After years of trying, Pinkie Pie had finally convinced Applejack to work with her on baking something. As sales had been awful in the past couple of months, Sugarcube Corner was planning a small Faustmas party to remind everyone that they existed, which was enough for her to help. It turned out all she needed all this time was an actual reason rather than “it’ll obviously be awesome”.

It was the night of Faustmas Eve, and the two were embellishing hundreds upon hundreds of cupcakes each with tasteless white sprinkles. Applejack had feared that getting the hang of holding the sprinkle shaker and making sure each cupcake had a roughly similar number of sprinkles would take some practice, as this kind of thing wasn’t exactly common with what she made, but it had all turned out to be quite easy.

“Applejack?” Pinkie Pie said. “You don’t look happy. Or even content. You look... bored.”

“We’ve just been doin’ this bakin’ for a whahle.” Not counting bathroom breaks and a meal partway through, “a while” had been about six hours.

“Well, we plan to feed everypony in Ponyville.”

“Whah did we have to do everythin’ on Faustmas Eve?”

“Freshness, duh. Do you have no respect for the common pony? Has saving the world—”

“Ah have no respect for the common sprinkle.”

“That wasn’t even a good joke. It’s been like five minutes anyway.”

“Ah know, it’s just near mah breakin’ point.”

“It hasn’t been that long. Is this just too dull and exhausting compared to kicking a tree over and over again?”

“Ah know this is nothin’ to you, it just ain’t mah thing. Ah ain’t doin’ that bad, it’s just all Ah have to think about is all.”

“I see what you mean. I’m not annoying you by being all happy about it, am I?”

“Bah bein’ Pinkie Pie?”

“Yeah.”

“No.”

Unlike ninety-five per cent of Equestria, Rarity wasn’t Faustist or atheist, so tomorrow’s holiday didn’t mean much to her. Yesterday, she, Sweetie Belle, and the only other pony in Ponyville homoreligious to them had had a small “Kwallzaa party”, which was basically a quiet family dinner with slightly more food and a few presents due to the lack of ponies available to make a typical party atmosphere. Rarity was lying on her bed feeling unproductive when Sweetie Belle appeared before her.

“Rarity?”

“Yes?”

“Can I go to the party at Sugarcube Corner?”

“Of course. I assumed you were going.”

“Sorry I took until now to bring it up....”

“It’s all right.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m okay. I would go too if everypony hadn’t decided to hate me recently, as you know, but just because I’m staying doesn’t mean you have to.”

“You still seem a bit bitter over everypony in and near your hometown suddenly hating you even though you’re exactly the same.”

“I am.”

With Applejack occupied, Rainbow Dash didn’t have to choose, so she was with Twilight.

“I should really just do it,” Twilight said.

“What?”

“Tie up Spike or something. We’re never going to get to do anything like this.”

“We could just tell him. Do you think you can trust him to keep a secret?”

“I think so, but... I don’t know if it’s worth the risk.”

“So you don’t trust him.”

“I mean, I guess if I don’t do it, then we’ll never get to do anything, so....”

“It isn’t about that anymore, it’s about whether you trust Spike.”

“I don’t know of any secrets I’ve told him getting out....”

“Then let him in the club.”

Faustmas Day. Tables were inside Sugarcube Corner. Tables were against the outside walls of Sugarcube Corner. Tables were blocking paths Sugarcube Corner was near. Round white plastic tables with umbrellas littered the streets of Ponyville like cupcake cups. Met with a row of tables that stretched from building to building on her way back to the barn, Applejack skilfully jumped over the tabletops and under the umbrellas.

“Is here good?” Twilight said, levitating a table near the entrance of Sugarcube Corner.

“A bit to your right,” said Pinkie Pie, directly in front of the entrance.

“Here?”

“Just a bit more. Too far. No, back. That’s good.”

“All right. That’s the last one, isn’t it?”

“Yep. Thanks for putting up with my perfectionism.”

“Well, I’m like that myself, so I don’t mind.”

“You can come in if you want. Have some nice, rejuvenating cupcakes.”

“I’m going back home.”

“Okay, see you in a few hours.”

Having nothing else to do, Rainbow Dash was the first famous pony to come to the party. She flew between some umbrella poles at speed to show off to the few who had come earlier, but it was the same trick on repeat, so she only took a minute before coming in to say hi to Pinkie Pie.

“Hi, Pinkie Pie.”

“Hi. Please buy a cupcake or you’ll make Pinkie Pie sad.”

“I’m not hungry. Or carrying any money.”

“I’m sad now.”

“I don’t have anything to cheer you up.”

“Well, if you aren’t even going to try, then just leave.”

She went to a table outside. Soon after, a mare with deep blue fur and a green mane and tail came in. She was wearing sunglasses and had an unused and unlit cigarette in her mouth.

“Welcome to the Sugarcube Corner Faustmas party!”

“Hey,” she said in a rough, almost growling voice that was low for a female, almost like an obviously exaggerated attempt at a male voice. “Have you heard of me?”

“Well, I don’t recognise you.”

She put her forehooves on the counter. “Oh, really.”

“Really!”

“I’m Negafluttershy.”

“I thought that was Rainbow Dash.”

“Ehhht. Wrong. It’s me.”

“So are the other... negasaviours coming soon?”

“I killed ‘em all with my M4 a long time ago.”

“Uh... okay... so do you know what you want?”

She slapped Pinkie. “Does Fluttershy decide quickly?”

“What was that for?”

“Because Fluttershy wouldn’t do it.”

“Then shouldn’t you just be wailing on me right now?”

“Fluttershy has consistent principles.” She got off the counter. “I’ll have a Lemon Bombing.”

“What made you decide to be the opposite of her? Like, how could you hate Fluttershy?”

“Fluttershy would try to answer a question like that. Now where’s the fuckin’ cupcake?”

“I don’t trust that you’ll pay for it.”

Negafluttershy vaulted over the counter and started a hooffight. Rainbow Dash noticed and ran inside to help out. However, by that time, Pinkie was already unconscious. Negafluttershy looked up at Rainbow, staying on the floor.

“Go ahead. Stomp my skull into the floor.”

“Okay.” She did, knocking Negafluttershy unconscious, then went back outside. “Is there anypony who can take Pinkie Pie to a hospital? Or Zecora? Or otherwise fix her? She might just wake up, but I don’t know exactly what happened.”

A unicorn who didn’t sign for release raised her hoof. “I can get her to Zecora.”

“Good, come over here.” She came over. “Just teleport her or whatever. I’m just assuming that because you’re a unicorn, I’m sorry if—” She teleported them away. “Well. What to do now....”

A few minutes later, she came back with a conscious Pinkie Pie.

“Thank you,” Rainbow said. The anonymous pony walked out. “So I’ve been debating what to do with... wait, holy crap. Is this Negafluttershy? I didn’t really think about it.”

“That’s what she said. Why, do you—”

Rainbow sprinted into the kitchen and came back much more slowly with a paring knife in her mouth, the largest type of knife necessary in herbivorous societies.

“Do you really need to kill her?” Pinkie said. “We could just call the police and get her thrown in jail.”

Rainbow put the knife in her hoof. “There’s one way she’s still like Fluttershy.”

“I’ll call them right now. If she wakes up, just do whatever you did to defeat her again.”

She put the knife on the counter. “I agree with you, I just thought of that line.”

“You scared me.”

With that sorted, Rainbow went outside and Pinkie went to call the police. The next significant guests were the Apples.

“Hey, welcome to the party!”

Applejack put twelve bits down. “Three Orange Sunsets and one Chocolate Check.”

She put them on the counter. “You worked here for a day and nopony paid you, just take them.”

“You’re the one in trouble.”

“Really, take them.”

“Ah said Ah was happy to help. Ah didn’t expect anything.”

“Fine....” She took the money. “Have a drunken argument-free Faustmas.”

They went outside and took a table. Secretly, most of them didn’t desire their current state of affairs; Applejack couldn’t keep her eyes off Rainbow nearby, Apple Bloom was mostly waiting for Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo to arrive, and Big Mac didn’t really like huge parties and only came because it was still better than being alone on Faustmas. Everyone began to eat.

“It was really impressive balancin’ all the cupcakes on your head,” Apple Bloom said. She was the one who chose a different flavour, shutting her out of the mainstream discussion but giving her absolute power over what she did have.

“Just somethin’ Ah’m good at,” Applejack said. “So what’s your verdict, Big Mac?”

“These aren’t as good as the apple ones.”

“Yeah.”

The next to arrive were Twilight and Spike.

“Hi, ponies! Pony and dragon! I’m not racist, our language—”

“Hey, Spike, are you offended?”

“No.”

“Well, I do care,” Pinkie Pie said. “I can just hear Spike saying ‘politically correct’ at some news right now.”

“We’ll have two Mulberry Murders, one in cupcheesecake form, and two Ravishing Raspberries.”

“The pony just before you got the last mulberry cupcheesecake.”

“Then this might take a while.”

Several minutes later, Zecora came in.

“Hi, Zecora,” Pinkie said.

“I’ll have a Vanilla Ascension,” Twilight and Zecora said.

“We have one left.”

“Then I’ll have a Molasses Meltdown,” Zecora said without hesitation, clearly having come in with a fallback.

“You don’t want to wrestle me?” Twilight said. “Are you scared?”

“You were here first.”

“Okay, I’m just surprised.”

“Would you prefer to fight for it?”

“No, but I am feeling a bit violent today. I’d prefer to fight in general.”

Zecora didn’t know how to respond to that, so she didn’t try.

Twilight couldn’t believe it. Of all ponies, Rainbow Dash was completely open. Not willing to lose out like she so nearly just did, she teleported to the table.

“Hi, Twilight.”

“Hi.”

“How’s your Faustmas been?”

“Not too Faustmassy yet.”

“Yeah, same here.”

“You’re going to love what I got you, though. So much that you’ll... make me... you know what I’m saying. The first one.”

“What?” Spike said.

“It’s a secret.”

“Wait a minute. Our conversation had an ambiguous ending and you didn’t tell him?”

“Well, once I do it, I can’t change my mind. We can’t tell him unless we’re sure.”

“I said I think we should do it. It’s what you said at first too.”

“I was just frustrated.”

“For this to work, he has to know.”

“It doesn’t change the fact that he could still walk into us... doing the secret thing.”

“Well, is it about that or is it about the secret?”

She took them to the treehouse.

“Are you okay, Rainbow?” Twilight said.

“I’m just exhausted after carrying both of you.”

“Anyway, now we can tell you the secret.”

“I’m waiting.”

“Rainbow and I are in love.”

“What?”

“She has a relationship with me and also Applejack. Well, Applejack and also me. Because apparently I’m—”

“It’s about time they got together.”

“What about me?”

“I mean, I know she’s been coming over a lot, but... do you have to be in love?”

“I know it’s shocking.”

“So you aren’t, like... having sex...?”

“We’re only telling you to make it easier for us to have sex. She already has sex with Applejack.”

“Are you sure you’re not fuckbuddies?”

“Yes.”

“I just... it’s hard to take in.”

“Can you look normal if we go back now?”

“I need to be alone for a minute.”

“Okay.”

They went back, this time via teleportation. Two other ponies had taken the table.

“We had this table just a minute ago,” Twilight said. “Please submit to your saviours.”

“This table was vacant when we came here,” one of the ponies said as the other got off and backed away. “It’s ours.”

“Under any other circumstance, you may have a point. But we saved the world.”

“Chadley?” the one who got off said. “Just give it to them. It’s not worth your life.”

“You can’t just let anypony who looks intimidating push you around, Beccarly. Now, I don’t know if you’re really Twilight or an imponiator, but I challenge you to a magic duel.”

“Considering—”

Twilight sent a white cylinder to his head and he fell unconscious.

“You want something to make pulling him around easier?” Twilight said.

“Eh, you can take him. I was on the fence for if he was boyfriend material, but I think I’ve made my mind up.” She walked off.

Twilight teleported away with him and came back without. “Now I can finally eat these.”

Over the next couple hours, nearly the entire rest of Ponyville arrived, as well as a few from adjacent villages. Pinkie Pie stepped outside to the myriad simultaneous conversations.

“Attention, partygoers!” Everyone went quiet. “We are now releasing the Faustmas specials into the open! Today, you are not restricted to cakes! We have fudge! Pudding with ingredients that fade into existence specially for this month! Home fries! Pastry shop fries! Fruitcake, if you can handle the stigma! Hard cider! Soft cider! Brittle cider! Powdery cider! Gingerbread kittens! Nut roast! Sane pony roast! And as if anypony cares, we made trifle!”

Table allegiances had changed dramatically since the beginning. The Apple table, which was now Granny Smith, Diamond Tiara, Silver Spoon, and a background character, was now mostly made up of rejects of other tables. As the coolest, Rainbow got in the cool foals’ table automatically and got to nominate two others, one of which had to be an actual foal. She chose Applejack and Scootaloo, leaving those two to decide the final member, who turned out to be Apple Bloom.

“Well, that decision didn’t take long,” Rainbow said. “Now which one of you wants to tell her?”

“Ah’ll do it,” Applejack said.

Apple Bloom was inside Sugarcube Corner, well down the queue but at least in the building, and still far from deciding what to get.

“Hey, Apple Bloom.”

“Hi, AJ. You got somethin’ to tell me?”

“You’re in the cool foals’ table.”

“Ah’d be excahted, but after seein’ who Rainbow picked, Ah can’t be that surprahsed.”

“Hey, Pinkie?”

“Yeah?”

“Apple Bloom’s the last cool foal.” This was relevant, as it meant she didn’t have to suffer through the queue.

“Okay.”

Applejack went back to the cool table.

“So I was crying more than I can ever remember and my hooves were shaking, but I knew I had to kill her or—” Scootaloo said. “Hey, Applejack.”

“Hey.”

Twilight and Cheerilee qualified for Table Two by winning this week’s challenge, with Twilight’s nominee being Spike and Cheerilee’s being Amethyst, apparently a close friend of hers.

“Okay, so I get it’s your decision and she’s your bestie or whatever,” Twilight said, “But she hasn’t been on either major Ponyville celebrity reality show until right now.”

“I finished the puzzle second, so I don’t know what your problem is. I’m trying not to sound angry, but you did the same thing, nopony else has connections to Spike.”

“Yeah, but he’s been on both incarnations of the show. I hadn’t even heard of this pony until you announced your decision.”

“Look, I didn’t expect her to pick me either. I don’t need the limelight, honestly....”

“I didn’t think so either,” Cheerilee said, “But I ended up liking it. So did Fluttershy.”

“You’ll be hoping this leads to more soon enough,” Twilight said. “Anyway, I know I need to calm down about this. So what purple stories do you have, Spike?”

“I ran into this guy who said there were no purple foods. I tried to give him some counterexamples, but those tortilla chips are blue, those grapes ‘you never see in real life, they’re faked’, and aubergines are ‘artificially coloured’.”

“Wow. You went outside?”

“It was her or me,” Scootaloo said, “So I knew there was really no right thing to do, but to this day I still have flashbacks and—hi, Apple Bloom.”

Apple Bloom took a seat. “Hey, ponies.”

“How did you carry that?” Rainbow said. “I mean, I saw you do it, but... how did you do it?”

“‘Sall in the wrist.”

The quiet table comprised Big Mac and Fluttershy. There weren’t many people there, and they liked it that way. With her best friends having gone on to better things, Sweetie Belle was left at the lame foals’ table, which was her and three of her lesser friends from school. But despite the table politics growing ever more complex, the cool table never voted anybody out, making it all pointless.

Then it was time for the presents. Wait, you do presents before cake? What kind of excuse for a parent are you? Oh, I’m the excuse? You’re the one who drops your foals off at wasting thousands of bits training for a career they’ll never even pursue class. When I bring my foals to wasting thousands of bits training for a career they’ll never even pursue class, I stay there the whole time. Yeah, and you know what you do? You play word games on your phone. That’s it. That’s all I’ve seen you doing the two times I’ve got to stay there because I have a fucking job, anyway.

“Mmmmkay,” said Pinkie Pie, outside in front of a microphone, “So we’ve got all the presents lined up now, who wants to open theirs first?”

Sweetie Belle raised her hoof.

“Sweetie Belle! If that’s you. It’s hard to tell. White filly way over there. Come on up.”

Nothing went hilariously awkward or otherwise wrong with any of the presents. Next Chapter: Chapter 36: The Cutie Mark Crusaders Get Ice Cream Estimated time remaining: 16 Hours, 21 Minutes