#powerponiesproject

We’ve not forgotten you! The building where we answered asks blew up and we had to move and setting up an Ask Area wasn’t high on our priority list. But Hum Drum got better at art and misses you guys so he really, REALLY wanted to do something for Hearts and Hooves Day.

Saddle Rager: Duh. We’re hot.

Masked Matterhorn: Could you not? I can’t say for sure that crush is the right word, but yes, there are villains that certainly seem to take a shine to certain members of the team.

Saddle Rager: Matterhorn is charmingly terrible at being hit on and some villains thrive on that.

Matterhorn: Not just villains.

Saddle Rager: Hush, my love. He’s also very much a gentleman, and a scholar, so the jilted and cynical can hope there’s still a good stallion out there for them, and it could be him.

Matterhorn: It will not be me. Moving on. Mistress Marevelous gets all kinds of unwanted attention from horrible kings for some reason.

Saddle Rager: I think they either recognize a queen when they see one, or secretly want to be strangled in their sleep because they’re being crushed by the pressure of the crown.

Matterhorn: I doubt it. She was also doggedly provoked by the Cat’s Eye burglar for maybe two or three months when it was just Fillisecond and Marevelous. We know she was doing it to get Marevelous’s attention because, according to Marevelous, she shamelessly flirted throughout the chases. She also stopped once the team expanded and she was about as likely to get Radiance or Zapp  as Marevelous or Fillisecond, and she stopped actually stealing anything. She’d break in with something already bagged up, move something that was a similar shape and size out of sight and wait for Marevelous to show up before she’d attempt to leave the building. She’s shown up a couple of times since, but we’ve never actually caught her.

Saddle Rager: Oh, and she kind of does it to all of us, but Mane-iac is like weirdly obsessed with Marevelous in particular in a way that reads almost like a bitter ex or something, and none of us are totally sure why.

Zapp has a gift with henchponies, and we like to send him out to seduce some villains-

Matterhorn: We certainly do not like to.

Saddle Rager: Don’t be jealous- who seem inclined to flirt back and therefore are easier to distract with Zapp’s wiles. By making his one job flirting, we also keep him from getting distracted. It’s a perfect system.

Matterhorn: A perfectly flawed system. It never actually works. Who’s left, you?

Saddle Rager: Yeah. I can’t think of anyone off the top of my head. Maybe Long Face, but I think his idea of a crush is less a crush-crush and more idealizing someone as a potential cure for depression. 

He did that to Radiance too when she was nice to him.

And of course, Radiance gets the brunt of all the weird villain crushes because she’s just…

Matterhorn: Good at manipulating the emotionally damaged?

Saddle Rager: I was thinking more, “really hard not to fall in love with.” Part of why we let her get captured so much is that after a while it became pretty clear that it was safe to leave her alone with the bad guys. If the main villain doesn’t end up at least a little sweet on her, it’s because they didn’t actually interact with her; but when that happens, it’s because their accomplices or henchponies did, and they usually won’t let the main villain hurt her. She just kind of baseline cares about them, and she’s pretty and sweet and clever and thoughtful and, honestly, pretty close to a perfect companion. Like unless you’re immune to lovely ponies being lovely like Matterhorn here, you probably love her. But, notable example: One time Razzle and Dazzle decided to try hypnotizing her into being their lovely assistant.

It worked, she fully thought she was their assistant and forgot they were the bad guys, she wasn’t manipulating them or trying to get them to like her because she thought they were already her friends, but their plan fell apart anyway because they both ended up getting a crush on her and fighting over her so much that they lost focus on the actual scheme, we just had to come to the show and nab them. They’re inseparable. She ruined them by accident, making Masked Matterhorn wrong. She can manipulate them if she feels she has to, or if she knows they won’t like her and needs to figure out a way to stay safe, but usually she just talks to them. She-

Matterhorn: Stop talking, you’re fawning, and giving too much away.

Saddle Rager: Marevelous isn’t here, it’s my job to talk up her marefriend on her behalf.

Matterhorn: Since when?

Saddle Rager: Since Marevelous said so. Radiance is perfect and deserves all the cults that worship her, and also the infatuation and adulation of all who witness her glory. I think that about covers it.

Matterhorn: Thank you. Get to Fillisecond.

Saddle Rager: Oh, everyone loves Fillisecond. Not so much a crush thing though.

Matterhorn: Agreed, they’re more fond of her. Kind of like a little sister.

Saddle Rager: An annoying little sister who wrecks all your plans, but she’s cute, so you can’t stay mad at her. If Radiance is hard not to fall in love with, Fillisecond is hard not to adopt. Actually scratch that, I know of ponies who have crushes on her, they just aren’t villains, and they skew younger than most of our villains do. I guess Fillisecond attracts fellow good ponies. Also, since they DO skew older than Fillisecond, no crushes on Hum Drum either.

Because this is the only time of year we’re always here, we’re on for our Annual Hearts and Hooves Day Event. This year, Mistress Marevelous has decided that she and Radiance will be taking questions all day in order to protect Radiance from the Curse that has plagued her every year prior. Radiance never ends the day able to walk on her own, and now Marevelous is paranoid about it; she put the others on hero duty and it is her personal mission to keep Radiance standicapable until midnight.

To help her, keep them entertained! Ask them for advice, ask them about themselves, about their thus far invincible relationship; the good, the bad, the mundane, the funny, their favorite and least favorite things. They will need it.

Mistress Marevelous: No offense, but don’t you have reality bending powers? Why don’t you just make a babyproof dimension or manifest a nanny or something?

Radiance: Maybe they’ve had bad experiences with past conjured childcare. There’s bound to be a lonely teenager somewhere available to babysit. Maybe your friends are busy, but one of them might have a referral for you. Maybe a niece or nephew or a sitter they’ve used in the past?

Oh! I don’t know if you have it, but if you’re in Maretropolis there’s this childcare agency that has an arrangement with a bunch of local restaurants. So if you call ahead you can request a specific sitter for the restaurant you want to eat at, but there’s a staffed children’s room at each of them. It’s supposed to be for things like if you have a lunch meeting or a job interview or a date, and there’s a fixed price for the room and the children’s food, so they can order whatever they want off the kid’s menu without you and it won’t cost you if they order like ten extra cookies and a chocolate shake for their friends.

Marevelous: Kind of sounds like someone just remembered a time they got ten extra cookies and a shake for a friend.

Radiance: They had so many good cookies. The babysitter referral thing is more likely to work out for them though. They don’t even have to ask for a babysitter, just someone who’s good with babies or might have a very young sibling. Chances are if they have a sibling they’re already stuck at home babysitting anyway, adding a couple of babies they get paid for can’t hurt. I wasn’t even a babysitter but my aunt mentioned I was good with babies to a sleep deprived mom, and I still get asked to watch fussy babies.

Marevelous: Fussy is kind of your specialty.

Radiance: HA! You would know, fussypants!

(P.S. A gift from Hum Drum and Zapp, it was to be your reward.)

As of midnight, Radiance succumbed to the curse. She could not walk by the end of Hearts and Hooves day. Chiefly, because she was asleep, but also because at that particular point in time Mistress Marevelous’s hoof would have been decreasing circulation to one of her hind legs had she been awake.

But before that happened, our last ask got Mistress Marevelous very, very sappy, and Radiance tapped that sap for several hours, ultimately gathering the material she needed to create this:

It’s that time of year again.

Maretropolis has always had pretty long, unusually snowy winters compared to most of Equestria. Hearts and Hooves Day is almost as important as Hearth’s Warming in keeping the city’s morale up, so we’d like to keep up the tradition of our annual Hearts and Hooves Day event.

Masked Matterhorn and Fillisecond will be on duty, but the others will be available for the following:

Hugs, kisses, and emotional support.(Mostly Zapp, but Hum Drum, Saddle Rager and Radiance are also happy to help.)

Personalized card making services.(Hum Drum is in charge, but they’re all contributing.)

Personal questions about their friendships.

Advice for your friendships or love lives.(Do not trust Saddle Rager.)

Questions for Marevelous and Radiance about their unfading mutual adoration for each other.(Recommended. Marevelous loves talking about Radiance and how much they’re definitely seeing each other romantically. It will make her winter.)

We will be aiming to release an ask or two a week from our backlog leading up to Hearts and Hooves Day. We will be accepting normal questions AND Heart’s and Hooves day questions right up until Hearts and Hooves day.

Fillisecond: Sure! Griffins, dragons, weird evil floaty lights, a goat, a big giant thrashy thing that wasn’t a villain but that we thought was one, another big giant thrashy thing with scary teeth that was evil and we thought was evil and was right, imps, rats, big weird bugs that weren’t changlings, weird fire thingies, egg-eating sky lizards, snakes! 

Mistress Marevelous: NO ONE is running against Mayor Blossom!

Saddle Rager: Yeah, they’re just winning.

Mistress Marevelous: Don’t do that! Mayor Blossom is the only one who has gone through the proper channels to run. She filled out the paperwork, she has a campaign, she attended every debate. This other pony isn’t even running, the media just got an idea in it’s head that she should be mayor and now there’s a push to write her in. But she’s the worst. I hate her.

Saddle Rager: I don’t. I happen to think she’s funny.

Marevelous: Because that’s what Maretropolis needs, a funny mayor.

Saddle Rager: You know, maybe they should write you in. You could be Mistress Mayor-velous. Oh, or Mayor Marevelous? Mistress Mayor Marevelous?