Previous Chapters Next
Close
The 988th Summer Celebration Pt 14,792 words
The 988th Summer Celebration Pt 23,758 words
Meeting Twilight Sparkle4,361 words
Coming Home3,108 words
Military Track3,067 words
Planning A Change2,587 words

The 988th Summer Celebration Pt 2

Author's Note:

I will try to update this story on a Tuesday, not every Tuesday mind you, but when I can it'll be on that day of the week.

Sit back, relax, and enjoy this chapter, and post any helpful commentary if you wish!

Arc: Childhood
Chapter 2: The 988th Summer Celebration Pt 2

“So who’s your favorite Power Pony?” Spike asked once we got out of the library. The sun was still high, but it was clear we had burned through some time reading those comics. Not a significant amount, but still, a noticeable one.

A soft tap on my shoulder by my sister reminded me that Spike was still waiting for my response. Giving my sister a silent “thank you”, I quickly turned to address his question, placing a smile on my face.

“Definitely Zapp. Her ability to control the forces of nature and hail down lightning, storms, and tornadoes on her enemies are just so amazing! Who wouldn’t want to have that kind of power! What about you?” I asked. Before Spike could answer, my sister tapped on my shoulder again, making me notice that we had reached our destination. As we entered the ice cream shop, a small bell rang above us, instantly summoning a creamy white unicorn who beamed at our arrival.

“Hi, everypony! My name is Eiscreme and welcome to Glace’s Shop! What can I get for ya?” The stallion said with a grin. My sister, being the fastest to respond, gave her order first.

“Can I get some strawberry ice cream?” Lightning Spark asked with a smile. The white stallion simply smiled as he began to take notes.

“Strawberry ice cream coming right up! What about you my fellow baby dragon? Got something on your mind?” Eiscreme asked Spike, who pondered on what he wanted to order.

“You guys don’t happen to serve gem sprinkles do you?” Spike asked, to which the unicorn shook his head.

“Nope! But we do serve sprinkles that look like gems and have a sort of ‘crunch’ to them. Not the real deal but they are still tasty!” The stallion replied, causing the purple dragon to smile.

“Then I’ll take some vanilla ice cream with those sprinkles on top,” Spike ordered, which the stallion noted down before turning to face me.

"And how about you? Anything you prefer?" The stallion asked as he showed me some potential options.

"How about a cone of vanilla chocolate?" I asked, to which Eiscreme nodded and jotted down. As my mother gave her order to the white stallion, Spike turned to me and answered my question.

"I think I'd choose Radiance. There's just this ring to the name that makes it so nice. But apart from that and the way she carries herself, I’d choose Masked Matter-Horn as a second option.” Spike responded. I simply nodded to his response as the stallion left to the inner compartment of the store before returning with our desserts.

Immediately we began to taste our savory treats as my mother led us to a table so that we could properly enjoy it. My sister and I couldn’t help but watch Spike as he licked his ice cream using his two-tipped tongue, so much so that we nearly forgot to pay attention to our ice creams which began to drip a bit. We were barely able to save our treats, but soon we found ourselves looking back at Spike, who finally noticed that we were looking at him.

“Why’re you looking at me like that?” Spike asked, causing me and my sister to blink. I simply scratched my head in embarrassment.

“Well… it’s about how you’re licking your ice cream… or rather what you’re using to lick it.” I responded with a nervous laugh. It was now Spike’s turn to blink before he chuckled.

“Oh, that! Yeah, I have a forked tongue, and it’s very long! It’s a dragon thing, like breathing fire!” Spike replied, causing me and my sister to go quiet.

“Y-You… You breathe fire?!” My sister yelled out in shock. Spike nodded with another grin.

“I do! Dragons breathe fire you know. Can’t show it to you two right now, considering the risks of doing it in this building, but maybe in the future I can show you two how I do it.” The purple dragon said proudly before returning to finish his treat, which we followed suit. After another few minutes, our ice cream cones were finished and we soon went outside.

“So I guess we’re going to leave you back with Twilight?” I asked Spike as my mother soon began to guide us back to the Canterlot Library. The young baby dragon simply nodded with a hint of sadness.

“Yeah. Back to helping Twilight, organize her books, serve dinner to her, wipe the windows, and so forth.” The dragon said casually while my mother suddenly stopped for a moment to process what Spike had just said.

“I think I’m going to have another discussion with Twilight again.” My mother said with a neutral expression before letting out a sigh as we arrived at the front doors of the library. As Spike began to enter through the doors alone, my mother called out to him one last time. “If you need anything dear, please don’t be afraid to contact me.” Snowy Blizzard said. Spike simply nodded.

“Thank you, but I’m pretty sure I can do all of my chores without any help,” Spike said as he closed the door behind him, leaving my mother silent.

“And he calls them chores… Let’s go home, my children.” My mother said as she grabbed me and lifted us into the air using her wings, with my sister flying behind her. As I felt the small gusts of wind hitting my face, I couldn’t help but feel the sense of freedom. Oh! If only I knew how to fly by myself! Then I can feel this emotion every day!

Eventually, we landed in the yard in front of our house. My mom gently placed me on the ground as my sister landed next to me with a soft smile and patted my shoulder.

“Don’t worry. You’ll soon learn how to fly. Wanna play a game?” Lightning Spark asked as my mother opened the door and let us in. I nodded with a smile.

“Alright!” I said enthusiastically to her before turning to my mom who had gone to talk with my dad. “Hey, mom! Can I go play with my sister upstairs?” I asked, to which my parents nodded.

“Sure. Go ahead, son. Just remember to go downstairs when we tell you to.” My dad responded with a smile. I ran towards my parents and tried to hug them at the same time.

“Thanks, mom! Thanks dad! I’ll do just that!” I said as I instantly went towards the staircase and began to rush upstairs, before tripping myself and letting out an ‘oomph!’ as I face-planted on the last stair. Lightning Spark, who had gone ahead before me, began to snicker before helping me stand up again.

“Oh, Midnight! You’re just so funny, especially when you make those cute little sounds!” My sister said as she playfully shook my mane, causing it to become even messier than it was before. I simply nervously laughed.

“I bet if I tried to make cute sounds you’d probably collapse from cuteness overload syndrome,” I stated, causing my sister to raise an eyebrow and smirk.

“Alright. Give me everything you got Midnight!” Lightning Spark said with a determined look as she sat down and prepared to defend herself from any cute sounds I could do. After pondering about which cute sound I should make, I picked my sound and took a deep breath.

“Hewwo!” I said out loud, using everything I had from cute puppy eyes to making my voice echo a bit. My sister stared right at me before she fell over, knocking me down onto the ground as she collided with me. Her body shook and twitched as she could only say a few words.

“C-Cuteness O-Overload!” Lightning Spark yelled before letting out a quiet ‘bleh.’ I simply stared at her fallen body, blinking at it before I began to nudge her. As she regained her consciousness, she began to lift herself, staring at my eyes with a sleepy look. Looking away, she pouted before letting out a smile. “Alright, Midnight. You win.” My sister stated, causing me to silently celebrate.

“Yay! I won!-”

“You’re now the cutest creature on the entire planet right now.” My sister added on, causing me to blink before I began to laugh nervously.

“A-Alright… Now can we go ahead and play? Maybe chess this time” I asked my sister who nodded.

“Fine with me. Chess isn’t exactly the game I would choose, but there’s no doubt that if done correctly it can become an intense battle. Bullet match?” My sister asked as we entered my room and pulled out the black and white chessboard, along with the clock used in chess tournaments.

“Bullet match,” I confirmed as we quickly placed the chess pieces in their place. “Flip the coin. I choose heads for black.” I ordered as my sister grabbed a small golden bit and tossed it into the air. When it landed on her extended wing, it showed heads, to which I nodded as I spun the board so that the black pieces were in front of me. My sister prepared the timer, giving us one minute each.

“Ready?” My sister asked as she held the King’s Pawn while her wing extended to start the clock. I nodded as I held my own King’s pawn with a smile.

“Ready!” I said with determination, grinning as we looked at each other intensely, ready to attack each other the moment the clock began.

“Go!” My sister yelled as my sister played e4 and stopped her clock, as I followed by playing e5. I barely was able to switch the clock when my sister switched it back after playing Qh5. I played Kc6, defending the e5 pawn and preventing a potential Queen check from there. Trying to fool me, my sister played b4, intending to have my knight capture that piece so that her queen could check me and capture the hanging pawn, but seeing through I played Nf6, attacking her queen. She shivered as I turned the clock against her, as she moved her queen to f5.

I accidentally fumbled my pawn and instead of moving to d5 as intended, I moved it to d6, not entirely bad, but not the best either. Seeing my bishop sneakily attacking her queen, she moved it back to f3. I moved my bishop to g4 to attack her queen and grinned as she was about to capture it until she realized that it was defended. She mumbled something under her breath as she moved her queen to b3.

As the game progressed she began to fumble more and more, the pressure from the ticking clock causing her to lose her concentration as she tried to move her queen to safety. By the time we traded queens, she was very low on material as I was ten points ahead of her. I began to check her King. An Rb2+ forced her king to move to f3, where I checked her again with a Knight to d4. My rooks and bishops slowly began to feast on her scattered pawns. At one point Lightning tried to turn the tables around with a Rook to e1 check, but moving a rook the attack was canceled. As the sole white rook was gobbled up near the end of the match, my sister began to sweat as she only had seconds left to move.

But before she could move I quickly tapped her shoulder and pointed to the board, making her groan as she realized what happened. Her King had been checkmated by my bishop, unable to move to another file due to being cornered by my rook, and any other potential escape paths were being blocked by my knight. It was game over for her, and she knew it.

“Ugh! The most annoying part is that you don’t have a chess-related cutie mark! Imagine how more powerful you’d be if you had a pawn, rook, or knight piece as your cutie mark! How are you so good anyway?” Lightning Spark asked as she began to put the pieces back in their place. I simply shrugged.

“I just like playing chess. Not enough to make it a talent, just a hobby. As for getting good at chess, a good idea is to make sure that you always apply pressure to your enemy while developing your own pieces. I chased your queen for the entire first half of the game, and you saw what happened.” I said, to which my sister nodded.

“Yeah. I think you’re a good tactician, which makes up for your lack of physical skill… have you ever thought of being part of the Royal Guard?” Lightning Spark asked, which caused me to blink in surprise. I never thought about that truthfully, which caused me to stall for a bit.

“I… I never thought about that question, to begin with.” I confessed, looking away for a bit as we decided to play again without any time limit. “Like… don’t they just stand in place for the entire day and do nothing else?” I asked, causing my sister to shrug.

“They probably do other things like train. Hey! Maybe it can help you train your wings so you can fly Midnight!” My sister exclaimed. The thought excited me until I realized something else, which caused me to frown.

“Wait. Military school starts from the age of twelve at the earliest, with the age usually being twelve to fifteen. I’m just ten, and I doubt that I’d need to go to military school to learn how to fly by the time I become age-appropriate.” I stated, causing my sister to realize her misjudgment and nod to the side.

“Yeah. You’re right on that. Alright, forget what I just said, let’s go back to playing chess… But if it’s true that the only thing the Royal Guard does is stand around on guard, I bet if you did end up in the military for whatever reason, you’d destroy the competition-”

“Checkmate.” I simply stated, causing my sister to look down and realize that my queen had checkmated her King, with a bishop defending it. She simply groaned as she began to reorganize the pieces again.

“Again. How?” Lightning Spark asked, causing me to roll my eyes.

“Easy. You did not perceive the future threat of checkmate and did nothing to prevent my bishop and queen from attacking that square.” I said calmly as my sister sighed.

“Well. I’m beat. Can we go ahead and do something else?” My sister asked. I nodded.

“Alright,” I said as I began to pack away the chess pieces as she brought out a board of checkers. “Hmm… maybe we should ask dad about what he does during work,” I said out loud, causing my sister to nod.

“Yeah, let’s do that. But not right now. Maybe in the future if you decide to become interested in being a royal guard.” My sister said. I simply shrugged in response.

“I don’t know if it’ll fit me, given that I think I’ll need to pass a physical test or something. Eh. Only time will tell.” I replied as we began to play checkers. We spent the next few hours playing board games, toys, drawing, and so forth. Soon my mom came up and told us that we had a few hours left as she needed to prepare dinner. When I noticed that she had placed the comics at my desk, I immediately grabbed them to read. As I continued reading the adventures of the Power Ponies, my sister got bored of playing games and began to do some wing-ups, causing me to momentarily look up from the piece of material I was reading and stare at her.

“Have you thought of becoming a Royal Guard? You’d certainly pass the physical test if you tried.” I said out loud, before becoming surprised as she simply laughed.

“Nah. I want to become a Wonderbolt! You do know what they are right?” My sister asked, to which my response was a shrug. “They’re the best fliers in Equestria, and they’ll be performing at the Summer Sun Celebration! I want to be just like them, and show how good of a flier I can be!” My sister said as she continued to do her training routine. I simply nodded.

“That sounds like a fun dream. No doubt you’ll reach it when you’re old enough to apply.” I responded with a smile. She returned the gesture by hugging me.

“Thanks Midnight.” My sister said before her ear twitched as she heard something downstairs. Going to the door, she heard our mother calling us, as she began to shout her reply. “Yes, mom! We’ll be coming down soon!” My sister yelled before turning to me. “Dinner’s ready. Let’s go downstairs.” Lightning Spark stated. We quickly placed our things away and neatly organized them before heading downstairs. She went ahead by sliding down the railings while I glided alongside her until we both reached the bottom of the stairs. Right when we hopped into our chairs, the lights went out. As I looked out the window, the outside world had become as dark as the inside of our house, which meant that nightfall had arrived. I could sense and hear ponies shuffling in the darkness, along with the sound of a plate being set on the table.

And then, as a small flicker of light began to appear, a soft song began to play in the background, before an invisible group of guests began to sing.

“Happy Birthday to You
Happy Birthday to You
Happy Birthday to You.
Happy Birthday to You.

From good friends and true,
From old friends and new,
May good luck go with you,
And happiness too.”

The candle from the now visible cake finally brightened up, revealing not only my parents but some family members too as well as the many friends Lightning Spark had gained, who also considered me as their friend. They all shouted ‘Happy Birthday Lightning and Midnight!’ in unison, before they did their best to hug us in a massive group hug. Even though I felt my body being squeezed past the standard limit, I couldn’t help but smile and laugh.

“Thank you everypony for this wonderful day! I mean night- I mean… ya know what I meant!” My sister said giggling, as I laughed along with her along with the rest of the crowd.

“Go ahead you two, blow the candle and make a wish.” My mother said as me and my sister stepped in front of the cake. The delicious pastry was of blue and white color, with lightning marks on the side. We smiled at each other as we mentally agreed to blow five candles each. And as we closed our eyes and prepared to blow, I silently wished this:

“I wish to one day be able to fly, and show everypony what I can do.”

Immediately upon blowing the candles together, the crowd began to cheer and the lights turned back on. My father immediately helped put on some party hats and the event began to go into full swing. Apparently either they had a good party planner or my mom was just good at doing everything for us as in just a few hours, they managed to make everything look perfect. From party games to decorations, the house had completely changed its appearance.

Soon I joined my sister and her friends in their games. We played Pin the Tail on the Donkey, a small Pinata game, and a bunch of other fun pastimes. The cake ultimately met its untimely demise as we kids soon were served a piece of it, with me and my sister gaining a slightly larger portion of it, courtesy of my mom. The parents of these kids also joined in and began to mingle with my mom and dad as they talked about all sorts of things that I didn’t pay attention to. It was our birthday, so why distract ourselves from anything other than celebrating?

As seconds turned into minutes and minutes turned into hours, we were able to plow through the entire night, going past midnight and into the early hours before sunrise. Something that I found interesting was that ponies, who usually sleep through the day, are granted unlimited energy the night before the solstice, which would’ve been really helpful information for the nine-year-old me who thought using sugar and sweets as an energy source was a good idea. While I did (barely) manage to stay awake back then, that was at the cost of a tummy ache soon after, so it was good that my mother convinced me to not do the same thing this year.

“Everypony! Thank you for coming here and celebrating my children’s birthday, but I’m afraid we’re going to have to pack up soon because sunrise is about to come!” My mother exclaimed, causing everybody to immediately squeal in delight before they rushed out, my sister and I included. As our parents followed behind us to make sure nobody was being left behind or lost, I noticed Twilight and Spike among the crowd of spectators, but they were too far away to be reached in time, and with risk of being lost, I decided to stay put. Instead, I opted to lean on my sister’s shoulder and smile.

“Love you, sis,” I said out loud, causing my sister to smile.

“You too, dear brother. Look! It’s Princess Celestia!” My sister exclaimed. The crowd began to cheer as Celestia landed in front of them, being escorted by several royal guards by her side, the Equestrian flag hanging in the background. The audience began to quiet down as she began to give her speech, before lifting herself in the air. We watched in awe as the sun quickly rose behind her, giving the impression that she was the glowing sun, as the night sky disappeared and revealed the wonderful early sunrise colors in the background.

We all cheered. Such a sight occurred every year, but having Princess Celestia present herself and raise it in front of you is somewhat rare, given that she tended to move from city to town each year to host the celebration. My parents came from behind and hugged me and my sister, and I found myself letting out tears of joy.

This tenth birthday of ours was the best one yet!

267 views