The day was in full swing, as was Ponyville. Some ponies moved through the town square with a clear destination, others simply drifted between browsing stores, to chatting with their friends. The sun was almost directly above Ponyville, casting it's rays down upon the town as it endured another busy day. Twilight meandered through the crowds of chatting ponies, drifting in and out of thought and outside awareness. She was under the impression that she was heading to the Library, however, she had in fact passed the library twice and had instead simply found herself back in the center of town. A certain purple dragon, who had been out shopping for quills and paper, had noticed Twilight complete her second successful lap of the town, he thought it necessary to make sure she was feeling alright.
Spike quickly paid the store vendor for the last quill and walked at a brisk pace to catch up with his purple carer. "Hey, Twilight! Wait up!" Spike yelled, as he worked his little scaly legs to their limit in an attempt to catch up with the day dreaming unicorn. The commotion seemed to knock Twilight out of her trance, as she slowed her pace and glanced over her shoulder. She could now see her assistant in full sprint, carrying the supplies she had asked him to purchase tomorrow.
"Oh, Spike! that list wasn't due until tomorrow." Once Spike took his place by Twilight's side, they began the walk back to the library.
"Oh I know, but I had already dusted the shelves, made the bed, and fed Owalicious, so my tasks for today were already complete, and what with you mysteriously vanishing this morning, I thought I would take care of some more tasks before you got back. Besides, it saves you another panic attack in case we run out before tomorrow." This earned a small giggle from Twilight.
"Well thank you, my number one assistant!"
"Don't mention it! What helps you, helps me, or something like that. Anyway, where were you this morning? I thought I had over slept, and that you were angry with me, and that maybe you left, and went back to Canterlot, and I would be all alone and..."
"Spike" Twilight interjected " You know as well as I do that I would never get angry at you for sleeping in." Spike seemed to relax after hearing that " Besides, I just went to talk to Applejack, down at the farm, that's all." Twilight explained.
"Oh? what did you talk about? Must have been important, whatever it was. Was it to do with the elements of harmony? Is Discord back again? More Changelings!? Oh I know it's those Parasprite things again right?!"
"No, no, nothing that serious, I just went to tell her that I'm in lo.. I, erm. Well, you see.." Twilight needed an excuse, "I needed to.. er, give her a book! Yes, that's it, a book!" To this Spike raised an eye brow is a questioning manner, "I-it was about.. Apples! A book about apples, for Applejack!" Twilight now had a plastered grin on her face, clearly intended to appear as if she was confident with her answer. Spike however, was sceptical.
"You got up at the break of dawn, to give Aj a book about apples? The pony who knows practically everything about apples?" As the two continued the conversation the library finally grew visible around the last of the houses surrounding Ponyville's town square, Twilight began to quicken her pace as if to outrun the rest of the conversation.
Spike matched Twilight's speed by breaking into a light jog. Twilight felt her mind race, trying to find an escape route out of the conversation, Spike was too young to understand the love between two ponies; granted he was strongly attached to Rarity, but Twilight viewed that as more of a crush, not love. Then it hit her, Rarity! "Yes! she is planting a new breed of saplings soon and wanted a book on them to ... research? A-Anyway! After that I went to talk to Rarity." Spike lost his sceptical look, and replaced it with a care free, dreamy expression. He sighed contently, and rather dramatically, to which Twilight rolled her eyes, but was grateful for the change in conversation.
"Rar- Rarity? Oh, it feels as if I haven't seen her in a thousand years." Spike slowed his pace as a result of his thoughts suddenly being occupied by the elegant white unicorn of his dreams, Twilight enveloped the quills and papers currently tucked under the young dragons arm in her magical aura, and carefully took them from him.
"Oh there's a thought Spike, seeming as you've done all your chores for the day, and I could use a nap, why don't you go and see if Rarity could use a helping hoof? I'm sure she would appreciate the help. After all, it has been a whole, well, day, since you saw her last." Spike stopped dead in his tracks, he looked up at Twilight who had also stopped at the front door to their home. He gave her the widest grin he could muster, and the most grateful expression he could provide.
"R-really? Can I?!" By this point he was practically shaking with glee at the thought of spending another day helping Rarity with her client's orders. Maybe they could go hunting for more gems, preferably without one of them being kidnapped this time.
Twilight giggled at the sight, "Of course you can!" At this, spike bolted in the direction of the town square once more, he got a mere few feet before skidding to a halt, turning back, and leaping onto Twilight, locking her in a rushed yet heartfelt embrace. Then once again, he turned tail and bolted to Ponyville in search of his pony in need.
Twilight watched her longest companion run toward Rarity's boutique. She admired his confidence to be so subliminally open about his feelings towards Rarity. As Spike vanished into the crowds of ponies, she sighed, and turned toward the door once more. "Time for a nice midday nap" She magically twisted the knob and entered the library.
The library was peculiarly dark, despite it being midday. Twilight noticed the curtains had been drawn on all of the windows and doors, so that there was no light in the room, what so ever. The position of the sun had also stopped a lot of light entering from the front door, as it was being blocked by the branches sprouting from the top of the tree. Strange, she thought. Why would Spike close all the curtains? could it have been Owalicious?. She shrugged it off for now and reached out once more with her magical horn, and turned on the lights.
The next few seconds were a blur. The moment the lights were lit, Twilight was bombarded with colours from every direction. There were streamers hanging from the stairway handle and scattered along the floor in a chaotic, yet somehow tidy fashion, balloons were both tied to objects around the room, and left to float to the roof of the library. On the nearby dining table, lay several cupcakes, each containing orange stars and what appeared to be purple slices of apples. There were banners hanging from almost every bookshelf, each bearing a similar message,"Twilight X Applejack", or "Applesparkle" and some were even called "Twijack". She was too busy gawking at the party decorations to notice an extremely happy, bubbly maned pony, directly in front of her, who was busy tinkering with what appeared to be a cannon of some description. Twilight moved her focus to the weapon in question which appeared to have been armed, Twilight began to cast her teleportation spell, but alas, it was too late, the cannon fired. The ammunition consisted of streamers, confetti and other party related decorations. The blast knocked her focus off the spell and sent her flying a short distance onto her back. Within a split second the Pink maned pony began hopping around the dazed unicorn, singing a merry tune with lyrics focused on the similarities between apples and books, which appeared to be rather plentiful. Unfortunately, all Twilight could hear was an extremely loud ringing reverberating around her skull.
After a few more moments of muted singing from Pinkie Pie, and Twilight's mind processing the last minute of events in her still ringing head, Twilight finally managed to move her stunned body into a sitting position. She glanced down at her coat, which was a complete mess by now and covered in party decor. she sighed, and dreaded to think of what state her usually straight, neat and tidy mane would be in.
With Pinkie's song eventually drawing to a close, (which had somehow been continuing for this long) and Twilight's hearing back to its original state, Twilight gave the most soul frightening stare she could currently conjure, and shot it in Pinkie's direction. Pinkie was apparently unfazed by the glare and continued to grin carelessly. "Pinkie." Twilight began as calmly as she could, "I would like you, to never, ever, fire that damn party cannon in my library again. Especially, if I am standing right in front of it!" Twilight snapped, then rose to all fours and grabbed her brush from the nearby desk with her magic, and began tidying herself, while massaging her forehead with a hoof. Pinkie watched her unicorn friend, noticing a severe lack of joy in her actions. Worried that she may have made a mistake, she checked her decorations once more. The banners were worded correctly, "Applesparkle" and "Twijack". The rest of the party decor seemed appropriate, the streamers, confetti and balloons were all coloured Purple and orange as were the snacks, which Pinkie was rather proud of. She couldn't understand why Twilight was so depressed, if Pinkie had just confessed her undying love to somepony, then she would be ecstatic.
"Twilight? Are you feeling alright?" Pinkie began piecing the puzzle together, "Oh my goodness, did Aj say no?!" Before Twilight could explain the situation she was tackled to the ground, and gripped in an incredibly strong hug. Twilight was taken aback by the sudden contact and strength of the party pony; the fact that she couldn't breathe also had something to do with her shock.
"Pi-... Pinkie!.. Need ai-- air!" Twilight gasped.
"Oh, Sorry Twilight, but I thought you really badly needed a hug! Rejection can be a real doozy!" Twilight rose once more, Pinkie nuzzled her as the lavender mare collected her breath. Twilight noticed the slowly drooping mane atop her pink friend's head. Once she had recovered her breath, she returned the gesture. A few moments passed before they parted.
"Thank you Pinkie, but it's nothing that bad. I just, couldn't do it. I couldn't work up the guts to tell her how I feel!" Twilight slumped back into a sitting position, resting against one of many book cases surrounding the room, Pinkie sat next to her. "Wait a second, how did you know that I had feelings for Applejack?!"
Pinkie became very guilty looking for a change, as she avoided Twilight's gaze, as if suddenly finding the texture of the floor very interesting. "Oh... Erm, well you see, me and Rainbow were busy with our pranking schemes. We both saw you go into Rarity's, so we thought we could catch the two of you off guard! But just as we were about to open the door and use our new rubber chicken launcher, we saw Rarity comforting you, and it looked like you were crying. So, you know, as we're your friends too so we wanted to help! But we were banned from Rarity's boutique for two more days." To this Twilight gave a puzzled look "Oh! that was just a misunderstanding, you see, we were supposed to be painting rarity's new dresses with that disappearing ink stuff, but we may have mixed up the bottles with the real ink..." Twilight stifled a giggle and gestured her friend to continue. "So anyway, as we were banned from actually going inside, we thought we could at least listen to what you guys were talking about from the open window."
"So you were spying on us? Pinkie! You can't do that! Ponies could be having a private conversation!"
"Oh. But didn't you follow me that one time? Remember? You were hiding in bushes and writing down everything I did."
"That was different. I had a reason" Twilight attempted to justify, ".. Ok, no, that was wrong of me, and I am sorry I did it, but Rarity was giving me advice on romance and what I should do about my feelings. Anyway, is there any more to this story?"
"Well not really, we both, wanted to see you and Jackie happy so we decided to plan when we would congratulate you both!"
"Well I can see that." A sudden realisation hit Twilight, "Wait, if you were both going to congratulate me, then where is Rainbow Dash?"
"Silly! I said congratulate, both of you! We figured you would be in two different places, so we decided we would congratulate you both separately! So Rainbow is probably congratulating Aj right now!" Pinkie finished, with a very satisfied smile.
Twilight sat shocked, mouth locked open. Pinkie began to wonder if she had said something wrong, when a purple light began to emanate from her friend's horn, the next moment, a stunning purple flash occurred, and Twilight was gone.