Lyra was hopping her way to the facility, her smile going from ear to ear as her saddlebag full of children’s books and fairy tales bounced and slapped against her flanks, the bags weighed quite heavy but not enough to stop her. As she bounced her way through the bustling city, Doughnut Joe again followed after her as he said with a smile of his own, “Hey good mornin’ Lyra. Somepony seems extra happy today!”

Lyra stopped bouncing, she only just realized that she probably looked a little silly doing so but she couldnt care less. Lyra brushed her mane from her face as she gently laughed, she looked at the baker with her electric yellow eyes and said with a sheepish smile, “Yeah... I dunno, today seems like a great day for some reason.” Lyra ever so wished she could just sing her reasons for joy from the mountaintop, but alas the dangers of letting word out outweighed her desires to be truthful. Instead she kept her reasons to be happy to herself but expressed her joy as best as possible.

Joe motioned his head to his doughnut store as he said, “Why don’t ya come inside? Have a coffee and doughnut on the house?”

Lyra took a few minutes to think about it, she wondered if Anthro was expecting her to be on time or if she could spare the few minutes to be with society for a few minutes. Lyra nodded her head and hopped her way inside with Joe. While inside, Lyra sat down at the bar and a french Vanilla coffee slid into her hooves as well as a plate with doughnuts on it. Lyra took a sip of her coffee and looked back up at Joe with her foam mustache and said, “Why are you being so generous? This is the second time in a week where you offer me free breakfast, why?”

Joe adjusted his position on the stood, he took a bite from one of the doughnuts and replied, “Because every time I watch you come by my store, you’re the only one who seems to smile every day. Every other pony seems to be unhappy when they enter my store, probably because they are all grouchy and are still waking up. I see you smile as you wave to me in the morning that you make my job worth it. I need to know your secret to being so happy.”

Lyra paused, her chest clenched and her throat tightened up. Her mind began to race as what to say to him, she couldn’t just say, “Oh I’m taking care of an imprisoned ancient and sentient creature that potentially has the secrets to our existence while my boss tortures it.” Instead, she decided to improvise and said, “My secret to find happiness is when you know something or someone out there is happy to see you no matter what you look like. It’s impossible to be grumpy when you know that even a simple hello and a little attention makes their day better. Now picture how they feel when you actually care for them and they mean the world for you... the feeling you get from that much unconditional love is... is astounding.”

Joe took a sip from his coffee as he said, “So basically adopt a pet eh?”

Lyra nodded her head, although what she was talking about wasn’t actually a pet but more like a child, she simply agreed with him and continued, “Adopt a pet, assume responsibility over something or someone’s life in a loving and caring way and your days will be so much better. Its so rewarding to come home after a bad day to see them want to make your day better because they love you. Sometimes they don’t even have to try to make you happy and you just smile.” Lyra looked at the clock before saying, “I’m sorry but I gotta get going, I’ll see you later!” Lyra decided to take the remaining doughnuts and put them in a paper bag before dashing out the door.

Lyra resumed her route towards the facility with Anthro on her mind, she wondered what she would do with him today and what they might learn from each other. Maybe the creature has magical powers much like unicorns or maybe the ability to fly like pegasi, maybe Anthro was super strong or had heightened senses. Lyra approached the facility with every hop, and got more excited each time she hopped a bit closer. She knew she was late, but only by a few minutes. She said to herself, “Oh boy I can’t wait to hear you talk to me, Anthro.”

Lyra approached the door and gave it a knock, it took a minute before Blueblood and one of his bodyguards to come and open the door. It opened very slowly as Blueblood said with a sigh of frustration, “Finally this thing wont shut up again!”

Lyra began to worry, she pushed the door open and rushed through as she stammered with panic in her tone, “What did you do to it?”

Blueblood responded with a shrug, “Nothing, it just started moaning again and hitting its head against the glass.”

Lyra charged down the stairs, her mind worried of what limbs Blueblood broke this time, but what she saw made her sigh with relief. Standing in the chamber was the perfectly alive and well Anthro, he had his hands putting pressure around his groin as he hopped from one foot to the other. His legs were bent inward to add more pressure and seemed to be leaning over as he moaned and did a little dance. Lyra approached the glass cylinder and put her hoof against it as she said, “Do you need to go to the bathroom?”

The creature babbled its native gibberish, Lyra breathed on the glass and drew a picture of a toilet as she said patiently, “Can I use the bathroom please?”

Anthro quickly responded, “Can I use the batroom please?”

Lyra nodded her head, “Good enough,” she began as she turned towards Blueblood, "Open the cage and let it go use the bathroom."

Blueblood shook his head with worry and said, "Are you crazy? What if it escapes?"

Anthro took a deep breath and grunted through clenched teeth, "Not lie."

Lyra looked Blueblood in the eyes and said with a look of anger as though she would wipe him of the face of the planet as she said, "Let... Him... Go. You need to trust it."

Blueblood began to stutter, "It... It's an ani"

"Shut up with the animal thing! Animals don't communicate with a theory of mind." Lyra shouted at Blueblood, "I've had enough of your nonsense about it being stupid. He is an intelligent and caring creature that needs to be treated equally."

Blueblood scoffed, "What if this thing is luring you into a false sense of security, just to get a chance to escape?"

Lyra shook her head, "Anything would want to escape from a place like this, if only you gave your head a shake and realized that every creature is equal and just as important. If you want to keep him you're gonna have to make him want to stay and the only way you can do that is if you trust it and show it some affection!"

There was a silence, "Lyra was ready to attack Blueblood as her own blood boiled with anger. She had spent too much time with Blueblood being a complete jerk to everything he saw as less important, it was time he took a lesson from Anthro and learned some respect. Blueblood motioned his head towards the control panel as he said, "Open the chamber up, this thing needs to use the bathroom."

Lyra gave out an exasperated, "Thank you!"

Blueblood shot her a stern look with his furrowed brows and spoke in a serious tone, "I'm going to trust you, but if this thing escapes its because of you. Got it?"

Lyra nodded her head, when the chamber opened up, Anthro came rushing out and Lyra came to its side as she said in her soothing tone, "It's okay sweetie, things are going to be different around here from now on." Lyra followed it right up to the bathroom, right before Anthro closed the door on her she said, "Blueblood won't hurt you ever again." Anthro paused for half a second before closing the door the rest of the way.

When the sound of trickling was heard, Lyra again heard a long sigh of relief coming from inside, she took the time to turn to Blueblood and stated with a concerned gaze, "It's time you change how you treat this thing, torturing it will only make it more likely it'll hurt you. He has feelings and a memory as well as facial recognition. He knows that when I'm here that he'll be cared for and when you're here with him that he'll be neglected. The other day he communicated with me using a drawing of him trying to kill you. He has developed a sense of hatred towards you and we need to change this as soon as possible."

"How do you suppose we do that? I don't want to be hurt at all, it's very expensive trying to keep me beautiful." Blueblood gave a brush of his blond mane and smiled at his reflection on the glass cylinder.

Lyra rolled her eyes, "We start by changing how you behave," she began, "if you change now and apologize to it there's a good chance it'll forgive you if I tell him to. It already trusts me and if it can trust you and understand that this room is no longer a place where he'll be hurt there's a good chance he'll open right up and give you all the information you want."

Blueblood took a few minutes to process this, he was deep in thought with the idea that someone didn't love him despite how he treated them. Lyra was pointing out how he had flaws and was extremely narcissistic, but that's impossible because he was perfect. He decided to just go along with it and said, "Where do we start?"

"It all starts with an apology." The turquoise mare knocked on the bathroom door as she said in her soothing voice, "Sweetie... are you almost done in there?"

"Yes please." the creature responded. Lyra couldn't help but laugh a little at his innocence and his ability to communicate. It was pretty adorable. The door slowly opened after the toilet flushed and he said with a smile, "Done."

Lyra wrapped one of her hooves around Anthro's hand as she said very slowly, "Sweetie, Blueblood has something to say to you." She proceeded to give her death stare at Blueblood, his eyes darted from side to side as he struggled to admit to his own fault.

Blueblood took a long relaxing sigh before saying, "I'm sorry." His voice dragged on like he was a toddler and it slightly annoyed Lyra at how he only said it to please her.

The young mare turned back to the naked creature and looked into its green eyes and said with her mothering voice, "Blueblood won't be mean any more."

Anthro let go of Lyra's hand and slowly approached the white unicorn. Blueblood backed up slowly and became extremely nervous when Anthro looked down upon him with his aggressive look. Anthro picked him up as gently as he could, despite being only two feet higher than him and having spaghetti noodles for arms compared to Blueblood, he was quite strong and held him up as gently as possible as he said in his limited language, "I sorry too, I make you not happy. We can be friend?"

Blueblood was beginning to have a meltdown, this creature was covered in filth and was making too much contact for his own liking. Not even his greatest admirers were allowed to touch him this much. But seeing as it was effortless to hold him up it shouldn't be much harder for him to crush the life out of the prince. The prince took a nervous gulp and said through a cringing face, "Yes... We can be friends now."

Anthro gently but him down, before Blueblood could give him a look of disgust he was surprised by his next move. He watched as the creature kneeled down and readjusted his tuxedo to where it was and fixed the tie around his neck. The naked creature smiled sheepishly as he managed to say, "Sorry, I mess up clothes. Nice clothe too."

Blueblood took a minute to process that, he looked from his suit back up at the creature as he said, "Why... thank you. I didn't know you knew of clothes."

Lyra quickly intervened and informed Blueblood, "Keep your sentences simple, I only got it to the language of a three year old."

Blueblood nodded his head before whispering to Lyra, "I didn't know it had an understanding of fashion and its value."

"There are a lot of things you don't understand about it, maybe today you can learn a few things about it with me." Lyra smiled towards Anthro who had taken his towel and wrapped it around his waist once more, she looked back at her superior and whispered, "I know you've never been this close and personal with the lower class, just give it a try and interact with it and engage with it. I promise nopony will know of what's going on here."

Blueblood thought about it, a few seconds later he began to smile, not one of his fake celebrity smiles but an honestly happy smile. He looked from Lyra back at the creature as he said, "What do you suppose we should do today?"

Lyra giggled, "How about we test its artistic abilities. Music and visual art has always been a universal language alongside math, who knows what we can learn from his style."

Blueblood nodded, it seems like he had become very shy now that it just him, Lyra, and the creature. For the next hour, Anthro described in simple words what he wanted and somewhat expanded his dictionary. Anthro drew a list of the objects he wanted and Lyra helped him throughout the list naming all the things he wanted. Anthro and Lyra went down the list together, "I... would... like... a... bed, some food, and the bathroom."

Blueblood agreed to provide him with these living conditions by the end of the night, it was awkward for him to be taking orders from someone else. He didn't look up from his colouring, it looked like he was focusing very hard on his simple drawing. He said to himself as he coloured, "This is embarrassing, the royal hooves shouldn't be brought down to crayons and markers with construction paper."

Lyra looked towards the other unicorn, her head nodding towards the naked creature as she whispered, "He seems to be enjoying the time were spending together." To which Anthro held up his beautiful work of art that blew away Lyra, "Wow," she exclaimed in her joyous tone that only made Anthro smile wider, "you are great at drawing! Good job!"

Anthro blushed as he said with slight struggle, "Thank them."

Lyra placed her hoof on his hand as she said, "Say, thank you."

"Thank you." he repeated, he looked over to Lyra's and Blueblood's drawings as he said, "You draw also good."

Lyra turned to the other unicorn as she said, "We still have lessons to go in language, but he's getting there pretty quick." Lyra looked towards the clock and back at the other two as she said, "If you'll please excuse me, I'll be right back, I think theres a book upstairs that might help you with language." She patted Anthro on the head before trotting her way upstairs with a bounce in her step.

When the door closed behind her, Blueblood was all alone with Anthro, the two sat in awkward silence, not even Blueblood's bodyguard was in the room for a half decent conversation. As he went about his arts and crafts he said, "Lyra beautiful, yes?"

"I guess..." Blueblood wasn't even three words into the conversation before he was ready to leave, the awkwardness had reached its maximum for the unicorn.

"I think she great, she make good friend with you."

"I wouldn't think so," Blueblood decided to drop the awkward act of being somewhat nice to Anthro while Lyra was around and reverted back to his old self, he took a deep breath and continued, "I didn't bring Lyra into this facility to be friends with her, I have plenty of friends. I brought her in and I did as she said because I know you have a crush on her and will do her every command and eventually I can get some information about you. Once I get your history and If I'm right I will use my discovery to boost me to a higher status than just a prince. I actually don't care for you, I just care for your secrets." After waiting a couple of seconds for Anthro to show any reaction, the prince looked from side to side as he awkwardly asked, "Are you not angry because of this?"

"I just don't know all words you use. This not my language." Anthro finished up his drawing and folded it up and put it on the desk.

Just then, Lyra came downstairs as she said, "Hello boys, I'm back. Sorry there aren't any books to help him with language or anything."

"That's okay," Blueblood began as he headed for the stairs to pass Lyra, "It turns out I need to be at a meeting to open a new Hospital under my name. Ill leave you to lock up when you're done, Lyra." Blueblood turned around and left the door without ever saying goodbye, it seemed as though he just wanted to get out of there because he was stuck with a lesser creature for way too long.

"Mean pony." Anthro said as he stretched his limbs and cracked his knuckles.

Lyra brushed her hair once again before saying, "Yeah... he loves himself too much."

Anthro took a look at his drawing before directing his eyes at Lyra and saying with a shrug, "Maybe some day he see real friend not like him for prince, all fake friend leave him and he see truth."

Author's Note

Sorry about not releasing this chapter sooner, it took a lot of re planning and re writing of my ideas and such to get this to be a fitting and interesting story with Blueblood instead of Twilight. I'm also not feeling to great while writing this chapter so it might be a little stale compared to the last one and its innocent feels. I'm also gonna be on hiatus for a few days while I turn 18 in a remote part of Quebec. Once I get back I'll immediately resume my writing.