It took less than a week after Cadence and Shining Armor's wedding for Equestria to go completely to hell.

Twilight was busy with her books, as always, when Rarity of all ponies staggered in through the door. The normally fabulous and fastidious pony looked like... well she looked like hell.  Her coat was scruffy and unkempt. Her hair was dishevelled--- an unheard-of thing-- and her normally carefully-polished hooves looked chipped and cracked. Twilight could see bags under the unicorn's carefully made-up eyes, and the unicorn wasn't sure but she thought the pony looked thinner, malnourished.

"Oh Twilight, I don't know who to turn to, you MUST help me!" the fashion pony wailed. Before Twilight knew what was happening, the most successful and high-culture pony in Ponyville was all but prostrate at her feet, sobbing out a tale of calamity and woe worthy of Charles Dickens on a cocaine bender.

Twilight repeated what she had just been told. Slowly and carefully, to make sure she hadn't misheard anything.

"Let me get this straight. You couldn't pay your taxes."

Rarity nodded.

"So you bribed the Mayor for more time."

Rarity nodded again, head hanging lower.

"With a SAPPHIRE NECKLACE."

A surprisingly fluttershy-like whimper came out of the white unicorn.

Twilight facehoofed so hard she saw stars. "And it never occurred to you that a SAPPHIRE NECKLACE could probably pay your taxes ten times over?" And, Twilight realized, it never occurred to the Mayor either ..... and it also hadn't occurred to the Mayor that trotting around with a sparkly bribe around your neck was a good way to end a career in politics very quickly. Had the Mayor been eating  locoweed or something?

Rarity looked puzzled for a moment. Then she glanced aside and pawed at the floor with one hoof. "Well I..... I was so flustered when she suggested ...... and the way she... I mean how she phrased it, about 'certain favors',  it threw me off and..." what she said next had Twilight's jaw on the floor.

"YOU THOUGHT SHE WAS asking to HAVE SEX WITH YOU???"

There was a thump of something falling to the floor. The two ponies glanced over in puzzlement. Over in the corner, Spike was standing on a ladder, a stack of books in his hand half-raised back to the shelf, pupils shrunk to dots, face frozen in a peculiar expression as certain visions involving a white unicorn and a grey mare flickered across his brain. His eye twitched slightly. "I'm.... not sure how I feel about this," he muttered.

"Spike!" Twilight snapped.

"Right, back to work, back to work, shelving books, didn't hear a thing---" Spike hastily stuffed the books on the shelf and scrambled down the ladder, heading for safer territory somewhere else in the library.

When the eavesdropping dragon had clattered out of earshot, Twilight turned her attention back to Rarity. "Let's get back to the point.  How on earth did you come to the conclusion that the mayor was a FILLY FOOLER?"

"Well I didn't SAY it, thankfully--"

"Oh EWWW!" the purple unicorn grimaced and made "ick get it off" motions with her hooves. "And she's like, old enough to be your MOTHER! GAH!" Twilight shook herself all over. "It's a good thing you didn't say anything-- if you thought you were in trouble before, imagine if you'd said anything.... Where on EARTH did you get the idea she was--?"

Rarity blinked, suddenly surprised. Her eyes flickered nervously, like an actress who'd suddenly forgotten her lines. "I.... I honestly don't know," she admitted, puzzled. She tapped one porcelain hoof to her chin. "It's... not like she's ever done anything one would construe as... well..." she frowned. "Maybe I--- heard a rumor someplace...?"

Twilight gave her a deadpan look. Rarity's appetite for juicy lowbrow gossip was proving to be a long-term headache. "Okay, moving on. Let's address the main issue here."

"Which is...?" Rarity said, distracted.

"How the hell can you be BROKE?" Twilight spluttered. "You find GEMSTONES with your HORN! You dragged home FOUR WAGONLOADS of them just a few months back! You sold SIX jewel-crusted costumes to 'the Pony of Pop!'I could buy a castle the size of Canterlot with what she  spent on those! And that commission by Hoity Toity would have funded the staff for it for a year!" How could even Rarity simply give away so much clothing and jewelry that she was starving-in-the-streets broke?

How could Rarity be behind on taxes anyway?? Rarity did community service every year! Winter Wrap-Up, the Running of the Leaves, decorations for the summer sun celebration... if anything the Mayor probably owed RARITY money.

Another thought struck her. She poked her fashionista friend in one skinny flank. "And why are you going hungry?"

Rarity looked offended. "I told you, it's not as if I had money to spare--"

"You've got to be kidding me! You're a HORSE! You eat GRASS! You eat HAY! You could just walk out in the nearest open field and eaten  your fill!"

Rarity gaped at her. "Eating grass like a..."

"Pony?" Twilight deadpanned. "I repeat--- college student. I know about being short on food. Plenty of times when it was a choice between grazing in the courtyard and eating Ramen noodles. Trust me, pick the grass."

The purple unicorn paused and drew a breath. "Anyway.... As if your friends would let you get that far. You've got one friend who's a FARMER and  another who's a BAKER. You can't get within hoof's reach of either of them without them trying to fatten you up..." Twilight couldn't help flashing back to her first day in Ponyville; the Apple clan had roped her into a "brunch" that nearly left her an apple-stuffed unicorn. And how could anyone get rib-bone skinny with Pinky Pie's cakes and punch around?  "Rarity, we're your friends. Why didn't you  say anything? Why didn't you ask for help?" Even Applejack hadn't let her mule-stubborn pride reach THIS point.

Rarity looked away; a silent tear slid down her cheek. "Because... I don't deserve it," she said. "The only reason anyone tolerates me  is because I'm generous... if I ever stopped being generous then nobody would ever like me again, because I'm such a vain and shallow  creature..."

Twilight just stared at her. She felt herself getting more bewildered with every sentence. Rarity's pain was obviously real, but everything she was saying sounded like she was reading it from a script. An incredibly BAD script. It was a litany of self-loathing and ridiculously  disproportionate self-recrimination. It was like something written up by those silly foals at the cafe' who dyed their manes and tails black, wore too much eye liner, and covered their cutie marks with rub-on tattoos of skulls and ankhs.

"Horseapples," she said. "Look, you just-- go get your receipts and your bank records and whatever. We'll go on over and have a talk  with the Mayor.... AFTER lunch.....and have her go through the Ponyville records--" and make a few pointed remarks to the Mayor about bribery laws, she added mentally--

"and we'll get this worked out...."

Elsewhere in Ponyville...

The upper room above Sugarcube Corner was strangely dark. Curtains were drawn, all lights extinguished. A bright pink pony with cotton-candy mane and tail sat alone in the center of the floor--- no, check that, a bright pink pony and a small toothless crocodile sat alone in the center of the floor. The pony rhythmically stroked the crocodile's belly with one hoof as she murmured and giggled to herself in a truly disturbing fashion. "Yes, yes, new cupcakes... with a SPECIAL INGREDIENT--- we'll have to invite Rainbow Dash over for THAT..."

Her manic, glaze eyed expression suddenly crumpled like a lump of sugar in warm tea. Her mane drooped. In a trice she went from wild-eyed giggling to hopeless weeping. "--- but she won't come, nobody will come, nobody likes my parties anymore... I'm so tired of trying to be happy all the time..."

Without warning she suddenly became manic again. "Well we'll just have to do something about that, won't we Gummy?" She said, giggling breathily. She picked up the gator and tossed him in the air, catching him again. "Oh yes we'll have funny fun fun games with our friends..." she said in a singsong voice. She spun in a circle in her chair---

--And caught a glimpse of herself in the dresser mirror.

The Pinky in the mirror wasn't quite the same as the one in front of it. Her normally bright pink coat was dull; her mane and tail hung in flat-ironed folds rather than floating about in a cotton candy frizz. The heavy-lidded, surly expression was as far from Pinkie's normal cheerful demeanor, or from her current psychotic mania, as it could possibly get.

The reflection spoke.

"Oh, not THIS again."

There was a shift, a RIPPLE in the air.....

Instantly Pinky's coat dimmed to match the mirror. Her mane and tail deflated like a  depressed party balloon, hanging like limp string. The pink party pony turned away from the mirror, the cynical expression in the reflection now her own. "Well, here we go again. Screw it. Might as well get started...."  Pinkamena set down Gummy and opened her dresser. In the bottom drawer were all the tools she needed for just such a situation.....

The Cutie Mark Crusaders were in deep trouble. Not that trouble was anything unusual for them, but this time it was on a whole new level. The three fillies were running through the orchards as fast as their tiny legs could carry them. The trees were barely visible in the twilight gloom... which was exceedingly peculiar as it was nearly noon. Not that the three fillies were in any position to appreciate this fact. Applebloom was weeping hysterically; poor Sweetie Belle had wet herself in fear. Scootaloo was darting frantic looks left and right as they ran, terrified that she wouldn't see the monster coming, and just as terrified that she would. Their desperate panting filled the oppressively heavy air as they ran for their lives.

Applebloom skidded to a halt and let out a scream. The other two screeched to a halt next to her, wailing in terror. Mere yards ahead, the monster stood facing them. It was impossible, they had run forever, and yet somehow it had caught up and passed them... and now stood waiting for them.

It was almost like a pony. Almost. It was impossibly tall and thin, taller than even Princess Celestia, nearly all of its height given to its insanely long, gangling legs. It was coal black, save for it's white flank mark--- a circle crossed out with an X--- and its bare white head. It had no tail, no mane, and most horribly of all, no face. It saw its prey and let out a mouthless shriek that drilled their ears from the inside. They hadn't seen where it had come from; it had simply stepped out of nowhere from behind the trees, into their path....

It, in turn, never saw Pinkamena Diane Pie step out of nowhere from behind itself.

The three fillies gaped in surprise as the cotton-candy-pink pony simply appeared from behind the gangling horror. She saw the girls, gave them a little wave and a manic grin, spun around, planted her forehooves on the ground and kicked with her back hooves straight up between the Slender Pony's hind legs.

Despite her panic, a small part of Applebloom was impressed. Pinky had bucked straight and true and had planted both hooves, as Applejack might have put it, right where the Slender Pony's trunk forked. There was a solid, meaty THUMP. The Slender Pony's back legs folded together like jackstraws. It had no eyes, no nose and no mouth, yet somehow its blank visage transformed into a most wondrous expression of surprise . The thin, piercing shriek spiraled upward into octaves too high to hear, and with a falsetto squeak the monster toppled forward like a felled pine.

"Hello, girls," Pinky said cheerfully. " Oooh, give me just a minute---"She produced a rope from nowhere and proceeded to hog-tie the insensate monster with ruthless efficiency. That done, she produced a pink glitter pen and, for reasons none of the fillies could fathom, began drawing crossed-out O's all over the Slender Pony's body and face.

The creature howled and writhed as if the marker were a branding iron. "Oh, SHUT IT," Pinkamena said, giving the thing a kick in the belly as she scribbled away. "It's your own fault for crossing over into a place like this." The shrieks faded to scratchy whimpers. Shortly the creature was decorated from nose to hoof with glittery X's and O's.

Pinky admired her hoofcraft, nodded in satisfaction and put the pen away. She flipped her long straight hair out of her face and trotted over to where the Crusaders stood, rooted to the spot, jaws dangling. "Are you girls all right--"

She didn't have to wait for an answer. They flung themselves at their savior and clung to her like a liferaft. After a few seconds of awkward crying and hysterical babbling and comfort-squeezing, she pushed them back.... Pinky was all for hugs, but they made Pinkamena uncomfortable.  "Scootaloo, Sweetie belle, do me a favor, would you?" she handed each of them a cast iron frying pan. "I need to speak to Applebloom for a second." She pointed back at the hogtied creature. "Watch him; if he moves, whack him in the head." The two ponies nodded and stood over the prone monster, skillets at the ready.

Pinkamena looked Applebloom in the eye. "Now Applebloom--"

CLANG!

CLANG!

CLANG!

CLANG!

CLANG!

CLANG!

"--I said IF HE MOVES, girls," Pinkamena said over her shoulder.

"I saw him twitch...." Scootaloo said.

Pinkamena sighed and rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Okay, Applebloom, you don't need to worry anymore.  You take Scoot and Sweetie up to your house.  Get cleaned up, have some cookies and milk, go to bed. I promise that everything will be fixed in the morning."Applebloom's eyes welled with tears. "But... but the monster...it got Applejack... and Big Macintosh too, it---"

"What are you talking about sweetie? There they are," Pinkamena said, pointing to the farmhouse, now in sight.

There was a shift, a RIPPLE in the air....

Applebloom looked where Pinky was pointing. There, silhouetted in the doorway, was Big Macintosh, calmly chewing a stalk of grass. Applejack was next to him, looking over the farm anxiously, obviously wondering where her little sister had gotten to. Applebloom's  grief turned to bewilderment. "But ah saw it--- ah saw it take them an'..."

"Now that's enough," Pinkamena said firmly. "No more talking about it, okay? You've had a horrible day, but that's all over. Just go on up and do as I said."

"What... whut's goin' on?" Applebloom said plaintively. First this horrible monster... and now Pinky was acting so... not-Pinky it made no sense....

Pinkamena felt a tug of sympathy. Children, especially ones who lived in a Sugarbowl like Equestria, just weren't meant to go through this sort of thing. "Some.... bad ponies.... have been making a mess of Ponyville," Pinkamena explained. "That's the best I can tell you right now. But don't you worry, your Auntie Pinky will fix it all up." She patted Applebloom awkwardly on the head.

"Now, don't you think you shouldn't keep your brother and sister waiting?"

Applebloom's tear-streaked face was suddenly wreathed in joy. She bolted for the farmhouse, calling her brother and sister's name. After a couple of final vengeful CLANGS to their nemesis' head, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo dropped their frying pans and bolted after her. Pinkamena sighed in relief. It wouldn't matter if the girls told their horror story to Applejack and Big Macintosh, really... by now the memory was probably already fading. With any luck the whole mess would be healed over as if it never was before the next sunrise.

Pinkamena turned back to her turkey-trussed victim. "With any luck, even if they DO remember, they'll only remember all this as a bad dream," she said to the faceless pony. "But all the same--- you sad sack of web-troll backwash---" she gave the creature a punt someplace tender--- "you traumatized a bunch of little girls for your sick giggles. And that makes Pinky a maaaaad Pony."  she took the loose end of the rope binding the Slender Pony and threw it over a low hanging branch. Spitting on her hooves, she began hoisting the Slender Pony up into the air. "And I think.... (tug).... that calls for (tug).... you and me(tug).... to have a little(tug).... PARTY."

She tied off the rope and stepped back. "I don't know about Pinky, but you know what MY favorite part of a party is?" Once again she pulled something from her trademark hammerspace-- a large baseball bat studded with nails. "The Pinata."

Her bubbly grin turned to a malevolent smirk. "Let's find out if you're full of delicious candy."

"Um, so let me get this straight." Twilight stared up at the mound of mint-green horseflesh before her. "Roundabout yesterday, Bon-bon, you realized you had this... compulsion."

Bon-bon, who was standing nearby, pawed one hoof through the dust and nodded.

"A compulsion to... fatten up... Lyra."

Bon-bon's only reaction to this was to turn an even brighter shade of red. "So you... talked Lyra into coming down to Sugarcube corner. And began plying her with sweets... until THIS happened. "Twilight waved a hoof in the general direction of the greenish mound before her. It was, in truth, Lyra; swollen to impossible proportions, and wedged solidly in the front door of Sugarcube Corner, an immobile ball of rolling fat with four tiny feet and a tiny unicorn head just barely sticking out. the mint-green unicorn looked as ashamed and humiliated as it was possible for a pony to look.

"And all... THAT... happened," Twilight went on. "In two HOURS??" She croggled. "This is scientifically and biologically IMPOSSIBLE-- the sheer caloric--- Lyra, why didn't you stop when you saw what was happening?"

Lyra tried to lick the chocolate smears off her own face. "... but the cakes were so tasty...I couldn't help myself!" tears of shame started rolling down her enormous cheeks. Even as grotesque as she was, the sight was one of heartstring tugging pathos.

Bon-bon sympathetically patted her friend with one hoof, "There there, it'll be okay," she said. "Don't worry, you're always beautiful to me..." Her expression changed oddly. She began rubbing her cheek along Lyra's grossly distended belly-folds, a lascivious smirk spread across her face. "In fact, I kind of like you this way..."

Twilight stood there staring. Her expression was indescribable.... almost as indescribable as the one crossing Lyra's face. "What is THIS load of happy horseapples??" she demanded of noone in particular.

From behind Twilight a certain purple and green snarker could be heard to mutter. "Chubby Chaser...."

"SPIKE!!"

Mrs. Cake was standing next to her. "Didn't you know, Dearie?" she asked. "Lyra and Bon-Bon are..." she looked around and whispered, "an item. you know..." Twilight wasn't sure what the hoof gestures Mrs. Cake was making were supposed to mean, but she could guess.

She gawped at the pastry chef, flabbergasted.  "Since WHEN?"

Mrs. Cake looked flustered. She hesitated for a moment, seemingly confused, then tried another tack. "Goodness, you led such a sheltered life before coming here, didn't you---"

"A sheltered life? In CANTERLOT?" the sarcasm in Twilight's voice could have etched metal. "I was in COLLEGE, Mrs. Cake, not sealed in a barrel. I've seen a few grad-student parties, and believe me, I've seen things that would curl your mane. I KNOW what you're talking about. but I also know for a fact that Lyra's dating a BOY and I saw Bon-Bon with her HUSBAND and FILLY at the meteor shower party just two weeks ago. What, did everyone decide that Lyra and Bon Bon had to be lesbians because they sit on the same park bench at lunch?"

Mrs. Cake's eyes glazed; she seemed to struggle with assimilating what Twilight had said. "Well, ah, people, ahh, do change, dearie..." she said haltingly.

"oh for crying out---" Twilight closed her eyes. "Never mind. Forget it. Focus, Twilight, focus... Okay, look, I'm going to do some research; this... swelling up... thing has to be some sort of magic effect. maybe Poison Joak got in the cake batter or something-- BON BON, STOP NUZZLING LYRA'S BELLY FAT LIKE THAT. IT LOOKS UNWHOLESOME!-- and once we get Lyra out of your FRONT DOOR, I'm going to find whatever's making everypony in town a CRAZY PERSON and FIX IT!"