"Oh! Was that the milk mare just now?" Rarity instantly shut her sewing machine off and trotted briskly toward the rear door of the Carousel Boutique. Twisting the lock, she pulled at the handle and opened the parlor to the outside world. "Hmmm..." Her eyes scanned, scanned the horizon, then darted down. "Oh! Silly me! Heheh... there it is."
Telekinetically, the unicorn lifted a metal basket filled with four glass milk bottles. She was about to turn back into the Boutique when a chilly wind blew at her neck and mane.
"Ooooh!" Rarity cooed pleasantly, her coat forming goosebumps. She gave a rosy smile to the breezy afternoon. "My, what a pleasant day! T'would be a shame to shut this all out." Her muzzle tightened with thought as she gazed at doorframe. "Oh dear, I seem to have misplaced my doorstop. Well, this won't do. This won't do at all."
Seconds passed. A minute...
Rarity's pout melted away from the crest of a bright expression. Smiling, she tilted her head towards the Boutique's interior. "Oh Sweeeeeetie Bellllle!"
Not long after, a pale white figure with a flouncing mane waddled up. "You called, Rarity?"
"Would you be so kind as to do your older sister a favor, dear?"
"Oh!" Sweetie's voice cracked as she hopped straight up with twitching hooves. "You bet! Anything for you, sis!"
Rarity pointed at the edge of the open door. "Just stand in this area."
Sweetie Belle obediently scooted over and gazed up with an innocent smile. "Right here?"
"Yes! Right there!" Rarity leaned away from the door, grinning victoriously when it refused to swing shut. "Perfect! Now, do not move from that spot!"
"Okay, Rarity!" Sweetie Belle said in a sing-songy voice.
Rarity levitated the milk jars after her as she trotted back into the Boutique.
Sweetie Belle stood in place, her hooves planted firmly against the body of the door. Silence reigned. She squirmed slightly, leaning forward and craning her neck to see into the Boutique. The brightness of the outside world made it difficult to see any deeper than three feet into the shadowed interior.
"How long do you want me to stand here?" she finally asked.
"Until you no longer have to, darling!"
"Oh." Sweetie Belle blinked. "Well, I guess that makes sense." She blinked again. "Hehehe, my sister's so clever!"
She stood there, swaying back and forth on her hooves, humming to herself. Another breeze blew at her, and the filly's teeth chattered a bit. She rubbed one fetlock, then the other, then resumed standing.
With a few errant chirps, a blue jay fluttered down and landed on her horn. Sweetie Belle gazed up, going cross-eyed. She winded and rubbed her eyelids.
Just then, the sound of hoofsteps shuffled up.
Sweetie Belle opened her eyes and smiled. "Hiya, Miss Shores!"
"Huh?" Sapphire Shores skidded to a stop, her flamboyant gown flouncing. "Who said that?!"
"You're here for another dance suit?" Sweetie Belle asked with brightly smiling teeth.
"Miss Shores! Oh, do come in!" Rarity's voice chanted from within the Boutique. "I have your latest ensemble ready to go!"
"Oh my stars do you work fast as lightning! Mmmm!" Sapphire smiled as she pranced into the parlor. "Miss Rarity, I swear, you are my main mare! Yow!"
A distinctly elegant "Squee!" could be heard from inside.
Sweetie Belle waved after her. "Oh, okay! It was nice talking to you, Miss Shores! It's so wonderful being alive and having fun, isn't it?"
The blue jay on her horn made a razzing sound, pooped on the filly's forehead, and fluttered away.
Sweetie Belle stared after it. She blinked again. "Yaay, fun!" she squeaked with her eyes shut.
"I dunno, Lyra," Bon Bon sighed, tossing and turning in bed. "Maybe it's weather. I just can't get comfortable, y'know?"
"Nnnngh..." Lyra sat up, blinking blearily into the soft shadows of night. "Again?"
"Well, I'm sorry! But you know how much my sinuses build up this time of year!"
"Mmmmf... what... what do you need, honey?"
"I dunno." Bon Bon sighed into the mattress. "Maybe another pillow will do."
Lyra slinked out of bed and softly padded across the carpet. "I'll... mmff... see what I can find."
"Thank you, darling."
A half-minute later, Lyra limped back to the couple's bed, tossing a white fluffy object onto Bon Bon's lap. "There ya go. Hope that works."
"Thanks, Lyra. You're a life-saver." Bon Bon lifted Sweetie Belle, fluffed her, and propped her up against the headboard. She then tossed her head against the foal, squirming and squirming as the filly's soft, pliable coat matched the contours of Bon Bon's skull. Despite all of her motions, she still couldn't rest easy. "Well, it's soft and all... but... but I can't get it to stop squeaking!"
"You work nine to five," Lyra grunted as she jerked the covers over herself and curled away. "Then you get to pay for the pillow that don't 'squeak.'"
Bon Bon whimpered slightly. "I-I love you, Lyra..."
"Rrrrgh!" Wildfire snarled. Her earth brown eyes turned red as she leaned forward at the end of her wagon's riggings. "Come onnnn! Celestia damn traffic!" Her nostrils flared as she stamped her hooves into the ground. "What's with all the hold-up?!"
A congested intersection blocked up the middle of Ponyville. As Wildfire craned her neck to see beyond the thick line of wagoneers, she spotted several firefighters struggling to erect a ladder before a tall oak tree rooted alongside Carousel Boutique. A bored-looking persian cat sat on an overhanging branch while a distressed unicorn pointed up at. Rarity pleaded and pleaded with the firefighters, all the while pausing to sob into the shoulder of a muscled stallion in uniform.
As Wildfire leaned back, the hairs on the back of her neck stood up on end. "Are you kidding me?!" Her squealing voice morphed into a draconian snarl. "Are you buckingkidding me?!"
She thrashed about, unabashedly imitating several species of wolverines as she kicked the air and hissed, causing several nearby commuters to squirm nervously.
"All of this for a friggin' cat stuck up in a tree?! I have to go to work! I have to pay my bills! I swear to all that is holy, I'm going to find whoever is responsible and make her eat her own horseshoes! I... I..."
Her forehead had turned blood red at this point. Veins popped along her temples and she was seconds away from foaming at the mouth. As her trembles quadrupled, a cold sweat formed over her body, and she reached back into her wagon, scrounging around until she finally grasped what she was looking for.
Wildfire dragged Sweetie Belle out by her tail. She fumbled a bit, ultimately dangled the filly limply before her, and pressed her lips over the foal's mouth. She proceeded to breathe in and out at regular intervals. Sweetie Belle's marshmallowy body expanded and contracted with mute little squeaks. This went on for a good minute and a half, during which Wildfire's eyes melted back to a cool and inviting brown. The hairs along her neck relaxed and even her wings retracted along her sides.
At last, she breathed calmer and dropped Sweetie Belle altogether. The filly deflated like a rubber balloon besides the pegasus' relaxed hooves.
"You know... so what? Big deal?" Wildfire's thin eyes hung serenely above a placid smile. "The cat probably means a lot to the mare. I'd totally call in everypony I could to save something so special to me. It's nothing to get upset about. Besides, its' a beautiful day--"
Just then, two stray dogs rushed in between the vehicles, bit onto opposite sides of Sweetie Belle, and fought for the scraps of foalish flesh. In their battle, they knocked over Wildfire's wagon, spilling engine parts and cartons of grease everywhere.
Wildfire blinked, then regained her snarling demeanor. "Oh motherbucker--!"
"Lieutenant!" a sailor shouted as he waded fetlock-deep through the rushing water. "That last Griffon torpedo did us in! We're sinking!"
"Just stay calm!" the other pony shouted back. Strobing alarm lights bathed him and the rest of the careening bulkheads with wide crimson swaths. He crawled up the careening battleship hallway as loose containers and supply nets were carried past him in the surmounting deluge. "Help me put out this fire!"
"What fire?!" the other sputtered, then positively shrieked as a plume of flame erupted before the both of them. "Agh! Celestia almighty!"
"This is the only way to the top deck!" the lieutenant shouted. "If we don't make up there in three minutes, we're shark food!"
"Nuts to that!" The other struggled to shout over the sounds of the ship's hull creaking and breaking. "I wanna see my family again!" Frantically, he splashed around, then grabbed a spare bucket. "Here! Help me!" He collected as much of the sea-water as he could and tossed it on the blaze. "Nnnngh!"
The rampaging fire only splashed wilder and hotter.
"That's no good!" The lieutenant grabbed his hoof and shouted into the bedlam. "We need something that's functionally flame retardant to put out this blaze!" That said, he looked around, then gasped at his reflection in a dark glass panel along the wall. "There!" Spinning, he bucked both rear limbs into the container. Glass shattered, exposing a filly unicorn packed in tightly next to a loop of hose. "Grab its tail and keep it steady"
The other stallion nervously obliged, holding the foal's fluffy hairs. "Okay! Okay! What now?!"
"Now, just need to twist the ears, and..." The lieutenant bit his lips for concentration as he gave Sweetie Belle's skull a good tug.
The filly's eyes stretched in opposite directions as her mouth opened wide, wider, and even wider. A loud falsetto noise warbled out of her lungs, pelting the junction of metal corridors in front of her with waves upon waves of uninterrupted sonic reverberations.
Slowly, the fire dissipated, then dissolved into smoldering chunks of burnt metal.
"Amazing!" the pony holding Sweetie's tail gasped. "Let me guess, the sound displaced the pocket of oxygen above the blaze, thereby choking its ability to spread?!"
"Works for me!" The lieutenant tossed Sweetie Belle like an empty cartridge behind him and galloped forward through the the sloshing liquid. "I'd rather ignore it while I'm alive than dwell on it as a corpse! Let's bail!"
"Go go go!"
The two made a hasty exit towards the upper decks in a series of wet little splashes.
In their absence, the battleship continued sinking, groaning, imploding.
"Uhm..." Sweetie Belle's voice squeaked. "Hello? Does this mean I'm not getting a biscuit?"
Silence. More groaning.
She sighed as she waded towards a tilted ceiling. "I'm not getting any biscuits, am I?"
"Mommmmm!" Button whined, lying upright in bed with an ice pack atop his red head of hair. "Stop smothering me! I'm not a foal anymore!" In spite of his protests, he wheezed and coughed with loose phlegm.
"No more fussing, Button!" A golden-coated mare trotted into the dimly-lit bedroom with a tray of things. "You're suffering from the flu, and it's my responsibility to see that you get better!"
"But I'm not sick!" Button wheezed and hacked. "Really! Can't I go outside!"
"Hmmph! You're full of mucus and infections and it's the one time you actually want to play old-fashioned games!" She plugged a heating pad into the wall and sat it on the floor. "What am I going to do with you, Button?"
"Let me... uhhhhh... outside?"
"No, and that's final! Now be a good colt and lie back. Try and relax." Button's mother placed Sweetie Belle on the floor, then stepped on her tail. Sweetie's mouth opened wide like a trash can lid. Pulling out a bag of ice, the mare ripped it open and dumped its contents into Sweetie's throat. She then stepped on the unicorn's tail repeatedly. Sweetie's jaws opened and shut in repeated motions, crushing the ice into a fine powder.
Once this was accomplished, Button placed the unicorn over the heating pad. As the ice began to melt, the mare kicked Sweetie Belle firmly in the shoulder. The filly began to vibrate from the neck up, gargling the melting liquid and preventing it from going down her throat.
As the heating pad worked its way through Sweetie's body, steam rose from the melted ice, filling the room with a fine mist.
"Now, just breathe easily, my little Button." The mother leaned over and kissed her colt on the forehead. "Deep breaths, okay? We're going to open those lungs of yours wide open, and then the flu will work its own way out. Okay?" She trotted out with a sing-songy tone to her voice. "Sweet dreams!"
As the door shut to Button's bedroom, he sat upright in bed, blinking at the gargling unicorn, then at the dark walls of the place.
"Alright, my little ponies!" Cheerilee trotted across the front of the classroom with a brilliant smile. "Open the brown envelopes and pull the sheets out, but keep them face-down across your desk! You've prepared for this test long and hard, and now's the morning we've all been waiting for! This is for your futures, remember?" Her eyes twitched as a strand of hair or two popped loose from her fuchsia bangs. "This is totally not for school funding or an improved curriculum, but this is for your bright and sh-shiny futures! Heeheehee! Got it?"
Students stared, blinked, drooled.
"Good! Now pull out your number two pencils and wait for my instructions--"
"Uhhhh..." Snips blinked and raised his hoof. "Teach?"
"Yes, Snips?"
He waved his blunt stick of a pencil. "There's something wrong with my pencil!"
Cheerilee stared at him. She sighed, face-hoofed, and fought to keep smiling. "That's because you've forgotten to sharpen it, Snips. Now be a good colt and quietly use the sharpener in the back."
"Uhhhhhhhhh-okay!" Nervously, the colt hopped out from behind his desk and galloped across the room. He stood before Sweetie Belle who was hanging horizontally from a spindle fastened to the wall. Plucking the pencil from his mouth, he reached a hoof forward, lifted her tail, and stuck the blunt end in.
"Eeep!" Sweetie Belle blushed deeply. Snips grasped her horn and spun her whole body several times with a muffled squeaking sound. At last, he let go of her and trotted away with a fully sharpened pencil.
"Ahem..." Cheerilee cleared her throat loudly and pointed toward the back of the room. "Snips..."
The colt blinked, then gasped knowingly. He turned around, trotted back, slid a small trash can underneath Sweetie Belle's tail, and gave her head several heavy slaps. A ribbon of loose pencil shavings fell into the can. Dutifully, Snips trotted back and sat at his desk.
Twnnng! An arrow landed just a few inches to the left of a target's bullseye at the far end of a grassy meadow.
"Horseapples..." Time Turner leaned back, wiping sweat from his brow as he lowered the bow at his side. "Where has my vision gone these days?"
"Hey, look on the bright side, Doc." Ace turned and smirked at him from underneath his sweatband. "You've improved from last week."
"Have I? I mean really?"
"Yup!" Ace smirked as he reached back into his quiver. "I'm just better than you then and now!" He pulled Sweetie Belle loose, lined her up with his bow, and launched her.
The filly whistled through the air, horn-first. Both stallions watched--squinting--as she flew true and embedded into the center of the target. Twnnnngg!
When Sweetie vibrated to a stand-still, she blinked up at her horn having landed smack-dab in the red bullseye. She smiled. "Hey! Great shot, mister! Just promise you won't reenact Robin Hooves like last time--"
The tell-tale sound of plucked bowstring echoed from a distance, and a sharp object flew from Time Turner's position.
"Eeeek!" Sweetie Belle flailed and covered her blank flank.
"Alright, fillies and gentlecolts," the lead surgeon spoke through his mask as he leaned over the table. "Now that the patient is anesthetized, we are ready to proceed."
A heart monitor bleeped consistently through the room while a nurse squatted besides Big Mac's unconscious face, holding a breathing mask over his large, freckled muzzle.
"This is going to be a traditional colic surgical procedure," the surgeon continued the speech while tightening the cylindrical rubber gloves around his hooves. "The patient is suffering from a strangulating lipoma of the large intestine, located near the vena cava. Removing the tumorous fiber will be a delicate operation, but nothing beyond our expertise. So, faces front, eyes awake, and let's do this as smoothly as possible."
Everypony gathered around as the surgeon reached his hoof out.
"Scalpel."
Quietly, the nurse hoofed him Sweetie Belle.
"Alright..." The stallion turned the foal over in his grasp so that her horn aimed directly towards Big Mac's shaven coat. "The first step is to make a thin midline incision along the patient's umbilicus..."
The surgeon gave Sweetie's skull a firm tap, and her horn glowed like a hot iron. The surgeon then lowered her towards Big Mac's lower body. As her burning horn made contact with the flesh, a thin stream of mist flew into the air of the operating room with tiny tendrils.
"Be sure you don't strike any blood vessels along the corpus cavernosum!" Sweetie's voice cracked upside down.
"Nurse!" the surgeon barked. "Sterilization!"
A pony rushed in and slapped a mask over Sweetie's muzzle.
"Mmmf-mmmfff-mmmfff!" Sweetie Belle insisted as more steam lit the air.
"Good afternoon, miss!" A mare in a finely pressed suit with high boots trotted across the richly perfumed store. "What can I help you find today?"
"Oh, uhm..." Cheerilee fidgeted, biting her lip as she stared at the many brightly colored wares lining the walls of the place. "This is my... m-my first time in a place like this, and... uh..." She couldn't stop trembling. "Oh dear, I m-must look like I just trotted out of a convent. Eheheh..."
"Hmmmm..." The employee smiled. "It's perfectly alright to be nervous, madame, but I assure you that you have nothing to be ashamed of." She pointed at the counters behind them. "Judging from where we both are, I'm guessing you're looking for... a way to relax?"
"Oh. Oh yes, most definitely..." Cheerilee rubbed the sweat off her fair neck. "I've been saving up, and... well..." She exhaled heavily, and at last her body relaxed somewhat. "I guess you could say I wouldn't mind... erm... spoiling myself a bit. Eheh..."
"Well, I'm sure we can find something that'll match your needs." The mare turned about and led Cheerilee down a nearby aisle under the scent of luscious incense. "Did you have a price range in mind?"
"Oh, nothing over... mmm... eighty bits."
"Well, thankfully, we have a lot that qualify. Did you have a color preference?"
"No, not really." Cheerilee gulped. "So long as it's easy to pack, not too big, and waterproof."
"Well, I think I know just the thing." The mare reached up to a shelf and pulled down Sweetie Belle. "This model came in just this month! Notice the shine! Stays polished after a single rinse! And watch what happens when I twist it like so." She gave Sweetie's tail one, two, three turns and then released.
"Vrbbb-bbb-bbb-bbb-bbb-bbb-bbb!" Sweetie Belle sputtered, wall-eyed, as her horn vibrated.
The mare smiled up at Cheerilee. "What do you think?"
"I... I dunno..." Cheerilee leaned away, grimacing. "Too... fluffy."
Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo trotted through the bombed-out ruins of Fillydelphia, carrying heavy backpacks over their mud-stained flanks.
"Unnngh... this bites..." Scootaloo kicked at one of several hundred bits of rubble. The chunk of asphalt bounced across the streets full of abandoned wagons and overgrown grass. "How much further 'til we meet up with the Fire-whatsits?"
"Beats the heck out of me," Rainbow Dash grunted as she climbed over an overturned bus. "I'm only in it for the payment. Once I turn you in, I'm going back to Bostrot and getting on with my miserable life."
"Honestly, Rainbow, that can't be all that you care about!" Scootaloo looked at her with a pitiable expression. "I mean, you've sacrificed so much to get me this far!"
"Meh." Rainbow frowned as she inspected a nearby flower shop, its glass exterior smashed in over a decade ago.
"Really! I mean it!" Scootaloo gulped. "Thank you so much for all that you've done for me. I mean, after what happened back there, with... with Tank..."
"Enough talking..." Rainbow Dash muttered.
"But, I know that he meant a lot to you and you were best buds for a long time and--"
"Shut up!" Rainbow Dash barked, turning to snarl at the wincing foal. "I already told you, kid! We do not bring up Tank!"
Scootaloo sniffled, her face long and sad. "O... Okay..."
"Hrmmm..." Rainbow Dash leaned towards the smashed window, squinting. "Buckin' A..."
"Calm down. We can take them out," Rainbow Dash droned. "Besides, it's our only way to the other side of the city."
"But... but... what if they bite you, I mean?!"
"Not if we don't shut up and be careful about it!" Rainbow Dash squatted low before the shop window and motioned Scootaloo forward. She kept her ruby eyes locked on one of two zombie ponies lurching around the shop interior while it hissed and spat out mists of spores from its mutated, mushroomy head. "One of them is close by. Remember what we practiced?"
"Mmmhmm!" Scootaloo nodded vigorously.
"Good." Rainbow Dash held her hoof out. "Gimme a brick."
Shuddering, Scootaloo fumbled with her backpack, reached deep inside, and pulled out Sweetie Belle. She quietly hoofed her over to the surly pegasus. "Here ya go..."
"Let's get this over with." Rainbow Dash licked her lips, pulled her body back, and tossed Sweetie Belle hard into the shop.
The petite unicorn spun a few times before weightedly impacting with the zombie pony's skull. Mushroom blades fell loose as the creature doubled over in pain.
"Rrrrrrgh!" Clamping a pipe beneath her teeth, Rainbow Dash rushed in and bashed the clicker's skull in.
"Behind you!" Scootaloo squeaked.
Rainbow Dash spun in time to block the attack of a second zombie. Snarling, she bucked the thing against the wall and pounced on it, beating its mushy brains out with the dripping-wet pipe.
