Sour Sweetness

by RisuUmbra

Chapter 8

Spike PoV:

“ RRRiiinggg!” The shrill sound of Spike’s alarm clock jolted him out of a particularly weird dream he was having about the crystal empire and brought his consciousness back into the reality that was his warm and dark room which was absolutely filled with comics and posters that he worked long and hard to obtain over the years… he needs some more comics. Sitting up in his bed and stretching Spike turned his head to the side before taking a deep breath a spitting out a small ball of green fire that flew across the room briefly illuminating the area in a green glow before landing on the wick of a candle sat on the desk by the door, the green flame changed from green to a warm orange and in seconds started lighting up the room even more. Sliding out of his delightfully warm bed Spike made his way out his door and walked down the hall to the bathroom, it only took a few minutes to do his business and morning hygiene before exiting the bathroom and walking across the hall where Twilight’s room was. Bringing his ear close to the door he was only greeted with silence and not the sound of soft snoring he usually heard from inside so Spike turned to quietly step down the stairs, the library was almost completely silent except for the soft breathing of his sister still swaddled up in a blanket on the couch where he and Anon had left her yesterday. A quick glance at the clock hanging over the front door showed he had around an hour before the time Twi usually woke up which gave him plenty of time to make both of them some breakfast, the kitchen was exactly the same as he left it and he would be surprised if anything was even slightly different as he was the only one to ever cook here besides from Anon that one time.

“Sigh” Just thinking about Anon filled Spike’s stomach with worry slowly driving away his appetite which he didn’t want so with a quick shake of his head he focused on making breakfast for the two of them and maybe some tea for everyone later but that could wait, deciding to just make an easy breakfast of hay bacon and eggs for Twi to get her ready for today and topaz and oatmeal for him to hold him over until lunch when his sister is going to reveal her newest creation to her friends. Sadly unlike actual bacon, hay bacon cooks by putting it in the toaster like bread so it always tasted more like over cooked waffles to Spike who’s had the real thing but if he ever cooked bacon in their house he fears Twilight’s gonna have to move out until the smell dissipates… like last time. Quickly putting together the needed ingredients for his oatmeal and topaz while Twi’s eggs and hay bacon cooked didn’t take long and soon enough Spike had breakfast ready for two and a drowsy unicorn stumbling over to the kitchen table, wordlessly Spike removed her now cooked hay bacon and sunny side up eggs and placed them on a nice plate in front of his sister then took a seat across from her at the table. Twilight’s still bleary eyes slowly went from Spike’s face to the plate in front of her before smiling softly… then collapsing headfirst into the food.

“Uh Twi…?” A frankly concerned and slightly amused Spike reached over the table and grabbed his sister by the horn and slowly raised up the head of the apparently comatose unicorn only to suddenly take a deep breath to stop himself from laughing out loud from the sight of the two sunny side up eggs that replaced her eyes and the sticky piece of hay bacon that gave her a unibrow right under her bangs, he could hear the sounds of soft snores coming from her which only increased his struggle to keep his laughter down. With a jerk Twilight awoke and pulled herself out of Spike’s grip to wipe the food off of her face with a few napkins though she was still quite sticky at least she could see.

*Yaawwnn* “Sorry Spike, what time is it anyway?” Twilight kept rubbing at the sticky residue left from her breakfast face mask and started to look around for a clock only for Spike to happily chime in.

“It’s almost almost 8:30 now, you got up a little later than usual but at least you actually slept for once” Spike watched Twilight’s expression slowly change from groggy confusion to frantic urgency in a matter of moments and it didn’t take Spike half as long to realize why as he sighed and hurried up in finishing his oatmeal.

“That means we only have an hour and a half to clean up and get ready for my presentation!” In a burst of panicked energy Twilight grabbed her fork in her magic shoveled her whole plate of food into her mouth along with a small stream of water from the faucet to wash it down in a large gulp that would have made Pinkie proud before standing back up and grabbing Spike who had just finished his food in her telekinetic grip and sprinting out of the front door before skidding to a halt and running back to lock her door then resuming her sprint to the office supplies store nearby. Spike sighed while he leisurely floated next to the sprinting figure of Twilight Sparkle not at all surprised by her actions as it was common practice for his sister to over prepared for everything.

“Spike, should I use color coded note cards or labeled… you’re right labeled hasn’t failed me before” Twilight didn’t even see the powerful facepalm Spike had performed when she had asked her question and simply continued on as if he had responded, rubbing the sore spot on his head Spike felt that today was going to be just as long and tedious as usual and resigned himself to his fate.
~Later~

“..ke… pike… Spike!” Spike was jerked back into reality by his sister’s voice almost making him drop the various bags he was holding all over the hardwood flooring of the library which he didn’t even realize they had entered after an hours worth of frantic shopping. Reminding himself that he was still standing in the middle of the library Spike quickly waddled over to the kitchen table to set down the actually quite cumbersome bags. Taking a quick glance around showed that Twilight hasn’t wasted any time on reorganizing the furniture in the library as she currently has two sofas held afloat in her magic while she moved a table and white board into place by the stairs. Spike just shrugged and went to work taking everything out of the bags and putting it on the table waiting for his sister to finish, besides the aforementioned color coded note cards they had bought some lightly salted potato chips and popcorn for the audience to munch on while they listened to the presentation.

“Spike can you bring out a big bowl and the refreshments please?” Peeking out of the kitchen showed a recently cleaned and refurbished library common room, wordlessly Spike lifted the two bags of junk food and in a few moments a large plastic bowl was used to transport the delicious looking snacks over to the table sitting between the couches and the white board, Spike barely got the chance to set the bowl down when the bags almost exploded open leaving their edible insides in the bowl while the wrappers floated away and into a nearby trash bag, knowing that she’s going to be like this for a while Spike started his way upstairs to take a shower quickly before the presentation started.

~Later~

Spike had just finished drying off when he heard the sound of animated conversation below him prompting him to hurry up and join his friends, jogging down the stairs revealed the voices to simply be the sound of Rarity and Fluttershy speaking to Twi about what sounds to be their day so far. It didn’t take Rarity long to notice Spike coming down the stairs and happily beckoned him over to join the conversation.

“Good morning Spike dear, how has the morning been treating you so far?” Spike smiled but didn’t respond immediately and gazed over at his sister figure for a scant moment before looking back at Rarity and responding.

“You know how it is” Rarity immediately knew what Spike meant and nodded along understandingly and tapped the couch next to her so he could finally rest his claws, the four continue to partake in their conversations for a time while refraining from eating to much of the refreshments so their would be enough for the other coming guests. After a good while a knock sounded from the front door which was quickly opened by the magic of Twilight showing two more of her friends Applejack and Rainbow Dash, the former carrying a sweet smelling basket on her back and the latter looking like she just woke up.

‘I’m so glad you two could make it, especially you Rainbow” Spike remembered that apparently Rainbow had left to cloudsdale for a meeting of some kind and came back late at night much to the suffering of her sleep schedule, which is quite flexible now that he really thinks about it. Spike rose to take the basket from Applejack’s back while the five friends engaged in a rather fast paced conversation… except for Rainbow who sat down next to Fluttershy and quickly went to sleep. Spike sat out the now revealed to be apple fritters on the table and went to the kitchen to fetch a pitcher of milk for those who want it, while Spike was in the kitchen he heard the door open once more and the surprisingly soft but still happy voice of Pinkie Pie filled the room while the others voices quieted in response much to Spike’s confusion. Exiting the kitchen with the pitcher in claw, Spike turned towards the door to see what the problem was and almost dropped the pitcher onto the floor from what he saw. Pinkie’s eyes were bloodshot and had dark bags under them, her mane was frazzled and slightly droopy in some places which brought him back to her birthday incident, lethargically Pinkie made her way over to her friends who had lapsed into a sort of concerned silence.

“Oh I haven’t had any of Applejack’s fritters in a while” Not even acknowledging her friends concerned expressions Pinkie continued past them and grabbed one of the warm fritters off of the plate, the group had seen Pinkie this tired before but nothing to this extent where she had to force a smile inorder to seem normal which was alarming to anyone who could see it. Spike took a deep breath and slapped an easygoing smile onto his face as he approached the table Pinkie was at and went to offer her some milk to go with her fritter… or he would have if Twilight hadn’t shot him a look that stopped him cold in his tracks, but by then it was too late and Spike was in speaking distance of Pinkie and was still trying to piece back together his composure in silence as she looked at him waiting for him to speak. After a few moments Pinkie dropped her stare and sighed deeply losing her fake smile and turning to her friends who had started to approach concerned for their friend, with a small frown on her face Pinkie finished off her half eaten fritter quickly and spoke to everyone.

“Can I ask you girls something?” Pinkie seemed to take a few deep breaths while she waited for her friends to answer which wasn’t long as all of them nodded wanting to help their obviously troubled friend.

“ Do any of you take me seriously?” The depth of the question caught most of the room of guard except for Fluttershy who seemed to flinch slightly when the question was presented and slowly started to curl into herself in preparation of what was to come. Spike personally thought Pinkie could be serious when she needed to be but his opinion wasn’t the one she needed to hear so he took a few steps back and simply watched as the silence stretched on.

“If you had to choose somepony to depend on… would you choose me?” Pinkie continued on after a moment of silence from her friends and slowly her expression changed from quiet sadness to slight irritation at the continued guilty silence of her friends, for a moment it looked like Rainbow was going to speak up but stopped herself after a moment and continued to look anywhere else but at Pinkie.

“I bet I can think of someone all of you would and have chosen, just because I like parties and to smile I can’t be trusted with anything huh?! ‘She’s just a airheaded party pony, she can’t do anything productive!” Over time Pinkie’s voice slowly rose until she was yelling at her friends who seemed to be getting offended by her rising tone until it dawned on Twilight just what this was about making her speak up about it.

“Pinkie, talking about Anon like that isn’t fair or right and you know it!” finally hearing one of her friends speak and in defence of the source of her strife only strengthened the fire that was Pinkie’s fury making her take a loud step towards Twilight bringing her voice up to drown hers out.

“The moment he came to town my life as gotten worse and worse day after day and its all because of him, first it was my other friends who started to side with him more and more, then work where everypony wants him to plan their parties and not me, and now my best friends who are family to me defend him! Everything was better when he didn’t exist here, I wish it would all go back to that! I wish he would just go away forever, I hate him!” Pinkie was huffing for air by the time she had finished her hateful triad and looked upon the horrified and sad faces of her friends and would have continued if the sound of glass hitting the ground from behind them made everyone turn towards the door only for their collective hearts to drop at the sight of a heart broken Anon standing in the doorway with what used to be a plate full of cookies at his feet, Spike was the first to recover and tried to speak to his hurting friend

“Anon-” Spike didn’t get far as mere seconds after speaking Anon turned around and ran back out of the house, the sound of glass crunching into the ground signaling his exit. Spike and the rest of the girls even Pinkie frantically tried to follow behind Anon as they rocket out of the library and see him sprinting around the house, as fast as his little legs could carry him Spike follow behind Anon but by the time they reached the backyard all they saw was a flash of blue before Anon disappeared from sight. The fear that this would be the last time Spike would see his best friend drove him to move faster towards the teleporter in some vacant hope that it would bring him to his hurt friend only for the floating stones around the contraption to fall to the ground powerless and inert bringing Spike’s fears to life. Coming to a stop in front of the teleporter with the girls behind him Spike could feel a different kind of fire rise in him, an inferno called rage all pointed towards Pinkie Pie.

“What is wrong with you!” Whipping around towards the focus of his fury was a shocked Pinkie Pie who wasn’t ready for an angry dragon to confront her, feeling a hoof touch Spike’s shoulder he turned to see Fluttershy pointing to something on the ground near the center of the teleporter, picking up what seems to be a pamphlet Spike heard the sound of hooves coming around the corner of the library… it was Princess Celestia.

“Sorry I'm late I got caught up in… what happened?”

Author's Note:

That took a while to write but I hope you enjoy the unfolding drama of the situation.
I have some stuff in college coming up so I might not be able to make any chapters but if I get a chance I’ll try.

I hope the wait was worth it

Comments

[Hekkar]

Oof...... well.... damn. Can't wait to see how this turns out.

[truenorth14]

Wow, Pinkie feels neglected and now she is exhausted and brain-addled, the poor girl needs a confidence boost

[Algedor]

Oof, well the main conflict has arrived! Hopefully the romance will ensue!
Thanks for the update, and take your time! School comes first!