“Did I ever tell you about my special cupcake, Dashie?”
Rainbow Dash shook from her stupor and drew a deep draft from her mug. “I dunno, Pinkie.”
Pinkie smiled enthusiastically, upsetting the cider swishing around her own mug. “Oh, it’s a great story! My first day at Sugarcube Corner, I knew absolutely nothing about baking. The Cakes just handed me a bag of flour and said ‘Here, give it a shot!’”
“Uh...huh.” Dash nodded, eyeing the setting sun from Sugarcube Corner’s balcony.
“Well, I was stumped. I didn’t even know how to work most of the kitchen stuff!” She chuckled. “But wouldn’t you know it? I had never made a cupcake before in my life, and on my very first try, I made a desert that the Cakes called perfect! It was coated in pink frosting with blue sprinkles on top! They said they couldn’t have done it better themselves.”
“Right,” Dash said, taking a second gulp from her mug. She felt her hearing begin to recede as the liquid flowed into her stomach.
“Anyway, I kept it under my bed ever since that day all those years ago. I actually don’t know where it went, but every once in awhile, something pink covered in green fuzz comes out and steals my midnight snacks.
“Uh, Pinkie, does this story have a...” She belched loudly. “you know...a point?”
“Of course not, silly!” Pinkie giggled.
Dash smiled and nodded in understanding. “Oh, I get it. Good one!”
The two shared a laugh and returned their attention to cascading sunbeams. Pinkie rose from her chair to refill their mugs when a voice could be heard in the distance.
“Rainbow! Pinkie! Is that you guys?”
“Oh, hey Twilight!” Pinkie bellowed over the railing. “Whatcha doin’?”
“I was just about to ask you two the same thing.” Her horn glowed, and with a flash, she appeared on the deck. “What are you doing up here?”
“Nothing,” Pinkie shrugged. She turned and took a bottle in her mouth, tipping a generous amount of its contents into each her and Dash’s mug.
“So you’re just sitting on a balcony, doing nothing? Twilight asked. “Would it mean anything if I said that makes no sense?”
“Probably not,” Dash said.
“Yeah,” Pinkie intoned, “I think Josh is getting annoyed with all the random stories getting featured.”
“Featured? And who’s Josh?” Twilight tilted her head.
“I’ll tell you when you’re older,” Pinkie said in a motherly voice as she set herself back down in the seat. “Anyway, I think he’s trying to make a point.”
“And what is the point?” Twilight wondered.
“There isn’t one.”
Twilight chuckled and shook her head. “No, that’s ridiculous. Nopony does anything for no reason. There needs to be a point to everything.”
“There is a point, when Josh wants to write one. But this one has none.”
“What in Equestria are you talking about, Pinkie?”
“It’s like the condoms you keep in your dresser drawer, Twi,” Dash explained. “There’s no point to them. They just sit there doing nothing, like us.”
Twilight turned beet red and looked down at the floor. “So...you’re just going to sit here doing nothing? You don’t even wonder why?”
“Not really,” Pinkie said dismissively. “We spent a couple hours guessing why he’s doing this, but we decided it’s just better to go with it.”
“Why who’s doing what?” Twilight demanded.
Dash shook her head. “You’re thinking too much, Twi. Here, have some cider.”
She lifted a third mug from beneath her seat and poured a measure of the golden liquid into it.
“Drink up!” she encouraged, pushing the glass toward Twilight.
Twilight sat in a third chair, grabbed the drink reluctantly and took a cautious sip. “It tastes like...whoa.”
She swayed dangerously in her seat, her head swinging back and forth like a metronome. “What the hay is in this?” she asked, taking a larger gulp.
“I dunno,” Pinkie said. “I lost feeling in my tongue about a half hour ago.”
“It...what?” Twilight gaped. “Where did you get this?”
“We bought it off a cart before we came up here,” Dash said. “There was a unicorn in the town square selling some little baggies of this white stuff. He offered to sell us this. We figured: why not?”
“But there’s probably drugs in it, or something!” Twilight shouted as she drained half the glass. “It might do something-” She took another sip. “-horrible to you!”
“Probably,” Pinkie agreed, emptying her mug.
“Shouldn’t we do something about this?” Twilight asked. “Isn’t that what we usually do? Solve crazy problems and have adventures?”
“Usually, but today there’s no point,” Pinkie replied.
“What do you mean there’s no point?”
Dash sighed. “I don’t think she gets it, Pinkie.”
“Someone got annoyed by something pointless, so he’s doing something else that’s pointless to make a point,” Pinkie explained.
Twilight’s eye twitched; a single strand of her hair turned silver. “Did that even make sense to you?” she asked Pinkie.
“Nope!” Pinkie grinned. “That’s the point!”
“You said there was no point!”
“Still not getting it,” Dash chimed in with a snigger.
“No, I’m not!” Twilight said irritably. “because you’re both being ridiculous!”
“There you go, that’s the point!” Dash clapped Twilight on the shoulder with a hoof.
Twilight heaved a deep sigh. “OK, let me see if I have this straight: you’re doing something that has no point.”
Dash and Pinkie nodded enthusiastically, leaning forward in their seats.
“Except it has a point, and that point is to be ridiculous because there really isn’t a point.”
“Yes!” Pinkie cried. “And...?”
“And this is all being orchestrated by some mysterious pony-”
“Person,” Pinkie corrected.
“What the hay is a person?”
“You don’t wanna know.”
Twilight waved a hoof. “Whatever. This is all being orchestrated by some person who wants to make a point by not making a point.”
“Couldn’t have said it better myself!” Dash declared, stomping her hooves in approval.
Twilight groaned and drained her mug. “Give me another one.”
* * *
“How long have we been out here?”
Pinkie glanced down at her bare wrist. “Twelve hours, thirty-seven minutes, and twelve seconds.”
Twilight stared at her friend, mouth agape. “How did you even-” She shook her head and muttered under her breath. “Doesn’t make sense, that’s the point. The point that there is no point. Except the point is...ANOTHER!” she bellowed, holding her empty mug out to Rainbow.
“On the double,” Dash slurred.
“So we’re going to stay out here how long?” Twilight asked.
“Until the story is finished,” Pinkie replied.
Twilight opened her mouth to respond, but closed it just as quickly. “And when is the story going to end?” she asked finally.
Pinkie scratched her chin and looked up to the sky, now stained with the crimson clouds of sunrise. “I can’t be sure, but probably pretty soo
