... Join 'Em For Dinner
It was so unfair, Twilight thought as she rocked back and forth, dividing her attention between the sullen unicorn at her table and the one across the room. The scene in the Canterlot cafe didn't need any help reaching peak awkwardness. Yet more and more of it kept getting dumped in her hooves, while tiny doe-eyed waifs in Nideeria were spending their fawnhoods entirely bereft of it. Why, the spare awkwardness in this room alone could provide thousands of them with the unforgettable experience of grinding their school play to a halt by tripping and falling off the stage.
"Slumber 101? I've read that," Moon Dancer muttered, and the others glanced back and forth, their forced smiles adding a few more kilowinces to the Equestrian awkwardness trade deficit.
"Oh! Eheh," Twilight chuckled, then stood up from her chair, staring across the cafe at Awkward Problem Number Two. "Girls, will you excuse me for one teeny-tiny moment?"
"Whatever," Moon Dancer grumbled, and Twilight was already in motion as the unicorn stabbed her fork into a carrot.
Twilight marched to the table at the far side of the room, then stomped her hoof down on Starlight Glimmer's menu, crumpling it to the table. "Listen," she murmured, staring coldly into the ex-cult leader's eyes, "don't think I didn't see you, or that I don't know what's up. Your villainy is peerless, you will have your revenge, yadda yadda. But I am right in the middle of a major friendship problem right now, so you're just going to have to wait your damned turn."
Starlight stared back innocently, then broke into a smile. "Villain? Me?"
Twilight ground her teeth. "Don't play dumb. We freed a town of ponies from your tyranny and you escaped with an unresolved plot arc."
"Ut." Starlight held up a hoof, then pointed down at the floor underhoof, where an adorable puppy was glancing up at them, flagrantly unkicked. Then pointed to the table behind her, where two smiling parents were watching their tiny foal contentedly suck on a piece of sugar candy. Then to the empty table just to their left, where a little "Back in a minute! -C." sign stood next to the solar tiara, the Alicorn Amulet, floor plans for Canterlot Castle, and Princess Celestia's diary.
Starlight looked back at Twilight and smiled. "I'm reformed now. And I'm just here for dinner."
Twilight's mouth opened and closed. She stared at the table with the sign.
Starlight cleared her throat, smiling a little wider.
Twilight forced her gaze back at the ex-cult leader. "Sorry, what?"
"I said, 'I'm reformed.'"
"… Really."
"So just pretend I'm not here and have a wonderful time." Starlight's smile somehow grew, making her resemble nothing so much as a landshark with a toilet-paper tube taped to its forehead.
Twilight narrowed her eyes. "Okay, you know what, no. That story's as fishy as … as … a landshark with a toilet-paper tube taped to its forehead. Why don't you tell me your actual plan and then I can get to foiling it after dinner."
"Oh, I couldn't possibly," Starlight said. "Dr. Horrible said that would be a sign of relapse."
"Doctor Horrible?!"
"My villain-reform therapist." Starlight lowered her voice. "Just between you and me, I don't think he's very good at it."
One of Twilight's eyes twitched.
"But I'm willing to give his theory of 'A monologued plot is just a cry for attention' a try." Starlight leaned forward, chin on forehooves. "So how did your Yakyakistan summit go?"
Twilight whirled and stormed off. "Ugh!"
Starlight calmly watched Twilight's retreat, then picked her menu back up and ominously resumed scanning through the list of appetizers. "Mwa ha ha," she said — then the smirk dropped away from her muzzle as she realized Twilight was glaring at her from across the room. She coughed, slapped herself on the pastern, and forced herself to pat the puppy.
When Moon Dancer dashed outside, Twilight followed — but took a detour to Starlight's table one more time, pointing a hoof at her eyes and then swiveling it toward the unicorn. Starlight met the glare with a sweet smile. For long seconds after Twilight's departure, she stared at the door, then tucked her menu under her plate and made a beeline for the exit.
A few minutes later, Princess Celestia sat back down. "Hey," she said, "where did my diary go?"
Starlight was reading a newspaper at the Ponyville train station when Twilight stalked over to her. "Reformed, my cute purple plot."
Starlight glanced up cheerfully. "Fancy meeting you here, Princess!"
"I quadruple-checked your alibi after fixing Moon Dancer's friendship problem. Then I realized you had to be lying." Twilight leveled an accusatory hoof. "We never blasted you with rainbows."
Starlight hurriedly set down the newspaper and held her hooves up. "Oh, no. I self-reformed."
Twilight slowly raised one eyebrow.
Starlight floated a stack of photos out from her saddlebags. "It was the obvious choice once I studied your history. I mean, look at what happened to Discord." She held up a photo of a stone statue. "Tirek." An emaciated figure in a dark, stygian jail. "Sombra." An irregular smudge on a snowfield. "Seriously, the more I researched, the more impressed I got. You're, like, some sort of invincible vengeance goddess."
"I guess I should grant you that one," Twilight said. "So what are you doing here?"
The landshark smile immediately returned to Starlight's muzzle.
"Oh," she said, "I'm just catching a train."
Twilight frowned.
"Oh, I'm just working on my tan."
Twilight glanced around the empty skies at the edge of Cloudsdale and frowned a little harder.
"Oh, I'm just collecting field data for my Master's in Applied Monsterology."
Twilight glanced around the deepest, darkest Everfree and frowned extra hard.
"ああ、私は日本語を勉強している。"
Twilight glanced around the Imperial Dragon Palace and frowned with the force of a million normal frowns.
"Oh, I just got lost after that left turn at Alba-clucky."
Twilight glanced around the submarine deep in the Mare-iana Trench and frowned times infinity.
"Oh, I just thought I'd —"
Twilight's frown divided by zero and boiled over into rage. "That is IT!" she screamed, voice echoing through the inexplicably thick atmosphere of the crater-pitted wasteland of Saturn's sixth-largest moon. Her horn flared with the light of an enthusiastic supernova, tearing a hole in the fabric of spacetime.
Starlight's smile vanished. "Wait! Not a villain —"
Twilight grabbed her, magic field clamping down on her muzzle. "Save it. I figured out your plan." She leaned in, finally allowing herself a smirk of her own. "You realized you didn't have a chance of facing me directly. So you devised a plan to annoy me to death."
Starlight's eyes widened. "Mmmph!" she shouted as she was cast out of reality.
Twilight let out a long breath, then sealed up the hole. "Good riddance."
The blissful silence was shattered moments later as Celestia walked by, sipping from a juicebox. "Oh, hello, Twilight," she said. "Fancy meeting you here."
Twilight jumped. "Princ— er, I mean, Celestia! What are you doing here?"
"Oh, I just thought I'd drop by to give Starlight some moral support." Celestia shrugged, then glanced around the empty, barren rockscape. "Huh. I really expected her to be shadowing you again. I guess she finally worked up the nerve to ask you for your autograph?"
Twilight froze.
"Uhhh," she said. "No, but she was totally the one who stole your diary."
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Still amusing.
Ladies and gentlemen, Pony logic at its finest.
6326062
Pony Logic? Pinkie Pie.
Pinkie Pie? Pony Logic.
6326223
So, Rainbow Dash can never be corrupted because she's always covered in rainbows?
Works for me.
地獄のようなあなたが持っています。
6326062 As it should be. Beautifully done.
Yep, as I thought.
Enceladus does things to a person's mind, I tell ya. Makes 'em paranoid.
This was amazing , as always.
6326062
Now I'm trying to remember who I was talking with when I had the discussion about the headcanon that the pony verb "to make friends" literally had two meanings: 1) being nice to people, 2) blasting them with giant rainbow beams.
Beware a princess declaring that making friends with your country is an Equestrian priority. You're about to get nuked from orbit.
6326249
これは私がインターネット翻訳の魔法の力を使用するときに何が起こるかです。
Still, isn't it funny that she claims she's been studying Japanese, while mangling it so badly? Hmm? No? Okay, maybe that was just me.
(Ninja-edited thanks to Chinchillax.)
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Thank you for reading and enjoying!
Wat?
Like, nothing, with that list of examples I'm pretty sure that's exactly what Twilight is.
Poor Starlight, but it cannot be said that she didn't know the risks.
Ok, was totally not expecting that ending.
*snerk*
Nice.
6326870
You're welcome!
Upvoted and fave'd with the force of a million normal upvote and fave's!
Inconvenient Starlight is inconvenient.
Very much so.
You know what? I still don't trust Starlight. I can believe the preservation-motivated attempt at self-reformation, but I'm still not buying her trying to ask Twilight for an autograph. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but I'm with the goddess of vengeance on this one.
Doctor Horrible is in Equestria!? I knew the evil league of evil had an Equestrian branch! It's to only explanation for Bad Horse! Is he still doing that sing along blog thing?
Also, if Doctor Horrible was her therapist that's reason enough not to trust Starlight.
6326870 A.k.a. the Takamachi Nanoha School of Friendship.
img10.deviantart.net/d477/i/2013/293/7/5/nanoha_teaches_twilight_how_to_make_friends_by_thedesertkitsune-d6r8ji5.jpg
6326870
6326062
Also Magical Lyrical Nanoha
This was quite delightfully silly, just the thing I needed after an early morning shift and a night that only got me about two hours sleep. Thanks, horizon!
What the actual f
k 
Good job at making me feel sad about being amused.
Yaaaaaaay, Starlight!
No, Twilight, not every villain requires magical rainbow beams of death! Like Gilda!
*crickets*
...Okay, not really a villain...um...what about Trixie!
*crickets*
...Corrupted into one by a magical amulet, but wasn't one originally, right...
But...uh...um...what about...um...
Well, Starlight had a nice run...
I'm sorry. But that cover-art is just perfect. Crack up every time I see it.
*insert long, thought out comment here*
lol
Yay new horizon words!
cdn0.sbnation.com/imported_assets/1016769/3879_-_animated_gif_chuck_norris_dodgeball_thumbs_up.gif
Oops
socialcomotion.com/Blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/My-God-Meme.jpg
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And my readers be like
pinkie.mylittlefacewhen.com/media/f/rsz/mlfw6117_small.jpg
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Rescued from my cut file for posterity:
Fun fact: I originally had added one more example in the list of defeated villains, but decided to axe the joke to keep the E rating.
As for Gilda: given that Griffonstone appears on Twilight's map of Equestria, the ponies basically annexed her entire nation and let her whole race stew in grinding poverty until it rose to the level of a Friendship Problem for the Mane Six to solve.
It would have been so much easier for her to take the "blasted by rainbows" route.
6328576 I can do you one better than that, Magical Pony Lyrical Twilight.
"Oh, I have been studying Japanese!"
Oooorrrr you just used Google Translate. Because you know, that's definitely a thing in Equestria.
I mean, considering how quickly they advanced from candles to speaker cars I'd say soon they'll have it.
I am not very confident about sing-alongs as a form of effective group therapy, either.
What did I just read?
6328529
Bad Horse's Sing-Along Blog?
Why isn't this a thing?!
6333072 Oh wow. Heck yeah it should be a thing! How has Dr. Horrible not been ponified yet? It already has sapient equines!
6333072
Mad Horse, Mad Horse, Mad Horse, Mad Horse
She rules the pony nation, the Goddess of the Sun
Her love of making friends has just killed ev-ery-one
The players are all helpless, and the game's just beguuuun...
Melt the Big Bad with solar rays?
No, friendship's gonna save the day!
Mad Horse, Mad Horse, Mad Horse, she's mad
A railroading DM is watching so beware
There is no information you can make her share
So make the Mad Horse gleeful
Or bow to the Nightmare...
You're saddled up, there's no recourse
It's Hi-Ho Silver
Signed, Mad Horse
6333120
So... Who's going to be the one to try and convince Bad Horse to sing...?
Is that "Ut" Starlight says at the beginning a spelling mistake or something? Because I didn't understand that.
Other than that, very funny story!
I must admit, while I think the first 80% of the story is really funny, I still have the same problem with this that I had in the Writeoff, and that's that I think the ending is really weak. I wish you had found some way to change the ending so that the joke--whatever it may be--had more impact. As is, I don't find the brick joke about the diary funny. It's just Celestia randomly being there and Twilight telling her something that's really of no consequence.
6333490
I think it's the onomatopoetic form of the sound one might make while interrupting someone.
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All y'all are making me wish I knew more about that particular crossover.
6330410
I love the cover art myself! I don't know who originally memed it, but I "borrowed" the image from FanOfMostEverything, who used it in a blog post while commenting on the episode.
6332434
I don't think Google can exist in Equestria until it gets a pony-pun name.
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I know that over in Tumblr-land there's Ask Dr. Adorable. I haven't specifically read any text-based Dr. Horrible pony fanfic but I'd be shocked if it didn't exist.
Also, there's Bad Horse here on FIMFic, but if 6333163 can convince Bad Horse to sing, he's a better
mandragon than I.6333120
6333490
What Dubs Rewatcher said in the comment directly above.
6334388
Fair enough! I remember a fair number of folks having the opposite reaction (finding most of it a "YAJF" – Yet Another Joke Fic – as Bad Horse called it, but then appreciating the ending), but both reactions are fine; not every story is going to work for everyone, and you're probably on the wrong side of the particular brand of humor here.
If you want some better Horizon comedy, I think you'll appreciate The 18th Brewmare of Bluey Napoleon a lot more, because it's the exact opposite of this in several important respects. Rather than starting faux-serious and derailing to an anticlimax based on character destruction, the whole thing starts out as what looks like cheap mockery of Blueblood and then veers into a serious deconstruction of his character and some heartwarming moments of pony empathy before leaping back onto the rails for a climax that squares the two. It was the runaway winner of a Writeoff gold medal and I'm pretty proud of it.
(Plus the title is a direct Karl Marx title drop and the whole thing's a roundabout satire of 18th-century French history.
)
Well played, Twilight. Well played.
Also:
Go metric or go home
6334764 I don't know of the crossover so much as I do the anime—had a friend who tried to get me into it a while back, but I just couldn't feel it, y'know? He kept joking about how the main character would blast enemies and they'd inevitably become friends with her later on, to which I'd always quip "Oh, so it's Japanese MLP!"
He couldn't stand MLP at the time, so he'd rage so beautifully~
6334388
Also, the ending joke is (well, is supposed to be) that Twilight stole the diary.
I think this version's last line implies it much better than the original, but that's not a high bar to clear.
6334764
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Trust me, I already have Brewmare in my favorites. I've been shadowing you for a lot longer than you've known!
That explanation clears it up a little bit, but I still don't think that the brick joke is strong enough to carry the ending--in addition, looking at it again, I feel like it detracts from the "Starlight just wanted an autograph" joke, which really seems like it should be the main thrust of the ending.
Oh well. Can't please everyone, I suppose. Congrats on the feature, cutie pie.
I reviewed this story!
My review can be found here.
That was a beautiful montage-type thing you did there. Best I've ever seen it done in writing.
6366561
Thank you! My gut tells me it worked exactly because of the montage; I didn't want to stretch out the joke. (Also, the original version had to fit in 750 words for the Writeoff. Necessity is the mother, etc.)
Amusing, but not that deep. So yeah, points for keeping it short! Random locations FTW as well.
6374218
Thanks!
I'm getting Mark of Destiny edited, to keep the deep stuff running. This one's sort of a palate cleanser.