the Equestria dialouges

by Paradise Oasis

chapter three- children

As the morning sun rises over Dream Valley, I am making preparations to fly back to Canterlot with Wind Whistler for our third visit. But first, I need to stop by the Dream Castle school room. Sundance, my daughter's teacher, wants to speak to me about something, and it sounded rather urgent.

"I'm sorry to trouble you when you're so busy with royal business for our Queen." The white earth pony mare tells me. "But your daughter has been making a circus out of my classroom!"

I sigh, rubbing my forehead with my hoof. "What did she do this time?"

"You mean besides tricking Baby Glory into teleporting Butterscotch and Blue Belle into the rainbow river?" Sundance Complained. "Or threatening Glider that the Smooze was going to come and eat him? Baby North Star is the most undisciplined little filly I have ever taught! She seems to enjoy tormenting her fellow classmates, and is the worst bully I have ever seen for a female pony."

"She can't be that bad!" I protest, slightly annoyed. "Surely, she's just going through a phase!"

"That little hellion is disrupting my classroom far too much, Miss Star!" Sundance shook her head. "Her brother Countdown was neeeeigh-ver this bad! If you cannot discipline her properly, I shall have to to take this to the Queen's minister of education, and stricter measures will have to be taken!"

"Thank you, Sundance." I respond politely. "Barnacle and I shall speak to her the first opportunity we get."

I don't understand, how could I have raised such a juvenile delinquent? And school isn't the only place she's caused trouble, either. My daughter almost caused a diplomatic crisis, by trying to sell the baby newborn twin ponies to the elf royal family as pets! Their mother, Sparkler, screamed at me for three hours... and I cannot say I blame her. I honestly don't know where I went wrong... maybe I'm just not cut out to be a mother. Still, Countdown turned out well, though that may be more attributed more to Barnacle’s father skills, rather than myself.

Sighing, I trot off towards Wind Whistler's quarters in the Castle. I find her talking to Moondream, her daughter, who is holding a small suitcase in her mouth.

"Now you be a good little filly while spending the week with your friend at Fort Rainbow Dash." Wind Whistler tells her. "And don't wander away from the convoy on your way there, unless you want to end up as a troll's dietary supplement."

"Yes, mother, I understand yours and father's expectations on my actions." Moondream replied. "I shall endeavor to be on my best behavior, during my excursion out of Dream Valley."

As she nuzzles her mother, I smile. Wind Whistler was doing an excellent job raising Dream Valley's next generation of egghead.

As her daughter trots away, Wind Whistler looks up and sees me. "Ah! North Star! So good to see you! Shall we be off?"

On our way to the Canterlot ruins, I speak up. "Wow, Wind Whistler, you're so amazing with your daughter. I wish I was as good a parent."

"All right, what did the little hellspawn do this time? Set fire to Sundance's mane?" Wind Whistler asks sarcastically. "Or did she start a war with the Gnomes?"

"I guess I was just too lenient with her." I sigh. "I just didn't want to be as strict as my mother."

"It's not your fault, North Star, some foals just turn out rotten. 'There's a bad egg in every bunch', as the humans say." Wind Whistler encouraged me.

"I don't know, Wind Whistler." I reply. "Maybe you're right."

As soon as we reach Canterlot, my partner and I explore the remains of the capital's Acadeima Magica, the school where the Equestrian Unicorn pupils learned the most powerful of magic spells. We find the rusted metal chairs, and broken desks, when we try to remove a book from the shelf, it crumbled away into dust.

"Hm, seems like their knowledge didn't hold up very well." My partner commented.

I stare at her, shocked, did Wind Whistler just make a joke?

"Well, I wish they had a book on parenting." I tell her. "I could sure use some advice right now."

"And why would that be, my good North Star?" A familiar voice asked us. "Art thou having problems with thine offspring?"

We turned around to find our elusive unicorn friend, standing in the doorway, looking at us.

"Oh, it's you." I sigh. "Yes, it's my daughter, Baby North Star. She's causing all sorts of trouble, and I'm at my mane's end with what do do with her."

"Baby North Star?" She asks me, puzzled.

"Modern mares often name their daughters after themselves." Wind Whistler tells her. "They often add the 'baby' prefix to avoid confusion when their offspring is young."

"How... wonderfully confusing." The bewildered unicorn replies. "In Equestria, the fillies and colts were treated kindly growing up, their parents and their teachers did nurture the young ones, and did helpeth them to explore and find what their special talent was."

"I find that amusing." I reply with a snort. "Our stricter feudal customs and laws usually mean that what a pony does for the rest of her life is determined for her. Most mares inherit their mother's jobs. Why, both mine and Applejack's daughters have inherited our cutie marks."

"They were told what they were good at, rather than discovering a special talent for themselves." Wind Whistler adds.

"Applejack, we once knew a pony by that name." The unicorn replied thoughtfully. "But that's beside the point. You mean to tell us a pony's life path and career are determined for them? How horrible!"

"Well, it's not like we can force the cutie mark to appear." I reply defensively. "Just that many young fillies end up following in our footsteps."

"But might not your daughter feel the pressure put on her to conform to your identity, instead of making one for herself?" The unicorn asks. "Might not she want to be her own pony, rather than North Star 2; the sequel?"

"I... never though of it that way." I reply with a nervous laugh. "I guess I always assumed my daughter would enjoy being an explorer like I was."

"Perhaps you should asketh her what she doth want." The unicorn replies. "She might and her friends might have enjoyed being cutie mark crusaders, discovering their special talent in all sorts of ways hilarious and most bizarre."

"A cutie mark what now?" Wind Whistler asks her, confused.

"Twas nothing, my good Wind Whistler." The unicorn replied with a whinnying laugh. "Merely remembering a group of troublemaking fillies from our younger days."

"Hey, look over here!" I speak up, looking over a few shelves on the bookcase. "I found an intact book over here!" I blow the dust off to see the book's title. "What's this? Cutie Marks: Cheerilee's guide to helping foals find their special talents?

"Perhaps the wisdom of an ancient teacher, can help your Sundance with her students." The unicorn told us.

"Hey, did you put that book there for us to find?" I ask her. "And how did you know about Sundance?"

"Who are you, anyway?" Wind Whistler asked her. "You have yet to tells us your name."

But when we look again, she is gone. Just as before, she has disappeared just as the sun is setting.

"North Star... I am beginning to suspect who our mystery pony is." Wind Whistler told me, looking up at the rising moon.

"Oh, that's ridiculous, Wind Whistler." I reply with a nervous laugh, realizing what she was insinuating. "Now come on, we need to finish this work up before sunrise."

I mean, there's no way we could have been talking to... her, could we?

Comments

[RavynKarasu]

How interesting how pony physiology now allows them to inherit cutie marks without proper personal discovery. Sad too. However, the nature of cutie marks is a fascinating subjects. In my fic, Ancient Equestria, while it goes further into detail in later chapters yet to be written, it's touched on that originally the cutie marks were called Destiny Marks and chosen for young zebras by the act of divination by the chief. However, rather than what their true talent was, they were marked by whatever the divination saddled them with, causing a lot of unhappy zebras...on top of that, they weren't even stamps, they were manually carved into the flanks and scarred there.

I can see how Luna would disapprove of the inheritance and how basically the offspring are basically clones of their mothers.

[MeadowRosePony]

So far, I am liking this story!

[Leave a Whisper]

Is she a spook?