> She Rings Loudly for an Audience Of One
>  by Duskwingmoth
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Lucky Charm
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Poor Ol’ Bloomberg.  Even given her entire predicament, Applebloom couldn’t help but feel miserable about accidentally pulling that tree down.  Ol’ Bloomberg was Big Mac and Applejack’s favorite apple tree, even after he’d lost all his leaves, and they just didn’t have the heart to get rid of him.  And neither did she!  It was an honest accident!

Granny Smith was in an absolute state when they rushed Applebloom to the hospital.  Everyone was worried her old heart would give out, she was so furious.  “Ye should’ve cut that damn tree down years ago, ya hollow-headed hayseeds!!  Now look at my grandbaby…!!”  Granny never swore!  The shock was enough to keep Applebloom awake through the blood loss, which was probably a big reason she’d made it to the operating room alive.

The youngest Apple couldn’t bring herself to look at her legs, even as thoroughly mummified as they were, without remembering what they’d looked like after they finally managed to heave Ol’ Bloomberg off of her.  For as sterile as the hospital’s general scent profile was, the stench of her own blood lingered in her nostrils.  She had known before the doctors told her, before she’d been carried into the hospital, even before they got her in the truck.  There was no way she was walking on those anymore.

Not that she’d ever have the ability to try; her x-rays were right there on the board not far from her bed, and they didn’t paint a pretty sight.  Applebloom’s entire lower skeleton wasn't in big enough pieces to even deserve being called bones at this point, and the doctor was shocked to find out she could still kind of feel the pain.  Not much, thankfully.  Enough that some relatively weak painkillers could suffice.

Applebloom puffed out her butter-yellow cheeks and blew out her version of a sigh, a tic she picked up from her pink cousin.  No legs meant no more climbing trees, so at least it wouldn’t be happening again.  Still stinks, she thought.  She struggled to turn her upper body port-side and propped herself up on her arm, even though she wasn’t supposed to.  A full survey of her room was in order.

Hmm. Yup.  Definitely a hospital.  Everything was either a sterile shade of white or a cool blueish, only thrown into warmer relief by the dappled sunlight from the windows on the far wall.  The clock on the wall opposite her said 9:06, meaning she was in the east wing, and that her family was definitely up by now.  Visiting hours couldn’t come soon enough.  The humming and beeping monitors created a soft cacophony that almost drowned out the buzz of the fluorescent lights, turned on by the nurse some minutes ago when she came in to check on her.

And her roommate.

You could barely tell there was a kid under all the tubes and wires that swarmed the bed on the other side of the room, especially since it seemed they had skin as white as the sheets.  The sight of them was deeply unsettling.  Their heart monitor was beeping away slowly, and that was the only sign that they were alive at all, let alone awake, which they apparently were.  At least, they were when the nurse was here.

Applebloom vaguely remembered being carted into this room the night before, and the room hadn’t been empty then.  How long had they been here, she wondered?

She weighed the worth of trying to talk to them, and shrugged her free shoulder.  Better’n bein’ stuck in mah head all mornin’, Applebloom decided.

“Hey,” she spoke somewhat softer than usual.  “You awake?”

The heart monitor beeped almost imperceptibly faster.  There was a strangled noise emanating from the still form.

Social activity!  Sort of.  “Ah’d ask what happened to you, but I guess y’can’t talk right now.”  Applebloom scratched awkwardly at her arm.  “Ah’m just glad Ah ain’t alone in the mornin’.  Prob’ly would be feelin’ pretty sorry fer mahself if you weren’t here.”

Her roommate made a noise that somewhat resembled a groan.  It sounded like an annoyed one.

Applebloom chose to believe it wasn’t and continued.  “Whatever it was, y’sure got messed up bad, though.  Ah can’t even think of what mighta gone down to put y’all outta sorts like that.”  Another moan in response.  “If ya get better while Ah’m still here, you can tell me.  Ah Pinkie Promise Ah won’t make fun o’ ya.”  A heart was crossed, wings were flapped, and a cupcake was pressed firmly into an eyeball, all on reflex.

Only periodic beeps were received in response.

“Hopefully yer legs’ll be fine.”  Applebloom chuckled.  “Ah got body-slammed by a tree!  Smashed mine into little bits an’ busted mah nerves.  Doctor says Ah’m lucky Ah can feel anythin’ at all down there but Ah’ll be stuck in a wheelchair for the rest of mah life.”

Her roommate gurgled softly and coughed weakly.  Their heartbeat didn’t get all that much faster.

“Guess it coulda been way worse.  Auntie Applesauce lost her whole arm back when she worked in the factory, an’ mah Uncle Cameo got shot through the spine while he was in boot camp an’ they just had t’ cut his legs clean off, ‘cus they were rottin’ off of his body.”

Applebloom could have sworn she heard the other kid say “gross”, and she giggled.

“It sure do sound gross, don’t it?”  Her crimson bangs fell in front of her eyes, and as she brushed them away her gaze fell on an unusually ornate black backpack sitting next to the other occupant’s bed, resting against the leg.  It didn’t have a brand; in the usual place one would find it, there was a name; embroidered, then torn by something sharp.  It took Applebloom a moment to parse what the name was.

Starsong Flanks.

“Izzat yer name on that backpack?”

Applebloom was shocked to get an unambiguous answer.

“nnnNoo…”

At that, Applebloom cocked her head.  “Huh.  Why would…” she trailed off as she considered all the information, and decided to leave it be.  “Eh.”

She looked back at the apparently nameless youth in the bed.  “Well, Ah’m Applebloom.  And it’s, uh, nice to meetcha.  Glad to see Ah have a lucky charm.”

No-Name made a noise that sounded like a question.

“Well it’s the only explanation fer why Ah got off easy!  Apples don’t usually get t’ keep the body parts they break, so…” Applebloom shifted back, with serious effort, to lying on her back.  “That means there’s a lucky charm of mine in here.  Only thing Ah can think of is you.”

Her lucky charm groaned.







There are many things Applebloom had, in her short life, come to love.  The scent of morning dew on fresh-cut grass, the feeling of treated wood in her hand, how comfortable her big sister Applejack looked in a dress, how hilariously uncomfortable Big Macintosh looked in a dress (and how confidently he wore them anyway; he liked to practice what he preached when it came to not letting shame get you down).

Currently, none of them compared to the feeling of watching a professional wrestling show with her brother and her best friend.

“C’mon Spitfire!  Reverse it, reverse it!!”  She cheered for the face of the Wonder Wrestling Association with all her heart.

“Re-verse!!”  Scootaloo parroted her with equal enthusiasm.

The old tube TV in the ceiling corner blared out a tinny eruption of cheers as the wrestler in question was put in a brutal submission hold by her traitorous former tag-team partner High Winds, and the paraplegic girl watching bounced as excitedly as her still-battered body would allow.  This injustice would only be allowed to stand as much as she was able!  The commentators were going nuts!  Scootaloo was liable to bruise her own knees, she was so stimulated!

High Winds said something inaudible that seemed to break Spitfire’s spirit, and the star of the Wonderbolts tapped out, accepting defeat.  The crowd roared and booed in equal volume as the bell was rung and High Winds’ theme music played, leaving Applebloom livid.

“No!  Ya can’t jus’ give up!!”  She collapsed into her pillow.  “She don’t deserve that belt after what she just did!!”

Scootaloo was equally mad, pounding her fists on her knees.  “Traitor!!  Trai-tor!”

Big Macintosh was in the room with her, shaking his head in equal disappointment.  Spitfire’s older sister was his favorite wrestler, so he was always rooting for them both.  She couldn’t imagine how bad he felt about this.

It had been a few days since Applebloom was brought to the emergency room, but on account of it having been Tuesday then, Big Mac was the only one who could make time to visit.  Applejack had school and farm-work to worry about, and so did Granny Smith.  Her big brother, however, was basically always on the farm, so he’d elected to pick up Scootaloo and come and keep Applebloom company in the afternoon.

Not that Applebloom and No-Name were alone in the mornings.  The latter’s mother had showed up every day thus far the moment visiting hours were open and bawled her eyes out each time, even when No-Name started being able to form sentences again yesterday.  Then, in the evening, No-Name’s big sister would come in and make snide comments about Applebloom’s company that she probably thought they couldn’t hear.  Said sister was presently quietly sewing something on the other end of the room, on the far side of No-Name’s bed.

Scootaloo shouted, as was her default volume.  “Rematch!!”

“There better be.  This just ain’t right!”  Applebloom crossed her arms in a huff.  “Ah ain’t ever seen somebody do somethin’ so foul!”  Tears were stinging the edge of her eyes, and it upset her even more just how upset High Winds had made her.  Big Mac just patted her on the head.

“‘Ain’t’ is not a word.”

At that, Big Macintosh turned to glare at the room’s other able occupant, and suddenly Applebloom’s blood ran cold.  She could tell when her brother was about to say something, and outside of the acres his words for strangers were rare.

“If’n you got opinions ‘bout mah little sister, “ he drawled, “Ah’d rather you kept ‘em to yourself.”

The violet-haired teenager was already pale as could be, and somehow she’d still lost all the color in her face.

“I, er,” she stuttered through her words as sweat began to drip down her face.  “D-did I, say that out loud?”

“You’ve been talking to yourself all afternoon, Rarity,”  No-Name rasped at the well-dressed girl.  “I think they heard everything.”

“Ah.  Oh, dear.”  Rarity fiddled with her needles briefly before setting them down in her purse.  “O-oh, goodness!  Look at the time!”  She checked her wrist for a watch that decidedly wasn’t there, before pointing at the wall-mounted clock, “I apologize, Starsong, but I simply must return home, plenty of homework to do.  I’ll be back tomorrow!”

Rarity scrambled to bring her things together and gave No-Name a pat on the head before hurriedly walking out of the room.  No-Name just made a wavering sigh as the door shut behind her.

The tension still held in the air for a long minute afterward.  Big Mac let out a breath through his nose.  Scootaloo fidgeted with the zipper on her favorite hoodie.  The TV babbled away with match promotions, utterly forgotten.

Daring to break the silence, Applebloom looked over to her roommate, “Uh, sorry ‘bout chasing yer sister off.  She seems… nice?”

“Don’t worry about it.”  No-Name grunted and attempted to shift around.  The big tube that Applebloom had been so disturbed by was gone, replaced by a smaller one wrapping around No-Name’s face, apparently helping supply air.  “Don’t really wanna see her right now, anyway.”

Big Mac hummed.  “‘Pologies, all the same, Starsong.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Hmm.”

Applebloom hmm’ed as well, scratching lightly at her cheek.  “Well, Ah’ve jus’ been callin’ ya No-Name by mahself, but ya gotta have one you like, right?”

“No-Name!”  Scootaloo had found her voice again.

“I don’t.”  No-Name grunted again, turning away from the Apples and company.

This did little to deter Applebloom.  “How ‘bout Ah jus’ keep callin’ ya Lucky Charm?”

“Don’t care.”

“Well, fine.  Be that way, then.”  Applebloom laid back in bed before reaching for her TwinScreen that had been left for her on the bedside table.

Scootaloo’s eyes lit up with a gasp, and she reached into her pocket for her own handheld.  “Bittybeasts!?”

“Heck yeah, Bittybeasts.”  Her screens were already alight with a pixelated glow as she started the game up.  It wasn’t the new new one, but according to Applejack, the third version was never as good, anyway.  Scoots didn’t have that one, either, so it was fair game between them.

Big Mac stood up.  “Need me some coffee.  Be right back.”

He started for the door, but halted his slow gait at the sound coming from No-Name’s bed.  He turned and saw the curly-haired youth looking back at him.

“Need somethin’?”

No-Name broke eye contact.  “Um… there’s a TS3D in my bag…”

Before anything more could be said, Big Mac had strode over to the backpack in question, easily retrieving the cool blue handheld from the side pocket and handing it to its owner.

No-Name accepted it with weak, shaking hands.  “Thank you.”

Big Mac simply nodded, and turned once more to the door.  His exit, along with the whole exchange, went unnoticed by Applebloom and Scootaloo as their battle began.  And what a battle it would be!  Before she’d been crushed by timber, Applebloom was certain she’d built a team that could finally defeat Scootaloo’s Gellerazam, dedicating three whole Beasts to the effort.  Phantoon was out first, and proved too slow, but did get off a Shadow Ball before being vanquished.  Sure, the Gellerazam just Recovered, but that was one less use Scootaloo had to abuse.

“So…” Applebloom heard No-Name’s scratchy voice, and stole a glance over.  “You guys play Bittybeasts, too?”

“Bitty-BEASTS!!!”  Scootaloo yelled as she one-shot Psychic’d Applebloom’s Sevii Kyubine.

“Are you kiddin’ me!?”  Applebloom threw her hands up in exasperation.

“Power…”  Scootaloo zipped her zipper up for emphasis.

“Yeah, yeah.  Laugh it up while ya can Scoots.”  Her entire strategy ruined, Applebloom turned and propped herself up to look at No-Name and their TwinScreen.  “Sure do!  Bittybeasts is the best!  What version ya got?”

“Ultra Sky,” and No-Name turned the little console to face Applebloom, showing the Beast Center.  “Rarity buys every Bittybeasts game, and she usually gets me one, too.”

“Ultra Sky?”  Suddenly Applebloom was jealous.  “Ah’m jus’ stuck with regular Sky, and Scoots has Earth.”

Scootaloo had stood up and rushed over to No-Name’s side.  “Ultra Ultra Ultra!”

“Scoots, give No-Name some space.”

“Seriously.  You’re really loud.”  No-Name pulled the TS away from Scootaloo’s too-close face.

“Scootaloo’s jus’ worried nobody’ll hear her.”  Applebloom resigned another Beast to be Gellerazam’d, having effectively forfeited the match.  Ah swear Ah’ll get ‘er next time.

The orange girl did back away somewhat.  “Sorry…”

No-Name just limply shrugged their shoulders.  “Meh.  My parents are always shouting, so I’m used to it, I guess.”

“Do they fight?”

“No, they’re just really obnoxious.”  No-Name tapped away at the buttons as animatedly as they could.

“Heh.  Sounds like mah cousin Pinkie Pie.”  Applebloom’s Zapmaus got a faceful of Focus Blast as Scootaloo returned her attention to the game.

“How big is your family?  You’ve talked about, like, thirty-million different people since you showed up.”

“Us Apples stick together, even with relatives who don’t have th’ family name.”  Her Archoot got obliterated by Shadow Ball.  “Darnit.  Whatcha doin’ in there?”

“Figuring out what Beasts I want to fight you with.”

That put a smile on Applebloom’s face.  “Oh yeah?  Better build yer team good, ‘cus Ah’m pretty great at Bittybeasts.”

No-Name coughed, though it sounded suspiciously like a laugh.  “Sure sounds like it.”

“Jus’ b’cause Scootaloo’s the best player in Canterlot don’t mean Ah can’t whup yer butt!”

“Bit-ty-BEASTS!!!”  With another Psychic, Scootaloo sealed her victory yet again.  Applebloom blew a sigh and opened the Festival Square again, in search of what might be No-Name’s avatar.

“Yer in the Square, right?”

“Oh.  Uh…”  No-Name’s fingers were still for a moment as they stared at the screens.  A sudden tap.  “Y-yeah.  Now I am.”

Sure enough, a white-haired, green-eyed girl in a Lovantis Outfit appeared on Applebloom’s screen.  Her name was a mere number.

“Zero?”

No-Name shrank into herself.  “That’s uh… That’s me.”

“Ah like that hairdo, too.  Betcha yer real hair would look good like that.”

She looked at Applebloom sheepishly, a ghost of a smile on her face for the first time since they’d met.  “Thanks…”
> A Bushel
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“You, um…”

In the dark of the early morning, Applebloom turned her head toward the voice that strained to be heard over a heart monitor.

“Applebloom...?”

“Yeah?”  She propped herself up for the umpteenth time that week.

Faint rustling greeted her.  No-Name was contemplating whether to say what she had meant to.

“...You… promised me you wouldn’t laugh.”

Applebloom’s eyes widened.  “Pinkie Promised!  If Ah went back on that, mah cousin would make sure mah arms were broken, too.”

No-Name coughed softly in rhythm.  She was doing her best not to laugh, despite herself.

“So you won’t?”

“Never ever.”

No-Name’s monitor was beeping faster now.  Applebloom knew what that felt like, what with living with Granny Smith and Applejack.  Having to come clean about The Truth, an act so much more terrifying than speaking frankly.  Your throat grew dry and swollen, your palms got slick with sweat, and it felt like somebody just shunted a two-by-four into your shoulder span longways, in some kind of cruel splinting that robbed you of your flexibility.  And, of course, your heart pounded frantically against your ribcage for an escape, wanting to scramble off into the toolshed and hide away from the world that had made The Truth so scary.

But The Truth itself could only hurt you when you did run from it.

“Ah’m the only one here.  Ain’t nothin’ t’be scared of right now.”

The beep did not slow down.

“Jus’ take a deep breath, first.”

No-Name drew in the strongest breath Applebloom had heard from her in all the days they’d shared the room together.  She held it in too long, and hacked it back out.  The heart monitor briefly began to panic, and so did Applebloom.

“No-Name--!  Jus’ try to get yerself breathin’ normal!”

Her coughing gave way to arrhythmic gasps, and Applebloom could faintly make out the outline of her: hunched over, clutching at her chest, bobbing with each desperate breath.  A swallow interrupted the rapid in-and-out.  Each breath after was slightly more orderly than the last, as No-Name’s frail body did its best to obey, and the heart monitor ceased its shrieking.

Applebloom’s own heart calmed as she blew a sigh.  She wasn’t going to lose her newest friend this morning.  Both her and No-Name slowly laid back down, though she kept her eyes on the darkness at her left.

“Ya don’t have to tell me right now,” she began softly, “Ah said when ya feel better.”

“...I don’t know that I ever will.”  No-Name’s voice was as raspy and weak as it had been Thursday.

“Ya sure seem better than when Ah got here.”

“No, I--” another brief coughing fit.  Only a few.  “...I don’t mean it like that.”

The furrowing of her brow tightened again.  “Well, what do ya mean?”

The heart monitor calmed back down, but not to that reassuring lazy beat Applebloom liked.

“...I…”  No-Name paused.  A soft rustling of sheets again.  “...I took a bunch of my mom’s pills…”

“That gotcha in such a bad way?”

“I... didn’t think it would.”  No-Name made a shallow sigh.  “I couldn’t sleep, and she had sleeping pills.  So I took them.  And these ‘anti-stress’ pills she had in the bathroom cabinet too.  Because I was really stressed.”

“Wow…”  Applebloom turned her eyes to the dark ceiling, oppressively white, even now.  “Guess that’s why the puh-scriptions they give mah Granny have these big ol’ warnings on ‘em.”

The both of them were silent for a moment.  Long enough for the faintest blue to tinge the sky outside the window.  Long enough for No-Name to start sniffling.

Reflexively, Applebloom tried to sit up, to no avail.  “No-Name?”

“I lied--” she hiccuped.  The heart monitor sped up again.  “I lied!  I knew…”

Applebloom fumbled for the handles on the side of her bed and, with great effort, pulled herself upright.

“No-Name!  It’s alright.”

“No!”  She did her best to shout through the rasp, through the beginning deluge of tears.  “No it’s not!”  She was sobbing now.  Truly crying, and it broke Applebloom’s heart that this was the most animated she’d seen or heard No-Name.  Whatever it was that was bothering her, it had stolen all the warmth from her body and left nothing but this great wall of sadness.

Applebloom wobbled without the familiar support of her leg muscles, but she did her damndest to stay up nonetheless.  “Yeah, it is!  Ah don’t like you cryin’.  Ah--”

She leaned too far toward No-Name.  She fell to the side, hanging over the edge of the bed with a punch to the chest from the railing.

“Applebloom!?”

“Oww…”  She was in danger of tumbling over.  She had to get back up.  The wind was knocked out of her by the impromptu meeting with the bedside, making it difficult.  “Ah’ll be fine… Ah’ll… ngh!”  She gathered her arms and pushed up and away from the rail.  She absently registered a thin trickle of liquid on her forearm which, she would find out later, was from her IV coming loose.  It didn’t matter right now.  No-Name was crying, and that needed to stop, somehow.

She locked her elbows and took a breath.  This is way harder without legs.  She looked up to start talking again, but was startled by the shape directly in front of her.

It sniffled.  “W-what did you do?”

“Ah tried to sit up.  Ah know Ah ain’t s’posed to by mahself, but…”  She had an easier time catching her breath than No-Name, “wouldn’t be here if Ah weren’t dumb enough to do that, heh.”

No-Name’s hand found Applebloom’s, quavering as it gently clasped over.

Her voice was still as ravaged by emotion as it was her sickness.  “I’m not worth people hurting themselves over, though...”

“Now you stop that.”  Applebloom managed to shift back into a comfortable position -- somewhat; her limp legs were in dull pain, which meant they were in real trouble.  Nothing she could do about it.  “Big Mac don’t like that kinda talk when it comes from our sister, so Ah don’t like it comin’ from you.”

She brought her now-free right hand to grip No-Name’s in return, strong and reassuring.

No-Name sniffled again.  “What the hell does she have to worry about?”

“Swear jar.”

No-Name snorted and coughed at that.

But it was a question that Applebloom had something of an answer for.  “Sometimes, she just don’t feel like she’s a real girl.  Grown-ups’ll get grossed out at her and teenagers laugh at her, an’ there are some cousins we have that don’t treat her the way she wants.  We don’t really look forward to seein’ them at the reunion, to be honest.”

No-Name’s pulse was a bit weak, but Applebloom latched onto it mentally as it quickened again.  It (and its monitor) were the only thing in the room for an agonizing silence.

She finally spoke again, scratchy and weary.

“...Why would she feel like that, though?”

And that must be it.  That had to be what it was.  Applebloom had thought it might be, and now she was sure.

So she dared.  “‘Cus she’s like you.  Everybody’s so sure she’s not one.”

And Applebloom didn’t even need to hear the monitor stutter or No-Name’s breath hitch.  Her grip said it all.

“What…?”

“Our ma and pa thought she was a boy when she was born.  But she ain’t, and you ain’t either.”

No-Name’s eyes were shimmering so brightly with fresh tears that they could have lit the entire room by themselves, if not for the growing dawn.  Applebloom could see her pale face, her messy curled hair, her trembling jaw as she stood shakily next to her bed.  “R--... Really…?”

Applebloom smiled.  “Really really.  Heck, ya wanna meet ‘er?  She’ll be here today.”

“I…”  She turned her gaze to the floor and her tears traced the same damp path as the ones from mere minutes ago.  “Yeah…”

“Glad ta hear that.  She’s the best sister ya could ever ask for.  Might even talk some sense into yer familyoof!”

No-Name let go of the IV rack she was using to stay upright and fell forward into Applebloom’s chest.  She held onto Applebloom as tight as she could and let herself start crying again, and the red-haired girl did her best to return the embrace.  They stayed like that for a good long time, only separating when the nurse came in and scolded them both.







Later in the morning, all was calm again in the room, and the two girls were facing off in Bittybeasts once more, doing their best to ignore the busy clamor of the hospital outside.

The wall clock hit 11:00 am, signalling the beginning of visiting hours, and Applebloom was stricken with an eldritch certainty.  She was coming.  She was approaching fast.

So Applebloom did her best to quickly prepare and psych herself up, smacking her cheeks and shaking her head.  This was going to be a Doozy, and she hadn’t had to worry about anything approaching that all week.  She would have warned No-Name while rolling her shoulders if they’d had time before--

“AppleblooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOM!!!!”

A titanic blur of pink burst through the door and pounced on her, crushing Applebloom in an extremely powerful hug.  The pink goliath was bawling its eyes out and dampening her hospital gown and currently the bum-legged girl could not breathe.

“I’ve been so worried!!  Applejack told me Wednesday and I couldn’t come and visit because I was so busy planning the Fall Formal at school and drama club is gonna do a BIG adaptive performance of King Leery and I have to look over the script and all the costumes and-- “  Pinkie Pie gasped for air, “--and Gummy had to go to the vet because he had gingivitis because I’m feeding him too much candy and Limestone was extra EXTRA EXTRA mad at me about it and then I got into a fender bender and my parents have to pay for the damage and I’m grounded from my car all because I’ve been so worried about yo-hoo-hooooouuuu!!!”

Applebloom was going blue in the face.  “W’ll… Ah appreciate the concern, Pinkie…”

Pinkie suddenly stopped crying and let go of Applebloom, zipping over to the foot of the bed to inspect the damage.  “You still have legs!”

Applebloom coughed up the previously trapped breath as her vision swam.  “Uh, yeah.  Don’t work anymore, though.”

Pinkie clapped her hands over her mouth with a gasp, more tears threatening to cascade out and flood the room.  “No…!  Is it like my old Granny Pie where you can’t use the little girl’s room???”

The tips of Applebloom’s ears got hot with embarrassment.  “A-Ah’ll be able to use the bathroom jus’ fine, Pinkie!  Landsakes!  Ah ain’t the only kid in here, y’know.”

“You’re not?”  Pinkie’s baby-blue eyes zipped across the room and instantly spotted No-Name, who had been stunned to silence by the towering young woman’s entrance.  “You’re not!!”  She pointed an accusatory finger at the poor girl.  “Who are you!?”

“I, uh--”

Pinkie was dissatisfied with this answer.  She turned back to Applebloom.  “Who is he?”

“She.”  Applebloom corrected.

“She!  Who is she?”

Applebloom was a bit at a loss herself.  “She er, doesn’t have a name, but--”

“Doesn’t have a name!!!???  What kinda girl doesn’t have a name!!???”

“Well Ah guess she jus’ ain’t picked one!  Ah ain’t been too pushy with her.”

Pinkie Pie’s eyes were now alight with fiery determination.  “This can not be!!”  She bounded over in one great step to No-Name’s side.  “Auntie Pinkie Pie and Big Sis Applebloom are gonna help you figure out your name!!”

No-Name was visibly uncomfortable.  “I really don’t know about--”

“Galaxy?  Question Mark!  Powder Pose!  Stop me when you hear one you like!”

“Uh--”

“Wavedancer!  Beauty Blossom!  Star Hopper!  Sparkler!  Screwball!!”

“I don’t--”

Pinkie pointed at Applebloom.  “Your turn!”

This was what Applebloom was afraid of.  “Uhhh...”  She decided to just roll with it.  No-Name wasn’t going to cut it forever, after all.  “Whirly Twirl?  Spring Song?”

“You guys aren’t even listening to me.”

“Sweetie Belle?  Um…”

No-Name was about to say something else before the door slammed open again, announcing the return of Scootaloo.

“Apple-bloom!”

Applebloom allowed herself to be distracted.  It'd be a lot harder for Pinkie's energy to dominate the room with more people in it.  "Howdy, Scoots.  Whoa, nelly…"

The purple-haired Bittybeast Master wasn't the only one to enter the room by a long shot; Scootaloo's aunts Lofty and Holiday walked in after her, followed by Applejack, Granny Smith, and Big Macintosh, trailed by their nurse, Redheart, who closed the door behind her.

“Hey, everybody!”  Was all Applebloom could get out before the premonition struck her again, and she knew before Granny Smith opened her mouth that she was about to get a tongue-lashing.

“Now wuts this I hear about you bein’ too rambunctious fer yer own good, young’un?”  Her still-golden eyes scowled out of her wizened jade face.  “Flippity-floppin’ round like ye ain’t jes’ been crippled fer life in the witchin’ hours when nobody c’n stop ya?”

Applebloom shriveled at her admonishment.  “Ah couldn’t just--”

“No excuses, little missy!  Th’ doctor says ye twisted yer leg, as if they weren’t a sorry enough sight as is!  Now ya gotta stay longer whiles they fix it!”

Nurse Redheart attempted to interject, “It shouldn’t be too much longer, we can still get you set up with a wheelchair on schedule--”

“Ah don’ wanna see ya doin’ any more funny business while yer in this here hospital, ya hear?”  Granny waggled her finger in Applebloom’s direction, who dejectedly nodded.  “If’n Ah couldn’t git away with it whiles they was replacin’ mah hip, you don’t neither!  And ye don’ wanna find out what’ll happen to ye if ya don’t behave and heal up like yer s’posed to!”

“Ah understand, Granny…”

“Y’all’d better!”  Granny’s stern facade held for a good moment more, but her trembling jaw betrayed her.  She blinked, and suddenly she was vulnerable.  “D’ohhh…!  Don’t you ever scare me like that again, ye little rascal!”  She hobbled to Applebloom’s side and held her tight, and Applejack followed suit.  “Ya remind me too much of when Ah was yer age…”

Applebloom readily hugged them back.  “Ah’m sorry, everyone.”

Applejack, for her part, was shaking.  “Ah’ve been worried sick all week about you, Applebloom.”  She looked into her little sister’s eyes, fraught with love and concern.  “Even tho Big Mac was sayin’ you were doin’ alright, Ah couldn’t help but think the worst when he wasn’t here.”

“Applebloom!”  Scootaloo was emotional now, doing her best to hug her friend from the side of the bed with her short stature.

“Family group hug!!”  Pinkie somehow managed to squeeze all four of them together in her own embrace, choking the life out of Applebloom once again.  Big Mac and Scootaloo’s aunts joined in on the outer layer, but at this point it was impossible for her to notice.

What she did notice over Pinkie Pie’s shoulder was No-Name, staring at her TwinScreen and stealing glances at the extended family.  She wasn’t the only one in need of some hugs right now.

“Wait, everyone, ther--” she gasped for air again, “--Ah can’t breathe…”

Everyone except Scootaloo pulled themselves away, and Applebloom took a second to appreciate the preciousness of life and every breath she took before continuing.

This gave Applejack an opportunity to speak again.  “Granny n’ Big Mac can’t stay long,” she started as she palmed away her tears, “th’ farm don’t wait for anybody.  But Ah’m gonna be here all day for ya, little sis.”

Perfect!  “Ah understand.”  Applebloom gave No-Name a wink and grin.  Although now it occurred to her:  “Wait. Are ya gonna need to hire somebody to help with harvest?”

Big Mac shook his head, as did Granny Smith.  “We gots family from Manehattan who’re chompin’ at th’ bit to fill in for y’all right about now.”  The old lady scratched her chin.  “Never can tell with yer Aunt n’ Uncle Orange; sometimes they be too high-falutin’ fer us country folk, an’ then they show up on yer doorstep the day after they git some bad news, jes’ itchin’ t’get their hands dirty doin’ some hard work.”

Applejack adjusted her hat with a smirk.   “Sure surprised me to see them again.  Cousin Braeburn’s drivin’ up here with his partner to pitch in, too.”

“Also me!  I’m gonna help through the whoooooole harvest!”  Pinkie was bouncing with manic excitement.  “And once you finally get out of this stuffy old hospital, we’re all gonna throw you the biggest bestest party you’ve ever seen!!”  She accentuated her point by tossing streamers everywhere, much to Redheart’s chagrin.

“So you just worry ‘bout gettin’ better, Applebloom.”  Applejack pulled a great pink ribbon from her leather satchel and propped her sister upright.  “We’ll talk about how you can help around the house when ya got wheels under ya.”  Her calm, calloused hands began to tie the ribbon around Applebloom’s hair.

Holiday approached Applebloom on the side where Scootaloo was still magnetized to her, gently pulling the reluctant girl away.  “And we’ll be popping in and out throughout the day to help keep an eye on you and Scooty here,” her voice thick with a Thestralian accent, “since you went and worried the poor thing with the news this morning.”

Scootaloo’s lips wobbled and her eyes were swimming in water.  “Applebloom…”

Nothing ever made Applebloom feel worse than when Scootaloo was upset.  “Ah’m sorry Scoots.  Ah’ll be okay.  Ah just--” she turned and Applejack groaned as her work with the ribbon came undone, “--needed to be there for someone.”

No-Name perked up from watching Redheart and Pinkie clean up the streamers, a cyan one still hanging limply over her head.

Granny Smith narrowed her eyes at her.  “Izzat th’ lil’ hussy what’s been rude to ye that Scootaloo were talkin’ about?”

No-Name’s own eyes shrank.  “Uh--”

“No, Granny!  No-Name’s mah friend!”

“No-Name!?  What in tarnation kinda thing’s that t’call yer friend?”

Applebloom flinched.  “S-She doesn’t have one, Granny!  See, she--”

“Course she’s gotta name!  She came from parents jes’ like you did, an’ I ain’t about t’fathom any parent what won’t name their baby girl!”

Pinkie Pie came to the rescue.  “We were helping her pick out a new one!”

Redheart looked up from the streamers at that.  “You do know that his name is on the wristband, right?”

Applebloom frowned.  “Her.”

Pinkie did as well.  “Her!”

“Her?”  Applejack paused from her work re-tying the ribbon to regard No-Name for the first time.

Redheart started as she realized her mistake.  “Oh my goodness.  Oh, that makes so much sense.”  A flash of old grief passed over her face, and she looked at No-Name penitently.  “I am so sorry, honey; I wish you’d told me yourself.”

No-Name said nothing, suddenly extremely interested in Bittybeasts.

Pinkie was inspecting said wristband.  “So you don’t like this one at all?”

“N-no…”

“Well Ah’ll be…”  Applejack finished tightening Applebloom’s bow and settled her as she stood up straight.

“She’s like you, Applejack!”  Applebloom was up on her elbow again.  “She’s, uh… whatchacallit?”

“A Libra!”  Pinkie Pie shouted excitedly.  “Her birthday’s pretty close to yours, Applejack!”

Applejack strode the gap between beds.  “That ain’t what we’re gettin’ at Pinkie.”

“Oh.”  Pinkie went mostly still as she pondered for a moment, and understanding dawned on her face.  “Ooooohhhh!”

Redheart excused herself, muttering about preparing reading material as she closed the door behind her and Applejack knelt down next to No-Name.  The pale girl looked at her with a gaze full of swirling emotions, and swallowed.

Applejack smiled and tenderly removed the stray streamer from her two-toned hair.  “So, it’s No-Name for now, huh?”

A nod.  “I-I guess.”

“Heh,” Applejack adjusted her hat again, “guess Ah didn’t rightly know what to call mahself for a while, either.  Name’s Applejack, an’ sayin’ it’s a pleasure to meet ya would be an understatement.”

“Me?”  No-Name rubbed her thumbs against the buttons of her handheld.  “But I’m nobody.”

“You’re important enough that mah sister calls y’all her lucky charm.  Makes ya important to me.”  Applebloom’s ears were burning at that, a heat that only got worse when she noticed Lofty, Holiday, and Pinkie Pie giggling.

No-Name’s face became flush with embarrassment.  “I don’t really get that; I didn’t do anything.”

Applejack pulled out her phone as she responded.  “Sometimes bein’ yourself is what you can do best.  For other people’s good…” Her thumbs tapped and swiped at the screen for a moment before she continued, “...and for your own.  Take it from me.”

Both No-Name and Applebloom craned their necks to see what was on Applejack’s screen, though all the latter could tell at her angle and distance was that it was alight with pink, white and blue.

“So, Miss No-Name,” --the girl shivered at the use of the title-- “do ya happen t’know what ‘transgender’ means?”
> What's in a Name?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

 	Stupid eyes.  Why did they want to cry so much, lately? It had been so much easier to just be full of nothing.  When she was empty, she could stuff those pills down her throat and have no worries about whether it killed her or not.

Stupid Apples.  Stupid Apples and their stupid caring.  Stupid Applebloom and her stupid broken legs and her stupid pretty red hair and her stupid cute voice and her stupid big strong nice sister wearing a stupid hat.

And that name!  No, not Applebloom; that one was pretty nice, she guessed.  It was that last one she said.  The one that tugged at her stupid weak little heart and filled her stupid weak little lungs and made her throat tense with the urge to say it over and over again.

Sweetie Belle.

Sweetie Belle!  Sweetie Belle Sweetie Belle Sweetie Belle Sweetie Belle!!  It was the dumbest, frilliest, girliest thing she’d ever heard, and she couldn’t stop thinking about it!

She hated it.  She hated all of them so much for making her cry in front of all of them, and for making her feel bad about trying to die.  Most of all, she hated them for making her want to see them again whenever she was booted out of this hospital, and she had to go back and face the other kids at school.

They can’t just lie to her like that!  Smile and say “you’re not a freak for wanting to be like your big sister” like that.  They were letting Applejack lie about it to herself.  She hardly even looked like a girl.  Broad shoulders, sideburns, a flat chest, hairy arms, deep voice -- Applejack played the part even worse than she did!

But… they still said she was one, didn’t they?  Pinkie Pie, so big and tall and curvy all over, a living pink monument to hyperactive girliness.  Scootaloo, apparently too dumb to figure out how to say more than one word at a time.  Granny Smith, quite possibly the oldest and silliest lady she had ever seen.  Scootaloo’s aunts that were both as feminine as could be (and had kissed each other! Are you even allowed to do that???)  Big Macintosh, who was even burlier and buffer than her own dad.  Even that stupid nurse that she hated.  They all let Applejack think she was a girl!

And apparently that’s all it takes???  Apparently there are even more people out there who were messed up, and none of them liked being called messed up.  But that was the truth, wasn’t it?  That she -- that… Sweetie Belle…

Sweetie Belle.

Okay, fine.  She liked that name, okay!?  And she liked all these dumb Apples and Scootaloo and her weird aunts and she absolutely liked Applebloom especially.  She could admit it and scream from the top of the hospital as much as her busted body would let her and more that by God, her name should be Sweetie Belle and she wanted to go live on that farm they can’t stop talking about!

And that was what really made her hate it all.  This wasn’t going to last, not even through the whole day.  They were lying to her and it felt good to be lied to, and as soon as her parents came in like she knew they would, it would be over, and that name would be taped over with her real one.  All these stupid people had managed was make her feel even more like falling asleep and never waking up, and make her feel bad about it in the process.

She also hated that she’d spent the last dozen minutes bawling into Applejack’s shirt and blubbering every last one of these thoughts out in a messy, coughing avalanche.  She’d made an absolute fool of herself in front of all of them, and now she couldn’t look at Applebloom ever again.

Applejack was holding her tight and stroking her hair and whispering more sickeningly sweet words.  “It’s alright, sugarcube.  No shame in cryin’ over what you’ve missed out on.  Ah was a big ol’ wreck just like this when Ah figured it out.”

All the stupid crying and coughing had run her throat ragged, and so she couldn’t manage to say anything more.

“Y’all need a drink?”

She nodded.  Applejack pulled a bottle of water from her satchel and handed it over, and she wasted no time unscrewing its cap and quaffing entire mouthfuls of the stuff.  Of course she choked on it.  Only a broken idiot would screw up drinking water like that.

That dumb nurse had shown up again, and was checking her for stuff.  Her pulse, or whatever.  “That certainly explains what had you so worked up early this morning.”  She pressed some buttons on the heart monitor and her eyebrows knit together.  “Don’t worry though.  We’ll let your parents know as soon as--”

“No!”  Her bone-white hands tightened into a stranglehold around the bottle, crumpling the cheap plastic.  “You can’t.  ...They don’t get it, anyway.”

The nurse looked at her like she had a horn growing out of her head.  “Sweetheart, I have to.  I don’t want you ending up in the hospital because of this again.”

“I won’t take any more of my mom’s pills, it’ll be fine.”  Her voice kept giving out each time she spoke, almost like it was letting the nurse know she was probably lying.  Who knows. Not her.

“It isn’t so much about what you’ll do…” Redheart began, though she seemed a bit out of her element.

Applejack, who’s hand hadn’t left her shoulder, decided to finish the thought.  “You did what you did because they weren’t makin’ ya feel happy, Sweetie Belle.”  More ridiculous tears stung at her eyes and her chest felt warm.  Why did it have to feel so good?  “If they don’t get it, then they just need to learn.”

She wasn’t going to cry again.  She wasn’t.  “B-but I… I tried already… I said I wanted to wear makeup like my sister and they looked at me weird.  And then--” hic!  “--then R-Rarity was like,” and she did the best her hoarse voice could to make a mock impression of her sister, “oh, I’d love to have someone with my complexion to try out different looks on!  I’m so glad you want to be of help, Star!”  She coughed again.  “She doesn’t get it either.”  Another long chug of water.

“Well then we’ll jus’ tell her how dumb she’s bein’!”

Applebloom’s voice.  She decided it was her favorite sound in the world.  Her eyes dared to look over at the redhead, and the image of Rarity that ran through her head made her smile, despite herself.  “She’ll get so mad.”

“Let ‘er!”  Applebloom had her arms crossed and an invincible grin on her face.  “Ah mean, if Ah figured it out the first day Ah was here, then Ah don’t trust none o’ them to even tie their own shoes!”

She shouldn’t laugh.  It wasn’t really even funny.  But if Applebloom was so sure, then how could she not?  Wouldn’t be the first time she’d been wrong.

In the far corner, Granny Smith hummed while scratching her chin, eyes scrunched up in thought.  “Ah’m gittin’ th’ sense Ah need t’ stick around…” She turned to Big Macintosh.  “Ye c’n handle yer cousin and them city-slickers fine on yer own, ya reckon?”

“Eeyup.”  The crimson behemoth stretched, his fingers nearly touching the ceiling in the process.  “Y’all be needin’ a ride later, lemme know.”  And he departed the room to a chorus of farewells.  She found, when the door closed behind him, that without his presence she felt even less enthused about facing her family.

“So,” Applejack turned back to her, “y’all have a phone?”

“No.”  She pressed her thumb rhythmically into the plastic of the water bottle, the denting and reforming making a percussive snap she found soothing.  “They say I don’t need one yet.”

Applejack made a face.  “Well… Ah’m gonna give you mah number, anyway.  Where’s that pen…”  She rummaged through her pack again, pulling out a green-covered notepad in the process.  “‘Cus Ah don’t want you to feel like you’re goin’ it alone when you get outta here.”  She retrieved what she was looking for and flipped the notebook open, writing down a string of digits before tearing the page out and handing it to her.  “Now, if this doesn’t go well, don’t let them know you have mah number unless you feel safe doin’ so.”

She took the paper in her shaky hands, looking at the orange woman with apprehension.  “I really don’t like this...”

Applejack wrapped her arms around her again and held her tight.  “We can’t let your family leave this hospital again without them knowin’, Sweetie Belle.  Ah know you’re scared, and Ah don’t doubt your feelings.  But Ah’d rather take the risk and have them still not understand, than leave you to the four winds without a lifeline.”

Pinkie popped up behind Applejack and rested her head on the wide-brimmed cowboy hat.  “But you’ve got all of us in your corner, girl!  It’ll be like an anime; friendship and love granting you the strength to quintuple your power level to a bazillion and cut the bad guys in half!  Ooh!  When you do, you should totally scoff and flick your hair out of your eyes and say, “Nothin’ personal, kid” in the coolest voice you can think of!”

“Uhh, okay.  I don’t know what an ’anime’ is.”

Applejack chuckled while Pinkie gasped in shock.  “She means we’ve got your back, come rain or shine.  No matter what happens, you’re a friend of the Apple family now, and we don’t leave our friends hangin’.”

“Darn tootin’!”  Granny Smith slapped her knee.

Scootaloo concurred.  “Apple!”

Her stomach was churning at the thought of what was to come, threatening at any moment to force bile up her throat.  It was stupid to hope for anything good to happen.  It probably said a lot that she trusted a group of strangers more than her family, for better or worse.

“One more thing, though.”

She looked up from her bedsheets into Applejack’s emerald eyes.  “What?”

“Ah want you to tell me, in no uncertain terms.”  She smiled, retracting her right hand enough to be shaken.  “‘Cus Ah realize we haven’t properly introduced ourselves.  Mah name’s Applejack.”

Oh.  She wanted her to say it again.  That name.

WIth a wink, she asked the million-bit question.  “What’s yours?”

No.  More than that.  She wanted her to take that name.  To claim it as her own, like a faerie would take someone else’s.  Applebloom had shown her the name, and now Applejack was handing it to her.

She gulped down the lump in her sore throat and gingerly took Applejack’s hand.  Hers looked so small, in comparison.

Mustering every ounce of courage she could, she met that jade gaze with her own, once again doing her best not to cry.  “I’m...”

She didn’t notice it at that moment, but the next day, and on several separate days for years afterward, she would ruminate on how, in that instant, she felt like she’d breathed life into herself for the first time.

Sweetie Belle.  The name was hers.







Each minute spent watching cheesy soap operas, playing games, and doing the best they all could to pass the time made little headway in killing Sweetie Belle’s dread.  Every attempt she made to loosen the coiling terror from her soul with some optimism only backfired, as she recalled yet another detail that refuted her faith, and made the metaphorical snake squeeze tighter.  All the while its fangs were bared, oozing a nameless venom, an omen of punishment, waiting for Sweetie to show her weakness.

In short, she was a nervous wreck.  One that only became exponentially more disastrous when she heard the airy lilt of her sister’s voice approaching from the hall.

Granny certainly hadn’t kept quiet, but she had kept an eye on Sweetie Belle the entire time, and she must have seen the girl’s heart sink into the darkest abyss her stomach had to offer.  “Izzat them?”

A panicked nod.

The elder Apple nodded sagely.  “Battlestations, y’all!”

The room grew mostly quiet, save for the anxiety-inducing music of Bittybeast battle between Pinkie and Scootaloo, whose eyes nonetheless were on the slightly ajar door, along with everyone else’s.

The steadily encroaching click of heels.  Only one pair.  Rarity was by herself, apparently on the phone.

Her shadow appeared through the crack and her hand rested on the outer handle, pressing it down.  “...oh, good heavens, no!  We’ve put this off for too long, Fluttershy, and Lord knows I could use the pampering after the last few weeks.”  She paused, trying to finish her conversation before entering.  “Now, don’t talk like that, darling; what your brother says may as well be a passing stench on the wind.  You deserve this spa date because you are beautiful, and that’s all the reason you need. ...Yes, I can afford whatever you like!  Now I hate to cut this short, but I’m standing outside my brother’s room at the moment, and I’d hate to bore him to death -- he’s already brushed far too close with that for my liking.”

Sweetie Belle wasn’t nervous anymore, at least.  Her insides were ice again.  That familiar numbness was back.

Rarity continued, utterly oblivious.  “I suppose that was in poor taste.  ...Yes, I’ll give him your well-wishes.  Now I must go.  Tomorrow at one, love!”  A moment later, she pushed the door open with a sigh, revealing herself in all her carefully-curated beauty.  “So sorry, Star.  Mother and Father are apparently too busy packing for their next trip to be here on... schedule…”  Her ocean-blue eyes darted across the crowd of bodies that were occupying the room.  “Oh!  My apologies; normally I expect to be the only visitor in the early afternoon.”

“That’s alright, hon,” Holiday gave Rarity a sweet smile, “If I had a bit for every time I barged in on a crowd when I thought there wouldn’t be, I could pay off my brother’s house!”  She presented her hand.  “Snap Holiday, and the talkative one over there’s my beau, Lofty!”  She gestured to Scootaloo’s other aunt, who gave a wave and a ‘’sup’.

Rarity was nothing if not a burgeoning master of niceties, gracefully shaking Holiday’s hand with a warm grin of her own.  “Well, I’m quite charmed to meet you.  Rarity, at your service.”  She gave a small curtsy in flourish.  “Dare I ask:  you wouldn’t happen to be…?”

“Guardians of this lil’ slugger here.”  Lofty ruffled Scootaloo’s already unruly hair.

“The Apples have been like angels for us, so we had to find some time to visit Scootaloo’s best friend here.”  Holiday continued, breaking the handshake and walking back to Applebloom’s bed.  Retreating, Sweetie Belle realized, for someone else to take action.

“Ah, yes.”  Rarity’s face made an imperceptible change to all but her sister, who knew full well what she thought of Applebloom.  “From what I’ve gathered, the incident she was involved with was rather ghastly.”

“Y’all already know a tree fell on me.”  Applebloom was clearly unamused by Rarity’s act.

To her credit, Rarity did not miss a beat.  “And you would describe that as a ghastly turn of events, would you not?”

“Reckon I would.”  Applejack had her eyes trained on the fashionista-in-training, scrutinizing her every move and word.

Rarity hummed, only faintly straining to keep her smile in place.  “Well, don’t mind me; my brother and I will be keeping to ourselves.”

Ice.  It was all ice.  A thick coat of rime over everything in the room, a solid block of frost inside her.  Rarity was the dead of winter, strutting to the far side of Sweetie Belle’s bed with a freezing sigh, and taking her usual throne in the glassy palace she had crafted with mere seconds of conversation.  Every little word she eked out under her breath was a sub-zero stinging snowflake colliding with Sweetie’s face in the howling wind, as she got to work knitting.  “At least that giant red brute isn’t here,” she uttered.  Disdain for their company clear.

She wasn’t sure how long she’d spent staring at her motionless hands.  Her neck hurt from hanging her head for so long, but what did it matter?  All the words and small talk the Apples exchanged, only occasionally including Rarity, melted into a frigid soup like neglected ice cream around her, further insulating Sweetie Belle from any possible heat.

“Star, you’ve been rather uncharacteristically quiet.”  Rarity was talking to her.  She didn’t look up at first.  “Is something the matter?”

She considered saying something.  She dragged her eyes up the covers, up the wall, and her fingers started to curl into her palm.  But once again, she wouldn’t be afforded the chance.

Two distinctive, unmistakable gaits were walking side-by-side down the hall.

The snake was back.  Truthfully it hadn’t actually left, but her insides had suddenly thawed out and the serpent was warmed to life.  They were here, and they were going to know.

Hondo, their father; he stepped into the room first.  And as usual he looked ridiculous.  His pale skin was where the sisters got theirs from, and his naturally luxuriant brown hair looked like it had jumped straight off the head of a 70’s rock band member, along with his absurd mustache.  They were headed to Hawhinn’i this time, and he was already dressed like an obnoxious mainland tourist, because damned if he wasn’t going to act the part.  Loud orange shirt and khaki shorts, sandals with socks -- the man hadn’t even come to see Sweetie Belle for the last two weeks, and when he finally did he couldn’t bother to even show up in anything approaching sensible.

His eyes, the same blue eyes as Rarity’s, found the two of them.  He immediately began to break, but held himself together as well as he could.

“Well, howdy ther--”

“Star, my baby boy…!”  Hondo rushed to her, down on his knee, and crushed the girl in his embrace.  She could feel the palpable emotions seizing up his tense body.

Rarity set down her work and gently tapped at their father.  “Daddy, careful!  He still has trouble breathing!”

A jolt ran through the man’s body and his arms loosened up. “Sorry, sorry…  I’m just so relieved that you’re feeling better.”  He held Sweetie Belle at arms length and regarded her with a sniffle.  His mustache was distressingly aquiver, and despite everything, it pained her to see him this upset.

Rarity stepped around to comfort their father, patting his shoulder.  “I’ve kept my eye on him for you.  Where’s Mother?”

Hondo wiped at his eye.  “She’s just outside the door.  Says she’s had trouble coming in here and being too sappy, so she wanted to take a minute to calm down.”

He turned to properly acknowledge the Apples for the first time.  “Good thing too; she’d be really embarrassed to cry with an audience!”  With a grunt, he stood back up and gave them his signature pearly-toothed grin.  “Hondo Magnum Flanks, at your service.  Assistant coach of the Everton Manticores football team.”

Applejack rose to meet him.  “Applejack of the Apple family, sir!  Acting head of Sweet Apple Acres.”

“Oh!  We buy your juice, actually!  My darling little angel over there swore by it when she was younger!”  He gestured to Rarity, who pouted at the recognition.

“Daddyyyy!  That was almost eight years ago!  I’ve not drank a drop of it in so long!”

“Heh.  Well I still love it.”  He and Applejack shook hands.  “Pleased to meet you in person, sir!”

Sweetie saw the entire Apple family and their guests collectively flinch.

Applejack’s smile became a pained one for a moment, but she recovered quickly.  “Well, it’s always nice to meet a loyal customer!  Though Ah can’t really take too much credit for the juice; you’ll have to thank Mr. Rich on that one.  Him and mah pa were the brains behind that deal.”

“It’s still your apples that get squeezed, and no amount of marketing can make up for taste, which has been spectacular!  My compliments, anyway!”

“Shucks, Mr. Flanks; Ah only do as mah Granny here taught me.”

Granny nodded.  “She got a skull thicker’n her dad’s, but she takes after ‘im in the good ways, besides.”  She made sure to look directly at Hondo, who lightly sputtered as he realized his mistake.

“Oh!  Sorry, Miss Applejack; I could’ve sworn you were a man!”

Her smile became thin.  “Ah get that a lot.  No hard feelin’s, sir.”

“I guess the farming life is really good for muscle mass.”  Another voice.  Her mother was in the room now, as usual seeming to have stepped directly out of a 50’s household.  She was at least more put together than the last several times Sweetie Belle had seen her, seeing as her makeup wasn’t already running down her cheeks.

“Mrs. Cookie!”  Applejack seemed to recognize her, which was less of a surprise than it was just more mounting dread.  “Ah ain’t seen you since you subbed for Ms. Autumn Gem in mah fourth grade class!”

“That’s because I had to quit teaching, honeybun.”  Cookie gave her a weary grin.  “Things got too hectic for me not long after, and I just haven’t been able to bring myself to come back to it since; raising two kids of my own takes a lot of effort from me, these days.  Speaking of which, I hope Starsong hasn’t been too much of a hassle for you all.”

She felt her body grow cold again.  More so at Applejack’s faltering.

“Been, uh…  Been nothin’ but a delight, actually.”  Her eyes kept shifting around, searching for a way out of this steadily worsening hell.  “Kept mah little sister good company this week, and Ah’m mighty grateful for that.”

Sweetie Belle dared to look at Applebloom, and she was visibly stewing in anger, glaring daggers at the offending parents.  Scootaloo’s aunts were only more subtle about it.  Pinkie Pie was eerily quiet, trying to keep Scootaloo’s attention on their game, with little success.  Granny Smith remained stoic, doing her best impression of her grandson, arms crossed and eyes calmly watching.

Hondo and Cookie were seemingly blind to how the room was drowning in tension, heedlessly continuing forward.  “Well, that’s good to hear.  My boy here can be a bit… standoffish at the best of times, and Rarity hasn’t spoken much about how things have been doing, just that his recovery was going well.”

“I must say, that actually comes rather as a surprise to me.”  Rarity’s eyebrow was raised and her finger on her chin.  Her ‘brain invasion’ face, Sweetie called it.  “Star hasn’t really spoken with anyone but myself while I’m here...”  After a moment she grew a smirk.  “Mayhaps he’s smitten by her rustic charm -- which it bears noting,” Rarity swapped to her ‘designer’ face, while Sweetie Belle’s swapped to “thoroughly red”, “is really tied together nicely by that lovely bow!  Truly, the image of the wholesome ‘girl-next-door’--”

“Her name ain’t Starsong.”

And then the viper struck.  A lance of pain shot through Sweetie Belle’s entire body, and she started shaking all over again.

The buzzing of the lights and the ticking of the clock and her beeping heart monitor turned oppressively loud to fill the ensuing silence.  All eyes turned to Applebloom as she struggled to sit up, all in varying states of surprise.

Rarity was the first who dared challenge the fighting words.  “Beg pardon?”

“Y’all heard me.”  This cute redhead was either remarkably brave or unbelievably dumb, and both made Sweetie Belle want to disappear from the room.  “That ain’t her name.”

Hondo was suddenly acutely aware of how hot the room was, tugging at his shirt collar.  “Sorry, little missy.  You must have gotten confused, because--”

“Ah know what Ah said!”  She dared grab for the bed handles, leaning forward now.  Just like early this morning.  “And Ah said it ‘cus a buncha dumb grown-ups are tryin’ to beat around the bush right now when there’s important stuff to talk about!”

Cookie crossed her arms.  “Does your sister have an idea of what manners are, Applejack?”

Applejack sighed and re-adjusted her hat.  “Still workin’ on it.  But, um…”  She bit at her lip, eyes no longer meeting Hondo, Cookie, or Rarity’s.

Applebloom wasn’t done, however, even as Lofty tried to pull her back to her bed, where she wasn’t in danger of tumbling over the side.  “C’mon, Applejack!  Ya jus’ sat there an’ let this guy call ya a man!  It ain’t right!”

She turned to scold her sister.  “Well if he doesn’t know, it ain’t gonna help to blow up on him!”

“Know what?”  Hondo was clearly confused now.  “What in the world are you two talking about, and what does it have to do with my son?”

Applejack turned back to the other family.  “Your…  Your kid’s a… See--”

“Yer youngest ain’t a boy, she’s a girl.”

The snake bit again, this time wearing the wrinkled face of Granny Smith, and the stabbing pain flared back up in force.

Cookie turned to the elder Apple slowly.  “...Excuse me?”

“Them fool doctors what delivered yer bundle o’ joy plum got it wrong; Ah don’t rightly understand it mahself, but it’s th’ same as with mah grandbaby Applejack here.”

Now Cookie was mad.  “Is this some kind of prank?  I sure don’t see how it’s supposed to be funny; my son has been in this hospital on the edge of death for two weeks, and I’ll not stand for you making a mockery of him!”

“No, I’ve… heard about this.”  Rarity spoke up again.  “Applejack, you’re a, er, transsexual, am I correct?  One step up from drag queen?”

Applejack’s frown became a frustrated one. “It’s transgender, and Ah don’t rightly appreciate the insinuation that Ah--”

“Oh my God, you’re a pervert…?”  Cookie’s hand was over her mouth, her eyes wide with horror.

Lofty chose then to get up and start escorting Scootaloo out of the room.  “Come on, slugger.  Why don’t we get some ice cream?”

Scootaloo pulled against her.  “Nnnnnno!”  She flailed fruitlessly in Applebloom’s direction.  “Apple-bloom!!”

“We’ll get them both some, too, don’t worry.”  She made it to the door, mouthing something at Holiday,who nodded in response as the two of them exited the room.

Meanwhile, Rarity was a bit disgusted, herself.  “I… wouldn’t go that far, Mother…  I believe it’s a mental thing.  An illness, as it were.  I’m not exactly well-read on the subject...”

“Obviously!”  Pinkie, at last, broke her silence.  “Didn’t you pay attention in health class!?”

“I sure can’t think of any health class that would teach about deviancy like… like…”  Hondo gesticulated wildly with his arms, “I don’t even know what to call it!  Where are your parents with all this!?”

“Six feet under, if you must know.  And for the last time, it ain’t a sex thing!”

“Well, my condolences, but it’s pretty clear now that you’re sorely lacking for some parental guidance, especially if you think you can come in here and…  My God…!  And accuse my son of being sick with this transsexual drag thing!”

“Okay, now you’re goin’ a mite too far, sir!”  Applejack was livid now, angrily doffing her hat.  “You can denigrate me all y’all like, and Ah woulda done mah best to keep the peace, but you trash mah parents’ good name again, and we’ll see this get uncivilized right quick!”

“Is that a threat, sir?”

“It’s a statement of facts!”

They just kept shouting and insulting each other, and this was so much worse than Sweetie Belle had feared.  The noise, the pain, the hot and cold, the shaking, the buzzing, the beeping--!!  It was so much that she didn’t even realize she was crying again for several seconds.  Not until she felt Rarity holding her and it shocked a sob out of her.

“I’m sorry, Star.  I can’t even fathom how this happened.”

“I--” She coughed again.  “I knew you guys didn’t get it.  I knew, I knew…”

Rarity dabbed at her tears with a handkerchief.  “I suppose I can’t very well say I do, but hopefully, when I get you out of this hospital in a few days, you’ll feel better.  Clearly, being stuck in the same room all day is taking its toll on you.  And these hillbillies...” She threw a disapproving leer at Applejack, who very much looked ready to punch their father, “obviously aren’t helping matters.”

It felt like she was being swallowed down the drain, and every gasp for breath a desperate clawing attempt to get back out.  This feeling, of collapsing in on herself, compressing into a microquark of superheated despair, this was why she wanted to escape, swallowing all those pills.  This, and her family, and from the kids at school, and her bad grades, and the hollow cold that persisted throughout.

That wasn’t an option, here.  But Sweetie Belle had to get away somehow.  She did the only thing that made sense, and limply, impotently beat her fist against Rarity.

“I hate you…”  It wasn’t true and also it was.  “I hate all three of you.  I hate you so much…”

Rarity just stayed there, and it only made Sweetie Belle cry harder.

Sweetie Belle’s tears went unnoticed by her parents, still running their own voices ragged in a screaming match with what was now the entire present Apple family.

“...and I am so glad that he won’t be staying here much longer, and he can be away from your corrupting influence!!”  Cookie pointed a shivering finger at Applejack, and then Pinkie Pie, Holiday, and Granny Smith as she shrieked her condemnations.

Rarity’s caress stiffened.  “Mother--”

“Who knows how much work we’ll have to do trying to make him well after this.”  Hondo had tired of yelling, though he was clearly still invested in arguing.  “They say mental illness isn’t contagious, but I know how ideas can spread!”

Her grip tightened.  “Daddy, please--”

“Ah can see this ain’t goin’ anywhere good; Ah’ve heaved walnut that was less dense than any of y’all!”

Fingernails digging.  “Would you all stop for a moment and--”

“I don’t think I’ve ever been more disappointed in somebody, really.”

“Same here.”

“QUIET!!  ALL OF YOU!!”

The queen of frost commanded, and so the court listened.  In their falling silence, everyone became very aware of the rapidly beeping heart monitor, and the cough-riddled weeping coming from Sweetie Belle.

Rarity’s nails stopped threatening to pierce her sister’s skin, though she still held her tight.  “Look what you two have done.  I hope you’re proud of yourselves, leaving your child in tears before gallivanting off to pretend neither of us exist for a week!”

All the Apples were stunned.  Applejack looked at Hondo and Cookie, awaiting a rebuttal.

One which the father put forward.  “Rarity, you know we can’t take him when he isn’t feeling well!”

“A suitable excuse this time, but what about the next?  And after that?  Frankly, now that I think about it, I’m far from surprised that this has come out of nowhere for you two -- you aren’t even here for us, half the time!”

Cookie tried to muster up her anger again to scold her daughter.  “Now you watch your language with us--”

“I, for one, appreciate the trust you put in me, but I’m only sixteen, Mother!  And I’m just one woman!  I can’t bear the brunt of mine and Starsong’s troubles on my own when you two deem it too difficult to help.  Obviously!”  She was stroking Sweetie Belle’s hair, now,and continued more softly.  “It’s gotten to the point that he’ll confide in total strangers before me, let alone either of you.  And given the state of you right now, Star,” she wiped away more tears as she addressed Sweetie Belle directly, “I imagine there would have to be a good reason…”

Sweetie dared to look Rarity in the eye.  Concern was etched into every flawless inch of her ivory face, shining in her azure eyes, and waiting to jump off her lips in words again, if needed.

She coughed and sniffled, trying to calm herself.  There had been enough of… everything, today.

“So, I don’t understand.”  Sweetie Belle shook her head at this.  “Alright.  Then… what is it that I don’t understand?”

She almost thought to answer, but realized her throat was in no condition to say anything.  Her hands fumbled for the water bottle from before, and she drank every remaining drop.

“What’s there to understand?  These Apples have--”

“Hush, Daddy.  The time for talking is past us; now we listen.”  Rarity’s vice-grip loosened at last.

Sweetie swallowed the last of the water, and she was relatively calm again,though her breathing was still shaky and fitful.  “There’s no point.”

Her voice sounded like it had when they had brought her into the hospital two weeks ago, barely qualifying as a voice at all.

“I have to disagree, dear.  We can’t ever get it if you don’t tell us, and I would like to.”

Sweetie supposed that meant she wasn’t getting out of this.  So she dutifully hefted her soul back up from the floor as it continued to beg for mercy, but she wasn’t going to look at anyone if she could help it.

“I… I want to be a girl.”

More silence, if not for the buzzing and beeping and ticking, though it only lasted a moment before Rarity spoke again.  “Since when?”

“Since always.”

“Always…”  Rarity breathed this more than she said it.  “And I… Am I right in thinking nothing I, nor Mother or Father will say would change your mind?”

She nodded.

“Well.  That’s that, then.”  Sweetie heard her sigh through her nose.  “This is going to take some getting used to.  Although,” she felt Rarity’s thumb gently run circles on her shoulder, “I had always wanted a baby sister, I suppose.”

Sweetie Belle couldn’t believe what she was hearing, and looked back at Rarity to be greeted by a small, penitent smile.

The both of them heard their mother sigh.  “This is just like with my sister Couch Surfer all over again…”

“And after that incident, I expected better of you, Mother.  Honestly...” Rarity rolled her eyes and looked back at Cookie.  “We’re sharing the room with two lesbians--”

“Three!”  Pinkie raised her hand.

“Three lesbians, pardon me; who clearly disapprove of our behavior, and I happen to know they keep close ranks, as it were.  She will hear about this, and I would be as devastated as I would be unsurprised to never see her again.”

Holiday looked supremely confused, as if she wasn’t sure she should be insulted, but Pinkie only nodded sagely.

Rarity’s arms receded from Sweetie Belle as she stood back up.  “So, rather than risking tearing our family apart, might I suggest…?”

Cookie seemed very much at war with herself, wringing her hands and searching with her eyes for some kind of easy answer.  “I don’t know, sweetums.  You said this was like that drag thing, and I just can’t abide by that.”

“If our rural friends’ reaction is any hint, Mother, then I misspoke egregiously, and I should have held my tongue…”  Rarity sheepishly crossed her arms.  “No matter the truth, there’s no more crass a thing to say to people you are barely acquainted with; of course they would be upset.”

“So I can only beg for your forgiveness, Applejack.”  Rarity clasped her hands together as she addressed the still-tense young woman.  “We seem to have quite a bit to learn from you, it turns out.  If you’re willing to teach, that is.”

“Has everyone lost their minds but me?”  Hondo found his voice again, and he was clearly unconvinced.  “This is insane!  You can’t just decide you’re not what you were born as, and I won’t let you pollute my son’s mind with the crazy notion that you can!”

“Daddy--”

“They’re trying to take our son from us, Cookie!!  And you’re about to say that’s okay!  I can see it in your eyes!!”  Their father was clearly tired from having shouted and gestured with such fervor, and yet he was adamant.

Cookie’s face hardened again, only now her ire was directed at her husband.  “And you wanna know why, Hondo?  Do you want to know why I’m about to say it’s okay?”  She was in his face now, and quaking with anger -- more so than before, betraying her relatively even voice.  “I’ll tell you why.”

She pointed at Sweetie Belle.  “Because we almost lost our son, anyway.  We tried to protect him, and we tried to make him happy, and it hasn’t been working!  He knows medication can be dangerous, and he still did what he did!”

The fire in Hondo’s eyes had died.  “Honeybunch, I--”

“Something was already wrong with him!”  She was yelling again, directly into his face.  “Little wonder you can’t see it, though, because this is the first time you’ve seen him at all since!”

“I-I-I-I I couldn’t--”

“And you know what?  Do you really think a bunch of strangers would just push their idea of things on us without asking, if the doctors don’t already agree!?  When the nurse finally arrives and she does a better job telling us what’s wrong with our boy, are you still going to act like this!?”

“I’d rather have heard it from the nurse--”

Cookie still wasn’t having any of it, on the verge of a set of utterly furious tears.  “And I’d rather my baby didn’t try to kill himself!  We don’t always get what we want, Hondo!!”

At this, Hondo was at a loss for a response.  He stood, frozen, for a long moment, until his head slowly found itself in his palm.  “I just want to keep him safe…”

“Hmm, it ain’t jes’ about that, though, izzit?”  Granny Smith spoke up, addressing him for the first time since the shouting began.  “Ye have this idear in yer head that ye’ve got yerself a son, an’ this here’s a right violatin’ a that.”

Hondo kept his head in his hand.  “What in the hell do you know?”

“Were th’ same with me an’ mah grandbaby, here, is whut Ah know.  What Ah don’t knows is how Applejack feels.  Ah has t’ ask, no matter what, an’ if’n she says she’s a lady, then them’s the facts.  Even if she didn’t have a good head on her shoulders, wouldn’t change nothin’.”

Hondo raised his head to look at her.  “And if he’s wrong?  He’s not even old enough to go to middle school, yet!”

Applejack put her hat back on her head.  “Nothin’ doin’, Mr. Flanks.  It doesn’t matter what it’s about; when your kid’s talkin’, you got to listen.”  She turned to Applebloom, who was still wary of Sweetie’s parents.  “Applebloom might be mah sister, but mah brother and me basically have to raise her ourselves.  And we ain’t done the best job, sure.  She’d still be runnin’ around on her legs if we’d just stop bein’ sentimental and cut down the tree before she pulled it down on herself.

“But Ah know what it feels like to not have your elders care what you think.  Ah still have to deal with it on the daily when Ah go to school, and lemme remind you:  it doesn’t feel good.  It’s like they don’t see you as a real person.”  Applejack moved to Sweetie Belle’s side.  “If your youngest -- if your daughter -- happens to change her mind later down the road, then hey, it happens to everyone.  Even for stuff that’s as important as this.  And that’s her decision to make, nobody else’s.”

Anti-venom had a name, and it was Applejack.  Sweetie Belle fell into her side because by God, did she need a lot of it right now.

“Now…”  She felt her hair being ruffled.  “If y’all don’t want to take mah word for it, that’s fine, because you got one thing right; Nurse Redheart’ll be here any minute with the exact same things to say and probably a lot of the same info Ah have to give.  But seein’ as this here vacation you’re goin’ on seems pretty set in stone by now, Ah wanna request that me and mah cousin over there help Rarity out while you’re gone.”

Rarity and Cookie were rather surprised, and Hondo trepidatious.  “Why?  Even after all this?”

Applejack smirked.  “Well for one, Rarity here nailed it.”  She looked down at Sweetie Belle.  “Y’all got a thing for mah little sister, huh?”

Not cold anymore.  Hot.  Extremely hot.  Especially in the face.  “I-I, uh--”

Applejack chuckled.  “Nothin’ wrong with that, either.”  She looked back up.  “But more importantly, Ah don’t wanna just walk out on her, or any of y’all after this.  Wouldn’t sit right with me.  Us girls gotta stick together.”

Hondo sighed and crossed his arms.  “Well, it’s not like we can stop you.  I know how bad it looks, going on a vacation now, of all times.  If we could just cancel those plans, we would.”

“This is something of a company trip for him,” Cookie explained.  “The football team’s all headed out there to kick off the season with a party and talk business with the league.  The original plan was for all four of us to go.”

“And I’m one of the senior members of the faculty; I have to go, no matter what.”  He shook his head.  “So, by default, you have our permission, I suppose.

“And… none of you are wrong, least of all you, Cookie.”  He looked at his wife with remorse.  “Something isn’t working, the way we’ve been raising Starsong.  I guess, so long as we come back and he’s-- if… if she… God, that really is going to take some getting used to…”

Sweetie could have sworn she was all cried out a moment ago.  Where did all these keep coming from?

“So long as we still have two kids when we come back, I’ll be happy, at this point.”

She had to stop crying.  It was honestly irritating her that even good things made her cry, these days.  “I’ll be okay, Dad.”

Hondo looked at his daughter with hope, fear, and uncertainty all written plain on his mustached face.  “You promise?”

She wiped away more tears, and gave him as genuine a smile as she could muster.  “I promise.”

He nodded.  “I can only hope…”

Applebloom was still dissatisfied, however.  “You’re still not callin’ her by the right name, y’know.”

“Applebloom, Ah think we’ll just wait for the nurse to get here.”

“Nuh-uh!  Ya told me yourself; the name Applejack was important to ya ‘cus ya picked it on your own!”  Applebloom propped herself up on her arms again.  “She told me, first day Ah was here, through a big ol’ tube in her mouth that Starsong wasn’t her name, an’ she picked one out today that she likes better!”

Applejack sighed.  “Guess she won’t be lettin’ it go so easy.  Well…”  She paused, and then looked back at Sweetie Belle.  “Actually, sugarcube, it’s probably better if you tell ‘em.”

One last squeeze from the snake, then.  One last threat of poison.  What if they don’t like it?  What did she even want to hear in response?  All the possible reactions scared her.

And yet, not telling them sounded even worse.  She’d just taken it as hers, and she was already trying to run away from it.

That was unacceptable.

So she let go of Applejack and straightened herself out, taking in as big of a breath as she figured was possible without coughing it back up, looked her father squarely in the eye, and she said it.

“My name is Sweetie Belle.”

She bore her name.  And it felt good.
> The Belle on the Hill
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It might have been late spring, but it was still a bit too cold to be wearing skirts that April.

Sweetie Belle squeezed the plunger on her inhaler and felt it empower her body.  Too bad she had wanted to wear one anyway.  Her legs were just going to have to deal with it.

She was sitting under the sunset-streaked sky in the south orchard of Sweet Apple Acres, on a hilltop right next to a sapling apparently called Bloomberg II.  Not on the grass, obviously; Rarity would kill her if she got her skirt dirty like that.  No, there was a pink plaid picnic blanket insulating her from the tingly green blades, much to her present company’s dismay.

Red was currently in his own world, observing a ladybug, lying on his side and idly fiddling with his hoodie zipper.

Red sighed.  “Buzzer…”

Sweetie grunted in agreement.  “Bored.”

He sat up, legs crossed.  “Re-bellion!”

She couldn’t help but laugh.  “Charging.”

“Uuugh!”  He flopped back onto the blanket.

Sweetie Belle flopped down in solidarity.  “Seriously.  What’s taking her so long?”

Learning to communicate with Red had been one of the more interesting things that she’d been learning to do.  With games (specifically Bittybeasts) as common ground to start with, their conversations probably sounded obnoxiously nerdy and strange, exchanging singular words for which only they and their mutual friend were privy to the meaning.

She’d gotten very much comfortable with it, and so it had been a surprise when Red had struggled out a few full sentences a couple months ago during Christmas break.  Even more so what he had to say that was so important he didn’t want to risk being misinterpreted.  He was a boy, he didn’t want to be called Scootaloo anymore, and he really looked up to Sweetie Belle for being brave enough to say she was a girl back then.

That had filled her with a new kind of warmth, one she had trouble describing.  Rarity said it was probably pride.  Applejack thought it was kinship.  It made her happy, either way.  For all her recent surplus, she cherished that happiness, and so she didn’t really mind being stuck waiting with Red.

Sweetie Belle rocked back upright, and stared out over the blooming orchard.  She really had been quite a bit happier lately, despite a lot of things.

Her days had certainly been… eventful since those two weeks, some months ago.  One day a boy named Starsong had been taken to the emergency room for medicinal overdose, and he never came out.  Sweetie Belle did in his place (with asthma as a battle scar), and her parents were still having trouble wrapping their head around that.

They weren’t the only ones.  Rarity had stumbled, at first.  She still didn’t seem sure if her sister actually enjoyed their time together (which had grown more frequent regardless).  Maybe it was her new aesthetic.  People in general didn’t seem to think goths enjoyed anything.  But honestly?  Sweetie Belle just loved black.  And piercings, but she wasn’t allowed those, yet.

But Rarity had, nonetheless, been so much nicer and willing to listen since then, and she didn’t slip up when she addressed Sweetie Belle anymore.

She didn’t think she’d ever get tired of hearing people say that name out loud.  It’d just be nice if more people did.

School had been another matter entirely, and after the semesters she’d had, Sweetie was very much relieved that she’d be starting middle school next year.  She already had two friends who were going to be in the same school.

“C’mon Pinkie!  Ah can move mahself around way faster than this!”

She smiled.  Well, one friend and one girlfriend.

“AJ says you can’t go racing up and down hills anymore, Applebloom.  And your Auntie Pinkamena Diane Responsibility Apple Pie is gonna make sure you don’t!”

Sweetie Belle craned over her shoulder to see Pinkie wheeling Applebloom up the slope, bickering the whole way.

“That don’t change the fact that Ah could probably wheel mahself up there in half the time with mah eyes closed!”

“Safety fir~rrrrrst~!”

Even with how heavy that wheelchair was (both her and Red had been allowed to try it out before, so she was pretty well aware) Sweetie Belle didn’t doubt it.  Turns out Applebloom was actually pretty strong for a girl their age, and this hill?  Probably nothing to her.

They did eventually crest the hill, and Red scrambled to his feet to meet them halfway.  “Late!”

Applebloom huffed.  “Ain’t mah fault; blame slowpoke here.”

“Yeah, that was my bad.”  Pinkie knocked her knuckles lightly against her own skull.  “But Fluttershy’s brought this super cool girl to the slumber party named Rainbow Dash who just moved back to town and you know what?  I think I’m in love…”  Sweetie Belle wasn’t sure how it was possible, but the party girl had turned several shades pinker as a dopey grin stretched across her face.  “And well, you girls know how that feels, right?”

“Pinkie!!”  Applebloom was turning pink, herself.  Sweetie’s ears were growing hot, and it wasn’t because of the sun -- her hair was getting long enough that it covered them now.

Pinkie snickered and snorted that laugh she always seemed to make when she’d gotten one over on somebody.  Teasing her and Applebloom still had yet to get old for the older girl.

She clearly wasn’t done, either, as once she’d finished wheeling Applebloom to the blanket, Pinkie stepped out from behind her and gave a bow.  “Any further accomodations I can provide the lovely budding lovebirds this evening?”  She said this in her most snooty voice possible, even as she ruined it with her continued giggles.

Applebloom crossed her arms and pouted as her blush deepened.  She mumbled something too muddied to discern.

Pinkie leaned in closer with a pearly-white grin on her face.  “My apologies, madam, could you repeat that?”

“Ah said Ah wanna be in Sweetie Belle’s lap!”

Ears were definitely on fire.  Hell, her entire head was probably on fire with how hot it was.

Without a word, Pinkie locked the wheelchair and hoisted Applebloom out of it, cradling her like the princess she deserved to be.  Nobody heard that, right?  Only Applebloom was allowed to know that Sweetie Belle had started thinking of her as a countryside princess.  Pinkie was certainly smiling at her like she had.

Hard to breathe again.  She fumbled for her inhaler and shot more treated air into her lungs.  It didn’t make her chest feel any less tight.

Pinkie carefully set Applebloom down such that she was leaning back into Sweetie Belle’s chest before squealing in gay excitement.  She pulled an entire picnic basket out of her mess of tangled curls (nobody in the Apple family ever questioned this, for some reason) and set it down next to them.  Red pounced on the thing, rummaging around for his prize.

“If you ladies (and gentleman) have no further needs, then I shall take my leave to give you privacy.”  Pinkie bowed again, her veritable mane of curly hair tickling Sweetie Belle’s nose as it cascaded forward, and she turned away, descending the slope significantly faster than she and Applebloom had come up.

Sweetie was unamused when the sound of footfalls on grass suddenly stopped once Pinkie was out of sight.  “You’re still here.”

“Shhh!!  That’s a secret!!”

“Don’t let it get to ya,” Applebloom’s voice reverberated through Sweetie’s chest, “she starts actin’ extra Pinkie when her gaydar is goin’ off.”

“Currently we’re looking at a 189.5 LesboRad reading on the Gayger Counter on account of literally every girl on Sweet Apple Acres that isn’t Applejack.  Very large amounts of homo energy.”

Applebloom was perplexed by this.  “Even Granny?”

Pinkie’s head popped up.  “Ask when you’re older.”  She descended from view again.

Sweetie was incredulous.  “My sister isn’t into girls!”

She popped back up again with a sly lopsided smile.  “As far as she knows…”

She did not want to think about that, actually.  “Get out of here, you big fat weirdo!”  She shooed the Biggest Lesbian In the Room away with fervor.

Pinkie’s smile only became more sly.  “You mock my size because you’re jealous of the power it affords me.  It’s okay, I understand.”  She blinked, and her face returned to its usual cheer.  “I’ll come get you three after sundown!”  Pinkie descended below the swell of the hilltop again, and a mere second passed before Sweetie saw her running back in the direction of the farmhouse.

Only to dive into a bush.  And for the glint of binoculars to pop out of it.

Sweetie sighed.  “She’s still watching us.”

Applebloom’s crimson hair rustled against Sweetie Belle’s shirt as she looked up.  “It’s what Applejack told ‘er to do.  We got as good as we’re gonna get.”

“Sandwich!”  Red triumphantly pulled a plastic bag containing a crustless peanut butter and raspberry jam sandwich from the basket.

Sweetie met her iridescent gaze, eyebrow raised.  “Does your sister think I’m gonna break you or something?”

“Ah do wish she’d stop babyin’ me; Ah can’t get into a whole lot o’ trouble like Ah used to anyway.”  A blush made itself visible across her sun-colored face.  “Besides, Ah got mah lucky charm with me; Ah ain’t got nothin’ to worry about.”

Her heart fluttered at the pet name, and she couldn’t help but smile.  “W-whatever.”  Sweetie Belle’s arms wrapped around Applebloom as she willed herself to forget they were being observed.  “At least she can’t hear us.  Probably.”

They sat in silence for a moment, the only sounds (other than how increasingly loud Sweetie Belle’s own pumping blood sounded to her) were the crickets, and Red happily wolfing down his sandwich.

Applebloom broke the peace.  “Are yer parents still givin’ ya grief?”

“No so much, lately.”  Sweetie’s thumbs swirled around each other.  “Dad still seems sad that I don’t want to come watch football practice anymore, but it’s off-season, anyway.”

“Always kinda wanted to be a quarterback mahself.  Can’t now, o’ course.”

“I bet he’d be happy to hear you say that.  You two could nerd out on football together like he tried to with me.”

She felt Applebloom’s hands lie on top of her own.  “Ah guess Ah should give ‘em a chance; still sore about them callin’ you the wrong gender last time Ah saw ‘em.”

“It hardly ever happens now.”  She rested her chin on Applebloom’s head.  “Actually the day after, they said they scheduled me for some kind of shot that would stop me from going through puberty.”

“Really?  Well, pickle mah cucumbers, they’re finally doin’ what Applejack said to!”

Sweetie Belle snorted.  “‘Pickle my cucumbers’?”

Applebloom chuckled.  “Granny says stuff like that all the time.”

Red gagged in disgust.  “Bluh!  Pickles…”

“Same.  Ick.”  Sweetie stuck out her tongue.

“Y’all are nuts.  Pickles’re the best!  Dill pickles most e-specially.”

“Pickles!”  Red all but spat the loathsome word out of his mouth, before returning to devouring his sandwich.

“Well, yer allowed to be wrong, it’s fine.”  Applebloom’s thumb traced slow circles atop Sweetie Belle’s hand.  “Pinkie likes to sully pizza with pineapples, an’ we ain’t disowned her yet.”

“Don’t make me come back over there, Applebloom!!”  Pinkie’s voice reverberated furiously from the bush, and all three of them laughed.

Sweetie laughed hard enough that she was short of breath yet again, so she freed her left hand to remedy that.

“You been usin’ that thing a lot.” Applebloom looked up at her with concern.  “Ya sure it’s gonna get better?”

Her chest full of air again, Sweetie Belle brought her arm around Applebloom’s chest, above the other.  “The doctor said cold air is thinner, whatever that means, so I’ll have a harder time breathing in winter and spring.”

“But it’ll get better, right?”

“She said growing up usually helps make it less of a problem.”  She turned her head to rest her cheek on Applebloom, feeling the silky red hair against her skin.

“That’s good t’ hear.  Sure wish it’d happen faster, though.”

Weight began to pull down on her heart.  “It wouldn’t be a problem at all if I wasn’t so stupid.”

Applebloom reached up and poked Sweetie Belle in the cheek.  “You quit talkin’ like that.  Ah wouldn’tve met you if ya hadn’t been in that hospital.  And we told ya, it ain’t yer fault nobody saw you were a girl before.”

She sighed through her nose as she eyed the yellow hand lightly pressing into her face.  A thought crossed her mind, and before it could make her smile devilishly, she acted on it, licking at Applebloom’s finger.

“Gah!”  The offending hand flinched away in surprise, retracting from view, and Sweetie started laughing again.  “Yeah, yeah, ya gremlin; you laugh away.”

She restrained her mirth before it left her breathless again, and tightened her embrace.  “Not enough people believe me, still.”

Applebloom petulantly wiped the saliva onto Sweetie Belle’s sleeve.  “Well, ya just gotta get some o’ that, uh, what’s it called again…  the girlifyin’ juice, y'know...”

“Estrogen!”

“Thanks, Pinkie!,” Applebloom shouted over Sweetie’s shoulder.  “Yeah, that stuff.  Step two after stoppin’ yer body from goin’ through the wrong puberty is helpin’ it go through the right one, remember?”

“Yeah, but my parents said they want me to be 100% sure, even though I already am.”

Red had finished his sandwich and was rifling through the picnic basket again.  “Juice.  Juice.  Juice.”  It didn’t take long for him to find his quarry, hoisting the amber and green carton of apple juice over his head.  “Juice!”  He blinked, and then grabbed another from the basket before presenting them to the girls.  “Juice?”

“Juice.”  Sweetie Belle nodded and accepted one as Applebloom grasped the other.

“Juice!”  Red grabbed his own, once relieved of the others, and eagerly stabbed the attached straw into the top.  He scooted closer to the two of them as he sipped.

Once she had done the same and taken a maiden taste of the kid-friendly ambrosia, Sweetie Belle thought to ask a question that had been burning in her mind.  “How come Applejack hasn’t gotten girl juice?”

Applebloom stopped her own loud drinking.  “Ah actually asked her that a few days ago.  Said she was waitin’ to be done with school before, but now she’s gonna wait ‘til she’s got somebody else to help with the farm, since Ah can’t do any more grunt work.”

“Why?”

“Somethin’ about bein’ afraid of losin’ too much muscle.”

“Hmm.”  Sweetie took another draught of apple blood (‘it totally is fruit blood’ having been a silly argument they had gone over before, and were likely going to have again), and felt the familiar snake squeezing her heart.  It never left her, it just wasn’t coiled very tight most of the time.

She wouldn’t suffer it in silence, and dared to make her fears real by uttering them.  “What if I just end up being ugly…?”

“Not happenin’.”  Applebloom shifted her gaze back up to the pale girl’s face.  “More likely you’ll get even prettier than you already are.”

Her heart skipped a beat, and shook the snake loose in the process.  “I-I’m not pretty.”

“Like heck you ain’t!”  Sweetie Belle, face burning again, met Applebloom’s eyes.  Her face was turning pink again.  “Y’all are pretty as a pear!  Ask anyone!”

“I-I…”  Sweetie’s tongue decided to turn into mush in her mouth as she tried to respond.  “Are you allowed to say pears are pretty?”

“First of all, yes.  Second, don’t ya try to throw me off like that!  Ah ain’t seen a prettier sight than you in all mah life.  ‘Specially with that make-up ya got on!”

Sweetie’s brain was getting fuzzy.  Rarity had insisted that black wasn’t a very cute color for her lips, likening it to the face-paint of a mime when paired with their skin color, but hadn’t stopped her.  “You… you like it?”

“Heh.  Reckon Ah do.  And uh...”  Applebloom rubbed the back of her neck.  “Aw, screw it; Ah’ll put one in the swear jar.  Ah think it makes ya look badass, too.”

While that had been part of her intent, Sweetie Belle certainly didn’t feel very badass with Applebloom turning her insides into warm jelly like this.  Suddenly her mind was screaming at her with every synapse firing like a gamma burst as she really studied how beautiful Applebloom was.

Kiss her!  Kiss her, you coward!  KISSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Her lips pressed against Applebloom’s forehead for a brief instant before her nerves caught up to her, and she squeezed her eyes shut as she pulled her head back up.  “IthinkIloveyouApplebloomI’msorry!”

At first she only heard a dazed, throaty giggle below her.  “Well… shucks…”

Sweetie Belle wrenched open one eye to peek down at her, and sputtered out a laugh.  Applebloom’s eyes were half-lidded and glossed over, and she had the dumbest open-mouthed smile on her face; the black mark her lipstick had left on her girlfriend’s forehead absolutely completed the image.

Eventually those beautiful red-orange jewels rolled back into sync with each other and found focus on Sweetie Belle.  “Ah’m pretty sure Ah love you too.”

All the tension that had gathered in Sweetie Belle’s body begged to dance and sing until dawn the next morning, because there was so much it was leaking out of her eyes in tears.  She held her country princess tight and didn’t ever want to let go.

As much as she liked being the designated lucky charm, Sweetie Belle knew it had to be the other way around.  Applebloom was her good fortune made manifest, and she never wanted it to end.

“Gay.”

Applebloom found herself again and scowled at Red.  “You hush, mister.”

Red just smirked.  “Gay, gay; homo-gay!”

“Yer just jealous.”

Red blew a raspberry at his best friend.  But then he rested his head on Sweetie Belle’s shoulder, slurping away at the apple juice.

Sweetie Belle didn’t even care that she could hear Pinkie Pie squealing at the upper limits of the human voice behind her.  She was too happy to care about being teased, or her father growing distant, or any of the bad things her classmates would have to say when spring break was over.  Her asthma didn’t bother her, her body didn’t bother her, the cold definitely didn’t bother her.

With these two by her side, she felt invincible.