The door flung wide open as Blaze entered her apartment before plopping into her old, torn, brown couch. Her horn glowed as she closed the door as it let out annoying creaky noises from its hinges. Blaze was from a tiring morning, hunting for a job, moving up and down through Ponyville but her efforts went blunt. She levitated her red - orange shaded shades as she laid it on the dusty stool beside her. She looked up at the ceiling that was peeling off its paint as she slowly drifted into a trance, but it was quickly interrupted by the ringing of her land-line cell phone. She levitated it to her as she answered it, gently placing it on her ear.
"Hello."
"Wheres my money Miss Blaze." A stallion responded in a rather dead serious voice.
It was Mr. Gouh. The stallion that collected rent from the apartment Blaze lived in. Blaze's heart paced up as she took a light gulp. She hadn't paid her rent for two months straight! She knew she was in trouble.
"Oh, Mr. Gouh. Umm.... what a pleasant surprise." she said nervously.
"Don't act cute on me Miss Blaze. You know why I'm calling. Wheres my money." he said as he slightly raised his voice.
"I..." she said letting out a sigh, "I... I.. need more time. Please."
"I've been going too easy on You Miss Blaze. And I'm beginning to loose my patience, you know how I am when I lose my patience right."
"Y-yes Mr. Gouh." she said as she remembered what happened to the poor stallion who lived above him.
He was on his final shift of the week at a market cashier and would finally earn his pay check which he would use to pay his rent that day after stalling for so long with Mr. Gouh. When he was at work, I saw Mr. Gouh and some other stallions break into his apartment. They all threw all his stuff through the window yet his room was 5 stories up. His couch, TV, bed.... everything! Flew right out of the window. In the evening he came back, ready to pay the rent only to find his stuff in a mangled heap as other things were spread across the ground. All I could do was watch him helplessly as he grieved.
"P - please, I'm begging you Mr. Gouh. Just give me a little more time, I promise I will have your money." she stated I'm a slightly wobbly fearful voice.
"Hmm..." he said as he gave it some thought, "Fine, I'm giving you till next week Monday. Got it?"
"Oh thank you so much Mr. Gouh." she said in a pleased and thankful tone, which she rarely does.
He cut the line as Blaze put her phone back into place. She had exactly a week to earn bits, but how? She soon began to remember a lot of things she hadn't paid for such as food, water bills, phone services and other things. She was to ashamed to go back to her parents. She wanted to prove to them that she could fend for herself on her own, that's why she left them in the first place. She had other relatives of whom she could call, but decided not to involve them. Her thoughts were set on pause as her belly began to rumble, clearly stating it was time to fuel up. She opened the fridge only to find a 3 day old slice of pizza and an energy drink. She took a sigh as she removed them. Though the pizza was 3 days old, it was still quite fresh. She gobbled it up and drank her energy drink in one gulp giving her a quick tingle. She sat again on her old couch as she turned on her television in order to pass time. As she killed time, she happened to stumble onto an advert that really caught her eye. It was an advert about a Pizzeria that was a few blocks away from her apartment.
"Help wanted as a night guard at the fun 'Pinkie's Fun and Joyful Pizzeria.' Work from 12AM to 6AM during the weekdays and earn a pay check of 120 bits at the end of the week, what could go wrong? Call 1-800-PINKIES-PIZZERIA to apply. For some strange reason, the ponies that were shown were rather faintly familiar to Blaze, but she couldn't put hoof on it. Back to the matter at hand 120 Bits would be enough to pay her rent for an adequate amount of time, as well as help in other needs she required. Without serious thought she dialed the number and applied for the job. Weirdly enough, she was the only one who applied and was instructed to head to the Pizzeria that day for instructions as well as a tour round the pizzeria since she would begin her day that day which happened to be a Monday.
She turned off her TV, wore her shades and head out of her apartment. Once she got out, she placed her black headphones on her ears as she began to listen to songs written and produced by her favorite pony artists such as DJ-PON3, as she walked towards her new job. She was quite excited but on her way, she had a feeling telling her to just walk back but she ignored it. At around 10PM she arrived at the Pizzeria. It was quite a large building even though they sold Pizzas. The building was oddly familiar to Blaze, as though she had seen it before somewhere. But maybe she was just hallucinating. She walked in to find the place quite packed even though it was at night. Fillies and colts running up and down like a pack of roaches, screaming in joy and laughter. Mares and Stallions were at one place as they watched then play. She also noticed about 6 animatronics roaming around, some playing with the fillies and colts, others serving drinks and others were walking around just talking to random ponies. There was of course one animatronic that really caught her eye. A pink mare with a that had a puffy mane and tail that was a darker shade of pink, bright blue eyes and a red bow tie at its neck. Unlike the others who trotted normally except the blue and yellow one's who could fly, her movement was rather.... unique. She hopped up and down from place to place making a funny boing sound and she kept on saying the words 'Party', 'Fun', 'Joy', 'Laughter.' and 'Smile.'. This made Blaze a tad uneasy as it glared at her for a bit. She felt a light tap on her shoulder causing her to get startled as she quickly turned behind only to meet faces with the manager of the Pizzeria.
She was a grey mare with a cream yellow mane and tail. She was a Pegasus unlike Blaze who was a unicorn. She had eyes that had both had a shade between orange and yellow another detail was that one of her eyes was looking directly at Blaze while the other was looking slightly up at the ceiling. She could have a slight issue controlling her eyes or she could turn her eyes at any given angle. Her cutie mark was a bunch of bubbles that was rather cute to Blaze's opinion. She wore a blue shirt that had the label 'Manager' on its left top pocket as well as a black tie hanging by the collar of her shirt.
"I'm guessing you must be Blaze Firecake?" she asked in a calm and friendly voice.
"Um..... yeah, how did you know?"
"I could kinda tell from your mane as well as your cutie mark. I'm Derpy Whooves. Your manager." she said with a slight giggle, "So, you applied for the night guard duty huh?"
"Yes, and you said I can begin tonight?"
"Yes, yes, off course but first you have to know your place around here. We have 10 parts in this pizzeria. The Show stage, Backstage, Dining area, Barn's cove, East and west hall, Restrooms, Kitchen ,supply closet and your office. I'm sure you won't find it hard to walk around this place right?"
"Heh, yeah. It's a pretty simple set up. I guess I can manage to get around."
"Great! Now next is to introduce you to the animatronics." Derpy said as she walked towards the area they were in.
Blaze slowly followed behind her as she got a bit nervous as some animatronics gave her a dead stare as she approached them. Derpy gave a general name to all the animatronics, naming them the elements of harmony. First was a white mare, she had a curly, purple mane and tail, she also had a cutie mark in form of tree blue diamonds and blue eyes, similar to those of pinkies. The animatronic was busy sharing a bucket of sweets to every table, ensuring every child got at least one sweet.
"That is Rarity, she's the element of generosity. She's the one who distributes sweets or toys for the kids." Derpy said before calling her out, "Hey Rarity! Say hello to your new night guard."
At first she turned with a smile but upon seeing Blaze's face, she simply moved to another location.
"Wow.... well... probably they haven't been set well or something." she said.
As she introduced her to the other elements which were the elements of Magic (Twilight Sparkle), Honesty (Apple Jack), Kindness (Fluttershy) and loyalty (Rainbow Dash). She got the same reaction, they just walked away or just glare at her before walking away. However when it came to the element of laughter, also known as Pinkie Pie, she had a very different reaction. She stared right into Blaze with a rather surprised look, her mouth was slightly open showing no frown nor smile and her eyes were as wide as they could be. This gave Blaze a negative attitude towards the animatronics.
She was soon lead into her office where her work would be begin her work as a night guard. It was an average size room, it had a table at the front where there was a fan laid on top of it as well as a bunch of papers some that were crumpled. On the wall where the desk was situated, there was a poster of all the animatronics and on top written of it written "PARTY". On the left side of the poster was a bunch of fan art little fillies and colts drew on their memories in the pizzeria with the animatronics. At the top hung a single blub to illuminate the room. On the left and right of the room were two doors which could be opened or shut at anytime via a red button on each door as well as a light button which was white in order to turn on a light only for a few seconds. Blaze had no clue as to why she needed doors, there was nothing that could get to her right?
As she walked around the room she happened to stumble onto a chair that had some sort of screen on its cushion. She slowly levitated it as she examined it.
"Hey, um.. Derpy, what's thing?" she asked as she showed it to her.
"Oh, that's the Tablet where you can view all the cameras in the Pizzeria." She picked it from her as she turned it on.
The map was just sticks joint together, trying to resemble the structure of the pizzeria and the cameras are represented in numbers like 'CAM4B'. The number of a camera would turn green if it was being viewed at that moment.There was a square box that represented the location she would be in. It was at the center of CAM2A, CAM2B, CAM4A and CAM4B which were the two main halls. That wasn't quite hard for Blaze to get used to. She was confident that going through every night would be a breeze for her. Derpy looked at her watch as it read 11:50PM.
"I have to go now, the place is closing, I'll see you tomorrow." she said as she left, waving goodbye. For a manager, she was rather kind and sweet.
Blaze Decided to take a quick peak at the camera as she checked the Show stage to find every pony in their positions. She took a sigh as she sat on the rather comfy chair.
"Watching a bunch of tin cans do nothing the whole night? This should be easy as cake." she said not knowing what lied in store for her as the nights progressed by.
