Dibs on the massage chair!!
Days have passed since the restoration of magic in Equestria. In what should have been a foal's fantasy, the three tribes have reconciliated for real. Our tale starts at the cliffs overlooking the city of Maretime Bay.
Pipp Petals and Zipp Storm just finished staying in the rebuilt lighthouse at the courtesy of their friend Sunny Starscout. But now it is time to say the duo to say goodbye and return home to Zephyr Heights as duty calls. Hitch has his sheriff duties while having to deal with the fallout of Sprout's incident. Izzy temporarily went back to Bridlewood to grab more of her stuff for an extended stay with Sunny.
"It feels like ages ago that I was living alone. But now, I just finished finding answers to most, if not all of my Pegasus related questions!" Sunny exclaimed as she was seeing her newfound friends off.
"Good thing too. Because I thought I would never see the day Pipp would wrench her eyes from that blasted phone for at least five minutes when not walking in an area with data service. Seriously, I don't blame anypony if they thought the phones are actually a part of our body." Zipp chided her sister.
"C'mon! You are exaggerating! I never used my phone that much!" Pipp said in protest.
"Oh really? Remind me how much the castle's data plan cost us again?"
"It was just a few hundred gigabytes per month! I'm sure I didn't go overbudget!"
"Ok, you two. It was nice having more friends but I can't keep you from your home forever. Both of you have to deal with that arrest warrant. In hindsight, that charade was going to pop even without Cloudpuff and Hitch getting in the way. With such an easily accessible control room, all it took was some mistake in the lighting and the wires are exposed. Glad you all can fly for real now."
The sisters froze in their tracks. Soon after, Pipp was frantically using her phone while Zipp turned to face Sunny.
"Aw crud! We forgot we are fugitives! Pipp, are there any updates on our situation? Sunny, did the guards approach you asking for us? I had a feeling I forgot something."
Sunny pondered in thought. "Actually, Queen Haven pulled me aside while you are all fixing up my house. She hoofed me a bag of bits, saying that it is what I would need later. I thought it was money to pay for the repairs. Afterwards, she told me to pass this message on to you a few days later, which is today. After that, she was escorted back to Zephyr Heights with the guards. I hope that being able to fly for real would make the whole thing water under the bridge."
"What did she tell you?"
"I trust you to keep my daughters safe in here. Right now, it is best that they don't come back for now. I will settle things back home. In a few days, you don't have to worry about that anymore."
"That was her message. To be honest, I have been trying to make sense of what she meant by that last part."
As the weight of the situation sunk in, Pipp soon broke the silence.
"Uhh Sis? You might want to read this." She soon showed her phone to Zipp and Sunny, trembling throughout. On it was an article of what is presumed to be the local paper.
Trial of the century reaches it's climax!
Queen Haven pleaded guilty to the charges of fraud in the face of overwhelming evidence. Princesses Pipp Petals and Zipp Storm have yet to face justice for their crimes. However, in a shocking turn of events, Haven pleaded for their sentences and punishments to be transferred to her, stating that she pressed them into the act against their will. The jury is still out on whether or not the former princesses are truly guilty and accept her plea.
We may have magic back but that doesn't excuse the fact that we had a family of charlatans as our royalty for uncountable decades, playing us all for fools. An emergency government and guard has been formed to prevent societal breakdown and riots from happening outside the palace and throughout the city. While the standard punishment is prison, it is very possible that the three will also be stripped of their royal titles and privileges. Personal opinion, I wouldn't trust them to lead my pet hamster, let alone Zephyr Heights after this fiasco.
In light of all this, something tells me that the Royal Palace will be under new management in due time.
Pipp sat on her haunches, crying her heart out. Their lives as royalty are pretty much over. Not even restoring magic were able to change their former subjects' opinion of them. Even if they kept their titles, they will have no authority and are nothing more than puppets for their replacements. Zipp could only stand in shock, practically frozen in place.
"This is the worst possible outcome. Now our social lives are ruined. No one is going to trust us ever again. What happened with Sunny made sense. Mom knew this might happen, so she kept us in here to prevent us from getting thrown to jail or stop her stunt. In hindsight, we had it coming. Our family got into power with giving false hope. We are considered lucky to not have our wings bound before being thrown off the side of the mountain."
Sunny stared in shock at her friend, who is now a completely different pony from before. She then spoke up to her distraught friend.
"During our stay, you once taught me that your fans only know the "influencer" you, not the "real" you. You wanted me to separate public perception from reality, to prevent building up impossibly high pedestals that will only serve to be broken. Now is the time for that, the two of you must now show your real selves in public, not behind some livestream or stage show, in which I know are good ponies at heart. Me, Izzy and Hitch will help out in any way we can. You may have lost your trust but you can get it back with enough time."
Zipp snapped out of her shock and replied for her sister, who is still sobbing.
"I don't know about building reputations as much as Pipp and I'm certain you had your fair share of negativity trying to preach your cause. But this isn't just some mob that is content to see you as a minor nuisance. This is a city's shattered faith. I appreciate your help but unless you can make everypony in Zephyr Height change their minds, we will just drag you down. You finally reached the top as a pioneer of unity. I don't want to see you dragged down back into the mud again for helping a family of frauds."
Sunny went deep in thought, soon perking up afterwards.
"I have an idea that may prevent your lives being spent behind bars and mockery. But we will need the whole gang..."
Zephyr Heights, a few days later
"Well that was a 'splendid' idea." Zipp stated as Sunny, Izzy, Hitch, Pipp, her mother and herself wound up sharing the same cell.
"Well, it went better in my head..." Sunny said sheepishly.
"Let's recap what just happened, shall we?"
Sunny's plan is simple enough. Have the team appear together as a PR stunt and preach to the mob to forgive, even flaring out her own wings and horn. Instead, the mob descended on them like a tidal wave and the next thing they knew they are in a cell with a tennis ball in the fruit basket. The newer guards were complaining why they are being given a luxury cell. The officers told them that the cell the six of them are in is the worst cell they can find and that there is no space to carve out a new cell block. Nevertheless, it still worked somewhat. The non-pegasi will be released after a few days while the former royals are given parole provided that they assist in helping Sunny preach her word of unity. The worst scenario at least been averted.
"Well, looks like we will be stuck here for a while." said the former queen Haven. "Can't believe you girls. You would still stick up for me after all we done?"
"Can't let you bear our punishments. We all played a part in it, willingly or not." Pipp said and hugged her mother afterwards.
"So who is using the massage chair? I call dibs!"
"Oh no you don't young lady! I did!"
Author's Note
Felt that the whole "queen arrested subplot" got blown away very quickly, to the extent some fans felt that it was padding to get the sisters to join the group, as she herself escaped shortly after.
Not exactly my finest work. The idea was that after the end scene, the guards would just yoink the royalty to jail. But this is reserved for comic strips and wouldn't have passed the 1000 word mark. Wrote this over a 6 hr period.
