The Life and Times of a Winning Pony

by Chengar Qordath

The Pony Who Can't be Processed With a Normal Brain

The bit I tossed landed moon-side up. Guess I was going to talk to Blossom first.

I’d made up my mind to sort things out with both of them before we left Canterlot. Well, sorting out this whole big messy love triangle in just a day or two might be a bit ambitious, but at the very least I needed to start making some kind of progress on the issue. I’d barely exchanged a dozen words with Blossom since I’d taken her virginity—maybe it was understandable that I hadn’t wanted to deal with a painful, ugly relationship talk on the eve of my mother’s funeral, but she deserved better than that. As for Derpy, I’d feathered up, and I wasn’t going to lie to her about it. She also deserved better than that.

At least my family seemed to be doing ... well, not okay, but better. The funeral had kinda helped us get some closure, at the very least. We were all still hurting from losing Mom, but Kickers are made of pretty tough stuff. We would shed our tears in private, then grit our teeth and carry on as best we could. It’s what Mom would want—or at least, that’s the kind of thing ponies always say about mourning your loved ones. I guess it was true in a way, though I suspect that if she were still here her response would not involve much in the way of gentle affection and telling me to let go and move on. Instead of getting all sappy, Mom probably would’ve wound up lightly swatting me upside the head and telling me to stop moping and being an idiot.

Dad wanted me to take ‘Lula back to Ponyville with me. I wasn’t sure about taking her away from the rest of the clan; at a time like this she needed all the family she could get. It wasn’t too hard to guess why he wanted ‘Lula out of Canterlot, though. At the reception, Luna seemed to think the thing that got my Mom was just an advance scout for a larger attack. If there was trouble coming, and especially if that trouble was pointed at Canterlot, then of course Dad would want my little sister out of the line of fire.

I suspect part of it was also him wanting to get me out of town. The longer I stayed in Canterlot, the harder it would be to resist the urge to go back into the Guard. I know ‘Lula needed me right now, but at the same time my sense of duty was telling me I should be out there on the frontlines. Plus, there was a big part of me that wanted to find whoever or whatever was responsible for killing Mom and rip them to pieces. So yeah, going back into the Guard was really tempting. My recent history has undeniably shown that I’m not that good at resisting temptation.

It’s hard not to wonder if maybe part of what made the Guard tempting was that it would also give me a way out of the whole nasty love triangle mess. It was the perfect excuse to get away from the whole situation for a while: shoot off a few platitudes about how Equestria needed me, and then just start running and not looking back again until my life got a little less crazy.

So, I was heading back to Ponyville tomorrow morning, to put one long train ride between me and temptation. I hadn’t ruled out coming back to the Guard at some point later on, once things had settled down a bit and Dad got a new post that took him off the frontlines, but for now my sister needed me.

In any case, if I was heading back to Ponyville in the morning and wanted to set things right with Blossom and Derpy before then, I needed to hurry it up, not waste time thinking about other stuff. Shadow, why did all these horseapples have to fall on my head at the same time? I’d been overwhelmed enough dealing with my mess of a love life, and then the whole mess with my mom came down on top of it. That had knocked my hooves out from under me just when I thought I had things under control.

Ugh, now if Mom were still here she’d be swatting me and telling me to stop feeling sorry for myself and start getting to work on dealing with it. Mom wasn’t the most sentimental of ponies, but it was hard to argue with her practical streak.

I found Blossom in the guest house she’d been sharing with Rainbow Dash for the last couple days. Thankfully Rainbow Dash was out doing whatever it was Rainbow Dash did while she was in Canterlot, so we would have some privacy. Not that I would be uncomfortable talking about things like this with Rainbow around, but Dash wasn’t good at silently sitting on the sidelines; her commentary would just make this talk even harder than it was going to be already.

Blossom opened the door within a couple seconds of me knocking on it, and I saw half a dozen different emotions flash over her face when she met my eyes. Love, compassion, anger, hurt, all of it. I probably should’ve said something deep and meaningful, but I couldn’t come up with anything that would work. Eventually, my brain spat out the best it could offer. “Heya, Blossom.”

Her ears went back a bit, and her head drooped down. Her voice was subdued when she responded, “Hi, Cloud.”

“We need to talk.” A second later I was kicking myself for using that exact turn of phrase. Everypony knows that nothing good ever comes of saying ‘we need to talk’ to a pony you’re in a relationship with. Too late to take it back now, though.

Blossom sighed and slowly nodded in agreement. “Yeah, we really do. Come in, I guess.”

She stepped aside to let me in. As I took a cursory look around the guest house, I suddenly noticed how strangely similar it was to my apartment. Sure, my place had plenty of personal touches to it that a guest house obviously wouldn’t have, but both places had this kind of simplicity to them. Not exactly spartan, but not big on luxuries. Guess it says something about me that my home back in Ponyville still ends up looking really Kicker-y even after I’ve spent years away from the clanhold. I suppose it’s like the old clan saying goes—you can take the pony out of the clan, but you can’t take the clan out of the pony.

Okay, I needed to stop getting distracted and focus on talking to Blossom.

The two of us settled down onto the living room couch, and a painfully awkward silence descended. I guess she was just as nervous about this as I was.

I eventually gathered my courage, and jumped in. “Look, I’m sorry about not talking to you for the last couple days. I just—after we slept with each other I knew we needed to have a big talk to sort things out, and with everything else that’s been going on...”

Blossom picked up where I’d left off. “Yeah, I understand, not exactly like you can sit down and sort things out when you haven’t even buried your mom yet.” She bit her lower lip and shuffled around on the couch, and her voice came out as a quiet, pained whisper. “You still could’ve said something to me, though. Yeah, we weren’t ready to deal with the big stuff, but you could’ve said ... something.” She sighed and rested her chin on her hooves. “I gave you my virginity, Cloud. That means something to me. Having that happen, and then you not even saying two words to me afterwards—hay, even going out of your way to avoid me—it hurt. It really hurt.”

That got a guilty flinch out of me. “Yeah, you’re right. I’m sorry.” I wouldn’t blame her for having some very nasty thoughts about me after I pulled something like that. Banging a pony, then ignoring them for several days afterwards isn’t something you do to a pony you love. She’d probably been scared that she might have been wrong about me all this time: that now that I’d banged her, I’d gotten what I wanted out of our relationship, and had no more interest in her. She should know me better than that, but fear isn’t a rational thing, especially when you mix it with love.

First things first, I needed to nip any thoughts like that in the bud. I took one of her hooves in both of mine, and brought it up to my lips. “I love you, Blossomforth. Have for a while now. And I want you to know that the night we ba—the night we made love meant something to me too.” I leaned in and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “You gave me something special, something that meant a lot to you, because you wanted to help me. Because you saw I was hurting, and you wanted to take my pain away. And you did, sweetie. You did.”

Blossom was starting to tear up by the time I finished, so I pulled her into a hug, letting her bury her face into my shoulder until the worst of the emotional turmoil had passed. She didn’t cry, but there were a couple of dry sobs, and she hugged me back as hard as she could. “Th-thanks, Cloud.” She pulled back a bit and wiped her eyes. “I ... I needed to hear that. I love you too. I have for a long time now. I just needed a while to figure it out.”

“Not much longer than I needed.” I gave her a quick peck on the lips, which might’ve led to something more if I hadn’t been making a point of keeping my sex drive on a tight leash. “Blossom, I want you to know that what we shared that night was one of the best experiences I’ve ever had in my life.”

How true that was really depends on your perspective, I suppose. Looking at things objectively, it had been about as awkward as sex with a virgin usually is. Having to stop two or three times to tell her she was doing things wrong and give a little advice does kinda throw the whole experience off. But the thing is, there’s more to banging than the simple physical mechanics of it: the whole emotional love and support thing we shared was a lot more important than how good we were at the physical side of things. Hay, even her little goof-ups just made things feel closer and more intimate than it would’ve been if everything had gone perfectly.

I smiled at her, and brought a hoof up to stroke her cheek. Now was when we got to the tricky part of things. “I could never, ever, regret making love to you. That said...” I took a deep breath, and mentally went over exactly how to say what needed saying. “I think we both know that the timing of things could have been a bit better.”

Blossom grimaced at that, and slowly nodded her head. “Yeah. Rule Three, right? No banging a pony who isn’t thinking straight.” She let out another little sniffle and wiped her eyes. “I should’ve said no. Hay, I tried to tell you no, but then you started kissing me and I just ... couldn’t. I was weak. I let you down at a time when you really needed your best friend to be strong for you.” She let out tiny, pained little whimper. “I took advantage of you. You were vulnerable, and I used that to get the sex I’ve wanted for a long time.”

“No.” I kissed her on the forehead and started running my hooves up and down her. “No, it wasn’t like that, Blossom. If anything, I used you. I knew you wanted me, and you were inexperienced enough that I could pretty much just turn off your brain by kissing you the right way. Hay, I took your virginity for a quick little comfort bang.”

Blossom put a hoof over my mouth to keep me from saying anything more. “No, that’s not true, and you know it. Hay, you just got done telling me how it meant more than that for both of us.” She leaned in and gently nuzzled my cheek. “How about we agree that we both could’ve handled things better, and leave it at that?”

I let out a low groan and conceded the point with a wave of my hoof. “Yeah, I guess that works.” I still felt like the bulk of the responsibility was on me, but then Blossom clearly felt the exact same way, so I suppose it balanced out. No point in arguing about which one of us was more to blame for it in any case, especially not when there were still a bunch of other issues hanging over our heads. “So, next question: where do we go from here?”

Blossom turned her face away from mine, pensively staring out the window as she worried at her lower lip. After a long silence, she gave a slight nod and answered me. “We’ll need to talk to Derpy. There’s a lot to sort out with her, and I want to do that before there’s another fight.” Her shoulders slumped, and she seemed to shrink down into herself. “I hate fighting with Derpy. I’ve been getting so mad at her, so frustrated with this whole situation. And the worst part is, I’m getting used to it. Fighting. Being an angry, scared pony who’ll say and do nasty things just to try and win some stupid contest over you. I don’t want to be that kind of pony, but I still feel myself changing, and I don’t like what I’m changing into. I want to be better than that.”

I sighed and settled back onto the couch. “Yeah, I think I know what you mean. This whole thing is just getting out of control; a lot of my rules boil down to not using banging in ways that hurt other ponies. Lately, I haven’t been doing such a good job of sticking to that principle. I’ve gotten myself into a big huge mess, and I’ve got no idea how I’m supposed to fix it without leaving a bunch of broken hearts in my wake.” My voice dropped down to a quiet, broken little whisper as I added, “Although at the rate things are going, I’d be lucky to salvage any kind of anything with either of you.”

Blossom sighed and slowly nodded in agreement. “It’s gonna get messy, Cloud, even more than it is already. But I’ve been doing some thinking, and I’ve decided on something really important you need to know.” Blossom reached out and took my hoof in both of hers. “I want you to pick me. Hay, I’ve thought you were good-looking since the moment I met you, and even if you didn’t make the best first impression you won me over pretty quickly.”

I shot my best attempt at a sultry grin her way. “I knew you’d fall for my irresistible charm sooner or later.”

Blossom let out a weary little chuckle. “Guess you were right. Just don’t expect me to ever admit it where anypony can hear us.” We shared a little smile, but the lighthearted moment could only be short-lived when we still had so many serious matters to discuss.

Blossom cleared her throat with a delicate little cough and got back to what she’d been saying. “Cloud, you mean more to me than I’d ever thought a pony could. All my life, I’ve always tried to play it safe. Got a degree in something that would give me a secure job, never took any big chances, and never let anypony get close enough to hurt me. I had no idea how empty my life was, how much I was missing by keeping ponies at hoof’s length. I should’ve taken a chance with you, I should’ve asked you for more, but I was afraid. I didn’t want to risk losing you, and now it’s caused us both so much trouble and pain.”

She went quiet for several seconds, licking her lips and shooting nervous looks at me out of the corner of her eye. “And that’s why I want to tell you this: I want you to pick me over Derpy more than anything, but if you don’t—” Her voice cracked a bit at that, but she forced herself to keep going. “If you don’t, I am going to try as hard as I can to still be a good friend to you.”

There was only one response I could give to that: I kissed her. Repeatedly. At first she met my lips every bit as eagerly, but once I brought a hoof up to start stroking one of her wings she placed a hoof on my chest and gently but firmly pushed me back. It’s not like I’d been planning on banging her again, but I guess her stopping me before we got too into the makeout session was probably a good idea. Those sorts of things do have a habit of escalating.

Once I’d reined my lust in, I got to work on giving her a better answer. A beautiful little speech like the one she’d given me deserved a proper response. “Blossom, no matter what else, I love you, and I'll be coming back to you. You've been my friend for years, and now that we've taken this step I'm not going to go back and pretend it never happened. I'm here to stay.” My wings gave a nervous little flick—to be honest, I was making this all up as I went, and I wasn’t sure how well it was coming out. “I have to sort a few things out first. Things are probably gonna be ugly for a bit, and I've got nopony to blame for that but me. But whatever happens, I'll come back to you. I’m not exactly sure what we’re going to end up meaning to each other, but you will never just ... just drop out of my life like I forgot you.”

I reached out to gently stroke her cheek. “Y'know why? 'Cause you're my anchor. You help keep me steady and grounded, and I need a pony like that in my life.” My ears went back flat against my head. “I haven't been the best friend to you. I could tell you were pining for me, on some level, and I tried to push you into being open about it instead of just talking to you. But from now on, I'm going to do right by you. And I hope that once things stop being so crazy, we can make love and not feel bad about it afterwards.” I leaned in and shared a tender little kiss with her. “I wanna give you as much as you deserve.”

I pulled Blossom in for a hug, and the two of us shared a tender moment. Then Rainbow Dash barged through the front door and ruined it. “Okay, seriously, I heard you guys talking, and that was beyond gross. Feathering Rarity would say you two were overdoing it on the sappy talk. I think I threw up in my mouth just listening to you.”

Blossom and I looked each other in the eyes and nodded.

Every loose pillow on the couch went flying in Rainbow Dash’s general direction.

---

After how things had gone with Blossom, I was cautiously optimistic about my chances of sorting things out with Derpy. I wasn’t so naive as to think the news that I’d slept with Blossom was going to go over well, but hopefully we could chalk it up to me making an understandable mistake in a moment of extreme distress, and work on figuring out where to go from here. I still had no idea what I was going to do, but I damn sure wasn’t going to just let this whole mess linger like some kind of malignant tumor in the middle of our relationship.

Since Derpy was staying with her parents, I had a bit of a walk on my hooves to reach their place. At least the bite wound on my foreleg had finally healed up. While it was working fine, it had still been a bit twinge-y during the funeral.

The Doos had a pretty nice place—not a huge mansion or anything, but well above average in both size and luxury. Her father, Klutzy Doo, had a very profitable import/export business, and her mother, Alta Stratus, was from the perpetually-poor noble House Cumulus. A classic tale of rich common pony and poor noble pony marrying up.

Yes, Derpy was technically a fancy Canterlot noble. Most ponies are pretty stunned when they learn that.

I wasn’t terribly fond of her parents—when she’d gotten pregnant with Dinky, they’d tossed her out on her flank instead of giving her the love and support she needed. Sure, they might’ve patched things up later, but it’s kinda hard for me to just forgive and forget when it comes to that sort of thing. Hay, I’d done a lot worse by my parents when it came to dropping out of the Guard, and they still backed me up. Sure, things got a little rough, and there were times when I felt like a bit of a black sheep, but they damn sure never threw me out of the house and disowned me.

I guess you could say there was some old history between Derpy’s family and mine, going back to the Rebellion. To be honest though, it didn’t really come up all that often—nine hundred years is a lot of time to get over an old grudge. Plus, while the Kickers might still be very conscious of our past thanks to sticking together as a clan, the Doos went a different way. Not that they’d had a lot of choice when it came to having their clan broken apart. While there were plenty of ponies with Doo DNA, most of them didn’t carry the old clan name, and even the ones that still did usually didn’t know much about what being a Doo really meant.

I’m not sure if a lot of that old history being lost is a shame, or just a sign that the Doos have adapted to modern Equestria a lot better than my family has. I love my clan, but a lot of our traditions are a bit out of touch with—well, everything that’s happened since Shadow bought the farm.

I knocked on their front door, and a pony who pretty much looked like a stallion version of Derpy, aside from blue eyes and a slightly darker coat, answered it. “Hello, Cloud Kicker.”

“Cirrus.” My tone wasn’t hostile or anything, but it wasn’t exactly friendly either. I’d butted heads with Derpy’s big brother in the past—he was pretty much the reason I hadn’t had any contact with her until she moved to Ponyville. I know he was just trying to protect his little sister after how crazy things got at Flight Camp, but he’d still cost me four years of friendship with Derpy. I’ll say this for the guy though—at least he backed Derpy up when she needed him. That puts him way above his parents, in my book.

He stood there awkwardly in the doorway for a couple seconds, then hastily stood aside and opened the door for me. “You want to talk to Dee, right? I’ll go get her.” He started heading deeper into the house, but stopped after a couple steps, then turned back to me. “Sorry about your mom. The Major ... she was a good officer.”

“Yeah, she was.” It seemed like there should be something more to say about Mom than just that. I guess it’s one of those things you can’t ever put words to; there’s nothing you can really say to capture how much you lose when a pony dies. There was so much to Mom, and now all that was left of her was the same headstone every other Kicker got: her name and the words ‘For Equestria.’ It seemed so inadequate, but the way Uncle Typhoon explained it to me once, there’s really no way a tombstone can ever tell you much about who the pony really was anyway. My memories of Mom are what counts, not what’s written on a piece of rock.

I moved into the living room and found a couch to make myself comfortable on while I waited. After a couple seconds, I could dimly hear Cirrus’ voice in the other room. “Dee? Visitor for you.”

A second later Derpy’s slightly indignant voice came out of the other room. “Cirrus! Didn’t you hear the shower running? I’m not decent—get out!”

There was the sound of a door slamming, and then Cirrus shouted through it. “You don’t even wear clothes normally! A towel’s actually more modest!” I sighed and facehoofed at that. There are some things a lot of ponies just have a hard time understanding about each other. I suspect it’s related to the fact that a whole lot of pony social customs just don’t make any kind of logical sense. Hay, just look at how a bunch of ponies had panic attacks over a bunny stampede.

Derpy trotted in after a minute or so, still slightly damp from her recent shower. When she saw me her amiable smile slipped a bit, but she still trotted over and gave me a quick nuzzle. “Hey, Cloud.”

“Hey, Derpy.” I leaned in for a quick kiss. She returned it, but there was a reserve in the way she kissed me that I wasn’t used to from her. Come to think of it, she’d been a bit out of sorts ever since she’d gotten to Canterlot. I hadn’t really thought much of it before, what with being preoccupied by funeral arrangements and all that, but she hadn’t exactly been showing me her usual levels of affection ever since she’d gotten here. I had a feeling this wasn’t just her way of trying to give me some space to mourn, either. Had some sixth sense mare’s intuition clued her into the fact that I’d done something wrong?

I thought about trying to make some small talk with her, but there wasn’t any point. It would only be delaying the inevitable. It was kind of like taking a band-aid off—sometimes the best course of action was to just get the painful part of it over with already. I took a deep breath and got to it. “Look, there are some things I need to tell you, Derpy.”

Before I could say anything more, Derpy put a hoof over my lips and gently shushed me. “I already know, Cloud Kicker.”

What? How could she have found out? The only ponies who knew I’d slept with Blossom were Rainbow and maybe Dad and Aunt Wind, if they’d overheard anything. Rainbow had promised to give me a chance to tell Derpy the truth, and I couldn’t imagine anypony in my family rushing to spill the beans on me—especially when I hadn’t exactly been keeping either of them up to date on the details of my love life anyway.

I guess my confusion must’ve been showing on my face, because Derpy sighed and took one of my hooves in hers. “Fluttershy told me on the train ride over.” One of Derpy’s ears gave an agitated flick, and her eyes narrowed. “I’m not very happy with you over that. You knew I was worried about losing you to her, and you slept with her anyway. Hay, you proposed to her!”

Oh. Oh feathers. After all the craziness that had happened over the last week or so, I’d just about forgotten that I’d slept with Eepy too. “I didn’t mean to—look, I’m sorry Derpy. I didn’t mean to hurt you by sleeping with Fluttershy, I just...” What could I even say? There wasn’t much of a defense I could offer beyond ‘it seemed like a good idea at the time.’ Well, that and the fact that I had been completely honest with Derpy about the fact that I was going to sleep with Eepy, but I don’t think mentioning that would do my cause any good.

Derpy let out a frustrated growl, then closed her eyes and took a couple deep breaths. “Okay, you screwed up big time, and I’m still very upset with you. However, considering the circumstances and everything that’s happened since, I can forgive you.”

Okay, this was bad. This was very bad. I was more than a little tempted to just drop the subject and wait until Derpy had gotten over me sleeping with Fluttershy before I moved on to the next confession. Not sure if that would actually do any good though—the longer I left the issue hanging, the more it would hurt when I got around to confessing. Lying, even if only by omission, would hurt Derpy every bit as much as actually sleeping with Blossom had.

That’s not to mention that Rainbow’s promise to not tell Derpy was contingent on me fessing up within a reasonable amount of time. If she thought I was dragging my hooves too much, she’d tell Derpy herself, and that would be the absolute worst thing that could happen. Hearing about it from anypony else would hurt a lot more.

So, I guess there was nothing I could do but get it over with. Going by the way her whole body tensed up, Derpy had probably picked up on the fact that something else was bothering me. Even if I wanted to back out, it was too late now, not unless I wanted to outright lie to her. Okay, here we go. “Derpy, that’s not all there is. I...” I needed a moment to gather my courage for the actual confession. “I slept with Blossom. The night after we found Mom. I was hurting and—”

“Are you motherbucking kidding me?!” Derpy’s eyes went wide with shock, and she bolted up from the couch, glaring at me. “Her too? Who haven’t you cheated on me with? Are you banging Rainbow on the side as well, or have you just not gotten around to it yet?”

Okay, I deserved that, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. Especially since with the state I’d been in, I probably would’ve at least tried to sleep with Rainbow if she’d woken up first, or any one of a dozen other variables. I doubt I would’ve succeeded, but just trying would’ve been be bad enough. “Derpy, I'm sorry. I am so sorry. I really feathered up.”

“You feathered up?” Derpy snarled at me, her eyes blazing with indignation. “You feathered up!? No, me bringing down Town Hall was a feather-up! Me setting the stove on fire is a feather-up! Hay, what happened back at Flight Camp was a feather-up! Even sleeping with Fluttershy was a feather-up! This?” She looked me dead in the eyes. “This is a betrayal!”

I flinched and let my head hang in shame. Much as I wanted to, I couldn’t deny it.

“You gave me your word that you wouldn't sleep with Blossomforth, Cloud Kicker!” Derpy continued, angrily pacing back and forth across the room, her wings giving several flicks as she went. “Do your promises mean anything at all?”

“My mom had just died!” I offered in a feeble effort to defend myself. “I was a complete mess. I know that doesn’t excuse it, but it’s not like I...” I trailed off, unsure of how exactly to explain what I meant. Sure, I hadn’t intended to hurt Derpy, but that’s mostly because at the time I hadn’t been thinking about how it would affect her at all. I slept with Blossom because I’d been so focused on my own pain that I hadn’t thought about what it would do to her or Derpy.

Derpy took a couple deep breaths and managed to put a lid on her anger, at least for the moment. “I know you’d just lost your mother, and I am so sorry, Cloud. I am.” She took another breath and then continued. “I was on my way the second I heard, because I wanted to be there for you. I thought about trying to fly straight to Canterlot that night—if not for your sister, I would’ve.”

Okay, she’d moved from screaming at me in burning anger to sniping at me in cold fury. I could tell the beginnings of a guilt trip when I heard them. “I know. Thanks for looking out for ‘Lula, Derpy.”

Sure enough, Derpy’s eyes hardened, and she started really hammering the guilt home. “One train ride. One feathering train ride. That's all the time I needed to get to you, to come to the pony I thought I could trust.”

The worst part about guilt trips is that they’re incredibly effective when you’ve got something to feel guilty about. I couldn’t think of anything I could possibly say that could make the situation less horrid for her. “Derpy, please. What can I do to make this right?”

Derpy was silent for a long time, and then very quietly asked, “Do I mean anything to you at all, Cloud? Or was I just another pony for you to bang until you could hook back up with Fluttershy, or finally make your move on Blossomforth?”

Did she really think it was like that? I reached out and tried to grab one of her hooves, but she promptly yanked it away from me. Despite that failure, I did my best to tell her the truth. “Of course you mean something to me, Derpy! I love you!”

Derpy let out a frustrated dry sob. “If you really love me then why are you so quick to trample my heart? I just don’t understand you anymore! Ever since Rainbow hurt her eye again, you've found more and more ways to hurt me!” She angrily swiped a hoof across her eyes. “Why? Why are you doing this to me?”

“I'm sorry.” The instant I said that, I realized how utterly inadequate it sounded. ‘Sorry’ didn’t come anywhere close to fixing this, but it was the best I could think of to say. “I don't want to hurt you, I never wanted that!”

Derpy let out a disgusted little snort. “For a pony who says she doesn’t want to hurt me, you're getting very, very good at doing it.” Despite my best efforts to do so, I couldn’t find a way to sink down into the floor through sheer shame at my own actions. Derpy took a breath and gave a slow, resolute nod. “If I can't trust you with this, why should I trust you with my children?”

Okay, that line of thought could only lead to ominous places. “Derpy, I promise you, it won't happen again.”

“You also promised you wouldn’t sleep with Blossomforth, so I think we both know how much your promises are worth.” Derpy shot an uncompromising glare at me. “No. You don't get to make promises to me anymore. And if you ever want me to let you come within earshot of my girls again, I want a straight answer from you right now: why. Should. I. Trust. You. With. Them?”

The thought of never seeing Dinky or Sparkler again stung a lot more than I expected it to. They were good girls, and they deserved better than to get caught up in the fight between me and Derpy. Some small part of me that didn’t feel like a complete mule over my recent feather-ups resented Derpy using her daughters to hurt me. “Derpy, I know I've screwed up with you, but you have to know I would never hurt them.”

“And you'd never hurt me either, would you?” Derpy shot right back. A particularly nasty look crossed Derpy’s face as she added, “Sparkler’s past the age of consent in Ponyville. Considering your track record, I think trusting you with her would be an incredibly poor decision.”

“Oh come on! That was way below the saddle-line and you know it!” I might have some promiscuity issues, but I wasn’t the kind of pony who goes around hunting down teenagers and banging them the instant they turn legal.

“I’m not sure of a lot of the things I thought I knew about you,” Derpy growled out at me. “I hope your little fling with Blossomforth was worth it.”

“What do you want from me, Derpy? I’m getting a little tired of just being your punching bag.” I let out a frustrated groan and slumped back against the couch. “I completely and utterly screwed things up with you. I admit that. I can completely understand if you want to break things off with me. I don’t want that, but I’ll understand if that’s the decision you want to make. Hay, I can even stay out of your way for a while so we can both adjust. But cutting me out of your life completely, and not ever letting me talk to the girls again? That’s too much.” I ran a hoof through my mane and let out a weary groan. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do here. All I can think of is to keep telling you that I’m sorry. I am so sorry.”

“Sorry?” She let out a dark, mocking little scoff. “That’s all you have to say for yourself? That you’re sorry? You lie to me and rut that whorse, and then you have the gall to use your mother's passing as an excuse for everything you’ve done? Sorry doesn't begin to cut it!”

“Yeah, I know it’s not good enough.” I rubbed my temples with my hooves for a bit. “But what else is there? How many other ways are there to say that I made a big mistake in a moment of weakness? Now I just want to find a way to make it up to you.”

“Maybe you could keep your promises to the ponies you say you love!” Derpy snapped.

“I will,” I answered her without a moment’s hesitation.

Derpy went quiet for several seconds, and when she spoke again her voice was eerily calm. “No. I don’t believe you. It’s too late for any more promises. I don’t trust you. I’m not sure I can ever trust you again after what you just pulled—and if I can't trust you, you're not coming anywhere near my children.”

“Derpy, I...” I was having a hard time keeping it together. It was hard to keep a conversation running when I wanted to just start bawling my eyes out, but that wouldn’t do me any good. To be honest, I think the only reason I hadn’t started crying already was that I was in one of those odd places where you’re in so much pain that the tears just won’t come. Our romantic relationship looked pretty dead to me, and now it was just a question of whether we could salvage any sort of friendship at all. “I know I hurt you, but the mistakes I made with you aren’t the kind of mistakes that would hurt your girls. There’s a huge difference between being good with fillies and being a good fillyfriend.”

Derpy turned her back to me, her shoulders trembling. Then, in a very quiet voice, she announced, “I think you should leave, Cloud Kicker.”

I froze, mostly because I wasn’t sure whether I should start heading for the door or make one last effort to at least leave the door open for some kind of reconciliation at some point. “Okay, I’m going, but if you or your girls ever need anything, anything at all—”

“Get out!”

I got up and started slowly backing up towards the door. “I’m going, I’m going, I just wanted to say that—”

“GET OUT AND STAY AWAY FROM ME!”

Derpy spun around, and a second later I saw a grey hoof heading for my face. I probably could’ve dodged or blocked it if I’d really wanted to, but after everything I’d put her through, I figured Derpy had kinda earned the right to smack me one. What caught me off-guard, however, was just how hard she struck. Well, in hindsight, I should have noted how she basically put her entire weight behind the swing. In my defense, I was a bit preoccupied with my broken heart.

Bottom line, when she connected, it hit hard and knocked me down.

Okay, next time I decide a pony deserves a free hit on me, I’m going to remember to roll with the punch.

Derpy stood there looming over me, the fury in her eyes tempered by just a little surprise at how hard she’d hit me. After a long silence, she repeated in a quieter but no less angry voice, “Get out.”

“I’m going.” I slowly picked myself up off the floor and started making my way to the door. “M'sorry.”

“If you were sorry,” Derpy snarled, “it would never have happened.” I could hear the beginnings of tears beneath the pain and anger in Derpy’s voice.

I opened the living room door to discover that we had an audience. Dinky and Sparkler were both standing off to the side of the door, like they were trying to stay out of sight but not doing a very good job of it. Cirrus was there too, beside them and shuffling his hooves uncertainly, probably torn between wanting to get the girls out of there and whatever sibling responses were going through his head when he heard the fight between me and Derpy.

Dinky and Sparkler both had the kind of dull, shocked expressions you usually see on somepony who’s just had a nasty bit of trauma dropped on them—like hearing their mom getting into a fight with her new ex-fillyfriend. Dinky was trembling, and Sparkler had her forelegs wrapped around her little sister.

I was wrong. The mistake I had made with Blossom did wind up hurting Derpy’s girls too.

Derpy followed me out, no doubt wondering why I wasn’t getting the hay out like she’d told me to, and let out a small gasp when she spotted her daughters. After taking a second to try and get her voice back to something resembling her normal tone, she said, “Girls, go to your room.”

Neither of them did. Instead Dinky wormed her way out of Sparkler’s grip and trotted up to me, then wrapped her forelegs around my neck and squeezed for all she was worth. After a moment’s hesitation, I hugged her back. I knew Derpy probably wouldn’t like it, but if there was ever a pony that looked like she desperately needed a hug right now, it was Dinky. Getting exposed to this kind of thing can’t be good for a young and impressionable filly.

Dammit, I’d just wanted to bang a cute muffin-obsessed mare. Now I had somehow ended up in a situation where I needed to worry about creating an unhealthy home environment for a little filly.

Derpy trotted over and gently tried to remove Dinky’s hooves, but the little filly stayed stubbornly clamped around my neck. Derpy let out a frustrated snort and tried again, a bit less gently. “Dinky Doo, let go of her and go your room.” Dinky still gave no sign of budging. “Now!”

I saw a hint of anger flash in Derpy’s eyes, and started getting very, very worried. Considering everything Derpy had just gone through, having Dinky defy her in order to hug me was not going to go over well. It was bad enough that they’d heard us fighting—the thought of Dinky actually getting caught in the crossfire...

Thankfully, Sparkler stepped in before anything happened. “I got her.” She quickly trotted up and whispered something to Dinky which got the filly to let go of me and transfer her death-grip to Sparkler instead. Sparkler was about to carry Dinky off when she glanced at me and froze, letting out a tiny little gasp.

Oh Celestia, Derpy must’ve hit me hard enough to leave a mark. I didn’t know all the details of Sparkler’s time in the foster care system, but I knew enough to guess that she wouldn’t react well to the idea that her mother had the capacity to hit other ponies.

A second later her face went carefully blank, and she shot a wary look Derpy’s way before carrying Dinky off. I couldn’t help but notice that Sparkler made a point of keeping her own body between Dinky and Derpy the whole way. Luna, did she really think Derpy might do something to Dinky? Derpy was just about the most loving and caring mother I’d ever known.

What have I done to this family?

Right as Sparkler was about to carry her out of the room, Dinky poked her head over Sparkler’s shoulder. “Bye, Cloud Kicker. I love you, 'kay?”

“Bye, Dinky. Bye, Sparkler.” The words had an uncomfortable ring of finality to them. My voice dropped down to a pained whisper. “Love you too, Little Muffin.”

Derpy pointedly cleared her throat. “It's past time for you to leave.”

I flinched at the reminder, but I guess I should’ve known Derpy wouldn’t take any interaction with the girls well. “Yeah, okay, I’m going.” I turned around and walked out the door.

The instant I was outside the door slammed shut behind me, and I heard the lock slide into place. Then I heard Derpy’s and Cirrus’ voices on the other side of the door. It took less than five seconds for Derpy to start crying.

I turned my back on Derpy’s home and started slowly trudging back to the clan compound.

---

Dad was out when I got back to the compound. Probably busy doing Guard things, now that the funeral was over. Or maybe he was doing something with ‘Lula. Hay, he could be doing both at once, for all I knew. Point is, Dad and my little sister weren’t around. That might have been for the best—them being around would lead to them asking questions, and then I would have to start answering questions. A quick look in the mirror showed the beginnings of a black eye, and I couldn’t imagine anypony taking that very well.

I’d considered heading over to Blossom and Rainbow’s, but I knew they’d both make a big fuss over the whole situation. Finding out I’d gotten smacked by Derpy was sure to set Blossom off, or possibly result in me getting her to ‘comfort’ me again. And Rainbow Dash would almost certainly do something impulsive and poorly thought out. No idea exactly what she would do, but she’s pretty consistent about having a very extreme reaction when one of her friends gets hurt.

I would have to tell them what happened eventually, but not now. Preferably not until the mark on my face was gone. Better for everypony if they think I just got slapped instead of punched.

I’m not sure how long I lay there on the couch, feeling like horseapples. Eventually, I heard a couple ponies right outside the front door, cheerfully chattering away about nothing in particular. Too late, I realized that the living room wasn’t the best place to be if I wanted to avoid running into other ponies. I’d been so worn down after the fight with Derpy that I’d just slumped down on the couch instead of walking the extra distance to my room.

I hastily tried to rearrange my mane so it would cover my bad eye, but without a mirror or anything to check my work, I don’t think I did a very good job. At least the fact that my couch had its back to the door would buy me another couple seconds. The front door opened, and now I could make out Lyra and Storm’s voices, the two of them fondly reminiscing about better times. Lyra and I had been pretty good bang buddies back in our college days, and she’d spent enough time hanging around the compound to get to know my family. Luna, I missed those simpler times, when I could just bang around with a bunch of nice ponies and not have things get all complicated and messy.

Well, there was no way they weren’t gonna notice me, so I might as well start up the conversation on my terms. “Hey, guys.” I waved a hoof over the back of couch, so they’d know where I was. “Just taking a bit of a break.”

I’d vaguely hoped they would leave it at that and go back their conversation, but instead of moving on they both came trotting over. “Hey Kicky.” I didn’t even need to see Lyra’s face to know she was grinning. “We were talking about that time Storm accidentally electrocuted me.”

“It was only a little bit,” my cousin grumbled. “And for the record, Kicky is a incredibly non-specific nickname for Cloud.”

“I’m not always hanging around in a place where you can’t throw a stone without hitting a dozen Kickers,” Lyra shot back good-naturedly. “And you’re changing the subject because you don’t wanna admit that you zapped me because you were trying to show off your special talent.”

“In my defense, I did manage to bounce that lightning bolt off every single one of the targets. S’not my fault it went after you once it was done.” Storm settled down on a pillow opposite the couch, while Lyra telekinetically grabbed another one for herself. “Besides, by the time that bolt got to you, there was barely any juice left in it. Fifty thousand volts, max. Isn’t that right, Cloud?”

“You say fifty thousand volts like that’s not a big deal,” Lyra groused, turning to me and looking for some support.

“It’s really not.” Storm gave a dismissive wave of her hoof. “Or at least, it wasn’t in those specific circumstances. I mean, I didn’t zap anything that vital, plus you still had your freshmare flab keeping you safe.”

One of Lyra’s eyes twitched. “Did you call me fat?”

“Lotta ponies put on a couple pounds when they’re in college,” Storm answered with an uncaring shrug. “It’s not like it’s a big deal or anything.” She cocked her head to the side, and smirked. “Now that you mention it, you’ve still got a bit of padding there.”

Lyra gave my cousin a decidedly ominous grin. “One day, when you least expect it, that’s when it’s gonna happen: revenge.”

Lyra turned back to me, and her teasing little smile slipped. I thought about trying to make up an excuse to get out of there, bathroom break or something, but before I could come up with anything she got up, marched over to me, and brushed my mane away, giving her a nice view of my eye. She let out a soft little gasp when she saw the bruise. “Kicky! What happened?!”

“Nothing.”

Storm flew up to get a look for herself, and scowled. “Not buying it, Cloud.” She brought a hoof up to my eye for comparison, and her frown deepened. “This is a hoof mark. Who did this to you?”

Horseapples. I needed to come up with a good explanation. Fast. “I tripped and hit myself.”

Dammit, even Applejack could’ve come up with something better than that.

Since they weren’t idiots, Storm and Lyra didn’t fall for it. “Kicky, stop lying.” Lyra reached out and stroked my cheek. “Be honest with me. Please.”

Dammit. After that rather spectacular failure of a lie, there was no way I could get them to believe something wasn’t wrong. I guess there was nothing for it but to tell them the truth. “Okay, but do you promise you won't freak out?”

“Saying that just makes me even more worried,” Storm grumbled under her breath.

Lyra shot an annoyed look at her; my cousin sighed and nodded, and then they both turned back to me. “We promise.”

I took a deep breath. “Okay, look, I got into a fight with Derpy, and she got mad and kinda gave me a little slap, but—”

“She what?!” Storm’s voice was positively brimming with fury as her wings flared out. “Your fillyfriend hit you?!” She got up, looking like she intended to grab the nearest lightning cloud and pay a visit to the Doo household.

“Whoa, calm down Storm!” Lyra put a restraining hoof on my cousin’s shoulder. “I’m mad too, but let’s not do anything crazy yet.” She took a few calming breaths, then turned back to me. “Why would Derpy ever do something like that? She’s not a violent pony.”

I slowly nodded along. “I don’t think she even meant to hit me as hard as she did. Besides, I did kind of give her a pretty good reason to smack me, so it's not her fault.”

Storm gave an angry snort. “Listen to yourself, Cloud! ‘It’s not her fault,’ and ‘I’m sure she didn’t mean to hit me.’ Could you sound any more like a stereotypical battered partner?”

“Storm, chill!” Lyra chided my cousin. “Let’s at least let Kicky finish telling us what happened!” She let out an annoyed little huff, then turned back to me. “So what were you two fighting about anyway? Must’ve been bad if you think it was okay for Derpy to hit you.”

My mouth opened and closed a couple times as I tried to figure out the best way to explain what had happened. “I slept with a couple other ponies.”

“So what?” Storm gave an angrily dismissive wave of her hoof. “It’s not like you were in an exclusive relationship with her or anything. You’ve always been a playpony—hay, you were dating Lyra back when you were at West Hoof, and that never stopped you from having some crazy party nights!”

Lyra gave a bit of jump at that reminder. Like most ponies who are good friends and bang on a regular basis probably would’ve, we’d taken a look at whether it was worth moving our relationship past being simple bang buddies. It didn’t work out.

I held up a hoof to forestall any further commentary from Storm. “Things have changed a bit since I was going to West Hoof, Storm.”

“Did you agree to see her exclusively?” she demanded.

I sighed and shook my head. “Not exactly.” Granted, the last time we’d discussed exclusivity was a long time back, and a lot had happened since then. “The problem is, I’d promised not to sleep with Blossom, but then the night after we found Mom...”

“You broke a promise and slept with her?” Lyra paused for a bit, chewing on her upper lip as she thought it over. “Okay, at least now I understand why she would get so upset—”

“So you’re saying it was okay for her to hit Cloud?” Storm let out an angry snort. “Yeah, breaking a promise is bad, but her mom just died! Nopony’s gonna be using their best judgement after something like that. Besides—” Storm paused, and shot a brief apologetic look my way, “—well, Cloud’s always kind of used sex when she needs to let off some steam or she’s going through a rough patch. It’s not exactly surprising that it happened. Hay, needing to do something kinda life-affirming is a pretty normal response to dealing with death—or at least that’s what Mom says.”

“I’m not saying it was remotely acceptable for Derpy to hit Kicky, there's no excuse for that!” Lyra took a couple seconds to calm down, then continued. “Sorry, this is a lot to deal with.”

“I did kind of screw up.” Hopefully now that I was talking, the two of them would stop debating the whole situation as if I wasn’t even there. “Bottom line is, Derpy got hurt because of my actions. Yeah, I wasn’t thinking straight when the thing happened with Blossom, but that doesn’t change the fact that I slept with her and broke a promise, and doing that hurt Derpy. I can’t throw out any responsibility for my own actions whenever things go bad.”

That’s not to mention the whole situation with Fluttershy. Storm was right that I technically hadn’t broken any rules or agreements by doing it. Hay, I’d been nothing but honest with Derpy when it came to my intentions to bang Eepy again. That didn’t change the fact that having sex with Fluttershy wound up hurting Derpy. I’m not a fan of hurting ponies I love.

Lyra let out a heavy breath and slowly nodded. “Well, facing up to your mistakes is the first part of making things right.” She walked over and gently nudged me off the couch. “C'mon, sweetie, get up. You're staying with me tonight.”

I let her pull me off the couch, but made no further moves to follow. “You sure that's a good idea? I mean, I’ve got my family right here, and even if we didn’t do anything, hanging out with one of my bang buddies would probably make Derpy mad. Well, madder.”

Lyra let out a snort. “I don't care if Derpy gives me two black eyes, you're staying with me tonight. You need the company of somepony who isn't in the messed-up triangle.”

“She does have a whole big family right here,” Storm groused. “I mean, I can get not wanting to worry Uncle Tor or little ‘Lu about Cloud’s relationship drama, but Mom and Dad probably wouldn’t mind having her over for a bit. And it’ll keep her close at hoof in case her dad or sis need her.”

Shadow, were they really gonna get into a fight over which one of them got to take care of me? “Look, girls, if you were stallions I’d be telling you to pull them out and measure them already.” The two of them at least had the good grace to be a little chastened at that. “Anyway, I think talking to Aunt Wind might not be a bad idea.” Thank Celestia Rainbow hadn’t been there, or I would’ve been subjected to her poking fun at me over the fact that I wanted to talk to a head doctor. Still, if anypony could help me sort out what to do next with this whole mess, it would be the pony who specialized in understanding what goes on inside the heads of ponies.

Lyra actually pouted a bit. “But I wanna look after you and talk things through and give you the love you need right now. I can’t just hoof you over to somepony else to take care of...” She thought it over for a bit, and then reluctantly gave in. “I could go with you to Aunt Wind, I guess.”

“Sounds like we got a plan, then.” Storm gave a satisfied little nod. “Head to Mom’s and let her sort things out. Dad might be around too, if we’re lucky.”

To be honest, I wasn’t too hopeful about getting any good advice out of Uncle Typhoon. Not that he’s a bad pony for advice, it’s just that when it comes to most moral dilemmas he goes for very black-and-white answers. Any advice he offered would boil down to ‘try to do the right thing’. Too bad the Book of Shadow doesn’t have much about how to deal with love triangles. Then again, her advice would probably be not to get caught in a love triangle in the first place. Seems like the kind of simple and practical thing she would suggest.

Lyra leaned over and gave me a quick peck on the cheek. “Always here for you, Cloud. I’ll go grab you an ice pack for that eye of yours first, and then we’ll get going. Sound good?”

“Yeah, sounds good.” While Lyra trotted off to the kitchen to get some ice, I rubbed at my eye to get an idea of how tender and swollen it was. It wasn’t hurting too bad, but my idea of what counted as a serious injury might be a bit off, considering the last injury I’d acquired involved a changeling biting my leg bad enough that I was lucky not to be stuck with a limp for the rest of my life. Or worse.

I gave my eye another little poke. “Gonna need something to cover this up before too many ponies see it.” There was a long list of ponies who wouldn’t be too happy about me walking around with a black eye: Dad would be worried and mad, Rainbow would almost certainly blow her top, and Blossom would either be furious with Derpy or try to comfort me in ways that would almost certainly end with us banging again, considering my current state of mind. Though if things with Derpy were as bad as I feared they were, it probably wouldn’t be long before my reasons for not wanting to bang Blossom went away.

Storm took another look at my eye, then offered a shrug. “Once the swelling goes down some, we can probably put some makeup or something on it to cover the bruise. Just need to find something that won’t stand out too much.” That sounded like a good idea; ponies would comment if I started walking around as prettied-up as Rarity. Makeup’s not something most of the Kickers use all that often, since the Guard has rules against wearing a lot of it. Having your mascara running into your eyes in the middle of a battle is a very bad thing, not to mention it didn’t really fit the whole austerity thing the clan had going.

Lyra trotted back into the room levitating a kitchen towel loaded with ice and gently tied it into place over my eye. “There you go, sweetie.”

“Thanks, Lyra.” I leaned in to give her a quick nuzzle. “You're great. I don't appreciate you enough, sometimes.”

With all the relationship craziness I’d been caught up in lately, it had been real easy to lose sight of the fact that, well, there were a whole lot of other ponies that I’d banged. Sure, some of them were casual one-night flings that weren’t much more than two nice ponies having some fun together, but some of those meant a bit more. The thing about friends-with-benefits is that it includes being friends. I loved ponies like Lyra, Bon Bon, Raindrops, and a couple of my other regular bang buddies. Our relationships had history, meaning, and depth. Plus a whole lot of mind-blowingly good sex. Don’t even get me started on Lyra’s hand spell, or the way Raindrops could—

Okay, losing track of my train of thought there. Anyway, my point was that I’d been so focused on my whole big romance thing that I’d never stopped to think about the fact that there were other ponies out there that I loved. Sure, not in the same way I loved Eepy, Derpy, or Blossom, but it was still love. It really wasn’t fair of me to more-or-less shove them off to the side while this whole stupid love triangle drama played out.

Lyra grinned and gave me a reassuring little nuzzle. “Hey, you're caught up in a whole bunch of really crazy stuff lately. I don’t think anypony could blame you for not having enough time for all of the other ponies in your life.”

“Still, you've been a good friend.” I put a wing over her back and gave her a teasing little grin. “Maybe I should just marry you and Bons instead of bothering with the whole crazy love triangle thing.”

I’d heard worse ideas. Lyra, Bon Bon, and I got along fine. There was a rather satisfying lack of jealousy and relationship drama to the whole thing. Hay, when Lyra and I had tried dating in college it worked out pretty good, until we ran afoul of my scars from the Flight Camp thing. She could tell I was hurting, and I didn’t want to talk about it. As casual bang buddies, me holding onto some big and painful secrets wasn’t a big deal. When we’d taken a crack at being more than that...

That’s old history, and even though it hadn’t worked out, I’m glad Lyra and I had tried. We had good times, and she’d opened me up a bit more to the whole emotional side of things. Having a relationship that kind of ended with a mutual downgrade back to being friends-with-benefits instead of exploding in a massive, life-scarring catastrophe of pain and drama did make me a bit less utterly terrified of opening up to the ponies I banged on a regular basis.

Lyra smiled and let out a light little laugh. “You, me, and Bons all getting hitched? I wouldn't mind that.”

“Sounds like a good idea to me, too.” It’s a pity we couldn’t actually do that. I could certainly do a lot worse than to just hook up with two good friends who I’ve had a bunch of really enjoyable threesomes with. That would be taking the easy way out, though. I wasn’t going to run away from this whole situation, and hooking up with other ponies would be doing that every bit as much as signing on with the Guard would.

“Yeah, would be a nice plan.” Lyra gave a slightly resigned sigh, then nodded. “Anyway, guess we should get going to your aunt’s.”

“Yeah, Mom-wards we go,” Storm chimed in. As the three of us set off on the epic thirty second walk from Dad’s place to Aunt Wind’s, Storm casually offered her own opinion on the matter. “Lyra’s cool and all, but I always figured Cloud would end up with Rainbow Dash eventually. I mean yeah, there was that whole Flight Camp thing, but they worked it all out and now they’re really tight.” My cousin shot a grin over at me. “Plus, Rainbow’s way cooler than anypony else you could end up with.”

It’s worth mentioning at this point that Dash’s visits to the compound back when Storm was still young and impressionable might have had a bit of an influence on her. At the very least, I don’t remember Storm being quite so ambitious and eager to prove herself back before she met Rainbow. Still, at least she wasn’t starting up a fan club and running around in a Rainbow wig.

I was going to knock on Aunt Wind’s front door, but Storm just opened it and walked right in. Oh, right, it was kinda her home too, so there’d be no reason to knock. Since Storm was usually gonna be out in the field, there wasn’t really much reason for her not to still live with her mom whenever she was on leave. “Mom!” Storm called out as she walked in. “Got Cloud and Lyra here, and Cloud wants to talk to you!”

Aunt Wind came trotting out of the kitchen, wearing an apron that looked oddly fitting considering it was being worn by a military mare. Then again, it’s not like Aunt Wind was regularly out on the front lines kicking in heads—being the Guard’s chief counselor was very much a desk job. I’m not saying Aunt Wind was out of shape or anything, but she definitely didn’t look quite as honed as, say, Storm. Then again, Storm was in the Long Patrol, and anypony who’s regularly getting into the thick of things with hodags, bandersnatches, manticores, and whatever else the Long Patrol runs into would want to be in good shape.

My aunt took one look at the ice pack over my eye, and her smile disappeared. “Right, I think Typhoon can handle the rest of the casserole on his own.” She trotted over and started gently nudging me towards her couch. “Just to be safe, why don’t you two go lend him a hoof?”

Storm knew better than to argue with her mother, but Lyra stubbornly set her hooves. “I’d rather stick with Kicky, if you don’t mind.”

Aunt Wind politely cleared her throat. “I do mind, actually. Please excuse us.” The words didn’t sound overly hostile, but she delivered them with this uncompromising tone that made it clear she was not to be feathered with. “Please go help Typhoon chop up the carrots.”

Somehow, the fact that she started both her sentences with the word ‘please’ just made them seem even more like ironclad orders. Must be a psychologist thing.

Lyra gave a cowed nod and scampered off to the kitchen with no further prompting, leaving the two of us alone. She settled onto the chair opposite me, and hit me with what I always called her Psychologist Look. It’s a bit hard to describe, but it was basically this sort of carefully neutral-but-attentive look. Like she wanted to hear everything you had to say, and she wouldn’t pass any judgement on you for saying it. Normally it kind of bugged me when she broke it out, since being analyzed tends to annoy me a little on general principles, but right now somepony who would listen and not judge was exactly what I needed. Lyra and Storm were great, but they weren’t exactly the kind of ponies you’d go to when you needed a calm, rational, objective analysis of your personal life.

I took off the ice pack without even needing to be asked. Her expression tightened a bit when she saw my black eye, but she gave no other reaction, patiently waiting for me to explain the situation. I decided to give her the quick version, then go back and fill in the details later. “Derpy smacked me for breaking a promise and sleeping with Blossom.”

Aunt Wind hissed something under her breath, but the expression on her face never wavered. “Is this the first time she's hit you?” she asked after a couple seconds.

“Derpy's not an abuser!” I snapped out. “I just made her mad at me!” Aunt Wind gave me a flat look for several seconds, until I facehoofed and started backpedaling. “I know that saying it's not her fault because I provoked her makes it sound worse, but she’s a decent pony, really! I put her in a bad situation, and she reacted badly. That was the first time I’ve ever really seen her get violent, and I don’t think it would ever happen again.”

“Enough stress can make ponies act in ways they normally wouldn’t.” Aunt Wind pursed her lips in thought for a bit, then nodded. “As long as nothing like this happens again, I don’t think we need to worry too much. We'll table that issue for now, but do let her know that overlooking this is a one-time thing—assuming your relationship survives the fallout of the whole incident.” Aunt Wind shot a quick glance at the door to make sure nopony was listening in on us before breaking out the obvious question. “I assume you need somepony to talk to?”

“Little bit, yeah.” I groaned and leaned back on the couch. “It’s a big crazy situation, and ... well, you're the only pony I can trust to not go off the handle over this. If Lyra and I hadn’t stopped her, Storm would probably be dropping lightning bolts on Doo Manor right now, and Lyra’s a wonderful pony, but she thinks with her heart, not with her head. Let’s not even get into what’s going to happen if Rainbow Dash finds out. Or Blossom.” Fluttershy would probably flip too; it was just a question of whether she would go into super-nurturing mode on me while blaming herself for everything, or go unleash the mother of all guilt trips on Derpy.

“Hmm.” Aunt Wind gave a slow nod. “I’m going to assume you don’t want Tor or ‘Lula finding out about this either. It might be a bit late to completely hide what happened—too many ponies know—but I could have a word with Storm and everypony else about not telling him until a better time.” She sighed and rubbed a hoof along her muzzle. “Neither of them need any more troubles on their heads right now. For that matter, you don’t need to be dealing with this sort of thing either, although that’s never stopped you in the past.”

“No kidding.” I let out a bitter, humorless little laugh. “If I could get a cutie mark in making bad decisions...”

“That’s not a special talent, Cloud.” She reached over and put a reassuring hoof on my shoulder. “Everypony makes mistakes.”

“You have to admit, I do it better than most.” I dragged a hoof down face, wincing a bit when I got too close to my eye. “You wanna hear all the nasty details of the last couple months’ worth of feather-ups?”

“As much as you can manage before dinner, at least. Just a second...” Aunt Wind trotted out of the room, returning a few seconds later with a blank scroll, a quill, and some ink. “Alright, now let’s start at the beginning and work our way forward.” She took the quill between her teeth, patiently waiting for me to start giving her something to take notes on.

“Seriously, Auntie?” I fought against the urge to facehoof, but eventually gave into it. “What’s next, am I supposed to lie back on the couch? You gonna start breaking out the inkblot tests? Am I supposed to tell you about my relationship with my mother?” I gave a bit of a wince at that last one.

“Taking notes helps me think, Cloud,” my aunt grumbled good-naturedly. “Now stop stalling and tell me what’s been going on. Sometimes just talking about what’s wrong with a pony who’s not already neck-deep in the mess can help.”

“Well, you already know about Flight Camp, so we can skip that.” Needless to say, Aunt Wind had put in a lot of hours with me after that disaster. “So let’s start with Blossomforth: she kinda bumped Rainbow Dash out of my best friend slot after Dash started spending more time with other ponies. Nothing serious, Dash and I still get along great most of the time, it’s just that we’ve kinda been going in different directions for a while.” I took a deep breath and tried to shake off the memory of the one time where Rainbow and I hadn’t gotten along so well. “So anyway, Blossom’s my new PFF, but she’s also got a bit of a thing for me. She’s kinda been nursing that crush for a while, but she’s got a bit of a problem when it comes to not wanting to take big risks, and confessing your love for another pony is a pretty huge risk.

“On top of that, I hooked up with Derpy, and we were starting to get really close—past the point of just being casual bang buddies. That scared Blossom, and eventually her feelings for me came out into the open too.” I sighed and ran a hoof through my mane. “Problem is, they’re both pretty special to me, and neither one of them likes the idea of me doing the sensible thing and hooking up with both of them. They both want me to be exclusive, even though Derpy said she didn’t mind me banging around! I don’t get it! Why can’t I love the ponies I love, and not have that be a problem?” I was starting to get a bit too worked up to just stay lying down, so I sat up. “Why do they both have to bring in this whole stupid possessive thing that I never wanted any part of in the first place?! Now I’ve got both of them demanding I not love anypony else, especially not their rivals, and I never signed up for anything like that! I’m not some feathering trophy for them to fight over!” I slammed a hoof down on the table to emphasize my point and let off a little steam.

After a couple seconds of absolute silence, I started realizing how pissed off I was about the whole situation. It was just so stupid. It’s not like the fact that I loved other ponies meant that I loved either of them any less. Why couldn’t they understand that, instead of making some big stupid dramatic production about which one of them I loved more?

Maybe that’s where I’d been wrong the whole time. I kept looking at this whole thing as a love triangle where there were only two real outcomes. The problem was, that whole situation was a no-win scenario. I’d end up having to pick one of them eventually, and that would end with me and the pony who didn’t get picked both feeling rotten—not to mention I’d probably end up resenting whoever I did end up with for forcing me to make that choice in the first place.

Maybe it was time to apply one of those old lessons from West Hoof: when you can’t win a battle, change the terms of engagement. There was no reason I had to go along with the whole love triangle where I had to make a painful choice, except that Derpy and Blossom both seemed to think that was the only way the whole situation could possibly go. Thing was, they were wrong about that. The only reason the whole drama about which pony I would eventually end up with kept playing out was because we’d all kind of accepted it.

There was no reason things had to be that way. Maybe it was time for them to adjust to the fact that there was no reason I had to pick between them. It’s not like I could up and decide I loved one of them less than the other. Love doesn’t work that way. You can’t put a number on it, or set up a bunch of graphs to scientifically analyze it (though that hadn’t stopped Twilight Sparkle from trying).

“I think I figured it out.” I felt a hint of a smile make its way onto my face. “Love triangles suck, so let’s not play that game. I’d floated the possibility of them learning to share before, Derpy shot it down, and I just let it rest there. Starting to think maybe that was the biggest mistake I made in this whole thing. When two fillies are squabbling over a toy and refuse to share, you don’t sit back and let them fight until one of them wins. You sit them both down, and you make them learn how to share!”

Too bad I hadn’t figured that out sooner, in time to stop the whole situation from blowing up the way it had. I might have been able to save things with Derpy. Instead ... well, right now Derpy and I were pretty much dead as a couple. I didn’t want to give up on her just yet, though. Call me stubborn, but I don’t give up on ponies I love. I had to at least try. Hay, even if there was no hope of hooking back up with Derpy, I still owed her a better ending than what we’d gotten. And part of properly closing things out would be looking at where things had gone wrong for both of us.

Hopefully it wouldn’t come to that, though. Hopefully I could still fix this.

“See? Talking about things did help.” Aunt Wind smiled at me. “Now you know why they pay me so many bits to do this for a living.” She set her notepad and quill down—she hadn’t even gotten around to taking any notes yet. I felt slightly robbed; I’d been expecting the whole analysis experience. That, or the beginnings of a grocery list which included almonds, cashews, and pistachios.

Lyra trotted in from the kitchen, shooting an unreadable look Aunt Wind’s way as she came in. She probably knew that Aunt Wind was looking out for me, but I doubt that made her any less happy that somepony had bumped her out of her role as my designated carepony. “Uh, you two still talking? 'Cause dinner's ready.”

“I think we’ve reached a good point for a break.” My aunt shot me a faintly teasing smile. “As I recall, Cloud is rather fond of Typhoon’s carrot casserole. It might be best to hurry and fill our own plates before Cloud gets there.”

My stomach grumbled at the thought of food. I don’t think I’d eaten much of a breakfast, and I’d been too busy feeling like horseapples after the talk with Derpy to bother with lunch. Food sounded good. Really good. Plus, I wouldn’t have to worry about running out of food—Uncle Typhoon’s casseroles tend to come out big enough to last for several days of leftovers.

“Sounds like somepony’s worked up an appetite.” Lyra grinned at me and led the way into the kitchen. Uncle Typhoon and Storm were already waiting, and the lot of us settled in around the dinner table, then got down to the serious business of eating. I noticed that Lyra made a point of sitting next to me, and seemed to be trying to stare down Aunt Wind. Somepony was obviously still stinging about being booted out of the room for our private talk. For her part, Aunt Wind seemed faintly amused by Lyra’s territorial hostility.

Once I’d put a couple bites of casserole in my belly and silenced the worst of the growling, I noticed one unoccupied place at the table. “Where’s Star run off to?”

“Said she had something to look into before dinner,” Uncle Ty offered by way of explanation. “I expect her empty stomach will bring her back soon enough.”

“Pity we can’t track her the way she tracks us,” Storm grumbled, though there wasn’t any real annoyance in her tone.

Dealing with Star once her magic had started really coming in had been a bit of a pain at times. Tracking spells combined with the boundless curiosity of a young filly was a recipe for all kinds of trouble and aggravation. Storm got the worst of it, though—sibling rivalries are bad enough without your little sister being able to magically follow your every movement.

I suppose I should be glad Mom and Dad didn’t have ‘Lula until I was way too old to need to deal with that kind of thing. Granted, that just meant I wound up with a little sister who looked up to me and wanted to follow my example instead, but that was the lesser of two evils.

I was just getting started on my second helping when I heard somepony at the front door. The lack of knocking was already a pretty good sign of who it was, but Star’s voice confirmed it a second later. “Mom, Dad, I’m home! And I brought company!”

Star was bringing somepony over to her parent’s place for dinner? Oh, the teasing possibilities this raised. Storm looked even happier about it than I did—like I said before, sibling rivalries and all that. My good mood abruptly vanished when I got a clear look at Star’s guest. “S-Sparkler?”

Derpy’s daughter gave me a shaky wave, her eyes lingering on my less-swollen but still very noticeable bruise. “Hey. I, uh, I needed to get out for a bit, and I don’t really know anypony in Canterlot other than Miss Doo—” She caught herself, took a breath, and then made the correction. “Other than Mom’s family and you guys. So...”

Oh, that was not good. Sparkler slipping and calling her mother ‘Miss Doo’ definitely said a lot about her mental state—she hadn’t called Derpy that since the first months after Derpy brought her home. Not to mention that she’d come looking for me rather than, say, Rainbow Dash. Granted, Rainbow was staying in the clan compound anyway, but it would be a typical angry and confused teenager response for Sparkler to come looking for the mare who Derpy had just very clearly stated wasn’t welcome around her daughters anymore.

Let’s just hope Derpy didn’t go completely ballistic when she found out where Sparkler was staying. The last thing any of us needed was another blowup right now. “Look, Sparkler, maybe it would be better if you stayed with—”

She cut me off with an upraised hoof. “Yeah, probably, but I think I’ll stick with you anyway.” She paused, then awkwardly shuffled her hooves. “I figure we kinda got some stuff to talk about. Y’know, with Mom and everything.”

I sighed and reluctantly nodded. “No kidding. How’s—”

Sparkler interrupted me again. “Can it wait until morning?” A pained grimace crossed her face. “I’m really not in the mood to talk about it just yet. Gotta sort out where I stand before I can even start thinking about how I wanna talk to you about this whole thing.”

“Fair enough.” To be honest, I wasn’t sure I’d be up to talking things over with one of Derpy’s kids either. Sparkler clearly needed some stable adult influence to help her deal with what she’d seen and heard during the fight, and I wasn’t really in a good place to provide that right now. “Aunt Wind, you think you could put Sparkler up for the night?”

"Not a problem at all.” Aunt Wind offered the teen a maternal smile. “Assuming Star or Storm don’t mind sharing a bedroom, or she’s okay with sleeping on the couch.”

“She can bunk with me,” Star offered.

Something about how quickly Star made that offer called to mind the way I’d seen the two of them getting along so well at the funeral reception. For that matter, it sure was a coincidence that Star just happened to run into Sparkler. Sure, Sparkler was headed for the clanhold, but the fact that Star apparently met her halfway was still a bit convenient. I wondered if maybe Sparkler had one of Star’s trackers hidden somewhere on her. Star was good at hiding those things, and she tended to slip those little gems of hers onto anypony who she had an interest in...

Yup, there was definite teasing potential here. After everything I’d been through today, I could use a good laugh.

“Sure, you two bunking together sounds fine.” I hastily hid a grin behind an upraised foreleg. “Just be sure to toss up a silencing spell once you start banging. Some of us would like to get a decent night’s sleep.”

The slack-jawed expressions of surprise and horror on both of their faces made me that much more convinced that teasing them was a perfect idea. Like any good sister would, Storm immediately jumped on the opportunity to poke fun at her sibling. “Yeah, I'm sure Cloud knows all sorts of good positions you two could try out.”

As the first hints of a blush started working their way onto the mares’ faces, Lyra joined in on the fun. “I know a ton of good spells you two could use to really spice things up, if you want.”

“Now now,” Aunt Wind gently chided us, “let’s all be nice.” The two embarrassed young mares shot my aunt a grateful look, only to have their hopes cruelly crushed as a merry light entered her eyes. “Star’s an adult, and we should all respect her choice in romantic partners.”

“Moooooom!” Star whined, her face positively flaming.

My terminally humorless Uncle Typhoon gave Sparkler a frank, appraising gaze, then offered a slight nod. “She’ll do.” He gave the comment a second to sink in, then added in perfect deadpan, “I just hope she’s not a screamer.”

“Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad!” At that point, I wouldn’t have been surprised if Star had bolted for the door.

Between Uncle Ty’s remark and the way Star was whining, I finally lost it and started laughing my flank off. It didn’t take long for everypony other than Star and Sparkler to join in. I almost felt sorry for them. Almost.

Mostly, I was thinking about how good it felt to laugh again.

Author's Note:

So, time for the latest announcements:

And that announcement is about (pause for dramatic effect): Merchandising.

Yup, we're working on merchandise that doesn't use or mention any of Hasbro's trademarks or copyrights, and thus should be safe enough to sell. So if you ever wanted to buy a Winning Pony Shipping coffee mug, a mousepad featuring the Derpy Killing Bastard (AKA Comma-Kazie) or a thong with the Rule of Banging written on it (seriously, that's an option), now's the time to get it.

Comments

[JaketheGinger]

And so we end with a loving, warm image of family and friends having fun together.

At the expense of Star and Sparkler.

Oh well, can't win 'em all!

fim.413chan.net/art/src/131295594669-CloudKickerShrug.png

[Ponibius]

And so Cloud Kicker's journey to dig the biggest relationship hole ever continues. Even her attempts to get out of this problem only seem to make it worse. Have to love that everyone nearly forgot Cloud had slept with Fluttershy, only for it to come up at the worst possible time.

Also the last bit with Star and Sparkler was hilarious.

[Comma-Kazie]

Mostly, I was thinking about how good it felt to laugh again.

A sentiment many of us share. As much as I've love this story, the silliness is long overdue.

Also, you should all go throw money at the Emporium--you might have a coffee mug almost as cool as this:

i40.tinypic.com/2nlu79t.jpg

[DreadedCandiru2]

This chapter would explain what somepony's last thoughts were in the CancercancerDerpycancerverse.

[Misplaced Modifier]

And now the wounds can begin to heal, until Kicky trips and break em open again.

-Mis

[Gem]

Typhoon is now best Kicker

[MrNumbers]

I really, really hate responding with inane memes but-

SHUTUP AND TAKE MY MONEY!

- with that out of the way I would more than happily pay for a "Rules of Banging" poster... Or a ROYAL CANTERLOT BEDROOM VOICE...

Great chapter, excellent as always, your quality assurance on a chapter-by-chapter bases could rival Valve's... Only you seem to be able to count to three!

[Akavi]

The problem was, that whole situation was a no-win scenario.

i3.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/210/119/+_2acc5a8841f8752904d37f90a8014829.png

When two fillies are squabbling over a toy and refuse to share, you don’t sit back and let them fight until one of them wins. You sit them both down, and you make them learn how to share!”

I was filled with a vague feeling of dread at this line. It's either the one hope for universal happiness or Cloud's ticket to the mother of all shitstorms. Or both. Here we go

[DerRotSpassvogel]

It is 6:30 in the morning... no sleep... doesn't matter. Had Winningverse.

Also, I loved the part at the end so very much. And now I need more.

[Ausbrony]

And so the story of 'The Pony Who Can't catch a Break' continues.

The part with Derpy made me a little sad. And I'm curious to see what Cloudy has planned.

Dinky Get Better hugs for all!!

[Hazy Answer]

I have some bad news about the merch. You've spelt "friends" wrong on the rules of banging stuff. I before E, and all that.

[Brizzles]

Ahhh Light-Hearted ending, good to see you again.

[Darkarma]

Hmmm... those are some voyeuristic tenancies Star Kicker is displaying there it seems uh?

What else can those little gems do or Doo as the case may be?

[Farnham]

2739939

I was filled with a vague feeling of dread at this line. It's either the one hope for universal happiness or Cloud's ticket to the mother of all shitstorms.

This times a million.
I'm both optimistic and apprehensive.

[Darkarma]

On a side note I'm half expecting the next chapter to evolve something like this.

"Alright I know my proclivities have feathered everything up but you're both trying to change who I am. Its practically a law of physics, I will bang ponies and I'm even willing to restrict it to just you two and an occasional orgy. But seriously can't we just-"
"Gotta share, gotta care, its the right thing to do!"
"..."
"Pinkie!"

[OddDreams]

Okay. Finally regained ability to type after about 10 minutes of laughing hysterically at the ending there.

Glad to see Cloud figured that relatively effective solution out, now the only things left to worry about are the inevitable Derpy-style atom bomb that is sure to come and how that's gonna screw up the kids even worse if not defused...

[Taliesin of the Forest]

SO MUCH YES!
CHAPTER UPDATE ON LIFE AND TIMES!

YES!

[Crim]

Awesome chapter, oooh Derpy's in trouble with sparkler , this chapter genuinely made me forget about my hangover for atleast half an hour .....aaaaaaaand now its back

[Lambda462]

YES! Finally! Back to innuendo! God I've missed that!

Though I fully understand if people are tired of it, I think this chapter's drama was by far the best, also because all the confessions are out now and things will probably die down. That combined with the return of innuendo and laughter... Yes!

[Tchernobog]

Aaand what hopes I had when Cloudy figured it out are being threatened by Sparkler's arrival...

[Cloudhammer]

2738908

And so Cloud Kicker's journey to dig the biggest relationship hole ever continues.

Couldn't have phrased it better myself. *Hides the stack of shovels he keeps tossing Cloud Kicker*

[Swiftest]

Hey look! Relatively short comment from me this time.

Oh. Oh feathers. After all the craziness that had happened over the last week or so, I’d just about forgotten that I’d slept with Eepy too.

The reactions we (the pre-readers) had when we reached this part was priceless, and the only thing better than our reaction was the utter realization of just how utterly screwed Cloud Kicker was at that point.

Love that lighthearted scene at the end, especially the deadpan Typhoon.

Right now, I'm just wondering just how badly Derpy will flip when she finds out where Sparkler has been.

[punzil504]

Interesting. After the feathers hit the fan, there's still hope.

If I had my druthers, it would still be CloudDerp, although Derpy's on my list of "ponies I'm rather upset with" at the moment for the black eye and for trying to change who Cloud Kicker is... or at least her current methods.

Dinky continues to believe that everything can be fixed with a hug. Never grow up, kiddo.

It'll be interesting to see whose side (if any) Sparkler takes after talking to Cloud Kicker. Unlike Dinky, she's old enough to understand what happened, but still innocent enough to question things in black and white.

[Wild Zontars]

2739939 2739993
Yeah. I know this is Equestria and all, but the only way I've ever seen "make them learn to share" work out is "I'm taking my ball and going home."

[Recovery15]

Give her hell derpy, give her hell
Just, patch it up soon, k?

[Steel Resolve]

Chen, seriously I am addicted to this story, but are you trying to get me to hate Derpy? Because if so, mission accomplished.

I get it. She's hurt, Cloudy betrayed her, but calling Blossom a whorse?

The worst thing Blossom did was have bad timing to figure out her feelings for Cloud. Derpy on the other hoof has demanded exclusivity from Cloud despite never worrying about that previously.

I think the worst part is Derpy was apparently willing to forgive a closure bang with Shy.

But Blossom? no, fuck Blossom, she can die alone and unrequited.

Derpy created this mess by being a roadblock when she needed to be understanding. Hell, she could have invited Blossom to a threesome so she could monitor it, to help her get over Cloud, but instead she decided NOW she was going to be demanding about no side bangs...

BAD PONY! No muffin for you till you get your head out of your plot!

[Trace284]

It's a difficult thing to decide, on one hand, Cloud Kicker knew how hurt Derpy would feel if she slept with Blossom, on the other hand, Derpy knows how Cloud is with the mares. I dunno what to think,

[Silvernis]

See, I knew they should have gone for the sexy threesome thing from the beginning.

[Web of Hope]

Excellent chapter as always.

I think the best part of this one was how Sparkler reacted; her reverting away from calling Derpy 'Mom' is a deceptively powerful sign, and I'm glad it's there...can't wait to see how that plays out.

on a merch-based note, wasn't rule twelve the one about Diamond Dogs?

Shh!! we don't talk about that!!!

[Cawfee]

thong with the Rule of Banging written on it

Well then...

---
This story just leaves me wanting more every. Single. Time! And the wait makes the new chapters that much better.

---

a mousepad featuring the Derpy Killing Bastard (AKA Comma-Kazie)

[AltGrendel]

Yea, I like the dinner scene at the end. Good work.

Sparkler and Star? So much possible fun there.

[Ack Sed]

2740209
She's almost to the core!

[Harwick]

If the problem with Derpy and Blossom was that they wanted to change her, and that was wrong, then how can the right solution be for her to change them? Cloudkicker wants to take Derpy, who clearly wants a 1:1 relationship with the pony she takes as a life partner, and wants to train her to accept being one of two (for now, at least... Who knows if CK will be unable to help herself from loving others?) Meanwhile, Cloudkicker gets everything she wants out of the relationship, and no longer has to feel any guilt. Problem solved!

Regardless of whether I believe in the feasibility of CK's idea of a polygamous lifestyle, if any rule should be followed it should clearly be one against trying to bend someone into accepting it who clearly isn't of that persuasion.

Honestly, it seemed like such a refreshing turn when Derpy refused to put up with any more and ended the relationship. Finally, someone who wouldn't enable Cloudkicker's behavior, resulting in a chance for Cloudkicker to grow at the cost of a relationship, perhaps one day being able to mend things back into a friendship. But then the punch, and suddenly CK is the victim, and the daughters are siding with her, and everyone is fawning over her (as she is, I suppose, the literal center of this universe), and the epiphany comes to her that suggests that the story isn't taking a turn after all..

I feel that this story could really benefit from a character who is willing and able to call Cloudkicker out on her behavior and not come across as uptight, close-minded or otherwise a bitch... And yet still be someone who doesn't turn around and treat Cloudkicker like a lost and injured puppy instead of a full-grown mare and try to soothe her hurt. It seems that Cloudkicker is far too cocooned by ponies who love her to get any kind of straight talk at this point.

[AltGrendel]

2740367

I'm presuming that you've never been on the receiving end of news like that before. I don't blame Derpy at all. She's right and CK knows it.
IMHO, the problem here is that knew what she was getting into, thought she could handle it, and her true feelings got in the way. So in a way it's both their fault. Derpy knew the job was dangerous when she took it.

[Kaille]

I'm a dude, but I will SO get that thong and frame it!

And on the chapter itself. . . curses, now to wait for the next one.

[Steel Resolve]

2740526 No, I'll openly admit that. I've been happily married to my first girlfriend for 13 years. I literally cannot relate here. But what I do know is Derpy is creating her own issue here. Does she have the right to be angry? Sure. But insulting Blossom, hitting Cloud? Nope.

[Forevermore]

I'll confess the idea of Cloud not choosing either of them did not occur to me. I blame this on my near-constant reading of harem manga where the guy (or girl) always winds up with one of the obvious choices. You'd think my fanboying of Batman would make me more inclined to always look at a third option. Ah well.

Still, at least she wasn’t starting up a fan club and running around in a Rainbow wig.

That's what you think.

[Valenti]

And the horseapple storm continues...

Also, yay positive chapter ending!

[Verdigris]

Every loose pillow on the couch went flying in Rainbow Dash’s general direction.

And about bucking/feathering time.

Oh, and you did not just hear a fan-girl-like squee! coming from the Orlando area when I saw this had updated.. Nope. Not even.

[AltGrendel]

2740546 Fair enough. Suffice it to say that you can say stupid mean stuff like that in the heat of the moment. Doesn't make it right, but it happens. You'd also be surprised at how much stuff said sounds like a badly written soap opera.

I honestly hope it never happens to you. Sounds like you're off to a good start.

[Verdigris]

2740015 This. Because Pinkie can't let something so serious stay so serious.

[Verdigris]

2740040 2740194 Oh, that's simple, and Cloud won't have to do much ... except mention that Sparkler referred to her as Miss Doo.
If that doesn't get her attention, then she's a lost cause if there ever was one.

[Verdigris]

2740512 Derpy's gonna go ballistic about that, and I have the feeling she may go after Star ... and have a righteously and royally pissed Cloud standing over her not two seconds later, likely growling, "You can smack me around all you like, but don't you dare touch my family, you feathering hypocrite!" No screaming, just calm words and a steely-eyed death-stare.

[Verdigris]

2740520 Bullshit. Cloud might be able to get away with things outside her clan, but not inside it. Her Aunt Wind won't let that happen, as she knows how unhealthy that really is, and she's still a Kicker, and they don't compromise on integrity.
Or did you miss all that?

[Verdigris]

Okay, I was expecting the ride to be rough, and I wasn't disappointed. I just wasn't ready for how rough.
For this once I can ignore my dislike about the DeadDerpyVerse; she was being a nag and then some and not all justified, especially after she slandered Blossom. My eye started twitching when that happened.
Sitting the two down might work, but I expect there to be a beat-down at some point, and I don't think it'll be Blossom vs Derpy. Cloud's gonna put her hoof down, and won't be very nice about it. And the most devastating weapon she has - and I hope to Celestia she doesn't have to use it - will be asking Derpy if Sparkler's calling her mom again, and keeping Dinky away from her.
Oy, you really know how to stir it up, Chengar. Thank you, and damn you ... again.
Nice touch with the teasing at the end; I think everyone and everypony needed that more than we and they thought.

[RoboRed]

Hooowheee...that went about as well as expected. But Derpy clocking Cloud good in the face, and Sparkler questioning loyalties? That, I did not expect.

Also, that quintuple-whammy on Star and Sparkler at the end. Priceless.

[djthomp]

Well. That went badly.

You know, things could go to hell in a hand basket quite rapidly if Derpy can't find her daughter and reports her to the guard as kidnapped by the Kickers. Of course with the punch and the black eye that could go badly for Derpy as well, but I don't expect she's thinking rationally at the moment.

[Ressi]

Is it alright for me to say that I geniouly liked it that Derpy broke up with Cloud Kicker?
I felt conflicted because Derpy didn't deserve a betrayl but Cloud Kicker isn't the kind of pony who changes from zero to a hundred. Derpy could have changed Cloud Kicker to the best but change her notherless.

Blossomforth didn't have a single chance to embrace love from Cloudy, cause she's almost the exact opposite.
Reasonable and strict.
So being broken out of her bubble by Kicker was the best thing that could have happend to her, I think.

Derpy has to find a better suitor.

I really feel sorry for her and Dinky and Sparkler's reaction is heart breaking...

(Bu well... secretly I shipp Cloud X Blossom)

[621Chopsuey]

I still had no idea what I was going to do, but I damn sure wasn’t going to just let this whole mess linger like some kind of malignant tumor in the middle of our relationship.

“Dee? Visitor for you.”
“Cirrus! Didn’t you hear the shower running? I’m not decent—get out!”
“You don’t even wear clothes normally! A towel’s actually more modest!”

Grin and shake my head.

I guess my confusion must’ve been showing on my face, because Derpy sighed and took one of my hooves in hers. “Fluttershy told me on the train ride over.” One of Derpy’s ears gave an agitated flick, and her eyes narrowed. “I’m not very happy with you over that. You knew I was worried about losing you to her, and you slept with her anyway. Hay, you proposed to her!”

Whoawhoawhoawhoa! What?! *reads back a few chapters* Cripes, how the hell did we forget that?!

“You feathered up?” Derpy snarled at me, her eyes blazing with indignation. “You feathered up!? No, me bringing down Town Hall was a feather-up! Me setting the stove on fire is a feather-up! Hay, what happened back at Flight Camp was a feather-up! Even sleeping with Fluttershy was a feather-up! This?” She looked me dead in the eyes. “This a betrayal!”

In other words, she reacted like this: i2.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/241/921/8b7.gif

Star was bringing somepony over to her parent’s place for dinner? Oh, the teasing possibilities this raised. Storm looked even happier about it than I did—like I said before, sibling rivalries and all that. My good mood abruptly vanished when I got a clear look at Star’s guest. “S-Sparkler?”

Whoa! What's she do-- oh, wait, I see where this is going.

My terminally humorless Uncle Typhoon gave Sparkler a frank, appraising gaze, then offered a slight nod. “She’ll do.” He gave the comment a second to sink in, then added in perfect deadpan, “I just hope she’s not a screamer.”

Subsequent reaction.

This was a great chapter. We finally got to see Cloud begin clearing up the situation between herself, Derpy, and Blossom. Albeit it so far ending on a sour note, it was better than delaying it any further. Though it will take some time to clean the scat off the fan following Derpy's moment of raging.
On the plus side, we got a little StarSparkler teasing. Good to see a happy family moment to close the chapter.

So, merchandising. Can't wait to see what else y'all got in store.

2741185 Derpy and Time Turner may have a chance ... that is, if they can make amends after he ditched her on H&H Day. If not, there are other suitable candidates like Brolly or Crescent Moon.

[Zytharros]

This chapter was perfect.
Utterly perfect.
That last deadpan would be the kind of joke my grandpa would do. Reading that joke in his voice nearly had me the centre of my lunchroom's attention Iin laughter.