//------------------------------// // Chapter Four: Crazy Days With Cozy Nights // Story: The Return Of Cozy Glow's Parents // by deadpansnarker //------------------------------// “Cozy Nights, wait up!” A yellow pegasus with a bluish straight mane flew after her younger sibling on the ground, worry clear in her voice. “You know mother doesn’t like it when you wander off! Stay close, or we’ll have to go back!” “Catch me if you can, Star Shine!” The far more carefree cry of Cozy Nights could be heard, as its owner galloped through the backstreets into the distance. “If you can’t even fly as fast as I can run, how will you ever make the cut for the Wonderbolts?” “Y-You had to bring that up, didn’t you?” Star Shine growled from the air, her sister’s words hitting a particular sore spot. “But enough of that. Don’t you remember what happened last time you went on a ‘solo adventure’? What would’ve happened if I hadn’t been there to rescue you?” “It’s not my fault I can’t swim!” Cozy Nights stopped momentarily by a postbox to frown at her pursuer. “Nopony ever taught me! Mum’s always busy with that stupid hotel job, and you’re always failing at training. Also, how was I supposed to know that wooden bridge was being repaired?” “I don’t know… maybe the giant ‘Under Repair, Do Not Use’ sign might’ve been a clue?” Star Shine finally caught up with her errant sibling, and she leaned against the mailbox to catch her breath. “Plus all the rotten wood, the workponies either side of the drop, the huge hole in the middle…” “Okay, okay… so sometimes I miss some stuff. But how do you expect me to always pay attention, when the world around us is so beautiful?” Cozy Nights sighed, remembering with awe the multi-coloured butterfly that almost led her to a watery grave. “This is why I’ve always felt like more of an earth pony than a pegasus. What is the empty sky and wispy clouds compared to the glory of the greenery down below or the mysteries of the even deeper sea? One of these days, I’d like to escape the concrete jungle and find out for myself.” “Well, good luck with your dream, but you might want to take a few things into consideration.” Star Shine had recovered her poise, and her words were stern and to the point. “Firstly, you need money for travel. After paying all our bills, we have virtually nothing left. Second, I have enough trouble keeping you out of danger in Manehattan. How hazardous do you think it’s going to be in the wild? No, I’m sorry… I simply won’t allow it.” “Hey, you’re not the boss of me!” Cozy Nights responded to Star Shine’s ultimatum with an extended raspberry, which earned her an epic eye-roll in return. “If I wanna pack up and leave some day, I will! Maybe not now, or even in the near future… but sometime, when I’m good and ready, you won’t see me for dust! Which reminds me: I need to clean my room later. Where did you put the feather duster again?” “I told you already, we can’t afford one! We have to make one out of the plumage we moult! That’s why we’re reduced to picking barnacles off ships for spare change now, just to eat properly!” Star Shine was embarrassed to admit it, but this was the reality of the dire financial situation their family was in. “But don’t change the subject! You didn’t give me a chance to tell you my last reason why I disapprove of you going.” “Huh?” Cozy Nights was about to rush off again to the docks, but the sincerity in her sister’s tone caught her off-guard. “What’s that, then?” “I’d miss you.” Star Shine trotted over to her bemused sibling to embrace her with a single hoof. “I already spend half my life miles away at Wonderbolt camp, and one of the things I look forward to the most is seeing you on my visits back home. How do you think it’s going to affect my performance if I know you’re not here, and might be hurt in a far-off place where nopony can reach you?” “Oh my Celestia!! So sorry for my selfishness in wanting to actually do something for myself, at the cost of providing a distraction from your training!” Cozy Nights commented sarcastically, backing a few inches from her sister as she did so. “I’ll go back home this instant, and wrap myself in cotton-wool forever so you can pass with honours! What was I thinking, trying to be independent? Such a stupid idea…!” “T-That… that’s not what I meant at all, and you know it!” An annoyed Star Shine took to the air again, to address the younger pony from on high as if trying to be more authoritative. “If I ever become a professional, it’ll mean big bits! A chance to move out of the hovel where we live! Mum could even give up being a restroom attendant! But if you suddenly up sticks and left, how is that going to help anypony? Me and Mum would miss and worry about you, plus who’s gonna take care of her while I’m away? These are factors you need to seriously consider, before making a rash decision like that.” “The way you spoke about me a few seconds ago, I thought I was the one who needed ‘taking care of’, but anyway…” Cozy Nights shook her head in confusion, but attempted at least to be conciliatory. “I didn’t say I was going to depart this second! I meant when things settle down a bit, and we’re not struggling to make ends meet every day. I wouldn’t just leave mother without making sure she wasn’t properly provided for, no Sirree! You have my word on that! To prove it, let’s do what we used to, whenever we made a promise to each other.” “Oh no, not here! Everypony is watching us…” Star Shine fluttered down to whisper a warning about the various passers-by, seemingly unaware that most were too busy with their daily commute to pay either sister any mind. “We’re older now. More mature. Time to leave such foalish things behind in the past, and…” “Pffff. Less talking, and more licking.” Cozy Nights ignored the other pony’s protestations, as she slathered her own hoof with saliva before extending it. “Shake. Unless you want to do the other thing, where we cut our hooves with my trusty rusty penknife, and exchange blood vows instead.” “No, no. One tetanus jab as a result of your poorly thought-out plans is more than enough. How you ever convinced me to do that, I’ll never understand.” Star Shine shivered at the mere memory of that awful day at the hospital, before daintily licking her own hoof a few times. “I suppose, if participating in this ridiculous ritual stops you from doing anything silly, it might be worth it. Come on, let’s get it over…” “You got it, sis!” Cozy Nights didn’t waste a second longer, and moved to vigorously shake Star Shine’s damp hoof until the elder sibling’s entire body seemed to vibrate. “Also, for what it’s worth, I’m pretty proud of you too! My own sister: Captain of the Wonderbolts one day! It’s gonna happen, mark my words!” “Well, thanks for the vote of confidence, but let’s not get too ahead of ourselves. That new mare in charge called Spitfire is a real ballbuster, so to even make the final selection I’m gonna have to be at my very best.” Star Shine smiled with gratitude at her sister, whilst trying to keep things in perspective. “All this ‘if you make one mistake you’ll be in a full-hoof-and-wing-cast-drinking-through-a-straw’ nonsense, plus you’ll never believe what her nickname was as a cadet. Or come to think of it, how she got it in the first place.” “Pardon? Oh c’mon, you can’t just tease me with that information, and then leave me hanging! You better tell me everything, or I’ll tell Mum you let me play on the construction site again!” Cozy Nights was not usually all that interested in her sister’s fledgling Wonderbolts career, but this secret sounded too good to miss. “H-Hey! That’s a lie! I would never… hey, come back here this instant!” A panicking Star Shine was not prepared for this random threat, or her sister’s subsequent rapid retreat. “That’s classified information! Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t… oh, why didn’t I keep my big mouth shut?” But even though both siblings made a big play of being rivals, both loved each other very much, and the breakneck chase to the docks was undertaken with plenty of laughs and smiles along the way. “If either of us had known what lay just around the corner though, our mood may not have been so cheerful…” …………………………………… “So there you are!” Rainbow Dash gazed down at a motionless Pinkie Pie, disapproval written all over her face. “I should’ve known something was ahoof when Cheese Sandwich came out of the blue with Boneless to play his ‘Greatest Hits’! All my favourite jokes in a row, from the classic whoopee cushion to the rainbow-mouth cookie switcheroo skit. I fell for it, too! Well, never again. I’m not letting you out of my sight until this coronation is over.” “Can’t talk. Eaten too much. About to explode. Tell Gummy I love him. And will somepony please take the cakes out of the oven back at Sugarcube Corner, before the entire town burns down. Or even worse, the pastry is ruined.” A giant empty bag of popcorn lying by her side, a bloated Pinkie burped contentedly, before the pangs of indigestion returned to make her wince in anguish. “Serves you right for taking food without permission, and refusing to share. That’s Friendship Rule 101, in case you’d forgotten about that as well.” Twilight obviously thought the party pony had brought all her suffering on herself. “I would also like words with your coltfriend later. It sounds like he’s taught Rainbow some bad habits…” “Hey, what did I tell you back then? I was an innocent victim of a brilliant prankster: It was Cheese Sandwich playing the cookie trick on me that gave me the idea to try it out on all of Ponyville. I’m just too easily influenced, that’s my problem. Always eager to please…” Rainbow sighed with her head bowed down in ‘shame’. “That may be so, but you didn’t have to copy him! For example, if I jumped off a cliff, would you leap after me?” Twilight was not letting the blue pegasus off the hook that easily.  “Of course I would! You can fly, and so can I! Which reminds me…” An alert Rainbow Dash called Twilight out on her poor choice of words, before she turned to address Cozy Nights. “I don’t even know why I’m asking you this, since you bashed up my pal Spike earlier and brought that tiny terror Cozy Glow into the world. But this ‘Star Shine’ you mentioned…” “My beloved sister? What about her?” Cozy Nights spoke to her fellow pegasus, an unnatural grin decorating most of her face. “Well, as a key member of the Wonderbolts myself and a total fanatic of them to hoof, how come I’ve never heard of her? I mean, even if she never quite made the team, there would’ve at least been some record of her at headquarters… but as far as I know there’s nothing. Care to tell me why that might be, or are you as good a liar as your daughter…?” If Rainbow Dash’s harsh tone and even harsher glare bothered Cozy Nights, she did a very good job of hiding it. “Oh, that’s simple! All of her time with the Wonderbolts was expunged from history, never to be spoken of again under punishment of death. Or, maybe a small fine. I always get the two mixed up, silly me!” “What?!” Yet again, the whole backstage area reacted as one, apart from Pinkie (still in a caramel-coma)... ...And a now-standing Ocean Glow, who wore the expression of a world-weary stallion far older than he actually was. “I think that statement requires some context, my love. If you permit me to explain, I’ll try my best. I’d just landed at Manehattan, and I was nervously waiting for my father to return with Gold Digger after he’d told her what ‘dreadful’ things I’d done aboard. That’s my mother by the way… and in case you were wondering, no she doesn’t ‘dig gold’ for a living…”