Aside from Crystal Heart's visit, the rest of the morning was visitor free. After Twilight Sparkle showed her parents the ribbon from The Running of The Leaves (for participating and completing it, she had not been anywhere near fast enough to place), Twilight Velvet and Night Light shared photos taken during their trip. Night Light claimed that there were even some pictures from other parts of their trip, although not exactly the kind that were family friendly. This got a playful swat from Velvet and grossed out faces from the others (with plenty of gagging noises from Spike).
Shortly after noon, the front door opened and two young ponies walked in. The two made their way toward the group, a cream colored pegasus colt leading the way, while a yellow unicorn filly followed close behind. Seeing them, Twilight hopped off her seat and moved toward the pair, smiling.
"Pound, Pumpkin, what are you doing here?"
Pound Cake -- the creamy colt -- and Pumpkin -- the yellow filly -- look at Twilight, then up at her parents. A brief glance was exchanged between the two before focusing on Twilight Velvet. The pair of young ponies let their ears droop and made their eyes wide, sticking their lower lips out and trembling.
The double-barreled sad puppy faces struck Twilight Velvet point blank dead-on. While she was a well experienced veteran when it came to motherhood, in all her years, she only ever had to deal with a single sad puppy face at a time. Not so much that she was totally immune to it, but enough that she had some resistance. However, she had never faced dual puppy faces.
"Is... is it true?" Pound Cake asked, his voice trembling slightly.
"Are... are you really going to take our best friend away?" Pumpkin then asked, her voice also trembling.
The two of them then gave a sad sniffle.
The pair got Twilight Velvet to wince, looking away. She moved to rub at the back of her head, trying not to notice the two still watching her.
"It's... it's not that simple," she said. "We don't want to take her away from her friends. It's just that..."
She made the mistake of looking at them again, just at they had started to tear up and their lip trembling grew stronger. Velvet grimaced and looked away, trying not to break fully.
"It just... Discord... and parasprites..." She turned away again, trying to get the looks out view.
She could still feel them.
"Pound Cake!" a voice called out. "Pumpkin Cake! You put those faces away this instant and leave her alone."
The twins turned to face a chubby blue earth pony mare who was giving them a hard look.
"But Mom," they both whined out.
"Don't 'but' me!" their mother -- Mrs. Cake -- snapped. "Now," she pointed a hoof toward the door, "I want the two of you to head back to Sugarcube Corner this instant. March!"
With sighs, the two of them sagged. Turning away from Twilight Velvet and their mother, the twins made their way for the door.
"I'm sorry about that," Mrs. Cake said as she faced Velvet. "As soon as Pinkie Pie told them about Twiley leaving, they took off to come here as soon as they could."
"It's... it's okay," Velvet replied. "They... I guess they meant well."
"Perhaps, but still. Please, come by the bakery later, and I'll give you some treats on me to make up for it."
"Thank you."
"Oh, don't thank me," Mrs. Cake declared. "I'm hoping to convince you to let her stay as well." She gave the other mare a grin. "I'm just willing to try and butter you up and bribe you with sugary treats in the hopes you'll at least listen and consider." She started to walk as well. "See you all later. Stop by whenever you like."
"Guess we should have expected that," Spike said. "You think other ponies'll show up too?"
With lunchtime upon them, the family decided to have a nice picnic outside. All of them made their way to the kitchen, preparing sandwiches, getting bottles of juice, making salad wraps, and finding some small pastries for dessert. Spike grabbed the picnic blanket while Twilight offered to carry the basket. Although she did not have much skill with her magic yet, she did have enough to hold and balance the thing on her back.
The five of them enjoyed the cool autumn air as they went. The ground was still damp from the early morning rain, their steps leaving paths in the grass and letting them know where others had walked before. A slight breeze blew through the air, making the afternoon almost chilly. Shining Armor led the way, while Night Light and Velvet looked for prime picnic spots. A task they found a little more difficult as none of the deciduous trees had any leaves remaining, granting neither shade, nor a chance to look at the lovely colors.
"Hey!" a voice called out. "Shining!"
Turning toward the sound, Shining Armor found him and the group being approached by the light blue form of Sonata Dusk. As the earth pony mare approached, Shining Armor could feel his face heating up. He could still remember the dream from last night. The feel of her against him. The touch of her lips to his. The teasing, flirtatious look in her eye. His mouth felt a little dry at the sight of her, and he could feel his heart beating faster in his chest.
"Son," Night Light said from beside him, "aren't you going to introduce us?"
"Right," Shining said with a shake of his head. "Dad, Mom, this is Sonata Dusk, who's moved to town recently. Sonata, these are my parents, Night Light and Twilight Velvet."
"Nice to meet ya'," Sonata said with a smile. "Your son's been super nice in helping me fit in. Everypony has really. It's a great place." Turning, she reached into her saddle bag. "Anyway, here." She pulled out a flyer and held it out to them. "I got a gig next weekend, and am passing out flyers to as many ponies as I can. I wanted to especially give one to you since you let me sing at that Iron Mare competition. Hope to see you there."
"Iron Mare competition?" Velvet asked once Sonata had walked away.
"Twiley didn't mention that to you?" Shining asked. After he got a shake of the heads from both parents, he started to explain.
"Well, it was just a few days before The Running of The Leaves..."
After the story and looking around a while longer, they finally found a place that looked like a decent picnic spot. It was near one of the dirt roads that headed out of town. The spot also was also near one of the small ponds that were scattered throughout the surrounding countryside. There must have been some frogs living around it as small musical croaks reached the groups ears from time to time.
Their meal was suddenly interrupted as a sky blue pegasus mare flew by, landing hard enough to skid across the ground, kicking up dirt and grass in the process. Her head snapped around to face them, rainbow colored mane and tail flapping in the wind. Her rose colored eyes were narrowed and mouth set hard. Wings flared out, she stomped over toward the group. Or tried to at least. The effort was lost when a bandaged hoof slammed into the ground, causing her to wince. Reaching the edge of the blanket, ears pulled back, she glared at the two older unicorns.
"What's this about you taking Twilight away from Shining Armor?" she growled.
"Rainbow Dash!" Shining Armor snapped. "That's no way to act. Especially to my parents."
The anger with which he said her name caused Rainbow Dash to jump, turning to look at him. Looking away, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath, slowly letting it out. Her entire body relaxed with it, sagging slightly. Pulling her wings back in to her side, she lowered her head a little further.
"You're right." Turning to the parents, she looked up. "I'm sorry. It's just..."
Shifting, she sat down as one of her forelegs rubbed at the other.
"Pinkie Pie told me what was happening," she said, "and I know how much the kid means to you. So when I heard she might be leaving, and thought about how much you missed her--"
"You got all hot-headed," Shining Armor jumped in, "took off to find us, and didn't think it all the way through."
A small, sheepish laugh escaped Rainbow Dash. Pulling the hoof away from her foreleg, she rubbed at the back of her head instead. It was, admittedly, not a claim she could argue with. Especially since it was true in this case.
"Bet this is going to keep happening all day," Spike mumbled as he grabbed another sandwich.
"Well, Miss Dash," Twilight Velvet said, "would you care to join us, and perhaps -- in a more calmly manner -- explain why you think it is such a good idea for my daughter to stay?"
Dash moved a little closer and sat down. One of the sandwiches was offered to her, and she took a bite.
"Look," she said as she chewed, "I'll admit I'm not good with kids. Never really had any siblings myself."
Shining Armor had to bite his lip to keep from arguing. She may have forgotten about it, but he remembered how she threw herself head on into danger to save a certain filly that was very much like Rainbow Dash.
"But if I had an older brother or sister," Dash continued, "I would want them to be like Shining Armor." She then looked at him and Twilight. "And if I did have a younger sibling, I'd would hope that I could be half as good as he is. Hay, the only ponies I could say better about would be Mac and AJ, but that's kinda different."
"As nice as that is," Velvet said, "it hardly deals with the matter of the dangers from living here."
"Ponyville's not that dangerous," Rainbow Dash replied. "And even if it is a little more than other places, in a way, your Twiley is probably the safest filly in the world."
"How so?"
"When I met them," Dash explained, "I accidentally bumped into them and... caused Twilight to scrape her knee. When Shining Armor noticed, he was about ready to tear me a new one."
"A new what?" Twilight asked, looking up curiously.
"... I don't know..." Rainbow Dash replied, looking away. "It's just a figure of speech I've heard a lot.
"Anyway, my point is that so long as Shining Armor is around, nothing is going to hurt your daughter. And if anything actually did try to threaten her -- to say nothing of hurting her -- I'm pretty sure he would make the worst monsters in the deepest depths of Tartarus shake in fear of his anger, and rip apart Canterlot Mountain with his bare hooves to find her."
Rainbow Dash then continued on her sandwich in silence, leaving the others staring at her, and Night Light and Twilight Velvet considering what she had said.