This Is Your Story!

by Mahayro

Chapter One

"Hey, get your sweet ass back over here!"

As the train rolled on its sentimental steady pace and bumped the rumps of its passengers ever so slightly, Berry Punch was getting bored. She wasn't ever one for subtlety, but her unicorn gal-pal Colgate was certainly one for gabbing with her clientèle. To Berry, it was all brushes and bizarre instruments; to Colgate, every open-minded client was another potential friend or source for stories. The disagreement of minds was temporarily settled as Colgate congenially dismissed her conversation and headed back to Berry's seat. A traded peck on the cheek later, the two commenced a spicier discourse.

"So, who all did you hook up with?" sparked the berry-marked mistress of sass and sauce.

Her hourglass-branded confidante stumbled at the mouth, eyes wide, her squeaky cute cheerleader-like nature thrown off course. "You know those are some of my regulars, not, um--"

Berry belted out that soulful, all-too-knowing laugh of hers. "Oh please, girl! Appleloosa! Tell me who all you met. And where you met. And how many times ya met 'em. Lemme hear it!"

And so, in only mildly hushed tones, Colgate divulged every lurid detail of her conquests during the first annual Buffalony Peacetimepalooza in the town they'd just departed--all four nights of them. She wasn't quite as loose in the lips with such matters as Berry, but together they could share absolutely anything. Make no mistake: Berry had at least found one partner of her own to make the Super Duper Party Pony's festivities utterly unnecessary to her vacation experience. But she could never turn down hearing these sorts of affairs secondhoof (or watching others blush in the process). There were more species involved this time around, so she got bonus diversity points there.

A few minutes into this, a thought occurred to Colgate. Shame that she couldn't get into things full swing herself... What kept my Berry that way? It was a thought kept to herself, though--forgotten soon enough.

Still, this discussion spurted and trailed along, covering at least half the length of the trip in a thread so sticky that no nearby passengers dared to try to leave their seat (except for a couple oblivious fillies). Everyone has their limits, however; and so Colgate and Berry moved on to discussing the more aesthetic pleasures of Appleloosa and the kind of party that would have put Ponyville's own legends to the test. How did they get so many streamers, or any balloons so perfectly shaped like ripe apple trees? How were they able to get pretty much the entire town playing Cops and Robbers--with pies of all things? Who was that Braeburn fellow, and what kind of heat was he packing? (Or perhaps they hadn't gotten all of that out of their system yet, after all.)

The attendant alerted their approach of Ponyville, which abruptly adjusted talk toward future plans. Colgate would have to head right to work after this, though she'd have just a few minutes to reserve if their missing member turned up on the platform. Berry just had the kids today, and there was no huge rush as her daycare reservation assumed for a possible train delay (and there wasn't one).

There must have been something either very settling or very unsettling about that evening sun that caught Berry Punch's eye, sending her gaze to a high deep distance as she and her best friend exited the train. She slowed a moment...an island of serenity in the bustling crowd.

Her unicorn friend, however, had been scanning the crowd for a few seconds already, hoping to find--

"Carrot Toooop!"

Berry quickly joined in facing Colgate's target of singsong attention, and the two practically bounded toward their missed mare.

In the proverbial blink of an eye, the trio was complete once more--mulberry, cerulean, and yellow corn flour. As a team they bore the standard of the BGs, or Backgrounders (referring to their apparent relegated role in Equestria, only half in jest). Their shared embrace was as toasty and gooey and "mmmm"-y as campfire marshmallows.

After the warmth subsided, Carrot got right to business. "Soooo...who wants to start? These articles don't write themselves!" The light creak in Carrot's voice strangely offset her typically frail tone and uneven fast pace, but it had its charm. And in any case, she held no emotional reservations in this moment of reunion. She did, however, hold a notebook and pen, prepared for anecdotes or dictation.

"Jeez, already?" Colgate nudged back at Carrot, attempting to subtly dissuade her from getting too serious too quickly.

Berry shared a glance or two with her lifelong friend--their secret code to remind that, though they handled issues quite differently, they would forever remain on the same page. She cleared her throat, alerting Carrot to an incoming story--one she delivered with a grave tone.

"Oh, it was the worst! They couldn't keep up with demand. None of the guests of honor turned up. There wasn't anything to do. It felt more like a damn scam than a party. They even tried to get us to pay just to sit in a bucking tub of jelly. I mean, why the buck not a good ole ball pit or something? And the worst part of it all, ya gotta know, it was..."

She mouthed two words to Colgate over an oblivious Carrot, and then they said them aloud in unison. "No cider."

Colgate continued from there, her perky upbeat tone highlighting the sarcastic charade. "It was bad enough having to be sober throughout all that. But then it got even worse at the end! The buffalo wanted us to pay respect to their...dinosaur ancestors before they would let us leave in peace. We all had to walk through...a ritual door, yeah! And then writhe around on the floor like wounded snakes. It was the most humiliating experience of my life."

"Wait--I actually liked that part!" Berry snorted as a devilish sidewise grin possessed her.

Carrot finally got the hint, pitching her writing aids onto the station platform in a huff. Berry immediately put a hoof around her, belly-laughing just once more before their eyes met. In a matter of seconds, Berry's compelling charisma returned Carrot to calmness. Then she drew the group toward a picnic table, well out of traffic's way, as she commenced the actual party debriefing.

"To be honest? For as much as I get around, that party was really something. Hell of a show. If I'd known it was done by the same guy who whipped my Berry Bunch into such a lather last year, this would've been a family affair!"

The others knew fully well that "Berry Bunch" referred to the light in her world, her three fillies and colt--Sunny, Dandelion, Sparks, and Planter. This didn't stop Colgate's segue: "I got all the lather I needed, though..." She wouldn't lay this talk on nearly as thick for Carrot Top, who had neither the lifelong friendship nor the common experience to appreciate the details. She might even get a bit salty from envy.

Envy of a life that's impossible to achieve and dangerous even to dream of. Did this occur to the carrot-flanked one just now?

As it turned out, even that offhoof phrase was enough to set Carrot's ears down a couple of pegs.

But Berry keenly picked up the slack: "But really, I just couldn't help taking some photos, you being stuck here to dig up dirt for your home and all that. The kids'll kill me if they find out where I was...so I guess these'll be just for you, huh?" If voices could wink, hers did right at the end; her right eye merely followed suit. The two shared a faint smile, keeping Carrot from her negative dwelling. Then Berry dug in her saddlebag for those pictures--grumbling and swearing in the effort--before sitting down. Splayed on the table, the assorted photos presented a piecemeal panorama of party life--over-sized piñatas, interactive parade floats, a monstrous tumbleweed made entirely of balloon animals, a guillotine that cut cheese and produced rude noises upon doing so, every manner of confetti and/or confection cannon... Berry went over every last one with her orange-maned friend, a hoof around her shoulder throughout. Colgate took this time to simmer down a bit before realizing she had places to be; this thought caused her to sit right up and quickly mention as much before hoofing it to another platform. The others weren't too worried about the lack of usual courtesy hug; they'd meet again that night.

As the two sat alone in mirth among a dying crowd of strangers, all tensions of the moment faded.

As if on cue, Berry then broke that tranquility like a boot to the head.

"You're still not stable, you know."

Carrot's demeanor instantly diminished, and the vocal cracking in her rapid reply was rather pained. "Why do you have to-- I mean, why can't I-- Uch..." She ran her forehooves through her generous mass of elaborate curling hair, grimacing.

"Goddesses, girl, do you even have any friends outside of us--I mean, besides that loopy-ass Script guy? Ditzy Doo, of all ponies! You can't even be friends with her! And after all she's put up with from you! I swear, that girl's heart pumps liquid courage." A self-admitted chuckle. "Well, maybe not quite like mine does."

Carrot Top was about to respond, but Berry intercepted the thought with what must have been pure presence. Berry's entire mien shifted to uncharacteristic tenderness--perhaps even soberness.

"You know what you really need now...you need freedom. And I think this little place you just built--you did finish it, right?" Carrot nodded in response, her expression unchanging. "This little place you just built is gonna help you a lot. But there's a great big bucking world out there, and you ain't seen the half of it still! But you've started to see it now, doing your writing work. Don't that mean anything to you? You can go just about anywhere now and be paid for it... That's a wonderful thing, and not everypony gets that. You think every last one out there is judging you? Think they even notice, really? Hell, only reason I know about you is because I know you already! It's been two years now--so ain't it about time you felt right about yourself? Take some bucking pride, for once? This is all your game to win, girl!

"And now, check this out! You're a BG, and now we make sure you see all the good things in life"--Berry's guarded tenderness peeked through her cheeks for an instant--"and they'll all love you for it. Now you get to help out everywhere--not just Ponyville, everywhere--help out so many colts and fillies who ain't never even knew you before, touch their lives--the same kinda ones who woulda dragged your name through the mud. We'll make 'em eat their own shit 'til they shoot sparkling rainbows out their asses, and we'll do it right"--she shook her right forehoof to slam it twice to the bench table and accent her spiel--"killing with kindness. It don't matter if we're living in a whole world of fools 'cause nopony can ignore the shit we do around here. We're the color of this town. And I'll keep telling you that until it gets through that thick-ass tank of a hairdo you got...ya got it?"

Similarly, nopony could ignore the deep thinly-veiled smile in Berry's voice, so charged with sisterly love and indignation--or perhaps a motherly sort, given that Carrot was a considerably younger adult than she or Colgate. Still, Carrot chose not to respond. What response is there to one who believes their own lies so completely?

As Carrot wilted onto the table and cupped her hooves around her head, the other mare tried to hide a sigh of exasperation from her torn friend.

Rowdy Berry returned.

"Are you bucking kidding me? We've got another event coming up in just six days, and that's another chance to break the ice with a guy! Another chance to show up your old garden gang. Another shot at somepony saying something nice about your banners, or your articles, or some shit like that.

"I'm not gonna let you live it down if you bail on this. Why..." Her eyes darted around, and she lowered her voice. "Back in the day, I'd have pushed my own husband off a cliff just to have what you got with us today." She'd hoped the very rare in-joke about her ex (notably a pegasus) would get at least a dry laugh or something. No dice.

Still, Berry's hardship could hardly compare to the isolation wrought by a transsexual transition--especially when leaving the small pool of available stallions in the process--within such a traditionalist, unenlightened town. Thus, Carrot dwelled in silence.

Berry waited for a proper response this time--a wait of perhaps twenty seconds. There was indeed a laugh, but it had a note of mockery to it.

But Berry was not known for putting up with that kind of arrogance from anyone. "I ain't taking that shit from you," she rang, following with a light smack on the back of Carrot Top's head. Berry then got up and headed a few steps away before turning around and brusquely calling out, "Colgate's apartment. Ten o'clock tonight. See ya." With that, she and the last slivers of sunlight fizzled out of the station.

---

One might imagine what a difference a moon makes. Without Luna's refined touch and the coordination of the weather pegasi, there could be no guarantee of moonlight sufficient to walk by almost every single night. She still wanted the world to play and revel in her sacred nocturne, it would seem.

By this moonlight, Berry and Carrot had no trouble making their way to Colgate's apartment in the northeastern quarter of town. Though they approached it at roughly the same time, their eyes did not meet until they were seated with Colgate around her drab table.

It had been a while since Carrot had seen the place, so she took it all in--however much that turn of phrase applies to a cramped one-bedroom apartment. It remained just as barren of decoration or flair as she'd remembered. A clock, a calendar, and a bulletin board with business cards and appointment notes comprised all of her wall ornamentation. Perhaps Colgate simply doesn't have time to live at home, she may have thought.

Colgate noticed this behavior, head nestled drowsily in forehooves atop the table. She called her out on it, mumbling what sounded like, "I don't have time for nonsense."

Berry was silently admiring the place herself, lamenting the probable lack of appropriate nighttime nosh in the fridge. The mumble reminded her that they had a purpose and she had a bed to get to at the other end of that purpose, so it'd be best not to hold that up. "Yes...Pet Center fundraiser. Cole, you say you're building and decorating the stage for the Ponytones. We ain't exactly carpenters or anything. So what'd you have in mind, bringing us into this?"

Colgate hadn't had time for a nap after the crazy last half-day of partying like Berry had, so the tiredness already carried in her voice. One might wonder what exactly possessed her to insist on this night to begin her next bout of Ponyville volunteer work. "Stage platforms are a simple enough thing. I can handle construction if one of you can help me fetch the lumber." With a flash of unicorn magic, she floated a bag of bits from a half-height corner bookshelf to the table's center. "Sooner's better, though. Who might be able to get started on that tomorrow?"

It wasn't much of a question to ask: Berry's winery schedule was more-or-less known to the group (and included a shift tomorrow), and Carrot's freelance writing work was flexible. "Got it," came Carrot's reply.

"Awesome!" she squeaked back. "Say, Berry...care to bring that 'shine' of yours out and help with the lighting?"

The pony in question rolled her eyes at the reference, then responded, "That's gonna take some thinkin' with my brain. You know I don't like thinkin' with my brain." She flashed a hint of a silly grin. "No, but seriously, there are lots of ways to do lighting. They're all just gonna be standing in a row on stage, right? So the stage isn't going to be very deep. No need to hang any weird skylights--we should be able to cover it either on the ground or on poles. Maybe both." The aforementioned brain-thinkin' started, then stopped far too quickly. "Gah--I still can't believe you got us into this."

Carrot Top just about saw the imaginary light bulb come on over her head. "There's lighting from behind, too! Throw a bright floodlight against a thin curtain... As long as they have some light from the front too, it should hit those outfits of theirs and come out dazzling!"

Berry began to mull this over, but Colgate piped up first. "This is going to be at night--just a little bit before right now, actually, around 9:30. To get the effect right at night, you'd either end up blinding the audience or making the Ponytones themselves look too dark and contrasted from the front. Backlighting's good, though...maybe something ambient?"

Berry was back on board again. "Oh, I get ya. Alright, I'll look into it. Maybe candles, or..." She busted out in a genuine hearty giggle at a sudden thought. "Aw hell, you're gonna love this one. I'll tell you about it on-site tomorrow, but I can't really set it up in advance. You're just gonna have to see Berry's magic live."

Colgate could afford her but half a smile before continuing. "I guess I'll cover the curtains, too...and that leaves the banner."

The prankster in Berry emerged forcefully in Carrot's general direction: "Oh, don't worry, Princess Celest's got that one covered!"

How could Carrot reply to this? She's making you eat your past mistakes right now--so where are the sparkling rainbows?

Her eyes suddenly gave the suggestion that they might fire acid or poison at Berry at any moment. Her expression was otherwise calm. Gradually, the energy behind those eyes dripped into flaring nostrils and a teeth-bearing grin. Without warning, she leapt from her chair to charge Berry, some way around the round table.

The teasing one was used to this sort of treatment from her troubled friend, but it was always a harmless flash-in-the-pan affair. Better to let her act it out, she must have thought. She let herself be choked for a moment, then to be knocked to the floor with the plain stool she sat on, tucking and rolling to avoid a neck injury.

"You lie to me! Why do you lie to me!?"

Berry's eyes plainly bugged out. This one would not be the same. This time I fight back, she realized. Maybe not even holding back.

Supine, Berry Punch whipped her legs up and down a couple times, trying to wiggle some proper momentum to overcome Carrot Top's incomplete choke-hold from the side. She finally whipped her hind legs down hard, curling inward to maximize the velocity of her forward roll. This worked better than expected, pulling Carrot with her and also freeing her right forelimb to come back down on Carrot's torso with an elbow as she spun 180 degrees. The elbow landed; Carrot coughed and relinquished her hold. Berry slipped after the elbow landing, however, and so the two were left to scramble to grab each other's limbs on the living room floor.

By the time either of them thought about what Colgate might be doing in all of this, she was about two paces away with a fire extinguisher telekinetically aimed directly at them.

"Five seconds," she bellowed.

Berry ceased struggling and sat upright, an unbefitting look of open-mouthed confusion spreading vaguely, turning toward Colgate. "Like, I don't even know--"

WHOMP went something after a flash of limbs and ferocity, obviously Carrot Top's. The sound apparently came from the contact of Berry's head with etched olive linoleum, and on etched olive linoleum Berry's head remained.

CLANG went the something that stopped levitating before Colgate, sharply upon the floor. A single sob, then: "Oh Celestia...what's going on?"

Colgate's composure under fire was easily the steadier of the two ponies standing, and it tied with Berry's; but now even her heart leaked through her voice box, pushing out a squeak and more sobs.

After a full minute of panting, with Colgate's gaze unshifting from her, Carrot's low-laying frenzy subsided. She then sat herself fully upright and gazed back at Colgate for an unending moment. Where one might expect submission or dejection or tears, only hardness could be found. The only sign that this former beast had not forsaken all care was the same open mouth of confusion that Berry bore before, perhaps with a slight frown added.

"I...need...help."

Stern and punctual, yet positive as ever through the exhaustion: "We. Are. Your. Help."

A stretch of silence.

The surrealism of the situation could not seep into Colgate's determined mind.

"...Hugs?"

The frowning vacancy hardly gave way, and the hopeless stare did not at all; but then a voice betrayed a still-beating heart.

"Hugs."

And so they came and collapsed together, slumping over and around Berry's slowly breathing mass. Gruesome commotion had faded to silent emotion, and then that faded as well. Nopony moved from there for the rest of the night.

Nopony.

Comments

[FoolRegnant]

Well... it isn't terrible. The writing is technically sound, but when we actually delve into characters and plot it starts to fall apart a bit.
You're dealing with three background characters. They have little canon development, but varying levels of fanon development as well that must be taken under consideration.
We're introduced to these three mares poorly at best. You could just as easily replace any of these characters with a random OC and the story would be the same.

Let's talk about the characters. Berry Punch. In fanon, she is generally depicted as either an alcoholic or a bartender, sometimes both. Berry Pinch is her daughter, she is a single mother. Colgate. In fanon, she is a dentist, often friends with Carrot Top, often a laid back, relatively bland/normal personality. Carrot Top. In fanon, she is a farmer, often friends with Colgate, either a friend/romanctic partner for Applejack or a rival.
Obviously, you want to give your own take on these characters, but you should at least start in some way, from where fanon has left off. In some ways it seems you have, but in others, not so much.

I'm very confused as to what's going on with each character. Berry has four kids? We get their names, but nothing else. Carrot Top is male-to-female transgender/an aspiring writer? Colgate is promiscuous? Berry is promiscuous? Carrot Top has random rage issues? Colgate has some random issue that means she needs to improve her standing in the community?

It's all well and good to raise questions for your readers, but these questions are simply basic. I'm sure that the characters exist fully realized in your head, but they make no sense when coming through in the written word, at least at this point.

I'll read the next chapter in a while and comment on that, but for now, this story looks like a decent idea that has fizzled in the presentation stage.