Daddy’s Little Princess
By Alaborn
Standard disclaimer: This is a not for profit fan work. My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is copyright Hasbro, Inc. I make no claim to any copyrighted material mentioned herein.
“Princess, you look beautiful.”
Filthy Rich smiled as he gazed upon his daughter, looking resplendent in her lavender dress. His little schoolfilly. Had it really been that long? That filly was now a young mare, and graduating high school.
“Thank you, Daddy,” she replied, pulling him in for a quick hug. The strain on his neck and back reminded Filthy Rich that he was no longer young himself.
“Growing up, graduating… soon you’ll be in Canterlot, studying dance. Princess, you’ll be the most beautiful and graceful young mare on stage.” He frowned as she continued to stare in the large vanity mirror, messing with her mane. “But if you don’t hurry, you’re going to be missing from the one stage that matters today, when your name is called to receive your diploma!”
“I… almost… got it!” she huffed. With a casual flick of her head, her mane fell into place. She looked up to her father, and saw him holding the one most precious piece of jewelry in the entire estate.
“You… want me to…?” she started.
Filthy Rich nodded. “It’s your day, Princess.”
She bounded downstairs, her father following. She paused as she heard his hoofsteps slow and stop. Turning, she saw him gazing with sadness at some old family portraits.
“You still miss her, don’t you?”
Filthy Rich nodded. “I wish she could be here.” His muzzle quivered, tears welling in his eyes. “I’m sorry, Princess. This should be your day.”
“Daddy, the fact that you always remember her is one of the reasons I love you so. Don’t you dare forget her.”
Filthy Rich nodded and composed himself. “Let’s go. The carriage is waiting.”
On this beautiful June morning, it seemed like most of Ponyville’s citizens, and then some, had gathered in the hoofball stadium of Ponyville High School. Princess Twilight Sparkle had a place of honor, front and center, sitting with the mayor and members of the school board. On the temporary stage, the high school’s principal stood by a podium, a stack of diplomas next to it.
Filthy Rich nodded to his acquaintances as he walked. He noticed the Apples, the Silvers, the Cakes, and the many other families and individuals that supplied the products that Barnyard Bargains was known for. He smiled as his daughter did the same, waving to her many friends. He was glad when she finally came out of her shell, moving from her comfortable relationship with only a few close friends and developing a wider circle of friends.
Principal Bright Mind rapped his hoof on the podium. The murmur of the crowd quieted. “Good morning, everypony. We’ll be starting the presentation soon. At this time, I would like to ask all graduating seniors to please come down to the reserved area and find your seats. Thank you.”
Filthy Rich gave his daughter a gentle hug before she walked down the stairs, heading to a decorated box on the stadium’s track. Several teachers herded the young stallions and mares, putting them into alphabetical order.
The crowd fell quiet as the school band started to play the high school’s fight song. Afterwards, the principal rapped on the podium again. “Thank you. Welcome to the graduation ceremony for the Class of 1459. Greetings to the students, parents, and families. Welcome, Princess Twilight Sparkle, Madame Mayor, distinguished guests. Children are the future of Equestria, and every year, I am proud to honor those students who came to our door to learn, and now leave ready to make their own place in our collective future. Now, I’d like to call the class valedictorian, Sweetie Belle, to the stage.”
The white unicorn who took the stage looked absolutely stunning in her light green dress, no doubt a design of her famous sister. Her speech was uplifting, briefly touching on how she overcame her difficulty in learning magic, and the lessons that she learned from that experience, lessons to apply to both school and life. And in a remarkable display of maturity, she kept her speech short.
Filthy Rich knew his daughter was never going to be class valedictorian. But that didn’t matter to him, because she was special in her own way.
The principal thanked Sweetie Belle and distributed her diploma. Sweetie Belle took it in her magical aura, used another burst of magic to move the yellow tassel of her mortarboard to the other side, and walked off the stage.
“And now, I will call the graduating seniors to stage, in alphabetical order,” the principal announced.
Filthy Rich watched the students below processing, with a minimum of disruption. He saw his daughter below, fidgeting with her mane and looking around. She always fidgeted with her mane when nervous. And he had a very good idea what she was looking for. Or, rather, who.
The ponies in her row stood up. She checked left, right, above. Just as her name was about to be announced, the sky shook with a loud boom, and a rainbow pattern spread in an ever-widening circle.
His daughter smiled as the rainbow-maned mare in a Wonderbolts flight suit took a seat in the stands. He could feel her energy, that spunk that made her special.
And once everypony could hear again, the principal announced his daughter’s name. “Scootaloo.”
Diamond Tiara watched the scene through a mirror that was not nearly as nice as the one on the vanity… HER vanity. The mirror she faced was dirty and scratched; the silver near its edge was tarnished, and it was chipped in three places. It very much reminded her of the mirror in the bathroom back at her elementary school.
“That WITCH! How dare she take my life!” The pink filly pounded the mirror, but her hoof rebounded as if she had struck a rubber ball. The image wavered with the mirror’s vibration, and when the vibrations ceased, she found herself staring at her own face, plus the ugly mug of the chimeric creature who had been taunting her.
“Temper, temper, little princess,” Discord cautioned. “I’m only giving you what you asked for.”
“And why are you here?” Diamond Tiara responded angrily. “Isn’t Princess Luna supposed to be in charge of dreams?”
“Ah, but you see, dreams are something living ponies have. You, my dear, as I have reminded you countless times, are a ghost. And ghosts fall under my realm,” Discord explained. “It’s quite the interesting story, too. I won dominion over the realm of spirits from King Sombra in a game of poker. It was quite the bluff. He folded when all I had was a four of spades, a seven of hearts, an Old Maid, a Rook, and a Chimney Imp. Made him go crazy and seal off the Crystal Empire for a thousand years. I swear, some ponies are just sore losers.” Diamond Tiara stared at him suspiciously. “True story,” he added.
“But why Scootaloo, of all ponies?” Diamond Tiara whined.
“Must we go through the whole montage again?” Discord said. “I can cue up that cheesy synthesized music to go with it. Or should we just go to that scene?” There on the mirror was Diamond Tiara, the same apparent age as her ghost form, walking by one of the brick buildings in Ponyville’s downtown, not far from her father’s office.
“Shall we zoom out?” Discord suggested, one eyebrow raised unnaturally high.
“No!” Diamond Tiara shouted.
“Oh, but it was quite the scene. To be crushed by a falling safe, then a falling refrigerator, and finally a falling grand piano, all in immediate succession? What are the odds?”
Diamond Tiara stewed.
“Say, DT—do you mind if I call you DT?—did you ever see that classic comic strip, the one captioned Celestia at her computer? No? Anyway, dear Celestia’s overly ample hoof must have been firmly pressed into that Smite key that day.”
“You still haven’t answered me, Discord. Why the blank flank?”
“Tut, tut. You’ll see that dear Scootaloo is hardly a blank flank now. In fact, the only blank flanks are you and I. You see, only ponies get cutie marks, and I am a draconequus, and you are a ghost. Have I mentioned that before?”
Diamond Tiara again scowled at him.
“Well, after that… excessively tragic event, little Scootaloo was the first to see what happened, and immediately sought help. Sadly, nothing could be done, well, nothing that didn’t require grave robbing, a lightning storm, and Princess Twilight Sparkle’s secret laboratory.” Discord met the gaze of the young ghost. “Say, why were you there in the first place?”
“I was going to see my fath…” Diamond Tiara started, but Discord tapped a claw on the mirror to interrupt.
“Magic mirror, remember?” he said.
“Fine,” Diamond Tiara huffed. “I wanted to see if it was true that the blank flank chicken was a homeless blank flank chicken.”
“And she was,” Discord said. “Now, your father is a good pony, and he saw how Scootaloo did whatever she could to help you. He also saw her as she tried to sneak away, heading to her crate in the alley. That image weighed on his mind, until the only thing left for him to do was help her. Though one life was lost that day, another was saved. So very touching.” Discord sniffed, and offered a tissue box to Diamond Tiara. “Tissue?”
The livid filly knocked the box out of Discord’s claw. “I didn’t ask for this! All of this!”
“Well, be that as it may, DT, there’s still the matter of you being a ghost,” Discord said. “And you’ve been one for a while. You’ve seen your father, seen how he remembers you, and seen how he brought that young filly under his care. A good thing, too; could you imagine somepony like Rainbow Dash trying to raise her? Do you think she’d ever have found her talent at ballet?”
Diamond Tiara stared daggers into the mirror in front of her. It now showed Scootaloo as the center of attention at a large party, a party held in her home! She of course mingled with Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle, but also spent time in the company of Alula, Archer, Dinky, and other ponies so unimportant that Diamond Tiara had forgotten their names. Scootaloo also got along with the town’s prominent adult citizens, including the Bearers and the mayor. And finally, she gave a lot of attention to a gold pegasus filly, a blank flank who looked up to Scootaloo like she was some kind of hero.
Discord tapped claw and paw together. “So, DT, are you ready to address that unfinished….”
“Blank flank!” Diamond Tiara shouted, interrupting Discord. Or, it would be an interruption, if she were actually listening to him. “I am so going to haunt that blank flank!”
In response, Discord merely raised an eyebrow.
“You heard me. I’m a ghost, so I want to haunt Scootaloo!” Diamond Tiara demanded.
Discord sighed and spread his arms apart. “You got me. You found the loophole,” he said. “As a ghost, you do have the ability to haunt the living.”
“Then send me there! Right there!” she said, pointing to the scene in the mirror. “Now!” she screamed in emphasis.
Discord snapped his claw.
“So what are you going to miss most?” Scootaloo asked to the ponies gathered around the table.
“Absolutely nuthin’!” Apple Bloom said. “It’s all good and all having a master carpenter in the family, but Ah can’t believe he made me stick through boring school. Ah’ve been itching to start mah apprenticeship ever since Ah got my cutie mark!”
“I’m sure your cousin knows what he’s doing, Apple Bloom,” Scootaloo replied.
“I’m going to miss the performances,” Sweetie Belle said. “Drama club, choir, and everything else!”
“I know I’ll see you on a bigger stage one day,” Scootaloo said.
“I won’t miss class, but I will miss P.E., and I’ll miss my favorite running buddy!” Alula said.
“I don’t know, I didn’t do anything,” Truffle Shuffle said.
“Don’t say that,” Scootaloo told him. “I think we all loved the comic strip you drew for the school newspaper. That ‘Principal Dull Shine’ character? The only thing funnier than the punch lines is imagining the principal reading it!”
“I think I’ll miss seeing you all every day,” Archer said.
The ponies’ reminiscing was interrupted by a swirling miasma, colored pink, white, and violet, eventually taking the shape of a filly. The ponies gasped as the ghost took form. She stood on the table, the phantasm moving through the plates and cups.
The ghost of Diamond Tiara pointed one hoof menacingly at Scootaloo. “This is all your fault!” she hissed.
Scootaloo recoiled, but then looked at the ghost and smiled. “You gotta stand up tall,” she sang in a scratchy voice.
“Learn to face your fears,” Apple Bloom sang in an unpracticed contralto.
“You'll see that they can't hurt you,” Sweetie Belle added in a pitch-perfect soprano voice.
“Just laugh to make them disappear!” the three sang together.
Scootaloo glanced over at the orchestra, which changed its tune to match the famous song. Throughout the room, ponies keyed in on the music of harmony, and joined in on the chorus.
“So, giggle at the ghostly
Guffaw at the grossly
Crack up at the creepy
Whoop it up with the weepy
Chortle at the kooky
Snortle at the spooky”
The music of harmony didn’t flow through Diamond Tiara as she had remembered. Instead, it hurt. She didn’t quite remember being squished by a safe, a refrigerator, and a grand piano, but this had to be a thousand times worse. She forced open her mouth one more time, determined to get in one last soul-scorching haunt, but nothing came out but a silent scream.
When Diamond Tiara finally opened her eyes, an action as painful as lifting her legs following a ten mile run, she saw that familiar room and mirror. Discord sat in the corner, calmly drinking a glass of freshly-squeezed cotton candy cloud chocolate milk.
“Don’t you remember? Ever since Pinkie Pie mastered the art of dealing with ghosts, it was made part of the Equestrian school curriculum,” he said. “So while, yes, you can haunt as a ghost, it’s not something I recommend. So shall we think about the whole setting your spirit to rest bit?”
“Just shut up!” Diamond Tiara hissed through clenched teeth.
“Take your time, then. We have all the time in the world,” Discord said. “Or, rather, you do. I, on the other hand, have a lovely dinner date with Fluttershy, and I don’t want to be late. Ta ta for now!”
With a pop, Discord disappeared, leaving Diamond Tiara staring at a touching scene. Her father, congratulating his adopted daughter, while in the background, multiple pictures formed a shrine to the daughter he lost. One father, with his two princesses.
Author's Note
Written for the Diamond Cutters group activity prompt 6: "Diamond Tiara is a ghost. Who shall she haunt and why?"
Not meant to be taken very seriously, as is the case with any story featuring Discord. One may speculate if Discord is being entirely truthful about exactly how Diamond Tiara died.
