Coco slowly trudged after Hipsterdouche as dusk had begun to settle over the streets of Manehattan. This combined with the fact that her eyes were even more solidly pointed at the ground than usual meant she was having some trouble seeing where she was going.

‘Bump!’

The contents of Coco’s neon-orange wagon shifted as she collided quite solidly with a stallion's flank.

“Hey! Watch where the buck you’re going with your garbage pile!” the stallion exclaimed harshly.

“Sorry,” Coco murmured as she peeked up just high enough to track Hipsterdouches’s black and red color scheme and point herself his direction as she continued staring at the sidewalk below her.

She tried her best to not think about the task ahead of her.

She really, really tried not to think about it.

Out of everything she already did today…

…such as ingesting disgusting things...

…or witnessing completely inane and bizarre acts…

…this seemed like it would be far worse than anything she had experienced already.

Yet somehow…

... she couldn’t get the thought of the task in front of her out of her head.

“Hmmmm, well this smells disappointing,” Hipsterdouche muttered.

Coco paused and looked up, catching the sweet scent of freshly baked pastries in the air. Hipsterdouche expressing disappointment in something usually meant it was normal, or perhaps even good.

She glanced up at the bakery in front of her. It smelled fantastic and the cakes and other baked goods on display looked delicious, however the sign that read ‘Goo: A little bit of us inside every bite!’ filled her with a profound sense of dread.

Hipsterdouche sighed heavily. “Well… let’s get this over with,” he said as he pushed open the door to the bakery.

The heavenly scent of baked good danced across Coco’s nostrils like an elegant ballet.

Hipsterdouche continued, “Maybe it’s not as pedestrian as it smells…” Hipsterdouche entered the bakery. Coco followed, taking care that her day-glow orange wagon made it through the door without incident.

Much to Coco’s surprise the bakery seemed busy. The dining area with its wooden tables and chairs, yellow walls, and tiled yellow floor was certainly full of ponies. Ponies all eating, and many of those same ponies with smiles on their faces. Though, Coco did note a pony here or there sending the odd glance to the food in front of them.

Hipsterdouche reluctantly trudged up to the front counter, a delicious looking assortment of equally delicious smelling items sat behind glass on shelves.

Coco swallowed and looked up into the kitchen, a mix of ponies wearing baker’s hats running around, mixing batter, putting things into ovens, and also disappearing and reappearing from some back room. She reminding herself that what was in those items was likely things she really didn’t want to put in her mouth.

Coco glanced downward. But they look and smell soooo good!

“Hello and welcome to Goo!”

Coco looked back up into the smiling face of a canary yellow earth pony stallion wearing a white baker’s hat and coat.

Hipsterdouche barely acknowledge the pony, he simply nodded at the baked ‘goods’ in the display case. “So… all these items are made with—” Hipsterdouche cleared his throat “—ingredients that are from ponies’ bodies?”

The baker pony chuckled. “Well yes… You could say it’s our not-so-secret ingredient. Believe it or not, a little sweat, blood, and miscellaneous really pulls the flavor together.”

“Hmmm, yes…” Hipsterdouche said in a dubious tone. “Well, I’ll try anything once.”

Hipsterdouche continued, “Coco, why don’t you pick something.”

Coco began to sweat bullets, her mind a cacophony of conflicting thoughts.

Given Hipsterdouche’s current attitude regarding the situation, he clearly expected failure on the part of anything she selected. Thankfully, it would be considering a failing of the bakery, not her.

However, choosing something came with it a sort of obligation to try it herself.

Coco carefully scanned the contents of the glass display case. A half-circle pastry caught her eye as well as its name and description.

‘Chausson au Pommes: horse apple turnovers.Not made with actual horse apples, but actual real apples. Still made with other stuff, though.’ The pastry was mouthwatering, but ‘other stuff’, kept Coco’s eyes wandering.

Her eyes skipped over a plate of eclairs, she dared not test the creamy filling.

Finally her eyes settled on a dark, dark chocolate cake. It had already been sliced into, and the insides looked moist and inviting, like a cave that promised a wonderful mystery.

Coco pointed at the cake. “That one,” she said. Not bothering to look at the description. Maybe if she could keep her mind off the miscellaneous ingredients, she might actually enjoy this.

“Ah, our double chocolate frosted cake.” The baker pony leaned down to retrieve the cake and place it on the counter. “An excellent choice.”

The baker produced a knife from his coat and began to slice a generous piece. The act released an alluring aroma of chocolaty deliciousness that beckoned Coco forward into the darkness of the cave

The baker placed the slice onto a white plate, put a couple of forks on the plate, and held it out for his customers.

Hipsterdouche, seemingly reluctantly, took the plate in a forehoof. A plaid glow began to envelop his horn and a fork lifted with a similar glow around the handle. He took up a very small bite worth of cake onto his fork and placed it into his mouth.

“Hmmm… mediocre…” he commented.

Wait… so if Hipsterdouche doesn’t like it does it mean it’s… good?

Hipsterdouche let the fork fell back onto the plate and passed it to Coco. “Here, Coco. Maybe you’ll enjoy this… pedestrian fare.”

The baker pony’s smile seemed to falter a bit. Coco surmised he wasn’t use to pony’s reacting like Hipsterdouche.

Coco took the plate.

Picked up the fork.

Coco slowly dug her fork into the, moist—

—chocolate and uh... miscellaneous—

—cake. She pulled it back up with the spongy—

—substance sticking to the utensil.

She brought it up to her lips.

And opened her mouth.

The sound of a door slamming shut played in Coco’s head as she brought her lips down around her fork and ate the substance. She braced herself for a wave of disgust as the gooey item touched her tongue, but instead she was treated to a gooey texture of deliciously sweet flavor balanced by chocolate the hint of something salty that seemed to melt on contact.

The taste felt to Coco alike she had discovered a warm, bubbling mud bath inside the cave. A bath she slowly lowered herself into, sinking deep into the thick substance that gently tickled her as she sank lower and lower. The warm bath of chocolate had began to take her into its comforting embrace.

She could feel her face flush and let out a moan as she felt herself enveloped by the tick substance, it hugging every contour of her body and filling her with a deep sense of relaxation and contentment.

Coco’s eyes shot open as the gravity of what she did just set in. She felt herself suddenly bolting from her ‘chocolate bath’ and run out of the cave into a miserable, rainy storm. And their Coco was, cold, alone, and covered in chocolate.

“Ba-Bathroom?!” Coco choked out as she came back to reality and dropped her fork on the plate.

Still all smiles, the baker pony leaned forward and pointed past a few tables. “Just down that way and take a right. Don’t worry, I know the concept takes some getting used to, but—”

One again, Coco felt the all too familiar feeling of her stomach doing summersaults. She set the cake back on the counter and bolted for the bathroom.

Hipsterdouche watched Coco’s run of with some degree of interest then turned back to the cake. “Wait… so if Coco doesn’t like it does it mean it’s… good?” he wondered out loud.

Coco once again found her head stuck in the toilet as she made a deposit of whatever happened to be in her stomach into the bowl. Something that had happened to her with startling frequency today.

Coco heard a knock at the stall door.

“Ugh… occupied…” she said quietly.

“I know…” A female’s voice answered. “I saw you run off just as I was getting off—erm— getting out of the backroom.”

Coco’s ears perked up. The voice was familiar. She flushed down the contents of the toilet.

“I wanted to say I was sorry I seem to be involved with lots of stuff that’s making you throw up.”

Coco unlocked the stall door and pushed it open. The mocha colored mare she had seen at two places before this one was looking back at her with a very apologetic look. She held what seemed like a warm, wet towel in a forehoof.

“Uh… Thank you,” Coco said accepting the towel. She began to whip it across her face. “Well, lunch had nothing to do with the food being served at the restaurant.”

“Really?” The mocha colored mare asked in surprise. “I mean… the food at Connections is pretty bad.”

“Well, I know that, but it was a different reason that made me lose what little was left of my breakfast… Also the cake was actually good… I just… I just… That was so bucking weird!” Coco said as she trotted out of the stall and over to the bathroom sink.

The mocha mare chuckled. “Yeah, I’ve been hearing that a lot today.” She frowned heavily. “Still, it’d be nice to find a job where I didn’t watch ponies rush to the bathroom and listen to them throw up all the time.”

Coco ran the tap and splashed some water into her mouth. Gurgling and spitting in an attempt to get the taste in her mouth to something more like a ‘default’.

The mare continued, “I’m just trying to find a job that’s… not soul crushingly horrible, you know? I mean… it’s a big city! There’s gotta be something I can do that doesn’t make me wonder why I get up every morning.”

Coco washed her hooves and turned to the Mocha mare. “I know exactly what you mean.” Coco quickly grabbed a paper towel from a dispenser, dried her hooves, and offered on to the mare. “Coco Pommel.”

The mocha mare smiled and extended her own hoof, pressing it against Coco’s and moving it up in down in a sort of ‘shake’. “Oddjob.”

“Oddjob?”

Oddjob gave Coco a smile and shrugged. “My parents are big spy novel nuts.”

In the confines of the bakeries bathroom, Coco finally felt some solace in the fact that there was another mare just trying to get by. She felt an immediate kinship with the mare, like two soldiers fighting the same war.

Maybe…

Just maybe…

With the help of a new friend…

… A friend that knew her struggle…

Coco would make it through this alive.

Do you have to ruin everything?