//------------------------------// // Chapter 4-The Morning After // Story: Harmony and Balance // by BlazingShadowBrony //------------------------------// Chapter 4 The Morning After Twilight woke up to the sound of breakfast being made, and the smell of something really good. She got out of bed and looked down at Spike's basket, as she did every morning like a reflex, and saw he was still there. Puzzled at why cooking wasn't being done by her number one assistant, she went downstairs to find a large amount of books all out of their shelves, but stacked neatly. She looked at the spot a sleeping unicorn should have been, and saw what she figured out already, Riverbank was already awake. "Hmm...NO! That is nasty! I can't follow these recipes worth crap. I guess it's hay waffles and daffodils for breakfast, what a horrible guest I am." Twilight recognized the voice of the unicorn she was having a great conversation with last night about another dimension, but why was he berating himself? She soon got her answer when a small cup of juice hit her floor, shattering instantly. She looked up at the sea colored pony who had a look of absolute terror on his face. "T-TWILIGHT!? Oh, Celestia! I-I-I wasn't expecting y-you to be awake yet. I'm so sorry. I'll clean this up." Riverbank stumbled over his words and his hooves when he turned back into the kitchen, leaving his muzzle smashed into the wood floor of the library. He got back up quickly and grabbed the towel he had already made dirty with his earlier experiments with cooking. He soaked up the juice and sheepishly smirked, as he levitated three plates out of the kitchen, each plate having a distinct seaweed green aura around them. What hit Twilight as odd was he seemed to know exactly what Twilight wanted on her simple breakfast, but he tried something else as if he knew she was starting to get tired of the same old thing. She shrugged it off as a small coincidence, and politely took her plate along with the other two. "SPIIIKE! BREAKFAST!" She yelled out to the baby dragon, waking him up and sending him down. When he sniffed the air he said, "I didn't make breakfast. Did I?" Riverbank looked up to answer quickly, "Nah, I did. I thought you could use the sleep after the party last night." He finished and proceeded to sit down and eat with his two hosts. It didn't take long before Riverbank had started a conversation that got all three of them laughing and chatting like they knew each other for years. _____________ Rarity woke to the smell of burning and jumped out of her bed. She experienced some deja-vu of the time Sweetie Belle was staying because her parents left for a vacation. When she finally tore her sleeping-mask off her face she realized nothing was destroyed or burnt, but everything was tidy and clean. She untangled her hooves from her sheets and followed the smell again, this time finding a distressed unicorn with ice-blue fur and a light red aura surrounding his horn. "N-no! Mom! Dad! Save them! Please!" Snowfall said in his sleep, unknowingly causing himself to use an illusion spell, "Put it out! P-PUT IT OUT!" All of the sudden, the smell grew stronger and if anypony had been inside they would have thought the building was surrounded by flames. Rarity, concerned for the safety of her boutique and the state of the stallion. "Snowfall! SNOWFALL!" Rarity shouted, causing the unicorn to violently wake from his nightmare, and then land on the floor. Snowfall got up shakily, looking pale and disoriented. When he looked at Rarity, she saw that he had been crying in his sleep. He sniffed the air and apologized, using his magic to open a window and quickly heading to a bathroom. Rarity had seen this before with Sweetie Belle when she had a nightmare about a dragon and her magic made one out of the aura but when she woke up it dissipated. She wondered why Snowfall was so flustered about a nightmare about fire, and his parents. When she put two and two together, she realized what happened. She went over and knocked on the bathroom door, "Snowfall? Are you alright darling?" She saw the door open to reveal Snowfall looking like he just walked in from a party in Canterlot. His mane and tail were much better looking, like his hair froze at a bend, and his stature was now more confident and regal despite him not being a noble. He looked at her, his red eyes clear of any signs of crying, and smiled, "I am now, Miss Rarity. I apologize if I caused you to panic, I did not realize I would have that particular dream." "Oh no, darling. You can't apologize for having a nightmare, nopony knows what dreams they'll have." Rarity chided. Snowfall walked out of the bathroom and took Rarity's hoof, "You're right. How about I make us some breakfast to make up for it?" Rarity smiled, "I would be delighted darling." She let her heart flutter for only a moment, before she realized he had already gone to the kitchen and followed suit. ____________ Pinkie and Windy had slept peacefully. No bothers, no cares, and no quiet after they woke. They talked about some new recipes, some old recipes, and some interesting topics about something called "humans". Soon they were out into the town, one bouncing, the other hopping. Today was going to be a good day...wait...twitchy tail? Windy got it before Pinkie explained, stating he had a similar sense. They got closer at that moment, completely oblivious to the anvil falling somewhere behind them. -------------------------------- Red got up really early that morning, in fact, he barely slept. He felt guilty about staying at their farm and not doing anything, so he got up and quietly set to work. He was going off of the answers to his questions at what they did at Sweet Apple Acres, which at one point explained all the chores. As he set to work, he allowed his mind to wander. His first thought was at the feud between his and Applejack's families, and why she didn't chase him off once she learned. He only used his family name to see how she would react, and to be honest, it hurt him to know he was spending time with her family only to see if there was any sort of thread of friendship that could be salvaged. He only told the truth, be it soft or blunt, and the more his mind stuck to the subject, the more his body slowed it's pace of work. "Hey! Why'd y'all stop?" Came the voice of the southern pony Red was thinking about at the time, "Y'all were doin' great for not bein' told what to do." Red turned around and smirked, trying to hide the massive drop of comfort he felt, "But y'all did tell me. Yesterday when ah was askin' about what y'all do here." Applejack could feel something was on the steel colored pony's mind, "What's the matter sugercube?" "Nothin'!" Red nearly facehoofed at the sudden outburst, and at the fact he was a terrible liar, and Applejack could tell. The first sign he lied horribly was his nearly shouting his answer, the second was his eyes. She was told about her eyes when Discord got to her, and Red's were just as rapid in their movement. There was a third sign that he was lying, he tensed up like a frightened cat, when he was normally relaxed, like Big Mac. "What's really the matter?" "N-nothin'. Nothin' at all." He got worse! It was like he was a bottle of soda being shaken up. Applejack used this to her advantage, "Are ya sure? I mean, y'all seem really tense," that did it. "AHWANTEDTOGETCLOSERTOYASOAHCANENDTHEFEUD!" Red stuck a hoof in his mouth and thought that the first half of that didn't come out the way he meant it, and he felt awful at the deception. "Y-y'all knew about the feud between our families?" Applejack blushed as she said this, having misinterpreted the first part of the confession, but disguised it as a question, "Why didn't ya say somethin'? Ah-ah was sorta doin' the same thing." After the stallion let go of the bottled-up guilt, he loosened up and smirked. "Now why would y'all do somethin' like that?" Red asked sarcastically, knowing know he was among friends. Applejack caught on, and answered honestly, "Well, me an' the folks here are tired of this feud. It's affectin' business, ya know. We want our old friends back." She took off her hat and held it to her chest, showing she was speaking from her heart. Red decided to talk to her some more while they finished up all the chores that day, they soon started to joke and poke fun at each other. It even escalated to a friendly challenge between them to see who was quicker at running and applebucking. While Red won the applebucking challenge, Applejack managed to beat Red in a down right speed competition. It ended when it came time to eat breakfast. ________________ Storm and Rainbow are still asleep...still asleep...still...*SNORE*! ---------------------- Fluttershy was slowly being roused from her sleep by a warm...something...that was moving underneath her. She opened her eyes just barely and saw a red mane and an orange body, who was slowly breathing. She squeaked and flew off of him, a blush very visible on her muzzle. She remembered what had happened last night and promptly decided that her own shyness was a little less important than his well being. She poked him to wake him up, but it wasn't enough. Angel, who had seen what happened last night and was worried. Normally, he would have found a way to get rid of the stallion and protect his Fluttershy. But, he was different. He was hurt, really bad, and he needed her help. That morning, though, Fluttershy was being too shy to wake the stallion up, so he took it upon himself to wake him up. He jumped up on the stallion's head and thumped his foot very rapidly. That did the trick, and earned a squeak from his owner. "Ngf! Wha? Oh, hi little guy...OW! Ok, note to self: stop saying that," Firewing got up and regretted it immediately, his chest felt like it was on fire and his wing was even worse. His legs fell out from under him, and he collapsed on the couch, causing him to wince from the pain. He couldn't believe he forgot his injuries, and wait...he was at Fluttershy's cottage. All the memories came rushing back from the night before, and the ominous message also made it's way back into his mind. He shook it from his mind temporarily, as to not worry his kind host, although she looked pretty worried already. It was painful to see her like this, but he couldn't stand without feeling that horrible, burning, pain. As Fluttershy quickly apologized for the rude awakening and went to get more bandages, he thought about why it hurt him to see her like this, or in fact why he felt like he could be himself around her, well, other than the fact he thought she was cute. NO! She was beautiful. He found himself looking at her flank, like any stallion would if he found a mare attractive, and quickly realized his wing hurt, so he shifted his thoughts to figuring out what exactly hit him. Fluttershy was grabbing a large amount of supplies and making sure she could properly treat his wounds, at least until she could get him to Nurse Redheart. As she turned around to face him, she saw that some of the bandages on his wing were almost completely red. In a flurry, she took them off as gently as she could, while taking them off as fast as she could. He seemed to be lost in thought, but still grimaced when she put the gel in the wound. It looked like it wasn't even trying to heal, and was bleeding more and more. If it wasn't for her kind nature, Fluttershy might have passed out from the sight of it. She quickly bandaged the wing back up and moved on to his chest, which was uncomfortable for both ponies. As she uncovered the wound she saw that it wasn't as deep as the ones on his wing. That being said, she saw some of his muscles that were toned near the spot where his legs were connected to his body, and a small blush made it's way across her muzzle. She quickly repeated the process that she used on his wing and tried to bandage his torso quickly and efficiently, but was having little luck with the distractions she had never had problems with before. Firewing was having even less luck with how he was feeling, and hiding it from the mare before him. He saw how gentle she was with him and having her head so close to his chest made him both happy and angry. Happy that the one mare he has had these feelings for, albeit since yesterday night, was caring for him. But he was angry with himself that he couldn't speak up and tell her that. He was instantly broken out of his thought process when he sharply inhaled through his nose as she dabbed the ointment on, and he got a good whiff of Fluttershy's mane, sending his one wing straight out at the smell of flowers he didn't know the names of and a hint of strawberries, but that could have been his imagination. He was sent into a whole new world of euphoria as he let a stupid-looking smile make it's way to his face and his wing slowly relaxed and drooped. He only snapped out of it when she was in front of him and shyly hiding her face behind her mane. "Um...I-I finished redressing your injuries. B-but your wing needs to be seen by a doctor, if you don't mind." She spoke in such a soft tone, any normal pony wouldn't have heard her, but Firewing was in her quiet cottage with only the bunny awake and making noise. Firewing tried to stand again and found it hurt only half as much, "Thank you, Fluttershy. U-um, if you could lead the way," he said, his voice getting quieter as he talked. "O-oh, oh! Of course! I-I'm sorry. I forgot you're new to town. I-I'll help you get to the hospital as soon as I take care of my animal friends." Fluttershy quickly responded, as she took off towards her kitchen, as she was trying to hide a furious blush that crept across her muzzle at the thought of the stunning stallion. She quickly gave Angel his carrot and she went outside to tend to the animals out there. Meanwhile, inside, Firewing tapped the carrot-munching Angel Bunny on his tiny shoulder, "Hey, do ya think you could help me find the feeding supplies?" Angel just looked at the stallion like he was crazy, but then pointed at the cabinet near the kitchen. "Thanks! And don't worry, I know what I'm doing." Firewing opened the cabinet and grabbed the bag of birdseed and proceeded to fill the bowls he didn't need to fly to get to. Then he grabbed some walnuts and acorns and put those at the base of the pole that led up to a hole with a squirrel peeking it's head out. Firewing looked at the squirrel with his kindest smile and turned, leaving the squirrel to take them or not. Firewing carried on with giving the animals food, and as he did they would poke their heads out and watch in awe as this stallion, that had never been here before, flawlessly copied some of the order their current caretaker used. Even Angel, who was almost never astonished, dropped his carrot in disbelief at the skill this pony had at caring for animals. Even Fluttershy, who came in half-way through his "feeding frenzy", was standing with her mouth agape and her muzzle turning a brighter red than before. Firewing turned to see Fluttershy watching him and he dropped the carrots he was about to give to the rabbits, causing Fluttershy to squeak. "H-h-how l-long have y-you been s-standing there?" He asked with great difficulty, as his shy nature made it hard not to stutter, not to mention his shyness in front of the beautiful and kind mare. Fluttershy, having been startled by the sudden halt in his work, shuffled her hooves as an answer. She made an attempt to speak, but it came out as a small whimper. Firewing suddenly realized he needed to pick up the carrots and put them away. He gathered the tops into his mouth and placed them back in to the mini-fridge he had found them in. When he turned back to Fluttershy, he promptly headed to the front door and opened it. "U-um...a-after you." Fluttershy snapped back to reality “Sorry...” she said and then they both made their way to Ponyville hospital in silence. WHY U NO END OF CHAPTER 5!? Author's Note: Holy Craptacular Badman! I know some of you have been waiting for the re-release of this chapter for a while so here it is! In all of its glory, and since I know it's still strange that I gave Fluttershy a lot of "screen time", the next chapter will actually focus on the other Mane 6. But for now, Ciao!