Disclaimer: I am not Lauren Faust nor Hasbro. I do not own My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, nor Equestria Girls.
Opening Note:
See the opening note of the 'preludes.'
This chapter concerns Principal Celestia and Vice-Principal Luna of Canterlot High School, the difficulties caused by a crater in the lawn with insurance companies, and what strikes them as a somewhat unlikely request from their student, Sunset Shimmer.
Warning: As noted in the preludes, this story is rated 'M'.
Chapter 3:
"So what, exactly, are you here for, Ms. Shimmer?" Principal Celestia asked.
Yesterday afternoon the nightmare had begun when a mysterious girl and her dog had tumbled into a just-formed crater in the lawns in front of Canterlot High School. The girl had been checked over in the school infirmary, and then sent on to the city hospital for a fuller assessment. Arguments with the school's insurers about filling in said crater had commenced shortly after the mysterious girl had been removed to hospital. The initial assessment from anti-terrorist or counter-espionage, or whomever-it-was-which-dealt-with-sudden-craters and who examined it yesterday evening was that the crater had been formed by a meteorite strike. That was bound to get Doctor Hooves' attention, unfortunately, given his obsession with aliens and things from outer space, and no doubt would leave the insurers claiming that the school's policy didn't cover the costs of making good such damage.
Pinkie Pie hadn't helped matters by making up a story that the mysterious girl and her dog and luggage had made the crater by falling out of the sky in a shaft of purple light – and then convincing her four closest friends to go along with the story.
Throw in the way that Pinkie Pie and her friends had been the only actual witnesses to what had happened since any motorists on the road outside the school at the time of impact been distracted by the sudden mechanical difficulties that their vehicles had all simultaneously experienced (Celestia had had to endure techno-babble last night about 'electromagnetic pulse effects' generated by objects from outer space) and the insurers were going to have a field day with reasons to be awkward.
And early reports from the hospital were that the mysterious girl who had ended up in the crater seemed to be in a considerable state of confusion and distress, and the hospital might have to get the police involved if abuse seemed to have been taking place – although there seemed to be no indication thus far that Canterlot High School were in any way to blame for whatever had happened to the girl.
And now Sunset Shimmer was here in Principal Celestia's office, before school had even started for the current day.
Pupils didn't usually actually present themselves of their own free will like this at the Principal's Office, outside of events like the election for the Fall Formal Princess. So this was likely something serious – or at least something Serious in Sunset's opinion.
And she had requested the Vice-Principal be present too. So Luna was here too, at least until it was clear if whatever bee was buzzing around in Sunset's head actually did require her presence.
"Look: the girl who just turned up yesterday in the crater." Sunset Shimmer said. She drew a deep breath. "I was wondering – and hoping – if once she got out of hospital, you could fix for her to stay with me? If Mr. Rich is agreeable of course?"
Principal Celestia exchanged a brief look of surprise with her sister. This seemed one of the least likely things to be coming from Sunset Shimmer of all people. Sunset Shimmer at least conveyed the outward appearance of a model-student, but was tough and very self-reliant for her age. In fact she seemed to have an urgent need to prove to herself and to everyone else that she was not weak. And she was not much inclined to ordinarily have much by the way of social contact with anyone else, except those two boys in her year, Snips and Snails, who seemed to have attached themselves to her as some kind of sidekicks. Sunset wanting anything to do with… well, someone who was a mess who had only been on the school premises briefly before being sent off to hospital… was quite a turn up for the books.
"And why would you like that, Sunset?" Luna took the lead.
"Because I think she's from the same place that I'm from. And I should help her. I want to help her." Sunset said. "She's had bad things happen to her. I think someone powerful may have mistreated her badly, back there. She and I exchanged a few words in the infirmary yesterday."
Celestia watched Luna study Sunset carefully. Luna had training and qualifications in psychological matters, and was the school's official student guidance counsellor. And if Sunset thought abuse of this mystery girl had been taking place, her request for Luna to be present too was starting to make sense.
"Is there anything I should know, on a confidential basis if necessary?" Luna asked.
Sunset Shimmer hesitated.
"She's going to need help. Lots of it." Sunset said after a moment. "Someone," and for a moment blazing anger kindled in Sunset's eyes, "has been unspeakably cruel to her." And then Sunset blinked and the moment of emotion was gone.
Principal Celestia opened her mouth to speak, but Luna held up a warning hand to forestall her, and so Principal Celestia closed her mouth again. She trusted her sister's instincts for something like this. It was why Sunset was even in the school in the first place, her sister having very calmly (and without specifically mentioning Crystal Prep Academy and Abacus Cinch) asked – when they were arguing about Sunset's application to CHS during summer last year – where she thought Sunset might end up, and under whose guidance, if Canterlot High turned her down? Even last year Sunset's ability and intelligence had been obvious, and what Principal Cinch might have done with them at Crystal Prep, without making any kind of effort at all to address some of the social problems Sunset had which were equally apparent…
"Do you know who has been mistreating her?" Luna asked Sunset.
"I only know what Twilight told me in the infirmary yesterday." Sunset said. "I don't think telling you will help her. He's too powerful."
"You know something you're not telling me." Luna said. Her tone was firm and politely inquisitive. "Do you know this person? Is he a friend or relative of yours?"
"No!" Sunset's eyes widened, and the denial was emphatic. "He's not a friend or relative of mine, but I'm at least as afraid of him as Twilight is. He's powerful. He can make a lot of trouble. And even if the police could get to where he lives, there is no way that they could just arrest him or anything like that. He'd probably persuade them to side with him."
"But you don't believe that this powerful person can come looking for you or our mystery girl or try to do anything to you here?" Luna asked.
There was a pause and Sunset scrunched her face up, hard, in thought.
"I don't think he even knows this place exists, let alone could believe that anyone would run away to here to get away from him." Sunset said. "And if we keep our heads down and don't do anything which might attract his attention, I hope that he won't realise where we've gone at all. Twilight did something very clever to get away and to come here, I'm sure, and unless he turns up in the next couple of days, I'm sure that will mean that he's completely lost her trail."
Sunset Shimmer and Luna looked at one another for a long moment, and then Luna nodded.
"Okay: so you hope he won't turn up, and you believe you've told me all that you safely can about this person who hurt her, and whom you're scared of." Luna softened her tone. "So what about her then? Her name's Twilight, right?"
"Oh, yes. That's what she told me yesterday in the infirmary." Sunset answered Luna's questions. "And I think she was at the school that I went to, for gifted students, back where we came from, so I'm sure that she's very talented – as we'll see if we can help her get her head back together. And besides staying with me, it would be really great for her if she could come here to Canterlot High, to be with us here."
"Do you know anything about how old she is?" Luna asked.
"No." Sunset shook her head. "But she must be about the same age group as me, even if a bit younger, given how she looks, right? And being talented, I'm sure that she'll be able to handle classes, easily enough, even if she is maybe young enough that normally she ought to be in the year below. I don't have much trouble with most of the subjects here, right?" She winced slightly. "Please."
"Hmm…" Luna said. "Have you ever seen her before, or maybe contacted her online?"
"I don't remember ever seeing her before." Sunset said. "I guess it's possible we could have bumped into one another… back home… but if so I don't remember it. And I certainly haven't been knowingly in contact with anyone from 'back home' online. When I have been online so far it's mostly to look stuff up for homework research or an assignment project. I haven't done social media much, unless I've had to tell Snips or Snails something, and I don't believe I could have met Twilight online, even if she was using an alias."
"Is it possible that Twilight was here, though, outside this school yesterday afternoon, to look for you? For any reason that you can think of?" Luna pressed.
"No." Sunset shook her head. "She certainly didn't say anything about that to me yesterday, and I think if she came here on purpose it was because she found the Canterlot Horse statue out front attractive. It's an…" Sunset hesitated a moment, as if trying to make up her mind how to phrase it, "equine thing. Very big, back home, some people are, on horse or pony things. Twilight may have been drawn to it. And of course, uh, 'go Canterlot Wondercolts'! Yay!" Sunset uncertainly punched the air.
The corners of Luna's mouth twitched for a mere fraction of a moment.
"Given the situation, you are excused from any delayed demonstration of school pride." Luna said.
"Will it matter much?" Sunset asked. "If she didn't come here specifically looking for me? Is there anything you want me to make up or say instead?"
"Right now, Sunset, what would be most helpful is to try to establish as many of the facts of what has happened, as is possible." Luna said, sternly.
"Okay: And if I said I think Twilight came here by magic from a parallel reality, where she was fleeing from…"
"No, Ms. Shimmer. Any embellishment of what Pinkie Pie and her friends have been saying about what took place will not be helpful to anyone right now." Celestia cut in. It was time to wind this down. "Unless you have any further actual information and not fantasies…." she paused a moment and softened her tone, "however well-meant, which you can give us, I believe that you had best be getting along and preparing for the start of the school day."
"Well?" Principal Celestia asked her sister an hour or two (and several exasperated telephone conversations) after Sunset had departed the principal's office, and with school classes underway for the day. "What do you think?"
Luna had just arrived back from other day-to-day running-of-the-school business, bearing two 'academic strength' mugs of coffee, one of which she kept for herself and one of which she had placed in front of Celestia. And she had closed the door and waited politely for Celestia's latest call to finish, Luna marking some papers and sipping her own coffee whilst the time passed.
"The insurers are doing what insurers do, and dragging their feet and looking for any excuse not to pay out." Luna advised, pushing aside the papers. "The school board voted against your advice on the current terms when we renewed the contract three years ago, as far as the minutes of the pertinent meetings go – I checked, and Mrs. Cotton Candy was particularly vocal against your advice at the time. But politics and governance are your domain, so what you do with that information is none of my business. As far as counselling goes, I can recommend some relaxation music to listen to, before you have to speak to or email the board about the crater in need of filling."
Since there were no students present to maintain a serene and imperturbable façade in front of, Celestia fake-glowered at her younger sister for a moment and then adopted a more serious expression.
"That too, but I mostly meant about Sunset Shimmer's early morning visit and what she asked us about?"
"Oh, right." Luna looked thoughtful. "Sunset was trying to be a good little devious manipulator, but I think she does actually care about the girl who tumbled into our insurance problem and wants to personally protect and help her as much as possible – which requires adult assistance in terms of where the girl ends up living or going to school. We've both been concerned that Sunset's too aloof from most of the student population, even taking into account her 'charity orphan from somewhere else with no known family' effective status, but she seems as if she's really prepared to connect with this 'Twilight' if she did remain around in these parts in Canterlot. But, whilst having this presumed 'Twilight' around might help socialize Sunset, Sunset spoke to Twilight yesterday in the infirmary for longer than either of us have done, and from the flash of anger Sunset showed us, she seemed to me to think that Twilight was pretty badly damaged, psychologically." Luna paused a moment, to drink from her mug, then went on. "For better or worse, Sunset seems pretty smart for a girl her age, when it comes to assessing others, and professionally speaking I'd have concerns about having a girl as severely traumatised as Sunset seemed to believe that 'Twilight' is around, at least in this school. That Twilight had a suitcase with her when she turned up here would fit with if she had been escaping from an abusive environment with what possessions she could carry when she tumbled into the crater, and I'm worried about this mysterious man, who Sunset is certain abused Twilight in some way – but I don't think we're going to get anything more out of Sunset about that for now. Maybe the hospital staff will get more out of Twilight." She took another long sip of coffee before going on. "To address the school issue, which is more in our purview, the girl would need a lot of attention and help here if Sunset is right – especially if other students decided to turn on the girl or to make a joke of her." Luna frowned. "I'd have to check with the hospital for their assessment and I'm not saying it couldn't be done or shouldn't be done. I am saying it would potentially mean a lot of effort, taking on the girl. Oh: and I'm sure you remember all the paperwork and the legal hearing for girl-out-of-who-knows-where, that we had with Sunset last year."
"I took five minutes out between calls to insurers to check with Principal Gilda at her school in Mainhattan that specialises in 'problem students' and where I could see Twilight ending up otherwise if Sunset Shimmer was right about Twilight's state of mind." Celestia said. Celestia had well and truly needed a break at that point from dealing with wilfully unhelpful insurance representatives, and had wanted to speak with someone prepared to act as if they were an actual human being living in the same star system. "Gilda said she's run off her feet at the moment. Something's upset a lot of her students overnight, and since they turned up there this morning there are group-chants about someone called 'Grogar' please keeping away, one pupil taking all the fire extinguishers in the school and moving them to the school library because he claimed that 'the gates had been torn open' and a 'lord of chaos' was planning to burn the books, another hiding under her desk since arriving in school because she claimed that a 'haystack was looking for her', and a final one climbing the school clocktower to shout out from the top that the Polar Lights would descend from on high to come looking for a tree. Gilda will take another student if she absolutely has to do so, but…" Principal Celestia made a face, "it sounded like it was bedlam there right now and she'd appreciate it a lot if she didn't have to immediately deal with any kind of transfer or new entrant – or at least not until things settle down. Which she doesn't have a clue at the moment as to how long it will take."
Celestia really would rather not let a fellow principal like Gilda end up having to handle this by default if Gilda was under this kind of strain already at the start of a new school year. Gilda had much worse immediate problems at the moment than a crater in the lawn that nobody wanted to pay to fill in.
"I'll check my messages and see if their student counsellor – I think a new one started this month – has put out any calls for discreet advice." Luna nodded. "But that would certainly make it irresponsible to leave Twilight to be passed to them without our taking a look at her, if the environment there is so unsettled at the moment."
There was silence for a minute or so, whilst they both thought and drank coffee.
Luna had said what she considered to be her piece and was waiting now for Celestia's decision. Celestia herself wasn't saying anything straight out because she was double-checking everything in her head because this wasn't the kind of decision which should be made lightly. At least with Sunset Shimmer last year, Celestia hadn't been under any kind of time-pressure to make a decision, and for all the unease that Celestia had felt about Sunset's character, there hadn't been much about Sunset to suggest she might require any extra staff time or care. Whereas the system would be looking to shunt Twilight off to Gilda as soon as possible if no schools in Canterlot did anything, and if she came to Canterlot High Twilight would require both time and care – and depending on her state of mind might accidentally disrupt the whole school.
"She certainly has a cute dog." Principal Celestia said in the end and sighed. "Twilight."
When Twilight had been removed to hospital yesterday afternoon, the principal and her sister had assumed temporary responsibility for the girl's dog and the suitcase assumed to be her luggage – although both had had to be left behind at the sisters' home today, with an adequate supply of food and water left out in a bowl for the dog and the run of the back-garden. One of the sisters was going to pop back at lunchtime to check on the dog.
And both sisters believed that dogs were often good reflections of the traits and personalities of their owners – a dog as cute as Spike must surely belong to a girl who ordinarily ought to be decent; maybe even adorable.
Luna looked at her sister, and the expression on her face showed that she understood what Celestia had concluded – that once the hospital released her, Canterlot High would at least temporarily take on Twilight, if Twilight was interested, to at least try to help her.
"So what about the accommodation question?" Luna asked.
"Regardless what Sunset Shimmer would like, unless someone influential can be found to expedite matters, Twilight will have to go into the foster care system, if no adult relatives can be identified and traced." Celestia snorted. "Sunset should have known that, having been in the system herself for multiple weeks, until Mr. Rich came forward."
Filthy Rich was a businessman of considerable wealth who lived locally. He was also a major patron of Canterlot High School and – crucially, as far as Sunset Shimmer had been concerned – a month or so after Sunset had turned up in Canterlot, there had been a scandal in an arms company in which Filthy Rich was a major investor. Gravitron Holdings, it turned out, had been illegally trading some kind of aircraft cannon to a foreign nation. Filthy Rich had needed to distance himself from Gravitron Holdings (and the defence and criminal investigations into their doings) and a 'good deeds news story' to reburnish his image was something he had been on the lookout for. The opportunity to house a mysterious (but highly photogenic) refugee from foreign repression in a guesthouse on his estate had been perfect for him. And it had been much preferable to Sunset from having to live under other people's feet and supervision in the foster-care system. Apparently whatever nation she had come from had left Sunset with an impression that a girl of her age could live where she pleased without adult attention, and she had deeply resented the foster households she had been placed in. Filthy Rich apparently let her live with much less supervision, Sunset only occasionally being checked on by his butler, to make sure she wasn't running a drugs-ring or looting and burning the guesthouse down.
But still, it was unlikely that Sunset would get her wish regarding Twilight being housed with her, unless something completely insane happened. Bureaucratic procedure was bureaucratic procedure.
"Mmmm." Luna said.
"You're thinking something." Principal Celestia said.
"You know I'm almost always thinking something, sister." Luna responded. There was mischief in her eyes. "But in this case I'm thinking about Hooves and his aliens obsession. And the fact that we have a girl who tumbled into what has been identified as a meteorite crater outside of our school. I'm not sure though that you want to know the details of what I'm thinking."
So it was back to Hooves again. If Filthy Rich was considerably wealthy, Doctor Hooves was completely and utterly insanely wealthy – having made several fortunes several times over from pharmaceutical discoveries. And when he bothered to use it, he had influence – lots of it. He was also completely and utterly insane – except that he was so rich that people talked about him being 'eccentric' instead. And a major feature of Doctor Hooves' insanity was an obsession with the idea that the planet would become caught in the middle of a war between alien races, any month now (it had been 'any month now' for years), and with rainbow defence laser superweapons (and other projects) which would be needed to hold any and all hostile alien invaders off.
Doctor Hooves had once attacked Celestia in the street one day, trying to take an antique brooch from her that she'd been wearing. He'd been ranting and raving about how it was a device that gave the power to control the sun (and any other stars), changing their galactic orbital patterns, speeds of rotation, and giving the power to make them flare or go supernova. It needed to be 'in the right hands' in the cause of the safety of the planet, he'd insisted. In court afterwards, he'd apologised profoundly (and settled with a large cash payment), and said that he'd made a mistake and that having seen the brooch he was now certain that it wasn't in fact the 'Daybreaker's Hoof' – and he'd been rich and important enough that that (apart from a rest-break to the west coast for several weeks, 'to improve his mental health') had officially been the end of it.
He'd used his multiple contacts to take an interest in Canterlot High, though, ever since, Celestia was absolutely certain. Probably in case this 'Daybreaker's Hoof' turned up at the school after all.
And from the expression of faux innocence on her face right now, Luna was probably developing some kind of plan to get Hooves to… well, Celestia had almost certainly best have complete deniability when it came to whatever it was which her sister was devising. Although in Luna's defence, Hooves was probably capable of making up stories along the lines of 'alien princess fleeing an intergalactic conflict in an energy envelope transit capsule' for himself all on his own. It was the way that he thought.
"You're right, sister. I probably don't want to know what you're thinking." Celestia shuddered. She picked up her mug and took a long drink.
Doctor Hooves was a nuisance-at-large whom Celestia wanted to spend as little time thinking about as possible. Luna seemed to think that he might be accidentally useful though, this time.
Author Notes:
Much setting up of background in this chapter. (And now the attempts to explain how/why I've developed some background in the way that I have.)
As far as I can make out, the statue of a horse outside of Canterlot High School which the mirror-portal in Equestria periodically connects to does not have an official 'name' in the shows. I am aware that some non-show sources name it as the 'Wondercolt(s) Statue', but for the purposes of this story, I will refer to it as the 'Canterlot Horse' statue (and assume that the founding myth of the human city of Canterlot had some kind of horse component.)
The crater in the lawns is positioned in front of the school to one side of the path leading to and around the Canterlot Horse statue. ERAFOSS Twilight Sparkle's arrival in chapter 1 – by seriously heavy-duty magic (touched by chaos from the environment which she departed in Ponyville) – is assumed to have been preceded and accompanied by some kind of electromagnetic effect which disabled security cameras in the vicinity and caused mechanical problems for any vehicles in the road outside the school distracting motorists enough for them to be unsure exactly what happened. Thus the main witnesses to ERAFOSS Twilight Sparkle's arrival remain Pinkie Pie and her friends.
I'm not entirely happy with having to handwave any motorists as being too distracted with vehicle troubles to see the exact moment of Twilight's arrival, but I had a narrative problem here of either the crater is around the front of the school in public view, and ERAFOSS Twilight might have been just a passer-by who fell in, or the crater is hidden from the public around a side or the back of the school and everyone is going to be just wondering what exactly someone who isn't a CHS student is doing wandering around the school grounds anyway?
Sunset Shimmer's current reasoning regarding how ERAFOSS Twilight Sparkle ended up at Canterlot High is that the human world terminus of the portal to the mirror in Equestria causes a distortion between the worlds – even when the portal is closed – which naturally 'sucked' Twilight (and Spike) in. Hence Sunset's remark to Vice-Principal Luna about Twilight having maybe found the Canterlot Horse statue 'attractive'. Sunset's telling the truth of what she thinks – just leaving out the bits about magical portals and travel spells between worlds. (Indeed: Sunset considers Vice-Principal Luna to be good enough at reading body-language and expressions for Sunset to stick as close to the truth as possible in the first scene in this chapter, figuring that 'honest but keeping stuff back' will look better than raising suspicions by lying.)
So many of the adult ponies that I knew anything about from Friendship is Magic already checked into Canterlot High School (or Crystal Prep Academy) in Equestria Girls canon as students (or occasionally as staff) – which is how Gilda the Griffin, or at least a human counterpart, has become principal of her own school in Mainhattan. With some of the other 'at a loose end' big names having had roles for human counterparts already assigned by me, elsewhere, it was either give Gilda the job, I felt, or completely make someone else up.
Some of Gilda's students are at her school because they are, unfortunately for them, psychically sensitive, which messes with their heads – not helped by the official scientific view in the human world that 'magic isn't real'. (And in the universe of this story, as will come up in a later chapter, historical human world records of an extensive 'witch-hunting' campaign, the last time anyone in the human world believed in large numbers that magic was real, is further reason for the human world scientific community not to examine the premise that magic could be real too closely.) And whilst there are other factors in play too, the arrival of ERAFOSS Twilight Sparkle in the human world in her Element of Magic fuelled panicked escape from Ponyville, Chaos Capital of Equestria, by means of a rift blasted between the dimensions, was rather unpleasant for some of Gilda's students.
I have adjusted the spelling to 'Mainhattan' for the human world, from the Equestrian version of 'Manehattan'. I have to live with 'Canterlot' as a human world city name, owing not least to the Canterlot High school name, but I really would prefer to avoid direct pony specific references in place names in the human world as much as possible, absent a very convincing reason and background story.
By the time of the Equestria Girls 'short', Monday Blues, Sunset Shimmer in canon is apparently living on her own in a one-room apartment somewhere in Canterlot. This short is clearly taking place after Legend of Everfree however (Rainbow Dash is shown using her super-speed ability in the Monday Blues short), and is in at least the latter stages of Sunset Shimmer's third year at Canterlot High (and maybe at the start of her fourth, or later, depending on how the maths is added up). I do not find the balance of plausibility in favour that any remotely sensible adult in the human world would permit a younger Sunset Shimmer to live in such a situation, however, since regardless of her being an adult as a unicorn-pony in Equestria, a younger Sunset Shimmer would look very much physically to be a 'minor' as a human in the human world – and thus as far as the authorities of the human world are concerned would require adult supervision and 'care'. So I had to come up with somewhere for Sunset Shimmer to live, if being on her own in a one-room apartment this 'early' made no sense to me. And in where I have set Sunset up as living at this point, to some extent I've gone with something which I find narratively convenient in terms of keeping the cast numbers down. (If Sunset is kind-of-independent in a guest-house on human Filthy Rich's estate, that means no additional care-givers to have to invent and to write into 'at home' scenes with Sunset and company.)
My original familiarity with the word 'gravitron' comes from the (Patrick Troughton) 'Doctor Who' story The Moonbase, where it was a piece of equipment set up on Earth's moon to help control the Earth's weather systems. Although here, 'Gravitron' is just part of the name of a company that (human world) Filthy Rich had connections to which was involved in dodgy arms deals.
Whilst the official (Friendship is Magic) pony version of 'Doctor Hooves' seems to me to be reminiscent of the David Tennant and Matt Smith versions of the title character of the Doctor Who franchise, the human world 'Doctor Hooves' who features in this story I am looking to cast as a much more Sylvester McCoy reminiscent character. Sylvester McCoy's version of the time-lord spent quite a bit of time fighting off alien invaders from outer space, and in one story, there was an important star manipulation device known as 'The Hand of Omega' – and there's a reference, in this chapter, to human world Doctor Hooves having a thing regarding 'aliens' and being obsessed at one time with something he referred to as 'Daybreaker's Hoof'.
Human Doctor Hooves, as I am writing him, I am finding narratively incredibly useful. Principal Celestia and Vice-Principal Luna are high-ranking high school teachers, without much reason to be able to wield power or influence outside of the education system. They can get done things within the education system, but have little ability – if any – to be plausibly able to get a mysterious and highly traumatised girl out of nowhere a set of papers and appropriately registered as existing with a human world bureaucratic system (with minimal questions asked) within a matter of weeks. A mysterious insanely rich eccentric, who is responsible for several breakthrough medical treatment discoveries, on the other hand…
I'm looking to develop Principal Celestia and Vice-Principal Luna as having much easier relations with one another than their (alicorn) pony counterparts.
Cotton Candy was the name of a pony in earlier 'generations' of My Little Pony. A relative of mine actually had a Cotton Candy toy some years ago, and it was one of the names I thought of when 'name required for adult in human world who has caused trouble for Principal Celestia and Vice-Principal Luna by recommending a now-problematic insurance deal' came up when writing this instalment.
Finally, during discussions on the alternate history board where I have been also posting this story, a point was raised that in the first Equestria Girls film, when Vice-Principal Luna confronts the (pony) version of Twilight Sparkle following the wrecking of the Fall Formal decorations, Vice-Principal Luna does not come across as sympathetic or understanding, which might be at odds with my choice to cast Vice-Principal Luna as CHS's student counsellor in this story. My answer is that given that a girl who has shown up out of nowhere and who isn't even a regular student at CHS had been afforded the consideration and generosity to run for Fall Formal Princess, only to be caught apparently on camera doing her best to wreck the occasion (and preparations for it) Vice-Principal Luna (in the first Equestria Girls film) has very good reason to be exceptionally angry, to my mind, regardless what her normal character and disposition might be. But if readers of this story find it difficult to square student counsellor Luna of this piece, with interrogator Luna of the first Equestria Girls film, please consider it one of those alternate storyline changes things.
Omake:
…In the beginning was the father of monsters, and the father of monsters was Grogar, and Grogar was father to many monsters both of his own making and of his adoption…
…Now one day the father of monsters took himself off to another dimension and gave unto a monster named 'Scrappy' an artifact for his use – this artifact was named 'The Daemon Ritus' and Grogar judged that it would be well-placed in Scrappy's paws: for although Scrappy was a monster of diminutive physical stature, he was both mean and fierce of spirit…
…Many moons passed, and Grogar returned to the dimension of Scrappy, and found that Scrappy was in circumstances much changed – for he was held in captivity, cast into durance vile by his enemies. But this was of no matter to Grogar, who instead requested that Scrappy return unto him the Daemon Ritus, now that he should have had adequate time to finish field-testing it, and Grogar's loan of the item now being ended. And Scrappy hung his head in shame and said that the Daemon Ritus had been taken from him by his enemies and he knew not where it was placed now, but that if Grogar could only set him free…
Grogar told Scrappy very firmly 'No!' and departed, leaving Scrappy to his imprisonment, the father of monsters discounting the Ritus as being lost to him for good, and vowing to take more care of the disposition of his magical artifacts and to whom he entrusted them or otherwise disposed of them in the future…
(Author Note: Because the random idea of a My Little Pony crossover with the universe of the 2002 Scooby Doo film was something that I had to write down to make it go away.)
