Pinkie remembered that morning a week ago, when she and her 5 friends were having a nice snack. It was all a blur in the pink pony’s head, but from what she remembered, they had started laughing once because of something Rainbow Dash said. Or was it Applejack? Pinkie couldn’t quite remember. But that didn’t matter. She remembered a loud, scary noise making their giggles shut into a scream of fear as they all reunited in a shaky hug, only to see a simple streak of lightning outside. “Phew, it was just thunder,” she remembered Twilight’s words, along with a sigh from everypony else as they went back to their seats.
“I didn’t know it was going to rain today,” Rarity said, tilting to look towards the door to catch a glimpse of the dark clouds coming closer.
“Oh, yes, it will,” Twilight said, or at least Pinkie remembered. “It will be a giant storm out there from what I read in the weather news,” the purple unicorn said.
They could hear the loud droplets rain fall against the asphalt outside. It was almost above them now. Soon every single window’s glass will be blurred by the pour of water falling down.
And that’s exactly what happened. The rain fell down in buckets, disabling sight outside of Sugarcube Corner. Rarity frowned at the window right behind her. “How am-I going to get home without getting wet?” she asked in desperation, mostly to herself.
Then she saw it. The pink earth pony remembers that part better than any other. She looked though the same window as the fashionista and she saw the rain... Well, it was of some sort of transparent-brown color. Her eyes lit up in surprise, but also in extreme excitement and joy. Was it...?
She got up from her seat and dashed outside of Sugarcube, leaving her friends who didn’t understand her move. They never understood. They never will.
Pinkie remembers she tilted her head up to face the sky, closed her eyes and opened her mouth, letting her tongue slide out as she sat in the rain. She waited, tasted...
… The usual, tasteless, watery rain.
“Pinkie! What are you doing?!” She heard behind her. She turned around to see Twilight at the door of the bakery, along with the rest of her friends behind her. She turned around to see the window she peeked through when she saw it. From an outside view, she could see it very well: it was the window on the right side of Sugarcube Corner. The one that hasn’t been washed since a week and was very dirty.
“So that’s why,” she muttered to herself, yet she didn’t hear her high pitched voice. The rain was too loud. She sighed heavily and got back up, forcing a smile towards the nerdy unicorn. “I got thirsty!” she lied, doing her best to make up something believable.
“But Pinkie,” Twilight said as the pink pony walked back to her. “You could have just bought some juice from Sugar-”
“Meh. Nothing beats the fun to taste the rain from time to time!” The pink pony cut her. She wasn’t doing a good job hiding her sad face. We could see it right through her fake smile.
Oh, screw believable lies, the pink pony remembered her thoughts at the moment as she entered back inside the bakery. They would believe anything coming from my mouth. They all think I’m crazy, anyway.
~~~~
The sad pink pony sat on a table in the outside. She was still at that fast-food store, sitting gloomily on one of the benches, all alone. Even though she was sad, her hair remained, surprisingly, in its same poofy, jolly state. She sighed as that last memory ended in her head. She didn’t care of what happened after. She didn’t want to care.
She looked at the other ponies, sitting on different tables near her. They were happy. Talking with their other friends, and occasionally bursting into laughter. How could they be happy in such a plain, boring world?
Another memory surfaced in her head. It was of only three days ago. All of her memories came from this week. It all happened now. Which was weird, if you thought of it. There was already a year that passed since... Then.
This time, the memory in her head included her and Dahie. She was bringing the rainbow pegasus to the picnic she had with her friends, since the cyan mare accidentally lost the paper where the place was written. That souvenir was short. It was just a quick flash, nothing to be noticed, but she still remembered it very freshly. They were walking down a dirt road when Pinkie tried to slide on the dirt. It was a reflex- not meant on purpose- but her hooves slid down the dirt until the rocks stopped her. Her pegasus friend looked at her questionably, then roared with laughter, saying, “Why did you do that?! You don’t slide on dirt roads! What were you thinking?!”
At that time, the pink pony forced herself to laugh along as if it was some stupid mistake of hers. But she knew it wasn’t. Even though it wasn’t meant on purpose, it wasn’t just a foolish act. It was... A happy feeling she tried to bring back. Something like that.
The pink mare growled again as the people next to her started laughing once more. Sometimes she felt as if every single time a pony started laughing, they laughed at her. Pinkie knew that was impossible, since the ponies around her didn’t even notice her, but still. She just felt like it.
Another memory was about to pop in her head, but whatever that was, it got interrupted as Twilight Sparkle sat down next to her. Pinkie hadn’t even saw her coming towards her. It’s just like she materialized out of nowhere.
Or maybe she teleported. Yeah, that’s a possibility, too.
“Hi Pinkie!” the bookworm cheered. Yet sher expression fell as she saw the earth pony’s. “Pinkie, what’s wrong?’ she asked, noticing her friend’s gloomy face.
“Nothing,” Pinkie grumbled in response.
Yet the purple mare didn't give up. “Pinkie, is there something bothering you? Tell me.” Twilight put her hoof on Pinkie’s and listened carefully to whatever the pink mare had to say next.
Yet the only response her friend gave was a cold stare and a growl. She snatched away her hoof from the unicorn’s grip and got up from her seat. “Nothing is wrong I tell you!” she shouted at the purple mare, who now was frozen, not knowing what to do.
“Pinkie, please don’t get angry...” Twilight tried to calm her as she got up as well and followed the pink mare who was furiously trotting away. “Tell me what’s wrong-”
The pink mare immediately stopped and turned around to look at her friend. She didn’t have to say a word because the simple sight of her expression made Twilight shut. It showed only fear, anger, hatred. And another emotion Twilight couldn’t quite get. It looked like... Loss?
Her thoughts were cut short as the pink mare shot flames at her with her eyes. “THERE’S NOTHING WRONG, I TELL YOU!!!” she yelled from the top of her lungs, making Twilight take a step back from fear. Tears formed on the pink mare’s face as she backed from the unicorn. Her hating frown immediately turned into a sad expression as she moved away. All eyes of random ponies passing by were fixed on her. “T-There’s n-nothing wrong,” she repeated, this time in a low, shaky whisper, before turning around and trotting away.
This time, there was no doubt on it: Twilight heard loss from the pink mare’s high-pitched voice.
~~~~
Twilight hadn’t seen Pinkie for the rest of the day. Even the next morning, she was nowhere to be seen. Not even the Cakes seemed to own any information on where she was. She was invisible.
That afternoon, Twilight was reading a book about dark magic when something pink came in her sight of vision. She peeked up from her book to see something she didn’t expect at all.
Pinkie Pie was running towards the library, a smile spread all across her face. But unlike the smile she forced herself to wear this entire week, this one was real. She shot the library door open, making Twilight bounce in surprise. “P-Pinkie?!” she let out.
“Hi Twi!” The pink pony greeted happily.
Twilight was surprised by how jolly the pink pony was. Only a day ago she was the most depressive mare in Equestria and today, she returned to her usual happy self. Even though the pink pony seemed like nothing she was yesterday, Twilight was still left with a mark. “Um, Pinkie, about yesterday, I’m sorr-”
“No worries! Excuses are already accepted!” The earth pony cheered. She turned around and noticed the open book on Twi’s shelf. “What are you reading?”
“Dark magic stuff,” Twilight replied, remembering her book. It glowed in a pinkish-purple aura and floated from the shelf until it stopped next to the unicorn. “It’s called ‘Darkness And Its Secrets’.”
“Oh,” was all Pinkie said in reply.
They both stood in an awkward silence as Pinkie read the cover. Then Twilight remembered. “Why did you come?”
“Oh yeah!” The pink pony stopped reading to facehoof herself. “I wanted to ask you a question!” she cheered.
“Alright, go on.”
“Can you flirt?”
The aura around the book disappeared and it fell down in a ‘thud’. The unicorn’s jaw dropped and her eyes widened in surprise. “W-What?!”
Pinkie started laughing when she saw Twilight’s reaction. She fell on her back and started laughing herself out. After a few seconds, she got back up and ceased her giggles. “I need your help to distract the guards, and I thought flirting might be a good idea!” Then she started giggling once more, and it quickly turned into a roar of laughter and hiccups. “What a- hahaha- stupid idea! hahahaha- hic!” Pinkie said between two laughs. She let herself fall back down on the floor.
Twilight wasn't in the mood of laughing, though. She was busy thinking. “Why would you want to distract the royal guards?” In Twilight’s mind, an act as such should be needed only to do something illegal. The purple mare would never break a law- and she knew Pinkie would never either...
Yet Pinkie’s laughter immediately ceased when she heard Twilight’s question. She stood on the floor, eyes widened. She never expected Twilight would ask that question. She should’ve. Twilight is always so busy on the details. The pink pony suddenly regretted to have had the idea to ask Twi for help. “Um... heheheh... Nevermind, actually. I think I can do it by myself...” She said sheepishly, getting up and backing from the unicorn.
Twilight was surprised for a moment. Why wouldn’t she want to tell her? Was it actually something illegal? She frowned. “You didn’t answer my question.”
Yet Pinkie kept backing out from her, the same sheepish expression on her face. She seemed to want to avoid the question. When she was entirely out of the library, she looked down at her hooves, who were now all on the outside ground, sighed happily and looked back up. “Well, I better hurry now! Bye Twi!” She cheered as she grabbed the doorknob.
“Wait! Hurry for what?! Where are you goi-” She stopped as the door shut violently behind the pink pony. She ran at the door and opened it as quick as she could, but she was too late. Pinkie Pie was already out of sight.
“What is she up to?” Twilight mumbled under her breath.
~~~~
“Haven’t you noticed how Pinkie was recently?” Twilight asked a bit later that day, when she was with her friends, at the fast food, sitting all at the same table.
“Yeah,” Rainbow Dash agreed. “I mean- Pinkie is Pinkie, after all, but this is different,” she said.
“She looks more... Depressive. About everything,” Fluttershy added shyly.
“Even corn makes her sad these days,” sighed Applejack.
“You know what’s the weirdest?” Rainbow asked to the group. They all fell silent and turned their eyes to face the pegasus. “It’s that normally when she’s sad her hair straightens, but this time it just stays poofy,” she said. The others nodded in thought.
“There was only one time when I saw her poofy hair yet she didn’t like to laugh...” Twilight said, looking at the others. They shared looks. It couldn’t be, though. The world was in its normal form, and nopony else except her has changed, after all-
Twilight gasped, her mouth dropping and her eyes widening in fear as she got immediately up from her seat in such a rush it made her friends jump in surprise.
“What? What is it, Twilight?” Rarity asked.
“Oh no,” was all the unicorn replied, in a dim whisper.
“What? Tell us!” Rainbow Dash insisted.
Twilight turned around to face the multicolored pegasus, her expression remaining the same. “Rainbow, you did say that Pinkie tried to slide on dirt roads, didn’t you?” she asked.
“Uh, yeah, that once,” Dash replied, unsure.
The unicorn turned around to face Applejack. “And AJ, you remember when Pinkie ate your corn and looked sad?”
“Yeah...” The farmer replied, the same unsure face as Rainbow Dash appearing.
“She said she was disappointed because it didn’t taste like popcorn, right?”
“Yeah...” she repeated.
“And you all remember when she went out in the rain randomly to drink it?” she asked to all of them, looking at nopony in particular. They all nodded in unison.
“So, what’s your point?” Rainbow Dash asked.
Twilight’s eyes narrowed. She couldn’t believe her friends hadn’t understood it yet... “Who makes dirt roads slippery, transforms corn into popcorn and makes rain taste like something Pinkie likes?”
By the last one, all her friends’ faces lit up in fear. “Oh no,” Rarity whispered.
“And that’s not all,” Twilight said, her voice showing clearly that she was scared. All her 4 friends around the table stared at her, waiting to hear the worst of news. “This morning, she came to my library, asking me if I could flirt!”
“W-What?!” The others let out.
“I know, that was exactly my reaction too. When I asked her why, she said it was because she needed my help to distract the royal guards...”
“W...Why would she want to do that?” Fluttershy asked in a whisper.
“When I asked her, she didn’t want to tell me... She just left to do it by herself.” Twilight stood a moment in silence. “But if I gather the clues I just told you all together, I think I know what she went to do...”
A deadly silence filled the air as everypony stopped talking.
“You’re not telling me she’s going to free...” Rarity couldn’t finish her sentence as she was on the border of fainting. Fluttershy seemed to be in the same state as well. Twilight, on her side, did her best to stiffen up as she removed herself from the bench.
“I’m afraid she will,” she said, her words strict and certain. “Come on, girls, we have to stop her before that happens!”
~~~~
Pinkie Pie was sitting on the pedestal, right next to his feet. Her rear hooves were dangling in the air as she stood silent, thinking: What could get him out of there?
She had passed through the guards easier than she thought. She asked them to leave her alone, and as soon as she mentioned she was an Element, they immediately obeyed. She double-checked that nopony was looking while she’d free him, for being noticed was the last thing she wanted. Now what she had to do was get him out of there. But how?
The pink pony remembered how he escaped last time. She couldn’t pick up a fight with anypony- since there was nopony around. Sure, she could pick up a fight with herself, but that would be too stupid. What else could bring the lord of chaos back to life? Chaos. Unharmony. Discord. How could she bring those things?
Then she remembered that she had almost all of those things in common. Simply her presence might wake him. She decided to give it a try and started talking; after all, it won’t hurt anypony if she said random things aloud, wouldn’t it?
“I miss you,” was the first thing that came out of her lips. She didn’t even look at the statue, only somewhere in the sky, a blurry point. She was looking at nothing in particular. She was barely even concentrating on what she was saying- that’s how she normally talks. Lets things flow out of her mouth without any control. And she liked it like that.
“I miss chocolate rain,” she continued. “Once this week I saw the rain turning brown and I was happy for a moment that you were back, until I realized it was just me who was seeing things. I really miss your chocolate rain. I wish it came back again. Oh- and the cotton candy clouds were nice, too. Sometimes I just like to look up at the clouds and imagine you can eat them and they taste good- that’s what you made. You made my dream come true! Even if it was for a short period... Did you know that? I bet you didn’t, didn’t you?” She giggled as she was happy to talk again. She hadn’t talked much this week. She missed the joy of letting words flow randomly.
“Oh- and I miss your soap roads, too. I mean, that was a great idea! Making everything slippery so you could slide your way from a road to another! Hee hee! I like to skate, did I tell you? Your soap was just like ice. I liked it. I could do pirouettes and poses all day!” She could hear a noise coming from her right, where the statue was, but ignored it. She continued talking, talking, talking. Letting everything out.
“What else? Oh! The popcorn! That was great! I mean, who needs fire to make popcorn now? We hardly get to eat that thing around here since Applejack doesn’t have time to do some and when she does it’s normally when we do campfires, but even then we do campfires only in summer and in rare times of summer too... I really liked swimming in the popcorn. It obviously tasted way better than corn- I still don’t understand why the others didn’t like that one. Oh- and the giant apples! I still don’t understand why Applejack was so freaked out! She could bake even more goods now that her apples were bigger, so why didn’t she take the chance?” Pinkie stopped to place a hoof on her chin and started thinking.
Crack, she heard next to her, yet she didn’t turn around. “Oh!” she shouted, shooting her hoof in the air. “I know what would make your chaotic world better! How about tree trunks made of chocolate? Oh, that would be so good! Oh, oh, and ice cream oceans! Ice cream oceans is good! Replace all water by ice cream!!!”
“That’s a good idea,” came a masculine voice next to her, making her freeze. From the corners of her mouth she could see the once gray statue next to her had now taken color. She perked up to see the draconequus smiling down at her.
She grinned back, making one of her usual, oversized grins. She had never felt so happy for the entire week... Who knows, maybe more? “Dissy!” She exclaimed, giving him a hug. The creature laughed.
“Dissy, huh?” He repeated. He picked up the pink pony with his two mismatched arms and lifted her up to place her on his head. “Not bad for a chaotic nickname.”
~~~~
“Halt! Who goes there?” The two guards had stopped them at the entrance of the castle about ten minutes later, when Twilight and her friends arrived at their destination. Twilight frowned at the two armored ponies, not believing they didn’t recognize her. But, oh well, it was the royal castle: they had to take precautions, after all.
“It’s Twilight Sparkle, Element of Magic,” she said, “along with the other Elements of Harmony.” she pointed to the others behind her. The guards took a quick look at everypony. “Look, this is very important, Equestria might be DOOMED if we don’t deliver this message to the Princess! Now let us in!” Twilight roared, not able to wait anymore.
The two guards looked at each other before opening the door and letting the five mares in. They dashed immediately inside and went up to the Princess’s royal throne room.
Princess Celestia was peacefully drinking tea out of her cup when the door slammed open. “PRINCESS!” Twilight yelled. Out of surprise, Celestia spit out the tea in her mouth and it landed directly on the royal red carpet. She looked at her mess with a frown, but her housekeeper quickly came and started cleaning it up. The sun Princess got up and went to other things as she approached Twilight and her friends.
“What is it, dear student?” She asked. They must’ve came in a real hurry because they were panting and sweating a lot.
“Princess! Pinkie Pie came back to free him!” Twilight shouted, spitting everything as quickly as she could.
The alicorn was about to ask, ‘who’, when it clicked in her head. The Princesses eyes widened in fear, just like everypony else’s in the room. The guards, the mistresses, even the housekeeper let go of her towel as her jaw shot open. “Why... Why in the world would she-”
“I’m really sorry, Princess,” Twilight apologized. “I should’ve doubted it sooner. Pinkie was the only one to enjoy his chaos, of course she’d end up missing him and wanting him back-”
“It’s alright, Twilight Sparkle,” The Princess interrupted, taking a more serious tone and expression. “We can’t waste time. We need to go to the garden as quick as possible.”
Twilight nodded, adopting the same expression as her royalty. “Right away!” she exclaimed as they all dashed outside.
But they were too late.
In the garden, balloons with jolly faces hung up from everywhere, even from tiny patches of grass. The statues were all painted in flash colors and stood out very clearly. Streamers fell infinitely from the sky as if they were raining. One of the statues was gone, and instead was left the pedestal who was now upside-down. The grass outside seemed to be very bouncy and shaky, as if it was made of... Jelly.
On the upside-down pedestal stood the draconequus. As soon as the seven mares appeared, he let out an evil-like grin. “Why, hello!” He cheered. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
A pink pony with puffy pink hair and shiny blue eyes popped up from behind the beast’s head, holding on to his two unmatched horns. She grinned wider than any pony could when she saw her friends. It rather surprised them, since she hadn’t been so happy in a while. Actually, she seemed like she hadn’t been so happy in her entire life. She was about to explode.
“Hi guys!” She shouted in glee. “You came just in time for Discord’s welcome party!”