The new cafe “The Secret.” has just had a grand opening within Ponyville, a cozy pink building nestled at the edge of town with a large white sign written in cursive hanging above the door. The sun shining brightly in the pale blue sky, clouds wafting across the horizon lazily on this calm quiet day.
Inside the cafe near the back wall a pair of young mares sat across from each other, one a pale blue pegasus with the darkest ocean blue eyes anypony might have seen. Her violet mane was in a long wild braid, the tips of her bangs a soft golden hue.
Across from her annoyed gaze was a white unicorn, with a neat wavy violet mane tied into a very bouncy ponytail. Her teeth covered with a pair of pink braces as a pair of black cat eye glasses sat upon her muzzle, hiding away pale orange colored hues.
“So why did we come here? Instead of Cloud Nine?” Sketchy Clouds rolled her eyes, the pegasus tapping her hooves across the table boredly.
“Well this place did just open. I thought it might be exciting?” Melody Smiles spoke up in a chipper tone, the unicorn gazing over a menu politely.
“...”
“Um you alright?” Melody added as silence grew between them quickly.
“Oh! No sorry was just expecting something exciting to happen.” Sketchy gave a swift eye roll.
“Don’t be like that.”
“Look around this place is one of those prim and proper joints! I feel so out of place.” Sketchy gave a soft shudder as she noticed the mellow piano music playing in the background.
“Cloud Nine would be better how?” Melody scrunched her muzzle up cutely in question.
“How!? Good music,fun pegasi, death at every corner if a cloud fell through… and the best nachos!” Sketchy smacked her lips softly as thoughts of cheesy goodness began to fill her mind.
“Yeah. I was never a fan of floating up hundreds of feet in the air, just to get tea.” The unicorn placed a hoof on her cheek softly.
“It’s the uncertainty of the end, that made the place exciting! Let’s face it the clouds that make up the joint are kind of old, like last spring old.” Sketchy slowly narrowed her eyes in deep thought.
“Well good thing I don’t base my decisions off how often I might die.”
“Phst! Then you are not living.”
“Mmmm.”
Both mares slowly picked up their menus gazing across each in silence, the piano music building louder and louder inside the small building. Sketchy could feel her ears twitch and the wings upon her back start to tingle.
“Grrrr! Everything about here is boring!” The pegasus groaned aloud while slumping down within her seat.
“Oi! Dear Luna here we go again.”
“Listen to this! Warm Wumpa Tea, Neat Nestle Nectar and Sweet Honey Dew Donuts!” The pegasus blew a bored raspberry aloud.
“They are cute names.” The unicorn pouted back softly.
“They are boring! I mean my vitality coming in here was a perfect hundred, now I feel as if I’m teetering at least at a eighty-two.” Sketchy lifted up a slender hoof to wave it upon its axis back and forth gently.
“This place is sucking away your will to live?” Melody snorted with a slight eye roll.
“Yes! I can feel myself fading away into the abyss that is classical music and snooty drinks.” Sketchy smacked her lips sarcastically.
“Just choose something!”
“I would but this place is like super dim!” Sketchy flaunted her hooves around the small candle lit cafe, a few other ponies flashing her odd looks.
“Dim!? You’ve been reading the menu for like ten minutes!”
“Honestly. I’ve just been staring into the eternal night that is this cafe, thinking of how to style my mane tomorrow.”
“So you’ve been just spacing out all this time?” Melody raised a thin brow to her best friend in annoyance.
“Eh? Who said that? All I can see is the darkness, my old friend!” Sketchy swung her head back and forth in a joking manner.
“Grrr! Give me one good reason, Cloudsdale would’ve been a better pick than Ponyville!”
“Nachos…”
“Besides the nachos!” The unicorn huffed with a cute snort following afterwards.
“Well the murder intrigue.”
“The old clouds in the cafe?”
“No! The Rainbow Factory!” Sketchy slammed her hooves atop the table roughly, a loud bang echoing around the quiet room.
“I keep telling you, that is an urban legend!” Melody sighed sweetly, covering her eyes with her left hoof.
“And I keep telling you, I’ve seen the missing pony posters lining the clouds! It’s an utter bloodbath up there!” The slender pegasus pulled herself closer to her friend in secrecy.
“Mmhmm. You think Rainbow Dash grinded up Scootaloo to make rainbows?” Melody giggled aloud with a smirk.
“Yes! She also runs the factory under the guise of…” The mare was cut off as Melody pointed a hoof behind her.
Sketchy spun around in her seat, seeing Rainbow Dash and little Scootaloo at the counter near the front door. Both ordering a fresh batch of muffins for the road, the pegasus narrowing her eyes slowly.
“I still say it could be true.” Sketchy spoke in a serious tone towards the unicorn.
“What! How? You see both of them right there!” Melody asked eyes locking on her friend’s in confusion.
“Well it could just be trickery to cover up the truth.” Sketchy added with a smug sense of self.
“Trickery? Like how?” Melody spoke in utter defeat, her lips forming into a small pout.
“I’m no expert. But perhaps the use of smoke...or mirrors.”
“...”
“Maybe even a combination of both. Smoke and Mirrors.”
“You’re not going to stop until we leave for nachos, are you?” Melody asked her friend in a serious tone of voice, tapping a small hoof atop the wooden table.
“Perhaps. Now onto the next subject, if Twilight could become an alicorn with minimal effort…”
“Oi Okay! Let’s go to Cloud Nine for nachos!” Melody shook her head side to side softly.
“Squee!” The cute squeak escape the muzzle of the pegasus.
Melody gave an eye roll and stood up from her seat, her friend watching her every movement in silence. The unicorn blinking confused as she noticed her friend not moving, the pegasus looking over the menu swiftly.
“Well! C’mon!”
“This place has Triple Cheese Nachos with a Cider Platter!” Sketchy spoke aloud in mere shock towards her friend.
Melody gave a blank gaze to her friend.
“...”
Melody continued to gaze to her friend, with a sense of annoyance growing behind orange eyes.
“I must try it.” Sketchy spoke in a utmost serious tone.
“I'll be at Cloud Nine if you need me.” Melody sighed and trotted out of the building slowly.
“Don’t be like that! How much do I tip afterwards? You do all the math! I just do the…and she’s gone.” Sketchy groaned in defeat a young waitress walking over to her table, flashing a sweet and caring smile.
“Triple Cheese Nachos with The Cider Platter. And I’ll be tipping two bits.” Sketchy told the waitress with a narrow gaze, who in return gave a glare.
“Sluuurp.” Sketchy gave a slow and deep sip from her styrofoam cup of coffee, sitting upon a uncomfy metallic chair within the Ponyville Town Hall.
A old and severely grumpy stallion stood behind a old oak podium, dressed in a fine silk cloak with a brand new wizard hat adorned in golden bells across the rim. His cold pale blue eyes glaring to the lone mare in the room, had the search for knowledge really declined as much during just a thousand years?
“Where on earth is everypony!?” His gruff voice boomed across the room leaving a echo behind.
“Wow! It’s only me here gramps! No need to scream.” Sketchy did a shake of the head, popping her ears softly to stop the ringing.
“I host a lecture on the evolution of magic in our world and this is all that shows?!”
“Maybe they find you boring?” Sketchy gave a sip from her small cup.
“Then why have you shown up!?” The wizard gave a shrill hiss across the room.
“I only came because of my friend Melody, now that she’s a no show I feel regret.”
“Then leave me be! Alone with my thoughts on how the world has plummeted!” His words fell broken and saddened.
“I would! But a Mcguffin is terrorizing outside…” The mare gave a soft shrug.
“What in the blazes is a Mcguffin?”
“You know a weird creature like that Bumble Bear or The Phantom Shark! It is a creature like those, all we know is it didn’t exist canonically until like just now, to help push along the plot.” Sketchy gave a quick eye shuffle side to side.
“So nopony is here because the town is being destroyed?”
“Pretty much.”
A odd silence began to fill the room, the only sound echoing about was that of coffee being sipped. The stallion grumbled something under his breath, noticeably gaining anger as time passed.
“So. I have a question about limbo?” Sketchy gave a sweet smack of the lips.
“Hmmm. Go on?” The cranky stallion gave an eye roll, doubting this mare had anything intriguing to say.
“So if you and those ponies were stuck in limbo for all that time, like how did you eat,sleep and you know “Nature Calls.” “ Sketchy slowly let her eyes narrow.
“Time in the void did not pass as it did here, it was a place between worlds and beyond time!”
“So you ponies just kind of stopped existing?” Sketchy scrunched her muzzle softly confused.
“We existed just not in this world.”
“But we all remembered you being gone! I failed a test about you in school!” Sketchy spoke in a even more confused tone.
“Where I was did not exist! So normal attributes of health did not apply!”
“But you just said you existed…”
“Yes! We existed in a world that was not existent.”
“...”
“....” Starswirl gave a blank stare in silence.
“Sooo. You all basically made non-existent poops for a millennia or so?” Sketchy spoke up her mind twirling with paradoxes.
“Sure why not!?”
Silence was filling the air once more, Sketchy popped her lips in a rhythmic tune as she glanced outside a nearby window. Outside the mane six were held tightly in the clutches of a dreaded Octapuss, a small kitten riding a giant octopus held with mind control.
“I have another question.”
“It’s not about limbo is it?” Starswirl gave a stern growl.
“No. I was just curious about how you felt about destroying Equestria’s cultural heritage.” Sketchy spoke up with a raised brow.
“I...what?” Starswirl spoke in a large state of confusion.
“Well yeah. Like eighty-five percent of our cultural heritage was based off the legacy, you and the legends built.” Sketchy slowly sipped from her cup lacklusterly.
“Uhhh?”
“I mean our pride was built upon the foundation of your deaths and sacrifice, with you all like alive we’re just celebrating ponies who sat in a empty space for like a thousand years doing nothing.”
“We kept an ancient evil from destroying the world!”
“Yeah! That you ended up just talking out of doing so, in like what five minutes?” Sketchy rolled her eyes in place.
“...”
“Not even you did that, Twilight did so and in turn learned a valuable lesson, just adding to her immense friendship powers.” The mare gave a sassy flip of her mane, the stallion covering his eyes in defeat with his hoof.
“Grrr! The Power Of Friendship lass, is just a foolish support tactic it merits no power source at all!” The stallion gave a loud slam of his right hoof atop the podium, his voice echoing loudly around the room.
“No. It has a power source! Like strong enough to level a city.”
“What!?” He spoke in utter disbelief to the mare before him.
“Yeah! Twilight like glows really bright and levitates in the air.” The mare spoke so seriously in her seat, never batting a single lash.
“She breaks the laws of gravity!?”
“Mmhmm. Her eyes then go white as if she collected all the chaos emeralds and she will start to shoot rainbow lasers everywhere.”
“...”
“...” Sketchy locked her eyes with the stallion.
“...”
“....” The mare slowly lift her cup to her lips.
“...”
“....Slurrrp.” The mare drank from deep within the cold coffee.
“...”
“I have another question.” Sketchy slowly lift her right hoof to be called upon.
“I feared as much.” Starswirl gave a loud groan, his headache now at its peak.
“Twilight became an Alicorn by finishing one of your spells.” Sketchy spoke her sweet voice wafting across the empty room.
“That’s news to me.”
“Well I was just wondering. If it was you who completed the spell, would you have like become the first male alicorn?” The mare gently looked down to her reflection cast in the cup of coffee.
“...”
“Or like would you have transformed into a female and become one?” The mare slowly lift her head, eyes locking on the stallion so seriously.
“OUT!” The wizard had enough of this nonsense, his large hoof pointing towards the door.
“But…” The small pegasus gave a cute sputter as the stallion glared daggers at her.
“I said out!” He gave a loud stern hiss, the mare rolling her eyes and cantering to the front door.
“Whatever fine! You were boring anyways!” The mare slowly flung open the door, her muzzle lifting high into the air.
To her surprise a long slimy purple tentacle swiftly started to wrap around her midriff, lifting her high into the air as she gave a loud whimper in horror.
“Oh Dear Luna! I forgot about The Octapuss! Nooooooo!” The mare was then brought outside to the screams of ponies all around.
“I wish I stayed in limbo.” Starswirl gave a large sigh and slumped against his podium in utter defeat.
