My Little Pony: Friendship is Absurd

by Lord Seth

Cutie Markless - Part 2

One ‘To Be Continued…’ note later…

“Did you know that the name for fear of the number 13 is triskaidecaphobia?” asked Trixie.

“In sameness, there is peace. Exceptionalism is a lie.”

“Is this going to be your new thing?” asked Flam. “Continually spouting off random tidbits of trivia?”

“Free yourself from your cutie mark. Choose equality as your special talent.”

“It beats complaining about how boring it is to listen to Starlight’s propaganda through this loudspeaker while she keeps us locked up in one of her houses,” said Trixie. “And hey, maybe this trivia will win you a game show someday.”

“Be your best by never being the best.”

“That line doesn’t even make sense!” said Flam.

Gilda finally woke up. “Oh, hi guys. Did I miss anything?” she asked groggily.

“You missed Starlight taking us all captive and locking us in this house,” said Lightning Dust. “And then playing all of this stuff over the loudspeaker.”

“Conformity will set you free.”

“It gets really tiring pretty quickly,” said Sunset.

“Accept your limitations, and happiness will follow. You’re no better than your friends. In sameness, there is peace.”

“Especially because it loops,” said Trixie. “You know, like that song. ‘This is the song that doesn’t end! Yes, it goes on and on–’”

“Stop it!” said Lightning Dust.

“Because it’s annoying?”

“Because I think that it might actually be copyrighted. Don’t want to infringe on it.”

“Is there any reason why none of the unicorns simply teleported out of here?” asked Gilda.

“We can’t,” said Sunset. “I’m guessing she set up some kind of anti-teleportation spell.”

“Never fear!” declared Gilda. “Unlike you lot, I never had a cutie mark to begin with! Thus, all my talents and skills are preserved!”

“Great,” said Sunset. “How about you use those to get us out of here?”

“No problem!” said Gilda. There was an awkward pause. “Uh… you guys don’t happen to have any of my guns, do you? Because I don’t have them.”

“Why would we have them?”

“Darn it, Starlight must have taken them,” said Gilda. “Well, looks like we’re screwed then.”

“Okay, I guess it’s back to the plan of pretending to agree with them so that they’ll let us out,” said Sunset.

“You think they’d be convinced after only one night of this?” asked Flam.

“Do you have any other suggestions?”

“Scream out ‘there are five lights’?” suggested Trixie. Everyone stared at her.

“I’m ignoring that,” said Sunset. “Okay, Gilda, I think they might buy that you’ve accepted it as you didn’t have any cutie marks to begin with.”

“Sounds like a plan!” said Gilda. “Though first we’ll have to wait until they let us out. Assuming this loudspeaker ever stops repeating itself…”

Much loudspeaker repetition later…

“Good morning!” declared the loudspeaker as it suddenly stopped saying the same thing over and over. Starlight then opened the door from outside. “I trust you had a pleasant night?” she said.

“Why didn’t you say ‘good morning’ when you opened the door rather than doing it with the loudspeaker?” said Lightning Dust.

Starlight ignored her. “This way, please. There are some friends who’d like to see you.”

Starlight led the group outside to find a crowd of the ponies with awkward-looking smiles. “Gather round, friends, gather round! We’ve come to ask if any of you are ready to join us! There are so many friends to be made once you realize you don’t need your cutie marks or the talents that come with them.”

“Sure, why not?” said Gilda.

“Don’t be a fool!” said Starlight. “Cutie marks are the source of… wait, did you just say yes?”

“I mean, I haven’t really seen them perform any real function outside of that one time they all got inadvertently switched and chaos resulted,” said Gilda with a shrug.

“That only happened once!” hissed Sunset.

“Well, it’s still one more time than I’ve seen any positive thing they resulted in outside of I guess looking kind of cool sometimes. Anyway, it’s not like I ever had one to begin with, so what do I care?”

“Hooray!” declared all of the ponies around Starlight.

“Well, if you didn’t have one to begin with I suppose it wouldn’t be that hard to persuade you,” said Starlight. “But I–”

“This is the biggest betrayal I have ever suffered!” declared Trixie. “How dare you give up on our friendship! After everything we’ve been through! Don’t you remember that time you had that fear of performing in public, but then you were able to overcome your fear thanks to us?”

“Uh… no?” said Gilda.

“Exactly!” said Trixie.

“Oh, please!” said Flim, causing everyone to turn to him. “This is all clearly a fake attempt to trick you all into thinking she’s accepted the philosophy even though she actually hasn’t.”

“I mean, just look at how badly Trixie was overacting,” added Flam.

“Hey!” said Trixie. “I do not overact!”

“Flim, Flam, what are you doing?” hissed Gilda.

“Just pointing out the obvious, that you’re clearly just trying to trick them,” said Flim.

“Aha!” said Starlight. “Just as I suspected. I appreciate the honesty from the two of you. I’d like to–”

“Can I ask a question?” interrupted Lightning Dust. “What, exactly, is supposed to be preventing us—or at least those of us who can fly—from just flying off?”

“The fact that those of us who can fly would just grab you?” said Starlight.

“I’m pretty fast,” said Lightning Dust.

“But you’d be slowed down due to me removing your cutie mark,” said Starlight.

“Exactly!” said Gilda as she flew up into the air. “But not me! So long, suckers!” she shouted as she flew off. The other pegasi tried to chase her down but couldn’t keep up.

“Not an issue,” said Starlight, “there’s nowhere close to here. She’ll have to come back eventually.”

“Okay, now I’m confused,” said Sunset. “Where are we right now?”

“In Our Town, obviously,” said Starlight.

“I thought this was your town,” said Lightning Dust.

“No, its name is… wait, you’re just messing with me, aren’t you?”

“Maybe,” said Lightning Dust.

“What I meant,” said Sunset, “is where we were in regards to the situation we were in before Gilda flew off.”

“Flam and I were demonstrating our honesty by trying to warn you about Gilda’s plan,” said Flim, “because we’ve been completely won over by your village and its philosophy!”

“Hooray!” declared all of the other ponies.

“How dare they!” declared Trixie. “This is the most horrible betrayal I have ever suffered!”

Suri facehoofed. “Trixie, the plan failed. You can stop with the overacting.”

“You say I overact?!” said Trixie. “How dare you?! I thought we were friends! This is the most horrible betrayal I have ever suffered! By the way, did you know that a hummingbird–”

“No one cares about your random facts!” said Sunset.

“I say things you know, and you complain. I say things you don’t know, and you complain,” grumbled Trixie. “This is the most horrible–”

“Okay!” said Starlight. “I can’t stand listening to you any more! Flim and Flam, you can join our village, because you proved your earnestness by trying to expose the scheme of the others.”

“Hooray!” declared the various ponies in the town.

“Any chance you’d believe us if we said were totally cool with your town and wanted to join?” asked Suri.

“No,” said Starlight. “Because your group tried to trick us.”

“Would you say this was the most horrible betrayal you have ever suffered?” asked Trixie.

“No,” said Starlight. “Because the larger betrayal is that it seems that some in our midst might be dissatisfied with the village life!”

All of the town residents gasped, with a few gasping so hard they fell over unconscious.

“Unfortunately,” continued Starlight, “it’s all too true! So, Flim and Flam, can you reassure us your intentions are pure by telling us the name of the friends who so desperately miss their cutie marks that they would sneak around in the shadows talking to strangers about it?”

Flim and Flam glanced at each other, then immediately pointed to Party Favor. “It’s him,” said Flim.

“What?!” said Party Favor. “How could you betray me like this?”

“Because we have realized the fault in our cutie marks!” said Flam. “And thus, we need to expose you.”

“Well!” said Starlight. “You gave no thought to the pain you’d cause your friends. Such selfishness. You can go with the others back into the house and reconsider things some more.”

“I’m sorry, everypony!” said Party Favor. “I never wanted to leave the village! I love all of–”

“So,” interrupted Trixie, “Party Favor, do you think that this betrayal was the most horrible–”

“Back into the house!” screamed Starlight.

And so our protagonists, along with a character of little importance, found themselves locked back into the house.

“Figures Flim and Flam ruined it,” said Sunset. “I always did peg those two as a bit untrustworthy.”

“You considered them a bit untrustworthy?” asked Suri. “They’re even less trustworthy than I am!”

“What was I thinking?” lamented Party Favor. “I can’t believe I even considered asking for my cutie mark back.”

“Don’t worry!” said Sunset. “Despite Flim and Flam’s betrayal…” There was a pause. “You’re not going to cut me off with another note about worst betrayal, Trixie?”

“Of course not,” said Trixie. “I’d cut you off with a note about whether it was the most horrible betrayal, not the worst betrayal.”

“Uh, okay,” said Sunset. “Anyway, despite that, I’m sure Gilda will be able to rescue us all. Eventually. Unless she decides to go off on her own adventure and forget about us, which is unfortunately not an improbable thing to happen.”

“So do you think that would be the most horrible betrayal if that happened, or what Flim and Flam pulled?” asked Trixie.

“That’s it,” snapped Suri. “You are hereby banned from ever using the phrase ‘most horrible betrayal’ for the remainder of this adventure.” As Trixie started to say something, Suri quickly added, “And that goes for any synonyms!”

“Darn it,” said Trixie.

Meanwhile, sometime later…

“So, do you think Gilda’s gotten help yet?” asked Suri.

“Would it make any difference as to whether I thought she did or not?” asked Sunset. “She either has or she hasn’t.”

The door opened and Gilda was thrown in before the door closed and locked again. “Uh, hi guys. Sorry I wasn’t able to help more.”

“What happened?” asked Lightning Dust.

“There’s not really anyplace nearby to escape to, so I came back to get my guns, but then I got caught and thrown back in here,” said Gilda.

“Well, just great,” said Sunset. “There goes our escape plan. I guess we’re doomed.”

“See?” said Trixie. “That’s the ‘pessimistic and annoyed’ part that Flim mentioned. Speaking of which, I wonder what that guy is doing now.”

---

“Well!” said Starlight. “All new friends stay with me until their cottage is completed. Let’s get you settled, and then you can enjoy all that our little village has to offer.”

“Right!” said Flim. “Because we like your village and are in complete agreement with your philosophy. This is not just a way to make you let us go for long enough that we can run off as soon as we get a chance.”

“Huh?” said Starlight.

“Exactly!” said Flim.

Starlight put on a forced smile. “It doesn’t matter. Just stay here until your home gets created.”

Starlight left, and Flim and Flam looked at each other. “Do you think she bought it?” asked Flim.

“I don’t know,” said Flam. “But we’re out of that annoying hut now, at least. I mean, sure, we’re still stuck inside a place, but it’s roomier and without the annoying loudspeaker. Any ideas on how to get out?”

“Hrm,” said Flim.

---

“Party Favor snores really loudly,” whispered Trixie.

“About time he fell asleep,” Sunset whispered back.

Outside the house, the guards were playing a game to pass the time. “I spy, with my little eye, something that begins with–”

The two were interrupted by a knocking from inside. “What is it?” one of them asked.

“Uh… I kind of got stuck in here with a teleportation accident,” came Starlight’s voice. “Could you open the door and let me out?”

“Wait, how did you do that with the anti-teleportation spell on it?”

“Because it only prevents teleportation out of the house, not teleportation into it.”

“That makes perfect sense!” said one of the guards as he opened the door and let Starlight out.

“Thanks for that,” said Starlight as they closed the door. “Well, I’ll go back home.” She started walking off.

“Isn’t your house in the other direction?” asked one of the guards.

“Um… I was talking the scenic route,” said Starlight.

The guards looked at all of the very bland-looking houses. “Makes perfect sense!”

Starlight glanced at them quizzically but then walked off. Once she made it to the edge of the town she took a quick glance to ensure no one was following her, then dashed off in the direction of the cave, which she eventually reached.

“No guards?” she wondered to herself. “Well, guess that makes things easy.” She quickly ran over to the wall of cutie marks to find Flam. “Oh, you’re here?”

“Starlight?!” exclaimed Flam. “Oh, um, I’m just here to admire the cutie marks.”

“I’m not Starlight,” said Starlight as she was suddenly wreathed in flame and turned into Sunset.

“Huh,” said Flam. “I thought you seemed slightly more pessimistic and annoyed than Starlight usually did.”

“Yeah, whatever,” said Sunset. “If you’re already here, why didn’t you smash this wall and see if that would return the cutie marks?”

“Because,” said Flam with a frown, “after I managed to sneak out of the house through the chimney, through the window I happened to observe Starlight had actually taken our marks for safekeeping. Destroying this, if it actually can simply be destroyed like that, might cause a little chaos, but it wouldn’t actually help us. She could just run off with them when she figures out the wall got destroyed. Especially because this would return her cutie mark to increase her power.”

“Wait,” said Sunset, “she brought them into her house? Where you guys were living with her? Doesn’t that seem extraordinarily stupid? What if you had just walked in? Or overheard her from the room you were in?”

“I was wondering about that,” said Flam.

“Well, it doesn’t seem like things are all that hard to figure out,” said Sunset. “We just go into her house, break the stuff she’s got the cutie marks in, and we’ll all be fine.”

“And then get re-captured by the other ponies,” pointed out Flam.

“Oh please, they’re without their talents, so what the heck are they going to do against us when we do have them? We only got beaten the first time because we were taken by surprise and were in an enclosed location.”

“Fine. But how do we find where she put them? I wasn’t able to see from the window I looked in. Speaking of which, I should really get back before she notices I’m gone. Flim might be able to stall her, but she’ll notice eventually.”

The two walked back towards the town. “You could search her house?” suggested Sunset.

“How would I get an opportunity to do that without her noticing? She’s probably not leaving it until the morning when she brings the rest of the group out.”

“I guess I’ll just use that opportunity to search,” said Sunset. “It’ll take her a little while to get the town together to try to convince the rest to join up, so hopefully I can find it in that time period.”

And so, the next day…

“All right!” said Starlight after the town had assembled. “Let’s let them out again and see if they’ve reconsidered! Open the door!”

The pair of guards sitting outside the house opened the door and the group came out.

“I have a good feeling about… wait,” said Starlight. “Where’s Sunset?”

“I don’t know!” said Party Favor. “I went to sleep and when I woke up she was gone! The others said she vanished into thin air! Maybe she was just a figment of our collective imagination all along!”

“You’re not very bright, are you?” said Starlight.

“No, not really,” said Party Favor sadly.

“Wait, how do we know you’re not a product of our collective imagination all along?” demanded Suri.

“Oh no!” said one of the ponies in the town. “What if all of this is a product of our collective imagination and we’re slowly being digested by plants?!”

“That is the stupidest thing I have ever heard,” said Starlight.

“That’s just what a figment of our collective imagination would say!” declared Suri.

“What if us pondering about whether everything is a product of our collective imagination is just a product of our collective imagination?!” asked one of the ponies. This prompted them all to start running around screaming.

“Hey! Calm down!” shouted Starlight. “They’re just trying to trick you!”

The panic instantly abated. “Huh, that would make a lot more sense than the collective imagination thing,” mused one of them.

“Now lock these guys back into the shed, then go and find Sunset!” said Starlight.

There was a sudden flash of light, and the cutie marks of Flim, Flam, Trixie, Suri, and Lightning Dust all suddenly reappeared.

“How did–” started Starlight, but she was interrupted by Sunset, also with a restored cutie mark, emerging from Starlight’s house and marching up to them.

“Next time you hide cutie marks in your house, it would probably be better to hide them in someplace less obvious than the closet,” said Sunset.

“How did you let her escape?!” Starlight hissed at the guards.

“We didn’t,” one said. “Why didn’t you notice she escaped anyway? You were in there.”

“I was never in there!” said Starlight.

“But… you walked right out,” said the confused guard. “We saw you. We talked to you.”

“How is that possible if I wasn’t there?”

“Enh, not that hard to figure out,” said Sunset as she was wreathed in fire and transformed into Starlight. “I kind of got stuck in here with a teleportation accident. Could you open the door and let me out?” she said in Starlight’s voice before smirking and transforming back into herself.

“You’re a changeling?!” asked Starlight. “But that’s not possible. If you were a changeling, I shouldn’t have been able to take your cutie mark!”

“Yeah, well, life surprises all of us,” said Sunset as she idly examined her hoof. “By the way, if you’re wondering how this isn’t illegal what with that whole requiring anypony’s express written permission in order to imitate them, there’s actually a number of exceptions written into the law if you actually bother to read all 900 pages of it, many of them very oddly specific. Such as ‘if you’re locked up somewhere because the leader of a town is trying to force you to accept their philosophy.’”

“Wait, how is that law 900 pages?” asked Suri. “Why would it take that much?”

“Well, it turns out there’s actually comparatively little law in the law,” said Sunset. “Most of the text is a bunch of knock-knock jokes. Also, on page 482, it says, ‘Yes, Sunset. I did totally leave out a self-mimicking exception in order to screw with you just in the off chance you got that ascension.’”

“I think Chrysalis enjoys her job a little too much,” said Lightning Dust.

“Who cares?” said Starlight. “It doesn’t even matter if you got your cutie marks back for now, I can still–”

“Oh,” said Sunset in a bored tone of voice, “if you were planning to re-capture us to take away our cutie marks again, that might be hard after this.” She nonchalantly pulled the Staff of Sameness out of a bag she had, then smashed it into the ground before setting it on fire. Everyone stared at it in disbelief.

“Unless, of course,” continued Sunset, “the cutie mark stealing was actually a spell you came up with and the staff was a fake-out, but for that to work you would’ve had to have been faking losing your cutie mark because good luck having that level of magical power without it.”

“I… well…” stammered Starlight as she glanced at the rest of the crowd. “Look, just because I can’t add more friends to the town for now doesn’t mean we won’t be perfectly fine and content! And I’m sure I can find some new way to remove cutie marks!”

“Oh yeah,” said Flam. “About that…”

There was a pause.

“What about that?” said Starlight.

“Darn it, I thought I had the timing right,” said Flam. “Guess I’m not in tune with my brother as much as I thought. Wait just a little. It’s sure to happen soon.”

“Wait, where’s your brother?” asked Starlight.

“Maybe he nonchalantly walked off during all of the fuss,” said Party Favor. “Or… or maybe he was just a product of our collective imagination all along!”

“Okay, remember when I said that you guys should get them?” asked Starlight. “How about you get to the getting of them now?”

Just then, there was a flash of light and everyone’s cutie marks returned except for Starlight’s. All of the ponies in town were so surprised and distracted they forgot all about grabbing them.

“Okay, now it happened,” said Flam. “He just went off to destroy that whole wall of cutie marks. We were deliberately stalling you in order to accommodate it. Odd it didn’t return yours, though.”

“Yes, well, mine was just kept in a different location, so–” started Starlight before she was suddenly doused with a bucket of water that Sunset threw at her. “How are you carrying so many things?”

“Ha!” said Sunset as she pointed at Starlight’s equal sign cutie mark, which had been partially washed off to reveal an actual cutie mark underneath. “My suspicions were correct! You never gave up your cutie mark at all, and were just faking it! That’s why that Staff of Sameness wasn’t one of the known artifacts! You were just pretending it was the cause and you were using a spell to remove the cutie marks!”

“And then you were trying to scare everypony away from the cave so you could secretly mine the gold yourself!” declared Trixie. “And you would’ve gotten away with it, too, if it hadn’t been for us meddling ponies and griffon!”

Everyone stared at Trixie blankly. “I… don’t think that whole part about the gold is the case, Trixie,” said Gilda.

“Hrm, must be getting it mixed up with something else,” muttered Trixie.

“So you didn’t give up your cutie mark despite insisting all of us do it?” demanded Sugar Belle. “You said cutie marks were evil!”

“But they are!” declared Starlight. “Just look at them! Don’t you see? Evil!”

“But then why take ours and not give up your own?”

“Because of the fact I had to in order to cast the spell? As Sunset just explained?”

“So you lied to us?” asked one of the ponies.

“Only about that one part! Everything else was true!”

“Even the part about the beans?” asked Party Favor. “Because that part always did strike me as a bit odd, even when I did believe in your philosophy.”

“Yes, even the part about the beans!” snapped Starlight. “The only way to be happy is if we’re all equal!”

“Except for you,” said Flam. “Either you’re all equal, or none of you are.”

“That’s right!” declared Double Diamond. “Let’s get our cutie marks back! To the cave!”

“YEAH!” shouted the crowd as they all ran off.

“But… they already got them back,” said a confused Sunset.

“I’m kind of getting the feeling the ponies in this town are not very smart,” said Gilda. “Which would explain, I guess, why they all fell for Starlight’s really obviously false claims.”

“Wait, where is Starlight?” asked Lightning Dust. “She’s gone.”

“She must have used the opportunity to escape,” said Trixie. “That, or she was a figment of our collective imagination all along.”

“I think I’m going to go with the first explanation,” said Flam.

“Yeah, me too,” said Trixie. There was a pause.

“So… is that it?” asked Lightning Dust. “Are we done with this whole nonsense now?”

“I guess so,” said Sunset.

“Okay, I have questions,” said Suri, “because you didn’t get a chance to explain it. Why did we bother with returning their cutie marks and exposing Starlight instead of just skedaddling out of here because we had our powers while they didn’t?”

“Because I figured that if we just ran off, it wouldn’t count as solving the problem we were sent to solve,” said Sunset. “And I did not want to have to deal with Chrysalis if we didn’t.”

“She’d probably banish us from Equestria, imprison us in the place where she banished us, and then come by a month later and say that things got mixed up and we were supposed to be sent to a theme park, but it’s too late to fix it now and thus no theme park for us,” said Flam.

“The sad thing is, I could totally see her do that,” said Sunset. “Anyway, I had my suspicions Starlight was faking it, so I had Flim go off and destroy the cutie mark wall to expose it. And even if she hadn’t been faking it, the return of the cutie marks would hopefully cause enough chaos to get away. So now that all the problems seem to have been solved and our mission is complete, we can leave this whole stupid town behind as soon as Flim shows up and the train comes back.”

Some waiting later…

“What is taking him so long?” asked Sunset in an irritated tone.

Just then, a large rush of the townsponies came up, and they tossed a tied-up Flim to Sunset. “Ta-da!” one of them declared.

“Why is he tied up?” asked Suri.

“Because he betrayed you, so we tied him up to bring him here!” said Sugar Belle.

“Oh, no, that was all a fake-out,” said Sunset. “The whole thing was a plan with two backups. The first plan was to have Gilda just run off and escape, the second was for Flim and Flam to pretend to betray us in order to gain Starlight’s trust, and the third was for me to escape. We figured at least one of those would work.”

“But wait, you talked about how Flim and Flam betrayed you even among yourselves,” said Party Favor.

“That was because you were around. We didn’t know if you would blab the plan to Starlight,” said Suri. “So we kept up the masquerade.”

“Oh, well that makes sense,” said Party Favor. “Wait. Hang on a minute! The only reason I was in that position was because you guys sold me out to Starlight!”

“And the only reason you’re here to complain about it is because of that,” said Flam. “We had to gain her trust. Sorry about that.”

“Are you saying that because you’re actually sorry, or because you don’t want to annoy a potential future customer to your cider business?” asked Party Favor.

“A little here, a little there,” said Flam.

“Well!” said Night Glider, finally having a speaking role again. “Now that we’ve gotten all those explanations out of the way, I wanted to mention that when we were looking through the caves, it turns out there was a big stash of gold! Trixie was right about it.”

“Huh,” said Sunset.

“Since you guys helped us find it, we figured we’d give the seven of you a pretty hefty share!”

“Can I get untied first, please?” asked Flim.

---

“You know how people say that virtue is its own reward?” asked Suri as the train sped away from Our Town.

“Yes?” asked Lightning Dust.

Suri looked at all of the gold. “I’m starting to wonder if those people are right. Virtue does seem surprisingly good at providing rewards.”

“I’m just disappointed that we went through all of that, and I still didn’t get a chance to use my rocket launcher,” said Gilda.

“Did you even bring it along?” asked Sunset.

“No,” said Gilda, “but what’s that got to do with anything?”

Later…

“And so the map and everything else got installed over in Ponyville,” said Luna.

“Oh, good,” said Chrysalis. “That thing was really cluttering up the place.”

“You know, you could give the job of notifying of you of these things to somepony else,” said Luna.

“But you’re so good at it!” said Chrysalis. “No one is at relaying mildly relevant information as you are!”

Luna sighed.

“But, it looks like that mission the Tree of Whatever sent them on was a success, and whatever problem was there was successfully solved by the group,” said Chrysalis.

“You didn’t find out what they actually did?”

“Nah,” said Chrysalis, “finding things like that out is for poor people. But! As has been shown by them defeating Tirek and now handling this… my plan is still working. Soon it will ALL come to fruition!”

“Wait, what are you talking about?” asked Luna.

“My secret plan!” said Chrysalis. “It’s going exactly as planned!”

“What plan is this?”

“I’d tell you,” said Chrysalis, “but then it wouldn’t be a secret.”

“Do you even have a plan, or are you just messing with me?” asked Luna.

“The annoying thing,” said Chrysalis with a frown, “is I’m not entirely sure myself.”

I need a new job, thought Luna to herself. However, her internal musings were interrupted by a grumpy-looking and covered-in-goop Twilight Sparkle pushing a not-as-grumpy-looking-but-equally-covered-in-goop Discord into the room, giving Discord an angry glare, and then walking out without saying a word.

“What was that all about?” asked Chrysalis.

“Don’t ask,” said Discord with a sigh. “Just know that I’m not going to be allowed in the Crystal Empire for a while. And neither is the Smooze.”

Still later…

“Did you see the new Mare Do Well issue?” a pegasus excitedly asked the unicorn next to him on the bench. “It’s great! Mare Do Well stumbles upon this village where the leader, Guitarlight Slimmer, is trying to enforce equality by removing cutie marks, but then it turns out it was all a lie and she actually had one. It’s really good! I’m pretty sure that for a long time, anypony who tries to spread a message about equality through getting rid of cutie marks in real life is going to have a lot of trouble thanks to this.”

Starlight Glimmer, the aforementioned unicorn, stared at him for a few moments, then got up and stormed off.

“Hrm,” he said. “Maybe she hasn’t read it yet and is upset I spoiled things for her. I really need to remember to use those spoiler tags more often so I don’t accidentally tell people things like how that one guy was a ghost through the whole movie.”

Comments

[Razzy]

Yay, Sunset finally uses her changeling powers for something.

And yes, Chryssie is having much too much fun at her job.

At least Luna will gain since serious mental fortitude.

I loved this chapter, I kept snickering ask the way through. Keep up the good work.

[LegacyMine]

I love this chapter. This is great.

[F14m3rz]

“Oh no!” said one of the ponies in the town. “What if all of this is a product of our collective imagination and we’re slowly being digested by plants?!”

Oh, I remember that X-Files episode.

[Streakofscarlet]

They had three contingency plans? I guess they can work together more than once after all.

[King of Kings]

What guy? What movie? I need to know!

[Lord Seth]

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It's a reference to The Sixth Sense.