Twilight sat in the center of the library, ostensibly poring over the huge volume that Pinkie had shoved into her hooves the day before, giggling in delight and bouncing in place— Sentient Rocks: the age old question by Amethyst Claire Pie. It really was a fascinating volume - the idea of sentient rocks was completely illogical, of course, but Twilight had known as much as soon as she had made the connection between the author and her bouncing pink friend. But where she had been expecting rambling, disjointed arguments that somehow made perfect sense what she actually found were dry, scientific observations concerned only with the facts of the case. It had struck her as odd, until Pinkie had pointed out the dedication with a gleeful squeal of “Look look look she dedicated to to me!”
Dedicated to my sister, Pinkamena, in the hopes that it will help her see sense.
For a while Twilight had just sat there, dumbstruck and wondering what Pinkie could possibly have done that had inspired her sister to pen an entire volume dedicated to proving her wrong. The book was no small undertaking – years of research had to have gone into writing it, and Pinkie’s delighted reaction suggested that it hadn’t been done out of spite. But the question had been pushed from her mind rapidly as the pink pony had bounded past her and started pulling books off the shelf at random, tossing them into a neat pile in the center of the room.
“Pinkie! What are you doing!?”
“Research! I mean, she went through so much trouble and it’’d be mean of me not to write a rebuttal. Mom always told us that when somepony does something nice for you – hey, Spike! Do you have anything by Professor Snuggleton?”
As her eyes trailed over the same line for the thousandth time, as she again failed to actually absorb the information she was reading, a small smile appeared on Twilight’s face. Her whole day had been spent watching and assisting Pinkie with her research. This had mostly consisted of answering the questions Pinkie had mumbled aloud to herself as she pored over the books, penning dozens upon dozens of pages of notes.
She had spent hours and hours discussing theories supporting the idea that rocks had souls too, and were every bit as alive as ponies. Ridiculous, slightly unsettling completely insane theories nopony in her right mind could ever believe – and she had loved it. By the time Pinkie had disappeared into the night with a loud gasp, taking a number of Twilight’s books with her, she had almost been convinced.
That infuriated her. She was a clever mare. A reasonable, logical mare. She knew rocks were just that – rocks. They were not alive. They didn’t even have brains! And yet she had had to spend an hour before bed reminding herself that it was completely impossible. And now she was sitting here, reading a book dedicated to disproving the idea, just to get the last scraps of doubt out of her mind.
And it wasn’t working because all she could think about was that insane, hyperactive, cloyingly charismatic persistently painful perfect pink pony. Her beautiful blue eyes, her shining smile and her…
Twilight caught herself before she could finish the thought, cheeks suddenly burning red as she chastised herself internally. She had to stop doing that. She wasn’t allowed to like Pinkie. They weren’t compatible. Statistically, they were doomed to fail – she knew it. She had run the numbers herself, time and time again. And she had nopony to go to for help.
Rarity would insist that she attempt some grandiose plan to sweep the party pony off her hooves, giggling all the while at Twilight’s insistence that she didn’t really know how she felt yet and pushing her into a place she was entirely uncomfortable going. Dash would roll her eyes at her and then race off to tell Pinkie, firmly believing that the problem would resolve itself. Fluttershy…would be hurt. Terribly. Applejack would tell her to be honest, and that idea terrified her more than Rarity’s hypothetical suggestion. The only pony that could have helped her – the pony that had always helped her with feelings like this – was Pinkie Pie. And that was simply not an option. She couldn’t just march up to the pony she maybe kind of liked and —
She was interrupted by a series of loud, repeated knocks on the door accompanied by that musical, melodious voice she had come to know so well. The one that echoed in her head like a drum, making it ache like almost nothing else could. The one that set her on edge and made her a little grumpy just on principle – the principle being that the pony it was attached to shouldn’t be allowed to make so little sense.
“Twiliiiiiiiiiiight. Open up! I need your help!!” Came the amazingly loud whine from the other side of the door, the excitement in it barely dimmed by the hitch it held. Her heart skipped a beat, and she had to take a deep breath to prevent her running to the door. Instead she sat for a moment, as the thundering on the door continued, to allow her blush to fade. Then, slowly, she lifted herself up onto her hooves and dimmed the idiotic grin that had appeared on her face to a smaller, more proper smile. Then she trotted across to the door and slowly pulled it open – only for a pink hoof to come to a dead stop less than a millimeter from her muzzle. She froze where she stood for a moment, eyes fixed on the hovering hoof, waiting for it to finish its approach and for the inevitable pain it would bring with it. And approach it did, as Pinkie Pie booped her gently on the nose.
“Hi Twilight! It’s good to see you again. It took you forever to get to the door though - you weren’t sleeping, were you?” The pink pony tilted her head, hoof still resting gently on Twilight’s nose. It smelt like flour, and Twilight had to fight back a sneeze. After letting it rest there for a moment of long, awkward silence Twilight took a step back, forcing herself to look irritated.
“Hi Pinkie. Sorry – I was just reading that book your sister wrote. It’s really very –” She began, hoping that the party pony wouldn’t call her bluff. She needn’t have worried; Pinkie Pie had other things on her mind. Such as the book she had extracted from…apparently nowhere at all and was now waving in front of Twilight’s face.
“I bought you a present! It’s a book! We wrote it! I thought you’d want a copy since you like books and you did help me write it and all so I figured it was only fair! So here you go, one copy of –” She was cut off by the unicorn enveloping the book in a magical field and snatching it away.
“…Treatise on Rockyus Pieicus by Professor Snuggleton and Doctor Sprinkles?” She stared at Pinkie flatly, for just a moment, as the Pink Pony bobbed her head up and down excitedly.
“Yup! You’re Doctor Sprinkles! I thought it was the perfect name because you’re such a smarty pants and it sounds like your name. Sparkle, Sprinkle, Sparkle, Sprinkle. See? I was going to call you Tutti-Fruiti but it just didn’t sound right.”
“Uh….huh.” Twilight turned the book over, mumbling absentmindedly. “Pinkie, this book is a thousand pages at least. Did you really write this whole thing yesterday?”
“Sure did! But you helped a bunch! Hey Twilight, what do you do when you like somepony?”
“You ask them out.” She muttered, adding, “This isn’t possible. Is…is this published? Did you publish this? I can’t have this attached to my name Pinkie!”
“It’s not attached to your name silly. It’s attached to Doctor Sprinkles! And I guess to Rocky’s too. Hey, do you want to go out sometime?”
“I’d love to.” She said it without thinking, opening the book and flipping through the pages as she spoke. “Pinkie, this is really impressive. How did you do this?”
“Awww. Thanks, Sprinkles! I’m really glad you like it. It was really hard, but it was all worth it if you like it! So, when they say yes what comes next?”
“Hm? I dunno. Kissing and stuff, I guess.” She blinked, and thought for a moment about what she had just said. Then what she had said before that. And before that. Slowly, she turned to stare into the wide, shining eyes that belonged to that paradoxical pony. “Wait, what did you just say? Did you just…?”
Pinkie kissed her then, and the book fell to the floor with a thud. That was okay. There would be time for books later. Right now, she had nonsense to attend to.