The first month of fall brought with it a storm of colors to the town of Ponyville. Unfortunately for the town it also brought in a storm of problems as well as the Prank Duo and I started our little war. “There they are, took them long enough to show up,” I mutter as I watch Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash walk down the street outside of Sugarcube Corner. “Let’s see how well they can handle being pranked back.”
I begin to levitate the bag next to me in their direction, making sure that they don’t see it. As I get it above them I lower it down between them and for a small barrier inside the center of it before using my magic to tap them both on the shoulders between them. Through all this nearby ponies look at the tableau, not sure what to make of it, though when the pink and cyan mares turn and see the bag floating between them they soon find out what is going on. As soon as the two are looking at the bag I rapidly expand the barrier inside of it, causing the bag to explode and coat the two with flour.
As soon as the cloud of flour clears, all everypony in the area can see are a white earth pony and pegasus just standing there blinking at each other. “Pinkie Pie, what just happened?” comes from the pegasus, who soon catches the sound of the laughter coming from me as I fall out of the doorway I’m hiding in. As soon as I catch her glaring at me I just blow her a kiss before taking off for home, my revenge complete.
The next day I catch the two trying to set up another prank outside of my home. I was able to catch them out though as I could sense them in the area through my link to the hearth stone. I climb out my window and up to the roof and carefully make my way over to above where they are hiding, waiting for me to exit. “Do you see her coming yet Pinkie?” I hear from Rainbow Dash as I peer over the edge of the roof. “Not yet Dashie, hurry up and get that bucket set up before she shows.” I can see the two are too focused on their prank to notice my decorations out front.
As Pinkie Pie is looking through my front windows she fails to notice the blue flowers that she is standing in. I chuckle at this, almost getting caught as Pinkie’s ear twitches causing her to look up at where I would be if I didn’t duck down. When she turns back to the window I float one of the flowers from the other window and slide it behind Rainbow Dash’s ear.
“Not a bad try you two,” I say causing the two to jump, which also distracts Rainbow Dash from the flower I put on her, “but seeing as I’m up here that bucket won’t do you much good above the door. Though from the looks of things I won’t even need to bother trying to prank you back either.” The looks on their faces is priceless as they start trying to make excuses, “Uh yeah… this was just… a gift, yeah that it,” comes from Rainbow, “I’ll just leave it here, I gotta go do some stuff at the place… see ya!” She then dashes off, followed by Pinkie Pie with a shout of, “Ditto!”
I catch the flower as it falls from Rainbow Dash’s mane, and climb down to see what they had in the bucket. “Really? Poison joke petals? Now that’s just ironic that they walk into the ones I had planted while trying to dump theirs on me.” I lift the bucket out from above my door and bring it into my house, “I guess I shouldn’t let a gift go to waste, I can probably find something to do with dried joke petals later.”
Later that day I made my way into town for a midday meal. I kept an eye out for the two, but couldn’t spot hide or mane of them, which should have been my first warning. Deciding on something sweet I made my way to Sugarcube Corner. Unfortunately as soon as I opened the door I was blinded by a face full of lemon pie.
I just stood there blinking as the pie tin falls away, revealing the two on the other side of the door. I just glare at them as they sit there laughing, before I close the door and head back home again to plan. “At least I got a free meal out of this,” I mutter as I lick off what I can with my tongue before I get home. Luckily it didn’t take too long to get an idea since they had already set up the prank already.
“Hehe, let’s see what they do when the only source of poison joke cure is in my possession.” I then head out and sneak back into town. From listening to Pinkie’s tales about their adventures, I knew that the spa and Zecora were the only places to get a ready sample of the cure. The spa was easy enough as they only keep a small amount on hand as it isn’t needed often. Buying the little they had left was easy enough.
Zecora’s supply was actually easier as she had run out of many of the key ingredients she needed. Luckily I brought some more pepper powder with me which I offered to persuade her to not gather what she needed for another couple days. I then let her know that I had a couple samples on hoof in case someone needed it. With that completed I just went home to wait for the two to arrive.
The next morning the two showed up around noon, with a large amount of noise as Rainbow Dash literally crashes through my front door. “Flarenza! Get your tail down here; we want a word with you!” I hear Rainbow Dash shout out to me while I am preparing some things in my attic. Heading downstairs I catch sight of them before starting to laugh, “Well it’s a good thing I didn’t replace anything yet, or else it would have been broken already, and I didn’t know it was possible for Pinkie Pie to be silent.”
I just sit there looking over the two, and also making note to never get hit by the stuff myself. Rainbow Dash looks to have had her wings flipped upside down, and because of this has no real control of her flying. Pinkie Pie on the other hand has had her tongue swell up enough that it prevents her from speaking. “Yeah, yeah, laugh it up. I wish I knew when you had the chance to pull this prank, there wasn’t a chance for you to pull it after that pie,” complains Rainbow Dash.
“That’s my secret to know, though you should really watch where you step when you spy on the inside of somepony’s home,” I brag to her. Pinkie Pie seems to catch my meaning though, and looks out my door to under the windows, spotting the flowers. She then starts to gesture towards them and makes noises at the pegasus until she looks at what she found. “Wait, you actually planted the stuff under your windows? What kind of crazy pony does that!?” exclaims Rainbow Dash.
I just laugh at this as I toss her a pouch of the cure, “Well since I moved into town I thought I need to do something to fit in. I have it on good authority that all the ponies in this town are crazy.” I smile at his, remembering some of the conversations I’ve had during some of my library trips, though the two in front of me don’t seem to get the joke. Shaking their heads they just head on back to town, though I can tell that this isn’t the last I’ve heard of them.
The rest of the month followed the same pattern, they’d prank me, and I’d prank them back. I made sure to not always catch them when they tried it at the manor, though I tended to avoid the messier pranks when they did do them, a few of the times I even turned the prank back on them. Strangely enough Pinkie Pie seemed to avoid the worst of my attempts as well; somehow she had some weird system of bodily twitches that could predict certain things. This led to me being very careful how I did certain pranks as some were easier for her to avoid than others.
Near the end of the month I was sitting under Rainbow Dash’s home, plotting on how I was going to get up there to put my current prank into effect. I had already switched out the shampoo in Pinkie Pie’s home for another with a small enchantment on it, so that just left the one for the cyan mare. “Why are you just sitting there staring at Rainbow Dash’s home?” The sound of the scratchy voice questioning me causes me to jump and turn to who snuck up on me.
Sitting behind me is Applebloom and the two fillies I saw her with about a month ago. All three of them just sit there staring at me, “Well?” This comes from the orange pegasus filly who spoke earlier. I contemplate how to answer them. “Who wants to know?” I ask trying to stall for time which fortunately works, though unfortunately for my ears. “I’m Scootaloo,” comes from her, “I’m Applebloom,” from the yellow earth pony, “And I’m Sweetie Belle,” from the white unicorn, “And together we are the CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS!” shout all three together, blasting my ears painfully.
Rubbing my ears I decide to go with the truth and see what goes from there, “Well the past month Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash and I have been having a bit of a prank war. I have a good prank ready to go, but I’ve run into a bit of a snag. I didn’t think of how to get up to Rainbow Dash’s house to finish it though.” I start looking back at it again while they sit there, “You’re trying to prank Rainbow Dash? That’s not going to happen, she’s too awesome to fall for a prank from some random pony,” states Scootaloo. “Even if you did succeed she’d just get you back with a prank ten times better than yours,” she boasts.
Detecting a bit of hero worship from her, as well as noticing her wings tiny though they are, I wonder if I can trick her into helping me. “Well if she’s so awesome she should see through the prank before she falls for it then, though how to get her to prove this if I can’t get up there. I’d need someone brave and nearly as awesome as her to get up there for me.” I watch her out of the corner of my eye, trying to get her to take the bait.
“Of course, but good luck finding anypony like that,” she counters. I smile and try to push a bit more, “I’d think her biggest fan would have fit that description, but I guess I must have been wrong…” I trail off at this, though it looks like she fell for it, “Hey, of course that matches me; I AM her biggest fan after all.”
“So you’d go up there and do the simple thing I need so she can prove how awesome she is?” She wavers at this, “Well I don’t know, I mean I can’t fly yet and…” Hehe, hook, line and sinker, “I can get you up there easily, but if you aren’t brave enough to do it…” This sets her off for some reason, “Hey! I’m plenty brave enough, just tell me what you want done and I’ll do it.”
I hand her the bottle and give her instructions to switch it for the one in Rainbow Dash’s bathroom. I then conjure up a flat barrier with enough energy to show my flaming aura to show for her to ride up to the cloud. “Ooh pretty, how are you doing that?” comes from Sweetie Belle. I turn to her, wondering what she means, before I look back at the platform and realize what she means, “Oh that, it’s just how my magic appears when I focus on it, normally I keep it where you can’t see it, but it’s probably best that it’s visible now.”
Sweetie Belle gets a thoughtful look on her face, though doesn’t continue with the line of questions so I turn back to what I was doing. After I lift Scootaloo up to the cloud I turn to the remaining two fillies, “Is she always that easy to manipulate?” Applebloom just rolls her eyes at this before answering, “If it has anything to do with Rainbow Dash, then yep. Who are you anyways?”
“I’m Flarenza; I’m surprised your sister hasn’t mentioned me. Especially with all the troubles with the manor outside of town,” I respond to her while waiting for Scootaloo to return. Sweetie Belle lets out a squeak at the mention of the manor, “You live in that haunted place outside of town!?” “And how do you know who my sister is,” comes from Applebloom immediately after. “Well it’s not haunted anymore; Twilight and I took care of that problem a while ago. Also I’ve met Applejack a few times, and I found out you were sisters from Spike back when I caught sight of you chasing Zecora,” I reply to them both.
They both look to be pondering this and Applebloom nods while Sweetie Belle responds, “Well I guess we can take Cutie Mark Crusader Ghost Catchers of our list if the ghost is gone.” I just look at her wondering if she is serious, though I turn back to the cloud house when I hear a call. Seeing Scootaloo is back I send up the platform again and bring her back down. “What was in that bottle anyways?” she asks as she lands by her friends. “Well if it works you’ll see tomorrow, if not I’ll let you know later that day. Thanks for the help, I couldn’t do this without you,” I praise her which causes her to pose a bit, “So since I’m done here, how about joining me for a snack, I feel like trying out some of that ice cream I heard of.” This catches their attention so we head off to the place I saw selling it, and wave them off as I buy one for each of them.
Chuckling to myself at their antics as they head off I make a note to find out what their Crusader group does. I remember hearing something about a group like that recently, but it was linked to some sort of property damage so that couldn’t be them, could it? Shrugging I finish off my ice cream before heading off to other things now that the prank is done.
The next morning I set out early to Ponyville and took a seat where I could keep watch on Sugarcube Corner. It didn’t take long for me to spot Rainbow Dash streaking towards it from her house to meet the figure that leaves it bearing Pinkie Pie’s mark. As the two meet I get a good view of my handiwork, and even spot Scootaloo out of the corner of my eye with her mouth wide open.
If somepony wasn’t paying attention they wouldn’t notice anything out of the ordinary. Those that actually look closer would notice that the earth pony now has cyan fur and rainbow mane, while the pegasus possess a pink fur and mane color scheme. “She got you too Dashie? How did she get up to your cloud house?” comes from Pinkie Pie. “I don’t know Pinkie, but when I find her she is really going to get it,” at those words from Rainbow Dash I try to sneak away.
Scootaloo, looking a little downtrodden, had walked up to them as I made my way in the direction of the library. She appeared to be saying something to the two, until she looked up towards me and gasped. Seeing her point towards me, and the two look at me angrily, only one thing came to mind. “Oh crap.”
I take off running, laughing the entire way, as they start to chase after me. I almost lose them a couple times, but the pegasus’ ability of flight allows them to find me easily. Soon I catch sight of the door to the library, and try to make it to the safety of it. Unfortunately I misjudged how close the other two mares were to me as they caught up as soon as I opened the door, sending all three of us tumbling into the library to be buried under a pile of books.
“What in the world is going on in here?” shouts the voice of the familiar resident librarian in response to the crash and mess. Poking my head out from under the pile of books, along with the other two pranksters, I notice that somehow we managed to knock every book in the library off its shelf. Turning to look at the purple unicorn I can see that she is very angry, and that things might have gone a bit too far.
“Twilight! Look what she did to us!” shouts the now pink pegasus. Twilight looks the two over before commenting, “Well you three *snrk* have been pranking each other the entire month. How is this any different from the flood of custard you caused last week that they are still cleaning up?” Twilight is obviously trying to hold in her laughter at this, much to the other two mares’ dismay.
“Twilight, this is serious! This isn’t a simple die job, no matter how much I try I can’t get this color out!” This comes from Pinkie Pie who actually seems a bit distressed at this. Spike walks in at this time and just breaks out laughing at their predicament in his usual blunt manner. Twilight on the other hand, “Well what did she prank you with to cause this, if she made it this far it couldn’t have just been a simple spell.”
Rainbow Dash replies to this, “She switched out our shampoos for this, Scootaloo admitted to being a part of this thinking it wouldn’t word so explained everything she knew.” She then glares at me for getting the filly to help pull this off, though I try to look innocent. Well she does have a point there; I should have tried something else since I didn’t have a way up there.
I turn back to Twilight to see her rubbing her temples with her hooves and sighing, “Flarenza, how do you reverse this? They are going to be insufferable until you tell them.” Looking between her and the other two I can see she has a point, though that doesn’t mean I won’t have a little fun with it, “Well it’s a rather complicated process to swap everything back the way they were. First thing you need to do is wash up again with the same shampoo you used before. Once you finish with that come back and I’ll tell you the rest.”
The two just look at me in disbelief, “You better be telling the truth about this, because if you’re not,” threatens Rainbow Dash before the two head back to their homes. After they leave I start chuckling causing Twilight to look at me strangely, “And what is so funny now? You know things will get even worse if you are still pranking them over this.”
I levitate the books around me to the nearby shelves, with a quick glance to reorder them before answering. “Oh just the fact that I now have the time to run off again before they realize that doing what I said is all that they need to do. You were right earlier though, things have been getting a tad out of hand lately. Maybe a peace offering of cupcakes will help end things for now.”
Twilight looks confused at my response, “What do you mean using the shampoo again is all they need to do, why would the thing that caused the problem fix… Wait, you mean all this was, was a simple color swap spell? You could have just said so and I could have fixed it here.”
“Ah, but then I wouldn’t have had time to escape from them so they’d have a chance to cool off. Now when they bust in here after finding out they were tricked again somepony can calm them down and stop their end of things before they get worse.” Twilight just glares at me for dumping this on her causing me to sweat a little, “And of course I’ll bring along something for you as well for the inconvenience. Just let them know to meet at Sugarcube Corner tomorrow to finish things up.”
Twilight just shakes her head and sighs at this, “Fine, but you better make sure to show; a month of having to dodge pranks has been getting on pony’s nerves.” I nod at her before making my way back to the manor before the other two can return. I thankfully make it far enough away in time as I spot Rainbow Dash streaking towards the library as I get home. “Well I guess I have some baking to do, though Maybe with one last prank for the road.”
I spend the rest of the night preparing the offerings to the two mares, as well as the gift to Twilight for helping out. I decide to use an old recipe that was passed down to me, though I can’t help but tear up while curled up in my bed before finally falling asleep.
The next morning I prepare to head out to the meeting place, but as I was about to leave I was surprised to hear knocking at my door. Levitating the items I prepared onto my back as I head to the door to see who it was. Opening it I’m surprised to see Spike is there, “This is an odd time to show up, especially since you know that I would be meeting up with the others at Sugarcube Corner soon.” Spike just rubs the back of his head, “Yeah, well Twilight thought somepony might try skipping out, so she sent me to get you while she went to round up Rainbow Dash. Pinkie Pie lives and works there so she wouldn’t be a problem.”
I just shake my head at this, though not overly surprised after some of the things Twilight has pulled before over the months I’ve known her. “And does she have a checklist prepared for this as well? And how badly do you think it’ll be ruined?” Spike chuckles at this, “Yeah, with about fifty things on it, too. Knowing you three she’ll be pulling her mane out in the first ten minutes.”
“Well hopefully my gift to her will distract her from doing that, but I guess we should head out before she starts having a fit.” With this we head off towards town, while chatting about random topics. I try to steer clear of certain things though, as the last time zombies were mentioned Spike got a little overzealous.
As we arrive at Sugarcube Corner I notice that Twilight and Rainbow Dash haven’t arrived, so I take a seat in a corner to wait. After a short time I spot Twilight dragging the stubborn pegasus in, though her attitude changes after Pinkie Pie whispers something to her and they all head over, That was an odd attitude shift, I wonder…
A bit wary, I wait for the three to take a seat, and for Twilight to mark some things off her list, before speaking. “We all know why we’re here. It seems we may be getting a bit out of hand with the pranks, especially since others have been getting caught up in them. So I propose that we come to an agreement to end this before we go overboard. So to mark my end of the agreement I brought these,” I lift the cover on one of the trays, revealing two cupcakes done up in the colors of the two mares, and levitate them over to them.
As I set them down Pinkie Pie speaks up, “Twilight said you were going to make something so I decided to make something extra specially tasty for you as well.” Rainbow Dash nods at that, “Uh yeah, after this no more pranks, I guess.” I catch the odd way she phrased that and sigh as I look over the cupcake Pinkie Pie pushed over. Somehow in her usual way she decorated it in the same way I did theirs. Looking at the two looking at me with hopeful looking grins I just sigh.
I’ll probably regret doing this, but seeing as I planned to do the same to them as well. I lift up the cupcake and take the whole thing in one bite to get it over with. As I slowly chew I can start to feel my mouth starting to burn, as well as sweat forming on me. With tears in my eyes I just nod at the two, while Twilight looks on in confusion. It’s not until Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie burst out laughing that she gets what going on.
“I can’t believe you two! I thought you said you were going to stop with the pranks but then you go and pull this?” Rainbow Dash calms down first, “Lighten up Twilight, I did say that this would be the last one before she ate it.” She tosses back her cupcake as Pinkie Pie continues, “Yeah, no more pranks after this, I Pinkie Promise to that.” She then follows suit and starts in on her own treat.
I signal to Mrs. Cake to send over some milk, though send up a number with magic for three glasses. I turn back to Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie as their faces start to turn a shade of red. “Now what is wrong with you two?” comes from Twilight before she catches on, “Wait, don’t tell me you added something to the ones you made as well?! I can’t believe you three! I thought you wanted to stop the pranks, not do another one in front of me, ugh!” She really seems to be getting into it as she tears her checklist apart.
At this point Rainbow Dash is panting heavily from the heat, while Pinkie Pie literally has fire come out of her mouth from the heat of the peppers I had added. As the milk arrives they both start chugging glass after glass as I nurse the one I grabbed. “Well I guess great minds think alike, though I’m wondering if any of us meant to prank Twilight by ruining her checklist,” I comment with a chuckle, which is soon joined by the other two pranksters.
“Yeah, I guess you can say that. I didn’t expect you to have something this hot though, Pinkie Pie used the hottest ones she got from you but they were nothing like this,” comes from Rainbow Dash as she recovered first. Pinkie Pie looks too worn out to even try to talk, and is still drinking from her glass. “Yeah, I kept this one from her; it’s a bit too dangerous to mess with if you don’t know about it. Though I may have overestimated how well she could handle it. She got half of a pepper, yours only was only a bit of the tip.”
The eyes on all three mares widen at this information, “Wait, you used that little in there? Pinkie was just chowing down on the ones she used in yours with no problems; I would have thought you’d have used at least six of whatever you used.” Rainbow Dash and Twilight look a bit scared at this, “Why in the world do you even have something like that? Ponies could really get hurt if they ate those and you use them in a prank?!” Twilight just looks at me incredulously for taking such a risk.
“Well of course I made sure to only use a safe amount, wouldn’t want anypony to be injured, and trust me when I say that the burns from these are not fun to deal with. It was the last time I ever tried to eat them and I made sure to never give them out to others unless I was sure they knew the risks. Anyways I believe I owe you something as well Twilight, and no there is no prank involved in this.” I bring out the other tray and set it in front of Twilight before uncovering it.
All three mares and the dragon look at the simple dish that is layers of applesauce and crepes. “What is it?” asks Spike who had finally finished his laughing at the pranks. “This is a simple family recipe that I know of that I’ve called an applesauce crepe cake. The name pretty much describes exactly what it is, though it tastes better with some whipped cream added to it.” At this Pinkie Pie vanished under the table just to return a second later with a bowl of the mentioned topping.
Shaking her head at the antics Twilight sighs, “Yes Pinkie, I’ll share it with all of you, as long as the pranks have ended at least.” She stares at all of us sternly causing all of us to just smile and nod. Levitating out a knife she proceeded to cut the cake into five pieces and sent a slice over to each of us. While the others started in on their piece, I instead cover mine so that it can be carried elsewhere.
Pinkie Pie notices this and asks, “Why aren’t you eating it now? It’s really tasty and stuff.” I just smile at her, “Well I would, but there is somepony else that probably deserves it more.” Once the piece of cake is secure I float it over to Rainbow Dash, “Can you make sure Scootaloo gets this? She seems to think the world of you and this is my way of apologizing to her.”
She gets a thoughtful look at this, “Yeah, that’s not a bad idea. I haven’t spent enough time with the little squirt lately either.” Thanking her for doing that, I bid them all farewell as I head back to the manor for the rest of the day.