Revenge is best served bitter.
I came to Fillydelphia with one goal in mind: revenge.
Most ponies would say it was petty. Most ponies would say I should leave well enough alone. Most ponies are not me. Perhaps I was being petty. A better mare than me might not try to do what I went there to do.
Some might also think that, after my little… incident in Ponyville the last time I went after revenge, that I was temping fate. Maybe some lingering after effects of the amulet were responsible for my need to claim revenge. Maybe I'm just not a very nice mare. Maybe I was just miserable and wanted everypony else to be miserable too. Maybe I just hate hecklers.
Hecklers are a fact of life for a performer. When a pony steps up on stage they paint a target on themselves and invite the whole world to take their best shot. If you aren't ready to take the hits they will tear you apart. Every performer handles hecklers differently. Some let the abuse roll right off them. Others shoot back with quick wit and a sharp tongue. Others decide to ask those hecklers to come up on stage and give them the rump-kicking they so richly deserve. No points for guessing my favorite.
Some ponies think that humiliating a heckler is going too far. I'd be willing to bet anyone who truly believes that is not a performer. They've never walked off a stage fighting back tears. They don't know what it's like to go out there, pour your heart and soul into your art and then have it thrown in your face by some hateful little pony who can't just keep their bitterness to themselves. Some pony who sees your act, assumes they know who you really are and decides to punish you for it.
Nopony is obligated to like a performer or what they do. Go ahead and criticize. Go ahead and tell other ponies that you didn't like it. Go ahead and get up, trot out and ask the venue for your money back. I won't ever try to stop you or even say a word about it. But nothing gives you the right to try to disrupt the show for everypony else. Would you charge into a bakery and kick a cake right out of the baker's hooves because you don't like their frosting, or would you just eat at another bakery?
Really, if you look at it that way, Fillydelphia had it coming.
My revenge was going to be perfect. It was going to be subtle and sweet and oh so fun. I was going to make them feel like the absolute clods they were, and ponies were going to thank me for it. Best of all it was going to be entirely, 100% legal and above board. No dark magic, no cursed artifacts, no sleepless nights, no endlessly gnawing guilt, no retching at the sight of my own refl-
The preparations took a while.
I had to do a bit of coordinating with a few key local figures. The terms of my parole meant a visit to the local police the moment I got into town to check in. Who I was, where I'd come from, how long I planned on staying, all of those sorts of details. Once that was out of the way, I sought out the local farmers market. Fillydelphia is one of the middle ground cities in Equestria, much bigger than someplace like Ponyville but far less urbanized than Manehatten. Get outside of downtown and many of the townships under the city's umbrella feel almost rural. Just the sort of places I need. Full of opinionated ponies who I knew from past experience need little excuse to hate me.
I needed the farmers' permission to set up my stage nearby the next day. I ran my plan (or rather a sanitized version of it) by their more senior members and got agreement pretty quickly. This was the most crucial part and it was a big relief when I pulled it off so easily. All that fresh produce was absolutely essential if the rest was going to work. I needed it available and ready for impulse purchase.
From there I needed only visit one other location, which turned out to be quite happy to be a part of my plans. A little too happy. The older mare in charge almost hugged me when I suggested it. A few foals actually cheered. Given how run down and rickety the place was, they must not have been getting the support they needed from their community. Just another reason the locals deserved what I was going to do to them.
From there it was just putting up signs and setting the stage the morning before the performance as soon as I rose from my latest round of nightmares. Baskets were borrowed from my co-conspirators and set up backstage, just out of sight of the audience. I needed them close enough to levitate at a moment's notice but I couldn't risk anypony getting wise. The cushioning spells I cast on them were originally meant for my own personal soft landings as part of my more physical tricks. You'd be surprised just how much being dropped only half a dozen hooves through a trap door hurts without padding to break your fall.
Most magician acts are set at night for good reason. Not only does darkness itself offer concealment, it also means that you are in control of the lights. Manipulating dark and light lets you hide the seams in your tricks from prying eyes in order to preserve the illusion. Sometimes by casting an opportune shadow, sometimes by misdirecting their attention elsewhere. Throw a spotlight on something and everypony is going to look at it and miss whatever else you're doing. I didn't care about that this time. In fact, having the seams visible would only help my plan. More important was that I needed the market open. That meant an early afternoon performance in broad daylight with eager farmers selling their goods.
No sooner had I announced myself and thrown back the curtains then I got my first jeers from ponies who either remembered my first visit or who read the newspaper. I grinned in response. All according to plan.
“The Great and Powerful Trixie thanks you for your mediocre welcome,” I called out in my best stage voice, provoking a few more boos. “She can see this town is as full of philistines as ever.” That got me some very dirty looks from the twelve or so ponies who knew what that word meant, and many more from the ponies who didn't and were upset by being confronted with their ignorance.
“Thank you for attending this inaugural performance in the Great and Powerful Trixie's new series of charity drives. All donations are final and non-refundable. Please,” I let my grin become a smug smirk, “enjoy the show.”
I performed my tricks with my usual skill. I may have been there for revenge but I have my pride to consider. Ingrates though they were and undeserving of my best as that entire town was, I never do less than my best. That's not for the audience, that's for me.
The insults? Those were for the audience.
I pulled all the usual things out of hats. “And here we have a hat covering something other than a bald spot.” I produced long strings of brightly colored handkerchiefs. “Better rags than I see on anypony's backs today.” A bouquet of flowers produced with slight of hoof. “Finally something that smells better than this place.” Smoke bombs. “What do you know, something else that smells better than this place!”
I didn't even make it through the rope tricks before the crowd reached their breaking point. A light brown earth pony stallion at the back reared back and hurled a bright red tomato at the stage. I cast the rope aside and yanked one of the baskets out from backstage. The ripe fruit landed softly as a pegasus on a cloud, exactly as I had planned it. They just needed a little more.
“Hmph! The Great and Powerful Trixie is not impressed. She has seen Breezies with a better throw than that!” Another tomato, this one from a vibrant blue mare, hurtled squarely at my face. My basket swooped in to catch that one just as easily as the first. “Well? Is that really all you've got?”
The dam burst. Fruits and vegetables of every shape and description rained down on my stage with such ferocity that I had to levitate three baskets at once just to keep up with them. In less than a minute they were full and I had to swap them out for the next batch.
Dance, puppets, dance!
I don't mind saying that my skill with levitation magic is quite formidable. I might not have the power of somepony like Little Miss Friendship, but I have skill. I can use a rope to hogtie a mare, pluck a single apple from a tree, and then shove it in that mare's mouth before she knows what's happening. Just ask the mare. Most unicorns use levitation just to do everyday chores, never even stopping to think just how much they could be capable of with a little dedication and imagination. Such as catching a barrage of produce out of the air.
Despite my skill I missed a fair amount of lobbed food. I caught much more, but it was a relief when they finally started to run out and get it through their heads that they weren't going to hit me. I set the baskets down on the stage in a line behind me where they were still clearly visible. I tossed my mane and gave the crowd the most flagrantly insincere smile I could muster.
“The Great and Powerful Trixie thanks you all for being such a horrible audience, just as you were last time. It's good to know,” I raised my voice over the chorus of boos, refusing to let them drown me out, “that she can count on Fillydelphia to remain as petty and spiteful as when she first came to entertain you.”
“Hack!”
“Witch!”
“Get off the stage!”
I'd heard it all before. The first time I'd come to Fillydelphia I had truly wanted to entertain. I was fresh to the open road, eager and excited to bring my show to new towns. Fillydelphia was a painful lesson. Never again would I let myself get brought down like that, that I swore then and there. Or perhaps later that night while sobbing into my pillow. It was the start of several unhappy years that would culminate in my wagon getting flattened by an angry Ursa Minor. It made the next words out of my mouth taste as sweet as cotton candy.
“And Trixie would most especially like to thank you all for your generous donations to the Feed the Foals Foundation.”
That shut most of them up for a moment. I watched them whisper among themselves, trying to work out what the hay I was talking about. I hadn't charged for tickets and none of them had thrown any bits my way. What possible way could they have donated? I grinned wickedly as I levitated a head of lettuce out of one of the baskets.
“Thanks to your donations of fresh fruits and vegetables, young fillies and colts all over Fillydelphia will enjoy healthy, nutritious meals. Trixie was shocked to hear that the local chapter was struggling to provide for all the poor, hungry mouths they have to feed. What kind of ponies must live in this town that would waste food rather than give to those in need?”
Oh, they didn't like that at all. I could almost see smoke coming out of some of their ears. Not one of them yelled though. Not one of them had the nerve to step forward and explain just why they had bits to spend for throwing vegetables at my head, but not for giving to Feed the Foals. I couldn't help but wonder how many of them were furiously concocting elaborate justifications in their head. I can only hope it was every last one of them.
I gently laid the lettuce back into its basket. “Worry no longer, good ponies of Fillydelphia. The Great and Powerful Trixie will see that this food gets to where it is needed most. Thank you once again.” I doffed my hat and bowed low. Time then to deliver my parting shot straight from the heart. Not from the Great and Powerful Trixie but from Trixie Lulamoon, the mare this very town had sent away in tears two years earlier.
“I knew I could count on you to be exactly the kind of ponies you are.”
With that I turned my back on them, put my hat back on and started to walk backstage. I'd only gotten three steps when something splattered against the back of my neck with a wet thud. I've been hit with enough tomatoes to know one when I felt it. Cool juice flecked my mane and ran down my neck along with thicker chunks of ruined fruit. I stopped in my tracks and looked over my shoulder out at the now completely silent crowd.
For a split second I considered retaliating. I had enough fruit and vegetables to redecorate each and every one of their hateful faces. It would have been so very, very easy to whirl around and start screaming at them while raining down ripe, nutritious justice.
No. I was better than that now. Better than them.
I brushed the wasted remains of the fruit off with my magic and let them splatter on the stage. Then I levitated the baskets and carried them backstage before closing the curtain without saying a word. The silence said everything I needed it to just fine.
Let them choke on it.
Author's Note
If I were told a year ago I'd be posting something like this, I'd have treated the speaker to the most raised of eyebrows. Then I actually watched the show. I've been writing for weeks now.
This particular story came from contemplation of feelings of bitterness and spite and how someone like Trixie might handle them in the wake of an experience like what she had with the Alicorn Amulet. It's also an experiment with first person perspective, something I've only recently started to use in my writing. And it marks my first posting of any kind in this fandom.
I appreciate any and all feedback from handling of perspective to misspellings. Also, on my use of tags. I think I picked the right ones but it's hard to be sure. Thank you for your time.
