In the middle of the sky, in the middle of a storm, Cherry Berry acts like everything is okay. It isn't.

Written for a Sofa and Quills Speedwriting contest, where it placed first! The prompts were 'pretending that everything's okay when it's not' and 'brace for impact.' Written in the span of an hour.

Entry in the 2020 Original Pairings contest.

Thanks to Lofty Withers (Great!), Moonshot, and RubyDubious from the Speedwriting Server for prereading.

Thanks to The Bricklayer for his thoughts, and thanks to my editor EverfreePony.

Great!

-- Lofty Withers

I read brace and now I hate you for it

-- PonyJosiah13

Alicornhood is a dream that most ponies never consider past their tenth birthday, when they finally understand reality. For Twilight Sparkle, that reality was just turned on its head. The day after her ascension, after the excitement and happiness has worn off slightly, the facts of the situation finally set in. During a breakfast conversation about the responsibility she will soon bear, Spike asks a simple question: "Do you really want to be a princess, Twilight?"

After the Elements free her from Nightmare Moon, Luna asks Celestia, "What happened to my daughters?"

Celestia escorts Luna to the Canterlot Sculpture Gardens and shows her the Reliquary of the Heroes.

Under the statues of her millennium-dead daughters, Luna learns how they lived in the shadow of Nightmare Moon's treason, and how they died as glorious heroes of Equestria.

Sequel: With Her Majesty's Coast Guard.

Recommendsday!

Content warning: Pandemic. Note that this was published before current events.

Rarity, following a somewhat rocky introduction, has become a rather welcome member of the upper classes of Canterlot. Living the dream, she eagerly accepts an invitation to an Opera in Canterlot with her new friends Viscount Fancy Pants and his wife Fleur de Lis. Especially since it means meeting a mysterious and somewhat reclusive Baroness that will also be attending.

Naturally, things grow somewhat awkward when she runs into one of her friends... and definitely not in any way she thought she might.

(Note: This is based on a head-cannon I had circa season four. We hadn't met Rainbow's parents yet, and we didn't really know all that much about many of the Mane 6's home lives. I know this isn't canon now, but I just wanted to put this on paper. Quarantine, man.)

Cover image: https://www.pinterest.com/mdhsoccer/
Prereading: Mosanted

Edit: Holy S***. I did not expect this to blow up like this. Thank you all so much!

An origin story from my own head, how the bat ponies came to be and what their role in Equestria really is.

May be a precursor to a full story, I'm not sure yet, but it just came to me a few days ago and I had to write it down. Enjoy!

Scarlet Frost has had more than enough death and violence in her life and has spent the last several years living quietly as a librarian and scholar in the New Equestrian city of Swanrun. Sadly, it seems that death and violence are not yet done with her, as she is about to discover.

After a chance encounter, Scarlet is forced to leave her home and flee for her life alongside a mysterious orphan filly named Primrose. Now being hunted across the land she once went to war for, Scarlet will have to use every resource at her disposal just to stay alive. And if she is going to make it through this, she must confront the ghosts of not only her own past, but those of this long-broken world as well.

A special thank you goes out to my editors, Mister Hypothetical and Chromio!

Now with a reading over on YouTube!

The sex tag is for occasional blunt discussions on the subject matter and implied sexual behaviors between consenting adults.

Sometimes, reality is best understood through fiction.
Other times, the two are harder to distinguish between.
Family is often such a complicated matter.

Featured by the Royal Canterlot Library!

We trained her.
We taught her.
We raised her to godhood.
She brought us down to earth.

Sequel can be found here: Memoirs in Ink and Blood

The Crusaders sometimes form conclusions and make decisions based on impulsivity and gut feelings rather than rational thought. So, when they meet Ponyville’s newest, specialty flower vendor—a young, quiet mare from Alemaneia named Schneeblume—Scootaloo immediately begins to suspect something… that behind her quiet exterior, that bright smile, and those kind eyes, she's hiding something sinister.

Well, technically, she is... but perhaps not in the manner they expected.

In the end, the three quickly-growing fillies may find that their cutie marks and their penchant for helping ponies may come in a different fashion than they're used to.

Cover art done by the incredibly talented G_Hyze. This is the crop of a full picture I commissioned; said picture is presented in the story and sourced to his DeviantArt.