A Million Bits, But...

"A new party game?"

Applejack looked at Pinkie with intrigue, yet caution. As appealing as the idea of a game sounded, the farmpony knew that Pinkie could sometimes go a little overboard with sudden improvisation. And Rainbow Dash wouldn't usually have the patience for any game that didn't involve a lot of moving around. Of course Pinkie played the usual suspects for parties, such as Pin the Tail, but judging by the small rectangular tokens she was pulling out of her cotton-candy mane, Applejack suspected that this was probably nothing like that.

"Yup!" nodded Pinkie. "I call it 'A Million Bits, But!'"

"And how exactly do we play?" asked Rainbow Dash, eyeing up the small cards Pinkie laid out on the table.  "You know I usually make myself scarce by the nibbles whenever you wanna play a game, so..."

"I know! That's why I thought of this one, because you always look kind of lost with all the other Nervous Nellies and I figured I should try and 'appeal to an otherwise overlooked demographic'. Twilight told me! And since you'd rather be flying and doing all those amaaaaazing stunts in the air and practice for the Wonderbolts and..."

"Pinkie," cut in Applejack. "Yer ramblin'."

"Oh right. So I decided if I couldn't use that, I'd appeal to your other love in life."

"What's that?" asked Rainbow Dash.

"Crude humor."

"Ah, horseapples," muttered Applejack.

"...go on," said Rainbow Dash, looking a lot more interested than Applejack at this stage.

"Well," declared Pinkie, getting into the swing of things thanks to Rainbow Dash's approval, "playing couldn't be simpler! First, we need a judge. Eeeeeh...Applejack, you can be judge."

"Fair do's," nodded Applejack. She had a bad feeling, but maybe this wouldn't turn out too embarrassing.

"Now then, Dashie, you and I have to pitch a scenario each to Applejack where we get a million bits, buuuuuuuuuuut...there has to be some sort of catch to it."

"Such as?" asked Rainbow Dash. Pinkie mentioned crude humor earlier, so she had an idea forming in her head, but...

"Anything!" declared Pinkie happily. "Just...nothing that would leave you 'pining for the fjords', if you know what I mean."

"Maybe you should pitch yours first. I guess I can follow your lead, or something," said the blue pegasus, motioning to Applejack.

"Okie Dokie Lokie! So, Applejack, given the choice, would you take a million bits, buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut..." Pinkie managed to draw out the 'but' for about 10 seconds, impressing the orange earth pony with her apparent lack of a need for oxygen, "for the rest of your life, you can't talk. You can only make the noises of a random animal a day, and you can't talk until somepony guesses the animal noise you're making."

"...What?"

"You make animal noises instead of talking. And you can't talk normally until somepony guesses the animal."

"...right." Applejack looked perplexed. "So...now what happens?"

"Now? We talk!" grinned Pinkie. "That's where the real fun from this game comes from! I mean, can you imagine waking up one morning and you're crowing like a rooster? Could you live with that?"

"Uh, Pinkie," said Rainbow Dash raising her hoof in the air, "what's stopping you from just writing down the animal's name and just showing it to somepony?"

"Ah yes," said Pinkie, giving her an evil grin...or at the very least the best evil grin possible when you don't actually have a malicious bone in the body. "It's not limited to animals that you know."

"What!?" exclaimed Rainbow. Then she started laughing. "So Applejack could just start the day doing impressions of something REALLY obscure, like a fossa, or a hoatzin..."

"How do ya know what those are?"

"You'd be surprised who's rooming at Fluttershy's cottage."

"Okay okay," Applejack shook her head, "but yeah, Rainbow's right. If it's an animal you know, or heck, everypony knows, then you can just write it down."

"If you're lucky," Pinkie said.

"If you're lucky," Rainbow nodded, "but on the other days..."

-

"Thank you so much for coming today, Applejack," Cheerilee smiled. It was a parent-teacher conference today, and despite everything, Applejack thought it wouldn't be right to miss out, especially not when the rest of the Apple family was busy enough as it was. Taking a seat, the teacher began.

Cheerilee went through the usual progress report on how well Applejack's younger sister Applebloom was doing, and how getting her cutie mark had done wonders for her confidence, and that the bullying incidents from Diamond Tiara had stopped, until...

"Um, excuse me," said the schoolteacher. "You've been awfully quiet for some time..."

Applejack rolled her eyes, opened her mouth, and...

"Kukukukukukuku...ku-WAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA."

"E...excuse me?"

"Kukukukukukuku...ku-WAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA." Applejack passed a note to Cheerilee, with a pleading look in her eye.

-

"THAT would be quite a hoo-hah," Applejack admitted. She was actually now grinning along with Rainbow and Pinkie Pie. She had to admit, it was fun just talking, as far as games go.

"And it would a pain in the flank, trying to get anything at the shops too," Rainbow said. "Going up to the shopkeeper, making some obscure bird noises..."

"You'd probably get thrown out," nodded Pinkie.

A thought then occurred to Applejack. "So it's any random animal?"

"Any random animal," confirmed Pinkie.

"So what if Ah get somethin' that don't make a lot of commotion, like a fish?"

"Then you're mute for the rest of the day."

"WHAT!?"

Rainbow Dash burst into a fresh bout of laughter. "Oh, that's a LOT of fish to choose from. Especially if the guessing...actually, how specific do the guesses need to be? Can I just name the animal, or do I need to guess 'two-toed sloth' and not just 'sloth'...?"

"THAT would be awful," Applejack agreed, letting her attention wander for a bit. "Even if it were somethin' like a snake, which makes noise..."

-

"Pits Viper?" Twilight Sparkle asked.

Nothing. Rainbow Dash gave a hiss in reply.

"Russells Viper!"

"Hisssss!"

"Gaboon Viper!"

"Hissssssssss..."

"Common Puff Adder!"

Rainbow slumped to the floor in despair. She had half a mind to just walk away and sleep this off.

-

"I didn't think of that, but yes," Pinkie laughed.

"Wow, that's..." Rainbow chuckled, "...really messed up." She then stared at Applejack. "So WOULD you take it? A million bits to only make animal noises until somepony guesses what it is?"

"Well, that's where you come in next, Dashie!" Pinkie exclaimed, remembering that this was supposed to be the tutorial for the game. "YOU now have to pitch a scenario of your own, and then Applejack has to pick one she WOULDN'T do for a million bits. Whatever she wouldn't do wins the round. So Dashie, make sure it's a doozie, okay?"

Rainbow grinned. Well, Pinkie HAD given permission, nay, ENCOURAGED, her to use crude humor, so she thought, might as well. "Okay Applejack, a million bits, but...whenever you need to use the little fillies' room, a random liquid comes out instead."

"Why did Ah know you'd go fer somethin' like that?"

"Pinkie said it was fine."

"I did," Pinkie nodded.

Applejack sighed. "Define 'random liquid'."

"Anything," Rainbow Dash elaborated. "Every so often, yeah, you can go take a leak normally, but you could pee coffee one time, then the next time, it's orange juice..."

"Or syrup!" chimed in Pinkie.

Rainbow grinned. "Yeah, can you imagine? You're sitting on the bog and suddenly syrup is just running down the inside of your legs..."

"Ah'm tryin' not to, thanks," Applejack muttered. Then she paused. "Wait, how would you even know it WAS coffee. unless..." Then she blanched. "Nope. Derailin' that thought train. Riiiiiight now."

"You wouldn't!" Rainbow half-panicked. "It would just happen!"

"I was just thinking," Pinkie interrupted, "Since it's any liquid, what happens if you get something really awful, like my special favorite brand of hot-sauce..."

Rainbow Dash and Applejack visibly winced. "Ouch! That's smarts..."

"But it wouldn't be ALL the time, right?"

"I dunno, AJ. There's a lot of different hot sauces in the world..." Rainbow stroked her chin. "Especially if you just had a bad week and you just got nothing but different types of hot sauce, and really spicy ones as well. Stuff you couldn't handle with bare hooves..."

"Or it could be something like that stuff Twilight once did some experiments with. What was it called...liquid nitrogen...?" Pinkie said slowly

"Didn't she freeze a flower in that?" Rainbow asked. "Oh sweet Celestia!" And she was off on another laughing fit.

-

"Um, Applejack?" Fluttershy asked. "Why is there a block of ice in between your legs?"

"Don't ask," came the curt reply. And Fluttershy knew it would be no good to argue.

-

"Would you take it?"

"Over barkin' brayin' or just sayin' plum nuthin' all day?" Applejack asked. "Not on yer nelly."

"So that means..." Pinkie pressed.

"Ah guess I could just do a Big Mac and not say much. Or maybe Fluttershy could help, she's probably better at guessing what animal Ah'm pretendin' to be. And Ah'm gettin' a million bits for the farm, too."

"Winner!" crowed Rainbow Dash.

"And because you won that round, Dashie, you get my celebratory token! Along with all the rights and privileges acquired therein!" Pinkie passed one of the white cards to Rainbow. She took the moment to examine it, but all it was was a blank piece of cardboard.

"And now Dashie is the new judge! Applejack, it's now your turn to pitch an idea with me!"

Applejack shuddered. What had Pinkie started?