"Thanks for hostin' this slumber party, Twilight. Ahm in need of some relaxation after buckin' apple trees all day."
"For the fifth time, Applejack, it's no problem at all! I already planned it all out, and I made sure that the activities were something that all six of us will enjoy." Twilight settled down into her sleeping bag with a smile. "The first activity on the list is games. What should we play?"
Pinkie Pie sprung out of her sleeping bag and started bouncing around the room. "Ooh! Ooh! I know! We can play pin the tail on the pony! Or how about pin the tail on the changeling? Or pin the tail on the frog? Wait no, that doesn't make any sense. Oh, I know! We can bake a coffee cake with coffee icing and fill it with dynamite and more coffee. Then we can take one of those giant, 40-foot tall pogo sticks and-"
Pinkie's words were abruptly cut off as she bounced close enough to Rarity for her to get a hoof shoved in her mouth.
"Ugh, this is so unsanitary. Anyway, darling, don't you think all that is a tad too much for a slumber party? I'm sure that your idea is... fun, but I think most of us would rather do something a bit calmer. Understand?"
Pinkie nodded solemnly and Rarity removed her hoof from her mouth, wiping it off with a handkerchief that was helpfully provided by Fluttershy.
"Yeah Rarity, I guess you do have a point," Pinkie sighed. "So I guess we can just use vanilla frosting instead? It's not as awesome as using coffee icing, but the explosions are just as big."
"Actually," Fluttershy spoke up, "I'd like to play a nice, quiet game of truth." All eyes turned to Fluttershy, and she shrank back a little. "I mean, if that's okay with you guys."
"I guess we can, but what is it? I don't remember reading about it in my slumber party guide," said Twilight, flipping the pages of the said book as she scanned it for any mention of the game.
"Well, it's kind of like truth or dare, but without the dare part."
"Oh come on, what fun is that?" complained Rainbow Dash, flopping down onto the pillow. "I'm the most daring pony, and I want a chance to prove it to everyone."
"Excuse me? Ah am the most daring pony. Not to mention the hardest workin' pony. I work all day, unlike you."
"Are you calling me lazy?" asked Rainbow Dash.
"Yep." Applejack said smugly.
"Am not!" Rainbow Dash caught Applejack looking at her accusingly and sighed. "Okay fine, sometimes I can be a bit lazy," she admitted, "but that does nothing to change the fact that I am the single most daring pony to ever have lived!" she boasted proudly.
"No, ah am," corrected Applejack.
"Actually, you two tied, remember?" Pinkie Pie interjected.
"Trust me, we remember alright." Applejack grumbled. "Either way, we're not playin' truth or dare, we're just playin' truth."
"Yeah, and I'm totally going to win this," announced Rainbow Dash.
"You? Win? Ha!" laughed Applejack. "Ah'd like to see you try! There's no way you could beat me, ah am the element of honesty after all."
"It's on!" declared Rainbow Dash.
"So, um, does this mean we're playing?" Fluttershy asked.
"Yes, I imagine it does, as soon as I finish adjusting my eye makeup," said Rarity, adjusting some microscopic error of her eyelashes. "Aaaaand there we go. All done." She closed her makeup pouch with a snap and levitated it into her enormous sleepover bag. "Now, since Applejack seems so entirely confident that she will win, why don't we let her go first?"
"Will that even work?" Fluttershy asked, "I mean, since she's the element of honesty, would she even have an answer to a question that we don't already know?"
"Oh, I'm sure that she does," Twilight replied. "Telling the truth isn't necessarily the same thing as not telling something to somepony. And with that, I have a question for Applejack. Tell us a secret that you have never told anypony before."
"Oh, well, um," Applejack scratched her head with a hoof," You see, I-"
"Applejack!" Pinkie exclaimed, "Tell us all your seeeeecrets. Your deepest, darkest, secretest secrets. Are you a spy for Nightmare Moon? Is your middle name Flankface? Are you allergic to apples? Is Apple Fritter actually a changeling? Are you actually an alicorn potato waiting to-"
"Pinkie Pie, shut up so she can talk!" Rainbow Dash interrupted. "I really want to hear this."
Everypony in the room was silent as they waited for Applejack to spill a secret.
"Well, ah can't actually think of any secrets of my own, but ah do know a secret. Y'all have to promise me not to tell a single livin' soul." Everypony nodded and leaned forward in anticipation. "Alright. It's not really a big secret, but ah am not even supposed to know about this. Okay, so y'all know mah sister Applebloom? And ya know how she's always doin' her crusadin' with her friends to find her cutie mark? Well, truth is, she already has her cutie mark. It's an apple tree sapling She dyes her coat to hide it."
Everypony looked shocked except for Rainbow Dash, who just looked disappointed. "I was hoping for some real good dirt," she muttered.
"I just don't get it," Rarity mused, "why would she hide her cutie mark? I'm sure her friends would be positively delighted to hear that their endeavors have somewhat paid off."
"Ah think mah little sis is scared that she'll lose her friends," said Applejack. "She's afraid that sine she has her cutie mark, she won't be a part of their little club anymore and they won't be her friend anymore. Personally, ah think it's stupid. They're too good friends for that to happen'."
"I still don't think that was a very good secret. It wasn't even your own!" Rainbow Dash protested.
"Ya want secrets? How 'bout we hear yours then, Rainbow?"
"Fine, if I have to." She took a deep breath and prepared herself. "I dye my mane."
"WHAT!?" The other five mares shouted in unison. Fluttershy's shout, of course, was much quieter than the others, so it sounded more like four and-a-quarter mares shouting.
"Hey, you would too if you had a pink mane." Rainbow Dash said defensively before diving underneath into wonderbolt-themed sleeping bag to hide her face, which was red with embarrassment from being laughed at.
"What's that supposed to mean?" demanded Pinkie, pausing her giggling. "I don't dye my mane."
"Yeah, well, you're Pinkie Pie," replied the lumpy sleeping bag.
"That's right, I am Pinkie Pie! How did you know that?"
"Um, maybe because you're one of my best friends?"
"Oh yeah, I guess that makes sense. Hey, can I tell a secret now? Too bad, I'm telling it anyway. So once, I was working at Sugarcube Corner when this stallion came up to the counter and ordered a pineapple upside-down cake. So I told him that we were all out of pineapple upside-down cake because we had sold all forty of them to some catering service or something and he got mad at me. He called me some really bad names- like, REALLY bad names- and I threw a pie in his face and then he left."
Twilight raised an eyebrow. "But Pinkie, you've already told us that before."
"Yeah," Fluttershy added, "except last time, you listed all of the bad names he called you." She shuddered at the memory.
"Oh nonono, that's not the secret, you silly filly!" Pinkie Pie laughed. "The secret is that I had eaten all forty cakes just an hour ago! That's why I didn't chase after that meanie pants stallion. I felt really full."
Rainbow Dash laughed. "You seriously ate that many cakes? Man, we have got to have a dessert-eating contest sometime."
Rarity shook her head in disbelief. "Pinkie, keep this up and you won't fit your gala dress. I don't think I have enough time to make you a new one, either."
Pinkie tilted her head to one side. "Why not?"
"I'll be busy in Canterlot trying to... well, I guess it's my turn to tell a secret. During the last grand galloping gala, I met Prince Blueblood. You all know that of course. But what you don't know is that while we were taking a stroll in the gardens, Blueblood proposed to me, and I said... yes."
The room was silent, save for a couple of snores coming from a wonderbolt sleeping bag. Fluttershy was the first to break the near silence.
"Oh my."
"Oh my indeed, Fluttershy. I'm going to Canterlot to file a whole lot of papers canceling the marriage. It's no simple process with royal proposals," Rarity said with a grimace.
"Rarity, why did you agree to marry him anyway? I thought he wasn't your type?"
"I know, but I agreed before I realized he was a...a..."
"Stuck up, snobby, meanie-pants jerkface?" Pinkie supplied.
"That wasn't exactly the word I was looking for, but yes, Pinkie, he was most certainly a snobbish... whatever you just said. Aww look, Applejack fell asleep. Actually, I think she's been sleep for quite awhile. Hmm, looks like those two certainly aren't the most 'awake' ponies in Equestria. So Twilight, I do believe that it is your turn to share a secret with us."
Twilight nodded. "While it is my turn, I can honestly say that I have no secrets. Actually, wait a sec. Now that I think about it, I do. So I know for a fact that I've told you before about my entrance exam for Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns, but I also... left out a few details."
"Like what?" asked Rarity.
"Well... I might have possibly maybe left out a small little detail. After Princess Celestia returned everything to normal, I accidentally transformed her into a nightmare-moonish type pony. She was about to set fire to everything and declare eternal day when the other unicorns in the room temporarily transformed her into a tree and saved us all."
"Wow Twilight, you almost doomed Equestria to eternal daylight! That is so WEIRD!" laughed Pinkie Pie.
"I for one wouldn't mind eternal daylight, for I sleep with a blindfold on and am able to get my beauty sleep. However, it must have been simply dreadful to be turned into a tree."
"It would not be that dreadful," protested Fluttershy.
"Of course not for you, you said once that you would like to be a tree," Twilight pointed out.
"That wasn't entirely true." Fluttershy fidgeted with her hooves a little. "You see, I am actually a tree."
"But how?" Rarity and Twilight said in unison.
"I guess I'll just show you," decided Fluttershy. And with that, she turned into a tree.
"Well will you look at that," Rarity mused.
"I know. I would have never guessed," admitted Twilight, who usually guessed everything correctly.
"I already knew," said Pinkie Pie with a shrug.
"How?" asked Twilight.
"Well duh, I can see through the fourth wall."
"But what-" Twilight started, but stopped herself. With Pinkie Pie, it was usually better not to ask.
"I don't know about you two, but I'm getting tired. After all, it's-" Rarity glanced at her watch and her eyes widened. "Oh my, it's 3:28. We really must be going to sleep."
Yawning, Twilight nodded in agreement and tucked herself in the sleeping bag.
~~~~~
Meanwhile, Diamond Tiara hit the stop button on her tape recorder, keeping a careful eye on the five mares and the tree to make sure she hadn't been spotted. Once satisfied that she hadn't been seen, she gathered her belongings and ran home with an evil grin on her face. Gabby Gums was back in business.