Pip woke up in a mud bath up to his neck. As he struggled to free himself from his bed, he noticed that he had a very large headache. “Ohhh, it feels like Applejack bucked my ‘ead” he said rubbing his forehead in an attempt to alleviate the pain.
When he was finally free, he tried to find his teddy bear and blanket, but they were nowhere to be found.
“Blimey, of course my teddy’s gone no one likes Pip… the runt of the litter”
Tears began to well up in his eyes. The runt of the littler had become Pipsqueaks nickname at the orphanage. Nopony would play with him because nopony liked a runt; so Pip often found himself alone and he’d gotten used to it
Derpy and Dinky were doing their usual Sunday thing, and that meant a picnic at their favorite spot.
“Here we are muffin” Derpy said as she landed.
Dinky bounded out of Derpy’s mail bags, landing on the damp, but not muddy grass. They were on a hill near the concealed part of the pond. The reason it’s not a muddy slide is because Derpy made a deal with Rainbow Dash; she’d bring her some of her delicious muffins for breakfast and whenever there was a storm scheduled for Saturday night, Rainbow would open a hole in the clouds so no rain would hit their spot.
Dinky was testing her bravery while Derpy set their meal up. She would go close to the edge and risk falling in, but she’d retreat back to the safety of the blanket before going again.
With one of these tests Dinky slipped on the mud and careened straight into the waters.
“Ahhh, c-cold” she said as she tried to go up the slippery slope “Mommy, help”
Derpy flew into the air and headed for the distress signal. The little purple filly rejoiced as her savior neared.
Derpy lowered herself and grabbed her daughter, taking her back to the safety of the blanket.
“I hope you learned your lesson muffin.” Derpy said as she took out a second blanket- A mother’s always prepared for anything- and wrapped her shivering daughter.
“I-I have mommy, don’t go too close to the edge”
“Yes, especially without your mom around”
Dinky smiled and affectionately nuzzled her mother.
When Pip had his headache somewhat under control, he sneaked past the early morning joggers and went to another tree. He grabbed one of the bars of soap that didn’t sink, from his cupboard, and went to the concealed part of the pond.
Pip was about to take the plunge, when a certain purple unicorn caught his eye. It was Dinky, she was having a picnic with her mother, she looked so happy.
Pip had to watch his every move, so he wouldn’t be taken back to the orphanage, while Dinky could frolic and not think about the consequences. Pip starves himself every day to be near his friends, his only sustenance coming from the rotten apples he steals from the farm. Dinky however, can have fun and not worry about where her next meal is going to come from. She had everything Pip wanted… a family, someone to kiss the boo boo away, to comfort him when he was sad or scared, someone to love him.
Tears blurred his vision as he saw what he’s wanted his entire life, what he knew he’ll never have.
Dinky was eating a muffin when she heard someone cry. Looking up she thought she saw a monster.
Pip was contemplating his next move when a shout startled him and he fell in the water.
“Hey Pip!” a voice called out a few moments later.
Pip surfaced, shaking violently as mud turned the water around him brown.
“Why are you in the cold water and why is it brown? I hope you didn’t have an accident”
It took a few seconds for Pip’s mind to figure out why Dinky was laughing so hard, but a stray piece of mud floated by, giving him the embarrassing answer to his question
“No! it’s just mud Dinky” he said blushing furiously “I-I slipped in a mud puddle and now I’m trying to clean myself off”
“Well why didn’t you go home, I tested the water and it’s freezing…! Oh my Celestia you must be freezing, get over here now!” Dinky demanded
Pip really was freezing and swam over to the light purple unicorn. Dinky gave Pip a helping hoof, but that just ended with her falling in too.
“Pip you numbskull, now I’m f-freezing too” Dinky shouted as she scrambled to her hooves, only to fall back into the cold pond.
Derpy, who was watching the scene from afar, jumped into action once again. She leapt into the air and hovered over the colt and filly, helping them help themselves.
After being airlifted to the safety of the hill, Derpy grabbed the second blanket and wrapped them both up like a burrito
“Th-th-thanks miz o-‘ooves” Pip said, blushing from the close proximity to his crush.
“Yeah, th-thanks again mom” Dinky added
“No problem, that’s what I’m here for muffin. Hey since your friend Pip is here, why don’t we let him join our picnic, he needs to warm up anyway”
Pip’s eyes bulged, he was going to be allowed to have a real breakfast
“Well, it sounds like someone’s hungry” Dinky said nuzzling her friend
Pip couldn’t think straight, the gentle touch and lovely blueberry smell she gave off blinded his mind.
“You okay Pip?”
Pip’s stomach growled and this time he took notice “Ummm, yeah w-why wouldn’t I be?”
“Well, you’ve been staring at me for a few minutes now… oh is it the blueberry shampoo my mom found? I love it so much, it reminds me of my favorite muffin can you guess what it is?” Dinky chirped, bouncing up and down and rubbing her fur with Pip’s, making him blush even more
“Ummm, blueberry muf- herrrp” Pip’s answer was cut short when a muffin made its way into his open mouth.
“Right! Now tell me what flavor this muffin is”
Pip was unable to hear Dinky’s voice for the second time in the past five minutes. His senses were overloaded by the taste of fresh blueberries and his body seemed lose all of its tension. His headache disappeared, making him feel better than he had in months.
“Pip, hello, Equistria to Pip” Dinky said as Pip seemed to melt, his body dragging to blanket and Dinky down with him,
“Pip, Pip… Oh geez” Dinky fell on top of Pip and stared in his glassy eyes.
“Yahahahaum, blueberry” Pip moaned as he came back from cloud nine
“Right a mundo Pip, it’s a blueberry muffin” Dinky said rubbing Pip’s muzzle
Dinky was pulled off of Pip by Derpy and placed next to the gray mare
“I think you’re invading his personal space muffin”
Pip’s vision blurred and he couldn’t tell if that was really Lyra floating on a cloud above him, playing her lyre with some kind of weird appendage.
“Oh, sorry Pip, I didn’t know”
Pip turned his body to the sound of the voice staring at Dinky with empty eyes. “Ha s-she called you m-muffin” he teased
Dinky frowned “What’s that supposed to mean”
Lyra was now floating behind Dinky giving him what looked to be a go ahead sigh.
Pip nodded to her, “yo-you’re a Dinkyberry muffin.” Pip waved at Lyra who went back to playing “ Th-that’s what it m-means. Oh shooting stars, pretty”
Dinky pouted, ignoring pip’s shivers while she contemplated something, “I’m not a muffin… I’m not a muffin, right mommy?”
Dinky never got her answer. Derpy stared at Pip’s bumbling, she had been so busy preparing the picnic that she didn’t notice one of the special muffins Pinkie bribed her to make made its way into the basket. “Oh dear, umm Dinky, we should take Pip home he needs to rest”
Pip rolled onto his back watching the lyre play Lyra “N-no thank you miz ooves, I fine ‘ere. Anyway, my ‘ouse is flooded with mud”
Lyra suddenly started to grow wings, and a picture of an apple started to grow on her head. She was giggling as her lyre used its strings to tickle her.
“Oh no, that’s bad, where do you live?” Dinky said, her curiosity about her friend piqued.
“I wive in the twee ovew dare” Pip babbled pointing in a random direction
“That’s okay, I’ll just take you to our house to take a nap and finish your breakfast. How does that sound Pip?” Derpy said, trying not to freak out over the little job Pinkie bribed her to do.
Lyra was soon joined by Applejack, she happily hummed along with the music the lyre was playing while eating a tomato. “Sure, I wove you Dinky” Pip said, not even realizing it, as he grabbed the muffin again and took another big bite.
“On no, please muffin, don’t eat that muffin”
Applejack and Lyra were soon joined by a yellow tree with pink leaves, and they began chanting “Eat the muffin, Eat the muffin” Pip didn’t want to eat the muffin Derpy said not to, but he soon found an acceptation.
“Hey, that tickles, Pip stop it” Dinky protested
Pip saw the gigantic muffin, Dinky turned into and started eating her, the tree and other ponies seemed please and continued doing random things.
“Pip! Don’t eat my daughter” Derpy yelled.
Pip released his mouth from Dinky’s head and looked at Derpy “Miz ‘ooves I thought you said this is a muffin, it doesn’t taste like a muffin at all. Actually I wouldn’t know because I ‘aven’t ‘ad a muffin in two and a ‘alf weeks”
Derpy took a deep breath “Calm down Derpy. That’s because Pip, she’s my daughter not a muffin, I just call her that because she’s my little muffin”
She rubbed part of the blanket on Dinky’s head to get rid of the buildup of Pip’s saliva
“’Ey Miss ‘ooves which is it? Is this your daughter or a muffin? You keep changing them”
“She’s my daughter Pip, now hop on my back, we’re going home”
“Yay, I don’t ‘ave a ‘ome”
Dinky quickly got over the weird feeling of being eaten and pushed Pip onto her mother’s back before something else happened.
Sunlight poured through the windows at the Ponyville library, which assaulted its librarian’s eyes.
Twilight groaned, not wanting to leave her warm bed, but when an enticing smell reached her nose her stomach growled.
“Fine, I’ll get up” she said, throwing her star covered blanket off of her body. Twilight stepped out on the hardwood floor, shivering involuntarily as her hooves came in contact with the cold surface.
“Oh, it’s a cold one today.” Twilight shivered and grabbed her fluffy purple bathrobe, before following her nose to breakfast.“Yum, that smells great Spike”
Twilight trotted down the stairs, expecting to see Spike put the finishing touches on breakfast, when she saw Luna.
“Princess!” Twilight said, startling Luna, who was making something weird
“ Oh it’s just thou Twilight Sparkle.” Luna said putting a hoof to her heart to try and calm herself “We beseech thou, don’t do that again”
“Oh sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you” Twilight apologized “But why are you talking with the… royal we?”
Luna levitated one of the giant balls of dough into a bag “Oh, well, we only dost it when we art frightened or nervous”
“Okay, that explains why you wouldn’t stop talking like that last Nightmare night. You were just nervous about the ponies of Ponyville accepting you”
Luna wrapped the bag with the ball of dough and put it in her saddle bags
“What’s in the bag Luna?”
“This, well this is a little gift for Pip” Luna said opening her bag to show Twilight what’s inside
“Huh? Why give Pip a gift?”
“Well I feel horrible about sending him off without food so I made him one of my favorite dishes.” She said putting the bag back in her saddle bags “I hope you don’t mind me using the last of your food stuff”
“Of course not princess, I was going to go shopping anyway” Twilight said with a forced smile
Luna saw how Twilight treated her but said nothing of it
“Oh-kay, well would you like to join me in delivering it to him?”
Twilight jumped to her hooves “Of course princess, anything for you”
“Twilight Sparkle, please, I don’t want to be treated like a princess right now. Tia said that I needed to make friends and I can’t do that if everypony is waiting on me hand and hoof”
But Twilight didn’t hear her, she was too busy grabbing her own saddle bags and filling them with bits. “Well are you ready, or we could wait, whatever you want princess”
Luna just rolled her eyes “No Twilight Sparkle I am ready”
Celestia’s sun was just making its way into the sky when Twilight and Luna left to find Pipsqueak. Luna had purposefully forgotten to wear her royal regalia in an attempt to feel like a normal pony. The results however, weren’t exactly what Luna was expecting.
Twilight and Luna wondered the roads of Ponyville as Ponies left and right bowed, fearing Luna’s wrath if they didn’t.
“I thought she was nocturnal” one stallion whispered
“Yeah, I thought she melted in sunlight”
Accusations like these were said and Luna’s patience was wearing thin
“Hey Luna” Twilight said, probably sparing the town another dose of Luna’s royal canterlot voice.
“Yes Twilight Sparkle”
“I also thought you were nocturnal, how are you awake right now?”
“Magic”
Twilight’s eyes bulged “Oh, that’s so cool! Maybe I can become nocturnal and the two of us could watch the stars together. Wouldn’t that be soo cool, oh I can see it now, you and I hanging out under your beautiful stars, with hot coco and, oh, daisy sandwiches, I love daisy sandwiches, what do you think princess”
Twilight’s enthusiasm put a smile on Luna’s lips “Yes, that would be… cool Twilight”
The duo kept walking, Twilight kept babbling about things her and Luna could do when she became nocturnal, when a certain pegasus crossed their field of view.
“Fluttershy!” she happily exclaimed bounding over to her
“Oh… um hi Twilight. I was just, you know, getting food for my cottage, Angel noticed the lack of carrots and I, well came to get some”
“Fluttershy you remember Princess Luna?”
The shy mare, whimpered in fear “Ummm y-yes”
Luna took note of the canary yellow pegasus’s fear, something she had learned from Pip and laid down, making herself look less threatening. “Please don’t fear us Fluttershy, if I may call you that?”
Fluttershy noticed Luna’s calm posture and calmed down a bit “O-okay, you c-can call me Fluttershy”
“Good” Luna said smiling and putting Fluttershy a bit more at ease. “How have you been? You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. I know how scary I can be”
There were ohhs and awws from the crowd gathering around.
“Um, I-I’ve been okay. Thanks for asking”
“I can’t believe this, our timid little Fluttershy isn’t scared of Nightmare Moon” a stallion murmured
“What did you call us!” Luna hissed, getting a startled epp from Fluttershy.
The stallion in question ran for the hills, begging for mercy and half expecting Luna to smite him with her powerful lightning.
What followed was complete chaos, mares grabbed their children and took off running, the bravest of stallions nearly wet themselves trying to get away from Nightmare Moon. Everyone but Twilight and Fluttershy ran away.
Luna once again started banging her head against the ground, wasting yet another chance to make friends.
The kind hearted Fluttershy immediately went into mother mode, galloping up to Luna’s side. “Oh, please don’t hurt yourself Luna, I know you never meant to scare anypony”
Luna looked up at the previously timid Fluttershy, all she saw was her caring eyes reaching out to her.
“Y-you’re not scared of us?” she said futilely trying to hold her tears back.
“No, you’re a nice pony Luna, I see now that you were just misunderstood and if it’s alright with you, could I be your friend?”
Luna leapt, bringing Fluttershy into a bone crunching hug. “Yes, I would love it if you were to become our friend Fluttershy thank you so much”
Fluttershy took the abuse better than some stallions would and rubbed Luna’s back reassuringly.
“I’m glad I can help, now, could you um put me down please, you’re kind of hurting me”
With a gasp, Luna released her death grip and apologized profusely.
With a few heartfelt goodbyes, Fluttershy left her new friend to continue her shopping. Nearly all of the stallions stared at the shy pegasus, mouths agape as they felt their stallionhoods drop like rocks.
“See, I knew you could make friends Luna” Twilight chirped as a crowd once again formed around the duo.
“Thanks Twilight, now let’s find Pip”
“Where could he be?” Luna asked, worried that her gift would get cold before it reached him
“I don’t think anypony knows where he lives, and I don’t see him falling out of the sky anytime soon”
Twilight was soon eating her words as a scream came from above. Luna looked up, what she saw horrified her.
Pipsqueak was in fact falling from the sky.
Luna flared her wings and took off like a bullet. Most of the other ponies worked frantically to make a safety net, just in case the princess failed
Derpy, Dinky and Pip were flying over the town of Ponyville. Derpy had the picnic basket around her neck, placing the leftover food items in her saddlebags to help keep stability in the air.
“Pip, stop squirming, you’ll fall off” Dinky said trying and failing to keep the drugged colt still.
“But Dinky I can fly I just know it” Pip said trying again to jump off of Derpy’s back.
“NO, Pipsqueak stand still or I will have to pull over” Derpy protested, she did not want any kind of attention placed on what she did to Pip. She just wanted to get him home.
“No, you can’t make me’ Pip teased, sticking his tongue out “You’re not my mommy, I don’t ‘ave a mommy”
“Pipsqueak, you’re not a Pegasus” Dinky said as Pip jumped.
Dinky felt her mother’s back disappear, and a weightless sensation came over her. Dinky didn’t have enough strength to keep Pip still and fell off with him.
“MOMMY!” she cried, pleading for mom to save her.
Derpy wasted no time before she raced toward her daughter, desperate screams filling her ears.
“MOMMY!”
Derpy closed the gap and when she was close enough, she grabbed hold of her screaming daughter. Dinky pulled her mother into a vice like grip, holding on for dear life.
“Shhh, it’s okay muffin, I’m here, it’s all going to be okay” Derpy said to her petrified daughter
“Mommy, what about Pip!”
Derpy matched Dinky’s death grip “There’s nothing I could have done muffin, you come first” she said as tears streamed down her cheeks “you always come first”
“PIP! No!” Dinky stared teary eyed as she watch her friend fall to his death
Pip tried to flap his wings, but he soon found out that he didn’t have any. Panic grew in the drugged pony’s heart and whatever high his body was experiencing shattered, leaving only the cruelty of reality.
Pip screamed, but unlike Dinky, he had no one to save him; no one to save the runt of the litter.
Luna rocketed towards Pip, plotting an intercept course; she never felt so determined over anything, but seeing Pip’s body plummet to certain doom filled her with adrenaline.
In the matter of seconds, she was under Pip. She held her arms out as she flew up, ready to catch her friend.
The ponies below were running like chicken’s with their heads cut off. Some were trying to make something soft for the young colt to land on, others, mainly pegasi were too scared to fly up and help Luna try to catch Pip.
“Come on, come on”, she was shaking like a leaf, what if she missed? What if she failed? No one would want her to be their favorite princess if she failed.
Seconds before landing safely in Luna’s outstretched forearms, Pip gave up what little fight he had left to live… to him, there wasn’t anything left to fight for, no one loved him, no one would miss him, so why even try. As blackness crept into his vision, Pip heard the sound of flapping wings. He thought they were his guardian angel getting ready to take him away, away from his torture, his nightmares and the agony of being alone.
Luna grunted as Pip hit her forearms like a rock, but with the help of her magic she was able to hold on to him. “Don’t fret young Pip, thine favorite princess is hither” she said, nuzzling him as tears fell on his sleeping form.