The Olden World

by Czar_Yoshi

Munch Munch Munch

Two mares stared into each other's eyes with iron determination, a gravy-soaked morsel of food floating in a telekinetic aura between them.

"You going to eat that?"

"Psyching myself up for it. I'm not done yet," Amber insisted, groaning uncomfortably. "Give me a minute and I can manage another bite or two... or you could eat it?"

Shinespark folded her ears, an equally-uncomfortable expression on her face. "Amber, my stomach feels like it's going to explode. I might have to be finished..."

"But we're so close," Amber whined, pointing at the plate between them. "Three more bites and we'll have it! Three more bites! You take one, I take two?"

"Heh heh..." Valey giggled groggily from where she sat on her back, a half-finished plate stacked atop five others that had been licked clean. "You had to team up just to try to break even with me and now I'm still gonna win. Nyaaah... Urp."

"If I eat this, you will eat the next two?" Shinespark gave Amber a desperate look. "We have to beat her. I'll manage it..."

Maple pursed her lips nearby as her cooking was used for sport, everyone else having gratefully finished the meal and settled in to watch or silently cheer. Amber returned the look with a confident nod. "We have this!"

Closing her eyes, Shinespark stuffed the bite in her own mouth, chewing slowly and eventually bringing herself to swallow. She was silent for a moment, grimacing... and opened her eyes with a game smile. "Did it! Now you eat two more and we win!"

"Keep telling yourselves that," Valey mumbled, waving her cast at the plate she hadn't touched in the last fifteen minutes. She burped again.

Amber steeled herself, folding her ears, and gave her and Shinespark's plate a look of grim determination. Without waiting for telekinesis, she lowered her head and took a bite.

"Yes! Ha! Go team Amber!" Gerardo whispered, pumping a talon and quietly rooting. Slipstream shushed him with a feather.

"Ooog..." Amber took even longer to swallow than Shinespark, sweating. "Split the last one fifty-fifty?"

"Are you really finished?" Shinespark watched her in desperation. "You said two... Valey's done, we're one away..."

Across from her, Amber groaned. "Sorry..."

Shinespark narrowed her eyes. "Fine. Victory now, consequences later!" She lit her horn, took the last bite... and chewed, unable to swallow.

"Shinespark?" Amber tensed.

"Mmm..." Shinespark mumbled around the food in her mouth, eyes watering. "Mmm...!" She pressed her ears straight back, tilted her head toward the ceiling, held for a second longer... and slowly, finally swallowed, holding the position and refusing to take a breath.

Amber's face split in a relieved, uncomfortable grin. "We won! Ohh, I'm going to be uncomfortable for a bit but we won!"

She got up cautiously to hug Shinespark, who stayed frozen in place, pushing her back with a light forehoof... before finally looking down, returning the pained, victorious look. "Alright. That'll do it. We did it. Don't squeeze me too hard?"

"I feel like a balloon," Amber agreed, giving her a light shoulder squeeze before turning to blow a raspberry at Valey. "Take that! I told you I could beat you. Heehee..."

Valey leaned a forehoof on the table, resting her cheek on it with an amused smirk. "Yeah, but you needed help. You really wanna say that counts?"

Shinespark groaned. "This had better count..."

"It counts," Amber insisted. "It totally counts."

"You sure about that?" Valey raised an eyebrow. "Like, you actually, one-hundred-percent sure you want this to be on the record?"

"I did not stuff myself this full for nothing," Amber managed, Shinespark subconsciously leaning against her. "And neither did she. We took you down, Valey."

Valey shrugged. "Whatever. I warned you." Then she leaned down, stuck out her tongue, wiped the entirety of her half-full plate into her mouth, swallowed, patted her stomach and belched. "There." She grinned contentedly. "I never said I was done."

Amber and Shinespark's jaws dropped.

Quickly, Valey was out of her chair and standing between them, a wing on each of their backs. She pointed at the half-empty plate they had been sharing as well. "So, you gonna finish that?"

Amber buried her face in her hooves. Shinespark just winced. "Please don't shake me right now."

Valey took that as permission, polishing off their plate too in a matter of seconds, her tongue not even leaving a trace. "Good stuff, Ironflanks!" she happily declared, not looking remotely bothered by how much she had just devoured. "What's for desert?"

"I..." Amber gaped at the plate.

"Nyaah." Valey poked her. "Remember, you said it was official. Now you just got officially wrecked. Take that."

Maple just shook her head and began to clear the last of their plates from the table. "If you're serious, apple cobbler, but I think you need to leave some for everyone else."

Valey burped again as the others cheered for desert, still hugging Amber and Shinespark with her wings. "Okay but seriously though, I am pretty full. Good game. Wanna go lay around in the library chairs and do absolutely nothing?"

"I think I might need to..." Shinespark's eyes watered, and she nodded toward the stairs.

---

Several minutes later, the three mares were as comfortable as they were going to get, all three laying on chairs on their backs or their sides and not thinking about desert.

"I think I'm going to have to skip dinner tonight," Shinespark moaned, eyes unfocused.

"Yeah, we better," Amber agreed, staring at herself with her legs splayed out wherever they felt like going. "So hey, Shinespark. Glad to see you're feeling up and better after Riverfall. I know we've chatted a few times, but all my memories of you were with you in a cast like Valey's, out with a cold and being all destitute about cleaning this airship. Congrats on getting back on your hooves from all that."

Shinespark focused a little. "Oh? Thanks. It's... been a long road. Things haven't been easy, either."

Amber nodded sadly. "I heard about Grenada."

"Yeah..." Valey sighed unhappily. "You'd think getting caught up in a pile of pirates would be enough to give someone a reality check, but eh. Mistakes were made, and now she's... wherever. Poor kid. Didn't seem like she was in the best place, and I kinda didn't do anything about it."

"It wasn't your job to do anything about it. It was mine." Shinespark gave her a look. "I was happy with our relationship being one thing, she wanted it to be something else, and after we both knew each other felt that way... I messed up."

Amber nodded. "Must have been especially hard, with her basically back from the dead. When I was a filly, I was playing with a friend on the docks and they fell in, and the adults had to resuscitate them and weren't sure for a moment whether they had drowned. She woke up, and that's my closest experience to all this... but it really wasn't the same."

"I'm okay, though," Shinespark promised. "Valey helped me through it. Even if it still does sting to have lost her again through things that are entirely my fault."

"Hey. I'm not cool with being a mopey downer." Valey waved a forehoof. "Hits way too close to home with what it feels like this empire is trying to do to me. I see something I can do, I'm gonna do it. Especially for my friends."

Amber grinned. "Sounds like you're in a good circle of friends. Or even have one great friend in particular." Her head tilted slightly. "She wanted to be romantic with you, right? Grenada? Do you just not feel like it's your time for romance in general?"

Shinespark lowered her head. "It's a side of myself I hadn't given myself chance to explore in Ironridge. But Grenada is my sister. There's a big difference between that and a lover."

Amber nodded sympathetically. "Blood sister, right? Did you grow up together?"

"We didn't." Shinespark shook her head. "I didn't even know about her until I was old enough to understand things like how my siblings worked, and how my father had many lovers. Probably six or seven?"

Amber pursed her lips. "Willow and Maple are my sisters," she said, eyes growing distant. "Not because we're related. We could be related, but we have no real idea. But it's because we spent our foalhoods together, not because our dad really liked mares. We spent our days and nights together, sleeping in the same room and going to each other's beds when we'd have a bad dream. We climbed roofs together to giggle at all the ponies below, shared each other's toys, laughed at the others when we weren't first in line to get a bath. And I don't think any sort of blood could change that."

Shinespark folded her ears. "I'm not sure where you're going with this," she admitted. "That sounds great, and I'm happy for all of you. But what's it have to do with me and Grenada?"

"I dunno." Amber shrugged. "Just felt like saying. Family is who you say it is. Feels like you're letting an excuse or convention get in the way of how you feel."

"Not getting in the way," Shinespark countered. "I know how I feel. I'm just saying we're sisters to explain it. I'm not looking for a way to think about her differently."

"Huh." Amber thought for a moment.

"Either way, that ship has sailed," Valey pointed out. "Grenada bailed. We both feel kinda bad about it, but what can you do? Not like I can smell her and track her down like Starlight."

Amber nodded. "Yep. That's why I'm wondering where you're planning on going now."

Shinespark blinked. "I don't think we're planning on going anywhere? Valey has obligations here with the tournament, now, unless she walks out on them, and we don't have anywhere-"

"Not physically, silly," Amber giggled. "I mean with yourself. Sounds like you've just gotten through a hard patch and you've got no choice but to move on. What are you going to do with yourself? Who are you going to be? Just a mare who sits around on an airship and does nothing?"

"I..." Shinespark folded her ears. "Haven't really been thinking about it."

"Aww, come on!" Amber tried to swat at her from between their chairs, then winced, remembering she had recently overeaten. "Whoof. But girl, you're years younger than even I am! You've got a huge airship and a cool cutie mark and I even just brought you more fuel to go wherever you want with it! You don't want to do just let your life sit around going nowhere, right?" She raised an eyebrow. "I just gave Valey a big reminder about how much better you feel when you're feeling good. Can I give you a pep talk here, too?"

Shinespark rolled over uncomfortably to look at her. "You sound like you have an idea?" she asked. "Having something to do would probably do me well, but the main thing I brought to work on was the ship itself, and I haven't been feeling like that ever since we got that idea to use the Firefly Sisters' singing against the pirates and then couldn't do anything with it."

Valey huffed in agreement. "Yeah, that was lame. And anti-climactic. Seriously, though, you could get back to fiddling away at that and try to get it to work next time? You never know when turning your airship into a portable concert venue for two magical performers we haven't seen in months could come in handy."

"Actually, I was thinking of you two." Amber pointed at them, earning two stares. "Shinespark, I have a distinct memory of Valey flirting with you back in Riverfall like it was the end of the world and you getting so flustered you had to leave the room multiple times. Valey, I even told you before you left I wanted you to enjoy yourself and would be more than fine with you trying things out!" She folded her ears. "Guess that didn't pan out, huh?"

Valey and Shinespark gave each other a look.

"Look, it's not like I like-" Both spoke at once, cutting each other off and ending with raised eyebrows and a bit of red on Shinespark's part. Valey held her daring expression for a moment longer, then sighed.

"...Getting some weird signals, here," Amber admitted. "You are really good friends, at least, aren't you? You said you went to each other?"

"No, I... like..." Valey fidgeted while Shinespark tried not to be looked at. "Well, bananas." She sighed. "My cutie mark doesn't detect impending awkwardness, but if it did, it would probably be poking me right about now. It's, uhh... Meh. Sounds like it's time to have a relationship talk?"

Shinespark tried to get to her hooves, wincing a little and looking nervous. "I should probably leave you...?"

"You know what?" Valey looked at her again. "I'd honestly be fine if you stayed. You've been in that mess with Grenada. Odds of either giving or getting some cool insight are pretty good. And hey, I trust you."

"Think we'd be willing to move to a more private room, also?" Amber grinned awkwardly. "Just because I'm the one with the most experience here doesn't mean I'm utterly shameless."

Shinespark hesitated a moment longer, meeting Valey's eyes. "Okay. I'll... I'll stay." She swallowed. "I trust you too."

"Cool." Valey relaxed, before slowly hauling herself to her hooves as well.

Comments

[Hap]

Draaaaaaaamaaah

[Mini-Joe]

"Nyaah." Valey poked her. "Remember, you said it was official. Now you just got officially wrecked. Take that."

OWNED.

[Venlinelle]

"I dunno." Amber shrugged. "Just felt like saying. Family is who you say it is. Feels like you're letting an excuse or convention get in the way of how you feel."

Everyone in this story is so determined to get Shinespark to date her sister.

I’d say me included, but I’m much more invested in her and Valey.