Airships, Sandskiffs, and Locomotives

Velvet yawned, stretching her hooves. Above, the warm sunlight bathed her entire body. There was heat from below, too, as the baking sand beneath her blanket warmed her stomach. Resting her head back down onto a foreleg, she closed her eyes under the sunglasses and let the gentle sound of waves rolling onto the shore rumble in her ears. It was their second day on the beach with the Candys, and she was more relaxed than she'd been in months.

A cool puddle of liquid dribbled onto her back. “Brr,” she muttered, shivering a little.

“Oh, don’t give me that,” said Night Light, rubbing the sunscreen into her coat with a hoof. “A few seconds of cold to not deal with days of sunburn seems a small price to pay.”

“I can’t believe there’s no anti-sunburn spell,” she mumbled. “Ancient ponies must’ve thought it was heresy or something. Gonna have to make that my team’s next research project.”

“Hey! I thought we agreed, no talking about work on vacation.”

“Hrmph.” Velvet flicked her tail at him. “All right, then, let’s talk about our plans. We still heading to the cathedral with the Candys tomorrow?”

“Mhm,” said her husband, smearing the sunscreen down onto her lower back. “Though we don’t have anything set for the afternoon, yet. I thought maybe we could explore our little pink ball some more. Having two dicks last night was pretty good, but I bet we can find something even better...”

Velvet grinned, though she didn’t open her eyes. “A worthy proposal.” The double dicks had been fun, and having him fuck her while the toy matched his thrusts in his own ass was going to be hard to beat, but anything was possible. “But I had something else in mind.”

“Hmm?”

“There was a flyer in the hotel lobby for a bungee jumping attraction near the edge of the city.”

Night Light laughed. “Bungee jumping? You want to go leaping off bridges, Miss Terrified-of-Heights?”

“No better way to get over your fears than facing them, right?” Velvet’s horn flickered, and she heard her husband inhaled a tight breath as the bottle of sunscreen brushed against his sheath. “Besides, I have fond memories of the last time we went hurtling off a cliff.”

“Oh, no,” he muttered, “don’t tell me I’ve turned you into an adrenaline junkie.”

“I admit, there’s a certain link in my mind now between mortal danger and good times with Night Light. Come on, it’ll be fun.”

“All right,” he said reluctantly, rubbing her cutie marks with lotion, “but if the line snaps and I turn into a pony pancake, I’m blaming you. Posthumously.”

“Oh, don’t be a baby. Just make one of those shield bubbles.”

She could almost hear him rolling his eyes. “That worked because we were in fluid water. I’d still go splat on solid ground. You’d think a professor of arcane studies would know some basic physics…”

“Ah-ah-ah, no talk about work,” she shot back, smirking. She scratched a cheek, luxuriating in the warm sunlight and the soothing massage she was getting. “Hey, do you have that letter Shiny sent? The one the porter gave us this morning? In all the rush to get to the beach we completely forgot to read it.”

“Oh, right, I’ve got it somewhere in the bag…” Night Light rummaged around noisily for a few moments. “Here you go.” An envelope landed on the blanket right in front of Velvet’s face.

Blinking her eyes open, her horn glowed and the envelope opened. Pulling out the letter, she scanned it over. She began reading it aloud to Night Light, who didn’t pause his hooves. “Dear Mom and Dad…”

There was the expected paragraph of glad you’re okay and send word to let us know that you’ve made it, which they already had—their most recent letter to the kids was probably still in transit across the ocean. After that, though, things got interesting.

She squinted at the letter. “Huh… Shiny says, ‘It might be for the best that you two went via another route. We’ve been having some bad problems in the Crystal Castle lately.’”

“Oh, no, not another changeling infestation, is it?”

“No, sounds like… oh, dear. ‘There have been major issues with our sewage system for the past week and a half. The entire west wing is flooded with things I don’t want to describe. We think the initial fault was a jam in the piping—the poor janitor who volunteered to go after it found train tickets wedged in there, of all things. Looks like somepony on a castle tour flushed them in a rage. Sp something, we couldn’t make the name out under all the, uh, mess.”

Night Light sat back, laughing so hard Velvet was afraid he might burst. Restraining herself to a grin, she continued. “The jam built up enough pressure that the entire pipeline exploded. There’s filth everywhere, all over that new carpet Cadance had installed four months ago… she’s been livid. Really, it’s probably for the best that you guys skipped out. I wish I could escape the city for a while—Maris sounds like heaven right now. But I’m stuck until we find a plumbing company willing to fix things up within our budget limits.’”

Her husband returned his hooves to her flank. “Oh, poor Cadance… poor Shiny, for having to be there with her. She’s got to be tearing the place up...” His hooves paused mid-rub. “Hey… they need a plumbing company, huh?”

“Sounds that way.” Velvet leaned her head back, grinning. “Maybe we should tell Don to call that favor in early.”

“We’ll let him know when he and Marietta come back out of the water.”

Velvet looked up toward the ocean. Among the hundreds of heads bobbing in the waves, she spotted the two she recognized. “You wouldn’t think someone who's half-bird would like swimming so much.”

“Did Shiny say anything else?”

“Just this cryptic bit at the end here. ‘Cady and I had something to tell you, but it can wait a while longer. We’d both like to give you the news in person. When you’re back from your vacation, we can talk about setting up a trip to Canterlot to see you both. Have fun in the meantime! Love, Shining Armor.’”

“Hmm.” Night Light’s eyes narrowed. “Big news they want to tell us in person. You think…?”

“I think that speculating is pointless,” said Velvet, trying to bury the little spark of parental glee that the letter had ignited. “We’ll find out in due time.” Filly or colt? she wondered, smiling irrepressibly.

She wasn’t going to be able to recapture her blissed-out state of relaxation after that. Still, there were ways to burn off excited energy. Clearing her throat, she said, “Don’t stop with the sunscreen, unless you want your wife to go walking around with big red marks on her backside this week.”

“Depends on how they get there…” He resumed his application, squeezing another dollop of it out above her tail.

She shivered again, flanks twitching. “You know, honey… you’ve already covered that area pretty well. Mind rubbing a bit lower?”

Night Light lifted an eyebrow. “I hope you’re not suggesting something indecent on a public beach.”

“Of course not,” she said, giving him a wink. Her horn blazed to life. “Just thinking out loud. Don’t-Mind-Me, dear.”

Grinning, Night Light bent down beside her. His lips met hers as the shimmering purple light covered them both.

If anyone passed their blanket at some point in the next half hour, that pony or griffon might have found it strange that the most bland and forgettable spot on the entire beach was making so many giggles and strange noises…

… but then, it was probably just the wind.