Chapter 3: Pokey! Pierce the Heavens with Your Horn!
or
Back Up… Hearts and Hooves Day?
That last bit was a bummer, what else happened on Hearts and Hooves Day? Seems like an important event with my ‘Ship them. Ship everypony.’ attitude.
“Great Jupiter!” thought Pokey loudly as he brushed his teeth. “Today’s Hearts and Hooves Day! That’s… significant!” after a pause he continued, “I’m… I should do something.”
But what? What would he doooooo?
“Well I-I I don’t know. What should I do?” Pokey pondered. “I must summon the council!”
Pokey went over to Lucky’s house. Lucky was still in bed, but he awoke on account of Pokey doing a B&E and being in his room shouting at him.
“Whaaa~aaa-t!?” Lucky whined/shouted as he pulled a pillow over his face.
“It’s Hearts and Hooves Day, I don’t know what to do, you’re the council!” Pokey anxiously exclaimed.
“Go to bed!” decreed Lucky.
“Its noon!” replied Pokey.
“So!?”
“Come on, this is important!!” Pokey pushed him.
“What!?” Lucky struggled to stay immobile under the pillow.
Pokey tried pulling the pillow away with magic but damn was Lucky strong. “I have a secret crush! And a near-death experience has made me weary of time! More so than normal! I don’t know! I only slept for four hours! She doesn’t like me! What do I do!?”
“If she doesn’t like you she doesn’t like you,” said Lucky.
“It was a misunderstanding!!!” whined/shouted Pokey.
“Then tell her that!!”
“How!?”
“With your mouth!”
“What do I say!!?”
“The truth!!”
“I don’t know…” The uncertain Pokey sank to the floor. Love is scary.
“Pokey,” said Lucky seriously, “Don’t be a pussy.”
Lucky’s words of encouragement lifted Pokey’s spirits. Some things were important. Sometimes doing things was important. Pokey needed to do something this time. It was important.
“Thank you my friend,” said Pokey as he left.
“Stay thirsty my friend,” replied Lucky, referencing the Most Interesting Stallion in the World simply for phrase association.
Walking through town, it occurred to Pokey he might want to do some information-gathering on his love interest. He couldn’t just stalk her, not that he hadn’t. He felt that, right now he needed a mutual ally. Maybe he could approach one of her friends for help? Or maybe he could ask Mr. or Mrs. Cake? No. Pokey didn’t trust old people. Don’t ask why.
Pokey decided he’d go and ask Big Macintosh’s sister AJ. When he arrived at the Apple home he heard giggling and talking inside. He totally eavesdropped.
The muffled giggle of Applejack could be identified saying, “Ain’t nothin’ to be embarrassed about Big Macintosh.”
“Kissy kissy kissy!” Applebloom seemed to be teasing.
“Bout time you made me some great grandkids!” shouted Granny Smith, strangely irate. “I was beginnin’ ta think you was queer or somethin’!”
“No,” Big Mac seemed to say, “Y’all got it all wrong.”
Pokey heard Big Mac heading upstairs.
“He’s so shy!” Applebloom said gleefully, “They’ll be so cute together! Although, I don’t see what she has that Miss Cheerilee ain’t got.”
Pokey raised an eyebrow. Mac’s got a dame? Who? Was it one of AJ’s friends? WAS IT PINKIE!? KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK… He knocked.
“Well hey there Pokey,” greeted Applejack.
“Hi!” Pokey smiled, “I heard shouting and laughing, what’s going on?”
“Oh Big Macintosh has a date with Fluttershy or something,” she smiled, “He won’t explain nothin’ but he insists it ain’t what it is.”
“I see,” sighed Pokey.
“What ya come over fer? I know ya didn’t hear us all the way in town or nothin’.” AJ raised an eyebrow at him, smirking.
“Actually, I…” Pokey blushed, “I need to speak with you in private!”
“O_O” Applejack got the wrong idea. Pokey was coming across as a nervous and terrified little boy. On Hearts and Hooves Day, that means love confession.
“It’s important!” he yelped, “And private!”
“I… I see,” Applejack blushed. She never thought of Pokey that way. He was just another one of Big Mac’s guy friends, aside from being a little too girly for her taste. “Well uh... Let’s go talk in the barn ah guess.”
So they went to the barn, where Pokey declared, “I’m in love with one of your friends and I need your help or something!”
“!!!” Applejack was taken aback and then laughed with relief. “Shucks, I thought you were fancyin’ me! Bout gave me a heart attack!”
“HAHAHAHA!” laughed Pokey in caps lock, “No no no! Well, not that you’re not, not that I don’t, not that I wouldn’t, not that I think or don’t think, hey how about you help me romance yer gal pal? HAHAHAHA! I’m gonna kill myself if you don’t say something soon!”
“First things first you need ta calm down n’ tell me who it is yer crushin’ on,” Applejack smiled. This was incredibly amusing to her.
“Pinkie Pie,” declared Pokey, who is supposed to be blue but was so embarrassed he was doing a pretty good impression of his love interest.
“PINKIE!?” AJ laughed.
“Hey you say anything bad about her and I’ll bury you, lady!” Pokey snarled as he stabbed at the air with his horn. The sad thing is his menacing gestures looked exactly like him popping balloons in that flashback but with a frown.
“Calm down lover boy!” she giggled, wiping a tear from her eye. She was pretty confident she could take him in a fight, so she wasn’t offended, “That’s good yer defendin’ her name and all; very chivalrous of ya. But yer pretty much the only pony in Ponyville Pinkie ain’t eager to sing to.”
“You mean she hates me?” Pokey held up his hooves teary eyed, “Y u no sing to me, Pinkie Pie!?”
“Nah, Pinkie dun hate nopony so far as I reckon,” AJ reassured him, “If anything she thinks you hate her.”
“Whaaaa? Because-of I pop the balloons?” he asked, still sob-faced.
“Yeah, pretty much. She thinks you hate parties, which’r kinda her thing,” explained Applejack.
“But I love parties!” Pokey rebutted, “I just like stabbin' stuff! And… I… well…”
“What?” AJ looked inquisitively at the furiously blushing Pokey.
“I… REALLY like balloons,” Pokey tried to explain.
“Uh-huh.” Applejack didn’t get it. “Then why do ya pop em’ all the time?”
“I’m a complicated stallion,” he replied with his serious business face.
“Well, yer gonna have to find a way to explain yerself and apologize to Pinkie if ya wanna get anywhere with her,” AJ replied before starting to chuckle again. Sweet, silly, innocent Pinkie? Crazy Pinkie? To be honest, Applejack felt a little defeated that somepony fell for that goofball before her. She inwardly acknowledged the contradiction between her earlier relief and her current jealousy. “Heh.”
“Do you have any advice? As her friend?” Pokey asked.
“First of all, I’m gonna need to know why yer set on Pinkie, and what exactly yer after,” AJ stared him down. There was a chance he was a jerk with nefarious motives; though he normally seemed pretty decent, from what little she’d seen of him around town.
“I’m after Pinkie Pie!” he replied stupidly, but it got better, “She’s my soul mate! Bouncing around town singing and laughing like an angel or a goddess! She’s too good for this world but she’s here anyways! She’s always being silly and making people smile! She’s a blessing to the world! She’s hot! She’s got balloons for a cutie mark! She’s a little off-kilter just like me! She’s everything right! AJ! APPLEJACK I’M GONNA VOMIT!”
“Please don’t!” Applejack replied, simultaneously touched and disturbed. Touched and Disturbed was Noteworthy’s band name in high school, by the way.
“What do I doooo?”
“First of all, yer gonna have to man up,” she answered. “Ya ain’t gonna win any mares actin’ like a nancy boy.”
“Some girls like girly guys,” he replied, “Some girls like girls.”
“Shut up and listen ta me,” Applejack replied. Applejack didn’t like girly guys and didn’t want any of her friends dating girly guys. She was biased, but she wasn’t having this argument right now. “Pinkie’s never had a suitor come callin’ before. Yer gonna have to toughen up and be a little more aggressive. But don’t go blabbin’ on and on, take a cue from Big Mac and be a bit more mysterious, at least at first.”
“All the mares do like Big Macintosh,” Pokey nodded thoughtfully.
“And remember to be yerself,” AJ smiled.
“WHAT!? That’s the opposite of what you just said!”
“Oh yeah,” she scratched her chin.
“And Big Macintosh isn’t aggressive at all!” Pokey realized.
“Hmmmm,” Applejack thought a moment, “Well, Pokey, yer just gonna have to go out with confidence, lay it on the line, and if it’s meant to be it’s meant to be.”
“Gwuuhhhh yeahh,” Pokey moaned.
“It’s Hearts and Hooves Day, and since everpony’s being so romantic and whatnot, Pinkie Pie just might be more receptive to you askin' her to be yer very special somepony. But more likely she’ll take whatever you say wrong, so be direct!”
At the time AJ told him Pinkie’d be off work, Pokey headed down to the Sugarcube Corner to confess his feelings.
He nervously walked in. There she was, preparing to leave. She turned to face him, and when she saw who it was she cut him down with a glare.
“You,” she said accusingly, expecting anything.
Pokey did not falter. “I don’t hate you,” he said.
“Huh?”
Except that.
“I’m in love with you.”