Princess Celestia smiled upon Lily, saying “That is a wonderful idea, miss...?”
“Lily,” Lily said tensely, her voice fading to a whisper as she realized it was the princess who was addressing her. “ ...Flowers... ”
“Miss Lily Flowers,” Celestia said gratefully. “Pinkie Pie is very hurt and frightened right now, and if there is one thing that could ease her heart, and bring her back to us, I have to say a party is a splendid idea.”
“I’ll get picnic tables!” Twilight blurted eagerly, turning and running into the library where she kept her supply of spare picnic tables for any picnic related emergency.
“We can whip up some morning treats!” Mrs. Cake of the Cakes said excitedly.
“We already were going to do that, honey,” her husband corrected her quietly.
“Oh, don’t be such a fuddy duddy,” she teased him, pushing his nose in lightly with a hoof, then went skipping off toward their bakery.
“Coming, dear!” he said half out of habit, trotting after her with her sleepy newborns on either side of him snugly in their baby totes.
And so it proceeded quickly, with every pony contributing something of their own who could provide and the rest quite willing to enjoy the bounty that resulted. There were cream puffs and freshly picked chrysathemums. A grape colored pony with a bruised eye carted in a sloshing punch bowl. Twilight watched them approvingly while she set up tables, the aqua green Lyra with her beloved namesake along with Fiddlesticks, plucking and strumming respectively a lively tune, to a melody ponies quickly began dancing to, this time of their own free will.
Scootaloo shot into that, and while she was technically the V.I.P. of this party, she was clearly more interested in just showing off her wicked dance moves. Archer on the other hoof, stayed close to Twilight the whole time, looking apprehensive at all the ponies around. Leading her a bit out of the crowd, Twilight gave Archer a gentle nudge of a nuzzle. Archer looked up and relaxed a bit at the unicorn’s sympathetic smile. Princess Celestia was amidst the partygoers too, chatting brightly with a single glass of punch in her magic, rarely if ever sipped. She looked around nervously every now and again, but no pink pony could be seen emerging from her funk to join the clarion call of a party. Spike was all over the punch bowl himself in the meantime. That dragon liked punch almost as much as he did gems. And Licky was...
“Uh oh,” Twilight said nervously, trying to spot that odd orange-on-orange filly in the crowd. “Where’s Licky? Does anypony know?” she called out. Before she could give a description, Archer herself piped up brightly saying,
“I know where she is!”
“We have to get her, before she breaks something else,” Twilight said disconcertedly, “Where did you see her last?”
Archer’s smile wavered a bit confusedly. “She’s um...” At a loss for words, the blue-on-blue filly just sat back, and patted her stomach in a satisfied manner.
“Oh?” said Twilight suddenly uncomfortable. “I ...hadn’t even noticed you um...”
“I thought I’d do it while the princess was telling the story about Opal Pie,” Archer explained on her hooves again. “Just so Licky didn’t get upset, or interrupt anything. I’m not usually the one who does it, but Scootaloo was busy, and I really shouldn’t leave everything to her all the time.”
“That’s true,” Twilight said a little more understandingly. “So,” she added uneasily, “I don’t suppose you can produce her again?”
Archer shook her head, making Twilight’s heart fight not to fill with dread. This was normal for these fillies. They are supposed to do this. It’s just Twilight ponypomorphising again, so she should just calm down and accept it. She had sort of been warming up to Licky though. Were these creatures really so ephemeral as all that?
It occurred to Twilight that Licky had, in fact, been no more than a single day old.
“She was a little broken,” Archer said sheepishly. “Licky couldn’t stop running around, and being excited about everything all the time. It’s not that she was happy. She just... couldn’t slow down. It’s because Bee made her, and Bee was only a few days old. All Bee knew was that we were safe, and just thought anypony who came out of us could be careless and never have to hide.”
“You really can control what kind of filly you produce?” Twilight asked astonished yet again by these odd sort of ponies. Archer started to nod, but then shook her head slightly.
“Sort of,” she said uncertainly, “You get better at it the longer that you’re... out, and the more of them you take inside. It’s sort of like practice. But it’s more like what mood you’re in. I can’t decide the color, or anything. I just throw up and they’re there. But the filly who comes out is going to be... the kind of filly I think would be good, at the time at least. If they’re new, I mean.”
“So, because Bee thought she was safe,” Twilight reasoned carefully, “The filly she produced would be less cautious, and take more risks?”
Archer nodded, “Yes, and because Scootaloo just wanted a filly to come out, who didn’t make trouble, Bee just stood around all the time and didn’t do much. Scootaloo didn’t want to have Bee; it was an accident, so Scootaloo made her less um... trouble to deal with.”
“So when Scootaloo was born, you were all feeling really safe then!” Twilight concluded, pointing with her nose over at the filly in question, who was currently stage diving onto a bunch of ponies, from her improvised ‘stage’ on the picnic table.
Archer laughed chirpily. “No way!” she declared, “That was back in Whinneapolis, and it was really dangerous. Scootaloo came out like Bee.”
Twilight paused. “Oh?” she repeated, looking down to Archer warily.
“She was just an extra,” Archer explained blithely. “She mostly just stood around, at first.”
“She sure isn’t like that now!” Twilight countered, prodding silently for more information.
Archer shook her head, sympathetically, “No, she sure isn’t. It’s because she was the last one.”
Twilight tilted her head.
Archer looked nervous suddenly, saying, “There was another one of us called um... Maple I think, who was the real one. She just had Scootaloo as an extra if they ran out of food.”
“So how did Scootaloo become, um... the real one?” Twilight asked using that odd terminology the filly (fillies) had come up with to understand their own condition. Archer took a long time to answer. The sounds of the party filtered over the quiet figures of foal and mare.
“She was the last one,” Archer repeated.
“What does that mean, exactly?” Twilight pressed curiously.
“It means Maple didn’t come back,” Archer said glumly. “She probably died or something. That’s usually what it is. We never found her body, but... if she never came back, it was because she couldn’t. And then the other extra stopped coming back too. So Scootaloo had to become real, or...”
The little blue filly scratched at the packed dirt, saying, “I probably shouldn’t be talking about this. I don’t know if I’m supposed to ask Scootaloo, or if she’d mind. She doesn’t like to talk about it much, even with me.”
Not going against her better judgement, which is to say going with her better judgement, Twilight swallowed her curiosity, like a bitter pill the size of a football. “You’re right, Archer,” she whimpered very maturely, “This is something Scootaloo should decide whether she wants ponies to know about or not. It’s good of you to respect her privacy. You can hurt her very badly if you share her memories. Think of it like a personal diary, I suppose.”
Archer nodded solemnly, but then a smile teased across her face. She said offhoovedly, “You know Scootaloo’s friend, Sweetie Belle, once took her sister’s diary, and put it in the newspaper! She was really mad!”
Twilight laughed at that, saying, “Those three made all of us really mad, that time. But they learned a valuable lesson in doing so.”
“They sure did,” Archer said emphatically.
“And afterwards, they were better friends than ever,” Twilight pointed out approvingly.
“They sure were...” Archer said ...wistfully.
“Don’t you have any friends?” Twilight asked. She instantly regretted doing so because, it should have been a rhetorical question. Everypony has at least some friends. But Archer wasn’t just anypony. She hadn’t been around as long as a pony her age, and she had special... needs. So it was no surprise when Archer said,
“No, I haven’t been able to find any. I want to be friends with Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle, because they’re really nice ponies. Um, and there’s a unicorn in class who’s purple and blonde and she’s always saying really wise things. There’s a colt who sits in the back who always knows the proper way to do things. His name is Truffle.”
Archer’s words were kind of spilling out at this point. Twilight listened to her patiently, as the pony abruptly started pouring her heart out. “I want to ask him to be my friend, but I don’t know if Twist would be okay with that—she doesn’t seem to like me, I think. I don’t know how to ask either because I mean, even when Scootaloo came here, it was Sweetie Belle who made friends with her! I just haven’t had anypony come to me like that, so I’m not sure what to do.”
“I might have a few ideas for you,” Twilight said in consolation, “And if I don’t, I know one of my friends who sure will.” She didn’t mention that this friend had been the one trying to kill Archer for the past day or so. Pinkie would come around though, Twilight was sure of it. Now that Twilight knew what was really going on, she could finally help her friend Pinkie Pie deal with her troubles.
Archer looked up at Twilight with lost, yet hope filled eyes saying, “That would be” Rainbow Dash crashed down onto a picnic table, right in the middle of the celebration, the thoom of recklessly released mana sending a wind blowing, among others, Twilight’s mane into disarray. The young pegasus mare exclaimed, not brashly, nor boastingly or overconfidently, but in a completely terrified tone,
“The party is over! Everypony get out of here! Just drop everything and go! Get inside. Lock your doors and windows. Don’t come out for anything! Come on, hurry!” Ponies started leaving as soon as she said it, but she wasn’t satisfied with how they were trickling out so slowly and it looked like she was going to start carrying ponies off herself.
Twilight teleported a single step, winking in right by Rainbow Dash on the picnic table, demanding at her, “What’s going on, Rainbow? What happened to Pinkie Pie?”
“She’s the fillysprite!” Rainbow shouted, coming eye to eye with Twilight.
“The fillysprite isn’t real!” Twilight shouted right back. “What are you really saying?”
“I don’t– I mean she’s a fillysprite,” Rainbow Dash reiterated in a flustered tone, backing her head up. “She’s one of those oracle things the princess was talking about.”
“We know that, Rainbow Dash,” Princess Celestia said, suddenly dangerously close to the two of them. Whether she teleported, or merely walked up soundlessly was never quite clear with her. “We all saw the enchantment end on her,” said the princess, “Please calm down, and tell us what you mean to say.”
Rainbow Dash gulped in a breath, and then she seemed frozen, staring with wide eyes and narrow pupils, at a punch cup on the picnic table in front of her. A cup that was... there was a vibration Twilight noticed in the ground now, that was making the punch ripple in the cup, and the cup dance closer to the edge of the table. Dash snapped her head around, looking to the east, staring down the street and beyond, at a low rumbling sound that was getting louder by the second.
“Oh no, they’re here...” Rainbow Dash shuddered dreadfully. And now Twilight finally saw what Rainbow Dash was talking about.
“No...” Twilight said softly. What was coming towards her could not be true. “No,” she repeated, as if she could bend reality by her will alone, more than usual that is. “No!” she accused the object of her ire, the unstoppable threat that even now thundered her way.
“Not agaiiiiiiin!” Twilight Sparkle shouted in abject despair as pink pony after pink pony shot past her, the sounds of glass shattering and ponies screaming beginning to echo throughout the entire town. A sly pink hoof slowly rose up from beneath the table Twilight was standing stiff legged on, and it pushed over the glass of punch right beside Twilight’s right rear hoof, then descended down as if it were never there.
“What in Equestria?!” the princess Celestia said, still beside Twilight, one of the few ponies who was not being chased around by bright pink madness, as clones of Pinkie Pie once again resumed terrorizing the populus of Ponyville. “How did she make so many? Did she have a creche all along? Why are they all alike? This is impossible!”
“This... is Pinkie Pie,” Twilight said to the princess resignedly, climbing down off the picnic table to slump against it wearily. Twilight didn’t even have it in her to save face in front of the princess. If this didn’t peeve Princess Celestia, then nothing would. The Princess wouldn’t be upset at this. Nothing to worry about, right? Yayyyyy. Twilight imagined waving the world’s tiniest flag.
Twilight lifted her ears in a puzzlement. “The mirror pool was sealed though,” she added, while a building fell over in two pieces, somewhere behind her. “And it’s deep in the Everfree. Why... why didn’t you stop her, Rainbow Dash?” Twilight suddenly spat accusingly at Rainbow, “You let her go into the Everfree?!” Twilight then... continued to stare silently beyond Rainbow Dash, at what was passing by. It looked like the Pinkies had managed to rig the Friendship Express to go down market square, instead of the train tracks. Again.
“I...” Dash seemed, to Twilight, flabbergasted. Twilight couldn’t tell if it was at her, or at Pinkie Pie, or at something about this situation. “She never made it to the Everfree!” Rainbow finally blurted, confused beyond recognition. She blinked, and then clarified, “These aren’t from the mirror pool!”
“You mean to tell me Pinkie Pie became an oracle for 103 minutes,” Twilight said evenly to Rainbow Dash, “She’s already gotten over her hatred of oracles, and she’s already found an unlimited source of food, that she’s somehow consuming fast enough to produce all... these, and the mirror pool had nothing to do with it?”
“Yeah,” Dash said. Without qualifying herself. Twilight squinted at Rainbow, not even lifting her head, just leaving her cheek smooshed against the table. Dash stared back at the weary unicorn, with those even round eyes that could hold no deceit.
“Okay,” Twilight stood up from her slump by the picnic table. “We need to reach Pinkie Pie first, and then cut off her food source. Then we can deal with... whatever this is.”
“Uh...” Dash said uncertainly.
“But why would all of her siblings look exactly like her?” Princess Celestia mused in puzzlement. “In any rate, you’re absolutely right. But perhaps you should take care of seeking out Pinkie Pie yourself, while the rest of us attempt to corral the ones already here.”
“Good idea,” Twilight said, running on automatic (planner mode variant). “Alright, so I can probably fashion an open topped cage in similar fashion to the force bubble if I use a pillar matrix. You begin digging a pit to contain it,” she said to Princess Celestia. “It has to be too deep for a pony to jump out of, accounting for any lift they can get from those wings,” At that, Twilight cast a suspicious glance at one of the Pinkies who was trying to get altitude by buzzing as hard as she could... ineffectively.
“You fly to Sweet Apple Acres and get Applejack, so you can both help herd the Pinkie Pies,” Twilight said to Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash raised a questioning hoof, but Twilight was already facing the little blue Archer filly, who’d stuck with them this whole time.
“You perform reconnaissance,” Twilight shouted to Archer, louder than the pony in the next yard, who was shouting “My Begonias! Why are my Begonias sideways?!”
“Find out their communication abilities,” Twilight instructed intently, “And whether they can be swayed by the I’m so sorry Princess Celestia!”
Twilight snapped her head away from Archer and gaped, finally realizing she’d just started ordering the princess around, like she was just another Ponyvillian volunteer. Twilight started fidgeting meekly, asking, “Please princess, tell us what we should—”
“I would,” Celestia responded teasingly, “But I’m afraid I have a hole to dig. You can take care of it in my stead, I hope, Twilight Sparkle?”
“I... uh...” Twilight blanked on a reply. Yes. Yes would be a good reply. “yeah...” Close enough.
“Twilight!” Rainbow shouted in her face suddenly, impatiently, “There is no food source. I don’t know what’s happening!”
Princess Celestia’s beneficient smile faltered.
“Well–” Twilight fussed in consternation, then prompted the rainbow pony agitatedly, “What is Pinkie Pie eating then?”
“She’s not!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed in abject disbelief.
“But where would she... oh dear,” Princess Celestia murmured unhappily, a tiny light of realization in her eyes, and the corners of her mouth turning down slightly. But only Archer alone was regarding her worriedly, right now.
“She’s not eating,” Twilight Sparkle stated skeptically to Rainbow Dash, “And she’s not at the mirror pool.” She then jumped to her hooves, frustratedly shouting, “Then why are there so many Pinkie Pies?!”
“I don’t know!” Rainbow Dash backpedalled, flailing her hooves in demonstration, “I was just following her, and she was going for the Everfree, but then she fell down and she just...”
Princess Celestia looked aside, and bit her lower lip, subtly enough that nopony noticed.
“Look, here’s what I saw,” Rainbow Dash began to recall.
Flying high is the greatest feeling a pegasus can have, short of breaking the sound barrier. You’re queen of the skies when you’re up here. Though the skies are a pretty lonely place to be queen of. But nothing beats the open air, for freedom of movement and manuverability. You’re not going to run into a tree when you’re ten times higher than the tree line. Flying high also makes you difficult to spot from the ground, even by a pegasus in Rainbow Dash’s case.
That’s how Rainbow Dash followed Pinkie Pie, giving the pony enough leeway that—even if Pinkie was looking for her—she would not have noticed Rainbow Dash’s camoflaged blue belly against the bowl of the sky above. Pinkie wasn’t looking though. She was just running, and stumbling, then running again. Rainbow Dash’s eyesight was top notch, so she could have made out stuff like Pinkie’s expression, if Pinkie ever looked up. But, all she could tell just from seeing the top of Pinkie’s poofy mane, and poofy tail, churning hooves and heaving sobs, was that this was one very upset pony. Despite her reservations on interfering, when Rainbow Dash saw that pink horse fall, and not get up again, she fired herself at the ground like an arrow.
“Pinkie!” Rainbow Dash shouted, landing running, and stopping short at her fallen friend. “What’s wrong, are you alright?”
“You... followed me...” Pinkie Pie said weakly. She had a smile on her, as Rainbow pulled her up in a fright, trying to see what was wrong with her, as if shaking a pony in your front hooves could help with that.
“It’s okay, Pinkie,” Dash said smoothly, stopping with the shaking and just cradling her friend in her hooves tenderly, “Nopony hates you or is afraid of you. You’re going to be fine.”
“I don’t—” Pinkie grimaced, her face twisting with disgust, and then looking with so much fright, into Rainbow Dash’s eyes again. “I don’t feel so good.”
If there’s anything worse than getting thrown back against a tree, it’s getting thrown against a tree by the force of the slimy, yet firm ball of gooey pink puke firing out of your best friend’s mouth like a gunshot. Dash crumpled to the ground at the base of the tree, covered in slimy saliva or– or whatever the hay this stuff was, and the thing that hit her wiggled, then popped out into a a a pony that looked exactly like Pinkie Pie. Dash and this ‘Pinkie Pie’ stared at each other for a timeless moment, before Rainbow turned to the real Pinkie saying, “Why does she look exactly like you?”
Tears streaming down her eyes, Pinkie Pie said despairingly, and very nauseously, “Why are you asking me-ee-eeeugk” She rippled again like a water balloon, and out of her gaping wide mouth shot a second ball of pink puke.
“How many you got in there?” Rainbow asked critically.
“Heck if I know!” Pinkie said her sides heaving, “There’s only one... one... oh noooglkh” and her eyes bugged out as another giant pink maroon swirled hairball fired out from inside her.
The two finished Pinkies were looking at each other with confusion and alarm while the third began to emerge. “What have you done to me?!” the original Pinkie cried, panting harder and heavier until yet another uncontrollable spasm contracted through her, and like a well oiled machine, she spat out yet another giant gloopy ball of yuck. The thing is, these balls were all the same size as her. Yet she wasn’t getting any smaller? Where was she getting all this stuff?
“I don’t know!” Rainbow Dash prevaricated frantically, “Nothing! Why do you keep doing it? Are you trying to repeat the mirror pool or something?”
Pinkie responded by horking forth another giant ball of magenta and pink spoo. “You... think I want to?!” she panted exasperatedly. Another Pinkie erupted from her. Collapsing weakly on her belly again, she moaned out breathlessly, “Can’t... stop it!”
Dash backed up from Pinkie anxiously, looking around trying to figure out what to do in the situation. “A-alright,” she said intelligently, “You finished Pinkies can line up over here, and y-you can aim it so the new go ones over there. Let’s all just keep calm and...” She trailed off. Another Pinkie unfolded. Rainbow really didn’t like the glimmering look the ten, now eleven Pinkie Pies were all giving her, in tandem.
Another blob erupted from Pinkie’s gut, right at Pinkie’s feet, and she pushed it away furiously. It actually rolled a little. Then she made another Pinkie, and sank down exhaustedly on her belly again. “Rainbow Dash...” she begged almost inaudibly, reaching faintly for the rainbow pony, “Help... me...” That was all she could say, before making another Pinkie Pie. It didn’t matter if she was standing or lying down. It just kept on happening! She lay on her side, clutching her belly and just crying pitifully.
“J-just hang on Pinkie we’ll figure out how to deal with this,” Rainbow said despite this unnerving feeling, forcing herself closer to the slimy mess that was original Pinkie Pie. She dodged as another ball of goo fired past her like a cannon. “Please tell me you’re almost done doing that,” she pleaded desperately.
“Water...” Pinkie Pie said hoarsely laying flat on her back. Her belly was already heaving in spasms she was trying to hold down, but they kept getting stronger, until her mouth snapped wide and she shot another Pinkie Pie into the air. She should not have tried to do it on her back, because it flew up vertically, lingered in the air just a bit, then plummeted back down splattering the already messed up pony with a face (and body) full of wiggly pink goop.
“Eww...” Pinkie managed to say underneath it. “Eww,” it said back to her mechanically, until it was Pinkie standing on top of Pinkie. The original looked terrified at this, but then she had to throw up again, and the bolus slammed the new Pinkie in the chest, right off of the original one and into a heap of bubblegum puke and brand new pony.
“Take...that...” original Pinkie said faintly.
Dash stammered, beside herself with unease, “I-I’ll go get you some water, um, water hold–just hold yourself togeth–just be care–I gotta go!” Rainbow zipped up into the air, looking around in a panic. Then she zoomed over where a nice little puffy cumulus was sitting. Stealing it from its appointed spot, she shoved the unresisting cloud back down to where Pinkie Pie was still throwing up. There Rainbow Dash started compressing it down into something that could be drunk, or wash you off. The Pinkies all stared at her as she did, moving in a creepy sort of sync. There were so many of them now. It made Rainbow Dash both nervous and terrified, or nervified if you will.
So of course, Rainbow Dash completely bungled the simple task of getting her friend a drink, and forgot that when you compress clouds down you have to ground the static charge otherwise they
Kaboom
And with that, every single Pinkie Pie went running screaming, fleeing the lightning and thunder, in the opposite direction, which, of course, had to lead them straight into town.
“...so, it’s my fault,” Rainbow Dash concluded guiltily.
“No,” Princess Celestia said, “The fault is mine for not realizing this would happen.”
“I don’t care whose fault it is!” Twilight cried out, stomping exasperatedly, “We have to do something about this, before somepony gets hurt!”
Princess Celestia spread her wings, announcing, “Pinkie Pie is in grave danger. I must go help her myself. You can handle the others as you may, but do not kill them.” She emphasized that last part with an extra urgency, as if anypony had actually been considering it. Then without waiting for an answer, the princess sprang into the air and soared above the buildings. She obscured the sun at the apex of her flight, before winking out into an eastwards focused teleportation.
Twilight only stared for a moment, before she realized that Pinkie Pie... a Pinkie Pie was millimeters away from Twilight’s face, staring at the exact same empty spot in the sky, with fascination. Twilight shoved the poofy curly mane away, resisting the urge to just grab this one unprepared. It shrank back at her glare with a look of terror, then blanked out and went scrambling backwards in a sort of crablike motion.
“Dash, Acres,” Twilight spat, “Get Applejack.” Dash saluted, and blasted into the air. A literal cannon ball flew past Rainbow Dash, but she weaved in the air like a dancer, avoiding that and the frightened flock of geese, on her way to the Acres. It wasn’t very safe to be in the air above Ponyville, at the moment.
“Archer,” Twilight said, leaning down to the nervous filly, “Forget reconnaissance. Get Scootaloo, warn every pony you can.”
“Oh good,” Archer said relievedly, “I didn’t know what reconnaissance meant.”
“You need everypony to bring all of the Pinkie Pies here to the library. All of them,” Twilight said. “I don’t care how they do it, just do it.”
“In the meantime,” Twilight said, lighting up her horn, and preparing an earth loosening spell, “Spike and I will be turning this courtyard into an excavation site.”
Twilight looked around for Spike and, of course, he was nowhere to be seen.
“...he’s under the picnic table over there,” Archer said, pointing to the underside of the picnic table that only a little filly could easily see under.
“Great, thanks!” Twilight said quickly, charging over and levitating the picnic table up into the air where Spike was cowering underneath.
“Twilight, thank goodness!” Spike shouted, “They were coming at me from all sides! I tried to fight them off but there was no—”
“Save it big boy,” Twilight said unimpressed, “Go get some shovels from the Flowers. In fact, go get the Flower Trio. And shovels. It’s about to get very messy around here.”
Spike paused at that. “...them?” he asked in a severely unsure manner.
“Tell them I need them to help me dig a nice big safe hole,” Twilight said, “Nothing dangerous, just digging. If that fails, get shovels, but you’re going to be digging a lot, if we don’t get some more ponies to help.”
Spike cringed at the thought of doing the work of four ponies. He saluted, then jogged over to the house/flower shop that made this neighborhood so pleasant, with ponies inside who managed to do the opposite sometimes.
Twilight went around behind the library tree, backed a good 200 feet away to avoid any roots, and started loosening the soil in a precise and very large square, getting down about 12 feet before she couldn’t probe any further, while waiting for help to arrive. And to her pleasant surprise, Spike did return with more than just shovels: three somewhat guilty looking ponies wielding their own shovels, along with him.
“Excellent!” Twilight cheered, looking up from her work. She paled then, stammering, “Now you—wait, no– don’t—!” and Spike, Rose, Lily and Daisy all charged over Twilight’s prepared plot, immediately sinking up to their barrels in extremely fungible soil. Or in Spike’s case, up to his everything.
Twilight levitated out one of the shovels Spike was carrying, using it to scoop out dirt from around his body with a bit of a nervous chuckle. “Eh... let’s get started, shall we?” she suggested. And so they did. And that’s about all there is to say about that.
“Why are there more Pinkies?” Applejack shouted, way back west at Sweet Apple Acres, running directly away from it down the beaten path along with Rainbow Dash, neck-and-neck towards Ponyville. “Didn’t we just get over this last—”
“It’s not the mirror pool,” Dash shouted tensely. “She just started spitting them out!”
“You’re gabbin’ like she’s the fillysprite or somethin’!” Applejack said, frustratedly.
“She is!” Rainbow Dash asserted, “She’s been the fillysprite all along! Can’t you tell? Just look at the signs!”
Rainbow Dash shot ahead as Applejack stumbled to a halt, then Dash careened around, to find Applejack counting to herself, confusedly.
“Ah don’t follow,” Applejack said flatly ticking off items on her mental list, “She ain’t got wings, she ain’t throwin’ herself into the river, she’s got a flapdoodle!”
“Princess Celestia cast a spell, or something. I don’t know!” Dash said exasperatedly, “Haven’t you ever seen Pinkie Pie open her mouth?”
Applejack only hesitated a moment before saying, “Fair enough,” and started running again.
The first thing they encountered was a fire, right at the edge of the farm, with three Pinkies all around it roasting marshmallows. It would have been innocent enough if the thing they were burning wasn’t—
“Mah Apple Cart!” Applejack shouted charging up in dismay as it looked like someone had dismantled it by smashing it with hooves into splinters, then set that splintered wood on fire... somehow. Unfortunately, her emotional cry gave the Pinkies warning, which caused the three Pinkies to lift their heads up staring dispassionately, toss away what they were holding as though they were one being, then scatter in three different directions at once. Applejack was too busy stomping out the fire to give chase, and Rainbow Dash just hovered uneasily, saying,
“Don’t you have like a hundred of those things?”
“It’s the principle of the matter!” Applejack said kicking the embers with the thick part of her hoof, “Plus ah ain’t gonna let mah whole orchard catch ablaze.”
Rainbow Dash paled. “Yeah,” she said faintly, “That could have been really bad,”
“Let’s just git over to the library,” Applejack said, “See if they’re ready for us.”
Rainbow Dash got there first. (duh) She wasn’t sure what she was looking at first, but once she saw past the lip of the pit to the ponies down in there it was pretty clear. “How you doin’ down there, Twilight? You ready for Pinkies?”
“No!” shouted Rose frantically.
“Not while we’re down here!!” Lily shrilly clarified.
“The h—” Daisy started to say, but Twilight cut her off saying,
“We’re almost done! I just need to go down 20 feet more and we should be past her jumping height!”
Considering the literal mountain of unearthed soil surrounding this curiously square shaped pit, Pinkie Pie could jump pretty darn high. Dash looked around, and over there was a Pinkie hopping around, and she’d figured out how to flutter her wings madly, so maybe that was the reason it had to be so deep. It looked like that Pinkie was trying to steal somepony’s foal, successfully, the little thing wailing in her arms while a couple of mares chased her with broom handles swinging in their mouths.
“Can’t you make your cage now?!” Dash shouted down to Twilight. “Things are on fire up here!” Matter of fact, where was Applejack? Oh, she was over there stopping the Buffalo stampede through market square. Why the heck are Buffalo—?!
“The walls would be too high!” Twilight shouted up at Rainbow Dash, “How would any pony get up there to drop them in?!”
Rainbow Dash stared for a moment, then rubbed at her temples.
She swooped over and grabbed a Pinkie, hauling her high into the air over the pit. “This high enough?” Rainbow Dash called down to Twilight Sparkle.
Twilight’s ears went down and she clenched her teeth in a sort of weird smile. “Oh,” she said guiltily. “Yes, that works.”
There was a twinkling sound along with Daisy saying, “Wait, no no no–!” and then with two flashes of light, the three ponies, a dragon, plus Twilight winked in up on top of the ground, outside the hole. “Confound it Miss Twilight!” Daisy snarled angrily, swaying on her feet along with the others as if her sense of balance was suddenly perturbed by a sudden unexpected motion. Spike was the only one besides Twilight who just took it in stride.
“Sorry!” Twilight said to them, her tail going down. “I forgot you didn’t want me to teleport!”
“Just please, stop these Pinkies,” Rose groaned nauseatedly. Twilight thinned her lips, then turned to face the pit.
“Can I put this one down now?” Rainbow Dash asked as entertaining as it was to watch all this. The Pinkie she carried wasn’t fighting her at all, and in fact was swinging in Rainbow Dash’s forelegs like she was on a swingset, going “Whee! Eee! Eee! Eee!”
“One sec!” Twilight shouted, concentrating on whatever her horn was doing, with intensity. Magenta bolts of lightning leapt between the corners of the pit, and then four glowy poles rose out from the corners. Twilight’s magic shimmered into place between them, and they wobbled into solidity with a weird vibratey sound.
“Okay, Rainbow Dash!” Twilight shouted out. Dash swooped down into the giant cube shaped magic thing, and deposited Pinkie Pie on the floor of it. Her pink little hooves landed on the surface with a bright tinkling sound that seemed to fascinate her. Dash didn’t spare any more time, whooshing out of the cage and heading into the air, scanning around for any other pegasi.
“Drizzle!” she shouted out, shooting over to the purple pony with the pumpkin colored mane. Drizzle was trying to put out a fire: it looked like a fountain had caught ablaze, despite being made of stone and covered with water. “I need you to cut that out,” Dash interrupted her, “And find the other weather ponies. Tell them to go grab as many Pinkies as they can. Twilight has a cage for them all, over by the library!
“But boss, the fire!” Drizzle protested, waving a hoof at the fountain.
“I’ll take care of it,” Rainbow Dash assured her. “We’ve gotta stop these things if we don’t want everything on fire!” Drizzle fluttered away without another word, and Rainbow zipped down to the ground. A number of earth ponies she wasn’t familiar with were around the fountain, watching the fire with some amount of interest and bemusement.
“Don’t just stand there,” Dash shouted, drawing their attention, “Kick some dirt on it or something. It’s just a grease fire, come on!” That got them moving at least, and Rainbow didn’t wait to see the results. Instead she charged down the street after a Pinkie she saw. Before Dash could catch her, Pinkie darted into the Sugarcube Corner. Rainbow Dash paused at the entrance indecisively. Was that the real Pinkie? Couldn’t be. The real one wasn’t in any state to be hopping around. But wait, would the real one ever spit herself out leaving a clone behind, or did she only spit out new ones?
Rainbow Dash got her answer when Mrs. Cake, carrying her filly, burst out the front door at a thundering gallop shouting “Run for the hills!” Mr. Cake carrying his colt followed at a similar pace shouting, “The end times are here!” The building subsequently rumbled, and behind the fleeing Cakes about 200 Pinkies came charging out the door.
“Oh no,” Dash whimpered. She didn’t even try to stop that hoard of solid pink, but flew into the bakery itself where she discovered that Sugarcube Corner was mysteriously completely out of stock today. Nothing was on the slobber covered shelves or behind the busted display cases or in the ransacked kitchen. “They even ate the...” Rainbow trailed off holding up a limp sack of empty flour.
“Alright, new plan!” she shouted, as she zipped out the front door. Anypony around Rainbow Dash who could have heard her, was far too busy running and screaming to pay attention though. Dash’s head sank, and her ears folded down. “This is a complete disaster,” she moaned, then charged off again, taking to the skies after three paces, and subsequently scoping out the situation below.
They already hit that fancy restaurant clearly, since there was only half of it still intact. The soda fountain was leaking milkshake out of every door and window. That had to have made at least a hundred more of them. Then, Rainbow Dash spied a building which was not issuing any smoke besides the smoke that it usually issued. A prime target, yet completely intact.
It was all she could think to do at this point. She couldn’t bring a Pinkie to Twilight, if they were going to make a hundred more. So Rainbow Dash dive-bombed, making a beeline straight for the local Hayburger. She quickly found out why the place hadn’t gotten buried in its weight in Pinkies yet, because there was the small family who ran the restaurant, one in each door and window, relentlessly beating back anything pink which approached them.
Rainbow Dash hip checked a Pinkie out of the way of being mercilessly beaten by the proprietor, only to have to dodge the furiously swinging broom herself as the earth pony shouted, “Nopony gets in! We’re closed! Get out of here you strange things! Closed for the day! Closed for the year!”
“No I–ow I–ow, ow ow!” Dash squawked until she managed to back up to the point that she wasn’t actively getting attacked, and she shouted,
“No, I’m here to help you! You can’t let any Pinkie eat anything or they’ll make a thousand more.”
“You think that’s not what we’re already doing?” the angry matron said harshly to Rainbow Dash. “Nopony gets in, not even you!”
“Argh, I’m–” Dash wanted to facehoof, but she was interrupted by the feel of hooves landing heavily on her back, making her stagger in place before the Pinkie leapt off of her, using her as a stepping stool, landing neatly up on the...
“They’re on the roof!” the older son shouted in alarm. Rainbow Dash didn’t bother correcting him. She just leapt after the Pinkie, landing on the roof herself where (of course) Pinkie had found an attic hatch with a padlock that had been left open, down into a storage area in the upper part of the restaurant. Dash bit down on—she missed. Pinkie slipped inside, and Dash bit down on nothing but air. Pinkie wasn’t even looking at her! How did she dodge? Rainbow jumped after Pinkie into the access hatch, landing on dusty floorboards and shouting desperately, “Pinkie no, don’t eat anything!”
Pinkie, who was halfway through shoving an entire bag of hay buns into her mouth, stopped short at that, and just let the bag drop out onto the ground, looking at Rainbow Dash blankly. Did that... work? Dash wasn’t sure. She just grabbed Pinkie, who put up little resistance, and hauled her out to the roof again. Making sure the padlock was securely locked this time (wasn’t it usually?) Dash turned, hovering in the air to hold the soft pony nose-to-nose, talking to her very seriously.
“Pinkie Pie, you need to get to the library,” Rainbow Dash enunciated clearly. “L i b r a r y.” If this Pinkie Pie understood, she gave no indication, just staring forward fixedly. Dash drifted to the ground, releasing Pinkie uneasily, and just sort of pushed Pinkie with her face, towards where the library was. Pinkie Pie went blithely bouncing off in that direction. If she was anything like Licky though, there’s no way that would last. Yep, something distracted her and she ran off to the right, out of sight. And here come 20 more Pinkies this way.
“Keep them out. I’ll go look for help!” Rainbow Dash shouted to the ponies defending the Hayburger. “I locked your attic!” she added with resentment. She then threw herself into the air and curved around looking for earth ponies. It was strange though: either everypony was shut tight in their houses or... something. Dash could only find Pinkies on the street. Oh no, what if she was eating ponies! But the princess said they couldn’t do that! But there were so many! So maybe they could?
From where she hovered, Rainbow Dash could see her workmates, and the other pegasi of Ponyville seemed to have caught on, divebombing Pinkie Pies and carting them up into the air, winging them over toward the library. They all seemed to have the same trouble getting and keeping ahold of the things, but with all of them working together they were bound to succeed occasionally.
With no better idea, Dash just grabbed a Pinkie and flew to the library, thinking maybe she could ask Twilight where all the ground ponies had gone.
Rainbow Dash didn’t set this Pinkie down gently, because there was no way Rainbow was going to enter that swarming mass of pink, that the floor of Twilight’s cage had become. Pinkies popped out of it like water at a roiling boil. Dash just... dropped the Pinkie in her arms, probably from a safe height, into that mess. Then she flew down to outside the cage, where Twilight was... powering the spell or something.
“Twilight!” Rainbow said, explaining hurriedly, “The Pinkies are eating stuff and making more Pinkies and they ruined Sugarcube Corner and I need help finding ponies to defend the Hayburger it’s the last place still standing!”
“Rainbow Dash, you need to get Rarity!” Twilight said tensely, not looking away from the cage. “We need a skilled unicorn to reinforce the fourth pillar. They keep breaking the spell somehow, it’s becoming unstable!” Rainbow looked around and there was that lyricist unicorn, and her golden magic was tinting one of the corners of the cage, and the hospital surgeon had his own teal colored magic tinting a third. And then there was... some white unicorn that Dash had never heard of, with bold looking electric blue hair. She wasn’t looking so good. Her horn was flickering and she kept cursing under her breath, and her blue magic barely tinted the fourth corner.
“Okay, Twilight!” Rainbow said curtly, shoving off again and torpedoing towards the southern part of town. It wasn’t long before she ran across the iconic Carousel Boutique, which stood out very clearly at the edge of the tent neighborhood. Pinkies were leaving it mostly alone, and Rainbow found out why when she tried to get in, finding all the doors and windows shuttered, shaded, and possibly even boarded up.
“Rarity, you in there?” Dash shouted at the closed door.
“Go away!” came Rarity’s muffled voice from within.
“Rainbow Dash, help!” came Sweetie Belle’s even more muffled voice. Uh...
“Come out, Rarity!” Rainbow urged, “Twilight needs your help!”
“No!” Rarity shouted, “We’re never coming out! First the Fillysprite threatened dear Sweetie’s life, and now the Pinkies are back. No more! The outside world has ceased to exist! It is a lost cause! We will rebuild society from the ashes, the two of us making our way in a forsaken land, now ....” Rainbow kind of tuned her out at that point.
“I’ll tell her you’re unavailable,” Rainbow shouted at the door.
Then Rainbow Dash turned and flew off for the library again, with only the sound of something squeaking, “Don’t leave me in here with her!” behind her.
Dash thumped down by Twilight again, whining, “Rarity won’t come out of her boutique. Isn’t there any other unicorn who would be good?”
“I need to find Derpy Hooves,” Twilight Sparkle said quickly, a drop of sweat trailing down her brow, as the brave pegasi of town continued to drop Pinkies into the pit. “You’re Derpy’s friend aren’t you?”
Rainbow gaped at Twilight. “Why does everypony think I’m friends with Derpy?!” she exclaimed shaking her front hooves frustratedly.
Twilight remained silent, focusing her magic on the Pinkie pit.
Dash looked aside. “Yeah,” she said in a subdued tone, “What do you want with her?”
“Derpy’s daughter, her older daughter is a talented pyrotechician. She should suffice nicely,” Twilight muttered distractedly. “Could you go get her?”
“Hasn’t Derpy come by to drop off Pinkies?” Rainbow asked uneasily.
“Why would I be asking you, if she had?” Twilight snapped irritably, still not looking at Rainbow Dash.
Dash sighed. “On it,” she said, too flustered to be enthusiastic. She flapped up into the sky and went looking for the grey pegasus. Somehow she doubted it was going to be an easy task.