“I must say Anthony, I never would have thought of combining melted milk chocolate with oranges, this oddly colored drink is quite the concoction!”

“Yup.” I lean back in the lawn chair I had replace the throne. Much more comfortable. Discord opted for a hammock and we bask in the sun’s rays, enjoying the castle’s new fold-back roof. A guard rushes into the room.

“Sir! The guard’s barracks have been replaced with a sauna! The bunks have been replaced with heated water beds!”

I look up, shifting my shades to rest on my forehead. “Yeah, I know. Any complaints about it?”

The guard shifts in place. “Well... no, but... we would like our barracks back...”

Discord sighs and snaps his fingers. “There, it’s back.”

Looking out a window at the castle grounds, the guard stammers. “But... it’s not. The sauna is still there!”

Discord shrugs. “I’m sure your little military hut is somewhere. You guys need to relax. Here, have a fat-free yogurt.” A small yogurt cup is spawned on top of his helmet. The guard just walks out muttering something about going back to the sauna, eating the yogurt.

I shift my shades back into place and lay back down, removing the wedgie I got from my shorts. “These ponies need to know how to relax.”

“I agree! I think what we’ve done for this place is so much more entertaining! You’re looking a little red though, Anthony. Maybe we should put the roof back up before you get a sunburn.”

“Meh.” I flip over and lay on my belly, letting the sun warm up my back. Might as well get both sides. My cup is empty so I hold it under the fountain of orange chocolate and let it fill up. I get back to the citrusy sweet drink when the doors open again signaling more guests. I sigh. “I don’ care what you want, just grab a drink and relax. We got a cistern of virgin piña colada over there if you aren’t up for orange chocolate.”

I hear a piercing shriek followed by shrill hyperventilating.

“Discord?” A snap of fingers and I have a remote control in my hand. I point it at the source of the noise and hit the ‘- volume’ button a few times. I take off my shades and sit up. “What’s the big deal?”

The Element bearers minus Twilight seem to have gotten my message, Rarity looking around the renovated throne room, her mouth open in a scream of horror, but barely making a whisper. “Chill Rares, we can put everything back in a moment.”

“If we wanted to that is.” Discord adds. We both take a pull from our glasses and I bump my fist to his curled paw. “Sit down, relax, we’re having a great time! And there’s enough here for everypony. You all look so tense!”

“I was kinda okay with Anthony running things for a week...” Rainbow says, looking around. “But Discord? Nuh-uh.” Two Pinkies have sat themselves underneath the chocolate-orange fountain guzzling it down, the third rushing around the room checking out all the little novelties I imagined for Discord to poof up.

“What’s the deal RD? Come on, like it’s that bad.” I toss one of the special large ultra-soft pillows Discord had made right at the pegasus and it poofs against her and falls over, Rainbow looks at the pillow and then pokes it with a hoof, shivering a bit.

“Wh- what’s this thing made of?”

Discord shrugs. “No idea. It’s super comfy though, whatever it is.” Rainbow has now laid down onto the mystery pillow and immediately has a half-asleep look to her already.

I return to the remaining three. “So what about you? Need something?” I aim the remote at Rarity and turn her ‘volume’ back up. And she starts criticizing what we’ve done with this place, from the walls to the now half-off ceiling. I hit ‘fast forward’ and Rarity speeds up and when I figure she’s done I put her back. Wow, this is pretty fun. I think I’ll keep it for later.

“Ah must say, Rarity having a mute button ain’t such a bad thing.” Applejack chuckles. “‘Specially when she starts talkin’ about the latest get-up in them fancy magazines, how she shoulda thought of ‘em first and that they should be pluggin’ her work more often.”

I grin and chuck the remote to Applejack. “Go nuts. Not sure how long the batteries’ll work, but it should be good for a few laughs.”

AJ stares at the device in her hoof, a strange look on her face like a griefer being offered unending TNT blocks and an infinite pool of lava. Naughty, surprised, and very very happy. She gives Rarity the evilest grin I’ve ever seen on the farmer. “C’mon Rarity, let’s find a big wet, sticky mud puddle and roll ‘round in it fer a while.”

Rarity looks mortified and opens her mouth but no sound comes out.

“Ah didn’ hear a ‘no’. Any a y’all?”

“She’s so happy she’s speechless.” I respond an evil grin across my face, wiggling my eyebrows at AJ, who grins and pulls a silent, raving Rarity along behind her.

Last is Fluttershy. Uh... Fluttershy... Hmmm... I turn to Discord and shrug. “Kittens?”

“Kittens.” With a snap, the butter-yellow pegasus is covered by a giant mound of tiny mewling kitties of all sorts walking around her, rubbing against her and basically being heart-explodingly adorable.

A pair of hooves grabs my face and yanks it upwards, now very close to one of the Pinkies. “Where’d you come up with this stuff!?” The word is less of a question and more of a hissed demand, the smell of orange chocolate on her breath very noticeable.

“It’s uh, something I came up with myself based on the idea of a seasonal human snack.”

“Give. Me. This. Recipe!” The Pinkie says, squishing my nose against her muzzle.

The other Pinkie who’d been gorging herself on the fountain smacks her lips. “Idunno, it could use a little something. Nutmeg? Cinnamon? Not sure, but I think it could use a bit of a ‘pop’ to it.”

“Use darker chocolate?” I suggest hesitantly. The vice grip on my cheeks from the first Pinkie increases and she stares into my eyes.

“You are a genius!”

“Uh, thanks? L- leggo please?”

Discord dunks both Pinkies back into the fountain and with a snap the fountain’s drink becomes a much blacker brown. Going back to guzzling it down, they look... Well, totally desensitized to everything else. I fill my cup with the new mixture and take a big gulp.

Ech, a little too bitter for me, the chocolate’s too pure. That said if I replaced the orange with chili pepper I’d have a pretty strong drink. Maybe not a sweet drink, but certainly would be pretty close to the original recipe for hot chocolate. “Whaddya think Pinks? Peppers instead of oranges?”

One of the Pinkies pools a ton of the stuff into her mouth, her cheeks swelling up like balloons. Gesturing excitedly to her mouth, I shrug. “Do it I guess.”

A snap later and Pinkie’s face becomes very red and she swallows immediately and rather than catching her breath, flames come out of her mouth. Jeez. She rushes over to the cistern of piña colada and dunks her face in it. She comes out completely soaked but a pleased look on her face. “That was awesome! Where do you come up with these recipes?”

I shrug. “I’m just an experimenter. I mean, the class I was absolute best in was Home Ec. I’m a good chef I guess but it’s not really my thing. I’m good at it but it just doesn’t speak to me as a profession.”

“Yeah, but some of these things are incredible! A chocolate drink that’s not intended to be super sweet but still delicious? You’re a culinary genius! Ooh, what do you think you could do with cupcakes!?”

I actually have a few ideas, but I think the Pinkies have gotten too wound up and I don’t want to risk one of them exploding. “Uh... I’ll think of something?”

“This could put Sugarcube Corner on the map! Well, it already is locally, but I mean like internationally! We might make enough money that I could eat ten whole batches of cupcakes but still have enough money to replace them!”

“Pinkie! Calm the hell down! I’m not going to do anything that would get you any more sugar. I swear your blood is eighty-percent Sucrose!”

“Oh silly, I had a checkup last week, it’s only fifty!” The second Pinkie comes out from under her fountain spout. “Mine was sixty!”

I feel my entire body twitch. How are they not poisoned!?

“Fi- i- i- i- ifty fiiiiiiiiiiive!!” The third says, flying out of the bounce house and landing in my lap, which is rather painful for me given her velocity. These three are going to be the death of me. One of these days they’ll make my head explode, I swear.

Rainbow’s loud snoring ceases. “Keep it down will ya... I’m trying to- wait, there was something we had to do...” Rainbow’s face scrunches up, getting up off the pillow. “Twilight!”

The entire room freezes. “Oh yeah... I forgot.” I admit. “I figured I’d just let her deal with it without me. Besides, her parents have unofficially banned me from their house.”

“But you’re the only one who’s been to her house, we don’t know where it is, that’s why we came to you!” Rainbow says, up in my face, her magenta-red eyes staring at me. “Come on, move it! Twi’s dealing with some serious crap and I’m not gonna leave her hanging for an awesome pillow. Move it!”

“Fine, fine. Sheesh. Protective much?”

“Not protective, loyal. It’s kinda my thing, remember?”

Right. I get up and stretch. “So is Discord staying here or coming with us to see Twi?”

This gets Dash to stop and turn to Discord who looks like he’s not even trying to hide the fact that he’s up to something. What he’d be up to and in what location the plan is for being left totally unpredictable.

“Fine he’s coming. But no funny business!” Rainbow huffs and grabs Fluttershy’s tail, the only thing visible of her under the mound of baby cats. As ‘Shy is dragged out, she’s still clutching a few kittens to take with her. Okay, that’s cute.

The Pinkies clean themselves off and trot out the door, Discord and I taking up the rear. I leave a sign on the throne room door telling anyone that we’ve gone ‘Snipe Hunting’ and that we will be back at twenty-five o’ clock.

Along the way we find Applejack messing with Rarity by ‘casually’ pushing her into a mud pit and then rewinding it and essentially make her fall into the mud over and over.

“No! Don’t-” *squelch-ʜɔlɘupƨ*

“-ƚ’noᗡ !oИ No! Don’t-” *squelch-ʜɔlɘupƨ*

“-ƚ’noᗡ !oИ No! Don’t-” *squelch-ʜɔlɘupƨ*

“-ƚ’noᗡ !oИ No! Don’t-” *squelch-ʜɔlɘupƨ*

“-ƚ’noᗡ !oИ No! Don’t-” *squelch-ʜɔlɘupƨ*

“-ƚ’noᗡ !oИ No! Don’t-” *squelch-ʜɔlɘupƨ*

Eventually Rarity grabs the remote before being dunked again and hits one of the ‘channel’ buttons and AJ ends up with an anvil falling on her head, a roll of dynamite blowing her fur off, a giant mallet flattening her into the shape of a pothole with eyes... all of which she bounces back from painlessly, but still looks very unnaturally mutilated for a few seconds after each random affliction. Eventually she holds up a sign that says ‘Help’ on it.

Sighing and chuckling I grab the remote from Rarity, hit the ‘channel return’ button and put it back in my pocket. “C’mon you two, enough. Let’s go see Twilight.”

“Right... Say, could I borrow that for one more moment? I’d just love to see dear Applejack in one of those radio soaps...”

“Today it was mud. Tomorrow it’s th’ hog trough.”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Wouldn’ Ah?”

I shrug. “I don’t doubt it. Seriously though, Twilight time. I’m keeping the remote until then.”

“Fine.”

“Fahn.” Next Chapter: Chapter 201 Estimated time remaining: 3 Hours, 13 Minutes