TCB: The Red Shoes

by Madrigal Baroque

The way you always thought it would be

"Feather! Feather, wake up! Wake up!!"

Featherfall blinked her eyes open. After…well, after getting very…frisky…with Lilac and Chip, she'd drifted into a spent and blissful slumber. She couldn't have been asleep that long; she still felt a sweet ache in her…well, in places she'd never used so…diligently before. "Hwuh…?"

"It's Tib! She's being called to the Pony Room!"

Featherfall sat up and shook her head to settle her still blissed-out brain. "What? Tib's getting Ponified? Today?"

"No, the second Tuesday of next week!" Chip was laughing with excitement. He was already up and trotting to the door. "Let's go wish her luck!"

Featherfall followed after with Lilac at her side. All the way down the hall towards the lobby she wondered when they were going to talk about…about what happened. They did need to talk, didn't they?

Didn't they?

The voice of the blond Finnish tech guy–Alex? No, Alexi–derailed her train of thought. "...I can't even spell this and I'm looking right at it! Wait, what? Is that what she goes by? Great. TIB! Come on down, Tib! You're the next contestant on The Ponification Is Right!"

Chip stopped dead in his tracks at the doorway, and both Lilac and Feather almost plowed into him, checking their gait only just in time. They all saw Tib being dragged across the lobby, almost literally, by an arm held fast in the grip of a grimly determined Beth. Tib wasn't putting up any resistance; if anything, she looked…ashamed?

When Beth came back, she was alone. She stomped to her desk and set down heavily. Almost at once she was besieged by three agitated equines demanding information.

Chip: "What the hay is going on with Tib?"

Lilac: "Is Tib okay? What happened to her?"

Featherfall: "Why were you forcing her back there? Conversion is supposed to be voluntary!"

Beth held up both her hands. "Hold on a minute! Tib's fine. Nobody's forcing her. She didn't change her mind or anything. There was just…something went on outside, and–"

"Outside?" Lilac was puzzled, but Chip caught on at once.

"She went out to chase off the protestors, didn't she? Oh, Celestia, it was all my fault. She knew I was upset. I shouldn't have said anything…"

Featherfall gave him a nuzzle that was almost a poke. "We were both upset. And Tib is confrontational." She looked at Beth. "Did she get hurt?"

"I think one of them hit her with a rock. The woman was talking about stoning her."

Featherfall felt a very unponylike flash of rage. She wheeled around and started galloping towards the outer door. It was locked, and she was trying to decide whether to find someone to open it for her or just buck the thing down when Chip trotted up to her. "Don't bother, Feather, it's okay, they're gone. See?"

Featherfall looked out of the clear plasteel door. Sure enough, the area was deserted except for a worker from one of the other Bureaus collecting the discarded signs. Her anger only somewhat abated. She wanted someone to…to confront about this! "They hit Tib with a rock!" she fumed. "They were going to stone her to death, right on the steps of this place!"

"But they didn't," Chip pointed out, moving in front of Featherfall and coaxing her away from the door. "In fact, Beth said she felt more like she was saving them. Tib was on her feet, hopping mad, and about to go after Wig Woman when Beth brought her in."

"Twenty to one?" Feather scoffed. "Even Tib's not that crazy…is she?"

"Most of them were gone. Just three were left and Beth thought Tib could've taken them."

Chip shivered at the very thought of violence, but Featherfall smirked. "I bet she could have." She still wanted to go after the one who threw rocks at her friend (just to remonstrate with them, really, that was all), but she was less angry at them now and more concerned about Tib. She let Chip steer her back towards the lobby. She could talk it out with Tib when she came out…if she still felt like talking about it as a pony.

"It's a good thing she got called in the middle of all this," Chip observed as they rejoined Lilac, who was waiting outside the Pony Room. "That was a real stroke of luck."

"Yes...quite the coincidence, that." Featherfall wondered if it really was a coincidence. She looked at her friends

(but weren't they her lovers now?)

and Lilac was as trusting and accepting as always, but she could see in Chip's eyes that he was wondering too.

Eventually the door opened, revealing a magnificently tall, indisputably imposing crimson pegasus with a rich, shining mane and tail of pure white streaked with glistening ebony. Her eyes were a shade lighter than emerald but no less rich in hue. She stood there, looking like a stranger, but when she smiled it was with Tib's quirky tilt of the lips, and when she spoke it was with Tib's musical voice. "Hey y'all, where y'at?"

Lilac squealed and charged her. As soon as she hit the crimson pegasus they both went down in a fury of flailing hooves and fluttering wings, right there in the doorway, completely shattering the regal air the newest pony of their group presented. "Whoa, girl! Take it slow, I not used to four laigs yet, me!" But she was laughing.

Chip went to help them both up, while Featherfall marveled at her friend's transformation…and how much of her hadn't changed. "Still a klutz, I see," she observed as Tib rose unsteadily to her hooves.

My name's Madrigal Baroque now," the crimson pony said. "And we can't all be the epitome of grace you are."

A throat cleared noisily behind her, and Tib–Madrigal–moved hastily into the hallway, almost falling on top of Lilac again but managing to stay on her hooves. Harmony trotted sedately out behind her granddaughter. "Enough loitering," she said in her sternly kind voice. "You need to practice walking on those long legs, so let's get moving."

"It's not the legs that worry me, it's these things." Awkwardly Madrigal fluttered her oversized wings. She seemed to be having trouble making them lie flat on her back.

"I can help you." It was the first time Featherfall had ever said those words, and she meant them with all her newly-awakened heart. "With flying, I mean. It's easier than you might think. You'll be airborne in no time."

Madrigal snorted. "Even a klutz like me?"

Impulsively Feather nuzzled her shoulder. It was all she could reach. "Even a klutz like you, Maddie."

***

Author's Note:

So the embittered, misanthropic ex-ballerina who hated the whole world and herself equally learns to care about others.

That's not the power of the Potion. That's the power of learning to love others, and to love yourself too.