"Are you sure your parents will be okay with this?"
Sandbar held Ocellus' hooves in his. "They're pretty relaxed. They should be alright with it. As long as we spend the next Hearths Warming with them."
"If you say so." She slid her body a bit closer to her lover. "I'm really glad we don't have to hide anymore."
Sandbar wrapped his hoof around her shoulder. "Yeah. It's really nice to just be open about our powers now. Have you seen what Silver's been doing around the school?"
Ocellus giggled. "Have you seen what Yona and I have been doing?"
"All over the place. It's really beautiful. The three of you are making a real difference in the area."
Ocellus' cheeks weren't as red as they usually would be. "Well, it's not very noticeable at the moment because of the snow and Silver can't exactly be in cold areas anymore."
"Oh, right. That." Sandbar did not want to think about what had happened a week after winter started.
Ocellus placed her hoof on his cheek. "Let's not worry about things right now. Silver is safe, after all."
"Y-yeah."
Ocellus closed her eyes halfway. "Let's just relax right now."
Sandbar closed his eyes halfway. "Sure."
They both closed their eyes the rest of the way and kissed. It was just them and their affection. Nothing could take that away. Not even the two creatures standing nearby that Sandbar could sense the breath of. The two that were watching the couple. Them and their child. The two that were most definitely not ruining the moment. Most. Definitely. Not...
Sandbar's face scrunched up as he broke off the kiss.
"Sandy?"
Sandbar looked over his shoulder with a scowl... only for his expression to completely shift when he saw who was watching them. "Mom? Dad?"
His little sister waved at him. "Hi!"
"Sorry for interrupting, Sandbar." His father rubbed the back of his head. "You certainly got my level of passion."
His mother giggled. "We figured you would want to spend your time with your lover this hearthswarming, so we figured we would surprise you by greeting you at the station there. I guess we didn't realize how soon you would be leaving, though."
"Wait, I never mentioned dating Ocellus to you guys. How did you know?"
"Let's just say, one of your teachers is a bit too passionate about passion."
Sandbar sighed. "Darnit, Rarity."
Sandbar's mother held her hoof over her mouth as she watched the Changelings singing. "They have some... interesting traditions."
"Wait 'till you see what they do with their gifts. Or the punch."
His father scratched his head. "So you knew that they do this before coming here?"
"I not only knew that they did it, I know why; They took Princess Twilight's instructions a bit too literally."
"That... explains a few things. And makes me worried about what they do with the punch."
Sandbar's head suddenly snapped to the side, his eyes pointed back. He turned back to the changeling crowd and locked eyes with Ocellus. The student stepped out of the circle and approached her lover.
"You felt that too, right?"
"Yeah. I don't know what it was, though."
Sandbar's sister reached her front legs out to Ocellus as Sandbar's parents shared a look.
"Is this something about your powers?"
Sandbar nodded. "We should probably check it out, just in case."
Ocellus nodded and followed Sandbar out of the room. "Your sister is pretty cute."
"Yeah. She is. I haven't been able to spend much time with her, though. She was born about eight months before the School of Friendship opened, and I spent six of those months fixing up my mistakes around town. That left me with two months free before school started, and she spent most of that time with my dad in the town he works at."
"Not with your mom?"
"Mom's job requires her to be out of the house a ton, and we had no idea when I'd be able to stay at home reliably. It was cheaper to simply have her go with dad since he spent less time working than mom did. The sad thing is that Gallus spent more time with his surrogate sister than I did with my real sister."
"Do you want to spend more time with her?"
"Yeah. That would be nice. Anyway, did you have a reason to bring that up?"
"Um, well." Ocellus' cheeks turned red. "I was thinking, uh, later in life, when we're older, um, I would like to have a daughter."
Both of them stopped as Sandbar looked his lover in the eye. "... Even if we have to go through twenty sons to get one?"
The female's cheeks went darker. "I'm serious!"
"Heh. I know." They resumed walking. "But I understand. I would be nice to have a child someday. And imagine if we're the first pony and changeling couple to have a child. If that happens, well, Twilight only gets to touch them if Fluttershy's there."
Ocellus giggled. "I'd agree to that."
The two rounded the corner, then stopped in their tracks. A few yards away was a door of pure light.
"That wasn't there before."
The pair walked up to the doorway.
"Ocellus?"
The duo turned around. Everyone else was standing there, with Thorax at the front.
"What is that?"
"I don't know, but you guys should stay back. We can't be too reckless until we know what-"
There was a sound like someone hitting a chime against a wall. They all looked at the door of light, which was showing ripples. Another sound rang out, accompanied by ripples.
Sandbar used his wind to push everyone, including Ocellus, back. "Stay back!"
A third sound, with some sounds of whimpering behind the empowered lovers, before something finally happened.
Two small boxes popped out of the doorway. Sandbar and Ocellus looked at each other, then at the boxes. One had Sandbar's name on it, the other had Ocellus'.
The couple immediately recognized the writing on the boxes. "Gold Strike?"
The kirin stepped through the portal. "Hey, guys! Oh, uh, didn't mean to interrupt your holiday. I figured I had a good bit of time before meeting with Luna and Celestia, so I should try to open the gateways that we used in the old days. Of course, the changeling hive wasn't exactly a place we wanted to have a portal to in the old days, so I had to create one that leads here instead. Not the easiest thing to do, since I wasn't the one that created the initial-"
Sandbar pressed his hoof against Gold Strike's mouth. "Hold on! Did you not think to warn us that you were doing this at all?"
Gold Strike moved the hoof off of his mouth. "How would I?"
Telepathy.
"... Oh, right. We can do that."
Thorax found himself chuckling a bit. "Are you telling me that the oldest and wisest member of your team forgot about one of the main powers that all of you have?"
The kirin rubbed the back of his head. "Ehehe... Yes. I'm not too used to using it since I wasn't in a lot of situations where it was useful."
Ocellus picked the box with her name on it up with her hooves. "Really? It was very useful to us."
"Well, I fell out with most of my last team, and I had to go solo for quite a while after coming back. Though it's still embarrassing for me, of all Guardians, to forget about one of our powers."
Sandbar's dad leaned towards Thorax. "Am I missing something here?"
"Their powers allow them to communicate to each other through telepathy. Gold Strike forgot about that, leading to the situation we're in now."
Gold Strike watched Sandbar pick up his gift. "Please don't put that in the exchange. That's not what they're meant for."
"Oh yeah! When's the exchange?"
"Well, I think we're done with carols, so let's do the exchange now."
The changelings started cheering as Ocellus gave her gift to Sandbar.
Sandbar's mother watched her future daughter-in-law walk past her. "I'm curious about the exchange."
Sandbar fumbled with the boxes a bit. "Yeah, it's, uh, interesting. You gonna stick around, Gold?"
"Nah. I've got to open up other portals right now before I meet up with Luna again."
"Is one of them going to be in Ponyville?"
"I plan on setting one up near the school. That'll save on train fares. And I will let your parents use it. Just hold their hooves while going through. Non-Guardians can't use it without a Guardian with them."
A seagull pecked at the ground a bit, only to fly off at the sound of magic. Several hippogriffs stepped out of the water.
Terramar turned to his sister. "That was a pretty amazing display you put on earlier."
Silver laughed. "Thanks. But can I say that being in water is super weird now? Like I step in the ocean and my mind went, "Woahhhhhh!" I could feel where every sea pony was at once! I could tell what they were doing! It was like I was hugging all of them, and they were all hugging me! Endlessly!"
Terramar blinked. "Wow. I kinda want to know how that feels now."
"Silver!"
Their father was perched atop a nearby rock, eyes locked on to Silver. As soon as the siblings saw him, he flew down and grabbed his daughter in a hug.
It took Silver a moment to process why he was acting like this. "Oh, right. I haven't met you since I got here."
The father grasped his daughter's shoulders firmly and looked her in the eye. "I just heard you were here! And I heard you were frozen solid!"
"Not completely. It was just three of my legs, half my face, and most of my body. I was fine after I thawed out."
"Don't act so casually about it! You could have died! Why did you even start to freeze?"
Silver rubbed the back of her head. "Well, it's winter time in Equestria, so they make it cold so that there can be snow."
Sky Beak blinked a couple of times. "Snow?"
Silver giggled. "Little pieces of ice that are white and fluffy. It's so pretty. You have to see it sometime!" Her eyes briefly went wide, then she folded her ears back. "Oh, but I guess I can't show you, huh?"
Terramar tapped his chin. "Quick question; Why didn't this happen last year?"
"I think I was just indoors a lot more last year. I spent a good bit of time cleaning up the school, thank Gallus for that, so I didn't spend more than a few minutes outside at a time. I guess it felt a bit strange when I was, but it wasn't as bad as this year since I was trying to help some other students by sitting outside with them."
"So you've been in the cold more."
"It doesn't help that one of my big clients right now is our newest member, who is made of ice."
Terramar giggled.
"What's so funny?"
"I never expected you to use a word as big as 'client'."
Silver looked her brother in the eye with a cold, hard stare. "I know big words. Like... dog."
Her family, as well as a few nearby griffs listening in, started laughing. Silver smiled herself after a bit. She could clearly sense the happiness in the others.
"Okay, okay. We should get back to Hippogriffia to set up for tomorrow. You two had plenty of fun with your mother, right?"
As the group started flying upwards, Silver paused and looked to her side. As the others headed up the mountain, she flew along the coastline to look for whatever she felt. Which didn't take long, as it was just around a bend.
She landed in front of the glowing doorway. She stared at it for a moment, remembering when she first got her powers and the portal she went through. She reached towards the portal... and saw a claw come through. She responded in panic, grabbing the claw and yanking on it.
"Yeow!" Gallus flopped onto the ground, his body still halfway through the portal. "Uh, hi Silver."
Silver let out an excited chirp, then pulled Gallus all the way through for cuddles and kisses. Gallus just rolled his eyes before closing them, unable to say anything. They held their position for a while.
Gallus suddenly started struggling and screaming into Silver's beak. Silver wasn't about to let go, though. She was going to get as much of her Griffon as she-
The sound of a cough somewhere behind her made her realize why Gallus started panicking. She broke off the kiss and turned around. Behind her was just about every Hippogriff and Seapony she knew, including her aunt.
"Uhh... So much for that surprise."
The first to react, oddly enough, was Novo, who started laughing. Most of the others followed suit, causing a chorus of laughter. The only exception was her father, who simply narrowed his eyes.
"If you mean figuratively, we're too young for that. Twilight would bust our heads open. If you mean literally, I prefer less sapient meat. I get fewer complaints when I do."
Sky Beak's expression stayed stoic, though his mouth did tighten a bit. "Are you royalty?"
"Nope. Not even sure where you got that idea from."
"And what would your parents say if I asked them?"
"If you ask them, let me know. I'd love to meet them for once in my life."
Sky Beak's expression finally changed noticeably, his eyes going wide and the corners of his mouth dropping. "Oh, uh... I didn't know you're an orphan."
"Yeah, it doesn't come up a lot. I just learned to live with it."
As the grown Hippogriff made odd noises with his beak, his children made a simultaneous sound from a table about thirty feet away as if they tasted rancid crab at the same time.
"The heck?"
The male Hippogriff chuckled. "I think their mother let slip who we were worried Silver would try to date."
"Mooom!" Silver clutched her head. "Why would you think that?"
Terramar pulled his tongue back into his beak. "Even if she asked me out, I would have turned her down!"
Ocean Flow chuckled. "S-sorry. All I can say is that you two had to get your wild imaginations from somewhere."
"But both of you?" Gallus, did dad tell you a joke?
"I may have told your father some things that-"
Silver suddenly whipped around in her chair, glaring at her lover. "GALLUS! HOW COULD YOU?"
This outburst confused her family, but Gallus was too busy laughing to be afraid. "Come on. It's silly."
Silver placed both of her claws on the back of her chair. "You made a joke about me kissing my brother, of all creatures!"
"Aren't you curious how good of a kisser he is?" Gallus punctuated his statement by puckering his beak (somehow).
All four family members reacted differently. Terramar glared at the Griffon. Ocean Flow bit her beak- lips- whatever, as her cheeks lifted. Sky Beak blinked a couple of times. Several spectators mirrored the parent's reaction, with a few of them laughing a bit.
Silver, however, had the most notable response. "You little- THAT DOES IT!" She kicked off of her chair and shot straight at Gallus.
Gallus sidestepped and grabbed her claw. Silver barely processed what had happened before Gallus was kissing her again. A couple of blinks later, and Silver closed her eyes, letting out a soft moan.
Sky Beak let out a soft chuckle. "She gets that from her mother. Anyway, I think you'll be a fine lover for her. Now, let's eat before the chefs decide to stop cooking."
"Smolder."
The Dragon popped another gem into her mouth before turning around. "Hey, Singe!"
The male Dragon limped up to the female. "You actually know the guy that got through the security I set up?"
Smolder swallowed the gem in her mouth. "Yep. Pretty close friend of mine, too."
"Did he actually kill the guards?"
"No, he just tricked them away from their posts after turning the security system off. Then his caretaker-"
"Convinced the others that the fake I made was the real bell, right?"
Smolder stared at Singe.
"Heh. That look says everything. I thought it was odd that they had me make a replica if they were going to have me install all of those security systems and put the real deal on that pedestal anyway. So who helped him?"
"No one. I think he knocked out the guard in the security room, paused a powerful sound wave next to the switch to turn it off later, whatever that means, made some noise that he also paused, then positioned himself outside the window next to the room with the bell in it."
"Did he turn off the security, sending one guard away-"
Smolder threw the gem in her hand on the ground. "How do you always know these kinds of things?"
Singe shrugged. "I'm just good at guessing."
Smolder grunted then picked the gem up off the ground. "Well, you obviously know what happened, so-"
"DON'T EAT ME!"
Smolder shrieked and dropped the gem. The gem rolled for a bit, then started laughing.
"Yona! What the heck?"
A statue of a Yak rose from the ground before shaping itself into Smolder's Yak friend.
Singe blinked a couple of times. "How did you do that?"
"Oh, that's easy. We're made of the stuff we control."
"You two are... made out of..." His eyes moved between the girls. "So your body is nothing but fire?"
"Yup." Smolder popped another gem in her mouth. "Can be useful or inconvenient, depending on the situation. Anyway, how did you even get here, Yona? Even though you travel fast, you can't go that far."
"Come on! I'll show you how!"
The classmates took a few steps together before Smolder noticed something. "You coming, Singe?"
"Nah, I don't think this involves me."
"... Okay." Smolder walked off with Yona a few steps ahead of her.
"Is Singe your brother?"
"Nah. He's just a friend. My only friend before I went to school. Heck, he might be the only reason I was chosen to go to the School of Friendship."
"Huh? Why?"
"Well, a few years back, he went missing for a while. Most of us thought he hid away to think up challenges for the other Dragons in his group. Then he came back with a busted wing, a limp, and amnesia. His old group ditched him when it became clear that he wasn't able to keep up with them anymore."
"Did you ever find out what happened?"
Smolder shook her head. "My best guess is that he hurt his head pretty badly, but there isn't a scar on his head like there is on his leg. Anyway, I saw him off on his own. I told the other I was hanging with him because he was weaker. I said it was because he couldn't get away if he betrayed me. But to tell the truth, I just felt bad for him."
"You always had a soft spot after all, huh?"
A year and a half ago, Smolder would have immediately denied it. Even now, she would have denied it to most creatures. But her friends weren't any creatures. "Yeah, I did."
Yona smiled. "So what does this have to do with you going to school?"
"I guess Dragon Lord Ember noticed that we were friendlier than other Dragons. Once the call for students from all races went out, she went right for us. She didn't want Singe being mocked for his injuries or for Dragons to come off as too weak, so she picked me over him. He was reluctant to let me go until she got him in with a sculptor named Incendia. She never seemed to hate him, so we both agreed to it. You won't believe how upset he was when I didn't come back that one holiday."
"You two sound really close. Would you date him if he asked?"
Smolder suddenly stopped in her tracks, her eye twitching. Her head whipped left and right for a few moments before she spoke. "Are we going the right way? You were going to show me how you got here."
Yona looked around a bit. "... Oops. I think it's this way."
"Are you sure this time? Or are we going to walk around aimlessly until we find it."
The pair walked around for a few minutes, Smolder hoping that Yona forgot her question. Eventually, the glowing doorway came into view, with two creatures standing in front of it.
"Do you even have a trick?"
"... No. I just..." Gold Strike let out a sigh. "It never gets easier."
"Singe? Gold?"
The boys looked at the girls as they approached.
Singe smirked and let out a soft sound. "You know, it's sad I wasn't looking for this thing and got here before you two."
The Kirin's eyes were locked onto the Yak. "Yona, I stood here so you could sense me out. You were walking in circles for a bit there."
"Hehe. Yak forgot."
Smolder pat Yona on the head. "Yak is so nervous she reverted speaking patterns. Anyway, what were you two talking about?"
The boys looked at each other.
Smolder let out a low growl. "I know those expressions. You're both thinking, "I don't want to tell her," right?"
Gold Strike looked from one Dragon to the next. "I'll tell you some day. Not today though."
The female Dragon rolled her eyes, then went over to the portal. "So is this some kind of teleporter thing?"
"It is. It leads back to the airship, but only Guardians and anyone accompanying them can go through. We used them a lot in the old days."
Smolder put her hand through the portal for a moment, then pulled it out. "How many of these things are working?"
"I've got one near the school, one in the Crystal Empire, and one in each of your homelands now."
"Is that it?"
Gold Strike moved up next to Smolder. "There are plenty more that can be made, but I only plan on making one more for today."
"Where to?"
The Kirin smiled.
Luna leaned on the balcony as the snow fell around her.
"Snow at night. And here I thought seeing you couldn't get better."
The princess looked over her shoulder as her lover approached. "You find plenty of things beautiful."
"None more than you." Gold Strike kissed his lover and closed his eyes.
They held their kiss for at least a minute before Luna pulled back. "Are your teammates doing well?"
Gold Strike nodded. "Sandbar and Ocellus are probably swimming in fruit punch right now, Gallus is spending time with Silver and her family, Yona's getting to know Smolder's old friends better, and Tempest is with her old friends in the Crystal Empire."
"She reunited with them?"
"She went to visit one and they ran into the other while walking around. The funny part is that he didn't know Tempest is a good girl now, so he went to the Crystal Empire to hide from her. They somehow held a nice long conversation before he recognized her. She made fun of him for that one."
"Was it the horn?"
"Definitely."
The lovers shared a laugh.
"Will she be staying on the ship?"
"Maybe. Maybe not. She hasn't made up her mind, but it's not like the ship needs someone on board at all times."
Luna looked to the sky. "Perhaps we should go inside. The cold can be nice but I want to be warm right now."
"Fair enough."
Luna put her hoof on the Kirin's nose. "And before you ask, I haven't seen her today. I don't know how she's doing."
Gold Strike laughed. "Really, Lulu? Did you think I-" He blinked a couple of times.
"Here's your cocoa, your highness." The Pegasus placed the tray on the table in the room.
"Thank you. You can take your break now." Luna watched the Pegasus float off before noticing her lover's expression. "Is something wrong?"
"Refresh my memory here. A collar means they're serving a sentence, right?"
"Correct."
"And the color of the collar depends on the crime they committed, right?"
Luna sighed. "Yes, it does."
"Red and black is the worst, right?"
"Goldie, don't worry about it."
Gold Strike finally looked at Luna. "But that was a little filly. Why would she have a red and black collar on?"
Luna turned to the door and let out a sigh. "That was Cozy Glow."
"Cozy-" His eyes went wide as he looked at the door. "She's the one that attacked the school?"