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Meet The Shimmers

Sunny lay in the hospital bed, her hair a frazzled mess after being in labor for nearly ten hours. It was almost nine o'clock in the evening and I knew the family had to be getting restless in the waiting room by now.

"Are you sure that you're up for visitors?" I asked Sunny.

"Yeah, they're probably getting antsy waiting to come in," she replied.

"Come on, little one," I said as I took Gleaming tightly in the crook of my right arm.

"Be back in a few minutes."

I slowly and carefully limped my way down the hallway to the waiting room. Along with a couple of other families, Mom, Dad, Shining, Cadence, and Azure Glide - Cadence's adopted brother - were anxiously waiting for my arrival.

"I know it's late in the evening but it'd like you to meet Gleaming Dusk," I said as they all gathered around me.

"She's adorable," Mom said.

"Thanks, Mom," I replied.

"Is she okay?" Cadence asked. "She seems a little on the small side."

"Dr. M. Brio assured us that she was okay due to Sunny being at thirty-eight weeks."

"You know, even though she has blue skin, she actually looks a lot like Sunset," Dad remarked.

I chuckled softly at him. "So who wants to carry her back?" I asked.

"I do," Azure volunteered.

After passing her off, I lead everyone back down the hallway to Sunny's room. Mom and Dad continued to coo over Gleaming while Cadence began to pick on her younger brother. I knocked on the door and lead the family in.

"Hold on a minute," Shining said. "What's going on?"

Latched onto Sunset's right breast was a pale yellow baby with orange hair, accented with blue and green streaks. Sunny looked at us and put her finger to her mouth.

I walked over to Sunny's side and drew attention to the other baby. "Everyone, this is Solaria Radiance," I said softly, "she's Gleaming's twin sister."

I could tell that Mom and Cadence wanting to hold Solaria but out of respect for Sunny's exposed breast, they stayed next to me. I happened to notice Azure's eyes as he passed her over to Cadence. "So this is what it takes to get my big, bad brother-in-law to cry," I said playfully.

"No. There's...something in the air," he deflected.

"Uh-huh," I deadpanned.

"Hey, Twily. I think someone's hungry," Cadence said with a small laugh.

"What makes you say...oh." I looked to see that Gleaming was fussing and trying to find a place to latch on to, so to speak. "Does somebody want some num-nums?" I asked Gleaming. I cradled her tightly in my right arm once again and headed toward the bed.

"Gimme a minute, babe," Sunny said. "Solaria is almost done." A minute or so later, Sunny and I switched babies. "She still needs to be burped," Sunny reminded me as she changed breasts.

"I know," I said as I walked over to the family with Solaria. "So...who wants to be the first to burp her?"

For whatever reason, Azure's hand shot up faster than Pinkie Pie. He took her and the burp rag from me and began rubbing her back.

"How big are they?" Mom asked.

"Gleaming weighed in at five pounds, ten ounces. Solaria is five pounds, four ounces," I said. "Both of them are nineteen and a quarter inches long."

"Solaria looks a lot like you did as a newborn," Mom said as a short but loud burp came from Solaria.

"Sounds like you're going to have a tomboy on your hands," Dad said in response to Solaria.

We all had a small laugh at dad's comment before Cadence spoke up. "Seems like babies think that you're a pillow," Cadence teased. "First, Flurry Heart when she was born, now Solaria Radiance."

"I guess I just have a magic touch when it comes to newborns," he responded.

"We'll see how good that touch is whenever you finally decide to settle down with Celaeno," Cadence continued to tease.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Azure asked.

A fiendish smirk crossed Cadence's face. "Well, me and Shining have Flurry. Twily and Sunset have Gleaming and Solaria. You're the only one here still a virgin."

"What?! I'm not a vir-"

"Okay, let's all settle down," Shining interrupted. "This isn't the place to be having this discussion."

I couldn't help but laugh at my family as Dad and Shining tried to get the two siblings settled down so they didn't wake up Solaria. With all the silliness going on, there was one voice I that didn't hear.

"Sunny, you're awfully qui-" I started to say before I saw the scene in the bed. Sunny was fast asleep with Gleaming still suckling on her teat.

"I think we should see ourselves out for the night," said Mom, looking over my shoulder. "Everyone's had a long day and could probably use some sleep."

Azure gently passed Solaria back to me so that I could lay her in the crib. "Thanks for coming," I said as I gave everyone a goodbye hug. "Will any of you be stopping by tomorrow?"

"I don't know. I might swing by if I have time," Azure replied. "I'd kinda like introduce the twins to Celaeno if that's okay."

I let out a long yawn before answering. "I don't foresee that being an issue," I told him.

After they had left, I went over to Sunny and gently shook her awake so that she could finish feeding Gleaming. "When did everyone leave?" she asked groggily.

"A couple of minutes ago. We noticed that you had nodded off and Mom made an executive decision to leave," I told her. "Whenever Gleaming gets finished with her dinner, I'll set her in the crib."

"I'll do it. I've got to use the bathroom, so I can lay her down on my way," Sunny said.

"Fair enough. Do you want to send them to the nursery for the night?"

"Probably should. They can always come and wake me up if either of the girls needs feeding," she replied.

I called the nurse's station and let them know that the girls would be spending the night in the nursery. A few minutes later, Sunny had finished nursing Gleaming and laid her in the crib. While she was in the restroom, I called once more for the babies to be picked up. The last thing we did before laying down was to give each of the girls a good night kiss as they were wheeled out.

Author's Note:

Please use the spoiler boxes for comments on this chapter.

For a pic of Azure Glide (an OC by my friend, TheWingman) and his full bio, click here.

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