Absolutely Baked

An hour or so later, Pot Luck carefully reached into the oven and pulled out a large tray. He gently set it on the counter and looked at its contents - a generously sized batch of thick chocolate brownies. The sweet-smelling steam wafted up his nose, and beneath the inviting scent of cocoa and fudge, he got a tea-like whiff of the Five Love he had mixed into the batter.

“Okay, Pot,” he murmured as he fished the see-through wrap from a cupboard, “you need to pace yourself this time. You never have any brownies left for the rest of the week, and you can’t go back and dip into the stock when you need a hit.”

Once the brownies had cooled off, he set one aside and wrapped up the others, putting them in the fridge. Out of sight, out of mind.

The one that remained, he carried to the living room and sat on the couch with. His heart fluttered excitedly as he stared at the treat. He couldn’t wait to see what his own creation would do, and part of him suddenly wondered if he should be so eager if he had no idea what was going to happen if he put something he’d never tested into his body.

He snuffled the brownie again, getting that inviting smell once more.

“Ugh, enough thinking,” he decided, and took a bite. As he hoped, the brownie itself was soft and sweet, the fudge flowing into his mouth. The Five Love gave it a very welcoming kick as he chewed and swallowed each bite. Soon he had finished it and he licked the crumbs off his hoof.

“And now to wait,” he said. He turned on the TV to an advert for Rarity For You in Manehattan. He smiled and wondered if she was going to come in soon for her Lavender Sunset.

He kept his focus on the TV and waited for the enhanced Five Love to kick in.

He flipped the channels to a show about renovating farmyard barns and waited.

He leaned on the side rest and waited.

He later watched a show about crab fishing and waited.

He flopped across the cushions and waited.

“What the heck is the holdup?” he groaned. “Don’t tell me these edibles ain’t sh–”

Grrrruuuuuuhhhrrrrrr…

His eyelids widened at that all-too-familiar feeling in his middle. A gnawing hunger that demanded to be sated. He wasn’t one to ignore that order - he lacked the will and self-control.

And he knew exactly what he wanted.

Licking his lips, he got to his hooves and sauntered to the kitchen. He opened the fridge and his eyes immediately locked onto the plate of brownies. With a big grin, he fished it out and set it on the counter.

He loomed over it, his eyes wide and glistening with sudden gluttony. He couldn’t wait to–

He shook his head. “No, remember what you told yourself. Gotta make them last.”

He picked the plate back up and turned toward the fridge.

“Maybe another night,” he muttered.

He got two steps toward the fridge before immediately turning back to the counter and removing the wrapping. “Just one more won’t hurt!”

He tore into a whole brownie in just two large bites, then grabbed another.

“It feels right to do things in threes,” he rationalised, his tongue greedily hanging out.

He stuffed a third brownie into his maw, then came a last one. Then a last one for sure. Then a last one for real this time, he promised.

The next thing he knew, he was left with an empty plate, some crumbs coating his muzzle, and a real buzz starting to form in his brain.

“Oh, I did it again,” he groaned, slowly blinking his bloodshot eyes. “Pot, when are you gonna listen to me…?”

He stumbled back to the couch and flopped onto it just as his legs gave out. He stared at the TV, which was showing something about birds. That was a funny name. Bird. Who named them that? What does it mean? Who came up with that word?

Bird. Word. Word. Bird.

“Bword,” he mumbled. “W-bird.”

He blinked one eye after the other. He wiggled his legs, finding he still had power in them. He found himself sitting up.

Grrrruuuuuhhhhrrrrrr…

He looked down and put a hoof on his stomach. “M’hungry.”

He dragged himself into the kitchen and opened the fridge back up. He looked up and down at the shelves loaded with food, and his tongue slid across his lips.

He grabbed a slim cardboard box and flipped it open, seeing half a circle of cold melted cheese, tomato, onion and slices of hay.

“Pizza time.”

Without thinking, he grabbed one slice after another and crammed them into his gaping maw, chewing and gulping every mouthful. It could’ve done with heating up, but he didn’t care. He needed to eat something, and he needed it now.

He quickly discarded the box and stuck his nose back in the fridge, looking for anything else that looked good. And at that moment, everything looked good…

“Even Hay Burger isn’t picking up?!” Pot Luck whined. “They’re always open!”

He was sitting amongst a mess of empty takeout boxes, soda bottles, milk jugs and other food containers, all strewn across the floor. The fridge and every cupboard in the kitchen had been cleared out, singlehooved by Pot himself, but his stomach was still gnawing at him for more food.

His desperate gorging had caused his middle to bloat out, but it wasn’t exactly from fullness: his flanks looked wider, his cutie marks stretching to fill the new space, and his face had gotten a bit softer. Not that he’d noticed anything, with how focused he was on trying to find more to eat.

He shook his phone in his hoof, trying to will somepony on the other end to pick up. For the past half-hour he had been trying to call every single takeout place he had a number for, but none of them were answering. The Bitalian place, the Saddle Arabian place, even the Baisese place.

“They can’t all be busy,” he groaned. “It’s not even a weekend!”

Grrrruuuuoooohhhhrrrrrrr…

Pot whimpered as his stomach let out a roar of hunger. “I’m starving here…!”

He pressed his face against the window looking over Ponyville. It was late at night, and most of the town’s residents were fast asleep, unaware of Pot Luck’s suffering.

And that’s when he saw it. An all-too-familiar building in the town square that looked quite like a gingerbread house from a foal’s bedtime story. Pot Luck knew the place very well, and more importantly, he knew what was inside.

“They won’t mind if I clear out some old stuff they didn’t sell, right?” he muttered, saliva dripping from the corner of his mouth. “They’ll just throw it out anyway, so what’s the harm? I’ll be in and out before anypony knows I’m there.”

With a wide, almost manic smile dimpling his cheeks, Pot Luck began lumbering to the door. It was time to get a midnight snack.