//------------------------------// // Pinkie Pride // Story: A Dream // by totallynotabrony //------------------------------// If you’ve never been there, you probably don’t know much about the multiverse. As I understand it, it’s sort of like Wikipedia. It’s huge, with many different areas and subdivisions. The actions of anyone can, knowingly or not, affect the content. Everything is constantly changing and everyone is always arguing. And somewhere out there is Kevin Bacon. Furthering the comparison to Wikipedia, there are all sorts of connections and ways of doing things. Once you learn the multiverse’s code, you can start to tinker with it and make your own edits. That’s why I was working on the summoning ritual. It was one way of performing the “import otherworldly being” command. “You’re absolutely sure this is going to work?” I said to Sir Win. He and I were digging a hole in the Everfree Forest. It was early morning and the sun was still a while from rising. “Well, you’ve got all the ingredients,” he allowed. His mane burned brightly and lit up our work. “I’ve never seen a summoning this complicated before, but I don’t see any reason why it won’t work.” I finished mixing the proper concoction and dropped everything into the hole. I slid the dirt back in and dusted off my hooves. “That’s the last one.” Sir Win and I had planted five talismans in a circle around Ponyville. Basically, it created a giant pentagram and we were about to do some terribly arcane things and stuff. The two of us trotted back into town. Sir Win had done his part, and I had a few tasks left to do before the ritual could be started. The eastern horizon was glowing with the promise of sunrise as I went into the library and prodded Sunset awake. I was already wearing my own rain gear and gave her a pair of galoshes as she blearily blinked away sleep. “Here, put on these boots. The monsters are about to get all biblical and shit.” The two of us suited up and went outside as the first rays of dawn broke over the horizon. I made Sunset carry my guitar and amplifier. While we walked, she asked, “What’s ‘biblical?’” “It means things have gotten ancient and badass, but also potentially violent and icky.” She frowned. “And what monsters were you talking about?” “The ones we might be about to unleash on Equestria if we screw up this summoning ritual that I’ve been putting together. I don’t intend to fail, but the raincoats are just in case we have to clean up the mess under a rain of blood.” Sunset did not ask any more questions. Good, I like it when people understand the first time. The two of us made it to the center of town as the sun came up fully. The townsponies were out and about, starting the day. Somewhere, I heard an accordion playing. My jaw tightened. We didn’t have much time left. With a piece of chalk, I set about drawing a series of complicated runes on the cobblestones of the town square. I told Sunset to run security so that none of the ponies would mess up my work before I was finished. I drew as quickly as I could. In the distance, I heard a male voice exclaim, “Hey everypony, who wants to party?” That was it. We were out of time. I turned around. A stallion with a curly mane was making his way up the street singing silly songs and getting the attention of every citizen of Ponyville. He wore a dark serape and hat, straight out of a western movie. He stopped in front of The Half Pint pub and knocked on the door. “Rainbow Dash! Come out and party! It’s your birthday and the anniversary of you arriving in Ponyville! It’s going to be the biggest, bestest, bash anypony has ever seen!” Rainbow stuck her head out the window. “Really? Somepony came to celebrate my… birth-iversary?” “That’s kind of what I was already doing,” said Guinness to her, also putting his head out the window. He wore a party hat. “But this pony isn’t married to me and still thinks I deserve a party,” Rainbow said. “Pinkie throws parties for ponies she isn’t married to all the time,” Guinness pointed out. Rainbow frowned. “Yeah. Speaking of, where is she?” Pinkie arrived just then, huffing and puffing. Last I heard, she was still in Canterlot, so it must have been a long trip. “Did…did somepony say ‘party?’” The new stallion turned to her, his hat riding low over his eyes. “Why yes, yes I did. The name’s Cheese Sandwich. I’m the best party pony Ponyville has ever seen.” Pinkie brightened. “Oh, that’s great! I’m also the best party pony Ponyville has ever seen.” The gathered townsfolk muttered amongst themselves. Clearly they knew that “best” wasn’t really a title that could be shared. “Anyway,” Pinkie went on, “me and you can throw the best birth-iversary party ever!” Cheese shook his head. “No, that will actually be me and you.” Pinkie gasped. “Not me and you?” “Me and you would just be pathetic,” Cheese sneered. “A real party pony should be headlining this birth-iversary.” The assembled crowd gasped. Someone murmured, “Oh no he didn’t!” Pinkie could hardly believe it herself. “But…I am a real party pony!” “Not as real as me,” Cheese retorted. “That might be true,” I said, stepping forward. “If you were actually the real Cheese Sandwich.” The pony, who I will now refer to as Sandwich au Fromage to provide differentiation, turned to face me. “That’s a big accusation, partner. What are you going to do about it?” We faced each other in the street. I picked up one hoof and moved it a few inches closer to my hip. “That depends on you.” Fromage brushed his serape back, revealing the array of party favors holstered on his belt. “Well then. I reckon we got us a little standoff. What makes you think you can take me?” “I’m going to activate a summoning ritual that I’ve been planning and setting up for weeks. It will pull into this world a being of awesome power from another universe. After that, the combined power of the summon plus my kickass repertoire will kill you. Of course, if I screw up, the backlash will probably kill us all, but at least that also means you’ll be dead.” “Well, that escalated quickly,” said Guinness. He frowned. “Go back to that part about all of us being killed.” “Yes please,” requested Rainbow Catcher, who poked her head through the window just then. I ignored both of them, still staring at Fromage. The two of us were still holding position, hooves poised. “So how about it?” I said. “You game?” He flashed a sneer. “Draw.” I grabbed for a piece of chalk from my hammerspace, slamming it to the ground and making one final mark, thereby kickstarting the spell. I went to my knees, throwing my hooves in the air. “Alfred Yankovic, I summon thee!” Time seemed to slow down. The town square went blurry as everypony but me froze in place. The centerpoint of the runes I had drawn began to glow with a bright light. An upbeat male voice with an American accent said, “Hey man, what’s up?” “I kind of need you to come and kick some ass in another world, Mr. Yankovic,” I said. “I’ve told you before, Mr. Yankovic was my father.” The voice chuckled. “Call me Al.” “Fair enough,” I said. “So what’s the situation?” he asked. “A musical party pony, if allowed to continue, will tear apart the spacetimes. That would be bad,” I explained. “Hmm. Okay, yeah, I can help. You know the rules of summoning, though. It comes at a price.” I nodded, even though Al hadn’t yet resolved into a form that could see me. “Name it.” “I’ll have my standard fee, if you please,” he said. “Hookers.” “Yep.” I could live with that. “Deal.” “Awesome. Here I come.” The light flashed brighter, and out popped a pony who looked exactly like Fromage. He had an accordion strapped on, and wore a huge smile. “Let’s do this.” Time suddenly restarted. The two versions of the male party pony stared each other down from across the town square. The new development had startled Fromage. A few seconds passed. Nothing moved. The crowd had gone quiet. The wind rustled my raincoat a little. Fromage growled at the new arrival. “You dare? Part of comedy is not bringing reality into things to ruin the joke.” “Part of reality is knowing the limits of good taste,” Cheese shot back. He played a quick few notes on his accordion. “I know a little something about parodies. And buddy boy, you are no quality piece.” Pinkie, who had been sitting by and quietly (by Pinkie standards) observing the proceedings, said, “I think I know how to settle this. This calls for a goof-off!” “No, just a beatdown,” I corrected. Cheese nodded. “My thoughts exactly. Mr. Valiant, a riff, if you please.” I took my guitar from Sunset and settled the strap around my shoulders. This was the moment I had been waiting for. I had practiced so hard for this one gig. I took a deep breath and hit the strings. The groove I busted out on request was the sweetest thing my hooves had ever played. Cheese followed up with an incredibly awesome tune that I didn’t know an accordion could even play. It sounded like it had brass, woodwind, and percussion all mixed in. The vocals, however, were the real show. He’d picked an old favorite of mine, suitably modified for Equestria. Put down that party cannon and listen to me It’s time to join a pie fight It’s time to let your fillies grow up to be stallions It’s time to raise some parasprites You better say no to homeowner’s insurance You better kick your hooves up in the air You better make a rhyme with a rhyme You better get a facefull of some nice hard stairs You better eat all Celestia’s cake that you can When the Princess is not around Next you’ll go to the surface of sun To get yourself a tan Do magic with alcohol Fly with your eyes closed Fly intoxicated, too What can you do? Dare to be stupid! Dare to be stupid! I was sweating with the effort of keeping up with Cheese, but it was all worth it. With one last fanfare from our mismatched instruments, Fromage was completely overpowered by the sheer ridiculousness. Cheese’s accordion lit up like something out of a magical girl anime and blasted a beam of light across the town square, slamming straight into Fromage. He screamed, his form glowing with an overcharge of energy. All that had to go somewhere, and his body certainly couldn’t contain it. Like a piñata, he exploded. But instead of candy, it was a shower of blood. Also, a small mouse with a miniature tuba fell to the ground and ran away. In a moment, it was all over. The pitter-patter of platelets and plasma tapered off. Cheese wiped off his face and put on a pair of sunglasses. “Looks like someone…got their mind blown.” “Hell yeah,” I cheered and slapped hooves with him. “Don’t forget the hookers, Valiant,” Cheese reminded me. He shot me a grin, and with a flash of light he was gone, accordion and all. I took off my bloody raincoat and surveyed the area. The entire town square, and the crowd that had gathered, was covered in tiny pieces of Fromage. Rainbow Catcher was the first to speak. She licked blood from her face and howled with glee. “This is the best birth-iversary present ever, don’t you think so, mother?” Rainbow did not think so. Nor did anyone else in town. Small price to pay for saving their asses, though. While I didn’t know exactly what Fromage would have done if not defeated, it certainly wouldn’t have helped the stability of Equestria. There was still the matter of paying the price of hookers, but it wasn’t like I had to deliver immediately. For the moment, the day was saved and we could all go have a beer. That was apparently not a popular idea with the residents of Ponyville. Most of them wanted to just go get cleaned up and try to forget what had happened. Sunset and I were the only customers at The Half Pint. Guinness’ hooves shook as he poured the drinks. “Valiant, I don’t know what you did to that pony, I don’t know why you know Weird Al, and I really don’t know how all the crazy things you keep doing are supposed to make Equestria more stable.” “Answering your questions in order: we killed him, one of my exes was an extra in the video for White and Nerdy, and trust me,” I said, taking a deep swig from my glass. Sunset sat beside me and sipped her beer in silence. Guinness glanced around at the empty pub. “Look, it’s a slow night. Please just talk to me.” I sighed. This might take all night. Then again, clearing out Fromage was a major obstacle taken care of, so I deserved a little break. “All right. Here’s what’s going on. Let me start from the beginning. Remember when I went to space?” “That’s the beginning?” Guinness frowned. “Close enough. See, my exes who were running this show wanted everything to go back to normal. They thought that by removing me from Equestria, my influence would end and things would sort themselves out. I did beg them into letting me travel to outer space, and the deal was that I would go home afterwards. Obviously, that didn’t happen.” “So…are you some kind of fugitive, then?” Guinness asked. “On the run from your exes and universal justice?” He chuckled. “A little bit, actually,” I agreed, “but it’s not my fault. When I landed back in Equestria, things had kept getting further off track, even in my absence. Knowing that I would probably get the blame anyway, I decided that I had to stay. I know that something or someone must be continuing to make changes. We’ve already seen that this universe started out as an imaginary place like a virtual reality, but turned real. I don’t want any of it spilling over into our universe after I do eventually go home, and so I have to stop it.” “What will happen if you don’t?” Guinness asked. “I mentioned that things were getting out of hand around here,” I said. “Imagine that, but worse. And again, I’ll mention that the possibility of cross-universe shenanigans is pretty high. Nobody wants that.” “But if there’s a problem, why haven’t you notified your exes?” Guinness asked. “Can’t they help? They did create this place.” “Think of the multiverse like Wikipedia,” I said. “Anyone can edit it, but only those with registered accounts are trusted users. In an attempt to isolate the problems, I figuratively changed all the passwords. Now nobody can screw with things without my permission. I’m the mod. The god mod, if you will. That doesn’t mean I’m all-powerful, though.” Guinness completely missed my self-promotion. “You locked your exes out?” “I locked everyone but me out,” I said. “Are you sure you just don’t want to ask for help?” he suggested. I ignored him. “As the only admin, I’m the only one who can edit this universe, but for some reason it just keeps changing. It’s not outside influence that’s doing it. It’s like if a program in here is running all by itself.” “So, uh, run a debug?” Guinness suggested. “That’s what I’m trying to do. Taking out anomalies like what I did today – think of it like correcting code errors.” I sighed. “But I’m afraid that it won’t be enough. More faults and glitches are popping up all the time and they might eventually overpower my ability to fix them.” “I’m not sure I like the idea of you being the moderator of the universe,” Guinness said. “Then again, if you can’t easily change things on your whim I guess you aren’t as powerful as that title makes it sound.” “Want to get deleted, asshole?” I said. “But yeah, running a whole universe is basically a full time job just to keep some semblance of order, much less try to overhaul anything. I barely have time for anything else. That’s why lately I haven’t been doing anything that Twilight would probably call my crazy robot business shenanigans.” “So do you have a plan?” Guinness asked. I finished the last of the beer and put the glass down. “I think I’m going to have to do a hard reset.” I rolled my eyes. “In Equestria’s case, that would probably be more like a girly reboot. Although to be truthful, that’s the most effective option. Turn it off and turn it back on again.” “What would happen if you did?” Guinness asked. “Well – speaking in metaphors again – only the universe’s base code is saved to the hard drive. Everything that has happened, all the changes, are in the RAM so when it powers off that memory disappears. After the reset, everything would go back to the way it was originally.” I gestured for him to pour me another beer. “Everything?” he asked while filling the mug. “Does that mean Rainbow and I would never have met?” “You wouldn’t even be in Equestria,” I confirmed. Guinness dropped the half-full glass and it shattered on the floor. He grabbed me by the neck and hauled me across the bar so I was face to face with him. “You can’t do that!” “Why not?” I said. “I’m calling the shots around here. Let go of me before I make you.” Guinness did release me, but stayed in my face. “You can’t just erase something like that. It’s love!” “Rainbow only likes you because Daring put you in a book,” I said. “It doesn’t matter how it started. Love is still love,” he said. “We’re happy together.” “What about your demonic kid?” I asked. “What about your kid?” he shot back. “Would you reset the universe and just give up Trixie like she was nothing to you?” Shit. I hadn’t thought of it that way. My mouth opened and closed a few times but I couldn’t think of anything to say. Guinness pressed on. “You know, I once met a mare who claimed she was Trixie’s grandmother. She said the rest of her family disappeared. You might be all Trixie has.” He got another glass and poured me a beer. I still hadn’t replied by the time he set it down in front of me. He gestured to Sunset and me. “Why don’t you two have a drink together? I’ll be back in a few minutes.” He must have really been trying to drive the love point home, as that was the same line he used when he wanted two ponies to hook up. “Jesus Christ,” I muttered into my glass as I took a sip. “The already freaking huge task ahead of me just got more difficult. Now I’m probably going to feel guilty about relationships I damage along the way. I don’t know if I can do this.” “I believe in you,” said Sunset. I glanced at her. “Thanks. You know, you’ve almost started to become my assistant on this, what with the stuff you keep helping with.” Sunset smiled at the praise but hid it behind her mug. I downed my beer and put the empty glass on the bar. “Another!”