Pink is not Limited to One Vessel: III
"We should call you Sparkle Pink!" One of the pink unicorns cheerfully suggested.
"Only if I can call you Twilight Pie, then." The other cheerfully concurred.
"Oh sweet Celestia, lovely Luna, and dear Cadenza what have you two done?" Bodivander was less than happy.
"Deal," The pink unicorn with the party balloons cutie mark stuck out a hoof to shake.
The other pink unicorn with a violet stars cutie mark clapped it in a hoof-shake, unable to hide her laughter.
"Pinks, this is no laughing matter," Bodivander turned to the ballooned one. "I'm assuming this started with you, Pinkie Pie?"
"Twilight Pie," Pinkie Pie corrected.
"PINKIE Pie!" Bodivander repeated.
"Or Sparkle Pink," Twilight Sparkle laughed.
"No, that's you!" Pinkie pie stage-whispered.
"Oh, that's right!" Twilight Sparkle laughed even harder, caught up in the mental state that was Pinkie.
Bodivander grabbed the pink, star-spangled unicorn and gently shook her "Twilight Sparkle, or whatever you want to be called, you must calm down. This is serious. We need to reverse this."
"Nothing is seriously serious. And nothin' doin' until I find out what's wrong with this potion. I should be fine for a little while." Twilight Sparkle grinned.
"You go, Sparkle!" Miss Pie gave her an elbow-bump to the rib. "Don't let The Man get you down."
"Sir?" an acolyte came to the double-doors. "Bodivander? What's going on?"
Bodivander sighed, "They're both Pink-drunk."
** *
"Which one is you?" The Acolyte asked.
"I'm me!"
"That … doesn't help much."
"Look at their cutie marks," Bodivander pointed to one for the acolyte. "Those didn't change at least, thank Celestia for small favors, the balloon one is Pinkie Pie plus a generous dose of unicorn essence. The one with stars on her flank is Twilight Sparkle plus a gentle helping of Pink fourth pony."
Bodivander stopped, then added, "And don't let them tell you differently, they're being very … mischievous."
"I just want to have fun so badly!" Twilight Sparkle almost begged, closing her eyes and jumping up and down alongside Pinkie Pie, "I suddenly really, really need to go out and play in the rain," and then she turned to face Pinkie Pie. "How do you stand it?"
"Sometimes... I can't." Pinkie Pie laughed. Twilight Laughed, too.
"Are you Twilight Pink or Sparkle Pie?"
"I can't remember."
"Me, neither."
They laughed again.
Twilight was hopping up and down, again. Pinkie, who was still laughing, immediately started doing the same as they hopped together.
"Maybe we can use this to our advantage," the acolyte said, "If I may presume … they can have fun as long as they're working."
"Hmmm..." Bodivander thought about this, putting one hoof to his mouth, lost deep in thought, "Okay, you can work out in the rain, but if you stop, you have to come back in-." The two pinks were gone before he finished his sentence.
* * *
Twilight couldn't remember when she'd had this much fun with an experiment in all of ever, standing out in the downpour, water cascading all around her. It was as if she were performing experiments in the shower; or a water park.
Pinkie was busy trying to destroy all the puddles, every single one, as soon as they formed. Strangely enough, she was succeeding in this endeavor, at least so far.
Twilight had rocks holding down everything, as the wind did its very best to blow her instruments away, as if the storm were attempting to play the same game Pinkie was playing with puddles, trying to destroy the potions one by one, except the wind wan't quite fighting fair, playing for the rest of their possessions as well. Finally, the latest experiment complete, the two finally ran inside, soaked to the skin, drenched, dripping like a hosepipe onto the red carpet, and both of them laughing hysterically and uproariously.
"You look so ridiculous," Twilight Sparkle laughed at Pinkie sprawled out in a quickly-forming puddle which was building around her. "I must look the same." Twilight pulled frizzles of her own mane in front of her face for inspection. "Mmyup."
"You sounded like Big Mac just then."
"Mmyup." Twilight repeated, deeply imitating Big Macintosh.
"Mmyup." Pinkie imitated Twilight Sparkle imitating Big Macintosh.
"Mmyup." Twi imitated Pinkie Imitating Twi imitating Big Mac.
"Mmyup."
"Mmyup."
"Mmyup."
"Mmyup."
"Mmyup."
"If I may interrupt that train of thought." The expression on Bodivander's face looked as menacing, but his eyes gave away a smile behind them. It was as if he couldn't decide which emotion to be. He finally chose smile. "If you two girls are done having fun-"
"We'll never be DONE having fun," Pinkie Pie interrupted from her puddle position still lying down on the floor.
Bodivander continued, "We still have a minor emergency on our hands. We need to get you two back to normal with all due haste."
"I actually don't believe so." Twilight lifted her hair out of her eyes with one front hoof. "The parameterized equations- "Twi light looked at Pinkie's confusion, stopped, and started over. "… It may be the giddiness talking, but I think this is what happened to the spider. The essences never quite settle in; it rolls off, like water off a duck's back."
"Or a Twilight's," Pinkie interjected.
"Or a Pinkie Pie's," Twilight grinned back.
"Or a Big Macintosh's."
"Or a-"
"ENOUGH! I must insist we get working. I much hate to play the part of a-"
"Meanyfacepants," Pinkie interjected.
Bodivander lost his train of thought at this. He started again from scratch.
"I don't really want to, but I really need you to focus on-"
And then, with a tremendous flash of lightning and burst of thunder, all the lights went out, castle-wide.
Whether the storm had finally snapped under the pressure of the continuous, ever-growing strength of the weeklong raining, or enough of the the magical energies of the Panacea escaped to give it its unfathomable power, or, less likely, the storm felt miffed that its new playmates had gone back indoors, the winds had simply finally had enough, blowing into every window and every crevice in the drafty castle.
Standing there, in the deep darkness, unable to see a hoof in front of her face, Twilight suddenly knew, absolutely KNEW the light fixture directly above would fall on her, feeling the subtle, subconscious twitching of some precognitive sense.
"Twilight! Something's gonna fal-" Pinkie started, but Twilight Sparkle was already ducking and rolling one one side, way ahead of her warning; she just barely stayed ahead of an incredible: "CRASH! tinkle tinkle!" as the ancient chandelier impacted.
"Omigosh. TWI! You okay?!"
"I'm fine, Pinkie." Twilight collected herself, quickly lighting her horn. "I sorta, kind of, already knew that was going to happen. Some secret sense was tingling."
"Sparkle sense?" Pinkie's eyes lit up. Her grin doubled, showing all of her teeth.
"I guess... Sparkle sense," Twilight admitted, her face tuning even pinker with the realization.
"Blast it!" Bodivander interjected, "We'll have to fashion torches. Or .. the reading room has a fireplace. We'll see if the flue is still clear. Or..."
* * *
Even more drenched, if that were possible, the pink Twilight Sparkle stood grinning just outside the main door with a tiny lightbug lantern. "It's no good. There are just no light bugs out in this weather."
Pinkie was waiting indoors with a towel as they headed off to the lab room, "McGrumperston says we need to dry off this time. Or we'll ruin the carpet."
As they spread out the provided sleeping bags in front of the warming, roaring fire, Twilight smiled as the pink color of them matched her own new color.
She'd been trying to master Pinkie for a whole book's worth of time (which was much more than regular, with the speed she normally went though books, at least when they didn't include confetti and such.) Twilight noted that she felt Pinkest when she THOUGHT pink, and although the potion was helping, it required a more … thought cooperation on her part.
Pinkie piped up in the flickering firelight, "Can you teach me to light things, or hover things, Twilight? I think I'd like that."
"I guess...But I'd need to teach you about vector arithmetic. And-"
"I don't think I'd like that."
"Well, Twilight half-grinned, "That's what it takes. Magic and science require a lot of math."
"So that's how you get so smart."
Twilight grinned at the compliment, until she saw Pinkie's saddening face and she stopped. "Oh, Pinkie..." Twilight thought but for a moment, and then said, "I can teach you the light spell. That's simple enough. If you want."
"Okay!" Pinkie's face brightened again.
"Basically, you simply focus as much mental energy into your horn as possible."
Pinkie looked straight up into her own protrusion, her eyes almost rolling back in her head with the effort to see it.
"You don't technically need to look at it."
"No wait, I got it." Still looking straight up, Pinkie's pink tongue stuck out one end of her mouth as she glared at herself more and more intently, finally with the 'spark-spark' like a florescent bulb, and with a very slight pink tinge, the horn ignited with a burst of Pinkie's magic.
"I did it!" Pinkie grinned wildly and excitedly, her eyes lighting up brighter than her horn.
"Good job!" Twilight beamed. As Pinkie turned back to look at Twilight, the light promptly went out.
"You have to keep focusing on the energy," Twilight suggested.
"Oh … " Pinkie clenched her eyes shut as the horn lit up even more furiously. She opened them and looked around at the room, bathed in her own soft, Pink light.
"Twilight, this is so awesomely amazing, I …" the light went out again. "And so very HARD!"
"You need to constantly think about the magic flowing through you. If you let up for an instant, the spell dissipates."
"I have to think about it ALL THE TIME?! But I need to breathe. And talk. And walk. - ."
"As long as the spell lasts. Come on, you're a master of doing lots of things at once."
"But I don't have to think about them!"
"That's … true. I've learned enough from you in the last few days to know how you think, and you're DEFINITLY not a concentrate-on-one-thing type of pony."
"I'm not sure I can hold a thought that long." Pinkie said.
"What exactly IS the problem with this spider?" Bodivander asked, still staring down at it, almost daring it to do something.
"Well, the spider-" Twilight started.
"Evil spider." Pinkie interrupted, correcting her.
They stared at the presumably Evil Spider, simply sitting there, performing no evil acts that the world could see.
"If the power's out, what's happening with the spider?" Bodivander sounded mildly panicked. Twilight motioned Pinkie to come over, as they tramped over to the display, up to the spider. Twilight mentally flicking her own horn's light on, so that the lab-half of the room was fully visible again.
"Well, the … evil spider …" Twilight faltered. She then laughed and began again, "The evil spider has received the potion, but there's nothing in a spider for it to change. "
"Go on … and could you speak up? The wind is getting louder." Indeed, by the sound of the clatter, the no-longer-gentle breezes had started peeling ceiling tiles off the roof.
"Huh." Pinkie Pie commented, alternately looking down at the spider and up at her own horn, apparently looking for some sort of similarity there.
Twilight raised her voice a couple notches over the wind, "The potions don't actually change who someone is. Pinkie can't suddenly cast any of my hard-learned spells. Similarly, I can't do many Pink things that I didn't learn from the Book of Pink. It's not too many steps up from a changeling's 'change my appearance' spell. It can't give you an alicorn's powers. I'm sorry, Bodivander, but the elixir of life doesn't change who you are inside."
Twilight looked down at herself, in the Pink. "I'm still me. Pinkie Pie is still-" Twilight grinned, "Pinkie. She didn't give me her hard-won powers of happiness through the potion. It does give a couple abilities here or there, but it doesn't change your soul. I'm sorry; the potion may make you an alicorn, but it doesn't make you Celestia."
"I understand."
"Huh." Pinkie Pie repeated, after this new information, staring up at her newfound horn again. She tilted her head back to see it better, only to find that the horn moved with it, causing her to tilt her head back some more, "WHOAH!" she suddenly screamed as she fell over backwards.
Bodivander ignored the WHUMP of Pinkie Pie hitting the ground as he glared at the readings of the various dials in front of the spider. It was true; there was no denying it. Even though the Panacea presented an INCREDIBLE amount of power, the power was raw, and basic, and elemental to the world. It simply wasn't a precise spell that could be cast; it had no focus, no point. He would have to find his own immortality spell.
"That's not to say it isn't a fantastic achievement," Twilight was still looking over her shoulder as she helped Pinkie up. "They'll be writing books, even libraries about you and your … group for centuries to come. Imagine bottling raw power like this. I'm sorry it's not what you wanted, though."
"Hmmm. I suppose It must be enough." Bodivander smiled at Pinkie Pie, still looking up as if there were an imaginary carrot on a stick hanging in front of her (or a cupcake). "Thank you for holding up your end of the bargain. I must, of course, do further tests to make sure, but, if all this checks out, I see no reason why you two cannot leave in the morning. I hope you aren't TOO angry with our methods when you make the report to Celestia. I have a lot of knowledge yet to provide."
Twilight could hear the faint cracking of trees being blown down outside;
Pinkie was still lost in looking up more than one should find physically possible.
Bodivander continued, "To be honest, we were trying to get to you when we found mistress Rarity. When our acolyte grabbed her by mistake, he panicked. We're more researchers than military folk."
As the wind's howling became increasingly turbulent against the celing, Twilight suddenly KNEW the roof would come off, drenching the entire library;
'The books! no!' Twilight whispered as Pinkie suddenly startled, jerking up at the same sensation she was feeling. " ... NO!" Twilight screamed at the top of her voice, throwing up a violet spherical shield around the precious volumes at precisely the time her prediction came true. With a titanic clatterbang, the room's ancient roof sheared off in the force of the tremendous wind.
Yet... not a solitary, single drop of water fell upon them.
Shards of the roof, various shingles, and tiles of the collapsing ceiling added weight to the bubble that replaced it, but Twilight persevered.
"I … I can't keep this up, forever," she groaned out through clenched teeth. "Pinkie, do you remember where the elixir of life is kept?"
"You're not going to-?"
"I need the energy!"
"Who knows what will happen to you, if-"
"I'm saving these books" Twilight shouted, as she galloped down the stairs to get a better angle, glaring straight up into the hurricane above her, almost daring it to do something.
"You can count on Pinkie!" Pinkie startled Bodivander, who'd still needed a second to react.
"Where's the panacea?! We need to juice up Twilight."
"Oh, nothing doing!" Bodivander shouted. "If anyone, I will MOST CERTIAINLY be the first to taste
…"
"Would you rather lose all your books?" Pinkie locked eyes with the still-seething Bodivander.
They looked at each other, staring, glaring into each other's eyes for a second that seemed like hours, each willing the other to break first.
Finally, Bodivander looked down at the fading pink Twilight, as the lavender purple gradually returned, sighed, and pulled a silver key out of his pocket. "Here. Do what you need to do," he said softly, calmly, almost a whisper. "And … I'm sorry."
Pinkie clapped the key between her jaws with such force she almost swallowed it, and swished up the stairs.
Pinkie's hoofbeats galloped and echoed through the corridors as she ran full tilt, up the stairs, bolted through the doorways, and, at last, found the panacea cupboard. Pinkie tremblingly unlocked it, clamped her jaws around the clear potion bottle's neck and galloped back again. Every second counts. Twilight was waiting for her.
The Panacea helped. It had helped, "But," groaned Twilight, "It's not … enough."
Pinkie looked straight up at her horn, still protruding above her eyes, "I have some magic." she whispered. "It's Pinkie magic, not-"
While her fighting face stayed put, Twilight's eyes smiled instead, as she interrupted, "It should be enough, Pinkie. Try it."
Pinkie touched her horn to Twilght's and Twilight felt the surge of the Pink magic surging through her, more than doubling the spell's strength.
Pinkie screwed her eyes up in concentration, not hardly daring to breathe and risk shorting out the spell, applying all of her mental focus to a single line of thought: Magic. magic. magic. magic. It became a mantra, as she said it to herself over and over. Magic. Magic. Magic.
Pinkie had been imbued with a great deal of magical energy, as she had drunk a great deal of unicorn essence. In fact, she kind of had to go to the bathroom.
Pinkie persevered, however, mouthing it, and then whispering it to herself in her effort to maintain focus. "Magic magic magic"
Twilight picked up on it, smiled, and joined Pinkie in the callout: "Magic."
"Magic."
"Magic."
They said it together, in harmony. "Magic. Magic. Magic. Magic." Twilight recalled the song they'd sung together while making sweetberry cupcakes; this song was equal parts Pinkie and Twilight, just the same as that; "Magic. Magic. Magic. Magic."
"Magic"
"Magic"
"Magic"
"Magic"
"Magic"
"Magic"
An incredible amount of pure power suddenly added to Twilight's spell. A burst as she'd never felt before, even from the Panacea. Her power doubled; then doubled again. She looked over at Pinkie's eyes squelched shut as tight as possible, her horn glowing with its devine brilliant inner Pink power, as they sang together, "magic magic magic magic". Twilight could see the pink aura feeding her own horn, Twilight's own purple aura feeding back into Pinkie's, and could feel in her mind's eye the two magics joining.
THIS was the panacea. THIS was the harmony.
Twilight was at last able to expand the protective radius of her spell beyond the roof of the Cult's library and up, up and up even higher. A shining violet magenta column of spell energy shot up, piercing the very clouds above as a lighthouse's beacon pierced the night, shunting all matter away from the amazing light's powerful center. The clouds evacuated the sky around their pink light.
Both ponies stood there gasping for breath, finally opening their eyes, and looked up as the spell finished.
Above them was a clear blue sky, a solitary dot of cloudless space. All around the castle, the gray, bleak storm was still torrenting downwards in buckets, but the rain could only fall downwards, to where the books were not. In this safe circle, on the campus of the Cult, there was no rain.
They had done it. Together.
They looked at each other and blinked. Twilight's eyes shone as her coat flickered between pink and purple like a neon sign. Pinkie's horn was nearly gone, as well.
"Thank you so much, Pinkie," Twilight said around her breathing.
Pinkie felt her forehead with one forehoof, "I don't know if I could do that, again. Magic is hard."
Twilight smilingly shook her head no, "It's right out of your Book of Pink; all we needed was our internal rhythm. Thank you again for it. It was rather … extreme, but it … really helped. And," Twilight let out a deep breath. "I learned so much about YOU. Thank you."
"Thanks, Twilight. I learn so much from you, too."
Twilight smiled and hugged Pinkie closer with one hoof.
** *
It was finally complete. In the dark reading room, now a writing room, a quill scratched out in the nectarine light of a lightbug lantern, finally levitating back to its place, right next to a now-closed, deeply lavender volume, emblazoned with the starry Cutie mark and the ultra-neat script of its author, the still-wet ink on its cover giving it its well-deserved title,
The Book of Sparkle.
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Is it over??
Wow.
I loved this!!
I wasn't sure how you would end this, but the final couple of paragraphs gave something to think about.
You have done a great job.
So...this story is over? Aww...
Excellent story. Fully enjoyed it.
I could SO see a sequel called "The Books of Harmony" where Twilight works with her other four friends to get their books out of them. Hmm..."The Book of Awesome", "The Book of Quiet", "The Book of Fabulous", and...and...okay, for AJ I've got nothing. I have no idea what she'd call her book.
2643313 the book o' apples
I smell a sequel! Also, it's a real shame so few people have followed you.
Uncomplicated, introspective, developed into its own thing. Very good job.
2643437
There's more to Applejack than Apples. Apples don't define her...unless your saying 'Apples' as in the Apple Family...
Wonderful story I'll say. I need to find myself some unicorn essence.
2643313
"So...this story is over? Aww..."
I have to give the other stories a turn
I loved this story a lot, but my inner grammar Nazi was blowing up with just about every line xD Wonderful writer, but honestly need slightly more formal writing practice
Wow, this was an amazing story, probably the most-coherent approach to Pinkie's philosophy of life I have yet encountered.
Thank you for not letting the story be side-tracked into romance; not that I wouldn't mind that happening in a sequel, but I have read far too many stories that threw away opportunities to explore Pinkie's character in favor of shoving the two mares into instant couple-dom without an adequate build-up.
Good luck with your future endeavors!
2645185
Could you give an example? I don't see anything wrong with the syntax. Do you mean the action interjections? Should they have commas/periods, or something?
An enjoyable story, if a tad rough in some places. I quite enjoyed getting into Pinkie Pie's mind.
2646939
No, syntax is basically fine, no complaints there. But yeah, punctuation or structure really. It's all just really minor stuff for the most part, like:
"If I may interrupt that train of thought" The expression on Bodivander's face looked as menacing, but his eyes gave away a smile behind them.
where there should be a comma after "thought," or:
They stared at the presumably Evil Spider, simply sitting there, performing no evil acts that the world could see.
in which case evil doesn't seem to be used as a proper adjective and shouldn't be capitalized.
I guess most of my complaints would just be my OCD or personal preference, but sometimes you aren't entirely consistent either, as in some cases where you'll end a quoted statement with a period in one place, not put closing punctuation in another place, and correctly use a comma in others.
Might also be the fact that the story is relatively fast paced that I feel like it's a bit odd in places, I dunno. But like I said, really loved the story!
Soooo.....whens the sequel coming?
Interesting short story.
Can't help but to feel that the last chapter was a forced ending.
Overall, it was good, but not fav material.
The sequel hath at long last arrived:
Book of Sparkle
Cap.
_________
Cap. [part of the name of a technique / ability]
__________________
needs end " marks.
__________________
Separate.
____________________
Needs end " marks.
______________
Connect lines.
_____________
Cap.
_____________
Hey can you do a quick run to make sure your paragraph structure in the sequel is correct? [Lines that need separated are separated, lines that need to be connected are connected]. That was a massive problem in this story, along not capitalizing names, sentences, or other things that need to be capped.
But other than that. The content was intriguing, and would be better if structured properly. Still I'll give you an upvote and a fave.
Y'know, it's stories like this that make me wonder if we should have a philosophical category.
6128609 agreed.
I know what this needs!
Awesome story
Interesting and funny
Pinkie mind is amazing.
I love pinkie
This about killed me, I laughed so hard.
This was a most excellent story. This is the kind of story I wish I could see in the actual TV series. Well done.
Available in Chinese translation:
https://www.fimfiction.net/manage/messages/11681190/mission-completed