[A/N] Once again, another one-shot posting here before I put it on FIMFiction. Once again I'd like to thank Pyruvate for letting me use his art as the cover, which inspired this silly, quick story.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy and, as always, feedback is greatly appreciated. :)
And I do not own anything related to MLP or "Thriller" by Michael Jackson.
Applejackson
"Consarn it Pinkie Pie. How do you manage to cause such a mess?" Applejack thought, picking up yet another glob of frosting she then tossed into a nearby garbage pail.
She looked around and sighed. The entire bedroom was a disaster, baking utensils scattered all around like pieces of debris after a hurricane. Globs of batter and frosting covered the walls, floor and ceiling. Glassware that once gave the pink mare's room an element of beauty were shattered, pieces of which littered the floor like shrapnel. Too great a mess to be handled by one pony, even if that one pony happened to be Pinkie Pie.
Frustrated with her lack of success cleaning solo, the pink mare ran outside to ask passing ponies for assistance. She wasn't having any luck until Applejack and Rainbow Dash walked by, giving their friend a small wave as they passed. Pinkie Pie took advantage of the opportunity and jumped in front of them, her breathing heavy and her eyes frantic.
Apparently she was trying to make a super-mega fudge brownie cake supreme for Nightmare Night, which was in a couple of days. She said how she envisioned a bizarre recipe while she was on one of her sugar highs caused by eating too many cupcakes. She wanted it to be grand, so much so that she put all her time and energy for the day into making it.
The bakery was closed on Saturdays, and the Cakes were out of town for the weekend, meaning that Pinkie Pie had the entire place to herself without the worry of customers. Using the opportunity, Pinkie took over the kitchen and began to experiment, resulting in several explosions of flour, sugar, butter and frosting. Once the kitchen was uninhabitable, she moved everything up into her bedroom, only to make another huge mess there.
After toiling with the ingredients for hours, she gave up. But when she looked at her surroundings, covered with every baking ingredient under Celestia's sun, she came to the realization that she had a greater problem on her hooves other than failing to make the baked goods. She had to clean up before the Cakes returned Sunday night, a process that would likely take the rest of the day.
Out of kindness, both Rainbow Dash and Applejack agreed to help their friend clean. Relieved, the pink mare assigned Rainbow Dash the kitchen and Applejack the bedroom, saying she'd bounce back and forth to help her two friends out. But because the kitchen was in such horrendous shape, she spent most of her time there with the cyan pegasus. Besides, Applejack assured her she had the bedroom handled, and Rainbow Dash was prone to letting her mind wander off task if nopony was around to egg her on.
Unfortunately, Applejack agreed to go solo before she even ichecked/i the bedroom to see how messy it was. She thought any mess would be easy to handle. After all, she was always the one to clean up the house after her sister and their friends did something to mess it up.
Once Applejack opened the door to the bedroom and peered inside, she immediately regretted telling Pinkie Pie to stay with Rainbow Dash in the kitchen.
The catastrophe that was once a simple bedroom left Applejack's jaw on the floor. It was in complete disarray, at a level of chaos that not even Discord himself could conjure up. It was far too much for one mare to handle; even the stubborn Applejack could see this. Nevertheless, she started the task, going at a brisk pace as she kept telling herself "it looks worse than it is, it isn't as bad as it looks."
That was an hour before where Applejack stood now. She surveyed the room, coming to the conclusion that she hadn't even succeeded in cleaning half of the mess yet. She ground her teeth in frustration, continuing her work as her mind raced in a silent rage.
"Help yer best friend clean, ah thought. It'd be nice, ah thought."Applejack thought to herself, scowl on her face as she finished cleaning up the remnants of a blue vase, which had been shattered by one of Pinkie's crazy baking explosions.
The orange mare walked over to a large glob of frosting, plastered onto Pinkie's dresser and covering what appeared to be a record player. She removed the globs of frosting before wiping down the machine with a dampened cloth. She then dried it off and looked it over.
"Shoot, ah hope the frosting didn't damage it.
The record player was white and pink, just what was expected for Pinkie Pie. It was very frilly and girly, something Applejack would never let into her house. On the machine was a record, still covered in some sticky, pink frosting.
Applejack used the dampened cloth to wipe down the smooth surface of the record, before drying it off with a second rag. She then looked at the center of it to see the words, 'Nightmare Night Party Music!' scribbled onto the center part in black marker. The sloppiness of the hoof-writing was unmistakably that of Pinkie Pie.
Applejack was curious to what music Pinkie Pie would put onto her Nightmare Night record. Did she just buy the record at the store, or manage to pick her favorite songs and put them onto some kind of "record playlist". That sounded odd, but knowing Pinkie Pie it would be plausible that she could find a way to pull it off.
She was about to get back to cleaning, but then stopped. She looked back at the record player and smiled, curiosity getting the best of her.
"Ah guess playing some tunes while ah work wouldn't hurt none." Applejack thought with a smile, "Besides, ah should probably see if this thing still works after being covered in frosting and whatever else Pinkie was working with."
Applejack turned on the record player and moved the needle onto the record itself, ready to see what her friend wanted to play for the upcoming holiday. She then turned to get back to cleaning, keeping her ear at attention so she could listen to the music as she worked.
After about ten seconds of the record spinning with no music coming out, Applejack feared that it was broken. She turned around and was ready to recheck the record when, finally, she heard some music coming from the device. Sighing, she turned back to her work, wet cloth in one hoof and dry in the other.
At first the song started out with a spooky beat, wolves howling and footsteps. But soon the song started to pick up in its tempo. It was around this time that Applejack began to think the mystery song sounded catchy. Without realizing it, she started tapping her hoof against the wood floor of her friend room. She also started to hum to the song, as well as move the damp rag to the rhythm.
Eventually, the lyrics started.
"It's close to midnight and something evil's lurking in the dark
Under the moonlight, you see a sight that almost stops your heart."
Applejack never heard of this song before. In fact, the singer sounded different than any musical artist she knew of in Equestria. His voice was masculine with a hint of softness. An interesting combination, but she didn't complain. In her opinion, it fit the song well.
"Then again, ah really only listen ta country music."Applejack thought to herself as the song continued on.
"You try to scream but terror takes the sound before you make it."
The song continued on, and with every second of it passing through Applejack's ears, it became catchier and catchier.
"You start to freeze as horror looks you right between the eyes
You're paralyzed."
She moved from frosting glob to sticky beater. There was a noticeable bounce in her step, like she was gliding across the floor. She continued this fluid movement until the song hit full steam.
" 'Cause this is thriller, thriller night
And no one's gonna save you from the beast about strike."
This is when Applejack completely forgot about the task at hand and began to move around the floor of Pinkie's room, trying to follow the rhythm as best she could. She spun around, but not like a ballerina. More like a single, quick turn, before getting into a pose.
She pulled her hat down over her green eyes. This was far from her typical dancing style- mostly she was accustomed to square dancing and ballroom dancing, none of this "hip" stuff- but there was something about this music made her continue moving in the same manner. She went along with the rhythm, letting the dry rag fall to the floor at her hooves, the song continuing to play.
"You know it's thriller, thriller night
You're fighting for your life inside a killer, thriller tonight."
She stopped dancing around and, hat still down, began a more stationary dance, spinning in place and moving her hooves onto the tips before lowering herself back to the ground. She dropped the damp rag to the floor before she continued to dance. This went on until the song finally stopped a few minutes later. She froze in mid-dancing position, posing as if she just ended a performance. Her chest expanded and contracted, her breathing rapid, tongue hanging out of her mouth as she panted, not unlike Winona did after chasing squirrels.
She stayed in this position for a few moments, until she heard somepony snicker. Her green eyes shot open.
"Oh no..."
Slowly, she lifted her head, pushing her Stetson hat back into its proper position. She turned around and looked behind her, towards the source of the voice. There she saw Rainbow Dash standing in the doorframe, her face contorted in an attempt to prevent herself from bursting into laughter. Pinkie Pie was also present, though she wasn't laughing. Instead, she had a huge grin on her face, her eyes seeming to sparkle in the light.
"Oh! I see you liked my record! Now I'm even more excited to play it in the market on Nightmare Night!" Pinkie Pie hopped over to the device to shut it off just as another song started to play- something about "busting ghosts" or something.
The blood rushed to Applejack's cheeks, lighting them a fiery red. Her eyes were fixed on Rainbow Dash, who had resorted to occasionally biting down on her hoof to prevent a giggle-fit.
"Awesome moves there, AJ." Rainbow Dash snickered, "I didn't know you liked to dance."
"Ah...ah wasn't dancing. There..there was batter on mah leg and...ah...ah was trying ta get it off by spinning and such." Applejack said, cringing. Only when the excuse came out of her mouth did she realize how ridiculous it sounded.
"Why couldn't you just use the cloth?" Rainbow Dash asked, pointing to the damp cloth that lay solitary on the floor, roughly ten feet away from the dancing earth pony. The dry cloth was nowhere to be seen, and Applejack forgot exactly where she dropped it.
"It seems like that would work best." Rainbow Dash concluded with a smug smile.
"Would you believe me if ah said ah was having a seizure?"
Both Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash shook their heads. Applejack was defeated. She was humiliated, and no longer able to look her friend in the face without passing out, face red as the apples she worked with every day. Rainbow Dash snickered.
"You like dancing, don't you AJ?"
Applejack slowly nodded, resulting in Rainbow Dash bursting into hysterics, laughing her flank off. Applejack wanted to disappear. But then, Pinkie Pie spoke up.
"I think you dance really well!" Pinkie Pie said cheerfully, bouncing over to Applejack and putting her hoof around her shoulder.
Applejack looked up at Pinkie Pie, "R-really?"
Pinkie Pie nodded, "Yeah, but you weren't doing the dance right...it goes like this."
Pinkie Pie got up onto her hind-legs and began to stalk side-to-side, hooves out in front of her. She looked like she was impersonating something between a cat and a zombie. Applejack cracked a smile and started giggling, as did Rainbow Dash.
"Wow, that's pretty good." Applejack said, "where did ya learn that anyway?"
"Around." Pinkie Pie said with a smile.
Finally, Rainbow Dash stopped laughing, wiping some tears away from her eyes, "Oh, sorry Applejack it's just sort of funny. You, the big, tough farm pony of Ponyville, and you enjoy dancing. It's just unexpected."
"Ha-ha, very funny." Applejack said, rolling her eyes in annoyance.
"But you did look good." Rainbow Dash said, rubbing the back of her neck nervously.
Applejack smiled at her friend, "Thanks RD."
"Great! Now that everything's back to normal, what do you say we get back to work? We have a TON of work cleaning these two rooms before the Cake's get back."
"Right!" Rainbow Dash said before zipping downstairs, Pinkie Pie right behind her.
Applejack smiled and turned her attention back to the mess still surrounding her. She picked up the damp rag, as well as the dry one, and walked over to the bookshelf, thoroughly wiping it down. As she did so, she began to hum the beat from the song, a little swagger in her step and a smile on her face. She swiveled her hips around a bit as well before she broke out into song.
"'Cause this is thriller, thriller night
And nopony's gonna save ya from the beast about strike..."
"Ha! I didn't know you liked singing too, AJ!" Rainbow Dash shouted from the doorway. She left her rag in the bedroom and came back up to grab it. "You're really quite the show-mare, maybe you should go out for a musical or something!"
Embarrassed, Applejack shot her friend an angry glare.
"BEAT IT, RD!"
With a laugh, Rainbow Dash flew off with the rag. Applejack turned back to her work and sighed.
"Every chance ah try ta sing, ah get interrupted. It's like some cruel, ongoing joke."