Highs and Lows
Highs and Lows
Much like her counterpart in Equestria, the Lego World’s Pinkie Pie lived in an apartment on the floor above Sugarcube Corner, where she worked. Starlight Glimmer was not surprised that the outside of this building looked very different from the version she was familiar with, since this version was in the middle of a large city rather than a small town. Although she also expected the interior of the building to be different due to its urban setting, she was still quite surprised to see a few additional items that weren’t exactly common in Equestria, such as a slush drink dispenser, vending machines filled with various snacks and beverages, and even a jukebox with a wide range of music available to play.
But of course, the real reason Starlight was here was to visit Pinkie Pie, so the two girls soon found themselves upstairs in Pinkie’s apartment. Despite a few additional items — such as a large television, a laptop computer, and even a mini fridge beside the bed — Pinkie’s bedroom actually had a close resemblance to the one occupied by her pony counterpart, except of course that this version was built out of Lego parts.
“Well, here we are, Starlight!” declared Pinkie Pie cheerfully. “So what would you like to do today? Crazy dancing? Baking cupcakes? Crazy dancing while baking cupcakes?”
“Actually, I had something a little different in mind,” replied Starlight with a smile. “I haven’t seen it myself, but I’ve heard that my world’s Pinkie Pie has this secret party planning cave. I don’t suppose…?”
Still smiling, Pinkie leaned close to Starlight and asked, “You wanna take a look around in my super secret party planning cave?”
Starlight nodded.
“Consider it done!” declared Pinkie cheerfully. She immediately grabbed Starlight and swiftly placed her on a small round rug near the middle of the room. “Just stand right there…” She then ran over to a stack of round bricks at one side of the room and removed the top portion, exposing a small lever underneath. “…and prepare to say ‘Geronimo!’”
“What?” asked Starlight in confusion.
Rather than say anything in response, Pinkie simply flipped the lever, causing the small rug to drop away like a trap door. With the floor under her feet suddenly gone, Starlight screamed as she fell through the small tunnel. Pinkie immediately jumped into the tunnel after her and excitedly shouted, “Geronimo!”
Starlight continued screaming as she fell through the tunnel, which soon ended in a slide that curved upward. She was flung off the end of the slide and landed softly in a small pile of pillows. As she sat up and glanced at the pillows she had landed on, she remarked, “Huh, that’s pretty convenient.”
Pinkie squealed excitedly as she came down the slide and landed on the pile of pillows, though her landing ended up knocking Starlight off the pillows and down onto the concrete floor.
“Though apparently it’s only meant to be used one at a time,” grumbled Starlight as she stood up.
Pinkie quickly jumped off the pillows and turned to Starlight. “So what do ya think?” she asked cheerfully. “Pretty cool, huh?”
Starlight looked around at the room they were now in. It appeared to be some kind of basement filled with all kinds of party related clutter. She also noticed one of the longer walls of the room was completely covered in large filing cabinets, presumably the repository of information necessary for planning the right kind of parties for the right people at the right occasions. “It’s certainly impressive, I’ll give you that,” said Starlight.
“Yeah, you wouldn’t believe what I had to go through to make all of this possible,” said Pinkie. “I had to work with permits and other legal stuff to get this room built, then I had to move all this stuff in here, many of which were just too big or heavy to go down the slide, so I had to use the secondary emergency entrance that leads into the sewer system, though I hardly ever use that door for obvious reasons, and finally, to gather up all of these files, I had to ask for some special permission from the library, the police station, pretty much any place in town that keeps official records of everyone who lives here.”
As Pinkie was talking, Starlight slowly wandered around to get a better look at all of the crazy stuff that was lying around the room. At one point, she accidentally backed into a tall air cylinder and almost knocked it over, but she reacted quickly and managed to catch it before it could fall. “It’s okay! I got it!” she quickly assured Pinkie.
As she set the air cylinder back upright, Starlight noticed the label on the side of it and raised an eyebrow. “Anti-helium?” she asked. “What’s that?”
“Oh, that’s something I use for one of my party tricks,” answered Pinkie as she quickly crossed the room and grabbed another tall air cylinder. “Its actual name is some big science-y word that I could never seem to remember, so I just call it anti-helium because it has the opposite effect of helium.”
“And what effect would that be?” asked Starlight.
As Pinkie began rolling the other air cylinder towards Starlight beside the anti-helium cylinder, she replied, “Well, let me put it this way. You’re familiar with what happens when you inhale helium, right?”
“Actually, no,” admitted Starlight. “I’ve never really tried it myself.”
“In that case, allow me to demonstrate,” replied Pinkie as she set down the other air cylinder, which had the label of “helium” on the side of it. She reached for a nearby pack of party balloons and stuck one of them onto the cylinder’s valve. She briefly opened the valve to partially inflate the balloon, then took the balloon off the valve and held it closed to prevent any of the gas from escaping. She then brought the balloon up to her mouth and released some of the gas as she breathed in. Then, with her voice sounding much higher than normal, she spoke, “It makes my voice sound really really high because it’s much lighter than normal air which means sound moves through it more quickly.”
Starlight couldn’t help but giggle before she remarked, “Okay, I sure wasn’t expecting that.”
“And don’t worry, the effect isn’t permanent,” assured Pinkie with her voice still very high. “All I have to do is breathe it all out like this.” She then rapidly breathed in and out a few times. “And now my voice is back to normal,” she added with her voice now back to its normal pitch.
Starlight chuckled and remarked, “I have to admit, that is a rather neat party trick.” She then glanced over at the other air cylinder and added, “So I’m guessing that anti-helium’s opposite effect…”
“Yup! Anti-helium is much heavier than normal air, which means sound moves through it more slowly,” confirmed Pinkie as she grabbed another balloon, stuck onto the valve of the anti-helium cylinder, and briefly opened the valve to partially inflate the balloon. “Which means that when I inhale this stuff…” She removed the balloon and placed it on her mouth, then released some of the gas as she breathed in. With her voice now sounding much lower than normal, she finished, “It makes my voice sound reeeeeealy low.”
Again, Starlight giggled and remarked, “Yeah, I can see why that would be amusing. It’s like I’m listening to you in slow motion.”
“Noooooooo!” exclaimed Pinkie playfully in mock terror, an act made more believable thanks to her voice still being very low.
Starlight finally burst out laughing.
Pinkie smiled at that accomplishment, then rapidly breathed in and out a few times to return her voice back to its normal pitch and excitedly asked, “So what do ya think? You wanna give it a try?”
Starlight took a moment to calm down before she replied, “Oh, what the heck. Might as well go for it.” She glanced back and forth between the two air cylinders before she added, “I think I’ll start with the anti-helium. I actually found that to be the funnier of the two.”
“No problem!” acknowledged Pinkie cheerfully. She took two more balloons from the pack, stuck each of them onto the valve of both air cylinders, and briefly inflated them both. She quickly took the balloon from the helium cylinder, then turned to Starlight and said, “Well, go ahead. You saw my demonstration, so you should know what to do.”
Starlight grabbed the inflated balloon from the anti-helium cylinder, making sure to hold the neck of that balloon closed to prevent the air from escaping. She then brought that balloon over to her mouth and released the gas as she inhaled. Once the balloon was empty, she lowered it and spoke, “How do I sound?” Even though she had tried speaking as she normally did, the voice that came out of her mouth was now much lower than usual.
Pinkie inhaled the helium from her balloon and, with her voice now very high, playfully exclaimed, “Oh no! My best friend’s been possessed by a demon monster! What do I do, what do I do?!”
Starlight smiled and played along by raising her fists and shouting, “I am the master of all evil! Mwahahahahahaha!”
Still playing along, Pinkie with her much higher voice exclaimed in mock terror, “Oh no! We’re doomed! We’re doomed, we’re doomed, we’re doomed!”
With that little playful exchange over, both Starlight and Pinkie laughed, despite the fact that Pinkie still had a higher voice and Starlight had a lower voice.
After a few seconds of laughter, Pinkie quickly breathed in and out a few times. With her voice now back to normal, she advised Starlight, “Don’t forget the breathing technique. You don’t want that gas sitting in your lungs for too long.”
Starlight responded with a nod, then breathed in and out a few times. “Well that sure was amusing,” remarked Starlight, her voice now back to normal. She glanced over that the helium cylinder, then smirked and asked, “Time to trade?”
“Time to trade!” agreed Pinkie as she quickly retrieved the two balloons, stuck them back onto the valve of the two air cylinders, and briefly inflated them both. This time, Pinkie took the balloon from the anti-helium tank, while Starlight took the one from the helium tank.
Starlight went first and inhaled as she released the gas from her balloon. Once that balloon was emptied, she playfully remarked with a now much higher voice, “Wow, what a rush! I can talk so fast that I’m unable to make any sense of anything! What are we talking about again?”
Pinkie inhaled the anti-helium from her balloon, and with her voice now much lower, she started a new act by mockingly threatening, “Starlight, I am your master! You will obey me!”
“No, no, never!” Starlight playfully exclaimed defiantly. “I will never submit to the dark side! Never!”
Starlight and Pinkie then laughed again, despite their altered voices. After a few seconds, Pinkie once again quickly breathed in and out a few times to return her voice to normal.
Starlight was having so much fun that she couldn’t stop laughing. It wasn’t long before she started to wobble around with a loss of balance. With her voice still very high, she said, “Okay, maybe we should take a little break. Starting to feel a little light-headed. Hoooooooooo…” As she exhaled, her voice gradually dropped back to its normal pitch. At the same time, she made no reaction as she fell over backwards and collapsed onto a small table, completely destroying it in the process.
Crash!
Pinkie immediately rushed over to where Starlight fell and worriedly asked “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” assured Starlight as she sat up. “I think I might’ve passed out for a moment, but I’m fine now.”
Pinkie grabbed Starlight’s hand and helped her back up onto her feet.
Starlight glanced back at where she fell and added, “Sorry about your, uh—”
“Oh, that’s okay,” assured Pinkie Pie. “I can always rebuild that thing. It is made out of Lego, after all.”
“Yeah, I guess the true,” noted Starlight. “Anyway, as much as I enjoyed that party trick, I guess this incident shows why it’s probably best kept in moderation.”
“Absolutely!” agreed Pinkie. “I’ve had to learn the lesson of moderation the hard way in a few other things, but I’ve never let that stop me from always having fun.”
“That’s good to hear,” said Starlight with a smile. “No matter which universe I’m in, it’s nice that I can always expect Pinkie Pie to know how to have fun.”
“You know it!” confirmed Pinkie cheerfully. She and Starlight both shared a giggle.
“Even so,” Starlight spoke up, “that was a pretty neat party trick anyway. Certainly not something I’ve ever heard of in Equestria. I wonder if you’ve got any others I’m unfamiliar with.”
“Then let’s find out!” declared Pinkie Pie excitedly before she rushed off to another corner of the room and began digging through all of the various clutter on the floor.
Starlight smiled as she walked over towards Pinkie Pie. Even though she was sure she would already be familiar with many of the things she was about to see, there was still a possibility that some of them would be completely new to her. For Starlight, that was one of the great things about exploring another universe; even with so many similarities, there were sure to be some new things, some of which could prove to be quite entertaining.
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Another neat trick they did with sulfur hexafluoride was to fill an aquarium with it and float a boat made of tinfoil on it.
That chapter put a smile on my face. I seriously love how Helium can make one sound like Chip and Dale. I didn't know there was a type that could make someone sound like a demon in those movies. Good to know though.
According to Google, the gas you're looking for is sulfur hexafluoride.
Well, there goes my nerd moment. 
And (long pause) you already pointed that out in the author's notes.
Just so you know, I had to Google it because I thought the gas in question had bromine in it or something, but I guess I was wrong.
This was silly but nice. Just like Pinkie
9163258 Yes, that was the actual myth they tested on that episode of Mythbusters I had mentioned.
9163294 Yeah, virtually everyone knows that helium makes your voice higher, but apparently not many people are aware that there's a gas that causes the opposite effect. As a result, I personally find the lower voice funnier than the higher voice because it's just less commonly used. In fact, for many of the times that I've heard someone alter their voice with sulfur hexafluoride, among the things they'd say would be to recite a certain famous line from Darth Vader, but I couldn't use it in this chapter since both characters are girls, so I tried to reword it into something that still had a similar meaning.
9163805 I had wanted to identify that gas by name in the chapter itself, but I figured that only Twilight would be able to accurately memorize a big complex name like sulfur hexaflouride, and since this chapter is supposed to feature Pinkie Pie, I decided to have her simply refer to it by her intended purpose for it, and that's to have the opposite effect of helium.
9168095
Yep, I mentioned it because you didn't, for the benefit of people who hadn't seen it.