but this was no surprise to her.
She trotted to the bathroom, which gave the term "water closet" a whole new meaning. It was practically the size of a closet. The toilet was covered in grime and the shower was this lone faucet hanging over a drain. She turned the knob, but nothing came out.
"Dad!" she called. "Did you forget to pay the water bill again?"
His silence told her he had. She sighed, but she was prepared for this. Next to the sink was a bucket of water with a washcloth. She dipped the cloth in and threw it over her face. It wasn't a thorough cleaning, but it at least washed the sand out of her eyes.
She returned to her room and levitated her brush from beneath the mirror. She ran it through her mane and cried out in pain as it found a knot. The more she tugged, the more it hurt, so she eventually gave up on her mane and started on her tail. She managed to smooth the surface a bit, but couldn't get the tangles out of there either.
"Oh, forget it," she grunted.
She looked back in the mirror, licked her hooves and attempted to smooth out her hair again. When she was done, her bangs were straightened, but the wisps of her short mane were sticking out from behind her neck and curling in different directions.
"Well," she sighed, "I'm no Princess Celestia, but I at least look somewhat presentable."
She trudged into the kitchen, opened the cupboards and found nothing but a box of cereal and spider webs. She levitated the box of cereal without even acknowledging the spiders. Then she found a bowl and set it down on the table. She took her seat as she shook the cereal into the bowl. She shrieked when a spider fell out. At this point, her father had walked in and chuckled.
"Talk about a special surprise inside."
Dawn smirked. "Very funny."
She used her magic to lift the spider out of her bowl and out the window. She then levitated her spoon and started eating. The cereal was a bit stale, but it would at least keep her strength up.
"Why don't you have milk with it?" her father asked.
"Don't you remember? We ran out yesterday."
"Oh. That's right."
Dawn watched as her father started going through the mail. Each one he opened seemed to increase the frown on his face. She recognized the postscripts and knew they were bills.
Her father, Fire Cracker, was a pyrotechnician and specialized in explosives, though he mostly made fireworks and could even create small explosions with his horn. He was quite good, but unfortunately, pyrotechnics wasn't a good business to have in a small town like Hoofington. They didn't have much need for fireworks, as they didn't have many big parties, other than the Summer Sun Celebration and New Year's. The materials for fireworks, depending on the type, would also tend to be expensive. He also wasn't well-known throughout Equestria and had few customers. It was no surprise that they should have financial troubles.
Dawn Cracker was also a pyrotechnician, or was her father's apprentice, at least. She could make sparks appear from her horn and put them in the sky when she wanted to. Her cutie mark was a red and yellow firework. She loved her father and helped him out whenever she could. However, he could get a bit forgetful, especially where money was concerned.
When the fifth bill fell on the table, Dawn looked up at her father sincerely.
"Dad, we really need to do something about this."
Fire Cracker sighed. "I know, but I can't just make money appear out of thin air."
"What about that Great and Terrible Trixie or whatever she calls herself? Has she paid for the fireworks and smoke bombs we sent her yet?"
"No, but she said she'd pay her tab when she could."
Dawn rolled her eyes. "Dad, you have to be more assertive with the customers. She's been saying that for months now! We can't just keep making stuff for her for free! We need that money!"
"I know we do, but she's out of town at the moment. I'll talk to her when she gets back."
She shook her head. Her father was a good stallion, but he could be really naïve sometimes. She gasped when she caught sight of the clock. She instantly jumped out of her chair, toppling it over in the process.
"Oh gosh, I'm gonna be late for work!"
"I told you," her father muttered.
Fire Cracker jumped when he opened a pink envelope and confetti spurred in his face. He grinned, knowing who this was from. As he read the contents of the letter, his eyes widened.
"Dawnie, you won't believe what…"
But his daughter had already grabbed her saddlebag and apron and rushed out the door.
Dawn worked part-time at the local Hayburger as a waitress from nine to two p.m. every day except Sunday. She did it to earn extra cash for herself and her father, but she hated the job. It was the busiest restaurant in Hoofington, which meant she was always bustling about with a notebook and a pile of dishes.
The bell above the door rang as she burst into the diner.
"Miss Cracker!" her boss, the manager, called from the kitchen. "You're late!"
"Sorry, Mr. Burger!" Dawn declared as she rushed to the window to the kitchen where the large blue earth pony in a tie was waiting. "I was…"
"I don't wanna here any excuses! Just don't let it happen again! And get to work! It's the breakfast rush and in your absence, Daphne Feathers over there has been running your tables!"
Dawn's ears drooped in guilt as she glanced at the orange, brunette pegasus in the blue beret flying frantically between tables. The unicorn took her notebook out of her bag before tossing it aside.
"I'm here, Daphne, I've got it!"
The pegasus looked over at her with her green eyes and sighed in relief. "About time. This place is packed!"
"I'm so sorry, Daph!"
The waitress smiled. "Don't be. Just try not to sleep in again."
Dawn returned her smile. Daphne was the only real friend she had in this town and could always count on her to get her out of a jam. The pegasus leaned forward and whispered:
"But I'm not covering your tables now that you're here."
"Oh," Dawn said, snapping back to the situation. "Right. Thanks!"
And so began a long day of rushing between tables, writing down orders and carrying towers of plates. You see, Dawn was a bit of a klutz, which was not a good thing to be when your jobs are handling explosives and carrying dishes. She could usually carry things just fine, but when lifting heavy objects, she had to have complete concentration on her magic, or else she would drop everything. Fortunately, that rarely happened when carrying explosives, since that was associated with her talent. Carrying dishes, however, was another story.
When lunchtime came, a family of ten came in: a mother and father, seven foals and a grandfather. They sat down at Table Six and Dawn gulped, for that was her table. Her pencil burned on her notepad as she wrote out their orders and kept crossing out whenever the kids or Grandpa changed their minds. It took about five whole minutes to get everything down.
Then the time came for her to carry all the meals over to them. She thought about asking Daphne for help but felt the pegasus had done enough for her today. Dawn took a deep breath.
"Okay, you can do this."
She closed her eyes and her horn glowed pink. Her aura engulfed the plates and lifted them into the air. She opened her eyes and sighed in relief.
"So far, so good."
She started walking slowly towards the table, which was, unfortunately, on the other side of the diner. She kept her eyes glued to the floating plates of food.
"Stay calm, don't drop them. Stay calm, don't drop them," she said to herself over and over.
As she neared the table, one of the foals dropped his dinosaur toy. Dawn was paying so much attention to the plates that she didn't see it when she stepped on it. She cried out as she slipped and fell on her back. Her concentration was broken and the plates fell to the floor, shattering and staining the carpet with food. One of the plates landed on the grandfather's head. He was so shocked that he fainted into the mother's hooves. She scowled at the unicorn.
"You clumsy fool! Look what you've done to my dad!"
"MISS CRACKER!"
Dawn knew the booming voice all too well. "Oh no."
She sat up and met the burning eyes of her boss.
"Clean this up at once!" he ordered. "And replacing these plates is coming out of your pay!"
She hung her head. "Figures."
As Mr. Burger stomped away, Daphne came over to help her friend up.
"You okay?"
Dawn grunted. "I hate my life."
The unicorn walked into her home with downcast eyes. She found her father in the workroom, rolling a dowel in brown paper. He grinned when he noticed his daughter.
"Hey, Princess. How was your day?"
"Not so good," she grumbled.
He shook his head. "You really shouldn't be working so hard, sweetie. A girl like you should be out having fun, making friends," he winked, "meeting stallions."
Dawn couldn't help but smile a little. "That sounds dandy and all, Dad, but we need the money and I just don't have time for that kind of stuff. Besides, I doubt any stallions would be interested in me."
"Don't be ridiculous. You're the prettiest girl in all of Hoofington."
She smirked. "Not in Equestria?"
"No, that was your mother."
She laughed and then looked down at the tube he was making. "What you working on here? A new order?"
"Oh, yes! You left before I could tell you! You remember that Pinkie Pie?"
Dawn rolled her eyes. Of course she remembered Pinkie Pie. Even though she had never met her, she was their best customer, ordering a new batch of fireworks for the parties she hosted every week. If it hadn't been for her, they would've been bankrupt by now.
"Well," her father continued, "she just placed an order for fifty crates of fireworks."
Dawn gasped. "Fifty? Wow. What's she planning this time?"
"They're for the fair in the Crystal Empire." His smile grew wider. "And she wants them hoof-delivered, and since I can't handle this many crates by myself…"
His daughter blinked. "Wait, are you saying…?"
"We're going to the Crystal Empire, Princess!"
She was silent for a long period of time and then let out a girlish squeal. They rarely had the chance to travel, and Fire Cracker usually went alone on deliveries so Dawn could hold down the fort. Ever since news spread about the Crystal Empire returning after a thousand years, Dawn had dreamed of going there. She imagined seeing the sparkling crystal ponies, the glorious crystal palace and the Crystal Princess, Cadence. Royals hardly ever visited Hoofington, so she hadn't seen any of the princesses, aside from Princess Celestia, but that was when she was eight.
Dawn's excitement was short-lived when another thought occurred to her. "How are we going to get there? The Crystal Empire is up north and we can't take the cart through all that snow."
"That's the best part," Fire Cracker replied. "We're going by train."
"Dad, do you have any idea how much two tickets to the crystal empire costs? Plus the freight train for the fireworks?
"Pinkie Pie thought about that and was more than generous."
His horn glowed and two train tickets hovered in the air. Dawn gasped and took them in her hooves.
"Are these real?"
"Yes. And you know what else is real?"
A check floated into her hooves. Her eyes widened when she read the amount.
"One thousand bits?"
"Pinkie paid us that in advance," Fire Cracker explained. "She'll give us another one after the fair."
Dawn tugged hard on her mane to make sure she wasn't dreaming. Not only would that money cover the costs for the delivery, but more than half of their debts! If that Pinkie Pie were there in person, she would hug her!
"This is…" Dawn tried to find the right words, "wonderful! When is the delivery due?"
"She wants us there in two days."
She stiffened. "Two days?! Dad, we'll have to work all night for that!"
"Then what are we doing standing around here talking for? Let's get to work!"
It was around six p.m. when the Crackers decided to break for dinner. Dawn liked to eat in her room. Tonight, her dinner was two pieces of stale bread with a daisy she had picked from outside stuck between them. She chewed her sandwich slowly as she glanced around her room.
Dawn was not the neatest of ponies. The trash can was overflowing, surrounded by crumpled pieces of paper. The few bits of clothing she had were scattered around the floor and over the foot of her bed. The sheets of her bed were tangled together. She hadn't made it or washed the sheets in months. It wasn't that she was sloppy. She just didn't have the time to pick everything up.
When she was done with her sandwich, she still had twenty minutes before her dad would call her back to the workroom. She glanced at the bookshelf on the wall. She didn't usually have time to read, but when she did, she found it very calming. She also didn't own that many books. She used to have a huge collection of comics, but had sold most of them to help her father pay the bills. All that was left was an old, tattered issue of Power Ponies, a battered up thesaurus with a dictionary to match, a cookbook which she almost never used because she was a lousy cook, and one novel, The Prince and the Pauper.
Before her mother had died of pneumonia when she was six, she would read Dawn that story every night. It was her favorite, and Dawn had kept that book in memory of her mother. She levitated the book from the shelf and opened to the page she had marked.
The unicorn felt she could relate to the pauper, Tom Canter. She didn't blame him for wanting to be a prince. Anything would've been an improvement from the life he had. At least Dawn's father wasn't as bad as Tom's and she wasn't begging on the streets. Still, her life pretty much sucked just as much. And, like Tom, if she had the opportunity to be a princess, she would take it.
She scoffed at the thought. "Me, a princess."
Dawn straightened up and stuck up her nose. "Servant, could you please put my book away so I don't have to do it myself?"
She laughed, but couldn't help but daydream. After all, every girl dreams of being a princess at some point in their life. What would it be like to live in a castle? It would certainly be better than this run-down old shed they called a house. Servants and cooks would come at her beck and call. She would have more food than she could ever eat, more money than she could ever spend and a whole walk-in closet of beautiful dresses. She would never have to work again and pay off her father's debts.
She also imagined meeting a handsome prince who would sweep her off her hooves.
But alas, it was only a dream. After all, you had to be an alicorn to be a princess.
Dawn then thought of Equestria's newest princess, Twilight Sparkle. She used to be a regular old unicorn like her, until Princess Celestia gave her wings. Dawn had never seen Princess Twilight but figured she was the luckiest pony in the world to go from being a unicorn to a princess just like that.
That could never happen to Dawn. Twilight Sparkle had earned her wings by saving Equestria countless times. Dawn was nothing special, just a normal unicorn struggling to help her dad with his financial problems. She couldn't even levitate a dozen plates, let alone save the world. She envied Twilight Sparkle and Tom Canter for becoming a prince even for a day.
The only thing she didn't understand about the story was why Prince Edward Trotter would give up his crown like that. Did he really think being poor was better than being a prince? Dawn knew the answer to that.
She glanced out the window at the evening sky. As she did, a shooting star went by. Dawn glanced down at her book and shrugged.
"Why not?"
She clutched the book to her chest, closed her eyes and whispered her wish:
"I wish I had a life like Princess Twilight Sparkle's."
Little did she know that far away, that very princess had wished on the same star.