sonicshadow1

It wasn’t every day that Vinyl was able to wake up under her own volition. Usually, it was the startling intrusion of alarms blaring into her dreams, or the incessant jabbing of an irate agent that woke her. As such, it wasn’t unexpected for the DJ to have rolled over and snuggled back into her pillow, drift off for a few more hours, before finally deciding that she couldn’t sleep any more. With a yawn and a stretch, the unicorn rolled onto her back, bleary eyes adjusting to the state of wakefulness. The ceiling was as familiar as ever as she looked up at it. It was white-washed and bare, and she stared at it for a few mome

Octavia was quite pleased that Lyra had accompanied Bon-Bon to meet her at the train station. Although the cellist was no stranger to lugging around heavy bags, boxes and equipment on occasion, she didn’t think she’d have enjoyed dragging her suitcase through the town. It had taken the trio a half hour to arrive at the unicorn’s house, and not a single pony had stopped them other than to say a hearty hello or similar greeting. Octavia found it very refreshing. Having lived in Canterlot for the majority of her life, she was well aware of how quickly news spread, and how people’s reputations could be tarnished by such t

The usual click and clack of hooves on pavement was accompanied by the repeated splash and splosh of hooves clopping through puddles every few feet. Canterlot didn’t require a lot of rainfall, the whitewashed and gilded buildings looking all the more splendid in glorious sunshine; but even the capital and residence of the princess of the sun needed to water the various gardens and surrounding hills. It just so happened to be on a day that Octavia was forced to walk to the train station rather than take her usual chariot taxi. It had been a month since she had sent her letter to Ponyville, and the rumour mill had been working at full ca

Each of the three subspecies of Ponies had their capitals. The Unicorns had Canterlot, the Earth Ponies had Manehatten. The Pegasus had Cloudsdale. The cloud city was separate from the other two, however, as only Pegasus could actually live there, the plush clouds and altitudes only accessible by flight unless powerful, uncommon magic was used. Because of the inaccessibility, other cloud cities made an effort to benefit from the contributions of the other ponies. They lowered the altitude of their cities, bringing the clouds closer to the ground and interacting with the ground bound ponies of Equestria. Fresh produce and intricate works of a

The concert hall sat in silence as the last few notes coming from the orchestra on the stage reverberated through the building, the audience waiting until they died down. Unable to contain themselves right to the end, however, the various ponies of the Orchestra barely managed to pull themselves out of their final motions before an uproar of hoof beats and stomps drowned out the fading music. Octavia pulled her bow away from her cello and glanced up at the audience, taking in the site of hundreds of ponies stomping their hooves in applause. It never ceased to amaze her that despite their joyous exuberance in showing their approval of the per

The dull roar of rain hitting the cobblestone paths of the streets of Ponyville had been continuous for the better part of the afternoon. The weather team had been scheduled for a downpour for quite some time but errors in cloud production from Cloudsdale had created a cloud shortage. This had caused a back log of showers and to get themselves back on track the team had decided to do several at once. Although the ponies of the town could see the reasoning behind it they weren't overly keen on the bad weather, least of all Bon-Bon. The confection maker sat behind the counter top of her shop, a hoof holding up her head as she stared out at the

"Well... aren't you going to invite me in?" Beauty asked, dressed as impeccably as ever in her bow tie and carefully groomed mane. The two mares had been stood in the doorway in silence, one with a pleasant smile, the other with a blank, mouth half open stare. Octavia's brain furiously ticked away inside her skull, desperately trying to restart itself from its addled state and articulate a response. "Huh?" was all it managed to come up with. "Oh, for goodness' sake, dear," Beauty replied, her smile turning into more of a smirk as she stepped forwards to let herself in, easily brushing the cellist to one side as she passed. "One would think

It used to be a strange sensation, waking up in a different bed. Vinyl remembered when she first began to tour that she found it difficult falling asleep in strange, unfamiliar locations. It took her a long time to be able to adapt to the different noises and atmospheres of each town or city where she lay down her head but she'd never manage to get a perfect night's sleep anywhere but her own bed. When she cracked one of her eyelids open in the bed provided to her by Octavia however, she found that she'd rested quite well. The curtains had already been closed before she'd fallen asleep the night before, which she was thankful for as she hadn

The streets had grown darker still. Celestia's sun had long since vanished beneath the horizon and Luna's stars were free to sparkle within the night sky without being hidden behind the sun's light. It had also grown a little chilly, or so Octavia thought as she watched her breath wisp away in front of her as she cantered out of the building. She remembered the weather report calling for clear skies that evening and the lack of clouds was doing little to keep the heat in. Autumn was quickly descending on Equestria with the last days of summer coming to an end and she found herself wondering when she should begin looking for her scarf again.

Life in Canterlot was a mixture of business and pleasure, though few ponies realised it. No matter what your chosen profession in life you had to try and sell your talents. Many ponies did this at dinner parties and extravagant balls, casually dropping hints of what they did and how successful they were at doing it at seemingly random intervals to the ponies they were discussing with. Many conversations were actually started in such a way, a method of breaking the ice which at the same time determined whether or not the pony that was being spoken to was worth investing time in them. A part of being a successful businesspony was making friend