My Little Pony: Friendship is Absurd

by Lord Seth

Friendship Is Absurd

Sunset Shimmer was not having a happy day. Of course, with her personality, she tended to not have happy days so much as “I don’t absolutely hate the world” days.

The main source of her ire for today was being sent to Ponyville to help in setting up the Summer Sun Celebration. Actually, the Summer Sun Celebration didn’t have much of a point anymore due to the the fact that the individual the whole thing was supposed to be honoring had been deposed at some point in the past by King Sombra. But everyone figured it was too much work to change the designs for the occasion, and it was apparently a popular time to get drunk, so it ended up remaining a tradition even after most people had forgotten what it was even celebrating.

Sombra was, in fact, the one who had sent her on this job. Or at least that’s probably what he wanted her to do; Sombra had a throat condition that prevented him from saying much, making it difficult for him to communicate precisely. Writing in text was out, because for some reason whenever he tried to write anything down, the paper would burst into flame. Thus, he was relegated to trying to communicate by a complicated set of charades. Based on previous experience, the charades used here either meant “go to Ponyville and help set up the Summer Sun Celebration” or “go, my sweet student, and spread terror in my name across the sea in griffon lands.”

Sunset wasn’t entirely sure of which one it actually was, but the former seemed like it would be much less hazardous to her health. Though after having to wait through a complex song and dance routine by the local apple farmers that was accompanied by an apparently invisible orchestra, she wasn’t sure if she should have tried interpreting it the other way. At least griffons were more serious.

“We’re the world-famous Flim Flam Brothers
Traveling salesponies nonpareil!”

With that, the two unicorns ceased their singing and dancing, and the mysterious orchestra that had been somehow playing in the background abruptly vanished.

“Okay,” said Sunset, resisting the urge to not bury her hoof into her face, “that was a complete and utter waste of time. And how are you traveling salesponies when you live here on this farm?”

“That’s a great question!” declared either Flim or Flam; Sunset didn’t care enough to try to keep track of which was which. “And the answer lies in another song!”

“No! No! Stop!” Sunset screamed at them, but it was too late. Another song ensued, again backed up by an orchestra that was nowhere to be seen. She didn’t even bother paying attention to the lyrics and just waited for them to stop. When it finally died down, Sunset was wishing more than ever she had just tried to take over the griffons instead.

“Look, just tell me, do you have the apples?” she asked, desperately hoping to cut this interaction short and move onto other ponies who couldn’t possibly be this irritating.

“Oh, sure,” declared one of the unicorns. “Thanks to the Super Speedy Cider Squeezy–” He halted as he noticed Sunset had, after the first two words spoken, opted to run as far away as possible. “Huh. Maybe she just doesn’t like cider.”

After having run like a mare terrified of more songs, Sunset arrived back into Ponyville proper. Which was good, because her next stop was there anyway to make sure the skies were clear. Which, she noted in retrospect, she probably could have just done before heading to check on the food.

Regardless, to her relief, the sky actually was clear. “Well, at least this means I don’t have to deal with another–”

Whatever Sunset Shimmer was about to say was cut short by a loud “Incoming!” yell, immediately followed by a fast-moving, light-green blur slamming straight into her. When the dust cleared, she found herself facing a green-coated pegasus with a cutie mark of a lightning bolt and three stars.

“Oh, sorry about that,” said the pegasus.

Sunset got up and rubbed her head. “Are you insane? Somepony could be seriously hurt because of that! In fact, you’d better give me an immediate reason why I shouldn’t sue your pants off for endangerment.”

The pegasus seemed to consider the matter. “Is it worth pointing out I’m not wearing any pants?”

“No!”

“Fine. I can see somepony is grumpy. Anyway, as you don’t seem to have actually suffered any harm, I’m lawsuit free. Can’t sue for damages when there aren’t damages! Additionally…”

Sunset stared as the pegasus rattled off legal jargon regarding lawsuits and accidents is mind-numbing detail. Finally she snapped. “Okay, fine, forget it! How do you even know this much?”

“When you get into as many accidents as I do, it’s important to keep up with the laws!”

Sunset figured that in the off chance she did have a case, she might as well find out who it was against. “So what’s your–”

She found herself cut off yet again by the pegasus, apparently deciding that the conversation was over at this point, flying off at remarkable speed. Sunset wasn’t able to see where she flew off to, but a loud crash several seconds later indicated it probably was into something. She stood there for a little while before finally sighing and moving on. “Just a few more places to visit, Sunset… then this whole nightmare will be over.”

“Hey, you!” called a voice.

Sunset turned around and found herself facing a grumpy-looking griffon floating in the air. “You didn’t happen to see a light green pegasus with an apparent death wish come through here, did you?”

“Uh, actually, I did,” said Sunset. “Who was she?”

“Oh, that’s just Lightning Dust. I always have to freaking babysit that idiot. Did you know that when clearing the clouds today she created a tornado that almost hit the town? Ugh!” The griffon sighed to herself. Sunset found herself oddly empathizing with this individual. “Anyway, which way did she go?”

Sunset pointed, and the griffon immediately flew off in that direction. “Finally, someone who seems almost sane,” she muttered to herself. “Maybe the rest won’t be that bad.” She relaxed a little.

That is, until a sudden drench of water hit her from above. “Ha! Gets them every time!” said a voice identical to that of the griffon from just earlier. Sunset looked up to see the griffon fly off.

“Life is pain,” she grumbled to herself, attempting to shake off the water before sighing for what must have been the hundredth time this day and moving on.

Decorations were next on the itinerary, so she entered the town hall. Which, she had to admit, was decorated fairly well. In the middle of the area was a pink-coated earth pony with violet hair, who was adjusting the decorations.

“Well, things seem fine here,” muttered Sunset to herself. “I guess this time I can actually avoid contact by–”

In what appeared to be a running gag of some sort, Sunset found herself cut off yet again by the earth pony abruptly stopping what she was doing and zooming straight up to her with almost uncanny speed.

“Oh my!” she said. “You’re all wet! I should do something to fix that!”

“No, you don’t need to. Really.” Sunset tried to protest, but immediately found a hat forced onto her head.

“There! Now your mane won’t look so bad, because it’s all covered up! Suri Polomare has done it again!”

“Oh, well, thanks,” Summer said flatly.

“Anyway, that’ll be 100 bits.”

Sunset blinked. “Wait, what? I thought this was a gift.”

“Oh, you’re right! I’ll be nice and give it to you for half off! Only 50 bits.”

Sunset rolled her eyes. “No, I’m not paying for this. I don’t even want it.”

“30 bits?”

“I’m not haggling! I don’t want the stupid thing!”

“10 bits? That’s my final offer.”

“No! I think this would probably be too much even if it were free!”

“Well,” said Suri, “that’s a real shame. I’ve become so distressed by your refusal to buy it at such a stupendously low price that I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to finish up the decorations! And what a catastrophe that would be!”

Sunset growled, but found herself so aggravated that she was willing to pay Suri just to shut up. She forked over the bits, then promptly left.

Luckily for Sunset, the last place to visit was far less irritating, as it only consisted of having to meet with one astoundingly shy pegasus. The lucky part came from the fact that the pegasus was so shy that it meant Sunset didn’t even have to talk with her to confirm things. With her work done for now, she entered the library-tree that was to be her temporary place of residence, only to be surprised by:

“SURPRISE!!!”

A blue unicorn wearing a star-colored cape and hat was standing in the middle of the library, surrounded by balloons with the word “welcome!” written on them. Confetti promptly fell from the ceiling.

“Welcome to Ponyville!” the unicorn stated. She paused before adding, “Well, that was fun. See you!”

As the blue unicorn turned to leave, Sunset finally regained her composure enough to talk. “Wait. What were you doing? Who are you? How did you get in here? What was the point of any of this?”

“Giving a welcome. Trixie Lulamoon, though you can call me the Great and Powerful Trixie! The door was unlocked. I want to make sure all new arrivals are aware of who I am!”

Sunset Shimmer was taken aback by the odd nature of the response. “What?” she asked, trying to puzzle out the answers that were all given.

“What, what? I can’t answer a question if it’s that vague.”

Sunset simply stared. Trixie walked up to her.

“The hat isn’t bad, but it’s nowhere as good as my own. Did you get that from Suri? She’s selling those things for 5 bits.”

Sunset’s thoughts finally managed to collect themselves into a semblance of coherence. “I–”

Sunset was at this point no longer surprised to be cut off, but she was irritated all the same. “Oh, never mind. Have to get going!” Trixie declared. A large blast of smoke appeared, and when it faded, Trixie was gone.

Sunset stared at the room, which was now covered with confetti that she hoped someone else would have to clean up. “Just a little more… just a little more…” she said to herself, hoping she would get through the next 24 hours without snapping and going insane.

---

“Fillies and gentlecolts, as the mayor of Ponyville, a position I would like to once again stress I did not get through any kinds of bribery or double-dealing no matter what my opponents may claim, it is my great pleasure to announce the beginning of the Summer Sun Celebration!”

Everyone cheered.

“But it doesn’t technically start until sunrise, so we have to wait until then to start the partying.”

Everyone stopped cheering. Sunset hoped sunrise would come already so she’d have an actual opportunity to start drinking and try to put this stressful day behind her. And if she wasn’t so aggravated by anything, she might have bothered finding the idea of someone named Sunset waiting for the sunrise to be amusing. However, because she didn’t have a particularly great sense of humor at the best of times, she didn’t, thus making this and the previous sentence feel awfully pointless.

Minutes ticked by with no sign of the sun. “That’s odd,” someone said. “By now the sun should be rising…”

Several more minutes ticked by, and people started to grow restless. “I’m growing restless!” someone else declared.

The mayor attempted to call the populace down by stalling. “You know, I just realized, we didn’t technically open the curtain to introduce our sovereign. Granted, that was because she isn’t the sovereign anymore, but it at least used to be part of the tradition, so…”

Suri rolled her eyes and went over to the curtain on the balcony to open it, revealing a black, malevolent-looking alicorn. Gasps resulted.

“Huh, that normally doesn’t happen…” the mayor said, confused.

“About time!” the alicorn shouted. “Do you know how long I’ve been waiting here for my dramatic entrance? Couldn’t you have opened this thing up earlier so I could make said dramatic entrance dramatically?”

“Huh,” said one of the ponies. “Usually I don’t see giant black alicorns until after I’ve taken several shots…”

Ignoring the outburst, the alicorn continued. “I had a great speech prepared, but it was all contingent on the dramatic entrance working right so… uh… the night shall last forever! See you.”

And with that, the alicorn vanished. Everyone seemed confused by the whole experience, but most decided to just go on with the celebration, i.e. get horribly drunk.

Well, with a few exceptions. Sunset actually did take the whole thing seriously, and opted to head back to the library to try to figure out what had just happened.

Several hours and an act break later…

“Ugh,” Sunset muttered to herself. “What idiot organized all these books? It’s one of the most counterintuitive forms of organization I’ve seen.” But at least she had finally found something about the mysterious black alicorn in a book named “Mysterious Black Alicorn Reference Manual.”

Sunset paged through the book, which was full of various examples of mysterious black alicorns, most of which were labeled as Mary Sues. Exactly what that term meant, she had no idea, but they clearly weren’t the applicable ones anyway. After a little bit of searching, she found an entry labeled “Nightmare Moon” that matched the description exactly.

“Banished to the moon by her sister wielding the Elements of Irony, which are apparently Generosity, Honesty, Kindness, Laughter, Magic, and Loyalty. Well, this seems simple enough. I just have to–”

“Boo!”

“Gyaaah!” screamed Sunset as she dropped the book in confusion, turning around to find herself face to face with Gilda.

“Ha! Gets them every time!” Gilda said, clearly enjoying the prank she had just pulled.

“What are you doing here?”

“Enh, the whole bit about eternal night seemed bad, and you seemed to be one of the only people who didn’t take to just drinking afterwards, so I figured I’d come over and see if you knew anything about it.”

Sunset rolled her eyes. “And you think that startling me is the way to get me to tell you something?

“Hrm,” Gilda mused. “I suppose I didn’t think that part through.”

“INCOMING!”

Lightning Dust crashed through the ceiling, slamming into the floor. Luckily, the part of the floor she crashed into happened to be where there were a lot of pillows, so she wasn’t particularly hurt. This did, however, leave a notable hole in the ceiling.

“You are going to pay for that, aren’t you?” asked Sunset.

“Actually, according to subsection–”

Sunset didn’t want to hear another lecture on legal loopholes. “Never mind! Why did you feel the need to smash through the roof?”

“Because I wanted to come in. You seemed like you might actually know something about that whole eternal night thing, so–”

“I mean, why didn’t you use the door?” Sunset interrupted, taking a brief moment to savor the fact she was the one doing the cutting off this time.

“Hrm,” Lightning Dust mused. “I suppose I didn’t think that part through.”

Lightning Dust took off through the ceiling, creating another hole. She then crashed through the door. “Was that better?”

Sunset found herself struggling to maintain any kind of composure, only succeeding by reminding herself that this wasn’t a place she was going to have to stay in. Before she could say anything, however, four more individuals decided to enter the room through the now-broken door: Suri, Flim, Flam, and Trixie, although the last opted to instead appear in a puff of smoke rather than simply walk through the door.

“Let me guess,” Sunset said, “you’re all here because of the fact I seemed to be the only one to care at all about the possibility of a night lasting forever?”

“The end of the world does seem bad for business.”

“I’m sure that we’ll all become super famous if we manage to save the world!”

"My brother and I can explain in the form of a song!” said Flim. Sunset glared at him. “Or, er, maybe we’ll skip that part.”

Well, thought Sunset, at least them aiding me means whatever hazards I could encounter might kill them instead.

“So let’s go get those Elements!” Lightning Dust said eagerly. “Where are they?”

“Um…” Sunset suddenly realized the book didn’t actually bother to say this.

“Oh, I know this one! They’re in this deserted castle!” declared Trixie.

“How did you know that?”

“Enh, I read things.”

“Okay, where is this castle?”

“It’s in…”

There was an awkward pause. With her thought apparently incomplete, Trixie simply walked out the door.

“I think we’re supposed to follow her,” Lightning Dust said.

“Without her at least telling us where she’s going?” Suri asked.

“Ugh,” groaned Sunset. “Fine. I hope she knows where she’s going.”

The six all dashed after Trixie, though Lightning Dust perhaps dashed a little too fast and hit a wall in the process. Luckily, she apparently wasn’t injured enough to not continue following.

Trixie didn’t respond to any questions, though finally they reached the point where Ponyville ended and the Everfree Forest started.

“… the Everfree Forest!” Trixie finished dramatically.

Gilda buried her claw in her face. “And is there some reason you couldn’t tell us that before we got here?”

“Waiting until now made for the perfect scene change!”

Everyone stared at Trixie, confused.

“You guys really don’t understand editing, do you?”

“Ugh,” said Sunset. “Let’s just get through this place.”

Off they went. Flim and Flam tried to make the time pass by singing a song, but were quickly slapped down—literally—by the others. Things were fairly quiet until a shadowy giant suddenly appears. “HALT!” it shouted in a commanding voice.

Unsurprisingly, this resulted in the seven halting.

“I AM TASKED WITH THE GOAL OF PREVENTING THOSE WHO WOULD USE THE ELEMENTS OF IRONY TO DEFEAT NIGHTMARE MOON FROM… REACHING THE ELEMENTS OF IRONY,” it bellowed. “Also, I’m, like, really good at telling when someone is saying something that isn’t true, so if you lie, I’ll know,” it added in a much less threatening voice.

“Wait,” said Gilda, “if Nightmare Moon just came back, how’d she have time to make a monster to do all this?”

“Oh, I’m actually a temp,” said the giant. “It’s actually kinda hard for shadowy giants to find work, so mostly I get stuck with guarding things. It pays the bills, you know. ANYWAY, STATE YOUR PURPOSE OR PERISH!” it suddenly added in a significantly more threatening voice.

“Not to worry!” said Flim. “We have no plans to use the Elements of Irony to attack Nightmare Moon.”

“And we can express all of that in a catchy pop song!” Flam added.

“Enh, I’m more of a rock fan. Anyway, your statements are clearly totally true, so you pass.” The shadowy giant opted to retreat. “At least this stopped the monotony of this job…”

“Guess he wasn’t that good at detecting honesty, then…” Gilda muttered after the figure had gotten safely far away.

“What? We were being completely honest!” protested Flim.

“Wasn’t the whole point of us going here to defeat Nightmare Moon?”

“Oh, certainly,” Flam said. “But we obviously can’t have any plans to defeat her until after we get the Elements, so it was completely true that we had no plans to do so!”

“Huh,” said Gilda. “That makes a certain twisted kind of sense.”

And so the group continued on.

“I wonder if we’re going to encounter any more obstacles,” wondered Suri. As if on cue, a manticore suddenly appeared and roared at them.

Trixie face-hoofed. “Seriously? You actually said that out loud?”

“Ha! A manticore? I can take that thing out, no problem,” Sunset said with a smirk as she started to ready her magic.

Gilda held up a talon. “Wait. I don’t think we have to necessarily fight that thing.”

“Then what–” started Sunset, unsurprised to find herself cut off immediately again as Gilda flew straight to the manticore.

“Hey, you!” Gilda shouted. The manticore seemed momentarily confused, prompting Gilda to get right up into its face. “What, are you raging because you received some tiny boo-boo? Toughen up! No one likes a crybaby!”

The manticore seemed to consider this, then ran off crying.

“Ha!” Gilda said as she floated back to the ground. “Tough love wins again!”

The others ran up to her. “Wait, what happened?” asked Sunset.

“Oh, the manticore obviously had a thorn in his paw or something. Wimp. I’ve had way worse injuries, and you didn’t see me running around screaming.”

“… huh.”

“Ugh,” complained Suri as the group continued on, “is this trip going to be much longer? I want to get back soon.”

“So you can take advantage of everypony’s inebriated state to sell them generic merchandise at marked up prices?” Trixie asked sarcastically.

“I prefer to think of it as a drunk tax. Anyway, the other point is the longer you spend in the Everfree Forest, the more likely you are to meet up with some kind of dangerous monster.” Suri paused to reflect on recent events. “Well, okay, we’ve already encountered two, but that just serves my point!”

“You’re welcome to go back if you want,” said Trixie.

Suri mumbled something inaudibly to herself. But the mystery of what she said shall remain a mystery, because yet another interruption happened in the form of a menace appearing. In this case, a manticore, which roared loudly at the group.

“Wait, is this the same one as before?” asked Lightning Dust.

“Don’t think so,” Gilda said. “This one’s rage seems more genuine.”

“Ha!” said Trixie. “Watch as the Great and Powerful Trixie shows this manticore who’s boss!” She took a few steps towards it, then suddenly engaged in a series of moves and yells. If ponies knew kung fu and made films about it, then someone made a parody film, Trixie’s actions would probably be a close approximation of what would be seen in that parody film. “Are you intimidated now?!” she asked.

The manticore stared at her briefly, then promptly fell over laughing. “Ha!” Trixie said. “I have frightened this manticore into giving up!”

Sunset rolled her eyes. “I think he’s just laughing at the pathetic nature of what you just did.”

“That’s how it might look to an untrained eye! But that laughter is just a cover to mask his inner terror!”

At this point, the manticore suddenly opened its eyes wide, then gasped for breath. It then spontaneously fell over and stopped moving.

“Huh?” Suri asked.

“Oh, manticores have surprisingly small lungs for their size. I’m guessing it wasn’t able to maintain consciousness after laughing so much,” explained Gilda. “Enh, it got rid of it.”

“And the Great and Powerful Trixie defeats another foe! I can’t wait to brag about how I singlehoofedly vanquished a manticore!” Trixie declared. Sunset started to say something, then thought better of it and didn’t.

And so they continued on… again.

“You know, something occurs to me,” Flim said. “If these Elements were so important to stopping evil, why in the world would they put it in such an isolated place? Wouldn’t it make much more sense to have an easy access point?”

“Or at least a more convenient one,” Flam added. “How about… say, a safety deposit box? That seems like a great place to put these sort of things, and it would require far less walking and encountering obstacles that seem oddly suited to our individual abilities.”

“Yeah, but then then what would happen if whoever had the safety deposit box died or something?” Suri asked.

“Hrm. Good point.”

Just a little further, Sunset consoled herself. Then this inane chatter can be done with, the world can get saved, and I can finally get out of this stupid town.

The group soon came to a river full of surprisingly turbulent water.

“Huh, a river full of surprisingly turbulent water,” said Trixie.

Suri rolled her eyes. “Is there any reason you had to state the blatantly obvious?”

“Absolutely!”

“Well, crossing it should be easy enough,” Lightning Dust noted. “Gilda and I can just carry–”

Just then, a giant sea serpent emerged from the water, crying considerably, having the effect of turning what might have been a rather fearsome monster into something much less ferocious.

“Let’s just ignore him and keep moving,” Sunset said. “As long as he isn’t trying to kill us…”

“Wait!” declared Suri. “I think we should do our duty as generous people and help this creature!”

“Wait, what?” Sunset asked, feeling very confused at this apparent change of heart.

“Sir,” Suri said in a kindly voice, “what exactly is the matter?”

“Oh, it’s horrible! Just look!” The serpent pointed to his mustache, revealing half of his mustache being gone. “All of a sudden, this cloud of smoke came by and took off half of my mustache! And that’s all I have going for me! It’s the only way I get any respect from the other serpents! Do you know they say I overact? Can you believe that? Overact? Me?”

Suri suddenly had a glimmer in her eyes. “I cannot let this go uncorrected! Allow me to fix it!” she declared as she abruptly tore off a scale from the serpent with her teeth, causing him to scream out in pain.

“Ow! That hurt! What was the point of that?”

Suri simply used the scale to cut off a significant portion of her tail, which she quickly tied to the small stump that remained of the serpent’s missing mustache half. “There! Problem solved!”

The serpent looked at his reflection in the water, his previously flamboyant attitude oddly disappearing. “Enh… well, it’s not quite the right color. I’ll give it a B-. Ah well, good enough!” he added as he swam away.

“That was oddly… generous of you,” Sunset said to Suri as Lightning Dust and Gilda started flying them and the others over. “I had you pegged for an individual who only cared about money.”

“Oh, don’t be silly,” said Suri. “I’m actually quite generous!”

“Hey, Suri, can we get that serpent scale?” Flam asked. “We would like it for, uh, posterity.”

“What, are you crazy?” Suri asked indignantly. “You think I’d just give this away! Do you know how much sea serpent scales are worth? I can buy a new tail with just a fraction of the cash I’d get from this!” She tossed the scale into the pack she had been carrying around.

“… and the mystery is solved,” Sunset muttered to herself as she and the others resumed their walk, having all been deposited on the other side of the river.

A specific-but-nevertheless-unspecified number of steps later, a similar obstacle reared its head, in this case a large gorge. “This should be no problem!” Trixie declared dismissively. “We can just get flown over again.”

“Uh, yeah…” Lightning Dust said. “About that. Not really sure I have the strength to do that again. Some of you guys are surprisingly heavy… er, some!” she added hastily as the glares began. “You agree with me, right, Gilda?”

“Huh? Oh, sure. Whatever,” Gilda said lazily.

Sunset’s eyes looked over the gorge until she saw a broken bridge. “Well then you guys should make yourselves useful and fly over there and fix that bridge.”

Lightning Dust dashed downward in a blur. “You know, for someone who says she doesn’t have the strength to carry us over, she sure seems to have plenty of speed left,” Trixie observed.

Meanwhile, Lightning Dust had grabbed the end of the bridge and brought it to the other side. She was about to start tying it up, when suddenly three pegasi wearing dark uniforms appeared.

“Lightning…” one of them said.

Lightning Dust looked around. “You sure? It doesn’t seem particularly stormy.”

The dark pegasus ignored her comment. “We’ve been eagerly awaiting the best flyer in Equestria.”

“Who?

“Why, you, of course.”

Lightning Dust blushed at the praise. “Oh, uh, thanks. But I’m not really looking for romance right now, so as effective as your pickup lines are–”

“No, no, no. I’m not trying to ask you out. We want you to join us, the Shadowbolts. We’re the greatest aerial team in the Everfree Forest and soon to be the greatest in all of Equestria, but first, we need a captain. The most magnificent, swiftest, bravest flyer in the land!” A pause. “That’s you, Lightning Dust.”

“Well I was kinda trying to get into this other team called the Wonderbolts, but that sure sounds promising!” Lightning Dust moved towards the bridge to start tying it up. “But right now I’m kinda in the middle of something, so we can talk about it after–”

“No!” interrupted the Shadowbolt. “It’s them or us! You have to choose! Now!”

Lightning Dust stared at the Shadowbolt for a few seconds. “Do you think I’m an idiot?”

“Er, what?” the Shadowbolt stammered.

Lightning Dust rolled her eyes. “Okay, let’s stop and take stock of the situation. Eternal night seems to have been declared. That’s pretty bad for staying alive and all. So, regardless of anything else, trying to save the world comes before anything else. Doesn’t matter if you get to be captain of some awesome team if you just die from the cold afterwards. This is all just common sense. Living comes before joining some team. Plus, the whole dark uniform thing makes you look kinda obviously evil.”

Lightning Dust paused briefly. “Oh, and the intellectual property is an issue also. Your outfits look like a total rip-off of the Wonderbolts, and your name isn’t helping. Even if you were real, you’d probably get sued into oblivion.”

“Hey!” the Shadowbolt protested. “Fair use protects us!”

“I’m not an expert on intellectual property law, but I don’t think that’s quite how it works. Anyway, the sheer obviousness of this trick is actually kinda pathetic.”

“So, uh, just to be clear: If it wasn’t a matter of preserving your life, you would’ve totally gone with us?”

“Oh, sure! Who cares about those guys back there? This job actually sounds awesome… or would, if not for the obviously-a-trick part and the questionable legality.”

“Fine!” snarled the Shadowbolt. “We’ll just make our own team! With blackjack! And cookies!”

“Wait,” said one of the other Shadowbolts, finally speaking up. “What does blackjack have to do with our team?”

The first Shadowbolt considered the question. “Good point. We’ll just get the cookies. Because the dark side always has cookies.”

“But we’re still making the team, right?” asked the third.

“Yes, yes. But with cookies.”

The three flew off. Lightning Dust shrugged. She then finished tying up the bridge, prompting the others to walk over one at a time.

Sunset was the first across. “Why didn’t we just have you and Gilda fly us over again?” she asked.

“What, do you have a bad memory? It was clearly the weight problem.”

Sunset buried her face in her hoof. “I remember that. But after walking across that old and creaky bridge, I’m going to tell you something: Next time the only way across a gorge is a bridge suspended over a high height, you’re going to carry me even if I just binged on donuts!”

“Oh, that weight thing? I made that up.”

Sunset stared blankly at Lightning Dust. “What.”

“Oh yeah,” Lightning Dust continued as the others started coming over. “You guys all got to overcome some cool obstacle, so I figured it was my time to do so. So I just made that up. And I got one, too! These guys called the Shadowbolts showed up and tried to make me go with them, but I said no!”

“You put everypony, including myself, through that because you wanted to overcome an obstacle?!”

“Well, yeah,” said Lightning Dust. “Was kind of a lame one, too. Wish I had gotten one of the manticores. Besides, you were hardly at risk. Having to walk across a bridge, how dangerous.”

“That’s not the point!”

“What are you guys arguing about?” asked Trixie.

Sunset pointed a hoof at Lightning Dust. “She could’ve carried us over, but didn’t want to because she wanted her own stupid challenge!”

“Well, duh,” Trixie said. “Why would you not want to do that? Are you jealous just because you haven’t gotten your own yet?”

“I don’t care about challenges! I just want to get the stupid Elements!”

“Sounds great!” Gilda said, having opted to fly over. “Let’s go in!”

Everyone else walked past Sunset, who simply stared in disbelief. “Are you coming?” Lightning Dust asked.

Life is pain, Sunset thought idly to herself, but she still went with the others and entered the castle.

“Okay, so we all have to keep an eye out for the Elements of Irony. I’m not sure exactly where they are, so–” Sunset stopped talking when she saw a large sign saying “Elements of irony below.” Underneath that sign was another sign saying “Sorry for not capitalizing that sign properly.” Underneath that sign were five large stones with insignias carved into them.

“So, we found the elements!” Flam said.

There was an awkward pause.

“Um, now what?” Flim asked.

“Ummmmmm,” Sunset started. She suddenly realized that despite coming all the way here, they hadn’t really thought of how to use the Elements. “I guess we just take them back to Ponyville to try to figure it out? Though, first we have to figure out where the sixth is.”

“No need for that!” came a loud, booming voice. A large cloud of black smoke suddenly appeared in front of them, with Nightmare Moon being revealed once it dissipated. “I will be taking those.”

“Wait,” Trixie said. “Were you here the whole time, or did you just get here?”

“Well–” Nightmare Moon started.

“You left traps and such on the way, so obviously you were ahead of us. Why didn’t you just take them before we got here?”

“I–”

“And come to think of it, the ‘traps’ were all kinda lame. Wouldn’t it have made a lot more sense to just confront us immediately? I mean, your plan seems to not really make much sense the more one thinks about it.”

“Trixie, maybe you shouldn’t be insulting the alicorn with the power to freeze the moon?” Suri asked nervously.

“ENOUGH!” shouted Nightmare Moon, who stomped her hoof, shattering the Elements.

“And why didn’t you just do that in the first place, before we got here?” Trixie continued. “I mean, you’re just not a very credible villain.” She tilted her head. “For that matter, what do you even want to accomplish with your plan? To make the ponies like the night more? Or is it just an ego thing? Your motivation seems unclear.”

Rather than say anything, Nightmare Moon chose to aim her horn at Trixie, then let loose a burst of black magic that slammed her into the wall.

“Told you so,” Suri said with a shrug.

“And with the Elements destroyed, nothing will stop me! This night will last forever!” Nightmare Moon shouted in triumph.

“Seriously, it’s a lame motivation. And she already used that night-lasting-forever line before,” Trixie said, although she was so weakened by being hit that no one heard her.

Sunset found herself racking her brain to think of ways to deal with the situation. There had to be some way of, if not winning, at least getting out alive. Looking around at the others, an idea suddenly popped into her head.

No, that’s stupid. That couldn’t possibly work, she thought to herself.

“Anyway,” Nightmare Moon continued, “as insignificant of a threat as you are, you did try to defeat me, so I feel it’s necessary to give proper retaliation. Namely, death.”

Screw it. Even if this doesn’t work, at least I’ll go down doing something, thought Sunset. Out loud she said, “That’s where you’re wrong! We don’t need the Elements of Irony because they live on inside us!”

Everyone, Nightmare Moon included, stared blankly at Sunset Shimmer.

“Wait, what?” asked Suri.

“Uh, well,” Sunset said hastily, “look at it! The Flim Flam brothers represent Honesty, because they said things that were technically true in order to get the shadow guardian guy to leave! Trixie is laughter because she incited laughter in the manticore! Lightning Dust showed loyalty by rejecting the offer of the Shadowbolts!”

“I think it had more to do with common sense than loyalty…” Lightning Dust muttered.

“Quiet! Okay, so, uh, still Generosity, Magic and Kindness left.” Sunset quickly tried to think of how to frame Gilda and Suri’s actions in light of that. “Suri showed generosity in offering up some of her tail to the sea serpent! And Gilda showed kindness, by… um…” she said as she trailed off. How is yelling at a manticore kindness?

“Tough love is a form of kindness. If nothing else, it has the word ‘love’ in it,” Gilda said.

“Right! That’s kindness! And Magic goes to me, because I’m the most… magically advanced? Okay, that works.” Sunset tried to think of something else to add. “Uh, so there!”

Nightmare Moon continued to stare blankly at Sunset for a few seconds more. “Well, that was a waste of time,” Nightmare Moon said. “So it’s time to–”

Nightmare Moon suddenly found herself cut off by the broken Elements levitating into the air, each group of rubble heading straight for one of the ponies. Well, except for the ones that went for the Flim Flam brothers, which were by definition going for two of the ponies. The pieces started orbiting around the corresponding ponies, who then began to levitate into the air.

“Wait, that actually worked?!” Sunset said in shock.

Before anyone could say anything else, another sphere-shaped Element appeared above her, which exploded in a white light. Sunset suddenly found herself wearing a crown, while the others all had necklaces that the rubble of their Elements mutated into. A large sphere of light engulfed them all, which a rainbow-colored helix emerged from the top of. The helix then went straight for Nightmare Moon, hitting and defeating her.

Or at least that’s probably what would have happened if a giant blast of energy from the door hadn’t slammed into Nightmare Moon before the rainbow-colored helix could. With nothing to target, the helix disappeared, causing Flim, Flam, Suri, Trixie, Gilda, Lightning Dust, and Sunset to all fall unceremoniously to the floor. “Okay, that’s a sprain,” Sunset groaned to herself as she looked to see where the magical blast had come from.

Several ponies dressed in Royal Guard uniforms entered the room from the door, all carrying what appeared to some kind of cannon. The apparent leader, a unicorn stallion with a white coat and blue hair, surveyed the situation. He approached the area where Nightmare Moon was. However, Nightmare Moon had vanished, being apparently replaced by a significantly smaller and collapsed gray alicorn. “Do you surrender?” he asked in an authoritative voice.

The alicorn gradually opened her eyes to look at him.

“Do you surrender?” he repeated, his tone growing slightly harsher and more impatient.

The alicorn stared at him uncertainly.

He sighed. “Look, I’m trying to be a nice guy here and give you a chance. But I’m still ready to blast you again, this time straight back to the moon if you won’t cooperate. So, do you surrender?”

The alicorn looked down, sighed, then nodded.

“Good! Now, you should still have some considerable power left, so…” The unicorn gestured to the other guards, who swiftly attached some hoofcuffs to her. “This should keep that in check.” She was then led away.

Sunset finally spoke. “What just happened?”

The white unicorn stallion turned towards her. “Ah! Sorry you had to see that bit of unpleasantness. Normally I’m much nicer. Sorry for ignoring you; work called. Anyway, I’m Shining Armor. What are you guys doing here anyway?”

Sunset picked herself up. “Well, after Nightmare Moon popped up, we were trying to get the Elements of Irony to defeat her.”

“Oh, so that’s what the rainbow-colored helix was. Did you have a permit?”

Sunset stared. “Permit?”

“Oh right,” Lightning Dust said. “I totally forgot about that. Usage of the Elements of Irony on anyone requires a permit or else it can incur a rather hefty fine.”

“Why would you need a permit to use them?!” Sunset asked incredulously.

“We are talking about what amounts to super-powerful weaponry,” Lightning Dust said. “It requiring a permit makes a lot of sense when you think about it.”

“Exactly,” Shining Armor said. “That’s some seriously dangerous stuff. I’d also question the wisdom of going after a super-powered alicorn by yourself anyway. You should leave things like this to the proper authorities.”

“Speaking of super-powerful weaponry, what was that cannon?” Gilda asked.

“Oh, that?” Shining Armor asked. “That is an especially potent magical cannon we’ve been developing for a while for cases like this. We knew the banishment seal would end tonight, so we had that all ready. The problem was we didn’t know exactly where she would manifest, so we made a list of where she would be likely to go wherever she did manifest. For Ponyville, that was this castle, so upon finding out she showed up at Ponyville, we made for here as swiftly as possible.”

“So the Elements of Irony aren’t the only thing that can defeat Nightmare Moon?”

“Well, it may have been that way back then, but it’s not like technological advances somehow stopped in all that time. Nope, we’ve developed significantly more powerful weapons since then. I mean, it would be pretty darn embarrassing if the most powerful items around were from so long ago; it’d mean we didn’t make any kind of progress in all that time.”

Sunset tried to wrap her mind around all of this. “So, uh, where does that leave us?”

“Well, it does look like you got the Elements to work, so I guess you count as the bearers.” He paused, appearing to contemplate the situation. “That said, I probably should be taking them all back to Canterlot for now for safekeeping, at least until you’re able to receive a permit. Though those things are fairly difficult to get, so it might be a while.”

Sunset briefly contemplated just hitting him with the Elements and keeping them, but decided that even if that did work, there was still the matter of the large cannon still tended by some of the guards to deal with. Reluctantly, she surrendered the crown she was wearing. The others handed theirs over as well. She noted that all of the necklaces were emblazoned with gems in the shapes of their cutie marks except for Gilda’s, whose gem was just a claw.

“Well, that’s that!” Shining Armor said. “Back to Ponyville! Looks like that eternal night is done, because the sun is coming out!”

---

When they returned, the sun had finished rising, and the celebrations had concluded in Ponyville. Naturally, this meant everything was actually quite quiet, due to the high number of ponies that were either passed out or at home nursing a hangover.

“Well, see you all later,” Shining Armor said. “I’d actually love to stick around and chat, but I’ve got to tie up this matter with Luna.”

“Luna?” Trixie seemed confused.

“Ah, you might have been unaware. Prior to her transformation into Nightmare Moon, she was known as Luna. I guess that’s a bit of trivia for you.”

“What is going to happen to Nightmare… er, Luna?” Lightning Dust asked.

“That… depends on a number of factors. Regardless, it’s also something that’s not necessarily for the public to know yet, so I don't think it's something I can really discuss with you anyway.”

Shining Armor left. There was a pause.

“Well, that was a complete waste of time,” Sunset complained.

“Speak for yourself! I’ve gotten a valuable sea serpent scale, and those Element thingies appear to have regrown my tail. It’s win-win!” Suri said happily.

“I wonder if those Shadowbolts might be interested in letting me be their captain now… I wish I had thought to get their contact information,” Lightning Dust mused idly to herself. “Actually, come to think of it, they were rather lame anyway. Still, the fact they thought I’d be a great captain is doing wonders for my ego.”

Gilda shrugged. “Enh, this whole ‘Element of Kindness’ thing at least gives me a good comeback to whenever anyone claims I’m mean.”

“Talking to those royal guards, I was able to make some inroads on possibly selling to Canterlot. You have no idea how competitive a market that is…” Flim said.

“A shame they didn’t want to hear our song, though,” Flam noted. “In fact, they seemed oddly eager to place orders with us in exchange for us not singing.”

“The Great and Powerful Trixie can now boast of how she overcame a manticore!”

“Well, I didn’t get anything out of this outside of nearly dying! I, for one, am going to bed before I finally get out of this town!” Sunset declared as she stormed off.

“Well, somepony seems to be in a bad mood today,” Trixie said. “Oh, right! I just realized another way that Nightmare Moon was lame! She could have easily just attacked Sunset in the middle of her big speech on the Elements and instantly won! I mean, wow.”

---

Sunset was awoken several hours later by a knocking at the door. She considered ignoring it, but she then remembered that despite managing to get the broken-down door back on the hinges after a bit of work, it would still fall apart if pushed too often. Therefore, she figured she probably should get the door, though she did grumble some to herself on the way. Unfortunately, as soon as she was about to open the door, the knocking pushed it off its hinges, hitting her right in the face. “Ow!” she said.

“Oh, sorry,” said the royal guard member who was on the other side of the door. “Wasn’t aware the door was so badly constructed. Have you considered getting it fixed?”

Sunset held back an insult. Insulting royal guard members tended to not end well. Instead she said, “Actually, I have. I would assume anypony who has a broken door has at least considered getting it fixed.”

The sarcasm was lost on the guard, possibly for the best. “Well,” he said, “I have some good news! King Sombra thought you did such a great job handling the Summer Sun Celebration that he’s decided to give you a permanent post here! Congratulations!”

Sunset stared in disbelief. “What.”

“Yes, you’ve been awarded the post of ambassador of Ponyville. We’ve actually been looking for a new one for a while.”

“So I’m in charge of the city? I can enact laws?” Hope started to rise in Sunset’s mind.

“Oh, no. That’s still the mayor’s job. Actually, you don’t really have much power at all; your main job is to take the occasional bit of orders from Canterlot. You know, dealing with monsters near the town, that sort of thing.”

Hope immediately disappeared. “Well, I get a raise out of it, right?”

“No, not really. But hey, it’ll look great on your record after you’ve worked it a few years. Will definitely help you move up later.”

Sunset found her mental state breaking down, but she tried her best to not let it show. “Well, that sounds fair enough,” she said while desperately trying to keep her composure. “Anything else?”

“Oh, yeah! Sombra wanted… Hey, are you okay? You seem to be shaking a lot.”

“Just, uh, shivering.”

The guard frowned. “Are you sick? It’s pretty warm.”

“Sick, yeah! That’s it! Totally sick! In fact, I’m so sick you should probably get away before you catch what I have!” Sunset said, hoping she wouldn’t collapse into insanity before the guard left.

“Well, anyway, Sombra wanted you to send him regular updates on what you learned about friendship.”

“Why?!” Sunset screamed. The guard stared at her. “Uh, the sickness affected my hearing a little, so sometimes I talk loudly by accident. Sorry.”

“Well, that part was a bit harder to figure out; we do have to sometimes guess at what he was saying. But they were pretty sure it was either ‘I need a laugh now and then’ or ‘in order to help increase your social skills.’ Probably the latter, though. Anyway, I should get going.”

The guard left. Sunset stared at the broken down door, then tried to set the door so that it, even if not on the hinges, at least blocked the door. To try to calm herself, she started breathing deeply and counted to 10. That didn’t work, so she counted to 20. That still didn’t work, so she tried for 30. She finally found herself in a state of relative sanity 14,887 later. She looked around at the tree library and noticed that all the confetti from Trixie’s appearance still wasn’t swept up. Also, the holes in the ceiling from Lightning Dust’s entry and exit weren’t fixed. She sighed.

“I really should have just gone to take over the griffons…”

Comments

[Mooncalf]

Fun read. Silly and crazy. Maybe a little rushed, but still pretty good.

[Aria H Discordia]

All of this was humorous. If I was to quote the parts that were good it would span at least three pages. Please make more.

[Imperator Knoedel]

Decorations were next on the itinerary, so she entered the town hall. Which, she had to admit, was decorated fairly well. In the middle of the area was a pink-coated earth pony with violet hair, who was adjusting the decorations.
“Well, things seem fine here,” muttered Sunset to herself. “I guess this time I can actually avoid contact by–“
In what appeared to be a running gag of some sort, Sunset found herself cut off yet again by the unicorn abruptly stopping what she was doing and zooming straight up to her with almost uncanny speed.

So which one is it now?

[Lord Seth]

5301102

My goof. Fixed now.

[Snake Staff]

This is hilarious!

[keaton-furman-prower]

This is the weirdest "Alternate Bearers" story I have ever read

And I absolutely love it

[Skyeheart]

Feels more like a sitcom than a cartoon...

[Oubliette]

I dont even...

[khatre]

Have you ever read "Bored of the Rings"? I have not read it in many years now but it could almost have been written by the same person.