"Oh dear...where is he?"
Twilight flew high above the entirety of the mortal world, scouring it for her quarry, yet no matter where she went, she saw neither hide nor hair of him. She looked in the cities, the towns and even the tiniest of villages, yet he was not there. She looked atop the highest mountains, all the way down to the deepest valleys, yet he was not there. She looked through forests, through deserts, through every place a person might be found, yet as always, he was not there. Despondency began to sink in for her, and she sighed heavily, returning high up to the heavens. Maybe some solitude would give her some respite from this low feeling? So she sat there, on the edge of an especially-poofy looking bit of cloud, legs dangling over the edge, looking down to the world below. But so engrossed was she with her own thoughts that she failed to notice the creeping figure that inched slowly behind her. Closer and closer it came, until at last, it let out its shocking scream.
"HIYA TWILIGHT!!!"
"GAH!!!"
Twilight spun around, stunned beyond belief at this sudden and unexpected interruption. Yet she found no attacker or monster there, but simply Pinkie Pie, who immediately burst out laughing at seeing the look on her fellow Goddess' face as she rolled around on the clouds.
"Oh boy! You should see yourself right now, Twily!" Pinkie giggled.
Twilight, though still feeling intense heartbeat from that shock, nevertheless began to calm down, and even offered a smile to her friend.
"Oh, Pinkie, it's you. Sorry, I didn't see you there."
Jumping back to her feet, the Lady of Festivities offered a wider smile to her.
"Well, you looked kinda down in the dumps. So I figured I'd swoop on over and cheer you up! Nobody should be feeling sad on my bit of cloud after all!"
Realising what her colleague had just said, Twilight immediately leapt up herself.
"Oh! I'm sorry! I didn't even notice this was your part of the heavens!"
But Pinkie waved her off, looking utterly unconcerned with that.
"Pfft! Don't worry about it! I love having visitors! So..."
She bounced down into a sitting position, looking up to her friend with curiosity.
"What's eating you, Twily?"
Knowing that talking to a friend might do her some good, Twilight sighed, then sat back down right next to Pinkie.
"It's just...I've been looking for one of my followers. I haven't heard any prayers or calls for help from him in some time, so I decided to go and see if anything was wrong."
Pinkie nodded.
"So...was anything wrong?"
Twilight shook her head, gesturing to the world.
"That's just it, I don't know! I can't even find him! I've looked all over and can't see even a single sign of Flash!"
Here, Pinkie's smile vanished, replaced instead with a more concerned look.
"You're, er...looking for who now?"
Twilight glanced at her briefly before looking back down to the Earth.
"Flash? You know, you saw him at that mortal party some time ago?"
Pinkie, who was starting to sweat a little now, let loose a nervous giggle.
"Oh! Yeah! That guy! Pfft! Of course I remember him! I mean, who wouldn't, right?"
Twilight looked to her, raising an eyebrow.
"Are you okay? You sound a bit...off somehow."
Pinkie laughed loudly in an obviously-forced manner.
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! What, me? Feeling guilty and nervous? Don't be silly, Twily!"
Twilight frowned.
"I...never said anything about feeling guilty, Pinkie."
Pinkie looked like she was right on the cusp of saying something else, when all of a sudden, a new sound interrupted the two Goddess' conversation. It was, strangely enough, the sound of somebody yawning, and as soon as the sound was heard, Twilight looked over. From the sound of it, the yawn had come from just over a nearby "ridge" of cloud, leading to Twilight looking back to Pinkie.
"Is someone else here?"
Pinkie's eyes darted from left to right.
"What? No! What makes you say that?"
Then, as if to answer her, there was the distinct sound of somebody giving themselves a quick stretch, and as Twilight again looked over to see what it was, she saw a pair of arms poking over the cloud-ridge and doing that very stretch. More importantly though, they appeared to have a very familiar skin tone to them, and as Twilight realised this, she adjusted her glasses.
"...Wait a minute."
Before Pinkie could stop her, Twilight was off, floating over the cloud and heading straight for this mysterious stranger. When she got there, Twilight looked over the ridge, and as soon as she'd done so, her eyes widened. Shock returned to her expression, but then quickly changed into both confusion and irritation in equal measure, as she slowly glanced back to Pinkie, who had floated just alongside her in the meantime.
"...Pinkie?"
"Um...yes, Twily?
"Why is Flash here?"
Sure enough, the mortal was indeed there, lying upon the cloud and, at a glance, sound asleep. A contented smile was upon his face, and he looked as though he was having the most comfortable night's sleep any human had ever had before. Twilight, though still knowing she'd have to give her friend a talking to, grunted a little before leaning over and poking Flash in the side of his face.
"Flash? You need to wake up now."
But to her confusion, he did not wake, instead continuing to sleep. Worry came to Twilight now, and she tried poking him a bit more vigorously. Again, this did nothing, so she slowly looked back to Pinkie, who was now sweating profusely.
"Um..hehe, you're gonna laugh when you hear this!"
Twilight's eyes narrowed, and Pinkie gulped.
"Okay, maybe not laugh exactly."
Twilight, very slowly, pointed to her follower.
"Explain...now."
Sighing, Pinkie now started to speak normally.
"Okay, well, you know how I kinda had a thing for him when I saw him at that party? Well, I maybe didn't let go of that afterwards, so I started to...well...follow him...just a bit."
Twilight slapped her own forehead, though Pinkie kept speaking as she did so.
"So, some time after he stopped being Flurry's follower, I saw him lie out on a nice grassy hill one night and go to sleep, and I thought 'ooooh, he looks really cute when he sleeps', so I decided to go and visit him when he slept at night and just, ya know...stare at him a bit."
Twilight face was one of utter incredulity.
"Pinkie...this is getting more and more disturbing with every passing moment."
Ignoring her, Pinkie carried on.
"So I kept on doing this, finding a nice little patch of cloud so I could watch this cutie-patootie sleep all night, then one day, I got an idea. What if I never had to see him wake up? What if he slept all the time, so I could watch him sleep all the time? So, that's what I did, used my power and boom, he hasn't woken up in weeks!"
Twilight stared at her, completely uncertain of how to take all this.
"There are so many things wrong with this scenario I can't even begin to count them!"
Pinkie floated past her, lying herself right beside Flash, looking to him in the same way she'd look at an especially tasty-looking cake.
"Let me tell you, Twily, it's been great having this sweet guy here to come home to after a long day of Goddess work."
Placing her hands upon her hips, Twilight frowned to her.
"Pinkie, not only is it wrong for you to just steal someone else's follower, but have you considered that, just maybe, this is, you know, the most creepy and disturbing thing anyone can do to a sleeping guy?!"
Pinkie thought on that for a moment.
"Errrrrrrrrrrr...no, I didn't consider that."
Twilights slapped her own forehead again.
"Pinkie...you need to..."
Then a terrible notion came to her, and the color drained from her face.
"Pinkie. Have you...done anything besides stare at him while he was like this?"
Pinkie smiled to her.
"Yep!"
Twilight gasped.
"What?!"
Pinkie nodded, looking over her shoulder.
"I also made that sweet art of him over there!"
Twilight looked up, seeing a nearby canvas with a painting of, what else, the sleeping form of Flash, with Pinkie's name signed in the corner of it. Blinking a few times, Twilight looked back to her.
"No, I mean...have you done anything else with him? Anything...intimate?"
Pinkie suddenly realised what she meant, and so started to blush.
"Ooooooooooh! You mean that stuff! No, I haven't."
Twilight breathed the biggest sigh of relief in the universe.
"Oh, thank Celestia!"
Then, Pinkie thought more on that.
"But it's not like I haven't thought about it or anything!"
Twilight's head snapped back in her direction.
"What?!"
Pinkie shrugged.
"Hey, can you blame me? He's gorgeous! Oh, by the way..."
She finally left Flash's side, floating on over to Twilight and whispering to her.
"On a totally unrelated note, what's the record for how many kids a Goddess has ever had with a mortal? Because I heard it was fifty."
Slowly, Twilight narrowed her eyes to her.
"Wake. Him. Up. Now."
Pinkie groaned and rolled her eyes.
"Ugh! Fine!"
She snapped her fingers, and immediately, Flash's eyes opened.
"Argh! What happened?! Where am I?! How long have I been sleeping?!"
Twilight, doing her best to control her rage towards her fellow Goddess right now, leaned over and smiled sweetly to her most devoted follower.
"Oh, don't you worry, Flash. Everything's fine. Lady Pinkie and I were just having a little chat..."
You could hear the venom in that last word as she cast a death glare in Pinkie's direction, the latter of which simply smiled and gave a little wave to Flash from where she was.
"...about proper treatment of followers. But I'd say you've been up here for quite long enough, so I'll just send you home."
Flash, calming down from having awoken in this strange place, nodded to his patron deity.
"Yes...yes, of course. Well, whatever I was doing up here...I'm glad I...helped?" he said, his voice betraying his uncertainty.
Twilight smiled to him, then snapped her own fingers. In a quick burst of light, the mortal was gone, now returned to wherever he'd been before Pinkie had taken him. And speaking of Pinkie, Twilight now looked to her with her usual disapproving scowl.
"Pinkie, we are gonna have a very long talk about this."
Pinkie clasped her hands together, her voice sounding just a touch more hopeful than she should be.
"Well...would it help if I got you an eternally-sleeping guy to fawn over?"
Twilight's eyes, if possible, actually managed to narrow further.
"No, Pinkie...no it would not."