Don't feed it after midnight... or any other time, for that matter.
Twilight Sparkle squinted as she closely examined what appeared to be a long-forgotten book shoved all the way in the back of the top-most shelf of the library's last book case. It was cleaning day and she had emptied the shelves completely, save for this last book tucked in the back. How she could have missed it after the countless times she'd cleaned those shelves, she had no idea. She stretched as far into the shelf as she could but couldn't get her hoof on it. She huffed in frustration, proceeding to repeat the process of reaching and grunting.
Spike watched from below, holding the ladder Twilight was standing on, a befuddled look on his face.
"Darn... book!" Twilight groaned, failing to snag the book again.
"Uh... Twilight?" Spike hesitantly started after a moment.
"Rrr... What?!"
"Wouldn't it be easier if, I don't know..." the dragon cautiously said, scratching his neck with one claw, "you used your magic to get it out?"
Twilight opened her mouth to snap at him, but her expression of frustration quickly changed to one of dumbfounded realization. She brought her hoof up to her face and sighed.
"Sorry, Spike," she exhaustively said after a moment, "You know how excited I can get when I encounter a new book for the first time."
"You don't say."
Twilight's horn lit up and a violet aura surrounded the dusty tome, carefully bringing it out. The book in hoof, Twilight quickly climbed down the ladder, her heart racing with excitement.
"You know you could've flown down, right?"
She wasn't paying attention to Spike. She stared in bedazzled wonder at the old, ragged book. Her eyes lit up like stars and she excitedly blew the dust off the cover.
"Careful, it looks a bit..." Spike started.
Twilight coughed and hacked.
"...dusty."
"Ack! It went up my nose!"
While Spike went out to grab some lunch, Twilight eagerly flipped through the fragile pages of the old book. "Hmm... a lot of this just seems to be nothing but wild rambling!" After scanning the book, she was quite disappointed to find only a small handful of seemingly simple spells. "Any foal in magic kindergarten could cast these spells without even trying!" she said, slouching slightly.
She sat down at her table and leaned on one of her hooves, blowing a raspberry in frustration. Now very bored, she flipped through the pages without interest. She stopped on a random page and looked down. She had stopped at a simple transformation spell. She chuckled and shrugged. "Couldn't hurt to brush up a bit, I guess."
She glanced around to select an object to transform, finally settling on the salt shaker right in front of her. She closed her eyes and concentrated, her horn enveloped in a strong, violet aura. This was foal's play.
Suddenly, there was a loud slam and a familiar, high-pitched voice sang out, "Howdy doody, Twilight!"
Twilight jumped and a purple beam shot from her horn. It bounced off the library walls, making spectacular laser trails in the process. Twilight shrieked and ducked under the table.
She heard a quick pop like a bubble bursting and cautiously opened her eyes. It seemed like it was over. She crawled out from under the table and turned to lecture Pinkie on the time-honored tradition of knocking before entering, but there was no Pinkie. The door to the library was flung wide open, but there was no trace of Pinkie Pie.
"Uh... Pinkie?" Twilight called, "You can come out, it's over." She slowly walked towards the door, looking about. "Pinkie, are you okay?" She stopped at the entrance and looked outside. No Pinkie Pie in sight.
Suddenly, a tiny voice squeaked below her, "Holy whack-a-moley, that was a zinger of a light show, Twilight!"
The alicorn froze, her eyes widening to the size of dinner trays. She slowly looked down.
"I loved the flash and dazzle, but you might want to take it easy next time. Those crazy lights did something weird to my eyes! Everything is super-gantically huge! I feel like a teeny-weeny, tiny-winy, twinkie-Pinkie again!"
The first thing Spike noticed when he returned was Twilight, passed out on the floor. He rushed to her side and shook her vigorously. "Oh c'mon! I didn't take that long to get food!"
Twilight blinked slowly with a loopy look on her face, mumbling something about twinkies.
"Snap out of it!"
Twilight shook her head and exhaustively looked at Spike. "Spike... why am I spinning?"
The dragon rolled his eyes and replied, "You're not spinning, Twilight. You passed out or something." He raised an eyebrow and squinted at her nose. "Say, when did you have time to grow a mustache?"
Twilight woke up completely at that remark.
She felt something fuzzy above her upper lip move and a tiny voice giggled, "Silly! I'm not a mustache, I am the mustache! Besides, I thought I should try to wake her up, lying on the floor isn't healthy for your kidneys."
Spike and Twilight both exclaimed, "PINKIE?!"
"Duh! The one and only! Wait, I have to think about that for a minute..."
Spike backed up and stared with a slack jaw. His eye started twitching involuntarily.
Twilight got up and slowly, carefully peeled Pinkie Pie off from under her nose.
"Woo hoo! Hoof ride! By the way, you might want to blow your nose at some point, Twilight."
Twilight unbelievably inspected her excitable friend. She had turned Pinkie Pie into a caterpillar. She looked like any other kind of caterpillar, except she was poofy and pink and had exceptionally large and expressive blue eyes (for a caterpillar, at least.) The little Pinkie hopped up and down on Twilight's hoof and started babbling some story about how her Uncle Lenny had once swatted a caterpillar with a golf club, turning it into a butterfly in the next county.
Twilight rushed back over to the open book on the table, her mind swirling. "I don't understand. There's got to be a reversal spell somewhere in here!" She rapidly flipped through the pages, desperate for answers.
"... and they're still friends today! Uncle Lenny still likes having that nice butterfly over for his weekly poker tournament..."
"It's okay, Pinkie," Twilight nervously reassured her friend, "I'm going to fix this, just try to stay calm!"
"La-la, la-la, la!"
Twilight had scanned the book for half an hour, to no avail. She was starting to sweat excessively.
Pinkie didn't seem to notice. She was too preoccupied with perching on the tip of Twilight's horn squealing, "I'm the king of the world!"
All Spike could do was watch in silence from his slouched position against the wall, his jaw still agape.
"Rrr!" Twilight groaned, "This doesn't make any sense! Writings in gibberish, the spells keep changing, I can't figure this out!"
Reluctantly flipping back to the first page, her eye caught a message scrawled inside the cover: Property of Discord, Lord of Chaos and Professional Pistachio Taster. If lost, please donate to a loving home. Great with kids! Has a tendency to bite.
"I should have known," Twilight sighed.
Another line of script magically appeared beneath the main message, making a clucking sound as it did so: P.S. If you're that nerdy, upstart princess who still doesn't trust a humble, reformed fellow like myself, flip to page twenty-three. You will find the instructions for the reversal spell to perform on poor Pinkie Pie. Nice going, Einstein. If you need a cheering section, call me!
"Page twenty-three..." Twilight recited, "page... aha! Here it is!"
The page read:
Turn one of your best friends into a grub? Ready to tear out your mane in a burst of royal poutiness? Fear not, the gracious Discord is here to help! The spell you oh-so-wisely cast will become permanent if Pinkie devours anything containing a single grain of sugar. Keep her off sweets for an hour and you'll be fine. Good luck. It'd be easier to herd whales made of jelly, believe me, I've done it. Bee-tee-dubs, Pinkie's present condition will also give her a significant energy boost, causing her to act out a little more. Tootles! Oh, on the off chance *cough* that you fail, I happen to know that dear Fluttershy needs food for some baby birds.
"Really?" Twilight said, quizzically raising an eyebrow, "That's it?"
The book slammed shut on its own suddenly and a cartoonish mouth sprouted out from in between the pages. "Yeah, that's it! I'm out of here!" Four stick-like legs popped out from the corners of the book and the belligerent tome hopped off of the table and scuttled out the front door. It whistled 'Oh Susana' as it left.
"He seemed nice!" Pinkie happily stated as she hopped up and down on Twilight's ear.
"Okay," Twilight said, taking a deep breath, "all we have to do is keep Pinkie away from sugar for an hour. We don't have any sweets in the library, so we should be fine!"
Pinkie dive-bombed from Twilight's ear, tugging on a tuft of pink fuzz like a rip-cord, causing a tiny parachute to open as she floated to the floor. Unfortunately, Twilight wasn't paying attention. She suddenly turned and saw the little, pink caterpillar skipping out the door - at a speed most uncommon for an insect - squealing, "Freeeeedom!" Gummy followed, snapping his toothless jaws, unaware the snack he was pursuing was his master (then again, you never know.)
Twilight let out a terrified gasp and bolted for the door after her friend. "Pinkie, no!"
"No, bad Gummy! We don't eat Mommy!"
Twilight came to a halt in the middle of town, frantically scanning her surroundings for the sugar-fixated Pinkie. A shriek from a nearby restaurant caught her attention and she hurried to the scene.
"Agh! A singing caterpillar just tried to eat my cheesecake! Waiter!"
Twilight arrived in time to spot Pinkie fleeing the scene on a conveniently caterpillar-sized scooter. She hurried after her and spotted Pinkie following a fleeing stallion who was desperately clutching a box of fresh cupcakes in one hoof.
"Gah! What do you want from me?!"
"The cupcakes! Hand them over, buster!"
"Whatever I did to deserve this, I'm sorry! Take them!" he shrieked, flinging the box to the ground and curling up in a fetal position. "Please don't hurt me!"
Pinkie giggled, "I wasn't going to hurt you, silly! The way you stallions think is beyond me!" She hefted the gigantic box of cupcakes onto the back of her scooter and sped away. Twilight couldn't believe how fast she was going, even when weighed down.
"Pinkie, please stop!" she desperately shouted, at last beginning to catch up to the speeding bug.
"Never!" she squeaked back, "I'm free! I will be a beautiful butterfly!"
"I won't let that happen to you!"
"I won't let you not let that happen to me!"
"What does that even mean?!"
"I don't know, but it sounds cool!"
Distracted, Pinkie didn't notice she was about collide with Rarity, who was obliviously exiting a shop with supplies. Turning around and noticing the impending disaster, Pinkie swerved and the little scooter flipped. Hitting the ground, Pinkie watched in horror as her precious cargo flew through the air. The cupcakes splattered all over Rarity, catching her quite off guard. Her shocked face covered with sprinkles and frosting, she opened her mouth to scream but became instantly silent at the sight of a pink caterpillar holding a sprinkle close, wailing, "Wilsoooon!"
Twilight came galloping up and instantly captured the grieving grub in her magic aura. She sighed and wiped her brow, turning to face the slack-jawed Rarity. "Whew! That was a close one, I couldn't have caught her without your sacrifice, Rarity!"
The fashionista just stared, her eyes twitching rather noticeably.
"As for you," Twilight said turning to Pinkie, "I have something to say... I'm sorry, Pinkie. You can't be held responsible for your actions today. I should've been more careful and I promise I'll wait this out with you until you're your old, pony self again! Pinkie Promise!"
Twilight turned back to Rarity. "Sorry about this, Rarity. I promise to make this up to you."
"Uh... not to worry, darling!" the unicorn nervously chuckled after a minute, "Cupcakes are... all the rage right now!"
Twilight chuckled and headed back for the library, pink caterpillar in tow.
"Put me down! It's my destiny! I am the chosen one! I AM THE ONE WHO KNOCKS!"
