//------------------------------// // 35. Full Twilight Panic // Story: Sunny, Moonie, Twily // by Jetto //------------------------------// Sunset Shimmer was once again on the crossroads of destiny, as she sometimes found herself since getting two roommates. On one hoof, she was lying perfectly comfortably on her bed, with a book of the bloody history of the Gryphon Kingdom Revolution from the 5th century after Lunar Banishment, where then king, Balthazar the XIII, was on the verge of getting cut by his own children. This was one of the juiciest parts of gryphons history, only possible due to their overzelous mentality. On the other hoof, there was an opportunity that presented itself very rarely, no more once a month, if she was lucky. She struggled to keep her eyes glued to the pages of history, intrigued by exactly which of the king's estranged sons would finally stab his back. Sure, she knew who was the following monarch, but the details were vague and movie adaptations took a few too many liberties with the source material. But as much as she wanted to read more about bloody murders and betrayals, the book wouldn't be going anywhere and Twilight would eventually leave the room. 'Eventually' being the keyword here, since for the last twenty or so minutes she was busy with taking a better care of herself. She took a shower (for the second time today!), groomed her mane at least three times, polished her hooves and took at least last five minutes debating over which perfumes were right for the occasion, using the reflective surface of one of the bottles to check if she had left any lettuce in her teeth, which she then proceed to floss. For the third time. The temptation was too strong. "You know, I don't think Moondancer will mind if you borrow a few raincoats for your date." There was a loud crash, as two bottles of (cheap) perfumes shattered on the floor, filling it with a bunch of pleasantly smelling sharp hazards. Twilight Sparkle wasn't at all bothered by the danger around her, as she was too busy blushing furiously. While not the most adept at innuendoes and naughty language, she was a very good student while her friends, mostly Moondancer, were good teachers. "I DON'T NEED CONDOMS FOR MY BROTHER!" She lashed out. Sunset shrugged. "Fine." Okay, she's had enough, I should stop teasing her. Two seconds later. Oh, who am I kidding? "Moondancer would be proud of you. Even she's too afraid to take it ra--" SMACK! One, next time when you tease Twilight, make sure there isn't a wet towel she could throw at your face. Two, ouch! Three, it was so worth it! "I'M NOT GOING TO... TO... WITH MY BROTHER! EWW!" She shuddered at the thought. Sunset shrugged, getting the wet cloth out of her face. "With all the prep work you've done thus far, you could've fooled me." Twilight gagged. "Ugh, you're disgusting!" "And you're denying your big brother complex." "I DON'T HAVE A BIG BRO--" She stopped herself, put a hoof near her chest, then slowly pulled it away, exhaling the frustration on the way "no, I refuse to continue this conversation! You hear me, Sunset?" "Yeah, yeah, I hear you. You're being boring again." Twilight's eyebrow twitched. "Refusing to indulge in incestuous fantasies doesn't make anypony bori--" She stopped herself again, pulling the stress relieving exercise from before once more. "Nice try, Sunny, but there's no way you can ruin the one day in the month when my BBBFF comes for a visit!" Now it was Sunset's turn to roll her eyes. "Oh darn, foiled again!" She deadpanned like she never did before. "Speaking of which, maybe you can join us for dinner? I'm sure Shiny, Mom and Dad would love to see you again!" Sunset snorted. "Yeah, I'm sure Spike would be delighted to see me." Twilight blinked. "That's still 80% approval! That's more than most of the nobles!" "As much as I'd love to gorge myself on your mother's cooking, I have a hooficure to make." "Since when do you do your own hooficure?" "Since you asked me to see your stupid brother ten seconds ago, duh!" Sunset shook her head, as if asked the most obvious question there ever was to a little kid. Twilight hummed, then realized there was still a lot of spilled perfumes on the ground, which started to mix together, thus creating a new, much more dangerous aroma than the sum of both its parts, not to mention there were glass shards all over the place. Having no desire to hear Sunset ranting about cleaning somepony's mess, she took a few paper towels and a broom and started cleaning the floor the old fashioned way. Sure, she had a few good cleaning spells, but there was a risk she could misfire one of them and create a spark which could ignite the flammable liquid and create a disaster. The chances were minuscule, about 0,0034% of her making a mistake on a basic spell, but she wasn't about to test the probability theories on a day this important to her. "Sunset, why do you hate Shining Armor so much?" Sunset shrugged, still holding the book in front of her. "I don't hate him. I just don't feel like seeing him." "I don't get it, he's been nothing but kind to you!" "Yeah, but that's the thing," she laid the book on the bed "he's been so kind it's a bit... uncanny! He's always smiling, asking me if I need anything, how I feel, how's the school and all that wishy-washy stuff!" Twilight feigned shock "Oh, the nerve!" "I know, right? At least when other stallions are nice to me, they do it in hopes they could score me. I get free drinks, sometimes even a dinner. And I have the satisfaction of shooting them down and publicly humiliating them, or in case of the less jerky ones, throw them at Moondancer and everypony's happy. It's a win-win scenario. With your brother, I just don't know how to react." Twilight raised a hoof and was about to say something, but her mind was blanking, so she hoofwaved it and turned away. "You're a twisted mare, Sunset Shimmer." "I get that a lot. Look, as much as I enjoy our banter, weren't you going on a date with your brother?" "IT'S NOT A DATE! But yeah, you're right, it's getting a bit late. His train will be here at 2pm, I need to hurry and get Spike!" "It's only noon." The lavender mare didn't listen to either Sunset or common sense. "Time's running out, gotta go, bye!" And she was gone, door slamming right behind her. Sunset Shimmer looked at the door where her friend had just disappeared. That mare just won't learn. She shook her head and went back to her book. Now back to backstabbing the king... TWILIGHT'S LOG 12:31am. Picked up Spike from his home. He was confused that I got there this early. Typical Spike, absolutely no sense of urgency. He asked for five more minutes to prepare himself. I obliged. 12:36am. Spike still isn't ready. I made a note to thank Cadance for teaching me this unstressing excercise. It has proven to be very useful today. 12:37am. Spike is ready, so we go. He wanted to sit on my back, but I declined, as most books on raising foals discourage rewarding kids for being lazy. 12:39am. Spike made a good point: he is not a foal, but a baby dragon. The books said nothing on how to raise your dragon, so I allowed it. It's already proven a great success, as whining stopped, thus our morale was raised by around 14%. 12:55am. We arrived at the station, still 65 minutes before the train is due. I'm having second thoughts about leaving this early, but it helped minimize the potential accidents we could have faced along the way. The downside is that Spike is getting impatient again so we try to kill time by playing 'Eye Spy'. 13:08am. 'Eye Spy' is a stupid, pointless game with no right to exist and should be labeled as non-entertainment. Spike disagrees. He knows nothing, he's a baby dragon. He replied that he is a winning baby dragon. I can find no valid counter-arguments. 1:30pm. We went for Ice Cream. Morale boosted by an additional 11%. 1:41pm. We found today's newspaper and we went straight for the crossword puzzle, like we used to do back in the days with Shiny. There is a 13% chance we won't be able to finish it by the time his train arrives, which then would have 98% chances of him joining, but only around 6% of him contributing to it's completion. 1:49pm. Seven words, starts with G, third letter N: 'a famous gryphon king that stabbed his father'. I wish Sunset was here. 2:00pm. What do ponies usually say when something isn't where it should be at the designated time? "Give it a few minutes." One or two is perhaps too little, and up to ten is more than 'a few', and thus a violation of terminology, so I will go with five minutes. 2:05pm. Still no train. Giving it 5 more minutes, but no more. Morale drops by 9%. 2:06pm. GUNTHER! Silly me, how could I forget? Morale increased by 2%. 2:10pm. Still no train, nor my BBBFF. Morale drops by 40%. 2:11pm. WHEN IS THAT TRAIN GETTING HERE!? 2:12pm. Oh, there it is! "Ugh, finally!" Spike exclaimed, as he happily jumped from the bench and ran towards the arriving train from Ponyville, Twilight happily following her surrogate brother. Her enthusiasm rose significantly when the doors opened and even through the small window she could see the white coat and horn, thus confirming that it was indeed... "BBBFF!" She shouted loudly, glomping the first pony in the cart, before the one in question could react. Or before she could confirm whether that was who she thought it was. "I missed you so much! Oh, we have so much to... to..." She squeezed tighter, but much to her surprise, her hooves touched each other a lot sooner than usual. On that note, the white coat she was touching wasn't of the same texture as she remembered, but it was much smoother and softer, like a silk pillow, like the ones Princess Celestia had in her private room. And not to mention, he was a lot smaller than Shiny used to be. "BBBFF?" She asked shyly. "I'm afraid not, darling." The soft, female voice answered. Twilight's eyes shot open. From the perspective of herself as the 'glomper', she had a clear view which she didn't have when her eyes were closed due to overflow of positive emotions. Now she could, as Moondancer would phrase it, 'enjoy the rear view' of a pony that had a white coat similar to BBBFF... and that's where similarities ended. Instead of the firm, muscular form of her brother, she saw the smooth, slim figure, with beautifully curled, long, purple tail. Also a cutie mark of three diamonds which couldn't be missed, no matter how much she wanted to avoid glaring at some unknown mare's flank, which was quite something even from her angle. Wait, this is not the time to enjoy the view! I'M NOT ENJOYING THIS VIEW! I mean, it's nice and if I was into mares I would love to see it more often, I mean, not in a creepy stalkery way, but in a more innocent... STOP OVERHINKING IT! The mare in question coughed. "I don't want to be rude, darling, but..." "MEEEEP!" Twilight squeeked and jumped away, making a few nervous steps backwards before bowing so low and fast she hit her forehead over the stone floor, ignoring the pain and blood to be apologetic. "I'M SORRY! I'M SORRY! I'M SORRY! I'M SORRY! I'M SOR--" she stopped when a hoof was gently placed on her shoulder. She shook a bit, but still slowly raised her head, her teary eyes witnessing the view of an angel! Or rather, a very pretty, white coated unicorn with mane as fabulous as her tail, standing right below the sun, making her look as if she had an aurora around her head. And she was smiling at her. "It's alright darling," she said again, once more sounding like a choir of angels. "B-but..." "No buts, darling" a tissue levitated itself over Twilight's forehead, wiping the blood and dirt she inflicted upon herself "there's no need to be afraid, you've done me no harm. Though I won't lie, I was scared for a second." "I-I..." The mare gently touched Twilight's lips with her hoof. "Hush! This has been a lovely day so far, let's not ruin it with a simple misunderstanding. Right, darling?" She asked. Twilight swallowed, but nodded obediently, making the mare smile even brighter. A small band-aid floated at Twilight's wound, though she didn't notice it until much later. "See? No reason to be flustered." She extended her hoof to help Twilight stand up. "Now, as much as I'd love to stay and chat, I'm in kind of a hurry. Maybe if you visit Ponyville someday we could find some time for small talk. But until then, ta-ta, darling!" She waved to her and left, swinging her flank left and right, left and right, left and... STOP LOOKING AT HER ARSE! Twilight shook her head violently, then applied some more anti-stress excercises, which still worked wonders, even after all this time. I sure am glad Sunny and Moonie weren't here to see this. I would NEVER live this down! She looked to her left, where Spike was standing still, looking at the same direction she was just a moment ago, his eyes half-closed, having the goofiest grin on his face. "Sooooo beautiful!" He whispered, sighing with delight. Twilight nodded, blushing profoundly. Meanwhile, back in the dorms, Sunset Shimmer stopped her reading when something came to her mind. I feel like I'm forgetting about something important... nah, probably nothing. She shrugged and kept reading about Gunther's reign. Few minutes passed since Twilight and Spike recovered from their infatuation and realized that even after all this time passed, Shining Armor was nowhere to be found. He wasn't at the station or inside the train. "SHIIIIIIIIINYYYYY!" Twilight yelled in the wagon, then blinked herself out into the station. "SHIIIIINIIIING!" Another blink, she was in front of the entrance. "BE-BE-BE-EF-EF!" One more blink, she was at the top of a building. "WHEEEEREEEE AAAAREEEE YOUUUUUU!?" Another blink made her disapear from Spike's view. He sighed, then crossed his arms and started counting down. "Five, four, three, two, one..." BLINK! "He's not in the sewers, or the donut shop, or the colts' bathroom!" "W-wait, what?" "HE'S GONE, SPIKE! SHINY IS GONE!" She grabbed him with her hooves and started shaking with every word. "He could be anywhere! What if... what if something bad happened to him! What if he found a portal to another dimension and got sucked in and now has to live in a world full of bipedal creatures!?" Spike, after recovering from his vertigo, managed a deadpan expression. "A what now?" "Or what if somepony foalnapped him?" "Then I pity that pony." "What if he got lost? What if he got on a wrong train and he ended up in the Gryphon kingdom and has to fight his way out in gladiatorial matches for the rest of his life?" Spike shrugged. "Or what if he just forgot he was supposed to be here today?" "Or what if he forgot he was... supossed to... huh, that actually makes sense!" Twilight put a hoof to her chin and started thinking. While Shiny had an impeccable memory when it came to his family, friends or important holidays, he was often forgetful when it came to small stuff. Granted, an once a month visit home wasn't a minor thing, but knowing Shiny, he probably took it as granted. And she knew exactly how to find out! She conjured up a scroll, along with one quill and some ink and made a note. Greetings, is Shining Armor still home? Yours truly, Twilight Sparkle "There, now I just need to send it over to Ponyville!" She smiled to herself, although Spike was still a little confused. "Can you send it with your magic?" "Nope!" She smiled widely. "But I know someone who can send it to somepony who can send it to somepony that can answer, then send it back to the pony who sent it so it can be sent back to us!" Moments passed. Spike scratched his head. "What? Why are you looking at me like that?" Meanwhile, in Princess Celestia's office, two scrolls appeared in the thin air. She raised an eyebrow and grabbed them. One had a note that said "For Princess Celestia", which is the one she opened. Dear Princess Celestia, I would like you to send the other message to your nephew, Prince Blueblood, if that won't be a problem. I would also like you to send his message back to Spike, if at all possible. It's very urgent, I promise I will explain it later. Your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle Celestia shrugged and sent the letter as politely asked. Few minutes of walking in circles in panic later, Twilight finally received the answer she was looking for when Spike, the dragon librarian, burped the scroll from Princess Celestia. Spike was able to send messages to Princess by burning the scrolls... for some reason. And she could send messages back to him via normal, though advanced magic, hence the awkward burping that manifested scrolls in mid-air. Whether it was something he was born with, or Princess Celestia enchanted him to do so, was a mystery that Twilight was afraid to ask. It has proven to be quite useful in case of emergencies, though, as exemplified today. The message was short: Dear Twilight Sparkle, your brother left about two hours ago. Sincerily, Prince Blueblood Twilight's eye twitched once again as she reread those few words over and over again. "B-b-but, th-th-that m-means..." Spike sighed deeply. "Oh boy, here we go again!" "SHIIIINIIIIIIING!" That was all that Spike heard, before his surrogate sister started her irrational fit of panic, complimented by a lot of shouting, teleporting, running and using any possible name, nickname or synonym she could find. To anypony else this might've seemed like a random fit of uncontrollable emotions, but Spike wasn't just any pony, in fact, he wasn't a pony at all, but more than that, he knew better. After living almost his entire life by Twilight's side, he learned how this filly's mind worked, and using a specific algorithm, created by Sunset Shimmer and Moondancer, he was able to predict the exact time and place where she would end, after spending an amount of magical energy that would force her to take a ten seconds breather. That place happened to be only about a hundred hooves away, several streets away, in a less populated residential district. His predictions were, as always, accurate, and he found her catching her breath just around the corner. "Twilight!" He shouted as he approached her. "Calm down, you know there must be a reasonable explanation! What if he got late to a train and decided to go by hoo--" "OVER THERE!" Twilight interrupted Spike, pointing her hoof somewhere. Spike raised an eyebrow, but then his jaw dropped as he noticed the scene. It was a fairly deserted area of residential blocks, and in between one of them was a small alley, where they saw two muscled, grey earth ponies along with a smaller brown unicorn in a bowler hat. But what really took them by surprise, was that one of the big ones carried another pony on his back. They couldn't tell all the details, but they were sure it was a white coated stallion, though that was all they could've tell since he had a paper bag on his head and his hooves tied up, while he was dragged into the alleyway. "Holy guacamole!" Spike yelled, though not loud enough for the trio to notice them yet. "Is that... was that...?" "Spike," Twilight said, not moving a muscle, as her eyes were focused on the alley, "go get help!" And then she rushed after them, leaving her little assistant in the dust. "Twilight, wait!" In between coughing, Spike extended his hand towards her, but didn't follow her, mainly because she was way too fast for his tiny little legs. And as much as he didn't want to leave his big sister alone, there was a task he was given and he wasn't going to fail it. "Stop movin', will'ya!" The tiny gangster in a bowler hat (which was also his cutie mark) kicked his impatient hostage, trying close the trunk of their cart. "Sheesh, why'd they always struggle so much? Ya'd think they'd 'ave learned by now to be quiet, or else!" One of the thugs, the one with an AA battery for a cutie mark, scratched his head. "Maybe it's his first foalnapping?" The other thug, one with a machine gun* cutie mark nodded. "Prolly'. By da third time they usually learn ta behave." After finally closing the trunk, the bowler hat wearing gangster shrugged. "Whatever, we got'im. Now let's git a move on before we--" "LET HIM GO, YOU CRIMINAL SCUM!" "What the--?" The gangster trio jumped and turned back, at first afraid that they were caught, only for the newcomer to appear to be just a single, if a little angry, lavender mare. "Sheesh, almost got a heart attack!" The filly in question lighted her horn and made a step forward. "I said, let him go now, or else!" "Boss, what'we do?" "What'ya think we do? We ain't leaving no witnesses! Assault, Battery, GIT'ER!" The two thugs nodded and charged at her who, despite having two stallions twice her size (which is four times the trouble) against her, didn't even budge. Her eyes narrowed with a glow, the same one that her horn had all this time. "I guess you chose 'else'..." "Quick, it's right over there!" After finding a pair of patrolling guards, Spike quickly led them to where he last found Twilight. Riding on the back of one of them, there was nothing that could stop hi-- "SPIKEY-WIKEY!" Drat, not now! Spike facepalmed, as two guards stopped before the white coated filly that has proven to be Spike's worst nightmare since the day they met. Just as she was calculating the proper trajectory for a glomp that wouldn't hurt the guard he was posted on, the dragon librarian put his hoof up. "Not now, Moondancer, Twilight's in danger!" There were few words that ever stopped Moondancer from being herself. Her eyes widened. "W-what? How? Where?" "No time, I'll explain on the way! GIDDIYUP!" He knocked the sides of his steed with his legs, but only earned himself an annoyed glare from the royal guard. Spike smiled sheepishly. "Uhm, sorry!" The guard shook his head and groaned, but resumed the chase, now joined by Moondancer, who got the abridged explanation from Spike on their way. She was about to say something, when they reached the alleyway that Spike had mentioned, where a tiny stallion with a tattered vest and bowler hat was crawling out of. "Oh, thank Celestia, guards!" He sighed with relief, as the three ponies and Spike stopped by him. Before anypony could ask him about anything, he crawled up to one of the guards legs and hugged it, crying. "I surrender! I confess to multiple charges of assault, battery, foalnapping, smuggling and stealing cookies from fillyscouts! I'll go to jail, just please, PLEASE, DON'T LET THAT CRAZY FILLY NEAR ME!" While the two guards scratched their heads and wondered between each other what to do with this, Moondancer and Spike swallowed, worried about what they would find there. "There we go!" Twilight smiled to herself, as she ended the double ashley stopper knot on the two incapacitated thugs, sitting back to back, their eyes still going in circles. It was a lot harder than it looked in the book. The knot, not taking out two oversized stallions, that was quite easy. I gotta thank Sunset for showing me that move, it's super effective! Too bad the third one escaped, but I can't leave those two just lying here, or Shiny. She sighed with relief, glad that, for once, she was the one who did the saving. After all those years of being the small, weak filly, she was now strong enough to protect her brother by herself and that was all that mattered. She went to the cart and forcefully opened the trunk with her magic, wincing her eye at her brother's figure, huddled in such tight space, tied up, with his entire head covered by a paper bag with just a few small holes for breathing. Judging by the muffled sounds he was making, he was gagged as well. And seeing as the cart and gangsters were still intact when she found them, they must've used a combination of magic nullifying rings and a liberal dose of sedatives to keep him down. "You poor little soul, it's okay, I'm here," she cooed the stallion, who stopped struggling, which meant that at least he could hear her "it's me, Twilight! I came to save you from those thugs. Here, let me help you!" She levitated the body back to the ground, cutting the ties before gently putting him back. "Before you say anything, yes, I know it was dangerous and yes, I could've gotten hurt. But I couldn't just leave you! I don't know what those guys wanted to do with you, but you're safe here, with me! I promise I won't ever leave your side and I'll be there when you need me." Even through the paper bag she could see how he tilted his head and cooed, despite the gag. She wanted to get out her speech without interruption, but maybe keeping the bag on the entire time was a bit too much, so she finally took it off along with the gag and stared at his face. And stared. And stared. And stared... "You're not BBBFF!" "For you, my lovely guardian angel, I will be anything you want!" The stranger said back to her, smiling like a lovestruck colt, even though he was clearly a lot older than her BBBFF. One quick glance at his rear (which after recent events she was adamantly avoiding looking at) revealed that his cutie mark, while similar, was shaped like a different triangle, though the colors matched that of her brothers. The stranger picked up her hoof and kissed it, though she was too confused to notice. "I accept your feelings, Twilight! Even though we have just met, it wasn't an accident that connected us, but destiny! For ours is blah blah blah..." B-but, it can't be! If he's not here, than where is he? What happened? Is he still out there? Is there a second foalnapping somewhere in the city? "...blah blah blah..." I... I don't know what to do... where do I go... what is... why... but... "TWILIGHT!" As called, Twilight slowly turned her head backwards, ignoring the stranger who kept on talking, which she tuned out long ago, and saw Spike, along with Moondancer and a city guard. The guard stopped on his tracks when he noticed the two tied up thugs. "Hey, I recognize those two! They are Assault and Battery, they're enforcers of Al Capony! We've been trying to track those two for months!" Moondancer raised an eyebrow, but ignored that matter in favor of the more important one. She went closer to Twilight, eyeing the not-Shining Armor guy that kept pestering Twilight, even if she didn't notice him. "Twilight, you do realize there's some guy over there, right?" Twilight didn't react to that, but pulled her hoof away from stranger's embrace and walked a few steps closer to Moondancer. "M-Moonie..." A few tears appeared in her eyes. Moondancer sighed and raised her hoof, inviting her into her embrace. "C'mere, let it all out." And so she did, landing in the welcoming shoulder of her best friend, crying herself out while recapping the last few hours of her life. "We went to the station and Spike wanted to ride on my back but I told him no because it's bad to reward foals for bad behavior but he's not a foal and he wasn't acting bad at all so I let him and I don't know if it's right but we got there and we did a crosswords and I almost forgot who murdered his father in the Gryphon kingdoms and when the train got here I glomped at some mare with nice rear even though I didn't want to look at it but it was pretty and Spike agreed with me but BBBFF wasn't there so I looked and found three thugs and I got two but one escaped but I didn't look for him because Shiny was in the cart but he wasn't Shiny and I don't even know who he is or where my big... brother... is... I... I don't know... I just... I just..." Moondancer patted her friend's head gently. "There, there, sweetie, it's alright, I'm here. Shining Armor is alright." Twilight's ears perked. "Y-you mean, you found him?" Moondancer shook her head. "No. Twily, don't you remember? Shining Armor is..." Meanwhile, back in the academy dormitories, Sunset Shimmer had an epiphany. Wait a minute, wasn't Shining Armor supposed to come tommorow? She hummed, then shrugged. Eh, she's a smart filly, she'll figure it out. "T-twilight?" Moondancer asked, waving a hoof before her friend's eyes. "Hello, anypony home?" CRITICAL ERROR An unexpected error has occurred while running Sparkle.exe. You done goofed! System will now reboot. Retry / Ignore / Abort / Whatever "Twilight? Twilight!" Moondancer groaned and turned to the dragon librarian. "Spike, call Princess Celestia. Your mother broke again." Meanwhile, in Golden Oaks Library, Ponyville. "I'm back!" Shining Armor happily announced as he crossed the doors with bags of groceries. Prince Blueblood looked at his roommate, annoyed and slightly hungry. "You're late. Where were you?" "Funny story," he waved his hoof as he unpacked the bags "I was going around the market when Daisy, the flower mare, asked for help with some loose hinges on the door, so I couldn't just ignore her!" He paused and completely missed the eye rolling that ensued "They wanted to pay me for mz troubles, but I couldn't accept it. In the end one of her friends, the tiny one, uh... what was her name again?" He hummed, touching his chin with his hoof as he tried to remember. "There's Daisy; the red maned one that doesn't like me is Rose and... uh, I always forget her name..." "Lily?" "Yes! She gave me bouquet of lillies as a token of gratitude. Guess what's for dinner today?" "Surprise me. I pity that mare." He coughed and quickly changed the topic. "Anyway, your sister sent you a message, she was asking if you were home." "Huh, Twily did? What did she want?" "No idea. I was expecting a reply, but nothing came. Should I call her back and ask for details?" Shining Armor thought for a moment, then waved his hoof. "Nah, if it was important she would've called back. It's probably nothing that can't wait until tomorrow."