"Chancellor Neighsay of the Equestrian Education Authority!"
The Chancellor strode proudly into the throne room as the guardsponies ushered him through the doors, He walked as if he owned the castle, and Princess Celestia, who was sitting in her throne, was merely keeping it warm for him.
"Your Highness? I have answered your summons, despite the fact that I have been exceptionally busy dealing with the fallout of your student reopening her unsafe, unsanctioned and unaccredited school of so-called 'friendship'."
His sneer was masterful, and his tone exquisitely calculated to imply that that duty was far more important than any mere summons from a Princess without actually edging over into lese-majeste.
"Yes Chancellor, you have been making the rounds of a number of the more... reactionary nobles. No doubt ensuring that they are fully aware of the situation and ensuring that they are well informed on the dangers of inviting non-ponies into our schools and our nation." Princess Celestia responded calmly. "And it's Princess Twilight, a title she has earned many times over."
Neighsay spluttered, "You had me followed?"
"Of course. I was most interested in how you'd respond to being thwarted. You can learn a great deal about a pony from how they handle defeat."
"I was not defeated! I will be lodging appeals at the highest level of government to have that abomination closed down permanently."
"My sister and I are the highest level of goverment. I've already consulted with her, and we have agreed that Twilight's school will remain open."
Neighsay's voice rose. "Not without the support of the noble houses, or the public, or the Equestrian Education Authority itself. Even you do not rule in a vacuum. In fact, I think CSGU is probably overdue for an audit."
"I doubt you can muster that much support." Celestia smiled, but with an edge rarely seen. "In any case, it is no longer your concern, Chancellor, as you are going to resign."
"What did you say?!"
"Resign. Give notice. Step Down. Bow out. Call it a day. Quit." Celestia emphasised the last word.
"You don't have the authority to ask for my resignation! The EEA is an independent body, not a government department. I was elected by the other members of the council, and I can only be removed by a two thirds majority vote."
Celestia nodded. "True. But you oversee the publicly run schools of Equestria, for which you are paid by the Department of Education, which according to the records represent over 80 percent of your organisation's funding. You do so by Royal Mandate. This Royal Mandate."
Celestia held up an elaborate scroll with a royal seal. "It requires that the EEA ensure the standards of safety and education are maintained in those schools. It does not allow you to unilaterally enforce your own curriculum or decide who can or can not be taught."
Neighsay rallied. "I closed the school because there were grave violations of both safety and educational standards! Students running truant, irresponsible teachers, and that changeling creature flying around as a giant bug and wrecking the school! What if some ponies had been under the falling tower?"
"Genuine concerns indeed, and ones that will be investigated and resolved. Indeed, if you'd been willing to work with Princess Twilight to resolve them, rather than just closing the school, they would have been fixed. My ex-student was very eager to follow your guidelines. The key thing is that you made no effort to resolve the problems, so the school could reopen. Instead, you jumped on the opportunity to close down the school permanently to feed your own bigotry, and stated conditions that had nothing to do with either safety concerns or educational standards.
"While it's true that you do administer a curriculum for public schools, that curriculum is the one previously developed and agreed with the government, and signed off by the Lords, Commons and myself. Even so, Princes Twilight's school does not fall under the standard curriculum as it is funded by the Crown, from our personal funds, rather than through the DoE. Even if that was not true, your attempt to set a bigoted admissions policy was still beyond the pale.
"In short, you have exceeded your mandate, and I am within my rights to withdraw it, and all government funding. While you would still get some money from private schools, assuming they don't follow suit, you will quickly become irrelevant and your entire council will be working for peanuts. I have no doubt they will vote you out once they realise how badly you've damaged the good name of the organisation, and their cashflow."
"This is blackmail!" Neighsay was incensed. "This is petty revenge for my shutting down your students school! I will not stand for this! I have friends in high places! They won't let you do this!"
Celestia sighed. "Blackmail implies I am forcing you to do something against your will using a threat. You have no agency in this apart from possibly resigning to save some shred of your dignity. If anything, I'm offering you a chance to avoid your reputation being utterly destroyed if I'm forced to make this all official.
"As to your friends in high places, by which I assume you mean your coterie of hidebound tribalists, I hope so, as if they're the ones I'm thinking of, I can use your multiple faux-pas to severely damage their power base. But they're too politically aware, however archaic their thinking. They will undoubtedly drop you faster than you can say 'Sol Invictus'.
"As to revenge, I assure you that is not my reason. The reason is why you will find no support, at least from anyone with the least bit of political horse-sense. In short, you fouled up, and in doing so you almost undid three years of hard work and brought Equestria to the brink of war!"
By this point, Celestia was out of her seat and looming over him, but Neighsay still protested.
"Those creatures..."
"Those 'creatures' as you called them, were representatives of other nations, nations Twilight and her friends have spent years, and at times risked their lives, trying to befriend and teach the value of friendship. Bad enough that you shut the school down, but twice you spouted your racist diatribes in front of them! Worse still, three of them were heads of state, with the power to respond to your studied insult by declaring war! They were close to that just for their students going missing!"
Celestia was in full flow now, her normal, motherly attitude replaced by a far more commanding posture. "Equestria has not gone to war in centuries. Even a defensive war would mean casualties on both sides, ponies and other thinking creatures dead and wounded, cities wrecked, hardship and suffering, even if we ultimately won. Something I'm not certain of."
"You can't be serious... we have more powerful magic than they do..."
"Not only are you a bigot, but a blind fool. Need I remind you just how easily Canterlot fell to the Storm King's army? Since Shining Armour left, most of the improvements he made have been left to rot. I was not aware of just how badly things had decayed until the Storm King's invasion. At least with Chrysalis we put up a fight, but Captain Glorious Miles actually had the entire Royal Guard off-duty so they could join in the celebration!
"Even if we did somehow turn things around, defeated them all so badly that they had to surrender, we'd still be in a mess. The races we defeated would fear us, and that fear would turn to hate and a need for revenge. Even the races we hadn't fought would suddenly see us as a threat. We would need to reform the EUP as a standing army and pay for it, trade would be harmed, and there would be war scares and an endless cycle of fear and hate..."
Celestia visibly brought herself under control. "Your own actions made it politically impossible to keep the school closed. Providing a place where those students could meet in harmony, and showing the other races that Equestria does not subscribe to your personal doctrine was vital if we were to pull ourselves out of the hole you put us in. Your ill-considered rant could have caused decades of strife and hardship for all of Equestria.
"If you have been peddling that same bigotry in the schools you've been inspecting, you may already have done great harm. That is why I refuse to allow you to be in a position of power, and why I'm willing to expend political capital on it. I also intend to have Mrs. Harshwhinny audit the EEA, and root out any other bigots who might poison the minds of Equestria's young, and check exactly what standards you are enforcing."
Neighsay seemed to have finally realised he wasn't in charge here. "Wait, Princess! Please reconsider! I've only ever done what I've done to protect the children of Equestria from danger, from harmful influences."
Celestia sighed. "The sad thing is, you actually believe that. What happened to you? You showed such promise when I taught you at CSGU. I expected you to become a great teacher, somepony who would use your talent for advocacy to force ponies to think, challenge old doctrines and discover new knowledge. Instead you've become a narrow-minded fool, so convinced of your own righteousness that you can no longer even consider you might be wrong."
Neighsay broke, slumping down. "But... but... my work, my legacy... what will I do?"
Celestia sat back on her throne, taking pity on the pitiful stallion in front of her. "Learn something new. Take a tour, visit the Griffish Isles, maybe even Griffinstone or Zebrica. Study the races you dismiss as 'lesser', and challenge your own assumptions about them, or at least test them. You may be surprised. It will probably be the hardest thing you've ever done, but whatever your prejudices, you are a highly intelligent pony; I have hope that your intelligence will allow you to surpass your current limitations."
She shook her head. "In any case, I expect to see your resignation within the next day. You are dismissed."
Neighsay left, head down, a completely different figure to the one he'd cut on entry.
Celestia looked at him as he retreated, musing. A thousand years and more since the Founding, centuries spent eradicating the stigma of differences between ponies, cultivating a friendly and accepting society that would not ignore those differences, but embrace them. However, the price was eternal vigilance, as despite everything, ponies would always appear who held tribalist views, or racist ones. Hopefully this one could learn better. She would have him monitored, making sure he followed through on her instructions, and possibly finding ways to help him.
This problem had been taken care of, but there would be others. There always were.
Author's Note
When I saw the episode, I wondered how Neighsay felt he could act the way he did, around, and towards the Princessses, not to mention denigrating other races with their rulers right there. Wars have started for less.
From there, the idea that Celestia would take action to prevent any further problems from him almost wrote itself. I've seen at least one other fic with pretty much the same premise, but this is original, mostly written on the Saturday after the episodes. Sorry if your waiting on my other fics, I am working on them, but I've had a severe crisis of confidence, which has put my muse in critical condition.
Edit: Made some modifications, to deal with some errors spotted by Setokaiva, and to address the fact that there were genuine problems with the school, that if Neighsay had been serious about doing his job, rather than using them as an excuse to indulge his ego, would have meant the school was closed, at least until they were resolved.
