//------------------------------//
// Reunion 
// Story: For the Good Times 
// by cowbrony93 
//------------------------------//

	Reunion
Six months later...
The bell over the door tinkled as Apple Bloom Storm walked into Ponyville’s premier bakery.
“Hello and welcome to Sugarcube Corner. How may I help?” Pumpkin Cake mechanically intoned, not even looking up from the fashion magazine that illustrated Rarity’s fall line in her aura.
“Mornin’ Pumpkin, are Candy or Jack in?” Apple Bloom asked as she settled her very heavily pregnant self into a chair.
“Oh, hey Apple Bloom, er...Pinkie has Apple Seed for the weekend and Jack had to go to Appleloosa to help out with the harvest there.” 
“Okay, but is Candy in?”
“Yeah, she’s in the back. I’ll go and get her. Anything I can get you?”
“This foal out of me,” Bloom deadpanned.
It took Pumpkin a while to process the joke, but as soon she understood, she tittered and called into the kitchen “Candy somepony’s here to see you.”
Candy Coating, who looked uncannily like a filly version of Cheese Sandwich, popped her head around the doorframe and explained that she would be right out after she was finished putting cupcakes in the oven.
“So AB what’s up?” Candy asked as she walked over to her, removing her apron as she did.
“Well, I actually wanted to talk to Jack, but you’ll do.”
“Do for what?”
“Could you and Jack come and visit when I have my foal?”
“Sure why wouldn’t we?”
“Well, you and Jack are so busy, what with Seed and the bakery...”
“Oh don’t be silly, Mom, Dad, and the twins can take care of those things. I’m just glad that you and Rumble are starting a family.”
“But what if it’s born with three legs and one eye? What if it has an extra leg, what if-” Bloom was immediately silenced by Candy’s caramel colored hoof
“Then you will love it all the same. Don’t you think that I had the same fears before Seed came along? Why didn’t you ask AJ?”
“Both her and Thunderlane tried having a foal several times about ten years ago and the foal miscarried.” With that statement, Candy brought up her hooves to cover her gasp. 
“Is that why...”
“She dotes on your daughter the way she does, yes.” AB stated sharply.
“I never-”
“Do you think she would want to talk about that. You know how she is. She...she always wanted to have foals and now the best chance for her to have that experience is right here” AB indicated her swollen belly. “Now, I was also going to tell Jack that Big Mac has left Sweet Apple Acres to Cider.”
“I’ll be sure to tell him that. I think he likes working here better. Now, can I get you a cupcake and milkshake?”
“Sure.”
Candy had just placed the cupcake in front of Apple Bloom when a grey earth-pony mare with horn-rimmed glasses and a pearl necklace walked into the bakery. She had the air of somepony with a lot of business to attend to and not much time to finish it in. 
“One chocolate-oat and one carmel-almond muffin to go please.” The mare asked Pumpkin. 
“Sure thing, Mrs.Tails.” Pumpkin replied, as she took hold of the aforementioned pastries in her aura and placed them into a paper bag.
“Silver Spoon, is that you?”
“Apple Bloom?”
“Well, it’s Apple Storm now, but yeah.”
“It’s been years! How’ve you been?”
 “Well, I head my own construction firm and Rumble’s head of weather patrol, and our family is just about to get a little bit bigger.” She indicated her pregnancy. “How about you?”
“Snails has just been asked by Princess Twilight to tag and survey all the cragodiles in and around her castle, so I guess you could say that we’re doing all right.”  
“That’s...good. I guess...”
“Well...it was nice seeing you again. Say hi to Rumble for me”
“Say hi to Snails for me.”
“Will do, bye”
With that, Silver Tails trotted out of Sugarcube Corner on her way to finish up her errands. Just as she was through the door, five very large and intimidating earth ponies sauntered into the bakery and set up positions guarding the entrances and exits. Several bits of chatter over their earpiece microphones later, and the Princess of Pop walked in. Now a majority of ponies under the age of 15 had little to no idea of who she was but to those who were, she was known simply as Belle. AB knew her as one of her very best friends in the whole of Equestria, Sweetie Belle.
“Hey Sweetie Belle!”
“Apple Bloom! It’s great to see you!”
“How are things in Canterlot?”
“As good as things can be in that place. How’s Rumble?”
“Oh yeah last time you saw him it was the wedding, he’s doing well. Head of Weather for the whole district.”
“Really?”
“Well, he had some, let’s just call it, encouragement to move up and provide a little bit more for his family.”
“Why’s that? I mean, don’t you have quite a bit of income from your company?”
“I’ll have to be taking some time off for a while.”
“What do you...mean time off? Are you sick or something?”
“Or something...” With that, AB stood up and presented one of her very best friends, the graceful figure of a ten-month pregnant pony. The resulting squeal of excitement from Sweetie cracked windows within a five-block radius and destroyed them within a two-block radius.
“When are you due?”
“In about...lessee...three and a half weeks.” 
“So who’ve you told?”
“Just about everyone from our class. I talked with Scootaloo about a week after Rumble and I found out ourselves.”
“Why was she in town?’’
“She was in with the ballet, and helping out the pegasi to do a water lift to Cloudsdale and we told her when she came to our place for dinner.”
“Oh.”
“I told Twist and Truffle at the candy shop that she runs after Bon Bon died and willed it to her...”
“How’s Lyra doing without her?”
“Well, she isn’t doing well. She just mopes around her place, and occasionally her and Berry will get drunk and have shouting matches over who has it worse off. Berry, for losing Ruby in the house fire and her sister in that train accident, or Lyra for watching her wife of fifteen years die of untreated throat cancer.”
“Oh so that’s why every time our sisters talked with her, she had a different voice and was so rude, she was trying out voices that allowed her to speak, and she was just really, really scared about what would eventually happen.”
“It seems that way, yes.Where was I...oh right, I’ve told the others in the class during shopping trips and at work. I just talked to Silver Spoon right before you got here.”
“So that’s who that was, I thought I recognized her.”
“Yeah it surprised me too. Did you know she was married to Snails?’’
“I did. I’d heard, that after she’d won queen at senior prom and Diamond Tiara had poured that blood onto her, she’d tried to kill herself by jumping into the river and Snails had talked her out of it. Three weeks later and wedding bells were ringing.”
“A whirlwind rescue romance eh? Sounds like something out of those trashy romance novels that we’d read at slumber parties at Rarity’s when we were fillies.”
 “Yes, it does, but your romance with Rumble certainly has some similarities.”
Apple Bloom grinned sheepishly, and motioned towards the door. “Why don’t we continue this conversation elsewhere, like, say my office?”
“What a great idea.”
So the two friends walked out of the bakery, flanked, of course, by Sweetie Belle’s security detail. Along the way chatting amicably, they passed several townsponies, one of whom acted like, but didn’t look like, Dr. Hooves. He had a blond mane, and a fez perched precipitously upon his head. Around his neck was a red bow-tie, and he was talking to a unicorn mare who suspiciously looked like Dr. Colgate. They also passed by Pip and Dinky taking their two foals to Ponyville Park. Sweetie and Bloom both cooed over Coffee, the earth pony colt, and Tea, the unicorn filly for several minutes. After a stroll through the park Sweetie and AB arrived at the latter’s construction company’s office. After checking in with her secretary, Bloom and Sweetie went into the small office.
“So have you heard about Diamond Tiara?” Sweetie asked grinning wolfishly.
“I only heard that she’d moved to Manehattan and married into money.”
“Well yeah, she did do that but, her husband had put a pile of bits into the stock market from real estate and after the housing bubble had burst, he threw himself off from their penthouse suite onto the pavement below.”
“And how is this related in any way to DT and why should I feel anything other than sheer horror that you told this in a way that you’re almost laughing?”
“Because before he killed himself, he cut her out of his will and now she has to move to Seaddle and in with her mother.”
“So there is justice for all of those she’s bullied over the years. I guess.”
“Well, it seems that my security detail is motioning me to cut the conversation short. It was nice catching up with you. Call me when you can, and as soon as the baby comes, I’ll be there. Ta-ta!”
“Bye, ‘Belle talk to you later.”
With that, Sweetie Belle walked out the door, trotted down to the train station and got on the 5:30 to Canterlot. After she left, Apple Bloom laid her head down on her desk and fell asleep.         Almost as soon as she fell asleep, she began dreaming. In the dream, she was a filly again, walking in the Everfree, following another blank-flanked pony to their “hidden village”. When she rounded a bend in the trail, though, the pony suddenly turned, snarled and transformed into a timberwolf. The bundle of sticks and bark leapt at her throat and the creature began shaking her violently.
“Bloom, Bloom, BLOOM” the creature spoke
“What?”
“Wake up honey, you’re having a nightmare”
“Huh?” With that, she swam back into conciseness.
“Wow, you put on quite a show there. Gave me an awful scare.” The voice spoke and the mouth it came from was attached to her wonderful husband Rumble.
“I guess I was more tired than I thought.”
“It seems that way. Listen, since you’re so tired, why don’t I cook dinner tonight?”
“Even knowing it’ll be nothing but sandwiches and hayfries, Thanks, dear.”
________________________________________________________________________
Three weeks later, Ponyville General Hospital was filled with the pealing screams of Apple Bloom as she birthed her foal. Rumble was pacing nervously in the waiting room and he was beginning to wear a small trench into the wood floor.
“Would you sit down, you’re making me nervous enough to throw you through the window. Jeez.” Scootaloo snapped
“Well, you know what, maybe if you weren’t such a plot-head maybe you-”
Before further threats could be hurled or violence enacted against anypony, Dr. Cold Hooves opened the door and had two orderlies pacify the two pegasi.
“OK everypony the mother is in stable condition and she’s awake with her son.”
With that statement, all the assembled ponies started slapping Rumble on his back and giving words of encouragement. Rumble began dazedly walking towards the door that the obstetrician held open for him.
“Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. Storm, he’s a healthy earth pony. He’ll be even healthier if he can get some of your milk into his system.”
“Thanks Doctor. Hey honey, how’s it going?”
“Well, they gave me the good stuff, so I’m doing alright.”
“So the nurse says he’s an earth pony, what do you want to name him? Do you have any ideas?”
“Yeah I do.”
“So what’s he going to be called?”
“Macintosh, Macintosh... Apple... Storm.”
“That’s a beautiful name honey, I’ll get that down on the birth certificate.”
With that, Rumble walked down the hall, leaving AB sleeping and her son, “Little” Mac, suckling contentedly, together with smiles on their faces.