Breakfast is Served

by Belgian Waffle

Second Letter

Dear Brother,

Ponyville was recently hit with a heat wave due to the amount of clouds the pegasi were unable to produce. Every pony who had to venture outside were seen either drinking something cold along the way, fanning themselves, or magically doing both! It was a good thing I re-stocked on the ingredients for the special tea, because ponies have been buying it like crazy! Ponies have also been enjoying the air conditioning in the restaurant as they have been lounging inside for quite some time. Luckily I never had to ask anypony to leave to make room for the new dehydrated ponies that were constantly dragging themselves through the front door; some literally!

There was one moment when a very elegantly dressed, but also sweaty, white unicorn tried to charm her way into getting more tea for a discount. She’s clearly done something like this before, because she was good at it, but I had to tell her I couldn’t fulfill that request.

Soon, however, I did because I was quite certain that her following level of anger towards me was going to escalate to dangerous heights.

The heat was clearly getting to everypony.

I tried to stayed inside as much as I could that day. You know how I’m not the kind of pony who could handle heat reaching near boiling. I sweat puddles, and I hate it! Unfortunately I did have to venture outside at one point so I could go to Sugarcube Corner and help with the planning of the competition with Pinkie Pie.

After I closed the restaurant, I headed for Pinkie’s shop. But just when I was about to reach the door...

---

“LOOK OUT!”

“Huh?”

*WHAM*

K.O.!

---

As Belgian Waffle was gaining consciousness, he felt that he was laying on something very soft and there was a nice breeze flowing past his head. He felt very relaxed at this, and shifted himself into a more comfortable position.

Just as he did, he heard somepony’s voice. Somepony familiar, but his brain is too foggy to recognize who. He slowly opened his eyes half-way, before shooting them open completely at what he saw.

Merely centimeters from his face were a pair of golden-yellow eyes that were staring straight into his soul... and his right ear.

Before he knew it, Belgian found himself flailing his hooves and yelping out surprised. When he sat up, he lost his balance and crashed hard on the floor on the opposite side of the mattress where a pony was standing.

She, too, was frightened by his outburst and reeled back while screaming because of it.

Belgian rubbed his head, where a headache was now forming, before he slowly rose to see a grey-fur, yellow mane, askew eyed mare standing on the other side of the bed; silent but with a shocked expression on her face.

Belgian became worried. “Oh, I’m so sorry for doing that! You kinda surprised me there!"

Her shocked expression was replaced with an apologetic one.“No, No. It was my fault. I shouldn’t have stood too close to your face like that.”

“Oh.” Belgian relaxed a little, but kept rubbing his head as his headache increased. “Well, if you don’t mind me asking. Why were you so close to me?”

“Oh, well I smelled something in the air and followed my nose to the source. That's when my nose came to you! You smell really nice! Like maple syrup!"

Belgian was surprised. He's never received a comment like that before!

She seemed to notice and giggled. "Seems nobody has ever told you that, huh? It's no surprise since you make the best breakfast in town. Same can be said about your muffins! But don’t tell Pinkie!"

Just then, Belgian’s brain un-fogged. He remembers the mare in front of him as the town’s postmaster, Derpy Hooves. He remembers how she would always order a maple syrup flavored muffin whenever she collected his mail in the mornings. He remembers how she would stop by the restaurant sometimes to talk about any weird packages that she may have had to recently deliver...

He also remembers how she was the last pony in his vision before he was knocked unconscious in front of Sugarcube Corner, and was the first one he saw when he woke up in... in... umm.

“Wait a second, where am I? And what happened?” Belgian asked, now noticing where he was.

“You don’t know? This is Pinkie’s room. It’s the second floor of Sugarcube Corner. I brought you in after I accidentally landed on you. I was coming in for a landing, and didn't see how close you were until it was too late. My depth-perception is a little off. Sorry about that.” She looked slightly sheepish telling Belgian that last part.

“Oh. Well, thank you for bringing me inside.” Belgian felt his headache begin to diminish.

“Yeah, you wouldn’t have lasted out in the heat for very long. You were completely soaked in sweat by the time I set you on Pinkie’s bed!”

He felt his headache rise and his face become warm under this embarrassment. He guesses that’s why there were a few towels laying on the foot of the bed. It’s not his fault he perspires more than the average pony.

Pinkie soon made her way upstairs and saw that Belgian was standing next to the bed.

“Oh good, you’re awake!” She said in her usual euphoric attitude. “I started to get super-duper worried after the second week!”

Belgian’s heart-rate increased, accelerating the intensity of his headache. “What?! Second week...? I’ve been asleep for weeks?!”

“About three-and-a-half weeks to be exact. You haven’t budged since!”

This news made him freeze in place; eyes wide in shock, mouth agape. Three weeks?! Was the impact THAT hard?!

“HA! Gotcha!” Pinkie announced with a hoof pointed towards the petrified stallion. She laughed a little before continuing. “You should see the look on your face! I was only kidding! You’ve only been out for nearly an hour.”

Derpy giggled as well.

Belgian finally relaxed, but felt exhausted from this emotional roller coaster these two ponies were giving him. “Good one, you got me.” He said blankly. “Listen, I was originally coming by to help you with the upcoming competition. We have to know how many ponies will be entering so we can see how much batter we will need to make.”

“A competition? What kind of competition?” Derpy asked

“It’s a competition to see who can eat the most amount of pancakes in one sitting.” Belgian responded.

“Ooh, a pancake eating competition?” Derpy asked

“Yep!” The pink party pony responded “Would you like to enter?”

“Oh, I don’t know how many pancakes I think I could eat... muffins on the other hand...”

“Well, we know how much Rainbow Dash could eat. Hopefully she’s training for the competition.” Belgian shook his head at this, remembering the ‘present’ Rainbow left him the last time he saw her.

“Speaking of Rainbow Dash,” Pinkie raised an eyebrow. “Have any of you guys seen her today?”

“I haven’t.” Derpy replied. “I went by her cloud home to drop off some mail, but it seemed like nopony was in or around it.”

“I haven’t seen her today either.” Belgian inserted. “I usually see her when she’s moving the clouds in the sky, but I guess she...” He stopped talking to glare at something he spotted through the window.

Pinkie raised an eyebrow at him. “What’s wrong?”

Belgian looked back at Pinkie. “I bet I know where she is.”

---

Belgian felt ridiculous walking outside wearing a rainbow colored umbrella hat Pinkie gave him, but it was one of the best methods of keeping the sun’s rays from shining directly toward his cranium.

Though as helpful as it might be, he still can't help but notice other ponies in shade staring at him as he passes them.

Pinkie was walking beside him to his right and Derpy fell behind a little to his left. The trio walked towards Sweet Apple Acres where they spotted, from Sugarcube Corner, a small lonesome cloud hovering above the trees. It seemed to be the only cloud visible from within Ponyville, which got them curious as to why that was. They guessed ‘somepony’ from the Pegasus Weather Patrol might have known where to find one like it at a time like this.

After passing the front gate, they made their way between the apple trees to where they believed the cloud would be. Eventually they found an orange earth pony napping under the plentiful shade of the tree she was lying against, and the cloud hovering some distance above the tree tops. Front legs crossed across her chest with her hat covering the top-half of her face, including her eyes. A few full and empty barrels sitting under nearby trees telling them that she may have taken a break from bucking the apples from the trees.

Pinkie let the orange mare know of their presence. “Hey, Applejack! How's it going?”

“Huh? Wha?” She seemed a little dazed from being rudely awakened from her peaceful day slumber. She adjusted her hat to allow her to behold the assembled group standing in front of her: a brown sweaty stallion wearing a colorful umbrella hat, a grey mare who seems to be glancing into two different directions at the same time, and an energetic pink pony with an ear-to-ear grin on her face.

Applejack simply stared at them.

After a few awkward minutes passed, Belgian broke the silence. "Right... Have you seen Rainbow Dash anywhere lately?"

Without looking away, Applejack pointed a hoof upwards towards the levitating cloud. Sure enough, there was a rainbow streaked tail hanging off the edge of it.

“Hey Rainbow, you up there?” Belgian yelled to make sure he was heard by the possibly snoozing pegasus.

The tail hesitantly wagged before disappearing into the cloud. After a bit of shuffling, Rainbow’s head finally popped out of the fluff to look at the crowd that gathered for her.

Pinkie was the first to speak. “Hey Rainbow! How’s it going?”

Rainbow finally responded. “Uhh, hey Pinkie. Did you guys just come from a swim or something?"

Belgian felt ridiculous.

---

Everypony was resting in the cool shade under the tree and the cloud, including Rainbow Dash. Pinkie, Belgian, and Rainbow explained to Applejack the competition they were planning, including how the idea came to them in the first place.

“So let me get this straight, you an’ Spike came up with the idea of makin’ a competition in Ponyville out of what Dash tried ta do in the restaurant?”

“Mhm!” Pinkie nodded vigorously.

Applejack shook her head. “Well, ah’m not surprised that Rainbow let Spike talk her into a challenge like that. Ah don’t know what got into her mind makin’ her think she could eat as much as you; or me for that matter!”

“Hey!” Dash inserted. “I can understand Pinkie’s abilities, but YOU?! You think you could eat more pancakes than I could?”

“Ah reckon ah could finish off more servings than you could in one sittin’! Who knows, ah could probably win that competition in my sleep!”

“So Applejack, does this mean you’ll enter the competition?” Pinkie asked.

The farm pony thought for a moment before answering. “It does sounds like fun. Sure, why not!”

“Okay, but don’t think that you can win this so easily.” Rainbow retorted.

“Great! So that’s Rainbow Dash, Applejack, and Derpy. There’s three competitors right there.” the pink pony announced.

“Why aren’t you competing Pinkie?” A.J. asked.

“I’m helping make the pancakes with Belgian.” The party pony pointed a hoof at Belgian, who was no longer wearing the umbrella hat thanks to the shading.

Derpy, who had been quietly listening to to the group since she didn’t have anything else she needed to do for the afternoon, asked Rainbow a question that was on the back of every other pony’s minds. “Hey Rainbow, where did you find that cloud? There’s not a single one in the sky and yet you have one.”

“Well it all started this morning when I went to gather clouds from the cloud factory.” Rainbow further explained to the group about how the cloud factory was on a shortage and was making very few clouds. A friend of hers that worked at the factory had a favor to owe to Dash, so she was able to use that to receive a cloud. The other clouds that were produced were sent to other places for more important uses. Rainbow then left the factory with her cloud to find a place outside of town to nap on it, and chose a random spot above Sweet Apple Acres to do just that. “Felt like I got a few hours in before you three came by,” she finished.

“Ah saw you bring that cloud here while ah was in the middle of apple buckin’.” A.J. added. “Since ah was ahead on gatherin’ apples, ah thought ah could use a rest from this darn heat as well.”

Most of the trees visible by the group have bucked clean of apples, with a smaller fraction left to do before the sun started setting. A big red stallion was seen in the distance doing his share of work, using only one leg to knock the apples from the trees into the barrels placed on the ground below them.

“Ya know, we could have the competition here at Sweet Apple Acres if ya like. There’s a open plot of land where we had the Sisterhooves Social race. I’m sure a large gatherin’ of ponies could watch from there.”

“That could work,” Belgian responded. “But we still don’t know how many ponies in town will actually be entering.”

Pinkie spotted someone in the distance coming towards them. “Hey guys, look. It’s Spike!”

Sure enough, the purple and green baby dragon was quickly making his way towards the group that were still gathered under the cloud and tree.

He was out of breath from running when he finally arrived. “You guys... I’ve been looking... everywhere for you guys!” he panted. “You guys won’t believe what had happened!”

“What is it?” Rainbow asked.

Everybody was staring at Spike who was still catching his breath, waiting for what he had to say that was so important for him to frantically search for them. Soon he caught his breath and explained what he recently did.

---

Spike had explained how he took the initiative to sign up any other ponies in town who wanted to take part in the competition. He handed out flyers the day before, and soon had 10 ponies recruited. Spike then apparently ran into one pony who presented himself as the champion of any food or drink competition held in Equestria. Have you ever heard of him? His stage name is Chow Down. He told Spike that he heard of the competition through a flyer that he found, and made is way to Ponyville from Canterlot to survey his competitors before deciding to partake in it.

As silly as that sounds, I could tell from the way Spike described him that he was the real deal. I never saw something like this coming at all, and I don't know how it's going to play out. I guess we'll have to wait until competition day to find out.

We still have training to do, and the girls are probably going to need to train extra-hard to beat whoever this guy is. I've had Spike look him up in any and every book he might be in at the library, so we'll finally know what we're dealing with.

Until then, I will keep you updated on anything that happens.

Your sweaty little brother,
-Belgian Waffle

P.S. If you find muffin crumbs in your letters, let me know so I can deal with it.

Comments

[Karrakaz]

finally another story that's a good read without having to threaten with the end of the world, great job

[Belgian Waffle]

121112 I agree! Lots of sad or dark fictions recently. I appreciate the comments!

[Guesswork]

This is a really cute and funny story, and I especially liked the part where Dashie eats the waffles. Don't be discouraged if this story doesn't get a lot of views, it's probably because it has an OC pony as the perspective character. That's a hard sell no matter who you are. Take this to heart: I've seen a lot of writers over the years and I can tell that you have talent. Keep developing that talent and it will always be a source of pleasure.

[Belgian Waffle]

152844 Thank you very much! I appreciate that!