Twilight Sparkle was tired. This she wouldn't usually admit, but after an entire week of spending time in the hoity-toity Canterlot city, the newly-crowned Alicorn just wanted to fall onto her bed, hay, her couch, and drift off to sleep. As she approached the town square, she noticed a familiar building on the horizon.
This building, mind you, was more of a tree, but Twilight was too tired to correct her inner thoughts as she adjusted her saddlebags and continued to trot toward her destination. Rubbing her eyes with a hoof, the mare began to go through her evening routines, reflecting on the sunset that met her gaze as she stole a glance at the Unicorn mountain range to the west.
Giving a smile as the tree-house grew closer in the distance, she suddenly took notice of a multitude of lights emanating from inside, shining brightly throughout the mostly dark-covered town it resided in. Now giving a slight frown, the mare hmmed and began to trot a little faster. It was a few minutes before Spike's bedtime, but ever since a couple weeks back, he had begun to tuck himself in earlier, so as to allow himself to become less grouchy in the morning, as per Twilight's request.
Although he needed light to read his comic books, he would most definitely not be wasting candles and his own breath to illuminate the entire household. That wasn't like him. Quickening her pace, she arrived at the front door with a few droplets of sweat to show for her slight fatigue. Feeling for her magic, her eyes scanned the tree with a steely gaze as she searched for the key under the Welcome mat.
Finding it, she brought it out and levitated it front of her eyesight, sliding the keys around the ring that held them to search for the one that unlocked the front door. A few heartbeats, and some annoyance later, the mare clicked the key into place, turning it in the lock and opening the door without a hitch.
What met her eyes almost made her faint. The entire library was a mess, papers, books, and ink scattered everywhere, marring the carpet, the furniture, and, surprisingly, a large amount of the ceiling. Dropping her saddlebag to the floor, the mare succeeded in picking her jaw up from the ink-splattered carpet at her hooves. Stowing her frustration into the back of her mind as if she were procrastinating, Twilight shut her eyes and began to perform her "Non-Insanity Breath Exercises."
Slowly calming herself down, she opened her eyes again and looked around the library for what to clean up first. Though the ink may have been spilled hours ago, she thought that cleaning it up before it stained should be first. Shutting her eyes for the second time in concentration, she imagined her household devoid of ink, and slowly pushed that image into her horn's aura. Giving a low grunt, she felt her horn give off a magical essence, and as she opened her eyes, she smiled, seeing a completely ink-devoid library looking back at her.
Suddenly, realization kicked in. She facehoofed as she realized that she could have just cleaned up everything then and there, but made herself feel better by telling her conscience that cleaning the mess all up at once would have probably taken a little more out of her. Returning to her smile, she thought about waking her charge up to assist her, but quickly shooed it away, wanting him to rest instead of help her. Admittedly, he would have jumped at the chance to help her, but with his latest birthday, he needed to catch up on sleep.
Which reminded her what she was supposed to be doing right now herself, were it not for this darned mess. Believing it to be an unnoticed mistake of Spike's, she made a plan to talk to him in the morning about not sending letters to all of his friends at once. He had done that once before.
It wasn't pretty.
Preparing a basic levitation spell, the mare began to magick the various amounts of books and papers that lay scattered throughout the library, stacking them into piles to assort later. Extending her wings, she flapped up to the top of the bookshelves, enveloping the mess atop them in a violet aura as well and placing them on her coffee table.
Suddenly, without warning, she heard a tremendous crash resonate throughout the library, causing her to lose her concentration and drop the books she was currently levitating. As she did so, A Complete Guide To Wingboners found itself crash onto the hovering mare's head, sending her falling to the ground below.
The damage to her would have been devastating from that height, were it not for the large pile of books she had landed in. Unfortunately, it wasn't a pile of paperbacks. Sliding The Guinness Book Of Equestrian Records off her head with a swipe of her hoof, Twilight gave a deadpan look toward where the sound had come from.
Had Spike really been up and in the kitchen the entire time, and didn't even take a second to think about assisting her? Grumbling with a roll of her eyes, Twilight spread a walkway through her "rescuer's" contents, lightly stepping over and around them so as to not create dirty hoofmarks on their delicate covers.
Clearing her throat, she asked, "Spike, are you in here?"
Not hearing an answer, she proceeded into the kitchen, hearing the tell-tale sound of someone rummaging through her refrigerator like it was the last source of food in Equestria.
"Spike, what in the name of Celestia are you doing up?! And eating food, you know that you can't eat food after 7:00!" She barked, growing annoyed with his raccoon-like behavior. Sometimes, she honestly could not understand that dragon.
Finding the fridge, she noticed that the plastic white door was blocking her view of the drake, as well as the recently-added island in the middle of her kitchen. Giving a frustrated look that would make her Magic Kindergarten teachers frightful, she felt for the frying pan inside the sink that she presumed her charge had used today. Bringing it over to the island, she quickly banged it on the countertop, eliciting a surprised stutter from her late-night food-thief.
Wait. Stutter? Spike never stuttered, only when he was in serious trouble or around Rarity. And although him being up and eating at this time wasn't really accepted, she never considered it to be "serious trouble". Lightly placing the frying pan on the counter, she tilted her head and slowly walked around the island, approaching the refrigerator from the still-opened door's side.
Biting her lip in fear that she had accidentally hurt her assistant, she quickly stammered out, "S-S-Spike? Are you okay?"
As she neared the kitchen appliance with caution, she suddenly screamed at the top of her lungs when she noticed that the intruder wasn't her beloved charge, falling down onto her haunches in surprise. Shaking her head with vigor, she got to her hooves and shouted, "Rainbow Dash, what are you doing in my....in my..."
Rainbow Dash didn't look like her usual self. Her usual blue outline was replaced with a solid black, her magenta irises being replaced with a likewise void-less appearance. Peering out from behind the refrigerator door, she broke the silence with a voice that most definitely did not belong to her.
"O-oh, hey Twilight. I got really hungry, so I thought I'd come in through your window and find somethin' to snack on."
Twilight just stood there motionless, her eye twitching as she noticed the Rainbow Dash-shaped hole in her kitchen window.
"Do you have any sugar cubes? 'cuz I could really go for one right about now."
"A-and sometimes, I don't know why she does it, she just...does, y'know? An-and then usually, she gets really angry with me, and then she starts yelling at me and makes me feel bad. Sometimes, she even says my full name when she yells at me, NOBODY SAYS MY FULL NAME EVER. DO YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT I'M TRYING TO TELL YOU?! SHE USES MY FULL. NAME."
Staring deeply into the eyes of her listener and breathing heavily, Rainbow kept her grip on the mare's shoulders, before she received a whack upside the head with a rolled-up newspaper.
"Ow! That hurrrt..." she whined, rubbing her cheek with a hoof. Frowning, she watched as the pregnant mare next to her got up from her seat and walked to the other side of the waiting room, making sure that she was as far away from the rainbow-maned Pegasus as possible.
Flattening her ears to her side, she slumped in her chair, waiting for her purple friend to finish getting an appointment for her. She stood in front of the counter, conversing with a lab-coat wearing unicorn, his pure white coat blending in with the walls of the waiting room.
Beginning to lose the feeling of pain emanating from her cheek, Rainbow gave a harumph of boredom, crossing her forelegs and sticking her bottom lip out like a pouting foal. Eyes wandering the various magazines that sat to the left of her chair, she gave an unbelieving sigh, bending over to assess what she should read.
Right then and there, Twilight arrived by her side to rescue her, "Oh thank God Twilight, I almost read a book while you were gone!" she celebrated, raising both hooves in the air and giving an open-mouthed smile.
"I thought you liked reading?"
"Oh, I do. Trust me. Some of these books here are really gross though. Did you know that wingboners can actually help in intercour-"
"Ehehe...that's enough Rainbow Dash, the doctor wants to see you now," Twilight quickly responded, thrusting a hoof out to shut her friend's mouth.
"Oh, okay Twilight. Just so you know, if you hear a lot of screaming out here, do not come in. I'm prob'ly gonna have an awesome party goin' on in there," Rainbow stated, waving a hoof out and fanning the air in front of her.
"O-okay, Rainbow," the Alicorn stammered, giving a half-feigned smile, "go on into the Doctor's office now."
"Alright Twilight. I'll, uh, see you in a bit!"
"Yeah, uh, bye Rainbow Dash...?"
Of course, the Alicorn wouldn't dare leave the room. She was so far the only one of her friends that knew about Rainbow Dash's new appearance, and wanted to be the first to know about what exactly it was. She was thankful for the fact that this was a 24-hour Walk-in office, she couldn't bear thinking about how long she would have had to wait if it wasn't so.
Walking over to the pregnant mare still in the room, she quickly apologized, turned tail, and sat across from her, hooves in her lap as she awaited her friends examination results.
"So, Miss.." the doctor trailed off, surfing through his clipboard for her analysis paper, "Ah, Miss Dash, how are you feeling?"
"Uh, pretty good, actually. Thank you for asking," the mare replied, her hind legs swinging freely over the side of the table.
The doctor tried his best to keep from chuckling at his patient's whiny-sounding voice, "Eheh, ahem. Well, what seems to be the problem?" he asked, raising his eyeglasses to his chestnut irises.
"Well, uh, my stomach kinda hurts."
Raising a brow, the doctor returned to his clipboard, looking through the notes his patient's friend had written down, "It says here that you usually don't hold this appearance. What does she mean by that?"
"Oh uh, I dunno."
"It says here that you usually don't look this...chubby-"
"IS SHE SAYING THAT I'M FAT?!"
"It appears to say so-"
"I'M NOT FAT! WHY WOULD SHE EVEN THINK THAT?! I MEAN, SURE I EAT A LOT OF SUGAR CUBES, HELL, I MIGHT BE THE FIRST SUGAR CUBE ADDICT EVER, BUT I AM NOT FA-A-A-AT!" Rainbow yelled, burying her hooves into her forehead as she keeled over and began to wail in sadness.
Suddenly feeling both guilty and awkward, the Doctor slowly advanced toward the weeping Pegasus, raising a hoof and placing it on her shoulder comfortingly, "Now Miss Dash, you are not fat-"
"YES I A-A-A-AM!"
"..you're just...big-boned..?" the Doctor couldn't quite tell whether it was a compliment or a question, but thankfully, his patient thought it was the former.
The Pegasus immediately stopped her wailing, instead quieting down enough to the point where she let out simple whimpers in intervals, wiping her eyes with a hoof whenever a tear dared cascade down her cheeks, "I...I guess that does make me feel better. Thanks Doctor Whateveryournameis."
"It's Cross. Doctor Red Cross," he answered, giving a solemn smile to his patient.
"Oh, well uh, thanks Doctor Red Cross. I feel a lot better now..."
"Good, good. Now, I usually only give these to fillies that come in here, but you've been a pretty good patient, so I might as well let you have one too," Cross said with a smile, turning his head and opening a nearby cabinet.
"Oh my God oh my God oh my Go-o-o-d, whaddou I get?!"
"Thanks Doctor Cross! You were really helpful today!"
"You're very welcome, Miss Sparkle! Have a good day, and keep an eye on Rainbow Dash for me!" Cross responded, waving goodbye from the wide-open door of the doctor's office.
"Can do, Cross! Thanks again!" Twilight said, waving farewell and turning her attention to the road ahead of her, "So Rainbow Dash, how'd it go? You feeling okay?"
Looking to her left, she found her rainbow-maned friend fumbling with a plastic container, "Uuughh, why did he give me dental floss? It's not even the freaking dentist's for cryin' out loud!"
"Well, maybe he ran out of lollipops-"
"He didn't though! I saw a whole bowl of them in the corner of his office! It's not fair!"
"Rainbow, I'm sure he had a logical reason why he didn't give you a lollipop-"
"There isn't a reason, though!"
"Rainbow...please, just calm down. Here, we're coming up on Sugarcube Corner, we'll get you something there, okay?" Twilight groaned, trying to drone out her friend's complaining from her hearing.
As if sensing her struggle, the Pegasus immediately ceased her long listing of why she should have received candy, suddenly brightening up and giving a big, admittedly adorable smile, "Uh, okay. That sounds fun."
"You don't sound very enthusiastic about this."
Waving a hoof in the air, Rainbow replied, "Nah, I'm really happy about it. Can't you tell, Twilight?"
Biting her lip, the Alicorn gave a feigned laugh, "O-of course I do! Now c'mon, I'll lead the way."
"Awesome! I get to have cupcakes!"
"Great...great..!" Twilight once again feigned, giving an obviously fake smile and trotting to the front door of the confection shop with vigor. Opening the door, she waited for Rainbow to pass by and thank her. After three heartbearts, she cracked open a single eyelid, scanning the field in front of Sugarcube Corner for her friend.
Giving a deep frown, she found Rainbow Dash upside down, her entire body wrapped in dental floss and fixed in a rather impossible stance. Looking to the skies and giving a deep sigh, she trotted over to her fallen friend, who stared back up at her with a still-sincere grin.
"Oh uh hey, Twilight. You wouldn't believe what just happened."
