My Little Pony: Lernin' 'Bout Frends

by FenDingo

Episode 1: Friendathon 5000 [part 3: once mare into the breach]

Rarity had taken it upon herself to give the ponies and baby dragon the guided tour of her wardrobe.
They all looked on as Rarity walked over to a previously-unmentioned animal-powered mill wheel in the centre of the room. “Look, a mill wheel! I wonder why she has that?” said the two ponies and Spike paraphrasedly. Rarity bit into one of the arms coming from the wheel and started to push it around. Fluttershy, Twilight and Spike looked up to see the white pony's complex machinations starting to turn steadily. “I wonder how we missed that!” said Spike sarcastically, disbelief rapidly unsuspending. Fluttershy answered “We probably didn't see it, before.” Twilight had a nosebleed. A loud, rocky groan was emitted as the floor to Rarity's house began to crack open down the middle. The assorted ponies of Ponyville looked over in their direction as they heard a piercing fog-horn and the low rumble of rock grinding past rock; for the third time that day, most feared the Black Gates of Mordor were finally opening.

The floor to Rarity's house had cracked open, revealing what could only be described as a chasm. “I still don't understand why you needed the horn.” Twilight said. In reply, Rarity hit her old-fashioned jukebox with a hoof and Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries blasted out, shaking the foundations of the building while her horn glowed violently as a roll of red cloth unwound itself from an oversized spool and shot over the edge, rippling into darkness. I'm presuming the noises now coming from the house had calmed the spirits of the villagers because none of them came to have a look and none of them will be making an appearance if I can help it.

Suddenly, the cloth [still attached to the spool] snapped taut and creased itself into a red, health-and-safety-defying staircase into the darkness. Just at that moment, Applejack, Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie crashed into the expensive oak panelling of the door. Rarity covered her ears as unacceptable words erupted from behind it. The door was unbolted and the three walked in, deflated [but not literally; I'll be using that one later!]. Spike had fallen down the chasm in all the excitement.

“Holy hell, what is that thing?” exclaimed Rainbow Dash. Applejack responded, “It looks like a rift in the space-time continuity.”

Pinkie Pie, having recovered from her heavy dose of medication, had taken it upon herself to jump back and forth across the chasm, singing Carl Orff's arrangement of 'O Fortuna' as if it were a campfire song. The other ponies stared at her before Rarity joined in, too: “Egestatem, Potestatem, Dissolvit ut glaciem.” Before long, all ponies present were singing along.

Fluttershy then noticed the missing Spike, addressing Twilight, “I think you're gargoyle fell in.” Twilight couldn't be sure, but she had a sixth sense for telling when someone would use the wrong 'your' in writing. “Well, you're the one with wings, here; go get him!” she replied.

“Well, actually,” interrupted Rainbow Dash, “I'm the fastest Pegasus in the west, but I still need practice at speed-rescues if I ever wanna have a hope in hell at being invited to join the Freemasons!”

The other ponies looked at her like she was mental. She grinned back at them all like she was mental. “Just go!!” Twilight shouted. Rainbow Dash dove into the rift, disappearing into the darkness like a horse diving into a rift and disappearing into darkness.

“I really hope your gremlin's ok!” Pinkie fast-spoke at Twilight. Rarity cut in, “Oh, don't worry about him. There should be a pile of fabrics at least 15 metres deep at the bottom; it's where I throw all my rejected garments. And boy can I reject garments when I get going... That, or it's lava.” Twilight would have corrected her on the lava/magma issue, had she legitimately given a shit.

Meanwhile; Rainbow Dash was blazing down the giant hole in creation. Relativistic effects had to be taken into account, causing time to appear to slow down around her. “What the hell's going on?” she cried out to herself for the benefit of the audience, “Every time I get faster, I get slower.” She was starting to suspect that Physics at large would prevent her from becoming a first-class Freemason. Below, she started to make out some kind of circus tent? Oh no! Was it too late? She ground to a halt over the space of three kilometres, two perimeters and a thermometer. The pressure-column caused by her rapid descent had scorched the sides of the chasm and had set alight what she now saw to be a gaudy collection of clothing laid out at the bottom. Spike was jumping up and down atop the technicoloured catastrophe. Rainbow Dash swooped in and grabbed him, just before the expensive heap of grotesque attire burst into lava. “I did it! I'm number 1!” shouted Rainbow Dash as she blistered back up the chasm with Spike nestled safely, clinging to her lower legs. “I almost died!” shouted Spike in a terrified and high-pitched tone [his usual voice]. “You're right,” the speeding pony replied, chirpily, “It's a good thing that white pony's so wasteful, we could really learn a thing or two! In fact; Spike, take a letter!”

By the time they reached the mouth of the chasm, Spike had somehow managed to keep hold of Rainbow Dash's rear hooves while penning a messy letter to Princess Celestia on the value of throwing unwanted clothing into the abyss. He'd have made it more generalized and applicable to the day-to-day life of the common Equestrian citizen's condition if he'd truly believed the princess could read.

The other ponies had started to descend the red staircase into the abyssal wardrobe. As they walked past various holes and niches in the side of the chasm, Rarity explained what various 'Collections' and 'Fashion-Lines' lay within. After a time, Rainbow Dash reappeared, Spike wrapped around a back hoof like a novelty Leg Warmer, looking exceedingly pleased with herself. She dumped him on the red carpet and stood stock still, head raised high and eyes closed, waiting for validation. No one had noticed so she and Spike followed and got to see the rest of the tour. Of which there was, luckily, only one stop remaining: the one pertinent to the plot.

“And this is where I'm storing my latest work!” Rarity exclaimed, hopping into one of the caves coming off the main rift. The others followed as she explained. “I've been working on the most fabulous dresses for our night at Celestia's Sundance Festival! We shall look simply stunning!”

Pony brain-cogs turned as they tried to work out how Rarity had known she'd need six dresses in appropriate colours for herself and five ponies who had just burst through her door twenty minutes ago. They chose to withhold their comments, however, as these items were just... well... fabulous and infinitely re-saleable . It looked like she'd spent months on them. “I spent months on them!” Rainbow Dash informed the jaw-dropped ponies, trying to make up for lost attention. Rarity glared at her briefly before continuing, “It took weeks of blood, sweat and Sweetie-Belle tears. I simply had to get the colours and themes just right if you weren't to show up in a seemingly cobbled-together array of clothing for the festival tonight!”

“What?!” Twilight ejaculated [no, not like that], “The festival's tonight?!”

“Well of course, dear! Princess Celestia isn't travelling all this way not to watch an assortment of delightfully quirky indie films.” Rarity answered with a condescending look on her face. Pinkie, meanwhile, seemed to have had a stroke at the mention of festivals, “A... a... party?” she hazarded. Rarity turned her condescension-display-unit towards the pink pony. “I think you mean Film Festival? A little something the French like to call 'Une Soirée des Filmes Indépendants'.”

Rarity's murdered French pronunciation hung in the air as she and Twilight [morbidly curious] looked from pony to pony to see how they'd react to a foreign language. Needless to say, half a minute later, Rarity was was strung up by her hooves over a pile of firewood which Applejack had somehow managed to gather from below the surface of the planet. Twilight was strung up next to her, having not displayed enough shock at the 'devil's tongue' to be out of suspicion. The rite was interrupted suddenly by Spike exorcising a rolled up piece of parchment from one nostril. Everypony stopped what they were doing to hear what the parchment said.

“Dear Twilight,” Spike started. Seeing Fluttershy's confusion, he elucidated “... the purple witch.” Fluttershy nodded in understanding. Spike continued, “As you now?.. know?.. the Sundance Film Festival is being held in Ponyville tonight. I forgot to mention that you will be in charge of preparing the precipitation [err, preparations?] for the Ball which is take place(?) around the screaming(?) of the latest interdependent films from across the glorious land of Equestria. Please inshore that the food, dress, music, entertainment and Freemasons are in place for the preseedings. Yours sinfully, Prince's Sellestria.” Spike rolled the parchment back up, none the more enlightened for having read it. There was an awful silence while no one reacted to it. Spike paraphrased as best as he understood, “I think Princess Celestia says 'keep doing what you're doing!'.” he summed up. He then added as an afterthought, “She also wants you to untie Rarity and Twilight. She says they're not witches.”

The ponies seemed to be appeased by this and began undoing the impromptu cleansing ceremony.

Author's Note:

Part 4 may be coming later today or maybe tomorrow! All comments/criticisms/ritual-sacrifices are welcome! Cheers -FenDingo [Your Guardian Angle] :)