Canterlot: Her Creation and Her Architects

by vren55

The Great Gathering: Part 3

The Great Gathering: Part 3

Head Guard Tent in The Great Gathering...

“Buck it! I should have designed a larger holding area for mischief makers!” cursed White Tower.

“White Tower, don’t be so hard on yourself! You were basing it off my estimate which seems to have been too optimistic,” said Barbican with a sigh. The two ponies were in the main guard tent, observing the many varied emotions demonstrated by mischief makers caught by the Royal Guardsponies. All the while, guardsponies ran back and forth on errands and on missions. The two ponies had known there would be a great deal of troublemakers at such a large congregation of ponies and had designed the venue with security as one of their main considerations. Guard tents and towers were posted all over the site, while patrols on hoof and in the air covered blind spots where there were none. White Tower had even designed holding areas for these expected troublemakers. However, she was furious that the main one was already full.

“I know, but I should have caught your mistake on my third check of your calculations! I’m your assistant after all!” cried White Tower in frustration. The pegasus’s light brown eyes blinked in surprise.

“Wait, you checked my calculations three times?” he asked.

“Five and I still couldn’t foresee this. Now they will have to take guards off their duties to escort the prisoners to the other holding areas and that would leave gaps in the patrol! All thanks to my mistake!” replied the mare as she made her way to a map of the entire site of The Great Gathering. The pegasus stared at her back, amazement plastered on his face.

“Wait how did you check my calculations five times? You couldn’t have had the time with all the work I’ve been giving you so you... ” the pegasus gasped and cantered up to his assistant.

“You silly mare! You’re going to work yourself to death if you don’t sleep,” scolded Barbican.

“I got seven hours of sleep every day for the past few weeks,” said the earth pony as she examined the map. That halted the pegasus in his hoofsteps.

“Wait what? Then... Did you used the time I have been giving you to find your cutie mark?” demanded the pegasus.

“Yes I did! I never asked for that time Barbican! You just gave it to me without asking if I needed it,” retorted White Tower without facing her master.

Barbican took a deep breath and let it out with exasperatedly. White Tower was right of course, the pegasus hadn’t asked and just assumed. After all the time that they had known each other and had been working together, the pegasus still could not understand why his assistant lacked a cutie mark and why she did not seem to care that she did.

Everypony wants a cutie mark, especially at White Tower’s age! Why would she not care? I just want what’s best for her... Even though she didn’t ask for it... Barbican sighed and trotted up to White Tower.

“White Tower, I am sorry, for not asking you and just giving you time to find your cutie mark. You know how I am about these things... I kind of took it for granted that you wanted your cutie mark,” explained the pegasus. The earth pony turned to Barbican a pensive expression on her face.

“I know you just wanted to help Barbican, but I’ve told you before and I will tell you again. You don’t need to worry about me,” said White Tower, her voice firm. The pegasus nodded and then snorted.

“And you need to stop blaming yourself so much and worrying in general! Let the guards deal with the holding area problem. Your mane and tail are going to turn grey if you keep this up,” said Barbican, punctuating every odd word with a light poke to his assistant’s shoulder.

“Um, Barbican, if you haven’t noticed, my mane and tail are silver?” replied the earth pony voice dripping with sarcasm. In mock shock, the pegasus threw up his front hooves and lifted off into the air.

“Oh dear! White Tower is getting old! Somepony get me some wrinkle cream!” moaned Barbican. Then, quick as a feather, the pegasus flapped his wings and sped out of the tent flap, his earth pony assistant chasing after him yelling:

“I don’t have wrinkles! Come back here you feather-brained foal!”

The Great Gathering...

Somehow, Chartres could never really escape the guardsponies. No matter where she galloped, cantered, or trotted, she was met with armored ponies, guard towers and tents, or pegasi guards in the air.

The unicorn was fighting a losing battle, with the guards and with her own body’s endurance. Her breath came in loud rasping coughs and her stomach growled with increasing intensity. She hadn’t had breakfast and last night’s dinner had been meagre. The crowd of angry armored stallions and mares only grew larger as the unicorn dodged, weaved and flashed her pursuers. Hooves flying, Chartres tore past a corner and in the distance, down the pathway, was the main gate of The Great Gathering.

“Stop her!” yelled the closing guards. Chartres desperately charged down the lane, quickly dodging ponies left and right. Passer-by’s jumped out of the way as the unicorn galloped for freedom.

The unicorn was almost to the gate when a sky-blue earth pony with silver hair galloped past her and skidded to a stop to block the gates.

White Tower had chased Barbican all the way to the Grand Galloping Lane, the main walk from the gate to the centre of The Great Gathering, when they had seen the platoon of guardsponies chasing after the ivory unicorn. They had reacted quickly, White Tower chasing after the unicorn on hoof and Barbican taking into the air and into the clouds. Being very fresh, White Tower managed to easily overtake the fugitive and now stood barring the way.

“Give yourself up. You have nowhere to go,” said the earth pony squaring her shoulders. The opposing unicorn blinked sweat away from her eyes, wheezing like an old forge’s air pump.

“Let me past! Please!” begged the other pony, her voice a rasp between her heaving breaths. White Tower shook her head and charged. A flash of bright blue light erupted from the unicorn’s horn, but the earth pony was undeterred and rammed right into the unicorn, tackling her to the ground.

“White Tower, are you alright?” yelled Barbican as he descended to the ground.

“I’m alright! She only cast a light spell,” said the earth pony in assurance. The white pony didn’t say anything, but her eyes glistened with tears as the guards caught up and surrounded her.

White Tower and Barbican had walked back to the guard tent and holding area with the guards and the captured troublemaker. Although White Tower wasn’t injured, the sky blue earth pony’s vision had turned spotty and hazy. Despite his assistant’s protests, the pegasus knight had grabbed a towel, shot up to the highest altitudes and procured some ice. Then, feeling rather nifty and peckish due to his feat of flying, the stallion had then flown to the food area of The Great Gathering. Meanwhile, the cold, soothing water crystals had done their work quickly and White Tower was soon able to see perfectly again.

The mare used her newly recovered vision to glance at the captured unicorn’s flank and was perplexed. The ivory unicorn’s cutie mark was of a glass blowing stick with a globe of molten glass to the end. On the glass ball was a six-pointed star, as blue as the other pony’s mane. It could only mean the unicorn was a glass blower, not a thief or vagabond.

“You don’t seem like the type to steal. What did you do?” asked White Tower. The pony was met with a sniff. The unicorn had shed quiet tears while being led to the guard tent and while she wasn’t crying now, she was hunched over and looked as if Luna’s moon had decided to sit itself on her back.

“I was trying to sell a piece without a stall. I... am in debt,” said the pony dismally. White Tower got the point and decided to leave the other pony alone. Turning back to her scroll, the earth pony made some amends to her notes about The Great Gathering’s guard tower and patrol system in capturing unicorns.

“Sorry for blinding you earlier,” said the unicorn. The apology caught White Tower off guard and she frowned for a moment as she registered the unicorn’s apology.

“It’s alright,” said White Tower in reply, as she wondered how to respond to the unicorn.

The tent flap rippled as two ponies entered, a white unicorn with magenta eyes and a pink mane and tail, and a yellow pegasus with a scarlet mane and tail. Observing the pair, White Tower could tell that the two ponies were noble. There had been several cues including: the way the pair held their heads, the shape they had raised their necks to and how their chest was slightly leading their trot.

“Hello? What is your business here?” asked the guard on duty.

“We heard that the pursuit of a single unicorn pulled half the guard from their posts,” said the unicorn serene and yet disapproving tone. Chartres overheard the unicorn and blushed as the guardpony was rendered speechless.

“It was only a platoon m’am. We have everything under control now,” stuttered the guard. The unicorn inclined her head slightly in understanding, but the pegasus didn’t look so sure.

“There are a lot of troublemaking ponies in this venue. Are you sure you can capture them all if you had to pull a platoon in order to catch one?” demanded the pegasus, her dark green eyes narrowed. Deciding to step into the conversation and alleviate the poor guard’s misery, White Tower drew herself up to her full height and addressed the two ponies.

“There is no guarantee we can catch them all, ladies. I assure you that precautions have been taken, and the few troublemakers that escape our hooves will be so scared that they will not commit any more crimes,” said White Tower. The silver-haired pony’s confident tone was met with scrutinizing eyes from the yellow pegasus and raised eyebrows form the unicorn.

“What type of precautions?” asked the yellow pegasus.

“I am not at liberty to tell you. The precautions should be best kept secret or else or somepony would be able to bypass them,” replied White Tower evenly. The two ponies glanced at each other and the yellow one stepped forward.

“I, Baroness Vaultaire of the Day Court, Flame of Cloudsdale and Lonely Peaks request that you tell me the precautions that have been taken for The Great Gathering.” White Tower kept her eyes glued on Vaultaire in order to make sure she wasn’t rolling them in exasperation.

“Baroness, I am sorry, but I cannot reveal to you these precautions for I do not answer to your authority and you lack the peerage to command me,” stated the blue pony. The pegasus’s lips opened to form a small ‘o’ as surprise spread across the her face and her perfectly poised head dropped down a notch.

“Wait you... ” gasped the scarlet-maned pony.

“I am Lady White Tower, Former Colonel of the 1st Stalliongrad Ponies and Member of the Order of Equestria. I am the assistant of Lord Barbican and helped him to design this venue with His Grace Golden Tower. Now, may you and your friend leave this tent?” demanded White Tower. The earth pony had always disliked the power of nobles to order common ponies around like dirt and while she felt sorry for Vaultaire, she kind of liked shocking a noblepony with her rank once in a while.

“Of the Order of Equestria thou say? We remember thou White Tower. Thou wert the one who used her boon to request the construction of new royal orphanages in every Equestrian city and disband all the contracted ones,” said the unicorn.

At this statement, the atmosphere in the tent changed like a flash flood. Heads turned to stare at the unicorn who flinched noticeably under the weight of so many eyes. Vaultaire had bit on her lip, flattened her ears and had shut one eye in a pained expression. White Tower’s brided silver mane had shot straight up like a flagpole and her blue eyes had almost swallowed her entire face.

Ponies were rarely inducted into the Order of Equestria. It was the most prestigious honour that could be ever granted to a single pony and was valued even more than knighthood. Along with the many powers and benefits each inducted member of the Order would receive, the new member was granted a boon by Princess Celestia. The pony would tell the princess it by whispering it into her ear during the induction ceremony. Thus, nopony would know about the boon, but the recently-inducted order member and...

“Princess Celestia?!?!?!?”

White Tower’s voice came out in a mixture of a scream and a whisper, making it sound like a loud, grating rasp. The white unicorn who was actually an alicorn-in-disguise let out a long sigh.

“We believe the most recent phrase appropriate for this situation is... ‘Whoops’,” said Celestia. A soft white light filled the tent as the sovereign of Equestria took hold of her power again. A tall alicorn with a pink mane, white coat and magenta eyes now stood in the white unicorn’s place. Each pony in the tent except for the sheepish Vaultaire was now on their knees. White Tower’s ears were flicked back in fear and the earth pony was also trembling as she began to spout apologies rapid-fire.

"Your majesty! Sorry for not recognizing you! Sorry that an entire platoon of the Royal Guard got pulled from their post! Sorry for the overcrowding of the holding area and…”

“Lady White Tower of the Order of Equestria, we ask thou to not apologize. We were in disguise because we did not want thou to recognize us. We do not blame thee for the incident with the platoon of Royal Guard and the overcrowding of the holding area…”

“But your majesty! It was I who designed the holding areas, and Lord Barbican and I who designed the locations of the guard posts!... Sorry for interrupting!” squeaked White Tower as she squeezed herself closer against the ground. Celestia chuckled. The ruler of Equestria had never met a pony that placed so much demand on herself.

"Thou art forgiven and thou may punish thyself by explaining to us how thou and thy master designed the venue.”

Comments

[vren55]

1094541 argh SO many errors... i'll correct them as soon as possible... And yeah, I'm going to need that luck, I already have one strike, though they did give me positive feedback.

[vren55]

1092364 HOLY SWEET CELESTIA I JUST REALIZED WHO YOU WERE!!!! I'm can't believe I didn't recognize your user name!!! I knew it was familiar! I feel like... one of my characters because she gets stuck in a similar situation. Must be karma

I LOVE My Little Alicorn and Bringing Up Blueblood and I have Keeping Your Hooves On The Ground on my fav list. Especially how you've portrayed the relationship between Luna and Celestia. And you're keeping an eye on this story with less than 35 likes... Sorry for the fan going crazy. Ah hem. What do you think of my Celestia's character given that your portrayal is one of the most well developed and best that has ever been done(question mark, my key is broken).

Yours sincerely,
vren55

P.S. I link the stories so that anybody reading this comment will see awesome work.

[InsertAuthorHere]

1096178

I like your Celestia so far. In particular, I like how she subtly manipulates the situations around her for the benefit of everyone, from setting up the Great Gathering to find all the ponies she'll need to build Canterlot, to basically banishing Vaultaire so that she wouldn't receive the same undeserved retribution others like Byzas received. She knows how important this project is to her ponies and wants to make sure the best are selected for the job. So...yeah, good work so far. (At least, that's what I'm understanding so far. Feel free to tell me if I'm horribly wrong. ) Keep up the good work!

[vren55]

1098157 You're right about the subtly manipulates the situations It's a feature of Celestia that is quite evident in the canon seasons and I wanted to keep it. However, I made her less able in that area (hence Vaultaire getting angry) she lacks 1000 years of experience after all. That implied, she has less emotional control, which you saw in Vaultaire's conversation with her.

[InsertAuthorHere]

1098292

I noticed that, as well. You've done a great job so far with Celestia, and your OCs as well.

[vren55]

1098367 Really (question mark).. AWESOME!! Thanks for the fav!