//------------------------------// // Part 3: a Toxic Gag // Story: The Prankster's Gambit // by aceotaku //------------------------------// Twilight stared as she looked at the damage to the farm. It wasn’t much, considering; all that crazy pony did was sabotage their sodie pop production machine, covering her, Flim and Flam in the sugary concoction, before laughing and throwing a cream pie in each of their faces. To be honest, it was quite possibly the weirdest moment of Twilight’s life. Something felt off, however. The Unicorn looked around and then at herself... And then her eyes widened, her eyebrows shooting up as high as she could. “What.” She said, intelligently. ------------------------------- Fluttershy flew into the window of Applejack’s home, smiling widely. “AAAAAAplejaaaaaaack! Fluttershy’s here to make your sad not so bad!” “No! Don’t look at me! I’m HIDEOUS!” Fluttershy blinked and turned, seeing her friend futily trying to cover herself with the blanket of her bed, but she was far too large for it. Her body had become ridiculously large and round, the coat of her torso was now plaid in colour, her legs were brown, her tail was a tiny clump and her mane was styled in an assortment of mismatched, rainbow coloured braids. Really, the only real way of identifying the mare was her cutie mark, which had remained unchanged from its regular appearance of an apple made of sewn up fabric with a knitting needle for a stem. Fluttershy gasped, grinning wide. “Oh my gosh! You’re a bagpipe!” “This is no laughing matter!” Applejack snapped angrily. “My silky mane...my full tail...my carefully washed coat and my svelte figure...it’s been ruined! AND MY COLOURS CLASH HORRIBLY!! I’ll be a laughing stock! An exile! Ponies will remember me only as the ugliest mare in town! So ugly, everyone dies from the sheer VILENESS! I can hear the story now: ‘once there was a mare so ugly everyone died. The End’. That’s me! That’s my life, my legacy, now!” Fluttershy’s smile slowly fell as she listened to her friend. Sure she liked to laugh and have fun...but it was never funny when somepony was hurt, including when the hurt wasn’t physical. Whatever happened, it hurt Applejack’s feelings and is making her unhappy. The Pegasus glided over to her friend, laying a reassuring hoof on her shoulder as she smiled. “Hey, I’m sure Rainbow will know something, or at least one of her magic books will!” Applejack nodded slowly. “Ah...Ah hope you’re right, darling...Ah just don’t want to be seen like this...” “Don’t worry! Auntie Shy has the perfect solution!” ----------------------------- “This is the worst idea ever.” Applejack waddled around as best she could, her body covered in an assortment of fabrics of various colours, looking like some strange psychedelic cloak. “But this way nopony knows it’s you!” Fluttershy grinned. “Except me! And you!” “Ah look completely ridiculous!” “Nah, I’d say you’re only semi-somewhat less ridiculous than if you weren’t wearing it!” Fluttershy giggled. “It’s fine, Jackie, it’s fine!” “Look, let’s just find Rainbow Dash and hope she can figure this mess out, alright?” Applejack grumbled Suddenly, they heard screams. “It’s coming from Sugarcube Corner!” Fluttershy gasped in shock. “Let’s check it out!” Without waiting for an answer, the Pegasus grabbed Applejack’s hoof and dashed off down the street towards the source of the sounds. What greeted them was the most unbelievable sight. Cup Cake was trapped in the doorway of Sugarcube Corner’s front entrance, looking as swollen as a beachball. Lotus and Aloe stood before her, grunting as they gripped one of the baker’s hooves each, trying to pull her out. Fluttershy gasped and pointed. “That’s unusual!” Applejack gave her friend a half-lidded gaze. “...Yeah.” “Oh hey guys!” The pair blinked and turned to find Rarity crawling on her belly, lying flat on the ground. The white unicorn waved in greeting, nonplussed. “...darling, what ever are you doing?” Applejack asked. “Oh that you AJ? Trying some new fashion or something?” Rarity chuckled. “Well it seems I’m having trouble standing and I feel kinda heavy, but if I just shuffle around like this I can manage to move around. Good thing I wasn’t inside huh? Otherwise I’d be trapped with Mrs Cake.” Applejack stared in bewilderment. “Excuse me?” Fluttershy put her hoof to her chin in though, eyes narrowing. “It seems we have a mystery on our hooves girls....” Suddenly, Filthy Rich’s voice called out through the town, gaining everypony’s attention. “Everypony, come to Town Hall for a vital meeting! We need to get everypony together to see how widespread the damage is! Everypony, come to town hall!” Fluttershy gasped. “A real live town meeting!? I dreamed of seeing one ever since I was a little filly! Come on girls, let’s go see!” ---------------------- As Rainbow Dash walked towards the Sparkle Farm, she felt a strange twinge in her body, particularly on her forehead. She frowned and reached to rub her head, face paling as she touched what felt to be a large, twisting horn. “Uh, Spike is there something on my....?” The pegasus’ question died in her throat as she stared at her travelling companion, making odd choking sounds in her throat as she fought for an appropriate response to what she saw. A cute, purple coated mare with a green, spiky mane and tail stared back, her green draconic eyes betraying her true self. “Uh, Rainbow what’s....!? Rainbow, You’re a unicorn...with a really funky looking horn!” “Forget that, you’re a pony!” Rainbow exclaimed. “And a mare!” “What are you...?” Spike gasped as she looked down at her hooves. “AH! W-what the hay!?” Spike grabbed Rainbow by the shoulders, shaking her roughly. “FIXITFIXITFIXITFIXITFIXIT!” Rainbow responded by slapping the hysterical mare off her. “Calm down Spike, we don’t even know what happened! I can’t just ‘magic up’ a cure for something without even knowing what I’m supposed to be curing!” Spike nodded, getting up as she hyperventilated. “Right...Right...Sorry it’s just...” “You freaked out.” “Yeah.” The former dragon agreed, hanging her head low as Rainbow helped her up. “Alright, we’ll go see Twilight and figure out what’s going on...” Rainbow said as she gave her own body a cursory glance, eyes widening at finding she no longer had her wings, her blue coat now a garish rainbow of colours. The horn protruding from her forward was long enough to be distractingly seen in her periphery, twisting like a spring.”Though I’m not sure how useful my magic will be right now...” “Aw dang really?” someone spoke from in front of the pair. “That’s a shame, we were really hoping you had some answers.” Rainbow and Spike stared at the ponies before them. Flim and Flam stood literally joined at the hip, their legs fumbling over each other as the now conjoined twins attempting to push a large, metallic statue of a unicorn up the road in front of them. Rainbow gazed at the ‘statue’, eyes widening in recognition. “Oh no!” The former Pegasus cried out. “Twi!! I-is she...!?” Flim shook his head. “No...thank Celestia no...she’s alive and well, at least near as we can tell with basic first aid magic, but as you can see she’s having some trouble moving without our help...” Rainbow sighed with relief. “Great...that’s...that’s not ‘great’ but...I’m just glad it wasn’t...” “You and us both...” Flam said with a nod. Spike looked at the statue, tilting her head in confusion. “Uh, guys, what are you...?” She was interrupted by a loudspeaker broadcasting Filthy Rich’s voice, directing everypony to head to town hall. Rainbow frowned and trotted beside the twin brothers, pressing her hooves against the petrified Twilight’s flank. “At least somepony’s trying to sort everything out...” ------------------ Pinkamena quietly put on a large, waterproof raincoat, a pair of black shades, a snug fitting face mask that clung tightly over her mouth and a pair of heavy duty rainboots, right before hefting a massive backpack onto her back as she opened her door and started to head off. She probably would have said something witty like ‘I hate family reunions’, however as she was alone and was focused on what she had to do, she instead silently walked towards Ponyville without so much a grunt. ---------------------- Filthy Rich stood on a simple stage with a podium holding a microphone in front of him, while ponies poured into the town hall building, in various bizarre states of form. Filthy Rich himself stood with his coat a shiny gold with his mane and tail looking like wads of paper money. A loud grinding sound was heard, everypony turning to stare as a rainbow coloured unicorn and a purple mare pushed a large, metal statue into the room, followed by a the conjoined forms of the Flim Flam brothers. Filthy Rich cleared his throat. “Well now...now that I what I can only assume is everypony is here...I suppose we should discuss about our...current appearances. As you can see, this wasn’t a small, isolated incident; everypony in town has been affected in some way, shape or form. Since the Mayor isn’t here currently, I have taken it upon myself to gather everypony together so we can figure out how and why this happened, as well as how we can attempt to fix it.” He scanned the room nervously. “....any ideas, anypony?” The townsfolk looked among themselves, whispering and muttering: confused, scared and disturbed. “It’s a prank.” Everypony blinked, looking to see PInkamena walk inside, completely covered in an outfit that could only be called ‘impractical’ and ‘ridiculous’. “A...prank....?” Filthy Rich repeated, tilting his head as he raised a ‘1 Bit’ eyebrow. “What...what do you mean by that, Miss Pinkamena?” “It’s National Pranking Day.” PInkamena grumbled. “What everypony is seeing now is the trademark ‘prank’ of my sister, Limestone Pie. She wanders Equestia pranking ponies for her amusement, justifying it as ‘spreading fun’, and she usually saves something like this for National Pranking Day.” “My entire stock of books was ruined!” Rainbow Dash snapped. “Not to mention my house was flooded too! Are you saying that significant property damage was done just cause somepony thought that’d be funny!?” “Yes.” PInkamena stated bluntly. “That and one of your books likely held a cure for this epidemic.” “Those books were expensive!” Rainbow Dash cried out. “I’m not the one who did that.” Pinkamena again stated simply. “Plus I can’t afford recompensing you for that.” “You make tons of money!” Spike interjected. “Possibly, but one, you can’t prove that, and two, I don’t care.” “Look, we can discuss the library later!” Filthy Rich yelled out calmly. “Please, Miss PInkamena, is there anything we can do?” The pink mare nodded. “My sister is likely to have an antidote. We’ll need to find her, either way, unless you want her causing more havoc.” “What do you mean ‘more’....?” Spitfire asked with narrowed eyes, her eyes literally burning aflame. “This is just the first phase.” Pinkamena said. “Now she’ll start to really prank the town until the day is through.” Rainbow frowned. “Alright. Everypony who is able, fan out and search the town! We need to find this ‘Limestone Pie’ character and stop her from causing more damage!” Everypony whose transformations didn’t afflict their mobility got up and nodded, heading out of the building while everypony else stayed behind, including Applejack, who didn’t even want to be caught dead seen looking like she currently did. ----------------------------- Rainbow Dash ran down the first street she saw, directing the others to split up, looking around herself. “come out you jerk!” She cried out impatiently. “This isn’t funny!” She heard laughter as she suddenly flung into the air by a massive, hidden catapult, eyes widening. “What.” ----------------------- Lotus and Aloe walked side by side, their mane and coat colours swapped around. They covered each other’s blindspots as they searched. They were unprepared for the snares grabbing their tails and pulling them high in the sky, dangling from the top of the clock tower. -------------------- Pinkamena walked, dodging a cream pie that was thrown at her, leaping over an avalance of square watermelons, slapped aside a chicken and leapt over an an entire field of thumbtacks. She was not going to fall for any of her sister’s stupid traps. Of course, having thought that, she immediately fell into a large pit filled with cheese. “Come on!” She cried out in exasperation. “What does any of this even MEAN!?” ------------------------- Fluttershy glided over the town, searching, grinning as she saw a familiar pony on alarge hill overlooking the town. She flew over, waving her hoof. “Dr Prankie!” The prankster pony looked up as she was hard at work setting up a massive, house sized cannon. “Well if it isn’t Fluttershy!” “Oh Dr Prankie thank goodness I found you! I was worried you ended up like everypony else!” Fluttershy landed in front of the prankster. “Something awful’s happened in Ponyville! Everypony has transformed into weird but hilarious things, but its not funny and everyponys seriously scared and a few of them are in terrible states like Twilight being a statue! You gotta come with me cause Pinkie says her sister’s done it and might have a cure!” Dr Prankie chuckled, pulling out a baskball sized round bottle filled with green liquid. “You mean thiiiiiis antidote?” Fluttershy gasped, grinning wide. “I dunno, but if you say so, that’s great! How’d you know we need it!? How’d you even get it!? OHMYGOSH DID YOU MEET PINKIE’S SISTER BEFORE ME!?” Dr Prankie chuckled, lowering her glasses to give Fluttershy a good look into her actual eyes. “Oh no, you silly billy, I got it cause I’m the one who put poison joke on everypony!” She spread her forehooves wide. “Isn’t it HILARIOUS!?” Fluttershy’s eyes widened. “NO! Dr Prankie, I know you had good intentions, pranks are fun and all, but what you did isn’t funny at all!” “Are you kidding!?” The prankster gasped. “Fluttershy, out of everypony I was sure you’d understand! Pranks are the ultimate form of fun! All these fuddy duddies with their mediocre pranks or just plain flat out not participating, I HAD to show them how a real prankster pranks! Did you SEE the baker blow up like a balloon!? How’s that NOT funny!?” “Mrs Cake was stuck for aaaages and wasn’t having any fun at all!” Fluttershy protested. “And you ruined Dashie’s house and her books and now she has to pay lots to fix both! And Twilight’s a statue! Its not funny when you actually break things and hurt ponies!” Prankie merely laughed loudly through Fluttershy’s spiel, ignoring her. “Oh come on, it’s all in good fun! It’d be no fun if I left somepony out, especially on this day!” She gestured to her cannon. “And I thought...WHY SHOULD I!? So I’m gonna spread poison joke TO EVERYONE and then set up traps all over so ponies’ll be pranked EVERY DAY! WON’T THAT BE FUN!?” “No!” FLuttershy shook her head. “That’s not fun! That’s BULLYING!” “Fluttershy, stop trying.” The pair turned in surprise, seeing PInkamena trot over. “Limestone won’t listen to reason, she thinks as long as she’s having fun, than everyone else is too.” PInkamena stated bluntly. “We’ll only get her to stop by forcing her out.” “That’s Prankie, sis!” Dr Prankie Pie said, pulling an accordion out of her mane. “Let’s throw down!” She began to play a tune on her instrument. “HEY THERE! Let’s have some fun!” The Prankster grinned, leaning her face close to Fluttershy. “Join my good time gang! Just one question first: RHUBARB!? OR MERANGUE!?” The prankster pulled out a pair of pies, tossing one at Fluttershy and one at PInkamena, both mares dodging the ‘weapons’. Prankie grinned and wrapped a hoof around Fluttershy’s shoulders, stretching her hoof to the horizon as she continued. “We’ll prank on ponies throughout the land everypony’ll be howling on their knees So my little yellow friend Lend a hoof if you please!” She took the pegasus’ hoof into her own, Fluttershy’s body spasming as she was electrocuted by a joy buzzer. “Hey, don’t look so shocked Ain’t it about the time To let the prank fit the crime!?” Pinkamena shook her head, rolling her eyes. “Limestone, this has gone too far.” “Hey that’s Dr Prankie if you please!” The crazed prankster held up a poorly written note of paper. “I forged my own PHD!” “Ponies should have fun and be able to smile.” Fluttershy argued, gazing sympathetically. “Nopony’s smiling with these pranks.” “OH YEAH!? SAYS YOU!” Prankie grinned, several extend-fist boxing gloves suddenly protruding from her mane. “BOXING GLOVES!” The prankster furiously played on her accordion, her weapons striking rapidly towards Fluttershy and Pinkamena, Pinkamena shoving the fists out of her way with her hooves while Fluttershy gasped and barely managed to dodge several times, before pulling a custard pie out of nowhere. “Custard retort!” The battle devolved into the Pegasus and prankster lobbing their weapons at each other, barely dodging, until a pie struck Prankie in the face,making her false moustache and glasses to fall off her face. “Hey,” the earth pony grinned, “you’re pretty good.” PInkamena groaned. “But I think we both know....” “It’s time to let these ponies go!” Fluttershy finished. “NEVER!” Prankie screamed, suddenly more boxing gloves, tennis racquets and more besies flying from her, striking both mares simoultaneously before knocking them both the ground, the crazed mare grinning in triumph. “Hey! Here’s a joke! How are you Like a lollipop stick? IN THE END YOU’RE BOTH WORN DOWN BY THE FORCE OF MY LICKS!” She struck several more times before pulling out a large, blue tinged cream pie, standing over the pair menacingly. “HA! HA! HA HA HA HA! Oh what a laugh! Hahaha! Looks like the end of the line SO LET! THE PRANK! FIIIIIIIT! THEEEEEE!” Before she could finish, a white cat rushed over, knocking the pie out of the mare’s hooves, send it flying into the air and interrupting her song. “Opal!” Fluttershy grinned, pulling the cat into a hug. “Awww did I forget to give your daily hug?” “WHAT!?” Prankie cried out in disbelief. “DEUS EX MACHINA!?” PInkamena suddenly kicked her crazed sister in the gut, knocking her into the cannon, the sudden action causing said cannon to move pointing upwards, the pie falling inside before the cannon fell to point the opposite direction from town. “So...shouldn’t we get the antidote or whatever from her now?” PInkamena asked. “I mean, that IS why we were fighting her.” Fluttershy held out the large bottle on her hoof. “Don’t worry! Opal got it!” She gave the indifferent cat a loving nuzzle on the cheek. “She’s such a good kitty!” PInkamena sputter. “I...But...When...How...Where did she even...” The pink mare sighed. “Ugh....I hate you so much...” Prankie’s mad laughter rang out from the cannon. “Oh...oh you girls should see me! I...I look...COMPLETELY RIDICULOUS! Man, you girls got me good! You should totally see this!” “No.” Pinkamena stated, kicking the cannon hard, causing it to fire the mad prankster far into the distance, her laughter fading as she got farther from town. “This is why I hate family reunions.” --------------------------- As the sun was setting, everypony had gathered together to celebrate the end of Pranking day, though everyone had been put off from doing any actual pranks for the rest of day. Using the antidote and the local spa, everypony managed to take a turn getting a good soak and curing their malady. By the time the final drop had been drained, the whole town was back to its old self, and Fluttershy had set up a huge party to lift everypony’s spirits. Fluttershy tried to pull an unresisting but uncooperative Pinkamena into a dance as an unfamiliar voice called out. “Hey everypony! Ah can’t believe Ah almost missed this!” Everypony stared at the winged red mare standing before them, the large yoke around her neck and the green apple cutie mark betraying her identity. Big Macintosh chuckled, tilting her head with a nervous grin, grinding her hoof into the dirt.