Once everypony was untied, Twilight felt the time was right for her next line, “Tonight! The Film Festival is tonight and I've gotta make sure everything's ready! I can't believe I've been here less than one day and already that unpredictable and off-character princess has just dumped a tight- bastard- deadline on me!” she'd begun to pace up and down the thin red carpet, edging past the line of ponies and the baby dragon, making them fear for their respective healthes -n-safeties. When they breached the outside world inside Rarity's house, Spike spoke up, “Hey, It's not so bad. I mean, we already know we can trust Applejack with the food! Rarity's dresses are excellent and Pinkie will make sure no pony leaves without cocaine and Electronic-Euro-Trance-induced heat exhaustion.” This seemed to cheer Twilight up a little; she felt hope [a pony from next door, who promptly left again- feeling violated].
However, there was still no projector for the delightful indie films. There weren't enough horse-seats for everyone. Nobody had, as of yet, even contacted the Freemasons. There was still so much to do! said Twilight Sparkle quotation-marklessly and using the wrong tense.
Well, said Rarity [joining in], If we had split up into three groups we will have been each already gotten done with having found a projector while the other groups obtained the seats fit for horses and the last group will see if the Freemasons could want to came.
As everyone stood there untangling this punctuationless knot of tenses, aspects and moods, Fluttershy spoke up, “Well, I'll group us into teams. I'm great at organizing barnyard animals: Twilight and Rainbow Dash can set up the projector, Applejack and Pinkie Pie can visit the Freemasons'... Guild(?) and Rarity and I will gather seats for everyone in Ponyville.”
Rarity then said, “That reminds me; we'll need to acquire royal seating for the princess. I'm sure we all agree we want her to be up all night on the throne.” The other ponies stifled giggles while Rarity tried to work out what she'd said.
“Why didn't you ask if you could help invite the Freemasons, Rainbow?” asked Twilight as they went to get the as-yet-unmentioned projector from her tree-house library. “Free..? Masons?” puzzled Rainbow Dash, her face then lighting up in remembrance, “Oh, no, I'm not looking to join or anything. As I was saying earlier, I've been brushing up on my building blocks and colouring-in so I can finally pass the test to join MENSA! I'm gonna be super fast!”
Twilight didn't get it; she got the projector instead.
Meanwhile, Rarity and Fluttershy were consulting the local furniture expert, Solid-Oak Roberts, on where best to locate maybe 400 fold-up chairs and one throne. “Well, ya could try the Ponyville Quidditch Stadium; they have chairs for the thousands. Could seat the whole Roman army, should they be interested in watching a bad attempt at reconstructing a magical sport from a children's book!” said Roberts, happy to share his knowledge. “What's a Roman army?” asked Fluttershy. “Ha! Damned if I know, dear,” replied Roberts, “It's just something my grandma used to say.” Rarity then cut in, “What's a grandma?” shifting the paradigm of her character. Fluttershy took another line, “How did Ponyville afford to run something as frivolous as a Quidditch pitch?”
“Well, when they commissioned” Roberts began, continuing thus, “ it, there was a big fanfare and everypony showed up for the opening. However, the mayor forgot that nobody plays any actual sports in Ponyville, so they gave it to the local Quidditch Fan-Club. They're now legally obligated to play their funny game every Saturday whether anyone turns up or not! Poor little fillies.” Rarity laughed at the image. By which I mean an actual photo that Roberts produced of the six little Qudditchers, looks of stoic but disappointed acceptance on their faces, playing a game they'd stopped liking two years previously to a seemingly empty stadium.
Also happening contemporaneously and tautologically at the same time; Applejack and Pinkie Pie were trying to locate the Freemasons' Guild. All signs pointed towards it being somewhere near the town hall. As Applejack's drug-addled stare fixed uncomprehendingly on the fifteenth 'Freemason's Lodge' signpost pointing towards the town hall, Pinkie Pie shouted towards her. “I found it! I found it! Applejack, I found it!!”.
“Pinkie, please stop shouting, I can't take it anymore!” shouted Pinkie right down Applejack's ear, “Is what I know you're gonna say. But please hear me out!” Applejack was zoned out on codeine, it was the only way she'd found to cope. She barely heard Pinkie at all. “This very kind mare just pointed the way!” she continued, pointing towards the mare in question who'd been able to point out the way, given they were standing right by the sign. “It's right by the town hall! We've been, like, ten metres from it this entire time!” Applejack would have cried had she been able to feel her tear ducts.
Pinkie Pie walked up to the door of the Lodge, pulling Applejack and the unfortunate stranger-mare with her. She knocked vigorously on the expensive mahogany panelling with her 'door-knocking gloves' [what appeared to be knuckle-dusters] and waited for an answer. “You know, it's illegal to wear those things in public.” said the stranger-mare, “Also, can I go now?”
“Sure. If you wanna miss the Freemasons!” Pinkie Pie tried to convince her. To which the stranger shrugged and walked off; looking back worriedly in case the pink threat was coming after her to rearrange her face with the door-knocking gloves.
The door was opened by a middle-aged and rotund gentle-pony who stared at the two ponies on the doorstep. Applejack stared through him. Pinkie Pie stared through both of them. Nothing changes for fifteen minutes, so let's skip back to Rarity and Fluttershy.
The two aforementioned ponies were on their way towards the Quidditch pitch when they bumped into Twilight and Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash had a pencil behind her ear. Twilight had a bag over her shoulder and Spike was riding the bag. “Ah, so you found the projector!” Rarity presumed. Twilight replied, “As my grandma always said: Never presume; it'll make a 'Pres' out of 'U' and 'Me'.”
“What's a 'Pres'?” asked Fluttershy.
“Seriously, what's a 'grandma'?” Rarity interrupted the non-answer Twilight was about to give, “I keep hearing that today and no pony's answering me!”
“I'll take it from here,” chipped in Spike, “When a mummy and a daddy love each other very much...” Twilight looked up at him, genuinely curious about where this was going, “... They each inevitably have their own sets of parents, the respective females of which would be your grandmas.” Twilight looked away again, nodding. Yep, nothing to see here.
“Thank you,” said Rarity, “My parents told me they hatched from magic eggs, it's forever crippled my abilities of inductive reasoning.”
“Anyway; yeah, I got the projector. However, I really don't know where we'll set it up.” said Twilight, “Not that I bothered looking. We could literally project it onto a tree and Princess Celestia wouldn't notice the whole affair's been cobbled together at the last second.”
“Well, I may just have a plan. It might be great. I might be brilliant. They might be giants.” said Fluttershy proudly [like the majestic wolf], “We're on our way to the Ponyville Quidditch Pitch to see if we could use their seats. Instead of moving like 400 chairs, we could just ask if we could use the pitch for the festival!”
“Fluttershy, that's an excellent idea!” said Twilight, “What the hell's a Quidditch Pitch?” Rarity produced a photocopied picture of the six young Quidditch players atop household brooms. Twilight giggled, “It's funny because their eyes are dead.”
On the way to the pitch, the four ponies and Spike passed by the town hall [given I've conveniently left out any vestiges of geography from this story]. A small crowd had gathered around one of the little annexes jutting off from the main hall. Spike, from his viewpoint on top of the projector on Twilight's back, could see three ponies standing still as a glass of mineral water in the centre of the crowd, blocking access to the annexe. Someone had had the courtesy to drop an upturned flat-cap on the floor by one of the inanimate pony'ses feet [err, hooves- Spike quickly re-thunk to himself, narrowly avoiding a potential thought-crime]. The cap had already been filled with pennies and precious silks and more were being thrown into an overflow-fedora. Spike would have asked if they could go over to gawk with the other ponies if he hadn't have embarrassedly recognized two of the three exhibits on display. He kept quiet and let his pack-mule carry him towards the next major plot point.
At the entrance to the stadium, they found a solitary adolescent pony counting down minutes in the ticket-booth in front of a knackered-looking computer, still unsure what she was being paid to do. At some point in the last eight months, she'd decided that it most likely involved becoming the Great Minesweeper Wizard of Western Equestria. The gang approached tentatively. “Pay no attention to the mare behind the ticket-booth.” the mare behind the ticket-booth said in an unexpectedly booming voice, without looking up from the computer. At this, Twilight looked around at the other ponies with one eyebrow cocked; the ponies nodded back, each looking at the others. “Wa-hey!” they cheered simultaneously, their faces lighting up and Fluttershy pulling out her 'drink to forget' whiskey and five shot-glasses from nowhere relevant to the plot. “Well guys, we did it! Our first Wizard of Oz reference!” beamed Twilight.
“Oh, I'm ever so glad we didn't pull the old 'not in Kansas anymore'!” Rarity chipped in. Rainbow Dash necked her shot, “Yeah, we're gonna need that one later. Ya know, for when we're officially out of jokes!” They giggled uncontrollably as the ticket-mare continued to beat expert-level in under ninety seconds.
Back at the town hall, the Freemason Elder had found himself wrapped up in an incredible psychological phenomenon. Unfortunately, most of the residents of Ponyville had found it just as incredible. When he'd answered the door, he hadn't expected to find himself confronted with an obviously drugged-up pony in full cowboy-getup along with a vacantly-smiling pink one wearing what appeared to be knuckle-dusters. He'd failed to say anything within the first ten seconds, expecting one of them to announce why they'd knuckle-dusted sizeable dents in the expensive mahogany of the front door. By the time an answer failed to come, he felt he'd lost his chance and could do nothing more but stand there until something happened. After five minutes he'd felt embarrassed to even make a move. After ten, a good crowd had gathered to see what was happening. Along the way, someone had put down a hat which had been quickly filled with donations. Photos had been taken. Another hat. More money. What was happening? How long had it been? How much sweat could one lose before being pronounced medically and clinically 'Dry as a Zealously Reformed Alcoholic'?
At the fifteen minute mark [precisely fifteen, through whatever diabolic mechanisms] the cowgirlpony held out a leaflet. Slow as continental drift he moved. It felt as if his whole life had been leading up to this moment. Every pony was on edge. Some were on their back. Some were on other ponies' backs trying to get a better view. The situation held with the Freemason reaching down, almost hoof to hoof with the cowgirl. It was a perfect pastiche of Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel Fresco; an enterprising young stallion took the initiative and started a preliminary sketch, I'm having that!, he thought to himself.
Once the Masonic Elder had finally read the leaflet to which his whole life had pertained, he simply nodded- tears streaming down his face. Applejack was overcome with emotion and began to sob uncontrollably as she gathered up the hats, pulling Pinkie Pie behind her as they made their way back down the streets of Ponyville. She didn't know how she knew to head towards the old Quidditch Pitch, only that there she'd find her Gethsemane.
They made at least £2000.