The griffon ambassador pounded a fist against the table and squawked approvingly.
“By gum, I think that just might work!” he announced. “If we divide the new territories up that way, there will be enough resources to benefit both Griffonia and Equestria!”
“Yes, funny how that works out every time we meet, isn’t it?” Princess Celestia asked.
The griffon guffawed. “Oh, it is. Once again, Your Highness, your negotiation skills have managed to leave both parties content! I just don’t know how you do it!”
Celestia forced herself to smile. “Neither do I, ambassador. Neither do I.”
The griffon hummed to himself as he strolled out onto the castle balcony. He spread his wings and took to the air with a mighty flap.
“Farewell for now, Celestia!” he called. “May our future encounters be as friendly as this one was!”
“I’m sure they will be…” the princess mumbled as she watched the ambassador disappear into the sky.
A few moments passed. Once Celestia was sure the griffon was gone, she turned and trotted back into the castle, her fake smile melting into an exasperated frown.
Celestia stepped into the hallway and nearly ran right into Princess Luna, but her sister managed to step back quickly enough to avoid a collision.
“Luna?” Celestia asked. “It’s the middle of the afternoon. What are you doing up at this hour?”
Luna blinked. “We had a craving for that wondrous modern confection known as ‘chocolate’,” she admitted. “We were just on our way to the kitchens to retrieve some.”
Luna examined her sister more closely, and pursed her lips. “You appear upset, sister. May we assume the negotiations with the griffon ambassador did not go as planned?”
“Oh no, they went well,” Celestia replied dully. “Perfectly, as a matter of fact.”
Luna cocked her head. “Then what is bothering you?”
Celestia sighed. “It’s just that secret problem I discussed with you once before,” the said morosely.
Her sister rolled her eyes. “Oh, please tell us you’re not talking about your belief that you are infallible.”
“But I am!” Celestia insisted. “No matter what situation I’m in, everything always turns out utterly perfect!”
Luna scoffed. “Not this again, sister,” she whined. “We still are having difficulty believing your ‘problem’ really exists.”
“Then explain how the negotiations just happened to work out in such a way that both the ponies and the griffons got an acceptable share of the new territories!” Celestia countered.
Luna raised an eyebrow. “…We would imagine that would be because you and the griffon ambassador are both civil and capable of settling problems with compromise,” she replied skeptically.
Celestia scowled.
“Your argument is both futile and meaningless, Celestia,” Luna continued. “We will not believe that you are completely incapable of error, and even if you are, why in Equestria would you consider that condition a negative one?”
“You don’t know what it’s like!” Celestia argued. “Every time I have an important meeting, it ends in the best possible way. Every time I address the ponies of Canterlot, I know just what to say. Every time I make a new decree, literally everypony in Equestria accepts it with open arms!”
“We still are not seeing the problem,” Luna said flatly.
“It doesn’t stop there!” Celestia continued. “Right down to the tiniest details, I’m totally perfect! I can travel through a mighty windstorm, and there won’t be so much as a single tangle in my mane. I can walk on the most dangerous and uneven surface and the rocks will always hold so that I do not stumble. I never need to put forth any effort, because literally everything will turn out ok, whether or not I try to make sure it does! It’s boring!”
Luna remained unimpressed. “We believe it is fortunate that you have not shared this theory with anypony else,” she said, “but if you are so desperate to commit an error, why not simply try to mess something up? Certainly things can’t continue to go right even if you consciously attempt to sabotage yourself.”
Celestia brightened. “That’s a great idea!” she admitted. “I’ll see you later, Luna! I have to start planning my worst day ever!”
Celestia practically skipped away down the hall. Luna shook her head disdainfully before resuming her quest for chocolate.
Princess Celestia opened her eyes. She rolled over in bed and glanced at her clock. It was precisely six in the morning, the same time she had woken up every day for the past few thousand years. The princess hardly noticed, though. She was used to waking up on time. That’s what perfect ponies did.
But she wouldn’t be a perfect pony for much longer. Not if she had anything to say about it, anyway. She grabbed a scroll on the bedside table, which contained the list she had compiled the previous evening of things she could do wrong.
At the moment, though, it was too dark to see it. Celestia looked out the window and watched the moon dip below the horizon, a signal that her sister was about to retire to bed for the day. The princess’s magic flared, and the sun rose in its place, flooding the palace with light and making it easy for her to read the first item on her list.
Item one: Don’t raise the sun.
Celestia stared at the paper for several seconds, and decided the best course of action was to simply move on to the next item on her list.
Item two: Mess up the preparation of breakfast
“Alright, this one should be easy,” Celestia muttered. “All I have to do is burn some toast or something. Anypony could do that.”
The princess couldn’t shake the feeling that ruining breakfast would be harder than she was anticipating, but she did her best to remain confident as she made for the kitchens.
“Good morning, Princess!” said Parsley, the palace chef. The earth pony bowed low as Celestia appeared in the doorway. “What would please Your Highness’s taste buds this fine morning?”
“Actually, Parsley, I’d like to prepare my own breakfast today,” Celestia said.
Parsley nodded. “Of course, Princess,” he said respectfully. “You won’t need any assistance, will you? Your sister’s skills with the stove are… lacking, shall we say, but I don’t imagine that you are the same way.”
“Oh, I’ll be fine,” Celestia replied, smiling.
Parsley bowed again. “Very well. I’m sure everything will be fine, but feel free to come and find me if you’d like me to prepare anything for you, Your Highness.”
“I’ll do that.”
Parsley nodded and excused himself from the room.
As soon as the chef had left, the princess set right to work. She tossed a few pieces of bread into the toaster, mixed up a batch of oatmeal, and used her magic to slice up a potato, which she then placed in a pan.
There, Celestia thought triumphantly. Now all I have to do is wait, and I’ll have burned breakfast in no time.
Outside, the palace gardener went about his morning duties, unaware of the Princess’s forays in the kitchen. Today, his task was to trim the hedges back into their usual pony shapes. He hummed merrily as he snipped away at the leafy wings of a pegasus-shaped bush. He turned to the next hedge and frowned as he inspected it.
“Well, this won’t do!” he announced to the empty garden. “Look at all these tangled branches around the bottom of this one.”
The gardener snapped his shears together and began to prune away the offending branches. A particularly dark-colored one gave way easier than something made of wood should have, giving off a crackling sound as it did so.
The gardener looked more closely and realized it wasn’t a branch he had just cut through, but a cable that had been tangled around the bottom of the bush.
“Gosh, I sure hope that wasn’t something important,” he mumbled. He glanced around a few times before hastily making his way to another part of the garden, whistling as nonchalantly as possible.
In hindsight, Princess Celestia supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised when the lights in the kitchen suddenly went out. She should have been even less surprised when she discovered that, at the moment the stove and the toaster had stopped functioning, the toast just happened to be perfectly golden brown, the oatmeal was appropriately hot but not dry, and the sliced potatoes were pleasantly crispy, while still tender on the inside.
Parsley rushed into the kitchen. “Oh dear, this whole wing of the castle seems to have had a power failure!” he announced, as if Celestia hadn’t already determined that herself.
He inspected the kitchen briefly. “Well, at least your breakfast was prepared properly before the electricity went out,” he continued. “Isn’t that convenient?”
“Convenient is one word for it,” Celestia said, trying her best not to sound hostile.
Parsley quickly collected and served the meal the princess had prepared, and bowed once more before excusing himself.
Celestia sighed, crossed out the second item on her list, and glumly ate her perfect breakfast.
Item 3: Disrupt the Harmony Day Parade
Celestia trotted out onto the balcony and gazed down upon the streets of Canterlot. They looked even busier and more festive than usual today, as the citizens were getting ready for the Harmony Day Parade, a celebration of the anniversary of the day the Princesses overthrew Discord and brought peace to Equestria over a thousand years ago.
For as long as Celestia could remember, the Harmony Day parade had been one of Equestria’s most well-orchestrated events; months of meticulous planning went into every part of it so that each year it could grace Equestria with a marvelous spectacle of color and sound.
And of course, that meant there were dozens and dozens of things that could go wrong.
The princess stood overlooking her subjects, scrutinizing the elements of the parade to find the easiest things to sabotage. A few potential weak points caught her eye, and she smiled deviously.
Celestia stepped forward to give the signal that would start the celebration. Hundreds of ponies cheered as she appeared at the railing. She sent a bright light into the air that burst into a colorful firework, and the parade began.
Music played, ponies sang, and multicolored floats moved slowly along the streets of Canterlot, but Celestia kept her eyes trained on the sky, waiting for something else entirely.
Soon, they appeared: five small figured leaving billowing trails of smoke as they flew in perfect formation over the crowd. Some of the spectators cheered at the arrival of the Wonderbolts.
Discreetly, Celestia used her magic to send a mighty gust of wind blowing through the sky, and gasped excitedly as it succeeded in knocking the team of performing pegasi out of formation. For an instant, it appeared their air show was ruined.
But as the Wonderbolts struggled to right themselves and regain, control, the smoke trails they left began to form a familiar image. After a few seconds of what appeared to the crowd to be dazzling skill, but what Celestia knew was simply sheer luck, they had drawn an image of the royal seal of Canterlot as they tumbled through the sky.
The Wonderbolts finally resumed formation. Hearing the cheers of the audience, they looked back upon the surprising result of their accident, shrugged, and continued their show.
Princess Celestia gritted her teeth, but rather than dwell on the strange coincidence, she focused on the next target: the approaching marching band.
It was supposed to be simple. The band would reach the plaza in front of the palace, where they would then stop and play the Equestrian National Anthem. Or at least, that’s what they thought they would be playing.
Celestia once again lit her horn, and cast a complex, delicate spell that scrambled all the notes on the music sheets carried by each member of the band. The ponies were busy marching into the square, and were unaware of the subtle change.
Soon, the band stopped their uniform movement and raised their instruments. Celestia smiled and covered her ears, awaiting the impending cacophony.
Instead, a cheery tune filled the air. It certainly wasn’t the Equestrian National Anthem, but whatever it was, it quickly got the ponies in the crowd below bobbing along to the beat.
Celestia rolled her eyes. She supposed she should have expected the notes would rearrange themselves into a catchy tune. She’d have to try harder than that if she wanted to break her perfection streak.
But the parade wasn’t over yet. Celestia turned her attention to her final target: one of the parade floats.
I’ve been too indirect so far, the princess realized. This isn’t the time for tricks and illusions. I’m going to just set the float on fire!
Celestia took off, soaring away from the balcony and into the sky. Once she was certain she was high enough that even the sharpest-eyed ponies wouldn’t be able to make her out, she produced a large fireball and hurled it downward toward the colored blotch that was the parade float.
“Let’s see that turn out alright!” she laughed, somewhat maniacally.
The float began to slow down.
“Yo!” called the brown pegasus who was driving the huge decorative machine. “We’re running out of power again. Open the solar panels!”
“Opening solar panels!” a chipper, bright yellow earth pony replied.
Slowly, several large, reflective panels unfolded atop the float. For a few moments, they gathered sunlight as expected. Then, a roaring fireball plummeted from the sky, bounced off the shining surface, and hurtled harmlessly over the horizon. A few loose sparks from the flaming orb were scattered around, and several touched down on the fuses of the fireworks and confetti cannons.
“What was that?” the pegasus driving the float asked.
The earth pony behind him shrugged. “I don’t know, but I think the fireworks are about to go off a little early…”
“Oooooh!”
“Aaaaah!”
The crowd called out in wonder as colorful fireworks and huge bursts of confetti decorated the air around Canterlot castle. Everypony went on to remember the event as one of the most spectacular Harmony Day Parades that they had ever witnessed.
Everypony, of course, except for the Princess, who simply shook her head in disbelief as she hovered above the clouds.
The day wore on and on, but everything Celestia tried ended up working out for the better. She directed the pegasi pulling her chariot to fly straight through a violent storm, but the wind remained calm around her and the lightning ceased to flash whenever she passed. She tried to write a demeaning letter to Twilight Sparkle, but the ink smudged and the portion of the letter that remained legible conveyed a positive meaning instead. She even tried to reduce a high-class banquet to chaos by performing the taboo act of eating with the salad fork instead of the dinner fork, only to find that the dinner was salad and therefore could technically be eaten with either fork.
Finally, evening arrived. Having attempted every single item on her list, Celestia sorrowfully trudged to her bedchamber. As she passed Luna’s room, the Princess of the Night poked her head out.
“Good evening, sister!” she said cheerfully. “Did you manage to overcome your little problem?”
“No,” Celestia deadpanned. “I tried everything I could think of. All day long, I attempted to mess up every situation I was in. And… somehow… everything still turned out alright.”
Celestia leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes. “I guess I’ll just always be perfect at everything,” she admitted.
Luna smirked. “Not quite, sister. We think you have overlooked something.”
Celestia opened an eye. “Oh? And what would that be.”
“If we are understanding correctly, you set out this morning with the intent to fail at something,” Luna continued. “You tried and tried all day long, but were met with only success. Does that not then mean that you have failed in the objective you set for yourself?”
Celestia blinked. “It… it does,” she admitted. “I failed at failing. And I suppose that in itself is a failure.”
Luna scrunched up her forehead in thought. “Of course,” she continued. “If failing to fail counts as a true failure, then that would mean you were successful at failing after all. Does success by failing to fail count as failure or success?”
Celestia hit her head against the wall again, a little harder this time.
“See, it’s interesting,” Luna continued obliviously, “because if your failure to fail counts as success, then technically, you were still successful at everything you did. But if that’s the case, then you have to consider the matter that you have failed to fail, because you even managed to be successful in failure by failing to fail in the first place.”
Luna looked proud of herself for a moment, but then she realized that the matter was not so simple to settle.
“Except…” she continued tentatively, “the failure in failing that you achieved by succeeding in failing to fail would in fact be a failure, would it not? So you’ve ultimately succeeded in failing after all, simply by virtue of the failure to fail that resulted from your successful failure to fail at failing.”
Her eyes went wide. “But wait—”
“Luna,” Celestia said quietly, “don’t you have a moon to raise?”
“Quite right,” Luna said, trotting off down the corridor. “Have a good evening, sister! And try not to think too hard on the actual result; we suspect it will take quite some time to determine for sure if you were successful or not.”
Celestia groaned and retired to her bedroom. There was a letter from Twilight Sparkle waiting for her there.
Dear Princess Celestia,
I don’t have a friendship lesson to share with you today, but I did have a wonderful Harmony Day! Our celebratory events here in Ponyville were lovely, and I heard the Canterlot ones were even more amazing!
What about you? How was your Harmony Day?
~Twilight Sparkle
Celestia sighed and picked up a quill and a roll of parchment, and wrote a single line before signing it and sending it off.
Dear Twilight,
My Day was perfect. Absolutely perfect.
~Princess Celestia
Author's Note
As stated in the description, this was written for the Equestria Daily Pre-reader Battle: April 2013.
The prompt that led to this little piece was "Celestia's terrible secret- revealed!"
I can't say I'm happy with how this came out at all, but... well, it's ok. Just don't use this story as an accurate measure of how I typically write.
