Twilight let out a contented sigh as she sat down in front of a good book. It wasn’t often the purple unicorn was allowed to rest. Her job as the town librarian, element of magic and protege of Princess Celestia usually consumed all hours of the day, whether it be studying friendship or helping a pony in need. The fact that the town and her friends were all crazy didn’t help either. But everything was looking exceptionally well today.
A hot cup of tea laid next to a simple daffodil and daisy sandwich. Spike was helping Rarity, which usually just meant distracting the CMC so she could do her work in peace. That would occupy him for a couple of hours. She just sent in her latest friendship report, so that’s one thing she could check off her list. Tea, sandwich, time alone and a good book. This was truly a rare event, one which she had only heard stories of... a pleasant afternoon of alone time. It was absolutely perfect.
In fact... it was almost too perfect. Twilight shifted her eyes around the room with suspicion, waiting for something to go wrong. No bad luck over there, no chores over here, and no Pinkie Pie in sight. She stared at the windows, waiting for her pegasus friend, Rainbow Dash, to come crashing through.
To her genuine surprise, absolutely nothing happened. Finally convinced this moment was real, she levitated her tea to take a sip, initiating the lovely afternoon.
There are two things most ponies don’t know about fate: It had a cruel sense of humor and it was patient, often stalking its prey for hours. But it waited long enough... and this time, it was out for blood.
The door to the library suddenly shook as it was pounded on relentlessly by an unknown source. Twilight jumped up a little in fright from the loud banging, accidentally cancelling her levitation spell and making the tea spill all over the open book.
“No!” Twilight shrieked. Watching the tea soak and stain the book was one of the most horrifying things she had ever seen. It never even had a chance to be read. It had so much to live for, and she killed it... she was a book murderer.
Ignoring the door as it banged again, she tried to save the book. Before she was able to do anything however, the hot tea trickled from the table and onto her legs.
“Ow ow ow!” she screamed as the scalding liquid burned her skin. Her reflexes made her jump up, but she hit the underside of the table and accidentally fell backwards. The table flipped when her hoof caught the side as she fell, making the sandwich, plate, tea cup and book soar through the air. The china shattered when it hit the floor, the sandwich smacked the wall and fell apart, and the book plunked into a bucket of soapy water that Spike used to clean the windows before he left.
Twilight tumbled backwards and hit her head on a bookcase. Stars danced across her field of vision upon impact. Then, every book on the wobbling bookcase fell down like an avalanche on top of the distraught unicorn, seeming to want revenge for their murdered brother. The army converged upon the betrayer.
When the chaos finally settled, Twilight’s head emerged from the mountain of books. When she finally managed to recollect herself and stop the room from spinning, she reluctantly surveyed the damage.
Shards of the plate and cup were scattered around the floor, a puddle of tea was advancing its attack on a nearby pile of books, the contents of her sandwich were sprawled around the room, now inedible. Her new, unread book was confirmed dead as it drowned in a bucket of soapy water, somepony was frantically beating at her door, she had first degree burns on her legs, and somehow every book on the shelf found their way to the floor. Oh, and her head really hurt.
Suddenly, the door broke from its hinges and fell to the ground with a loud thud. A frantic Pinkie Pie rushed into her home and shouted, “Quickly Twilight! we’re all going to die!!!”
Before Twilight could even open her mouth to respond, shards of glass rained down across the room when a recently cleaned window shattered, caused by none other than the living natural disaster herself, Rainbow Dash. The light blue pegasus busted through like a homing missile and zoned in on Twilight, making a direct hit and burying the mare in the sea of books again. The brutal impact shook the entire house. Every book on every shelf came crashing down, joining their brethren in the same unfortunate fate. It was a sad day to be a book.
Both Twilight and Dash popped their heads out from the rubble. “Um... sorry about that,” Dash apologized, grinning sheepishly. “I guess the double backflip corkscrew was a bad idea...”
“Nah, you just need more practice!” Pinkie said encouragingly with a smile, apparently forgetting about the previous emergency.
Twilight’s mane suddenly exploded into a frizzy mess and her eyes went completely vacant. Then, without looking at either of them and just staring into space, she quietly said, “Oh, hello Pinkie Pie. Hello Rainbow Dash. No, please, make yourselves at home, I wasn’t doing anything anyway.”
“Um... Twilight?” Pinkie said, her voice filled with worry, a concerned expression on her face. She pointed a hoof to the kitchen and said, “Your toaster is on fire.”
“What!?” Twilight yelled, bursting out entirely from the books. Sure enough, smoke was billowing from the kitchen entrance. “NOOOO!!!” Not wasting a second, she rushed in to quell the fire, with Pinkie and Dash coming to her aid.
Flames were spitting out from the toaster, burning intensely. The crimson tendrils were licking dangerously close to some drapes. This toaster has clearly gone rogue.
“How did this even happen!?” Twilight screamed.
As her violet friend frantically searched for an extinguisher, Pinkie said, “Yeah, I thought you’d want to know your toaster was shooting flames like that. When I saw it, I was like ‘Gee, my toaster doesn’t do that’ so I thought it was weird, but then I thought that maybe it was a super duper toasty toaster! but that seemed weird because it looks awfully dangerous. But then I thought that maybe it was a super duper magic toasty toaster that only cooked food and looked pretty at the same time. But then I figured that maybe it was just a regular toaster on fire and that you should know about it in case you didn’t, so I told you! and it’s a good thing I did because I was right and you-”
“Pinkie!” Twilight yelled, still rummaging through her kitchen for an extinguisher, and finding it extremely distressing that it wasn’t where it was supposed to be, for whatever reason.
“Oh! I know!” Pinkie continued, oblivious to the escalating disaster before her, “Listen to this! How about a super duper magic toasty toaster that toasts toast! Ooh, not only is it fun to say, you could even-”
“PINKIE!!! If you have any regard for your life or ours, then help me find the fire extinguisher before we all perish in flames!”
Pinkie gave a salute and a “Yes ma’am” before rushing out of the kitchen.
Meanwhile, Rainbow Dash was trying to splash some water on the toaster from the sink, but that just seemed to make it more angry... somehow. “This isn’t working!” Dash said, frustrated. She needed something to hold more water, and fast too. She rushed out of the kitchen, but was perhaps a little too fast, and didn’t have time to notice the bucket of water on the ground.
Rainbow Dash yelped as she tripped over the bucket, sending soapy water and a very deceased book across the room. Several books got soaked. “Oops.” Ignoring the mess, she grabbed the bucket and ran back into the kitchen.
The flames finally caught hold of the drapes, and continued its glorious domination as it climbed the fabric. “Agh! No!” Twilight shouted, “Who’s bright idea was it to build a library in a tree anyway!?” She wanted to use magic, but she couldn’t think of any helpful spells, and the spells she knew would be counter productive and cause more damage than the fire, like flooding the room or simply blowing the flames around with wind. Magic would be her last resort. “Where’s Pinkie with that extinguisher!?”
“Don’t worry Twilight, I got this!” Dash said as she charged in. Unfortunately, she slipped on a small puddle of the soapy water. “WHAA!” Dash cried as she soared across the room, coming to a dead stop when she smashed into the kitchen sink. The faucet broke, sending a fountain of water to spray across the room. Everything was soaked in the downpour. Fortunately, this disaster managed to cancel another as the water smothered the flames.
“Don’t worry, I can totally fix this,” Dash said with a hesitant grin, her wet mane covering most of her face. “And look on the bright side, at least the fire’s out.”
“I should have just used magic,” the soaking wet unicorn mumbled. She gave a long sigh as she watched the water soak everything in the room. “I just don’t understand where the extinguisher went, I always kept it in there,” she said, pointing a hoof to an empty cabinet. “And I just know I had a spare somewhere...”
“If anypony can find it, it’s Pinkie,” assured Rainbow Dash.
“Twilight!” Pinkie yelled as she ran down the stairs, “I found it!”
“Pinkie! NO!!!” both Twilight and Dash screamed in wide-eyed horror. But it was too late. The pink pony had already fired the device, and released the torrent of the foamy white spray. She didn’t even bother to aim as she haphazardly discharged the foam, coating every surface.
She eventually decided to stop, or simply ran out. “Did... did I get it?”
Twilight and Dash looked like two snow ponies after experiencing a blizzard localized entirely in her kitchen. It wouldn’t be the first time this room experienced an isolated weather related phenomenon.
“Oh! that looks like fun!” Pinkie exclaimed. “Do me next, I want to be a snow pony!”
The Twilight shaped snow pony only groaned in response.
The winter wonderland didn’t last long as the shower of water drenched the ponies and the room, melting the white foam into a messy goop. The two snow ponies transformed into a guilty, apologetic Rainbow Dash and a very unamused Twilight Sparkle, both of which had wet manes.
Pinkie Pie, who now also donned the wet mane fashion, glanced at the charred toaster. “Gee, it sure was a good thing we came when we did or this could have really gotten out of hoof.”
The violet unicorn’s eyes twitched and became vacant once more, as a strand of wet hair defied physics and sprung out of place.
“Heh heh, don’t worry Twi, we’ll help you clean up,” Dash said shakily, putting on a fake and awkward smile. She reached out a comforting hoof to her shoulder, but decided against making contact. She was all too familiar with her ‘touch me and die’ look.
Twilight finally spoke up after an uncomfortable moment of silence between the mares, and said with a distant sounding voice, “Pinkie, dare I ask, what did you find so important that you felt the need to break down my door to tell me?”
“Oh yeah, I almost forgot!” the pink pony exclaimed joyously, happy to remember her important news. But then she gasped loudly and jumped into the air, entering full panic mode, and screamed, “Quickly Twilight, we’re all going to die!”
Twilight ignored the foreboding exclamation and said, “Yes, you already said that. If you aren’t going to explain, then I’m going to take a shower so I can die in comfort.”
“There’s no time!” Pinkie yelled in a panic, oblivious to the snide nature of her cynical friend’s reply.
“She probably just needs to borrow sugar because she ran out,” the light blue pegasus said, rolling her eyes.
“No, it’s not that...” Pinkie said, looking around in panic. “Believe it or not,” she paused and got real close for dramatic effect, eyes filled with pure terror, “this is... even worse.”
Twilight gave a fake gasp of surprise. “Oh dear, guess our only option is to die.” She walked out of the kitchen. Pinkie quickly followed behind.
“Don’t give up hope Twilight! There’s still a chance!”
Twilight stopped before a pile of soaking wet books and shot a glare at Rainbow Dash. “Sorry... again,” she apologized, her wings drooping and head held low.
Before she could walk upstairs, she was blocked by Pinkie. “Twilight, I’m really really serious! I need you to come with me to Sugarcube Corner ASAP! You too Dash.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow and asked, “Sugarcube Corner? Why?”
“I told you, there’s no time! Mr. and Mrs. Cake will explain.”
Twilight gave a long, irritated sigh and said, “Fine... just let me take a shower and I’ll be on my way- HEY!” She was interrupted when her pink friend started pushing her towards the door.
“No time, let’s go!”
“Um... hey, you guys?” Dash spoke up. “You know how much I hate to be the voice of reason... I really do... but I don’t think we should leave this place like this...”
“You’re right, we have to do at least something.” Twilight put a hoof to her chin in thought. “Ah ha!” she exclaimed, thinking of a brilliant solution. A quill and blank sheet of paper magically floated to her.
“Dear Spike...”
---
Ponyville wasn’t considered to be a very busy town, nor was it densely populated. With no real tourist attractions, it wasn’t exactly a place of interest for the traveling pony. The only real time of day this quaint town could be considered busy was the hours of the market, and even that whole affair was treated civilly and quietly. Yup, Ponyville was a quiet town.
But today, this was exceptionally so, and Twilight was getting concerned. No ponies wandered the streets, no foals playing in the yards, and no vendors behind their stalls, despite it being midday, market hours. The only other time she had ever seen the town so devoid of life was the first time Zecora arrived. That, and when Fluttershy came back from her first visit to Taco Bell. Those poor souls.
She could almost physically feel the foul aura around her, like a thick fog... Again, like that time with Fluttershy and Taco Bell, except this was metaphorical. Even Pinkie seemed to be on edge, choosing to walk instead of her usual hopping, which was a big deal. Rainbow Dash appeared to be just as concerned and confused as she was.
It didn’t take long to reach Sugarcube Corner. Even this brightly colored and cheerful sanctuary seemed to be shrouded by an air of uncertainty.
A little bell rang as they entered the confectionary.
“HELLO HOW CAN I HELP YOU SIR!?” the two store owners, Mr. and Mrs. Cake, yelled together in a frightened and nervous voice, while quickly facing their guests. They both breathed a sigh of relief and visually relaxed upon seeing the pink pony.
“Oh, hello Pinkie Pie. We were afraid you weren’t coming back,” Mr. Cake said, still sounding very anxious. A brief glimmer of joy shone in his eyes when he noticed she wasn’t alone. “Welcome Twilight and Rainbow Dash, we’re glad you could make it.”
“Close the door, quickly!” Mrs. Cake demanded, quickly gathering menu pamphlets that were knocked over in their outburst. She worked to place them in a perfect position on the counter, displaying a level of OCD that Twilight had never seen from her before.
“Alright, can somepony please tell me what is going on?” Twilight asked in a commanding tone.
“Trust me, you won’t believe it when you hear it,” a familiar, elegant voice said from the side.
“Rarity?” Sure enough, her white unicorn friend stood near the counter, and she wasn’t alone. “And Fluttershy? What are you two doing here?”
“Probably the same reason you are, darling.” The posh, white unicorn did not seem too enthused to be here. “Good heavens! What happened to you three!?” she exclaimed with great concern, finally getting a good look at their soaking, dirty and messy coats.
“It would be in everypony's best interest not to ask that question again,” Twilight grumbled as she flicked some wet hair away from her face. “Now, I believe you were explaining to me why the world appears to be at an end?”
Fluttershy spoke up in a hushed, nervous whisper, “I just followed Rarity when Pinkie told us there was an emergency...”
Rarity spoke up for the frightened pegasus, “Why yes, we were both enjoying a lovely day at the spa, as we usually do, when Pinkie rushed in to tell us about the emergency. I can tell you that Aloe and Lotus were none too pleased, as she caused quite a commotion when she screamed ‘Run! We’re all going to die!’.”
“Right... sorry about that,” Pinkie apologized, “I’ll repay any damages. But at least I probably saved their lives, even if two ponies were trampled and one had a broken leg.” Twilight simply rolled her eyes upon hearing the typical mayhem that followed in her friend’s wake.
“Anyway,” Rarity continued, “word got around fast apparently, because most of the town had taken shelter indoors. I came as soon as I could when I found out how serious the situation seemed.”
Both the cakes turned to glare at the pink pony. “Pinkie... What did you do?”
Pinkie tapped the floor nervously with a hoof, recognizing the all-too-familiar ‘You messed up’ looks of the Cakes. “I... I prevented disaster... right? You said he was going to devour us all!”
Both the cakes face hoofed hard, and Mrs. Cake scolded, “Pinkie, you are the only one bringing disaster! We said that he would be coming with an insatiable appetite for pony food, not ponies! Nopony is going to be eaten!”
“Oh... oops.”
Mr. Cake continued for his spouse as he sorted some baked goods, “We told you to ask your friends if they could help out with baking and cleaning, not send the town into DEFCON 2!”
“Sorry...” Pinkie’s mane deflated slightly.
Mr. Cake sighed, now acclimated to the pink pony’s antics on a weekly basis. “It doesn’t matter now... At least your friends are here now. If you’re all still willing to help out, we would appreciate it greatly.”
Twilight swallowed the fury that built up upon hearing there was no emergency at all. It was exceedingly difficult, and she almost choked. “Sure, I can help.” Then she mumbled under her breath, “It’s not like I can go home anyway...”
“You know me, element of loyalty,” Dash stated proudly, striking a pose. “Whatever it is, I can handle it! There is nothing I can’t do!” She paused and thought about her statement with a frown. “Unless if it’s baking... I’m not so good at baking. Or preparing food... or handling food... or really anything that has to do with cooking... or food.”
“That’s fine, I would never allow you to be within a mile of a kitchen anyway,” Mrs. Cake said, then quickly added, “no offence...”
“None taken, I assumed you already heard the stories about my last attempt at cooking.”
“Oh no,” Mr. Cake interjected, horror filling his eyes as he entered a flashback, “I didn’t just hear about it... I was there...” The stallion went into a fetal position and started to shiver. “I was there...”
“There there honey,” his wife soothed, placing a caring hoof on his shoulder. “It’s all over now, she isn’t going to cook.”
He simply kept rocking back and forth, whispering over and over again, “I was there...”
“Sorry about... that...” Rainbow Dash apologized, rubbing the back of her head with guilt. “I tried my best...”
“Don’t you worry about it,” Mrs. Cake assured, “He’ll get over it... eventually...”
“It was moving... and screaming...”
“Um... anyway, if I can’t cook, how can I help?” Dash asked.
“We just need you to serve food. But you gotta go fast.”
“Fast!” the cyan pegasus exclaimed joyously, flitting her wings. “I can go fast!”
“I cook all the time for the animals,” Fluttershy said in her timid, squeaky voice, “I should be able to help out... at least, I think... I hope...”
“As for me,” Rarity spoke up, bringing attention to herself, “I consider myself a fairly good gourmet, if I do say so myself. And Sweetie and her friends are at Applejack’s, so I’m sure I can help out.”
“So I assume Spike went home then?” Twilight asked.
“Why yes he did. Actually, now that I think about it, I worry if he made it home safely, seeing as the town is on alert and all that.”
A distant but clear scream of distress could be heard at that moment, resounding throughout the town in what sounded like the voice of a familiar baby dragon.
“Oh good, Spike made it home safely,” Twilight stated nonchalantly, relaxing with knowing there was one less thing to worry about.
“Oh dear! I hope he’s alright!”
“Don’t worry, he’ll be fine with proper compensation. Speaking of which, can I borrow some diamonds?”
Another distant scream could be heard as the dragon saw the kitchen.
“A lot of diamonds.”
---
Pinkie Pie, Rarity and Fluttershy all situated themselves in the kitchen, while Twilight used her magic to quickly set up the supplies and ingredients necessary for this seemingly unnecessary event. Rainbow Dash simply stood watch near the door, ready and waiting for instructions.
“I can’t thank you girls enough for lending us a hoof,” Mr. Cake said as he watched the fantastic work unfolding before him. “We would have never been able to do this ourselves, and you don’t know how important it is to please our customer.”
Twilight lifted a box with magic and brought it into the kitchen, then asked, “Speaking of this customer, I still don’t know what we’re dealing with, and I’d like to understand how important this is considering it brought the town into near destruction.”
“Well, the reason why it is so... so... important...” he paused for a moment as he struggled to push a large box. Twilight effortlessly flew the box of ingredients into the kitchen with magic.
“Heh heh, thanks,” he said, trying to catch his breath, then continued, “This customer travels the world, picking restaurants at random for his next meal, no matter how far it may be.”
“But this place isn’t really a restaurant, it’s a confectioner. Why choose a candy store for a meal?”
“Nopony knows how or why he chooses his next location. We simply got a warning letter from a friend of mine telling me that he’s coming, and once he chooses his next target, there’s nothing in Equestria that can change his mind.”
“I don’t understand, why not just refuse to serve him? Is he a food critic?”
“No... not exactly. His arrival is considered something of a challenge by all gourmets. He almost always demands food that wouldn’t normally be supplied by that particular cook, and he is very, very picky, yet he has been known to eat almost anything. It’s very bizarre, and even I don’t quite understand it.”
Twilight looked around at the vast quantity of unusual ingredients, then asked, “This sure is a lot of food, how could one pony eat so much?”
“Um... actually, to tell you the truth... he isn’t a pony. He’s actually a... a...”
Mr. cake was interrupted by Dash mumbling as she continued to stare out the window, but it was too quiet to hear.
“What was that Rainbow?” Twilight asked, worried by her friend’s ghostly expression.
“...he’s here...”
“What!?” both the Cakes said, rushing to the window. Twilight quickly joined them, now being more curious than she could ever remember.
“I don’t see him, where is he?” Twilight asked. The town was bathed in shadows by the dark, ominous clouds above, making it slightly harder to see. “Is he behind that really big pumpkin?” Sure enough, an unusually large pumpkin that she was sure wasn’t there before sat in the distance, right in the middle of the road.
There was no response from the others.
Twilight noticed that the pumpkin appeared to be moving, and it was coming towards them. “Is... is he pushing the pumpkin?”
Still no response.
The pumpkin was getting closer still... but it wasn’t rolling. Twilight gulped and said, “Please... please tell me that somepony is magically levitating that pumpkin towards us... please.”
But the truth was inevitable now. The object that Twilight decided was the physical manifestation of her apparent insanity stood just twenty feet from the door. Lightning decided this was the perfect opportunity to apply its special flair, and struck fear into the hearts of the unfortunate ponies. Twilight could only say one thing:
“Where did my life go so wrong...”
---
It was undeniable, the pumpkin had legs. Not only that, it had arms. Worst of all, the animate vegetable had a face, but more specifically, eyes. And it used those eyes as a weapon with lethal force as it just stood outside, staring at none of them in particular but also feeling like it was all of them at the same time.
“It begins...” whispered Mr. Cake.
Mrs. Cake began to shout, “He’s here! Everypony get ready, this is going to be one heck of a service!”
“I must be out of my mind,” Twilight said, returning to full craziness. “Is that a pumpkin? Are we really feeding a pumpkin? Am I going completely insane!?”
Mr. Cake put a comforting hoof on her shoulder and said, “We can worry about the status of our sanity later, right now we need you.”
Despite the fact that Twilight was fearing for her mental state more than ever, she reluctantly nodded and went back to the kitchen.
The door chimed as it opened.
Both the cakes looked on in horror at the abomination that stood in their doorway. The bipedal pumpkin was far bigger than they thought, and could barely fit in the doorway in which it now occupied. Its horrible, expressionless eyes slowly scanned the room until it settled on the Cakes, eliciting a shudder from them. With those unholy, demonic eyes, they wouldn’t be surprised if it was here to feast on their souls.
And then, the creature that appeared to be grown from the garden of Tirek himself spoke its first words to its unfortunate hosts:
“I’m very hungry.”
And there was much fear.