Title: Magnificent
Pairing: Photo Finish/Princess Celestia
The flash went off yet again, causing Celestia to blink so rapidly the entire throne room seemed to strobe.
“Beautiful! Beautiful!” cried the pony behind the camera, only slightly muffled by the cape draped over her front half. “You are magnificent your majesty! Mwah!”
Celestia put on her practised Beatific Princess Smile. “You are too kind.”
“Nein!” the pony cried. “Not kind enough! You are wondrous! Your beauty makes the mountains themselves want to sing! Why, it is enough to make a mare tear out her own eyes so they may not be soiled by looking at ordinary, ugly, ponies for the rest of her life instead of your magnificence – ptooey!”
“Uh …” Celestia struggled for a response. “Thank you?”
More exclamations of her looks came after that. They were flung in such rapid-fire succession that by the end of the photo shoot, Celestia felt quite exhausted, despite having not moved from the top of the dais.
“My film roll, it is finished!” the photographer gasped. “They are all finished.”
“Possibly a good thing,” Celestia said softly. “Day Court starts in ten minutes.” She did not add that she desperately needed to pee. Princesses did not admit to their subjects that they had small bladders and an over fondness for grape juice. “I thank you for your time, Photo Finish. I trust you have taken enough photographs for your magazine client?”
“Uh, ja! Of course! Better Homes and Ponies will be so pleased with this magnificent showing!” Photo Finish snapped the legs of her camera stand together and began backing away, pushing her entourage behind her as if with an invisible force-field projected by her tail. “Good day to you, your magnificent eminent majesty!”
“Uh … quite,” Celestia said to the closed door.
In her dark room, Photo Finish clipped another print to the line dangling above her head. Hundreds littered the lines strung around the room.
“Magnificent,” she muttered to herself, solution sloshing in the tray as she added another print.
Behind her, beneath her schedule board, a cork board teemed with magazine clippings, ponyrazzi photos and other articles. Nowhere on the schedule board was any letter from the fictional Better Homes and Ponies.
Photo Finish squinted her uncovered eyes hungrily at the while alicorn developing in the tray.
“So magnificent …”