Raven Mystery

Chapter 4

Raven Mystery raced home. Her desperate need to have her abode in good shape to hold a party was paramount to everything else. She was in such a hurry, she pushed the door open without realising she had forgot to lock it before going to work.

“Surprise!” Pinkie yelled out. Raven screeched her hooves to a halt and became alerted by a lot of ponies in her house. She barely had time to catch a glance at the multitude of ponies when a party cannon went off and decorated her living room floor with confetti.

Then, before she fully recovered from the shock of watching her hard work cleaning the floor disappearing in front of her eyes, a pony had climbed onto her shoulders.

“Come on, Raven, it’s your birthday! Lead the conga line!” Pinkie cheered from behind. There was a battle of conflicting thoughts for a couple of seconds as other ponies joined the line. One line of thought wanted to whine about her floor being messy again, but the other was noticing ponies expecting her to be part of the partying scene and not some whiny pony.

“Aww, come on, up there in front!” called a frustrated brash voice who wanted the conga line to start dancing and moving to get the party started.

Deciding not to be a party bopper, Raven let out a reluctant sigh. She was likely to work all through the night to scrub the floors clean again after the party finished and led the line. Conga dancing was not her speciality, but the line soon began to split up as other party goers thought about snacks, something fizzy to drink and to socialise with each other. Raven tried to sneak off using the other ponies talking to each other rather than to her to her advantage and climb up the stairs to her bedroom.

“Yo! Howdy up there!” called a southern accent a little familiar to Braeburn’s, but with a bit more culture to it.

Raven turned around to see Applejack standing at the bottom of the stairs looking up at her with a bright smile, but with curious sap green eyes.

“Are ya’ trying to make an escape? I wouldn’t do that if I were ya’, Pinkie Pie has yet to get ya’ to pin the pony tail on a picture and get some party games started,” Applejack said as she trotted up the stairs toward Raven.

“Well, I’ll come down later,” Raven kinda lied and thought she didn’t really intend to come down until the party was over and then only to clear up the mess every pony left behind. She also turned her head away from Applejack and focused her deep jungle green eyes on her bedroom door.

“Ah’ give it a chance, ya’ been enjoying yer’ self before the party’s over,” Applejack tried to call her back with an encouragement.

“I believe I said I’ll come down later!” Raven yelled as she slammed the bedroom door shut and her mind was still stuck on the fact, all of the confetti still littered her living room floor. Plus, as she whimpered, finally away from the commotion and partying atmosphere, she wondered if the confetti had spread from her living room to the kitchen and perhaps even to the dining room.

Her thoughts dwelled that she could live with her living room and kitchen being a bit messy at times, but the old, oak dining table was an inherited and valuable piece. It had passed through her grand-mare, her mother and then to her and she would go nuts if some pony accidentally destroyed it.

“So, what’s up, Applejack? Why you up here and not having a soda?” asked a loud brash voice from the other side of the door as Raven contemplated coming down tomorrow morning to see nothing but mess and ruin.

“I think our birthday mare has gotten upset about something, maybe she’s a bit concerned Pinkie Pie and the guests would wreck something precious to her,” Applejack talked back and expressed her honest opinion. Though, behind the door, Raven noticed Applejack’s assumption was spot on with how she was feeling.

“Oh, sure, Pinkie Pie gets a bit wild every now and then, but she doesn’t go out of her way to destroy things. If anything, sometimes her Pinkie sense saves things from being destroyed,” the brash voice answered back.

“Well, I still figure she could do with uh… small or smooth talk,” Applejack said and knocked on the bedroom door, “Umm… uhh… ah, shoot, this is always the hard part.”

“Well, let me help,” the brash voice interrupted and then added a harder knock on her bedroom.

“So, it’s Raven, right? Why don’t you open that door and join right back in, Applejack and I won’t tell any pony you skipped a few minutes and you can still have some wicked fun!” The brash voice encouraged.

Raven gave no immediate answer as she felt the encouragement was well-intended, but she didn’t want to be present if one of the party-goers did stumble into her old oak dining table and cause it to smash to pieces. She would lose her temper big time if that happened. After, no answer from Raven was forthcoming, there was a frustrated grunt.

“Hay, Rainbow Dash, don’t get yer’ self so hot headed, maybe being more polite will get Raven to come out,” Applejack suggested and Raven noticed her flimsy bedroom door provided very little sound resistance to their voices which meant they were both close to it on the other side.

“Oh, my gosh!” yelled an enthusiastic fancy tone from downstairs, “This old oak dining table must be at least a hundred years old!”

“Ugh, Rarity,” complained Applejack’s voice.

“Well, Raven with Rarity guarding your table and getting all mushy and fashion sensed about it, you don’t have to worry about it being destroyed anymore,” Rainbow Dash joked.

“Ha, ha, ya’ sure right about that, Dash, she’ll guard it against any pony who dares try to get near it unless they obey formal, strict codes of conduct,” Applejack chuckled along with Rainbow Dash.

Raven raised her head and thought if what Applejack and Rainbow Dash was saying was true, she could stop worrying about it and maybe re-join the party.

“Get back, you partying heathens! Have you no respect for antiquities?” bellowed Rarity’s voice, obviously not too happy about other more playful or more reckless ponies getting too close to the table.

Raven smiled and buzzed with confidence, her oak dining table was indeed safe from harm and while she felt good about that, she felt more ready to re-join the party and opened her bedroom door with a relieved breath from Applejack and a smile from Rainbow Dash.

“Wait,” Rainbow Dash muttered and narrowed her cerise eyes onto Raven, “I’ve seen you before, which means…” she paused, “You know who I am! Right!? I’m the most awesomest flier you are ever likely to see!” Then, without warning, Rainbow Dash took off and did a small aerial flip in the small air space between the stairs and the ceiling.

Raven watched her in awe and did remember seeing Rainbow Dash just before the buck-ball match, but she hadn’t seen this level of aerobatic skill from her before. Plus, despite the small air space between the stairs and the ceiling, she didn’t bang her head.

“Dash! Ya’ did that inside a building here, ya’ could have hurt yer’ self,” Applejack complained.

“Pfft,” Rainbow Dash scoffed and dismissed by throwing her left hoof out, “I doubt it. Thanks to my Wonderbolt training and skills, doing that small flip in a tight space wasn’t hard.”

Raven was still surprised; Rainbow Dash had pulled off a small aerial flip in such a claustrophobic amount of space and said nothing.

“Ha! See, Raven likes it,” Rainbow Dash bragged with a smug grin.

“I have to admit, I am amazed,” Raven complimented and then thought about going to check on the other party guests. Upon passing Applejack, Raven noticed she looked as she about to criticise Dash some more, but she decided not to. Once downstairs, Pinkie hopped on past with playful energy.

“Oh, you’ve re-joined the party. Great! You’re just in time to play pin the pony tail,” Pinkie chuckled and led her toward the crowd.

Raven still felt a little reluctant to trot into a large crowd of ponies, but they were all smiling and though some were dancing, enjoying a drink, having a few party snacks, or just socialising, they had all made some space, so Raven could trot back in. As she did, she caught a glance at Rarity.

“Rarity, while I admire your values for protecting antiquities, I don’t think you need to yell and get all confrontational on the other party guests,” spoke an informed, calm, and refined voice that sounded like a leader from the dining room.

Raven was about to go and check it out when she was tapped on the shoulder by Pinkie and then spun around and around a few times and got a blindfold put onto her eyes. Raven took a wobbly step forward after Pinkie finished making her dizzy and then a pony hooved her something soft which was likely the pony tail.

“Um, Pinkie Pie, can I be Raven’s guide?” asked an unsure shy voice amongst the crowd.

“Of course, silly! But your voice is not the only one in the room, Raven’s going to need to concentrate on your voice and only your voice if she’s to succeed,” Pinkie chuckled.

“Ha! I could mess with her and lead her in the wrong direction,” Rainbow Dash laughed and tried to distract her.

Raven wanted to turn her head and make a scowl of discontent at Dash, but without her vision and needing to hear the shy voice again to given direction or the hot or cold responses, she kept her head forward.

“Good, now come forward three steps,” the shy voice called from the other side of the room and Raven followed it.

“Side step, three paces to the right!” Rainbow Dash laughed and tried to misguide her.

“No, don’t do that, take two side steps to the left instead,” instructed the shier and calmer voice.

Raven nodded and took two side steps to the left and noticed she could definitely hear the difference between Rainbow’s brash voice and the quieter voice.

“Oh, sorry, Pinkie, I had to resolve a little situation with Rarity, so what’s going on?” interrupted a question from a formal, curious, but not too brash or loud voice.

“Raven’s playing pin the tail!” Pinkie told the new voice.

“Oh,” came a quick understanding reply from the voice.

“Um… ignore them,” the kind, calm voice instructed, “You’re almost there and very warm.”

“Nah, you’re actually way off-course and very cold!” Rainbow Dash tried to interrupt again and get Raven to face away from the picture or at least make a move in error.

“Dash!” Applejack grunted.

“Now, take, half a pony step forward, and then a slight step to left and pin the tail on the picture,” the calmer voice of her guide managed to stay refined and not too bothered by other commotion.

Raven nodded and took a half step forward and a slight step to her left and raised the tail. She hoped she was in fact pinning the tail onto a picture and not onto an inattentive crowd member who was in the wrong place at the wrong time as she pushed the tail forward onto what she thought was the picture.

When, there was no yelp of pain, Raven sighed in relief and removed her blindfold to find out she had placed the pony tail onto the picture, but a little too low to be in the exact correct position.

“Whoa, that was mighty close, Raven,” Applejack complimented from behind.

“Ooh, I forgot to tell you to raise your hoof and where to pin the tail” commented the shy voice with just a hint of sad failure.

Despite being off the mark by a little, Raven still thought the shy voice was much more helpful than Dash’s attempts to distract her and looked around the room for the owner. Only to see another familiar looking face and a pony expressing the body language of trying to hide herself from attention.

Meanwhile, Pinkie bounced over to the shy yellow Pegasus with a light rose mane and rose her chin up, “Here, was your guide, Fluttershy.”

Then, upon getting a better look at her moderate cyan eyes, Raven remembered she had seen Fluttershy before too and that was at the buck-ball match.

“Hi,” Fluttershy waved with hesitance and put a small smile across her face.

Raven smiled back and thought about getting to know Fluttershy a little better at a later date. Then, Raven noticed another reserved pony with shier body languages than most of the other party guests near her. She appeared to have a small dilemma adapting to the party and Raven took it upon herself to approach her. Meanwhile, a few compliments about Fluttershy’s skills as a guide murmured amongst the party crowd as Raven made her way over.

“Howdy,” Raven greeted the pony in traditional Appaloosa country accent.

“Oh, uh… I still find these things a little awkward,” stuttered the voice of the awkward pony, “But I am Starlight Glimmer and you are?”

“Raven Mystery,” Raven decided to introduce herself with a warm, country smile. Though, in return from her smile, she only received a small, unsure one back from Starlight.

“Oh, I think Starlight might make a new friend!” Pinkie buzzed enthusiastically while talking to another pony.

“I’m getting used to that,” Starlight said and re-drew Raven’s attention with a small chuckle.

“So, do you like spa trips?” Starlight asked with awkwardness and hoped there would be a yes.

“Um… Appaloosa doesn’t have a spa,” Raven commented and knew it to be true. Though, deep down she had wanted to travel to a town or a city that did have a spa to have the experience of using one.

“Oh,” Starlight gave a dumbfounded look on her face, “Didn’t know that, so what do you do to uh… you know to look nice?”

“Uh, huh, keep going, ignore me,” interrupted a studying voice.

Raven thought this new pony was rather rude for studying their conversation, especially when there was a lot of other ponies about as the party was still ongoing. She turned her head and then leapt back in shock.

“Princess Twilight!” Raven shouted, cowered a bit and then bowed her head.

Starlight Glimmer face-hooved herself as Twilight had interrupted her attempts to get to know Raven, even if it was just with a studying remark.

“No need to bow,” Twilight said and gave a friendly smile, “And I’m here to enjoy another one of Pinkie’s parties on a non-formal assignment, so you could call me Twilight.” Then, she had an awkward blush on her cheeks as Raven’s shout had diverted almost every ponies’ attention to her.

“Oh, come on, every pony, the party’s still young!” Pinkie tried to revitalise the party atmosphere and spirit.

“The Princess is here,” murmured a few ponies and then assembled a line as they all seemed keen to meet and greet Twilight in an orderly fashion.

This only made Twilight feel more awkward, but she was unable to avoid the new amount of attention on her as she overcame a slight shiver and another awkward blush to put a small smile on her face and make her violet eyes and facial expressions appear eager to meet every pony that had lined up.

“Ooh, she’s actually wanting to write autographs,” another curious pony amongst the party called out and more ponies lined up.

“Aww, bummer,” Pinkie whined in defeat, “There goes the party.”

Meanwhile, now feeling guilty about causing this scenario to happen, Raven got out of the way of the ponies wanting to gain Twilight’s autograph and stood in a void of emptiness on the left side of her living room.

“Hmm, I actually thought Twilight got a lot of ponies done in her coronation rituals,” commented Rainbow Dash with a small frown as she noticed Twilight getting the attention.

“Well, Appaloosa is full of simple, country folk, maybe most of them couldn’t afford to make the journey to Twi’s coronation,” Applejack commented with glumness too.

Meanwhile, still with guilt for causing a party bust, Raven got to her stairs again and trotted to her bedroom. This time, Applejack and Rainbow Dash did not come to get her to re-join the party and Raven had a rough night feeling responsible for a terrible mix-up.