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Pinkie’s knees were tingly. That meant a call was coming in. That, or they were twirly-whirly, which meant that next Tuesday would be raining catfish and dogcopters. That only happened a few times, but it still paid to be aware of it. It was easy enough to mix those two up, but since the sky was clear, Pinkie figured it was the former scenario.
She hopped over to the nearest tree, where she had stowed away a telephone for phone-operating-related-emergencies, and picked it up. “Hello, you’ve reached Pinkie Pie, in Ponyville, Equestria. How can I be of assistance?”
The other end laughed, which made Pinkie laugh too. It wasn’t a very nice laugh, but maybe they’d just had a bad day. “Pinkie Pie, is it? I’m the Joker, perhaps you’ve… heard of me?” His voice was menacing, and Pinkie could practically hear the grin on the pony or whatever-he-was on the other end.
She hummed supportively, trying to place the name. Being an interdimensional phone operator meant that she had to be either really good at remembering names, or really good at faking it. “Oh, I LOVE jokes! Did you hear about the one with the bat and the birdie? That one’s a doozy!” Nope, it still didn’t ring an interdimensional bell. Oh well, she got paid for answering calls, not idle chit-chat, anyways.
The voice at the other end seemed to stumble on its words, as though the pony-whatever didn’t know quite how to respond. “Y-yes, I have heard of that one. Speaking of Bats, mind connecting me to Gotham City Headquarters?”
Pinkie nodded, spotting Rainbow Dash out of the corner of her eye. “Okie-dokie-Loki! Just let me put you on hold!” She hung up the phone and trotted over to see what Rainbow Dash was up to.
The pegasus gave her a quizzical look. “What was that all about?” she said, flying in lazy loops.
The earth pony shrugged. “Oh, just a hook to get the reader engaged. You know, normal stuff.” Rainbow Dash looked as though she wanted to say something in response, then thought better of it. Pinkie giggled and elbowed her friend. “I’m just kidding, don’t worry your speedy little headsie! So, whatcha doing?”
Rainbow blinked and took a deep breath. “Alright, so Twilight was working on her latest spell, and she accidentally mutated this ferret that Fluttershy brought over into a magic-eating death burrower, and we need your help to distract it. You can handle that, right?”
Pinkie gasped. “It’s a super-dupery friendshipery adventure! Count me in!” She bounced on her tail, lost in thought. “Though, how am I supposed to distract it? I’m not that good with animals, that’s Fluttershy’s gig!”
Rainbow huffed. “Look, I gotta report back to Twilight so we can plan out how to catch the monster and reverse the spell, alright? You figure out the details.”
Pinkie’s tail deflated underneath her as she thought, until she was sitting on the ground. “Yeah, alright, but it’ll take more than a tuba and a party to keep a giant ferret-of-death entertained, and…” She looked up to discover that she was speaking to a Rainbow Dash-shaped-puff of dust.
The problem at hoof plagued Pinkie’s mind all throughout the day, even while she was shopping for party goods and cleaning supplies. All that cake confetti had to be mopped up somehow, and what better than a mop cannon? It was still a work in progress, though, and after her last five mops had caught on fire and burst into sudsy fireworks, she had some serious redesigning to do.
Her knees started tingling halfway through choosing the best type of soap, so she got off of her soap-box and held it up to her ear. It, like all soap-boxes, functioned as a decent makeshift interplanar telephone. “Hello, this is Pinkie. How can I help?” She put on her biggest smile. Maybe it would be a fun new friend! Maybe…
Maybe it was trying to choke her through the phone, through some show of Force, no doubt! Oh no, not this crazy-daisy again! He really needed to get somepony to help him with his asthma. Pinkie sputtered and coughed out a quick “I’ll connect you,” before hanging up. She flopped on the floor, gasping for breath. Why did she always get the weird ones?
Still, her shopping was complete, which meant that she could get back to her work on building a mop cannon! Pinkie skipped home, mops and cleaning supplies in tow. She wished she could get them to bounce along with her. Maybe Discord could help with that!
Pinkie squee’d and waved at the nearest ponies who happened to be passing on her way home. Talking to Discord might have to wait for another day; Pinkie vaguely remembered that he was supposed to be having tea with Fluttershy. Ah, yes, here are the spa ponies out spa-ing, and the butler pony out buttling, and the giant ferret of death and doom out for a walk…
Wait. Hold the soapy-boxy phone. Something on that list didn’t quite fit in. Pinkie bounced backwards to retrace her steps. Spa ponies gasping in horror? Yeah, that was normal enough. Butler pony running away in terror? Sure, just another day in Ponyville! Giant ferret of death and doom eating a building? For some reason, that last one didn’t sit right with Pinkie, so she assumed that was the weird bit.
There were her friends, out to save the town from the Death Burrower! Pinkie almost made up a song about cheering on her friends, when she remembered that there was something they wanted her to do. What was it? Maybe she should distract the mean old meanie-pants while she figured it out.
Pinkie took a deep breath and trotted forward. If only she hadn’t left her party cannon or her mop canon back at Sugarcube Corner! What is more distracting than bubbles and balloons? Pinkie hummed idly as she took in the scene. The Death Burrower was batting at Rainbow Dash. Pinkie winced as it almost hit her friend. It didn’t seem angry, though, it seemed… confused? Scared? That was just the saddest thing she’d ever heard of!
Aww, maybe hearing a friendly voice could help save the day! And who could make friends better than Pinkie? She galloped forward, wishing that she could use that sciencey-portaly technology that one of her clients had been advertising, before she explained that she couldn’t help with interdimensional solicitation calls. That would help her get there faster!
She skidded to a stop in front of the giant mutant magic-eating ferret and waved at it. It didn’t wave back. It didn’t even notice her. It just kept munching on roof tiles and questioning its life choices, like giant mutant magic-eating ferrets are wont to do.
So Pinkie sat there, in front of the ferret, and thought to herself. She poked herself on the temple, in the hopes that it would help her figure out what to do. It didn’t help, and in fact gave her a mild headache, but that was to be expected.
What wasn’t expected was that her knees tingled. Three times in one day! That had to be an Interdimensional Phone Operator Academy record! She grabbed the nearest item, which happened to be a pineapple, and pulled a phone out of it. “Hello, yes? This is Pinkie Pie. Where do you want me to redirect your call?”
“Hello. You will hear a tone. When you hear the tone, the time will be 8:46 and 50 seconds. Hello. You will hear a tone. When you-” Pinkie set the phone down, and got an idea.
“Hey, you! Catastrophically powerful ferret!” She shouted up to the monster. It looked down at her, bewildered. “Yeah, you!” She held up the phone. “I’ve got somepony on the phone for you! Here, listen!”
The ferret took the tiny phone and the fruit it was attached to and held it up to one overly-muscular mutated ear.
“Hello. You will hear a tone. When you hear the tone, the time will be 8:47 and 30 seconds.”
A single purple-tinged tear made its way down the ferret’s cheek. It didn’t expect somepony to care about its feelings, and it touched its giant mutant heart that whoever-it-was on the other end of the line felt like saying hello to it. Over and over. At least somepony was willing to give it the time of day.
Pinkie beamed up at the ferret, just as the blast of magic from Twilight shrunk it back down into a normal-sized ferret, an eggplant, and a very confused pot of petunias. Pinkie caught the pineapple and phone as it fell, and hung up on it.
Rainbow Dash flew over, dusting herself off from the fight. “Hey, what was that all about?”
Pinkie winked up at her. “Oh, it was just a wrong number. Nothing to worry about, really.”