//------------------------------//
// Tide of Change 
// Story: This Changeling Life 
// by Nasha Rei Kun 
//------------------------------//

~TCL~

Twilight Sparkle wasn’t sure why, but she had a feeling they were in for a surprise today. She heard a tapping and sound, and looked up from her feet to the annoyed gaze of an azure unicorn.

“Come along Sparkle, if Trixie must go to class early, she will be sure to drag you along with her.” The protégé of an alicorn blinked.

“But I already go early, why would I NOT?” Trixie actually seemed to think about that for a moment.

“...Let’s go Sparkle, Trixie is sure Moondancer is waiting for us.” Trixie pushed forward, all the while ignoring the chuckling unicorn behind her.

They’d been traveling the streets of Canterlot for a bit, as was their usual, when they were going to school. They’d meet up with Moondancer at the school gates, maybe swing by to see Spike, and then go to class.

Things were going according to plan, as far as meeting Moondancer.

“H-hey Twilight, Trixie.” Moondancer.

“Ah clone, I mean, Moondancer.” Trixie.

“Trixie, why are you saying that with such a straight face?! Hi Moondancer,” Twilight said.

They had grouped up, talked about classes and decided that maybe they’d swing by to see Spike.

“I’ve always taken you for a cream filled kind of guy.”

“Meh, it can be cool, sometimes. Though I really like the eclairs.”

They stopped at the entrance to the main castle chambers. That sounded a lot like Spike, but the voice of the pony he was talking to...It sounded familiar, but they felt like it was slightly deeper than before, for whatever reason.

Waiting around the corner, they peeked, and froze at what they saw.

Maybe it was the sun catching him, it looked like a guy, in the right light. Or maybe it was their minds making them hallucinate.

The tall pony seemed to have a black coat, wearing an assortment of tight top, just barely below knee bottoms, and gloves. A head of feathered yellow looked down at the young drake, as a trail of gold followed behind.

They could only stare, as the being’s ears pricked upward, before he turned in their direction. Crystal clear blues eyed them curiously, before they brightened in recognition.

“Ah ha! It’s my wayward students!” The being grinned, even as the trio of unicorns’ minds took a second to process what he said.

“WHAT?”

~TCL~

Naruto chuckled as he walked with the three, still in shock, fillies. Spike just kept giving the girls weird looks as they walked, even the ponies that came across them would stop and stare for a while.

Naruto waded through it all with a smile, not even acknowledging the passing ponies.

Finally, after some time, the three seemed to snap out of it enough to present an intelligent response.

“Naruto?/Master!/Mr. Uzumaki?” he could hear the plethora of their calls, and merely turned his head to the side to see them. Even now, they couldn’t help but keep his enamoring ponytail in view, minds idly tracking it.

“Naruto? As in ‘Naruto’ Naruto?” Twilight asked, only having Naruto laugh at the question.

“Unless there’s another Naruto around, or I have a clone about after it’s been so long, then yeah. It’s me, Naruto Uzumaki, in the flesh,” he stated simply, causing her to blink, before all three of them smiled widely at him.

Trixie, ever the proud one, puffed out her chest.

“Trixie knew master was great. She knew master was powerful, but this,” she gestured to his current form. “She never knew master was this Majestic! You’ve become the dream, master!”

She preened immensely, as he gave her hair a good ruffle, all the while never noticing the slightly envious look of Moondancer.

Or did he? It was hard NOT to notice that filly’s particular stare. Giving her a confused looked, she blushed, before quickly pushing his attention to something that wasn’t her.

“Um, Mr. Uzumaki, I, uh, like your hair!” she squeaked out, causing him to blink, before he pulled back from the fillies.

Reaching behind him, and pulling at the gold strands he looked at them, and blinked.

“Whoa, okay, now I’m sure I didn’t do this.” He muttered, something along the lines of “Celestia’s idea of a joke” passing from his lips, as they continued their walk.

“Trixie thinks it looks very good on master,” the young blue pre-teen stated, her eyes falling from the adult’s hair to his attire. “Among other things,” she finished with a grin, and a flush to her cheeks.

“Trixie?” Twilight tilted her head in confusion, before noticing that the azure filly gave her a sad, pitying, look.

“Trixie will always worry about you Sparkle. As Trixie’s first rival, you’re failing Trixie’s expectations.”

“I don’t even know what you mean!”

Naruto the whole while merely shook his head at the antics of the wayward kids, before a thought popped into his head.

“Don’t you guys have to get to school?” His question seemed to freeze them in place, before as one they all shouted in unison.

“We’re late!” Spike facepalmed.

~TCL~

They had gotten up on Naruto as they ran. Well, not really, it was more like Naruto had decided that he was the fast way to get to school.

Which he undoubtedly was.

“Trixie, while amazed at Master’s speed, still can’t believe he hasn't mastered the Teleportation spell,” one Beatrice Lulamoon said, from her on the giant beast’s back. Her place behind Spike, who sat at the helm of the transformed changeling, had her keeping her hair out of her eyes constantly.

“Didn’t Naruto say it was just too complicated for him?” Twilight said from her place behind Trixie. She studied the glow between her place on Naruto’s back with a studious intent. How was he keeping them in place, despite how fast they were moving, or how high they were?

Moondancer, for her part, was simply looking at the bunches of blonde feathers she could feel below her. Her hands spread over an area, feeling it slip between her digits, with an almost outstanding fluidity.

“Forward my steed! We must get the princesses to the castle!” Spike was ever the enthusiastic one, as he held onto the long neck of his bird transformed brother in all but blood.

Naruto merely rolled his eyes, before allowing his speeding form to leap from place to place. All those wandering the castle could only stare, as a bird of some sort blew past them, with a speed that could rival a Wonderbolt’s.

Blue eyes, lacking pupils, narrowed in on the approaching school. He allowed his raptor-like feet to tense before he jumped high into the air, form soaring over the castle walls, and landing on the extending bridge to the school.

His passengers screamed, in either joy or terror, as he did this, and he was loving every minute of it.

The bridge had an overarching cover to provide safety to those crossing it, and he currently ran over the top, ponies inside it stopping and staring at the golden bird that passed them.

“We’re coming up on the target! Brace for impact!” Spike said, as Naruto made one last jump high into the air. All those on his back, sans Spike, felt their eyes become pinpricks in their seeing holes, at the height.

“Ahhh!” came the terrified scream of three fillies.

“Muhahahahahah!” Spike laughed loudly, as they all felt the grasp of gravity hold onto their falling form.

Most in the courtyard blinked as they heard the screaming, before looking up to the meteor of feathers and screaming children in shock. Yet, right as it was about to impact the ground, there was a flicker of purple, and they seemingly floated centimeters from the ground. A pair of dark, yet yellow tipped, horns on the bird’s head flashed yellow.

The four children looked around themselves as they felt the weightlessness. Spike looked around, as he felt them touch ground softly. Twilight, Trixie and Moondancer opened up their eyes slowly, not trusting their sight when they saw themselves just barely in the courtyard.

Twilight looked around, before looking up and noticing her mane floating, as well as the purple tint surrounding the group. Her eyes widening as she looked over at Naruto, who turned his neck around to them, and smirked as much as a bird could. She saw the pair of horns on his head, and made the connection.

“You casted a gravity spell?” He smiled in joy, even as he nodded his head. The next moment found him changing in a flash of yellow flame, catching the quartet in a flash and setting them down.

Now ponies were staring for a different reason, much more so the mares around the schoolyard.

“That was so amazing, an- Hellooo doctor~!” came a voice, causing the quintet to turn their gazes towards an approaching blue filly, with a semi-long mane of dark and baby blue.

Trixie was not amused.

“If Minuette would stop ogling Trixie’s master,” she stated with a growl, causing the other blue filly to laugh, as she scratched the back of her head. She felt no shame in saying what she thought about what she saw, and what she saw was good.

Naruto, ever the oblivious one, simply grinned.

“Hey Minuette, where’s Twinkleshine and Lemon Hearts?” his question caused the filly to freeze, before her eyes nearly popped out of her head.

“Wait, wait wait...Naruto?” He pouted at this.

“Why does everypony keep asking that? I disappear for one month, and you all act like I’m some different changeling,” he said out loud, only to receive stares from four of the five children in front of him.

He actually began to feel a sweatdrop forming from their gazes, before Trixie sighed, and pat him on the arm.

“It’s okay master, one day, you’ll understand.” He felt himself deadpan at this, as all the girls of the group nodded sagely. Turning to Spike, he looked for support.

“What did I miss?”

“Not a clue, I’m as stumped as you are.”

“Boys,” the girls said in unison, causing the both to blink.

~TCL~

Coming back to the Light/Velvet household, Naruto wasn’t sure what to expect when he got there.

Knocking on the door, he waited with Spike to be let in. He’d have used his key, but…. he kind of lost that before going through his change

He watched as the door opened to reveal Night Light, ever the same as of a month of ago. That said, one look at him, had the stallion gaping.

“Who-Who?” he looked to the blonde’s side and saw Spike waving, and put two and two together.

He gaped harder.

“NARUTO?!” he damn near screamed, causing a rushing to come from within the house, before Twilight Velvet popped out from within.

“Naruto?! Where...is…. he?” She stared as well, mouth dropping wide open, causing Naruto to sweatdrop.

That lasted all of a second, before he felt an iron grip upon his bicep, and he felt terror grasp onto his very soul.

“Shopping," Twilight Velvet seemed to hiss, steam shooting from her mouth. Her dark visage only seemed to darken further, as she actually gave the bicep a good few squeezes, and that grin became HORRIFYING.

Seriously, it had to be hair, right? He was blaming it on the hair.

Fuck this hair!

~TCL~

Shining laughed and rolled, as he looked at his blonde friend flopped over his bean bag.

Wiping a tear from his eye, the unicorn brother of Twilight stifled his laughs to snickers.

“Oh, oh that’s RICH.” Naruto glared at him.

“Nice to know you enjoy my suffering.”

“Only if it’s you. Naruto, seriously, how can you NOT get why this is happening.” The blonde threw him an annoyed look.

“Well then wise guy, why don't’ you TELL me!” Shining simply shook his head in the negative.

“Nuh-uh, if you can't realize it by this point, me telling you isn’t going to help.” Naruto sent him a betrayed look, which only caused his silky strands to flicker in the light being let into the room.

Shining could only imagine what Cadance’s face would look like when she saw their fellow adult. He couldn’t even imagine what Derpy would.... think…

It should be noted that Shining “Sparkle” Armor had just had an idea.

A horrible, wicked idea.

Naruto saw the grin on his fellow male’s face, and felt a similar horror to when he’d been dealing with the stallion’s mother earlier.

“Shining~ I’m here~ Why did you have...Spike...send...me…”  In came Cadance, in all her pink alicorn glory, who froze upon seeing her blonde friend, after his long month of absence. She stared, mouth wide open, as Naruto waved at her.

“Heya Cady, guess who’s back?” he grinned, only to notice something was off. “Um, Cady? Cady~ Why are you looking at me funny?” The changeling slowly began to feel a cold grasp on his heart, as the alicorn’s eyes seemed to shine a chill-inducing light

Shining’s grin grew just as madly.

So when Naruto felt a grip on his shoulders, enough that he felt like circulation was being cut off, damn alicorn strength, he knew he was done.

“Clothing...Photos~” Why the hell did every mare have this weird ability to do that?!

Seriously, fuck this hair!
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“Oh mom, look! Naruto sent something back! Maybe he’s done with his month-long assignment?”

“That would be the only reason, right? Come on Dinky, I’m sure sis thinks the same.”

“Hold on, hold on, oof!”

“You okay sis?”

“Ahehe, just a little trip, I’m fine! Now let’s see what Naruto sent us!”

The three huddled around the slight large, rectangular package, Amethyst already working on opening it up with a pair of scissors.

Their father wouldn’t be home till later, but they’d fill him in when he came home.

“Hey Derpy, thanks for the shower. My place being fumigated isn’t doing me any favors. What’s that? Another package from your coltfriend, hmm?” Golden harvest rounded the corner, a bathrobe on.

Derpy went red in the face, her golden eyes crisscrossing harder in her embarrassment, as she tried to deny any such thing.

“It’s not like that! We’re just really good friends!” Golden gave a look of sly amusement.

“Right, and I’m NOT a natural redhead. Face it.”

“But it’s not-!”

“You seem to always have that look, when he’s around.”

“You didn’t-”

“Plus I know how much you love when he’s around Dinky.”

“Me and Naruto always play lots of games! When he brings Spike over, it's like never-ending fun!” Came the cry of the smallest of the four, causing Golden’s mouth to crack a smirk, and Derpy’s face to start resembling a tomato ripe for harvesting. Amethyst wasn’t helping her case.

“Then you have to take into account, all the secret little imaginary worlds they come up with together. What was the last one? I think it had something to do with a space adventure, with a pair of blonde bounty hunters, hmm~”

Derpy’s face couldn’t handle it, before steam shot out of her ears, causing those around her to laugh, or in Dinky’s case, look on in concern.

Taking initiative, the smallest popped open the box in her elder sister’s hands, before squealing in delight at the smaller package that fell out. Tearing it open, she grinned at the title.

Destiny/Stuck Daylight: The Harbinger's Feel

She wiggled in delight.

“Spike you’re the best!” she hugged the book to her chest, much to the amusement of those in the room, before they noticed another package fall out of the box, along with a letter.

Amethyst picked up the letter, and read it out loud to those listening, while Dinky set her book down, and looked at the smaller item.

Square shaped, and decently content-filled, she popped it open and looked at the pictures, she found within.

“Hey guys, hoped this reaches you all well. I wasn’t planning on sending out a letter so soon, but Cadance and Junior Officer Shiny thought it’d be a good idea.

They, and everypony else has been acting kind of weird, ever since I got back. Not sure why. I think it’s the hair. You’ll see what I mean.

Anyway, hope this reaches you. Your friend, Naruto. P.S. The two of them say ‘hi,’ but I think they’re doing it to mock me.”

That said, they were wondering what he meant, before they heard Dinky.

“Naruto grew out his hair? It looks really nice,”

They snapped their heads in Dinky’s direction, to see her shuffling through a couple of pictures with a smile on her face. Proceeding to look over her shoulder, they looked down, and felt their brains stop in a harsh fashion.

“...”

“...”

“...”

“I like the one with the blazer.”

All who were female, and above the age of 6, would agree, wholeheartedly as they felt their faces grow hot.

Which wasn’t the only “hot” thing in the room.

The first photo, had been tame, but nonetheless tantalizing.

Naruto stood in dark blue cargoes, a grey long sleeve, and was wearing orange gloves. All that was fine, but he looked so drastically different compared to last time, that it threw them all for a loop. He seemed to have been whipping his head around to look back at the camera, causing the long silky strands he now had to flicker in some form of light. That, combined with the seemingly very tight clothes, was one thing. The definition underneath, though, that could be seen on the other hand

“Sweet Celestia, he’s is fit.” Amethyst couldn’t help but state in a daze, the other two elder mares nodding dumfounded.

The next pictures were all of the blond in different outfits.

One had him in a form-fitting shirt with shorts, both black, and a white and gold fur-coated short jacket. He looked at the camera with a grin, before presenting them a “V” with his fingers.

Another had the blonde in a black suit, pressed and clean cut. He seemed to be wearing a tie, and was tugging on it, as Shining leaned on his side, wearing a matching one. Both of the two wearing a pair of shades, hair slicked back.

The third had Naruto and Cadance, strangely enough, in togas. Reefs in their hair, they seemed to be acting out a scene from a picture Golden Harvest may have seen once.

The last normal one held Naruto in a long sleeve orange dress shirt, and dark slacks. The top two buttons of his shirt remained undone, leaving his beginning pectorals to be showing, as well as a blue and orange necklace, Derpy had gotten him on one of his past birthdays. This one had the blonde’s ponytail slightly braided, as he looked at the camera from a lower angle, leaning on a desk prop.

Those were fine, great even, though Amethyst rumbled that she could do better.

What followed next, had them sending Dinky to go and “find” a pair of long lost socks.

The temperature in the room seemed to blast up immensely, as a blonde wearing nothing but a pair of white shorts, and a scarf. Said shorts were dangerous, very dangerous, as they revealed the “V” leading down from the changeling’s abdominals to the shorts waistband.

Mentally, all three let out a whine at this, Derpy the most, as their minds seemed to sink further beyond the gutter.

The next had Naruto mid-way through taking off his shirt, giving all the more emphasis on the blonde’s muscular torso, and abs.
 
Golden Harvest would admit, she may have drooled a bit, right then and there.
 
The final one, left a room of unconscious mares, with completely red faces. Dinky came back in, with a face of disappointment at not finding the lost sock, only to blink at the scene.
 
Going back over to the pictures on the floor, she stared at the for a moment.
 
“Is Naruto going to be a cowcolt, for next Nightmare Night? Why’s it say “I’ll give you the ride of a lifetime” underneath?”

What followed three mares waking up, was a filly with too many questions, and another fit of unconsciousness.

It was needless to say that Derpy kept THAT particular picture, under her pillow.

~TCL~

“Derpy, please, I’m sorry!”

“Go away, Naruto!” there was a slam, before a dejected Naruto came around a corner, and flopped into their couch. He long since dropped his transformation, after they had just come from outside.

Dinky, and Spike, looked on in worry, as he began to groan.

“Way to go, bug-boy, way to fu-plucking go,” he almost cursed, but remembered where he was. In a corner of the room, lay four coats, one drenched to the bone, along with a soggy hat and eyepatch. Next to the coats, were four pairs of skates.

Naruto gave the two a strained smile, before he sighed, and took a look around. Eyes landing on the wet ice-skates, and other articles of clothing, he groaned again, before standing back up.

“Guys, just...chill for a bit. I don’t think Derpy wants to see me right now,” he said, only to leave just as quickly, the kids barely nodding in confirmation before he was gone.

The two looked to one another, as the changeling left down the staircase. They could hear the flicker of flames, as he transformed right as he touched the street.

“I don’t like this,” Spike said simply, Dinky nodding next to him, with a sad expression.

“Mama wasn’t happy at all.” Spike rolled his eyes slightly. Wasn’t that an understatement.

They’d just gone ice-skating, and both the adult blondes weren’t the best at it. Naruto because he didn’t know how to, and Derpy because she was just uncoordinated. She’d made sure to tell them, as much, but Naruto had pushed her into going.

Ponies had laughed at the both of them. Naruto had brushed them off. Derpy had tried to, but there were more than her fair share of jeers. Some of them had been her peers from high school, so they knew exactly how to get under her skin.

When she tried ignoring them, they decided that getting physical was easier.

One moment of Naruto not being nearby, and they’d corralled her over to some thin ice.

No one wanted to stay after that, especially when Derpy had been laughed off the ice.

Spike snorted, a puff of dark smoke escaping his nostrils, as he remembered Naruto running off after Derpy. He remembered when Dinky had gotten off the ice, that he’d had basically enough of them being laughed at.

One large gout of flame later, they didn’t need to worry about skating on ice anymore. He remembered the feeling of smugness he’d felt upon doing so and watching the ponies scramble for it.

He then felt guilty because of the talk with Naruto after.

There’d been other ponies on that ice who hadn’t been a part of it. Not only that, but they didn’t know if anybody over there couldn’t swim.

He remembered Naruto’s words
_______________________________________________________________________________

“Life’s not fair, Spike. We can cry about it all we want, but we can’t change that.”

“So we’re just supposed to let what happened, go? Derpy could catch a cold, or something worse! They don’t care, so why should we!”

“Because two wrongs don’t make a right!”

“Well what if I don’t want to be right?!”

“Then you’re just as bad as they are. So tell me, do you want to be like them?”

“...”
________________________________________________________________________________

Dinky looked on as Spike stared into the fireplace, mind elsewhere.

She looked on at her dragon friend, as his wings twitched every now and then, before she stood up.

Spike watched her go, before looking back into the flames.

Several moments later, he began to hear sounds.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________

She simply sat there, back to the door, as she listened to Naruto shuffling away. Her mind not in its right place, as she tried to stuff down the turmoil.

“I told him, but did he listen? No, and now I looked like a fool in front of everypony.”
 
She allowed her eyes to roam as they pleased, not bothering to control them. Moving her head around the room, she let them settle on the pictures on the walls.
 
Several were of her with her family. One with Dinky and Amethyst, another with her and Dad, one with her, Golden Harvest and her sisters, and one with just her and her best female friend.
 
There were plenty others, times of when she and family could spend some time together.
 
One of the last photos she focused on, was one with her, when she was younger, along with a short-for-her-age unicorn mare. The mare was smiling, as she held the shoulders of the younger Derpy, while a small bump in her tummy was pronounced by her dress.
 
“Mom…” she wasn’t going to lie about it, losing their mother had probably been the biggest mark against her, since childhood.
 
Their father had been a wreck, but he tried to pull through for all three of them. Her, Amethyst, and the barely born Dinky.
 
Dinky knew to introduce her to ponies as her big sister, but they all knew that the filly considered her, Derpy, as her mom. Sisters they may be, but the age gap put them in different rungs, so to speak. Dinky just decided that Derpy fit the rung of both “Sister” and “Mom.”
 
She sighed, before she turned her head to the last picture, it was one that caused her to wince, due to the recent event.
 
It featured Naruto and her, the both of them wearing a uniform of the Moxy Pot, as they gave a welcoming gesture to the eating place. Naruto had come over a year ago, and well, they were down one person. It wasn’t a problem, but the blond recommended his services, for no charge, and well they had a picture to commemorate it.
 
Looking it over once more, she sighed and let her head fall to her knees, before the sound of pans and the like clanking, reached her ears.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

~Play: 18 Years by Daughtry~


He could feel the cold air biting at his outer shell, and realized it was a stupid idea to leave a house without bringing his coat.

So much for dramatic, “cool” exits. Not that anything behind his exit was supposed to be cool.
 
He sighed, releasing another frosty breath. He was thankful for the fact that, at the very least, he had worn a slightly thick long sleeve shirt. Rubbing his colorful gloved hands together, and peering down the orange top he wore, he swore silently.
 
“Why didn’t I listen?!” he knew some ponies were looking at him weird, but he didn’t care honestly, not then, and not later.
 
He rubbed the space between his eyes, before continuing on, and roaming the cold city streets. Regardless of his earlier outburst, and noting of pony passersby, there weren’t that many ponies in the streets to be noted. He could see that things had trickled since the coming of the Fall season, with an abnormally large cold front coming in.
 
“Seriously, what are those weatherponies doing?” he muttered, and he shoved his hands into his pockets, and scrunched his head lower, into the neck of the orange top. Walking on, he simply allowed the noises of Manehattan to swallow him, before he ended up once more at that oh so important park.
 
Where it all started.
 
Taking a look up at the cloudy sky, it could have been maybe evening. He remembered that they went out to ice-skate in the afternoon, so pretty much.
 
He walked down the path.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
Derpy stepped out of her room, rounding the corner to find a surprise waiting for her in the kitchen.
 
“Now just pour it into the pan. Slowly, slowly, aaannddd Done!”
 
“Thanks a lot, Spike! I’m sure Sister and Naruto will-Ma-Sis!”
 
“Huh?!”
 
What she found were a pair of children, covered slightly by flour, pouring a batch of something into what looked like a muffin tin.
 
Looking over the kitchen, she could see a couple other things were set out; A large tea kettle was set up by the stove, a bowl of jam, and some butter.
 
She looked to them in confusion, before Dinky escaped from Spike’s clutches, as he held her up to fully see the stove stop, and ran to her.
 
Embracing her mother figure, Dinky looked up at her with concerned eyes.
 
Derpy looked more than confused.
 
“What’s going on here? Dinky? Spike?” she looked over to the drake currently putting things away in the sink, before he began to wash them. He did this as if it were a practiced motion, as he and Dinky answered her.
 
“We were making some muffins for you and Naruto.” Dinky started, causing her to look down at the youngest in surprise.
 
“What?” Spike pipped in.
 
“It was really Dinky’s idea, but as soon as I saw her having trouble doing some of the things, I pitched in. I can say that neither of us want you guys fighting,” the male in the room said, as he turned on the faucet, his long sleeve scrunched up to the elbows.
 
Derpy frowned at this, causing Dinky to look up at her.
 
“I love what you guys are doing, but me and Naruto...it’s not like I hate him,” she couldn’t, she wasn’t sure if it was possible, unless he fully betrayed her.
 
“Yeah...but this isn’t just to get you guys talking, but it’s also a way to try and get Naruto apologize in a normal fashion, or at least a place to start,” Spike said back to them, his wings twitched every now and then.
 
“Huh?”  came the pegasus of the room’s confused response.
 
“Naruto...he’s the best big bro I have, not including Shining. We connect on a level I’d like to think, but when he’s in a fight with someone...he’s got a hard time trying to make things up between them. At least if their female,” Spike said, as he stopped washing the dishes to cup a hand to his chin. Never noticing the suds on his hand going to his chin.
 
Dinky giggled, and Derpy did her best to keep her lips in a thin line.
 
“I know, Naruto’s headstrong, so subtle isn’t really his forte,” they’d been friends for so long, it was hard NOT to know this about him. Biggest example? When Dinky’s birthday had come up and he was free.
 
He bought them a clown, a large pizza that could take up a table top, and the largest plush bear she’d ever seen. She was sure, that he’d done this all in one day, too.
 
His excuse?
 
_______________________________________________________________________________
 
“I couldn’t find a bigger bear, so I brought the clown. Wait, why are you laughing? Do you know how hard it is to find a clown on short notice?”
_______________________________________________________________________________
 
She sighed.
 
“But that doesn’t mean he should just force ponies along when they clearly don’t want to.” she said, causing Spike to stop, as he was finished drying the dishes. He shrugged in response.
 
“Naruto means well; he’s just got a hard time going slow with some things.” Spike replied, as she let her shoulders slump.
 
Dinky looked up at her, before she blinked.
 
“Wait, didn’t Naruto leave?” she asked, causing Spike to look at her weird.
 
“Uh, yeah? That was the whole point of doing this when they weren’t noticing Dinks.” she shook her head.
 
“No, I mean, he left without his coat,” she explained, causing the other two to blink, before their eyes widened.
 
Derpy looked back over to the living room where a set of coats were, and low and behold, there was the male blonde’s coat.
 
Looking at it, and remembering him leaving, she let go of Dinky, and walked over to it.
 
She picked up the coat, before placing it on herself, and walking to the door. She picked up a large scarf that was hanging off the back of the foyer door, and looked back to the two children in the hallway.
 
She smiled at them.
 
“I’ll be right back.”
________________________________________________________________________________
 
He walked over to the park bench, eyes focused on the road below. Stopping for a moment, his mind played images of their meeting, and he smiled at it.
 
Looking at the seating, park furniture, he saw the images of a changeling sitting on the floor, with a sleeping, pegasus mare laid on the bench.
 
He imagined the two, as they chat, the small freak out of the mare and the changeling offering a helping hand.
 
It all started with a fall, too.
 
“Oof! Owie.”
 
Yeah, just like that…?
 
His mind returned to the present, as he looked to his left, where a mare lay on the ground. Her grey wings twitched from their places on her back, coming out of a familiar looking white and red jacket.
 
The grey coated, pale yellow maned, mare sat up. Her golden eyes crisscrossing, before they chose that moment to focus in on the changeling who looked down at her with a shocked expression.
 
He quickly got down to her level.
 
“Derpy, what are you? Wait, no better yet, are you okay?” he checked her over, before sighing as he only saw a few smudges of dirt. She gave him a confused look, before noticing the small amount of frost on his exoskeleton, or the transformation’s outer shell.
 
Now that she thought about it, she looking around, she was sure this was beyond familiar. Minus the frost.
 
He saw her looking around, before he smiled.
 
“Uhm, are you okay? I didn’t mean for that to happen! I didn’t think there would be anypony out this late, and...” She looked at him in confusion, before her eyes brightened the way he liked.
 
“Mondomezza!” she announced, jumping to her hooves, scarf flopping from its place around her neck, causing it to move out of place, obscuring her vision. She was about to move to change it, before she heard a chuckle and felt it being rearranged.
 
Her eyes came free last, as Naruto untied it, and grinned at her.
 
“Oh so you DO remember.” she gave him a close eyed smile, before nodding.
 
“Of course I do, I could never forget.” Her words caused him to blush slightly, only making it more obvious against the frost covered exoskeleton of the changeling’s disguise. She looked him over, as he let out a small sneeze, before she took the scarf from his hands, and proceeded to wrap it around his neck.
 
Stepping back, she gave him a smile, as his ears went skyward before relaxing against his skull.
 
Looking at her handy work, he rose his eyebrow at her.
 
“Oh so you get to keep my coat?” she smiled at him, tongue breaching the side of her curved lips.
 
“You still deserve some form of punishment.” He frowned a bit, his mood dipping slightly.
 
“Derpy, I’m…” he tried to say, before she simply shushed him with a “Shhh” gesture.
 
“I know. Just, promise me next time, you’ll listen to me. Okay?” he looked at her, before he smiled softly.
 
“Yeah, sure.”
 
“Oh look who it is! It’s the ditz and her freaky coltfriend!”
 
“A freaky moment for a pair of them? Celestia, I want to gag.”
 
“We came out here to find that dumb lizard that gets our girls soaking wet, and we find this show?”
 
Looking to the path, they found themselves in the audience of none other than the mares who’d been giving Derpy a hard time on ice, and her subsequent ice bath.
 
The four mares, were accompanied by just as many, if not one more, stallions. Said stallions were seemingly sizing him up in that moment, before the one that spoke before turned to one of the mares.
 
“I thought you said, it was some lizard runt?” she scoffed, before crossing her arms, and pointing at them.
 
“Forget the freaky brat. It’d be easier to deal with the prey in front of us.” Naruto, hearing her words, felt himself blink before he pointed at himself.
 
“They talking about me?” Derpy frowned, trying to use some of her hair to cover her left eye.
 
“Just ignore them, we need to go bac-”
 
“No pony is going anywhere, until we get what we deserve!” Naruto gave the loud one a flat stare, before responding.
 
“I thought you did earlier, when my little buddy gave you your bath earlier. Obviously, that wasn’t it.” The leader of her little clique seemed to flinch back at this, before growling at him.
 
The stallion next to her, didn’t seem to approve of the blonde changeling’s words either. He was a big earth pony, but his run towards the blond ate up a decent amount of distance.
 
“That’s right, kick his plot!”
 
So they were all surprised, Naruto included, when the stallion was stopped. He’d gotten close, and reached his hand forward to grab the collar of the ninja’s coat, only to find his wrist seized in a painful grip.
 
Following the grip to the right of the changeling, found Derpy holding onto the stallion. Before anybody knew what happened next, said stallion was brought to the floor, before finding his arm brought harshly behind him.
 
“I try to live my life ignoring you, and you attack my friend. For somepony who loves calling me “retard,” you sure aren’t too smart yourself.” Derpy’s words barely registered to the shocked mare’s group, when they did she shouted at them.
 
“Bitch, you obviously don’t know your betters. Mace get your plot up! You wanna be a Royal Guard so much? Then get off the floor, and kick her off!” the stallion, who Naruto assumed was Mace, struggled to try and get up, only to find that Derpy had a tighter hold on him than was originally thought.
 
“I, I can’t!” Derpy looked up to Naruto, and the blonde smiled before moving over a few feet.
 
The next moment saw a stallion go flying back towards his group, and landing on his back with a groan. The bullying party looked up, to see the two blondes standing side by side.
 
Looking to try and leverage the situation in her favor, the leader mare tried to mock him.
 
“Oh wow, so you have to have a mare do all the heavy lifting, do you? Some stallion, or whatever freaky pony you-” he interrupted her.
 
“Man, you love hearing yourself talk don’t you?” she looked appalled.
 
“Don’t interrupt you dic-”
 
“And I’ve stopped caring. Look, are we gonna do this or what? It’s cold out here, so can we hurry this up? -ttebayo,” Naruto already didn’t like this mare, and she was insulting him and Derpy before?
 
He was losing both interest, and patience.
 
“Your coltfriend is currently lying on the floor, and somehow I doubt the two behind you are any more of a threat. Heck, the “lizard runt” from before would have no problem stepping all over you.” A lie. He hadn’t trained Spike to that point yet, but he was planning on it. The drake could still shoot a mean fireball and spell sword though.
 
“Mace, I don’t care anymore, kick both of their plots, RIGHT. THIS. INSTANT! You four as well, what are you standing around for?! Beat them UP!”
 
Mace got off the floor, with a shake of his head, before growling at them.
 
“You’re gonna wish you didn’t do that! I was just gonna beat up your little friend here and maybe Missy might have laid off, but now, I’m doing this for me! Araaaa!” With that said, him and the other four stallions behind him ran at them.
 
Naruto looked at the approaching all-earth pony posse, before turning to Derpy. The cross-eyed pegasus was getting into stance, before he put a hand to her shoulder and walked forward.
 
To the running stallion squad, it looked like the bug-pony had decided to take them all on, in some laughable attempt of bravado. Stupid and idiotic, yes, but they’d give him some points here. Maybe he’d get Missy to go ea-!
 
Mace choked, as the blonde male clotheslined him, causing him to flip harshly. In the time he was in the air, he could only watch in upside down vision, as the blonde systematically brought down the rest of them, before he hit the floor.
 
Naruto simply looked down at the fallen stallions with an expression closer to pity than disgust. Missy didn’t seem to be all too happy with the predicament either.
 
“He’s one freak! Get off all your asses, and beat his!” She was frenzied at this point, before Naruto simply laughed in her face.
 
“Man, you guys have some really bad marefriends, sweet Celestia. Do you ever close that mouth of yours?” he made mocking motions with his hands, incensing her and her posse to no end.
 
To put the final nail in the coffin, he reached down into his pockets, before retrieving his badge.
 
“I’ll have you know, that as a registered Royal Guard, I have all the right to put you all under arrest for attempted violence against an authority figure.” All eyes widened, as he flashed them the certified badge of the Royal Guard, a small gold seal floated above it.
 
Celestia’s seal.
 
“T-t-that’s not-!”
 
“Not real? Oh you of little intelligence! Do you not recognize the Cutie Mark of your own ruler? And you on the floor, I can make it pretty hard for you if you wanted to get into the Royal Guard. I wonder what Captain Sail Wind, Morse Code, or Angle Feather would think of ponies with a record, hmm?” He saw two ponies’ eyes widened, one of them being this Mace fellow.
 
“Y-you know-”
 
“Of course I know the captain! I’m from Canterlot, and in the Royal Guard! Naruto Uzumaki, Junior Officer of the Royal Guard!” Mace’s eyes widened even further, before he the rest of the stallions scrambled to get off the floor and away from the blonde.
 
“Get back here Mace!”
 
“Sorry sweet cheeks, we’re through!”
 
“Arggh!”
 
“Now what to do with you three, hmm?” they heard a voice near them, causing all four mares to jump. They turned to find the blonde changeling standing there as if nothing had even happened.
 
Buffing his nails mockingly, Naruto continued.
 
“A preconceived attack on a minor is one thing, a recognized and acknowledged attack on an individual pony is another, but both together? I can’t get you lifetime in prison, but I’m definitely sure that’ll net you some time in the local jail. I’d say, I don’t know, three months at the least.” His words caused them to freeze, before the girls behind Missy started to run.
 
“We’re not a part of this! It was all her idea!”
 
“Nooooo! Missy’s the one that planned all this, I just wanted a movie!”
 
All said and done, Missy was the only one left on the bullying side.
 
Naruto was ready to go over, and hammer this nail into the coffin some more, but was stopped by a grey hand. Looking over, he saw Derpy give him a shake of the head, before she turned to Missy.
 
“You can call me all the names you want, but in the end you’re the only one who’s gonna be left all alone. Bye Missy.” Her piece said, she began to walk off, Naruto following behind her.
 
Left alone, Missy simply growled at everything falling apart around her. She screamed to the heavens, before she heard another laugh behind her.
 
Looking to see who would dare do so, she froze when she caught sight of that freak blonde from before.
 
Naruto’s clone finished his laugh, before he narrowed his gaze on her. The next instance found Missy’s personal bubble broached.
 
“I’m going to make one thing clear. Go after any one of my friends, family or precious ones, and I will personally be the one to bring your ass in. And believe me, I won’t make it pleasant.” He emphasized his point by allowing his arm to lash out sideways, away from her. A nearby light pole slid sideways, before it fell to the ground beside its base.
 
He gave her one more glare that froze her heart, before disappearing into the shadow of evening.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
Naruto blinked once the memory hit him, and he complained about “AWOL clones” under his breath.
 
Derpy looked to him in confusion, before Naruto shook his head in the negative. She shivered slightly, remembering that one, she had been cold dunked earlier, and two, she gave the scarf to Naruto. Her neck did feel decidedly colder than before.
 
Naruto watched her rub at her neck out of the corner of his eye.
 
Derpy rubbed the nape of her neck once more, before she found a body far closer to her than it was before. Not only that, but there was a fluffy warm object now encircling her neck. Looking up, she found Naruto had closed the distance between them, and had part of the scarf around her own neck.
 
Naruto was looking forward, when she looked at him. He was slightly leaning to her direction, considering he was just a few inches taller than her in this transformed state.
 
“You seemed cold, but there’s only so much scarf to go around. Plus, you ARE warm, and I could use the warmth.” He gave a playful grin. Her cheeks heated up, but she didn’t stop him. She went so far as to make sure her arms had a secure hold on his own.
 
This left two blushing blondes to walk back to her house.
 
It wasn’t bad, though. Not at all.
 
~TCL~
 
When they got back to her house, Derpy could smell the muffins from the door.
 
“Mmm.” Naruto grinned at the enthusiastic expression on Derpy’s face.
 
“Somepony wants a baked good, no?” She nodded her head in hunger, the scarf making the action looked far cuter than it should have been.
 
“Welcome baby bear, and Naruto-my don’t we look comfy? Hmm~?" Out came Rolling Barrel, a muffin in hand, before he took notice of the pair’s current circumstance with a wiggly eyebrow.
 
The two almost-adults felt their cheeks burn under the question, before being shuffled inside.
 
They found themselves in the eyes of Amethyst, home from school, and the smell coming from within the kitchen.
 
They walked forward, to enjoy a day with their families.
 
~TCL~
 
“Look deep inside of you. Don’t let anything interrupt you from your focus, and allow yourselves to be carried by the ‘rhythm’ of your magic.”
 
He walked along several wooden poles, put there by himself, as he encircled his current “students”.
 
Each of those he circled sat on a stump, or a mat in some cases. His own eyes closed, as he split his focus in three directions.
 
One on the pole he was on, another on the next pole, and the third on the “center” he had to circle around. He tasted the emotions of slight irritation, serenity and calmness radiating off each of them.
 
Derpy sat on a stump in front of the pole he was currently passing, and he was forever thankful that his eyes were closed.
 
Should they be open, he’d be too distracted if he looked at her even once. The feeling of “weather” was something he was getting good at taking in.
 
Next, he felt the feeling of “flame” and nodded his head at Spike, and the slight irritation waving off of him. He too was on a stump.
 
The last two were his best, and considering who one of them was, that was kind of funny.
 
Shining Armor, and Dinky sat next to each other, Shining on stump, and Dinky on a mat.
 
Standing on one more pole, he spoke once more.
 
“Okay guys, you can relax now.”
 
His words were like magic themselves, as each of the five let out a deep breath, with Shining recovering the quickest, and Derpy right after him.
 
Those outside of this little “Session” now approached the group with curiosity. Naruto could see the princess on the outreach of the Canterlot garden, looking on at Spike with an uncertain frown.

“I’m still trying to wrap my head around it, but what you’re doing for Spike and Derpy...it’s fascinating!” commented Twilight, as she, Trixie and Moondancer stood back by a tree. This had become their de-facto meeting place of sorts. It had been a long while, since coming here had become routine to those who lived in Canterlot of their little group.
 
“Trixie wishes she could join, but alas Sparkle would drive the rest of her friends to tears, should Trixie not be nearby to stop her ramblings.” Twilight gave the most ego-driven of them all the stink eye, before she smirked an un-Twilight like smirk.
 
“I don’t seem to remember that being the case when we had that science experiment. Oh, what was it again? Oh, that’s right, turn the ingredients into bread!” Trixie looked off to the side with a nervous cough.
 
“T-Trixie still passed.”

“It came alive!”
 
Moondancer finished writing something on her piece of parchment, before it went into the backpack on her back, and she contributed to the conversation.
 
“I thought she passed because the teacher said, and I quote ‘It’s a magic marvel-Ahhh!’ right before he was attacked?”
 
“See, this is why Trixie favors Moondancer. This is why she’s her favorite rival.”
 
“Oh please.”
 
Naruto merely looked at them with a smile, before turning back to his “group”, and doing his damndest to ignore just how curvy Derpy’s rump was.

There was nothing more sinful than a mare with that kind of rump, in spandex shorts.

He mustered up all the ironclad fortitude his mind would lend him, even as Derpy came his way with that cute smile of hers that drove him crazy.
 
“S-so yeah, good work guys. Shining, Pa would be proud.” The recently turned 21-year-old grinned.
 
“Oh yeah!”
 
“Dinky, I’m beyond surprised by the fact that you seemed to be so good at this. I’m just, I don’t even know the word for it. I’m just, wow.” the filly giggled in glee.
 
“Derpy, you’re getting there. I’m definitely starting to feel the flow of magic coming off you, for sure.” she smiled as she slipped on her blue and white track jacket, covering up the tight tank top, and clearing Naruto’s mind of that particular distraction.
 
‘Now just keep your eyes off her ass, Naruto. You’ll be home free by then.’ he thought, as he smiled at Derpy. Turning to his last student, Naruto saw the dragon frowning.
 
Spike looked down at his claws in confusion, before letting out an irritated breath. Naruto was going to go over, and speak with him, but he was saved the distance, as Celestia made her way over to the dragon herself.
 
He saw them talk for a bit, before she nodded her head at him, with him reciprocating.
 
The next moment, they disappeared in a flash of teleport.
 
Seeing that, he turned his attention back to those who were here. Seeing Shiny off with his little sister, and her friends, he turned his attention on Derpy and her little sister. Making sure to keep only her front in view, he spoke to them.
 
“I’m happy you guys could come here, I wasn’t expecting you being able to, but I’m happy you did. Now I just have to wonder where Amethyst went off to.” his question would be answered soon enough, as he heard a pair of familiar, irritating, voices.
 
Irritating, because one of them just happen to be Blueblood.
 
“I said, I’m not interested.”
 
“But if you would just give me a chance-!”
 
“Nope!”
 
Coming out into the garden, stomping away from a dejected looking, white unicorn with blonde mane.
 
Those in the garden simply rolled their eyes, as the pink unicorn made it over to her family.
 
Giving Naruto a flat look, the teenager ignoring the slumping unicorn she left behind.
 
“Can we please go now? Canterlot really does lose its novelty, once you start dealing with the ponies.” she scoffed, as she looked to her sisters.
 
Naruto gave a nervous chuckle, as she said this.
 
“If you’re sisters are fine with, well get the stuff from your hotel room, and I’ll take you guys home.” Naruto stated, getting a nod from Derpy and Amethyst, while Dinky let out a whine. Naruto gave the smallest Doo a head-rub.
 
“Time to go home, Dinky.”

~TCL~
 
Seeing them off at the station was always a slightly sad affair, but they knew better.
 
“It was nice coming here Naruto. You should be sure to come by soon, I’m sure dad, and Golden wouldn’t mind seeing you again.” Amethyst said, as she gave the blonde a hug, to which he reciprocated.
 
“Make no mistake, I’ll be down there faster than you guys would even know.” Oh they would be surprised the next time they saw him.
 
Letting her go, he found his mid-section engulfed by the body of a small filly.
 
“Hehe, later Naruto! I’m still sad, that Spike won’t be able to see us off, but I’m sure what the princess has to say to him is important.” Naruto smiled down at her, before giving her a hug. Pulling back, he tapped her once on the nose.
 
“I’m sure he misses you too. If anything, I bet he wishes he-” he was interrupted by a small swirl of flame appearing in front of him, before a letter drop out of it.
 
Looking at it, Dinky picked it up and read it, before she smiled. Another swirl of flame later, there was a book deposited into her waiting hands.
 
Looking at it, Naruto smirked.

“Didn’t take Spike for someone who had that a great timing.” nodding her head, Dinky skipped off to her elder sister, leaving Derpy alone with the blonde.
 
Looking to Derpy, he grinned, before spreading his arms wide and catching her hug, with his own.
 
She hugged him close, and he her, before they separated, just enough to look at each other.
 
“Thanks for having us here, Naruto. For the hotel, and the tour.” he nodded his head to her.
 
“No problem, I’m always will to bring you out here, when you want to.” she frowned slightly, and shook her head.

“You don’t have to do that; you know? I’m happy just having this few moments to spend here,” with you were the words she wanted to say, but they failed her in that moment.
 
He understood though, but just as badly he couldn’t say the right words either.

“I get it, it’s just,” I always want to see you, “I’m sure I want you to enjoy yourself."

With you? Always, “Then next time...We’ll plan something for us to do. When you’re not at the Guard, and I have time.”
 
They pulled together one more time, before they heard the train sound off.
 
“All aboard!”
 
Looking over to the Conductor, they looked back to one another and, reluctantly, let go.
 
Separating slowly, Derpy stopped for a moment, before coming over and leaping with a small flutter of her wings to give him a kiss to the cheek.
 
Both parties, pretty much flushed in the face, she zipped off into the train.
 
Standing there frozen, as he watched the train roll off.
 
“The deities above, will you two just kiss already?!”
 
He ignored Shining’s exclamation, even as the unicorn and Cadance came out from around the corner.
 
“Naruto~!” the princess of love whined. “That was the perfect moment, to pull her back, hold her in your arms, and start, you know!” she made mad gestures with her hands, as if words were not enough to convey her meaning.
 
Naruto for his part, just felt his face burn even worse.
 
~TCL~

It had been half a year since he last saw them, and yet, now, with this piece of paper in his hands, he felt forever closer.
 
Naruto walked the halls of Royal Guard HQ, an area just below the castle.
 
Were anypony to look at the changeling, they’d see a grinning former ninja holding a couple of papers.
 
Catching a look at the top of them, the words “Apartment Invoice”.
 
~TCL~
 
She looked down at the bottle in her hands, the alcohol inside had been some of the strongest she could find. She pulled out a rag, before taking a breath and stuffing it inside it.
 
She ignored the falling snow, as she walked her way to the target place. She didn’t care anymore, and stopped.
 
The streets were close to barren, mostly from the fact that snow piled high on the streets. In front of her stood that damnable mare’s house. She remembered seeing that retard leave with that freaky coltfriend of hers, and decided now would be the best time to do this.
 
She pulled back, and launched the bottle forward, and left the scene without a second thought.
 
That night, Missy burned a building to the ground.
 
~TCL~
 
They walked side by side, in the cold weather. She looked down at her gloves, before looking up at the sky, in thought.
 
He looked over to her, before looking up as well, as they stopped in the snow. Their hoofprints leading up from their walk, to the front of an intersection.
 
“Naruto?” the changeling at her side, turned his head her way, his orange cap bobbing with the motion.
 
“Yeah?” she looked slightly flushed before, she brought herself a little bit closer, and entwined their arms with one another’s. The ninja’s face exploded into blue, before he took their entwinement one step further, and did so with their fingers.
 
They could both feel the heat on their faces, before Naruto tugged Derpy a little bit further ahead.
 
“Come on, I want to show you the thing I was talking about.” he stated, causing them both move forward.
 
They’d been walking for a bit, she noticed, and yet it was strange that it was towards the more pricy areas of Manehattan.
 
They’d crossed the crosswalk, just as there was a blaring sound. Naruto felt his ears prick, as they turned their heads to the cross-walk, and saw a quintet of ponies, in uniform rushing off towards the direction they just walked from.
 
Derpy didn’t know why, but she felt something stop her cold, as she watched the ponies pass them. Her eyes trailing the blaring red and yellow aura of the unicorn in the middle.
 
Naruto felt something was wrong as well, as he looked up, and saw smoke.
 
‘What?’
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
She coughed, as more of the bad smoke entered her lungs. She tugged at the arm of her father, the stallion coughing out more of the bad air than she.
 
“Dad! Please, we have to go!” Dinky cried, as the fire from the kitchen set off the smoke alarms, making her ears ring. She saw her father, Rolling Barrel, crawling to keep up with her.
 
They’d both been asleep when the fiery destruction had begun to spread. Being in the room at the end of the hall hadn't helped matters, especially when they had a hard time grabbing the burning doorknob.
 
“It’s oka-ergh, kuff! Just keep low to the ground baby-girl.” she nodded, as tears reached the corners of her eyes; both from the smoke, and the despair of the situation.
 
She did the only thing she could, and tried to listen, but when a support beam came falling down in front of the area by the kitchen…
 
“Mama! Mama!” She cried for her mother figure.
 
“Mama! Spike! Naruto!” she cried for those, that she wished would save them both in their time of need.
 
She looked down at her right hand, and looked at the marks on it.
 
It had been something her and Spike had tried to copy from the books they’d read.
 
These sigils were supposed to be capable of many things. Speaking through their minds so they could talk whenever, empowering one another so they could handle all the bad guys and last…
 
She focused on the words form the book, some childish part of wishing at that very moment for those words to be true. The more realistic part knew that it was fake. That those imaginary worlds were just that, imaginary.
 
In that moment though, she could only believe in those words.

“Shut(Fill). Shut(Fill). Shut(Fill). Shut(Fill). Shut(Fill).”
____________________________________________________________________________________________
 
His mind called him to a stop, as he handled the scrolls in his care. His body froze in the motions, and dropped the parchments all over the floor.
 
“Spike?”
 
He didn’t hear her, all he could do was stare forward, before something called his mind to his right hand.
 
Those magic seals, that he and Dinky had painted on the back of their hands, had been more for make-believe than any real reason. They both knew that they couldn’t do what they did in the books, though they entertained the thoughts of making their own, one day.
 
Twilight had even said, it wouldn’t be THAT impossible for something like it too exist!
 
Like in the books, they had drawn them on their hands, but Dinky had said something...interesting.
______________________________________________________________________________

“I want to be able to summon you! That way, we can always talk to each other, and if I ever need help, you can save me right?”

“Of course! I’m a dragon, and dragons are big, and strong, and noble, too!”

“Yay!”
______________________________________________________________________________
 
In lieu of that idea, they made a single change.
 
Instead of Spike having sigils like the “Masters” in the book, he’d have the magic circle for the summoning.
 
It was so, that he could be called whenever, but it was fake, ever still.
 
So why…
 
“Why is it glowing?” he stared at the flickering marks, on his hand. His mind tried to go through all the reasons for it, but they only settled on one.
 
Dinky was in trouble!
 
His breath quickened slightly, and he ignored the sounds of the others getting worried.
 
What could he do, what could he do?!
 
He thought back to the books, and looked for anything in his memory.
 
“Spike!”he heard it in his mind, and in that moment he settled on an image.
 
An image of a knight kneeling to an unsuspecting “Master”.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
She casted her teleportation spell to activation, almost as soon as Twilight had come into her chambers speaking of something wrong with Spike.
 
What she came upon though, was something she didn’t expect.
 
Spike sat kneeling in the middle of Twilight’s room, his eyes closed, as he held a hand to his chest. Stranger still, around him, various random numbers of the books flipped open, before the words from certain pages flew into the air, and swirled around her adopted son.
 
“Spike!” she called out to him.
 
He looked up at her slowly, and gave her a small smile.
 
“I have to help her mom.” his words said, he closed his eyes, and spoke a phrase.
 
“I ask of you…
 
The books floating scripts flew faster, and faster. Lightning sprouted from one specific tome, and bounced to another, before settling above Spike himself.
 
...are you my Partner?”
 
Then the next instant he was gone.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
He’d already scooped up Derpy, before he even thought of it. They bounced over the tops of roofs, as he moved faster, and faster, towards the location of the burning home.
 
“No, no, no, no…” he could hear Derpy muttering, as her eye, not hidden by an eyepatch, shivered with tears, her grip on him alike to iron clasps.
 
He felt his own heart tear at the sight, before he narrowed his eyes forward, and they blurred across the rooftops.
 
The next instance, found them in front of a familiar location, that now lay on fire. Ponies lay out on the sidewalks, some in tears, other slightly burned, and others calling for help.
 
Yet, she didn’t see them.
 
Derpy fell to her knees, as her mind failed to process what she was seeing. Her house, her home, was on fire, and her little sister. Her father, and her baby girl…
 
“Derpy, stay here.” Naruto didn’t even think for a moment, his mind too far gone to allow the sight before him to mutter his senses.
 
He could still feel them in there, and he’d be damned if he couldn’t do anything.
 
“Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!”
 
The next instance, there was a hail of blondes, who burst into the home. All transformations forgotten in the wake of the flames.
 
They surged around and into the burning home. They moved in groups in hopes of mitigating the destruction of most of them, before allowing their bodies to be coated in an orange yellow flame.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
Naruto, the original, burst into the center of the house, eyes frantically moving every which way, before they settled on a broken down beam. He could hear something, coughing!
 
“Dinky!  Rolling!”
 
“Naruto!” Wait, that sounded like…
 
No time, no thinking.
 
He moved through the burning living room, before coating his hand in ravaging wind chakra. He sliced through the wood, and moved forward in the same motion, eyes going down the hallway, before they landed on a triplet of figures.
 
“Spike!” he lunged forward, as he saw the dragon child, with his wings extended over the fallen forms of two familiar ponies. The drake didn’t look too good, as he coughed up another lungful of smoke, but he still shakily raised his head up to the blonde before giving him a shaky smile.
 
“I saved them, ugh!” his form shuttered, and above him a section of the ceiling began to fall.
 
In that moment, Naruto’s mind didn’t even run through the number of options he could use to save the trio. It simply settled on something that would protect them, keep them safe, and most of all, get them out of these flames.
 
I that next instant, before falling into unconsciousness, he felt something large, wrap around his form; Lifting him, and those underneath him away from harm, and danger, before curling around them in protection.
 
Something large, and scaly.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
Derpy still didn’t register as multiple blonde shot out of the flames, before dispersing into clouds on impact with the ground outside. Left behind were the slightly scorched forms of ponies, of varying ages.
 
None of them were her family, nor her best male friend.
 
“Derpy!” she heard the call of somepony, who was it...Amethyst?
 
She felt arms wrap around her form, as her little sister cried tears, of slight relief. Coming up behind her was Golden Harvest, who looked at the fire in shock, even as more blondes shot out of it.
 
By some point, every pony had gone quiet, even as the flame s burned and no blonde came out.
 
‘No, no no no no no...’ She wouldn’t accept this, no, not at all.
Yet, it was in the quiet of this burning fire, that something did ring out.
 
“!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
 
Something that blew away the flames, in a rapid forceful fashion, before going silent.
 
Her ears rung, as did a couple other ponies, yet even still, her eyes focused on the now barely flaming building. The front of it bulged, before bursting outwards in an eruption of burning wood, ash and cinder.
 
The smoking object rolled for a few moments, before coming to a stop, right as the building collapsed in on itself.
 
Most stayed silent, as they eyed the large oval shaped object, dressed in smoke.
 
Then it unfurled, and large extensions burst from its backside and blew away the smoke.
 
A dragon. A purple dragon that stood tall, and heads over those around the site of its crash. It curled in on itself slightly, allowing its eyes to adjust, before it focused in on her.
 
Blue eyes met a golden one, before it leaned down, and gently opened its arms out.
 
Releasing three bodies, that had been tucked away within its hold.
 
She felt her breath hitch, as the forms of her father and sister/daughter fell out of its clutches, along with the confusing form of Spike.
 
Just then the fireponies came, and the dragon flashed yellow, before out came a familiar blonde in charred clothing.
 
He gave her a lazy grin, before he too fell.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
When he came too, Spike found his eyes full of nothing but white. He felt the world had become some sort of blurry vision, he couldn’t comprehend.
 
He could hear something muffled coming from the side of him, somewhere.
 
“H...ine..princ...Smo...in his lungs.”
 
His mind,  addled as it was with unsure thoughts and processes, went back to one thing. The one thing he could remember before waking up here.
 
“The fire!” he sat up in a flash, before he coughed harshly, his hand going to his throat in protest. He wasn’t sure who passed him the water, all he knew was that he saw the blurry form of the cup, and got some pills with it.
 
“At your leave Prin-Ms. Sunny Daze” Spike’s eyes snapped open at that, nearly spitting out his water, before he turned to the clearing image of a pink pony, with shiny yellow hair.
 
Emerald reptilian eyes met a unicorn’s dark purple hue, before he looked down to his sheets. He crumpled the sheets in his grasp, before speaking.
 
“H-hey mom.”
 
“Spike, look at me.” he did as instructed, and was hit the full power of a mother’s worried state.
 
While her disguise was seemingly impeccable, he could see through it somewhat. The small amount of lines running down the contours of her nose, to the scrunched muzzle.
 
“Mom, please I needed to…. Dinky…” he muttered, causing “Sunny” to look at him with concerned eyes.
 
“Spike, you understand that what you did...I was so worried,” he looked up slowly, seeing her closer than before, and watching the expressions she made, made him lunge out towards her.
 
He wrapped his arms around her midsection, and she allowed his face to press into her stomach, before his shoulders shook.
 
Enveloped him in her arms, and held him close, as he cried the fear away in her blouse.
 
~TCL~
 
Naruto moved away from the door, Twilight in tow, before placing a hand on her shoulder, and leading them back to the others.
 
Coming back to the waiting room, Twilight ran to her mother, Shining and Cadance, before quietly telling them all of what happened. Naruto moved back to another hallway, though not before catching eyes with Cadance and Shining Armor and getting a nod,
 
Throwing one back, he continued his way down the hallway, mindful of any passing doctors, nurses or families. He ignored any possible looks his true appearance could garner at the moment, as he made his way to one door in particular.
 
Knocking on it once, he heard a muffled “Come in”, before entering.
 
Closing the door behind him, he looked at the scene of two hospital beds, one of which held a grown earth pony stallion bearing a few bandages, and the other holding a little unicorn filly. By the beds, in between them on a chair, was a mulberry grey pegasus mare. Her crisscrossed eyes revealed for all the world to see, as she looked over the form of the younger occupant.
 
If he looked to the right of the door, he would see the sleeping form of Amethyst Star, and Golden Harvest, the unicorn and earth pony slumped into their seats. He grabbed the third chair by the wall, and brought it over to Derpy’s own, in between the beds. Sitting down, he simply listened to the beeps of monitors, and the drips of IV’s.
 
He could see a pair of masks on the faces of both of the occupants. Every moment they breathed, there would be the expulsion of some blackened smog that flew down a tube into a glass orb in the middle of the two beds, and gathered in the glass sphere.
 
Looking away from the glow around the masks, he turned to Derpy, her coat was matted underneath the eyes. Her mane was disheveled from lack of care, and her coat was a duller shade. That said, she was better than she was when they first got here, and he let his eyes wander over to the table in between the beds.
 
On it lay a bottle of medicine. Medicine that he’d remembered sending down here some time ago, that now lay empty and tipped over.
 
Turns out that the smoke inhalation would have been a lot worse for Dinky without it. Spike and Rolling Barrel, were a dragon and earth pony, respectively; Regardless of their age, their constitutions were far better, and more built.
 
Dinky was a unicorn, and a young one at that, she was far more susceptible to dangers of the invasive kind.
 
Derpy seemed to just register him, and he allowed her to lean into him, as they looked over the two patients.
 
She pushed herself as far as she could into his shoulder, and the muttered “Thanks you”s, hadn’t lost their strength, even now a few days later. He simply allowed her to, she’d been here for the whole stay, up since the beginning.
 
He remembered going off, and telling her boss the news, and he let her off for however long she needed, with the blonde monarch changeling offering to sub in, if needed.
 
“...” he heard her muffle something into his shoulder, and turned his attention away from his thoughts.
 
“The doctor says, that they’ll be alright. That come a few days’ time, they’ll be capable of going home by the end of the week.” he listened and smiled at the good news, but felt it fall from his face as Derpy’s own visage still held a frown. She sighed at his expectant look.
 
“We still don’t have anywhere to live, Naruto. Golden said she’d be able to hold up with us, but I’ve seen her place,” they both had. One time, he’d spent the whole day with her and Derpy, just chilling out on the orange maned pony’s couch.
 
Naruto looked at her for a moment, before he grinned.
 
“I have a feeling that that won’t be as bad, as you think.” she looked at him confused, but he simply shook his head.
 
“Remember that thing I wanted to show you?” she gave him a confused look, before he unfurled a roll of paper from his pockets.
 
Looking it over, she looked up to him in disbelief.
 
“You bought an apartment in Manehattan? But I thought you lived in,” he nodded his head.
 
“Just because I live in Canterlot, doesn’t mean I can’t live here. I can just as easily take some missions around the area of Manehattan. Before I couldn’t do that, but now I’ve got a few notches on my belt, and such I can take some solo assignments.” she still looked conflicted.
 
“But, you can’t hold all of us. Surely not,” He blinked at her, before showing her the paper again, and then pulling out another piece of paper.
 
Holding them together, in front of her, she ran her crossing eyes over them, and blinked.
 
He held onto her again, as she let out another stream of “Thank you”s into his shoulder.
 
~TCL~
 
“Whoa.”
 
“Whoa.”
 
“Whoa.”
 
“Hah, “whoa” indeed, come on in gals, I actually still need to check this place out, before I rent out any of the apartments.”
 
They’d spent the most of the next day, actually at the hospital. Checking on Rolling, Dinky and Spike, before leaving in the late evening.
 
Now, they stood in front of a large building in the more expensive areas of Manehattan.
 
Taking out a pair of keys, Naruto opened up the front, and went inside. Following after, Amethyst, Golden and Derpy looked around at the interior of the first floor, before seeing Naruto waiting by an elevator.
 
“Going up?” he said with a grin.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
They walked around the spacious room, eying the large amount of area there was to move around in.
 
“Naruto, this place is sweet! I see like, two bathrooms in this apartment alone, and three bedrooms. I didn’t even know there could even be a room like this in an apartment!” Amethyst’s words caused the blonde to buff the end of his digits in pride.
 
“That’s because you won’t, at least not until you hit some of the really pricy places. I had the this, and an adjacent apartment room, put together. Breaking the wall down, and just having some circuitry moved around, here and there. Remodeling the rest of it, until it fit my needs,” he said to the pink unicorn teen, before they both heard the sounds of wonder from the kitchen area.
 
“Oh my gosh, I could fit a good amount of juicers in here!”
 
“There’s a good looking view from the balcony, too!”
 
“Oh my gosh!” the two in the living room snickered, as they heard Derpy and Golden, freak out at the apartment.
 
“I still can’t believe you own these apartments now, Naruto!” he saw Derpy come back into the room, Golden Harvest right behind her.
 
“Yeah, well, I was gonna have to move out of my old place anyway. Didn’t want to take up too much space at Shining’s parents’ house. Besides, I don’t mind Manehattan that much.”
 
“The upkeep for this place, is gonna cost a bit of bits though.” Naruto gave her a smirk; he could also see Derpy giving a big grin as well.
 
“Oh ye of little knowledge. I’m planning on doing all the stuff for this place. I’ll usually come back at the minimum four times a month, to keep things running.” Golden and Amethyst looked at him in confusion.
 
“Uh, Naruto? You can be as good with your hands as you want, but you’re still only one guy.”
 
He grinned wider once more, before crossing his fingers.
 
The next instance, two pairs of eyes became audience to a group of ten blonde monarchs.
 
“You were saying?” they all said in unison, snickering at the wide eyed expressions on the mares faces, before the original dispersed his clones.
 
Looking closer at them all, Naruto felt his eyebrow raise, as he saw their faces begin to turn bright shades of red, the likes of which would leave a tomato jealous.
 
“Uh, girls? Hello? Anypony there?” his words held no effect, as the three mares remained daze.
 
Ever oblivious to their thoughts going to the gutter, as they remembered a certain photo of the blonde before them.
 
‘Oh dear’ he was forever unaware of the triplet of thoughts running between them.
 
~TCL~
 
~Play: Kingdom Hearts Dearly Beloved (Vose Remix)~

 
Manehattan night had fallen, and with it Naruto couldn’t help but think about mares currently sleeping in the bed of the enhanced apartment.
 
He remembered them going to the city, to get some temporary clothes, that they would change into at the apartment. Naruto’s being the only one that had the water running at the moment in the building, they took turns, before coming to the sleeping arrangements.
 
It wasn’t even a suggestion at that point, Naruto had just as quickly let the girls have the bedrooms of their choosing, before taking his place on the couch in the living room.
 
He was laying on the couch the long way, with only a pair of orange shorts on, leaving his upper half open to the world.

Man did the girls turn red, when he came out of the shower, and he still didn’t get why.
 
He looked up, in the darkness of the room, before looking over to one of the windows on the far end. Seeing as his remodeled apartment was a somewhere in the higher levels of the building, the very top, he had an okay view of the Manehattan. As it was right now though, the window was one of three that let in some moonlight.
 
Thinking less about it, he was about to turn over to get some sleep, before he could hear the sounds of hoofsteps.
 
Turning his head to the right, he saw the shadowed form of Derpy standing nervously by the couch armrest where his head lay. She was dressed in dark blue pajamas, with light blue hem lining.
 
Looking up at her, he smiled, before getting up, startling her slightly. He patted the area, next to him, and waited for her to sit down. Once seated, they stayed like that for a moment. Minds probably running through all that happened, in the span of a week.
 
The fire, the hospital, then the apartment, and now here.
 
Naruto looked up at the ceiling, and wondered all the way back to the beginning.
 
A simple changeling cursing his failure at love in the center of a park. A mare who was coming back from a bad experience with her co-workers. Both slightly buzzed, and meeting under the most unusual of circumstances.
 
He jumped slightly, when he felt her leaning on his shoulder, before relaxing. He saw that she held the end of his long strand of hair in her hands. He’d decided to keep the hair, only because Cadance kept saying things about how he didn’t change up his style that often.
 
She let her fingers comb through the tresses, as they flowed around her hand. He could feel several emotions running around the air between them.
 
Slight fear, anxiety, relief, a smidge of uncertainty, and…
 
He closed his eyes, as he focused on that last emotion.
 
Love.
 
He didn’t react when she let the tresses fall from her hand. He simply let his eyes open, before they turned to focus on her face, which was turned towards his own.
 
It was a closing of the distance between them, that brought their lips together. Several thoughts ran between them at that moment.
 
[Would they be okay?]
 
[Would there be pain in their future?]
 
[Could they live the life they wanted, together?]
 
More than several questions of such nature, arose between them in that moment. Yet, as he felt her body press more into his, and his own moving to meet hers. Even as they both knew not of what the future held, one thought held true between them.
 
[We’ll be fine, as long as we have one another.]
 
The night ended on a note, of a many new loves across Equestria.
 
And one specifically between two blondes, who’d found their other half in one another.
 
_____________________________________________________________________________
 
“Because I love you!”
_____________________________________________________________________________
 
“Did you know, there was somepony who loved me, once?” he muttered the words, but she heard them all the same.
 
“Hmm? What happened to them?” she held onto him, and he her, as they rocked slightly from side to side.
 
“I never really got to know that person, as well as maybe I should have. She was “weird”, in a good way, but I never gave her chance, but in the end she loved me the most. I chased that away with my ignorance, and in the end, only learned of it before coming here. With her protecting me,” he tightened his hold on the grey mare, who simply let him.
 
“I would say, I failed at love once, and dreaded ever getting the chance to do so again.” she shifted against him, before looking him in the eyes, as well as she could. She smiled at him, with that smile that made his heart skip a beat. The smile that made him want to do everything in this world, and the next over, to keep it around for the rest of his days.
 
“It sounds like I should thank her. That I get to meet you, to know you, to fall in love with you. I thank her from the bottom of my heart.” hearing those words, brought his heart nearly to burst, and he held her close as he felt a few tears fall from his eyes.
 
He wouldn’t allow himself to lose love for a second time. He’d hold onto this feeling, and protect it, for the rest of his life.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Cadance simply looked up at the sky from the rooftop of Shining’s apartment. Her horn shone with an ephemeral light. Shining lay asleep in the bed inside, and she would be quick to join him in a moment, but she had to come out here, and just listen.
 
She heard many things. So many of them wondrous sounds, and others destructive ones. Yet…
 
She smiled, as the wind picked up and blew her own tresses of yellow, pink and light purple hair.
 
“Congratulations, Naruto Uzumaki and Derpy Hooves.” she felt that magic in her horn finally die down, and walked back inside, to her own love.
 
~TCL~
 
Dinky felt her eyes flicker, as she tried to bring them open. She wasn’t sure where she was, but her tummy hurt and her eyes were really itchy.
 
Finally getting them to open, she saw blurry whiteness, and heard a muffled beeping. She tilted her head slightly to her left, and saw a blurry form of colors on an object of white.
 
She felt like the colors were familiar, but she couldn’t place it.
 
There was a muffled “click”, as a, just as muffled, whining squeal pervaded the room.
 
Her bleary eyes slowly moved over to the sound, and they caught sight of a blurry grey and pale yellow blob.
 
Her eyes blinking away the blurriness some more, she could see the shape was a pegasus, with an eyepatch. The pony whose form gave her the strength to actually try speaking.
 
“Ma...ma?” the blob looked startled, before it rushed to her side, and she felt herself engulfed by a familiar warmth.
 
~TCL~
 
Two days later, Rolling had been checked out of the hospital, much to his family’s happiness. Though it was much to his, Golden’s, Amethyst’s shock as well as Dinky’s glee, that they found out Naruto and Derpy had gotten together.
 
It hadn’t even been something the two told them, but more that they found out.
 
They’d been checking out Naruto’s apartment, after he’d given them the rundown on what he planned, and where they would stay.
 
For the most part they’d all been lazing around, before Derpy suggested that Naruto should buy some new furniture, and they travelled all over Manehattan, doing so.
 
It came as a surprise, that as they shopped Naruto and Derpy held hands. It came as shock, when the two would be so touchy-touchy. Not necessarily in a bad way, but it was odd when two ponies, or a pony and a changeling in this case, were so free with one another. Especially when they weren’t even in a relationship.

The final kicker was when they’d been carrying, wll more like Naruto had been with those clones of his (Rolling still couldn’t comprehend that.), and Derpy had stated she was going to zip on over to work to tell them she’d be in the next week.
 
That had been all fine and dandy, until she laid one on the blonde, who didn’t look any bit as surprised as everypony else did!
 
Watching his marefriend fly off, the ninja turned to see the gaping looks of her family and friends, and blinked at them.
 
It took him a few moments, before he dropped a fist in his palm, with an “Oh right!”, before he scratched the back of his head and said:
 
“Yeah, funny story, me and Derpy kind of hooked up...Crazy, right?”
 
They didn’t know what to be more appalled at. The casual delivery, or the way he just expected them to tak-!
 
“Yay!” Dinky’s little cheer was simply all that could be said, in that moment.
 
~TCL~
 
Following that event, a couple of days later Naruto had thought it prudent to introduce the rest of his own family to his second half.
 
It went as well, as could be expected.
______________________________________________________________________________
 
“Must...buy...Wedding gown! Give me your three sizes!”
 
“Velvet, honey, no!”
______________________________________________________________________________
 
“Trixie now realizes, that Master must be a flank stallion. She always thought he was more favoring of the chest department.”
 
“Trixie! That’s inappropriate!”
 
“Eep!”
 
“Hah! Trixie knew she would be able to teach you something Sparkle! Even Moondancer is not safe from Trixie’s teaching hands!”
______________________________________________________________________________
 
The worst of it though, had to have come from Cadance.
______________________________________________________________________________
 
“Cadance, you can stop dancing, now!”
 
“I~ was~ Right~! It makes me just want to sssiiinnngggg~! Makes me want to DANCE!”
 
“Uh, good job, Naruto. Uhmm, Cadance? Maybe lay off the dancing?”
 
“Aww, why?”
 
“Our dancing Queen!”
 
“Ah the cult! It’s returned!”
 
~TCL~
 
Looking back on it, Naruto found it hilarious.
 
“Naruto the movie’s about to start!”
 
“I’m coming, I’m coming!” He leaped over the back of his most recent purchase, before landing in between Derpy and Golden Harvest. Looking over to Golden’s right were Shining and Cadance, the unicorn having an finger on a button behind the projector. In Cadance’s hands were three bottles of liquor, as she grinned a cheerful grin.
 
Naruto grinned right back, as Golden and Derpy Hi-5’d in front of him.
 
“Let’s do this!”
 
~TCL~
Canon Omake: Spike’s Side
Five Years Later…
 
Spike looked down at his written notes, before nodding once more.
 
The dragon had gotten up from his place on the ground, in the woods, by the field the others had chosen to have their picnic at.
 
Spreading his wings, he gazed at them. The scar running along the membrane of the right one, and the large line of slightly messy flesh on the left, reminded him of how weak he actually was that day, so many years ago.
 
Looking back down, he could hear Twilight, and their new friends from Ponyville, chatting just outside the forest line. Hard to believe that she’d come so far from that little no-friend filly from so long ago.
 
She definitely still stayed in touch with their friends from Canterlot, if Trixie’s recent passing through was anything. The Wandering Performing Researcher, her words not his, had did her absolute best to stay in touch.
 
Last he heard from Moondancer, she was studying to be a professor at the Celestia’s School for Magically Gifted Individuals. It had been a quite a while ago, that the other bookish mare, that was often joked to be Twilight’s doppelganger, had decided that she liked teaching. This mostly stemmed from watching Naruto “teach” them, when they were kids.
 
He glanced down at his lavender sweatpants, and white shirt, before leading his gaze to the bracelet on his right wrist. Said bracelet, was a thing Naruto had given to the dragon, when he was about 12. The blonde had finally perfected the idea of getting spells to stay in objects, mostly with some help from Dinky, surprisingly.

The drake felt his face heat up, at the thought of his, as of next month, yearlong marefriend. Scratching the back of his headfin, he brought a flaming hand to his bracelet, or as Naruto dubbed it, The Black Cross, patent pending. It was named as such for the large “X” decoration as the main centerpiece.
 
On more than one occasion. He’d had Rarity ask him about it, and he gave her the same answer.
 
“Family Secret.”
 
She always seemed to try and get it out of him, but he remained strong. Were he not attached already, he might have fallen for her wiles, but he resisted!
 
Bringing his magically burning digit to the cross, he tapped on the southeast corner thrice.
 
He let out a sigh, as he felt the weight of his body lighten to an incredible degree, before he began some stretches.
 
He’d come a long way, under both Naruto’s and Shining’s tutelage. The blonde had even said, that come his 16th birthday, he’d have Spike speak to his Toad teacher! Shining even said, that he’d probably be able to take the Recruitment Day Training once he turned 17!
 
He’d be turning fifteen soon, so that wasn’t that far off.
 
Finishing his stretches, his body a little bit more attuned with the “floatiness” it now had, he moved on to the one thing he would call his own.
 
Focusing on a palm, he watched it glow, before slowly a sword began to form.
 
It had taken a long time to try and find a spell like this. It took that long, mostly because a spell like this didn’t exist, in the beginning. It was something he’d created of his own efforts, along with help from Twilight, Moondancer, Trixie and his adoptive mom, Celestia.
 
Memory spells, transmogrification, lots of book reading and a trip to some southern temples, and this was the result.
 
In his hand, lay a short sword. By the definition of its name, it was short, maybe the length of his forearm, to a quarter of his bicep. The blade was a deep gray, and the handle a dark green. Its base started out broad, before narrowing in the middle and then widening again at the top, before coming together in a point.
 
He lifted the blade, tested its weight, and then swung it a few times, before frowning. Bouncing it in his claw, he then threw it at one of the trees around, before watching it break apart, and disperse into motes of magic.
 
“Tch, seriously, it’s like I can only get it right, 50% of the time. Back to the drawing board.” he huffed, before looking down at his notes again.
 
He’d become quite the studious dragon, more likely because of the company he was around, than self-interest.
 
Pondering for a moment, he allowed his magic to go on autopilot, as he went over the formulas necessary for this particular spell.
 
A glow shifted into the dragon’s palm once more, before a plain short sword appeared. In a flash it was gone, and replaced by a dagger, and next by a broadsword.
 
He wandered, as he did this, ever oblivious to the wandering eyes of three fillies, as they watched the spectacle in his hands.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
“How do you think he’s doing it?”
 
“Ah don’t know! I’ve never seen Spike do this before. Maybe he’s just able to do magic?”
 
“I thought dragons only did fire! Since when was magic a part of their package? He didn’t even do this, when Trixie came to town”
 
The three fillies spoke in hushed, not so hushed, whispers. The only reason their resident dragon hadn’t heard them, was solely due to him being lost in his own thoughts.
 
He just wandered aimlessly, as he continued to mess with the different weapons that floated into his hands.
 
“Ah don’t like how deep he’s going into that ‘ere forest.”
 
“Same here.”
 
“Me three!”
 
“...” x 3
 
“Cutie Mark Crusaders on a rescue mission!” the trio managed to whisper-yell, never noticing how the dragon in question disappeared from their sight, the moment they looked away.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“Oh Twilight would you please, just tell me! Please~” the pristine white pony whined, before pushing out her lower lip.
 
Twilight wasn’t budged.
 
“Rarity, I told you, if Spike doesn’t want to tell you, I can’t. I don’t even know how these things are made.” though she grumbled, “Not like I haven’t tried.”
 
“Wait, you, the egghead, don’t know? How the hay is that even possible?” came a raspy voice, from a multi-color maned pegasus. Next to her, a pegasus with a butter colored coat, twiddled her thumbs, as a trail of ants passed by.
 
“The pony who made them, wasn’t exactly too forthcoming with the information, when I was younger. After a while, I got swamped with too much stuff to do, to focus on it.” Rarity’s eyes shone with this revelation.
 
“So you know the pony who made the item? I’ve been wondering forever, and I can never get Derpy to open up about where she got it. Even Trixie didn’t tell me, and she left before I could say a thing!” an earth pony mare, wearing a Stetson hat, flicked the tip of the headwear upward with a finger.
 
“Now Ah ain’t one for all this, fruu-fruu fashion nonsense, but Twilight I find it hard to believe that you know nuthin about this ‘ere, thing. Heck, you’re wearing one of the things right now.”
 
Reaching up to her ear, where a certain cross shaped, black earring stayed, she grinned sheepishly.

“Well, it’s not like I don’t know anything about the thing. It’s just that, the Black Cross, isn’t my story to share.” they all looked up at her in confusion.

“Black Cross?” the quartet of her friends asked, though Rarity’s question came out with more of a “Squee”, causing Twilight to nod her head.
 
“That’s the name, originally Na-the pony who made this wanted to call it something else, but he said the name stuck.
 
“So it’s a male, who you have possible history with? Oh please, Twilight! I must have this wear! Think of the dress I could market around it!” at this, Twilight chuckled, and detached the earring.
 
She held it out in the palm of her hand, showing it to her friends. They noticed how she let off a sigh with it off, and gave her a questioning look.
 
She smiled.
 
“I don’t think these would be a good idea to market for clothing. At least, not how they currently are. The special thing about these is that, well, they affect gravity.” Rainbow Dash gave her the squintiest look possible.
 
“Uhm, excuse me, but as a mare who stomps gravity into the ground on a daily basis,” they rolled their eyes at this boast. “I don’t see how this thing, is affecting anything. Unless the Earth all of a sudden got like .01 times lighter, or something.” the lavender unicorn smirked, before holding the earring out to the Wonderbolt wannabe.
 
“Well, why don’t we put your money where your mouth is?” she grinned, innocently. “Put these on, and I’ll turn it to the highest setting.”
 
They all looked to one another, as they noticed that Twilight went into one of her “moods” again.
 
Rainbow Dash wasn’t convinced.
 
“Fine! But when it does nothing, you have to tell Rarity everything!” Twilight looked nonplussed, before she nodded her head.
 
“But, of course.” eying her friend for a moment, Rainbow Dash set the earring in place, before Twilight’s hand tapped the side of a point.
 
The effect was instantaneous.
 
“Whoa!” the next thing Rainbow knew; she was struggling to get off the ground. “Struggling” being that, she could only twitch her body in different ways, as she now lay flat against the floor itself.
 
“Welcome to the world of 4 times gravity! What can I get ya?” Twilight seemed all too pleased with the result, before she tapped the side of the earring, and Rainbow let out a breath of air.
 
Taking the earring off, she set it back onto her own ear. Her expression straining slightly, before she relaxed, much to the others disbelief.
 
Fluttershy was the one to voice their question.
 
“Twilight? Are you okay?” in the background, Rainbow felt a crick in her neck pop, as she got back into sitting position.

“Well, yeah. Like I told Rainbow, that was the highest setting. I’m not even going two times gravity right now. More like...one and a half?” she said, with a shrug.
 
“Who the hay would even make something like that? What were they? Some kind of masochist?” Twilight actually laughed at that.
 
“Not even. Naruto just likes to train, even when he doesn’t-Oh,” Twilight brought a hand to her mouth, but they could see the smirk behind it. She’d intentionally let it slip.
 
“Nah-rue-toe? What is that, some sort of fancy fruit?” the Stetson wearing pony asked, only to be interrupted by Rarity.
 
“So that’s the name of the creator? I must have at least a dozen of these!” the orange one gave her a flat look.
 
“Were some snakes just clogging yer ears, or somethin’? You saw what it did ta Dash, why would you even want something that ain’t good for nopony?” here Twilight interjected.
 
“Who said this wasn’t good for anypony, Applejack?”
 
“Ya lost me.”
 
“What I mean is, that there ARE good things that these are used for. Like previously stated, my “friend”, made these for training. Even now, under 1.5 times gravity, I’m feeling my muscles burn energy to keep me upright.” they all looked at her weirdly for a moment, before they looked upwards in thought.
 
That is, before Rarity’s eyes seemed to shine brighter than any star. She gripped Twilight by the shoulders, and stared her right in the eyes.

“Twilight, are you saying that even now, you’re basically exercising? That no matter what, at this very moment, you’re burning calories, fat, and pounds?” if Twilight ever wanted to feel the familiar intensity of her mother, it’d be in this moment.
 
For in that moment, Twilight knew, she messed up.
 
“Um…. yes?” she actually curled backwards, as Rarity loomed overhead.

“I want one~” she seemed to hiss, causing the group to collective sweat, before Applejack turned the conversation to something else.
 
“Wait a minute, doesn’t this mean that Spike’s been walking around with in that same gravity, somethin’?” Rarity eased back to actually think of this.
 
“Actually dearie, couldn’t this be dangerous for Spike? I mean, the dear’s just a child.” Twilight gave her a frowny look.
 
“Rarity, Spike’s fourteen.” They all blinked.

“He is?” Twilight nodded, but Rarity interjected.
 
“But he’s so...short.” Rainbow actually seemed to take slight offense to this.
 
“He reaches past my shoulder, how is that small?” Rarity threw her a look.
 
“Rainbow, you’re not exactly the shining example of a normal sized pony.” the weatherpony captain’s eyebrow twitched in irritation.
 
“Yeah, well neither is Pinkie,” this statement, actually got the rest of them wondering. They looked around for a moment.

“As a matter of fact, where is Pinkie?”
 
At that moment, a tree in the forest fell, with a resounding crash.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
 
Spike knew he should stop thinking and doing, but it was something he picked up from Twilight. It wasn’t his fault.
 
He ignored the growls from the timberwolves, and thought to himself for a moment.
 
Right now, what would be to the best effect?
 
The timberwolves didn’t seem to care for his thinking, and one of the three lunged forward. As it was, neither it nor its brethren saw the glow from Spike’s claw.
 
One moment the wolf was jumping towards the teenaged male, the next, Spike stood behind the natural, unnatural, creature. He flicked a trail of sap from the edge of the butcher’s knife, he now had, splattering the sticky substance against the ground.
 
The wolves froze, as the one that passed Spike, turned around, only to find that its vision began to split. The next moment, the wolf fell to pieces.
 
The other two looked to one another, before looking at Spike. The dragon teen grinned at them, showing all his sharp teeth,
 
The next moment, he was beside one of the wolves, in his hand was a broadsword. Across the edges of weapon, was a thin shining line of burning green.
 
He brought the sword down on the wolf, and sliced it in two, the sides burning from the added damage of his flames. He lashed a leg out, and kicked the last wolf to the side, watching as it broke apart against the bark of a tree. The tree it slammed against was small, but big enough that when it broke, it fell to the floor with a sound larger than “thud”.
 
Looking at the broken mess of magic wood, he waited. In the grasp of his hand, the broadsword broke, and dissipated. He acknowledged this, and simply allowed a different weapon to take its place. This weapon was something he’d seen in a samurai movie once.
 
A single edged blade, with no guard, and the handle being a polished, dark green. Across the edge of the blade, he fed his flames, as he watched the timberwolves, begin to form back together.
 
He’d heard of timberwolves, from his brothers. Creatures that lived only in Everfree, and could be quite the nuisance, if destroyed in large amounts, and left alone.
 
Naruto had come here, a few times, to actually scope out the forest, and encountered them. He let Spike know ahead of time, and well, the dragon was all the more prepared for it.
 
He’d already burned the two halves of one of the wolves, so the reforming wasn’t even that big of a threat. It was simply one size bigger, than a normal timberwolf. Even as it growled at him, Spike smiled a truly happy smile, as he held his katana aloft.
 
He allowed light to flash from his other hand, as a scabbard appeared, and he set the blade inside. That done, he began to walk towards the Enhanced Timberwolf, his steps holding a steady grace, as his left claw held the scabbard.
 
Resting his right on the handle, he thought immediately about what he was gonna do.
 
He remembered the talks he had with Naruto and Shining, about how fast the ninja moved. More than once, the two slower of the boys, tried to devise a way to keep up, speed wise.
 
Back then Spike had been looking through one of his comics, or books, for the sake of reference. The one he found though, wasn’t as he wanted, but it had its good points.
 
He thought about that comic, Alicorn Sphere Y. The main character, Monkey West, had come back from a space battle, after a year’s time, and had gained a new technique. It was like a teleportation spell, but instant.
 
Obviously, Spike couldn’t use a spell like that. He was like Naruto and Shining, in that it seemed to complicated, but that was okay. After much brainstorming, he and Shining came up with an idea that might make it work.
 
Instant Movement, plain and simple. Launching themselves at one moment, by using a set of spells and coordinates.
 
As he walked, his hands glowed for a moment, as a light flickered over his feet.
 
The feet would hold control the movement, and the active coordinate setting.
 
The next moment, a minor wind spell set itself over his being.
 
Cut down any resistance, one might get during. Spike was lucky to have scales, instead of fur. His IM was better than Shining’s due to it, though Shining’s came with less pain, if you messed up.
 
With this they had surprised their blonde “brother”, and also never let him know, for some petty reason, how they made it work.
 
He was closer to the magical contructed being, and he allowed his mind to slow to a crawl, as he gripped the handle of his sword.
 
The best part? Was just how cool it was to pull it off. Spike had only ever gotten to do this with dummies, Naruto set up.
 
The wolf growled, a sound that inspired no fear in Spike at this point, but it did prod out a grin of challenge.
 
So he stopped for one moment, the wolf watching him as he did.
 
“You know, I always wanted to come up with a name for this. Naruto had cool names for all his attacks, but even Dinky said that sometimes the best attack, didn’t have a name.” he scoffed in amusement.

“Shows what she knows. Marefriend, or not, attack names are always cool. So I came up with one anyway. So come,” he lifted a hand off his hilt, and made a “come hither” motion.
 
The wolf made no delay, as it lunged full force. It’s wooden bulk, coming towards him, with all the power it had.
 
The dragon simply, crouched slow, and brought his claw to the hilt of his blade.
 
The next moment, he gripped the coordinates of his soon to be displacement, toes curling against the forest floor, before his form blurred towards, and then past the wooden wolf in an instant. He took a few steps to bleed off the excess momentum, but as he did so he was slowly sheathing the blade in his possession.

“Dragon Song.”
 
The blade slid shut into its sheath, both items proceeding to break apart, back into motes of magic and light, leaving him defenseless.
 
Not that he had anything to fear, as he watched the body of the Enhanced Timberwolf, begin to become etched into. Lines and flashes of green ran across its exterior, from nose to tail, before they ended, and it fell into a heap. The pieces smoking slightly, as the cut apart pieces revealed charred insides.
 
Spike simply stared for a moment, mentally preparing himself for his outbu-
 
“YES! MOVIE LEVEL ACHIEVED!” He dropped to his knees, pumping his arms up and down in victory. He wanted to rake in his own personal victory, as he finally did it!
 
So many hours in front of a movie projector, and he finally got it right!
 
He would have continued his victory celebration alone, were it not for a trio of familiar fillies lunging out of the bushes towards him with stars in their eyes.
 
“That was the coolest thing, I’ve ever seen!” He heard the shouting from the orange pegasus filly, as her excitement matched his own.
 
“That was just like in the movies!” The cracking voice of a unicorn enter from his left.
 
“You gotta teach us how to do that!” The bow wearing earth pony proceeded to shake him, for all she was worth.


“Hay no!”
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

They sat once more at the picnic blanket, as Spike was still wrapped in his own euphoric moment, of self-attained badassery.

"Okay, so does somepony want to explain, why I just saw something that looked like it came right out of an action flick? Much less, from our resident teenaged dragon, over here,” Rainbow asked, pointing at the still grinning, from ear-to-ear, Spike.

“But it was so cool!” Scootaloo couldn’t help but argue. Rainbow wasn’t going to lie, it was cool, that didn’t really explain how it happened.

Spike had essentially almost one-upped her in the Cool department! HER! Rainbow Danger Dash!

She was getting to the bottom of this, no if’s, and’s, or but’s.

“You guys should have seen it! It was like watching Mohawk Samurai 3! It was all like, “Whoosh”, “Zing” and “Psssshhhtt”!” They’d found Pinkie, of course, she was off to get Spike, so he would explain the bracelets and earrings.

Speaking of...

Rainbow eyed the bracelet on his wrist, and turned to Twilight.

“So exactly how much extra weight, IS Spike packing here?” the dragon’s adoptive sister, put a finger to her lips, as she thought.

“If I had to guess...2.5 times? Possibly three, it has been a while.” their eyes widened, Rainbow’s especially.

“But there’s no way he could move that fast, with that much weight!”

“Well, duh, of course I can’t.” Coming down slightly, the dragon in question spoke up, catching their attention.

“I turned all the gravity back to normal, and from there, I used what I know.” he said, with a smirk, causing Rainbow’s eyebrow to tick, before her mouth twisted into a smile.

“Oh is that so? Then how about a race? Me and you, right here, right now?!” Spike actually laughed nervously.

“I’m gonna have to give you that win.” her jaw dropped, before she made strangled sounds and mad motions back towards the forest.

“It’s not like I’m super-fast normally. I’m definitely not that great at flying either, at least, not without the gravity. That’s why I fly so slowly, I’m just faster on the ground.” she still looked put out.

“So what was all that back there?” Spike thought about it for a moment.

“Well, think of it like this. It’s like you going from standing to your fastest flying speed in a literal moment.” she froze at this, as her eyes gazed out towards the horizon. Her, Rainbow Dash, going from 0 to Sonic Rainboom, in a single moment.

Spike looked at her, and nodded his head, as she began to drool at the very idea.

“That’s basically it. I can’t do it with the weights on, and I can’t do it continuously, as much as I want to.” Scootaloo looked at him.

“So the attack name?” he grinned once more

“Got inspiration for it from an epic. Apparently, the guy that used it in the book, had three swords, don’t remember his name though.” Sweetie Belle, looked at him strangely.

“What about that bit, with the marefriend?” he froze, Twilight froze, and so did the rest of them.

“O-oh, u-um, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” he started to sweat, as he saw Twilight send a look his way.

“Spike~” he gulped, but right before he could speak, he held a hand to his lips and a bit of green flame escaped him. The next moment he was holding a scroll. This scroll in particular had a pin on it, that looked strangely like a sword, with a ribbon on it.

They all looked at the scroll for a moment, before Spike slowly tried to get up, only to be brought back down by a purple aura.

“Spike~?” oh darn his day.

“Y-yes, lovable big sis?” Those who had siblings, could only shake their heads.

That was the tone one used, when they knew they got their flanks caught.

“Who’s this from?” he started to sweat even more, and let out a nervous chuckle.

“Why from the princess, of c-course?” he stuttered. She looked at him, before giving him a sweet smile. It was the kind of smile that was so saccharine that it could melt your teeth, on sight.

“So let me read it.” was all she said, but he froze, and Applejack shook her head, a muttering of “The varmint’s lying right through his teeth.”, escaping her lips.

“Well, I mean, I usually read it, right? I might as well,” he didn’t know when they had all grabbed him, but he didn’t like it. The scroll floated out of his grip, and into Twilight waiting hands, before she unfurled it.

“So Twilight, who is our little dragon friend courting, hmm?” Rarity couldn’t help herself. She was gossiper of the very highest rungs, and she’d never let this pass her ears. Twilight froze, as she got to a certain part of the scroll.

‘Oh no,’ Spike couldn’t help but think.

“Spike… When were you going to tell me that you’re dating Derpy’s daughter?” The CMC, who had currently been drinking something, spittaked.

“You’re dating who?!” Twilight wasn’t done it seemed.

“Spike…” he resigned himself to his fate.

“Yessss,” he droned

“How long?” he froze, as she threw him the biggest The Look™ he’d ever received in his short life.

“...Eleven months,” he whispered, but she heard him all the same.

“ELEVEN WHAT?!”

~TCL~