Saturday Morning

Chapter Seventeen – Pinkie Pie

Pinkie was without a doubt, a morning pony. And technically a night pony too. The point was that she was active at all times.

Just not this time.

It was a groggy start to Pinkie's day. Once Celestia had raised the sun, the early beams of light shown through the window of her suite and came to rest upon her face. She blinked in resistance to the light upon awaking, and turned her head to a slightly less bright corner of the room.

Her head hurt. A lot. She guessed it was due to all the events of the past two days. It all came back to her. She frowned, remembering that she still blamed herself for dragging all of her friends into this mess.

"I should've just left him alone." Pinkie said.

"What was that, Pinkie?" Dash said from the other side of the room. The pink mare turned to her friend, who had apparently been up and alert for a while.

"Oh, umm… nothing Dash." Pinkie said.

"It sounded like you said 'I should have left him alone'." Rainbow said. Pinkie managed a weak smile.

"Yeah, I did." Pinkie admitted. "If I hadn't tried so hard to befriend Frostburn, then we wouldn't be here now, Ponyville wouldn't be nearly as destroyed as it is now, and you wouldn't have had your heart broken." She said.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa." Dash said. "First of all, my heart is not broken. I just felt a little abandoned by Frostburn is all. But that's not the point." The cyan pegasus blushed a little, and tried to hide it from Pinkie. "Second of all, none of this is your fault… It's mine."

Pinkie bolted awake in shock at Dash's last statement. "How in Equestria is this mess your fault?" She asked.

"I chased Frostburn into the Everfree Forest. And that set in motion everything else."

"But Dash that's silly. You can't blame everything bad that's on yourself! Pinkie said. Her pegasus friend smiled at her.

"And neither should you." She said. Pinkie held her breath as she realized Rainbow Dash was right. Nearly all of the guilt that had been weighing down the pink mare had suddenly fled. Nearly. Guilt was hard to completely get rid of.

At that moment there was a knock on the door. Twilight peeked in not a moment later. "Hey girls." She said. "The Princess needs all of us in the throne room."

"Okay Twilight." Pinkie said, her usual pluckiness restored. "We better get going then."

The Crystal Empire, as he learned it was called, was unlike anything Frostburn had ever seen before. He had been all over Equestria, but had never come across a city made of crystals. And that wasn't the only mind blowing thing. The ponies were also different, looking as if their coats were pure gemstones.

His regular blue coat made him stick out like a sore hoof. The native ponies stared at the new comer to their city, obviously having gone without visitors for a long time. Some younger colts and fillies even pointed at him and whispered to each other.

His introverted self naturally wanted to run and hide, avoid all contact with these crystal ponies. But he couldn't bring himself to do it. Frostburn had to return their stares, because he was just as amazed as they were. No pony spoke to him though, seemingly waiting for him to come up to one of them and start a conversation. He couldn't bring himself to do it though. Years of isolation held him back. He wouldn't know the first thing about conversing.

Instead the crystal ponies were content to watch him explore, just as he was content to walk around and not break anything. It was a fragile peace, until one little colt broke away from his mother and ran up to him. His mother followed him, determined to keep him safe.

"Excuse me, mister." The young crystal colt said. "Are you a pegasus?" The young kid had probably gone his whole life so far without seeing a different kind of pony, so Frostburn simply took the question as curiosity.

"Yes." He said. "Yes I am." Quickly he tucked his wings behind his cloak.

"Could you fly now? I'd really like to see it." He said.

"That's not a good idea." Frostburn responded. The young colt's mother came by, leading her child away with an apologetic glance. The kid seemed pretty upset that Frostburn had said no.

"You know, if I had wings, I'd never stop flying." The colt said as his mother led him off.

Frostburn only stared, without coming up with a response. He eventually just turned and walked away.

If I could give you these wings, I would in a heartbeat kid. He thought.

The throne room was just as Pinkie remembered it, outrageously large. She had always wanted to through a party in here. Maybe after the whole apocalyptic prophecy snafu was over she would get her chance.

That thought brought up another memory for Pinkie. Her 100th party spectacular extravaganza. It was supposed to have gone up yesterday. With everything else going on, it had slipped her mind. At first, she was upset, but then she got excited when realized that she still had a chance to throw her hundredth party spectacular.

"Ah, there you ponies are." Celestia said from the center of the throne room. Normally the Princess would sit on her throne when addressing the Mane Six, but today a large map of Equestria had been laid out in the center of the room. Princess Celestia, Luna, and a handful of guards were all studying the map.

"What are y'all doing?" Applejack said, walking towards the map.

In a gruff voice, the nearest guard responded, "Attempting to determine the location of the outlaw, ma'am."

"Outlaw?" Rainbow said distantly.

"Y'all don't hafta refer to me as Ma'am. Applejack suits me just fine." AJ said. The guard nodded, but his attention was really on the map. Pinkie looked over the shoulder of a guard with a darkened coat, and saw many towns and landmarks scratched out.

"Hey, you crossed out Ponyville." She noticed. "Did the town disappear or something when since we last saw it?" The guard looked back at Pinkie with a startled expression on his face, like he couldn't believe somepony had actually asked that question.

The other guard – who had called Applejack ma'am – answered her. "Ponyville is one of the towns we have determined the outlaw not to be at, ma'am." Pinkie chortled when he said that.

"You don't need to call me ma'am either." She said amongst her laughter.

"What exactly did you mean by outlaw?" Dash said, bringing the subject back up. "He has a name you know."

The guard gave a stare down at Rainbow. "I am well aware of that. I prefer not to use it. Outlaw is what he is, and what he is called." Rainbow looked like she was about to fling an insult at the guard. Pinkie stopped laughing when she saw all the tension. Thankfully Princess Luna stepped in.

"You can calm down, Swift Sword. And Rainbow, I am sure the Sergeant did not mean what he said." Both ponies lowered their gazes, accepting the compromise offered by the Princess of the night.

Pinkie on the other hoof, tried not to laugh again, thinking about the tongue twister of a name that Sergeant Swift Sword had. Twilight spoke before she got the chance to blurt it out.

"Have you narrowed down Frostburn's whereabouts?" The purple mare asked.

Princess Celestia stared down at the map. "Not very much." She said. "We've dispatched scouts throughout Equestria to keep an eye out for him. So far, we don't believe he's flown since we last saw him. But since then he could be anywhere."

"Not anywhere." Rarity said, stepping forward to look at the map. "He wouldn't set a hoof in Vanhoover. Not after his last experience there." Swift Sword looked to the Princess for confirmation. She nodded, and the Sergeant proceeded to cross of Vanhoover with a red marker.

"Anything from your Pinkie Sense?" Fluttershy asked, looking to Pinkie. The other members of the Mane Six also turned to her. Knowing her ability would not reveal itself under all the pressure, Pinkie shook her head.

"You simply must try Pinkie." Rarity said.

"The Pinkie sense doesn't work like that." The party pony responded. "I can't force something from it. It just happens."

"Well when it happens, I would like to be the first to know." Rarity said. Rainbow glared at her.

"I think I should be the first to know when Pinkie senses something." Dash said.

"Oh really?" Rarity said. "Because I feel that I would be more generous with that information than someone who would just jet off and leave her friends at the first chance of finding her coltfriend!" Rainbow's face turned a shade of dark crimson, as the two shifted into a heated argument.

"Oh yeah? Well I would at least find him! Unlike you, a unicorn who can't do anything for herself except sew a dress!" Rainbow angrily declared. Rarity's face contorted in anger. The two began yelling at each other loudly. Twilight and Applejack were too stunned at this sudden development to do anything, and Fluttershy looked around sheepishly; undoubtedly blaming herself for even bringing up the subject of the Pinkie sense.

"That is quite enough out of both of you!" Princess Celestia said firmly. The two mares quieted down after the order was given. "Pinkie, if you do pick up something, tell us all at once instead of individually." Pinkie absently nodded, contemplating on the fact that she would likely be the first to know Frostburn's whereabouts, given that it was her Pinkie Sense.

As the group returned attention to the map, Pinkie walked up to Rarity. "What was that all about?" She asked. The white unicorn bore a look of shock.

"I really don't know Pinkie." She said. "I have no idea what came over me." Looking at Rainbow Dash, Pinkie could see the pegasus was still burning up over Rarity's words, and faintly Pinkie wondered if they could have been true. Next Chapter: Just Bucking Leave Canterlot Already! Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 51 Minutes