The Last- (editted)
It was an ordinary day in Ponyville. The sun was shining, the sky was blue, and Pinkie was saying her daily round of good mornings.
"Good morning, Gummy!"
"Good morning, Mr. Cake!"
"Good morning, Mrs. Cake!"
"Good morning, Pound and Pumpkin!"
"Good morning, kitchen!"
With her set of “good mornings” finished, Pinkie moved onto the one thing she loved to do the most—besides partying of course.
Baking.
“Pans in the kitchen shimmer!,” she began to sing. “Pots in the kitchen shine! Come on, Gummy, you know this one!”
Pinkie sang on during that calm, peaceful morning. The sun was shining, the sky was blue-
Wait, that description of tranquility was already used.
Doesn’t matter, for in a moment everything changed.
"Pinkie!" Mr. Cake called from the front of the shop.
"Yes?" Pinkie asked as she popped up next to him.
By now, Mr. Cake was perfectly used to Pinkie's ability to appear from thin air. That is why he only jumped a foot when Pinkie suddenly appeared next to him. "We're closing up Sugarcube Corner for the day!" Mr. Cake announced.
Pinkie’s jaw hit the floor. "But we just opened!" she protested. "And we've got plenty of hungry customers waiting to get their sweet treats right... huh?" Pinkie had pointed to where most ponies stood in line at the beginning of the day to grab their morning donuts and such, but to her surprise, there was nopony there.
“This is impossible!” she exclaimed in shock. “Where did all our customers go?” Before Mr. Cake could reply Pinkie dashed off to find the store’s wayward customers. She checked in the corners, in the restrooms, under the rugs, under the plates and silverware, and even on the roof; but there was still no pony to be found.
“Oh, there you are, Gummy!” Pinkie said in surprise when she noticed her baby alligator looking over the edge of the roof. “How did you get all the way out here?”
Gummy flicked his tongue towards town square. Then Pinkie noticed the sound of ponies talking and laughing.
“What is going on?” she wondered aloud. She deftly tugged a pair of binoculars from her mane and peered at the scene. She could see a large group of ponies gathered around the town hall. They were all snacking, laughing, and dancing. Pinkie gasped as she realized that had happened.
"T-they threw a p-party, without me?" Her mane deflated as the shock settled in. “They were trying to keep me away?”
"No! Maybe it was a surprise party and I wasn't supposed to know, yet," she told herself.
"But last time they had a surprise party they did a good job of hiding it," she argued. “A surprise party would be held so obviously in the center of town!”
"They might've gotten sloppy?"
"No! There were just excluding us!"
"Let's not jump to conclusions!"
"And why not?"
"Remember what happened last time we did that?"
"... Point taken."
"Alright, let’s go check on our friends! We’ll go to Rarity’s boutique first."
"Fine, let's go."
After settling her own debate, Pinkie bounced over to Rarity's as quickly possible. When she bounded inside, she one-quarter of her mind was surprised that Rarity was hard at work making the strangest of clothes. It appeared to be a suit, but it was definitely not designed for a stallion to where. It looked like something Spike would wear, but it was much too large for the baby dragon.
Pinkie wondered what kind of creature would Rarity would be making these clothes for, and decided to get her answers directly from the horse's mouth. Since Rarity was too engrossed in her work to notice that Pinkie had entered the boutique with subdued enthusiasm, Pinkie decided to make her appearance in the most ordinary way possible.
"Hi, Rarity!"
Rarity jumped back in shock when Pinkie's face popped up over the sewing machine she was using. "Pinkie, darling, you nearly gave me a heart attack!" Rarity exclaimed when she finally got her bearings. "What brings you here? Shouldn't you be celebrating with everypony else?"
"I came here for answers Rarity," said Pinkie with a small frown as her facial expression shifted from excited to serious. Quickly, she dashed around the boutique as a pink blur, closing all the curtains. With that task complete, she pulled a small flashlight out of her mane and shone it at Rarity's face. "Now, tell me everything."
"About what?" Rarity asked in confusion as she flinched away from the harsh light.
"What’s this celebration for? Why is Sugarcube corner being closed? And why did no pony tell me anything about this?" Pinkie shouted as smoke came out of her nostrils. "I mean, I'm Ponyville's Number One Super Duper Party Pony! I should know everything that goes on here related to parties!"
"We thought you would've already known, Pinkie," Rarity replied honestly. "Usually your Pinkie Sense tells you whenever something is going to happen before anypony else knows.. I'm dreadfully sorry, and I'm sure the other girls are too."
Pinkie considered this for a moment. “Apology accepted!" she said cheerfully. Quickly, she opened back up the curtains before zipping back to her previous position. "So, what's going on that's got everypony in a party mood?" she asked curiously.
"Well," said Rarity as she levitated a new bolt of cloth to her work station. "You're never going to believe this, but the seventh element has arrived!"
"The seventh... what now?"
"The seventh Element of Harmony of course!" Rarity replied.
"But I thought there were only six…"
"I'd love to give you the full story, darling, but I'm kind of busy right now," said Rarity as she indicated the outfit she was working on. "Why don't you head over to Twilight's and have her explain everything to you?"
Pinkie nodded eagerly. "Okie doki loki!" she replied as she bounced out of the boutique and closed the door behind her with her tail. She immediately glanced back at the shop and scratched her hoof thoughtfully. “Something funny is going around here, and I don’t want to be the butt end of this joke!” She quickly bounded over to Twilight’s castle to find the answers she seeked.
"You see, ever since the Celestia and Luna first used the Elements of Harmony, there had always been six of them," Twilight explained to Pinkie as she placed new books on the library shelves. "However, the Tree of Harmony found that there was a new creature worthy of wielding the elements. In order to accommodate for this, the tree grew a new branch, one that was thicker than any of the other branches, and presented our new arrival with the seventh element. This is the first time in history such an event has happened, so I made sure to have a festival to honor this occasion."
"Cool!" Then Pinkie paused as she realized something. "Hold on a minute, when did all this happen? We haven't been to the Tree of Harmony in ages!"
Twilight rolled her eyes. "It's only been a few weeks," she reminded Pinkie.
“But if none of us were at the tree, how did you know what happened?”
“Well… he kind of told me…”
“Who?”
“The seventh element. He kind of told me everything that happened… and well, he appeared to be honest.”
“…”
“Pinkie, are you-”
“ARE YOU KIDDING ME!”
“Um… no?”
“So a random stallion walks up and says the tree gave him a seventh element—which, I might add, nopony has ever heard of before—and you just believed him?”
“Well, you see-”
“And to make matters worse, you threw a party! A PARTY! Without telling me! Pinkie Pie! Ponyville's Number One Super Duper Party Pony! How could you?”
By now, Pinkie had gotten so close to Twilight’s face that their noses were touching. Desperate, Twilight looked around for a method of escape. Her face lit up as she looked across the bookshelves. “Terribly sorry, Pinkie, but a… n-new shipment of books just arrived! Yes! And they need to be shelved right away! So if you’ll excuse me, I’d best be getting to work.” Twilight dashed away, until to run into her assistant Spike.
“Ow, watch where you’re going Twilight,” Spike grumbled.
“Sorry, Spike, I need to hurry and shelve that new shipment of books!”
“But we didn’t get a new-” Twilight put her hoof in Spike’s mouth and gave a sheepish smile to Pinkie.
Pinkie narrowed her eyes suspiciously, but did not press the issue. She turned tail and stalked out of the library. “If Twilight won’t give me answers, I’ll have to go to somepony who will!”
Knock! Knock! Knock! Knock! Knock!
“Who is it?"
"Me!"
Fluttershy opened the door for Pinkie to enter. "Nice to see you, Pinkie," she said in greeting. “Please, come on in.” Pinkie did as her friend said and bounced in with a spring in her step, closing the door with the tip of her tail. "What brings you to my cottage?" Fluttershy asked.
"Well... it all started this morning," Pinkie began. She took a deep breath and let out as she gave her explanation. "I woke as usual and went to go work, but then Mr. Cake told me to take the day off. Then I found out there was a party going on that no one told me about, so I decided to go to Rarity for answers. She told me the Seventh Element popped up and I was like 'what?' And she was like, 'go ask Twilight.' So went over to Twilight and she told me that the Seventh Element was given to some stallion but she never went to the tree and threw the party because the stallion told her that the tree gave him an element that didn't exist before! And then she said she had to go shelve some books so I decided to come to you for answers!"
"Well, um, I hope I can help," said Fluttershy as she tried to make sense of what Pinkie was saying. "What do you want to know? I mean, if you want to tell me."
“Who’s this stallion who claims he got a new element from the tree of harmony?”
“He’s not, um, well, that is to say…”
Pinkie tapped her hoof impatiently.
“He’s not exactly a stallion,” Fluttershy whispered.
Pinkie blinked twice. “Mind saying that just the teensy-weensiest bit louder?”
“He’s not, um, a stallion.”
Pinkie gasped. “He’s a colt?” she exclaimed in shock.
“Um, no…”
“A dragon?”
“Not exactly?”
“Oh! Oh! I got it, he’s a draconeques! The new element of harmony is Discord!”
“Actually, no. He’s a human.”
"A what now?" Pinkie asked with a raised eyebrow. "A who-nan?"
Fluttershy shook her head. "No, he's a human. They're mythological creatures, well they were mythological until he showed up," she explained. "They kind of resemble hairless monkeys, but he's so pony-like! He can talk, laugh, joke, and do everything ponies can do!"
“So he can fly, use spells, bake, and grow plants out of his hooves?”
“I-I’m not sure…”
“Hmm… maybe I should ask him myself. Do you know where I can find this… human?”
“I believe he was going to Sweet Apple Acres to see Applejack.”
“Alright, thanks!”
________________________________________
Pinkie managed to catch Applejack just as the farmpony was leaving the farm. Applejack was a mite bit confused when Pinkie asked her about the human in the least straightforward way possible. "The human?" Applejack echoed. “Oh, ya mean Anon!"
“So that’s his name! Cool!” Pinkie exclaimed. “Where is he? I want to meet him!”
"Sorry, sugarcube, ya just missed him," Applejack replied. "He helped me finish apple harvestin' just half an hour ago. Ya would've missed me to if Ah hadn't remembered that Ah forgot 'bout my other chores this mornin'. Ah swear when that guy walks into the room the whole place changes."
"Interesting," said Pinkie as she idly scratched her chin with a hoof. "Wait, apple harvesting?"
“Yessiree.”
“As in, bucking apples?”
“Well, he actually picked by hoof. Or hand in this case.”
“But how did picking apples one by one help you with the apple harvesting if you can get them all at once by yourself?”
“Uh… hmm…” Applejack idly scratched the brim of her hat. “Ah never quite thought about that. But he was happy to help.”
Pinkie scratched her chin thoughtfully. “When and where exactly did you meat this Anon?”
“Well, it was over at… no wait, Ah’m pretty sure it was… then again it could have been…” Applejack scratched her chin thoughtfully. “Huh, Ah can’t seem to remember right now. Ah swear it was right on the tip of my tongue.”
“You can’t remember anything?” Pinkie pressed.
“Well, nothing about how I met Anon,” Applejack replied. “But I remember things about him.”
“Like what?”
“He’s about our age, loves everything about apples, oh! And he also was gonna visit Rainbow Dash!”
“So he’s hitting Dashie’s house next, huh? Well it looks like I’m going to have to do some investigating!” Pinkie pulled out a mustache and bowler hat from her mane. “I’m off to Dashie’s, see you later AJ!”
“See ya later, Pinks!”
________________________________________
"Yeah, Anon was here. He left just a few minutes ago," Rainbow Dash told Pinkie. The blue pegasus was floating on a cloud next to her house. Pinkie – having ditched the hat and mustache shortly before her arrival – was standing almost directly below her.
"Aww... I just missed him again!" Pinkie whined.
Rainbow Dash bucked the cloud apart and flew down to Pinkie. "Whatchya needed him for anyway?" she asked.
"I wanted to finally meet him and ask him about himself so I could figure how to make his party!” Pinkie replied. “But I’m running out of time! I need to have his party done by this afternoon and I still don’t know anything about him except he’s a mythological creature that likes apples!”
“Apples?” Rainbow Dash shook her head. “He might like apples, but the number one thing he loves is the Wonderbolts! I’d say he’s their second biggest fan. Of course, I’m their number one fan!”
“Aren’t the Wonderbolts more than one pony?” Pinkie pointed out.
“Yeah, but they’re one group.”
“Oh… ok! So, he really likes the Wonderbolts that much?”
“Sure does!” Rainbow declared proudly.
Pinkie raised an eyebrow. “But how did he know about the Wonderbolts?” she asked in confusion. “Humans don’t live anywhere near Equetria, and Wonderbolts haven’t done flight shows anywhere else.”
“He quickly became a fan when I showed him my Wonderbolt collection,” Rainbow Dash replied.
“That quick?”
“Uh-huh! Of course, who wouldn’t go crazy over ponies as awesome as the Wonderbolts after seeing my entire collection?”
“So you didn’t have any trouble bringing it all out here?” Pinkie asked. “I mean, some of those things are precious to you that you only take them out if they’re stuffed in pillows!”
“Of course I didn’t take them out,” Dash replied with an eye roll. “I brought him inside.”
Pinkie gasped. “You let him ride on your back?”
“What? Hoof no!” Rainbow Dash flared her wings defensively. “I just carried him up to the clouds and let him walk around.”
“…”
“What?”
“So he’s part pegasus?”
“No. Why?”
“But how did he walk around in your house?” Pinkie asked. “It’s made of clouds! Unless Twilight cast a cloud walking spell on him…”
“Actually, no. He-”
“Do humans usually have the ability to walk on clouds?”
“I don’t think so, the only reason he could-”
“Then how did he walk on clouds?”
“Hey!” Rainbow shouted to grab Pinkie attention. The pink mare’s mane was now more frazzled than ever as she looked at her pegasus friend blankly. “As I was trying to say earlier, he could use his element of harmony to walk on clouds. Cool, huh?”
“Wait, he has the element of cloud-walking?” Pinkie asked in confusion.
“What? No! He has the element of…” Dash’s voice trailed of as she scratched her chin thoughtfully. “Huh, I can’t seem to remember what it was. Anyway, I’m certain that it is not cloud-walking. Anon can just use his element to do stuff like that.”
“Uh-huh…” said Pinkie, unconvinced. She could tell Rainbow Dash was being honest, but she knew something was still wrong with this picture. And for the life of her she couldn’t figure out what. “Well, I’ve got a party to plan. See you later, Dashie!”
As Dash waved a hoof at her friends retreating form, she missed the serious expression on the party pony’s face.
________________________________________
Pinkie had her face scrunched up in thought as she whisked the contents of the bowl in her hooves. “I just don’t get it, Gummy,” she said in frustration. “All of my friends are acting a strange, and I still can’t figure out if Anon really is bad news. I just wish I knew how to find him. He always seems to disappear whenever I come close. And to make matters worse, my Pinkie Sense isn’t picking up anything about him. DO YOU KNOW WHAT THIS MEANS?”
Gummy forked out his tongue and licked some batter off a wooden spoon.
Pinkie let out a sigh. “You’re right, Gummy. I shouldn’t judge until I’ve met him. It could all be in my silly little head! I’m glad I come to you for advice!” she said as she rubbed her nose against the snout of her pet.
In response, Gummy licked her face.
“Aww… you’re welcome!”
________________________________________
The party was in full swing. Ponies were laughing, dancing, and snacking. They all looked thoroughly exhausted—probably because they had partying all day—but seemed to be enjoying themselves nonetheless. To Pinkie's disappointment, however, Anon had yet to show up.
"Don't worry, Pinkie," she said to herself. "No pony or even human would dare miss a Pinkie Party made especially for them! Hopefully..."
Then the door to the Sugar Cube Corner swung opened slowly and dramatically. The music abruptly stopped as every pony and a sole dragon turned the new arrival. The second Pinkie laid eyes on him, she knew he had to be Anon. He was bipedal and did share some resemblance to a monkey, but the differences were obvious. First, he actually looked good in a suit. Pinkie had seen some monkeys in a suit and they usually looked more comical than handsome. Second, he was standing up straight without any indication of hunch. Third-
Pinkie blinked. “Huh… I’m pretty sure I was getting somewhere with that thought,” she said, puzzled.
However, she didn’t have long to ponder as Anon turned in her direction. As they made eye contact Pinkie felt something strange happen to her. She was felling happy, but it wasn’t joyful happy like she was when she smiled around Ponyville. No, this happiness felt hollow…
“Gummy, what do you think is going on?” she asked as she peered up into her mane. Hearing no response, she stuck her hooves into her mane and discovered Gummy was gone. “Funny, he was there just a second ago.” Focusing her sights on Anon again, she felt her feeling of confusion melt away. She didn’t her pet anymore… she was happy without him.
"Thank you for inviting me to this party, Element of Laughter," Anon said in a voice that made honey seem bitter in comparison. "I must say it's an honor to meet you, even if it's a complete lie."
“Uh-huh…” Pinkie’s brain was a having a small bit of trouble processing what he had said. But he said it nicely, but it must have been something good, right?
"I must say, you were the toughest pony in Equestria to crack," Anon said as he started walking toward her at a leisurely pace. "Most ponies bend to my will just by being in the same general area as me. The other Elements of Harmony required eye contact before they became mine. But you, you’re a different story. Even though we're only a few feet apart and gazing in each other’s eyes, you still are able to resist me."
Pinkie’s brain and mouth felt like they were full of cotton, but she had been able to discern a few words from his short speech. “Elements… resist?”
“Yes,” Anon said with a snarky smile. “You’re connection to that pesky Tree of Harmony gave you six a strong resistance to my power, but it appears you weren’t quite strong enough.”
“Resist…”
“Yes, my little pony,” said Anon as his smile grew predatory. “You have been resisting me all day. But that’s all about to change.” He held out the flat of his hand in front of her. “Physical contact allows my powers to reach their full potency. I thought I would have to save it for that Sun Princess of yours, but it won’t hurt to use a bit on you. One small touch and you’ll be just as mindless as the rest of your friends. Are you ready?”
Pinkie stared at him through unfocused eyes. “I guess so,” she said unsurely. Something was nagging at her mind, but she couldn’t make out what it was saying.
Anon stretched out his hand towards her.
Pinkie extended her nose.
They drew closer.
And then made contact.