//------------------------------// // Epilogue 1: The lesser of one, two, three, four, five, six....many evil // Story: My New Life in Equestria: Helping Has Its Ups and Downs // by HAZESHIFT //------------------------------// The lesser of one,two,three,four,five,six...many evils. Contrary to what many ponies believed Celestia did not make her throne herself by melting gold with the power of the sun and molding it into its shape with her perfect white hooves. She had a stallion for that, and little did all the nobles know that was over the ages of her life she had kept him and all his descendants who followed in the trade on retainer just in case she needed a new throne or modifications made to the one she had. And at times like this she wondered if the large crowd made of almost all the nobles could sense that she was thinking of calling for said descendant of said stallion to make her throne a bit easier to relax on so she could at least be more comfortable while she listened drone on and on with their circular logic on and on. And it wasn’t just the fact that they were doing this, she had been in situations like this for thousands of years. Their regularity had in fact only increased especially in the last thousand years. But what annoyed and threatened her patience at this very moment was not the nobles voicing their complaints but what the subject of their complaints was, her precious student and now equal princess’s wedding to a certain human who now worked for her mother. “-and to think in the worse case if something happens to you, your sister, and Princess Twilight that this thing could become ruler of Equestria,” Celestia caught the end of one speech that was being regurgitated for the literal fiftieth time as she realized she was zoning out just a bit, she was glad she had trained herself to give the same semi smiling impassive stare for hours on end so many centuries ago. Taking a time to quickly double check everything she remembered it had been Count Checker Board’s turn to address her, she found it easy to lock onto him in the small sea of ponies before her because he always wore plaid. “It’s good to know you think about my fellow princesses and I’s well being. But i can assure you that the odds of a future like you just spoke of are very very small and practically impossible. And I would like to remind you The Princesses Twilight Sparkle’s fiance has a name...and at least one title, and i would like him to be spoken of as such,” Celestia responded her smile drooping a little. She had to remind most nobles who brought Dan up to call him by his name or title every time the decided to talk to her about him, and she had to do that a lot. The only reason that most nobles came to talk to her about this was that while most of them would not say it in public or possibly in the private spaces of their abodes, they were afraid of Dan. True, he was a creature summoned by her student over a year ago. True he had access to magic and at points was fairly powerful, Not close to being as powerful as her, her sister, Cadence, and possibly Twilight but still powerful enough to take on probably most of the nobles. He was also very unlike most of the nobles, mostly completely selfless and willing to help any pony or creature who asked him for help. Others were still scared when they heard and eventually saw what happened to her nephew after Dan had “punished” him when he made his return. Speaking of her nephew was one of only two nobles not here right now. Her nephew still being in traction could not freely move anywhere and also as if by epiphany or brain trauma had begun to change. He seemed nicer, more jovial, courteous to everypony he saw, and had used more “please’s’ and “thank you’s” than she had ever heard him use in his entire life. The other noble not in attendance was Fancy Pants who as a relation to the bride of the upcoming wedding had seen it a good idea to warn her about the group of nobles coming to “talk” to her, his advice had allowed her to grab an early lunch seeing as how she knew she would be postponed from anything else for a couple of hours. “But you can admit that there is a possibility of it!” Celestia cursed mentally, she had inadvertently set herself up for more minutes of a circular argument where there was no winner. BOOM BOOM BUH BOOM BOOM! Five musically timed knocks on the throne room doors silenced everypony in the room besides celestia who chuckled to herself, she knew of only one who would knock like that and she knew it was the precursor to a good entrance. BOOM BAM! the last knock sounding as the doors were blown open with a kick, everypony in the room looking to see the solitary foot hanging in the air. Dan stood in the entranceway, casually clothed as he gave a quick nod to the two guards ponies who had moved from their post to the opposite side of the hall most likely under his orders, he still did hold a rank in the guard. He stood for a moment taking in the scene before making eye contact with Celestia and gave her a quick wink. Slowly he walked in, thumping his foot a little with each step so to make his walk stand out in the silence. as he came to the group of nobles they parted in front of him, some slowly backing away while other jumped quickly.. He took off his jacket and in a flash Kibitz appeared and took it from him. “Thank you Kibitz,” he thanked as Celestia’s aid left as quickly as he came. He stopped just short of the throne steps and gave a quick nod to Celestia before he began to stretch. Celestia watched the nobles watch him, she could tell most were intimidated but there were a few who would speak up when they felt he had offended them enough. So far from the looks of it the two front runners were Countess Maple Leaf and Baron Munchausen. “Oh enough already!” Baron Munchausen it was. “If you think-” Dan stopped him by putting up a hand just as he finished cracking his neck. The action made the baron flinch and stop mid rant. With his outstretched hand Dan snapped his finger and in a flash his guard armor appeared, unnerving even more of the nobles who now took another step back. “Alrighty then-” with another flash Dan was now shouldering his large sword. He turned slowly, he glowing visor looking down at the group in front of him. “So a little birdy told me that some ponies...had a problem with my wedding,” He swung his sword straight down and it embeded two feet into the marble with a loud crash. “So let’s get this out in the open, if you have a problem with me marrying the mare I love, don’t try and go over our heads to Princess Celestia. Come right out and say it to me,” He crossed his arms and waited for the first of possibly many small insults to be thrown at him. “Ahem,” Dan flinched slightly when Princess Celestia cleared her throat behind him, he turned to see her staring at the a sword imbedded into her perfect marble floors. “You can bill me for the floors,”Dan turned slowly to find Kibitz standing in front holding out an already filled invoice for the floor damage. “...Thank you Kibitz,” he thanked the butler as he took the invoice and placed it into his pocket. He and also all the nobles took a few seconds to compose themselves again to allow the prior tense scene to reform. Seconds ticked by and so far the biggest regret Celestia was having was that she didn’t have any popcorn to watch the spectacle taking place in her court. Dan stood his ground presumably staring down the nobles in front, it was hard to tell with his helmet. “Do you think you can simply bully us into giving into your demands!” A noble finally broke the silence. Marquis Cuckoo broke free from the group and marched right up to Dan staring over his mustache and up into the visor. “You may work for our creator and have the blessing of all the princesses. But we will not put up with being ruled by anything that is not a pony! Plus what’s to stop you from doing to us what you did to Prince Blueblood! You think we may cower before you but we will stand together in saying that we will never agree with or allow your wedding!” He stomped his hoof as he finished and Celestia could swear that his mustache flared as well. “Ok I gotta admit I’m a bit impressed. One with the little speech there, was nice. And two you have a fine moustache sir,” Dan said surprising the stallion. “But my impression of your moustache aside your speech did have some factual flaws. First off, i only get along with one other noble whose family I’m going to be marrying into. Why in the wide wide world would i want to have royal privileges where i would have to work with a group of ponies i don’t even come close to having an agreeable opinion with?” Dan asked and watched the stern expressions of many ponies start to break. “Second, what I did to Blueblood was punishment. Were any of you being racist while trying to bend a newly crowned princess to your will? If the answer to that is no then you have nothing to fear. Oh and third-” Dan’s magic flashed again and the next thing the Marquis knew he was staring almost face to visor with a pony. “Due to my job working with Faust I technically am a pony. Which brings me to my last point, that whole thing you said about me being a bully and coercing you into letting this weapon happen...well yeah that’s exactly what I’m going to do and let me tell you exactly why just to make sure you know exactly where all of you stand,” Dan finished as powered down his armor and used a hoof to ruffle his hair before looking at the whole group. “Because I'm being nice,” “HUH!” Celestia was surprised when the whole group of nobles replied in unison, it wasn’t something she saw often, the last time was many years ago when she came up with vacationing just to get away from all the nobles. “Well let me break it down for you. After we’re all finished here you can all go do whatever you want knowing I intimidated you into not doing anything to stop this wedding, you can go tell everyone, go print it in the newspapers, what have you. Because at the end of this day me actually giving you this choice and telling you about it is the lesser of two evils. You may ask yourself why lesser? Well because it involves no actual physical violence,” Celestia could tell Dan was having fun as he slowly strolled around the group as he explained. “See if you were to actually do something you wouldn’t just run a foul of me but also possibly the most powerful ponies in the world. Let’s start with the most obvious Lord Fancy Pants, My fiance’s Uncle who happens to be the most widely known and popular noble in Equestria whose reach far eclipses all of yours,” Celestia immediately saw some faces in the crowd blanch at the thought of getting on Fancy Pants’ bad side Second, My fiance Twilight, a princess who you all are all subjects under now. Let me also remind you of something you should know about her. One, she loves to plan, she has been planning so many things about our wedding and putting in so many little details. Two, sometimes stuff like this can stress her out, you might all recall possibly reading something about a certain Lesson Zero incident? So imagine if something or somepony were to get in the way of something much more important to her, say her wedding?” Celestia could see the opinion of the crowd slowly start to shift as Dan began picking up more steam. “Then you should remember her friends and fellow Elements of Harmony. Remember the Gala a couple years back. Well let me tell you their roles. Applejack is providing a good amount of the catering, and getting a great workout while doing so, man i would hate accidently be behind her while she’s applebucking. Next We Have Rainbow Dash, fastest pony in Equestria running various errands at top speeds, just imagine how fast she can go. Taking somepony who can’t fly with her and flying way up high and then letting them go and fall but she’s probably still fast enough to zoom down and catch them, heck she’d still probably have enough juice in the tank to try that at least a couple more times. Then we have Fluttershy, who i might add is doing a great job keeping Twilight from getting too stressed out, nice soothing teas, and candles, making sure Twilight doesn't go completely overboard with how much work she’s done in one day...oh and also keeping Discord in check, but we’ll get to him later. Then there’s Rarity who’s in charge on not just my suit but Twilight’s wedding dress. Oh man has she been spending so much time going over every single piece of that dress to make it absolutely brilliant, just imagine what a creative mind would do I she heard that there was a delay. Oh and then there’s Pinkie PIe who’s been planning this...in my best guess awhile before i even proposed...i don’t think i need to say any more about her though,” Celestia chuckled, most of the nobles had been able to maintain some composure when he went through most of the Elements but when he got to Pinkie she saw several looks of sheer terror. And then let’s get to some heavy hitter. First off, Discord, you remember him right. Well I left him in choice of music, me and him have formed a bit of friendship and he said he had a surprise for me. Then we have Princess Luna who I asked to officiate the ceremony. And I’ve been assured by some of my friends in her personal guard that she has been hard at working writing and rehearsing her lines. I mean I’m sure you get the point by now, I’m doing you a favor and letting you have the easy way out and saving you from having a most likely violent visit from one of several ponies and i’m sure I could go on for a while rattling of a good contingent of the guard on my side especially those in the upper ranks But for the sake of brevity i’m only going to give you all one more example, my best mare,” Dan had the group exactly where he wanted. “And...and just why do you think that telling us who your best mare is will scare us?” Brave Marquis Cuckoo,still trying to put up a brave front asked causing Dan to chuckle. “Well for starter she the only other pony in this room besides me that isn’t part of your group,” he stated simply as he took a small step to the side. “But there is no one else here besides us you and Pri-” The Marquis stopped and all eyes moved to the throne as Princess Celestia rose from her throne and slowly descended the stairs, each of her golden shoes making a small “clack with each step. “I thought it would be cool if she wore a suit instead of a dress but she’s fighting me on it a little,” He said before Celestia gave him a small shove with her free hoof. Part of Dan really wished there was an audible sound for jaws hitting the floor at this moment. “So you see everybody, as of right now everything is stacked against you when it comes to this wedding, so you can go on and try and cause a fracas, and maybe i’ll read something in the paper about several disappearances or something of the like. Or we can do this my way and you can keep your dignity, remember I said you can go to the papers say what you like but keep it clean for the kids. But if you wanna keep that option there’s just one thing you gotta do as you leave,” “Wha-what’s that?” The Marquis asked causing Dan to chuckle as he smirked. “heh heh….run,” ____________________________________________________________________________ “Well I have to admit I've never seen court clear out so fast before...maybe i should see if there’s something I can do about having more high profile weddings where the groom and bride are both-” “Crazy...in love,” Dan said as he squirmed around on the throne. He had decided to try out the seat while Celestia did a quick inspection of the room, the nobles had filed out so quickly it was a wonder that there was practically no mess besides Dan’s sword still embedded in the floor. “Nice save,” she remarked as she finished her little patrol and walked over to the sword and with one hoof easily pulled it free like she was lifting a feather off the ground. “Thanks. By the way how do you sit on this thing,” Dan squirmed around failing to find a comfortable position. “Oh it takes years of practice to get used to it, although it could also be that you’re used to having your spine curve differently,” Celestia laughed as Dan accidentally rolled one way and ended up tangled with himself, hooves flailing in the air before he managed to stand. “I don’t know, i think you could totally make that more comfortable. Do you got guy for that or something?” Dan asked. “Oh you have no idea , actually it’s a funny story,” “Well Twilight’s going through her choices for tablecloths today so I got plenty of time,” “Shouldn’t you be there for that?” “Oh i told her i would agree to everything she wanted and not make any arguments in exchange for three things,” “What were those?” “Discord on music, Luna doing the ceremony, and you being my best mare. bit of a hard compromise on the last one but she relented when she realized how much easier it would make everything. “She didn’t want me to be your best mare?” “Ah ah! throne guy story first, then mine,” “Oh fine...oh and it’s not a guy, mare actually, was actually surprised she took up the family trade. But anyway let me start from the beginning," Celestia took back her seat and began to tell Dan just as Kibitz brought in a giant bowl of popcorn and some drinks.