The passing of the day became apparent as Ditzy and John continued their walk, a chilly wind catching him off-guard, he shivered slightly as he carried a bag which contained several quills and scrolls for his own use.

“You okay, John?” he looked at Ditzy with wonder.

“Aren’t you c-cold?”

“Oh? Well… Pegasus are practically resistant to harsh weather conditions both hot and cold, so we don’t usually feel one or the other,” she said rather easily, while John rubbed his hands together and gave her a surprised stare, not expecting the rather detailed explanation. He shivered once more, despite the warmth the sun was giving, the cold front had been harsher than what it seemed.

“Lucky you, don’t need to carry a jacket, huh?” he asked envious, putting his hands inside his shirt, figuring that nopony would care much for it.

“Well, Pegasi still need to wear jackets and scarves when it‘s really cold; we may not feel the weather effects, but we CAN get sick from them. It’s more of a... momentary relieve,” Ditzy explained.

"I see," John muttered, not knowing how to continue the conversation. “So, what's next?” Ditzy grinned at his question, ready to show him the surprise she had kept for last.

“Glad you asked! It’s actually another place, just outside of Ponyville—if you still want to come, that is,” she gave him her best puppy-eyed look, noticing his discomfort, but she had planned to be a bit selfish over this if she needed to.

“Ugh… Don’t give me those eyes, I get that from Twilight enough,” he sighed in defeat and complied. “I mean, I was going to go anyway, geez... lead the way, missy.”

Ditzy grinned satisfied. “You got it!”

They walked for a couple of minutes, and the number of houses had soon thinned out, passing by the last house in the outskirts, where a pair of donkeys affectionately nuzzled each other as they made their way inside their home. John appreciated the beauty of the place they had arrived to; big and lush trees, flower beds that looked unnaturally good and animals actually approaching him; a squirrel even daring to get on his shoulder for a bit.

“Here we are!” John noticed the spot Ditzy, being a single tree peering in the distance. The tree was at the top of a hill, looking towards Canterlot in the far distance—something he found very familiar.

“Oh… Nice… Place,” he said, trying to show some surprise.

“You don’t really seem so surprised, “ noticed Ditzy right away.

John tensed up, but not feeling that it was that big of a deal, he decided to just say it: “Well… I’ve been here before.”

Ditzy’s eyes widened. “What? How? This place is quite far. I didn’t think you’d been outside of Ponyville apart from Canterlot,” she said, getting herself comfortable by the tree.

“Oh, well,” he followed her lead, sitting next to her, failing to notice her jump in place as he continued. “I was here for a somewhat odd reason,” he looked over the horizon, the view had been beautiful at night, but not much beyond could be seen. Now, however, multiple ranges of mountains were visible in the far off distance, with a small patch of yellow in the farthest reach that suggested a desert of sorts that hadn't been visible that night.

"Hmm," Ditzy hesitated to speak, giving him a curious look. “What reason? If you don‘t mind me asking.”

“Well, let’s just say I made a friend sad, and I went looking for them, is all,” he recalled the recent memory, feeling like it had been ages ago—lots of things had taken place since then. “You could say I learned a few things with Pinkie her- oh…” he facepalmed, realizing his mistake. "I mean..."

“Pinkie? What were you two doing here?” she asked, giving him a look he quite couldn't place.

“Nothing! Nothing bad at least, if that’s what you might be thinking, ugh,”he groaned, though Ditzy seemed a bit confused by his words.

“Oh… But what was that last ’ugh’ for?” Ditzy asked sounding hurt. John just sighed in mild annoyance, not liking the way the conversation was heading.

“Nothing, forget about it,” they were both quiet, the moment of awe lost in the confusion of their own words.

After a few minutes of total silence, Ditzy finally spoke: “How exactly do you see mares? Do you see us as just ponies?”

“Oh, come on!” John thought aggravated, the one topic he hadn’t expected to pop up for at least some time was now being brought up over a misunderstanding.

“Look, Ditzy. I’m not saying I do, but I’m also not saying I don‘t either. It’s complicated! I’m still getting used to this place, and honestly, looking at you ponies in a certain… ’way’ isn’t on my list of priorities at the moment,” Ditzy seemed thoughtful over his response, looking down on the grass. She released a wistful sigh, and got on her hooves.

“I see… Alright. Do you wanna go back n-”

“Fun!” both were taken aback at the sight of something John wished hadn’t been possible just hours earlier; two Pinkie Pies stood in front of them. He rubbed his eyes, but the vision didn’t go away.

“W-what’s going on here?” Ditzy asked, clinging to John in fear.

“I don’t know! I-it’s this what you meant by weird stuff?” John managed to slip.

“Yeah, this fits into that, can we run now!?” they slowly backed away. Thankfully, the Pinkies ignored them and resumed their trot, and once they were far enough, they set into a run, headed straight for Golden Oaks.

“They ruined the barn we were trying to raise!”

“They jumped on my flowers!”

“They ate my carrots!”

“Carrot Top, you have more at home.”

“THE NAME IS GOLDEN HARVEST!”

“Enough!” yelled Twilight at the ponies in front of her, a crowd that only grew in size, complaining at the appearance of the Pinkie Pie looking creatures that began running rampant through town. “I’ll try to find a way to fix this! Please, bear with me!” her piece said, she returned inside, Rarity and Spike following right after her and closing the door to the still continuing screams.

“So, Twilight! What’s the plan?” called Spike, getting ready to pull out books at her call.

“... I have no idea…” she said simply, and Rarity and Spike’s jaws fell. “Don't get me wrong, I just don't have one yet; I don’t know what we are dealing with exactly. And while normally I’d search through the books easily by bringing them up with my magic, we don’t have the luxury of that," taking a deep breath, she faced the pair. "Listen, I’m going to need you guys to get me any book that has to do with cloning or even some sort of transformation!”

“Are they not changelings?” asked Rarity, hoping that she might be wrong.

“No. They are causing far too much chaos for that to be the case, they seem to be looking for, well… ‘Fun’…”

Knock, Knock!

“Who is it, we are busy!?” said Twilight with an exasperated huff.

“It’s Ditzy and I, Twilight!” came the voice from behind the door.

“Who is Ditzy?” wondered Rarity out loud. Spike opened the door and both him and a gray Pegasus made their way in. “Oh... I see.”

“What’s going on!? Why are there so many Pinkie Pies!” asked Ditzy loudly, gasping tired breaths between each word.

“I don’t know! I’ve never seen anything like this! Maybe the real Pinkie has something to do with this, but I can’t be sure!” then, at that moment, the earlier meeting with Pinkie Pie returned to John.

“The Mirror pool!” all present turned to him.

“The what?” Twilight ran to him with open ears.

“What about it?” said Ditzy recalling the words from somewhere.

“Pinkie Pie said something about a mirror pool, and that she went to search it, I think… Might be what caused this,” Twilight’s eyes flared to life at the information and ran to another part of the library, returning with a dusty book, opening it for all to see.

“We found this book earlier while rearranging things, I skimmed some of it and read a part about that pool,” she turned the pages until a few letters engraved in gold were the forefront. “There is a way to solve this, but…”

“What?” said John rapidly, the panic in his voice getting all in an uneasy mood.

“It’s a spell, and while I don’t think it’s particularly difficult, we need somepony who CAN cast spells…” all turned to Rarity at this point who was sweating beyond belief.

“M-m-me?”

“Yes. I’m sorry, but you are the only pony in Ponyville who uses their magic more than most ponies here outside… Well, Lyra, but she isn’t here since she left to some vacation or something,” Twilight said bitterly.

“I-I-I…”

“We don‘t have a choice, but don‘t worry—I‘ll teach you!” Twilight said, pointing her to the door heading downstairs. Rarity eyed the door warily but did as she was told, being led in by Twilight without delay.

“What do we do?” asked Spike, holding out his chest, awaiting instructions.

“You stay here, I need you to help me out here, and you two; you have a more important task: finding the real Pinkie Pie. The spell sends the fake Pinkies back, but it can also accidentally send our Pinkie into the pool,” she finished darkly.

“You can just bring her back thought… Right?” asked John, but the shake from her head was enough to bring them to terms with the stakes.

Twilight nodded. "Yes, bu-"

“Okay, we’ll do it! Come on, Ditzy!” John shouted, running out the door before any of them could say anything else, leaving behind the distressed forms of Twilight and Ditzy.

“He didn’t let me finish…” Twilight groaned, but turned to Ditzy with a stern look. “It's not gonna be easy it's likely all Pinkies will probably try to say they are the real one; you must both try your best to find and save the real one,” Ditzy nodded to Twilight, and ran off after them.

“Must… Find… Pinkie…” John ran as fast as he could, the thought of the real Pinkie in his mind. He looked around wildly, seeing the chaos that the other Pinkies had brought as he tried his best to find her, but to no avail. “T-There are too many…” he fell to his knees as he came to the realization. “I’ll never find her, and she’ll be send into the pool, and it’ll be my fault, and I’ll be losing someone I care about again, and I’ll be alone again, a-”

He fell a push from the side, and he turned to see Ditzy glaring at him. “What are you doing?” she asked, shaking him out of his stupor. “Come on! We have to find her!” realizing what he was doing, he quickly nodded.

“Y-yeah… Yes! We do,” they set into a normal pace, scanning the multiple Pinkie Pies in search of the real one, but despite everything, it proved a difficult task. Finally, John groaned in frustration at the sheer number of them.

“Why did Pinkie do this anyway?” said Ditzy, finally joining his frustration, just as one of the Pinkies jumped on her back momentarily and sped off.

“She wanted to take part in the fun with everypony else, remember?” John explained, remembering her earlier comment.

“Well," Ditzy groaned. "I think it was irresponsible of her! Didn’t she think of what could have happened?” John turned to her with a surprised look, the behavior strange on her usually sweet and kind form.

“Somepony is a bit on edge today… Does this have to do with what happened earlier?” John asked. Ditzy just huffed, her annoyance at the comment obvious to John.

“It doesn’t matter—we have to find Pinkie Pie!” she dismissed the comment, and the pair continued their search.

An hour of searching later, they found themselves sitting down on a table, the chaos of Pinkie Pies still going on around them, the terrified ponies in Ponyville trying their best to get away or even stop them. Something that failed to do miserably.

“It’s no use… “John sighed, mimicked by a sigh right next to him. "Yeah, I know it sucks, Ditzy."

“Um… John?” Ditzy called, tapping his shoulder.

"Huh?" John looked up and found himself staring at one of the Pinkie Pies, frowning sadly and pacing her hoof on the table right next to him. “Are you the real Pinkie Pie?” he asked right away, the question now engraved into his mind after repeated use, the flicker of hope lingering in his mind now just a dull dot.

“Heck if I know! Any of us could be the real Pinkie. It‘s like I don‘t know who I really am anymore…” his heart sunk like a brick at the despair in Pinkie’s voice. He‘d received mixed answers from the other Pinkies; unfortunately, many of them had given him a similar look, the Pinkie in front of him giving him the saddest of the bunch. Hope for the Pinkie to be real was there, but doubt was there as well. “But… What if she is faking it…”

“Come on, John, let’s continue,” called Ditzy, getting him on his feet.

As he got up, he looked back at the Pinkie as she laid on the floor, drawing sad faces on the ground. “Hold on…” he approached the Pinkie and crouched next to her. “Come with me, would you?” she turned to him with a doubtful grimace and sighed.

“Why? I’m probably just a fak- woah!” she was now in John’s hands, being carried away by him. “What are you doing?” John didn't reply, simply starting to walk/

“Come on, let’s just get them all; I have an idea,” he walked away with Pinkie easily in hand, as she had stopped resisting and allowed herself to be taken.

“I hope you know what you are doing, John…” Ditzy said to herself, flying towards them without another word, conflicting thoughts lingering in her mind.

Rarity panted heavily, tired from the exertion of magic, Twilight had said the spell was easy, but to her, it was a great consumption of magic that she never thought was possible to even use, having never attempted it with so much in such a small time period.

“Come on, Rarity; you almost got it!” Spike called, showing some support. Despite his efforts, his continuous bickering over her failed attempts had become more annoying than helpful.

“Spikey, can you please quiet down? I need to concentrate,” she pleaded as calmly as she could muster. To her relief, he saluted her and made a zip motion over his lips, showing he’d be quiet. “He is so understandable,” she thought, concentrating once more. “Come on, Rarity! You are an unicorn! You can do things Pegasus and Earth ponies could never dream of! You have the power!” she abruptly fired a shot that quickly bounced off the walls, and Twilight and Spike jumped for cover right away, the blast leaving burns wherever it touched. “Oh, who am I kidding! There is no hope!” she pulled her hoof over her head in usual dramatic fashion and fell back, landing on the hard wood. Spike hadn’t bothered to soften the landing this time, it seemed.

“Don’t worry Rarity! You’ll get it sometime!” encouraged Twilight.

“Let’s face it dear, time is something we may not have… We don‘t know the extent of the Pinkies!” she shot back.

Twilight couldn't help but bite her lip in response, looking over the clock in the nearby wall. “I know… But we can’t give up! Not when I know you can do it," she gave Rarity a reassuring smile, but it didn't seem to be much comfort.

“Twilight! Are you down there?” came a familiar southern accent from upstairs.

“Yes, AJ. Rarity and Spike are here as well,” at her call, the rapid sound of her hoof steps began as Applejack descended into the basement, watching the group incredulously.

“What’s in tarnation is going on here?”

“We are trying to have Rarity use a spell to get rid of the Pinkies,” explained Spike who now wore a make-shift helmet.

“Uh, Ah’m guessing it ain’t going so well…” the drooped faces told her enough. “Sorry. Anyway, Rainbow Dash and I managed to capture a good number of the Pinkies, we found John and he had an idea to get them locked up somewhere; they are in town hall right now if y’all want to go there,” her message said, she ran off upstairs, stopping long enough to say: “Better hurry though! Ah’ don’t know how long it’ll hold!”

“B-but…” Rarity began, thinking of the job she’d have to do.

“Rarity!” Twilight shouted, getting Rarity out of her stupor. “Listen, if you don’t cast this spell and right, we might lose our Pinkie forever. I’m sorry for bringing this up now, but we need you to have confidence, please? For her?” she closed her eyes, her eyeballs moving behind as she quickly accessed the situation, she opened them again and a determined look replaced her previous fear.

“Very well! Let’s try this one more time!”

Twilight smiled. “Good! Because I have a plan!”

John and the rest of the mares stared down to the full house they had, the town hall had been big enough to contain the group, and it held a stage that each Pinkie tried to fight for as they performed various random things.

“So… What now?” asked Rainbow, her front hooves crossed in boredom and annoyance.

“I think we have to wait, Rainbow,” commented Fluttershy, barely keeping her rabbit—who had just been continuously grabbed by the Pinkies—hidden, as he shook in fear. “Now, now, Angel. Mommy’s got you.”

“Ah’ told you that Twilight and Rarity are working on it, no need t—get back in there!” Applejack threw her lasso as one of the Pinkies nearly jumped to the window. “Ah’ stand corrected! Ah’ll go get them.”

“They are here!” Ditzy pointed at the first floor where Spike, Twilight, and Rarity made their way to the stage from another entrance.

“Finally!” Rainbow flew down, followed by the rest, John getting ahead of them all.

“Hey, Twilight," Dash asked. "So how did it go?”

Rarity cut in front of her before she could say anything and held a smug smile. “It went great! Now… Did you find Pinkie Pie?” they all turned to John holding a scroll and a feather to write with.

“Yes… No? Kind of! Look, we can actually have this over with in one go if you let me try my plan, okay?” he looked at the Pinkies and grinned, looking at a Pinkie poking the wooden floor sadly, somehow making a hole through it with ease while everyone else looked at him with the doubt he expected.

“What!? How are you doing that!?” he was surprised to see that Rarity had been the one to speak up instead of Rainbow Dash.

“Well, with trivia, of course!” he unrolled the scroll and turned to the Pinkies who at the moment, spend their time jumping around and doing numerous Pinkie Pie-esque feats. “Excuse me!” he said loudly, but found himself ignored. “Er…”

“Attention!!” shouted Rainbow Dash, all the Pinkies lining up perfectly for the group. “That’s how you do it!” she told John with a satisfied grin.

“Alright, Pinkies, I’m going to ask you a few questions! You can either think it’s correct, or not, but this information will be known to the real Pinkie only,” they all looked at each other and sighed, a ’boring’ coming out of one of them.

She was promptly blasted away from existence, the fake’s body slowly disintegrating into tiny specks and flying away, a trail of smoke directly from the spot that ended in the horn of an annoyed looking Rarity, with everyone giving her a horrified look.

“What? Our Pinkie would never be that rude!” she noted simply, blowing away the smoke that lingered on her horn.

With the stunned look still in his face, John turned back to the Pinkies “R-right; anyway, you Pinkies can think of this as a… game,“ the look of excitement on their faces revealed their interest as John began. “Now, how many of you know that my real name is actually James? If so, come up front.”

“What?” came the combined voices of the elements and Spike behind him, but a stern look from John was enough to silence them.

“Oh, oh, I do!” said one of them. “And me!” said another. A few more of them raised their hooves and moved towards John, giggling as they did.

“Rarity?” he looked behind him at Rarity who, to her credit, quickly understood and released the spell, and the Pinkie Pies were no more. The rest of the Pinkies stared at the now empty spots with worried glances and numerous gulps before turning to John again. “Alright… Let’s continue.”

The process continued at a much slower pace, many of the Pinkies following a different one, and doing gambles over each other. After seven more questions, only two remained, each one of them sweating profusely.

“Alright, last question,” John said as he walked by the pair, and the room remained nearly silent, all but the sound of their breathing and Spike’s popcorn munching. “Pinkie Pie,” both of them perked up at their name, ready for whatever he had planned in asking.

“Tell me,” he began, putting the scroll in his pocket. “Where did I first refer to you by name, Pinkie?” one of them began sweating extensively, looking back and forth between the elements and John. She eyed the ground, and before any of they could notice, she was in the air.

“Ah! I can‘t handle the pressure!” she rushed to the closest window, but she never reached it, and she was gone before she could even make it a meter from the spot. A few feet from there, the last Pinkie breathed heavily, barely containing her breath.

“Pinkie! Fina-”

“Hush, Twilight…” John silenced her, still looking at the last Pinkie. “So tell me, Pinkie—where?” she looked at him with worry, took a deep breath, and spoke.

“At the tree by the hill, where I go take breaks. You found me there and apolo—” she was stopped as she was engulfed in a hug by John, who nodded to the others.

“Glad to have you back, Pinkie…” he said as the rest of the present reached her instantly, enveloping her in a group hug of their own.

"Thank you, John, girls; all of you!" she said to all present.

“But Rarity, how did ya manage that spell? You were having so much trouble earlier,” asked Applejack, Rarity looked at Twilight and grinned.

“That‘s the genius of it! Twilight modified the spell allowing me to use it along some magic I use often! I mastered it in a few minutes thanks to her,“ the others congratulated Twilight, who shrank in embarrassment at the praise.

“See, Twi? Even without your magic, you are still a great help!” said Spike happily, Twilight giving him a warm smile and hugging him.

“I guess I am…”

John had by then moved to the stage where he watched the group talk to each other with a big smile on his face. “We did it, Di-Huh?” he turned to the side and noticed Ditzy slowly leaving. “Ditzy, where are you going?” he asked while approaching her.

“Um, I feel I’m just intruding here, so I‘m heading home, if you don’t mind,” she kept walking and was stopped once more by John. “What? I said y-”

“Look. I know it's worrying you, but Pinkie is my friend, that’s all. I won’t stop being your friend just because I worried about her!” he explained, though Ditzy only rolled her eyes at the comment.

“Why are you getting all sappy? I really do feel I’m intruding, I barely know them,” she explained with an amused grin. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be making my leave. I'm tired.”

“Geez, sorry, I was just trying to help. You know, you certainly act different from when I first met you,” John sighed, and returned to the group as they spoke, never noticing the satisfied giggle from Ditzy as she reached the exit.

She looked back one more time, staring at the others intensely, Pinkie Pie being the one she focused on.

“Pinkie, huh?” she shook her head and cleared the thought away. “Nah, no point in worrying,” her stomach rumbled at that moment and she recalled the small lunch she’d had hadn’t been enough.

“Huh… I wonder what Harvest cooked up for lunch today?”

...

“Well, we did it! So, now what?” asked John as he reached the group.

“Well, we have to seal the pond, of course. With Rarity’s help, if it isn’t too much trouble,” replied Twiilght, while Rarity waved her mane around in an exaggerated manner before replying.

“If it prevents another one of these stress inducing incidents? My schedule is open. But you know, I feel like I’m forgetting something…”

“Yawn, wow, that was a nice nap!” Sweetie Belle said as she got out of her tiny bed, but she didn’t make it far as the memories of the earlier events hit her.

“Oh no! Well, maybe she won’t be too mad!” she looked for her sister all over the house, but found no such luck. “Maybe she went out?” she headed for the entrance and tried to open it to no avail. “Oh, yeah… Well, maybe I should try the chimney then; shame exit after all,” she sluggishly headed to the chimney where her eyes dilated at what she was staring, or rather, not staring.

“W-where is the ladder?” she looked over the chimney and found no traces of it. She ran to all of the other exits and tried them, but was unable to do anything—she had been very through with her task. She reached the last window and her eyes were glued at the sight of a rope ladder being softly blown by the wind with nopony in sight.

“Oh… COME ON!”

Author's Notes:

And here is the next.

You get two chapters this week.

Spoiler Notes 25 - 5/23/18

Wow, talk about being super wrong. I don't even remember having finished this one as quick as I did.

In any case, BOY did I have some exaggerated drama in this one. I wasn't too happy about that, not gonna lie. Not to mention my continuous issue with sentences where it gets
difficult to discern who is talking—it's a huge problem.

Other than that? Very meh on this one. I just didn't much care for this chapter at all, though it did give some characters a bit of development, as well as hinted aspects of others. Bah! Watchu gonna do?