A Stop at Sugarcube Corner
Twilight walked contentedly across Ponyville, wearing a bag with a book inside around her back. She had promised Mr. and Mrs. Cake that she would deliver them a cookbook from the library, and she kept to her promise.
When Twilight arrived at Sugarcube Corner, Pinkie Pie's head was already poking out through the door.
"Hi, Twilight!" Pinkie Pie exclaimed cheerfully. "A little birdie told me that you're delivering a cookbook for Mr. and Mrs. Cake!"
Twilight chuckled a little and smiled. "Well, that little birdie was correct." Twilight's horn grew a purple glow as she levitated the book out of her bag. "'The Guide to Cooking the Perfect Chocolate Chip Muffins,' correct?"
"Yessiree!" Pinkie chimed, grabbing the book with her mouth and setting it on a nearby counter. "Oh boy, my mouth is just watering just thinking about those yummy chocolate chip muffins! Although, my tummy doesn't agree." Pinkie frowned and rubbed her abdomen with her front hoof.
Twilight gave her a concerned look. "Is everything alright, Pinkie? Are you feeling okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. My tummy is just churning a little bit. I probably just ate too many cupcakes. Mrs. Cake wasn't feeling too good last night; her tummy was upset, too! So, I cooked her a big, big, big batch of cupcakes to make her tummy feel better! And I ate some too! There's some cupcakes leftover - you should have some!" Pinkie Pie trotted off into the kitchen, and quickly brought back a cardboard box filled with six leftover cupcakes.
"Oh, well thank you Pinkie!" Twilight's horn glowed once again as she picked up the box using her magic."That was very kind of you-."
"Ohhhh noooo!" A shrill stallion's voice called out from the back of Sugarcube Corner, his voice just barely standing out from the wails of crying babies. "Dear, grab some towels, hurry!"
Twilight piped up. "What's going on back there?"
"I dunno," Pinkie answered with a confused expression. "Come on, let's go look."
Twilight set the box down on the counter with the cookbook, then she and Pinkie walked to the back of the store to find Pumpkin Cake and Pound Cake crying in Mr. Cake's arms, and Mrs. Cake wiping up a pale orange mess on the floor with a towel.
"What happened?" Pinkie and Twilight said, in sync.
Mr. Cake answered frantically. "The twins just had a little accident. They just puked a little. No big deal, right sweetie? The twins are okay, right?"
Mrs. Cake laughed to herself, rolling her eyes. "Yes, they're okay. No need to worry. Babies spit up all the time." Mrs. Cake threw the soiled towel in a laundry hamper, then washed her hooves. "Although, I was a little nauseous myself last night, and it's still lingering a bit."
"That's what I told Twilight," Pinkie responded. "And I told her that my tummy's a-rumblin' today, too!"
Mr. Cake, still trying to calm his ill babies, answered nervously. "My stomach is a little upset, too. I hope there isn't a stomach bug going around. I don't want any of us to be sick!"
"Don't worry, Mr. Cake," Twilight said in a warm tone, walking back to the front of the store. "This all just seems coincidental. Now, I have to get back to the library. I'm sure Spike will be excited to see the delicious present I'm bringing back!" Twilight levitated the box of cupcakes and smiled back at Pinkie and the Cakes. "Rest up, all of you!"
Twilight walked home, not thinking much of the incident back at Sugarcube Corner. Like she had mentioned before, it all seemed pretty coincidental. However, she did begin to feel a little nauseated as she headed back to the library...
"Spike! Spiiike! I have a present for you!" Twilight chimed as she walked through the doors of the library. Spike came rushing down the wooden steps to see Twilight holding an open box of cupcakes.
"Oh boy!" Spike exclaimed, grabbing a cupcake, marveling at the pale yellow, baked batter and bright pink, sugary frosting before digging his teeth in, admiring the taste just as much. "Mmm, these are good! Did you get these from Sugarcube Corner?"
"Yep, Pinkie gave them to me when I gave her the cookbook." Twilight answered, setting the box down on a nearby desk. Her stomach grumbled, reminding her of what had recently happened. "Although, it was a little strange over there. Everyone there seemed to have had some stomach issues, and when I was walked back here, I started to feel a little woozy, as well."
"Well, don't get me sick." Spike said absentmindedly, finishing the last of his cupcake.
"No worries, I don't think I'm getting sick. My stomachache was probably just somatic from seeing all of them not feeling well. I'll check on them tomorrow-." Twilight got cut off with a sudden coughing fit. She cringed as her throat violently contracted.
Spike looked up at Twilight, concerned by her sudden coughing. "Twilight, are you okay?" He said, trying to shield his face from each cough.
Twilight cleared her throat. "Yes... I'm fine," She said, coughing in between every other word. "Just... A little... tickle in... my throat..."
Spike wasn't too convinced. "Okay... But, like I said, don't get me sick." He grabbed another cupcake from the box on the desk and walked back up the stairs.
Seconds later, Twilight's coughing fit ended, although she still felt more and more nauseated. Still convinced in her mind that this was all a coincidence, she went on about her studying, coughing here and there and stopping to rub her churning stomach.
"Ugh... Twilight! I... told you... not to... get me sick!"
Twilight woke up the morning after her Sugarcube Corner visit with an angry baby dragon sitting on her bed, nearly two inches away from her face, clutching his stomach and coughing out spurts of dragon breath right on her.
Twilight labored to get a sentence out to Spike, having still being disoriented from being awoken and beginning her own coughing fit with a wave of nausea. "Spike... calm down... How can you... be so... sure that I... made you sick?"
Spike's face scrunched up, both with anger and fighting back the urge to vomit. "Just listen... to you! You're... coughing... too! And I bet... you feel like... you're gonna throw up... too!"
Twilight regained herself from her coughing fit just long enough to make a deal with her assistant. "Here, I have an idea. Why don't you run to the pharmacy and pick us both up some cough drops and Pony-Bismol while I check on Pinkie and the Cake family?"
Spike agreed and headed out the door, holding bits in one hand and his stomach in the other. Twilight followed shortly behind him.
"Oh, hello Twilight!" Pinkie Pie chimed with high energy, although her body said otherwise. Her face was a very pale shade of pink, and there were dark pink bags under eyes. Her mane was unkempt and her legs were wriggling about, clearly fighting to keep Pinkie on all fours.
"Pinkie, are you okay?!" Twilight said, very concerned.
"Well, like I said yesterday, probably too many cupcakes. I was up all night a-coughing and heaving and chucking up cupcake bits! And when I tried to sleep, I just couldn't! The same went for Mr. and Mrs. Cake and the babies.
When Twilight peered into the bakery, she saw that the Cakes were all sharing Pinkie's weak, pale, tousled look. In the back of the store, Pound and Pumpkin cake were crying weakly and restlessly in Mr. Cake's arms, coughs interrupting their wails. In the front of the store, Mrs. Cake was sloppily giving a line of people orders of pastries, with a rather unclean bucket that had a pale-orange taint to it that made it clear that it has been used recently.
"Pinkie, why are you guys working in these conditions?" Twilight asked worriedly. "You all are clearly ill! Aren't you afraid that you're going to spread germs to your customers?"
Pinkie asserted. "I am, but Mr. and Mrs. Cake have been very straightforward with the fact that we have to make as many chocolate chip muffins this week as possible for our customers-." Before Pinkie could finish explaining, her stomach grumbled loudly, and her face turned from a pale pink to a slight tint of green. She put a hoof over her mouth. "Uh-oh, gotta go Twilight! Cupackes are calling!"
The Sugarcube Corner door quickly slammed before Twilight could say anything. Although none of her anxiety was alleviated after seeing the bakery's unsanitary condition, Twilight turned around and walked back home, continuing her cycle of coughing fits.
Spike groaned painfully as he hobbled over to Ponyville's shopping tents. His throat was burning from the coughing fit he recently had, and his stomach felt like it was doing flip-flops inside his body.
In the shopping street, there was a lot of commotion going on in one small, white tent with a large, red, health symbol on it - the pharmacy. There was a huge cluster of coughing, woozy ponies, all crowding around the tent to buy medicine. Spike found in the very far back of the group a familiar light yellow pegasus. Her wings were erect enough to where four sickly birds can rest atop of them - two on each side.
"Fluttershy!" Spike called out. Despite the commotion, Fluttershy heard Spike and trotted over to him.
"Oh... hello there Spike..." Fluttershy was letting out very small, gentle coughs, being mindful that any sudden jitter of her body could scare the birds away. "What are you doing here?"
"Getting some medicine for Twilight and I. We're both not feeling too good."
"Oh dear, neither are these birds and I," Fluttershy said, glancing at the weak, weezing birds on her wings. "It seems as though we all have a little bit of a cough and a belly ache, and all of us are having a hard time sleeping and resting our little heads. I'm getting some medicine for both them and for me. Apparently, there are many other birds that are in bad shape, but I just couldn't get a hold of them in time, so hopefully these little birdies will spread the word to their sick friends once I heal them up."
"I see. Hope you guys feel better." Spike said before he felt an uncomfortable wave hit the back of his throat. He was getting more and more nauseated at the time flew by. "Well, uh, it was nice talking to you, Fluttershy, but I gotta get some medicine. See ya!" Spike zoomed into the crowd of ponies with his hand covering his mouth.
"I just... don't get it... Spike." Twilight said, using her horn to insert a cough drop in her mouth. This had been her third cough drop since Spike delivered the bag of them, yet she was still coughing up a storm. She was simultaneously reading as many medical books from her library as she possibly could. "How could everyone feel so sick all at once?"
Spike was sitting on the floor with a medicine cup filled with Pony-Bismol, slowly sipping an extra dose of the bitter, thick, pink substance. The first dose had no effect other than upsetting his stomach more. "Well, clearly, there's some sort of virus going around. Maybe Ponfluenza? Monoponliosis?"
"No, no, no. Those... ailments can... be remedied with... over-the-counter medicines... but the ones... we're taking... aren't helping. This has to... be some... kind of new illness." Twilight allowed herself to catch her breath from coughing and suck on the cough drop for a few moments before continuing. "Have any... of the ponies... seen a doctor?"
"I don't know, I didn't think of asking anypony." Spiking said, feeling his stomach churn more and more with each slow sip. "Do you think we should see a doctor?"
"Definitely." Twilight croaked as she held in a cough to answer, then fiercely letting it out, laboring to talk. "I don't see.. anything... in my books... about this. We're coughing... we're nauseated... vomiting... some prone to insomnia... I would assume... this would be... ponyfluenza... but this illness... is also seeming to... factor into... drug resistance."
"Drug resistance? You mean this whole thing isn't gonna react to the stinkin' cough drops and Pony-Bismol I bought?!"
"Hey now... settle down... We don't know that... for sure yet..." Twilight struggled to say, deeming yet another factor of this illness as a coincidence. "We'll see a doctor tomorrow... for now... let's just get... some rest..."
