//------------------------------// // Junior Patty // Story: Order Up! // by Sparkler //------------------------------// It had been a pleasant day for a childbirth, bright and cool. In the old earth pony way - at home, surrounded by family - Cinnamon had whelped a beautiful little filly foal, still amazed at feeling so wonderful and horrible at once. Her sister, Nutmeg, gently nuzzled the insecure newborn filly, guiding her to her mother's muzzle while making a proud proclamation: "It's a girl." "And a beautiful one, at that," the little filly's father beamed. Skystriker could already see the golden brown of his fur in the young filly's dawny fur, and the pale yellow mane and tail seemed somewhere between his bright gold and his wife's dull white. "She's beautiful!" "Hello," the worn Cinnamon nickered, the sight of her daughter giving her strength she couldn't have imagined she would have had ten minutes ago. As the filly huddled close to her mother, Nutmeg crooned, "What are you naming her?" Her parents locked eyes, and stammered a moment. "She's..." The golden stallion also stammered, fumbling for a word that wasn't there. "Her name?" They had been married long enough that they didn't need to speak their mistake. Assuming their child would be a young colt, they had never thought to think of a name for a young filly. And neither of them thought Stormbolt, the name of her famous grandfather, would be a suitable name for a mare. "Erm... I was thinking of naming a filly for her grandmother, Patience." Cinnamon preened over her daughter, nuzzling the newborn earth pony behind the ears. "And I was thinking she'd take after my aunt - you know, the sculptor? Patina." They looked at each other... and again shared a grin. After so many years together, their sense of humor was shared, too. "You were going to call her 'Patty'..." "... and I was going to call her 'Patty.'" Skystriker smiled, and took his place at his wife's side, resting his muzzle over hers to look at his new daughter. "Then... it's decided. We want to name her 'Patty' twice... and so, that's how we'll name her. Patina Patience; or... Double Patty." Nutmeg shook her head, with a soft laugh at her sister. "You're both silly." There was a quiet pause, as she fiddled with paperwork. "... but I have to admit - it's unique, and kind of pretty." Taking a quill with a careful lilt to her muzzle, the mare midwife wrote on the birth certificate: "Patina Patience (Double Patty)." Of course, in giving their child that name, Cinnamon and Skystriker had made a mistake. An innocent mistake, but not without consequence. In Equestria, as in so many places, words have power, and names especially so. Their choice would set the course for their child's life... She was still a year too young for school, but the foal Double Patty had already learned everything she would learn in kindergarten: reading, numbers, colors, even writing her name and address. She had to, because she needed to know all this to properly enjoy her one true love: Cookbooks. Every cookbook the little filly read was like a treasure trove. Every picture depicted new dishes, colorful and unique and interesting, and described the origins of the dishes. The best cookbooks weren't just recipes - they were portals into faraway lands and the lives of people completely unlike her, like griffins and buffalo and zebras. And best of all, it was treasure she could MAKE! She held measuring cups and cut vegetables more often than she played with her doll (although Mister Schnarfle sometimes gave her ideas or held her cookbook open for her). Every recipe was better than a spell, because while her unicorn friends would get frustrated as their incantation sent awry (or just didn't go at all), Double Patty would have made something delicious. She started simply, like any cook; boiling noodles and cutting vegetables into salads. (One particularly painful cut just above the hoof quickly taught Patty to respect knives - and while that was still healing, she believed her parents when they told her that fire would hurt worse.) But she experimented and explored the kitchen with the enthusiasm of a foal, and Cinnamon encouraged the filly to substitute ingredients to try to improve dishes. Some of her experiments, like her pecan lasagna or her dessert salad, were so successful that her parent's friends would ask her for the recipe. (Others, like the time she tried to sweeten her morning oatmeal by adding ketchup, weren't so successful. Mister Schnarfle invariably was the one who gave her the bad ideas.) Where most ponies her age were obsessed with sweet above all, Patty loved to explore flavors: bitter chocolate, salty soy, savory alfredo, rich guacamole, spicy chili and zesty lemonade. Soon, she was beginning to cook a meal a day - her mom still made the best dinners, but Patty was allowed to make lunch as long as she agreed to do the dishes. She didn't understand why her parents looked at each other with disbelieving pride when she made that offer, but she felt proud for wrangling that concession out of them. Cooking from an early age made Double Patty a a bit smug for it - not simply the absolute sureness only a five-year-old could have, but she had learned enough to explain just why she was right. She had learned more about the history and culture of Equestria through its varied cuisine than some adults had learned in their lifetime. And her sire told her she was almost as good a cook as her dam. "Fatty! Fatty-fatty! DOUBLE fatty!" Double Patty had gained a lot of weight early on; coddled by well-to-do parents and routinely completing the results of her own experiments (Skystriker would not stand for Double Patty wasting food, no matter what), the calories added up into pounds of extra padding. Not even a filly's normal rambunctious energy held sway; she had learned to read early, and the only hard work the young pony knew was stuffing her saddlebags at the library. Even on her first day of school, everyone could see that she was heavier than any other pony her age and height. And the colts in her class were the first to comment on the matter. As the classroom slowly filled, the banter before the teacher arrived was the same as usual. Today, the first to speak up was a blue and purple filly - unusual. "Double Patty's so fat, she sat on a book and chapters popped out!" Grinning, another colt - Marbles, was that his name? Double Patty didn't recall - grinned and spun in his desk. "Double Patty's so fat, she turned the merry-go-round into a see-saw!" One of the taller fillies in class, Skyreach, laughed at both of her classmates. "Double Patty's so fat, at dinner she asks for seconds first!" The young golden filly was still managing to hold back tears - just barely - when her teacher, Golden Rule, called the class to attention. Her cutie mark was a ruler, and the black-and-silver unicorn wielded a near-identical ruler in the dark purple grip of her magic, wielding it at attention like a rapier. "Now, class - quiet down. It's time for everypony to get started." With only a glance, the teacher lifted up the rolebook to her face; there was nothing like being a schoolteacher to give a unicorn practice in juggling multiple objects with their magic. With each name, the ruler dipped in the air to mark a beat. "Alabaster!" A white earth pony colt waved his hoof. "Bass!" A dark silver pegasus filly waved frantically, making some in the class giggle. "Bruno!" A pastel green colt waved his hoof, while stifling a laugh with the other. He knew what was coming. "Double Patty!" Double Patty dreaded having her name called - most of her classmates had come into the habit of whispering her nickname in the same cadence their teacher used. It never quite rose to the older mare's attention, but the young filly never failed to hear the entire classroom rising in quiet unison against her. She sighed, and squeaked in response to her teacher, trying not to look at the way some of her youngest classmates bloated their cheeks and mimed waddling. Just six hours left in the day. After class, Double Patty was tired. Not simply from trying to remember the history of the Equestrian political system; not just from trying to parse how to balance algebraic equations; not only from trying to remember the obtuse rules for how the color wheel worked. Hours of trying to not notice various jokes had worn on her heavily. Like when Tick Tock bloated his cheeks and looked cross-eyed to her, or how Maple Leaf tried to pull out her chair from under her. (Frankly, she was afraid of what would happen once Trickster got his cutie mark.) Her saddlebags were loaded - all the normal books and tools, plus the gifted books, plus library books, plus one or two fashion magazines (so pink you could almost read by the glow of their covers). All together, her saddlebags weighed almost two stone, and the filly stretched out low to get underneath where they sat on the floor. It took a proper heave to get her bags up in the air, but it was a familiar burden. From school, it was a fairly long trot - both her parents preferred lots of room to run in, and so lived on the outskirts of Ponyville - but Double Patty was in no rush. Her day's plan involved some roasted eggplant, a lot of reading, and a few naps; she was going to be far too busy to study, or worry about mean classmates. Before she could make it off of school grounds, though, she heard a furtive whisper. Double Patty looked over her shoulder to see what the noise was, and saw a pegasus waving at her. Of course, she recognized the pegasus - Evergreen was a year older but was one of the most popular fillies in school. She wore her green coat and three-tone green mane like a bride would wear her gown; she was tall and regal and popular and beautiful. And she was waving a hoof, drawing it backwards towards herself to say "come here" from across the courtyard. The golden filly didn't question it - after all, Evergreen was popular because she was so nice. She knew that much about her upperclassman. "We've been expecting you," the unicorn smiled softly, leading Patty just beyond the corner. She kept her voice down, as if sharing a secret. The earth pony tilted her head. "We? Who is we?" "We... our inner circle. All of us girls who... well. Have higher values than most of those around us. We think you're just about ready to join in our group." Evergreen smiled, and Patty couldn't help but feel as if Princess Celestia herself were smiling upon her. Patty's flush immediately took over her face. "But... Why me?" The older pegasus gave a small smile. "It's what we see in you. What more could there be?" That smile was too winning, and this time, when the pegasus tilted to turn, Double Patty immediately followed. The walk wasn't far, but it was twisty, as the two avoided any teachers, the green pegasus keeping to her hooves and making sure her new initiate was staying close. It eventually led to the far side of the sports courts, where Evergreen reached into her own (stylishly small and oh so cute!) saddlebags and grabbed a blindfold. "For this last step, I need you to not know the path - at least, until we formally initiate you." With that winsome smile, Evergreen held her hoof out. "Will you trust me?" Double Patty looked at the blindfold, then back up to Evergreen. That smile, the way her eyes searched Patty's hopefully, sealed it. Somehow, Patty just knew things were turning around for her - she didn't know this circle at all, but she resolved to try her hardest and get along. Proper manners for proper mares, and all that! Standing up as straight as she could under the weight of her load, Patty took the green blindfold and slipped it over her eyes. "I will. I'll trust you, Evergreen." Patty's legs burnt like they had been moving for miles, although it could only have been a few minutes at most. Evergreen was taking careful steps so the blindfolded mare could follow, and the only sound was the distinctive clip-clop of hooves as Patty followed the sound. She vaguely understood that they were doing a lap around the pool enclosure, but she wasn't sure what hallways they were walking down. "Almost there..." The creak of a door being nudged open preceeded quiet voices from up ahead. She barely recognized Maple Leaf's bell of a voice, but the rest of the voices were too low and hushed for the earth pony to understand. The clops came to a halt, replaced by a shuffling to the side. "Just a little forwards - oh, and pick up your hooves!" Double Patty lifted her hooves just in time, to catch a step she hadn't noticed. It gave under her weight, but held. "Alright - stand very still on that platform, dear. And don't take the blindfold off yet." Doing her best to emulate the poses in her fashion magazines, Double Patty held her head high, keeping her muzzle and spine in line, flanks straight, forehooves set close together for demureness and hindhooves set slightly spaced to indicate openness. If she hadn't had a blindfold on, she would have been doing her best to wear "blinders", staring straight ahead. The voices seemed to crowd in on her, and became quiet. She knew she was surrounded, but she couldn't tell what they were doing or what they were talking about. But suddenly, there was a shout to the mare's right - "EIGHT! Eight and a HALF stone!" The silence shattered into a million pieces as Patty was engulfed by laughter. And not joyful laughter, but disbelieving and berating. Shaking off her blindfold, Patty looked about. She recognized the room: Evergreen had led her into the gym's rarely-used weight room. Only a few of the lights in the room worked, casting angular shadows over racks and benches and bucking bags. But Patty had been guided into the corner with the - Scale. It creaked under her as she reared in surprise, but its needle came back rest between two faded and ornate numerals. "Oh, Celestia, this is TOO rich!" Evergreen's voice had completely lost its kind nature, and she raised a hoof to point over Patty's curves while laughing. "Can you imagine being that heavy? I'm only three and a half stone - I'd just DIE if I weighed that much!" "I'm just three and a quarter," piped up Maple Leaf, "And I had no idea that a filly that short could be that fat!" "I'm only two and three-quarter, and I am taller than she is," laughed an emaciated unicorn filly. Skyreach, one of her Double Patty's classmates, joined in with that laugh Patty had long learned to fear. "I'm five stone-" two dozen heads turned her head predatorially, so the pegasus quickly stammered, "-which means that two of us could stand on that scale and STILL weigh less. No wonder everyone calls her Double Fatty - she's as big as two ponies in one!" "Really? Her name is Double Fatty? Oh Celestia!" Evergreen fell backwards laughing, which only started the snickers all over again. The little brown filly reared up, and tried to press back against the wall - she couldn't think straight, and she couldn't figure out how to get away, the tears in her choking her throat. Someone touched Double Patty. It might have been teasing her blank flank, or poking at her soft pudge, but getting poked like that was the trigger. With a shocked whinny, Patty leaped over what looked like the thinnest point in the crowd, leaving her bags behind her to crash onto the scale. It wasn't enough to clear, and Patty rolled over one of the smaller pegasi in the group, collapsing. She didn't care that this made her tormentors laugh all the harder as she bolted out the gym building and onto the grass. Got to get away, thought the terrified filly, sniffling. Her eyes were closed but all she needed to know was to keep galloping, to head downhill. Across the sport greens, to the creek on the edge of the field, over it into the forbidden Everfree, away from her mean classmates, away from everyone. As she leapt the creek, Double Patty thought: Not a single pony had given chase after her. Not a single one of her classmates had cared enough to see why she was crying. Her leaping the forbidden creek had even gone unnoticed by the teachers. And in her young mind, that meant one thing: she was well and truly alone. That's when she began properly bawling.