“Let’s see.... There’s... music?”
“Of course!”
Pinkie Pie, Archer, and their recently inducted co-conspirator, Scootaloo, were currently seated at the nicest table they could find in Sugarcube Corner. At this extremely nice table, Pinkie Pie was mercilessly grilling Archer about every possible angle of traditional Vorlanian (that is to say, human) celebrations.
“It has to be live music, too. No gramophones. Preferably piano or strings.”
“Oh! Hang on!”
In two shakes of a filly’s tail (literally, Scootaloo only had time for two), Pinkie had zipped upstairs and down again, bringing with her a stringed instrument.
“You mean like this?”
Its body was a large oblong, somewhere between a viola’s and a cello’s. Which made sense, seeing as Equestrians were quite bigger than humans. But...
“How do you play that with no hands?”
“Hehe! Like this, silly!”
In defiance of physics, of logic, and of common sense, Pinkamena Diane Pie stood erect on her rear legs, produced a bow, and played the violin like she owned fingers of her own. It sounded very nice.
“Alright, that’s pretty good. But my original question still stands.”
“She’s Pinkie Pie,” Scootaloo explained. “It’s better if you don’t think about it.”
“I’ve noticed a lot of stuff like that lately.”
***
It said, simply:
“Archer is staying in the library with Twilight Sparkle.
In the kitchen cupboard, he has concealed items of great value to both him and you.
Retrieve them. You will know what to do when you find them.
-P”
Inkwell studied the note carefully. The handwriting was completely unremarkable, which, given her talent for analyzing all things linguistic, was saying quite a lot.
And then there was the fact that the note was written in English, rather than Equestrian. English was nonexistent among ponies, save for her. She only knew of one human, and even then, she’d only stayed with him as long as it took to teach him a whole language and give him a roof over his head. And this definitely didn’t look like a prank.
So who was “P”? Moreover, why did they think she and Archer were connected in any way? What was hiding in the library’s cupboard, and how would she “know what to do” upon seeing it?
Well, she knew where to go to answer one of those questions.
“To the library!”
***
“Oh, and food. There has to be food. Lots of food. Potatoes, chicken, beef stew... I’m hungry, actually, do you have any donuts or something?”
Pinkie rolled her eyes. “Yeah Archer, we’ve got plenty of donuts. They’re all on the ground behind the building.”
“What?” Archer forgot, momentarily, why he’d been trapped in a tree-shaped cottage all day. Then he remembered. “Oh.”
“Yeah. Mr. and Ms. Cake were pretty mad. They say you gotta pay off your tab before you’re allowed to order anything else.”
Niggling worry, followed by dread. “How much is it, exactly?”
“Two hundred ninety four bits.”
Archer considered it a small blessing that he had no idea how much a “bit” was worth. He didn’t even know how the Cakes expected him to make any money at all, short of taking up larceny. But that was neither here nor there.
“Alright,” said Scootaloo, going over a poorly-hoofwritten bucket list. “Next up is... ‘accommodations’. Miss Pinkie, what are ‘accommodations’?”
“That means we need to figure out where we’re throwing the party! I don’t know how big human parties get. Archer, how big do human parties get?”
“Well, keep in mind, I’m not exactly an expert on the subject of having a good time. But the few parties I have attended were all massive.” Pinkie grinned at this. “Most of them were celebrating the defeat of a great evil monster nearby, and drew in everyone from the nearby towns. Now, call me cynical, but I sincerely doubt Ponyville will be even half as thrilled as that to greet a complete stranger.”
“Aww, lighten up! You don’t give us pony folk enough credit. I remember when I threw Twilight’s ‘Welcome to Ponyville’ party a year or so ago, and everyone came then!”
“Yeah, but at least she was an Equestrian. I don’t exactly have that luxury.”
Pinkie’s expression shifted to thoughtfulness, then sudden inspiration. She smiled that Cheshire grin people of all species seem to get when they’re about to do something devilishly clever.
And then everything changed.
The lighting shifted imperceptibly. Pinkie Pie began bouncing up and down.
Was that...
Music?
“Weeeeelll~” she began, only to be rudely interrupted.
“NO!”
THUMP
“Mmph?”
Scootaloo had, with a single well-placed muffin, changed the lights back to normal, stopped the music, and (judging from her expression) kept Pinkie from bringing about the end times.
“Pinkie, you promised you wouldn’t sing around me, remember?”
Pinkie’s hair deflated a tad. She nodded.
“Wait, I don’t get it. What happens when she sings?”
“Trust me, it’s best if you don’t know.”
“You’re going to have to start explaining this stuff to me eventually!”
“Calm down. I think Pinkie Pie’s trying to say you need to give the ponies in Ponyville a chance. Who knows? They might surprise you. Right, Pinkie?”
“Mmm-hmm,” said the almost-singer, her mouth still crammed with blueberries and short bread.
“Well... Fine. It’s got to be roomy.”
Pinkie Pie swallowed and said, “Oh! Oh! I know a roomy place!”
“Please continue.”
“The farm down at Sweet Apple Acres has barns! Huge ones! We can clean one out and it’ll hold everypony, easy!”
“We’ll have to check it out first, but it sounds promising. Scootaloo, next item!”
“Next item... layout!”
“Now, this I know perfectly. Pinkie, fetch me a pen and paper. It’s high time I introduced you ponies to the mead hall.”
***
“He just asked me to get something for him. It’ll only take a minute, I promise.”
“Okay, Inkwell... but I think you might want to get some rest after this. You look terrible.”
“Gee, thanks.”
Twilight recoiled slightly at Inkwell’s uncharacteristically snippish comeback. She definitely needed some sleep, the librarian decided. Or a date. Or both, in that order.
Heedless of Twilight’s unspoken judgement on her personal life, Inkwell pressed on into the kitchen. There was nothing out here, save a couple of odd burns on the wall and a discarded quill on the table, next to an emptied specimen of her namesake.
Thank goodness she wasn’t looking for anything out here, then.
The cupboard was cluttered far beyond its apparent capacity. There was probably more food stuffed in here than any of the original architects could have imagined, magicked into being and charmed into place by the prodigious Twilight Sparkle, for no other reason than because it was possible.
Inkwell searched high and low. She didn’t know what she was looking for. She didn’t care. All she wanted was to solved that danged letter’s riddle so she could stop feeling so bloody irritable.
A sweep of telekinesis rattled something on a high shelf. Something wrapped in vellum paper.
She knew the sound of vellum. It was what her correspondence with a Gryphon linguist had been printed on, shortly before she discovered that it was made from animal skin. Since then, she’d sworn it off forever. Why would more of it would turn up now, in the royal protege’s home, of all places?
She pulled it down gingerly, as if the woodland creature sacrificed in the paper’s manufacture would return to haunt her if she didn’t show it the proper respect. Wrapped in the vellum was a bottle. On that bottle were written words in English.
English!
What was it with that stupid language cropping up so much? Couldn’t anything weird or headache-inducing be printed in French? Or what about Dutch, or Russian? She liked Russian! The rest of the linguistic spectrum couldn’t hold up to Russian, in terms of sheer - Wait a second, how had her mind wandered this far? What was she doing, again?
Oh, right, the bottle. The English bottle. With English words. What were those English words?
“LIQUID NERVE: For Strength of Mind and Steadiness of Hand”
The vintage was... well, she didn’t have a clue how long ago the human date was.
“Put down the bottle now, miss.”
What the...?
“You can’t control me, Higgs! I know what you do, what crimes you commit every day. The kingdom is rotten to the core, and I’m stuck in a flat with living proof!”
Who was saying these things? Rather, who’d said these things?
“Good lord... how much of this stuff have you drunk tonight? You’re nuts!”
“I’m more sane than I’ve ever been, Higgs. I’m leaving.”
She floated the Liquid Nerve to eye level, popping the cork. A suspiciously familiar aroma of berry and alchemical fumes filled the air.
“Tell me where you’re headed, at least, so I can come get you once you’ve regained your sense.”
“I’ll let you know just as soon as I find out! Ta-ta!”
Her hooves were shaking.
If what she knew about this drink was correct, then a little swig couldn’t hurt. Could it?
That was the thing, though, about one little swig of anything under duress. Soon enough, it turned into two. Then three. By the time she stalked out of the cupboard, Inkwell’s mind was indeed strong, and her hooves were indeed steady.
Such a shame, then, that she was no longer quite herself.
***
“Item seventeen: alcohol!”
“Alcohol?”
“Alcohol.”
The topic had wandered, as you might have already guessed, to alcohol.
“Are you sure, Archer? Nopony in Ponyville drinks that much except Berry Punch. And, well...” Pinkie shuddered. “We all saw how she turned out.”
“I’m not saying everyone has to get zonked off their gourd, Pinkie. I am saying, though, that these kinds of drinks are traditional in human parties. And you do want to have a human party, riiiiight?”
“Yes! Yes! O-of course. But... alcohol? Really? I’ve been to drinking parties before, and they’re no fun at all.”
“Mister Archer? What’s this alka-seltzer stuff you’re talking about?”
“It’s nothing. Go back to drawing the banner.”
“Okay.”
“Alright, so your appley friend makes cider, right?”
“Applejack? Yeah.”
“Just get one tankard of that each for everyone attending, and swap it for straight apple juice after. I honestly can’t tell the difference.”
“Well, why can’t we just have the apple juice to start with?”
“Because then someone’ll spike it, and then we’ll have an absolute mess instead of a party.”
“So, you’re trying to prevent someone from spiking the juice...”
“...By serving everyone pre-spiked cider. Yes.”
Pinkie sat with what had to be the first incredulous look she’d worn in years. These human parties made no sense at all, and yet...
“Alright. One glass of cider each. What’s next?”
“Item eighteen: party games.”
“YAAAAAAY!”
***
“You’re sure you’re not leaving?”
“Yes. Archer said he’d meet me here.”
“But you said-”
“I misspoke.”
“Are you sure?”
“Quite sure.”
“Do you need anything?”
“Some peace and quiet would be nice.”
Sheesh. Who inked in your coffee, lady?
“Well, I guess I’ll be going, then. I’ll make sure to tell Archer you’re here, if I see him."
“Please do.”
***
“What do you mean he isn’t here anymore!?”
“Um... well, see, Pinkie came over to invite him and Scootaloo to something, and...”
“To what!?”
“I, uh, I think it was... maybe... a welcoming party. For Archer, since he got here yesterday.”
“So where are they now?”
“I think they went to Sugarcube Corner to plan it. I’m not sure.”
Twilight gave her trademark, frustrated, ragged, “I can’t believe I’m back at square one what is wrong with the world” sigh.
“Thanks, Fluttershy. Next time I ask you to keep someone here, though, just use the Stare if they try to get out.”
“Umm... I’m not sure if that’s how it works...”
“Goodbye, Fluttershy.”
“Bye, Twilight.”
***
“Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, WOO!”
Pinkie had very recently discovered the joys of a particular human parlour game. They called it “Blind Man’s Bluff”.
“Oh-oh-oh-kay, guys, I’m dizzy!” She giggled. “What now?”
“Now you have to catch us!”
The sound of a door opening and closing told Pinkie she had a definite winner.
***
Twilight Sparkle, true to her reputation, was a master of logical deduction. What follows is as near a literal transcription we can manage of her thought processes as she saw a most unusual sight in the Ponyville marketplace.
Fact: Archer and Scootaloo are running through the market, laughing.
Fact: Pinkie Pie is trailing behind them, staggering drunkenly and bumping into things.
Fact: Pinkie Pie is blindfolded.
Thus: Archer, Scootaloo, and Pinkie Pie are engaged in “shenanigans” of a possibly mischievous nature, with probable levels of guilt in that order, from greatest to least.
Fact: Pinkie Pie can and has caused major accidents when blindfolded before.
Fact: If Princess Celestia finds out I let someone get hurt in such a potentially catastrophic way, I will probably be banished from Ponyville and sent back to Magic Preschool.
Therefore: The shenanigans must end now.
***
Twilight Sparkle was not having a good day. She could tell it would never be a good day when Archer got out of control like this. She told the three stooges as much, immediately after stopping their rampage of hilarity.
Scootaloo was frightened. Pinkie Pie was downcast. Archer was unimpressed.
She told the first to go home, and come back tomorrow when the party planning wasn’t so rambunctious. She told the second to calm down and maybe go play with her pet alligator. She told the third that she wouldn’t tolerate much more of this, and that he had someone waiting for him back at the library, so would he please go there now.
To their credit, they all listened. So that was something.
***
“Hello, Archer.”
The unannounced blue mare, staring steely-eyed at him from the kitchen, was sadly the least surprising thing to happen to him so far today.
“Hello there, missus... Inkwell?”
“Come have a seat, Archer. I need to talk to you.”
He had sat in this exact same seat yesterday afternoon. He didn’t remember it being so uncomfortable.
“Can you tell me, exactly, what this was doing here?”
She floated up the bottle. That bottle. The gift from the king. It was missing quite a bit.
“Saints alive, woman, how much of that did you drink?”
“Enough.”
“Why are you asking me about this?”
“Because it came with a very nicely-worded letter.” She levitated said letter into view. “And it just so happens that both the bottle’s label and this letter are printed in a language that only you and I know how to speak. Uncanny, wouldn’t you agree?”
This was bull, and Archer knew it.
“So you’ve got it all figured out, eh?”
“Let me see. You’re spying on the Equestrians until you can get an opening to escape. You plan on using this,” she shook the bottle, “a highly potent nerves-of-steel potion, to aid in said escape. You hid this, and the letter instructing you to do all this, in the kitchen cupboard, figuring correctly that no one would look for them, and could not read them even if they did. How’s that?”
“I’d say that about covers it,” Archer said, sighing heavily. “What’s your price?”
“My price?”
“Yeah. Money, favors, what?”
Inkwell was at first confused. Then she realized what Archer was insinuating. Then she laughed.
“My dear boy, you have me figured all wrong. You think I’m going to tell on you to the princess?”
He nodded.
“No, no, no. I am not planning on betraying you, Archer.”
She leaned forward on the table.
“I’m planning on coming with you.”