Secret Sisters
MLP:FiM
By: Kestrel
Rumble yawned and smacked his lips as he sat in his desk at the Ponyville schoolhouse. It had been a long week and he was ready to relax for the weekend. No more paying attention in class, no more homework, no more—
“Rainbow and me are totally gonna win the Sisterhooves Social again this year!”
No more of that!
Seriously, Scootaloo had been boasting about her and Rainbow Dash for the entire week. The Sisterhooves Social was coming up again this weekend. Last year, Rainbow and Scootaloo had won, beating out the other competitors in a landslide victory.
Acknowledging accomplishments was all well and good, but this was starting to get ridiculous. Rumble rolled his eyes and shot an expressionless stare at the filly. Some of the other students were starting to get annoyed too, slinking away from the filly.
“Last year we beat the horseshoes off of everypony, and we’ll beat anypony who gets in our way! Nopony can stop us!” Scootaloo continued to boast to anypony who’d listen.
Finally fed up with the constant showboating, Rumble closed the Power Ponies comic he had brought from home and trotted up to the front of the class where Scootaloo was showing off for her friends and the rest of the class.
“Scootaloo!” Rumble called out. “Can you please just stop that? It’s getting really annoying to hear how you think you and Rainbow are the best. Who knows? Maybe you’ll lose this year.”
The confident little filly turned back to face the colt and snickered at him.
“Lose?” she answered. “As if. We’re the best! And you’re just jealous because I have the most awesome sibling in Ponyville. You’ve got lazy Thunderlane.”
Hurt by the comment, Rumble fumed, looking away and mumbling under his breath. Thunderlane wasn’t lazy! Well… maybe a little. But he was still the coolest brother ever!
“Hey, Thunderlane’s my big brother and he’s super cool!” he retorted. “He’s the coolest sibling ever, much better than Rainbow Dash!” The young colt’s cheeks puffed out in anger as his face flushed with a tinge of red. Nopony made fun of his brother.
Scootaloo laughed confidently in response.
“Well, he might have a cool manecut, but Rainbow’s like, twelve times more awesome. I’d tell you to prove it at the Sisterhooves Social, but no colts allowed. Sorry Rumble!”
Rumble felt the need to retort, but was cut off by the school’s bell. Ms. Cheerilee stepped into the classroom and Rumble was forced to go back to his seat before being singled out to stand in the dreaded corner.
Class poured on like a deluge even though it was a Friday. Cheerilee was doing her best to get through the day’s lesson so she didn’t have to assign homework. But that meant long hours of reading, writing, and doing… math.
After what seemed like an eternity to Rumble, who had been fighting the urge to sleep, Cheerilee interrupted class to point out the community events in Ponyville that weekend.
“Everypony,” Cheerilee began. “This weekend, Ponyville is hosting the very special Annual Sisterhooves Social! Make sure to bring your A-game and be ready to have some good old-fashioned family fun!”
Murmurs swept the classroom as the fillies chattered amongst themselves, talking about how much fun they’d have with their sisters. Rumble and the other colts in the room just sat boredly. Rumble grumbled to himself. Why was it that only the fillies got to have all the fun?
The last few minutes of class consisted of Cheerilee narrating a story of her youth when she competed with her older sister. Rumble lost interest and began to fiddle with his pen.
When class let out, Scootaloo went right back to her bluster while Rumble went straight for the door. But as he reached it, he stopped…
The other students trotted out the doors on their way home, but a poster caught Rumble’s eye. A poster advertising the weekend’s main event hung proudly on the schoolhouse wall. Cheerilee’s words rung in the colt’s head. Family fun? That could work.
Rumble rubbed his hooves together with a devious grin plastered to his face. Oh yes… this was going to be good. He made a move to the wall and ripped down the poster, rolling it up and placing it in his saddlebag.
Cheerilee coughed, alerting him to her presence.
“Rumble?” she inquired. “What are you doing with that?” Cheerilee threw a smug grin at the colt as his devious grin broke into a flustered smile, exposing his teeth and causing his eyes to bulge out.
“Um…” he began, searching for an excuse. “I was just gonna take this poster to some friends of mine. I know that they’d appreciate being part of the Sisterhooves Social if they hadn’t heard yet.” Keeping his cool to some degree, the colt stared straight into Cheerilee’s gaze, seeing if she bought the story.
Luckily, she didn’t seem to bat an eye.
“Okay! Have a good weekend, Rumble! See you on Monday,” she said, escorting him out and slamming the door closed.
As Cheerilee and Rumble trotted off in different directions, Rumble let out the breath he had been holding for the past few minutes. That would have been so embarrassing! Now… to continue with his wonderful plan.
Back at home, Rumble burst into the door of the family house in downtown Ponyville. His family used to live in Cloudsdale, but moved to Ponyville when he was born so it would be safer to learn to fly. His parents were business ponies for the Cloudsdale Weather Factory, so they went out of town a lot. They were gone this weekend, so it was just Rumble and Thunderlane.
While Thunderlane was a full-grown pony and had a job, he was living with his parents until he could get the bits to move out on his own. Not the best situation ever for Thunderlane, but Rumble sure enjoyed having his idol within easy reach.
“Thunderlane! I’m hoooooome!” Rumble shouted. A muffled groan replied from up the stairs.
Rolling his eyes, the colt ascended the stairs past and went past his own room to the one at the end of the hallway, lined with band posters and logos.
Rumble rushed into his big brother’s room with a determined look on his face throwing open the door, causing a loud thud to resound from the wall. The heap of black stallion between the sheets of his bed stirred, and was immediately assaulted by Rumble plastering a poster to his face.
“We’re competing!” he stated adamantly.
Startled by his vision being suddenly blocked, Thunderlane’s hooves flailed out as he panicked. As Rumble relaxed the pressure of his hooves against his older brother’s face, Thunderlane grasped at the poster and held it to the light where he could see.
His face quickly broke into a smile as he laughed.
“Ha ha ha, good one, little bro!” he chuckled out. He smoothed out his mane into its normal mohawk and took a glance at his little brother. “For a second, I thought you were serious.”
The smaller pegasus stood stock still, holding his expression. Thunderlane’s smile broke into a deadpan.
“You’re not kidding, are you?” he asked plainly. Rumble shook his head. “Are you nuts!?” Thunderlane bellowed, his face contorting in embarrassment. “You know that’s only for fillies, right? Why the hay would you want to be in it anyway?”
Rumble kicked at the floor with a hoof and mumbled under his breath, looking back at Thunderlane when he finished speaking.
“Little bro, I didn’t catch that.”
“I said that it’s because you’re the biggest, best brother in the world and Scootaloo thinks Rainbow Dash is a better sibling, but she’s wrong and I’m gonna show them!” he shouted out. Thunderlane’s ears were pinned as far back as they could due to the colt’s volume.
“Look, you don’t have to prove anything to anypony. Let them think what they think. They could be wrong, and it really doesn’t matter in the end,” Thunderlane tried to reason.
“But Scootaloo called you lazy!” Rumble complained.
“Oh, come on!” Thunderlane whined. “You miss one tornado duty because you’re sick and you’re labeled ‘lazy’ for life!” When he was finished, he noticed that his hooves were way up in the air in a frustrated pose. Collecting himself, he settled back into his bed and folded his legs together and let out a controlled cough. “Not that it bothers me. We don’t need to show anypony up.”
Rumble tilted his head down and then looked up with the biggest, widest, saddest eyes he could muster. Here it goes… Rumble was doing it again.
“But big brother, I just wanted to have fun with my brother and show everypony what a great team we are,” he moaned softly.
Thunderlane’s heart swelled just a bit as he felt guilt tug at him. Oh boy… he was guilting him hard. Thunderlane shook his head vigorously at Rumble.
“Uh uh, no way!” he said. “Not happening!”
“Please Thunderlane?” Rumble asked, forcing tears to the edges of his eyes.
“No!” came the resolute response.
“Please, please, please, please, please!” Rumble pleaded pathetically.
“No! It’s not going to happen!”
It happened.
The next morning, Thunderlane sat in Cloudchaser and Flitter’s house, huffing while waiting for the Sisterhooves Social. After caving to the pressure Rumble had thrown at him, they planned to enlist the help of Flitter and Cloudchaser to help them blend in.
Rumble was helping himself to a container of lip gloss while Thunderlane contemplated how his life had led to this. Oh right, he was a pushover for his little brother. Hoofsteps behind him alerted him to Cloudchaser’s presence.
“You know…” she whispered into his ear. “When you came back, I expected you wanted to make me feel like a mare again, not the other way around.” She giggled and Thunderlane blushed intensely. He cast an incredulous glare at his marefriend, horrified by her words.
“Cloudchaser! Rumble is in the room!” he hissed, prompting her to silence him with a kiss, leaving him blushing and flustered.
The mare grabbed some of her beauty equipment and trotted back to the unhappy stallion sitting in a salon styled chair with his hooves crossed.
“Don’t worry!” Flitter chimed in. “When we’re done with you, you’ll both look beautiful!”
Thunderlane shrank and slid down the chair while Rumble beamed back at the mares, adoration in his eyes. Well, if this is what he wanted, then Thunderlane would oblige. Before they started though, Thunderlane beaned Rumble with a cap from one of the bottles.
“You so owe me!” he complained.
Soon, both of the colts were seated in chairs while Cloudchaser and Flitter worked on them. Rumble got the easy treatment from Flitter. Since he was still young, it was easier to simply apply makeup and call it good. In ten minutes, Rumble bounded out the door while Thunderlane was moaning in anguish.
Out in the living room, Flitter sat the colt down and started to coach him through pretending to be a mare.
“Okay Rumble, your job is going to be pretty easy since you’re still little, but you have to act like a filly,” she explained. Rumble nodded his head.
“You and Thunderlane are going to be new arrivals in town. Pinkie Pie is gone for now, so we don’t have to worry about her throwing a welcome party to draw attention to you. Just pretend that you’re a new filly who gets home schooled. Feel free to make small talk about hobbies, but try to stay away from things you’re actually interested in.”
Rumble nodded his head once more, taking in all the detail like a sponge to water.
“Thanks for helping me get settled in Flitter!” Rumble said in his most feminine voice, sounding oddly similar to Scootaloo. Flitter nodded her head in approval.
“It’s no problem at all, Fairy Wind,” she replied. Rumble shook off the silly name and beamed back. This plan was so great.
“This plan is so stupid!” Thunderlane’s voice shouted from behind the curtain separating the living room from the sisters’ bathroom.
The clattering of various tools and the thud of plastic bottles falling on the floor resounded through the air. Thunderlane must have really not liked what he saw. A scream reverberated back to the living room to confirm that suspicion.
“Oh come on Moon Shine, don’t be shy! You look beautiful…” Cloudchaser said, putting special emphasis on the word ‘beautiful.’
“You’re darn right my alias should be Moon Shine. I’d have to be drunk to go through with this!”
“Then maybe I can take that fine flank out for a drink later tonight. Sound like a plan, my wonderful marefriend?”
A grumble rumbled from Thunderlane’s throat as he stepped through the curtain.
While Rumble looked more or less the same with a new mane cut, makeup, colored contact lenses and some facial detail, Thunderlane looked completely different! No wonder he spent so long in there!
Looking at his brother now, Rumble couldn’t help but snicker. Thunderlane’s usual mohawk manestyle was now tucked away and put under an emerald green wig. His facial detail was much more defined to hide his masculine jawline and his makeup was also much heavier. Cloudchaser had even covered up his cutie mark in makeup and printed on another design. Instead of the normal adornment of a cloud and lightning bolt, he now had an emerald tattooed on his flanks. To top it off, he was wearing a stylish saddle dress. He, or rather ‘she,’ was not pleased.
Cloudchaser and Flitter could hardly keep it together as they nearly joined Rumble in his laughter.
“Not. One. Word,” Thunderlane gritted out.
Cloudchaser shook her head and waved a hoof in front of Thunderlane.
“You’re never gonna fool anypony with a voice like that! You have to sound lighter, like a mare,” she jeered, relishing in the stallion’s torture. Thunderlane sighed.
“Hi, I’m Moon Shine,” he said in a higher pitched voice that would just barely pass for a mare’s. “Sorry, don’t get too close to me. I have a slight cold and don’t want to make you all sick. But I still plan to run the race with my little sister, Fairy Wind.”
Cloudchaser gave a condescending clap of her hooves as she grinned devilishly at the cross-dressed stallion in front of her.
Rumble looked at the clock and jumped up from his seat.
“Big brother— I mean sister! We’re gonna be late for the Sisterhooves Social if we don’t leave now!” Rumble exclaimed.
Thunderlane gulped as he was forcibly herded to the door by the pair of actual sisters in the room. Rumble opened the door and stepped out. Thunderlane thanked his lucky stars nopony was out there at the time. With a final shove, Flitter and Cloudchaser pushed him out of the house and locked the door. Opening a window, they swooned and waved in mock adoration.
“See you later, ladies! Good luck at the race!” Cloudchaser cried out. Thunderlane’s ears pinned back hard, and he ran with Rumble, trying to avoid any attention the exclamation might have provoked.
“Oh my gosh she’s so pretty! I like her mane,” Flitter mentioned to Cloudchaser.
“I know, I really love her mane,” Cloudchaser answered back, both sisters snickering and sharing a hoofbump.
When ‘Moon Shine’ and ‘Fairy Wind’ reached Sweet Apple Acres, the festivities were in full swing. Teams were warming up and sharing secret hoofshakes and other forms of sibling bonds.
Racing to the registration table, Thunderlane went up to the mare in charge and began to negotiate joining up. This was what he had been trained for a whole entire hour for! Rumble held his breath in anticipation, hoping that these ponies wouldn’t notice anything up.
The mare at the registration table wasn’t convinced.
“I’ve never seen you ponies here in town before,” she stated. Thunderlane was taken aback. Oh shoot, she was onto them! He scrambled around in his head to piece together the story he had woven with Rumble, Flitter, and Cloudchaser.
“Oh, well, we don’t do much around here. My little sister Fairy Wind here is homeschooled, and I work out of town, so we hardly interact with ponies here,” Thunderlane blurted out.
“Riiight, well, I’d like to get your name and talk to somepony who knows you so we can get you regis—”
“AAAAAAHHHH!” squealed a mare standing near a lemonade stand. She bounced up and down excitedly as she bounded towards Thunderlane. “Omigosh! Omigosh! You perform with Sapphire Shores! You’re her backup singer Emerald Ripple!”
Thunderlane jumped back as the fan mare got in his face. His hoof felt laced with pain as the mare gave him an enthusiastic and crippling hoofshake. This new development piqued the interest of the mare behind the registration table.
“Emerald Ripple?” she asked. Thunderlane quickly thought about his planned identity. But since he hadn’t given his alias yet, he decided to roll with the one presented to him on a silver platter.
“Y-yes… I’m Emerald Ripple,” he nervously said. “That’s why I work out of town most of the time. I work on doing the dancing and the singing with Sapphire! Haha… yeah...”
“Wow, wow, wow!” the fan mare exclaimed. “I’m Jive! I love the work you do with Sapphire Shores, Miss Ripple! Can I call you that? Oooooh, can you show me a dance you do with Sapphire? Pretty please!?” She certainly was… charged. Thunderlane gulped. This was going to end badly.
The registration mare nodded to Jive, her interest piqued.
“Yes, let’s have Miss Ripple do a little dance for everypony here. Then we can all start the race! It’ll be a good warmup for everypony.”
Rumble smiled widely. It worked! They were going to be in the race! Now they just had to win. Oh, and Thunderlane had to try to convince these ponies that he was part of a famous show pony’s group. No problem.
Thunderlane stood motionlessly as the crowd hushed and faced toward him, giving him a wide berth to do a dance. Rumble nudged him from behind, urging him to get on with the performance so they could race.
The more he waited, the worse it got. All the mares at the farm were staring straight at him. Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash even stopped talking with Applejack, Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Rarity to watch.
Sweat poured down Thunderlane’s face, but thankfully the makeup that had been applied to him was made for workouts, so it didn’t run or smudge.
“Come on dude…” Rumble whispered pleadingly. Now or never… If he didn’t wow these ponies now, things were going to get very ugly, very fast.
Rumble was counting on him, and Thunderlane wasn’t about to let his little bro down. So he did the only thing he could do: fake it.
With all eyes turned on him, Thunderlane began to move. He lifted his legs in time to an imaginary pulsing beat. As he kicked his legs out in regular rhythms, he added more to his routine. Spinning around, he ran a hoof down his side and struck a pose, pointing out to the crowd.
Rumble put his hoof into his face in the crowd. They were so dead.
But to his surprise, a couple of the mares in the crowd, specifically Jive, started to join in. Thunderlane took this as acceptance and kicked it up a notch. Soon enough, he was throwing his hooves up into the air and standing on his hind legs, spinning in pirouettes and whipping his head side to side. To finish off the little dance, Thunderlane outstretched a hoof to the crowd and waved it back and forth.
“That serves her right!” he sang in a low key, as if ending a song with Sapphire Shores on stage. The ponies in the crowd gave a resounding cheer, stomping their hooves up and down.
Rumble yanked Thunderlane off of his quaking hooves and dragged him by the tail off to the side.
“Thun— I mean… Emerald, that was great! They totally bought that! I didn’t even know you knew her songs,” Rumble whispered excitedly.
“Eh, she’s the Pony of Pop,” he said, his balance still upset by his nerves.
“Now all we have to do is win and prove you’re the greatest sibling ever!” Rumble explained with a smirk.
Recovering from the onset of stage fright after the performance, Thunderlane shook his head.
“You know, we don’t have to do this,” he said pleadingly. “I already just took a huge risk for this plan. If we keep pushing our luck, they might find out.”
“Come on, just a teensy bit more. Then we’ll have a big trophy to prove it!” Rumble made puppy dog eyes at Thunderlane, who promptly cracked under the pressure.
“Fine…” he heaved out.
“Wow, that was so cool, Emerald Ripple!” called out a young filly behind Thunderlane. As he turned around, he realized that it was Scootaloo, one of the worst possible ponies they could be talking to right now.
“Oh, thanks honey,” Thunderlane replied in his best Sapphire Shores impression. Surely the backup singers all sounded like their front mare. “It’s an old routine we haven’t used in a while, so I’m a bit rusty. I hope you enjoyed it!” he finished with a high note inflection to his voice.
“I did, I did! I wish I would have brought something to get your autograph on. I love Sapphire Shores’ songs, and you were awesome out there,” Scootaloo gushed. “Wait, are you competing in the race?”
“Mhm, you know it, filly!” Thunderlane shot back. “Me and my little sis Fairy Wind here are going for the gold.”
Scootaloo set her hooves and motioned to Rainbow Dash, who was standing a little ways from their congregation.
“Oh, that’s cool! But we’re not gonna make it easy for ya. You might be famous, but we’re the best athletes in all of Ponyville!” Scootaloo said while puffing out her chest.
Rumble jumped up on Thunderlane’s back and struck a showy pose, trying to emulate his elder brother’s role playing.
“Maybe, but me and Emerald are a force to be reckoned with!” he exclaimed, cutting into the conversation.
“Well, either way, I still have the best big sister ever! Even if we somehow don’t win, that won’t change,” Scootaloo explained, provoking a slight blush from Rainbow Dash. “May the best mare win!”
No sooner than the gauntlet was thrown down did the announcer for the year called over the competitors to the starting line. Thunderlane and Rumble were let through without any fuss.
The starting line was a lot bigger than it had been last year when Thunderlane and Rumble came to watch Flitter and Cloudchaser compete. Now it was long enough to hold room for at least twenty teams. Thunderlane and Rumble took their lane in slot sixteen. Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo were in slot one. Among the crowd were other ponies that the colts knew, including AJ, Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, and Rarity. Nopony knew why they weren’t competing, but they were there waving Rainbow Dash regalia and cheer items around.
Granny Smith, the reigning regent of the Sisterhooves Social tilted back and forth in her rocking chair and shouted into a megaphone, amplifying her voice much higher than it needed to be.
“Welcome to the… uh… umptienth Sisterhooves Social!” she yelled. “I see lots of new faces ‘round here today. I wish y’all the best of luck. But first, we got to lay down some ground rules.”
Rumble looked back and forth at the other competitors limbering up for the games and decided to follow suit while listening to the elderly green mare.
“First, this is to be a fair race. We won’t have no flying or magic casting. All the events are easy to do and don’t need a great deal o’ strength, so ya don’t need to worry ‘bout no earth pony competitors having an unfair advantage,” she explained.
No flying? Well that sucked. Rumble cast his eyes over to Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo. On second thought, maybe that was good. Rainbow was definitely the fastest flyer he’d ever seen, even if Scootaloo wasn’t.
“Second, it’s a fair race!” she reiterated. “There’ll be no cheating, no bumping, no name calling, and no lollygagging! We’ve got several obstacles to complete for y’all. The first team through all the courses and to cross the finish line with both members of their team wins!”
Teamwork. That was the name of the game. If there was one thing Rumble and Thunderlane had going for them, it was their spectacular bond. Rumble set his hooves on the ground, ready to take off at the signal. Thunderlane mirrored his actions.
“Get ready!” Granny Smith announced. “Get set!” All the competitors set their hooves for the start and eyed the starting line determinedly. “GO!” In a thunder of hooves, the teams were off on the initial stretch. Rainbow and Scootaloo enjoyed an early lead while Thunderlane and Rumble were left behind in the dust.
The first obstacle they came to was a simple row of buckets that each competitor trot through. Rumble went first, jumping to and from each bucket since he wasn’t big enough to reach more than one at a time. Thunderlane came in afterward, getting slightly snagged by the flowing part of his saddle. At the end of the obstacle, he took the saddle off and threw it to the side, prompting several observing stallions to whistle in his direction, much to his chagrin.
“Come on, Emerald!” Rumble shouted to his brother. “We gotta get a move on! Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo are way ahead!” He was right. The fillies were ahead and covered with mud from the next obstacle course.
Thunderlane looked up to the wig he was wearing and fell into his current alias’ personality.
“Aw no, my hair’s gonna get all ruined in that gunk!” he complained as Rumble unceremoniously kicked him into the mud pit. Now covered in mud, he swam across and pulled himself off, shaking off the majority of it. “Nasty!”
“Shake it off, you big drama queen!” Rumble complained as he ran ahead to the apple toss obstacle. Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo had pulled even further ahead.
At the apple toss, Thunderlane threw a perfect toss, causing a pony in a dunk booth to splash down into the water while Rumble missed horribly, impacting a spectator in the crowd. He winced as the pony in the crowd groaned. As he took another apple, he threw another careless attempt and the apple splattered on a nearby tree.
The dunk pony took this opportunity to do the heckling he had been hired to do.
“Where ya aimin’ darlin’? I’m right over here, but you ain’t got the skill to dunk me!” he jeered, turning around and smacking his plot. Rumble’s face flushed with anger at the pony’s words.
Taking another one, Rumble prepared to throw until Thunderlane came and guided him through the motions.
“You’re bending your legs too much, hun,” he said, keeping up his character. “ It’s making your throws curve too much. You’ve gotta aim before you throw. You don’t need to throw it hard either, it’s just gotta hit the target over there.”
“Ya cain’t hit me, ya galloot!” the pony in the box heckled again. Rumble’s temper flared hotter as he followed his brother’s instructions. Rumble carefully gauged the trajectory of the ball and let it go. The ball sailed through the air and impacted the target, causing the dunk tank pony’s mouth to go agape before he plummeted down.
Splash!
“Woohoo! How’s that water taste?” Rumble shouted as he and Thunderlane ran to the next obstacle, not waiting to hear the dunk tank pony shouting back at them.
“It tastes refreshing!” the distant voice responded.
By now the colts had closed some of the distance between them and Rainbow and Scootaloo, but they were nearing the end of the course. They could see Rainbow and Scootaloo balancing eggs on spoons from the hen house. Several shells and yolks littered the area. Apparently they’d been at it for a little while already.
“Come on, Emerald!” Rumble egged his brother on. “We’re still behind, we gotta get a move on!”
Upon entering the hen house, Rumble was assaulted by angry chickens trying to peck at his hooves. While it wasn’t enough to really hurt him, the pain stung into his hooves as he let out a yelp.
“You keep that fowl mouth to yourself, girlfriend!” Thunderlane blurted out, shooing the offending hen from Rumble. “Are you alright, Fairy?”
“Get the eggs before I come down with feather flu!” he shouted back. As Thunderlane procured a pair of eggs for them to balance, Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo came back in once again, prepared to try again.
“Come on, Dash! Quit dropping the eggs! We’re losing ground!” Scootaloo complained as she balanced another egg on her nose.
“Me!?” Dash fired back. “You’re dropping them too! I at least got one of the eggs over there!”
One of the eggs over there!? That meant they were halfway done!
“This way, Emerald!” Rumble shouted while Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash were trying a new strategy of balancing the egg between the two of them.
“Let’s balance the eggs between us too,” Thunderlane advised. The two brothers shifted close together and pressed the eggs lightly between their bodies, slowly scooting across the distance to the baskets.
Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo were moving much faster, but their egg constantly teetered and tipped, threatening to tumble to the ground. In contrast, Thunderlane and Rumble never had a problem with their egg, but lost ground quickly to the other pair.
Both couples reached the basket at the same time, depositing their last eggs and taking off for the finish line. Thunderlane and Rumble led.
“Come on!” yelled Thunderlane. “They’re catching up!”
The final hurdles came into view as the two teams were neck and neck. Thunderlane and Rainbow Dash jumped deftly over their hurdles while Scootaloo and Rumble struggled to pass theirs.
“Keep at it, Fairy!” Thunderlane encouraged.
“You can beat ‘em!” cheered Rainbow Dash.
The younger ponies raced hard, but on the last hurdle, Rumble fell flat on his face, giving Scootaloo the edge.
“Come on, come on, come on!” Rainbow yelled. “We gotta hustle! We’re so close!”
“Can’t give up, we can still win!” Thunderlane exclaimed, hoisting Rumble up onto his back and darting to the finish line.
There was no keeping up with Rainbow Dash, but Thunderlane was hot on Scootaloo’s hooves. The win wasn’t to the first pony to cross the line, it was the first team. Maybe they could win off of that technicality.
“Faster!” Rumble called out, slapping Thunderlane’s plot hard. In response, Thunderlane picked up speed and passed Scootaloo, much to the filly’s dismay.
The brothers cast a glance back, smiling about passing their opponent. Before he knew it, Rumble’s lead extended! This was easy! They were practically sailing through to the finish line at this point. He felt lighter than a feather!
Rumble passed the finish line and promptly found himself hitting the ground and bouncing a few times before he came to rest. He jumped back up immediately and proclaimed his victory.
“Woohoo! We win! Aww yeah, we’re the best!” he chanted. He turned to his side to give his brother a brohoof, but noticed he wasn’t there…
Rainbow and Scootaloo came rushing through the finish line, cheering loudly together to the roar of the awaiting crowd. Confused, Rumble looked back at the finish line to see Thunderlane bumbling through the finish line from around a tree, collapsing at the end.
“Unnghh…” Thunderlane groaned incomprehensibly. “Did we win?”
“No… but we got really close,” Rumble responded.
“Ugh, sorry little guy, I did my best.”
“It’s cool, let’s just get up to the podium.”
“And that brings us to the end of another Sisterhooves Social!” Granny Smith announced to the cheering crowd while the top three teams stood upon the victory pedestals. “I want to thank y’all for joinin’ up with us this year. This has been the best turnout ever, and I can’t thank you enough!”
Thunderlane stood atop the pedestal with his chest puffed out. They didn’t win, but he felt like he had done one right. And besides, nopony had figured out that they were in drag, and maybe second place would divert some attention.
“Hey bro,” Thunderlane whispered into Rumble’s ear. “You’re not too disappointed we lost, are you?” Rumble shook his head.
“Nah, it was a lot of fun, and we were really close. Thanks for doing this with me.”
The third place pair knelt down to receive their medals, which were really just glorified husks of metal suspended on some cheap rope. But it was the thought that counted. Granny Smith hobbled over to the brothers, supported by Big Macintosh, and bestowed upon them their medals, which had a nifty splotch of paint to differentiate it from the bronzes. Rumble scratched the back of his neck. It itched…
Finally, the Apple family matriarch placed the first place medals on the necks of Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo. Taking to the skies, Rainbow tossed Scootaloo into the air, performing a rolling maneuver in a rehearsed victory performance.
“Showoffs…” Rumble mumbled. Thunderlane chuckled out loud.
“Hey, we did pretty good. Maybe we can do something that doesn’t involve makeup and dresses next time?”
“Heh, sure thing, big brother.”
“Brother!?” shouted a voice near Rumble. A mare was looking quizzically at the pair on the second place platform. Thunderlane’s face went white as fear set in.
“What in tarnation?” Granny Smith exclaimed, heading over to the mare who had called out. The mare pointed her hoof to Thunderlane and Rumble accusingly, and Granny went to investigate.
Thunderlane shrunk back as the elderly earth pony approached. Sensing his fear, or perhaps smelling, based on the flaring of her nostrils, she got into his face. In a blink of an eye, she struck Thunderlane’s hair, knocking the wig straight off his head in one clean motion.
A collective gasp rose from the crowd. Thunderlane’s mohawk sprung to attention as the wig holding it down disappeared.
“Thunderlane!? What the hay are you doing here?” Rainbow Dash exclaimed bewilderedly. She came down and got in the stallion’s face, which turned completely white from its normal pitch color.
Scootaloo followed suit and approached ‘Fairy Wind,’ taking a good long look at her. She ruffled her hair, and it bounced up to its normal style. Now a makeup covered Rumble wearing an athletic dress stood in front of her.
“What’s going on here?” Scootaloo asked with a deadpanned expression. “On second thought, I’m not sure I wanna know.”
Unfriendly glares and shouts of dismay rose from the crowd as the brothers stepped back tentatively away from Rainbow Dash and Granny’s hard expressions. The shouts of the angry mares in the crowd grew louder as they started to move closer.
Thunderlane tapped Rumble on the back and brought his face close to his brother’s ear.
“You thinking what I’m thinking?” he asked quietly.
“Yup, I think so.”
The brothers stepped back as the crowd got even closer. Suddenly, Thunderlane pointed out to the edge of the farm.
“Is that famous Wonderbolt Spitfire!?” Thunderlane shouted. Rainbow let out a squee and turned around to take a look, firing from her spot while turning. The other ponies in the crowd followed suit. Rumble and Thunderlane leapt to action with the brothers shouting to each other in unison.
“RUN!”