Rainbow's Cookies
Early autumn as making it's appearance; leaves were beginning to become a pallet of oranges and golds and reds. They decorated the ground, giving a sort of a mosaic look. Where they didn't line the streets, they were put into neat little piles that small fillies and foals would dive bomb into, scattering them, only to be collected up again with trills of laughter.
Everywhere else, everypony was busy preparing for the on coming winter. However early they might be, it was better to be prepared than sorry. They gathered up what crops still grew, got their fire wood, and so and so on.
The feverish preparations and cold wind, however, did not seem to stop one lone Pegasus. Her early morning routine of zipping through the clouds of Ponyville, darting clouds this way and that, still preceded on. On the complete other end of the small town, another pony was making her usual rounds as well. A small pink mare bounced along the streets, stopping to smell the autumn flowers, and bringing general delight to everypony she greeted. It was a morning such as that that became one of Ponyville's greatest shocks. A crisp, cool morning was the prologue to a ghastly event that shook the small community to it's core. Nopony speaks of it anymore, but you could still see the fright in the eyes. The morbid atrocity circled around two of Ponyville's most beloved inhabitants.
~ ~ ~
Autumn usually brought a special buzz to Ponyville. Nightmare Night was underway, everypony was setting out decorations, preparing special foods for the celebration, and having an altogether good time. Spirits were high, jokes were passed around, everypony was enjoying themselves. Pinkie Pie was in full swing making cookies, and cakes, and planning the festivities for Ponyville's biggest event: Nightmare Night. She wasn't the "Party Pony" for nothing.
"Oh I just can't wait! This is going to be the best!" she gushed over to her best pony pal, Rainbow Dash. The cyan, rainbow maned Pegasus wasn't much use in the kitchen, her cooking skills were rather...lax, but she kept the Earth Pony great company.
"Haha...Yeah, I suppose you might be right." she replied back, wiping a bit of flour from her face.
Pinkie Pie returned to the task at hand: icing 2 dozen cookies in shapes of bats, pumpkins, and Nightmare Moon herself. Pinkie made these cookies each year as her offering to the moon mare. Everypony else gave up their candy, but Pie, of course, just had to stand out. And who knew, maybe Nightmare likedcookies.
"I'm so excited, Rainbow!" Pie continued to lather Rainbow Dash in her excitement, pouring over how this year was going to be bigger than ever with her in charge of it. She was going to pull off fireworks, maybe some sort of dance number. Dash tuned Pinkie out as soon as her mouth started moving. She couldn't tolerate the jubilant pony much anymore. It was like something in her finally broke free and quit bearing her excitement, her care free ways, everything about her. Dash could no longer stand the way Pinkie thought everything in life was nothing but an utter joke. Who knew life better than the athletic one? The one who trained every single day and yet still wasn't good enough for The Wonderbolts? She ground her teeth and endured the high pitch of Pinkie's ramblings as she iced the cookies.
"Isn't that just the best! These cookies look so great! Everypony is going to ju-"
" I have to leave!" the Pegasus shouted, not caring for the protests or the shock, the wonder. Not caring about anything but preserving her sanity. She zipped out of there at typical Rainbow Dash velocity, knocking everything down in the after math, and just leaving Pinkie alone. She blinked, icing tube in hoof, shrugged, then went back to her duty.
~ ~ ~
High above the limits of Ponyville, the rainbow mare laid on a cloud, hooves over her ears and still unable to block out Pinkie's voice. Her sturdy frame was shaking badly. Helplessly powerless to prevent her sanity from depleting, she had to find some way out of Pinkie's entanglement of bliss. Cheer is good, yes, but the mare just brought it to a whole new extreme. Dash could leave Ponyville. Yes, that was one possibility. But the frizzy pink pony could find anypony anywhere.
Rainbow's mind racked itself with ideas of what to do, but everything came to naught.
"Oh Raaaaaaaaaaaaainbow!" came the voice that finally ate at the last bit of whatever hold she had left of herself. Dash sat up on her cloud, eye twitching, a ghoulish smile across her snout. Suddenly, everything made sense to her again. She knew what to do. An eerie calm stole over the mare's body. She let out her wings and maneuvered her way down to the bane of her existence.
The abhorrent grimace still graced her muzzle as she greeted Pinkie Pie. The party pony took a step back and pulled up her face in a frightened expression, "A-are you alright?"
"I'm better than ever." she replied as calmly as she could, trying to keep her bemused thoughts from entering her voice. She couldn't let Pinkie on to her plans for fright of running her away.
"Okay!" Pie returned, all fright completely erased from her mind, thus returning to her enraptured demeanor, "I was wondering if you'd like to come try a few of the cookies I just iced."
Dash took a deep breath, easing away the shivers of excitement from her shoulders, and slowly nodded. "I'd love to."
"Come on then!" Pinkie took to her normal bouncing gait and led the way. Dash, abnormally, followed behind her in a slow trot, rather than taking to the air. Pinkie looked behind at her, gave a quizzical glance, and then just looked away. The grin came back to Dash.
~ ~ ~
Once inside Sugarcube Corner, Pinkie quickly ran off to get the cookies she had set aside for her and her closest friend. Dash took to locking the door, pulling the blinds, everything to keep anypony from looking in at what was going to happen. She marched her way to the back room where Pinkie had gone, cold shivers traveled from her haunches, to her midsection, eventually up to her her shoulders, and then exploded all throughout her body. The sheer ecstasy of knowing she'd finally be rid of the being that caused her intense mental pain, the pony that devoured everything she had formally been, became the greatest thrill of her life. A bigger thrill than doing a sonic rainboom, a bigger rush of adrenaline than flying at speeds faster than anypony.
She reached the room. Body heaving. Coat matted with a sheen a sweat. Foamed saliva oozing out of the sides of her mouth. Eye twitching.
"R-Rainbow....What's wron-" Pinkie could barely finish before Dash pounced on her. Dash pinned the mare down, hooves on her forelegs, she straddled the pony to keep her from moving. Spittle dripped and splashed on Pinkie's face.
"I'm s-scared Dash..."
"You should be. I'm sick and tired of you, Pinkie. Do you know how much pain and misery you've caused me over the last few months?!"
Pinkie's blue eyes welled with tears, "How.."
"All your happiness over NOTHING. Life's not a freakin' party! Get over it, Pinkie! Not everything can have a dance number. The last song you'll ever sing will a funeral song!" Dash grabbed Pinkie's magenta mane between her teeth and dragged her out to the kitchen section of the bakery. Pinkie struggled and kicked against the Pegasus's jaw, but she grunted and held tough. When they got there, Dash took the twine that was meant to tie the cookies, and subdued Pinkie's legs with them, while shoving a dish cloth in her mouth.
Pinkie tried her best to reason with Dash around the cloth, but everything came out muffled. "Thu dunth theed tho doth thith!" the little party pony shrieked. Rainbow grinned, "You don't even know what I'm doing. That's probably for the best." A psychotic, broken look glasses her eyes as she leaned in to tie another cloth around Pinkie's eyes.
~ ~ ~
The celebration that Pinkie had planned for Nightmare Night turned out to be the best. Ever. Rainbow Dash passed around a plate of pink coloured cookies she had made herself. Everypony had declared these the greatest cookies they had ever sampled. Dash glowed with delight. When asked about her recipe, she merely replied saying Pinkie had helped out and that she couldn't give it away. It was secret.
~ ~ ~
Days passed without sight of Pinkie Pie. Everypony began to get a little worried. When three weeks went past, there was a decided search upon the Sugarcube Corner where she was last seen. In the kitchen sat a pile of Pinkie's hair, her hooves, skin, everything. And a dirty cookie pan. It didn't take long for the residents of Ponyville to discover exactly what the "secret" to Rainbow's cookies were.
