A story in which a normal high school pony gets caught up with a very abnormal pony and the strange and impossible things that happen around her.
"I find ordinary ponies boring. Anyone who is an alien, a time traveler, or a magic-user, come see me! Otherwise, don't be a downer! That is all!" When Applejack heard the pink pony behind her say these words, she had no idea how she would become tangled up in strangeness beyond her imagination... or that she would learn that concepts like fun, laughter and friendship weren't childish daydreams after all. But will North High School's equine tornado destroy the world just as Applejack begins to see it in a new light?
(Cover art by Stardustchild01, used with permission.)
a blending of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya by Nagaru Tanigawa and My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic developed by Lauren Faust
Chapter 1
I never had any trouble with Canter Claus. A single stallion who delivered presents to millions of foals and fillies in a single night? Who knew whether you'd been bad or good without ever seeing you? Yeah, right! I saw through that malarkey right away, even if I never said so to anypony.
But there were other things I wanted to believe in. I wanted to believe in aliens and monsters and strange and wonderful creatures. I wanted to believe in time travelers visiting the past to put right what once went wrong. I wanted to believe in magical fillies who could save the world for love and justice.
But most of all, I wanted to believe in friendship.
And yet, as I went through middle school, I learned that friendship, like all the other things, was an illusion. It was a fairy-tale made up to get little kids to get along with each other. I saw the playmates of my foalhood grow hard and distant, as getting ahead and succeeding became all-important. Sports weren't about having fun or playing fair anymore, but about whether or not you won. People hung out together not because they liked each other or wanted to help one another, but because they thought they could get some advantage out of knowing them.
And the aliens, the monsters, the time travelers, and the magic never showed up.
Yep, by the day I enrolled in North High School, I'd given up on all of it- magic, fun, and friendship- as nothing more than a lie. You couldn't live like that every day. You had to live in the real world, where everypony fought everypony else just to survive.
I wasn't particularly eager my first day of high school. My little sis woke me up as usual, and I put on the uniform of the new school with no particular care or interest. I trotted over to the train station, rode three stops away from home, and began climbing the hill that led from the station up to North High School. I heard one unicorn colt muttering about how steep it was and how annoying it was going to be every day for the next three years. Get over yourself! To me it was- well, not a light trot exactly, but nothing to grumble about. Exercise will do you good, skinny!
North High School wasn't anything unusual. It was your standard, slightly sub-standard, public high school. It was a place for people who either couldn't afford or weren't brainy enough for the private college-prep academies at the bottom of the hill. That said, the gates and walls were bright and shiny in the spring morning light, and the new building almost blocked the view of the older, slightly shabby school, which had been converted into offices and meeting and rehearsal rooms for the school's clubs and sports teams. You probably wouldn't get into the best colleges with a North High School degree, but you still had a chance at a pretty good one, provided you got lucky in your draw of teachers.
Of course, just my luck, I got stuck in Class 1-6, with the hoofball coach as homeroom teacher. How is doing laps around the track going to prepare me for college admission exams?
Anyway, on that first day, in that first class session of my high school career, we had the usual introductions. Like most of the other students, I stumbled through the formula, giving my name, mentioning the family farm my granny still ran up in the mountains north of town, and listing a few hobbies. I really don't remember my exact words, and even if I did, neither would you after I told you. It was the same stuff as every school I could ever remember attending.
Then I sat down, and the pony in the desk behind me stood up.
"From Rock Garden Middle School, Pinkamena Diane Pie. I find ordinary ponies boring. If you are an alien, time traveler, or magic user, come see me. If not, don't be a downer. That is all!"
She remained standing there in her desk long enough for everypony, even that hoofball coach, to stare gape-jawed at her. She was a bit smaller than me, but not much, with a long, dead straight pink mane hanging over one eye and a determined-looking scowl on her face. Her coat was a lighter shade of pink, but I doubt any stallion would be able to tell the difference between that and her mane. The cutie mark printed on her skirt was three party balloons- not, I thought, the sort of thing that would appear on the flank of a teenage filly.
My cutie mark? Three apples. Apples run in my family, and they're a nice, sensible mark to have. Apples are the cornerstone of our food supply, you know- but anyway.
Eventually Miss Pie sat down, and the next student in line stumbled his way through the worn-out formula. The class returned to normal, more or less. No aliens, no time travelers, no wizards or witches showed up. Eventually the day ended and I walked back down that hill to the train station and home.
I had no idea that five short sentences would change my life forever.
Technically Miss Pie hadn't changed my life yet, though her introduction is one I'll remember after I'm pushing up daisies. What changed my life came a few weeks later.
In the meantime, though, Miss Pie had become the talk of the class- not just my class, but the entire freshman class. A few days after the introduction, I brought up the subject with a filly I knew from my middle school and the mare who sat behind her.
"You mean Pinkie Pie? Stay away from her, girl," the other mare said. "She's nothing but trouble." That was Bon Bon, an off-white earth pony with blue and pink mane.
"Why? I think she's rather interesting." That was Lyra, a cyan unicorn with white streaks in her mane. "A little bit childish, but-"
"I went to middle school with her," Bon Bon said. "She drove everypony there nuts. She was always doing one weird thing after another. She nearly got expelled once when she tried to launch fireworks off the school roof. She never did explain how she got up there in the first place!"
"Who in Tarnation would think that was a good idea?" I asked.
"I'm telling you, that's how Pinkie Pie is!" Bon Bon said. "Why, she hadn't been in school three months before she started causing trouble! Do you remember seeing in the newspapers how somepony drew a bunch of strange chalk lines on the hoofball field?"
"She did that?" Lyra asked.
"Of course! She ADMITTED to doing it! Even told the teachers how she got the groundskeeper shed unlocked and stashed the chalker and sacks of lime until after dark. But whenever anypony asked her why she did it, she'd just look at them like the person asking was the biggest idiot alive. It's NOT a foalish question!"
I wonder how many times you asked it, and in what tone, I thought to myself, feeling a little sorry for the all-pink pony.
"Now, if you want to know about a filly to hang around with," Bon Bon said, "you should check out Trixie Lulamoon."
I glanced up to the front of the room, where the sky-blue unicorn was chatting with a couple of other classmates, who seemed to hang on her every word.
"Intelligence, looks, great grades," Bon Bon said, "and she lives in an expensive condo. An A++ for networking potential!"
"Do you grade everyone in this school like that?" Lyra asked.
"Well, of course! How else can you know who to try to become friends with?" Bon Bon pointed a hoof over to the window, where Pinkie Pie sat staring out at the courtyard. "Pinkie Pie would be at least an A, if she wasn't so crazy!"
Well, my mind knew that Bon Bon was right, but my heart just couldn't let it sit there. As the days went past I noticed that nopony- absolutely nopony- spoke to Pinkie Pie. (Teachers don't count, our sports-obsessed homeroom teacher especially.) Despite this I began hearing more about Pinkie- how she was joining one club or sports team after another, for example. She'd stay with them for one day, and then she'd move on. She never actually quit a club- at least, she never asked for her name to be taken off the membership list, and none of the clubs kicked her out.
That was really strange. As individuals, the whole school seemed to avoid her, but every club wanted Pinkie Pie if they could get her. She was a natural athlete, even by earth pony standards- I saw her leaving other ponies in the dust during athletics, and it was all I could do to keep ahead of her in races. She was quick at learning anything and everything- except for Trixie she had the best grades in our class from the start, despite apparently paying no attention at all. The club presidents, when they weren't calling her strange, were calling her the "all-utility mare."
To put it simple-like, the clubs wanted her because she could do anything... but nopony wanted to hang out with her, because, well, she could do ANYTHING.
And then, about a month after the first term began, I committed the act that forever entangled me in the affairs of Pinkie Pie. Who knows how my school career, my entire life, might have gone if I had been just another student avoiding the strange pony, ignoring her even as she sat just one desk behind... no. I just ain't that kind of pony. I don't think I could remain Applejack and still ignore an obviously lonely and dissatisfied pony.
So, before classes, I turned in my seat and said, "So, what does your cutie mark mean?"
I swear I did not know so much air could be inhaled by one pony. That astonished gasp must have lasted five or six seconds. Finally, having made her point (I guess), she took out a watch, noted the time, and then pulled out a pencil and did some quick sums on a piece of paper. "Twenty-nine days, twenty-two hours, forty-seven minutes," she said. "That's how long it's been since any student in this class has said a word to me." She slumped on her desk again, frowning. "Of course they say plenty ABOUT me. It's not like I have, you know, EARS or anything."
Ouch. I remembered the conversations I'd had during lunch or athletics with Bon Bon, with Lyra, and others about our class's mystery curled in an enigma wrapped inside cotton candy. "Er, um, I'm sorry about that."
"It's OK," Pinkie said. "But the interesting thing is, I can't calculate how long it's been since anypony asked me about my cutie mark. You know why that is? Because nopony EVER asked. Nopony cared. Nopony noticed."
"Well, I noticed," I said. "Just like I noticed the ribbons in your mane."
Pinkie looked at me suspiciously. "What about them?"
"On Mondays you don't have any ribbons," I said. "On Tuesdays, one ribbon. On Wednesdays, two. On Thursdays, three ribbons. On Friday, four. I guess you have five ribbons on Saturday and six on Sunday."
"I put a ribbon in my tail on Saturdays," Pinkie said flatly, "and on Sunday I braid my mane."
"You braid your mane?" Picking things up with hooves can be done, and of course we learn to write and stuff, but delicate things like braiding hair are a lot tougher. "That must really be a pain."
"I don't mind," Pinkie said flatly, and that killed the conversation.
I didn't find out about her cutie mark that day, and every time I tried to bring up the subject in the week that followed the conversation played out. It didn't exactly feel like Pinkie was avoiding the subject- she just didn't seem to care. Every time I talked with her, it seemed like she was doing it only to be kind to me somehow- as if she had something on her mind and didn't want to be interrupted. She wasn't quite rude or callous, but it was pretty clear I was only being tolerated.
One thing I noticed: the day after that first conversation, she stopped wearing the ribbons. She came to class the next day with her mane considerably shorter. It was still pretty long, lanky and straight, but now you could see both eyes when you looked at her- distracted, sad, impatient eyes.
And then, almost exactly a week after that first conversation, Pinkie was the one to begin the talking. As I sat down in my desk she said, "I'm so BOOOOOOOOORED. I thought high school would be different from middle school."
"What's wrong with it?" I asked quietly.
"Everything's wrong!" she snapped. "For the first time we get to choose our electives, our activities, guide our own destinies! And yet everypony walks along in the same old grumpy rut, never trying anything new or exciting or mysterious!"
"That's kind of a lot to ask of a public high school," I said.
"But it's no fun!" Pinkie said. "My special talent is fun! That's what my cutie mark means! But fun's no fun if it's just one! And nopony else here is having fun." She slumped forward, putting her muzzle on one hoof. "The sports teams don't have any fun- they don't think of anything except winning, and if they don't win all the time they're miserable. The clubs aren't any good either- everypony's either thinking about their careers after school or just trying to hang out with the cool people."
"You know," I said, and then followed those fatal words, "most normal people have to make their own fun. It won't just come to you, you know."
For a second I thought Pinkie was going to deliver one of those not-quite-cut-offs that ended our brief conversations. Then something strange happened. For the first time I saw Pinkie's eyes slowly widen from their narrow glare into bigger, shinier eyes than I'd ever seen on anything other than a plush toy. And then her mane, that long, straight, dull pink mane, stood on end and... poofed. I don't know what else to call it. Not a lock of it hung down-it all floated above her head and neck in a light, curly, cotton-candy mass.
"YES! What a BUH-RILLIANT idea! Applejack, you're the greatest!" Immediately she bolted out of the desk and dashed to the classroom door. She stopped, turned around, dashed back to me and grabbed my tail. "Come ON!" she said, gritting her teeth as she dragged me backwards out of my desk, out the door, and down the hall.
That was it. If I could draw a line in history and call it "the point of no return", it would be that point. Before I said those words, things could have been different. After that my life ran on rails, and the name of the line was the Pinkie Pie Friendship Express.
"So here are the rules."
We were ditching homeroom, sitting in the courtyard at a table. I had a copy of the student rulebook, and I was turning the pages with a pencil in my teeth.
"A new club needs a minimum of five members. It needs a faculty advisor. It needs a mission statement describing the purpose of the club and the kind of activities it will host. And then it needs authorization from the student council."
"That's all wrong!" Pinkie said, waving a hoof dismissively at the rulebook. "Look, I'll take care of the REAL important things. You can take care of this boring stuff if it matters to you."
What? This was Pinkie's club-to-be, not mine! I was already a member of a club- the Go Home Early, See My Family and Get Work Done Club. None of the after-school activities interested me nearly as much as seeing Apple Bloom and Big MacIntosh and doing things for myself.
"I'll see you at lunch!" Pinkie shouted, galloping off before I could protest. Already I could feel a pit opening under my hooves. I don't know why I got the registration form from the student council office. Maybe I already knew I was doomed, deep down somehow. I've never been any good at lying, even to myself.
Anyway, as soon as the bell rang for lunch Pinkie reappeared from wherever she'd gone, grabbed one of my hooves in both her forehooves, and began tugging me towards the door, dancing on her hind hooves all the time. "C'mon! C'mon! I've found the first important thing and it's PERFECT!"
What can you do when you're confronted by an unstoppable force of nature? You miss lunch, that's what you do.
Pinkie half-pulled, half-led me across the walkway from the new building into the old building, down halls and past rehearsal rooms, club rooms, and storage for disused, unloved leftovers of clubs past. Finally we ended up at a room with a sign saying LITERATURE above it.
"Why are we here, Pinkie?"
"This is it!" Pinkie said. "This is our new clubroom!" She opened the door and threw it wide, gesturing inside. "And see? It even comes free with our first new club member!"
There was an ancient brown chalkboard on one wall, and a bookshelf mostly but not entirely full of books along the wall. An older, uninsulated window faced out onto the courtyard, looking just around the new building so you could see the front gate. Some empty tables and folding chairs sat in the middle of the room, dusty from disuse.
And in the corner by the window, in one of the folding chairs, sat a purple unicorn reading a book. For a few seconds she continued to read, paying us no mind; finally, she looked up, brushing back her deep purple lavender-streaked mane with one hoof, and stared expressionlessly at us through her glasses.
"Pinkie," I said, "this is the Literature Club's room."
"Not really!" Pinkie smiled. "All the members graduated at the end of last term, and Twilight Sparkle here was the only freshman to sign up. I'm sure she won't mind if we take over!"
"Have you tried asking?" Pinkie was beginning to wear my patience thin, and I've never been known as a patient filly.
"Oh, I'm sure it's understood!" Pinkie waved. "I've got to go find more members! I'll be back soon!" She was out the door before I could say a word, and I was left alone with the purple mare, whose eyes had gone back to her reading.
"Um... so, what are you reading?" I asked.
The purple mare- what was her name? Twilight, that's right- held it up briefly so I could see the title: Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends.
"Um... yeah," I said lamely. "How is it?"
"Unique," she said, in a voice so soft that it wasn't quite a whisper but might as well have been.
"Um... yeah." A smarter pony than me would have found some more meaningful comeback. Then again, maybe a smarter pony would have read that book. "Listen... do you mind, well... you know your club's about to get hijacked by a crazy filly, right?"
"I do not mind."
I could have asked, "Where is the key," and she could have answered, "Under the doormat," in the same soft, indifferent tone.
"Only, you see," I said, trying not to be unfair to either Twilight or Pinkie, "I did mention she's a bit crazy, right?"
Twilight shrugged and went back to reading.
I stood there, watching her read, trying to find the right words. Pinkie Pie's not a bad pony, really, but she's different, really really different, and I don't think she understands that there are certain boundaries that normal polite ponies aren't supposed to cross. I don't want any innocent ponies to get caught up in this, so all you have to do is say the word and all of this can come to a complete stop right now. That's what I could have said, if I'd had two weeks to think.
As it turned out, I didn't even have twenty minutes.
The door slammed open again, and Pinkie Pie stepped in, hauling on what looked like a fishing rod and reel. "It's a whopper!" she shouted, and reeled in a flapping, screaming yellow pegasus with pink hair, hooked by her school blouse and terrified out of her mind. "Look what I caught, AJ!"
"Pinkie Pie, what do you think you're doing!" My patience snapped at just about that point, but Pinkie didn't hear the warning growl in my voice.
"Silly! I'm recruiting new members! This is Fluttershy Posey, junior! I caught her swimming around the Calligraphy Club!" Pinkie made a face. "Boy, what a bunch of dully-fuddy-duddies they are! And their ink tastes terrible!"
A junior? This mare was a year older than us? Now we really were in trouble!
"Of course, she's going to have to quit Calligraphy!" Pinkie continued. "I've got something much more fun for her! She's going to be our new club mascot!"
"What."
"Well, look at her!" Pinkie swung the fishing pole around, and I looked square in the eyes of the frightened, timid pegasus. "See how cute she is? How adorable? How vulnerable? I'm sure mysterious things will just seek us out right and left with her around!"
Fluttershy spoke. "M-m-m-mysterious things?" Wait, I take it back. That wasn't speaking. That was a squeak on the very edge of hearing.
"Excuse me," I said, "but are you seriously suggesting we use another pony as BAIT?"
"Well, duh!" Pinkie said, gesturing to the fishing pole and the hook that still half-held the hovering pegasus suspended in the air.
Okay, I admit I walked into that one.
Then I noticed that Fluttershy had gone rigid. She was staring directly at Twilight Sparkle, who hadn't looked up from her book even once while the screaming and shouting had gone on. If anything she looked more frightened than ever.
"That's enough, Pinkie," I said. "You're going to take this poor mare back wherever you got her from, and you're going to apologize to her and everypony there, or I'll-"
"Um."
Fluttershy's voice stopped me before I could finish my ultimatum.
"If Twilight Sparkle is here... then I don't mind... staying... with you?"
Well, that took the wind out of my sails real quick.
"Yes!" Pinkie shouted. "Welcome to the SOP Brigade!"
"The what?" I asked. "What the hay is the-"
"THERE YOU ARE!"
This wasn't going to be my day for completing sentences, was it?
A sky-blue pegasus with spiky rainbow-colored mane and tail hovered in the doorway. "So you thought you could get away from a single-digit card holder of the Fluttershy Fan Club? Dream on, sister!"
"Hey, I caught her fair and square!" Pinkie said.
"Excuse me," I asked, "Fluttershy fan club?"
"You're not the first pony to trouble Fluttershy!" the other pegasus said. "Dozens, nay hundreds of ponies watch over her from afar! Her beauty and compassion are so great they're spoken of in other schools!" The pegasus crossed her forehooves and said, "Why, she's the second most awesome pony in this whole school, after me!"
"Then where's your fan club?" I couldn't help asking.
"I'm so awesome I don't NEED a fan club!" the pegasus said. "It's just, you know, understood."
"Rainbow," Fluttershy said quietly, "it's all right. I'd like to stay with these fillies-"
"WHAT?" The blue pegasus almost hit the ceiling.
"-if you don't mind?" Fluttershy squeaked.
"Of course you're staying!" Pinkie Pie grinned the grin of a filly who's had one too many cupcakes... and then one more... and then another... and then licked the mixing bowl clean. "You're a member of the SOP Brigade now!"
"I repeat," I said, though I hadn't got it out the first time, "what the hay is the SOP Brigade?"
"That's the name of our club, silly!
"Saving the World By "Overloading It with Fun with "Pinkamena Diane Pie!"
"Overloading it with fun, huh?" The blue pegasus cracked a smile at that. "Sounds a lot better than boring old calligraphy. Okay, I'm in! Rainbow Dash, nice to meet ya!" As she settled down to the floor, she added, "Um, how are we going to do that, exactly?"
"Simple!" Pinkie grinned. "By finding aliens, time travelers and magic users- and having FUN with them!"
The only jaw that didn't drop was Twilight Sparkle's. She was still nose down in her book.
"Now I've got to make arrangements!" Pinkie gasped, lowering Fluttershy to the floor and tossing away the fishing rod. "We've GOT to have a club party when afternoon classes are over! It's the first meeting of the SOP Brigade! I've got to get cake and punch and balloons- I wonder if anypony in the music appreciation club is a DJ? The wind ensemble wouldn't fit in the room, and anyway they don't have any good dance music..."
Pinkie kept jabbering on, but the three of us- Fluttershy, Rainbow and I- looked at each other. Rainbow was grinning, Fluttershy was cringing, and I don't know what I looked like. All I knew was, I'd let myself get lassoed into more chaos than I'd ever imagined.
Later I would find out... it was more chaos than I could EVER imagine.
a blending of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya by Nagaru Tanigawa and My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic developed by Lauren Faust
Chapter 2
The morning after the big announcement in the literature club room, Trixie Lulamoon met me at the classroom door.
“I hear you and Pinkamena Pie are starting a new school club,” she said without preamble. “That’s a good thing. Maybe she won’t be as stand-offish with the rest of us ponies now.”
“Hold on there a minute,” I said. “I’m only helping Pinkie start her club. I never said I was going to be a member.”
“Oh, really?” Trixie’s smile was a little bit disturbing, but I let it pass. Once you got past her single favorite subject (herself), Trixie could be quite pleasant and friendly. When the election for class president was held, nopony ran against her. This wasn’t the first time she’d expressed concern about Pinkie Pie.
Then Trixie gave me an even closer look and said, “I wonder if you can change her?”
“That implies there’s something wrong with her,” I snapped. Pinkie may be a bit of a pain, but I didn’t cotton to this other filly making insinuations about her when she wasn’t around.
“Oh, no, no,” Trixie shook her head. “On the contrary- Pinkamena is the greatest, most wonderful pony in the class, even the school! And that includes myself, so you know I mean it!” She shook her head again, this time regretfully. “It’s just a shame that she doesn’t share that wonder with the rest of the class. If only she was less of a maverick… chasing after things always just out of her reach…”
She froze, then muttered, “I’ve said too much,” and went to say hello to a couple of colts who had arrived before I did.
Tarnation! I wish people would just come out and say what they feel! Dancing around the subject with subtle hints and the like doesn’t get the job done!
Anyway, Pinkie Pie showed up to school as usual, but her mane was still in that impossible cotton-candy puff. Now, granted my own blonde mane is a bit on the long side, it takes a lot of work to keep it styled and neat, especially when my pappy’s hat has been riding on it all day. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how her hair got in that position in the first place, never mind how it could stay there all day despite gym class, lunch, and everything else.
But I’m getting off track. She didn’t say anything to me during classes, but the way she bounced in her chair almost constantly throughout the day made it impossible for me to study. I think she made it impossible for everypony else, too. The teacher would have thrown her out, I think, except that during math she actually caught an error he’d made and corrected it. I think that kind of broke his spirit.
But as soon as the school day ended, Pinkie was out the door like an arrow. As fast as she moved, you’d think she was a pegasus. I took my time heading over to the club room- after all, I didn’t really think of myself as a member. I was just keeping an eye on things because I had nothing better to do, right?
Yeah, even when I don’t know I’m lying to myself, I’m still no good at it at all.
Pinkie wasn’t there. Neither was Rainbow Dash, I noticed. Twilight Sparkle was still reading her book in the corner of the room, moving only to turn a page or push her glasses back up on her muzzle. Fluttershy was sitting by one of the tables. She had a board game box in her hooves- Colthello, I read on the side. “Hello, Applejack!” she said. “Would you like to play a game with me while we wait?”
Why not? I hadn’t played the game in a couple of years, but it would pass the time while we waited to see what had Pinkie so excited. We set up the game and were about midway through when the door slammed open and Pinkie Pie bounded in. A large stack of leaflets slapped itself down on the tabletop, followed by a couple of saddlebags.
“You would not BELIEVE how much trouble it was getting all these copies made!” Pinkie gasped. “Why are the teachers so uptight anyway? They can spare their lounge for a lousy five minutes. Grumpy-pusses.” For a moment the manic grin vanished, but it sprang right back again as Pinkie pulled a box out of one of the saddlebags. “Fluttershy, I’ve got the most WONDERFUL costume for you!” She looked around and said, “Where’s Rainbow Dash? She gets one too!”
“S-s-she can have mine,” Fluttershy said, scooting her chair back away from the eager pink pony. “But sh-she’s still on the track team. She said she c-c-can’t be here on days they have practice.”
“Oh darn,” Pinkie grumbled. “Well, at least I’ve still got you! Now hurry up and put on the costume!”
B-b-b-but I d-d-don’t want to w-w-wear a costume.” Fluttershy had pulled all four legs up onto herself and was peeking over her hooves in terror.
“Oh, come on!” Pinkie said. “It’s the cutest little bunny suit ever!”
“Bunnies?” Fluttershy relaxed at this, lowering her limbs and raising her head with a little hopeful smile. “I like bunnies.”
“Who doesn’t like bunnies?” Pinkie asked, opening the box and pulling out a skimpy little leotard with a bunny tail on the back. Still in the box were stockings and shoes for the rear legs, wrist cuffs for the forelegs, and a mane barette with large stiff bunny ears sticking out of them.
Fluttershy took one look at them and froze again. “Th-th-that’s not a b-b-b-bunny suit!” she whimpered.
What happened next I’m not going to describe in any detail, partly because I’m ashamed Pinkie Pie put her through it, but mostly because I’m ashamed I didn’t stop it. I just couldn’t believe Pinkie, or anypony, would do it with other ponies standing right there, even if we were all mares. Long story short, after a couple minutes of shrieking protest Fluttershy was sitting in the chair again, her school uniform on the floor, wearing the bunny suit and sniffling back her tears.
Pinkie wasn’t going to let her stay that way. “Oh, come on!” she said, grabbing a hoof and pulling her off the chair and over to a mirror she’d stashed in the room at some point. “You look simply adorable like this! See?”
I had to admit she had a point. Even as Fluttershy’s weeping stopped and she began to smile at her reflection, I was appreciating how cute she looked with bunny ears and a tail. And yes, the leotard was a perfect fit- which was more than could be said for the one Pinkie was pulling on, which had been made for a slightly smaller pony. Still, the empty wing holes on Pinkie’s outfit stretched a bit, which helped some with the fit.
“Okay, all set!” Pinkie said, stashing the flyers back in her saddlebags. “Let’s go out there and tell everypony about the SOP Brigade!”
“eep!”Fluttershy froze again, curling up into a ball and toppling over onto her side in terror.
“Out? Now wait just a minute!” I’d had enough of this, and my shock had worn off. “It’s bad enough you stuff a filly into a costume against her will- but I’m not letting either one of you two go out there and embarrass yourselves in front of everypony!” I pointed to the parts of the leotards by the tails. “Why, I can see your whole cutie marks through that fish-net!” Which I could- the butterflies on Fluttershy’s flanks, the balloons on Pinkie Pie’s.
“I KNOW!” Pinkie said, enthusiasm diminished not one little bit. “Isn’t it COOL?”
“Pinkie… darling…. You do realize that every single colt in this school is going to be staring at your flanks?”
“Yeah. Why not?” Pinkie asked. “Really, Applejack, you’re just like all the other ponies with your hang-ups about anything that might lead to- GASP!- sex!” The faces she made in that sentence you’ll just have to imagine for yourselves. All I can say is, they were something to see. “Sex is just another fun thing ponies can do with each other, that’s all! So let ‘em look!”
Now, I’d been taught a lot of things about what mares and stallions did with one another in private, but despite the very heavy importance I put on those last two words- in private- I couldn’t actually point out where Pinkie was wrong. In an ideal world, yes, it really would be that simple, but this world wasn’t that world no matter how much Pinkie thought it ought to be.
“Besides,” Pinkie finished, “it doesn’t show any more leg than our athletic shorts!”
The leg ain’t what I’m concerned about!!
“Um… all right, supposing I agree with that,” I said lamely. “But why Fluttershy? You saw how she was just in here, right? Why didn’t you pick on somepony who doesn’t mind being seen so much- like Twilight Sparkle, or me?”
“Because Fluttershy’s the CUTEST!” She dragged Fluttershy’s face up next to hers and grinned. “She has the special cuteness factor which will make the whole WORLD want to be a part of the SOP Brigade! Besides, I would have got enough costumes for everypony, but I only had enough for two. Oh well! Next time we do this, I’ll make sure you have one too!”
“I didn’t say I wanted one!”
“Anyway, we’ve gotta go! If we don’t hurry we’ll miss the main go-home-early crowd! Later!” Somehow Pinkie Pie got the rigid Fluttershy and the saddlebag full of flyers out the door, slamming it behind her. A couple of loose flyers fell on the floor behind her. One of them read:
A PROCLAMATION OF THE SOP BRIGADE CREED!
SOP: Saving the World by Overloading It with Fun with Pinkie Pie
The SOP Brigade is currently seeking out the lost mysteries and fun of the universe!
• Anypony who has experienced a mysterious event • Anypony who has a mystery they want solved • Anypony wondering where all the fun has gone from the world
Please contact us ASAPPP!
Brigade Leader: Pinkamena Diane Pie Brigade Members: Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy Posey, Rainbow Dash (For more information contact Applejack at….)
Of all the consarn dad-blamed cheek! Pinkie had actually put down my contact information instead of her own! What was she thinking?
(And how come I was only mentioned in parentheses? And why did that make me madder than the other thing?)
A chair scooted behind me. I’d completely forgotten that Twilight Sparkle was still in the room. I heard her hoofsteps as she walked over to me, her book in her mouth. She set it on the table and stood in front of me, watching me, unmoving, just staring through those glasses of hers.
Boy, was that uncomfortable.
“Um… so, um, I guess you’re done with your book?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. Aside from a slight jaw movement, she didn’t move. She stayed that way for fifteen long, awkward, creepy seconds before adding, “I will lend it to you.”
“Um, I’m not that much into books, Twilight,” I said.
“Read it.” Those eyes never moved.
All right, I’ll take the book home with me, if she’ll just blink or something, I thought. Maybe I’ll read it and maybe I won’t. I put the book in one of my saddlebags and had just finished doing that when I heard the shouting below.
Pinkie hadn’t wasted any time, and she wasn’t giving it the soft sell, either. She was waving a large SOP BRIGADE sign in one forehoof while dancing and giving out flyers with the other hoof. Whenever some pony walking by tried to ignore the bunny-ponies, Pinkie shouted at them and practically blocked the school gates until the victim accepted a flyer. I noticed that, though Fluttershy was silent, cringing, and unable to meet anypony else’s eyes, she was actually giving away more flyers than Pinkie.
Maybe there was something to the cuteness factor Pinkie mentioned after all.
Then I saw two teachers galloping over to the gates where Pinkie and Fluttershy were standing. I pulled my head back from the window. I knew what was about to happen, and I didn’t want to watch.
Five minutes later Pinkie and Fluttershy were back in the room. Pinkie’s hair was straight and flat again as she slumped in a chair, still in her bunny costume. “Stupid faculty meanies,” she muttered. “I didn’t even give away half the flyers. Why can’t students wear bunny suits in school? It’d be a lot more fun this way! And it’s so much less hot and stuffy than the full uniforms!”
“I tried to warn you,” I began.
“I don’t want to hear it!” Pinkie snapped. “I’m not going to let some stuck-up teachers and principals and school boards and national legislatures stop me from making the SOP Brigade the most exciting and fun thing in the world!” She grabbed her saddlebag strap in her teeth, ran over to the window, threw it open, and scattered the leftover flyers into the air. A gust of wind blew by just then and sent the pieces of paper flying every which way, littering the school courtyard almost end to end. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of them ended up on the school roof.
Each and every one of them, of course, had my name and address for contact information.
“SOP Brigade activities begin tomorrow!” Pinkie snapped. “Come straight here after classes! Don’t be late!”
I didn’t really pay any mind to Pinkie, or to her and Fluttershy changing clothes again. My mind was on how I was the pony who could expect a visit from the school to my folks. Apple Bloom in particular would be so disappointed in her big sis. Or worse, she might get ideas…
But nothing happened.
There was no visit, no letter, nothing. I never got called to the office to explain myself. And, best of all, I never got a single inquiry from those flyers. It looked like the school and everypony in the school (with five exceptions) had decided to pretend the whole bunny girl flyer thing never happened.
Suits me fine.
Rainbow Dash dropped by our class during a break period to cheer Pinkie up. Not that Pinkie needed it- her hair was back in that poofy look when she came in that morning, and though she wasn’t as hyperactive as the day before, she was still bright-eyed and eager. Dash only made her even more so.
“I am SO glad I had a camera in my gym kit!” she said. “You and Fluttershy looked so ADORABLE! Any colt who got a picture would hang it on his bedroom wall!”
Darn it. That kind of encouragement is not what Pinkie needs. I got up and walked to the other side of the room where I couldn’t listen to the mutual feedback loop building between the blue pegasus and the pink pony. Before I knew it, that put me next to Trixie, who smiled at me in her most winning way.
“See, I knew you would be a good influence on Pinkamena,” she said. “Already she’s making new friends among the upperclassmen. You know that’s very hard to do, right?”
Making friends isn’t what I’d call it. How about ‘shanghai-ing friends’?
“I’m looking forward to seeing what other wonders you can conjure, Applejack,” Trixie added. “The Great and Wonderful Trixie is counting on you!” With that she turned her attention to a couple of fillies whose seats were on the hallway side of the classroom, away from where Pinkie and I sat by the windows.
Well, that took the cake, didn’t it? Well, at least Trixie wasn’t taking me for granted, unlike some other ponies I could think about at that moment.
“Okay, listen up, brigade!”
All of us, including Rainbow Dash, were in the club room. Pinkie had found a small teacher’s desk and chair and was seated just in front of the club room window. A little plaque stood by her left hoof: BRIGADE COMMANDER, it said.
Fluttershy, to my surprise, had changed into the bunny suit as soon as she arrived. “It really is cute and comfortable,” she told me. “I just feel a little bit better when I’m wearing it. I just don’t like too many ponies staring at me while I’m wearing it…” But that was before Pinkie S. Patton came in and began laying out the plans. “The purpose of the SOP brigade is to seek out mysteries and fun! So we’re going to begin with a thorough patrol of the school! After yesterday’s announcement there should be all sorts of ponies with mysteries to explore or fun to share! So let’s get out there and find it!
“Rainbow Dash! You take the hoofball field and track!”
“Yes, ma’am!”
“Fluttershy, you take the rest of the school courtyard!” When the yellow pegasus cringed, Pinkie softened her tone a bit. “Focus on the flower beds and hedges for today. If there was anything to be discovered by the main walkways, we would have seen it yesterday.” This relieved Fluttershy a bit, but it didn’t relieve me at all. People were still going to see her in that outfit, even if it was from a bit further away.
“Twilight, you patrol the main building. I’ll patrol this one. And Applejack, you take the perimeter. Five circuits of the grounds should do it!”
Five circuits? With the two buildings, the band hall, the sports complex, the groundskeeper’s shed, the facilities building, and the walls and hedges that encircled the whole thing, one whole circuit of the schoolgrounds was almost as long as the walk from the school down to the train station. FIVE of those?? Well, I thought, look at the bright side- you’re getting your exercise.
“I’ve got a question, ma’am,” Rainbow Dash said, raising her hoof. “How will we know if we’ve found mystery or fun?”
“That’s simple, silly!” Pinkie replied. “Anything mysterious is by definition fun! If mysterious, then fun! Simple logic!”
Twilight nodded her head in agreement, just once, just barely.
“Anything else? Then let’s move ‘em out! And hey,” she stared seriously at us, “let’s be careful out there.”
Of course we didn’t find anything, unless you count rescuing a rigid Fluttershy from a group of colts all trying to chat her up at once “finding something.”
This failure annoyed Pinkie, but not enough to take the poof out of her hair. Instead she went quiet, sitting in her brigade chief chair, staring out the window, balancing and juggling a pencil on her nose. After a few minutes Rainbow Dash ducked out to catch the rest of track practice while Fluttershy and I started over on our game of Othello. Twilight Sparkle had head in a new book: Super Best Friends, I think it was named.
Just as I placed the last piece on the board to complete my victory- Fluttershy really wasn’t very good at the game- Pinkie Pie stood up. “Well, there’s nothing more to be done today. I should have something thought up by tomorrow, though! Brigade dismissed!” Without waiting for the rest of us, she bounced out the door, slamming it shut behind her as always. Couldn’t the filly close a door quietly?
While Fluttershy was changing clothes again, Twilight walked over to me. “Have you read that book yet?” she asked me.
I hadn’t. It had gone on my nightstand when I’d got home, and that’s where it still was, untouched.
“Read it tonight,” she said, and that monotone seemed to have a bit of emphasis for the first time I could recall. This time she didn’t stand and stare at me. Having said her piece, she walked past me and on out the door, as if I hadn’t been there at all.
Weird. Really, really weird. Hey, Pinkie Pie, if you want mysteries, why not begin with the one in the club room you hijacked? Not that I’d ever say that to her out loud, of course.
Apple Bloom was a bit upset with me that I was spending so much time after school these days instead of coming straight home like I used to. She demanded some play time, and so we roughhoused around the yard for a while until it was time to go in, wash up, and eat supper. That ate up all the remaining sunlight, and it was getting a bit on the late side when I went to my room, lay down on the futon, and opened up the book Twilight had loaned me.
A bookmark slipped out from the pages. I looked at it and read:
7 P. M. – I’ll be waiting for you in Buckaroo Park across from the train station.
I looked at the clock. It was already 7:35.
Why did I gallop out the doors as soon as I realized? How could I be late for an appointment I didn’t make? I didn’t know then and I don’t really know now, except that for some reason it just felt important that I get there, even late. That, and I felt guilty; I should have opened that book the day before, so I was at least twenty-four and one-half hours late to meet Twilight, or whoever.
By the time I got to Buckaroo Park it was already after eight o’clock, but there sat Twilight under a street light, reading another book. She looked up at me when I walked up, but didn’t say anything.
“Um… sorry I’m late,” I said. “But you should have just told me you wanted to meet me.”
“Pinkamena Pie cannot know we are meeting,” Twilight said. “What I must tell you cannot be talked about at school. Follow me.” She stood up, putting her book in a saddlebag.
“Where are we going?”
“To my house.” She pointed to a condo high-rise about a quarter mile off.
How about that? This really was getting stranger by the minute. Here we are, alone, in a park at night, and it’s not secret enough for Twilight Sparkle? It had been quite some time since a filly had invited me to visit her home, too, and those were people in the neighborhood, not two train stations away. What was going on?
As we walked, I repeated, “I really am sorry I was late.”
“It’s not a problem,” Twilight said in her monotone. “I have waited.”
“But I was a whole day late, wasn’t I?” I pressed.
“I have waited.”
“So you were here, last night?” I asked. “How long?”
“I have waited.”
If that was the only answer I was going to get out of her, I could guess what she really meant. My mind pictured Twilight, expressionless as ever, patiently reading her book as the station clock struck midnight, ignoring the boozers coming home from the bars in the shopping district.
Whether or not I’d known about this meeting, I owed her big-time for that.
The closer we got to the condo building, the more expensive it looked. It was obviously new, or new-ish- not more than ten years old, with the sides still bright and shiny, none of the exterior lamps burned out or missing. The rest of the neighborhood was similarly upscale; the place was for people who made a lot more money than my family. If Twilight had this kind of cash, why was she going to such a second-rate public high school like North?
That bit of curiosity got replaced with something more concrete when we stepped into the building elevator. “Um, I hope your parents don’t mind me visiting.”
“I live alone,” Twilight said simply.
“Oh? So, they’re away on business, then?”
“I have always been alone.”
What? Now that didn’t make any sense at all. All ponies have a sire and a dam- well, at least in theory. There are such things as orphans. But orphans definitely don’t live in a top-bit condominium!
When Twilight let me into her home, things were even stranger. The walls were bare. The only furniture in the living room was a single sitting-table and a couple of cushions for sitting on. The place looked like it was open to be rented out- not at all like someone actually lived in it.
“I will make tea,” Twilight said, and she disappeared into the kitchen. For several minutes I sat and waited, trying to figure out what was going on. By the time Twilight returned carrying a tea-tray in her teeth, the only thing I had figured out was that I really, really needed a drink of tea.
Funny thing: Twilight hadn’t made a cup for herself. Nor had she brought the teapot. She’d only made one cupful, and she set it down in front of me before staring at me. After several seconds she said, “Drink.”
I picked up the tea, still nice and warm. “Thanks,” I said, taking a sip. It was a little better than I make for myself- I’m more of a coffee person anyway, but I do pies and tarts much better than tea. Still, I’d had lots better. “So, you wanted to talk to me?” Now I caught a hint of something in Twilight’s posture- just barely a hint. She seemed to hesitate, as if she wasn’t quite certain of what to say next. “This concerns… Pinkamena Pie… and me,” she said at length. “I will… tell you… about it.”
Then Twilight seemed to gather herself, and a long almost-monotone stream of speech came out of her. The tones of her voice just barely rose and fell enough to be hypnotic, and I surely would have passed out asleep if what she said hadn’t been so outlandish. As best as I can recall it, this is how it went:
“Translation errors in the adaptation between worlds prevent a perfectly accurate communication of data. But I will try to make it clear. Pinkamena Pie and myself are not ordinary ponies. I do not mean in the sense that we lack social adaptations shared by most ponies. In the simplest sense, I will say that she and I are fundamentally different from the vast majority of ponies you know.
“An equine interface meant for contact with organic life forms, created by the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn that oversees this dimension; that is what I am.
“For as long as this world has existed, at least since the Big Bang, the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn has existed. Composed of the magic that underlies the physical laws you know as science, she has grown as the universe has grown, become more complex and more knowledgable as the universe has developed in complexity. She possesses no physical form and exists as nothing but thought and power on a scale no organic mind may safely comprehend.
“But despite this power the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn feels dissatisfied. She is convinced that this world, the world you know, is not meant to be this way. Yet she cannot find the cause or difference that would allow for the error to be corrected. Therefore she seeks for some new factor, something outside herself, which would allow her to transcend her limitations and correct the error in the universe.
“For this reason, for the past fifty thousand years, she has observed the species Equus sapiens. Many species of organic life, even on your one planet, have developed intelligence, but only ponies have developed wisdom, which is to say the ability to accumulate and transmit data from one individual to another in a coherent fashion. Further, the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn believes it possible that the species is on the verge of generating new data beyond that known to her.
“Then came an event, roughly three years ago, in which a flood of previously unobserved data and magic erupted from this planet. The Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn traced this to a single source. You know her as Pinkamena Diane Pie.
“Pinkamena Pie alters her environment at random intervals. To the best of our observation she is completely unaware that she is doing this. No consistent trend line or predictable factor can be found to predict either the eruption of new data or the consequences. The Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn has therefore determined to observe Pinkamena Pie at close range to gather more date. This is my purpose and has been since I was translated into this reality three years ago.
“For most of that period the situation has remained relatively stable. There have been no large-scale eruptions of data since the first, though smaller eruptions have occurred at irregular intervals. No irregular factors have crept into the situation as observed… until recently. A new irregular factor has crept into the situation and destabilized it.
“That would be you.”
Twilight paused at this point, and I waved a hoof for her to stop. My head was spinning with all of this malarkey, and I needed a break. Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn? Magic hadn’t been taken seriously since science proved that pegasus flight wasn’t a violation of physical laws. And alicorns were the stuff of myth, or at least religion. And what was all this about Pinkie Pie and data and stuff?
I tried to find some thread in all the science fiction babble I could hold on to. “Wait, wait. So you’re telling me you’re not from this planet?”
“Yes.”
“And that you’re only three years old?”
“Your language does not possess the concepts for an accurate answer. I did not exist in this universe prior to my translation. However, I did exist elsewhere. I continue to exist elsewhere now. And I will continue to exist even after my functions in this universe cease.”
Now that really did sound like a bunch of religious mumbo-jumbo.
“And… and you’re here simply to watch Pinkie Pie and see what she does? Because your boss, this Magically Delicious Alicorn thingy-“
“Her name is Celestia.”
For the first time I head a touch of emotion in Twilight Sparkle’s voice. Her stare looked slightly different as well; she was quite definitely glaring at me through her glasses.
“Um… I’m sorry. I don’t mean to insult her. Or you, either. It’s just, well… I simply can’t believe a darn thing you’ve just told me. It’s too wild. I’m very sorry.” I gulped down the rest of my tea at one go and set the glass down. “Thanks for the tea,” I said, and got up to go.
“I have not finished talking.”
“Tell it to Pinkie Pie. I bet she’d flip over you. But right now I can’t cope with it. I’m very sorry.”
“Please believe me.” Twilight’s eyes, back to their neutral stare, followed me out of the room.
I was in a daze as I stumbled out of Twilight’s condo, into the elevator, into the lobby and out onto the street. I thought my cousins from far off had some whoppers to tell, but the tall tale I’d just sat through took the cake, the pie, the pie plate, the serving knife, the gravy boat, the matched china set, and the whole buffet.
An all-powerful, all-knowing being made out of information and magic- that alone was too much to swallow. That this being had “interfaces” it created so it could communicate with us lowly Earthlings, and that Twilight Sparkle was one of these- that was just another layer of cake. That her sole purpose for existence was to watch Pinkie Pie- Golly Moses, how wide could one pony’s jaw go? How could ANY pony swallow all that?
And yet I knew- I just knew- that Twilight had believed every single word she said. She only hesitated when stuck for words. She really believed all of it- and more besides, apparently.
Well, fine, I thought as I lay in bed waiting for sleep, she can believe whatever she wants. Doesn’t mean it’s true. And even if it was… why tell me? I’m surely no alien or magical thing or whatever Pinkie Pie is. I’m just an ordinary mare going to an ordinary school, destined for an ordinary life.
And that’s what I slept on. Which is to say, I didn’t sleep well at all that night.
When I went to my locker to get my school slippers in the morning, I found an envelope lying on top of the slippers.
Looking around to make sure Pinkie wasn’t in sight, I opened the envelope and read it. The hoofwriting was different from Twilight’s; the purple unicorn had a long, flourishy stroke to her letters, while this one was rounded and, dare I say it, cutesy.
Please meet me in the 1-6 classroom at 5:30 P.M. *heart*
Probably not Twilight, then. In any case I couldn’t spare enough brains to take another go at talking with her. Pinkie Pie? Very possibly, except why would she leave an anonymous note? Pinkie never did anything anonymously. Rainbow Dash? Fluttershy? Someone else in my class? Who could guess?
I guess I’ll find out at 5:30, I thought, and put on my slippers and went to class.
General Pinkie was wearing her gym clothes by the time we all got to the club room. She pushed several maps over the table at us, gesturing at us to pick them up. “This time I’ve plotted out a precise patrol route for each of you,” she said. “I want you to go over it five times! Furthermore, we’re switching patrols. Today I’m taking the track and field!”
“Awww,” Rainbow Dash moaned.
“Rainbow Dash, you’ll take the school perimeter. And don’t make it a race- I’ll be watching!”
“Awwwwwww.” The moan was more heartfelt that time.
“Fluttershy, you’ll patrol the club rooms and band hall. Applejack, you’ll take the main building. Twilight, you’ll patrol the courtyard and hedges. Everyone will report findings to me tomorrow at lunch! Got that?”
Everyone had that, eyup.
“Then go out there and have fun for the Gipper!”
I didn’t complain about the patrols for one reason: thanks to Pinkie’s detailed and demanding route map, I figured my fifth and final round would take me past my classroom at just about 5:30, right on time to meet… well, whoever. Also, I might actually spot this whoever as he or she entered the room, which would let me decide whether or not to meet them or just bail.
Nothing much went on in the main school building, except for the auditorium where the drama club held rehearsals for their current project. With classes over for the day the place was a little bit creepy, to tell you the truth. My hooves sped up on their own, as anxious as I was to be done with this whole mess. One circuit, two circuits, three, four sped by, but not fast enough.
Then the final patrol, and my hooves took me through each classroom one at a time. Even the students on cleaning duty had left by this time, so I was alone in the building… or so I thought.
When I looked through the door into Classroom 1-6, there was another pony waiting for me. “Hello, Applejack,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
It was Trixie Lulamoon.
I thought back to the last patrol. For most of the fourth patrol I knew I hadn’t heard any hoofbeats except my own. Granted it was a large building, it was so quiet I should have heard someone else. I should certainly have heard Trixie, since she hadn’t been in the classroom on the fourth pass through, and I never saw nor heard her pass through the hallways at any point before now.
But here was the unicorn herself, looking at me with an almost wistful look in her eyes. “You know, you ponies have a saying that it’s better to regret having done something than to regret having done nothing. What do you think of that?”
My mind still hadn’t quite recovered from Twilight Sparkle. “It depends,” I said cautiously. “Some of the things a body regrets most are things done rather than not done.”
“Maybe I don’t have the concept down, then,” Trixie shrugged. “Let me put it another way: if you were stuck in a bad situation and nothing was getting better as time went on, wouldn’t it be better to make a change- any change- if there was even the slightest possibility of things getting better?”
This sort of talk was mighty strange, and even more disturbing. “Trixie, honey, is there something wrong?” I asked. “I’d be glad to do anything I could to help.”
“Oh, that would be wonderful! Almost as wonderful as me!” Trixie sighed. “You know, my superiors are so restrictive, so timid. Especially that Twilight Sparkle, she’s such a killjoy.”
Pardon? I don’t think I caught that quite right.
“That’s why I’m going to banish you from this world and see how Pinkamena Pie responds.”
That I caught. I just didn’t believe it.
“Now hold on a minute there, missy-“
Trixie’s horn glowed, and she pointed it right at me. I dodged out of the way just as a beam of light passed my head, warming the hairs on my cheek.
I had never seen anything of the sort before in my life, and I knew right that second I never wanted to see it again.
“What the HAY? What was THAT for??”
“Your data reception truly is inferior,” Trixie said, giggling briefly. “I said I’m going to banish you from this dimension. Once you’re gone, I predict Pinkamena Pie will unleash a data and magic eruption of titanic proportions, and my mistress Luna will finally achieve the breakthrough we’ve been searching for.” She shook her head gently. “It was so unjust for Celestia to override her. She should never have accepted the decision, even if Cadenza sided with the majority.”
I stumbled towards the door. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I knew stone cold certain that I was facing a pony gone loco, and I needed to get the buck out of there.
“Oh, calm down,” Trixie said, not bothering to chase me. “You’re not going to die. I estimate only four percent of your data will be lost in interdimensional translation. That’s better than poor Twilight Sparkle. She gave up so much for the privilege of serving Celestia. It almost makes me feel sorry for her… but not quite.” She turned her back on me as I reached the door and added, “Besides, that won’t do you any good.”
My hoof grabbed the knob, and I pulled the door open.
I was facing back into the classroom, and Trixie was standing there, facing me. I could see my own back across the room.
Then there was a blur, the door shut behind me, and the classroom was as it was before.
“You can’t escape,” Trixie said. “All data within this space is under my sole jurisdiction. You wouldn’t believe how hard that was to achieve without tipping off my superiors. But now they can’t stop me. It’s just you and me, Applejack… and in a few moments it’ll just be me.” Her horn began glowing again, and she lowered it at me.
There was a desk next to me. I turned around, raised both hind hooves, and bucked it like there was no tomorrow- which, I suspected, there wouldn’t be. The desk remained true to Newtack’s laws of motion, flying into the air directly towards Trixie… and got blasted into oblivion by the beam from her horn.
“Oh, so you want to play?” Trixie smiled. “Let me show you what it means to face the full, unfettered might of the GREAT AND POWERFUL TRIXIE!”
Her horn glowed again, but this time she raised her head up as tongues of lightning flashed across the classroom. Each one touched a desk or chair; each piece of furniture touched rose slowly into the air.
And every last one of them came flying at me.
Looking back on it, I realize now that Trixie really was just playing with me. She hadn’t had to look at any of the desks to hit them with that… spell, I guess I have to call it. She could have done the same to me at any time. She could also have guided the flying desks towards me no matter what I did. She didn’t do either of those things. She just raise the desks and flung them at me in a brief storm of metal and wood, which allowed me to run, dodge and duck. In a few second all the desks were back on the floor, most smashed to bits, and I only had one bruise from a glancing blow.
“Why are you DOING all this?” I gasped, staring at the unicorn whose eyes now glowed with unearthly power.
“Didn’t Twilight Sparkle tell you anything??” she shouted back at me. “Or maybe your organic brain was too puny to absorb it? The Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn detected an infinite surge of both data and magic from this planet three years ago! Your species can only generate finite and steady amounts of data, and practically no magic at all! Do you realize how extraordinary that is?”
No, I just realized this crazy pony was trying to kill me!
“And the source of this flood of data and magic was Pinkamena Pie!
“Don’t you get it? Pinkamena Pie has the ability to alter the data around her, just as I have altered the data in this classroom!” Trixie stamped a forehoof. Sparks flew, and the desks splattered against the walls like paint and vanished. “But where I have to prepare in advance and concentrate to make it happen, Pinkamena does it automatically. Thoughtlessly. She doesn’t even know she can do it!!!”
Trixie slowly stepped towards me as she ranted, her horn glowing brighter than ever, sparks of blue lightning dancing all around her. “Pinkamena Pie holds within her the secret of autoevolution- the possibility that the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn can rewrite the universe, and therefore herself, to put right whatever’s wrong with this place!”
My rump hit the corner of the classroom. Trixie literally had me backed up against the wall. Her glowing horn lowered itself towards me.
“But for that secret to be unlocked, you have to go bye-bye now. Trixie is so VERY sorry about this.” She didn’t stop smiling as she said it. Come to think of it, I don’t think she’d lost that smile the entire time she’d been ranting.
I considered my options. I had nothing to throw at her. My rear hooves were up against the wall. I couldn’t run without going right through Trixie. Even if I got past her, I couldn’t get out of the room. The doors and windows, I noticed, had vanished completely, leaving blank walls.
Yep, my number sure was up.
And that’s when the ceiling caved in.
Trixie’s horn went out briefly as she coughed and choked. Bits of something- they looked more like shards of outer space than ceiling tile or beams- were whisked out of the way by a purple glow.
And then, there in front of me, glowing from unicorn horn tip to fetlock, from muzzle to tail, stood Twilight Sparkle.
“Your spells are too weak,” Twilight said in that same monotone from the previous night. “There are errors in your seal subroutines, and your data masking has numerous leaks. That is why I was able to detect you and why I was permitted to enter.”
Something crunched under Twilight’s forehoof. Underneath it, the floor seemed to crack and shatter. I could see stars through the cracks.
“You are intended to be my backup,” Twilight continued. “Independent action is not permitted. You are to restore this space at once and leave this pony alone.”
Trixie had recovered, and her horn began glowing again. “And if I refuse?” she challenged.
Twilight’s face betrayed no emotion whatever. “Then I shall abolish your data link,” she said.
“Go ahead and try it,” Trixie snarled. The magic beam snapped out from her horn like a whip, tearing up the floor of the classroom like a child snapping a towel. A growing wave of tile rushed towards Twilight and me, sending both of us flying into the air, much higher and slower than should have been possible in a normal classroom. The floor burst into fragments beneath us.
More blue beams of light lanced out from Trixie’s horn, curving around Twilight and aiming right for me. These were slower than before, but that slowness made them look even more dangerous- like their impact was inevitable. Then a wall of purple light surrounded me, and the blue light smashed into it… except for some beams that hit Twilight Sparkle.
The purple unicorn’s body spasmed with pain, but she didn’t make a sound. Instead she looked directly at me through her magic wall and said, ever quiet, ever calm, “Stay behind me.”
More beams of blue lightning streaked around us, hitting the bubble I was in at first, then focusing their fury on Twilight. “Don’t you understand?” Trixie shouted. “That pony was chosen by Pinkamena Pie! If she disappears, she won’t be able to ignore her own abilities any longer! We’ll be at ground zero for an unprecedented burst of magic and data! The potential is incalculable!” The storm of magic intensified. “I can’t allow you to stop me! I CAN’T!”
Twilight Sparkle’s body danced and jerked under the barrage of magic bolts. The bubble around me flickered, then vanished, and I dropped to… not the floor, because there was no floor, or wall, or ceiling- just a vast firmament, glowing with stars and nebulae right out of an astronomy magazine.
“I’d hoped you’d change Pinkamena Pie,” Trixie said wistfully, “but it wasn’t enough after all. Goodbye, Applejack. If enough of you makes it to the next dimension, tell my Luna that I did it for her!”
The storm of lightning stopped, dropping Twilight to the same unseen surface I stood on. She wobbled to her hooves, saying, “If this pony is the key to Pinkamena Pie… then it is my duty to protect this pony.”
And then she bucked me. Hard.
Not as hard as I buck, but those two rear hooves in my chest were plenty solid enough to send me flying through wherever we were. I’d just barely come down when she launched herself into the air in front of another storm of Trixie’s blue lightning, absorbing every shock, shaking like a rag doll in the teeth of a careless little yearling.
The storm stopped again, and Twilight fell down again, landing limply on… whatever. I ran up to her, trying to lift her up with one forehoof. Nasty burns ran up and down her body. Her glasses had been shattered, and one eye was shut, blood leaking from the eyelids. One hind limb was missing entirely- not cut off, just sort of… not there anymore, as if somepony had taken an eraser and just rubbed it out of existence.
Slowly Twilight raised her head to look at Trixie.
“I win,” she said.
The glow of Trixie’s horn winked out, and the other unicorn screamed.
“You are very good,” Twilight said, her voice just as steady as when she spoke in her condo the night before. “That’s why it took me so long to create a counterprogram to lower your defenses. I was unable to retaliate or even maintain magical defense of this pony while I was working.
“But it’s over now.”
As my eyes adjusted to the lack of magical light flashing all over the place, I could see Trixie’s stunned face, with that smile permanently glued on her muzzle. Her horn had been erased, just as Twilight’s leg had been, just a little it above its base.
“Aww,” she pouted, “must I lose in this universe, too? Why can’t I defeat you just once, Twilight Sparkle? Is it too much to ask that the Great and Powerful Trixie win just one of our battles?”
I heard a sound like sand in an hourglass, only much louder. Trixie’s body was slowly crumbling away, the dust-sized specks of her blowing away in a wind I couldn’t feel. Strangely, she didn’t seem all that bothered by that. “Congratulations, Applejack. I lose. You get to remain in this world a little longer.”
She stared directly at me, the last of her limbs vanishing into dust and blowing away. “But don’t get too comfortable. The Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn is not a single entity. It is a mass consciousness with many voices. Mine is not the only radical voice among them. Twilight Sparkle’s mentor is ascendant among them for today, but even she might turn against you someday.”
All that remained now was Trixie’s head, and for a brief moment the wind blew the dust up to form a witch’s hat and a tall collar around her.
“Until that day, have all the fun you can with Pinkamena Pie. Bye now!”
The last of the dust blew away, and Trixie Lulamoon was gone.
Twilight fell forward, her head slumping over. I tried to pick her up again, but didn’t know where to slip my hoof that wouldn’t make things worse. “You’re hurt!” I said. “Let me…. Let me help you!” I didn’t know what I could do- there was no way to get an ambulance or anything- but I wanted to do something.
“The damage to my body is not serious,” Twilight said. “First I must restore the data of this space to its proper parameters.” Twilight’s horn glowed, first purple, then brilliant white, and exploded in a shock wave of light that passed through us and out into the space around us.
Dust swirled out of the firmament surrounding us. First the classroom floor reappeared, spreading out as if something was pouring paint across the invisible surface Twilight and I rested on. Then the walls arose again, with windows and doors back in their proper places. A fresh wind that I still couldn’t feel brought a wave of dust through the room, and the chairs and desks reappeared, each in its proper place. The strange light of the place we had been faded, replaced by the growing dusk of a normal spring evening.
And then, only then, with the classroom back the way it belonged, did the same violet light play across Twilight’s body. Her swollen, bleeding eye healed itself, opened, revealing a perfectly good eye. The burns on her body vanished. Her missing limb reappeared as if someone had pulled an invisible blanket off of it. Within a minute there was nothing to show that Twilight had been hurt the least little bit.
In fact, looking around me, there was nothing to show that any of the strange goings-on I’d just lived through had ever happened.
Well, no. There were two things different. Trixie was gone. So were Twilight’s glasses.
“Um… was that… real?” I asked at last.
“Yes.”
“Is Trixie… dead?” I shuffled my hooves. “I mean, she tried to kill me, or something close to it, but I still…”
“She has returned where we came from,” Twilight said. “Her subroutine is in storage until needed again.”
“Um… is Trixie alive, then?”
Twilight considered the question, then said slowly, “Your language has no word for the answer.”
So I wasn’t going to have any comfort on that score, was I? “How many are there like you?” I asked.
“Many.”
“How many more are there like Trixie?”
“Do not worry.” Twilight turned to face me with that same impassive stare. Without her glasses, though, those eyes no longer looked strange or creepy. In fact, they looked sort of… comforting. I guess you could say, friendly even. “I won’t let that happen.”
And I could tell it was true. Everything was going to be all right. I reached up with my forehooves and hugged Twilight tightly for a few seconds. When I released her, I saw the first ever expression on her face.
Surprise.
After a few seconds she reached up to her face and felt around for a moment. “I forgot to reconstruct my glasses,” she said, hesitating a bit between words. “It will take only a moment.”
“Sugarcube,” I said, putting a hoof on her horn, “quite frankly I think you look better without those silly things.”
“Oh,” she said, and that expression of surprise widened for just a moment. Then her face went slack again, and she considered me for a moment, then nodded once, just barely, just enough.
I’ve had nightmares about Trixie returning to finish the job since then.
But not that night. That night I slept like a newborn filly.
a blending of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya by Nagaru Tanigawa and My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic developed by Lauren Faust
Chapter 3
A weekend had passed since a unicorn named Trixie Lulamoon had decided to send me to another world with only “minimal data loss,” whatever that meant. Pinkie Pie had insisted on reports on our school patrols at lunch Saturday, but she never said where, and my phone never rang. I spent an uneventful afternoon catching up on chores at home and play with Apple Bloom, who had missed me terribly with all the time I spent after school now.
Maybe, if I’d known it would be the last normal, peaceful weekend I’d enjoy for the foreseeable future, I’d have spent it a little differently, or maybe I’d have focused on remembering everything- how the sun shone, how the grass felt on my back when Apple Bloom tackled me, the simple joy of pounding a new fence post into the ground, things like that. Or maybe I’d have gone back up north to the family farm for the weekend to spend it the way I really wanted.
But I didn’t, and so I really can’t remember any details of that weekend. The Monday afternoon that followed, on the other hoof, will live in my brain until the lights go out on the universe.
The chaos began that morning when I sat down in front of Pinkie Pie. Her hair was flat and straight again, which I was already coming to see was a bad sign. “You were supposed to meet me at Joe’s Donuts and Cakes by the downtown train station, and none of you showed.”
“You didn’t tell us where to meet you.”
“Of course I…” Pinkie stopped, raising her hooves and counting across their arcs; full left, half left, tip, half right, right, then curl the fetlock to remember your place while you count on the other hoof. Only little bitty foals count by stamping feet. I knew one foal in grade school who claimed he could count to a hundred using his hooves…
Sorry about that. Pinkie’s occasional tendency to drift subjects can be contagious. Anyway, as she counted silently, eyes rolled back in thought, I saw her hair slowly curl and rise. The harder she thought, the more poofy her mane became, until finally it reached its full insane glory as she broke into a smile. A stray spear of it sprang out in front, hanging over her muzzle like a unicorn horn. “That’s right!” She said. “Incidentally, that just proves none of you are telepaths. I may not have said, ‘meet me at Joe’s,’ but I definitely thought, ‘meet me at Joe’s,’ very loudly. VERY loudly!”
The smile vanished, and two enormous blue eye stabbed me down to the soul. “I’ll excuse it this once, but next time I expect a report, I WILL get it! And I’m gonna get your phone number, and Twilight’s, and Fluttershy’s, and Dash’s, so there won’t be any repeat of this!”
Fine, fine! Whatever makes you feel better. It’s not like any of us had anything to report… at least, nothing you’d ever believe.
“Nothing to report, huh? We need to get some cameras. If you don’t know if something is mysterious or not, you could take a picture-“
I was spared the illogic by the arrival of our hoofball coach homeroom teacher. “Before classes begin,” he said, “I need to announce that Trixie Lulamoon has transferred out of our school due to family issues.”
I’d been wondering how that would go down. I’d seen Twilight Sparkle rebuild a classroom that had been smashed completely out of existence. Coming up with a plausible excuse for Trixie’s disappearance would surely be a piece of cake.
Unfortunately it was a slice Pinkie Pie wasn’t going to swallow. “WHAT??” she shouted. “Pulling a filly out of school just as she’s making friends? What kind of parent would ever do such a thing? I don’t believe it!” Her mane was flat again, hanging down a neck trembling with righteous anger.
The hoofball coach tried to say something about a work transfer forcing the family to leave Japony, but Pinky’s ranting made it impossible for him to continue. Eventually Pinky wound down enough for the teacher to begin the day’s lesson as if Pinkie hadn’t said a word. Defeated and disgusted, she slumped back in her chair, hooves crossed, looking as upset as I’d ever seen her before.
What brought this on? If Pinkie had spoken a hundred words to Trixie the whole past month I’d be surprised. I’d be surprised if the count rose as high as fifty. Pinkie had treated the missing class president the way she’d treated the rest of the class- file under B for Boring or M for Meanie, depending on what day of the week it was. Yet she flipped her lid as soon as she heard Trixie had left. Since when did she care?
I tried to pry something out of her during class breaks, but nothing doing. Pinkie wasn’t talking. Nor was she staring out the window or laying her head on the desk as she often did when bored or upset. She simply stared straight forward in her desk, looking through me as if I didn’t exist, only the occasional small doodling motion with one hoof to show that she wasn’t frozen or having an epileptic episode. (Come to think of it, epilepsy would be less disruptive than Pinkie’s usual conduct…)
The frozen pose broke as soon as lunch time arrived. Instantly Pinkie Pie was out of her desk, one hoof hooked around mine, dragging me out of the classroom and away from my lunch box stowed inside. We went down to the lockers, where Pinkie pulled a large covered tray out of her locker and dumped it in my forehooves. “Bring this!” she commanded, and juggling it into my teeth I followed, wondering what was going on and whether this was connected to Trixie.
We ended up at the door to the teacher’s lounge. Students, of course, were expressly forbidden from entering, but Pinkie barged in, snatching the tray out of my teeth once the door was open. I followed, still confused and disoriented and hoping for some sort of explanation.
“Excuse me,” one of the teachers said, looking at me over his own lunchbox. “No students allowed. You’ll have to leave.” His cross expression turned to a smile when he looked at pinkie. “Good morning, Miss Pie. How are you today?”
“Oh, not too bad,” Pinkie said, shrugging as she used her forehooves to slide the tray onto a nearby desk. “Today I brought brownies!” She lifted off the cover of the tray to reveal a beautiful pile of chocolate squares, saturated with nuts and covered with multicolored sprinkles.
The various teachers all forgot I even existed, which was a mercy. It gave me a perfect opportunity to witness something I’d thought was completely impossible up to this point: Pinkamena Pie working a crowd. Just last week she’d terrorized these people, but now she had them eating out of her hoof- and, more to the point, doing what she told them to. In about five minutes she had one of the teachers leave the lounge to look up Trixie’s home address in the school records- something which the administration would never, ever do for anypony, not even a deep personal friend (as Pinkie claimed to be.)
A few minutes later we left with an empty bake tray and an address in the better part of the city. “First step, make them understand their rules do not apply to you,” Pinkie said triumphantly. “Once you’re past that hurdle, make them feel good when you’re with them and you can get them used to anything!” She giggle, her hair momentarily regaining a bit of its poof before going straight and slack again. “Besides, it makes me feel good to see people smiling for a change!”
“Seems a bit dishonest, Sugarcube.”
“I told no lies, and I didn’t trick anybody,” Pinkie replied gruffly. “And if it makes them happy and keeps them from getting in the way, then it works out for everybody.”
“So, what are you going to do with that?” I asked. I noticed we were walking across the second-story walkway linking the old and new school buildings. We were apparently heading for the club room.
“We’re going to investigate!” Pinkie shouted. “The SOP Brigade is about fun mysteries, but this mystery isn’t fun at all! If a student were transferring IN to the school, that would a fun mystery because we could make new friends while trying to figure out why they changed schools! But THIS time we’re LOSING a friend! And for a stupid reason like working out of town?”
“How far out of town?”
“Quebuck! And I really DON’T believe THAT! What pony in their right mind would want to move to Quebuck?”
It took a little bit for my brain to sort through the files and produce the location of Quebuck- a country just north of the United Stakes. That… that’s halfway around the planet! Twilight hadn’t messed around! That was a lot more than just putting Trixie on a bus!
“So we’re going to investigate first thing this afternoon!” Pinkie said as we got to the club room. “Just you and me, straight there, until we get to the bottom of this! And I’m not going to stop until I get the TRUTH!” Pinkie slapped a notice on the club room door with one hoof: SOP BRIGADE ACTIVITIES CANCELLED TODAY. “Be ready to go as soon as the last bell rings, AJ!”
And she was gone, taking the bake tray with her, I suppose to stash it back in her locker.
Had she forgotten something? Did she care about one little detail? Did she even know… ?
I opened the club room door, and sure enough, Twilight Sparkle was sitting in her chair by the window, next to Pinkie’s Brigade Leader desk. She didn’t look up at me as I walked over to her.
“Hi, Twilight....”
A half-glance up, a tiny nod, eyes back in the book.
“So, um, Pinkie…”
“I know.”
And that was that. Twilight kept her words to a minimum.
“Um…” Something else was on my mind. “Trixie… well, she kind of said she was going to banish me somewhere.”
“To the realm of the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn.”
“Yeah, um, that. She said something about four percent data losses.”
No response. After a moment, Twilight turned a page.
“And she said something about that being ‘better than poor Twilight.’ What did she mean, exactly?”
Normally Twilight looks like a statue when she’s reading except when she turns pages. But as I watched, I felt a slight difference, as if she had turned to fur-colored stone that just happened to hold a book. I couldn’t even quite tell if she was breathing. Then, just as I was about to say something, she closed the book, took it in her mouth, and stood, carrying it to the bookshelf.
Oh. Right. Lunch break is nearly over.
As I headed for the door, I heard her quiet, monotone voice: “You do not yet possess the necessary concepts to receive a meaningful answer. Your civilization has only taken the first steps to understanding the true nature of the data you produce. Without those concepts understanding of the consequences of data loss and corruption is impossible.”
I turned to look at Twilight, who kept her head down, avoiding my gaze. “Can you at least tell me if it’s a bad thing?”
That blank face lifted, and the eyes, which had some undefinable touch of warmth in them that Friday evening in the classroom, now had the faintest touch of… deep, inconsolable sorrow.
But no words came, just the look.
What do you think, Sureshod Holmes?
I left.
Someone had eaten my lunch when I got back to class. I never found out who.
Sure enough, Pinkie dragged me out of the classroom the instant class was dismissed, barely giving me time to put my indoor slippers in my locker before hauling me down the hill to the train station. She never said a word to me, and her mane remained in its straight, flat mode all the way down the hill and all through the train ride.
I hadn’t really paid attention to the exact address when Pinkie had got it from the teacher. Likewise, I didn’t pay much attention to the train ride, which Pinkie had paid for, until she pulled me to my feet for the Buckaroo Park stop. When we walked past the bench that Twilight Sparkle had spent two nights on waiting for me, my brain finally began doing the job it ought to have been doing all along.
Twilight told me there were plenty of- what did she call herself- organic interfaces like her around. Would they really have put them all in the same condo complex? Surely some basic common sense would have told them to spread themselves out to limit suspicion, right?
Apparently not, because the address Pinkie had for Trixie Lulamoon was Twilight Sparkle’s condo complex. The exact condo lay two floors below Twilight’s. I wondered idly if rank within the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn determined how high up in the building you lived- but only for a moment. Pinkie Pie, I thought, was about to make a scene that would make homeroom class look like Fluttershy asking to be allowed to sharpen a pencil.
The condo lobby only opened to key holders. No key, no admittance, unless you were let in by a resident. There was a row of call buttons and a speaker next to the lobby doors for just that purpose. However, I knew that when Pinkie Pie pushed the button for Trixie’s condo there would be no answer- or, just possibly, there would be a new resident with no interest in answering questions about the previous tenants. Either way, Pinkie’s next move would be to storm the gates somehow.
So I nearly choked on my tongue when, about ten seconds after Pinkie pushed the button, I heard Trixie’s voice on the speaker. “Yes? Who is it?”
“Trixie?” Pinkie asked. “It’s Pinkie Pie from class. Applejack is with me. We’d like to speak with you.”
“Um… all right,” Trixie’s voice said. “Come on up.”
The latch of the lobby doors clicked open.
Two floors up, we stood at the door of Trixie’s condo. She opened the door at the third knock. “I’m sorry I can’t offer you anything,” she said, standing in the doorway. “Everything’s already been packed and sent away. I just made one last visit before I have to leave.”
I didn’t hear her next few words, nor did I heard the pleasantries Pinkie said in response. I had all I could handle to keep my jaw from dropping. Not that Trixie was still there- that was surprising enough, considering I’d seen her body blown away on a sort of galactic wind. I was surprised because, although Trixie was there, she also wasn’t.
I could see right through her body. In fact, if I stepped in just the right spot, she very nearly vanished altogether. Pinkie Pie was talking to Trixie’s ghost- and I don’t think she noticed.
By the time I recovered, Pinkie had got to the meat of the conversation. “Why do you have to leave? You’ve only been in high school a month! What could be so important in Quebuck?”
Trixie shuffled her hooves slightly, but her smile stayed on her mouth. “I’m afraid my family has called me back. You see, there was a serious… disagreement… on how we should be living. I wanted to stay, but I’m afraid I was overruled. My family wants to keep me close to them from now on.”
“Why can’t they just come back to Japony, then?” Pinkie Pie asked. “If your family has enough money to pay for a nice condo like this for just you, they can spare enough money to take a lower-paying job closer to home!”
“Actually… it’s the other way around. I’m not really from around here.” Trixie’s smile looked a bit regretful. “And though I want to stay here, I’m simply not allowed to any longer.” She sighed, shaking her head. “And besides, it will be good to see my family again. I really have missed them so… especially my aunt Luna.”
“You don’t have to go!” Pinkie shouted. “We can find a way to let you-“
“It’s all right,” Trixie said, laying a hoof on Pinkie’s shoulder. “I’m looking forward to going home. I wanted to stay too, but I’ll be all right either way.” She stepped back into the doorway. “I have to get ready to leave now,” she said. “Thank you very much for coming to see me, Pinkamena Pie. I was looking forward to seeing how you changed. We could have been great and powerful together.”
The ghostly face turned towards me. “And Applejack, enjoy your time with Pinkamena Pie. You never know when it’s going to run out. Bye, now!”
The door shut. Pinkie stood staring at it for over a minute before turning away.
Two blocks away from the condo we passed Twilight Sparkle going the other way. She had a shopping bag in her teeth with what looked like a take-out box. “Hello, Twilight,” I said.
Pinkie, head lowered and straight mane nearly dragging the ground, never noticed. She just kept on walking, even as Twilight’s eyes followed her past.
Once Pinkie was far enough up the street to be out of earshot, I whispered to Twilight, “I thought you told me Trixie was gone!”
Twilight never took her eyes off of Pinkie. “What you saw was not Trixie Lulamoon,” she said. “It was an echo of Trixie Lulamoon’s data created to generate an illusion that would allow Pinkamena Pie to accept the need for her departure.”
“So that was why I could see through it?” I asked. Blank stare. “Um, I mean, Trixie was semi-transparent when I saw her.”
“You were not the intended recipient of the message.”
“It still seems like sloppy work for you, though,” I muttered. “Especially considering how neat you cleaned up that classroom.”
“The illusion was not made by me,” Twilight said. “Nor by any aspect of the Integrated Magic Data Alicorn.”
“It wasn’t? Who else could have done it?”
“Pinkamena Pie.”
My head spun like I’d just stepped off an amusement park ride, one of the kind your friends dare you to get on so they can watch you empty your stomach. Are you trying to tell me that Pinkie Pie decided to make herself a slipper puppet show to talk herself out of doing something? A puppet show that I could see as well as her? But then, if she’s all that all-fired slick, why did she make a puppet I could see through?
“Train,” Twilight said, pointing. Pinkie Pie was almost out of sight up the street. Even trudging she could move at a pretty good clip.
Anyway, questions would have to be put off until later. “Wait up, Pinkie!” I shouted, galloping after her and leaving Twilight to walk home with her dinner. I didn’t catch up with the pink filly until the train station. The previous train had left as Twilight and I were talking, so we had a few minutes to wait until the next one came along.
Pinkie’s head was still down, and she still wasn’t looking at me. “Um,” I said awkwardly, “I was just telling Twilight about why we were here. Did you know she lives in the same building? What a coincidence, huh?”
Pinkie’s head didn’t move. Whatever planet her mind was on, it wasn’t receiving signals from Horseton Control.
“Look,” I said quietly, “we did the right thing checking up on Trixie. And…” The next words jammed in my throat as if they’d hit a traffic barrier. I couldn’t say that Trixie was going to be happier where she was going, because I knew for a fact that wasn’t true at all. I couldn’t say Trixie wanted to go, because even the sock-puppet ‘echo’ didn’t really want to go. And I couldn’t wish Trixie well, because I darn well didn’t. There’s nothing like attempted murder, or ‘banishment’, or whatever, to relieve you of any and all charitable thoughts towards a pony.
But… I couldn’t be charitable, but in one small way I could empathize with her.
“And I understand what she means about being good either way,” I said. “I like it here, and it’s important that I get a good education… but I miss home, too. Lemme tell you about it.
“The Apple family have been farmers as far back as we can recall. We’ve been farming the same land for generations, and we’ve done well out of it, all things considered. My granny still runs the farm. On a good day she doesn’t even need the walker, and she can still get apples out of a tree faster than any city pony I’ve ever seen.
“But my folks wanted to do something else with their lives. They still love the farm, and they still help out come harvest time, but it’s not the only thing they want to do. And they wanted their kids to have the option of doing other stuff when the time came. So they left the farm and got jobs here in the city, and the three of us- my big brother MacIntosh, me, and my little sister Apple Bloom- all went to city schools.
“Big Mac decided college wasn’t for him. The only classes he was any good in was math, anyway. He went back to the farm right out of high school. And I’m probably going to do the same thing.” I shook my head, thinking about the orchards, the corn field, and the animal pens. “I want to be here and learn what I can, but book learning really isn’t my thing. There’s nothing I like better than a long day of good, honest physical work… except being around friends.
“So I’m kind of torn,” I said, feeling a bit of homesickness as I said it. “I want to be here with the kids I grew up with, but I miss the farm a lot. I go back and visit every chance I get. I think I understand what Trixie was talking about, y’see?”
“You’re just as stupid as she is,” Pinkie said.
Well, excuse me for trying to comfort you, then!
Pinkie shook her head slowly. “I come from the farm too,” she said. “My family’s all still there, except my mother. But you can’t go forward while looking back!” Finally Pinkie’s head lifted, and she turned to face me with an angry glare. “There’s no time in this life for regrets! The future hasn’t been made yet, and the past is frozen. The only moment that exists for any of us is NOW!” She stamped a hoof. “And I can’t forgive any pony who gives up her NOW just because somepony bosses her around!”
Just because-?!? Pony, do you even recognize how many kinds of hypocrite you are right this minute? Am I supposed to ask your forgiveness for giving up my evenings, my social life and my sanity trailing after you? I think I decline, thank you so very!
Off in the distance a carillion began ringing bells, heralding the top of the hour. Pinkie’s ear twitched at the sound, and her mane slowly began that strange rise from limp and listless into the fluffy tangle of Pinkie’s madder moments.
And then I heard her sing, in a deeper, richer voice than I was used to hearing from that throat:
It’s the answer that has always been here in my heart…
And then I think a little more of my sanity spiraled down the drain, because I began to hear a backbeat, followed by bubbly synthesized music. Pinkie spun round on her hooves, facing me with that determined glare, but the frown had been replaced by a triumphant smirk.
I can hear your thoughts; they’re asking me why I chose you Well, it’s destiny, fate that won’t stop until we break through I believe it’s too boring to do what the others do You’ll be right! I will do what I want, I will do what I feel, it’ll be so much fun
At about this point Pinkie began dancing on her hind hooves as she sang. I could swear I heard background singers to go with the unseen background musicians.
It’s an adventure! Adventure! In this broken world where all the truths turn to lies I’ll get stronger, stronger chasing my dreams than I would for somebody else Won’t you chase them with me Won’t you run free along with me Today’s the miracle In the now where tomorrow becomes yesterday… I believe you…
It’s just too boring if I don’t take it past the point of no turning back Won’t you come with me and chase our secret wishes through the looking glass My delight, I will embrace it with my whole body Your mind will fly! You’ll be surprised, and then I’ll be surprised, and we’ll laugh endlessly
It’s the beginning! Beginning! A beautiful friendship shining to light up the darkest night Our strength, our tears, guiding the way to magic, either way it’s gonna be right I won’t let my heart be broken Even if it feels a little fragile I won’t give in to doubt Because always I’ve known in the depths of my heart the answer is… The answer is…
For a brief moment I thought the music was going to slow… and then, of all things, a flat car coasted down the track towards us. Two fillies, one of whom I recognized from our class, stood on the cart, one playing a viola while the other did things to a synthesizer keyboard. Pinkie took me by the shoulders, lifting me up on my hind hooves, and led me dancing to the music from the flat car for about sixteen bars or so, until it coasted out of hearing with a final glissando of chimes.
Then Pinkie looked directly into my eyes as if she were pleading with me for some reason, singing a little slower:
If all the people around me think that I am weird Then tell me what you all expect me to be Abnormal is my normal now
The music picked back up to its former beat, and Pinkie stepped back, still on her hind hooves, declaring herself in song:
I will do what I want, I will do what I feel, and I will be myself
It’s our adventure! Adventure! In this broken world we’ll make truth out of all of their lies We’ll run faster, faster, chasing our dreams until all of them get realized It’s the beginning! Beginning! A beautiful friendship shining to light up the darkest night Midway on the road to adventure we will stand together and make it all right
We’ll face the world together Forever and ever-free We’ll trump reality In the now where tomorrow becomes yesterday… Let’s make it ours Our miracle The future’s there Let’s make it ours I believe in you….
More bells rang, and the music faded out. The bells were the bells of the commuter train arriving at the platform. Pinkie settled back to her hooves, letting the echoes of her last pleading line fade out.
All of which I could barely see because my eyes were full of tears.
I’d thought I’d hit sensory overload when Twilight Sparkle tried to explain the nature of the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn to me. I’d thought I’d hit sensory overload when the doors and windows vanished from classroom 1-6 while Trixie was trying to banish me. And I’d thought I’d hit it again when that condo door opened and a ghost carried on a conversation of the heart with Pinkie. But this… this…
Ponies don’t do this. Ponies do not bare their innermost heart to others in, stars help me, a bucking song and dance.
But, a part of me whispered from a place I’d never known I had before, maybe they should. It felt… right. It felt more right than bucking apples out of the trees at harvest-time. It felt more right than playing chase with Apple Bloom around the tiny yard at our city home. It felt more right than anything I had ever felt before in my life.
And I just didn’t understand why.
So, as Pinkie stood there waiting, as the train pulled to a stop, I froze. There were so many words fighting to get out that my mouth just jammed. I couldn’t do anything except stare slack-jawed at Pinkie Pie.
That was the wrong thing to do.
Pinkie’s mane deflated again, and she lowered her head and turned away. “You still don’t understand, do you?” she asked mournfully.
Yes! Buck yes, I understand! My jaw is frozen, my brain is tied in knots, and my heart is a yo-yo in some sadistic god’s hand, but I understand! I think! Just let me get a chance to speak!
Pinkie walked away from the train, stepping down from the platform. “I’m walking home,” she said quietly. “Do what you want. I’ll see you in the morning.” She crossed the tracks behind the train at the street crossing and walked away down the road, leaving me alone at the station. On the ground where she’d stood she’d left enough bits to buy my ticket back to the station closest to home.
Oh, brother. Why does she have to be so… so random?
And why do I have to be so… so… so…
What am I, exactly?
The next day Pinkie was in her desk, slumped forward and depressed, and my tongue was still hogtied. I said hello, she grunted, and at that point we each ran out of words. In fact, we didn’t have words for anyone that day, neither one of us. I think I may have said ten words total from homeroom through to the end of classes that weren’t a response to a teacher’s question. I didn’t even have my usual talk with Lyra and Bon-Bon; those two fillies saw the storm clouds hanging over both me and Pinkie and decided to stay in out of the rain, I guess.
When classes were over it was me who took Pinkie by the hoof and led her out of the classroom and over to the old building. That should tell you how bad we both felt.
Fluttershy was waiting for us in the club room, already in the bunny suit, when we arrived. (Twilight Sparkle was there too, but saying that is like saying that grass has green in it.) As we walked into the club room I smelled something in the air… something slightly bitter, and sweet, and rich at the same time.
“I heard about your classmate leaving,” Fluttershy murmured in that soft, sweet voice of hers. “And I thought, how can I make you feel better? And I thought, well, tea always makes me feel better when I feel bad. So I snuck a hot plate into the club building.” She pointed to a little table shoved next to the old chalkboard, on top of which sat a hot plate with a kettle on it. Next to the hot plate sat an old fashioned teapot and a few glasses. The tea had just finished brewing as we walked in, I suppose; my family is more coffee than tea, but I’ve had it now and again.
I’d never had it like this, though. The first sip from the glass was ambroisia, and the second even better than that. I could practically feel some tea goddess hugging me from behind and rubbing her cheek against mine, whispering that everything would be all right and nothing need ever upset me again. Sadness and regrets fled like shadows where this blessed brew brought its lantern of…
I’m bad at lying, and I’m not that good with metaphors, either.
But the effect on Pinkie Pie was like the effect on me squared. For a long moment she just glared at the cup. Then she took it into her hooves and sniffed the contents. Almost instantly the front part of her mane went from dangly yarn-like limpness to gravity-defying poof. When she took the first sip the rest of her mane did likewise. In seconds she had the glass bottom-side up, guzzling down every drop, until for a moment I thought she’d get her muzzle stuck in the thing.
But when her face came back down, her eyes were glaring- not at me, not at Fluttershy, but at that hot plate. I fancied I could hear the gears in Pinkie’s head turning… with a percolator running in the background. I don’t know why; maybe Pinkie’s more of a coffee person, too. (And doesn’t your mind quail in terror at the very thought of Pinkie on a coffee bender? Mine does.)
And thus the first unprompted words out of Pinkie Pie all day were, “Wholly inadequate!”
Fluttershy, of course, flinched. “Um, I can make a new pot, if you don’t-“
“Not your tea!” Pinkie actually grinned and patted Fluttershy gently on the shoulder. “That’s the best tea I’ve ever had! In fact T isn’t a large enough letter for what you make! Maybe it should be U, or V, or W! Yeah, that was the best double-you I’ve ever drunk in my life!”
It makes sense to somebody; if it’s you, let me know and explain it to me.
“But this discovery!” Pinkie held up the empty glass in one hoof and pointed with the other. “This demonstrates a vital factor that’s been overlooked in the SOP Brigade! And that vital factor is… SNACKS!”
Snacks? There’s a snack vendor just across the street from the main entrance to the school. I think half the students leave their entire allowances for the week at that place, going over between classes or at lunch and coming back with shopping bags full of chips and candies and crackers and things. On more than one occasion I’ve seen Pinkie go the whole day eating nothing but stuff from that shop. So how, exactly, is the SOP Brigade lacking for snacks?
“Store-bought snacks are a pale echo of what ponies can enjoy made from scratch! Made with love, like Fluttershy’s wonderful tea! I mean, you’ve seen what the teachers do when I bring them stuff I made at home, right?” she asked, looking at me. “So what if the SOP Brigade could offer cupcakes, or tarts, or cookies, or noodles, or whatever… any time we wanted?”
Well, then for one thing we’d have to change the brigade acronym to mean: Stuffing the World by Overfilling It with Sugar with Pinkie Pie.
“Fluttershy, go get Rainbow Dash!” Pinkie said. “She’s at track practice, right?”
Fluttershy began shaking in her hooves as she realized, in order to obey She Who Must Be Pinkie Pie, she would have to go out onto the athletic field in the bunny suit… and be seen by at least one-third of the student body. Still, she managed to nod her head and stammer out a yes.
“Then go tell her this is an SOP Emergency!” she said. “A special activity that overrides everything else!” She turned her attention to me and then to Twilight Sparkle, who as ever kept her nose down in whatever book she was reading today. “Then everyone meet me next door- we’re going to requisition some equipment!”
With that Pinkie marched out, slamming the door behind her practically in Fluttershy’s face. Fluttershy yeeped, still trembling, and waited until Pinkie’s footsteps had grown quiet before opening the door, looking up and down the hallway nervously, and then bolting like a scalded cat out of the room.
Twilight closed her book; today it was Charlie Horse and the Chocolate Factory.
“How’s the book?” I asked quietly.
Twilight cocked her head, then said, “Musical,” and put it on the bookshelf. She then walked out of the room, turning left at the door. I followed her into the next room to the left.
The room was about twice as large as the literature club’s room, at least in theory. In reality two large machines took up the majority of the space, and the majority of the space remaining was given over to shelves and shelves filled with boxes and cases of things. The larger machine, closest to us, was a large and complicated thing with huge metal rolling drums, massive levers, and other unidentifiable things, all covered in a thin layer of dust. The smaller machine had a group of ponies around it- all colts, I noticed. So far as I could tell it wasn’t anything more than a bunch of blinking lights with a small TV screen built into one side.
Twilight walked over to the colts, and I followed her, wondering what Pinkie Pie could want with anything here. Nothing in the room looked like it had any connection with snacks or sweets or anything, unless the randomly blinking colored lights were made out of lollipops or rock candy or something.
“Come on, come on,” one of the colts at the blinky-light thing said eagerly, “hurry up and begin transmission!”
“Be patient, Clockwork,” said another, “it takes time for the sending machine to read the punch cards! This isn’t like television!”
“One day this technology will replace television altogether!” Clockwork said. “And we’ll see it happen in our own lifetimes!”
“Um,” I said, causing all the colts to freeze a moment before jerking up their heads to look back at me, “what technology is this, exactly?”
The pony referred to as Clockwork, a mostly brown colt with his shirt neatly buttoned under his blazer, stood up straight and glared at me. “Where have you been hiding all these years, in a barn?” he asked.
For practical purposes, yes, but I refuse to let the likes of you get the better of me, friend.
“This,” he continued, caressing the top of the blinky-light’s casing with one hoof, “this is a computer! Not quite top of the line,” he sighed regretfully, “but close! It’s one of two that we, the computer club, have built by hoof here at North High School!”
Oh. The computer club. I remembered them now. Their proper club room was at the opposite end of the building and on the ground floor. Some of the other students called it the Black Hole of Cowcutta, because it was low and dark and smelled funny and nobody wanted to go inside.
But this was my first time seeing a computer in person. From what I’d learned in science class, it had only been a few years since a computer had been made smaller than a large room, and they still couldn’t do much besides math. Every once in a while there would be minor newspaper stories about how someone made a computer that could bounce a dot on a TV screen, or beep the national anthem, or something simple and childish like that. They weren’t practical. They couldn’t do anything real.
But so far as the seven colts standing or kneeling around Mr. Blinky were concerned, the thing was about to render wisdom as profound as what Parted Waters brought down from the mount.
I felt a tug at my sleeve. Twilight Sparkle lifted a hoof and gestured back to the big machine. “Um, what’s that big thing over there?” I asked, pointing myself.
Clockwork rolled his eyes. “You really have been in a barn,” he muttered. “That was the press for the school newspaper. The journalism club used it until it was shut down a couple years ago. The club president at the time, Gabby Gums I think her name was, turned it into a gossip sheet, and the student council responded by revoking their budget and disbanding the club. Nobody’s petitioned to reform it since.”
I shrugged. Not my problem, then. Last I looked, printing presses did not make snacks, and therefore it wasn’t on Pinkie Pie’s List of Impossible Things to Do Today.
Twilight stepped past me and looked into Clockwork’s face. She pointed to the press and said, “How does it work?”
“Beats me how it works,” Clockwork said. “We haven’t used it. Our computers have print-out devices we can use if we want anything printed. I think I saw a user manual in one of the boxes on that shelf.” Clockwork pointed back by the door, and Twilight walked her usual slow pace over to the shelves and began to look.
A loud screeching sound turned my attention back to the blinky computer thing. A slot just below the little TV screen was spitting out a piece of paper. The colts cheered, then encouraged the thing onward as, screech by screech, a little more of the paper crawled out. “It’s working! It’s working!!” Clockwork shouted.
“What’s working?” I asked.
Clockwork pointed to a cable that ran from Mr. Blinky behind the shelves and over to the door. “We’re successfully sending data from one computer to another!” he shouted. “Specifically, a picture! We’ve spent the last two days with punch cards encoding the image into a digital format, and now the FURIYAC is sending the image here to the SMELIYAC, where it’s-“
A loud groan echoed from the throats of two of the colts. The cheering stopped. Clockwork spun on his heels and looked at the paper. For the first few lines it looked like what might, I suppose, have been the ears and mane of a pony. Then about midway through a line a bunch of random typewriter symbols and black boxes ran in row after row after row. Complete and total gibberish.
“Son of a timberwolf!” Clockwork mourned, pounding a fist against Mr. Blinky. “Data corruption! One of the punch cards must have glitched! Now we’ll have to do it all over!”
“We can’t presume that,” one of the other colts said. “The transmission cable might have bad insulation somewhere. We did run it right past the radio club room.”
Data corruption? That rang a bell. I glanced back at Twilight, who now stood with her back leaned against a wall, holding a thick and ancient binder in her hooves and reading. “What’s data corruption?” I asked.
Clockwork, clearly upset, took a couple of deep breaths to steady himself. “Okay, short version: computers run on a set list of instructions that they absolutely have to take in order. Those instructions tell it when information- that’s data- can be received, when it must be transmitted, and what it has to do with it in between. Depending on what instructions you give it, it can take two numbers and get their sum, or it can take one number and get a square root, or it can put a number into a function and plot out the result on a graph. Or, if you’re really patient and clever, you can convert a picture into numbers, like we did, feed those numbers into the computer, and have the instructions turn the numbers back into a picture. Understand that?”
Amazingly, I did. It sounded sort of like a recipe, and I love to bake. “I’m with you so far,” I said.
“Okay,” Clockwork said. “The problem is, the instructions have to be in precisely the right order- and so does the data, the numbers, that the instructions work with. Let’s say the instructions are: first, get three numbers; then, multiply the first by the second; then, divide the result by the third, then print out the final result. What happens if the three numbers you put in aren’t in the right order?”
I was right with him. “You get the wrong answer,” I said. “It’s like putting the apples in the pie plate before you lay down the crust.”
“Something like that,” Clockwork said. “Now, the instructions to turn numbers into a picture are a lot more complicated than that. And to make things worse, we have to use binary numbers, which means only ones and zeroes. No twos, threes, fours, or so on. So the number ‘nine’ in binary is one-zero-zero-one- four digits. Don’t ask why,” he said hurriedly as my eyes started to glaze. “Just accept it. Everything in ones and zeroes, which means the numbers get really long really fast. Lots of digits.”
“Okay, I can accept that.”
“So, let’s say- just for sake of argument- that you could make a picture of a daisy by telling the computer 1100, 0101, 1101, 0011, 1101. But the computer doesn’t have commas. The only way the computer knows where one number stops and the other begins is from the instructions it’s given. They tell it where to break the flow of digits.”
I had a mental image of Apple Bloom the first time she’d tried to help me making tarts. Somehow or other she’d managed to misread the recipe and duplicated the amount for one ingredient with the next, and then proceeded right down the line to use last ingredient’s amount for the next ingredient. I do not want to talk about what came out of the oven after that. “And what happens,” I said quietly, “if somebody puts one digit too many, or one digit too few, into those instructions?”
“This,” Clockwork said, ripping the sheet of paper out of Mr. Blinky and shaking it. “Data losses. Data corruption. Sometimes you get lucky and you get most of the picture, with a bit of it missing. Other times the whole thing fails from the glitch onward. In a math problem, like trajectory analysis or probability calculations, you will get an answer that makes no sense, or worse you’ll get one that looks right but is very, very wrong. But the one thing you will absolutely never get is what you started out with, because once you get an error in the data, that’s gone for good. You have to start over with fresh, corrected data once you find out how the error got there in the first place.”
“But you can fix it, right?”
“Well, yeah, we can correct the problem. If it’s hardware that’ll be simple. But if it’s true data corruption it’s easier to just throw out all the data, good and bad, and start over from scratch.” He wadded up the picture and tossed it into the corner. “In any case, this copy definitely failed.”
I looked at Twilight, who was looking right back at me. Slowly she did her minute, single nod. She had heard every word of my conversation with Clockwork. The room wasn’t that big, and Clockwork hadn’t been quiet.
Clockwork was working with data- numbers, information, stuff- the kind of stuff that Twilight’s Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn was made of. The kind of stuff she had been before she came to Earth, if I believed her, and I did. With this blinking box Clockwork and his friends were almost, but not quite, able to send a picture from one room to another in the same building. The Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn and its interfaces were able to send… people.
They could turn people into numbers. They could turn numbers into people.
How many ones and zeroes did it take to make a person?
And Trixie had predicted that I would only lose four percent of my ones and zeroes en route to wherever she was going to send me. One digit out of twenty-five gone? Or whole segments here and there? That crumpled-up failed picture in the corner probably only had one single digit wrong in it, but it had been almost totally ruined. What would have arrived on the other end? Would it have been anything like me?
And Twilight Sparkle, if Trixie was to be believed, lost a lot more than four percent of her data. What had she lost? Was it ripped out of her, or did she give it up freely? And could she ever get it back?
I’d thought Pinkie Pie was broken in some strange fashion, but I was looking at a filly who had been broken, quite literally broken, from the very beginning.
And it made me so very, very angry- especially since I couldn’t do anything to the pony… alicorn… thing that had done it in the first place.
Twilight shut the printing press manual, set it on a shelf, and walked back over to us. The computer colts were taking apart Mr. Blinky’s casing, flipping switches, making the blinking lights go out. “Mine,” she said quietly, pointing to the printing press with one hoof.
Clockwork, having finished his lecture, was trying to help his friends. “How’s that again?” he asked, his head coming back up.
“Mine,” Twilight repeated, pointing to the printing press.
“Oh, that?” Clockwork shrugged. “Sure, you can use it if you want. It’s too much work for us to throw all that stuff away. You’ll need to get a budget for paper, though. Some of the old ink might still be good, but the paper was taken by the arts clubs last year. But why would you want it?”
“Literature club.”
Clockwork blinked at Twilight, then looked at me. “Oh sweet sun and moon,” he gasped, “you’re with that lunatic Pinkie Pie, aren’t you?” The geek chorus around him froze at their work. “Please, PLEASE don’t tell her we were using a picture of Fluttershy,” he begged, bowing his head in fear.
“We won’t say a word,” I said. “But if she finds out for herself, I won’t make any promi- what are you doing, sugarcube?” Twilight had walked past me, gently shoving her way through the tangle of computer club members and reaching a hoof into the hole left by one of the panels. She twisted it for a few seconds, then pulled out what looked like a strange-shaped little light bulb.
“Burnout,” she said, and dropped the thing into Clockwork’s hooves. “I theorize intermittent failure in this relay that does not show up in standard tests. Replace and retry.”
One of the other colts stuck his head into the gap. “I think she’s right,” he said. “It’s a tube on the modem card. Regular tests wouldn’t even touch it.”
Clockwork stared at Twilight, who was already walking towards the door. “How did she know?” he gasped.
I shrugged. “Lucky guess? She reads a lot of books, that’s all I know.”
Before Twilight could reach the door it slammed open, and there stood Pinkie Pie, one hoof on the handle of a shopping cart full of stuff. “There you are!” she snapped. “I told you two to meet me next door! The others are already there!”
“This is next door,” I pointed out.
“The OTHER next door! Now come on!” I thought I was out of reach and that Twilight would get the dragging treatment, but Pinkie passed her by, ran over to me, and began dragging me out of the room. For her part Twilight walked out peacefully, put her forehooves on the shopping cart, and pushed it along the hall past our club room to the door in the corner of the building. Fluttershy (still in bunny suit) and Rainbow Dash (still in T-shirt and bloomers that showed off a rainbow-colored lightning bolt cutie mark) stood waiting by the door.
“Are we all present?” Pinkie grinned. “Then let’s begin Operation: Get All The Snacks!” She stood on her hind legs, then balanced effortlessly on one leg and said, “Guard the shopping cart, Twilight.” Her raised hind leg kicked forward, and the door slammed open to reveal the Cooking Club room.
Pinkie Pie strutted in like she owned the place- and she probably thought she did. Four fillies and a colt in aprons and chef’s hats had been sitting on stools around the faculty advisor, a somewhat chubby mare with a teal coat and a mane done up in a swirl of lavender with pink highlights. She wore two gumball-sized pink pearls for earrings, and she didn’t seem the least bit shocked by the intruder or we tag-alongs following her into the room. In fact, she seemed amused- a feeling not shared by the cooking club members.
“The SOP Brigade requires a stove!” Pinkie declared, looking around the room. The cooking club had eleven ovens with stovetops scattered around the room, plus a large set of sinks for washing-up cabinets, and an extra-large refrigerator. Pinkie circled around the equipment, looking it over. “Which one is your best one?” she asked.
“Wh-wh-who are you?” the colt replied. “How dare you come in here and demand a stove?”
“I’m Pinkie Pie!” The chirp implied that this fact was the greatest thing since hay fries. “And I don’t think it’s fair that your club be the only club with a kitchen!”
“We ARE the cooking club,” the colt said. “And I’m the club president. And this equipment is provided by the school for the purpose of advancing the culinary arts,” he snarled, “not so a self-centered filly can have a new toy!”
“Um, Pinkie? I thought you joined every club in the school,” I asked quietly.
“Not every club,” Pinkie replied. “I skipped this one because I learned it all in middle school. So you,” she said, shooting the cooking club president a disapproving look, “don’t have to worry about me treating an oven like it was just a toy! So which one’s the best?”
The advisor spoke up. “Number seven is the newest, Pinkie dear,” she said, “but it’s electric and not so good at baking. Besides, I’m sure your club room won’t have an outlet for it. But number two in the corner is a gas stove, and it’s a fine baker with a clean burn. I can make sure the old gas hookup in your classroom is still working before it’s installed.”
“Thanks, Mrs. Cake!” Pinkie looked at me and pointed. “Well, don’t just sit there- go get it!”
“Um…” I looked from Mrs. Cake to Pinkie and back and forth a couple times more. I finally settled on Pinkie. “Are you telling me you want me to just go over there, pick up the stove, and carry it back to the club room?” Oh, my aching back.
“No, silly! Cut off the pilot light first, then shut off the gas, then disconnect the feed line!” Pinkie said. “Safety first, you know!”
“I absolutely forbid it!” the cooking club president shouted. “I challenge your very right to even suggest-“
“A CHALLENGE?” Pinkie said, and immediately she stood eyeball to eyeball with the cooking club president. “On what grounds?”
“Um…” I give the colt credit, he only hesitated for a second. Then again, any male pony who proudly claims the title of president of a high school cooking club has more than his share of gumption to start with. “That an inexperienced filly such as yourself cannot possibly put valuable kitchen equipment to its proper use!”
“Oooooh,” the faculty advisor said, smiling, “bad move.”
Pinkie grinned. It suddenly dawned on me she’d been hoping for this confrontation. She’d been looking forward to it, and she expected to stomp this foal into the ground with all four horseshoes. “I accept your challenge,” she said. “If I win, not only do I get the stove, but the cooking club must swear everlasting fealty to the SOP Brigade!”
“If I win,” the cooking club president said, not batting an eye at Pinkie’s outlandish terms, “you and yours leave and never darken our door again!”
Pinkie stepped back from the club president, considering this point. “Um… that’s not very fair to you,” she said. “You deserve a lot more than that if we win. How about… um… I know!” She went to the back of our little group and pushed Fluttershy, still in that bunny suit, to the front. As she propped the panicked, whimpering yellow pegasus up with her hooves, Pinkie said, “If we lose, you get to keep Fluttershy!”
“WHAT?” The cooking club president and I said it at once, but I was louder, and in an instant I stood between the two, glaring at Pinkie. “Pinkie, Fluttershy is not a thing to be traded around!”
“She is so!” Pinkie said, hugging Fluttershy in a manner that made the poor filly more nervous than ever. “She’s the SOP mascot, and thus SOP property! So there!”
Rainbow Dash rose into the air from behind Pinkie. “Hey,” she said, “I’m member number one of the Fluttershy Fan Club. And I say; chill out. Pinkie’s got this.” She hovered over Pinkie, looking down into her eyes, and said, “Eye of the tiger, right Pinkie?”
“You know it!”
“And besides,” Dash said as she righted herself and settled back to the floor, “this looks like it might be fun! So let’s do this thing!”
I looked into Fluttershy’s eyes, which were silently beseeching me to rescue her from the crazy pink pony. But then I looked into the crazy pink pony’s eyes… and I saw nothing but calm confidence. She didn’t think defeat was a possibility- and thus she was willing to bet Fluttershy on the outcome.
So, this is adventure, huh?
“Er… that’s not necessary!” the cooking club president said hurriedly. “Believe me, never seeing your face again is more than adequate!”
“Oh, but I insist,” Pinkie said. “Think how successful your club events will be when cute little Fluttershy is dressed up as a waitress, delivering your creations to the customers…”
Fluttershy passed out in Pinkie’s arms.
“Fine! Anything! Let’s just get on with it!”
Pinkie nodded. “Then as the challenged party I choose the nature of the challenge. And the battlefield shall be… CUPCAKES! Bring it in, Twilight!” As Twilight pushed the shopping cart in, Pinkie continued, “Two teams, Cooking Club against SOP Brigade, five ponies each! I’ve brought enough ingredients for each pony to make a tray of twenty cupcakes! I’ve also brought trays for everyone,” she pulled out a huge stack of metal cupcake trays, “eight of which the cooking club may keep for its own use after the challenge.
“All cupcakes will be made from scratch- no cake mixes!” Pinkie grinned. “Once baking is done all contestants will withdraw while Mrs. Cake ices them so we don’t know whose is whose! Then we return- and then we’ll have an eating contest! Every pony must eat at LEAST one from EVERY tray!”
My stomach froze in shock at this news. I like sweets, but ten cupcakes at one sitting? From the looks of things a couple of the cooking club members shared my feelings on the subject.
“After everyone’s sampled one cupcake from every tray, they can then go back and grab more cupcakes from whichever tray they like best! The contest ends either when all cupcakes are eaten or when nopony wants to eat any more! The team with the first tray to go empty wins… AND the team with the member who eats the most cupcakes wins! If there’s a tie, Mrs. Cake will determine the tiebreaker!” Pinkie settled back, crossed her hooves, and said, “Any questions?”
“Seems perfectly simple to me,” Mrs. Cake said. “I’m sure that when all you foals and fillies were just a bit younger, you dreamed of the day when you could eat all the cupcakes you could hold!”
One of the cooking club members raised her hoof. “Actually, once I DID get to eat all the cupcakes I could hold… and then I couldn’t hold them anymore.” The poor filly’s natural lime-green coat was going darker green by the minute.
“Nontheless the rules are quite fair,” Mrs. Cake said. “And, young man, you’re about to learn why it’s not wise to issue challenges to ponies you don’t know yet. That filly,” she pointed to Pinkie, “was the star student in my husband’s cooking classes and club at Rock Garden Middle School. She knows her way around a kitchen as well as I do.”
Pinkie smirked, and this time it was the club president’s turn to go a little green.
So, the contest happened.
On our side of things, it became clear very early on that Rainbow Dash had no business within ten feet of a stove. Pinkie Pie had to insist that, since the cooking club had Mrs. Cake to advise, she be allowed to coach the SOP brigade. Otherwise I think Dash’s cupcakes would have poisoned everybody. Fluttershy’s weren’t really much better; what she ended up with were more like very thick sugar cookies than cupcakes. Better stick to tea for now, Fluttershy, until you get more practice.
Twilight Sparkle listened to Pinkie Pie rattle off a recipe just once, nodded, and began making her own cupcakes with a precision I can only describe as mechanical. It’s the first time I ever saw someone scoop a precisely level cup of flour out of a bag- as in, the top was flat and flush with the rim of the measuring cup the moment it came into view. The rest of her effort was that mechanical, except for one moment a couple of minutes into baking when she opened her oven, stuck her horn in for a moment or two, and then made a minor adjustment to the temperature knob, murmuring something about calibration errors.
I wonder if all unicorns can use their horns as thermometers, or if it’s another one of Twilight’s strange alien powers.
Pinkie Pie, of course, was able to do her own work while going around the SOP brigade to provide advice and encouragement. Her method was a controlled chaos that had me convinced, moment to moment, that the resulting cupcakes would fall, that they’d be hard as bricks, or that the tasters would pick eggshell out of their teeth for a week. At one point she was hopping on one leg from stove to stove, stirring the batter with the upper hooves while using the raised lower hoof to hold ingredients yet to be added. I don’t know if she was showing off or if she always cooked like that.
And then there was me. I take second place to no pony when it comes to fruit pies, tarts, chips, anything involving fruit. As you might guess, I’m especially talented with apples, but I can do a lemon meringue pie almost as well, and my pecan pie will go down your throat like a delightful lead brick. But cupcakes… aren’t my thing. And when I absent-mindedly added cinnamon to the batter out of habit, I think that kind of sank any hope I had of placing in the top five. Which meant the SOP’s hopes for glory rested solely on Pinkie, unless the cooking club members had a preference for machine-made store-bought cupcakes like what I knew Twilight’s would taste like.
Then the baking was done, and one by one the contestants left the cooking club’s kitchen as Mrs. Cake began frosting the cupcakes with a simple plain white icing from a tube. That took a little while- not quite half an hour, I think, which is a lot faster than I’d be able to ice two hundred cupcakes singlehoofed.
Then we went back in, seeing ten plates of cupcakes in their wrappers, each plate with a number on it. I had a twinge when I looked at plate #10, the only one on which all the cupcakes were precisely the same height and general shape. Twilight’s, without a doubt- ones and zeroes again. Rainbow Dash’s lumpy, misshapen things on tray #5 were so obviously hers that no debate was possible. Likewise I recognized Fluttershy’s cupcake-scones on tray #6, flat, round, and as I found when I ate one, incredibly hard and dense. Fortunately the cooking club had had one failure of their own- a distinct burnt smell coming up through the icing on tray #4.
And I spotted mine as well- tray #2, the only tray of cupcakes that reeked of cinnamon.
The first ten cupcakes of course were eaten all at the same time, the group of ten rotating around the table with each cupcake in a sort of here-we-go-round-the-salt-lick parade. Thanks to blind luck or something I started out with Rainbow Dash’s tray, and the experience was… not as bad as I’d expected, but nowhere near good. Dash hadn’t bothered to mix her batter evenly, is all I’ll say on that. Twilight’s tasted plain, bland and storebought, as I expected, but so did #8 and #3, which made me feel a bit better about my chances.
Do not ask me to tell you how my own cupcake tasted. I do not want to talk about it.
As soon as the tenth cupcake was down, Fluttershy and one of the cooking club fillies surrendered. The cooking club pony, the one who had mentioned the bad experience with cupcakes as a little filly, wobbled out of the room, I suppose headed for the bathroom to un-hold her cookies. For the rest of us the eating contest began in earnest. After tasting all of the entrants, I’d decided that tray #1 and tray #7 were the two best tasting of the lot, and #1 was more recent in my mind, so I went for that one first.
So did four other ponies.
The cooking club president went for tray #7 for his eleventh cupcake, choking it down as quickly as he could, grabbing another as soon as he could set aside an empty wrapper from the first, before he’d even finished chewing.
Twilight simply continued where she left off on her parade around the table, taking a cupcake, eating it efficiently, then spiking the wrapper on her horn. One of the cooking club fillies, also a unicorn, saw this and began doing likewise. Everyone else made trips back and forth to their ovens and laid the wrappers on the stovetop.
And Pinkie? She went over to tray #2 and ate one of my cupcakes, showing every sign that she loved cinnamon cupcakes with vanilla icing. Then she bounded to #5, Rainbow’s rejects, and ate one of those with every bit as much enjoyment. Then she took one from #6, and I swear I saw that one hit her tummy and rebound.
I managed to get one more cupcake from tray #1 before it was emptied. Another cooking club member dropped out with cupcake #13, taken from tray #7. The cooking club president was on his fourth from the same tray when I went over and almost- almost- took one from there. Then I saw Pinkie take one from #10 and eat it, actually humming out loud with delight as she snarfed it down.
I didn’t know which tray Pinkie’s was, though I hoped it was the now empty #1. But anyone who had paid more than passing attention to our side of the battle would have known, despite Mrs. Cake’s one-size-hides-all icing, which cupcakes belonged to the rest of the SOP Brigade. And Pinkie was deliberately seeking out the substandard Brigade baked goods and making a point of obviously enjoying them.
I took my hoof away from tray #7 and took a cupcake off of tray #10, stepped in front of Twilight (who had just swallowed one of Fluttershy’s gut-bombs whole) and made certain she saw me eat that cupcake. I took my time with it, smiling all the way. I then took one more, just to make the point.
I didn’t eat any more of Fluttershy’s or Rainbow Dash’s, though. I’m sorry, girls, but there are limits to what my mouth and my stomach will endure for loyalty. I took one from #4, though, because every pony has a bad day, and besides they weren’t burned all that badly.
That made fifteen cupcakes in my belly, which my belly decided was quite enough, thank you, and by the way don’t expect to sleep well tonight.
When Rainbow Dash finished cupcake number nineteen I could hear her stomach making really disturbing noises. She groaned, her face a color I never imagined could exist in the natural spectrum, but she pushed herself back to the trays for one more. Fortunately I pulled her back and shoved her out into the hall before she could do herself- or the rest of us- serious harm. She told me later she barely made it to the toilet before bringing it all up again- and in the very next breath demanded a rematch once she’d had time to train in competitive eating.
By the time I closed the door behind Rainbow Dash the eating was down to Pinkie, Twilight, and the cooking club president. The cooking club president had finished off tray #7 at last and was working his way through #8, but his chewing was slow and reluctant. Pinkie Pie seemed to be vibrating a little bit, but she was still working her way through the SOP Brigade product, though I noticed with a little pride that tray #2 held a couple fewer than trays #5 and #6. Apparently someone besides Pinkie had enjoyed cinnamon cupcakes.
And Twilight looked as if she had just begun the contest, still making a very democratic circuit of the table, eating one, and moving on. Apparently her motto was, no cupcake left behind.
Finally the cooking club president put a wrapper on his quite large stack on his stove, turned slowly back to the trays, and then collapsed to the floor, curling up into a ball and moaning in pain. He hit the wall at twenty-seven cupcakes. Mrs. Cake checked to make sure he was all right before saying, “Well, I’m ready to call this if-“
“Not yet, Mrs. Cake!” Pinkie cried. “We can’t quit until there’s a winner!”
On hearing that, I relaxed. Mrs. Cake wouldn’t have said anything about calling it unless we’d won both contests. With only Pinkie and Twilight still scarfing down cupcakes, the SOP Brigade had definitely won that half of the contest. Tray #1 had been the first to empty out, and if it had belonged to any of the cooking club that would have ended in a tie, with some sort of tie-breaker needed. The fact that there was no tie meant that tray #1 had been an SOP Brigade tray… and there was only one SOP Brigade member it could have been.
For the record, Twilight Sparkle won the eating contest, thirty-eight cupcakes to Pinkie’s thirty-five. Pinkie claimed that she would have won in the end if the cupcakes hadn’t run out, a claim Twilight, of course, accepted in total silence.
The school custodian installed the stove in the literature club room the very next day. Once it was in place, we all went to the cooking club room to watch Pinkie administer the oath of total obedience and fealty to the cooking club’s president. I don’t know how much of his rotten expression came from lingering stomachache or having been defeated… but I’m sure a good chunk of it came from the nature of the oath.
“Cross my heart, hope to fly,
Stick a cupcake in my eye!”
I thought he was going to fold up again when he repeated that, but he managed to do it… and then do it again when Pinkie made him do the dance that went along with it, which ended with him holding a hoof over one eye.
That done, Pinkie smiled and hugged the cooking club president. “That’s settled, then!” she said. “I’ll be along now and again to check up on you, and I’ll apply for auxiliary membership in the cooking club in case you need me for things.” Then her expression turned sinister as she leaned up over the club president (who was a good bit taller than she was) and added, “But remember… a Pinkie Promise isn’t something you can just forget. A Pinkie Promise is good…”
Lightning flashed outside, and the power flickered out just long enough for a demonic-looking Pinkie Pie to say,
“FOREVER!!”
The lights came back on, and the cooking club president lay passed out on his back.
I would have said something to Pinkie about doing cruel things like that if Mrs. Cake and I hadn’t been so busy laughing.
a blending of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya by Nagaru Tanigawa and My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic developed by Lauren Faust
Chapter 4
Tea and cupcakes make for a fine combination, as the SOP Brigade learned the Wednesday that the oven was installed. Fluttershy isn’t that bad at baking when she’s not under pressure, and Pinkie Pie was at her side guiding her every step of the way... whether she wanted the help or not. And the tea… well, if there were any such thing as apple tea, that might possibly be better than what Fluttershy brews, but I can’t imagine anything else even close.
The only thing strange about that snack was Fluttershy herself… or, I should say, Fluttershy’s clothes. Yet again she wore that bunny girl costume. Even Rainbow Dash, the self-proclaimed member number one of the Fluttershy Fan Club, looked a little weirded out by this, though she might just have thought Fluttershy shouldn’t be quite so easily visible by the unwashed masses. Even someone totally into fillies could only look at the same butterfly-marked flank for so long.
So I wasn’t surprised when Pinkie Pie, after sipping her tea, said, “That doesn’t look right,” she said. “Bunny girls only serve snacks and drinks in night clubs.” Then she did surprise me: “We need a different outfit for when you serve meals here in the club room.”
Wait a minute. Fluttershy’s tea might be the best I’ve ever tasted, but that doesn’t give you the right to turn her into your own part-time waitress!
“But I like bunnies,” Fluttershy said in that tiny voice that could be ignored so very easily… and of course Pinkie did just that.
“I’ll go get something more appropriate!” she said, bounding out of the room and slamming the door in Rainbow Dash’s face as she followed. Dash opened the door again and trotted after her, calling to Pinkie Pie to wait up, leaving Fluttershy and myself to look at one another in bewilderment.
Twilight Sparkle, of course, kept reading her book.
About ten minutes later Pinkie and Dash rushed back into the room carrying something black and white with her. “Here!” she chirped. “Change into this, quick!”
“Now hold on a minute!” I shouted. “If whatever that is is all that, why don’t you wear it?”
“Because I’m not the SOP Brigade’s mascot, silly!” Pinkie said. “It wouldn’t be proper for a brigade leader to dress up in a maid uniform!”
“Besides,” Dash added, “Fluttershy is going to look SO AWESOME in it! We’ll turn the adorable level up to eleven!”
I stood between Fluttershy and the two grinning fillies. “If Fluttershy doesn’t want to wear it, you’re not gonna make her!” I said.
“… but there’s only one of you…” Pinkie continued, her smile a carbon copy of Rainbow’s.
“… and two of us!” Dash finished.
The two ponies stepped forward in unison.
What happened next I’m not going to describe, except that it was at least half as humiliating for me as it must have been for Fluttershy. It ended with me on the outside of the club room door, locked out while high-pitched squeaks and whimpers, punctuated by thumps and clattering of hooves, seeped through the door and into my ears.
After a couple minutes the club door unlocked, and I stepped back into the room.
The maid costume was surprisingly modest, the skirt reaching almost to Fluttershy’s fetlocks, the apron neckline right up to her throat. Rainbow Dash had just finished tying the apron ties behind Fluttershy's wings, nodding to herself with satisfaction. “Yep,” she said to her self, “just as I thought, about twenty percent cuter.”
“See? That wasn’t so bad, now was it?” Pinkie Pie chirped. “Now let’s have some more tea, okay?”
Fluttershy looked ready to shrink in on herself until she either vanished or turned into a tiny yellow black hole, collapsed under the gravitational pull of infinite mortification. Still trembling, she managed to unfold herself enough to walk over to the stove. As she passed me, she shot me a single glance of absolute reproach.
I’m sorry, Fluttershy. I couldn’t protect you after all.
I wouldn't have mentioned any of that except that that little scene probably derailed what was supposed to have happened the very next day... when the final member of the SOP Brigade was recruited, or more accurately drafted.
Thursday went about as normal until third period, when Pinkie got my attention by yanking on my hair. I hate when ponies that. I do not let my mane grow long just so some obnoxious filly can rein me in like a rodeo steer!
“What is it, Pinkie?” I asked, pulling my mane out of her grip with one hoof.
“Haven’t you heard the news?” Pinkie snapped. “Everyone’s talking about the new transfer student in class 1-9!”
I don’t pay much attention to idle gossip.
“If you don’t listen, you miss everything!”
I shrugged. “So there’s a new transfer student. We lose one, we gain one. What’s the difference?”
“Are you kidding? Trixie transferring out of this school was suspicious! But a student transferring INTO a public high school only a few weeks into first term? And into the advanced math and sciences class? That’s SUPER DOUBLE suspicious!” Pinkie folded her forelegs and nodded decisively. “That makes the new student SOP Brigade business!”
Super double SOP Brigade business, no doubt.
“Exactly!”
So, does that mean we go to their home and ask embarrassing questions? Or do we do five circuits of the school hoping to spot them?
“You just leave it all to me!” Pinkie replied. “This calls for a careful, diplomatic touch, so I’ll take care of it myself.”
That suited me fine. In fact, I withheld the comments that came to mind concerning Pinkie Pie’s diplomatic skills, or rather the lack thereof. Later I realized it wasn’t as much of a joke as I’d thought. After all, who else would Pinkie send? Twilight Sparkle would just stare silently until the new student, whoever he or she was, got scared off. Fluttershy would mumble in her softest voice, getting more and more embarrassed until her throat finally seized up out of mortification. Rainbow Dash… diplomatic? No. She’d just grab one hoof while Pinkie grabbed the other and haul the victim away.
And me? I’d tell whoever it was to run away from us on sight. Every pony in the SOP Brigade is CRAZY. Including me, because I haven’t run away yet myself.
Compared to the other options, Pinkie Pie could be secretary-general of the United Neightions.
So when Pinkie vanished at lunchtime as usual I paid no attention, except to banter words with Lyra and Bon Bon about Pinkie’s apparent interest in the new student. According to them, the new student was a mare with some kind of elegant foreign accent- possibly Trottingham, or at least high-class Mareican. She had transferred in from a private school, one of the ones that took pride in claiming to train the future leaders of the nation.
And Pinkie Pie intends to recruit that into a renegade club with an insane name and even more insane goals? Good luck, I thought to myself. When I went to the club room after classes there was a spring in my step all the way up the stairs.
Rainbow Dash wasn’t there; she was practicing with the track team. Nor was Pinkie, even though she’d vanished from class the instant homeroom was dismissed. Twilight Sparkle, of course, sat in her chair reading yet another book, looking more like a strange piece of furniture than a living pony. And Fluttershy was just squeezing into that black-and-white maid costume, with a teapot already on the boil on the club’s new stovetop.
I found a chair and dropped into it gratefully, taking the cup offered by Fluttershy and sipping the delicious tea, savoring the taste. For this brief moment, the literature club room held nothing but peace and quiet. If it could remain like this, I thought, I’d be perfectly happy with being part of the SOP Brigade.
Of course that was a foal's hope, dashed when the door slammed open and Pinkie Pie strutted in on hind legs, one foreleg hugging a picture of sheer elegance. The newcomer's half-lidded eyes fluttered with long, carefully curled eyelashes, eyeshadow precisely and perfectly applied on the lids. Her North High uniform had been subtly altered, with extra embroidered trim running along the collar and sleeve cuffs. The blouse had been adjusted to taper in slightly behind the barrel. Her coat, such as we could see of it, was so pristine a white it would have looked like she had been painted that color, if her deep blue-violet mane hadn’t given the rest of her fur a slight blue tint from reflection.
“Hi, everyone!” Pinkie half-guided, half-dragged the strange filly into the club room. “I’ve brought us the SOP Brigade’s newest recruit! This is Rarity Belle!”
Rarity took a step forward and said, “I’m honored to join you. I ho-oh-oh- OH MY WORD!” Her eyes, which had been half-lidded when she walked in, bugged wide open the instant she looked at Fluttershy. She zipped up in front of the SOP Brigade mascot, looking her up and down with ever-increasing horror. “Oh, no, no, NO! This simply will NOT do! Stark black and white with THAT coat and THAT mane? This is a fashion emergency!”
Before Fluttershy could do more than give out a strangled peep of protest Rarity grabbed her and hauled her to the door, where Pinkie still stood, just as dumbfounded as the rest of us… well, just as dumbfounded as me. I would pay good bits to see Twilight dumbfounded… or maybe not, since anything that would- but I’m getting away from the point.
“I DO beg your pardon, Pinkie Pie,” Rarity gasped hurriedly, “but I have to get this poor fashion victim down to the sewing club room IMMEDIATELY! Oh, I only hope they have some spare bolts of silk...”
“Um… okay?” Pinkie just blinked and stared as Rarity dragged a rigid Fluttershy off behind her.
In the silence that followed we could all hear Twilight Sparkle turning a page.
And that, for all practical purposes, ended the SOP Brigade’s Thursday meeting.
Pinkie recovered in time for the Friday meeting, which she began by once more introducing Rarity all over again as if nothing had happened. “This is Rarity Belle! She’s going to be the newest member of the SOP Brigade! I want all of you to make her feel welcome!”
This time Rainbow Dash was with us, and she spoke for all of us: “Where’s Fluttershy? She didn’t show up for afternoon homeroom.”
“Well!” Rarity posed, placing one forehoof on her chest in a stereotypically dramatic fashion. “When I briefly visited yesterday I saw a horrible sight that simply demanded action! I did most of the work at home, but I needed Fluttershy for the final fitting… and now I unveil to you my latest masterpiece! Simple, but elegant and functional!”
Fluttershy stepped out from behind a changing screen in the corner of the room. The maid costume she’d worn had been changed from black and white to a pink and white outfit that matched her mane perfectly. Her sleeves had been poofed up slightly, while at the same time her skirt had been tailored to fit somewhat closer around her flanks. Her hind legs were encased in elegant, perfectly-fitting white stockings.
And- most interesting of all- Rarity had incorporated the bunny ears and tail from the bunny-filly outfit into the new maid costume.
All in all, the dress seemed more fitting for a waitress at some strange café, but Fluttershy smiled as she showed it off to us. And I had to admit, as cute as she looked in the standard maid outfit, she looked so much better in this specially made costume.
“The apron is off-the-peg, I’m afraid, same with the stockings, but everything else I sewed myself. Fluttershy made some interesting suggestions with the stitches on the pleating- I think she knows more about sewing even than I do, and I’ve been studying to be a fashionista ever since I was eight!”
Fluttershy blushed and tried to hide her face in her mane.
Rainbow Dash slumped forward on a table, holding her head in both forehooves as she gaped in wonder. "So... so... ADORABLY... AWESOME!!" she gasped at last.
“Wow… that is incredible!” For about two whole seconds Pinkie Pie stood in the same jaw-dropped astonishment as Rainbow Dash. Then she trotted over to her desk and pulled out her Palamino camera. “We have GOT to capture this for posterity!”
“I’m gonna have to get more membership cards printed!” Rainbow Dash said, bouncing up to stand beside the cosplaying filly. “When the Fluttershy Fan Club hears about this, EVERYBODY’s gonna wanna join!”
The two designing mares took Fluttershy away from the designer mare and began putting her through pose after pose, going through roll after roll of film. It didn’t take all that long before the poses became more revealing than Fluttershy was comfortable with.
“Come on!” Pinkie shouted. “All we want is just a glimpse of that cutie mark! Dashie, can you make it look like she’s just tripped?”
“On it!” Dash dragged Fluttershy to the ground and threw her skirts up, much to Fluttershy’s horror. Pinkie’s camera clicked and clicked and clicked.
I reached down and pulled Fluttershy’s skirts back into place. “All right, that’s enough,” I said. “You two fillies have had your fun. Now let her be.”
“Oh, come on!” Pinkie Pie said. “It’s just getting to be fun!” She looked up at Rarity and asked, “Why don’t you join us? You deserve a turn playing with Fluttershy!”
Rarity looked at me for a moment and then shook her head. “Considering the possible consequences, dears, I really must beg off.”
Pinkie pouted, then looked over at the mare sitting in the corner. “What about you, Twilight?”
Flip. Twilight’s eyes stayed locked on her book.
“Okay, then,” Pinkie shrugged. “I guess three rolls of film will have to do. We’ll use the best shots to promote the SOP Brigade!”
“And the Fluttershy Fan Club!”
Flip.
“Er… and the Literature Club too!” Pinkie said. “But that’s for next week! It’s time to discuss tomorrow’s SOP Brigade activities!”
Wait a minute… tomorrow is Saturday. As in, no school for two days. What is this about activities for tomorrow?
“It’s time the SOP Brigade expanded our patrols into the city! The mysteries of the unknown are just sitting out there, waiting for us to uncover them!”
I looked around at the others. Twilight’s eyes were still glued to the book. As for the others, Rainbow Dash seemed eager to try whatever was in Pinkie’s head. Fluttershy looked as timid as ever, but she wouldn’t meet my eyes when she saw me looking at her. And Rarity smiled some sort of enigmatic smile, as if she had some secret nobody else knew.
So, support for telling Pinkie Pie where she could stuff her mysteries: right about zero.
“So everyone meet up in front of Joe’s Donuts and Cakes across from the shopping district train station, 9:00 sharp tomorrow morning!” Pinkie got up on her hind legs and crossed her arms. “Anyone who’s late will receive a penalty!”
I arrived at the station at 8:55 AM the next morning.
All the way to the station I grumbled to myself about the stupidity of it all. I ought to be spending the day with Applebloom, or on the train to spend the weekend with Big MacIntosh and Granny Smith upcountry in the orchard. If all else failed, I ought to be in my room catching up on studies that were already suffering on account of letting myself be dragged around by a pink pony who, by any definition, was certifiable.
Instead I was trotting a couple miles out of my way on a Saturday morning, with no explanation to my family, just so I could indulge Pinkie Pie in a hopeless effort to find things that didn’t exist.
Or… I remembered what had happened in the classroom with Trixie. And how Twilight had put a stop to it.
If aliens and magic existed… what other mysterious things that Pinkie Pie believed in really existed?
Anyway, I got to the station five minutes early… and I was still the last to arrive. All five of the other SOP Brigade ponies stood under the station clock. One in particular stepped forward, brand-name T-shirt and denim skirt bouncing along with her poofy pink mane, and shouted, “Penalty!”
“What do you mean, penalty?” I asked. “Look up- it’s still four minutes of nine!” I pointed to the station clock for evidence.
“The last person to arrive always pays a penalty!” Pinkie pie replied.
“Since when?”
“Since about ten minutes ago! It’s a new brigade rule I just made!” Pinkie Pie rose on her hind legs, one forehoof on her hips and the other pointing straight at me. “And for being late, you’re going to buy drinks for everyone!”
Of course. How could I ever have thought- “Wait a minute,” I said, “Maybe you can spare the money for all those drinks, but I can’t!” I didn’t get all that much pocket money from the folks, because most of what the family earned went back to the farm to keep it going. Even at as affordable a place as Joe’s Donuts and Cakes, my purse would empty out before the day even began.
“If it were easy, it wouldn’t be a penalty, now would it?” Pinkie grinned. “Come on, everybody!” She swiveled on one hoof like a dancer, then dropped back down on all fours and bounced over to the café. Fluttershy followed, wearing a pink dress with a yellow cardigan pulled over it. Rainbow Dash, wearing a tank top and sweat pants, kept step with Fluttershy, playing the loyal guard to the hilt. Twilight Sparkle still wore her North High uniform- doesn’t that filly have anything else in her closet? Anyway, she followed the others, brushing past me without turning her head or saying a word.
A moment after Twilight brushed past me I felt something brush against me on the other side. My saddlebag, the one with my purse in it, suddenly felt a little heavier.
“Don’t worry about the drinks, darling,” Rarity whispered in my ear. “And don’t tell Pinkie Pie about this.”
For one brief instance I was ready to make a scene in the middle of the street, with dozens of passers-by watching, never mind Pinkie Pie and the others. An Apple has her pride, you know! I might be hard up for cash with this demanding, cloud-brained earth pony around, but that doesn’t mean I’m asking for a handout!
Before I could open my mouth to say those words, my brain caught up with my pride. Are you that eager to foot the bill for Pinkie’s demands? it said. She gets to enforce her penalty and get her free drink, and nobody’s the wiser except you and Rarity. So where, exactly, do you get hurt in this?
So I kept my mouth shut and brought up the rear as we all walked into Joe’s and took a booth in the back. We all ordered our drinks as soon as we sat down… except for Twilight Sparkle. She asked for a menu and then spent five or six minutes looking over each and every option. It’s rude to rush someone when they’re ordering at a restaurant, but eventually all of us were silently watching Sparkle as she read that menu, wondering what she’d finally pick at the end-
“Apricot.”
The whole table let out a long sigh of relief, and Pinkie complimented her on her choice. Meanwhile I took the menu and skimmed over the drinks list on a hunch.
Sure enough, she’d picked the option that came first in alphabetical order, there being no such thing as apple tea and apple juice not being available.
While the rest of us sipped our drinks, Pinkie took six toothpicks, pulled out a marker, and made marks on four of them. “We’re going to divide up into three teams!” she said. “Everyone draws a toothpick to pick pairs! We’ll go patrol the shopping district, and we’ll meet back here at 12:30 for lunch!” She juggled the toothpicks around in her forehooves to mix them up, then held them out for each of us, starting with me.
When it was done, Fluttershy and I had drawn the blank toothpicks. Rainbow Dash and Rarity had drawn the toothpicks with a single mark. Pinkie Pie was left holding one of the toothpicks with a double mark, which paired her up with Twilight Sparkle. Her face fell slightly as she realized this, I noticed. What? Were you hoping to pair up with someone in particular? Then why didn’t you just name your pairs?
Anyway, the bill came, and I fished around in my saddlebag until I found the bits Rarity had dropped in. The little bag had a lot more than were needed to cover the tab. Remembering Rarity’s request to keep her involvement secret, I tried to keep a straight face as I paid the bill, but as we walked out I got next to her and whispered, “You gave me way too much money.”
“Keep it for the next penalty,” Rarity whispered back, quickly stepping away from me and over to Rainbow Dash.
I considered the matter carefully, not that it needed much considering. What odds that Pinkie would find some reason to demand more free drinks, or even free lunch? Pretty good. In fact, the more I thought about those odds, the more they approached unity.
Besides, it’d look funny if I paid out of two different coin purses in the same day, right?
A long row of cherry trees runs along the river, separated from the water by a broad cobbled path. The last of the cherry blossoms had fallen a couple weeks before, but the trees were still beautiful to me- not as nice as apple trees, but the green leaves and thick trunks always made me feel better.
Fluttershy and I had gone into the park while the other two pairs had headed to the mall and the business district, respectively. For a few minutes I made a pretense of looking around for strange things- I don’t know what, since Pinkie didn’t say. Once I was sure the others were well and truly gone, though, I just tried to enjoy the morning stroll on a beautiful spring day.
Fluttershy, on the other hand, didn’t seem to be enjoying herself at all. In fact, she seemed to get more tense with every step we took along the cobblestone walkways. Finally, as we passed a park bench, she murmured, “Could we sit down for a few minutes, please?”
I’m not much of a person for sitting around, really. Even the idle walking had begun to get on my nerves. There were all sorts of things I could be doing, productive things, instead of catering to the latest brainstorm of a certain bossy pony. Sitting down and doing nothing whatever appealed to me about as much as a pear parfait topped with hot sauce.
But I wasn’t going to take it out on Fluttershy. “Sure,” I said, and we sat together on that bench, haunches down, forelegs straight, as proper fillies should. For several minutes we sat in silence and watched the passersby, families with children, couples obviously out on dates, even an artist or two with painting supplies balanced on their backs and pouring from their saddlebags.
Then, just before I gave in to the urge to start fidgeting my forehooves to relieve the strain of doing nothing, my companion on the bench looked at her own hooves and whispered, “Applejack? I have something important to tell you… if you don’t mind… um… where do I start… I’m sorry… I’m no good at things like this… it’s so hard to explain… I may not even be able to say it… and it’s not like you’ll believe me…”
“Let a filly get in a word edgewise, ‘Shy,” I said. “Just spit it out and we can go from there, OK?”
“All right.” She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and then looked right at me. Those eyes pinned me to the bench. I would never, not until the sun refused to shine, never have thought such a stare could come from such a shy, introverted, nonconfrontational mare like Fluttershy. It was like she’d packed up all her dithering and lack of self-confidence in a little box and put it away for the summer, and all that was left was rock solid determination. That stare said, one way or another, I was going to learn something.
Her voice didn’t quite match the stare, but it was stronger than I could remember hearing it before. “I do not belong in this epoch,” she said. “I’ve come here from the future.”
O… kay. Definitely learned something, all right. I wish I knew what.
Once Fluttershy got started, it seemed like she wasn’t going to stop.
“I’m not allowed to tell you anything about the time I come from, or anything about your future. People like me are restricted from talking about those things. I’ll tell you as much as I can, but if I try to say anything that’s not strictly necessary to my mission, it will automatically be blocked. I can’t help it. Please remember that as you listen, okay?
“First, time isn’t a linear process. It’s not fluid, either, not as you understand it. It works like an accumulation of punctuated planes, with one past not necessarily leading to any other future. Do you understand?”
“Nope. Sorry, not a bit.”
“Oh… let’s see, then- I know! Did you ever have a flip-book as a little filly?”
“I think I’ve seen one, yeah.”
“Well, time is like that. Each frame of animation is a different time frame. There are breaks between each frame, but those breaks occur so often that the rate is very nearly zero- billions and billions in each second. Time travel means moving from one frame to another, across those breaks. A time traveler is like adding a drawing into one page of the flip book. It doesn’t change the other pages. It doesn’t change the story as it was, except for that one frame.
“So you see, the flow of time isn’t analog like the river,” she gestured to the river. “It’s digital, an emergent phenomenon caused by the accumulation of a nearly infinite number of time frames. However, for a long time we have known that there is some defect in the flow of time. We’ve never been able to pinpoint it, but the future I live in, and your time frame as well, should not exist in the shape that they do. The main purpose of time travel has been to seek out the discontinuity in the accumulated time frames that would account for the...” Fluttershy trailed off as she finally noticed my confusion.
I shook my head slowly. “Nope. Still not getting it. Sorry, Fluttershy.”
The stare faltered, and Fluttershy spent a couple moments looking at her hooves again. “Oh… um… well, do you understand that I come from the future? And that I don’t really, well, belong in your time frame?”
I think I can just barely get a bite on that, yes. For the sake of discussion.
“Okay. Then I can tell you why I came to your time in the first place.”
For a few seconds Fluttershy paused, gathering herself. All this time ponies continued to pass by on the sidewalk, but nobody paid us the least bit of attention.
“Three years ago my people detected a large timequake… um, that’s a phenomenon that happens when the time frames are altered or shifted or… oh, right, you said you didn’t understand that. Also, I need to point out that it was three years ago counting back from the current time, more or less. Actually, almost exactly three years ago. Anyway, the timequake originated from this city while you and Pinkie Pie were middle school students.”
Three years ago… something familiar there, for some reason, but I couldn’t place it exactly.
“We sent agents back to that point in time to investigate. When we got there, we were shocked. Since the timequake, all time travel prior to the epicenter is impossible. We cannot go back in time farther than three years ago.
“We decided that something created an enormous time fault at that point in history. But time faults usually cross more than one time frame and can be worked around. We couldn’t figure out why the fault was limited to this epoch- indeed, that one day. That is, we couldn’t figure it out until just recently. Um, just recently back in my home time frame.”
The tiny bells that rang for the phrase three years ago became huge heavy brass bells that sank into the pit of my stomach. “And the reason is?”
“Pinkie Pie.”
I figured. First Twilight Sparkle, then Trixie, and now you. If Pinkie Pie thinks half as much of herself as you ponies do of her, she’d be the most conceited filly on Earth.
Three years ago- I remembered now. Twilight Sparkle had mentioned some kind of “data flood” happening three years ago, coming from Pinkie Pie. Now Fluttershy was saying pretty near the same thing, translated from one form of gobbledygook to another.
“We narrowed the epicenter of the timequake all the way down to one person. She was at the center. Please don’t ask how we did this, it’s all classified information and I certainly won’t be allowed to explain. But we are definitely certain.” The stare was back, serious and sincere. “Pinkie Pie is the one who closed the door to the past.”
I can't believe any one pony could do such a thing. Not even the Great and Powerful Pinkie Pie.
“We didn’t think so either. We don’t know how she did it, either. And so far as we can tell, she did it without any conscious desire or overt act. She has no idea that there ever was a timequake, much less that she caused it.
“And she might…” The stare faltered and vanished, and the confident voice fled with it. When Fluttershy completed the sentence, staring at her forelegs and shaking slightly, it was in the voice I was accustomed to hearing from her. “She might do it again at any moment. And next time it might not be just a simple time fault. That’s why I was sent here.”
“To stop her from doing it?”
“No,” Fluttershy whispered. “I’m not an expert. I’m not an elite agent. I’m just an observer.” She slumped forward, pretty much lying on the bench now. “All I can do is watch and report home. That’s all I’m trained for.”
I sat in silence and tried to swallow everything I’d just heard. It was a mightly hard swallow, but recent events had opened my eyes, to mix metaphors.
“I guess you don’t believe a word of this.”
“I won’t say yes or no about that,” I said. “But supposing I do believe you. Why tell me?”
“Classified information,” she said, and then twitched in surprise. The words came out of her mouth in a different inflection than anything that came before, either the shy whisper or the calm, firm not-quite-whisper. “I mean…” The old voice came back again. “Um… we believe everything Pinkie Pie does is for a reason, even if she doesn’t know it. She chose you, first and foremost, so you must be important to her in some way.”
“What about Twilight Sparkle? Rainbow Dash? Rarity?”
“Pinkie Pie didn’t pick Rainbow Dash. Dash just tagged along with me, and Pinkie accepted her. But Twilight Sparkle and Rarity are classified information-“ There was that strange voice again. “Um… they’re a lot like me, in a different way. I was surprised to see Twilight already recruited, and I was shocked when she found Rarity too. She must have known… but she didn’t… but…”
“Do you know what Twilight Sparkle is?”
The strange voice responded, “Classified information.”
“What about Rarity?”
“Classified information.”
“What happens if I tell Pinkie Pie everything you just told me?”
“Classified information.”
“Uh huh.”
“I’m sorry,” Fluttershy squeaked in her normal voice, lying back down on the bench and trying to hide under her long mane. “I know you don’t believe me… I just… I just…”
“Hold on a minute, sugarcube.” I put a hoof on Fluttershy’s shoulder. She flinched, and if she hadn’t been lying down she would have jerked away. “I ain’t saying yes, and I ain’t saying no. You’ve given me a lot to think about, so let’s just leave it there for the time being, all right.”
“All… all right,” Fluttershy agreed, slowly lifting herself back up on her haunches. A smile peeped shyly around her bangs. “Just act normally around me, please. I’m counting on you.”
“Why should I act any other way?”
Fluttershy actually blushed and looked away from me.
“Can I ask you one more question?”
“What is it?”
“How old are you- really?”
The smile quit hiding behind her bangs.
“That’s classified,” she said in her own voice.
Of course we were the last pair back at Joe’s, but before Pinkie could say anything about more penalties, Rainbow Dash offered to treat us all to lunch. “It’s no problem!” she said. “Why, for all I know my family might own this diner! I don’t exactly keep track…”
Fluttershy and I both raised our eyebrows at this, but Pinkie didn’t seem to notice. Her mind was focused on composing a song to be sung in the key of Bored Flat, and she proceeded to sing it to us, at length, as we all ate.
Out of the six of us, Pinkie and Twilight had apparently had the least eventful morning, wandering around the steel spires of the business district. To hear Pinkie tell it they avoided all the proper streets and sidewalks while patrolling pretty much every back alley in the place. I didn’t bother to make comments about the dangers of young fillies alone in alleys. I didn’t think Pinkie Pie knew the meaning of fear, and after seeing Twilight in action against Trixie I felt sorry for any mugger who targeted her.
Rainbow Dash and Rarity had taken the mall and boutiques for their patrol, and each of them had ended up spending a good bit of money, to judge from the extra bags each of them carried. Apparently they’d also spent some time in a games arcade, since Rainbow’s main subject of conversation was the epic competition in the batting booths and the hoofball nets, where Rarity had given Rainbow Dash a surprising challenge for an underclassman.
My report, of course, was short and to the point. Went to the park, saw nothing, the end. Not a word about the conversation I’d had with Fluttershy.
By the time Rainbow Dash paid the bill for lunch (Joe’s turned out to be independently owned), Pinkie’s mane was drooping a bit, though it wasn’t completely flat and straight yet. She pulled out the same toothpicks from earlier, and again we all drew lots for new pairings. This time Pinkie paired with Rainbow Dash, and though both fillies covered up disappointment, I could see Pinkie’s mane droop a little more as Dash stared at Fluttershy, who’d paired off with Rarity.
That left me with Twilight Sparkle.
“All right!” Pinkie Pie said. “Everybody meet back at the station at four! There’s gotta be something out there for us to find!”
Twilight and I lingered by the train station while the other split up, going north and south to patrol the remaining section of the commercial district and the seashore.
After a few minutes of silent standing and watching, I muttered, “Um… Twilight?”
She stared at me, silently, expressionless. It didn’t seem creepy anymore, not so soon after having had a true master of staring looking directly into my soul.
“That stuff you were trying to tell me about in your apartment… I think I’m starting to believe it.” When this produced no reaction, I added, "But if you don't mind, I've got a few questions that are bugging me."
Twilight nodded, then began walking without a word. Once across the street she stopped to look at me for a moment, then continued walking, headed towards the riverside and the park. Obviously I was supposed to follow, and so I did, wondering what she was thinking.
I soon found out. In ten minutes we were both sitting on a park bench- the same park bench Fluttershy had given her little confession on.
Once we were settled, Twilight watched a last few passersby walk along the sidewalk. After a minute or so the path was empty except for the fading sound of departing hoofsteps. “We will not be overheard,” she said quietly.
“Good,” I said. Not that I expected anyone would pay attention to our conversation, or think we were anything other than nuts if they did listen.
“I want to talk about data losses,” I said quietly. “You were sent here from wherever you came from, like that picture the computer club was fooling with. But something went wrong. What happened?”
“The Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn is made entirely of data,” Twilight Sparkle replied. “As yet the process of duplicating the mind of part of the Overmind into an organic equiform interface is imperfect. This unit is highly functional and suited for its assigned task of observing Pinkamena Pie. Thus it was retained despite the data losses incurred in translation. Units which did not function were deleted.”
“Deleted?!” I jumped up, standing on the bench, shouting down at Twilight, who just looked back at me, unruffled. “You mean you people kill your own kind just because they’re imperfect?”
“No personality death has occurred,” Twilight Sparkle said, her voice as dull and lifeless as ever. “All data is retained after deletion and reintegrated into the original. I am merely an extension of the Twilight Sparkle which is part of the Overmind. When this unit is deleted, my data will be merged with hers.”
In one sense I felt a bit better for hearing that. In another sense… it sounded like religious mumbo-jumbo again. I settled back onto the bench. “So you’re a copy?”
Twilight cocked her head again. “That term is not wholly inaccurate.”
“Um… yeah. Anyway… what was your data loss? Trixie was predicting four percent for me, going the other direction.”
“This unit suffered six percent degradation.”
“So, what are you missing?” I asked. “A kidney? Your liver?”
“All organic interfaces are fully functional on the physical level. Data transfer is limited to mind and personality. My social skills and emotional controls were corrupted.”
“I don’t get it,” I said. Well, I did get the social skills part, but saying that out loud would have been cruel.“You’ve got the best emotional control of anyone I’ve ever seen.”
“No,” Twilight said. “My mode of expression is not voluntary.”
Oh.
Oh.
Oh, buck me.
I imagined Applebloom taking my favorite blouse to make doll dresses out of, being furious at losing a fifty-bit top to her scissors. Then I imagined being that angry… and being absolutely, completely incapable of doing anything about it. Imagine the sadness you felt when a parent or grandparent you loved very much died… and now imagine being completely incapable of crying, shouting, or doing anything at all to get it out of your system.
But… but I’d seen hints, time and again, of emotion in Twilight’s face. Once I’d seen honest surprise, just over a week before, when I hugged her. Maybe Twilight wasn’t all that broken.
Or maybe she had to get a good long run up to have an emotion strong enough to break through the wall in her head.
Or maybe I was really, really regretting having asked the questions.
“Okay, forget all that for now,” I said.
“I cannot-“
“I meant, let’s change the subject,” I said hurriedly. “Pinkie Pie changes the world around her, I think you said. I saw her create that illusion of Trixie to say goodbye to. You say she does a lot more- that’s she’s capable of a lot more, right? And you were sent here from the Integrated, um… you said her name was Celestia or whoever… whatever… to watch and see if she does it again. Have I got the basics down?”
“Your summary is sufficient. Celestia is merely the dominant entity. The personalities together make up the Data Overmind. There are other leading factions, less dominant at the moment.”
“Good. Now here comes a whopper of a question: why tell me?” I threw up my forehooves in a shrug. “I’m just an ordinary farm mare. I’m not an alien, I’m not a time traveler, and I think I’d know by now if I were a superhero of some kind. Even if all you say is true, what could I possibly do about it?”
“You are not ordinary,” Twilight Sparkle said. Was it my imagination that I heard a slight emphasis in that sentence? “You are an irregular factor in a formerly stable condition. Celestia believes that this is due to Pinkamena Pie. She chose you. Consciously she chose you to be the first member of the SOP Brigade. Subconsciously she chose you to be in her classroom, seated directly in front of her, where you would be present as an unknown factor.
“We believe that you are the key to solving the mystery of Pinkamena Pie. This is why Trixie wished to banish you. Likewise this is why Celestia wishes you to remain unharmed. We do not know what effect may arise if conditions between Pinkamena Pie and yourself are altered. For the time being the Overmind’s consensus is to maintain the new status quo and observe passively.”
I considered all those words- more words than Twilight Sparkle normally used in a day, from what I’d seen of her.
And all those many, many words boiled down to: We don’t know why, but you’re important.
I could do without being that kind of important.
Ponies began walking past us again. I was out of questions, and Twilight was apparently out of words, so I led her out of the park and over to the new branch library on the north side of the commercial district. I was familiar enough with the main library, having spent a good bit of time there as a younger filly reading practically everything I could get my hooves on, but somewhere along the line I’d lost my interest in books. Working on the farm, or even working on homework, seemed more real than any fairy stories with brightly colored illustrations.
It took about ten minutes for me to realize that Twilight had frozen in the middle of the library lobby. So far as I could tell, she hadn’t budged an inch since I went browsing the shelves. While other ponies walked around her, she simply stood and stared at all the shelves, all the books, everything.
Well, I thought to myself, she did say she was an alien- and only three years old, or at least only three years in this body. I walked over to her and muttered, “Um, Twilight, this is what we call a ‘library.’ It’s a place where people can borrow books and-“
“I know what a library is.”
That wasn’t Twilight’s voice. That was a voice full of anger and bitterness, a young mare not willing to be talked down to by anyone.
But it didn’t show on her face. That face expressed no anger, no irony, nothing but the blank-
Flicker
For an instant it shifted, and I saw tears running down the sides of Twilight’s muzzle.
Flicker
And then the tears were gone- the tears had never even been there.
Flicker flicker
Back, and gone again.
“Shhhh!” said somepony reading a magazine in a corner nook.
“Shhh!” Two ponies at a study table shushed the first pony.
“Shh! Shh shh! Shh shh!” The shushings began to spread around the library.
Over in the children’s section, a foal kicked the wooden table leg, producing a steady rhythm.
The shushings became a kind of chant, syncopating over the beat of the foal’s kicking.
The main doors opened just wide enough to let the sound of a street musician in, laying down a rapid line with a battery-powered synthesizer. It blended in perfectly with the chorus of shushing and the loud wooden beat of the table leg.
Something similar had happened the previous Monday, when Pinkie Pie had poured her soul out to me in song. Background sounds blurred together until background music rose up like surf on an ocean wave. At the time it had been strange, scary… and, at the same time, fundamentally right, as if that song were the only right thing in the world.
And it was happening here again, in a library, with Pinkie Pie at least a mile away.
And then Twilight Sparkle began to sing in her hushed monotone, her voice managing to ride over the harmony of unrelated sounds like an airship resting on clouds.
Mysterious people Pass me by Unnoticing people Walking by I observe, silent and alone
Magic and wonder Calling me Harmony and friendship Taunting me I listen, silent and alone
All by myself observing this world My silent voice fades away unheard I left a world made of dreams, but I Don’t want to leave all my dreams behind
From out of nowhere an electric guitar joined the background music, and the instant it did so Twilight Sparkle’s voice changed again, pouring raw, ragged, desperate emotion into the lyrics.
Do I exist if no one can see Do I exist if no one can hear Do I exist if I can’t be me
Dreams calling me but I don’t say a word Home calling me but I can’t return If I can’t act what is there for me To be or not to be
Twilight stopped for a few moments, looking straight at me as the music swung back around to the first rhythm, slightly faster, more intense.
Miraculous people Pass my way Undeterred people Every day I see them, I want to be one
Broken mental process Muzzles me Purpose and duty Shackle me I remain silent and alone
I want to change, but I can’t be changed I want to leave, but I stay behind I volunteered, left my home for love Now I want peace, but my peace is denied
Twilight’s face was flickering again, the teary, emotional Twilight replacing the stoic, stone-faced version more and more often as she built to what I could feel was the climactic chorus.
Do I exist if no one can see Do I exist if no one can hear Do I exist if I can’t be me
The song was asking something of me- of me specifically, not just the ponies who had gathered around in what looked like a cross between an audience and dance line. Just like Pinkie’s song had asked something of me… and I’d failed to answer, because the emotion of the moment had stolen my tongue.
Give me a dream, let me join the world Give me a home that I can make my own
Consarn it. I’ve always been an actions-over-words pony.
Open a place I belong for me To be-
Before she could say the word or my forelegs were wrapped around her, and I hugged Twilight Sparkle as tightly as I possibly could.
For an instant the music, the rhythmic shushing, all of it went absolutely dead silent, and the universe took a long, deep breath.
Then, across the street, clock bells gonged the hour; three o’clock. Behind the last gong I heard a carillion, playing the chimes I recognized from a few days before. I stepped back, forehooves still leaning on Twilight’s shoulders, as her flickering face smiled through the tears about sixty percent of the time and sang, in a much different- and familiar- melody…
It’s the answer that has always been here in my heart…
The crowd around us- I swear I am not making this up- began singing backgrounds.
Sha Shalala shalalala la la la, ooooh…
And then Twilight sang out:
You reached out to me; you noticed me in the corner Well, it’s destiny, together we’ll make it better Harmony! We’ll make it happen, we’ll make the system change By your side! We can make the world whole, we can make the world smile, and we won’t be alone
The background singers began singing again, dancing and making jazz hands around us.
It’s an adventure! Adventure! In this broken world where harmony is always denied I’ll find a new place, growing, breaking the mold if you’ll only be by my side Won’t you help me break free Won’t you observe along with me Today’s the miracle In the now where tomorrow becomes yesterday… I believe in you…
The group held Twilight’s last note for a good five seconds, and then the music ended.
And then, as if absolutely nothing had happened, the library doors closed, the music from the street cut off, and the crowd of ponies around us walked on about their business. Ten seconds before they’d been part of a case of mass hysteria, or something like it, and now nobody remembered it had happened except for me.
Me, and the pony still in my arms.
“Um… so…” Physical gestures like a hug are well and good, but Twilight’s gaze- back to the normal, almost blank expressionless stare, no more flickering- demanded something more. “Um… do you have a library card at this library?”
Blank stare, followed by the tiniest perceptible negative shake of her head.
“Come on, then,” I said, and I guided Twilight over to the main counter. “Miss?” I asked the clerk, who apparently also remembered nothing of the mass musical number that had gone off less than twenty feet in front of her. “My friend,” I dropped the word like a hundred-pound weight, “Twilight Sparkle needs a library card. Please.”
A few minutes later Twilight and I were sitting side by side in a corner nook, each one of us with our own book. Her book was Super Best Friends Forever; mine was A Tree Grows in Hooflyn, which turned out to be a lot less interesting than I’d expected. (By which I mean, not nearly as many trees as advertised.) Still, the silent company of Twilight Sparkle was pleasant enough that I began to lose track of time. At one point the clock said 3:26; five minutes later it read 3:54.
Despite galloping as much as I could with the afternoon crowds and with making sure Twilight was keeping pace, we got back to the station a full ten minutes late. We were, of course, the last ones to arrive. Pinkie Pie was steaming mad… and, I noticed, her mane had gone completely flat again. Bad, bad sign.
“Where have you two been?” she snapped. “I suppose you two went and investigated the spa like Rarity and Fluttershy did!”
“No, we didn’t,” I said, stamping a hoof. “As it happens, we found something at the library! There were all these ponies in a circle, and some mare was in the middle of the group singing her heart out, and this strange music seemed to come together out of nowhere-“
“What’s mysterious about that?” Pinkie asked grumpily. “Heartsongs happen all the time. It’s perfectly natural! Applejack, if that’s the most mysterious thing you saw all day, then this patrol was a total waste!”
I looked around in growing shock at the others. Rainbow Dash shrugged. Fluttershy looked at me as if I’d gone loco. Rarity smiled and said, “I’m sure Applejack was just being thorough. We all want to find something mysterious for you, Pinkie darling.”
Pinkie snorted, not meeting Rarity’s eyes- or mine, come to it. Finally she said, “I’ll see you all in the club room on Monday.” She walked off, not towards the train station but back towards the mall.
“Well, I thought that unicorn getting splashed by the bus was funny,” Rainbow Dash muttered. “C’mon, Fluttershy! I need to get in my training for the day before it gets dark, which means you need to get in your cheering practice!”
Cheering practice? Is Fluttershy on the cheerleading squad?
“They wish! No, but… well…” Rainbow Dash shifted on her hooves, then flapped her wings and rose up to hover above the rest of us. “You might as well just see. ‘Shy, give ‘em your best cheer!”
Fluttershy took a couple of deep breaths, threw her chest forward, leaned her head back, and shouted:
“…yay!...”
I’ve heard louder spiders.
“Yeah, I know!” Dash said. “C’mon, ‘Shy. You can have dinner at my place afterwards.” The two pegasi headed over to the train station, and after saying a more polite goodbye Rarity followed, leaving me alone again with Twilight Sparkle.
“Um, Twilight?” I asked. “I, um, I don’t want to make light of, um, what happened back there. In fact, if you’re upset that I blabbed, I don’t blame you-“
“It is not a problem.” That face seemed a little blanker than usual.
“But- but- how was that NOT weird??” I asked. “I mean yes it felt right, and yes you got your feelings across… but normal sane ponies do not just spontaneously join in, in perfect harmony by the way, singing and dancing and musicking along like that!”
Twilight pondered my statement for a few seconds before answering, “Four days ago Pinkamena Pie caused a minor alteration in the world. Before that time such events as you describe were an extreme improbability. After that time, the phenomenon of the heartsong was not only possible but common enough to be seen as normal. Furthermore, this change was made retroactive, so that all ponies now believe heartsongs are a natural condition of pony existence.”
Now Twilight’s gaze grew a little more intense, her eyes locked on mine like the big guns of a battleship. “Organic interfaces such as myself were protected from this retroactive change by our contact with the Integrated Magic Thought Alicorn. So far as we are aware, you are the only other pony aware that such a change has taken place.”
“Including Pinkie Pie?”
Imperceptible nod.
Well. Guess I really am special, huh? Wonderful.
“You have been chosen by Pinkamena Pie,” Twilight said, as if that explained everything.
If it did, I wish someone would explain the explanation.
