//------------------------------// // Chapter 3: Rehersals // Story: Cheerilee's Hearth's Warming Play // by Talon and Thorn //------------------------------// “Ok class,” said Cheerilee looking around the small room. “You’ve all been very good waiting so patiently for this, but I’ve finally gotten the list of who will be playing the major roles in the play.” Excited mumbled passed through the class as everypony started to guess who had gotten what role, Cheerilee waited a few minutes for the noise to die down. “Now I talked to a few of you during break so some things won’t be a surprise to all of you, but I want to tell you now that all of you were very good, and it was very hard to decide who would get what role. You shouldn't be too disheartened if you don’t get your first choice, maybe you will next year, we might even have other plays next year if this one goes well. Plus even if you don’t get a big role you'll get to be extra’s, then you don’t just get to play one role, you get to play several!” There was another round of chatting between the foals which Cheerilee quietened with a raised hoof. “First of all the band, Snips, Tootsie, Rumble and Truffle, Miss Lyra will be helping you practice for the show, she should be around soon to talk to you about it,” I hope, thought Cheerilee, she’d reminded Lyra, and more importantly Bon Bon, of the appointment but the bard tended to get distracted by things. “Now, the pegasus tribe, Scootaloo will be Commander Hurricane.” “Awesome!” crowed the filly. “And BeeBop will be Private Pansy.” “WOO HOO!” yelled the other little pegasus causing Cheerilee to flinch a little against the sound. “For the unicorns, Dinky will be Princess Platinum.” “Aww!” moaned Sweetie Belle sticking out her lower lip and rubbing at the large bandage covering her head. “I’m sorry dear,” said Cheerilee, “But you’ll be her understudy.” “I’m sorry,” said Dinky, trying to keep a lid on her excitement, “I’m sure you’ll have fun being an extra.” “I guess so,” mumbled Sweetie. “And Clover the Clever will be played by Firelock,” continued Cheerilee. The unicorn clapped her hooves together excitedly, a band of flame shooting up and down her horn. Cheerilee eyed the magic cautiously, her hoof creeping towards the bucket of water near her desk, kept there for just such emergencies, but Firelock managed to keep herself under control and she let out the breath she had been holding. “As for the Earth Ponies,” she looked around the larger proportion of her class. “This was a very hard decision, but after a lot of thought Miss Trixie and myself decided that Apple Bloom should play Chancellor Puddinghead.” “Yee Haw!” yelled Apple Bloom leaping into the air. Diamond Tiara clenched her jaw and fumed in silence. “Ha! I told you me and Puddinghead were practically cousins!” exclaimed Apple Bloom. “Now as for Smart Cookie,” continued Cheerilee, “this was also a hard decision and I’ve talked to several of you about the role, and we eventually decided that the position would be best taken up by Diamond Tiara.” “Hey, Miss Cheerilee, that isn’t fair,” said Apple Bloom, “what about Twist?” she said pointing to her friend. “Thath’s... I mean that’s all right Apple Bloom,” said Twist, “I get nervous when everypony’s staring at me, I think I’ll prefer being an extra.” “And I want to be behind the scene’s,” said Silver Spoon. “So, you get to be my minion!” said Apple Bloom grinning at Diamond Tiara. “Secretary!” growled Diamond, “And one of the first true friends, I never really wanted to be the silly Chancellor anyway,” she mumbled, “Smart Cookie’s much better.” “Now finally the last main role, the Narrator. Again this wasn’t an easy choice, but me and Miss Trixie decided that Alula would be very good at the role,” she paused, she was a little worried that the filly might refuse based on her nerves. Alula opened her mouth for a moment, then shut it again looking around the class, Firelock was nodding excitedly and most of the other foals were smiling. “Thank you Miss Cheerilee,” said Alula eventually. “Aww, Miss Cheerilee,” complained Snails, “I wanted to be the narrator!” “I’m sorry Snails, but it is a lot to remember and you did have a bit of trouble with some of the longer words,” said Cheerilee gently. “But... but I figured out how to remember them better, I can use the spell Miss Trixie taught me! I can store four pages at once now!” “That is very clever Snails, but the script has more than four pages I’m afraid.” “But I can changes pages, as long as I can look at them!” “You won’t be able to have the pages on stage with you...” then Cheerilee paused looking down at the dejected foal. “Actually there might be a very important role you’d be perfect for! You can be the prompter.” Snails tipped his head to one side, “The what?” “The prompter, it’s the pony that makes sure the actors remember their lines, you’ll read through the script and if anypony forgets what to say you can help them.” “I... I think I can do that!” he exclaimed his ears perking up. “Good, I’m sure you’ll be perfect for it, we can talk a bit later. Now, if you could all move your seats into a circle we’re going to have what is called a table read. I’ll put out some copies of the script and...” “Of all the stupid, pain in the flank, horse apple, bucking stupid...” fumed Cheerilee as she stomped around the deserted classroom shoving tables and desks to the side rather than stacking them neatly. “I might be going out on a limb here, but I sense you might be a little upset,” said Trixie as she strolled into the room. “Just how big a tent do you think I’d need for this play?” demanded Cheerilee turning on her friend. “Uh, I don’t know, big enough for a stage, the kids and maybe a hundred or so audience members?” “Exactly, do you think I’d need something that looks big enough to hold most of Ponyville?” She grabbed up a catalogue from her desk and waved it in the blue mare’s face. Trixie bobbed her head from side to side trying to keep the images in focus, it showed a number of marquee tents ranging from family sized up to the scale needed for royal events. “Did something go wrong?” she asked. “They put the wrong numbers under the pictures! It was my own stupid fault for not reading the full description but I ended up ordering far too big a tent,” the teacher slumped down to the ground. “Hey, it was a mistake, can’t you just cancel the order?” said Trixie sitting down beside her friend. “Yes, I could but there’s a penalty clause for booking the tent, that plus the price of the right sized tent would be almost as much as the one I ordered, if I could even book one of the right size. There’s a premium on them at this time of year. Maybe I should have gone to the Apples or the Riches to see of they had one, but given the problems they were causing you I didn’t want to given them a chance to hold one over me.” “Is there anything I can do to help?” asked Trixie, “I know a few important ponies, I didn’t annoy everypony I knew at court, well not quite all of them anyway, I could pull a few strings?” she suggested. “No, it was my mistake, I’ll live with it. It’s just with a larger tent we’ll need more of everything else, more lights, seats, more paperwork to show it’s safe. It’ll really blow the budget, but it’s my fault so I’ll take the hit, can’t have the foals suffering because of something I did,” she sighed. “Can you afford that?” asked Trixie sounding worried. “Hey I’m a teacher, you know how well we’re paid,” said Cheerilee with a smile. “Don’t worry I’ll survive.” “I’m sure me and the girls will do all we can to help,” said Trixie nuzzling the earth pony, “Nothing can stop all of us right? Not Corona, not Grogar, certainly not a stupid catalogue.” “Thanks Trixie,” said Cheerilee closing her eyes for a moment and leaning against her friend, “I needed that. Now,” she said a smile returning to her face as she bounded to her hooves, “We better get ready, the kids will be turning up soon,” she started to stack the chairs. “Don’t mention anything about the tent issue to the class, they’re all so excited about the play, I wouldn’t want to worry them.” “Mum’s the word,” said Trixie making a zipping gesture with her hoof. “Good! Now which side of the room do you think would be best to use as a the ‘stage’?” There was an excited buzz as more and more foals crammed themselves into the classroom ready to carry out their first rehearsal of the Hearth's Warming play. “This is going to be awesome!” squeaked Firelock excitedly, “Everypony is going to see us and love us up on the stage!” Dinky nodded. It did sound like fun, her Momma had told her all of the parents would come to the play when it finally took place in a month. She’d told Dinky that she’d have to work hard but that she should have fun playing Platinum, it was a big important role. “It’s going to be fun,” she agreed. “Yeah, Miss Trixie said you were a really good actress, I’m sure you’ll get lots of applause!” “I don’t know,” said Dinky modestly, “Platinum is a bit mean, Clover is much nicer and she was one of the first friends, she should get more applause really.” “I like her, she made the fire of friendship! But really she’s a bit of a nerd, Platinum was mean, but it’s sort of a fun mean.” “I guess so, it is sort of fun to pretend to be mean sometimes, as long as no one gets their feelings hurt for real,” added Dinky quickly. “Yeah,” said Firelock looking through the crowds to where her friend was standing a little way from the rest of the foals. “Looks like Alula’s feeling shy.” “Are you sure it was alright to sign her up for the narrator?” asked Dinky a little guiltily, “She might not like it.” “She accepted when Miss Cheerilee asked her didn’t she? She’ll be fine once she gets used to it. We should go and cheer her up!” suggested Firelock starting to run towards the pale yellow filly. Dinky set off after her friend but found her way blocked by a large blue shape. “Hi miss Trixie,” she said looking up at the mare. “Hi Dinky, how’s my favourite foal doing today?” she asked with a slightly false grin. “I’m excited,” she explained, “I’m going to get to be pretend mean! The princess seems a really fun role to play!” “That’s good, I hope you brought your A game today, we want to knock the audience's shoes off!” “I’ll do the best I can,” announce Dinky brightly. “That’s the spirit!” agreed Trixie, “I told Cheerilee she didn’t have anything to worry about, I’m sure you’re one of the best actors here, maybe even the best.” “Thank you,” said Dinky glowing a little from the praise. “What was miss Cheerilee worried about?” she asked frowning a little. “Oh, nothing, just a little mix up with something she ordered, cost the school a bit more than it should have, nothing to worry about really. I’m sure this play will go really well and you’ll make back all she spent, maybe more!” “Ok,” mumbled Dinky biting her lip, that was a bit worrying, she knew her Momma was very careful with her money, she was never happy when things turned out to be more expensive than she’d thought they would be. Momma tried to act happy but Dinky could tell when she was worried. If miss Cheerilee wasn’t happy like that Dinky would have to do something to try and cheer her up. “Anyway I better get back to Cheerilee,” explained Trixie, “We’ll be starting the rehearsal soon, have fun,” she said and with a flourish headed back into the crowd towards the teacher. Looking around for a moment Dinky saw Firelock and Alula and ran off towards them. “Hi,” she called. “Hi,” said Alula shuffling her hooves a bit. “I was talking with miss Trixie,” said Dinky, “She said that the play is costing more than miss Cheerilee thought it would and she needs the play to go well to make money.” Alula looked around the school room. “How much does a play cost?” she asked. “I don’t know,” Dinky considered for the moment, she supposed the costumes and sets and things must cost something. Her momma always complained about how expensive clothes were for foals given they grew out of them, it was one of the reasons why Dinky hardly ever wore anything. Maybe costumes were the same? “My dad says plays are really expensive,” said Firelock, “he said that nobles are always wasting money on them and that it all comes from his taxes.” “But why would the school need money?” asked Alula. “I guess they need it for books and stuff,” answered Dinky. “And Miss Cheerilee! She gets paid to teach us and stuff, what if the school doesn’t have enough money to pay her? What if we get another worse teacher?” exclaimed Firelock. Dinky frowned, she liked Miss Cheerilee, she was her favourite teacher. Miss Black Board had been ok, but she’d been a bit old and boring, she prefered Miss Cheerilee, she made everything exciting! Even things like maths and equestrian. “We need to make sure the play goes really well!” said Firelock, “Or Miss Cheerilee will have to leave and we’ll got another teacher, probably a mean one, maybe one that uses a crop!” “A what?” asked Alula. “It’s a thing that bad teachers use to punish foals they don’t like, they smack them on the flanks!” exclaimed Firelock her eye’s wide. Dinky and Alula stepped back, that sounded horrible! “Children!” called out Cheerilee breaking up the conversation, “Settle down Children, we’re almost ready to start.” The whole herd turned to face her. “Good, now this will be the first rehearsal so you can get a feel of for acting your parts, not just reading them.” She gestured to a chalked out area at the back of the classroom. “That will be our stage. I hope you all spent time working on your lines, but if you can’t quite remember them all you can keep your scripts with you for the moment.” Several of the actors looked quite relieved at this, learning lines was hard. “Now we have a special guest here today, Mr Written Script,” she gestured to a light purple unicorn stallion standing next to him, “He wrote the script and he’s here to make a few changes to it to better fit your personalities. Miss Trixie will be helping me as well and Miss Heartstrings will be working with the band.” Trixie gave a deep bow to the class and Lyra reared up with a smile strumming her lyre, producing a single pure note which floated over the room in a rainbow of light causing the class to ooh and ahh appreciatively. “Good now if the band could go with Miss Heartstrings and the rest of you sort yourselves out by tribe, the pegasus should go to that wall,” she pointed towards one side of the room, “The earth ponies to the other side and the unicorns in the middle.” The class quickly split up into it’s respective tribes each group buzzing excitedly. “Good!” cried Trixie, “Now before we start I think we should have a quick acting exercise to get you all in the mood. Now this is the Hearth’s Warming story so it’s going to be very cold all the time so you’re going to have to get used to acting cold.” The blue unicorn started to blow into her hooves to warm them up and drew her cloak closer around her as if even the enchanted garment couldn’t deal with the imaginary cold. “Al..all of yo-you try as well,” she stuttered through chattering teeth. After looking confused for a moment the foals all started to, shiver and stamp to keep out the cold. Tails were tucked up tight for warmth, feathers were fluffed up, and the entire class pretended to be freezing. Trixie moved through the crowd giving suggestion and encouragement. “This is a good idea,” said Cheerilee to Trixie as she followed behind shaking with the imagined cold. “I didn’t know you were so good a teacher.” “I’ve got quite a few younger cousins, and this teaching lark isn’t that difficult,” she said grinning at Cheerilee’s scowl. “This is the new land we've been searching for!” exclaimed Scootaloo walking to the front of the stage area and looking into the distance. “IT'S SO PRETTY! LOOK AT THAT BEAUTIFUL MEADOW, WE CAN CALL THAT BIT PONYVILLE!” cried Bee Bop fluttering off the stage and pointing into the corner. “And we’ll call that pile of mud over there Hoofington! And we’ll send all the really smelly ponies there!” adlibbed Rumble, causing a ripple of laughter to spread through the hall. “Hoofington, that’s a good one,” said Written scribbling at his notes. Cheerilee glared at both the small and big colts around her before gesturing to Scootaloo to continue. “I proc-proclambe?” started Scootaloo looking down at the script on the ground in front of her. “Proclaim this new land to be Pega-sopy-lis,” shouted Snails from the front of the stage. “Thank you Snails,” said Cheerilee, “But as we’re using the scripts we won’t need a prompter at the moment, just read through the script quietly as we go,” the colt pouted, “Don’t worry we will need you in later rehearsals once we don’t have the scripts on hoof.” “You can give me a hoof with changing the script,” offered Written, after a moment's hesitation the colt hopped onto a chair near him. “Proclaim this new land to be Pegasopolis,” said Scootaloo. “Maybe put a pause before the city's name,” suggested Trixie, “and put more force on it. Proclaim this new land to be... Pegasopolis!” Cheerilee nodded. “What would sound better, now if we had lights they’d moved onto the unicorns, the pegasus should then move to the back of the stage to give them space.” The foals shuffled around with only the minimum of pushing and shoving. “Good now, Dinky,” she prompted. The purple filly stepped forwards and glanced for a second down at the script before starting to speak. “I’ve never seen such a rich land! Ore of all kinds, copper, silver, gold!” “The mana lines are stronger than any I have ever sensed before, your majesty!” added Firelock her horn glowing. “This land is perfect for us,” continued Dinky, “In the name of the unicorns, I hereby dub this land... Unicornia!” “Very good Dinky,” said Trixie, “You too Firelock, although sensed should be asensed, its means to look at something using magic. Now like before the lights will move to the earth ponies this time and the unicorns should move to the back.” Once again the children shuffled around the stage, Apple Bloom and Diamond Tiara jostled each other as they made their way to the front. “The air! The trees! The dirt!” exclaimed Apple Bloom, “This land is perfect for growing all the food we’ll ever need!” “Hey! That was my line!” cried Diamond. “We’ll ah thought it sounded better coming from Puddinghead given all the farms she set up.” “Miss!” Cheerilee sighed. “How about you have another line Diamond? How about ‘We’ll be able to build homes and shops, perfect to trade with other species? That’ll make the earth ponies a little less one note,” she glanced over at the unicorn script writer who shrugged and started to scribble on the paper in front of him. “Fine!” exclaimed Diamond stepping in front of Apple Bloom, “We’ll be able to build shops and houses, perfect to trade with other species.” “In the name of the Earth ponies,” said Apple Bloom pushing past her follow actress, “I think I'm gonna call this new place,” she paused and the seconds ticked by, “Earth Pony Land!” “Maybe just Earth,” said Diamond. “Maybe a shorter pause before Earth Pony Land Apple Bloom,” suggested Trixie, “Now we want just the three rulers stepping forwards to the front of the stage, everypony else moves to the back but stay in your tribes. You’re all angry with each other so snarl at each other, wave your hooves or stamp them, scratch the ground, things like that.” The foals happily complied and the room was filled by echoing sounds of anger. “Good, just keep it quiet, mime it.” Cheerilee nodded and gestured at the foals playing the rulers. “We found our new home!” they all chorused. “I was here first!” yelled Scootaloo. “No I was,” said Dinky. “Were not!” cried Apple Bloom. “Was to!” “I’ll fight you all for it!” growled Scootaloo very convincingly causing Apple Bloom to take a few steps back while Dinky turned to face the pegasus. “Please your majesty,” called Firelock, “There is no reason to fight.” “CALM DOWN!” yelled Bee Bop, jumping up and down. “We can talk about this,” said Diamond a little sulkily. “That was very very good children,” said Cheerilee stamping her hooves. “Now there’s going to be a big fight scene between all the tribes,” several of the cast looked very interested at that, “but we don’t want a repeat of the incident between Pip and Ruby in the first scene,” she glanced over at the two slightly bruised foals sitting sulkily in the audience. “So we’re going to have to be very careful how we do things,” she looked around the stage for inspiration. “Miss!” said Dinky, “Maybe we could have a snowball fight? If the windigo are making it all cold there could be snow around, and as it’s cold out so we wouldn’t even have to use magic to make the snow, we could just bring some in from the outside.” “That is... a brilliant idea Dinky, we’ll have a snowball fight,” she glanced around the school room kept nicely snug by the wood stove in the corner, “maybe not right now, but we can all get together in our tribes and decide what we’re going to do in the fight. I’ll talk to the earth ponies, Trixie can talk to the pegasus, and...” she glanced over at written who was busy scribbling on the paper in front of him, “Dinky, you can be in charge of the unicorns. Give yourselves ten minutes to decide what you want to do then we’ll all get back together again.” “So what are we going to do in the snowball fight?” asked Sweetie Bell, “Maybe we could put all our aura’s together and make one huge snowball to drop on the others?” “Maybe, but I don’t think that would look right,” said Dinky chewing her lower lip, “We want a long fight not something we just win. We really need to make a spectacle that loads of ponies will want to watch, it’s really important that lots of ponies come to the show.” “Why?” asked Sweetie. “Because otherwise we’ll get a new teacher and she’ll use a crop on us!” explained Firelock. “A what?” “It’s not important,” said Dinky trotting back and forth nervously, “it’s just important that the play goes well.” “Ok, I’ll do as well as I can, but well, I havn’t done much acting before.” “Just do what Dinky tells you, both miss Cheerilee and Miss Trixie think she’s a really good actress,” said Firelock. “I’m not that good,” said Dinky humbly. “Yes you are, or Miss Cheerilee wouldn’t have put you in charge!” “I guess that’s right,” she swallowed with difficulty, it was worrying that it was up to her to make sure their teacher didn’t have to leave. Still it did feel a little good to have all the foals around her looking towards her for leadership, and her teachers had said how good she was at acting. She really wanted to make her momma proud of her as well. “Ok,” announced Dinky, “during the snowball fight why don’t you two,” she pointed to some of her classmates, “put up a field to stop us being hit, and then the rest of us, with me in front, will run across the stage towards the, um, pegasus,” she knew Scootaloo was a good fighter, she’d be the most impressive in the fight, “Then we let one of the snowballs through heading to you Firelock, and I’ll leap up and push the ball aside at the last minute and pretend I got hit, then you all gather around me and I’ll sort of stagger to my hooves to lead you on again.” The other foals nodded with a range of enthusiasm that sounded cool, but many of them were veterans of many a snow ball fight, it didn’t sound like something they could do in a pitched battle. “Are you sure Princess Platinum would do that?” asked Sweetie, “She didn’t seem very nice.” “I’m sure she would,” said Dinky with certainty, “and I’m the best actor here afterall.” “Hey Snails,” called Snips levitating his trumpet alongside him. “Hi Snips,” said Snails not looking up from the pages in front of him. “How did the band go?” “It was good, miss Heartstrings can make really good music, she got a bit worried when she found out only Tootsie can read the musical squiggle things, but she wrote out the music in normal letters that we all know and we worked with that.” “That’s good,” said Snails continuing to study the script. “Do you want to come over to my place? Mum made a batch of her festive shortbread and I’m sure she’ll share it.” Around them the foals were slowly drifting off either in small groups or as they were collected by their parents. The adults were putting the room back into order for tomorrow's lessons. “Can’t,” said Snails raising his tired eyes from the pages in front of him, “I got to learn the script.” “Isn’t Mr Script changing it?” he asked. “Yeah, but this is the latest version, I’m the prompt, I need to know it all, it’s very important.” The plumper colt looked at the thick wad of papers. “That looks like a lot.” “It is,” signed Snails, “It makes my head hurt.” “I’m surprised there’s room in your head for all that,” said Silver Spoon as she wandered over, “Or maybe not, it’s not like you use it for much.” “Hey!” said Snips putting himself between the filly and his friend, “Snails knows lots of stuff, he knows all about all sorts of cool bugs.” “So nothing useful then,” teased the filly before turning away towards her father. “Don’t listen to her,” said Snips turning back to Snails, “You’re plenty smart.” “I know,” sighed Snails, his sister told him that all the time, but everything seemed so hard sometimes. He turned over another page covered in red changes. “You sure you don’t want to come get cookies?” It was tempting, but Snails really wanted to prove his sister right and Silver Spoon wrong. “Maybe next time, my sister will be here to collect me soon,” he turned back to the script and tried to focus on the words.