NaNoWriMo2015 Oneshot Colletction

Moonlight Dancer limped backstage, the last five minutes playing through her mind on a loop. These sorts of things weren’t supposed to happen to the Royal Equestrian Ballet. Unfortunately, they did, which is why the normally snow white mare was covered in dust, her raven black mane was knotted and tangled, and her wings looked like they hadn’t seen a preening in months.

She looked around at the rest of her troupe, noting that they didn’t seem up better. Then again, nopony would if an entire stage came down on them. Moonlight glanced back out at the stage where everything previously affixed to the ceiling now lay. That they had all made it out with little more than a messed up ankle was a miracle.

Looking forwards again, she finished approaching her troupe, putting on a reassuring smile. Given the uncertain looks she got in return, she wasn’t sure it worked. “Is everypony okay?” she asked. Sure, she knew there was no physical injuries, but that didn’t mean mental ones couldn’t be just as bad.

She got a general murmur of ascent to her question, though like the expressions, it wasn’t exactly definitive. Still, it was a start, at least. “Well, everyone got out more or less in one piece, and I think the worst injury is the couple sprained ankles. Unless somepony has fractured ribs we find out about later,” she added with a frown.

“I think we escaped anything worse than the sprain, Miss Dancer,” an earther mare said, approaching from the side. She was in a red vest with a white medical cross on the back, denoting her position as the theatre’s first aid attendant. “I’ll let the doctors tell you for sure, but I didn’t find anything that looked like a break or fracture.”

Moonlight smiled in relief, nodding. “Thank you. That is an amazing relief to here,” she said with a sigh. That was a massive load of her back for worry. She might not be the owner, manager, or coordinator of the Ballet—the first two were back in Canterlot and the last was making a fuss with the Theatre staff—but they were still her dancers. She was the Prima Skydancer—there was a Prima from each of the three races—so she felt a responsibility to all her fellow dancers.

She turned her relieved look into a confident smile, this one much more believable in that Moonlight believed it herself. “So, we’re mostly fine. Anypony with nothing more than a few bruises, head back to the hotel. I’m going to bring Silent and Velvet to the hospital.” Moonlight’s head jerked towards the snigger in the group, her eyes falling on Velvet Step, one of the soloists in the troupe and one of the ones she’d just mentioned. “What’s so funny?” Moonlight asked with an uncertain frown.

“Sorry,” she apologized. “A friend of mine is named Silent Knight. Your wording just struck me as funny.”

Moonlight nodded, leaving it be for now. She turned her attention back to the troupe at large. “Light Hooves, you’re with me. The rest of you… I’m not sure, maybe the boss will be down in a bit. Until then.” She shrugged helplessly, before walking over to Velvet Step as Light Hooves came over, Silent Dreams already on his back. The baut mare was pouting slightly as she lay on the silver stallion’s back, not enjoying needing the help in the least, but neither arguing that she did need it.

Moonlight glanced at Velvet. “So, three legged, or on my back?” she asked the little pink earther with a grin.

Velvet Step was about the same size as Moonlight, both of them extremely petite—Moonlight had met all of one mare shorter than her—though both also extremely fit from the demands of dancing. Even so, Moonlight smiled and crouched when Velvet answered, “You should carry me.” Moonlight was glad she at least she knew when to take the help.

“Light Hooves, let’s go,” Moonlight said, leading the way, not seeming to be slowed down by Velvet even a little.  A fact that was no surprise any of the dancers, but got double takes from even the most oblivious of Manehattanites.

About halfway to their destination, Velvet spoke up. “You’re enjoying the attention far too much,” she told Moonlight, giggling.

“And you’re not enjoying it nearly enough,” Moonlight retorted with a grin. “Besides, how often to you see a small mare being carried by an even smaller one and not missing a step?”

There was a short pause as Velvet thought that over. Light Hooves was the one that spoke up, though. “Not nearly often enough,” he teased. There was a good sounding whack a second later and Moonlight laughed, not even looking back to see where Silent had hit him.

“Oh, come on, let him have his fun,” Velvet laughed. “Besides, I don’t think Moony minds the attention too much.”

Moonlight gained a mischievous smile, before suddenly firing a set of bedroom eyes at Light Hooves. The expression didn’t have the desired effect, as the stallion only smiled, raising an eyebrow in return. There was a flash of light from across the street that made Moonlight and Light Hooves stop in their tracks.

As one, they turned to watch a reporter scurry off down the street. “Well, that’ll be tabloid fuel for weeks,” Light Hooves stated after a momentary pause. There was another moment of silent contemplation before Velvet burst into laughter, quickly followed by the other three.

“Are you sure this won’t make your coltfriend jealous?” Velvet asked curiously.

“Who, Sunny?” Moonlight asked in surprise, before giggling. “Oh, he’s not my coltfriend. Just a friend. In fact, I’ve been trying to get him set up with somepony for a while!” She glanced hopefully over at Silent, who immediately shook her head.

“Nope, not happening, not a chance in Tartarus,” the baut immediately answered, deadpan. “You’ve already tried to set us up once.” She glared at Moonlight with narrowed eyes.

“Yeah, tried. You’ve never actually gone on a date,” Moonlight complained.

“Oh, hey, look the hospital!” Light Hooves said quickly, speeding up before the argument could actually go anywhere. He was clearly not keen on Moonlight and Silent entering another one of their arguments.

Moonlight rolled her eyes as she matched Light Hooves pace. His distraction had done its job, though, and Moonlight did not start the argument again.

They checked in quick, and in barely any time at all, Velvet and Silent had been looked at and bandaged up. Unfortunately for the baut, though, something had also clipped her wing bad enough that it was going to be out of commission for a bit. How Silent hadn’t felt that pain was beyond Moonlight.

As the quartet made their way back towards the theatre, they were in good spirits. Velvet had a bandage around one of her forehooves and instructions not to use it for a cold of days. Silent had the same, plus one of her bat-like wings was tied to the side of her body, but there were no breaks or fractures, and it was only a couple of days that they’d be out. Nothing like Moonlight had worried that it could have been.

“This is going to put me out for the rest of our Manehattan tour, isn’t it?” Velvet sighed, frowning.

“Probably,” Moonlight readily agreed, “but better that than you do something that screws it up bad enough that you’re no longer able to dance at all. “And if I have to tie you to your bed to keep you off that hoof, I will. I like you.”

There was a short, contemplative pause from Velvet. Light Hooves answered the look Moonlight knew Velvet would be giving with a resigned tone,” Don’t ask, you’ll be happier.”

Moonlight laughed. “Oh come on, I’m not that bad,” she complained, though there was no real heat in her voice.

She could feel Silent and Light Hooves’ deadpans. She ignored them. Velvet was still new enough to the company that she didn’t quite know all of Moonlight’s quirks. Not yet, anyway. It was going to be fun when Velvet finally realized that Moonlight wasn’t the pure little Pegasus she often liked to portray for her public face.

Moonlight could practically feel Velvet’s confusion, and decided to fuel it with an enigmatic smile. The earther had been herself from the beginning. She was a fun little pony. Moonlight, however, was only herself in the privacy of the Canterlot practice studios or when they were outside of a theatre they were performing at. Due to this, Moonlight knew that Velvet had yet to get a full picture of her personality, and she had no problems taking advantage of Velvet’s unsure position for a little teasing.

It wasn’t long before they got back to the theatre, only to find a large number of guards out front. Moonlight wasn’t all that surprised the guard had gotten involved,   but the number of them was surprising, as well as the fact it looked like the theatre was shut down.

“The theatre is closed, please move along,” one of the guards said to them as they approached the doors. Moonlight looked over to see a Manehattan Police Guard approaching.

After a quick glance at his rank, Moonlight smiled at the unicorn. “Inspector, we’re members of the Royal Ballet. If you want to confirm it, talk to Scripted Grace, the choreographer, or any of the others in the Company. Are they within or somewhere else?”

The Inspector frowned. “Moonlight Dancer, Velvet Step, Light Hooves, and Silent Dreams?” he asked them. Moonlight nodded. “Come with me please,” the inspector stated. “The rest of your company is with us inside. The lighting didn’t fall down. It was cut.”

There was a long pause after that, before Moonlight stated quite eloquently, “What?”

“The Detective will explain it inside, but the equipment falling was, unfortunately, no accident,” the inspector repeated.

Moonlight nodded somewhat numbly as she glanced around at her fellow dancers. That was not good news. Someone hated them or someone in the Company enough to drop thousands of pounds of lighting and sound equipment on their heads, and Moonlight had no clue who it could be.

The inspector let the quartet into a room where the rest of the company was gathered, everypony shifting nervously, glancing towards one of the doors nervously. There was no conversation in the air at all, and Moonlight could instantly feel the palpable nerves in the air.

She looked around at everypony with a slight frown. There was simply too much angst in the room, and she had to find a way to get rid of some of it. Unfortunately, there was very good reason for it, and she wasn’t entirely sure how to remove that angst without making light of the reason for it in the first place. She thought for a moment, before gaining a slight smile. “So, they dropped an entire rig up of theatre lighting on us and the worst that happened was a fractured wing. I think we’re doing pretty well, no?” she asked cheerfully, hoping to lighten everypony’s spirits at least a little.

“Yeah, but the fact is, somepony dropped that lighting in the first place,” somepony within the troop argued. It was not an argument that Moonlight had a quick and easy rebuttal for.

“True, but we’re all okay, and we know to watch out. Besides, we shouldn’t be feeling down right now. Everypony’s alive and mostly intact. We should be delighted!” Moonlight called.

There was a short pause, before the collective groan made its way around the room and she received a firm smack on the shoulder from Velvet. “That was horrible,” Silent stated from Light Hooves’ back. “That was bad and you should feel bad.”

Moonlight smiled unrepentantly around at everypony, glad the pun had at least drawn some kind of a reaction. “Hey, we don’t leave anypony to provolone! We all prove together.”

This time the swat was to the back of her head. Moonlight just turned to grin at Velvet, not even looking a little bit phased.

The door on the other side of the room opened and a Guard with a detective insignia on his armour stepped out. “Miss Dancer? Let’s spare them any more of your puns. I’d like to get your statement please,” she requested.

Moonlight nodded, sobering slightly. “Of course detective,” she said. She left Velvet with the rest of the dancers, before walking over and going into the room with the guard stallion, confident she’d done at least a bit to help raise the spirits of her coworkers. Now to see if she could pull anything out of the Guard about what they knew. She really wanted to know what the hay had happened…