She Slimed Me

By SwiperTheFox, with help from TheBandBrony, Josephdalepony, DJDasher, EMF, and other sweet darlings (thanks again)

Snips and Snails were commonly known around town as nothing less than an inseparable duo, finding boundless adventure under every pebble of Ponyville. Even as the years went by and they crossed the line from wide-eyed foals to curious teenagers on the cusp of adulthood, they still bumbled their way through thick and thin before coming out the other end looking all smiles. It all could only stem from a near-telepathic level of understanding and pure friendship.

That was exactly why so many ponies flinched in surprise when the two started screaming at each other.

"'No'? What do you mean, 'no'?"

The taller of the two craned his head down, glaring daggers that only intensified as he drew closer to Snips’ face. "You promised that we would go to the Nightmare Night party together. Heck, you ‘Pinkie Promised’ on it! You don't just fake a ‘Pinkie Promise’ and then expect everything to be okay!"

"I didn't fake it!" Snips retorted, still reeling from the shout as if it had been a foghorn exploding in his ears rather the words of than his friend. "It's just... you know, something came up. It's not like I'm ditching you or anything." Snips did his best to match Snails' rising levels of sheer intimidation from Snails’ staring face, though Snips still wanted to back away from the confrontation at the same time.

"Then what are you doing?"

"I'm just... uh, not not ditching you! Yeah, that."

"Not... not, not dit—" Snails shook his head, his ragged mane flopping about his head, as he muttered on, "—quit using those darn word-plays on me! You know I'm no good at them."

"Look," Snips commented, trying to calm his tone of voice as his head lowered, "I'm really sorry I have to leave you hanging like this, but something just came up, honest! The last thing I would want to do is spend a super-mega-awesome party without my best friend at my side, but there are some things that are just out of my control."

Without thinking, Snails huffed, "Like that little fillyfriend of yours?"

Snails didn't even realize that he had struck a nerve until Snips' eyes all but combusted into fiery balls of pure, seething rage.

"You leave Applebloom out of this!"

Now it was Snails' turn to go on the defensive, retreating to a safe distance until his friend had calmed down a tad. "Geez, Snips, don't blow your top over it. I didn't think it was even such a big deal to you. You’ve talked about wanting to date Applebloom for years now— I know. I just... I thought that since the two of you are together now, you'd be a bit less sensitive about it. I’m sorry."

All that pent-up anger that swelled inside Snips' chest sputtered and died as he took in the crestfallen look on his friend's face. "Aw, shoot... buddy... I should be the one who's sorry. Snapping at you like I'm some sort of crazy pony— that wasn't very nice of me at all."

Tension seemed to melt as the two companions realized their own follies. Snips took the initiative and saddled up next to Snails, resting his head wearily on the other's lanky leg.

"It's just— it was so hard to get her to notice me, you know?" he said, sniffling a bit before continuing, "I go through all that craziness, read all those books about farming just to impress her, plan a whole week out to go perfectly and get her to finally realize that I exist, and then the whole thing blows up in my face like a bad firecracker anyway!"

Snails would have felt no less empathy for him if he had heard this tragic little tale a hundred times before. It didn't even matter that the number seemed more or less accurate. "I'm sorry too. If I hadn't been distracted, that bucket of varnish wouldn't have fallen on you and your roses." The words felt well-rehearsed coming out of his lips, but nonetheless genuine.

After a long moment of contact that would leave anypony but the thickest of thieves blushing, they pulled apart and offered up a pair of cocky grins as a truce. “So,” Snips finally wondered, “friends again?”

“Friends.”

“Friends ‘til the end?”

“Friends ‘til the end!”

“Cool!” Snips then delicately slid his head to the side and stared off at the nearby bench, lowering his voice. “I still can’t go with you to the Nightmare Night party.”

“Oh, come on!”

And just like that, the two were pressed snout to snout once more, boring holes into each other’s head with looks that could curdle milk from two hundred yards. Though, their looks were laced with an added layer of exasperation.

“Look, I’m still really, really sorry, but Applebloom asked me to go with her in front of all her friends, and she pulled out those really big puppy dog eyes that she knows I can’t say
no to. Geez, what was I supposed to do, turn her down and get the stuffing beat out of me by that one Scootaloo pony?”

“No... b-but, you could’ve invited me to come with you two!”

“Really?” Snips’ stare melted to one of deadpanned apathy. “No offense or anything, but you’d just end up being a second wheel for the entire evening.”

“I think you mean ‘third wheel’.”

Snips awkwardly counted out three beats on the ground. “Yeah, but— really? That doesn’t matter. Would you really want to spend the whole night following me and Applebloom around like we did to Trixie that one time? It doesn’t exactly sound like very much fun.”

“Yeah, but, I just—” The wheels of Snails’ adolescent mind stalled and ground to a halt as he took in the vivid image in his mind of him skittering awkwardly behind Snips and Applebloom, both of whom looked too enraptured by the other’s eyes to notice at all the bumbling, lanky unicorn behind them. Nor would they notice me being such a fool, me straggling behind them in what might as well be another planet.

Slipping to either lovebird’s side and joining the conversation horizontally would seem as annoying to those ponies as poking them in their chests, Snails knew. He pictured being buffeted back into his place in the rear by the brick wall of a crowd around him. He didn’t like it.

Snips could tell, as usual, and he also knew that Snails’ vision seemed far from a pretty one. Rather than saying a word back, Snips offered the sulking colt an apologetic shrug. Snails spent a spare second simply gazing off into the distance at the area off of the town square where sturdy stallions were putting the finishing touches on Nightmare Night decorations.

“Well,” the lanky colt murmured, “it still would have been nice of you to ask, at least.”

Snips searched for a response, the expression on his face with his shifting eyes and pressed together lips making it clear that he wanted to dart away to put some last minute work on his costume. Snails closed his eyes and took in a deep breath. He visualized his own fancy get-up, seeing in his mind’s eye his long white lab coat coated in splotches of fake blood alongside pocket protectors with fake hypodermic needles. Our costumes match just perfectly. We picked both ours out at the same blasted time. We just— oh, gosh— I feel so weak thinking of being there without you!

“Look, buddy, you can’t just leave me like this,” Snails spat out, eyes still closed as he shivered a bit, “and the whole thing is going to start in a half an hour, for goodness’ sakes! You just... can’t!” Snails almost burst into hysterics at the rate his voice rose. “We’re friends, right? Friends don’t leave each other in the dust for fillies!”

“Snails,” Snips began as he tried to reach his stubby foreleg up pat his ailing friend on the shoulder only to fall comically, tragically short, “we can hang out sometime tomorrow, I promise for serious.”

“You ‘promised for serious’ that we could go to this Nightmare Night party.”

“That was four months ago, and you threatened to spill my first mug of Apple family cider if I didn’t.”

“Y-yeah,” Snails stumbled, “but you still said yes! A promise is a promise, no matter what!”

“Snails, we’ve spent the past three weeks doing nothing but spending time with each other. Even when we’re in school, we sit next to each other and plan what we’re going to do when we’re not in school.”

“Well, but,” Snails began, stopping as it truly dawned on him that he could rehash things another dozen times without it making much difference.

“I already had to turn Applebloom down, like, a million times so that I could hang out with you. She’s starting to get worried that I would rather hang out with you than her, and that’s hurting her feelings,” Snips said with finality, turning a bit in place as his hooves scraped against the gravelly ground.

“But you should hang out with me instead of her! She’s got a world of friends! You’re all I’ve got!” Snails all but roared into his companion’s face, surprising himself with his sudden burst of emotion.

Snips knew that neither of them really had anything more to say, staring blankly upwards at his friend. And he knew that Snails felt, deep down, the same way. With one last resigned sigh, Snips hung his head, hooves digging into the ground, and replied, “Snails, I’m really sorry, but I want to hang out with Applebloom tonight. We can hang out later, but just not tonight.”

Snails opened his mouth, but no sort of refutation came out. It remained as empty as his mind at that moment, his eyes turning as his head remained still to catch Snips trotting through the almost totally set up Nightmare Night stalls and platforms. Shouting had had no effect on the diminutive unicorn— neither had begging, pleading, praying, despairing, lamenting, and even asking politely. Snails got back off of his knees and dusted the dirt off his belly, standing up straight, and restrained himself from shouting at a Snips that simply was not there anymore.

"Hmph," he groaned, kicking a stray pebble out of his path, "Snips, gotta go and throw his oldest, most bestest friend into the river and use me as just a blasted bridge for him and Applebloom to walk on." He sighed again as he followed the same path that Snips had tread upon, his eyes dancing along the various shops and stalls around him with the fake cobwebs, fake spiders, and such almost all finished up. "This is all just so dumb! I’ll end up going to the party all alone and have a terrible time, and then he’ll feel all bad and stuff, with us ending up right back as before— he’ll never go anywhere without me again, same as the old story.”

Snails blinked rapidly. Like a rusty but faithful machine, the gears in his head began to turn, gaining momentum with every moment. He sucked in a huge breath of air.

"I'll... end up going to the party alone... and have a terrible time!" He burst out in giggles, causing the zebras beside him hosting a huge ‘Have a spooky time’ banner to shoot him stares. Never had anypony in the history of Equestria ever sounded so enthusiastic at the prospect of being the dud of the party. "I'll just show him what a mess I am without him, and then he'll feel so bad that he'll have to ditch Applebloom and go with me! It's foolproof!" Whether or not the newfound plan meant anything resembling sense remained to be seen, but it certainly had a profound touch of madness to it such that only somepony as mostly simple-minded as Snails could have possibly thought it up.

With a plan getting embedded in his head and no shortage of motivation pumping the pistons in his heart, Snails set off at a sharp trot towards his house. He had yet to change into his costume, of course— he couldn't risk dirtying it on some petty adventure before the main event. As he thrust open the back door, he gazed off at the forest behind him, spotting the sun setting beautifully above the clumps of raggedy oaks and maples.

Not that much time left until Cheerilee comes around door to door and picks the whole class up for our chaperoned fun! I need to get to my closet right now— I’ve got to be in tip-top shape if I want to be miserable! Snails skipped over to his bedroom and gave his mother, with her almost frozen in place carefully poised over an array of pumpkin pies, a sudden wave before slamming the door. She hardly had time to turn her head before Snails had stepped over to the far corner of his room.

In less than a minute, Snails had slipped completely into his Nightmare Night outfit, sliding along the carpet over to the tall mirror besides his skinny black bookshelf. He took in his whole get-up as a mad scientist in full comic-book fashion— his eyes going from his twisted goggles and tarted up hair down to his pockets filled with fake hypodermic needles. Decked from head to hoof in a dangerous looking lab coat, he had covered it with nefarious looking stains of blood and grime as well as slashes down the back like from some monstrous creation. Snails nodded before kicking up a thin cloud of dirt as he shuffled towards the not-too-distant lights of Ponyville’s main town square.

Later...

The blood on his get-up may have been fake and the goggles may have merely been his old prescription lenses accented with some creative plastic pieces and pen marks, but the scowl Snails wore rang all too real. "Stupid Snips... gotta go and ditch me right when I need him the most...”

The dejected Snails trudged heavily down the darkened street. His pent-up anger at his unfaithful friend contorted his face into a mask that would have terrified the entire town's foal population, had it not been largely hidden beneath the huge goggles and smears of pretend chemicals. He put on a mocking voice. "'I'll just meet you there! I have to go meet my date beforehoof!' Eugh!"

“Here, miss?” Featherweight loudly chirped, his voice snapping Snails back to full attention. The colt blinked before smacking into a clump of costumed young ponies in front of him, all of them huddled awkwardly at the entrance to a phony graveyard. He glanced from side to side, spotting Featherweight as a jailed inmate in garish orange and Sweetie Belle bound in fabric like a mummy— though it looked more like mere fashion experient gone extremely wrong with those bright white and blue colors— but nopony else that he particularly recognized well.

Well, that’s odd. The hay is everyone? Snips? Snails felt somepony brushing his shoulder, causing him to spin around. Seeing Cheerilee, made up as a sort of ‘queen vampire’ with long fangs in her teeth and white touches of makeup all over her face, brought him to ease for the first time in a while. She looks, gosh, rather... attractive.

“Oh, I worried that you had wandered off,” she commented, her face just inches from his ear, “you should be careful about strangers and weirdos using Nightmare Night as an opportunity for mischief. Please don’t get too far out of the fairgrounds, right? Strangers bring danger.”

Snails nodded, his eyes moving along his teacher’s shapely curves so well accented by her flowing black cloak. I’m feeling tingles all over. She stood up straighter as well as cleared her voice before beginning to make some speech to the whole group, the words just going in Snails’ left ear and coming out the right. He just gazed at her figure. Wow, that dark, mysterious look just hits me... somewhere deep inside

Snails thought back to how he had woken up one fateful day just a month before to see that puberty had hit him like an anvil crushing a peanut . Overcome with new desires for the opposite sex as well as flashes of what his parents called “finally, some intelligence”, he had tried his best to find a date for something, anything for about a day before realizing that he shouldn’t want to decimate his self-esteem too completely. Snails flashed forwards to Nightmare Night as he felt a cold chill blowing upon him, realizing that he was standing all alone— lost in thought— in the fake graveyard with his fellow students far in front of him.

“Alright, looks like the whole ‘seem miserable’ plan isn’t going to work so well if, darn it, nopony really even notices,” Snails muttered under his breath as he tiptoed across phony gravestones. A green hand covered in blood jumped out at him, smacking his front left hoof. He let out an embarrassingly feminine squeak before swapping tip-toeing for a full run. It only took a moment for him to bump against a hard steel platform, curling up his body and gasping for breath before rubbing his pained noggin.

The pounding in Snails' head temporarily distracted him from feeling the matting adhesive of a foal's sticker leave its previous perch on the metal bar and reattach itself to his forehead, its message proclaiming in bold, sassy lettering, Warning, Trick or Treaters: my ‘trick’ is heartbreaking!

By the time the hot swelling in his skull had dulled to a somewhat more tolerable level of pain, the sticker had firmly welded itself to his forehead. Snails wouldn't have noticed, anyway. He still felt too concerned with the pounding in his head to notice anything else in the world.

“Ugh,” he muttered, being so quiet that he could barely hear himself, “maybe looking where I'm going for a change might be a good idea.” Looking up proved to be just as painful as his encounter with the platform. He blinked rapidly as he heard twisted carnival music filling his ears from nearby magical speakers.

I’ve got to get where I can hear myself think. He looked off into the distance as ponies massed together. Well, gosh, I can still make this plan work! I just have to find Snips and Applebloom before I mope them into submission! Picking himself back up, Snails ventured alongside an array of stalls leading deeper into the festival grounds, scanning the crowds in search of a familiarly-colored colt and his date.

Lady luck did not seem to be with him tonight, though, for the two lovestruck ponies were nowhere to be found. This particular section of the festival seemed to hold only cheap, rigged carnival games and lights far too bright for any pony's eyes. He at least managed to get some what away from the music blaring overhead. Still, walking around aimlessly would work about as well as attempting to find matching snowflakes in a blizzard, and Snails, simple as he was, knew it.

Without really thinking, his eyes gravitated towards whatever nook or cranny seemed least likely to sear his corneas with poorly-placed lighting. As it were, that spot just happened to be a small, overstuffed tackboard crammed with papers sitting in the shadows of an especially tall funnel cake stand. One brightly-colored poster in particular caught his attention.

"Come one, come all, to the Nightmare Night... costume contest?"

Wishing not to repeat his previous mistake with the metal platform, he struck out at a cautious pace for the board, not once breaking eye contact with the banner or its intriguing headline. He read aloud, "all colts and fillies of ages one to one-oh-three are encouraged to dress up in their best Nightmare Night apparel for a contest judged by the town's own Mayor Mare, followed by a mighty monster mash afterwards. First, second, and third place winners will receive a candy prize. All contest participants are invited to the following dance. Dress well, and don't forget to be spooky."

Snails rolled his eyes at the sign's small attempt at humor, but the concept of being able to guilt his friend into spending more time with him and win candy in the process intrigued him to no end.

Well, it’s not like my other plan was any better. Plus, candy! You can’t go wrong with candy! He stood still and eyed the poster as he smiled. Thankfully, he managed to snap his mouth shut before anypony could notice the drool beginning to accumulate on his lower lip.

His jaw set and his mind made up, Snails spun around in newfound delight, letting his faux-bloodstained jacket billow in the breeze. After I win or at least come close, Snips will grovel to me. After all, he said it himself that my get-up looks better than his! The way everything fell into place so naturally as it did couldn’t have been a flimsy act of mere fate. A force greater than himself wanted this night to turn out in his favor, or so he thought, and Snails would be more than happy to oblige it.

“Alright, boy,” he growled to himself. “It’s time to get this train wreck rolling.” He glanced about at the various stalls, thinking about trying to have some fun for himself in the meantime before meeting up with Snips and Applebloom later to change their entire night.

Snails’ eyes locked onto a stall with Lyra, dressed oddly in a combination of grey pants and an immense, pocket-filled brown jacket like some kind of foreign news correspondent, throwing her front hooves around a massive case filled with various sparkly rings. Shining through and through from the pervasive moonlight, Lyra hawked them to passers-by, a couple small fillies looking right up at her. Snails glanced over at the four milk jugs stacked upon each other before him at the end of the stall.

Ugh, her game has to be just about as rigged as everything else. But Snips would just adore one of those red rings up there, he really would. And if I got it for him, that might just get his mind back on our friendship over that silly girl. It seemed like it would work as a good ‘Plan B’, which Sweetie Belle once told him his schemes always lacked. Snails tried to stand up tall, building determination.

“Test your strength!” Lyra called out, looking down at the two fillies, both dressed as changelings with their fake fangs showing off. She deviously grinned before going on, thrusting a hoof with two sticky softballs upon it downwards. “How about it, dearies?”

The two fillies recoiled as if she’d thrown a venomous snake at them, both looking at each other before darting off to the far right. Lyra merely stood in shock for a moment. Snails closed his eyes, stepping forwards while gripping his sides with his hooves.

“What?” Lyra murmured, scratching her left cheek, “I’m being too strong with my salesponyship, or something? They just think it’s rigged? Darn it! Or did I just—” She paused before shivering, her jacket clinking against her body as she walked a bit outside of Snail’s frame of view. “Now, how did it get so cold right now—”

“I’ll give it a shot,” Snails declared, opening his eyes again and extending a few bits in his right hoof. He tried to look like a big shot, glancing at her from underneath his mad scientist goggles. “Why not?”

“Fantastic,” she replied, though she still shivered once again as she collected the bits and found herself shifting over until she rubbed up against Sn ails.

“No problem,” Snails confidently remarked, biting his lip a tiny bit as he leaned himself back and aimed the first softball right at the center of the milk jugs. Just as his dad had taught him, he pictured an imaginary target circle in his mind’s eye. Snails sucked in a deep breath before hurling it with all of his might.

*Plink!*

The softball flicked against the side of the top jug before darting off onto the ground, causing the jug to wobble a bit but— otherwise— nothing happened inside the stall besides another chill breeze.

“Oh, come on!” Snails spat out, scuffing his lab coat against the stall counter— fake blood brushing upon the wood.

“Hey, now, just give it another try,” Lyra replied, scrunching her face while curling her eyes. She hardly looked innocent. “You paid for two balls, after all—”

“One second!” Snails remarked, flipping his head upwards. He felt another breeze, this time as cold as an open freezer, as well as the scuffling of a pony walking up right besides him, but he paid no attention. “What kind of milk is in those jugs, anyways? Something tells me it’s, I don’t know, high in iron content?”

Lyra stared blankly back at him.

Snails thought for a moment, glancing to his right and faintly making out a darkly dressed filly around his size. Good job, that’s a more intellectually-based joke than I thought I was smart enough to make. He smiled.

“That’s a more, well, intellectually-based joke than I thought you were smart enough to make,” Lyra whispered, apparently to herself— though Snails heard every word.

Snails popped over a few feet. “Guess where this next volley is going?” he called out, winding up and aiming for Lyra’s forehead.

“AS-MS,” went a feminine voice that seemed to come from the air above the ponies’ heads.

“Beg pardon?” Snails asked.

“Turn around, little mister mad scientist,” it went again.

Snails did so, getting a good look of the filly besides him for the first time. His eyes slid along from her dainty looking crimson hooves to her sleek, well fitting dark cloak and then over to her incredibly beautiful blackish red mane— covered in delicate-looking streaks. He noticed the chill blowing through the air seemed to emanate right from under her, though he had no idea what to think of that.

“Yes?” he asked, gazing at her smooth as silk face, her flush cheeks seeming so pretty. Darn it, focus on what she’s saying! Stop being so shallow with girls now that you’ve found a taste of adulthood!

“You seem to be commenting that it’s rigged,” she went on, walking over to a spot directly behind him as she pointed at the jugs, “and, well, that’s not that interesting. It’s obvious. The more interesting part is how do you use the rigged nature to your advantage, as much as you can.”

Snails merely nodded, trying to think of what exactly she seemed to be costumed as. Her small and stylish black sunglasses just confused him. At night? Her wispy, not-quite-all-there voice seemed to just caress his ears. She also appeared to glide so effortlessly upon the ground as she moved around his body. She’s dressed as a vampire, I guess? She’s one of the best, subtlest ones I’ve ever seen.

“Thus,” she went on— holding up her right hoof, colored in the same black, grey, and red mix as the rest of her body, “apply as-ms. In other words, ‘aim small, miss small’. Also, understand—” She rubbed against his body a bit, feeling so deeply frigid yet wonderfully smooth upon Snails’ fur that he blushed profusely. “That you need to aim, not for the center of the three jug set-up, but for the one weighted the most, which is most likely the left jug.” She gestured over.

“Aim small, just for a spot on the left one, and then they’ll all fall,” Snails said, narrowing his eyes. He paused before turning back over to Lyra, who embarrassingly acted like she hadn’t heard the whole mini-conversation.

The older unicorn then shrugged before pressing her back against the wooden counter. “Don’t forget, it’s only a hoofful of bits for another try.”

Snails contorted himself into position, looking rather like a pony-sized slingshot. The female stranger watched on, holding herself close over to Snails right. Lyra whistled a happy tune with her blase yet happy expression, making it clear that she thought Snails would never make it. He gritted his teeth, putting the finishing touches on his aim, and threw with all of his might.

*Crash!*

The bottles tumbled over to the side of the stall. Snails blinked rapidly, finally letting out a gasp. He gazed over at the gothic looking filly to his side, noticing how she stood up straight right in parallel with the abandoned barn off of the carnival area proper. Bright flashes of moonlight blared through the trees high above the barn over through to her mane and tail, looking sparkly and translucent somehow.

“Gee, thanks!” Snails remarked before turning back to Lyra. The stall operator shrugged, magically lifting over the red ring that he had had his eye on.

“Well, I merely said certain words of advice,” the filly replied, cocking her head in a way that made her glasses slide down a bit on her pretty face, “the execution was all on you, mister mad scientist.”

“I didn’t spend eight years in Mad Medical School to be called ‘mister mad scientist’, dear,” Snails commented, standing up on his hind hooves in a melodramatic fashion, “it’s ‘doctor mad scientist’.”

“Did you minor in ‘heartbreaking’?” she asked.

Oh, sweet goodness, is a girl... flirting with me? Me? Snails brain seemed to short-circuit at the thought, his nose twitching. Me? Of all ponies, me? After an awkward several seconds just rubbing his freshly-won ring between his front hooves, he forced himself to nod his head ‘no’.

“False advertising then, no?” she replied.

After the tall colt slid his head back and frowned, no idea, she turned about and led him along the edge of the Nightmare Night festival zone across to a nearby pumpkin patch. He idly followed, his heart beating like crazy as he tried to get some kind of clues from her dress. It’s like she has some kind of black eyeshadow or something that’s all behind her glasses. Gosh, I wonder what her eyes look like.

“Here we are,” she said, spinning about all of a sudden and plopping herself atop of a gigantic pumpkin, “a little more isolated to get rid of the embarrassment.” Before Snails could ask her to explain, she reached out and ripped the sticker off of his head.

He let out a feminine squeal, hooves going to the stinging skin, as the girl pasted the sticker onto the pumpkin before her. He looked out, read the message— Warning, Trick or Treaters: my ‘trick’ is heartbreaking!— and groaned. She couldn’t help but laugh. A chill breeze seemed to batter Snails’ senses with her every noise, every breath of hers that came out, somehow.

Darn it! How could I have been so stupid to think that she actually liked me or anything... she was just patronizing me... The dejected Snails already turned to the right and stepped over out of the pumpkin patch, eyeing the group of ponies assembling for the costume contest in the distance.

“Hey, wait up, uhh, what’s-your-name!”

She popped up behind him— scaring him a bit since he had neither seen nor heard her running, her body seeming to poof into place. He had no idea what to even begin to say, having the hardest time talking to even a slightly pretty mare. She trotted over to a set of timberwolf props to their side, made out in great detail in ready-to-pounce poses.

“Snails,” he said, brushing his hooves against his mad scientist lab coat.

“Pirouette,” she replied, making a curtsey in which her black cloak fluttered about on her sleek frame.

“Nice to meet you,” he said, reaching out his front right hoof to shake with her. Pirouette held out her own before coughing, her dark glasses sliding about on her face before she hurriedly shoved her hoof up to hold them flush against her face. Snails held his hoof up as she put hers up next to his.

“Ummm,” she squeaked, shaking her mane on her shoulders. Her hook awkwardly hung in the air without touching his.

“So, shake?”

“One moment of concentration,” Pirouette muttered, scrunching her mouth adorably. Snails blinked, and then he felt her finally pressing her hoof against his. She felt cold enough, as he expected from them both being outside at such a time of night, yet she also seemed to have a bit of a charge or something, her body tingly like a live wire stuffed to the bursting point with static electricity.

Feels rather, good... He almost said that out loud before snapping back to attention, shaking hooves with her and then continuing his walk over to the costume contest area.

“Oh, in my, uh, culture,” Pirouette murmured, something of a skip in her step as she followed him, “shaking hooves is a no-no.” She lowered her voice before going on. “It’s not really that practical, anyways.”

“Come again?” Snails asked, feeling confused. She shook her head, clearly not wanting to talk about that anymore, and trotted over to the end of the line of ponies besides the massive center stage of the Nightmare Night festival.

“Well, uh...” Snails hesitated, letting his half hearted sentence die on his lips. The last thing he wanted to do at this point was insult her ‘culture’ that she seemed so fond of. He felt a-okay with driving a wedge between his best friend and the filly he literally went through hay and high-water to get, after all, but just the mere thought of doing a single thing to upset the gorgeously mysterious filly that had swooped in from the heavens above and stolen his breath away— a real, honest to goodness, definitely not being paid off by Diamond Tiara as part of a sick prank, filly— made his stomach roll.

He would have to play it safe, to be sure. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t test the waters a bit.

“So, yeah,” he finally continued, “are— you know— giving gifts against your culture too?”

She turned to him, eyeing him through her glasses with a look that almost resembled confusion. “Gifts? As in, like, real, physical gifts?”

“Well, yeah. What other kinds of gifts are there—oompf!”

Snails would have loved to hear a lesson on this culture that Pirouette spoke of and how it defined gifts, if not just to hear her wonderfully wispy voice again, had she not knocked the reply right out of his lungs with a shrill, otherworldly squeal and ran up right to his side, cheek to cheek. A over-excited Pirouette leapt up into the air, mimicking Pinkie Pie’s bizarre defiance of gravity. She bounded up to him with a grin that nearly split her face in two.

“A real gift! This is so cool! I’ve never gotten a real gift from anypony before— and from a mark no less! What is it? Is it a teddy bear, or a flower? Tell me tell me tell me!”

Snails, for his part, did his best not to back away at the sudden, unexplainable shift in Pirouette’s behavior. “Erm— wow, you’re loud— it’s the ring I won from the ball toss earlier. You helped me win it in the first place, and you’ve been nice to me all this time, and you aren’t even doing it as part of a mean prank.” He mentally kicked himself for that last phrase. “So, yeah, I just thought that it would look nice on you.”

He hardly had time to get his hooves out the way before Pirouette snatched it up from his grasp and held it up to the moonlight that outlined her starstruck grin like a fine painting’s frame. “Wow, it’s so pretty,” she muttered, hardly able to force out words around her grin. “I’m going to wear this right now! This is, like, the best thing to happen to me all year, and to come after finding a mark no less!”

Still recoiling in surprise, Snails blushed bashfully. “Mark? Oh, you know, it’s just a toy ring. It’s not like it’s made of diamonds or anything.”

“No, you silly little colt,” she replied, her eyes still glued to the flimsy plastic band, “you don’t quite get it. In— uh, in my culture— getting gifts is a really big deal! Physical manifestations of strong emotions go over really big where I come from.”

“Obviously,” Snails mumbled through his shell-shock— or, more appropriately, ring-shock.

If Pirouette heard his little slight, she chose to ignore it, hugging the ring tightly to her chest and adding, “I’m going to treasure this for a long time. Thank you, again, so much.”

Alright, seriously? Snails forced a smile to match his companion's grin. It’s eight bits’ worth of plastic. Calm down.

“But wait a minute...” he murmured under his breath, seeing her slide the ring onto her front right hoof right along to where he could barely see it with her large dress.

Snail's mind, already eager for some grand idea to get himself closer to the mysterious filly, spun into action. This... this could spell an opportunity for me. I just know it,

His grin widened, despite the fact that he didn't actually know how to spell the word 'opportunity'. Yes, the grateful mare can come rushing to her stallion, swooning over him and his wonderfully thoughtful gift! Now how can I turn this in my favor?

Thinking quickly, a quality that Snails knew he was known to lack at times, the colt reared back onto his hind hooves and spread his forelegs out, waiting for a certain spookily-dressed filly to come rushing to him. "You know, in my culture, we say 'thank you' by giving each other hugs. And I happen to love hugs. How about you show me how thankful you are for my gift?"

Tragically, like so many before her, Pirouette shirked away from the lanky colt, a look of mild contempt dragging the smile down into a wry smirk. He spotted something like a glint behind her sunglasses. "Uh-uh, I'm not falling for that old trick. Your hooves will stay on the ground where I can see them. You understand? No touchy.”

A pair of hooves hit the dirt, accompanied by a huff that relayed just as much disbelief as it did disheartenment. "Whu, what? I don't get it! I don't get you.” Snails sighed before he went on, getting no response from her yet. “You go bananas over this little toy ring that I give you, but you're still unwilling to get that near me. Do I smell or something?"

Receiving only a poorly-muffled giggle in response, Snails growled a little bit, sadly sounding less like a wild animal and more like a frustrated puppy. Pirouette shifted about in front of him before they both walked into the carnival proper, Snails trying to put weight into his steps. He couldn’t believe it, but she giggled yet again, this time a bit more brazenly at Snails’ attempts to look tough.

"Seriously! We can't hold hooves, and we can't hug, and we can't even touch each other! If you're not culturally allowed to do any of that, what can we do?" Snails asked, exasperated.

Still giggling that same aggravating, wonderful giggle, Pirouette replied, "we can go to that costume contest, of course. I hear they're going to hand out candy to the winners. I don't know about you, but I would love some candy right now." Her whole body seemed to lighten up, almost to a different color with her hooves turning slightly pinky, at the mere mention of sugar.

Snails, meanwhile, blinked hard as the request registered in his head. "Uh— the, costume contest?” He tapped his chin as he reflected for a second, taller ponies in a variety of poorly done get-ups bumping around and walking around him. “Well, I mean, I guess it would mean going back to ‘Plan A’ getting back at Snips— hey, wait!" He sputtered, choking back his own words. "I'm supposed to be mad at you! Stop trying to make us have fun so I can be mad at you!"

"We won't win the contest if all we do is fume at each other," Pirouette replied matter-of-factly. Snails followed behind her as she stepped around undead pony decorations, brushing her cloak against a fake-fleshy hook on the wall. "Tell you what. Let's enter the contest as a couple. That'll give us twice the chance of winning. When we win, we'll split the take fifty-fifty." She let out a muted squeal, equal parts excitement and anticipation. "All that candy... and it'll be ours!"

Snails opened his mouth to let out a proper mope, only to recoil as two entrancing eyes invaded his personal space with all the subtlety of a rhinoceros dancing ballet. "You'll help me, right Snails? You'll help me win? You have to help me— I'm begging you! You just have to!"

Still flinching, Snails relented, "Okay, okay! I kinda wanted to go to the contest, anyway." Gosh, she’s so cute. I can hardly really think around her. He watched intently as she brushed herself upon the decorations of the nearby carnival game stalls, making her cloak fly all around her body’s shapely curves.

"Heehee, yay!" Pirouette shouted again joyously, leaping into the air. If Snails had actually been using his eyes instead of rolling them in the most obvious way possible, he would have noticed that she lingered weightlessly in the air a little bit longer than should be physically possible.

"Come on then, slowpoke," she giggled, turning on her hooves and skipping gaily a second time. By the time Snails realized that his new partner was in the process of leaving him in the dust, he tried to call after her. But the action was in vain— a candy-craze gripped her just as tightly as the ever-present cloud blurring her outline into nothing.

"Dang it, is this what all mares are like?” Should I just forget this whole ‘Plan A’, ‘Plan B’, and whatever thing about getting back at Snips? What’s the point, anyways. I just want to have... some fun. His previous mission laying abandoned and forgotten in the gutter, Snails grumbled glumly and fell into step behind Pirouette towards the main stage.