//------------------------------// // Make Your Mark: The Traditional Unicorn Sleep-Over // Story: The Second Dream // by totallynotabrony //------------------------------// It had been a heck of a day. We’d interrogated Misty at the hospital, and become certain she was working for someone. Sunny had opened an earth pony magic practice area on the grounds of the Brighthouse, with Hitch there to officiate the ribbon-cutting with giant scissors and all, but someone (cough Sunny cough) didn’t do an environmental survey beforehand, which led to a critter stampede.  It had been all the rest of us could do to round them all up. In the midst of all that, an errant magic spark from Sparky the adopted dragon resulted in Hitch and I swapping cutie marks, and also which one of us was carrying our lovechild. So here I was, sweaty, covered in fur and dirt, and also now pregnant, being wheeled into the hospital because this kind of thing really probably should have some professional consultation. Hitch was at my side, hurrying along beside the gurney, hobbling on two legs because one hoof was holding mine, and the other was still carrying the huge ceremonial scissors he’d apparently forgotten to put down in the shuffle. “Hey, um,” I began.  “What does a contraction feel like?” “I don’t know,” he said, “I’ve never had one.” A moment passed. “Oh,” I said.  I tilted my head back to look at the nurse pushing the gurney, upside down because of my position.  “Hey, maybe add labor to the list of ailments.” Hitch stumbled as if he was going to faint, but kept it together. The nurse wheeled me into a room and set the brakes on the gurney.  “The doctor will be in shortly.” I got another probable contraction.  Wow, I guess we were doing this. Hitch leaned over the bed, gently touching my belly.  “Are you okay?” “I mean, I’m as okay as I’ve been in the last hour.  Maybe not as okay as I’ve been overall today, but we’re trending back up.  As for the future…”  I glanced down at myself.  “I guess we’ll see.” There was another kick in my underparts which made me wince more than the contractions. “I love you,” Hitch said suddenly. I appreciated that, though did slightly wonder what prompted it.  “I love you too.” There was a polite cough from behind the curtain that separated the room.  “Um,” said Misty’s voice, “That’s great, nice to hear that, I guess we’re roomies.” Hitch pulled the curtain back, but that didn’t make it any less awkward. “So you two are actually together after all,” she said.  “You even have a baby.”  Though, even as she said it, her face suddenly frowned in confusion as if she wasn’t sure who had been carrying it that morning. “This could be anybody’s baby,” I said.  “You don’t even know what kind of love we’re talking about.  Ever heard of platonic coworker love?” “No.” “Do you have a job, Misty?” Hitch asked, I thought cleverly segueing back into interrogation to distract from the previous topic. “Er-” From down the hall, we all heard Izzy’s voice.  I couldn’t make out the words, but nobody else talked that annoying, even if it was just tone. Hitch slid the curtain back across Misty’s bed just as Izzy, along with Sunny, Pipp, and Zipp, burst into the room. “SENTRA YOU’RE PREGGERS!?” Izzy shouted. “We brought gifts,” Sunny said. “We’re going to film it,” said Pipp, raising her phone. “We’re not going to film it,” corrected Zipp, pushing the phone down again.  Undeterred, Pipp raised another phone with her other hoof and the two of them had a brief wrestling match. “You sure have a lot of phones,” I observed after I’d seen the third or fourth one go by in the tussle.   “Oh, I’ve got phones for days,” Pipp said, even though Zipp was so far doing a pretty good job pinning her. I mean, I had two phones myself, but her amount seemed a little excessive.  Not that it really surprised me about Pipp. “We had been planning a traditional unicorn sleepover at the Brighthouse, but when your thing happened, we decided to hold it here,” Izzy said, voiced toned down but still excited.  “Are you surprised?” “Though it’s down on the list compared to the rest of my day, yes,” I replied.  I also cautioned, “You’re going to have to ask the hospital staff about this, though.  I’m not sure they’re keen on hosting sleepovers in patient rooms, particularly in the middle of maternity.” “But I’ll finally get to find out where babies come from!” Yeah, the doctor shut that one down when she came in.  I was relieved; I had been worried she was actually going to allow shenanigans to continue. But- “You can stay until before the delivery.  It might take up to twenty four hours,” she said. “All nighter!” Izzy cheered. I prayed for the contractions to come faster. On the surface of it, the party was not terrible.  I didn’t figure I should be eating much, though, and I definitely shouldn’t be moving around much, not to mention the cramps every few minutes.  At least, despite being the physical centerpiece of the room, I managed to not be the center of the event, and managed to divide my time and conversation. Zipp was still curious why Hitch and I had declined to get magically swapped back, and were still wearing each other’s cutie marks.  I made up something about not knowing how it was going to affect the baby, which was at least partially true. It was a little harder to brush off her questions about “Why didn’t I look pregnant until today,” “That sure was a fast pregnancy,” and “Wow Hitch, you sure lost a lot of weight recently.” In an effort to avoid some of her questions, I instead swung my conversation to Pipp, trying to low-key figure out how many phones she actually had. “Funny story, I don’t actually know,” she said.  “I just keep buying them.” I had one phone for official Martial Law business and one phone for Sentra everything else business.  Though I was considering getting a third to be a dedicated platform for shitposting and pirating like it’s 1699. Oh no, I was nearly getting as bad as Pipp.  At any rate, I probably didn’t even need two phones.  It wasn’t like anyone was going to figure out my secret identity, because I was doing literally nothing else to hide it. Though, good question which was the secret one. At least as part of the sleepover, I did manage some sleep, even wincing through the increasing contractions.  Though, things seemed to be reaching a crescendo late that night and I awoke dripping in sweat and clenching my jaw. “Oh yeah, you’re just about ready,” said the doctor’s voice. The room was dark, but there was a light from between my legs, glowing from under the blanket that covered me. “Um,” I said, slightly weirded out.  “Should I ask everyone to leave?” She lifted her head.  “Yep, just about time.” Hitch was allowed to stay, being a spouse.  Everyone else said words of encouragement, but were pushed out of the room.  A few nurses came in. The doctor put on gloves, snapping them tight.  She seemed really cheerful.  Maybe that was just in contrast to me, who was still building up on the pain scale. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve done a lot of dumb things in my life that resulted in getting hurt, but those were usually temporary incidents.  Lying here for the last few hours with a bowling ball trying to come out of my nethers had not been fun in the slightest. Hitch had not stopped holding my hoof, though, and I was reminded that this was still probably a lot better than if it happened to him.  There is satisfaction in knowingly taking one for the team. “Okay, so push with the contractions,” said the doctor, squatting before me again. “You play baseball?” I asked. “I’m on the office softball team,” she replied.   “Catcher?” “Of course.” That was the last coherent conversation in the room for several minutes.  Though I wish I could have had something to distract me, I probably wouldn’t have been able to participate in the whole speaking and listening thing. But eventually, with one last gasping push, I did give birth and limply collapsed back onto the bed. “Time?” the doctor asked. The clock was in my field of view, which was good because I wasn’t really interested in moving right then.  The nearest nurse looked up.  “Uh…stroke of midnight.  Which day do I write down?”   Everyone else seemed extremely interested in the baby, down where I couldn't move my head enough to see.  Understandable, but I didn’t know why they were all frowning. “Well, that’s…definitely a baby,” said the doctor.  She shook her head.  “We’ll deal with this later.”  She turned to Hitch.  “Papa, do you want to cut the cord?” “Oh, um, sure,” he said. Hitch looked a little worse for wear, even though he hadn’t been the one giving birth.  Distracted.  Frazzled.  Understandable, I thought, though I would have expected some overjoyed happiness in there somewhere. He was so distracted, in fact, that he didn’t notice a pair of offered forceps and instead picked up the huge ceremonial scissors he had carried all the way to the hospital room. Snip. “Speech,” I was able to whisper. Put on the spot, Hitch stumbled over his words.  “I, uh…now pronounce this vagina open!”