In Which Twilight Sparkle Is Dreadful
“Don’t tell me you can’t get to Manehattan, you drooling oik. Getting to landmarks along the railway is your one and only purpose in life. Don’t tell me you can’t do it! Don’t brag about your shame!”
“Prince Blueblood, that’s, that’s not how trains work. That’s not even slightly how trains work.”
“Twilight, don’t talk to him. Don’t make it look like we’re associated with him.”
It didn’t take long after slipping out of the palace for civilisation to start going to the dogs. A scene of unparalleled infamy was taking place on one of the many platforms that Canterlot Railway Station boasted.
I was delivering stern instructions to the locomotive’s driver from on high — or from below, obliged as I was to yell up at the window of his carriage. At my back, though I was much too preoccupied to heed her, Twilight Sparkle was making unhelpful noises of dismay and confusion. Her dragon was being insolent, as seemed to be his one and only mode. An audience of various non-entities had gathered in the near distance and seemed to be snickering amongst themselves at some private joke.
And the driver himself, that wretched specimen of ponykind and an undoubted embarrassment to all who knew him, just laughed and issued opprobrious remarks at my expense from behind the safety of his glass.
“Prince Blueblood, that’s the Seaddle-bound train,” Twilight Sparkle said into my ear, a terse edge to her voice. “It doesn’t stop at Manehattan. It’s … you won’t find many trains that go further from Manehattan.”
“I don’t see how that’s relevant. Our driver can simply detour along the right rails,” I snapped, my temper on the frayed-ish side. “And do remember to use our codenames, there’s a good sidekick.”
Sparkle took a moment to breathe deeply and acquire self-mastery. I took advantage of the moment to grant some frank character delineation and sterling life advice to the driver. The varlet received my generosity and returned an offensive gesture. The nerve of these lower orders.
“Azure Sanguine,” Sparkle eventually bit out. A jolly good code-name if I do say so myself. That brisk trot from the palace had been a great assistant to thought.
“That’s better,” I replied, and then remembered. “You’ll get into the swing of this eventually, Gloomy Twinkle. Though that ought to be Prince Azure San—”
“No, it shouldn’t,” Sparkle said. Her expression momentarily betrayed great turmoil, as if she was having to shift her whole mind to some other mode. “Because … because if I call you Prince where ponies can hear us, ponies might suspect you’re Blueblood and not Azure Sanguine.” She seemed to wince, as if the last two words somehow induced effort.
These intellectual types have trouble being efficient, I’ve noticed. Nevertheless, she had something approaching a point. I pursed a thoughtful lip. “Well, possibly,” I allowed. “So long as you maintain appropriate deference, some of the normal rules of courtesy can be relaxed, I suppose. Now, if you’ll excuse me...”
The dragon whelp coughed. “Twilight, I think that guard over there’s beginning to think she ought to do something about this.”
Sparkle sighed. “I should probably beat her to it.”
“I’m easy either way, to be honest,” replied the whelp.
This exchange went on at my back while I resumed my exchange with the train driver. I was of the view that he was Nature’s last word on the subject of odious scruff who’d have been whipped through the streets in some more halcyon age. He held some other, deeply mistaken view. All of a sudden, I felt Sparkle try to physically bundle me to one side. “I say, unhoof me! You’ll ruin this waistcoat!”
“Azure Sanguine,” Sparkle hissed. “We’re getting a train to Manehattan, aren’t we?”
“And this train will do nicely, now unhoof—”
“But you’re Azure Sanguine, not Prince Blueblood,” she said. “Why should Azure Sanguine, whoever he is, try to redirect trains? Only ponies who the Mockingbird will be suspicious of would try to do that.”
I opened my mouth to object, mulled over the exact form my objections should take, drew a blank, and then mulled further. Something of her meaning began to percolate through. “Ah,” I ventured. “She might be on the alert, then, if she catches sight of the wrong train trundling into Manehattan. Is that your meaning?”
Sparkle sighed. “Something like that.”
I apprehended immediately. This was the sort of small-details-thinking the mare earned her metaphorical bread for, and I was quite pleased with her in spite of her habit of waistcoat-mauling. Appropriate credit went to my own wit and attention to form, of course, in remembering to bring her at all. “Good thinking, Sparkle.”
“Gloomy Twinkle.”
“Twinkle, yes.” I eyed the other trains grousing to themselves at their own platforms. “Twinkle, discern which of these culprits will speed us Manehattan-wards without arousing suspicion. They all look equally suspicious to me, I might add.”
Sparkle trudged forth, and after something of a delay — perhaps finding an innocent-looking train was more difficult than I’d imagined — she returned with the knowledge in store, and to the right train we apparently went.
It didn’t strike me as especially innocent from the outside. A great, muttering, steam-dribbling brute like all the others, it seemed. But I took Sparkle’s word as her bond and into one of its carriages we went. The inside corridor was hardly prepossessing either. The walls were close and oppressive, the carpet always seemed to be toying with the idea of sticking to my hooves, and there seemed to be a great deal of noise and natter coming from compartments down the length of it. The rabble were out in force.
I could swear that ahead of us, one group burbled amongst themselves. “...And you’ll never believe it, but that was Prince Blueblood himself, yelling at that driver. I swear, Peach Blossom, while you were away, he just strode up and started yelling all sorts. Wouldn’t have thought royalty even knew that sort of language—”
“This one’s empty,” the dragon observed of one compartment, diverting my attention away. Some glorious isolation seemed just what the doctor ordered, and I led the way inside. Once inside, though, the prospect scarcely improved. ‘Velvet’ and ‘gilt’ and other basic furnishings were so many mere letters to whatever bounder had furnished the place, and the seats lining each wall looked shabby and well-worn.
Sparkle and her dragon parked themselves at one side happily enough. I begrudgingly perched at the other, trying to let as little of myself get in contact with the seat as possible. Roughing it may sound jolly in theory, but I was quickly learning that, in practise, one mitigates. Thank goodness for my fabled tolerance.
Eventually, as if the train had deliberated over the decision with all the agony its soul could muster, we began to trundle forth. I stiffened as the whole contraption lurched underhoof, and only slowly relaxed as the scenery slouched and then trotted and then cantered past the window, building to a gallop. The stout urban structure of the station, which I’d never thought I’d miss, was replaced by more rural greenery and cloudy sky than a stallion could need.
Sparkle and her bally dragon didn’t seem the least nonplussed, knowing, as they did, hardly any better. I opted instead to brood on the perilous adventure ahead and the immediate discomfort staring me in the face, as it were.
From one pocket of my waistcoat, I drew a packet of cigarillos, lit one with my magic, and had a mind-cleansing puff or ten. That helped draw me back to exactly the right frame of mind for concocting plots and stratagems. Once restored to being as merry an old Blueblood as I’d ever been, I was even of a sufficiently generous frame of mind to offer one to Sparkle. She politely declined. Her dragon whelp clutched forward for one, quite cheerfully, and it was Sparkle’s censorious look that flattened him before mine.
“Attend, Sparkle — Gloomy Twinkle, rather,” I announced, once the cigarillo was at half-mast and the rurality past the carriage’s windows had been reduced to so much blurry farmland. “I have a plan I would share with you.”
“Oh? Well, I’d … well, I’d be delighted to hear it.” She leaned hither to myself and looked properly attentive. Even her dragon glanced up from the comic he’d been furnished with at some point. “This should be good,” he said. Sparkle gave him another Look.
“Apprehending the Mockingbird and reacquiring Auntie’s painting. Those are our objectives. As a minor hurdle in our path stands the fact that we don’t know precisely where in Manehattan either may be. How do we correct this, do I hear you ask?”
Sparkle continued to look attentive. Her dragon rubbed his claws together, as if with anticipation.
“Why, it’s simplicity itself. As I’m sure we all know, Manehattan is the city civilisation forgot. To call it a vulgar hive of iniquity would risk insulting all other vulgar hives of iniquity. It has the occasional street or pony of culture, I grant, but only in the same sense that a bed of diseased molluscs has the odd pearl.”
Sparkle’s attentive look seemed to have frozen slightly, as if she was processing all this. To a sheltered academic, this sort of nitty-gritty knowledge would certainly be something of a revelation. “Oh, really?” she eventually ventured.
“Set aside all expectations that Canterlot may have instilled, Twinkle. Where we go, good class and taste go clear out the window, and all things grubby come cat-burgling their way up into said window to take their place. Imagine, a whole city chock-a block with ponies sufficiently vulgar as to have to work for their living.” I sighed, and puffed philosophically. “I suppose somepony has to do it somewhere down the great chain of society, but blessed if I can see the need to revel in it as Manehattan seems to.”
But back to business. “All this is background, you understand, from which we can extrapolate. We can deduce that with that sort of locale ever-present in their lives, the criminal class in Manehattan must be booming. You could start kicking at random in the city’s thoroughfares and be confident of concussing one if not several bank-robbers. Every serial I’ve read indicates the streets are heaving with gangsters and that the waterfront is where pirates gather for their weekly soirees. I’ve no doubt the serials ground themselves in the facts.”
With one more masterful puff, I laid down the last essential. “Consider now, that criminals oft flock together and learn from one another’s malfeasance. No pony comes into the world knowing how to wield a garotte or pick a lock, but rather must be taught it by their more worldly fellows. They all have dens, I understand, where they meet and scheme and cackle on a first-name basis.”
I drew the whole intricate web together. “Therefore, all we need do is decant ourselves into Manehattan, identify and apprehend a member of the criminal class — and that should not be difficult at all — and interrogate them as to the whereabouts of the Mockingbird. Elegant simplicity itself.”
You need my select sort of grey matter to unravel problems and conceive solutions like these, you know.
Sparkle appeared to be giving it a good, stiff mulling-over. Her dragon spoke first, a bright grin on his features. “Wow, that was good.” I favoured him with an avuncular smile. There’s hope for all of us, it seems.
Eventually, Sparkle spoke. “So just so I’ve got this,” she began, “you’re saying we find somepony who looks criminal. And then we ask them, ‘Where’s the Mockingbird?’ That’s the plan?”
“Succinctly put, Twinkle.”
She mulled things over more. I settled back with an easy smile, anticipating high praise, or perhaps some question begging elaboration on some minor point, or something of that nature.
Instead, Sparkle said, “And just to check, you’re certain that you were made responsible for retrieving the Harmony?”
“For the sixth time, Spar — I mean, Twinkle — yes.” This wasn’t the desired reaction at all. I gave her my sternest look. “Refer yourself to some brain specialist once this is done. This leak in your short-term memory badly needs corking.” Her dragon stifled a laugh, hemorrhaging the goodwill he’d cultivated, and I gave the little brute a censorious look. “And you kindly shan’t gargle.”
He coughed, and beamed at me. “Wouldn’t be caught dead.”
It was a pleasing image, but one couldn’t linger on it. Instead, I peered hard at Sparkle. “Come now, Gloomy Twinkle, I require your feedback on my plan. If you deem it flawless, say so. If you wish to interrogate a particular, lay on.”
She was silent for an interval. Then she rose and said, “I need to give it a little thought. Could I be excused?”
I blinked. “Whatever for?”
She hesitated for but a second. “Mare stuff.”
A gentlestallion doesn’t enquire. I waved her off, and off she trotted to attend to whatever. Goodness knows why she hauled the dragon along with her, but again, a gentlestallion doesn’t enquire. I turned my gaze to the window once more, where a distant line of mountains were trying and failing to enliven the view. I regarded them critically, finished my cigarillo, and withdrew another.
At one point, a flurry of green sparks flew past in the direction of Canterlot, like a little swarm of fireflies that had forgotten what colour they ought to be. The countryside just doesn’t know how to do things properly. I put them out of mind.
After however long, Sparkle re-entered with a thoughtful look on her face. Her dragon had come back with her, alas, and the smirk he flashed me was an odious one. He was consistent in his dreadfulness, I grant him that much.
“Your Highness,” she started auspiciously, “I think your idea would work perfectly.”
This was more like it. “Yes, I think so too,” I said cheerily.
“Though perhaps I could suggest one small addition?”
I waggled a magnanimous cigarillo. “Suggest away, my Clover.”
“Suppose we were to get lost or separated by, oh, some careless accident on my part,” she said breezily. “I could put a tracking spell on yourself and that would help me find you much faster if that sort of thing were to happen. Naturally, wherever you’d be would be the place to be, you being the leader in all this.”
Now take note. You’ll recall that previously, due to sheer kind presumption on my part, some perfidious mare took cruel advantage. I am unknowingly about to repeat this error. I assure you that I have learned from this whole experience, and a wiser, cooler-headed stallion narrates all this. Nowadays, were Twilight Sparkle to amble up and make the same suggestion, I would immediately raise my forehooves for battle and seek a wall to put my back against.
Alas, all I said then was, “Capital notion, Twinkle! Act on it, by all means.”
And she did, her horn glowing as she laid some intricate piece of spellwork upon me, the sensation akin to briefly being plunged into a warm bath. And at the time, more the poor dumb chum I, I distinctly recall nodding at her approvingly and making a mental note to praise her in my inevitable report to Auntie.
Little more to be said of the journey itself, with all the important chin-wag dispensed with. The train bloviated onwards, Sparkle drew out a book, her dragon returned to his comic, and I contemplated the infinite.
Time it ticked by, sinking ever-further into the afternoon. The rurality outwith grew gradually ever-urbaner. Out the carriage window, I could glimpse the far-off shapes of lofty buildings swaggering upwards, looking more smug with themselves than they had any right to be.
Manehattan awaited. I steeled my soul. Our platform rolled closer like the bells of Destiny.
“Now remember, Twinkle,” I said as to the dark towers we came, “you let me handle the actual interviewing of culprits and what-not. Leave the chancy work to your capable prince. Remain vigilant in the background and make notes and be prepared to abscond if need be. A feeble scholar like yourself has no business being on the frontline.”
Sparkle dutifully nodded.
“You,” I said, turning to the dragon about her withers, “attract no undue interest to yourself. Impersonate a particularly silent and ugly ornament.”
Dragons smile dutifully with rather a lot of teeth, I noticed.
And to Manehattan we came, and from the train we disembarked.
Truth be told, the initial impressions are all something of a blur — I’d never been quite this close to so many of the great unwashed, and my refined sensibilities reeled. There was a great deal of jostling and a great many bodies under a high, vaulted ceiling, shouts and laughs and grumbling carrying through it all like halitosis-tinged thunder. Sparkle smartly led the way and I mutely followed, past ponies and barriers and yet more ponies than the Creator had surely ever intended to exist, and then finally outside, where something like blessed fresh air greeted me.
I took my bearings.
I immediately regretted it.
Outside the train station, the broad streets of Manehattan forked seemingly everywhere, sporting crowds. A rank of yellow-painted cabs awaited by one edge of our sidewalk, their drivers in harness giving us expectant looks. Past them, carts and wagons blazed paths through the masses.
Those masses themselves were a mad blend — business-ponies and flocks of foals, couples marauding forth, labourers and couriers, grounded weather-teams, and representatives from all the known intelligent species, and perhaps some of the unknown and unintelligent ones too. Untold gangsters and muggers undoubtedly lurked in their midst.
All of it under Manehattan’s ghastly own sky-poking tower-buildings, their walls emblazoned with every sort of advert for every sort of product, each in more lurid colours than the last.
I didn’t quite swoon with horror, but it was a close-run thing.
“Come on. Shall we interrogate a criminal, Azure Sanguine?” Sparkle prompted me. She seemed to be quite enjoying the spectacle, the mad-mare. “What about her?”
She indicated a particular pony in the fray. I haven’t described the all-encompassing cacophony before now, so I shall at this juncture — a great ongoing thrum, gregarious and rumbling and punctuated by hoots from the wagon-drivers and distant honks from the ships in harbour — and I describe it merely to emphasise how this pony eclipsed it.
A unicorn newsfilly, the top of her over-large cap perhaps coming up to the base of Sparkle’s withers, with the apparent lung capacity of Auntie when she’s using the Royal Canterlot Voice at full steam.
“EXTRA, EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT!” she merrily bassooned, exploiting the plinth she stood upon. She brandished a newspaper in her magic and thwacked it atop of a stack of similar culprits. “MYSTERIOUS BREAK-IN AT CANTERLOT PALACE! PROGRESS IN THE ZEBRICAN BROTHERS’ WAR! SCANDALS OF EVERY ADJECTIVE! FEW IF ANY FALSEHOODS! ALL IN THIS AFTERNOON’S MANEHATTAN HERALD!”
Were newsfillies connected to a high degree with the criminal class? Not to my knowledge, though with this one’s calculatedly-oversized cap, I wouldn’t have put it past her. I inveigled my way hither.
“What-ho!” I ventured.
“HELLO YOURSELF, MISTER!” she rocketed right back at me, and I needed a moment to recover. “Whoops! I mean, copy of the Manehattan Herald? There you go! That’ll be one bit!”
“Wait, no,” I said, looking non-plussed at the newspaper that had been foisted into my forehooves while she stared unblinkingly at me, hoof outstretched. Then I considered adapting myself to my role. “I mean, ahem, wait, yes. Twinkle, pay this good yeo-mare, would you?”
With what I might have mistaken for a long-suffering mutter, Sparkle forked over the coinage, which the filly adroitly vanished about her person. “So,” I ventured, with subtlety and panache, “break-in at Canterlot Palace, you say?”
“Yup! Mockingbird at it again!” She seemed terminally incapable of finishing a sentence sans an exclamation mark. Even her question marks came with the implicit exclamation. I wasn’t sure how much of this my constitution could endure. “She’s great, ain’t she? Just pillaging all over the place, scarin’ the crust right off all them upper-crusts! I aspire to that level of moxie!”
“I say — I mean, well,” I corrected, past gritted teeth. “I’m sure some of these upper-crusts are rightfully disconcerted by the abstraction of their beloved heirlooms and would love to know of the thief’s whereabouts.”
“It’s a mystery, mister! ‘Scuse me, I’ve papers to sell!” She turned away and resumed bassooning. “READ ALL ABOUT IT! GOLEM-FIGHTING RINGS UNCOVERED THROUGHOUT—!”
“Blast it, listen!” I insisted. “WHAT?” she replied, and for a moment, the point-blank blast rendered me incapable. Strong stallions rallying round with brandy at that moment would not have been unwelcome. “Blark?” I feebly wheezed.
Somewhere past an unfathomable distance came Sparkle’s tones. “I beg your pardon,” she ventured. “My companion and I were just wondering if you might happen to have any more information about the Mockingbird? Any local knowledge about her usual haunts, anywhere she might have been seen or pawned something off?” Her voice dropped to a surreptitious octave. “Crime aficionados, you see, straight from Canterlot. Can’t resist a scandalous true story.”
There followed no immediate reply. Only the newsfilly sizing us up, for much too long a while. “Hey, you’ve got a dragon! Neat!” was her unpromising response.
“Darn right I am.” Sparkle’s dragon preened, as if he wasn’t loathsome enough.
“And from Canterlot, you say? Say, your pal there’s got a familiar face!” As my full faculties slunk back to me, the newsfilly insisted on persisting. “HEY, HE LOOKS A LOT LIKE PRINCE BLUEBLOOD, DON’T HE?”
“What? Prince Blueblood?” Sparkle glanced back at me and exaggeratedly shook her head. “Maybe a little around his ears, but otherwise … are you sure?”
“Positive!” The little demon’s eyes lit up. “This ain’t some undercover royal visit, is it? Gee, the Herald’ll be keen on a story like that! PRINCE BLUEBLOOD HIMSELF, INCOGNITO!”
What I wouldn’t have given for the nameless little fiend to have collapsed and arisen a mute. I would perhaps have settled for her not being able to be heard in different time zones. We were already getting some attention. “I’m not Prince Blueblood!” I desperately insisted.
“Sure you are! You got the face, and the blue eyes, and the kinda dopey expression! I sell papers with you on the cover all the time!”
I bit down the retort that came immediately to the lips upon the utterance of ‘dopey expression’. Mine is a noble countenance, I say. My teeth gritted again. “My resemblance to that worthy and pedigreed stallion is a lucky coincidence, and oft remarked on. I tell you, my name is Azure Sanguine.”
The filly’s eyes glinted with a little too much base intelligence for my liking. “‘Azure’ means ‘blue’, don’t it? And ‘sanguine’ means ‘blood’, right? That’s a lousy code-name you got there, PRINCE BLUEBLOOD!”
“I’ll have you know, you little blot on the landscape, that it’s a fantastic code-name!” It occurred that this perhaps hadn’t been an entirely helpful rejoinder. “Listen,” I hissed urgently, and scrabbled for my own purse. “I will give you these, er, ten bits to stop broadcasting in that vein.”
“Twenty,” she immediately said. “Also, you gotta sign an autograph for my friend Whirligig! She’s got a picture of you on her wall!”
I acquiesced, though not without whatever resistance I could sneak in (“Dear Whirligig, cordial wishes from your feudal superior, Prince Blueblood of Unicornkind. PS: I hope your friend’s trachea implodes.”). I shelled out whatever I could from my own purse when Sparkle’s proved insufficient and escaped down the street as soon as equinely possible.
Once at a reasonably safe remove, the dragon spoke up. “I liked her! We should have spoken to her more. ”
“Kindly belt it, you tiny excrescence.” I took a steadying breath and fixed Sparkle with my coldest look. “I recall the fateful words, ‘What about her?’ passing your lips, Sparkle.”
“Twinkle.”
“Whichever!”
“I’m very sorry, Azure Sanguine,” she said, looking all chagrined innocence. “I thought she might be one of those criminal classes you were talking about.”
The damndest thing was, Sparkle wasn’t altogether mistaken. The dictionary definition of ‘criminal’ ought to have that filly’s face appended. I sighed, thinking about all those bits from my stipend doubtlessly gone to fund future foul undertakings. And if in confirmation, siren tones fit to powderise any ear-drum arose in the distance.
“EXTRA, EXTRA, READ ALL ABOUT IT! PRINCE BLUEBLOOD DENIES ENTERING MANEHATTAN TODAY! PRINCE BLUEBLOOD ABSOLUTELY DENIES HE WALKS AMONGST US! READ ALL ABOUT IT!”
I yowled the yowl of a stallion who was suffering. “I don’t fathom,” I managed, at last, “how what amounts to ten pints of concentrated blackguard-ness can be contained in a half-pint like her.”
“Perhaps, Azure Sanguine, we ought to forget about her and just keep going?” Sparkle suggested, and the familiar and superb code-name helped settle my nerves somewhat. “If we head down toward the waterfront, there might be ponies there who haven’t heard her yet. More criminals you could try to interview.”
There was some sense to that. Pirates and smugglers and scurvy types would practically be tripping over each other down thereabouts. I took a moment to try and orientate myself sea-wards, and a longer moment to give up and just consult a sign. “Tantivy, Twinkle,” I declared, and a-hunting we went.
The ground level sort of tips down as you head towards Manehattan’s waterfront, and the buildings shed a few of their compensatory storeys. Past the odd gap, you get a view of the ship masts that crowd the harbour and shipyards. All of Equestria’s pegasus-driven clippers and windjammers jostle for space with foreign vessels, steam-spouting brutes that came hammering through underneath. You get the salty sea-breeze as well, much as you may wish you didn’t.
I found myself forging ahead, taking one of the narrow streets that led closer to what seemed like the shipyard side of things. “Recall that I spoke of criminal dens, Twinkle,” I said, and squinted at the buildings on either side. “We now search for such an establishment. If whoever we interview in there proves as similarly unrewarding, we simply move onto the next table.”
“Could that be one?” she said suddenly, once again all innocence.
I looked where she had gestured. Ahead of us, set within and seemingly taking up most of one wall, such a criminal den appeared to loom. The Seahorse was emblazoned on a board outside, under a picture of a gormless-looking seapony, and past its long, dark windows, I heard chatter and laughing and clinking glasses.
I smiled wolfishly. “Well-spotted, Twinkle. As iniquitous a lair as I’ve ever seen.” I strode up and paused before the dread portcullis. “Keep alert, you two. Doubtless we’ll be exposed to debauchery and sordid scenes beyond anything Canterlot permitted in its environs. Remain strong, and let me do the socialising.”
Sparkle mutely nodded, as if shaken by my description and steeling her nerves. Her little gargoyle smirked insufferably. If we found some pirate captain in there, I thought, mourning his recently deceased and monstrously ugly parrot, we’d have just the replacement to offer. And with that, I opened the door and ventured forth.
Within was …
… well.
The Seahorse was fairly light and airy, plush at ground level and spacious up top, with big windows at the back that afforded a view of the harbour. A large bar lined with bottles and taps took up a decent-ish wallop of the floor. Behind its counter, an old, rangy zebra stallion polished glasses and looked up curiously at my entrance.
Before and around the bar, ponies had congregated, most of them looking like shipyard labourers bidding adieu to the daily grind and wetting their whistles, their manes still dusted with wood-shavings. At the counter itself, there chortled a nautical-looking trio — two mares and a stallion. Their own manes and tails were plaited with tar and their sinewy frames sported what were either badly-misplaced cutie marks or marine-themed tattoos. Past them, in a relatively sedate alcove, two younger stallions were massacring a game of pool. Under said table, at their hooves, two little colts had set up rows of toy soldiers and were cheerfully marching them to their glorious deaths.
I’d half-expected a rusty cutlass to be bunged at my head at this point, according to the form book. Instead, all I got were a few curious looks, some of which persisted as the lookers studied my face carefully. One of the sailor mares winked at me. A cutlass at head-height might have been preferable.
“I go forth to socialise,” I whispered to Sparkle, half-unnerved myself. Sordid criminality ought to wear itself plainly, I thought, not be spacious and well-lit and suffer colts to fool around with toy soldiers. I found myself distrusting the place more and more as I stalked to the bar.
“Good day, stranger,” the old zebra stallion said as I approached, still polishing a glass. “What’s your poison?” To my side, the sailor mare winked harder, as if thinking I’d missed the hint the first time.
“Ah. Er. Hmm.” I did my best to ignore her and cast a perturbed eye over the rows of bottles, huddled as if suspected by the constabulary. “One, er, drink, good barkeep.”
He turned a languid eye towards his bottles and then turned as equally languid an eye back towards me. “You might care to specify.”
“Well, I, er.” I hadn’t exactly planned for this, was suddenly wary of sloshing back anything that might be considered suitable swill for the scruff, and the whole bally place had me on edge. “Dash it, pour me something good.”
He crooked one brow, but made no further queries. Instead, he ambled towards one of the furthest taps and began decanting into a well-polished glass. I ogled the room, wondering who’d be the best-informed as regards to roguery, and just when I’d reluctantly concluded that the winking menace and co. would be the ones…
“Sorry, dumb question, but are you Prince Blueblood?”
Had I inhaled any part of my drink at that point, I’m sure I’d have moistened the scenery. As it was, I just choked and took a moment to realise I ought to stammer out some denial. If I’d remembered to wear an inconspicuous dark cloak and cowl, perhaps this sort of thing could have been avoided.
“What? No! Though my resemblance to that noble scion of the line of Platinum is uncanny.”
“Oh.” My interrogator, a young mare who was still sawdusty from her ship-building duties, gave me a curious look over the rim of her glass. I noted with some dismay that the rest of her table was listening in. “Do you know him, then? You sound like you’re from Canterlot.”
“Well, er, only from afar. As this sort of shining beacon, you know.” Sweat was beading on the old brow.
“You’re his spitting image,” said the sailor mare this time, in what was probably meant to be a friendly sort of growl. “Hi, by the way.”
“Well, of course he’d be, Anemone,” said the singular sailor stallion with a snicker in his tone. “Canterlot, eh? You don’t get family trees there so much as one great family thicket.”
It took me a moment to process this, as well as some minimal working-it-out on my hooves, but once I apprehended, I flared up like a sprightly volcano. “I say!”
I mean, quality needs must marry quality, and that maxim can sometimes lead to some entangledness, but I’ll have you know no member of the line of the Platinum has married so much as a close cousin in, oh, decades.
“Settle, all.” The zebra returned with something amber-coloured and foamy in the glass. “Be civil, Rock Salt. You ought to know better. Peace, stranger. I’m sure Rock Salt didn’t mean to imply consanguineous goings-on.”
The concoction was placed before me. I eyed it warily. “Is this grog?” I’d heard it mentioned often in nautical tales, but was still hazy as to whether it was animal, vegetable, or mineral.
“Looks to me more like a glass of Seahorse Amber beer.” The zebra’s voice was serene, like, say, a swan upon still water. “But you sample it and be the judge.”
I continued to eye it. I understood beer in theory. Perhaps this was an initial drink all must sample before the underworld would accept them as one of their own. With stateliness and purpose, I lifted it up and sipped.
Then came the scenery-moistening.
After I’d finished coughing and spitting and wiped from my muzzle the beer that had come rocketing up past my larynx, I surveyed the damage. Though there were protests from either side, it seemed that the zebra had gotten the worst of it. His somewhat sodden features were still fairly calm, considering. His voice had acquired a note suggesting a hostile edge to the serenity, like, say, a pony-eating swan. “Am I to take that as a review on the quality of my homebrew?”
“Take it however you please, but skyfire, blachh, take it with the intent of keeping it far away from me!” The taste lingered on my tongue. “I’d feed that to pigs, but only if I had some uncommon grudge against the pigs and relished the notion of their misery! What the dickens do you put in that? Distilled sadness? Unquiet ghosts?”
“Hops play something of a part.” The unruffled amiability the old zebra had displayed at first was at a quick ebb.
On all sides, public opinion didn’t seem to be entirely with me. “Dear Celestia, imagine just wasting Seahorse Amber like that,” muttered one discontent stallion. “Definitely Canterlot manners,” another vouchsafed. Others murmured assent. The sailors were now giving me a collective look that echoed rumbling on ship-decks.
I was not to be cowed. “I’m surprised anyone in this building is compos mentis — though that is, of course, eminently open for debate — let alone able to see if this is the sort of thing you drink sans any coercion. Still, let’s see if I can salvage something from the whole pack of you. I shall try to be optimistic, though goodness knows what cause I have.”
There was something approaching a silence. Then one of the ship-yard workers said, in an unpleasant tone of voice, “Three sheets to the wind already, are we?”
“The devil does that mean?” I looked around for terminological assistance, but none was forthcoming. Sparkle, confound her, had sequestered herself by the colts under the pool table, and was enthusiastically helping them recreate the Battle of Gorgonmela. Her dragon had joined the pool game itself, and stalked around the table’s rim with cue in claw and a sharpshooter’s eye. One could almost get the impression they were purposefully not looking my way, no matter that it was becoming the dominant trend throughout the rest of the bar.
Left bereft, I turned back to the zebra barkeep. “Why should I be three sheets to any bally wind? Explain your court jester’s ravings.”
“It suggests that you’re suffering the effects of strong drink, stranger,” he replied. “Perhaps it’d be wise to excuse yourself, rest it off and drink plenty of coffee, and come back to offer apologies once you’re your better self again.”
“I am my best self at all times, you malevolent ruiner of perfectly fine water, and frankly, I think the average quality in this room puts you all on decidedly shaky ground when it comes to discussing anypony else’s quality. There’s an expression regarding stones and glass houses that temporarily eludes. Regardless, I’ve not had a sip of anything before setting hoof in this establishment, and the sip I’ve had was a fine argument for temperance.”
I warmed to my theme. Enough of their games.
I turned my commanding gaze to the rest of the astonished bar. “But let’s leave this professional poisoner’s defects aside. I’m feeling generous. Let’s leave all your defects to one side as well. Otherwise, we’d be at it for the rest of the century. All I require is some simple, straightforward information, which I’m sure most of you will have gleaned from your foul lifestyles, fouller associates, and those tendencies that make you objects of contempt wherever honest, decent ponies assemble. Now tell me truthfully, and tell me plainly. Where can I find the Mo—?”
There was a motion at one side, cutting me off. I turned to find myself practically muzzle-to-muzzle with one of the sailor mares, the one who hadn’t been winking. “Don’t breathe on me, you revolting pleb—”
“Maze,” she said. She didn’t appear at all appreciative of my frank character study. Rather, she had the air of one contemplating a happy task ahead. “You still have that longliner tied up out back?”
Maze seemed to be the sobriquet of the barkeep, seeing as how he answered to it. “It was tied up out back when I got this place, and odds are good it’ll still be there when my grandfoal’s grandfoals run it. Honestly, I’ve always just thought it part of the city’s scenery.”
“Come on, chump,” said the mare cheerily, and before I could realise who she’d called a chump, she all of a sudden had one of my forelegs in a lock, and my other foreleg had been similarly bound by one of her fellow scurvy-sufferers. “A nice bath will do you the power of good.”
A nice bath hadn’t been requested at any point. I was perplexed. No interpretation of any of my words could possibly lead to that conclusion. “Unhoof me,” I demanded, and tried to shrug both sailors off with a casual flex of muscle-power. This availed little, and they started to drag me in the direction of a back-door. Approving looks and frequent cheers marked their passage. “Unhoof me, I say! What are you playing at, you drooling reprobates? Unhoof me at once!”
They continued hauling, deaf to reason, and I continued to shout and began to scrabble, rearlegs flailing at the floor and any surfaces that might arrest my procession. “Get your bally hooves off! Twinkle! Twinkle? Step in, would you!” I cast my gaze about for any sign of her. “Twinkle? Twinkle’s dragon, whatever your name was? Come to my aid, dash you!”
But of my supposed allies, there was not a sign, and I was bundled out the back-door in the vice that was the two sailors, my rear hooves skittering over a stone jetty. A general sloshing indicated the ocean was imminent. It was a sunny afternoon and fairly pleasant all-round, if you didn’t mind the salt-smell and the being hauled to an uncertain doom.
At the moment where I was pondering all the forms that doom could take, up to and including ritual cannibalism, I was abruptly spun around and left contemplating the water’s edge. Below me, there was tethered a boat of sorts, as old as the hills and as mouldy as a mausoleum. It sloshed as it rocked on the waves, and I noticed that it was half-full of some murky water. Murky, I say, when I really ought to say ‘pitch-black’, and soupy with unidentified seaweed.
There were bubbles.
I got a premonition of my destiny then, and I will say, there is something to be said for ritual cannibalism. I scrabbled back as boldly a pony ever scrabbled, and laid a curse on the family names of my captors without a time limit, and generally did all within my power to steer clear of my Fate. The old poets know what comes of ponies who try that sort of thing, and alas, I was to prove very much a part of the tradition.
Without so much as a sea-shanty or a kindly reminder to hold my breath, the sailors pitched me forwards. Freefall, all-too-briefly, and then a great and calamitous splash.
It was hardly any distance to drop, and all the weed padded my descent, but all my breath was driven out by the sheer repellant shock of it. I spluttered and thrashed and strove to rise, dimly aware that my waistcoat and cravat may well now be write-offs, and once I’d resumed a standing position, yowled unkind language in the direction of my tormentors.
“Blighters! Bounders! Brigands! Other b-words! I’ll thrash the whole bally pack of you! I’ll — glark!” My outpouring of invective was abruptly dammed when my hooves slipped on a treacherously slick timber and I flipped backwards into the primeval goop. Whatever parts of me hadn’t been submerged previously were now, and those that had were getting a surprise second outing.
“Gchk!” I trumpeted. “Blarchk! I’ll glawarchk! Pfft!”
Learn from my errors. Do not have your mouth open when engulfed by bilgewater. Especially do not attempt to enunciate when you have a mouthful of the same. As mentioned, I am a wiser stallion these days, and have taken much trouble not to repeat the above.
In any case, it didn’t have the desired effect, and the sailors just had a chuckle at my expense before turning on their heels.
“Stars, it’s a shame,” I heard Anemone sigh as the blighters wandered off. “Every time, without fail. I eye up a handsome face and firm haunch and there’s always a total twerp between them.”
“You’ll find the right one eventually, Anemone,” said her sympathetic confederate.
“Yes, but when—” came her reply before they abstracted themselves from my senses altogether.
I fizzed in silence and sogginess, a white-hot sentiment building in me that threatened to boil the water roundabout. I spat out a length of weed and thought dark thoughts.
There came a cough from up above. I sighted Sparkle, the mare looking down over the jetty’s edge, with her dragon in close attendance. My mood did not improve.
Wordlessly, she summoned a set of purple-glowing stairs by which a stallion might ascend. I mustered what dignity I could and did so squelchily. I alighted upon the jetty, nursing the storm within.
“Sparkle,” I ground out. My vision of her was obscured by my trailing fringe, heavy with bilgewater and weeds. No matter. “We were in the same interior space, were we not? Within easy hearing distance of one another?”
She confirmed that this had generally been the case.
“And when I was being escorted along the road that led to my present state of disadvantage, did I not call for you? Multiple times?”
There was a noise of assent.
“And was I rescued from my plight? Or was I, to use an appropriate and regrettable turn of phrase, left in the soup?”
Given the choice between the two, Sparkle considered that the latter described the outcome better.
“Explain yourself, Sparkle.”
She looked at me, an awkward smile fizzling about her features, and said, “Well, Your Highness, you insisted that I leave diplomacy in your hooves, and that I was merely to hang back and take notes.”
I goggled. Struck by a sudden inability to verbalise my deepest sentiments, I produced a yowl that could have come from an orchestra’s brass section having a nasty shock. The inability passed. “What the frabjous thump,” I stuttered out, “was diplomatic about what was happening at the end there? There is often nuance in this world, Sparkle, but the dividing line between diplomacy and brigandage is bally definite, and you should have had no trouble discerning which predominated.”
Her gaze was bright and, so it seemed, gormless. “I thought it was very subtle diplomacy, Your Highness. Your reasoning was far beyond my ability to understand, and I was sure you’d planned for that exact sort of reaction. Was I mistaken?”
It was a shade beyond the pale.
It was several shades beyond, in fact, bordering on black. Here I was, inviting Sparkle along on glorious adventure — and really, how many times in her scholarly life was she going to get the chance? — in a loyal Auntie-serving cause she ought to have rejoiced in. And in return … this was the ability she evinced? Is this what she considered Equestria and her Princess needed from her?
“I see I have made a mistake,” I said coldly. Even the pang that admission ought to have caused barely registered, so consumed was I with other thoughts.
“Not much of one, Your Highness. I’m sure they’ll let you apologise, and it’ll clean right off.”
I took a moment to breathe deeply.
“Clearly, you had no business being here in the first place, Sparkle,” I continued, as if she hadn’t spoken and I hadn’t needed to take a long pause. “I shall reflect upon my decision-making then, and the sum total of your use may lie in making a sadder, wiser stallion of me. But you serve no more use here. Go.”
Her face credibly fell, though her tone was a little flat. A more mentally settled Blueblood might have made something of that. “Oh no. Are you sending me away?”
“I wash my hooves of you, and I hope you know how to take yourself away. Abscond, Sparkle.” I turned my face to the sea.
After a few minutes, I was aware of her leaving. Her and her dragon both. I didn’t vent much more anger their way. I had mine at a good, steady glow, and was not about to waste it.
Eventually, I blasted steam out my nostrils, pawed the ground, and turned sharply. An alleyway snaked out of the jetty and led back onto the street. I stormed forth, and paid little heed to the passersby shrieking at the new sea-monster that had blundered into their lives. I simply made straight for the door of The Seahorse and slammed it open.
“Now see here, you horde of damned hooligans—!”
I elect to draw a veil over my second visit to the boat. I have that prerogative in this narrative; I choose to exercise it.
I elect to do the same for my third visit as well.
Suffice to say I was getting jolly tired of it by the time I found myself gargling bilgewater for the third time, and my erstwhile pack of amateur bath-attendants were getting a little tired too. “Not that this isn’t cathartic,” Anemone remarked as they sashayed off, “but I do have a drink that’s not drinking itself.”
“Tell you what, come back tomorrow,” said Rock Salt. “Make a once-per-day thing of it. You can be a part of our routine.”
I sprayed vindictive bubbles after them and was soundly ignored. Possibly for the best. They weren’t very good bubbles; my heart was no longer in it. Their voices had long faded by the time I hauled my way out of the boat. The afternoon was darkening overhead as I slouched forth, well-marinated in all things bilgey.
A night-time of the soul had descended upon me as I squelched through the streets of Manehattan, drawing only the occasional shriek. It was hard to know what to do for the best, and when the line of Platinum loses its certainty, it bumbles rudderless.
Attempting to interrogate a criminal-looking sort availed little, as they simply eluded my squelching attempts at pursuit while calling me opprobrious names. In a fit of desperation, I think I once asked a stray cat where the Mockingbird was. And the sight of a freshly-printed newspaper sporting an old photo of me and a headline to the effect of PRINCE BLUEBLOOD IN SECRET MANEHATTAN VISIT, WANTED FOR AFFRAY DOWN AT WATERFRONT, SOAKED IN BILGEWATER (and in a smaller heading below, PRINCESS’S FAVOURITE PAINTING STILL MISSING) had all the effects on my mood you might expect.
Even my cigarillos were denied me as a morale-booster. Bilgewater had mixed with the packet, and had not mixed well.
And so it was that I ended up squelching aimlessly through an unknown part of the city, where the narrow streets were quiet and the high buildings angled up towards an evening sky, when I heard the mare in distress.
“Help me!” came the wail from down a shadowy alleyway. “Muggers! They … they want my wallet! That’s all the money I have, please! Don’t wave that club around near my foal! Anypony!”
The fires of the line of Platinum may on rare occasion simmer low, but the merest outside spark’ll get it roaring merrily again. I looked up, eyes flaring, my vigour pounding back in waves. “Fear not!” I boomed, and squelched down into the darkened alleyway like a charger of old. “Help’s on the way!”
I mean, an obviously poor-but-honest mare in distress, a sole beacon of humble integrity in the midst of this dreadful city, being menaced by the city’s more notorious element? To the line of Platinum’s noblesse oblige, that’s as good as a war-trumpet. And, in a thought that only occurred when I was already pelting down the alley, knocking down the mugger would guarantee a concussed crook to pose sharp questions to.
I thundered on, seeking my quarry. And you’ll agree that I did in a sense, when a size nine cosh suddenly came whirling up out of the gloom and took me just behind my right ear.
All was suddenly very starry.
In time, the starriness abated and sensation returned. My head ached like someone had taken a size nine cosh to it. Something metal pressed about my fetlocks. I heard distant water rushing, as if a river was in high spirits.
I groaned and cracked my eyes open and found myself shackled between two statues. An upright marble mare who’d forgotten to put her forelegs on that morning, and another marble piece detailing Flash Magnus glaring off into the middle distance, presumably at the rotter who’d absconded with his clothes and barding.
And across from me, there stood the Mockingbird.
“‘What-ho’ is the phrase, isn’t it?” she said.
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I usually associate "sanguine" with the color of blood specifically, and so thought Blueblood was being just right enough to be so very, very wrong by naming himself "Blue Red".
Come on, Twilight. Nicotine will hardly harm a creature who treats volcanic fumes the same way you do the smell of wildflowers.
I suppose we should be grateful that Blueblood isn't one for comic books.
Good to see Twilight didn't forget the second half of "trust, but verify."
There's enough irony in this statement for half a skyscraper.
The news cycle has mutated over the years, but the core remains the same.
Now, now, Blue, there's no call for that kind of language. He doesn't have a waterspout; he's clearly a grotesque.
Yeah, then ponies might instead mistake you for A. K. Yearling. Who would probably be similarly disappointed by the place being too light and airy for a proper hive of scum and villainy.
I'm not sure what I love more, Twilight getting to be the big sibling in a game of toy soldiers or Spike the pool hustler. Which I imagine comes easily when you own the only set of thumbs in the building.
Ah, there's the other half.
And... Well, Blueblood accomplished his goal. He's found both the Mockingbird and her hideout. But the question of "Now what?" lingers over him like the Sword of Damocles, and he's gone and dismissed his detail mare. (Of course, there's still that tracking spell...) Eagerly looking forward to seeing what happens from here.
A very hilarious story here (featuring everypony's favorite royal punchbag
)
Was sooo glad Twilight did some fact-checking regarding Blueblood's *adventure* mission, plus good use of that tracking spell. Also seeing her & Spike just chilling out at The Seahorse while Blueblood was getting grilled (or dunked as the case may be😂) was just priceless!
Till the next dropkicking err I mean adventurous tale of Blueblood!
10435519
Hah, that'd have been fun, and perfectly fitting for Blueblood - getting onto the right track, and then whirling into a perfectly avoidable crash regardless. Not intended, though, alas. I've always associated sanguine with blood itself rather than the colour, in light of 'sanguine humours' and suchlike.
10435544
As far as Twilight's concerned, as the pony who lives in close proximity to Spike, the fewer interesting things his digestion has to work with, the better.
She'd probably go so far as to call it a disappointing tabula rasa of a place, and then have her umpteenth argument with her editor about what that exactly means.
No false modesty here, they're both pretty excellent. Though my slight preference goes to Twilight playing with soldiers and laying out historical battles. Both educational and bloodthirsty fun!
Glad to induce anticipation!
10435565
Glad to oblige on that front! It does seem a bit unrealistic to portray the nobility as a pure hostile monolith in stories in like these. Even if they're mostly approaching Twilight and the princesses in the name of pure self-interest, you'd think that most of them would do so by currying favour, subtly sucking up and getting in their good graces in the hope of favours and friendly contact, or even just realising that they lose nothing through civility to the powers-that-be.
In this case, and in normal circumstances back in the palace, Blueblood's sufficiently secure in himself and loyal to his auntie that it wouldn't even occur to him to be especially hostile to her student. Patrician aloofness, at worst; blithely forgetting she even exists in the main.
10435686
Glad you like it so far! Twilight having a far happier time of it than Blueblood at the bar was great fun to write.
The next and last chapter featuring Blueblood's misfortunes in Manehattan should be out tomorrow!
Either the noun or the adjective is inverted, much like the frown that once defiled my countenance.
Out of curiosity, did you draw from other sources for the invective, or does that sort of verbal acumen come naturally?
10435893
Ordinarily, a winning personality would make up for any degree of daftness, but on character creation, Blueblood opted to make both Intelligence and Charisma his dump stats. I've not got a good feeling about his Wisdom either.
For all his faults, he does love his Auntie. He'd be hard to work with as a protagonist if he didn't have that and a couple of other virtues.
Three-parter in all! Tomorrow'll bring the conclusion to Blueblood's (mis)adventures. Glad you've been enjoying it so far.
10435930
The overall style's my stab at Wodehousian, but a lot of the invective is very much drawn from the old boys' weekly stories penned by Charles Hamilton. 'Frabjous thump' is a direct lift, and whatever other blandishments Blueblood heaps on the ponies around him almost certainly have their origin there as well. They seem to fit him nicely.
I mean, she'd be doing a lot of ponies a favor if she did, and got this whole affair ended before it began.
Oh good, Twilight's already got him figured out. That'll help make things at least a little easier for her.
Well...he's not wrong...just not in the way he thinks.
Okay, but as soon as you're done laughing at him behind his back, do come back so to gather even more material so to laugh at him again later.
I wonder how long it took Spike to stop laughing at Blueblood until he could compose himself long enough to send that letter.
All said, this has been a great day for Spike, hasn't? Free entertainment wherever he goes all day!
...ew.
If you're thinking the cold water will clear his head, then I'm sorry to disappoint, it doesn't appear it gets any "clearer" than this.
I suppose that's going to be the closest to a compliment Blueblood's going to get this whole story.
Shall I count the ways?
10436130
He's one of those fairly easy ponies to figure out as well. Just assume he'll go for the least optimal and common-sensical route, and then take whatever pains you please to try and fail to dissuade him.
I've always liked Spike when he's acting the role of a sardonic chorus. Turns out when you stick him in a story alongside Prince Blueblood, he gets umpteen chances to act on that.
Aristocratic pedigrees are dreadful things, and not to be pursued even once.
10436179
I mean, the fact that the results of such pedigree resulted in Blueblood ought to be motive enough to avoid it. Clearly, little of anything actually good will come of it.
10435693
It's the sheer lack of effort that gets me more than anything. It's like slapping a title on a pony, other than princess, gives writers carte blanche to not have to try to make them interesting anymore. And audiences will buy any and all negative qualities, no matter no little sense they make, how contradictory they are, especially in the context of MLP where it's shown pretty much everyone outright worships Celestia. Noble ponies will do everything to get more power... except anything positive or smart. It's baffling.
Do you know how many times I've come across a pony noble trying to grab power with the justification of then being in a better position to serve his or her princess? Never. Literally never. Not even that being only partly true. Pride, being chosen, being considered worthy, that's never a motivation for pony nobles, only self-destructive backstabbing contempt for their rulers that would make a Skaven blush.
/sigh
So, I really like how Blue loves his Auntie. For all his many faults, he cares a great deal for his family.
And he's dumb, in a weird way. Actually, and this may sound crazy... he reminds me of Pinkie Pie. It's not that he can't make connections in his brain, he can, they're just nonsensical to everyone else. Now it remains to be seen if he can also have flashes of chaotic insight.
It's good to read this interpretation, in any case. I'm right now stuck on my own second Blueblood chapter, and while the story itself is not-safe-for-work, his current situation is one of of a misguided, innocent romantic ideal more than anything, brought up with the wrong person. So, I'm grateful for this inspiration.
10436475
The nobles in This Platinum Crown are probably more what you're looking for.
I was kind of surprised Twilight seems so at ease off in Manehatten with effectively no supervision. But I guess even without knowing much about friendship she's still ok at social interaction, and Celestia must have given her a reason to feel things are under control.
I wonder why Mockingbird would grab Blueblood at all. I guess she thinks she can extract more value from kidnapping him? Or maybe she's taking an opportunity to gloat or humiliate him; she does target nobles after all.
10435544
I'm not sure what I love more, Twilight getting to be the big sibling in a game of toy soldiers or Spike the pool hustler. Which I imagine comes easily when you own the only set of thumbs in the building.
Depends if there are any Unicorns in the building and how fine their ability to manipulate things with their magic is. I bet Rarity could give Spike a run for his money. (Fanfic notion: Spike and Rarity as a team of wandering pool hustlers. Discuss).
10436475
It's a curious thing. For every Backstabby McSneersalot, you'd also expect there to be another noble who's of diligent assistance to the Princesses and generally lives up to a familial tradition of royal service. As well as another noble like Blueblood, who just wants to live beautifully and unburdened by the weight of the world. And those two probably wouldn't invite Backstabby to their parties if they could help it. A cad like him would just rather lower the tone, you know?
Glad to provide it! Giving him a portrayal that stayed true to his canon prattishness, explored new and exciting facets of that prattishness, and which still equipped him with sympathetic motives and impulses appealed greatly, and it's nice to ken I'm in good company on that front.
10436851
Twilight's okay at social interaction, even at this stage in her life, and a lot better informed about and able to navigate Manehattan than certain other ponies in her company. Besides, confidence comes easily while you've somepony like Blueblood to compare your own competence against.
Today's chapter should shed light on what the Mockingbird intends with Blueblood.
10436895
If the peasantry didn't want to help fuel the scientific and arcane enquiries of their betters, well, they should have had the sense to not be born peasants. Beginner's mistake, really.
10436913
What discussion is there to be had about pure perfection?
10436851
I mean, Anenome did point out he's got a cute face and a firm haunch....
*is beaten with rolled up newspapers*
10437005
The Mockingbird's method of flirting may need work, but you can't deny it gets results.
Oh, this is brilliant.
Especially the third consecutive dunking, which somehow caught me just as off-guard as it must have Blueblood.
And Spike continues to steal the show from the sidelines.
But what does the Mockingbird see in old Bluey here?
10435519
Sanguine has a number of definitions. To quote Firefly's Zoe,
10436835
Yes. Thank you for bringing that up. It's a story I love, and upon reflecting about it, I must correct my post from before: I've seen one story where noble ponies do grab power thinking to better serve their monarch that way. It's a great deal of personal anguish for Celestia, in fact, because she loves all of them, many are her family, and seeing them feud, fight, or even kill one another in her name makes it all so much worse.
10436945
Something I've found lately, by watching a bald man throw spears at medieval shields... it's quite often not the normal things that get reported, but the unusual ones. Such as spears lodging themselves into shields, thereby weighing them down and making them less effective. Now, I was told, years back, that this was the idea behind the design of the Roman pilum... except if you actually throw it against a shield, it will punch through far enough to hurt the person holding it. So it's more likely the idea behind the design was hitting people, and it weighing down a shield occasionally happened when the person carrying it got lucky enough not to be impaled straight away.
Sorry for the tanget there; what I mean to say, in a roundabout way, is that nobles simply doing their jobs probably isn't made much of. And Canterlot High Society was remarkably friendly overall, if a bit shallow and more than a bit self-indulgent. Rarity explicitly did NOT learn the lesson that rural country=good, high society=bad, which I commend the show for.
Well... after reading this chapter, it's been very heavy on the prattishness, and lacking in any positives, to be honest. I'll read the last one now, but I didn't enjoy things quite as much by the end as I'd hoped.
This is hilarious. Poor, stupid Blueblood. Love how Twilight's like "yep, I'm out."
10477386
Glad you like it!
Ah, if only the show had bothered to do something as amusing as this with Blueblood.
But, they'd have needed actual writers first. (WHOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!) *sickest of burns!*
10598643
Definite missed potential for Blueblood in the show. He could have made for a fun antagonist/redeemable ally of convenience/chew-toy in Canterlot-based episodes.
I do so dearly love irony. :)
Also how googling "cosh" got me both the definition of the word and charts detailing the hyperbolic cosecant.
10713010
Prince Blueblood knows all about irony; it's one of those metal thingummies like bronze-y or steel-y.
Present, what have we told you about coming into comments sections and blatantly making up words.
10436475
The Lunaverse has all kinds of nobles, including several that claim - with some evidence - they seek power to help. Maybe 2/3 of which are probably lying to themselves, but the other third are decent. (Hooray for Max)
10731403
I've heard... not so good things about the Lunaverse and its treatment of Luna's court. Mostly that it's such a den of vipers, so incompetent and so utterly void of positive influence on the world that it could only be mildly improved by Trixie threatening to poison everyone there with truth serum and then using any and all things they blab about to ruin their lives (and getting away with all that), in addition to Luna disbanding it in all but name. On top of the creator of the Lunaverse coming to hate what it did to his creation and putting a moratorium on any court-related stories for a good long while.
That, and what I heard about how the canon Mane Six are written, plus some fanon additions I'm not a fan of, have kept me well away from that setting. There's one story I enjoyed, and that was Crisis on Two Equestrias for being the least Lunaverse out of the Lunaverse stories.
But perhaps these issues have been addressed in the meantime?
10731807
I do believe I said all sorts of nobles, and that about 2 in 3 were not great. Many of them are mostly bad with some good. My point was that some of them were generally good ponies, not that that was the norm. I guess it depends on whether you are looking for good nobles or avoiding bad ones. And RDD definitely never intended them to be as bad as they got, but they are turning over a new leaf.