Gah! Bucket please!

by StormDancer

Tea?

Inside the cafe, six ponies and a small dragon crowded around a table, merrily chatting and catching up, when the waiter brought over their third kettle of tea. Fluttershy quietly held her cup forward as AJ smirked and waved it off. Rainbow smirked and 'misplaced' her cup for the forth time, while Rarity politely exchanged her mostly full cup for a warmer one. Pinkie giggled and ordered her 3rd milkshake as Twilight eagerly held her cup to be refilled... again.

Rarity watched, quietly, until the waiter wandered off again, before quietly clearing her throat.

"Twilight."

"Mmm?" the alicorn looked up at her friend from over the rim of her teacup.

"Not to be insensitive, Darling, but... have you been taking care of yourself over the last week?" Rarity politely let her eyes slip around the room, admiring the.... rustic... decor of the clearly not trendy enough cafe, despite the quality of their food.

"Um, yes? I mean, it's not like I was running laps or anything, but it's not like I was just laying in bed either." Twilight lowered her cup and floated the kettle over to refill her tea as she tried to piece together where her friend was going with the question.

"It's just that, well, and don't take this the wrong way, but... you seem to have put on a tiny bit of weight since we saw you last." Rarity's lips drew to a thin line, trying desperately not to sound condescending or as if she were judging her friend.

Rainbow Dash, however, had no such tact. "Seriously?" And in a flash, she was around the table, softly poking Twilight in the side. "Whoa! Twilight, what'd you do? Like, eat nothing but cake?" She grinned as she hopped back a step, right as Twilight batted where she had been poking her from. "I know you're a princess and all, but cake's a sometimes food."

Pinkie Pie gasped! "IT IS NOT! Cake is one of the most bestestest things EVER made! It's got flour and water and milk and eggs and nuts and berries and sugar and the distilled essence of all things yummy! Cake is the one food you should be able to have at any meal of the day!" She had bounced over to stand between Twilight and Rainbow by that point and was staring at the pegasus hard.

"Yheah, Pinks, cake's great and all, but jeeze! Look at Twilight, it's like she's gotten all squishy!" Rainbow grinned as she started in like she would with Applejack.

Twilight sat agast, the teacup frozen at her lips as she heard her friend taunting her. At the moment, it wasn't a good natured jab to her, the focus had shifted entirely too quickly and without her own retaliation it seemed all too familiar to the kinds of cruel taunts fillies and colts used on the schoolyard.

Idly, she noticed that while she hadn't swallowed the mouthful of tea, her tongue was now dry.

Pinkie, meanwhile had rolled her eyes and thrown her forelegs out. "That's not nice Rainbow! Even if she is a liiiiitle more soft than she normally is, there's nothing wrong with that." Pinkie grinned wide as she pointed to herself. "I'm a little soft too, and that just makes me more huggable and lovable! You should be cheering her up, not making fun of her!"

Rarity chimed in over a soft sip of her own tea, "Pinkie, we're not trying to make fun of her... well, I'm not at least..." Rainbow shot her a frown, "but I am a bit concerned Twilight. It's not like you to simply disappear for days on end and come back... well... like this."

Rarity gently placed one of her immaculately tended hooves to Twilight's side and pressed gently, a dimple forming in the soft layer that the lights of the cafe must have revealed to her.

Fluttershy lowered her gaze and quietly took another almond cookie from the tray they had been sharing, electing to remain silent as her friends suddenly seemed to be involved in a conversation she was not comfortable with.

"Hey! Not you too Rarity!" Pinkie spun in place, somehow avoiding the table as she prodded Rarity in the shoulder. "Not after you ate ALL the chocolate mint fudge butterscotch toffee butter brickle ice-cream when your puppet box thing didn't work!" Rarity craned her neck back with a nervous glance around, clearly wanting no one else to know of her moment of weakness... especially since she maintained a stash of such snacks in her boutique for those moments when inspiration failed to strike.

"Well, it's no trouble to have ya come over to the fields if you'd like to work a bit off Twilight," Applejack smiled. "Way as I see it, what you do in your own time's yer own business. An' if you're worried about it, we're always happy to have ya over to lend a hoof or just chat while we work." She chuckled. "Celestia knows we don't eat those little fluff things 'et Rarity likes... Real meals for Real work at home. Big Mac'll put away half a cart'o apples on a hard day and I can pull a bushel or two myself." With a firm nod, Applejack smirked as she whipped her gaze to Rainbow Dash, "And THAT one, she'll down a bushell and a half while nappin', and don't let her tell ya otherwise."

Rainbow's face turned beet red. "I-I do not!"

"Ya do too and you know it. I've had to lug your sorry butt off the ground more times than you'd like when you conked out in the branches. I know how much you weigh."

"I BURN IT OFF BEING AWESOME!"

"Sure you do, but when you're nappin', you ain't awesome enough to weigh any less ya pig." Applejack's grin was enough to be made into legends... and enough that Rainbow Dash suddenly couldn't just suffer the humiliation any further.

With a barking laugh, she flipped into the air and grabbed her sides before drifting down and pounding Twilight on the back, "I'm just teasing you Twilight. It's cool. You're cool. We're cool."

Unfortunately for Twilight, she had realized what was happening and had tuned out the conversation around her.

Smooze goo apparently absorbed liquids.
Smooze goo hybrids apparently absorbed liquids quickly as well.
She was, currently, such a hybrid, masquerading as herself, by laminating her body in semi-permiable magical membranes.
Membranes which let water and other liquids in (a wet coat in the rain is important for image... to say nothing of being able to eat and drink).
Membranes which did not let liquids, such as the ooze she was constantly exuding, out.
Membranes which had been slowly stretching as she absorbed her morning shower, a rain storm, and several pots of tea.
Membranes which, under the unexpectedly strong thwaps of one Rainbow Dash, had just failed...

and covered everything in a nine foot radius in a thick layer of thin, clingy, ooze.

Twilight's face was glowing red in embarrassment.

"OH ICK! YUCK YUCK YUCK YUCK YUCK! EeeeeeEEEeeeeeeeW!" Rarity exclaimed.

The rest of them shocked into stunned silence, except for a deadpan Spike who simply lowered his umbrella and asked, "couldn't find a cure?"

When Twilight continued to remain frozen, her entire body glowing bright red, Spike rolled his eyes, pulled out a scroll, and sent it on it's way.

Comments

[Hillbe]

Pop goes the Smoozel
Oh boogers
Twilight's a snail
Spikey get it off! It Stings it burns, IT'S WORSE THEN DIRT! please Spikey!
I broke Twilight!!
It took me hours to clean Rarity, We're going to Los Pegasus tomorrow, don't see why....
He licked me totally clean...I LOVED IT
TWILIGHT'S a JELLY DOUGHNUT?

[Shadowshame]

7120352
Your killing me with these