One-shots and minifics, written for various Writeoffs and EQD Writers' Training Grounds events.
A collection of one-shots and minifics from various Writeoff competitions and Equestria Daily's seasonal Writers' Training Grounds events.
Pinkie the Vampire Slayer [Crossover] [Comedy] – EQD-WTG for "Bats!" (s4e07) Manehattan [Slice of Life] – EQD-WTG for "Rarity Takes Manehattan" (s4e08) Lament [Slice of Life] – Writeoff Minific for "The Best Medicine"
The three fillies looked up from their books at the commotion and Twilight bit back a sigh. She’d agreed to help them finish their research project on bats for Cheerilee’s class, but she hadn’t counted on just how easily they grew distracted.
Pinkie dropped her pack saddle on the floor, spilling a couple wooden stakes. “Well of course you know about slaying vampires. You live in a library, silly!”
“She’s got a point, you know.” Spike sauntered out of the basement, clutching a small stack of comic books. “This was bound to happen eventually. The only question was whether Pinkie Pie or Sweetie Belle would end up as the Slayer. Both names work.”
Then many things happened at once.
1. Twilight glared at the little dragon. “Spike, you’re not helping.”
2. “You mean I could have been the Vampire Slayer?” Sweetie Belle slumped back on her haunches. “I’m never going to get my cutie mark!”
3. Pinkie gasped and her mane flared out like a living thing. “Spike! Why didn’t I think of this before!” She rushed over to the dragon and began poking at his face with her hooves. “Oh no! You’ve got fangs, too? Did she already get to you?”
Spike rolled his eyes. “I’ve always had fangs, Pinkie. But it’s okay—I’ve still got a soul.”
“So we’re post Season Six, then.” Pinkie rubbed her chin with one hoof.
“I guess?” Spike gave a little shrug.
Twilight’s horn flared as she cast a voice amplification spell. “EVERYPONY, STOP!”
The library grew quiet as all eyes turned toward Twilight, who allowed herself a moment of self-satisfaction. Magic was wonderful. You could solve any problem with a suitable application of magic.
Spike closed one eye and squinted at her. “I dunno, Pinkie. Are you sure she’s a Giles and not a Willow?”
“SPIKE!” The little dragon fell silent. Twilight took a deep breath, calming herself. “Thank you. Now, will somepony explain to me what’s going on? And why, for pony’s sake, are we talking about vampire slaying?”
“There’s no ti—” Pinkie began to say, but she cut herself short at mid-sentence. Then she pursed her lips, glanced around the library, and made a series of rather complicated expressions. “I guess things probably would have gone better with the parasprites if I’d stopped to explain, wouldn’t they?”
Twilight nodded emphatically.
“Well, Fluttershy’s a vampire, right?”
“Fluttershy was a vampire, Pinkie. My magic fixed all that.”
“No no no, you just think you fixed it. You can’t be sure, Twilight. None of us can be sure. Have you seen her teeth? They didn’t go back to normal. And she’s a much better flyer than she was before. Rainbow Dash confirmed that for me. Your magic can’t fix everything.”
Of course her magic could fix everything. But aside from that point, Twilight was forced to admit that Pinkie seemed shockingly lucid. Sensible, even. Fluttershy had continued behaving strangely, despite Twilight’s counterspell. Maybe she’d picked the wrong one? That happened sometimes.
“But why are you talking about slaying, Pinkie? Fluttershy is our friend. I can’t believe you’d say something like that, even as a joke.”
“Oh, Fluttershy’s fine.” Pinkie waved her hoof dismissively. “She’s not the problem. Well, she is—but she isn’t. Fluttershy’s too kind to pose a threat to Ponyville, and anyway, all she wanted was to suck the juice out of apples. Your spell worked kinda like the old gypsy curse. She’s definitely got her soul back.”
This made about the usual amount of sense for Pinkie, but Twilight had learned years ago that she and Pinkie worked on different wavelengths. She’d had time to find a passable workaround.
“Spike, does that make any sense to you?”
The little dragon thought for a second, scratching his chest with one claw. “Yeah, I think so. Though if Fluttershy’s fine, I still don’t see what’s got Pinkie so worked up.”
“You don’t!?” Pinkie looked shocked. “Isn’t it obvious!?”
Spike thinned his lips and adopted his Thinking Dragon look. After half a minute, he shook his head. “Nope. I got nothin’.”
Pinkie pointed to the stack of comics Spike still held in one claw. “Issue 45, page 18.”
“Oh.” A light seemed to dawn in Spike’s eyes. “Ohhh.” He found the appropriate comic and riffled through it. “Ohhhhhhh.”
“You see?” Pinkie wore a self-satisfied look.
“Twilight! We gotta do something before this gets out of han— I mean cla— I mean hoof!”
And then Spike launched himself out the door of the library, with Pinkie hot on his heels.
“Oh for the love of… Girls, can I trust you to stay here and study for the next half an hour, and not get up to any mischief?”
Her request was met with a pouty chorus of, “Aww, Twilight!”
Pinkie poked her head back into the library. “No! Bring ‘em along. We need a Scooby Gang!”
The three fillies shared a look and dropped their books in a heap. Scootaloo was the first one to speak. “I don’t know what that means, but…” And then all three voices rose in chorus. “Cutie Mark Crusaders, Scooby Gang!”
They barreled out into the darkness, and Twilight had no choice but to follow. And if her magic happened to slam the library door shut a little more violently than usual, that was understandable. She could always find a spell to fix it, if the force caused any serious damage.
The door to the cottage crashed open and Pinkie, Spike and the Crusaders marched inside. Fluttershy, sitting at a small table with a large bowl of bright red apples, squeaked and shot into the air.
“Hold it right there, Fluttershy!” Pinkie fixed a flashlight on the face of the yellow pegasus—though, since the cottage was well-lit, this had little effect other than to make Fluttershy blink in pain. She wobbled in the air before crashing back to the floor of the cottage. Spike ran forward and leapt onto her back, pinning her to the ground.
Tears leaked from the corners of Fluttershy’s eyes. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! But they’re just so… so juicy. I can’t stop myself!"
“A likely story,” Pinkie said as she clip-clopped across the room to the table and began examining the bowl of apples. “But that’s not why we’re here. Tell us where he is!”
“Where he is?” Fluttershy blinked in confusion. “Don’t you mean—”
A crash sounded from the kitchen and Pinkie’s head whipped around. “Cutie Mark Scooby Gang!”
The three fillies saluted Pinkie and ran toward the kitchen, but before they could reach the door, Angel came charging out with a small apple tucked in his mouth.
Pinkie let out a scream. “Nooo, we’re too late! Angelus has returned! Everypony, run for your lives!”
Angel stopped just in front of the doorway. The Crusaders stopped halfway across the room from him, then turned to stare at Pinkie. Twilight rushed into the cottage, looking haggard and out of breath. There was a distinct lack of running for lives, all around.
“You mean we came here for the bunny?” Scootaloo screwed up her face into a look of bemused indignation.
“He’s not just a bunny, Scootaloo.” Spike sat up on Fluttershy’s back. “He’s Angelus, the Scourge of Equestria, the Demon with the Face of an Angel.”
“Aw, c’mon, he’s not that bad,” said Apple Bloom.
“But he’s eating apples!” Pinkie pointed an accusing hoof at the bunny.
“Um. Excuse me.” Fluttershy tried to stand up, but Spike was firmly lodged on her backside and she didn’t really want to knock him over. “Um. Angel has always liked apples.”
“But that’s no reason to turn him back into a vampire!” Pinkie shined the flashlight at her again, and Fluttershy had to turn her head away.
“Ah don’t think he’s a vampire, Pinkie.”
Scootaloo nodded her head. “Yeah, he looks pretty normal if you ask me.”
Sweetie sighed. “Okay, girls, why don’t we go finish Ms. Cheerilee’s report?”
A look of bliss came over Twilight’s face for a second. “What a wonderful idea! Spike, come back home whenever you and Pinkie are done here.” Then she tramped right back out of the cottage with the three fillies in tow.
“I didn’t… um… I mean, I don’t know how you’d even turn a bunny into a vampire. Do you?”
“So he’s just a regular bunny?” Pinkie sounded crestfallen.
“Yes. I mean, if that’s okay with you.”
Pinkie’s mane deflated a little. “Yeah, I suppose. Come on, Spike. Let’s go.”
The little dragon hopped off of Fluttershy and paused to stare at Angel for a moment. He pointed two claws at his eyes and then at the rabbit, gave a little growl, and then followed Pinkie out of the cottage, closing the door behind him.
A blonde-maned head poked out from the kitchen. “Is mah sister gone yet? ‘cause I’m mighty happy about your newfound affection for apples an’ all, but there’s some things I don’t rightly want to explain to her for a couple more years.”
I never rightly understood why they call that place the Big Apple. I spent my time there, sure enough, and I can tell you it ain't no place for apples. My mother Clementine, rest her soul, she was from Manehattan. And that's where she met my Pa, but that's a story for another day.
What matters is this: when I was a filly, Manehattan always seemed like the most romantic place in all Equestria. Specially after the accident.
Ma always used to show me pictures. All the skyscrapers clawing their way up like trees in a forest, some of them stunted and little, some of them like towering, limbless oaks built all out of stone and steel. The sun rising over the ocean, shining down the long alleys of buildings like the rows of an orchard. The first home she and Pa ever knew, a little apartment tucked into the basement of a white plaster building in a run-down old bit of the west side. I think she missed it, a little.
After they were gone, Manehattan became something else for me. I don't got the words for it, really, but it had a kind of... magic. When you lose somepony, it carves a little hole in you. Cores you out, just like an apple, I suppose. And you want so bad to find a way to fill up the empty space inside. For me, that's what Manehattan was.
My brother was born there too, but I reckon you already know that.
Getting away from the story here, though, ain't I? Okay, why don't we start over.
So Rarity, the old fussbudget, she walks into the barn one day. I'm baling up some hay for the cows. Got a nice rhythm going, too.
She coughs, all polite like. You know the way she is. "Oh Applejack, dear. How would you like to come to Manehattan with me for Fashion Week?"
Rarity's a friend and all, so I can't rightly tell her that I'm busy, and the rain gutters on the barn still need fixing, and that Manehattan is pretty much the last place in Equestria I've got a mind to visit. I already been there once, and y'all know how that turned out. So I bite my lip, and I find something truthful to say. "Sure thing, Rarity. I always like spending time with my friends."
And that's how, four days later, I find myself stepping off the train and into the City that Never Sleeps. It's pretty much just the way I remember it—loud, and ugly, and full up with tin and spit. But this time, I'm here with friends, and that makes all the difference.
Rarity, she's a wonder. She's high-class, just like my aunt and uncle, but she ain't snooty about it like some ponies. She don't make you feel like she's better than you are. Different, sure, but there ain't nothing wrong with being different. And before you can say giddyup, there she goes, helping ponies out, just like she always does. I'm proud she's my friend. But I'm worried about what Manehattan might do to her. I know what it tried to do to me.
Then again, maybe I'm wrong to be afraid for her. Rarity takes Manehattan as she finds it, and sure enough, she's making new friends before she's been there ten minutes. She's helping everypony out, same as she always does. Even I get into the spirit—I help her fix the wheel on a taxi that's broke down. Then she's running off to make some appointment or other for her fancy dress competition, and it's just me and the other girls—and Spike, of course—for the rest of the afternoon. We go see the Equestrian Museum of Natural History. Twilight insists. She's got a real thing for the Hayfield Planetarium. We do a little more sightseeing, but everypony's distracted by the fact that we're going to see "Hinny of the Hills" this evening. After a couple hours, we make our way back to the Manefare Hotel.
Rarity's there, waiting for us.
Her mane's frazzled, real frazzled, and one look at her says she's been crying. And I know, sure as sin, that Manehattan's claimed its latest victim. My friend, Rarity.
She tells us the story. She tried being generous with some mare from Ponyville she used to know, and it backfired. This Suri somepony stole Rarity's fabric, or designs, or something. I don't know a whole lot about fashion and I don't rightly follow what she's saying, but it's plain as plums she's been hurt pretty bad. She came here dreaming of the skyscrapers, just like me. But steel is cold and stone is lonely, and maybe it takes an earth pony to realize that for some of us, there ain't no such thing as magic.
That's not what you say to your friends when they're down, though, is it? So instead, I tell her to buck up. I reckon if someone copied her dresses, she just needs new ones, and I tell her as much. And then she's looking around the room, and I can see those gears in her head starting to click. Before you know it, she's pulling the curtains off the windows and the sheets off her bed. She's sizing them up like a new crop of apples. Fluttershy asks if there's anything she can do to help, and Rarity gets this big grin on her face. She whips out her red sewing glasses, and she puts us to work.
But this is a different Rarity. Manehattan's already started to change her, and before long everypony can see it. She's meaner, and harsher. That Suri must have done some real damage. This ain't a pony I can call my friend no more. We miss dinner, and then we miss "Hinny of the Hills", and even when we're ready to drop off from being so gosh darned tired, Rarity demands that we keep working. And we do. We want her to succeed, after all. And everypony has a bad night, now and again. My friend's still there, hiding somewhere behind those red glasses. Isn't she?
We finish the dresses about three in the morning, and Rarity goes haring off to the place where they're holding the contest. She doesn't get a lick of sleep that night, I reckon. The rest of us, we're too exhausted. I collapse on a bed next to Rainbow Dash.
Next thing I know it's noon, or near enough, and I've got pegasus feathers in my mouth and a hoof in my stomach. Rainbow don't sleep gentle. I look at the clock, and it takes a couple seconds for the time to register. When it finally clicks, when I realize the fashion show starts in less than four minutes, I hear the most godawful whinny. Takes a moment to realize it was me. Then I'm on my hooves, trying to pry the other girls out of bed. That ain't no easy task, especially with Pinkie. She kicks, and she don't like waking up.
When they're all awake and ready to go—and let me tell you, as a genuine championship rodeo pony, that herding them fillies is a good sight harder than rounding up some unruly sheep ever was—we gallop on out. By the time we reach the contest, though, it's over. And Rarity's gone, just up and ran off in the middle of all the fancy pageant walking.
Suri's there, though, with some cute-as-a-button little filly named Coco Pomade or somesuch. She gives us the story, tells us that the contest judge was furious after the scene Rarity made, and that she's still in a right snit about it all. I don't see much reason to trust what Suri has to say at this point, but Coco confirms it. Coco tells us all about the competition, and tells us that Rarity lost. That's a shame, but after all, this is Manehattan. Manehattan ain't good for much, aside from crushing ponies' dreams.
We hear some noises from out in the lobby, and we trot on out, and there's Rarity. Her mane's a bit of a mess again. Looks like she got caught out in a rainstorm. Manehattan gets an awful lot of those.
Twilight tells Rarity that the contest's over and that she lost, and Rarity... well, Rarity takes it pretty darn well, if you ask me. Says she doesn't even care. Maybe Manehattan's not going to ruin her like it ruins so many other ponies. Maybe we'll get our friend back.
I glance over at Suri and Coco. Suri's wearing a big old grin now, but Coco looks almost as upset as Rarity had been the night before, near as I can make out. There's something wrong here.
The girls are talking now, but I'm paying them no mind. Mostly, I'm thinking about what I could do with this Suri, if I found her in a dark alley. But that look on Coco's face, that's floating around in my head, too.
I overhear Rarity telling everypony she's going to make it up to us, that she's taking us to an exclusive performance of "Hinny of the Hills". She starts to head back outside, the girls in tow, but I stop her for a second. "Rarity," I say, "I'll meet up with y'all in just a little while. There's something I want to do, first." She just nods, looking a lot happier than she had last night.
When the girls are gone, I turn back to Suri and I do my best to imitate that look Fluttershy gives her chickens when they're misbehaving. And then I give her a piece of my mind. Her and Coco both, 'cause by now I've figured out that they're in cahoots. They've been lying, and if there's one thing I can't abide, it's lying.
I don't know how long I'm there, but I make a real fuss. Eventually, the contest judge shows up, some pony named Prim Hemline. Reminds me of the Equestria Games pony—what's her name, Harshnelly? Anyway, I make a big stink about Suri stealing dress patterns or whatever it was. Then Prim's making a fuss her own self, and Suri's coat's gone from pink to white. Coco's looking more upset than ever. Eventually, I get tired of yelling and let Prim take over, and I just work on practicing that Fluttershy glare.
Suri slinks off, eventually—never to be seen again, I hope. And Prim tells me that no, Rarity won the competition, even with those outfits we made from the sheets and curtains the night before. I really don't understand these fashion ponies. If you can win a contest with sheets and curtains, why does everypony put so much time and effort into designing fancy new dresses. Don't make a lick of sense, if you ask me.
Prim gives me the trophy and tells me to take it to Rarity. She didn't get to meet all the designers who came out for the show, but given how much they liked the hotel curtains, maybe that's no great loss. She can get something, anyway. And Coco, wonder of wonders, asks if she can come with me, to give it to Rarity. I almost say no. But she's just trying to make up for lying, and that's a notion I heartily approve of.
So the two of us, we take the trophy and we march on down to Bridleway. Coco starts to get cold feet, but I'm having none of that, so I shove her on into the theater. It looks like Rarity's private performance of "Hinny of the Hills" has just wrapped up. I march Coco down the aisle, give Rarity her trophy, and...
Wait, that ain't how the story went, is it?
Well, you see, there's a reason for that. I ain't been telling you quite the whole truth, here. Rarity wasn't in the room when we got back from sight seeing, for example. And I can't use a sewing machine to save my life. And all this stuff about Suri, and Coco, and Prim, and me? Pure fabrication.
'cause here's the thing: I'm what y'all might call an "unreliable narrator".
If there's one thing Manehattan taught me, all them years ago, it's that honesty doesn't mean telling the truth. Any two-bit horse can twist the truth into a pack of lies, and don't I know it. No, honesty ain't about telling the truth. It's about making sure ponies understand the truth.
And the truth about Manehattan is that it takes a lot of good ponies and turns 'em bad. It tried to turn me bad, and it near succeeded. But not everypony comes out like that. Some of 'em come out like our Rarity, a little singed around the edges but more generous than ever.
And some of 'em, every once in a while, come out like that Coco Pommel. You see, I never stayed back to talk to her. I never said a word to that nag, Suri, neither—and boy howdy, did I want to.
Coco didn't need no help from a mare like me, though. She didn't need me to tell her she'd done wrong. She didn't need Prim. She didn't need anypony. Manehattan threw everything it had at her, and she just set her shoulders, stood up, and told that city what it could go do with itself.
Manehattan ain't all bad. It's stone and steel, sure, but it's got ponies pumping through its veins like lifeblood. And a lot of them are like those skyscrapers—pretty to look at, but cold and lonely and hollow inside. But not all of 'em.
They say I danced through star-filled streams, My hooves high-stepping, silver-shod. But sudden sadness drowned my dreams Along that moonlit promenade. A stalking shadow followed near: Envy, ever in my ear.
Oh Sister, shall I now relate That saddest story of our reign? How she I loved, by cruel fate, Had bound me to my own domain. And sunless, sundered, did I dwell In that gray and graceless hell.
A thousand summers thus I slept, As stars and seasons passed me by. And in that dreamless sleep I wept. Oh irony, that dreamless I Should ever be—the finest joke That I could dream ere I awoke.
But wake I did, and waking found, The world waxing as I waned. By harmony was I unbound, Though many harms for me remained. What cure is there for calumny, Chiefly when it deservèd be.
Luna sighed, setting down her quill and rising from her desk. She'd spent three nights now, trying to hammer this poem into shape, and it just wouldn't come. She knew what she wanted it to say, but she couldn't find the words.
Opening the glass doors to her balcony, Luna stepped out into the warm night air. The stars twinkled overhead, and a pale shimmer of aurora just touched the northern horizon. Summer was almost here now, the Summer Sun celebration only two days away. She'd meant this poem as a private gift for her sister, but she was beginning to doubt she could finish it in time.
Poetry had been so easy, once. Or at least that's how she remembered it. She'd grown up with it, Celestia reading to her from a book of old Eqquish sonnets each night when she was a foal. Luna wondered, not for the first time, how much of her love for the night was tied up in those old memories. Was she always fated to raise the moon, from the time she was born? Or was her cutie mark a product of her own desires? Could she have chosen a different path for herself?
No, there was no use to thoughts like that. The past was the past, and all anypony could do was move forward and try to learn from it.
Only, why was poetry so much harder now than it had been before... before everything went wrong? A millennium ago, she could have dashed through this poem in two hours. Now three nights of work could only produce a bare four stanzas.
A small noise from her chamber brought her attention back from the night sky. She turned, and to her mortification, Luna saw Celestia sitting at her work desk, reading her notes. Her heart thudding in her chest, she hurried back inside.
"Tia! What are you doing up so early?" Frustratingly, her sister ignored Luna's words and kept reading.
"Please, Tia, it is not finished." Still, Celestia made no response. Luna bit her lip, an anxious habit she wished she could quit.
Eventually, Celestia set the page back on the desk and turned. "I've never understood your aversion to letting ponies read your drafts, Luna. It's a good way to refine your work. And it's not early at all. I'm supposed to raise the sun in fifteen minutes."
Luna blinked. Had the night gone so quickly? Truly, this poem had taken too much of her attention—and for what? Her face fell. "I'm sorry, Tia. It was supposed to be a present for you, but I do not think I will finish it by tomorrow. I do not know why writing takes so much longer than it used to."
Celestia chuckled. "It takes longer because you've gotten better, silly."
"No I have not. You remember how many poems I used to write—how much ponies loved them. Now I can hardly write at all."
"Nonsense, Luna. Your old poems were... fine. But you were a princess; of course they were going to be popular. This, though—this is good. Or it might be, once you finish it. Believe me, I've been reading poetry for the last thous—" Celestia's voice trailed off and she looked back at the poem, a small frown creasing her face. "I'm sorry, sister. I didn't mean to—"
"Please, Tia. It is the past now. Do ponies not say, 'Time heals all wounds'?" Luna forced herself to smile. She'd always wanted to believe that, anyway. And maybe, in another century or so, she'd even know if it were true.
