It's Always Burning in Fillydelphia
Author's Note
It helps to imagine [url=http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0911320/?ref_=tt_cl_t4]this guy's voice (Kronk, live action Tick) when the fourth major character starts talking, in my opinion.
Other than that, enjoy... or despair. Whatever.
It's Always Burning in Fillydelphia
The Order of Things
Twilight Sparkle sat in her crystalline chair which bore her cutie mark above her on the high back and was set in front of a massive table displaying Equestria via a seemingly magical holographic display. Twilight’s attention was not currently on the table however, though it was some hours back.
Earlier in the day, the table was displaying the cutie marks of her two friends Rainbow Dash and Rarity over the city of Fillydelphia. However, their marks were now absent signaling that their task was done.
True to form, Twilight was now muzzle deep in a book, or rather, she was still muzzle deep in a book but minus the occasional glance to the map to see if there was an update. Now all that was left to do was wait for her friends to return, no doubt with news that yet another friendship problem had been solved and another important lesson has been learned by some pony or another.
Twilight’s ears perked up as she heard the familiar sound of hooves daintily tapping on the hard crystal floor of her castle leading up to this room. This sound was accompanied by a pair of wings beating against the air.
Twilight looked up from her book with a smile. “Rarity! Rainbow Dash! Glad you’re back! How was FillydelphAH!” Twilight’s pleasant expression changed with all the subtlety and grace of a train bringing friendship to a collection of trees via unexpected derailment at full speed.
Rarity said nothing, allowing her present condition to do the talking. Her eyes were red and veiny and Twilight could see that the skin around them was puffy and pink. Rarity was not one to shy away from tears, but Twilight had never seen her eyes quite this bad. In fact, Rarity’s eyes still looked to be watery. Still, this was not nearly as alarming as the cylinder-shaped black mark across Rarity’s forehead just under her horn along with a large bump almost as if Rarity might be growing a second horn.
Rainbow Dash, likewise, looked like she had seen better days. Her blue-hair and feathers were covered in a dusting of black soot, much of which also inhabited her rainbow colored mane and tail. Additionally, the ends of Rainbow Dash’s feathers were burnt and the occasional, small, black-charred feather would fall from her wings as she hovered in the air.
"So how'd things go?” Twilight asked with a smile she hoped would cut through the obvious misery on her friends faces as the pair took to their own large crystalline chairs around the map.
Rainbow Dash stared Twilight in the eyes, her irises burning like barely contained magenta fires on the verge of escaping their confines and destroying all in their path. "The map sent us to deal with a labor dispute between the Fillydelphia weather ponies and the local mayor's office after things had already got so heated that the weather ponies were already rioting and fighting with the all-unicorn police force, Twilight."
Twilight cringed. "Yikes!” With some degree of trepidation, she put her hopeful smile back on her face. “Well it's a good thing the map sent you two to fix the friendship problem!"
Rarity’s deep blue eyes focused onto Twilight’s with the precision of laser beams. "The city was on fire, darling! And not just any type of fire. Magical fire!"
Rainbow Dash nodded. "Water just made it burn hotter and spread faster! Go figure..."
Twilight swallowed, looking between her two friends worriedly. "But... but you two fixed things, right?"
Rarity let out a heavy sigh. "Sure, dear. I negotiated a fair contract and designed new uniforms for the weather ponies after I got the police to stand down, only taking one baton to the face before an entire can of mace was emptied into my face."
Twilight’s mouth dropped slightly as her left eye twitched. She looked at Rarity and worked her lips as if she knew she should say something to all that, but her brain offered little in the way of anything useful.
Rainbow Dash spoke up, "And I got the weather ponies to stop rioting and stop the magical fires from consuming most of downtown where they would continue to burn until the end of time." Rainbow frowned heavily. “I mean… There’s now a monument of literal eternal frame memorializing the whole event as like… some sort of symbol of what happens when ponies don’t work out their differences or whatever…”
Twilight turned with a small smile. “Oh, well that sounds nice.”
Rainbow Dash furrowed her brow. “The monument is like twenty square blocks, Twilight. The fire spread after it hit an explosive barrel store and took out, amongst loads of other things, a kitten store, an orphanage, and a kitten orphanage!”
Rarity cocked her head slightly as a thought hit her. “Oh right, somepony should go tell Fluttershy she needs to make room for about two hundred kittens at her cottage.”
“1, 2, 3, not it!” Rainbow Dash said quickly.
“Not it!” Rarity chimed in.
Twilight just looked between the two ponies and blinked a couple times. “Uh… I’ll tell Fluttershy. I’m sure Ponyville can throw a kitten adoption program, or something…”
The other two mares stared back at Twilight blankly.
After a few beats of uncomfortable silence, Twilight forced a grin onto her face. "Sooo... everything worked out then?"
Rarity suddenly lit up with a smile. "Oh sure, everything's just peachy-keen, as Pinkie would say."
Rainbow Dash "Yep! We took care of this one lickety split!”
A colt’s young voice floated up through the open balcony. “Did somepony call my name?”
Rainbow Dash grimaced. “I mean we took care of this in a Flash.”
A stallion’s voice called out this time. “Does somepony need me up in there?”
Twilight mumbled to herself, “Probably me when this is all over…”
Rainbow Dash clenched down on her teeth and rushed to the open balcony. “Anypony out there named ‘jiffy?!’ Huh?! Anypony have parents weird enough to leave them saddled with that name?! No?!GOOD!” Rainbow Dash pulled her head, her expression soaked to the brim with frustration as she turned back to Twilight. “We fixed the problem in a jiffy, Twilight! Alright, a jiffy!”
“Erm… Okay then…” Twilight said. She took a deep breath and put a smile back on her face. “Well, the important thing is you two solved the problem and made it back safe—”
“WHAT THE HAY, TWILIGHT?!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed.
Rarity nodded her head up and down “Yes, darling. What the ‘hay’ indeed!”
Twilight shrank back into her chair slightly as the mares continued.
“WHY DID THE MAP SEND US TO FILLYDELPHIA AFTER THINGS HAD GOTTEN SO BAD?!”
“Indeed,” Rarity commented in agreement. “Had we shown up earlier, I’m sure would we could have prevented things from escalating so spectacularly and dangerously. And also saved the city a bundle in unrepairable property damage.”
“It’s like…” Rainbow Dash paused and thought for a moment. “It’s like the map wants us to get into these crazy tense situations!”
“Now hold on there,” Twilight said, raising a forehoof. “Sure you two had a difficult trip this time, but it’s not like all the other trips were that much of a problem.”
Rarity gave Twilight a serious look. “Twilight, darling, would you be so kind as to name one time the map sent any of us to a place where things weren’t already terrible or the ponies sent weren’t under some sort of horribly inconvenient time constraint.”
Twilight paused for a moment. “Well uh… Starlight’s village was… erm… Okay… that example is a bit extreme, but the Hooffield and McColts were… were…” Twilight gave the girls a slightly defeated look. “Las Pegasus didn’t sound that dire…” she offered weakly.
“See!” Rainbow Dash said. She glared at the table. “Sure, this table knows to send us to solve friendship problems, but it waits until the last possible second to send anypony! And I’m sick of it!” Rainbow Dash banged a forehoof hard against the table’s surface, causing the 3D image of Equestria to flicker.
“Hey! Watch it!” A small, but deep masculine voice called out. “That’s some sensitive magic that keeps that going, you know!”
The ponies all paused and stared at each other in bewilderment.
“Did… did the table just talk?” Rarity inquired. “Or do I have a concussion?” She frowned heavily. “I’m not sure which outcome would be worse.”
“Dude…” Rainbow Dash said as she stared down at the table.
Twilight also looked down, but in wonder. “This is incredible… I mean… I spent some time examining the table, but I never thought it might be able to converse with us.” Twilight’s face lit up. “Perhaps with some careful study—”
Rainbow Dash hammered her forehoof against the table's surface with a ‘BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG!’
“Rainbow!”Twilight called out a in a chastising tone.
“What?!” Rainbow Dash protested. “Me hitting it is what got it to talk in the first place!”
“Seriously! Knock it off!” The voice commanded.
Rarity’s eyes went wide. “Okay, now I do hope the voice is coming from the table, otherwise it’s coming from between my legs…”
Twilight and Rainbow Dash locked eyes briefly, then quickly darted towards Rarity’s chair. The white unicorn let out a startled gasp as the girls thrust their heads in between Rarity’s throne and the table.
“Ugh! Get your horn out of my face, Twilight!”Rainbow Dash groaned.
“Sorry!” Twilight said. She shifted her head slightly. “Better?”
A shudder started at Rarity’s waist and ended at the top of her horn. “No it’s not! No it’s NOT!”
“Hey!” Rainbow Dash called out. “There’s like… a hatch down here or something?! It doesn’t look like it’s been used in a while…”
Rarity’s face flushed red as she pulled up her legs and cross them. “That’s none of your business!”
“Not that!” Rainbow Dash chided. “Down here on the table!”
“Oh…” Rarity said quietly. She lowered her head under the table, placing it between the faces of the two mares who were already crammed under the table. All three pairs of eyes stared at a small square-shaped cut in the crystal.
“I’ve examined every inch of the table!” Twilight exclaimed. “How could I not have noticed that before?!”
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Maybe more of the table sense of drama kicking in?” she suggested sarcastically.
“It’s a table!” the masculine voice called out from the other side of the panel. “It doesn’t have a sense of anything.”
The three mares once again exchanged confused and inquisitive glances.
With a purple glow of her horn, Twilight carefully swung the panel open, the three ponies making way as it swung just a hair’s width from their nooses. Each of them let out an audible gasp at the sight that awaited them.
A tiny tan dog with a white underbelly, muzzle, and paws stood on a small metal swivel tool and working a much larger, but still tiny, control panel with a collection of monitors over buttons, knobs, and dials.
“Oh sure!” the dog said. “Just barge right in! It’s not like I’m monitoring all of Equestria for friendship problems or nothing!”
“…There’s a tiny dog in the table,” Rainbow Dash muttered.
“It’s a shiba inu, darling,” Rarity specified.
Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. “Shiva emu?”
“Shiba inu,” Rarity stressed. “It’s what breed of dog that is… though they’re usually not nearly that small.”
Rainbow Dash flashed Rarity an annoyed look. “Does the breed really matter, Rarity?! There’s a tiny dog living in the map table!”
“Girls!” Twilight exclaimed forcefully. She looked at the dog apologetically. “Sorry, they’ve had a rough day.”
“Hah!” The dog exclaimed. “Dog puns! I love it.”
Twilight paused for a moment. “Uh, what?” She shook her head slightly. “No, never mind… My name is Twilight Sparkle and these two are…”
“Yeah, I know who you all are,” the dog said. “I’ve got a button here for all of your butts.”
“What?!”
“Whoa! Dude, the heck?!”
“My word.”
With a hearty chuckle the dog tapped a trio of cutie mark-shaped buttons on the console in front of him.
Simultaneously, all three mares felt a vibration on their flanks causing their heads to jolt upwards and bang against the heavy crystal table above.
With a few exclamations of pain and a trio of glares, the dog tapped each button again causing the glow from the mares’ behinds to cease as his uproarious laughter slowly rolled to a stop.
“Okay, so who are you?!” Twilight quickly interjected before the irate mares next to her to get a word in.
The dog smiled and pointed at itself with a paw. “Name’s Order. I monitor Equestria for friendship problems and use this magic table I live in to alert you girls to where you’re most needed.”
“What?!” Twilight exclaimed. “How?!”
The dog motioned to the monitors in front of it. “I’ve got a full loadout of magical monitors here that pretty much show me everything plus take meticulous notes about ponies and other creatures in Equestria.”
Twilight smiled in interest. “How meticulous?”
“Rarity’s right eye is actually set about a millimeter above her left,” Order answered.
Rarity let out a sound that was half-gasp, half-distressed shriek. “Why… Why would you tell me that?!”
Order shrugged. “I just thought you’d like to be self-conscious about it for the rest of your life.”
Rainbow Dash pressed her head against Rarity’s to get a better view of Order. “Okay, but why do you always let us know there’s something we need to fix after it’s already turned into a really big deal?”
Twilight looked across Rarity to shoot Rainbow Dash an annoyed look. “Really? We’re just signing off on the fact that a manifestation of Order is a tiny talking dog that lives in the giant table in my castle and has a device that lets him see everything and uses buttons that basically have our cutie marks on ‘speed dial’?”
Order swiveled in his stool to look at Rainbow Dash. “Look, it takes a lot of time and effort to keep tabs on all the various friendship problems in Equestria. Sometimes I don’t know I need to send two or more of ya until things have started to get out of paw…. Or hoof as you ponies say.”
“’Started’,” Rainbow Dash fumed. “You call a city on fire a ‘start’ of things getting out of hoof?”
“Okay, so maybe I sat on that one a little long! I’ve got a lot to monitor here!” Order said as he motioned to the monitors in front of him, the biggest currently silently viewing a light-tan mare with a long brown mane held in ponytail by a red bow who looked on in a panic as a small brown colt in a propeller hat screamed in terror at a flaming pile of tortillas as a light-blue pegasi with an electric-blue mane with dark blue stripes in a ponytail stood next to the colt and boggled vacantly at the shenanigans. “Cut me some slack, eesh!”
“No, seriously!” Twilight tried to interject. “We’re all talking to a tiny magical being that’s possibly the reason we all are Elements of Harmony and which also can apparently view all of Equestria and all you two are doing is—”
“Excuse me,” Rarity interrupted as she thrust her head forward slightly and stared at the dog. “What, exactly, do you mean by ‘sat on’?!”
Twilight let out a defeated sigh. “That…”
Order chortled. “Well, I found out long ago that fixing everything before it was really a problem was really, really, boring. So sometimes I let things develop until they’re a bit more interesting and then send you girls in.”
Rarity and Rainbow Dash’s eyes shot open wide, then their expressions froze as they took in this new information.
Even Twilight seemed a bit taken aback by this revelation. “You… you intentionally wait on things you know are going to be a problem before alerting us because it would be too boring if we got in before any damage was done and fixed things?!”
Order nodded. “Yep! There you go! A little more excitement in all your lives! No need to thank me. Just happy to help.”
“I…” Twilight trailed off, her eyes drifting far, far away from the little dog in his tiny compartment. “I need to go and do some thinking…” Twilight stood up and began to walk away. “Or better yet do something that requires very little thinking…” She pointed her head towards the open balcony window. “Flash! Your princess needs you! Or rather, she has needs that she wants filled by you.”
“Hah! Score!” Flash’s voice called back.
“Yes, that’s the idea.”
“Do you want the armor off or on?”
“Off, please.”
“Well, too bad!”
In contrast to Twilight’s eyes which had drifted far, far away before her departure, Rainbow Dash and Rarity’s eyes remained fixed on Order. Fixed and unblinking as they both silently stared at him.
“Uh, girls?” Order said. “Woulda mind scooting back a bit, or maybe try speaking? Yer kinda creeping me out here…”
Rainbow Dash turned to Rarity. “Do you think we could fit a kitten in there?”
“What?!” Order exclaimed. “No! I’m allergic to cats!”
“Rainbow Dash, please…” Rarity said. “I think we can fit at least two or three… Maybe all of them if we can get Twilight or Starlight to shrink them.” Rarity put on a thoughtful look. “The latter there is probably more readily available.”
“No really! Just a tiny cat or two and it’s gonna sound like yer table has a sneezing problem,” Order complained.
Rainbow Dash smiled widely. “I like the way you think!”
With that, the two mares got out and began to trot away.
“Okay! Okay!” Order called out. “I’ll give your butts a courtesy buzz if I think there’s trouble brewing! Hello?! Girls?! I can even let you use the monitors to spy on ponies if ya want! I know you two have got to be interested in that. Girls?! Seriously! Too much cat hair and I break out in hives and everything!”
The End
