The Idea Bin

“Shining Dear?” Princess Cadance began loudly, her husband grunting in response from where he lay sprawled out on the bed, only half listening. “Do you think Celestia would be angry at me if I didn’t finish this decree and instead hid under the covers with you for the rest of my life?”

“Just a bit,” Shining replied in an exhausted voice.

“What if we declared independence from Equestria?” Cadance asked, sounding overly innocent.

“That wouldn’t end well,” Shining stated, stifling a yawn as he groggily sat up.

“What if, now here me out,” Cadance carried on, sounding slightly desperate now. “We fake our deaths…”

“Cadance stop,” Shining said bluntly, now sitting straight up and meeting his wife’s gaze. “Celestia asked you to establish a new annual holiday, and no amount of scheming is going to get you out of it.”

Cadance slumped in her desk chair, pouting and looking thoroughly put off.

“I really don’t see why you’re finding this so difficult,” Shining continued, standing up and walking across to where Cadance was working.

“Because I’ve never done anything like this before,” Cadance whined as she crumpled another sheet of paper and cast it aside. “Economy I can manage, Foreign Relations are a breeze, but this is something that could go down in history, be forever engrained in our culture.”

“Well why don’t you make it something to do with love?” Shining asked. “After all Celestia has the Summer Sun Celebration, Luna has Nightmare Night, and Twilight has…”

“National Book Day,” Cadance finished, sounding unamused. “Yes you’ve made that joke before.”

“Well my point still stands,” Shining mumbled, looking put off.

“Stands only to fall flat,” Cadance retorted, rising from her chair and drifting away from the desk. “We already have a holiday celebrating love.”

“Hearts and Hooves Day, yeah,” Shining acknowledged. “But do you think that in your stress over all this and… other things, you’ve forgotten one of your most basic principles?”

“And what would that be?” Cadance asked forlornly as she reached the window and leaned forward, gazing down at the streets of the Crystal Empire.

“That love comes in many forms,” Shining replied smugly.

Cadance didn’t reply, she simply continued to stare out as her husband’s words rang in her mind. Far down below her, her keen eyes made out a solitary figure walking across the near empty street. It was one of the shimmering Crystal Empire residents, a mare specifically, pushing a pram with what looked to be her young foal. Cadance heard the foal wailing, saw the mother stop pushing the pram and instead scoop her baby up in her forelegs and begin rocking it gently back and forth.

Cadance couldn’t be sure from this height, but she imagined the mother singing soft lullabies to her baby. Very quickly, the infant stopped crying, and the mother stood for a moment more, holding her child close to her before redepositing it into the pram and carrying on her way. Seeing this began to stir an odd sensation in Cadance’s body, almost instinctively she raised a foreleg and rested it against her stomach.

When Cadance turned back to her husband, she wore a warm smile, while his was smug with a touch of ‘I told you so’.

“Well?” Shining asked knowingly.

“I hope you’re in the mood for a family get together,” Cadance began, making her way back over to her desk. “Because very soon you’ll be celebrating the first Mother’s Day.”