In the weeks after Luna’s return and Twilight’s new assignment to learn about the magic of friendship in Ponyville, Sonic’s life slipped into an easy routine. He’d wake up with Rainbow, get down to hang out with Spike or Big Mac, and watch as Twilight’s circle of friends engaged in their daily adventures and shenanigans. Of particular delight to Sonic was when Rainbow and Pinkie realized their mutual love of pranking and proceeded to, over a three-day period, somehow prank everyone in Ponyville, sans Fluttershy.
The day after Rainbow and Pinkie’s pranking spree, Rainbow and Sonic were awoken by a knock at the door to Rainbow’s home. Rainbow opened the door to see a griffon waiting.
“Hey, Dash!” the griffon chuckled.
“Gilda! It’s been forever!” Rainbow grinned, raising her hoof for Gilda’s claw to bump. “It’s great to see you!”
“Mama, who’s this?” Sonic asked, rubbing his eyes. Rainbow grinned.
“Sonic, this is my old buddy Gilda. Gilda, this is my adopted son, Sonic. I adopted him a little over a year ago.”
“Huh. Didn’t take ya for the parent type, Dash,” Gilda commented.
“He fell outta the sky in front of me and we share at least two base traits. We’re both blue, and we both like to go fast!” Rainbow joked.
Gilda snickered. “Well, guess if he’s that much like you he’s pretty cool.”
Sonic grinned. “Mama’s... at least twenty percent cooler than me, but I try!”
Gilda cackled. “That’s what I like to hear!”
Rainbow beamed proudly. “So, what brings you? Just looking to hang?”
Gilda groaned. “Griffonstone is so boring, and everygriff over there’s in a bad mood... not like that’s new, but it’s becoming more oppressive.”
Rainbow cringed sympathetically. “Well, a friend of mine’s been helping me with a pranking spree and we’re gonna try and prank as many ponies as we can at once. You wanna help?”
Gilda’s answering grin was viciously giddy.
Pinkie’s voice shortly called out, “Rise and shine, Rainbow Dash! It’s a brand new day and we’ve got a lot of new pranking to do!”
Rainbow grinned. “That’s the friend I was talking about. C’mon, let’s go introduce you!”
“‘Kay,” Gilda shrugged.
“I do wanna warn you, she can come on kind of strong, but she’s cool once you get to know her,” Rainbow explained.
“Heh, I gotcha,” Gilda snickered.
Rainbow let Sonic onto her back and flew down to the ground with Gilda.
“Woah!” Pinkie exclaimed in surprise. “Who’s this?”
“Pinkie, this is my griffon pal Gilda. Gilda, this is my friend Pinkie Pie.”
“‘Sup,” Gilda nodded.
“A griffon?” Pinkie asked, cocking her head.
Rainbow explained, “Half-eagle, half-lion-”
“-And all awesome!” Gilda crowed. Rainbow flashed a grin.
“Well, it’s nice to meetcha, Gilda!” Pinkie nodded, extending her hoof. “Any friend of Rainbow Dash is a friend of mine!”
Gilda moved to shake Pinkie’s hoof, only to yelp in surprise when a fart noise rang out. Rainbow snickered and Pinkie and Sonic burst into giggles as Pinkie raised her hoof.
“The whoopie cushion on the hoof trick... it’s ALWAYS funny!” Pinkie exclaimed between laughs.
Gilda smirked. “Heh, not half-bad. So, Dash, who were you thinking we’d prank first?”
“Ooh, is she gonna join us?” Pinkie asked excitedly.
Rainbow nodded. “If you don’t mind!”
“Of course not! Another prankster will be super duper helpful for pranking the whole town!” Pinkie insisted.
“Wait, the whole town?” Rainbow asked excitedly. “You figured out a plan for that?”
Pinkie nodded virtuously. “Well, except for Fluttershy since she’s so sensitive, but we can do everypony else!”
Gilda raised an eyebrow. “...Why do we need to care about that?”
Rainbow frowned. “Hey, Fluttershy’s like a sister to me,” she interjected. “She’s not a very brave pony but she’s there when it counts. If you’ve got a problem with keeping her out of the pranks, we can do this without you.”
Gilda held up a claw in surrender. “Chill, Dash, just wanted to make sure we weren’t givin’ anyone a free pass they didn’t need.”
Rainbow nodded. “In that case, what’s the plan, Pinkie?”
Pinkie grinned. “Alright, get in close...”
Sonic hurried along the roads of Ponyville to Fluttershy’s house so he could keep her distracted and away from the town proper while Pinkie, Gilda, and Rainbow could put their prank into action. He giggled as he envisioned the results of the prank Pinkie had planned. The whole town covered in flour? The sight would be hilarious.
He met Fluttershy outside her house.
“Oh, hello, Sonic!” she giggled. “What brings you?”
Sonic bit his lip. “Um...”
Fluttershy suddenly narrowed her eyes. “The girls have told me about Rainbow and Pinkie’s pranking spree. Is this part of that?”
Sonic whimpered. “S-Sorta, Mama met an old friend named Gilda and she and Mama and Pinkie are gonna prank the whole town but Mama and Pinkie didn’t want you getting pranked because they know how sen-sa-tive you are,” he blabbered.
Fluttershy rolled her eyes in amusement and sighed. “Well, I appreciate Rainbow’s concern for me,” she decided. “I was planning to head into town for a bit to grab some groceries, but if that’s not an option right now I can wait for a while.”
“Mama packed me some snacks!” Sonic offered.
Fluttershy giggled. “Of course she did... don’t tell her I said this, but it’s frankly adorable how much she cares for you.”
Sonic snickered. “Okay! I won’t tell!”
“So, um... you want me to read you a book?” Fluttershy suggested.
Sonic shrugged. “If you have one of the cool ones,” he allowed.
Fluttershy waved Sonic into her house. “Well, I’ll let you decide if I do,” she offered. Sonic nodded in response.
An hour later, Sonic and Fluttershy were invested in a game of Go Fish with Harry and Angel when an explosion rattled the windows. The four of them jumped at the noise and Sonic rushed over to the window. A massive off-white cloud of dust rose from Ponyville.
“...Was the prank covering Ponyville in flour?” Fluttershy asked.
Sonic nodded with a goofy grin.
“...You know what, with that level of dedication, I can’t even be mad right now,” Fluttershy mumbled.
“Mom said you’d say that,” Sonic replied.
Twilight paced in front of Rainbow, Gilda, and Pinkie Pie with rage blistering on her face.
“So.” Twilight spat out the word with enough intensity to blow a leaf away. “You three. Decided to... what was it again?”
“Prank the whole town by covering it in flour,” Pinkie supplied.
Twilight’s eye twitched. “Yes... that.”
“Wheat like to apologize for the trouble,” Rainbow offered, her face the picture of innocence.
“Y-Yeah, sorry, w-we barley thought it through,” Gilda added as the three pranksters broke into snickers.
Pinkie said through her giggles, “G-Girls, I... I think we... we oat to apologize to Twi-”
Twilight’s horn lit up with magic. “You have three seconds to run before I toast you.”
Rainbow and Gilda took to the skies, while Pinkie got flour in her nose and sneezed herself out of Twilight’s field of vision.
Twilight giggled to herself as the mass telekinesis spell she’d prepared gathered every grain of flour in the town and carefully pulled it toward a few bins set up by Applejack and Rarity.
“Those three are such goofs,” she sighed with an eyeroll.
Dear Princess Celestia,
I’m sure you saw the massive flour cloud over Ponyville. Don’t worry, it’s been cleaned up.
Today I learned a lesson from Rainbow Dash. Sometimes, all it takes to bring two of your friends together is something they both love to bond over.
...In this case, it was a massive prank, re: the cloud of flour. It was if not amusing at least cathartic to hear Fluttershy lecturing Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, and Rainbow’s old friend Gilda on how dangerous their prank could have been. The definitely funny part was watching Fluttershy realize how bold she was being.
You know, maybe I learned two lessons today! Sometimes our friends can bring out sides of us that we didn’t even recognize we had!
Your faithful student,
Twilight Sparkle