Of Ponies and Muffins

Chapter 9: Cameron is ponynapped and Brian makes Tacos

“Well, this seems to be quite the predicament that I’m in….” Cameron said to herself (or would it be Carmen?), realizing her current situation. “Twilight, so help me if you can’t reverse this I will eviscerate you using your own horn.  Then I will go about removing every trace of you from history, so that there will not be a single pony who remembers you, and you will effectively be dead to the world”.

Alex knew this side of Cameron, and he knew that Cameron was dead serious about the threats he was making. He had once managed to completely remove a student from his old school from the servers, making him redo the entire grade simply because he had tripped him and never apologized. He had also once promised to pull the greatest April fools prank the school would ever see, and then on that all of the ketchup had been replaced with 5 alarm hot sauce and it was a day they had French fries. Never again was Cameron allowed to go anywhere near the condiments. She was a man (mare?) of promises and always kept to them.

It was at this point that that a certain purple maned mare walked into the library. “Twilight, do you still have those-“. She stopped mid-sentence, eyes locked onto Cameron, who seemed to have a look of terror in his (her, Celestia this is going to get confusing fast) eyes. “Why, what a lovely coat you have. I just got done with a new dress and I think it might fit you. Come along.” She said, however it was more of a command rather than a request since she started to lead Cameron on her way to her boutique, regardless of Cameron’s protests.

“Well, that just happened. You know who that was?” Brian asked, sitting down. “Shadow and I met her when we first came here, that was possibly one of the most awkward things that have ever happened to him. And now that he’s a she, it could only ever possibly get better.” He said with a stupid grin on his face.

“Yeah, that was Rarity. She runs the boutique in town. So, Shadow is now stuck with her until she is done. I think that if I tried to pull him… I mean her out of their Rarity would not be exactly happy. Tartarus knows no fury like that of an angry seamstress.”

“Great,” said Alex. “We have to go in there and save Shadow before he becomes a model for whatever dress she has in store for her. Personally I just want to see how this will play out just so that I can have something to use against him, or we could attempt to get him back… Wait, did you say her name was Rarity?”

“Yeah, why? Is that important or something?” Twilight said, curious as to why he would ask that question.

Alex stood there for a few seconds, just blinking. “Well, I need a job and that was the job I was going to apply for. It says that she was looking for somepony that could start working immediately.” He sat there, pondering what to do from there. “I could go and get the job, and then I might be able to get Shadow out of there and back to you before he loses all semblances of sanity. Seriously, even if Shadow is a girl now I think that her wearing a dress would bring the apocalypse upon us and there would not be a single pony that would not die in the ensuring fallout.”

“Well, that sounds like a perfectly good plan that I am going to stay as far away from as possible.” Brian said. “Besides, I’m freaking hungry and I could go for a taco.”

“What’s a taco?” Twilight said, head cocked at an angle.

“Wait, do you mean to say that tacos don’t exist here? They are these little folded and cooked things on what we call tortillas that are filled with stuff, possibly one of the greatest inventions of all time where our little trio came from and you mean to tell me that they don’t exist in Equestria?”

“If they do, then I've never heard of them before today. And this is coming from somepony who has read at least half a dozen cookbooks.”

“I…. This changes everything….. Crimson?”

“Yeah? Oh Luna… That look…. You have a plan to do something, don’t you?”

“ON THIS DAY THE TACO SHALL BE INTRODUCED TO EQUESTRIA, AND IT SHALL BE GLORIOUS!” Shouted Brian, before he bolted out of the library. Alex barely had time to react to what he had just heard. Brian was loose again and was about to introduce a whole new kind of food to the world, which could possibly end with more chaos than he had created when he had first gotten free.

“Well, then. I guess that means that we have to save Shadow ourselves then. Brian creating the taco might be a

problem though.”

“Oh? Why would that be?” Twilight asked,

“Well, he came out of Shadows head, and if he is anything like Shadow then it is quite likely that he will somehow manage to burn it before he even manages to turn any kind of cooker on.”

“Shadow can’t be that bad of a cook, could he?”

“Twilight, he once did a family cooking challenge. He was put in charge of pouring water for the judges and while tests later confirmed that what he had served was pure water, he had managed to turn it purple with floating bits of green in it. I swear to this day that it blinked at me…..”

“So, back on the subject of saving Shadow from the fashion machine that is Rarity?”

“Yeah, so to pull this off I have a brilliant plan.” Alex sat there for a second recalling some of the major details that he had come up with. “Twilight,  how much can you teleport at once?” He asked.

“I don’t know, never really had to move more than a few ponies at any given time.” She responded, curious to why he

would have asked the question.

“Okay, that seems like it should be fine. Next part of the plan: Do you know where we could get bananas? Like, at least a dozen crates worth?”

Chapter 10: Alex nearly drowns and Cameron plots

It had been about 20 minutes since Cameron had been dragged into the store by Rarity, who was still taking measurements of him so she could make the dress. Cameron had long given up any hope of escaping her after one of his earlier attempts was met with being hit by a spell that froze him in place. It was at this point that Cameron had started coming up with ways to get back at Rarity and possibly burn down the store at the same time. “You know I didn’t want a dress. The things look terrible on me and… Buck it; I’m out of reasons to get you to stop…. Are you done yet?” Cameron asked, waiting for a reply from his captor.

“Almost, should only take one, maybe two…” She trailed off at the last part and Cameron did not quite catch the last part.

“Minutes?”

“No, hours. I want to make sure that I get this absolutely perfect” The mare replied, measuring the length of Cameron’s back. At that mention something inside of Cameron broke, and with that decided that he had two options to escape from this predicament. He could either A. Lose all of his masculinity (ironic, given his current state) and sit there for two more hours while a dress was made for him (that he would likely be forced to wear in public) Or B. He could go off and kill himself to save him from the insanity of this world, the humiliation he was about to receive and he might wake up if he was in some sort of coma. He was just about to get done with making a choice when the bell at the front door sounded.

“Hello? Is there a Miss Rarity in here?” Called the voice, who Cameron recognized immediately as Alex.

I swear if that cheeky bastard came here just to see me wear a dress…

“I’m here about the job offer, it said you were looking for an assistant?”

Wait… What? Now this was something completely unexpected, Cameron knew that Alex really did not do much work, but the fact that he actually had managed to pick a job and it happened to be that he would work for his captor seemed a bit... Unlikely.

“Wonderful, I will go and grab the paperwork that you will need to sign.” She turned to Cameron, giving her a glare that would likely be able to make a grown man cry of fear. “And you need to stay here.”

Rarity walked away to the upstairs of the shop, leaving the two of them alone. “Alright,” Cameron said. “If you’re here to just see me in a dress, I am so going to kill you.”

“No, I’m here for three reasons. The first is to get your sorry flank out of here, the second is to get a job like I said I would.” He said, a slightly ticked look on his face.

“Okay fair enough.” Cameron replied. Then he remembered that Alex had a third reason. “Wait, you said there were 3, not two. What's the third?”

“I wanted to see you in a dress, then use magic to capture that image. Permanently.”

“Okay that bucking settles it, you are so dead when we get back home.”

“Yeah well, good luck killing me. So Twilight and I came up with a plan...” Alex then spent the next minute or so explaining the plan to him, being vigilant that Rarity did not interrupt them.

“Okay, that is a bit ridiculous of a plan... But why bananas? I mean, theres a freaking apple orchard like, less than a mile from here. Surely that would make more sense.” Cameron asked, curious about why he would have used that fruit in particular.

“Well, my fine feathered friend (you have no idea how long he had waited to use that in an actual sentence), its because all ladies love them bananas.” He then gave Cameron a look that one would only use in the most suggestive of ways. Then Cameron realized how incredibly awkward a situation he was in, being a girl himself at that moment.

Rarity then came back downstairs with a clipboard levitating in the air beside her, a faint blue glow surrounding it. “Okay, here it is. I just need you to sign in a few places that give me the ability to employ you as my assistant. The last one ran out of here screaming after the first day. He actually only got through with helping me with one of my orders, then he just ran out, something about expectations I think?” She said, not really thinking about what she had just said. However Alex saw through (what he prayed to be) her ruse, and was just attempting to make him reconsider working for her.

“Well, I’m not that pony. So I think i’m still going to go sign those papers.” Alex said, calm as a cucumber that took yoga classes and was recently injected with sedatives. She handed the clipboard over to Alex, who used his own magic to sign some the spots, vaguely glancing at some of the lines in between them, he swore he read something about pony sacrifice but went back to find it and couldn't. After he was done he passed back the clipboard to her.

        This was what Cameron had been waiting for, the signal for the plan to go into action. Cameron coughed, then spoke one of the oldest excuses known to the world. “Excuse me, I have to use the bathroom.” The likeliness that this would work seemed to be about 50/50. Rarity just rolled her eyes at this.

        “Very well, just make it quick. I don’t have all day. I need to drop this sheet off upstairs anyhow.” She said, waving Cameron off with a hoof. Perfect, this was all going to plan. Cameron trotted off towards the bathroom, where his escape plan was waiting. There was a chance this could all go terribly wrong,  but that was only a chance.

        Cameron entered the bathroom, where a certain lavender unicorn was waiting for her. “Took you long enough, picking new hats?”. She said, a sarcastic tone to her voice.

        “Trust me, becoming a girl and then being hit by the wave of hormones makes you think things. And for a while I was considering buying things that no sane male individual should ever consider buying.” Cameron shuddered. “Look, lets just get this over with.”

        “Okay then.” Twilight then began charging up her magic to teleport the two of them out of the bathroom, away from the fashionista that Cameron would likely be seeing in his nightmares VERY soon. She teleported them back to the library dropping off Cameron before, where a rather dapper looking Brian. He was sporting a black top hat with a golden rimmed monocle.

        “Um, what's with the stuff?” Cameron asked, perplexed by Brian's new found swag.

        “Oh this? I recreated the taco and sold the concept to a food chain, I put you as the name and we get a cut of the profits. You would be surprised how popular the taco is here, I did however change a few things since the ponies here don’t eat meat.”

        Twilight teleported back into the library a moment later, after wondering exactly how hard it WAS to find a document that started with W. “Well, I dropped off the rest of the plan at Rarity’s. Why did he chose bananas anyways?”

        “Twilight. Trust me when I say that his reasoning is something that you do NOT want to know. Lets just get this over with. Turn me back to being a colt and get Brian back in here.” She said, tapping her skull.

        “Alright then. This might sting. Really, really sting.” Twilight said, charging up for the upteenth time that day.

        “Wonderful, can’t wait to go through that again. For the second time. In the same day.” He prayed to Celestia that his body was ready.

        She fired the blast, hitting Cameron felt the the same pain from before, doubly so because he also had to get a second consciousness forced into his head. Losing your mind (not in the Pinkamena way of total insanity) surprisingly does not really hurt. However having your bone structure reworked in a matter of seconds is about as painful as being forced to listen to modern pop music for 24 hours straight. After the searing pain of a thousand terrible songs having coursed through Cameron's flesh, he was now back to his old self. Brian included.

“Damn, and I was just starting to like being alive.” Said Brian, only sounding slightly disappointed. “Well, at least I took care of the cash problem. And to top it off I helped usher in a new food for the many ponies that inhabit this land. Today was a good day.”

Yeah well, to be fair you nearly leveled the entire town with your shenanigans. I seriously hope that I won’t have to deal with this later. Cameron took a deep breath. “So, how do you think Rarity is going to handle her surprise?”

        “I don’t know, I guess we're going to see when Crimson gets back.”

        “Well, this might just be one of his best plans ever.”

^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^V^

        “Crimson? Do you know if my newest client is still in the bathroom?” Rarity called out, hoping for a reply from her new assistant.

        “I never heard her come out.” Although I know that she is gone. I hope that everything has gone according to plan. Alex gave himself a wry smile.Oh how I hope everything has gone according to plan. “Maybe you should go and check on her? I would but, you know. I might get bucked in the mouth for barging in on a lady.”

        “Very well,” Rarity said in a slightly annoyed tone that someone could easily mistake for whining. She walked up to the bathroom door and knocked. “Hello? Are you alright in there?” There was no reply. Rarity knocked a bit harder. “Hello?” Silence. At this point the fashionista was getting rather annoyed. “Alright then, I’m coming in there.”

        This was the moment that Alex had been waiting for. Rarity started up her magic and begin to turn the doorknob, not noticing that the door had sounded like something was propped up against it when she knocked and that it had a ever so slight bulge. She turned the doorknob. It was at this moment that Alex realized that he was in the blast zone for what was about to happen. Oh buck.

        The door exploded outwards, a sea of bananas exploding out from inside of the bathroom. How Twilight had managed to compact them all in there, Alex would likely never know. The wave of the yellow fruit came full force and buried Alex and Rarity underneath its potassium rich mass. The sheer quantity of the material forcing its way out blocked out the seamstress’s screams as the fruit battered her. There was silence for a minute possibly two, as the two of them got over the fact that they were now buried under bananas, of all things.

        Alex was the first to get up from the mess. “Well that was unexpected.” Yes, the bananas were part of the plan. However he was not lying, him getting caught in the fallout of his plan was not expected whatsoever. Rarity got up next, and that's when Alex nearly died of laughter.

        “What? What's so funny?” Rarity asked, not noticing what exactly had happened to her appearance.

        Alex snickered into his hoof before using his magic to bring a mirror over to his new boss, and revealed to her was a

truly comedic sight, impaled perfectly parallel on her horn was a banana. Rarity just sat and stared at herself, after a few seconds she began to scream.

        It took her a minute of 20 to calm down, get herself back in order and remove the banana. Alex was the first to say something. “Just going to go out on a limb and guess that i’m going to be the one that cleans up this mess?” Rarity simply nodded. “Figures”.