“We really have to go to this thing?”
Aria stared apathetically at the flyer in her hand, breathing out a long, bored sigh even as Adagio snatched the paper from her.
“It’s the perfect opportunity to gather more information on our – heh – ‘competition,’ if you can call it that; of course we really have to go.”
Sonata straightened up and peered over Adagio’s shoulder at the flyer. With its font printed in bright shades of blue, pink, and purple that somehow coordinated flawlessly with the festive, faded-out background of an electric guitar, varying music notes, and balloons, it was like a party on paper.
CANTERLOT HIGH SCHOOL
MUSICAL SHOWCASE PRE-PARTY
Join your fellow student musicians for an
evening of socialising, food, and fun!
WHEN: Tuesday, February 25, 2014 @ 4:30 PM
WHERE: CHS Gymnasium
WHO: All Musical Showcase student participants!
Refreshments courtesy of the
Party Planning Committee & Student Volunteers.
Aria groaned.
“Why are we even worrying about the ‘competition’ when we already know we’re better than all of them?”
“I think the party sounds like fun.”
“Because we still need to be vigilant. We haven’t identified the source of Equestrian magic here yet; it could be any of them.”
“So like, what kind of food do y’think they’re gonna hav—”
“If we haven’t found it yet, how can we even know for sure that we even will? That cafeteria was full and – wow – nothing!”
“You’re still going on about that? We all saw it, and it was right here!”
“Doesn’t mean it’s still here. You ever think about that, O fearless leader? I mean, we only had to wait five months to get into this stupid place. I’m sure it definitely sat and waited for us.”
“Actualllyyyy, helping with refreshments sounds like fun too—”
“Oh, for the love of—are you going to actually help or just argue everything I do, Aria?”
“Is not helping even an option when you’re in charge, Adagio? Oh, never mind, because that’s always.”
“We’re not talking about the party, are we—”
“Sonata!”
Both her bandmates glared at her and she froze.
With an exasperated groan, Adagio pressed her fingers against her forehead, holding the flyer out in front of her. Aria turned her gaze toward Sonata, who eased up and tried to offer a smile. Aria rolled her eyes and looked away.
What a grump.
Recovered from her vexations, Adagio folded the paper up into a neat, perfectly-pleated square, turning back to Aria and Sonata with renewed vigour in her smile. She held the paper between her fingers and waved it at them as she spoke.
“Even if we don’t find what we’re looking for tonight, there isn’t much chance for it to escape us once we’ve – heh – charmed everyone.” She looked at Aria pointedly. “Is there?”
“Whatever,” Aria mumbled.
“Our bases need to be covered. We are not letting this slip away from us.”
Sonata raised her hand slowly.
Adagio sighed.
“Yes, Sonata?”
“Doooon’t you thiiiink,” Sonata started slowly, twisting some hair around her finger, “if we do socialise with other students like this, there’s a better chance of being able to figure out who did all that rainbow magic stuff?”
Adagio and Aria exchanged looks. Sonata swallowed down hard, but continued.
“I mean, like, we didn’t even sit in the cafeteria to eat lunch like the other students. Maybe they’re gonna be suspicious if we’re too . . .” she trailed off and paused, running a finger along the ribbon of her necklace before finishing: “. . . if we act weird.”
“Didn’t help that Adagio nearly broke Sunset Shimmer’s wrist this morning,” Aria said, laughing. “Nice one. Bet she definitely didn’t think we were weird then.”
“She was going for my necklace.”
Sonata held onto the ribbon a little tighter.
“And anyway, you two didn’t help, either—especially you, Sonata. ‘How we get people to do what we want?’ What possessed you to say that?”
“I just got kind of exci—”
“Us two? Don’t know what I did.”
“We could have done without the arguing.” Adagio sighed again, glancing away. “But Sonata is right.”
Sonata let go of the ribbon and looked up. “I am?”
“Yes. We are ‘students’ now, after all.”
Sonata beamed brightly—until Adagio continued.
“But you need to watch yourself.” She punctuated these last two words with two heavy taps against Sonata’s chest, eyes narrowed. “We don’t need a repeat of that little thing that happened a few months ago. No friends. No dating. Got it?”
Sonata looked down. Then back up. She opened her mouth to say something—but closed it and looked away. And nodded.
Adagio smiled, gently smoothing down Sonata’s collar with her fingers before adjusting and centring her fellow Dazzling’s gem.
“Good.”
Pinkie had been making a lot of lists since that morning.
She knew first-hand the importance of list-making in the process of party-planning, or recipe-writing, or inventory-taking, but it was becoming apparent that it was also important to crazy-event-recording.
Not that, normally, these crazy events would have bothered her too much (because she was all about crazy! Crazy sweets, crazy parties, crazy hats, crazy hair—), but she was still trying to work through this whole Sonata being a siren thing.
Oh, right. Rewind.
The visit to Principal Celestia’s office had been a total bust. Not only did both Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna not have any advice for the girls, but they were also obviously not themselves. So, naturally, the girls turned to the one person they knew could help them, because she had before, even though she was in another world now and they didn’t know of any way for her to get back for a super long time – but there had to be some way to get around that because Sunset Shimmer had a magic book that could magically send a magic message to her and if the book could magically send a magic message then there must be some magical way for her to—
Super long story super short, Twilight Sparkle had (magically!) come back to help save the day.
And she had also told them she was pretty sure the new girls, who called themselves the Dazzlings, were sirens who wanted to enslave everyone with their magical voices.
Pinkie thought it sounded kind of harsh coming from Sonata (via Twilight).
So, the Crazy Event List:
1. The Dazzlings had shown up during lunch. (See Summary List.)
2. Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna were already completely enchanted.
3. The Musical Showcase was now a Battle of the Bands.
4. Sunset Shimmer had a magical book just sitting in her locker.
5. Twilight Sparkle found a way back to their world with help from said book.
6. Twilight told them that the Dazzlings were sirens, voices, enslavement, et cetera. (Solution: the Magic of Friendship, of course!)
7. Pinkie completely forgot she was supposed to bring refreshments for the Musical Showcase/Battle of the Bands Pre-Party.
This last item occurred to her in the middle of a conversation with the other girls while sitting on a couch in Sugarcube Corner, chocolate milkshake in one hand and straw in the other. She sprung to her feet, cheek still cold from the bit of milkshake that Twilight had wiped off her face moments before, eyes wide.
“Ohmigosh, I just forgot! I mean, I just remembered that I forgot!” Pinkie made to hold her hands to her face, but the cup and straw obscured her path, pressing against her cheeks instead of her actual hands. “I’m on the Party Planning Committee! I’m the head of the Party Planning Committee! Me! I am!”
Twilight looked at Rarity and Sunset, but they only shrugged in response.
“And?” Sunset raised an eyebrow.
“And! And! Annnnnnd!” Pinkie dropped the straw into her cup, paused a moment to look into the cup, sipped up the last remnant of melted milkshake, then continued: “And, I’m supposed to help bring refreshments!”
There was a loud, collective sigh from the other six girls and Spike.
“Y’need a hand with that, sugarcube?” Applejack stood up.
“We’d be happy to help,” Fluttershy added.
Pinkie, at any other moment, would have spun back around, flung her arms open wide, and given a loud yes! – but instead, she turned slowly, smiled only a little, and shook her head.
“That’s fine. I’ll meet you girls there!”
“Sure,” Rainbow shrugged. “We can fill Twilight in some more while we wait, anyway.”
“Oh, yes!” Rarity leapt to her feet, pulling Twilight up by her hands after her. “It’s always a treat to hear more gossip, is it not?”
Twilight giggled and nodded, in no apparent rush to pull her own hands away from Rarity’s. Sunset slid off the arm of the couch and looked at the two of them before glancing away.
The six girls and single dog took their leave, waving to Pinkie before the door of the café closed behind them, their departure marked by the chime of the store bell’s decidedly un-novel sound. Alone with her thoughts (and the café’s other customers), Pinkie made sure the tissue paper was in the gift bags and the streamers were hanging off the ceiling, but she wasn’t quite ready to throw the confetti in the air yet.
She wasn’t scheduled for the day, but the Cakes were always gracious enough to allow her use of the kitchen off-hours—except, she didn’t think she had time to make anything now. Unless she whipped up a plate of fruit and cream sandwiches really fast – but there was something else she really, really, really wanted to bring instead.
“Hey, Missus Cake!” Pinkie slid the kitchen door shut behind her, pulled both a hair net (well, two) and an apron on, approached the sink, and waved at her matronly mentor before turning the faucet on to wash her hands.
“Afternoon, Pinkie.” Missus Cake, holding a mixing bowl in one arm and whisk in the other, paused from her task to smile at Pinkie. “What can I do for you, dearie?”
“Actuallyyyy,” Pinkie started, turning the faucet off with a paper towel before drying her hands, “I need a huuugeee favour.”
·✫✫✫·
Half an hour later, Pinkie kicked the outer door to the Canterlot High gymnasium open, running her delivery to the refreshment table.
Serving plate down, bakery box open, cookies piled onto plate. Phew.
It was fortuitous that Pinkie had a mentor-slash-manager willing to let her take the freshest batch of cookies from the oven in exchange for overtime work during the weekend and taking command of the mixing bowl while Missus Cake packed her order.
Pinkie thought—hoped—that her peace offering would be noticed, and Sonata wouldn’t be too mad about the whole Friendship Magic thing that they planned to use against the Dazzlings. After all, it had worked on Sunset Shimmer, and now she was a good friend and part of their group, even if her ‘We’ve Been Friends for Over Two Months Now But Never Celebrated Properly slash Thanks for Being Our Friend We Love You Sunset Shimmer!’ party had to be postponed and became a ‘We’ve Been Friends for Over Four Months et cetera et cetera!’ party.
But that was mostly Pinkie’s fault.
So, that was her plan: wait for the Dazzlings to show up, summon the Magic of Friendship to revoke all their evil magic, apologise to Sonata for the seemingly-out-of-nowhere-yet-completely-necessary dramatics, ask if they could start sorta-new, offer entire plate of cookies (or, whatever was left of them after the party), evoke memories of her visits to Sugarcube Corner, warm her heart, win back the girl.
Yes. Flawless.
Pinkie exhaled and looked over the refreshment table. Cookies, napkins, straws, cups—and anxiety hit her full force despite her flawless plan and she inhaled quickly, snatching a cookie off of the plate. Nibbling frantically, Pinkie double-checked the table’s inventory: cookies, napkins, straws, cups. Straws, cups . . . straws . . . cups.
She forgot the punch.
Stuffing the last of the cookie into her mouth, she turned heel and ran toward the door leading to the hall, hoping she had time to whip up something quick. No, of course she had time, she was Pinkie Pie! But where was the rest of her Party Planning Committee and the student volunteers, anyway? She had very specifically named both on her flyers under the assumption that she’d get help from people other than herself, late to prep or not.
Hmph.
Pinkie threw the door to the cafeteria kitchen open wide.
“Granny Smith! I need—I need the punch bowls! And ladles! And the punch!”
“Oh, I don’t have them.” Granny Smith didn’t bother looking up from her sink full of pots. “Some girl came an’ took them already.”
Right, back to the gym.
“OkidokilokithanksGrannySmithseeyoulater!” Pinkie called as she turned and dashed out again.
Some feet from the refreshment table, Pinkie slowed to a stop, hands on knees and panting. Thinking too much about one thing while trying to do another sure was exhausting. Just thinking too much about one thing and nothing else was exhausting, in itself; she needed to get back to her typical merry-go-round of thoughts, soon.
Standing up straight, she took the last few steps to the table, laughing.
“Boy, am I glad you got the punch, ‘cause—”
Pinkie froze.
So did Sonata – staring right at her with wide eyes, bottle of juice still held mid-air, lid half-twisted on.
Pinkie opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.
“Oh,” Sonata finally said, tightening the cap and setting the bottle down before fumbling with a second bottle she didn’t even look at. “You’re the Party Planning Committee.”
“Um. Head of,” Pinkie corrected awkwardly, watching Sonata pour apple juice into the bowl she had previously poured grape into.
Sonata glanced around, then looked back at Pinkie as she finished pouring. She secured and tapped her fingers on the lid, inhaled, looked like she wanted to say something – but all that came out was, “I should, uh, get going.”
“W-Wait, Sonata.” Confetti, air. This was her chance. “Um . . . can we talk, please?”
Sonata seemed to consider it a moment – then shook her head and hurried toward the to the hall door – then stopped a few feet away, as if remembering something, and turned back around. She grabbed a few cookies, looked up at Pinkie sadly, said I can’t, and rushed out the other door.
The confetti fell to the floor heavily as students began to file into the gym and Pinkie’s friends found her. She didn’t feel like picking the confetti up, and so she grabbed a few more cookies instead, munching quickly and blinking furiously and swallowing hard.
Sonata came to a sharp halt a ways from the gymnasium door, not ready to find and face Adagio or Aria just yet.
She breathed out slowly and shoved a cookie into her mouth, but it only made her feel worse despite the warm, soft, melt-in-your-mouth deliciousness. It’d been months since—
Sonata thought about spitting it out, but kept chewing instead in some sad nostalgia which grew into bitterness as she threw the other cookies across the yard and crossed her arms tightly, glaring at the ground.
She should have seen this coming, but she really didn’t.
What were the chances that Pinkie would have gone to school anywhere else when she lived in the same city? What were the chances she wouldn’t have been part of the showcase when she had a band? What were the chances of anyone else being on the Party Planning Committee when she herself had told Sonata parties were her favourite thing ever?
Sonata’s eyes widened.
She had a band.
Pinkie had a band and she was the drummer. She wasn’t just likely to be a victim of enchantment just by happenstance of being a Canterlot High student, she was almost guaranteed to be a victim of enchantment by happenstance of being in the showcase-turned-battle.
And Sonata would be right there lulling her with her own siren song.
She lifted her hands to her head and pushed them through her taut hair, thoughts seeming less like thoughts and more like a mess of seaweed tangling around her neurons, anchoring her down and keeping her from going to the surface for air to clear her head. She shouldn’t have a problem with this; she liked making people do what she wanted, she loved having that kind of power— but she was breaking into a cold sweat and her stomach was churning thinking that she may have already pulled Pinkie under.
Sonata started pacing, fingers tightening in her tresses.
There had to be some way around this.
Some solution.
Some . . . something!
“What are you doing?”
Sonata lifted her head to see Aria staring at her. She quickly pulled her hands away from her hair and spit out a hasty, “Nothing! What are you doing?!”
Aria raised an eyebrow. “Looking for you.”
“Well, congrats, you found me!”
“Your hair is a mess.”
Sonata lifted her hands and pushed the bumps in her hair toward her ponytail.
“Nuh-uh!”
Unfolding her arms, Aria sighed and approached Sonata, lifting her hands to pull the tie out of Sonata’s hair. She brushed her fingers through the long blue locks, smoothing them out and styling them back up into a high ponytail, then stepped back again and stared Sonata square in the eyes.
“What’s going on with you?”
“I . . .” Biting the inside of her lip, Sonata ran her hand along the freshly smoothed strands. “I’m nervous.”
“Since when do you get nervous? What’s there to be nervous about?”
“I don’t . . . want to be wrong.”
“Okay, well, you’re not the one who singled this place out, Adagio is. She’d be the one who’s wrong.”
Sonata pulled a hand through her ponytail and shrugged.
“You don’t have time for sulking around. We don’t have time for you sulking around. And anyway, you were the one who wanted to go to this dumb party, remember?”
“You were listening?”
“It’s hard not to listen when your voice is so incessant.”
“Hmph. That’s a big word, you learn it from Adagio?”
“Why? Don’t know what it means?”
Sonata made a face at Aria, who offered a patronising smile in return.
Sonata crossly mumbled that she did indeed know the meaning of the word and, before Aria could make another quip, insisted they both catch up with Adagio. Aria conceded – and not without a that’s what I came here for in the first place, dummy – but Sonata had no response, taking a particular interest in her own fingers and fumbling them about with one another as they entered the school.