Chapters Twilight once again woke up to the sun barely cresting over the horizon. Today was a beautiful day in Ponyville, just like any other. The pegasi had already cleared the sky of clouds from yesterday, which allowed the entire town to bask in warm sunlight. Some ponies were already awake and roaming the streets of Ponyville, buying the groceries for the day or meeting with friends. Since it was well into spring, the entire town was also covered in flowers and other greenery; be it earth pones with their gardens of tomatoes and carrots, or the Sower Smith memorial garden over the bridge. Twilight couldn’t have asked for a better day than today. She bolted into the back room and closed the door.
In the past few weeks, she had been a little more restless than usual. She had been studying a new spell from an ancient scroll she found in the Starswirl the Bearded section of the ancient Canterlot archives. It was by far one of the most complex and energy-consuming spell she had ever seen, but she knew that being Celestia’s prized student meant that she needed to push her limits from time to time. She hoped that the princess would be immensely impressed with this particular spell, though. She had spent weeks reading it and the last few days practicing it by herself. Now that she felt ready to test it, she would need a victim…
“Spike? Can you come up here? I need help with something!”
“Coming Twilight…” called out Spike from downstairs. ‘He must have been eating breakfast,’ thought Twilight. ‘Oops!’
Twilight continued to read the scroll until she heard footstep coming up the stairs. Spike came through the door looking more tired than usual. He had had a late night with one of Pinkie Pie’s parties, and he fell asleep before the party was over. Twilight had to carry him back, and in the process he “accidentally” threw up on her back. He had eaten way too many sweets, and it took the poor unicorn two hours to wash the stink off. Now she wanted payback.
Twilight closed her eyes. Her horn sparked.
“Twilight, I was just barely making breakfast, what do you need?”
Her horn grew brighter.
“Hey, Twi… what are you—“
When Twilight opened her eyes again, everything looked the same as it did before; none of the books had moved, Spike looked as tired as ever as he stared at her…but everything was so still. She walked over to Spike. Not a single part of him was moving. This could only mean one thing.
“YES! My time-stop spell worked! I knew I could do it!” Twilight squealed in joy as she hopped around the room singing “I did it, I did it, I did it!” in a style not unlike Pinkie Pie. “Okay, now I only have a few minutes before the spell wears off, gotta act fast!” She reached behind the desk in the study and pulled out a quill and some ink. She walked over to her frozen assistant, dipped the quill in the ink, and started to draw a fake mustache on his lip. She made sure to draw it as big and swirly as she could, so that Spike would walk around town looking like a very fancy baby dragon, even if he wasn’t a baby anymore.
It had been about 7 years since the two moved into the library here in Ponyville. That would put Spike at about 15, even though looking at him you couldn’t tell. He had barely grown over the years, but to the trained eye of his unofficial big sister, she could see that he had grown about 2 inches and was starting to lose some of his baby fat. He was still the same Spike she had always known, though.
She had barely put the finishing touches on his mustache when the spell began to wear off, and the world returned to normal. Spike saw that Twilight was inches from his face. “What happened?”
“Oh, I…uh…teleported over to you. This is really important!” Twilight tried to act serious, but could not contain the enormous smile on her face.
“Okay? What is it?”
Twilight didn’t think her plan this far. “Well, I… you see, it’s kinda… PICTURE! That’s it! I need to take a picture of you!” She ran over to her desk and grabbed the small camera in the drawer. “Okay Spike, Hold still!”
“Are you sure you’re okay Twilight?”
CLICK
“All finished!” Twilight informed him with a grin, “That’s all I needed help with Spike. Thanks!”
Spike still had an incredulous look on his face, so Twilight tried smiling even brighter. Spike just decided to ignore the weirdness of his friend.
“O…kay then Twilight…Hey, I was wondering, if you don’t need my help today, can I go over to Rarity’s boutique and see if I can help out?”
‘This is perfect!’ Twilight thought. “Of course you can Spike. Are you ever going to tell her about how you lo—“
“What? Love? No, I don’t LOVE her Twilight, that’s crazy! Where did you ever get that idea?”
“You told me. And I take that as a no?”
Spike blushed. “I’ll tell her when I’m ready, don’t push me Twilight, GEEZ!”
Teenagers.
Spike left the room, and Twilight knew that he would rush to Rarity’s store as fast as he could. He didn’t even notice the mustache! This was priceless! Twilight put the scroll with the time-stop spell back onto the shelves until she could return it to the archives the next time she was in Canterlot. Next, she pulled out her checklist for the day and checked off “Prank Spike”. Next on the list was to go buy some food for a dinner she would throw tomorrow night.
She had invited all of her friends over to commemorate this day, which had the anniversary of the defeat of Discord. But for them, it was more than that; because of the Elements of Harmony, they have been closer than friends to each other, closer than they had ever been to anypony (except Applejack, who had been dating Doctor Whooves for a while). They felt more like sisters, and ever since they came together to defeat Discord, all six of them realized this.
Twilight levitated her saddle bags onto her back and walked out the door. It was still just as beautiful as it had been this morning, except with maybe a few more ponies hustling and bustling down the street. One such pony bounced her way through the crowd towards Twilight.
“Hello there, Twilight!”
“Hi Pinkie Pie!” Twilight called out waving her hoof towards her jubilant and bouncy friend. “Isn’t today just lovely?”
“Oh my gosh, it is! I can’t remember there being a day any more beautiful than this one, although there are a LOT of beautiful days here in Ponyville. But the best thing about a good day is that there’s bound to be a good night following it!” Pinkie Pie finally took a breath. “Which reminds me; I’m throwing a slumber party tonight, and I wanted to invite all of my friends, which includes you and I REEEEALLY hope that you can come, so can you come?”
Twilight looked at her long list of things to do to prepare for the dinner tomorrow. “I’m sorry Pinky, but I still have a lot to do to prepare for the dinner tomorrow.”
“Oh no, that means that you can’t make it too! Rarity and Fluttershy already said they were too busy… but I guess it will still be a party even with just Applejack and Rainbow Dash! Oh, and I am most definitolutely going to be there tomorrow!”
Twilight pulled out her list and made a quick note. “Thanks for letting me know Pinky!”
“Sure thing Twilight! I gotta go get some chips for tonight, see you later!” Pinkie bounced off and disappeared into the crowd.
Twilight watched Pinkie Pie as far as she could see. She looked at all the ponies that were cantering up and down the streets. Seven years ago she didn’t know what friendship was, and now she wouldn’t give it up for all the books in Equestria. She loved her friends.
Rarity was knee-deep in bright neon fabric as she frantically sewed these fleece jackets and skintight vests. Rarity knew that fashion usually cycled every 30 or so years, but she honestly hoped that the 80’s would never come back. She nearly had a heart attack every time she thought about all the clothing she wore, the ridiculous mane styles she tried… it was a fashion disaster! But everypony was willing to buy these clothes, so Rarity continued to make those horrid arm bands and hats.
Suddenly, she heard a knock at the door. “Come in!” Rarity called out as she laced the thread. She heard the door open and close, and footsteps coming up to her. “Look, if you’re here for your vest, then it isn’t ready.”
“Oh, well I’m not here for a vest, but if you have one I’m sure it would be fantastic!”
Rarity heard the voice and was relieved that it was Spike. “I’m so sorry about that, Spike. I’m just really swamped with orders and my boutique is just a horrid mess.” Spike looked around and nodded in agreement. Rarity must have been so busy for the last few days because there was so many scrap fabric and boxes lying on the floor that he couldn’t see the ground anymore; just a neon sea. “Actually, it’s a wonderful happenstance that you’re here, I would love some assistance. Can you spare a few moments?”
‘Of course I can! That’s why I came here! Well, that and because I love you.’ Spike thought, even though his words were a little different; “Well, I guess I can help. What do you need help with?”
Rarity turned around. “Well, first we need to— OH MY GOSH SPIKE, WHAT IS THAT?”
“What’s what?”
“Did you… draw that?”
Spike turned around and looked at himself in the mirror—fake mustache and all. It reminded him of the time that Twilight had learned her 25th spell, only this wasn’t a REAL mustache. “Twilight…” Spike knew that it had to have been her. He had no idea how, but Twilight did it. He would get her back later. He looked in the mirror again. It wasn’t that bad.
“Spike, I know you’re excited to grow up, but I don’t think this is the way to go!” The two of them laughed for a long tie together. It was times like these, when Spike saw Rarity so happy, that he felt butterflies in his stomach and wanted nothing more than to tell her how he really felt. But fear always just barely stopped him.
The next few hours were filled with rarity finishing up her orders as Spike gathered all the pieces of fabric thrown onto the ground and burning the pieces that Rarity could no longer use. He took the bigger scraps and organized them by color into different bins. Spike used to hate doing this, but as he grew up with Twilight (the pony who once made him take out all the books in the library, wipe the shelves, and place all the books back exactly as they were) he could do these kind of tasks quickly.
Spike looked up to see what had caused Rarity so much time and work. They were neon bright vests, jackets, and hats. To Spike, they looked like a mismatched set of oddly colored quilts draped over the pony mannequins, but since these were Rarity’s doing, and since she knew more about fashion than anypony he knew, they must be what was in style. “Wow Rarity, those look… colorful!”
Rarity chuckled. “Go ahead Spike; tell me what you really think about them!”
“No, honest! I would definitely like one!”
“Really? And you would wear it?”
“Well… yeah…” Spike tried, but he didn’t know what to say about these very crazy pieces of clothing.
Rarity smiled. “Thank you Spike for caring about my feelings about fashion, but even I have times when I find some fashion styles these ponies follow that are not very fabulous in my opinion. Now, tell me what you really think about these vests!”
Spike looked at the vests. He looked as long as he could. “Honestly, the brightness kinda hurts my eyes.”
“Good, then I’m not the only one! Honestly, I thought this fashion would be done away with in the eighties… I guess I was wrong.”
“Did you wear these kinds of clothes back then Rarity?”
“WHAT? No, of course I didn’t Spike, I would never follow a style like this, no matter how popular it was back then!”
“Then why did you just flip over that picture over there?” Spike knew she was trying to distract him, but he noticed her horn light up a picture frame on Rarity’s work table and turn it around. She was hiding it. “What are you hiding?”
“Nothing! Just get back to work, please Spike?”
“If it’s nothing, then can I see it?”
“No, you can’t. Please Spike, for me?” She batted her eyes at Spike, trying to make him forget what they were talking about. If he had been any younger, he would have fallen for it; but he had lived here for seven years, and was somewhat used to Rarity’s flirtatious ways. Spike ran for the table and grabbed the picture frame before Rarity could levitate it any higher.
What Spike saw was, in his mind, one of the greatest sights he had ever laid eyes on. It was Rarity, wearing a vest not unlike the ones she was working on. Judging from the background in the picture, it was taken sometime when she was in high school. Spike thought she looked cute, but what she was wearing nearly made him fall to the ground in laughter. She was wearing an unnecessarily large amount of bracelets and necklaces, all different colors, and higher up on her legs were bright neon purple arm sleeves. And her hair… she had abandoned her naturally beautiful curly hair and turned it into an enormous beehive. She looked ridiculous, and Spike could tell Rarity thought so too by the way her face turned a deep shade of red as she walked over to him.
“In my defense, it was popular back then. Please don’t tell anyone.”
Spike looked up at Rarity. “Why are you so embarrassed? I mean, it is a little strange at first, but you can pull it off! You look really great, even in this picture!”
Rarity’s blush grew darker. “My, Spike, you really are the charmer. Thank you.” Spike readied himself for what he thought was the perfect kissing moment. “Now, GIVE ME THE PICTURE!”
“Okay.” ‘Dang, shot down again.’
The next few hours continued along as the two finished up the work. Spike was exhausted, and Rarity was almost growing tired of sewing, but they were nearly done. Spike noticed that it helped when Rarity sang as the two worked. In all the years that Spike knew the unicorn, he never grew tired of hearing her lovely soprano voice, like a chorus of angels, ring through the shop. This was just one more thing that Spike loved about Rarity.
“Spike, it’s nearly sundown! You better go back home, you have helped me so much today! Thank you!” Rarity walked over to Spike and gave him a big hug. Was it Spike’s imagination, or were the hugs slowly getting longer and longer every day? He felt lost in her embrace. Again, the butterflies came back and he wanted nothing more than to tell Rarity what she meant to him, and to ask if she felt the same way about him. But once again fear stopped him as the words began to roll off his tongue. Instead of words coming out, Spike could only grunt a few syllables.
“Spike, are you okay darling?”
“Oh, I’m fine…just need a little bit of water.”
“Okay, let me get that for you really quick!”
As soon as Rarity left the room, Spike started to silently yell at himself; “C’mon, Spike! Why is it so hard for you to tell her this? You’ve waited seven years, you know you love her, just say it? What’s the worst thing that could happen? I mean, besides her rejecting me… or telling everypony about my crush, and all of them start laughing at me…or if Twilight still doesn’t approve of us…”
Rarity came back into the room with a glass of water. “Here you go Spike, I hope that this helps!”
“Thank you!” Spike took the glass and chugged the contents in one gulp. There was a small moment of silence between the two. ‘Spike, it’s now or never!’
“Rarity?”
“Yes Spike?”
“…see you later!” And Spike rushed out the door without a hug or a goodbye from the love of his life. Spike walked back to the library with a spirit of defeat. He had the perfect opportunity, but fear got the better of him.
Spike entered the library to the sound of pans clicking and hooves running rampant in the kitchen. ‘Twilight, what is going on?”
“Oh, Spike! Thank goodness you are here!” Twilight sounded out of breath,and there was food splattered all over her face and mane. “I need help preparing the food for tomorrow!”
‘Okay, another normal day for Twi’s number one assistant!’
“Sure thing Twi, what do you need?”
He couldn’t believe what he had just heard! After everything that happened to them, after the pain and suffering, the death of people they loved and cared about… this felt like he was seeing the rainbow after a horrible hurricane.
“Big Mac, I’m gonna need ya to hold this here barrel for me.”
“Eeyup.” The large, red stallion lifted the barrel with ease and held it under the tree for his sister while she kicked the trunk of thee tree as hard as she could. In one hit, Applejack had knocked nearly all of the apples out of the tree and into the barrel on Big Mac’s back. The two earth ponies walked this barrel back to the barn where all the other barrels were being held.
Applejack and Big Mac were busy at work in the middle of Applebuck season, and were in a hurry to remove all the apples before the stormy season. They had been hard at work all morning, waking up at the crack of dawn with the rooster, and working until the sun set. Twilight had always been nice enough to help their Apple family by dividing the orchard into groups, and making fancy charts and reports over the years to determine how many apples they would have growing, and a quota of how many apples they needed to harvest in order to harvest the entire orchard.
Applejack thought this would make things easier, but instead it only added to her stress. Even when working as fast as they could they never seemed to be “ahead of schedule”; this time of the year was always stressful on the Apple family. In a way, that was why Applejack was so thankful for her brother. He was always so calm and reassuring, the perfect balance to her hot headedness. Had she been working with anyone else, she would have already started screaming and rushing to try and buck all the apples. Not with Macintosh here, though. Of course, she would never tell him any of this, but it was still nice to have him around.
Big Mac lowered the barrel back onto the ground. “Well sis, I think Applebloom said she would make us lunch. Should we take a break fer a while?”
“Sure, that sound mighty sweet of Applebloom,” replied Applejack, still slightly out of breath from bucking apples all morning.
As the two walked into the room, they were greeted with an unnatural burning smell coming from the kitchen. Granny Smith’s voice could be heard coming from the kitchen: “Now, be careful there darlin’, yer makin’ the fire too big!”
“Don’ worry Granny, ah know what ah’m doing!”
Soon after, Granny Smith came out and explained to the others what was happening in the kitchen; Applebloom was trying as hard as she could to cook the food on her own (she was growing up, and recently it seemed that she wanted to do everything without help, trying to prove that she was growing up, not a kid anymore. Applejack remembered when she was like that), even though the most she knew how to cook on her own was daisy sandwiches and carrot sticks.
“She’s just tryin’ ter grow up so fast,” Granny explained, a tear coming to her eye as she remembered the little filly that used to be Applebloom.
Big Man gave his grandmother a hug, and silently whispered “Don’ worry gran-gran, she’s jus’ tryin’ ta find out who she is. She’s still the little filly we love.”
“That’s right grandma! Just like me when ah was her age!” Applejack chimed in.
“Oh, I know you two’r right… still doesn’t give’er the excuse ta kick me outta my own kitchen!”
The three laughed together as they dispersed themselves among the small table in their dining room to wait for Applebloom to finish making lunch.
“So, how’s the harvestin’ goin’?”
“Gramma, I don’t think we can get all the apples this year, according ta Twilight’s raports. We just can’t work that fast!”
“Forget the reports, how do YOU think the harvestin’s goin’?”
“Well, like Big Mac says, we’re workin’ as fast as we can. But I still wish that Applebloom could help us out there.” Everypony started to argue against the idea. “Now I know y’all don’t agree, I’m jus’ sayin’ it’s a shame that Applebloom can’t help us out there in the orchard. If we could jus’ get one more pony out there harvestin’ with us, we may not be so behind all the time!”
“Now sis, you know that Applebloom is still in school. That’s more important.”
“I know Big Mac, but she’s always willin’ ta help…”
“Don’ worry sis, we can harvest all the apples. We’ve done it before.”
“Applejack, listen to yer brother, he’s been doing this fer… how many years has it been, Macintosh?”
“A few.”
“Exactly! We Apple ponies can do anything we set our minds to!”
“Tha’s exactly what ah was tryin’ ta tell YOU, gramma!” said Applejack as she walked out of the kitchen. “And ah finished cookin’ lunch fer everypony!” Applebloom walked out of the kitchen with a large plate full of…daisy sandwiches and carrot sticks. The family sat around the table eating their lunch and talking about their plans for the weekend. Applebloom was going out again with her friends Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo on another Cutie Mark Crusaders “mission” in the library with Twilight.
Everypony knew that this really meant that the girls were going to go spy on boys or talk about boys or do something with boys. They were now at the age where they just started to notice the opposite sex but were still embarrassed to admit it. Big Mac thought that Applebloom was developing a crush on one of the transfer students in the class, Rumble, because she constantly complained about him at home. He remembered when Applejack was like this with some colt she knew, but then dated him for a few months. He wasn’t too good at reading girls and their emotions though. They were confusing creatures.
After lunch was finished and the plates cleared from the table, Big Mac and Applejack got back to work finishing the apple quota for the day. Work in the orchard had always been quiet, since the two ponies were focused solely on their work. Nopony ever came out into these orchards; maybe that was why Big Mac always felt comfortable out here when he needed to be alone. Not today, though.
“C’mon brother, if we don’ hurry up with these last trees we won’t be able to catch up tomorrah!”
“Applejack, calm DOWN!” Big Mac was heard enough of his sister’s worrying; she had been acting delusional since lunch. “We can do this, we’re working as fast as we can! We’ll gather all the apples up, just calm down!”
The words didn’t seem to sink in since applejack darted to the next trees and knocked the apples out before Big Mac could catch them with his bucket. Big Mac finally came to the conclusion, ‘Applejack’s gone crazy!’ He caught her after a few trees and pinned her down. She was fighting him, and had that same look in her eye as that time she tried to harvest all the apples in the orchard by herself, those many years ago.
“Now sister, you need ta calm down!”
“Ah can’t Big Mac! We need ta hurry!”
“Nope. You need a break!” He pushed her back to the farm, against her will, and towards the house. By this time her deliriousness was becoming apparent. It looked like she merely pushed herself too hard and succumbed to the heat. ‘That’s mah sister, all right!’
Big Mac nudged his sister towards the couch, motioning for her to lie down. Even though she was still fighting, she cooperated. She nearly fell asleep the moment her head met the pillow. Big Mac went back into the kitchen and grabbed a glass of water for his sister, set it down on the table next to her, and sat down. As much as he wanted to keep working, Applejack needed him more, and he wanted to keep an eye on her just in case she tried to come back outside. Instead, he lost himself in his own thoughts.
A lot had been on his mind recently, as usual during the harvesting season. However, today was different. He had been wrestling with this problem for quite some time now— a few years to be exact. Usually it didn’t bother him this much but recent events had brought his doubts back up. He noticed that Applebloom was growing up, even getting interested in colts. Also, even though she would never admit it, he noticed Granny Smith moving slower and becoming more forgetful each day. Life changed, and he knew that doing nothing was the worst thing he could do.
Applejack woke up a few hours later, calmer than she had been this morning. “Big Mac, what happened? Did we get all the apples?” No answer.
She turned around and saw him sitting right there behind her. He wasn’t asleep, but he looked like he was in a daze, just staring off into space. She called his name again, “Big Mac, y’all alright?”
He blinked and jumped a little. “Oh, ah see yer awake. Feelin’ better?”
“Yeah… musta been really tired! It’s nearly night time! We need ta get back ta work if we’re gonna keep on schedule.”
“Not so fast, little sis! You can’t get back to work jus’ yet. You need to relax fer the rest of the day, we can work tomorrah.”
“And I s’pose you ain’t gonna change yer mind?”
“Nope.”
Applejack sighed. “Well, it is night anyway…wait; what time is it?”
“Well, the sun set about an hour ago, so I s’pose it’s about eight?”
“Holy fritters, I’m late!” Big Mac remembered the slumber party that Pinkie Pie was throwing for all the girls back at Sugarcube Corners, and how Applejack promised to bring one of her apple pies for everyone to share. Fortunately, the pie was prepared beforehand, but AJ was never one to show up late for something.
She ran out of the kitchen with her pie in a box and gave her brother a quick hug. “See ya later, Big Mac!”
“Yeah…see ya sis…”
The earth pony stopped at the door. “Are you okay Big Mac? You seem troubled.”
“Yeah… I mean, nope. I’m alright!”
“Are ya sure?”
“Don’t worry about me, sis; just get going, and try ta take it easy.”
“All right, if ya say so…” Applejack said as she turned to walk out the door.
He was so overcome with emotion; he wrapped her in his arms. Though it would never fix everything, at least now he was happy. He had her.
They had been married for 2 years now. They immediately decided that having children would not be a wise idea. For one, they were very different, and she didn’t really have good experience with little ponies. It made him sad to hear this since he had always planned on having a large family, but he loved her and respected her wishes. Besides, he loved her no matter what.
Today, though, after so long, she seemed to change her mind. “You know, there’s a lot of young fillies ad colts out there who lost their parents to the war…”
“Yeah?”
“And I know we decided against trying to have kids, but… I don’t know.”
“No, go ahead,” he encouraged.
“Well… maybe we could adopt. I mean, there can’t be too much harm in having a kid live with us. I mean, we can do anything together!”
He started to tear up. He married the mare of his dreams, and now she wanted to start a family with him!
