Post by Luna on Jun 12, 2013 23:33:33 GMT -5
Canterlot
(&)=(&)=(&)=(&)=(&)=(&) =+= CANTERLOT =+= (&)=(&)=(&)=(&)=(&)=(&)
Canterlot, the capital of Equestria, is an aloof city built into the side of Canterlot Mountain. Its towers and spire soar majestically forth,defying gravity and expectations, the royal palace of the princesses foremost among its buildings. Up close, Canterlot is a place filled with clean, broad plazas, beautiful terraces, and shiny, bright stone buildings. The city is very old, but has a constantly refreshed air of newness.
Perhaps this is because of the pride of its citizens, who think of themselves as being at the intellectual and historical center of their country. Perhaps it's also because those citizens are predominantly unicorns, andt heir magical talent is good for not just changing the seasons, but keeping their city clean. For whatever reason, the commerical district of Canterlot is filled with fascinating shops selling curios, inventions, magic items, spell scrolls, glassware, books, fine art, and quality hardware. It's a city of proud, intelligent ponies thrilled to be living so close to their benevolent ruler, Princess Celestia.
[ Buildings: <St>ar Paige's Home, <O>ld Black Forest Bakery, ]
[ The <V>elvet Rope, Canterlot <U>niversity, ]
[ To the <R>oyal Palace! ]
[ Roads: <Down> the Mountain ]
Firefly has arrived.
Bardigan has arrived.
Nightshade has arrived.
EconomistBrony has arrived.
Luna walks out of the front gates of the palace, her hoofsteps slow but her silver shoes clacking loudly on the flagstones. Her head is held high, face and aquamarine eyes cold and regal as they wander the plaza in formal acknowledgement that everything she sees is her kingdom. Her mane and tail are especially glittery tonight, shining a circle of starlight around her as they whip in the light breeze. And then... she looks straight at Bardigan, and the Royal Canterlot Voice happens. "LOYAL SUBJECTS, WE HAVE AN UNUSUAL GIFT FOR THEE. A STALLION HAS ASKED US TO DANCE. THY PRINCESS DOES DANCE, BUT AS OF NOW HAS BUT ONE DANCE PARTNER. SO, TONIGHT WE SHALL DANCE FOR THEE, A DANCE SADLY FORGOTTEN BY MODERN PONIES, THAT THIS STALLION MAY KNOW EXACTLY WHAT HE IS ASKING FOR ERE HE COMMIT."
Nightshade, as usual, is sidelined in the shadows of the courtyard pillars, but that suits her just fine. To watch from darkness is her favoured mode of presence. She sits at the edges, observing with a keen eye...
Firefly is in the blacony, quietly sitting, watching.
EconomistBrony is off somewhere, doing something, before he recognizes the unmistakable earth shaking caused by Luna's Canterlot Voice. Oh, dear. Wait, was he supposed to be somewhere? He ponders for a moment before turning towards Bardigan and the Princess. Probably there. He trots off from the store he was at, leaving his half-purchased goods there, to arrive at the palace's front gate. This is something he hasn't seen for a loooong tim- er, ever.
Starlight has arrived.
Bardigan's dressed up to be snazzy. One cannot *not* be snazzy when they receive a personal invitation from the Princess. An outfit that wouldn't be out of place in the Reneighssance complements his hat, and he's wearing it completely straight. He glances up and returns the look when Luna peers directly at him, ears perked under his hat, which is pulled down conspicuously low on his forehead. A tiny little raise of his eyebrow is all the acknowledgement given of the strangeness of Luna's remark.
Scope has arrived.
Luna having made her speech stands in the middle of the plaza, Bardigan forgotten. Her wings extend, and she stretches them forward, twisting her body to make sure they're limber first on the right side, then the left. Those extra-long wings give a hard beat, and wind gusts around the plaza as she leaps up into the air. Another powerful flap brings her even with the balcony where Firefly waits. Hovering now, Luna extends a front hoof, giving Firefly a fond and rather wicked grin. "Shall we dance the Griffon Dance, most faithful? Thou must dance it pure, as this is for their edification, not thy training. No magic."
Firefly tilts her head and hoves up from the balcony, descending to the stage to face her Princess, nodding, backing off a bit. No magic, this would be fun. While a bit dissappointed she could not show off her training with the new magics, this would be a good excersize. The rocs in the forest were getting scared to play anymore. She lopps back into position, flaring her pinions and sweeping her wings once, a good sweep, to swoosh the air and stretch a bit.
Bardigan rubs his chin, wondering what 'griffon dance' Luna could be refering to. He does know at least a few of their dances involve a lot of leaping and screeching and very often the death of a few of the revelers, but this looks new on him... Nevertheless he stays in the open in the plaza, watching with a studying eye.
Luna follows her up, spiraling around Firefly at first and then sliding away through the sky to the far side of the plaza. The glow of starlight from her mane and tail keep her brightly lit for the audience, and Firefly's wings glow like moonlight, keeping her visible as well. From up there, Luna's voice booms, "ALAS, THAT THERE IS NO MUSIC ANYMORE, BUT WITH OR WITHOUT... BELOVED FIREFLY, I SHALL HAVE THIS DANCE." With that she whips around in a circle and charges, front hooves extended like claws, speeding through the air towards Firefly like a missile!
..What's all this racket about?" Letting out a yawn, a sleepy Sun Knight staggers out onto the balcony of his quarters with tired eyes blinking open and trying to focus, only seeing a pair of illuminated blobs moving about one another backdropped by a darker blob. Oh, wait. Horn aglow he retreives his glasses from his nightstand and sets them upon the bridge of his nose and only then do things come into foc-- .. What the deuce? o.O
Marble_Memory has arrived.
Firefly's eyes light up and she listens, grinning. This move...resulted in her eating part of Ponyville's main road. "THEN LET US DANCE!!!!" and with loud piercing crack of air, she too jets forward like a missile, the two streaking objects tearing across the skies towards one another, She veers not a millimeter as they draw close, she locks her own hooves forward, hoof to claw, shall be no draw...preparing a second action...as they are about to clash, she sweeps her wings back and rotates them, leading edge up....slamming hooves to hooves in a peal of thunder, then in a flash bringing locked wings foward and down the double axe chop of her wings at the knees of the 'claws' before her.
Apple_Bloom has arrived.
Marble_Memory has left.
Luna's hooves meet Firefly's, and Firefly spins down like a buzzsaw, but in that eye blink Luna shoves Firefly out of wing's length. Laughing, the princess circles down. In the middle of that loop her wings flap hard, twice, and she arcs back up much faster, in a streak of blue and silver, one wing extended to swipe at Firefly from underneath like the edge of a blade.
Bardigan's face scrunches up, his lips pursing as he turns a hoof up at the 'dance' about to ensue. "Music? *I* could have provided the music for - oh my goodness." His hoof goes limp before slowly, slowly dropping down to the ground. This is... not a dance he has ever spun with a mare on any floor that *he* can remember. And yet, it's still remarkably appropriate to call it a "griffon" dance.
After a few long moments of analyzing the pair's movements, the orange unicorn upon the balcony bites his lower lip with a "Hrrrrrrrrmm..", eventually shaking his head with a frown. "No sir, I don't like it!" Turning around, Sunflare trots back into his room and locks the glass door behind him.
Firefly s ears pull back as she makes a note of redirected force. She turns her new momentum into something useful, knowing full well a counter attack would be forthwith. Angling one wing out and up, the other out an down, the Squire of the Night pulls up into an arc, but she is not in level flight, her body is rotating rapidly, almost violently as she tightens her wings to increase the rotation, a veritable pink and blue blur, front hooves placed forward, wings angled, looking and sounding like an airplane propeller, a living buzzsaw, deflection and return strike in one.
Luna finds herself flying straight up into that. She has a half a second to change strategies, but for an ancient warhorse that is enough. Her wings furl, her body spins like a ballerina, and her long back leg shoots out to strike at the side of the buzzsaw, to combine a kick with pushing herself off as her wings release and flap again, shooting her up and away at an angle.
Nomad has arrived.
Firefly finds herself shooting away as well, at an ooposing angle, not to mention feeling a bit spin dizzy. It was a new manuever after all, one of a few. She could feel the impact had added to her velocity a bit so she reverses the angle of her wings with a whoosh the rotation ceases as she banks upwards, hard, trying to place where the other angle of that impact would be, and then a loud crack again pierces the air as she snaps her wings back, then across, and power strokes back, turning a midair ninety degree snap roll towards where she hoped Luna would be, or rather, just past it, assuming the obvious flight path would be the wrong one for a seasoned fighter to use.
Bardigan looks back and forth at any other ponies who might still be in the plaza - those who haven't taken cover or run for their lives yet at any rate - reaching out and trying to get their attention so he can figure out if this is a regular occurrence. And then it hits him: this is *exactly* the kind of thing that would be common around here, wouldn't it? With Luna at least. He looks back up as cracks and snaps break the air, his mouth gaping open. Still plenty of that old fear, yes, but as the dance goes on and he peers closer and closer at the intricate maneuvers, there's something approaching awe in there too. It's amazing he hasn't dived under a table, but the fight *is* still happening way up there.
Luna laughs, sailing off after the kick. "Firefly, Firefly my darling, thou become rusty. I must train thee harder on the basics." It's not like she's going slow, but her arc continues, swooping along where Firefly aims to be, right up until at the last moment she spins again, extending a long back leg, her whole body really, intent on that hoof intercepting Firefly's face.
Firefly laughs and hooks a wing out, spinning around as well, while it was the original intended manuuever, it served a defensive purpose this time. Luna's hooves connect all right, a resounding boom as one of Fire's hind hooves connect and kick off of Luna's in one heck of a CLACK. one that sends Fire off in a ricochet. But not a long one, she takes a deep breath and attempts another new manuever, one only tested until now on mindless rocs in Everfree. She throws her head back, swings her hindlegs forward under her and extends her front hooves, then in a peal of thunder slams her wings back, pulling a one eighty and rocketing right back at Luna. "RUSTY!?!?!?!"
Luna is knocked away as well, but she swings around in a much more gentle circle, flying up to meet Firefly's charge in a smooth and not especially hurried stroke. Only at the last moment does she extend her own forehooves, again to meet Firefly's - but not to push off of them. This touch is just to push Firefly's blow aside a few inches, so she can pass right beside her squire, body to body, her own twisting just enough to bring her shoulder into the path of Firefly's head as it thunders past.
Firefly realizes this error perhaps a bit slow by alicorn standards....but that slow approach Luna made was a tipoff to another redirection, and this time there wasn't time for her to dodge it, rather, she has just enough time to rotate her wings give one stroke back to get them out of the way and tuck her head a bit, bracing, rolling slightly -into- the impact, using her full weight and velocity to put as much as her forehead as she could into her Princess' shoulder. The collision was intense, but such was the reward for such a mistake. For Firefly, it wa slike hitting a planet. She recoils as much as is blasted back and off to one side, spun a bit, one wing, slips out to try to slow the spiral, then with a thumpo that vibrated the ground she crash landed, kind of sideways in that spiral. amidst a few softly flutterintg pink feathers and settling dust. "Buy some @*($&U@ Apples that hurt." shaking her head.
Bardigan winces, gritting his teeth as the combat ratchets up to 'ponies smacking into solid stone' levels. Firefly's crash is close enough that he jumps up with a fright and flutters back a few pony lengths, landing next to EB. "Did you see that?" he hisses excitedly as if talking too loud might actually disturb the fight, nudging the unicorn's shoulder with vigorous enthusiasm. "She just got *up* from that! Should we be scared? I'm not scared."
Luna is knocked into a spin herself by the jolt, but she took it on the shoulder, so that spin becomes a perfectly controlled downward spiral, until Luna pulls up at the last moment and lands daintily on the flagstones next to the heap of her squire. She curtseys, hind legs stepping back, one foreleg remaining extended, the other knee bent and her head dipping down until her horn nearly touches the ground as her wings extend high above her. "Very rusty. Thou fight as every opponent were a dragon, but worry not. A blade like thee is worth holding to the grindstone." That is all whispered to Firefly in the softest of voices as Luna bows low. When she rises up again her wings lower, one of them to caress down Firefly's mane, then start scooping her up onto Luna's back. The pleasantries exchanged with her fallen foe, she still has the crowd to address, or at least to blast with the gale force of the Royal Canterlot Voice. "WE HOPE THAT OUR SUBJECTS ENJOYED AND WERE EDUCATED. THIS IS HOW A PRINCESS DANCES. THE DANCE IS ENDED, AND WE THANK OUR PARTNER FIREFLY FOR AGREEING TO DANCE JUST THIS ONCE WHERE THOU MAY SEE."
"Don't get too excited," says Nightshade, suddenly emerging from the shadows behind Bardigan. "It's not considered polite." She continues to watch the display, making the required gestures of politeness as required. "Ah, yes, fascinating," she tells one member of the royal court.
EconomistBrony applauds his hooves politely, looking rather much in awe.
It's probably fortunate the fight ended when it did. Bardigan *might* have ended up shouting and clambering all over EB to make sure he got excited too. No applause from him, just more open-mouthed gaping. "Th- that... goodness," he breathes. And only then it hits him. "Dance... that's how... *oh.*" Somehow, his eyes get even wider than before.
Firefly presses her head to the wing stroke, remaining quiet as she is scooped up. She lies across Luna's back, shaking dirt off of herself then flexing her wings, rotating them, slow sweeping, making sure everything was working. Then it hits her. "The zig zag is what I should have returned with..." then nods to the 'audience' as it were. "It has been envigorating..but yes, direct force clearely is not enough. You may need a few more grindstones." laughing, then spreads her wings and lifts up to hover, making sure her pinions all felt right, landing lightly beside her Princess. "I do beleive I have a headache."
EconomistBrony is also quite happy that Bardigan didn't start clamboring all over him. Clamboring gets -manes- dirty. Let alone hooves. Hooves AND manes, perhaps! Or, worst of all... the economist gasps inwardly... one could get one's mane soiled - by- dirty hooves. He nearly tears up at the prospect. He does, however, nod over at the Bard of Gan at his gasp. "Yes. Dance. Quite a sight, is it not?"
"It is an ancient, time-honoured custom," Nightshade explains, "an encapsulation of gryphon ethos: the idea of struggle as a means of social construction."
Luna ignores the crowd now, may even have forgotten it. She walks back into the palace with Firefly beside her, chatting amicably, "A hot bath for thy body and a cold compress for thy head, I suggest. Myself, I shall call in the Royal Groomers. I, too, am shamefully out of practice, and my muscles are sore and could use a rubdown." Just before she disappears inside, her wing stretches out to curl around the back of Firefly's head and neck, and Luna leans in to tell her, "Rusty or not, thou are the finest pegasus warrior alive, and I would have no other as my squire or apprentice."
