Nightwatch: A Wondrous Beauty
In the nicer corners of Manehattan, ones that, even in the current state of the world, managed to stay somewhat insulated from the ever-present calamity and therefore continue some form of lifestyle similar to what was present before the Lunar Fall, lovely dining establishments were not uncommon. Real silverware and porcelain flatware, crystal glassware, fresh flowers, staff that dressed in ties and buttoned shirts, and a chamber orchestra playing even at lunchtime were luxuries still available to the upper echelon of the city. And among them all, the Hilltop Terrace stood apart in that it had private rooms accessible only via one of the new steam-powered elevators. Here on the upper floors, the patrons were able to see above the grimy haze of the smoggy, sooty streets below and enjoy a wonderful look about the whole of the ever-ascending Manehattan skyline in the light of day.
As lovely as the view was, however, a far more pleasant view alerted several of the guests when the door to the dining area opened. Several found themselves staring at the new arrival; more so of the male variety than the female, much to their chagrin.
The woman was tall, prim, and dazzling to behold. Her face was that of a sculptor’s angel. Her hair was as shimmering as silk. Her makeup and coiffure had been done so perfectly that not even a single strand was out of place. Even more eye-catching was her attire--the very latest, sharpest, and most elegant in stylish women’s suits, and her wide-brimmed hat was tipped just right such that only one of her lovely eyes was visible. Not just beautiful, but sophisticated and graceful.
Her manners only reinforced that as she thanked the waiter for ushering her in before passing over the threshold. She strolled with grace and poise toward a two-person table close to the main window tucking a case under one arm. While she didn’t “milk it” for all she was worth, she clearly was aware of her fashionable, eye-catching style and wasn’t afraid to let everyone get a good look.
A blond-haired man in glasses with a suit of his own was seated there. Although he caught her as soon as she walked in, he didn’t seem quite as receptive as the others. Nevertheless, he rose from his chair as she neared. As soon as she reached him, she held out her hand, which he immediately accepted.
“Miss Rarity.” He planted a kiss upon it. “You’re looking as radiant as always. I’ll suppose that’s another one of your new designs?”
“Oh, this old thing?” she laughed. “Perish the thought. It was simply the first halfway decent thing I could find in my closet before heading out. You’re looking smashing as well, Mr. Tartan Top. That shade on your coat suits your eyes just perfectly.”
He smiled slightly and nodded back. The waiter, meanwhile, pulled her chair out. She smiled appreciatively back at him as he sat. “Thank you, sir. I always tell all my friends and associates that service at the Hilltop Terrace is without peer, and you did not disappoint on this occasion either.”
“Thank you, Ms. Rarity,” he answered as he seated her. Tartan Top resumed his own seat as soon as she was down. “Now, may I start you with your usual Sauvignon Blanc?”
“Oh, today is a special occasion, garcon. I believe I will be a bit different and have a Chardonnay.”
“Very good, madam. Shall I list the ones we have available?”
“Oh no, dear. I trust your judgment implicitly.”
He smiled and nodded back. “And for the gentleman?”
“I’ll have a bottle of the specialty Viognier.”
The waiter paused. “May I remind the good sir that the specialty Viognier is 100 dollars per glass?”
“Oh, that won’t be an issue,” Rarity spoke up. “I’m covering the bill for today. We have a great deal to celebrate.”
The waiter hesitated again, but in the end nodded to both. “Very good, madam and mister.” He turned and departed.
Rarity was left to give Tartan Top a beaming smile; bringing her case on her lap and opening it up. “Now I do so hate to start off with business before we had a chance to catch up, but since today is to be something of a celebration I figured it would be best if we had something to celebrate.” The case open, she pulled out three separate sketches of detailed uniforms that had been written over pre-drawn models. “Now then, I spoke with both the Major General as well as the member of the Finance Committee on Monday and they absolutely love this design. And when I mentioned that we could make them at only 120 a uniform, they immediately said they’d authorize the order for 500,000 in two weeks!”
In spite of her ladylike demeanor, she barely contained her excitement as she drew out another slip of paper; this one a contract.
“This is the big order we’ve both been waiting for! Carousel Couture becomes the primary outfitter of the Manehattan Armed Forces, and Tartan Top Textiles becomes one of the biggest fabric companies in Manehattan! So…” She pushed the contract forward. “If you’ll just sign on the bottom like we agreed, everything will be well and we can spend the rest of this lunch passing the time drinking to our success.” She folded her hands and beamed at him expectantly.
Throughout the entire speech, Tartan Top had shown little to no change. That didn’t stop as he sat idly in his chair and looked down at the contract, not lifting a hand toward it. After a short while he looked up again. “Actually Rarity…I’m afraid I’ll have to decline.”
The lovely, smiling woman continued to sit there, still as a statue, for several seconds. She blinked at last. “Oh, um…pardon me, Tartan Top…I think I must have misheard you just now. I could have sworn that you just said that you decline…”
“I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I’ve reconsidered my options,” he calmly explained, straightening in his chair. “I recently discovered that I could be netting 60 per uniform instead of 40. An extra 50 percent is an offer that I can’t ignore.”
“Fif…fifty?” Rarity responded, her smile still present but her arched eyebrows starting to shrink. “Why, who could possibly afford…I mean, who in the world…excuse me, I mean who would be offering you such a deal?”
“Suri Polomare. I’m sure you’ve heard of Polomare’s, right?”
A twitch momentarily broke Rarity’s pleasant look. “I…may have heard the name in some of the darker corners of back alley seamstresses…”
“Well, she’s moving up in the world quite a bit, and that sort of offer was music to my ears. I’d be slapping the shareholders in the face if I snubbed it.”
Rarity’s fair smile began to fracture, alternating between her lovely countenance and a shocked look. “Well…well, ahem…Suri Polomare doesn’t have an order for 500,000 new uniforms to be paid by the Manehattan government.”
“Oh, but she will in two weeks.” He smiled a bit wider.
Rarity’s pupils turned into pinpricks. “Excuse me?”
“She’s already secured a quote with Chancellor Fancy Pants himself. 500,000 new uniforms at a price of 180 each. She initially quoted 200, but knocking off 20 per uniform made him all too happy to come on board.”
“But…but he’ll definitely sign with Carousel Couture once he hears we can save him an additional 60…”
“But you can’t give him that price without me, and I’m going with the garment company that’s giving me 60 off of each. And since that officially makes Polomare’s deal the cheapest on the market, it seems as if Tartan Top Textiles will indeed be the major fabric producer in Manehattan. We just won’t be doing it alongside Carousel Couture.”
Rarity was speechless. Her eyes stared out into space as she sat frozen with her mouth hung open. After a moment, the waiter, bearing a silver tray with a glass of wine and an empty glass with an unopened bottle arrived. As soon as it did, Tartan Top rose from his chair before he could say a word.
“Now that I think it would be improper to take any more of your good will, I will take what is mine and bid you farewell, Miss Rarity.” At once, he plucked the unopened bottle from the tray with one hand while he took up his hat with the other, placed it on his head, and tipped it to her with a smirk. “Thank you for the wine. I wish you continued success on your boutiques…especially since that appears to be all you will have to your name for the forseable future.”
Without another word, he turned and left with the bottle slipped under his arm. Rarity herself stared at his now-empty chair unmoving; her eye periodically twitching.
One hour later, Rarity’s well-groomed features and lovely countenance were quite different.
She was back in her office/workshop on the upper floors of Carousel Couture. Not wanting to risk her work space being disturbed, cluttered, or stained, she was in the stylish meeting lounge that preceded it, half curled up on the couch. Her afternoon tea had been ignored on the table, which was just as well considering how many tears sullied with her mascara she had put into it, although she had grabbed the “biscuits” from the tray and periodically paused in her airy sobs long enough to stuff one in her face. The doors were shut, the windows drawn, her face and hair were disheveled, and she was in the perfect spot to wallow in depression and misery.
A knock rang out on the door, and a moment later it cracked open. An auburn-haired woman, looking like she took almost as much care of her appearance as Rarity did, poked her head inside. “Ms. Rarity?” she called in a light Trottingham accent. “Ms. Pommel downstairs informed me you requested your ‘Stress Tea’ this afternoon. Is everything alright?”
Not hearing any answer immediately save for more sobs and biscuit “noms”, she pushed the door open the rest of the way and stepped inside. She took one look at Rarity’s mascara-stained face and went wide-eyed. “Ribbons and ruffles, Ms. Rarity! Pardon my saying so, but you look terrible! What in Greater Everfree happened?”
Rarity took a moment to sniffle and compose herself, grasping for her pocket handkerchief and giving a quite unladylike snort into it before straightening. “It…it…it’s Tartan Top, Sassy… The…the lunch meeting today went…simply awful!”
Sassy moved in to the couch nearby and sat down, smiling at her supportingly. “Oh bother, Rarity. I’m certain it wasn’t nearly so bad. Remember the time Sapphire Shores changed the order from wanting a backstitch to a topstitch when all the dresses were already assembled? You reacted the same way and we still made the order with time to spare.”
“He dropped out of the contract!”
Sassy’s jaw instantly dropped in horror. “He did what?!”
Seeing her reaction, Rarity’s lip began to quiver again.
Sassy gave a start and shook her head at once. “I mean…I-I-I’m certain it’s nothing we can’t bounce back from!” Her smile was as transparent as the strain in her voice. “Right…?”
“Maybe if we made it mandatory for ten hours of unpaid overtime and expected the workers to get by on only twelve meals a week…” Rarity dismally answered. “Otherwise there’s no way we can undercut the offer that Polomare’s is making…” Face tightening, she finally threw herself back on the couch, laying a hand over her forehead, and cried an exaggerated wail. “Oh, let’s face facts, darling! We’re doomed! Do-oo-ooomed!”
“Now, now, Ms. Rarity…” Sassy went on, even if she was trying to bolster her own sagging spirits in the same breath. “I’m certain it’s not as hopeless as it seems…”
“I know! It’s even worse! This is all my fault! I put everything into changing my parents’ last three boutiques into a national-scope outfitter, and look what it got me! Mountains of debt and 500 new employees I won’t even be able to pay thrice! I sank everything into this venture, Sassy! We’re fin-ni-ished!”
Sassy looked rather uncomfortable at the bleak outlook of affairs, but she pushed on. “Well, if there’s anyone who can get us out of this mess, it’s certainly you. You almost single-handedly not only salvaged this business after the Lunar Fall but you kept Ponyville from becoming a waystation for every vagabond and highwayman from here to Trotheim. And you did that when you didn’t have a fraction of the means and experience you had then.”
Rarity continued to recline for a moment more, sniffling and moaning, before she drew her head up at last. She let out a tired exhale. “I suppose you’re right. And it would be one thing if this was just for myself, but considering everyone else who’s invested in this business, and not just in terms of capital…” Sniffling one last time, she wiped away for her eyes. “I think I do owe them a bit more effort than just my tears. But I’m sad to say the situation is rather bleak. The most utilitarian and economic uniforms in the world mean nothing without the materials to make them.”
“Well then, our only problem is finding a new supplier, isn’t it?”
She sighed as she sat up fully. “Yes, but one problem is quite enough. The next cheapest supplier who was willing to sell to us wanted 80 per uniform—twice what Tartan Top initially offered. I’m afraid without a reputation behind us, no supplier is willing to risk a discount on Carousel Couture.”
“We’ll just have to start again. A fresh round of telegrams to every branch supplier in town. The contract is practically signed already. Certainly that makes us more appealing than before?”
Rarity didn’t look too optimistic. “We’ve been trying to square things away with suppliers for four months, Sassy. I’m not sure how much better we can do in two weeks from scratch. But…” She held her head up higher, forcing a mild smile on her own face. “We won’t know unless we try, and I’m not doing the business any favors lying around eating Chevalese pastries. Let’s head downstairs and get to work.”
About five hours later, Rarity’s initial dismal assessment of the situation was still being confirmed. She immediately commissioned telegrams to fourteen separate suppliers she had previously contacted attempting to secure a deal for the uniform contract to Manehattan. On the suggestion of her factory manager, she included information that the deal was as good as done if they could incur a materials cost of only 40 per uniform, operating on the idea that a bird in the hand was worth two in the bush.
Yet the other suppliers in Manehattan were just as business-savvy as Rarity and, in many cases, far more cutthroat. They knew full well it would be far better to sink her current deal and pair with different designers for a slightly higher bid to get themselves more out of the arrangement. And in a town where textiles were so aggressive, it was far better to let an up-and-coming company sink to avoid future competition than to make a tidy profit in the short term. She had scarcely begun to look through their records for whatever additional suppliers they could contact when telegrams began to come back declining her offer. Half of them had been rejected by the time she began to send additional ones out.
Within three hours Rarity and Sassy had exhausted all of their original options. They had little choice after that but to look into smaller fabric companies that had offered solicitations. These ones were even bigger shots in the dark than before.
Rarity sighed as Ms. Pommel brought her a cup of afternoon coffee, thumbing through one sheet of a potential contact after another. “No…no…no…certainly not…no…a thousand times no…” She paused and held up one, frowning. “This one appears to be the kind of fabric we need, but they won’t go lower than 75…”
Sassy held up one. “Ms. Rarity, what about Plaid Practical? They’re offering as low as 35.”
“Yes, and it most certainly shows in their product,” she answered with a frown. “The swatch they sent us was the most threadbare and miserable excuse for a textile that I’d ever seen in my life.”
“But we are rather desperate at the moment…”
“Not desperate enough to sacrifice quality,” she answered, turning her nose up indignantly. “I’m sorry Ms. Saddles, but I won’t match our price if the uniforms we produce are made of such shoddy materials. Not only would that do irreparable damage to our own reputation, but the client would be left with a marketed all-weather uniform that would only be fit for cleaning rags.”
Two hours later, however, with still no success, Sassy at least was clearly beginning to wonder if high quality would be worth the price of them all being without means to feed themselves, and even Rarity was beginning to lose heart all over again. Her coffee had been drained and she had worked so steadily that she was now half-hunched over a cluttered table with one contact after another marked “NO SALE”. She had to blink several times at her own slips to make sure she wasn’t looking over the same ones twice.
“Is there any way we could possibly reduce our portion? If we can’t cut the cost one way…”
Rarity sighed. “No, that’s impossible. If we hadn’t expanded we might have had a chance, but we won’t be able to cover our debt payments and continue our expansion at any cheaper. A few dollars might be workable but not enough to be competitive. I’m afraid this is all but hopeless.”
“Well, it’s…” Sassy looked outside, only to frown regretfully. “…nearly sundown." A pause, before she made her voice more upbeat. "But we still have more time. We have all of…" Again, her voice dimmed. "Thirteen days…" She smiled again. "And a place like Manehattan is bound to have a surplus of supply…or…" Again, her face turned downcast. "It would have eight years ago before all of this mess happened…” A pause. “I’m afraid I’m growing inclined to agree with you, Ms. Rarity.”
“Ms. Rarity! Ms. Rarity!”
By this point, both women were so discouraged they didn’t even look up when Rarity’s assistant/apprentice designer came running back into the room, waving a letter in the air. “Ms. Pommel, I think we’re both ready to call it a day on putting in any more rejections…”
“Oh, but this isn’t a rejection! It came in the evening mail!”
Both of them looked idly up as she placed the letter in front of Rarity. Sighing a little, she adjusted her reading glasses and took up the envelope. “‘Fabrichique’? I’ve never heard of them before…” She reached for her letter opener, broke the seal, and opened it up, producing not only a letter but three different swatches of fabric. She focused on those first, blinking a little in surprise at them.
“Oh?” She took up one sample and examined it more closely. “Interesting weave… Nice choice of fibers…” She picked up another, rubbing it between her fingers. “Smooth feel, but not silky…” She grasped it with her other hand and tugged. “Just the right amount of give too…” She took up the third one and held it up to her table light. She ‘hmmed’ as she kept examining it. “Why, this is almost as good as Tartan Top’s. In fact,” she took up another swatch and held the two at once. “if they could make an intermediate between these two, I’d say it’d be just what we were looking for.”
A bit more pep in her voice now, Rarity took up the letter and began to read it over. By now, Sassy had straightened in her own chair while Ms. Pommel waited to one side. It took about a whole minute, but at last Rarity’s face lit up.
“Oh my… I don’t believe it! It’s like a miracle!”
“Well buttons and bobbins, Ms. Rarity! Don’t keep us in suspense! What does it say?”
She held up the letter. “It’s a new fabric company soliciting designers! And they’re offering us a generous starting price! At this, we could make each uniform at a cost to them of only…” She quickly looked back, ran over the numbers, and did some calculations in her head. “…42 dollars each!”
Now Sassy lit up. “Why, that’s wonderful! An extra two dollars would make us have to scale back a little and tighten our belts a bit more, but compared to having no contract at all it’s a small price to pay!”
“Yes, that’s what I thought!” Ms. Pommel chimed in. “Um, except for one small thing…”
“Oh, that’s no bother at all, Sassy,” Rarity waved off. “We only need this deal to break Carousel Courture into the Manehattan garment industry. The plan was always to have this be our first big sale. With our feet in the door here, we can contract with Fillydelphia next and then attract enough investors to start putting out domestic lines.”
“Of course,” Ms. Pommel tried to speak up again. “But I’m afraid…”
"I only hope we can attract enough on this first deal to make a big enough 'splash'..."
“Don’t you worry about a thing about that end, Ms. Rarity," Sassy reassured. "As soon as we have this deal signed I’ll make sure every fashion periodical and advertiser in this entire town knows about it! I’ll go door to door like a salesman if I have to!”
Rarity smiled back appreciatively, and looked again at the letter. “This is simply wonderful! This little miracle may have saved the entire business! Ms. Pommel, let’s get a wire out to Fabrichique to send their representative at once to Manehattan so we can have a new contract signed immediately, and then I’m taking out all three of us to dinner! It will make up for that abysmal lunch! Although…after that abysmal lunch, I’m hoping you won’t mind if we eat some place that’s a little less than five-star. Perhaps a three or two even…”
“Ms. Rarity!”
Both Rarity and Sassy snapped up as Ms. Pommel finally shouted loud enough to command attention. That done, she exhaled once before looking regreftul. “I don’t want to rain on anyone’s parade, but before you think of closing the deal, perhaps you should look at the address on that envelope more closely.”
She blinked once before looking back down at the table, finding the envelope, and bringing it up in front of her again. She read for a moment before her eyes widened a little. “Oh my… Ap…Appleloosa?”
“Not just Appleloosa, I’m afraid. The Macintosh Hills part of Appleloosa. Not only is that out in the country, it’s very near…” She swallowed at the thought. “…the Equestria border.”
Sassy cupped a hand to her mouth. “Oh dear… Rarity, have you been reading the papers?”
She looked uneasy. “I’ll admit I have been a bit preoccupied the past few days…”
“The latest word is they believe the Nighttouched may be making another move soon. Everyone’s in a tizzy. Fillydelphia, Griffonstone, Mount Eris, and Appleloosa are all bracing themselves either for a surge of those monsters or one of the other countries to react. Or worse…that Trottingham or the Dragonlands will try to use the opportunity again.”
“By now they have to have already commandeered all of the telegraph lines for emergencies…assuming that the Macintosh Hills even had one… And since their company is so new, they don’t have a representative outside of Appleloosa yet,” Ms. Pommel sighed. “That letter was postmarked a month ago. It’d take at least that long to send a response, and probably a lot longer with what’s going on. We only have fourteen days.”
Rarity began to look dismayed all over again. She bowed her head and silently thought about this for a few moments. Sassy sighed as she slumped in her own seat. “Oh, linens and lace… This was our ray of sunlight in the clouds and now it’s gone dark again. Now I really do wish Manehattan would have tried to build airships of their own…”
Suddenly, the young woman looked up again. “I…don’t suppose the rail lines would still be open, would they?”
Both Sassy and Ms. Pommel looked up so fast one would think they had sat on a tack. Rarity herself looked a little nervous at her own suggestion, but looked them both in the eye.
“Excuse me, Ms. Rarity?”
“Would they?”
Ms. Pommel stammered a moment. “I…I suppose they would be, because they need to allow evacuation, but-”
“And it’s my understanding that there is an express line that runs from Manehattan to Appleloosa, is there not?”
The jaws of the other two women dropped. “Ms. Rarity,” Sassy began to speak, “you…you can’t possibly…”
“I…I don’t see why not, Ms. Rarity, b-b-but…”
“So, in theory,” she drew herself up, taking in a deep breath, “a representative of our company could take a rail to Appleloosa, walk into Fabrichique in person, negotiate the deal, get the contract sighed, and come back with a signature on a piece of paper guaranteeing that we can get materials for that price and thereby allow our own government contract to be valid, and present it for signature on the desk of the Military Budgeting committee within the two week deadline, correct?”
“No, Ms. Rarity!” Ms. Pommel nearly cried. “You can’t do that!”
“I agree with Ms. Pommel wholeheartedly! That would be an act of madness!” Sassy concurred. “Besides, the Macintosh Hills are so close to the border there’s a good chance they would get hit by another surge forward, whether it be those monsters from Equestria or armies from Trottingham! Even if they didn’t, those rail lines they’ll be using to get us the material might end up commandeered or worse!”
“None of that matters!” Rarity insisted. “All we need is a slip of paper with a signature on it that guarantees we can get that price and our own contract to the Manehattan government is valid! We can claim production delays or wartime expenditures later if need be, but the bottom line is they’ll have already signed the binding contract, we’ll already have our capital, and we’ll be past this giant hurdle and dealing with much smaller and more manageable ones!”
Ms. Pommel wrung her hands nervously. “But taking a trip out there is…is suicide! If you’re caught out on that train line when…I-I mean if the Nighttouched break through, you’ll be stranded out in the country with no escape! And that’s not accounting for all the criminals, bounty hunters, looters, and robbers that will be clogging the train lines looking for marks from refugees!”
“Ms. Rarity,” Sassy said more quietly yet insistently, “no one here says you have to do this. We all know you for being a generous spirit, but there comes a point when some sacrifices are just too much to make. It won’t do Carousel Couture or Ponyville any good to lose both you and the contract if the worst should happen.”
She hesitated on hearing these responses. Her eyes drifted to the ground and she bit her lower lip, wavering for a few moments. Finally, however, she closed her eyes, tightened up, and lifted her head again. “As you pointed out before, Ms. Saddles, there is more at stake here than myself or even the employees of this company. After what happened last year, this business is now the only thing I have left and it’s the only thing still stable in this world a lot of others have left. Because of that, I simply cannot stand to one side and pretend I don’t see this last opportunity in front of me.”
She lifted her nose into the air again. “I’m sorry, ladies, but my mind is made up. Ms. Pommel, if you would be so kind as to leave a bit early today for the Manehattan Station to purchase a ticket for the next train to Appleloosa. I will be down myself as soon as I have finished packing a few things and I wish to depart at once. Ms. Saddles, I believe I can count on my manager to keep things running smoothly while I’m gone?”
The two hesitated, neither liking this, but also unable to argue. They both slumped a little in the end. Ms. Pommel finally nodded. “Of course, Ms. Rarity… I’ll leave right away,” she answered quietly before turning to leave.
“Certainly, Ms. Rarity,” Sassy answered even more quietly.
“Thank you both, darlings. Now…I need to head off as well. It will take me a good twenty minutes just to pick out an outfit perfect for making a business deal on the first day of meeting face-to-face…”
She rose from her own seat at her assistant/apprentice designer cleared the threshold of the room. However, she barely began to step out when Sassy spoke up again. “Shall I let everyone know the news tomorrow?”
Rarity gave a panicked start. “Oh, merciful heavens, no. I wouldn’t want to ruin morale when there’s no cause to. Just…” She paused to breathe. “Tell them I’m on a business trip looking for a better supplier for the uniform textiles. That’s technically the truth…”
Her manager looked uneasy. “Are you certain that you don’t want the employees to know because they might also try and talk you out of it? I can’t keep this company afloat without you, Rarity. None of us can.”
She laughed airily, although it sounded a tad forced. “Oh, Sassy…you and Coco are just being pessimistic. Thousands…or…at least hundreds…of individuals make this sort of trip all the time and don’t run into any trouble. A quick trip to Appleloosa, a few hours for a signature, and then a quick trip back. I shouldn’t even need a whole week, let alone two. I’ll be back before you know it. After all,”
She calmly shrugged.
“What’s the worst thing that could possibly happen?”
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Overall, this is an aggressively well-designed story. Your initial introduction slams us into a new world, and each chapter does an excellant job in multiple areas: Expanding your worldbuilding, letting us see and feel the encroaching threat, without letting excellent characterization fall to the wayside. This is how AU's are designed.
That said, your actual writing can be a little clunky. The initial panic after the Lighteater breaks into the city is effective, but maybe to direct? Ramping up the panic, perhaps moving some of the descriptions of people just smashing through shop windows (really good inversion of typical mob panic imagery) and the death by trample descriptions later? And definitely, use the word 'trample' less.
Twilight's introductions, likewise, needs to be a bit more subtle. It works, but Starlight thinks "oh, she's helpless," and is then proven wrong a few too many times and it telegraphs the move to the audience. We need to be with Starlight being impressed, but it's clear too early that Twilight is going to curb stomp that thing.
And here
It's imminently clear where we're going. It's especially disappointing when this genre doesn't have a lot of superheroes or superhero tropes, and you could have really surprised your audience. (Also, no one has ever smirked to themselves after thinking they were hallucinating while a giant unkillable monster tries to kill them. Not just because giant monsters aren't a thing.)
Clunky descriptions also keep popping up.
"When it did her clothing changed" is a sentence fragment and needs to be absorbed into a different sentence.
"Grew, Enlarged, and reshaped" is a good attempt, but they all mean the exact same thing. They should be describing the different actions the wand is undertaking, like: The severed end of the wand she held grew, twisting around and thickening into a proper oak stave...
"Only her eyes stood out. They were glowing too." Using sentence fragments in this spot is better because it places more emphasis on the descriptors and how cool they should be, but "they were glowing too" is not a cool line. At the very least they need to glow with determination, or righteous fury, or something.
There are lots of places like this where your prose could be streamlined, and there's a lot you could probably cut. Heck, your title is basically two titles, and both are pretty vague as to what this story is actually about. My story Mystery of the Arcane Train is still vague, but it tells people that there's a train, a mystery, and a focus on not just magic, but scary magic. Also, I should have called Mystery on the Arcane Express, I just now thought of that and it's way too late to change it. Anyway, I read somewhere that a good technique is to cut every third line and see where that leaves you, and it sounds like a good general location to start.
As I said, the plotting is airtight. Solid. A class could be taught using this as an example. This is the exact approach that is called for, with the exactly correct amount of focus on the exact right things. You just need to do some pruning and this could be one of the greats.
EDIT: Just to be clear, I really, really like this story.
9412937
Thank you for the feedback. I will try to be mindful of it in the future, although I'm not sure how effective I can be. An ongoing complaint about my work (not necessarily on this site but elsewhere) is that I'm far too wordy. Part of the reason I decided to move forward with this story was to see if I could write a less-verbose version of longer fare I do on other sites and experiment with more minimal descriptions (Normally, for example, I would have gone into a multi-page description of how Starlight Glimmer ended up in that town, how the town got into its current state, and generally sum up the entire world history over the past eight years...this time I'm wanting to see if I can get it to come out gradually without any exposition dumps.)
Unfortunately, based on this feedback, not only does it sound like the story is still too wordy but my attempts to be shorter on descriptions only made them worse than before. I'll try to do better in future chapters.
9413286
I wouldn't be discouraged. It's all about finding the right things to spend time on. Cutting the town's backstory and such was a good call, for instance. There's still a lot to like here.
Oh dear...
Oh dear...
Well, this promises to be all kinds of disastrous. The question is how many Nighttouched are going to end up with needles through both eyes. And how much Rarity's business rivals will regret crossing her once she's through with this monor "saving the world" affair.