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The Short-Lived Case of the Incongruent Kitchen
Pinkie Pie was all bounce when she walked down the stairs. A bounce to her tail, a bounce to her step, a bounce to her mane, a bounce to the alligator holding on to her mane, and a bounce to her smile. Today was going to be a great day, and great days had to start great.
Well, if Pinkie Pie was great at something was making things great!
“Great! Great, great great, great~!” she singsonged with each step. “Hey, Gummy. I’d be grateful if you helped me grate some great Graviera.”
The little alligator blinked its eyes one at a time.
“Actually, I don’t know if we have that kind, but it’s the only cheese that fit the—” Pinkie’s words stopped as abruptly as her steps did. There was a tingle, a shuddering tingle running down her back unlike the usual tingles she got when she added too much sugar to her milkshake. This was definitely a different kind of tingle, an unsettling kind that was more like the times she left a window open when she went to bed and woke up in the middle of the night feeling really cold.
That could only mean one thing. Something was wrong.
With worried, but no less bouncy steps, Pinkie walked towards the working surface in the middle of the kitchen.
“Gummy.”
Immediately, the little alligator jumped into her mane, emerging a couple of seconds later with a dark grey hat he placed on top of PInkie’s head as he dove back into the poofy confines of his master’s hair.
Pinkie Pie, meanwhile, had turned pensive. She dragged a hoof across the polished wood and brought it close to her face.
“Hmmm… moist,” Pinkie whispered in a gruff voice. “Can’t be right. I cleaned last night, it would’ve dried by now.”
She hummed as she took a step back, squinting as she looked for anything else out of place, and although nothing seemed to be odd, it only made her suspicion grow.
“It’s clean. Perfectly clean.” Her eyes narrowed until they were almost closed. “Too perfect.”
Over the years, Pinkie had grown to know the kitchen of Sugarcube Corner like the frog of her hoof. She knew how important it was to keep things clean, but also knew how to save time and which corners to cut without compromising salubrity. Wouldn’t want a repeat of Salmonella Sunday from several years ago, after all.
This time, however, the kitchen looked spotless. That could only mean one thing. Well, maybe two, but she’d stopped sleepwalking ever since she removed the pop-rocks from her pre-sleeping snack. Regardless, somepony must have been here last night, and cleaned the kitchen to hide their tracks.
Opening a cabinet, she pulled out a bag of flour. The same she had been using the day before… Or was it?
When she wrapped things up last night, the bag of flour had been roughly half of the way down, but now it was barely a third of the way down. Plus, she always made sure to close the flour bags with a different coloured clip for every day of the week so the flour could keep track of time, and this wasn’t yesterday’s clip. This was tomorrow’s clip. Somepony had come into Sugarcube Corner after closing time, used up what was left of the flour, opened another bag, either used or dumped some of it, and then closed it with a different clip.
Why?
“Something doesn’t add up. It’s rather subtracting…” Doing the gruffy voice was straining, but sacrifices had to be made in order to find the truth.
She quickly checked the rest of the kitchen for other inconsistencies and—much like the time she tried some of Mr. Cake’s splendid special espresso and ended up overflowing Sugarcube Corner with pastries—they were everywhere.
Speaking of coffee, the intruder had used some to fill the bottle after it was emptied. The butter was used, but then softened and badly evened. And the shell of a broken egg had been taped together and put in the back of the carton. What was up with that?
Last, the smoking gun. Only instead of a gun it was the ove. And thankfully it wasn’t smoking, either, because she really didn’t want the oven to break down. However, it was still warm. Not the warmth of an oven that had just been turned off, but just a few degrees above room temperature that let her know it had been used at least an hour or so ago.
Pinkie paced around the kitchen in a serious detective pace as she thought. She double checked the supplies last night, so she was sure some had been used before she came into the kitchen in the morning. The Cakes weren’t awake yet, so what was going on? Had somepony really snuck into Sugarcube Corner just to bake something? That was rude. They were all perfectly capable of baking great things, why would—
Suddenly, the tingle was back, this time focused on her lower back, running to her dock and morphing into a twitch as it ran through her tail. She whipped her head, scanning the whole kitchen. Could they still be here? Hidden in Sugarcube Corner, lurking in the shadows, eating freshly baked pastries while concealing ominous intentions?
Pinkie heard a rattling coming from somewhere in the kitchen and she perked her ears as she tried really, really hard not to jump around the kitchen opening every drawer and cabinet. She heard the rattle once more, just as she saw the doors of a cleaning closet at the back of the room jiggle and a faint murmur come from it.
Pinkie's cheeks puffed, but she was quick to will them back to normal and put on an intimidating detective look instead. She took a deep breath, jumped towards the closet, readied her mad, reproachful tone she’d learned from her mom, and opened the doors, just in time to see the twins fall down alongside a small round cake.
“Wuh-huh?” Pinkie asked, forgetting to turn off her gruff detective voice.
Pound Cake was the first to gather her bearings. He blinked a couple of times before his gaze settled on Pinkie.
“Hi, auntie Pinkie…” Pound said in his no-longer-a-baby-but-still-not-really-a-colt voice. Pumpkin was about to speak as well, but a cleaning rag fell over her head.
Pinkie Pie pursed her lips for a second. Gummy popped out of her mane, bit her hat and pulled it alongside him back into her hair. She started giggling, and remembered to go back to her normal tone before speaking.
“Hi, you sillies. What are you doing here so early?”
Pumpkin shook her head, but the rag was stuck on her horn. Rather than trying again, she just talked from under it. “We wanted to try baking something on our own.”
“Yeah, we wanted to show our parents we can help too.”
“Aw… That’s so nice of you,” Pinkie replied with a smile that the twins reciprocated. However, her smile quickly turned mischievous. She swept the kids with one arm while she held their cake with her free hoof. Eyeing the cake, she opened her mouth and ate it all in a single go.
Once she finished eating, she held them even tighter and gave them a sly smile as she put on the gruff voice once more. “You’ve got potential kids. Work with me and I’ll show you the ropes.”
The trio laughed once more, stood up, and went on to bake.
Well, if Pinkie Pie was great at something was making things great!
“Great! Great, great great, great~!” she singsonged with each step. “Hey, Gummy. I’d be grateful if you helped me grate some great Graviera.”
The little alligator blinked its eyes one at a time.
“Actually, I don’t know if we have that kind, but it’s the only cheese that fit the—” Pinkie’s words stopped as abruptly as her steps did. There was a tingle, a shuddering tingle running down her back unlike the usual tingles she got when she added too much sugar to her milkshake. This was definitely a different kind of tingle, an unsettling kind that was more like the times she left a window open when she went to bed and woke up in the middle of the night feeling really cold.
That could only mean one thing. Something was wrong.
With worried, but no less bouncy steps, Pinkie walked towards the working surface in the middle of the kitchen.
“Gummy.”
Immediately, the little alligator jumped into her mane, emerging a couple of seconds later with a dark grey hat he placed on top of PInkie’s head as he dove back into the poofy confines of his master’s hair.
Pinkie Pie, meanwhile, had turned pensive. She dragged a hoof across the polished wood and brought it close to her face.
“Hmmm… moist,” Pinkie whispered in a gruff voice. “Can’t be right. I cleaned last night, it would’ve dried by now.”
She hummed as she took a step back, squinting as she looked for anything else out of place, and although nothing seemed to be odd, it only made her suspicion grow.
“It’s clean. Perfectly clean.” Her eyes narrowed until they were almost closed. “Too perfect.”
Over the years, Pinkie had grown to know the kitchen of Sugarcube Corner like the frog of her hoof. She knew how important it was to keep things clean, but also knew how to save time and which corners to cut without compromising salubrity. Wouldn’t want a repeat of Salmonella Sunday from several years ago, after all.
This time, however, the kitchen looked spotless. That could only mean one thing. Well, maybe two, but she’d stopped sleepwalking ever since she removed the pop-rocks from her pre-sleeping snack. Regardless, somepony must have been here last night, and cleaned the kitchen to hide their tracks.
Opening a cabinet, she pulled out a bag of flour. The same she had been using the day before… Or was it?
When she wrapped things up last night, the bag of flour had been roughly half of the way down, but now it was barely a third of the way down. Plus, she always made sure to close the flour bags with a different coloured clip for every day of the week so the flour could keep track of time, and this wasn’t yesterday’s clip. This was tomorrow’s clip. Somepony had come into Sugarcube Corner after closing time, used up what was left of the flour, opened another bag, either used or dumped some of it, and then closed it with a different clip.
Why?
“Something doesn’t add up. It’s rather subtracting…” Doing the gruffy voice was straining, but sacrifices had to be made in order to find the truth.
She quickly checked the rest of the kitchen for other inconsistencies and—much like the time she tried some of Mr. Cake’s splendid special espresso and ended up overflowing Sugarcube Corner with pastries—they were everywhere.
Speaking of coffee, the intruder had used some to fill the bottle after it was emptied. The butter was used, but then softened and badly evened. And the shell of a broken egg had been taped together and put in the back of the carton. What was up with that?
Last, the smoking gun. Only instead of a gun it was the ove. And thankfully it wasn’t smoking, either, because she really didn’t want the oven to break down. However, it was still warm. Not the warmth of an oven that had just been turned off, but just a few degrees above room temperature that let her know it had been used at least an hour or so ago.
Pinkie paced around the kitchen in a serious detective pace as she thought. She double checked the supplies last night, so she was sure some had been used before she came into the kitchen in the morning. The Cakes weren’t awake yet, so what was going on? Had somepony really snuck into Sugarcube Corner just to bake something? That was rude. They were all perfectly capable of baking great things, why would—
Suddenly, the tingle was back, this time focused on her lower back, running to her dock and morphing into a twitch as it ran through her tail. She whipped her head, scanning the whole kitchen. Could they still be here? Hidden in Sugarcube Corner, lurking in the shadows, eating freshly baked pastries while concealing ominous intentions?
Pinkie heard a rattling coming from somewhere in the kitchen and she perked her ears as she tried really, really hard not to jump around the kitchen opening every drawer and cabinet. She heard the rattle once more, just as she saw the doors of a cleaning closet at the back of the room jiggle and a faint murmur come from it.
Pinkie's cheeks puffed, but she was quick to will them back to normal and put on an intimidating detective look instead. She took a deep breath, jumped towards the closet, readied her mad, reproachful tone she’d learned from her mom, and opened the doors, just in time to see the twins fall down alongside a small round cake.
“Wuh-huh?” Pinkie asked, forgetting to turn off her gruff detective voice.
Pound Cake was the first to gather her bearings. He blinked a couple of times before his gaze settled on Pinkie.
“Hi, auntie Pinkie…” Pound said in his no-longer-a-baby-but-still-not-really-a-colt voice. Pumpkin was about to speak as well, but a cleaning rag fell over her head.
Pinkie Pie pursed her lips for a second. Gummy popped out of her mane, bit her hat and pulled it alongside him back into her hair. She started giggling, and remembered to go back to her normal tone before speaking.
“Hi, you sillies. What are you doing here so early?”
Pumpkin shook her head, but the rag was stuck on her horn. Rather than trying again, she just talked from under it. “We wanted to try baking something on our own.”
“Yeah, we wanted to show our parents we can help too.”
“Aw… That’s so nice of you,” Pinkie replied with a smile that the twins reciprocated. However, her smile quickly turned mischievous. She swept the kids with one arm while she held their cake with her free hoof. Eyeing the cake, she opened her mouth and ate it all in a single go.
Once she finished eating, she held them even tighter and gave them a sly smile as she put on the gruff voice once more. “You’ve got potential kids. Work with me and I’ll show you the ropes.”
The trio laughed once more, stood up, and went on to bake.
Pics
A perfectly Pinkian mystery. While I'm not sure the relative narrowness of the story's scope would encourage multiple readings, it was an effortlessly fun and engaging read throughout.
Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for sharing!
So I stopped immediately right here to star this comment:
I don't know if you intentionally made a "Private Investigator" double capital there, but damned smooth joke if you did. Very well done.
As for the rest, now that I've caught up, simple and sweet. Detective Pinkie uncovering a mystery with a delightful ending is exactly as wholesome as it needs to be. Pinkie is perfectly in character, which is hard to do when she has to hold the spotlight too, and I appreciate that even Gummy gets in on the action!
Great work all around. Oh, and bonus points because I had to Google words I didn't know and that's always appreciated. One was a cheese so I don't fault myself too much for missing that.
dark grey hat he placed on top of PInkie’s head
I don't know if you intentionally made a "Private Investigator" double capital there, but damned smooth joke if you did. Very well done.
As for the rest, now that I've caught up, simple and sweet. Detective Pinkie uncovering a mystery with a delightful ending is exactly as wholesome as it needs to be. Pinkie is perfectly in character, which is hard to do when she has to hold the spotlight too, and I appreciate that even Gummy gets in on the action!
Great work all around. Oh, and bonus points because I had to Google words I didn't know and that's always appreciated. One was a cheese so I don't fault myself too much for missing that.
This is quite lovely. I struggle a bit, engaging with Pinkie Pie stories, though. She's strange, and that's the point, but that makes it hard to read her antics sometimes. So someone used the kitchen. What's the big deal? I yearned for a straight-man in the scene to give Pinkie the raised eyebrow and ask what exactly she was doing, so that I can point to them and say "Yeah, what they said." With Pinkie on her own, I'm just supposed to take her silliness at face value that something is wrong.
Speaking of something being wrong... nothing is. it felt strange that the conclusion to Pinkie's Pinkie Sense Attack was that "something was wrong." Her sense is always proven accurate eventually, although it may take some interpretation to find out how it was accurate, but here, nothing is wrong. Things are actually pretty right.
Plus, "the flour bags are closed with a different coloured clip for every day of the week so the flour could keep track of time?" That's... really weird. And what would lead the kids to using a different colour clip anyways instead of reusing the one that was already on the bag? How about just... there's less flour than yesterday? A new bag's been opened. Is that not enough of a clue?
I dunno. Overall me likey, it's a very complete and contained story. It just seems like it's missing something to really elevate it, although the only thing it may be missing is a character I like so I dunno :S
Thanks for writing!
Speaking of something being wrong... nothing is. it felt strange that the conclusion to Pinkie's Pinkie Sense Attack was that "something was wrong." Her sense is always proven accurate eventually, although it may take some interpretation to find out how it was accurate, but here, nothing is wrong. Things are actually pretty right.
Plus, "the flour bags are closed with a different coloured clip for every day of the week so the flour could keep track of time?" That's... really weird. And what would lead the kids to using a different colour clip anyways instead of reusing the one that was already on the bag? How about just... there's less flour than yesterday? A new bag's been opened. Is that not enough of a clue?
I dunno. Overall me likey, it's a very complete and contained story. It just seems like it's missing something to really elevate it, although the only thing it may be missing is a character I like so I dunno :S
Thanks for writing!