Misconceptions

"Isn't it amazing, Pinkie?" Twilight nodded, her horn pointing towards the Ponyville Rest Inn as they passed into the outskirts of Ponyville.  "All this recent construction is bringing lots of progress to Ponyville!  With a hotel in town, we can attract visitors, who'll bring more revenue so Ponyville can grow even more!"

Pinkie squinched her mouth up into a frown.  "I don't know, Twilight.  I kinda like Ponyville being all small and cozy.  I mean, I know everypony here!" She hopped backward and bounced on her tail.  "If there's lots of ponies coming and going all the time, how can I give them all a real welcome to Ponyville?"

It was Twilight's turn to frown.  "Hmm.  I hadn't thought about it like that.  I guess parties would be more difficult for you if Ponyville got too busy."

"And another thing!  Construction is dumb!" Pinkie reared up on her hind legs and pointed an accusing hoof into the middle of town, the fourth story of a half-finished building peeking up above a skyline otherwise composed of thatched roofs.  "All the noise interrupts my singing, and the dust gets into my cooking, and I tried to talk to the construction site ponies once but they were boring meanie-pantseseses!  So there!"

Twilight gave a rueful smile.  "Well, unfortunately there's not much we can do about all that except wait it out.  Don't worry, Pinkie," she continued, laughing softly, "I'm sure Ponyville will continue to be the cozy little town you've always loved for quite a long time.

"...Uh, Pinkie?"

Twilight turned to see just what had caused her friend to grow so suddenly silent.  Pinkie stood beneath the hotel's sign, eyes fixed upward.  Twilight followed Pinkie's gaze and noticed nothing odd, save that the "No Vacancy" sign was lit, glowing warmly against the fading evening sun.

"That's strange," she said, tilting her head to the side.  "They just opened this place.  I wouldn't think it'd be full already.  Well, maybe that's a good sign!"

Pinkie said nothing, only continuing to stare at the sign, eyes wide.  Twilight's hooves shifted to the side.

"Umm, well... I've got a new book on the plant life of southern Equestria, Pinkie, so I think maybe I'll head home now and start reading it." She paused.  "If that's okay.  Pinkie?"

"Go ahead," Pinkie murmured, waving a hoof in Twilight's direction.

Grateful for the dismissal, Twilight powered up her teleportation spell and vanished in a flash of light.  Only then did Pinkie move, her eyes tracking the fall of the light down the sign to the ground below.  It shone upon a large bush, covered in small pink berries, planted near the base of the pole that supported the sign.

Pinkie's pupils dilated to pinpoints.  With a gasp and a sharp scream, she sprang into the air and tore off into Ponyville.

The bush didn't seem to notice.

Twilight wished the pirate captain would shut up those stupid birds and focus on keeping his ship steady.  Every time he sent her to walk the plank, it listed to the side and she had to teleport back.  Honestly, the nerve!

As Twilight's eyelids cracked open, she realized two things.  First, that the rocking motion was actually her bed jostling up and down, as though somepony were jumping on it.  Second, that the chirping birds were actually a voice, and that it wasn't chirping, but yelling at her, high-pitched and panicked.

"Twilight, you gotta wake up, there's were-bushes and curses and chuckleberries afloat!  Twilight, come on!  Come on Twilight, wake up!"

"I'm up, I'm up!"

Jerking upright from drowsiness to screeching wakefulness in a moment, Twilight levitated Pinkie off the bed.  She was just awake enough to make sure her friend's landing was gentle.  Pinkie immediately zipped back to the bedside and shoved her face in Twilight's.

"Pinkie!  What in the hay is wrong with you?  Do you have any idea how early it is?"

"I know, Twilight, which is why I had to wake you up before anypony else gets up and eats them!" Her eyes were wide and earnest, and filled with just a bit of fear, a strange emotion to see on Pinkie's face.  "I was up all night drinking coffee and trying to figure out what it was that I saw and then I figured it out and I had to come straight here and tell you because you're the only one who can help me stop them!"

"Stop who?" Twilight rolled off the other side of the bed and clomped downstairs.  "Eat what?  You're not making any sense and all I want to eat is breakfast!  Spike!"

Spike scratched his side and rolled over, mumbling, "Mm, pizza..."  Pinkie bounded over him and down the steps, keeping pace with Twilight as she made for the kitchen.

"There's no time, Twilight!  C'mon, you gotta come with me!  I brought muffins so we can eat on the way!" Pinkie stopped between Twilight and her kitchen table, giving her a face full of watery eyes.  "Please?  They're fresh!  And cherry!"

Despite the annoyance of having been awoken at such an awful hour, and in such a violent manner, the concept of fresh cherry muffins was just tantalizing enough to push Twilight's irritation to the wayside.  She let out a huff.

"All right, Pinkie.  I will join you for muffins on the way to whatever it is you're talking about.  But you'd better have a darn good explanation by the time we get there!"

Pinkie did not, in fact, have an explanation befitting Twilight's criteria by the time they arrived at their destination.  Mostly, she got distracted in talking about coffee and all the joyful ways it kept her up at night and gave her energy to do the things that she needed to, and Twilight found herself wishing that it did not in fact exist.  Especially when she realized their destination was the Ponyville Rest Inn.  As they approached the building, Pinkie grabbed Twilight and pushed her behind a stand of trees, as though she was afraid of being seen.

Twilight sighed disparagingly.  "All right, Pinkie, I give.  What was so freaking important that you had to drag me out of bed to see?"

"Look!"

A shaky hoof pointed to a black-maned blue stallion bent over beneath the still lit "No Vacancy" sign.  He faced away from them, but Twilight could see a small gardening trowel in his mouth.

"I see a gardener," she said plainly.

"That's just what he wants you to think, Twilight!" Pinkie's voice lowered to a hiss.  "He's one of them!  He's a were-bush!"

She grabbed Twilight's face, directing her gaze just to the left of the stallion.

"Last night, I saw it, beneath the light of the No Vacancy sign: a were-bush, just laden down with chuckleberries!"

"He's just planting flowers, Pinkie." Twilight tried and failed to wrest herself from Pinkie's grasp.  "I don't see any bushes."

"That's just it, Twilight!  The bush is gone because he is the bush!  Now do you understand?"

Twilight moaned and grimaced.  "Not in the least.  Pinkie, I've never heard of chuckleberries, and I'm pretty sure there's no such thing as a were-bush.  Now would you please let me go?"

Pinkie released her grip with such ferocity that Twilight's head vibrated up and down.  "You mean you've never heard of chuckleberries?  Well, Twilight, let me explain!"

The light in the area dimmed, save for one beam that shone down upon Pinkie.  Twilight looked around, slightly confused as music started up, drawing the stallion's attention, and Pinkie began to sing.

"Oh in the dark of night, beneath the light of a hotel No Vacancy sign, please do not eat anything that you meet, growing on branch or vine!"

Pinkie drew down a branch of one of the trees, upon which hung an apple.  Turning it around, she revealed it was half-rotted and full of worms.  Twilight stuck her tongue out, getting the hint.

"Beneath that glow, chuckleberries grow, so sweet and temptingly small!  But eat one and you're cursed -- any more and it's worse! -- to be a were-bush once and for all!"

Twilight rolled her eyes.  "I still don't get it."

The music halted for a moment as a number of ponies from around Ponyville popped into the stand of trees and surrounded them.

"What's it all fer?" cried an older stallion.

"Is there any cure?" wailed a trio of mares.

A large stallion prodded Pinkie in the side and intoned in a deep voice, "It sounds pretty serious, we oughta be sure!"

Pinkie nodded and leaped onto a stump, pointing at the various assembled ponies in turn.  "There are things you'll need, if you just take heed, you can make it out alive!  Listen well my friends, for this spells the end of the Chuckleberry Chive!"

Twilight fell back onto her haunches, face twitching as she stared at the spectacle before her.  "Chuckleberry what?"

Pinkie hopped down onto the ground and began dancing while producing items from out of nowhere.  The ponies formed a circle and joined in the dance.

"Three-cheese pizza!"

Together, the ponies chorused, "The Chuckleberry Chive!"

Twilight narrowed her eyes.  "Oh, come on."

Pinkie held up the next object.  "Rooster feather!"

"The Chuckleberry Chive!"

"Please, stop," Twilight moaned, but Pinkie was undeterred.

"Daring Do book!"

"The Chuckleberry Chive!"

Twilight teleported directly behind Pinkie, stood, and slapped her hoof around Pinkie's mouth, cutting off her next words.  She shouted, "Knock it off already!"

A record skipped.  The ponies, halfway through a synchronized dance step, lost their tempo and faltered, collapsing into a heap.  At the back of the crowd, a white unicorn wearing sunglasses pouted and began to wheel her portable record player back to town.  Taking her place was the blue stallion gardener, who had been watching the entire scene from the hotel.

"What in the hay's goin' on here, eh?" he asked as the ponies picked themselves up and, grumbling and muttering, followed the unicorn back into Ponyville.

"Fess up!" Pinkie cried, wrenching herself free from Twilight's grasp.  "You're a were-bush!  We all know it!  You're down with the Chuckleberry Chive!"

The stallion shook his head pityingly.  "Miss, I got no idea what you're on aboot.  That No Vacancy sign's on the fritz.  Brand new and already got problems with it!  Go figure, eh?  Anyway, I ain't no were-bush or whatever you said.  I'm an earth pony like you.  My name's Night Keys, and I own the hotel.  Just been doin' a bit of landscaping to clear out the unwanted plants afore we start gettin' busy is all."

Twilight cleared her throat and stepped forward, offering the stallion her hoof.  "Mister Keys, I'm very sorry about all the bother.  My name's Twilight Sparkle, I'm Ponyville's librarian, and this is my friend Pinkie Pie."

A glance back at Pinkie showed her baring her teeth and growling.  Twilight quickly continued, "She's usually very nice about welcoming new ponies to town, I promise!  It's just that sometimes she gets weird ideas in her head and it's hard to convince her otherwise, heh heh!"

For the second time that morning, she scooped Pinkie up with levitation and began to trot off.  "We'll leave you alone now, sir.  Again, we're very sorry for all the noise!"

"Eh, it wasn't too big a bother, eh.  Get your friend some help, though, that's my advice."

Twilight gave a nervous laugh and took off in a run for Ponyville, while Pinkie blew a raspberry to Night Keys.

"Come on, Pinkie."

Neither noticed the bushes rustling in the clearing they had been in.

"Would you mind explaining what that was all about back there?"

Twilight didn't set Pinkie back on her hooves until they were back on Stirrup Street and headed for the library.  Pinkie huffed and turned her nose up.

"I seem to recall having explained everything very clearly, Twilight!"

Twilight sighed and squeezed her eyes shut for a moment.  "No, Pinkie.  No you didn't.  I get that you think there was something weird about a bush over at the hotel, but that was no reason to disturb a legitimate businesspony early in the morning.  Not to mention I don't think you know what the word 'chive' means."

"Fine." Pinkie whirled on her.  "I'll lay it all out in words you can understand!"

Pinkie began animatedly gesticulating and hopping about as she explained.

"Chuckleberries are little pink berries that taste really good and only grow on were-bushes by the light of a hotel No Vacancy sign.  Anypony who's tempted into eating them is sure to be cursed by the Chuckleberry Chive, and will turn into a were-bush themselves under that same light!  Then they'll grow lots and lots of chuckleberries, and entice more ponies into eating them, and then the cycle starts all over!"

She began pacing back and forth.  "And I think Mister Night Keys, if that's his real name, is actually a were-bush!  And there's only one way to cure the Chuckleberry Chive!  You need an eight-inch three-cheese pizza, a cockatrice feather, and the latest Daring Do novel!  If you get all these things together and combine them, you can remove the curse and turn the pony back to normal!"

"Pinkie..."

"I know what you're going to say, Twilight." Pinkie frowned, her eyes casting groundward.  "That there's no such thing as curses.  But it doesn't matter what you call it, it's just like Poison Joke!  It's as real as real can be!  Like the parasprites!"

That took Twilight aback.  She cleared her throat.  "Pinkie, the difference between that and this is that the parasprites were real.  They were a real problem, that we could see, and we were wrong to ignore your methods for getting rid of them.  But there are no such things as chuckleberries or were-bushes.  I would have read about them in my book on plant life!"

Now it was her turn to pace.  Pinkie's head swivelled back and forth as she did.

"Not to mention you've got no evidence whatsoever that they do or ever have existed, or that Mister Night Keys is one of them!  You're jumping to conclusions!" Twilight paused, frowning.  "Pinkie, I hate to say this, but I think you need to learn the difference between what's in your head and what's real."

She immediately regretted having said it as Pinkie's face fell and her eyes began to water.

"Pinkie," Twilight whispered, "I'm sorry, I..."

In a burst of sobbing and tears, Pinkie dashed off toward Sugarcube Corner.  Twilight stretched a hoof out after her.

"Pinkie, wait, please!  I... I didn't mean it..."  She sighed.  "Way to go, Twilight."

Then her stomach growled.  It didn't seem like she'd had breakfast all that long ago, but then again muffins were not the most filling of treats.

"I'll have some brunch and then go talk to Fluttershy," she said to herself.  "She'll know what to do."

"And then she ran off crying."

"Oh dear, that's awful!"

Twilight stood outside the little tree cottage as Fluttershy flitted about, feeding her bird friends.  She'd been most attentive as Twilight laid out the entire story.

"And I just... Fluttershy, I don't know what to do.  I've really never even seen Pinkie cry before.  How can I take back what I said?"

"You can't," Fluttershy said, looking over her shoulder with a sad smile.  "But you can show her that you're sorry, and that you care.  You should probably wait until she's ready to talk to you, though.  It was a good thing you didn't run off after her immediately, or it could have made things worse!"

Twilight groaned.  "Well, that's the last thing I want to do right now."

Fluttershy alighted on the ground as the birds circled overhead, chirping happily, and nodded, smiling.  She gave Twilight a soft hug.

"You might also try seeing things from her perspective."

Twilight made a face.  "What?  But how?"

"Well, what if there really were were-bushes?"

"Uh..." Twilight shrugged.  "Then I guess it would be parasprites all over again and I'd owe her two apologies." She began to pace.  "But there aren't were-bushes, Fluttershy, that's the point.  I even have a new book about plant life!  There's no mention of chuckleberries or any of this other nonsense.  It's just Pinkie being Pinkie."

Fluttershy's smile turned sad again.  "What's wrong with being Pinkie?  She sings songs and throws parties, and maybe she says something silly now and then, but she never hurts anypony."

"But..."

"Twilight." Fluttershy placed a hoof on Twilight's shoulder.  "You've got to learn to appreciate Pinkie for who she is, not who you want her to be.  Even if she's a little, um, silly sometimes, that's a part of her.  She'll always be Pinkie, and you can be her friend as long as you can accept that.  It doesn't matter what's real or not."

"Actually, I beg to differ," said a cultured voice from below.

Twilight and Fluttershy gaped down the path at a pony who looked like Pinkie, but could not possibly be Pinkie.  She was a pink earth pony, yes, with poofy magenta mane, but she wore a modest high-necked lavender party dress, of a style fashionable in Canterlot high society, and a wide-brimmed white hat.  A pair of square spectacles perched upon her nose, which she looked down as she gazed upon them.

"Pinkie?" Twilight gasped.

"My name is Pinkamina, do please use it," Pinkie scoffed.  "Miss Sparkle, I just wanted to say thank you."

"W-what for?" Twilight glanced to Fluttershy, who seemed just as lost.

"You see," Pinkie said, continuing with her high-class airs, "what you last said to me began to make sense after a while of thinking upon it.  I've realized that I have been approaching life in entirely the wrong way all this time." She sniffed haughtily and smiled.  "Which is why today is the first day in the life of the new Pinkamina Diane Pie!  No longer shall I fritter away my time with frivolities.  From now on, I shall focus only upon that which lies before me!" She made a sweeping gesture with one hoof.  "Reality!  It's truly wondrous!"

"B-but Pinkie!" Twilight choked.  "I mean, Pinkamina, what about your parties?  Are you giving those up too?"

"Oh, dear girl, perish the thought!" Pinkie gave a high-pitched chuckle.  "No, I am still quite enamored with party planning, you see.  As a matter of fact, I am about to meet our good friend Rarity for a tea party!  I simply thought to stop by and ask if Fluttershy or yourself would like to attend."

"Um..." Fluttershy looked helplessly at Twilight.  "I-I'd love to, Pinkamina, but you see, I, uh... Still have a lot of animals to feed, yeah!"

"Ah well," said Pinkie, and shrugged.  "There shall be other times for such travails.  Until then, my dears!  Ta!"

She turned and, swishing her bustle, sauntered off down the path in the direction of Carousel Boutique.

Twilight stared, open mouthed, first at Pinkie, then at Fluttershy.

"We've got to do something," she said, "and fast!" She dropped to her knees.  "Or we'll never see the old Pinkie Pie ever again and it'll be all my fault!"

Just at that moment, somepony near the center of town screamed so loudly and shrilly that they heard it from Fluttershy's house as clearly as if the screamer had been standing next to them.  They looked at each other, panic written on their features.

"Sh-should we go see what that was about?" Fluttershy asked, shaking.

Twilight took a long glance in the direction that Pinkie had gone, then steeled herself.

"Let's go."

It was easy to find the source of the trouble: just follow the screams.  Getting there was another matter.  They had to dodge a continuous stream of frightened townsponies in order to make it in.  Fluttershy's panicked mantra of "Oh my goodness, oh my goodness!" did nothing but keep Twilight on edge.  By the time they had found the source of the confusion, she was wishing she'd teleported and left the pegasus to arrive under her own power.

A flash of six colors caught Twilight up short and interposed itself between her and the moving shapes in the distance.

"Twilight, what in the hay is going on?"

"If you would move, Rainbow Dash," Twilight growled, shoving her friend aside, "I'd be able to... Oh no!"

Lumbering up Ponyville Square were a quartet of large, shambling plants.  They lurched forward on a trio of stubby roots jutting from large boles, a motion which caused them to sway back and forth in a manner that was nauseating to watch for long.  Long stalks surrounded by branches and branches of bushy leaves comprised their bodies.  At the top of each stalk was a large flower, of a washed-out puce with vomitous pink spots, from which emerged a long, snaking and obviously dextrous tendril.  The plants all made intermittent screeching noises as they wobbled toward the ponies, and Twilight found herself frozen in place.

"Are they..." Fluttershy gulped loudly.  "W-w-were-bushes?"

Twilight's mind leapt like a snapping rubber band, from point to point to point.  The only conclusion she could reach was, Yes!

"Run!"

"Come on, Twilight," Rainbow Dash said as she followed them away from the plant monsters, "those things are as slow as Tank!  I don't think we really need to be afraid of them."

"We have to find Pinkie," Twilight panted.  "She knows... how to stop them.  She's... with Rarity!"

"Do you have a plan, Twilight?" Fluttershy asked.

Twilight only stared at Fluttershy as though her head were made of cheese.

"Plan, haha!" Her eye twitched.  "Right!  Plan!  Fluttershy, you and Rainbow Dash head for the library.  I'll go to Rarity's and find Pinkie, then meet you and we can... Uh, do something."

Rainbow and Fluttershy exchanges glances.  "Something?"

"I'll know what we're doing when I find out!" Twilight shouted, and in a flash, she was gone.

She materialized outside the Boutique, in an area of town somewhat quieter than where she had just teleported from.  Heedless of decorum, she burst in through the doors, to find herself in a warmly-lit, cozy parlor, filled with the soft sounds of a string quartet and the polite laughter of two female voices.

"Goodness," said a voice that she instantly identified as Rarity, "it seems somepony has decided to ignore my lovely 'Closed Today' sign!"

"Rarity!" Twilight called.  "Pinkie...amina.  I need your help!  There are plant monsters in Ponyville!"

"Yes, dear," Rarity said calmly, coming out from around the corner.  She was wearing a lilac dress that was almost more ruffles than dress, and a hat with a thoroughly ridiculous number of feathers in it.  "There was so much screaming, we had to turn the record up."

Twilight boggled at her friend, then lowered her head and marched past her.  "Excuse me."

The tea party itself was being held in the plushest den Twilight had ever seen.  Everything that wasn't covered by drapes was heaped with pillows.  In the middle sat a short table with an elaborate ornamental tea set.  Pinkie sat to one side, casually sipping from a white porcelain teacup.  She did not react to the intrusion until Twilight cleared her throat.

"Yes?" The question was languid.

"Pinkamina, I need your help."

"I heard you the first time, dear girl." Pinkie sipped once more at her tea.

"You were right about the were-bushes, it's parasprites all over again!  I need to know the song, the lyrics to the song!  I can't remember them, and they're the only thing that can stop these plants!"

Pinkie turned her head slowly, and peered over the top of her spectacles at Twilight.  "Why ever should you wish to know something as silly as that, Twilight my dear?"

A lump formed in Twilight's throat.  She felt tears sting the corners of her eyes.

"Pinkie, I want to say that I'm very, very sorry for what I said to you today.  I'm sorry I made you think you had to be anypony else at all.  You're my friend, and I appreciate you for who you are."  Twilight leaned forward.  "And right now, I need some of that amazing, outlandish, completely free-wheeling Pinkie thinking to help solve this problem."

Pinkie smiled demurely.  "Oh.  Is that all?"

In a single motion, she whipped off her dress, balloons and confetti bursting out from beneath it.

"Apology accepted!"

With no further prompting, Pinkie recreated the dance and chorus that Twilight had witnessed that morning.  When it was done, Twilight threw her arms around Pinkie and hugged her tightly.

"Pinkie, you're back!"

"Silly Twilight!" Pinkie laughed, her voice back to normal.  "I never left!"

Rarity rejoined them, smiling broadly.  "I suppose we'll have to cancel the tea party," she said ruefully.

"Not cancel," Pinkie replied, "just postpone to a time when there aren't horrible plant monsters marauding through downtown Ponyville!"

"Right!" Twilight said, grinning.  "You two meet us in Ponyville Square in five minutes.  I have to go prepare some ingredients first!"

With a thought, she was in the library.  Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash were frantically searching the shelves, leaving a large pile of books on the floor, and didn't notice Twilight until she spoke.

"All right, girls," said Twilight resolutely, "we need a three-cheese pizza, a cockatrice feather, and my copy of Daring Do and the Quartzite Question!"

"Oh man!" Rainbow cried.  "Twilight, don't tell me how it ends, I haven't read it yet!"

"Sorry, Rainbow, but you may have to wait a while longer.  Fluttershy, do you know where I can get a cockatrice feather?"

"Um..." Fluttershy glanced to the side.  "No."

"That's all right.  See if you can find my Guide to Plant Life in Southern Equestria instead.  It should be filed under Nature.  I want to see if I can't find these things in it once and for all!"

She rushed into the kitchen, because there weren't many other places she could think to rush to.  The first problem was that neither she nor Fluttershy had any cockatrice feathers.  The second was that she really had no idea how these disparate elements were meant to stop plant monsters in the first place.  Asking Pinkie that detail had sort of been pushed to the wayside, as all her concentration had been spent in just keeping herself together enough to teleport.  So she focused on the task at hoof: pizza.

"Oh hey, Twilight," said Spike cheerfully.  "You're just in time for lunch!"

"Lunch!" Twilight's eyes grew wide.  In his claws, Spike was holding just the thing she needed: a piping-hot cheese pizza, and just the right size for a single dragon to consume on his own.

"Spike, I need to borrow that!" She scooped the pizza out of his grasp and galloped for the door.

"Hey!  I've been waiting since yesterday to eat that!"

"I promise I'll get you another one!  Bigger, even!"

"Aw, man." Spike sat down on the floor and crossed his arms over his growling stomach.

Twilight carried the pizza outside as Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash emerged with their books.

"Is that everything?" Rainbow asked.  Twilight could only shake her head.

"I don't have any cockatrice feathers and I don't know where to get any at short notice.  We're going to have to hope this is enough."

The plant had made a turn in midtown and were now lumbering directly for them.  Fluttershy squeaked in fear and clutched the book of plants to her chest.

"D-do you know what to do next, Twilight?"

Twilight squared up against the plant creatures.  She narrowed her eyes.  The pizza floated menacingly nearby.

"I have no idea.  Charge!"

She lowered her head and did just that, Rainbow Dash hollering and whooping beside her as she brandished the book like a shield.  Twilight let the pizza fly and it sailed into the midst of the plants, landing in a squishy heap.  The three of them skidded to a halt.

"I don't think it's supposed to work like that," Rainbow Dash remarked.

The plants seemed drawn by the pizza, however.  They leaned over, tendrils unfurling to curl over the hot, cheesy surface.  As they fed, or whatever it was they were doing, the cheese began to come apart and stick to them.  After a few moments, the four monsters were entangled with one another.  The screaming reached a new, higher pitch, and Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy covered their ears as Pinkie and Rarity emerged from a side street, likewise shielding themselves from the keening..

"Well, that turned out all right, I'd say," Twilight said, and drew the book of plant life to herself, opened it and flipping pages quickly.  "Now to find out what you all... What?"

There, in the third section, near the end, was a picture of the very creatures Twilight was staring down.

"Triffids?" she exclaimed.

"You mean they aren't were-bushes?" Pinkie asked, disappointed.

"No!" Twilight stared at the page.  "And they aren't hostile, either.  In fact, it says here that triffids are shy and very intelligent.  They tend to stay near the edges of forests and don't venture into populated areas.  So why are they here?"

She furrowed her brow and flipped to a marker in the final section in the book that indicated the talk to plants spell.  After a moment to refresh herself on the mental components, she cast it at the triffids.  Their screams immediately became intelligible to all in the area.

"Hot!  So hot!"

"Make the pain stop!"

"It burns, it burns my tongue!"

"Please, let us go!"

Twilight dropped the book.  "Oh my gosh.  Rarity, help me!"

Together, the two unicorns used their magic to delicately lift the molten cheese from the four creatures, whose wailing was reduced to mere whimpers of pain as they were freed.  Once the task was finished, Twilight and her friends gathered around the triffids, who swayed drunkenly and clung to one another.

"We're sorry," said one.  "We're sorry for scaring ponies."

"We're the ones who should be sorry," Twilight said solemnly.  "There was no reason to attack you.  But what are you all doing in Ponyville?"

"We wanted to talk," said another.  "Wanted to talk to ponies, but they don't understand."

"Ponies took our land," said a third, its voice filled with regret.  "Made stone houses, no good to live by."

Twilight and Pinkie looked at one another.  "You mean all the new construction at the outskirts of town is pushing you out of your natural habitat?"

The puce stems bobbed forward.  "Yes, yes, yes," said the voices, and the gathered ponies all looked shamefully at the ground.

"I don't know how we can make it up to you," Twilight said at length, "but you have my word that we will try and find a way to compromise, and make sure you have access to the land you need."

"Thank you!  Thank you!"

"Ponies are good, we knew it."

The swaying motion calmed then, and one triffid bent down, brushing the edge of its flower gently against Twilight's horn.  The action released a small cloud of pollen, and she sneezed, then laughed.

With the triffids seen safely back to the edge of the Everfree Forest, and both Mayor Mare and Night Keys briefed about the impact the construction was having, Twilight and her friends at long last had a peaceful evening together, laughing and relaxing in the library with juice and cookies.  Spike got his large pizza, and a stomachache afterward, and Rainbow Dash got her Daring Do book.

"I really do want to apologize to you again, Pinkie," Twilight said.  "I still feel awful for what I said to you."

"Water under the bridge, Twilight," Pinkie said with a large grin and a hug.  "I'm the one who should apologize.  If I hadn't spent so much time telling you about chuckleberry bushes, you might have remembered about the triffids sooner!" She snickered and rubbed her hoof against Twilight's mane.  "You really need to learn to tell the difference between what's real and what's in my head!"

They shared a laugh at that, as their friends looked on.

"But there's one thing I simply do not understand," Rarity said, sipping at a teacup she'd brought from the boutique.  "If, after all of this trouble, were-bushes and so forth simply do not exist, why did the pizza stop the triffids?"

Twilight gave Pinkie a confused look.  "That is a good question."

Pinkie shrugged.  "Chalk it up to luck, I guess!"

"Or a little of the old Pinkie-style lateral thinking," Twilight added.  "You know, this gives me a great idea for a letter to write to the Princess.  I've learned to really appreciate other ways of thinking, especially when they come from my friends."

"That sounds wonderful, Twilight," Fluttershy said quietly.

"But don't write that letter just yet, Twilight," Pinkie said suddenly, and all eyes turned to her.

For a moment, nopony spoke.  Then Twilight asked, "Why not?"

Pinkie grinned and hopped up on the coffee table.  "Because we need a reprise first!"

With a laugh, she launched into song, and her friends joined in.

Three-cheese pizza!

The Chuckleberry Chive!

Rooster feather!

The Chuckleberry Chive!

Daring Do book!

The Chuckleberry Chive!

Put 'em all together, and I guarantee

That's how you get out alive!

Yeah!