//------------------------------//
// After 
// Story: Chubble-Bubblegum 
// by kudzuhaiku 
//------------------------------//

A million, billion stars twinkled overhead, turning the sky a soothing shade of royal purple with clouds of lighter hues. Beneath them all, two ponies sat together. The pink one stood out, almost as if she glowed with her own inner light, her pinkness remaining vibrant somehow in defiance of the darkness. For the chocolate brown one—nearly a coffee brown—she was almost unseen in the darkness, a condition that she often exploited for personal gain.

In their eyes, the reflections of the stars sparkled like a sea full of diamonds and the moonlight caressed them with silvery shimmers. Sparkles, glimmers, gleaming, shines, shimmers, these were things that ponies liked a great deal, things the fuzzy little quadrupeds treasured. While not all of them could be rich, or have endless wealth, any of them could have bedazzled rhinestone eyes, or flowing manes, tails, and pelts. They were creatures that celebrated beauty wherever they found it, treasured it, and named themselves such things to remind themselves of it.

“What do you think is out there?” Pebble asked her aunt as she looked up at the stars.

“Dubious,” her aunt replied with a shrug.

“That is a strange answer.” With a sigh, Pebble did not press the issue any further. When Pinkie chose to be cryptic, she remained that way and not even the command of alicorns could make her spill the beans. “The movie was sappy.”

“It sure was!” Pinkie yanked her eyes away from the stars to look at Pebble. “I loved it!”

“You seem happy.”

“I am happy!” Pinkie Pie blinked a few times, her eyes seeming to glow with their own inner light, and the corners of her mouth stretched into a wide grin. “Are you happy, Pebble?”

“I guess I am.” Pebble took a moment to reflect upon the question and her answer. “I am happy and also a little disgusted.”

“Disgusted?” Pinkie’s smile showed signs of strain and the tips of her fuzzy ears quivered in tight little circles.

“When I was kissing Sumac I tried to lick the dangly thing in the back of this throat and he almost barfed into our popcorn bucket.” If Pebble had any feelings about this, she didn’t show them, not at all, not even in the slightest. “I felt his throat clench around my tongue and I was really grossed out.”

“Oh.” Pinkie’s ears splayed out in opposite directions, and while her smile remained, it was now a perplexed one. “Pebble, I don’t know what to say. And even if I did know what to say, I don’t know if I would say it in front of you. I just don’t know what to say.” Taking a deep breath, Pinkie’s barrel rose and fell.

“Neither did Sumac.”

At this, Pinkie Pie began to giggle and her whole body started to jiggle. The ghost of a smile haunted Pebble’s face along with the spectre of amusement. Her aunt’s bemused expressions were something Pebble treasured, because not everypony laughed when she tried to be funny. But Pinkie… sometimes, Pinkie did laugh and for some reason, it made Pebble feel better about things. It was nice, Pebble supposed, that the Element of Laughter found you comical.

“Aunt Pinkie…” Pebble saw her aunt hold her breath to contain her laughter, holding it back so that she could listen to whatever it was that was about to be said. Hesitating, Pebble began to chew on her lip, wondering if she was ready for this subject, but she was having a moment where she wanted to take a crack at being grown up. “Aunt Pinkie, are you in love?”

“I don’t know, Pebble!” Pinkie blurted out, and then she folded her front legs over her barrel in a self hug. “I want to be, I think? But I made foolish choices for so long and I tried to hold on to what was unobtainable, and I really hurt myself, and now, I don’t know if I trust myself to know what is right for me… and even if this is love, it is really confusing because I’ve never felt anything like it. It scares me and no matter how much I try to giggle at it, the fear doesn’t go away, so I am having to actually face up to it and that’s super hard!”

Perhaps from solidarity, or maybe to show that she was listening, Pebble nodded. “I don’t understand love either and it scares me. Love from you, from my parents, the love I have for my siblings, and of course, Sumac…” In the dark, Pebble’s cheeks turned a ruddy, darker brown.

“Like, I don’t even know if I am into Twilight in that way, and that scares me, because I don’t want to hurt her, ever, but I have these doubts and they conflict with my desires, because I want to be with Twilight and Seville… I do… the idea of spending the rest of my life with two of my best friends sounds great—it would be like a party that never ended.”

“You know, Pinkie, you can be with Twilight without actually being with Twilight. Just think of my parents. All of them. They’re together, but separate.” Pebble thought she had more to say about the subject, but the words on her tongue vanished like a bird on the wing. She thought about her own hidden desires, what her heart wanted, and she began to wonder if she was the one that should be giving her aunt advice. Pebble had her own heartfelt confessions that needed to be given voice.

With a gasp, Pinkie Pie flopped over onto her back and then wiggled in the damp grass while shooting out exuberant little giggle-snorts. At some point, a distinct ‘oink’ could be heard, but Pinkie continued with reckless, gleeful abandon. Pebble watched her aunt and was content with the moment, just one moment of many that had been her night. Some of them had been pretty good, others were exceptional, and some, like right now, were just satisfying.

Worried for the state of her dress, Pebble did not follow her aunt’s example, but she longed to do so. She wanted to be naked and free beneath the stars, she wanted to feel the cool, moist grass against her skin. Sometimes, it felt good to be a mindless pony, even if those moments never seemed to last long enough. The burden of consciousness was a real downer sometimes.

“You know, Pebble,” Pinkie Pie said as she rubbed her generous rump against the grass and waggled her tail about to get the kinks out of her dock, “it would be a very Twilighty thing to do to have a lasting bond based on friendship alone. A binding friendship forever ceremony? I don’t even know, but it sounds nice. I have so much to sort out, but tonight, tonight, everything was magical. Just about perfect. Just three friends hanging out together.”

Sitting on her haunches, Pebble watched as her aunt went still in the grass. The way that Pinkie’s barrel rose and fell as she panted was almost hypnotic to Pebble, the visible indicator that this beloved pink pony was living and breathing. Above her, a shooting star went streaking across the sky, unnoticed, and had Pebble seen it, she might have mused about how the falling star represented life in general.

“Once Twilight and Seville got over being so nervous and shy, everything felt so natural.” Pinkie Pie sighed out these words and while she did so, she rubbed her own rotund tummy. “You know, Pebble, it’s funny. You’re in such a rush to grow up and be an adult… you’re in such a hurry to put your foalhood behind you so you can be a grownup… and me… I did the opposite. I refused to grow up and I acted foalish for as long as I could get away with it. I guess I’m still trying to get away with it, because being a grownup scares me, but now that I’ve got these grey hairs in my mane, the time has come to face the facts. My foalhood is over.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” Pebble replied, showing surprising gentleness, warmth, and understanding. “Be like Sumac and go down with the ship. Never surrender. Never give in. Go down in flames if you have to—”

“Pebble?”

“Hear me out.” Pebble took a moment to collect her thoughts and she lifted her head skyward so that she could look up at the stars once more. Her lips pursed into a tight pucker of concentration—an unusual look for her—and her ears fell back against her head. “Once you know what you want, just be an earth pony and run with it. Do what we do. Maybe have some foals, Pinkie, and then you’ll have playmates and you won’t have to deal with the pressures of growing up. Or maybe you will, but it might not be so bad if you had somepony to stay young with.”

“Do you know how many grey hairs I gave my mother?” Pinkie asked in a low voice that sounded as though a laugh or two was lurking within.

Shrugging, Pebble could think of only one thing to say: “It’s a risk you have to take.”

“The future is so scary and uncertain. Bad things are happening. Really bad things. Twilight goes off and vanishes for days—weeks! Weeks at a time. I have trouble dealing with that now, and I’d have even more trouble dealing with it if we all settled down together. It’s all I can think about. I know a lot about what is going on because Twilight talks with me and she needs me to cheer her up and keep her hopes up, but sometimes, sometimes I need somepony to share a little hope with me.”

Again, Pebble said, “It’s a risk you have to take.”

If the night sky was a sparkling, endless sea, the moon had to be a beautiful, perfect pearl, a rare and priceless treasure. Or, Pebble mused, the night sky was Princess Luna’s treasury and she was sharing all of Equestria’s wealth with her subjects, those who dared to venture out after dark. She gazed upon the vast, infinite tapestry above her and tried to think of meaningful things.

On near-silent hooves, another pony arrived and announced her presence with profound, stony silence, a sound that few could hear. Without looking away from the precious, wonderful stars, Pebble listened as her mother sat down in the grass. When she heard the crinkle of fabric, her ears perked, but she kept her focus skyward.

“Out to catch Sly?” Pinkie Pie asked.

“Nope,” Maud Pie deadpanned in reply. “It’s Tarnish’s turn. Although the little stinker did ‘meep meep’ me. I was tempted to give him a good what for, but I decided that I couldn’t be bothered. I did, however, have another colt that I had to find when my daughter didn’t come home at the scheduled time.”

Pebble suffered a dreadful internal cringe and her stony exteriour showed no sign of the suffering within. With her mouth dry and her tongue clinging to the roof of her mouth, she realised that she had forgotten to inform her mother of the change in tonight’s plans. Biting her lip, she said nothing, but focused on calming down. She hated little slip ups like these because they made her look foalish, and she couldn’t stand appearing to be foalish.

“I had the most illuminating conversation with Sumac after I interrogated him,” Maud remarked, and Pebble knew her mother’s voice well enough to notice that she was irked. Surely, she had to be joking, she hadn’t actually interrogated Sumac, had she? It was a joke, something to make Pebble sweat, and it was working, because there was a growing uncomfortable moistness beneath the fabric of her dress.

“Uh oh.” From the sounds of it, Pinkie Pie had also cottoned on to the faint, almost unnoticeable waver in Maud’s voice and Pebble wondered just how much trouble she was in. When Pinkie Pie said ‘uh oh’ that way it meant that trouble was ahoof. Pinkie knew.

For a moment, Pebble thought about pulling a Sly and making a run for it. No, she realised, no, that wouldn’t work, her mother was too well-conditioned from the daily marathon runs to try and keep up with Sly. It also occurred to her that this might be the reason her mother stayed so perfect and trim. Perhaps it was time to chase after Sly herself.

“I hugged him, said ‘hello,’ and he folded like a house of cards.”

Pebble winced, not knowing what Sumac might have given up to appease her mother.

“So, Pebble, any confessions to make?”

This was a dangerous game, because Pebble didn’t know what Sumac might have spilled. The back of her mane grew sweaty, along with her frogs, and she wondered how far she might make it if she took off running now. More running would be great for her physique. She was still full from dinner and all of the junk food she had eaten in the theatre. How much had Sumac betrayed her? She couldn’t blame him, he had to save his own skin, just like she had to save hers.

“Hey, Pinkie, you want to know what Pebble and Sumac were doing in the movie theatre tonight?” Maud asked.

To which Pinkie replied, “Well, I know that Pebble tried to lick Sumac’s tonsils.”

“Oh.” Something about the way Maud said this chilled Pebble’s blood. So much so that her joints went stiff and running was no longer an option.

Daring to look at her mother, Pebble gulped and listened to the eager sound of Pinkie’s breathing. Whose side would her aunt take? Would Pinkie save her? In desperation, Pebble went on the offensive. “You did more than hug him and say hello, I just know it.”

“You’re right,” Maud replied without skipping a beat. “Twinkleshine and Lemon Hearts were already working him over when I arrived and they made him tell me what the two of you had been up to. As it turns out, Lemon went up to his room to talk to him about some of his homework. And do you want to know what Lemon found?”

“Puddles of magical colt custard?” Pebble replied, taking a great risk.

Pinkie Pie exploded with laughter and clamped her hooves over her mouth. She tried to hold it in, but it escaped as little piggy snorts and she rolled over onto her side as her whole body convulsed with hoots and grunts of laughter. Well, the shot was fired and went wide. It was time to face imminent destruction. Sucking in a deep breath, Pebble prepared to face oblivion.

“Okay. Fine. Sumac and I looked at an issue of Sapphic Happenings together in the theatre. I had my reasons and I don’t think we did anything wrong.” Pebble set her jaw in defiance and locked eyes with her mother, the first move in the Great Game. Studying her mother, she tried to read for any signs that might give away her mother’s reaction.

Alas, there was none, as Maud was in good form tonight.

“How can you see a porno mag in a theatre?” Pinkie asked from behind her hooves.

A hot flush crept over Pebble’s face. “Sumac has a horn.”

“Tell me your reasons,” Maud said in such a way that left little room for refusal.

When she turned away, Pebble lost the Great Game. She stared into the grass for a while, then up at the stars, and then she focused on her Auntie Pinkie for a time. Every inch of her skin burned with a dreadful prickle and she was sweaty in all of the wrong places. Turning her head about, she looked every direction except her mother’s.

“Sumac wouldn’t say, but he did tell me to talk with you, and to listen.”

Hopeful, Pebble’s ears stood up.

“So tell me, Pebble Pie, the sweet little pie from my very own oven, why were you looking at 'The Tender Touch of Tribadism special edition of Sapphic Happenings?'”

When Pebble went to answer, all that came out was a squeak and a flood of self-loathing almost overwhelmed her. “I wanted to see if I responded…” She didn’t like how foalish her voice sounded right now, how emotional and vulnerable it was. Even worse, all of the laughter within Pinkie Pie seemed to have died, and this left Pebble in a bleak place.

“Rainbow Dash bought it for him,” Pebble confessed and these words seemed a little bit easier to say. “Sumac was aware of my problem and he tried to find a way to help me and Rainbow Dash helps him get stuff all the time, and I was really embarrassed about it, too embarrassed to talk about it with anypony, really, even to Octavia and Vinyl, and so Sumac told me that Rainbow Dash wouldn’t think it was too strange for him to request something with lesbians in it.”

“Oh my gosh… Dashie…” Pinkie breathed out these words and then her heavy breathing became strained huffs.

“I have plans for my future and they involve a big family…” Pebble gulped and then tried to say more, but no more words seemed forthcoming. Her mother’s expression was stony, statuesque, unreadable—and this scared Pebble something awful. Feeling frantic, she turned to look at her Auntie Pinkie instead, and she gazed into those warm brilliant blue eyes that flashed silvery in the moonlight.

“And so you looked into a magazine to see if it woke up anything inside.” Maud blinked once and then her face seemed to freeze.

In response, Pebble nodded, but her throat was too tight to say anything in return.

“Did it?”

“Maud, maybe now isn’t—”

“Quiet, Pinkie.”

With an agonised expression, Pinkie Pie went silent and Pebble continued to stare into her aunt’s eyes, sharing her pain. There was no running from this and Maud, her mother, expected an answer. At the moment, it felt as though she had been ripped right down to her soul, leaving it exposed and bare. This was, perhaps, the most awkward moment in Pebble’s young life and the only thing that kept her rooted in place was Pinkie. Their shared stare was a strong, powerful connection, a tether.

Pebble shrugged.

“You don’t know?” Maud asked.

Again, Pebble shrugged and tried to make as honest of a gesture as possible.

“Pebble Pie, you blockhead… if you would have just asked somepony—”

“I couldn’t!” Pebble blurted out in a pained whine.

“Get over here.” Maud made a come hither gesture with her hoof, trying to lure Pebble over. “You’re not in trouble, but you are in trouble… come here and let me and my sister save you from yourself.”

Pebble didn’t need to be told twice, and she launched herself at her mother. There was a sound, a terrific whump, as if two slabs of fuzzy, cuddly granite had collided with one another. Pebble felt two powerful forelegs wrap around her, and things felt a little better. When another set of forelegs encircled her—pudgy ones—Pebble felt the protection that she craved and she closed her eyes, secured in the embrace of those she trusted most.

“You know, Pebble… most of the problems that you and Sumac have happen because you won’t come to an adult and ask for help,” Maud said as Pebble buried her face into her mother’s smock.

“Maud, to be fair, Sumac did go for help… we just weren’t the adults he went to.”

“Pinkie, you make a stunning point.”

“I do that about once every blue moon or so. Surprises Twilight too. And me. Me as well. Perhaps me most of all.”

Together, the three Pies sat there, holding one another beneath the stars. Pebble welcomed this moment, this catharsis, the circumstances had played themselves out just right to bring all of the emotions up to the surface and there had been a delightful burst. Now, all she had to do was recover, and that would be easier with her Auntie Pinkie and her mother, Maud.

“Pebble, you are in such a hurry to get everything sorted out and to grow up,” Maud began, and in a rare moment, she let heave a troubled-sounding sigh that made Pebble feel weird. “I know how competitive you are. This isn’t a race and adulthood isn't a finish line. It’s a beginning. I don’t know why you are in such a hurry.”

A foalish case of the sniffles crept up on Pebble and she had to fight to hold them in. For a time, she thought about answering while wondering if silence might be best. Silence had brought her to this point, however, and now seemed to be the time for words. If only she had something to say. Clinging to her mother, she agonised over how to express herself, and then, as if by some miracle, she knew how to start.

“Mother, you said that your life began when you found Father and had me.” A sniffle escaped, left the door open, and the others began to make a break for it. “I want my life to start. I want it now. I’m sick of waiting. It’s like I’m the most earth poniest of all earth ponies and there are times when I just ache inside with needs that I don’t understand.”

“That is true, I did say that.” Pebble felt her mother’s heart through her ribs and her ears strained to listen to her mother’s voice. “But Pebble, before that point, I was lonely. Isolated. I really didn’t have friends, or somepony who loved me, or a special somepony. I was… I was crippled with loneliness and when I found your father… when I found Tarnish, I made up for lost time. Life began in earnest for me at that point, and I wanted to experience all of the things I had missed.”

“Yeah, Pebble… this is true.” Pinkie’s embrace grew tighter and there was a sympathetic sigh. “When you think about it, you already have a special somepony. You have friends. Pebble, you have all of those things that your mother, my sister, was missing in her life. You don’t need to make up for lost time, you need to slow down and make the most of the time you have.”

Inside of Pebble’s head, something clicked. This wasn’t a metaphor, as one might believe, but there was a distinct mental click from within Pebble’s ears as her Auntie Pinkie’s words settled into place. As more sniffles exited in a neat, orderly single file, Pebble knew her aunt’s words to be true.

“You’re right. You’re absolutely right.” With a shudder, Pebble went limp against her mother and told the Incredible Sulk lurking within to go away for a while, because she was in the mood to be a foal for a bit.

“Hey, you know what, Pinkie?”

“What’s that, Maud?”

“I think you’d make an incredible mom, Pinkie.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Really. You’ve had a lot of practice. The Cake twins, foalsitting with Fluttershy, all that time you spend with Sly and Alto Clef, and Pebble… Pinkie, you’re the best sister a pony could hope for and I think you’d make a terrific mother.”

“Gee, Maud, when you say it like that… I mean… well, you know… uh…” Pinkie began to stammer and it sounded to Pebble as though her aunt was having a hard time finding the right words. “I had all of these doubts and all of these arguments and they’re all gone now. Where’d they go?”

“Pinkie, try not to worry about it. For now, we have each other and we should make the most of it.” Maud’s voice, a seeming deadpan, held a surprising amount of warmth for those who knew what to listen for, and Pebble could hear it now, just as she was certain that her Auntie Pinkie could hear it as well.

Holding one another, two sisters looked up at the stars, holding a troubled filly between them…