//------------------------------//
// 44-Protective Father 
// Story: The Life of a Non-Brony 
// by BronyWriter 
//------------------------------//

"Mail call. looks like it's from Comet."

I look up from the book I'd been reading to see Cheerilee walk into the room with a stack of letters in her mouth. She places them on the side table next to my chair, and I see that the top one is indeed from Comet. I take if off of the table and start opening it. 

"Well, her last few said that she was doing pretty well, so hopefully she's keeping that trend up," I say. "Hopefully it's not 'hey, Mom and Dad, I started partying and now I'm off the dean's list and can I have a bunch of money?"

Cheerilee scoffs and sits down next to me. "That's rather unlikely," she replies.

"Oh, without a doubt," I say as I begin unfolding the letter. "Besides, we would have probably heard about it long before a week before break."

"Maybe. In any case, what does it say?"

"Alright, let's see."

Dear Mom and Dad. things are going well here.

"Told you," Cheerilee says.

"Yeah, yeah," I reply with a wave of my hand. "Anyway..." 

I'm planning on coming to Ponyville for the break, so don't rent out my room and sell all of my stuff before then.

I click my tongue. "Darn. I was planning to do that for some extra cash."

Cheerilee scoffs. "As if we'd need it. Keep going."

I'll get all of my homework and other projects done before then, so we won't have to worry about me needing to take some of the week to get all of that finished. My schedule will be free and clear when I'm down there. I'm excited to see you three again. 

I've managed to talk to Tea Leaf, and I managed to switch rooms, so I'm actually roommates with Night Blade. That was about two weeks ago, and I haven't once woken up to see her in bed with another pony asking if I'm sure I don't want to join in this time, or waking up to hear her puking in the bathroom. It's been pretty great.

If it's alright with you, I'd like to bring somepony down with me to stay with us. In the past several months, I've started... seeing somepony. His name is Night Shadow, but he's an albino bat pony, so everypony just calls him Blizzard, which he doesn't mind at all. We've been dating here for a few months now, and he's a really great guy. Can't wait to have you two meet him. We met at the bat pony club, which has also been really great. It's nice to find a place where I feel like I belong; truly belong. I get the feeling that a lot of the other ponies in the club feel the same way. In any case, Blizzard said that he'd like to come down and meet you guys during break. I think you'll like him. I know I do.

Love, 

Comet

I reread the letter a few times to myself. Hm. Comet has a coltfriend. Interesting. I hand the letter to Cheerilee, who reads it herself. After a few moments, she grunts and puts it on the table. 

"Well, she was always going to have a special somepony at some point. I don't think I'm some old mare pining for grandfoals, but I don't want Comet to be alone forever."

"No, no, of course not," I say. "And since she didn't find one in high school, college isn't too much of a stretch, especially since this is really the first time she's interacted with other bat ponies. Don't know if she's going to marry the first pony she starts dating."

Cheerilee shoots me a sly smile. "You did."

I scoff and roll my eyes. "Different circumstances, and even fourteen years later it's still a bit weird. In any case, it'll be interesting to meet him. I'll be curious to see if he's a confident pony that is looking forward to meeting us, or if he's freaking out. 

Cheerilee shrugs. "Guess we'll find out in a few weeks here. We should do something. The break lines up with Comet's, so things are pretty open."

"Probably not going to be able to go somewhere, unless we can all agree on something beforehand," I say. "I don't have any problem bringing..." I glanced at the letter again, "Blizzard with us to some vacation spot, but it seems like he'll be spending the week with us, and it might be awkward to just get him his own hotel room. We'd either have to get a room for all four of us, which would be awkward, or some combination between two rooms." I let out an amused scoff. "I'm not having him and Comet in a room by themselves, and either of us would be weird."

"True, but at the same time, they can get up to whatever shenanigans they want to in their college," Cheerilee points out. 

"Yeah, yeah, but I'm not going to be lying in a hotel wondering if my daughter and a colt I just met are getting up to hanky-panky in the next room," I reply. "Comet's a good kid, but she's also at the age of raging hormones, and she might not care that we're in the next room if things get heated enough."

Cheerilee rolls her eyes and bumps my side. "You're overthinking it. Does that sound like Comet?"

I shrug. "Dunno. She's never dated anyone before."

"Call me silly, but I can't see her doing something like that," Cheerilee says. "Either way, we'll find out more when we actually meet this guy in a few weeks. You sure you're not going to be papa wolf 'if you hurt my daughter, you won't be able to fly fast enough to get away from me' are you?"

"Does that sound like me? The last person I hurt because you were in danger was a magic draining centaur, and he wasn't even after the two of you specifically at that point." I shrug. "I mean, he would have tried to get you two at some point, but that's neither here nor there. Between that and Chrysalis, meeting Comet's first boyfriend is small potatoes."

Cheerilee sighs and facehooves. "I do wonder what the next thing is going to be with you, TD. You want a quiet life in Ponyville, as if there's such a thing, and you have to fight a changeling queen out for revenge, and a magic eating monster that escaped from Tartarus. What's next?"

"Eugh, hopefully nothing," I groan, rubbing my temples. "I'm looking forward to something lower stakes for once."


*  *  *  *


"So your dad isn't going to chase me out of the house with a knife if he doesn't like me, right?"

I roll my eyes and rub Blizzard's shoulder. "He wouldn't do that. He may be my dad, but he's got a good head on his shoulders." I shrug. "Now, if it turned out that you're actually an evil spirit that's trying to do something bad to me, all bets are off at that point."

"So far I haven't found any kind of evil artifact or been possessed by some kind of spirit, nor am I a demon in disguise, so I think I'm pretty good on that front," Blizzard says. 

"Well good," I reply. "It would be a worse shock for me than for him, but given what he did to Chrysalis, you probably wouldn't have much time to run."

He flinches back. "Ugh. Yeah. I really, really hope I don't mess up enough that he feels he has to go that far."

I scoff and roll my eyes. "Oh, yes, I'm sure he'd do something like that if you said the wrong thing." I lean over and nuzzle his neck. "You're being silly. He's a good guy, and he'll like you. Promise."

"If you say so."

"I do say so. Either way, I suppose we'll find out in a few seconds here." I look out the window as the train screeches to a halt. I smile when I see that Mom and Dad are already waiting for me. The spot me through the train window, and we smile and wave at each other.

"Well, here we go," Blizzard says as we stand up. He looks uncomfortable. He shouldn't. I like him, and Mom and Dad will, too. 

I move faster than Blizzard, and he follows behind me. Seriously, he shouldn't be scared of my dad. Though, I will admit that it's pretty cute. The two of us get our luggage, then meet Mom and Dad. 

"Hey, Comet!" Mom says, pulling me into a hug. "How was the trip?"

"Uneventful," I reply. "Super glad that I don't have any homework this week."

"Better than when I went to college," Dad says, ruffling my mane. "Classes going well?"

I nod and pat my mane back down. "Straight As so far. Nothing too hard yet. We'll see how finals go in a bit here."

"Good," Mom says before turning to my coltfriend. "And this is Blizzard?"

He's so cute when he blushes. He steps up to Mom and clears his throat before shaking Mom's hoof. "Uh, yes. Ma'am. Mrs. Powell. Uh, that's me. Blizzard. Yes."

Mom smirks and glances over to me. "He's a charmer, I see. Very polite."

Blizzard forces a weak smile on his face, then turns to Dad and shakes his hand. "Nice to meet you, Mr. Powell. Sir. Uh, you have a very beautiful daughter that... uh... Comet is a great mare and..." He gulps. "Nice to meet you."

I can tell by the way that Dad is biting his lip that he's about to burst out laughing, but he holds it together. "It's nice to meet you as well, Blizzard. Sir."

I snort and shake my head as I toss my suitcase over my back. "You got everything, Bliz?"

"Yeah, I think so." He pats his suitcase before tossing it on his own back. "I'm ready."

"Sounds good," Dad says before taking both of our suitcases. Sheesh. Whatever. We walk through Ponyville just catching up on stuff. I say hi to anypony I know that we pass by. It reminds me how long it's been since I was here. Not too long, but long enough that it feels like forever ago. Blizzard isn't saying anything other than general greetings whenever ponies say hi to him.

We make it back to the house and Dad walks in first to put our suitcases down next to the front door. "Mr. Blizzard, welcome to Casa de Powell, or as we call it, Manderley. 

"Uh... thank you," Blizzard says, looking around with wide-eyed wonder. I rolled my eyes at him. Guess he hadn't been in a house this big before. He told me that bat ponies tend to be a bit... simpler with their possessions and dwellings, so this had to be insane for him. 

"Alright, I don't know about any of you, but I'm starving," Dad says, walking into the kitchen and opening up the cabinets. "Pizza sound good to you?"

"Oh, uh... yes, Mr. Powell. Thank you," Blizzard says.

"Make sure you have one with meat on it!" I call out. Once I tried it, I found out that pizza just wasn't the same thing without it. Blizzard is looking at me like I've lost my mind, but I just shrugged. "Don't knock it 'till you try it."

"That's... I don't know about that."

I scoff and swat him with my tail. "Wuss. You not going to be brave for your marefriend? It's not going to kill you."

"Well..." He rubs the back of his neck and bobs his head. "I suppose that I could at least try it."

"Trust me, you'll love it. For now, let's relax and let Mom and Dad handle dinner." I lead him over to the family room where we keep our collection of movies. "Let's watch something. Anything in particular look good to you?"

He tilts his head and starts reading the titles. "Hm. I've never seen most of these. A Nightmare on Elm Street? Nightmare Night? Wolf Creek?" 

I perk up at that last one. "Ooh, that one is the best! Super scary. You a horror fan, too?"

He takes the movie off of the shelf and bobs his head. "I've been known to dabble. I know there have been a lot of movies that have come out based on your dad's stories, but we don't have a player in our house, so my opportunities are limited to theaters."

"Welp, we're going to fix that," I say. I set the movie up and hop onto the couch, patting the seat next to me. Blizzard sat down, and I leaned my head on his shoulder. "Don't worry. I'm here if you get too scared."

He snorts and rolls his eyes. "Oh, sure. I really appreciate it."

We only make it about an hour through the film before Mom and Dad finish dinner. One meat pizza, and one wussy cheese pizza. I cut out a slice of the meat pizza and put the plate in front of Blizzard. He grimaces and gives me an uncomfortable look.

"Must I?"

"I insist."

"Do you reeealy insist?"

I grin and push the plate closer. "I insist.

He sighs. "Well, if you insist."

"He doesn't have to if he doesn't want to, Comet," Mom says.

"No no, she insisted." Blizzard picks up the slice of pizza loaded with beef and chicken and takes a not half bad bite. He flinches as he first chews, but after a few moments, he nods his head. "Huh. Not bad. Not bad at all, actually."

"Just make sure you cook it properly whenever you make it. Learned that the hard way the first time."

I shoot a glare at Oswald, who gives me a smug look. Jerk.

The rest of dinner is fairly uneventful. We eat our pizza and chat about various light topics. Bliz is fairly quiet, but still chimes in whenever he's asked a question. It's nice to see that he's getting along fairly well with Mom and Dad. I can see that some of the tension in his shoulders has relaxed. It's nice. I didn't expect Mom and Dad to dislike Blizzard, but that still doesn't mean that it's not nice actually seeing it in front of me. 

The five of us manage to eat all of the pizza, and Mom digs in the freezer to get some ice cream for dessert. Dad joins us on the couch so that we can finish the movie, and Mom arrives with several bowls of ice cream on a tray a few minutes later. Blizzard still isn't say all that much, but that's okay. All things considered, tonight has been a good night. 


*  *  *  *


I wake up early in the guest bedroom, which is kind of annoying. Mr. and Mrs. Powell insisted that Comet and I have separate rooms for the duration of my stay here. I suppose I can see why they'd do that, but it's not like Comet and I are going to do anything while I'm in their house! We did try to sneak me staying in her room, but Mrs. Powell knew what we were doing, and called out for us to sleep in separate beds. Oh well. 

I glance at the clock in the room and grimace when I see that it's seven-thirty. Living in a largely diurnal society, I didn't get to partake in my nocturnal tendencies as much as I'd like. I'd fix that once I graduated from college. Comet, too, from what she was telling me. 

Either way, I was awake now, and nothing was going to change that. I hopped out of bed and stretched out. Ah, my back cracked nicely. After a quick shower I headed on down to see if breakfast was being made by anyone, but all I saw was Mr. Powell sitting at his chair reading a book. He looked up when he saw me come down and smiled, putting his book down on the nearby coffee table.

"Ah, just the stallion I wanted to see."

No, calm down, Blizzard. He likes you. He's not going to be a crazy girlfriend's dad. 

I forced a smile on my face. "H-hello, Mr. Powell."

"I was thinking that you and I could have breakfast together. You know, man-to-stallion kind of thing. There's this great bakery called Sugarcube Corner not too far from here. It's Comet's favorite, if you want to keep that in the back of your mind."

Uh... why do I get the feeling that he's not making this optional? This is terrible. I force a smile on my face and nod. "Er... yeah. Okay. Let's do that."

"Fantastic. Let's do it."

Mr. Powell and I walk in silence toward Sugarcube Corner. The townsfolk are setting up their stalls in the town market for the day, and most of them smile and wave at Mr. Powell. 

"They, uh, all seem to know you," I said.

Oh. Oh good going. That's certainly a line that will start a riveting conversation. Relax, Blizzard. In and out."

"Well, I have lived here for eighteen years, so it's only natural that they'd know me." He looked down at me and smirked. "I'm not a hermit."

"I wasn't saying that you were, Mr. Powell, I was just... everypony was waving at you and I thought that it was nice and... so yeah."

He snorts and shakes his head. "I'm not currently armed."

"W-well I know that, Mr. Powell." I force a smile on my face. 

"As far as you know."

My smile instantly drops. 

Sugarcube Corner isn't that hard to spot, being the only building in town decorated like a giant gingerbread house. Mr. Powell reaches the front door before I do, and opens it to let me inside first. The instant I enter, I'm assaulted with the smell of... sugar. I might get diabetes just standing inside for ten minutes. Everything I can see in the display case looks good, though.

We walk up to the counter where a pink pony with the occasional gray hair in her mane is working the register. "Heya, TD! How are you doing today?"

"Doing just fine, Pinkie. Just here for some breakfast with Blizzard here."

Somehow Pinkie's smile gets even wider, and I wonder if she's going to jump over the counter to tackle me. "Ooh, a new pony! How long have you been in Ponyville?! Did you get here yesterday or have you been hiding from one of my parties?! Are you here to see someone or did you just move in?! Are--"

"Alright, Pinkie, let's not overwhelm him more than usual," Mr. Powell says with a smirk. "This here is Blizzard. He's Comet's coltfriend from college, and they're spending break down here. 

Pinkie gasps with such force and duration that I'm beginning to wonder if she's going to suck all of the oxygen out of the room. "COLTFRIEND?! COMET HAS A COLTFRIEND?!"

"Well, now Comet knows where we are," I mutter to myself."

"NOW WE HAVE TO THROW YOU TWO A PARTY! WHEN DO YOU GO BACK TO--"

"Pinkie, let's just start with breakfast," Mr. Powell says. "How about we start with a chocolate chip muffin and a cup of coffee cream and sugar for me, and for our guest here..." He turns and motions to the menu board. "Get what you'd like. My treat."

"Oh, thank you." I peer up at the board, then the display case. "Cherry danish and peach shake?" I glance over at Mr. Powell to see if that's okay, and he nods before pulling the needed bits out of his bag. 

"Alrighty! Coming right up!"

With that out of the way, Mr. Powell and I find a table. It's close to the door, which is good in case I need to bolt. I shouldn't have to, but I'm with my marefriend's father. Anything can happen. Hopefully this is just a short little breakfast and I can get back to Comet. Ugh. She is the braver one, isn't she?"

"So, Blizzard," Mr. Powell begins, tapping his finger on the table. "You seem tense."

"Tense? Me?" I scoff and shake my head. "No I'm not tense why would you think I'm tense I'm just sitting here and waiting for my breakfast and--"

He chuckles and shakes his head. "Don't worry. I'm just here to get to know you a little bit better, that's all."

"Yeah. Right. Sorry, it's just that it's always nerve wracking to have a one-on-one conversation like this."

"I get that," Mr. Powell replies. "Don't think I haven't gone through something similar. Did Comet ever tell you how I met Cheerilee's parents?" I shook my head. "Well, she was actually estranged from them at the time, and we were getting married, so I wanted to see if we couldn't patch things up before the wedding. So not only did I not know too much about the guy, but I had no idea how him and his wife would react to seeing Cheerilee again. Thankfully it worked out, but I had no idea if it would."

"That must have been a bit rough."

"It was," he says with a nod. "So I've been on your end of things. Relax. Like I said, I'm just here to get to know you a little bit better."

"So you're not here to tell me that if I hurt your little girl you'll hunt me to the ends of Equestria?"

He rolls his eyes at that one. "Look, when I first started dating Cheerilee, ponies around here were pretty happy. They liked it. However, I did get some of that kind of thing, at the party celebrating it, actually. A few ponies came up to me and told me the same thing. I kind of just let it slide back then because I was a much younger TD, but nowadays I wouldn't have just taken it. I would have definitely called them out on it. So I'm definitely not going to do it to you. Like I said: this is a get to know thing."

Well that took some of the stress off of me. I just had to answer some questions about myself? That's better. Still...

"So you're not going to chase me to the ends of Equestria. I mean, I've read your book, and Comet has told me the stories..."

He rolls his eyes again. "Look, Comet is smart. I have no issue saying that Comet is much smarter than I am, and I'm no dummy. Cheerilee would probably say the same thing. The only two times I've had to get violent were when her biological parents tried to kidnap her, and when an evil monster kidnapped her to get to me. Would you do either of those things?"

"N-no."

"Well then what are you nervous about? Like I said, Comet is smart. If things didn't work out, she'd handle it like a mature mare. So why bother asking questions like that? Would you do anything?"

"I vigorously shook my head. "No! No! Never!"

"Then let's just have some pastries and get to know each other better. Where are you from?"

"Vanhoover," I reply, more of the tension fading away. "My parents are doctors, and we live in a community that is largely populated by bat ponies. Lived their my whole life until going to college. Going into anesthesia. I don't know if Comet told you that. I don't know what Comet told you at all."

"She might have mentioned that," Mr. Powell says, leaning back in his chair. "She's really thrilled with you for teaching her things about bat pony culture. It makes her feel like less of an outsider, so I must thank you for that. It's really helped."

"Well it's not just me. She has a bat pony for a roommate, and we have a bat pony club every week. She's picked up a lot more knowledge than what I've provided."

"Still..." He tilts his head. "Appreciate it."

And it just goes on like that for a while. Eventually Pinkie brings our breakfast order over, and... not gonna lie, I can see why Comet thinks this place is the best. This might be my new standard for sugary food, too. Maybe Comet and I should move to Ponyville after college just so we have access to this place all of the time.

Eventually breakfast ends, and the two of us head back to the house. It's only been a few hours since we've been gone, so Comet might not even be up yet. She sleeps in late when she can which... isn't very often, so she takes the opportunity whenever it arises. 

However, Comet is up and about having breakfast with Mrs. Powell when we get back. Comet smiles when she sees me come in, and motions for me to sit next to her at the table. 

"So, how was Sugarcube Corner?"

I blink in surprise. "How did you know we were there?"

"Well, it's the only decent place to go for breakfast," Comet responds. "Plus, we heard Pinkie Pie from here. Something about how she has to throw us a party?"

I chuckle and take my place at the table. "Something like that."