Recipes for Disaster, p. 235
Scootaloo frowned and mouthed the word to herself a few times, pacing about the Carousel Boutique's kitchen. Finally, she shook her head and asked, "We're making what?"
"Paella!" repeated Apple Bloom.
"Isn't that a fruit?"
Sweetie Belle shook her head. "That's papaya."
Scootaloo shrugged her wings. "If you say so. What goes in pie-yaya?"
"Paella. An' accordin' t' Aunt Apple Empanada, anythin' ya want!" Apple Bloom beamed. "Way Ah figger it, if we make somethin' that uses every ingredient we can think of, we're bound t' find a talent fer cookin' somethin'."
"And Rarity has the best stocked kitchen in Ponyville!" added Sweetie Belle.
Scootaloo rolled her eyes. "More like the best stocked kitchen we're still allowed in."
Apple Bloom scowled at her. "Sheesh, what nestled in yer wing an' died?"
Scootaloo sat on her haunches and crossed her front legs. "Cooking is lame."
"Yer jus' sayin' that 'cause Rainbow Dash can't cook."
"She doesn't need to! Besides, where's she going to put an oven? Under her house?"
"Girls!" cried Sweetie Belle. "Arguing isn't going to get us anywhere, and Rarity's only going to be at the spa for so long."
Apple Bloom and Scootaloo traded one last appraising look before nodding. "You're right," said Scootaloo. "Where do we start?"
"Well," said Apple Bloom as she got the mouthwritten recipe out of her saddlebags, "every paella's gotta start with rice."
"Rice?" Sweetie gave a rictus grin. "Um, that may be a problem."
Her friends gave her matching flat looks. "What happened to 'the best stocked kitchen in Ponyville'?" asked Scootaloo.
Sweetie scowled and lit up her horn. "Rarity has all kinds of stuff!" One by one, the cupboards swung open, briefly wrapped in lime-colored auras. Sweetie wiped her now sweaty brow. "See? There's just no rice."
Scootaloo drooped. "Well, that was a bust. Why don't we go try sword swallowing? My dad has—"
"Hold on a sec." Apple Bloom backed away, her gaze panning over the kitchen. "Ah think we can still make this work."
"But you said every pandora needs rice."
"Paella. An' it does." Bloom smiled. "But we can work around that. We just gotta be creative."
Scootaloo turned to Sweetie. "Is this making sense to you? 'Cause I think AB just lost it."
"Ah'm right here."
Scootaloo wingshrugged. "Yeah, and?"
Apple Bloom shook her head. "Look, what Ah'm sayin' is that we can still make somethin' with a little bit o' everythin' in it. It just don't gotta be paella. We got flour, sugar, tons o' spices an' syrups an' such... Sweetie, there any eggs in the fridge?"
Sweetie nodded. "Definitely. I looked before you guys got here."
Bloom sat back on her haunches, smiling at her visions of a glorious, cutie-marked future. "Crusaders? We are gonna bake a cake."
"What kind of cake?"
"Huh?" Apple Bloom shook the tatters of her dream out of her head and scowled at Sweetie Belle. "It don't matter what kinda cake!"
Sweetie twisted her hoof into the floor. "I'm just saying, if we don't have a recipe..."
"Pfft. Who needs recipes?" Scootaloo started rummaging through Rarity's pots and pans. "We just throw together everything that'll taste good, stick it in the oven, and bam! Cutie marks."
Apple Bloom smirked. "Ah thought y' said cookin' was lame."
Scootaloo didn't answer right away, as her mouth was busy helping her forehooves extract the biggest cake pan she could find out of the pile. Once it was free—as was all of the cookware that had been stacked on top of it—she said, "I'd rather have a lame cutie mark than none at all. Besides, maybe my special talent is making cooking awesome."
"One way t' find out."
Scootaloo looked from one box to the other. "Do cakes need baking powder or baking soda?"
Apple Bloom shrugged. "Ah dunno. Put in both."
"Got it."
Scootaloo considered the spice rack and grabbed a container full of reddish strands. "Hey, Sweetie, what's this?"
"Oh, I didn't know Rarity still had some saffron."
"Should we put in?"
Sweetie bobbed her head from side to side. "Well, she probably won't mind. She doesn't seem to like it; she never puts much in anything."
"Awesome. I'll throw it all in, then."
Sweetie boggled at what Apple Bloom brought in from the wagon. "Potions? You're putting potions in the cake?"
Bloom quirked an eyebrow. "Well, Ah was gonna cook th' rice in 'em."
"Eh heh..." Sweetie cleared her throat. "Still, isn't that dangerous?"
"Nah, Ah've brewed these a bunch o' times. Perfectly safe."
"That gives me an idea!" Scootaloo darted off of one of the overturned pots they were using to help them reach the countertops. The sound of buzzing wings soon moved away from the boutique.
"Whaddaya think she's got planned?" asked Apple Bloom.
Sweetie shuddered. "I'm almost afraid to find out..."
The buzzing returned, and Scootaloo galloped back into the kitchen, panting for breath and with a half-full jar balanced on her head.
The others took in the jar. "Liquid rainbow?" Sweetie took a step back, eyes wide.
"Are you nuts!?" cried Apple Bloom.
Scootaloo snorted. "Relax. It's not like I added cloud or feathers to it."
"That stuff ain't for eatin'!"
"Sure, when it's fresh out of the weather factory. Rainbow Dash told me the stuff she uses in her house barely even stings your eyes. It's completely safe." Before anypony could respond, Scootaloo tipped the jar into the cake pan. The colors swam and mixed with the batter.
When no explosions or tree sap seemed forthcoming, Sweetie sagged with relief. "That could've been really bad. I mean, I don't know what the hay do you think you're doing!?"
"What?" Apple Bloom blinked at her, empty potion vial in her hooves. "Ah said they're safe."
"But with the rainbow—"
"Cool!" cried Scootaloo, eyes locked on the batter. "The stripes are changing color now!"
Sweetie waited for a few moments, biting her lip. The colors kept changing, but nothing else happened. "Well, I guess if they're safe separately, then they should be fine together."
"Think th' oven's done preheatin'?"
All three turned to the appliance. "Well, it's glowing red," said Scootaloo. "That's probably a good sign."
Sweetie telekinetically opened the oven. The heat washed over her in a coat-crinkling wave. "Seems about right," she said. "Now we've got to get it in." She moved out of the way and scrunched up her muzzle as her horn's aura grew brighter. The cake pan barely shifted.
"C'mon, Sweetie!"
"Just a little more!"
Sweetie gave a wordless grunt as she put as much magical oomph as she could into the cake pan. It felt much heavier to her horn than to her hooves. Still, she was able to lift it a few inches, enough that Scootaloo and Apple Bloom could wedge their muzzles under it and lever it the rest of the way. The pair tottered towards the oven, the weight of the pan constantly changing as Sweetie struggled against it.
Once they were right in front of the door, Scootaloo said, "On three."
"Three! Three!" Sweetie shouted, sparks flying from her horn.
"Three!" With that, Scootaloo and Apple Bloom tossed their heads, and with them the cake pan. Sweetie shifted her magical force along the same direction, propelling the pan into the oven with a clang and a splash.
Apple Bloom shut the door as Sweetie Belle collapsed. "Ow..." the unicorn moaned, hooves over her horn.
Scootaloo sat by her. "You did great, Sweetie."
"Can't talk. Dying."
Apple Bloom's eyes went wide. "She... she ain't really dyin', is she?"
Scootaloo gulped. "Um, I don't think we've gotten to that in biology."
Sweetie groaned long and loud.
"We should go an' check."
"What about the... oh, who cares about the cake? That sounded like something out of a zombie movie." Scootaloo reared up, lifting Sweetie Belle. "Urgh. Help me get her to the wagon. We can ask the first unicorn we find if it's serious."
Apple Bloom knelt down in front of them. "An' if it is, what t' do."
"Right." Scootaloo draped Sweetie so her chin was dangling over Apple Bloom's barrel, then scooched under the unicorn's limp hindquarters.
Together, they got her to the wagon. Scootaloo kept the ride as smooth as she could, Apple Bloom keeping pace at Sweetie's side. "Don't you worry now, Sweetie," she said. "Everythin's gonna be just fine."
Then the boutique exploded behind them.
Ponyville was gone. In its place, a squirming, shapeless mass bubbled and heaved. Mottled in a number of colors that shouldn’t have existed, it propagated itself like a sped up slime mold, spreading over ever more of the countryside. The town’s occupants had been evacuated. Three princesses had not been so lucky.
Floating above the ruins, the last alicorn and the only draconequus discussed their tactics.
“Well, we just proved that my powers can’t alter it,” said Discord, “and flashy energy blasts aren’t my style.”
Twilight didn’t look away from the great blob, eyes narrowed in thought. “As long as you introduce a massive influx of chaos magic at the same moment as when my spell hits, that should stop it.”
Discord hummed to himself. “I’m normally all for uncertainty, but I’m not sure I like relying on a ‘should’ here. Can’t you and the girls throw that glitzy Rainbow Power of yours at it?”
“We tried that.” Twilight pointed a hoof at a few crystalline branches poking out of the ooze.
“Ah. Well.” Discord cracked his neck. It took a few seconds for him to get through all of it. “Then fire at will, or whatever it is we’re calling this mess.”
Twilight closed her eyes. “On my mark.” Her horn glowed, rapidly brightening. When light was streaming out through her eyelids and her horn was encased in a pillar of magic taller than her, she shouted, “NOW!”
Discord still waited. Not out of hesitation, but to give the enormous beam time to reach the blob. Just as Twilight’s spell first brushed against its target, he clapped his paw and talon together.
The beam made contact and light twisted around the ooze kaleidoscopically. There was a deafening, bone-shaking groan, like the scream of reality itself.
Twilight swayed about the sky, scrambling onto a cloud and sinking halfway through before her body decided it was solid. She gasped out, “Did it work?”
Discord sat by her, taking in the sight and working the cramps out of his wrists. The light had returned to normal, and huge bubbles had formed along the mass’s entire breadth. They burst as one and didn’t close, gasses escaping with a sound like a dozen dragons’ flatulence. “Congratulations, Twilight!” He raised his voice over the din, halfway to shouting. “We’ve made the world’s largest whoopie cushion!”
A few more seconds, and the Ponyville-eating menace ran out of gas, limp as an uncooked pizza tossed over the town. Twilight leaned over the edge of the cloud, taking it in. “It worked. I really wasn’t sure.”
Discord nodded, frowning. “It’s dead, then?”
“I’m not sure if it was ever alive.”
“Well, that’s good. I hate killing things, especially interesting things.”
Twilight glared at him. “It would’ve overrun all of Equestria.”
Discord smiled back. “Right, interesting. Granted, I've come to appreciate how that would be problematic for the pony population, but still.”
Twilight just grumbled and plopped her chin back on the cloud. “What did you do to it, anyway?”
“Nothing, since it wouldn't have worked. However, I did make pi equal five in the space it occupied for a split second." Discord winced as he moved his lion paw from side to side. “Not easy, even for me, but you never said how massive an influx you needed.”
“Well, it worked. Can you get the other princesses out of there?”
Discord leaned back onto the cloud, his eyes closed and his arms behind his head. “In a few minutes. They’ll be fine. Not even Lovebutt actually needs to breathe.”
“Discord…”
“Well, she doesn’t." He cracked an eye open. "How did this happen, anyway? I wasn’t here for that bit.”
Twilight sighed. "It was supposed to be a cake."
Discord chuckled. "I see why Spike makes your meals normally."
"I didn't make it. The Cutie Mark Crusaders did."
"Ah, yes, that makes sense." Discord blinked, wide-eyed and more horrified than he had ever been during the fight. He tore off his muzzle—bloodlessly, rather like what Trixie once did to Pinkie Pie—and dropped it in a wastebasket marked with an eight-pointed star superimposed over a biohazard symbol. Both items vanished and, from a newly grown mouth, Discord said, "What are you ponies doing to me?"
Twilight found she couldn't help but smile. "Come on. Break's over. We still have work to do before we can tell everypony the good news."
In a tent in the evacuation camp, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, and Applejack glared down at the still blank-flanked fillies. “And what have we learned, girls?” asked Rarity.
“If we're not sure what the recipe calls for,” Sweetie Belle said promptly, “don’t add everything in the kitchen.”
“And?” said Applejack.
“Don’t add any potions either, 'specially not just t' see what happens,” added Apple Bloom.
Dash loomed over them. “And?”
“Liquid rainbow is not a toy,” said Scootaloo.
Just outside the tent, Spike belched out a scroll. He grabbed and unrolled it, nearly tearing it in his haste. “'We did it,'” he read. “They did it!”
Everypony nearby cheered. Several trotted through the camp, spreading the news. Only Pinkie Pie, still weeping into Fluttershy’s shoulder, didn't join in the celebration.
“It’s okay, Pinkie,” said Fluttershy, stroking her friend’s mane. “They’ll clean it all up, just you wait and see.”
“It tasted terrible, Fluttershy. It tasted terrible!”