Igneous Rock Pie was ill that day, leaving his wife Cloudy Quartz Pie to tend to him, while their four children rotated the cardinal (read: north-east-south-west) fields. Limestone Pie worked the west field, rotating to the north; Marble Pie worked the south field, rotating to the west; Pinkamena Pie worked the east field, rotating to the south; and the eldest, Maud Pie, worked the north field, rotating to the east. Secretly, Maud wanted to get her work done quickly, so that she could help out Pinkie with her work.

And then she saw it.

A particularly smooth rock, just large enough to fit in her hoof.

She'd paid it no mind at first, but as her work progressed, she found that the rock seemed to have disappeared even though nopony else was in the north field, and she herself didn't move it.

Looking down at her front hooves, she saw the rock just inches away from her hooves. She blinked at it. When her eyes opened from the blink, the rock was perched against her right front hoof.

She didn't quite understand the how or the why, but this rock was alive.

She kneeled down on all fours, and did something rare for the normally unexpressive Maud Pie:

She smiled.

"Let's be friends!" she said brightly, and she could have sworn that the rock began to glow with joy.