Transparency: Q. Mint Jewelip

Early Warning was a simple stallion, in the same way that the Royal Treasurer was only responsible for playing with numbers. He was a stallion of simple means, simple joys, and simple duties. All of his varied skills, ultimately, boiled down to two ideas: protect the royalty and keep the peace.

Life was predictable, for the most part. He got up in the morning. He stretched. He took a quick shower in the barracks and brushed himself into a presentable mess before hitting the barracks sauna to finish drying. He'd check his gear, get dressed, and hit the armory for anything that wasn't up to snuff. Eventually, he'd report for duty a full half hour before sunrise.

Yep, Early Warning's life was just about perfect, which was why he'd never seen the hit that little colt had given him coming. Nope. One second there was a little colt leading a hoof full of civilians (and two guards) through the city, shimmying along with a quirky little song, and the next, he's being laid out by a full grown stallion.

And now... now he was hanging, upside down, in somepony's basement, covered in some kind of tough green stuff.

He sighed.

At least whoever it was didn't seem to have thought to strip him of his armor.

So, with a second frustrated sigh, Early Warning fiddled with his hooves until the Canterlot Issued Guard Blade (patent pending!) flicked out from his tramplers... and began the slow process of cutting himself free.

...

To return to the barracks and report he had been blindsided, and taken out, by a colt no taller than his knee.

This was gunna be a simply ~wonderful~ day, he just knew it.

-~oOo~-

Recon fidgeted. She was sitting, well more properly, she was laying on a rather plush velvet pillow with spun gold trim... at a shimmering marble end table... with a teacup which likely cost more bits than the hive had ever managed to con, steal, 'borrow', or earn over the course of several centuries... while debating the safety of trying the little almond cookies that were floating before her.

"Oh do go on, they're quite lovely, really." Celestia smiled, her mane drifting in the afternoon sun.

And, then there was a small stack of almond cookies delicately placed upon her tea saucer.

Which left Recon with a new problem.

If the saucer was full of cookies, where could she place her teacup-of-ultimate-financial-ruin?

Panicking inside, Recon swallowed another sip of tea before she looked up again at her 'host.'

"Um... may I be exceptionally honest, and in no possible, conceivable, or imagined way hostile in the least?"

Celestia, for her own part, never stopped smiling - though, one of her perfectly shaped eyebrows did rise the slightest bit as she turned her head to sip from her own teacup. "Oh yes, please do be utterly non-confrontational and peaceful. I would hate to think that you felt the need to be combative." She turned to look once more at the changeling across the table before her, a dainty forkful of strawberry cake hovering a foot from her lips. "By all means, don't stand on ceremony with me."

Recon blinked again, the sun on her back felt awfully warm today. She wouldn't be doing that on purpose would she? No... Celestia would never intentionally move the sun closer just to intimidate a 'guest' as she kept calling her. Celestia would never put all her little ponies under so much stress just to slowly wear down the defenses of a captured enemy of her people's species. She'd never do something so utterly terrifying as risk all life on the planet simply to make someone squirm.

She had banished her sister to the moon for a millenia.

Recon swallowed.

And she had 'lost' the Elements of harmony.

... more than once.

And she had trusted a librarian, a farmer, a dressmaker, a veterinarian, a public servant, and an apprentice baker with stopping an elder god with nothing at all as an edge.

Oh Hives... she would move the sun closer just to make her sweat.

"Um.... was there.... that is to say, did you.... um.... I'm feeling a bit uncomfor.... NotThatI'mNotPleasedWithTheTeaOrAnything!" Recon blinked a few times as she struggled to stop panting.

The sun was definately too hot.

And, yet, Celestia simply watched her for a moment longer before looking down at her teacup.

"Oh, Kibitz," the goddess said as she looked over towards the three story tall door behind her. "Could you get me another pot of tea please? This one seems to be a different blend than my usual afternoon tea."

The aging stallion, waiting silently by the door, bowed curtly before trotting out and leaving the two alone.

Celestia watched the door close before turning back to her guest. "I'm terribly sorry about that, miss. You were saying?"

Recon felt her heart hammering in her chest again.

Psychological warfare? Celestia was clearing the room of witnesses now?!?!?

There were no doors on the balconies! There were no more Guards! The only pony who she would have had even the slightest hesitation of frightening off with a horrifying dismemberment she had simply sent to look for more TEA?!?!?

Recon's brain simply shorted out. "I'll tell you everything! Just please stop moving the sun closer!"

To which Celestia simply tilted her head, in that way that silently screamed a battlecry that could end the existence of all life. "Oh? I wasn't aware I had asked a question, but please..." she gestured with her empty teacup, "do continue."

-

-~oOo~-

Sleep Dep strolled through Canterlot, listening in as the guards raced by every few minutes. She frowned every once in a while, carefully counting her steps along the path and stepping to the right just as a brigade of the heavily armored Guard whipped around a corner only to stream past her without a second glance. She sighed as a unicorn mare screamed out her horror at the 'absolute monstrosity' that was her bowl of imported Saddle Arabian soup.... which Sleep, patently, did not believe a word of.

Who imports soup?

Greedy, pompous, brain-cell-deficient nincompoops without the intellectual acumen of a frostbitten turnip.... that's who.

With a snort, she flicked her tail just enough to send a small pebble arcing through the air to land, precisely, in the mare's soup... resulting in a few bright droplets spattering her, no doubt, 'priceless' imported something-or-other dress.

The sight of the mare fainting dead away brought a smile to Sleep's lips that lasted until she was finally within the castle proper. Apparently these ponies were suspicious of everyone and everything unless it looked like a cheerful, satisfied, and happy little pony with reason to be there. Sleep rolled her eyes as she walked purposefully past, yet another, checkpoint and spared only a moment to ask the guard, who wasn't grilling the young pegasus beside her, where she could go to petition the crown.

Which, was remarkably easy, given the pegasus' rising discomfort only a few paces away. Apparently, one only needed to speak with the Royal Scheduler, Herald, or Crier.... who all happened to be the same stallion.

Sleep chuckled once she was out of earshot.

It had only taken a tiny bit of magic to have the 'changeling' 'accidentally' reveal herself by changing her mane color. Silly Guards... decoys came in all kinds of flavors... even the kind that didn't know they were helping. And better yet, as she passed through another set of grande doors, the tired face of a elderly unicorn looked up from a podium to the side of the throne room antechamber, a weary, though ever present, smile gracing his lips.

A smile that Sleep was absolutely familiar with.

-~oOo~-

Mine smiled patiently as another noble regaled him with tales of the most abominable of travesties. The utter madness of flower petals landing in their fountains! The senseless chaos of clouds shadowing their atriums at 3:14 pm ... during prime napping time! The wanton disregard for their hydrangeas when the neighbor's cat ~maliciously~ plotted to shed upon their floral blooms!

And through it all, he smiled patiently, only to add another name to the list of those who would be turned away today due to royal order.

All was as it should be. All was as it must be. After all, royal orders were royal orders, and at the end of the day, his pockets were still being lined with a little bit more gold and not a few more gems of various, though questionable, origin.

Mine smiled, patiently, because he was supposed to smile patiently. He was supposed to stand still, listen to the nobles complain and whine and moan and beg for an audience with her 'most high and respectable, crepuscular, highness, Princess Celestia of Equestria.' He was supposed to take down their names, nod his head politely, give lip service to the loudest ones and give polite dismissals to the important ones. He was supposed to keep the rabble out and only let the most worthy... or the ones with the most realistically important... through to an actual audience with Celestia today.

Something, he smiled at the thought, that he was uniquely qualified to do... seeing as how not a single mare or stallion had visited upon him a legitimate reason to petition the crown yet this afternoon.

And so, another fancy, self-important stallion, was turned away to join the milling throng in the Grande Hall before the Throne Room antechamber.

Mine smiled, because he was doing such a fine job.

And then ~She~ turned the corner and strolled up, requesting an audience with the Princess. Mine smiled patiently and listened to the tale of woe about how a cup of coffee had been delivered upon this mare at precisely two degrees too warm. The tale... it was told with such agonizing pain and heart that Mine felt himself moved.

The mare was directed to the Throne Room antechamber to await being announced, the offending cup of coffee floating along beside her in a silvery glow of magic.

And the mob of nobles surged with cries of fury and threats of horrible horrible things being placed in gardens and terrible harm inflicted upon his salads... until the Guard moved to hold them back.

No, the nobles were not without creative measure or mind... but they did tend to lack the ability to follow through with anything short of disdain.

Which was perfectly fine for Mine... as he politely smiled and refused the next supplicant after having waved Sleep Dep through to visit the Princess.

Ah yes... the joyful fulfillment of a job well done.

-~oOo~-

WC was having a wonderful time.

Really! What could be more fun than playing with all his new friends?

He had shown up, just as his queen had instructed, at just the time when his queen has requested, and had been playing tag, just as she had told him to do.

And, just as she had said they would, the ponies had all come out to play with him!

It was wonderful fun!

Some of them were cooks, like before. And some of them were sporty ponies with their weights and jump ropes. And SOME of them were just stunt ponies... probably there to play because they had seen other ponies playing... but that was alright for WC.

Ponies were so much fun!

And WC LOVED playing with ponies!

They were playing freeze tag now. WC had known when one of the cooks had yelled "FREEZE!"

Well, if he had yelled freeze, he was probably it, and WC knew the rules for freeze tag: Don't get tagged or you have to stay still.

So, he had dodged, and ducked, and jumped, and flew, and bounced off of buildings, and rebounded off of ponies, and leapt through windows, and broken a few doors, and smashed a few walls, and even gone the wrong way down a one way street (but he wouldn't tell the ponies because they might think he wasn't playing fair).

You know... things like that!

Freeze tag!

And then... one of them got him!

And he froze... and the game was over.

But, he knew the rules of freeze tag, even if the ponies all seemed to have forgotten them. They never tagged each other.

WC would have shrugged, but... well... freeze tag.

And so, WC stayed 'frozen' as they chained him up and started to drag him away.

Ah well... ponies were still fun!