"You're making me what?! Redundamanant?! That's not even a real word! You're just making that up, silly!"
"...Redundant. You're being made redundant, Pinkie."
A brief, but awkward silence filled the air in Sugarcube Corner as Pinkie took the news in.
"What? Why? I've been on my Absolute Best behaviour!"
"I know, Pinkie, trust me, it's the last thing I wanted to do," Mrs. Cake assured her, "I'd love to keep you around if I could; you're a big help, but...between the kids, and taxes, and financing the shop... the money just isn't stretching far enough."
"Well, couldn't you just...pay me half or something?" Pinkie briefly winced at the idea of getting paid even less, but she cared about the Corner and the Cakes too much to let her own feelings get in the way.
"If anything, we should be paying you even more. But you're on minimum wage as it is. If we paid you less, and the government found out, we'd get shut down for sure. Not to mention fines and possible jail time on top of that for fraud!"
Pinkie sighed in disappointment.
"I'm very sorry, but we just don't have any other choice if we want to keep this place afloat."
"No, it's fine. I totally understand," she said, walking away, "See you around."
Man, what a bummer, Pinkie thought as she walked through Ponyville. She stopped to look up at a sign; a particular sign which happened to be very instrumental to her current predicament:
Isla's Ices: The Best Sweets in Ponyville!
She stared at the sign for a while, before shaking her head and continuing on her way.
"There! All the books, fully alphabetised and re-alphabetised!" Twilight Sparkle said to nobody in particular. Spike was in Canterlot on royal business right now, meaning that she'd had to sort all of her books by herself, much to her annoyance. "Can't you just smell that...that neatness in the air?"
"Not really. Mostly smells like old paper and sparkles to me," Pinkie said as she walked into the Library, "Ooh, and bubblegum shampoo, too!" she added, sniffing at her mane.
"Hey, Pinkie! How'd it go at Sugarcube Corner?" Twilight asked.
Pinkie sighed. "Not great...They had to let me go."
"Oh, no, that's terrible! Why? Did you do anything wrong?"
"That's what I wondered at first, but they said that they just couldn't afford to pay me any more."
"Oh, no! Are you gonna apply for another job?"
"I'll try, but I don't think it'll work. Most places tend to not want to hire ponies with my...reputation for partying." Pinkie said, her hair starting to deflate slightly. "I'll be in my room."
"Feel free to use me as a reference!" Twilight shouted up at her from the bottom of the stairs. She sighed, wondering how to go about helping her friend. Pinkie was really having it rough recently, ever since that Isla Sweets opened up shop. What she lacked in reputation, she made up for in variety, offering tons of different desserts from all over Equestria, and even a few from the Zebra lands. That, combined with slightly cheaper prices, meant that soon the customers were flocking to their new favourite candy shop, at a great cost to Sugarcube Corner.
As well as having her pay gradually reduced down to minimum wage, Pinkie had also been evicted from her room above the Corner after the Cakes thought it was unfair to take so much of her pay away and then have her pay them rent on top of that. Twilight had happily offered a spare room in the library, free of charge for Pinkie until she could get on her own hooves.
"Well, no point dwelling on it all day. There's alphabetising to be done!" she said, and skipped off to another part of the library.
"This day is just the absolutively-positively worst!" Pinkie said, rubbing her temples with her hooves. She needed something to lift her spirits, and she knew just the thing she had in mind. When her eyes caught the box under the bed, she looked around, then closed the curtain before picking it up.
"Should I...? Surely one treat can't hurt, right? And I have had a bad day..." she muttered to herself. She reached behind her ear and pulled a key seemingly out of thin air, and unlocked the box. Inside the box were around 15 small pills of different colours. She took out a light blue one, and promptly stuffed it in her mouth, letting it dissolve on her tongue. A wave of relaxation slowly washed over Pinkie, as she felt like all her troubles were just melting away.
"Now this...is a way to relax!" she grinned, as she lay down on her bed. After discovering them in college, she'd never been able to resist a Party Popper since. While strong enough doses could induce hallucinogenic trips, she preferred a little less, just enough for a decent buzz (and maybe a few fun visions here and there). Despite the many hours of fun she'd had with Party Poppers, however, she had to keep it on the down-low, or face Pony Jail, which she'd never really understood, because why would you make something so fun and happy illegal? That'd be like making balloons illegal, which would just upset everybody, and how nobody understood how nice it would be for everybody to just try some-
A tidal wave of inspiration crashed over Pinkie.
If everybody was on Party Poppers, they'd have fun and want to get more...if we sold Party Poppers at Sugarcube Corner, we'd definitely get more customers!
Pinkie thought this was the best idea that she'd had in months.
"I get by with a little help from my friends...I get high with a little help from my friends..."
