Author's Note
I had to write this. It had to happen.
Also, I did take pictures of my Twilight Plushie at the RNC after the whole Melania plagiarism thing broke. They are available on my page in a blog post.
If you are wondering why that's relevant here, read on.
One final thing: I now have a Patreon with cool rewards that I'll be using to raise money for charity. Check it out!
Putin on the Ritz
Princess Celestia of Equestria sat on her balcony and sipped some tea as her old student, Princess Twilight, finished presenting a new construction project.
“And that’s why we should put a new rail line in that bypasses Canterlot,” Twilight finished, gesturing proudly to her well-organized and aesthetically pleasing bar graphs.
Celestia eyed them and put down her tea deliberately. “Well, I can tell that you really thought out this proposal, Twilight…”
The purple pony princess’ eyes shone with pride at her work.
“But, I just don’t see how we can fund it. The train system is already losing a lot of money as it is, even with the subsidy from the government.”
“W-well, it’s fine! We can finance it with bonds, and maybe a small sales tax increase, or-”
“Twilight, your proposal costs one hundred and fifty billion bits.”
Twilight’s ears fell. “W-well of course! We have to provide good service, and-”
Celestia calmed her gently by making small shushing noises from her mouth. “It’s alright, Twilight. Maybe we can cut some costs. Do we really need the platinum trim on the outside of the train?”
“Yes!” Twilight stomped her hoof. “We have to project power! In addition, Young’s modulus for Platinum is in a very narrow range of values that guarantee-”
“Princess Celestia!” came a cry from inside. A moment later, one of the Royal Guards skidded to a halt in front of the two Princesses and bowed. “Princess Celestia, you’re needed…” the guard eyed Twilight warily. “Um...Perhaps we should-”
“Come now,” Princess Celestia soothed the guard with a smile. “Twilight is a Princess, you know that. You can tell her whatever you can tell me.”
“A-are you sure?” he asked her, looking left and right. “It involves the...inner sanctum…”
Princess Celestia nodded. “What news do you have for us?”
“I-its best if we walk and talk,” he explained, getting up and trotting through the hallways toward the library.
Princess Celestia calmly followed with a gentle smile as if nothing was wrong.
“Wh-what’s happening?” Twilight asked worriedly. She was never a fan of anything that butted into a well-organized schedule under normal circumstances, but the guard’s tone had her especially worried.
The guard looked around for a few moments before he cleared his throat. “The Equestrian government has just experienced a...cyber attack.”
Twilight blinked and looked at him curiously. “A cyber attack?”
The trio turned into the library and continued toward a back bookshelf. “Yes,” the guard confirmed as he began pulling out books in a specific sequence. “The government’s central server was hacked, and the hackers have begun releasing sensitive information obtained from the cyber attack.”
“What information?” asked Celestia, suddenly worried. The area of the castle’s floor that they stood on began to descend.
Twilight just spun her head around in surprise at the unexpected movement, while the guard merely shifted from hoof to hoof.
“What information?” Celestia repeated sternly.
The guard sighed. “They had access to almost all information in the servers,” he told her timidly. “They’ve already released your expense account to the public, Princess.”
Since Celestia was white, she couldn’t go pale. Still, that didn’t stop her from turning a sickly shade of off-white at the news. The elevator stopped at the edge of a large server room, with dozens of ponies furiously clicking away at computers or looking at screens, and Celestia trotted briskly into the room.
Twilight and the guard struggled to catch up to Celestia as she halted behind a large screen that showed the images of the leak. Displayed was a single word document, with Celestia’s personal expense account.
Twilight squinted at it as she read. “I know I should be surprised to find this giant, secret information hub under the castle, but...Princess Celestia...how did you spend 180,000 bits in a single year on massages?”
The guard leaned over to Twilight. “That’s actually just last month,” he whispered.
“Do you know how stressful this job is, Twilight!?” Celestia shrieked, beginning to hyperventilate. “How else do you think that I can stay happy all the time?”
Twilight scanned down the list and read out the various columns. “I mean…’Imported tea with pure gold flakes’? ‘650 Organic chocolate tortes’? ‘Human cuddle buddy’!?”
Celestia’s growing embarrassment was relieved by a shout echoing from the other side of the room. “WE CANNOT BELIEVE IT!”
Twilight jumped in fright and whipped her head around to find an absolutely fuming Princess Luna stomping over to them from another screen across the room. “WHEN WE FIND THE MISCHIEVOUS ELECTRONIC HOOLIGANS THAT DID THIS, WE WILL CHOKE THEM WITH THEIR OWN DESIRE FOR MAYHEM!”
With Celestia in shock and on the edge of a breakdown, Twilight knew she had to step up and be the voice of reason. “Princess Luna, calm down! What’s wrong!?”
“They released my emails!” she huffed. “A complete and total invasion of my privacy!”
Twilight trotted over to the screen where Luna was previously stationed and read through a few of the emails. “Luna...You called for the reinstatement of serfdom and indentured servitude in this email to your advisor.”
“I wasn’t serious, I was just yearning for the good old days,” Luna explained desperately. “I mean, who doesn’t yearn to not have to pay their castle servants, or receive a significant portion of their subjects’ crops each year!?”
“What about this one, where you insinuate that the Saddle Arabian ambassador only brings his most attractive wife to events?”
Luna scoffed. “Come on, do you expect me to believe that he only has one wife?”
“Yes, Luna! His previous wife died in a horrible boating accident!”
“‘Accident’,” Luna accentuated, making air quotes with her front hooves. “And what about you, Ms. High and Mighty? Didn’t you see what was released about you?”
Twilight’s ears fell. “Th-they released things about me?”
“The chat logs from the group chat you have with your friends, and a video compilation of you emotionally abusing Spike.”
“I don’t emotionally abuse Spike!”
Princess Luna stared down at Twilight, decidedly unamused before she floated over a tablet and began reading. “Twilight: ‘Rarity, I need you to refuse to speak or look at Spike until he finishes cleaning the castle bathrooms.’ Pinkie Pie: ‘Why would you do that to poor Spike?’ Twilight: ‘He’s refusing to do his work, but I know he will if I crush him emotionally.’ Rarity: ‘Sounds like a plan, darling.’ Rainbow Dash: ‘Why don’t you have me just kick the crap out of him, like last-”
“Okay!” Twilight relented, her ears flopping to her sides in embarrassment. “Wh-what did they release on Cadance?”
“You don’t want to know…”
Celestia and the Royal Guard that had fetched the Princesses earlier trotted over to rejoin Luna and Twilight. “We’re not certain who the attackers were,” the guard began explaining, “but there is circumstantial evidence linking them to Russia.”
Twilight frowned and tilted her head. “Russia? Why would those strange humans want to cyber attack us?”
Celestia hummed in thought. “We need to confront them about this…” She turned to Twilight, “And maybe, while they’re here, we can ask them.”
____________________________________________________________________________
Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation, sat on Canterlot Castle’s balcony and stared across the table with his cold, KGB-trained eyes, appraising Twilight and Celestia. The two of them stared back awkwardly at the bare-chested, muscular Russian strongman, reluctant to begin speaking.
After a moment, Twilight leaned up toward Celestia, who craned her neck down to listen to her former student. “Celestia, I think we should say something. Public disapproval with the monarchy has risen to 70% from 15% in the last thirty-six hours...we don’t have a lot of time to waste, even if he isn’t wearing a shirt.”
“Why would he be wearing clothing?” Celestia whispered back. “I’m not wearing anything besides my regalia, just like him.”
Twilight glanced over at the shirtless head of state and examined the small golden crucifix icon that hung around his neck. “I think humans usually wear clothes, though. From what I’ve read, not to do so can be disrespectful or even sexual in nature.”
The two exceedingly large Russian men flanking Putin shifted awkwardly as the pony princesses eyed him again.
“Okay,” Celestia whispered, “I might as well start out this meeting like I do every other one.” She straightened her posture and floated over a teapot to Putin. “Would you like some tea?” she asked.
Putin blinked. After a moment, an almost imperceptible smile spread across his face and he moved his head up and down in what could almost be construed as a nod.
Celestia filled up his teacup and placed the teapot back down, quite pleased with her performance thus far.
Putin looked at the tea for a moment before snapping his fingers to one of his bodyguards, who handed him a small flask. Unscrewing it, he poured a strong smelling clear liquid into the tea, filling the cup up to the brim. He then poured the rest of it over his head, letting it run down his shirtless and somewhat elderly, yet muscular, body, before he threw the flask over the side of Canterlot’s castle. The sound of a yelping pony and a piece of metal clanking to the ground from a high drop was heard a few moments later. “Этот чай является слабым и женственной. Я исправить эту проблему.”
“Well, um...alright then. Now, Mr. Putin, we have invited you here because we have something very serious we need to talk about,” Princess Celestia began, crossing her hooves on the table in a dignified, yet adorable manner.
“Я видел, что bronies написал о вас. Если его правда, ты блудница.”
Twilight’s eyes furiously scanned a Russian-Equestrian dictionary she had purchased from one of the new interdimensional bookstores. “Um...Princess Celestia? I think he jus-”
“Now, it has recently come to our attention that our government has been hacked in a cyber attack...As you have likely learned since you arrived for our meeting.”
“Вы предоставляете свободу ваших СМИ. Это отражает слабость культуры и наследия. Он также делает подавление таких неловко промахи как это трудно.”
Princess Celestia smiled weakly. “Mr. Putin, I know that you can speak Eques-er, English. I saw you sing Blueberry Hill on the human internet.”
Putin frowned at her. “Fine,” he told her, his strange English accent making him seem significantly less imposing. “Why do you wish to speak to me about hack?”
“Well,” Celestia frowned, “our intelligence services have indicated that Russia seems to have been linked to the hack. Do you know anything about this?”
Putin raised an eyebrow, but otherwise did not move. “This is scurrilous accusation. Russia is not involved in cyber attacks.”
Twilight cleared her throat. “Well, there were a couple of pieces of very strong circumstantial evidence that led us to believe this. For one, the largest branch of the attack came through an email phishing scheme which promised Russian Pony wives to Royal Guards in exchange for residency rights in Equestria.”
Putin hummed in displeasure. “Are you sure ponies were Russian? Probably scheming Ukrainian ponies are ones looking for wives. No Russian ponies ever want to leave. Excellent working conditions. One square carrot per day. I will fix Ukraine horse wife problem with false flag pony invasion when I return. Maybe can even annex Kharkov. This way, Equestria win, Russia win, only Ukraine lose.”
Princess Celestia clopped her hooves together in pleasure. “Oh! Hear that Twilight? Everypony wins! I’m so glad we had this meeting!”
“Princess, please!” Twilight huffed, adjusting her own crown to appear more dignified. She turned to Putin again. “Don’t you get it? There were no interdimensional pony wives! It was a scheme to get naive or uneducated ponies to give classified login information and personal identification numbers to the hackers!”
Putin looked back at Twilight with pursed lips. “And how many personal numbers were stolen from your guards and government employees?”
“Ummmm…” Twilight looked down at her smartphone before looking back at him awkwardly and blushing. “Four thousand.”
Putin said nothing, but after a moment his face contorted into a knowing smile.
“B-but that’s not all!” Twilight countered desperately. “The hackers also transferred more than a billion bits from the Royal Treasury directly to the corporate account of one ‘Gazprom’!” Twilight slammed a hoof onto the table triumphantly. “Know anything about that? Or are you going to take the foolhardy step of asserting that independent hacker would do such a thing?”
Putin shrugged, the fairly impressive muscles on his shirtless chest bulging in response. “Your currency is valuable. Very strong. Plenty of people or ponies must want.”
“Of course it’s a strong currency! It’s solid gold coins!” Twilight huffed. “Stop avoiding the question and answer!”
“Maybe was Ukraine. They are sneaky devils; they try to frame poor Gazprom, maybe? Gazprom and Ukraine have differences in past.”
“Stop trying to blame the Ukrainians!” Twilight cried, beginning to lose it. “I know it was you!”
“Shhh, shh, Twilight,” Princess Celestia hushed her. “This isn’t helping.” She turned back across the negotiation table after giving Twilight a comforting pat. “Now, Mr. Putin, we are unfortunately going to have to take action because of this unfortunate incident.”
Putin un-entwined his fingers before re-entwining them, in a gesture which screamed ‘I’m waiting’.
Princess Celestia began to feel less sure of herself. “Umm...L-let me confer with my associate for a moment.” She turned away and pulled Twilight into a huddle. “Twilight, did you ask the incoming and outgoing American presidents for advice, like I asked?”
“Yes,” Twilight confirmed, pulling out her smartphone. “I messaged them both over human social media, since the cyber attack didn’t compromise my account.”
“What did they say?”
Twilight scrolled down on her phone. “The outgoing President replied, ‘Dear Princess Twilight Sparkle, thank you for your’...yada yada, something something...ah! Here. ‘In your situation, I would act prematurely on incomplete information, demonizing the Russians in a desperate attempt to draw attention away from your own moral depravity and the fact that this wouldn’t be a problem at all if you had acted in accordance with the law and were transparent. It worked for a friend of mine...sort of.’” Twilight frowned. “Moral depravity?”
Princess Celestia covered her muzzle with a hoof as she thought. “No good. The damage to our reputations has already been done. What did the incoming President say?”
Twilight looked at her phone again and raised an eyebrow. “Well, he didn’t respond to my message, but he did post a ‘tweet’.” She read it and frowned deeply. “I-it doesn’t contain anything worthwhile.”
Princess Celestia bit her lip. “Come on, Twilight! Read it! We need every scrap of advice we can get!”
Twilight groaned and cleared her throat. “Okay. Okay. He wrote, ‘Dopey Princess Twilight Sparkle just wrote to ask me for advice. She is deluded, and not cute at all. Sad!’ ...It has 250 thousand likes...”
Princess Celestia seemed to deflate. “Why did he write that? I thought he liked you! Didn’t you write that speech for his wife?”
“What? No! Why does everypony keep saying I did that?” Twilight’s phone let out a brief ringing noise, and she glanced down at it. “Oh, no...He just tweeted again. ‘Goofy Princess Twilight wrote a speech for Melania and still lies about it. Dishonest! What a loser!’ ...I don’t get it! It’s almost 4am where he is! Why is he still tweeting!?”
Princess Celestia cast a worried glance over at Putin, who stared back at her with laser focus. “Well, we need to figure out something quick, Twilight.”
“Uhh…” Twilight scrolled back up on her phone. “Well, the outgoing president wrote that we should take diplomatic action. He expelled thirty five Russian diplomats...But if my time reading human news has taught me anything, it wasn’t enough.”
Princess Celestia’s ears perked up. “Oh! That’s great news! We can just go with the original plan!”
“No!” Twilight hissed back. “We can’t go with the original plan. We have to be strong, Princess! He won’t be hurt at all by the original plan, it’s too soft to affect him. I mean, he poured three quarters of a pint of overproofed vodka on himself less than five minutes ago!”
“Well, doing this will be much worse than expelling diplomats. We’re going for it.” Princess Celestia turned back to the table with a smile.
“Princess, no!” Twilight hissed. It was too late.
“Mr. Putin, I’m sorry, but in retaliation for this hack we will no longer be giving any welcome hugs to you or your foreign service here in the capital,” Princess Celestia delivered confidently with her eyes closed and her brilliant mane billowing magically in the slight breeze. “I’m sorry, but as a sovereign nation we have to respond to this breach of our security.”
Putin frowned, and his facial expression softened such that he almost looked sad.
One of his bodyguards leaned over to him. “Sir, maybe we also eliminate diplomatic pony hugs as retaliation?”
Putin shook his head. “No, I will not retaliate. I refuse to do such terrible thing. What kind of monster would eliminate hugs for diplomats? That is cruel and evil. Is this the world that we have wrought?” He sighed. “Only a nation which abuses dragons could be this mean. Please tell young Spike we have position waiting for him in forges of Magnetogorsk if he decides to escape from abusive relationship with mentor.”
Princess Celestia’s ears fell and she began to tear up. She wiped her eyes with a hoof. “Twilight,” she whispered weakly. “I don’t think I can go through with it. I was too harsh.”
Twilight just stared down at her smartphone. “I...I can’t even… ‘If I was Princess Celestia, I would fire third rate loser Twilight Sparkle immediately. A total egghead! Celestia can do better!’ Why is he doing this!?”
“Look,” Putin said from the other side of the table, “Russia did not cyber attack you. Still, maybe we can stop who did from doing again...But first we must make deal.”
Twilight looked up from her phone and narrowed her eyes. “What kind of deal…? This wouldn’t have to do with all of the searches in government database for an unnamed pegasus mare, would it?”
“You have pony here with very special skill. All I ask is to borrow for little while...And that you reinstate diplomatic hug ties between great nations.”
Princess Celestia glanced over at Twilight Sparkle. “Well…”
Princess Luna landed hard on the table from somewhere up above and shook Putin’s hand with her hoof. “It’s a deal!”
“Princess Luna!” Twilight cried. “What did you just do!?”
“Listen, Twilight,” Luna hissed, leaning down toward the other Princesses, “If the hackers release the emails I wrote about forcibly cuddling the wait staff, painting anti-Griffonstone graffiti on their sports stadium, or my insider trading racket, my ass is grass! Understand?”
Twilight groaned. Her phone dinged once more, signifying the receipt of a new tweet. She groaned again, even louder this time.
____________________________________________________________________________
“Thank you for letting me bring Harry along to earth with me, Mr. Putin,” Fluttershy beamed as she sat atop her bear friend. “He gets terrible anxiety when he’s left alone, the poor guy…” She patted Harry on the head gently, and the bear smiled.
“No, no, thank you Miss Fluttershy,” a still-shirtless Putin replied from atop his own bear. “I never thought that I would fulfill dream of riding bear half naked until you came along.”
“Oh, it was my pleasure,” Fluttershy demurred. “I do so love working with big, fluffy animals!”
Putin took a swig from his canteen. “You look dehydrated. Would you like drink?” He offered the canteen over to her.
“Oh, um...no thank you. That water made me feel funny yesterday.”
Putin shrugged and poured the rest of the vodka over himself and the bear. “Miss Fluttershy, tell me: could you make friends with perhaps a thousand more bears?”
“A thousand!?” Fluttershy’s eyes lit up. “Oh yes! I’d so enjoy to make a thousand new, cuddly animal friends!”
Putin smiled wickedly. “Great. Let us return to Presidential Dacha, it is getting late. What would you like for dinner?”
“Oh, um, anything is fine, really. Except that I don’t eat meat, of course.”
“Potatoes it is. Now, these bears, how calm will they be? Could they follow orders?”
Fluttershy nodded. “Oh yes! Bears are very loyal, just like my friend Rainbow Dash. Once you’ve befriended them, they’ll follow and protect you wherever you go!”
“So we could fit ballistic armor and lasers to them?”
“Oh, well…” Fluttershy replied, beginning to look a bit confused, “I guess you could do that...But, um, why?”
“Big laser tag game, of course!” Putin chuckled. “Now, how fast are bears? For example,” he continued, unfolding a map of Eurasia, “how long would it take a bear to travel from here,” he pointed to Rostov-on-Don, “to here?” he finished, pointing at Kyiv.
Harry the bear made a friendly, growling bear noise that sounded like an explanation. “Harry says that he could do it in as little as a week if he had to. Less if he could hitch a ride in the automatic carriages you have on earth.”
Putin’s face lit up with glee. “Oh, Fluttershy,” he said, pulling her into a tight hug, “we are going to be best of friends. Would you like to sauna with myself and Sergey Shoigu this evening?”
“I, um...I guess so?” Fluttershy responded, settling into the hug with Putin briefly before she removed herself and flew back to perch on Harry once more. “Can I bring my friend Rarity? She and I always like going to the spa.”
Putin thought about it for a moment. “Is this your supermodel friend?”
Fluttershy blushed. “Oh, well, um, actually, I was the supermodel. But she designed all my dresses!”
Putin shrugged. “Close enough. Sure, invite her.”
“Oh, she’ll be so pleased!” Fluttershy beamed, pulling out her new Russian smartphone, specially made for hooves. “Oh, look, a new tweet about Twilight! I...Oh. Oh my…”
Putin laughed heartily as he rode into the sunset on his bear, with Fluttershy at his side.
All was going according to plan.
