Trials of a Doktor: Stepping Back
The second in the series of fictions following Jack Doktor.
Chapter 2: Canterlot's day-by-day
The sun slowly rose. A beam of light warmed the snout of a sleeping purple unicorn. She groggily opened her eyes, and looked around. She glanced at the clock, and instantly all of her grogginess left her, as she hopped out of the bed.
"Oh no oh no oh no oh no! I'm late!" Twilight yelled as she quickly brushed her mane, then ran out of her room. She made her way through the castle, trying to get to the place she needed to be. Every guard she passed all glanced at her in curiosity, then remembered it was Twilight after all. She made it to the large doors in front of her, and used her magic to open them. Inside, were the two Princesses of Equestria, Celestia and Luna, her brother, Shining Armor, and his wife, Princess Cadence. Among those were a few others of importance, and Twilight blushed as she made her way to the seat in between Shining Armor and Celestia.
"I'm so sorry I'm late Princess, I normally don't sleep in," Twilight said with a deeper blush on her face.
Celestia turned to her, and was about to speak, when Cadence interjected, "Twilight, you need to stop worrying so much," she began to laugh a bit, "Honestly, I wouldn't mind if you slept in a bit for once, might make you a little less... stressed."
Twilight had a look of disbelief on her face, "I can't! I have so much work to do around here! Research, reading new spells, and with what the Princess told us yesterday, how can I rest!"
"Okay Twilight," Celestia said with a smile, which Twilight knew that a silly command would follow, "If that's how you feel, then, as Princess, I order you to take a day off."
"But Princess!" Twilight began, "With this threat being made, I can't take a break now! I mean, what if they attack like, tomorrow!"
Celestia rolled her eyes, and giggled, "Really now Twilight, you're a smart unicorn, do you think they would just attack before they said they would?" Celestia said, then her laugh dropped, "But seriously, Twilight, take the day off, talk to the ambassadors or to Rarity. Just relax for one day please?"
Twilight looked down, "I don't know Princess... I mean... I don't want to just leave my work halfway done... Wait, where are the others?" When she looked up, she saw Celestia doing a begging face, which had Luna, Shining, and Cadence laughing.
"Pleeeeeeease?" Celestia asked her.
"Okay, fine, I will..." Twilight muttered out, defeated, "How do you beg like that..."
Celestia flashed a large smile, "Lots of practice, and trust me, fifteen centuries certainly is good practice time."
Meanwhile, in the forest, Jack was waking up. He yawned, and stretched, and looked around. Nothing major had changed, it was now mid-morning, so he should get a move on. He stood up and walked down the path, until it began to disappear from no use.
'Oh great... if there was a town here, there would be more use of these paths, but now, it's GONE!' Jack yelled in his mind, and in response, he heard Doktor laugh. After shuddering, he continued, his leg getting weaker and weaker.
'Damn, I'm gonna fall out if I cant find a place to get this looked at,' Jack thought as he sat down, and drank the last of the soup he got from Trixie. Jack continued walking, but then noticed the trees began to have less and less leaves. Soon, the trees were bare from all life and blackened, and the ground was a lot less lush. It was mostly barren, and had a white tint to it.
'Ugh, what happened here?' Jack thought, grunting in pain over his leg. For some reason, it was hurting more than it was before, and he shortly fell. Upon hitting the ground, out of exhaustion, he passed out. Around a tree, a pony's head poked out, and saw Jack laying there. They picked him up with a green magic aura, and carried him away.
Twilight hung her head as she left the castle. She didn't want to take a break today, she wanted to help find out who had threatened Canterlot.
"Well, might as well try and enjoy today..." Twilight said as she made her way to the Castle Gardens. Once there, she saw her friend Fluttershy, who was tending to the animals there.
"Hey Fluttershy!" Twilight said excitedly, causing an 'eep' from the pegasus, "Oh, sorry, what's up?"
"Oh, hello Twilight, well, nothing much. I've just been caring for the little creatures here like usual," Fluttershy responded, "Aren't you usually working on something for the princess?"
Twilight gave a mock laugh, "Well, I'm not today. Thanks to Cadence, I was ordered to take a day off!" Twilight yelled out, "With this threat, I CAN'T be taking a day off! I NEED to find who is responsible!"
Fluttershy giggled quietly, "Twilight, you're too busy lately. It's good that they gave you a break. You could have overworked yourself," Fluttershy told her, then sighed, "I want to know who threatened Canterlot, but there's not much to do until the princess replies to the note."
"I guess you're right..." Twilight muttered, kicking up some dirt with a hoof, "I just don't want anything bad to happen..." Fluttershy sat down, and thought.
Suddenly, she shot up, "Why don't we find Rarity and have a girls' day? It might help you calm down and relax."
Twilight put her hoof to her chin, then nodded, "That could help, to Rarity's then!" The two then left the Castle Grounds, and headed into the city.
Strongheart floated back and forth. She was frustrated, annoyed, and generally angered. She found Jack passed out, in the possession of some pony she had never seen before. Doktor however, was laughing to himself as to how they could mess with the passed out one. The two had followed the pony to a strange abandoned town with misshaped buildings made from a hard, carapace-like material. The pony walked into the largest one, which had a certain Castle shape to it. They were currently watching from a window, seeing what this strange pony was doing with Jack.
"Starkeherzen, you are stressing over nozing, just anozer pony vou found Jackie, calm down," Doktor said as he floated lazily past her, glancing in the window.
"Jack could be in trouble, and we can't risk that. Not after what we had to do to get him back," Strongheart replied, and turned to Doktor, "Besides, if I were to calm down, think of all the problems Jack would get in."
Doktor laughed a bit, "But it vould be funny! I vant to see him in a silly situation! It vill make me laugh," Doktor said as he lightly punched Strongheart in the arm.
"Oh, yes, the whole world focuses on your laughter. That's the whole point of life," she responded in an annoyed tone. Without either of them noticing, a certain onlooker had joined the conversation. The pony that had carried Jack into the building was at the now open window, resting her head on a hoof as she quietly laughed at the two. When Strongheart mocked Doktor's favorite hat, his ruined top hat, he looked hurt.
"Vell, I never!" Doktor yelled out, "Vell... Vell for a sprite, you are big, and I mean, BIIIIIG! Ho man, I couldn't zink of anozer pony as chunky as you!"
Strongheart gasped, and smacked him across the face, and tears escaped his eyes, "Now, say you're sorry!" she commanded him.
"I-I'm sorry..." Doktor said as he held a hoof to his cheek and whimpered. This caused the onlooking pony to laugh a little louder than before, and startled the two sprites, who glared at her.
"Oh, I'm not interrupting anything, am I?" the pony asked as they glared at her.
"Yes, yes you are!" Doktor began, then instantly stopped, "Vait, how can you see us?"
This caused a chuckle to escape the pony, "Oh, almost forgot this was still on." The pony began to glow a slight green, and she changed form. She went from a basic earth pony into an alicorn-like pony. Her wings were bug-like in origin, and her horn was misshaped. Her forelegs also had a series of holes near the ends of them.
Strongheart gasped, "It's you! You were there to tell us how to get Jack alive again!"
The strange pony nodded, "That I am, I'm Chrysalis, queen of the changelings... or used to be..."
"Used to?" Doktor asked, floating around her, "Also, changelings are zose ponies that get energy from affection, right?" he added, trying to remember what he had learned while he was in Jack's mind.
Chrysalis nodded, "They are, and I used to be queen of them, until something happened a few months back..." she blushed deeply, "I had found the biggest deposit of pure love, and I went to get power from it. I was going to have my subjects feast after I had a few of them take it back. Unfortunately, all of them showed up and made it a lot worse than it would have been."
"So," Strongheart began, "You're going to hold Jack, and eventually feed off his affections?" She asked, but the queen shook her head 'no', "Okay, but the other changelings, they got greedy, then blamed you for it?"
Chrysalis shrugged, "Pretty much. After it all failed, they stopped following me, and left Nassus."
"Nassus is zis place?" Doktor asked, knocking on the carapace wall of the building for effect.
"Yes it is, now, please, give me some time to concentrate, I can fix Jack's leg. Then, we will have to wait for him to wake up." Chrysalis told them, and they nodded. She closed her eyes, and her horn charged up with a sickly green magic, which then turned into a brighter green color, accompanied by a fresh smell through the room. She touched her horn on Jack's leg, and the scars from the thorns healed over, and the nerves were repaired.
"Well, little sprites, now we wait," Chrysalis said as she sat down and yawned.
Doktor's eyes grew wide, "Oh, oh, oh, oh! I got an idea!" Doktor then zoomed over to the queen, and whispered something into her ear. She then began to laugh like a little schoolfilly.
"That IS a good idea!" Chrysalis blurted, and she high-hoofed Doktor's smaller hoof, this, was going to be priceless.
Twilight and Fluttershy made it to Rarity's boutique, and they went inside to talk to their friend. When they entered, there was Colgate there, letting Rarity measure her for some outfit.
"Hey Rarity, What's going on?" Twilight asked her friend, who was still measuring.
"Darling, could you give me a second? I need to get these measurements done for Colgate here," Rarity said, still busy with her work.
"Hi Twilight!" Colgate greeted, "What are you doing in Canterlot?"
Twilight smiled, "I'm Princess Celestia's student, remember? I'm here to continue my studies."
"Oh, yeah! I remember now!" Colgate smiled, and moved a bit, which made Rarity grunt in annoyance, "Well, gosh, I would figure that would make you really busy..."
Twilight laughed, "Usually I am busy, but today, Cadence and the princess thought it would be a good idea to make me take a day off today."
"That was nice of her," Colgate said with a smile, "I'd love to have a day off on a work day!" Rarity had finished with her measurements, wrote them down, then smiled to Colgate.
"Well Colgate, your all set! I'll have your dress done within the week," Rarity told her as the dentist began to leave, "Take care darling!"
"So, you're done Rarity?" Twilight asked, not sure if she's free now.
Rarity smiled, "Why yes, any reason the two of you are here?" she then caught herself, "Not like it's a problem, or anything, I just want to know if there's an actual reason."
"Oh, we were wondering if you wanted to go to the spa or something, we can have a girls day like we had before," Fluttershy asked in her usual quiet tone.
"A spa day with two of my closest friends," Rarity smiled, "You two really do know me well." The other two smiled, and they left the Boutique together, and headed to the spa.
When they had reached the spa, they were met by Aloe and Lotus, the pair of spa ponies had evacuated Ponyville before everything had happened there. The trio asked for their usual treatment, and they all got situated in.
"Oh, Rarity," Aloe began, as she was doing some work on getting the rooms set up for them, "I know how much you enjoy watching ponies attempt to become famous, so have you heard about Las Pegasus in a few more weeks?"
Rarity shook her head no, "Why I haven't gotten that bit of gossip yet."
Lotus walked into the room, "There's going to be a concert-like show, where many ponies and others are going to be performing to try and get famous!"
"Really now? I might have to go to this. Maybe I can make outfits for some of them!" Rarity said excitedly, then let out a little squeal, "This is going to be amazing!"
"Rarity? I never figured you much of a concert pony," Twilight said, receiving a smile from her friend.
"Don't be silly darling, I enjoy these things! Lets me see what's new or is going to be in-fashion soon," Rarity explained, "Why don't we get the girls together, and we can make this a little vacation?"
Twilight huffed in annoyance, "I can't do that Rarity, not with this thing going on," She dodged around mentioning the threat, but Rarity understood.
"Maybe there's one of those station things in there?" Fluttershy suggested, she wanted the group to get together again, and be like old times.
Twilight thought for a moment, then nodded, "You might have a point there Fluttershy, if there is one there, I can figure out what it is and does." The three had it settled, they would go there, watch the show, and look for that station in the later weeks. They knew one thing, however, this was going to be really fun.