Golly, I hope we find a solution
It was a bright and sunny afternoon in Canterlot. It had been three weeks since Twilight's coronation, and the princess of friendship was busy putting some order into a three meters high pile of important papers. The National Index on the Effects of Railings, part 2, B edition, was of utmost interest for her. Somehow.
Yet, that was cut short by a guard knocking on the opened door of her desk, announcing:
"Princess, a doctor from the Hooded Woods is requesting an audience. She says it is of the highest importance."
"From where?" the princess asked, raising an eyebrow, stopping what she was doing with a sheet of paper still in mid-air. "Never heard of that place."
The guard shrugged, clueless about that name as well. Twilight let out a sigh of exasperation.
"Fine, bring her."
"Right away, your majesty," the guard bowed, leaving the room.
The purple alicorn rearranged the pile in the corner of a room, brought back some order on her desk with her magic, and waited, hooves crossed, hoping this wouldn't take too long.
A few seconds later, a bright yellow pegasus entered the office, carrying a saddlebag. She bowed slightly but respectfully, introducing herself:
"My respects, princess. I am Undeserved Cure and I came all this way from the Hooded Woods because I fear a great danger might be looming over you and the School of Friendship."
Twilight had to refrain from rolling her eyes. Again? Couldn't the world be at peace for more than three days? Patiently, and not giving in to panic, she asked:
"What could that danger be?"
"You have been exposed to Gollylalia, and so have all the students and teachers, and probably a good portion of Ponyville as well," the pegasus said with a serious tone.
"Golly-what?" the princess repeated in disbelief.
"You don't know this disease?" Undeserved said, surprised.
"I think I would remember the name if I did," Twilight replied, frowning, still doubtful that it was even a real thing.
"It is a rare sickness nowadays," the doctor nodded with understanding. "But it can still spread rapidly if we're not careful. I had one young filly suffering from it in my town, but she moved away to your school, princess."
"Who is it?"
"Her name is Cozy Glow."
Twilight abandoned her concerned facade, leaving instead a bored and unimpressed look on her face.
"Oh," she said in a softly disappointed tone.
"You see, she contracted the disease a few years ago. And I was the one in charge to watch over her and make sure it wouldn't spread. She learned about it, how to behave and so, when she left for the school, I thought everything would be alright for her."
"Uh-huh..." said Twilight unconcernedly. "Well, I think you don't need to worry about her sickness anymore."
"On the contrary, I think that I do," the doctor argued.
"She was frozen in stone for attempting to conquer Equestria and eradicate friendship," Twilight explained in a monotonous voice.
But, unexpectedly, Undeserved replied:
"Yes, I have been informed of her... predicament. But I think my concern is still warranted."
"What do you mean?" Twilight asked, confused. "How could a statue spread a disease? What even is that disease?"
The doctor sighed.
"Gollylalia is a neuromagical affliction of the verbal functions. In short, she has to say "Golly" regularly, otherwise she might explode."
Twilight resisted the urge to laugh or to immediately dismiss the pegasus, instead asking with as much restrain as she could muster, painfully hiding a smile:
"Really?"
"I'm surprised you haven't heard of it," the doctor said. "It was a very common disease at some point. And if she explodes, everypony that ever heard her say "Golly" will be affected by the sickness too. Including you, princess. For now it is just dormant."
The revelation didn't strike the expected reaction in Twilight. In place of fear and a sense of hurry, she was only showing a very polite bafflement tainted with serious doubts.
"May I check one thing, if you allow me?" she asked.
"If you will, but we should not waste time," Undeserved said. "The recommended treatment is to say "Golly" at least once per week, and from what I've learned, she hasn't said anything in almost a month."
The doctor ended her sentence at the same time a little purple beam of magic hit her on the nose, without doing any harm to her. She raised an eyebrow, looking at the princess.
"What was that?"
"A changeling detection spell," Twilight explained with a slightly stunned face. "I thought you were joking. As in, one of her partners in crime, trying to free her."
Undeserved got a little bit angry but tried to keep her composure, answering:
"I'm serious and this is a very important issue, princess. Everyone is at risk, even if she's trapped, the disease is still active. We don't even know if it can affect other species or if it's just ponies."
"Fine, fine," Twilight said, raising a tempering hoof. "We'll go find her so you can see for yourself."
"Thank you, princess."
Twilight stood up and walked to the pegasus, laying a hoof on her shoulder.
"Let's go," she said, before teleporting both of them away.
They reappeared in the garden behind Twilight's old castle, where the statue had been put, among other things. And not too far from it, as doctor Cure immediately saw it and headed that direction, Twilight in her steps.
"She really is a statue," Undeserved noticed in a whisper.
"Well, yeah. What, you expected it to be some kind of metaphor?"
"Can she hear us?" the doctor said, examining the three frozen antagonists.
"I think they can, yes," Twilight thought out loud, looking at Tirek. "Or maybe it was just a Discord thing."
Undeserved circled around the statue, focused on Cozy Glow. Twilight rolled her eyes, still unsure about the seriousness of all this, until she heard, coming from behind:
"Hey Twilight, what are you doing here?"
The princess turned her head, seeing Rainbow Dash flying in towards them.
"Haven't seen you in a while," the blue pegasus said with a happy smile, stopping in the air in front of her.
"Hey Rainbow. Sorry, I have been busy. Princess stuff, you know."
"Yeah," Dash nodded, before looking at Undeserved with curiosity. "What is she doing?"
"She told me Cozy Glow has a disease called Gollylalia," Twilight explained with a still-not-convinced face. "So, she's examining her so we-"
"Gollylalia!?" Rainbow cut, suddenly scared, causing Twilight to arch an eyebrow yet again.
"You know about that...?"
"How couldn't you!?" the blue pegasus replied in shock, grabbing her face with both hooves, before releasing it and raising her legs in the air. "It's one of the most dangerous diseases out there! And Cozy has it!?"
Twilight frowned in disbelief.
"You're messing with me, I've never heard of it."
"But i-"
"What's all the commotion here?" Applejack suddenly interrupted, coming into the park. "Oh, Twilight!"
"AJ!" Rainbow shouted, flying up to her immediately. "Twilight doesn't know about Gollylalia!"
"What is that nonsense again?" the orange mare asked with doubts in her voice.
Twilight pushed a sigh of relief, saying:
"Finally, somepony that-"
"Ain't no way Twilight doesn't know about it," Applejack said, staring at Rainbow with an accusatory eye. "Ah didn't think you would doubt our friend like that."
"What!?" both Rainbow and Twilight shouted, but not for the same reason.
Undeserved cleared her throat to gather some attention, more specifically the princess' attention.
"The stone spell hasn't stopped the disease. She needs to say at least one "Golly" every two weeks, and she urgently needs to say one now."
"Huh!?" both Rainbow Dash and Applejack said in sudden panic.
"Well, she can't say anything right now," Twilight pointed out, still upset by the situation. "And I'm not freeing her."
"You can't do that, Twilight!" Rainbow Dash said, incredibly worried, holding her own face between her hooves.
"Ah think Ah have to agree on that one. Gollylalia ain't nothing to joke about. She'll die, and everypony in town will have to say golly all the time."
"I-" Twilight began, at a loss for words. "Why does it sound so stupid!?"
"Ah don't know, I ain't a disease maker, Twilight. But it's still serious."
Twilight looked at her friends and at the doctor in disbelief, asking:
"Every two weeks?"
"At least," doctor Cure nodded.
"For the rest of her thousand years punishment!?"
"Afraid so," Undeserved replied. "If it's truly for a thousand years, you can wait until everyone she's ever spoken to dies, then she'll just explode and contaminate you."
"But I- I can't- UGH!"
Twilight accepted her fate with reluctance, immediately casting a large beam of multicolored light towards the statue. The filly began to move, her wings beat again in the air, as if they had never stopped. The magic was stopped and she was freed, as she spoke with a smug smirk, hooves on her own hips:
"Well, golly princess, isn't that a shame that you-"
The beam was cast again and Cozy was turned back into a statue, Twilight looking angrily bored, staring at Undeserved.
"There, she said it. We're good, right?"
"For the week to come, yes," the doctor approved.
"Great!" the princess sarcastically rejoiced.
"Now you just need to do that twenty-six times a year for the next millennium," Rainbow said.
"Ain't like anyone else has a spell to freeze and unfreeze here," Applejack added. "Well there's Discord but we all know how that would turn out."
"Or, maybe you can rethink her punishment," Undeserved suggested.
"I'm too busy for now, thank you," Twilight sighed. "That's it? Nothing else you need to tell me before I go back to my princess business?"
"Well, she does need a treatment of essential oils and energized stones, but that's only every two months."
The princess didn't reply, she just stared at the doctor with the most tired, upset face she had ever put on.
"It'll give you a reason to come back to Ponyville," Rainbow tried.
"Yes, as if the fact that all my friends live here wasn't a good reason already," Twilight ironically agreed.
"It wasn't?" the blue pegasus asked, surprised.
Twilight's face grew ever so slightly more tired.
"Thank you for your work, princess," Undeserved politely said, bowing slightly. "I'll leave you now, I need to get back to my patients. Let me know if you have any questions, the Hooded Woods isn't that big of a place."
"I have many but I'm not sure you can answer them."
"Ah'm sure you'll do a good work, Twilight," Applejack reassured. "You're so good at planning, you won't forget somethin' like that."
"That wasn't my concern..." Twilight replied with a voice that was getting lower and lower each time she spoke, out of sheer baffled desperation.
"Now, if you'll excuse me," Undeserved said. "Have a nice day, princess."
And like that, the doctor left. But something was still bothering Twilight, so she turned to her friends.
"How did you even hear about this disease?"
"From a cousin," Applejack said.
"From Applejack," Rainbow added.
"I should have guessed that one..." Twilight sighed, understanding her friends would not bring a reliable and easy to find source. "Alright, back to Canterlot and my princess business then."
"Aw, already?" Rainbow saddened.
"Sorry Dash, I have work to do."
And with those words, the princess teleported herself away, leaving her friends alone and the statue with a new smug expression added to the filly's face.
As prescribed by Undeserved, Twilight went back to the garden two weeks later. She had put a reminder on her schedule, which had gotten her a few questions from the guards as to what "Dealing with the stupid situation with that filly" was supposed to reference.
So, in the garden, like last time, she unfroze Cozy Glow, who stopped mid-sentence, looking unamused at the princess.
"Gee, that was harsh."
"I'm not here to joke around, Cozy," Twilight warned. "Say your word, I have other things to attend to."
"What if I don't?" the filly naively asked.
"I guess you'll die?" Twilight shrugged, finding the question stupid.
"And you'll be forced to say golly for the rest of your days," the filly said with a smug smile, before realizing her mistake when she saw Twilight already charging her beam. "Crap."
Twilight froze her again, pushing a desperate sigh, pissed at herself that she was once fooled by a filly this dumb.
"Oh well,” she said. “See you in two weeks, Cozy."
The time came again for Twilight to meet with the filly and, this time, as she unfroze Cozy, the little pegasus only crossed her front legs, flapping her wings with a displeased face, staring at Twilight.
"Okay, that one was my fault," Cozy admitted.
"What are you talking about?" Twilight naively asked, shaking her head slightly, as she had completely forgotten their previous dialogue.
"You know, me saying go-" she stopped herself, taking in a deep breath to contain her words, waving an accusatory hoof at Twilight. "Oooh, you almost got me again, you're good at this princess, aren't you? You think you're more clever than me."
"Uh-huh," Twilight replied, unfazed. "Could we get this over with?"
"Not so fast! You can't do anything if I don't want to say that word!"
"Sure. And you'll explode. Do you want me to bring a camera and try to capture that on film, or...?"
The little filly gulped, looking unsure, as she stuttered:
"Y-You wouldn't do that, princess."
"Well, if you don't want to talk..." Twilight shrugged. "What can I do?"
"But you can't let a cute little filly like me die!" Cozy pleaded with an adorable face.
"Yes," the princess replied with a quick and slightly irritated tone. "That's why I'm freeing you right now. You're the one not saying golly."
"Well you're not making me want to!" the filly pouted, turning her back on Twilight. "You're just being mean to me."
"You tried to destroy Equestria. Twice."
Cozy faced Twilight again, shouting, feeling she was being done an injustice:
"Well maybe I've changed, how could you know!?"
Twilight politely raised her eyebrow, a silence following Cozy's words, as they stared at each other, pondering the believability of those words.
"What?" the pegasus asked.
"Just say golly."
Twilight wasn't in the mood to deal with that. She had a library to open in Canterlot. It was the fifth one this month but she was still really impatient to get to it.
"No."
"Yes!" a voice nearby suddenly rejoiced.
Both turned around, only to see Pinkie standing by their side, as if she had always been there, with a bright smile on her face.
"Hi Twilight!" she happily said. "Hi Cozy!"
"Oh please, not her..." the filly muttered.
"Hey Pinkie, nice to see you," Twilight said, finally finding a reason to smile today. "What are you doing there?"
"I'm here for my usual tri-monthly-put-off-by-one-day-every-cycle one-way discussion with the Legion of Doom."
Twilight raised the other eyebrow.
"The what with the who?"
"The tri-monthly-put-"
"No, no, I got that part," Twilight cut, distractedly pulling Cozy Glow back by the tail with her magic, as the filly was trying to sneak an escape. "What is it?"
"She comes here and talks for hours on end to us," Cozy cut, seeing Pinkie taking a way too dangerous breath in. "About every ten days."
"E-xactly!" the pink pony jumped.
"You talk to them?" Twilight frowned, intrigued.
"Yes!" Pinkie explained. "I thought they might feel lonely, being unable to talk and to move, so I come here and talk to them, about what's happening in town and all."
"Honestly, I thought this was part of our punishment at first," Cozy added.
"And you, Twilight, what are you doing here?"
"I'm letting Golly say Cozy. Or the other way around. She has a disease called Gollylalia, so-"
"Oh, I didn't know this was a real one," Pinkie said, looking at the small pegasus, frowning. "Well, your ears look normal to me."
"Huh?" Cozy and Twilight said in sync.
"What? Isn't it supposed to, like, make the ears super big?" Pinkie wondered.
"No, that's not any of the symptoms I ma- I know about," Cozy said, nervously glancing at Twilight.
"Where did you learn it was supposed to do that?" Twilight asked, curious.
"In a Daring Do fanfiction," Pinkie explained, rolling her hoof in the air. "that Rainbow Dash forced me to read. She said it was awesome, but the writing was below average to be honest, especially with that new character that just gets along with Daring Do for absolutely no reason, even though they have no chemistry and-"
"Alright, alright, I get it Pinkie," Twilight giggled, still finding all of this a bit weird.
"But then, what are the real symptoms?" the pink mare wondered.
Cozy simply answered:
"I just have to say golly from time to time and- Aw, shit..." she stopped herself with a bummed out expression on her face as Twilight's magic beam struck her.
"Thanks, Pinkie," the alicorn said with a smile, blowing on her own horn.
"You're welcome!" she replied, pulling an easel out of nowhere and setting it in front of the statue. "Today, guys and girls and bugs, we'll talk about painting in Ponyville!"
"Have fun," Twilight wished, seeing her friend preparing her presentation.
"You too!"
The alicorn teleported back to her castle with a smile on her face. But something was running through her mind, a doubt. She needed to do research, and maybe ask Applejack.
Another two weeks later, Twilight found herself with a very much deserved anger burning in her, a book by her side, as she was unfreezing Cozy for the fourth time already.
"You could at least let me ta-" the filly began, before stopping, recoiling when she saw the flames in Twilight's eyes. "W-What?"
"I've searched around for Gollylalia," the princess growled. "Any traces of it, any mention, any little bit of in-joke academic paper about this disease, and the only things I could find were a weird fanfiction written by a certain Elbow Rash and this one book!"
Twilight brandished the tome in front of the filly, a barely held together amalgamation of paper with a crude cover drawn in pastels. Cozy feigned to not recognize it, flying a bit back, her hooves behind her back and an innocent gaze on her face.
"I-I don't know what you're talking about."
"History of very real rare diseases that should be taken seriously, by Goly Cowz," Twilight read out loud, pissed beyond reason. "It was in the library of doctor Cure and nowhere else! She doesn't even remember buying it! There's misspellings everywhere, the writing sounds like it was made by a five year old! Because it was!"
Twilight slammed the book – a first for her – at the filly's and statue's feet, while Cozy Glow was trying to keep an innocent wince.
"I-I still don't see-"
"You wrote this!" Twilight shouted. "You fooled your entire village, including Applejack's cousin, into believing you had a rare disease so you could keep on saying golly without people being mad at you! I asked them, you were being annoying with that word but they all thought you were just sick and scared! Undeserved was worried about you and you just used her to have a reason to be freed!"
"I didn't expect her to come all this way, honestly," Cozy said, abandoning her act. "Also, I was six, not five. I didn't do that to be freed, I just found it funny when you had to liberate me."
"Yeah, and maybe find a way to get out definitively, right?" Twilight threw in between her gritted teeth. "You would have tried to negotiate something, I let you out, you say golly and stay quiet, so I don't have to worry about that. Or something along that way."
"I thought about it," the pegasus confessed, right before looking at Twilight with ambition in her eyes. "But you don't get it, princess, don't you?"
She flew up to Twilight, pointing a hoof at her torso, a conspiratorial smirk on her face, as she followed with a proposition:
"I can make them believe whatever I want. Even if you tell them, there will still be ponies to believe what I wrote. Imagine how much easier your work as a princess would be if I was by your side, as your public-relations manager. You blow up something fighting a villain? I can put the blame on them, even with witnesses. Citizens are unhappy? I spread rumors about some obscure things no one ever heard about to distract them. Want to declare war on another country? I make a few wonderbolts crash int-"
"I'm not doing any of this, Cozy," Twilight cut, a little anger spasm in her upper lip. "And you know that."
The little pegasus rubbed her chin, squinting, looking at the princess for a second, before a smirk appeared on her face. Her voice became soothing, slithery and she began to slowly circle around Twilight.
"Then maybe I could convince everyone that the princess is perfect, even in her library book-return record. Or, I could suggest that a certain series of fanfictions written by an anonymous mare is, in fact, part of Daring Do's canon. I could even spread the good word about friendship, about the princess of friendship. I know a lot of people are still upset that Celestia and Luna left, so, maybe, a little nudge could help them accept the new regent. That would certainly free up some time to allow you to pursue your romantic interests, now, wouldn't it?"
Twilight frowned, following her with her eyes. Those sounded tempting.
"I still can't have you roaming around freely," she said.
"Come on," Cozy giggled. "The princess frees up a little filly from a way too harsh punishment, that would make a good headline for you."
"Again: you tried to destroy the world."
"I'm eight," Cozy opposed. "I don't know about you, but in some countries, you can't put minors in prisons. Do you really want the news to title Are yaks more progressive than ponies? A deep dive into our unjust penal system! one day?"
"We live in a monarchy, Cozy. They won't be titled like that for long."
Cozy raised an eyebrow, looking pleasantly disgusted.
"Gee, and I'm supposed to be the bad guy."
Twilight still thought about it. Discord had been evil and manipulative, yet they had managed to reform him. At least, in theory. So, why not a filly without chaos magic? She could be useful, just like she was back at the school before the whole draining-the-world-out-of-its-magic thing.
"Alright, then," the princess agreed. "But no more fake diseases."
"Not unless you command it," Cozy winked.
Author's Note
Again, trying my hand at not over-charging with the humor on this one, unlike what I usually do. I feel like the few jokes here and there are enough (My favorite one being how Cozy inadvertently says "golly" with Pinkie). I might use the idea of the disease itself again, like a curse, taken more seriously.
Also, look at the author shamelessly referencing one of his own fanfiction with the whole Pinkie visiting the statue thing.
