Chapter Seven
In which the Doctor is flirted with by a stallion and Twilight is broken
As they stepped down into the party, Twilight instinctively leaned back with an uncomfortable expression as she was greeted by a wall of ponies. Twilight was fine with parties if it was just her and her close friends, but parties like this, where there were ponies crowded everywhere in a giant thronging mass, and the music was turned up so loud it shook your hooves, and everyone's voices was shouting all at once....It took all Twilight had not to turn tail and flee back into her bedroom. She didn't like crowds, she really didn't like crowds, and.....Sweet Celestia somepony was touching her books. Someone had taken a book off it's shelf and was messing around with it!
She stalked over to the pony and snatched the book out of his hand with her magic "Just who do you think you are, disrespecting this library's property?" She snapped.
The stallion backed off, looking thoroughly cowed.
Twilight watched with a dirty glare straight from the depth of Tartarus as he scurried away.
"Remind me never to mess with your books" The Doctor quipped from beside her.
Twilight chose to judiciously ignore that comment, and looked around the party with distaste.
"Alright" She said "We'll split up so we can cover the ground faster. If one of us finds Pinkie, we will signal each other by...."
Her lavender eyes flicked around, before coming to rest of a light switch
"Turning the lights on and off twice"
The Doctor nodded and gave a mock salute, before disappearing into the mass of ponies, muttering under his breath "Ten instruments?" and shaking his head
Twilight began to weave through the crowd as well, looking for the source of the loud electronic music that was the epicenter of the party. If Pinkie would be anywhere, it would be there.
Soon she had shoulder-checked through a group of ponies to find the blue maned DJ, Vinyl Scratch, sitting at a turn table horn lit as she turned the volume even higher.
This close to the speakers, the vibrations were so strong they made Twilight's teeth rattle.
"VINYL!" she shouted, trying to attract the musicians attention over the wubs. Twilight had known Vinyl nearly since she had come to Ponyville, since she had been a fillyhood friend of Pinkie Pie
"YEAH?" the white unicorn shouted back, looking at the bookworm. Or at least Twilight thought she was looking at her, it was almost impossible to tell with those sunglasses.
"Have you seen Pinkie Pie?" Twilight mouthed, giving up at trying to project her voice over the rumbling bass.
Vinyl pointed a hoof over by the kitchen, and Twilight took off, mouthing words of thanks.
Meanwhile, the Doctor was also asking around.
"Excuse me sir?" He asked a dark blue pegasus, putting on a high falsetto voice "Have you seen Pinkie Pie?"
The blue pegasus look up from his cider and gave the Doctor a lopsided smile
"No, but that's alright....You're the only mare I need to see"
".....what."
"No need to be shy sweetheart, I don't bite...Not unless you want me to" the pegasus flipped his light blue mane out of his eyes and grinned.
"Ohhhh, no. No thank you" The Doctor began to back up "I really need to find Pinkie-"
"Oh, come on, baby. Don't leave so quickly"
"Star Hunter!" A familiar airy voice snapped "Stop harassing that poor mare....That's the third time today! Go on! Get!"
The pegasus, Star Hunter, scurried away sharpish as Rarity stepped over to the Doctor, flouncing her mane.
"I'm so sorry about that, Darling" The white unicorn apologized breezily "Star Hunter is a terrible flirt, especially after a mug of cider...Have we met before?"
Her sapphire eyes narrowed as she looked over the disguised Doctor over appraisingly, eyeing the pink saddle with distaste.
"No, I don't think so" The Doctor said.
"Well, I insist you let me give you a makeover! That saddle is atrocious...No offense intended mind. I think a nice cobalt color would suit you better, it would bring out your eyes. They're really quite lovely, very striking. Here, why don't you come over to the mirror here, we'll get that unfortunate saddle off you and I can fix up your mane as well"
"No thank you, I'm fine" The Doctor said hurriedly, he knew from Twilight that Rarity was highly observant, and if she had found him familiar before, as soon as she saw his cutie mark she would surely put two and two together. That would be a very awkward situation to explain "I'm extremely attached to this saddle. It was my grandmother's"
"Well that's probably why it's a bit old fashioned" Rarity said, not to be dissuaded
"She's gone now" the Doctor added
"Oh....Well.... Never mind" Rarity said, finally backing off
"Thank you, I-"
"I'll just do your hair then" The white unicorn forcibly dragged the Doctor over to Twilight's guest bathroom and began pulling all sorts of beauty products from various drawers. The Doctor gave a long-suffering sigh. He hoped Twilight was having better luck.
Twilight winced, if the main room of the library had been crowded, the kitchen was ten times worse. There were an assortment of delectable snacks sitting on every available counter top surface, and just as many hungry hooves reaching out to pick and choose through the selection. Twilight herself even picked up a small brownie despite her better sense telling her that finding Pinkie was more important than all the amazing food. She rationalized that the chocolate would help her de-stress a little.
As she wove and dodged though the living wall of ponies, she was briefly distracted and she bumped a hoof into a table and smacked straight into an orange earth pony with a stetson stubbornly planted on her head despite the fact they were indoors.
"Tarnation!" The pony yelped as she was briefly knocked of balance. The drink she was holding nearly spilled, but the earth pony deftly regained her equilibrium, righting the cup and and pushing her hat back into it's proper position on her head. Twilight was struck briefly with a pang of jealousy at the grace earth ponies possessed on the ground, she didn't think she had ever seen one trip over their own hooves like she often did.
"I am so sorry!" She apologized.
"It's alright, Sugarcube" Applejack said smoothly "No harm done"
"Would you happen to know where Pinkie Pie is?" Twilight asked.
"Can't say I do" the orange earth pony replied "She passed by not ten minutes ago but I have no idea where she went off too...some party, huh?"
"Yeah" Twilight replied, not wanting to be sidetracked, but also not wanting to be rude
"I feel a bit sorry for Twilight though" Applejack said conversationally "She seemed pretty dead set in insisting that her and that stallion, Turner, were just friends...you know Rarity though. I personally have never been one for getting all up in somepony else business, but that unicorn is always throwing herself at that sorta thing. She's still one 'a my best friends of course, I just think she needs to lay off the drama sometimes"
That was AJ for you, frank and down to earth. Though she was stubborn, and sometimes a bit narrow-minded, she was always the one Twilight trusted for advice.
"Well" Twilight said "I need to keep looking for Pinkie, but thank you"
"Anytime, Twi" Applejack said with a wink, before trotting off into the crowd.
It took the purple unicorn a moment to realize that AJ had seen through her disguise the whole time, and she couldn't help but chuckle. Applejack might not have Rarity's extreme attention to detail, or Pinkie's impossible ability to recognize anyone past even the best disguise or years since last seeing them, but she knew her friends.
She ducked back into the crowd, searching for Pinkie.
"Tada! It looks fabulous, Darling!" a mirror was levitated in front of the Doctor.
Now the ruler-straight bangs that Twilight had styled his mane in were swept to the side,framing the right side of his face, and the rest of his hair hung in bouncy waves. If he had looked like a girl before, it was now ten times worse.
"It look's....Great" He lied, forcing a smile. If Twilight were there, she would have been laughing her flank off.
"That's wonderful!" Rarity gushed, then sighed "You haven't seen Twilight Sparkle at the party, have you? She sort of disappeared early on"
"No. Can't say I have"
Rarity nodded "Didn't think so.... but it was worth a shot. I think she slipped out while I wasn't watching...I just don't get it, why would she would be so unhappy with this? Doesn't she want me to be happy for her? Why would she keep lying to me?"
"Have you ever thought that maybe she was telling the truth? Like you said, what reason would she have for lying?"
Rarity paused, the hair brush she had been running through her mane pausing and hovering within her telekinesis. "Oh...Oh, my...and by continuing to push the issue I was just..."
"Further mortifying her? Probably."
"I've got to go find her!" Rarity said hurriedly, returning all the beautification items to their drawers, exiting the bathroom door and making to exit the library.
The Doctor followed behind "You should probably look around the library first" he said in an attempt at detering her. The library was probably the safest place for them to be considering all the protection wards the paranoid Twilight had put over it. "In case she's still here"
"Good idea!" Rarity chirped, the Doctor gave a relieved sigh. It would have been highly unfortunate for the unicorn to bump into a scarisprite while looking for Twilight.
He went back to the search, eyes roving for a hint of the bubblegum pink fur and mane.
"Pinkie Pie!" He called "Hello? Pinkie?"
"Hi Doctor!"
"Gah!" The brown stallion leaped almost a foot into the air "Pinkie!"
"Yup!" The magenta pony said brightly
"Twilight and I were looking everywhere for you!" The Doctor said.
"Well why didn't you call sooner?" Pinkie Pie giggled, giving a small snort at the end "You look like a mare!"
The Doctor's ears folded back in annoyance "I am well aware of that Pinkie. Now let's go grab Twilight"
Pinkie Pie saluted and began to bounce off, before the Doctor grabbed a hold of her tail.
"Hold on Pinki- Oof!" He lost his grip and smacked into the floor of the library "We're supposed to turn the lights on and off again!"
"Lights Shmights!" Pinkie chirruped, trotting into the crowd "I can find Twi faster that she'll be able to make her way over to us!"
The Doctor shrugged, he couldn't really argue with that logic. Rubbing his now sore back, he followed after her.
Twilight huffed angrily. All this searching and she still hadn't seen a trace of Pinkie Pie! She began looking though the smaller rooms branching off from the main ones, even checking inside closets.
"Eep!" A small voice cried as she threw open a door to the left wing of her library, inside she saw Fluttershy consoling a thoroughly shell-shocked Spike.
"Oh!" She said softly "You startled me..."
Spike simply whimpered, and the yellow pegasus, hearing the noise, looked back to him.
"It's okay Spike...Just because they're dating doesn't mean anything will change....Well I guess a couple of things will change, I mean, they might kiss now or-"
"K-Kiss?" Spike said, eyes contracting into pinpricks "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Twilight facehoofed "I think I'll just go now" she said slowly, backing out of the room and shutting the door behind her and turned around.
"HI TWILIGHT!" a voice screamed into her ear
The purple unicorn jumped backwards, hooves pinwheeling, while making a noise similar to that of a sqeaky toy being squished by a ton of bricks, before tripping and ending up flat on her back on the floor.
Pinkie Pie just laughed "Found you!"
Behind her, the Doctor waved a hoof "Hey Sparky"
Twilight made some more incoherent squeaks.
"Oh, dear..." The Doctor said "I think you broke her Pinkie"
Pinkie Pie frowned, looking at her purple friend "Twilight? Are you broken?"
The unicorn rose, wheezing "Not unless you count getting the wind knocked out of you as broken"
"Oh....Yay!"
Twilight rolled her eyes, then chuckled. Pinkie Pie was..well...Pinkie Pie. Speaking of which...
"Hey Pinkie, you still got that tuba?"
In response, the pony reached into her fluffy mane and pulled the large, shining brass instrument out "Do I ever not have my tuba?"
The Doctor meanwhile, looked like he was having a mental short circuit "I...but...She...How....Tuba?....Whaaaaaaa? That...That's not.....but..."
Twilight giggled "You know, you always surprise me so much that sometimes I forget that you can be surprised too"
The Doctor pulled himself up, grinning "Just because I know a lot already doesn't mean I can't still learn something new every day"
Twilight laughed and shook her head. It was just another part of the paradox of the Doctor. He was the stallion who drove her half out of her mind with his antics, but had quickly become one of her best friends. He was the stallion that challenged everything she had always known and accepted about the world, while at the same time possessing the same joy in life and love for learning that she held so close to her heart. The stallion who had showed her the brightness of the stars, as well as the ever-consuming darkness that twisted through the universe as well. The stallion who had laughed like a foal with her as she spun around in zero gravity outside the TARDIS doors, and yet was so sad, so old.
She smirked at him, quipping snarkily "Like learning how to make your hair that fabulous?"
The Doctor put his hooves to his girly hairdo, pouting "I got ambushed by Rarity, alright? I had no choice in the matter"
Both Pinkie and Twilight began to laugh hysterically.
"Can you just make it normal again?" He asked
"What's the magic word?" Twilight cooed
"Please."
The purple unicorn lit her horn, and the Doctor's hair returned to it's usual state with a *Foomph*
"C'mon, lets go" There was a crack, the smell of ozone, and the trio were gone.