When their friend falls ill with a strange disease, Minty and Pinky Pie must travel the continent to save her!
In the small mountain village of Ponyville, the odd couple of Minty Mule and Pinky Pie the unicorn bard go on an adventure to find a cure to Skywishes' rare affliction: Fadeaway. So rare, in fact, that it was thought only to exist in mythology and foal's tales! The two will make their way across the country in search of the mythical Queen of Chaos, who (in theory) is the key to curing their friend, though at a mysterious cost.
An alternate universe fic with a world much different than, but heavily inspired by, FiM, and featuring a smattering of redesigned and repurposed G3 ponies!
Content warnings and notes about the tags: "Death" is pertaining to the premise being about trying to cure a character of a terminal illness being the main driving force behind the plot. "Sex" doesn't occur except through implication, usually by way of suggestive humor. "Suicide/Self-Harm" is something one character contemplates in chapters 6, 7, 8, and 9 (so far) But, SPOILER ALERT (not really) it doesn't happen and is simply for emotional effect. "Gore" is present mainly only in chapters 7 and 8, and has mostly to do with environmental blood splatters, and not-particularly-detailed wounds. "Violence" because why/how else would there be blood and wounds for me to vaguely detail?
Warning for total party-poopers for whom this is a deal-breaker: there is a lot of queerness in this. Specifically and especially transgender lesbians. You have been warned.
This is my first fanfiction, and my first exercise in creative writing in some time. The cover image is hand drawn on paper because I wanted to have *something* original, even if it was lackluster.
One day, in the country of Equiland, in a little mountain village called Ponyville, an odd, young couple trot through the streets. A very stout and bubbly, seafoam green mule, with bubblegum pink mane and tail, by the name of Minty, and a much taller, hot-pink unicorn mare with somewhat more muted pink mane and tail, named Pinky Pie. They romped about through the markets, chatting with their friends, Minty trading her hoof-made beads and carvings for various other nicknacks: wood stain from Toola-Roola, the painter-- tanned hideleaf leather from Applejack, one of many farmers-- and other such odd and ends, while her marefriend discussed her music, lute slung across her back, with Rainbow Dash the seamstress.
“That’s a truly excellent idea, darling!,” Dash said, genuinely impressed by Pinky’s progress in learning her instrument, “I can remember just a month ago when you were barely able to strike a chord. You’ve come so far!”
“Aw, shucks,” Pinky replied, a bit more red than pink, “Thank you, but it’s really not that impressive.”
“Don’t be modest, darling! Oh-” Rainbow Dash cut herself off, “You positively must go and play for Skywishes! The poor dear is just languishing in that dreadful little room.”
“We’d planned on it!” Minty interjected, as she leaned against her marefriend’s side, “Actually, we’re on our way there right now.”
“Oh, then I shan’t keep you any longer!”
“Oh, no, Dash! We always enjoy talking to you.” Pinky replies, and good-naturedly patted the earth pony on the shoulder with a hoof.
“Yeah, Rainbow! Oh, and I just gotta tell you, your mane is absolutely dashing!” Minty offered, chuckling to herself.
“Ha ha ha…” Rainbow Dash added sarcastically, and playfully rolled her eyes, “Run along now, little lovebirds! Your friend will be happy to see you.”
The mule and unicorn made their way deliberately to a small house on the crowded street, just past the market district, over the door of which is a circular sign bearing a painting of a candle with lit flame. The two mares strode into a small reception room, with tack-covered cork-board in one corner, rustic wood furnishings, and little floral patterns painted on the walls-- with Toola-Roola's trademark swirling flourishes, of course. Pinky was the first to notice Lamplight: a tall, lavender coated and violet maned unicorn mare with a stern face and tense-- albeit benevolent-- presence, and the office's proprietor.
"Hello, miss Pie."
"H-hello, doctor Lamplight." Pinky swallowed nervously, and Minty offered her a comforting hoof, which she accepted.
"Here to see Skywishes?"
"Eeyup!" Minty chirped with feigned cheer, "Pinks here has a new song she's been practicing, just for her."
"So she has," Lamplight said, looking the smaller unicorn up-and-down, as if sizing her up. "I still think you'd have made a better apprentice than a musician, but the heart wants what it wants."
"Um, is she available, Doctor?" Pinky queried, refusing to address the comment, but thankful that Lamplight wasn't trying to press her into service, as she so often had done, having been the only other unicorn in town not to practice medicine professionally. Aside from little Rarity-- Toola Roola’s sister-- of course, as she was only a filly.
This garnered a sigh from the eldest mare, "Come in, she'll be happy for your visit."
Pinky and Minty were led through a heavy oak door, held together by blackened-iron nails, and hinged with the same. A magenta earth pony mare with curly pink-and-purple mane lay in bed on her back, a lukewarm mug of either tea or mushroom broth on an old-looking bedside table to her left. A very tall and lithe pegasus mare, with snow-white coat and luxuriant blue-and-pink mane, tail, and feathers, and the same shade of pink in a tattooed pattern on her face-- tendrils and spots cascading down her brow and cheeks from a heart at the center of her forehead, traditional for a married pegasus-- loomed protectively over her.
"Oh, Minty! Pinky!" The bedridden pony sat up excitedly, but immediately wilted back down to the bed, saved from thumping by the pegasus beside her, who eased her down slowly.
"There, there, love, it's awrite..." Starcatcher reassured her ailing partner, in her distinctive Butterfly Island accent, "I know you're excited that ya mates are here, but you gotta take it easy."
"Hi, Sky," Minty said, leading Pinky the way over to the bed, and then taking one of Skywishes' hooves into her own. "How're you feeling today?"
"Like a million bits," she said deadpan, before rolling her eyes and sharing a chuckle with Minty.
"Has Lamplight given you any idea what's going on?" Pinky inquired. Starcatcher and Skywishes gave one another a resigned sort of look, which Pinky took as a sign she shouldn't have asked.
"I'm sorry, I know it's none of my business, it's just-"
"No, no, it's alright!" Skywishes assured her, seeming genuine, "why don't you tell them, Starry? I don't completely understand it." Starcatcher took in a deep breath, and replied.
"Consider it done, love. Well," she rubbed the back of her head with a hoof, and adjusted her wings nervously, "Doc says it's not like anything she's ever seen before. 'Least not in real life..."
"What do you mean by that?" Minty tilted her head to the side, her big ears swayed as she did.
"Erm," Skywishes began again, in her partner's stead, "Lamplight says she hasn't seen what's got me in anything other than legends and folklore. Foal's tales, like Breezies and Dragons and... oh, you know what I mean." She appeared somewhat dejected, and her wife leaned over to embrace her gently.
"Skywishes has contracted Fadeaway, I'm certain of it." A resolute and familiar voice rang out, and the four turned to face Lamplight in the doorway.
"Wait, really?" Minty cocked her head even further to the side.
"What's that?" Pinky unintentionally mimicked her marefriend's gesture.
Minty turned to her, now more certain. "She's begun to fade out of existence," she explained whilst flicking her tail anxiously, "She'll slowly get weaker and sleepier, until she starts to turn transparent, and..." She stopped to look back at Skywishes, whom Starcatcher was clinging to desperately. Both looked as though they might cry. "Omigosh, I'm sorry!"
"Where'd you learn all of that?" Skywishes asked, shaken.
"It's, uh... part of a story my stepmom used to tell me, before I left the wagon train." Minty said, looking towards the ground, and rubbing one of her forelegs with the other. She then looked back up with her usual bright eyes and goofy grin. "But, there is a cure! We've just gotta find The Queen of Chaos!"
“The who-what of what-now?” Skywishes asked incredulously, clearly perturbed.
“The Queen of Chaos.” Minty replied, matter-of-factly.
“Um, Mints?” Pinky interjected, equally as puzzled, “I think she doesn’t know what-- who-- that is.”
Lamplight came forward, “Minty is right, for a change,” this received a glare from Pinky and Minty both, which the doctor ignored, and pressed on, “This is a mythological illness, and calls for a mythological treatment. Skywishes, you must seek out this ‘Queen of Chaos,’ and when you find her… Well, Minty, as much as I prefer not to rely on folklore, it seems you may actually know more about this than myself.”
“Apology accepted,” Minty said, as she gave Lamplight a sideways glare, stepping towards Skywishes. “So, um, Sky? How do I put this…” She scratched her chin with a hoof in thought, eyes wandering to Starcatcher, before settling again on Skywishes. Minty sighed, resigned, and a bit confused. “Skywishes, my dad used to tell me this story sometimes when I was a filly. It was a favorite among donkeys and those who traveled with us, dunno why, really… Oh, but--”
“Mate, I’m not tryna be rude,” Starcatcher cut in, “but my wife is sick, could ya maybe take a deep breath and collect ya thoughts?”
“R-right, sorry… I-I--” Minty began, but was cut off again by Pinky, who wrapped a foreleg around the back of her neck and pulled her to her side in a gesture of comfort and support. Minty had always felt more confident with her marefriend there by her side. She took in a deep breath, gave an ox-eyed look to Pinky as thanks, and turned back towards the ailing mare in bed. “Skywishes, the Queen of Chaos is a big, scary, goddess-type-of-thing… A-and the rules of how things-- like, the laws of nature or whatever-- work is… different, when you get close enough to her...”
The five other ponies looked upon Minty with wonder and terror as she explained this being, her ever-shifting appearance, her odd riddles, otherworldly wisdom and her ability to shift the very fabric of reality around her. It was impossible not to notice the growing look of pride on Minty’s face as she got to regale this story from her foalhood, even the circumstances being as they were.
“Skywishes, you must seek out this Queen of Chaos, and 'defeat' her within a year,” Minty finished, with uncharacteristic solemnity.
The others stared in awe at the little mule. Lamplight in astonishment that such an odd and unserious little creature possessed such knowledge of mythology, and the other three-- especially Skywishes-- simply gawked in their struggle to entirely comprehend what they had just been told.
“So, let me get this straight,” Starcatcher began, looking befuddled at Minty and Lamplight both, “you think my very sick, BEDRIDDEN wife needs to get up outta bed, and run all around the continent-- possibly the world-- to find a mythological CREATURE that she might have to fight?”
“Starry, wait,” Skywishes countered her wife, “I know I’m frail, but I can still walk around a bit for now.”
Pinky Pie felt Minty flinch a bit at Starcatcher’s understandable upset, and held her tighter to her side. “Maybe Minty and I can go out ahead for a week, maybe a month, and see if we can get any information on where to take you?”
“That won’t work,” Lamplight said, with no malice, but all of her usual snobbery, “Skywishes’ condition will only worsen in that time. If she were going to travel, she would have to do it now.” Lamplight held her fetlock against Skywishes’ forehead, and looked thoughtful for a moment before levitating an ice pack onto the earth pony’s head with her yellow magical aura. “If only we had a recall rune, you and Minty could just teleport Skywishes to wherever she needs to be.”
Minty’s long ears prick up, and she suddenly runs off and out, with a big grin on her face. The other four stared after her out the door, but continued their conversation. This sort of impulsivity was nothing new for Minty, even in such dire situations. Pinky and Skywishes found this charming, but Starcatcher had somewhat limited patience for it, and Lamplight had none at all.
“What exactly is that?” Starcatcher was the first to break the silence.
Skywishes looked at her, perplexed, and pointed at the top of her head with a hoof. “It’s… an icepack, sweetie.”
“No, no, the… recall rune or whatever.”
"A magical artifact that a unicorn can use to teleport themselves, or a group, to any place they've been before," Lamplight explained, "but they can only be used twice a day-- a round trip-- and it puts a lot of strain on the caster."
"I don't know if that'd be much use to us even if we had one," Pinky rebuts, "I've never been very good at magic, no matter how much potential you say I have..."
"Well, I can't leave the office, especially not with cutiepox season fast approaching!"
Minty then barged back in, returning to a confused room a few minutes later with saddlebags on, out of which she took out a small velvet pouch. She opened it and carefully set the item inside, a small jade-carved boomerang with arrows embossed at either end, on the table.
Lamplight gawked at the talisman, then Minty, then back to the item, then back to the mule. "H-how- what- where did you get that??"
"It was a gift," Minty stated flatly.
"From who???" Lamplight demanded with incredulity.
Minty didn’t respond, and was evidently shaken. Pinky puts a hoof on her shoulder to comfort her, and shoots Lamplight a look as if to say 'it's none of your business', so the elder of the unicorns drops it.
“Is that it?” Starcatcher asked, and appeared a bit more hopeful.
“Yuppers!” Minty chirped, now with genuine glee.
Lamplight nodded her head, “Mhmm,” and visibly tried not to pester Minty about it too much more, lest she incur the wrath of Pinky Pie. Ms. Pie tended to be a pushover herself, but always stood up for Minty.
“Great!” Starcatcher spoke, withholding her sarcasm more than she would have liked. “What do we do with it, though?”
“Well, I was thinking,” Pinky began, “we could do what I suggested earlier. Minty and I could go out ahead of you two, and then come back for Skywishes when we find The Queen.”
“No ya don’t!” Starcatcher interjected, raising her wings and smirking, “I’m comin’ with ya. I can’t stand the idea of not directly helpin’ get her better.”
“Um, Starcatcher, I don’t mean to impose, but, could I have you back here with me instead?” Skywishes asked, putting a hoof on her beloved’s back to get her attention.
“Yes, that will work.” Lamplight states, and Starcatcher looks more than a bit embarrassed that her first priority wasn’t directly taking care of the mare she loved. “If this goes on long enough that Skywishes becomes incapable of taking care of herself, I cannot always be on standby. You, as her wife, will fill that role better than I ever could.” Lamplight gave a slight nod and smile in the direction of Starcatcher. Coming from the incredibly grumpy and reserved doctor, this was a display of tremendous confidence and affection.
“I think you could still come along sometimes!” Minty bleated out, “Pinky could use the rune to come back here, grab you, and then return you the next day. Oh, and Lamplight!” Minty trotted over to her, “You can use your crystal ball to get in touch with Pinky and I, to let us know if Starcatcher is ready to come with, or if she’s needed back here.”
“Wow, Minty,” Starcatcher says, genuinely surprised, “that’s a.. An incredibly concise and decent plan, mate!”
“I’m going to ignore how back-hooved that was, and accept it as a compliment,” Minty said with a wink, and shared a chuckle with Skywishes and her wife.
“Alright, it’s getting late. We should pack tonight, and leave tomorrow by midday at the latest.” Pinky stated authoritatively, before leading Minty and herself to hug their two friends goodbye, and head out the door.
"Was my plan actually any good, hun?" Minty asked, suddenly feeling apprehensive.
Pinkie hushed her worries with a very tender kiss on the head, which resulted in a high pitched squeak from Minty, and a tight hug. "Yes, sweetheart. It's a great idea. I'm sure we'll get this all figured out..." 'I certainly hope so, at least,' she thought to herself.
Minty grunted as she slid herself into her yoke, and started pulling her wagon forward. The wagon was painted a shade of orange that-- Pinky said was "rust colored"-- but it had always made Minty think of persimmons, and painted on the broad sides with the cutie marks of various ponies Minty considered friends: Pinky's three balloons, Starcatcher’s heart with a comet tail, Rainbow Dash's... well, rainbow, and her own three mint candies, to name a few. It had never been difficult for her to pull, even with more weight than was presently in it, but something in her made it feel lighter than air. Probably the new sense of purpose, she thought to herself as Pinky Pie trotted up beside her.
"All ready to go?" asked Pinky, adjusting the belt of her saddlebags with her maroon magical aura.
"Yuppers!"
“Absolutely, definitely, positively?” Pinky asked, as she raised an eyebrow and smirked a bit.
“As sure as you’re ‘absolutely, definitely, positively’ pink!” Minty giggles, and Pinky rolls her eyes before joining her.
“Alright, but I wanna go over the checklist one more time before we take off.” Pinky’s horn glowed as she telekinetically floated a clipboard and pencil in front of her, and began to read from the list. "Dried oats?"
"Check!"
"Rope?"
"Check!"
"All the bits you can carry?"
"Check!"
"Canteens?"
"Check!"
"Aaand, lastly, my crystal ball?"
"Check-eroni!"
"Alright, then she should be all set!"
"Yeah! Wait, no!"
"Really? What are we missing?"
"New horseshoes. I've had the same ones on for... Well, I don't remember how long, and you don't even have any!"
"Minty, I don't want or need horseshoes. I can't imagine having some iron hoop-thingies nailed into my hooves making it more and not less comfortable to walk on rocks."
"Oh, no, sweetness, you absolutely do! I spent half my life walking, that I haven't spent making bracelets at least, and I can tell you for absolute certain that you need horseshoes for a big thing like this."
"This is just so you can flirt with Bloomery again, isn't it?"
She scoffs, "well, not just that!!"
Bloomery had always been a ferrier, as every stallion in her family had been. Bloomery wasn't a stallion, though, at least not anymore, though some parts of her work did make her feel stallionish at times. All the hammering, hefting, filing, and grinding left the already large pony with too much muscle to effectively fly as other pegasi could. Bloomery's beautiful, golden mane had to be tied back all day as not to pose a fire hazard, and her glossy chestnut coat had to be saturated with sweat, and grease, and filings of iron and steel; and these things hurt her heart, but she was a ferrier, and she was never short of work in a town populated by ponies-- ponies need horseshoes, after all!
Bloomery’s ears pricked up at-attention as the heavy door to her shop swung open. The bell dangling above it rang its soft little twinkle. Starshine above, she was proud of that little bell.
“Hellooo, Bloomie!” a familiar, nasal voice rang out after the bell had settled, and Bloomery saw Minty and Pinky Pie enter.
“Oh, hey, Minty!” Her face lit up as she spoke, with a distinct lack of the Butterfly Island accent that normally seasoned pegasus-speech, “didja finally get Pinks to agree to some horseshoes?”
Bloomery had always liked it when Minty came into the shop. The little green mule often tried to trade her little bead bracelets and necklaces for buckles and buckets of nails, then Bloomery would explain that she wasn't able to accept anything other than actual money for the goods she produced, only for Minty to try again the next time she came in. Actually, come to think of it, Bloomery had no idea why she looked forward to Minty's visits. They were almost always stressful, especially if Minty was having a clumsy day and knocked things over-- which she did, often-- and insisted on helping to pick them up; which invariably resulted in more dropping. In spite of this, there was a certain, unquantifiable charm to Minty that the pegasus-blacksmith (or "Pegasmith" as she had sometimes been jokingly called by the enigmatic little molly) found difficult to resist; even if Minty was a pain-in-the-neck.
“Actually…” Pinky looked down in slight embarrassment, and Minty nuzzled her reassuringly, “yeah.”
Bloomery looked back and forth between the couple, needing a moment for disbelief to subside. “...Really?”
Minty got up on two legs to hug Pinky around the neck. “Yup! We’re going on an adventure!”
“Well,” the blacksmith began, “you’d better tell me about it while I get you two ready to go!”
“Goodness, the Queen of Chaos, huh?” Bloomery said with a wince, and she used a file to smooth down the jagged points of the nails coming up through a blindfolded Pinky Pie’s hoof. “That sounds pretty serious. I certainly don’t envy Skywishes, no matter how boring it gets around here.”
“Ya got that right, for sure, hehe!” Minty chuckled. She seemed so often to find humor where nopony else could; just one of her multitudinous quirks.
“Um,” Pinky began, apprehensively, “I know i’ve asked this about a kajillion times by now, but… are you done yet?”
Her answer came in the form of a brown hoof pulling the blindfold off her head, and holding up her pink foreleg in front of her face. Pinky was astonished to find that she didn't feel any different; no pain from the nails driven through her, and not nearly as gruesome an appearance as she might have expected from what she perceived as a barbaric practice. Actually, the polishing Bloomery had done resulted in Pinky thinking she looked better as a result of this horrid procedure. “Oh my gosh…”
“See, silly?” Minty taunted, “I told you it wasn’t gonna hurt!” She then turned to Bloomery, with a devious little smile. “Aren’t we so lucky to have such a big, strong, talented Pegasmith in town?”
Bloomery blushed furiously, and turned away for a second to collect herself. Pinky rolled her eyes and scoffed in mock offense at Minty. “W-well,” Bloomery started to speak, rubbing the back of her head with a hoof, and trying much too hard to act casually, “Um… I need to practice a bit more, really… uh, i-if I’m going to possibly be shoeing the next Queen of Chaos…?”
Bloomery clearly meant this as a joke, even if it was very forced, but it got a look of confusion from the other two mares. “Oh, I’m sorry, I-I was just trying to be silly--”
“No, Bloom you’re fine, it’s just… what did you say?” Pinky asked, brow furrowed in concern, as she stepped slightly closer to the smith, as did Minty.
“Well, I was just thinking, since Skywishes and I grew up together, maybe she’d still come by after she, ya know… takes the current Queen’s place…?”
Minty and Pinky Pie were in a bit of a stupor as they left Bloomery’s. The news that Skywishes, Skywishes, of all ponies, would be taking the place of a deity. Skywishes-- whose time was spent flying kites, and charting constellations, and fainting at the very sight of a stained dress-- would become immortal and gain limitless power.
"Myths are different from culture to culture," Pinky said, trying to reassure Minty, whose ears drooped down and eyes locked on the grass beneath them, "maybe Bloomery got it wrong, and other folks have a different story, one more like the one you told us?"
“I dunno, maybe…” She cheered up a small bit at that, and briefly brushed her flank against Pinky’s as they kept walking. “Not gonna lie, I kinda expected to be much more excited to go on an adventure than I actually am.”
“Me too, sweetie. Me too…” Pinky said, as she looked over her shoulder to see that they couldn't see Ponyville through the trees anymore, and that the two were well into the forest their town sat in the center of. “Try to think about how exciting it’s gonna be when we get out of the Everfree, though!”
“Yeah!” Minty said, genuinely chipper, ears re-erect, “I haven’t been out of town since I first left the donkeys’ wagon train. But, even then, dad never let me mingle with the townsfolk for too long, hehe.” She laughed to herself with only a shred of mirth. “Did Lamplight have a map for you? I certainly don’t know how to get to the next town from here, other than following this ol’ trail here.” She stamped a front hoof against the gravel, kicking up a little bit of dust, and smiling just a bit brighter. Goodness, Pinky loved that sweet little smile… Seeing that girl smile always made her feel like she could slay a whole flock of dragons with a spoon, especially if the dragons-- fictional though they may be-- were being mean to her Minty.
“No. I don’t think Lamplight would shove me into the river if I were on fire.” Pinky replied, receiving another chuckle from Minty. “But I’m sure we’ll stumble into something if we keep on the same path. We’ve got a whole year to figure this out, and folks in other places are sure to know more than we do”
“Yes, ma’am!” Minty gave a silly little salute, and trotted just a bit faster, the contents of her wagon rustling around under the quilt that covered them. “Ponyville is pretty secluded. Honestly, I don’t think I would’ve moved in there if I hadn’t met you…” She nuzzled up under Pinky’s chin, and gave her a little smooch, which Pinky reciprocated and giggled a small bit. Nothing had ever made Minty happier than hearing Pinky Pie laugh, even such a subdued one.
The couple, now in much better spirits, kept their pace steady for a while. Well, Minty did, anyway. Pinky occasionally had to pick up her pace to stay close to her companion. Eventually the same-ey looking foliage started to become darker, more blueish in hue, and mushrooms of all sorts became more prevalent. As did lightning bugs, which both mares noted as odd, given that it wasn’t even past 4pm, if the sun’s position in the sky were any indication. It had never not been, right?
“Um, Minty,” Pinky asked, with some trepidation, “do you remember ever seeing something like this when you were still with the donkeys?”
“Uhhh,” Minty began, and slowed her pace a bit to stay at foreleg’s-length near her marefriend, “Iunno…”
A shadowy figure streaked past in front of them, from a tree on the right, down into the foliage on the left. Minty ducked under Pinky Pie’s body, shaken, and Pinky reared up, horn aglow with magic-- not that she knew any combat magic, but whatever it was didn’t know that. “Stay back!” Pinky yelped. Feeling Minty shuddering underneath her, she moved her legs a bit closer together to gently hug the sides of Minty’s barrel. The shape went back up from the brush, and over the two ponies’ heads, before seeming to circle back around, a bit slower this time. Were those… butterfly wings?
“Hold on, Pinks. I think it’s just a bug…” Minty whimpered as she backed out from under Pinky, slowly. “S-sorry for freaking out…” Despite Minty’s reassurance, Pinky still wore a snarl on her face. Anything that spooked her marefriend that thoroughly had to apologize, at least.
“Minty, it’s okay, but I don’t know if you should be--” She cut herself off, seeing the streak again, but this time: Minty had grabbed a bug net from her wagon, and swung it right into the creature’s path, catching what now was evidently a little yellow shape, squeaking out something, as though berating her. Minty deftly moved the critter from the net into a jar, and held it up proudly. Pinky let her jaw hang open for a moment. She had never known Minty was so… capable.
“Just a bug, see?” Minty said, giggling, as the little shape inside banged on the glass as though it were a prisoner-- a pony prisoner.
“Good catch, Mints!” Pinky leaned down to take a better look at the jar in Minty’s hoof. She noticed that the creature inside seemed to have four legs, not six, and was a good bit stockier than any moth or butterfly she’d seen before. Her eyebrows raised in puzzlement as she realized that the creature was very pony-shaped, and even seemed to have a mane, tail, and cutie-mark. “Minty, was is it?”
“Hehe, I have no idea!” Minty chortled warmly, and shook the jar a bit, which resulted in a hoofful of muffled squeaks, which led to Minty and Pinky both looking upon the jar in astonishment. “Uh, sorry?”
“Should we…” Pinky began, but Minty had already untwisted the lid, and cracked it open just a smidge. The critter inside immediately rushed to the top and started shaking a tiny hoof out of the opening, as if cursing them, accompanied by another bout of squeaking. Squeaking which, it became apparent, was another language. Another language, which then became clear was actually just Ponish in a very heavy accent.
“And I’ll grab out yer intestines, an’ skip rope with ‘em, ya bloody ugly giants!” The creature shouted out, in an accent somewhat like one from rural Unicornia, but with more emphasis on consonants. Minty and Pinky both turned to look at one another, as if to check and see if they were both seeing the same thing, before returning their gaze to the little yellow pony-thing. It took a deep breath before continuing to shout at them, squeezing its tiny body a bit further through the opening. “Don’tcha hear me, lasses? I’m tellin’ ya I’m goin’ tae rough up yer oversized behinds good an’ proper! Are ye really that stu--”
Pinkie cut it-- them-- off. “I’m sorry, but, what are you?”
“What ahm I? What ahm I!?” they belted out incredulously. “I’m a bloody breezy, ya bleedin’ idiots!”
“Huh? But I thought breezies were a myth?” Pinky turned to Minty as if for confirmation.
“Eh, hello?” The creature asked, now more perplexed than offended.
“Well, I thought that too, but we thought Fadeaway was a myth too, just yesterday,” replied Minty.
“Excuse meh??” The breezy’s anger began to mount again.
“No, Minty, you thought that. I didn’t know it existed.”
“YE TERRIBLE GIANTS!! I’M RIGHT-BLOODY-HERE!” they erupted. The two mares turned back towards the breezy, and looked somewhat apologetic.
“Right, sorry!” Minty said, nervously, and took the lid off, and the breezy crawled up onto her hoof, huffing and puffing like some great beast, which they certainly were not. Minty patted the creature on the head-- carefully, between its antennae-- as if soothing a riled-up dog (not that any dogs Minty had seen possessed antennae, but she felt she ought to keep an open mind). “I’m awfully sorry for putting you in a jar. You gave us a bit of a spook, ya know.”
“Well, it’s not my fault that ye’ve ne’er seen a breezy ‘till now.” They stood up on two legs, pushed Minty’s hoof away, and crossed their front hooves defensively. “Mah name’s Zipzee, by the way,” they said with a huff, and sarcastically growled “thanks fer askin’.”
“Hi, Zipzee. It’s nice to meet you,” Pinky added, with a forced smile. “I’m awfully sorry, too. But, uh--”
“Well, I cannae accept yer apology!” Zipzee squeaked out, stamping a hoof down, “do ye know what it’d do to me reputation? ’Oh, that’s Zipzee! She lets freaky giants catch ‘er in an oversized net because she’s a DOLT!!’”
“Yes, I understand that you’re upset,” Pinky says, very cautiously, “but do you happen to have any idea where we are? You see, we’re a bit lost. We’ve never seen these parts of the woods before.”
“AW, GREAT! I got stuck with the stupid giants that dunnae even know where they are! Ya bleedin’ idiots, I’m lost too!”
“Oh, goodness, I’m sorry, Zipzee!” Minty chirps, earnestly. “Well, do you wanna maybe stick together, just until we getcha back to where you’re trying to go?”
Zipzee grumbles to herself a moment, before fluttering her little wings and muttering “Fine…”
Somewhere, far-and-away from Ponyville, two very odd young mares sat in the library of a large, and very old, stone spire, studying. The first of whom rifled through volume after volume, as ravenous as an emaciated wolf. She was a unicorn, dark lavender of coat, and white of mane and tail, with bold golden and red streaks through her hair, and a similarly colored starburst on each flank, and seemed truly mortified by the lack of information on what she pursued. The other of the two, a buttercream yellow pegasus with a pastel pink mane and tail, and with violet and magenta streaks contrasting with her partner's, similarly colored as her cutie mark: a swallowtail butterfly with a bumblebee on either side-- that, and she was strikingly, almost painfully beautiful, and not made any less so by the growing sorrow and worry on her face.
"Um, Twinkle...?" The pegasus spoke up first, nervously shifting her forelegs in front of her. Her voice was light and soft, but with a slight strain that made it clear she was forcing it to be that way.
The unicorn stopped and immediately disappeared in a flash of yellow light, and reappeared just as quickly at her friends side, her horn slightly aglow with residual magic. "What's wrong, Flitter Flutter?" She began in a panic, "Is it too quiet in here? Do you need water-- or some tea? I can make tea--" Twinkle cut herself off, and her face twisted into an expression of terror. "Are you shifting again already?"
The already pale Flitter Flutter paled further at this, and struggled not to cry at the suggestion. "N-no!! I promise I'll tell you if I am, Twilight."
Twilight Twinkle regained some composure, if she could ever be said to possess such a thing, and wrapped her forelegs around her friend in a hug. Flutter flinched at first, but returned it right away. Twilight spoke, "I just worry, is all... Sorry for kinda freaking out on you."
"It's alright, I know it's only because you care..."
Nopony had ever made Flitter Flutter feel as safe and comfortable as Twilight Twinkle, and she wasn't sure if it was in spite or because of her neuroses. She could relate to Twinkle on a level she hadn't been able to with any other creature, even the insects with whom she could communicate.
“I promise, we’ll figure this out. You’re gonna be okay. I swear.” Twilight looked into her eyes, and Flitter Flutter wished she wouldn’t have thought about kissing her, wished she could just stop acting so predatory-- at least, that’s how she saw it. She felt her heart lurch as she caught sight of the bandage wrapped around Twilight Twinkle's barrel. If she couldn't stop herself from becoming that monster again, then she didn't think she could live with herself. She'd rather die than hurt this pony again. This pony who took care of her even though she was just a freak who talked to bugs like they were other ponies, and who couldn't stop herself from becoming that horrid, stallionish thing again, she might just have to-- Flitter Flutter began to sob.
“I think we may be walking in circles, Mints.” Pinky Pie levitated the map the breezies had drawn for them in front of her, trying to compare any significant landmarks on it to what they were seeing in front of them. “I feel like we’ve been at this for ages, and I’m really quite sure we’ve passed by that tree at least three times now.”
“Pinky, I’m tired.” Minty said, for what felt to the three like it must have been the hundredth time.
“Will ye quit sayin’ that?” Zipzee butted-in, “remindin’ yerself if it cannae make it any better!”
“Maybe we should break camp for the night?” Pinky said, pointing a hoof towards the sky, pink and orange with summertime sunset. “Give Sky and Star a call?”
“WHAT? But if we get back to Breezy Blossom, ye can jus’ sleep there!” Zipzee squeaked out.
“But, Zipzee, we’ve been walking-- or, in your case, flying-- for hours,” Minty whined, donkeyish ears drooped down, “We should stop, and at least use the crystal ball.”
Minty took off her yoke, and performed an incredibly prolonged stretch, with accompanying groans, to which Zipzee responded by theatrically rolling her eyes. All the while, Pinky Pie was shifting around the contents of the wagon briefly, and pulled out the ball with her telekinesis. Minty grabbed its special stand from the wagon, and set it down in a flat spot on the grass, while Pinky lowered the ball into it.
The ball shone with white light briefly, before showing them a view of Skywishes’ hospital room. The pink pony in the bed’s baggy eyes lit up, and a smile overtook her face.
“Minty, Pinky! Hi! How are you?” She asked, with evident mirth.
“Pretty alright, but we think we’re lost. How are you?” Pinky replied.
“Where’s Starcatcher?” Minty added.
“I’m doing alright! Oh, and Star is--”
“What’s this bloody thing?” Zipzee came into frame and spat.
“Zipzee, that’s Skywishes! Be nice.” Minty admonished.
Skywishes gasps, “woah, a talking moth?”
“That’s Zipzee, she’s a breezy!” Pinky stated with mirth.
“Breezies are real? Wow, so maybe we-- er, uh, you-- really can find the Queen!” Skywishes chirps.
“Well, here’s the funny thing…” Minty then explained to Skywishes what Bloomery told her earlier in the day.
“Oh my stars,” Skywishes replied, with a somewhat blank, unfocused look. “I-I, uhh…”
All of them were very evidently uncomfortable. Even Zipzee, who had no direct connection to any of these ponies, couldn’t help but empathize with Skywishes. It would be very difficult to accept ascension to godhood when you had so many mortal friends and loved ones, especially being married, as Skywishes was.
“Well, try to bear in mind that myths are different all over the place!” Minty reassured her, “the version I knew growing up just said you’d have to ‘defeat’ her, or whatever, and who knows which of these is even right?”
Skywishes nodded slightly, but still looked pretty lost-in-thought over the news. “I… think I’m gonna head to bed, it’s pretty late. Thanks so much for giving me a call.” She offered a small smile, barely concealing her concern.
“Of course! We love you, Sky. Rest well” Pinky says, as she stops channeling into the ball.
Minty and Pinky share a sigh, and a hug.
“I wish we could’ve done more…” Minty whimpered.
“It’s okay, honey, it’s okay…” Pinky cooed at her, and stroked her mane soothingly.
“Bleck! Can ye two contain yourselves? Yer gon’ta make me vomit.” Zipzee spurted out.
Minty gave her puppy-dog eyes, and Pinky gave her a glare, but all three of them were immediately distracted by some rustling in the nearby bushes. Minty clung to Pinky for protection, and popped her back by accident due to her earth pony strength. Zipzee zoomed behind the other two, unsure of what might pop out of those bushes. Nopony had time to do anything but chirp weakly before, quite anticlimactically, two more breezies flew out of the brush, one had a magenta coat with a purple mane (quite a bit like Skywishes, as a matter of fact), and the other had a light pink coat with a hot pink mane.
“Zipzee!?” The lighter pink one piped.
“We’ve been looking for you all day!” The other added. Both of these breezies noticeably lacked the accent that Zipzee had.
Zipzee flew up from behind the two much larger ponies, and peeped excitedly, hugging the other two breezies. “Tiddlywinks, Tralala! Oh, thank you so much for coming for me!” She said, excitedly, but now also without her accent, and displaying an unexpected level of affection; at least when compared to how she treated Pinky and Minty. Breezies sure were odd creatures…
“You know each other?” Minty asked sheepishly, but with evident relief, as she peeked out from the cover of Pinky Pie’s mane.
“Of course we do, they’re my girlfriends!” Zipzee stated proudly, did a loop-de-loop in the air, and giggled.
“Did you make new friends, Zip?” Tralala, the paler of the two, asked, as she nuzzled Zipzee affectionately.
“I did, I did! Oh, let’s take them back to Breezy Blossom!”
Minty and Pinky stared on, in a combination of relief and awe, as the three breezies mingled and hugged and did everything that Zipzee had complained about them doing for the past… however many hours it had been. They were both too dumbfounded to do more than listen, as they were led by their tiny guides through a suddenly very evident clearing, full of hoof-sized flowers, and head-sized mushrooms, many of which emitted a soft glow. In spite of the late hour, there were still many breezies zipping through the air, which Minty flinched at the first few times. They really were just like tiny pegasi with butterfly wings, and, stars above, were nothing like what anypony could expect.
“I’m, like, sooooo glad you two showed up,” Zipzee chortled in a voice that sounded to Minty and Pinky Pie like it was not her own, “I was getting sooooooooooooo tired of doing that accent, hehe!”
“Why, again, were you doing that voice?” Pinky asked, ignoring the fact that she had not actually asked before then.
“The three of us are guards!” Tiddlywinks cheeped, enthusiastically.
“Yeah! She does that voice to try and scare off ponies who might wanna hurt us, but you two went long enough without squishing her that we could tell you’re safe to let in.” Tralala added, with a chiding giggle directed to Zipzee.
“Heyyyy!” Zipzee chirped with equal enthusiasm, and mock-offense, “I wouldn’t get squished! I’m the fastest flier of us all, and you know it!” The other two breezies cooed, and Tralala even swooned, as Zipzee put her hooves on her hips and puffed out her chest.
Minty giggled alongside them, and Pinky asked “But why the accent? It was kinda familiar.”
“There used to be a magician who lived with us who talked like that, I forget her name, though.” Tiddlywinks stated flatly, with a shrug. “She was pretty intimidating, though.”
“Oh!” Tralala cut in, yet again, “But she had lime green fur, and a forest green mane with pink highlights!”
Pinkie gave a flat “mhmm” to indicate she was listening. They kept on, now with uncharacteristic quiet from the troupe, until Pinky noticed Minty froze up behind them, and ran back to check on her.
“Minty, sweetheart, are you okay?”
“I, um…” The little mule gulped nervously, and stuttered out something under her breath.
“What was that, baby? I didn’t hear you.”
“I don’t think I’m ready…” Minty’s ears drooped in her usual, wilting display of displeasure, and her eyes were watery with tears. Pinky lunged at her and wrapped her forelegs around her small partner’s neck, in attempt to comfort her.
“Hey, Minty, it’s okay, dear! It’s okay, you don’t have to talk about it.”
“O-o…” Minty gasps, trying not to sob, “Okay… Thank you, P-Pinky…” She nuzzled her snout up under Pinky’s chin and shuddered for a short bit while the breezies circled back around, only just having noticed the rest of their party lagging behind. Minty quickly regains her composure, and taps Pinky with a hoof to indicate she’s okay. “Thank you… I love you.”
“I love you too, so much.” Pinky responds, and hugs Minty again. The breezy trio give them a very exaggerated “AWWWWWWWWWW” before embracing one another as well.
The five did eventually make it into Breezy Blossom proper, demarcated form the surrounding environment by the addition of small wooden doors on the large mushrooms, and little windows, even, with warm yellow light shining through, arranged in much the same way a full-sized pony neighborhood might be. This was complete with a little commons area in the center of it all, featuring a fountain with glowing little berries dangling from the woven vines that made of its structure. It didn’t seem to be depicting anything in particular, but rather to blend in with the environment around it. In spite of its miniature size, Minty and Pinky Pie couldn’t help but feel welcome, especially with so many breezies rushing up the greet them!
The breezies were incredibly hospitable, preparing a great bed of straw and soft flower petals for the two marefriends to sleep on, unbeknownst to them. As tired as they were, they still felt invigorated by the breezies and their kindness, and stayed up more than a bit longer than they meant to, mingling. Minty chatted them up, and taught them how to make flower crowns, astounded how ponies living amongst so many beautiful wildflowers didn’t know; while Pinky plucked away on her lute, mostly just jamming. She did share a few instrumentals with her pixie-like hosts. It was this very sort of experience that made Minty so fond of the idea of an adventure in the first place-- since before Skywishes caught ill, anyways.
As the last of the breezies fluttered into their adorable little homes, turning out the lights and winding down, the two full-sized ponies (if Minty could properly be called “full-sized”) snuggled up and fell asleep under the stars. Pinky found it difficult to stay asleep, though. She kept waking up with thoughts about how shaken Minty had been earlier at the mention of that magician. Minty was always bubbly and happy. Pinky wasn’t so naive as to think anypony could be that way all the time, and she had seen Minty upset before, plenty of times! This was different, though. She never had that look of dread and fear in her eyes before, not to that extent.
Pinkie looked down at the mule’s big, round snout that was pressed up against her chest, and worried quite a bit for her best friend. “She’ll tell me when she’s ready. If she doesn’t want to, that’s okay. We’re allowed privacy,” Pinky reminded herself in a whisper, but wasn’t sure how much of it she really believed. At any rate, they had lots more walking to do tomorrow. She should try to sleep.
Warm beams of yellow-white sun came in through the windows of the cramped hospital room, in which Skywishes lay asleep on the bed, and Starcatcher curled up on the floor like a cat. This was the image that greeted Lamplight as she opened the door with a loud creak, which roused Starcatcher from her slumber on the hardwood floor.
“Uh, g-goodness, mate, awful sorry ‘bout that!” the pegasus whimpered, as she rapidly got up on her hooves, and nervously rubbed the back of her neck with a wing. “I shoulda asked if it was alright for me to stay here, sorry--”
“You’re right, you should have asked...” Lamplight replied sternly, floating a clipboard over to her in her magic, and she gave a wry smirk that confused Starcatcher. “That way I could have given you some pillows and blankets.”
Starcatcher sat befuddled for a few moments before the relief washed over her, and she chuckled to herself. “Gosh, doc, ya really threw me for a loop there.”
The conversation seemed to have stirred Skywishes awake as well, and she indicated this with a very groggy “good morning,” and a prolonged yawn, which the other two mares in the room reciprocated.
“How ya feelin’ love?” Starcatcher took skywishes forehooves in hers as she asked.
“Peachy keen, dear!” She replied, and leaned forward to give Star a little peck on the cheek and receiving a giggle in response.
Suddenly, a light pink unicorn stallion opened the door, “You called.”
“No, Peachy Keen.” Lamplight replied, and facehooved theatrically.
“Turn of phrase again?” He asked, clearly having been through this before.
“Yes, Peachy Keen.”
He nodded, and closed the door. Skywishes looked at the door, then to Starcatcher, and giggled a bit. “I forgot about him! He took my blood pressure yesterday.”
“Yes, a great nurse, unfortunately named.” Lamplight said with a nod, and turned back to Skywishes. “I’m very glad to hear you’re feeling well. You’re certainly more energetic this morning than you were yesterday, and I believe that’s a good sign.” She gave a rare smile.
“Yeah, very much so!” the bedridden pony replied, “I’d like to maybe take a short walk in Wysteria’s garden later. Spending two days straight in bed hasn’t been very much fun, and I’d really like some fresh air.”
Lamplight stared Skywishes and her wife down, with an unreadable expression, for a few seconds, before deciding “thirty minutes after breakfast, no less. Don’t overdo it.”
“Oh, thank you, doctor!” Skywishes squeed, and then looked a bit bashful about the silly little noise. Starcatcher thought that may have been the most adorable thing anypony had ever done, and gave her a hug immediately, giggling.
“I’ll have Whistle Wishes fetch you something to eat. She’ll be in a few minutes from now. Sorry to be so short, but I have paperwork to do.
“‘Course, doc!” Starcatcher said, and then looked somber for a moment. “And... thanks. For everything.”
Lamplight simply nodded in understanding, and closed the door behind her.
The unicorn doctor sat in her study, lit by a candle which looked much like her cutie mark, writing with a quill on a patient’s medical records. ‘Poor little Rarity” she thought to herself, reading over what she had written on the filly previously, in case amendments were needed. She sighed while reading down the list of so many broken bones, wishing Rarity would stop being so reckless with those roller skates. This most recent time, she had somehow fallen into the town square’s fountain, bounced out, and skated backwards by mistake into the woods, falling directly in a patch of poison joke. The little filly could barely be consoled, despite having no real injuries from the mishap. The issue was that her beautiful red, orange, and yellow mane, and green, blue, and violet tail-- of which she was oh-so very proud-- had been muddy, earthy greens and browns.
Underneath her hard exterior and commanding presence, Lamplight truly was a very kind and compassionate pony, she just felt the need to be emotionally detached from her patients, that’s all. It was simply the professional thing to do. She was most certainly not afraid of letting others in, by any means. It didn’t have anything to do with her husband, who disappeared without a trace one day, leaving her to take care of a colt all by herself. It had absolutely nothing to do with her son, either, who had run away from home after stealing a bunch of her notes. “And whatever other lies I have to tell myself,” she mused under her breath, and laughed without mirth. If that good-for-nothing stallion she’d actually gotten married to showed up at her door right now, she’d kill him herself, but Dusk, her own son…
A magical prodigy himself, as Lamplight had been, but Dusk surpassed even her. He was more powerful, able to handle more magic, and more importantly he was much more clever than his mother when it came to spellcraft. She supposed it shouldn’t have shocked her that he would leave her-- and Ponyville-- behind. She presumed he must have thought she was holding him back. That, and the only male role model in his life had done the same when he was very young, and this was a backwater town anyways. Most of the ponies here don’t even know that outside the Everfree weather doesn’t happen on its own, ponies have to make it.
But, stars above did she miss him…
A crystal ball in the room, the first one she had ever used, that she kept for exclusive personal use, glowed briefly, and a familiar-but-not rang out from it. Lamplight knew immediately who it was. “Speak of the devil…” she croaked to herself, as she scrambled out of her chair and in front of the ball. She recognized the face immediately, changed though it was.
“Dusky!? Is that really you? I haven’t heard from you in--”
“I’m fine, mom. Sorry, no time to chat. Do you still have that book on curses and transmogrifications?”
“Well, yes, but--”
“Could you please fetch it for me? Just hold it in front of the ball?”
Lamplight does so, promptly but not frantically. “Sure, here, but what’s going on? Where have you--”
The book teleports out of Lamplight’s telekinesis with a small shower of yellow sparkles, and appears in front of Dusky. “Thanks mom, love you, gotta go, bye!”
The ball goes clear again, the magical image inside dissipating as her child closed the connection. Lamplight felt herself dizzy with shock. First, why was her son’s mane grown out so long? Was he wearing eye makeup? She never figured him the type. Secondly, a teleportation spell? She had thought that was only theoretical-- which she maintained, no matter what that hack Clover the “Clever” had claimed in her journals-- but her own foal got it figured out. She was so proud of him, though she had no clue how he’d done it. Lamplight had gone to the best schools in Unicornia and not only participated in, but sometimes led study seances on the topic, and nothing ever came of it. What was he in such a rush to find in that book that he couldn’t explain to his own mother how he made, what could very reasonably be called, the greatest advancement in spellcraft since invisibility.
Perhaps it wasn’t as technically impressive as necromancy, or anatomical alterations, both of which Lamplight had pioneered in: The latter of which she perfected, and the former she swore never to touch again in the hopes that her late (twice now) grandfather might forgive her for that little foible that was her student thesis. Stars above, was she proud! Possibly even more than she was curious as to what Dusk was doing with that book, but not nearly as hurt as she was that he left her again so soon, without even a word of what was going on. This pain, still, was almost outweighed by worry for Dusk, and what sort of mess he had gotten himself into to require that particular tome. She had to go see him-- to save him from whatever this was! She had to--
No.
Dusk abandoned her without a word, then came back into her life for a split-second just to take more from her. She knew he was capable when he ran away five years ago, but he was obviously more so now if he could teleport things so casually. Dusk would be fine. She didn’t need him-- No! He didn’t need her help, but Lamplight had patients to take care of.
After finishing their breakfast of oat porridge, which the breezies sweetened with their honey, andPinky heated with her magic, her and Minty Mule sat up, and departed. Zipzee accompanied them through the woods, towards the nearest town, Trottingham. When the large flora and day-long glowing lightning bugs had dissipated, Zipzee said farewell to her new friends, and formally forgave them for putting her in a jar.
“You’ve gotta admit,” Minty bleated out giddily, “it was pretty funny.”
“Okay, maybe a little!” Zipzee replied, chuckling, and booped Minty’s nose with a tiny hoof. “Well, girls, just keep on this path, and you’ll be in Trottingham before noon!”
“Thank you so very much, Zipzee!” Pinky said. “Be safe going home!” She began to say before Zipzee promptly turned around and zoomed back towards Breezy Blossom, faster than she had ever seen a living creature move. “Huh…”
“Wow, I guess she really is the fastest flier!” Minty chortled, and began walking, the contents of her wagon thumping and clinking together. This was the only sound, aside from birds and cicadas, that the two heard for quite some time. Silence had always made Minty uncomfortable, and so she decided to talk about anything at all.
"Isn't there some sorta legend about Trottingham? Some kinda robin fighting a sheriff?"
"I think so, yeah. I wonder how a bird beat up a pony, though."
"Maybe the sheriff was a bird too?"
"I think the breezies would have told us if the villagers were birds instead of ponies."
"The fact that we got directions from BREEZIES is enough on its own for me to think a bird town isn't that far-fetched."
"Fair enough" they giggle as they trot along, silence beginning to set in again. Pinkie didn’t often enjoy silence, but right now she was enjoying the sounds of the world around her. She felt so real in a way she didn’t really feel back in Ponyville. She thought about this, until interrupting herself:
"Oh, Moondancer in the sky, we forgot to call home and tell Sky and Star what we're doing next."
"Could we try talking to them while we walk?"
"I can't really operate the ball AND levitate it at the same time, and this path is too bumpy to just put it on the wagon."
"We'll just call when we get to Trottingham, then! It'll be okay"
“You’re right, I’m overthinking it.”
“Do you ever, I dunno…” Pinky asks, just thinking out loud.
“I do ever! Just about all the time.”
“Pfft!’ Pinky laughs, and snorts as she laughs, leading both of them to laugh more. “I mean, do you ever just like listening to the birds? And, like, the sounds of nature, generally?”
“Pinky, if you’d like me to be quiet, you can always just ask.”
“Oh, honey, I know that! And thank you. But, no, I don’t need quiet right now, I just want you to try enjoying some quiet yourself. You may even like it.”
Minty grumbles to herself a small bit. “Well, I don’t wanna, but I’ll humor you, because I love you.” She playfully sticks out her tongue at Pinky, who giggles softly, finding it hilarious and adorable how little resistance her marefriend put up. Minty tried to focus on emptying her mind, and just listening to the bugs and birdies chirp, and the sound of her hooves on the dirt road through the now-thinning forest, and the jostling of the provisions in her wagon, but just found herself thinking about what she didn’t want to tell Pinky Pie yet.
The two keep walking, and just as Minty was able to stop feeling so anxious, and to find comfort in the silence, they saw the tower in the distance. Neither of them could quite stop looking at it as they approached the Town, and the much shorter houses became visible over the hill. Everything was at a complete standstill in the town. It looked like there were ponies in town, out-and-about, but they were just sitting still. The dark stone spire in the middle of the village stuck out of the earth much like a tree, but unlike a tree it seemed to be piercing into the ground, rather than sprouting out of it.
Pinky gulped audibly. “That’s… foreboding.”
“Yeah, gosh.”
The two walked, very cautiously, into the town. They spotted a blue earth pony stallion with a silver mane, seeming to stare at them cheerfully.
“Hello, there!” Minty chirped, relieved, but she became even more on-edge than before after the stallion just kept staring at them. Smiling.
“Um… hi?” Pinky offered, to no avail. Her and Minty proceeded down the road, past the stallion, who just kept staring straight ahead, smiling.
“I sure hope he’s okay.” Minty remarks, and is disturbed to see that there are pegasi, just, stuck in the air. It was as though they were suspended by cables reaching up into the sky, but it was the middle of the day and no cables could be seen. “Me too…” Pinky states, solemnly. She approaches a brown-coated unicorn mare, and taps her on the shoulder. “Hey, madam, Is everything alright?” The mare sat perfectly still, unflinching, while a breeze blew by. Pinky used a front hoof to brush her mane out of her face, and noticed that the mare’s mane wasn’t moved at all. Her eyes widen, just as Minty knocks on a young filly’s head, to no response.
“Um, Pinky?”
“Yeah, Minty?”
“Remember that thing I wasn’t ready to talk about?”
“Yeah?”
“Well, I’m not ready, but I think you should know anyways.”
The two stop walking, and Minty drew in a deep breath as Pinky sat politely to listen.
“I think my mom did this, and I think we’ll have to stop her.”
“Your mom? I thought your mom was still with the wagon train?”
“That’s my step mom, she’s great! But, no, this mom is a real piece o’ work, I can tell ya that much.” She chuffed, and scraped at the ground with a front hoof as if preparing to charge. Her pink eyes flared with newfound determination. “I dunno what dad saw in her, but she left shortly after I came out as… well, ya know.”
“Oh, Minty…” She hugs her. “I’m so very sorry that we might have to see her… But, how could she do this??”
“She’s a unicorn, a-and…” She tries not to cry, “and she doesn’t think anything is off-limits when it comes to her magic.”
Pinky hugs her friend tighter, having realized this implication. “I won’t let her hurt you again, I swear… Whatever it takes.”
“Thank you, Pinky… I love you so very much…” She sniffles, and then smiles genuinely.
“I love you too.” Pinky replied. “Now let’s go save Trottingham!”
They approached the tower, presuming that they’ll figure out what’s going on in there. as a flash of yellow light causes the tower to tremor and a stone to fall off the top onto a mail-carrying pegasus who was frozen in mid-air. The rock shatters against her, revealing that the frozen ponies are invincible.
“I don’t like this one bit.”
“Neither do I, but at least we know they’ll be okay.”
“Pinky Pie, they’re frozen! We have to save them! They probably got stuck this way by her way up there!”
“I know, I’m just trying to stay positive. You taught me that.”
Minty nodded somberly. “S-sorry…”
“Hey,” Pinky looks her in the eyes as they start to climb the stairs in the spire, “It’s alright, babe. ‘Our own advice is often the hardest to take.’ That’s what my mom says, anyways.”
“Cheerilee sure has a way with words! Guess ya kinda need that to be a school-teacher.” They both smile before opening a door, which falls off its hinges and tumbles down the stairs, landing at the bottom with a thunk. They stared at the door at the bottom of the stairs, at least 20 feet down. Minty shrugs, and the two enter the room it led to. It was surprisingly well lit, much unlike the rest of the tower, which facilitated the two’s notice of a few disturbing things about the present environment.
Firstly, blood. Lots of blood, splattered on the floor, on overturned tables, soaking books. Secondly, an enormous pile of pastel yellow feathers at the base of a chair in the center of the room. Underneath these feathers was a length of thick rope, that seemed to have been burst out of by some horrible beast. Minty and Pinky both strode much closer to one another, as they investigated the particulars of the room.
“Okay, so…” Pinky began, “whatever’s up there did this.”
“I, uh, don’t think this is my mom anymore…” Minty remarked shakily. “So that’s good, at least?”
Pinky made a face, and lifted-- in her magic-- a large, very old book that was on the floor, near the feathers. Miraculously, it was not spattered with blood as many of the other times had been, but it was familiar.
Pinky inspected it for a moment before gasping. “Minty! This is from Lamplight’s study!”
“What the-- really!?” Minty gallops across the room to look at it, and reads aloud “A Complete History of Known Transformative Curses, Hexes, and Charms, by Lamplight, the last Medicine Mare; co-authored by Clover the Clever…” Her eyes widened. “Lamplight worked with my MOM?”
There was a shriek from above, and Pinky dropped the book to the ground. The two mares didn’t need to say anything, both of them zoomed up the stairs to the very top, where they intuited the issue was occurring, only to see a huge, bloodied bat-pony-thing, looming over a unicorn mare around their same age. She was covered in bite marks, and her dark violet fur and predominantly white mane were stained with blood that it became apparent was hers. The creature above her bent down, with its jaws opening, huge fangs gleaming in the midday sun, as Pinky charged towards it with her horn out in front.
“Get away from her!” Pinky shouted, which caused the monster to turn its head to face her, huge yellow eyes seeming to bore a hole right through her. She didn’t know this mare, but she didn’t think there was any way she’d deserve to be eaten.
“Pinky, wait!” Minty chased after her, terrified for her love’s safety.
“Wait, don’t!” A desperate, harried voice came out of the other unicorn’s mouth, as her horn flashed with an almost blinding golden light, and froze both Minty and Pinky Pie in place.
“Um, I-It’s happening…” Flitter Flutter starts to sob uncontrollably, feeling the searing pain all over her body, but concentrated at her wings. This did not overwhelm her as much as guilt, and hate. She hated herself so very, very much for how she thought about Twilight Twinkle, and felt so guilty that she couldn’t stop herself from hurting her the other night, and that she was starting off this morning by doing it again.
“Flitter Flutter! What’s wro--” Twinkle stopped herself right away, eyes widened with realization, seeing her poor friend starting to writhe on the floor, her gorgeous eyes turned from teal to yellow in a flash, and steam rose up out of her skin while she shrieked out apologies, mixed in with desperate pleas for help. Twilight Twinkle could not stand how much pain this poor mare was in, and hated herself for the way she thought about Flutter in private. She tried-- and failed-- not to tear up while she used her magic to move Flitter Flutter into a chair, sat her upright, and tied her firmly in place with a thick rope she kept for this purpose. The pegasus had never been able to burst out of it before, and she saw no reason it couldn’t contain her now.
“Twilight, I-I’m sorry!” Flitter Flutter shouted out desperately, so desperately that she wasn’t trying to make it sound light anymore.
“It’s okay, Flutter!” Twinkle said, scrambling to flip to a page in one of the books she took from her mother. “We’re gonna fix this, I promise.”
But Flitter Flutter was already gone, mentally. Whatever was in there now did nothing but growl, hiss, and shake the feathers off her-- its wings, to reveal membranous bat wings underneath. The creature in Flutter’s body seemed to grow and contort beyond her size and form. Flitter Flutter had always been quite a tall mare, and a fairly stocky one too, but this was certainly beyond the known size difference between the two that Twilight had noted in the past. She thought of this, as she heard the ropes strain, and begin to fray and snap. She had to act quickly.
Twilight Twinkle leapt forward, trying to appear confident and collected in the face of what very well may be her certain doom, over the table on which the book sat. Her horn began to glow, and she strained herself to perform the most technically complex spell she had yet attempted: Selective Time Stop; if properly cast, Twinkle could conceivably stop time’s effects on every other pony in town. “So if I fail,” she says to herself, struggling to contain the magic she drew into her horn, “nopony but me gets hurt…” She yelped in pain, feeling the enormous charge of magic rush out of her in a wave.
Acting as a conduit for so much magic would have killed a less-experienced magician, but Twilight Twinkle was left with nothing more than minor burns on her head, and a body that was both overheating and exhausted. “Alright, Flitter Flutter,” she began, “Let’s get you out of there…”
Twilight had foreseen the werebat breaking out of its bindings, especially seeing as it had a propensity to expand its host body, but she wasn’t by any means expecting it to have grown quite as large as it now had. She hated this thing. She hated how it had taken her very best friend’s body and twisted it into this enormous killing machine. She wished she didn’t care so much about Flitter Flutter, that she could bring herself to just destroy the body pursuing her so doggedly, but she could not. Twilight had tried every single method in the book, as well as in several others, to try and slow down the werebat, but not a single one offered any way to return Flitter Flutter to her normal form other than to kill her, which was out of the question.
Flitter Flutter was the only pony Twilight Twinkle had ever met who she felt truly understood her, and didn’t expect the impossible, like so many of her mentors had. Flitter Flutter didn’t ever make Twilight feel like she was unworthy of love or trust, as her mother had done. Flitter Flutter didn’t know Twilight was a stallion before the two met, and that fact made Twilight feel like she was able to not worry about being perceived as stallionish around Flutters. At least, when that omitted fact about herself didn’t stop Twilight from feeling like there was any way Flitter Flutter would have the same feelings for Twilight Twinkle that she had for her.
With those thoughts, she had an idea. It was a foolish, desperate one, sure, but it was better than killing or being killed. “You’re the best friend I’ve ever had, and I mean that!” Twilight shouted, narrowly avoiding a lunge by the werebat. “I don’t think I would have ever believed I could be happy if I hadn’t met you,” she shrieked desperately, barreling over a table in avoidance of enormous, snapping jaws. “The books all told me all I could do is hurt you, but I won’t!” She shouted, before tripping over a book she had left on the floor earlier, and turning on her back. Her pursuer rapidly gaining, a predatory glint in its yellow eyes, before it lunged and grabbed a hold of one of Twilight’s hind legs. She felt its sharp fangs pierce into her skin, and heard it growl as it shook its head from side to side, the way a wolf does to break a caught rabbit’s neck. Searing pain shot through Twilight, as she barely broke free with her mangled leg, and scrambled to the door, which she slammed behind her.
“I-I’m so sorry, Flitter Flutter!! I’m trying so hard,” she shouted over her shoulder as she made a mad dash up the stairs, hindered considerably by the injured leg. She didn’t have time to take stock of just how badly it was hurt, but she was incredibly aware of how very badly it hurt when she accidentally fell against the wall, smearing it with her blood. She heard the door thump repeatedly as the monster it held back pushed it closer and closer to its limit.
Even as the werebat in her body used it to sink its fangs into Twilight’s leg, her side, and barely missing her neck, Twilight did not, at any point, give up on Flitter Flutter, and she wished so desperately that she could indicate how much she appreciated this, pointless though it may be. It was so horrid, and so fitting for one as pathetic as herself, that the closest she’d ever gotten to some kind of intimacy was turning into a monster and sinking her fangs into somepony else. Hating the feeling of hot, sticky blood dribbling down her chin and filling her mouth, Flitter Flutter tried her very best to say she was sorry, but it only came out as snarls and growls. It felt like every time she tried to resist her body’s attempts to maim and kill her very closest friend, it pushed harder to do exactly that. She could hear very clearly all of Twilight’s attempts to calm her down, but they just made her feel worse, and that seemed to give power to the monster that had hold of her. Enough power to bust down the door that was keeping her at bay, and heard a thud outside a few moments later, presuming that her tackle had been enough to dislodge one of the loose bricks at the top of the spire.
But Flutters couldn’t just not fight back! That was precisely what she had always done before, until Twilight taught her otherwise, and gave her the gall to believe she deserved to be happy. She was so grateful to Twilight. She was so kind, and smart, and beautiful, and in so very much danger. Flitter Flutter hated that she almost felt okay about having fallen in love with this pony, even if she knew there was no way she could possibly feel the same way. Flitter Flutter had kept it a secret that she had been a colt growing up, and the fact that Twilight didn’t know that was probably the main reason she’d felt comfortable around her, but that was about to be taken from her. She was about to take that away, to take her best friend’s life, and there was nothing she could do about it.
“You know,” she mused in her own head, wistfully, “maybe if I had just told her how I felt before, I wouldn’t have to wish I could still do it now…” She climbed up the stairs with the graceful movements of a stalking leopard, but felt disgusting and bulky and stallionish regardless of this. She hated how she had to feel predatory, even when she hadn’t shifted. She always had been worried about fitting in with other mares, and petrified that they’d find out she was some freak stallion who had to play pretend at being a mare to not cry himself to sleep at night. She heard what Twilight had said earlier, about not being able to hurt her, but as she stalked her prey closer to the edge of the tower, her prey who had been weeping, and begging, and screaming at her not to take her life. Flitter Flutter wished so very, very desperately that she could stop, but she had no control over what was happening. Her mind and body were operating on their own, and she was only a terrified observer. She heard shouting behind her, and her head turned around in time to see another unicorn, about half a head taller than Twilight, charging towards her. Flitter Flutter was so grateful to see that somepony else was able to stop her from doing this when she couldn’t, and mentally prepared herself to have her neck lanced open by-horn, as a flash of yellow-white light blinded her.
Twilight could tell that she nearly took her last breath with that spell. It hadn’t been to freeze a whole town this time, but even just two ponies was plenty difficult when she wasn’t bleeding out and afraid for her life. She could tell this was the end for her, as the monster turned its head back around to her, growling like wolf. “I’m so sorry, Flitter Flutter…” She said weakly, sniffling, “I-I’m so sorry… I love you…”
The monster opened its jaws, and rushed down towards Twilight Twinkle’s neck. She closed her eyes, and prepared for death to take her, content in the knowledge that she had at least told that secret before she went.
Twilight had expected to feel the searing pain of huge jaws clamping down on her neck, and of fangs being embedded in her flesh. That, and, if she heard anything at all, that it would be her own screaming and perhaps some snarling. What she most certainly did not expect was the feeling of a warm, heavy body on top of her, a snout in the crook of her neck, and the sound of… sobbing?
She opened her eyes to see a scuffed-up looking Flitter Flutter on top of her, while Twinkle herself lay on her back. Were she not still in so much pain, and her friend not weeping atop her, she’d have assumed this to be the afterlife. Everything was so serene now, even if only compared to just moments before.
“I-I’m s-sorry…” Flitter Flutter choked out, tears streaking down her face, wetting both pony’s fur. “I’m s-s-so.. S-sorr-yy!” She spouted out between gasps, and hugged Twilight like she was her only anchor to the world. “I l-love you too! P-please don’t h-hate meee!!” She seemed to sob harder at this, and Twilight’s heart lurched. She hugged the pegasus back, and stroked between her wings with a hoof.
“Shhhh, It’s okay, she reassured, “I could never hate you. It wasn’t your fault…”
“Y-Yes it was!! I’m a freak, a predator!!” Flitter Flutter retorted, hiding her face in Twilight’s mane. “I’m some gross colt who just wishes he were a mare!! You can’t love me…”
“Oh, Flutters…” Twilight cupped Flutter’s chin with a hoof, and turned her up to face her. “No you’re not, unless I am too.”
“T-Twilight…? But you’re…” Her eyes, now teal again, go wide in realization. “B-but you’re so pretty! Th-there’s no way you’re like me!!”
“Flitter Flutter,” Twilight adopted a faux-scolding tone, “you are literally the prettiest mare I have ever seen in my entire life!” Flutter flushed bright red at this, and seemed to have nothing to say, so Twinkle continued. “It hurts my heart that you don’t see that, and that you think who you were in the past means you can’t be somepony else in the future.” She pulled the pegasus closer, and gave her a very gentle kiss on the nose. “I love you, and I have for a long time, and I will continue to. Always, and forever.”
Flitter Flutter promptly buried her face in Twilight Twinkle’s chest, and sobbed deeply into it. “B-but I hurt you,” she wailed, muffled though it was. “I hurt you s-so much! And i-it’s going to happen aga-a-a-aaaaain!”
Twilight responded by sitting up just enough to rest her chin on Flutter’s head, stroking her mane and back and trying to comfort her through her gasping sobs. “You don’t know that, Flutters,” she pleaded, “we might find a cure before then. Please, don’t give up…”
“B-but what if we c-can’t?”
“Then I’m not going to leave you behind, no matter what!” Twilight had started to cry herself, at this point. “Nopony has ever made me feel so comfortable, and appreciated, and I’ve never met any creature as kind or generous as yourself, and I absolutely, definitely, positively will not give up on you…” She shuddered, and hugged her friend even tighter.
Flitter Flutter seemed to calm down a bit, her full-throated keening dying down to a more subdued sniffle. “O-okay… Thank you…” She gave Twinkle the most adorable, wet, huge puppy-dog eyes anypony had ever seen. “Y-you’ve been nothing but kind to me, even when I haven’t really deser-- sniffle--ved it… I love you.”
“You do deserve it, whether you care to admit it or not.” Twilight remarked, as she looked Flitter right in the eyes, and gave her a gentle, but unreserved, smile. The two just sat there for a moment, enjoying this closeness they’ve both wanted for so long.
“Um,” Flitter Flutter broke the silence, “you should probably unfreeze the town now.”
“Oh. Yeah, I should.”
“Wha-- you’re okay??” Pinky asked in utter befuddlement as-- from her perspective-- what was initially about to become the scene of a mauling suddenly became the prospective victim stopping Pinky’s charge with a gentle telekinetic push, and the other unicorn’s assailant seemed to be… no longer a monster? Before Pinky Pie was able to properly take stock of the situation--
“Pinky, stop!” Minty slammed into her rear-end from behind, sending both of them tumbling head-over-all-four-heels towards the edge of the tower, requiring the unicorn to stop both of them with her magic. She did this more casually than Pinky was able to drink water, in tandem with wrapping bandages around her very recent wounds with that same aura.
“Hello!” said the purple unicorn, unwary of the pegasus next to her who only moments ago seemed to have been some sort of huge monster about to rip her to pieces. “My name is Twilight Twinkle, I am a sorceress.” She points to herself, then to her yellow companion. “This is Flitter Flutter, my close friend.” Twilight seemed, to Pinky, to have said that last word with a hint of uncertainty.
“U-um… hi?” Minty queried, looking at both of the strangers wearily. “Are you… not eaten?” Flitter Flutter seemed to pale at this, understandably. Minty also noticed that Flitter Flutter was very possibly the most gorgeous pony to ever exist-- aside from Pinky Pie, or herself, of course!-- so much so that all of Minty’s attention was directed to this pegasus for the next several seconds. “Puh… Pretty?” Pinky had these same thoughts, but was able to maintain composure, and joined Twilight in giving Minty quite the sideways glance, as Flitter Flutter surreptitiously scooted slightly behind her friend.
“I think what she meant to say, was, eh--”
“--Pretty odd welcome to town? I’m sure.” Twilight replied. “Terribly sorry about that.”
“That’s alright. You seem to have everything under control.” Pinky responded in turn, and gave an apologetic glance at Flitter Flutter, who blushed.
“Um, you’re a werebat, right?” Minty asked Flitter Flutter sheepishly. The pegasus responded only by nervously shifting and squirming in place, which Minty took as a yes. “Hey, it’s alright, girl.” Minty said to Flitter Flutter, and approached her slowly, hoof outstretched for a shake. “I used to know a werebat, a long while back. I might be able to help you, um, Flutter, was it?”
Flitter Flutter nodded, and eased up a little. “Th-that’s awfully kind of you, but I-I think Twilight and I can figure it out on our own…” Flitter Flutter did believe that, didn’t she? She looked to Twilight Twinkle for approval, and received a failed attempt to hide uncertainty.
“I think that, maybe, having somepony around with direct experience with your affliction is a good idea.” Twilight said, much to Flutter’s disappointment. She was really hoping to just keep living with Twilight, especially with their recent admissions. But, she supposed, Minty and Pinky seem nice enough-- even if Minty was a bit of a flatterer. She thought it unlikely that the little molly really thought her that beautiful. She wasn’t even a real mare, after all…
“Minty, when did you have experience with a werebat?” Pinky asked, genuinely intrigued.
“When my mom was still with the wagon train…” Minty began, less reluctantly than she felt. Pinkie shot her a glance as if to say ‘you don’t have to,’ but she continued anyways. “She, um… Let’s just say she was a magician doing some studies? And, well, one of our neighbors started to shift during a stop one night, and she, um…” Minty looked thoughtful for a moment, eyes red with unshed tears, which Twilight failed to notice, but Pinky held her, and Flitter Flutter nodded slightly in understanding.
“You don’t have to talk about it if it’s so upsetting, Minty.” Flitter Flutter said, and approached her. Minty gave her a very genuine smile, and sniffled.
“No, no, it’s important! You two oughta know,” Minty said, seeming more chipper, but Pinky could tell this was hard for her, and held her tighter. The other two looked on with rapt attention. “I, uh… I took care of a werebat when I was a filly. Mom had me make him this tea-- silverwort-- that didn’t do anything bad to him when he wasn’t shifted, but made him smaller and weaker as a werebat. It seems to me like you two could really use some of that.” Twinkle looked unsure, but Flitter Flutter stood up right away.
“Do you have any?” She asked, looming over Minty. Who tensed up a bit, clearly flustered. Pinky, noticing this, stifled a chuckle.
“Uh, um…” Minty began, and Flitter Flutter backed off a bit, seeing she had made the molly uncomfortable. Minty continued, “I do have some, but--”
“Give me the maximum dose you can tomorrow night. I shouldn’t shift again tonight, I’ve never done it twice in 24 hours. Though, it was pretty odd that I did it in the middle of the day today…”
“Yeah, sure! Also, maybe we could go to the market together-- tomorrow? A-after, y’know…” Minty said nervously, gesturing broadly to the town surrounding the tower. “I’ll prolly need more than I have right now, and you oughta learn how to spot it.”
Flitter Flutter flushes again, and stops being quite so imposing, slouching back over as she usually does to obfuscate her height. “U-um, sure…” She meeped, “I-I might like that…”
Pinky and Twilight looked at one another knowingly, and shared a smirk.
“I should probably unfreeze the town, but, um… I am properly exhausted.” Twinkle stated. “There are three bedrooms in the tower, but I don’t expect we’ll be using more than two.” Flitter Flutter sputtered some sort of flustered gibberish at this, at which the other three had a light chuckle.
“Right, Pinky and I will start dinner!” Minty said, and began to rummage around in her wagon.
Rarity had never been a particularly “normal” pony, as far as she was concerned. As much as normal was-- of course-- a relative term, Rarity knew that she didn’t fit the descriptor. For starters, she possessed rainbow colored hair, of which she was incredibly proud! Her mane cascaded from canary yellow, to sunset orange, to salmon pink; and her tail from lime green, to electric blue, and a deep violet. She had so very much pride in these colors she bore, as did her older sisters Rainbow Dash and Toola Roola. With two thriving and successful artists to model herself after, Rarity couldn’t help but be a little eccentric. This eccentricity and pride, however, meant high-highs and low-lows. Unfortunately for the filly, this day was shaping up to be downer.
Since tumbling into the poison joke on saturday, as the result of a spectacular roller-skating accident, Rarity had kept herself holed up in her room to hide her shame from her friends and, in spite of their best efforts, her family. She spent this time curled up in a blanket on her bed, cuddling her stuffies and daydreaming of the (from her perspective) far-off day that she could go outside and play again. Nopony would stop her if she tried to, she was well aware-- indeed, there would be celebration-- but she couldn’t bear to show so much as her muzzle out the door of the bedroom she called her sanctuary. She was roused from her present bout of self pity by a knock at the door.
“Rarity, please come out,” the nasal and perpetually drowsy-sounding voice of Toola Roola rang out, “It’s time for school, sis.”
“For the last time, NO!” The pink-coated filly shouted in reply, “they can’t see me like this, I’ll never live it down!”
“Rarity, darling,” Rainbow Dash’s sonorous voice began, “I am certainly no stranger to how cruel other children can be. I haven’t been shy around you about my own experiences as a filly, have I?”
“N-no, but…” Rarity felt she might cry. “I just can’t!”
“There’s no way it’s that bad, hon.” Toola stated as if there were no alternative. “Can you please let us in, so we can at least talk about it?” There was a long pause, and Toola added, sounding a bit choked-up, “Please, Rares?”
Rarity considered for a moment, and wordlessly rose from her bed. Cloaked in a fluffy, bubblegum-pink duvet, she slumped over the edge of her bed, and focused her magic on twisting the doorknob. An aura, the same shade of green as the stripe in her tail, appeared, and with some effort, pulled open the door to her room. Her sisters both looked as though they might cry, and greeted her with concerned smiles. Rainbow Dash zipped immediately towards Rarity, and wrapped her forelegs around the filly in a very tight hug.
“I’m so sorry you aren’t feeling well, darling.” Rainbow offered, visibly straining not to cry., as Toola Roola strode towards them and joined in the group hug, and Rarity did cry. Her two elder siblings gave her a few minutes to just let it all out, and did their best to make sure she felt comfortable and safe.
“Th… thank you.” Rarity sniffled, and nuzzled her snout up under Toola’s. “I’m.. s-s-sorry…”
“Shhhhh, no-no, Rarity, don’t be sorry.” Toola said, and hugged her tighter, “Just, please, tell us what’s got you so upset?”
Rarity paused for a moment, forced a determined expression, and pulled away from her sisters. She shook the blanket off her, and revealed the obvious source of her anguish: her beautiful mane and tail’s hues had been changed to earth tones! Olive drab, dirt brown, and granite gray, where there ought to be a whole spectrum of vibrant color. “Here,” she choked, “this is the problem…”
Toola and Rainbow both were astounded to see this, and did a very poor job of hiding it.
“Oh, it’s not that bad, darling…” Rainbow dash said, trepidatiously.
“I dunno, sis, it’s pretty bad.” Toola Roola said, with complete sincerity. Rainbow looked back at her with a surprised scowl.
“I KNOW!” Rarity bellowed, and buried her face in her pillow. She surely said something else on the matter, but neither of the other ponies could understand it through the muffling of the pillow.
Toola Roola patted the filly’s back with a hoof, and tried to reassure her. “Well, Rares, what I mean is that it’s bad if you think you can only pull off having a rainbow mane. There are plenty of ponies with earthier tones! Like Applejack: she’s got sort of dirty-blonde colored hair.”
Rarity lifted her face from her pillow, sniffling, eyes red. “That’s easy for you to say, TooRoo. Yours is still perfect...”
“Oh, darling,” Rainbow Dash dismissed, “Toola’s mane is far from perfect, it seems to me like she barely remembers to get the clumps of dried paint out more than maybe bi-weekly.” Toola Roola replied with a sneer, and Rainbow fluttered her eyelashes innocently.
Rarity seemed to brighten at this-- even permitting herself a little chuckle-- so Toola Roola decided to let Rainbow have this one. She was technically right, after all. Toola Roola hugged Rarity again, and Rainbow Dash joined in it.
“I love you guys…” the filly said, and her sisters reciprocated. “But… Do I still have to go to school today?”
The sun was setting over Trottingham, and Minty could tell by sight alone that Flitter Flutter was feeling the effects of the silverwort tea-- colloquially called “Bat’s Bane” for the weakening effect it had on werebats-- baggy eyes, and a much more mellow attitude, generally. The buttercream pegasus had spent the totality of the day so far helping fat little bumblebees out of flowers they had gotten stuck in, and making sure all the local grasshoppers got enough to eat, which she apparently did under normal circumstances as well. She had tried to get Pinky Pie to let an injured hornet rest in her mane, because Flutter had run out of space in her own for more tired bugs, but Pinky vehemently objected. It started when Flitter Flutter started telling the other three about the life cycle of luna moths, of which she had a particularly large specimen poised upon her snout. Twilight Twinkle-- predictably-- whipped out an entomology textbook to read up on it while Flitter Flutter gave her explanation, and informed the group that this particular moth was named “Linus,” and he had been migrating all the way down from Unicornia, on his way to Butterfly Island for the winter, when Minty noticed something familiar in Flitter Flutter’s eyes: a sudden golden sheen.
Minty poked at Twilight to rouse her from her reading-stupor, and explained “I think your marefriend is about to shift again. We should get the rope just in case.”
Twilight scowled, but nodded. “Yeah, but I hate having to restrain her.”
“We may not have to,” Minty replied, nuzzling under Twilight’s chin in an attempt at reassurance, “it’s only a precaution. We’ll have to see if I got the dosage right, okay?”
Twilight gulped, and pulled a length of rope out of her book-stuffed saddlebags. “Okay,” she said, resolute as she let the rope out of her teeth, “But we need to have her evacuate her hair first.” Twilight was the one who cut off Flutter’s insectoid-infodump, and she reacted amicably enough.
Flitter Flutter took care to relocate Linus the luna moth over to a field of wildflowers with Sammie the stag beetle, Beeatrice the Bumblebee, Celica the centipede, and many other alliteratively-named arthropod-amigos. She was very understanding about being tied-up, all things considered. She gave Twilight a warm smile, as the unicorn telekinetically wrapped her in the heavy cord. “It’s okay, Twilight. I’m not mad,” she reassured, “but, honestly, I am scared…”
“I know, honey, I know…” Twilight said, and gave Flitter Flutter a very soft kiss on the forehead. Minty gave Pinky Pie her trademark puppy-dog-eyes, and received the same sort of smooch after a playful eye-roll.
“How will we know if we did everything right?” Pinky asked Minty, sitting down next to her.
“From what I remember when I was a foal, she’s still gonna get all big and scary, but not as big, and way less scary.” Minty replied, and failed to properly force a confident smirk.
“U-um, girls…” Flitter Flutter asked, with a quiver in her voice, “M-may I please have a hug? Before, y-you know…”
“Oh, of course, sweetheart…” Twilight said, and embraced her twice as hard as usual to make up for Flutters inability to do reciprocate.
“Anything for a friend.” Pinky Pie said, and joined.
“I’m always down for a hug!” Minty giggled, and topped off the pony-pile.
“Totally!” Minty chirped, answering for Pinky, who simply nodded. “Why else do you think we’d spend two whole days with you all?”
Twilight wrapped a foreleg around Minty, and nuzzled Pinky to indicate that the feeling was mutual. “Well, I’m quite grateful you two came around. I don’t think Flutters or I have felt quite this hopeful for a long time…”
Flitter Flutter nodded, and smiled with hope and love that was palpable in the air. She was cut off by a sudden feeling of heat-- burning, overwhelming heat-- from deep in her chest. It was time.
“We haven’t had a call from them for two whole days, Starry. I’m worried.” Skywishes whimpered, and sipped her cup of tea: some fruity blend Applejack had dropped off, she couldn’t properly identify any flavor or aroma but apples, but Skywishes had never been of a culinary persuasion.
Starcatcher paced around the tiny hospital room, grumbling to herself. “I knew this was gonna happen, I knew Minty’d find some way to muss it up.”
“What? Where’s this coming from?” Skywishes was surprised. She knew Minty had a tendency to push a lot of Starcatcher’s buttons without realizing it, but Starry had never expressed such animosity towards their friend before now.
“Aw, c’mon, love. She’s a bumbling fool, and you know it.”
“Starcatcher, you can’t mean that!”
Starcatcher stopped herself from saying anything else before she had calmed down. “No, you’re right. I’m sorry, hon…” She looked away from Skywishes, ashamed of her outburst. “I just… I feel kinda guilty puttin’ this on our mates like this. I don’t think Minty’s stupid, not really.”
“Oh, sweetie…” Skywishes beckoned her wife over to her bed, and leaned up to hug her as tight as her weakened forelegs could. “It’s okay, I know you’re scared, and I knew you couldn’t really feel that way…” Skywishes patted Starcatcher’s head. “Please don’t feel so guilty about not being out there, dear. I’d really rather have you here with me.” Skywishes gave her a kiss on the lips, and Starcatcher smiled adoringly back.
“Awrite, love…” she replied. Then grinned a bit deviously, “But I am still mad at that li'l molly for knockin’ over the Hearth’s Warming tree.”
Skywishes scoffed, gave her wife a playful shove, and chuckled. “Oh, you spiteful bonehead!”
“Yeah, yeah. Whatever, pipsqueak!” Starcatcher retorted with equal mirth.
“Seriously, though. Do you think they’re okay?” Skywishes asked, her thoughts returning back to their departed friends.
After a moment of thought, and resting her chin on Skywishes head for good measure, Star replied, “I do think so. Minty’s pretty strong-- she could lift up this bed with both of us on it if she wanted to-- and what Pinky Pie lacks in magic, she definitely makes up for in bein’ a clever-clogs.”
Skywishes chortled at that, and was visibly relieved. “‘Clever-clogs’, honey?”
“Oh, chomp the bit, ya dork…” She replied with a grin.
Flitter Flutter felt it very firmly, it was taking the forefront of her mind, making her take a back seat to control of her own body, punishing her for her hubris of thinking she could ever really be a mare. Her last act as herself was to wail out “It’s coming!” as a warning to the ponies embracing her, before that awful beast came out. The three yelped and jumped back, staying about ten feet away from her, understandably wanting to put some distance between themselves and that monster. She felt her feathers shed from her wings, even as they were restrained, and her body grow larger, more muscular. She hated this feeling, but had hope she wouldn’t have to live with it forever, and that counted for a lot. As it took her over, made her into only an observer, she felt less fearful of what would happen.
“Oh my golly gosh!” Minty yelped. “That looks like it hurts, Flutters! Are you okay?”
The only reply was a growl, and a bearing of fangs.
“Minty…” Pinky admonished, “No. Just… just don’t.” This was met with a look of genuine, innocent confusion from the mule, followed by sudden realization, and an apology directed towards the werebat. Pinky Pie facehoofed.
“It seems as though it’s working…” Twilight stated, illuminating the dark room with her horn. “I know you can’t talk right now, dear, but I’m here for you… okay?” Twilight said, and looked into the werebats golden eyes. The creature in Flitter Flutter’s body seemed smaller, and put up much less of a fight than it had against its restraints previously. It seemed even to… calm down a bit? Twilight took an incredibly cautious step towards it.
Minty was not so cautious, and started trotting over to the bat, before Pinky telekinetically stopped her. “Minty, careful!” Pinky yelped, and then added “Please…?”
Minty looked at her with a thoughtless expression, before smiling. “Oh, Pinks, it’s okay. I’ve done this before, remember?” Despite her confidence, she proceeded more cautiously.
Pinky and Twilight looked at one another apprehensively, but joined Minty in creeping closer to the werebat, which growled and wriggled in place. It was hardly any bigger than Flitter-Flutter’s body usually was. Granted, Flitter Flutter was easily the largest pony the others had ever seen, but the werebat had-- of course-- been much larger before than it was now. Two nights ago, if Flitter Flutter was an orange, the werebat was a grapefruit; but now the werebat was more like a slightly larger orange (in keeping with the analogy). Minty was the first to approach, and the creature snarled and writhed wildly in-place. Twilight was next to follow, taking a much smaller step, and the bat seemed to calm, and met her eyes. It looked at her sternly, and she froze. She could sense… something. She didn’t know what, but she felt less threatened, and more curious. She got closer, and Pinky nervously scooted closer to Minty. Twilight shook her head and unfroze; she had an idea. Possibly a stupid one, but she liked it much better than consigning her marefriend to bondage every other evening.
“Hey there, girl…” Twilight said in a low voice, trying to be comforting, trying out treating the werebat like an animal, the way she had seen Flitter Flutter do before. Maybe, since the werebat seemed to be much more like beast than a pony, she ought to treat it like one? The bat looked up at her, reminding Twilight of the big, wolf-like dog that Granny Smith used to have back in Ponyville. Actually… upon close inspection, (and without immediate threat of death) the face really was much more like a wolf’s than a bat’s. She carefully reached out a hoof to the werebat, and ignored Pinky Pie’s gasp. It-- no, she-- rose her snout to sniff at Twilight’s hoof. Twilight Twinkle should have, by all accounts, not done this; but she was herself, and that meant she would put herself directly in harm’s way for the sake of learning new information, even if the back of her mind was relentlessly screaming ‘DANGER, DANGER! BIG SCARY THING THAT ALMOST KILLED YOU! RUN AWAY!’. The werebat growled softly, leading Twilight to pull her hoof away, just as carefully as she had offered in the first place. The werebat stopped growling immediately, and just looked Twilight in the eyes curiously. There wasn’t much of Flitter Flutter in them, but they were still pretty in their own way.
Several seconds of silence were interrupted by the hooting of an owl in the surrounding woods, and Minty was the first of the group to speak up. “Wow. Twilight…” She started and stopped to say something else several times, but eventually decided that “Wow. Just, wow.” was sufficient.
“It’s… kinda like a big dog.” Pinky said. “Except… a pony.”
To donkeys and mules, Butterfly Island was a place defined by its inaccessibility. A group of ponies not composed mostly of pegasi couldn’t cross the water without a ferry, as it was much further to go than fording a river. Sunny Daze, who elected to travel there alone with nothing but the coat on her hide, was not one to be deterred by unfavorable odds-- she was far too awesome for that. That was why she was here, after all, on a search for a long-lost childhood friend whom she hadn’t seen since foalhood! Four straight hours of swimming would be exhausting for a full-sized pony, but Sunny was easily the smallest full-grown donkey in the troupe, so by the time she made it to shore she-- of course-- collapsed immediately onto the sand.
She was tired. Dead tired. Sunny’s mane, usually a beautifully kept gradient from yellow to red to orange to violet-- like a sunset!-- was a jumbled mess of warm colors, seaweed, and scallop shells. Her white coat was covered in wet sand, and in some places blood, due to small cuts from pieces of shells and driftwood. Her body stung and ached all over, and she felt like she was going to yuck-up the rainbow berries she had foraged before the swim.
“Razz was right,” she said to herself, “I shouldn’t have eaten before swimming… She was totally wrong about me swimming in the first place, though. That was so freakin’ RAD!” She thrust a hoof up into the air in triumph, congratulating herself out loud for being so awesome. This thought was very comforting, as she passed out from exhaustion.
Thistle Whistle had always been fairly reclusive pegasus, and she tended to feel queasy whenever confronted with even the most basic of problems. Bearing this in mind, finding an unconscious pony washed up on the beach during her nightly decompression stroll, was enough to send her on quite the spiral. She knew she couldn’t leave the filly-- or, what looked to her as if they were a filly, albeit with a strangely round snout and long ears-- on the beach. What could Thistle Whistle do? The hospital was on the other side of town, not to mention in the sky above the rest of lower Cloudsdale. Thistle simply wasn’t strong enough to carry somepony there on her wing power alone. Thistle didn’t really have any friends to call for help-- not since Starcatcher moved to that little town in the mountains almost a decade ago-- except for Pastel Heart, but she was an earth pony and not much better equipped to handle the stress than Thistle would be alone. Pastel was lovely, but she was really much more of an acquaintance anyways. Not somepony you could really call in an emergency.
Thistle Whistle had come to the incredibly unfortunate conclusion that she’d have to take the kid home and dress their wounds and whatnot, and just hope that the police didn’t think she was being creepy when she brought the filly to the station the next morning.
“Oh, Starshine above, little mate,” Thistle grumbled to herself, hoisting the white-furred filly onto her back, “I hope you’re not an orphan or somethin’...”
Sunny Doze awoke groggily from what she liked to call a ‘power nap,’ but it would be more accurate to say she blacked out from exhaustion. The little jenny noticed two things immediately: firstly, this was not her bed. “Nice.” She smugly asserted, out loud, as she sat up on the bed. The second thing she noticed was that her hair and coat had been cleaned, and her scrapes had been bandaged. She had little memory of the previous evening, other than swimming really hard, scraping herself on rocks, and taking an aforementioned ‘power nap’ on the beach, so she had no idea when, and-- perhaps, more importantly-- how she had found the time to shmooze on some as-of-yet unremembered mare, molly, or jenny. She knew that her swagger and amazing hair were pretty much irresistible, but she at least remembered most other evenings she spent like that, even if not with whom.
Her answer arrived in the form of a very tall and spindly pegasus mare, with sky-blue fur and red-and-orange mane and tail, and the image of a purple wildflower emblazoned on her flank-- which, Sunny noted, was a bit undersized for her figure, though still cute.
“Oh, l’il mate, you’re awake!” The mare chirped, in a voice deeper than Sunny had anticipated. She wouldn’t have assumed this gal to be trans, from her figure, but gosh she was cute.
“That I am, mamacita.~” Sunny responded with a sultry flutter of her eyelashes, at which the pegasus recoiled in astonishment, followed by confusion. “Um…” Sunny began, hoping to salvage the situation, “I’m sorry, ma’am, did I make you uncomfortable?”
“Uh… whatever, kid. Are you feelin’ alright?” The mare said, and approached the donkey, carrying a tray with a glass of water and a banana atop it between her wings.
“I feel great! No more sore than usual, bab-- er, I mean-- Miss.” Sunny flushed at the fumble. Why couldn’t she just be normal? The mare was clearly off-put. Wait, why is this lady asking if she's okay? “What happened last night?”
“I found ya washed up on the beach, lookin’ pretty roughed up.” She replied, and set the tray down on a coffee table next to Sunny, as plain as the white sheets and pillows on the bed. “It was real late at night, and I don’t have a whole lotta folks in my circle, so I thought I oughta fix ya up a bit. Couldn’t just leave ya there! Where’re ya parents, kid?”
“‘Kid?’ Lady, I’m 23!” Sunny gave a hearty chuckle and facehoofed. “OOOH, that’s why you made that face! No, girl, I’m not a foal-- just a donkey.”
“Ah! That’s why the ears…” The pegasus was visibly relieved, presumably not to have to track down anypony’s parents, among the confusion with her height being resolved.
Sunny scarfed down the banana, with the peel still on it-- at which the taller pony cringed-- and chugged the glass of water like she hadn’t eaten or drank for days. “Thanks a bunch, sweetheart,” Sunny said with a grin to her temporary-caretaker, “The name’s Sunny. Sunny Daze!” She outstretched a hoof to the pegasus, who shook it with her own.
“Thistle Whistle, and you’re welcome.” Thistle Whistle took the now empty tray back up in her wings, and gave Sunny a puzzled look. “How’d ya end up passed out on Butterfly Island? I thought donkeys couldn’t swim.”
“Psssht! That’s a buncha hooey.” Sunny days, brayed, as she did an astoundingly-perfect cartwheel out of bed, causing Thistle to flinch. “Ponies seem to think there’s lots we can’t do, for whatever reason, Miss Whistle, but we’re just as capable as yourself!” Sunny said this while walking on her front hooves, her mane and long ears dragging along the-- thankfully very clean-- carpet. “As I’m quite sure you’ve noticed by now,” Sunny performed a backflip and landed on only her hind legs, giving a triumphantly smug ta-da gesture with her front hooves, “I am exceptional.” Finished with a wink, for good measure.
Thistle simply stared on in awe. “Wow, mate, that’s--”
“Sure, that works. I was just gonna say ‘Sumn’ else.’”
Sunny looked at Thistle for a moment, confused, but then smirked and booped the pegasus on the nose. “That, I am, ma’am. I’m somethin’ else, for sure.”
“We know Flitter Flutter is a girl, Twilight.” Minty said, confusedly. She had inched a bit closer to the werebat, prompting it to growl softly at her. Minty backed off, giving both Twilight and the bat an apologetic nod. “I just thought we were calling,” she gestured broadly at the transformed Flitter Flutter, “this an ‘it.’” Pinky Pie gently jabbed Minty in admonishment, who only looked confused.
“Well, this is Flitter Flutter, Minty.” Twilight replied, hiding her offense on her marefriend’s behalf. “Or, a part of her, at least. I don’t think she’s a monster, just… A creature.”
“A creature?” Pinky Pie asked.
“Sometimes Pinky says I’m a creature.” Minty added, with a big, goofy grin. Pinky rolled her eyes, permitted herself a small smile, and a look of adoration at Minty. Twilight couldn’t help but giggle, not noticing as the werebat inched a bit closer to her.
“Yeah. She’s just an animal, I think.” Twilight began again, “That’s a better explanation than her just being a monster. Animals don’t reason the same way ponies do, is all, it doesn’t make her mean. When she attacked me before,” Twilight pointed to the bandage around her leg, which she had changed this morning, “she probably felt threatened that I was in her territory or something like that.”
“I never got to see a werebat out of captivity when mom was still around,” Minty added, with less fear and more cheer than was probably called for, but wilted before continuing. “It always made me feel icky, having them tied up, afraid…” Pinky put a hoof around the back of Minty’s neck and pulled her into a hug. Minty nestled her snout up under Pinky’s, and muttered a thanks.
“Maybe you should try to touch her again?” Pinky offered, absentmindedly petting Minty like a dog. “She seems really curious about you.”
“I think you’re right, and I’ll probably unbind her too.” Twilight stated, nodding.
“Wha-- Twilight, wait!” Minty brayed, and bounced away from Pinky Pie. “I’m not too worried about her hurting us, but what if she runs away?”
“The doors are locked, Minty.” Twilight replied flatly. “She won’t get out this time, not as she is right now.” Minty crawled up under Pinky for protection, and Pinky gave her a little kiss on the head for comfort.
“I think it’s an okay idea, Twilight.” Pinky responded. “But, are you gonna be able to hold her in your magic if she does attack us?”
“Oh, absolutely.” Twilight said, with a look of excitement she only wore when explaining something unintuitive. “The only reason I couldn’t before was because she was just too strong for my telekinesis to hold her back for more than a second or two. We’re totally safe now, if she can’t break out of those ropes.”
“Well, okay.” Minty said, not shaking herself, but close to it. “If you insist…”
Twilight had finally finished untying the last knot in the bundle of rope that kept the werebat restrained. There were only two knots-- one linking two lengths of rope together, and another closing the loop around Flitter Flutters’ corrupted body-- but it felt like she had been working at them for hours. This was the moment of truth. She removed the ropes from around the werebat, allowing them to slump down at her sides. The bat’s eyes widened, and it glanced apprehensively at the three ponies surrounding her. Twilight took the initiative to get a bit closer, while Pinky and Minty watched carefully at a safe distance.
“Hey, girl, it’s okay,” Twilight Twinkle offered a hoof to the creature, who sniffed at it with her long, angular snout, “It’s okay, you’re safe.” The animal looked up at her with its big, wet, golden eyes; accentuating how doglike her other features were, as she rose to her hooves-- which, Twilight noted, were narrow and cloven like a deer’s rather than wide and singular like a pony’s. The werebat cautiously backed up, eyes fixed on Twilight, and then cautiously approached again. Pinky and Minty stood very still, as if hoping to avoid notice, before the little mule spoke up.
“Oh my gosh, she’s so pretty…” Minty said, with a twinkle in her eye.
“Yeah…” Pinky said, with a gulp. “And, a little scary.”
Twilight didn’t seem to notice or care what her friends were saying; she had much more important matters to attend to. The bat-wolf-deer creature had begun sniffing her hoof again, and tentatively licked it. Minty couldn’t help but chirp out an “AWWWWW!” as Twilight then reached up, very slowly, to the beast’s head to gently pet it.
“Good girl,” the unicorn said in a low, soothing tone, “good puppy…”
The creature seemed to relax, letting her wings unfurl just enough for the other three to witness their enormity-- they were easily wide enough to drape over the whole party like a canopy. This, followed by a very gentle nuzzling of Twilight Twinkle’s face, almost knocking her over by mistake. The (relatively) little unicorn cooed softly to the creature, and stroked the side of her enormous head.
“She. Is. So. CUTE!” Minty squeed, and hopped over, the suddenness prompting the Flutter-Bat to recoil and growl, seemingly protective of Twinkle. Minty backed off immediately, and brayed apologies at the two.
“I think maybe we take this a little slower, okay, Mints?” Pinky hugged Minty, and attempted to console her. “This was a really big step for Flitter Flutter, we can hardly expect she’ll warm up to either of us quite as quickly as she did to Twinkle, alright?”
“Yeah, that makes sense.” The little green mule stated, then turned back to Twilight. “Sorry, again.”
“It’s alright, Minty. Just, maybe ask next time? And move a little bit more carefully. She seems to startle easily…” She said, while scratching behind the animal’s ears, causing her to smile and roll over belly-up. “D’awwww… baby girl.”
Flitter Flutter felt more well-rested after that night than she ever had before, in no small part thanks to the fact that her bat-form didn’t hurt anypony or break anything. In fact, it-- no, she, seemed to develop quite a rapport with Twilight, with whom they snuggled all night. She was just an animal that needed to be taken care of, which ws something she was very much familiar with-- both in concept, and in-practice. After a celebratory breakfast of wild mulberry pancakes, that Minty insisted on making, the two from Ponyville seemed to remember something important.
“PINKY!” Minty shouted suddenly, after gasping as she put the last dirty plate in the sink.
Pinky Pie rushed out of the tower’s dining room and into the kitchen, and looked at Minty with tremendous concern. “What’s wrong, sweetheart!?”
“Oh, it’s just terrible, just the worst thing in the whole world!”
“What is it? Minty, please--”
“We haven’t called home in three days!”
Pinky let out a sigh of relief that nopony was hurt, or anything seriously damaged; but huffed a bit at her marefriend. “Minty, Minty, Minty. You don’t have to yell about that, sweetie-pie.”
“Right, sorry…” Minty looked apologetic, but still indignant. “We really do need to call them though.”
“You’re absolutely right,” Pinky replied, and gave Minty a peck on the cheek, “We’ll call them as soon as I’m done helping you clean up, okay?”
“Okay!” Minty replied, all her tension immediately melting away. She hummed a little tune to herself as she and Pinky started scrubbing the frying pan she had used earlier, which Pinky thought she recognized as a common ditty sung to donkey foals, which she begun to sing herself:
When you’re rife with devastation,
There’s a simple explanation:
You’re a toymaker’s creation
Trapped inside a crystal ball,
And whichever way he tilts it,
Know that we must be resilient.
We won’t let them break our spirits
As we sing our silly song!
“Woah, Pinks!” Minty brayed, clearly impressed. “Where’d ya learn that?”
“The night we first met, when you and dad stopped into Ponyville for the first time…” Pinky said, a bit bashfully, thankful the color of her fur hid her blushing a bit.
Minty’s, however, only seemed to accentuate her own. “D’AAAWWWWW, Pinky!” Tears welled up in the corners of her eyes as she leapt forward to wrap her love up in a tight hug. “That’s so sweet, I can’t believe you remembered that from all those years ago…”
“Minty, it was only three--” Pinky began to respond, but thought better of it, and instead just kissed the molly she loved.
Clover had never been a particularly gregarious pony, and she had begun to grow increasingly uncomfortable with her loneliness and inability to get along with other ponies (or, really, any other creature at all). The only real friend she could recall having in her unnaturally long life-- somewhere in the vicinity of 500 years, she had lost interest counting after 235-- was Wintergreen: a very kind, and silly, but deceptively intelligent donkey, but she even drove him away, after a fight she had with their son. She knew she shouldn’t have involved Peppermint in those experiments, but she felt she’d be putting him at a disadvantage: not showing the colt how cruel some creatures could be. That was another problem of hers: assuming most would be as cruel as she was if given her power and authority.
Clover very much missed Peppermint, or “Pep” as she and his father often called him, and hoped very much that he was doing well. She did genuinely love Pep, even though she was very much afraid to show it-- both to the colt and herself; being so long-lived did tempt one to avoid forming attachments (even if she had failed to resist the charms of one in particular)-- for fear of coddling him or possibly making the boy afraid of the outside world. She had not utterly failed as a mother, though! She had successfully taught Pep to think for himself, even if the conclusions he reached were ones she couldn’t stomach. Clover hadn’t seen her son, or her husband, for at least a year now; since she left their caravan in order to pursue more magical experimentation among the dragons to the NorthWest. It was strange, she never had really sought company before, but she very sharply felt the absence of her family when she saw the families of dragons living in Ember Vale, where she had been for the last few months.
Whimsy Weatherbee-- a stout, chubby dragon, with orange scales on her body, red spines lining her back, a kind, round face, and overall motherly appearance-- made her way down the stairs leisurely, her clawed feet making a heavy thud with each step against the wooden platforms. “G’mornin, Ms. Clover!” her chirpy voice rang out, “Did ya sleep okay?”
“Aye, lass, that I did. Thank ya.” Clover stated flatly, but with an appreciative smile. “It’s still awful kind of ye to let me stay with you an’ yer family. I’m not exactly… welcome by my kind back home anymore.” Clover felt stinging tears threaten to to streak across her face-- remembering Greenie’s raised voice telling her not to ever come back, and Pep’s tearful eyes when she dismissed what he told her so readily-- but she just hid her face behind her mane, trying not to take advantage of Mrs. Weatherbee’s kindness anymore than she already had by implicitly demanding comfort. This failed, as she gave a very audible sniffle.
“Clover, you’re shuddering…” Whimsy began, and put a clawed hand on the back of the unicorn’s neck. “You don’t have to talk about it, but I could tell from the moment I met you that you’re not a bad pony. I’m an excellent judge of character!” She said, permitting herself a momentary chuckle, before putting on a serious face, and looking Clover right in the eye. “Seriously, though, Clover. We all change as we get older, and-- at least in my neck of the woods-- it’s usually for the better. I can’t think that whatever ya did that you’re running from is really so bad that you can’t be forgiven.”
“Ye cannae know that, Whimsy!” Clover spat, barely avoiding shouting. Whimsy flinched at the sudden snap, and Clover apologized with a scrunched muzzle and a hoof on the dragon’s shoulder. “Sorry, I’m just… I mean…” She was interrupted by an unrestrained, crushing, dragon hug.
“It’s okay, honey, I know you’re having a rough time…” Whimsy whispered in as comforting a tone as she could. “I just hope I can help you somehow, is all. I’m worried about you, spendin’ all that time running around casting spells in the woods back there. You’ve been a great help with tutoring Spike, that’s for sure, but--” Clover started bawling unreservedly at the mention of her housemate’s son, thinking of her own little Peppermint, and how he must hate her so very much.
“Uh, mom,” a little dragon whelp-- with purple scales, a yellow underbelly, and green-and-orange spines on his back-- began nervously. “Is Mrs. Clover okay…?”
“Yes, Spikey, she’s just having a…” She paused for a second, considering her words carefully. Ponies were so emotional, you really had to be careful with them. “Nervous breakdown? No that’s not it, it’s more of a… self-pity-induced ugly-cry!” Clover began to sob harder, thinking she definitely deserved this, even if it wasn’t intentional on part of the dragon.
“Mom, I really don’t think you’re helping…”
“Oh, hush, Kenbroth, you’re only fifteen.” She replied, pointy snout turned up, petting the sobbing unicorn like a cat.
“Hey, fifteen and three quarters!” The (relatively) little dragon snarled, white smoke puffing out of his nostrils in a chuff.
It had been two and a half years since Minty had come out to her parents as a trans molly, and the rest of the caravan ran her mom out of camp on a rail-- not literally, of course. The nearest train tracks were all the way up in Unicornia. While Minty had never gotten along particularly well with her mother, she genuinely expected her to-- as Sunny Daze said-- ‘be, like, chill about it, okay?’ But Clover was most certainly not ‘chill’ about it, Clover may well have demonstrated such a severe lack of chill that medical diagnoses would consider it terminal. She was all ‘Peppermint, you cannae jus’ decide te be a different gender than ye already are!’ and ‘Magicians like me have been tryin’ to make a spell ta do that fer centuries, an it jus’ doesn’t work right!’ Minty didn’t care about that.
Minty didn’t care about being exactly like every other molly, mare, or jenny; that just wasn’t important to her. Minty just wanted to be Minty, and part of that was, even if only superficially, being a girl. Dad understood that, his friend Moondancer and her foal Razzaroo did too, and so did Sunny, Alphabittle, and… Whoever else! Minty didn’t need to rationalize how she felt by going down a list of everypony else she knew, and she certainly didn’t need mom’s approval either! No matter how much she wanted it, no matter how much of her sixteen years on earth she had dedicated to trying to win Clover’s approval, and never getting it for anything because she wasn’t born with a unicorn horn and couldn’t do magic like her mother!!
Minty bawled to herself, wrapped up in a blanket in the bed of a covered wagon, full of hay. She felt like doing nothing. Just rotting away and allowing the moss, and worms, and flowers to reclaim her… Until a raspy, yet sill high pitched voice, accompanied by blue-and-white mane, a purple horn, and two donkey ears of the same color stirred her from her usual evening-crash-reverie.
“Hey P-- uh, crap-- Minty!” Razzaroo fumbled. He meant well, but he’d known Minty since forever as ‘Peppermint,’ and could be forgiven for the occasional fumble. “We’re nearly to Ponyville now. You gonna get up or just stay in that little quilted cocoon?" Minty grumbled, sniffled, and hid a grin from Razz.
“Hehe… quilted cocoon…” she said to herself, with a slight chuckle, but otherwise didn’t respond to her friend.
“Is she out yet?” A voice somehow both boisterous and shrill called out, much louder than necessary given how close its speaker was to the wagon.
“No, Sunny, but you know how excited she was to come here and see that medicine mare though, so we gotta get her up.”
“Oh, right!” Minty brayed, and jumped to her hooves. “Lamplight! I gotta go see Mrs. Lamplight!”
“Well hey there, dead-mare-walking.” Sunny said with a playful sneer. “I thought Razz would never learn enough necromancy to get you up out of your grave, good-looking!”
Minty flushed at this, and found herself privately wishing Sunny Daze wasn’t such a flirt, but she’d be lying to herself if she didn’t admit the confidence boost was a much needed one-- even if the lack of it could be easily corrected by Lamplight once they reached Ponyville. She stepped down out of the wagon and walked along with her two friends, almost bouncing in place with excitement. “Sorry for being such a log, guys.”
“It’s not your fault that your mom is so totally uncool, Mints.” Sunny said, with complete sincerity that she never once thought might be diminished by her phrasing.
“Yeah, no offense, Minty, but…” Razz paused, and looked thoughtful, but then simply stated “Clover was a real jerk,” and left it at that, as he used his baby blue magical aura to pick pieces of hay out of Minty’s mane.
“None taken, and I gotta agree,” Minty nodded along. “But, let’s just not talk about my mom, okay?”
“Sure, sorry.” Razz stated flatly, and looked guiltily at the ground.
“Tubular, girl!” Sunny brayed with great enthusiasm, before her eyes momentarily widened, and she pensively added “Oh, and, uh, sorry.”
It was early in the morning-- earlier than she would have liked, at least-- when Skywishes was roused from sleep by a distant, and slightly muffled, hello. It took her a few seconds to understand that the voice, which she only just had begun to recognize as Pinky Pie’s, was coming from the crystal ball at the other side of the room. Skywishes would have preferred to get up and answer it herself, but knew she wasn’t meant to get out of bed in her condition without assistance, so she decided instead to wake up Starcatcher; who was curled up like a cat at the foot of the bed. Skywishes nudged her wife in the side with a hoof. “Star…?”
No response.
“Starry.” A slightly harder jab this time.
Starcatcher met this with some gentle writhing and incoherent grumbling. Skywishes cursed herself for marrying such an adorable goofball.
“STARCATCHER!”
“WAUGH!!” The pegasus’ eyes went as wide as saucers as she jumped up out of bed, landing on the wooden floor with a great *thud.*
“Good morning, sleepyhead!” Skywishes chuckled to herself. “Sorry for the literal rude awakening, but I think Pinky and Minty are trying to call us.
Starcatcher, bags under her eyes, responded to this with a great, back-popping stretch, a grunt of acknowledgement, and a gentle forehead kiss, which made Skywishes involuntarily squeak. Starcatcher seemed to be quite a gruff pony, but she really was very sweet.
As Starry approached the crystal ball, Minty could be heard braying out a louder *HELLOOO*, afterwhich Pinky shushed her, and giggled. Starcatcher swooped the red felt blanket covering the ball with a wing, and gave the projected images a hearty “G’mornin’, mates!”
“Starcatcher!” the pink and green ponies excitedly chirped, as the white pegasus in question carried the ball in her wings over to her ailing love’s bedside table, followed by a “Skywishes!!”
“How are you two doing?” Pinky asked.
“Sorry for not checking in with you the last few days have been totally crazy and ridiculous and we have new friends now and we’re--” Minty’s lack of punctuation meant she had to take in a deep breath, and she started to begin again, but Skywishes cut her off.
“Hey, hey, hey! Take it easy, Molly. We kinda figured, but I won’t lie and say we haven’t been worried sick.”
“I wasn’t,” Starcatcher said with a smug expression.
“Liar!” Skywishes sat up to playfully jab her wife, giggling, but got winded from this very minor activity and had to lay her head back down on the pillow.
“Easy, dear, easy…” Starcatcher said softly, and loomed protectively over Sky.
“Gosh, are you okay?” Pinky asked, with genuine concern.
“Gotta say, not really.” Skywishes replied. “I mean, I’m not any worse than when it started, but I’m not any better either.”
“Not worse is good!” Minty said, trying to lighten the mood, as she is wont to do. “You seem to be in good spirits for somepony with a mythological disease that only exists for the purpose of deific succession.” Minty gave an empty-headed smile, and was met with silence while everyone else looked at her in astonishment that she had described anything so… dryly.
Starcatcher broke the awkward silence by clearing her throat, and then proceeded to ask, “So, you two there are new friends of Pinks and Mints, eh? Care to introduce yaselves?”
A dark purple unicorn mare, and a striking white mane suddenly appeared, much too close to the crystal ball, as she much-too-excitedly asked “Are you talking about fadeaway??”
The two ponies in the hospital couldn’t help but flinch at this, before Skywishes answered “Um, yes? Is that… good?”
“Oh, no, it’s very bad. There aren’t any reliable historical documents referring to it as a real disease, other than some half-burned manuscripts attributed to--”
She was cut off by two buttercream yellow forelegs pulling her back to reveal a second pony-- an absolutely towering pegasus mare with a pink mane and distressed expression, who admonished the unicorn: “Twilight, stop, you’re scaring her!”
“But Flitter-Flutter, I--”
“Guys!” Pinky Pie’s head poked out between the two ponies. “Please just introduce yourselves?”
“No, no, it’s okay!” Skywishes assured them, “I’m already not as optimistic as I’d like to be…” She gave a mirthless chuckle, and Starcatcher rested her chin on the purple mare’s head in a gesture of comfort, while shooting a glare at the newcomers.
“So, you haven’t made any real progress, is what you’re sayin’?” Starcatcher said venomously, as Minty came into frame.
“No, Starcatcher, we have! We’ve got Twilight Twinkle with us! She’s a really super-duper powerful magician, and I’m sure she can help us!” Minty chirped with a grin.
The door to the hospital room suddenly swung open, just carefully enough not to slam against the wall, but with very deliberate aggression; as a tall, thin, purple unicorn strode into the room. “Are you two okay? What’s all the commotion?” Lamplight looked back and forth between the other two, and then her eyes became saucers upon seeing the crystal ball-- and specifically a very familiar pony depicted upon it-- “Dusk!?”
“May I have a word with my child, alone, for a minute?” Lamplight didn’t wait for an answer as she hoisted the crystal ball in her gilt telekineses. Minty and Pinky wordlessly left the room, as far as was visible to the medicine mare, while she rested the ball on its stand in her private study. Flitter Flutter-- as she thought she had heard Du… Twilight-- call the primrose giantess who seemed to stay by her foal’s side. “Alone, please,” the doctor reiterated.
“Flutters, it’s okay.” Twilight patted her friend-- Lamplight assumed-- on the shoulder, and the pegasus slowly walked away, shooting a pleading look back at both unicorns before lamplight heard a door shut out-of-view. Twilight cleared her throat, and then barely managed a weak “Hello.”
“Hello? Hello??” Lamplight fumed, “You drop off the face of the Earth for four years and all you can think to say is ‘hello’!?”
Flitter Flutter was the last to exit the room, brushing a wing against the door on her way out to shut it, eyes fixed firmly on the ground.
One of the other two express concern, and Flutters tells them that Twi ran away from home because of feeling stifled by her mom’s home environment, and being trans probably just compounded that. Pinky interjects that there’s no way Lamplight would have any issue with Twilight being a mare; Lamplight actually was the first magician to successfully perform long-term transmogrifications on ponies. Minty, Pinky, and another who neither of them have the right to name, have been having it done for years. That’s actually half the reason Minty settled down in Ponyville in the first place, the other half being her metaphorical 'other half,' Pinky Pie. Medical Magicians across 'Ponydom' have been practicing this for a year or more at this point, and its surprising that Twilight, as avid a reader as she is, wasn’t aware.
“Though, truth-be-told,” Pinky remarked as she lifted a tome from the tower shelves into her telekineses, “pretty much all of these are really… uhhh…”
“Old?” Minty added.
“More like ancient.” Pinky nodded.
“Well, Twilight has been pretty hesitant to leave whatever house we’ve stayed in since I’ve known her.” Flitter Flutter offered, seeming to piece several things together in her head. “Maybe she was worried somepony would recognize her? Through family resemblance, I-I mean.” She cleared her throat, then continued with a weary smile, “W-well, bearing that in mind, we probably have nothing to worry about.”
“Other than her running away from home, you mean?” Minty asked, with genuine curiosity.
“Minty!” Pinky chided.
“What!?”
“... I’m sorry.” Twilight offered, weakly.
“You had better be!”
Twilight could do little else but offer a wince, as Lamplight took and breath and tried her best to cool her temper.
“I love you very much and I missed you so much, and I am very happy that I at least know you’re okay now, but I was so scared…” Lamplight couldn’t help but choke on those last words, raising a hoof in front of her eyes to block what Twinkle could only assume were tears.
“I-I love you too, mom…” Twilight sniffled, and her own foolishness hurt her heart for not the first time.
“I… I won’t make you talk about it, I know you don’t like to discuss your feelings, but please, come home.”
“W-what?”
“Please, Du-- er-- Twilight. Whatever I did to scare you away, I…” Lamplight paused, seeming to consider her next words carefully, which would be somewhat redundant in her case if not for the circumstances. “However I hurt you, I-I can’t promise I won’t do it again, but I can promise I’ll try to make it right. You’re a brilliant magician, a-and I could really use your help.”
“M-mom, I-I…” Twilight couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Her mom… needed her help? All those years of pushing her to be the perfect little school ‘colt’ and being told she wasn’t good enough, and NOW she wanted help? Well, what the hay, her girlfriend was a bloodthirsty vampire who regularly maimed her, and that issue seemed to suddenly be under control after years of frantic research-- she still couldn’t believe she hadn’t looked into herbal remedies rather than thaumaturgy-- so what was one more interpersonal trauma to confront?
“My child, p-please… There’s a pony who is very sick, and I’ve been stuck for days.”
“Okay.” Twilight said, resolutely other than her sniffle.
“W-what?” Lamplight’s eyes shone like her namesake.
“I’ll start the journey home today.” Twilight offered a reassuring smile, her confidence returning to her, finally receiving the praise from her mother she had needed for so long. Lamplight’s confusion about her foal’s gender could be resolved with time and a series of heart-to-hearts that were a long time coming anyways.
“Though, mom, I do have a stipulation…”
“Do you two really have to go?” Minty pleaded, looking up at Twilight and Flitter Flutter with her trademark puppy-dog-eyes and droopy ears.
“We do,” Twilight answered, stalwart, “my mother needs my help, and if you and her have similar knowledge of herbs as you say, she can help my…” Twilight blushed, and pulled Flitter Flutter to her side tighter. “M-marefirend, hehe!” She giggled like a smitten schoolfilly for neither the first or last time, as the larger yellow pony nuzzled the side of her head, both of them still very much in the ‘honeymoon’ phase of their blossoming relationship.
“Why don’t we all just go home together with the recall rune?” Minty asked, already dropping her saddlebags to the ground to begin rummaging for it.
“Are you sure it works with all our stuff and not just… ourselves?” Pinky asked, tilting her head to the side in genuine curiosity.
“Oh, I have absolutely no idea!” Minty giggled, losing none of her cheer.
“Well, can we really afford to take that risk, Twilight?” Flitter Flutter asked, somehow only now noticing that Twilight had gone and started gathering her books and alchemical equipment into satchels and loading them into a wagon downstairs that she didn’t know they still had until this very moment.
“Nope!” Twinkle stated with confidence, as if she needed to give any more answer than what she had already done.
“It was a nice try, Mints.” Pinky hugged her from the side for reassurance, even though Minty didn’t seem offended in the slightest. She, of course, returned the gesture anyways-- eliciting an ‘awwwww’ from Flitter Flutter, who began helping her partner pack.
Several hours, lots of packing, and a lunch of daisy sandwiches later, Twinkle and Flutter were hitched to their wagons-- a second was needed for all the books-- and ready to set off.
“Are you sure you don’t want to just use Breezy Blossom instead?” Pinky asked for what felt like the bajillionth time, “Based on that map you showed us, it could take you a week or more to get to Ponyville without that shortcut, whereas it took us only a day and night.”
“I’ve been trying to talk her into it, but Twilight is decided.” Flitter Flutter said, before leaning closer to Pinky and saying much quieter-- with uncharacteristic confidence: “Just between you and me, I think she just wants to spend time with me.~”
“Well, who wouldn’t?” Minty asked as Pinky grinned. “You’re, uh…”
“Hot.” Pinky stated matter-of-factly, Minty nodding sagely in agreement. Flitter Flutter squeaked, and hid her face in her mane, her confidence having been shattered through the affirmation of it. Oh, the duality of mare!
“Alright, girls, it’s almost two o’clock, and we’ve got to get moving. Sorry again we couldn’t introduce you two to the townsfolk, this was just very spontaneous!” Twilight said with a rueful chuckle.
“It’s okay! We’ve got a schedule to keep too.” Pinky said, waving as the two began trotting off in the opposite direction.
“Send a postcard! Or something!” Minty added, and then insisted on sitting there and continuing to wave as the other two disappeared into the woods.
It was a fairly typical afternoon in Trottingham; the bees were buzzing, birds tweeting, ponies trotting to-and-fro to accomplish their responsibilities and generally be cute and colorful, and there were two new strangers milling about to replace the two who had left earlier that same day.
After seeing off their new friends, Minty Mule and Pinky Pie decided to meet the townsponies, and ask around about other nearby places, but didn’t make it particularly far into the endeavor before happening across a pony who could offer just the assistance they needed.
“It’s very nice to meet you, Bubbles!” Pinky said, shaking the hoof of the grey-furred pegasus before her, who blew her yellow mane out of her face in such a way as to reveal her lazy eye.
“Likewise, Miss Pie.” The mare replied, cordially, and tipped her mail carrier hat at the two greeting her. “It’s nice to see a familiar face around her, Minty!”
“Yeah!” Minty said, affectionately nuzzling her apparent acquaintance. “How’ve you been, Bumbles?”
“You two know each other?” Pinky asked.
“Oh, yeah!” Minty said, as Bubbles hugged her. “We both grew up in the same wagon train!”
“Small world, eh?” Bubbles giggled and let Minty go. “What brings you both to this li’l ol’ place?”
“We stopped here as part of a larger trip.” said Pinky.
“Me too,” replied Bubbles, with a swell of pride, “I’m one of her majesty, Queen Starshine’s, royal courier service.” She flared out her wings and giggled. “I don’t think I’ll ever get tired saying that.”
“Movin’ up in the world, huh?” Minty beamed, and clapped her forehooves together for her friend.
“Heck yes! Where you guys headed?”
“Unicornia, probably” Pinky said, unsure of the answer she gave. “We’re trying to, um…”
“Learn more about an ancient prophetic myth in order to cure a friend of a disease previously thought not to exist.” Minty added with her usual smile.
“Right, we’re… uh, doing that.” Pinkie said awkwardly. “Yeah.”
“Oh jeez, that sounds important.” Bubbles said, blinking as though doing a double-take, and her lazy eye finally focusing on the same faces as her other. “And grueling. Do you have a map?”
Minty pulled the map out of her saddle bag with her teeth, and offered it to Bubbles, who took it and winced. “Yikes, girls… this is-”
“Out of date?” Minty interrupted. “We know, it was the newest we had.”
“The newest you had? Where are you two coming from?”
“Uhhh… Ponyville?” Pinky said, tentatively.
“My Queen in the sky! How long did it take you two to get here?”
“One day and one night.” Minty stated, with no indication that she saw how astounded Bubbles was.
Bubbles stared blankly at her old friend for a few silent seconds, her lazy eye drifting back to the side. “Okay, well, I won’t pretend to understand how you accomplished that, but I can give you my spare map from the royal Courier-in-Chief.” She said, putting the confusion out of her mind and pulling a neatly rolled, very new-looking (and smelling) map scroll, which Minty gratefully accepted into her teeth.
“That’s so kind of you, Bubbles!” Pinky began. “I don’t know how we could thank you--”
“No, no, none of that. They’ll give me another one with no questions asked.” Bubbles waved a hoof in front of you dismissively. “I’d be shirking my duty to our Queen by not protecting her ponies through the provision of up-to-date, accurate navigational aides!” She haughtily said without a hint of irony.
“Oh wow, Pinky, look!” Minty said, and pointed a hoof at the unrolled map.
When Pinky did look she was astounded. The colors were so vibrant, the lines so bold, and the text in the key was so… legible! That’s not even mentioning that it seemed just about impossible to smudge the ink, if Minty’s ineffectual pawing at it while chuckling was any indication.
Bubbles stood over them with a look of pride. “This map, like all other provided by her majesty, is waterproof, fireproof, smudge-and-scratch resistant, tear resistant, and enchanted to glow in the dark just enough that you can reliably read it without a source of light.”
“Bubbles, this is incredible! Thank you so much!” Minty hugged her again, and Pinky would have too if she knew the mailmare better.
“Woah, Molly!” Bubbles chuckled. “I already told ya, there’s nothing I ask in return, I just want you to be safe, okay?”
“Right, and thank you.” Pinky said with a nod, Minty squeaking out something vaguely like an affirmation. “Bubbles, we’d be more than happy to tell you how we made the trip in just one day, if you have the time.”
“Thanks, but no thanks!” She replied, flaring her wings out again and checking to make sure her satchel was buckled properly. “I’ve still got about three-hundred letters to deliver by the end of the day, and also Minty seems always to find a way to do the impossible.” She gave a wink to her now blushing green-coated friend, and took to the skies gracefully. “See you two around, the Sun and Moon know that’s where I’ll be!”
The other two bid yet another friend goodbye, hopeful for another to cross paths with soon.
