"It's over. " Golden Chalice put down the impossibly thin plastic spoon that came with the milkshake. She said the words like she was casting off a chain that had held her back for a very long time. Looking across at her coltfriend, Independent Variable, she noted that he seemed unaffected by her proclamation.
She raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you going to say anything?"
"Any questions you wanna ask?"
Independent didn't say anything for a long time. Golden Chalice noticed that his milkshake was beginning to warm. It seemed like a waste of a perfectly good milkshake, so she pulled the bendy straw out of her own milkshake, then slid his milkshake over to her and began drinking it. In her opinion, it was a perfectly reasonable thing to do.
Independent answered after a while. "I was actually kind of expecting this." He reached out a hand to grab his milkshake, grasped at empty space, looked over to the other side of the table and sighed. "You're a mare who recovers the past, while I'm a stallion who spends his time developing the future. I guess things just couldn't work out between us."
He raised his hand to order another milkshake. "Besides, look at what happened just now. You took my milkshake which was clearly meant for me. That is so irrational."
The waitress came over and took his order.
Golden Chalice was just about to rebut with a sharp jab that would probably scar him for the rest of his life - how dare he call me irrational I'm clearly a very sensible mare- she thought this as a glob of milkshake dripped off her glass and, without thinking, she started licking it off the table. The waitress gave her a look of polite indifference and walked off to the kitchen with Independent's order.
They were sitting at a window seat, the first mistake of many.
The window they were sitting next to shattered with no warning, spraying shards of broken glass everywhere. The duo instinctively shielded their eyes, and when the last shards of glass stopped tinkling onto the marble floor did they risk a glance outside. What they saw defied all common sense. From the outside of the cafe came the sounds of zapping and explosions.
"Laser sharks." It was Independent who said this, and the worst part was that he knew exactly who would do such a thing.
They ran outside the cafe and turned a corner, past trampled cotton candy and deflated balloons.
"Who would attack a circus tent full of innocent orphans who were clearly completely harmless and merely enjoying a good day out?" Golden asked of Independent, and Independent replied deliberately.
"There's a researcher in my lab who's been well liked by everyone ever since she developed a vaccine for cancer at the age of twelve."
From somewhere up the street there was a stomp.
"No matter what she does, she always earns everyone's forgiveness in the end."
Another stomp, this time louder.
"And the one thing she can't stand - "
The final stomp sent rubble scattering around the duo.
"Is imperfection." It wasn't Independent who said that.
Standing next to them was the most perfectly imperfect mare the two had ever seen. Everything about her was right, and that was what made her so, so wrong.
"Apologies for interrupting your conversation, but my name is Mary Sue."
"Gosh, even her evil voice is so good." Golden muttered.
There was a conveniently placed mirror that just so happened to be slightly off to the left side of Mary, and she started describing her appearance in the most perfect voice ever.
"I'm a alicorn pony and I have a coat of midnight blue. My eyes are emerald green, and my mane sparkles when I sway it around. Everyone always tells me that I'm beautiful, but I don't see why. I'm just an ordinary pony."
"Ordinary, " Independent said, "does not exactly fit what you have done here."
The circus tent had failed at its one job. The entire tent had collapsed, somehow folding itself into a manner that was ready for transport. All the orphans who had previously been enjoying a charity circus show were now lined up outside of the folded tent in a perfect two - deep line. They stood perfectly at attention, not moving a muscle, except when they blinked.
Perfectly.
Mary smiled at the children, still standing in their two straight lines. She smiled in that enchanting way as she addressed Golden and Independent. "Aren't they just so perfectly adorable?"
"You see," she continued, "as I was going about their day, I saw so many ponies, all doing such imperfect things. Now, I simply couldn't bear to see such imperfectness in our wonderful land of Equestria, so I simply gave them a little push towards being good and right, all the time. A change for the better, don't you think?"
To his credit, Independent tried to reply to Mary. He really tried. But as soon as the rebuke was about to leave his tongue, it caught on his lips, was sucked back in, and something entirely different replaced it.
"...Yes, Mary, a change for the better."
Golden looked over had his now perfect face and started to rack her brains. Somehow, she had to save Equestria from the perfectly manicured hands of this Mary Sue. Then, a piece of milkshake foam fell from the cup she was still holding, and she had an idea.
Slowly, without breaking eye contact with Mary, she crouched to the floor and licked the foam off the pavement. Mary's face scrunched up in disgust.
"No...no, what are you doing? You know how many diseases you are getting?"
Golden kept on licking. She dumped the rest of the milkshake on the pavement and licked the rest of it up. When she was done, she stood back up and let out an almighty burp. Flecks of spit landed on Mary's mane, making it much more sparkly than normal.
"NO, I can;t stand this! NOOOOOOooooo....."
Mary collapsed to the floor, screaming and scratching at her eyes and mane. She withered away into a perfect circle, and disappeared. Across Equestria, thousands of minds cleared.
Independent smiled. "I guess being imperfect is okay as well."
"Can't have beauty if flaws didn't exist." Golden replied.
Together, they trotted back to the cafe.
Author's Note
I would like to apologise in advance to the mod who is going to read this.
