Twinkle/TOCP's Thirty Minute Ponies Stories

by Twinkletail

Prompt #17: The Pernicious Pan Purloiner

The Prompt: ”Elementary, my dear Twilight.”

Pinkie Pie galloped through town in a tizzy. Except this was no ordinary tizzy. This was a super-duper EXTREME tizzy! The tizziest of tizzies! Tizzy was a fun word to say. It was so unique; not a whole lot of words sounded like tizzy. It was pretty much just tizzy and dizzy. Although missy sounded kinda like it if you slurred when you said it, but that was cheating, and Pinkie Pie was a lot of things, but she wasn't a cheat. She was a pony, a baker, a party-thrower, a town greeter, a babysitter, a fortune-teller, a member of the Ponyville Yacht Club...but she was NOT a liar! Wait, that's not where the sentence started...cheat! She was NOT a cheat! So she refused to accept missy as a reasonable rhyme for tizzy. Pinkie stopped for a moment; she couldn't remember why she was trying to rhyme tizzy. Was she writing a song? She didn't remember having any reason to write a song...wait! Now she remembered! She was IN a tizzy, and had to see Twilight! She continued galloping.

Twilight had just finished organizing the exotic birds section of the library, when suddenly, a pink blur burst into the room. Twilight managed to light her horn up and just barely stop Pinkie from colliding with the bookshelf that she'd just finished arranging. THAT would have been a pain in the neck.

"Twilight! Twilight!!" Pinkie shouted, bouncing up and down frantically. "I need your heeeeeeelp!!!" Twilight turned right to her. In the past, she may have dismissed Pinkie's crazy behavior, but there had been enough times in the past where she'd doubted Pinkie's intentions and it had come back to bite her on the flank.

"What do you need?" Twilight asked, showing concern. Before she knew what was going on, Pinkie had plunked the bowler hat from their train ride a while back onto Twilight's head. Twi shook her head out and looked up at Pinkie, who was now suddenly wearing her detective hat.

"Your help!" Pinkie said. "I already said that, silly! Unless I said something else and it sounded like 'I need your help' but I'm actually under a spell where things I say sound different to other pon-"

"No, Pinkie," Twilight said, interrupting. "I heard you say 'I need your heeeeeeelp.' What is it that you need my help with?" Pinkie could really be a hoof-ful sometimes. Even when she had something urgent she needed to do, she was so easily sidetracked that it was often necessary to keep her under control when she went on a tangent like that.

"There's a mystery we need to solve!" Pinkie said, all wild-eyed. "Somepony took my favorite baking pan!" Twilight gasped. This was a legitimate gasp, not a fake one. She knew how much Pinkie cared for her baking implements.

"Who was it?" Twilight asked. "Did you see them?"

"I did see them!" Pinkie said. "But they were wearing a big cloak and I couldn't see anything about them! Oooo, Twilight, we need to pause the pernicious pan purloiner before he perpetrates another petty-" Twilight interrupted her again.

"Pinkie," Twilight said, "While I'm awfully appreciative of your ample application of alliteration, we need facts! Which way did the pony run?"

"He ran thataway!" Pinkie said. Twilight deadpanned.

"...Whataway?" Twilight asked. Pinkie giggled. "What are you laughing at?" the purple unicorn asked, starting to get annoyed.

"You sound silly when you say that!" Pinkie laughed. "But enough being silly, Miss Sillypants! We need to solve this!"

"I know," Twilight said. "What way does 'thataway' mean?"

"Oh!" Pinkie said, looking thoughtful. "Well, he ran away from Sugarcube Corner and towards the middle of town! And while he was running away, I heard him say something?"

"Now that could be a useful clue!" Twilight said, smiling. "What did he say?"

"Something!" Pinkie said. "Weren't you listening?" Twilight let out a grunt of aggravation. She opened her mouth, but then stopped herself before yelling. She didn't want to yell at Pinkie; that would likely just stress her out even more.

"Pinkie, I need to know exactly what it was that he said," Twilight said calmly. It took the patience of a saint to deal with her sometimes. "Whatever he said could provide a clue as to the reason he stole the pan, or who he is, or where he might be going with it."

"Oh, right!" Pinkie responded. She stopped bouncing and thought back, holding a bubble pipe to her mouth. "I remember him saying that he needed the pan..."

"Right, right..." Twilight said, listening closely.

"And that he wasn't gonna give it back..." Pinkie mused.

"Right, right!" Twilight answered, eyes widening.

"And then something about..." Pinkie continued, tilting her head.

"About...?!" Twilight practically shouted. She was on the tips of her hooves now; the suspense was killing her.

"...Oh! I remember!" Pinkie said suddenly. "He said that he was taking the pan to the school!" Twilight leapt in the air.

"See, Pinkie?" Twilight exclaimed. "THAT'S the kind of clue we need! But there are so many schools nearby...which school did he say? The high school? Ponyville University?" Pinkie stared right at Twilight and smiled widely.

"Elementary, my dear Twilight," she answered.

Twilight couldn't speak for a moment. She just stared at the pink pony in front of her. She took a deep, deep breath as Pinkie continued to smile.

"...There wasn't a thief, was there," Twilight asked. Pinkie shook her head, her smile growing further.

"You made all of that up and ran all the way across town just so you could make that joke, didn't you?" Twilight asked, a flat look on her face. Pinkie burst into uncontrollable laughter, rolling about on the floor. Twilight facehooved, then shook her head and smiled. There was never a dull moment when one was friends with Pinkie Pie.

Comments

[Makokam]

So. Much. Awesome!
That really was awesome. Pinkie should win a moon for pulling that off. So many things could have gone wrong with that set-up, but she managed it flawlessly.