Order-naries: Vacation

by CTVulpin

Epilogue

Trixie's full power came back two days later, but she allowed Luna to spend her last night in Manehatten helping with her magic show anyway. Soul kept away from the backstage area for the rest of the week, and was surprised to find a letter from Trixie in his pack as he prepared to leave for Canterlot. The letter was written in Trixie's flamboyant stage persona and the meaning was hard to decipher, but Soul managed to unearth an admission of forgiveness from the midst of it. "Aw, she likes you," Heart teased him when he showed it to her. Soul just rolled his eyes and packed the letter away.

Luna arrived home to slightly less fanfare than her sister had, but she didn't mind. She and Celestia spent several hours in private telling each other of their weeks and finding much to laugh about. By the end, they agreed it had been for the best that Luna hadn't intervened with the stars, since that had allowed Celestia to learn of her Poison Joak infection. The flower was eventually traced young florist who had unwittingly picked it while ghatering inventory and added it to the bouquet Ash had swiped. Luna also talked Celestia into holding a talent night for the castle staff, to be headlined by a Stella Moon and her amazing illusions.

Ashen Blaze was allowed to return to Canterlot, although he kept himself scarce for several days out of a feeling of self-preservation. Celestia had not made any statement, official or otherwise, regarding his standing in her eyes beyond an acknowledgement that his idea to scan the Princess with PC had been right. After a while, he began to relax and go about his usual business, although he decided out of the blue to get himself an apartment in the city proper rather than continue to stay in the castle's school wing. He moved in next to Gale, whom he gave PC back to with the solemn promise to ask before borrowing it again.

One morning, a week or so after Luna's vacation, Gale emerged from her apartment to find Princess Celestia lurking by Ash's door. Swallowing her surprise, she executed a quick bow. "Stand," Celestia said off-handedly, her attention devoted to the door in front of her.

"What are you doing here Princess?" Gale asked.

Celestia shushed her and stifled a giggle. "Just wait," she whispered. Curious, Gale sat down and watched. A short time later there was a solid thud from within Ash's apartment, followed by sounds of confusion and frustration. Gale could hear something dragging on the floor and thumping occasionally in time to muffled "Ows" as Ash's hoof-steps neared the door. There was a sound of scrabbling as Ash struggled to open his door. Gale's confusion grew; why wasn't he using his magic? She got her answer as Celestia took pity on Ash and magiced the door open. Gale gasped as she saw Ash half-lying on the ground due to an enlarged head that looked quite heavy and uncomfortable. Ash's eyes rolled up and shrank as he saw Celestia, who was sitting very regally, her amusement almost totally hidden.

Ash gaped at her for several seconds before finding his voice. "You," he said, "This… Poison Joak?"

"Poison Joak," Celestia said with a sedate nod, a wicked smile crossing her face.

"Why?" Gale and Ash both asked, the former through giggles.

"Consider it payback for going against my wishes," Celestia said, "While you were right in your approach to my problem, you still went against my wishes and direct orders. I can't really punish you for being right, but I can't let you get away with defying me either. I think this is happy medium."

"You put Poison Joak pollen on my bed to teach me a lesson?" Ash looked like he was going to burst. Celestia just smiled. "Gale!" Ash pleaded, "Help."

"I'll send a letter to Zecora," Gale said, stifling her laughter.

"Thanks," Ash said grumpily, dragging himself back into his apartment and slamming the door.

"Well, that was fun," Celestia said, standing up, "I'll have some of the cure sent over right away- Zecora made more than enough for me." She walked to the window at the end of the hall and flew off toward the castle, back to her royal duties. All was right with the world.

Comments

[UseFistNotMouth]

Great characterization in this one if a little light on adventure.

[Emeral Bookwise]

My first fict in this continuity was Of Two Minds and after reading that I immediately moved onto its sequel Multi-mental in Manehatten, but that was still in progress at the time, so still wanting more I decided to delve into the backlog, which brought me to this fic. The original Order-naries fic might have seemed a more logical place to go, but I still had no real clue who those were, and I was far more interested in seeing the encounter between Trixie and Luna that had been briefly mentioned in Of Two Minds.

Because of that however I can say that the Oder-naries really do merit respect as characters unto themselves. Even stripped of most of their otherworldly background, and with little frame of reference to work from, I found all of them to be delightfully entertaining, with all the witty character interplay and banter that makes such fictional entities seem to come alive.

Anyway, the encounter between Trixie and Luna was entertaining enough, if a bit predictable and mediocre in it’s resolution. Luna is, as to be expected from when this was first published, largely based on her then standard fanon persona, but because of the way she is handled, easily reconciled with her full canon debut. The twins were also an interesting add on, but really never managed to serve in much capacity that couldn’t have been filled by any generic guard/escort, beyond the occasional outsiders perspective they get due to their from another world origin, but even in that respect there were all too, and to forgive the pun, ordinary.

The really meat of this story though was the plot involving the mystery of what’s wrong with Celestia. This is also where my backwards introduction to this continuity really factored in. Ash and Gale are more than just OCs at this point, well technically they still are, but seeing them for the first time already fully fleshed out and developed they feel just as deep as the mane cast. I may not understand why Rarity has a crush or what’s got Celstia so freaked about a simple computer scan, but I don’t have to because all the characters just flow so naturally.

I’d already met Ash, if only briefly in Of Two Minds, but in this fic I really got to know and appreciate him. I would later go onto get to know him even better in other fics, but I still somewhat feel that this is when he was truly at his most interesting, with no world ending crisis to resolve. He’s cordial enough to Celestia, if plainly not all that interested in her current problem, yet overtly disrespectful of her authority when it goes against his rather blunt sense of pragmatism. It makes for an odd contrast, a sort of maturity to do what needs to be done no matter the consequences combined with a childishly selfish adherence to his own ideals and the unwillingness to compromise that spawns from both. Then there was Gale, who I’d very much like to speak equal volumes about, but can’t really think of anything more to say at the moment other than that she was the perfect foil to Ash throughout the whole story all the way to the final joke at the very end.

In the end every tension and conflict in this story was resolved with the most simple and straight forward approach, but that’s no real complaint, quite the opposite even. Too many authors get overly invested in epic narratives, when the real strength of MLP tends to lie in the more slice of life aspects, and which I tend to find to be the more impressive works. Anyone can invoke involvement from the reader when the stakes are big and the action intense, it takes an all together different kind of skill to really get a reader interested in the more mundane aspects of life. Not that there’s anything wrong with epic scale adventures, and this particular continuity has plenty of that to go around in other installments, but it’s always nice to see an author that can deliver the full spectrum variety.

[CTVulpin]

859531

Fixed.

[Majk]

Good, underthumbed story.
And that ending... Trollestia in her finest.

[MariusIoannesP]

Princess Trollestia strikes again!