Rainbow's Radical Reunion and Ridiculously Rambunctious Romp
Cloud Kicker was finally coming to visit Ponyville, and I was pregnant.
Well okay, not really pregnant. That would be crazy. But I had a pretty reasonably convincing fake pregnancy belly thing. Cloud let me know she was gonna be visiting a month before she actually showed up, so there had been plenty of time to get everything ready. I had to give her a ‘Welcome to Ponyville’ prank. It was like one of her banging rules, except this one was about something that actually mattered.
So anyway, for something as big as faking a pregnancy, I needed a partner-in-crime. After all, there would be lots of obvious questions like ‘who’s the sire?’ that I would need a good answer for. Yeah, I could’ve just said I didn’t know or blamed some random stallion, but it would work a lot better if I had another pony backing me up. That’s where Lyra came in.
Lyra Heartstrings was an old banging buddy of Kicker’s, who’d moved to Ponyville a couple months back. We’d first gotten to know each other over at the Ponyville bowling alley. I’d gone there with some of the other weather ponies after work for a friendly game. I was winning, naturally, but then somepony saw Lyra playing in another lane, and getting more or less the same score I was. Naturally, I couldn’t let such a challenge go unanswered.
After a bowling battle I totally won (mostly, that bit at the end didn’t count) we decided to hang out for a bit, and pretty soon it came out that we both knew Cloud Kicker, and liked pranks. So once Kicker told me she was gonna come to Ponyville for a visit after she graduated from West Hoof ... well, there was only one thing we could do. Seriously, with a setup like that it would’ve been a crime not to prank her.
With a month to get ready, we’d had plenty of time to cover all our bases. We’d come up with a fake pregnant-me belly that would easily pass inspection. At first I’d wanted to have it be Lyra that got knocked up, but she shot that down ‘cause Kicker might freak out and think she’d gotten Lyra pregnant. I guess Lyra had a point there about that going a bit too far—I wanted to freak Kicker out and get her good, but not to the point where she was, like, seriously freaking out and stuff.
So, we’d settled on it being me who was pregnant, while Lyra was the sire. After that, it was just a matter of getting a couple other ponies in on it, at least enough that I wouldn’t have random ponies I know flying up and asking why the hay I suddenly looked all pregnant and stuff. Cloud Kicker and I had been pranking buddies back at Flight Camp, and it’s always tricky to prank a prankster. The tiniest screw-up, and we’d be so busted.
Lyra turned to me, grinning like mad and practically bouncing up and down with excitement. “You ready for this? Because I can’t wait to finally nail her! I’ve got practically everypony in town in on it, so there’s no way anypony’s gonna blow our cover!”
I was just about as excited as she was. Between having the most radical prank in the history of pranking set up and the flat-out coolness factor of Cloud Kicker coming to visit, this was gonna be the best day ever! “I know! This is gonna be so awesome!” I was so worked up that my voice actually got a little squeaky there at the end.
My pranking partner gave a couple eager nods, then dropped her voice down to a conspiratorial whisper. We didn’t need to whisper about it really, but it just feels prank-ier when you do things that way. “Okay, start acting all pregnant and stuff. Basically, lots of moaning.”
I frowned and cocked my head to the side. “Pregnant ponies moan?”
She let out an annoyed little huff. “I thought we'd gone through all this? Don’t you remember everything we worked out about about how to fake being pregnant?”
“Yeah, I remember.” We’d actually done some research at the library, and I’d made a trip back home to ask Cool-Mom about it. This prank had to be just perfect. “I remember everything, but there was so much stuff! Seriously, Cool-Mom just went on and on, plus I had to separate all the sappy stuff about how wonderful it felt from what I actually needed.” Although I guess it had been kinda cool, hearing about how happy Cool-Mom was about being pregnant with me and stuff. I just wish she hadn’t gotten all lovey-dovey about it. I needed pranking advice, not my mom hugging me and going on about what a beautiful foal I’d been.
On top of that, then Awesomom got all curious about why I was asking pregnancy questions, and I had to make something up. I guess I could’ve just told them it was a prank, but then Awesomom would wanna give me pranking advice, and that would mess everything up. I mean, getting advice on how to act pregnant was okay, but if Awesomom was showing me how to do the prank, then it wouldn’t really be my prank anymore.
Lyra gave a sympathetic nod. “Yeah, my mom got pretty sappy on me too when I asked her for advice. Must be a mom thing. Anyway, just give it your best shot, okay?”
“Yeah yeah, this’ll be easy.” I took a deep breath and got my mind into the pranking zone. “Oh, wow, I am soooo pregnant. I’m, like, the pregnantest pony in the history of pregnant ponies!”
“Oh wow, yeah!” Lyra nodded along. “So when are you expecting?”
We’d worked out an answer for that a while ago, but I decided to throw that out and say something cooler. “Like, I'm so pregnant I could be popping the kid out any minute now! Right here in the train station and everything!”
“Now that would be awkward!” Lyra let out an amused snort. “Maybe I should get some water ready, so we can pretend to have your water break too.” She took a look around the train station. The place wasn’t all that busy, but there were a couple other ponies waiting for the train from Canterlot. Nothing obvious for setting up some kind of fake water-breaking thing, though. “How long before the train’s supposed to get here, anyway? Dangit, a month to plan and we had to get a great idea for how to make the prank even better five minutes before she shows up...”
I was gonna tell her to stop wasting time talking and get to work already, but then I spotted the train. “Aw feathers, too late now. We’re just gonna have to improvise.” Wouldn’t be the first time I’d had to wing it on a prank—hay, back when I was a kid my prank planning was pretty much just me getting an awesome idea for a prank, and then me going out and doing it. Kicker’d kinda gotten me in the habit of planning my pranks out a bit more—so really, she’d kinda brought this on herself if you think about it.
Lyra started actually jumping up and down as the train pulled into the station. “Ohmygosh ohmygosh here it is!” After a couple more bounces she took a deep breath and tried to take inspiration from me to calm down and get her head in the pranking game.
Some crazy little part of my brain wanted to let out an excited little squeal like I was still a schoolfilly, but I was way too cool for that. Mostly. Look, the important thing was that I definitely kept my cool. “This is gonna be the best prank ever!”
“Hay yes it is!” Lyra and I exchanged a quick hoof bump, then got our game faces on. Getting your pranking game face on is a big deal. I mean, first you gotta get all serious and ready to go, and then you have make yourself look like you’re not all serious and prank-planning. After all, looking like you’re in the middle of planning a big prank is kind of a huge giveaway that you’re up to something, and it’s a lot harder to prank somepony who knows it’s coming.
Then Cloud Kicker stepped off the train, and for a little bit I forgot all about the pranking. What can I say? Seeing one of my PFFs again just felt all kinds of awesome. Sure, Kicker and I had gone through a lot of ups and downs, but we were friends. I just wanted this visit to be the most radical thing in the history of radical things, because now that she was fixing to go into the Guard we probably wouldn’t get to hang out very much. She’d be too busy kicking dragons in the face and stuff to hang out with me.
Anyway, she looked like her usual awesome-but-not-quite-as-awesome-as-me self. I was a little disappointed that she wasn’t wearing some of that Guard armor, ‘cause she probably would’ve looked pretty cool in it. I mean, she’d looked alright in her uniform and cadet armor, so the real thing would have to look even more hardcore, right?
Eh, whatever. I guess it wouldn’t really be fair for me to expect her to really understand coolness as well as I do. I mean, asking another pony to be as cool as I am just isn’t a very realistic thing to wish for. I waved a foreleg to get her attention. “Kicker! Over here!”
Lyra joined in on the waving, but she was acting all energetic and eager about it instead of being cool and laid back like I was. “Kicky!”
Cloud got about two steps off the train before Lyra hit her with a tackle-hug. For just a second, I was a bit annoyed that she got to hug Kicker first instead of me. It’s not like I wanted to get all sappy and stuff, but I kinda wanted to be the first one to hug her. After all, I’d known Cloud Kicker way longer than Lyra did. I guess that all works though—it’s not like I wanted this turning into some big emotional reunion where we spend all day crying and talking about how much we missed each other and stuff. I have a reputation to maintain.
Too bad Lyra didn’t get the memo on playing things cool. Sure enough, she was getting all misty-eyed while she hugged the hay out of Cloud Kicker. “I missed you so much, Cloudy! It feels like it’s been forever!”
Cloud tightened her grip on the unicorn, which got me shuffling a bit and clearing my throat. I mean, I had been a bit worried that if she hugged me too hard she might knock my fake pregnant belly off or figure out it wasn’t real, but she could hug me a little. Instead of being all over Lyra and ignoring me.
Then Lyra went and pushed things right into crazy territory. “Kiss. Now. Gimme.”
Kicker being the banging-crazy pony she’d turned into since Flight Camp, she went and locked lips with Lyra right then and there. Seriously, I was right next to them, and there were ponies watching and stuff. Well, nopony was actually watching them kiss, but they could be, and it was weird to do stuff like that out in public. Why did Cloud Kicker have to be such a weirdo? Oh yeah, and I should probably say something about the fact that Cloud was kissing the supposed sire of my foal. “Sheesh, get a room, you two.”
Cloud finally stopped getting all slobbery with Lyra, thank Celestia, and started paying attention to me, like she should’ve been doing the whole time. She hadn’t even noticed I was knocked up yet! But instead of saying anything about that, she just turned to me and grinned. “I think somepony’s jealous. You want a kiss too, Dashie?” She pursed her lips at me and started making a bunch of kissy noises.
Yeah, that wasn’t happening. “No way!” I put my forehooves on her chest and shoved her back. Not hard or anything, but enough to keep her out of range. “You can't kiss me, I'm pregnant!”
That got Cloud to stop joking about kissing me, at least. “Bwuh?” She blinked a few times, then looked down at my big fake belly. “Huh. Well that’s ... huh. That’s—that’s certainly something.”
Lyra jumped in to cover her part of the prank. “Oh! We should've told you first thing. We're just so used to it.” She trotted over and put a foreleg across my back, then grinned at Cloud. “See, Dash and I banged and, well—happy accident.”
I nodded along and tried to act all couple-y with Lyra. “Yeah. And now I'm, like, massively pregnant and stuff. I could start popping out kids any minute now.”
“Yeah, sure.” Uh oh, didn’t look like Cloud was buying it. “So you two found enough true love to start making kids?”
“Hay yes we did!” I was really gonna have to sell this, or the prank wouldn’t work. “We’re crazy in love! I’m completely nuts about her!’
“Yeah.” Lyra tightened her foreleg around me, and I resisted the urge to shrug her off. I’m usually not a touchy-feely kinda pony, but if I was gonna pretend that me and Lyra were a thing I needed to put on a good act. “We're totally in love,” Lyra continued. “I’m sure if you give me a couple minutes, I could come up with a song about it.”
“Yeah, sure you could.” Kicker was still looking pretty skeptical, but before I could come up with some other way to convince her that this whole pregnancy thing was completely legit she smirked at us. “So, if you two are having a baby, you'd be fine with kissing each other right here and now, wouldn't you?”
Aw horseapples. Okay, the most important thing was not to panic, ‘cause as long as I didn’t start panicking I could figure out a way out of this. Not that I was scared or nervous or anything, but I didn’t want Lyra panicking. “Oh yeah! Sure, we can kiss. We do that kind of thing all the time! And all the other stuff too! We have loads of sex—like, sometimes we do it a dozen times a night! ‘Cause that’s what couples who are crazy in love which each other do.” I cleared my throat. “So yeah, we could totally kiss and stuff. I’m just not in the mood right now, is all.”
For some reason, Kicker was frowning at me and just generally looking completely unconvinced. No idea why, ‘cause I’d done an awesome job of acting all couple-y and stuff just then. Before I could come up with another, even more awesome plan Lyra decided to take the lead, setting her forehooves on my shoulders and kinda getting into my personal space. “C'mon, Rainbow, gimme a kissy for your foal's other mom.”
She had to be kidding, right? I shot a look at those mint-green lips very slowly moving towards mine, then over to Kicker. Cloud didn’t look nearly freaked out enough—in fact, she was kinda waving her hoof and signalling us to just get on with it already.
Okay, I guess I was gonna have to go through with this. It’s not like it was a big deal or anything. I mean, it was just a single stupid little kiss. I could do that, no problem. I slowly pursed my lips and started leaning towards Lyra. It must’ve been cold out, ‘cause I was shaking just a little bit. I’d have to check that nothing weird was going on with the weather later.
Lyra puckered up as I got closer. Oh yeah, I should probably get my lips all sticky-outy too. That’s something ponies are supposed to do when they kiss, right? I also really needed to check on the weather ponies, ‘cause now they somehow had things so messed up that I was sweating like crazy and trembling at the same time. Stupid weather ponies messing up the weather to make it do weird stuff. But what other explanation could there be?
Lyra leaned in close enough that I could feel her breath on my lips, and now the weather had gotten so crazy that my cheeks were getting all hot. It almost felt like I was blushing, but that obviously couldn’t be what was going on. Sheesh, Lyra must be really freaking out right now about having to kiss me. So, I decided to help her out, and leaned in the rest of the way, very lightly brushing my lips against hers, then backing off. I didn’t wanna kiss her too much or anything, just enough to do the job. “S—see Cloud Kicker? We’re totally together!”
For some reason, Lyra facehoofed and Cloud was just looking at me and grinning. What was up with that? I’d kissed her and everything. “I don't buy it,” Cloud was frowning skeptically at the two of us. “I’m not exactly an expert on the subject, but I’m pretty sure that was no true love's kiss.”
“Oh come on!” I grumbled. “Were you even watching? My lips totally touched hers and everything!”
“I’ve seen you kiss your moms with more passion than that,” Kicker shot back.
“Ew. And bleg.” I shook my head to get rid of that mental image. “Biiiiig difference between a fillyfriend and my moms, 'kay? Don’t get all gross on me, Cloud.”
Cloud Kicker rolled her eyes at me. “I’m just saying, if you want me to buy this whole ‘Lyra and I are lovers’ thing, you’ll need to kiss her like you mean it.”
“That was just a warm-up kiss,” Lyra announced, popping a mint. “Dash always needs a bit to get into it. She’s shy that way.”
“Yeah, sure, that’s it.” Cloud let out an amused half-snort. “Seriously, you two. If you’re gonna prank me, you can do better than that. Were you even trying?”
“Oh that is it!” I might not be much for all that stupid sappy romantic stuff, but nopony, and I mean nopony, questions my dedication to pranking. “You want true love? Fine! Here’s your true love!” Before I could take any time to start second guessing myself, I marched right up to Lyra, grabbed her, dipped her down, and planted a big old smooch right on her lips.
For the record, kissing Lyra was weird. And wet. And minty. What was I supposed to be doing with my lips anyway? I mean, aside from getting them onto hers? After a little bit Lyra started kissing back, so I just tried to mimic what she was doing.
Okay, so that’s one thing dealt with. Too bad I still had no idea what I was supposed to be doing with my hooves. Or my wings—was I supposed to force a wingie, or just focus on keeping us balanced? Well, at least the hoof thing got answered when I felt one of Lyra’s hooves running down along my side. Before I could copy that, though, her hoof brushed against one of the straps holding my fake preggobelly on.
I backed off and quickly tried to get it back on, but it was too little, too late. A second later the strap we’d gone to all the trouble of painting blue so it wouldn’t stand out gave way completely, and then the whole thing flopped off to the side, still loosely hanging from the left-hoof strap.
Aw horseapples, busted. “Um...” I let out a sheepish chuckle while I desperately tried to think of something really clever to say that could get me out of this. When nothing came to mind, I decided to just wing it—trying to plan the whole thing out hadn’t really worked anyway. I whirled on Lyra, and put on my best shocked and betrayed look. “You lied to me, Lyra! How could you?”
Lyra seemed to be mentally scrambling for an answer too, if the way she was sweating and her eyes were darting all over the place was any indication. After a couple seconds, she came up with a good answer. “It's just a complication, those happen with pregnancies. That's the mother of all detached placentas, I'll tell ya!”
Cloud just smirked and shook her head. “It was a nice try, but you two really should’ve thought things through. That’s always been the problem with your pranks, Dash. Great ideas, but you always overlook the little details, and that’s what trips you up.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Stupid Cloud Kicker and her ‘you should plan things out and account for all the variables and stuff’ way of pranking. Yeah, I guess her way of doing things usually worked out alright, but it was so boring to just sit around planning and stuff when we could’ve gone out and done the prank already. Sure, you gotta do some planning to get a good prank, but she just kept worrying about every single stupid little detail that probably wouldn’t matter. “I’m still gonna call this prank ninety percent successful, though. Admit it, we totally had you going there for a while, didn’t we? I had the fake belly and everything! We even kissed!”
Oh yeah, I’d kissed Lyra. Bleck. Well, it’s not like she was gross or anything. I guess it was okay. But just kissing her at all was weird.
“Well, you certainly had an interesting idea and took a good try at it.” Cloud admitted, before hitting me with that annoying ‘I’m smarter than you are’ smile again. “There’s just one thing you didn’t think about. When was the last time you came to visit me?”
“While you were on spring break from West Hoof.” That had been pretty cool, too. I spent a whole week hanging out with her clan, getting to do practice stuff with them and even getting to try out some of the weapons and armor they use. The whole thing had almost been awesome enough for me start thinking about trying out the Guard if the whole Wonderbolt thing didn’t work out. Not that I needed a backup plan, since I was obviously gonna get into the Wonderbolts any day now.
“Exactly.” From the tone of her voice, Cloud sounded like that was important, somehow, but I didn’t get it. Lyra facehoofed pretty hard though, so there was obviously something to it. “How long ago was spring break, Rainbow Dash?”
“Like, two or three months ago,” I answered.
“Well, there you have it,” Cloud announced with a satisfied nod.
“There you have what?” I demanded, waving my hooves in the air. “So I visited you two months ago. Big deal.”
“You weren’t pregnant two months ago.” Cloud shot me a level look. “If you were ‘so pregnant that the kid could pop out any minute now’ then you sure as hay would’ve been showing two months ago. Not to mention that you’ve sent me at least a dozen letters in that time, and never once mentioned it before today? Pregnancy is kind of a big deal, you know.”
“Oh, yeah.” Stupid eleven-month equine pregnancy cycles. Should’ve stayed with my original plan of just throwing water balloons at her instead. Sometimes, the best thing to do is stick with the classics.
“Well we failed,” Lyra grumbled, crossing her forelegs over her chest and pouting. “Damn it.”
Cloud was still looking at the two of us like we were a couple of foals she’d caught raiding the cookie jar. “Yup, you two are completely busted.”
“Eh, whatever.” I shrugged and took the preggobelly off. “Not every prank works perfectly.” It’s just part of the pranking profession—even a prankster as awesome as I am isn’t gonna nail the target with every single prank. Not that I’d made a mistake or anything, but sometimes stuff happens even when I get everything perfect on my end. S’just bad luck, is all. “I’ll just get you twice as good next time to make up for it.”
Lyra nodded along like a proper veteran prankster. “Sounds like a plan, Rainbow.” She turned back to Kicker and grinned. “It's not like you could do anything to stop us, anyway.”
“Not true.” Ugh, Cloud just would not wipe that smarmy grin off her face. “I can prank you back. For the record, I wouldn’t make mistakes like not remembering that I’d visited my prank targets a couple months ago when I’m trying to pretend I’m eleven months pregnant.”
Ugh, she was probably gonna keep bringing that up for years. Stupid details, why do they always have to screw up my awesome prank ideas? “Yeah, well good luck trying to prank me. I’m completely unprankable. I’ve got eyes like an eagle, and ears like a—well, something with good ears. And that’s not all! I’m, like, swift as a coursing river, got all the force of a great typhoon, and all the strength of a raging fire! Short version is, I’m awesome.”
Lyra let out a little snort. “Not to mention incredibly modest,” she murmured under her breath.
“Yes, yes, it’s all true.” I buffed a hoof against my chest. After all, I could go on all day about why I’m cool, and I’d limited myself to just a couple seconds. I didn’t wanna brag too much and make it look like I had a big head. “So yeah, stuff went off track with the prank, probably ‘cause Lyra messed up somewhere. But you have to admit, if we’d pulled it off that would’ve been an epic prank, right? It was all my idea, too! She was just, like, backup or something.”
Lyra let out an annoyed huff of breath. “Excuse me? I messed up?! You were the one who forgot that oh so important detail of visiting Kicky during her spring break!”
“Okay, so maybe we both made mistakes,” I conceded. “You more than me, but whatever.” I could totally be the bigger mare about this.
“Wow,” Cloud commented dryly. “You two are just paragons of loyalty and maturity. So what was the plan for after you pranked me?”
Lyra thought about it for a bit, then shrugged. “I don't know, we didn’t plan that far ahead.”
“You didn’t plan for anything beyond the first minute after I stepped off the train? That’s—” Cloud Kicker paused, looked at the two of us, and just sighed. “That’s probably something I shouldn’t be surprised by, considering the ponies I’m dealing with.”
“You and your whole planning thing.” I rolled my eyes and blew a chunk of my forelock out of my eyes. “We’re just gonna do the same thing we do every time we get together. Something awesome?”
“Yes. That.” Lyra nodded along in agreement.
Cloud rubbed a hoof under her chin for a bit, then nodded. “Awesome, sounds great. There any good hangout spots here?”
“Yeah, there’s lots of great places for such a small town!” Lyra smirked over at Cloud and flicked her tail. “We could go back to my place, but...” She paused and shot a speculative look my way, then shrugged. “Well, I wouldn’t mind bringing Dash along for that, but I’m not sure how the two of you would feel about a threesome. If that’s out, we could always just go to Sugarcube Corner. I heard they were baking up a new batch of mint cupcakes today.”
I wasn’t sure whether I should shudder in horror or just facehoof, so I settled for doing both. “Okay, first off, you’re pretty okay Lyra, but a threesome is just gross. Especially with Kicker there. That’s just ... no.” Seriously, why do I always end up hanging out with ponies who get all stupid about banging? I guess it was my own fault for spending time with one of Cloud Kicker’s old banging buddies, but still. “And your other idea’s almost as bad. If we go to Sugarcube Corner, we’ll probably end up running into ... her.” I shivered again, and this one I’ll admit had nothing to do with the weather. Some things are just that scary, messed up, and wrong.
Lyra frowned at me and cocked her head to the side. “Who are you talking about? Do you mean Pinkie P—”
I shoved a hoof into her mouth to cut her off. “Don’t say her name!” I all but shouted at her. “I swear, she’s got some kinda freaky ability to know when ponies are talking about her or something. She’s like one of those fairy tale creatures from the stories, where if you say her name three times she’ll just pop outta thin air.”
Lyra pointedly removed my hoof. “You’re being completely ridiculous,” she grumbled. “She’s a perfectly ordinary—okay, she’s a mildly insane and incredibly hyperactive pony, but she’s just a pony. Look, I’ll prove it.” She took a deep breath. “Pinkie Pie Pinkie Pie Pinkie Pie.”
A second later, the fake preggobelly I’d set off to the side exploded into a mass of confetti accompanied by the sound of those noisemaker things that always show up at parties. Then I saw her. The Pink Terror herself. “Hiya!”
Lyra was the first one to recover, maybe because she’d been the one to unleash the Pink Horror upon us. “Huh. Didn’t think that would actually work. How ‘bout that?” She smirked over at Cloud Kicker. “Told you Dash was pregnant.”
“Lyra, shut up!” I hissed at her. “She’ll—”
Before I could get any further a wall of pink slammed into me, and immediately started trying to break all of my ribs. “Ohmygosh, you’re pregnant? I’m sooooooo happy for you! I love babies!”
“I’m not pregnant, it was just a stupid prank that didn’t even work!” I planted my hooves on Pinkie Pie’s chest and tried to shove her away, but instead she just latched on even tighter. Seriously, had she never even heard of personal space? “Dang it, get off! I don’t want your weird freaky hugs!” Despite my best efforts to get rid of her, she just seemed to be attaching herself more and more firmly to me, until I was pretty sure the only way to get rid of her would be to just chew my leg off or something. That would almost be worth it, if it meant she would never bother me again, but I decided to try out something a bit less painful first. “Hey, Pinkie, there’s a new pony!”
A second later she stopped trying to hug me to death, thank Celestia. Instead she was standing nose-to-nose with Cloud Kicker, with a big stupid smile on her face. “Hi! I’m Pinkie Pie! What’s your name? Are you a friend of Dashie’s? I hope you are, ‘cause I’ve never seen you before, and I know everypony in Ponyville so if I don’t know you then that means you must be new! So if you’re not friends with Dashie then that means you wouldn’t have any friends in Ponyville, so you’d be all lonely and sad and that would be terrible! Don’t worry though, ‘cause I’m gonna be your new bestest best friend forever!”
The pink madmare tried to charge in and hug Cloud to death, but when Pinkie closed her forelegs, CK just wasn’t there anymore. She must’ve done some slick Krav Pega dodge or something. Pinkie whirled around and found her again, but by now Cloud Kicker was ready. When Pinkie rushed in, Cloud Kicker picked up a big long stick and planted the end of it firmly in Pinkie’s chest, holding the crazy pony safely at bay. Pinkie stretched her forelegs out as far as she could, and then started quietly whining when she still couldn’t reach Cloud to unleash one of her equicidal hugs.
Once she was sure that the lunatic pony wasn’t gonna hug her to death anytime soon, Cloud Kicker took a deep breath, and answered her questions. “Okay. I’m Cloud Kicker, and yes, Rainbow Dash is my friend. So’s Lyra, and I’ve got plenty of other friends too. I’m just visiting for a while. Nice to meet you.”
“Okay!” A hopeful little smile appeared on her face. “Now can I hug you?”
Cloud Kicker brought a hoof up under her chin, and adopted a thoughtful expression. “Well gee, I’d really like that. There’s just one problem: right now Rainbow Dash looks like she really, really needs another hug.”
“WHAT? No I—” The Pink Lunatic slammed into me again, and I’m pretty sure I felt half my ribs break.
The worst part was, over Pinkie’s shoulder, I could see Cloud Kicker looking at me with this smug little grin on her face. She made eye contact with me, and mouthed a single word. “Gotcha.”
Dammit, she’d definitely won this round of the prank war. Siccing the Pink Monster on me was just fighting dirty.
After several hours of horrible tortures like listening to crazy random songs that came completely out of nowhere and being force-fed enough sweets to give a dozen ponies diabetes, I finally managed to escape from the Pink Terror’s clutches. After what felt like years, Mr. Cake finally came to my rescue and made the Pink Monster get back to her work, so I could finally get away from her and back to Cloud Kicker.
By the time I found the two of them walking around Ponyville, it was getting pretty close to sunset. Both of them had these big grins on their faces, probably ‘cause they were so happy to finally see me again. No idea why their manes were looking so messy though, or why Cloud smelled kinda minty. Geeze, they must’ve been so bored, with nothing to do for hours while they were waiting around for me to get away from Pinkie.
I came in for a landing, and took a moment to strike an appropriately dramatic pose. “No need to worry anymore, I’m here now. You two are safe from the horrors of boredom and a general lack of awesomeness as long as I’m around.”
“Gee, thanks Dash,” Cloud Kicker was using that flat, uncaring tone she always uses when she’s pretending not to care about my awesomeness. “Lyra and I would just have no idea what to do with ourselves without you around.”
“Oh, I bet we could think of a couple things...” Lyra giggled and bumped her rump against Kicker’s Oh barf, they were getting all flirty and stuff. I hope they weren’t gonna keep doing that, or I’d have to clear out. No way I was putting up with them being sappy and maybe even kissing and stuff right in front of me.
Time for a quick change of subject. “So, what’s the plan anyway? It’s Cloud Kicker’s first night in Ponyville, so we have to do something awesome to celebrate.”
“I’m definitely up for awesome,” Cloud Kicker agreed. “Lyra was telling me all about this one hang-out spot of hers, a place called Sun’s Flank...”
“Sun’s Flank, huh?” I wracked my brain for any info about the place, and came up empty. “Can’t be anywhere that cool, ‘cause I’ve never heard of this Sun's Flank place.”
“Yeah, you wouldn’t be familiar with it.” It was probably just my imagination, but Lyra sounded just a tiny bit annoyed for some reason. “It’s a fillyfooler bar. Well, not exactly a fillyfooler bar as such, since it’s not strictly for single mares who are looking for company. It’s more like a cool place for mares to hang out, and if you happen to hook up with somepony, so much the better.”
Oh for the love of Celestia, don’t tell me Cloud was planning to go looking for ponies to bang. That was why I’d spent the last trip to Canterlot in the Kicker Compound instead of going out on the town with Cloud Kicker. It was just weird, hanging out with her when she was in the middle of trying to find somepony to bang. Plus, whenever she’s going around doing stuff like that, it means she’s not spending time being awesome, cool, and radical with me.
“Pfft, that place sounds really boring.” I gave a dismissive wave of my hoof. “If we need somewhere to hang out, we could just go to my place. That’s way cooler than some sun-butt bar place.”
“There’s a few problems with that, Dash.” Kicker countered. “First off, you live in a cloud-house, so we’d have to leave Lyra behind. Second, I’m gonna guess there’s not nearly as good of a selection of drinks, or as much music and dancing at your place. Finally, and most damning of all, the only other mare there would be you. No offense Dash, but I wanna get laid tonight.”
Lyra giggled and nudged Cloud in the shoulder. “You already got laid, you goof. Don’t tell me you’ve already forgotten.” She grinned and tossed a foreleg over Cloud’s neck. “But you're in luck. I think Ponyville has the highest per-capita concentration of sexy, cute, and/or adorable mares in the whole of Equestria. I’ve heard the stallions are pretty decent too, if you’re into that kind of thing.”
“Don’t knock it ‘till you’ve tried it, Harpflank.” Cloud grinned and bumped rumps with Lyra. “Mares are great, don’t get me wrong, but there’s some stuff that you just gotta have a stallion for.” Cloud paused and brought a hoof up under her chin. “Well, unless some of those new toys I’ve heard about work as well as advertised...”
Ugh, why were they still talking about all this stupid boring banging stuff? Cloud had to know I didn’t care about this kinda thing, but they just kept on talking about it instead of changing the subject to something that was actually worth talking about, like my new flying tricks or the Wonderbolts or something. I let out a snort, and crossed my forelegs over my chest. “Fine. Whatever. Let’s just go to this sun-butt place already.”
Lyra and Cloud looked at each other, then Lyra kinda shrugged and started leading the way. By now the sun was completely down and what nightlife Ponyville had was starting up. Normally I didn’t really do much at night, unless there was weather work going on. I could try practicing my moves in the dark, but that was a little too risky even for me most of the time. Not that anything would ever go wrong with my flying, but if something did it could get a lot worse if I couldn’t see where I was going.
Anyway, going off my admittedly limited experience with nighttime hangout spots, this Sun’s Flank place didn’t seem too bad. At least they didn’t have the music blaring so loud that I could barely hear myself think, the way it had been at that one club Kicker dragged me to one time when I was visiting Canterlot. The worst part was, Kicker wound up pretty much ditching me so she could hook up with the feathering DJ who’d been responsible for all the too-loud music. And it was definitely loads better than that one time Cloud actually took me to a brothel.
This place didn’t seem so bad, though. “I guess it could be worse. They have any decent grub here?”
“I’m seeing plenty of good pie,” Cloud commented, looking around at all mares. “So I guess it really just depends on how picky you are. Personally, I see enough for me to keep eating for weeks.”
I’m pretty sure that was some kind of innuendo, even if I didn’t quite get what she was going at. With Cloud Kicker, it was usually a safe bet that any time she was saying something weird that didn’t make any sense on its own, she was probably going for some kinda sex joke. “Yeah, whatever. What about real food?” Sure, I’d technically been fed by Pinkie while I was her party prisoner, but Pinkie’s idea of food is ninety-nine percent pure sugar. I needed something with some actual nutritional value.
Lyra shot a grin over at me. “You really haven’t ever been here before, have you Rainbow? This place has the best hayfries in all of Ponyville. Nice drinks too.”
I took another look around, just to see if I’d missed anything worth seeing. Nothing all that fancy really, just booths, tables, a bar, a dance floor. “Not really my kinda place, but if the food’s decent I’ll give it a fair shot.”
“This place deserves more than a fair shot, it’s awesome.” Cloud gave an appreciative whistle, though I couldn’t tell if she was admiring the decor or just one of the patrons. Probably both. “I like this place. It’s bustling like a proper club, but they manage to keep it classy without going overboard into stuck up and pretentious.”
“Still can’t believe you’ve never even been here once.” Lyra trotted over to grab us a nice corner booth. “Even if you’re completely straight, it’s a pretty nice hangout spot to get away from all the stallions for a bit.”
“I’m not—aww hay, who cares?” I grumbled and settled down on the other side of the table from Lyra. “Look, I just never really bothered with the whole romance thing. I’d rather focus on something that’s actually important, like getting ready for the Wonderbolts.”
Cloud Kicker let out a snort and rolled her eyes. “I'm starting to think Dash has no sex drive. Seriously, you have no idea how many times I hooked up with somepony and tried to get Dash set up as well, only for nothing to happen.”
“Huh?” I frowned over at her. “What are you talking about?”
Cloud groaned and facehoofed. “You never wondered why whenever I took you out clubbing with me, I always looked for ponies who had a spare friend?”
“I figured you were setting up a threesome,” I offered in my own defense.
“Well, it did end up working out that way more often than not.” Cloud Kicker didn’t even try to hide the smugness in her voice, but a second later she stopped her ego trip and got back on topic. Geeze, some ponies and their egos... “But yeah, I was trying to be a good wingpony and get you hooked up too. Not my fault you couldn’t seal the deal.”
“Oh.” I blinked a couple times as that thought processed. “Well, thanks, I guess. You didn’t have to do anything like that, though.”
“Wish you’d told me that before I’d tossed a couple of the hot ones your way while keeping the slightly-less-hot ones for myself,” Cloud grumbled. “Hay, I wasted a set of twins on you. Twins, Dash. How can you say no to that?”
“Eh,” I shrugged, “they just weren’t all that interesting. All they wanted to do was giggle a lot and take me back to their place to hang out.”
Lyra frowned over at me. “You do realize that when they said they wanted to hang out, what they really meant was that they wanted to take you back to their place for a night of wild sex, don’t you?”
“Well duh, ‘course I knew that.” Sure, I’d only really figured it out about a minute or so ago, but why quibble over stupid little details? “I mean, it’s not like I’m some prude or I think there’s something wrong with the way Cloud likes to bang anything with a pulse, but I just don’t really care about that kind of thing myself.”
“Well, everypony’s sex drive works a bit differently.” Lyra shot a slightly downcast smile at me. “Though I think it'd be a real shame if you didn't find somepony who’s right for you. You’re too nice of a pony to be single forever.”
Cloud smirked over at me and Lyra. “Why the sudden interest in Dash’s sex drive, Harpflank? Don’t tell me that one kiss you swapped trying to fake me out made an impression?”
What? Kicker thought Lyra might have a thing for me? Whoa, that’d be weird. I mean, I guess we’d gotten along well enough while setting up our completely awesome and ninety-percent-successful fake pregnancy gag, but I dunno about anything past that.
“Sheesh, you whine about your lack of success in setting Dash up, but half a minute later you’re already trying to get her together with the hottest mare in the place.” Lyra smiled over at me. “Dash is a lot of fun to hang around with, but I’m not interested in her that way.”
“Well why not?” I leaned back in my chair and crossed my forelegs over my chest. It’s not like I wanted her to be interested in me or anything—that’d probably end up being really weird and awkward anyway, I just wouldn’t blame her getting stuck on me, since I am pretty awesome, after all.
“You’re a great pony, Rainbow, but I’m just not interested in you that way.” Lyra grinned and reached over to put a hoof on my shoulder for a few seconds. “I just think it'd be a real shame if you never found anypony.” There was a bit of an awkward pause, and then Lyra shrugged the whole thing off. “Anyway, drinks.” She waved to one of the waitresses.
A couple seconds later a cream-coated earth pony waitress with a pink-and-blue mane trotted up to our table and gave us that fake ‘my tip depends on how much you like me’ smile. “What will it be, ladies?” She turned to Lyra, and her smile got a bit less forced. “You’ll want your usual mint cocktail, right Miss Lyra?”
“Sure do,” Lyra grinned right back at her. “And toss in a big plate of your fancy hayfries. I’ve got hungry friends.”
“Can do.” The waitress turned to the two of us expectantly.
Cloud Kicker put her order in first. “I’ll have a lemonade.”
I could barely believe my ears. “Lemonade? Really?” Lyra was frowning at Cloud’s choice of drink too. “Hey Cloud, did you miss the part where we’re having a big ‘Welcome to Ponyville and congratulations on graduating West Hoof’ pa—celebration for you?” I almost made the mistake of saying ‘party,’ but that word could summon up Pinkie Pie almost as reliably as just saying her name.
Even the waitress joined in. “You don’t need to worry—about your friends, or yourself. Ponyville's pretty free of riff raff, and we're very strict about our blacklists. We can even have the bouncer or somepony else walk you home, if you’re worried.” She paused and shot a smirk at Lyra. “Or too drunk to manage on your own.”
“Aw be nice, Bons,” Lyra whined. “Those mint cocktails seem all nice and light when you’re drinking them, then half an hour later they start catching up with ya. Besides, I gave you a ginormous tip for that.”
“Which is why you’re still getting served,” the waitress declared with teasing grin. “You keep getting plastered and paying me extra to walk your drunk plot home, and soon I’ll have enough to get that candy stand up and running.”
“Everypony wins.” Lyra grinned right back at her, then turned to Cloud Kicker. “But that’ll only work if everypony helps out.”
Cloud rolled her eyes at the two of them. “Fine, make it a hard lemonade, then. Still not gonna get plastered, though.”
Lyra grinned over at her. “That’s more like it, Kicky.”
The waitress nodded, then turned to me. I thought about it for a second—normally I’m not a huge fan of booze, but with the way this day had been going I think I could make an exception. “Got any of the good cider?”
“We’ve got a pretty good selection,” she answered. “I’d recommend the Sweet Apple Acres cider—Applejack and Big Mac are actually in the back unloading a delivery right now.”
“Sweet!” I’d been hanging out with Applejack some ever since I moved to Ponyville, and her cider was just awesome. AJ herself was pretty cool, too. “Yeah, gimme the cider. And tell her I’m out here too, so if she wants to come hang with us once she’s done unloading, that’d be cool.”
“Can do. I’ll be back in a bit with your drinks.” Bons trotted off to the bar—and both Kicker and Lyra watched her go with way too much interest. Sheesh, what a couple of pervs.
Once she couldn’t ogle the waitress anymore, Lyra apparently decided to spend some time talking to us again. “I come here almost every night, you know.”
Cloud grinned at her. “Oh really? You come here every night? Must be hunting for love...”
“Not really.” Lyra shrugged and settled back into her seat. “I wouldn’t mind finding somepony, but mostly this is just a nice place to hang out. I've met lots of good friends here, like Colgate and Berry Punch. Bons too, I guess, though we can’t exactly be friends when she’s on the clock, and we don’t really see each other any other time.” Lyra stretched her forelegs out a bit. “But yeah, if you’re just completely uninterested, the worst you’ll have to do is shoot down one or two ponies who offer to buy you a drink.”
Turn down free booze? Yeah, right. The waitress came back, carrying a big platter of hayfries covered in cheese, chopped onions, seasoning, and bits of haybacon. I didn’t waste any time with pleasantries before digging in. “Theshe‘re gud.” Cloud and Lyra shot me a look, and I kept my mouth shut until I finished chewing and swallowing.
“Told you it’s a nice place.” Lyra gave a satisfied little nod, then she and Kicker got into the fries as well. They were all delicate and manner-y about it though, which is just dumb. Sure, we had a lot of fries now, but if they took their time eating, that would just leave more for me. Wait, why was I complaining about that? “Anyway,” Lyra continued, “I’m not too worried about finding my special somepony just yet. I’ve got plenty of time, and there’s no sense getting all worked up over it. I’ll find her eventually.”
Bons the waitress came back and set our drinks down. “There you go, ladies. Lemme know if you need anything else, okay?”
Lyra grinned over at her. “Will do, thanks Bons.” She hoofed over some bits. “I'll pay for us.”
Okay, taking me to a pretty cool new place and covering my bar bill on top of that earned her a couple awesome points. “Cool, thanks.” I took a big old swig of the best damn cider in Equestria. “Ohhhhh yeah, that's the stuff!”
For a while the three of us just enjoyed our drinks, until Cloud Kicker decided to start talking about her favorite subject. “So ... who're the hot mares here?”
Lyra grinned and ran a hoof through her mane. “Me.”
I let out a snort at that. “Oh please. You're not that great, Minty.”
“Well, you're not interested in romance or banging, so you’re not exactly the best judge of who’s hot and who isn’t,” Lyra shot right back, sticking her tongue out.
“Play nice, you two.” Cloud put a wing over Lyra’s shoulders and grinned over at me. “Now, I’ve obviously got the two hottest mares in Ponyville sitting at the table with me, but how about you two show me some of the slightly less hot mares, just to humor me.”
Lyra beamed and nuzzled her. “Thanks, Kicky. But if I’m gonna be completely honest, there is one mare who’s probably hotter than me.”
Cloud’s ears perked up in interest at that, but I really didn’t care at all. It just bugged me that they were gonna start talking about stupid pointless stuff like who Cloud was gonna bang, when she could be hanging out with me instead. I mean, the whole idea behind her coming to Ponyville was so she could visit me and we could hang out, but if all she cared about was finding somepony to bang then there was really no point in me even being here. So instead I just slammed back the rest of my cider and tried to ignore the talking.
“So yeah,” Lyra continued, “There’s this one mare called Rarity. Dear Celestia, even her name sounds hot. Anyway, she’s pretty much the most fashionable pony in the town. Too bad she’s probably too much of a proper lady to really go banging around.” She paused and let out a wistful sigh. “Oh well. On the other end of things you’ve got ponies like Applejack who have that whole ‘rough and tumble country gal’ thing going for them. I kinda like both types, really, so it’s up to you.”
Cloud smirked at her and put her hooves behind her head. “You make it sound like I’d have a hard choice to make, instead of just going out and banging both of them.”
Lyra snorted so hard she nearly sent some of her mint cocktail squirting out of her nose. “Yeah, that would be your solution, wouldn’t it?” She took a sip of her drink while she thought things over. “Who else is there? Well, there’s my drinking buddy Berry, though to be honest all I really know about her preferences right now is which vintages she likes. Then there’s Pinkie—she isn't the hottest pony in the conventional sense of the word, at least not in my opinion, but she's cute as a button and full of energy.”
They were talking about Pinkie now? Seriously? I mean, I guess I could kinda get why Cloud might go for a pretty girly-girl, and Applejack was cool enough, I guess, but Pinkie Pie? “Did you two forget that she’s completely nuts? Cloud can’t bang Pinkie!”
“Why not?” Cloud asked.
“Because,” I answered.
“Because what?” Lyra shot back.
I crossed my forelegs over my chest. “Because of reasons.” Darn it, that came out way too petulantly. “It’s just ... she’s a total weirdo.”
Lyra grinned and nudged me in the ribs. “Careful, Rainbow. Saying she’s weird might just make Kicky wanna get with her even more.” Oh geeze, she was probably right about that. Cloud Kicker’s whole banging thing is pretty weird, so maybe she would get along with a pony who’s weird about everything. Lyra turned back to Cloud, and dismissively waved a hoof at me. “Rainbow is just being silly. She thinks Pinkie is weird just because she's energetic and touchy feely.”
“That is weird,” I pointed out.
“No it's not.” Lyra planted her forehooves on the table. “She's just got enough self-confidence to express herself however she wants, without worrying about what anypony else will think.”
“And she uses all that confidence to do weird stuff,” I countered.
Cloud turned to me and grinned. “If she’s really into all kinds of weird stuff then maybe I should give her a whirl. Sounds like it could be a lot of fun.”
“Look, you can't bang her, okay?” I grumbled.
Lyra frowned at me, and I could practically see the gears whirling in her head. “Why so upset at the idea of Cloud Kicker banging Pinkie?”
I don’t know what she was thinking, but whatever was going through her head was wrong. “No reason, I just don't want Cloud banging her, that's all.”
“Why?” Lyra pressed.
Sheesh, what was her deal? It’s not like this was complicated. “I don’t want Cloud Kicker banging Pinkie 'cause I don't, okay?!”
Lyra eyes widened, and she brought her hooves up to her mouth and let out a tiny little gasp. Then she started grinning like a madmare as she leaned across the table and loudly whispered, “You like Pinkie Pie, don't you, Rainbow Dash?”
What? No, seriously, what? “No! Ew! Don't even joke about that!” Just thinking about it was making me shiver. “I don't care about Pinkie at all, okay! It's just if Kicker does stuff with Pinkie, then it'll encourage her to bother me even more than she does already! I won’t be able to show my face in Ponyville without her running up and spending hours bothering me! It’s ‘cause of that and other reasons, okay?”
Lyra leaned back, shaking her head and giggling. “I think Pinkie's a bit more restrained than that.”
I shot her a flat look. “Pinkie Pie? Restrained? Have you even met her?”
Lyra sighed, her ears drooped down, and her voice got just a little grumbly as she conceded the point. “Okay. Aware. More aware.”
Yeah, that didn’t work either. “She thinks sarcasm is a kind of food.”
“Aware of other ponies' feelings!” Lyra burst out, smacking a hoof on the table. “Okay?! Stop calling me out on this.”
I gave an uncaring shrug and smirked at her. “Then stop saying stuff that’s wrong.”
Lyra crossed her forelegs over her chest and started grumbling under her breath. Hey, not my fault she can’t handle being called out when she says something stupid. I finished off my cider and signalled for a refill, while Cloud tried to get get the conversation back on her banging track. “So, how about all the hot ponies that aren't Pinkie...”
“Oh, whatever.” Great, now I was getting all grouchy and stuff too. Why did Kicker have to keep being so stupid about wanting to bang around anyway? You’d think she could turn it off for just one freaking night, so we could just chill and hang out.
The conversation kinda died for a while after that. Eventually, Lyra finished off her cocktail and ordered another one. “Love the mint cocktails here. Not many places you can get a drink like that.”
I shrugged and took a swig of cider. “Eh, hard to beat AJ’s stuff, if you ask me.”
A hoof slapped me on the back, and I heard Applejack’s unmistakable country twang. “Well glad ya like it, sugarcube.” The farmpony slid into the booth next to me. “Now be neighborly, and introduce me to these friends of yers.” Before I could actually do that, she extended a hoof across the table to the two of them. “Howdy do. Name’s Applejack.”
Cloud and Lyra took care of introducing themselves, and the three of them made a little small talk. Before long AJ was knocking back a mug of her own cider, and telling us about something crazy that happened on the farm the other day. “... and then Apple Fritter just looked me right in the eyes and said, ‘But Ah can't fit it all in!’”
We all cracked up at that, me especially. However, once I was done rolling on the floor and laughing my flank off, I noticed that Cloud Kicker seemed kind of distracted. Oh great, don’t tell me she was about to ditch us just so she could get laid again... “What’s up, Cloud?”
“Hmm?” Cloud Kicker gave a quick shake of her head, and turned her attention back to me, where it belonged. “Sorry, I was just thinking that Applejack’s coltfriend is kind of in an uncomfortable spot right now.”
The smile dropped off of Applejack’s face, replaced by a perplexed frown. “Mah wut now?”
Cloud waved a hoof in the general direction of Big Mac, who had been standing off awkwardly to the side while Applejack was chatting with us. I kinda felt sorry for the big lunkhead—it had to be just a bit awkward being a stallion stuck in the middle of a fillyfooler bar.
Applejack looked at her brother a couple times, then blinked and started shaking her head so hard it was a miracle her hat didn’t go flying off. “No! No no no no! That ain’t mah coltfriend, that’s mah brother!”
“Ah, gotcha.” Cloud Kicker shot another, much longer look at Big Mac. “So ... I guess that means he’s single then, right?”
Applejack didn’t say anything right away, but I could practically hear her teeth grinding. She’s kinda got a thing about not liking it when mares start sniffing around her brother. A thing that, in hindsight, I really should’ve warned Cloud Kicker about beforehoof. After all, it’s pretty much inevitable that she’s gonna hit on anything with a pulse that comes within her line of sight. “Uh ... Cloud? Ix-nay on the Ig Mac-Bay.”
Kicker nodded to me, then turned back to Applejack and tried to fix her goof-up the only way a pony as nuts about banging as she was could. “Sorry, misspoke. I meant to say ‘I guess that means you’re single, right?” She shot a grin that was probably supposed to be flirty at Applejack.
One of Applejack’s ears flicked a couple times, and then she took a deep breath and finished off the rest of her cider in a single gulp. After running a hoof across her mouth, she turned to me and said, “Ah’d love to stick around, sugarcube, but there’s lots of farmwork needs doin’ in the morning.”
Oh hay no, Applejack couldn’t be ditching me now. With Kicker and Lyra being all stupid and talking about banging and stuff, I’d be totally lost if I didn’t have somepony normal around. “Aw, c’mon Applejack. Cloud’s just being herself, she didn’t mean anything by it. So, y’know, you can stick around, and I promise she won’t do anything weird. Okay?” I quickly signalled the waitress to bring refills for the two of us. “C’mon AJ, at least stick around for one more cider.”
Applejack hesitated long enough for Bons The Waitress to bring the ciders, and after that I had Applebutt locked down. With as much as she loves apples in pretty much any form, including cider, I kinda wonder how Sweet Apple Acres ever managed to turn a profit. The farmpony sighed and slipped her hoof into the mug. “Alright, alright. Reckon I’m gonna need a good drink or two as it is.” The mug paused halfway to her mouth, and she looked over at Cloud Kicker. “For the record, missy, I ain’t interested in what yer sellin’, and neither is mah brother. That clear?”
“Yeah, yeah, I got it.” Cloud let out a breath, then sipped some of her lemonade.
Well, I had them all sitting at the table, but things were still way too uncomfortable and awkward. I should probably do something about fixing that. “So, Applejack, Cloud just finished up at West Hoof. She’s gonna be a Guard.”
“That so?” Applejack grunted neutrally.
“Yeah.” I waited for a couple seconds, but nopony said anything else. Dangit, so much for starting up a conversation. I slipped my hoof into my cider mug and started pouring it down the hatch. AJ followed my example.
About halfway through the drink, I just kinda looked over at Applejack, and she looked at me. Our eyes met, and we both kept going—no way I was gonna stop drinking before she did.
Applejack lucked out, and our glasses ran dry before I could beat her. There were easy enough ways to fix that, though. “Hey, we need more booze!”
Lyra’s ears perked up. “We’re doing a drinking contest? Sounds like fun!” Lyra paused and brought a hoof up under her chin. “We can’t do a drinking contest without Berry, she’d never forgive me.” She turned and waved towards the bar. “Berry! Over here! We’re having a drinking contest!”
A couple seconds later, a purple earth pony mare trotted up to our table. Sheesh, I could smell the booze on her from here. “Yer doin’ a drinking contesht? I’m in.” Oh wow, sounds like she was already kinda sloshed, and I was definitely better than Lyra and AJ. I had this contest in the bag.
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Embarrassing Parents makes this line roughly a billion times better
Seems like something got cut off here. Feels like something should have been in front of that sentence.
Got a
out of me simply because I have a buddy that feels the need to sing it at every available opportunity.
This had me rolling. Chose some very good references Chen, me gusta.
Heh, nice characterization of Rainbow Dash pre-show.
There were a few issues here and there that stuck out to me. Nothing major.
Not sure if Rainbow would use acronyms. Not that way anyway.
And mysterious as Luna's hindquarters.
...
In any case, you forgot the opening quotation mark.
I'm surprised Pinkie didn't latch onto that subject. The pranking part, that is.
Anyway, on to the next chapter!
Hey, Dashie, you know the average Pegasus can't fly with that much lead in her head, right?
Incredibly dense mind is right.
Okay, I was thinking this was set shortly after where winning pony currently, not years ago right after West Hoof (the description could use some clarification is all)
There's an ad for addiction therapy on this page. Rather fitting, I do believe.
That reference. The big one.
Interesting. NEXT CHAPTER!
2512605
Probably a good thing that Pinkie did not mention anything about pranking considering Dash did not know Pinkie likes pranks until the episode "Griffin the Brush off" and hearing about it now would go against that.
>And it was definitely loads better than that one time Cloud actually took me to a brothel.
A brothel? Really? Cloud Kicker I am disappoint.
Oh yes, this is gonna be so awesome!
Cloud Kicker knows what's up.
Rainbow Dash, on the other hand...
I completely lost my shit at this part by trying to envision it. That was just priceless.
Half drunk Berry vs. Dash vs. AJ in a drinking contest... Those poor fools have no idea what they've gotten themselves into, it's like challenging a fat Irish man to a game of drink.
--Edit--
Cause in retrospect I realized someone will be insulted. I do not believe or endorse the drunken Irish stereotype.
So far, off to a good start. Got some foreshadowing of LyraBon, visiting the Sun's Flank again, and Mulan and Beetlejuice references. Huzzah!
This is hilarious!
The standard first-pony narrative of winningverse stories is great for a less mature, but just as oblivious Rainbow Dash, as the story that started the whole thing.
Okay, Firefox, forget the last time I said fuck you. Pretend that, at this point, I have never said anything even remotely impolite to you. Just trust me, this is important.
Alright, you in that state of mind, Firefox? Good. In that case, NIGHTMARE MOON CURSE YOU TO A THOUSAND RAPES AT THE TENTACLES OF A THOUSAND STAR DEVILS. DISCORD FUCK YOU IN THE ASS WITH CELESTIA'S HORN. I HOPE YOU CRAWL INTO A DIGITAL HOLE TO DIE, BUT THE HOLE TURNS OUT TO BE A PORTAL TO 10,000 YEARS OF PAIN. THIS ISN'T LIKE THE OTHER TIMES YOU HAVE LOST MY COMMENT OBVIOUSLY ON PURPOSE. THIS WAS NOT MERELY ME SAYING SILLY THINGS. I WAS POURING MY HEART OUT TO THE INTERNET. IT FELT NICE. IT FINALLY INSPIRED ME TO TELL ONE MORE OF MY FRIENDS THAT I WAS ASEXUAL, AND THEN WE TALKED FOR HOURS ABOUT SECRETS AND IT WAS GOOD. AND I WANTED TO COME BACK HERE AND MENTION HOW I HAD BEEN HELPED AND GO ON READING. BUT YOU CALLOUSLY THREW AWAY MY COMMENT, AND NOW THE GOOD FEELINGS ARE GONE. YOU THREW THEM IN THE TRASH. YOU KNOW WHAT I'M GOING TO DO, FIREFOX? I'M GOING TO POST THIS COMMENT RIGHT NOW, RIGHT HERE, SO YOU CAN SEE IT, AND THEN I'M GOING TO GO READ THE REST OF THE STORY IN CHROME. BECAUSE CHROME HAS NOT BETRAYED ME TODAY.
And then I guess I'll edit this there, so I'm still only making one comment.
So, anyway, the gist of what I had said was a little commentary on how Dash isn't a good enough friend to stop CK from making a choice she will regret for years to come in the near future, some stuff about what a terrible plan the pregnancy prank was (getting sometimes into the topic of how Dash can't even have foals), and I ended up actually kind of gushing about how nice it is to ride around in Rainbow's head since she's all but asexual and that is just so rare to see in fiction. Honestly, I see Winningverse Dash as being, orientation-wise, a slightly toned-down version of me. A little more okay with touching, a little less of a slowly growing feeling of wrongness and just being faking it when dating, but all in all the closest I've ever seen to me. And even though I don't mind being alone, it's nice to have some company sometimes, you know? So I really like spending time with this Dash.
And I mentioned an amusing story (at least, I thought it amusing). One time, I was in a store with my parents (probably due to an errand being merged into a larger excursion), and they decided the girl at the register was cute and tried to get us talking. Now, this probably doesn't come through very well in my comments, but I am not exactly loquacious in real life, and I don't like talking to new people, and I was busy trying to remember song lyrics at the time (funny how there is nothing I remember clearly about this, except for the fact that I was trying to remember the lyrics to "Stop Me If You Think That You've Heard This One Before" the whole time), so needless to say I didn't really play along. I don't think I even really noticed what they were doing until afterwards, when they had a bit of a debate as to how much they should be helping me to get a date (conducted as if I weren't standing right there). Sadly, I cannot recall what I had to say about this.
By the way, I'm sorry about that guy up there. He enjoys being melodramatic entirely too much. Or he's trying to compensate for not being emotional enough. It's so hard to keep track of precisely what his deal is on any particular day.
And with all that out of the way, I think we can finally get back to the story.
Don't forget the part where you get so used to it you stop needing to be paid to walk her home. And stop bothering to leave after that's done.
Aw, but you're so funny when you're plastered! You hit on mood goddesses and everything!
Okay, I admit, Dash would be even less amused than she currently is. That would be less than ideal.
She's got you there. We asexuals should not be commenting on hotness.
I've said it before, on this very story even, but due to certain events I shall have to say it again: It really is a pleasure riding around in your head, Dashie. It feels like home.
Her? Really? I honestly don't see what everypony sees in her. I don't know who would go for the completely fake look.
Shut up, Lyra. I'll have you know that your opinions of beauty were invented by 25-year-old men who live in their parents' basements, so I have every right to think I can understand them even from a completely outside perspective. In fact, I challenge you to find a way I could be more objective, given my lack of biological preconceptions.
Yeah, well, some ponies think they don't like being touched. Some ponies express themselves by avoiding direct contact whenever possible, because that is however they want. And that takes self-confidence too, because some ponies will take that as an insult.
It's the curse of fanaticism. You get somepony who's very enthusiastic about one thing, and somepony who's not at all enthusiastic about that same thing, and soon they realize they can't talk and start projecting a crushing awkward silence field around them. You can't fight the field.
Oh, yeah, I said earlier that given the way CK is behaving on this visit, she deserves to not have Dash there to support her when she gets cold hooves about joining the Guard. I forgot to mention that, but I should, because it's kind of an important remark. It's important to mention my disdain for her single-minded focus on an interest her host does not share.
I hope you're ready to lose, Dashie. Nopony out-drinks Berry.
Alright, and now I'm done here. No more edits, unless somebody points out a typo or something. And the next chapter, I should be doing more normally.
3636500 Firefox says "I just don't know what went wrong."
I can't ignore the potential to comment on Asexuality. A few years ago I started wondering if I was Asexual or just celibate. Which is weird because I'm a 28 year old Asocial Atheist. Who's never even attempted a sexual relationship. How and why did I suddenly stop being content about it at 25 bucking Firefox (internet)
. After over thinking way to much I figured... "A to hell with all these words I'm Jack."
You referenced I'll Make a Man Out Of You. All my dragonstaches.
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Not to mention mysterious as the dark side of the moon.
*G3 flash backs*
I’m, like, swift as a coursing river, got all the force of a great typhoon, and all the strength of a raging fire!”
MULAN!!!!
I hate reading about Winningverse’s Rainbow Dash because she’s got such a huge fucking ego that she can’t wrap her head around any conversation that isn’t about her. Honestly, it goes beyond egotism into full, hardcore narcissism.
Granted, I’m pretty sure she gets better about it later on, but it’s obvious that she’s so fucking stupid because she doesn’t have space in her head for any thoughts that aren’t about her.
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Watch any of the first 3 seasons' episodes. Dash has toned it WAY down, but that's what she was like