How do I get roped into these things? Luna thought to herself bitterly. Princess Twilight Sparkle and her friends had stopped by the castle this afternoon for a visit, as they were in Canterlot for a fashion show that Rarity would be competing in that evening. With them, they had brought three little filles. What were their names again? Sweetie Loo, Apple Belle and Scootabloom, that sounds correct. The three fillies were very small, very energetic, and oh so very, very loud.
Luna had greeted the mares in a friendly manner, as they could also be referred by her as her friends. After all, it was they who corrected her social errors on the previous Nightmare Night and helped her win over the hearts of the townsponies . Things sure had changed in the most, during her time banished in the moon. However, it was this that put her within the six mares' debt, though they themselves did not consider Luna in debt to them, Luna did, and she was determined to honor the royal protocol that deems all debts to be paid.
The fillies had come along with Twilight and the others to sightsee in Canterlot. They were scheduled to spend the night with a foalsitter, when it came time for the show. However, the sitter had to cancel, due to a sudden onset of the Pony Pox.
“Please?” Twilight had pleaded. “It’s only for one night, and they will be as sweet as honey, won’t you girls?” She asked the three fillies sitting at her hooves, staring up at Luna with wide, admiring eyes.
“We’ll be so quiet, you won’t even know we’re here.” The yellow filly with the red mane stated in her southern drawl.
“We’ll be like perfect angels!” The small, orange pegasus grinned ear to ear.
“Maybe we’ll even get our Cutie Marks!” Squealed the third, her voice rising to a piercing pitch. “Because we’re….”
“THE CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS! YAY!” The three screamed together.
Luna winced, as the cacophony reached her ears. “Are you sure there’s no pony else who could take them tonight? I have a lot on my schedule, Twilight. Royal duties never cease.”
The three fillies drooped their heads in unison. “Aww….”
“Actually Princess, your schedule is clear for the rest of the evening,” said a passing guard.
“YAAAAAY!!!”
“Great.” Luna gritted through her teeth. Note to self: have that guard fired.
Luna had just finished raising the moon, when the fillies were escorted into the throne room by a guard, who waved them off with a grin. It was the same stallion who had gotten her into this mess. “I’m going to fire you,” she muttered under her breath.
“Who ya goin’ to fire?” Came the voice of the red-maned filly from over her shoulder.
The orange pegasus tilted her head. “That guard?”
“But he’s so nice!” The little obnoxious unicorn squeaked.
Luna sighed. “No, I’m not going to fire him… yet." She added inaudibly. She cleared her throat. “So, why don’t you introduce yourselves?”
“I’m Apple Bloom!”
“My name is Scootaloo.”
“And my name is Sweeeetiee Beeeelle!!!” The white unicorn belted out her name in a melody that literally rocked the house, well castle.
Luna winced again, before recapturing her composure. “Alright then. Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, and er, Sweetie Belle, what is it pray tell that you do when you stay with a, um, what’s the word?”
“A foalsitter?” Apple Bloom offered.
“Yes, that. What do you do when staying with a foalsitter for the evening?”
Sweetie Belle hopped up and down. “We could draw! I like drawing things. Maybe I could make something for my sister, Rarity, for when she wins the fashion contest!”
“Nah, I say we race!” Scootaloo pulled out a blue scooter from seemingly nowhere and beat her tiny wings in anticipation.
Luna bit her lip. The walls were adorned with timeless tapestries, antique furniture decorated the resting chambers, and priceless sculptures decorated the halls. “No, no! No racing, my little ponies. How about something a little less… destructive?”
“Hide and seek!” Sweetie Belle cheered.
Scootaloo revved her wings on her scooter. “Princess Luna’s it! Onetwothree - GO!”
The three took off in a cloud of dust. Luna gasped, as a sculpture nearly fell off its pedestal, thankfully catching it with the navy aura of her horn. She breathed a sigh of relief and looked about. No sign of those fillies anywhere. Great. “Scootaloo? Sweetie Belle? Apple Bloom? Can you please come out?” No answer. Of course they weren’t going to answer, they were playing Hide and Seek. Luna hadn’t played any foal’s games since she and Celestia were growing up. Speaking of Celestia, where was she when she needed her? It had to be this weekend that she had to travel to Saddle Arabia. She rarely left the castle overnight, but it just had to be tonight!
The Lunar Princess paced through the halls, continuing to mutter under her breath. “No pony asked me if I wanted to play this dastardly game. I’m the foalsitter. I should decide what we are to be doing, and this castle is so gargantuan, those foals could be anywhere!”
She spotted a guard passing by and galloped up to him. “Guard, have you seen any young fillies about, have you?”
The guard let out a deep, bass chuckle. “Foals? In the palace? Don’t be ridiculous, your highness.”
She sighed. “So you haven’t seen them.”
“Oh no, I saw a little orange pegasus on a scooter heading towards the armory, just a few moments ago.” He pointed down the hall.
What was it with these guards? Were they all dense? She and Celestia were going to have to have a serious discussion about this matter, when she returned from Saddle Arabia, Luna thought, galloping frantically down the hall. A speedy and reckless pegasus foal in the armory, nothing to worry about. Nothing to worry about at all. Yes, just keep trying to tell yourself that, Luna.
She barged into the armory. “Scootaloo? Scootaloo!” She called out, peering around the darkened room. With a spark from her horn, she lit the torches along the wall. There was no filly to be seen, just racks of armor and a variety of swords, bows, axes, and spears. Suddenly, she gasped. One of the crossbows, along with a quiver of arrows, was missing.
Luna’s heart jumped into double time. “Okay, Luna. Don’t panic,” she said aloud to herself, trotting through the hallways, her eyes searching madly for the filly, who was presumably flying about with a deadly weapon. “Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Everything is going to be fine, as long as you keep a level -”
BANG!
An ear-shattering sound came from the corridor to her right. The kitchen! Luna sped into a full gallop, coming around the corner into the kitchen, she was assailed by a cloud of smoke. She sputtered and coughed. Peering through the thick cloud, she could see a small figure standing on her tip-hooves, trying very hard to work something on the counter. The counter, of which, was starting to catch fire.
“Filly!” Luna cried. She plunged into the smoke and grabbed whichever filly it was by the nape and promptly set her down outside in the hall. She turned to the burning kitchen and cast a spell to dissipate the smoke and douse the fire. Luna rounded on the youngling with a scowl.
“Aww, you ruined the surprise - and you found me!” The unicorn filly, Sweetie Belle, whined, dropping the green apple she had been carrying with a green levitation spell.
“You could have been harmed, young Sweetie Belle! Pray tell, what were you doing to cause such a conflagration and nearly burning the kitchen to the ground?”
“Making Smoothies!”
“You be a good little filly and draw a delightful picture.” Luna told Sweetie Belle, trying to mask the obvious strain behind her tone. She had found some paints, in Celestia’s room of all places, and paper for the unicorn filly and set them out on the table in the guest chamber, where the three fillies were to sleep that night. “There are some stories on the bookshelf behind you.” She added. “Please remain here until I find your friends.”
Sweetie Belle sighed. “Okay, Princess Luna.”
With one filly taken care of, the Princess was just as desperate to find the other two. The chief concern was for the pony who had gotten ahold of the bow and arrows.
“Children?” She called through the now empty halls, save the sparse late-night guards. “Children, it grows late. It is time to end this game and sleep!”
No answer.
“Oh, why in Equestria did I ever agree to do this?” She galloped helplessly through the halls of the castle. She called through every corridor. Her mind raced through all the worst possible scenarios involving a pegasus riding a scooter, while shooting a crossbow, which were a lot.
She bolted around a corner, coming snout to snout with a guard, nearly sending him sprawling. Luckily she was able to recompose herself quickly enough to catch the poor stallion with a spark of magic. She sighed in relief, when he was unharmed, however he was out of breath, and his eyes were wide with wild panic.
“Your Majesty! The Great Hall has been….” He stopped short, gasping to regain his breath.
“What? What?! The Great Hall has been what?!” Princess Luna demanded shaking the guard by the shoulders. His head jerked back and forth like a ragdoll.
“Frozen.” He completed with a gasp.
“By the stars!” Luna cursed, dropping the stallion unceremoniously onto the floor and bolted to the Great Hall.
The Moon Princess rammed open the doors and charged into the Hall. Suddenly her hooves gave out, and she was sent sprawling over an icy floor. The guard wasn’t joking. She slowly started to raise herself, when a flash of something white zipped over her head, missing her head by a few mere inches. Whatever it was, it hit the marble pillar behind her. Ice creeped from where the projectile hit, partially encasing the pillar in ice. Losing her footing again, Luna knocked her jaw on the ice-covered floor.
“Blast it!” She sat up and rubbed her jaw. Looking at the pillar, she let out a groan of despair. Ice arrows. Typically they were used strictly for sporting purposes, but in the past, they had been used in cases of magical warfare. Fantastic.
“Scootaloo! That is dangerous! You nearly killed me! Put that down now!” The princess growled in frustration.
“I can feel it, Applebloom. I’m definitely going to get my cutie mark in archery!”
“I’m going to get mine in ice sculpting!”
VROMMMNAMMROOM!!
An ear-splitting, mechanical roar echoed through the room. Was that a chainsaw in Applebloom’s hooves? The noise escalated, as she took it to a large hunk of ice in the center of the room. Where did she even…?
“Applebloom! Put that chainsaw down!” Luna cried.
“Hey, Scootaloo, you think you could give me some more ice? I don’t think this is going to be enough.”
“Sure!” The orange pegasus filly flapped her wings, until they were but a blur, and charged towards the one called Applebloom, aiming the crossbow at the mound of ice. Suddenly, the back wheel of the scooter gave out against the icy floor. Scootaloo bumped the trigger, as she hit the ground with a dull thud. The arrow went flying.
Applebloom screamed, as the arrow came flying at her. Luna charged her horn. The yellow earth pony winced, only to open her eyes to see the icy arrow stopped in mid-air by a navy, magical grasp. She let out a sigh of relief, and let herself collapse against the mound of ice behind her.
With a small flick of her horn, Luna stalled the chainsaw, and cast a spell to send it back to the gardening shed, where it belonged. “FILLIES, FRONT AND CENTER. NOW!” She could not contain it any longer, and unleashed the Royal Canterlot Voice upon the two, who came scurrying and sliding to the raging alicorn. “YOUNG PEGASUS, RELEASE TO ME THE CROSSBOW AND ICE ARROWS!”
Scootaloo cowered against the cold floor, shaking like an autumn leaf. She gingerly stepped forward and laid the weapon at the ruler’s hooves, before hastily backing away again.
Luna fixed burning eyes on the two foals. “WHAT HAVE YOU TO SAY FOR YOURSELVES?! SPEAK NOW!” The fillies eyes were wide as full moons, and it seemed as if they wanted to become one with the floor. It was then that Luna realised that she was frightening them. She should have known better. She sighed. “Please forgive my abruptness, children. I feared you would not listen, so I felt the need to raise my voice. However, it was not out of anger, but of concern for your safety…. Please accept my apologies.”
Apple Bloom was the first to dare look at her, relieved to see the Princess calm once more. “That’s alright, Princess,” she said in her southern accent. “We should have been more careful and listened to you.”
“And…?” Luna raised a brow.
“And we shouldn’t have taken things without asking.” Scootaloo finished.
Luna smiled. She levitated Scootaloo’s scooter back to her. The pegasus beamed. “If you promise to ride at a moderate pace, you may ride it back to the guestroom, where you three will be staying tonight. Your unicorn friend, Sweetie Belle, is already there waiting for you.”
Both fillies agreed to behave themselves on the way back to the guest chamber, staying close to Luna’s side. They really are angels, when they behave. Luna smiled to herself, as they walked. She opened the doors to the guest room, and all three of them gasped.
“Sweetie Belle! What did you do!” Apple Bloom shrieked in dismay.
“I wanted to surprise Princess Luna.”
“By coloring all over the walls?” Scootaloo was incredulous, as she took in the navy walls, which were now murals featuring the unicorn’s artwork. She winced, glancing over her shoulder at Luna, who had an odd expression on her face. “Well, I’m sure she’s surprised, Sweetie Belle.” She covered her ears, preparing herself for another onslaught of the Royal Canterlot Voice, but it never came.
The Night Princess cracked a smile. “Indeed, I am surprised, my little ponies, but it is one most pleasant. I do believe the walls look better this way.”
“What?” The three fillies asked in astonished, unified confusement.
“What marvelous artwork you have made, Sweetie Belle! Mayhaps the rest of us could pitch in some, as well. It would be…. fun!” The Princess would not normally condon drawing on the castle walls, but against the navy paint, the unicorn filly, Sweetie Belle, had composed a night sky. Little stars accented the once barren wall. Red and green painted an aurora borealis, a night’s rainbow. In the center of the wall, adjacent from the door, a full moon, bright and yellow, was shining. There was no Mare in the Moon depicted upon it, but below the moon, near the baseboards, was navy alicorn with stars in her mane, her horn aglow. She was raising the moon.
Luna lowered her head, so that she could meet the gazes of the three fillies. “How would you like to paint the night with me?” She smiled.
The rest of the night was indeed fun. Together, they painted the walls. They painted brilliant stars that covered nearly the entire room and the Aurora Borealis, as bright and vibrant as they could make it, and a shower of shooting stars. Against the baseboards, they painted ponies upon the ground, looking up at their brilliant sky and basking in the light of the moon.
It was late, when they had finished. Luna tucked the three fillies into bed. She had to bring Scootaloo and Apple Bloom hooferchiefs, as it seemed they were coming down with a cold from playing in the ice. “Another reason not to play with ice arrows, they tend to make things very cold. I hope you two are not sick for long.” Luna chided.
Scootaloo blew her nose noisily. “Let it go, Princess Luna. The cold never bothered me anyway.”