Chapter Eighteen: Post-Partum
Two days after the birth of the twins, Dr. Null Result declared that both Cup and her foals were ready to leave the hospital. Of course, he couldn't help but throw in a few sarcastic comments at Carrot's expense, informing the new mother that he hoped the foals would have a “strong male parental figure” in their lives.
“Of course they wil!” Cup had snapped back. “Their father is a fine stallion and a great role model!”
The doctor only just smirked at her. “Be that as it may,” he said, leering at the mare and her foals, “if you ever get tired of the ruse, you know where to find me, heh.”
“That is enough, Dr. Result!” a familiarly hyperactive, yet enraged voice said out of nowhere. Both older ponies turned to see Pinkie Pie in the doorway of the hospital room, looking decidedly un-Pinkie-ish. “Upon graduation of the Royal Equestrian Institute of Medicine, you had to take an oath, right?” The cold smile on the pink mare's face could have melted the penguin lands.
“Pinkie Pie?!” the doctor exclaimed, his shock mixing with his indignation. “What are you doing back here? This is a restricted area!”
“Nurse Redheart sent me back here to see what was taking so long- it seems like you've been back here with Mrs. Cake, like, FOREVER!” Then, she returned to her more serious tone. “You didn't answer my question, doctor. Did you or did you not take an oath when you graduated from medical school?”
“I fail to see how that is the concern of a little pony like you,” the doctor replied coldly. Pinkie just smirked at him, the uncharacteristic expression sending a chill down the doctor's spine. The mare looked like she had just stepped out of one of those horror movies his eldest son was so fond of, like she was about to carve him up and bake him into cupcakes. It was very unnerving.
“That's your answer, then, hmm?” Pinkie stated. “Interesting. I'm sure that the Royal Equestrian Institute of Medicine will be interested to know that one of their alumni has been disregarding the seriousness of the Cloveric Oath. And if, in fact, you are not breaking your oath by engaging in sexual harassment of your patients, then I believe the Board of Directors at this hospital will be fascinated by the fact that they are apparently paying the salary of a charla... charles... a fake doctor!” she finally concluded with vehemence. “So what is it going to be, 'doctor?'”
“You know I could have you committed to the psychiatric ward,” Null Result spat. “Fine. I retract my earlier statements, Mrs. Cake. You and your foals are free to go.” He trotted out of the room with as much dignity as he could muster. Astonished, Cup turned to her employee.
“You didn't have to do that,” she said. Pinkie Pie just shrugged.
“He's always been a creepy creeper,” she replied, any trace of her previous animosity completely gone. “And I promised you and Mr. Cake I'd protect you and the foals. By the way, my friends brought up the whole 'Mr. and Mrs. Cake and the babies are all different kinds of ponies' thing. Applejack was especially curious, but Mr. Cake's explanation seemed to make sense to them.”
“Well, that's good, at least,” Cup mused. “They didn't want to know more about that? I worried that Applejack especially wouldn't let the question go so easily.”
“Nah, she believed Mr. Cake,” the pink mare replied. “Rainbow Dash did warn us though that Pound might start flying around all crazy-like, so we'll need to be on the lookout for that.”
“Really?” Cup was surprised. “Pegasus foals fly so early? But that little Scootaloo can't fly yet...”
“Hey, I don't know so much about pegasuses,” Pinkie said, shrugging. “But if you're curious I can ask Dashie about it.”
“No, you don't need to do that,” Cup replied. “Actually, please don't do that. Scootaloo's situation is really none of my business. I don't know whether or not that could be considered offensive to pegasi. By the way, Pinkie,” she continued, fixing the other mare with a stare. “The term is 'pegasi.'”
“Oh., that's right!” Pinkie exclaimed, paying no attention to Mrs. Cake's worried of potentially offending a pegasus pony. “Pegasi! I knew that! That definitely sounds better than pegasuses! Pegasuses sounds like sausages, and that doesn't make sense because ponies aren't sausages! Ponies aren't snausages either, even though I don't know what a snausage even is! Oh yeah, Twilight also said to be careful around Pumpkin because baby unicorns can't control their magic yet and they might blow things up! So we need to watch out for that, although Twilight didn't exactly say it like that. She just warned us that unicorn foals can't control their magic, which is really just a fancy way of saying that they blow things up!”
“...huh?” Cup asked, only catching the tail-end of Pinkie's stream of consciousness rant. “Did you say that baby unicorns blow things up?”
“Well, like I said, Twilight didn't up it quite like that, but pretty much, yes.” Before Cup had time to panic about that, however, Pinkie interrupted. “You can probably talk to Twilight about ways for you and Mr. Cake to make sure she'll be safe. If anypony would know about that, it would be Twilight.
“I suppose...” Cup said doubtfully. It wasn't that she didn't trust Pinkie Pie to accurately interpret her bookish friend's advice, or that she didn't trust the educated unicorn... okay, maybe it was that she didn't trust Pinkie or Twilight. Both mares technically had good intentions. Still. If baby unicorns did have controlling their magic, it would be prudent to consult an actual unicorn. And consulting Ponyville's most powerful unicorn would be the best...
“Anyway, what are we standing around for?” Pinkie Pie asked. “Let's go home!”
After the initial incident at the hospital with the bearers of the Elements of Harmony, nopony else raised any objections with regard to Pound and Pumpkin Cakes' race. The ponies of Ponyville were nothing but supportive towards the new family. Three days after the foals came home, Boxy Stacks himself dropped by with a small trailer full of baby supplies.
“They're from Derpy,” the gruff pegasus stallion said. “She was gonna drop it off herself but she got held up on a delivery to Canterlot. Some sorta crap about the delivery needing to go through customs inspection due to a security threat. Yeah, like a whole shipment of teddy bears is a security threat,” he muttered to himself.
“Oh...” a very surprised Carrot replied. “Well, I'll have to thank her. How much do I owe you for the delivery?”
“Don't worry about it,” Boxy replied, shrugging. “No charge. Least we could do after all those free muffins you've given us. And congratulations, by the way!”
A few days after that, Berry Punch staggered up to Sugar Cube Corner, a bottle of high-quality Trottingham whiskey in her saddle-bags. “Congradulashions on yer foals!” she slurred, although it was impossible to determine whether or not she was actually drunk. “Have a present, compliments of Ponyville Liquor Supply! But it's not fer you,” the magenta mare interrupted herself, pointing a hoof accusingly at Cup. “You can't have none. It's bad fer the foals, y'know. You can't have none until they're weaned! I didn't touch a drop until Pinchy was two, y'know! Hardest years of my life! Now where are the little cuties?”
Blinking, unable to respond to Berry Punch's odd tirade, Cup just pointed her hoof in the direction of the other room. The purplish mare immediately trotted over and poked her head in, grinning widely when she saw the small ponies asleep in their cribs.
“Aww! They're so cute! Congratulations!” Berry exclaimed loudly, wincing once the words came out of her mouth, seeing that she'd startled the babies. Being a mother herself, the town drunk could tell when a foal was about to let loose with an ear-splitting racket of sobs and cries. “Well, anyway, congratulations again!” she said quickly, before turning and cantering away. She'd made it to the door before the babies let out a long sustained wail in unison.
“Oh come on!” Carrot cried out, exasperated. “I had just gotten them asleep!”
“I think she did mean well,” Cup said faintly, hurrying over to soothe her foals.
Several more weeks passed, and life continued much as it always had at Sugar Cube Corner, except this time, with the additions of two little foals. Cup and Carrot loved every second of it. Playing with the foals, singing them to sleep, bonding with them... every moment that passed just brought the little family closer together. Even the day that the older bakers had to leave the twins in the care of Pinkie Pie, despite their reservations about the whole thing, turned out alright in the end. The hyperactive pink mare, unfortunately for her, happened to be the only one around when her friends' warnings about the unpredictability of unicorn and pegasus foals came true. After an entire day of chasing after that little winged speed-demon (it was increasingly clear that in a few years they would have Rainbow Dash 2.0 on their hooves), and trying to keep up with a remarkably powerful miniature unicorn, Pinkie had realized something. Something that she realized she needed to discuss with her employers.
“I don't know how long ponies are just going to ignore their abilities,” she warned the Cakes. “If what Rainbow told me was right, baby pegasuses usually show their future abilities at a month or so, even though they'll lose the ability to fly until puberty a few weeks later. And I don't know much about unicorns, but I think Twilight mentioned something about how the most powerful unicorns show it really early.”
“What are you trying to say, Pinkie?” Cup sighed, massaging the sides of her head with her hooves. She'd very nearly had a heart attack when the younger mare had described the day's events to her. Even after checking on the foals herself and confirming that they were fine, she wasn't in the mood for Pinkie Pie's whole “mysterious” thing. The mare needed to speak plainly, something that she wasn't especially good at. It was an endearing quirk when it wasn't connected to very serious situations. Lately, most of the situations that the Cakes had found themselves in were nothing if not serious.
Fortunately, Pinkie seemed to get the point, and she got right down to the bare bones of her argument. “I'm saying that if their abilities get stronger and everypony knows about them, then everypony will want to know where they're coming from. I dunno if just saying that you have unicorn cousins or whatever is going to cut it. If Pumpkin turns out to be really powerful with magic, then everypony will want to know where it came from. They're going to want to know which unicorn relative it was. Especially if she's eligible to go to Celestia's Academy for Gifted Unicorns. For ponies like Twilight, it's not a big deal, see, because she's actually from a unicorn family. But, like, if Dinky Doo was to go, Derpy'd probably have to finally tell everypony who Dinky's dad is.”
Carrot's eyes widened. “That's right...” he said, alarm creeping into his voice. Cup, however, just rolled her eyes.
“So what? Maybe we just don't allow her to go to any school other than the one here in Ponyville,” she suggested. Pinkie looked like she wanted to say something, but Carrot interrupted before she had a chance.
“And what? Deny her the best education possible because we're afraid of what some ponies might think of us?!” he shouted. “Fine. I'll take the reactions. And Cup, you know I'm the one who'd be taking the brunt of it! 'Oh look, there goes Carrot Cake, that stallion so useless his wife had to pick the father of her children out of a catalog!' I'm the one who has to live with that, don't you get it? But I will deal with it if it means my daughter can have the best life possible!”
Cup just snorted in annoyance. “Not everything is about you, or your pride,” she continued sarcastically. “Who's going to believe that's what happened? Nopony. Everypony will assume that I cheated on you. Look at how Pinkie Pie acted when she reached that conclusion! No, you won't be the one taking it!”
“Oh shut up,” Carrot snapped, his patience finally breaking. “I've put up with your hysterical stupidity since we went through with this treatment. I've dealt with you refusing to get the medical care you need, I've put up with you snapping at me and Pinkie Pie over the slightest things, I've gotten used to the idea that my children aren't really my children, and I've had it up to here with your selfish flank! And you know damn well why Pinkie acted that way, or did you forget about that since it wasn't all about you, Cup O'Coffee?” The blue mare flinched at the use of her maiden name- Carrot only did that when he was beyond furious with her. But she drew herself up again, indignant.
“I'M the one who's been selfish?” Cup practically screeched. “YOU'RE the one who wanted to have foals so badly! I went along with it because you felt so bad about not being able to be a father!”
“Are you regretting it?”
“Of course I'm regretting it! What's more, I'm regretting ever having met you!”
The shouting reached the foals, who woke up from their slumber and immediately started crying. Their parents, however, ignored the wails and continued arguing, their angry words growing more and more vicious.
“I should never have broken up with Dewy Papaya! Now THERE was a mare who knew what was what, and how to respect a stallion!”
“HA! Dewy Papaya? You mean that vapid little unicorn you dated in high school? Oh come on.”
Pinkie Pie realized that the two older ponies weren't planning to comfort their children anytime soon, and she took it upon herself to calm the foals down. Several minutes later, she returned, covered head to hoof in flower and looking angrier than either of the bakers had ever seen her, including the time she'd explained her past to them.
“Enough!” the pink mare finally snarled, getting the attention of her employers. The older ponies froze, recognizing that tone of voice. Indeed, Pinkie's mane and tail had flattened out again, and she was fixing the Cakes with a dark stare that rivaled that of a cockatrice.
“Pinkie-”
“Do not start with me,” Pinkie said shortly. “I try to give you both a warning about what could happen, and you start fighting like a couple of foals! You're supposed to be the parents here! But you fight over the stupidest things imaginable! Do you know how many ponies would love to have a life as stable as yours? Don't you know how many foals live in broken homes? Of course you don't. But you ought to know it happens! I'm standing right here! Don't you care about Pound and Pumpkin?”
“Pinkie-” Carrot started, but she cut him off.
“No. Don't start. Don't even go there,” the mare warned. “You knew what you were getting into when you had the foals, and if you can't get over that, then maybe you shouldn't have had foals at all. Nopony is going to think well if you can't be bothered to care about your own children because you're too worried about your own image. No foal should have to grow up like that. If you don't want to be parents, then you'd best put the foals up for adoption. I'd offer to take them in myself, but Celestia knows I'd be a terrible mother. I heard Lyra and Bon-Bon have been considering having foals themselves. Maybe they'd be willing to raise Pumpkin and Pound. Lyra's even a unicorn- it would be good for Pumpkin.”
“Pinkie, that's not-”
“Shut up,” Pinkie snapped. “Just shut up.I am going to go have a shower to get all this Discord-damned flour off of me, and then I'm going out for a while. Who knows? I might not even be coming back! I'm sick of this. I really am.”
“Pinkie Pie, please-”
But Pinkie was already halfway up the stairs.
To Be Continued
Author's Comments:
This has been another installment of Everypony Standing Around Arguing. I mean, The Donors.
Everyone who's in the middle of Hurricane Sandy, please be safe.
-Kaboom
To start, don't worry, I'm making sure to stay inside during the storm, and my parents got plenty of nonperishables in case our power goes out. I also have plenty of books and a latern to read with at night.
As for the story, I am really loving this more and more as it goes on, and I am really getting anxious to see the confrontation between Moneybags and the Cakes over his paternal rights to Pumpkin Cake. I would say the same about Steel Seethe, but I'm not sure he'd want to really meet Pound, if only because he only really gave his "material" because he needed the money.
You know, it's weird seeing Cup and Carrot argue like this. I always have a hard time imagine them fighting at all, but I could see them having disagreements. However, this is just so...strange, with them talking about how they wished they never got married and them ignoring the twins when they cry. Granted, for years my parents argued a lot and the arguments got pretty fierce (they never hit each other, but they could get pretty loud), so seeing the Cakes argue like that is unsettling.
That's something I never thought about: that unicorn magic could show up earlier if the unicorn will end up being especially powerful. I always figured that baby ponies will usually show signs of flight or magic at around a month old, then until they hit a certain age, the abilities just come and go until they finally stop completely for a few years. I had also figured that baby unicorns got a bit of a magic "boost", which is why Pumpkin could levitate and phase and possibly teleport. I have a theory that any unicorn could learn to levitate and teleport, but it takes a lot of effort. As for the phasing, part of me likes to imagine that phasing is Pumpkin's "special" magic, like Rarity's gem-finding spell.
So...are the Cakes aware of Pound's strength at this point? I mean, besides being able to lift Pinkie (who I doubt is the lightest earth pony in the world) off the ground and drag her not only around the house but up the stairs, he broke the metal faucet of the bathtub with his hoof. Considering he is a pegasus, something tells me Pound is abnormally strong, especially for a foal.
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To be perfectly honest with you? In normal circumstances I can't imagine the Cakes fighting like that either. In fact, my headcanon for them, under most circumstances, is that they're one of the happiest couples in Equestria.
But this story has been getting progressively darker, and one of the themes of it (at least, in my mind) is that even people (uh, ponies?) who seem to have perfect lives have things lurking below the surface. And apply enough pressure, and those things will come to light, whether you like it or not.
Cup could potentially also be suffering from post-partum depression. Sometimes, new mothers react very poorly to the changing brain chemistry after the baby is born and become seriously depressed and irritable. I've seen it happen several times, and it usually corrects itself after a while, and it can be treated with medication. I think Carrot, too, has some deep-seated insecurities and Cup is, intentionally or not, kind of poking at them. He couldn't be the father of his foals, and on some level, I think that bothers him a bit, but Cup doesn't really understand that.
As for Pumpkin's powers, I agree with you- pretty much all baby pegasi and unicorns do show their powers early in life, then lose them until later. But I think it would also make sense for particularly magically powerful unicorns to have even stronger magic as babies. And yes, that would actually work well as Pumpkin's future special talent, with her being able to phase through things. And for the Cakes knowing about Pound's strength, well, Pinkie probably left the bit about Pound being able to lift her up out of her report. No reason to freak out Mrs. Cake more than necessary. They do know about the faucet, though, that's a little harder to hide.
I'm working my way up to that! It'll probably be several more chapters before the big showdown happens, though- gotta get everything set up first!
Thanks for reading, and hopefully your power won't go out! Something just fell onto my house, there was a huge crash, but there's no holes in my roof and the power's still on. Hopefully that stays!
1528945 Yeah, I have a feeling that men who aren't actually the fathers of their children, whether the children were conceieved through more "loyal" ways like how the twins were conceieved, or if their wife actually did sleep with another man to get pregnant (which I have seen; it's basically the same thing, only with an actual human being involved) have trouble coming to terms with it completely for a while, even if they say they're perfectly fine with the idea.
As for the post-partum, that is actually a nice touch. I've seen many stories about pregnancy and babies that seem to ignore the fact that things don't always go hunky-dory. I mean, besides the fact that things can go wrong with pregnancy, either serious things like premature labor or pre-eclampsia or less serious things like long-lasting nausea or back pain, things will rarely go back to normal for a couple immediately after the baby is born.
I do like that it seems everyone in Ponyville is supportive of the Cakes, and not really questioning why Pound is a pegasus and Pumpkin is a unicorn, meaning either they "know" about the distant relatives, or they don't really care and are just happy that Cup and Carrot finally have their own foals.
I also have to admit that Pinkie in these recent chapters scares me a little. I mean, not to the extent of "Cupcakes", but after seeing her open up about how her father killed her mother, sisters, and newborn half-brother and nearly killed her, everything else where she's seriously becomes unsettling. I mean, I love her for calling out Null Result on his harrasing Cup, but near the end with her semi-threatening to give Pound and Pumpkin to Lyra and BonBon if the Cakes can't stop arguing...it's disturbing.
On a more light-hearted note...aren't pony names fun to come up with?
Bitch, I have 2 hours less school tomorrow. I'm not complaining
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I would be very surprised if Pinkie didn't have post-traumatic stress after what happened to her. Yeah, her behavior is kind of erratic and I can imagine it would scare the crap out of the Cakes, and her friends, if they knew what was going on. But at the same time, even if she was triggered into a flashback, she wouldn't hurt the foals. If she did, her mind would probably permanently snap- she'd spent the latter half of her life running from what happened and trying to prove to herself that she was different from her father. If she'd failed at that, I don't think she would ever really recover. It's why she goes to such lengths to make sure the babies would be okay. Probably why she threatened to give the babies to Lyra and Bon-Bon. Get them out of a situation where they could be put in danger.
As for the pony names, I have the hardest time coming up with them. If I get stuck, though, I've realized that the names of cosmetics sound a lot like pony names. If I get stuck, I'll go to Sephora's website or something and look at the names of the eyeshadow colors or something- it helps a lot.
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Heh. I'm not really complaining either, the shopping district I work in shut down and my university is closed through Wednesday. But I don't want anyone to get hurt. It's damn windy out there!
1531091 So, Pinkie is basically the exact opposite of a child abuser. If she feels like Pound and Pumpkin are in any danger, she'll do anything she can to stop the danger from coming to them. Which makes me a little worried for Moneybags if he tries to take Pumpkin away...I mean, I know that he technically doesn't have any right to do that (at least if Equestrian laws when it comes to sperm banks and donations are the same as our world, where the donor doesn't really have rights to the children), but considering how the doctors at the clinic are and the fact that Moneybags is very rich...
I honestly just think of names that I think sound right...Sometimes going the route of the fans and naming them something that goes with their special talent or their colors or something of a theme like with the Cakes. Some of the names I've come up with are things like Pinto Bean, Lima Bean, Jelly Bean, Fluffer Nutter, Blue Blur, Honeycomb, Pock-Picket (little mix-up of "Pick-Pocket"), Dew Drops, Token Medal, Precious Medal, Ocean Breeze, Tsunami Storm, Crystal Lake, and Bronze Medal.
Pinkie Pie was a little hard on the Cakes, and I hope that they all make up soon. So far the Cakes have been pretty good parents and seem to love their children dearly. Why would the Gifted Unicorns academy need to know who Dinky's father and Pumpkin Cakes unicorn relatives are? Why would that be any of the schools business?