All musical numbers end, sadly, which meant that Luster Dawn had to put some actual legwork into getting set up in her new room at the School of Friendship. Though the creatures she’d met during the song had been happy to stick with her on the way to her dorm.
“So is it true that Princess Twilight eats thirty hayburgers a day?”
Though she had to admit that that wasn’t entirely on her own merits.
“Come on, Georgia,” River Song the kirin said to the corvid-panther griffin hauling one of Luster’s suitcases. “Luster just got here. She doesn’t need creatures asking creatures about her famous mom.”
Luster cleared her throat. “Um, Princess Twilight isn’t my mother. I’m just her student.”
“River projecting because River daughter of Rain Shine,” said Yelena the yak, wearing the rest of Luster’s luggage like fashion accessories over her traditional blanket… dress… thing? Luster made a mental note to research yak clothing at the next opportunity. She’d be a fool to pass up friendships offered to her on a silver platter.
Then Luster registered what Yelena had actually said. “Really?” She considered River, who rolled her eyes at the scrutiny. Same tan coat and green mane as the kirin headdoe. “I’ve seen your mother at the palace, but I, uh…” Luster bit her lip. “Well, I never actually attended any of the diplomatic meetings Princess Twilight invited me to.”
“Seriously?” cried Georgia. “You’re the student of the Princess of Friendship! You gotta network!”
Luster gave an exasperated snort. “Look, we can’t all be social butterflies like Professor Moondancer. I made four friends today and I’m already exhausted.”
“I thought that was the bureaucracy,” said Fry the earth stallion.
“Okay, that did get old after a while. But you won’t get far as Princess Twilight’s student if you can’t handle filling out a few forms.”
Yelena stopped before one of the rooms so suddenly that Luster nearly ran into her. “This new friend Luster’s room. Bunking with Yelena.” She paused for a moment, possibly winking under her bangs, but Luster couldn’t be sure. “No worry; Yelena prefer bottom bunk.”
“Thanks. All of you.” Luster had to admit, the group was making a very persuasive argument against her earlier stance on friendship, even without taking Princess Twilight’s own maintained connections into account.
“Hey, this is Ponyville,” Fry said as they brought Luster’s luggage inside. Right, he’d said he’d grown up here. “Everycreature’s happy to meet new faces here.”
“Also, we had a homework assignment to make a good first impression on somecreature.”
Fry rolled his eyes. “Don’t ruin the moment, Georgia.”
“Hey, I’m still waiting on the hayburger thing.” Georgia turned to Luster and jerked a thumb at Fry. “He swears that back when Princess Twilight lived here, she got banned from the local Hayburger so other ponies had a chance to get something there. I’ve got ten bits saying he’s full of it.”
Luster turned up her nose like her proper Canterlot grandparents. “I’m afraid I’ve been sworn to secrecy on such sensitive personal matters.”
Everycreature moaned in disappointment at that.
“Kidding!” Luster beamed as she saw her attempt at humor hit home. “She inhales the things. The castle once ran through three chefs in a moon because they couldn’t take being treated like fry cooks.”
Fry scowled. “What’s wrong with being a fry cook?”
“When you’re one of the best chefs in the country, to the point where you can get hired to cook for the princess?”
“Yeah.” Fry took a step closer, and Luster realized she was in close quarters with an increasingly angry pile of pure muscle wrapped in a beige coat. “What’s wrong. With being. A fry cook?”
Then a larger pile of pure muscle nudged his wither. “Fry at a nine,” said Yelena. “Friends need him at four.”
Georgia gave an awkward grin. Luster still wasn’t sure how that worked with a beak. “Fry’s a little defensive about his talent.”
“Defensive nothing.” Somehow, through social mechanisms far beyond Luster’s current comprehension, Fry had gone from scowling fury to his usual easygoing smile in the space of a few seconds. “I think I figured out what I want to do when I graduate.”
“Hey, Luster?” River Song said from the dorm’s empty desk. “What’s this?”
Luster turned and saw River had opened one of the boxes. Indecision consumed the unicorn for a moment. Should she be angry somecreature was going through her stuff without her permission or grateful that a friend was helping her unpack? But then she saw what River had asked about, and the chance to get to familiar ground overtook any concerns. “Oh, that’s my Twiggle Home.”
River looked at the wingless plastic caricature of Princess Twilight, about the size and shape of potato. She rotated it in her magic, considering it from several angles before she finally said, “Your what?”
“Oh, I’ve heard of these!” said Fry. “Part of the whole hue-mon initiative.”
“Human,” Luster said automatically. “But yeah, Mom let me keep one of the first prototypes.”
Georgia went almost completely still, her head turning agonizingly slowly to face Luster. “Your mom’s Sunset Shimmer?”
“Georgia,” said River. “We’ve been over this.”
“But, but…” Georgia threw up her talons. “Famous ponies! Famous ape-things! Famous ape-things that used to be ponies! How are you not excited by this?”
“I grew up around it?”
“Meh.”
They traded flat looks before giggling it off. River turned her attention back to the Twiggle, setting it down on the desk. “If it’s a prototype, that would explain why it looks like… well, that.”
Luster nodded. “Yeah, Mom and Aunt H-Twi made the casing as a joke. The production models are just purple cylinders.”
“How small plastic pony work?”
“Well, most of the features won’t work until I have everything set up, but…” Luster beamed as she thought of the perfect demonstration. “Okay, Twiggle, what’s the weather going to be tomorrow?’
The tiny Twilight’s eyes lit up, pulsing on and off for a few seconds before the Princess’s voice sounded from the construct. “The weather schedule for Ponyville tomorrow is clear skies until 2 PM, followed by increasing cloud cover until evening showers beginning at six.”
Yelena scowled at it. “Yelena not sure how to feel about small plastic pony always listening.”
Luster waved that off. “Oh, it’s fine. It doesn’t do anything unless you start with the command phrase.”
“Must always be listening to know when Luster says command phrase.”
That got a shrug. “Well, yeah, I guess, but it’s not like it’ll do anything with the information.”
Twilight couldn’t help but smile as she looked at her student. “I do have to envy her naivety.”
“Your Highness?” said the guard at the monitoring station.
“Don’t mind me, Private Residence. I just wish life were simpler some days. Keep doing your duty.”
He saluted. “Yes, Your Highness.”
Twilight nodded, then made her way through the halls of scrying screens, countless telepresence spells displaying countless scenes across Equestria. Here a family having dinner, there a bar full of happy customers of all species, there a pegasus’s-eye view from one of the experimental aerial delivery drones… though those were being challenged in Parliament. The postal workers’ union had never had a defender quite like Dinky Doo. Still, all Twilight had to do was turn her head and she could see the fruits of her labor.
Including the rotten ones. This system had already found domestic abuse, drunken assault, spies lurking in otherwise unnoticed corners. Even after the Tree of Harmony had reincarnated as another palace-tree, it had never reconnected with the Cutie Map. And so, as she had so many times when the great powers of the past had failed her, Twilight had taken matters into her own hooves.
As she left the subterranean chamber, she felt one corner of her mouth turn up as a memory came to mind, one of those simpler times she had insisted on making so very complicated. “Monitor everything.”
“Your Highness?”
She shook her head. “Sorry, Gallus. Reminiscing.”
He gave a short nod, all the familiarity he allowed himself while on duty. “You’re expected in the throne room soon, Your Highness.”
“Well, we can’t keep them waiting.”
And Twilight left the Cartography Department of the Royal Guard to their business.
So, Applejack catches on and publicly tears down the entire apparatus?
Wait, Luster's father isn't somehow Sci-Twi? Shame on you. And since when was River Song going to friendship school? Moreover, why isn't Fry delivering pizzas?
I think Harmony or Junior might have some ... opinions on this.
I know there's been a couple decades worth of timeskip, but come again?
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This is post-timeskip anyway, so it doesn't even really need an explanation.
Because he clearly hasn't dropped out of college yet, meaning we're still too early in his timeline for that.
that went from cute to dark REAL fast im….guessing princess twi went full big sister or something
Honestly, while I'm not really a huge fan of that level of surveillance, I trust Twilight a helluva lot more with it than damn near anyone else. And there's still the issue of how she sorts through it all, so there's got to be some sort of way to flag something for review by an actual sentient.
Nothing, so long as it's the job you signed up to do. Otherwise, you're justified in complaining.
Does Twiggie come with worm friends accessories?
Also, "aunt" SciTwi? I'm... confused right now. So, if SciTwi's not Luster's "other mother", who's Sunny's paramour in this world?
And, well, AliTwi is approaching a very dangerous, slippery slope here.
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I hadn't thought of most of those.
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That or the Everfree decides it's due to get another alicorn to knock off her nonsense.
10282822 10283860
There are at least two options here: Either Luster is the result of conventional reproduction, or she just calls her other mom "Aunt" to avoid awkward questions and having to explain things for the fiftieth time. Pick your favorite.
10282871
"Then they are welcome to actually talk to me about them."
10282883
Part of it is a few decades of socialization. Part of it is that Luster is that much of a shut-in.
10283059 10283555
Twilight is certainly one of the more palatable choices for exploiting the Internet of Things, but this was still meant to be disturbing. Glad to see it pulled it off without being too abrupt in the tonal shift.
10284722
the third option being that's a reality where Sunset, Sci-Twi, Flash and Timber are ethylene dione.
So regarding the prototype Twiggle did Starlight get one? If she did did she dress it in a ballerina costume? Or did Twi give her one, already done that way and Glimmer chuck it into orbit?
10284889
Oh, I have to go with the pre-tutu'd option. Starlight hucked that thing directly into the sun.
Missed this one too.
The creepy bit is the use of "naivete"... It's just sorta the villain thing to say! Congrats!
Totally great MoodWhiplash! In both its before and after bits!
Luster moving in is sweet!
10284889
Ethylene dione?
10285786
When human Twilight proposes a polycule, she specifies its chemical composition. (Though she just thought of it as a peroxide. Sunset was the one who approved of the double bonding.)
10285786
Shipping science!
camo.fimfiction.net/TbSk8Y763vJqaDKFCuXorFMx6ubJpmi3urOaquHeInM?url=https%3A%2F%2F66.media.tumblr.com%2Febe0a4289ac5a0654c28afeb7e0ea43b%2F4d0dc85cc940ec46-2e%2Fs1280x1920%2Fec1b1267bdd242c2064e93f2c527f889d0330b56.png
Dangit Jargon. Dangit Twi!
That said, I did like Dawn's new friends here. Especially Fry having a very clear career path.
I wheezed with laughter when I got to the part about Moondancer.
For some reason, I'd always assumed Dawn was Glimmer's kid. Maybe it was the color. That said, was Luster Dawn born a human or pony?
Here's hoping someone is able to peacefully talk Twi out of her technocratic surveillance state before she goes too mad with power. Then again, Moonhorse could already see everypony's dreams at a whim...
10284722
Thanks for your reasoning regarding Moondancer. Neither of the two continuities I can offhandedly think of where Moondancer absolutely does qualify as a social butterfly blends into this well, but I know you know both of those and there could easily be ones I haven't run across yet. Was wondering.
...Given that I tend to identify with blue/black/white, mixed in roughly that order of precedence, it repeatedly surprises and amuses me how removing any one of those three colors always seems to increase the cynicism of the worldview. (Or something approximating cynicism.)
Well, that can't possibly backfire