Derpy Hooves trotted across Ponyville's Main Square lost in thought. Ever since she had brought it up to Lyra a couple of weeks ago, she couldn't stop thinking about some of the show's plot holes. She had always noticed some of these errors before, but she brushed her concerns aside without much thought just like everypony else. However, the more she thought about things, the more questions popped up in her head.
"And come to think of it, our technology is completely all over the place. I know were supposed to be more old fashioned, but how does that explain that high powered hair drier, or that computer Twilight likes to use? Moreover, is Equestria the name of the country or the name of the planet? We never really explained that part very well in the show." Derpy scratched the back of her head as she tried to figure everything out. "Maybe I'm just over-thinking things," she finally decided.
Derpy continued down the street when she noticed a group of three ponies coming her way in full gallop. She recognized the three as the flower trio of Daisy, Lily, and Roseluck, and she also quick to notice that the three of them looked as if they were running away from something in horror.
"Everypony run for your lives!" Daisy warned.
"She's cursed! She's possessed! She'll destroy us all!" Lily yelled in horror.
"She's on her way! We don't have much time!" Roseluck shouted.
Derpy looked on in confusion. She didn't know what could have caused the trio to panic like this. Then again these three have been known to lose their heads over spilled milk, so it could have been any number of things that spooked the flower girls. Still, she had to know what in the world was going on with the three.
"What's the emergency?" Derpy asked them.
"It's Pinkie Pie!" Roseluck answered. "She's terrorizing Ponyville!"
"Huh? Are you sure? That doesn't sound like her."
"That's just it. She's not acting like her normal self. She's angry!" Daisy elaborated.
"Even so, it's still not like Pinkie Pie to be so angry that she's scaring everypony. Just how angry is she?" Derpy asked.
Before Daisy had a chance to respond, she was suddenly shoved from behind and she and Derpy both fell to the ground. The pegasus recovered just in time to see Pinkie Pie walk past them. Well, it looked like Pinkie Pie at least. The cutie mark was definitely Pinkie's, but her mane and tail were flat, her colors were noticeably duller than usual, and her face... her face was beyond mad. This was the type of anger that would make Fluttershy at the gala cringe. It would make Twilight's rage explosion in 'Feeling Pinkie Keen' look like a candle. Speaking of 'Feeling Pinkie Keen', how could Twilight learning her lesson be a bigger 'doozy' than a scary Hydra anyway? Wait! Now wasn't the time for that! There was a rampaging Pinkie Pie storming down the street that needed her attention.
"What’s gotten into her?" Derpy wondered.
Lily shrugged. "How are we suppose to know? She kept muttering something about ‘Equestria Girls’. Do you have any idea what that's supposed to mean, Derpy?"
Derpy froze.
"Uh... Derpy? Anypony home?" Roseluck waved her hoof in front of the pegasus' face.
"Sorry, but I gotta go!" Derpy apologized.
She wasted not time to launch herself into the air, flying at full speed to get ahead of the rampaging pony. If the source of Pinkie's extreme anger was related to 'Equestria Girls', that meant only one thing; Lyra was in very deep trouble. The grey pegasus flew faster than she ever remembered to get to Lyra and Bon Bon's house before Pinkie. She arrived at their house and pounded on their front door. The sudden loud knocking was met fairly quickly as Bon Bon opened the door.
"Derpy! What brings you over?" she asked.
"I need to talk to Lyra now! It’s an emergency!" Derpy shouted.
"Emergency? Did something bad happen?"
Derpy shook her head. "Not yet, but it might if we don’t hurry!"
"Calm down Derpy, just tell me what's going on!"
The sudden noise at the entryway stirred Lyra from her room upstairs. "Bon Bon? I heard shouting. Is everything all right?" The green unicorn walked down the stairs to see what all the commotion was all about. She was quick to notice their visitor. "Derpy? What brings you over here?"
The pegasus flew straight to to her. "Lyra! Pinkie’s on her way over here!!! You have to run!!!" she shouted.
Lyra arched her eyebrow in confusion. "Run from Pinkie? Why?"
Derpy held Lyra by her shoulders as she broke the news. "Lyra, she knows! And she's not happy!"
Lyra's pupils shrunk in fear. "She isn't?!?"
"She knows? She knows what?" Bon Bon asked, trying to get a handle on what the two were worried about.
Lyra gulped. "I never told you what I was doing with Derpy and the Changelings a few weeks ago, did I Bon Bon?"
That question was more than enough for her to figure out that Lyra must have done something that got out of hoof. "Lyra…. What did you do?" she asked.
Lyra and Derpy began to laugh nervously.
"Well you see, I kinda shot a movie behind Pinkie’s back."
"And I kinda sent it to Hasbro by accident."
Bon Bon's jaw dropped. "WHAT?"
"I didn't mean for things to get this out of hoof, I swear!" Lyra explained. "When they all rejected 'Equestria Girls', I decided to shot it anyway as a surprise for Pinkie and her friends, and no one else."
"Lyra..." The earth pony groaned.
"I wasn't ready to give up on my project," Lyra continued. "I figured that they needed more evidence to see that this idea could work, so I shot the full movie so they could see for themselves just what I had planned. It just wound up in the wrong hooves at the end."
"And that part was all my fault!" Derpy added. "I tried to deliver it to the library, but I got curious, I explored the basement, and the next thing I knew, I accidentally sent the movie through the submission machine. Trust me, Lyra wouldn't have gone to Hasbro herself if she could help it!"
Bon Bon sighed as she finished hearing the story. "So that's whats been going on this past month. I knew there was something odd with all those random trips you took."
"Well, you said that you didn't want anything to do with it Bon Bon. So that's why I never said anything."
"Well I did say that, but it still would have been nice to know what exactly my roommate and best friend was up to this past month," Bon Bon pointed out.
Lyra's head lowered a bit. "You're not mad?"
Surprisingly to her, Bon Bon giggled. "Why should I be mad? This was your dream after all, wasn't it?"
"Thanks for understanding, Bon Bon" Lyra smiled.
Derpy suddenly spoke up, breaking the moment between the two roommates. "We don't have time for this right now! Pinkie's on her way over here! We have to run!"
"Calm down Derpy," Bon Bon replied calmly. "We'll just calmly explain everything to her the same way you explained it to me. Pinkie's a reasonable pony. I'm sure she'll understand."
SLAM!!!
The three ponies were interrupted as the front door slammed open. They all quickly turned to see that Pinkie Pie had barged right in, knocking the door completely over. Her flat mane came as a shock to Lyra and Bon Bon, as did the angry scowl that was currently pointed directly at Lyra.
"Then again, I could be wrong!" Bon Bon corrected herself.
Lyra laughed nervously, hoping desperately to lighten the mood as she talked to the ticked off newcomer. "Pinkie! You’re back! So how was Las Pegasus?"
"Funny you should mention that," Pinkie spoke in an eerily calm tone. "It was fine, up until I got back to Ponyville and got a message from Hasbro. Apparently they got a hold of a movie that we never approved."
Lyra began to sweat bullets under Pinkie's glare. "Oh yeah, that. Heh... well you see…"
"Pinkie, it was all my fault!" Derpy suddenly blurted out. "She didn’t mean to go to Hasbro like that! She meant to show it just to you first as a surprise but I accidentally sent it!"
"Don’t cover for this traitor!!!" Pinkie snapped. The three were taken aback at how the insult seemed to have come out of nowhere.
Bon Bon was quick to reply to Pinkie. "It’s true. Lyra and Derpy told me everything!"
"And you can even ask Octavia, Vinyl, Time Turner, or even Chrysalis & Discord!" Derpy added. "They were there with us too, and they all know what Lyra really wanted to do with ‘Equestria Girls’ when it was finished!"
Pinkie took a look at the two, taking in their rebuttals. She eventually shook her head. "Even if all that was true, it doesn’t matter anymore. Hasbro already made their decision."
"They did?" Lyra asked.
In response, Pinkie threw the copy of the poster over to Lyra. The unicorn took a hold of of the paper and laid it out so that Derpy and Bon Bon can see it as well. The three all gasped when they saw the big 'Coming Soon' line underneath the main logo, as well as the official Hasbro logo on the bottom corner. Those two details could mean two thing. Not only was 'Equestria Girls' approved, but it was actually getting an official release! Lyra was at a complete loss for words as she continued to look at the promo poster for her own work.
"Hasbro said yes!" Derpy cheered.
"What do you know, they actually liked it after all," Bon Bon thought out loud.
After getting over the initial shock, Lyra smiled in astonishment. "I did it! I DID IT!!!"
Derpy hugged Lyra in celebration of her accomplishment. "I knew you could do it Lyra!"
"Derpy, Hasbro liked it! They really liked it!" Lyra shouted. "Do you know what this means?"
"I’ll tell you exactly what it means," Pinkie shouted, her harsh tone putting an abrupt end to the celebration. "It means you killed ‘Friendship is Magic'!"
The statement took the three by surprise. "What? What do you mean by that?" Derpy asked.
"When this ‘movie’ gets released," Pinkie explained. "We’re going to have a major backlash on our hooves from the fans, and a huge chunk of them could go as far as stop watching us all together!"
"Huh? But how could Hasbro say yes even with all that?" Bon Bon asked.
Pinkie frowned. "Do you really think that Hasbro would say no to a new chance to sell some more toys?"
Bon-Bon took another look at the poster. "I don’t understand. How do you know that they'll be a huge backlash?"
Pinkie grabbed the poster and shoved it into Bon Bon's face. "JUST LOOK AT IT!!! This thing does not represent what the show is about. It's an insult to Lauren's vision for the show!"
"Wait, you’re not being fair!" Lyra shouted back, hoping to defend her project. "I think if you give it a chance, then you’ll see that the message of friendship is still..."
"Speaking of friendships, Lyra..." Pinkie interrupted as she began to approach the green unicorn, "There’s something I need to tell you."
Lyra tried to back away from the angry Pinkie until she bumped into the nearby wall. She shuddered in fear and discomfort as Pinkie got right into her face, their noses touching during the tense faceoff.
"You knew," Pinkie simply said.
"I knew what?" Lyra stammered.
"You knew just how much the show means to me, and I trusted that you would keep that in mind when you started this project. But you went and did this when any number of things could have gone wrong." Pinkie backed away from Lyra and began to pace back and forth as she went on. "It didn’t have to be submitting the tape by accident. It could have been anything. What if you used the live cameras instead and it went straight to the Hub? Or what if Hasbro came to visit and saw a production being made without internal permission? How do you think they would see us then, huh?"
Lyra felt more and more foolish while Pinkie laid out her points. "I never realized that…"
Pinkie scoffed. "Of course you didn’t realize. You never think, do you?"
Up until that point, Lyra had managed to maintain a brave face. However, she found herself teetering on the verge of breaking down as Pinkie chewed her out. Her lips trembled as she tried to hold back her tears.
"Pinkie, you’re being too harsh!" Bon Bon shouted in defense of her roommate.
"For something this important, I don’t think I’m being harsh enough." Pinkie argued back. "Didn’t you realize in all of this that there was a chance you could have ruined everything, Lyra? Not just for the show, but for all of Equestria?!?"
"I’m sorry…" Lyra said in a small voice..
"Well, congratulations," Pinkie said sarcastically. "You have you’re movie. Now take your poster and get out of Ponyville. You’re no longer welcome on the show."
Lyra's tear-filled eyes shrunk. "No…"
"Pinkie, you can’t do that!" Derpy shouted.
"I can, and I did!" Pinkie then turned around to exit the house. "Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to poof my mane back up."
Lyra tried to speak up one more time to reach out in vain to the departing pony. "I was only trying to help."
Pinkie stopped at the door as she heard Lyra's words. "If you really wanted to help, you should have just stayed in the background where you belong." With that, Pinkie left the house, slamming the door shut.
Lyra couldn't speak. She could barely even think. She just stood there as Pinkie's final words sunk in. The tears she was desperately trying to hold back during Pinkie's rant started to flow freely down her face. All of her accomplishments didn't matter. She had lost everything. The banishment from the show was bad enough, but that paled in comparison to Pinkie's parting shot. It was clear now. She didn't belong. She had no place on the show. She didn't even deserve to be a background pony. Yes, Pinkie made it clear. She was nothing.
Lyra abruptly ran up to her room crying. Bon Bon chased her friend in order to try the impossible task of cheering her up. Derpy didn't follow her, though. While she was deeply concerned for Lyra now more than ever, she couldn't help to be stunned at how Pinkie Pie was acting back there. Anger boiled inside the grey pegasus. There was no way the so-called Element of Laughter could be left off the hook for her behavior.
Derpy flew out of the house and down the streets, looking to track Pinkie down. It didn't take her long to catch up to the still furious earth pony fuming down the streets a few blocks away.
"PINKAMENA DIANE PIE!!!" she shouted as she got within earshot of her.
The sudden shouting of her full name caught her by surprise. Pinkie turned around to see an angry Derpy hovering just behind her. "What do you want, Derpy?" she groaned.
"You go back and apologize to Lyra right now!" Derpy shouted, pointing back towards Lyra's house.
Pinkie wasn't in the mood to argue. She turned back and continued walking. "I have nothing to apologize for."
Derpy frowned. Pinkie wasn't going to get out of this that easy. She continued following her down the street. "What about all those mean things you said to Lyra!"
"She deserved every second of that."
"No she didn’t! She never meant for anything bad to happen. She just wanted to surprise you."
"Well, it was a terrible surprise."
"But it still doesn’t give you the right to be this mad!"
"You saw the poster, Derpy. You saw how bad it was!"
Derpy landed in front of Pinkie, going face to face with the pink pony. Her own anger was slowly starting to match Pinkie's. "For your information, I was Lyra’s main camerapony for this. So yes, I saw every second of ‘Equestria Girls’. And I thought it was fine! How much of it have you seen, anyway?"
Pinkie hesitated before responding. "OK, I’ll admit I’ve only seen that one poster so far."
The revelation left Derpy slack-jawed in disbelief. "How can you just barge right in and say all these things about Lyra and ‘Equestria Girls’ when you only looked at that promo poster?"
"Ugh… I don’t have time for this. You know how much work we put into the show, Derpy."
"Well do you know how much work Lyra put into ‘Equestria Girls’? Do you know how exhausted she was while we made it? Do you know how much she stressed over the littlest things? She tried so hard to try to recreate what you girls do every week, and I think she did a good job."
Pinkie scoffed. "I find that hard to believe. She doesn’t understand the show like I do."
"Pinkie, listen to yourself, you’re starting to sound worse than the fans you… YOU HYPOCRITE!!!"
Pinkie eyes narrowed. "What did you say?"
"Weren’t you the one who said that we shouldn’t worry about the fans’ reactions anymore? And now here you are overreacting over something you haven’t even seen yet just like a fan who has nothing better to do than to nitpick every single aspect of the show! What do you think your friends would say if they saw you like this? What would Lauren say?"
"Don’t you dare bring her into this!"
Derpy ignored the warning. "The way I see it right now, ‘Equestria Girls’ isn’t the insult to Lauren’s vision. It’s YOU!!!"
The next thing the grey pegasus knew was that a pink blur was lunging towards her in rage. Her instincts kicked in, thankfully and she flew upwards beyond the earth pony's reach before any harm came to her. Pinkie kept leaping to the air in pure rage, trying to get the insubordinate pegasus down.
"TAKE THAT BACK!!!" she screamed to the airborne Derpy.
"Only if you take back what you said to Lyra. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go check up on my friend."
Pinkie could not believe Derpy. "How can you still stick up for her? You know what happens if you lose a friend's trust!"
Derpy sighed sadly. "Pinkie, if losing a friend’s trust is the fastest way to lose a friend, not forgiving a friend is the fastest way to stay alone forever."
Pinkie opened her mouth to counter that point, but nothing came out. Having had her say and with Pinkie unable to respond, Derpy took off. Pinkie stood alone for a few seconds before letting off an annoyed groan and continuing back to Sugarcube Corner.
Flying not to far from the ground, Derpy headed back to Lyra and Bon Bon. She was still angry overall, but she felt a bit better after she let off some steam from that argument with Pinkie. It might have been foolish to stand up to an angry, straight-maned Pinkie Pie, but somepony needed to let her know her behavior was crossing a line. At any rate, Pinkie wasn't a concern for her anymore. It was Lyra. It was going to take more than muffins to make Lyra feel better this time. As a good friend, Derpy was ready to do everything in her power to help.
On her way back, however, Derpy noticed the familiar form of Twilight Sparkle walking down the street. As she got closer, she noticed that Twilight seemed to have been through a war zone. Her mane and tail were unkempt. Her wings looked to have been battered, and she was sporting several bandages from various cuts and scrapes. Despite all that, she kept walking down the street levitating a clipboard and quill in front of her.
"Ok, so the restoration spell at Sugarcube Corner is done," the purple alicorn said to herself, seemingly worn out from a major ordeal. "Now we have to figure out a way to calm him down before we try to deal with Pinkie."
"Twilight?" Derpy asked from the air. Turning around, Twilight noticed the grey pegasus landing besides her.
"Oh, hi Derpy." she said, not bothering to hide the exasperation she was going through.
"What happened to you? You look awful!"
"Well, long story short, we found out about 'Equestria Girls'," Twilight explained.
"I figured that much. I ran into Pinkie just a while ago." Derpy replied looking fairly annoyed as her recent argument replayed in her head. "You girls won't believe what she just did. She went over to Lyra's and..."
"One thing at a time Derpy!" Twilight suddenly interrupted. "We've got a bigger problem."
"What could be a bigger problem right now than Pinkie?"
"Spike," Twilight replied. "He found out about his role in the movie."
"Uh oh..." Derpy cringed as she connected the dots. She remembered the conversation about making Spike a dog vs something else, and she remembered Lyra deciding that the canine Spike would be a placeholder before she got a chance to retool it after consulting with Pinkie like she originally planned. However, now that the movie was being released as is, Spike the dog was here to stay.
"Sooo... how did he take it, Twilight?"
At that moment, Applejack, Rainbow Dash and Rarity slowly passed by, trying to drag a wooden crate down the street. The crate was jerking left and right as its occupant continued to react violently. Fluttershy floated just overhead to make sure the crate was handled as gently as possible. A warning label was placed on the crate's side. 'Caution! Angry baby dragon inside! Handle with care!' it read. Derpy was quick to notice that all of them looked about as torn up and worn out as Twilight.
"I’LL GET HER!!! LET ME OUT OF HERE!!! I’LL SEND HER TO OBEDIENCE SCHOOL MYSELF!!! I'LL TEACH HER TO SIT DOWN AND BEG FOR MERCY!!!" a voice rampaged from inside the crate.
"We’re sorry we had to do this Spike, but this is for your own safety," Fluttershy apologized to the rampaging occupant.
"How much longer until we get to the library? I don't think I can take anymore of this!" Rarity complained as she struggled with the crate.
"If you stopped complaining we would have been there by now!" Rainbow Dash grunted.
"Quit your belly-aching, both of you, and push!" Applejack shouted.
Derpy watched stunned frozen as the four ponies continued to move the crate to the library.
"Overall, I think Spike is taking it pretty well," Twilight observed.