//------------------------------//
// Just don't row in the boat, baby 
// Story: The Boats We Row 
// by kudzuhaiku 
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Vinyl Scratch had a plan. Vinyl Scratch had a most wonderful, devious plan. Being the clever pony that she was, she had put this plan into motion, and today, she would enjoy the fruition of its success. Everything was going to be perfect, because she had planned, and she was looking forward to relishing the final end result. There were times when she felt as though she was a clever pony, and today, well, today was one of those days. 

Nothing could possibly go wrong, but she didn’t say this aloud, for fear of jinxing herself. 

Not only did Vinyl Scratch have a plan, but she had an apprentice, and he was a vital part of this plan. Apprentices had to do what their master’s told them, and that fit into Vinyl’s plan. So stoked was Vinyl about her plan that she actually put on perfume, and enjoyed it. Today was going to be one of those days, and she was looking forward to feeling (and smelling) a little girly. 

Besides, it would help Octavia go along with the plan. 

That was one part of the plan that Vinyl might have neglected just a teeny, tiny bit. Informing her apprentice and Octavia of the plan. Okay, so not everything was perfect, but she could still wing it through charm and grace. After all, she had graduated from Princess Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. If she could do that, anything was possible.

Thinking of her plan, Vinyl realised that the only part of it that she had really acted on was putting a deposit on the rowboat rental, and she had done that yesterday, almost at the last minute. But this was a good plan, and it was sure to work. What could go wrong? She had worked hard to get to this point of the plan, and if she had to, if it couldn’t be avoided, she could make a little more effort. 

Grinning in the mirror, Vinyl made ready to inform her apprentice that he had plans for today. 



 

The colt in question was somewhat smudged with grease, a little scorched, a bit sweaty, and drinking a frosty bottle of Celestia~Cola. Mounted on one of Rarity’s old discarded dress forms was a rocket powered flight suit. The workshop shed was an absolute mess and appeared as though it had been hit by a tornado. 

“Are those vectored thrust nozzles?” Vinyl asked while she peered over the top of her signature shades. 

“Eeyup.” Sumac did not turn around or look behind him, but continued to stare at Vinyl, perhaps knowing that his master was up to something. 

“Clever.” She nodded in approval—it was important to be supportive of her apprentice’s activities—and her glasses slid down her muzzle a bit. “Come on, Sumac, we gotta go. You’re coming on a double date with me.” 

“I am? But I was working on my flight suit today and I—” 

“And you were just finishing up your work so you can come spend a nice day with Octavia, Pebble, and I. We’re all going out on a rowboat to have a picnic.” Vinyl grinned, showing teeth. “Really, do you wanna spend all day tugging on your tool in this shed or would you like to spend some time with Pebble?” 

Staring Vinyl in the eye, Sumac tipped back his bottle of Celestia~Cola and emptied it before he made his reply. Pulling the bottle away from his orange-stained lips, he said, “Fine, since you put it that way, but I have a funny feeling about this.” 

As well you should, my apprentice! Vinyl thought to herself while keeping her smile of mild, inconveniencing evil hidden away. “Just a nice day on the lake, Sumac. Together. It’ll be great. Now come on, let’s go. If we don’t claim the rowboat, they’ll rent it to somepony else.” 

The colt let out his words in a huff: “Fine, I’m coming—” 

“Good, good, my apprentice.” 



 

Moving into the center of the kitchen, Vinyl put on an impressive display of magic. The picnic basket, somewhat battered looking and the subject of one repair spell too many, was set down on the counter while Vinyl created a tornado of items to fill it. Megara yowled when she was almost brained by a flying jar of pickles and then hightailed it out of the kitchen with a screech of feline indignity. 

“What’s going on?” Octavia asked, sticking her head through the door to investigate the source of the disturbance in an otherwise quiet house. 

“We’re going on a picnic,” Vinyl replied as she crammed a quarter of a cheese wheel into the basket. “Grab Pebble and let’s go. We gotta hurry before I lose my deposit on the rowboat. Grab your cello.” 

Octavia’s protest came out as a cultured, rather posh whine: “But I was going to—”

“Grab your cello and Pebble so we can go on a picnic?” One of Vinyl’s eyebrows raised, forming a thin, delicate arch. She turned away from her efforts and gave Octavia a half-hearted, somewhat lazy sultry stare, the sort of look that she knew would fluster the grey mare to no end. 

Sniffing, Octavia’s eyebrow arched in return, a form of unspoken communication. “Are you wearing perfume?” Her tail began flicking at invisible flies that didn’t exist in the house. The flytrap plants ate them all. 

“Yeah.” Vinyl’s response had no real enthusiasm and she crammed more stuff into the basket. “I was feeling a little girly. Now, I wanna feel a little Octavia.” She waggled her eyebrows to ham it up a bit, but she didn’t want to seem too eager. She had to maintain her aura of respectable laziness, after all. 

“I’ll get Pebble,” Octavia said in defeat, and then she chewed on her bottom lip for just a moment. After a thoughtful chew, with her nostrils flaring and an excited look in her eye, she turned to Sumac to give him a command: “You… you’re going to grab my cello.” 

“Oh… discordant descendant notes,” the colt muttered, and this caused Octavia’s eyes to go wide while she sucked in a deep, wheezing breath so he could be scolded. 

“I’ll not have that kind of language in this house, Sumac Apple!” 

“Fine, fine, I’ll go get your cello, sheesh! I didn’t give up a day of work so I could be lectured, ugh!” The colt stormed off, his hooves clicking on the stone floor, and he let out a defiant snort while he blew past Octavia in the doorway. He failed to notice her affectionate smirk while he passed. 

Grinning, Vinyl continued to pack, and everything was going according to plan. 



 

Everything was going according to plan. The lake was a little crowded and there were swan boats everywhere, but that was fine. Everything was fine. Swan boats were for chumps—Vinyl found them tacky for some reason she could not explain—and she much prefered the classical rowboat. 

Just behind Vinyl, Octavia was loaded with the picnic basket, some cushions, and a few other items they needed. She trotted with a light spring in her step and seemed oblivious to the load upon her back. Pebble followed just behind Octavia, wearing a broad brimmed straw sun hat that offered suitable protection from the sun. 

Sumac brought up the rear and seemed to be having trouble with his legs. Not all that long ago, he had suffered quite a growth spurt, and now, he was all legs and a bit of scruffy fluff. He was now taller than Pebble—though not by much—and in his telekinesis he carried Octavia’s cello tucked away in its black wooden case. 

“TITS!” Sumac shouted in a voice that carried through the area and caused other ponies to turn their heads to look in his direction. 

“Where?” Vinyl yanked her camera out from Octavia’s saddlebags. “Where?” 

“There!” Sumac cried as he charged ahead, still holding Octavia’s cello case over his head. 

“I don’t see any tits,” Vinyl said as she peered around, hoping to see some spectacular tits. Pairs of tits liked to congregate around the lake, and this was an excellent place to go tit-watching. 

“There!” Sumac took a moment to point. “The Central Equestrian Forked Tit!” 

“By golly, you’re right.” Vinyl held her camera up to her eye and focused her viewfinder on a fine pair of tits. Sumac had an excellent eye for spotting tits in the wild, and she was proud of her apprentice’s skill. He also shared her love of boobies, and together, they had done a lot of tit and booby watching. 

“Butterflies are better.” Looking a little miffed, Octavia let out a snort while she turned to look at Pebble. “I just don’t understand Vinyl’s obsession with tits and her incessant need to ogle every tit under Princess Celestia’s sun. And now that she can talk… if you bring up boobies, she won’t shut up. She even has Sumac doing it.” 

“Of course you would think that, you’re a lepidopterist,” Pebble remarked in deadpan. Turning her head, she glanced over in Sumac’s direction. “It’s just a hobby, but I do get a little jealous that he’d rather be looking at beautiful, perky tits and not paying attention to me.” 

Vinyl snapped a few pictures using the incredible zoom of her camera. 

“More tits!” Sumac shouted while he pronked around and almost stumbled. “Tits everywhere! Oh happy day!” 

“Come on, Sumac, we don’t have time to stare at tits all day, I have to secure my rowboat!” Vinyl pursed her lips and let out a shrill whistle to get the colts attention. “We’ll look at tit pictures together, later, okay?” Vinyl’s ears pricked when she heard a sulky adolescent whine and she felt a little bad for Sumac, as it was her fault that he was so obsessed with tits. She had to up the ante for her apprentice. “We’ll watch a film about tits tonight, okay?” 

“Okay!” Lugging Octavia’s cello case, Sumac came pronking back over to join the line once more. 



 

The rowboat was long and wide, meant to hold a whole crew of ponies, so there was a lot of room to spread out. Vinyl made herself comfortable in the prow, and she even had a little eyelet that she could slip her parasol into. It was here that she piled the cushions that had been brought, and then she flopped over with a satisfied sigh. 

“I am uncertain about this,” Octavia said while she stared at her cello case. “Playing my cello, I mean. The boat will rock and I don’t know if—” 

“It’ll be fine.” Vinyl hoped that she had managed to cut off Octavia before doubt had a chance to settle for a stay. She had a lovely spot in the shade and while reclining, she glanced at Pebble and Sumac. “Get to rowing, you two. This boat isn’t gonna row itself.” 

“What?” Pebble sat there, blinking in astonishment. “You never said anything about having to row—” 

“Well, if you can’t row…” Vinyl waited after saying what needed to be said and she watched Pebble’s face contort. Any moment now… she waited… and waited just a little bit more… 

“Oh, I can row.” Pebble’s voice was now an annoyed deadpan. “But Sumac is a weakling. We’ll do nothing but go round in circles.” 

“Hey!” Lifting a foreleg, Sumac flexed his muscles—and absolutely nothing happened. Undaunted, the unicorn colt did nothing to let this stop him. “I’m pretty strong—” 

“In one foreleg, maybe,” Pebble replied, interrupted, and releasing the burn. 

Sumac’s ears turned a bright blazing red, fueled by the laughter of the two mares. “Pebble—” 

“Stroke,” Pebble deadpanned, and she gave Sumac a sweet, coy smile while she made a crude gesture with her left foreleg. 

Vinyl was laughing fit to split, and she was getting a stitch in her side. She rubbed her ribs with her elbow, revelling in her own laughter, and savouring the special love that Sumac and Pebble shared with one another. The red from Sumac’s ears now crept down into his face and his glasses fogged over. The rowboat rocked a little in the water as it drifted away from the shore, and Vinyl was eager to begin her voyage of relaxation. 

“All that spoon lifting made you strong, Pebble—” 

The chocolate brown filly’s jaw dropped and she let out a perturbed gasp. 

“—must be quite a workout, digging through through that hard-frozen honeysuckle and oat ice cream.” 

Octavia looked a little shocked by what was said, and Vinyl waited for Pebble’s reaction. 

“That was fair,” Pebble said once she recovered. “You got me good, Sumac. You just wait, you’ll pay for this later.” Eyes narrowed, she squinted at Sumac with pursed lips. “You can either win, or you can be happy. And you”—Pebble paused and focused her dreadful ire upon the colt—“you have chosen the path of wrath.”

“Yeah yeah, whatever.” Sumac shrugged, then grabbed an oar. “I don’t wanna row,” he whined, and Vinyl could see him staring at her. 

Vinyl laughed, she couldn’t help it, and what was even more amusing was just how uncomfortable Octavia seemed to be about all of this. Pebble too, grabbed an oar, and she began to match Sumac stroke for stroke. Everything was going to plan, the only thing missing was a cello concert. 

“Vinyl…” 

Yawning, she did not respond to Octavia, because she knew what was coming. Octavia was too darn smart, and the tone of her voice told Vinyl that the gig was up. The earth pony knew that she was being exploited by a clever, drop dead sexy unicorn, and this put Vinyl in an excellent mood. 

“Vinyl, this was never meant to be a date, was it?” 

“I don’t know what you mean, Octavia.” Vinyl didn’t even try to look innocent.

“Vinyl, I’ve been married to you for a very long time now,” Octavia said, warming up her voice for a lecture. “This has nothing to do with a ‘double date,’ you just wanted a lazy day out on the lake, didn’t you?” 

“My lazy day would be a lot nicer if you’d pipe down and do what you’re good at.” Vinyl grinned, knowing that she could get away with this. “Play a nice song, Octavia. Give the foals something pleasant to row to.” While Vinyl spoke, Sumac was grunting with effort, and his oar chopped at the water. 

The rowboat suffered an alarming wobble while Octavia wrangled her cello from the case. The rocking got bad enough that Vinyl had to expend the effort to help, and for a few seconds, she worried that she might go for a swim. That got the blood racing and her heart pumping. So did Octavia’s adorable, squeaky distress. 

Octavia stood in the bottom of the boat, embraced her instrument, and waited for the boat to hold still. When the soft, faint rocking continued, she sighed and resigned herself to playing in less than perfect conditions. Meanwhile, the boat had a definite curve as it moved through the water, as Pebble was a stronger, more capable rower than Sumac, who kept slapping the water with his oar. 

She had to lean into her cello and brace her hind legs. She rubbed her cheek against the neck—just below the peg box—perhaps hoping for some reassurance, but there was none to be had. Vinyl had a most excellent view of Octavia’s swaying backside, her rounded, wide hips, and her sleek, velvety sides. The first draw of the bow across the strings brought a swell of music and sensation. Those sensations were heightened by watching Octavia’s adorable, fuzzy-wuzzy little dock wiggle to and fro while she struggled to keep her balance. Vinyl loved that adorable, fuzzy-wuzzy little dock, and many, many times, she had felt it wiggle-waggle against her belly while she spooned with the love of her life. 

Yes, so far, everything was perfect. 

Pulling out a jar of pickles, Vinyl Scratch settled in so that she might enjoy her most perfect day…