The Royal Snackdown

Can You Take the Heat?

Canterlot: a prestigious and rich city filled with several ponies who walk around either in classy wear or with no wear. The capital of Equestria glitters in gold and shines its bright white shell in the sky. The Royal Pony Sisters’ rule this wondrous city and the bountiful country around it with a sort of benevolent ruling akin to that of a house cat. They very rarely hiss unless it’s something of importance.

So why are they so upset?

“Celestia!” a loud feminine whine sounds. The doors in front of her parted like the Red Sea, and by that I mean they opened up quickly.

“What, Luna!” a softer tone replies, the sound of the doors clacking against the white walls of her chambers. Her sister would do this daily, opening up her doors in fierce rage when something delicate arose. It gets annoying, really, really fast.

“Tis the time for our ancestors’ hunger to be sated!” she bellowed, her tone straight like an arrow. “We cannot wait for thy suggestions!”

The excitement in her sister’s voice causes Celestia to sigh. It’s time for the Royal snacking, a ritual practice long before her and her sister. Legend has itThe words of their “defined” past relatives says that those who participated in the ritual of the snacking will gain blessings from their predecessors ancestors* for their sacrifice. Luna and her have been trying for decades— no, centuries upon centuries to have the best sacrifice for their ancestors who roamed and possibly marked their hindquarters on this land. The two of them cannot possibly screw this up.

Or can they?

“Well, we could consult with our chefs…” Celestia suggests, her tone calm and collective. “They must know something about the delicacies of our past.”

Luna, however, ain’t having none of that. No siree.

“Come on!” Luna whines, drawing out the last syllable as much as she could**. “That would take forever!”

Celestia sighs once again, her mind going through several replays of Luna’s horrible whining noises. The horror...the sheer horror.

“Then what do you suggest, Miss Snacker?” Celestia rebuts, her patience beginning to wear itself down.

Luna peers at the ground, the smooth surface looking suddenly more appealing than her sister’s terrifying glare. She has never been too good at suggesting things. She always loved following through with what her sister says, because that’s how things were back then. Now, she’s finally getting the opportunity to make her own decisions…

...and she has nothing to bring to the table***.

“Maybe,” Luna begins, softly muttering to the ground as if it had some sentience like all crazy griffons do. “We could…”

“Pardon?” Celestia asks, her hearing getting worse and worse as the days go by.

Luna brings her attention to Celestia’s now confused appearance. “We could...consult with the library?”

Celestia couldn’t look anymore confused if she tried, even more so than she did on National Look Confused Day****. Her muzzle scrunched up, her eyebrows raised to the heavens above, her eyes beginning to go cross-eyed; the definition of confusion.

“Why the library?” Celestia begins, her voice suddenly ecstatic and high. “I mean, there’s no real reason to go there, think about it, Lulu.” The white alicorn with her lucky of a charm mane leans forward in her gold, comfy, plush chair, her forehooves splayed out in a way that many ponies would misinterpret her for being a signer*****. “We are the most revered beings in all of Equestria, we get our hooves polished and heavily kissed upon by our loyal ponies. They look up to us as the beings who know all.” Celestia sighs when seeing her sister’s countenance, her confusion matching her previous facial expression.

“Ugh, Lulu, it means that they think we’re amazing and all knowing,” Celestia groans, her hoof meeting her forehead in one swift movement.

Luna perks up at this, letting out a loud drawn out “oh” as she nods at Celestia’s explanation.

“Glad you understand me for once…” Celestia mutters underneath her breath, looking away from her sister to hide her negativity. Then, out of the bloo******, Luna appears in front of Celestia, causing her to yelp and slide off her comfy perch while Luna laughs hysterically at her clumsy ol’ sister.

“That’s what thy gets for talking smack about one’s misunderstood sibling!” Luna announces as she points an offending hoof at Celestia, who is currently positioned sunnyside up.

Celestia groans, annoyed by her sister’s antics. “Lulu, I wasn’t talking smack…” she begins, attempting to pull herself up from the ground, her hooves in an unfortunate tangled, four-squared mess. As she pulls herself up, Luna replies quickly, her voice loud and proud for all—yes even those random bystanders walking across the street. On Mars. To hear.

“YES YOU WERE!”

Celestia flies backwards, the sudden force from Luna’s canterlotian voice ejecting her like a spring board out of her unfortunate position and onto her feet, landing very closely to that white Wall of Glory next to her chamber doors. The Glory Wall, an instrumental obstaclepiece of Equestria’s history, shows all the holes ever made in the castle, the memories too enjoyable for the Princesses to forget.

And Luna almost made an even bigger hole (to China*******).

Celestia sighs and dusts herself off with her magic, the brilliant dandelion colored aura dancing around her being, the dust suddenly parading off her and into the holes of yesteryear.

“Well that was anti-climatic,” Celestia mutters, turning towards her dark bloo’d colored sister, her midnight mane gently flowing in the nonexistent wind. “Well, my younger sister of mine, I’m sorry for making fun of you,” she apologizes, slowly and cautiously approaching her sister as she speaks. “You know I love you an-”

“Sister,” Luna says dryly. “We know this.”

Celestia sighs, her loving torrent suddenly being rained upon. “Okay…” Celestia, then, moves to her seat on her comfy plush cushion and turns to her sister, patting the little indigo plush beside her. “Will you please sit, so we can talk in a comfortable manner?”

It was Luna’s turn to sigh, her appearance becoming calm, gentle, and not so confused like before. “Alright, sis…”

She canters slowly over to the plush and lays herself upon it, almost as if she was one of those Prench mares that did not want to be drawn`.

“So, what is on decision on finding the most delectable treat in all of Equestria?” Luna questioned, snuggling into her plush seat of comfort, her forehooves in front of her chin and her head placed upon those very hooves.

The sight of this caused Celestia to smile. “Well, I am very well considering your suggestion about the library, but I have to ask you this,” Celestia says, leaning back on her cushion of undeniable comfort. “Why are you so adamant on not asking the chefs for advice?”

As Celestia awaits her response, she notices her sister’s attention shift to the ground once again, her eyes welling with small amounts of moisture.

“It…” Luna begins, her voice suddenly beginning to waver. “It b-brings back bad memories``.”

Celestia sighs for the umpteenth time, her struggle to stop her sudden exhalations of the Sea of O’dubble twos never-ending. “Look, I’ll never bring up a chef’s delight ever again if you help me in brainstorming for more options.”

Luna smiles for the first time today. “Alright, tis’ an honor to work alongside my sister in our quest to find the best snack in all of Equestria,” she states as a matter of fact, her eyes practically glowing at the realization.

“I am too,” Celestia announces, matching the smile of Luna, the two mares’ grins practically akin to that of a toddler seeing Santa eating their sugar cookies and milk right in front of their faces like the “more than happy” diabetic he is.

The Royal Sisters begin their scheming, the two now brainstorming for the possible places to look…

*Une heure plus tard…*```

After sitting on their poofy, plush seating, the two large alicorn mares look at each other, their grins still wider than the man who has both won the lottery and somehow the Nobel Piece prize at the same time and somehow made contact to an ancient civilization of equally wide beings. Wrap your heads around that one. With the will of the moon, the stars, and possibly all the starbursts in the only human in Equestria’s mouth, the young bloo```` alicorn looks up at her influencevery important sibling and says with pride, “We believe we have no other options to supply to our plight.”

Celestia groans. “Same with me…”

The two look at each other, the white alicorn looking scared, while the other grinning at the thought of terrorizing the very knowledgeable texts of her day and age. “Library?” Celestia asked fearfully.

Luna’s eyebrows almost raise to the roof, her grin still plastered upon her face. “The Library,” she states, her voice very grim and gravely. “Aren’t you excited...sister?”

The very thought of being in there...that horrifying place of knowledge. Celestia did not want to succumb to the depths of the otherworld, a place where Twilight, her prodigy, visits on the daily. She’s seen the look on Twilight’s face when she dives into a book, that scandaloussleep-deprived countenance, a face of every mare with the weapons of mass destruction`````. She is still, to this day, wondering when that purple pudge of magic would snap, pulling out several otherworldly items from her endless void and selectively firing all of them off at once at her enemies.

“Sister, are you alright?”

“Huh?” Celestia says, snapping out of her dazed stupor.

“You stopped working there, Celestia,” Luna says, her eyes full of concern, her grin fading to the normal small smile that teetered like two children on a teeter-totter. “Are you sure you’re able to function?”

Celestia scoots her plush seat over towards Luna, their eyes now not having to be strained from the distance they once previously shared. “Yes,” she responded simply, her mind not able to formulate a more lengthier response, kind of like a kid at a school being asked by a teacher if he’s sure he didn’t cheat.

Luna’s smile stops its wobbling status, finally forming the half-pipe that all skaters dreamed of. “I’m glad,” Luna begins, her attention still upon her sister’s charming mane. “Besides, I need you to be in stellar form when we head to the…”

Then, in seconds, the word that got Celestia in her unresponsive state, is uttered again by her own sibling.

“...library.”

With that, Celestia entered the realm of nothing, her mind zapped by the word of untold horrors``````.

Luna watches as Celestia stares off into the distant, her gaze landing upon the door of all doors: the exit. Luna giggles at Celestia’s stare, before getting up from her comfort zone and bopping Celestia on her nose which, in turn, causes Celestia to return to her beloved reality. “Race ya!” Luna announces, before galloping out the door.

Celestia watches as her sister mindlessly exits her chambers. Then, as her sister begins to turn, Celestia remembers that the cleaners have passed by already, the floors freshly waxed and wet. In seconds, Celestia hears a loud yelping noise, followed by numerous collisions of pointless objects of little to no value, the crashing making any connoisseur of these valueless objects cringe and groan in agony.

Celestia simply gets up and approaches her battered bloo``````` sister, the alicorn lying flat on the smooth stone surface. “Are you going to get up or are you going to lay around all day?” Celestia says coldly. “Because bopping somepony in the nose and then causing numerous amounts of objects that I didn’t even know existed in this castle until now crash to the floor in pieces is a bad idea, especially when this pony forgets that the royal cleaners come by at this time.”

While Celestia lectures her sister, Luna tries to get off the ground, her limbs disagreeing with her every movement.

Celestia raggedly sighs. Her sister is very clumsy. She needed walking classes to help her move around in the castle when she was younger, however; it didn’t help much. Sliding is her number one weakness; every alicorn knows that sliding should not be an alicorn’s weakness.

With the strength of a thousand suns, Celestia easily lifts her sister off the ground, her magic aura enveloping Luna in gold. She carefully tilts her upright and sets her down on the floor. While this all happened, Luna’s facial expression is similar to extending your hoof in friendship to Poseidon and him spitting on it, frozen and unable to move. As she lands on all fours, she snaps out of her shocked state and looks up at her sister. “I’m sorry, Celly,” Luna replies softly. “I just wanted to have some fun…”

Celestia brings her close, hugging her with her forehooves. “It’s okay, Lulu,” Celestia states, nuzzling her cheek with Luna’s. “Just don’t do it again…”

Luna smiles and returns the nuzzle. “Alright, I promise,” Luna says quietly. “Besides, once we get to the library, we’ll have loads of fun!”

Celestia smiles awkwardly at her sister, the two having separated from their sharing of sisterly affection. “Yes, loads of fun…” Celestia says, her voice trailing off into the sunset.

Luna smiles and bumps Celestia’s flank with her own. “Come on, we have work to do.”

Celestia giggles and walks beside her sister, warming up to the idea of the once horrible image of the Royal Library. “Lead on, my sister.”

And lead on she did.