Private Pinkie

Chapters

1 - I Just Really Don't Care
2 - Put Your Hooves In The Air Tonight
3 - Staring At The Mirror
4 - This Has Been A Warning Shot
5 - All We Need Is Some Laughter

1 - I Just Really Don't Care

11:37 - 16/01/1005 - Near Appleloosa, Mixie

Conscript life sucks.

Six hours past high moon: awoken by the crack of a defanged rifle and the shouts of the CO. Six till seven: the whole barrack onto the parade grounds for mandatory nonstop exercise. Seven: a shower and a change of clothes or else their clothes reek of sweat for the rest of the night. No later than half past seven: all were to stand in formation outside the barrack and wait for the CO to tell them what they were doing for the night.

From there it was like a roll of the dice. It could be vehicle maintenance, could be scrubbing the floors, could be standing in a guard tower, could be any number of other things including absolutely nothing. Tonight was one of those “lucky” nights that Privates Pinkamena and Maud Pie had a job to do that got them outside the camp: Hop in a jeep and drive around on patrol.

After Nightmare Moon’s takeover, all her Equestrian subjects were required to sign up for conscription and enlist for two years of military service before they turned twenty-eight years old. The four sisters of the Pie family, not wanting to leave their parents and family rock farm alone, opted to go in pairs at separate times. Their two other sisters, Marble and Limestone, had already completed their mandatory two years, and in August, it was Pinkie and Maud’s turn.

Right away they’d been shipped off to boot camp, and while the experience was fine for the stoic-as-stone Maud, it was torment for the hyperactive Pinkie. Every night for four months, it felt like what made Pinkie Pinkie was being crushed, chewed up, spat out, all over and over again like bubblegum. It was a miracle that her mane still kept its spring at the end of it all. The most positive thing she could say is that she’s learned more about explosives than she’d ever thought she’d want to, which gave her a few ideas for fireworks displays after she was out.

After that, it was off to Camp Copper in the Equestrian Southwest, where they were then stationed. The camp had been built shortly after the establishment of the Lunar Empire to serve two primary purposes, one was to prevent monster attacks in the area, the other was to ensure peace between the local ponies and buffalo. While they were on patrol, they were meant to look for anything monster-shaped and either deal with it themselves if they could or report it back to camp if it was too much.

With only the grumble of the open-top jeep’s engine, Maud quietly drove through the silent, lonely desert, her pet Boulder settled on the dashboard. Pinkie was slouched in the passenger seat, silently sulking as she stared up at the starry sky. So far, no luck on their mission. Enchanted night-vision goggles made the job easier, but no less dull. All there was to see was endless miles of auburn-coloured deserts dotted with the occasional butte, plateau, or hill. Technically it was a good thing that they’d found nothing, that ideally meant there were no monsters to worry about, but Pinkie could only think of all the things she’d rather be doing. At least she knew how to make a game out of scrubbing the washroom floor.

The thing was, Pinkie had exceptional talents that were useful in a military setting. She could dig trenches and ditches at lightning speed, she could punch through solid rock, she had a sixth sense that could detect imminent danger, and she even had access to hammerspace. But what joy was she supposed to derive in an environment of enforced mass conformity?

Pinkie eventually broke the silence with a groan. “Huhhgh, Maaaud, I’m so booored!” she exclaimed, throwing her hooves into the air.

“You are supposed to be keeping lookout,” Maud stated plainly, appearing to pay Pinkie no heed as she kept her eyes solely on the road.

“But there’s nothing out there!” Pinkie whined, gesturing to the lifeless landscape dominated by dull rocks and dead plants. “If there was, my Pinkie Sense would’ve sent me spinning! Literally! No monsters, no trespassers, no nothing! It’s just rocks and sand!”

“They’re not ‘just rocks’, Pinkie,” Maud said. “Mixie is home to some of the most fascinating geology in Equestria. Just look at the buttes. They’re composed of horizontally bedded sedimentary rock and sandstone, gradually moulded into the shape we see tonight over three hundred million years of constant erosion-”

“It’s boooriiing, though!” Pinkie groaned. A few seconds of whinging later, Pinkie leapt out of her seat and into the back of the vehicle. “I’m gonna see if there’s anything fun back here!” she announced as she started to rummage through the supplies.

“Pinkie,” Maud said in a stern tone, like a mother talking to a disobedient child. “There’s live ammunition back there, do not do anything-”

A sudden noise. Maud flinched. But it was not the harsh crack of a gunshot she heard, and when she realised this, she quickly calmed down. Instead, a nasally blast of discordant musical notes, and moments later the air was filled with a vibrant cascade of rich, reedy music.

The sound was too distinct to be anything else. Pinkie had found an accordion in the back of the jeep, and she was playing it remarkably well. How? Why? Maud didn’t wonder, it was just Pinkie Pie being Pinkie Pie. More than anything, Maud was delighted that Pinkie was still herself and still able to conjure such joy.

Maud parked the jeep by the side of the road and turned herself around to watch Pinkie play. While her face didn't show it, she was in awe at the raw technical talent on display. Pinkie's hooves cleanly and gracefully slid up and down the keys and buttons on either side of the instrument, slowly pulling it open and closing it again as the song required, producing a resonant tune that expressed a sense of boundless whimsical joy. A small smile slowly crept its way onto Maud’s lips.

When Maud and Pinkie drove back to camp, they had nothing to report. Pinkie was still playing the accordion, mostly making up tunes on the fly, and had attracted the attention of some of the ponies in the camp. It started with a few ponies following their jeep to the garage, curious as to what was going on. After the jeep had been parked and Maud left to report her findings, or lack thereof, more ponies had gathered outside the garage as Pinkie happily performed. Before long several barracks worth of ponies had gathered, shouting cheers and song requests.

Already lively, Pinkie’s smile grew wider and her playing turned to a performance as soldiers around the camp gathered around her jeep. Where once there were cold dejected frowns amongst the soldiers, there were now wide buoyant grins. Even some of the officers who had gained a reputation for being strict and stern had made themselves present, enjoying the show as any other attendant was.

After finishing a song she’d come up with on the spot, she set the accordion down.

“Play something funny!” a captain cried.

“Yeah, Pinkie!” a sergeant shouted.

“Now do Classical Gas!” a lieutenant lipped.

“Okay!” Pinkie picked up the accordion again. Acquiescing to the requests, Pinkie improvised the best cover she could muster with nothing but an accordion. It was good for what it was, and the audience went wild. The cheers were so loud Pinkie could barely hear herself play, but she continued undeterred. The commanders responsible for maintaining discipline didn’t even try to stop it, they were caught up in it.

While nopony knew it at the time, this was Pinkie’s last night as an ordinary conscript.

2 - Put Your Hooves In The Air Tonight

21:58 -19/09/1007 - Fort Thunder Struck, Hayseed Province

In a way she never would’ve imagined possible, Pinkie had achieved her dream of putting smiles on as many faces as possible.

‘Private Pinkie’. The name was known up and down the country and even beyond. If a soldier heard that she was coming to their base, they'd mark the date as soon as they got the chance as everypony immediately knew that a night of fun was being launched directly towards them out of the barrel of a party cannon. A party of music, dancing, drinks, and friendship. A night where they could forget all the drudgery of military life and be reminded of just how great it was to be alive.

Ponies who didn't know better may have assumed the name was an artificial invention rather than a natural coincidence. The alliteration fit together so well, the rank of Private expressed humility, and the name Pinkie conjured up bubbly childlike cuteness. But no, Pinkie was really her name and Private really was her rank. Technically, she wasn't enlisted personnel anymore, but for the whole course of her two-year service, she kept the rank, refusing promotions time and time again, as she never wished to be viewed as superior to the common soldier.

She’d sometimes write her own songs and play those, sometimes just popular national songs or military anthems. She knew what she preferred. It was much more fun to sing songs that expressed her love of laughter, happiness, and friendship than to sing songs like “The Lunar Army Stands Above All”, but having to sing the militaristic songs was an intrinsic part of her arrangement with the Army. Either way, the audience loved it.

From all the record sales, tours, and merchandise, Pinkie had become fabulously wealthy, having more money than she could ever know what to do with. Even throwing a gigantic self-funded party every single night, each bigger and better than the last would barely dent her bank balance. She thought that the rest of the family might know what to do with it, but the investments they wanted to make to improve the farm only used up a fraction of her wealth. Now the whole Pie family were tremendously rich, owning a thriving string of quarries across Rockshire with some properties in Mixie.

At around ten o'clock, she was up on an open-air stage at the tail end of a four-hour accordion performance fueled purely by the desire to spread joy and six cups of Pinkie Juice (it's like if coffee and cotton candy had a baby). Her audience, made up of soldiers and marines across the Empire, was deep in dancing, drinking, and cheering, a turbulent and ever-moving wash of ponies. One may have expected them to be exhausted from the joint training exercises, but their relentless partying energy suggested otherwise. The smell of alcohol, sugar, and sweat was pervasive, it would’ve been nauseating to anypony who wasn’t absorbed in the moment.

Once the song was over, Pinkie lay her accordion down and allowed herself a moment to absorb the unbreakable cascade of euphoria before her. She needed to speak into the microphone just to hear herself. “Thank you, everypony! I need to take a break, but until then I'll leave you all in the hooves of the one and only DJ-PON3!” she announced, gesturing to the unicorn at the turntable. “Hit it, Scratch!”

More cheers followed, the DJ threw a vinyl onto the turntable, and Pinkie stepped behind the curtain.

Even when she was well away from the concert ground, Pinkie could still hear the audience's electrified cheers and ecstatic screams drowning out the thumping synth beats that the DJ was playing. Parties were great, practically her lifeblood, but Pinkie needed some quiet moments to herself between the mirthful mayhem just to recharge. She was grateful for the fact that she could skip around camp without worrying about being hounded for an autograph or anyone’s attention. Not that she’d mind passing out autographs, but nopony here was clambering for clout due to a culture of mutual respect amongst enlisted soldiers. Passing soldiers and marines threw her a smile and a salute, and she didn’t need anything more than that.

“Oi, Pinkie!” somepony yelled.

Well, occasionally somepony wanted her attention.

Pinkie spun around and saw two grinning pegasus stallions gliding up to her, softly landing on the ground. One wore a form-fitting bodysuit of mostly purple and black, giving off a distinct glossy shine. At a glance, it was indistinguishable from the uniforms of the Shadowbolt stunt fliers, but the sheen from the armour enchantments and the extra gear strapped on made it clear he was from the Shadowbolt Division of the Imperial Lunar Army. His mane, styled back and coloured vibrant yellow and orange, complemented the uniform well as did his piercing azure eyes.

By his side, the other pony was sporting a cocky grin. His pale red coat contrasted against his dulled purple fatigues. The vibrant fiery colours of his spiky, styled back mane grew in brightness and intensity as it got closer to the roots, like he had a mane of fire. A quick glance at the rank insignia on his collar revealed he was a Sergeant in the New Marelander Imperial Marine Corp.

“Private Pinkie!” the marine said in a strong New Marelander accent as he put a wing up to sharp salute. “Hi, name’s Sergeant Flame Fireblast, this cunt is Captain Blaze.”

Blaze saluted much as Flame had, not visibly reacting to Flame's vulgarity. “A pleasure to meet you, Private.”

“Hi!” Pinkie pipped with a bouncy salute of her own. “How ya doin’, ponies?”

“Ohh, positively fantastic, Private,” Blaze grinned, his eyes narrowing. “My friend Flame has something he wants to show you.”

“Ooh, what is it?” Pinkie questioned, turning her curious gaze to Flame.

Flame produced a small black box out of the satchel on his belt, showing it to Pinkie. Upon closer inspection, it was a VHS tape, hoofwritten words on the front reading ‘Smile SD’. “Something I made as a memento. Uses one of your songs, I’ve shown it to my mates and they all love it. Made a ton of copies, but this is the master tape.”

Twinkles flashed in Pinkie’s eyes as curiosity and excitement swelled within her. “Oooo! Yeah, that sounds like fun! Do you have somewhere to play?” she said. Pinkie had been fascinated by these videotape thingies, only recently had they entered mass market availability and had provided her with ample ideas for how to party with them. Imagine having a personalised movie watch party at home! Any movie, any time!

“Barracks here have TVs, follow me,” Flame confirmed. They moved into the nearest barrack, which housed rows of bunk beds and various recreational equipment in the common area. They were the only ponies in the building at the time. On the far end of the barrack, there sat a small television set with a built-in VCR opposite a set of benches. Flame and Blaze exchanged smiles while they walked down with Pinkie giddily skipping in tow.

As Pinkie and Blaze sat down on a bench, Flame moved down to load the tape into the TV, but stopped right as he was ready to push it in. “You don't mind that we used one of your songs, do you?” he asked.

Giggling, Pinkie wiggled a hoof to dismiss his concerns. “Of course not! It's there to make ponies happy, use it however you like!”

“Fuckin' told you she was cool!” Flame laughed, jabbing a hoof forward to punctuate the point. Finally, he loaded the tape into the machine with a soft click and dashed to sit with Pinkie and Blaze. “Alright, you’ll love this, you’ll love it.”

The three ponies watched quietly as the television hummed to life, its screen glowing blue with white lines and other hazy artifacts flickering across the display. The tape’s snow distortion soon faded, giving way to an image of a snow coated forested landscape. Mighty Equestrian tanks rolled down an icy dirt road, the camera itself being mounted on the turret of one such tank, with many pony soldiers either riding on the tanks themselves or trotting behind them. Slowly the soft hisses and crackles of the audio themselves gave way to a lively accordion tune accompanied by Pinkie’s voice. “-y name is Pinkie Pie, and I am here to say,” its slightly distorted voice sang.

“Soooo, what’s the video about, anyway?” Pinkie asked tentatively.

“Ahh, just our time in Olenia, you know, that deer country,” Blaze replied, his eyes glued to the screen as a grin grew on his lips. “About a month or so ago.”

“Yeah, you see, I was the driver on this tank, the one with the camera,” Flame added, also intently watching the screen.

Quickly the mood of the video shifted. The tanks sped up. The soldiers took cover behind the armoured machines. They were sheltering from unseen gunfire. Sparks pinged off of the tanks from the nearby enemy position. The song approached the chorus. The tanks approached their targets.

“‘Cause I love to make you smile, smile, smile!” it sang as white-hot streaks of phosphorus burst from the tanks and into the fortifications. It cut to a shot of deer soldiers desperately retreating from their burning bunkers. They were cut down by machine gun fire. Countless more videos flashed on the screen, one after the other in sync to the beat of the music. Burning trees. Burning vehicles. Burning houses. Burning bodies. The camera zoomed in on what was left of a deer soldier, their face down in the snow and their skin charred black. All the while Pinkie could only stare in horror, her eyes wide and wet and jaw low, listening to her cheerful voice as it sang praises to the slaughter.

“You- you’re-” Pinkie shuddered, her blood running cold. “Y-you burned them alive-”

“Yeah, course we did, it’s fuckin’ freezing up there, perfect excuse to bust out the flamethrowers!” Flame laughed.

“Honestly, we were doing them a service!” Blaze snorted.

The perspective changed to an overhead shot as the second verse began. Thick grey and white mist shifted around the edge of the frame; it was likely filmed from a cloud eighty meters off the ground. Below, under the cover of unicorn-cast shields a platoon of Equestrian infantry advanced upon an Olenian trench. Bullets flew from the trench. The Equestrian soldiers dropped to the ground, spraying the trench with suppressive gunfire. Then the camera flipped around, focusing on a tank racing down the field and towards the trench.

“Look, look! That’s me in there!” Flame excitedly pointed at the tank. As the second chorus drew near, the camera gave a clear view of the side of the mechanical beast and the words that had been painted on, ‘The Barbeque’.

“'Cause I love to make you grin, grin, grin!” fire burst from the tank and engulfed everything in the trench. Deers, their uniforms on fire, scrambled out of the trench with some running away and some dropping their weapons in surrender. The tank’s machine gun executed the lot. A paralyzed deer desperately crawled away from the trench only for the tank to drive over them, squishing them like jelly with a cartoonish squelch sound effect added on top. It cut to another clip, the aftermath of the attack as seen from the ground. Maimed and mangled bodies littered the area, blood and entrails mixing with dirt and grime. Another cut, focused squarely on a single cadaver slumped against the trench wall clutching their rifle. Their fur and flesh had turned black with flickering embers bespeckling them, like coal in a furnace. Crimson-stained bones were visible through peeled and burnt flesh. Melted flesh dripped from the charred skull. Their eyes were gone. Their eyes were gone.

In a lightning-quick motion, Pinkie snatched the remote from the bench and slammed the ‘stop’ button. The image on the screen distorted and froze amidst a sea of static.

Flame’s smile fell from his voice. “Oi, what gives?”

“Yeah! We haven’t even gotten to my part yet!” Blaze complained.

Pinkie was motionless. The remote fell out of her hooves and hit the ground with a clatter. Through shuddering breaths, she finally spoke. “Y-you killed them. You-, you’re celebrating killing other creatures.”

“Of course!” Blaze laughed as he nudged Pinkie’s shoulder. “It’s a war! They’re enemies of our Empress! Don’t you know that creatures die in war?” he said with a hint of condescension in his voice.

“But-” words failed Pinkie. “Th-they were retreating! Some were surrendering!”

The two pegasi exchanged a glance of mutual confusion. “And…?” Blaze shrugged.

Pinkie nearly choked on her next breath. Her lips quivered and eyebrows trembled as she subconsciously put distance between herself and Blaze. She bumped into Flame, making both ponies jerk in opposite directions. Pinkie scooted away, and Flame rubbed his shoulder.

“I take it you don't like it, then?” Flame asked sullenly.

“No!” Pinkie yelled, practically leaping off of the bench. “This isn't what my music is about! It’s about happy things, brightening up ponies’ nights and putting a smile on their face! Not killing or dying!”

Biting his lip, Flame shuffled on the spot. “To be fair…” he said, then snickering, “we did brighten up their night.”

For a moment Blaze was silent. Then a snort which devolved into a full laugh. “Oh Nightmare! Brightened it up! With fire! Hahahaha!”

“Right?” Flame’s frown vanished as he matched Blaze’s laughs, the pair’s laughs feeding back into one another as it got louder and louder. “Brightened it up so much it overexposed the bloody camera!”

Their cruel raptuous cackles were drowned out by the overwhelming ringing in Pinkie's ears. She couldn’t move, like shackles of lead had chained her and weighed her down. She couldn't think, the truth of her circumstances that she tried so desperately to bury was screaming in her face. Of course her music was associated with the Empire’s murderous conquests, her performances were before audiences of those murderous conquerors!

She looked at the TV, the image frozen exactly where it was on the burnt deer’s remains. Past the distortions and artifacts, she gazed into their black, empty eye sockets. In that moment Pinkie could’ve sworn they were staring back, like they were watching her. Judging her. Blaming her.

Visions of who else befell the fate of those deer flooded her mind. More burned bodies, more murdered creatures, their slaughter celebrated with the hurn of Private Pinkie’s accordion and the battle cry of “Encore! Encore!”. Her breathing turned into hyperventilation, her hooves felt sickly wet, her face was drenched in sweat. This was what she performed for. This was what she gave cover for. This was her legacy, the culmination of her efforts.

Creatures murdered, as the murderers laughed.

Leaping to her hooves with tears spilling from her eyes, Pinkie galloped out of the barracks and out of the camp, never looking back.

3 - Staring At The Mirror

14:09 - 16/01/1008 - Pie Family Rock Farm, Rockshire

Melancholy. Dejected. Depressed. Gloomy, sorrowful, woeful, dolour, or just 'sad'. Sad worked. Sad was simple and to the point. It didn't require a whole lot of thinking to say you felt sad, and Pinkamena certainly wasn't in a thinking mood.

It had been, what, four months? She hadn’t performed since seeing the video, she hadn’t even touched a musical instrument since. A few ponies came after her, tried banging down the farmhouse door to drag her back onto a stage and back on the murder party circuit. Limestone did a good job of shooing them away, and Pinkamena was under no obligation to go anywhere. She quit. She was done. She wasn’t going to play a single note in the name of Lunar slaughter again.

Once every couple weeks, if that, Pinkamena may have worked up the courage to step out of the farmhouse and onto the quarry. She’d tell herself it was something to keep her mind and body occupied, yet every time without fail she’d retreat back inside after an hour or two. Being this inactive would’ve caused her to gain weight, had she not lost her taste for cupcakes, or anything other than rock soup.

Whole nights would go by without her seeing a single pony. On the rare occasion she did, it came in the form of Limestone kicking down her door and telling her off for being so hard on herself. “You’ve never hurt anypony! You’ve never even wanted to hurt anypony! You didn’t even have a choice of whether to join the Army or not! So come on! Stop being so sad!” it usually went. It didn’t work.

On the occasion that Maud had some time away from her studies to come back home, she’d always make an effort to comfort Pinkamena. Usually, Maud talked, more than she usually ever did, about whatever she thought Pinkamena would find engaging or interesting. Rock studies, news from around the area, or things they did together as fillies. Pinkamena was at least grateful for the company and could tell Maud was looking for a way to get her mind off of what was troubling her, but it too didn’t work.

That left Marble. Every so often, maybe once a week, she’d try to talk to Pinkamena about how she felt and try to say something to lift her spirits, but all too often she’d be paralysed by the fear of saying something wrong and she’d end up saying nothing at all. At the end of all that, Marble would resort to embracing Pinkamena in a hug. It was appreciated, but again, it didn’t work.

It wasn’t that Pinkamena didn’t appreciate her sisters’ efforts, she really did, it was that she knew it’d be better for everyone for her to just stay here. The only person she felt comfortable opening up to was Boulder, at least until he started talking back.

Most nights she never left her bedroom and spent her time lying motionless on the filthy floorboards, which caked her straightened washed-out mane and dull coat in the pervasive dust. She was staring up at the window, watching the stars as they drifted across the eternally dark sky amidst the noise of machines working the quarry outside.

At some point, her eyes drifted to the grimy old mirror leaning up against the wall. Staring back at her through the cracked glass, a pony lay on the floor much as Pinkamena was. A pony with a light and curly hot-pink mane and soft pink coat that stood out like a sore wing against the dusty grey room. The pony grinned widely once Pinkamena made eye contact.

“Hello!” Pinkie chirped.

Pinkamena flinched but quickly calmed down. It was only her. “Where have you been?” Pinkamena asked.

Pinkie giggled. “Where have I been? I’ve been with you the whole time, silly! The real question is where have we been?” she said whilst pointing at herself and Pinkamena. “There’s a whole world full of creatures who need a good cheer-up, and you’ve holed us up on the farm?”

Averting her eyes from the mirror, Pinkamena sighed. “What good have I brought? Everypony is better off with me here.”

“Pssh, no way!” Pinkie rolled onto her front. “You don't really think that, do you? A bright and bubbly Pinkie Pie can make everypony happy! But a Pinkie Pie who’s shut herself away?” Pinkie shook her head. “Nuh-uh! No bueno!”

Pinkamena sulked, burying her face in her hooves. “No,” she moaned. “I know it’s better off if I’m alone.”

“Oh come on, Pinkie!” Pinkie hopped to her hooves. “Look around you! Limey hates seeing you like this, Marble’s torn to shreds, and Maud- Nrrgh! I’ve never seen Maud so upset before!”

“Maud looks exactly the same as she always does,” Pinkamena said.

“What!?” the mirror Pinkie gasped. “That’s crazy talk! Why you talking crazy, Pinkie Pie?”

Gazing around the room, Pinkamena lay silently on the floor trying to ignore her reflection.

“Alright, that’s enough! On your hooves, Pinkie!” Pinkie demanded, clapping her hooves together for emphasis. “Come on, up and at ‘em!”

Begrudgingly and ploddingly, Pinkamena rose to her hooves and blankly stared back at the mirror.

“Who are you?” Pinkie barked. “Who am I talking to?”

“Um…” Pinkamena rubbed her leg. “Pinkamena Diane Pie.”

“And who iiiiiis Pinkamena Diane Pie?” Pinkie pressed an eyeball to the glass.

Pinkamena hesitated. She didn’t want to say it aloud, even to herself. It took her a moment to speak up. “I’m a walking propaganda piece, okay?” she shouted bluntly. “I’m a tool of a murderous tyrant used to glorify massacres. An accompanying piece to atrocities on a horrifying scale, a mercenary for the world's biggest baddest empire, whose whole livelihood is the result of joyous participation in the whitewashing of bloody murder!”

Pinkie smiled and nodded. “Yep.”

“What do you mean ‘Yep’? Don’t you get it?” Pinkamena wailed. “Out there I’m helping hurt ponies, here I’m not helping hurt anypony! The world is a better place without me!” she screamed, tears starting to fall from her eyes, her legs quaking as she struggled to stand.

Pinkie just giggled. “Sure I get it. Good thing you pulled us out of there!” she said with a wink.

Pinkamena flinched, whatever crying may have come stopped. “Huh?”

“Honestly, you did great back in Camp Thunder Struck. If that were me watching that video I’d have stuck my hooves over my ears, shut my eyes, sang ‘la la la I can’t see you!’, then waltzed out of there and hopped back onto the stage!” Pinkie said, with appropriate motions and gestures to accentuate her words. “But you knew what was going on! You saw how we were being used and you pulled the plug!”

“Right,” Pinkamena said, nodding as if the motion would reassure her. “That’s good, right?”

“But then you turned us into Miss Mopey and Dopey,” Pinkie pouted her lips and put on a grumpy frown. “Imagine that, the Pinkie Pie! The most positively peppy pizzazzy pink party pony in all of Equestria reduced to this! Are you really gonna just sit there and let that happen?”

“What are you even saying?” Pinkie said with a befuddled wince.

“What I’m saying is that you pulled me out of there,” Pinkie’s smirk turned sly, her eyebrows moving up and down. “So now it’s my turn to pull you out of here! Now’s the time we have to do something to turn this around and make up for all that! Sulking won’t help, you need to act! Think, what are we best at?”

“...parties, I guess?” Pinkamena gave a half-hearted shrug.

“You got it!” Pinkie winked. “That’s how we’re gonna dig ourselves out of the mopey hole! By throwing a party! But not just any party, the biggest party of our life!”

“A… party?” Pinkamena cocked an eyebrow, her mouth agape with worry.

“Ohh yeah!” Pinkie smirked. “A party.”

Pinkamena shuddered. “You- you mean a… a ‘party’, don’t you?”

“Yes, a huge party,” Pinkie nodded rapidly, a devious grin on her lips. “A surprise party for all those Imperial meanies! With fireworks, big fireworks! Fireworks that ponies could see for miles! A firework display so bright and dazzling that nopony could look away! One that everypony’s gonna hear about and remember, even if they weren't there! You helped them? Then yoink the rug out from under them and have them land on a whoopie cushion!”

Pinkamena suddenly broke eye contact, her eyes racing around the room. She eventually looked back at Pinkie. “W-who are we gonna invite to this ‘party’?”

“Oh no no!” Pinkie stepped back and shook her head, her smile unbroken. “You don’t want anypony to be at the party! It’s got to be a very special kind of party, where nopony attends but everypony sees and everypony remembers! You do this right, nopony is ever going to forget this party! Nopony's even gonna know it was your party!”

Unconsciously, Pinkamena swallowed, rubbing small beads of sweat from her forehead. “Where should we have this party?”

Pinkie shrugged and leaned against the mirror. “Iunno! Your old camp, the one in Mixie? Maybe Camp Thunder Struck? Some ammo depot? The Imperial Castle way deep in the Everfree? Wherever those two meanies with the video are stationed? There are tons of places to choose from!”

“But,” Pinkamena ran a hoof through her hair, feeling that it had gotten lighter and curlier. “A party like that could take weeks to plan, months maybe.”

“Eeexactly!” Pinkie puffed out her chest. “So what are you waiting for? Come on Pinkie! There’s a time and a place to doubt and pout, but now is a time to bring out the confetti!”

“Do you really need me for any of this?” Pinkamena asked, pawing at the floor. “You sound like you have it all figured out.”

Pinkie scoffed. “Of course not, we need each other! You’re the only thing stopping me from throwing us over the edge! Without you, I’d burst like a balloon! Without me, you’d deflate and flop to the ground,” Pinkie said, then moving to tap her chin. “…also like a balloon. Anyway, only together can we become the pony we were always meant to be. Bright, bouncy, bringing joy wherever we go! A beacon of beatitude! A paragon of positivity!”

“What, like a balloon?” Pinkamena snickered, the corners of her mouth slowly curling upwards.

“Yeah!” laughed Pinkie. “Haha! I was never that great at poetic metaphors, was I? Just balloons! Balloons, balloons, balloons! It's not my fault they’re so great!”

Pinkie laughed as she bounced on the spot, her cushiony mane bouncing with her. When she stopped she looked back at the pony in the mirror and the gleeful grin that matched her own. With an almost literal spring in her step, Pinkie set off to plan the most incredible party Equestria had ever seen.

4 - This Has Been A Warning Shot

08:23 - 01/05/1008 - Lunar Castle, Everfree Forest

The blaring alarm split Warmaster Selenite’s ears like a guillotine.

The thestral wrothe in bed as a battle raged inside her mind. A battle between the desire to ignore the noise and return to the blissful realm of sleep she was so unjustly torn from, and the understanding that this resounding blare meant she had to get out of bed.

“Nnrrg,” her husband Sol groaned as he shot out from under the covers. “The hell’s that?” the unicorn mumbled, struggling to speak over the noise.

“Mh, emergency alarm.” Selenite clambered out of bed and stumbled to the door, her logical side achieving a triumphant victory in the mental battle. “Whatever it is, it's urgent. Get my uniform ready, please.” Her voice was barely audible over the low drone of the alarm.

Sol raised a hoof to his forehead in what might’ve been a salute or what might’ve been him moving to rub the sleep from his eyes. Probably both.

While Selenite stumbled into the living room her long, matted, silver mane and tail dragged across the floor. Selenite and Sol’s military experience may have forced them to be early risers capable of operating on inconsistent or lackluster sleep patterns, but that didn’t make rude awakenings any more pleasant.

Once she picked up the phone, the alarm stopped, allowing the couple a brief moment of respite. “Warmaster Selenite speaking. What’s the situation?” she said into the transmitter, rubbing sleep from her eyes. A few moments passed with barely audible chatter coming from the receiver. “What!?” she shouted. “I’m sorry, say that again, slowly.”

Still stretching, Sol crawled his way out of bed, his body begged him to throw himself back down onto the mattress. Sure, he could get up, but it was May first, Workers’ Night, a public holinight! Definitely a night to lie in before he got cracking with his plans with friends. But now also a night when his wife had to deal with an apparent emergency. Duty calls, he supposed. Nevertheless, he was soon up on his hooves and carried a well-pressed uniform in his magical grasp, bringing it over to Selenite.

“Thanks,” Selenite whispered to Sol. “Hold the phone while I get dressed.”

Taking hold of the hoofset, Sol repressed a grumble. While she slipped into her uniform, every inch of it snugly fitting onto her small frame, her ear was firmly pressed against the receiver, intently listening to the chatter from the other end. What were they saying? Sol couldn't tell, he could barely keep his eyes open let alone keep his ears forward. He must’ve nearly dropped the phone at one point.

“Okay, what’s the extent of the damage? Any injuries? Casualties?” a fully dressed Selenite said as she took the phone out of Sol's aura. A few seconds of chatter from the phone followed. “None? Really? Oh thank Nightmare,” she breathed, releasing a large amount of air she didn’t know she’d held. “What about damage to the building?”

Coffee, Sol’s mind snapped to coffee. He rushed into the kitchen, technically the same room as the living room due to the absence of walls, and quickly made two mugs of coffee for himself and Selenite. Both mugs were exactly as the couple liked them, pitch black. Coffee was wake-up juice, no need to be fancy. In a single swig, Sol downed the contents of his mug, his vision sharpened dramatically as enlivening caffeine rushed through his veins.

“Moon above, the whole archives wing? Fuck, fuck!” Selenite stressed, grabbing the mug Sol had levitated over to her and drinking from it. With the coffee in her system, she blinked herself further awake before speaking again. “Do we know who did it? Who might’ve done it? Who’d even have the capability?”

But as Sol’s vision cleared and the final traces of sleep were blinked away, he noticed an orange glow emanating from one of the windows with flickering light filtering through the blinds. Curious, he pulled back the curtains and lifted the blinds. The sight before him made him gasp and shudder.

Fort Polaris, a brutalist monolith shaped like its namesake star housing the nerve centre of the Imperial Lunar Military, was ablaze. A whole wing of the building was gone, reduced to smouldering rubble, as the fire raced through the rest of the building sending thick billows of smoke into the night sky. Already the pegasi fire brigade had descended on the inferno, bringing storm clouds to pour torrential rain on the inferno in an attempt to slow the raging blaze, their effect so far limited. The flames were so bright that if Sol had more distance, he’d almost think the sun was rising.

“Okay okay…” Selenite took a deep breath. “I’ll be there as soon as I can, Warmaster Selenite out,” and she clicked the hoofset back onto the phone. “Sol, you alright?” she asked as she turned to her husband, noticing his gaze locked on the inferno outside. She got to her hooves and walked up to Sol, putting a hoof on his shoulder. “Nopony’s hurt, as far as we know. It was evacuated beforehoof,” she said, attempting to reassure him.

Even though she was aware of what happened and needed to hurry, Selenite couldn’t stop herself from staring at the inferno. How? It was one of the most secure buildings in Equestria, perhaps even the world, built of anything-proof concrete and guarded at every hour of every night. It wasn’t the fire itself that scared her, it was that someone or something had struck so deep into where she thought was safe, struck where her friends worked, struck right next to where she and her husband slept. If this building was vulnerable, everything was vulnerable.

Suddenly, Sol noticed something amidst the fury, ripping him from his thoughts. Small dark spots stuck out against the fire, too small to be immediately noticeable yet obvious when spotted. They were rising out of the fire, floating through the smoke and into the air. He blinked a few times, just to be sure his eyes were fine, yet the spots remained. He’d practically pressed his snout up against the glass, squinting at the great mass of smoke and flame trying to discern what these spots were. But once the shapes became clear and indistinguishable, the realisation hit him like a brick wall.

“Are those balloons?”

5 - All We Need Is Some Laughter

08:25 - 01/05/1008 - Near Lunar Castle, Everfree Forest

There were so many great spots to get a view of the Lunar Castle and all the surrounding buildings. All around the vast complex were hills, cliffs, observation decks, and many more natural and artificial vantage points to give guards and tourists a splendid look at all it had to offer. The unbelievably tall spires of the castle itself, the lush greenery of the gardens and courtyards, the imposing architecture of the adjacent buildings, and the thick plumes of smoke and fire spilling from Fort Polaris. That last one had to be Pinkie’s favourite.

She’d really outdone herself. Huge turnout, hundreds if not thousands of ponies had gathered to watch the party, the fireworks display was mesmerising and according to her radio, everypony had heard about the party and nopony was hurt! All that planning was worth it in the end, with maximum splendour and minimal injury. Exactly how she’d envisioned it.

First was the date. Right away, she decided it had to be a public holinight, because those were the perfect nights to have parties and also there’d be fewer ponies wherever she’d host the party, thus easier to get them away from the fireworks. When she decided to have this party, the nearest public holinight was Hearts and Hooves Night (actually “Charter Night”, but everypony treated it as Hearts and Hooves Night, same date). It was less than a month away, which was way too soon. After that was Workers’ Night, a few more months away, with plenty of time to plan. Perfect.

Next was her target. She’d already gone over a bunch of ideas, but she quickly settled on Fort Polaris. Iconic, deep in the Everfree Forest, right next to the Lunar Castle, and only a hop skip and a jump away from her old home of Ponyville. Pinkie easily convinced Mr and Mrs Cake to let her resurrect their old arrangement where Pinkie lived and worked in their bakery, giving her a place to effectively plan her party close to the site itself. With a base of operations established, she went from store to store purchasing as much petroleum and fertilizer as she could buy without raising suspicion. Ponyville was once a farming town, so there was no shortage of places to get these things from. There was, however, the issue of the site itself being the heavily guarded headquarters of the Imperial Lunar Military.

Allegedly not even a breezie could get inside Fort Polaris without the right papers. This was quickly disproven when Pinkie got her hooves on blueprints and security information, which was made surprisingly easy by going to the right ponies and pulling the right charms, as she noticed its construction and security system was full of holes. Security staff was often overworked, several weak spots in the foundations due to the rushed construction, and CCTV blind spots everywhere. It wasn’t even resistant to magical signals.

All she really needed to do to get inside was to canter up to a side entrance and act like she was exactly where she was supposed to be. Of course, her brilliant disguise certainly helped.

While she could barely see through the tiny holes in the paper mask, the look on the security officer’s face was one she’d never forget. First a look of total bewilderment, and moments later their cheeks filled with air and they looked like they were barely stopping themselves from exploding into laughter.

“Pfft- Uhah, hm, can I help you?” the security officer snickered, her eyes darting around each element of Pinkie’s disguise. The huge silver wig, the oversized army officers' uniform, the paper maché thestral wings, the cardboard rank badge attached with staples, and the paper mask with a crude drawing of Warmaster Selenite’s face.

Throwing a leg up in a dramatic salute, Pinkie loudly cleared her throat. “Atteeeeeeention! I am Warmaster Selenite! At ease, officer! I must be let through at this instant! That is an order!”

The officer repressed a laugh. “Okay? Sure thing, 'Warmaster'! Ohh, stars above,” she sighed.

Once she was through the metal detector and had been administered a quick changeling-undisguising zap, the officer let her go. The metal detector did flag up the staples in her disguise but otherwise turned up nothing. Pinkie made a quick look over her shoulder right as the officer was about to get back to their desk. Leaning up close to the officer, Pinkie lifted her mask. “Don’t tell anypony,” she stage whispered, “I’m not Warmaster Selenite! I’m actually Private Pinkie!”

“Oh my gosh I had no idea that’s so crazy!” the officer giggled, barely holding themselves together. “Surprise party, I assume? Don’t worry, I’ll keep it on the down low.”

Pinkie gave a nod and trotted away, the officer smiled and waved. Just like that, Pinkie had free reign over the most secure facility in Equestria.

She had no use for her disguise anymore and disposed of it as soon as she could, stuffing it into the trash. While she skipped around the surprisingly quiet offices, ponies only taking up a hoofful of the desk space, she drew looks from some of the staff, no doubt surprised to see her after her lengthy absence from the public eye. Thankfully, nopony bothered her. All across the walls Pinkie spotted several evacuation maps directing ponies to the nearest exits, with clear messages printed in large, bold text next to each map.

Never assume that an alarm is false, always follow procedure when the alarm is active. Delays can cause life-threatening loss of time.

The message was punctuated with a phrase in even larger, bolder, fully capitalised text beneath it.

PLAY IT SAFE, EVACUATE!

It was reassuring, to say the least!

Then the next step in her plan, setting up the fireworks. Her first stop was a bathroom, but she obviously couldn't plant anything in there. If she was seen entering that toilet and a bomb went off in there, immediately somepony would suspect something. Right away she was hopping around the empty bathroom, poking her head in each stall, in search of a service grate. Sure enough, she'd found one. All it took to bust through was a hop, a skip, a jump and a pounding thrust of her legs into the grate sending her crashing through into the crawl space. That did leave the grate noticeably damaged though, which could throw off her whole plan. It didn't concern her, whacking it with a wrench she found a few times made it good as new.

Desperately resisting the urge to break out into song or hum a catchy espionage theme, Pinkie swiftly shimmied through the cold crawl space, passing numerous vents and wires and pipes. Soon she happened upon an exit hatch overhead, which if her Pinkie Sense was correct, should lead her into a seldom-used maintenance closet. She flung the hatch open and jumped out, finding herself exactly where she wanted to be. It even had a window, confirming she was by the outer wall.

Right away, she grabbed the heaviest-looking things she could find and put them up against the door, ensuring that nopony would enter this room before the party could get started. Safety first! Next, she reached into hammerspace to retrieve the first of her fireworks: a pipe bomb! Setting that up was as basic as sticking it in the corner of the room and setting the timer. Thirty minutes would do. This one wasn’t intended to do any serious damage, just trigger the alarms and get everypony outside. With the setup complete, Pinkie exited through the hatch, through to the bathroom, and then out into the rest of the complex, unseen every step of the way.

For the next part of the plan, she went as low as she could go. Down several flights of stairs and into the bottom floor of the complex. She kept her eye out for camera blind spots and found that a bottom floor broom closet was free of unwanted eyes. Perfect. Inside the closet with nothing but her bare hooves, she burrowed her way through the concrete and into the earth, digging long winding tunnels beneath that wing of the complex. Specifically, the archives wing, where all the important plans and documents for war were kept. Plus, the gas pipes were down here too, all to provide the sparkling lights of the display. Being so far below ground, Pinkie was free to sing gleefully as her hooves worked like jackhammers, safe in the knowledge that nopony could hear her. Satisfied with the length of the tunnels, she loaded them with her ANFO mixture of fertilizer and petrol and prepared a detonator, set to go off fifteen minutes after the utility room pipe bomb. Hammerspace was so useful.

Then the final part of the plan, what she declared the piece da resistance! Was she saying that right? She never learned Aquileian. With the limited time she had left, Pinkie rushed around stashing balloons weighed down with devices with timed release mechanisms in closets and cupboards. She told her enchantress, local zebra Zecora, that she needed the balloons to withstand being in close proximity to fireworks. These were obviously no ordinary fireworks, but she couldn’t tell that to Zecora. It was all to give Pinkie the final sign of her success.

As the first bomb went off right on time, it shook Pinkie. It broke windows, cracked concrete, and triggered the alarms. She still had balloons to stuff around the building, but knew she had to get the heck out of dodge as soon as possible. Running with the evacuees, she dashed outside and up to her vantage point where, hopefully, nopony gave her extra attention. The building was empty of ponies in no time at all, giving everypony a safe view of the second bombs which too went off at the right time, leveling the whole archives wing in a spectacular display of collapsing concrete carnage. Finally, once all eyes in Equestria were squarely on Fort Polaris, the balloons were released. Pinkie’s vantage point gave her a marvelous view of the balloons and her wider masterpiece, and she swelled with satisfaction. After years of being the Empire’s wind-up display toy, she’d rained all over their parade. They’d never forget this.

But seeing them float away did briefly fill Pinkie with a sense of worry. Was it too obvious? Balloons were her signature, she didn’t host a party without them, and she was seen and recognised in Fort Polaris that night. What if she got caught? It wouldn’t take Shadow Spade to figure out what happened, to connect the few dots that led right back to her. Yet her worries dissipated as she recognised that all of this remained hypothetical. She might get caught, she might not. Those were all problems that future Pinkie would have to deal with.

At that moment, Pinkie could smile. Even if she’d never top this one, there were so many more parties to throw.