Twilight Sparkle’s nose twitched. A scent, both bewilderingly foreign and uncomfortably familiar had wormed its way through the open window and into her study. Lifting her muzzle out of a book, she sniffed at the air. The distraction clawed at her, demanding she determine what it was. She could not. Many memories of smells long past marched through her mind, but none fit. She huffed and returned to the book she’d been reading, trying and failing to reimmerse herself. The strange smell was compelling. Alarming, even.
In a coincidence the likes of which only the worst writers would dare to make use of, her gaze fell upon the perfect word. There on the page she was reading, she was given the kick she needed to identify what was wrong. Her mouth dried up and her pupils shrank to pinpricks.
“Fire,” she mouthed as an explosive boom tore through the air. In a blink, she teleported outside and frantically began scanning the area. Within seconds, her expert gaze completed the monumental task of tilting slightly upward and finding the enormous plume of smoke leering above Ponyville. Tracing the cloud of ash back to the ground, she noticed a blackened husk where Sugarcube Corner should have been. She gasped, her mind reeling at the horrifying possibilities, but before she could complete a thought she was squashed beneath a huge lump of cake.
As ponies tend to do when accosted by raining globs of... of anything, really, Twilight flailed about in a panic, scattering chocolate and frosting in a wide circle. The sweet, sticky mess began to multiply as more baked goods fell from the sky and pelted the town, inciting similar panic in each pony assaulted by the fiendish desserts. Ponyville filled with screams as its inhabitants stampeded about, not knowing what to do in the event of confectionery armageddon.
Several seconds ticked by. The sun dripped down to meet the horizon, and soon Twilight calmed, regaining a portion of her sanity. Enough to note that the recent precipitation of dessert was likely a side effect of the bakery exploding. The bakery her friend lived and worked in. Mustering up what courage she could, she charged through a hail of brownies and toward the smoldering ruins.
“Pinkie! Where are you? Are you okay?” she shouted into the hazy fog of sugar and soot.
Two blue eyes blinked their way through a mound of dough. “Oh hey, Twilight!” An absurdly long tongue reached out and swabbed away a circle of the gooey pile, revealing a pink face. “I was just trying some experimental ‘extreme baking’ while the Cakes were on vacation. I was gonna bring some stuff to our picnic tomorrow, but... I guess I should cross that recipe off the list, huh?”
Rushing forward and tackling the space beneath the face in a hug, Twilight breathed a sigh of relief. She had never felt so comforted while smearing uncooked and unidentified substances against her belly as she did in that moment.
The mess could be cleaned up. Rebuilding Sugarcube Corner would be a more daunting task, but at least nopony was injured. “Pinkie, don’t scare me like that. I don’t care what your recipe calls for; if it’s that volatile you probably shouldn’t put it in an oven! Somepony could’ve gotten hurt, and it’s probably a bad idea to risk maiming yourself or others for the sake of more appealing food.”
Something within the pile wriggled out of Twilight’s hooves and a thick glob of it curved up in a salute. “Aye aye, cap’n. I Pinkie Promise I’ll be more careful about explosive and/or magical ingredients when whipping up tasty treats.” Her faux-military discipline faded as a huge grin spread across her face. Twilight giggled.
“Okay, Pinkie,” she said. “Why don’t you go get cleaned up at the library? I think I can handle the mush out in the streets with a quick spell or two, and then we can figure out what to do about Sugarcube Corner.”
A smaller wad of dough bounced out of the main mass, pockets of pink peeking out here and there, and Twilight let herself smile. Pinkie never let anything get her down and had a pep to her step even in the most... well, even in whatever this situation was. Straightening herself and mentally sorting through different spells that could be useful, Twilight let Pinkie’s infectious and eternal enthusiasm seep in, foolishly feeling not only unburdened by, but almost eager for the task ahead.
Stumbling through the front door, Twilight nearly collapsed to the floor. In much the same way that sand invades every conceivable crevice after a trip to the beach, cake and frosting and batter had wound up smeared inside nooks and crannies of Ponyville nopony even knew about. Exhausted from tracking down and eliminating thousands of square feet of accidental pastry-painting and realizing most manual labor was done while the light of day shone down, she decided that reconstruction could wait until tomorrow.
Spike waddled up and frowned. “You okay, Twilight? You don’t look so good.”
“Huh? Oh, hello Spike. I’m... I’m fine. Just tired,” she replied, wobbling but still standing.
“That’s good.” Spike’s expression brightened a bit. “Say, is there a particular reason Pinkie Pie showed up coated in Celestia-knows-what, took a shower, then passed out in your bed? Or is this one of those things we’re just supposed to ignore because Pinkie Pie doesn’t fit that ‘rational actor’ thing you always go on about?”
“It, uh, actually makes more sense than most of what she does. I told her to come here and get cleaned up, and I can understand if she needed some rest after creating and surviving Equestria’s first recorded bakepocalypse.”
“OH!” Spike exclaimed. “So that’s what that sound was!”
Twilight raised an eyebrow. “You heard an explosion and didn’t even bother looking outside?”
He shrugged. “Things explode around here all the time; you get used to it.”
“That’s... unsettling,” she said with a frown.
“If I jumped out of my seat every time I heard a loud noise, I’d never get anything done. I mean, you blow something up in the basement at least twice a week.”
“Point taken.” She rubbed a hoof against the side of her head. “We’ll have to talk about the ethics of ignoring potential distress sometime, especially in the case of explosions, but I think I need to get some sleep myself. And tomorrow is probably going to be devoted to making sure Mrs. Cake doesn’t have a heart attack when she gets back. Could you add it to the medium-high priority checklist for me? I need to set up the other bed.”
“Man, like there weren’t enough lectures on the list already,” Spike grumbled. “Scientifically rigorous bubblebaths, proper care and feeding of alligators, the Dewey Don’t-cimal system, reasons not to trust Rainbow Dash, the dangers of short skirts, the ethics of explosions,” he rattled off in his best Twilight impersonation, fading as he waddled around a corner.
I guess it’s true — there’s always a silver lining. If nothing else, this incident will have given me a great reason to revisit the fascinating philosophy of ethics. Giving a good lecture was always so much fun. Twilight gleefully reviewed what she remembered of the topic while magically assembling a place to sleep. The pony-sized bulge under her covers emitted a soft snore. She smiled, glad that the world was such a wonderful place. She crawled into the newly-prepared spare bed, closed her eyes, and drifted off to sleep.
Sunlight streamed down across Twilight Sparkle’s face. She stirred a little and mumbled through the last few moments of a fading dream. Her eyes creaked open and a yawn escaped her lips. Sitting up in bed, she glided across the gap to waking and set the gears in her brain working. It was morning, there were things to do, and something was terribly, horribly wrong. An inexplicable sense of foreboding permeated the air. It hung so thickly that she could taste it. Kicking those mental gears into overdrive, she drew her memories of yesterday back into focus.
Flicking her eyes about the room, she noticed both Spike and Pinkie were nowhere to be found. She jumped out of bed and galloped down the stairs.
“Spike? Pinkie?” she called.
Spike’s head peeked out from the kitchen. “What?”
Twilight let out the breath she’d unwittingly held since leaving the bed. Even before he’d responded, she’d felt better. Whatever was wrong, it was less wrong down here than upstairs. “I don’t know. There’s... something isn’t right. You’re okay, though, and that’s a good sign.” She trotted into the kitchen where Spike was preparing breakfast. “Have you seen Pinkie?”
He shook his head. “Nuh-uh. She was gone when I woke up, but she did leave a few cookies on the counter.”
“Hmm.” Twilight put a hoof to her chin and glanced out a nearby window. “She could’ve wanted to get an early start fixing up the bakery.” The sun sat low in the east; morning had just begun. “How much longer is breakfast going to take?”
“Uh, maybe ten minutes?”
She nodded to herself. “Alright then. I’ll be right back.”
“I’ll keep it warm for ya’,” Spike said.
“Thanks,” she tossed over her shoulder as she cantered toward the door. She shivered when her magic made contact with the knob. It felt... wrong. Blinking, she shook it off and opened the door, stepping out into the streets of Ponyville. She turned toward the charred stain that once was Sugarcube Corner and saw... Sugarcube Corner.
She blinked. She blinked again. I’m not crazy, right? Yesterday, Pinkie blew it up... didn’t she? The feeling that something was not as it should be intensified and her stomach sank, weighed down by the increasingly sickening feeling. Trotting carefully toward the bakery that shouldn’t have been, she grew increasingly repulsed by the nauseatingly ominous sensation. Her hoof rapped against the front door three times, and a moment later a voice chirped through.
“Come on in, Twilight,” it said.
She pushed the door open and stepped inside. Her head started to throb. “Pinkie?”
“I’m in the back! I need to get back to baking to replace all those poor little pastries that got exploded.”
With every hoofstep, Twilight became more certain that an unspeakable horror lurked just ahead. “Why is—” She gulped. “How did you rebuild so fast?”
“I dunno,” Pinkie replied as her head popped around the corner. “Maybe I was sleepbuilding last night!”
Time slowed to a stop. Twilight’s pupils tripled in size and her jaw brushed against the floor. Jutting proudly out of Pinkie’s forehead was an enormous horn, easily twice the length of her own. Of course, the size didn’t actually matter. She was just making an observation is all. Having a big horn didn’t mean a pony was skilled at making use of it no matter how many uneducated jerks perpetuated that myth. The Princesses had long horns by chance.
Purposefully derailing that particular train of thought, Twilight’s mind once again slammed on the brakes and sat gawking at the impossible. No, worse than impossible. Something so horrible she didn’t even have a word for it. If Pinkie was that destructive and unpredictable as an earth pony, flagrantly violating the laws of physics as if she didn’t even know they were there, then Pinkie with magic...
She shuddered and tried not to stare at Pinkie’s horn. “So,” she said, grinning awkwardly. “How are you?”
“I’m extra super fantastic! I feel like a million bits! Which is pretty weird, since I don’t think I can count that high and I’m probably not legal tender for all debts public and private.”
Beads of sweat rolled down Twilight’s forehead. Her head throbbed again. “That’s... that’s great, Pinkie. I uh, I left Spike in the washing machine and I’ll be back soon and please, please promise me you won’t go anywhere or do anything but safe, ordinary baking until I get back, okay?”
“Hmmm,” Pinkie’s gaze drifted aside, her tongue creeping out of her mouth. “Okay.”
“Good,” Twilight shouted. She turned, paused, looked back, and gestured to the floor. “ Stay,” she said before bolting out the door and smacking it shut behind her. She slumped to the ground and hyperventilated as peacefully as she could against the smooth stone walkways of a town on the brink of destruction. What she wouldn’t have given for a paper bag to breathe into...
Okay, think Twilight. Think. Pinkie seemed unaware of her condition, so maybe there’s still time to do something. But what? Is an arcano-surgical hornectomy possible? What about going back in time and stopping her from getting the horn in the first place? How did that even happen?
She flinched at the muffled sound of a metallic pan clattering to the floor, her face locked in a wince. One eye peeled open and toured the area, but found nothing out of place. She loosened slightly. She just dropped something. That happens. That’s normal. Calm down and breathe, Twilight. You can trust Pinkie. She said she’d behave. I just need to get back to the library and get my head on straight.
A serene silence blew threw her mind as she exhaled slowly. She subconsciously assured herself that the potential for doom is not the same as an actual impending doom and began trotting briskly back to the library. When her magic grabbed hold of the doorknob, she froze. It felt completely normal. She pulled the door open and stepped inside, pushing the door shut behind her, and then telekinetically reached for the inner doorknob. At the moment of contact, she was gripped by that wretched sensation again. Leaning down and squinting into the innocent metal bulb, she found it to be free of any visible deformations or blemishes.
“Spike?” she called.
“Yeah?” his voice answered, bouncing out of the kitchen.
She stepped toward it to find him sliding various foods onto plates.
“Oh, uh, breakfast is ready to go.”
Twilight shifted slightly. “Thanks, but there’s no time.”
“No time for breakfast?” he asked.
“I’m afraid not. There are much more urgent matters to attend to right now,” she said as she scanned the room. She stopped and stooped near the floor to find a few microscopic cookie crumbs on the floor. Craning her neck to look up at Spike from the ground, she narrowed her eyes. “Where did Pinkie get these cookies?”
“I dunno, Twilight. Is it even important? She could’ve just been carrying them with her in case of a cookie-emergency or something.”
Snapping her focus back to the tiles beneath her, Twilight followed a nigh-invisible trail of micro-crumbs around the library with Spike following behind out of worry at her odd behavior. A few flakes of cookie-dust had settled on just about everything Pinkie had touched that morning. Tracing them toward the door, she noticed a conspicuous absence of the stuff on the doorknob.
“Twilight, is everything alright?”
She licked it; it tasted metallic, without a hint of sweetness to it. “No, Spike. The doorknob feels all wrong, but tastes completely normal.”
He backed away slowly.