The Donutier

Chapters

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Epilogue
Chapter 5

Chapter 1

I finished my speech and shoved the donut into the stallion’s mouth.

Glazed yeast donuts hold up better for this purpose. Cake donuts tend to crumble instead of acting as an effective gag.

I opened a carton of chocolate milk in my magic, turned it upside down, and smashed it onto his head.

He stumbled backwards, blinking rapidly and working his jaw like he couldn’t decide whether to eat the donut or try to talk around it while chocolate milk dripped off of his sopping mane and splattered into a growing puddle on the tile floor. I stomped forward to keep his momentum going and waited until he bumped into the door before I lit my horn. Just enough force to slow the door and make him push against it. Then I threw it open and watched as he fell in a heap on the sidewalk.

As I turned back around, all four of the old farts at the counter began clapping their hooves like I’d just sunk a long putt. I tilted my paper foodservice hat up off my bangs, then rolled my eyes as I trotted behind the counter to grab a mop.

“You know,” said an earth pony with a five-o-clock (A.M.) shadow as he smoothed down his mane and plopped the construction helmet back on his head, “you could save yourself a lotta trouble if you’d skip the chocolate milk.”

I wheeled the bucket up next to the chocolatey puddle and parked it there while I rested an elbow on the counter. “Hey,” I said, levitating a carafe of coffee from its heating pad to refill the stallion’s mug. “At least I stopped using coffee for that bit.”

He froze with the mug halfway to his lips and looked at the steam rising from the black liquid. With a half-frown, he set the mug down and slowly pushed it to the other side of the counter.

The other stallions laughed and spent a few seconds slapping each other on the back while I magicked the mop across the floor. One of them, in a crisp gray suit, nodded toward his cup. I topped it off and spooned a dollop of vanilla icing in afterward, then gave the liquid a spin with my magic.

At the other end of the counter, a stallion in blue overalls shook his head. “It’s my own personal theory that you enjoy the attention.” He took a bite of his bear claw and chewed with a smirk while I pondered grabbing a carton of chocolate milk from the fridge behind me. I halfheartedly smiled, and blinked three times. Four.

He finally swallowed and licked his lips. “Why else wouldn’t you get your address unlisted from the public directory?”

With a glow of my magic, I tugged his straw hat down over his eyes. “See, this is why you’re still playing in the dirt, and I’ve got a successful business. I can’t sell donuts if nopony knows where to find me.” I put a hoof to my chin as he straightened his hat and gave me a phony scowl. “Or did Donut Joe put you up to this? With me out of the way, he’d have a monopoly on the Canterlot donut market!”

A pegasus spoke with his mouth full, spraying crumbs across the counter. “Ha! I wonder if Donut Joe has these kind of problems?”

Swabbing the countertop with a rag was almost reflexive for me. “Yeah, maybe if he was named Donut Celestia, grew fifty percent taller, bleached his fur, and had an ethereal floating pastel mane.” I sighed. “So many ponies think Twilight can fix their problems. Or, you know, marry them.”

The businessstallion downed the rest of his coffee in one gulp and picked up his briefcase under the crook of his hoof. “Well, she might be able to solve your problems.”

I took a breath and froze, my mouth halfway to pronouncing a profanity. Maybe Twilight could solve my problems. I mean… she had caused them, however unintentionally.

“No. No.” I shook my head. “I know how she solves problems. Friendship this, and friendship that. She’ll probably just tell me to make friends with all these weirdos. I don’t need those kinds of friends. I don’t need friends at all.”

He was already gone. My delayed response drew a chuckle from the rest of the customers. I looked out through the glass storefront and spent a moment watching the sky slowly change colors. I grunted and stuffed the mop back in its bucket before wheeling it behind the counter again.

“Aren’t we your friends, though?” He apparently had gotten over the idea of me pouring scalding coffee over somepony’s face, and had returned to sipping his coffee.

“Nope,” I said as I turned around and removed the filter basket from the coffee machine. The dawn crowd was much, much larger than the pre-dawn crowd, and I’d need all my coffee pots to be full when they showed up. “That’s why I don’t know any of your names.”

The door jingled.

We all turned to look at the newcomer. Her coat and mane were both jet-black, with maybe a bit too much glisten. Like she’d just trotted out of a shampoo ad or something. A striking red cape hung off her shoulders, its flowing lengths pooling on the ground behind her while the stiff collar’s pointed corners stuck up around her ears. Raw, powerful magic crackled just beneath the surface of her horn.

I could hear the stallions snickering.

Without acknowledging anypony else in the room, she jabbed an accusatory hoof toward me and snarled, “Twilight, you are not qualified to be a princess!”

I put both my front hooves on the counter and grinned. “I agree! It’s nice to meet somepony on the same page, for once.”

If she was confused, she didn’t show it. She stomped her hoof back onto the ground and lowered her head menacingly toward me. “Prepare to be defeated, vile pretender!”

I levitated a glazed donut out of the display case. “My name is Twilight Sprinkle…”

Chapter 2

“No, I’m sorry.” The mare stuck the towel in her ear and swabbed it around as she winced. Her pale blue eyes really stuck out against her jet-black coat.

Nopony had ever apologized before. I halfheartedly dabbed my moist washcloth at the brown splotches on her cape. “I’m no expert, but I’d think that ‘get the right victim’ should be rule number one for revenge.” My eyes crossed for an instant. “I mean, as a professional revenge victim, I guess I kind of am an expert, and it’s sure not near the top of anypony’s list.”

“It’s not revenge, per se,” she said as she held the towel between her hooves and rolled her mane back and forth to squeeze out the chocolate milk. “I just think I deserve to be a princess more than she does. And she’s standing in my way.” She looked up at me and gave half a smile. “I just wasn’t expecting to be assaulted by breakfast foods. That can’t be good customer service.”

I shrugged. The bell jingled as another customer trotted through the door. A second later, he laughed and shouted across the crowded cafe. “Got yourself another live one, eh?”

The voice was one I recognized, so I pulled out a chocolate-iced, custard-filled, rainbow-sprinkled extra large éclair from the display case and tossed it in his general direction without looking. The lack of cursing told me that he’d caught it in his own magic. I smiled at the unusual mare and shrugged again. “The customers seem to like the show.”

She chuckled. “I stand corrected, then.” She moved the towel down to her neck, where much of the chocolate milk had been trapped by her high collar, and began scrubbing. Her mane didn’t seem quite as black as it had been before. “How much do I owe you for the donut and chocolate milk?”

This was new. “I, uh, I’ve never had anypony try to pay before.”

She fished around in her mane and pulled out a soggy bit bag. “I feel bad enough having assaulted one of my own subjects, and such a nice mare, too. It’s important that my subjects feel respected. And I don’t think anypony respects you once you’ve stolen from them. I mean, I didn’t technically eat the donut, and I didn’t ask for it—well, I suppose I did ask for it, didn’t I?” She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head, holding up one hoof while she took a breath. “The point is, my actions had a very real cost to you, and it’s important to me that you are compensated.”

I floated a coffee pot across the room and refilled a few mugs, then turned back toward the mare. “You’re the strangest, most polite villain I’ve ever met. One bit for the donut, and one for the chocolate milk.”

“Oh, I’m not a villain,” she said. She finished swabbing her neck and plopped the towel down on the counter as she opened her bit bag.

In between the pale brown blotches of chocolate milk, I saw what looked like black dye soaking into the towel. I poked it with a hoof and glanced back up at her with a raised eyebrow. “And three bits for the towel.”

“Ah,” she said, turning over her bit bag. “Can I owe you for the towel?”

I squinted and looked closer at the fur around her collar. It was definitely lighter. Kind of a… pale greenish blue, maybe?

With a subdued cough to clear her throat, she pulled the collar closer around her neck. “A princess must keep up appearances. Surely, you don’t think that Celestia’s mane is naturally that way, do you?”

I looked her square in the eyes. “I donut know.”

“You are a terrible pony.”

“Yeah,” I said as I took bits from ponies who had brought enough money to pay for their breakfast, and passed them their donuts and coffee. “What’s new?”

She stood up and straightened her collar, only for it to slump back down in a soggy heap around her shoulders. “Well, I shall return to pay for the towel. I have much research to do before I can find this Princess Twilight Sprinkle.”

“Sparkle. She’s Sparkle, I’m Sprinkle.” I stuck my purple flank in the air and pointed a hoof toward the white-iced donut with multi-colored sprinkles. After a few moments, I cocked my head to the side. “Speaking of which, what’s your name?”

She held her head high and tried—I assumed anyway—to look as regal as possible with a soggy red cape smelling of chocolate milk and an uneven mane and coat dye job. “Ravenwing Bloodmane. Princess Ravenwing Bloodmane.”

I felt my eyebrows climb up my forehead as I clamped my jaws together, hard, to keep from betraying my amusement. Some customers laughed out loud.

She nodded toward me. “And now I must learn all I can about this royal pretender. Goodbye, dear subjects.”

“Goodbye,” I said, “and nice to meet you.” I picked up a plate and started swabbing the counter, then froze in mid-swipe, and raised my head toward Ravenwing, who had just opened the door with a jingle. “Hey!”

She turned back toward me.

“You sure you don’t wanna just stay here and read through my binder?”

Ravenwing raised an eyebrow. “Binder?”

Chapter 3

I stirred the warm water with my magic until the grittiness of the sugar had disappeared, then tilted my head over and touched the tip of my ear to the water. Perfect temperature. I lifted a block of yeast with my magic and started crumbling it into the water.

Ravenwing turned a page in the binder, then tapped a hoof against the clear plastic sheet protector as she looked up at me. “Her mom is also named Twilight? That seems to be a ridiculously popular name.”

I pushed the pot of yeasty sugarwater across the counter, leaving it next to the oven where it wouldn’t cool down too quickly. “Well,” I said as I dumped a bag of flour into an enormous bowl, “there’s a beautiful overlook on the mountain above the city, called ‘Twilight Point.’ It’s a popular hiking destination for couples. Very private.”

I turned to look at Ravenwing. Her eyes were enormous saucers. She glanced down at the picture of Twilight’s parents and slowly moved her hoof away from the binder, then looked back up at me with her eyebrows pinched together. “Seriously?”

“No.” A grin crept across my face. “I just made that all up.”

I heard her harrumph. “You’re still a terrible pony.”

Clouds of dust rose from the bowl as I started stirring sugar into the flour. “If it was true, it’d be in the binder.”

At the sound of her gasp, I glanced over my shoulder. “Omigosh, is this her? She’s adorable!”

She must have found the photo of Twilight attempting to get into the cookie jar under the guidance of her older brother. Any second now, she’d ask…

“Wait. This looks like one of those old-fashioned photos. The instant kind.” She looked up at me with wide eyes and a slack jaw, her eyebrows twitching between pinched in confusion and raised in awe. “This isn’t a copy, or a scan. It’s the original. How long have you been stalking her?”

I glanced at the off-white foam collecting on top of the yeast water, then turned around and sat down on the floor, curling my indigo tail around my flank. “I had tea with Twilight Velvet a few times. I told her I was trying to meet everypony in town named Twilight.”

“Okay, but—” she tapped the photograph “—how did you get this picture?”

“Well, I swiped that out of one of the photo albums. It was just too cute. Also, potential blackmail material.” I narrowed my eyes. “Evidence of her dark criminal past.”

She held up the photo in her magic and frowned. “But won’t Twilight’s mom miss this picture? This is the kind of thing I’d want to keep if I was a mom.”

“I’m not a monster. There were two photos. This was the blurry one; it’d been stuck behind the good one.” I stood up and turned back to my work. “You know, I’m beginning to question your dedication to this whole not-revenge assault scheme you’re working on.”

She tucked the photo back in and turned the page. “How so?”

“Well,” I said as I poured the water into the dry ingredients, “you seem awfully concerned about your archenemy’s mother’s feelings. Also, calling your archenemy ‘adorable’ is going to make it difficult to crush her under your hooves later.”

“I… I never said she was my enemy.” I heard another page being flipped. “I don’t want to crush her, either. I care for all my subjects, even those who have wronged me.”

The wooden spoon stuck straight up as I paused my stirring long enough to turn around and raise a single eyebrow at her. “You seemed awfully confrontational when you showed up here this morning. ‘Vile pretender,’ I think, were your exact words.”

She squirmed against the floor.

I resumed mixing the dough. “I just feel like it’s going to be hard to pull off that level of vitriol after you’ve seen filly Twilight Sparkle stealing cookies from a cookie jar. What even is your plan, anyway?”

I heard her cape shift as she sat up straighter. There was that regal air again. She cleared her throat. “Once we have ascertained her location, we will create a distraction to bypass her formidable garrison of guard stallions, and then—”

“Whoa. Slow down there, Seabiscuit.” I turned around and hauled the massive dough bowl down to the floor so I could keep stirring with my magic. “We? You mean, like, the ‘Royal We?’”

She tapped her hooves together and smiled with only her teeth. “Well, ah, no. Just the normal we. You and I. You and the royal I. So, like, half of the we is royal. Just you and me, though.”

I spun back around and rolled my eyes in a single dramatic gesture. After years of practice, I’ve gotten pretty good at those. I ditched the spoon and started kneading the dough with my magic. The key to a good yeast donut is the chewiness, which comes from interlocking gluten molecules, which in turn happens during kneading.

“And what,” I said, consciously relaxing my jaw muscles and instead putting that energy into the dough, smashing it hard against the floured countertop, “makes you think I want to be part of your weird little coup attempt?”

I swore I could hear her soul deflate. “I, uh. Y-you’re my most loyal subject. You’re the only pony who’s ever helped me. I, um, I just thought that we could… together.”

This batch of donuts was going to be so chewy. So very, very chewy. I stopped kneading and took a deep breath. “I’m not your royal subject. Because you’re not a princess. You’re just… a weirdo in a costume.” I didn’t turn around, because I didn’t want to see the way I was sure she was looking at me. I did hear a sniffle, and that was bad enough. “The chocolate milk is starting to sour. Why don’t you take a shower upstairs in my apartment while I finish this batch of donuts. Leave your cape in the big sink by the stairwell. I don’t want sticky sour milk all over my home.”

Chapter 4

I wasn’t sure what I was expecting when I went upstairs. I had the red cape soaking in hot soapy water, but I doubted if that fur dye would ever come out of the collar. Then again, if milk was enough to wash it out of her fur, maybe I could use milk to get it out of the fabric? I shook my head and turned the doorknob with my magic.

Ravenclaw, um… McDarkwing? I couldn’t remember her name. But she was sitting on my couch.

In my fluffy, fuzzy, lavender bathrobe. I sighed.

She turned to look at me and rubbed her face before trying to smile. “I’m not a weirdo. And I’m sorry for trying to force you to come on a dangerous mission. It’s my responsibility, not yours.”

I rolled my eyes and trotted into the living room, then plopped down into the big cushy chair that I’d pulled off the curb on trash day a few years back. Come to think of it… this was the first time I’d ever had another pony in my apartment. Why did I need extra seating? I guess it just felt better to have a chair off to the side of the coffee table. Which had never had coffee on it. I cleared my throat. “It’s not a dangerous mission. You’d probably just… get force-fed some cupcakes and get hugged more than you’re comfortable with.”

She just kept looking at me. I guess she didn’t know what to say. Fuzzy terrycloth puffed out in a ring around her shoulders as she pulled the bathrobe closer around her neck. At least it looked like she’d scrubbed most of the fur dye out, and wouldn’t be staining my bathrobe.

Her pale blue eyes seemed a much better match for her natural coat color, which was a pale greenish blue (bluish green?), though still stained with remnants of the dye. It looked like her mane would be a striking orange if it wasn’t for the leftover dye still subduing its brilliance. Without the excessive quantities of product in her mane, it fell in a wave around her shoulders and highlighted her eyes.

She almost seemed normal.

“I hope you don’t mind that I borrowed your bathrobe.”

“I hadn’t thought about it beforehand, but since I invited you to take a shower, I guess it’s kind of expected, huh? I’m sorry it hasn’t been washed in, uh, a few weeks.”

It almost looked like she was blushing. “It’s okay. You… you smell like frosting. It’s nice.”

Well, there went that normal thing. I felt myself blush a bit. “I, um, I brought the binder,” I said, levitating it up in front of my face, “because it seems like you didn’t bother reading the executive summary in the first section.”

She went back to just looking at me.

I floated the binder over to her and continued, “Because you said, ‘when we locate her’ even though the summary has a map and photos of her castle in Ponyville. And her friends. And a list of villains she’s defeated, and her methods for doing so. And her habits, and likes and dislikes and a whole bunch of other stuff.”

She took the massive scrapbook in her hooves. “Yeah, I skipped all that stuff and started with the ‘narrative.’ It just, you know, seemed more like a story.”

“Well, that stuff’s in the front because it’s important, and—”

“Why are you so obsessed with her, anyway? Are you her nemesis, or vice versa?”

“I’m not—” Okay, I kind of was. “The problem is… Well, the problem is you.” I cringed.

The binder still sat, unopened, in her hooves. “How am I the problem? You didn’t even know I existed until this morning.”

“Yes, and a gaping hole in my life it was, before you showed up.”

She glared at me, her eyebrows low and her lips pinched together. “Twilight.”

“Fine.” I crossed my forelegs across my chest. “You’re not the problem, you’re just its most recent symptom. Everypony with a grudge to settle against Twilight Sparkle looks in the public directory or sees an ad, and comes after me instead. The same with suitors, and every pony who thinks a princess can help their business or their dispute or their disgusting personal problems. They all come after me instead of her.”

“Oooooh.” She held up the binder, peeking over the top of it and grinning with her eyes. “That would explain why nopony in the cafe was surprised to see our ‘duel.’”

“Yeah.” I pulled off my paper foodservice hat and folded it flat, then slapped it against my hoof. “It’s pretty much a daily occurrence.”

“Well,” she said as she sat up straighter, somewhat less intimidating in my lavender-colored bathrobe, “it sounds like we have a common enemy, then!”

A smirk crawled across my face as I leaned forward. “I thought you said she wasn’t your enemy?”

She fell backward and slumped into the couch. “You know what I mean. We share a goal.” She sat up again, tossing the binder onto the other cushion of the couch. “You wish to be free of her… tyranny of… uh, mistaken identity. And I wish to claim my birthright, my destiny!”

“Yeah,” I said, waving a hoof in the air. “The whole princess thing.”

She lifted up one corner of the bathrobe and showed me her cutie mark. “The crown is my destiny. You can’t deny it.”

It was hard to ignore. I sat up and looked closer. Her cutie mark was a very regal crown. It didn’t look like it had been stained with the fur dye at all. “I… I suppose not.”

She nodded, her chin in the air. But when she opened her eyes, her shoulders slumped and she curled up on her end of the couch. It almost seemed like she was trying to get farther away from the binder.

I sighed and got up out of my chair. “I have a big catering gig tonight, lots of cooking to do. If you help me out, I can tell you all about Twilight Sparkle, and you won’t have to read the binder.”

“Really?” She sat up and smiled. “And then tomorrow, we can travel to Ponyville to take what we truly deserve!”

“Eeeeeh,” I said as I fluffed up my paper cap and set it on top of my indigo bangs, just to the right of my horn. “Let’s take it one day at a time.”

Chapter 6

I watched her open her eyes, and I couldn’t help but smile. The rising sun shone brilliantly through her copper mane, making her blue eyes nearly glow as she looked around the cabin.

“Are… are we on a train?”

“Welcome to the waking world, Rip Van Stinkle.”

Copper sat up and rubbed her eyes, then looked around again. “No, seriously, we’re on a train. How did I get onto a train?”

I nodded with a smirk, feeling my bangs bounce around freely without the paper hat on top. “I have my ways.”

She tugged on the collar of my bathrobe, then looked at me. I looked back at her and asked, “How did you get into my bathrobe?”

“I… I was cold. And the blanket you gave me wasn’t enough.” She couldn’t hold my gaze, and her eyes dropped to the floor. “And it’s so soft. Sorry, Twilight.”

I smiled. “You looked so peaceful, I didn’t want to wake you up.” I levitated a disposable coffee cup and a paper bag from the seat beside me. “I brought you breakfast, though.”

“Thanks,” she said as she took the bag and looked inside. I’d just kind of tossed a few guesses in the bag. I figured if she didn’t like one, she’d eat another. “I, um, don’t like coffee. Thanks anyway.”

I shrugged, and took the paper cup in my own hooves. “I figured you might not want me trying to give you a carton of chocolate milk.”

She chuckled. “Yeah, maybe someday I’ll be able to drink chocolate milk again without flashbacks to that terrible day when I met you.”

“If you keep being mean, I’m going to dessert you.”

She looked at me, with a donut in one hoof. Chocolate cake donut, with chocolate frosting, chocolate sprinkles, then glazed over the whole thing. Maybe I was crazy, but ponies like it. She just kept looking at me.

I sighed, and rolled my eyes. “Dessert you. D-E-S-S—”

“Yeeeeah,” she said, then took a bite of the donut. “I got it.”

I watched her chew for longer than it should take to chew a bite of donut. She finally swallowed and said, “I hope you’re done.”

With a sigh, I crossed my forelegs in front of my chest. “Yeah, I’m going to quit making donut jokes. I’m just tired of the hole thing.”

She froze, her mouth open wide just above the donut in her hoof. Slowly, she brought the donut down and closed her mouth. She carefully placed the three-quarters of a donut back in the paper bag, and brushed the crumbs off her hoof. I was trying desperately not to smile. She folded the top of the bag down and placed it daintily on the seat next to her, then looked up at me and said, “You’re still a terrible pony.”

I smiled. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” She scrunched her eyebrows and frowned, puffing out her cheeks. “There’s not a lot of material there. I’ve heard all three of your jokes. It’s time to stop now, Miss Sprinkle.”

As she reached for her bag, I opened my mouth. “I—”

She held up a hoof. “Ah. No. The Copper Princess needs her quiet breakfast time. We could have talked, but you ruined it. Quiet time now.”

I didn’t feel like I deserved that, but I sat quietly and watched her eat all three donuts. Good thing I ate breakfast before I left. I slurped my coffee once, and got a glare from Copper, but I wasn’t sure if it was, like, supposed to be a joke glare, or if she just really wasn’t a morning pony and I was being too loud with my coffee.

When she was finished, she brushed the crumbs off my bathrobe and looked up at me. “So, where are we going on a train this fine day?”

“We’re going to Ponyville.”

“Wuh-wuh-what? Why are we going to Ponyville?”

I smirked and lowered my voice. “You’ve got a date with destiny, and it looks like she’s ordered the crème brûlée!”

“I don’t”—she rested her forehead on a hoof—“I don’t even know what that means.” She looked up with an angry eyebrow. “Is that a donut joke?”

“No, it’s just, if you go on a date with somepony, and they order the—”

Copper held up a hoof. “Nevermind. Seriously, why are we going to Ponyville?”

“Well,” I said, letting my eyes wander around the ceiling of the passenger car, “there’s somepony in Ponyville that we both need to, uh, talk to.”

“Oh, no!” She pulled away from me and scrunched up her muzzle like I’d just tried to feed her a cauliflower donut. “I’m not ready! I… I don’t have my cape! I need my crown, a-and my hoofguards, and—”

“Hey,” I said, grabbing her by the shoulders. “Your cape is stained with that weird fur dye you used. I mean, I’ve got it soaking, but I’m not hopeful. Wait.” I froze and squinted at her. “You have a crown?”

She stuck her chin in the air. Again. “I made it myself. For when I become a princess.”

I leaned back into my seat. “Let me guess. It’s made of copper.”

“Copper is a precious metal. Just like Princess Celestia’s regalia is gold, and Princess Luna’s is silver and onyx, mine is copper.”

My muzzle scrunched as I thought back to history class in school. Copper was used for coins, a long time ago, I remembered. Some ponies still wear jewelry made of copper. I shrugged. “But why do you need your crown to confront Twilight Sparkle? You didn’t have it when you showed up at my shop.”

“Yeah, but, but…” Now I watched her eyes wander around the roof of the train car. “I need the crown because… Because I have to…”

The sun swung around from my left to somewhere behind the train. We’d hit the last curve leading into Ponyville. I put my hoof on her chin, and when she looked at me, I stuck my own chin into the air and tried to affect her regal manner. She halfheartedly followed suit. I said, “It’s your destiny, Copper. Whether you’re wearing a crown or a bathrobe, destiny is destiny.”

She smiled as the train lurched to a stop. I’d like to say that it was a sweet moment, but since I was already leaning forward, I toppled out of my seat and bounced off of Copper, landing on the floor of the train. Good thing my coffee had a lid on it.

As we walked through town, Copper elbowed me and gestured toward the ponies just starting to sit down at a little outdoor cafe with mushrooms for tables. “See,” she said, “this is when reasonable ponies are getting up and having breakfast.”

“But instead of being reasonable, we’re on a quest to—” I stopped and jabbed a hoof into the air dramatically “—turn you into a princess!”

She stopped next to me and stuck her hoof in the air next to mine. That wasn’t what I was going for, but okay. Go team us, I supposed. “And get you, uh, whatever it is that solves your problem!”

I wasn’t exactly sure what to do with my hoof now that it was up there, so I just resumed walking. Copper fell into step beside me again. It became obvious which way to go when we trotted onto the main street. Well, not so much a street as a big open area. Ponyville didn’t really have roads; it had places where nopony’s built a house yet. But the castle was plainly visible over the rooftops to our left. It certainly stuck out among the wooden-beamed, plaster-walled cottages.

Seeing it in person was a bit more breathtaking than the photographs I’d collected. It didn’t take us long to get there. Compared to the castle in Canterlot, it was tiny. Also, incredibly purple and shiny. As we trotted up and looked at the massive front door, I poked her in the ribs. “Good job evading that formidable garrison of guard stallions.”

She gulped loudly and looked up into the “branches” of the crystal tree with her ears laid back. “So, uh, do we knock, or what?”

“The library is in here,” I said, pushing the door open with a hoof. “It’s open to the public.”

As I stepped inside the castle, Spike—little purple baby dragon, first mentioned page one in the executive summary, dedicated chapter starts page seventy-three—jogged past with a stack of books clutched in his arms. Without so much as glancing up at me he said, “Heya, Twilight. I didn’t realize you’d left. I’ve got—”

He glanced up at me. “Uhhh.” I saw him notice my chronic lack of wings before his eyes made their way to my donut cutie mark. “Oh, heheh, you’re not Twilight.”

I grinned. How could I not? “Actually, I am Twilight. And that’s the problem.”

Spike studied my face for a moment. I could tell he wanted to scratch his head, but his arms were full. “Did you…” He raised one eyebrow but didn’t resume talking.

Copper cleared her throat and stepped forward. “This is Twilight Sprinkle, here to see Twilight Sparkle.”

Spike nodded toward the nearest doorway on our left, where rows of bookshelves were visible stretching into the dim reaches. “She’s in her study, back of the library. That’s where I’m headed with these books.” He jogged off again, mumbling to himself. “Whole dictionary full of words…”

I looked at Copper. She looked back at me and took a deep breath. It wasn’t until she’d turned away that I took my own deep breath.

Chapter 7

It was like looking in a mirror.

“Wow. It’s like looking in a mirror.”

Well, that was creepy.

“A dirty mirror.”

Twilight Sparkle must have seen the sour look on my face, and grinned sheepishly. “Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just, at first glance you looked at a lot like me. But now that I look closer—”

I leaned back, because she really was looking closer.

“—I can see that your colors are slightly different. The similarity is magnified by your choice of the same mane style as me. I wonder if we’re related?”

I pushed her back to a comfortable distance with my hoof and said, “Related? Because of a mane style?”

She snort-laughed. An actual snort. “No, of course not! Style number twenty-four in Snipper’s book of manecuts is simple, practical, low-maintenance, and available at every Snipper’s franchise. I was just thinking out loud.” She leaned forward again. “There are seven common eye morphologies in Equestria, five horn shapes for unicorns, and three genes that control bone length ratios in… Well, we share all of those genes. Coloration is far less hereditary, but genetics is still involved. Also, Twilight is a family name.”

“Yes,” I said, pushing her back again. “I’ve met your mother.”

“Oh,” she said as she pulled a hoof to her chest. Her eyebrows squished together, but I couldn’t tell if her frown was part of her confusion or a sign of offense. I wasn’t sure what she was feeling, but her wingtips twitched a bit as her eyes darted left and right. “You visited my mother.”

“Yes, I did just say that.” I shifted my hooves on the floor. “She was very nice. Showed me some photo albums and everything. Lots of photo albums. Told me your entire family history. I was lucky to get out alive.”

Sparkle chuckled. “Well, I guess you did meet my mother. So, what brings you here?”

“I have a problem. And the problem is, well… It’s you.”

“Me?”

“Yeah. See, I run a donut shop in Canterlot, and I’m listed in the public directory. So if anypony comes looking for you, they see ‘Twilight Sprinkle’ and come visit me instead.”

Sparkle scratched her head. “Who comes looking for me? Because I don’t really get a lot of visitors.”

“Oh, the usual,” I said, holding a hoof in the air. “Suitors, favor-seekers, and, uh—” my brow wrinkled for a second “—revengers? I don’t know if that’s a word. Also, usurpers.”

“Usurpers?” Twilight Sparkle raised an eyebrow and tilted her head.

“Yeah,” I said as I pointed behind me with a hoof. “Like her. She’s here to usurp your throne.”

Sparkle leaned to her right and peered around me. I stepped aside and let her look at the wide-eyed mare in a fluffy bathrobe and messy mane. Copper didn’t move a muscle. Sparkle looked at me again. “She doesn’t, um. She doesn’t look particularly dangerous. Why is she in her bathrobe?”

I sat down. “That’s my bathrobe, actually. It’s how she works.” I held up my hooves in a threatening manner. “She shows up and announces her intention to take over the world, making you underestimate her with her silly outfit. Then out of nowhere, BAM! She’s usurped your couch.”

“Oooookay,” Twilight Sparkle said as she glanced between me and Copper. “I’m just going to pretend that any of what you said makes sense.” She pointed at Copper with a hoof. “Miss, do I understand correctly that you are here to depose me and usurp my throne?”

Copper opened her mouth, but didn’t speak for several seconds. “A-actually, I’m here because she”—Copper jabbed a hoof at me—“pony-napped me.”

“Okay.” Sparkle turned around and closed the book she’d been reading when we came in. “This is getting weird.”

I heard the sound of hooves approaching, and turned to see Starlight Glimmer—first mention page 184, Twilight Sparkle’s first and current apprentice—trotting up with Spike riding on her back. “Wow,” she said, looking me up and down like I lived in a display case. “You sure weren’t kidding, Spike! That is weird.”

Sparkle turned back around and said, “That’s not the weird part. She claims to have been pony-napped by her who in turn claims that she is here to take over Equestria. Or something.”

Starlight glanced at Copper and then turned back to Twilight. “She’s in a bathrobe. Don’t they usually dress up to take over the world? Like, at least a cape, or something?”

Copper stared at me with a “told-you-so” sort of look. I rolled my eyes, then cleared my throat. “Okay, I may have forced her hoof a bit, and brought her to Ponyville without her very fancy cape, but she really did come here for a reason. Why don’t you tell them, Copper?”

She pulled the robe tighter in front of her chest with her hooves, and looked at the three ponies staring at her. I tilted my chin slightly higher into the air. She saw the gesture and one corner of her mouth curled upward ever so slightly before she assumed her regal posture. Her regality diminished slightly as she lifted the corner of the robe to show off her flank. “I am Copper Crown, and, as you can see from my cutie mark, my destiny is to become a princess.”

“Psssst!” I hissed at her, loudly enough for everyone to hear. “You forgot to say ‘vile pretender.’”

Heh. As it turned out, I was the evil one.

Copper turned white as a ghost, and her jaw dropped open as she stared at me with wide eyes. Sparkle raised one eyebrow and lowered the other. Starlight’s grin threatened to break the surface and show itself on her face. Spike looked ready for a show.

I cleared my throat and did my best to imitate Copper’s dramatic voice from yesterday, even throwing a pretend cape over my shoulder. “Twilight, you are not qualified to be a princess! Prepare to be defeated, vile pretender!”

Copper blushed, hard. It was adorable. Sparkle and Starlight both looked at me, mouths agape, then turned to Copper, then back to me. I shrugged. “This is what I deal with on a daily basis.”

“I…” Twilight Sparkle shook her head. “I have no idea how to deal with this. Either of you. I mean, if you were rampaging through town and threatening ponies, or enslaving the townsfolk to build a throne for you in city hall—”

“Oh!” Copper exclaimed, holding up a hoof, “Like Trixie did, the second time she came to Ponyville!”

“Yeah, but—” Sparkle leaned back and put a hoof to her chin “—you’re not doing that.”

Copper giggled, her messy, wavy mane bouncing around her ears. “Why would I hurt the ponies of Equestria? I’m destined to be a princess so I can help make Equestria a better place.”

Sparkle nodded for a moment, then said, “And you think I’m making it a worse place? That’s why you want to overthrow me?”

“Eeeeeeeh,” Copper said, waving her hoof back and forth in the air. “Let’s call that a misunderstanding. I saw you as standing in my way of becoming a princess. But when I took the time to learn about how you became a princess, and what you’ve done since, I can’t see you that way any more.”

“Also,” I added, “once you’ve seen your archenemy as a filly stealing cookies with the help of her adorable big brother—” I shrugged “—there’s no going back.”

“Yeah,” Sparkle grumbled, “she shows that one to everypony.”

“It’s true!” Spike said with a snicker.

Even Starlight Glimmer was smirking behind a dainty hoof.

“So, what happens now?” Copper asked with a cringe. “Are you going to banish me, or something?”

“You haven’t done anything wrong, and I don’t really have anything against the idea of you becoming a princess.” Sparkle looked at Copper’s flank again. “I can’t really argue with destiny, either. Whatever ‘destiny’ is.”

“That,” said Starlight as she held up a hoof, “is an interesting question. Based upon my recent, heheh, temporal transgressions, it seems like destiny isn’t so much set in stone as it is shaped by the ponies around us.”

Sparkle raised her eyebrows and nodded. “Excellent point, Starlight. My friends and I all got our cutie marks together—”

“The sonic rainboom!” Copper interjected.

Sparkle eyed us both warily. “—and when an irresponsible use of time travel caused that to not happen, our destinies had all changed.” She tapped her chin with a hoof. “You know who else got their cutie marks simultaneously?”

I bit my lip and looked at Copper. I could see the gears turning in her head. She looked back at me and raised a hoof like she was trying to pull the answer out of the air. “Oh, I know this one. It was in the next-to-last section of your binder, after Twilight defeated Starlight the first time, but before she took her as an apprentice.”

“A binder?” Sparkle turned toward me, slowly, with a wide plastic smile on her face. “I looooooove binders.”

I suddenly found myself wishing for a donut and some chocolate milk.

“Oh yeah!” Copper shouted. “The Cutie Mark Crusaders!”

“That’s right,” Sparkle said without taking her eyes off of me. “Starlight, why don’t—”

Copper’s head bobbed left and right as she listed off facts about the Crusaders. “Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo. Applejack’s sister, Rarity’s sister, and no relations of note, respectively. They got their cutie marks in helping other ponies with their cutie marks. Crazy! Even though Twilight had spent years fruitlessly helping them search for their talents, and—”

Sparkle cleared her throat. I must have been making a face, because when Copper looked at me, her ears drooped instantly. The Princess quietly said, “Starlight, why don’t you take Copper Crown to see the Crusaders? Twilight and I have some business to discuss.”

I wasn’t sure if I could see heat waves coming off of Sparkle, or if I was just starting to get faint. As I heard Copper’s hoofsteps disappear into the stacks, I wished, for the first time in my life, that my friend was standing by my side.

Chapter 8

I sucked in a breath through my teeth. “I prefer the term ‘unofficial biographer.’”

Sparkle did not prefer that term.

I sighed and held up my hooves. “Well I didn’t take any of the pictures. And most of the information I have came from your mom. All I had to do was knock on her door and say, ‘Hi, my name is Twilight, tee hee.’”

“I suppose I’ll have to have a talk with her about sharing too much information with strangers.” She turned to write in a little notebook. “For all she knew you might have been a villain.”

While she had her back turned, I conjured a mustache onto my upper lip. One of the black, curly, waxed kind. The ones you twist when you’re coming up with an evil plan. The kind I’d seen Pinkie wear in some of the photos in my binder. How could I not teach myself that spell? “Or perhaps I am a villain after all!”

Sparkle turned back around and looked at me. I assumed she’d seen too many Pinkie Pie mustaches for it to have much of an effect on her. “This isn’t a joke!” she said, waving a hoof in the direction that Copper had disappeared. “Until yesterday, she was planning to overthrow a princess of Equestria. This isn’t funny, this is my life!”

“Uh, no, it’s my life. She didn’t show up at your castle to overthrow you, she showed up at my donut shop to overthrow me.” I sat down and folded my forehooves across my chest. “You’re the one who’s not taking it seriously.”

That little speech probably would have had more impact if I hadn’t been wearing a mustache. My lip tickled as I let the thing dissolve into nothingness.

“Oh, no.” She waggled a hoof at me like I was a troublesome youngster. “You’re not going to change the subject. This is about you and the creepy amount of information you’ve compiled on me, my friends, and innocent foals.”

I shrugged. “Every bit of that information is publicly available. Newspaper articles, books, personal interviews.”

“Reading a newspaper article is normal. Keeping clippings about particular ponies—especially those who aren’t public figures—crosses a line. It is not normal.”

“Neither is being accosted by villains, favor-seekers, and suitors every day.” I’d been saving that one.

“And how exactly is an extensively detailed dossier on myself and my friends supposed to help you stop this harassment?”

That kinda cut down my argument, and, honestly, I didn’t have much left. I stood up and trotted over toward a comfy-looking couch in what I assumed to be a public reading area. Maybe this conversation wouldn’t feel quite so confrontational outside of her personal little office. I climbed up on the couch and lay down as Sparkle took a seat on a cushion across the little coffee table.

Nope. This was still definitely her territory. I sighed and shook my head. “At first, I just wanted to know who this Twilight Sparkle was. She just kind of appeared out of nowhere a few years ago, and suddenly everypony wanted a piece of her. Except… they weren’t coming after you, they were coming after me.

“So I did some research. This was before you became a princess, and there wasn’t much about you. A few articles here and there in some royal gossip mags about Princess Celestia’s reclusive favorite student. I found a snippet in the royal archives about your defeat of Nightmare Moon, but most of the information was about Princess Luna.

“I mostly just pointed interested parties toward Ponyville. That is, until you became a princess and your pictures started showing up in the papers and gossip magazines. Now, everypony knows what you look like, and when they see me, they won’t let it go.”

Sparkle nodded. “So, how do you deal with them when they show up?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Violence. Glazed, chocolately-creamy violence.”

“And this is how you subdued Copper Crown, too?”

“Yeah.” I wondered how Copper was doing with the Crusaders. “And now she’s living on my couch, apparently.”

Sparkle giggled. “And in your bathrobe.”

I briefly pondered whether I looked like that when I giggled. I concluded that I don’t giggle much. “She just kind of took over my entire life since yesterday.”

“That’s funny,” Sparkle said with a grin. “She said that you are the one who ponynapped her.”

I rolled my eyes and laid my head down on the couch. I mumbled because my muzzle was half-buried in the cushion. “So I physically placed her unconscious body on a train. Big deal. Ever since she showed up, every moment of my life has been about her. Her destiny.” I glanced at Sparkle. “About you.”

She put a hoof on the table and just kind of stared at it. “Sounds like you were already obsessed with me.” Without looking up, she took a breath and tilted her head to the side. “Why didn’t you come here before?”

“I have a donut shop to run. Dozens of ponies count on me for their breakfast, and I cater sweets to half the fancy parties in Canterlot. I’m not being conceited when I say that Canterlot night life would fall apart without me.” I could feel the eyebrow, even without looking. “Okay, I exaggerate. There would be some parties with substandard desserts.”

“Hmmm,” Sparkle said. If ‘Hmmm’ is a thing you say. Grunted? She made a noise. She hmmmed.

I lifted my head and looked at her. “You hmmmed. What does that mean?”

“Oh,” she said, putting her hoof back on the ground. “I was just wondering. If you’re so busy, why didn’t you just drop her off on the train, and go back to your shop?”

“She—” I froze. This was beginning to sound suspiciously like a friendship lesson. “Listen here, Sparkle. I don’t need friends and I don’t need your help. Well, I do. But not that way. I need you to get rid of all these weirdos who keep showing up.”

Sparkle chuckled. She legit laughed at what I had just said. “You’re trying to change the subject! One thing at a time. Why did you come with Copper instead of just leaving her on the train?”

Well, yeah, I was trying to change the subject, but that was due to a perfectly legitimate conflict of interest. “Okay, this is going to sound unnecessarily, uh, friendly, but she needed my help. That’s all.”

“I don’t see why you’re so against the idea of being a friend and-slash-or having a friend. It seems to me like you’re a pretty good friend already.”

She was being tricky. With her tricks. I didn’t really know what she was doing, but I felt like I needed to be on my guard. I’d read so much about her friendship lessons and friendship crystals and friendship lasers and…

“Are you okay?”

I realized that I was hyperventilating. I rolled my eyes, if for no other reason than to convince myself that what she’d said was silly.

Which thing she’d said? That I was a good friend? I was having a hard time remembering what else she’d said. Her words echoed in my head until the very sounds themselves became meaningless. I swallowed hard and wished that Copper was here to say something dumb so I could roll my eyes and feel justified for having done so. To have somepony sillier than me. Because I suddenly felt very exposed, all alone in front of the Princess of Friendship.

“Thank you, Spike.”

I looked up to see the little dragon holding a tray with two mugs of hot cocoa. Sparkle floated one over toward me, which I took in my magic and held close to my muzzle. There were seven marshmallows floating in it.

She said something, but it didn’t register in my brain. She’d given me something I didn’t ask for and didn’t deserve. I knew it sounded lame, but I felt like I had just realized what it was like to have somepony looking out for you. Then I immediately felt guilty for emotion-assuming that I provided for Copper without getting anything in return. Then I kind of got angry when I realized that Copper actually hadn’t given me anything in return. Of course, then I felt like a jerk for trying to quantify friendship in transactional terms.

“Hey! Twilight Sprinkle!”

For once it was nice to hear her voice instead of my own thoughts.

“What are you thinking about?”

Aaaaaaand it was over. She was back to being annoying. I growled and set the steaming mug on the coffee table, untouched. “I don’t like this friendship stuff. It’s complicated.”

Sparkle giggled again. That noise was beginning to seriously grate on me. “It gets less complicated when you live it out. Just be her friend.”

I rolled over onto my back and groaned. “Life was so much simpler when I just ran my donut shop.”

She didn’t giggle, but I could tell she wanted to. “If you had the choice, would you go back and make it so you’d never met Copper Crown?”

I had to think about that one for a bit. I listened to the sound of the library. And by that, I mean the terrifying sound of nothing. Sparkle’s breathing was the only thing my ears could detect at all. If a library could have a soul, it would be Twilight Sparkle.

I missed the noise and bustle of Canterlot. My internal clock was ticking, reminding me that any second now a gaggle of construction workers would trot through the door. The repeated dinging of the shop door’s bell tickled the edges of my imagination. The scruffy one would order his coffee black even though I know he likes it with cream cheese frosting swirled in. Trying to look tough for the mare with a jackhammer cutie mark.

So many ponies whose names I scrupulously avoided learning. And then she showed up and announced her name. Well, sort of. I knew that Sparkle and Starlight Glimmer both had the ability to do a time travel spell that could erase Copper from my life. Nothing apocalyptic like what Starlight had tried to do. Copper only showed up yesterday.

Wow. I met Copper barely twenty-four hours ago. Without her, I’d be serving donuts to a couple-in-the-making and dozens of other ponies right now. How had she turned my life completely upside down?

If I did go back in time, what would I do? Just kick her out with a chocolate milk carton impaled on her horn, and go back to slinging pastries? Seems like kind of a jerk thing to do. I’ve not always been the nicest pony, but I didn’t like to think I was a jerk.

So, she had needed somepony right then. Is that all it takes to build a friendship? One pony who needs something, and another pony to provide it? Aaaaaand I was back to that train of thought again, treating friendship as a one-sided transaction.

“No,” I was surprised to hear myself say.

I didn’t bother to listen to what Sparkle said. I supposed that some part of me remembered wishing that Copper was by my side. I shook my head and couldn’t help but smile a little.

“Well,” Sparkle said as she stood up and smiled back at me, “we can finish talking about that binder later. Why don’t we talk about your situation with the, what was it? Villains, favor-seekers, and suitors?”

“That’s it. Thanks for—”

Sparkle froze, her lips pursed and one eye twitching. She squinted at me. “Suitors?”

Epilogue

I couldn’t say that I was surprised to find out that Copper’s destiny was not to become a princess. I didn’t think anypony was. Not even her.

I kind of was surprised when she waltzed into the library with those three annoyingly cheerful fillies, and all four of them were absolutely covered in jewelry. I mean, I should have guessed that she was a jeweler at heart. I hadn’t seen her crown or anything, but I was sure that I would, seeing as she hadn’t shut up about her jewelry since we got on the train.

Apparently, she and the Crusaders had built a forge. Oh, and she invented some new alloy of copper, stainless or sterling or something. Doesn’t tarnish. Then Applejack confiscated the forge, and Rarity agreed to sell Copper’s jewlery in her Canterlot boutique. Good for her.

The train slowed as it started climbing the foothills of Canterlot. Copper poked me in the ribs. “So, whatever happened with your thing, Twilight?”

“You mean the flocks of weirdos like you?”

“Yeah, that. What did the other Twilight do?”

I snorted. “Besides interrogate me about that binder you spilled the beans about?”

She stuck her nose in the air and folded her forelegs across her chest. “You never told me it was a secret.”

“Well, apparently she’s pretty public as it is. It’s not like she hides her castle or anything. So there’s not really much she could do.” I looked at Copper and hoped my grin didn’t look too evil. “Oh, she did say she was going to start a literacy program, to help ponies who can’t read the difference between ‘Sparkle’ and ‘Sprinkle.’”

I couldn’t help but laugh as she punched me repeatedly in the shoulder. One of her brand new bracelets fell off and rolled into the aisle of the train car. I picked it up with my magic and floated it back, taking a moment to study the intricate design pressed into its surface. It did look pretty nice. I guessed. I’ve never really been into jewelry. I’ve always worn paper hats.

I passed the bracelet to her and she slipped it back over her hoof. And then she started talking again.

I studied her face as I did my best to let her babbling blend into the sound of the wheels rumbling over the tracks. She seemed… brighter. Like the last remnants of that horrid dye had been washed out of her fur. But deeper. That inky blackness had been washed out of her very soul.

“What are you… You’re making a face again.”

“Oh.” I did have a tendency to—

“You know, when you’re thinking, you still move your face like you’re having a conversation.” I felt my cheeks burning. “That was your ‘melodrama’ face. Like when you say something really hammy.”

I cleared my throat. “Prepare to be defeated, vile pretender!”

Copper suppressed a smirk and gave me a light shove. “So, I may have been a bit, uh, intense when we first met.”

“You’re like a completely different pony.”

“Yeah.” Copper pushed a lock of her frizzy orange hair behind an ear. “I was trying to be something I wasn’t. I just needed somepony to help me see who I really am, and what it was I really wanted.”

I nodded. “I’m glad the Crusaders were able to help you.”

She put a hoof on my shoulder and waited until I turned to look at her. “It wasn’t them who helped me, it was you. I never would have even considered the idea of not being princess until I met you and…”

She just kind of stopped talking. I didn’t know if I was supposed to talk or what.

She smiled again. Not the kind of smile I’m used to ponies sending my way. “You didn’t think I was a princess, but you were my friend anyway. You were a friend to the pony I really was, not the pony I was trying to be.”

I felt like this was the terrible, squishy, emotional moment that I was afraid would happen. And in the end, I found out that it didn’t bother me that much.

Chapter 5

“This—” she looked at me with her ears laid back against her neck “—is the royal palace.”

“Yeah, like I said, this is a big catering gig.” I shrugged as I pushed one of the foodservice carts with my magic. “And there’s no bigger deal than a royal Canterlot party. Also, that’s why I wouldn’t let you wear your cape.”

After a second shower, her fur and mane were nearly back to normal, just a bit subdued. Still, she looked professional in just a white collar and black bowtie. Like a server. Which she was. She’d better not forget that.

My own outfit was better suited for a guest than a server. It was a slinky, midnight-blue dress that fell off my hips like a waterfall, with fluffy silver wool around the bottom edges. It wasn’t expensive. Truth be told, it was a knockoff of one of Rarity’s dresses that I’d found in a resale shop. Lots of “Twilight Sparkle” dresses get sold by uncreative clothiers, and they often end up in resale shops because they don’t match many other ponies’ colors. I suppose that’s one upside to having such a similar body type and coloration as her. I can wear all her imitation dresses, and get them cheap.

All in all, I’d rather just pay full price when I feel the need for fashion.

I stopped at the service entrance and nodded to the guard stallion. He nodded back. “Miss Sprinkle. Who’s your friend?”

“She’s not my friend.” I saw her nod from the corner of my eye, where she stood behind the other cart. “She’s my new server.”

As he turned to retrieve a clipboard, she leaned over and whispered in my ear, “Quick thinking. If you’d said ‘My Liege,’ he may have been suspicious.”

“I swear,” I said through gritted teeth that turned into a smile when the guard turned back around.

He held the clipboard in one wingtip while he spoke around the pencil in his teeth. “And her name is?”

I froze with my mouth open. I blinked a couple of times and licked my lips. “Her name is, uh, Ravenblood, um, Dark… thoughts.” I hoped that hadn’t sounded too much like a question.

She stepped forward and put a hoof on his shoulder. “Twilight thinks she’s funny. My name is—” there was just a hint of hesitation here “—Copper Crown.”

“Alright,” he said after scribbling on his clipboard. “I’ll make sure she gets added to the list for next time. Head on in.”

I levitated one of the tiny pastries from my cart into the air, and tossed it toward him.

He didn’t see it. The little dessert bounced off his gold-colored peytral, and landed in the grass beside the door. I smiled and pushed my cart over the threshold. He smiled back as Copper followed behind me with the other cart.

“Sooooo,” she said with the grin evident in her voice, “we’re going to pretend that didn’t happen?”

I didn’t look back. “You’d darn well better.” It’s a good thing I make it a point not to remember ponies’ names. I wouldn’t even know if I ever see him again.

I could still hear her chuckling as I turned a corner toward the the garden where we were setting up the dessert table. I glanced back at her for just a moment, then returned my attention to the hallway and said, “So, is that your name? Copper Crown?”

She was silent for several steps. “I told you. It’s my destiny to be a princess. That’s my real name.”

I nodded, but didn’t say anything until we got to the garden. I did have to give her this, though: she may be crazy, but she could follow directions like she wasn’t an idiot. We got the dessert table set up in time to sit and chat for a few minutes before the guests arrived.

“Soooooo,” I said as I stealthily levitated a carrot hors d'oeuvre off of a passing cart, “what’s with the name? Why’d you make up a new one?”

“Surely you don’t think that Princess Mi Amore Cadenza was born with that name?”

“I don—”

“Don’t you dare!”

“Well, it’s either that, or ‘don’t call me Shirley.’ And only one of those has to do with donuts.”

She crossed her forehooves in front of her chest. “You need to get some jokes that aren’t—” she looked at me with narrowed eyes “—stale.”

Ouch. That was actually pretty good. Of course, I couldn’t let her know that.

Stale donuts are bad, but stale donut jokes? They were probably worse. I chuckled a bit and looked down at the appetizer I’d swiped. I looked over at Copper, whose name I actually remembered now. I held the morsel out to her, and she took it with a smile. As she chewed, I asked, “What’s your plan? For when you meet Twilight Sparkle, I mean.”

“Well,” she said with a hoof covering her mouth. She swallowed. “Since you told me all about her, and I read up on the more interesting bits in that binder of yours, I think I understand how this all works now. If I can convince her to use the Elements of Harmony on me, it should turn me into the princess I deserve to be.”

I glanced around the courtyard and then turned and squinted at her. “But the Elements of Harmony banished Nightmare Moon, and turned Discord to stone. I’m not sure you want to get zapped.”

She smiled. “Both of them got what they deserved. And what I deserve is to be a princess. They were evil; I am not.”

“Okay, then. So, how are you going to get her to use the Elements of Harmony on you?”

She leaned toward me and grinned. In a kind of scary way, actually. “We know from the Tirek incident that if I hold her friends hostage, she will acquiesce to whatever I demand.” She raised her eyebrows.

My hooves rose to my temples almost involuntarily. “I thought you just said you weren’t evil? And now you’re taking hostages?”

“Not for real, though. I wouldn’t hurt anypony.”

I sighed. “Besides, they all have to be together to use the Elements. And the Elements are stuck in the Tree of Harmony now, anyway.”

“Oh, that’s right.” Copper chewed on the edge of her hoof. “So what was it they used to defeat Tirek?”

“Some kind of magic Rainbow Power. Even more mysterious than the Elements of Harmony.”

She nodded. “So if I can convince them to blast me with—”

“That’s a great way to end up in Tartarus. That’s even if they can activate it at will, which we don’t know. It may be triggered only by apocalyptic evil.”

“What if I pretend… to…”

Her eyes opened wide as her jaw went slack. I followed the line of her vision across the room to where Princess Celestia herself was walking among castle staff. I’d met her on a dozen occasions, and she’d even been in my donut shop more than once. She and Princess Luna both had notoriously ravenous sweet tooths. Sweet teeth? Who the hay knows.

Most ponies are a bit awed the first time they see Celestia in the flesh. But I suppose that when you were planning to ascend to her level, that makes the meeting a bit more… momentous. I elbowed Copper.

She slowly turned her head to face me, but her expression didn’t change. Until I lifted a hoof to her chin and pushed her jaw closed. Her lower lip stuck out just a little as she turned to me and blinked. Her lip might have even trembled, or that could have been my hoof. I put my hooves back on the floor and cleared my throat.

“It’ll be okay, Copper. Just act normal. See everypony else? They’re just doing their jobs. And your job is to sit there and be ready to carry around a tray of these delicious pastries.”

“A-and what if she comes over here? Oh no, she’s coming over here!” she hissed.

“Don’t worry,” I said as I patted her on the back. “Just talk to her like normal. She’s a normal pony, just like you and me. Only bigger. And immortal. And… gorgeous…”

My mouth just kind of stopped working as Celestia stepped in front of the dessert table and lifted up the corner of the white cloth that covered all the treats. She peeked underneath and then winked at me before pulling out a miniature éclair and popping it into her mouth. I smiled back with a little, courteous bow.

She swallowed and licked her lips. “It’s good to see you again, Twilight Sprinkle. I’m happy to see that you’ve taken my advice and made a friend.”

“Oh, uh, she,” I stammered. “She’s not a friend. She’s just helping me with a, um, a thing.”

Celestia raised an eyebrow and looked to Copper Crown.

Copper sat up straighter and lifted her chin. Oh no.

“It is true, Your Highness.” No, Copper, that was the opposite of a bow! “Fate has crossed our paths for this endeavor, and once we have both achieved our respective destinies, we shall part ways. However, I do look forward to working with you in the future.”

“Okay, then,” Celestia said. I felt my face burning hot as the sun as she turned toward me and smiled. “It seems like the two of you are getting along well. Enjoy the party.”

“Dank you,” I muttered through clenched teeth.

Copper shivered as she curled her tail tightly around her flank, before turning toward me with a smile. “She’s nice. I have a feeling we’re going to work well together.” She looked me up and down. “What’s wrong?”

She must have seen the sparks coming out of my teeth. That might have been her clue, because it is not normal. Except probably for ponies who have to deal with Copper Crown. “I said to act normal. Not ‘pretend to be a princess in front of an actual princess.’”

She stuck her tongue out at me. “Well, you started the acting weird. You just kind of, well, started listing her attributes. That’s pretty weird.”

“I could list some of your attributes right about now,” I growled. “Besides, it’s not my fault that she’s so, so… intimidating. Not in a scary way, you know. Just that she’s—”

“Gorgeous?” Copper cut me off, batting her eyelashes.

“Lots of ponies have—Everypony thinks she’s—” I grunted. “You can’t say you weren’t intimidated by her.”

She lifted her chin in the air again. That seemed to be one of her favorite poses. “Of course not. Did you hear how we conversed? As equals. As natural as can be.”

“Yeah, I’ve noticed that you start talking like that when you get uncomfortable.” She shot me a glare, but I couldn’t keep a hint of a smile from pulling up the corner of my mouth. It felt good to know something personal about a pony besides their favorite donut, or how they like their coffee. The first guests were starting to shuffle in, so I nodded toward the entrance and said, “It’s time to get to work. Try to at least act like you’re pretending to be a servant.”

And she did. I had to point out a few tidbits of etiquette here and there, but overall she didn’t get weird. Except when she got near Princess Celestia, so I did my best to steer the two of them apart from each other. Then, of course, Celestia accused me of calling her fat, because I was trying to keep her from the desserts. That was embarrassing and a half. It was a joke, of course, and everyone but me found it funny. I’m sure Copper would have loved the excuse to spend more time giving pastries to her, if she hadn’t been asleep on her hooves by that point.

Celestia sidled up next to me. Honest, I didn’t jump at all when she started talking. “It looks like your not-friend isn’t used to such late nights.” I hadn’t realized I’d been staring at Copper. Celestia giggled, like golden wind chimes. “I kind of want to poke her, and see if she falls over.”

“Uh, yeah,” I said without looking up. “She’s had a hard day, what with her failed plan at world domination and all.”

“I see. Another case of mistaken identity?”

I looked up at Celestia with what I hoped was incredulity on my face instead of anger. “What—How did you know about that?”

“Oh, I hear things, is all.”

“B-but… If you knew about it, why didn’t you do anything?”

Celestia smiled again. That far-away smile she gets when she’s thinking about something, or wants you to think about something, or maybe when she’s just trying to look mysterious. It’s a good look for her. “Well, for one, I’m not in control of everypony’s actions, so I’m not sure there’s much I could do. Second, and I mean this in the least-rude way possible, but it’s not my problem. Three and four, respectively, it’s not my business, nor my fault. Also, five, you didn’t ask.”

“Um, can I ask now?”

Another giggle. “I’m not the pony to ask, I don’t think.” Well, Celestia was never known for solving other ponies’ problems for them. She looked down at me from the top of her very long neck. “Why don’t you two call it a night? I think the guests can find the dessert table on their own by now.”

After grumbling my thanks, I had just reached out to collect my carts when I felt Celestia’s surprisingly delicate hoof on my shoulder. I turned first to look at the hoof, then up to her face. She smiled a warm smile and said, “Thank you for taking the time to help a pony who’s so unsure of her place in the world.”

I chuckled, a laugh as cold as her smile was warm. “Oh, she’s not the least bit unsure of her place in the world.”

“Be that as it may, thank you for watching out for one of my little ponies.”

I watched her stalk back into the crowd. Suddenly, the idea that she was interested in me and my life was a lot less appealing.

With a shudder, I stepped up to the sleeping would-be princess. Her eyes were closed, and her breathing was slow and even, so I poked her with a hoof and watched her eyes crack open. She seemed unconcerned that she was sleeping on the job. I couldn’t help but smile. “Come on, sleepyhead, we’re done here. Let’s get you home.”

She nodded, but dropped her gaze to the floor. I hoped she was just tired. I grabbed both carts with my magic and pushed them along in front of me. Her hoofsteps shuffled along in regular rhythm to my own, out into the chill air that must have woken her up enough to actually lift her hooves. As we exited the castle gate, I twisted my neck around to ask her, “Where are we headed?”

She rubbed her muzzle with a fetlock and refused to make eye contact. “I’ll just, um, find my own way home. I’ll come pick up my cape later, I guess.”

“Hey.”

Copper actually looked up.

“You don’t have a place to go, do you?”

She looked somewhere off to her left, but didn’t say a word. I sighed. “It’s too late to talk about this right now. Why don’t you stay with me tonight, and we can talk about it in the morning?”

Her eyes closed as she nodded, and then she stepped up close enough to lean against me for just a moment. It had been a long time since I felt the warmth of another pony against my side. I’d never much cared for hugs. She pulled away and started heading back to the shop, and suddenly it was colder than it had been before. It was cold, that’s all it was. Just the cold.

I shook my head and started following Copper. We had a big day tomorrow. Destiny, and all that. I shivered, just a little.