It was a dull, gray, cloudy day on the farm.
It always was. That was the way it was supposed to be.
The farm, this farm, was not for growing things. Bare earth spread out to the horizon, the flat, uninteresting surface only interrupted by the methodically ordered, equally uninteresting rows and rows of rocks.
That's what the farm was for. It was a rock farm.
Rocks don't need light to grow. Sunlight would have just encouraged other things, like grass and weeds, and those would have just gotten in the way. So no sunlight. The cloudy haze that hung over the plains was almost entirely natural; that was what had made the place such a good site for the farm. The pegasi only needed to touch things up a bit, every now and then. And even with all the clouds, it hardly ever rained. It was just cloudy, always cloudy.
Except for that one day.
That one, magical day, when the brilliant colors had come and pushed away the clouds, and Pinkie had found her calling, and life had been happy.
Igneous sighed.
That had been a special day.
A breeze blew past. It was a small breeze, and it really wasn't that cold out, but Igneous shivered all the same. The stoic earth pony wrapped his forelegs around himself as he waited there, in the silence of the plains in front of his house.
That day hadn't lasted.
When they woke up again, the clouds had started rolling back in. It wasn't a bad thing, not really. Igneous Rock had even welcomed it. The main problem for him was that it didn't come back sooner; he would have to pay the cloud workers more than usual to get it fixed before the weeds started popping up.
His family felt the same way, mostly. Or, at least, they knew why it had to be done. All of them did; his wife, Cloudy, and their lovely daughters. Even Pinkamena.
Pinkie...
Pinkie was the real problem.
It was wonderful to see how she had brightened up. Really, it was. She could make even rock farming, the absolute dullest of chores, seem like a game. It was like a small part of that color had come to rest in her and refused to leave, and it seemed like the sun was shining wherever she happened to set hoof. It was wonderful. At least... at first.
Then she started popping out of drawers.
That was the first time he had seen it. He had reached into a drawer to get some silverware, and out had popped his young, brightly smiling daughter. He had started, she had laughed, and laughed, and he just stared.
Because that was impossible.
And then, the next day, when her sister Marble had walked into the living room to announce that Pinkie could see the future. Igneous had gone out and checked.
There was Pinkie, laughing again, with a bright orange and purple polka-dotted blindfold that had never been on the farm before, calling out when her sister dropped a rock – before it hit the ground.
Those were the first signs.
It had only gotten worse.
At first, Igneous had just thought that his little Pinkie was happy, really happy, for the first time in her life. It seemed that way, to a point. She had always been a little sillier, more off-the-wall than the rest of her family.
But the change wasn't just when she was happy.
She was happy most of the time. Even when it didn't make any sense, she would be beaming, and bouncing around all over the place – she hardly ever seemed to just walk anywhere anymore.
But when she was sad...
She would cry buckets – literal buckets of tears – when they went to a movie and the lovers died.
Her eyes would water at the first hint of rejection.
She would call out to him as he left in the morning to visit the town market as if he was never coming back.
…
And the things she did... They just kept getting weirder. More unnatural.
Pony limbs are not supposed to bend that way!
Igneous was a logical sort of pony. He was a stallion of routine, who knew his place in the world, who knew what he needed to do and did it well.
He had no idea how to deal with what Pinkie had become.
There had been tests. Fancy unicorn doctors, experts in the field of strange magics. None of them had any idea what to make of her. She was a complete unknown.
So he went to the Princess.
Unknown was dangerous.
Igneous sighed again.
She would be here soon. The shining angel from on high, come to rescue him from his troubles.
From his daughter.
Pinkie was inside, with the others. Saying her goodbyes maybe, or just sitting there, in silence. Just like everything else on the farm.
Igneous stared back at the wooden shack his family called home.
Why hadn't he made it better for them? There was no reason not to. It wasn't like a firmer construction would hurt the rocks. They were rocks – they didn't mind a great deal. So why had it all been so depressing, all the time?
There was movement in a corner of the sky, as the Princess' chariot, pulled by flying guards, broke through the cloud layer. It was the Sun coming back again. One last time.
Igneous got up, and slowly stepped back into the house to tell Pinkamena that the Princess was here to take her away.
Igneous wasn't all that much like his daughter.
He didn't cry very easily.
The ride back was very quiet. The cold of the high altitude air and the wind of travel made things slightly uncomfortable. Princess Celestia looked down at the tiny pink ball of fur that had been the reason for her visit to the farm. The little filly sniffed.
“Are you cold?” the Princess asked, half in seriousness and half to break the monotony of the flight.
For a moment, it seemed like Pinkie wasn't going to answer. Celestia turned to look back over the sea of clouds, staring off to where Canterlot would be coming over the horizon soon.
“... I hate you,” the filly mumbled.
Celestia glanced back. There was no hurt in the Princess' eyes; but there was enough for both of them in the little filly's, from where she stared, unmoving, at the floor of the chariot.
“Your family loves you,” Celestia said softly. “They're just a little confused right now. They don't know how to react.”
“I hate them too,” Pinkie choked. “ – Hate everything. I... I hate..!”
And then she burst into sobs. Pinkie threw herself at the Princess, her long pink mane flowing loosely against Celestia's whiter coat. At first, the Princess thought the filly was embracing her, clinging tightly to the only pony within reach. Then she felt the weak drumming of hooves against her side. Celestia didn't react, but held her forelegs around the little, suffering pony in a tender embrace.
By the time they had landed, the drumming had stopped.
Pinkie got on better, after that. By the time they finally made it to the castle, she was bouncing around, asking questions, making herself beloved by all she met. And her stay was a happy one. She made it so, more than anything, although Celestia tried her best to be the little pony's friend. Pinkie always seemed to find a way to make things brighter, and ponies loved her for it. Pinkie was odd at times, and some ponies thought she couldn't take anything seriously, but the Princess knew better.
She had been with her, on that lonely flight from home.