The Hearths Warming Eve: The Next Year

Chapter 1: Smoke on the Water, and Everywhere Else, too

It was a beautiful day in Equestria (or, at least, as beautiful as it got in the middle of December). The sky was the most delightfully ugly shade of gray, and the trees all looked completely dead. The fields that scattered Equestria looked no better. Even the blue bird couldn't find anything to try and fail to eat. That year was particularly cold, as far as things go, and that had taken its toll on everypony. But life went on, and Hearths Warming Eve was tonight.

Seemingly in nowhere, a train was speeding it's way through a desolate land (yes, trains can speed, or at least they can now :P). On board the train were several ponies from Ponyville, all headed for Canterlot for the Hearths Warming Eve pageant. Among those ponies were Twilight Sparkle and the gang, plus a friend of Twilight's, Lemon Blossom. Lemon Blossom had brought two friends of her's along, too: Hand Grenade and Crystal Meth. The train ride was dragging on forever, so Hand Grenade decided to get the group engaged in a conversation.

"So, how's it going with you all?"

"Pretty well," said Rarity. "Opal has been acting up a lot lately."

"She probably just needs some attention," Fluttershy informed. "You have been working a whole bunch lately, and Opal probably just wants to be with you."

"I'll try, thanks, Fluttershy," Rarity said. The whole train fell silent again.

Darn, I thought that would work, Hand Grenade thought. Just when he lost hope, though, Applejack spoke up.

"What in the name of Celestia is that smell? It smells like burning cow manure!"

Indeed, there was a horrible smell in the train-car, but so far only Applejack smelled it.

"Speaking of smells, where's Crystal?" Lemon Blossom asked. Her friend was a drugo, abusing as many kind's of drugs possible (marijuana to cocain, heroin to Vicodin, aspirin to Benedryll, etc.), and she sure as hay smelled like it!

"Now I smell something," Twilight said. "Ungh, you were right, Applejack, that does smell horrible!"

"Ew, that smells horrible, and I would know, because I've smelled some pretty bad things in my time. OH OH OH, like that time I made that cake, and I accidentally added some lemon juice, but it was chocolate-strawberry swirl, and it made it smell really bad for some reason, but I found out that the smell was just Crystal walking into Sugarcube Corner, and she smelled really bad and the cake was OK, and tasted great!" Pinkie Pie rambled.

Everypony was complaining about how bad it smelled on the train, when Hand Grenade perked up...

"Something's not right, everypony! Crystal's missing, it smells horrible in here, Pinkie Pie, you said that is smells like Crystal did, and anypony notice that cloud of smoke coming from under that table?" he pointed, and everypony looked to see that he was right. The table had a cloth on top of it, and smoke was coming out from the pores in the fabric.

"Hey, Lemon," Twilight got her friend's attention. Her voice was dragging a little. "Doesn't it smell like marijuana?"

"Come to think of it, ye... Everypony, get into another car!" Lemon ordered, but Fluttershy was fluttering over to the table with the smoke to lift the cloth, and that, for some reason, distracted everypony in the room, so they all stayed put.

Fluttershy lifted the cloth, and a cloud of smoke billowed from where it used to be. Everypony started coughing and covered their eyes and mouths to shield from the smoke. Once everypony thought that it had cleared up (they thought right), they looked up and looked at the table. They saw Crystal Meth under it, smoking a really, really, really, REALLY, fat joint (I can't emphasize enough how big it was). It took a little bit for her to realize that she had been caught, and she tried to look innocent.

"Crystal, why!?" Lemon Blossom chewed out her friend. "I said no drugs on this trip!"

"Well, I'm not tripping, am I?" Crystal responded, thinking she found a loophole. Lemon didn't buy it.

"Not what I meant, Crystal! Now look what you did to poor Fluttershy!" and Crystal looked, and saw a semiconscious Fluttershy, who was still recovering from getting about 20 hit's worth of marijuana smoke.

"Oh, no!" Twilight said. "She won't be able to participate in the pageant tonight!" and she fell over. Lemon took a closer look at her, and saw that her eyes were red and bloodshot.

"Neither will you. You're high, too," Lemon Blossom informed. Twilight was just sulking, as she knew this, and knew that Celestia would be very disappointed if she found out that Twilight got high.

"Ah think Ah am, too. Ah feel all lightheaded n' stuff," Applejack confessed. And indeed, she was right. Her eyes were red, she had poor reflexes, and her stomach growled.

"Whada we do!?" Twilight worried, still not terribly high. Just then, the train came to a stop.

"Canterlot station, all leaving, get off now!" said a very irritated sounding voice on the train intercom. At this point, Twilight's panicking.

"WHADA WE DO!?"