Melchizedek

by Super Trampoline

Her

"I know right? So then, so then my friend is like 'Oatmeal? Are you CRAZY?!?'" The ponies within earshot of this apparently hilarious punchline erupted in laughter. Twilight smiled. She needed to do this more often.

You see, Twilight Sparkle had a birthday tradition. Though distance and time separated them, she always made sure to meet with her Ponyville friends on her birthday. They all made space for it in their calendars. Later however, after they had left, or in Rainbow's case (living so far away), crashed on the couch, she had another tradition. She got drunk. Not by herself of course. That would be kind of stupid unless you're moping about a breakup. No, she liked to hear what the common people had to say about her, HONESTLY, so she disguised herself as a pegasus and went bar hoping. Celestia wasn't incredibly fond of this approach to information gathering, and it had led to several diplomatic crises in the past, but she understood her former student had the right and competence to make her own decisions and stupid birthday traditions. She just prayed to herself there were no multivariable calculus-related brawls this time.

---

Twilight's disguise was perfunctory, but it did the job. She shed her horn (which was always a weird feeling, especially since she usually gripped glasses with her magic) and inverted her color scheme. She was now an olive-coated pegasus, whom she gave the persona of, appropriately enough, Olive Garnish.

Totes mad MS Paint skills, right?

Olive Garnish was a tourist from the south sightseeing in Canterlot. She also happened to be newly single after a traumatic break up which was clearly not at all her fault. Of course, the moment Twilight first related this made-up backstory to Rarity, the mare instantly called out her friend for trying to pick up stallions. Twilight would neither confirm nor deny this accusation.

At any rate, she had her spiel down pat, and if anything enjoyed this role playing as a chance to escape from royal duties. And she might have even gotten a telegraph extension number or two. But her main purpose, besides relaxing and getting drunk, was to do a sort of annual survey of her people's opinions on her. It was an informal survey with lots of room for errors and personal bias, but this was a fact that Twilight had long ago realized didn't matter if she was significantly hammered. In a brilliant example of business acumen, she had inasmuch even managed to secure a royal stipend for alcohol consumption, under the pretense that she was better at gathering this information under the influence. Luna got the same sort of stipend for visiting Ponyville on Nightmare Night too, with the justification of "Tequilas loosen me up. Wouldn't want me banishing anypony to moon, now would we Tia?" Celestia could afford a few bits here and there disappearing from the books, if Luna didn't reveal her cake infatuation. It was an arrangement that benefited all involved, except for the taxpayers.

So Twilight got free alcohol and honest opinions, and Equestria got a more informed princess. Here, on her thirty seventh birthday, it seemed another year of this polling would come to pass, when he appeared.