Acrylic paced back and forth, struggling to keep himself anything approaching calm. What was Pinkie thinking? There was so little time already, they couldn’t waste it on something like this. Then again, he figured the only thing that lay along the path of trying to understand Pinkie’s ‘thinking’ was madness. Even her kids couldn’t do it and they grew up with her. Even worse, their only real advice was ‘eh, just go with it’. As if he could just GO with whatever the pink mare said.
But frankly, he didn’t have the energy to argue with her. She’d blow your argument up and then tie it into funny shapes as you watched helplessly. Like a weird party clown pony of cotton candy. He was starting to see why she and his mom got along so well. Frustratingly well.
Acrylic was brought out of his thoughts by a sudden laugh. He glanced over and saw Pearl standing by the entrance, a smirk on her face. “You look ridiculous.”
“This was her idea,” Acrylic said, his voice dripping with annoyance. “Do I really look that bad?”
“Your mother would be proud,” Pearl said with another laugh. “The pink mohawk is an especially great touch, but the orange coat really helps bring it together.”
Acrylic gave a low groan and looked down at his legs, lifting the front one up and examining the dye in it. “I loathe this. What if I sweat and this washes off?”
“Oh, you know that won’t happen,” Pearl said. “Facepaint Surprise worked extra hard to make sure the only way you’re getting that stuff off is with her special cleaning goop.”
“What if we get captured and I’m trapped looking like this forever?” Acrylic asked with a shudder.
“I’m sure if we run into anypony who wants to capture us, they’ll let us go out of pity considering the way you look now,” Pearl said. “Come on, let’s go before we miss the fireworks.”
“Those aren’t until sunset,” Acrylic said with a roll of his eyes.
“If only your moping would wait until then,” Pearl said in a teasing tone. “Come on, mister serious, let’s go. Otherwise, I’ll go ask Pinkie if she can--”
“I’m going, I’m going!” Acrylic said quickly, turning and walking out from the tunnel and into the outside world.
This was a total waste of time. But he could still hear Pinkie’s voice in his head. ‘Now now, you’re tenser than a party cannon right before it erupts. You need a break before you snap like a dried out pretzel! Other party based quip.’ Okay, she probably hadn’t said that but it certainly felt like it.
“It’s not that bad spending a day with me, is it?” Pearl asked.
“What? No! I spend most days with you,” Acrylic said quickly. “I--”
“No, you spend most days around me,” Pearl said. “But you spend very few of them with me. You’re usually training, working, trying to find some way to win this war on your own, fight off a--”
“I-I know,” Acrylic said, his cheeks burning. “But I just… I mean…”
“It’s a festival, come on. Enjoy yourself,” Pearl said.
“Why are they even doing this?” Acrylic asked. “There’s a war going on. What are they even celebrating? Some garden sprouting?”
“Nope, the founding of Sire’s Hollow. Close, though,” Pearl said. “The village came about because there was this garden made by an old healing pony and apparently his daughter named it in his honor after he passed on. But that’s not really important, is it? Ponies need a chance to celebrate, to relax. To let the stress out and enjoy themselves. If a pony spends all their time on a razor’s edge, just waiting to snap, eventually they break.”
“You spend too much time around Pinkie,” Acrylic said.
“Maybe you don’t spend enough,” Pearl said in a chipper tone before lightly bumping his flank with her own. “Come on, just try to have a bit of fun? For me?”
“Fine, but--”
“If you try saying ‘But I don’t have to like it’, I will dunk you under water at some point today,” Pearl said. “I checked, the disguise will hold.”
Acrylic paused for a moment before giving a light chuckle. “Fine, fine. I’ll like it.”
“Good,” Pearl said.
------
Acrylic stared at the thing on his plate. He was a tiny bit nervous about it. Not that he didn’t trust the food to not be poisoned, oh no. He just knew that the ponies here tended to like… spicier foods than he was accustomed to. Very spicy foods. This thing was bright red and he suspected might almost glow if it was night.
“It’s not that bad,” Pearl said.
“That would be a little more believable if you weren’t crying right now,” Acrylic said with a light chuckle before slowly picking off a chunk of one and pushing it into his mouth. After a few moments the tingling, burning sensation filled his mouth, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as he thought it would be. His mom had put enough spicy things in his food as a prank over the years that it wasn’t even that bad. He picked one up and tossed it into his mouth. It had a nice, creamy center as well. “Mmmm. Not bad.”
“Y-you’re crying now too,” Pearl said with a light giggle, lifting a hoof over her mouth.
“Y-yeah, still a bit spicy,” Acrylic said with a light laugh before glancing around. Honestly, none of this was as bad as he’d thought it would be. The small town had dozens of visitors during the small festival, with all kinds of stalls and stands setup. Nopony was giving him so much as a second glance. He could, almost, relax.
He twitched when he heard some ponies ohhhhing and ahhhhhing. He glanced over to see what the commotion was about, only to cringe when he realized what it was. A few unicorns had flown in…
Using Tomorrow Industry’s artificial wings. Of course. He found his thoughts instantly drawn towards Silver and how she’d have felt about this festival. She probably wouldn’t have liked it, she’d never seemed to like festivals as far back as he could remember. Not that he could blame her. Every time there was some festival or celebration, her father did something major in response, creating some new display or working on a new device. Not to mention the whole alibot fiasco. Seriously. Why would ANYPONY make something like that?
“A bit for your thoughts?” Pearl asked.
“Huh?” Acrylic asked. “Oh, it’s nothing.”
“It doesn’t seem like nothing,” Pearl said. “Come on, tell me.”
“Come on, let’s just enjoy this,” Acrylic said softly. “I don’t want to bring down the mood.”
“Silver?” Pearl asked.
Acrylic gave a soft sigh before nodding. He might not have been the best with mares but even he knew it wasn’t a good idea to be thinking about one mare while out with another. “Sorry. Just…”
“She was your friend for years,” Pearl said. “And is currently doing all of… this. I think almost everypony is thinking about her these days.”
“Probably,” Acrylic said softly. “Sorry. I just… it sometimes feels unreal. I keep expecting to wake up or something and it’ll turn out this was all a nightmare. If I hadn’t seen what she was capable of first hoof, I wouldn’t even believe it.”
“What exactly DID happen?” Pearl asked.
Acrylic cringed and glanced away. “R-right. We never really talked about it, did we?”
“Not really, no,” Pearl said flatly. “If I hadn’t been called in to help with Dr. Alicity’s sudden… departure, I wouldn’t have even seen you.”
Acrylic let out a low hiss, his cheeks burning bright red as he shuffled nervously in his seat. “S-sorry. It was all, well… I just, err. It’s not important.”
“The buck it isn’t,” Pearl said, cocking an eye. “Come on, I won’t get mad. I just want to know what happened. Last thing I know is we had this adorably awkward date, we visited each other a few times. Well, I visited you. You seemed to be having a good time, though I’m not always the best judge of that. Then all of a sudden, poof, you’re gone. Vanished off the face of Equestria. Would you believe it wasn’t the first time that’s happened to me?”
“Yeah,” Acrylic said before his cheeks went red again. “Err, sorry. But… I mean, sorry. I just, you know?”
“No, I don’t,” Pearl said before rolling her eyes. “That’s what I’m trying to find out. I’ll be honest, I wanted to drop buck you off a pier and then hold your head underwater for a minute or two. I thought you were a coward who decided he didn’t like me after all and that you were going to just hide until I lost interest. Not the first stallion to do that, either, you know.”
Acrylic cringed, giving a small nod. “Sorry. I guess it was kind of a jerky thing to do.”
“At first,” Pearl said. “I was considering how to beat your face in. Then, well… you stayed gone. The first day I was furious. Second I was nervous. By the third I was really starting to worry about you. I knew you were involved in a lot of really, really dangerous stuff. By day four I thought you were dead. Finally I saw you and for a moment I was relieved. Then I was on my way towards the ship to give you a piece of my mind. Before I knew it Dr. Alicity had dragged me on board and I’m not even sure HOW he did it. One moment I was furious, the next we were taking off and apparently escaping while we could. I didn’t even know what was going on.”
“That’s just him,” Acrylic said in a flat, unamused tone. “If you told me he was a reborn Discord I would believe it in a second, but Silver? That’s still… a lot to swallow.”
“So, tell me about it,” Pearl said. “Don’t I deserve to know?”
Acrylic gave a soft sigh before nodding. “I… I guess. Okay. So, it all started when Ironwing started to wake up. Button and I were uhhh… talking about, uhhh…” His cheeks went redder and she got a knowing smile on her face.
“Me?” she asked.
“Y-yes,” Acrylic managed to stutter out. “And uhhhh, when we got the news we agreed to go tell Silver. It wasn’t supposed to be a big thing, but when we got there and walked into her office, well…”
“Yes?” Pearl said.
“She was standing there with her eyes all glowing and she had the Alicorn Amulet. It didn’t make any sense,” Acrylic said. “We’d gone all the way to the Badlands to get it, now she had it. Worse, she was doing something with it. When she stopped glowing we confronted her. Next thing I know Button and I are just in this weird, strange place. I can’t even really say what or where it was. We were just there. Like… it was dark. Occasionally we could see out, but most of the time it was like a weird dream. Or a nightmare. We saw out at times and, uhhhh… sometimes… err…” Once again his cheeks started getting redder.
“What?” Pearl asked. “What did you see?”
“Err, it was weird, I mean. I probably didn’t see it at all, it was probably just the strange void thing getting to me,” Acrylic said, unable to help himself from sinking into his seat a little.
“Come on, tell me,” Pearl said with a small smile. “If it’s got you squirming like that I’ve GOT to know.”
“I think I saw Diamond and Silver Spoon kiss,” Acrylic said.
Pearl blinked a few times before bursting into a small fit of giggles, laughing so hard she actually snorted after a moment.
“W-what? What? What’d I say?” Acrylic asked, his cheeks burning.
“I-I’m sorry, that’s just such a, well, stallion thing,” Pearl said, a hoof covering her mouth as she tried to suppress her laughter. “I mean, the Avatar? Really? Why would she kiss Silver?”
“I uhhhhh… I mean…” Acrylic said, his eyes wandering a little away from her.
“Honestly, it sounds like you just had an uhhh, interesting dream,” Pearl said before giving another light snicker. “Did you think they were that close?”
“I mean, maybe,” Acrylic said sheepishly. “We were all kind of… close. Well, they were. I think in a lot of cases I was kind of the odd pony out. I mean, err…”
The smile fell off Pearl’s face and she cocked her head to the side. “Come on, you can tell me.”
“I don’t know,” Acrylic said softly. “A lot of the time it didn’t feel like I really knew any of them except Button. Even him I didn’t really always get. I certainly couldn’t help him. Believe me, I tried. Then he met Diamond and suddenly he was advancing faster than I ever imagined. If anything I think I was just holding them all back.” He lightly nudged his food around on the plate with his hoof. “No, I definitely was. I… stagnated.”
“Really? You? But you’re so talented! You can even teleport ponies now, that’s not an easy feat,” Pearl said. “I mean, I’m not a unicorn but--”
“That was new,” Acrylic said with a sigh. “It just… I guess…”
“How long had you known all of them?” Pearl asked.
“Since I was a colt,” Acrylic said. “Well, no. That’s not true. I knew Button since I was a foal. Our moms were best friends and uhhhh… I think we were… kind of… possibly related? Neither of our parents ever really talked about our dads much, but I always kind of suspected it might be the same stallion. I never got confirmation, though.”
“They wouldn’t talk about it?” Pearl asked.
“I never really asked,” Acrylic said with a shrug. “It didn’t really matter, though. He was always like a brother to me. Silver I met when I was a colt. Met her dad first. No surprise, he and my mom got along amazingly well. Distressingly well. Was horrible. I actually thought they might date for a bit, talk about nightmares.”
Pearl gave a light shudder. “I mean, errr. Don’t get me wrong. I’ve met your mom a few times, she’s uhhh… unique. Awe inspiring, amazing. But terrifying. Adding that to Dr. Alicity…”
“Yeah,” Acrylic said before giving another soft sigh. “But then I met Silver. I never would have guessed SHE was his kid.” A small smile spread on his lips. “Funny story about that, actually. When I first met her I was with my mom at Tomorrow Industries on some council examination thing that she thought might be fun. I had actually wandered off and I thought she was a little filly who was lost from the tours. I ended up taking her to the main office to help her find her parents, only to find out she thought the same about me.”
“She thought you were lost?” Pearl asked.
“Yeah,” Acrylic said with a light snicker. “Turned out she was trying really hard to not embarrass me and help me find my parents. Afterwards we had a big laugh about it. From there we just kind of started… hanging out. I guess? It was weird. I don’t even entirely know how it happened. She just… was there.”
“Discord magic?” Pearl asked.
“No,” Acrylic said quickly, shaking his head. “More I think… a lot of the time it felt like she just wanted to be near other ponies. She was always so sad growing up. Quiet. Button could usually make her smile in one way or another, but then before long she’d go quiet again. But then, I guess that was most days. Button was pretty good at filling the silence. Some days she’d be fine, though. It was usually at its worst around the holidays. I wouldn’t say anything, but…”
“Really? She was depressed?” Pearl asked. “I mean, can’t say I’d blame her. Knowing she’s going to betray her friends one day would probably depress me too.”
“Can you stop that?” Acrylic snapped, his voice harsh for a moment before he quickly shook his head.
Pearl froze, her eyes going wide. “What?”
“Sorry,” Acrylic said. “I just…”
Pearl stared at him for a few moments before nodding. “Right. Sorry. I guess I was getting a bit snippy there. But fine, this is the Silver I know. How about you tell me about the Silver you knew? Before all of this?”
Acrylic gave another sigh. He really didn’t like this topic, it just made his heart hurt. But he supposed he couldn’t just avoid it forever. “She wasn’t like this. At least, I didn’t think she was. She was… nice. Very nice. She’d always be looking out for other ponies. She was generous, hard working. Silver had her dad’s eye for business, everything was always kept in mind as to how much of a profit it could make. But there was always…” He glanced away for a moment. “They were both very profit driven. But for them it always felt like they used it as a means to an end, if that made sense? They wanted profit so they could use it to invest in more things to help more ponies. I remember when they first started making the artificial horns and wings. Sure, now they are pretty successful. But at first they were seen as just jokes. All Silver ever talked about, though, was how one day everypony could have them. They’d all be equal and able to do things. Nopony would ever have to feel they were inferior. I… used to worry that she felt that way, because she couldn’t bend. I guess that was just another lie though, huh?”
Pearl lightly coughed and just cocked an eye at him.
“O-oh! I didn’t mean, err, I mean, I-I know that earth pony’s--”
“I know what you meant,” Pearl said with a small smile. “But it’s really not so bad. I’ll admit, when I was younger I used to get really jealous of the wings and horn thing. But you know, there’s some things us earth pony’s can do that are pretty nice. We’re a lot tougher, too.”
“Isn’t that the truth,” Acrylic said, thinking back to the number of times Diamond, Button and Silver had seemed to outpace him in that regard. “But I guess… there really was always that kind of… guilt that hovered over her. Almost as if she was trying to make up for something. I didn’t know it at the time, but I guess it makes a lot of sense now. If she knew that one day she’d do all of this. At least, when we were younger.”
“Hm? What happened?” Pearl asked.
“I don’t honestly know,” Acrylic said. “When we were foals she’d always seemed so sad. But then one day she just… stopped. I don’t know why. It was like a switch had been flipped or something. She’d seemed more determined than ever. Sometimes she’d have moments where I'd thought I caught her crying or something, but in general she just seemed happier. I hadn’t thought about it much at the time. Now I kind of wonder if I’d missed something important. It wasn’t long after that that Diamond kind of… blasted into our lives.”
“Ohhhh, that must have been exciting, meeting the Avatar like that. Did you know?” Pearl asked.
“Not until a few minutes after I met her,” Acrylic said before rolling his eyes. “And trust me. I wanted to drag her to the bottom of the lake long before I found out. Quite a few times after, as well.”
Pearl’s mouth fell open and she stared before giving a light cough. “I mean, she couldn’t be that bad, right? I heard some of the things others said, sure, but—”
“Oh, she was worse than you heard,” Acrylic said with annoyance. “So, so much worse. Obnoxious. Trust me.”
“I’ll have to take your word for it,” Pearl said sheepishly. “But… really?”
“Really. She was infuriating,” Acrylic said. “Drove off our newest team member, Piro. Undermined any confidence Button had like a dozen times. A spoiled brat who I absolutely loathed most days. Worse? She was talented and knew it. So it wasn’t like she’d listen to anypony. She got better. A lot better. They all did. I just kind of… stagnated.”
“Then you saved my life,” Pearl said.
“Yeah, uhhhh, that was new,” Acrylic said sheepishly. “I mean, saving anypony. And the teleporting. I’d been working on my magic, of course. But I hadn’t tried anything that big. Err, not that you’re big or--”
“It’s fine, I’ll let that one slide. This time,” Pearl said in a teasing tone. “Do you still feel like you’re stagnating?”
Acrylic slowly shook his head. “I… don’t think so. I mean, we haven’t done much fighting. But being able to teleport myself and others is incredibly useful.”
“It really is,” Pearl said. “I can’t deny, having a colt friend who can--” Her words were cut off by a sudden scream, followed by frantic yelling. The two looked around in confusion before finally their eyes fell on the cause of the screams.
Scorched Legacy. The armor clad unicorn was descending on the town, his gold covered body glimmering in the sunlight and a herd of changelings flying with his carriage, which was being pulled by a pair of pegasi.
Acrylic had the momentary wonder on if this would still count as ‘relaxing’ to Pinkie Pie.