The Mysterious Vanishing Of The Celesti-O's
by Chaodiurn
Luna's shift did end hours ago and Twilight laid still in her warm, comforting bed. It was one of this lovely week-end days where she was able to lay in the bed till early noon without being harmed for laziness. Not that a saver-of-the-world-twice had to care for being lazy a day or two, but it just wasn't Twilight's nature to be a none-productive pony.
Spike however wasn't granted that pleasure. He was up as early as always, cleaning the mess Twilight had made while studying last night. It wasn't bigger than usual, but still big enough for the little baby dragon.
From time to time, when he had to put a book into the upper bookshelves and were able to get a look at his sleeping boss, he was temped to get some more sleep for himself. One more hour or two wouldn't be missed after all, and Twilight didn't seem to get up very soon. But no, the little dragon didn't want to disappoint Twilight. She loves it so much when the library is tidy and clean and all. So she shall have it that way.
Suddenly, a loud growl filled the domestic halls.
Spike put the last book in his hands into the bookshelf and went down the ladder. He looked around, several books were still lying silently around, nothing moved that he didn't want to. Not even Owlowiscious who was sleeping at his perch.
The growl repeated.
Spike looked down his little body.
Growl
Realization hit the little dragon's mind. He was the silence-killing noisemaker. Very well, then.
He turned around, facing the kitchen. Only because he didn't want to disappoint Twilight it didn't mean that he had to work hungry.
As he entered the kitchen, a little smile crossed his expression. Everything where nice and clean, Owlowiscious must have done a good job last night. That owl wasn't the best dish-cleaner with his wings after all and it was up to him, to clean up what this owl didn't manage to do during the night.
He made his way to the fridge, searching for something worth to eat. A library wasn't known for good food and so wasn't their fridge. Milk, some soda, cheese and some flowers. He did never understand why Twilight was keeping flowers in the fridge. She said it would save the aromas and make them taste even better, but that sounded just ridiculous to him. He never had to keep his gems cold, and they never lost any taste. But that was perhaps one of the entities of ponies he had to accept. He took out the milk and closed the fridge, dooming the flowers into their dark, cold prison again. Thanks to Daisy Jo and her herd Ponyville always got awesome, fresh milk. Mixing this white liquid with a bunch of Celesti-O's was one of the rare delicacies even a dragon was able to enjoy in this paper-yard.
Spike took out a bowl and a glass, making ready for this yummy start into the day.
Then, he took a chair to gain access to the cupboards where the cereals were located with several other stuff, which needed to be stored in a similar way.
Another growl filled the room.
Come to me, breakfast.
Spike opened up the cupboard which usual contained all the cereals and Owlowiscious' food.
Pushing some boxes out of his way, he got deeper and deeper inside. But no matter how many boxes he pushed away, he didn't found the wanted cereals.
Soon he began to drag the unwanted boxes out, down to the ground. Maybe he just overlooked them with all this trash inside.
Clonk. Clonk. Crush. Clonk.
Box by box felt to the ground, leaving a bit more space in the cupboard. But it was no use. With every fallen box the fatal truth came closer to his mind: The Celesti-O's were gone. Finito.
“Nooooooooo!”
He quickly took a claw at his mouth as the sleeping mare upstairs came to his mind.
Spike began to put the other cereals back to they places. While putting them back he overflew the covers, searching for something to replace the void in his breakfast-bowl. But not one of them was worth the good milk that already filled in his bowl. Disappointed, he turned to his bowl to face a full-liquid, white breakfast.
However, he didn't came that far. A sleepy pony with a pale, not too light but neither too dark grayish mulberry coat stood in the door, rubbing her forehead.
“Eww, mornin' Twi”
“Good morning, Spike. Why are you crying like a madhead?”
He waved his hands. “I was cr- wait, what is a madhead?”
Twilight stepped in, looking at the bowl and the glass, both only filled with milk.
“Never mind. Why were you crying? Saw a zombie again?”
“Z-z-z-zombies?!”
“Spike!”
“Sorry..I was crying because the Celesti-O's are missing. I searched in every corner, but nothing.”
“Oh, don't be silly Spike. They can't be missing. You know that I always have a reserve for that course.” She walked to the little cupboard that hold all the cereal stuff.
“It's just- ahhh!” She opened the cupboard, not to see the expected boxes but a wild Pinkie Pie jumping into her face. She landed dumbfounded on her flank, wearing an expression between terror and amazement.
“Twilight! You're finally awake! I need your help, fast, my Celesti-O's are missing which I wanted to eat at breakfast today as I do every day but I wasn't able to eat them because they are gone! Can I borrow some of yours please?” The pink pony seemed to be pretty excited about it, even for her standards.
Twilight's mind had its problems to manage the early amount of input and recaptured what was just thrown at her ears rather slowly. “Of, of course, Pinkie.”
“Oh thank you, thank you, thank you! Where are they?”
Twilight finally managed to get back to her hooves again. “Probably somewhere between your lung and your liver. Could you please come out of my cupboard?”
“Oh, eh, right.” The pink Pony plopped out of the cupboard, unfolded her four legs and landed without a sound at the ground. To Twilight's confusion, the internals of the cupboard weren't damaged in any sort by the sudden visitor.
The Unicorn snorted and moved forward to fight through the cupboard.
“Nope, nope, nope. Nope?”
“Nope. As I said.” Spike confirmed.
“But that's just not possible, Spike. At the end of this cupboard were a reserve box of Celesti-O's since we came here. There's no logical explanation how they could have got away from there.”
“Unless someone stole them!” He said.
“Who should steal my reserve-Celesti-O's? That's pointless.”
“Maybe someone really really really needed them and searched in the next house for them! Do you thing it was a cereal-zombie?” Pinkie said, supporting the theory of Twilight's number one assistant.
“ZOMBIE?!”
Twilight pulled her head out of the cupboard to face the hyper-active pony and Spike. “There are no zombies! And even if they would exist, they would rather not eat Celesti-O's!”
“Not rather but possible?” Terror grew in Spike's expression as he slowly made his way back to the door. “I have to prepare!” He screamed as he left the two meres alone in the kitchen.
“Prepare for what?” Twilight screamed after him fruitless.
“We must contact Mare Do Well! I'm sure that she will find the thieve and get us our Celesti-O's back!”
“Pinkie,” Twilight tried to say as calm as possible, “we are Mare Do Well. Remember?”
“Oh, well. Then we have to do it!” The pink pony said, a beaming smile on her face.
“But, how are we supposed to find a thieve who probably doesn't even exist?” Deep down in her subconsciousness Twilight cursed Lauren for the lack of coffee in Equestria.
“Maybe we shall lure him with some more Celesti-O's! Then we can catch him in action!”
“And how are we supposed to lure him with stuff that we don't have anymore since it was stolen by the imaginary thieve we are hunting?” Twilight slowly realized that this day won't become the planned day at the SPA.
“Well, duh! We just go around and ask for donations! I'm sure Rarity or Rainbow do have some, too!”
“Fine,” Twilight said as she walked pass the pink pony, straight to the fridge, “just let me get something to eat first.”
Suddenly, a loud crack filled the halls of her library.
“In the meanwhile, could you please look after Spike? I really have no idea what he meant by 'preparation' but it doesn't sound good at all.”
“Okey dokey lokey!” Pinkie Pie bounced happily out of the kitchen, right in the direction where the crack came from.
The mare with the not too light but neither too dark grayish mulberry coat opened the fridge and searched for a acceptable breakfast. With still tired eyes she observed her food. Nothing of it was what she wanted now, but at least there was something to eat. And so she stood there. Nearly a whole minute past until she finally took some cooled flowers out and began to chew on them.
Sometimes, flowers just don't get the job done.
~-~-~
Twilight was on the way to the exit of her home to meet her pink friend as Spike opened the entrance-door, missing Twilight's head only by several inches. However, Twilight was rather confused as she didn't met her little, purple assistant but some larger planks which got carried inside her library by her little dragon.
“Spike, what do you need the planks for?” She asked.
The little dragon didn't give answer instantly. As he finally entered the library, carrying those planks, Twilight was able so see why. His mouth was filled with several nails of different lengths.
“SPIKE?!”
He trotted to a little desk and laid down the planks to get the nails out of his mouth.
“Preparation, Twilight, as I said,” he finally answered.
“Preparation for what?” Twilight asked while she looked outside for any signs of his further plans or Pinkie Pie.
“No time to explain, time is running out! Ah, and Pinkie is waiting for you at Sugarcube's. She had to get back for some sort of business with the Cakes or so.”
“Aha, thanks. I think I shall go and visit her then. And please, while I'm away, don't try to hurt yourself doing..whatever you are.”
The little dragon waved a claw, “nah, won't do. Have fun.”
Twilight rose a last eyebrow at him, but then she turned to the door, waving a hoof, “Won't take too long I hope, see you!”
As the door shut closed, Spike stood alone in the big library.
“Let's do this..”
–
Twilight stood on the door sill to her home. It was a nice, warm day in the middle of summer and the sun was still on its way to get atop of the mountains, which decorated the horizon in the north.
As she wanted to do her first steps, a soft breeze carried fresh air into her face.
It was one of the greatest benefits of living in a tree. Always fresh and clean air, right before the own doors.
Feeling the fresh breeze, the peaceful scenario suddenly filled her head. The fresh wind, the cheeping of the birds who nested in her tree every year, the bees summing around their hive and even the road which laid silently before her, inviting for a peaceful walk through Ponyville.
Twilight closed her eyes. This morning was far to exciting for a free weekend day. Why can't people just wait with being randomly abandoned until a day where she had to do exciting stuff anyways?
Oh, she could nearly feel the smell of the oils and perfumes, carried from the light breeze coming from the direction of the SPA. Lotus Blossom would easily get this day back into order and harmony.
Twilight decided to enjoy the first moment of peace she had this day just a little bit longer.
Who knew it could be such a bad idea to study two more hours than usual?
Several minutes past and the bookish unicorn didn't seem to do a single movement too soon.
At least not until a certain sound started to fill her ears.
She knew that sound too well. It was that sound, which gets into foreground whenever a pony wanted to enter a deeper state of concentration – or simply tried to rest, as in this case. It was a sound, so terrifying that its causer became the symbol of the highest lord of Tartarus itself. Many ponies turned into murderers under the pressure of this sound, their wills not strong enough to keep it out of consciousness.
Her ears began to twitch, as the sound became louder, moving closer to her body. It had to came from somewhere in her front. Usually, this would grand her the possibility to open her eyes and to locate the source of it. But no, this wasn't a usual case. She knew that it would be useless. This sound had to stop by itself, and if it did so, then she would be able to fight it. Nothing was invincible. The only thing she had to do for this was waiting. Silent, motionless waiting. And so she did.
It was almost ridiculous how good she knew this. It moved closer, only to get some distance again for another chance of returning. But as good as she knew it, she still had to lay down all her concentration into the control of her ears, to make them stop twitching and to give a chance of pausing to the sound itself.
Then, as she suppressed the urge for barely a half minute, the sound came closer as it done before, moving around her ear, seemingly testing her nerves to the deepest core. Not a single movement was given that day. So it came, that the sound turned away again, but only enough inches to reach a point of interest where it was able to take a little break from terrifying little ponies all day long.
Now was the time to strike back. Twilight opened finally her eyes, fixing both on a spot not too far away from them. A fat, evil fly was sitting on her nose.
The unicorn wasn't able to resist a reflex of nose-twitching. Luckily, it didn't sent her chances to Tartarus. The only response of the black insect were a step forward. A little step for a fly maybe, but a big step for Twilight. This one step was enough to give Twilight the chance to let the creature meet its fate. With a not-so-elegant blast of suddenly inhaled air, the fly was thrown off her nose, seemingly disappearing in a void between her and the road.
There you go, little terrorist.
It was a shame that it wasn't possible to erase the existence of those little creatures in towns. Celestia always told her to love every creature, but those ones made it really hard for her.
Alas, at least she was fully awake now. Twilight blink-blinked her eyes awake and threw a glance down the empty road. She shouldn't let Pinkie wait any longer.
She left her lovely house-tree behind and entered the walk down the road.
There weren't many ponies out today, so the road was nearly empty. She watched the simple-built houses of the ville pass her on both sides, here and there a pony behind closed windows. At least some ponies had a peaceful morning.
–
It didn't took too long to get the Sugarcube Corner into view range. And with that, the true reason for the empty streets was revealed to Twilight. A long line of ponies stood in front of the candy-selling house. Twilight rose a eyebrow. So that's why Pinkie needed to go.
“Could you be a dear and work faster, please? I don't have all day.”
“Calm down, I'm sure they're as fast as they can.”
“Well, in that case they should learn to work even faster.”
Very impatient waiting ponies.
As Twilight came closer, she tried to work out a reason for this.
She asked a random stallion that stood around, “hey, what's going on here?”
“Bites me,” the pony answered, “I'm waiting here now since forever!”
The pale mare rose an eyebrow, “well, I can see that. Why are you waiting?”
“I'm trying to get some breakfast, isn't it obvious? I ran out of supplies just today.”
“Oh, you too?” What a twist of faith.
“As I said. Hey, if you want something to eat too, you'll have to get back to the end of the line.” Suddenly, any sign of amusement left the stallions expression. He seemed to enjoy the new company to this moment.
Twilight shook her head in a slightly disbelieve, “if you shall need some satisfaction, I am the one to help you out. In fact, I'm here to fix this. I think.”
As fast as it fell, the expression of the stallion raised again.
“Satisfaction you say?”
“Well, yes.”
A small smile grew in the face of the stallion as he loosed the eye-contact to Twilight. His eyes wandered down her face, her neck and along her still rather unfilled stomach.
“I could indeed need some satisfaction, now that you are saying it.”
Twilight backed up only a bit. She wasn't sure what to think about this. “And what would that be?”
His eyes wandered slowly ahead and reached finally her flank, where they found rest again. As he let out a silent moan, an urge came to being in Twilight's chest. It was a tiny one, but she knew that feeling somehow.
“What was your name again?” The stallion asked.
“Ehr, Twilight. Twilight Sparkle.”
“Ah, Twilight! I knew that I know this cutie mark! You are the local librarian, right?”
Twilight nodded awkwardly. “That's correct. Why?”
“You said that you are here for my satisfaction, right? I would love to have one of those books you are holding in your library. The boredom is killing me!”
And suddenly, a certain mare gave a rather loud sigh into the air while moving to a certain candy-selling house.
“Is that a yes?”
–
Twilight passed several other stallions and meres who waited for getting some space in Sugarcube Corner. That was one of the two necessary points for ordering something, after all. The second point was to reach the bar – a rather simple task in average days. However, this wasn't an average day and the task wasn't easy. Twilight realized this just in the moment where she tried to pass the entrance-door. The whole selling-room were full with ponies! Strong and tall stallions, beautiful and slim mares, workers, teachers, aristocrats. The mare gasped as she saw in only one little look almost every kind of ponies one could find here in Ponyville. How should she get through that mess?
She could use the royal Canterlot voice to get the attention of all the ponies. Well, she could do that if she was an Alicorn. Spike mentioned here and there how awesome and helpful it would be, if the elements could turn their bearers into such mighty creatures. Twilight always tuned that idea down, as soon as Spike raised it. She told him, that it wouldn't be right. Only royals themselves should be granted with such a power. But now, facing this situation, she had to admit that Spike had a point there. It actually would be helpful sometimes. But no, that's just ridiculous. Every problem that was cased by a mortal pony could also be fixed by one of them. But how?
Twilight made a step forward. Just standing there wouldn't help anyone, anyways. With a rather determined expression, the librarian mare caught up with the impatient mass, and engaged. She placed her hoof at the flank of a stallion in front of her and pushed against it. She inhaled deeply, to fill her lounges with the usually odorless gas that surrounded her in every step, and gave her desire out for knowledge as loud as she could.
“Let me pass!”
Hooves trampled on wooden floor and sweaty shoulders made contact, as the unicorn tried to pass the wall of ponies. She pushed her body straight between the two chosen ones, almost wearing a half expectation to fulfill her will in her mind. She pressed and pressed, but there were simply no space for her.
As the stallion to her left noticed that it became rather hard to breath, he made up his mind to fix this. The stallion pranced like a bronco, and to the disapproval of his environment, the pressure was instantly released from his chest. Ah, air.
As a side-effect of which he never should get knowledge of, a Unicorn got a very close look to the battered roof. It was made of beech which was varnished in a dark tone of green. Usually it is used because the wood is hard and though. However, Twilight preferred softer lumbers from time to time.
It didn't took long until her efforts of becoming a friend of a very likeable plank got shattered. Her rushing had seemingly inspirited other ponies to take action, too. Heavy hooves came closer in all directions, and not a single one seemed to even recognize the downed mare.
Not in the mood to get trampled down today, the downed mare raised up from the hard ground with a crack of her neck. Wasn't there another mare-do-well for such things?
After she got back on her legs and recollected the last parts of her consciousness, a look around her was the next step she planned; her action didn't get her any closer to the bar. In fact, it did cause even more ponies to fill the not-so-big selling-room of Sugarcube's. Time for plan b.
Twilight turned around and fought her way to a corner that wasn't embattled by costumers. To her relief, getting backwards wasn't a big deal. Of course not. Everypony that was getting back meant one pony less wait-time. Twilight reached the corner in what felt like instant-arrival and she wasn't up to waste even more time with idling. She got a short look over the mass as good as it were possible for her, to make out the direction in which the bar were located. Then, she lowered her head and tried to focus as hard as she could on remembering the right steps for her planned spell. She really didn't want to let this fail right now.
Not that she needed to. Being the personal protege of her highly immortal princess of the sun Celestia herself and bearer of the element of magic, it wasn't something that was out of her skill-range. Probably this spell wasn't even allowed to be difficult for her. Given to the second fact, Twilight maybe was one, if not the highest, of those who where responsible for the save of Equestria itself. Right after the royals, of course.
With a sparkling flash, Mrs. Sparkle disappeared from the corner and re-materialized in a less sparkling way behind the bar.
“Always wins!” She simply couldn't resist the urge to cheer herself up a bit.
“You cheated! That doesn't count!” Resonated from the other side of the bar.
“For Faust's sake, I'm here to help, not for shopping!”
“If that's really the case, then give me my ordering, now!”
For what felt like the thousandth time this day, Twilight moaned a really annoyed sigh.
“I'm pretty sure, that either Mrs. or Mr. Cake will process your order when it's time for it. Right Mrs. Cake?”
Twilight turned her head to the right in search of approval by the probably overworked bakerness. To her confusion, she was the only pony standing behind the bar in the moment.
“Well, I am sure that she will return soon.”
“She better does so. I'm standing here since a full hour now.”
Twilight felt her mandibula drop. Don't those ponies have anything in their fridges?
“So..do you want to borrow one of my mandibular third molar forceps or are you actually going to help me now?”
–
Deciding to better not take advantage of this offer, Twilight found herself searching for Pinkie in the backrooms of Sugarcube's only a few moments later. She seemed way too upset at this morning for playing hide and seek-games now.
“Pinkie! Where are you?” An unknown part of the Unicorn's mind knew better somehow.
There was no answer that wasn't expected, but for the sake of her nerves Faust sent a little box of candies to the ground behind a door at the farther end of the room. It wasn't loud, but still enough to catch her attention. And being the scientific mare she was, Faustism was something for ponies who were too lazy for research.
Twilight stepped forward without further thoughts, heading directly to the clearly not supernatural caused noise. And since this wasn't Canterlot-Castle, it took barely ten full steps to reach it.
She placed a hoof at the wooden door to push it open, but disappointment filled her mind as a tight click told her that it was locked.
“Pinkie, are you in there?”
“Twilight, is that you? I'm glad that you came,” a muted and yet shrieking voice answered her from the other side.
“Of course I did. Could you please open the door? What are you doing?”
Rambling was everything that came back as an answer. Pinkie was probably re-organizing the inventory as she had recommenced it her so many times before.
However, as it stopped and the pink mare answered, Twilight was caught off-guard by the sound of her voice, that seemed to dance somewhere between sobbing and giggling.
“D-Don't you know that it's impolite to ask more than one question in one sentence?”
She searched for an answer in her mind, but only came up with the simplest one could find,
“could you please open the door?”
She expected another rumbling noise, the sound of things being pushed out of Pinkie's way, but nothing like that happened. Only her light steps were chiming through the closed door, until the crackling sound of the rather simple lock told her that she was about to finally see her friend.
As the door granted her vision by falling open, Twilight's emotions made a big turn for the first time this day. Pinkie stood there, not being the happy and chaotic mare she was barely a hour ago. Her expression spoke of sorrow and fear and tears drew already their small and dark lines down the face.
“Pinkie!” Twilight shouted, “what happened?”
The party pony didn't seemed to be up for a greeting of any kind as she turned back into the room which was filled with nothing more than a few empty shelves at the walls and a chair that was standing in the middle of the room.
“Everything comes to an end, Twi.” Pinkie said, this time a more stable voice than before.
Twilight stepped in, coming a bit closer to her friend. This wasn't good. “What do you mean?”
“My life in Ponyville, Twilight! It's over!”
“What? Why? There's nothing that is going to end it, is it?” Dealing with other ponies never was something Twilight was good in. Dealing with an eccentric Pinkie, however, made that look rather easy.
“Didn't you see? The Celesti-O's! They are all gone Twilight. They are all gone!”
The Unicorn made another step forward, aiming for a hug or something that maybe could become in handy in that situation.
“So that’s really the reason why all those ponies are waiting outside. That’s not that bad, is it?”
Pinkie Pie shook her mind, “it is! All the ponies of this town are without their Celesti-O's. They all need another kind of food now!”
Twilight stopped in her tracks. “I'm pretty sure that the most of them will have something in their fridges. And besides, this will give a great boost to Sugarcube's, won't it? I'm sure all these new costumers will fill the cash box in no time!” Slowly, the hope that some motivating facts could get this job done raised in Twilight's chest.
“Only if there is somepony who cares about the costumers! Did you see the entrance-hall? It's a disaster! I tried to serve them all, but I can't! I'm too slow. I really, really tried my best, but there are too many of them!”
“What's with Mr. and Mrs. Cake? Shouldn't they do the main-work, anyways?”
“Usually, yes. But they went out, for vacation with they children. They gave the full responsibility of Sugarcube’s for this time to me and so I am the only one who runs this place by now! I through this would be fun but then the Celesti-O's vanished and then all these ponies entered and I wasn't able to serve them all and now I'm failing, because they all will go away because they don't get what they want and then Sugarcube's will earn no money and if that happens than the Cakes will be mad with me and they will throw me out and then I will have to go back to the rock farm again, Twilight! The rock farm!”
The bookish Unicorn stood before her friend with her mouth agape, horrified by the rush of words that passed her ears. She stood there for a briefly long time, her consciousness wrestled down by a stream of information. As the words passed faster and faster through her mind, the solution came closer to her, getting slowly into range of her consciousness. There was a solution.
“I guess I could help you,” she finally managed to say, “With my magic, we should be able to serve them all. Together, we won't fail!”
As good as it sounded to herself, the depressed party-pony only shook her head in denial, again.
“Even if we would be fast enough to serve all of them, Sugarcube isn't prepared for such a situation. There aren't enough goods around, and even if we would produce some more, it wouldn't suffice.”
It was in this moment, when Twilight's expression dropped, her head empty of any useful ideas. A state which she really, really disliked.
“And if we just serve as many as possible? I'm sure that they will understand that we wasn't able to serve everyone under this conditions.”
Another effort that was doomed to clash on the cold stone-walls of Pinkie's depression, as the response took the last bit of her hope away, “no, Twilight,” Pinkie answered dry, “everyone is getting everything he wants at Sugarcube's in record-time. That's the very basic principle of this place.”
Twilight sat down her flank on the hard floor. “So, what can we do then? There must be a way!”
Pinkie shook her head no, too hopeless for the Unicorn to watch.
“What if we return the Celesti-O's again, just as you said?”
For the first time, Pinkie looked up from her little chair. “How? We don't even know where they went.”
“But they have to come from somewhere, right? Pinkie, where does Sugarcube take them from?”
“We are getting them weekly from an solar-express. I don't know where they are produced, but we are receiving them directly from Canterlot Castle.”
“Fine then. I write to the princess that we are going to visit. I'm sure that the Cakes will be happy if the mare that had responsibility of they shop saved breakfast for a whole week!”
“Canterlot?”
Relief filled Twilight's mind as she saw this smile grow back into Pinkie's face.
“That sounds fun! Meet me at the train-station!”
And with that, a fluffy party-pony with a pink mane in an optic as it just has been extracted from a cotton-candy-machine jumped out of the nearly empty room, straight into the direction of the rear-exit.
Meanwhile, an certain Unicorn had to focus her entire will-power to deny herself from collapsing. Who showed that mare how to live?