Twilight Sparkle’s diligent way of administrating has spread far and wide.
Both Equestria and the Crystal Empire are run by a long chain of Administrators. An ambitious filly who wants to be an Administrator herself follows the trail of scrolls up to an actual declaration from the Ultimate Supreme Administrator. This exciting administrative duty sets her on the path to reunite with her beloved mother.
It takes me quite some time to carve the last letter into the wall, but I want it to be perfect, just like my mother is who’s name I’m writing. With the last stroke of the piece of brick, it’s finally finished: Mayor Mare. The name of my mom stands on top of the pyramid of other words that I still like but not as much; words like ‘elaborate’ and ‘contrive’.
My mother’s name deserves to be on top because she’s a High Administrator and gets to use some of the best words. Though, there are some words that are even beyond her paygrade; the best words like ‘declare’ and ‘proclaim’. I start engraving the first bestest word into a cloud above the pyramid of words. Mom isn’t fit to use them in context, but I’d seen her scribe those words anyway because she knew how much I like them. Last birthday she even broke the rules and gave me a card that said, “I, Mayer Mare, your mom and level 10th High Administrator, declare my love for you, my daughter. I proclaim that I’ll love you until the day I die.” She used the best words!
At the very bottom of my carved pyramid are just letters from A to Z that I wrote down when I got bored with waiting in my cell. Having all letters written down makes it easier for me to craft written words. That’s how my pyramid of words began yesterday. After a day of carving, I’m still not content with the result. I know the best words, and not all of them are engraved in the wall yet.
My mom only taught me how to write after my last birthday. I can read just fine, but writing is still a struggle. I could do it way faster if I had an actual quilt and a scroll but prisoners can’t be choosers, I guess...
In the past year before my foalnapping, other adults were mean to me after they saw me writing letters on their walls. They said that my mom’s job is affecting me, but their protests only made me want to write more. My mom was told that she should make me do what other foals my age do, like play and sing outside. I didn’t like those things because they kept me from playing with letters and words. Whenever somepony had an objection over my hobby, my mom would just write on a piece of paper, “I enunciate that my daughter is happy.” and stamped it with her right sealing hoof. Nopony ever dared to oppose her annunciation. Her note always stayed on top with no other note daring to cover and supersede it.
She never told them that I was the one who begged her to teach me her wordcraft. It has always been my dream to be just like her one day. Her wordcraft of administrative words was nothing less than magical in my eyes.
I should have kept at the craft. Had I stayed at home yesterday, I wouldn’t be in this mess now.
The reason I didn't stay at home was because it got too hot for me to play with letter cubes indoors. I went outside hoping for some wind in the shade. I got thirsty, but there was no water in the local stream. Since that never happened before, I got curious and followed it to the source. When I came across the pipes in the neutral zone that were stealing all the water, the Crystal Empire Administrator snatched me up.
Some say that the Crystal Empire was a good place before King Sombra’s 8th resurrection and was actually part of Equestria. But that was ancient history. It probably happened like over a decade ago. The adults always say that they don’t want to talk about Sombra’s latest resurrection, but I bet they can’t even remember that far back. Even I, the daughter of the High Administrator, can’t remember more than a few years back. My head hurts whenever I even think about remembering the times before I was born. Maybe history didn’t even happen and is just something grownups use to scare us foals with...
I pin my ears after I hearing hoofsteps outside my cell. It’s weird. In the morning, my owner told me that the portion of hay and water should last me until tomorrow. Either he wants to check on me or he wants something.
The door opens, and the landlord Administrator steps inside. Landlording is the 20th level of administration. The lowest-rank. Still, he outranked me by far. I wasn’t even an Administrator. I was nopony at all. A mere slave.
“What’s that drivel, you Equine?”
I drop the piece of brick and obediently assume my position at the center of the cell at the floor-hook on which my leash is locked on. “I turned the blank wall into the wall of pleasure,” I whisper.
“You fucked my wall, you Equine!”
“You keep calling me this Equine... I’m High Achiever and I’m an Equestrian! I told you that like a dozen times already.”
“If you Equine was of legal age, I’d fuck you right back for fucking my wall. But old rules still apply for the time, unfortunately. No cutie mark, no funny business, and no renting your plot for some easy bucks.”
“Getting a cutie mark is not the legal age.” I protest, but I know my wordcraft is weaker than his. He’s an Administrator, after all.
“Fuck yeah it is. At least here in the Crystal Empire. The Administrators out there in Equestria are all a bunch of pussies to put the legal age twice as high.”
“My mom’s not a pussy!” I yell while running at him, raising a forehoof to strike him. Just before I can connect with his neck, I ran out of the leash. It chafes in my neck and throws me on my back.
“You’re a real stupid Equine, aren’t you?” He asks with a grin.
I slide myself on the floor toward the center of the cell to give myself more free leash. After a few moments of catching my breath, I ask without facing him, “What’s a pussy?”
“It’s what’s between your legs, Equine.” He steps over me and unlocks the leash from the hook at the center of my cell.
I look between my legs and then at him. “I don’t get it.”
He wraps the leash around his forehoof. “I have a job for you, stupid. You’ll see where your pussy ways lead you Equines.”
I stand up so that he wouldn’t drag me across the floor. “I’m not of legal age yet, I shouldn’t be working.”
“File a complaint with your local Landlord Administrator, you Equine. Oh, wait, that’s me.” He presses his sealing right hoof to the ink sponge around his neck then presses it on top of my head. “Complaint dismissed.”
“Hey, why’d you do that?” I press a hoof on my head where he stamped me, but he pulls at the leash and makes me take a step forward.
“I did you a favor, Equine. It’s a whole new world out there. You’re either owned or a target.” He opens the doors outside.
I pull back my head. The fresh air I expect isn’t here. The outside smells as if somepony is blowing smoke from a pipe in my face.
He unsnaps the leash from my neck.
I squint my eyes and see that we are at the dried stream where he caught me. Instead of water, there were scrolls laid along its bed. There must have been an administrative battle waged there since yesterday.
He points a hoof across the stream. “Collect the scrolls in chronological order for the Crystal Empire Administrative Archives. Arrange them from first to last in that shack so they stay dry until the Administrative collector comes for them.” He hints at the wooden shack under the pipes. “After that, dig a hole with your hooves somewhere and bury the remains.”
“The remains?” I ask.
He grins and unties the leash from my neck. “You’ll see.”
“So, you’re letting me go to do all that?” I raise an eyebrow. “Are you going to watch me while I work?”
He sighs. “Look, Equine. You either make yourself useful or you’re useless to me. As long as you have my seal on you, everypony will leave you alone, but it won’t last forever.”
“Okay, whatever. I’ll start collecting the scrolls. I promise I won’t run away.”
He laughs so hard that he drops to his plot. “I know you’ll want to run to your mama who you keep crying about. A bunch of pussies, all ya’ Equines” He boops me on the snout. “But I also know that if you’re not a complete idiot, you’ll beg me to let you back inside when you’re done.”
I turn around and cock my head. “I don’t get it.”
“Get to work, Equine!” He slams the door in my face, leaving me alone outside.
I look at the dried bank under the mountain cliff. I’d just have to run along it, take a turn at the cliff and I’d be off the neutral zone and on Equestria soil. From there, it was just a short trot to my house and my parents.
At the edge of the cliff, however, were some crystal spikes emerging from the dried bed, leading almost horizontally behind the edge of the cliff’s edge. “Those weren’t there yesterday,” I say to myself. The spikes are almost touching the edge of the mountain, so I probably can’t escape the same way I came to the neutral zone, but I can just go around the spikes and then I’d be in Equestria, free to run back home.
In the distance under the base of the spikes, a black scroll lies on top of the others. I was no Administrator, yet, but I knew how the administrative battles are fought. The counter-response is always thrown on top of the one it is countering. That’s one of the reasons why the scrolls are so big. I bet there are other reasons as well.
Once, I asked my mother if size matters and she said that bigger is always better and that she never settles for small ones. One day, I’ll be a High Administrator like her, and I won’t settle for anything less than enormous ones.
I recognize the Equestrian scrolls on the other side of the bank. That side is where Equestrian Administrators must have thrown them from. And the Crystal Empire’s Administrators must have been throwing them from this side of the bank. They are all at least two dozen steps long, which allows them to counter other scrolls laying on the ground.
There is a chance I can just run past them all toward home, but the Landlord Administrator is probably watching me from the window. If I actually collect the scrolls, they wočč lead me to the spikes at the edge of the cliff. After that, I could then just break into gallop from there and nopony could catch me without invading Equestrian lands.
I start to roll the first scroll that was thrown from the entrance of the building. To the side of me is a big pipe. I can hear water flowing through it. That water always flowed to Equestria. The Crystal Empire was clearly breaching the declaration of Administrative forefathers by stealing the water at its spring.
There was much I didn’t know, but I knew for sure that Administrators of Equestria would not stand for such violation of the treaty.
I roll up the scroll under the second one to the end of it at the bank. It was the first scroll that started the administrative battle. In my view comes the declaration at the end of the scroll. On it was written, “I say, this is my property. Pussy off, Equine!”
Only a 20th level Administrator could have written such an informal scroll. I rolled it up and carried it to the shack. The Landlord Administrator that captured me must have been its author. He didn’t use any of the best words.
I roll the next scroll from the center of the dried up stream to the bank under the cliff. At the top of it is the declaration that must have been read when it was thrown over the first one. At the end of the scroll was the text, “Per declaration of High Administrators from both sides, I, the 19th level Administrator of Equestrian Administration convey that this stream is the border of our lands between Equestria and the Crystal Empire and as such is not owned by anypony. Thus, I emit that my presence at this place cannot be interpreted as trespassing.”
A smile escapes me. “Yeah, you tell it to the 20th level Administrator, 19th level Administrator!” At this moment I promise to myself to rise in ranks and make my life aspirations into a reality, someday. “To be a High Administrator, that is my dream!”
I look down at the stream of scrolls. The faster I collect them, the closer I can get to the border beyond the cliff. Equestria and my freedom will be just a jump away at the end of the administrative battle collection.
I lift up the second scroll and run with it to the shack. Then, straight back to the next one. In my mind, I imagine that I’m an assistant to an Administrator training to be a real Administrator one day. When I tell my mom how I collected the scrolls and how important they were, she might even forgive me for walking into a neutral zone without her consent.
The third scroll also seemed to have been thrown from the entrance. It’s another one from the landlord, the twentieth chain of Administration, that was tossed over the previous one. When I rolled it all up from the center of the dried-up stream, I read the declaration at the end. It said, “I proclaim this stream to be of the Crystal Empire, for it touches our lands. What touches our lands is ours. The trespassing Equine filly is also mine. Wanna buy her? I also sell water if you’re thirsty.”
After collecting the previous scroll, I ran to the middle, to collect the scroll from the other side which said, “I promulgate that you overstepped your boundaries of good taste and the law. For that reason, I shall negotiate the matter of stolen water and displaced filly with your higher ranking Administrator. Please supply your superior within the period prescribed by law under administration of international matters.”
The response of the landlord was, “I say, screw you! I’ll bring you a 19th level Administrator. That’s all you’re getting, you Equines. I hate you, and I hate your pussy bureaucracy.”
As per protocol, when a same or higher-ranking Administrator tells a lower-ranking Administrator to speak to a higher-ranking Administrator, the lower-ranking Administrator is obliged to fulfill that request. And not only that. The lower-ranking Administrator must present the higher-ranking Administrator to the one who posed the request and during the interaction must also stand behind the presented higher-ranking Administrator. The administration is so exciting!
I run back to see what the sixth scroll from the same side entails. It was thrown over the fifth scroll but from the side of the building further down the stream. When I rolled it up, it said at the end, “I declare that I’m a 19th level Administrator of the Crystal Empire. Despite the same ranking, I do not recognize you as my equal. Either you buzz off to your shrinking Equestria or you bring me a higher ranking Administrator.”
After going over many more scrolls, I gather that the Equestrian Administrator complied, but his superior demanded a higher ranking Administrator from the Crystal Empire side.
The sun is already in the zenith, burning through the smog. I’m sweating like crazy in the heat. But I can’t stop. The administrative battle is starting to get really intense. Some powerful words are expressed like, address, clarify, transfer, devise, phrase, impart, transmit, govern, regulate, formulate, treaty, articulate, direct, prescribe, authorize, arrange, inquire, regulate, revise, announce, order, mediate and other good words.
I only stop collecting the scrolls to seep some water from the leaking pipe. I’ve never been so excited in my life. I’m part of the bureaucracy now!
There are already over thirty rolled-up scrolls in the shack and I’m eager to collect more, but the next one in line stops me in my tracks.
The scroll lies before me. I recognize its author even before I roll it up to the text at the top. The writer of it is my mama herself. In it, she says, “I, the 10th level High Administrator, decree that the Crystal Empire may have this stream if the one High Achiever who was taken hostage by the Crystal Empire is returned alive and unharmed. Please bring the filly back to me. She has nothing to do with our administrative affairs.”
I caress the hoof seal at the end of the text. My hoof fits perfectly in the middle of hers. “Mama,” I cry out. Her words sound formal, but I can sense the love between the lines. I want to be with her, more than ever.
The path before me is marked by the remaining scrolls further down the dried-up stream. The collection of the administrative battle is already half done. I look toward the spikes over the cliff’s end at the edge of Equestrian territory, “I’ll come to you soon, mama!”
When I bring my mother’s scroll to the shack, I have a hard time departing from it, so I allow myself a moment of rest. I hug it with all four legs and lay my head on top of it, “Mama, you’ll always be my favorite Administrator.”
I finally detach from my mother’s scroll and make my way to the next one. It’s still too risky to just make a run for it. To make it safe for me to escape, I have to collect the scrolls. I have to collect them all!
I snort out of anger when I see the content of the next one. Somepony dared to disagree with my mother’s administration. How offensive! The scroll from the Equestrian side says, “I, the 9th level High Administrator, belay the statement of my subordinate. She has no authority on the matter. Furthermore, we do not negotiate with terrorists, even when hostages are involved. I regularize that the water in this stream belongs to Equestria, and we shall sacrifice everything to preserve the pacts of our ancestors.”
I’m careful to be extra careless when carrying that scroll. If my mama had her way during the Administrative battle, I would already be in her warm embrace.
The rest of the scrolls are a haze because I keep thinking of my mama. I know the scrolls are really important because they use the best words like consort, articulate, enounce, pronounce, formulate, explicate, machinate, excogitate, dilate, expatiate, expound, discourse, dissertate, relinquish, forswear, dictate, accord, modulate, enjoin, rescript, adjudge, promulgate, arbitrate, liaise, intercede and even bigger ones.
Any other time, the best words like these would light the fire in my heart, but not anymore.
My distraction doesn’t last for long, though. Before me, I see a scroll that I never thought in my wildest dream that I would ever get the honor of seeing. It’s a scroll from our beloved Alicorn Princess Twilight Sparkle herself. I hesitate before daring to touch it. Carefully and with much respect, I liberate it from under the black scroll on top. When I roll it all the way to the Equestrian side of the bank under the cliff, I focus on the beautiful lavender handwriting before me, “I, the level 1 Administrator of Equestria, edict this as a matter of international dispute. No side shall prompt any further action until this matter is resolved via the border negotiation biros that shall be established from both sides for this purpose. There is no reason to rush this bureaucratic dispute. We only need to follow due process and mutual understanding shall prevail in the end. I will it so.”
I wish I was there when it happened. It must have been glorious. The procession of twenty Administrators standing in line one after another with Princess Twilight Sparkle in front, representing them all, and my mother among them in the line behind her.
After carrying the scroll to the shack and making my way back, I decide I will make a run for it as soon as I reach the last two black scrolls. However, when I get near the one before the spikes, I can’t help myself. The ending of the Administrative battle is too enticing for me to miss.
I don’t even roll up the scroll but just walk to the end of it at the Crystal Empire bank. Red letters on black papers say, “I, King Sombra, The Ultimate Supreme Administrator of the Crystal Empire, declare war with Equestria.”
I gasp. He dared to use the best word to express an evil intent! How could he‽
My body trembles. The heavy air since the morning. The smog. The heat. Could it be...
With a few hops past the spikes, I get myself to the last King Sombra’s black scroll. It says, “I proclaim victory. Go forth, my soldiers. Plunder and burn everything in your path. Leave no Equine alive. So wills the Ultimate Supreme Administrator.”
I turn around and look past the spikes toward Equestria. My town is in flames. And there are more fires. Equestria is burning.
There is a red tint on the spikes past the cliff’s edge. I dare not look directly at the victims of bureaucracy.
With bowed head, I walk along the black scroll, only looking at the base of the spikes. I count each one I pass. “One.”, “Two.”, “Three.”, “Four.”, “Five.”, “Six.”, “Seven.”, “Eight.”, “Nine.”, “...”.
I can’t bring myself to count the next spike. I feel the shivers down my spine when my hoof slides over a mushy-like texture. I look at my hoof. It is red.
With one eye, I glance above and I see a dangling foreleg. The bottom of the hoof has traces of black ink on it. The sealing hoof of the High Administrator!
I lift my own forehoof and put it in the one above. It fits inside perfectly.
