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How to think really really really really hard. (That's 4 reallys)
A more pinkieish book had not ever been written. The cover was a bright neon pink, covered in further pink stickers. Every inch of its collage was bedazzled in at least one object, sometimes more than one, overlapping in a massive fractal of chaos, peppermints, drawings, plastic flowers; it was an incarnation of Pinkie's mind made manifest, dropped one day into an unassuming reality.
"I was going to give it to you tomorrow during the party, but I just couldn't wait! I thought of you having the whole day off and not reading it! It was too much to ask." Pinkie happily bounced up and down outside Twilight's door, her burden cheerfully lifted.
"Well …" Twilight eyed the homemade book skeptically as it hovered before her. It seemed so fragile that pieces might come flying off any second, but nothing had fallen off so far.
"They say the best presents are those that you make yourself. I was going to give you food, but then I thought *gasp* 'what Twi loves is more books, so what better book than one I made myself.'" Pinkie at last came to some semblance of rest with her ever-present smile on her face, beaming in her touch of brilliance.
Twilight carefully, slowly opened the book to the table of contents. All the sticky bits stayed stuck. This book was more substantial than it looked, The table of contents lay before her in what was obviously Pinkie's curlicue script. "I didn't know you knew how to bind books."
"I had some help. OH! That reminds me! Gotta get back to the bakery! Tell me what you think! Tootles." Pinkie's voice faded off into the distance as she happily bounded away. Twilight smiled and brought the book into the house. Well, the library was closed anyway. Why not take Pinkie's advice? Twilight carefully nudged aside 'A History of Legal Water Rights' and allowed the book to land on her reading table. This was going to be an … interesting read.
* * *
Twilight smiled at the illustration as she reassembled herself to match it. Pinkie's drawing of her had Twilight firmly sitting on her plot, with her front hooves clasped together in a circle, and her hind hooves clasped in an X, it what was apparently Pinkie's idea of a meditation position. Twilight couldn't help but grin at that, she'd had courses on meditation, how to clear the mind of all activity so she could fill it up with magic. The positions were nothing at all like this. Poor Pinkie. But she might as well give it a chance.
"Huh," Twilight frowned at the book. It obviously did not say to 'clear the mind' as her magic books did in their first chapters, but instead to fill the mind. Of course. Twilight could never imagine Pinkie's mind not going a mile a minute, anyway. Twilight was supposed to imagine her happy things. Twilight laughed as she closed her eyes and tried to think "really hard" about them. Her friends. an A on her report card. The places she used to go to relax and find tranquility and excitement. Her favorite music. To tell a joke and have everyone laugh. Favorite foods, both desserts and meals. Relaxing on the beach, viewing an amazing vista of the mountains at sunset, the smell of freshly-baked cookies.
Twilight thought really really hard.
Twilight thought of the day the Pegasi over Canterlot accidentally dropped a foot of snow, and they had to cancel school for the day, giving her an extra day to work on her final report. She'd gotten a hundred percent on that report. She remembered how thankful she'd been for that extra time; she'd worked so hard on it. Everyone had been proud of her. Of course, she learned later, they would have been proud of her, anyway.
Twilight thought really, really, really hard.
Twilight thought of the time she'd surprised Pinkie with a cake Twi had made out of a cookbook's recipe. It had been terribly lopsided, but Pinkie insisted it was one of the best tasting cakes she'd ever had, saying it was flavored with love, giving her a huge hug of thanks in return.
Twilight thought about that really really really really hard.
A warmth started creeping up her, from her center, core, soul of her being, and spreading, ever so gradually, outward, towards her hooves and horn. This wasn't anything like a magic spell; it caught her by surprise, but Twilight let the aura fill her with its energy, yielding to the pinkish manna, so different than the kind derived from order and organization, or the darker magic derived from chaos. This was a magic derived from whimsy. And she let it subsume her.
Twilight had thought Pinkie knew nothing of meditation when she'd started. As she opened her eyes to her world still glowing with the last lights of a slight pinkish tingle, she realized she'd actually learned something from this book. Not exactly magic; something … different. She would need to take it more seriously. This was a subject she'd never studied before, and here was the only textbook written by the world's foremost authority. Who knows what Twilight might learn?
Twilight collected the book in her hovering light, and marched it down to the basement and the reading room, "Spike," she said to the lazing-about dragon as she passed, "Could you not interrupt me for a while?"
"No problem" Spike sighed as he turned over. He'd heard it before.
"No distractions. I want to get this read ."
It was time for some SERIOUS reading.
"Hello" Pinkie cheerfully popped her head in a basement window, "I'm off for the day. How do you like your present so far?"
"It's really interesting," Twilight honestly said. "I'm really drawn to it. It speaks from the heart. Thanks, Pinkie," Twilight smiled up at the equally grinning pink face, "Doesn't your neck hurt doing that?"
"Nope! Any way in is a good way in! Have you gotten to that bit, yet?"
Twilight blinked, "Um. Yes, actually." She'd read those words not fifteen seconds before. How did Pinkie KNOW?!
Well, might as well ask her, "Is it in the book later? How do you keep showing up that way?"
"Oh, it's easy." Pinkie tried to shove herself through with her hind legs. For a moment, it was obviously not going to work, then Pinkie gave an extra 'Oomph' and came tumbling inside.
"This is becoming an interactive story!" a very upside-down Pinkie said, as Twilight gently helped her up.
"This is how you do it. First, you think about where you want to be."
Twilight gently nodded. This is how her own Teleportation spell began.
"Second, you think of the shortest way to get there."
Twilight continued nodding more vigorously. This part she knew well.
"Then, C: You think about all of the things between you and there."
Twilight grinned again.
"Finally, you think of all the other ways you could go that you were missing, instead."
"What?"
"What's happening in those places? Are they lonely?"
Twilight couldn't quite grasp this sudden change of course. Her mind mentally tacked hard to port, right over a waterfall.
Twilight slowly repeated, "Are those places … lonely?"
Pinkie nodded earnestly. "Sometimes you think you need to go right in the front door. But nopony seems to think about the other ways. Is where you're going in the back? Go in the back door! It's much quicker. Is where you're going on the second floor? Go in a window. Dashie taught me that one!"
Twilight imagined how Rainbow must have taught Pinkie that specific trick; probably involving high velocity.
Pinkie laughed as she continued, "Anyway, you never know. Some ways take a bit more effort. But the extra effort is worth it. If nothing else, it surprises them!" With that, Pinkie hopped up, clutched the windowsill, stuck her head out, and in an excellent explanatory demonstration of her technique, wriggled, squirmed, oomphed, and plopped her way outside again. "The book tells you all about it! Happy reading!" Pinkie giggled off into the sunset.
Twilight looked up. Wait, the sun was setting? Just when it was getting good!
But Twilight smiled.
"G'night Spike!" Twilight gently tucked in the still-sleeping dragon on her way out the door.
She'd hadn't pulled an all-nighter to read a book since unicorn school, but this … this was too good to pass up. She grabbed up her nectarine lantern in her mouth, up the stairs, and marched outside into the twilit darkness, placing it on a stump. As the fireflies crowded around the dish of sweet nectar inside, the lantern started to give off its familiar citrine light. Not even waiting for the lantern to fill, Twilight continued reading in the combined soft glow of the lantern and setting sun.
She'd planned to close the lantern properly and bring it back inside. She'd planned to curl up with the book in bed, as she used to. She'd planned to stay up all night in there.
Not out here.
Without even realizing, the tired eyes combined the words with dreams, until at last Twilight fell asleep with her hooves tucked underneath her, cherubically on the grass, softly dreaming dreams of Pink.
How To Not Be Constrained by Reality
"So is the library open, or what?" An upside-down Rainbow Dash abruptly broke through Twilight's morning.
"Dash?" Twilight dreamily opened her eyes wider. "Dash! Ohmygosh! What time is it?"
"I dunno," Dash shrugged, "library time?"
Twilight had NEVER slept through a library shift before; she rushed in to find she was only fifteen minutes late, thanking every star in the sky, many of which by name.
"Good thing I happened by! Must be some crazy studying." Dash's mouth pulled up into a grin around Twilight's lantern, now empty of both fireflies and nectar, having never been closed the previous night, "What book is it?"
"Um … it's my birthday present from Pinkie Pie. She … um made it herself?"
Dash looked at the book now laid out on Twilight's reading desk again, full of its neat pink script, "Oh …... kay. No offense, Twilight."
"It is … strange in places, but it's also … interesting." Twilight struggled to find the right word, again something she almost never had to do, "Actually, I'm … intrigued by it."
"Whatever. Cycling Daring Doo books." Dash pulled the previous volume out of her saddlebags, quickly replacing it with the next already laid out for her.
"All right. Happy reading." Twilight smiled.
"Same to ya!" Dash called out. "Don't fall asleep again."
"I won't!" Twilight called out to the retreating rainbow blur, before carefully turning the page and continuing on.
"It's time for a test!" the pink words read off the page. "Study hard!"
Twilight blinked. This was a textbook after all. Well, no matter. Twilight knew how to study for a test. She grabbed pen, and ink, and paper, and some flashcards, from their various places, as she scurried about the room.
Then she stopped.
What exactly would she be studying? There was nothing to calculate or memorize. No dates. No formulas. She thought about this for a minute or two, and then brought her supplies back to her desk in a heap. Well, she might as well get started, then. She was sure she'd do fine at any test Pinkie would write.
Question 1:
What can you only get when you give it away?
Twilight stopped again.
Twilight put down her quill.
This was not any kind of question she'd seen before. In fact, it was more of a riddle than a test question.
Question B:
What is the answer to this question?
"Oh, COME ON!" Twilight complained aloud, "What kind of a question is that?"
"You get infinity guesses. When you're ready to guess, come find me and tell me your answer" the book continued. And there the chapter ended.
Well, it was going to be that kind of test was it? Twilight set a determined scowl on her face.
She was set on passing it. She quickly started to pull reference works off the walls. She'd get at least one of these questions right. What IS the answer to this question? And what can you only get when you give it away?
* * *
"Are you sure the answer isn't love?"
"No, but you're super-duper-really close." Pinkie placated Twilight with a big hug, "Anyway, have a cookie for coming all the way down here."
"Thanks, Pinkie. Do you have change for a gem?"
"Oh, don't worry about it. It's on the house. Call it an advance on your birthday party!" Pinkie started pronking up and down. "It's going to be super fantastic! I should know!"
Twilight put a hoof on Pinkie's shoulder, "Well, I know how to repay you; I can help you make more cookies. And you can tell me all about what you have planned."
Pinkie stopped pronking and winked at that. "Now, you're starting to think like a Pink."
* * *
"First, you need the right musical number."
"I sort of imagined it would go that way," Twilight looked down at the round doughballs, wondering how music could possibly affect cooking times and temperatures, desperately trying to hit the right frame of mind.
"The music helps keep up your internal rhythm."
"Rhythm?"
Pinkie nodded, "Oh yes, everything needs to have a rhythm. It's how things get done. I'll start." And with that, she started singing a happy song involving cookies and cupcakes.
"I don't see what this has to do with the recipe."
"It's written in the recipe. It must be followed."
Twilight looked over at Pinkie's recipe book. Sure enough it was, lyrics and all. Perhaps the Book of Pink wasn't the only book Pinkie had written.
"All cookbooks need music in their recipes."
"I've read dozens of cookbooks. None of them had music in them."
Pinkie tilted her head to one side, and thought about that a second, "Why, Twi?"
"Why what?"
"Why would you read a cookbook? You can look it up later."
"So I know how everything works. If you know the recipe by heart, it works better."
"That is true..."Pinkie looked at the ceiling, "Why does it work better?"
"Because I have everything organized for it. Set up. I know what I'm doing while I'm doing it; I have an internal compass, an-"
"An internal rhythm!" Pinkie clapped her front hooves together, point made. "Without an internal rhythm I get distracted, lose focus, and wind up doing something else."
Twilight stopped and thought about that another second. "Huh. I learned something." She was actually learning new studying tips? And from Pinkie?
Together, they sang a song of cookies and cupcakes.
* * *
Twilight stopped before going into the pastry shop the next day. She knew she couldn't go in the front door. She thought for a moment. Did the building even have a back door? She went around 270 degrees and, behind some bushes, next to a garbage can, was one. Pinkie was standing there all a-beaming, declaring for all to hear, "I KNEW you'd wind up over here. You're a fast study, Twi."
Twilight grinned again, at the familiar compliment, which sounded strange coming from Pinkie Pie, but also because it included Pinkie's natural effervescence.
"I have some more guesses for your test."
"If you have more than one guess at once, they're probably not it."
"Hmmm." Twilight kept one hoof to her mouth in thought. "This is a rather difficult puzzle."
"Have you ever done a really hard maze? How do you solve it?"
"You start at the end and work back towards the beginning."
"Right. You imagine everything being perfect, then work your way back. That's how you figure out how to get there. Reality is over-rated. Instead, concentrate on having fun where you want to be, instead. If I'm making cookies, I can pretend the cookies are for Celestia. And then- OOH, I bet we can actually send her some! And they could be the most delicious thing she's ever- HANG ON" with this, Pinkie Pie suddenly ran off in a puff of dust.
She returned a moment later with a small vial. "Rarity gave this to me. It's sweetberry essence. She'd ordered it thinking it was a perfume, but it was actually to eat," Pinkie giggled. "It's in some foreign language. Poor Rarity. But anyway, we could make Celestia some sweetberry cupcakes! I bet she's never had that before."
"We? Did you want a helping hoof?"
"Wouldn't you like to make Celestia the world's best cupcakes? I know I do."
"Isn't this all a tad optimistic?"
"Nothing's gone wrong so far."
Twilight frequently felt a twinge when Celestia was concerned. She always imagined messing something up in front of her teacher. "What if the recipe went wrong? What if she got sick from that? I couldn't forgive myself."
"We can try a few first of course; the chef's taste," Pinkie winked. "And worst comes to worst, we start over with plain cupcakes. If you keep thinking about things that might stop you, you'll never get started. If you think about what keeps you going, you'll keep picking up speed, like Rainbow Dash. Internal rhythm."
"But what if she doesn't like them?"
"I'm sure she'd be polite about it. After all, one, she'd want more Twi-Pinkie cupcakes! I mean, who wouldn't? And B: Celestia isn't like that."
"That's true, Celestia isn't some evil … "
"MeanyFacepants."
Twilight facehoofed to hide her laughter. "Yes, Pinky. Meany. Face. Pants. Just the word I was looking for."
"We should add that question to the test" Pinkie was laughing now, too. "Twiley, use the word meanyfacepants in a sentence'."
"Okay. Sometimes Trixie is a meanyfacepants." Twilight was crying with laughter by this point.
"That's correct, Twi! Good job!" Pinkie was laughing her self silly, well sillier, as well.
"Everyone wants to be happy. Open the door to happiness, and they'll go right in. They aren't going to be unhappy to spite you. If they have a choice between a response that makes everyone happy and a response that makes them sad, they're always going to pick happy, so you don't need to worry about them picking sad. If you give it a chance, it almost always works. If nothing never ever had any way of getting done, nothing would ever happen at all."
Twilight stopped, suddenly getting it. It sounded very ... metaphysical. "Oh. I think I realized something."
Pinkie wrapped up Twilight in a big Pinkie-hug, "Does this mean you know the answer to my questions?"
She guessed right.
Author's Note
Answers in two chapters. Didn't want to spoil it for those who wanted to think about them, first.
Much had passed in the next few days, including Trixie's return, along with some kind of deletion of Pinkie's mouth. Where was Pinkie, anyway? Twilight was still looking for her, trying to dispel the magic, but the village was still recovering from the chaos. No one knew where she was, not any of Twi's other friends, not the Cakes, although the Cakes had mentioned she hadn't been able to eat for the past few days. Twilight cringed at that. Imagine Pinkie not being able to eat. How horrid.
It reminded her of the latest chapter of Pinkie's book, so different from the other chapters, about her time on the rock farm.
Twilight stopped and tried to imagine Pinkie being without any friends at all.
She tried.
She couldn't. It wasn't thinkable.
Pinkie'd learned the value of friendship much earlier than Twilight had. No wonder Pinkie was so possessive of them. They were so valuable to her.
Her eyes started to tear up with Pinkie's pain. She wanted to help Pinkie with all of her heart, but where was she? It seemed so hopeless. Twilight was desperately running through town randomly now, eager to find where she might be.
She suddenly approached a … nexus? Wormhole?
An eerie black circle stained the world before her; an iris closing off a perfect radius of the world. It was similar to the end of a movie, a camera trick, where the black boundary of the film would slowly bullseye into itself until the film was no more, and the movie was all black.
Yet here it was, in real life, a black void in the world, nightmarish in its perfectness.
Twilight slowly stuck out a front hoof into the inky blackness, giving a little 'eep' as it passed through the yielding event horizon. She quickly set it down there to stop it from shaking.
Breathing heavily, She slowly set up the other front hoof, gingerly stepping over the portal's boundary that wasn't quite flush with the ground. Its maker not being concerned with things such as reality.
Twilight kept thinking that the doorway might close suddenly, shearing her in half. Finally able to stand it no longer, she jumped both her back legs over, and tumbled upside down onto the black, featureless ground upon the other side, a dark, fully featureless void, not a speck of light, nor a note of sound, not even being able to feel her hooves upon the floor.
Twilight managed to upright herself to all fours and heard a general, distant 'snuff-snuff' of Pinkie's tears off in the distance, and started to follow the only sound in the universe. Noting, with some dismay, that the hole back to reality was no longer there.
She stopped and looked behind her again. And then to each side. The longer Twilight stepped through the blackness, the more she got the feeling of someone LOOKING at her. Several someones. thousands of them. She felt as if she were on stage, a character in a play. Of course, Pinkie always acted as if she were a character in a play, and it never bothered HER.
She shook her head and strode onward. She wasn't going to worry about that right now, for two reasons:
A. Pinkie was in trouble and she was going to help her.
This was Pinkie's universe, and she doubted anything would happen to her there, knowing Pinkie, no matter how sad she was right now.
Twilight started forward in a mild gallop, closing the distance between her and the sniffling at speed.
Pinkie's tears were slowly trailing down her mouthless snout as Pinkie tried to cry- but couldn't, "Mmmm. Mmm. Mm" .
Pinkie looked up and suddenly spotted Twilight.
"Mmmmmm! MmmMmmmm!" Pinkie looked right into her eyes, then looked down and shuffled her hooves, "mmm."
"Are you ready to go, now?" Twilight asked.
"MmmHmmm."
"Let's do something first," Twilight's horn glowed softly with her inner purple spirit, loosing her worldfamous magic with her trusty failsafe spell, disempowering the enchantment. Her temporary fear of the Black subsiding; here at least was something she knew how to do.
Disenchanted, Pinkie's mouth opened up with the BIGGEST rush of air, "Ehhhhhhhhhhhhh! Oh ThankYouThankYouIwantedToEatThoseCookiesSoBadAndNowICan,HowDoWeGetOutOfHere?"
"The … same way we got in?"
Twilight stopped. This was Pinkie's universe. That didn't sound right- too... logical; not enough … whimsy.
"Well, all the other ways might be … " Twilight smiled, "lonely. Let's go that way, instead."
Twilight closed her eyes, and started thinking about her teleportation spell, but not casting it. Instead thinking about the way she wanted to go, asking for permission, 'hello, little ways' she thought. 'Aren't you lonely? Do you want a friend'?
Suddenly, a circle back to the world appeared before them.
"Oh!" Twilight meeped. "That was easier than I thought it would be."
"Most things are, until people overthink them." Pinkie smiled and hopped briskly through. Twilight more gingerly stepped over the threshold, not wanting to trip over the … whatever that was.
Back in the real world, Twilight looked behind her. There was no black, no indication that anything had happened before. She looked ahead, where she wanted to be: with Pinkie.
Pinkie was again pronking thorough the streets. Her friend was happy. Because all HER friends were happy. And Pinkie, and Twilight, could make them so; a ricochet of happy that reverberated forever.
"And then I ate ALL the day-old sweets. We usually make crumbs out of them, and then-. But first I had to. Wait, before that, I ..." Pinkie had been motormouthing all day, making up for lost time. Some of the sentences got confused en route, only to be picked up later; well, most of the time.
"The thing is, it's like the answer to that question..." Pinkie trailed off.
"Which question?"
"You know, 'What is the answer to this question'?"
"Seven? Wait, do you mean what I finally, officially answered, or ... ?"
"No, silly. The real answer to the question."
"That any answer to the question must be correct, since it lacks sufficient requirements to make any answer incorrect?"
Pinkie stopped, "Yuppers. You can make up whatever you want, and you're right! So you can make up your own answer. The secret is to not overthink it. Is seven a lucky number, then?"
"Well, it has various magical properties, which - "
"THERE you are!" A midair turbulence resolved itself into Rainbow Dash, "Do we want to help clean up downtown or uptown?"
"Hmm, okay, everypony, pick a number" Twilight suggested.
"Okay. Now what?" Dash asked.
Twilight smiled, "If it's odd, head downdown. If it's even, head uptown."
"Twilight, is infinity odd or even?"
"Hang on, we need to pick again. Pinkie needs a number besides infinity."
Dash rolled her eyes. "Maybe you guys should help Zecora, then."
"Okey dokie, Loki."
* * *
"We're here!" Pinkie Pie shouted at maximum volume as soon as her voice was within audible range of Zercoa's place. Perhaps luckily, Zecora was standing outside waiting for them:
"The Alicorn amulet now has its escort
Twilight added, "Just to make sure, you are not going to try it on, Pinkie."
"There's a differene between silly and stupid," Pinkie skipped on ahead.
Twilight dutifully collected the amulet's darkwood box, placing it in a smaller pocket of her saddlebags so she could feel the ressuring lump of its bulk. She wanted to take no chances on losing it and having someone else find it. She felt as if she were in some kind of 'Fellowship of the Alicorn Amulet', trying to safeguard it.
Twi's load finally secured, they said their goodbyes again. Leaving the clearing, Twilight mulled the alicorn amulet over in her mind, and its power, and turned to ask Pinkie, "What would you get if you could have anything?"
"Hmmmmm." Pinkie thought as she walked alongside Twilight back through the forest. She thought for so long that Twilight was starting to wonder if Pinkie's mental paths hadn't gotten crossed again; but finally Pinkie replied. "The only thing I can think of is to make the bestest best cupcakes ever for Celestia and the rest of my friends, but we already did that last time. So what about you, Twi?"
Twilight thought, too. "Usually I only wanted to please everyone."
"Well, me too!" grinned Pinkie Pie, "I'm good at that."
Twilight smiled back, "Not exactly in the same way, though. I guess I wanted to do everything right. Not mess up and let everyone down."
"You don't need to worry about that. We'd still love you."
"I'm glad I meet with your approval, at least."
"After all, we'd still need someone to hug."
"You can't get a hug without giving a hug, after all," Twilight said.
"Yup, because a new, fresh one is made every time."
"I ... hadn't thought of it quite that way."
"So many things are that way. You can only make half of a hug. Someone else has to make you the other half. Teamwork! Like sweetberry cupcakes! And this way you know the hugs are ALWAYS fresh."
"An ancient philosopher once asked 'What is the sound of one hoof clapping?' because it takes two hooves to make applause."
"Or four hooves, for double applause. Or three, what would that sound like?"
Twilight pondered this. "This reminds me of my imaginary numbers class."
"It makes every hug slightly different. No two are alike. Like snowflakes. There's no such thing as a perfect hug. You make the best one you can."
Twilight thought about this for several minutes as they walked. "Each part adds to the whole."
"It's all very mathy. You should be good at it, Twi."
Twilight laughed at that. She finally admitted, "I guess I don't have anything to worry about, then."
Pinkie skipped on ahead again, humming quietly.
And, at certain times, not so quietly.
"Oh, that. I've started stashing an extra book in my saddlebags, in case of book emergency," Twilight Sparkle said.
"And what exactly would constitute a 'book emergency'?" Rarity arched one eyebrow quizzically.
"You know, if I'm stuck somewhere without anything to read." A real tragedy for Twilight, Rarity was sure.
"It's a very odd-looking book, this one," Rarity hoisted the Book of Pink in her magical glow, peering at it from every angle.
"Oh, Pinkie gave it to me for my birthday last week."
"I can imagine," Rarity snuffed a giggle. "What is it about, Darling?"
"Well … It's not really 'about' anything, I guess. But it's the most mysterious book. I can loan it to you after I'm done, if Pinkie's okay with it. I'm almost finished with it."
"Well, that sounds-" Rarity was interrupted by a knock on the door. "Ah, a customer. Come in." She started heading towards the front, "Welcome to Carousel Boutique, where every dress is unique, chic, and-" as Rarity went out the front door, the voice suddenly snuffed out. No more words followed.
"Rarity?" Twilight called out questioningly as she headed towards the door herself.
As she exited Rarity's shop, she was answered only by the WHAM of the Book of Pink suddenly dropping to the ground in front of her, shorn of its supporting glow. Rarity was nowhere to be seen; simply vanished.
* * *
Thunder crashed through the air as lightning smashed into the castle's battlements. Rivers of the ever-drizzling rain cascaded down the sides in rivulets, and the entire castle grounds were a soggy mess, as the weather ponies had been unable to move the clouds away for weeks.
This fortress was the hideaway of the Cult of the Fourth Pony. From what Celestia had told her, they'd mostly kept to themselves until very recently, studying the secret to the Alicorn's immortality, hoping to uncover it for themselves. They'd been years at it, if not decades, if not centuries!
Twilight carefully stepped through the castle portcullis, thankful at the momentary break in the rain, which was drenching her to the skin. Little droplets dripped off her, adding to the wetness pooling at her hooves. She pulled the now-sopping ransom note out of her wet saddlebags, thankful she hadn't brought any books with her this time. The note was addressed to Celestia; the Alicorn Amulet had resurfaced, she was to trade it, along with a promise of security, in exchange for Rarity, the Element of Harmony. They were sure that the amulet held the key they'd been searching for all these years. Twilight could sympathize with the desire for research, and yet...
the portcullis slowly started groaning open, grinding upwards bit by bit. It had been part of the castle's defenses a thousand years ago, from the wars before Celestia's reign. It desperately needing more oiling, from the sound of it.
A rather large stallion stepped out with a coat of fiery dark red magenta, and the fire cutie mark to match. "Ah, Celestia's assistant. Have you come to make the trade?"
"Not exactly. I've come to make a counter-proposal. One Element of Harmony for another: me."
"And what brings about this bit of charity?" The stallion grinned on one side of his mouth, but not the other, most disconcertingly.
"I'm sorry, can I ask you: is your cutie mark a pony ON FIRE?" Twilight pointed one hoof at the offending icon.
"That's why my name is Bodivander" the stallion chuckled. "We believe in completing the body so that it is perfect. Our beliefs have frequently been … misunderstood. But you haven't answered my question. You would seem to be a more valuable prize than this one ..."
Twilight gaped in awe as she was led though the cult's library, looking in every possible direction, including straight up and down, through to the ever-spiraling-downward bookshelves below and above. Twilight couldn't possibly let Celestia destroy such priceless information. Although, as she passed by the bookshelves, she stopped occasionally; some of their title's ideas seemed strangely familiar. Some of these titles were chapter names taken right from the Book of Pink. She was worried about finishing one Book of Pink. Here was a whole LIBRARY of them.
Twilight shook her head, fighting to regain focus on the task at hoof.
"We didn't want to invade and destroy this priceless work, although you probably know Celestia could defeat you easily if she really wanted to. You think your research is right where others are wrong. Well, let's prove it. We'll attempt to make, say a spider, immortal and then try to kill it. If your spells work, then the Alicorn amulet will be handed over for further study under my direct supervision. If the spider dies, you give the whole charade up peacefully, and what IS true and correct can actually be made available to the rest of the world."
"It sounds as if I win either way." Bodivander mused. "We finish our research or others will."
"It also means I win either way," Twilight smiled, "We learn how to get to the bottom of this research. For all of Equestria."
"My dear, you have a deal."
* * *
"Have you … " Bodivander was leading them from the library into some sort of research lab, "ever asked yourself 'Why are some royals immortal when others aren't?' Celestia is; prince Blueblood isn't. Why is that?"
Twilight didn't know.
"We call them Dualcorns, such as Prince Moron; Unicorn + Earth Pony. No Pegasus. Similarly, you can possibly be an alicorn of Pegasus and Unicorn, but no Earth Pony. This is not a 'true' Alicorn.
"There may be hundreds of pegasi or unicorns that may be alicorned with Earth Pony and don't even know it... or with a fourth kind."
"Fourth kind?" Twilight asked.
"We've been studying the possibility of a 4th type for some time, which is why, we believe, previous experiments have failed." Bodivander explained, as he led Twilight around the lab, pointing Twilight at all the various magical geegaws and assorted apparatus. "Other alicorns might not know if they have the 4th type or not, which might be a factor in their immortality. We need to find a 4th-typed pony for comparison. But again, how to know them? They might easily have their bloodlines mixed with the other three, and so would appear to us as one of the other three kinds. No, what we need most is a pure 4th-type pony. Not a Pegasus concerned with charisma and going for broke, nor an Earth pony concerned with Duty and Honor, nor a Unicorn concerned with reason, but a fourth kind, devoted to … whimsy."
Twilight facehoofed, "Oh, no."
"You know of such a pony?"
Thunder continued booming across the sky as what was now a very shallow lake of marshland splashed under-hoof.
Miss Pie looked up at the decrepit weather. "This castle is so gloomy. Wow." She looked from side to side. "What it needs is some Pink!"
Pink is not Limited to One Vessel
"And then you need to sing a song!" Pinkie brightly carried on. There was no help for it; Bodivander and Twilight combined simply could not write as fast as Pinkie could speak.
"I'm sorry, Pinkie. Usually, I'd be assisted by Spike. What was that, again?"
"I've never been in a cult, before," Pinkie turned to Bodivander. "Do you have a cult song?"
"Not … per se."
"I can write you one! Let's see:" Pinkie started singing "Oh... the … cult! It's the cultiest cult! it was so gloomy in here! But then Pinkie came along and …"
"No, that's quite fine, thank you."
"Okay!" Pinkie sprightly said, continuing to dole out pink party decorations from her saddlebags, which clashed terribly with the the somber decor of the rest of the austere reading room. Rarity had already voiced her horrification at this.
"And Rarity, if this spider dies, don't tell Fluttershy." Twilight said.
"My lips are sealed."
They'd already caught a spider, and placed it in a small, clear bottle, snatched up from one of the surrounding magical apparatus that had been obviously hastily installed in the converted reading room, making up what was now the alicorn research lab, and, more recently, Pinkie's Party Room.
"I don't like the eeeeevil way that spider looks at us," Pinkie stood level and glared menacingly at the spider. The spider did not respond in any way to this.
"I just …" Bodivander trailed off. "I simply do not see what the purpose is in any of this."
"We need to get Pinkie in her element." Twilight smiled and explained. "If you really want to know what it means to be Pinkie Pie, you've got to attend one of her parties." Twilight turned to Pinkie, "I should have told you to bring more supplies."
"Nope-ers. I brought plenty. I'm always ready for a party!"
"In case of party emergency." Twilight smiled.
"Yuppers"
Pinkie snapped the neckband of a plastic, motley party hat under Bodivander's chin. "Come on! You've got to sing, too, Dismal McGrumpyston."
* * *
"Ooh, pretty. What is that? Pink juice?" Pinkie grinned at the vial of Pink Potion Bodivander had placed over the Bunsen Burner. As the vessel's odd shape warped her reflection in its glass, Pinkie started giggling and making faces at it.
"Er … yes. Pink juice." Bodivander couldn't help but grin slightly at the corners of his mouth. He quickly turned back to the burner so the others wouldn't see, embarrassed somehow that his usual staid demeanor was coming undone by Pinkie's continuing presence. "This is distilled and droughted … Pink. It is a potion that contains everything that it means to be the fourth kind of pony. Now we shall mix some of it with … " he trailed off as he collected three other bottles from their respective places on the shelves.
"Earth Pony grounding" Bodivander poured some of the brownish-green dirt-like sand into a beaker like an hourglass, until it had lined the bottom completely.
"Unicorn essence," Bodivander slowly poured the milky liquid into the beaker until all but the tip of the little island of sand sank beneath the waves.
"Pegasus vapours" Bodivander poured a puff of the sky-blue fog into the beaker, as it settled on top of the liquid.
The final scene was very serene in the dim light of the lab room. It was as if the potion was its own little world, its own universe beneath one of Luna's nights, the 'ocean' reflecting the moonlight, the dark-blue sky imitating the sky after the setting sun. The 'land' appearing to be fertile soil. It appeared to be a small version of the universe. With a gasp, Twilight realized that must be exactly what this was. It was a mimic of reality.
"And finally," Bodivander turned back to the burner and stopped. The 'pink juice' was now glowing sweetly with its own inner light, as if it were some glow-in-the-dark toy- a very pink glow-in-the-dark toy, with a lot of glow to make up for a lot of dark.
Twilight carefully levitated the bottle out of its flames and brought it over to Bodivander while it shone bright enough to light up the entire room. Gradually brighter and brighter it got, dwarfing all the lanterns inside, until at last, almost too bright to look at directly, it started giving out a faint hum instead, almost beneath the level of hearing. The sweet sound changed the whole feel and aura of the place, the mood of it; Both Twilight and Bodivander realized they were also in a party room's party, not simply a lab's experiment. Pinkie started humming along with the hum, and, with a giggle, Twilight joined in, too. Bodivander did not participate.
Twilight turned the vial to one side as the Pink light started to pour out into the mini-planet below. The pink brightness started mixing with the sky, sea, and ground, as the world advanced deeper and deeper into sunset, or possibly sunrise, the sky turning more and more pink, giving it more and more life, infusing it with its Pinkishness.
Until at last, with a flashbang and a cloud of smoke, the entire thing changed into a beaker of transparent, perfectly-clear, water-like potion.
It was done.
"This … we have finally discovered Panacea, the elixir of life." Bodivander's sparkling eyes gave away his bedazzlement before his smile grew, until it was, at last, as wide as Pinkie's. "We've done it!"
"Hurray!" Pinkie cheered, then stopped. "What do we do now?"
"We TEST it!" Twilight's levitating magic snatched the flask away, bringing to the spider the shiny new potion. Twilight dripped a precious few drops of the Panacea into the spider flask, some onto the spider, some the spider drank up from the bottom of its jar.
"Now we wait ... "
"Can I drink the rest of the pink juice?" Pinkie asked.
"No."
Pink is not Limited to One Vessel: 2
"Wow. Are all these books about me?" Pinkie asked astonishingly she pondered the library spiraling downwards, below.
"Not quite all of them," Twilight smiled. "Some of them are on ancient Equestrian history."
"Oh." Pinkie's ears drooped slightly. "I bet you read most of those, then".
Twilight looked at the ground semi-blushingly, and scraped one front hoof along the ground. "Those books aren't quite as interesting as the ones about Pink."
Pinkie giggled. "Aww. Don't stay up too late reading about me." Pinkie hopped off to bed. "Goodnight! Sleep tight! Twilight!"
Twilight sighed, and looked out at the torrent of rainwater drenching the outsides of the windows. Rain had always helped her to sleep in the past, but in this endless, unending gloom of it … nothing.
Twilight cantered over to the spider. SOMETHING should have happened to it by now, even if Bodivander were completely wrong. But Twilight was growing increasingly concerned that he may just be RIGHT.
The theory was sound, so what was the issue? Twilight gazed into the vial of 'pink juice' as Pinkie loved to call it, sitting in its place of honor so far away from the other three. They could make all they wanted, now, but it still seemed so precious somehow. Twilight smiled. Perhaps she'd make some to light up the library when she got home. Reading by Pink-light would be a nice reminder on gloomy, rainy nights such as these. Twilight set a determined grin on her face.
Twi didn't know what was happening with the pink juice or the spider, and that had concerned her. She'd finished the Book of Pink, and scanned every chapter in the Cult library that seemed to be pertinent, but still, there was one simple factor that eluded her. Twilight simply wasn't thinking Pink enough.
Twilight had been worried she might need to give up the Alicorn Amulet after all.
But Twilight had just thought of one last, sneaky, thing to try before morning.
Continuing to stare into the pink light of the vial, Twilight closed her eyes, levitated it, uncorked it above her head, tilted it carefully, and allowed a single, shining drop of Pink to hit her tongue.
** *
Pinkie gazed out into the rain outside her guest bedroom window. She couldn't sleep. No matter how many parties she threw inside the castle, there was still so much gloom outside. Maybe she really needed to go out in all those splooshy puddles like her subconscious brain kept telling her to. But she needed to be fully alert tomorrow for more tests. Pinkie sighed. She sometimes wished she were smart like Twilight. Then she'd know what to do.
Well, why not?
'Subconscious brain, you are a genius', Pinkie giggled. Well, at least she'd be a genius, soon. As Pinkie crept down the stairs, carefully tiptoeing to avoid squeaking any of the steps, she carefully crept over to the cabinet where the other three ingredients were stored. Pinkie slowly pulled open the ancient, wooden door of the cabinet (It wasn't locked!) without making a single sound. And there were all three of the essences, neatly labeled in their neatly-placed neat little bottles. All nice and neat ...
for now.
Pinkie grabbed up the clear, milky bottle labeled 'unicorn essence' and started chugging it down. A gulp slid noiselessly down her throat …
** *
Bodivander had been woken up by explosions before. Magical interruptions, charms zapped awry, even hooffights between fellow cult members, but this...
Bodivander was suddenly awakened by an excess of quiet. All the regular background noises in the castle suddenly .. stopped. No janitors or security guards. No wind. No rain that had been incessantly clattering the windowpanes for weeks now. Bodivander had far enough potion training to know what this truly ominous sign meant: some exceptionally powerful magic had just been cast, displacing all other energies in its wake. One that could only have been started by ...
"The Panacea" Bodivander mouthed, and then raced downstairs, still in his pajamas, as fast as he could go.
He took them two at a time, then three, then finally slid down the railing in his quest to get to the bottom at all possible speed. Finally galloping full tilt into the experiment room, Bodivander crashed open the double doors. Still panting, he looked up.
Inside, he found two bright pink unicorns. Both slightly grinning at each other. Both slightly blushing. Both standing there blinking at each other.
Bodivander breathed a great rush of air. He really should have locked that pantry up.
Pink is not Limited to One Vessel: III
Pink is not Limited to One Vessel: III
"We should call you Sparkle Pink!" One of the pink unicorns cheerfully suggested.
"Only if I can call you Twilight Pie, then." The other cheerfully concurred.
"Oh sweet Celestia, lovely Luna, and dear Cadenza what have you two done?" Bodivander was less than happy.
"Deal," The pink unicorn with the party balloons cutie mark stuck out a hoof to shake.
The other pink unicorn with a violet stars cutie mark clapped it in a hoof-shake, unable to hide her laughter.
"Pinks, this is no laughing matter," Bodivander turned to the ballooned one. "I'm assuming this started with you, Pinkie Pie?"
"Twilight Pie," Pinkie Pie corrected.
"PINKIE Pie!" Bodivander repeated.
"Or Sparkle Pink," Twilight Sparkle laughed.
"No, that's you!" Pinkie pie stage-whispered.
"Oh, that's right!" Twilight Sparkle laughed even harder, caught up in the mental state that was Pinkie.
Bodivander grabbed the pink, star-spangled unicorn and gently shook her "Twilight Sparkle, or whatever you want to be called, you must calm down. This is serious. We need to reverse this."
"Nothing is seriously serious. And nothin' doin' until I find out what's wrong with this potion. I should be fine for a little while." Twilight Sparkle grinned.
"You go, Sparkle!" Miss Pie gave her an elbow-bump to the rib. "Don't let The Man get you down."
"Sir?" an acolyte came to the double-doors. "Bodivander? What's going on?"
Bodivander sighed, "They're both Pink-drunk."
** *
"Which one is you?" The Acolyte asked.
"I'm me!"
"That … doesn't help much."
"Look at their cutie marks," Bodivander pointed to one for the acolyte. "Those didn't change at least, thank Celestia for small favors, the balloon one is Pinkie Pie plus a generous dose of unicorn essence. The one with stars on her flank is Twilight Sparkle plus a gentle helping of Pink fourth pony."
Bodivander stopped, then added, "And don't let them tell you differently, they're being very … mischievous."
"I just want to have fun so badly!" Twilight Sparkle almost begged, closing her eyes and jumping up and down alongside Pinkie Pie, "I suddenly really, really need to go out and play in the rain," and then she turned to face Pinkie Pie. "How do you stand it?"
"Sometimes... I can't." Pinkie Pie laughed. Twilight Laughed, too.
"Are you Twilight Pink or Sparkle Pie?"
"I can't remember."
"Me, neither."
They laughed again.
Twilight was hopping up and down, again. Pinkie, who was still laughing, immediately started doing the same as they hopped together.
"Maybe we can use this to our advantage," the acolyte said, "If I may presume … they can have fun as long as they're working."
"Hmmm..." Bodivander thought about this, putting one hoof to his mouth, lost deep in thought, "Okay, you can work out in the rain, but if you stop, you have to come back in-." The two pinks were gone before he finished his sentence.
* * *
Twilight couldn't remember when she'd had this much fun with an experiment in all of ever, standing out in the downpour, water cascading all around her. It was as if she were performing experiments in the shower; or a water park.
Pinkie was busy trying to destroy all the puddles, every single one, as soon as they formed. Strangely enough, she was succeeding in this endeavor, at least so far.
Twilight had rocks holding down everything, as the wind did its very best to blow her instruments away, as if the storm were attempting to play the same game Pinkie was playing with puddles, trying to destroy the potions one by one, except the wind wan't quite fighting fair, playing for the rest of their possessions as well. Finally, the latest experiment complete, the two finally ran inside, soaked to the skin, drenched, dripping like a hosepipe onto the red carpet, and both of them laughing hysterically and uproariously.
"You look so ridiculous," Twilight Sparkle laughed at Pinkie sprawled out in a quickly-forming puddle which was building around her. "I must look the same." Twilight pulled frizzles of her own mane in front of her face for inspection. "Mmyup."
"You sounded like Big Mac just then."
"Mmyup." Twilight repeated, deeply imitating Big Macintosh.
"Mmyup." Pinkie imitated Twilight Sparkle imitating Big Macintosh.
"Mmyup." Twi imitated Pinkie Imitating Twi imitating Big Mac.
"Mmyup."
"Mmyup."
"Mmyup."
"Mmyup."
"Mmyup."
"If I may interrupt that train of thought." The expression on Bodivander's face looked as menacing, but his eyes gave away a smile behind them. It was as if he couldn't decide which emotion to be. He finally chose smile. "If you two girls are done having fun-"
"We'll never be DONE having fun," Pinkie Pie interrupted from her puddle position still lying down on the floor.
Bodivander continued, "We still have a minor emergency on our hands. We need to get you two back to normal with all due haste."
"I actually don't believe so." Twilight lifted her hair out of her eyes with one front hoof. "The parameterized equations- "Twi light looked at Pinkie's confusion, stopped, and started over. "… It may be the giddiness talking, but I think this is what happened to the spider. The essences never quite settle in; it rolls off, like water off a duck's back."
"Or a Twilight's," Pinkie interjected.
"Or a Pinkie Pie's," Twilight grinned back.
"Or a Big Macintosh's."
"Or a-"
"ENOUGH! I must insist we get working. I much hate to play the part of a-"
"Meanyfacepants," Pinkie interjected.
Bodivander lost his train of thought at this. He started again from scratch.
"I don't really want to, but I really need you to focus on-"
And then, with a tremendous flash of lightning and burst of thunder, all the lights went out, castle-wide.
Whether the storm had finally snapped under the pressure of the continuous, ever-growing strength of the weeklong raining, or enough of the the magical energies of the Panacea escaped to give it its unfathomable power, or, less likely, the storm felt miffed that its new playmates had gone back indoors, the winds had simply finally had enough, blowing into every window and every crevice in the drafty castle.
Standing there, in the deep darkness, unable to see a hoof in front of her face, Twilight suddenly knew, absolutely KNEW the light fixture directly above would fall on her, feeling the subtle, subconscious twitching of some precognitive sense.
"Twilight! Something's gonna fal-" Pinkie started, but Twilight Sparkle was already ducking and rolling one one side, way ahead of her warning; she just barely stayed ahead of an incredible: "CRASH! tinkle tinkle!" as the ancient chandelier impacted.
"Omigosh. TWI! You okay?!"
"I'm fine, Pinkie." Twilight collected herself, quickly lighting her horn. "I sorta, kind of, already knew that was going to happen. Some secret sense was tingling."
"Sparkle sense?" Pinkie's eyes lit up. Her grin doubled, showing all of her teeth.
"I guess... Sparkle sense," Twilight admitted, her face tuning even pinker with the realization.
"Blast it!" Bodivander interjected, "We'll have to fashion torches. Or .. the reading room has a fireplace. We'll see if the flue is still clear. Or..."
* * *
Even more drenched, if that were possible, the pink Twilight Sparkle stood grinning just outside the main door with a tiny lightbug lantern. "It's no good. There are just no light bugs out in this weather."
Pinkie was waiting indoors with a towel as they headed off to the lab room, "McGrumperston says we need to dry off this time. Or we'll ruin the carpet."
As they spread out the provided sleeping bags in front of the warming, roaring fire, Twilight smiled as the pink color of them matched her own new color.
She'd been trying to master Pinkie for a whole book's worth of time (which was much more than regular, with the speed she normally went though books, at least when they didn't include confetti and such.) Twilight noted that she felt Pinkest when she THOUGHT pink, and although the potion was helping, it required a more … thought cooperation on her part.
Pinkie piped up in the flickering firelight, "Can you teach me to light things, or hover things, Twilight? I think I'd like that."
"I guess...But I'd need to teach you about vector arithmetic. And-"
"I don't think I'd like that."
"Well, Twilight half-grinned, "That's what it takes. Magic and science require a lot of math."
"So that's how you get so smart."
Twilight grinned at the compliment, until she saw Pinkie's saddening face and she stopped. "Oh, Pinkie..." Twilight thought but for a moment, and then said, "I can teach you the light spell. That's simple enough. If you want."
"Okay!" Pinkie's face brightened again.
"Basically, you simply focus as much mental energy into your horn as possible."
Pinkie looked straight up into her own protrusion, her eyes almost rolling back in her head with the effort to see it.
"You don't technically need to look at it."
"No wait, I got it." Still looking straight up, Pinkie's pink tongue stuck out one end of her mouth as she glared at herself more and more intently, finally with the 'spark-spark' like a florescent bulb, and with a very slight pink tinge, the horn ignited with a burst of Pinkie's magic.
"I did it!" Pinkie grinned wildly and excitedly, her eyes lighting up brighter than her horn.
"Good job!" Twilight beamed. As Pinkie turned back to look at Twilight, the light promptly went out.
"You have to keep focusing on the energy," Twilight suggested.
"Oh … " Pinkie clenched her eyes shut as the horn lit up even more furiously. She opened them and looked around at the room, bathed in her own soft, Pink light.
"Twilight, this is so awesomely amazing, I …" the light went out again. "And so very HARD!"
"You need to constantly think about the magic flowing through you. If you let up for an instant, the spell dissipates."
"I have to think about it ALL THE TIME?! But I need to breathe. And talk. And walk. - ."
"As long as the spell lasts. Come on, you're a master of doing lots of things at once."
"But I don't have to think about them!"
"That's … true. I've learned enough from you in the last few days to know how you think, and you're DEFINITLY not a concentrate-on-one-thing type of pony."
"I'm not sure I can hold a thought that long." Pinkie said.
"What exactly IS the problem with this spider?" Bodivander asked, still staring down at it, almost daring it to do something.
"Evil spider." Pinkie interrupted, correcting her.
They stared at the presumably Evil Spider, simply sitting there, performing no evil acts that the world could see.
"If the power's out, what's happening with the spider?" Bodivander sounded mildly panicked. Twilight motioned Pinkie to come over, as they tramped over to the display, up to the spider. Twilight mentally flicking her own horn's light on, so that the lab-half of the room was fully visible again.
"Well, the … evil spider …" Twilight faltered. She then laughed and began again, "The evil spider has received the potion, but there's nothing in a spider for it to change. "
"Go on … and could you speak up? The wind is getting louder." Indeed, by the sound of the clatter, the no-longer-gentle breezes had started peeling ceiling tiles off the roof.
"Huh." Pinkie Pie commented, alternately looking down at the spider and up at her own horn, apparently looking for some sort of similarity there.
Twilight raised her voice a couple notches over the wind, "The potions don't actually change who someone is. Pinkie can't suddenly cast any of my hard-learned spells. Similarly, I can't do many Pink things that I didn't learn from the Book of Pink. It's not too many steps up from a changeling's 'change my appearance' spell. It can't give you an alicorn's powers. I'm sorry, Bodivander, but the elixir of life doesn't change who you are inside."
Twilight looked down at herself, in the Pink. "I'm still me. Pinkie Pie is still-" Twilight grinned, "Pinkie. She didn't give me her hard-won powers of happiness through the potion. It does give a couple abilities here or there, but it doesn't change your soul. I'm sorry; the potion may make you an alicorn, but it doesn't make you Celestia."
"I understand."
"Huh." Pinkie Pie repeated, after this new information, staring up at her newfound horn again. She tilted her head back to see it better, only to find that the horn moved with it, causing her to tilt her head back some more, "WHOAH!" she suddenly screamed as she fell over backwards.
Bodivander ignored the WHUMP of Pinkie Pie hitting the ground as he glared at the readings of the various dials in front of the spider. It was true; there was no denying it. Even though the Panacea presented an INCREDIBLE amount of power, the power was raw, and basic, and elemental to the world. It simply wasn't a precise spell that could be cast; it had no focus, no point. He would have to find his own immortality spell.
"That's not to say it isn't a fantastic achievement," Twilight was still looking over her shoulder as she helped Pinkie up. "They'll be writing books, even libraries about you and your … group for centuries to come. Imagine bottling raw power like this. I'm sorry it's not what you wanted, though."
"Hmmm. I suppose It must be enough." Bodivander smiled at Pinkie Pie, still looking up as if there were an imaginary carrot on a stick hanging in front of her (or a cupcake). "Thank you for holding up your end of the bargain. I must, of course, do further tests to make sure, but, if all this checks out, I see no reason why you two cannot leave in the morning. I hope you aren't TOO angry with our methods when you make the report to Celestia. I have a lot of knowledge yet to provide."
Twilight could hear the faint cracking of trees being blown down outside;
Bodivander continued, "To be honest, we were trying to get to you when we found mistress Rarity. When our acolyte grabbed her by mistake, he panicked. We're more researchers than military folk."
As the wind's howling became increasingly turbulent against the celing, Twilight suddenly KNEW the roof would come off, drenching the entire library;
'The books! no!' Twilight whispered as Pinkie suddenly startled, jerking up at the same sensation she was feeling. " ... NO!" Twilight screamed at the top of her voice, throwing up a violet spherical shield around the precious volumes at precisely the time her prediction came true. With a titanic clatterbang, the room's ancient roof sheared off in the force of the tremendous wind.
Yet... not a solitary, single drop of water fell upon them.
Shards of the roof, various shingles, and tiles of the collapsing ceiling added weight to the bubble that replaced it, but Twilight persevered.
"I … I can't keep this up, forever," she groaned out through clenched teeth. "Pinkie, do you remember where the elixir of life is kept?"
"You're not going to-?"
"I need the energy!"
"Who knows what will happen to you, if-"
"I'm saving these books" Twilight shouted, as she galloped down the stairs to get a better angle, glaring straight up into the hurricane above her, almost daring it to do something.
"You can count on Pinkie!" Pinkie startled Bodivander, who'd still needed a second to react.
"Where's the panacea?! We need to juice up Twilight."
"Oh, nothing doing!" Bodivander shouted. "If anyone, I will MOST CERTIAINLY be the first to taste
"Would you rather lose all your books?" Pinkie locked eyes with the still-seething Bodivander.
They looked at each other, staring, glaring into each other's eyes for a second that seemed like hours, each willing the other to break first.
Finally, Bodivander looked down at the fading pink Twilight, as the lavender purple gradually returned, sighed, and pulled a silver key out of his pocket. "Here. Do what you need to do," he said softly, calmly, almost a whisper. "And … I'm sorry."
Pinkie clapped the key between her jaws with such force she almost swallowed it, and swished up the stairs.
Pinkie's hoofbeats galloped and echoed through the corridors as she ran full tilt, up the stairs, bolted through the doorways, and, at last, found the panacea cupboard. Pinkie tremblingly unlocked it, clamped her jaws around the clear potion bottle's neck and galloped back again. Every second counts. Twilight was waiting for her.
The Panacea helped. It had helped, "But," groaned Twilight, "It's not … enough."
Pinkie looked straight up at her horn, still protruding above her eyes, "I have some magic." she whispered. "It's Pinkie magic, not-"
While her fighting face stayed put, Twilight's eyes smiled instead, as she interrupted, "It should be enough, Pinkie. Try it."
Pinkie touched her horn to Twilght's and Twilight felt the surge of the Pink magic surging through her, more than doubling the spell's strength.
Pinkie screwed her eyes up in concentration, not hardly daring to breathe and risk shorting out the spell, applying all of her mental focus to a single line of thought: Magic. magic. magic. magic. It became a mantra, as she said it to herself over and over. Magic. Magic. Magic.
Pinkie had been imbued with a great deal of magical energy, as she had drunk a great deal of unicorn essence. In fact, she kind of had to go to the bathroom.
Pinkie persevered, however, mouthing it, and then whispering it to herself in her effort to maintain focus. "Magic magic magic"
Twilight picked up on it, smiled, and joined Pinkie in the callout: "Magic."
"Magic."
"Magic."
They said it together, in harmony. "Magic. Magic. Magic. Magic." Twilight recalled the song they'd sung together while making sweetberry cupcakes; this song was equal parts Pinkie and Twilight, just the same as that; "Magic. Magic. Magic. Magic."
"Magic"
"Magic"
"Magic"
"Magic"
"Magic"
"Magic"
An incredible amount of pure power suddenly added to Twilight's spell. A burst as she'd never felt before, even from the Panacea. Her power doubled; then doubled again. She looked over at Pinkie's eyes squelched shut as tight as possible, her horn glowing with its devine brilliant inner Pink power, as they sang together, "magic magic magic magic". Twilight could see the pink aura feeding her own horn, Twilight's own purple aura feeding back into Pinkie's, and could feel in her mind's eye the two magics joining.
THIS was the panacea. THIS was the harmony.
Twilight was at last able to expand the protective radius of her spell beyond the roof of the Cult's library and up, up and up even higher. A shining violet magenta column of spell energy shot up, piercing the very clouds above as a lighthouse's beacon pierced the night, shunting all matter away from the amazing light's powerful center. The clouds evacuated the sky around their pink light.
Both ponies stood there gasping for breath, finally opening their eyes, and looked up as the spell finished.
Above them was a clear blue sky, a solitary dot of cloudless space. All around the castle, the gray, bleak storm was still torrenting downwards in buckets, but the rain could only fall downwards, to where the books were not. In this safe circle, on the campus of the Cult, there was no rain.
They had done it. Together.
They looked at each other and blinked. Twilight's eyes shone as her coat flickered between pink and purple like a neon sign. Pinkie's horn was nearly gone, as well.
"Thank you so much, Pinkie," Twilight said around her breathing.
Pinkie felt her forehead with one forehoof, "I don't know if I could do that, again. Magic is hard."
Twilight smilingly shook her head no, "It's right out of your Book of Pink; all we needed was our internal rhythm. Thank you again for it. It was rather … extreme, but it … really helped. And," Twilight let out a deep breath. "I learned so much about YOU. Thank you."
"Thanks, Twilight. I learn so much from you, too."
** *
It was finally complete. In the dark reading room, now a writing room, a quill scratched out in the nectarine light of a lightbug lantern, finally levitating back to its place, right next to a now-closed, deeply lavender volume, emblazoned with the starry Cutie mark and the ultra-neat script of its author, the still-wet ink on its cover giving it its well-deserved title,
The Book of Sparkle.
Sing and the World Sings With You
This chapter of Pinkie's book had made Twilight nervous. It's not that she couldn't sing, because she could. And it's not that she was nervous in front of crowds because she wasn't.
"What'll you sing, Twi?" Pinkie smiled, again bouncing up and down in her excitement, unable to handle the stress of standing still AND waiting for an answer simultaneously.
"It seems so … silly. What if people think the song is stupid?"
"Nonsense. everypony loves it. How can you hate something you love? It's not possible. It's like a dirty joke: you can get away with anything if they laugh. You can't complain about something you laughed about."
Lyra was there at the train station with some friend of hers from Canterlot… Octavia was her name? They were idly tuning their instruments waiting for some train to arrive, but, judging by the delays board, that would be a while. What they needed was something to pass the time.
Twilight started singing; quietly low at first, and then gradually louder as she found her confidence. Lyra, plonking away, was seemingly only half-listening, however her songless tune started to match cadence with Twilight's own song. Octavia's impromptu rehearsal did likewise, matching to Lyra's. Eventually, Twilight had some instrumentation to go with her vocals.
Twi wasn't surprised they knew the song; it was quite well-known, but she'd never been a part of it before. Some of the other ponies on the train platform got caught up in it, as well. Some of them tapped their feet. Some of them started quietly humming along. Some of them started mouthing the words. Some even started singing a few bars here and there, as though they couldn't get the melody out of their heads. The song kept picking up inertia, Lyra and Octavia playing the prerequisite melodies, as more and more started harmonizing along. Virtually everyone at the station was doing something now, and most of them were doing quite more than something.
Twilight grinned as she started walking forward and found the other ponies marching along with her alongside the tracks; Twilight's impromptu parade was picking up steam, and was on the move!
"We're doing great, Pinkie!" Twilight's grin kept getting wider, approaching Pinkie proportions.
"Me? I'm not in charge of this. You are!" Pinkie continued dancing into the sunset with the others, in time to the beat. Twilight stopped and looked back. Pinkie was right. Twilight was in charge of this. Twilight had been thinking of it as something that was overwhelming her. But this was all an ORGANIZED chaos. The best kind, in Twilight's opinion.
Twilight tested this theory, as every scientist must, via experimentation. She suddenly turned left at the next street corner.
The entire entourage turned left with her.
Twilight needed only to keep ahead and navigate the worst bits, lead them around any carts or storefronts, poke them a teeny bit. Twilight stood there, rooted in place, awestruck. The parade continued around her, streaming both sides along her right and left flanks like bread and butter. Nothing was stopping them. Nothing was halting them.
"Oh dear," Twilight mouthed. She knew how to start a song, but how to stop it?
Without a captain, they went straight and did as they pleased. No one was there to herd them a little here or there. But there was somepony who knew about herding.
The pony in question paused mid-kick as Twilight ran full-tilt through the front of Sweet Apple Acres, breathlessly, barely coming to stop in front of a tree whose harvest had just been temporarily reprieved.
"Well, howdy to you too! What exactly are you askin'?"
As the last word was spoken, the first filaments of the crowd crested over the hill, followed by more and more of the paradedom. Applejack's eyes ballooned wide, slowly, in amazement.
"I … see."
Both of them started running back towards the parade route, "Did Pinkie get this goin'?"
"Sort of... It's actually kind of my doing."
"YOUR doin'?"
"Well, Pinkie was showing me how to start a song, and I didn't... don't know how to stop them."
They'd both gotten in front of the hullabaloo. Twilight bit her upper lip with nervousness. Applejack stopped for just a second, with an "I'ahm thinkin' … ?"
Twilight spotted Pinkie in the crowd "Pinkie!" She shouted.
"Yes, Twi?" Pinkie bounded ahead, too fast to see, blurring instantly to their side.
"Can you help us corral this stampedin'?"
Pinkie shook her head. "Sorry. This one is Twilight's party. I'm just an observer."
Applejack's eyes got wide again "Well, fritters."
***
One of Dash's clouds had been shoved far away from the others. This was to be a resting cloud for the nap, after the others were gone. But far below, there were a lot more ponies than Dash usually saw in a random residential neighborhood. In fact, more than Dash had ever seen in a random residential neighborhood. Dash stopped in-place, the cloud she had been shoving continuing to drift forward with its own inertia as Dash dead-stopped midair. It seemed to be .. some kind of party? Curious, Dash plummeted down to investigate.
Applejack continued getting an explanation out of Twilight, "So all this ballyhoo is y'all's doin'?"
"I think we've over-pinked it," Twilight admitted. "Oh dear."
Pinkie tilted her head sideways. "Huh. This never happened to me before."
Twilight turned to face the other two, "How do we disempink the town?"
"I dunno, but I'm still grooving with the sound of it," Pinkie started nodding her head to the music again.
It then became obvious to Twilight that Pinkie was increasingly involved in the song as much as everyone else in Ponyville. "Great. Pinkie's become our Patient Zero."
"Whut?'
"Nevermind."
A cometary Rainbow trail ended in the sudden appearance of Dash. "So … what exactly is happening down here?"
Twilight sighed as she realized she'd need to explain everything a second time.
***
As the Big Brass Band rounded another corner, Twilight ran beside the still-grooving Pinkie.
"Pinkie! I can't stop this. You've got to do something!"
"But it's so amazing!" Pinkie was as enthralled by the others, showing no immunity to the effects of her own pinkishness.
"This isn't working" Dash said, flying a couple paces behind the two of them. "You're going to need to come up with your own answer."
Twilight stopped and let the crowd stream by her again, as Dash hovered in place.
"What I don't understand … , " Twilight started musing.
"What?"
"… Is why Pinkie is affected the same as everyone else." Twilight finished.
"Hmm."
They both stood there for a moment.
"I dunno," Dash admitted. "It's so catchy, though. I can barely keep from joining it, too. Someone as Pinkie as Pinkie is probably can't contain herself."
Applejack had finally caught up to them. "Nothin' doin'. They jes' won't herd. It was worth a shot, Twilight, but I think this is more of a packleader- or bandleader problem than a herdin' problem."
"Applejack, do you know why Pinkie can get caught up in her own party?" Twilight asked, she was absent-mindfully staring into space, turning it over in her mind. "Shouldn't she, at least, be able to …"
Suddenly... Twilight had a thought "Oh! For Celestia's sake! "
"What?" Dash asked.
Twilight started booking it full speed ahead. Starting but a second behind her, her friends followed.
As they caught up with the bedlam, Twilight raced ahead to the front where Pinkie was. She remembered how the crowd had made turns when she was in front of it, when she was in it, heading it; the same reason Pinkie was in it herself; and the same way Twilight could finally stop it:
She had to become a part of it.
Pacing herself next to Pinkie, she picked up the song mid-verse, about where it had left off. As she sang, Twilight lengthened the words, adding more and more of a flourish on the last few bars, finally trailing off at the end with a louder, higher, happy conclusion.
Finally, ending, the song … completed.
There was a pause, a quiet pause, an ever-lengthening pause, where everything stayed quiet a moment.
And then a raucous cheering broke out. Still smiling, everyone 'huzzah'-ed back into the village, started milling about, and complemented Twilight, Pinkie, and Lyra on the song. Many of the ponies in the core of the parade made their way back to the train station to keep waiting, others went back to their business, the big grins on every single one of their faces attesting to the fact they'd they'd been in an incredible thing … one of Pinkie's - one of Twilight's crowd songs.
Eventually, the four of them were the only ones there again.
"Mmm-mmm, I feel so good inside," Pinkie stood back, eyes closed, smiling as if she'd just eaten a particularly delicious food, "so this must be what everyone else feels when I do that! Mmm-mmm."
Twilight, Dash, and Applejack still had smiles from the radiative effect of the music, feeing the twinkles of the positive force, and good vibes surrounding them.
Finally, Twilight put in, "Well, that finally ended well. And I certainly know what to do for next time."
"And what not to do," Dash added.
"And what to do more often!" Pinkie brightly, cheerfully said, bouncing up and down at double the pace.
"Someone turned Pinkie up to eleven," Applejack noted.
"Pinkie's always at eleven," Dash said.
"Well, now she's turned up to twelve." Twilight grinned so very wide. "And you know what? I am, too."
