"Why Would She Get Mad About It?"
Rainbow Dash waved to the last audience member to leave the gymnasium. The adrenaline was still pumping through her system after ponying up in front of everyone. It was such a rush—unlike anything she’d ever felt. She wasn’t sure how the pep rally was going to pan out, but she couldn’t have been happier with the result.
“Rainbow Dash, that was amazing! Even I feel like we can win!” beamed Fluttershy.
Rarity looked ready to burst with excitement. “I feel like my school pride is at an all-time high!”
Applejack looked troubled. “Is anybody else wonderin' how Dash ponied up without playin' her guitar?”
“I know, right?” Rainbow Dash was still riding high. “It's probably because I'm so awesome!”
“Maybe,” said Applejack. “What do you think, Sunset?”
Up until then, Sunset hadn’t been tuned into the conversation. She held nine pieces of thick posterboard signs in her hands. On the back of each was a piece of Canterlot High’s logo.
“So, what’s up with these?” Her expression was as flat as her delivery.
Dash snickered. “Oh, you mean–”
“The poster, yeah,” Sunset interrupted. “The band guys on the bleachers were holding these in the middle of the song.”
Rainbow Dash couldn’t help but break into a full laugh. “Got you pretty good, didn’t we?”
“No.”
With just one word, the warmth was sucked out of the backstage area. The girls all glanced at each other awkwardly, engaged in a never-ending game of telepathic hot potato.
Sunset flipped each poster around, showing every piece one by one. Once she reached the poster with the picture of her demonic visage, she stopped.
“This is supposed to be funny?” asked Sunset, her tone making it clear she didn't think it was.
Dash rubbed the back of her neck. “Um, well–”
“Well shoot, Sunset, we figured you’d get a kick out of it,” Applejack explained. “I mean, you gotta know it was all in good fun, right? After all, we were just jokin’ about it in the library–”
“Yeah, AJ, I was there; in the library, when it was just us,” she hissed. “Not in front of the entire school!”
Rarity let out a forced chuckle. “Darling, I know how it may seem, but this was not a deliberate act of malice. We truly didn’t think–”
“You didn’t think what?” Sunset snapped “You didn’t think I’d mind? You thought I’d just be okay with it? 'Hey, everyone, remember when we beat the shit out of that demon girl who, by the way, is here in the room with us?' Comedy gold.”
“But that’s not you,” Fluttershy argued. “A-And besides, we did the Sirens too.”
Sunset huffed. “So I’m as bad as the sirens, huh? Is that it?”
Too distracted by her own simmering anger, Sunset didn’t even hear Vice Principal Luna walk up behind her. “Sunset, I need to talk to you about–”
“Hold on a second.”
“Sunset, this is of vital importance to–”
“I said hold on a second!”
Vice Principal Luna looked stunned, Sunset’s demand somehow assertive enough to make her listen.
Sunset continued her interrogation. “How much work went into this? How many of you knew? Did you all know? Was everyone in on the joke? I mean, you had to coordinate this, right? This was rehearsed, right? You had nine people practice flipping those posters on cue, right? All that, and I didn’t even find out about this stupid bit until it happened?”
Most of the girls shared looks of guilt, all except Pinkie Pie who was sitting on the floor, too busy banging away on a snare drum she dug out from somewhere backstage.
Rainbow Dash sharply exhaled. “We practiced it, yeah, but we only had yesterday to prepare. The bit was–" Dash paused when the snap of Pinkie's snare drum interrupted her "–kind of last minute because we thought it would be funny. It's just a lighthearted jab, you know?”
“A lighthearted jab?” Sunset echoed. “Dash, there’s nothing light about a “jab” from over, like, a hundred people!”
“Sunset, I do believe you may be blowing this out of proportion.” Despite Luna’s position of authority, she didn’t look particularly confident in her attempt to calm Sunset.
Whipping around, Sunset pointed her finger at her vice principal. “Were you in on this, too?”
“No, Sunset,” Dash intervened. “None of the staff–" another crack of the snare pierced through Rainbow Dash's words "–knew about this.”
Sunset continued her line of questions. “Where did you even get these, anyway? They look way too fancy for a last minute crafts project. And what’s with the drawing? Did you commission someone for it? It’s so accurate it actually scares me; I could throw up looking at it!”
“It was–" yet another snare snap blocked Rainbow Dash's response "–Pinkie Pie would you cut it out?!"
"Don't yell at her!" Sunset barked.
Dash groaned. "Fine! Whatever! It was a commission, yeah.” Dash kicked the ground with the tip of her shoe, looking as embarrassed as she was frustrated. “We, uhh, thought about commissioning you to do it, but, I don’t know, I think that would have been worse.”
“What do you mean you think it would have been worse?” asked Sunset. “How could that have been worse? At least I could have made some money! At least I would have known it was coming!”
Sunset’s eyes returned to the posters in her hands. “So it’s a commission, fine. Who did you get to do it? Because this is eerily close to the real thing.”
When Dash’s eyes darted over to Rarity, so did the rest of the girls’, and Sunset’s oppressive gaze followed.
“I, um…” Rarity twiddled her thumbs. “I drew it.”
“You drew it! Well, that explains why it’s so disturbingly precise!” Sunset laughed as she flipped through the posters in her hand. “Though, I can see room for improvement. You could have made my teeth and claws a little sharper, maybe add some dripping blood to them as well—oh! You could have drawn a half dead puppy in my mouth to really sell the whole “horrible monster” angle.”
Rarity shrank into herself, but once again, no one wanted to say anything. Vice Principal Luna began to inch toward the door, realizing it’d be best to come back later.
Sunset chuckled as she flipped through each posterboard like flashcards. “And where did you get these? You didn’t print them at school, did you? This posterboard is way too thick and high quality to be from here.”
No answer.
“Where?” Sunset demanded. “Where did you–”
“The office store,” Dash admitted. “I got them printed at the office store.”
“You spent money on these?” Sunset threw the posters to the ground, each one flying off in a different direction as they hit the floor, one managing to hit Sunset in the shin.
“Motherf–!” Sunset hissed.
Fluttershy giggled.
“Don’t laugh!”
Fluttershy cowered.
Dash sighed. “Yeah, I did.”
“And how much did you–”
“Eighty dollars.”
“Get the fuck out of here. Eighty dollars? You spent–” Sunset’s eyes went wide. “That’s why you needed to borrow money last week, isn’t it?”
Dash didn’t say a word, but the way she looked at the ground said it all.
Sunset threw her hands up. “I can’t fucking believe you guys! It wasn’t bad enough this was all at my emotional expense, but financial, too? Do you know how little I make working at the mall? That was all the tip money I made that day, Rainbow Dash!”
“We’re sorry, Sunset,” said Pinkie. Despite her heartfelt apology, her eyes were still on the snare drum she’d been playing incessantly.
Suddenly, Sunset’s anger was gone. Instead, she was somber and morose.
“Pinkie Pie,” she said with a sniffle, a single tear rolling down her cheek, “you have literally never done anything wrong in your entire life.”
“I know!” shouted Pinkie, punctuating her exclamation with a drum fill on her snare, somehow getting it to sound like an entire drum kit with cymbals.
Author's Note
I wrote this back in June after watching Friendship Games with Nudistsquid. Every time we've ever watched it together, we always point out how funny it would be if Sunset was totally unaware they were going to pull out that huge picture of her demon, and then we imagine how that ensuing conversation would play out. Thanks again to both The Sleepless Beholder and Aklinstar for a little bit of workshopping.
