• Published 13th Oct 2020
  • 467 Views, 34 Comments

All the Time - Shrinky Frod



Mudbriar’s first Hearth’s Warming with the Pie family leads to some harsh reminders of what it means to be Limestone.

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Chapter 3

Limestone didn’t even have the energy to slam the door behind her, just letting it swing shut on its own as she stepped out into the bracing, frigid air outside.

”Before thou takest it on, with Maud.”

Her limbs felt like gabbro as she walked away from the house, wandering off into the rock fields. Heavy, hard to move, and damned near worthless.

They aren’t even talking about getting married yet, let alone having foals.

Not that you’re likely to have them any sooner.

Buck, you’re not even likely to have them. Little hard to do with another mare.

Tartarus, when’s the last time you even looked at anypony outside the farm? Not since that blue filly bailed on us, and she stopped writing back pretty quick, didn’t she?

Oh, but you’re just ‘busy with the farm,’ right? Like that’s ever going to change. Why are you even upset about this? You should be happy Dad’s giving the farm to them, that’s always been the Plan, hasn’t it?

The Plan. Capital ‘p,’ plan. The reason she’d done… anything since before Maud had even gotten her cutie mark. Ever since they’d realized her kid sister absorbed information about rocks like a sponge, it had all been about the Plan. Scrimping, saving, pulling every single bit together to keep Maud in her classes. Poring over hand-me-down books to try and glean any secrets to picking out which rocks were worth cultivating and which were only good for gravel. It would all be worth it, when Maud graduated and came back to help improve the farm. To apply the science she’d learned, that her parents, grandparents, their grandparents, on back to Holder Cobblestone and Stonefruit Pie, had originally eschewed in favor of ancient earth pony tradition. To prove that their little plot of barren caldera land could make their kin proud.

That they could manage in seven generations what had taken the Apples less than three.

And then….

Limestone’s distracted wandering ended as she bumped into a crystal stand. She looked around quickly, recognizing one of the deeper quartz deposits on the farm, the walls of the cavern shot through with varicolored crystalline veins. She’d been working with Marble to expand it out into a full station earlier in the year, when they had orders to fill for the crystals that glittered in the light of magically charged hazard lanterns that had been placed throughout the tunnels.

Well, it was as good a place as any to put the ‘rock.’

Limestone quickly drew out a lumpy, black stone onto the parchment she’d grabbed, and stuffed it into the toolbox they’d brought down when the order was finished. Spitting out the charcoal stick she’d used, the mare started back for the farmhouse, trying hard not to get lost in her thoughts again. It was already getting dark out; she didn’t particularly want to end up finding out where she’d wander if she got lost.

Fortunately, finding her way back from the mine entrance was a simple matter. To be fair, she could literally find her way out here from the house in her sleep, so it wasn’t too much of a surprise she’d ended up here in the first place.

Marble’d probably end up finding it, if Pinkie didn’t stumble over it first. There was no accounting for Pinkie luck, but Celestia knew how often Marble had found Limestone out there.

Snow was starting to gather on Limestone’s coat when she made it back to the house, and she shook it off before going back inside. If she was going to mope, she could at least do it where it was warm.

“Okay everypony, rock’s ready when you are,” she announced as she hung up her cap and scarf. “I’m gonna catch a nap while you’re hunting.”

“Okie dokie lokie!” Pinkie hopped over and gave Limestone a hug.

“Sorry I made fun of you earlier,” she whispered. “I left you some sweet rolls in the kitchen!”

“Heh… thanks, Sis.” Limestone returned the hug after a moment. “I’ll grab ‘em later. I’m still giving you something distinctly un-fun to do for chores while you’re here.”

“Eh, I’ll find a way!” Pinkie winked, giving Limestone a peck on the cheek before she turned to the rest of the family to pass out team assignments.

“Okay, Maud, Mudbriar, Apple Bloom - you’re on team one!” Pinkie announced as Limestone started up the stairs to the room she shared with her single sisters. “Marble, Big Mac, Sugar Belle, you’re team two!”

Limestone tuned out the activity below, flopping into her bunk and pulling her pillow over her face. She clutched it there, waiting until she heard the front door closing, and then let the tension go. She pulled her pillow down tight, wrapping her hooves around to stuff it into her mouth, and screamed into the cotton and feather barrier. The muffled wail turned into sobs as Limestone rolled over onto her stomach, trying to bury the noise in her mattress as she pounded a hoof into it next to her head.

“S’upid, s’upid, s’upid!” She shouted into the bed. “Tirek damn you, this is what you’ve been waiting for! Idiot!” Powerful muscles trembled beneath her sweaty coat as she screamed again. She shook like a pebble in an avalanche, trying to ignore the dull ache in her chest and pressure in her head. She could feel her veins throbbing beneath her mane, and drew in deep, shaking breaths between sobs as she soaked her pillow.

“What - the buck - is wrong - with me?” Limestone cried between sobs, starting to hiccup as much as cry. She didn’t hear the sound of hoofsteps coming up the stairs, or of the door to the bedroom opening.

She barely noticed when another pony crawled onto the mattress with her, snuggling up to her side.

She did notice when her new bedmate’s head pressed gently against the back of her neck, hooves wrapping around her in a silent, gentle embrace. Limestone bit her lip, hard, trying to swallow the pain, or at least to keep it from escaping any more loudly than necessary.

“Please be Marble,” she whimpered softly.

“Mhm.”

Growing up in the Pie family meant speaking at least six languages fluently. Ponish and Middle Ponish, obviously, for dealing with the outside world and their parents. But then each of the Pie children had their own language, their own way of expressing themselves through their quirks and the scars that they’d built up over the years. Their own ways of expressing the things that they couldn’t actually say, not without making trouble.

Pinkie understood Maud’s the best. Maud was the only pony who even came close to speaking fluent “Pink-ese” as her sisters had come to call it. Limestone had learned to be the most straightforward of the four, having to deal with other ponies more than most and being the oldest of them. But Marble was the one who truly came closest to speaking another language, putting more meaning into two syllables than most ponies did into everything they said, if you knew how to understand her.

She was here. It was going to be okay.

Limestone sniffled, wiping her eyes and drawing a few slow, shuddering breaths. Marble shifted to lay down next to her, stroking her back comfortingly.

“Hmm?”

“N-no, I don’t want to talk about it,” Limestone croaked. “Why aren’t you out with Sugar Belle and Mac?”

“Mm-mm.”

“Come on, they didn’t mind you being there. Pinkie wouldn’t have paired you up with them if they did.”

“Eh… mm-mm.” A light shrug, the warmth of her sister snuggling up closer.

“You’re gonna lose out on the rock hunt,” Limestone pointed out

“Eh.” Another shrug, a nuzzle. Marble’s muzzle slipping gently into the crook of Limestone’s neck.

“P-please don’t let me ruin a-anypony else’s Hearth’s Warming,” Limestone whispered, starting to tear up again. She felt Marble’s frown against her neck, and sidled away from the younger Pie.

“I’m just being an idiot, Marble. Just like always. I should be glad Dad’s talking about Maud… about me not having to run the farm any more. Not like she’s taking over now anyway. Still more than enough time for me to get everything set up perfect for her. Then I can just….”

Just what? Just go find another rock pile to waste your life on? Just keep plugging away here and wait until you go the way Granny did? Going about your day and not even remembering your own family?

You can’t put them through that again. You’d just be -

Limestone was jostled out of her thoughts by Marble gently booping her on the nose. Despite herself, she smiled at her little sister.

“I dunno what I’ll do, but I’ll figure out something,” Limestone lied, trying to believe it herself. Trying to believe she had any ideas, any options, beyond the ones that came to her in her darker moments, when she was trying to balance the budget and just not coming up with enough black ink to outweigh the red. When she started considering the monthly payments that went to protecting the family in case one of them got caught in a cave-in, and how very close she’d come to that herself. When she started trying to figure out just what the payoff was for everything they were doing, and weighing that against the payoff for just not running quite fast enough next time.

She didn’t like thinking about those things. But sometimes, she just couldn’t help it.

Marble frowned at her and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly.

“Limestone, talk to me! I’m… I’m worried about you.”

It would have hurt less if Marble had just bucked her in the gut. Limestone heaved a sigh, going limp next to her sister.

“I wish you wouldn’t be,” she whispered. “I told you, it’s stupid! I’m stupid. I just… you know Hearth’s Warming’s always tough for me, since I started running the farm. Too much work not getting done,” she tried to joke. “You should go have fun with the others.”

“And what about you?” Marble’s voice was soft, hoarse from disuse, but the plaintive tone of it made it impossible for Limestone to just not answer her.

“I’ll be fine. You know me, solid as bedrock. Limestone… it’s what you build with. You make the house out of it, and what’s the point if nopony lives there?” The eldest Pie sister let out a laugh, trying not to think about how strained, almost manic it sounded in her head. “What’s the point of building it all up, if there’s nopony there to enjoy it? You don’t just… let the house be a house, you don’t leave it up just to be there. You use it. Then you leave it when you’re ready for something better.”

Marble nuzzled Limestone gently.

“Mm-mm.”

“Sis, if Big Mac hadn’t found somepony else… you’d leave too,” Limestone countered. “I know you had a crush on him. Can’t blame you either. Get out of here, go to a farm that’s thriving, closer to Pinkie and Maud, somewhere you could have a life of your own?”

She sighed, shaking her head.

“I don’t… I don’t really have anything, that’s mine, do I?” Limestone climbed out of her bed, looking out the window at Holder’s Boulder, leaning against the sill and wiping her tear-matted muzzle. “It’s all Mom and Dad’s, until they pass it on to Maud. I just keep it running. I share a room with my sisters, my things have all become hand-me-downs, the ponies I try to date all leave once they have enough paychecks to get out of here?

“And it’s never going to stop being like this,” Limestone murmured, more to herself than her silent audience. “Maud gets the farm, I’ll just keep working it for her. Keep her from getting too wrapped up in her research to actually pay the bills. Her kids take over, Auntie Limestone keeps working, until one day their kids find her….”

She shuddered, remembering the fateful winter night she and Pinkie had found Granny in the garden.

“At least Granny had Grampa,” she whispered.

“Limestone?” Maud’s monotone voice called up the stairs. “I think we need to talk.”

“Great,” Limestone groaned, leaning her forehead against the cold window. “Just what I needed. More talking.”

“If it’s about what Father said, you do need it,” Maud told her evenly as she stepped into their old bedroom. “Mudbriar and I aren’t taking the farm away from you. Not now, not ever.”

“In case you didn’t catch Dad’s point earlier, it’s not mine in the first place, so no problem there,” Limestone pointed out.

“Then you didn’t hear the part where I reminded him that you’ve done more to earn this farm than I ever will. I only said the part about how he should already know that in my head.”

“It’s not about earning it, Maud!” Limestone groaned, turning around to face her sister. “It’s about making the farm support itself, and keeping it in the family, and that means grandfoals! And it’s a little hard for me to provide those. Even if I wanted to try adopting, who’d send a kid to grow up on a rock farm with an angry nag like me as a Mom?”

“Then he’s still turning over the wrong rocks,” Maud observed. “Mudbriar and I have talked about it. Neither one of us is comfortable with the idea of trying to raise foals, or think it would be fair to pass… ‘us’ on to them. We’ve taken steps to keep it from ever happening without significant assistance.”

“Welp, guess it’s up to you and Pinkie then, Marble!” Limestone laughed, leaning back against the cold window, putting her weight on the window sill. “But seriously, Maud, you’d do a better job of running this place than I do. You’ve got all the tools, the education… we’ve always planned on you taking over, I just… I guess it just hurts to hear it out lou-”

“I don’t want to take over the farm from you, either, Limestone. That’s the whole reason I moved to Ponyville, to study the grotto.”

Limestone’s teeth ground together as she squeezed her eyes shut.

Tirek take me, why can’t I just pick a side that I want and be happy to hear it?

“I kind of figured that out, Sis. Really… glad you’ve had that chance,” she muttered between her clenched teeth. “I… damn it, what is wrong with me?” She shouted.

“The fact you don’t even care about the farm says I shouldn’t care what Dad thinks about who runs it, but it’s also driving me crazy after everything we’ve done to get you through school! The idea of you running the farm makes my gut twist, but every time I pay the damned mortgage we took out to pay for your rocktorate I want to scream!” Limestone drew in a hard, long breath, filling her lungs and continuing her tirade before Marble or Maud could interrupt her. “And I know you’re n-not wrong to run from this damned place, but I, I always thought it was all going to be an investment that you’d be here to help make up for every Hearth’s Warming when nopony found any presents because there weren’t any presents to find! When the only fun thing we had to do was a rock hunt that I couldn’t even be part of, because I was the one who set it up! W-when I, when I stopped going t-to school? And I can’t blame you for it, because you’re not even doing anything wrong, you’re just bucking smart in ways I can’t be, and I’ve never even said any of this before because I knew you’d try to drop out and then it’d all be wasted but now you’re gone and it’s all wasted anyway and- and- and -”

“Limestone, you need to calm down, you’re going to hurt yourself,” Maud warned her, her face still that same impassive, unbreaking, infuriating mask she always wore. Limestone wiped her eyes, still panting, and glared at her sister.

”I don’t care any more, you selfish, ungrateful whorse!” She roared, her chest tight and her head pounding as she desperately sucked in more air only to spew it back out along with the vitriol she’d been saving up for as long as she could remember.. ”I don’t bucking care, who could hear this who should be more upset about it than you should be! You’re bucking happy and I bucking hate you for it, and I- I-”

Limestone saw Maud lunging towards her, her hoof rising towards her face, and then-

Limestone was in her bed, feeling sick, her head spinning and aching, her tongue bleeding slightly, her gut unsteady. Her eyes darted around, trying to figure out how she’d gotten into bed, just as Marble wrapped her up in a tight hug, tears on her muzzle.

Maud stepped into the room, carrying a tray with a mug of mulled cider and the sweet rolls Pinkie had saved for Limestone.

“You- did you hit me?”

Author's Note:

The closing is coming on Friday; decided to step the pace up a little bit on publication, particularly since this chapter's the biggest one.