Empire of Pink

by Gordon Pasha

Pink is Power

“Ah don’t know why it was so important that we all had to come help ya find yer diary,” Applejack said as she and Rarity dug through various books on the bookshelves in Twilight’s library.

“You know, darling, that you probably just misplaced it somewhere,” Rarity added. “You can be a little… shall we say, forgetful, at times?”

Twilight shook her head as she magically pulled several books out of one shelf and then put them back in perfect alphabetical order. “It’s not about the diary. It’s about the fact that there’s something strange going on here and I need the notes in my diary to figure it out!”

“A’right,” Applejack said, not showing much faith in this explanation, “we’ll keep looking.”

As she continued checking all of the shelves, drawers, and what amounted to furniture in her general area, Applejack came upon Pinkie Pie sitting, dejected, upon a stool.

“Ya know, we might be able to get this done a touch more quickly if you lent a hoof, sugarcube,” Applejack said to her.

Pinkie Pie shook her head a little. “I would, but I don’t want to end up breaking your nose. Sorry.”

Applejack raised an eyebrow. “That’s just ridiculous! Why would ya break mah nose?”

“Well, it is rather large for a lady,” Rarity said from somewhere behind her.

Applejack turned on her. “Are ya sayin’ mah nose ain’t ladylike? Ya sayin’ it’s too big or somethin’?”

Rarity just continued searching, not looking at Applejack. “All I’m saying is that there is no shame in a little cosmetic surgery.”

Applejack began to approach Rarity menacingly. “Ah’ll show you a little cos–”

“Girls! Girls! This is not the time!” Twilight interjected. “We’ve got bigger things than Applejack’s nose to worry about!”

Now Applejack turned on her. “So, ya also think mah nose is big, do ya, Twi?”

Twilight shook her head. “What I meant to say was there are more serious problems to deal with than arguing about your nose. Better, AJ?”

Applejack’s eyes narrowed. “For now.”

“What in Tartarus is going on in here?” came a voice from above them.

All the ground-bound mares except Pinkie looked up to see Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy hovering directly above them.

“Dash, how’d you and Fluttershy get into the library?” Twilight asked.

“You left the way to the observatory deck unlocked again,” Dash answered. “But the more important question is what could be so important that you had the word out all over Ponyville that me and Fluttershy had to get down here right away as soon as we got back?”

“Oh, it’s only something of the gravest significance!” Rarity said. “Twilight has lost her diary!"

Rainbow Dash could not help but laugh. “Really, Twilight, that’s your big emergency? You lost your diary?”

“If that diary falls into the wrong hooves,” Rarity said, “all of Twilight’s deepest, darkest secrets could be revealed!”

“Oh, you mean like the fact that she only ever read twelve of the thirteen volumes of A Short History of Classical Equestria?” Dash said.

“Hey, I was going to read the thirteenth volume, but then with being made a Princess and all, I just kinda….” Twilight’s eyes grew wide. “Dash, how could you know that unless you…. You read my diary!”

Dash gave a light-hearted shrug. “Oh, come on. It’s not like there was anything interesting in there anyway!”

“Rainbow Dash, I can’t believe you would invade one of our dearest friend’s personal spaces like that! It’s uncouth!” Rarity protested.

“Oh, and who was the one who asked me to let them have it after I was done, hmm?”

“That was only to return it, I swear!”

“Yeah, I’m sure. That’s why it took you a week to drop it off at the library. You’re just lucky Twilight was in Canterlot all that week.”

Twilight shook her head. “My own friends, reading my diary. Now you two know all the very, very personal things I wrote in there.”

Twilight stopped speaking as she noticed that Applejack was trying to suppress a chuckle. “You too, AJ?” she said.

Applejack quickly got a hold of herself and smiled apologetically. “Ah’m sorry, sugarcube, but ya do have a tendency to leave yer diary in random places. Ya gotta ’spect that some ponies are gonna take a look.”

“I don’t believe this!” Twilight reared up her head and fixed her gaze on the one pony she was sure she could trust. “Fluttershy, at least you’ve never read my diary, right?”

Fluttershy did not answer. Instead, she just gave Twilight a small, bashful smile.

Twilight’s eyes narrowed. “You did.”

“Well, I didn’t mean to,” Fluttershy said apologetically. “It was just that you left it open on my table and I didn’t see it until you were already gone and I just meant to glace at it…. Oh, please don’t be mad at me, I only read half of it….”

“So every pony’s read my diary! Just great!” Twilight said, turning her eyes across the room toward the pink pony on the stool. “I guess you’ve read my diary too, eh, Pinkie?”

Pinkie did not even seem to be listening. She seemed more lost in her own mind than anything. “No, but I guess I could take a look at it later, if you want.”

“I can get it out to you when Twilight isn’t looking,” Spike said, coming up from cleaning the basement.

“Spike!” Twilight scolded.

Spike shrugged. “Hey, like it or not, it’s the most checked-out book from this place. Though you got me if I know why. The thing is seriously boring.”

Twilight slapped her hoof against her head. “Okay, fine, whatever. It doesn’t matter that all my friends are low-lifes who would read my diary behind my back. What matters is that we find it so that I can figure out what’s going on with Pinkie!”

“Is that all?” Rainbow Dash said. “Why don’t you just ask her? How you doing, Pinkie?”

Pinkie did not look up as she answered, “I’m a super-terrible friend-insulting, nose-breaking meanie, but other than that, I’m fine, I guess. Thanks for asking.”

Dash shrugged and faced Twilight once more. “See. It’s just the usual Pinkie being Pinkie.”

“But that’s the thing, Dash,” Twilight said. “Pinkie is not being Pinkie. It’s like somepony else is. It’s like there’s two of her wandering around Ponyville or something.”

Dash was incredulous. “Two of her? Two of her? How can there be two of her? What, did she clone herself again?”

“No, I haven’t been anywhere near the mirror pool since you guys fixed everything,” Pinkie said, taking Dash’s question more seriously than Dash intended.

Twilight once more began sorting through books. “And if she didn’t go anywhere near the mirror pool, it can’t be another clone.”

“Unless a’course one escaped when we were roundin’ ’em up,” Applejack said. “But that’s impossible, what with my round-up skills and all.”

“And there’s no way any of them could have gotten away from the fastest pony in Equestria,” Rainbow Dash said proudly.

Twilight nodded as she looked inside of a large book to see if she had left her diary there. “That’s right. I think we can pretty much cross the clone theory off of the list. Agreed?”

Everyone except Pinkie nodded and laughed at such a silly idea. That is, until a voice from outside interrupted them.

“Twilight Sparkle! Come out here this instant! I’ve got something to say to you!”

It was enough to make a pony’s blood run cold. That voice was unmistakable as the voice of Pinkie Pie. Yet all of the ponies could see Pinkie Pie, right there, sitting amongst them.

The last remaining doubts were wiped from the ponies’ minds. Something very bad was definitely going on here.

The six rushed out of the library and into the street, where a large crowd of townsfolk were already gathering. And there, in the middle of the road, framed against the purple of the quickly darkening sky, stood Pinkie Pie. Her foreleg was wrapped around a large, pink megaphone, on which was painted her distinctive three-balloon cutie mark.

Twilight looked from her Pinkie to this other Pinkie, then back to hers, then back to the other. She sighed. “I’m really starting to hate clones.”

“Believe me, I don’t particularly like you either,” the other Pinkie said, her voice blasting through her megaphone.

Well, she had good hearing, Twilight had to give her that.

“Okay, so you’re a clone,” Twilight said. “I must have missed you when I sent the others back to where they belong.”

“That’s a nice way to say it,” the other Pinkie’s voice came booming back. “That’s a nice way to say that you murdered all of my fellow Pinkie Pies in cold blood!”

“I didn’t murder anyone,” Twilight responded. “I just sent the clones away. There is, after all, only one Pinkie Pie.”

“Wrong!” This was loud enough that it hurt the ears of pretty much everypony in the vicinity. “After what you did, there were two Pinkie Pies!”

Twilight eyed this new Pinkie. She could not help herself, she was genuinely curious about the clone. “And how is it that you didn’t get sent back with the others?”

The other Pinkie rolled her eyes. “Because I’m not a complete buffoon, silly! When I saw you rounding up Pinkies left and right, I made sure to hide until you were gone. Then I snuck up to the town hall and watched you....” Here, she seemed to almost break into tears. “You murdering swine, you killed them all!”

“Murdering swine? Murdering swine?” Twilight said, her facing contorting with anger.

“No, sugarcube,” Applejack said, putting her hoof on Twilight’s shoulder. “Don’t let ’er get to you. Just blast ’er back to where she come from before she can cause any more trouble.”

Twilight nodded. Her horn began to glow as she aimed it for the rogue Pinkie. The rogue Pinkie merely smiled in response.

“Ah-ah-ah,” she said as she reached for something behind her back. With a swift motion, she held up her other foreleg to reveal a book. “Shoot me and your beloved diary goes away forever!”

Twilight’s eyes widened, but the glow around her horn disappeared. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them, she was calmer. “Okay then, let’s just talk.”

“Yes, let’s,” rogue Pinkie’s voice boomed.

“But first, since we can clearly hear each other fine, why don’t you get rid of that silly megaphone.”

The rogue Pinkie looked at the megaphone for a moment, shrugged, and threw it over her shoulder. “Fair enough.”

“That’s a good start. Now, what is it you want?”

“What do I want? What do I want? I had to watch my sisters brutally murdered by you and your hippy-dippy friends. What do you think I want? I want justice! I want payback! I want chocolate! But mostly justice and payback, against you, against your friends, and against every other mindless pony in this accursed town!”

“Oh, what do you want us to do, eat so many sweets we get sick and throw up?” Rainbow Dash mocked.

Rogue Pinkie ignored him. “What I want is for this town to acknowledge its rightful and true ruler: Pinkie Pie, and for all the ponies to surrender their liberty as payment for the wrongs they’ve done to any and all Pinkie Pies in the past!”

“Well, that’s quite a jump, isn’t it?” Twilight said. “From wanting vengeance against me to wanting to be ruler of Ponyville?”

“And you’d know something about jumps, wouldn’t you? Going from humble librarian to Princess of the land just like that, hmm?”

“She does have a point,” Rarity whispered to Twilight.

Rogue Pinkie continued. “So, I’m giving you all twenty-four hours to accept my proposition, or–”

“Or what?” Rainbow Dash said, still getting quite a hoot out of all this.

“Or I’ll take it over by force….” rogue Pinkie answered.

Dash could barely contain her laughter any more. “Force? You’re going to take Ponyville by force? You and what army?”

Rogue Pinkie smiled proudly. At that very moment, a rumbling began to shake the town of Ponyville. The buildings seemed to tremble with fear as the noise drew closer and intensified Ponies began to run for cover left and right, fearing that the sounds and the shaking could mean only an earthquake or a stampede. But those who were brave enough to remain, including our six ponies, saw something which terrified them even more.

Where once had been a single Pinkie Pie, there was now a veritable ocean of pink, bursting down this little road like the waves of a flood. As the pink-tinged mass came closer and closer, they could make out the figures of frizzy-haired ponies bobbing and bouncing anywhere they could – and several places they never should have been able to go. The street was now resounding with cries of “Fun? Fun! Fun? Fun!”, uttered in almost a call-and-response manner.

The mere sight of them all – more than there had ever been the first time Pinkie had cloned herself – made the mouths of Twilight and her friends gape open. Even knowing that they were facing a clone had not prepared any of them for something like this.

With the seemingly-endless horde of clones gathering around her, the rogue Pinkie stood there, her forelegs crossed and her mouth curved into a wicked smile.

“Me and this army,” she said.

How would Twilight and her friends respond?

Read on.

Comments

[ponypoplover]

I can't wait to see what happens next, keep up the good work :)

[Gordon Pasha]

4380328
Thanks. I'll do my best and I hope you'll enjoy the future installments.

[Crimson Dawn]

You should turn this into a joke but you mean "proposition" not "preposition".

[Gordon Pasha]

4381437
You're right. Thanks for catching that. I've made the correction.

[Harmony Charmer]

Oh, it's about to go down. I really like this story~!

[Gordon Pasha]

4390479
Thanks! And thanks for commenting on each chapter. There will be more to come soon.

[Alex Warlorn]

Kick their butts army of Pinkie Pies, let justice be done!

[Emperor]

Reading this at random and I have to say, given how Twilight deflects Pinkie clone's 'you murdered them, you murdering murder' lines three times in a row by saying 'no it wasn't murder' suggests she's in hardcore denial