Mender started his walk down the main road of Ponyville. Many buildings lined both sides, all painted bright with vibrant colors. Most of them were homes, which wasn't too surprising. This town was relatively small, and stores were sparse here. Some market stands dotted the path as some ponies sold their goods.
Yep, he definitely wasn't in Fillydelphia anymore. This was nowhere close to the tightly packed and modernized space of his old town. Neither did it carry as many volatile denizens...Mender wondered if there were any that existed in this town. It looked way too nice to have any terrible ponies living in it.
As he reached a crossroad, a sweet-themed bakery caught his eye. It had a gingerbread-theme as its exterior, and smelled of sinful, sugary confectionaries. Mender's mouth turned moist as he momentarily dreamed of feasting upon the sweet treats inside it...but that would wait until later. He needed to get home, he hadn't finished unpacking yet!
He passed the bakery, but as the sweet scent faded, a stronger scent of sugar flooded his nose. Mender looked around, but didn't see anything as the source of the smell, and he ruled out the bakery. That smell was different.
The sickly sweet scent was getting closer, and Mender felt his stomach knot in agony. He looked back towards the bakery, and he heard somepony...bouncing?
A pink female pony was indeed bouncing around the bakery at the corner. She was the source of that smell. Upon seeing her, Mender's stomach twisted even harder.
She stopped bouncing, and turned her head to face him. Suddenly she sported a wide smile to match her very excited blue eyes.
Oh Tartarus. He knew that whatever she had planned before seeing him was immediately abandoned. Instead, her focus of attention was now completely on him. Mender didn't like it one bit, so he closed his eyes and turned around.
It took him precisely one second to realize that was a mistake as her sweet smell suddenly heightened tenfold, forcing his eyes open. Her face was two inches from his, and he reeled backward, falling on his rear. His breathing was momentarily forgotten as pain rushed into his chest and head.
He could barely register her figure. Her mane was a curly, frazzled mess akin to the look of cotton candy. Her tail was in the same state as her mane. Her cutie mark was three balloons, two yellow ones with a blue one in between.
"Hi! You're new here, aren't ya?"
Her voice was high pitched and squeaky. Mender involuntarily ground his teeth at the sound of her voice.
"Uh...you could say that. I guess. I've been here for two weeks, but haven't really talked to a lot of ponies here yet."
She gasped loudly. "Ohmygosh, we HAVE to fix that! You know what I can do to fix that?"
"Somethin tells me I won't like it," Mender grumbled as he rose from the ground. Her overly cheery attitude starting making his stomach flop around in agony.
"A...PARTY!" She stood on her rear legs and stretched upward, a shower of confetti inexplicably exploding behind her.
"...no." Mender was blunt. He hated parties.
"Aw come on, don't be such a sour stallion. It'll be fun! My parties are always fun!"
"I haven't even finished unpacking yet," Mender grumbled. He really wanted this conversation to end quickly.
"But you said you were here for two weeks! You haven't unpacked after all this time? Sheesh, not even Rarity takes that long, and she usually takes like twenty bags with her when she goes to Canterlot on business," she quipped.
"Who's Rarit-...never mind. I couldn't finish unpacking because I was recovering from an accident."
"You mean from the fillies that busted you up thinking you were a ghostie?"
Mender blinked. "How, how did you know that?" As far as he knew, that news didn't leave the hospital. He wanted to keep that little incident a secret, at least until he was more settled in to living here.
"How did I know what?" She turned her head, confused.
"But you said...gah, never mind. I must be imagining things."
She gasped again. "YOU imagine things too?! I thought I was the only one!"
Mender felt a migraine coming. This mare was going to turn his brain into oatmeal at this rate, and he very much preferred to keep his sanity. He quickly changed the subject...well, he tried to.
"So-"
The mare interrupted. "Oh silly filly, I haven't even told you my name yet! Pinkamena Diane Pie, though everyone around here calls me Pinkie Pie for short, or Pinkie for even shorter!"
He felt a very strong urge to facehoof at this point, but resisted instead. "Able Mender. A pleasure to meet you, miss Pie."
Pinkie gasped again. "Wow, that's a new one! I've never been called a miss before! That sounds so...so gentlecoltly!"
"W-w-wait a sec. You're fine with being called miss Pie?" Mender was genuinely shocked at this.
"Sure! Other ponies have called me worse things than that. Nuisance, Creepy, Pleasegetthebuckawayfromme...you know, names that sound bad to say to somepony."
He was about to say that those weren't actually names they gave her, but he didn't feel like going off on another tangent again.
"Well, I think I'll just call you Pinkie then. Miss Pie sounds too...formal for you anyway."
"Okie dokie lokie! Oh, and can I call you Mendy?"
"Mendy?!" Dammit, that sounded even worse than his first name!
"Yeah, Mendy the Medic! Sounds catchy to me! Easier to remember than boring old Mender too. Makes you sound old."
Mender's eye twitched at that remark. "Old? OLD?!" He suddenly didn't care that she knew he was a medic. He hated being reminded of his age.
His yelling caused Pinkie to take a few steps back. She swore she could see smoke streaming from his nose.
"Now now, uh, calm down Mendy....OH! I know what'll make you feel better!" Pinkie dashed off to the bakery.
Mender's pain in his lungs snapped him out of his anger. He almost toppled. Sheesh, this damn mare was really starting to tick him of-
"I'm back!" Pinkie zoomed back, holding a bag of flour. She immediately dumped it on herself as Mender watched, bewildered by what she just did.
...and then he started doing something unexpected, even to him. He laughed.
For a moment, he could care less about his recovering ribs. He laughed long, hard, and hearty. He didn't know why it was so funny...but that wasn't all he was laughing at.
Mender was laughing at the absurdity of everything that happened so far. He laughed at his barely standing home. He laughed at his injuries and fillies responsible for them. He laughed at his long stay in the hospital. He laughed at Pinkie, Dash, and AJ.
He laughed at how nice and innocent this town and its citizens were, even after all it has gone through. He heard about Nightmare Moon's return...and everyone knew of Discord's antics throughout Equestria. But here this town remained, well above the evil influences that befell it.
It all seemed so foreign to him now, and Pinkie made him see that truth with a simple practical joke. She may not have known it, but she broke down a wall Mender had been building in his heart for years.
It was a cold wall that stood as a reminder that there were still all sorts of problems in the world that couldn't be ignored. Pinkie took a hammer to that wall, showing that all that focus on those problems prevented him from seeing the bliss that was ignorance in places where such problems were not his concern anymore.
His laugher slowly subsided, and he looked back to Pinkie and saw a worried expression on her face. He realized that his laughter didn't sound as funny to her as it was to him.
"Hahaha...haaaa...thanks, Pinkie."
"For what?"
"For reminding me that I could laugh...even when I thought I couldn't anymore."