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// Harmless Pranks 
// Story: The Element of Laughter 
// by Inky_Quill 
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	One sunny morning in Ponyville, Mr. and Mrs. Cake were hard at work baking four dozen cupcakes for Mayor Mare’s birthday party. The party wasn’t until that afternoon, but Mr. and Mrs. Cake didn’t mind starting their work a little early. They prided themselves on punctuality.
As Mrs. Cake tested the first batch of cupcakes with a toothpick, a pink mare hopped downstairs, somehow balancing a one-bit coin on her nose, the narrow side touching her face and the flat sides spinning round and round like a top. When the mare reached the landing, she stopped for a moment, obviously waiting for some sort of recognition from the Cakes. Unfortunately, the bakers were so used to her antics that they didn’t bat an eye at this particular eccentricity.
“Hiya, Mrs. Cake! You look pretty busy!” said the mare, sticking her nose out to show off her new trick.
“Oh, hello, Pinkie dear,” replied Mrs. Cake. “We were just baking some cupcakes for a very important order. Why don’t you help yourself to a bite in the other room?”
“I already had breakfast, silly!” said Pinkie Pie, ignoring Mrs. Cake’s hint. She crouched behind a counter and slowly lifted her nose above the surface so that the Cakes would be sure to notice her bit trick.
Mr. Cake sighed. “Is that a bit you’ve got there?” he asked.
“Oh yes, indeedy!” shouted Pinkie Pie, springing into view. “It’s an easy trick! Do you wanna try?”
Mr. Cake tried to protest, but he knew that until he humored the young mare, she would never leave him in peace. “Alright, Pinkie, I’ll try,” he said.
Still balancing her own bit, Pinkie Pie tossed Mr. Cake another coin, and he awkwardly positioned it on his nose.
“Like this!” said Pinkie Pie, and she spun the bit on Mr. Cake’s nose. He was so flustered, he drew back sharply, and the bit skidded across the kitchen floor. The deed was done, however, and there on Mr. Cakes snout was an obvious graphite mark.
Mrs. Cake shook her head, and Pinkie Pie snorted, pleased with herself for getting away with her stupid prank. Her own bit fell as she rolled on the floor, laughing. Mr. Cake frowned and washed his face in the sink, and Pinkie strutted out of Sugarcube Corner in search of other fun things to do.
“I know!” she said. “If I’m gonna be prankster, I should go and find Dashie, and we can do it together!”

Rainbow Dash sped over Town Hall, stretching her wings as she always did in the morning. She raced toward the market, a rainbow in her wake, and then flew up sharply toward the sun. Out of nowhere, a cloud collided with her, and in her surprise, she spun out of control.
Regaining her balance, Rainbow Dash glanced over and said angrily, “Come back here you!” She charged the renegade cloud and tackled it, expecting it to burst and dissipate. In a bizarre turn of events, Rainbow Dash found herself covered with sticky, pink cloud. 
“Eww, what is this?” asked the bewildered Rainbow Dash. She licked the cloud. “Cotton candy?” To Rainbow’s surprise, dozens of pink clouds appeared out of thin air and zoomed back and forth. Above her, she heard a thunderclap, and one of the clouds began to leak.
“Wait a second!” said Rainbow Dash, obviously annoyed. “It’s not supposed to rain until tomorrow. You can’t just—” Suddenly, she found herself drenched with rain. No, not rain. She could have sworn it was—but no, it couldn’t be…

“Dashie!” Pinkie Pie shouted to get Rainbow’s attention, but it was too late. The pegasus had dashed off after one of the clouds in a hunt that was destined to fail. Pinkie sagged for a moment, disappointed that her friend was too busy to play with her. Then, she noticed the clouds and the rain. She giggled and bounced away, following Rainbow across Ponyville.

Later, Applejack was harvesting corn at Sweet Apple Acres. It seemed like a normal day until a pink cloud soared over the barn, pursued by Rainbow Dash. 
“Hey, I didn't tell you to go anywhere!” shouted Rainbow. Apart from the cloud’s unusual color, Applejack noticed three disturbing things about the situation. First, the cloud was raining. Second, it was followed by dozens of rainclouds just like it. Third, the rain was… brown!
“Rainbow Dash,” demanded Applejack, “what's going on with this rain? I mean chocolate milk? I mean chocolate milk rain?!”
“There's crazy weather all over Equestria!” said Rainbow Dash. “Cloudsdale’s getting soaked by a major cola storm right now! But don't worry. I'm not leaving you till I get control of Ponyville!”
Applejack didn’t think Rainbow could ever control this chaos, especially since the Sweet Apple Acres cornfields had just begun to pop, showering the area with a delicious, buttery snack.
“Why would you wanna stop this??” said Pinkie Pie, diving in and out of the popcorn and catching chocolate rain on her tongue. She hadn’t had so much fun since her trip to Canterlot four months ago. Anyway, meteorological candy was a far more spectacular prank than anything she could hope to accomplish, and she planned to enjoy it to the fullest.
Meanwhile, Rarity strolled daintily by the popcorn fields wearing an expensive purple hat and an umbrella saddle. She cleared her throat.
“I heard about your troubles, Applejack, and I came to see if there's anything I can do without getting wet. Or dirty. Or out from under my umbrella,” she said.
Without warning, all of the unpicked apples on the farm grew to the size of pumpkins, and the apple trees bent and groaned under the weight. Noticing the luscious fruit, small rodents from all over climbed the trees and began gorging themselves. 
“Fluttershy! Do something!” screamed Applejack, afraid for her family’s apple trees. Fluttershy gently scolded her pet rabbit, who was among the first animals to bite into an apple.
“Now, Angel, you really shouldn't—” she began, when Angel’s legs quickly grew to the size of giraffe legs. “No! It's not possible! I must be seeing things!” said Fluttershy, panicking as the other rabbits grew giraffe legs just like Angel’s.
Just then, Twilight Sparkle showed up, accompanied by her valet dragon, Spike. “Don't worry everyone,” she said triumphantly. “I've learned a new spell that'll fix everything.” After consulting a book, she cast her spell, and her trademark purple aura swept over Sweet Apple Acres, leaving everything… exactly as it was before Twilight showed up.
“My fail-safe spell... failed,” said Twilight, genuinely surprised. “What do we do?”
“Uh, give up?” suggested Spike.
“Spike, Twilight will come up with something,” said Rarity, generously giving Twilight her umbrella saddle. Twilight thought for a moment.
“Time for plan B,” she said confidently. “Rainbow, can you corral all those clouds in one corner of the sky?”
Without hesitation, Rainbow Dash zipped across the sky, herding the cotton candy clouds together into one massive ball of sugar.
“Applejack,” said Twilight, “I need you to bring those high-strung storm clouds down to Earth.”
Applejack lassoed the giant cloud and pulled it to the ground, disappointing Pinkie Pie, who had been enjoying the last of the chocolate rain. However, the rose pony was determined to take advantage of this opportunity to have fun. She rushed over to the cloud and began tearing away at it with her teeth, eating the candy like a pig, as she always did.
“Oh dear,” said Fluttershy at Twilight’s request. “I hope none of the animals see these delicious chocolate-filled cotton candy clouds. I'd hate to have to share them.”
“You and me both, sister!” said Pinkie Pie, oblivious to Twilight’s plan. “Hey!” she shouted, as the bow-legged rabbits and their rodent friends sped to the cloud and devoured it.
Now Pinkie was really annoyed with her boring friends for ruining the fun. While the other ponies celebrated their victory, Pinkie sulked in a corner, not bothering to wipe her chocolate-covered face.
Suddenly, Spike belched, and a sealed letter burst from his fiery breath. Curious, Pinkie Pie joined her friends as Twilight broke the seal and silently read Princess Celestia’s letter. Twilight gasped.
“Come on, girls. Princess Celestia wants to see us all in Canterlot immediately!”

On the train to Canterlot, Pinkie Pie curled up in the backseat, staring out of the window and wishing she could enjoy the sight of a candy-covered Equestria. Already, new clouds had overshadowed Sweet Apple Acres, and the animals had been too full of apples and cotton candy to eat the popcorn that blanketed Applejack’s cornfields. In the distance, the Everfree Forest had already become a mysterious world, liberated from its old tyrant, reason. Patches of trees floated here and there above the forest, some of them hanging upside-down on invisible strings. If Pinkie Pie had had eagle eyes, she would have seen Fluttershy’s friend Harry tearing licorice vines from the branches and eating them one by one. She would have seen Zecora impatiently shooing the woodland animals away from her candy hut. She would have seen a violet filly float to and fro, inspecting the forest and tampering with anything that seemed too ordinary. And she would have relished all of it. This was the best day ever, and Princess Celestia had summoned her to destroy it.
“Why the long face, sugarcube?” asked Applejack. Pinkie giggled and looked out over Equestria, ignoring Applejack’s question. Maybe Pinkie was wrong to enjoy the cotton candy clouds and the chocolate rain. After all, her friends saw the unusual weather as a threat. Maybe they were right. Then again, Pinkie knew to trust her instincts. Nopony else’s gut reactions were half as good as hers, and all she felt about the candy weather was glee.
The train pulled into Canterlot, and the six mares stepped onto the platform. Everything seemed perfectly sane in Equestria’s capital city. Whatever was causing the phenomena, maybe Princess Celestia was powerful enough to overcome it. The friends set off towards the palace, Twilight Sparkle in the lead and Pinkie Pie in the rear. Pinkie had just made up her mind to trust her friends when something colorful caught her eye. She turned and squinted through the crowd of ponies in Canterlot Market, but whatever she had seen was nowhere to be found. She shrugged and bounced after her friends.

No sooner had the mares entered the palace garden than Pinkie Pie caught another flash of color in the corner of her eye. This time, she broke away from the group and chased it behind some shrubbery. There, she found three balloons: one teal, one cyan, and one yellow. Pinkie snorted her amusement and lightly batted at the balloons, forgetting about her audience with the princess. To her surprise, the balloons turned in midair, revealing three cartoonish faces.
“Hello, young mare,” said the teal balloon in a friendly, male voice. “You look awfully bubbly to be stuck in the stuffy palace on a day like this. Why don’t you stay in the garden with us?”
“Maybe you haven’t heard,” replied Pinkie, “but weird things have been happening in Equestria. The princess wants me and my friends to do something about it.”
“Really? What sort of things?”
“Well, it’s raining, but it’s not supposed to rain till tomorrow. And clouds are moving around on their own…”
“Is that all? I’m sure the pegasi could clear that up in ten seconds flat!”
“But the clouds are made of cotton candy! And the rain is made of chocolate! And no matter how fast the pegasi work, the clouds just keep coming!”
The three balloons guffawed. If they had had arms, surely they would have clutched their sides in amusement.
“Why, that sounds marvelous! What a ridiculous sight! Cotton candy, you say? And I’m sure you loved the chocolate rain?” said the teal balloon, nudging Pinkie Pie with its string.
“Well, it was kinda tasty…” admitted Pinkie Pie.
“What’s wrong, then? Does Celestia really care about such a harmless prank?”
“But the rabbits have really big legs, and the forest is going crazy, and the apples are ginormous, and and and—” Pinkie struggled to defend Princess Celestia. She had just made up her mind to do whatever the princess asked of her, and she wasn’t about to let a talking balloon dissuade her.
“Oh, Pinkie Pie,” said the teal balloon sincerely, “I’m sorry I made you so upset. I completely understand if you don’t like my tricks. They were all in good fun, but you’re probably right. The princess knows best, and if she says they must go, then they must go.”
Pinkie’s jaw dropped. Never mind that the balloon knew her name before she had introduced herself. Did it say that it had caused all the mayhem in Equestria?
Pinkie heard a thunderclap, and she found her mane soaked with chocolate rain. Looking up, she found that Canterlot was overshadowed by pink clouds. She turned to the balloons, ready to speak, but they had vanished.
“Pinkie!” Twilight Sparkle trotted through the royal garden anxiously. “You know what a hurry we’re in, Pinkie Pie!” she scolded. The two friends galloped off to find the others, and they approached the palace for an audience with the princess.