Upper Crust

Things were moving along for Upper Crust.

Cookie and Pinny had come to the conclusion that despite the growing size of their customers, it was still not wise to start swapping the sugars for their treats. They still had bills to pay.

More packages were going out to Princess Twilight. Each day Pinny bought a paper to try to see if a front page article appeared stating the immense size of the Princess. So far, nothing. Each day he would breathe a sigh of relief.

The bags had come in and had been somewhat of a success. Ponies were buying them up who were regulars but most didn’t seem too interested. So far, they had only really been just about able to recover their investment into the research and development of the product, but it was slowly recovering which was the important point.

Doughy was doing well, he had taken to the job and was now starting to help out around the bakery when the hatch was quiet. However due to the increasing size of their customers this was getting less and less commonplace. As returners kept coming back they were finding they were too large to enter the store and each day the hatch queue got progressively longer. Clipsy was always up front of course.

Thinking of Clipsy, Cookie had discussed her idea with Pinny. Whilst initially against it, she had slowly brought him around. His only real concern was would she agree to it? Cookie was fairly sure with what they were offering as payment, she’d jump at it.

“Morning Clipsy!” Cookie said. She had asked Doughy today to let her know as soon as the mare appeared at her hatch. Cookie was carrying her usual order. Conversation was slow. Clipsy seemed to have now settled into a rhythm of huffs that punctuated her speech.

“You...huff...brought it out?” she asked.

“Well, you’re our best customer, we hardly talk anymore. I thought it might be a nice chance to catch up.” Cookie beamed, pushing the loaded bags into her folds for storage. “I have something I wanted to ask you.”

“What...puff...was that?” Clipsy asked.

“Well, Doughy has gotten to know you quite well. He told me you lost your job? Is that right?” Cookie asked with a concerned tone.

“Yes...huff... couldn’t fit inside...puff...the observatory or...huff...work from home.” came the short but very laboured response.

“Oh dear, you know I can’t help but feel we’re partly responsible for all this. I wanted to make you an offer, seeing as you’ve supported us right from the start.” Cookie smiled.

“What...huff...offer?” Clipsy asked.

“Well, we’re doing okay but we’ve still got a lot of debt to pay off for the work done to get us up and running, as well as bills. We’d like to try to sell even more. You’ve always been an advocate for our baking. How would you like to be the mascot for Upper Crust?” Cookie asked.

Clipsy didn’t say anything, she just raised an eyebrow and gave Cookie a stare as if she wanted to know more.

“You’d be well compensated! We were thinking of paying you a salary of six bags a day?” Cookie said.

“Ten.” came the single word response.

“Eight and it’s a deal.” Cookie negotiated back. She could tell even without explaining what Clipsy was going to have to do the offer of free food was too tempting.

“Deal.” Clipsy said. “I’d...huff...shake but uh…” she trailed off, noting that her hooves were somewhat sunk in blubber. Cookie just grinned.

“I think we can assume you’ll take the job. So we have a plan. Mobility is obviously a bit of an issue for you. We’re going to get a large cart pulled by some hired ponies. They’ll move you around the city. All you need to do is act as a living billboard. We were thinking that your size alone will make ponies come here. Would you object to uh...being painted on?” Cookie asked.

“No...huff...as long as it...puff...washes off.” Clipsy said. “I’ll do...huff...whatever you like...puff....for this, within reason.”

“Great. Well we’ll need a week or so to prepare everything. Can you come here early on Monday? Say around seven in the morning?” Cookie asked her.

“No problem.” Clipsy said. It seemed a little too easy to Cookie but the mare had readily accepted and now they had a travelling billboard to draw in more customers. She trotted back inside the store to give Pinny the good news.

“I had to offer a little more than six bags.” Cookie started off by saying.

“Let me guess, she wanted ten?” Pinny chuckled.

“Initially, but I got her down to eight. I explained what we planned to do, she was only really concerned that the paint we were planning to put on her would wash off.

“What was the idea with that anyway? I thought we were going to paint the cart.” Pinny said.

“Contingency dear. At eight bags a day her flab is probably going to start covering the advertising at some point as it spills over the side. I figured we could put it on her when it does.” Cookie explained.

“Of course, you do think of everything.” Pinny said, giving her a smile. “When did you tell her to start?”

“Monday next week, so we’ve got a week to prepare everything. We just need to find some very strong ponies and someone to paint the cart with advertising for the bakery. What do you think of ‘At this size, there must be something keeping this mare coming! Upper Crust Bakery.’ for the cart? We can put it on Clipsy when she covers it.” Cookie mused.

“I think that works, easy to get that on the side and makes it nice and direct. No problem at all with that.” Pinny said. “I suppose I’ll start seeing about some ponies that can haul her about if you want to take care of the painter?”

“I hope we can find the time.” Cookie said. “Did I see another letter come from Ponyville?”

“Yes. I’m waiting for the day we see a rather blobby Twilight on the front page. She’s had several boxes now. Even sharing them with her friends, they’re going to start getting rather large soon.” Pinny replied. “We can make it up after work or tomorrow morning?”

“Let’s do it in the morning, I’d like a night at home this evening.” Cookie smiled.

“Of course.” the response was interrupted by a ping from an oven timer. “Oh that’ll be the marzipan.” Pinny said, trotting off to remove the freshly baked batch from the oven.

Next week, the two would have everything ready for Clipsy. Hopefully she wouldn’t immediately break the cart under her weight...