The Hostess
The Soul of a Pony
Chapter 2: The Hostess
Pinkie Pie hummed happily to herself as she bounced down the street. It was a lively tune, one she'd come up with on the spot. The pink party pony loved music; few things could so quickly change a pony's mood for the better. Well, except for cake. Or ice cream. Or—she gasped—a party!
Improving a pony's mood was, by no coincidence, exactly the purpose of her little afternoon jaunt through the streets. Last night, while enjoying a nice dinner with all her closest friends—not that any of her friends weren't close—she'd noticed something completely inexcusable. Twilight wasn't having fun! She'd been quiet and distracted all night, even though she'd tried to hide it. Obviously, something was up, and it was up to Pinkie to figure out what it was and, if necessary, how to fix it.
That was why, as soon as she'd finished with her responsibilities for the day at Sugarcube Corner, she'd set out for the library. She was almost there now, the enormous canopy of the tree coming into view over the houses ahead. Now, what would be the best way to cheer up a sad librarian?
"Hm?"
"I said, you need to get something to eat!"
Twilight looked up from her books for the first time in more than an hour. "I'm not hungry, Spike," she protested. It was true, too; when she really got into her studies, she found the needs of her body to be little more than distractions. She had become quite good at blocking them out.
"You still need to eat," Spike pointed out. "It's afternoon already, and you barely had any breakfast." Plus, he thought to himself, I'm hungry too.
"Look," she began, "I'm almost done. I just need to calculate the thaumic energy conversions, and then we'll find some lunch, okay?"
"Hellooo, Twilight!" came a cheery voice from the main room of the library. "Anypony home?"
Spike gave her a pointed look. Twilight sighed, then called out, "Be right with you!" As much as she hated stopping in the middle of a project, she had to admit that her job as librarian came first. She put down her notebook and trotted into the main room, to find a familiar pink pony sitting there. "Oh, hi, Pinkie," she greeted in what she hoped was a friendly and not-at-all-tired tone.
Pinkie gasped. "Oh no, it's worse than I thought! Here, eat this!" At this, she produced from somewhere a cupcake covered in bright pink frosting and thrust it at the confused unicorn.
It took Twilight a couple seconds to mentally process Pinkie's lightning-fast non-sequiter, but unfortunately her mouth went ahead without waiting for her brain to catch up. "What?"
"Eat the cupcake," Pinkie repeated patiently. "Trust me, it'll make you feel better."
Twilight, about to protest that she felt perfectly fine, was interrupted by a loud growl from her midsection. Maybe she really was hungry after all. Besides, she had to admit, that cupcake was very tempting. "Um, thanks," she said, before taking the proffered treat and biting into it. It was pleasantly light, vanilla sponge with strawberry frosting. There was another flavor there too, just barely enough to be noticeable without bringing attention to itself. Almonds? she wondered. "Mmm, that's pretty good. What's in it?" she asked, taking another bite.
"Cyanide!"
"WHAT!?" Twilight cried, spitting out the mouthful of cake. "Are you crazy? Don't you know what—" she paused. Pinkie Pie was desperately trying to keep a straight face, but failing miserably. Realization dawned on her then. "Very funny," she deadpanned, magically hurling the half-eaten cupcake at Pinkie. It hit her frosting-first, leaving a pink smear on her face before bouncing to the floor.
That proved too much for Pinkie, who burst out laughing. "You should have seen the look on your face! You were all like 'Oh no, Pinkie poisoned me! That delicious cupcake was a lie!'" As she kept laughing, Twilight couldn't keep a grin from her own face.
"All right, you got me."
"See? I told you it'd make you feel better!" Pinkie exclaimed. "I saw how distracted you were at dinner last night, and I knew you must have been working on something, but whenever you get really into your work you forget to have fun, so I brought you a fake-poison cupcake to make you smile! What're you working on, anyway?"
Twilight had only heard about half of Pinkie's whirlwind explanation, more preoccupied with how the pink pony could go so long without taking a breath. The question, however, she had heard, and she leapt at the opportunity to give a lecture. "Well, I was reading this book last night..."
"...and now I just have to finish up the calculations and I'll be done!" Twilight finished excitedly. A thought occurred to her then, looking at the bright pink pony in front of her. "Actually, I could use your help testing the procedure. Are you busy right now?"
Pinkie, who had lost track of what Twilight was saying several minutes ago, realized she was being addressed. She mentally replayed the last few seconds of conversation, before answering, "Nopey-dopey! I have the rest of the afternoon off."
"Great! Just wait here for a minute while I grab my notes, and then we'll get started." Twilight trotted back into her study, a small room just off the library's lobby. Next to her bedroom, it was Twilight's favorite room in the building. Big enough to hold a writing desk and several bookshelves, yet small enough that it wasn't overwhelming, Twilight always felt completely at ease there. As an added bonus, the round window in the outside wall was situated to perfectly catch the sun's illumination all day, without ever suffering from the harsh glares that so often plagued reading rooms. In short, it was the ideal location for a day (or three) spent studying obscure applications of magic.
Spike was still there, trying to instill some sense of order to the hectic mess of books and parchment scattered throughout the room. He glanced up at Twilight's arrival. "Who was it?" he asked.
"Pinkie," she answered, telekinetically grabbing the notebook containing her research. "I asked her to be my test subject."
"What about lunch?" he protested.
"This isn't going to take long," Twilight reassured him. "Why don't you get something started? We'll eat as soon as I'm done."
Spike's mood brightened considerably at that. Though he didn't often admit it, especially after the teasing his other hobbies had earned him during the dragon migration, Spike loved cooking. At first, he'd learned out of necessity, given his caretaker's complete culinary ineptitude. After a while, though, he'd embraced the art, and though his skills were nowhere near those of Pinkie or Applejack, nor were they anything to be laughed at.
Plus, he reflected, I get to eat whatever I want.
Twilight returned to the library's lobby, notes in tow, to find Pinkie conspicuously absent. "Pinkie?" she called out. "Where'd you go?"
The pony in question answered by leaping out from behind the large wooden bust in the center of room, shouting, "Surprise!" and startling Twilight into dropping her notebook.
Rolling her eyes at another example of Pinkie's randomness, Twilight retrieved her notes and said, "Okay, I have everything I need. Are you ready to start?"
"Start what?" Pinkie asked, her head tilted to the side in apparent confusion.
Twilight nearly facehoofed at that, but managed to restrain herself. "Never mind," she said resignedly, "just hold still for a moment."
"Okey-dokey-lokey!"
Flipping through pages of notes, Twilight quickly found the information she needed. The spell itself was deceptively simple, given all the calculations it had taken to put it together. She concentrated on her magic, sending streams of power through her horn and weaving them into a cohesive whole. Her horn began to glow, the ever-present signal of magic at work. Finally, when she was satisfied that everything was working, Twilight looked Pinkie in the eyes and released the spell.
Immediately, she felt as though she were falling forwards. Pinkie's bright blue eyes seemed to be pulling her in, expanding until she could see nothing else. Suddenly, everything went black.
Twilight found herself in a party. Though perhaps "party" didn't do it justice; the word didn't seem nearly exciting enough to describe the event taking place around her. Tables lined the walls of the room, surrounding an area the size of the Canterlot Castle Ballroom, if not bigger. Each one was covered in confections, from pies and pastries to candies and cakes. Bowls of punch sat on a few of the tables, next to stacks of glasses. The walls were hung with streamers of every color, and blue and yellow balloons strained to break free of the knots holding them to the tables. A few had evidently succeeded, their strings dangling from where they rested on the ceiling. Huge, high windows in the walls let in bright beams of sunlight. Through them, Twilight could see fields of grass and clear, blue skies.
Music was playing somewhere, though it was music unlike any Twilight was familiar with. It was completely erratic; the instruments just seemed to do whatever they wanted, without regard for the rest of the band. The drum couldn't keep time, and would randomly speed up and slow down. By all rights, it should have been appalling, yet somehow all of the conflicting elements came together to form a single piece that was as cheerful as it was completely unpredictable.
As interesting as the music was, however, it couldn't come close to matching the strangeness of the guests. Twilight's jaw dropped as she saw them. There had to be more than a hundred ponies there, dancing to the strange beat. No, not a hundred ponies, Twilight corrected herself, a hundred Pinkies. Each of the guests in attendance was the spitting image of the pink party pony. The closer she looked, however, the more differences began to appear. Many of the Pinkies had different hairstyles, unlike the impossibly curly mess that was her default look. One or two were slightly different sizes, and one even had the squared-off muzzle of a colt.
In all the chaos, Twilight managed to notice two of Pinkie's doppelgangers standing off to the side, apart from the furiously dancing crowd. That struck her as odd; what kind of Pinkie Pie would pass up a party? Making her way around the thrashing mob, she quickly got close enough to get a better look at the pair of Pinkies. One looked very young, barely more than a filly, and a blank-flank to boot. Her mane and tail fell straight and lifeless, and her expression was one of mixed boredom and sadness. The other looked much closer to Pinkie's normal age and appearance. In fact, the only features that distinguished her from the multitudes of similar Pinkie clones were the pair of horn-rimmed glasses balanced carefully on her snout and the stern expression on her face.
"Um, hello," Twilight said once she reached them. She had to strain to make her voice heard over the roar of the music and the dancers.
"Greetings, Twilight Sparkle," the older Pinkie intoned, turning to face this new sight. Unlike Twilight, she didn't raise her voice, which made it difficult for the unicorn to hear her. The filly seemed to take no notice of Twilight's presence, instead gazing sullenly at the floor.
"What is this place?" Twilight asked.
"What you see here is a representation of Pinkie Pie's consciousness. It is a construct, created by your spell, to allow you to experience in an abstract form what your own mind and senses could not possibly comprehend." Not once during the stern mare's explanation did her tone or expression change. There was no sense of interest in her voice; she was merely relaying information.
"What?" Twilight managed, shocked at such calm intelligence from the mouth of the ordinarily ditzy and hyperactive pony. "How do you know that?"
"You said as much when you were explaining the spell earlier," she answered.
"Well, yeah, but..." she trailed off. It was true, she had gone over the mechanics of the spell with Pinkie, including the details of the mental construct it utilized. The problem was, when she'd explained it, it had taken her ten minutes of detailed thaumaturgic terminology. This Pinkie had condensed it down to just two, easily understandable sentences. Plus, she could have sworn Pinkie hadn't been paying attention to her lecture. "Who are you?" she asked, awe creeping into her voice.
"I am Pinkie Pie," replied the bespectacled baker. "Though it might be more accurate to call me Pinkie Pie's Knowledge."
"So, all of these Pinkie Pies," Twilight asked, gesturing to the still-dancing mob, "are just representations of Pinkie's different traits?"
"Not exactly," answered Knowledge. "They are Pinkie Pie, just as I am. Everything here, from the decorations to the guests to the room itself, is both a part and the whole of who Pinkie Pie is. It is a difficult concept, one she does not fully understand, and it does not lend itself easily to equine language."
"I think I get it," Twilight said. She looked around the room again, trying to take everything in. Pinkie's mind was a fascinating place, and she would have loved to have been able to spend more time there, but she wouldn't be able to hold the spell forever. Finally, her gaze landed on the sad filly beside her. "Who is she?" she asked without thinking, before hastily adding, "I mean, if you don't mind me asking."
Knowledge looked down at the filly as if only noticing her for the first time. She was a long time in responding, and when she finally spoke, it was with the faintest trace of what could have been sadness. "She is what should not be remembered, yet cannot be forgotten." Her answer given, Knowledge looked away from both Twilight and the filly, then became silent and still once more.
Twilight ended the spell.
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Here it is, Chapter Two. Twilight stares into Pinkie Pie's soul, and it stares right back.
I had a lot of fun with this chapter, and I think it shows. Pinkie is completely ridiculous.
I like the reference to Pinkamena. Also: well done. Again.
1259164
You make me smile sir.
Keep up the awesome work.
Excellent work, it's not often I follow and favorite on the first two chapters but your idea and style intrigue me and you spin a great yarn.
I eagerly await more.
A thumbs up from Lyra!!!
(We need Lyra emoticons!)
Oh dude, that was awesome! ON TO TEH NEXT CHAPTER!
"By all rights, (the music) should have been appalling, yet somehow all of the conflicting elements came together to form a single piece that was as cheerful as it was completely unpredictable."
Clearly, Pinkie Pie has acquired a taste for freeform jazz.
Wow. Just wow.
You have earned yourself a favorite! 
She is what should not be remembered, yet cannot be forgotten
I like that line a lot.
The description of the party music in the manifestation of Pinkie's subconscious reminded me of Gulliver's Travels Part III.
Brilliant!
So is mini-Pinks her inner child or the heavily suppressed Cupcakes!Pinkie?
Intriguing story so far!
This is exactly what I like to see, fics that show Pinkie Pie has hidden depths.
The cupcake was a lie?
I see what you did there...
THE CAKE IS A LIE!!!!
Well, Pinkamena (at least what everyone makes her out to be) is not here, so that's nice.
okay that last line "She is what should not be remembered, yet cannot be forgotten" make me think of background pony except the complete opposite
Whew... I thought that was going to go much worse than it did... I mean, Pinkie Pie doesn't exactly have a reputation for having the most stable psyche.
>and you barely had any breakfast
"barely" should be between "had" and "any"
>That delicious cupcake was a lie!
1278633 You are late for the emoticon party //dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/misc_Lyra.png
Excellent use of lying cake. ^-^
OMG that ending was like
1389940
I don't think so I think it is supposed to be her psyche pre-rainboom.
The temptation to click 1000th "like" was too big.
Fascinating. I always love any story/tv episode/movie that does the "look into a person's mind/soul" thing. The writer always has such interesting interpretations of what makes that person tick.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2012/10/7/116469.jpg
Well, cyanide would explain the almond taste.
Very serious vibes here.
Oh no you did not. :D