//------------------------------//
// Interactions, Part I 
// Story: Caged Inside 
// by ShadowKirby 
//------------------------------//

Pinkamena's POV

My eyes snapped open and I sat up, breathing heavily. Sweat covered my forehead, making my smooth mane damp and messy.
"Ugh....." I rubbed my eyes. 

'That was NOT a pleasent dream.....'

I yawned and got out of bed, wobbling a bit when my hooves touched the floor. I noticed that outside the window it was dark out, the only light coming from Luna's moon.

'I didn't sleep very long, did I?'

Shrugging, I decided I may as well get an early start to my day. Pushing that horrifying dream to the back of my mind, I headed down the stairs as quietly as possible so as not to wake anyone else in the building, and entered the kitchen.
Those sweets may have been delicious, but I needed something healthy this time. No way was I going through that stomach pain again.

As I searched for anything even remotely sugar-free, I started to feel like something wasn't right.

Something was off. What was it?

After a moment, I realized what it was. 

Pinkie Pie.

She hadn't said a thing this morning, which was unusual. 

Deciding to accept my blessings rather than question them, I just continued my search, eventually managing to find some plain bread.
Eating slowly, I realized how bland it tasted compared to the sugary treats I had had yesterday. Sure, I had been used to bland foods like this, but....well, having experienced those desserts really was an eye opener for me.

Forcing down the rest of the tasteless meal, I headed out the door and immediately shivered as I felt the cold night air wash over me.

I had missed that feeling.

Pulling from the memories I had from my time in Ponyville while I wasn't in control, I headed towards a large hill I knew stood right outside the small town.

When I finally reached the top of the hill, I sat down and stared up at the stars. There were so many out tonight.

'They're always so beautiful, no matter how much I change, the world changes, or where I am.'

It wasn't long before I started making pictures out of the stars in the sky. Unfortunately not much came to mind other than rocks and cake.

While scanning the sky with my eyes, I noticed a small cloud drifting all on it's own in the otherwise clear sky, and a pegasus happened to be laying down on it.

'Who is that....?'

I got up and walked a bit closer. I knew everypony in Ponyville just like Pinkie did; I'd have no trouble identifying who the pegasus was.
Even still, I was a little surprised when I saw the Rainbow mane.

"Rainbow Dash....?" I whispered in slight surprise.

Her ears immediately perked up and she flipped over, staring down at me.
"Oh. Hi......Pinkamena." She rubbed the back of her neck, clearly feeling a bit awkward.
I stared back up at her. Did I really want to socialize with her?
Thoughts flooded back into my mind of when she defended me in front of the others, and I sat down where I was, going back to stargazing.

'I'll talk to her if she talks to me first, I suppose.....'

Rainbow hopped down from the cloud she was on and walked towards me, stopping a few hooves away.
"So, uh....what're you doing out here so early in the morning?"

"I woke up early." I replied, having expected that question a mile away. "What about you?" I replied with, genuinely curious. From what I knew, she tended to like sleeping a lot.

"Oh....um, I couldn't sleep."

Such a simple response. I didn't feel the need to push the question further, so I just went back to staring at the stars in a  fruitless effort to trace a pattern of something other than rocks and cakes.

Maybe I could trace a rock-cake?

After many moments of awkward silence I sighed.

"If you want to sit next to me, go ahead." It only took a moment's hesitation before she did what I knew she was thinking about asking but couldn't seem to do.
At first her presence was a bit discomforting, but I slowly grew to be okay with it.

Eventually Rainbow seemed unable to take the silence and asked me "Do you wanna hang out or something tomorrow?"

I raised an eyebrow and turned to her with an impassive look.

"I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that's a no......" 

I stared at her for a moment and then turned away. 
Looks like I wouldn't be getting the peace and quiet I had hoped for here. Oh well. It was my own fault for alerting her of my presence, I suppose.

"Y'know we all wanna help you get settled into your new life, right?" Rainbow tried.

I sighed. "All you want is Pinkie Pie back. And I'm not going to be fooled otherwise."

She stood up and said in a more stern voice, "Hey! What makes you think you know what I want, huh?" 

I sighed again. "I'm not stupid. She's your best friend, I'm some stranger who showed up out of nowhere. So the better question is, why should any of you care?"

Her mouth was left open as she tried to think of a response.

"That's what I thought." I got up and started walking down the hill away from her.

"Wait!" I suddenly had a pegasus face taking up my entire field of view. "We care because you're a living pony too! Just because Pinkie Pie is our friend doesn't mean we can't do anything to help you too!"

I stared at her intensely for a minute before walking around her without saying a word.

This time she didn't follow.
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I wandered around the town aimlessly for the next who-knows-how-long until the sun started to rise, prompting several early birds to step out of their houses and begin the day.
As usual I did my best to ignore them, despite the nervousness it made me feel.

For now the most prominent thoughts on my mind were questions about what to do now.
The lifestyle I had by default now was certainly not something I wanted to live with.

Working in a bakery? Making others smile? Throwing parties? No, I couldn't do any of that. 

Although.....

I turned my head as far as I could to try and see the three balloons on my flank.
If that was my cutie mark, what other path could I take? Pinkie had already chosen my supposed destiny and even if I was in control now, I couldn't exactly undo that, could I?

Thoughts of what I could possibly do lead me to realize that I couldn't do anything. Not on my own, anyways.
But hadn't Rainbow Dash said that she and the others wanted to help me? Could maybe Twilight do something about my cutie mark?
With the thought of being stuck within the destiny given to me by Pinkie Pie, I came to the conclusion that I had to ask for help, whether I wanted to or not.

With a huff of annoyance, I turned around and headed towards the library where I could no doubt find the unicorn.
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I knocked loudly on the door, waiting with growing impatience for a response. How heavy of a sleeper was she, anyways?

'Maybe she's not home......'

Oh. Great. She was back.

I frowned even more than I already was at hearing her voice, even if it did sound depressed rather than cheery like before. Hearing no response, I at least relished in that fact.

I must've really gotten to her last night. 

'I should do that more often.....' I made a mental note to pressure her more the next opportunity I got when the door opened, a drowsy and slightly more than irritated Twilight being revealed.

"What is it Pinkie- oh." She quickly perked up a bit and put on the best smile she could, though it was clearly forced.
"Pinkamena, um, come on inside!"

I did so before she was even done her sentence.

Looking around, I noticed a mess of books laying around. A bit suspicious, I looked at some of the titles, and found most of them were about split personalities and pegasus magic theories.

'Whether she's researching those topics to get rid of me or help me I'm not too sure......'

'She's doing it to help you, of course.....'

I ignored the voice in my head and looked at Twilight who had a sheepish look on her face.

"Eh-heh, sorry, I was up late studying and didn't have time to clean up......"

I gave her a blank expression to show that I didn't really care.

"So, uh, what is it you came here for?" She still had that awkward grin on her face, which frankly was weirding me out.

"I need help with this." I pointed to my cutie mark.

Her brows furrowed and she finally lost that unsettling grin. "What do you mean? Your cutie mark looks fine!"

I sighed. "It's not my cutie mark. Do you really think my destiny is throwing parties?" 

"I....suppose not." She scrunched up her face a bit. "But what do you want me to do about it?"

"Remove it or something. Let me get a new one that matches me." I stated bluntly. I figured it'd be obvious at this point.

"Wha-" Her eyes widened a bit and she shook her head. "Not possible! You can't get rid of a pony's cutie mark!"

"Use a spell or something. It's magic, isn't anything possible eventually?"

She facehoofed. "No, not anything!" She looked me in the eye and her mind seemed to be racing.
With that thought in mind I decided to be cautious around her. She was definitely the one most likely to do something towards getting Pinkie in control again.

After a moment of waiting, I could practically see a light bulb form above her head.

"Okay, maybe I can figure something out if you let me run some tests! You being different from Pinkie Pie could mean it's possible SOMEHOW, but I'd need to find out more about the situation first."

I pondered her response while she had an excited grin on her face that was almost as unsettling as the awkward one from before.

'Pros: Possibility to change my cutie mark and thus my destiny, letting me really do what I want with my life.
Cons: She's probably using this as an excuse to find a way to get Pinkie in control again.'

After a little internal debate, I came to a conclusion.
"No. I don't trust you."

Her grin vanished and she looked downcast. "Oh....I thought maybe.....never mind...."

I decided not to pressure an answer out of her for this. What went on in her mind didn't really matter to me as long as I stayed safe.

Sighing, she looked up and said "Well, if that's the case I'll guess you don't have anything else to do. Sooooo......" She seemed a bit hesitant to say what she said next. "Maybe you should head over to Applejack's farm? I bet she'd enjoy seeing you."

I gave her a look that gave her the answer about how little I cared.

"And I'm sure you haven't really gotten anything good to eat yet, right? She has lots of apples!"

My stomach grumbled.

'Curse my stomach and it's mind controlling capabilities.....'