Backstage

"Fillies and gentlecolts! Live from the Harmony Theater in Neigh York, this is the Comedy Central Roast of Princess Celestia!" Spike's voice rang throughout the auditorium. Throughout Equestria in homes and buildings from Canterlot to the Crystal Empire, the image of a beautiful white stage adorned with coloumns, clouds and all manner of royal scenery was broadcast. Descending from the cieling was an enormous wooden sun, a prop containing the center of attention: Princess Celestia. She stepped out and took a seat on a throne in the middle of the stage made to look just like the one she sat on back in Canterlot. Applause echoed off the walls as she graced the audience and cameras with a warm smile.

"Presented by Hasbro and Flim Flam Formulas..." Spike continued reading through the list of sponsors as the applause died. The theater was packed with ponies. Celebrities, recurring characters, background characters and even original fanmade characters filled the seats from the front of the stage to the back of the complex. Off to the right of the stage and behind the curtain, the newly crowned Princess Twilight Sparkle was having her very first nervous breakdown... as an alicorn princess.

"Twilight..."

"Why did she pick me? I don't understand this! I didn't even know what a 'roast' was until two hours ago! What if something goes wrong?" Twilight carried on an exasperated conversation with mostly herself as her friends did their best to calm her down. Naturally, their efforts were futile.

"Twilight, you might want to calm down a bit." Rainbow Dash said to her. "You've got wings now. If you get too stressed out, you might start molting. You don't want to lose those feathers early. Let me tell ya, it's kind of embarassing."

"Molting?!" Twilight asked in shock. "Now I have to worry about molting?! I don't know if I can go through with this. What am I going to do if-"

"Twilight darling" her friend Rarity began. "This is the last night of Princess Celestia's career... I mean, reign. She trusted you to make this night memorable for her and that's exactly what you're going to do."

"But I thought this was a party or something!" Twilight protested.

Pinkie Pie appeared almost as if on cue. "No silly! There was a party before, there's the intermission party and then the ending party but the roast itself is like a party on stage!" Pinkie declared.

"Wait a minute. There was a party for the Princess before the roast?" Applejack asked, skeptical.

"Of course there was!" Pinkie answered. "Gummy, Madame LeFlour and I raised the roof on the ride over here!"

"Is that what you were doing dancing with that sack of flour on the train?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"Hey, she may not look like much but Madame LeFlour is surprisingly light on her feet."

"I'm a little bit nervous myself." Fluttershy admitted. "But I'm excited to be here." That statement drew looks from everypony around her. Twilight actually stopped pacing dead in her tracks and turned to look at her slowly.

"Um, Fluttershy, you do know what this entails don't you? Did anypony explain it to her?" Rarity asked, looking around.

Fluttershy just nodded. "Oh yes, I'm looking forward to going on. I talked with all my critter friends about it before the train ride over here and they gave me some great material to work with."

Twilight's eyes went wide with disbelief. "Fluttershy.. there's a crowd of ponies out there. There's MILLIONS of ponies that are going to be watching this all over Equestria."

Fluttershy nodded again. "I know. But the Princess is out there and she needs our support, this could be her last public appearance in a long time and she needs her friends with her." Twilight still could not believe this. Fluttershy was OKAY with being in front of a live audience? Has the world gone mad? Twilight then realized that of her friends, she was the only one who was freaking out about this event. She practiced taking a deep breath and releasing it as Cadence had taught her. It helped... a little.

"Twilight Sparkle, ladies, it's good to see you all, thank you so much for coming." a gray stallion said as he approached. A brown stallion acompanied him, they wore almost matching business vests and their manes were slicked back and polished to a shine. Producers.

"It's not every day you roast Canterlot royalty. We appreciate you and your princess choosing to have this presented by The Hub." the brown stallion added.

"And it will air on Comedy Central this weekend." the gray stallion continued with an overly put-on smile.

"You mean it will appear on The Hub." the brown producer corrected. This made the gray one turn to face him directly.

"No, it will be appearing on the CC first." the gray one argued.

The brown producer also turned. "My company's endorsing this show, it will appear in MY Saturday lineup."

"Oh please." the gray producer scoffed. "So the same audience who watches thoseTransformares reruns gets to see it first? This is a CC special, it's going in MY lineup first."

"Why? So you can air it twenty times instead of reruns of MADCMC? At least my channel has ORIGINAL programming. When's the last time any of your shows has lasted more than half a season?" Twilight and the others said nothing as they watched the display, perplexed.

"Original programming." the gray one mocked. "You got lucky replaying those old shows from the eighties along with new ones. Your channel's still new. The CC has lasted for decades providing a dedicated audience with quality entertainment."

"Stop calling it the CC. You're not clever unless you're trying to change the name from 'Comedy Central' to 'Canceled Central'. If a show in your lineup stays up for over a year, then we can talk about you getting a special first." the brown one retorted.

These two were more than a little angry. "Kiss my flank, Howard!" the gray one yelled.

The brown one, apparently Howard, chuckled at the remark. "Why don't you put your flank in your lineup Carl? It'll be the first time in ten years your channel's ever seen anything with plot." Carl lunged at Howard and the two began fighting. They rolled, smacked each other and tumbled further backstage, grunting, groaning and beating each other all the way. An even more confused Twilight and her friends were left behind.

"Well, that was interesting." Pinkie remarked, breaking the awkward silence.

"Roastmaster on in two minutes! Where is he?" a stagehoof asked from the side of the curtain.

Twilight was about to answer when the answer chose that moment to make itself known.

"My little ponies!" a familiar draconequus announced as he approached. Taking all six of them in his arms, he hugged the group in an uncomfortable embrace.

"What a wonderful evening this is going to be! Are we ready to grill that princess of yours?" Discord asked. Twilight's confusion was now scaring her.

"What is Discord doing here?" Twilight asked in a feeble whimper.

"Why, Princess Celestia invited yours truly to be the roastmaster! Isn't this exciting?" Discord said, releasing the group.

"You're on in one minute Discord! Get the rest of the dias out here!" the stage assistant called back.

Discord looked ecstatic. "Here we go! Everypony ready? All right, Fluttershy will be on first. Are you ready my dear Fluttershy?" Discord asked the yellow pegasus.

Fluttershy smiled and nodded. "Yes I am."

Discord returned the smile. "Let me just make one slight adjustment first." he said, pressing the thumb of his claw to Fluttershy's forehead. Instantly, her yellow coat drained of color, being replaced by a dull gray. The pink in her mane and tale followed suit, her eyes swirled in a transfixed hypnotic gazed for a moment. Twilight's jaw hit the floor as she watched in devestation as the villainous fiend deharmonized Fluttershy once again before everypony's very eyes.

"Discord! Change her back now!" Twilight shouted. Her friends took up an offensive formation behind her and they prepared to pounce on the evil draconequus. Strangely, he waved his claws defensively. Fluttershy, her personality switched, now turned to face them.

"No." she said as a mischievious grin dawned on her gray face. "This was the plan. Thank you Discord. Now I can give that little princess exactly what she needs. Now get out of my way!" she pushed Discord aside and walked by

Discord just turned to the others, unfazed by Fluttershy's new attitude. He smiled a mouth full of teeth at Twilight and the rest of them. "All right everypony, it's showtime!"

Author's Note:

In this alternate universe, Twilight's adventures with her friends are filmed and broadcast on television around Equestria the same way they are on Earth, the difference being it's a cartoon on Earth and simply being filmed on Equestria, unscripted, unedited. MADCMC is a sketch comedy show and the Equestria-equivalent to MADTv starring the Cutie Mark Crusaders, it will be featured in other stories.

I was thinking of calling this story the Canterlot Roast or Grand Galloping Roast of Princess Celestia instead but I feel if you're going to ripoff something, why beat around the bush?

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