//------------------------------//
// The Preparation 
// Story: No Turning Back 
// by MKIIPro121996 
//------------------------------//

"Okay... here we go..."

I thought to myself. It was about 6 in the morning, the sun slowly rising above the clouds scattered in the skies above Equestria. The sun was shining right into the mirror that I had mounted on my wall, and it gave off a bright reflection right onto the carpeted floor of my home in northern Cloudsdale, not too far from the town square.

"Just one hell of a party, some drinks, and Rainbow Dash to get by. Everything'll be fine."

My mind was focused on one mare, and that was Rainbow Dash. We had attended flight school together, and I had a huge crush on her.

"Oh, shut up, you fool. She'll never say yes." I kept thinking...

There was no point in even asking her to this party, I sort of invited her without letting Pinkie know. Besides, Rainbow doesn't really like dubstep.

Well, she could change her mind like I did. I didn't like Dubstep until I heard a little bit of Vinyl’s collection.

I had let her listen to a little bit of Bassnectar's "Magical World", and she said it was "alright."

I had an end with Vinyl down in Ponyville, she lived right across the street from Twilight's library with Octavia. I asked her if she could be a DJ for the party that Pinkie was having today sometime around 6 or so, since I haven't had the time to talk to Pinkie about who was going to the party with me down at sugarcube corner and who wasn't.

"I'm sure she won't mind, it's her party and anypony is invited, I suppose."

It was quarter 'til 7 in the morning, and I had just finished dressing to go down into Ponyville. Vinyl needed help getting her equipment over to Sugarcube corner, she didn't want to do all of the moving on her own like she usually does when she has a gig that's just down the street from her home. A single pony couldn't haul 225 Kilograms of equipment all by herself as far as she lived from Sugarcube corner.
I stepped out of the front door, and slammed it shut thinking about what all could happen on the negative side of things. I wasn't in that good of a mood since I barely slept the night before.

I trotted to the edge of the cloud from where my home sat, not too far from Rainbow’s home. You could see everything, including Ponyville a little off in the distance. Everypony looked like ants, skittering around on the ground in desparate search of a source of food.

I thought for a minute about what all could happen tonight.. "Is..she going to say yes..? Or is she just going to turn her back on me?" I never had a problem with this until today. She was generous and willing to stick up for anypony; including me.

I stood there with the most dumbfounded look on my face for a good 15 minutes. I can only imagine what I looked like, saliva trailing out of my mouth, my eyes defocused on the sky full of nothing but a light blue and an orange hue reflecting brightly off of the top of the clouds scattered about in the sky.
I finally snapped out of my deep train of thoughts.

"C'mon.. pull yourself together. The party doesn't start until about 9 tonight or so. Besides, the wedding rece-"

...Wedding.

I totally forgot about Shining Armour and Cadence's wedding. I meant to get them something a little nice, but I didn't have anything in the means of cash on me or in the bank.

"Shit, what can I do..? The reception starts in about 6 hours... I can dress in something nice, at the least.."

...and I continued to let my mind race. Thoughts kept spilling out of my mouth as fast as they came.

I never thought about getting them anything, so what else could I do...? Just try to appear at the wedding as snazzy as possible?

Well, that's what I ended up doing. Dragging out my old tux from the closet, and not even bothering taking it to the dry cleaners. I set it on my bed; I decided that I would come back and change after I had helped out Vinyl for a bit.

I flew down to Ponyville, to help Vinyl before the wedding started. She was anxiously waiting for me to get down there, apparently. The first thing she hoofed over to me was a box full of binders. They all had a different music genre written on them, and they were filled with CDs. The picks she had for tonight fitted my liking, really. I set the box down on the ground, struggling to read the small print on the front covers of all four binders that were packed full of CDs.  She noticed how hard of a look I was giving the small print, I must have been looking at it with a face that told her that I was struggling with something.

"Just wait... It’ll be better if we don’t add any spoilers into this deal" She said with a positive tone. Nothing ever seemed to stop her, she was always so pumped before she had a gig in or around town. I had a feeling that tonight everything would be alright.