Button stared at the chocolate milkshake sitting in front of him. Motionlessly just staring at it in deep contemplation, even to the point he was willing to let his mind wander a little bit and pretend he was warrior at an inn looking at a glass of the inn's finest beverage. Unlike that warrior though, he wasn't at an inn, but at Sugarcube Corner staring at a dessert item as he thought about the day before.
It was now Sunday, and more than 24 hours since he last saw that evil temptress, Sweetie Belle, and he was more than happy about that. Still, he couldn't quite shake the feeling that was now plaguing him since yesterday morning.
After he got home yesterday, he had quickly gotten into the shower fully intent on washing out the smell of Sweetie Belle, as well as her perfume, off of himself, earning more than just a confused look from his parents. The whole time he was in the shower, he was worried because he had found he was actually starting to like the smell of her perfume, and really appreciate how it complimented its wearer.
When he got out, he was surprised to find that Rarity had dropped by to return his JoyBoy, which he had forgotten at her place. Though her expression was quite relaxed, and had no trace of her deadly look from earlier, he was also quite terrified to be seeing her again so quickly. He only relaxed, once his mother had apparently mentioned that Rarity had explained why he didn't return home last night. Apparently, Rarity decided to help him out by giving him a proper alibi to work off of.
What she told them was that after he and Sweetie's date, they arrived at Carousel Boutique where the two of them played some video games well into the night, and since it had been so late by the time they were ready to sleep, Rarity decided to let Button sleep on the couch overnight. It wasn't the absolute truth, especially since Button hardly recalled what happened after helping Sweetie with her game, but it had enough of the truth to be believable and give him a free pass about not coming home last night.
After that, everything just seemed to go back to normal for him, or as far as it could: he played video games for a majority of Saturday, only stopping for food, bathroom breaks, and his homework later that afternoon, then went to bed. Despite all that though, he couldn't find a way to fully purge what had transpired, as well as the image of Sweetie's annoyingly cheerful smile, from his mind.
Which is what brought him to Sugarcube Corner today. If his favorite pastime wasn't going to help him escape his concerns, then maybe the worry of getting a brain-freeze, and Pinkie Pie's spontaneity and tendency to be loud could help solve it; and, if that failed, then nothing short of a mind-wipe will help.
"This is ridiculous...Why am I still thinking about this...?" Button groaned and slammed his head onto the table he was seated at with a loud thud, "This is so annoying..."
"Hey there, Button." He heard a familiar voice greet him.
Looking up he saw Spike standing there with a sapphire cupcake in one of his claws. "Hey there, Spike."
"Mind if I join you?" Spike asked, indicating one of the available seats.
"I thought you were too busy helping the crusaders." He stated with the slightest bit of anger in his voice.
Spike glared at him as he took his seat. "You know well enough why I helped them out. Don't blame me because you were idiotic enough to not see that what you wanted to do that night was a terrible idea."
Button audibly sighed before the two fell into silence. Button kept his face a couple of inches from his milkshake, the cold air radiating off from it cooling the very tip of his muzzle, while Spike took a few bites of his cupcake and watched the ponies buy and leave with their orders.
"Please tell me you're not here because those three are planning something, again."
Spike shook his head, "Nope, the reason I'm here is simple enough, I was hungry and Sugarcube Corner is the only bakery in town who's willing to take my unique dragon requests." then promptly tossed what was left of his cupcake into is mouth. "Besides, I'm kinda avoiding Applejack right now." He added with a full mouth.
"'Applejack...? Why are you avoiding her? What happened?"
"Well, uh, that is-" Spike stopped to take a deep breath before let it out slowly. "I was hoping to talk to you about that."
"What exactly does that have to do with me?"
"A lot actually... Did you and Sweetie Belle do anything after you two left Sweet Apple Acres Friday night?"
Button felt his blood run ice cold and his eyes widened at the question. How did Spike find out? Did anypony tell him?
"W-what...what do you mean?"
"What I mean is: Did you do anything with Sweetie Belle after you two left?" He asked with a raised brow, "Like, I dunno, go to Carousel Boutique perhaps...?"
Button hesitated as a feeling of dread filled his body, as he looked on at his friend. He can tell that the look on Spike's face was more inquisitive than anything, but on the back of his mind, it felt more like he was staring down the glare of a full grown dragon with cave filled with his hoard he just accidentally trotted into.
After a brief moment of silence, Button gathered enough of his nerve, as well as calm his fears enough to answer, "Y-yeah, we kinda just walked around town for a bit before going to Carousel Boutique, where I kinda helped in a game of Minecraft."
"So you did go to Carousel Boutique, and did you stay the night there?"
"Y-yeah, I did..." Button replied with his ears pinned backwards. "But, I slept on Miss Rarity's couch, I swear."
Spike didn't say anything right away, as Button could see the dragon looking him over, looking for the chink in his armor that will force him to come clean to his friend. Eventually, Spike sighed. "Alright, glad to hear that actually happened."
Button gave a relieved sigh as Spike accepted the explanation. Still though. "So why the interest in what I did after Sweetie and I left, and how does that connect to you avoiding Applejack?"
"As I said, a lot. It seems those three and myself made a, ehem, slight mistake when we set up the restaurant." He admitted in embarrassment and the quills on is head drooped.
"A mistake...? What kind of mistake?"
Spike quickly checked to see where the Cakes and Pinkie Pie were, finding they seemed to be pre-occupied with other matters he turned his attention back to Button and said in a hushed tone, "Not too loud, but we found out the reserve cider we used for the date, it was fermented."
"Fermented?! As in-"
"Yeah, as in alcoholic." Spike interrupted, "Apparently the barrel of cider we used was a leftover from the reserve last year that fermented. The Apples keep several barrels in reserve each year for personal use and according to the number of requests for it they get from the others around town."
Button merely listened as he took a couple of sips of his milkshake. So far, it's pretty obvious, the Apples still acted as a business group when not farmers, so it's not too far fetched for them to hold a couple of barrels on the side as long as ponies asked them.
"Anyway, we don't get how it happened, but it did. Twilight is looking into figuring out how it happened, but until then our best guess is that the barrel suffered from cold fermentation."
"Cold fermentation?"
"It's what happens when both the fruit and juice are left in the cold weather for a while before pressing, then the juice is left to ferment in the cold. I won't go into the details of how I know this, just know I do a lot of reading in my spare time."
"How could you serve that? How did you four not know it became alcoholic?" Button asked, some anger leaking into his voice.
Spike caught it though, and shot him a glare. "We didn't because it's not that simple. Leaving a barrel of cider laying around for almost a year doesn't usually cause it to become alcoholic. Anyway, Twilight thinks it wasn't by much though, whatever concentration of alcohol in it was would've been very small at best, and wouldn't have affected you by much."
"Then why tell me about it? I mean if it wasn't worth worrying about, you didn't have to tell me about it."
"I kinda do actually. Sweetie told us you two drank about three bottles of that stuff, and that's excluding the bottle Sweetie admitted to taking with her when you two left. You two did eat the biscuits, which is good since that would keep some of it out of your blood, but..."
"But, what...?"
"But then I went over to Rarity's to ask if she still needed my help with organizing some of her paperwork, and apparently, you two had a little more to drink."
Button's jaw dropped upon hearing that.
"Rarity found a couple bottles missing from her fridge." Spike explained, to which Button face-tabled upon hearing, knowing exactly what bottles Spike was referring to, "Most of 'em were just regular apple cider; but, one of the missing bottles wasn't even cider, it was a special apple-based wine shipped from Baltimare."
At that point the duo fell into silence again. Spike looked back over towards the kitchen and found Pinkie seemed to have heard them as she was looking right at their table, but thankfully she seemed to understand to remain quiet about the matter. Button was rubbing the side of his head in irritation. He was silently fuming about how Sweetie could possibly not even notice one of the bottles she picked out of her sister's fridge wasn't cider. Didn't that mare read the label...?!
Still though, he felt a bit of his anger reserved at himself for not even bothering to check the label himself. Or that he failed to notice that the taste would've changed. Well, he assumes that it would be different anyway. He wasn't sure. The core ingredient would be similar, but one would certainly be worth more than the other, so...Whatever, he can sort that out later.
"I'm not entirely sure just how drunk you two probably got, but considering Sweetie seemed to be in high-spirits yesterday, I'm assuming you didn't end up coming clean with that idea of yours or saying anything else you might've regretted saying now."
Button silently groaned to himself.
While that might've been true, at this point he'd love the chance to figure out what exactly happened that night.
"So, whatever." Button let out a sigh. "Thanks for letting me know, but, how does that mix in with you avoiding Applejack?"
"Well, um..., you see-" Spike was saying before both heard Applebloom's voice.
"Spike, there ya are." she stated as she walked up to them, "Ah was beginnin' ta wonder if ya gone and got cold hooves on me."
"No, just hungry, and trying to stay out of Applejack's sight. Is she still looking for me?"
"Eeyep..., but sis is watchin' the cart right now, so yer probably safe. As long as ya avoid the marketplace."
"That's good." He seemed to relax visibly. "So, do you wanna talk about it here? I mean the dining area is pretty deserted right now, I don't even know if Pinkie is around to eavesdrop. and I'm pretty sure the Cakes are busy in the kitchen with an order."
"He's here." Applebloom bluntly stated as she pointed at Button.
"To be honest, he seems kinda out of it today." Spike remarked, "Give him about ten minutes, and he'll probably lose a staring contest with his milkshake, again."
"Hey!" Button shouted indignantly.
"Nah, this is personal, Spike, ah want jus' us ta talk about it. There's a spot just outside of town we can talk without anyone hearin'. Meet me at Horseshoe Lake in few minutes and ah'll lead ya there, a'right?"
"Sure..., I'll see ya in few minutes then." He remarked just before Applebloom affectionately nuzzled Spike's cheek and took her leave.
Button's jaw dropped at the sight, which didn't go unnoticed by Spike.
"I know what you're thinking. After you and Sweetie left two nights ago, we had to do something with your food -which by the way if you had waited another six minutes, it would've been ready, and well...Applebloom and I had only snacked on some fritters previous to the date thing."
"Wait, so you two had a date?! I thought you had a thing for Miss Rarity."
"Well, I wouldn't call it a 'date' per say. Also, wow. You're really disconnected about what's been going on with the guys and I, aren't you?" Spike asked with a confused look.
"What the hay do you mean by that?"
"What I mean is that I got over my crush on Rarity three years ago, and apparently you're the last guy in the group to find out."
"But you still visit like five times a week."
"Yeah, I do, but that's because I still want to help Rarity out every now and again. While it didn't amount to anything, all these years of helping her in hopes of getting her attention at least made a strong friendship between us."
"..."
"Look, you don't need to know the details between me and Applebloom, just know that we drank some of that cider from Friday night, we talked, and we ended up agreeing to see if we can be more than friends." Spike got up to leave, "I have to get going. Listen, the thing with the cider was an accident, so don't hold it against the girls. If there's anyone who understands the concept of a slight oversight, I'm sure it's you."
Button wasn't sure if Spike was referencing the occasional moment where in a game he'd make mistakes that turned costly, like forgetting to look up in certain games, or if it was about his 'plan' to go along with Sweetie to save face. Either way he shot a glare at the drake, who paid him no heed before leaving the building.
Now left to his own thoughts, Button let out a frustrated sigh and growled before taking a big, long gulp of his milkshake. He didn't even have time to regret his action before he felt a massive spike of pain hit him from the resulting brain freeze. He gave a loud shout, which attracted the Cakes's and Pinkie's attention.