Button Cashby CouchCrusaderChapters฿ 0.01฿ 0.03฿ 0.02฿ 0.01Button Mash had no idea how the day had gone so horribly wrong. That wasn’t to say he was a stupid pony, no matter how many angry red letters Miss Cheerilee stamped on his homework. He could trace the events that led him out here, stomping by the city park, with his beanie buzzing in the stiff breeze whistling from his ears. If an eight-year-old decided he needed to paint his room after the bizarre and bituminous Planet Brain-O-Blaster from Ultra Attack Galaxy Attack Squad IV, then darn it, that eight-year-old had every right to make that dream come true. So maybe he got a little paint on the carpet while dragging those buckets through the living room, and just a little bit more on the sofa, and perhaps all over some random coffee table photo albums his mother spent her weekends assembling with the greatest of care, but what right did she have taking away his video game money for something like that? “Bitless! Broke! It’s so unfair!” Button kicked the dusty road and roared. What was he going to do with the rest of his Saturday if he couldn’t spend one red cent of it at the arcade? Huh. Why did they call them red cents, anyway? Button had never seen a single cherry-colored penny in his life. Whoever they were, they were dumb. Pennies had always been the same copper of his short, fuzzy coat, much like the one glinting at him two yards away. Unbeknownst to the Royal Society of Seismologists in Canterlot, the minute increase in the planet’s rate of rotation sprang from the wheeling rage of a disenfranchised colt slamming to a halt. Button tip-hoofed toward the coin, ears perked. By all accounts, it was an ordinary penny somepony had dropped on the path. This solitary piece of currency, one-hundredth the value of a bit, could no more save the world from alien mutants than it could buy him a single round of skee-ball. But it was a cent. And, in his hoof, it was one cent more than he’d previously had when he’d stormed out his front door, streaks of chartreu— char— that one color nopony could ever agree on what it was along his back and face. It wasn’t in bad shape, either—the coin, not his face. The embossed sun on the front of the coin gleamed, and its edge was round and unnicked. Maybe, just maybe… he could do some more scrounging around and find twenty-four more pennies, just like this one. Ponies dropped coins all the time, spoils for the crafty and watchful, and Button Mash was the craftiest and most watchfulest of ‘em all. If he got really lucky, somepony may have even lost a nickel. His head swam with possibilities. He imagined himself trotting up to the counter at the arcade, spilling a little pile of coins onto the glass as the wide-eyed attendant on the other side passed him his tokens— “Bitless! Broke! It’s so unfair!” Button’s head whipped around, and the rotation of the planet returned to normal. In order, the impulses that sparked across his brain were these: the voice belonged to the snarling pink earth filly tromping up the path behind him in her sparkly tiara thingy, he knew who that filly was, and for some reason he wanted to disappear instead of telling her “hello” like he did with all the other ponies. That was right. Weird, but right, for that was Diamond Tiara, schoolyard queen and rich girl closing in fast. The only reason she didn’t notice him then and there was that she was focused on developing laser eyes, and thankfully—why was he thankful for this?—they were trained on the ground instead not him. Button knew every trap in the thirty-two levels of Daring Do’s Dungeon Run and could bring Gallopaga to its pixelated spaceship knees in a single life. His perfection in the gaming sphere, however, did nothing to prevent him from this slip-up: “Hey, Diamond?” Somewhere in Canterlot, a senior seismologist shook his head at a junior researcher abdicating his console, its reading fluctuating for the third time in as many minutes. All he did was pour himself another coffee, muttering “Kids…” under his breath all the while. Back in Ponyville, Button’s ears folded. The part of him that once wanted to hide re-dedicated itself to rooting out the idiot that drew Diamond Tiara’s attention in the first place. Her head perked at the address, then her eyes widened in recognition. “You,” she said. “You’re.... you’re broke, too?” asked the part of Button on the lam from the rest of himself. “I overheard you saying some—” “You can’t prove I said that,” Diamond snapped at him. “If you try telling other ponies that, I’ll sue you.” Button wilted under her glare. “Sue me? But... but I like my name the way it is.” Diamond tilted her head in turn, throwing in a dropped jaw and an arched eyebrow for good measure. “No, dum-dum,” she said. “That’s when I send a bunch of daddy’s lawyers after a pony to demand money for being a stupidhead.” “Ohhhh.” Button straightened up a little. He wasn’t a stupidhead, so he was therefore safe. Or, so he thought. The dum-dum comment did worry him a little. “That is, if I could even get daddy’s lawyers to lift a single overpaid hoof for me right now.” Diamond wheeled and took a couple of paces in the other direction. “Who does he think he is, taking away my allowance like that? All because I ripped up a couple of ‘precious’ photo albums when he told me to clean my room?” She threw her hooves up in the air. “I told him I could buy him some more, but noooo, he said memories don’t work like that. Which was totally missing the point, because I thought he was talking about albums, which, hello? He sells in his stores.” Button began flashing back to his living room from ten minutes ago, but stopped himself before he got to his mother entering from the kitchen. He needed a distraction. Oh, that was it! He held up his penny again, and all his troubles were forgotten once more. “What’s that?” “Ahh!” When did Diamond Tiara get so close to him? “It’s… it’s a cent,” he offered, trying not to inhale the LD50 of her perfume. His cent, to be more precise, because he noticed the way she leaned in as he turned away from her. “That’s it?” Diamond asked in a tone that would mean something very different to the both of them in ten years’ time. “Yeah.” Diamond placed a hoof under her chin and squinted at his penny. “Hmmmm.” It took Button a second or two to figure out a response to that. “What is it?” “You think that’s only worth one cent?” Her angel blue eyes peered into his, which only pushed him to scoot a little further away. Button wasn’t a fan of trick questions, if this was one. Trick questions were all about coming across as not tricks, after all. But what was the trick here? “Yeah?” he said again. Diamond Tiara sighed, though she did so with a smile and a patronizing pat on his crest. “Oh, you. I can tell you’re kinda new at this, so I’ll let you off easy. What you’ve got there is an unflipped penny.” Button’s ears flopped to one side. “An unflipped penny...?” he repeated. “As in never flipped once in its entire circulation history, duh,” said Diamond, rolling her eyes. “Can’t you tell? The other side of it’s never seen sunlight.” “Really?” Button made to turn it over. "Stop!” Diamond seized his hooves before he could complete the maneuver. “Are you crazy? Keep this thing sunny-side up, always.” Button began to wonder if he was a stupidhead after all. He didn’t want a bunch of scary ponies in suits taking away all his money, and he definitely didn’t want to end up with a girl’s name, either. “W-why?” was all he could eke out. Diamond snorted in his face. “Because they’re worth a lot of money. When you have a bunch of coins on you, you flip ‘em, turn ‘em over, make ‘em worthless compared to how they start out. Geez, it’s like you’ve never been on a playground before.” A protest formed in Button’s throat to inform her that just the other day he had explored the farthest depths of the Tannhorser Gate, but something in him held it back. Being taller than Button wasn’t all that hard for ninety percent of Ponyville’s foal population, and Diamond herself seemed mounted upon a pedestal of thunder. He suddenly realized he just wanted to go home for a glass of chocolate milk. “At any rate, you’ve got something valuable there,” said Diamond, backing off. “It could be worth thousands, or even millions! Imagine what you could do with all that money if you sold it to the right pony.” Like an ooze, Diamond’s words began pooling together in the center of Button’s brain. Strange as she was, she seemed to know what she was talking about. That glass of chocolate milk was still sounding pretty good, but he began to see the other path unfolding in his mind, radiating from the small copper circle and its sun resting in his hoof. “Millions?” he asked. “Why do ponies have such a hard time believing anything I say?” Diamond whined, sticking her lip out. After a moment, she sighed and slipped her foreleg behind his neck. “Here. Why don’t you stick with me, and I’ll get you a nice bundle of bits for your penny there?” “Really?” Pennies and nickels nothing—the sound of golden bits raining into his hooves filled his head. “On the condition that you pay me my appraisal fee, of course,” she said, drawing his flank against hers. Button’s brow furrowed. “What’s an appraisal fee?” “Another condition: that you stop asking me all of these tiresome questions,” Diamond continued. “It’s money you pay me to tell you how much something you have is worth. I charge ten bi— ten hund— ten thousand bits for that.” The bottom dropped out of Button’s stomach so fast that he didn’t even have time to wail. “Ten thousand bits?” His gaze fell to the ground. “I—I don’t have that much money.” Diamond snorted. “Worthless. How about ten bits, then?” “No,” Button moaned. “Two?” Water welled up in Button’s eyes as he looked at her. “All right, all right!” Diamond huffed. “You’ll just help me with a couple of favors around town until we get that penny sold. Deal?” Button sniffled, drawing the back of his hoof across his muzzle. “O-okay,” he said, holding his hoof out. “Gross!” Diamond swatted the be-boogered limb away from her. “C’mon,” she said, wheeling down the path. “We’re going to Sugarcube Corner,” she called over her shoulder. “Whatever you do, don’t let that penny turn over or else you lose everything! Because I’ll sue you.” An uneasy feeling stirred in the hollow formerly occupied by Button’s stomach. Something told him he wasn't going to bed that night with the same name he woke up with, but what choice did he have but to see where this went? ฿ 0.03Button’s coughing had done a fair job of clearing the first ninety percent of his airways, which meant the last ten percent tickled and plugged his breathing all the worse. Somepony put a napkin in his hoof, with which he promptly turned and began making unpronounceable noises into. “What are you doing here, Sweetie Belle?” Diamond asked over his back. “I was just about to ask you the same thing,” said the unicorn, eyes narrowed. “I asked you first.” Instead of answering, Sweetie made a grunting noise and gestured at the camera hanging around her neck. “Ugh yourself!” Diamond snapped back. “You think you can shoot for the Foal Free Press with some ten-bit relic you dug out of your parent’s closet?” “Not for that, no,” said Sweetie. “I was just about to try photography for its own sa—hey, will you stop trying to change the conversation?” “Oh, mare.” Diamond snickered. “Hey, give it back!” Button turned around just in time to watch Diamond pluck the camera away from Sweetie and shove her away with a hind leg. The next thing he knew, Diamond had pulled him closer, bringing his muzzle a foot or two away from the lens. A flickering aura—colored the same pale green as Sweetie’s eyes, Button later realized—tugged at the half of the camera not in Diamond’s grasp. “Photography isn’t hard,” Diamond said, pasting her cheek against his. “Let me start you off by showing you a selfie. Cheese!” “What?” was all Button could utter. The world turned “Gimme that,” Sweetie groused, snatching her camera back. “Thanks for ruining the film with your face.” Diamond sighed. “This is the thanks I get for teaching you the ways of the art? Really, now. I was just about to make you an offer, too.” “Hmph! You know what? Forget it. I’m outta here.” Button’s vision cleared of spots just enough to watch Sweetie Belle turn on the spot and high-step it out of Sugarcube Corner, nose and tail hiked high in the air. “You’re just jealous your boyfriend wants to spend more time with me than you,” Diamond called after her. Sweetie was just about to step outside when Diamond’s remark hit her, and she threw back a glowering look in response. This only prompted another chuckle from Diamond and a sip of her milkshake. “That was kinda mean,” Button said. “What’d she ever do to you?” “Remember that thing I mentioned about asking questions, and how we weren’t having any more of that today?” said Diamond. Button frowned. “Well, yeah, but still—” “Look, you,” Diamond said, poking him in the chest. “I’m trying to do you a favor here, okay? Just roll with me.” A mental search for “favors” under “Diamond Tiara” yielded nothing Button could answer her with. “That blank flank did give me a good idea.” Sitting up, Diamond shaded her eyes with a hoof and swept the area, frowning. Her eyes widened when she spotted what she sought—a cream-colored, mosquito-legged pegasus colt chatting with a full-grown, musclebound stallion far too big for his chair. “Hey, Featherweight!” Diamond hopped out of her seat and trotted over to the colt. Featherweight’s sail-like ears flapped once at his name. Judging from how he flinched upon recognizing her, Button could only guess what their history was. “Do you want to take pictures of me and my boyfriend for the rest of the day?” Featherweight lifted a brow, but that looked to be as much as he dared do beneath her scrutiny. “He’ll pay you, of course,” Diamond continued, extending a hoof back at Button. “How does a set of new teeth sound?” Button winced. The kid did have a bit of bucktooth going on the—hang on. What was that about paying Featherweight in teeth? The little pegasus perked up, poking his teeth once. “Oh, that’s all right. Mom says I just need to grow into ‘em.” “I meant for your brother, genius-in-chief.” Featherweight’s conversation partner cringed, exposing teeth the color of lightly stained wood. “Can we please not bring up my dental situation in public?” he asked, loud enough to rock the light fixtures above. “I’m kinda self-conscious about that.” “If your little brother agrees to help me help him help you,” said Diamond, addressing the pegasus as he tried to withdraw his head into his bulging collar, “nopony will bring it up ever again.” Featherweight did that thing—tilted head, ears flopped to one side, mouth agape and eye twitching. Boy, Diamond was getting that look a lot from ponies today. “Look, just grab your camera,” Diamond told Featherweight. “It isn’t every day that you can do somepony one tiny, minor favor and cash in big on it, right?” Without pausing for breath, she turned around and beckoned Button over. “C’mon, we’re getting out of here.” A shot of adrenaline slammed against Button’s stomach. Diamond hadn’t taken more than two sips of her milkshake. “Don’t you want to finish this first?” he asked, gesturing. “I’m watching my weight,” said Diamond, turning toward the door. “And besides, it’s already beginning to melt. What competent business can’t keep their milkshakes from becoming lukewarm ooze in ten minutes, anyway?” *** “I didn’t even know they sold water in glass bottles,” Button told Diamond. “Huh?” “I saw Mrs. Cake take one out from behind her counter when we left Sugarcube Corner.” “Oh.” Diamond put a hoof to her chin. “Oh, yeah! Daddy has a whole shelf of that back home.” She made a face. “It’s disgusting.” “Really?” “I had to sneak into his office while he was sleeping one night because he wouldn’t let me try any. It made me get up sick the next morning and I puked.” Button winced. “Sorry.” Diamond shrugged. “Can’t you push any harder? I’m barely higher than the see-saw over there.” They had come to the playground outside the schoolhouse, an alien place to Button at best. His hooves were dextrous, honed for rapid sequences of fine movements—definitely the poorest spec he could have chosen going up against a swing set. He wiped sweat from his brow, lamenting the grains of sand that scratched his coat and stuck to his forelegs. “I’m getting tired,” he said. “Wow. We’ve only been at this for a minute.” Diamond held her hoof out, sole downwards in the universal gesture for “that’s enough.” Button no sooner saw it that he sat down on the playground sand, panting. A puff and a flash of light came from his right side, and Featherweight looked out from behind his camera. The two colts shrugged at each other. Aside from him, nopony was around to see Button like that. At the edge of the playground, two unicorn colts of teal and orange turned away any and all those seeking to use the jungle gym and the surrounding facilities for their own entertainment. Strangely, when Diamond asked them to provide security, all Snips and Snails had asked for were new bugs and new rocks. “It’s like they enjoy telling other ponies what to do,” said Button, staring at them as they chased a filly away from the whirlygig. “No kidding,” Featherweight added. “Excuse me, we’re not paying you to talk,” said Diamond. “Take more pictures, will you?” Featherweight groaned. Button looked up just in time to notice the pegasus glancing at him, but Diamond shooed him into the air before anything else could happen. “I swear, you ask a pony to do one thing in this town,” she said, returning to her swing seat, “and then it’s ‘I don’t know’ this or ‘here’s my unsolicited opinion’ that or even just flat-out ‘no’. It’s never as straightforward as ‘thank you, Diamond Tiara, our arrangement is sure to benefit you right away.’” Button followed her hoof as she twirled it in the air, but wasn’t sure what to say in response. None of the words he had sounded like words she wanted to hear. Thank her, maybe, but… “No thanks from you either, then?” Diamond sighed. “This is what I get when I go about trying to make ponies happy, isn’t it?” Okay, Button thought to himself, drawing out the time between syllables. He mashed the sand with his hooves while hashing his mind over any possible definition of happiness Diamond might agree with. He wasn’t a stupidhead, after all, but it worried him a bit that he had to prove that, and he had a feeling she didn’t get the same kicks he did out of tearing the cellophane off a brand new game. “Daddy says happiness is living in service of others,” Diamond said suddenly, looking at her hooves. “That’s why he owns Barnyard Bargains—he tells me it makes him happy because he can help ponies find what they need there.” She paused, and Button found what he had to say the same way a drowning stallion at sea finds a life ring. “Yeah.” Good enough—something told him she wouldn’t care for his brother’s opinion on “mega-stores stomping out local businesses”. Diamond smiled at him. “Daddy’s smart. He has to be. He and I don’t always see eye to eye on everything, but I agree with him on what makes ponies happy. So if living in service to others is what it all boils down to, all I do is help ponies realize they can do nice things for me.” Button mulled that one over. He supposed that made sense. “Yeah.” “Of course, not everypony’s going to get with the program. Take those blank flanks in my grade, for instance. I spend an inordinate amount of time on those three, considering their extensive histories of non-cooperation. I’m kind of surprised I bother to remember their names, because I don’t remember the last time they did anything for me.” Diamond’s brow furrowed. Her smile had vanished, but the look she gave Button wasn’t anger. It was something else. “What is it with you and Sweetie Belle? Do you find her to be as much of a pain as I do?” Button frowned. That wasn’t the look of a pony who wanted to hear “no”. “...Yeah?” “Good.” Diamond kicked her legs and set her swing into a gentle motion. “I didn’t want to hurt your feelings by pretending to be your girlfriend in front of her.” Button still wasn’t sure what Diamond was getting at. She was a girl after all, even if the “friend” part was a little less clear. Nevertheless, a bad taste settled on Button’s tongue, as if eggplants became ghosts when they were tossed in the trash to haunt the tastebuds of foals once more. He had to say something else. “I mean… we don’t really hang out much. She’s just there at board games club after school because her other friends are off doing other things.” Diamond blew a raspberry. “Trying to get her cutie mark at Slides ‘n’ Stairways, I bet.” “No, actually.” Button winced. That’d just slipped out, he promised— Only Diamond was still snickering at her own joke to notice. Talk about a natural 1 on that Listen check. Button wasn’t making great rolls in Sense either, even though he agreed that game was pretty dumb, because he chose to keep pressing his luck. “I mean, we don’t always play together. When we do, though, she’s always passes on stuff like Monopony and Starving, Starving Rhinoceroses… seses.” How the hay was that pluralized again? “How can she not like Monopony?” Sounded like Diamond was back listening. “What greater joy is there than squeezing every last cent out of your opponents over the course of three hours until they finally bust on your Beach Pier?” “She brings in stuff they don’t sell in your dad’s stores,” Button said. “Dukes of Skyheight, Imperion, Tiny Pasture, you name it.” “I’ve never heard of any of those games. No offense, but they sound boring.” Something sparked in the bottom of Button’s guts. Something red, like the shell of a rousing magma elemental. “They’re pretty fun, actually. They’re more than just rolling dice or mashing buttons. There’s a lot of strategy that goes into them.” He remembered the red of the schoolhouse walls as the afternoon sun filtered in through a window, lighting a floor of noisy foals clustered around games of Apologies! and checkers and marecala. From the front door, he noticed one unicorn filly in the corner steadily setting out piles of colored plastic train cars around a cardboard map of Equestria. Several decks of cards sat by her side, meticulously arrayed and spaced. She looked up from her prep work with a small smile, scanning the room for another pony or five to join her. He saw her smile wilt. “I can’t imagine ponies are into games they’ve never heard of,” Diamond suggested. “I bet she plays alone a lot.” Ears folded, she reached over to the pile of red pieces and began straightening them out, one by one. The smile that returned to her face was even slighter, shakier. She looked up again. “I dunno,” said Button, heat flushing in his head. “She joined the club before I did.” Miss Cheerilee came over, asked her a question or two, swept a hoof at the other foals by way of suggestion. The filly shook her head, sending Miss Cheerilee away. “How could she not play alone?” Diamond mused. “Outside of those two, she doesn’t have friends, right?” He went up to her while she straightened up the green pieces, one by one, oblivious to his presence. His tail swished. He cleared his throat. “Maybe?” said Button. “I really don’t know why she wouldn’t have others.” “You still don’t know?” Diamond’s eyes bugged out at him. “After everything we’ve talked about?” Her hooves flitted here and there, pointing to different lines on the board, showing how the cards he held in his hoof permitted him to lay pieces on those lines. Her voice squeaked, struggling to keep up with her explanations. “Yeah, she’s a little weird,” said Button, glancing off to the side. “And when I’ve seen her outside of board games club she always walks around as if she isn’t a hundred percent there or something.” He looked Diamond in the eye, and a little grin emerged on his face. “But you oughta give her more credit,” he said. They were neck and neck, his Seaddle-San Prancesco line to her Featherfax-Dodge Junction. His plans for service to Manehattan were just one turn from fruition, and he’d run away with this thing. “She gets the same way I get about video games when she plays. It’s almost unreal at times.” One impossible six-piece link later, the citizens of Manehattan found themselves connected expressly to the ivory towers of Canterlot—and he wouldn’t see a single dime from it. “You’re saying she’s good at these games?” Diamond’s eyes grew wider by the second. “At anything, actually?” “Not just good,” Button chuckled. What he’d give for a pair of shades right now. The Sableshore Coast was hers. She took root in the Mild West. Starsweep Peak fell into her empire before he could cobble together the single green link he needed. “She’s a pain. In all the times we’ve played together, I’ve never won once.” All he could do was sit back and wonder what just happened, his tiny little network paling against the spread of her dominion. She bounced around the board with little springing noises, giggling, and when she looked at him, her eyes were bright and her smile wide. Diamond could only gape. “Is that what happens between you two?” Button couldn’t be the only victim to her surprising wiles. “Do you always lose to her, too?” And just like that, Diamond’s face contorted into something draconic. Puffs of steam escaped from her ears, complete with puffing noises. No, hang on—those noises were coming from above. Button followed her gaze upwards, where a pegasus with the colors of the rainbow arrayed in her mane bucked clouds into wisps of vapor. Something told Button he may have gone too far. “Yoo hoo!” Diamond called up. “Miss?” Rainbow Dash, Button added for her. To his surprise, the pegasus stopped what she was doing and looked down. “Yeah?” she asked. “What’s up?” “I was just wondering if you could move that cloud over to give us some shade? This sun is quite piercing today.” “Ooooh,” said Rainbow, descending to the playground. “That might be tough. Us weatherponies don’t do the whole ‘valet’ thing, know what I’m saying?” “I wasn’t asking you to do it for free,” said Diamond, shooting a glare at Button. “Surely there’s something we can offer you in exchange.” Rainbow’s eyes widened. “Really? Try me, kid.” “A one-on-one VIP dinner with Spitfire, Captain of the Wonderbolts.” “Hmm. She already knows how awesome I am, but that’s pretty good.” “Now wait a second—” Button tried to cut in, only for Diamond to cut him back out. “A copse of pillow trees set aside in town for your own personal nap use and nopony else’s.” “Seriously?” Rainbow hid a chuckle behind her hoof. “Try again.” “You drive a hard bargain.” Diamond sighed, coming back up with the winningest smile Button had ever seen on her. “Very well, then. How about a lifetime ten percent discount with Barnyard Bargains and all affiliated chains, franchises, enterprises, and competitors?” Rainbow Dash answered by doubling over in laughter. “You know how bargaining works, right?” she asked between gasps. “You start with your worst offer and work your way up, not the other way around.” “Well, let’s hear what you want!” Diamond screeched, several octaves higher than pony ears should ever have been allowed to hear. “Okay, wow,” said Rainbow when her eyes stopped rolling in her head. “For real, was one of your grandparents a harpy or something?” Diamond stood her ground. Tendrils of black hate seeped from the corners of her eyes. At least, that’s what Button expected to see, finding this tendril-less reality less satisfying to watch. “If you want me acting as your personal umbrella all day,” Rainbow continued, “you’re gonna have to build me a water park.” Button balked. “A water park?” Was the penny beneath his beanie really worth that much? “Yeah, you heard me,” Rainbow snorted. “It’s gotta have everything: tube rides, log flumes, a wave pool, lazy rivers, a sick wicked deadmare’s dive, and a snack bar gift shop combo. It’s got to be free for me and my friends to come and go any time, too.” “Anything else?” asked Diamond. Rainbow Dash recoiled. “Uh, maybe a fireworks stand I can set off every night.” “Yeah, yeah.” Diamond tapped her hoof on the ground and rolled her eyes. “Anything else?” Button wasn’t overly familiar with the pegasus before him, but if Scootaloo’s constant gushing over her was anything to go by, Rainbow wasn’t a pony who enjoyed being led on. Her eyes narrowed. “Yeah,” she said, matching Diamond’s tone. “You’re gonna build it in the sky, right next to my house.” Button flailed his hooves in Diamond’s direction, but she wasn’t looking at him. “Sure thing,” she said. “Anything else?” “Look, kid, just quit while you’re ahead. I’ll move your stupid cloud, all right?” Rainbow vaulted into the sky, a fading stripe of all the colors in her namesake trailing after her. “Thank you!” Diamond trilled, waving her hoof. She gasped as Button half-swatted it down. “We’re building her a water park?” he demanded, heart ramming against his throat. “What are you so worried about?” Diamond asked in return. “Don’t believe your penny’s worth that much? I told you it’s worth millions. You don’t think I’d be making all these bargains on your behalf if you weren’t going to have the money to back it up, do you?” Button couldn’t find the words to explain why a water park the size of Slydesdale hit him harder than some number Diamond kept throwing at him. He really, really didn’t want to doubt her expertise in these kinds of things. But what if she was up to something? Everytime he tried routing his thoughts to make sense of his day, the question entered some new crevice in his brain like a marauding colossus. “I don’t know,” he moaned. “You don’t know?” Diamond repeated, smirking. “There’s a reason my family’s rich, you know, and that’s because I do know.” She looked up. “Snips? Snails?” Button followed Diamond’s gaze toward the two forgotten colts at the edge of the playground, fending off a growing group of ponies both foal and full-grown. Pegasi flapped in the air like a skein of alien drones where earth ponies and unicorns clogged the ground. All of them were looking in Button’s direction. If he didn’t know any better, he’d have said they were looking at him. “What do they want?” asked Diamond. Snip’s nasal speech keened through the air. “They’re saying you and him are giving away money,” he explained. “Yeah,” Snails added, his voice more encumbered. “And all they have to do for it is do you some kinda favor.” “I told ‘em that!” Featherweight’s brother popped up in the back of the group, beaming. “I’m getting new teeth, everypony!” The group cheered, pressing against Snips and Snails. Diamond tapped Button on the shoulder. And Button looked into the face of evil, and it was smiling. “Let them come,” she called out, rubbing her hooves together. “I’m sure we can make them happy.” ฿ 0.02On most days, Button liked coming to Sugarcube Corner. Maybe there was a little too much pink wrapping around the columns and bannisters, and he certainly wasn’t there for all the hearts laid into the woodwork and walls, but a colt as coltish as he could only demand so much of the town’s number one bakery and sweet shop. Ponies young and old packed the seating area, sipping on smoothies and munching on cupcakes, though their chatter had died down somewhat with his entrance. Or, rather, hers. And only now he noticed, bracingly, how quiet it had become as the portly, blue-coated earth mare glared across the counter at his current company. “And how do you plan to pay for that today, dear?” Mrs. Cake demanded, smoothing down the ruffles on her apron straps. “Daddy’s tab, as always,” Diamond shot back, smirking. “Just put it on there with the rest of what he owes you.” Button shied a step back, allowing a display case of fruit pies to half-hide himself from the rest of the bakery. Mrs. Cake was always nice to him, but she was acting a lot like Mom did when she caught him doing something bad, and everypony knew all mothers could read minds and follow up accordingly. “I ran into your father the other day, young lady,” she said, veins tensing in her neck like piano wires. “He’d never heard of a tab under his name here—or with anywhere else in all of Ponyville. The only reason you’re still in my store is because he paid for everything, then and there.” “But surely you value my repeat business?” Diamond sidled up to the counter and leaned a foreleg against the glass. “I’m never that much in need of a milkshake that I can’t have one delivered from Canterlot in a refrigerated car. You should be glad there’s nothing I enjoy more than supporting my local economy.” Mrs. Cake stood her ground, purple eyes boring into Diamond’s blues. “I’ll be happy to make your milkshake after you pay for it, just like how it works for everypony else,” she said, sweeping her hoof toward her diners. A couple of them gave her a nod. The kitchen doors burst outward, expelling a wiry orange stallion with a bow tie and a grimace on his face. “And even if we let you pay later,” he said, whisking by with a tray of pastries destined for the window display, “you’d have to wait until we repaired our sprinkle machine. Poor thing finally gave out this morning.” Mrs. Cake turned on her husband. “Dear!” “Best sprinkle machine we ever had, too,” Mr. Cake continued, lime-green eyes sliding upwards in recollection. “Good ol’ Betty, puttin’ em out one at a time since my great-great uncle bought her from the old Foalsworth’s in Manehattan.” “Dear!” Mrs. Cake repeated, an octave higher. “We’ve enough sprinkles in reserve to last us through the week. That’ll give us plenty of time to find a replacement.” The kitchen doors burst outward again, this time disgorging a puffy-maned pink earth mare with her cheeks flecked with every color on and off the rainbow. She more bounced than walked, and it was hard not to hear her perky, balloons-rubbing-against-each-other squeak-talk from a hundred paces, much less ten. Button liked her. “Hey, Mrs. Cake!” said Pinkie Pie, peppering her boss’ face with confectionary shrapnel. “I’m taking this week’s pay in sprinkles ‘cause I realized I was really really hungry and in the mood for, like, a gabzillion of something. You ever been in one of those moods before? Sprinkles are really good for that, I’ve learned! Oooh, that’s a journal entry!” Mrs. Cake blinked. “Don’t worry—there’s still a sack back there for the rest of the day. I’m off to Twilight’s, but I’ll be back for the lunch rush!” Pinkie cartwheeled between Button and Diamond on her way toward the front door. “See you later!” she trilled, and with one final bang she disappeared into the city. The door creaked closed behind her. For a few fragile moments, the only sound in the building was the hum of display cases refrigerating their contents. “Ahem.” Diamond Tiara rapped on the counter. The grin she wore had far too many square, shiny teeth for Button’s comfort, so he reached up and retrieved his penny from under his beanie. “So I hear you’re having trouble with your sprinkle machine,” Diamond said. “Oh, most definitely,” said Mr. Cake, swinging around the counter. Button would swear on his Joy Boy that he heard a sound—something between a spike slamming into something meaty and a baseball bat obliterating a skull. It came from the glare Mrs. Cake shot at her husband, and his head jerked forward before he could skitter back into the kitchen. Diamond tapped on the counter once more, and not in the oblivious way other foals stuck their hooves in things like wall outlets, bear traps, or Mom and Dad’s Completely Unremarkable Drawer of Mom and Dad Stuff. Button had stumbled across that drawer once, and to this day he still had no idea why Mom turned that red when he asked why they kept those weird rumble packs in there. Completely Unremarkable his poor, bruised hiney, but his parents probably had a point. They didn’t even plug into any of his controllers. “…still hung up on the part where you make me my order and I pay you later,” Diamond’s voice came fading back in as her hoof pulled Button to the counter. “So, let me introduce you to my friend.” Flat-hoofed! Button cursed his inattention as he gazed into Mo—Mrs. Cake’s eyes. His ears folded against the certain hurricane, one he’d already survived that morning in the living room, if barely. Only, Mrs. Cake didn’t yell. “You?” she mouthed at him, eyes wide and unbelieving. “My friend carries with him a very precious commodity, Mrs. Cake.” Diamond’s voice had somehow turned sweeter than a box of Calf ‘n’ Hobs’ Sugar Bombs, though Button was too occupied with not being vaporized on sight to appreciate that. The hoof in his side jammed him out of it as Diamond told him, “Show her what you have there.” Button gave her a confused look, to which she only answered with a smile and a “Go on.” It was worth millions, according to her. Button wasn’t a hundred percent sure what a million came after, but it sounded about as valuable as a purple Corona blaster in Burrolands 2, and he wasn’t sure if waving that kind of tech around in public was a good idea. Cringing, he sat back on his haunches and presented his penny with both hooves. Mrs. Cake peered over the counter, brows furrowing. “That’s it?” “To you, it’s a simple penny,” said Diamond, leaving the counter to circle behind Button. “To Penny Royal down the street, it’s a very rare kind of penny. It’ll be worth a fortune.” “Oh, dear.” Mrs. Cake held a hoof to her mouth, though even Button could cotton onto something weird going on with her. “That’s quite compelling. I never realized how much I could trust you in these matters.” Diamond chuckled. “Don’t patronize us, Mrs. Cake. It’s quite insulting. At any rate, this penny will make me—I mean, us—” she said, patting Button on the head when he glanced at her, “quite the tidy sum. And when you see us walk past this building without the brand new sprinkle machine you so dearly need right now, you’ll realize just how much that milkshake you wouldn’t make me will have cost you.” Button blinked. One by one, wheels came unstuck in his head, conveying Diamond’s words from his ears to the sleepy little part of his brain responsible for processing them. “You want to buy them,” he whispered, grasping for words, “a sprinkle machine? For a milkshake?” “Two milkshakes, actually,” Diamond said, nudging Button in the side with a wink. “Can’t forget about you, can I?” Mrs. Cake struck her countertop hard enough that Button thought he heard something splinter. “I’ve had just about enough of this,” she declared, staring the both of them down—yep, Button too, he realized as his insides curled up and asked for blankies—with apocalyptic Mom-level threat. “I will not be swindled in my own store. Leave.” Button’s ears folded. So did the rest of him, at the thought of what Mom’d do to him if she heard about this. When she heard about this. His older brother always talked about the time he’d been stuffed into a box for a week without his LPs... Diamond held her hooves up in front of her chest. “Perhaps I may have done a few things—” Mrs. Cake pointed at the door. “Now!” “Excuse me, rude!” Diamond barked back. Pressing her counteroffensive, “So I was saying that I may have done a few things to cause friction between us but Mrs. Cake please return behind the counter and hear me out!” Way back when Button was a newcolt to the gaming scene, exploring the world of Ponyroth with his first ever zombie cleric, he’d somehow stumbled beyond the borders of the lowbie glade into a corrupted forest where the only life was death. Not ten yards into the zone, a reanimated manticore picked up his scent beyond sight range, somehow, and welcomed his arrival by spreading his character over a half mile of terrain. Being honest with himself, the whole thing got kind of insulting after the quarter-mile mark. Now that this was real life, it was all terrifying. He put his hooves together, held them up, and prayed to gods named and unnamed that he’d still have both his ears attached after Mrs. Cake dragged him back to his house. “Oh, good job, good job,” Diamond said. “I’m sorry!” Button whimpered. “Not you! You.” Until then, Button had had no idea that Diamond had put points into Petrifying Glare. No other explanation sufficed for why Mrs. Cake stopped in her tracks, her wheeling rage arrested along with a junior seismologist’s love for his job. Her hoof had shot up to her mouth, and her eyes darted towards the still-occupied seating area. “All right, all right,” Diamond conceded, walking toward her vanquished foe. “I admit you and I may not see eye to eye when it comes to you giving me stuff when I ask for it. But what right do you have to barrage this poor little colt because he just happened to walk in here with nothing beside him but me and my good intentions? Are you going to tell him that the penny he holds right now isn’t worth what he thinks it’s worth? Can you live with that? And if you can...” Diamond folded her ears and sniffled. “... will everypony else here be able to, after they saw you yelling at two members of your largest business demographic?” Hard to say whose jaw dropped first. Button was content to call it a tie with Mrs. Cake. “I, um…” Mrs. Cake backtracked behind the counter. “You just want to make children like us cry,” Diamond said, wiping her eyes. “No, dear.” Mrs. Cake couldn’t keep her eyes off the two or three ponies standing from their tables. “I-I do have a business to run, that’s all.” “Children who only wanted to help you in your time of new sprinkle machine need.” Mrs. Cake flicked her tail, turned her head toward the kitchen. “Dear?” “You’ve got this, honey!” Mr. Cake called from somewhere near the back. Button put his hooves down. When he chanced a glance at Diamond, the wink she passed back lifted something on his face. His cheeks. The corners of his lips. For the first time that day, he smiled. Mrs. Cake shook her head, sighed, and after a moment’s composition put on a tired smile that couldn’t have been anything in Button’s eyes but genuine. “Two milkshakes, was it?” she asked, tilting her head. “That’s right,” said Diamond Tiara. “But now that I think about it, I hope you wouldn’t mind adding an extra or two on there…” *** Chocolate milkshakes were the best thing ever, and nothing was going to lead Button Mash from the light of that sacred truth. He was far from a perfect pony, however. On occasion, he encountered temptation. In its current incarnation, it sat before the pink earth filly seated next to him in the corner booth, casting its shadow on a family two tables over. He beheld layers of vanilla, chocolate, mint, and raspberry swirling their way up the sides of a glass the size of a birdbath, a glorious foundation for a pyramid of ice cream scoops of every flavor ranging from apple pie to zebra stripe (a combination of white and dark chocolate, Button was informed, not meant to model the taste of an actual zebra’s stripes), caulked in with lines of frothy whipped cream, chopped nuts of every variety, morsels of candy bars, Rodeo cookies, and peppermint pieces, and rings of sliced strawberries and bananas drizzled with hot fudge and caramel and melted toffee, all sealed at the top with a perfectly spherical mareschino cherry. True to her word, Pinkie had also left a few sprinkles behind. Diamond Tiara put her hooves up and leaned back from her straw. “Ahh.” “How much did that cost, again?” Button asked, looking the monstrosity up and down once more. “More than your daddy makes in a week, I bet,” said Diamond, patting the Cakes’ last burlap sack of sprinkles on her other side. “What?” “Hm? Did you say something?” Button blinked, then shrugged it off and went back to his milkshake. Man, chocolate milkshakes. Best thing ever. “Almost done?” Diamond asked, cracking an eye at him. He still had an inch of milkshake left, but he wasn’t about to fall for its brain-freezing trap just yet. “Getting there,” he said, panting from his last pull. Diamond sighed. “The sooner you finish, the sooner we can keep swindling ponies out of th—the sooner we can help them get what they need.” Button raised an eyebrow. “You know, that’s the third time today you’ve changed something mid-sentence,” he noted. With his head a little lighter from the frostiness of his milkshake, he found his thoughts emerging into a cool little clearing of clarity. “And why does that concern you?” Diamond’s brows went flat enough to plane wood. “Because most of the time an NPC does that in one of my video games, it means they’re up to something.” Button’s eyes narrowed, as did his smile. “Actually, make that every time.” Diamond’s jaw dropped. “Oh, for the love of—we’re not in a video game, are we?” “I fail to see how that’s relevant, Diamond Tiara.” On the outside, Button relished the last sip of his milkshake. On the inside, he was tap dancing. Intrigue! He loved intrigue, especially when it came to unmasking it. “Because real life isn’t like your video games or whatever,” said Diamond, burying her face in her hoof. “Light of Celestia, being your girlfriend can be so embarrassing sometimes.” Diamond’s words did nothing but spin the vanes of Button’s beanie a little quicker. “Whaf?” he asked, mouth full of shake. “What?!” squeaked the squeakiest voice to ever squeak in Equestria, directly behind him. As Button turned and flailed and coughed for air, locking eyes with the white-coated unicorn filly staring at him with pale green eyes the size of saucers, he allowed himself a moment to consider the possibility that chocolate milkshakes were no longer the best thing in the world, especially when dumped down his windpipe.
฿ 0.01Button Mash had no idea how the day had gone so horribly wrong. That wasn’t to say he was a stupid pony, no matter how many angry red letters Miss Cheerilee stamped on his homework. He could trace the events that led him out here, stomping by the city park, with his beanie buzzing in the stiff breeze whistling from his ears. If an eight-year-old decided he needed to paint his room after the bizarre and bituminous Planet Brain-O-Blaster from Ultra Attack Galaxy Attack Squad IV, then darn it, that eight-year-old had every right to make that dream come true. So maybe he got a little paint on the carpet while dragging those buckets through the living room, and just a little bit more on the sofa, and perhaps all over some random coffee table photo albums his mother spent her weekends assembling with the greatest of care, but what right did she have taking away his video game money for something like that? “Bitless! Broke! It’s so unfair!” Button kicked the dusty road and roared. What was he going to do with the rest of his Saturday if he couldn’t spend one red cent of it at the arcade? Huh. Why did they call them red cents, anyway? Button had never seen a single cherry-colored penny in his life. Whoever they were, they were dumb. Pennies had always been the same copper of his short, fuzzy coat, much like the one glinting at him two yards away. Unbeknownst to the Royal Society of Seismologists in Canterlot, the minute increase in the planet’s rate of rotation sprang from the wheeling rage of a disenfranchised colt slamming to a halt. Button tip-hoofed toward the coin, ears perked. By all accounts, it was an ordinary penny somepony had dropped on the path. This solitary piece of currency, one-hundredth the value of a bit, could no more save the world from alien mutants than it could buy him a single round of skee-ball. But it was a cent. And, in his hoof, it was one cent more than he’d previously had when he’d stormed out his front door, streaks of chartreu— char— that one color nopony could ever agree on what it was along his back and face. It wasn’t in bad shape, either—the coin, not his face. The embossed sun on the front of the coin gleamed, and its edge was round and unnicked. Maybe, just maybe… he could do some more scrounging around and find twenty-four more pennies, just like this one. Ponies dropped coins all the time, spoils for the crafty and watchful, and Button Mash was the craftiest and most watchfulest of ‘em all. If he got really lucky, somepony may have even lost a nickel. His head swam with possibilities. He imagined himself trotting up to the counter at the arcade, spilling a little pile of coins onto the glass as the wide-eyed attendant on the other side passed him his tokens— “Bitless! Broke! It’s so unfair!” Button’s head whipped around, and the rotation of the planet returned to normal. In order, the impulses that sparked across his brain were these: the voice belonged to the snarling pink earth filly tromping up the path behind him in her sparkly tiara thingy, he knew who that filly was, and for some reason he wanted to disappear instead of telling her “hello” like he did with all the other ponies. That was right. Weird, but right, for that was Diamond Tiara, schoolyard queen and rich girl closing in fast. The only reason she didn’t notice him then and there was that she was focused on developing laser eyes, and thankfully—why was he thankful for this?—they were trained on the ground instead not him. Button knew every trap in the thirty-two levels of Daring Do’s Dungeon Run and could bring Gallopaga to its pixelated spaceship knees in a single life. His perfection in the gaming sphere, however, did nothing to prevent him from this slip-up: “Hey, Diamond?” Somewhere in Canterlot, a senior seismologist shook his head at a junior researcher abdicating his console, its reading fluctuating for the third time in as many minutes. All he did was pour himself another coffee, muttering “Kids…” under his breath all the while. Back in Ponyville, Button’s ears folded. The part of him that once wanted to hide re-dedicated itself to rooting out the idiot that drew Diamond Tiara’s attention in the first place. Her head perked at the address, then her eyes widened in recognition. “You,” she said. “You’re.... you’re broke, too?” asked the part of Button on the lam from the rest of himself. “I overheard you saying some—” “You can’t prove I said that,” Diamond snapped at him. “If you try telling other ponies that, I’ll sue you.” Button wilted under her glare. “Sue me? But... but I like my name the way it is.” Diamond tilted her head in turn, throwing in a dropped jaw and an arched eyebrow for good measure. “No, dum-dum,” she said. “That’s when I send a bunch of daddy’s lawyers after a pony to demand money for being a stupidhead.” “Ohhhh.” Button straightened up a little. He wasn’t a stupidhead, so he was therefore safe. Or, so he thought. The dum-dum comment did worry him a little. “That is, if I could even get daddy’s lawyers to lift a single overpaid hoof for me right now.” Diamond wheeled and took a couple of paces in the other direction. “Who does he think he is, taking away my allowance like that? All because I ripped up a couple of ‘precious’ photo albums when he told me to clean my room?” She threw her hooves up in the air. “I told him I could buy him some more, but noooo, he said memories don’t work like that. Which was totally missing the point, because I thought he was talking about albums, which, hello? He sells in his stores.” Button began flashing back to his living room from ten minutes ago, but stopped himself before he got to his mother entering from the kitchen. He needed a distraction. Oh, that was it! He held up his penny again, and all his troubles were forgotten once more. “What’s that?” “Ahh!” When did Diamond Tiara get so close to him? “It’s… it’s a cent,” he offered, trying not to inhale the LD50 of her perfume. His cent, to be more precise, because he noticed the way she leaned in as he turned away from her. “That’s it?” Diamond asked in a tone that would mean something very different to the both of them in ten years’ time. “Yeah.” Diamond placed a hoof under her chin and squinted at his penny. “Hmmmm.” It took Button a second or two to figure out a response to that. “What is it?” “You think that’s only worth one cent?” Her angel blue eyes peered into his, which only pushed him to scoot a little further away. Button wasn’t a fan of trick questions, if this was one. Trick questions were all about coming across as not tricks, after all. But what was the trick here? “Yeah?” he said again. Diamond Tiara sighed, though she did so with a smile and a patronizing pat on his crest. “Oh, you. I can tell you’re kinda new at this, so I’ll let you off easy. What you’ve got there is an unflipped penny.” Button’s ears flopped to one side. “An unflipped penny...?” he repeated. “As in never flipped once in its entire circulation history, duh,” said Diamond, rolling her eyes. “Can’t you tell? The other side of it’s never seen sunlight.” “Really?” Button made to turn it over. "Stop!” Diamond seized his hooves before he could complete the maneuver. “Are you crazy? Keep this thing sunny-side up, always.” Button began to wonder if he was a stupidhead after all. He didn’t want a bunch of scary ponies in suits taking away all his money, and he definitely didn’t want to end up with a girl’s name, either. “W-why?” was all he could eke out. Diamond snorted in his face. “Because they’re worth a lot of money. When you have a bunch of coins on you, you flip ‘em, turn ‘em over, make ‘em worthless compared to how they start out. Geez, it’s like you’ve never been on a playground before.” A protest formed in Button’s throat to inform her that just the other day he had explored the farthest depths of the Tannhorser Gate, but something in him held it back. Being taller than Button wasn’t all that hard for ninety percent of Ponyville’s foal population, and Diamond herself seemed mounted upon a pedestal of thunder. He suddenly realized he just wanted to go home for a glass of chocolate milk. “At any rate, you’ve got something valuable there,” said Diamond, backing off. “It could be worth thousands, or even millions! Imagine what you could do with all that money if you sold it to the right pony.” Like an ooze, Diamond’s words began pooling together in the center of Button’s brain. Strange as she was, she seemed to know what she was talking about. That glass of chocolate milk was still sounding pretty good, but he began to see the other path unfolding in his mind, radiating from the small copper circle and its sun resting in his hoof. “Millions?” he asked. “Why do ponies have such a hard time believing anything I say?” Diamond whined, sticking her lip out. After a moment, she sighed and slipped her foreleg behind his neck. “Here. Why don’t you stick with me, and I’ll get you a nice bundle of bits for your penny there?” “Really?” Pennies and nickels nothing—the sound of golden bits raining into his hooves filled his head. “On the condition that you pay me my appraisal fee, of course,” she said, drawing his flank against hers. Button’s brow furrowed. “What’s an appraisal fee?” “Another condition: that you stop asking me all of these tiresome questions,” Diamond continued. “It’s money you pay me to tell you how much something you have is worth. I charge ten bi— ten hund— ten thousand bits for that.” The bottom dropped out of Button’s stomach so fast that he didn’t even have time to wail. “Ten thousand bits?” His gaze fell to the ground. “I—I don’t have that much money.” Diamond snorted. “Worthless. How about ten bits, then?” “No,” Button moaned. “Two?” Water welled up in Button’s eyes as he looked at her. “All right, all right!” Diamond huffed. “You’ll just help me with a couple of favors around town until we get that penny sold. Deal?” Button sniffled, drawing the back of his hoof across his muzzle. “O-okay,” he said, holding his hoof out. “Gross!” Diamond swatted the be-boogered limb away from her. “C’mon,” she said, wheeling down the path. “We’re going to Sugarcube Corner,” she called over her shoulder. “Whatever you do, don’t let that penny turn over or else you lose everything! Because I’ll sue you.” An uneasy feeling stirred in the hollow formerly occupied by Button’s stomach. Something told him he wasn't going to bed that night with the same name he woke up with, but what choice did he have but to see where this went?
฿ 0.03Button’s coughing had done a fair job of clearing the first ninety percent of his airways, which meant the last ten percent tickled and plugged his breathing all the worse. Somepony put a napkin in his hoof, with which he promptly turned and began making unpronounceable noises into. “What are you doing here, Sweetie Belle?” Diamond asked over his back. “I was just about to ask you the same thing,” said the unicorn, eyes narrowed. “I asked you first.” Instead of answering, Sweetie made a grunting noise and gestured at the camera hanging around her neck. “Ugh yourself!” Diamond snapped back. “You think you can shoot for the Foal Free Press with some ten-bit relic you dug out of your parent’s closet?” “Not for that, no,” said Sweetie. “I was just about to try photography for its own sa—hey, will you stop trying to change the conversation?” “Oh, mare.” Diamond snickered. “Hey, give it back!” Button turned around just in time to watch Diamond pluck the camera away from Sweetie and shove her away with a hind leg. The next thing he knew, Diamond had pulled him closer, bringing his muzzle a foot or two away from the lens. A flickering aura—colored the same pale green as Sweetie’s eyes, Button later realized—tugged at the half of the camera not in Diamond’s grasp. “Photography isn’t hard,” Diamond said, pasting her cheek against his. “Let me start you off by showing you a selfie. Cheese!” “What?” was all Button could utter. The world turned “Gimme that,” Sweetie groused, snatching her camera back. “Thanks for ruining the film with your face.” Diamond sighed. “This is the thanks I get for teaching you the ways of the art? Really, now. I was just about to make you an offer, too.” “Hmph! You know what? Forget it. I’m outta here.” Button’s vision cleared of spots just enough to watch Sweetie Belle turn on the spot and high-step it out of Sugarcube Corner, nose and tail hiked high in the air. “You’re just jealous your boyfriend wants to spend more time with me than you,” Diamond called after her. Sweetie was just about to step outside when Diamond’s remark hit her, and she threw back a glowering look in response. This only prompted another chuckle from Diamond and a sip of her milkshake. “That was kinda mean,” Button said. “What’d she ever do to you?” “Remember that thing I mentioned about asking questions, and how we weren’t having any more of that today?” said Diamond. Button frowned. “Well, yeah, but still—” “Look, you,” Diamond said, poking him in the chest. “I’m trying to do you a favor here, okay? Just roll with me.” A mental search for “favors” under “Diamond Tiara” yielded nothing Button could answer her with. “That blank flank did give me a good idea.” Sitting up, Diamond shaded her eyes with a hoof and swept the area, frowning. Her eyes widened when she spotted what she sought—a cream-colored, mosquito-legged pegasus colt chatting with a full-grown, musclebound stallion far too big for his chair. “Hey, Featherweight!” Diamond hopped out of her seat and trotted over to the colt. Featherweight’s sail-like ears flapped once at his name. Judging from how he flinched upon recognizing her, Button could only guess what their history was. “Do you want to take pictures of me and my boyfriend for the rest of the day?” Featherweight lifted a brow, but that looked to be as much as he dared do beneath her scrutiny. “He’ll pay you, of course,” Diamond continued, extending a hoof back at Button. “How does a set of new teeth sound?” Button winced. The kid did have a bit of bucktooth going on the—hang on. What was that about paying Featherweight in teeth? The little pegasus perked up, poking his teeth once. “Oh, that’s all right. Mom says I just need to grow into ‘em.” “I meant for your brother, genius-in-chief.” Featherweight’s conversation partner cringed, exposing teeth the color of lightly stained wood. “Can we please not bring up my dental situation in public?” he asked, loud enough to rock the light fixtures above. “I’m kinda self-conscious about that.” “If your little brother agrees to help me help him help you,” said Diamond, addressing the pegasus as he tried to withdraw his head into his bulging collar, “nopony will bring it up ever again.” Featherweight did that thing—tilted head, ears flopped to one side, mouth agape and eye twitching. Boy, Diamond was getting that look a lot from ponies today. “Look, just grab your camera,” Diamond told Featherweight. “It isn’t every day that you can do somepony one tiny, minor favor and cash in big on it, right?” Without pausing for breath, she turned around and beckoned Button over. “C’mon, we’re getting out of here.” A shot of adrenaline slammed against Button’s stomach. Diamond hadn’t taken more than two sips of her milkshake. “Don’t you want to finish this first?” he asked, gesturing. “I’m watching my weight,” said Diamond, turning toward the door. “And besides, it’s already beginning to melt. What competent business can’t keep their milkshakes from becoming lukewarm ooze in ten minutes, anyway?” *** “I didn’t even know they sold water in glass bottles,” Button told Diamond. “Huh?” “I saw Mrs. Cake take one out from behind her counter when we left Sugarcube Corner.” “Oh.” Diamond put a hoof to her chin. “Oh, yeah! Daddy has a whole shelf of that back home.” She made a face. “It’s disgusting.” “Really?” “I had to sneak into his office while he was sleeping one night because he wouldn’t let me try any. It made me get up sick the next morning and I puked.” Button winced. “Sorry.” Diamond shrugged. “Can’t you push any harder? I’m barely higher than the see-saw over there.” They had come to the playground outside the schoolhouse, an alien place to Button at best. His hooves were dextrous, honed for rapid sequences of fine movements—definitely the poorest spec he could have chosen going up against a swing set. He wiped sweat from his brow, lamenting the grains of sand that scratched his coat and stuck to his forelegs. “I’m getting tired,” he said. “Wow. We’ve only been at this for a minute.” Diamond held her hoof out, sole downwards in the universal gesture for “that’s enough.” Button no sooner saw it that he sat down on the playground sand, panting. A puff and a flash of light came from his right side, and Featherweight looked out from behind his camera. The two colts shrugged at each other. Aside from him, nopony was around to see Button like that. At the edge of the playground, two unicorn colts of teal and orange turned away any and all those seeking to use the jungle gym and the surrounding facilities for their own entertainment. Strangely, when Diamond asked them to provide security, all Snips and Snails had asked for were new bugs and new rocks. “It’s like they enjoy telling other ponies what to do,” said Button, staring at them as they chased a filly away from the whirlygig. “No kidding,” Featherweight added. “Excuse me, we’re not paying you to talk,” said Diamond. “Take more pictures, will you?” Featherweight groaned. Button looked up just in time to notice the pegasus glancing at him, but Diamond shooed him into the air before anything else could happen. “I swear, you ask a pony to do one thing in this town,” she said, returning to her swing seat, “and then it’s ‘I don’t know’ this or ‘here’s my unsolicited opinion’ that or even just flat-out ‘no’. It’s never as straightforward as ‘thank you, Diamond Tiara, our arrangement is sure to benefit you right away.’” Button followed her hoof as she twirled it in the air, but wasn’t sure what to say in response. None of the words he had sounded like words she wanted to hear. Thank her, maybe, but… “No thanks from you either, then?” Diamond sighed. “This is what I get when I go about trying to make ponies happy, isn’t it?” Okay, Button thought to himself, drawing out the time between syllables. He mashed the sand with his hooves while hashing his mind over any possible definition of happiness Diamond might agree with. He wasn’t a stupidhead, after all, but it worried him a bit that he had to prove that, and he had a feeling she didn’t get the same kicks he did out of tearing the cellophane off a brand new game. “Daddy says happiness is living in service of others,” Diamond said suddenly, looking at her hooves. “That’s why he owns Barnyard Bargains—he tells me it makes him happy because he can help ponies find what they need there.” She paused, and Button found what he had to say the same way a drowning stallion at sea finds a life ring. “Yeah.” Good enough—something told him she wouldn’t care for his brother’s opinion on “mega-stores stomping out local businesses”. Diamond smiled at him. “Daddy’s smart. He has to be. He and I don’t always see eye to eye on everything, but I agree with him on what makes ponies happy. So if living in service to others is what it all boils down to, all I do is help ponies realize they can do nice things for me.” Button mulled that one over. He supposed that made sense. “Yeah.” “Of course, not everypony’s going to get with the program. Take those blank flanks in my grade, for instance. I spend an inordinate amount of time on those three, considering their extensive histories of non-cooperation. I’m kind of surprised I bother to remember their names, because I don’t remember the last time they did anything for me.” Diamond’s brow furrowed. Her smile had vanished, but the look she gave Button wasn’t anger. It was something else. “What is it with you and Sweetie Belle? Do you find her to be as much of a pain as I do?” Button frowned. That wasn’t the look of a pony who wanted to hear “no”. “...Yeah?” “Good.” Diamond kicked her legs and set her swing into a gentle motion. “I didn’t want to hurt your feelings by pretending to be your girlfriend in front of her.” Button still wasn’t sure what Diamond was getting at. She was a girl after all, even if the “friend” part was a little less clear. Nevertheless, a bad taste settled on Button’s tongue, as if eggplants became ghosts when they were tossed in the trash to haunt the tastebuds of foals once more. He had to say something else. “I mean… we don’t really hang out much. She’s just there at board games club after school because her other friends are off doing other things.” Diamond blew a raspberry. “Trying to get her cutie mark at Slides ‘n’ Stairways, I bet.” “No, actually.” Button winced. That’d just slipped out, he promised— Only Diamond was still snickering at her own joke to notice. Talk about a natural 1 on that Listen check. Button wasn’t making great rolls in Sense either, even though he agreed that game was pretty dumb, because he chose to keep pressing his luck. “I mean, we don’t always play together. When we do, though, she’s always passes on stuff like Monopony and Starving, Starving Rhinoceroses… seses.” How the hay was that pluralized again? “How can she not like Monopony?” Sounded like Diamond was back listening. “What greater joy is there than squeezing every last cent out of your opponents over the course of three hours until they finally bust on your Beach Pier?” “She brings in stuff they don’t sell in your dad’s stores,” Button said. “Dukes of Skyheight, Imperion, Tiny Pasture, you name it.” “I’ve never heard of any of those games. No offense, but they sound boring.” Something sparked in the bottom of Button’s guts. Something red, like the shell of a rousing magma elemental. “They’re pretty fun, actually. They’re more than just rolling dice or mashing buttons. There’s a lot of strategy that goes into them.” He remembered the red of the schoolhouse walls as the afternoon sun filtered in through a window, lighting a floor of noisy foals clustered around games of Apologies! and checkers and marecala. From the front door, he noticed one unicorn filly in the corner steadily setting out piles of colored plastic train cars around a cardboard map of Equestria. Several decks of cards sat by her side, meticulously arrayed and spaced. She looked up from her prep work with a small smile, scanning the room for another pony or five to join her. He saw her smile wilt. “I can’t imagine ponies are into games they’ve never heard of,” Diamond suggested. “I bet she plays alone a lot.” Ears folded, she reached over to the pile of red pieces and began straightening them out, one by one. The smile that returned to her face was even slighter, shakier. She looked up again. “I dunno,” said Button, heat flushing in his head. “She joined the club before I did.” Miss Cheerilee came over, asked her a question or two, swept a hoof at the other foals by way of suggestion. The filly shook her head, sending Miss Cheerilee away. “How could she not play alone?” Diamond mused. “Outside of those two, she doesn’t have friends, right?” He went up to her while she straightened up the green pieces, one by one, oblivious to his presence. His tail swished. He cleared his throat. “Maybe?” said Button. “I really don’t know why she wouldn’t have others.” “You still don’t know?” Diamond’s eyes bugged out at him. “After everything we’ve talked about?” Her hooves flitted here and there, pointing to different lines on the board, showing how the cards he held in his hoof permitted him to lay pieces on those lines. Her voice squeaked, struggling to keep up with her explanations. “Yeah, she’s a little weird,” said Button, glancing off to the side. “And when I’ve seen her outside of board games club she always walks around as if she isn’t a hundred percent there or something.” He looked Diamond in the eye, and a little grin emerged on his face. “But you oughta give her more credit,” he said. They were neck and neck, his Seaddle-San Prancesco line to her Featherfax-Dodge Junction. His plans for service to Manehattan were just one turn from fruition, and he’d run away with this thing. “She gets the same way I get about video games when she plays. It’s almost unreal at times.” One impossible six-piece link later, the citizens of Manehattan found themselves connected expressly to the ivory towers of Canterlot—and he wouldn’t see a single dime from it. “You’re saying she’s good at these games?” Diamond’s eyes grew wider by the second. “At anything, actually?” “Not just good,” Button chuckled. What he’d give for a pair of shades right now. The Sableshore Coast was hers. She took root in the Mild West. Starsweep Peak fell into her empire before he could cobble together the single green link he needed. “She’s a pain. In all the times we’ve played together, I’ve never won once.” All he could do was sit back and wonder what just happened, his tiny little network paling against the spread of her dominion. She bounced around the board with little springing noises, giggling, and when she looked at him, her eyes were bright and her smile wide. Diamond could only gape. “Is that what happens between you two?” Button couldn’t be the only victim to her surprising wiles. “Do you always lose to her, too?” And just like that, Diamond’s face contorted into something draconic. Puffs of steam escaped from her ears, complete with puffing noises. No, hang on—those noises were coming from above. Button followed her gaze upwards, where a pegasus with the colors of the rainbow arrayed in her mane bucked clouds into wisps of vapor. Something told Button he may have gone too far. “Yoo hoo!” Diamond called up. “Miss?” Rainbow Dash, Button added for her. To his surprise, the pegasus stopped what she was doing and looked down. “Yeah?” she asked. “What’s up?” “I was just wondering if you could move that cloud over to give us some shade? This sun is quite piercing today.” “Ooooh,” said Rainbow, descending to the playground. “That might be tough. Us weatherponies don’t do the whole ‘valet’ thing, know what I’m saying?” “I wasn’t asking you to do it for free,” said Diamond, shooting a glare at Button. “Surely there’s something we can offer you in exchange.” Rainbow’s eyes widened. “Really? Try me, kid.” “A one-on-one VIP dinner with Spitfire, Captain of the Wonderbolts.” “Hmm. She already knows how awesome I am, but that’s pretty good.” “Now wait a second—” Button tried to cut in, only for Diamond to cut him back out. “A copse of pillow trees set aside in town for your own personal nap use and nopony else’s.” “Seriously?” Rainbow hid a chuckle behind her hoof. “Try again.” “You drive a hard bargain.” Diamond sighed, coming back up with the winningest smile Button had ever seen on her. “Very well, then. How about a lifetime ten percent discount with Barnyard Bargains and all affiliated chains, franchises, enterprises, and competitors?” Rainbow Dash answered by doubling over in laughter. “You know how bargaining works, right?” she asked between gasps. “You start with your worst offer and work your way up, not the other way around.” “Well, let’s hear what you want!” Diamond screeched, several octaves higher than pony ears should ever have been allowed to hear. “Okay, wow,” said Rainbow when her eyes stopped rolling in her head. “For real, was one of your grandparents a harpy or something?” Diamond stood her ground. Tendrils of black hate seeped from the corners of her eyes. At least, that’s what Button expected to see, finding this tendril-less reality less satisfying to watch. “If you want me acting as your personal umbrella all day,” Rainbow continued, “you’re gonna have to build me a water park.” Button balked. “A water park?” Was the penny beneath his beanie really worth that much? “Yeah, you heard me,” Rainbow snorted. “It’s gotta have everything: tube rides, log flumes, a wave pool, lazy rivers, a sick wicked deadmare’s dive, and a snack bar gift shop combo. It’s got to be free for me and my friends to come and go any time, too.” “Anything else?” asked Diamond. Rainbow Dash recoiled. “Uh, maybe a fireworks stand I can set off every night.” “Yeah, yeah.” Diamond tapped her hoof on the ground and rolled her eyes. “Anything else?” Button wasn’t overly familiar with the pegasus before him, but if Scootaloo’s constant gushing over her was anything to go by, Rainbow wasn’t a pony who enjoyed being led on. Her eyes narrowed. “Yeah,” she said, matching Diamond’s tone. “You’re gonna build it in the sky, right next to my house.” Button flailed his hooves in Diamond’s direction, but she wasn’t looking at him. “Sure thing,” she said. “Anything else?” “Look, kid, just quit while you’re ahead. I’ll move your stupid cloud, all right?” Rainbow vaulted into the sky, a fading stripe of all the colors in her namesake trailing after her. “Thank you!” Diamond trilled, waving her hoof. She gasped as Button half-swatted it down. “We’re building her a water park?” he demanded, heart ramming against his throat. “What are you so worried about?” Diamond asked in return. “Don’t believe your penny’s worth that much? I told you it’s worth millions. You don’t think I’d be making all these bargains on your behalf if you weren’t going to have the money to back it up, do you?” Button couldn’t find the words to explain why a water park the size of Slydesdale hit him harder than some number Diamond kept throwing at him. He really, really didn’t want to doubt her expertise in these kinds of things. But what if she was up to something? Everytime he tried routing his thoughts to make sense of his day, the question entered some new crevice in his brain like a marauding colossus. “I don’t know,” he moaned. “You don’t know?” Diamond repeated, smirking. “There’s a reason my family’s rich, you know, and that’s because I do know.” She looked up. “Snips? Snails?” Button followed Diamond’s gaze toward the two forgotten colts at the edge of the playground, fending off a growing group of ponies both foal and full-grown. Pegasi flapped in the air like a skein of alien drones where earth ponies and unicorns clogged the ground. All of them were looking in Button’s direction. If he didn’t know any better, he’d have said they were looking at him. “What do they want?” asked Diamond. Snip’s nasal speech keened through the air. “They’re saying you and him are giving away money,” he explained. “Yeah,” Snails added, his voice more encumbered. “And all they have to do for it is do you some kinda favor.” “I told ‘em that!” Featherweight’s brother popped up in the back of the group, beaming. “I’m getting new teeth, everypony!” The group cheered, pressing against Snips and Snails. Diamond tapped Button on the shoulder. And Button looked into the face of evil, and it was smiling. “Let them come,” she called out, rubbing her hooves together. “I’m sure we can make them happy.”
฿ 0.02On most days, Button liked coming to Sugarcube Corner. Maybe there was a little too much pink wrapping around the columns and bannisters, and he certainly wasn’t there for all the hearts laid into the woodwork and walls, but a colt as coltish as he could only demand so much of the town’s number one bakery and sweet shop. Ponies young and old packed the seating area, sipping on smoothies and munching on cupcakes, though their chatter had died down somewhat with his entrance. Or, rather, hers. And only now he noticed, bracingly, how quiet it had become as the portly, blue-coated earth mare glared across the counter at his current company. “And how do you plan to pay for that today, dear?” Mrs. Cake demanded, smoothing down the ruffles on her apron straps. “Daddy’s tab, as always,” Diamond shot back, smirking. “Just put it on there with the rest of what he owes you.” Button shied a step back, allowing a display case of fruit pies to half-hide himself from the rest of the bakery. Mrs. Cake was always nice to him, but she was acting a lot like Mom did when she caught him doing something bad, and everypony knew all mothers could read minds and follow up accordingly. “I ran into your father the other day, young lady,” she said, veins tensing in her neck like piano wires. “He’d never heard of a tab under his name here—or with anywhere else in all of Ponyville. The only reason you’re still in my store is because he paid for everything, then and there.” “But surely you value my repeat business?” Diamond sidled up to the counter and leaned a foreleg against the glass. “I’m never that much in need of a milkshake that I can’t have one delivered from Canterlot in a refrigerated car. You should be glad there’s nothing I enjoy more than supporting my local economy.” Mrs. Cake stood her ground, purple eyes boring into Diamond’s blues. “I’ll be happy to make your milkshake after you pay for it, just like how it works for everypony else,” she said, sweeping her hoof toward her diners. A couple of them gave her a nod. The kitchen doors burst outward, expelling a wiry orange stallion with a bow tie and a grimace on his face. “And even if we let you pay later,” he said, whisking by with a tray of pastries destined for the window display, “you’d have to wait until we repaired our sprinkle machine. Poor thing finally gave out this morning.” Mrs. Cake turned on her husband. “Dear!” “Best sprinkle machine we ever had, too,” Mr. Cake continued, lime-green eyes sliding upwards in recollection. “Good ol’ Betty, puttin’ em out one at a time since my great-great uncle bought her from the old Foalsworth’s in Manehattan.” “Dear!” Mrs. Cake repeated, an octave higher. “We’ve enough sprinkles in reserve to last us through the week. That’ll give us plenty of time to find a replacement.” The kitchen doors burst outward again, this time disgorging a puffy-maned pink earth mare with her cheeks flecked with every color on and off the rainbow. She more bounced than walked, and it was hard not to hear her perky, balloons-rubbing-against-each-other squeak-talk from a hundred paces, much less ten. Button liked her. “Hey, Mrs. Cake!” said Pinkie Pie, peppering her boss’ face with confectionary shrapnel. “I’m taking this week’s pay in sprinkles ‘cause I realized I was really really hungry and in the mood for, like, a gabzillion of something. You ever been in one of those moods before? Sprinkles are really good for that, I’ve learned! Oooh, that’s a journal entry!” Mrs. Cake blinked. “Don’t worry—there’s still a sack back there for the rest of the day. I’m off to Twilight’s, but I’ll be back for the lunch rush!” Pinkie cartwheeled between Button and Diamond on her way toward the front door. “See you later!” she trilled, and with one final bang she disappeared into the city. The door creaked closed behind her. For a few fragile moments, the only sound in the building was the hum of display cases refrigerating their contents. “Ahem.” Diamond Tiara rapped on the counter. The grin she wore had far too many square, shiny teeth for Button’s comfort, so he reached up and retrieved his penny from under his beanie. “So I hear you’re having trouble with your sprinkle machine,” Diamond said. “Oh, most definitely,” said Mr. Cake, swinging around the counter. Button would swear on his Joy Boy that he heard a sound—something between a spike slamming into something meaty and a baseball bat obliterating a skull. It came from the glare Mrs. Cake shot at her husband, and his head jerked forward before he could skitter back into the kitchen. Diamond tapped on the counter once more, and not in the oblivious way other foals stuck their hooves in things like wall outlets, bear traps, or Mom and Dad’s Completely Unremarkable Drawer of Mom and Dad Stuff. Button had stumbled across that drawer once, and to this day he still had no idea why Mom turned that red when he asked why they kept those weird rumble packs in there. Completely Unremarkable his poor, bruised hiney, but his parents probably had a point. They didn’t even plug into any of his controllers. “…still hung up on the part where you make me my order and I pay you later,” Diamond’s voice came fading back in as her hoof pulled Button to the counter. “So, let me introduce you to my friend.” Flat-hoofed! Button cursed his inattention as he gazed into Mo—Mrs. Cake’s eyes. His ears folded against the certain hurricane, one he’d already survived that morning in the living room, if barely. Only, Mrs. Cake didn’t yell. “You?” she mouthed at him, eyes wide and unbelieving. “My friend carries with him a very precious commodity, Mrs. Cake.” Diamond’s voice had somehow turned sweeter than a box of Calf ‘n’ Hobs’ Sugar Bombs, though Button was too occupied with not being vaporized on sight to appreciate that. The hoof in his side jammed him out of it as Diamond told him, “Show her what you have there.” Button gave her a confused look, to which she only answered with a smile and a “Go on.” It was worth millions, according to her. Button wasn’t a hundred percent sure what a million came after, but it sounded about as valuable as a purple Corona blaster in Burrolands 2, and he wasn’t sure if waving that kind of tech around in public was a good idea. Cringing, he sat back on his haunches and presented his penny with both hooves. Mrs. Cake peered over the counter, brows furrowing. “That’s it?” “To you, it’s a simple penny,” said Diamond, leaving the counter to circle behind Button. “To Penny Royal down the street, it’s a very rare kind of penny. It’ll be worth a fortune.” “Oh, dear.” Mrs. Cake held a hoof to her mouth, though even Button could cotton onto something weird going on with her. “That’s quite compelling. I never realized how much I could trust you in these matters.” Diamond chuckled. “Don’t patronize us, Mrs. Cake. It’s quite insulting. At any rate, this penny will make me—I mean, us—” she said, patting Button on the head when he glanced at her, “quite the tidy sum. And when you see us walk past this building without the brand new sprinkle machine you so dearly need right now, you’ll realize just how much that milkshake you wouldn’t make me will have cost you.” Button blinked. One by one, wheels came unstuck in his head, conveying Diamond’s words from his ears to the sleepy little part of his brain responsible for processing them. “You want to buy them,” he whispered, grasping for words, “a sprinkle machine? For a milkshake?” “Two milkshakes, actually,” Diamond said, nudging Button in the side with a wink. “Can’t forget about you, can I?” Mrs. Cake struck her countertop hard enough that Button thought he heard something splinter. “I’ve had just about enough of this,” she declared, staring the both of them down—yep, Button too, he realized as his insides curled up and asked for blankies—with apocalyptic Mom-level threat. “I will not be swindled in my own store. Leave.” Button’s ears folded. So did the rest of him, at the thought of what Mom’d do to him if she heard about this. When she heard about this. His older brother always talked about the time he’d been stuffed into a box for a week without his LPs... Diamond held her hooves up in front of her chest. “Perhaps I may have done a few things—” Mrs. Cake pointed at the door. “Now!” “Excuse me, rude!” Diamond barked back. Pressing her counteroffensive, “So I was saying that I may have done a few things to cause friction between us but Mrs. Cake please return behind the counter and hear me out!” Way back when Button was a newcolt to the gaming scene, exploring the world of Ponyroth with his first ever zombie cleric, he’d somehow stumbled beyond the borders of the lowbie glade into a corrupted forest where the only life was death. Not ten yards into the zone, a reanimated manticore picked up his scent beyond sight range, somehow, and welcomed his arrival by spreading his character over a half mile of terrain. Being honest with himself, the whole thing got kind of insulting after the quarter-mile mark. Now that this was real life, it was all terrifying. He put his hooves together, held them up, and prayed to gods named and unnamed that he’d still have both his ears attached after Mrs. Cake dragged him back to his house. “Oh, good job, good job,” Diamond said. “I’m sorry!” Button whimpered. “Not you! You.” Until then, Button had had no idea that Diamond had put points into Petrifying Glare. No other explanation sufficed for why Mrs. Cake stopped in her tracks, her wheeling rage arrested along with a junior seismologist’s love for his job. Her hoof had shot up to her mouth, and her eyes darted towards the still-occupied seating area. “All right, all right,” Diamond conceded, walking toward her vanquished foe. “I admit you and I may not see eye to eye when it comes to you giving me stuff when I ask for it. But what right do you have to barrage this poor little colt because he just happened to walk in here with nothing beside him but me and my good intentions? Are you going to tell him that the penny he holds right now isn’t worth what he thinks it’s worth? Can you live with that? And if you can...” Diamond folded her ears and sniffled. “... will everypony else here be able to, after they saw you yelling at two members of your largest business demographic?” Hard to say whose jaw dropped first. Button was content to call it a tie with Mrs. Cake. “I, um…” Mrs. Cake backtracked behind the counter. “You just want to make children like us cry,” Diamond said, wiping her eyes. “No, dear.” Mrs. Cake couldn’t keep her eyes off the two or three ponies standing from their tables. “I-I do have a business to run, that’s all.” “Children who only wanted to help you in your time of new sprinkle machine need.” Mrs. Cake flicked her tail, turned her head toward the kitchen. “Dear?” “You’ve got this, honey!” Mr. Cake called from somewhere near the back. Button put his hooves down. When he chanced a glance at Diamond, the wink she passed back lifted something on his face. His cheeks. The corners of his lips. For the first time that day, he smiled. Mrs. Cake shook her head, sighed, and after a moment’s composition put on a tired smile that couldn’t have been anything in Button’s eyes but genuine. “Two milkshakes, was it?” she asked, tilting her head. “That’s right,” said Diamond Tiara. “But now that I think about it, I hope you wouldn’t mind adding an extra or two on there…” *** Chocolate milkshakes were the best thing ever, and nothing was going to lead Button Mash from the light of that sacred truth. He was far from a perfect pony, however. On occasion, he encountered temptation. In its current incarnation, it sat before the pink earth filly seated next to him in the corner booth, casting its shadow on a family two tables over. He beheld layers of vanilla, chocolate, mint, and raspberry swirling their way up the sides of a glass the size of a birdbath, a glorious foundation for a pyramid of ice cream scoops of every flavor ranging from apple pie to zebra stripe (a combination of white and dark chocolate, Button was informed, not meant to model the taste of an actual zebra’s stripes), caulked in with lines of frothy whipped cream, chopped nuts of every variety, morsels of candy bars, Rodeo cookies, and peppermint pieces, and rings of sliced strawberries and bananas drizzled with hot fudge and caramel and melted toffee, all sealed at the top with a perfectly spherical mareschino cherry. True to her word, Pinkie had also left a few sprinkles behind. Diamond Tiara put her hooves up and leaned back from her straw. “Ahh.” “How much did that cost, again?” Button asked, looking the monstrosity up and down once more. “More than your daddy makes in a week, I bet,” said Diamond, patting the Cakes’ last burlap sack of sprinkles on her other side. “What?” “Hm? Did you say something?” Button blinked, then shrugged it off and went back to his milkshake. Man, chocolate milkshakes. Best thing ever. “Almost done?” Diamond asked, cracking an eye at him. He still had an inch of milkshake left, but he wasn’t about to fall for its brain-freezing trap just yet. “Getting there,” he said, panting from his last pull. Diamond sighed. “The sooner you finish, the sooner we can keep swindling ponies out of th—the sooner we can help them get what they need.” Button raised an eyebrow. “You know, that’s the third time today you’ve changed something mid-sentence,” he noted. With his head a little lighter from the frostiness of his milkshake, he found his thoughts emerging into a cool little clearing of clarity. “And why does that concern you?” Diamond’s brows went flat enough to plane wood. “Because most of the time an NPC does that in one of my video games, it means they’re up to something.” Button’s eyes narrowed, as did his smile. “Actually, make that every time.” Diamond’s jaw dropped. “Oh, for the love of—we’re not in a video game, are we?” “I fail to see how that’s relevant, Diamond Tiara.” On the outside, Button relished the last sip of his milkshake. On the inside, he was tap dancing. Intrigue! He loved intrigue, especially when it came to unmasking it. “Because real life isn’t like your video games or whatever,” said Diamond, burying her face in her hoof. “Light of Celestia, being your girlfriend can be so embarrassing sometimes.” Diamond’s words did nothing but spin the vanes of Button’s beanie a little quicker. “Whaf?” he asked, mouth full of shake. “What?!” squeaked the squeakiest voice to ever squeak in Equestria, directly behind him. As Button turned and flailed and coughed for air, locking eyes with the white-coated unicorn filly staring at him with pale green eyes the size of saucers, he allowed himself a moment to consider the possibility that chocolate milkshakes were no longer the best thing in the world, especially when dumped down his windpipe.
