Months had passed, spring coming back to the world once again after another successful Winter Wrap-Up in Ponyville. It was relatively peaceful when the Heartless weren't invading, and barely a harsh blizzard struck the town. Now that there was no snow anymore and the land was warming up more, many of the animals hibernating are beginning to wake up and return to warmer climates. And it was almost time for a certain holiday involving romance, flowers getting ready to be sold and lots of chocolate sweets for stallions to give to their sweethearts.
In Fluttershy's cottage, the pegasus sat in her living room with her animal friends, several copies of a book laid out around them as she held hers. "Ok, does everyone have their copy of Wuthering Hooves?" Fluttershy asked, all the animals all letting out noises of agreement. "Hooray! I love Furry Friends Book Club! Now, let's discuss the theme of nature as it applies to Hoofcliff's love."
Before Fluttershy's book club got into their "discussions", there was a knock at her door. Curious to know who was visiting her, she walked over to her doorway, her guest none other than Kairi.
"Hey, Fluttershy," Kairi greeted. She paused when she saw the animals in a circle with books in front of them. "...Uhh, you holding some kind of book club?"
"I am. Do you want to join us, Kairi?" Fluttershy asked.
"No. I'm good. I probably won't have any clue what story you all read." Kairi knew the animals in Equestria were somewhat sentient, but she didn't question if they were able to read. Then again, Twilight's pet owl, Owlowiscious, is pretty smart, helping the alicorn at night when Spike gets too exhausted and needs sleep. "I actually came by to run an errand for Twilight. She needs food for Owlowiscious." The mice all squeaked in fright as they overheard the unicorn, quickly scurrying away and hiding in the many mouse holes. "Not field mice. Just some birdseed."
"Oh, sure." The mice squeaked in relief and scurried back to their open book. "I hope Owlowiscious is doing ok in the castle. It's not the same living in a crystal tree than a normal one like the library."
"I think he's adjusted to it. He also kinda comes and goes in the evening, helping Twilight or getting fresh air." Fluttershy walked over to her kitchen to grab some food for Twilight's owl companion, but when Kairi saw her cutie mark begin to glow, she gasped when she felt her cutie mark tingle. Looking down, Destiny's Embrace and the white heart cutie mark glowing outward, which meant the map was calling the two of them to the Cutie Map. "Uhh, Fluttershy, I think we're being summoned by the map!"
"We are?" After grabbing the birdseed, Fluttershy looked down at her rump and now noticed her glowing cutie mark. "Oh my!" Hefting the bag over her back, she ran back into the living room, sad to have to cut their book club short. "We'll continue this when I get right back, everyone!"
Both mares rushed out of the cottage, leaving the animals behind as they chatted in their animal tongue with each other, probably about the book or something else only Fluttershy could understand.
Twilight squealed excitedly, trapping Riku in a tight choke hold as she hugged him as they looked at the Cutie Map. As soon as she felt her cutie mark tingle, she ran into the throne room and saw her cutie mark float over to a part of Equestria.
"The map is calling me!" Twilight cheered, unaware that her coltfriend's face began turning red due to lack of oxygen. "Riku, the map is calling me!"
"C-Choking! Not breathing!" Riku said, tapping her hooves repeatedly to tell her to let go.
Ventus ran into the throne room, his own mark glowing as the map called him as well. He noticed Twilight being overly excited while Riku was beginning to turn blue in the face, on the verge of passing out.
"Whoa, Twilight!" Ventus flew over to them, quickly prying the alicorn's hooves away from the strangled stallion's neck. Once succeeding in separating them, Riku let out a big gasp of air as he fell to the ground. "You ok, Riku?" He didn't respond, only raising his hoof and giving him a small wave to let him know he was still alive. "Twilight, you nearly killed your boy-OOF!"
Twilight quickly grabbed Ventus, pressing her hooves against his cheeks as she pointed his head at where the map took them: a pair of mountains separated by a small river, both mountains with lush forests climbing up to their peaks. "Look! Our cutie marks are pointing there! I need to do some research!"
She teleported away, making Ventus faceplant on the hard surface of the crystal table. As soon as he pulled his face up and rubbed his cheeks, Twilight began teleporting hundreds of books around the room, a chalkboard, and several pieces of parchment, ink, and quills, speed reading through any book she could grab. Riku pulled himself up on his hooves, using the table for support as he panted, trying to get his breath back.
"Why did you decide to date Twilight again, Riku?" Ventus asked.
"Just look at her while she's going nuts with the research," Riku responded. Ventus looked at Twilight, who was smiling widely with an eager glint in her eyes, practically shimmering as her excitement for studying turned her into a different pony. "She's adorable when she goes into dork mode." Hearing him, Twilight purposely levitated a book behind the stallion and quickly shot it toward her to hit the back of his head. Riku ducked, letting out a grin. "And I love teasing her about it."
Ventus rolled his eyes and looked back at the map. While watching his and Twilight's cutie marks float over the mountains, two more were added as Destiny's Embrace and a trio of butterflies joined them. Barging through the doors, Kairi and Fluttershy arrived, the yellow pegasus dropping the birdseed on the ground as they saw all the books scattered about the room.
"Uhh, what's going on in here?" Kairi asked.
"Research," Riku and Ventus said simultaneously.
"Since when?" Fluttershy asked.
"About five minutes ago!" Twilight answered, her magic going all over the place as she multi-tasked with her studies on their location. "And I've also tested out potential friendship problems, diversifying my solution portfolio, anything needed for friendship problems for future summonings as well!"
"How about you tell us a bit more about where we're going and we'll figure out the friendship solutions when we get there?" Ventus asked, letting Twilight get on with their destination before she goes off on a nerdy tangent.
"We're heading to the Smokey Mountains!" she said.
"Oh. I've never been there before," Fluttershy said, looking at the two mountains closely.
"Neither have I, and there isn't much information on them." Twilight snatched one of the books and opened the pages to a matching image of the Smokey Mountains, only with a lot more detail on the vibrant geography than the holographic map. "This was all I could find. The Smokey Mountains harbor the most beautiful valley between its two majestic mountain peaks."
"And she found out about this in only a few minutes," Riku complimented, clapping his hooves together in applause. "What a record."
"Oh hush!" Twilight said. "I could have found it sooner if I knew ahead of time!"
"You were too busy trying to pop my head off my shoulders to begin researching." Twilight considered throwing another book at Riku for the remark, but she let it slide, nearly suffocating him to death in her excitement is enough of a punishment.
"I can't wait to go there," Fluttershy said. "A place like that would be full of animals."
"And I can't wait to get started!" Twilight exclaimed, dragging Fluttershy, Kairi, and Ventus over to four pairs of already stuffed saddlebags filled with traveling supplies. "I'm actually a little nervous since that was all I could find. I always want to be prepared for anything."
"More like overly prepared," Ventus commented.
"Yup! And I already prepared us with everything we need!" Twilight said. "Snacks, books, blankets, books."
"You said books twice," Kairi noted.
"There are a lot of books." Riku facehooved at the insane reason behind there being more books than survival gear.
"Nerd." Twilight growled and flung another book at Riku, no longer feeling sorry that she nearly choked him out. He grabbed the book, stopping it just before it reached his face. "Aha!" he gloated, only for the alicorn's magic to move down to his hooves, making himself smack himself in the muzzle with the book. Grumbling, his hooves now free to move by his will again, he lowered it and leered at the innocently grinning alicorn. "...For someone who loves books, you abuse them too much and use them to hit me."
"Not my fault if you keep teasing me," Twilight said, levitating the saddlebags and placing them down on everyone's backs, Fluttershy unfortunately not strong enough to carry the heavy weight as he legs nearly buckled. The alicorn walked up to Riku and kissed his muzzle. "We'll be back!"
"You sure I can't come along?" Riku asked.
"No! The map says only us four are supposed to go and solve this issue! We can't break the directions the Cutie Map gives us!" Twilight reasoned.
Riku stared at the alicorn blankly, then pointed his hoof up at the holographic image of Equestria on the Galactic Map. "The map doesn't call any of us when there's a Heartless infestation. We just go."
"It's a different map and shows other worlds, and there's no friendship problems in any of them, so it doesn't count." Riku groaned, letting the argument go and admitted defeat. "Come on, everypony! To the hot air balloon!"
"Or we could use our gliders to get there faster?" Ventus suggested. "Fluttershy could hold onto one of us as we fly to the Smokey Mountains."
"A-Actually, the...hot air balloon...sounds easier," Fluttershy said, straining to stay standing with the heavy bags weighing her down. "Too...many books..."
"Yeah, she isn't going to hold on for long with our 'packed' supplies," Kairi said, even feeling a little strain from how much Twilight packed. "Hot air balloon it is."
The trio followed after Twilight, Ventus taking off Fluttershy's bags so her back doesn't break from the pressure. Just before they exited the throne room, Sora accidentally walked into Kairi, sending the couple stumbling over each other with the unicorn falling on top of the pegasus. He gave her a wide grin, a glint of mischievousness in his eyes.
"Kairi, if you wanted to be on top, you could have just said something," Sora said, his joke earning him a slap on the chest from Kairi.
"Funny, you big perv," Kairi said. She got up, pressing her hooves down on Sora's chest for support and to push some air out of his lungs for his provocative statement. "We got called by the map to help sort a friendship problem, so I'm not sure when we'll be back."
"Oh. Who's going?" Sora asked. He sat up and got his answer as Fluttershy and Ventus stood behind Kairi. He squinted his eyes as he leered at Ventus. "Oh...I see. Ven's going with you girls. Is there something you're not telling me, Kairi?"
"I'm not stealing your girlfriend," Ventus said, rolling his eyes as Sora goofed around by feigning jealousy. "Now quit flirting with her and making her laugh. We need to get going before Twilight drags us with her."
"You sure you don't have a thing for Kairi after being a part of me for so many years?" Sora questioned skeptically.
"...Yeah. Sure," Ventus answered sarcastically with a blank stare. "Kairi, good luck with him if you two eventually get married, because when you have kids, you're going to have an extra child no matter how many you want."
"Heeheehee. I think I can handle that when the time comes," Kairi said. Sora stuttered at the idea of marriage being brought up again, which only made the unicorn giggle more.
"W-We're not...going to have kids yet, right?" Sora asked fearfully.
"No, Sora, not yet," Kairi said, easing the stallion's worries a little. She walked up to him, giving him a quick kiss, then nuzzled him. "But if we did, I know you'd be an amazing dad. You do great with the Cake Twins."
"W-Well, maybe, but that's babysitting," he reasoned. "That's a big difference."
"It doesn't seem like much of a difference." She leaned forward and gave him another kiss. "I'll see you later. Better hurry before Twilight gets too antsy."
"Have fun without me," Sora muttered playfully, earning another quick kiss on the cheek before Kairi sauntered past him teasingly. Fluttershy and Ventus followed the unicorn, but Sora stopped the younger pegasus with a tug on his tail. "Hey, don't get any ideas, Ven."
"Hey, you and Kairi are together," Ventus said, swiping back his tail from Sora's hoof. "All those thoughts about her were all yours, none of them remotely mine."
"Are you sure?" Sora questioned skeptically.
Ventus let out a groan of annoyance. "Yes, I am absolutely, one hundred percent sure I'm not interested in Kairi. Not even Twilight or Fluttershy. Now, quit acting jealous and just deal with who the map sends."
"Ok, I believe you," Sora said, his attitude making a complete one-eighty as he laughed, punching Ventus's shoulder lightly. "I'm just messing with you. If we're like brothers, then it's my job as the oldest one to mess with you."
"I'm sorry, but who's the oldest?" Ventus asked. Sora responded by pointing at himself with a smug grin. "By age, not appearance."
"You're still technically younger," Sora argued.
Ventus rolled his eyes. "Forget it. I'm going before you try to win this argument by acting like a five-year-old."
"Yeah, that's right. I'm the-Hey!" Ventus chuckled, quickly running out of the castle to catch up to the girls. Sora grumbled and crossed his forelegs against his chest. "I'm not a five-year-old."
"You're right," Riku said from the throne room's doorway. "You're more like a three-year-old."
Sora glared at Riku, scowling angrily as he stomped toward him. "Ok, you wanna go, Riku!? You want to pick a fight with the better swordsman!? Need I remind you who won the Struggle Tournament!?"
"I lost because I fought against Terra, someone who had a lot more physical strength than me," Riku argued. "That doesn't count."
"But I did beat Terra, so I did beat you, technically," Sora countered.
"...Alright, that's it!" Riku pounced, tackling Sora to the ground, both pegasi wrestling each other as they tried to pin the other beneath them.
Aqua and Terra heard the commotion as the two best friends fought, both of them watching them in silence for a moment before the blue unicorn mare let out a sigh, separating the pegasi with her magic. "What are you two doing?"
"...He started it!" Sora and Riku said simultaneously, pointing hooves at each other.
"I don't care who started it, but I'm ending it," Aqua said. "Both of you, five hundred laps around Ponyville, on foot, and in opposite directions. I know you two will end up making a race out of your punishment, and if you do, you're going to be getting a lot more of a workout than just running nonstop."
"Y-Yes ma'am," they both said, walking out of the castle to run around the town and obeying their superior Keyblade Master's commands.
"You know those two aren't going to get tired from just running a few hundred laps, right?" Terra asked.
"I know," Aqua said, entering the throne room to see the mess Twilight left behind. Ignoring the hundreds of books laid scattered around, she approached the Cutie Map, where they saw the cutie marks of Twilight and Fluttershy along with Kairi's and Ventus's Keyblades hovering over the Smokey Mountains. "Looks like another friendship problem to solve."
Terra stood beside Aqua and looked at the location where the four chosen ponies were heading to, cringing at the two mountain peaks. "Ooh...They're going to the Smokey Mountains?"
"You've been there?" Aqua asked curiously.
"...I passed by it while I took some time exploring the world," Terra said. "But as peaceful as it seems from the map, it's...not really as serene when you make it there." He then pointed at the two mountain peaks. "There's two settlements on the mountains, and I have a feeling they're not going to have an easy time fixing this problem."
Aqua looked at the mountains, concerned over the feuding sides while also puzzled by how the two peaks didn't show any civilizations living on them, or any change in the scenery as Terra vaguely described. "Was it really that bad there?"
"Ever had a pumpkin nearly smash on you as you walk along the river between those mountains?" the stallion asked, rubbing his head and physically winced. "I was unlucky and got hit. Pumpkins hurt when they fall from several hundred feet in the air."
Twilight, Fluttershy, Kairi, and Ventus floated across the land in the hot air balloon once used to lift everyone up to Cloudsdale during the Best Young Fliers competition Rainbow Dash performed in. It felt like forever since they had used it, and it was a nice change of pace from a casual train ride, that and there weren't any tracks leading to the Smokey Mountains. Along the way, Twilight couldn't stop pondering about what the possible friendship problem might be as she talked nonstop, going through her portfolio of problems and solutions that would surely make their job quick and easy. They landed in a small clearing, making sure to tie the balloon down so it didn't float away from them and made the rest of the way by air, while also carrying the heavy loads Twilight packed for them.
Ventus had to carry Fluttershy's bags and carry Kairi on his back since she was the only one out of them who couldn't fly. He could manage the weight, but it put a lot of strain on his back when it came to three full saddlebags of books and supplies and a full-grown mare weighing him down.
"You doing ok, Ven?" Kairi asked with concern as her ride was slightly bumpy, Ventus slowly losing altitude and quickly rising back up while keeping up with the excited alicorn and silent pegasus listening to her.
"Y-Yeah! I'm good!" Ventus assured, nearly dipping again while flapping his wings harder. "G-Good exercise for me. Get some muscle after sitting in a coma for so many years!"
Kairi rolled her eyes, lighting up her horn. She teleported the bags Ventus wore off of him, making him flail around from the sudden loss of weight as he rose up higher in the air. After regaining his balance, he saw the bags floating in front of him, held in the pink unicorn's white aura.
"There. Is that better?" Kairi asked.
"...I had it under control," Ventus muttered.
"You were going to strain and exhaust yourself," she argued, letting out a sigh. "You can be just as bad as Sora when he tries too hard. Are you sure you two aren't really related in some way?"
"No, but if there was ever a family tree we could both look at, then I doubt we'd related. I barely even knew what kind of life I had before Xehanort 'took' me under his wing." Ventus let out a depressed sigh, wishing he could remember the days before he earned a Keyblade and went through such harsh training under Xehanort's teachings. "My life is kinda sad before I met Aqua and Terra. I can't remember if I knew my parents, or where I even came from."
"...Sorry," Kairi apologized. "To be fair, Ven, I didn't really remember much about my past either when I ended up on Destiny Islands. All I did recall was the story my grandmother told me when I was younger, but I learned a little more of myself and Radiant Garden thanks to what had happened to us. I never knew I was a princess in that world, but I'm not really ready to announce that the heir thought lost for years has returned. I got too used to the casual life living in a tropical paradise than in a castle."
"Yeah, that's right," Ventus said, recalling the strange vision Sora had in the castle's massive library where Kairi's grandmother told her a story about light and darkness in everyone's hearts, which was probably some legend on how everything was before the Keyblade War began.
While pondering that story, Ventus wasn't paying attention to where he was going, accidentally bumping into Twilight as she and Fluttershy stopped moving. "Ah!"
"Sorry!" Ventus said. "Why'd we stop?"
"Just trying to get our bearings," Twilight said, holding a map of the area as she judged how far they traveled from where she marked the balloon's location. "I'm just a bit too excited that I'm finally going to solve a friendship problem, so I may be a little skiddly-bopty-boo."
"Twilight, relax. It's not that exciting," Kairi said.
As Ventus looked down to see where they were, he heard something being shot out from what sounded like a cannon behind him. Flying straight toward them was a large pumpkin, which seemed to have come from a farming town on top of a mountain with lots of vegetation filled with different crops.
"Incoming!" he warned, summoning his Keyblade and slicing through the fruity projectile.
Even though it was sliced clean through, the two halves of the pumpkin kept flying until they reached what appeared to be a fortress on another mountain across from the first one. Another whole pumpkin was shot at them, all of them quickly getting out of the way as it flew off and struck the fortress. Looking down, they seemed to have found the Smokey Mountains, but instead of the lush forests, green plains, and flowing river they saw in Twilight's book on the location, there was nothing but stumps where the trees stood, the land looked dead by the dried up ravine, and there were two settlements apparently at war with each other.
"Uhh, I think we're here," Kairi said, yelping as Ventus dipped to avoid another chucked pumpkin. "What is going on?"
"I don't know, but I think we're going to find out." Deciding on staying low to avoid any random fruits and vegetables firing at the fortress on the other side, the group flew down to the halfway point of the mountain just to be safe.
They walked up the mountain, walking past several fields of pumpkins, tomatoes, squash, and more as they approached the town. The buildings weren't in the best of shape though as they saw several earth ponies in varying shades of red gathering their crops, loading them in cannons, and firing them on the fortress across the valley. An elderly mare with a pumpkin cutie mark wearing a light blue shirt with a darker blue vest and a red neckerchief seemed to be the matriarch of the town, commanding the other ponies that appeared to be all a family community with their similar coat colors and farming-related cutie marks.
"Ready!" she said as a stallion loaded a cannon with a pumpkin. "Aim!" Another behind the dangerous wooden weapon raised it up, taking aim at the fortress. "FIRE!!!!"
With a powerful and loud boom, the cannon shot the pumpkin across the valley, the orange makeshift cannonball barely hitting the fortress as it smashed on the ground a few yards away. Before they could load another of their hundreds of pumpkins, the four visiting ponies approached the elder to make a ceasefire on this crazy battle.
"Uhh, hello," Twilight called out, getting the mare's attention. "Excuse us, but what are you doing?"
"We're pumpkinin' our neighbors!" the mare answered.
"...We see that," Ventus said. "And you almost 'pumpkined' us up there."
"But why are you 'pumpkining' your neighbors?" Fluttershy asked.
"Well, it's 'cause the McColts are just plain rotton!" the mare said, suddenly looking at them suspiciously. "Hey, wait a tick. Who are y'all!? Are y'all spies for the McColts?"
"I'm Twilight Sparkle, the Princess of Friendship," Twilight said, introducing herself. "And this is Fluttershy, Kairi, and Ventus. We're here to solve your friendship problem."
"Name's Ma Hooffield," the elder said. "Pleased to meet ya, but y'all are wastin' your time. We don't have a friendship problem. We have...a McColt problem."
"And there's absolutely no friendship there," one of the Hooffield stallions added out of nowhere.
"What exactly did the McColts do to you to upset you?" Kairi asked.
"Oh, many things," Ma Hooffield said. "Why, just today, they shot pebbles at our farmhouse an' wrecked it!" She pointed over at the buildings, where the remains of the farmhouse laid in a heap of wood and stone. The other houses weren't in the best of shape either, the Hooffield's apparently pretty poor carpenters from the state of their homes. "See, we're not very good at buildin', so all it took was one pebble. But still!"
"I think just a small gust of wind would send the buildings crumbling to pieces," Ventus muttered.
While one of the Hooffield stallions began loading another pumpkin, he didn't notice the family of mice living inside of it as they hollowed it out as their home. Fluttershy noticed, gasping in fear for the innocent critters as they were about ready to be stuffed in the cannon and fired to their doom. She quickly flew toward them, grabbing the pumpkin in time before the stallion stuffed the large orange fruit inside.
"Oh my. That was close," Fluttershy said, moving the mice's home further away from any ponies willing to use the pumpkin as a fruity cannonball.
"I know what to do about this," Twilight said. "We'll go and talk to the McColts and hear their side of the story. Once we have all the facts, we can put an end to this using reason and rationale."
"And if it fails?" Kairi asked.
"I have no idea," the alicorn answered. "But in the meantime, can you call off the pumpkining?"
Ma Hooffield let out an irritated groan, but she complied. "Oh, alright."
"Thanks. Let's go everypony." Twilight lead the group as Ventus and Kairi followed her, Fluttershy soon after once she was sure the family of mice were safe, unfortunately leaving their pumpkin home so they don't get shot out of a cannon.
It was easier to fly across the valley with the ceasefire from the Hooffields, though the pegasi, unicorn, and alicorn were not sure how long it would last if the farming family had feuded with the McColts for so long. They landed before the heavily fortified wooden fortress, Twilight knocking on the large doors to request entrance.
"State your business!" Looking up, they saw a couple earth ponies look down at them skeptically, one stallion and one mare, both of their coats a dark shade of blue.
"Don't even bother," the mare said. "They're probably spies for the Hooffields."
The stallion looked closer and noticed Twilight's wings and horn. "Hey, wait! You're an alicorn! I thought the three princesses are the only alicorns!"
"These guys don't get out much, do they?" Ventus asked.
"Well, there are four alicorn princesses now." Twilight said. "I'm Princess Twilight Sparkle, the Princess of Friendship."
"And we're her entourage: Kairi, Ventus, and Fluttershy," Kairi added as she introduced herself and the rest of their small group.
"We have a new princess? When did that happen?" Ventus facehooved, only kidding when he said the McColts didn't get any news outside of the Smokey Mountains. "And how did the Hooffields come across an princess spy?"
"We are not spies!" Twilight exclaimed with a frustrated groan. "Seriously? Why does everypony assume we're spies?"
"Because we don't get a lot of visitors," an older stallion said from behind the doorway. The heavy wooden doors swung open, a short, pale blue stallion wearing blue overalls with a dark blue beard stood before them, along with a hat that was taller than him atop his head. "Ah'm Big Daddy McColt. Ya caught us at a bad time. We're in the middle of a giant feud with our-" Big Daddy McColt looked over at the other mountain peak, running over to the edge of his land. "-TERRIBLE NEIGHBORS!!!!!"
His booming voice echoed throughout the valley, causing the rebuilt farmhouse to fall back down. They could hear Ma Hooffield swearing profanities, probably glaring at the short stallion while on the breaking point of ceasing their fire on her enemy's home.
"...Yeah, I think we could tell when we got here," Kairi said.
"And we're here to solve your problem with the Hooffields," Twilight said.
"So you're here to help us get rid of 'em." Misunderstanding what the alicorn had meant, the rest of the McColt family cheered as they would finally get the Hooffields out of their manes.
"No, that's not what she meant," Fluttershy said.
"We're not going to help you get rid of the Hooffields!" Twilight quickly added, realizing her mistake.
The varying shades of blue earth pony family stopped cheering, Big Daddy McColt leering at them. "Well, if you ain't fer us, you're agin' us."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! We're neutral in all of this!" Ventus stated. "We're on no one's side!"
"We're here to help both your families become friends again," Twilight added.
"Well, that's gon' be hard," Big Daddy McColt said. "And Ah don't believe we've ever been friends with the 'Hooffields'!"
"Maybe if you didn't destroy their farmhouse, it could have been possible," Kairi said.
"Wait just a hog-wogglin' minute! We only did that because the 'Hooffields' pulled the pin out of our wagon wheel!" The McColt elder pointed over to a perfectly constructed wagon inside their home, one of the wheels falling off and making the cart fall over. "A whole week's worth of food rollin' down the mountain. Us McColts are mighty fine builders, but we don't know the first thing about farmin'."
Now the situation was confusing to the visiting ponies. The Hooffields say that the McColts started the fight, but now the McColts were accusing the Hooffields for starting it.
"...Uhh, ok?" Ventus muttered.
"We have to travel quite a ways to buy our food," Big Daddy McColt continued, ignoring the confused expressions on the mares' and stallion's faces. "Now, we'll be stuck eatin' the pumpkins the 'Hooffields' launch at us: pumpkin bread, pumpkin soup, pumpkin queserdillars, pumpkin paella, pumpkin cheese, pumpkin pie, pumpkin frittatas...Actually, that all sounds pretty good. But it'll get old real quick!"
Just hearing all the different pumpkin recipies made their stomachs growl. They also noted all the bits of splattered pumpkins that managed to land inside the fortified McColt residence, some of the McColts scooping up the remains to be used for their food they're getting sick of eating. Fluttershy spotted a squirrel hiding under one of the tables, just about ready to nab a sizable bit of pumpkin for lunch, only for it to get swept up by one of the McColts. Since they were allowed inside the building earth pony family's home, the yellow pegasus grabbed a bit of pumpkin and gave it to the hungry critter.
"Well, have you even tried to meet at a neutral location and talked about your problems?" Twilight suggested.
"What!? No!" the McColt elder exclaimed. "They'd sooner launch their dinners at us than listen to us!"
"Well, they'll listen to me. I'm an impartial third party." With a flap of her wings, Twilight flew up into the air and made her way to the center of the valley between the mountain peaks. The others watched, wondering what she had planned as she used her magic on her vocal chords to amplify her voice. "Attention, Hooffields and McColts! I'm not on anypony's side, but I can see you're both wasting time and resources being mean to each other. Ponies are supposed to help each other and be kind. So let's stop this senseless fighting!"
Finishing her speech, Twilight flew back down into the McColt's fortress beside Fluttershy, Kairi, and Ventus. "You really think that's going to work?"
"Of course it is," Twilight confidently said. "Now, let's get back home."
"But our cutie marks aren't even glowing," Kairi said, pointing at her cutie mark. "I don't think it was that easy to solve."
"They'll be glowing any second now." As Twilight turned to look at her own mark, waiting for the telltale glow of a successful mission complete, she yelped as a tomato struck her flank. Looking back across the valley, the Hooffields didn't seem all that moved by her words and were now firing tomatoes at the McColts. Everyone panicked and scattered to avoid getting splattered. Twilight, Kairi, Fluttershy, and Ventus quickly ran for cover as well, getting hit by a few stray tomatoes until they found shelter in a shed. Twilight sighed, pulling out her portfolio of solutions and tearing out the one she tried. "So much for potential friendship solution number twenty-eight."
"Why in the world are they launching tomatoes?" Kairi asked. "I don't think anything you said sparked more of a conflict that's already been lit."
"Either that or the Hooffields watching Twilight fly down to the McColts side might have made them think differently," Ventus pondered, wiping off the tomato juice from his neck.
"I think we better see why they're launching tomatoes at the McColts," Fluttershy suggested.
Making their way back across the valley to the Hooffield's side, the quartet saw the farming family slinging the tomatoes at the McColts with slingshots. Ma Hooffield instructed one of her family members not to put too many tomatoes in one sling, otherwise they'll squish together and not get any of the McColts.
"Hey, what are you guys doing!?" Ventus called out. "Twilight said not to continue fighting!"
"Oh, is that what y'all were hollerin' about?" Ma Hooffield asked. "We thought the McColts rubbed ya the wrong way. So we tomatered them for ya."
"You also 'tomatered' us," Kairi said before leaning over to whisper to Ventus. "I think she also did that on purpose out of stubbornness."
Ventus nodded in agreement, both Keyblade wielders knowing full well that this dispute wasn't going to end with just words alone. "Sorry. Mah mistake," Ma apologized. "Stop the tomater slingshots!" The Hooffield family stopped firing, but that moment of peace ended too soon as the McColts retaliated by firing hay bales at them. The Hooffields screamed in panic as the bales fell, the guests unfortunate to be caught in the explosion of hay as one of them landed on them. "Reload the tomater slingshots! We're gonna paint their mountaintop red!"
Twilight, Kairi, Ventus, and Fluttershy poked their heads up out of the mess of hay they were smashed with, spitting out hay that got in their mouths. "Ok, are we considered the third party as part of this war? Because we got hit from both sides," Ventus said.
"I thought for sure that was going to work," Twilight muttered.
As they climbed out of the hay while avoiding more falling bales, Fluttershy noticed a turtle slowly trying to flee for safety. The Hooffields ran to their weapons to fire back, sending the reptile spinning rapidly and flipping it on its back with its feet flailing helplessly. Fearing for the defenseless turtle's safety, she flew over to it and picked it up, dropping him to safety by a thick bush nearby.
"Well, it was a good plan," Fluttershy said. "We really need to think of another one soon, though. This fight is really affecting the animals here."
She looked down, the turtle barely making an inch toward the bush she lifted for him to enter. She pushed it inside, making sure it was safe and sound before returning to the others.
"Don't worry, I still have other solutions," Twilight said, flipping through the pages of her friendship portfolio for her answer. "We'll, uhh...find the root of the problem and work it out from there!"
They winced as another hay bale crashed into one of the Hooffield's homes. "It's about as good of a plan as any. I'll stay with Twilight with the Hooffields to figure out what started this feud. Ven, you and Fluttershy make your way over to the McColts and do the same."
"Ok, but we're going to take the low ground," Ventus said, looking up to see another hay bale come straight toward them. Calling his Keyblade again, he shot up in the air and dashed forward, a circle of flames surrounding him as he used Fire Surge, burning the hay bale until it was nothing but ashes. "It's like a war zone out here. Not sure if there's anywhere safe where we're not pelted with pumpkins or hurled hay bales."
Ventus and Fluttershy flew off toward the McColts, being careful to avoid the random projectiles as they stuck to the lower section of the valley. Twilight pulled out a quill and some spare parchment as she and Kairi approached Ma Hooffield, who was joining her family in flinging tomatoes with one of several slingshots.
"So, Ma Hooffield, do you think you can tell us how this whole feud started in the first place?" Twilight asked.
"They know what they did," Ma Hooffield replied vaguely after firing some tomatoes at the McColts.
"They know what they did!" Big Daddy McColt said, answering Ventus and Fluttershy as soon as they made it back to the McColt family fortress.
"Can you actually tell us?" Ventus asked, slightly irritated at the vague answer. "Or do you even know what really happened?"
"Of course we do!" the McColt elder said. "Them Hooffields did us a grave injustice some time ago for some reason."
The McColt family voiced their agreements, which didn't give Ventus or Fluttershy any answer to their question. The pegasus stallion facehooved, seeing how they clearly have no idea how the feud started, and he was betting all his Munny that the Hooffields didn't know either.
"Ok, but maybe there's something in common you share with the Hooffields," Fluttershy pondered aloud, knowing Twilight would have a backup plan to her backup plan if getting to the root of the problem wouldn't work. "Do you do anything besides fight?"
"That's easy; gettin' ready to fight," Big Daddy McColt said.
"What do you even hope to get out of fighting?" Kairi asked Ma Hooffield, calling her Keyblade out just in case a stray hay bale came sailing toward them again.
"The satisfaction of winnin'!" Ma answered, loading up another shot of tomatoes to lob.
"Of winning what?" Twilight asked, writing down what little information she was able to get.
"The fight, of course!" Big Daddy McColt responded as he repaired on of the walls that managed to get punched through by a pumpkin earlier. "To prove our family is the best!"
"The best at what?" Fluttershy asked.
"Winnin'! Weren't y'all even listenin'!?" As the short stallion went off to help fix some of the catapults used for flinging their hale bales, Ventus groaned in irritation.
"We're not getting anywhere," he grumbled, smacking his head against the fortified wall. "I'm guessing Ma Hooffield gave Twilight and Kairi the same answers as Big Daddy McColt."
"Maybe they did find something useful," Fluttershy said.
Leaving the wooden fort, while also avoiding any veggie projectiles shot at the McColts, Fluttershy and Ventus made their way back to the Hooffield's side to meet up with Twilight and Kairi. They found the duo after climbing back up the mountain, Twilight looking through the small amount of notes they had received from Ma Hooffield.
"You didn't get anything useful, didn't you?" Ventus asked.
"Nope. Not a single thing," Kairi said.
"How are we supposed to figure out how to solve this if neither side knows what they're feuding about?" Twilight questioned, tossing away her notes and falling on her belly with a huff.
The group sat and thought of a way to end the fighting that didn't involve either side getting killed or losing their homes. "Maybe somepony just needs to say they're sorry," Fluttershy voiced after a few minutes of thinking.
"That's a kinda crazy idea, Fluttershy," Ventus said in disagreement. "They'd rather get into a fist fight with each other than apologize."
"Actually, that just might work!" Twilight said, the teen falling over in exasperation while she flipped over the pages of her portfolio. "And it's friendship solution number forty-eight. But we can move that up."
"This isn't going to work!" Ventus exclaimed.
"...I can't believe this is going to work," the pegasus stallion grumbled as he walked alongside Twilight, Fluttershy, Kairi, Ma Hooffield, and a giant carrot cake he was pulling up the McColt's mountainside.
Twilight suggested to the elder Hooffield that if they wanted to end the feud, one of them would have to apologize. Ma Hooffield was surprisingly ok with it and came up with the idea of baking the McColts a giant carrot cake as an apology to prove it to them.
"I'm really glad you agreed to this," Twilight said to Ma. "This apology cake will go a long way making amends between you two. Which part of my argument changed your mind? The part where I said the benefits of friendship outweigh the cost of war, or the part where I said forgiveness is an investment for happiness?"
Ma Hooffield didn't even seem to be paying attention to what the alicorn was saying, focusing on the wooden fortress before her. "Yeah, yeah. All of it."
"Wait, were you even listening to me?" Twilight asked skeptically.
They reached the McColt family's home, the sentries keeping an eye out poking their heads up. "Who goes there!?"
"It's Ma Hooffield," Ma Hooffield said.
"Hooffield alert! Arm the cannons!" The McColts quickly aimed the several cannons they had up on the scaffolding on the inside down at the mare, preparing to fire.
"Hey! We're down here too!" Ventus cried out, quickly unhitching himself from the wagon used to carry the cake.
"And Ah came with an apology cake," Ma Hooffield added.
"Did you say 'cake'? As in..." The stallion paused, the McColts finally noticing the giant carrot cake that was behind them. All of them were salivating, dying to taste something other than pumpkins for what felt like an eternity for them. "...Cake?"
"Consider it a gesture of goodwill from us to you," Ma Hooffield said, suspiciously cheerfully.
"Ah haven't had cake in ages," one of the McColt mares said.
"...Open the gates!" the drooling stallion sentry quickly said, the doors opening up to let the gifted cake inside.
Twilight pushed it the rest of the way with her magic, but Kairi grew suspicious when she saw the smirk on Ma Hooffield's face. Something was off by the sudden agreement to apologize, and making this cake for them that looked like it could feed five extended families. Not only that, but this seemed very familiar, like a scene from a tale of two warring countries that eventually ended with a dirty tactic. As the McColts admired the cake before digging in, Twilight wanted to let them know about the cake's symbol from the Hooffields.
"Think of this as more than a cake," she said. "It's the first step in the long road to forgiveness."
"Nothing says 'let's be friends' like a cake that says, 'Let's be friends!'" Fluttershy added, pointing at the top of the multilayered cake with small writing that said those exact words. She leaned over to one of the McColts as if telling that specific pony a secret. "I wrote that in icing on the top."
"Wait, something's really off," Kairi muttered. She looked back, watching Ma Hooffield back away with her sneaky grin, almost as if she poisoned the cake. Then she realized, back on the Hooffield's mountain, most of the farming family had mysteriously disappeared, gasping in shock when she looked back at the cake. "Oh no! That cake is a Trojan Horse!"
"A Trojan what?" Twilight and Fluttershy asked in confusion, but Ventus knew what that meant as he looked at the cake.
It was already too late, the cake bursting open as some of the Hooffields had hid inside it for a sneak attack. They caught the McColts by surprise, getting hit by bits of cake the Hooffields threw at them. They jumped out of the cake, but their attack failed as Big Daddy McColt seemed to have had a feeling the cake was a trap, pulling a lever and catching the invading family in a net.
"I knew it wasn't going to work!" Ventus exclaimed. "No wonder that cake seemed heavier than it should have looked!"
"McColts! Assume Delta Formation!" Big Daddy McColt commanded, the family all gathering into a large triangular formation before charging after Ma Hooffield with a battle cry.
Ma Hooffield turned tail and ran away from the stampeding carpenter family, chasing her down the mountainside and into the valley. While Twilight and Fluttershy were recovering from the shock of the surprise attack, Ventus flew up to let the trapped Hooffields free from the net. He cut the rope holding them up, then lowered them down, but instead of being thanked, they ran off after the McColts.
"W-What just happened!?" Twilight yelled. "And what the hay is a Trojan Horse!?"
"It's a dirty military tactic we know of from certain mythology we've read about," Kairi explained. "Give your enemies a gift, and it turns out to be a surprise they didn't expect coming, which turns out to be their downfall for accepting a gift too good to be true."
"And Ma Hooffield just made things worse!" Ventus added.
The group hurried after the feuding families, where they just caught sight of the Hooffields pulling off their plan B if their Trojan cake failed. The rest of the family hid around the valley with catapults filled with fruits, vegetables, and baked goods, launching them at Ma's order onto the McColts. The McColts were quick on the defensive, holding up wooden shields to protect themselves, although one tall stallion was unlucky enough to get splattered with a cream pie to the face. Twilight, completely flabbergasted by the Hooffield elder's actions, flew up to the mare.
"Ma Hooffield, you planted ponies in that cake!?" Twilight asked.
"Yeah!" the older mare answered with a laugh, only to pause as she noticed the serious expression on the alicorn's face. "...Wait, were y'all serious about apologizin'?"
"Yes! That was the point to stop this fighting!" Twilight said.
"Why in Equestria would we do that!?" Ma Hooffield exclaimed. "We didn't do anythin' wrong!"
"What are you talkin' about!?" Big Daddy McColt exclaimed angrily, tossing away his shield while stomping over to the mare. "Y'all have done SO many things wrong!"
"Not as many as you!" Ma Hooffield argued, both ponies growling as they butted heads.
They were the first to throw the first punch, sparking an all out war between both families as the valley became a battlefield. Twilight leapt and hovered out of the way before hooves began swinging, ponies actually physically hurting each other over something neither side knew what caused their feud. She felt helpless as her plans only seemed to fail, flapping sadly to a safer part of the clearing where she looked at her portfolio, ripping out and crumpling her solutions into paper balls.
Kairi, Ventus, and Fluttershy tried to stop the fighting, but none of the families were listening to them. Fluttershy noticed a few animals caught in the battlefield, confused and frightened as they tried to flee from the unaware Hooffields and McColts only caring about getting rid of their rivals. She flew in to rescue them, leaving the Keyblade wielders to get them to stop beating each other up.
"Hey, knock it off!" Ventus said, pushing a McColt and Hooffield away from each other. "This isn't going to solve anything if you keep fighting with each other!" They ignored the teen, tossing him aside and continued with their scuffle. Ventus growled, getting fed up with being ignored, but at least it was because of the feud and not because of his age. Unsuccessful with their attempts, he and Kairi gave up and walked over to Twilight, who felt like a failure as she took apart all the hard work she made in less than a few minutes. "Alright, if they keep fighting, we're going to end up as a third group in this war just to get them to knock it off."
"We can solve this without violence, Ven," Kairi scolded. "Twilight, do you have any other ideas?"
"I don't even know if we can do this at all," Twilight said dejectedly. "No matter what I try, they're just going to keep fighting..."
As Fluttershy rejoined them, she spotted a few more woodland critters peeking out from the shrubbery and tree stumps around them. "Hello, little guys," Fluttershy cooed, coaxing them out of hiding, assuring them they were safe. "You can come out. It's ok." They all gathered around the animal-loving pegasus, surprising the quartet when all their stomachs growled. "Oh, you poor things are hungry." They then huddled up to her, making the pegasus shudder as their bodies were practically freezing, and spring had just come around, too. "And you're freezing! Don't you worry. I'll bring you home with me and get all of you hot cocoa. How do you feel about book clubs?"
Twilight looked up at the ruined valley, grabbing the geology book that had pictures of the flourishing landscape of the Smokey Mountains she expected. "I don't understand. This was supposed to be the most beautiful valley in all of Equestria. What happened here?"
"The McColts and Hooffields ended up destroying it, no doubt," Kairi said. "They're too busy focusing on fighting with each other that they don't realize how much damage their causing to the land. If only we knew who started the fight, we can end this and get these two families to make up."
"But they don't know," Ventus mentioned. "They only cared about fighting that they didn't even bother paying attention to the true problem."
One of the squirrels climbed up on Fluttershy's hoof and chittered. "What's that?" she asked, getting an explanation as her eyes widened in surprise. After a moment of storytelling in squirrel tongue, Twilight, Ventus, and Kairi curious about what it was saying, Fluttershy looked at them, seeming to understand what had happened. "They know what caused the fighting."
"The animals?" Ventus asked. "What exactly did he say?"
"I'll tell everypony, but we need to get them to stop fighting." Looking out to the war zone of blue and red ponies, it seemed like it would be impossible to stop them with how badly they were going at each other's throats.
"Ok, I'm going to try something." Kairi stepped forward, summing her Keyblade in her aura. Face all of the feuding ponies, she decided to try using a variation of a Stop spell with the power of her unicorn magic combined with her Keyblade magic. The aura around Destiny's Embrace began glowing brighter as her unicorn magic merged with her Keyblade. "Stopga!"
Raising her blade up in the air, the spell shot out as a large clock zoomed out toward the Hooffields and McColts. The illusion flew past them, immediately affecting them as they suddenly froze in place, ceasing their fighting, but keeping them aware of their surroundings unlike how the Stop spell was supposed to act. Able to move their eyes, ears, and mouths, the ponies all looked around while voicing their confusion, stuck in awkward stances as they were about to pummel their opponent or whack them over the head with tools. Ma Hooffield and Big Daddy McColt were just as confused, staring at each other awkwardly while their bodies were paralyzed from the time spell.
"...Well...that worked," Ventus said. "But, isn't Stop supposed to trap them in time completely?"
"Twilight taught me a little something while training," Kairi said. "Unicorn magic can be really diverse, especially when mixing other magical spells to create more variations than what we currently know. Sadly, I don't think you, Sora, Riku, or Terra can do anything like that."
The pink unicorn then turned to Fluttershy, giving her cue to tell the Hooffields and McColts before the spell wore off. Fluttershy flapped her wings, hovering over the Hooffields and McColts with her squirrel friend on her back to tell them all the truth over their seemingly endless feud.
"Before you keep fighting, there is something you should know!" she began. "Long ago, there were two best friends,Grub Hooffield and Piles McColt. When they found the valley between the Smokey Mountains, they knew it was something special. So they made a promise to each other to protect and preserve the valley for its adorable furry inhabitants. But they disagreed on how to go about it.
"Grub wanted to start by planting crops so that everypony would have something to eat. But Piles thought it would be better to start by building a shelter to protect them against the cold and wind." Both families were heavily engrossed in the story, knowing of their ancestors who had founded their homes and the never-ending fighting between their families. "The two ponies were unable to come to an understanding, so Piles went ahead and built a shelter anyway, exactly where Grub was going to start his farm! Grub was upset, so he tore down Piles's shelter so he could plant his crops!"
"So it was the Hooffield's fault after all!" a McColt mare exclaimed, but before the ponies all began arguing, Kairi fired a Thunder spell far from them, but silencing them as they metaphorically jumped in surprise.
"Both sides were at fault!" Kairi added. "This is the first we're hearing of this story, too, and these animals have a better memory than all of you! Apparently, Grubs never seemed to have mentioned to Piles that he was going to build his farm where Piles started building his shelter after their argument over what they should do first!"
"Exactly," Fluttershy agreed as the squirrel nodded its head. "And they began fighting with each other, ruining each other's work until it got worse and worse until it turned into a feud! The valley had suffered from the constant destruction, until the Hooffields and McColts moved to separate mountains. What's even worse is that the animals had all suffered, getting caught in the crossfire as well. Can't you all see that your fighting is destroying the very place that brought your families here in the first place?" The McColts and Hooffields let all this sink in, looking at their foes before feeling guilty that their fighting was only destroying their homes more and more. What made it worse was that they were affecting the wildlife as well, hurting the animals by destroying their homes and taking away their food, ruining their habitat when they wanted to make it prosper like their forefathers tried to do, only to fail and spark an all-out war against each other. "So it's time to put your differences aside and come together!"
"If not for yourselves, then do it for the sake of these cute and cuddly guys!" Fluttershy hovered back down, hugging the defenseless woodland critters that gathered around her.
Ma Hooffield and Big Daddy McColt saw the errors of their ways as they looked at the poor animals whose homes they've destroyed, and almost harmed during their fight. They both looked at each other, feeling like foals as they argued over something their great-grandparents started, and they were best friends before the feud.
"...Aw, shucks," Big Daddy McColt said. "We never meant to hurt you little critters."
"Yeah, we're sorry," Ma Hooffield apologized, along with the rest of both families.
The animals all chittered or squeaked, Fluttershy translating for them. "They say they accept your apology."
The family elders grinned as the animals forgave them, though they were still stuck in their frozen positions. "...Uhh, can we be free now?"
"I think now's a good time to free you all," Kairi said, casting Esuna in a wide radius, freeing the Hooffields and McColts as they collapsed to the ground, being careful not to hurt their neighbors.
Once freed, Ma and Big Daddy looked at each other as their families gathered around. "Ma Hooffield? We promise we won't fight ya no more."
"Us too, except we promise not to fight you," Ma Hooffield said. "I suppose it doesn't matter who's right. We're both wrong."
"That's one thing we can agree on," Big Daddy McColt said.
Both elders then spat on their hooves and shook them, sealing their truce in a disgusting way, but at least they vowed not to fight anymore. Twilight teleported between them, overly excited to see them making up.
"This is wonderful!" the alicorn squealed. "I am so proud of you two!"
"Thanks, princess," Ma Hooffield said. "But Ah would like to point out that Ah was the, uh, first to to admit Ah was wrong."
"That may be, but Ah promised not to fight first," Big Daddy McColt argued, making Ventus groan in irritation. "That counts for more!"
"Oh, for the love of Kingdom Hearts!" the teen shouted. "Now you're fighting about who admitted they were wrong first!? Did you not learn anything!?"
The animals all agreed with Ventus as they leered and scolded them in their animal tongues. Ma Hooffield and Big Daddy McColt laughed sheepishly, letting their competitiveness get the better of them.
"Uhh, how about we just both agree we apologized at the same time?" Ma suggested.
"Yeah, Ah can live with that," Big Daddy agreed.
Now that the McColts and Hooffields were friendly neighbors, the first thing they did was fix the valley and make it a prosperous place like it was in its heyday. Twilight, Ventus, Kairi, and Fluttershy helped out as they planted flowers, crops, and built a few shelters for the animals. It would be quite a while before the land was brighter and filled with flora, but with both families finally working together, it probably wouldn't take long. They even built a fountain with statues of Grub Hooffield and Piles McColt shaking hooves, a sign of both families reuniting as friends for their ancestors.
"This place is looking a whole lot better already," Kairi commented.
"It sure is," Ma Hooffield agreed. "The McColts are gonna help us rebuild our homes. And good ones this time."
"And the Hooffields are gonna help us grow some crops," Big Daddy McColt said.
"Not pumpkins," one of the McColt stallions said, overhearing them before getting back to work on building one of the nearby shelters.
"Thank y'all for teachin' us that friendship is so much better than winnin' a silly argument." Ma Hooffield and Big Daddy McColt headed back to work after thanking their guests, the four ponies waving to them as they left them to revitalizing the land.
The quartet flinched when they felt their cutie marks glowing, their job complete as they saved the Smokey Mountains and brought peace to the Hooffields and McColts. "Well, that's another group of friends made," Kairi said. "I knew we'd figure it out eventually."
"We did, and I guess I didn't need my friendship portfolio after all," Twilight said as she held up her little notebook of friendship problems and solutions.
"Not everything needs to be solved with a book, Twilight," Ventus said to the alicorn. "I think we need to get you farther away from your books so you don't have to rely on them all the time."
"Don't be like Riku and Sora keeping me from my books," Twilight warned. Ventus giggled nervously, backing away as he saw that crazed look in the alicorn's eyes, willing to follow through with punishing him if he didn't heed her. "Anyway, it seems like the Cutie Map has called every single one of us. I wonder what'll happen next?"
Twilight levitated their saddlebags, plopping them down on their backs. Fluttershy nearly crumpled under the weight, barely able to move with everything the alicorn packed for them.
"Seriously, Twilight, did you fill these bags up with books or rocks?" Ventus teased as Kairi levitated the saddlebags off of them.
She didn't retort as she was too busy pondering what outcomes will happen next with the Cutie Map out loud, making her way back to their balloon. "And she's off on a tangent. Prepare for another boring ride with an overly excited princess."
"Weren't you a bit too overexcited when you first came to Equestria?" Ventus questioned with a smirk.
"I grew out of it," Kairi said.
"That's gonna change when we see Shining Armor and Cadence's baby." The unicorn leered at him before dropping all three heavy saddlebags on his back, making him yelp and crash to the ground.
"You know what? I think I'm exhausted after carrying all that weight. Be a gentleman and carry our bags, Ven." Kairi walked on ahead, leaving Ventus to struggle as he tried to stand up.
"F-Fluttershy? Help?" he pleaded.
"Oh, I don't know. I can barely lift my own bags before we came here," Fluttershy said. "I'm sorry."
"Mrph...Right." Ventus struggled as he slowly walked forward, feeling his spine almost snap with each step he took as the distance between the Smokey Mountains and the balloon felt like a hundred miles. "I did say...I needed some muscle." Fluttershy walked alongside him for support, the teen letting out a sigh while slugging onward to catch up to Twilight and Kairi. "Should have kept my big mouth shut..."