//------------------------------// // Chapter 17 // Story: Princess Twilight Sparkle and the Quesadilla Conquest // by kudzuhaiku //------------------------------// High noon. It had to be one-hundred and eleventy degrees outside, or more. Following Rainbow Dash’s advice, Twilight kept two damp towels tucked and hidden away beneath her wings to help keep her cool. She walked towards the tables like a prisoner towards the chopping block and all of her friends formed an impromptu parade behind her. She was having second thoughts already, now that she had seen one. They’re just so cheesy. Her mother’s prophetic words haunted her, made her soul shrivel in fear. Hesitating, Twilight felt cold prickles crawling over the flesh of her neck and she let out an involuntary wicker of fear. She thought she was okay with this, that she was over this, that everything would be okay because she had faced the issue. A muzzle tickled the base of her ear, and she knew that it had be a pink one. “Twilight, there is a reason it is called a phobia. It’s an irrational fear, sillyhead.” The words were comforting, but not enough. She froze in place, unable to move, and she retreated into her own logic. Pizzas were fine, she didn’t mind those and ate them all the time. Cheesy hayburgers were great, and she was constantly being photographed out in public pigging out on those when she was stressed. And she was always stressed—thus, she was always getting photographed. It was a distressing, almost paradoxical problem that had no easy solutions, other than becoming a hermit or a telegraph sex operator. “Pinkie, no amount of giggling at the ghosties is going to fix this,” Twilight whispered to the pink mare standing beside her. “I thought I was okay. I thought everything was all better. I mean, I tackled the problem and admitted what it was. Why is this so hard?” Twilight wondered if it was even turophobia if it was only triggered by quesadillas. Quesadillaphobia? Was that even a word? She didn’t know. Right now, at this moment, she would rather face other fears, other terrors, like mixing chocolate ice cream with vanilla. Twilight loved vanilla ice cream, it was her favourite, and she tolerated chocolate ice cream, but she found it was a little too exciting for her tastes. Vanilla was the ice cream of choice for sane, reasonable, responsible ponies who had their heads screwed on straight, and Twilight was a sane, reasonable, responsible pony who had her head screwed on straight. But mixing them together in the same bowl? No. No. No way. That was just a little too much excitement in one day, and she didn’t like it, not one bit. Just thinking about it left her flustered and a bit panicky. Murmuring to herself, Twilight closed her eyes and tried not to think of neapolitan. “Stop thinking about mixing ice cream,” Pinkie Pie whispered. How? Twilight bit down on her bottom lip and began chewing. How? At some point in her life, Twilight just had to understand how Pinkie Pie did what she did. Twilight found that she needed the great mystery that was Pinkie Pie, the one unfathomable thing that she didn’t understand. Of all of the great unknowable mysteries that could be found in the world, Pinkie Pie was the most intriguing. She was the great unknown in Twilight’s life, a mysterious book that begged to be read, but could not be translated. Bowing her head, Twilight Sparkle allowed herself to be led forward by Pinkie Pie… “—and some of the quesadillas will be hot!” Braeburn warned, his voice amplified by the sound system. “They will be delivered to your plates by a small army of helpful pegasus ponies. The judges have cast a few spells on the plates to help us keep count. The contest will go on as long as it needs to, until there is a clear winner.” Twilight was about to say something, she was about to tell Pinkie that she couldn’t go through with this, but she felt a squeeze on her fetlock. Turning her head, she saw Pinkie Pie looking at her, and her face was solemn. She saw Pinkie inhale, and for a moment, Twilight felt her throat grow tight. “Everything is gonna be okay, Twilight. For the both of us. I have to face my fear too, just like you have to face yours. When this is over, we’ll talk, and maybe you can help me with my problem. Everything is gonna be fine, though, just you wait and see.” Being one of the guests of honour wasn’t helping at all, and Twilight was certain that everypony was watching her, judging her, ridiculing her for her absurd phobia of ooey, gooey, melty cheese inside of a toasted tortilla. A bowl of guacamole was plunked down in front of her and Twilight almost jumped right out of her skin. Why guacamole? she asked herself. Lubrication, the voice of her logic replied. It will help the quesadillas go down, and later, it’ll help them come out. You’re gonna have more toots and brassy notes than a burro mariachi band, Señora Sharty Pants. Gritting her teeth, Twilight wished her logic would go and fronk off. Since when had logic ever done anything for her? Logic was a fronking ridiculous and illogical concept for equines anyway. The corner of her eye twitched and one fuzzy ear bobbed from side to side like a manic metronome. What need did she have of logic? She was a colourful, magical, one-horned, flying purple pony princess with a rabid fear of mixing ice creams together… when she should just be eating grass, hay, and oats. Logic did not apply here, it was not welcome, it was not wanted. Phobias were a consequence of daring to have a cultured palate. It was time to go back to happy horsie food. Twilight whinnied, wishing she could be a happy horsie. “Jackie, I’m scared…” “I am too, Dashie… maybe it’ll be a soft break and she’ll just sit there and drool for a while.” “Are we that lucky, Jackie?” “I dunno, Dash, I dunno.” Talking about the monster and facing the monster were two entirely different things. Rocking back and forth in her seat, Twilight stared down at the steaming quesadillas on her plate and tried to ignore the sounds of ponies eating all around her. Talking about the monster was not as easy as facing the monster, nope. All around her, rivalries played out. Applejack and Rainbow Dash were busy stuffing their faces, smacking their lips, and eating quesadillas. They would never be happy horsies, no, never. No, they were evolving, with each bite of quesadilla, with each smear of guacamole, they were evolving, changing, becoming Equus Crepitatus. The dreaded Break Windigos. Chaotic, demon-wind spirits. Grinning, Twilight’s eyes drifted in different directions as her head bobbed up and down. Sumac and Pebble were giving the adults around them a run for their bits. Pretty much all of Ponyville suspected that Sumac had four hollow legs as well as a dimensional void stashed somewhere inside of his skinny, scrawny frame. Pebble was a machine when it came to eating and she crammed in whole quesadillas slathered in chunky green guacamole. A few seats down, Flicker and Hennessy were engaged in a fierce competition against all comers, and the residents of Appleloosa were cheering on the muscle-bound brute that gobbled two quesadillas at a time. Not far away, Piper was screaming at Flicker to pace himself if he wanted to win this, and her aggression had contorted her face into something frightful, something unnerving. Piper was all murderous fury packed into a rail thin, scholarly body. Rarity, her face smeared with bright green guacamole, was somehow keeping pace with Rainbow Dash. The marshmallowy little mare grunted between bites and her narrowed blue eyes were fierce as she glared at both Fluttershy and Applejack. Fluttershy had her eyes on her plate, not on the crowd, and the pegasus mare’s dainty nature had vanished. She was a snarling, growling pegasus warrior, come to destroy all things cheesy. Her snapping jaws ripped quesadillas apart—she did not take bites, no—and picante sauce dribbled from her muzzle like blood as she continued to disembowel her prey. With a demented giggle, Twilight gave into her madness. The first bite was an explosion of cheese that spurted into her mouth. All of the joy of her youth, previous to the incident, came back to Twilight in a flood. Cooking a quesadilla was considered little filly Twilight Sparkle’s first real grown up act. She could cook a meal and feed herself, she didn’t need grown ups telling her what to do anymore. Tears streamed down Twilight’s cheeks and her breath whistled through her nostrils as a hot, steaming load of cheese flooded into her mouth and tickled the back of her throat, almost making her gag. Twilight took it like a champ, just like she had as a filly, and continued, licking her lips. This was bliss. Wrapping your lips around hot, toasted happiness, followed by the sensation of the hot, sticky, clingy mess being blasted into your mouth. Twilight savoured the moment, giving her quesadilla a squeeze as she licked the hot, moist, stiff edges of the tortilla, her tongue plundering into its depths, and she was rewarded with even more of the quesadillas’ hot, ooey-gooey liquid treat, which coated her tongue in long, stringy strands. Pulling away, she gazed into the cheesy depths. How many years had it taken to rediscover what joy there could be hidden inside of a toasted tortilla. Oh cruel, needless misunderstanding! Oh, stubborn, self-willed exile from the cheesy teat! Two onion-scented tears trickled down the sides of her muzzle to mingle with picante and sour cream. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. She had won the victory over herself. She loved cheesy quesadillas. Moaning with pleasure, Twilight gave herself into indulgence.