Derpy and Rainbow Dash were preparing Town Hall for an event.
“Rainbow Dash” said Derpy, "I have a question that I believe may be of some importance at this juncture“
"Well spit it out then" said Rainbow Dash
"Ok, my question is: were we supposed to be fixing the town hall or wrecking it?”
“Well OBVIOUSLY the answer is…” Rainbow Dash started, “...actually I can’t remember either.”
“Should we ask Cassandra for help?” asked Derpy.
“I’ve got a better idea,” said Dash, “Cassandra taught me a technique so that I wouldn’t have to bug her so often. It’s called WWCD. What Would Cassandra Do?”
“Wicked!” said Derpy, “How does it work?”
“It’s easy. I just think really hard about how Cassandra would handle the problem if she were here right now. Stand back, I’m gonna give it a try.”
“Ooh” said Derpy, mystified.
Rainbow Dash shut her eyes and went into a zen state.
In her mind, an image appeared, of a time that Cassandra rescued her after she got stuck in a tree. Dash had been so grateful that she agreed to practice kissing right on the spot. But most pivotal of all was what Cassandra said next,
“You’ve got to be more careful.”
Dash’s eyes flew open,
“I’ve got it!” she declared, “we need to minimize risk and diversify our investments! If we hedge our bets between breaking it and fixing it, then we’ll be partially right no matter what!”
“Yay Cassandra!” shouted Derpy.
“Ok, so down to business” said Dash, “the building’s rundown, but we want it derelict. Derpy, you can start by smashing home holes in the roof”
“Aye aye” said Derpy. She slammed into town hall with an aerial kick, sending a good-sized chunk of wood down into the conference room”
“Next I’ll kick down a few of these support beams,” said Rainbow Dash, “Don’t worry, the structure will hold. Cassandra taught me that it can stand up with just three beams in a triangle pattern.” She circled around the balcony, bucking the appropriate beams from their mountings.
“And finally...” she picked up a hooful of stones and handed some of them to Derpy, “...we take care of the window removal." The two began hurling rocks at the town hall windows, laughing giddily.
“What the hell are you doing?” called Cassandra. The two pegasi looked to their left to see Cassandra, as well as a whole crowd of ponies actually, were there.
“We’re doing just like you said!” yelled Rainbow Dash, “we’re making the town hall halfway between broken and fixed!” She and Depry hoof-bumped. The reverberations shook the town hall and caused the entire structure to collapse.
“Brilliant” said Cassandra sarcastically. She made a mental note to write Celestia a retraction of her Friendship Report on trusting ponies less competent than oneself.
“So I know this is a moot point now, Miss Mayor” said Dash, “but out of interest, were we supposed to be fixing or wrecking the town hall!”
“Neither!” shouted the mayor, “you were supposed to be hanging that banner!” She motioned to the ground where a large white canvas with Applejack’s picture sat next to a hammer and a box of nails.
“Whoops, my bad” said Derpy.
“As I was saying,” continued the mayor, “we’re here to celebrate Applejack, who has kindly offered to donate her rodeo winnings towards the replacement of the town hall.”
“Speech! Speech!” yelled Pinkie Pie
“Hwell alright,” said Applejack, “ah never was a gal of many words but here goes… Ah’m very proud to be useful for th’ town. Even though mah own family is so poor that were probably gonna hafta to eat Applebloom to make it through th’ winter, ah'm gonna donate all th' bits because ah can’t say no to tha oppertunity ta get this much attention.”
The crowd cheered.
*****
It was a week later, and Applejack still hadn’t come home.
“Where could she be?” wondered Fluttershy
Twilight replied, “I would assume she failed miserably at the rodeo competition because she’s an uncoordinated mess with no exceptional talents. And because she’s too proud to come home empty-hooved, she’s now making up the money by either prostituting herself to the locals or doing menial labor.”
“Twilight please!” said Cassandra, “while I can’t say I’d bet money against your theory, it wouldn’t kill you to sugarcoat it.”
“Sorry” said Twilight
“We probably should go check on Applejack,” continued Cassandra, “who’s up for a roadtrip?”
*****
One transition later, the six ponies arrived in Dodge Junction, and spotted Applejack almost immediately.
“Applejack! Applejack! Hi!” called Pinkie Pie, bouncing over to her, “are you a prostitute?” she asked.
“Nah,” replied Applejack, “but ah do take lotsa cherries. Ah got a job workin’ fer th’ local orchard”
“Because you didn’t win any money at the rodeo” finished Cassandra.
“Now how’d yall know that?” inquired Applejack, “this was th’ one time ah didn’t tell the truth!”
“Because you can be read like a book” replied Cassandra, “honesty is a useless trait when you’re that bad at lying.”
“Well shucks, ya got me. Wanna help me make some money at th’ cherry factory?”
“I suppose we do owe it to the town” said Cassandra.
*****
“Welcome to the factory, girls” said Cherry Jubilee. She was showing the Mane 7 to their workstations. “Applejack will spin the wheel, and the rest of you will sort the cherries into the red and yellow buckets. Most importantly, have fun.”
“Wait, what?” said Cassandra, “have fun? Is that really the advice you want to give to factory workers? Because the only fun I envision us having here involves lost product and onsite accidents.”
“Oh really?” said Cherry defiantly, “you think you know better than me how to run this factory?”
“I know so. I’ve only been in this room for a minute, but I can name ten inefficiencies.”
“Horseapples. Somepony as pretty as you couldn’t possibly be a genius businessmare as well!”
“You wanna try me?”
*****
The next day, Cherry Jubilee’s business saw a serious upturn. Cherries were going out out as fast as the carter ponies could take them. The Jubilee factory had tripled in size, and by a much greater factor in income
“Cassandra, you’ve turned my little business into an empire” said Cherry, “these 50,000 bits are the least I can do.” She handed Cassandra a hefty sack of bits that Cassandra lifted effortlessly.
“Oh, and here, a more personal gift. I baked it this morning.” Cherry gave Cassandra a fresh cherry pie. She and her friends helped themselves to a slice. It was delicious,
“Mmm!” exclaimed Twilight “This is just like Applejack’s apple pie, only I want to keep eating after the first bite!”
“Wow Cassandra” said Applejack, “it sure is mighty great that ya raised th’ money ta fix th’ town hall.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Cassandra quizzically, “you raised this money by winning the rodeo.” She pushed the bag of bits into Applejack’s face.
“We saw the whole thing” said Rainbow Dash, “It was AWSEOME the way you hogtied Wild Bull Hickock to win the Masters’ lasso event.”
“And when you jumped over 15 hay bales? I was so nervous I could barely watch” added Fluttershy.
“Oh my, and the dressage contest” added Rarity, “such style, such finesse, I thought for a minute it was me out there!”
“Aside from Cassandra, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a pony break so many world records in a single day,” finished Twilight
“Ya guys” said Applejack, tears welling up in her eyes, “Ah cayn’t believe ya’d do this fer me. Ah can’t wait ta see th’ look on the mayor’s faces when ah give her all these bits!”
“She’ll be happy enough with half of them” said Cassandra, “have you cleaned out the cellar recently? Didn’t you once tell me once that the Apple Family had a secret stash of around 25 thousand squirreled away for hard times?”
“Now that ya mention it, ah do faintly recall that.” replied Applejack
“All aboard!” called the train conductor
“Hey Cassandra?”
“Yes Applejack?”
“Th’ element of Honesty’s really startin’ to cramp mah style. Think you could help me come up with a better element when we get home?”
“I would love to.”