It was a regular day in Portland. One might even call it monotonous. The sun shone dimly through the scattered clouds in the sky, and the residents of the city generally went about their daily tasks as they would on any normal day of the week.

But there was something off. Something not quite right. Deep in the suburbs, something was moving shockingly fast.

Said something was pink, bouncy, and very clearly equine.

"Holy sh– she's real!" A voice yelled from inside a house on the street corner.

The startled exclamation was dutifully ignored as Pinkie Pie dashed across the room, past the old couch, and jumped straight towards the television. John, the one responsible for the outburst in question, winced as he prepared for the inevitable impact, one which would surely result in a broken TV and, more importantly, a pony with a serious head wound.

The impact never came. John opened one eye, and looked around to see not a single pony in sight besides the fictitious creatures on the screen in front of him.

"God, never thought I'd say it, but I've been watching too much of this show." He muttered to himself as he picked up the remote and hit the power button.

Pinkie Pie sighed in relief. She'd finally shaken off her pursuer, hopefully for good this time. She didn't feel her tongue twitching, at least. She trotted the last few blocks to Sugarcube Corner, trying to think of a way to explain what had happened without her friends thinking she was crazy. Well, more then they already did. Which was already more then they usually did, and considering they already thought she was pretty crazy, that wasn't good at all. In the end, she decided not to say anything. As much as she hated not being able to tell such a good story right away, this wasn't the time.

As she neared the door of the bakery, she heard voices from inside.

"So, what did you bring us here for, exactly?" Twilight's voice. Definitely Twilight.

"I must admit I am rather curious why you've called us in on such short notice." Rarity added, although it sounded like she was trying to seem uninterested. She was silly like that sometimes, trying to act like something she wasn't.

"Well, girls, I have something very special planned for today!" Pinkie Pie said happily.

Wait, what?

Pinkie peeked over the windowsill and saw, inside the bakery, Twilight, Rarity, and... and Pinkie! But how was this possible? Had one of the mirror pool clones escaped? Was an impostor taking her place? A changeling?

Suddenly, she remembered. This was the same meeting she'd had with Twilight and Rarity a week ago! It was the first time she'd noticed that someone was watching her! But that meant that this was a week ago! Somehow she'd gotten sent back in time!

As the gears turned in her head, and she began to piece it together, she ran off from Sugarcube Corner back over to the Ponyville library. She'd have to take a sideways route so that the human wouldn't see her, but if her memory was any indication, he'd be following her past self from this point on.

How had this happened? The only reason she had gone back in time was because she'd followed the one who was following her, which, she now realized with creeping horror, was the reason he had followed her in the first place.

There was only one explanation. These events had occurred because the author wanted them to. It had to be a fanfic. The events were too contrived to be canon, and besides, there were humans involved. The human she'd seen certainly wasn't from Equestria Girls, either; she knew the difference.

Wait, did he come from the same world the author lived in? She wouldn't put it past him; he, like most of his kind, probably had some sort of wish-fulfillment problem. If that was the case, perhaps she could find him. But where?

She paced the room, pondering. She could go to the human world and do some research, but that would take too long. Reality was at risk! Besides, research was more Twilight's thing, and she couldn't enlist her help without causing a paradox. Then again, wasn't there already a bootstrap paradox in play here? No, better not to risk a second paradox, it would only make things worse.

What else could she do? It's not like she could just hop out of the writer's mind and demand that he–

Wait! Of course! She should have realized it earlier! She was Pinkie Pie, for Luna's sake! All she had to do was jump through the fourth wall!

And so she did.

Ocalhoun yelped in surprise as Pinkie Pie suddenly jumped out of his computer screen.

"Hi!" Pinkie said, standing on his lap and taking a glance at the mess of a room around her.

"Wha– but– but how–" Ocalhoun stammered in absolute befuddlement.

"I jumped through the fourth wall, silly!" Pinkie replied, and her grin shifted to an accusing frown. "Did you really think you could write me into a bootstrap loop and get away with it? Fix this, right now!"

"Actually, I think someone already wrote a story where you try to fix the time loop..."

Pinkie raised an eyebrow. "Who?"

"Uh, Deli73, I think, but–"

"Ooh, let's read it then!!"

"Pinkie, I don't think–"

The pink pony shoved him to the side. Sitting in the chair of the now unconscious author, she typed "deli73" into the FIMFiction search bar. Locating said user, she then observed that he had only two stories posted. One was a crappy OC fic; the other was entitled "The Following: Escape". She opened the latter story and began to read.

"It was a regular day in Portland..."

And then the universe imploded.