My Little Pony: Friendship is Absurd

by Lord Seth

Lunar Eclipse

Sunset was, for once, in a good mood, having recently been notified that she didn't have to keep sending friendship reports out. She wasn't exactly certain why this change was effected, but she also didn't care enough to find out. However, she was distracted from her reverie by a knock on the door. “Didn’t the mail already come?” she wondered out loud. She went over and opened the door. Several children were outside dressed in costumes.

“Nightmare Night! What a fright! Give us something sweet to bite!” they said.

Sunset stared at them for a few seconds, then slammed the door shut.

“Told you she wouldn’t give us anything,” said one of the kids. They walked off.

Meanwhile, back inside, Sunset groaned to herself. “Oh, right, Nightmare Night. Stupid holiday. It was much nicer back in Canterlot where I lived in an apartment, so I didn’t have to bother with any of it. Ugh.”

Knocking on the door interrupted her monologue. She opened it to discover more children. “Nightmare Night! What a fright! Give us–” they started to say before she slammed the door on them again.

“This is going to be an annoyance,” she muttered to herself.

“Nightmare Night! What a fright! Give–”

SLAM!

“Nightmare Night! What–”

SLAM!

“Nightmare–”

SLAM!

“Sunset Shimmer! We have graced your–”

SLAM!

Sunset Shimmer did a double take. “Wait, what was that last one?” She went back and opened the door to discover a dark blue alicorn standing outside. “Er, do I know you?”

“Sunset Shimmer!” the alicorn said in a deep, booming voice. “We have graced your tiny village with our presence, so that you might behold the real Princess of the Night! A creature of–”

“Er,” Sunset interrupted, “could you tell me who you are? Because I’ve only met one alicorn and she looked different than you.”

“We are that alicorn!”

“No,” said Sunset. “She was more gray colored, lighter-coated, and her hair wasn’t all wavy. Which is kind of cool, by the way. How can I get my hair to do that?”

The alicorn sighed. “No, we are Princess Luna! Well, okay, not exactly princess anymore, but Luna nevertheless! Did you forget that whole Nightmare Moon thing?”

Sunset stared. “That was you?”

“Yes! But thanks to a way that most assuredly involved neither torture nor brainwashing, we are back to normal! So we were hoping to use tonight as an opportunity to make ourselves look better!”

Sunset looked around. “Uh, you keep saying ‘we,’ but I don’t see anypony else. Also, could you tone it down? You’re being really loud.”

“But this is the traditional royal Canterlot voice! It is tradition to speak using the royal ‘we,’ and to use a booming voice such as this to address our subjects!”

This is going to be painful, though Sunset to herself, but she knew better than to deny the request of someone affiliated with the federal government. “Well, for starters, you’re going to have to cut out that weird royal we and also stop with the booming voice.”

“Why in the world would we need to do that?” asked Luna loudly.

This is going to be really painful, Sunset thought. “Well, here, I’ll show you.”

She left her house and closed the door behind her, then gestured for Luna to follow her. Spotting some children, she said, “Okay, go over there and try to talk nicely to them.”

Luna walked over to them. In her usual booming voice, she declared “Together we shall change this dreadful celebration into a bright and glorious feast!”

The kids looked at her for a few seconds. One shouted, “Stranger danger!” and they all ran away screaming.

“See?” asked Sunset. “You have to quiet down.”

“Oh,” said Luna without lowering her voice. “Any suggestions on how to do that?”

---

Sunset knocked on the door. “Come on out, Fluttershy!” No answer came. She knocked some more. “Come on! I need to talk to Ponyville’s resident quiet-talker!” Still no response.

Sunset turned to Luna. “Do I have governmental permission to knock down the door?”

“No,” said Luna.

“Hey!” shouted Sunset to the door. “I have governmental permission to knock down this door if you don’t open it up!”

“But we just said–”

“Yeah, I know,” said Sunset quietly, “it’s all a bluff.”

The door finally opened very slowly. Once it was opened just a crack, though, Sunset grabbed it and pushed it open, revealing an extremely scared-looking pegasus. “Eep!” she said as she looked as if she was trying to figure out which way to run.

“So anyway, I need you to help teach Luna here how to speak more quietly,” said Sunset.

Fluttershy made a squeaking noise.

“Don’t give me that! I’ve seen you can be assertive when you want to be! Just stop whining and help me with this!”

Fluttershy mumbled something inaudibly.

“Couldn’t hear that! Talk louder!”

Fluttershy muttered something else inaudibly.

“I know you’re supposed to teach being quiet, but not this quiet! Speak up!"

More mumbling.

“Ugh,” said Sunset with a groan. “Look, if this is your normal talking voice, just shout. I’m sure that’ll be a regular voice for you.”

“OKAY!” shouted Fluttershy. Unfortunately, she was actually so loud this time that the soundwave sent Sunset and Luna flying backwards and slamming into a tree. “Um, too loud?” she asked nervously

“You know,” said Luna, “maybe Fluttershy isn’t the best one to teach being quiet.”

“Well, this actually gives me an idea,” said Sunset. “How about you try whispering?”

“Like this?” asked Luna in a normal voice.

“Exactly!” said Sunset. “Whispering for you is actually normal talking! Problem solved! Now go and enjoy Nightmare Night while I go back home!”

Sunset started to walk off, but was halted by Luna. “Wait! What if they still don’t like me? I need you to come along just in case!”

Life is pain, thought Sunset to herself. “Fine,” she said out loud, “let’s go.” Please let everypony like her so I can get out of this.

The two returned to the town square. “Now, just go and have some fun.”

“Fun?” asked Luna. “What is this fun?”

“Okay, seriously,” said Sunset, “I have to ask. How in the world did they think it was a good idea for you to come to Ponyville when you don’t seem to understand social norms at all?”

Luna grinned sheepishly. “We may have… Er, I may have sort of come on my own without letting them know.”

Of course, thought Sunset. “Well, ‘fun’ is just doing something you enjoy. So maybe you could try playing the various games that are around. Like… that one!” Sunset pointed to a game where people would try to throw spiders at webs. “Have fun!”

Luna tried the game. After several attempts, she managed to succeed. “Huzzah! How many points do I receive?”

“Uh, this game doesn’t have points. You just try to throw the spider there,” said Sunset.

“If it doesn’t have points, how does anypony know who is ahead?”

“You got me,” said Sunset with a shrug. “I don’t see the point of any game that I don’t win.”

“Well, I found it enjoyable regardless!” said Luna.

“At least you seem to have dropped the ‘we’ business.”

“Let us partake in further merriment!” declared Luna.

“And there it goes again,” muttered Sunset.

“Oh, you misunderstand. By ‘us’ I refer to the two of us!” She grabbed Sunset. “Two great friends against the world! Or at least the games of the world! Nothing will stop us!”

“Hey! Hey!” said Sunset, pushing Luna away. “Personal space! Personal space!”

“Oh. Sorry.”

Sunset didn’t want to put up with the alicorn any longer, but she knew that quitting now could make herself look bad. So she simply sighed and went along with Luna to play more games.

Not counting a mishap involving banana cream pie, things went without incident for the next few minutes. Observing things seemed to be going well, Sunset used the opportunity to slip away. “Maybe now I can get a break,” she muttered to herself. However, in her mutterings she wasn’t looking where she was going, causing her to walk straight into someone.

“Ow! Why don’t you look where you’re going?” asked the someone she had just walked into.

“Why don’t you–” started Sunset before seeing who she ran into. “Trixie! You’re back? Where have you been? What was the penalty box?”

“Don’t ask!” snapped Trixie. She abruptly stopped when she saw Luna. “AAAH! Nightmare Moon!” she shouted.

Apparently, simply screaming “Nightmare Moon” was enough to cause havoc and pandemonium to reign. Shortly into their reign, they gave birth to chaos. Luna’s attempts to fix of the situation, such as turning the toy spiders into real ones and multiplying them, only caused chaos to then have a younger sibling in the form of mayhem.

“BE STILL!” Luna finally screamed in a voice even louder than her previously loud voice. Everyone else, terrified of her, simply stood around whimpering. “Since you choose to fear your princess—well, former princess, but that’s besides the point—rather than love her, and dishonor her with this insulting celebration, we decree that Nightmare Night shall be canceled! Forever!”

Sunset had to work very hard to contain her utter glee at this announcement. “Oh, how sad,” she said in the most emotional voice she can muster, which had about as much emotion as something that lacks a particular something has of that particular something it lacks. Luna started to stalk away.

Help her out or just go home? thought Sunset to herself. Wait, why am I even asking myself a question I already know?

“So, Sunset,” said Trixie, pulling up to her, “have I been the talk of the town since my disappearance?”

“Actually,” said Sunset, “nopony really cared or noticed you were gone.”

“In that case,” declared Trixie, “the Great and Powerful Trixie must do everything in her power to remind everypony of her existence so much they’ll never ignore the fact she’s missing!”

“I think they might have noticed, but just in how they were being irritated less,” said Sunset. “Anyway, I’m going home to celebrate the fact there are no more Nightmare Nights.”

Sunset went home. Somewhere between 10 and 30 minutes later, however, she heard a large commotion. She left the house to see what it was and discovered Luna running through the town square away from a group of royal guards. Unfortunately for her, they were able to catch up and subdue her.

“All right, Luna,” one of them said, “you’ve terrified enough ponies tonight. We’ve talked about this. It’s time to bring you back now. And we’ll need to do some more reprogramming.”

“What?!” screamed Luna. “No, not that again! Not Room 101!”

Luna’s screams were quickly muffled by a gag as the royal guards led her away. Sunset ran up to them.

“So, uh,” asked Sunset to one of the guards, “is there still no more Nightmare Night? She said there wouldn’t be.”

“Oh, of course there is,” he said. “Luna here doesn’t have the authority to make a decree like that.”

“Oh, okay,” said Sunset. Darn it.

“Though it is a shame,” continued the guard. “If she had been able to connect with everypony here in some way and shown she was ready to integrate back into society, that would’ve been great. If somepony had managed that, that certainly would have won them a lot of points with the government and practically assured them a high-paying job of some sort. Ah well.”

Sunset stared off at at them as they left, then went back into her house. “I hate everypony,” she said.

---

“Nooo!” screamed Luna. “Not more reprogramming!”

“Sorry, but you have to do it,” said the unicorn in the room with her. “Now, let’s ease ourselves into it for a bit and start with this.” The screen lit up and the following displayed on it:

public class FirstTest
{

public static void main(String[] args)

{

System.out.print(“This is the first line.”)

System.out.print(“This is the second line.”)

}
}

“Now, how would we fix it so that ‘This is the second line.’ actually displays on the second line?”

“Replacing the first ‘System.out.print’ with ‘System.out.println’ should do it,” said Luna is a dull voice, as if answering a basic math problem.

“Good! See? This totally relaxes you and aids in your rehabilitation. Now for the next bit of reprogramming!” A new bit of code appeared on the screen.

“Can’t we at least do something more challenging? This is beginner’s stuff,” Luna protested.

“Hey, this is called Room 101 for a reason!” said the unicorn. “Do a good enough job and maybe you’ll move up to Room 102.”

Luna sighed. “I wish this had at least been Perl.”

Comments

[Hopeful_Ink_Hoof]

That is one of the cleverest twist puns I have seen. Great humorous way to end the chapter.

[Qussar]

I did not see that coming
Good job
Really like sunset mantra life is pain

[Tinee_The_TinCan]

Poor Luna, Poor Trixie, Sunset seems to be too harsh.

[Lord Seth]

5502859
5500943

Thanks! I came up with that kind of at random, and thought it was so funny I had to include it somehow.

[cmartist]

Ok, that bit about reprogramming totally caught me by surprise. Well done.

[keaton-furman-prower]

This is where the time-traveling spell would really have helped Sunny D

[xoid]

Luna sighed. “I wish this had at least been Perl.”

Luna’s a masochist? Seems legit.

[Streakofscarlet]

It's nice to re-read old chapters and understand some legitimately funny jokes that I didn't originally. (I wouldn't understand the 'reprogramming' joke until about two years after first reading the story.)