MLP: A Guest of Honor? Part 1

Deep within the town of Ponyville that lay blanketed under the black night sky, the bright lights of civilization swarmed the streets to conquer the oppressive darkness. One such source of civilization in this settlement was Sugarcube Corner, residence of the cheerful, if often insecure, Pinkie Pie. Pinkie Pie was often considered by most that knew her, and especially her own friends, to be an incredible source of laughter and joy to be witnessed, as well as incredibly taxing of any diligence previously mustered by those who meet her.

For the past two months, however, this was hardly the case, as Pinkie Pie had just spent the previous two months recovering from serious trauma. Two months had passed since the infamous anomaly Pinkamena had returned to blight Pinkie Pie's reputation, as she was forced against her better judgment to set about spreading fear and terror to all who would find themselves a victim. However, Pinkie Pie had eventually returned to her original demeanor since these incidents occurred, as she had finally returned to the more excitable, positive attitude that she and her friends had cherished.

As of this moment, Pinkie Pie was in the middle of cooking for herself and her guests' dinner, as the clock chimed 8:00 from upstairs. "Yes! Yes! I know what time it is. You don't have to hang off my back!" Pinkie Pie shouted as she stirred through the warm cake mix for her friends to indulge themselves upon. "How are you all going out there?" she called into the living room, to which a familiar voice replied "Wow! How long does a cake take to make?!"

Pinkie Pie raised an eyebrow and pondered whether to take offense to this statement, unsure of whether to treat it as an insult or just a genuine question. Eventually, she decided to shrug it off, as dinner was finally ready to serve. Pinkie whistled to herself as she collect the five different meals for her guests, each staked upon her head as she carefully balanced them. Pinkie Pie made her way out of the kitchen and entered the dining room, soon to be met with a truly bizarre sight.

All of her friends were asleep; each slouching in their seats with their mouths hanging open. Pinkie Pie howled "Hey, everyone WAKE UP! Food's ready!" while shoving Rainbow Dash gently. To her surprise, Rainbow Dash simply slid from the chair and fell to the floor, to which Pinkie Pie realized that her friends were neither breathing nor moving in the slightest. Her friends weren't asleep at all, and were definitely not going to wake up.

Pinkie Pie screamed at the top of her lungs in terror, only to find silence from her voice. She continued to scream to herself, discovering herself to be physically unable to vocalize in any fashion. Pinkie Pie soon fell to the floor in shock as her chest radiated with warmth, feeling her heartbeat become steadily more intense. "What took you so long?" a voice echoed, "We were nothing but skin and bones before you were finished!"

Suddenly, all that could be heard was a loud, menacing cackle that rang in Pinkie Pie's ears. All of the plates Pinkie Pie carried were carelessly dropped and crashed to the floor as Pinkie Pie swung her head relentlessly. "NO! NO! This is a dream! It has to be a dream! Wake up! WAKE UP! PLEEEASE!" she shouted in a fit of hysteria.

"You can't wake up, cherub… This is not a dream… You're as awake as you've ever been".

"HUUUAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!" Pinkie Pie soared up into the air landed comfortably on the mattress of her bed. After the additional shock had subsided, she struggled to sit upright on the mattress as she gasped desperately for breath. Her hair was drenched in sweat and her heart relentlessly pounded away inside her chest.

Her head was aching from stress and her muscles were throbbing in agony, leaving Pinkie Pie in an almost broken state, both physically and emotionally. "When… will this ever… stop?" she whimpered miserably to herself, wiping her brow with her wrist as her eyes glistened with long-contained sorrow.

Pinkie Pie leapt from her bed and rushed through her bedroom door, much to the dismay of her muscles. Pinkie Pie ignored the welling discomfort that spread through her body as she burst through the front door and ran madly into the street. "Hello? Hegh… Anypony?!" she called helplessly into the empty streets, searching for anypony to interact with to retain her dwindling sanity.

However, as this happened, Pinkie Pie's shoulder had finally had all the strain it could endure and ultimately gave way, sending the rest of her body sprawling across the pavement. As she lay against the concrete path, she wheezed "I n-need help… please… somepony… anypony?" Fatigue had begun to take its toll as Pinkie Pie slowly felt her body shut down from extended wear. Reluctantly, but voluntarily, she lost consciousness as the sound of a nearby voice became the only sound she could hear.

"Pinkie Pi…ony get hel…to the hosp…"

---

"What happened this time!?"

It was the next morning at 7:00, and Rainbow Dash burst through the doors of the ward and screamed in shock. She quickly approached the bedside table where Applejack, Twilight and the others resided, who had apparently been waiting for a sign of recovery from their comatose colleague. Pinkie Pie had been in the hospital for the past three hours, while her observers had been tending to her for the latter two.

Applejack turned to face the latest arrival and replied "I dunno. Twilight said that she found her runnin' about the streets, screamin' like a maniac" before turning to Twilight for confirmation. "Yeah, that's right! Pinkie Pie was lucky I was coming to visit her, because everypony else was asleep in her neighborhood" Twilight explained.

"No… kidding…"

All eyes peered into a pair of white, glistening eyes as they sleepily gazing upwards from the bed. "Pinkie Pie! What happened?" "Another nightmare…" Pinkie Pie replied exhaustedly "But this one was… worse… much worse that the others". Her friends listened as she explained the events of the dream, leaving each of them mortified by the specified details.

"What could this mean?" Twilight asked herself before turning away to ponder this situation. "It may not mean anything, Twilight. It's just a bad dream, after all. It can't hurt me" Pinkie Pie reassured as she sat up comfortably from the bed. "Well, I dunno about that. If it can land ya in the hospital…" Applejack reminded her. Pinkie Pie soon pulled herself from the bedsheet covers and stated "Trust me, it's nothing to worry about".

"I'm sorry, but you cannot leave just yet" called a nurse who had entered the room to interrupt this action. "What? Why?" Pinkie Pie asked curiously. "Miss Pie, we have read your files. You have apparently been suffering from multiple forms of nausea and repeated nightmares. I'm afraid you must stay under care for the time being" the nurse explained.

"How did you know I was suffering from nightmares? Twilight, did you tell them?" Pinkie turned to Twilight for the answer. Twilight simply stood flustered and remained without an answer before the conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Fluttershy. "I-I did…" the pegasus stuttered nervously, "I thought it would be the right thing to do". "No, it was. But Fluttershy, why didn't you tell us before?" Twilight questioned curiously, degrading Fluttershy's already declining confidence.

"Leave her alone, Twilight. She did the right thing, and I'm actually annoyed that I didn't do it before her" Applejack admitted. "Whatever… it doesn't matter, anyhow" Pinkie Pie sighed meekly before jumping back-first against the bed once again. Rainbow Dash then turned back to face the nurse and asked "Well, is there anything we can do?" The nurse then pondered the possibilities before answering "Well, she may return home. But, she would have to stay there under both house-arrest and constant supervision. Just for safety precautions, after all" the nurse then reassured.

"Well… I dunno" Applejack considered, while her companions remained skeptical of such a choice. "Well, there is a choice at least, which is rare. So we should take advantage of it" Twilight offered an end to this prolonged stalemate. "Very well; in that case, you may take her home" the nurse offered with a somewhat stiff smile, before turning away and swiftly leaving through the door to tend to other patients. And with that, Pinkie Pie and her friends made their way from the hospital back to the bakery, thankfully savoring the lack of a delay or unforeseen event having occurred.

As they entered the establishment, however, Pinkie Pie had begun to succumb to her insurmountable fatigue, resulting in her mindlessly staggering through the living room and collapsing on the couch. Twilight stared down at her and asked "Should we take her upstairs?" Rainbow Dash pondered for a moment before replying "Hmm… Nah. Just leave her here, I guess. She seems okay" while watching Pinkie Pie snuggle comfortably into the sofa.

"I'll stay and watch over her for the night" Applejack offered generously, clearly confident of her own capability. "What if you f-fall asleep?" Fluttershy questioned. "Well, it's already..." Applejack paused as she stared towards the clock, "2:30 am, so I should manage". After this agreement was confirmed amongst the motley crew, Applejack remained beside Pinkie Pie as the others followed a single file though the front door and shut it; thus beginning Pinkie Pie's daily 'house-arrest' routine.

---

Unfortunately, Applejack actually did end up falling asleep during her stay in the Pinkie Pie residence, much to her own shame. She had slept for only two hours before daybreak loomed through the windows to interrupt her slumber. "Ugh… W… Wha…?" she muttered sleepily, before her eyes shot open as she leapt from her sofa bed in a panic. "Pinkie Pie! Are ya still here?!" she called into the room, finding no trace of her observant anywhere within the living room.

Applejack rushed upstairs to search her bedroom, peeking through a gap in the bedroom door to find the lack of an occupant. She stepped into the room and paced around it in a clockwise motion, considering where else she could possibly reside, believing that she wouldn't have voluntarily left the house without informing her of doing so. "I just hope she's hasn't run off to cause a ruckus in town" she thought to herself, before dashing out of the bedroom and leaping down the stairs.

"…need somepony to help me, I need somepony to help me, I need somepony to help me, I need somepony to help me, is anypony OOUUUUTT THHHEEEERRRREEE!?"

A panicked, high-pitched voice called out from the bathroom, instantly seizing Applejack's attention. Without pondering whose voice it was, Applejack rushed to the bathroom and burst through the door, soon to be mortified by a truly horrific scene. The entire bathroom and all of its furnishings had been completely tarnished, from the mirror sink to the bathtub, to which broken glass lay scattered across the floor.

"Pinkie Pie! Where are you?!"Applejack called into the bathroom nervously, hoping desperately to hear a reply. "Applejack?" came a soft, exhausted voice from the corner of the bathroom, where lay Pinkie Pie in a truly degrading appearance. Pinkie Pie's tearstained eyelids opened as she turned to face the door and asked "Applejack, can you… see them?" Applejack simply stared in a confused fashion before Pinkie Pie added "I need to know if they're there or not, I need to know if they're actually on me!" "Well, I can't see anything on you" Applejack attempted to reassure her.

Pinkie Pie shook her head violently before replying "There's spiders all over me! I can feel them on me! They're crawling through my hair and they're trying to get into my mouth! I couldn't tell if they we're there!" Pinkie Pie exclaimed maniacally before catching her breath while clamping her mouth shut.

Applejack rushed to her and pulled Pinkie Pie from the tile floor, only for Pinkie Pie to suddenly scream and shout madly "They're in my mouth, THEY'RE IN MY MOUTH! GET THEM OUT, PLEASE!" Applejack quickly grabbed her by her shoulders and shouted "Pinkie Pie! I swear, there is nothing on you, and there are no spiders in your mouth! You're just imagining it all!" Pinkie Pie sighed in resignation and whimpered "But… they feel real…"

Meanwhile, Rainbow Dash had come by Pinkie Pie's house to make sure nothing that they hadn't predicted had happened in her absence. As she came to the window of the front door, she soon found that Twilight had arrived before her, possibly intending the same act of precaution, and entered the establishment to greet her respectively. "What happened while I was gone?" Rainbow Dash asked curiously.

Twilight cringed nervously, obviously debating whether to reveal what had happened before eventually, if reluctantly, coming to a conclusion. "Well… Pinkie Pie had a breakdown this morning, apparently" Twilight explained, her breath rather faint as to not be overheard. "What!? Is she alright!?" Rainbow Dash began to panic, before Twilight steadied her and explained "Nothing happened! She's alright now". Twilight then proceeded to explain the events that unfolded on their behalf, or at least from what Applejack had told her.

Rainbow Dash then heard the sound of sobbing from the living room; and upon peeking carefully into the living room, she was destined to discover Pinkie Pie cowering distraughtly on the couch, "Let's face it. I've got one step left until I completely lose it, don't I?" "Pinkie Pie, you're not losing your mind! It was just a hallucination, that's all. It can only get better from here" Applejack intervened in this degrading statement.

Applejack herself currently sat across from her and had spent the past hour comforting her from such a horrific experience. "I'd like to know how" Pinkie Pie sighed before hanging her head in shame of her own insecurity. Twilight then stepped into the room and added "Well, it definitely couldn't get any worse than this, to be sure". Unfortunately for the protagonists, the writer had other plans, and regrets to say that Pinkie Pie's dilemma had only just begun. And it did so with two musical notes.

'DING-DONG!'

To be continued…