Chapter 3

The Contest

     Honestly Rainbow Dash couldn’t remember much about leaving the restaurant, but the night air refreshed her and washed away the alcoholic fuzz which clouded her head. Pinkie and Apple Jack were exchanging semi-aggressive banter. Usually it was Dash herself who would be challenging the blonde cowpony to this contest or another, but when it came to matters of drinking, or anything having to do with parties really, the normally easygoing Pinkie Pie became quite competitive. They arrived at The Rusty Bucket in about twenty minutes, and the two ponies wasted no time in beginning their challenge.

     “So, what’re we drinkin?” Pinkie asked, sizing up her competitor.

     “Hard apple cider!” A.J. declared.

     “No fair! Homefield advantage! You drink that stuff like it’s fruit punch!”

     “Ah do not!”

     Um, yeah ya do Rainbow wanted to say, but she knew she’d better hold her tongue or she’d be sleeping on the couch tonight. Applejack was what one might call a ‘functioning alcoholic’. She never seemed drunk and her work never suffered, but it was a rare occasion that she ate, worked, relaxed, went to sleep, or got up without a couple of mugs of cider. Dash didn’t mind, it didn’t change her personality any. It was the apple whiskey that she had to watch out for. When those bottles started popping open, all bets were off. A.J. could end up anywhere between fiercely violent or passionately aroused…or for that matter fiercely horny and passionately violent.

     “I say whiskey!” Pinkie pounded the table.

     “Whiskey it is then!” A.J. shouted, “bartender, bring us some whiskey an’ leave the jug!”

     Celestia have mercy thought rainbow.

     “I’d like to join too,” Rarity interjected. The two other ponies burst out laughing.

     “Alright sally, but I ain’t carrying ya home.”

     “I can hold my liquor just fine, thank you.”

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     “Yer…yer fadin’ Jackleapp, I can shee it in your eyeballs,” Pinkie slurred.

     “Are you kiddin’, why Ah’m as spry as a…as a wagon wheel!”

     “That doesn’t even make sense,” Rarity admonished.

     WHAM

     Pinkie’s head hit the table; she was out.

     “AH WIN!” A.J. declared triumphantly.

     “I’m still in,” said Rarity.

     “Yer not even drunk!” the cowpony pointed an accusing hoof.

     “I think that’s the point.”

     “That’s a buncha hooey! You cheated with some kinda unicorn magic!”

     “Well! I never…” Rarity began but she stopped herself, “Ugh, look at me arguing like another foalish bar fly. I shall but graciously bow out of this competition.”

     “Uh, come again?” Apple Jack was at the point where she was struggling to understand normal speech

     “She’s sayin’ you won,” Rainbow said in exasperation.

     “OH! WOOHOO! YEEHAW!” she shouted.

     “I’ll take her home,” said Dash, feigning irritation. In reality she was glad to have a pre-made excuse for going home with Apple Jack. Twilight and Fluttershy said they’d take Pinkie. Rarity, somehow still lucid, bade them goodnight and took off for home, only the slightest hint of a stagger in her step.