by PseudoBob Delightus

　　　　　　　　　　

Pinkie Pie was invisible.

This was intentional, of course. She hadn't run full-speed into Zecora's hut while blindfolded for no reason, nor had she escaped the infuriated Zebra's curses and charms for naught. It just... wasn't quite what she had expected.

There was no outline, rippling air, or faint shadow where she held her hoof in front of her face. No, it was as if it wasn't even there - just the dirt road leading to Ponyville. Her whole body was like this, including her eyelids, meaning she could still see just fine with her eyes closed. And that whole part just seemed wrong for some reason.

It took a while for her to figure out how to walk like this. All the muscle memory was still there, but if she thought about it too hard, and started to wonder where her hooves were - ow! She'd trip over herself and fall. She still left hoofprints, but those would disappear a minute or so after she made them.

Oh, and that was the other thing. She wasn't just invisible - she couldn't make any sound either. Hoofsteps muffled, voice silent, even her 32-pounder party cannon barely let out a 'puff' when fired.

Still, she tried waving and saying 'hi!' to everypony she met in town, but none of them noticed her. Occasionally her heart would jump when a pony looked straight at her, or noticed a breeze when she passed, but the most they'd do is shake their head, or ruffle their feathers, and move on. Nopony knowing she was there - it was starting to make her sad.

What did she do when she felt sad? Why, she spent time with her friends, of course!

Only problem: everypony in Ponyville was her friend. That didn't narrow it down one bit. She thought about spending time with her best friends, with whom she'd shared countless hours of play and laughter, but that still only narrowed it down to a few hundred, some of whom had just passed her without noticing.

"Ah," she said, "I should find my ultra super-duper friends!" Of course, none of the ponies around her heard any of it.

Nevertheless, it was a good idea. There were only five ultra super-duper friends in Ponyville, and they tended to cope with her weirder moments better than the average pony. It didn't take long before she found one of them, hauling a wagon full of apples towards market square, with her distinctive hat atop her head: Applejack! She was the perfect mare for the job!

Pinkie simply walked up beside her and shouted into her ear, as she often did, "HEY APPLEJACK!"

No reaction.

She tried again, jumping up and down and screaming, "APPLEJACK! APPLEJACK! APPLEJA-A-ACK!" - but Applejack just kept moving, oblivious to the nonexistent racket.

It seemed shouting and jumping around really wouldn't solve this problem, which was definitely a first for Pinkie Pie. She hopped onto the apple wagon and thought about her dilemma extra hard for a moment. Applejack noticed the extra weight, but, after a quick inspection of the wagon, just shrugged and kept moving.

They soon arrived at the market stand, which Applebloom was running - with only a little help from Big Macintosh. What a strong young filly! Her next birthday was less than a year away, so Pinkie hoped she could get this invisibility problem fixed before that.

With the three of them starting to unload the wagon, Pinkie Pie hopped off, to get out of their way - and the movement was noticed again, but again waved off. She could still touch things just fine, but the fact hadn't really occurred to her until just then. Curiously, she poked Applejack on the shoulder.

Applejack merely turned, looked through Pinkie, and wondered aloud, "Huh?"

"What?" Applebloom asked.

"... Nothin'," she responded, but Pinkie poked her again, and she suddenly jumped and shouted, "Who's prankin' me?!"

A dozen ponies around the market turned in reaction to her outburst, and she retreated, quietly trying to explain what was happening to Applebloom and Big Macintosh. Pinkie prepared to poke a third time, as it had so far been the only thing to get a reaction, but it was all interrupted by a white mare rushing over.

"Applejack, Applejack!" she cried - it was Rarity! Score! With two of Pinkie's ultra super-duper friends here, surely she could work something out!

But her hopes were dashed when she realized what Rarity was telling them: "Have you heard? There's a ghost in the market!"

All of them froze - including Pinkie, though nopony else noticed. Applejack stated, not quite a question, "a ghost."

"Indeed!" Rarity said. "Or a poltergeist, more like. Some nasty haunting spirit. I hear it's tripping ponies, knocking things over, all silent and invisible - only leaving hoofprints behind."

Pinkie Pie stood, dumbfounded. What kind of mean old spirit would do those things? This pony must have been a serious case of nastiness in life if even their ghost was this rude!

Applebloom voiced the question on everypony's mind: "What do we do?"

This shook Applejack out of her petrified stance, and she reasoned, "Well, just stay calm, everypony. And just think for a minute, you hear? It might could be all exaggerated, or a regular sort of magic, or even a prank. Maybe once we're done here, I can ask-"

"Hay," Applebloom interrupted, "weren't you just sayin' somethin' about a prank? You think...?"

Rarity cleared her throat. "Pardon me, Applejack, have you had a run-in with this ghost?"

Applejack looked deep in thought, and pushed her hat away as she scratched her head. "Hmmm. You know..."

But Pinkie Pie wasn't quite listening. Had this ghost been haunting Applejack this whole time, without Pinkie even noticing? What a terrible thing! Here she was, so very ghost-like, and she couldn't even protect an ultra super-duper friend from a ghost. She sat, even sadder now, and pawed at the ground.

"-Wait," spoke Big Mac, cutting through the din - everypony looked to him, even Pinkie. He pointed in Pinkie's direction - through her, of course - and asked, "What's that?"

Pinkie Pie stood to look behind her, and there came sudden, piercing screams:

"Hoofprints!"

"It's the ghost!"

"RUN AWAY!!!"

All at once, the market was pandemonium. Stalls were forgotten, if not clambered over; carts still hitched to their panicked drafts crashed into others; and all around was dust and noise and the rumble of stampede.

And then...

Nothing.

All that remained of her friends was Applejack's signature hat, left behind. She leaned down to pick it up, and chuckled around the brim as she realized.

"Oh! It was me!"

Comments

[Orderly Disassembly]

for those of you who don't want to squint at the annoyingly colored text, just highlight the chapter and paste it somewhere.

[Iromo]

… No. no no nonono, I’m getting DOC SCRATCH flashbacks?!?! HERE OF ALL PLACES!?!? (Cool story, so far.)

[noah2x4]

The sites text to speech helps

[katarjin]

Well done.

[Frankie2]

11544361
How do you read this on a kindle? Can't copy and paste on it.

[RainbowStorm514]

this is just annoying

[GrimWolf]

I have to give it to you... I didn' t see it comming!

[Grave_Mind]

The formatting is like I'm trying to read House of Leaves while the book is being set on fire...

[Spaghetto]

The gimmick is cool and all but this is just a really annoying hassle to read

[Gyro Pony]

Not sure what the complaints are about.
I’ve read this on desktop PC browser Firefox and mobile Firefox, it’s fine and easy to read.

Nothing about annoying colours or small text...
And highlighting the blanks on both browsers works fine. Highlight, copy, paste.

Of course it was fun reading the chapter, as is.

Nice April Fools Day story, dear author!

EDIT:
rofl at the souls downvoting this comment.
Seriously? It hurt you that much? With my patting the author on the back?
I say again, nice April Fools Day story, dear author!

[Onyx Quill]

What am I looking at...?

[Jamie P Rose]

Just use the text to speach, it works just as well.

[Arceaion]

This is by far the weirdest story I've read and yes it is readable but the hoops you have to jump through are excessive. You have to copy and paste the chapters on something else without the formatting, and yes you can copy and paste it just looks like it's not copying over. Like I said this is the weirdest story I've ever read and while I love the idea, it is a bit annoying.

[Greenhorn]

I first thought it was a hidden text and I have to highlight in order to make it appear. It appeared I was thinking too much.

[The Blacksmith]

It took me a while to notice but DAMN BOI--

[Silentwoodfire]

11544644
You CAN copy-paste, on Kindle you have to hold the spot in question and provided you found a hidden word, it will be highlighted, THEN you can expand the boundaries of the copy zone as desired before selecting copy, then go to the comment window and hold in the empty area until you can see the command to paste appear

[Sozmioi]

Easiest option is to use 'reader' view.
Windows Firefox: click the little document icon in the address bar
Mac Safari: cmd-shift-R
Mac Firefox: cmd-opt-R
Mac Chrome: stupidly hard to get to. Google it.

[Verdant Frost]

the trick is that the texts are set as nearly transparentcdn.discordapp.com/attachments/788368611013820429/1092633189614362694/image.png

[Draskos]

Thought either the site was broken or I was hallucinating. Im amazed and appalled at the genious of this.

[Teraunce]

Well I didn't foresee a story like this coming along. Also what idiot gave Pinkie Pie an invisibility potion?

[Connected12]

11546393
It is hidden text, but you need to copy and paste it somewhere instead of highlighting it.

[MikiStenbeck]

11546661
what about Opera GX? nevermind, i found it, it's a book next the the address bar just like Firefox.

[bluewolf263]

General instructions; click and drag over where the text should be, right click and select "Copy", and Paste into a program like Word or LibreOffice. The text should then be readable.

Addendum; follow the above instructions throughout all chapters.

[Greenhorn]

11548346
Too much work. I guess I just save the whole story as html file and change the opacity all at once.

[AlexTFish]

My solution is to just hit F12 to open Chrome Dev Tools, then hit the + button and type ".bbcode p span", hit Tab then type "opacity: 0.5 !important;".

[Bicyclette]

Pinkie Pie was invisible.

well that explains a lot! for a second i was worried the entire story was a blank document but the text being invisible because Pinkie is invisible makes a lot of sense

This was intentional, of course. She hadn't run full-speed into Zecora's hut while blindfolded for no reason, nor had she escaped the infuriated Zebra's curses and charms for naught. It just... wasn't quite what she had expected.

just a typical Pinkie day

Still, she tried waving and saying 'hi!' to everypony she met in town, but none of them noticed her. Occasionally her heart would jump when a pony looked straight at her, or noticed a breeze when she passed, but the most they'd do is shake their head, or ruffle their feathers, and move on. Nopony knowing she was there - it was starting to make her sad.

oof, this is quite the personal Tartarus for poor Pinkie!

Only problem: everypony in Ponyville was her friend. That didn't narrow it down one bit. She thought about spending time with her best friends, with whom she'd shared countless hours of play and laughter, but that still only narrowed it down to a few hundred, some of whom had just passed her without noticing.

love this misdirection that is also very Pinkie Pie

"Huh?"

ehehe love this being the first visible text

But Pinkie Pie wasn't quite listening. Had this ghost been haunting Applejack this whole time, without Pinkie even noticing? What a terrible thing! Here she was, so very ghost-like, and she couldn't even protect an ultra super-duper friend from a ghost. She sat, even sadder now, and pawed at the ground.

love bits like this where the character does not understand that others are referring to them no matter how clear it is

"Oh! It was me!"

aww the bit ends!

[6-D Pegasus]

11858685
>:c