And You Have Butter-Soles?
Trixie's show was met with thunderous applause as it ended. Dozens of pairs of hooves were either clapped against each other or were pounded against the ground. The air above the stage was illuminated in a variety of fantastical colors as magical fireworks were launched into the late evening sky.
Yet Twilight Sparkle trotted slowly back towards her castle, head hung low, seemingly lost in thought.
When the castle door shut firmly behind her, Twilight breathed a sigh of relief.
“TWILIGHT SPARKLE!” The sudden boom of the Royal Canterlot voice caused Twilight to jump several hoof-lengths into the air.
Twilight spun to look at the imposing figure of Princess Celestia looming in the doorway to the banquet hall. The hall was littered with the remnants of a dinner with exquisite silverware placement. A puddle graced the center of the crumb laden table where, mere hours ago, an impressive ice sculpture pony had stood.
Long gone were the three “friends” that Twilight had chosen for her erstwhile student. Now she faced a fully irritated Princess of the sun, quite alone.
“Pr-Princess?” Twilight stammered as she vainly attempted to regain her composure. The last time that Celestia had directed this much ire in her direction, she had just finished enchanting half of Ponyville into fighting over her smartypants doll.
“I-I’m sorry, Princess, I know skipped out on the dinner, but-” Twilight’s rambling apology was cut short as Celestia stood to the side, revealing two quite uncomfortable-looking mares.
Twilight looked at one, “Starlight?” And then the other, “Trixie?” She paused for a moment to gather her thoughts. “How did you get here before me?”
“Well,” Starlight began, “I thought I’d surprise you by teleporting Trixie and myself here ahead of you so we could tell the Princess what a good job you did with my friendship lesson-” Starlight lowered her head. “-but when I got to Trixie’s performance-”
“Enough,” Princess Celestia stomped her hoof for emphasis, “you two may go now, I must speak with the… Princess of Friendship.”
Twilight watched, nonplussed, as Trixie and Starlight started to trot down one of the castle hallways with their heads lowered and shoulders hunched, almost as if they were expecting something horrible to happen.
Princess Celestia watched the two retreating mares until they had vanished down one of the winding hallways. She then turned with a look of complete and utter disappointment that shook Twilight to her very core.
“Princess?” Twilight managed, having finally regained some of her composure.
“How could you?” Celestia’s voice was soft, like a whisper, yet her normally composed tone was heavy with barely contained emotion.
“How could I?” Twilight parroted back to her former mentor. She looked down the hallway that Trixie and Starlight had vanished down.
“But, it was just a dinner, and they both came here and-” Twilight’s mouth stopped moving as Celestia’s brows somehow managed to furrow themselves further than they already had been.
“This. Isn’t. About. Dinner. Twilight.” Each word stood on its own as a testament of accusation.
“It can’t be about Trixie and Starlight,” Twilight conjectured, “with my help they’ve… become… friends…” She trailed off again as she began to wither under Celestia’s ever increasing glare.
The silence between the pair of alicorns was absolute. Twilight’s mouth continued to open and close, like a that of a fish caught out of water.
Celestia closed her eyes and let out a long breath. “Twilight,” she began, “you are now the Princess of Friendship.”
Twilight slowly nodded her head.
“And you almost caused the death of a pony today.” The emphatic statement caused Twilight’s heart and ears to sink.
“But-Who-How-What?” Twilight found herself stammering again.
“Twilight,” Celestia said, “what would you have done if Starlight hadn’t forgiven Trixie?”
“But… she could have done… a different trick?”
Celestia inclined her head forwards, the way older ponies would when looking over their reading glasses. “Please tell me you don’t actually believe that, Twilight.”
Twilight lowered her head in shame. “No.”
“Twilight,” Celestia said, in a tone as dry as the Appleoosa badlands, “Trixie would have succeeded.”
“What?” Twilight’s question was loaded with incredulity. “You think she could have completed the Trick on her own?”
“Of course she couldn’t complete the trick, Twilight.”
Twilight stared at Celestia. “But you just said-”
“She would have succeeded in killing herself, Twilight.”
“Kill herself?” Twilight shook her head from side to side. “But, ponies don’t do that, Princess… Why would she… do that?”
“Do you remember when you faced Discord for the first time?”
“How could I possibly forget that?”
“Then you remember how you felt when all of your friends left you?”
Twilight cringed. “I… I wanted to go away... “
“And?”
“And… I… I never wanted to come back.” Twilight’s voice quavered as she hung her head low.
Princess Celestia extended a wing towards the distraught Princess of Friendship.
“Oh, Princess…” Twilight’s head sprang up suddenly. Her eyes were wide with understanding. “I drove away her only friend!”
“And she wanted to leave…”
“And not come back,” Twilight whispered. “Oh Princess, how could I have been so-”
“Irresponsible?”
Twilight shot a hurt look at her mentor. “I was going to say blind.”
The stern look never left Celestia’s face. “Twilight, you cannot afford to make mistakes like this. You have responsibilities. You cannot allow your personal feelings for another pony to cloud your judgement. I don’t understand, though; you fully forgave Starlight, a pony who altered history to take revenge upon you. Yet Trixie only ever wanted to show you up, even when she was possessed by the Alicorn Amulet. She wasn’t in control of her actions.”
Twilight’s head lowered yet again.
Celestia’s eyes softened, for the first time since Twilight had arrived. “Why are you still holding this grudge? Was it because she humiliated you and your friends? Twilight, if I held a grudge every time I was humiliated, the Foal Free Press would have ended in a smoking crater.” She paused, then whispered through gritted teeth, "I can't even enter a room with a cake in it anymore without..."
Twilight stared at Celestia.
Celestia cleared her throat. “Was it the humiliation Twilight? You have to learn to-”
“No.” Twilight’s answer was abrupt. “It had nothing to do with that at all.”
Celestia tilted her head in confusion. “Then… why? You’re the Princess of Friendship. You should be bringing ponies together, not forcing them apart.”
"I…” Twilight’s head hung low, her eyes locked on the floor, almost as if she thought could find the right words written at her hooves. “I just... didn't think... Starlight has such magical potential... And Trixie’s only brush with real magic was a cursed artefact… I… I didn't want a petty wannabe unicorn like Trixie stunting Starlight's magical growth with her pathetic tricks..."
Celestia’s eyes widened. “You cannot mean that, Twilight.” A look of uncertainty worked its way across her features. “I thought I taught you better than to judge ponies for their differences. Where did you pick up such poisoned, such… tainted ideas?”
Twilight stared firmly at her own hooves.
“Twilight! Answer me!”
“YOU, Alright?” Twilight exploded.
Celestia stumbled backwards, a shocked expression frozen in rictus across her features.
“I Learned it by watching YOU!” Twilight exploded, again.
“I never-” Celestia began.
“Oh, you never said anything,” Twilight sneered. “You didn't have to. All the books you had me read; Starswirl’s compendium on the fundamentals of magical theory, Clover’s thesis on inherent magical ability-”
Twilight paused for a deep breath. “Everything you had me study, everything, it all was about how pony magic, unicorn magic, was the only true magic. I've learned so much since I came to Ponyville. There are things that our magic can’t explain, like Pinkie’s ‘Pinkie Sense,’ or Zecora’s ‘completely not magical’ potions.
“I feel like such a horrible pony now that I realize that I had been dismissing their talents out-of-hoof because it was something that I didn’t understand. I even got angry at Pinkie Pie, just for having a talent that I couldn’t figure out. And Zecora? I know when we confronted her that I was swept up in the moment with everypony else, but even before then, I had dismissed potions and incantations as ‘just a load of hooey!’”
Twilight Sparkle’s face was streaked by tears as her rant devolved into a series of racking sobs.
“And… and now... I’ve almost driven... a pony to suicide!”
She looked into her former mentor’s eyes. “Princess...” her words caught in her throat, “I'm… I’m a terrible pony, aren't I?”
Twilight didn't wait for an answer. She swung her head around swiftly, her body almost not keeping up, to face away from Celestia. She lowered her head as her body shook with sobs. Her tears ran freely down and off of her muzzle, pooling on the floor.
Celestia stepped forward and wrapped one of her massive wings around the sobbing mess that was her former student.
For a few minutes they stood there. Celestia remained silent until the only sound was the occasional whimper or sniffle from her former student.
“Bias can be a very dangerous thing,” Celestia began, “and you are not a terrible pony. I am guilty of far worse than you, Twilight Sparkle.”
Twilight raised a pair of red-rimmed eyes to meet Celestia’s. But the Princess of the Sun was not looking at Twilight, she was staring wistfully across the room. As Celestia continued to speak, Twilight noticed the slightest of quavers in Celestia’s normally steely gaze.
“My own bias, and my unwillingness to acknowledge it, resulted in some of the greatest tragedies of my life. At the time, I was unable… or unwilling to see it for myself. Even when-” Celestia paused for a moment and closed her eyes, “even when my own sister lay imprisoned in the Moon, I placed the blame everywhere but myself.
“I even vilified my own flesh-and-blood rather than face the truth. I allowed ponies to celebrate Nightmare Night, I even encouraged it, pretending that Luna was a monster… I told myself it was so that my little ponies could sleep at night, but it was all so that I could justify the horrible thing I had done.”
“But,” Twilight interrupted, her voice raw from her previous bawling, “but she had become Nightmare Moon! She refused to end the ni-”
“And I drove her to it Twilight. I did. I never encouraged ponies to stay up late and enjoy the night, or to maybe sleep in every once in a while.” She let out a heavy sigh. “The daytime is so enjoyable, isn’t it?” Celestia’s voice had become bitter. “I told myself a pony would have to be crazy to want to enjoy the nighttime over the day, wouldn’t they? And I asked myself what kind of monster would want, neigh, demand their fair share of recognition?”
Celestia shook her head. “I was the monster, Twilight. It took me a thousand years to realize that, but it’s the truth.”
Twilight looked down at the floor. “Princess, no... I could never see you as a monster, even if… Even if you were responsible for what happened.”
“Twilight,” Celestia said, finally turning her gaze to the younger alicorn, “as a Princess, you must be aware that everypony—and I do mean everypony—has a dark side, including yourself. You are fortunate to have recognized it in yourself, and to have begun to work against it. Just remember that you must control it, lest it control you.”
“I will, Princess,” Twilight said, looking up.
Celestia’s features softened. “Well... It seems that disaster was avoided this time, and as an added bonus, your pupil Starlight has made a new friend of her own.” A mischievous smile slowly crept across her muzzle. “I think this calls for a celebration.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Should we really be celebrating a brush with catastrophe?”
“Enjoy every victory Twilight,” Celestia said with a single nod of her head.
“Well,” Twilight asked hesitantly, “how do princesses celebrate near-misses with total failure?”
Celestia threw one foreleg around Twilight and gestured off into the distance with the other.
“Cake, Twilight. Copious amounts of cake.”
“Yeah Twilight,” said Pinkie Pie, bursting out from under the dining room table. "Ol' Sunbutt here's been buying enough from the Cakes to put the Twins through college!"
