PRAT

by Integral Archer

Chapter V: The Most Adequate Night Ever

“Invitation?”

Despite the smile he maintained for his classmates, professors, and clients, and the alacrity with which he threw himself into his work, Due Process was not, in general, a happy pony. In a certain sense, he preferred it that way. He remembered that the last time he was happy—he reckoned it was shortly before puberty—was a period in his life when he was showered with everything he could possibly want. As his wants had grown, so did his inability to satisfy them. General discontent was, so he thought, a state much more preferable than bliss, as it meant that the smallest pleasure or convenience the ordinarily merciless world would bestow upon him at rare intervals would bring a satisfaction that would have been taken for granted had he his every whim fulfilled.

This was why his heart had been aflutter, as if in the intoxication of passion, when he, earlier that evening, had dug out from the back of his closet the suit his father had bought him for his school prom: a beautiful hoofmade silk jacket, tailored exactly to his specifications, with an equally lovely variegated tie that was flashy, yet still understated, which his mother had chosen for him, everything fitting him now just as well as it did then. This was why he had unironically whistled a popular ditty, ironing his clothes till their folds were impeccable, just as they had been on prom night, the only other night he had worn them. This was why when he had retrieved from the box they had come in a set of dress shoes, which his father had told him to use for his first day in a real court (and though he had not been specific on what kind of “court” he meant, Due Process had his own interpretation, and he felt that it was not contrary to the spirit of his father’s desires), he had cradled them in his hooves against his breast as if he were carrying his newborn quadruplets back from the hospital. And this is why, despite the hour of arduous, manual work it required, his knees and face soaked with polish at the end, he had kept smiling at them, to confirm that, indeed, he could see the reflection of his teeth in the black leather which shone in brilliant silver under the lights of his apartment.

He had walked, all dressed up, sparkling and grinning like a dandy, to that grand hall, and the sight of all those beautiful ponies around had given him so much pleasure that he could barely restrain himself from running up to each one and giving him a kiss and a hug.

But that horrible, insolent, and importune word—invitation—spoken just now by that elderly, hideous unicorn with saggy eyes, and even saggier cheeks, who was now standing between him and the splendor that was supposed to be his by right, had been so discordant with the wonderful emotions he was feeling at that moment, that Due Process felt himself as if ripped from paradise and cast into the blackest depths of Tartarus. Falling, dying, suffocating, he tried, with the last of his breath, to say to the gatekeeper: “I’m an attorney in the employment of Her Majesty Princess Celestia; I have the right to be here just as much as if I were she herself; so move aside, you arrogant, officious little gargoyle; move aside and make way—in the name of the princess, of Equestria, in the name of the sun, the earth, the moon, the galaxy, the universe, make way and let me through!” but, his intestines churning within him as his glorious universe collapsed and burned, all he could choke out was:

“I’m . . . Princess Celestia!”

The doorpony squinted at him, and an amused sneer curled the corner of his mouth. “Well, well,” he scoffed, “I must say, that’s one I’ve never heard before. But nice try. Come back when you’re three feet taller, have grown a horn, and your voice has gotten a little deeper; maybe then that excuse will be plausible.”

“I need . . . to get in!” he yelled back.

“No can do, kid,” droned the doorpony. “Rules are rules: nopony is given admittance to the Grand Galloping Gala without an invitation.”

“Listen . . . listen to me,” he choked, making a supreme effort to avoid bursting into tears. “Princess Celestia . . . she’s my client. She has a very important hearing in a couple days, and she told me . . . she told me, you hear? She told me that the only time she could meet to work on her defense was now, at the Grand Galloping Gala, and that . . . to meet her here. Call her here and ask her if you don’t believe me! But it’s important—really important . . . so let me through!”

He tried to push past him; but the unicorn, grabbing him with his magical aura, shoved him right back.

“Like I told you,” said the unicorn, “no—ticket—no—admittance,” jabbing his hoof into Due Process’s chest with each word.

Due Process looked down and noticed that the violent strikes the unicorn had made against his coat had creased the lapel and displaced a button.

“Traitor!” screeched Due Process, flaring his wings. “Impeding the will of your princess—traitor! Wait till she finds out that you denied entrance to her attorney!”

He let fly a sudden punch right into the unicorn’s horn; the doorpony recoiled, disoriented.

Due Process leaped over his head, clear into the air—and struck headfirst into something unmovably solid. He fell to the ground, landing awkwardly on his wing. Through his dizziness and pain he could just dimly perceive the form of a massive stallion, bedecked in the colors and armor of a Royal Guard, lowering down on him.

The nauseous laugh of the doorpony resounded in Due Process’s ears. “Ah, I see you’ve made an acquaintance with Private Fluffy! His captain agreed to let him be my bouncer. We’ve become great friends over the evening, talking about hopes, dreams, life, and love. Haven’t we, Fluffy?” he said, playfully bumping his shoulder against that of the soldier.

“Don’t touch me,” said Private Fluffy.

Due Process, unable to fly, unable to walk, unable to effect his mission, his splendid suit irrevocably creased and bespeckled with gravel and dirt from his fall, his nice shoes irredeemably scuffed, feeling nothing but pain in the present, and seeing nothing but despair in the future, could withstand it no longer: he burst into tears, sobbing like a little boy who has lost his mommy.

“Dewey?”

At the sound of that soft, caressing, familiar feminine voice, he looked up. Though the pain in his wing and the tears in his eyes blurred his sight, he thought he could see the figure of a mare walking toward him.

“Due Process?” he heard the same voice say. It came from the mare; she had taken flight to get to him faster.

He wiped his eyes, and took a closer look; and when he recognized her face, instantly he was upon his feet, his wings strong again, his head firm, his smile so wide that it hurt his cheeks. He was still crying, but now from euphoria.

“Fine Print!” he sang, and he too took to the air toward her. He met her two feet above the head of the doorpony, and there, in midair, they embraced.

Laughing, still embracing him, she said: “Dewey, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, it is you! I haven’t seen you since graduation!”

“I wanted to talk to you, to congratulate you!” he sputtered as they landed, laughing till his tears flowed the greater. “But after you gave the valedictorian speech, you just flew off!”

Fine Print stepped back to look at him, and at once Due Process’s joy evaporated; into the vacuum it left flooded a hot sense of shame. He knew that all she could see was the gravel in his mane, the scratches on his shoes, the disorder of his tie, and the creases in his jacket.

“Dewey, what’s wrong?” she said. “Never mind, tell me when we get inside.”

“He won’t let me in!” whined Due Process, pointing at the doorpony.

“What!” ejaculated Fine Print in disbelief. “Tell him you’re here on official business.”

“I did!” Due Process responded. “I told him that I have to talk to my client, that it was really important, but he didn’t believe me.”

Her countenance suddenly becoming baleful, she turned to the doorpony. “What’s the meaning of this?” she snapped. “Why won’t you let him through?”

“He has no invitation,” said the doorpony, with the sententious inflection and smug grin of one taking pride in regurgitating the maxims handed down to him by his superiors.

“Why don’t you have an invitation?” said Fine Print, turning to Due Process.

“I didn’t know I needed one! The princess just told me we could talk at the Gala, and that was that!”

“Don’t you know who this stallion is?” she yelled at the doorpony. “This is Her Majesty Princess Celestia’s attorney and counsel, who is in the process of working on a case which is of the utmost importance to her. Let him through, you officious coot—let him through in the name of the princesses and Equestria!”

“Sure,” said the doorpony, “he just needs to show me an invitation.”

“An invitation . . .” muttered Fine Print.

And then her ears twitched as a thought passed rapidly through her brain.

Due Process recognized the tic. The doorpony had no idea what he had awakened.

With amazing rapidity and dexterity, she reached into her purse and pulled out a golden card. “Here you go, Dewey!” she said, extending it to him. “Here’s your invitation.”

“Invitations are nontransferable,” said the doorpony.

“Says who?” Fine Print shot back.

The doorpony took the invitation from her with a levitation spell and brought it close to his face.

“Here,” he said, levitating it back to her. “On the back, in the small text on the bottom. As you can see, it says: ‘This invitation is the sole use of the addressee and cannot be transferred.’”

Due Process winced. The doorpony could not have known he had just awaken a force that was to utterly annihilate him. Due Process couldn’t look away, morbidly fascinated and strangely aroused.

She grabbed the ticket between two feathers of her wing, her eyes moving rapidly over the text, her cheeks shaking with the effort of her complete concentration.

After three seconds, a huge, wily grin appeared on her face. “Let my date through, please,” she said.

“Excuse me?” said the doorpony.

“The conditions of entry clearly stipulate,” trumpeted Fine Print, “that the addressee of the ticket—i.e., I myself—is entitled to bring one guest. Due Process is my date, and therefore is clearly eligible for entry as per the conditions of the invitation.”

The doorpony screwed up his eyes. “What, him?” he sneered, chuckling. “He’s your date?”

“What,” shouted Due Process, growing red in the cheeks, “exactly, is so hard to believe about that?”

Fine Print enveloped Due Process’s body in her wing and pulled him close to her. “Oh yes,” she whispered sultrily into his ear, the humidity of her breath making Due Process shiver, “he is. You, sir, cannot begin to even conceive”—twitching against him at this word and shuddering with a slight moan—“of the burning passion that engulfs us. He is my champion, my stud, and I his mare, his prize. He craves me every waking hour and leaves me no choice but to submit till I’m crying for mercy. My date, you ask? Sir, I am his slave.”

She was now supporting the entire weight of his body with her wing, for Due Process’s legs had gone completely limp.

“But . . .” stammered the doorpony, “but you’d already entered with your invitation. You have to enter with your date; he can’t come in by himself after you’ve already entered!”

“Why not?” riposted Due Process, having regained his courage and strength. “Where does it say that?”

The unicorn took back the invitation and began to go over the text. Due Processed noticed that the doorpony’s collar was dark with sweat.

The attorneys waited, smiling, and holding each other tighter.

“It’s . . .” stammered the doorpony at length, “it’s implied?”

“Perhaps so, and perhaps you could even prove it,” said Due Process. “But any extrinsic evidence you could produce to support that claim would be inadmissible in our common law of contracts. Given that we have an ambiguity in the terms, I will assert the doctrine of contra proferentem: and, as you represent the party that drafted the terms of the invitation, the ultimate interpretation of said terms will favor me. What do you have to say to that, huh?”

“Uh . . .” he said, fumbling with the invitation, “but . . .”

“But what?” said the lawyers.

“How . . . how do I know she hasn’t already entered with a date?”

“How do you know that she has?” said Due Process. “If you want to accuse her of date fraud, the onus is on you to prove it.”

“But . . . I can’t—”

Fine Print smirked. “Do you really think you have any chance in successfully disputing a contract when your opponents are both lawyers who specialize in exactly this form of law?”

“Before . . . retirement,” stammered the doorpony in a desperate final attempt, “I was . . . a paralegal!”

To this, the lawyers’ sole response was to throw back their heads and laugh.

The unicorn, scowling, pouting, handed the invitation back to Fine Print, stepped aside, and reluctantly extended his hoof toward the path that led to the Gala.

“Thank you, my good sir!” chirped Due Process as they walked past. “Oh, and, by the way, when your ex-wife is done with her current stallion,” he added, licking his lips, “make sure you send her my way. I know how much she likes young studs!”

The unicorn made a sound that was both a moan of physical pain and a cry of surprise, as if he had just been punched in the stomach. “Why, you little!” he screeched. He leaped, his teeth bared, at Due Process—but now it was the doorpony’s turn to be stopped by the iron wall which was the muscles and sinews of Private Fluffy.

When they were out of sight and earshot of him, Fine Print turned and gave him another hug. “I’m glad you’re here,” she whispered.

“You told me we’d hang out after graduation,” said Due Process sadly. “I called you a million times, but you never answered or returned my messages, and then you changed your number . . .”

She pinned her ears. “Dewey, I’m so sorry. If I’d known how much it would’ve hurt you, I would have, really! Life got so busy when I started work. But hey”—bumping her flank against his—“will you accept me as your date to the Grand Galloping Gala by way of an apology?”

“Sure,” he said, touching her shoulder, “I’d like that very much. Thanks for saving me from that jerk of a doorpony.”

“You know him, then?”

“I’ve never met him before in my life.”

“Then how did you know that about his wife?”

“I didn’t. But I do know that about ninety percent of stallions his age are married or have been in the past. I also know that about sixty percent of marriages end in divorce, and infidelity is the reason cited for about ninety-five percent of them. It was an educated guess.”

Fine Print laughed, patting him on the back with her wing. “Wow, Dewey, look at you, using statistics to rub salt in a wound—you’re already ten times the lawyer I’ll ever be!”

“Oh, come on.”

“I’m serious. You know, I really envy you.”

Due Process stopped completely in his tracks. When Fine Print turned back to look, he was staring at her, jaw agape.

“What?” he gasped. “You . . . envy me?”

“Of course!” she said, in her excitement her wings flapping so fast that her hooves barely touched the ground. “What’s there not to envy? Out of school, and you’re already representing the princess in an actual court!”

“Well, it’s not exactly a court.”

“It might as well be! Do you realize, Dewey, that not only will you be able to work in any firm in the country—no, the world—after this but they’ll be studying this case, and the choices you make, for years to come? Undergrads will be writing papers on you! You’ll be able to give speeches, talks—anything you want for any price you might set. You can do anything!”

“You’re really making it out to be a bigger deal than it is,” said Due Process, shaking his head sadly. “You have a way better job than I do.”

“Ha!” ejaculated Fine Print. “You have no idea—”

“Oh, don’t give me that. I know that you’re a royal scrivener; that was why you turned down the princess’s case when it was offered you—that, and also, you know that my case is unwinnable.”

She scoffed. “Royal scrivener—yeah, it definitely sounds prestigious, doesn’t it? Dewey, do you know what I do all day? I copy out sections of laws into contracts. Sometimes I reword and move around paragraphs that have already been written. If I’m lucky, maybe I get to be a notary.”

“If it’s so terrible, then why didn’t you choose to defend the princess at the PRAT?”

“Because I’m an idiot, okay?” said she, slapping her forehead with a hoof. “In my excitement, I didn’t realize that scrivener is just a fancy word for scribe!”

“You’re not an idiot. You’re the valedictorian, remember? I’m only the second best.”

“That’s only because I took a lot of bird courses, and because I knew how to get along with professors. Don’t sell yourself short, Dewey. You’ve got a lot going for you. If it seems bad, and if it seems that everypony is doing better, just remember that we all have our demons.”

They’d always heard that Canterlot was the city of opulence and fortune, but they, in their middle class lives, having never experienced such wealth, could only dream of what such majesty could look like. But now, having entered the hall, they could safely say that their dreams had been ill-founded—nothing could have prepared them for the extent of the majesty that spread out before them.

The ends of the main hall stretched so far out of sight, and were so packed with ponies, that they could not see the ends, much less the divers branching corridors and hidden chambers. When they looked down, they saw that the marble beneath their feet was polished to the point that the colors of their fur were reflected in its sheen; when they looked up, they instantly shut their eyes, lest the ornate roof that spiraled upward and onward into infinity give them vertigo. To the left of them was a buffet table as long as the hall was wide, in the middle of which stood an incredibly detailed ice sculpture of the city of Canterlot; to their right was a stage upon which sat a string quartet which had just struck up one of Beethoofen’s massive fugues, balancing, with incredible skill and insight, the piece’s fire with its lyricism. A sparkling staircase, sculpted in the style of the old architecture of the city, unfolded right before them like the gradations of a great cumulus, leading to a mezzanine whose walls were adorned with luxurious, intricate tapestries that extended from the ceiling to the floor. And, encircling the great hall were stained glass windows each as tall as the building itself, adorned with daedal vistas and landscapes which, by some abstruse artistic mechanism employed by their master, did not distort the light that passed through, but rather amplified it, made it clearer; such that to the north, they could see the tops of Canterlot’s skyscrapers rising up to peek at them; to the south, from the height of the great mountain upon which the city was founded, they could see the lights of Ponyville twinkling far below. In short, a sensuous paradise unfolded in front of them, beckoning them to join and revel in its splendor, and to add their own happiness to the rest.

“There . . . there are no . . . I’m at a loss,” gasped Fine Print, her eyes wide with rapture.

“Ditto,” breathed Due Process. “And, to think, we have the whole night at our disposal. Fine Print, I . . .” He gently wrapped his wing around her and pulled her closer, staring deeply and tenderly into her eyes. “I can’t . . . imagine any other pony I’d rather have as my date to such a wondrous event such as the Grand Galloping Gala than you. The Gala is ours; the night is ours; and you are mine, mine till the sun rises on a day I hope never to come.”

Abruptly, she shrugged out of his embrace, blushing. “I’m . . . sorry, Dewey,” she stammered, “but I’m not really into balls—I mean galas—galas, dances, social get-togethers. I was kinda here for business, just to network, perhaps find a better employer . . .”

Due Process flattened his ears and took a step back, as he plummeted from cloud nine to eight. He blinked, as if waking from a dream after a sudden, unexpected fall. His heart pounded, a strange concoction of horror and disappointment churning within him—it was the horror of experiencing a nightmare but with none of the relief that accompanied waking up, simultaneous with the regret that a wonderful dream had irrevocably slipped away from him, all the more painful because it was something that could be but was not.

“Oh . . .” he said. “I see. . . but that’s okay!” He pricked his ears up. “Actually, I’m just here on business too. That’s the only reason I came.”

“Great!” Fine Print said. “I’m glad you understand. But, I’ll tell you what: at the end of the night, come and find me, and if I’m still around, we’ll hang out, okay?” She stepped toward him and embraced him. “It was really great to see you,” she whispered into his ear.

Then she was gone, trotting off toward the ponies in front of the string quartet.

Due Process stood where he was, thinking about something. Finally, shaking his head, and remembering why he had come, he looked around the room.

A long line of ponies stretched all along the staircase up to the mezzanine where the princesses were standing. At the moment, a wizened gray pegasus at the front of the line had their attention. Due Process could not hear what he was saying, but, whatever it was, it was enough to make Princess Luna, at her sister’s side, utter an audible “Ugh!” that drew the attention of every head in the room, whereupon she leaped down from the mezzanine, her wings spread to their greatest extent as she glided over to where the string quartet was scraping out an incredibly discordant piece of noise that could hardly be called music, more than it could be called pure despair in the form of screaming strings that was Shostakonik’s Eighth String Quartet. “What would make you think that that abominable allegro would in any capacity be suitable to a princess’s ball?” cried she. “Manedelssohn’s First—play, play! I want music, not the howling of Tartarus’s damned!”

The guests at the ball, half of them courtiers, the other half denizens of the upper echelons that frequently came into contact with the princesses, were used to the younger’s outbursts. It wasn’t too long till normal conversation resumed, mostly dominated by the aforementioned gray pegasus’s vehement, but unintelligible, vociferations, which did not in any way perturb the equanimity of the ponies who were standing in line behind him. Far from it: the old stallion had such a tasteful way of spitting his insults; they carried all of the shock of using naked profanity with none of the impropriety. “Isn’t he wonderful?” they whispered, keeping their voices low lest they disturb the fine music of his invective. “He must be a politician.” At the other end of the room, two stallions in front of the string quartet were yelling at the cellist, soliciting her opinion as to which one of them was taller and more muscular.

Due Process saw all this but thought nothing of it. He took to the air, above and past the line of ponies who were waiting for the princess’s attention. He did not mark the disdainful scoffs and gasps of those over whose heads he flew; instead, his eyes and ears were drawn to this old pegasus who had now taken to hovering in order to punctuate his words with gestures from both his forehooves. As Due Process got closer, he was able to discern the words, though not their meaning.

“Enfin, Céleste,” the old stallion was saying, “la séparation est presque sur nos têtes. Elle attendait patiemment ; maintenant elle vient, et elle n’attendra plus . . .”

Due Process was able to hear a rational meaning in these words as well as he would have been able to hear a sonnet in the gargling of hot soup. But from the old pegasus’s enraged tone, his desperate gesticulations, the hasty departure of Princess Luna, and the nervous nods of Princess Celestia, he could tell that it was some sort of screed on a topic that probably wasn’t that important. So he felt no scruples when he landed next to the princess and said: “I’m here, Your Majesty. Can we get to work now?”

“Excuse me,” said a pony stepping out from behind the princess. “If you require an audience with Her Majesty, you must wait like everypony else.”

“Excuse yourself!” cried Due Process. “But the princess gave me her express word that the matter I have to discuss with her would take place at the Grand Galloping Gala; and as it might take some time, and seeing that the night will end before long, I need her attention now.”

“No,” said Princess Celestia, turning a baleful glare upon him, “she’s right. I will talk to you once it’s your turn.”

“But . . . Your Majesty!” he stammered, pulling at his mane with a hoof. “You . . . said that we’d talk at the Gala!”

“And who are you to dare to presume how I should dispose of my time?”

At first, Due Process smirked at her, as he would have done at a facetious friend. When he realized, by the souring of her features, that she was asking the question in complete sincerity, he took to the air, both his hooves on his head as though in a nightmare, and screamed: “I’m . . . your attorney!”

The princess blinked. “Are you . . . the lawyer that’s handling my case with the PRAT?”

“Yes!”

He landed on his belly, coughing and choking on his disbelief.

Princess Celestia, her expression changing as understanding dawned on her, shook her head at two Royal Guards who were advancing toward them, their weapons drawn; they nodded silently, sheathed their swords, and resumed their posts. “My sincerest apologies, Esquire,” she said, offering a hoof to help him to his feet. “I sincerely didn’t recognize you.”

“Qui est cet enfant-ci ?” spat the gray pegasus, gesturing to the disheveled and distraught little lawyer. “Va t’en ! Personne ne pourra arrêter la séparation.”

Princess Celestia stepped between them before blood could be drawn. “M. le Premier,” she said to him, “permettez-moi d’introduire mon avocat, Esquire Due Process.” Then, turning to him: “Esquire, this is the premier of the province of Quebuck, M. Idée Fixe.”

“La séparation est l’avenir !” ejaculated he.

“How lovely,” snorted Due Process.

Simpering, Princess Celestia said: “M. Fixe was just telling me he believes very strongly that Quebuck will soon separate from Equestria.”

“Je ne be-lieve pas,” snarled he, scrunching up his face as he spat, one after the other, the two syllables of believe, as if he were ejecting from his mouth the moldy seeds of a particularly odious fruit. “Je know.”

“A cute, albeit ridiculously unconstitutional, thought,” said Due Process. “But, Mr. Fixe, the princess must ask your leave now; she has some actually serious matters to discuss.

“Princess!” he continued, turning his back on the premier who had just started choking on his dentures. “Good, we have some time alone. Now, I’ve given a lot of thought to the angle you should take. There are many different possibilities, but my opinion is—”

“I want to settle,” she interrupted.

“What!” At this remark, Due Process had reflexively flung out his wings, knocking Idée Fixe in the jaw and dislodging his dentures clean from his mouth. Ignoring the cries of mares as the premier dove under their dresses in search of his teeth, Due Process squawked: “Your Majesty, but I thought that we—”

“Yes, I know,” responded she. “But you must understand that I have other things on my mind, and this is a battle that is simply not worth fighting. I imagine that, for you, this case, and the work that you’ve put into it, is the entirety of your life—but, for me, it is only care number three thousand thirty-three. I have to make priorities, and this case isn’t one of them. I’m sorry, Esquire, but I can’t devote any more time to this than I already have. We can speak as soon as I’m done with . . . M. le Premier !” she suddenly said, turning to him who was now standing beside Due Process with a scowl that could liquefy a baby. “Quelle chance d’avoir retrouvé vos dents !”

Due Process flew down from the mezzanine before he had a chance to be bitten in the flank with a set of particularly dirty dentures.

Once again, the little lawyer found himself on the ground floor, looking up at the princess on the mezzanine, at the premier who had resumed his polemic, and at the backs of a long line of ponies who were waiting for Her Majesty’s attention. He stood there a few moments, waiting for some indication that Idée Fixe was about to run out of breath. He waited for what seemed to be an hour—yet the premier talked, yelled, screamed, and slobbered; Princess Celestia simpered and nodded; the line of ponies impatiently tapped their feet; and the night matured, the day to make a defense, which had yet to be prepared, approaching. At this rate, Due Process knew he would be lucky if he would be able to schedule an appointment with the princess next year.

His feet hurt; his head hurt; the heat of the room, rendered humid by thousands of exhalations, was making him perspire; and he was now conscious of a particularly uncomfortable bulge in the lining of his coat.

He shoved a hoof into his breast pocket and yanked out the nagging extrusion. He was surprised to find he was holding a small glass bottle containing a clear-colored spirit.

He recognized the label quite well. Every year on his birthday, ever since middle school, his uncle would invariably give him a small bottle such as this one of this precise spirit. It was a brand made and to be found only in Yakyakistan, where his uncle went every year on business. “It’s magic; I swear!” Due Process’s uncle would invariably tell his nephew. “Special yak magic, I tell ya. I dunno what they do, but they’re smart ones, the yaks, much smarter, much more powerful than the unicorns we have here in Equestria. One sip of this can win anypony over to you, no matter how opposed she was initially. Give it to a pretty girl you like; all her snooty defenses will fall, and she’ll be yours in a heartbeat!” Knowing what just one of these was able to do to his uncle, who was the stoutest and stockiest of earth ponies, Due Process had been always too scared of how it would fare on the body of a hollow-boned pegasus to ever try it, much less did he know of anypony he would dare subject to such an influence.

He opened the bottle, and the fumes alone were enough to make his head spin. But what was the alternative? Sit here sober and hope in vain for the princess’s time? At least with this, maybe he’d be able to temporarily forget his troubles and actually be able to enjoy the Gala.

He brought the odious beverage to his mouth and was just about to take a sip, when a loud “La séparation !” erupted from the mezzanine, and he turned to see the premier hovering in front of Princess Celestia, his wizened little wings beating as fast as a hummingbird’s in a strenuous effort to keep his fat little body a feet or so from the ground.

And, all of a sudden, he had an idea.

“Dans cette affaire, Céleste, tu n’as pas, et n’auras jamais, la parole !” screamed Idée Fixe up on the mezzanine, more fervidly than ever. “Car les Québuckois sont un peuple libre, et ne répondront jamais au mot d’une—”

“Hello!” interrupted a gay little voice.

The princess and the premier turned to see the little lawyer from earlier once more beside them, now smiling, hovering happily, and holding in each forehoof a glass.

“Quoi, encore toi, enfant ?” spat Idée Fixe. “Que veux-tu ?”

“I know that we got off on the wrong foot,” Due Process said. “But, as I am Her Majesty’s attorney, I represent her in all legal aspects; thus, it’s incumbent on me to make sure that all negotiations go smoothly.”

Princess Celestia looked at her lawyer, expecting him to turn and give her a wink; he did not. She scoured his countenance for any indication of his aim, any crack in the veneer of his politeness exposing his ulterior motives—but she could find none. Either he was a genuine diplomat, or he was the perfect liar; in either case, she found her respect for him augmenting the tiniest bit.

“I terribly regret that this conversation has escalated to such a point as to give you great ire,” continued the lawyer, “and for that, I suppose we partially can be to blame. It seems my client has forgotten the ancient and sacred custom of her court: that whenever she gives an audience with a foreign leader, she must do so over a drink. Because, indeed, you, Mr. Premier, are a foreign leader; for even if Quebuck is not yet—speaking from a strictly legal point of view, of course—a sovereign nation, the Québuckois are without question a sovereign people.”

The premier laughed, wholeheartedly and with unrestrained jollity—a startling, stark contrast to the unbridled rage he had shown not a minute before. “Voici une chose drôle,” he bellowed with pleasure. “Bien que l’enfant ne parle pas français, il parle mieux qu’une princesse et, de plus, sait ma langue mieux qu’elle !”

Sensing by his tone that he had won the premier slightly over to his side, Due Process, his confidence growing, continued. “My client has long known that when two leaders of two great nations come together in lengthy discourse,” he said, “they need drinks to soothe their throats and tempers.” He thrust the drink in his left hoof toward the premier. “For you, sir. Drink, so that we may have more productive conversations.”

Skeptically, Idée Fixe leaned over the drink and took a sniff. He puckered his face at the smell. “Qu’est-ce que c’est ?” he asked.

“Only punch,” responded Due Process. “It’s good!”

Idée Fixe shook his head. “Je ne bois que du vin.”

Due Process took a sip from the glass in his right hoof. “Ah!” he sighed. “I feel better already. And so would you, Mr. Premier. Go on. Just a sip!”

Idée Fixe fixed the little lawyer with a glare; he often used such a glare in debates to melt the pretenses of his opponent, which often succeeded, evinced by the fact that he was now on his fourth consecutive term as premier. But still Due Process smiled on, and held the cup out to him with a steady hoof.

He received the cup in a hoof, gave it one more sniff, and took a sip.

“What did I tell you?” said Due Process. “Tasty, isn’t it?”

Idée Fixe smacked his lips, shrugging. “Pas mal,” he murmured, “mais un trop . . .”

All at once, his eyes widened; he gasped, flushing profusely, as a quite contented, warm smile melted away the perennial tundra that was his countenance.

“C’est . . .” he stuttered. “C’est un bon . . .” His voice trailed off as he took another sip.

“See?” said Due Process. “What did I tell you?”

Idée Fixe downed the rest of the drink and smashed the glass on the floor, to the dismay of the spectators, the princess, and everypony else—save for Due Process. “J’en veux un autre !” he cried. “Où peut . . . on . . . en . . . trouver plus ?”

“There’s more where that came from if you follow me,” responded Due Process. “And we’ll be able to discuss everything. But let’s step down from this mezzanine and go into the crowd; there’ll be a bit more privacy there. No, no, Mr. Premier, let’s not fly, probably not a good idea. Careful . . . watch your step, this way . . . good!”

“Allons !” cried Idée Fixe when they were on the ground floor, waving his hoof in Due Process’s face as if to emphasize that there was no glass in it. “Allons trouver plus de . . . punch !”

“I’ll show you where to get more punch in a bit,” responded Due Process. “But now that we’ve both had a drink, I think it’s time to discuss the matter at hoof. I must say that I’m terribly interested in this issue. So, what is this, this . . . ‘sep-er-ass-yon’? Tell me everything!”

“Quoi !” bellowed Idée Fixe. “Tu ne sais pas la séparation ? Elle est l’esprit du peuple du Québuck, elle est la grand chose de notre époque . . . elle est . . . et est . . .”

“You want Quebuck to secede from Equestria?”

“Oui, oui . . . sur-le-champ . . .”

“Very interesting! May I ask why?”

Idée Fixe stumbled, as if slapped. “Quoi ! Tu demandes . . . les raisons . . . alors, il y en beaucoup . . . beaucoup, j’peux t’assurer de . . . ça !”

“Hmm, yes, I see; I see. Very good reasons you have there,” lied the little lawyer. “But let’s do a thought experiment. You know, we educated, intellectual ponies are not dogmatic, you understand? We can entertain contrary thoughts for the sake of argument.” He threw his wing across the premier’s back. “Would you like do that?”

“D’a . . . accord.”

Due Process could not tell whether that had been a word or a hiccup. Regardless, he took it as permission to continue. “Great! So imagine this: the Québuckois are a strong, intrepid people, and there are a lot of good reasons for sep-er-ass-yon. But—bear with me here . . . what if you didn’t separate?”

The premier gasped. “Eh bien ! Qu’est-ce . . . que tu . . . veux dire ?” He jabbed an angry, shaky hoof in the lawyer’s chest.

Due Process discretely wiped off his face the spittle the premier had just flung at him, maintaining with an effort his smile throughout. “No, just think about it,” he said. “Sure, you can separate, go your own way, and Equestria goes about its . . . but what if you didn’t?

“You remain a province of a country consistently ranked in the top five in the world when it comes to healthcare, political rights, economic rights, freedom, and standard of living.

“You’re guaranteed, by the Constitution, that at least three of the justices that sit on the Supreme Court will come from your province. No other province or minority group in this country gets such a right! If anything, that’s an overrepresentation.

“Your language and religion are treated with absolute equality throughout the land.

“I need hardly say that it’s much easier to trade for oil when your business partner is just another province.

“You have the reputation of Equestria and Equestrian corporations backing you for any foreign contracts you wish to make.

“You reap all the benefits of being part of a country with one of the largest economies in the world.

“You’re protected by a military that will always be bigger than any military you yourself could raise.

“You’d continue to receive equalization payments from the federal government, the amount of which is nearly double what every other province of Equestria receives combined, to say nothing of the standard federal funding for education, healthcare, and divers other concerns that the GDP of Equestria can help you fund no problem, but the GDP of a sovereign Quebuck would struggle with. Think, Mr. Premier, about your people: do you think turning off that money would result in no negative consequences?”

The premier nodded. “Oui, oui . . .” he sputtered, “mais . . . mais—”

“Whom do you think your sep-er-ass-yon would be hurting? Equestria? Believe me, however much you’d hurt us, you’d be hurting yourselves ten times over. A million things that you take for granted, which as a province you don’t need to concern yourself with, would suddenly fall on you. Things you can’t even imagine. For one thing, what currency would you use? A new country’s currency takes a while to be trusted, which may result in problems when you try to conduct international business. You could use the Equestrian Bit, but what does that say about the new country of Quebuck, that not even its citizens have enough confidence in its government to back its own currency?

“Do you even think you could raise enough taxes to fund your current needs? Without funding from the government of Equestria, you’d have to do a lot of cuts, or tax more; but doing the former will result in special interest groups complaining, to not speak of the possible harm that might happen from losing whatever you’re cutting; and doing the latter—well, I need hardly say what kind of unrest that will result in, unrest that could no longer be blamed on anypony but you yourself. Is that any way for a new country to begin? Unable to pay its debts?”

The premier tried to say something, but a spasm of hiccups silenced him.

“Look,” continued Due Process, rubbing the premier’s back with his wing, “I’m not saying you don’t have good reasons. I’m not saying that Equestria has never given you the short end of the stick. I’m just saying that, when you look at the big picture, it seems that this country has done you more good than ill. You’re a minority group, so naturally there will be times where perhaps you could’ve been treated better. But this country does everything in its power to sate each one of your needs, so much so that it invariably happens that you, as a group, receive better treatment than any other group in Equestria. For goodness sake, the minorities of the world would be downright jealous—compared to them, you’re treated like gentry!”

“Mais . . . tu,” Idée Fixe hiccupped, his chin trembling, “tu ne sais—”

“Equestria is the greatest country in the world. We’ve got oil, lumber, and pretty much every natural resource you can think of coming out of our flanks. We have a large, vibrant economy, yet do not suffer from crowding. We’re not too hot, yet not too cold. Compared to every single other country, political corruption is pretty much nonexistent. Did you also know, Mr. Premier, that we have six percent of the world’s fresh water—do you also realize that ponies in the world still suffer from drought, that wars have been fought, and are still being fought, over fresh water? Yet that’s a problem that we, as Equestrians, won’t ever have to consider. The issues that we don’t have to deal with but which most of the world does are innumerable, yet are irrelevant to us by virtue of the fact that we’re Equestrians in Equestria. Yes, of course we have problems, but all those problems exist in every other country to a much greater degree. It’s easy for you to notice what’s missing, but it’s even easier to not be appreciative of everything’s that whole, complete, perfect, good, like our country. I’m an Equestrian; I love my country, and I want to be an Equestrian for the rest of my life. What about you? Why would you not want to be an Equestrian?”

Idée Fixe burst into tears, throwing his hooves around Due Process’s neck.

“Oui !” he cried. “Tu . . . tu es un bon garçon. Tu es mon fils ! Je t’aime !” He gave the little lawyer a flurry of kisses on both cheeks.

“I’m glad you’ve seen the light,” said Due Process, wincing as he tried to pry the premier off him, painfully conscious as he was of how many gazes he was drawing. “But it’s been a long night, and you’ve spent most of it yelling at the princess. Why don’t you spend the rest of the time enjoying it? Look, I think those fillies over there are in estrus. Go try your luck!” Rearing up, he placed both hooves on the premier’s back and pushed him thither.

“J’suis equestrien !” yelled Idée Fixe, running among the crowd, “et j’suis fier d’être equestrien ! Vous êtes tous equestriens ! N’sommes tous equestriens !” Cries erupted here and there among the crowd as the premier went about haphazardly kissing his fellow countryponies.

Due Process landed on the mezzanine, next to the princess, strode up to her with his chest outstretched, and said: “Now, Your Majesty, that I’ve taken care of that problem, we have time to talk about your case.”

Next to his ear, a pony cleared her throat. He turned and saw a burly, stocky mare, whose comparatively plain dress seemed to be fighting a losing battle in order to contain her mass. She seemed to him less built for balls and foreign politics and more for pushing plow in field to feed family and glorious motherland.

“Кто этот мальчик?” she spat.

*

Due Process stood at the other end of the grand hall, bitterly sipping his virgin punch as he watched the line of ponies waiting for the princess’s time. A few minutes ago he had attempted to fly the length of the queue; but, after about half an hour of trying to find its origin, he was now convinced that it started in some alternate universe.

The princess had no time for him; that much was clear. He regretted that he had wasted so much time with that strange politician. The night pressed on; time was slipping away, and he could feel the inexorable advance of the next sitting of the PRAT. As the minutes flew by, they prodded him in the side on their way past, reminding him of how ill-prepared he was.

So much anticipation for this evening, so many things attempted and failed. How to salvage this night?

He suddenly noticed that even though there was no problem with the lighting anywhere in the building, nevertheless the other end of the hall was cast in a strange sort of shadow. In the epicenter of that eldritch abyss, Princess Luna stood at one of the windows, directly behind the string quartet, gazing into the night. A great semicircle of open space, with her at its focus, formed around her, in an uncanny accordance with the inverse square law, into which the crowd dared not encroach. She stood behind the small stage erected for the string quartet. The musicians played a cheery Moztrot divertimento; the guests orbited, chatted, and laughed—but their motions evinced an unconscious, uncomfortable avoidance of the imposing presence in their midst.

Due Process felt this repulsive force as much as anypony else, and he wished to stay where he was; but, his reason telling him that he had exhausted all his other options and, what’s more, telling him that there was something still yet within his power, he knew there was only one course of action proper to him now; and, in fidelity to logic, he resolved to undertake it—it was now just an issue of convincing his heart and body to carry out his will. He cursed the fact he had no more yak liquor.

He had once stepped on a frozen puddle in the dead of winter. The surface of the puddle had cracked, and he had then found himself torso deep in water. In the lecture hall, the professor had told him to go home, because the chattering of his teeth was distracting his fellow students and making it hard for them to follow the lecture. He had then spent the next four hours in the emergency room under a mountain of electric blankets. But as chilly as that puddle had been, it could on no level compete with the frigidity of the shadow that was Princess Luna’s personal space.

His first step into it froze him completely in place. A violent, palpable force had seized his nervous system; he could not even breathe. Princess Luna, who had sensed the encroachment from the outset, was now fixing him with the gimlet eye of a rattlesnake. He gulped, looked around, and noticed that the ponies in the room had stopped their conversations to stare at him. Even the string quartet was taking a particularly longer pause than was usual between movements. Time seemed to slow as he approached the singularity. He could not think about what he was going to say, much less what he was doing, for the entirety of his efforts was concentrated on taking those inching steps forward.

Before he knew it, he was right before her, standing under her chin, looking up at the cold features bearing down on him. He stumbled a step back and curtsied, praying that his knees would not give out from under him. He rose, and when he had caught his breath and recovered a modicum of his equanimity, he spoke.

“Permit . . . me, Princess,” he coughed, “to first extend my, uh . . . humblest—most humble gratitude to you, to . . . your sister, or, rather, family in general—or rather, administration—for this opulent Gala, at which, it seems . . . only the finest of tastes, such as yours, could—”

“Speak straight, stallion,” interrupted she. “I get enough circumlocution from my courtiers. I don’t need it from a commoner at the Gala.”

Due Process hiccupped. “Yes, Your Majesty, I’m sorry—”

“Don’t apologize. Just state your business. What is it? You’ve petitioned your princess, and she has graciously deigned to give you a moment. Talk, then!”

“Permit—permit me to . . . introduce . . . I’m—”

“Esquire Due Process, and you’re representing my sister before the PRAT. Aye, I know this already. Well, what have you? You undoubtedly saw that I was deliberately keeping to myself, yet you insisted on accosting me anyway. So speak then!”

He could not speak, nor did he have the strength left in him even to run away. He was certain that the only thing left to him was to keel over and cry—but, just when he felt the last of his strength giving way, the notes of a melody came wafting over from the direction of the string quartet. Its tender melancholy pierced straight through the morass of fatigue, bewilderment, fear, and disappointment that the hours of this night had been slowly accumulating in his heart, swept them all away, and left a feeling that could be described only as exultation, yet he felt as if he would weep. The sublime beauty of the piece was a physical pain in his chest, but it was the pleasurable pain one feels after having strained his body to its utmost and has finally been given a deserved respite; it was the pain of strengthening. He saw Princess Luna close her eyes and sigh with euphoria, and he knew that the music was making her feel the same thing he felt; he thought at that moment he had known her forever.

They stood together in silence for eight minutes, listening to the andante cantabile from Tchaitrotsky’s First String Quartet. Only once did Princess Luna dare to interrupt the music, whispering to him: “Politics is transient; ideas change; but Tchaitrotsky’s thoughts will forever be relevant.” Whatever coldness permeated the soul of Princess Luna, and whatever conception and terror Due Process had had of her as of a chimera—all of it melted away beneath the notes of that nocturne.

“Bravi!” shouted she, before the quartet had had time to begin the third movement, a cheer that was taken up round the room. There was a thunderous clamor of stamping hooves and whistles—the only applause the the musicians had gotten all night, at which they were pleased to stand up, smile, and receive with bows.

Only when the quartet had leaped into the scherzo did Princess Luna resume the discourse. “Forgive me for that outburst,” she said. “The Gala always puts me on edge.”

Even though this princess was much less warm and welcoming than her sister, even though her imperiousness, both in speech and countenance, struck in those she talked to an immediate desire to submit and beg for mercy, Due Process immediately took a liking to her. Whether it was because of her smooth, regal voice, now measured and tranquil, or the hint of a small, contrite smile, or perhaps because of the mere fact that she had addressed him as an adult, Due Process felt reassured talking to her, much more than he had ever felt with her sister.

“Absolutely no need to apologize, Your Majesty,” he responded. “Believe me, no one is strained more by this night than I.”

“I don’t believe that for an instant,” she replied. “Social engineering is your avocation. Don’t think I didn’t notice your exploit with Idée Fixe. My sincerest congratulations for that preternatural feat.” Here she gave him a slight curtsy, and Due Process could not forbear a blush. “What longanimity have you, sir, to be able to deal so patiently with such an execrable stallion? I cannot say, but I can assure you that it’s greater than mine and my sister’s.”

“I’m a lawyer,” said Due Process, with a grin. “It’s my job.”

“And I’m a princess,” riposted she. “Through my life, I’ve seen and borne enormities that no mortal, though he live to two hundred and occupy the most strenuous posts attainable to mundane creatures, would be able to support without the total loss of his sanity. And though I can withstand terrorists, wars, insurrections, and corruption, the one thing I cannot bear is the Québuckois.”

“Excuse me, Your Majesty?”

“My sister—always, says she, that Equestria, as a land of harmony and friendship, will do everything in its power to keep one and all, no matter what differences may separate them. But, were it my unilateral decision, I would, right this moment, sign a decree declaring all political ties between the Principality of Equestria and the province of Quebuck to be now and henceforth totally dissolved. Let them secede.”

Due Process could not help ruffling his feathers a bit. “Excuse me, Your Majesty?” he said again. “I’m not saying I disagree with you, but . . . just to be devil’s advocate, your attitude seems—if I may be permitted a remark—not very . . . how shall I say it? Not very . . . concordant . . . with this country’s values.”

“Neither is that of the Québuckois. Do you realize, sir, that it’s because of that confounded province that everything, everywhere, from Vanhoover to Newfoaland, is printed in two languages? Pick up a cereal box anywhere in the country; on the front it’ll say ‘Hay Flakes,’ and on the back, it will say, by law, ‘Flocons de foin.’ Go take a tour of the Canterlot Archives; you can visit the Starswirl the Bearded Wing, which a modest plaque on the left side of the wing’s threshold identifies as such, and which, on the other side, spanning the complete height of the wall, a billboard insists is called L’aile de Tourbillon des Étoiles de la Barbe.”

“Your Majesty, again, I’m not saying I disagree with you here, but do you not think that that law reflects the importance of the noble virtues of multiculturalism and diversity, which we pride ourselves on, as they’re the very foundation of our society?”

“Ha!” Princess Luna had a very pleasing laugh, Due Process thought; with such an august snort of derision, she was able to confute anything. “Everything, everywhere, ‘multiculturalism this,’ ‘diversity that.’ Indeed, that’s their argument isn’t it? From the way they talk, you’d think that’s the foremost thing on their mind, of paramount importance to the Québuckois. But, I urge you, sir; go to Quebuck City, walk into any bistro, and say: ‘One grilled cheese sandwich, please’; and, mark my words, the cashier will look at you with a scowl, and snort: ‘En Québuck, on parle français !’ Their values change to suit their self-interest. When they come into our space, they cry and moan for ‘diversity.’ But when we come into theirs, all of the sudden you’ll see how much they care about it.”

Noting his look of pain, the princess sighed. “Forgive me,” she said. “I often forget that among the vulgar population, politics as a topic of conversation is a taboo. Please understand that, as a princess, my life is politics. But, indeed, I’m still in the wrong. The Gala is, above all, a function with the purpose to divert. So let us divert ourselves. What did you want to ask me?”

For a second, Due Process couldn’t remember and had no desire to. His mission at last came back to him with a terrible shame.

Flattening his ears, he said: “Forgive me, Princess; believe me I wouldn’t ask you this if I felt I had somepony else to beseech. But your sister is neglecting a very important matter, one which, if not properly attended to, will not only reflect poorly on her image, but could jeopardize one of her most important institutions. You see, the School for Gifted Unicorns—”

“The complaint brought before the Pony Rights Administrative Tribunal,” interrupted the princess, “yes, I know about it. Celestia wants to settle. But what exactly would you like me to do?”

He gulped. “I think . . . it would be greatly beneficial to her and her school if she fought the complaint out. But she won’t listen to me. Could you, Princess, urge her? As her sister, your words will have more sway than mine.”

Princess Luna laughed, and Due Process at that moment knew he had lost. “If you genuinely believe,” she scoffed, “that my sister holds my opinion in that high of an esteem such that it could change her mind, you clearly have no idea as to what exactly constitutes the nature of our relationship.”

“But, Princess, it’s certainly worth a shot, isn’t it?”

“And you, sir,” she said, as if his previous sentence had not even registered in her mind as something colorable, “should know that, though other world leaders might be induced to a decision by a word from a malicious minister, my sister cannot be convinced by words. Only actions and precedents will she heed; when you have lived as long as we have, it’s impossible to be ignorant of the fact that there’s a huge difference between what ponies say is the correct thing to do and what actually works.”

“But, Your Majesty, at least could you try—”

“My sister already knows my thoughts on the matter. To be clear, sir, I agree with you completely. The PRAT is a disgrace to our great nation. The only proper way to deal with it, the only way suitable to a princess, is to abolish it, totally and completely. This is the only thing I will advocate to my sister, and this is what I have advocated. Though she is absolutely adamant on its staying, I have let her know that should she change her mind and wish to abolish it, on the royal decree my signature of assent will appear right next to hers. Alas, were it that I could sign such a decree myself, without her consent or knowledge, but perhaps it is best that thus is our government structured.”

“Your Majesty!—” gasped Due Process.

“Enough. I have heard your piece. Bravi!” she said, for the quartet had just finished the Tchaitrotsky and was receiving its applause. “Bravi!” Turning to Due Process, she said: “Now, please excuse me. As we have gathered for the purposes of diversion, I must pay my respects to those whose lives and efforts are committed to diverting us. Farewell!”

She spread her wings and leaped onto the stage next to the bowing performers; and, ordering them, one by one, to rise, she gave each a curtsy and a kiss, with a personal bravo whispered into his ear.

*

He had planned to talk to his client; when he had failed at that, he had tried to divert those monopolizing her; when that had failed, he had tried to leverage her sister. And now he had failed at that too.

His shirt was ironed, his shoes shined, his mane brushed; in short, the best that Due Process had to offer he had brought to the Gala. All of it had been for naught.

Feeling as if the eyes of the entire world were giving him mocking stares, he bowed his head, not noticing, or caring, that his tie had fallen out of his jacket and was dragging along the floor as he walked toward the exit. Somewhere in his mind were some concerns tied to a conceptual leviathan he did not dare cast light on lest he see a monster too big to deal with; he could not ignore it, but he could compartmentalize and quarantine it, just long enough to give himself a small respite, and the fortitude to make it home without crying or killing himself.

On his way out, a sound made him prick up his ears. It was a voice from a time in his life not too long ago, a happier time which felt like ages long gone: a pure, unaffected, childlike laugh, replete with an absolute gaiety which one can feel only when uncorrupted by the ugliness of the world.

He knew whom that laugh belong to before he looked up and saw her: a small, lovely, ladylike mare, who blushed and giggled at her interlocutor’s wild words.

The laugh was hers. She was Fine Print.

Once more, there again was the thought to which he was hesitant to give a name, passing rapidly through his mind, checking his exit from the Gala; it was the same thought he had had when she had shrugged out of his grasp at the beginning of the night, and he had watched her graceful form skip off into the crowd.

An uncomfortably familiar feeling that had been demanding satisfaction for the past four years.

He bowed his head, his instinct telling him that patience was a virtue; that, as important as it seemed, nothing good was ever achieved by rushing into action without a plan; that the pursuit of whatever velleity he might have could end only in shame, disgrace, and disappointment; that, truly, the best course of action was to go home, that there and then he could find peace from this feeling—but he knew, from long, frustrating experience, that these reservations, especially the last, were not true, that the only thing that would be accomplished by his going home right now would be another night spent in solitude, regret, and ruminations which would spiral out of control till they drove him into a troubled, fitful sleep.

Yet even so, he could not bring himself to do anything but avert his eyes and drag his feet onward toward the exit. As he walked, the laugh filled his ears; he ground his teeth, the sound seeming to him to acquire mocking tones.

And then, breaking through and rising above that laugh, like an impudently expelled flatus, was a guttural, nasal snort, not unlike the sound of one trying to breathe with a mass of jelly in the throat. “Très drôle, mam’zelle !”

Only now did Due Process notice that the pony she was talking to was Idée Fixe, whose red face, stained coat, tangled tie, disheveled mane, and extravagant gesticulations did not seem in any way to be putting off Fine Print.

Due Process was surprised to find himself walking, at a not sluggish pace, toward them.

When he was by Fine Print’s side, he grabbed her hoof, and before she had had the time to turn around and see who it was, he whispered, his mouth pressed to her ear: “Come with me.”

“Mon fils !” sputtered Idée Fixe. The premier threw a heavy leg over the lawyer’s neck and, hovering, used his other leg to tousle his mane. “Quelle bonté de ta part de vouloir être près de moi !’

Due Process simpered as he tried to shrug out of the premier’s inordinately powerful chokehold. “Come with me,” he whispered once more into Fine Print’s ear, once he was free.

“In a minute, Dewey,” she said, in her turn also simpering to Idée Fixe.

“No, right now.” He pulled at her hoof. “We’re going—far, far away from here.”

“Eh bien, que veux-tu dire, mon garçon ?” The spittle the premier ejaculated on the word garçon was the primary impetus for Fine Print’s decision to take her leave of him rather than any exhortations on Due Process’s side.

“Dewey,” said she, running after him, “what on earth is going on? Don’t you know who that was? That was the premier of Quebuck! He was telling me about an opportunity in—”

“There’s nothing for you in Quebuck,” said Due Process flatly, without the dignity of a glance back at her. “There’s nothing for anypony in Quebuck, nothing but lifeless tundra as far as the eye can see.”

When Fine Print had gotten over her bewilderment, she saw that she was in a dark room, lit only by the wan glow of the moon filtering through a skylight, such that the center of the chamber, where she was standing, was dimly illuminated, whereas everywhere else was cast into a murky shadow. The room was decorated in the same style as the rest of the palace; but without the usual blazing chandeliers to breathe life into everything, the plush carpets, the furniture, the tapestry, the upholstery, took on a sort of mysterious, intangible aspect, as if they were the mere reflections of another world leaking through some anomalous tear in the universe. And the figure that lurked there, three feet away from her, whose only signs of life were the two pinpricks of light that resembled eyes that were watching her intently, greedily even, seemed to her to be just another chimera of that impossible world.

“Um . . . Dewey . . .” she stuttered, not sure that it was even he whom she was addressing. “What . . . what are we doing?”

The figure stepped forward into the moonlight, and she saw Due Process. . . at least, he looked like him. But there was an unmistakable, eldritch difference in the stallion she saw before her, which she could find no precedent for in the memories of her old friend from university: this stallion appeared taller, stronger; he held his head straight, towering above her, so it seemed to Fine Print, with an audacious look in his eyes, a slight, knowing sneer on his lips, as if seeing a challenge he knew he could, and would, conquer, and craving the satisfaction of beating it.

“What are we doing?” The voice was Dewey’s; the words were not. “I’m going to make this the best night ever.”

“No . . .” she whispered, but only reflexively. Before she had the time to think, she felt a strong body moving her, pinning her against the wall, and warm, thirsty lips pressed greedily against hers. For a brief moment, the intoxicating feeling of those muscles subduing her taking hold, she submitted instinctively, not knowing herself why, engulfed as if in a trance.

Only when a particularly indiscrete hoof touched her in an unexpected place was she shocked back to reality. She opened her eyes, and shuddered in disgust. “No,” she murmured beneath the kiss. “I said no!” she said, pulling away, rearing up, and giving him a kick with both forehooves.

The blow nearly knocked him off his feet. He cried out, gasping for breath. When he stumbled back into the moonlight, Fine Print saw Dewey reappear once more—she could tell it was indeed he from those large, hurt, supplicating eyes that looked back at her, which she knew him to affect at times.

“Why?” he choked, when he had regained his composure and was able to stand again.

“What on earth are . . . were you thinking?” she gasped.

“I don’t understand . . .” Due Process responded, his wind being very reluctant to return to his chest. “What’s the problem? Why not?”

“It’s not . . .” Fine Print paused as she struggled for the reason. “It’s not . . . right! It’s not appropriate!”

“Not appropriate?” repeated Due Process, his indignation giving him fortitude. “Well, if that’s so, if it’s not appropriate for a stallion to kiss his date, then I submit to you, Fine Print, that it is never appropriate for a stallion to kiss a mare under any circumstances whatsoever.”

“But you’re not my date!”

“Of course I am!” Due Process responded. “If you will recall, at the beginning of the night, I gained admittance to the Grand Galloping Gala despite my not having a personal invitation. But, as Grand Galloping Gala invitations admit one plus a date, I was able to enter under the date clause—therefore, I am here as your date. If you doubt the veracity of my testimony, I believe there’s a doorpony whom I can call as a witness. He will corroborate what I’ve said.”

There was a pause as Fine Print looked at Due Process expectantly, waiting for the punchline of his joke. She stared at him seriously and soberly, expecting him to cave and say his apologies. But he did not; he was as serious now as he had been during their classes’ mock trials.

“Dewey,” stammered Fine Print, “you can’t . . . expect to create . . . and enforce the terms of a romantic relationship . . . by contract!”

“Sure you can! What do you think a marriage is?”

Another pause, as Fine Print went over the entire history of their relationship, desperately searching for any indication that he might not be completely serious. But, as long as she had known him, Due Process had always stuck, with a religious zealotry, to agreements, both written and verbal, and to his merciless interpretations thereof. She remembered a time when she had forgotten a date with him, and he ceased speaking to her for nearly half a year, until she agreed to sit down with him and explicitly renegotiate the terms of their friendship. Due Process had always been a lawyer first and a friend second.

“All right, Dewey,” she said, her patience with him coming to its end, allowing her to drop all pretenses of amicability, “let me put this to you in terms you can actually understand. Yes, de jure, I am your date; we engaged in that contract, solely for the purpose of getting you into the gala. But de facto, we are just friends. Didn’t you pay attention in our history of law class? De facto, not de jure, is what matters. It is the only thing that has ever mattered. Law exists to support the way things are done, not the other way around. Do you understand?”

Dewey bowed his head, his ears splayed. Fine Print sighed. “With the way you are,” said she, “you’re going to run into trouble with a lot of ponies who don’t think the same way you do. I’m only trying to help you because I’m your friend.”

“I see; I understand,” he mumbled, shaking his head. “But . . . maybe . . . seeing that you are, indeed, well, my date . . . at least in the de jure sense, I don’t suppose that there’s a reasonable expectation . . . for at least a kiss? A de jure kiss for your de jure date?”

He looked up at her expectantly, from under his brow, like a repentant puppy—which worked on Fine Print as an emetic. For his words proposed a romantic endeavor—but his tone, bearing, and countenance suggested one of supplication.

“A de jure kiss? You want a de jure kiss?”

“If you would do me the honor . . .”

With a contemptuous flick of her wing, she opened her purse. Due Process watched in shame, confusion, and curiosity as she withdrew a tissue, along with a pen and her lipstick applicator. She uncapped the applicator and flicked it across the tissue; she did the same with the pen. When she was done, she returned her tools with a similar grace and efficiency, and extended the tissue to him on an outstretched hoof, as if presenting him with a summons.

Due Process took the napkin: he saw at the bottom a scribble next to some barely legible numbers, and at the top a big red smear in the shape of the letter X.

“What’s this?” he asked.

“It’s your kiss,” she responded. “Signed and dated. We can get it notarized if you want. I ran into some of my colleagues here a while ago; they’ll be happy to help. I can probably even get them to do it for free.”

“No . . . that’s okay.” He carefully folded up his prize and put it in his breast pocket.

Fine Print sighed. “Dewey, I have to go.” She turned to leave, leaving him sulking in the middle of the room. Just before she shut the door on him, she turned and said: “I’ll see you soon,” which made Due Process prick up his ears. He thought he had heard some ulterior message in those four words, and he eyed Fine Print, searching for it. She held his glance for a brief, yet significant, moment, then sighed, chuckling, before leaving him alone in that dark chamber.

When he at last left the room, he was drawn into the current of guests filing out of the hall.

A conversation; a drink; a quartet; an awkward, inconclusive fumbling in the dark; an indefinite time spent in solitary self-reflection—and the supposed best night of his life was over, leaving him confused, unsatisfied, and unhappy. At once he was sad and relieved that it had passed so quickly.

He felt overwhelmingly tired, as if it were not the onset of the night but minutes before an approaching dawn. He did not know how long he had spent alone in that lonely room; it could have been hours for all he knew.

Involuntarily, he found himself away from the crowds, away from the lighted path, and leaning against a fence. The barrier blocked a drop of thousands of feet to the earth below. The entire desolate expanse of Equestria opened up before him, with the only signs of life the lights of Ponyville far off. And while he watched, even those progressively died away, as the inhabitants shut their doors and settled down for the night.

For Due Process, the only light left to him was the niggardly glare of the moon, and the only warmth in his chest was the kiss folded and tucked snugly in his breast pocket.

He took it out, unfolded it, and held it up to the moon, trying to find some mark of affection in it. But the white light was unable to even bring out the rosy red of the lipstick.

He was about to fold it up and put it away, when he noticed that the light piercing the thin translucent napkin brought out some faint marks on the reverse side.

He turned it over. He stared and stared, half in ecstasy, half in bewilderment. His heart knew exactly what it was, but his mind spent five minutes trying to convince him that it was illegible, meaningless, a phantasmagoria of shadow and somnolence, before finally accepting the evidence of his eyes.

Ten faint numbers, separated by dashes. The first three he recognized: they were the area code of Canterlot.

It was a phone number.

A new, yet familiar, heady hope filled his breast. He looked up, his heart racing with adrenaline, his mind through half-connected thoughts of the glorious future that was undoubtedly soon to be his, replete with love, prosperity, consummation, and fulfillment. All he had to do was to go home, wait a day or two, and . . .

What exactly?

To find the appropriate course of action, the appropriate response and avenue of attack, a lawyer looks at precedents; he examines cases similar to the one he currently encounters, and plans accordingly.

So Due Process remembered the countless promises made, but not kept; the missed dates he was begged to forgive, to reschedule, and begged to forgive again when missed a second time; the long, cold, sterile nights spent in the company of one who looked at him with a snide skepticism whenever he hinted at making them warmer; the fleetingly enjoyable times, always leaving him eager for more; the long, long periods of complete silence that followed directly afterward; the hints that made him giddy; the bemusement received when giving his own; the group study sessions he was profusely thanked for giving, yet from which he never derived any benefit; the messages left, but never returned; the reminders he gave in class, but never acknowledged; the countless assertions of misplaced cell phones; the apologies; the excuses; the professions of great affection; the underhanded denials of anything greater; the mixed messages; the pushing and pulling; the duplicity.

And, having gone through the entirety of four years’ worth of cases, having distilled them down to their essential principles, applying the entirety of his educated acumen to the task, letting his merciless logic lead him right to the proper end, in a minute the just course of action was clear to him, and once he realized what it was he did not hesitate.

He sank his teeth into the kiss, tore it in half with a twist of his neck, chewed, and spat the bolus over the fence. He watched with pleasure as the thin napkin twirled once, twice, and then dropped, disappeared from sight, its flimsy white blinking out of existence, destroyed by the blackness of midnight.

He turned and walked homeward with a stately trot, a slight smile on his face, feeling that, in some way, this night had been slightly productive.

Comments

[Emperor]

Yep, I can definitely tell you're mocking the Canadian HRTs now with this chapter, given the stinging rebuke of Quebec in this chapter.

Poor Due Process. Looks like the night just broke him. Now he's...a real lawyer!

[Lancerlot]

8233041
Fairly typical. Make-believe heroes battling make-believe evils of social justice, caring nothing for—or even seeing—the damage they cause in the process.