Not all is right
Pip, Rumble, Button, Thorax, and Ocellus had all been watching the rehearsal, and to say they had mixed reactions would be something of an understatement to say the least. A few minutes went past them, almost unperceived by the five students sat there in the sunny day, until Thorax decided to speak up and break the silence.
"Well, that was... something," Thorax said quietly. "I'm not entirely sure what the something was, but something it certainly was."
"I can't imagine the amount of work that went into the effects and lights, not to mention the smoke!" Ocellus exclaimed, almost immediately switching into geek mode, as she was known to do periodically. "Coordinating all of those effects to go off at the right times and produce the right effect is an extremely difficult task, as anybody who arranges music can tell you. As a matter of fact, it usually requires complex computer systems that control each element and set them off at a pre-programmed time, and this-"
"Yes, thank you," Thorax interrupted. "What do any of you think? I thought the core point of the performance got a bit lost underneath all of the production. It wasn't so much watching Countess Coloratura and hearing her sing. It was closer to watching some lights and smoke machines with Countess Coloratura's voice hidden somewhere in the mess and her dancing on stage!"
"Those are not the best lyrics I have ever heard," Button admitted. "Ooh for five minutes? Or how about the profoundness-"
"Profundity?" suggested Rumble.
"Whatever," Button replied. "Or how about the profoundness of the chorus? 'Razzle dazzle; Glitz and glam; Turn it all up, it's a spectacle!'? What's that even supposed to mean?"
"I still don't like Svengallop," Pip sighed. "Did you see that at the end? He wasn't complimenting her at all. He was praising himself with all those special effects he piled on top of the performance."
"Well," Ocellus said, seemingly on the other side of the argument, "the effects are a key part of the performance. Creating all those elements is a lot of work, and Countess Coloratura's performance wouldn't exist without them."
Rumble shrugged. "Would that be a bad thing?" he asked, just as the clock began to chime. "Oh wait!" he cried. "It's time for the meet and greet with Coloratura! Let's go!"
The kids got up out of their seats, and headed off to the main pathway to the centre of town, that would take them to the school, where they would meet with the Countess herself. On the way, the chose to catch a streetcar to the school station, as this would save them going through the heat on the streets, not to mention that the streets were absolutely packed with people wanting to see the Countess make her way through the streets. It took them longer than they expected, but at long last they made their way through the doors, and arrived in the foyer, where the meet and greet was taking place. Coloratura was speaking to the assembled crowd.
"Hello everyone!" she smiled, still looking totally ridiculous in her performing outfit. "I'm holding a contest where some of you will get a chance to sing with me onstage at the concert tomorrow! Sound fun?"
Svengallop's face did very little to hide the feeling of disgust he had when he looked at the assembled items Pinkie had placed upon the cart in front of him. "Let's see," he said. "Is that water imported from the springs at Niagra Falls?" he asked.
"All 20 bottles, as requested," Pinkie replied, a smile on her face. This fell when she saw Svengallop's disgust.
"I told you to give them all straws," he said. "The Countess is very particular about her beverages having straws in them."
Pinkie produced a box absolutely filled with straws. "Well, you're in luck!" she exclaimed. "Because I have a box here filled with over five hundred straws that will absolutely suit her needs." She removed one that was entirely coloured white, and looked exactly the same as all of the others. "I call this one Fernando."
"No cultural appropriation!" shouted Discord, as he rolled by.
"Who was that?" asked Svengallop.
"Oh, that was Discord," Pinkie replied. "Sometimes he writes stories on Fimfiction about us, but he spends most of his time floating between dimensions. Some of us call him 'el dragonequus Espagnol'."
"Whatever," Svengallop answered, his voice betraying his complete lack of interest. "Can you show me everything else, comprendo?"
"It would actually be 'comprende'," Discord said, suddenly floating into place. "You see, the -o suffix is used to indicate the first person, or 'I'. 2nd person, or 'you', is indicated by the -e suffix. Thus, you asked 'do I understand'. Clearly, you don't, judging from the incorrect Spanish."
"Can somebody please get this nutter out of my hair?!" Svengallop demanded, as security guards removed Discord from both the manager and Pinkie. With that out of the way, Svengallop bent down and looked at the other assembled items on the list. "Floral arrangements from the Kew Botanical Gardens... Chocolate éclairs made by Gustave le Grand, in cooperation with Hotel Chocolat... A selection of crystals from the Needles Hills mine... Freshly picked cherries from Cherry Jubilee's farm separated red from yellow..." He paused for a moment. "I have no idea why she does business with that woman in Dodge City. Think of the meat contamination!" His eyes drifted over to his list, and then ticked some more items off. "Somehow," he said finally, "it seems as if the needs of the Countess have been miraculously met. That leaves my personal needs."
"What?" Pinkie asked. "You never said anything about your own personal needs!"
"I have a hard life managing one of the most famous pop stars in the world," Svengallop said vainly. Is that a word? I think it is. Irrespective of whether it is a word or not, he produced a list. "I need high quality oats for porridge, and five hundred fully peeled and cored apples."
"There's no way we can get that many apples in that time!" Pinkie protested.
"Your friend Applesauce-"
"Applejack," Pinkie corrected.
"Whatever. Your friend Flapjack lives on a farm, does she not? And do they not grow apples? And is it not harvest time?"
"They've harvested all the apples, and are shipping them off to their established customers!" Pinkie exclaimed. "I should know, I participated in the process this year!"
"Then it shouldn't be too hard to pursuade them to part with some, should it?" Svengallop said rudely, and walked away. "If you don't get those items, I will pull Coloratura from this joke of a festival. Wembly looks to be a better deal anyway."
Meanwhile, at the meet and greet, Coloratura was very popular with the kids. The Crusaders at last had their turn, and stepped forward.
"It's a pleasure to meet you-" Scootaloo started, only to notice Coloratura looking at her in surprise. "Is something the matter?"
"I know you three!" Coloratura smiled. "You're the girls who restored the Everfree Forest Railway!"
"How do ya know that?" Apple Bloom asked innocently.
"It was pretty big news throughout the state," Coloratura said kindly. "I may live a lot in different parts of the world, but I always keep an eye on what is happening in my home state. Not to mention your family's apples get all over the world. I once saw produce made with Apple family apples on sale in Tokyo."
"Where's that?" Apple Bloom asked.
"It's in Japan," Sweetie Belle explained. "It's very far away. Several hours plane flight from here, as a matter of fact."
"Oh," Apple Bloom replied, then turned as she heard the door open. "Heya Pip!" she called. "Countess Coloratura knows us!"
"Through the news, let me guess," Rumble answered. Just then, Pinkie burst in after them.
"You would not believe what has just happened?" she said, in a panic. "Svengallop checked over the list of items I had prepared in advance for Coloratura, and cleared them all, but now has demanded that we get him some things I cannot possibly source, such as oats for porridge that you cannot get in this country at short notice, and after that he wanted five hundred apples!"
"Five hundred!" Apple Bloom parroted, sounding very surprised.
"Not only did he want five hundred apples," Pinkie continued, "he wanted them, and I quote, 'fully peeled and cored'."
"That ain't even possible from Sweet Apple Acres!" Apple Bloom replied to her, visibly shocked by this turn of events. "We've already completed processin' and shippin', not ta mention made all the cider fer the year."
"Is that the Svengallop who is Coloratura's manager?" Sweetie Belle asked. "I've heard a ton of stuff about him, and none of it is good. He's really demanding."
"You can say that again," Scootaloo sighed.
"I've heard a ton of stuff-"
"NOT LITERALLY!"
"You're telling me," Pinkie sighed. "Pip, I know you helped get Coloratura here. You wouldn't mind speaking to her and ask her to bring Svengallop under control? I'm really too scared to talk to him right now."
Pip nodded, and walked over to Coloratura, who seemed to be elsewhere. "Excuse me? Countess Coloratura?"
"Yes?" she asked, looking at the boy in front of her. "How can I help you?"
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Fun fact about Disney Parks. For several years, all their attractions, lights, fireworks etc, were handled, controlled and synchronised by the same model of home computer that NASA used for launch telemetry. No faster than 50 Mhz CPU, up to 30 thousand simultaneous channels, fully multitasking. Not Hard Real Time. It was just that Fast.
Modern versions of the systems are so fast, that large parts of the parks are outside the OS event horizon, even using dedicated hard links and interupts, so synchronisation methods have to take into account time of flight etc.
Best example I remember for music, was a group of musicians playing a gig in Malaysia during the monsoon season, and the heat and humidity caused comptuers to fail that much, they had four machines all running identical software and MIDI lists, with one person dedicated to triggering reboot and reinitialisation as the systems broke. Would hate to see how much Svengallop managed to write off in costs for that show rig.
As for the apples thing, a sudden additional request in excess of the origional rider? Twilight should really have a look at that contract for the additional fine print unrestricted excess clause Svengallop added to see if its the Blueblood Clause, and if Celestia has repealed it in time since Lunas return?
9850400
Blueblood Clause?
9850417
Sorry, its something Id assume was done to keep him around, the clause that Blueblood has that lets him get so much royal resources to keep his style of living while expected to be a pain in the rear?
9850598
Muh. Sounds about right.
Oh that will be fun to see him comment on this chapter of course X3
9850665
Oh, I imagine it will.
9850669
yep =3
9850670
Any other points of note on this?
9850673
Heh, I noticed that the latest two chapters, aka the one yesterday and the one today, it seems like this might be a EG Interpretation of The Mane Attraction
9850676
Well spoittted.
9850708
Good afgternoon. What do you think of the chapter?
9850736
Heh, I remember seeing tons of that over on Derpibooru and DA btw X3
9850739
Those were the days.
9850742
yep =)
9850744
Coloratura was certainly an interesting character.
9850746
yep, heck Lena Hall did a great job voicing her of course X3
9850747
She is an established popstar, so that helps.
9850750
(Hence why my special reason for her has that X3)
Indeed <3
9850752
Special reason? Where is this?
9850893
OK.
9850924
My dad has it on porridge.
9850927
Yes. On porridge.
9850940
I suppose so.
9851041
Very true.
9851054
Werl.
9851063
Earl.
9851089
von Count.
9851131
Yep.