No Motor Vehicles or Equestrians
No Motor Vehicles or Equestrians
By Alaborn
Standard disclaimer: This is a not for profit fan work. My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is copyright Hasbro, Inc. I make no claim to any copyrighted material mentioned herein.
Consider the city of Spring Hill.
Those looking to move into the area might have seen the town’s appearance on several Best Places to Live lists. They might be influenced by the highly regarded public schools and low crime rates, or the town’s excellent parks and trails. Others might be attracted to the town’s revitalized downtown, with its unique restaurants, boutiques, and art galleries.
Fans of local history would highlight the town’s Quaker heritage and place on the Underground Railroad. They might note the town’s firsts, like having one of the first electric stoplights, or recommend the history museum in the old courthouse building. The old railroad station that once carried passengers around the region may be no more, but the redeveloped mixed residential/commercial area was one of the city’s hottest neighborhoods.
One could say a lot about Spring Hill. And as Spring Hill’s three term mayor, Alice Harper could talk about any of these points. But she would be the first to admit that Spring Hill was primarily a bedroom community, a quiet suburb of a moderately-sized American city that itself would hardly be anyone’s choice to visit on one’s first visit to the country.
Let alone the world.
Therefore, she asked her assistant, Matthew Stewart, to repeat what he said. “You said my next appointment is with a pony?”
“Yes. I was as surprised as you to see a pony walk in and request an appointment,” Stewart said.
“What is it about?”
Stewart passed her a single sheet of paper, his normal approach for summarizing the meeting details. He could have used a Post-It note, for all that was written there. “He didn’t say much. ‘Official business’ or the like. He said he was a lawyer, though he used the term barrister. But he was as earnest as a little pony could be.”
The announcement of the existence of another world, inhabited primarily by colorful magical ponies, had seemed surreal to the mayor when it had first happened, seven years ago. After the shock wore off, humans and ponies decided they wanted to learn from each other and extend a hand, or hoof, in friendship. Ponies dominated the news for about a year, but after that, the worlds settled into a relationship characterized by a limited exchange, primarily focused on scientists and students. So there were ponies working on Earth, but they were few and far between.
Which made Mayor Harper wonder just what official business this pony had.
“If he’s a lawyer, shouldn’t he want to meet with the city’s lawyer? And how could he possibly have jurisdiction here?”
“He said he wanted to avoid a formal case, in the interest of friendship and harmony. And as for the second question, there’s an agreement of understanding between the Royal Equestrian Society of Barristers and the bar associations of the various states to allow ponies to represent in legal cases affecting ponies in our world, and vice versa.”
“Seriously?”
Stewart nodded and passed her his tablet computer. There, on the screen, was just that announcement from her state’s bar association.
Harper shook her head and returned the tablet. “Well, send him in,” she said.
Stewart left the office, returning with a little pony following him. He was an earth pony, dressed in a conservative suit, and he was carrying a briefcase in his mouth. The pony’s big, expressive eyes made him appear young, and Harper immediately thought of a little boy dressing up in Dad’s clothes. But she mentally corrected herself; this pony was clearly an adult.
The pony set the briefcase down on the floor, took off his hat, and looked around the room, his hat somehow staying attached to his hoof.
Harper figured out what the pony was looking for. “I’m sorry, but we don’t have a hat rack. Hats have been out of fashion for gentlemen for fifty years now.”
“Let me take that,” Stewart volunteered. He picked up the pony’s hat, and placed it atop a nearby bookshelf.
The pony picked up his briefcase and took a seat opposite the mayor, setting his briefcase on his lap. The pony sat in that weird doglike manner, but his briefcase balanced perfectly on his hind legs.
Harper checked the notes her assistant gave her. “Mr. Scales?”
“It’s Crooked Scales, Madame Mayor. Most ponies don’t have family names in the manner you humans are used to.”
Well, that name isn’t worrisome at all, thought the mayor. She looked at him again, and noticed the pony’s suit didn’t include pants. That left his cutie mark on display, an image of the scales of justice, with a hoof pushing down one of the pans.
“And what did you want to meet with me about?” she asked.
“I am here to issue a formal complaint on behalf of all creatures of Equestria for unconscionable discrimination perpetrated by this city.”
“I’m sorry? As far as I know, you’re the only Equestrian citizen to have ever visited this town.”
“And it’s a good thing I came here first, to spare my fellow countryponies the indignation of this discrimination, which is not only unbecoming for a civilized people but illegal under the treaty of mutual understanding signed by Princess Twilight Sparkle on behalf of the nations of Equus and your United Nations.”
“I still have no idea what you’re talking about,” Harper said flatly.
The pony popped open his briefcase, poked his muzzle inside, and came out with a photograph in his mouth. “It’s this,” he said. He sounded remarkably like one of those television lawyers dropping the surprise piece of evidence on a shocked jury, though the effect would have been better if he didn’t have to mumble around the photograph stuck between his teeth.
Alice Harper took the photograph and examined it. It was probably the first time she had handled an actual photograph in twenty years. It was thick, something like an old Polaroid photo, though without the white border that she remembered. As a girl, she had thought Polaroid cameras were the coolest thing. But this photo was probably made with magic, not with chemicals.
She then looked at what the photograph actually portrayed. It was a picture of one of the city’s trails, probably the one running through the residential neighborhoods south of downtown. She had no idea what was offensive about the picture, until she noticed the sign in the picture.
Right there, in big black letters, was a standard road sign, stating a rule regarding use of the trails:
NO MOTOR VEHICLES OR EQUESTRIANS
“Mr. Crooked Scales, equestrian in this case refers to horseback riding. Spring Hill is well known for its horse ranches, which have been in our town for generations,” Harper said. “Plenty of people still ride. The sign is to indicate that the trails are meant for walkers, joggers, bicyclists, and roller bladers. People riding either horses or motorized vehicles are prohibited.”
“But that’s not how a visitor from Equestria will read the sign,” Crooked Scales stated.
Mayor Harper shook her head. “Shouldn’t the portal have granted that understanding?” It was supposed to be some magic inherent in the portal that made ponies come out speaking English, although with some strange quirks that made them say anypony instead of anybody, or substitute the word hoof for hand in any of a number of phrases. And apparently, it mapped their word for themselves into an existing English word.
“There exists no equivalent concept for your horseback riding in our language,” Crooked Scales said. “But even if there were, a pony’s first thought would be the meaning of Equestrian that they were most familiar with. Granted, if your sign presented the word starting with a lower case letter, they might understand otherwise. But you render your signs using only capital letters.”
“This is a legal matter,” Harper said. “Shouldn’t you be meeting with our lawyer?”
“In the interest of friendship and harmony, I would prefer not to make this a legal matter. I’m sure your city does not want to be known as the first one to be sued over a matter of interspecies civil rights,” Crooked Scales said.
Harper nodded. She didn’t see how any human could win. All those ponies would need to do was turn their big eyes to the jury box or judge, and it wouldn’t matter what the facts of the case were.
“I know you have a good heart, and you did not intentionally keep up these signs in order to insult Equestrian citizens. All I’m asking is for your promise to update all of your offensive signage in a timely manner,” Crooked Scales explained. “And pay the fee for my legal services.”
Well, there it is, thought Harper. The pony poked his muzzle into his briefcase, and came up with a manila envelope. Harper opened it, and saw a settlement agreement. As she scanned it, she thought back to a line from that historic speech by Princess Twilight Sparkle. “I think that, despite our obvious physical differences, humans and ponies are more alike than different.” And the document in the mayor’s hand showed that was certainly true, at least as far as their legal systems were concerned.
The pony barrister had done his homework. The city’s legal budget included provisions for these kinds of nuisance suits, and the pony’s bill was right in line with those expectations. It wasn’t an amount to break the budget, and it certainly wasn’t worth creating an interdimensional incident over.
“You’ll have your response within a week,” Mayor Harper said.
“Very good,” Crooked Scales said. “Please send your notarized letter to the address indicated.”
“Matt, would you please see our guest out?” Harper asked.
Stewart nodded stood up. He retrieved the pony’s hat. At the same time, Crooked Scales stood up in the chair, took his briefcase in mouth, and hopped to the ground, landing with a surprisingly loud thud. He took his hat back, placed it on his head, and followed Stewart out of the office.
Harper took the brief reprieve to fully read the settlement agreement. Fortunately, it was short, just two pages long. For her first personal contact with a magical species, it was amazing how mundane it all was. And just like any appointment, she came out of it with another agenda item for the next staff meeting.
Stewart returned to the office. “Our little pony friend is on his way,” he said.
“Out of curiosity, how is he traveling?” Harper asked.
“He’s being driven around. Nice car, too. Definitely not an Über.”
“The address on this letter is a post office box in a town two states over. Just how many towns has this guy hit? I thought Equestria was a land of sunshine and rainbows.”
“I believe the term they use is friendship and magic,” Stewart said. “Or friendship and harmony. Although I’m not sure if that’s the same thing for them.”
“Regardless, how does a land of sunshine and rainbows and friendship and magic generate scummy lawyers?”
“I remember Princess Twilight Sparkle say that ‘Friendship is universal’”, Stewart said. “I guess it’s not the only thing that’s universal.”
“We’ll be bringing this issue up at tomorrow’s staff meeting,” Harper said. “We want to act quickly and write a check to make him go away.”
“You don’t think our lawyer can figure something out?”
“I’d rather not have Crooked Scales return to our city,” Harper said. “I mean, can you imagine what he would do if he saw the antique carousel in Founders’ Park?”
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Ha!
Careful. You know what they say; if you pay the manegeld, you'll never be rid of the mane.
Crooked, I meant that as a pun. If you want to sue along those lines, you have plenty of bigger targets back home.
You spoiled the punchline, but this was still a delightful twist on the Biscuit formula (recipe?) Thank you for it.
FYI for those of you who do not recognize this particular species of pest among the legal world, this is a serial or vexatious litigant, what business owners call a PITAttorney. We had one in a wheelchair who worked his way down main street in Topeka once, measuring every doorway and step so he could file a stack of suits at once under ADA, and leave dozens of business owners trying to hire contractors to lower that 3" step out by their wheelchair ramp to 2" within 30 days, while still having to shut the whole business down to show up in court and hire their own lawyers. (This is also known as 'fishing for a bribe' where a $2,000 check written to the individual will magically make the case go away cheaper than dealing with all the legal crap.) Since the litigant is a lawyer and can operate pro se, they effectively have no cost to their actions, and can make a living out of this.
Now, most government organizations will cave to this kind of extortion... I mean helpful advice. After all, it's cheaper than hiring a lawyer, going to court, etc... The problem (as stated above) is exemplified in the eternal quote by Kipling: "Once you have paid him the Danegeld/ You never get rid of the Dane." or in simpler terms, here comes another lawyer, and another, and another....
The best approach the city can do in this case is to *immediately* go to the signs department and have them print a replacement sign for every one of the 'offensive' ones, then the moment the paint is dry, get them out and the old ones removed. (fyi: they paint over old signs in good condition to use them for other purposes. It's cheaper.) That lets the city send a regular letter signed by the mayor to the address specified saying "Thank you for your visit yesterday, Mister Scales. It's always nice to have a concerned citizen inform us of potential issues in our fair city. Be assured, the signs in question have been replaced, and there should be no issue regarding this in the future. Thank you so much for your concern."
There should *not* be a check in the envelope. Mr. Scales' legal services were *not* requested, they were pressed upon the city without the promise of recompense, and no court will force the city to cough up cash for unrequested services. There may be an exchange of correspondence in the mayor's future, but each letter should end with something to that regard. "...so with that in mind, the city bears no legal liability to pay you for your services. Thank you very much for your concern."
9897047
Georg knows my inspiration for the story, even citing the particular form of vexatious litigant I was thinking about.
His advice is good, but remember: do you really want to go to trial against an adorable pony?
If the mayor had any smarts she'd be looking at an Equestrian law firm to make sure what Crooked Scales is doing isn't against Equestrian Law or in violation of the treaties signed by Equestria and the United States.
9897151
I'm guessing she wants to get in touch with the illustrious Dewey, Cheatham and Howe.
9897010
I foresee myself stealing Manegeld at some point.
...Well I feel silly. I didn't even remember equestrian also meant horseback riding until the mayor said so. Had me wondering why a city wouldn't want ponies on their trails, then all the more so when they had never had any pony tourists before. Figured it was going to be some xenophobic individual doing such things on his own.
9897449
You'll notice when using a program like Word to write. It will flag Equestria as a misspelling, but not Equestrian.
It also doesn't like pegasi.
Jeeze, I’m half expecting him to be secretly working with Flim and Flam.
9898128
Crooked Scales got his law degree from Flim and Flam's Friendship University. I could see that.
It's good to know that even as perfect as we think Equestria may be, it is still a bit like our world, too. Even in Eden, there were snakes.
Great story! You really picked a good tale to tell.
9897613
That is because “Pegasus” was the name of Bellerophon’s flying horse. As a unique individual, spell check thinks that it should be capitalized.
In & of itself, this isn’t a problem. However, for consistency,
you need to either capitalize “Earth Pony” & “Unicorn” or make “pegasus” small lettered
Spell check hates “pegasi” & “pegasuses” equally. “Brony” is Right Out
For similar reasons, you’ll have the same problem with “Minotaur” although that doesn’t come up as much
Just glad that the game "Pin the tail on the donkey" has fallen out of favour.
9898661
Except at Pinkie parties!
9899002
No sane human or equestrian will ever try and sue Pinkie for anything, ever.
9897102 Yep, I'm a follower of Overlawyered.com and the absolute weird stuff they get there, like the guy who sued to stop a service that lists frequent litigants who sue phone soliciters so said soliciters can be sure not to call them. Yeah, think about that for a minute.
What the mayor should do is write a letter to twilight sparkle. She would not be amused and would reply rapidly.
9899356
Nah. Get the Cutie Mark Crusaders to help Crooked Scales find new meaning from his cutie mark.
No horseplay
No grazing
Old country signs are old.
There's a suburb near me called Spring Hill. Maybe I should keep my eye out for a very litigious pony....
I was expecting somepony complaining about how the trails aren't pony-friendly, or that the parks are massively inferior to what they have back in Equestria, or just harassing people on the trails and/or in the parks because they're not using them correctly.
Crooked Scales was an unexpected surprise.
Not what I expected, and I love the way his name's meaning changes in context
Crooked Scales. At first, it aligns with him being a lawyer suing against discrimnation, "crooked scales" of unfair treatment.
Then it's meant as a metaphor of corruption, since he came to ask for bribes
9900579
I'd like to think, with the right CMC intervention, he'd start acting in the former case rather than the latter.
9897241
Or Shyster, Flywheel, & Shyster.
9898432
Technically, "Minotaur" was a title, literally "bull of Minos", and he arguably had a name but it was rescinded when he was born and turned out to take after his father (a bull that was ensorcelled into raping some queen or other because the Olympians were assholes; there's a reason Hades didn't argue with a position that put him as far away from them as cosmologically possible).
9897151
Ain't worth what it would cost to litigate. Just research