It was a red letter day at Sweet Apple Acres, full of excitement, mystery and at least in one specific case resentment and hurt feelings.
It had proven to be remarkably easy to convince Big Macintosh to help the colt drag their discovery from its original resting place into one of the less used barns on the acreage’s property. None of the six colts could determine just why the stallion had seemed so willing to help, though Peppermill swore he had heard a low murmur at one point during the trip about ‘colts being colts’ and ‘reminds me of when I wuz small…or young as the case might be…’.
Once safely stowed away, the colts began to arduous task of restoring the carriage to something at least movable and presentable to the general public. After all, as Pipsqueak had insisted, a proper ship had to be both sea-worthy (or land-worthy, whatever was easier) and able to strike fear and/or respect in anypony who laid eyes upon it. While the whole ‘ship’ idea was debatable at best, the others agreed that there was potential in the whole ‘moving clubhouse’ idea.
“And maybe if Snips would make a huge sail we could catch the wind. That would be smashing!” Pipsqueak chatted endless as he tugged at some broken wood off of the side of the carriage.
“Why do I have to make a sail? Why would I want to make one?” whined the chubby unicorn as he struggled to pull out loose nails near the front of the carriage with a borrowed hammer.
“Because you are so good at making things like that. I mean, you’re so brilliant when it comes to sewing and stitching and stuff…” insisted Pip.
“Honestly Snips, if you would spend as much energy on your talent as you do on avoiding and complaining about a little hard work, you could be the greatest tailor in Equestria” This comment came from above with a smirk as Featherweight pulled the canvas from the carriages body. Snips gave the Pegasus colt a glare, and followed it by a snort as he struggled with the stubborn tool. Nearby Rumble, Peppermill and Snails peered at a rather rough drawing made by Pipsqueak of what he felt their ‘ship’ should look like.
“For a crayon drawing, it’s actually pretty detailed.” said Rumble thoughtfully.
“He certainly seems…to have taken a lot…of thought into this.” agreed Peppermill.
“What is that?” asked Snails, pointing to a small doodle in the corner of the paper. It looked like a rough drawing of a crescent moon.
“That’s going to be our Jolly Roger!” announced Pip gleefully from the ‘ship’.
“Ugh. For that last time Pip this…thing isn’t going to be a boat!” snapped Snips.
“I don’t know. This looks like a drawing of a boat to me. Well, a boat with wheels at any rate.” remarked Rumble.
“It has wheels so we can go on land and water.” explained the pinto pony, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
“Well, whatever this thing turns out to be we have a whole lot of work ahead of us.” grunted Featherweight as he finally managed to pull the canvas free, sending it and himself tumbling to the ground. He slid across the wooden floor of the barn and smacked into the wall with a thump. The other raced to check on him.
“Heh, and you keep saying I need to work out more.” grinned the spindle-legged colt to his friends, which elicited peals of laughter.
***
“Well, wutever them boys are doing they seem to be enjoyin’ themselves.” This was the comment made by the blond Earth mare with the triple apple cutie mark to her elder brother. Applejack and Big Macintosh stood a little ways away from the barn, the mare having been spending the last half an hour or so needling the draft horse for answers. Applejack didn’t like being left out of the loop when things happened on the acreage, and she especially didn’t like it when her brother kept infuriatingly tight-lipped about it.
“Colts will be colts.” This had been the catch-all answer for almost every enquiry posed by the Element of Honesty as to what exactly was occurring in the occupied barn.
“It ain’t that I mind Peppermill and his friend using it Big Mac.” intoned Applejack. “Celestia knows ahm pleased as punch to see our little brother and his pals enjoying ‘the magic of friendship’. After all, I reckon I know a thing or two about that. It’s just…just…”
“There are some things a colt has to do on his own or in this case a mess of them doing together. It ain’t our place to interfere.” announced Big Mac. The stallion couldn’t deny he was enjoying his sister’s unease a little more than he probably should have. Though the stallion knew that he probably should tell his sister about it all, he chose not to for a simple reason: pride.
There was no mistaking that Applejack and Big Macintosh had very differing opinions on how to raise their new little brother. Granted, their immediate knowledge of younger sibling until that moment that Peppermill literally stumbled into their lives was relegated to dealing with a precocious, cutie mark obsessed filly. Gender notwithstanding, Peppermill and Applebloom were two extremely different ponies, and therefore required extremely different methods of lending a helping hoof with the trials and tribulations of adolescence.
Applejack, utterly lost when it came to colts (and stallions, for that matter) had a tendency to hover like a frantic Pegasus and insist on knowing where and what Peppermill was doing on a constant basis. While she obviously meant well, it led to the colt feeling that she didn’t have any faith in him or that she didn’t trust him to make his own choices in his life. Lately, it had caused issues between the two of them which had led to the chef spending long periods of time away from the farm and not sharing stories of how his day went with her. This silence only hurt the mare’s big heart, but she hadn’t the slightest clue of what to do about it.
Whereas Applejack was clearly having trouble, Big Macintosh finally felt like he could offer something other than his prodigious strength to the farm. He doted just as much in the colt as his other sibling did, but his methods were much more subtle. After all, who better to understand the mind of a colt than a pony who had been a full-blooded boy himself not that long ago? He understood better than most just how trying it could be for a colt to live in a house full of females. And as such he knew just the right things to say and the right things to do to keep the peace. At least, for the most part…
Big Macintosh readily accepted that the colt’s early life in Canterlot was centered on his family’s restaurant. As such Peppermill naturally excelled when it came to deal with older ponies, to a point where even he felt he should go to him for advice when trying to talk to mares. But it also meant that Peppermill had little to no regular contact with ponies his own age. It was funny in a sad way how Big Mac’s awkwardness around mares was mirrored by the colt’s uncertainty around colts.
But with some gentle prodding and tough love when Peppermill became despondent over bouts of shyness the chef had come out of his shell and flourished. Despite his incredible maturity and poise, the young ponies of Ponyville accepted the colt with open forelegs and empty stomachs. Big Macintosh always liked to see it when his little brother and his five little friends got together and played as colts were meant to do. And when he got wind of their discovery and the big plans they seemed to have for it, he was more than happy to assist as needed.
The stallion also respected the fact that sometimes (well, a lot of the time) it wasn’t that necessary for his sisters to know every detail of his day-to-day life. Sometimes a colt only learned by doing and taking each success or failure as it came. Applejack and Applebloom had to learn that they were not always going to be there to protect Peppermill. And if the only way to get that lesson across was to keep the Element of Honesty out of the loop, then so be it.
“Fine. Ah can see ya ain’t gonna talk.” snorted Applejack in resignation. “If you say everything is going to be okay, then I guess I ought to take yer word fer it.”
“Everything will be fine AJ.” agreed the stallion. “I promise you’ll lahk what they are gonna accomplish together…”
***
“Ah don’t lahk this, ah don’t lahk it one bit!” This angry comment was spat out by Applebloom as she sat and glared at the barn, on the opposite side and out of sight from where her elder siblings stood. On either side of her sat her two best friends Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, who were decidedly less angry about the situation.
“So a bunch of boys are working on some secret project in the barn. We’ve done all sorts of secret projects in that barn and you didn’t have a problem with it then…” snorted Scootaloo. The Pegasus filly had been looking forward to some serious cutie mark crusading that day, only to have Applebloom drag them into yet another Peppermill-centered crisis.
“Peppermill is in there with those fellas. Who knows wut kind of trouble he could get into thanks to them…”
“But those are his friends.” remarked Sweetie Belle, shocked at how angry her Earth filly friend sounded. “They are our friends. They wouldn’t get him into trouble…well, not intentionally.”
“They better not get him into trouble.” A small, insistent voice in Applebloom’s mind reminded her yet again that she really was over-reacting. The voice pointed out that she did consider the other colts with her brother as her friends. The voice also added emphatically that as a Cutie Mark Crusader she was hardly in a position to complain about secret projects being done that may or may not lead to misadventure and/or tree sap. There was even a reproachful reminder that it hadn’t been all that long ago that she and her brother had come to an emotional charged compromise in regards to her over-protectiveness.
But self-inflicted trouble was one thing; trouble induced by hanging around a bunch of other colts with questionable motives and sense of self-preservation was something else entirely.
Ah know ah promised not to lose mah cool about stuff lahk this little brother… thought the yellow filly darkly but as long as ah can still breath I ain’t lettin’ anything hurt you, even if you bring on yerself…