I met with Rainbow Dash for brunch at her place. She's been bothered by Fluttershy being abnormally touchy-feely too. (I really wish there were a less silly way to say that.) She's noticed other inconsistencies, like Fluttershy not using her saddlebags when she goes shopping at market. Instead she's been using a paper bag, which is less convenient to carry, I suppose. I've never noticed other ponies' habits that closely, so I have to take Rainbow at her word.

After quite a bit of debate, we decided to include Applejack in the loop, and tentatively, Pinkie Pie. She might be "off the chain" (Rainbow said that, but it sounds like an expression that suits her), but Pinkie does know how to keep a secret. Still, we wanted to make sure nothing weird had happened to them first, in case the changelings or dark magic or whatever the hay we're up against started affecting them, too.

A couple of Q&A sessions later, we were satisfied that Applejack and Pinkie Pie were completely normal (er, for them). Together, the four of us (Pinkie Pie dubbed us "The Herd of Four" just to be dramatic) gathered in AJ's barn. It was early evening. Rarity was probably at her boutique, as she had been for most of the day. Mac was with Fluttershy at her house. Apple Bloom was having a sleep over with Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo at Rarity's parents' place. Granny Smith was asleep. So this was pretty much the safest time and place to make our plans.

"Alright," said Applejack. "Do y'all have any ideas what's goin' on? No matter how crazy. Except changelings, because we've done beat that pony to death and back already."

"POD PONIES!" gasped Pinkie Pie.

"Okay. And, what are "pod ponies", exactly?" I asked.

Pinkie leaned in very closely to us, and lowered her voice to a whisper. "I have no idea," she said. "But maybe they're like changelings who can take over your body and mind!"

"And just where'd you hear about this, little missy?" asked Applejack.

Pinkie smiled and held up a comic book. "I borrowed it from Spike!" she said.

"Oh, great. Thanks a lot, Pinkie Pie," said Rainbow Dash, her voice dripping with sarcasm (even I could tell).

"Sure thing!" Pinkie said cheerfully.

"Well, actually, that's not a bad idea to start with," I said. "We need to be open to anything, because we're really shooting in the dark here. Just fire off some ideas. For me, the only thing I can think of is a degenerative brain disease, but that would be horrible and fortunately it doesn't match the timeline."

Rainbow Dash just put her hoof over her face. "Wow, Twilight. Thanks for the positive outlook." (I guess it was kind of macabre to bring that up.)

Applejack raised a hoof. "How about, some kind of a magical force that's like, controllin' part of their behavior, but not all of it?"

"Interesting. What do you mean?" I asked.

"Well, I don't rightly know. You're the magic expert," she said, and shrugged. "We've seen things like this before, though. Sombra used magic to enslave ponies, and we've seen magical artifacts that corrupt their users. And I'm sure you know some compulsion spells of your own, at least from what Big Mac tells me."

"Hay! Look, I'm still embarrassed about that mess I created. But no, I don't know of any way to subtly change a pony's behavior. It's like, either you have total control, or you're out-of-control, or you have no control. The only time I've ever seen—" I said, and paused in thought for a moment when it hit me. "I don't know if this is relevant, but Cadance's special talent is, well, matchmaking, and I already told you what Luna said. I don't think Cadance can create love where it doesn't exist, but she can influence it. I've seen her do it."

"Maybe," said Rainbow Dash. "I might even buy that she could make Fluttershy fall in love with Big Macintosh, if they hadn't been an item for like, the past several months already. But there's no way in Equestria that Cadance could make Rarity fall in love with having her pretty horn yanked clean off her skull, no matter how powerful alicorn magic is. Not from hundreds of miles away, either."

"Seriously?" I said. "It's been going on for months?" Everypony else nodded. "Arrrrgh! Okay, okay. Maybe the Big Macintosh and Fluttershy thing—"

"Fluttermac," corrected Pinkie Pie. "Try it, it's catchy!"

"Ugh. Maybe the 'Fluttermac' thing is a red herring, that's all I'm saying." (I have to admit, it is pretty catchy.)

"I'm inclined to agree that at least some of this may be an odd coinky-dink," said Applejack. "I mean, ponies do some pretty darned weird things when they fall in love, y'know, so maybe Fluttershy isn't messed up at all, but just a bit, er, confused. Love don't always make horse sense, which is why they write so many Country-Western songs about it."

"Applejack. Please. Yesterday she snuck up on me and actually tried to preen my wings," said Rainbow Dash.

"I see, hmm. And is that, er, odd, exactly?"

"It's almost as odd as having another pony clean you up after you use the bathroom, though not nearly as nasty," said Rainbow Dash.

"Ewww, gross! Can we please talk about anything else?" I begged, but the image had already burned itself into my retinas. Just... ugh.

"Sorry," she continued. "You're new to this whole thing Twi, but preening is just, well, it's not somewhere you go with other ponies, except maybe in a major emergency, or a parent to a young foal. And you might do it with your special somepony, but not only am I one-hundred-twenty percent impossible to confuse for Big Macintosh, Fluttershy and I are both girls!"

At this point, Pinkie Pie and Applejack exchanged a familiar glance I like to call the "yeah right look". It didn't make any sense to me in this situation, and I decided it best not to ask.

"What?" asked Rainbow Dash.

"Let's just try to get back on topic, alrighty?" said Applejack.

"Oh! I have an idea! There might be more than one thing causing this," said Pinkie Pie. The rest of us turned and looked at her.

"That's... actually reasonable," said Rainbow Dash.

"Well, duh. Not all my ideas have to be ridiculous!"

"It'd be nice if it were just one thing," I said, "but we need to keep an open mind, so that's a possibility. Okay, so to review, we have the following hypotheses: changelings, a disease, pod ponies which may or may not exist, a corrupted magical artifact, Cadance's love magic, nothing is wrong and we're overreacting, it might be some combination of two or more of these, an as-yet-unseen villain of some sort... is that it?" It was a moment before anypony spoke.

"Discord," said Applejack, and there was a long silence punctuated by crickets.

"Hmm. Maybe. We can't blame everything on Discord when it doesn't make sense, but maybe," I said.

Rainbow Dash sighed, and added, "Well, there's another possibility. Ponies can change over time. It's not usually this abrupt, but it happens. Maybe Rarity just, like, outgrew some of her issues. And maybe Fluttershy just in-grew a huge dose of creepy. I don't like the idea, but it's there."

"Maybe we should wait it out a little longer," said Pinkie. "I remember what can happen if you make bad assumptions about your friends. Maybe they're just planning a really big surprise party for us, so they're acting really weird? I mean, Rarity dunked her mane in garbage that one time, just to hide something from me. Garbage! And we'll all feel pretty darned silly when the party starts."

"A party ain't what this is," said Applejack.

"Oh come on, Pinkie Pie! What would she do with the horn?" asked Rainbow Dash.

"It'd be the best cake topper ever!!!" Pinkie exclaimed, to a group of unhappy faces. "Or, maybe not. Heh."

"Alright, I think we're at an impasse. We have theories going all over the place, but no new data. We're agreed that the six of us are heading to the Crystal Kingdom regardless, right? I mean, that's a crisis we know is legitimate," I said. Everypony nodded, so I continued. "Tomorrow we'll go visit Fluttershy first, all of us together as one and get her to come with us. Then we hit Rarity up. It will look less conspicuous if we all travel to the Crystal Kingdom as a unified group. Remember, Cadance's dreams are more concerning than all the rest of this put together, so that mystery takes precedence over our friends' idiosyncrasies. But keep an eye on them, everypony. Somehow, we'll get through this: all six of us."

The four of us all knocked hooves together and left to get a decent night's sleep. Pen down, head on pillow.