And Pinkie is not as Excited.
“Oh god, what have I agreed to?”
-Skijarama
“What he said.”
-Tom117z
"What are you doing?” Twilight asked her former student.
It was in the dead of night, beyond the point where the Princess of Friendship would have fallen asleep. This night, however, she came to notice her former student had been spending a lot of extra time in the library. She was all in for hours and hours of studying, but over the day she had become more than a little suspicious of Starlight’s activities. It wasn’t like she didn’t trust Starlight or anything, it was just that her magical escapades usually ended up with somepony (or everypony) being placed under some sort of mind control spell… or her map vanishing as Spike had later snitched.
“Wha-! er…” a rather tired Starlight Glimmer jumped frantically in the air on the intrusion, calming on seeing it was the Princess. “Oh… hi Twilight.”
“It’s a little bit late, don’t you think? You look exhausted!”
“Yeah, I’m a little tired,” the unicorn admitted. “But I promised Pinkie Pie I would get this… thing, done as soon as possible.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow. Where Pinkie Pie was involved trouble and craziness was sure to follow. “Thing?”
“Yeah, a thing. It’s… hard to explain.”
“Try me. I’m no slouch at magic,” Twilight stated, opening one of her wings just to prove her point.
Starlight gave a sheepish chuckle. “Yeah, I suppose. It’s these rocks…”
Sure enough, on the table Starlight sat at were two gently glowing rocks. There were also a lot of rock fragments from failed test subjects scattered around the place.
“Good thing Boulder can’t see this, huh?” Starlight commented.
“You realise Boulder isn’t a living thing, right?”
“That’s racist.”
“But it isn’t!”
“Maud would disagree. And he did save my life.”
“From what Pinkie told me, Maud saved your life using Boulder!” Twilight adamantly, and logically, argued.
“So by extension, Boulder saved my life.”
Twilight’s eyes twitched, and she was forced to suppress her incoming rage lest she need a bottle to contain it with. Which would be dumb, and dangerous. Who would do something like that? Starlight squirmed uncomfortably under the alicorn’s twitching gaze and the long, long silence that followed her comment.
“Back on topic…” Twilight moved the conversation on forwards, before adding within the safety of her own thoughts: ‘Even though you’re wrong.’
“Yeah, right. The rocks…”
“The rocks, what are they for?”
“Pinkie Pie cornered me this morning. And believe me, I tried to run but escaping that mare is impossible,” Starlight said, wincing at the recollection of the pink mare’s seemingly impossible knowledge of where she would teleport to.
“Rainbow can attest to that,” Twilight agreed. “Continue.”
“In short, she wanted something to connect Maud and her on a spiritual level. She kinda worships Maud a little bit.”
Twilight couldn’t help but frown. “Starlight, connecting two ponies spiritually is incredibly dangerous. Entwining two souls is not something that should be undertaken lightly, the consequences could be disastrous!”
“It’s not exactly combining their souls,” Starlight explained. “It’s just so they are always… aware of one another. Or at least that’s the best way I can describe it. Like they always feel like they’re next to each other. Pinkie is a stalker in the making but who am I, the enslaver of an entire town, to judge?”
“At least you grew out of your problems. Mostly,” Twilight muttered under her breath.
“What was that?”
“Nothing!” Twilight sang. “Still, it’s not something that you can create on a whim. Honestly, you probably shouldn’t try. Believe me.”
Starlight narrowed her eyes, though a smirk also formed. “Did you try combining two ponies’ souls once?”
“I was eleven!” Twilight objected. “And Smarty Pants technically isn’t another pony, and doesn’t have a soul.”
“So the spell just failed?”
“Er…” Twilight twirled a hoof. “Kinda. I went limp like a doll for a few hours until Celestia found and freed me. Though, being a rag doll was kinda fascinating... I wrote a whole paper on it!”
“Right…” Starlight seemed unimpressed and/or disturbed by the thought. “I promise nothing bad will happen, I got this.”
“Starlight,” the Princess gave her former student a stern look, channelling the same look Celestia gave her in the previously mentioned Smarty Pants incident. “No. Bad.”
Starlight rolled her eyes, but she seemed to relent. “Fine. I’ll stop.”
“Thank you, my former student. Now clean up and get to bed, tomorrow is another day.”
Starlight huffed. “Fine.”
Twilight nodded, and content that the situation was resolved and NOTHING bad would happen she sauntered on out of the library and towards her own bedroom. Starlight looked gloomy, and she studied the scattered contents on the table. She considered the risks in her head, the risk of disappointing her teacher… again. She deemed it all worth it.
“Challenge accepted,” Starlight muttered, getting back to work. “It will all be fine.”
And then it wasn’t.
“No, Boulder. You can’t take over the world today,” Maud deadpanned in her constant voice to the eagerly motionless rock in her pocket. “Maybe next year.” It didn’t move in agitation. “Bad.”
“Who you talkin’ to?” Pinkie chirped from her place behind the counter, appearing from her secret party planning dungeon with a POP.
“Boulder.”
“Ooooohhh~! Is he plotting world domination again?” Pinkie asked in a knowing, teasing voice.
“Yes.”
“Baaad boy, Boulder woulder.” Pinkie said, poking Maud’s chest pocket where Boulder was still.
Over on the counter of Sugarcube Corner, Gummy sat motionless as if he too was a rock. Pinkie looked towards her pet alligator, and gave him a disapproving frown.
“Gummy! Don’t encourage him!”
Gummy’s eyes looked near lifeless. He licked one of them.
“And no, you can’t take over the world by yourself either! Honestly, the two of you are quite the mischievous pair.”
“That they are,” Maud emotionlessly stated. “They need constant attention. That is our job as pet owners.”
“Yup!” Pinkie nodded and then looked around quizzically. “Where’s Starlight?”
“Was she supposed to be here?” Maud asked flatly.
“Yeah; see, she was bringing that surprise I told you about in that little card I sent you but I guess she forgot that she agreed to this best idea ever or she fell asleep working on it or she's with Trixie or something. Or maybe it’s both! The people do love to ship.”
Maud blinked. “Are they an item?”
“Iunno. It’s anypony’s guess right now.” Pinkie shrugged noncommittally.
Boulder didn’t move.
Maud leaned down slightly. “Don’t get upset, Boulder. I’ll take care of her myself…” she whispered emotionlessly to the rock.
Gummy flicked his tail.
Boulder didn’t move.
It was settled.
“Hmmmm…” Pinkie hummed exaggeratedly with a hoof to her chin. “She really should be here… let’s go see if she slept in at Twilight’s place. Maybe she’s having another Kite dream.”
Maud looked at her pocket again before withdrawing Boulder and placing him down next to Gummy on the counter. She looked up at Pinkie. “Boulder wants to stay and play with Gummy.”
“That’s totally fine by me!” Pinkie sang before trotting by with Maud in tow. The rock and alligator sat in silence.
What plans do you normally have for world domination, anyway? Gummy asked.
Rockslides.
Pinkie bounced up and down like she was followed by a trampoline under her hooves literally her whole life. Who needed to walk normally anyway? Maud apparently, as she calmly kept pace with her bubbly and excitable sister.
“What is the surprise?” Maud asked, seemingly uncaring, but Pinkie knew better.
“A surprise silly!” Pinkie Pie stated the obvious as if it was a seldom known truth. “I also met a Surprise once, she’s a wonderbolt, did you know?! Oh, we had such a good time! She’s just like me but recoloured, and a pegasus, oh the party we threw! Spitfire was less impressed buuuuut meh.”
“I believe one of our ancestors married into a cloudsdale family,” Maud noted. “She may be a cousin.”
“Oh my gosh!” Pinkie excitedly blurted at the possible revelation. “That would explain soooooo much! Now I have even more family, wait until I tell our second cousin twice removed!”
They came to a stop outside of Twilight’s bright crystalline castle, of which Maud remained unimpressed. Maud examined the giant doors, and then glanced towards her sister.
“Where are the guards?”
“Oh silly, Twilight doesn’t have guards! We can just go right in.”
Maud blinked, her eyes remaining fixed and without emotion. “That seems unnecessarily reckless and dangerous.”
“She has plot armour, it’s fine,” Pinkie stated dismissively.
“How would only protecting her flank help with a lack of guards?” Maud asked bluntly.
Pinkie laughed heartily. “Oh, silly! Not that sort of plot!”
“I know.”
Pinkie laughed more. “Oh, ha ha! You old kidder! Come on!” she pushed the door open and trotted inside. Maud followed at her own pace. Pinkie seemed to be looked around for something in the entrance hall. “Let’s see here… ah! Here it is!” She hoofed a normal looking piece of the wall and yanked on it, pulling open a secret door that led to a ladder. “This will take us right to Starlight’s room!”
“...Why is that there?”
“Plot convenience, silly!” Pinkie stated, holding her muzzle as if she were about to dive into a pool and then performing said dive down the ladder.
“Okay.” Maud just walked in.
Pomf.
Maud glanced around as she bounced unceremoniously off of Starlight’s very empty bed. Pinkie was standing a little to the side with a look of thought on her face.
“Huh… so she’s not sleeping in here…” Pinkie muttered. Then the proverbial light bulb went off and she smiled massively. “Ooooh! Right! She’s probably in the library passed out on a desk from an all-nighter of studying the surprise!”
“It needs study?”
“Yup!” Pinkie chirped before opening another secret door and trotting through while la-laing merrily.
Maud just blinked and followed after her.
The journey didn’t take all that long, Pinkie knowing her way around the castle better than those who lived there. She even spotted a few of her super secret hidden and yet unactivated confetti cannons along the way. She had just finished discreetly examining one such cannon when she spotted the doorway into the library, proceeding to bounce into and open it with her face. Maud followed her in, questioning nothing and accepting all.
Pinkie Pie was revealed to be correct, Starlight Glimmer herself was found snoring gently atop a pile of magical spells and other books and parchments.
“Was she working all night?” Maud asked.
“Sheesh, she sure pushes herself too hard,” Pinkie commented, before being distracted by the items she had been craving so badly. “EEEEEH! Shiny rock! They must be what I asked Starlight for!”
“I like rocks,” Maud commented.
“And you’ll LOOOOOOOVE these ones!” Pinkie happily assured her sister, snatching up the two rocks on the table without a second thought.
The two rocks were now imbued with even more magic than they had been the night before, and were also attached to a ornate chain each signifying their intended usage as necklaces.
“Ohhh, she’s good!” Pinkie complemented the oblivious Starlight. “So, what do you think?”
“I like rocks,” Maud stated again. “It’s Arcanium-rich Magimysticite. Only found in ancient meteorites that crashed long ago in the dragon lands.”
“So… it’s good?”
Maud gave her sister the slightest hint of a smile. “Yes, Pinkie. It’s good.”
“EEEEE!” Pinkie squeed. “BEST. DAY. EVER!”
At this loud noise, Starlight Glimmer began to slowly waken.
“Quick, put it on!”
“They are enchanted,” Maud noted. “What do they do?”
“This!”
Pinkie ended her exclamation by taking the necklaces, shoving one on to her own neck and then bouncing high into the air and down back towards Maud to deliver her own. Of course, it was at this moment Starlight realised what was going on.
“Pinkie! NO!”
Too late.
The necklaces glowed, and a beam of light connected the two twin rocks as something seemed to pass down the magical stream between the two mares. Maud’s mane seemed to go poof while Pinkie’s began to deflate, their facial expressions slowly becoming the complete opposite of what they had been moments before
‘It’s not going to be fine, is it…?’ Starlight thought weakly.
“EEEEE!” Maud Pie shouted in excitement. “That was SOOO cool! Do it again, encore encore!”
“That wasn’t supposed to happen,” Pinkie Pie dryly noted with a complete lack of enthusiasm.
“I. Am. In. So. Much. Trouble…” Starlight muttered, feeling extremely faint at the turn of events. “It wasn’t ready yet! The connection was still too strong!”
Pinkie Pie looked between a frantic Starlight and her sister, who was doing backflips just because she could. “Whoops.”
“Best. Gift. EVER! Now who wants ice cream, I want ice cream!” Maud stated happily, before taking a sudden intake of breath. “DOES ANYPONY SELL ROCK FLAVOURED ICE CREAM!?”
“Marble does sometimes…” Pinkie deadpanned.
“ARE YOU NOT WORRIED ABOUT THIS!?” Starlight raged, struggling to keep in a certain red cloud. “Twilight is going to kill me! She’s going to disown me as her former student or… or… SEND ME TO MAGIC KINDERGARTEN!”
At about this moment, the door to the library opened up. “Hey, Starlight. What’s going-” Spike asked before stopping at the sight. Maud vibrated and shot like a rocket into the roof. With that, Spike slowly backed away. “Nope,” he said as he closed the door with a soft ‘click’.
“Gah! She’s gone!” Starlight was in a full-on panic by this point, nearly hyperventilating. “We need to go after her.”
“She can handle herself,” Pinkie noted.
“Not the point! We need to catch her before Twilight notices!”
“Okay.”
And that was that.
Derpy was confused. Even more so than usual. Maud Pie had just dropped in front of her out of seemingly nowhere with a poofed up mane and a enormous grin splitting her face. Maud had then spoken so quickly that Derpy could have sworn her eyes were going cross when the excitable mare managed to slow down. “So! Where is the ice cream flavored rocks?!”
“...Uh?”
“Oh, wait! My bad!” Maud let out a sheepish ‘squee’. “Rock flavored ice cream is what I meant.”
“Uh…”
“Ooh!” Maud zipped away in a heartbeat, so fast in fact that she lost her shirt, probably going to leave somepony else confused on every single possible level like she had with Derpy.
On the bright side, Derpy now had an awesome new shirt.
After about a minute of letting her brain reboot and catch up, Derpy decided it was Saturday and started trotting along to get some much-needed lemon surprise muffins. Starlight Glimmer soon enough came barreling towards her from down the street with a look of unrivaled panic with Pinkie being dragged along behind her in her magic. “Derpy! Have you seen Maud?!”
“Uh-huh.” Derpy nodded happily and then pointed to where they had encountered each other about a minute ago.
Pinkie was let down and slowly trotted up to the prints before licking the soil where Maud’s hooves had been. “These are a minute old.”
“Oh, no no no no NO!” Starlight babbled, trotting in place and looking around frantically. “Where is she?”
“Oh! Hey girls!” came Maud’s uncharacteristically chirpy voice. Starlight and Pinkie looked to see her holding an ice cream cone with a scoop of every flavor in town topped with a large rock. “Want some?”
“Maud! Hold still!” Starlight screeched in desperation, reaching out with her magic to remove the necklace.
“I can’t!” Maud said with joy, zipping over to look at some poor stallion crossing the street. “Hi! What’s your name! I’m Maud Pie! You’re orange! Okay bye!” Maud declared before galloping away at impossible speeds. The stallion looked at Pinkie before turning and galloping back into his house, slamming and locking the door behind him.
“Huh. I always thought cheerfulness equated to friendship. Odd,” Pinkie noted flatly.
“You’re not exactly cheerful now!” Starlight pointed out in a huff.
“I feel fine.”
“You feel like Maud!”
“I feel fine.”
Starlight was on the edge of a migraine, barely holding it together. "Alright, where would she go next?”
And then something crashed near the town hall.
“Found her,” Pinkie stated.
Maud herself was indeed near the town hall, having knocked over a cart of apples being dragged by a now very annoyed Big Macintosh.
“Oh! Sorry! Awww, I dropped my ice cream!” Maud moaned. “I was going to share it with Boulder. I know it’s got a rock in it so it might be considered cannibalism, but he’s magnesium rich basalt, and this is just marble so it’s Okay.”
Bic Macintosh looked rather perplexed.
“Hey, do you like rock!?” Maud was suddenly in his face. “I like rocks, and rock music, and stand-up comedy! What about yoooou?”
“Nnope.”
Big Macintosh then walked away briskly, causing Maud to tilt her head.
“Huh. I guess not.”
Maud Pie was then distracted by a nearby fountain with the statue of a pony in its centre. A fountain made of rock.
“Ohhh, rocky!” Maud smiled unnaturally wide as she sauntered off.
“Maud!” Starlight shouted, rushing up to the earth pony with the pink mare known as Pinkie Pie following behind at a calm pace.
“Huh,” Pinkie Pie said. “I’ve held some good parties here. I should throw another one maybe. When it’s most convenient anyway, no need to rush into things.”
“Oh hi Pinkie!” Maud waved enthusiastically. “How’s your day been?”
“Adequate.”
“Awesome!” Maud grinned. “Have you seen this statue, it’s so rocky! Such a good quality of marble, I could smother my face on it all day!”
“Hmm.”
“ENOUGH!” Starlight raged, having had enough. “You are giving me a headache with this silliness!”
“You, and all the people viewing in from the outside,” Maud pointed out. She then looks at you and waves. “Hi, by the way.”
“I’m not going to even try understanding that,” Starlight said with a sigh. “We need to fix this before Twilight-”
“What is GOING ON!?” a rather unfortunately arriving voice angrily screeched.
Starlight grimaced. “Magic Kindergarten, here I come…”
“Uh oh!” Maud laughed. “You’ll be fine silly, that place is for little foals. Now, I’ve gotta go get Boulder before he dominates the planet, see ya!”
And then Maud bounced away from the fountain. Pinkie was uncaring, Starlight was livid and Twilight Sparkle had the most confused facial expression known to ponykind on her muzzle.
Twilight slowly turned her head towards her former student, who suddenly wished to be sucked into a weird magical alchemy induced wormhole. “I’ll say it again, what is going on?”
“Uh…” Starlight didn’t quite know what to do.
“Starlight was making some necklaces for us. We put them on before she finished the spell as she had fallen asleep. My bad,” Pinkie Pie explained matter of factly.
Twilight’s face looked rather… maddened. “I thought I told you to scrap that project?”
“Yeah, well… I did not.”
“Obviously.”
“I’m so, so sorry!” Starlight desperately apologised. “I was just trying not to disappoint Pinkie and Maud. Especially Maud, I don’t want to lose a new friend just after making one.”
“Maud really likes you, Starlight,” Pinkie Pie told the unicorn. “She would have understood. As would I.”
“I… guess I overreacted again, huh? Should have just listened to you?”
“Ya think?” Twilight snarked with a raised eyebrow.
Starlight wilted again, making sad horse noises.
Twilight’s face softened, and she gave a sigh as she approached her despondent former student and lifted her chin. “I know how loyal you’ve become to your friends since you started your studies with me, and I’ve been known to make some mistakes in my time. Hay, I’m still learning. I forgive you, Starlight.”
Starlight perked up a little. “Thanks, Twilight. So… no punishment?”
“We’ll discuss that later,” Twilight said in a way that suggested there would, in fact, be a punishment. “For now, we really need to fix this little situation we’re in.”
“But how?”
“We need Maud and Pinkie together, and we need to reverse the polarity of the spell. I can handle that part, but somepony is going to need to hold her down.”
“She is a bit excitable right now,” Pinkie noted in her new dry tone.
“Right,” Twilight agreed. “Alright team, let’s go!”
Sweet merciful mountains, make it STOP! Boulder screamed to gummy as Maud relentlessly assaulted him with words, smooches, pokes prods fondles and who knows what others affections he really didn’t want to be subjected to right then, or at any point really.
No, please, keep it going. I haven’t had this much fun in a looong time! Gummy urged on the great energy pony, standing still and flicking his tail in excitement. Finally, he could enjoy something else’s pain instead of being alone with his own existential dread plaguing his mind.
“And we’re gonna go rocking, I’m gonna get you a new super-duper best friend and you can rule your own little rock house like it were the whoooole world!” Maud announced, waving her foreleg to emphasize the grand scope of her lunacy.
“Maud,” Pinkie said as she strode in, getting her sister’s attention. “Can we talk for a second?”
“Oh! Sure! What about?”
“...Candy?”
“What about candy, specifically?” Maud asked, tilting her head curiously.
“Rock Candy.”
Maud’s attention was got.
“You have my attention…” Maud said in fascination, putting on a chef's hat from behind the counter.
“We are going to have a lot of rock candy when this is over. My treat,” Pinkie deadpanned.
“Huh?”
“GOTCHA!” Starlight declared triumphantly as Maud was engulfed in her magical aura and lifted off the ground.
“Ooh~! Floaty!” Maud squealed in joy before bursting into a giggle fit.
“Twilight! Now would be a good time!” Starlight called out as she finished clambering in through the window, which had been used to expertly hide the ambush.
Twilight galloped in through the front door a moment later. “Got it!” Her own horn lit up and pried the necklace off of Maud’s neck and Pinkie’s neck, setting them down next to each other. “Okay, okay… how did that counterspell go…?”
“TWILIGHT!”
“This is fun! Ooh! Make me do a flip!” Maud suggested with a delighted ‘eee.’
“Got it!” Twilight announced before shooting a beam of magic at the rocks. They stopped glowing entirely. Then they broke.
Then Pinkie’s mane poofed back up and Maud’s deflated. The latter glanced toward Starlight with a blank look that Starlight knew hid an enormous amount of embarrassment. “Put me down,” Maud commanded.
“Alright.” Starlight sighed heavily before setting Maud down on her hooves. Pinkie shifted slightly.
“Wow… that was… uh…” Pinkie was unsure how to process all of it before a huge grin split her face. “That was so INCREDIBLY FUN! Maud, I LOVE how you act even more now!”
Maud blinked. “Thanks. I have a deeper understanding you now, too.”
“So we’ve bonded even more because of this! EEH! This is the best mishap ever!” Pinkie squealed in joy, hugging Maud with titanic force. “Aww, but our special rock necklaces broke.”
“Pinkie, I don’t need a rock to connect with your spiritually,” Maud stated in her renewed usual deadpan, having long deduced the original intention of the necklaces. “I just need you. That is all.”
“Aaaawwww,” Pinkie cooed with tears breaching her eyes, hugging Maud all the tighter.
“You two go ahead and talk about that. Starlight...” Twilight turned to her former student. “Heel.”
Starlight wilted and nodded before following Twilight back to the castle.
“Okay, Starlight, I hope you learned something from all of this,” Twilight said to her former student.
“Yeah… I shouldn’t have been so afraid of disappointing my friends…” Starlight muttered. “Real, good friends won’t judge you if you can’t do something outside of your experience or knowledge. They’ll understand and forgive your shortcomings. That’s kinda what having friends is about, right?”
“Exactly,” Twilight said fondly. “Very well said. Now, about your punishment…”
“What do I need to do?” Starlight asked worriedly, though doing her best to sound brave.
“I’m putting you on dishwashing for the rest of the week. Spike needs to rest his claws and you need something to occupy your time.” Twilight said simply, before perking up. “Oh! And write me a friendship essay on this.”
“You know I’m technically not your student anymore, right? I graduated?”
“I could have Trixie start making more teacups…” Twilight threatened subtly with a smirk.
“I’ll do it!” Starlight yipped. Twilight nodded, hugged the unicorn and then went off to forget the whole experience ever happened.
“Is this literature, or… a mistake?”
-Skijarama
“I have no idea. Why can’t it be both?”
-Tom117z
“Tom... No. Bad.”
-Skijarama
Author's Note
(We regret nothing!)
