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/O.O\

"So much for that weird title screen thing," said Pinkie. Her bounces here in the Twilight Realm seemed a touch sproingier than usual, or maybe that was just an illusion due to the way her multicolored umbrella flipped temporarily inside-out with each one.

"So which frame would you like to start with?" asked Twilight, following along slowly.

"Oh gosh, I don't know! There's so many! There must be, like, sixty-five of them!"

Twilight's eye was arrested by the face of her faithful late-night companion peering out at her. "How about this one?" she suggested.

Pinkie zipped back and looked along with Twilight. "Ooh! It's Owlowiscious!"

He was soaring his way through the night sky. "I think this must be before I met him," observed Twilight. "I wonder what he was doing back then."

"Before he was sorting and filing scrolls with you?" asked Pinkie. "Probably living in the woods and meadows, sorting and filing mice!"

"I think that's Ponyville in the background," said Twilight. She turned the frame so as to see it better, but suddenly the image blared out, replaced by one in which it was day. The scene settled on the library, and soon they were watching Spike loading fruit and cookies into a wagon.

"Whoa! You changed it!" said Pinkie.

"I didn't mean to! But I wonder if this is the beginning of the story of how Owlowiscious came to us. This is Spike and I getting ready for the celebration of the centennial meteor shower! And that was just before Owlowiscious showed up."

Pinkie quirked her neck at a funny angle and watched Spike juggling apples from up close. "Twilight?"

"Yes, Pinkie?"

"Is it really a centennial celebration? Every hundred years? Not, like, ninety-nine and two quarters?"

"Mm-hm!"

"Isn't that kind of weird? That the meteor shower happens exactly once every hundred years?"

Twilight blinked. "Why is that weird, Pinkie? It's a perfectly round number-one of the least weird numbers there is!"

Pinkie's eyes were in Twilight's face in less than a second, bulging like unusually flexible dinner plates. "That's what so weird about it!" she shouted. "It's TOO round! Twilight, I work with balls! You know I work with balls! I hide them everywhere!" She reached under the floating walkway and retrieved a little blue bouncy ball by way of illustration. "But even *I* can't make a ball that's *perfectly* round! There's always tiny little smidges and dimplets and whiffles that make it a liiiittle off-center, and that's what makes balls-"

Twilight's eyes were wide. "Pinkie?"

Pinkie pronked promptly, letting the ball roll away. "Yes Twilight?"

"Did you... hide a ball in my personal spirit domain?"

Pinkie blushed and looked behind herself for a moment. "Maaaaybee..."

Twilight drew forward, every muscle in her body tense. "HOW DID YOU DO THAT?"

"I... brought it with me?" Pinkie leapt in place, giving her umbrella a shake; ten or twelve more balls cascaded out and started bouncing their way across the Twilight Realm.

Twilight did a double take and followed first one, then another of the balls. She planted her hoof on one and glared at her manic companion. "You can't just... scatter random objects all over somepony's personal spirit domain!"

"Aw, I'm sorry, Twilight. I thought there was room!" She gestured expansively, framed by the endless panoply of distant lights in an eternal expanse of half-night.

"Well." Twilight had to admit she had a point. "Maybe there is room. But still."

Pinkie zipped around, stuffing balls back into her umbrella. "I know I had some sort of point but now I've forgot it."

"You were asking about the centennial meteor shower. Maybe you don't realize that celestial cycles frequently operate on the basis of round numbers," explained Twilight. "Objects in the heavens have a regulatory effect on each others' orbits. They pull on each other until, over time, their orbits synchronize according to whole number multiples."

"Is that another way of saying lots of zeroes?"

Twilight smiled at her friend's innocence. "More or less. Powers of ten are among the most common multiples."

"Is that why the stars were right for Nightmare Moon to return after exactly a thousand years?" asked Pinkie.

"Exactly! And that's also why we use a base ten number system."

Pinkie scratched the side of her umbrella, and another ball plopped out. "You mean how we have just ten number symbols and we use a one and a zero after that?"

"That's right!"

"Oh neat! I always assumed the alicorns invented that and it was because they have ten sticky-outy bits—four legs, two wings, a tail, two ears and a horn!"

Twilight frowned. "I'm pretty sure it's because of astronomy." But then she realized she didn't know why the celestial cycles favored powers of ten. She would have to look that up when—

"Whoa, Twilight! Did you see what Owlowiscious just did? He turned his head all the way around without turning the rest of himself around too!"

Twilight smirked. "He's an owl, Pinkie. Owls can do that."

"Well someone forgot to tell me and I guess someone forgot to tell Spike too because he's spooked out! Looks like he and Owlowiscious didn't get along at all at first!"

Twilight watched the rough beginning between her assistants. "He never told me about this. I really should have introduced them myself!"

The frames had sound, albeit soft sound, and the two mares heard Spike speaking to the owl. "Man of mystery, eh?"

"Twilight?" asked Pinkie.

"Hm?"

"What's a man?"

Twilight had to think about that one—the term 'man of mystery' was familiar, but again she stumbled at the root. "I think it's an obscure term meaning an adult male of any species. But Spike was probably just quoting his Martini Jones novels."

Pinkie's ear turned to the tale playing out before them. "Ooh! Speaking of books with funny names, what were you writing that you needed a book called Ferrets of Fairyland for?"

"Uh…" Twilight tried to recall.

"It must have been something to do with Two-Headed Mythological Mysteries too." Pinkie gasped, her body rising into the air as she grasped the edge of the frame with her teeth. "Were you writing about two-headed ferrets?" She slammed silently into what passed here for ground.

"Oh, now I remember!" said Twilight. "I was writing about the mythological origins of constellations."

"You mean two-headed ferrets aren't real?" pled Pinkie Pie, seizing Twilight around the neck. "Tell me two-headed ferrets are real! I'm begging you! Lie to me if you have to, but tell me it's true!"

"I'm sorry Pinkie, but I just wanted the book so I could write about Ferrox the ferret! He only has one head, though. The stars at his other end clearly make a tail!"

"Then we'll just have to move some stars," growled Pinkie, her tail revving up. But fortunately the frame distracted her again. "Wow! Spike really booted that quince of mine!"

Twilight peeked at the scene unfolding outside Sugarcube Corner. "Well, it serves you right! Did you somehow not grasp that he was looking for a quill?"

"Oh, I got that. I just figured a quince started with the same three letters so it must be almost as good. Likewise for the quilt and the quiche."

Twilight grimaced on one side. "Do you have all your items sorted alphabetically?"

"Just the ones that start with funny letters." Then Pinkie gasped again, but this time in horror. "Twilight! Spike said 'shoot'! Just like you said when you broke your quill!"

Now Twilight gasped too. "You're right! He's developing a foul mouth, and it's all my fault!"

"He really does look up to you, you know! Oh, look! Now he's in his cape and top hat! I gave him those!"

Twilight looked in surprise at Pinkie. "You what?"

"I gave him the fake mustache, too! I just figured a growing dragon needed a way to express his evil side."

Twilight was appalled. "Pinkie!"

"Well I mean he is a dragon! And what happens if you don't let your evil side out? It gets all bottled up, like ketchup!"

"That is not how ketchup gets bottled!"

Pinkie pointed to the frame, wherein Spike was pouring ketchup over the fake dead mouse. "Well, that's how it gets let out, anyway!"

"Touche."

"Aww, poor Spike." Pinkie watched the story progress until Spike, having gorged on gems, started feeling the heat of the approaching grown dragon. "Hey Twilight? Is steam really good for a dragon's complexion?"

"Well, nopony really knows that much about dragons, but I think so! That's why I taught him to make tea when he was six."

"You're such a good big sister! Or mom. Or whatever you are to him," said Pinkie. "Except for how you keep saying you're disappointed in him and then just walking away. What's that about?"

"He was supposed to reflect quietly on what he'd done wrong," said Twilight. "But in retrospect, I guess I should have given him more context."

"You think? Wait. What did he just say? 'It's us against the world'?"

"I guess he was trying to appease the angry dragon!"

"Well yeah but still! Are dragons really against the rest of the world? Twilight, no one ever told me that!"

"It's true, I don't know where he got that from."

"Could it be his Martini Jones books? I know there was that one set in the Dragon Kingdom."

"That could very well be. I wonder how much of his personality those books are responsible for."

"I wonder how much of your personality books are responsible for," mused Pinkie. "I bet it's like, a hundred and forty-six percent!

"That's not even possible, Pinkie!"

"Oh really? Who told you that—a book?"

"A math book, maybe."

"Exactly! Oh, wow. Did you just call Spike your number one friend?"

Twilight blinked. "Um… I said he was my number one assistant and friend… I'm not sure the 'number one' applies to both parts."

"Well, it had better not! Because you always say me and Rainbow Dash and Rarity and Fluttershy and Applejack are your best friends!"

Twilight drew up stubbornly. "Well maybe the five of you are my best friends and Spike is my number one friend," she declared.

"Really? So what's better than number one?"

Twilight smirked. "Numbers zero, minus one, minus two, minus three and minus four respectively."

Pinkie gasped openly in admiration as the story drew to its close. "You really did learn a lot from your math book!" She gave Twilight a quick hug. "I forgive you for being made of books."

Twilight stood up straight. "I'm not made of books."

"On the inside, silly! Now come on—we've got sixty-four more picture thingies to gabble at!"

Twilight gave a last glance at Owlowiscious, who was winking at her. His head rotated around, then suddenly canted at a jagged angle as the scene went dark and lightning flared. One beady eye glowed bright green.

"Wow. That owl of mine sure is spooky. I never really noticed it before!"

"Didn't I tell you to stop noticing things, Twilight?" called Pinkie from a faraway frame. "Come on—you're missing the show!"

Twilight shrugged and trotted to join Pinkie. She could almost feel Owlowiscious's eyes boring into the back of her head. Yet when she glanced back, all that was in the frame…

...was a torn-apart cat toy, smothered in ketchup.

Now that was scary.

]o[