Late Night Encounters At The Gas Station

Chapters

Late Night Snack
Sugar Madness
What Exactly is a Hotdog?
Realizations
Pulling An All-Nighter
Last Second Purchase
Split Down The Middle
Upgrade Your Magic Coverage
Plain And Simple
Roll For Initiative
The Return
Thank You And Goodnight

Late Night Snack

It was a late June evening at the Stop-n-Snak. The crickets were chirping next to the entrance of the gas station. The tall pumps stood still as not a single car stopped in. Only the occasional one drove by, which made the night feel long for the quick pick-me-up place.

“How much longer?” Derrick asked, staring out the window that led to a world unlike their own.

“About three hours.” Mark replied. He punctuated it by rolling his eyes.

“Seriously?! Why can’t we just clock out now; no one's gonna show up, and I’m bored out of my mind.”

It was true; working the graveyard shift at a gas station was boring, not just because of the location being too far out for any reasonable person to go out wandering, but for the lack of anything to do. Compared to the bustling lines of people wanting convenient food, this lack of activity and isolation was getting to the two clerks

Mark smirked. “Welcome to the night shift. Besides, you know we can’t clock out, we have to deal with the shift or the boss is gonna have our asses mantled above his fireplace!” Mark exclaimed. He was playing Devil's advocate, even though he too wanted to head back home as much as his friend.

“Fine, at least there’s the paid time off to look forward to.” Derrick sighed. He looked around the store. It was depressing to see no one in here other than his co-worker. There were so many shelves filled with all kinds of snacks, warm treats, and refreshing drinks to buy. Yet, no one had come in in the past couple hours. It tempted him to get out from behind the counter to look around…

...especially because he just saw the banana nut muffins just screaming at him from the sweets table.

“Hey, Mark, you mind taking my spot?”

“Your spot, what do you mean?”

“In case a customer comes in, y’know? I got a massive craving for those new banana nut muffins over by the sweets table.”

Mark rolled his eyes. “Dude, you get more of the munchies than I do. And I’m the one that hits the bong!”

Derrick chuckled as he slid out from behind the counter, taking an exit stage left towards the sweets counter. Even though the banana nut muffins were calling him, there were plenty of diabetes-inducing sugar foods to devour: chocolate and vanilla donut holes, mini eclairs, and cherry turnovers.

As he grabbed his second muffin with those plastic tongs of his, he saw something move out of the corner of his eye. At first, he thought it was a mouse or something, but then he did a double take and gasped. It was a horse. A horse in a convenient store.

Derrick froze, the muffin falling to the ground, bouncing off the tile floor. “Uh, do you speak Equestrian?”

Derrick continued to look like a deer in the headlights, “...What?”

“Hmm, I’m not familiar with that particular region, do they speak Equestrian in What?”

Derrick finally snapped out of his trance, “I’m going to talk with my coworker, I’ll be right back.”

Derrick simply stared off into space, so sidetracked, he hadn’t even heard Derrick running towards him, “There’s a horse in the store!”

“Very funny dude, how could a horse get in—“

“Dude, I swear, she was in the corner, standing there, menacingly.”

“Rrrightt… and pigs fly.” Mark just waves flippantly at his co-worker. “Look, let me know when you actually see a customer walk in, because man, if we start hallucinating anything else tonight, I’m going to check myself into an insane asylum—hey!”

Derrick had grabbed his friend by his shoulders and shoved him down behind the counter. Mark looked at Derrick, smiling, thinking he was witnessing Derrick’s first ever acid trip, while Derrick was wide-eyed and gritting his teeth.

“What the hell man?!” Derrick whispered.

“I know, this is crazy! You’re higher than me right now,” Mark stated with a grin growing on his face.

Derrick wasn’t sure if this was some weird prank or the result of going so long with no sleep, but he somehow knew his friend was behind this. “I swear to god if you slipped something in my lunch I’m gonna—”

“Um, hello? I didn’t mean to frighten you!” The voice said, interrupting Derrick’s threat.

Derrick shushed Mark, who now realized that someone was at the register, those eyes of his widened too. However, unlike Derrick, Mark was ambitious, he didn’t care if danger stared him in the eyes and told him to not take another hit, because he was going to take that hit. He did it regardless, consequences be damned.

Mark popped up like a gopher to see a horse staring at him, head tilted. “Oh, another one,” it said. “Where did your friend go?”

Mark stared… and stared… and stared some more, until Derrick hit him in the leg. The consequences had hit him, quite literally, and now he was paying the price. “Uh… he’s not around right now. How may I help you?”

“I’m trying to find a bag of Herds chips, and a few cans of Moon Star energy drink, though I’m not having the best luck finding them.” The horse said. Derrick had somewhat of an idea of what the horse was talking about, though he wasn’t too sure about the names. Meanwhile the horse looked around the store as if it was studying the ways how the slushie machine worked, to the hot dogs lazily rotating on the warmer and possibly wondering where the buns were.

“Wow, you can actually talk! This is the best night of my life!” Mark said with pure excitement.

“But how? Last time I checked, horses can’t talk, nor do they have wings or a horn.” Derrick replied he sighed since he knew that the only way to get any answers was to talk to it, “...hi, welcome to Stop-n-Snak. How can I help you tonight?”

“Well as I was saying to your friend, I’m looking for Herds chips and Moon Star energy drinks.”

“Are you making these up? Because it sounds like it.”

“I would never, lying is unfit for a princess of my caliber.”

Derrick ignored the idea of the horse being royalty, the snack names were on his mind, “Well we’ll try helping out on that miss…”

“Luna.” The horse replied, “Princess Luna.”

“NO WAY!” Mark exclaimed, “Not only did we get a talking horse, but a royal talking horse!”

"Ok, before anything gets really crazy, do you mind telling us why you're here?" Suddenly, a loud screeching sound made the two clerks look behind them. It was a black and white car with red and blue lights above it. The car came to a sudden halt right in front of the store, and shut off its lights. "Shit, it's the cops!" Derrick exclaimed.

"What are we gonna do?!" Mark asked frantically looking around for potential hiding spots for Luna.

"Luna, quick you gotta—" In an instant, it was almost like she wasn't even there, "uh…"

"Forget it, get behind the counter!" The two quickly rushed towards the counter right as the door creaked open.

“Evening officer.” The two nervously said, not caring about the cop but rather what the heck their new equine friend was doing out of their sight.

“Evening boys.” The cop said in a lackadaisical way as he looked about the snacks, “Kinda odd they got you two for the graveyard shift.”

“Well… our boss needed some guys to be here, and everyone else suddenly had plans.”

“Yeah; that’s how I got stuck on the night patrol. O’ Malley and I were on the list and our chief needed someone out. He managed to weasel out of it by saying he had romantic plans with his wife, so here I am. Ugh,” The cop replied, grabbing two hot dogs and some sour candies, “How much do I owe ya for these?”

“Let’s see…” Mark began to work the register, working out to figure out how much the snack foods would be, “That’ll be six dollars and eighty-five cents.”

The cop took out his credit card and set it on the counter. He gave the two clerks a smile. “This should cover it, right?” He laughed to himself.

Derrick took the card and swiped it for him. Then, he handed it back to the cop, along with a receipt. “Yes it does! Hope you have a nice night, officer.”

“You too. Now you two stay outta trouble now, don’t want to have to come out here with back up!” With that, the cop soon paid, walked out and drove off into the endless road of the night to continue his work.

“Oh thank god, I thought he’d never leave.” Mark sighed.

“Ok Luna; wherever you are, you can come out now!” Luna then materialized out of nowhere, startling the two almost sending them crashing into a display for energy drinks.

“Where did you come from?!” Derrick asked.

“I never left.” Luna replied, “My magic allows me to do many things, such as being invisible, and muting sounds I make.”

“That’s so cool.” Mark said as he was enjoying the experience far too much.

Derrick ignored his friends being so easily impressed and decided to get back to business, “Getting back on topic before the cop showed up, why are you here exactly?”

“Well, why does anyone else come to a convenience store?” Luna asked. “To grab a quick pick-me-up.” She then proceeded to grab a few energy drink cans and a bag of corn chips.

“Really?” Derrick asked.

“As someone who travels within the dreams of everyone, you get a bit hungry after a while.” Luna replied.

“Wait… why the energy drinks?” Mark asked, he didn’t know much about horses, but he knew enough to know they don’t drink anything carbonated.

Luna sighed, “In all honesty, I’m tired of just drinking coffee, I needed a change of pace.” This only confused the two clerks more as both knew coffee wasn’t something for horses to casually drink, “Anyway, how much do I owe you?”

The two snapped out of their confusion and went back to the register to complete the transaction, “That’ll be three dollars and fifty cents.”

“Right…” Luna said as she dug through her saddlebags, “Do you take bits as payment?”

The two clerks looked at each other, “After what happened tonight, it’s on us.”

“Thank you.” Luna replied, “I’ll be sure to come back to this store once I get a chance.” With that Luna had used her magic to leave the store, the sheer amount of magical power used blinded the two clerks. Soon afterwards, Luna was gone.

“So… I guess that wasn’t just a mad hallucination.” Derrick said.

“Yeah, and hey all that managed to kill a solid hour.” Mark said as he looked at his phone.

“Great… only two more.” Derrick replied as he slumped onto the counter where the register sat.

“Cheer up dude, if we’re lucky, we might get another talking horse to help kill time.” Mark stated as he walked back to the counter with a certain pep in his step.

Once again it was just business as usual; an empty convenience store in the middle of nowhere. The two clerks just stared at the clock hanging above the wall. All that time being bored managed to kill another hour, only one more until they were able to go home and enjoy three days of relaxation.

Derrick picked up a strong scent,“Hey… do you smell cotton candy?” He asked.

“Probably just the cotton candy flavored milk.” Mark replied, “why do you ask?”

Sugar Madness

Directly after Derrick had asked if Mark smelled cotton candy, a small pink pony was zipping across the gas station. The boys knew this wasn’t going to end well, so their mission was clear: catch this pony. However this task was easier said than done, it was as if the pony was one step ahead of the two as it ran across the store. Each time they thought they got her, she ran off and the clerks crashed into each other. This game of cat and mouse seemed endless, until at last, it stopped by the slushie machines next to the soda dispensers.

The clerks finally managed to catch their breath as she started to layer all the slushie flavors. Mark stared at her and suddenly had a thought, “Dude, you think she’s gonna get more hyper?”

Derrick looked at the pony as she tried her best to drink the concoction, “I doubt it, those things are mostly ice. As long as she doesn’t try mixing a suicide soda then we should be fine.”

As if the universe was just aching to mess with the clerks’ evening, the pink pony stopped and walked up to them and asked, “What’s a ‘suicide soda’?”

Mark ignorantly quickly answered the pony, “Oh that’s when you mix all the sodas from the dispenser into-“ He was suddenly stopped by Derrick elbowing him in the gut, taking the wind out of him.

The pony’s eyes grew as big as dinner plates as she heard of the idea of mixing every soda imaginable. She quickly ran up to the machine, grabbed the biggest cup they had in the store, and started to pump out every soda it had, even the diet ones.

“Duck and cover!” Derrick shouted as he hid behind the counter. Mark, however, wasn’t as cautious as his coworker. He stood there frozen, watching their little invader shake like she was exclusively experiencing an earthquake. Soon enough she had become a ball of pure pink energy, which the two clerks knew was too dangerous in mass quantities. Soon enough, she began to run around at an alarming speed, with all the chaos going on, Mark had finally decided to retreat.

“You just had to say how to make that stupid drink,” Derrick said. He let out a shaky exhale.

“Well, you mentioned it in the first place!” Mark shouted. The two got into an argument on who started what and why this was even happening in the first place when suddenly the pink pony stopped in its tracks.

The pony looked around, “Is this where I pay?” It asked, only to be ignored by the continuing fight, “Excuse me?”

The fighting raged on, and the pony was tired of being ignored, so it decided to add to the madness by popping over the counter, "Would you two stop!" The pony exclaimed. "Can't you see all this fighting is tearing us apart!"

The two clerks looked up and were utterly stunned by the Telenovela levels of acting by the pony. “Ok...so this one is weirder than Luna.”

Mark nodded. “Yep, she even smells like cotton candy. Most horses around here smell like ass.”

“Do I look like a horse to you?” the pink not-horse asked.

The two clerks looked at each other. Neither of them wanted to say anything more. They didn’t want to offend the pure ball of energy, she probably could blast them out of this Earth’s atmosphere with how powerful she probably was.

Then Mark opened his mouth.

“Kind of? You don’t have as long of a face and—”

Derrick smacked Mark’s mouth shut. “Don’t listen to him, he’s on his high at the moment.”

And going back to the smell thing; remember when we went to Chappy’s, that place smells worse than horses,” Derrick added, remembering the horrors they endured going to that cursed restaurant.

“Well… I’ve never been there, but I can imagine how bad it could smell.” The horse just fell over and landed into Derrick’s lap, “I can imagine like the world’s biggest dumpster left out in the sun for a week.”

“Well how can we help you…pink pony?” Derrick asked.

“My name’s Pinkie Pie.” The pony replied, “And well….I guess after the drink, and a slushie, I’ll get these!” Pinkie suddenly whipped out several, large king-sized bags full of candies of all sorts of varieties. “Though I’m not sure which ones are the best.”

The two looked on as the pony sifted through all the candies until she picked up a bag of gummy candies shaped like bugs. “Why would anypony ever try to eat bugs? That's just... gross.”

“Those are just candies shaped like bugs, not actual bugs,” Mark began. He picked up the bag and showed Pinkie Pie that they weren’t real, squishing them with his fingers. “Look, see?They even got little sour centers!”

“Really? Are all of them like that?”

Derrick nodded and leaned on the counter. “Basically. They got different flavors and appearances, but they’re all just candy at the end of the day.”

Pinkie Pie squealed as she scrambled to grab another bag. “what are these things?” She asked as she picked up a bag with a lot of multicolored circles.

“Those are M&Ms, they’re little chocolate candies.” Derrick replied.

“I wonder if anypony tried alphabetizing them!” Pinkie pondered as she looked at the bag and the little candy people on it.

“Well I wouldn’t know that, but I know you can put them on top of ice cream sundaes, you can put them in cookies, all sorts of stuff,” Derrick said.

Pinkie’s eye grew wide as a whole new world of culinary opportunities opened up for her. “These can go into cookies?! Forget all this stuff, I’ll take ten bags of these!”

Much like Luna’s encounter, the purchase was odd given that it was with bits instead of real money. They held onto it and watched the pink ball of insanity happily hop out of the store. Once they heard the door close, the two clerks just collapsed onto the floor. They have faced many things over their somewhat-long careers. From crazy kids running amok with their only supply of toilet paper in the bathroom, to people demanding things that they were out of stock to the point that they demanded the two clerks to ‘go get some more in the back’, none of these extremes even compared to that pink anomaly. She had broken them. They began to whimper and cry because screaming in anger would take too much energy.

“How much time is left?” Derrick asked, in-between sobs.

Mark eyed the clock and sighed. “Thirty minutes…”

Derrick gulped. He peeked over the counter to look at the damages and smacked his head up against the counter. “Mark…”

“Yeah, Derrick?” Mark asked, only to peek his head over to and gasp.

“Wow, a miniature tornado just wiped out our store!”

“You could say that again,” Derrick bluntly said, getting himself off the counter.

“Wow, a miniature—”

“I didn’t mean literally!” Derrick exclaimed, which got Mark clutching at his stomach laughing. Derrick sighed.

Then, once Mark recovered, he sighed too.

“Guess we better clean up before the day shift comes.”

“Shut up and get me the mop,” Derrick rasped out.

“I hate you.”

“I hate you too.”

The next thirty minutes seemed to be going on for nearly an eternity as it took them forever to clean up the store. By the time they were done, it was time for them to clock out. As they got into their car, they began to think of their freedom. “Three whole days…”

“Dude… we need a whole week after what that… thing caused us,” Derrick weakly said as he rubbed the sides of his head.

“Did Luna ever say when she was gonna come back?” Mark asked as he turned the keys to the car.

“I don’t know, let’s just go home. I need an aspirin,” Derrick replied.

With that, the two clerks drove off back home. They had time to rest and recollect the moments of this crazy night, but something inside of them kept asking the same question: if this were to happen again, what would they encounter next, and would it be as crazy as it was tonight?

What Exactly is a Hotdog?

Once again, it was the dead of night. The two clerks had decided to take another night shift to see if their little pony friend would show up or not. The start of their shift was quite different from their first, they had more customers come in, they restocked some retro soda from the 90’s, and finally managed to empty out the Blue Thunder flavored slush.

Hopefully Luna would show up, because they seriously needed a break from the insanity they’re used to, “Back to square one…” Derrick sighed.

“So when do you think she’ll show up?” Mark asked as he tapped his fingers against the counter.

“I don’t know, I hope she gets here, otherwise we’re stuck twiddling our thumbs for the rest of the shift,” Derrick replied as he once again looked outside the window.

“Yeah, that would be a boring shift—not that you’re a boring person, Derrick.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Derrick said lamely, rolling his eyes.

Mark shook his head. “I mean think about it, she showed up here around the exact same time last night, so it would make sense for her to come back again around the same time,” Mark said.

It was as if they were trying to catch a lightning bug in a bottle, only they were so far from even finding one to catch. Why was she not here yet?

“Dude seriously. After what happened the last time we had to deal with this, I’m still not even certain if any of that happened,” Derrick said. He was still of the belief that none of what they had experienced wasn’t just due to the lack of sleep.

“Or maybe we just got to give it some time. She could be running a little late, y’know. She’s a princess, remember?” Mark replied, hoping that their experience was real.

“She’s got magic. She could just pop up right now,” Derrick replied matter-of-factly.

“Yeah…” Mark said, his voice trailing off.

The two stayed silent. They only heard the clock ticking and tocking… and then, suddenly, a loud BANG came from outside.

“Great, now the raccoons are back.” Derrick grabbed one of the brooms from the supply closet and walked out to the back of the store, “Alright you fuzzy little fuckers, get out of here before I start swinging!” In all of Derrick’s anger, he did not notice the yellow pony below him. “Oh… another one.”

The yellow pony just looked up at the clerk, a bit terrified at the threat of being hit with a broom. “Please don’t hurt me…” She pleaded, “I was just trying to shoo the raccoons away. Eating garbage isn’t exactly healthy for them.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Derrick quickly put his weapon of choice up. “Well since you’re here, are you in need of something?”

“I am actually. In all of the craziness, I completely forgot about it.” The pony replied.

Derrick went back to the door and opened it. “Well, by all means, come in miss…”

“Fluttershy.” The pony said, “And thank you.” With that, she walked right into the store.

“Anything yet Mark?” Derrick asked.

“Nothing yet dude. Just a few cars passing and—” Mark stopped when he finally noticed the yellow pony beside his friend. “I see you found the raccoon,” Mark replied as he straightened back up.

“Yeah, you could say that,” Derrick said with a smirk. The two watched as Fluttershy wandered about, looking for whatever she was intending to buy.

Fluttershy was a bit taken back by all of the items in the store. She was normally used to the open space of a farmer’s market, or borrowing from her friends. With the enclosed space, the flashy items, and the low buzzing sounds of the lights above, it was a lot to take in. Everything seemed to be going well until she smelled something... odd. It was as if something was left to rot in the sun and forgotten to the sands of time.

She looked around until she noticed the machine rotating some hotdogs. This sent her into a bit of hysteria as she was trying to process what she was witnessing, eventually, she let out an ear-piercing shriek that could render the skies.

“What the heck was that?!” Mark asked. “Sounded like a banshee found out what a megaphone was.”

“W-what are... these?” Fluttershy asked as she pointed a hoof at the machine.

“Those are just hotdogs,” Derrick answered as he walked up, trying to comfort the shaking mare.

“Who would ever eat a dog?” Fluttershy asked.

Derrick sighed. “They are not made of dogs, they're made of… you know, I’m not really sure.”

“You’re not sure?!” Fluttershy shouted while grabbing the clerk’s face.

Derrick was really unsure of what to say at this point, but he went with his gut. “We get them in a box, that’s all I know!”

Fluttershy fainted. Luckily, she didn’t hit her head on the tile or the counter. She was totally out, though, much to the chagrin of the two clerks.

Derrick was unsure of what to do at this point. “Uh… Mark, she fainted.”

“Ok, what do you want me to do about it?” Mark asked.

“Well, help me wake her up,” Derrick said, grunting. He tried to nudge her in her side, but the pony was unresponsive.

“Dude, I heard you’re not supposed to wake up a sleeping horse.” Mark said as he pulled out a nature magazine on horses.

“That’s bears, you idiot.” Derrick retorted, knowing his friend was just trying to blow off helping.

“It’s still an animal,” Mark weakly replied.

Derrick sighed. “Look, just get an ice pack or a fan and help.”

After a good long while of trying to wake up their customer, she finally woke up. “Well, look who decided to wake up,” Mark said, which earned him a glare from Derrick.

They watched as Fluttershy groaned, holding her head with a hoof. “Oh, dear… I guess I must’ve passed out,” Fluttershy weakly said as she got back up on her legs.

“Well, I guess hotdogs aren’t on your list then,” Mark chuckled, only to be immediately smacked by his coworker.

Fluttershy rolled her eyes. “Well… I know this might be a long shot, but you wouldn’t happen to have any trail mix in stock?”

The clerks looked at each other, “That depends on what size of bag you want, they’re next to the chips and jer… uhh, the snack cakes!” Derrick said, saving them from dealing with another fainting episode.

“Oh well, in that case, do you sell it in large bags? I was planning on going on a nature walk with a few friends and I forgot that I was bringing the trail mix.”

“Don’t worry, we got you covered,” Mark stated as he grabbed a party-sized bag and walked up to the counter. “Is that everything?”

“Yes, it is,” Fluttershy replied. She cringed as she took one final look at that rotating machine. “How much do I owe you?”

After scanning the bag and working with the register, the machine gave out the total. “That’s gonna be five dollars and thirty-five cents.”

Fluttershy looked through her bags and just like the other ponies that came through the stores, they had bits instead of regular money. The mare frowned when she saw the look on the clerks’ faces. “I guess you don’t accept bits as payment?”

“We’ll hold on to this, you enjoy your night,” Derrick said as he grabbed the bits from the pony.

“Thank you, I’ll try to come back sometime.” With that Fluttershy grabbed her bag of trail mix and walked out of the store.

“How much longer do we have?” Derrick asked.

“Two more hours,” Mark replied. “I hope Luna shows up before we close.”

“I hope so too, otherwise this is gonna be the worst night since these ponies showed up!” Derrick exclaimed.

“I dunno, this doesn’t top that night when that hobo tried to make his home in the dumpster.” Mark simply replied.

Derrick groaned. “Don’t remind me. I don’t need another headache from all that banging…”

Realizations

Time seemed to have flown by because there was only about thirty minutes left in the clerks’ shift and yet there was still no sign of Luna showing up. It was official- the two wasted their Friday night for absolutely no reason. “That’s it, I’m calling it quits!” Derrick exclaimed as he got up from behind the counter.

“Come on dude, just give it like a few more minutes.” Mark whined as he looked at his phone.

Derrick turned back to look at his friend, “You can, but I’m going out back.” He proceeded to march out, or rather he was intending to do so because he ran right into Luna.

“I knew it!” Mark exclaimed, “You just had to wait a few extra minutes!”

“I’m terribly sorry that I’m late.” Luna said, “I ran into someone dealing with a heavy loss and their thoughts had manifested into their dreams.”

Derrick looked back at the princess, “Well… sorry to hear that.”

“Guess that was worth the wait.” Mark sheepishly said, “Not like we were doing anything else, other than trying to stop someone from freaking out over hotdogs.”

Luna looked at Mark with a quizzical look, “Hot...dogs?”

“Yeah, hotdogs, you know the things that the cop bought from us.” Derrick said as he pointed to the tubes of meat rotating at the machine, “You know, that’s when we first met.”

“Wait… I was certain that the officer bought a few snack cakes.” Luna said in a concerned tone, she looked back and ran to the machine. This was sending all kinds of messages to her and this wasn’t helping in the slightest. “Oh dear… this is bad. This is very bad.”

“Are you alright Luna?” Mark asked.

“No, not at all.” Luna stated, “Something is clearly wrong, but I’m not sure what. I believed that this was the Stop-n-Snak outside of Canterlot, but this clearly isn’t it!”

“I take it that that place is also in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by trees?” Derrick asked, “I mean, did you not notice how we were acting when we first met you?”

“When you look into others dreams, some things just get muddled up and you cannot tell if it is real or if it’s still a result of the dream walking.”

“I guess that makes sense.” Mark said as he scratched his chin, “Sometimes I think I see things in the dark back home when it turns out it’s just my jacket.”

“Well, this is far more than just mistaking an unknown entity for a simple jacket.” Luna replied, “ This is a mix up on a magical level.” She continued to pace the floor while looking at the various snack foods hanging on their pegs.

“You see magic works on a different plane of logic than what you could expect. For some reason there’s an aura connecting our world and our version of the store, and there’s your version of the store and your world; however, it seems that those lines might have been crossed and that could mean ponies have been finding their way here.”

“Yeah, that happened after you left!” Derrick exclaimed, “We ran into a pink pony who just bought all our M&Ms, and earlier we were dealing with the hotdog freak out.”

“That sounds like some of Twilight Sparkle’s friends.” Luna muttered, “I know all of this is a lot to handle; but until I can figure this out, could the two of you just keep doing what you are doing?”

“You mean just standing around, doing nothing?” Mark asked, “Sounds simple enough.”

“Before anything else, what do we do with these?” Derrick pulled out the bits that she and the other ponies had paid the clerks.

“Right...payment.” Luna looked at the two boys. She grabbed the bits with her magic, “I’ll figure out something to help compensate for this mishap, but until then just keep holding on to the bits.”

“What do we do now then?” Mark asked, clearly this nonsense was getting confusing with all the talk of magic, mixed with all the worry that the princess was giving off.

“Just keep doing what you two have been doing.” Luna answered, “You two are doing great, I’m the one that needs to focus on this.” With that, she walked out of the store still muttering to herself.

The two clerks just stood there utterly confused from what was now going on, “What on earth do you think she could be talking about with that magic stuff?”

Mark was processing everything that was going on, until he had thought of something, “Well, you know how when you go in between radio stations you can faintly hear other stations out of range?” Mark asked.

“Kinda.” Derrick replied.

“Or think of cell phones.” Mark said, trying something different, “You know how around here the coverage goes all crazy because all of the trees sorta block the signal strength?”

Derrick was starting to understand, “Yeah… I get what you’re saying.”

“So essentially, think of magic like those things.” Mark said, “The magic signal gets blocked or is somehow crossed between our connection with theirs. With the cross-connection, they are somehow walking into our store and yet nothing else.”

“Okay… now I’m getting lost.” Derrick said, “Why would it only affect us?”

“Well Luna said that there’s a store like this in their world, maybe that’s one of the very few connections to them and us.” Mark answered. Granted this was still a rocky theory, but it was the only thing the two could rely on.

“I can accept the idea that there are few connections to us and them, but I refuse to believe that the whole cell phone signal idea is how it really works.” Derrick flatly stated.

“Well, how would you try and describe it?” Mark asked.

“I don’t know, but it certainly wouldn’t be that.”

“Well if it is how magic works, you owe me ten bucks.” Mark said as he nonchalantly looked at his phone, “And that’s it, we can go home!”

“Cool, get the car started, I’ll lock up.” With that the night was over, the clerks looked at each other and backed out of the parking lot.

“You think this is gonna last a while?” Mark asked.

“At this point, I think we’re going to be taking the night shift a bit more than normal.”

Pulling An All-Nighter

It had been a few days since Luna had told the two clerks their predicament, nothing had really changed from their point though. Customers would come in, buy items, pay for gas, or just use the restrooms as a last minute emergency. For almost a week during the night shift no ponies had come through any of the doors, it was strange, but given how the last set of ponies came three days after the twos break. However, the two Derrick and Mark were on night shift once again, but this time they were more prepared for their potential encounters.

“So… do you think anyone is gonna show up?” Mark asked.

“At this point anything could happen.” Derrick replied, he looked at the doors with intrigue for what kind of pony would pop in for their late night pick me up. Soon the door opened and a pony looking somewhat like Luna, minus the fur color and hairstyle walked right in.

“Welcome to Stop-n-Snak.” Derrick said with the vigor of a first time employee. The pony simply nodded with a weak smile as she browsed the store, “Is there anything that you need help with?”

“Yes actually.” The pony replied, “By any chance do you guys sell coffee?”

“I think the better question is, how do you like it?” Derrick asked, “We got it canned, bottled, iced, or fresh. So take your pick miss…”

“Twilight Sparkle.” The pony said, “I’m not sure why a convenience store would have this level of attentiveness.”

“Well our boss thinks if we get to know our customers we’d be able to work better and it gives the customers feel special.”

“Well I guess if it works.” Twilight replied, grabbing two of each type of coffee varieties.

“So why do you need all that anyway?” Derrick asked.

“I'm currently going over some important documents for a meeting of royalty, and the amount of errors and contradictions aren't helping in the slightest.” Twilight sighed, “I needed some fresh air, and I thought getting something could help.”

“I know that feeling.” Derrick said, “I remember when I had to cram for finals a few months ago, and it wasn't fun.”

“Well why is that?” Twilight asked.

“Well I kept forgetting to study that much over the time that class was being held, and by the time the tests were up… I panicked.” Derrick replied as he looked at the rows of iced coffee, “I know they tell you to try working in study time into your schedule, but I just didn't care and wanted to treat myself to some fun.”

Twilight chuckled, “Yeah… I guess that sort of mindset persists, despite who it is. I remember how I used to be when I was just a student, instead of a princess.” Although Twilight was the epitome of studying, research, and all things academia; there was that special occasion she’d like to take the day off and enjoy herself.

“I mean sometimes you burn yourself out if you do nothing but study all day.” Derrick looked back at his friend back at the register, “Then again… sometimes you need someone else to help you get through it.”

Twilight looked back to where Derrick was looking, “Friend of yours?”

“Yeah. That’s my pal Mark, we met a little ways back.” Derrick proceeded to regale Twilight all about Mark and all the things the two did. From the time when they first met, to when they both got hired to work at the gas station and the bizarre things that had been happening to them.

“Well at least my friends have been keeping you company.” Twilight said with a slight chuckle.

“Except Pinkie…” Derrick shuddered, “How do you put up with all that crazy?”

“After a while, you eventually get used to it.” Twilight replied, “Trust me, I was in you guy’s shoes when I first met her.” Twilight then looked up and her eyes grew to the size of dinner plates, “Oh my gosh, I didn’t know it was THAT late!”

“What’s up?” Derrick asked.

“I have to get back to the castle.” Twilight replied as she ran towards the counter, “Those documents aren’t going to revise themselves.”

Without hesitation Mark began to scan the items that the purple alicorn had dropped onto the counter, “Your total is… twenty three dollars?!”

Twilight sighed, “I really need to stop doing this sort of thing.” She opened her saddle bags and pulled out some bits and dropped them on the counter, “Thanks for the help!” With that, she ran out of the store.

Derrick looked around the store before heading back to the counter where Mark just looked at the amount of bits left by Twilight. “So, you two seemed to be getting along pretty well.”

“Yeah I guess.” Derrick said, “I mean, it seemed like we have a lot in common.” He looked back at his friend and just reminisced about the times where the two of them hung out before the job.

Nearly any chance they got over their friendship, they stayed up late into the night, watching TV, discussing old sci-fi movies, and just trying to beat one of the secret bosses of their favorite RPGS.

Mark looked out the windows, and watched the trees swayed in the wind. Everything seemed fine; he focused on how the trees moved, they seemed to be moving like a tornado was coming along. “Was there a storm in the forecast tonight?”

“No.” Derrick replied, “It’s June, I highly doubt there would be anything for at least a few weeks.”

“Then why are the trees going off like that?” Mark asked. Derrick looked outside and his pal was right, the trees were blowing as if they were in the middle of a tornado or some freakish storm. The two decided to get away from the windows just to be safe and stuck around the snack cakes and day old doughnuts.

After what felt like hours, the wind had finally died down. Everything seemed to be normal until the doors just slammed open.

Last Second Purchase

It seemed as if history was repeating itself for the clerks when this new pony came in. However unlike Pinkie Pie; this one was able to fly, it was like having their own personal tornado come in. Unlike their time with Pinkie, the two decided to assert the situation and tried to make sure not to knock over any of the shelves and just let the pony burn themselves out. Anything to save themselves from enduring another migraine from cleaning up the store.

After what felt like hours the pony started to slow down and landed on the ground. She began to look around frantically, but at a more reasonable speed compared to when she first came in.

“You need something?” Mark asked.

“Of course I do, if I didn’t I wouldn’t be going around this fast!” The pony quickly replied, she continued to dart around the store like a squirrel trying to find its stash of nuts.

“Do you know what you need exactly?” Mark continued as he began to slowly walk around where the pony was at.

“That’s the annoying part, I forgot what I came in for!” The pony exclaimed as she rubbed the sides of her head with her wings. “Do you ever get that feeling when you are trying to remember something, despite repeating what you were going to get in your head?”

Mark scratched his chin and nodded as the pony went on and on about her thinking process. “Yeah, I have those sorta days all the time.” He replied, “it gets really annoying when you are in the middle of something, and you really can’t drop what you’re doing.”

The pony sighed, “Yeah, that gets really irritating. My name’s Rainbow Dash by the way.”

“I’m Mark.” The boy looked back at his friend, “Man the register Derrick, I got this one covered.”

“Thanks for the help.” Rainbow said, “Even though I’ve completely forgot what I was gonna get.”

“Anytime.” Marke replied, “try retracing your steps, that might help jog your memory.”

Rainbow began to take a deep breath and began to think over what she was going to buy, “Okay… I was doing some stunts outside to help me coordinate my moves in the dark.”

“Weird but okay.” Mark stated, “Wouldn’t that be a bit dangerous?”

“Well Wonderbolt Practice can be unpredictable from time to time, so I gotta train in weird ways.” Rainbow replied, “Like one time we were going over weather dangers and how to get through it better, so I decided to practice my swerving in the middle of a thunderstorm.”

“Cool, that kinda reminds me when I was riding my bike when it was raining.” Mark replied, “I totally crashed bad, but that’s what I get for trying to do wheelies in a mud pit.”

“I crashed badly once too.” Rainbow said, “I was testing my wind resistance by flying around a tornado.”

Mark’s smile grew wider from what Dash was saying, “Sounds pretty badass!”

“Yeah, until you get a cramp in your wing and crash into a tree.” Rainbow’s eyes grew wide, “THAT’S IT!” She exclaimed with glee, “I flew over to get some energy drinks.”

“Well do you need the ones that keep you up, or the ones that rehydrate you more?” Mark asked as he walked over to the section of the store that sold that kind of drink.

“Anything that helps get rid of cramping muscles.” Rainbow replied.

“The sports drinks, got it.” Mark opened the fridge and let Rainbow look in. She pointed at the flavors she wanted and Mark grabbed them. Soon enough they had grabbed eight bottles.

“Yeah...I needed a lot.” Rainbow sheepishly said.

“I think you need to focus on your stretching more than just using these all the time.” Mark stated, trying to keep the bottles from falling out of his arms.

The two made it to the counter and let Derrick scan the drinks, “Alright, you’re total adds up to ten dollars.”

“Really?” Rainbow asked, “I thought they’d be more.”

“Well they’re on sale, so you’re saving around five dollars.” Derrick replied.

“Cool, give me a sec.” Rainbow reached into her bags and grabbed her bits, “Thanks for the help.”

“No problem, just remember to stretch before you actually do anything.” Mark said as he watched Rainbow flay out of the store, bags in her fore hooves.

“Seems like you got your own pony friend.” Derrick said with a smirk.

“Well you’ve seen me when I forget stuff.” Mark replied, “I mean, remember that time we went to that Christmas party, and I couldn’t find my sweater?”

Derrick chuckled, “Of course, you nearly made me spill that cheese dip onto my clothes when you were rushing around.” His voice now having some spite in it.

“I didn’t want to lose the ugly sweater contest.” Mark replied.

“You did anyway.” Derrick stated, “Then again, who really could top a bedazzled Santa, and Christmas light reindeer?”

“At least I tried.” Mark said, “Not like you’re one to talk; I mean you totally struck out with that one chick.”

“The feelings were mutual, and we both agreed to see other people.” Derrick replied, the light roasting and jokes turning into hostility.

Mark rolled his eyes, “Yeah that’s what everyone says.”

“Why did you even bring up that night anyway, we agreed to NEVER talk about it again.” Derrick exclaimed.

“That’s the first thing I could think of alright, get off my back about it!” Mark shouted back.

“Really? Like there isn’t any other time that thick head of yours?” Derrick asked, “Like that time you lost my bus pass, and you forgot where you left it.”

“Oh like you ever used that stupid thing.” Mark said.

After their little skirmish, the two friends refused to talk to each other until it was time to leave, unfortunately for them it came around faster than what they had expected. The two looked at each other and silently finished their nightly duties and locked up the store. They got into their car and drove off back to their place in complete silence.

“We should probably think about getting another car.”

Split Down The Middle

The next day the two were still mad at each other. Throughout their whole shift they did not talk to each other, unless it was related to restocking items, or helping verify customer licenses in order to buy cigarettes or beer. Other than that, they just held a grudge from the other night.

The air was tense; so tense that in the two’s wallowing, they barely noticed the two ponies walking in. It was as if the universe itself knew misery loves company, because the two ponies were also arguing with each other. Oddly enough the only thing the clerks did manage to realize was that there was the scent of burning hair.

“Why in the name of all things decent, did you have to act like that?!” The lilac pony asked, “You made both of us look like complete fools, and you singed my mane.”

“Well how was I supposed to know that the fireworks were going to go off like that.” The light blue one said in a defensive tone, “The pony that sold them to me did not specify anything when I bought them.

“Well maybe some ponies have the common sense NOT to wave them carelessly over an open flame!”

“Well who makes a fire that late in the evening anyway, it’s really irresponsible.”

The lilac pony sighed, “I can’t deal with you when you’re like this!”

“The feelings are mutual.” The blue pony replied. The two walked across the store looking at the store's items. Most likely trying to burn time and not look at the other; the clerks decided to do the same.

“I guess you’re having friend troubles too huh?” Mark asked.

“As if, I let her stay in my cart,and this is how she repays me?” The blue pony asked, “It just seems like she can’t handle things when-“

“They’re not in control?” Mark asked

“How did you know?”

“My ‘friend’ over there is just like that.” The clerk replied as he extended his hand, “My name's Mark.”

“I’m Trixie.” The pony said, extending her hoof to shake with Mark.

“It truly feels like I keep surrounding myself with insanity.” The lilac pony sighed as she looked at the candies.

“Tell me about it.” Derrick said, “It's almost like no matter what you do, no matter what you try-“

“You just seem to be an idiocy wrangler.” The pony said, completing the clerks thought.

“FINALLY! Someone else gets it!” The boy exclaimed, “I’m Derrick.”

“My name’s Starlight.” The pony said with a small smile, she finally had someone else to talk to about her situation.

“Ok, I get why you got the fireworks, but why did you have them near the fire exactly?” Mark asked as he listened to Trixie vent out her problems.

“Well I wanted to show Starlight how they looked so I could get some opinions on using them for my show.” Trixie replied, “I didn’t expect them to ALL go off.”

“I just wanted some peace and quiet. I didn’t expect her to just come out and ask my opinions on fireworks, they all seemed fine to me.” Starlight stated as she looked at Derrick, “The explosion was the final straw and… I went off.”

“I get that you got angry about it, I would be too.” Derrick replied, “Why didn’t you just go out for a walk then?”

“I guess my anger was just clouding my judgement.” Starlight replied.

“I’m guessing I could’ve been a little less… eccentric.” Trixie sighed, “Maybe everything could’ve been a bit different.”

Mark looked over to where Starlight and Derrick were and looked back to Trixie, “I know the feeling… me and my friend got into an argument yesterday.

“Me and my pal got into some dumb argument when we talked about this stupid Christmas party and went bad pretty fast.” Derrick said.

Starlight looked over to where Trixie and Mark were and looked back to Derrick, “And you have that feeling wishing you could just go back in time and fix it?”

“Yeah.” Derrick sighed, “I doubt there’s a spell or something that can do that.”

Starlight looked around, “Well not anymore, that scroll caused more problems than solutions.”

Trixie sighed as she looked at Mark, “I guess the only thing we can really do is apologize.”

“I guess so.” Mark replied, “Try getting something that she likes, that’d be a good icebreaker.”

Trixie nodded as she ran towards the freezer where the ice cream was held. She dug around until she found something, “If there’s one thing I know, is that she loves pistachio ice cream.”

“Guess that stuff isn’t just a shelf warmer then.” Mark chuckled.

“Well try apologizing with a gift.” Derrick said, “Maybe that’ll butter her up.”

“Of course, and I know just what to use.” Starlight said as she looked along the shelves and pulled out a few packets of peanut butter crackers, “Do you think that three would work?”

“Better make it five, just to be safe.” Derrick replied.

Eventually the four met in front of the register. The air was tense, but this time it was due to uncertainty from the two sides about the others' thoughts.

Trixie was the first to speak, “Starlight… I know that I have been annoying all day, and the fireworks didn’t help in the slightest.”

“Me trying to control the whole day wasn’t helping either Trixie.” Starlight replied, “I should’ve been a bit more… easy going.”

The two looked at each other before running towards the other, soon enough they just started to apologize constantly and felt sorry for each other. After everything they put their items on the counter; Derrick scanned the items, “That’ll be eight dollars.” The two paid and walked out of the store with their items.

Mark sighed,it was his turn now to apologize, “Derrick… I just wanna say-“

“I don’t wanna hear it dude.” Derrick said, “I already forgive you.”

Upgrade Your Magic Coverage

After what felt like a mushy hour of apologies and roommate banter over their personal nonsense, the clock showed that thirty minutes was left before it was time for them to leave. “You just want to just lock up the shop?” Mark asked.

“I dunno.” Derrick replied, “Given the last time we wanted to try leaving early, Luna showed up. I’d say give it a bit more time.”

As if on cue one of the doors had opened, and it was indeed Luna. However this time she was accompanied by another pony. She had the same hairstyle, but it was colored like the early morning sky and her fur color was a brilliant white. “Mark, Derrick; it is great to see you two again.”

“Well it’s… been one heck of a night on our end.” Mark stated, “Who’s your friend?”

“This is my sister, Celestia.” Luna answered, waving a wing as she introduced the other pony.

“My sister has been telling me a lot about you two.” She said with a warming tone, “However we are here to talk about the… predicament that is going on with this store.”

“Oh!” Derrick exclaimed, “That reminds me.” He reached into his pockets and pulled out a handful of bits, “I think that Twilight girl needs some kind of intervention with coffee.”

Celestia looked at the clerk, “She gets like that whenever a meeting of royals and diplomats is around the corner; I’ll make sure to talk to her about this when I get a chance.”

Luna grabbed the bits and put them in her bags, “Anyways, we might have figured out what might be causing this magic interference.”

The two boys perked up, all interest now on the two royal sisters, “Well don’t keep us in suspense, tell us.”

Luna and Celestia looked at each other and took a step back, giving enough for their magic to form a general map of Equestria and a map of the Stop-n-Snak. “As you can see; this is Equestria, our home.” Luna stated.

“And this little map is our shop right?” Mark asked, pointing at the small projection of the gas station.

“Correct.” Celestia answered, “There is a magical aura that surrounds our world, it’s what gives many creatures in our world their uniqueness. Pegasi controlling the weather, unicorns having an in-depth knowledge of all things magic, and so on.”

Luna pointed towards a small shop outside the outskirts of Canterlot city, “And here is one of the many Stop-n-Snak stores in our world.”

The two clerks were in amazement, “It is freaky how that place looks exactly like our store.” Derrick said, the map closing in onto the ponies version of the store. A few key things were different; gas pumps were water troughs, the fluorescent lights were old style lamp posts, and the road was cobblestone instead of asphalt.

“Right, which is why it took me so long to realize there was something wrong.” Luna replied, the maps began to lower as a pinkish aura began to flow over the two maps, “We’ve theorized that our worlds have their own different magical auras, but now somehow they’ve somehow become intertwined with each other. As if the frequencies of the worlds were mixed.”

“I guess if you wanted to understand it a bit more easily, try thinking of a radio station coming in between other stations, or what your world has a ‘cell phone’ losing signal.”

Mark started to grin at the realization of what was going on, he looked at his friend with the smuggest look, “Guess who was right?”

Derrick sighed, “God dammit…”

“You owe me twenty bucks.” Mark said.

“I thought it was Ten?” Derrick asked.

“Think of it as interest for everything else I was right about.” Mark replied.

“Anyways, so you think this is what’s going on?” Derrick asked the two sisters.

“It is possible, but we are still unsure about it.” Luna replied, “At the very best you two just keep doing what you’re doing.”

“This world is far different from ours, I’m surprised no one has actually noticed anything wrong.” Celestia stated. She looked at the various bags of candies and snack foods, the logos and mascots were all alien to her.

“My guess is, because everyone shows up in the middle of the night and just wants to get their stuff and go home.” Mark said, thinking of a possible reason as to why no one really questioned why there wasn’t any real questioning.

“That could be.” Celestia said, “Regardless, we need to fix this as soon as possible. Who knows what could happen if this lingers.”

“I’m surprised no one from our world managed to cross to your place.” Derrick said, “Though now thinking of it… that’d be worse than us dealing with this.”

“Regardless, you two just continue what you two have been for the past few weeks.” Luna sighed, “We might have to ask others for help in this endeavor.”

“Well whatever is going on, we’ll manage.” Derrick said, “I mean, we’ve handled it so far.”

“It’s good to see you’re taking all of this well.” Celestia said.

“In all honesty, it gets boring around here, all this insanity is a good change of pace.” Mark said, “Like some weird movie or something.”

“Good luck you two.” Luna said, Celestia and her walking out of the store.

“Keep strong princesses!” The clerks exclaimed, they knew that they were the ones needing more luck than they did.

After a while the two closed up the store and got into the car. “Didn’t think there would be a store that looks exactly like ours. It’s uncanny right?” Derrick asked.

“Yeah, but at this point anything is possible; heck I didn’t even expect magic to work like how they described it.” Mark said, looking outside of the car window.

“You’re the one that thought of it.” Derrick replied.

“Yeah, but I didn’t expect it to be it.” Mark said, “I thought it was gonna be more complicated or something.” Eventually the two pulled out of the parking lot and drove back home.

Plain And Simple

A few days had passed, and the two clerks had indeed continued work as usual. At this point, taking the night shift was normal for the two as if they were wanting to see what would happen next. After the fight, the craziness, and odd purchases, they were preparing for anything to happen; but what could happen?

The two looked outside, counting the cars that passed outside and making it a fun game. It was a neck and neck game that was interrupted as the door opened. An orange pony with blonde hair and a cowboy hat walked in.

It was odd, to say the least, but at least there wasn’t anything resulting in the destruction of the store. The two were surprised; so much so that they knew there had to be something else behind this, so naturally they decided to follow the pony.

The pony looked around aimlessly, all she could do was rub her head as the colorful bags were not helping her in her shopping.

“Do you need any help?” Derrick asked, breaking the customers concentration.

“I do actually.” The pony answered, turning around to see the duo, “Do y’all happen to have any aspirin or something?”

“That’s it?” Mark asked.

“Well I would’ve gotten some earlier, but I got busy with work, and by the time I was finished… all the stores were closed.” The pony replied, as she was talking she had made her way to the drink coolers, “I then thought I could wait until tomorrow, but this headache is killing me, I couldn’t even fall asleep.”

“Yeah I know how that feels.” Derrick stated, “Don’t we Mark?”

Mark sighed as he knew exactly what his friend was talking about, “Oh… the night when we ran into that pink pony?”

“You know it. I swear by the end of the night I was seriously suggesting we should just find a different job.” Derrick said.

“Y’all ran into Pinkie Pie?” The pony asked.

“Well she found us.” Mark replied, “We were more or less trying to catch her and stop her from destroying the place; In the end she just ran off with all our candies.”

“Yeah that does sound like Pinkie.” The pony muttered before extending her hoof, “I’m Applejack by the way.”

“Well it’s nice to meet ya.” Mark said, “ I’m Mark and this is my pal Derrick.”

“Hey there.” Derrick said, “You were looking for aspirin right?”

“Yeah, do you guys got any?” Applejack answered.

“I think we have them in that one section no one looks at.” Mark replied.

“That’s not where we keep them.” Derrick said, “We moved them behind the counter.”

“Why did we do that?” Mark asked.

“That was because of that scare, back around Halloween.” Derrick replied, grabbing the keys to the locked items behind the counter, “It was that time when people thought it was part of some underground smuggling ring.”

“I still don’t understand how that sorta junk gets so much traction.” Mark replied, “I mean, what could anyone possibly do with it?”

“Stupidity isn’t a virus, but it spreads like one.” Derrick sighed. He grabbed one of the bottles and placed it on the counter, “So it’s just the pills and water?”

“Yeah, now how much do I owe ya?” Applejack asked as she dug around her saddle bags.

The clerks however were too busy thinking about what was going on. This was too simple! No comedic chases, no destruction of store and mind, no comedy of errors when looking for items. It was just a plain and simple purchase that anyone could make. Sure the reason why the item in question was outta place was off, but any store would have a reason to why something is out of place. It was off putting to the duo, and they had to say something about it.

“Are you sure that’s everything?” Mark asked.

Applejack looked at the boy quizzically, “What else would I need?” She asked, “I got what I came here for.”

Derrick looked up as soon as he was done with scanning the two items, “Sorry, he’s just a bit confused why the purchase was so ordinary.”

Applejack looked at the two, “You guys must be used to crazy ain’t ya?” She asked.

“You have no idea.” The two sighed in unison.

The farm pony chuckled, “I get it.” She stated, “You deal with craziness so much, it oddly enough becomes normal, anything else seems practically alien to ya.”

The group began to laugh for a good while until Derrick looked back at the register, “Anyway, your total is six dollars.”

Applejack sighed, “Fair enough.” She paid and then proceeded to try and open the bottle.

“Need some help?” Mark asked, Applejack nodded as she was now trying to open the bottle with her teeth. The clerk grabbed the bottle and unscrewed the lid, “this is a easy open bottle, how can you-“ Mark stopped himself and looked at himself and then back to the farm pony, “right...hands.”

Eventually he solved the bottle issue and Applejack walked out, now hoping for a more restful sleep. “Thanks a lot fellas!”

“So… that was odd.” Derrick simply said.

“I know.” Mark replied heading back to the register, “I mean after everything we’ve dealt with before.”

“Yeah, I just wasn’t expecting something so normal.” Derrick said, “But at this point, what is exactly normal?”

Mark smirked, “At least it isn’t another Pinkie encounter.” The two began laughing as they now saw one of the craziest nights of their lives was now one of the funniest things they can just spring up for a quick laugh. Their lives clearly weren’t going to be the same since the night they met these multicolored ponies waltzed into the doors of the store, anything to keep themselves distracted during the night shift was a good thing. Now the only thing that the two clerks were thinking of at this point was how long was this craziness going to last?

Roll For Initiative

“Have you noticed the odd pattern going on?” Mark asked Derrick.

“What do you mean?” Derrick asked.

“I mean we’ve been dealing with two ponies each time we work the night shift.” Mark answered, “We already go through one, and it’s near closing time again.”

Derrick looked at his friend with a judgmental look, “And by the time we’re gonna deal with the next customer, it’ll be time to close up shop right?”

“Yeah.” Mark answered, “It's like a time loop or something.”

Derrick just sighed as he tapped the counter, “I can deal with the ponies coming in here, but I draw the line at conspiracy theories.” The two clerks looked outside, waiting for anything to happen, soon enough the door opened up. A small green and purple dragon walked around, ignoring most things as if it was in its own little world, “Hey little dude, you need help?” Derrick asked.

The dragon broke out of his concentration, in his excitement fire began to come out of his mouth. The clerks were amazed, for all of five seconds until it hit the chips; at that point they rushed towards the green fire to put it out. “You can breath fire?” Mark asked, still in amazement.

The dragon looked up at the clerks, “Yeah.” He flatly stated, “Nearly every dragon can do it.”

Mark's eyes grew wider at the knowledge of all dragons being able to breath fire; all sorts of ideas began to run in his head. “Dude, what are you planning?” Derrick asked.

Mark looked at his friend, “We gotta test this dude’s fire breath, I wanna see if some of the stuff here can affect it.” Without hesitation Mark ran off to the various corners of the store in his quest to test the fire breath.

Derrick rolled his eyes and kneeled down towards the dragon's eye level, “So what brings ya here little dude?”

“Well I had to prepare for a game night with my friends tomorrow, and I had completely forgotten about the snacks!” The dragon exclaimed, he paced back and forth receding back into his own little world, “

“Calm down little man.” Derrick said, snapping the dragon out of his trance once again.

“It’s Spike.” The dragon said, looking back at Derrick.

Derrick sighed, “Okay Spike, let me help you look for what need, that way we can get this finished faster.”

Spike nodded, “Yeah, that sounds pretty great.”

The two began their hunt for snacks to make Spike’s guys night one to remember, without making Spike cry into his wallet. The two began to look high and low for some of the most common things that no game night would be without. From party sized bags of chips, to the cool refreshing sodas, and of course some candy to help anyone stay up no matter how tired they were.

By the time they were finished going through the list of snacks, Mark had returned with a bunch of spicy snacks ranging from jalapeño hotdogs, to Chernobyl ghost pepper jerky. “Let’s do this experiment!” Mark exclaimed with joy.

“Uhh… what’s going on?” Spike asked, as if knowing his health was in some way going to be jeopardized by this nut case.

“I wanna see what kind of foods affect your fire breath.” Mark answered, “What do you say, wanna do some pyrotechnics?”

Before Derrick could derail this insanity train, Spike threw caution to the wind and decided to join in on Mark’s crazy idea. They started with a bag of spicy lime chips, they had a bit of a kick yet Spike didn’t feel a thing. They tried the jalapeño dogs along with some peppers from the nacho bar, those had more punch; once again Spike did not feel anything. “Is your stomach freaking made of iron or something, how are you not feeling anything?!” Derrick asked in utter confusion.

Spike simply shrugged, “I’ve eaten stuff like this, I guess I’m just used to it.”

“Okay, let’s try the ghost pepper jerky then.” Mark replied as he opened up the bag. The scent alone was enough to bring the two to tears.

Derrick seeing this, thought it was a good time to stop the madness, “Before you guys open this Pandora’s box of pain, maybe try splitting one strip with each other instead of downing the whole bag.”

Mark nodded as he pulled out one strip of jerky and tore it in half before eating it. Spike took his piece and chewed it as well, “This ain’t so hot.” He said, suddenly as if in some cruel form of irony, Spike began to scream in pain. The heat was too much for the little guy; his normal green fire had turned a bright red, he soon started to run around the store as the spice was overwhelming him.

“Holy crap!” Mark exclaimed, “I didn’t expect that would happen!”

“What did you expect, you fed him a ton of spicy foods!” Derrick shouted back, he ran towards one of the fire extinguishers. Spike continued to run about the store, setting things on fire as Derrick followed behind trying to put out most of them.

Mark soon had an idea and ran towards the slushie machine and grabbed one of the biggest cups the store sold, “Yo Spike, chug this down!” He handed the dragon the cup and he immediately began to drink the sugary ice mix. After what felt like forever, Spike had finally finished the slushie, the fire was finally extinguished.

“Dude, how do you feel?” Derrick asked, concerned for the dragon’s well being.

Spike took a while to respond, “Other than my tongue being burnt, I’m feeling pretty good.”

“Well that’s a relief.” Mark sighed after a long session of apologizing, “Now let’s get ya all scanned.” Mark took care of scanning the items, he had decided to say that everything was on him. Spike nodded and walked out of the store, bags in tow.

“I didn’t expect you to be THAT generous.” Derrick said with a smug grin.

“Well it all was my fault.” Mark replied, “I just gotta remember not to be surprised at my paycheck on Monday.”

“Well just close up, I’m gonna get the car started.” Derrick stated as he walked outside.

The Return

Another day had gone by, and the clerks were absentmindedly looking around the store; everything seemed to be going perfectly fine, that was until they picked up on the most distinctive scent. “Is that… cotton candy?” Derrick asked.

Mark’s eyes grew wide, he knew what was coming, “We gotta barricade the doors!” He exclaimed.

The two began to run about, trying their best to fortify the establishment. A sudden bang had hit one of the doors, the clerks began to lean against the door. However their attempts were in vain as the door flew open. The two cowered in fear at the force breached their defenses, this dark force looked over them. A creature so horrendous that it’s very voice could render the skies, and its name could make the bravest cower in fear. Pinkie Pie had returned.

“Hiya guys!” Pinkie exclaimed with joy and pep, she hopped around the store as if she had won the lottery.

The two clerks looked at each other, they sighed knowing this was going to be a long night. “Hi Pinkie.” Derrick said in a deadpan tone.

Pinkie stopped in her tracks, “Aw, why the long face?” She asked, concerned for the young man.

“Oh nothing.” Derrick replied, “Just getting over the first hurdle of the night shift.”

“Well look on the bright side, you guys don’t have to stay here all night.” Pinkie said.

“Any particular reason why you’re here tonight?” Mark asked.

“Well after you guys gave me that idea for putting those candies in cookies, I wanted to see what other kind of sweets I could use in my baking.”

“Well that sounds easy enough.” Derrick said, “Let’s go to the candy section.”

Pinkie hopped with joy, the clerks sighed as they knew there wasn’t going to be a single chase or the store being destroyed in the process.

The trio looked at the various candies, to Pinkie it is an untapped wonderland of possibilities to extend her culinary reach by combining any of these items; she had reached a new level of nirvana and she wished the night would never end. “Oh my goodness, I don’t know where to start!” She exclaimed with unbridled joy.

“Well that depends on what you’re gonna do.” Mark said, “Some of these can be mixed into cookies, some of them can be mixed into ice cream, or some random combination of the two.”

Pinkie looked at the young boy and her eyes grew larger than they already had, “You can put these candies into ice cream?”

The excitement that Pinkie had at that very moment could make anyone become terrified at the implications of what was going on. The amount of energy she had could very well be used as an alternative energy source, and keep an entire city functional for up to three months; the catalyst was set and the reaction was soon to come.

“I see my mistake.” Mark said.

“Oh DO YA?!” Derrick shouted, soon enough Pinkie started to run bounce around the store in a ball of pure excitement. It was a strong sense of deja vu as Pinkie jumped about, however the two clerks had learned from the last time and did not try to catch Pinkie, and simply waited for her to wear herself out. This lasted for some time as Pinkie began to slow down, soon enough she collapsed onto the floor. “Did you get all the crazy out of your system?”

Pinkie sprung back up, as if nothing had happened, “Sorry, I’m just not sure how to properly react to this.” Pinkie replied, “I’m so used to eating candies and baked goods separate; I can plan parties decades in advance, but I never thought of combining my two favorite things together.”

The clerks laugh, “You actually plan parties in advance that far?”

“Well yeah.” Pinkie answered, “I also have a list for all my friends preferences, and their fears so I can plan their parties accordingly.” She pulled out a list with crudely drawn portraits of ponies that Mark and Derrick had encountered since they started to take the night shift, “For instance, my friend Twilight likes vanilla ice cream and red balloons, and she’s afraid of ladybugs and quesadillas.”

The clerks looked at each other and started to giggle like a pair of school girls. After their laughing fit, they proceeded to list off which candy would fit best with what kind of treat; they might have slipped the idea of ice cream cakes, but Pinkie oddly enough had thought of the idea beforehand so no real outburst was needed. By the time they were done choosing candies, Pinkie had a bag that any kid during Halloween would consider a night well done.

They started to scan the items and quietly thanked the store for having a multi item scanning system, otherwise they would be there all night scanning the candy they had picked out.

By the time they were done, the total cost was about forty dollars, just from candy alone. Needless to say, the guys were surprised, “I’m guessing they don’t have these back where you’re from?”

“Well not the way this place has it.” Pinkie replied, “They normally sell them in bulkier sizes, but these tiny versions work just as good, plus all the various kinds are better since I can fit so many in our supply closet.” The two had been to one of those bulk item shopping centers and they could agree with Pinkie. As cool as the bulk items are, the small things are better to keep around.

After she paid she bounced out of the store, happy with her bag of sweets and the knowledge of some new recipes to try out. “Okay… now let's get this place cleaned up.” Derrick said as he walked over to the supply closet.

Mark sighed as he grabbed one of the mops and a bottle of glass cleaner, “Yeah, at least this wasn’t before we closed up.” And With that, the two began to clean up the shop.

Thank You And Goodnight

The two looked around the store, with some eagerness they were anticipating another visitor before the night was over. It was around half an hour until closing and the clerks were getting a tad restless. “You think anyone else is gonna show up?” Mark asked.

“Hard to say.” Derrick said, “Although, I’m tempted to do some overtime just to find out.”

The two looked around, until they noticed that Luna popped into the room. “Hello you two.”

The two nearly fell over in shock, “Do you always make a dramatic appearance?” Derrick asked.

Luna looked around, “My apologies, but I believe I might have found the solution to our predicament.”

“Really?” Derrick asked, “Well don’t keep us in suspense, give us the details!”

“Well since our world's magic managed to become mixed up, I’ve found the reason as to why it got mixed up.” Luna said, “Back in Equestria we have found out that our magic can be blocked or messed with due to various items.”

“Like rocks or something?” Mark asked.

“Sometimes it is rocks, sometimes it can be enchanted items, like shields, armor, or just common things like books.” Luna answered, “However I don’t know what could be causing this sort of mix up.”

The two clerks thought to themselves, the idea of magic just simply being messed with by common items was ridiculous. Then again the idea of magic working much like cell phone service, they thought of something that could be the reason. “Oh god… I think I know the reason.” Derrick said before opening the door leading to the back of the store, Mark and the princess followed; Mak and Derrick climbed up the stairs while Luna decided to simply fly up to the roof of the building.

The three looked around the rooftop, nothing seemed too out of the ordinary at first glance; there was some trash that probably was blown about from somewhere else, some old soda cans, rat traps, some wrappers from the burger joint down the road, not much that seemed odd. Derrick sighed as he kneeled down and picked up a large ball of wadded up aluminum foil, “I think this might be the reason.”

“Foil?” Mark asked, picking up the ball and tossing it about, “You think this is really the cause?”

“Well, let’s test it out.” Derrick responded, “Try doing something with this Luna.”

Luna tried to pick up the ball of foil with a simple levitation spell, and to everyone’s surprise, her magic had no effect on it. “This is interesting.” Luna said, looking at the foil with great interest.

“How the heck did this thing even get up here?” Mark asked, knowing that even with all the crazy stuff they had dealt with, this was the weirdest thing to just casually be around.

“Well remember when we had to chase that hobo out of the dumpster?” Derrick asked.

“Not really.” Mark asked, “Was it the one that caused the raccoon problem, or the one that kept putting the lawn gnomes around the store?”

“No, that was the one that believed in that crazy cult; you know, the one with that giant blue goat.”

“Oh right, what was the name of them?” Mark asked, “ Union of Trogdor or something…”

“I dunno, all I know is that this thing was most likely the cause of it.” Derrick said, “How on earth are we gonna get rid of it?”

“I’ll handle that.” Luna answered. She grabbed the ball of foil and place it in her saddle bag, “I have a feeling my sister and Twilight will have a field day with trying to figure out this ball of foil.”

“Well I guess that’s it then.” Derrick said, “How is this gonna get fixed?”

“Once I return home with this ball of foil, the magic frequencies of our worlds should slide back into order.” Luna replied, “You two have managed to deal with this mix up better than I had expected.”

“It gets boring around her.” Mark replied, “In all honesty, I was actually looking forward to who was gonna show up next.”

“Yeah, it got pretty crazy.” Derrick added. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the bits that they had collected since the last visit they had with the princess of the night.

Luna took the bit and placed them into her bag, “And here is your payment for all this craziness.” She handed the two clerks a bag of gemstones along with a small book.

“What’s the book for?” The boys asked, confused with the added gift.

“Consider it a way to keep in touch.” Luna answered, “You two could use some entertainment if you take up another night shift.” She wrapped the boys in a hug with her wings, “Farewell my friends, I have enjoyed our little meetups.” With that Luna took flight. The two looked on until she had disappeared, the weeks of insanity had finally ended.

“Wow, I guess it’s finally over.” Mark said.

“Yeah.” Derrick said, he looked at his phone and looked at the time, “And that’s our cue to lock up.”

The two climbed down the ladder and proceeded to close up the store. As they got into the car they looked at the book, “What do you think she meant as a way to keep in touch?” Mark asked.

Derrick shrugged, soon enough the book began to glow brightly; he opened it up and saw some writing in it.

Derrick and Mark, I am writing to see if this was indeed working. I thought of using this book as a way to keep in touch with each other; my sister once gave one of these books to one of her old students, before Twilight Sparkle. I hope to use this and keep in touch every once in a while.

“Cool!” Mark exclaimed, “Luna gave us a magic book.”

“I’d say it’s more of a journal, but yeah.” Derrick said, “I guess after everything we’ve been through, she wanted to see what else we get into.” He flipped through the book and saw a photo of Luna and all the ponies they had met over their night shifts. Soon enough they pulled out, and drove back home, wondering what might happen next in this crazy job.