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Incoherent noises

Chapter 72

Twilight sighed, looked into the bag of pastries, her second purchase for the day from Sugarcube Corner, cast a spell that would alert her when an hour had passed so that she could move on to her next stop, and then looked at the Ponyville Schoolhouse with as much trepidation as she had once felt looking upon the Everfree Forest.

A sphere of invisibility protected her from casual detection, and it was a necessary defence considering the increasing rabidity of the paparazzi, with the ever-overworked Officer Rulebook having to issue more and more fines and cautions to the mob as the desperate reporters began trying more and more demented plans to get that all-important incriminating shot. At least five of the paparazzi had already been jailed for a disturbance of the peace involving an altercation for a prize perch ontop of the Ponyville Council Offices that looked directly into Twilight’s room … if one had a long distance, high-resolution lense on an illegal, magically-augmented camera, that is.

I need to invest in some one-way windows for the library after this. Lead-lined, preferably, to deal with the paparazzi who’ve got those infernal x-ray lenses. Twilight sighed and tried to rustle up some more courage to get herself through the door and into the school-house. Telling Cherilee that the Crusaders had cursed themselves again would be a piece of cake, but trying to avoid the conversation turning to dating, let alone Cherilee’s last encounter with Twilight where the purple princess had been ignorant of the fact that the school-teacher had been trying to entice Twilight into playing the role of the naughty student to Cherilee’s dominant teacher … And maybe I should be prepared to teleport out of here at the drop of a hat. Or the swish of a ruler. She did mention something about spanking naughty students the last time, and after what happened with the Spa Twins, I am taking no chances!

“Excuse me, Cherilee?” Twilight called out, tapping a hoof on the main door to the school-house and waiting for a response. She could be checking the students’ homework, or working out a lesson plan. Definitely not lying in wait for me with a wicked grin and a ruler that’s about to be used as a spanking device.

The thought of preparing a quick teleportation spell, just in case, suddenly became far more appealing.

“Twilight? Come in, come in!” Cherilee’s voice came out to her in bright, happy tones. Twilight wondered if Cherilee would still be so chipper after Twilight shot her down …

“Hey … Cherilee … sorry for dropping in unannounced, but we’ve got kinda … well, the Crusaders did something rather drastic to themselves, and then they got involved in something even worse …” The purple alicorn began, forcing herself to speak slowly and without stuttering as the school-teacher approached, looking utterly confused at the absence of a body to go with the voice before the purple alicorn dropped her invisibility spell after a final visual sweep of the area for more paparazzi. As Twilight ‘appeared’ before her, Cherilee clapped her hooves together in delight, the school-teacher favouring Twilight with a brilliant smile on her face, accepting the bag of pastries with a murmur of approval as she led Twilight into the school-house before gesturing for her guest to take a seat on one of the student’s tables, while the school-teacher fiddled with a coffee-machine. “Hoooo boy, okay, so, this is going to be awkward, but there’s a few things we need to talk about.”

“Well, whatever mess the Crusaders have gotten themselves into this time, so long as you’re prepared to help the Crusaders keep their averages up, I’m fine with them taking a short break from school. I mean, it’s not like extenuating circumstances don’t go hoof-in-hoof with their ‘crusades’, after all, and having a Princess vouching for them certainly goes a long way towards making the Education Board ignore their absences from school.” The magneta-coloured mare sighed and gave Twilight a small grin as she poured two cups of coffee and hoofed one over to Twilight. “Faust knows you, of all ponies, wouldn’t be pulling them out of school without a serious reason. And I’m assuming that their families know?”

“Errr, yes. The Apples and Rarity are well acquainted with the situation, but I’m at somewhat at a loss to find Scootaloo’s parents to inform them. Scootaloo is very close-lipped on the subject, the other Crusaders don’t know when they’ll be home, and nopony I’ve spoken to can tell me what they do for a living, or even what they look like.” Accepting the cup of coffee with a hoof, not wanting to lord her magic over the hard-working teacher and also wanting to conserve her magical abilities for a flash-teleport out of the room if something else went wrong, Twilight took a deep breath and savoured the aroma of the coffee before taking a polite sip. “There’s also the problem that the Crusaders were accidentally exposed to medication designed to produce a ‘false’ estrus when a miscommunication turned a prank into a potential felony, so we’re very keen to keep them contained until the medication works its way out of their systems for obvious reasons.”

Cherilee blinked, slowly, and took a large gulp of her coffee, apparently oblivious to or conditioned to the burn as her expression turned pensive, then horrified.

“A second generation of Crusaders. I don’t think I’m paid enough to teach two generations of Crusaders in a row …” The teacher mused out loud with a horrified note to her voice, to which Twilight giggled.

“Yes, and the nature of the … curse … they’re labouring under means they are a potential risk to both the other fillies as well as the colts. It’s awkward and I am humiliated to admit Sweetie Belle did this with a spell-scroll I’d been translating, but until their bodies purge the medication, they’re stuck as a ‘third’ gender, if you can believe such a thing exists.”

“Oh, the Neighpone thing?” Twilight’s eyes bugged out and she stared at Cherilee, who shrugged and grinned again at Twilight, this time with obvious mirth. “I went to college and was a real wild-child, remember? Lots of crazy parties and crazier ponies all packed into the same dorm. I roomed with an exchange student from that nation and kind of found out the hard way that such a thing existed when spring rolled around and the poor exchange student got locked into a dorm that was full of randy college mares leaking their hormones all over the place.” Cherilee’s grin turned wider and more shark-like as Twilight spluttered into her cup of coffee. “So the Crusaders are packing and in the middle of a false estrus? Holy Faust, I hope you’re supplying them with the mother-load of birth-control supplies, because if they’re anything like Cherry Blossom, they’ll be damn-near insatiable.”

“You’re … ah, you’re taking this rather well. Nurse Redheart just about threatened to murder somepony when she found out.” At once relieved that Cherilee wasn’t making a scene over the accidental transmutation that Sweetie Belle had brought onto the Crusaders and shocked that the school-teacher was being so blasé about the whole situation, Twilight pushed on. “Y-yes, about the ‘protection’ issue, after the invasion of the Succuponi, I’ve got Spike making the Crusaders meals and making sure they can stay at the spare room in the library, since as a dragon, Spike should be all but immune to mammalian pheromones, and I’ve also recruited Trixie to … guide the girls and make sure they take their morning-after pills and herbal teas, and cast the Spring’s Regret Spell on the girls constantly, just in case the mundane abortificants start to lose effectiveness.”

“Redheart’s always be pretty violent for a mare who works in health-care, but yeah, I’m not surprised, she worked in a really seedy area of Neigh York and thus had to deal with a lot of really sketchy ponies when she was working as a trainee nurse before moving out here. Mare’s got a mean-streak a mile wide, and for good reason considering what they’d try to pull on the nurses working in the waiting rooms in Neigh York. But I’d also make sure Spike knows that if the girls start to get too rowdy, and let’s not forget Trixie doesn’t exactly inspire confidence in the rest of the townsponies, that he should go and get Redheart to help him.” Cherilee sighed, her eyes flicking over Twilight and the bag of pastries before closing in thought for several seconds, and the school-teacher seated herself ontop of her teacher’s table before speaking again.

“We shouldn’t forget that even if he is a baby dragon, he’s still sexually active enough to have an interest in mares. The Crusaders’ pheromones might not affect him, but his own hormones might push him to take advantage of the situation, or he might have another emotionally-powered growth-spurt and we could end up with the next generation of Cutiemark Crusaders being half-dragon ontop of the rest of this mess.” The school-teacher sighed and shuddered silently at some ill-received thought at having to teach those children. “And let’s also not forget that out of the young colts in town, the only real competition he’s got for the affection of the girls would be Snips and Snails, and neither of those two are particularly inspiring examples to convince three hormonal, horny messes who have never really shown any measureable amount of common sense thus far to say no to a rather charming drake.”

“Uh, but what about Featherweight, Button Mash, Pip and … what’s his face? The food-one?” Twilight asked, feeling a little upset that she couldn’t remember the young colt’s name. I’ve lived in this town for years! I’ve defended these ponies with my life! I should know this!

“Truffle Shuffle? Yeah, he’s a little, well, forgettable unless the topic turns to gourmet food, then you can’t get him to shut up. But no, I’m fairly certain Featherweight is about as queer as a seven-bit note, Button Mash doesn’t pay attention to any girls in the ‘three-dee verse’, as he calls it, Pip’s been obsessed with Princess Luna ever since that Nightmare Night incident and Truffle and Twist have been dating for over a year now, so the only unattached colts in my classroom are the two I’d vote most likely to never know the touch of a mare outside of their own mothers.”

“… Ow. I mean, I get they’re dorky and kind of uninteresting unless you’re looking for disposable minions like Trixie did, but still … ow.”

“Twilight, I know Snips and Snails, I’ve known them since they were tiny little foals just starting their school-years. They’d be some of my best students if I could only get them to have some self-confidence, but between Snips’s parents weaponizing him to use as a bludgeon against each other during their divorce and keeping it up for the past ten years out of utter loathing for one-another, and Snail’s parents’ apparent obsession with telling everyone, in-front of their own son no-less, that’s he’s as slow as the creature his cutie mark represents, I spend most of my time with them in school trying to keep them from becoming total dropouts because everypony important in their lives keeps telling them they are losers.”

Twilight’s jaw worked silently as she digested that little bit of information, while Cherilee, apparently relieved to have somepony else to vent to, before the new Princess found an opportunity to get a word in edgewise. “Well, about the boys … this is going to sound awkward, but I’ve been worried that Spike is … well, he’s becoming isolated both from our friends, and ponies his own age. He really only hangs out with the girls and me when we’re off on an adventure, and maybe the Crusaders when they try to make him the focus of their next adventure to get Cutie Marks, so I kind of made a deal with him. If I can get Snips and Snails average grade up to a B-, I’ll give him the weekends off … which he can then spend with Snips and Snails.”

“Clever. Spike helps his friends get their confidence back up, they get the grades they’ll need to be more than labourers once they graduate, and maybe learning that an actual Princess is taking notice of their children will get the parents of my two favourite goof-balls to start acting like actual parents.” Cherilee mused, rubbing at her chin with a hoof while crossing and re-crossing her legs, some sort of nervous tic, Twilight assumed, and certainly was not about squeezing Cherilee’s teats against each other like some sort of demented stress-toy. “I’m all for it, actually, and while they’d never admit it, the two do look up to you, Twilight, and they consider Spike a friend. If you pitch this idea of yours to them the right way, that if they up their grades with your help, they’ll get to hang out with Spike more, you’d probably get them to agree on the spot.”

Time passed in merciful banal fashion as Twilight and Cherilee discussed which topics Snips and Snails struggled with, how best to approach their self-defeating attitudes without causing further issues with the unlucky duo’s parents, and then catch-up work for the Crusaders. It was a treat to simply talk with another intelligent mare about something as familiar and comforting to Twilight as studying and schoolwork, without having to wonder if Cherilee was concerned about her Princess-hood or in cahoots with the paparazzi, and so it came as something of a disappointment when, as Twilight and Cherilee were putting the last touched to the lesson-plan for the Crusaders to follow when the spell-timer Twilight had set up earlier went off, appearing as a small, glowing version of Twilight’s face.

^{"Warning! Twilight, you are approaching the time limit! You have ~one~ hour and ~thirty~ minutes until the train to Canterlot departs from Ponyville Station. Warning! Twilight, you are approaching the ..."} The small illusion chanted, pausing slightly as it enunciated the time, before Twilight waved a hoof through it. ^{"Delay warning for ~ten~ minutes or dismiss?"}

“Delay, delay.” The purple alicorn grumbled, giving Cherilee an apologetic look as the illusion disappeared with a small ‘pop’ noise. “I’m sorry, Cherilee, I’m going to have cut this short. I need to get the girls to Canterlot before tomorrow morning for yet another potential world-shaking disaster nopony decided we needed to know about, as usual, and I have to meet up with Luna back at the library to make sure the Crusaders know they have to look after Fluttershy’s cottage for a few days.”

“We’re letting the Crusaders take over Fluttershy’s cottage? I’ll have to let Mayor Mare know the apocalypse is coming earlier than scheduled this week.” Cherilee feigned a swoon, to which Twilight laughed and threw a muffin-wrapper at the other mare in protest.

“Well, we’re hoping the task of looking after all those animals will tucker them out too much to, well, you know.” Twilight pointed out, before getting up … and finding herself staring at Cherilee, on her back and with her ‘goods’ on full display, the teacher grinning back up at Twilight.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!

“W-wuh-well I’ve got to go, busy Princess stuff and all.” Stammering furiously, Twilight tottered for the exit, keeping wide, panicking eyes on Cherilee as the earth pony stretched and curled in ways that the equine body surely should not have been able to do without doing severe damage to itself, contorting herself into a position that made Twilight’s eyes nearly pop out of their skull.

“You know, Twilight, you never did give me a proper answer from last time. Did you want to … be my naughty, naughty little student?” Cherilee purred, slinking off the table and towards Twilight with a smouldering look on her face and a definite waggle to her hips. “For all you learned from a book, I’m willing to bet there’s quite a few things you can’t learn between sheets of paper, but rather between sheets of silk?”

Twilight responded with a particularly articulate series of squeaks and coughing noises, wings shooting out from her back and her hooves flailing wildly in the air before she remembered to breath and shouted back.

“Havetogosavetheworldandtalktomarefriendaboutaccursedsexappealbye!”

Taking off into the air at top speed, Twilight made it about a hundred foot into the air before a shout of joy made her head whip around and her rocketing ascension turn into a fumbling hover as scores of reporters came flapping their way, cameras and note-pads at the ready.

“Can I not have five minutes of peace from you damn vultures?” Twilight shouted, stress, frustration and panic wearing down her natural shyness and sense of decorum as she gathered the magic for another invisibility sphere as the mob of paparazzi came screaming towards her.

“NO!” the mob shouted back, before squawking in dismay as their target rippled in the air and then vanished, the paparazzi dispersing to check the clouds and the bushes, and one nosy reporter popping his head into a window in the school-house, only to be sent packing by a duster that powdered the stallion’s face with multi-coloured chalk-dust.

Chuckling, Cherilee went to the window and leaned out it, watching as a strangely Alicorn-shaped hole punched it’s way through a cloud high above the swarm of blue-balled reporters, smiling as she imagined her flustered prey’s face.

“That wasn’t a no, Twilight.” The school-teacher whispered to herself as she pulled her head back inside the building and lifted a hoof to pull the window down, only to pause as she thought back to something Twilight had said.

“A marefriend, is it? Time to talk to the club, and see who has dared to lay hooves on our sweet little Twilight without going through us first …”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“THE SHIPPING WILL LAST FOREVER!” Cadence bellowed, sitting upright from the bed, eyes wide open but unseeing, before collapsing back onto the inn’s bed and began mumbling and giggling in her sleep once again.

“Sir?” Adamant whispered, having ducked behind a handy couch when his monarch had begun talking and giggling in her sleep, the crystal pony’s eyes barely emerging from behind the flimsy barricade.

“No idea, but keep the tranquilizers handy.” Shining Armor grunted, lifting a hoof to pull a pillow off his horn that had been propelled into his face at high speed by Cadence’s wing when she’s bolted upright in bed. “Has anypony seen Flash Sentry? We could do with a sacrificial offering, and I think he’s just about earned that role by now.”

“Sir, the last we saw him, Private Flash Sentry had holed up in the foyer and was keeping the reporters from coming up the stairwell to intrude on Princess Cadence’s privacy.” One of the other Crystal Guards whispered from the other side of the room, where the two crystal ponies had embraced each other seconds after Cadence’s sleep-shouting had begun. “Permission to go aid him, sir?”

“Permission granted, no sense in more of us being traumatized than absolutely necessary.” The Royal Consort said, closing his eyes and counting to ten before taking another breath as his normally-stalwart ponies fled the room like cats fleeing a kennel full of dogs. “Adamant, remind me when we get back to Canterlot that I willingly married Cadence, would you?”

“O-of course, sir! But I’m sure this is just some … some temporary anomaly!” The diamond-coated crystal pony gave Shining the most tearful, puppy-dog-eyes look that Shining had seen since the time a filly by the name of Twilight had messed up a hair-growth spell and caused all her fur to fall out at once.

“I’m not divorcing my wife, Adamant. But after today’s debacle, she’s on the Royal Couch for at least a week after this.” The white-coated stallion sighed and took a long look at the hole his horn had punched in the pillow, before throwing the ruined cushion back onto the bed with a frustrated sigh. “And I have to keep my head in the game, because when we get back to Canterlot tomorrow, I need to take Princess Celestia to task about using my own sister as bait to get Cadence and I out of Canterlot.”

“Is … is that wise, sir?”

“If one were wise, good Adamant, one would never get involved with Alicorns.”