Twilight Sparkle was completely insane.
Don't try to argue with it, okay? After being trapped in the library's closet, guarded by that owl with those beady, all-seeing eyes, Pinkie was quite convinced Twilight was completely insane.
She had been trapped in here for days. Twilight would always bring her breakfast, lunch, and dinner with whatever choice of drink Pinkie requested. At breakfast and lunch, Twilight would leave her alone, but at dinner, she would eat with her.
"Mm." Pinkie traced her hoof along the wall, trying to find a seam or splinter that she could punch out and maybe make an escape.
Owloyicous started hooting wildly and loudly. The closet door swung open, pushed by Twilight's hoof.
"Oh...trying to escape again, sweetie?" Twilight said bemusedly. "Now, now...you know we can't have that."
"Twilight!" Pinkie pleaded. "Please let me go! This isn't right, keeping me here like this!"
Twilight looked confused, then blew it off with a chuckle. "Oh... Am I going to have to use my horn on you again?"
Pinkie backed against the wall, remembering what happened the last time Twilight used her horn. "No! No. It's fine. I'll stay put."
"I don't think you will." Twilight said coldly, approaching. Pinkie had nowhere to run, stuck in this blasted closet. Twilight put her hooves on Pinkie's shoulders and pressed against them, pinning her.
"Please don't." Pinkie whimpered weakly.
Twilight's horn lit up, sending out two small beams of pinkish light from it. They swirled around and around like the lights on a police siren. Pinkie had no choice but to look at it. Even she tried looking at the wall, the light was still visible and drew her attention. She could feel herself being pulled in, deeper and deeper, her eyes becoming glazed.
"Now...say it." Twilight instructed confidently.
"I...love...yooou." Pinkie drawled, enchanted and spellbound. She hugged Twilight back and leaned for a kiss with closed eyes. Twilight moaned quietly before they were done.
"Good." Twilight patted Pinkie on the neck. "Now you'll stay, won't you?"
"Yes..." Pinkie said, still entranced.
Pinkie bolted out of her covers, her mouth a squiggly line of fret and worry.
Twilight wouldn't do that...would she?
Pinkie curled her hooves around the edges of her blanket. She put the blanket over her snout and whimpered a little.
"Pinkie Pie?" Mrs. Cake called from below, on the lower floor of Sugarcube Corner. "Are you all right up there, dear?"
Pinkie wasn't going to lie.
"No!"
"No!?"
Mrs. and Mr. Cake were in Pinkie's room in almost the time it took Pinkie to appear mysteriously like she always did.
"What's wrong, dear?" Mr. Cake asked, sitting on the bed and draping a fatherly leg around Pinkie's neck.
"I had a bad dream." Pinkie answered, but she wasn't really willing to discuss anymore than that.
"Oh, dear. Do you want to talk about it? Maybe have a chocolate bar?"
"Chocolate would be good..." Pinkie muttered, looking down. Being a baker, she knew chocolate always made ponies cheer up. (Though she had rather painfully discovered how some ponies needed a LOT more cheering up than just a bar of chocolate would allow.)
Mrs. Cake left the room and returned with a very large chocolate bar the size of a ruler. Anypony else would gorge on it and get sick, but Pinkie had a bottomless pit for a stomach. The chocolate probably wouldn't even be a crumb's worth to her. She took it and began to nibble it on slowly.
"Oh...must've been one heck of a dream." Mr. Cake noted at Pinkie's abnormal slow eating.
"Ooooh!" Mrs. Cake made a very displeased high-pitched squeal. "Isn't there anything else we can do?"
Pinkie bit on her chocolate and shook her head no.
"Drat." Mrs. Cake looked away, upset she couldn't do anything for her number one baker.
"Tell ya what, kiddo." Mr. Cake said. "Why don't you take the day off? You're our best baker- besides ourselves, of course- but you're no good to anypony if you're head isn't on straight."
"Okay..." Pinkie muttered, still nibbling on her chocolate. Mrs. Cake was almost ready to declare a world record: "Longest Time its Taken Pinkie to Eat a Sweet".
"Have a nice day, Mr. and Mrs. Cake." Pinkie half-heartedly waved at them as she jumped out of bed, leaving the chocolate bar's wrapping abandoned on her sheets. "I need to go talk to a friend."
"Do whatever you think will make you feel better." Mr. Cake told her as she took her first step down the stairs.
After going from one end to the other, Pinkie found herself stopping at the Corner's bottom floor. She looked at the counter, where last night's incident had taken place. Thinking in some makes-sense-to-Pinkie-Pie way, she went up to the counter and traced her hoof across its surface. In hope that would somehow shed light on just what it WAS that Twilight did last night.
Pinkie could only for a moment recall what Twilight's tongue had tasted like on hers. Ink. Probably from all those library books she was always reading. Fancy, high-priced good quality ink, too.
Taking a forlorn last glance at the counter, Pinkie started trying to prepare herself.
Come on, Pinkie. You can do this. You're a big girl now.
With that reminder firmly in her mind, Pinkie took in a deep breath and puffed her chest out high, intent on showing she wasn't afraid of anything the wide-wide world of Equestria had to throw at her!
Only for the breath she was holding to flow out of her nose like a deflating balloon...
Shaking that aside, Pinkie bravely trotted out Sugarcube Corner and up to...*gulp* Twilight's library.
Pinkie didn't want to do this. But she gave the door an impatient knock anyways.
The door creaked open to reveal a very...normal looking Twilight.
"Oh! Hey, Pinkie Pie. Come to pick up a book?" Twilight asked jovially. Cheerfully. Joyfully.
Like absolutely nothing had happened.
"Um, actually, Twilight, I wanted to talk to you." Pinkie said hesitantly.
"Oh?" It was really unnerving how cheerful Twilight was being. "About?"
Pinkie creased her eyebrows. "About last night?...On the counter? Where you kissed me?"
Twilight's demeanor switched like...like...like a switched being thrown. Her irises shrunk, her eyes twitching. The base of her tail arched up. Pinkie got the feeling Twilight was going to sprout fangs, bite into her neck, and then propped her up in a display case in some twisted way of 'uniting' them like in a horror movie.
But instead, Twilight just slapped on a very, very forced smiled and chuckled airily. "Hahahah! I have...NO idea...absolutely no idea...at all...what you're talking about, Pinkie Pie! Ha ha ha. Ha..."
Pinkie frowned. The change in her expression seemed to provoke another mood swing from Twilight.
"Oh...don't do that, Pinkie Pie." Twilight said sympathetically. "You look terrible when you frown. It's not right when you frown..."
Pinkie switched to a pout.
"Don't do that either. That's even-" Twilight's voice started to crack. "-Wyyooorrsee...st-stop that. I said stop- AAAA I CAN'T HANDLE SEEING THAT ON YOUR FACE!"
Twilight shut the door. She didn't even slam it; she just shut it quietly.
Pinkie was even more confused now than she had been before. She knocked on the door repeatedly, hoping to coax Twilight back out so she could try to get to the bottom of the mystery. "Twilight! Twilight! Twilight, come back out!"
Twilight did, eventually...wearing an open book over her head, with Spike similar wearing a book on his, and that durn owl in Twilight's hoof, appearing to know just as much as Pinkie did about what was going on. Twilight sat down on her fours and pointed Owloyicous like a gun. "Sargent Spike! The enemy has detected our position! Open fire! Pew! Pew! Pew!" She shook the poor owl in her hoof, making laser noises, pretending he was some sort of weapon. "Pew! Pew!"
Pinkie turned to Spike. Spike shrugged.
Twilight quit shaking Owloyicous and gave Pinkie a filthy look. "I'm going to keep doing this until you leave." Her tone strongly suggested she was aware of how delusional she was acting. "Or if this doesn't work, I'll go back inside and think of something else to pretend to be."
"Okay...um." Pinkie turned to leave. "See you later?"
"Yes!" Twilight answered excitedly, wrapping her hooves around poor, poor Owloyicous like a plushie animal. She turned her head away and spoke in a cold detached tone. "I mean, maybe...if you want to. I guess."
Pinkie made an 'o' of confusion with her mouth and then started to walk away from the door. She heard it close behind her, followed by Twilight making a very frustrated groan, and Spike questioning what was wrong.
"Hmm..." Pinkie dejectedly walked away, her head hung so low it almost touched the grass. She was blindsided by a roving blue blur that knocked her to her side.
"Ah-heh...my bad, Pinks." Rainbow Dash apologized, lying parallel on top of Pinkie's side. "Here..." Dash got up and gave Pinkie a helping hoof up. Even as inattentive and insensitive as she was, even Rainbow Dash could pick up on Pinkie's dull mood. A pony would have to be completely blind to not notice Pinkie not being a hyperactive ball of energy. "Heeey! What's wrong?"
Pinkie looked away, trying to come up with an explanation. She didn't want Twilight to get in trouble for her own lack of knowledge. "Uh...somepony kissed me."
Dash raised an eyebrow. "Why would they do that? Not that you're not pretty or anything, but..."
"You think I'm pretty, Rainbow Dash?"
"Eehh...not really. I just didn't want you to feel like I was insulting you. At least, not when I wasn't."
Pinkie ignored Rainbow Dash's comment and decided to explain more about it. "No, they didn't just kiss me, they REALLY kissed me. Like, they put their tongue in my mouth..."
Then, Pinkie had a strange feeling creep up on her. Why wouldn't she be pretty? ...Why did she care if she was pretty or not? For some reason, it stuck at Pinkie's mind, Dash's comment. Maybe she just wanted to be told she was pretty, even if she wasn't?
Rainbow Dash looked confused. "I have...no clue what that's supposed to mean. Is that some sort of euphemism? Oh! You know what you should do? You should talk to Rarity. She knows about this kind of stuff. (I think.) Later!"
Dash hovered into the air and took off at speeds that could burn small insects, leaving Pinkie to consider her advice.
Pinkie shrugged and decided to do it. At least it was a lead, and that alone made it her best chance at getting any better understanding of the situation. She just hoped Rarity really did know something about it.
Bouncing her way to the Carousel Boutique, Pinkie entered to find Rarity ranting to her cat Opalescence about a client.
"I mean, really! Of all the nerve, how dare- Oh, hello, darling!" Rarity's mood switched tunes at the sight of Pinkie. "Does your dress I made need fixing? How did the date go, if I may be so bold for asking?"
"The date went fine." Pinkie answered. "It's what happened after that's bugging me."
"Oh?" Rarity sauntered over to her friend, her diamond eyes glistening with concern. "You can tell me anything, darling. What's troubling you?"
The door chime for the Carousel Boutique ran, and both Pinkie and Rarity were startled to see Twilight enter- holding her nice gray dress neatly folded in her hooves, no less.
"Hey, Rarit-tieeeee..." Whatever Twilight wanted, she didn't appear to be willing to stay too close to Pinkie to get it.
"What is it? Does your dress need fixing?" Rarity inquired.
Twilight started backing out of the Boutique, a sound like a forklift in reverse emanating from her as she did so.
"Twilight? Twilight Sparkle! Come back! What's wrong? Ooh..." Rarity sighed and shook her head. "I love the poor thing to death, but Twilight really has to learn what's socially appropriate." She turned back to Pinkie. "Now, what was your problem, Pinkie?"
"Somepony kissed me...really hard."
Rarity tilted her neck in confusion. "Hard?"
Pinkie nodded. "Uh-huh. They..." Pinkie was, for some reason, okay with telling Rarity more than she had told Rainbow Dash. Maybe because, since she was expecting Rarity to know more about it. So it was okay to tell her more. "Rubbed their chest up against mine and rubbed their hoof against my Cutie Mark."
Rarity's eyes were widened in disbelief and shock. She put her hoof over her mouth. "Oh my! Pinkie, darling, you should've spoken up sooner! Who did this to you!?"
"I, uh...a friend." Pinkie answered. There was no need for Rarity to do...whatever Rarity was probably planning to do, to Twilight.
"A friend? I can't imagine a friend doing that to...hold on." Rarity rubbed her chin with her hoof. "All right, then. Pinkie Pie. Did your friend have your permission to do this?"
"Well..."
"This is important, Pinkie Pie! Did they or did they not have permission!?"
"I, it, um, well..."
Pinkie flashbacked.
"Let me show you. Please?"
"Ummm...okay, I guess."
"...Yes." Pinkie answered resolutely after a long while. "Yes, they did."
"Okay." Rarity seemed to start to calm down a little, but she still looked on edge. "Did you know they were going to...kiss you really hard when you gave them permission?"
"Uh, no."
"Did you try to get them to stop once they did?"
"No..."
"Why not?"
"I...I didn't really know what they were doing."
Rarity rubbed her chin again, at a loss for ideas. She raised her hoof in the air, seemingly having gotten one. "If they tried to do it again, would you let them?"
Pinkie looked down. She didn't have the answer to that anymore than Rarity did.
It...did kinda feel...I don't know. Pinkie thought to herself.
"Pinkie?" Rarity asked, snapping Pinkie out of her thoughts.
"...Maybe."
"Maybe?" Rarity repeated, confused. "You mean, maybe you would let them do it again? As in, you might let them do it again, but there's no guarantee you would, yes?"
"I think so?" Pinkie questioned. Rarity's funny way of talking had befuddled her.
"I think you should have a talk with your friend." Rarity said like a scolding mother, trying to teach her foal the difference between right and wrong.
"I tried. She pointed her pet owl at me pretending it was a laser."
Rarity looked confused. "Pet...owl? Is your friend Twilight Sparkle? Is that why she left so awkwardly earlier?"
OH! Ponyfeathers!
"No." Pinkie answered calmly. She was no Twilight, or Rarity, but she realized yelling a denial would pretty much confirm it was Twilight.
"Oh...so it was another friend of yours who had a pet owl?"
"Uh-huh!" Pinkie nodded with a smile. Rarity gave her a piercing, penetrating leer that caused Pinkie to have a cold sweat, but she didn't break. When she didn't, Rarity decided to quit trying to press the issue.
"Well...will that be everything, darling?"
"I think so."
"Then have a nice day." Rarity returned to venting to her pet cat.
Pinkie left the Boutique and her head for a little bit, before bouncing her way ahead, waving to Twilight as she passed-
Twilight!?
Pinkie stepped backwards and looked at the lavender unicorn. Twilight still had her neatly-folded dress in hoof, and seemed motionless against the bushes just outside the Boutique. Paralyzed, one might say.
"Twilight?" Pinkie questioned softly.
Twilight raised her free hoof an expression of sorrow and disappointment on her face. She held her hoof against the air, like an invisible wall was keeping Pinkie from her.
"Twilight, I need to talk to you!"
Pinkie walked forward, but Twilight walked backwards in response, keeping the two of them separate.
"Twilight... can't we forget about last night and just have things go back to the way they were?" Pinkie pleaded, desperate.
Twilight's eye twitched. "NO! NO! I will not go back to the way things were! Do you know what is like for me, Pinkie Pie!? Always wanting you, always drooling when you touched me...always feeling better about myself when I saw a smile on your face...without having any idea WHY I was having those feelings...but now, now I know...now, I know that I'm- I was in love in you. Maybe this isn't ideal, and a little awkward. BUT IT'S BETTER THAN WHAT I'VE BEEN GOING THROUGH THE LAST WEEK!"
Pinkie was hurt by this. The last week? But- Twilight seemed open enough to hanging out with her for Celebratory-
"THE LAST SEVERAL WEEKS, IN FACT!"
Oh. That would explain it.
Twilight heaved and breathed heavily, teeth bared and eyes pointed forward in rage. Pinkie stepped back. She hadn't been expecting Twilight's reaction to be so volatile. Twilight saw the fear on her face and switched to a tone of remorse.
"Oh, Pinkie Pie, I'm sorry...I just...I've been having strange feelings, and now I finally know what they are- WERE! What they were, haha."
Were, she says. As in, past tense. Pinkie didn't know that. She didn't read a whole lot. Certainly not as much as the pony before her.
"Wait...you HAD feelings for me?" Pinkie didn't think she would be so upset about it, but for some reason, she was. The idea that such strong emotions could be discarded so easily was offensive by itself. But did Pinkie know that?
...Possibly. Maybe.
Twilight put her hoof over her mouth. "No! Yes! I mean... I... I don't love you! Not anymore! I don't...I don't..."
Twilight turned tail- literally- and bolted. She dropped her dress into the bushes, too...
Pinkie picked it up and pouted after Twilight had been long gone. Even as emotional challenged as she was, Pinkie could tell Twilight was in denial. She was trying to make herself think she wasn't in love with Pinkie anymore by simply denying it to Pinkie's face.
But in a contest between love and thinking, throughout written and much of unwritten history, thinking did not have an exactly high score of victories under its belt.
Twilight suddenly appeared right in front of Pinkie and put her hooves on Pinkie's shoulder-equivalent area. "I'm sorry. I do still completely love you. Please don't hate me."
Then, before Pinkie could do or say anything, Twilight took off again like a Road Runner bird.
"Twilight! Wait..." Pinkie weakly protested, hoof barely raised in the air.
Pinkie walked in around in circles, Twilight's dress still firmly in her hooves, wondering what to do. Then it hit her like a light bulb being turned on. What else did Pinkie do when she didn't know what to do? What was the one thing Pinkie always did, no matter the circumstances or how flimsy her excuse for doing it was?
Throw a party!
Duh! Why did it take her so long to think of that!?
Pinkie got a devious smile on her face in anticipation of her upcoming victory. Then she realized she was still holding Twilight's dress and started to wail. She didn't cry, though. She just made weird loud, sad noises with her Pinkie-style mouth.
Rarity exited out of the Boutique, wondering what those heart wrenching noises were. "Pinkie Pie? Was that you!?"
Pinkie composed herself and blushed while smiling nervously when she heard Rarity call her name. "Yeah...uh, could you help me with something? I'm going to throw a party! Can you make sure all our friends are there?"
"Of course, darling." Rarity assured, before noticing the object Pinkie held. "What are you doing with Twilight's dress?"
"Oh...nothing." Pinkie fibbed. "Here. Why don't you hold onto it in case she comes back for it?"
Rarity nodded, whisking the dress away with her magic.
Pinkie rubbed her hooves, her mind a-thinka-thinking about what she was going to do when Twilight showed up. If Twilight showed up.
Zooming her way back to her base of operations at the Corner, Pinkie began setting up the long arduous process of throwing a party for her friends. She also started to search the building for a secluded area to ambush Twilight in. She set up all the traps she knew how to set up to blast ponies with confetti when they leasted expected it. Afterwards, Pinkie went upstairs to her room and gave a long gaze to her space-minded pet alligator, Gummy.
"It'll be awhile before Rarity gets everypony over here." Pinkie reasoned with herself. "So, I have time for a power-nap!"
With that reasoning in mind, Pinkie flounced onto her bed. The sudden weight propelled Gummy into the air, and the poor reptile bounced up and down on the mattress before landing on his back put an end to the springy motion.
Pinkie fell right asleep.
A land of ice cream sweets, with cake-castles (or would that be castle-cake? Teehee! She didn't know!), chocolate fudge bricks and glowing marshmallow peeps speared on Candy Cane light poles. With smiley faces painted on or plastered over, well, everything. Gingerbread houses formed the neighborhood, while hollow chocolate bunnies frolicked. Naturally, this was where Pinkie had her dreams.
She bounced around, her usual oblivious smile on her face as she fudge all over her hooves. She stopped to nuzzle a stray bunny, then ate its tail. It chittered at her angrily, shaking its little bunny fist before dreamland physics kicked in and magically regrew its tail. Satisfied, the bunny left her alone.
Moving along, Pinkie peered into the windows of the gingerbread and made funny faces at her reflection in the glass pane. Finger puppets then appeared on the other side, making Pinkie feel bad about invading their privacy...before the puppets burst out laughing at her antics.
Pinkie, proud of herself for making even non-ponies laugh, continued on her way. She tripped over a candy cane on the road, and felt embarrassed as one of the glowing peep streetlights shorted out, electricity crackling from them. The candy cane she tripped on must have been a conduit. Giggling at her unintended mischief, Pinkie got up and admired the castle cakes in the distance before going on her way down the street.
Something started to feel...off to Pinkie, though, as she kept walking.
Eventually, she felt the ground beneath her shift. Looking down, she saw the fudge pavement she was used to being replaced by pink painted wood. Like...
Like Twilight's library.
Pinkie slowed down to a nervous trot. What was happening? Her dreams didn't usually involve Twilight's library...so why would they now?
Pinkie heard humming. Muted, soft...innocent humming. The cake castle in the distance started to fade away and be replaced by trees and plants. Pinkie didn't know it, but they were the kind of plants they were used for papyrus.
The humming got louder. Pinkie must've been getting close.
She saw it. There was some sort of enclave that was like somepony tried to recreate the library in an interactive dollhouse play set.
Pinkie grimaced as she saw an extremely innocent sight.
Twilight, staring at the mirror of a vanity, humming to herself as she brushed her hair with her magic.
Pinkie raised her hoof to say something, but put it down. Why did ponies do that, anyway? It's not like hooves could talk. Instead, she silently made her way towards the mirror.
"La-la-da-da-dee-da-da..." Twilight hummed.
Pinkie scrunched up, hesitant. She sighed before taking the plunge and stepping to where Twilight could see her in front of the mirror.
And Twilight was not happy to see her in the mirror.
"Uh...Twilight..." Pinkie said, crossing her legs nervously. "I know you're probably not happy to see me..."
Before Pinkie could get any further than that, there was a thud as Twilight dropped her brush against her vanity. She collapsed against it, burying her head in her legs and starting to cry.
"Twilight!" Pinkie cried urgently, rushing over. Twilight's tears dropped from the vanity and started to form small puddles around her. Pinkie wanted to hug Twilight. To make a funny face where she could see and laugh at. To tell her there was nothing to cry about. But Pinkie stepped into the puddle from the tears and sunk into it like a stone, even though the puddle was smaller than her hoof. She felt herself being carried away by a powerful water current, pushed further and further back.
Further away from Twilight, her friend.
Pinkie tried to raise her hoof out of the water and call to Twilight for help, but the water got deeper and started to flow into her mouth, making anything she said come out as just "Grrrgugullg!"
For once in his life, Gummy paid attention to what was going on around him. Namely, Pinkie's heaving breaths and noises like she was having trouble breathing. He did his usual routine of staring blankly before climbing over his owner's back and biting on her tail as hard he could. He had no teeth, so there was no pain, but the sudden jolt was enough to wake Pinkie... and release her from her torment. The first thing Pinkie did was curl around and embrace her loyal pet in a hug.
"Oh, Gummy!" Pinkie wailed. "It was awful! First there was cake and glowing peeps, but then there was Twilight and she was crying and I started drowning in her tears- LITERALLY!" Pinkie's eyes moistened, but she didn't actually cry. "Tears are supposed to be salty! But they didn't taste like salt AT ALL! They tasted like SORROW and DESPAIR!"
Pinkie heard the door chime ring.
"Oh!" Pinkie put Gummy down. "That must be Rarity and the girls for the party! I hope Twilight's ready to talk to me..."
Pinkie zoomed down the stairs to greet her friends. One by one, they piled into the corner. Applejack, Rainbow, Fluttershy...followed by Rarity, Spike, and Twilight in the back. Twilight gave Pinkie a sheepish smile and a wave, so that was progress at least.
No pony questioned what the occasion was, given who was throwing it, so they all simply settled into their party routines. Applejack and Dash competed with each other, Fluttershy stuck to a corner, trying to not be noticed, and Spike attempted to woo Rarity with technically-true-but-highly exaggerated tales of his accomplishments in the library.
Pinkie served some punch to the other ponies before nervously trying to make her way towards Twilight.
Come on. She thought to herself at her shyness. It's just Twilight.
Pinkie didn't notice her tail curling in on itself uncomfortably the closer she got to the group of unicorns.
"Is that so?" Rarity murmured at Spike's next tale, disinterested already. "Oh, hello, Pinkie! Any news?"
"No." Pinkie answered weakly. "I just wanna...talk to Twilight."
Twilight looked up, holding her punch glass in her hoof tight.
Rarity looked between the two of them. "I don't know what's going between you two, but I do so hope you sort it out before it becomes a problem. Come along, Spike."
Spike obliviously obeyed his crush's demands, leaving Pinkie and Twilight alone.
"Hi." Pinkie waved, trying to act normal.
"Hello." Twilight averted her gaze and took a sip from her cup. "...How are you?"
"Okay, mostly. Kinda concerned about you."
"...How considerate of you."
The two avoided the others' eyes and scuffed hooves. The awkward silence so thick and palpable that anypony nearby could feel it.
"Pinkie Pie, whatever I did to you in your dreams, I would never do that to you." Twilight said out of the blue.
"What!?" How did Twilight know Pinkie was having bad dreams involving her!?
"I...I'll bet your wondering how I knew that, huh?" Twilight offered.
"Y-yes!"
"I've been having some bad dreams of my own..." Twilight looked away wistfully. "I know a few things about it...your tail. It's all curled. More than usual, I mean."
Pinkie looked at her tail. It was, in fact, all scrunched up and knotted. She started kneading at it, trying to untie it. It took a while, but she eventually prevailed. But when she turned back to talk to Twilight some more, the unicorn was gone. Looking around, Pinkie saw she had gone over to Spike and was trying to talk to him. He wasn't really cooperating, so she grabbed his claw and dragged him over into the mares' restroom, despite his protests.
Pinkie had to wonder what was so important that it warranted dragging Spike into the bathroom that was not meant for his gender. Pinkie decided it was best to follow them inside. She saw Spike standing outside a stall, Twilight probably on the other side.
"What am I doing, exactly, Twilight?" Spike asked. It sounded like it wasn't the first time.
"I had voices in my head." Twilight answered. "I needed them for conversation, and they're gone, so now I need you to pretend to be them for me. Okay?"
From the way his lips were poised, Spike was going to answer that it was not okay, but he saw Pinkie Pie. And with her, an escape from his weird situation. "Oh, hey Pinkie Pie!"
Pinkie was too slow to tell him not to say her name.
"Pinkie's in here!?" Twilight exclaimed.
Pinkie shoved Spike out of the way and forced the stall open. "Twilight-" But she was only greeted with the white flash of a teleportation spell.
"Whoa." Spike whistled. He scratched his head while Pinkie looked at the floor in despair. "What's going on between you two?"
Pinkie shook her head sadly. "I wish I knew, Spike."
Pinkie left the bedroom and head upstairs for her bedroom. No pony noticed her sad, downed, defeated trots, too wrapped up in their own party activity.
As she got to her bed, Pinkie collapsed on it. Loyal Gummy was still lying there, not a care in the world. Pinkie envied him a little right now. No friends of his were going to go stick their tongues down his throats, certainly.
Ooh, is poor little Pinkie Pie feeling sad?
Pinkie's head popped up from her bed. Gummy wasn't talking. No pony else was in the room. Who said that?
In here, silly. We're in your head!
"In my...head?" Pinkie questioned out loud.
Yeah, yeah! Don't you remember? Twilight's missing the voices in her head. We're those voices! We were in her head, but then she resolved her internal conflict with herself, so messing with her quit bein' fun. So now we're in yours!
Pinkie hmmphed. "I'll have you now, I've had voices in my head before back on the farm, and they were a LOT nicer and less mean than you guys!"
Ooh, this one's got a temper on her!
"Get out!"
Aww, did we hurt the whittle Pinkie Pie's whittle feelings?-
"I SAID GET OUT!"
"Oh! Oh my, um, okay..."
Pinkie whirled around to see a very confused Mrs. Cake backing away from the door to her room.
"Oh no-no-no, Mrs. Cake!" Pinkie assured her. "I wasn't talking to you!"
Mrs. Cake was confused. There wasn't anypony else there, and it didn't look like somepony had jumped out the window. "Then...who were you talking to?"
Pinkie shifted her eyes, then grinned. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
"All right...I'll take your word for it. Your friends downstairs are wondering where you are. Is there something on your mind? Anything you would like to talk about?"
Pinkie sighed. "Yes, but I'm not sure you would be of any help."
"Oh...well." Mrs. Cake said as she moved to let Pinkie through. "If you need anything, just ask me or Mr. Cake, okay?"
"Okay. I will. Thank you..."
Pinkie made her way downstairs, where everypony greeted her.
"Heey! There's the party mare!" Dash said. "What's got you down, Pinks?"
Pinkie didn't answer the question. She looked around the room, seeing everypony stare at her with a friendliness that steadily grew into a concern the longer the silence lasted.
"Could I...talk to Rarity?" Pinkie asked, having an idea. "Alone?"
Everypony looked to Rarity. The marshmallow unicorn bravely stepped forward, giving her best glare of sympathy to Pinkie.
"Of course, darling."
They made their way to a corner of the room to have their hushed conversation.
"What is it, darling? Tell me everything." Rarity said in as soothingly a tone as possible.
"It's my friend." Pinkie told her. "I keep trying to talk to her, but she keeps finding ways to avoid me."
"Hmm..." Rarity looked away as she tried to solve Pinkie's problem. "Oh! I know! Try to find somewhere where she can't run away from you."
Pinkie didn't grasp Rarity's meaning. "Where she can't run away?"
"Yes! Somewhere there is no way for her to avoid you. Somewhere where she is completely trapped and has no choice but talk to you."
Pinkie thought long and hard, attempting to think of such a place. A place with no escape...with no exits or alternate pathways. One Twilight would be stuck in until Pinkie said her peace. But where could she find such a place? What kind of land would support that ideal? What kind of world would have the twists and turns necessary for that to happen? The longer Pinkie thought about it, the more it seemed like a pipe dream...
...EUREKA! That's it!
"Her dreams!" Pinkie proudly announce to a startled Rarity.
"Her dreams? Now, darling, that's not really what I meant-"
"Thanks, Rarity!" Pinkie grabbed Rarity's hoof and shook in thanks. "You've been a really, really big super-duper funtastic help with this! See you later! I've gotta get to Zecora's!"
"You're...welcome?" Rarity confusedly answered as Pinkie zoomed out of the confectionery.
It was brilliant! Pinkie thought to herself as she bounded for Zecora's hut in the Everfree Forest. She'd get Zecora to make a potion to let her enter Twilight's dreams, and then there would be no way for Twilight to run away!
There was absolutely, positively no way this could possibly go horribly, horribly, horribly wrong.
In the dead of night, a puff of green smoke wiggled in underneath the library door and curled into a tendril that unlocked the door and pulled it open. Zecora in her brown traveling cloak and Pinkie entered the room and looked around for anything that might give them away.
"I will ask you once more: Are you sure you want go through with this chore?" Zecora questioned Pinkie.
"Yes." Pinkie answered without hesitating. "Twilight's room is upstairs."
Pinkie led Zecora up the spiral staircase. It seemed much longer and more ominous than Pinkie remembered it being.
Being very, very, very careful to not wake anypony up, Pinkie poked the door open.
Inside, Twilight, Spike, and that durn owl were sleeping. The owl snapped to at the slightest disturbance, and Twilight writhed in her bed, only slightly perturbed.
Pinkie put her hooves together to silently plead with the owl not to hoot and wake up Twilight. The owl eyed her warily, then raised a feather. As if to say, "All right, but only this once."
Pinkie mouthed a thanks. She and Zecora weaved their way to the sleeping Twilight and looked over her.
"I will only ask you this one last time." Zecora whispered. "Are you sure you don't wish to change your mind?"
"Yes."
"Very well. In that case, climb atop Twilight Sparkle and drink the potion...and it will take you beyond the veil."
Pinkie was reluctant to just climb on top of Twilight like that, but she wormed her way onto of her. Zecora brandished the potion- a green liquid in a triangular beaker- and she gulped it.
Zecora wished her luck before disappearing in a poof of green dust.
Pinkie looked to Twilight's sleeping, oblivious, innocent face. But it only took a few seconds for the potion to take effect and knock her out.
Pinkie felt like she was being dragged through a tunnel before plopping against solid ground. Getting up, Pinkie didn't like Twilight's dream. Not in a "Oh man this is scary" way. More of a "Why would your dream BE this boring!?" way. Everything was black, and there was nothing here! No decorations or cake-castles or anything interesting at all!
"I don't believe this!" Pinkie shouted and cursed at nothing. "This is a dream! How do you make a dream this BOR-ing!?"
"Pinkie Pie?"
Pinkie's irises shrunk, and she turned around.
There was Twilight now, walking along like she was expecting to meet a friend here. She seemed quite surprised to see Pinkie Pie.
"Pinkie Pie!?" Twilight exclaimed with delight.
Pinkie waved and smiled. "Hi, Twilight."
Twilight galloped over to embrace and proceeded to nuzzle into Pinkie's chest. "I'm so glad you're here...I did this awful, awful thing to the real Pinkie yesterday, and knowing I can make you in my dreams now makes me feel so much better." She rubbed Pinkie's sides with her hooves affectionately.
Pinkie chuckled nervously, a sweat forming on her brow. "Uh-huh...eeyup!" She hoped Big Macintosh wouldn't mind her stealing his catchphrase.
Twilight nuzzled her and made a content little 'mmm' before stopping abruptly.
"...Wait."
Ooooh, dear. Pinkie wasn't actually part of Twilight's dream...and Twilight was starting to pick up on that fact. She began patting Pinkie across the sides of her legs, the back of Pinkie's neck, and some of her chest. Twilight removed her head from Pinkie's chest and drew up to stare Pinkie in the eye. Pinkie was starting to get the feeling this had been a bad idea.
"You're not part of my dream." Twilight stated.
Pinkie gulped nervously and nodded. "Uh-huh."
Twilight started walking around her in predatory, lion like circles. "So...what are you?"
"I'm, uh, Pinkie Pie."
Twilight stopped her pace and glared. "Well, I can see that." Twilight stepped back and adopted a battle ready stance. "I'll warn you, if you're one of those monsters I've read who feed on psychic energy, I know a dozen spells designed to make you overload."
"Well, uh..."
Twilight snorted and huffed. Pinkie heard resounding booms of thunder in the distance and rocking thuds of volcanoes. Two mini-volcanoes burst from the ground behind Twilight, with two full-grown dragon heads from the ground in front.
A really, really bad idea.
As Pinkie stared at the volcanoes in the distance, and dragons head in the ground, it occurred to her this really may not have been the best of ideas. This wasn't the real world, where everypony was expected to follow a certain set of social rules. This wasn't a place where the long hoof of the law would protect. This was Twilight's dreamvoid. Here, Twilight was queen. Here, Twilight was Princess Celestia, her will be done. If she was going to be in Twilight's dreams, she was going to play be Twilight's rules. If she was going to be here, she was going to play Twilight's games. No matter how extreme, ridiculous or even overtly dangerous they might be.
Faced with the possibility of being injured, Pinkie confessed to everything. With her usual way of rapid fire dialogue, of course.
"I wanted to talk to you about last night, but you kept avoiding me all day, so I talked to Rarity about what to do. And she gave the idea to go to Zecora's to make a potion so I could get into your dreams where you couldn't possibly avoid me anymore!" Pinkie gasped and took a deep breath.
The dragon heads and volcanoes sunk back into the ground. Twilight stared. Pinkie smiled awkwardly in response.
"...You took a potion to get inside my dream? Pinkie, do you realize how much a TOTAL invasion of privacy and personal space that is!?"
"Sure I do! ...What's personal space?"
Twilight facehooved before turning around, clearly angry about Pinkie's methods.
"I just... wanted to talk!" Pinkie protested. Twilight huffed, not even bothering to look at her. "Twilight, what do you want me to do?"
Twilight looked over her wither at her. "Play some music for me."
Pinkie looked around the void. "I, uh, don't have an instrument."
Pinkie heard a rattling crash behind her. She turned around to see a pile of instruments with almost anything she could think of in it- pianos, keyboards, chellos, violins, guitars, electric guitars, and even the oft-neglected electric banjo.
"Pick one." Twilight demanded.
Pinkie started climbing up the pile and sifting through.
"Just one." She heard Twilight snap.
Pinkie picked up a tambourine and held it out where Twilight could see.
"Are you sure?"
Pinkie nodded. She felt a rather jarring disruption in weight as the pile of instruments she was standing on disappeared completely.
"Now play." Twilight growled. A vanity and a hairbrush appeared to Twilight's side, which the unicorn faced and levitated the brush to her hair. Meanwhile, Pinkie played the tambourine as best she could in her fright, which only intensified from seeing the same thing in Twilight's dream as was in hers. A coincidence, without a doubt, but that did nothing to make it less terrifying. Twilight eventually tossed the brush aside, which landed right in front of Pinkie and hissed like it was smoking hot before turning into ink and disappearing into the floor.
Pinkie looked down at before returning her gaze to Twilight. Twilight walked up, like she was on an invisible spiral staircase. From the rising stairs, she gave Pinkie a glare.
"Did I say you could stop!?"
Pinkie didn't even realize she had stopped playing when she had looked at the brush. She immediately resumed, rushing to bang on the hoofheld drum before Twilight lashed out again. Twilight's ears winced from the sound. Pinkie's hurry had made the drum not sound very harmonious.
"Slow down!"
Pinkie did.
"That's better." Twilight muttered before continuing up her invisible staircase. She stopped and pulled out a book from nothingness, like the staircase had an invisible shelf to go with it. She opened the book and skimmed through it before tossing it to the floor as well. Pinkie took a look at it. The pages were blank. She could least pick up that before the book followed the hairbrush's example of melting into ink.
Suddenly, Twilight dropped back to the ground, a clattering noise like the staircase had crumbled away echoing. Pinkie tossed aside her tambourine before rushing to Twilight's aid.
"Twilight? Are you okay?"
Pinkie wasn't expecting Twilight's response to be what it was.
"NAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH! Why is it so hard to stay mad at you!?"
Pinkie just frowned while Twilight glared at her. Said glare subsided quickly, and was replaced a soft, quiet sob.
"It's because you're beautiful." Twilight muttered, covering her face with her hooves.
Pinkie became intrigued. For some reason, Twilight's words sticking out. Probably something to do with Dash's comment earlier.
"You think I'm beautiful, Twilight?"
Twilight peered one eye out from her hooves. "Beautiful. Voluptuous. Curvaceous. Irresistible. Charming." Twilight kept going on, using words from foreign tongues Pinkie didn't understand. Like Spanish. Or maybe French.
Or maybe the Black Speech of Cthulhu and Related Ideas.
...Actually, now that she had that thought, Pinkie was quite certain that it was, indeed, the Black Speech of Cthulhu and Related Ideas.
Twilight rolled over onto her stomach and looked Pinkie Pie dead in the eye with a steel in her vision to quash any doubt of what she was about to say being true or not.
"I think you're gorgeous."
Twilight's gaze did not falter once.
Pinkie was unsure how to feel about this. Her mouth was open with the intent to say something, but her brain was dry on words.
"Why?" Was the first word Pinkie could form.
Twilight tapped her hoof, uncertain herself. "Well...what do you do with all your time? What do you try to make everypony around do?"
Pinkie had to think on this one for a moment. She shouldn't have had to, as the answer was obvious.
"Smile!"
Twilight nodded. "Mh-hmm...and what do you want for all the trouble you go through? What do you want back from all the time you spend on that?"
Pinkie was confused. "Umm...you know what, Twilight? A smile is really all I need."
"There." Twilight pointed. "That is why I think you're gorgeous. You put all this energy and time and effort into making ponies smile, and you never ask for anything back. That-that's... beautiful."
"Huh." Pinkie sat down on her belly and put a hoof on Twilight's. "Okay...so...what do I do wrong to make you cry last night, Twilight?"
Twilight blinked. "What?"
"What did I do to make you cry last night!?"
Twilight stared...and stared...and stared...and stared. However, her lip curled upward at some point and she started giggling in a very unsettling manner.
"You...hehehe...heeheeehahahaa! You want to know what YOU did wrong? That's- oooh, THAT is- what's the word? HILARIOUS! Am I using that term correctly? I think I am. HA-HAA!"
"...Twilight, you're making me worry."
Twilight took in a deep breath. "I took you for granted. I kissed you, made out with you, took advantage of your innocence...and you want to know what you did wrong!? That's so...I don't even...oh, Pinkie Pie..."
Twilight collapsed, defeated.
Pinkie didn't know what to do. Looking around, she couldn't find any inspiration from the sprawling infinite blackness. Thinking back to the incident on the counter, Pinkie finally had an idea of what she had to do.
She walked forward to the exhausted and drained Twilight, who only looked at her with only the slightest interest.
Pinkie took in a deep breath and put her hooves on Twilight's cheeks. Twilight's slight interest turned to confusion.
Closing her eyes, Pinkie dared the unthinkable in a twist Twilight would never predict.
Pinkie kissed her. She even used a little tongue, going off Twilight's example from the previous night.
Pinkie dropped Twilight and started backing away. She started to feel the effects of the potion wear off. The gravitational drag from being jerked backed up the 'tunnel' winded it's away around her.
"Uh...see you tomorrow." Pinkie waved good-bye at the stunned Twilight.
Twilight yawned adorably before she woke up the next morning. Stretching her hooves, she rose up off the bed slightly.
"Hey, Twilight." Spike greeted groggily. This being one of the few times where they woke up at the same time. "Sleep well?"
"Yes..." Twilight answered dreamily, wiggling like a disoriented snake as she remembered what happened in her dream. "I had the best dream ever..."
Twilight smacked her tongue against the roof of her mouth.
Wait...no, no, that's not possible...
Twilight wiggled her tongue around. There was a distinct slimy aftertaste in her mouth. Like somepony had made out with her.
...Maybe it wasn't a dream.
Twilight hurled her covers and dashed for the stairs.
"Where's the fire?" asked Spike.
"I need to go to Sugarcube Corner! No time to explain!"
"Do you want me to go with you?" Spike asked between yawning.
"No!"
Twilight went out the library and made a beeline for Sugarcube Corner. She wasn't sure what happened, how it happened, or any number of things, but she wanted to see Pinkie.
She had to ask.
She had to know.
She wanted to know.
She NEEDED to know.
Barging her way into Subercube Corner, Twilight made absolutely no notice of Mrs. Cake polite greetings or understandable inquires into where she was going.
Without knocking, she barged into Pinkie's room and found her the object of her affections lying on her bed. She look tired and was breathing heavily. Like she didn't sleep very well.
"Pinkie!"
Pinkie jolted awake at the sound of her name. She look at the door and saw Twilight. "Oh!...Hi."
"Pinkie..." Twilight said softly. Twilight sat on Pinkie's bed and grabbed Pinkie's hooves. "I need to know something about last night."
"Oh...oh. Okay."
Twilight took in a deep breath, preparing to pop the question. A question that the answer to could either make her the happiest mare in the world, or leave her a broken wreck for years.
"Do you love me?"
Pinkie's lip quivered. Her eyes wavered. Her throat bulged as she gulped.
"No."
The answer made everything seem surreal to Twilight. She let go of Pinkie's hoof and turned away to start crying.
Pinkie grabbed her hoof back and held it with both of her own.
"But..."
She gave Twilight's hoof a little kiss the way Canterlot gentlecolts do to important mares of important status. When she was done, she looked Twilight in the eye.
"I don't like making ponies sad...so...let's...give this a shot. I mean, what's the worst that could happen, right?" She smiled nervously.
Twilight was speechless. She kept opening her mouth, but nothing came out. She burst into tears and wrapped her front legs around Pinkie.
"Oh, Pinkie Pie!" Twilight cried rapturously. "You have...no idea how happy that makes me."
Pinkie was okay with Twilight crying now. The warm sting of her tears of joy felt nice on her traveling down withers.
"I like making ponies happy..."
"I-...I know you do."