It was a glorious day in ponyville. After days of torrential rain, the air was now warm, and the sun was bright. Not a single pony was indoors, and the streets were more crowded than they had been in weeks.
It pained Rainbow Dash that she wouldn’t be able to enjoy it. About a week before she’d agreed to meet Pinkie Pie at sugarcube corner, and the bouncy pink pony had become ever so eager to constantly remind her in the last few days. For a moment, she considered making up an excuse, but then again that would just hurt Pinkie’s feelings. So, giving in to her conscience, she sped towards the little cornershop.
Rainbow Dash wasn’t knowledgeable on businesses, but it puzzled her that the family owned store was still surviving. A huge, well established franchise had opened up directly across the street a few months ago, which should have taken away all their business. Yet the opposite was happening. Maybe ponies just loved her cupcakes.
The store was closed, and as soon as Pinkie knocked on the door she was immediately greeted with the pink mare bouncing in excitement.
“Hooray! You’re here!” Pinkie squealed, barely able to contain her excitement. “I’ve been waiting all day! We’re gonna have so much fun together!” Dash laughed, a little uncomfortably. Pinkie’s enthusiasm was creepy, even by her standards.
“So are you ready!?” Pinkie squeaked as she let Dash in.

Dash grinned, “you betcha. What do you have in mind?”

“We’re gonna make cupcakes!” Pinkie happily announced, practically singing the last word.

“We’re going... to bake cupcakes?” Dash asked, raising a confused eyebrow. “Pinkie, I’m no good at baking, remember the last time I came over to help?”

“Oh don’t worry your pretty little head,” Pinkie squeaked reassuringly. “I’ll do most of the work and you’ll get to taste them!” She bounced over to the counter. A single cupcake was sitting on a plate. “Here’s my new recipe, I’m sure you’ll love it!” She said. She brought the plate over in her teeth.

Dash thought it was rather nice of Pinkie to save her the last cupcake, and it would be rude to not accept it. She hungrily chomped it down. Delicious!”

“Okay so now what?” Dash asked. Pinkie was watching him expectantly.

“Now, you take a nap,” Pinkie said.

Dash suddenly felt lightheaded. Her vision blurred, her world spinning. The last thing she noticed before she dropped to the floor, unconscious was Pinkie’s insane grin.

Dash awoke. Her head was groggy and vision blurry. Not that it would have made much of a difference. The room was too dark to see. “Ungh... what happened?” she asked, trying to move. With a start, she realized she couldn’t. Her arms, legs, wings, and even her neck were held in iron braces. Her legs and arms were spread wide apart. She felt vulnerable, and didn’t like it.

“Oh goodie! You’re awake!”

The gleeful voice startled her. Dash craned her neck as much as she could in the brace to make out Pinkie in the dim light before her. She was pulling a cart with her, but it was too dark to make out. “Now we can get started!”

“Um... Pinkie, I can’t move,” said Dash, worried. “What’s going on?”

“Well you’re tied down, duhhhh,” Pinkie chided playfully.

“Why?” Rainbow asked, trying to move, but the braces were too tight. “I thought we were going to make cupcakes.”

“We are,” squeaked Pinkie. “See, I ran out of my special ingredient again, and I need your help to get more.”

Dash's skin crawled. "Wha - what's that?"

“You, silly!” Pinkie giggled.

Dash’s eyes widened in shock, no, surely she didn’t mean... “Haha, you really got me there Pinkie, tricking me into thinking I was gonna get made into a cupcake.”

Pinkie giggled, “well not really made into a cupcake, just some of you.”

“Pinkie. This isn’t funny.”

“Oh Dashie, this isn’t the first time you’ve helped me,” Pinkie giggled, pulling the cloth covering the cart. Dash’s heart felt like it had sunk into her stomach, her mind raced. The cart was loaded with sharp medical tools.

“No!” Dash shouted. “No, no, no! You can’t do this, I’m your friend!”

“I know you are, that’s why I’m so happy that it was your turn to help me,” giggled Pinkie, completely unperturbed by Dash’s pleas. “It’s too dark in here! I’ll go get the lights.”

Dash’s eyes stang as the white lights illuminated the room. Her mouth hung open in shock. The room was decorated in Pinkie’s typical flair, but was utterly twisted. There were streamers, balloons filled with helium, the usual sort. Yet what caught Dash’s eye were the many species of taxidermied animals hanging from the ceiling by thin wires. In the middle of the room was a table with what looked like four stuffed ponies. They looked like they had been dead for years, though were remarkably well kempt. On the table was a cake that had long passed its expiry date. Above it, was a banner with the words Life’s A Party scrawled across it. Dash reeled at the sight, but had an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. “What is this?” Dash stammered, voice choking in her throat.

Pinkie, bounced into her vision, this time wearing what looked like a butcher’s apron. It was stained with blood. “Do you like it?” she asked eagerly. She gestured to the animals hanging from the ceiling. “I made this all by myself! I get soooo lonely when I lose a pet, so I stuff it and bring it down here so I can remember them forever. Isn’t that sweet?”

Dash didn’t know what to think. “And the p-ponies?” she asked.

“Oh yes I never told you about my old friends before Twilight came here, did I?” Pinkie asked, she actually sounded sad. Her cotton candy mane started to fall flat. “They were my best friends, until they all died in a horrible train accident.” She then began to giggle madly. “So I dug ‘em up and stuffed them. Now we can always have parties together!”

Dash was starting to tear up not only from the story but also fearing for her life. “Oh Dashie, don’t cry. Someday you’ll sit with them too! We can have parties forever!”

“Pinkie, you need help,” Dash stammered. “Please, Twilight could help you!”

“Oh Dashie that’s exactly what you said last time, and the time before that, and the time before that,” Pinkie rolled her eyes. “Well, it’s time for us to get started.” Dash watched her, hyperventilating. Pinkie pulled a large hypodermic needle out of the tray in her teeth.

“What is that!?” Dash demanded.

“Something to take all the pain away,” said Pinkie. She placed a hoof on Dash’s chest, it felt intrusive. “I wouldn’t begin harvesting if you could actually feel it, silly.” Dash’s heartbeat quickened. What did she mean by harvest? Dash looked away, gritting her teeth in disgust. Pinkie thrust the needle into the pegasus’ heart, her tongue pushing down on the plunger.

Dash unclenched her teeth. An unsettling numbness slowly crept through her body. Pinkie sat before her, watching expectantly as her muscles went limp. “Are you going to kill me?” Dash demanded.

“Oh Dashie, why would I do that?” Pinkie asked, offended. “You’re my friend.”

“Friends don’t eat each other!” Dash shouted, the numbness had spread to her wings and legs. “This is wrong Pinkie!”

“Eat you? Oh Dashie I don’t think you’d taste very good,” Pinkie giggled, completely unperturbed. “I just need a few things from your body and then I can zip you back up and you’ll forget this ever happened.”

The realization dawned on Dash as everything began to fit into place: the overwhelming sense of déjà vu, the unexplainable disappearances of her friends only to have them appear later unable to remember where they’d been, and Pinkie acting like as if she’d done this many times before. “Y-You’ve done this before? To me?”

Pinkie nodded so eagerly Dash was a little worried her head might fall off. “Lots and lots of times! Not always on you of course – that would be soooo boring.” She bounced over to the cart, and pulled a large scalpel out with her teeth. “Now hold still – oh wait I forgot, you can’t move.” Dash tried to struggle, but even without the restraints, her body wouldn’t listen to her. She felt some vertigo as Pinkie levelled the operating table. With uncanny precision, the pink mare stabbed the scalpel into the soft flesh just above her pelvis.

The flesh gave way almost instantly with an icky gooey sound, blood splattered onto Pinkie’s apron and trailed from the incision drawn up to her chest. Pinkie opened the wound with her hooves. The sight of her own Innards made Dash pass out from shock.

Dash’s vision swam as she awoke, for a moment she hoped it was just a horrible dream, only to be greeted by Pinkie’s stern face. “Dashie that was very rude,” she huffed. “I invited you over so we could spend time together and you just fall asleep. How would you like it if I went over to your place and were like Oh this is so boorrrinng I’m just gonna go have a nap, wake me when it’s over.”

Dash hyperventilated, she hated feeling helpless. She wanted to escape, but it was clear there was no way out. For now, she’d have to be compliant, for her own good. “S-sorry pinkie.”

Pinkie merely smiled down at her. “I forgive you, and you know Dashie, I really do have to thank you.” Dash tried to stomach her fear as her psychotic friend pulled a fresh needle from the tray.

“For what?” Dash growled.

“Well if it weren’t for you, my store would no longer be in business,” squeaked Pinkie, propping her hooves up on the table. “The cupcakes we make together are especially popular. Take a bit of various bodily fluids, mix them together, and wah-lah it’s delish!”

“What? How do you test something like that?” Dash asked nervously. She tried not to look at the gaping opening in her stomach.

“It’s... complicated and just a bit weird,” squeaked Pinkie, stabbing the needle into Dash’s stomach. The pegasus’ face contorted with revulsion at the strange squelching sound it made. “When I was a little filly, my parents wanted me to become a doctor...”

***

“NO, NO MORE!” Dash screamed, hysterical. “You’re killing me!”

“Oh and it gets better!” Pinkie laughed. “When the patient woke up, his skeleton was missing, and the doctor was nowhere to be found!”

Dash could barely contain her laughter, and a hiccup brought a splatter of blood to her mouth.

“Oh silly Dashie,” giggled Pinkie, wiping her friend’s mouth with a damp cloth. “Anyway, that’s how I lost my medical license, and why I can’t go back to Manehattan.”

She withdrew from the operating table, tossing the last of the hypodermic needles into a bucket below. She looked over to the cart, five beakers, each full of various bodily fluids like blood, bile, adrenaline, thyroid, and bone marrow. Pinkie claimed they made a tasty concoction when mixed, but Dash was unconvinced. “Hooray! I think we’re done.”

Pinkie scooted down to collect a set stitching tools from the lower shelf of the cart. “I had sooooo much fun, did you Dashie?” She began to stitch the wound, holding the flaps of skin together with her hooves and weaved the needle with her mouth.

“Uhh... not exactly what I’d call a good time,” Dash admitted, craning her neck to look down at her now stitched up tummy. The procedure was over, and Pinkie unscrewed the bracers holding her limbs in place, but Dash was still numb from the neck down. “So... what happens now?” she asked.
“Now, we bake!” said Pinkie excitedly. She bounced out of the room, ascending a ramp. In tow was the cart and beakers. “I’ll be back in a jiffy!”

“A trap door,” Dash mused. “So that’s how she does it.” Soon the smell of baking dough, and Pinkie’s incessant singing of her favourite song ‘cupcakes – so sweet and tasty’, albeit with a few more morbid lyrics, wafted down through the open trap door. Half an hour passed, and Dash felt the numbness in her forelegs and wings fade. She considered escaping, Pinkie couldn’t possibly catch her. She could warn the others of what their friend was doing behind closed doors. Maybe even get her the mental help she needed. But then she considered the consequences. If anyone found out her secret, Pinkie would be ruined – she would become a pariah. Sugarcube Corner would go out of business, Mr and Mrs Cake would lose their livelihood, and Dash would have to buy the cupcakes from across the street at their horribly inflated prices – five bits for a snack-sized cupcake – THEY were the real monster here.

Soon Pinkie came back through the trap door, carrying in her mouth a plate with a single cupcake. It had blue frosting, with rainbow coloured sprinkles. “All done!” she squeaked excitedly, setting the tray on a clean space on the operating table. “I saved this one just for you, try it.”

By now, Dash, though exhausted from the ordeal, had full control her limbs again. She stared down at the cupcake, knowing what the weird concoction inside it contained. Part of Dash felt indignant and sick, and another part of her morbidly curious. The latter part of her won. She reached down and flung one of the cupcakes into her mouth. She expected it to taste horrible, but it was delicious. “I can’t believe how good these are,” Dash remarked.

“It’s a shame that cupcake’s going to erase your memory,” Pinkie said sadly. “You were so much more cooperative this time – the first time I tried this you nearly bit my nose off.”

“I had to admit, I was really worried – I thought you were going to chop off my wings and cutie marks for an obscene dress, and use my organs as party decorations and bagpipes,” suddenly her vision swirled, her head felt fuzzy. “Uh, what was that about my memory?”

Pinkie burst out laughing, rolling on the floor. “Oh Dashie, you are hilarious!” was the last thing Dash heard before her vision faded to black.

***

The next morning, Dash awoke groggy and disoriented in her cloud home. Someone was knocking on the door. She had no memory of what had happened yesterday, she couldn’t even remember falling asleep in her own bed. “Hold on. I’m coming,” she muttered, flopping out of bed and answering the door. Standing there was Derpy, a letter in her mouth.

“Derpy?” Dash asked, crossing her forelegs in irritation. “Couldn’t you have just left it in the mailbox?”

“She told me to give this to you personally,” Derpy replied. Dash just snatched the letter from her mouth, it was from Pinkie Pie.

Dash arrived at Sugarcube Corner around midday to find it packed with customers eagerly awaiting Pinkie’s newest batch of cupcakes. Pinkie, from the counter, saw her standing at the back of the line and waved her over. “Hey Dash, I made this batch just for you!” she said excitedly once Dash had flown over the crowd and met her by the counter. “Give one a try.”

“These are delicious!” said Dash. “What did you put in them?”

Pinkie looked at her modestly, “oh nothing special, just a bit of rainbow.”

“How much?” Dash asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Just a dash.”