"Come on Pinkie, tell me what I'm doing here!" Rainbow Dash called as she sat at one of the many tables inside Sugar Cube Corner, bored out of her mind. Pinkie Pie, who had invited her over for a "surprise", poked her head out of the kitchen just long enough to reply.
"You know I can't tell you that, silly! That's why they call it a surprise!" Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes as her friend disappeared once more. She could still hear Pinkie muttering to herself in the other room. "Hmm, what would they call it then? A russirpe? A pirsuser?"
Dash found herself chuckling despite her boredom. Pinkie Pie was always good for a laugh. That was probably why she had just gone along with her when she mentioned a surprise at Sugar Cube Corner. At first she had assumed that Pinkie had just invented another reason to throw a party for her. Not that she minded, of course. She always appreciated it when other ponies showed their appreciation of her.
But there was no party to be found.
Instead, Dash sat and waited while a different kind of surprise was being prepared for her. She admitted to herself that she was rather curious about the surprise, but her ever-present need for movement quickly overshadowed that curiosity.
Just as Rainbow Dash was about to fly into the kitchen to tell Pinkie to hurry up, she emerged with a wide smile, skipping along with a silver platter balancing precariously atop her head. Resting on the platter were about one dozen cookies, all freshly baked and looking absolutely delicious.
"Oh, wow Pinkie. Those look... so... good..." Dash's mouth began to water as the heavenly aroma reached her nose. "What are they?"
"They're cookies, silly filly!" Pinkie said with a giggle.
"I meant, what kind of cookie?" Dash didn't even take the time to roll her eyes, all her thoughts focusing on the freshly baked goods.
"Hmm, that's a good question" Pinkie replied, somehow managing to tilt her head in thought without dropping the platter. "I still have to come up with a name for them."
"Huh? What do you mean?" Rainbow asked, taking her eyes off of the cookies long enough to look pinkie in the eye.
Pinkie knelt and let the platter slide off of her head and onto the table in front of Dash. She then placed her hooves on Dash's shoulders and looked deep into her eyes, brow furrowed in concentration.
"I present you, Rainbow Danger Dash, with the highest, most important, most prestigious, most delicious position that is within my power to grant."
Rainbow swallowed nervously, slightly disturbed by Pinkie's sudden seriousness.
"Official Taste Tester!" Pinkie shouted, leaping with excitement while confetti seemingly materialized out of thin air around her.
Rainbow blinked slowly in confusion. "So... you just want me to eat these cookies... and then tell you how they taste?"
"Well duh! I just made these today with a super special, super secret ingredient! I needed somepony to taste them and tell me if they're yummy-licious, and I thought 'Rainbow Dash definitely knows when something is yummy-licious!'"
Rainbow needed no further persuasion as she quickly grabbed the nearest cookie to her and ate it with a single bite. The immediate explosion of flavor caused her cheeks to go numb from pure ecstasy and her wings to flare open so suddenly that pinkie was nearly sent flying.
The taste was unlike anything she had ever tasted before. It was sweet, but it was a unique sweetness that was unlike any treat or dessert she could think of. It also had a subtle spice to it that was impossible to place, yet reminded her of her happiest foalhood memories and her mother's cooking. as the taste began to fade from her mouth, so too did the feelings of happiness and fulfillment. Rainbow Dash suddenly found herself desperate to recapture those feelings.
Before Pinkie could even blink, Rainbow Dash scooped the entire platter into her hooves and stuffed every last cookie into her mouth at once, a feat that surprised even the physics-ignoring mare.
"Wow Dashie, I guess they really were yummy-licious!"
Rainbow appeared not to have heard her as she was currently absorbed in the task of licking every last crumb from her hooves.
"Say" lick "Pinkie" lick "You think you could" lick "Make some more?" lick.
"Sure thing, Dashie!" Pinkie said with a bounce as she started hopping back towards the kitchen. "Maybe I can even try some this time!"
Pinkie disappeared into the back once more, humming merrily, completely oblivious of the fact that Rainbow Dash continued to lick her hooves, even after the last crumbs were long gone, desperate to get just the faintest glimmer of that glorious taste upon her tongue once more.
~ ~ ~
"Spike!" Twilight called out from her dimly lit laboratory in the basement of the Ponyville Library. She was currently reading the most recent list of potions that they had stored there, and was quite concerned about what she had found.
The green and purple draconian assistant came running down the stairs a moment later.
"Yes, Twili-- Ah!" He tripped in the semi-darkness and stumbled the last few steps, landing on his face at the base of the stairs. The unicorn was too absorbed in the thick tome before her to notice his plight.
"Spike, when was the last time we cataloged our potions?"
"Huh? Uh... Just last month, I think" he mumbled from his position on the floor.
"That's what I thought" Twilight said as she turned away from the book to look at the shelves along the wall stocked with every potion imaginable. "Then why does it say that we have this potion when we clearly don't." She pointed with her hoof to a single empty spot on the shelf.
Spike lifted himself up and dusted himself off before walking over to the tome that Twilight had been reading.
"Hmm... 'The Perfect Potion. When used in small doses, creates the illusion of perfection in any endeavor. Warning: Overexposure may cause mind alteration.' Huh. Well it seems harmless enough."
"Spike, potions are extremely dangerous when used by untrained ponies. What if one of the CMC took it to help them find their cutie marks? Or what if somepony broke in and stole it to make themselves more powerful? We have to find this potion!"
"Alright, alright, we'll find the potion. Uh, just how are we going to do that, though?"
"We'll start by re-cataloging our whole stock to make sure it wasn't just misplaced."
Spike looked at the shelves of potions of every shape and size that reached all the way to the ceiling.
"I was afraid you'd say that."
"Potion number eight-hundred and fifty-three: 'Poison Joke from Concentrate'." Spike read the label on the small blue bottle as twilight crossed it off of the list she had levitating in front of her.
"Looks like that's the last one, and still no sign of the missing potion" she said with a worried frown.
Spike placed the bottle on the shelf in its original position. "So what now? Whoever took the potion could be anywhere in Equestria by now."
"Twilight!" Both of them looked up in surprise as Pinkie Pie burst in through the basement door. "Twilight! I need your hel-- Ah!" Pinkie tripped at the top of the stairs in her haste, sending her somersaulting all the way down to land on her face with a thump.
"Pinkie!" Twilight said in panic. "Are you alright?"
"Oh, sure. Notice when she falls down the stairs" Spike said moodily.
Pinkie bounced back onto her hooves, seemingly unfazed by her long tumble and face plant.
"Twilight! I need your help! There's something wrong with Rainbow Dash!"
"What do you mean? What's wrong with her?"
"I don't know. She started acting weird after I gave her some cookies, and then she flew off, calling herself Queen Thunderbutt and talking about finding her royal court."
"Bwahahaha, Thunderbutt! That's a good one! Why didn't I think of that?" Spike said as he burst out laughing.
"Spike, this is serious!" Twilight berated. She turned back to Pinkie. "You said she started acting strange after eating cookies? What kind of cookies were they?"
"They were just plain old chocolate chip cookies, except I used a new spice I got for my birthday last week."
Spike's eyes shot wide open. "Uh oh."
"New spice? Who gave it to you?"
"Spike."
Twilight rounded on the dragon, but he was already half way up the stairs and running for his life.
"Oh no you don't" Twilight said as she grabbed him in her purple aura and floated him back in front of her.
"Be gentle!" he begged.
"We just spent the last five hours going through every single potion we have, when you knew where the missing one was the whole time?!"
"No, I didn't! Honest! I forgot that it was Pinkie's birthday and I needed to get her a gift! So I just grabbed the nearest thing to me! I didn't even remember about it 'till just now!"
"You forgot my birthday?" Pinkie asked with the longest face they ever saw.
"I'm really, really sorry" Spike said to both of them.
Twilight put him down, releasing him from her magical grip. "It doesn't matter now" she said. "What's done is done. Lets just go and find her before she hurts herself. Did you see where she flew off to, Pinkie?"
"Yep! She was heading towards the Everfree forest."
"Perfect."
~ ~ ~
Rainbow Dash sat atop a rock in the Everfree forest surrounded by all manner of woodland creatures. She was covered head-to-toe in mud and had a circle of twigs placed upon her head like a crown. Pinkie, Twilight, and Spike approached cautiously, afraid of how she might react given her unstable mindset.
"Step forward, my subjects" she called out in a commanding voice. "Why have you come before the royal court?"
"Rainbow Dash, Your sitting on a rock in the forest surrounded by squirrels" Twilight told her.
"Ha, do you really think such blatant lies could fool me, Queen Thunderbutt, Lord of Lightning and Rainbows?" She clapped her hooves twice. "Pink one! Your queen desires nourishment. Bring her the royal cookies!"
"Uh, Dashie, I think you've had enough cookies for one day" Pinkie said with a frown.
"You would dare deny your queen?!" She shouted in outrage. "Guards! Take her away!"
The squirrels made no move to obey Rainbow's order.
"My soldiers! You've corrupted their minds with your magic, haven't you?! No matter. My court wizard will deal with you when she returns."
Twilight cocked her head in confusion. "Court wizard?"
"Worry not, my queen!" a familiar and painfully annoying voice called from the shadows. "The Grrrrreat and Powerful Trixie shall subdue the usurpers." The blue show-mare appeared in a puff of grey smoke.
"Oh for the love of..." Twilight sighed as she face-hoofed.
"Hey, aren't you that phony-baloney-pony?" Pinkie asked.
"No, I am not! Uh, I mean... The Grrrrreat and Powerful Trixie is a true magical genius! And after this performance, she will be on the path to fame and fortune, for the rainbow nut has promised Trixie her weight in gold! Hahahaha!"
"Rainbow Dash doesn't have any gold" Twilight deadpanned.
"WHAT?!"
"Do not trust their words, Lady Puddinghead!" Rainbow Dash told her. "They are obviously agents of my evil twin sister!"
"Hahaha, Even I'm not that gullible" Spike laughed.
"I'm surprised you would trust the word of a mare who looks like she just spent the last hour rolling around in the mud" Twilight said in all honesty.
"Well, uh... KAZAM!" Trixie threw another smoke bomb and quickly ran away.
"She never changes..." Twilight said almost wistfully.
"Ha!" Rainbow laughed. "You may have defeated my soldiers and my wizard, but you have yet to face the wrath of Queen Thunderbutt! Now watch as I call forth the power of the heavens to smite you!" She stood on the rock and struck a dramatic pose with her hoof raised towards the sky. Several moments passed in silence, Rainbow trying to smite them and the three of them wondering how they should react to that.
"Alright, that's it." Twilight finally broke the standoff, wrapping Dash in her magic and dragging her in front of them.
"How dare you?!" she yelled. "I am Thunderbutt! Release me at once, peasant!"
Twilight brought Dash closer to her until her horn was touching her forehead. In a flash of light, she removed the effects of the potion and set Dash down. They all waited anxiously to see whether they were looking at Rainbow Dash or Thunderbutt.
Finally the pegasus opened her eyes and saw her three friends looking at her in anticipation.
"Uh, what's up?"
They all released the breaths they had been holding in. Pinkie hopped on top of Dash, embracing the mare in a bone-crushing hug. "Dashie!" she cried joyously.
"Can't... breath..." she managed to choke out. Pinkie obliged and released her.
"Hey Rainbow" Twilight said. "How are you feeling?"
"Like I had too many sweets" she said as she stood and rubbed her tummy. "Uh... why are we in the Everfree forest? And why am I covered in mud?"
"....Sorry..." Spike said. Rainbow just tilted her head in confusion.
"It's a long story" Twilight told her. "Lets head back to Ponyville. Then we can tell you all about it."
After the four friends left the clearing, a cold wind blew through the woods. The crown of Queen Thunderbutt rested on her granite throne where it had fallen from her head, as if awaiting her return.
