Trebuchets, Pies and Gemstones, Oh My!
An unusual sign was posted on the Ponyville Market Notice Board. There being a sign, in and of itself, was not unusual, as that was the board's intended purpose.
However.
However, the sign itself was on a rather expensive looking paper with hornwriting as formal as it was archaic in nature. Worse still was what was written on the paper.
Dearest Denizens of Ponyville
My Sister, the princess Celestia, will be visiting yon township on the morrow. Thusly, I am offering a two thousand bit boon to the pony who best 'pranks' her during this visit in the form of a bounty. In the spirit of fair competition, no magic allowed.
Signed Princess Luna of Equestria
P.S
Please take this sign down before her visit, lest its presence give away our devious plot.
Indeed, there could be no doubt as to the authenticity of this sign, a sign from a god as it were, as her royal seal was stamped quite heartily in dark wax the colour of midnight at the bottom.
Now, whether the two thousand bit reward was adjusted for a thousand years of inflation or not, well, that was another issue entirely. The current issue, as it stood, was what this sign meant to the denizens of the humble Ponyville – humble in spite of its latest addition of a giant crystal castle in the middle of the town where the library once stood, where their personal princess lived. The residents of Ponyville would be quite proud of their ability to remain humble in the face of overwhelming odds, but that would be a most dreadful contradiction, and so they remained humble.
But I digress.
Regardless of inflation, two thousand bits was a lot of money, not to mention the prestige of managing to prank Princess Celestia herself. So it was that a perfectly lovely day in Ponyville for many would be utterly ruined by a dedicated few.
Let's meet them, shall we?
"Pinkie, stop squirming, I'm trying to read."
"I'm sorry, Dashie, but I'm too excited, I can't stop shivering my timbers. Look at the size of that booty!"
"I'm trying to, Pinkie," Rainbow Dash complained at the pony gripping her withers from behind and bouncing every-which-way, "but it's hard when you won't stop moving."
"Two thousand bits if we prank Celestia! That's twenty hundreds! Or a hundred twenties!"
"We could totally buy a jet-ski with that money." Rainbow Dash drooled at the sign. The sign looked reasonably unimpressed.
"Or the Cake's a new oven!" Pinkie agreed, bouncing this-way-and-that on the place, never quite settling.
"What? Pinkie that's boring. And practical." Rainbow Dash complained, glaring at the pink mare over her shoulder, "Why not spend it on a huge party or something?"
"I don't need more parties, but the Cakes need an oven." Pinkie Pie prodded Rainbow in the side pointedly. Rainbow winced a little, partially at the chastisement but mostly because of the hoof digging into her ribs.
"Yeah, but if we're getting money for a prank, it should be on something fun. Exciting! And maybe, just maybe," Rainbow Dash glanced suspiciously to the left, "and hear me out on this," and now she looked suspiciously to the right, before looking Pinkie in the eye and nodding soundly, "kind of awesome."
Pinkie's voice went an octave higher, right into 'whining' territory. "We can do awesome stuff for free all the time! Practical things cost money."
"Practical things are boring." Rainbow Dash explained with a sigh, rubbing her muzzle with a hoof as her patience wore ever-thinner, "Awesome things are awesome. Ergo, when we win, we spend the bits on awesome things."
"If you win," Pinkie declared, "because if you won't let me do boring things with the money, I'm not helping you."
"Fine!" Rainbow shouted, throwing her hooves up in the air, "Then when I win, I'm buying us something awesome, and you'll love it, and thank me for it, and say 'Oh, Dash, you were so right all along, I'm sorry I ever doubted you' and I'll say 'I know, I'm awesome, and also gracious'. So there."
"Nuh-uh!" Pinkie retorted, wittily.
"Yuh-huh!" Rainbow Dash retorted right back, an equal paragon of wit.
"Fine!" Pinkie snapped, stomping off, huffing and puffing.
"Fine!" Rainbow boomed, flapping off, fuming.
Sweetie Belle watched from afar, confused. She nudged Applebloom and Scootaloo beside her.
"Hey, girls, I just saw Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie fighting." She pointed at the message board, long since vacated by the pair, :It looked really bad."
"What?" Scootaloo hissed, head snapping to where Sweetie Belle pointed, scowling when she saw both had left. "What were they fighting about."
"I think it was one of the signs on the board. Maybe it's something really bad."
"We better check it out." Applebloom nodded, "Ya know. Just to be sure."
And so they did.
Sweetie Belle, being the fastest reader, was the first to react, squealing in excitement. Applebloom came a close second, gasping in realization and delight. Scootaloo, being the slowest, asked the other two to explain it to her, to which she then reacted with a happy little fluttering of her wings and a big, goofy smile.
"We have got to get in on this!" Scootaloo whispered, eyes darting across the market square to make sure nopony else was watching, "It might be the only way to save Rainbow Dash's friendship."
Applebloom shook her head, her big red bow wiggling with the gesture, "That and two thousand bits. That might be more than we see the rest of our whole lives!"
"What do you think we should do?" Sweetie whispered back.
"Ah'm thinkin' 'trebuchet'," Applebloom grinned, leering at Scootaloo out of the corner of her eye, "how 'bout you, Scootaloo?"
"A trebuchet and fireworks. Lots of them." Scootaloo agreed, bouncing on the spot in excitement.
"Hey, don't I get a say in this?" Sweetie stomped a hoof indignantly. The other two glanced back at her apologetically.
"Gee, Sweetie, real sorry about that--"
"Hey, we didn't mean anythin' by it--"
Sweetie grinned, wide and toothy. "I'm just kidding, let's go do this thing!"
The other two matched her, grin for grin, and scarpered, leaving the sign unattended, and a small dragon in their wake.
"Milk. Eggs. Bread. Milk. Eggs. Bread." Spike repeated to himself, counting off on his claw each item, just so he wouldn't forget them. It was just three things, three things, that he couldn't forget. Milk, eggs and bread. Twilight might live in a huge castle, now, again, but she still had to eat sometime.
Hang on, was that Luna's seal on the message board?
Spike plodded up to it, reading the message in fascination. He scampered off a few seconds later, one more item added to his list.
"Milk, eggs, bread, win prank contest, milk, eggs, bread, win prank contest," he recited dutifully to himself.
Discord passed Spike, bemused by his ramblings. "Boring, boring, boring, win prank contest." He recited, gagging, before mentally doing a double take, staring after the receding dragon. "Hang on, what was that last one?"
Discord flew after Spike in a zig-zag, rapidly catching up to him. "Ah, Spike, what was that you were saying?"
The baby dragon was far too excited to remember he should be terrified, wary and otherwise cautious of Discord, and so freely shared information that, in a more rational state of mind, he certainly wouldn't. "Prank contest! Two thousand bit reward! Read the message board!" Spike panted out, still running in spite of Discord having picked him up by the head between thumb and forefinger.
And so Discord placed Spike delicately back down on the ground and retreated back into the market place, curiosity pulling him ever-forward.
His eyes caught upon Luna's royal seal immediately, and he read the message three times, backwards and forwards, to make sure he was reading it right.
"Well, well, well," he sing-songed, grinning deviously, finishing with a trill of "jackpot!" His eyes stuck to that disclaimer, however. "No magic, though? Why, that gives me an idea as devious as it is brilliant." And with that, as is the nature of a god of chaos, he drifted lazily off on the breeze, cackling deviously.
Big Macintosh drifted lazily through the market, looking for good ingredients for the broth he would make that night. His eyes, too, caught upon the royal seal displayed on the messaging board.
He read the letter slowly, carefully, pondering its vast and weighty implications.
"Nope!" he said, and rather loudly at that, and tore the message from the noticeboard, daintily putting it ever-so-carefully in the bin, as if it were a rattlesnake coiled to strike. He didn't feel too guilty about it, because it said to do exactly that on the message anyway.
But who knew what could happen if the wrong pony had read that sign? Macintosh certainly didn't want to find out.
Long into the night ponies schemed and plotted, each equally eager to claim the bounty on Celestia's head, each with their own plans for what they'd do with the prize money, each working long into the night on their plans.
Each certain that they would be the one who would win.
A pink pony slaved over a hot stove, late into the early morning. A blue pegasus stole from the Apple's windowsill a pie that lay cooling there. Three small fillies removed 'subtle' from their dictionaries. A baby dragon cackled maniacally, though not quite loud enough so as to alert his ward... and a being of utter chaos made a great show of doing absolutely nothing, behaviour that deeply concerned Fluttershy.
Then morning came and tension thrummed through the air of humble Ponyville. The "Welcome Princess Celest" banner was brought out under a bemused Princess Twilight Sparkle's gaze, storefronts were cleaned to a diamond shine in anticipation of Princess Celestia gracing them with her presence...
But underneath the usual tension caused by the arrival of prestigious royalty, there was another deeper, darker tension. The tension of the imminent battlefield. A war would be fought on Ponyville soil today by combatants who did not know each other, know them a part of a battle, but combatants nonetheless.
They would be at war for The Bounty.
The kitchens of Twilight's crystal castle teemed with life, the Cakes and Apples desperately doing what they could to make sure catering was absolutely perfect for the princesses. This is where we will find Pinkie Pie, delicately placing a dessert pie on a buffet table when nopony is watching.
Well, when she thought nopony was watching.
"Pinkie Pie," Mrs Cake crooned, "another pie? Oh dear, you've been just so very helpful this morning."
"Thanks, Mrs Cake," Pinkie Pie beamed as genuinely as she could, nudging the pie deeper into the confections table, "just trying to be super-duper ready-eady for the Princess. This pie is just for her!"
"I'm sure we'll be just fine, just fine." Mrs Cake said, more to herself than to Pinkie, "What flavour pie is it? I'll make a special note of it."
"What flavour? Oh, it's, ah, it's a surprise!" Pinkie stammered, backing away slowly, "Just for the princess, see? I used special super-secret ingredients to make it!"
"O-oh. I see." Mrs Cake said, studying the pie apprehensively. "Well, I'll make a special note of that then, dear, won't I?"
Pinkie's eyes darted back and forth between Mrs Cake and the pie cooling on the table. She was caught! Her plans were foiled! Well, the pie had a foil plate to begin with, but now it was all foil! Pinkie prepared to bite down on her sugar pill just in case. Twilight had told her, once, that if you told a pony what a sugar pill did, and they believed you super-hard, it made it come true. She called it the play-see-something effect, and Pinkie trusted in it now to be one of those pills spies in spy movies always claimed to take when they got caught, praying it would work.
"Well, alright, but Pinkie, please, could you help Mr Cake lay out the tables? Princess Celestia might be here very soon, and it's very important everything is presented as nicely as possible for her."
Pinkie Pie sighed in relief, internally, chewing down on the sugar pill and believing super-hard that it was just a sugar pill. She wouldn't need it now. "Okay Mrs Cake, sure thing!"
With that she zipped off, leaving Mrs Cake alone in the kitchen.
"Where should we aim it?" Applebloom asked from her marksman's chair, surrounded by grinding wheels and wooden cogs for turning the great wooden engine beneath and beside her.
"At the Princess, duh." Scootaloo rolled her eyes, adjusting the helmet she'd borrowed from Pinkie Pie. Sweetie Belle had told her it was a pickelhaube, but Scootaloo didn't think it looked like a pickel at all, it looked like a helmet with a big spike on the top of it.
Sweetie pushed Scootaloo in the side, wearing her own pilfered military costume, green camoflague fatigues and matching warpaint, which she had pilfered from her sister's wardrobe. "Where's the Princess going to be, though?"
Scootaloo thought about it for a second. "She's probably just going to be at Twilight's new castle, right? Why don't we just aim for that?"
"Isn't aiming a trebuchet at a castle a decoration of war?" Applebloom asked nervously, even as she wound one of the many wheels in front of her, calibrating the huge wooden machine to aim towards the crystal tower looming in the distance.
"Declaration." Sweetie Belle corrected promptly, "But I think it's just using it for its intended purpose. I mean, I think."
"Rainbow Dash says we can get away with anything, because we're miners." Scootaloo added helpfully.
"What? But we tried for a mining cutie mark and we didn't get nuthin'!" Applebloom protested, seriously considering aiming for a non-descript path of woods and sabotaging this whole plan... but then again, two thousand bits. The weapon remained primed and on target.
Sweetie Belle seemed to think about that for a moment. "I think she means minor with an 'o'."
"Yeah. That one." Scootaloo nodded, pickelhaube bouncing around on her too-small head. She turned and stared at Sweetie Belle, mystified, "Wait, wait, hold up... you can spell minor with an 'o' now? Why have I been spelling it wrong the whole time, then?"
"No, you've been spelling it right. I think it's just one of those, ahh, homonyms, I think. Words that sound the same but are spelled differently."
"That just does my head in." Applebloom moaned, "Maths is so much easier. There's just one right answer, and you know if it's wrong."
Sweetie Belle raised a skeptical eyebrow. Scootaloo joined her dubiousness, "I thought you hated maths?"
Applebloom twisted in her chair to glare at Scootaloo beside her. "Hey, I said it was easier, I didn't say I liked it better or nothin'."
"Whatever," Scootaloo said, waving her hoof dismissively, "so are we going to load a whole bunch of fireworks into this thing now or what?"
"On it!" Sweetie Belle chirped, diving for the crate marked 'explosives'.
Pinkie Pie had left the kitchen. Mrs Cake was busy, totally not looking.
Now was the perfect time for Rainbow Dash, ninja extraordinaire, to switch the pies.
Feeling the black nylon whisper against her fur, Rainbow crept ever closer to the table coated in sweet deserts, prank potential every one of them... but she would have to go for the pie.
She sure as sugar couldn't bake, she could just steal pies from windowsills and be awesome about it.
She crept with the loaded pie delicately gripped between her arched wings. She'd have to make the switch quick, before any of the Cakes caught her.
She made the switch, deftly juggling the pie on the table with the one in her wings' grip and trading them. She glanced at the door... nopony had seen her. She glanced at Mrs Cake... she was still busy. She glanced at Spike, he was staring at her from the pantry and-
Wait.
"Spike?!" She whisper-hissed, wincing at the sound of her own exclamation and quadruple checking Mrs Cake was still distracted. She was, doing baker things. Cakes and stuff. Alright.
"What are you doing here?" He whisper-hissed back, and Rainbow noticed he, too, was trying to stay out of Mrs Cake's sight. She put two and two together rather quickly, like she did everything. Because she was fast and stealthy and awesome.
Oh. Right. And caught.
"You're here to prank Celestia, aren't you?" she accused, pie still balanced overhead.
"Yeah, well, so are you." he accused right back. Touche, lizard boy. "You were going to prank the pie!"
"So?" Rainbow shot back, "What were you going to do?"
"Sprinkle gem bits on the cake. I could even test it for her, that way, to 'prove' it isn't pranked." Spike admitted, rather proudly.
"Nice," the pegasus whispered back, bumping her hoof against Spike's offered claw. Close enough to a hoofbump in her book. "You know I can't let you win though?"
"So what--"
And that was as far as Spike got before Rainbow Dash shoved him back into the pantry, propping a broom up against the door handle.
"Rainbow Dash?" Mrs Cake bawked, "What's going on here?"
"Argh! Mrs Cake!" Rainbow jumped, almost losing her grip on the pie, "I mean, ah, Mrs Cake, hi," time to make like a cliff and bluff, lie like a rug and cover her butt like a pair of tight pants, "There was a rat! Big rat!" She mimed out the size of the rat, a size which Mrs Cake could only agree was quite large indeed, "I used this pie to lure him into the pantry, so don't let him out until I can get the exterminator, okay? I'd, ah, give you the pie back but I don't think you'd want it anymore."
"Oh, goodness gracious," Mrs Cake breathed, staring at the door. By this point Spike had started to bang against it in futility. Fortunately, Mrs Cake appeared to buy the cover story hook, line and sucker. "It sounds large. Well, go! Go! Everything has to be perfect for Princess Celestia!" She shooed Rainbow Dash out into the dining hall.
Celestia's chariot came to a gentle, graceful arcing stop in front of the crystal castle. A lot of ponies had suspected this is where she would show up, so an awful lot of them had decided to crowd around waiting for her.
Celestia stepped down from the chariot, gesturing for the guards to stop their bowing. This was an informal visit, after all, there was no danger to be had here. There was only the possibility of an old nemesis.
So, of course it was Discord that waded through the crowd of ponies anxious to see her arrive. Nopony dared try to stop him.
"Ah, Celestia," he sing-songed, evidently delighted, "how grand of you to show up. Nothing like a visit from an old friend."
"Hello, Discord," Celestia replied cautiously, waving at the crowd gathered around the pair... though obviously a little closer on the Celestia side than to the Discord side. Self-preservation instincts, you must understand. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
Discord clutched his chest with mock offense. "Oh, Princess, you wound me so. Can't two old friends simply be catching up without it being the start of an elaborate, convoluted prank?"
Celestia's eyes narrowed on the draconeques, even as she smiled and waved to the surrounding crowd, starting the slow and steady procession to Twilight's castle. "That's an oddly specific denial, Discord. Just what are you up to?"
"My dear Celestia, you must be growing deaf in your advanced age." Discord crooned, floating lazily in the air beside Celestia, "I said I wasn't up to anything. Nothing at all. Nada. Bupkus. Zilch." Discord smiled wolfishly. "Please, I'm a reformed and honest draconquess." Discord made a big show of crossing his fingers behind his back as he said, "Scout's honour. Why would I ever want to prank a pony as noble and graceful as yourself? No, this is merely a friendly visit!"
Suddenly Celestia felt rather itchy, and it started right in her brain.
"Oh man, I feel kind of really guilty about the whole Spike thing." Rainbow muttered to herself outside the kitchen, cradling the pie to her chest in front of her. Then she looked up and saw Pinkie Pie helping Mr Cake with the last of the banners and felt inspired. "Maybe I'd feel less bad if I shared this pie with Pinkie. Make up to her for earlier." She smiled at the thought, deeming it to be good indeed, before frowning. "Wait, why am I talking to myself?" then, louder, "Hey, Pinkie, want some pie?"
"Sure!" Pinkie Pie said, dropping down from her stepladder, causing Mr Cake to overbalance on the other side, falling off his own step. Pinkie winced and looked back over her shoulder at the groaning stallion, "Sorry, Mr Cake. Hey, at least the banner stayed up!"
Huh. So it did.
"I'm fine!" he assured the room, "Not hurt at all... ow."
"Hey, Rainbow Dash, are you ready to apologize?" Pinkie asked happily, smiling cheerfully.
Rainbow bristled for a moment at the notion that she had to be the one to apologize, but then she remembered, hey, she was ready to apologize, so, moot point.
"Yeah, I even got us a pie. An apology pie."
"An agolopy!" Pinkie declared triumphantly, mouth watering at the sight of the hot pie that Rainbow was now holding at eye-height. "That's the best kind of apology!"
Rainbow rubbed the back of her neck in a manner she hoped was surreptitious and awesome, "Yeah, well, I don't want to lose our friendship over something as dumb as a prank. Even if I'm totally spending the money on fun stuff when I win."
Pinkie smiled wider-still, wide enough that, quite frankly, it sort of creeped Rainbow Dash out. "You mean if you win. Now, let's eat this pie!"
They divided the pie in half and plopped themselves down at a nearby table, hungry and eagre. Rainbow and Pinkie demolished their halves with gusto and precision.
Then Pinkie Pie hiccupped, clapping her hooves to her mouth in shock. Rainbow Dash started laughing until she, too, hiccupped, quite loudly.
"Rain – hic! -- bow... where did you get this -- hic! -- pie?"
"Hic! -- from the kitchen, on the table – hic!"
"Uh oh." Pinkie muttered, then hiccupped, then laughed.
"What? Hic! What's so funny?" Rainbow demanded, clutching her chest as each loud, sucking hiccup wracked through her.
"Self-prank. Classic!" Pinkie Pie wheezed out, then hiccupped particularly loudly, then promptly fell off her chair laughing. Soon, Rainbow Dash joined her.
That was when Princess Celestia walked through the door, Discord in tow.
Applebloom was the first to see from her vantage point, a pair of binoculars raised to her eyes. Nopony had spotted them near their treehouse yet, nopony really came out this far... fortunately it was still in effective range.
In theory.
"The duck has entered the pond!" she hollered, rousing Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle from their game of checkers, saving Scootaloo from yet another embarassing defeat.
"We're ready to fire, right?" Scootaloo asked, somewhat excited, somewhat nervous.
"This won't hurt nopony, right?" Applebloom asked cautiously.
"I'm sure it's perfectly safe." Scootaloo reassured her, "I mean, I'm wearing a helmet, that's safe."
"I guess you're right..." Applebloom muttered, readjusting the trebuchet with another lurching groan or heavy wood.
"Of course I'm right." Scootaloo replied smugly, "Now, are we going to fire the darn thing or what?"
Sweetie Belle lit the massive fuse to the ball of fireworks they'd loaded into the trebuchet. "Ready!" She hollered.
Applebloom pulled the lever, and with a horrendous whoosh sent the ball of lit fireworks hurtling through the air with startling velocity and accuracy.
Startling accuracy because she missed. That was quite startling indeed.
"It's pulling to the left!" Applebloom cried, following the trajectory through the binoculars.
"Fireworks are supposed to be aerodynamic!" Scootaloo moaned, watching as best as she could with her naked eyes, "Why aren't they aerodynamic?"
Spike banged against the cuboard door in futility, wailing miserably, but no help would come. He didn't mind being locked in a pantry filled with baked goods and a jar of gemstone sprinkles. Frankly, that was kind of awesome. What annoyed him was that the pony who locked him in here was going to win his two thousand bit prize money.
And he couldn't have that, now, could he?
Spike got down on his knees, clasping his claws together and looking skyward, or at least ceilingward. "If there's anybody out there, any spirit that listens to little dragons prayers," Spike prayed, "please, save me from this plight."
That was when his very, very small part of the world exploded.
Celestia had been seated, the partygoers at the banquet tables at their banquet tables and Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash had safely contained themselves somewhere. Mr Cake could finally breathe easy. Celestia's trademark weakness for cake had almost done her in, but the leering draconequus over her shoulder appeared to be giving her second thoughts.
"Go on, have a bite. The Cakes have worked very hard on it, I'm sure." Discord crooned.
"What have you done to the food, Discord?"
"I'm reformed, remember?" Discord retorted haughtily, "I have done nothing to your precious cake. Especially not the pie. Absolutely nothing at all."
Celestia sighed and eyed the desserts in front of her warily, cautiously, "Why do I find that so hard to believe?"
"Because you don't trust me." Discord pouted, folding his arms in a huff, "Here I thought we were becoming such close friends and you don't even take my word for it that the pie is perfectly, completely, utterly safe."
Celestia glared at him out of the corner of her eye when Spike burst into the room, fireworks and rockets shooting over his shoulder.
Bang! Boom! Crackle! Everypony in the hall dove under their tables, explosives whizzing and whooshing perilously through the room. Celestia protected herself and Discord with a golden shield which thrummed and hummed with power as bottlerockets smacked into it and fizzed and popped.
Spike took a deep breath and declared, "The pie has been pranked!" as loudly and as boldly as possible.
Celestia sighed in relief. "Thank you Spike, I had suspected." Celestia turned in her chair to glare at Discord beside her, who looked trapped all of a sudden. "The pie is completely safe, hrrm?"
"I swear I have absolutely nothing to do with what may or may not have been done to that pie!" Discord protested. Celestia looked thoroughly unconvinced.
"My prank was not pranking you!" Discord protested, "I was going to make you paranoid for no reason!"
"Ah, that's... actually very clever Discord. It certainly nearly worked." Celestia congratulated him.
Discord took a little bow, stopping at the lowest point as his eyes slammed open in realization. "Oh, bother, I just gave it away, didn't I?"
Celestia covered her amused chuckle with a dainty hoof. Discord grumbled beside her and, in one angry bite, devoured the pie, storming off.
Everypony started crawling out from under their tables as the fireworks subsided. Celestia sighed wearily.
"Where is our real culprit, Spike?"
Twilight Sparkle entered the room, at that point, holding a sheepish looking Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash in her telekinesis. Twilight looked very, very bemused indeed.
"I've found them, Princess." She sighed, depositing the pair of would-be-pranksters in front of Celestia. "I think they've suffered enough, though."
"Hic!" Rainbow and Pinkie Pie hiccupped in unison.
Celestia continued giggling behind her hoof. "Oh, dear, it appears they have. Very well, then. Is there any food here I can trust?"
Big Mac stood up from his table, emerging from under it, emergency pie at the ready. "Eeyup." He announced, wearily.
"Thank you, Big Macintosh."
"Hic!" Pinkie Pie agreed.
Spike sighed and stormed over to a table, grabbing himself a cupcake. Well, there goes his chance of pranking Celestia out the window.
Big Macintosh paraded the emergency pie he had prepared the moment he saw the flier, just in case. He was Ponyville's last chance of normalcy and he knew it. The walk to the princess's table stretched infinitely long, but he made it in far too short a time.
Which is when Rainbow Dash hiccupped loudly right in his ear, wing stretching out and tripping him up.
Big Mac fell forward, foreleg pinwheeling to find balance, instead guiding the pie forward and true and right into Celestia's face.
The crowd gasped in shock. Twilight Sparkle gasped. Rainbow Dash retreated, muttering 'sorry' at a rapid-fire pace, Pinkie Pie hiccuping right behind her.
And Celestia?
Celestia gently removed the pie tin from her face and licked her lips. "Apple, as I suspected."
Then she threw her head back and laughed uproariously. "It seems I have been 'pranked' after all. Well done, Big Macintosh."
Big Mac remained silent, staring at the princess in utter horror.
"Oh, don't look so horrified. I enjoy a good joke almost as much as I enjoy a good pie. It's very delicious thank you. Twilight, would you be so wonderful as to help me clean up?"
The crowd breathed a collective sigh of relief as Twilight wiped the last remnants of pie from Celestia's face – the bits that she couldn't surreptitiously reach with her tongue, at least.
"Big Macintosh! Mail for ya."
Big Macintosh smiled and trundled easily through the farmhouse to the family room, where his sister was waiting for him with a sack full of bits.
"Aww, Big Mac won?" Applebloom groaned. "But we worked so hard on our..."
Applejack raised an eyebrow as the filly trailed off. "Your what?"
"Nuthin'!" the filly said, far too quickly.
Applejack grunted. Nothing that could be done about it now. "Looks like there's a letter attached. Gunna read it, Mac?"
"Eeyup."
And so he did.
Congratulation, Big Macintosh
My sister regaled me with the tale of your bold and daring do. Most humerous indeed. As promised, here is the boon for your most courageous action.
Spend it and be merry!
Your Princess
Luna
Huh.
"Know what you're going to spend it on, Mac?" Applejack smirked, nudging her brother in the ribs. He shook his head slowly, staring at the huge sack of bits sitting in front of him.
There was another knock on the door. Applejack trudged off to get it as visions of grandeur flooded Big Mac's mind. A new harness? A new... harness? Okay, so, that was about all he could comprehend right now, but he was sure he'd think of something.
"Applebloom!" Applejack hollered from the doorway. Big Mac turned to see Twilight standing in the doorway, looking even less amused than she had when he last saw her, cleaning pie off of the Princess's face. "Get your kiester over here, missy."
Applebloom trudged to the door like a filly condemned. "Yes, Ms Twilight?"
"You launched a giant ball of explosives at my castle. Did you mean to declare war on me, or was that just a happy accident, young lady?"
Applejack bawked. "Wait, she did what?"
Twilight sighed and rubbed a hoof slowly, wearily down her face. "You haven't seen the CMC clubhouse recently, have you?"
Applejack's eyes hardened, narrowed. "Boy, howdy, I got half a mind to check it right now."
"It's only a trebuchet, ain't nothin' big." Applebloom whined.
"You blew up my kitchen." Twilight emphasized. "It's going to cost at least two thousand bits to repair!"
Everypony stared at Big Macintosh. Big Macintosh stared back, sighing bitterly. Goodbye, new harness.
"Eeyup."
