It didn’t seem to matter. Shining never knew exactly when the day would come; every year, it always managed to surprise him, somehow.
From past experience, however, he did manage to figure out a few things along the way. For one, it always came during the fall, right around when the leaves starting changing colors and the chimneys started to smoke. But even so, it never failed; it always seemed like his mother would announce his “doctor’s appointment” right when he least expected it, or right when he had just begun to think that maybe, just maybe, she would forget for once.
No such luck this fall. She had made the announcement of his appointment last night at the dinner table… or rather, had mentioned it in a passing comment toward the end of the meal. Shining Armor was glad she had waited, or else he probably would have lost his appetite entirely. Having the appointment scheduled for the morning didn’t exactly help matters, either. He had all night to think about it, to lie awake in his bed and contemplate his impending doom.
But unlike all those other years, this time things were going to be a bit different. This year, he wasn’t going to face the dreaded, terrible needle alone.
…
“No!”
The same muffled, high-pitched voice came through the bedroom door. Shining Armor watched from a little ways down the hall as his mother jiggled the doorknob for the third time. Finding that it was still locked, her brow narrowed menacingly.
“Okay, Twilight Sparkle. I am going to give you ten seconds to come out of that room right now,” she threatened. Her tone was no-nonsense, low in volume but very clear nonetheless. “I’ve given you plenty of chances. If you don’t come out of there by the time I get to ten, I am going to take away all of your books for the rest of the week, young filly.”
“What?” The threat, not unpredictably to Shining, got Twilight’s attention. Her voice squeaked with incredulity. “B-But, I-I…”
“No buts,” her mother cut her off. “You are going to get your pony flu shot this year, no matter what. I know I didn’t take you last year, but that is something I am never going to risk again. Do you understand?”
She waited for a response, ear pressed up against the door. The only thing she got was a muted sniffle. Sighing, she started the countdown.
“One…”
Shining Armor sat awkwardly in the middle of the hallway, staring at a tiny discolored spot on the carpet as if it were the most interesting thing in the world. Nonetheless, his ears remained pricked up and listening, on the alert.
“Two… three…”
“But mommy…”
“I told you, no buts, Twilight!” her mother scolded. “Four…”
Shining Armor winced. He hated it when his mother was upset, especially when it was at his little sister. He also knew from experience the futility of the ‘closed door’ method that Twilight was now using to hide; most of the bedroom doors had simple button locks that could be opened from the outside using little more than a toothpick pushed through a hole in the doorknob. His ears fell back as the countdown neared ten.
“Six… Twilight, I mean it… seven…”
Shining’s frown deepened as no sounds came from the other side of the door. His mother did not stop counting. An uneasy feeling churned in his stomach, mixed with the sensation of butterflies which swelled up in his chest and fluttered beneath his ribs.
And then, before he knew it, he found himself lurching forward. His eyes widened urgently as he took a place beside Twilight’s bedroom door.
“Come on, Twily,” he pleaded. “It’s Shining…”
A pause in his mother’s counting. He looked over his shoulder, grimacing in an attempt to draw sympathy toward his sister’s plight. Sure enough, as his eyes met hers, her expression, slowly but surely, softened. And then, almost imperceptibly, the corners of her lips twitched upwards into a smile. She nodded her head once toward the door and took a small step back.
Seeing the approving nod, Shining breathed an internal sigh of relief. Twilight still had another chance. He pressed his cheek against the door. “Twily?”
He heard shuffling from inside. Then, the familiar sound of her voice piping up from the far corner of the room. “Shiny?”
Hearing her response, Shining felt another wave of relief. He smiled. “Yeah, it’s me, Twily. Listen…” he looked back to his mother out of nervousness, and then, back to the door. “…you need to come out, sis.”
He tried his best to sound gentle, much like their mother had on her first attempt to coax Twilight out. Unfortunately, his sister’s answer was still just as immediate as it had been before.
“But it’s gonna… it’ll hurt,” she concluded simply. She sounded quite pitiful. Shining Armor frowned, but kept his voice calm and reassuring whilst also, trying to keep his own breathing under control.
“Well, yeah, but…” He paused for a moment, wracking his brain for the right thing to say. There was a lot of pressure weighing down on his shoulders at that moment; after all, he knew how much Twilight loved to read. “… Like mom said, it’s really not that bad, honest.”
The words tasted foul coming off his tongue. He cringed as though he had just eaten something very sour; in hindsight, he was glad for the door acting as a barrier between them, or else he would have been about as convincing as a pony in a black and white striped shirt trying to pass off as one of Celestia’s Royal Guards. He heard Twilight shuffle around a bit more, which was followed by a couple of hoofsteps toward the door.
“B-But… the book I read about vaccines said that they have to put a sharp nee—needle in your…your…” she trailed off. “…you know. And everypony at school told me that it hurts…”
Shining Armor’s eyes did a little roll in his head. Typical of her to read up on the subject beforehand. Still, he had to take a couple of deep breaths before addressing her concerns, still staying calm and collected as he could.
“It’s really not that bad, Twily. I… I promise. All those other colts and fillies at school are just trying to scare you,” he said. He had to raise his voice slightly to sound a bit more confident, as well as to compensate for the shakiness in his voice.
At first, Twilight did not reply, most likely pondering what he had to say. Shining turned once again to his mother, who fortunately, gave him another approving smile. He let out a breath he had been holding in his lungs.
Her voice again, sounding a little bit closer to the door. It was quiet, and accompanied by a sniffle. “Really?”
She still sounded hesitant, but it was progress. Shining Armor nodded despite the fact that she couldn’t see him.
“Really,” he insisted. He swallowed a lump in his throat. “Okay? Now, just come out, alright, Twily? I really don’t want you to get in trouble.”
With all this said, he waited with baited breath, pressing his ear against the door. He scarcely dared to breathe, listening intently for any noise he could pick up.
Then, to his great joy, he heard her hoofsteps, slowly padding over to the door. It was quickly followed by the clicking of the lock. The doorknob jiggled just a bit, turning a few degrees, but before it could go all the way, it snapped back in place.
“Are you sure?” she asked at the last second. Shining had to bite his lip in mild frustration; so close, but still not quite there. Nevertheless, he dared not let his annoyance show.
“I’m sure, Twily. Come on.” He took a step back away from the door. Sure enough, as he anticipated, the doorknob turned all the way, and in a moment the head of his litter sister poked through the crack between the door and the frame. Her big eyes, puffy and red, regarded him first before shifting over to their mother, standing behind him. Wisely, she stepped around her son and pushed the door all the way open with an outstretched hoof, assuring that Twilight couldn’t quickly dart back inside.
With her fate sealed, Twilight dragged her hooves over to her brother while shying away from her mom’s gaze. Shining Armor swallowed another lump, puffed out his chest, and put on a bold face for his sister.
“Thank you, Twilight,” her mother said sincerely. Any sense of agitation she had from before had left the premises. “Now, the carriage has been waiting outside for more than five minutes, and we don’t want to be late.”
That was when Shining notice her give him an especially wide smile. He did not have much time to reflect on it, though. Staying a little ways behind to prevent either of them from making a run for it back to their rooms, she nudged them along toward the stairs and, inevitably, to their dooms.
…
Neither sibling spoke hardly one word during the trip. Fortunately, the journey was not especially long, perhaps fifteen minutes with traffic. But as Shining had come to know over the years, this carriage ride felt always felt at least twice as long.
It did not seem to matter how many times he’d gone through it; he never fully remembered what getting the actual shot was like. All he knew was that it hurt, and that was enough for the dread to set in. His stomach felt like it was floating feely in the vacuum of space, bringing unwanted acid to the back of his throat which forced him to swallow frequently. His hooves also became slippery with cold, clammy sweat, leaving behind faint, U-shaped spots on the cushioned seats whenever he moved them.
But as he turned his head to look down at his little sister, sitting in between him and his mother, he was sure that no matter how bad he was feeling on the inside, she was taking it far, far worse. Her eyes were downcast, but they shimmered with unshed tears of fear, and the whole rest of her body was so tensed up that he could see a couple of the veins popping out at her neck. Mom definitely noticed this, and had one hoof wrapped tightly around her shoulders, hugging her daughter against her and occasionally rubbing Twilight’s front leg up and down in an attempt to soothe her.
Shining Armor, meanwhile, was rubbing his own leg up and down, all while concentrating on every rattle, squeak, and bump of the carriage wheels over the stone road to keep his mind distracted. It worked for a time… that is, until the carriage at last came to a stop.
His stomach went from floating to free-falling in an instant. They were here already.
His mother, with a comforting hoof, encouraged Twilight to walk slightly ahead of her while Shining Armor followed closely behind, stepping out with slightly trembling hooves onto the road. He would have been perfectly content with staying inside a while longer, but he knew he had no choice in the matter. The carriage pulled away from the curb, and pretty soon was lost to sight down the street. With his destination before him, Shining Armor stood up straight and followed his mother and sister into the building.
Due to his involvement with athletics at school, he was not a stranger to this building; rudimentary physical examinations were necessary every year before he was cleared to participate. Regardless, there was never a time when he liked to be here, least of all during days like today.
After traversing two floors, they came into the waiting room. Clipboard and paperwork carried in her magical field, his mother sat herself down and busied herself with filling everything out while he and Twilight sat silently, motionlessly in the seats beside her. A couple of foal’s books lay on the floor beside Twilight, but she did not bother to pick them up while they waited. Instead, she sat without moving a muscle, staring at the floor and not daring to make eye contact with any of the ponies in lab coats behind the counter.
Seeing her there, terrified out of her wits, Shining felt the swimming in his stomach slowly begin to recede. He leaned sideways in his seat until his head was behind Twilight’s tense shoulders.
“Hey Twily? You okay?” he whispered. Twilight inhaled sharply, obviously startled out of some sort of trance by his voice. Her lips moved without any sound coming out before she was able to, at last, nod her head.
“Uh-huh…” She scrunched herself up further into the chair and sank into the cushion. Misery dimmed her normally bright eyes. “Kinda s-scared.”
As soon as she had admitted this to him, their mother got up and walked over to the front desk, delivering the paperwork to the pony at the counter. Shining Armor felt his heart skip a beat, but he ignored the fear stirring in his gut to focus more attention toward Twilight, who was now eyeing the door to the back like a hideous monster were about to emerge. He put a hoof around her shoulders and forced a smile.
“Yeah, I know. But it’s really nothing to worry about. It goes by pretty quick…”
He couldn’t help but notice how much he sounded like his mother. Truth be told, he wasn’t even sure if he believed the words that were coming out of his own mouth, but feeling Twilight shivering in her chair, he needed to say something. She appeared to ponder the words for a minute in silence, occasionally glancing between him and mom.
And then, with a deep sigh, she said, “Okay.”
It was only one word. But to Shining Armor, it said a lot. She leaned a little further into him, pressing her side against the arm of his chair. His smile, while having been forced at first, became genuine. He looked over to his mother, to see that her expression matched his.
The waiting, unfortunately, could not last forever. The back door opened eventually, and with is, Twilight sucked in a sharp breath. Shining’s smile from before was wiped away instantly.
A petite unicorn mare, dressed in the familiar white lab coat and visor cap, emerged with a clipboard held in her magical aura.
“Shining Armor and Twilight Sparkle?” she called out. Twilight’s ears flopped back, and she sank in her chair in a failed attempt to become invisible. Shining, on the other hoof, did the opposite, sitting up straight as an arrow and craning his neck. Their mother nodded and got up from her seat, motioning the two of them forward.
“That’s you.” She walked over and gently coaxed them from their chairs. “Come on, you two.”
Shining’s hooves wobbled a bit beneath him as he walked, but he kept his head held high. Lips tightly pursed together, he strode through the doorway with his sister at his side. Twilight, however, kept her whole body as low to the ground as it could go, nose practically touching the tile floor. But she nonetheless kept up with her brother, occasionally glancing up at him with pupils wide. Mom followed closely behind.
Twilight almost missed the nurse looking down at her. When she did notice, a red tinge formed on her cheeks, and she melted further into her brother’s side for shelter.
“You must be Twilight Sparkle,” she said. Her voice was soft and jovial, making a sharp contrast between her and the filly at her hooves. Twilight nodded wordlessly, struggling to maintain eye contact. The nurse smiled sympathetically. “I'm Nurse Tenderheart. Is this your first time getting a pony flu shot?”
Again, Twilight nodded. Her blush deepened. Tenderheart’s smile stretched wider. She opened the door to the examination room and stepped off to the side.
“Ohh, alright.” She exchanged a knowing glance with their mother, which went unnoticed by the sibling pair. “I promise it won’t be so bad. Just a pinch, but then it’s all over. Okay?”
Twilight stared at the examination table. She stood in the doorway, her front hoof hovering above the floor in preparation to take the first step. Shining Armor opened his mouth to say something to her, but before he could, she at last stepped… or rather, dragged herself into the room.
Shining had not spoken a word, but he watched the whole scene unfold with careful, anxious scrutiny. His mother stepped past him and beat the nurse to the stool, dragging it over to Twilight to help her up onto the exam table. The young colt felt his stomach as he followed suit, hopping up next to his sister and sitting down on the crepe paper. Their mother sat in a separate chair beside them, between the bench and the door. Nurse Tenderheart brought the clipboard back out.
“So it says here that this is…”
Shining paid no attention to anything the nurse was saying. He never did, really; nervousness made the whole conversation between the nurse and his mother blur into the background, sounding like nothing more than incoherent garble. He stared at his hind hooves, watching them swing back and forth like little pendulums. A drop of sweat trickled down his back and made him shiver.
The conversation went by very quickly. The nurse nodded her head a few times, set the clipboard into a saddlebag on her croup, and headed for the door.
“Thank you very much, Mrs. Sparkle,” she said. She looked at Shining and Twilight, who immediately shifted their eyes down toward the floor in response. “I will be back in a minute with everything. Just stay put, okay?”
She closed the door behind her, and the echo of her hoofsteps on the hard tile floor receded into the distance. The silence that followed was long, and it did nothing to ease the dread that Shining felt in the pit of his stomach. He grimaced; it did not take a genius to know what “everything” really was.
“You both are doing great,” his mother encouraged in the midst of his musing. “All you have to do now is just do exactly what the nurse says, and it will be over before you know it.”
From the calm whisper, Shining knew who her comment was primarily directed towards. Twilight’s ears perked up for a moment before falling back onto her head, and the same blush from before returned to her cheeks. She stammered a bit, trembling enough to vibrate the crepe paper she was sitting on, but nodded obediently.
“Yes, mom… h-hey, Shiny? C-Can you… I mean, is it okay if y-you go f-f-first?” She looked up at him with shimmering, pleading eyes, pupils so wide that the whites of her eyes were barely visible at all. “Please?”
Days later, and with the benefit of hindsight, Shining would have been ashamed to admit it, but… the request took him a little off guard. He appeared to freeze in place for a moment, matching his sister’s pleading gaze. A knot formed in his gut as an insidious, insipid fear took a hold of him, and for a moment it was hard to breathe.
But once he looked into his sister’s terrified eyes, none of it mattered. Not in the slightest. There was no way he could have resisted. He nodded, far more emphatically than he would have normally thought himself capable.
“Uhh… yeah, of course!” he said. He had to force his enthusiasm. “Yeah yeah, I’ll go first. Sure. No…” He swallowed. “…No problem, Twily.”
For what it was worth, the answer appeared to bring Twilight some comfort. She nodded, her features brightening for a brief moment for the first time since this morning. She reached over and squeezed him in a grateful hug.
“Thanks…” She slouched back over, all the while sniffling and wiping her nose. The crepe paper crinkled as she scooted a little closer to him.
Shining, meanwhile, was still contemplating what was to come in stoic silence. He may have still been young… he hadn’t yet left elementary school, though he was only a year away… but he knew quite well that, from this point on, he could show no fear. It was his duty; he couldn’t let Twily see him squirm.
She was counting on him.
The door opened back up. Just as before, Shining sat up straight as an arrow like the head of the Royal Guard himself had just strolled in. Nurse Tenderheart entered, carrying with her a rolling metal cart. On the top tray, lined up neatly on another square sheet of crepe paper, Shining saw it all plain as day.
Two syringes, a box of multi-colored bandaids, and what appeared to be a pair of latex hoof gloves, all set beside a plastic bin of alcohol wipes. But, most importantly, set behind it all was a small jar filled with an assortment of lollipops. The nurse pushed the little cart out of the way and placed it up against the opposite wall.
Shining could not take his eyes away from it. The only difference, however, was that his brow was creased downward with grim determination. He took a deep breath in through his nose, and looked the nurse in the eye as she spoke.
“Alright, that’s everything.” She stretched the latex gloves over her hooves. “Have you both decided which one of you wants to go f—”
“Me.” Shining Armor did not even give her a chance to finish the question. He kept his shoulders broad and chin held high, putting on bravado. “I’ll go first.”
Unconsciously, he had tried to make his voice sound deeper than it actually was. He felt another bead of sweat trickle down his back, but he ignored it. The nurse nodded once to indicate she understood.
“That’s very brave of you, Shining Armor,” she said, using his name. She exchanged another quick glance with his mother and grinned. “Thank you very much. Now, Twilight, I’m just going to need you to go over to your mother for a minute?”
Twilight, albeit with a bit of hesitation, listened to the request and hopped down to the floor. Before she passed Shining, she whispered just loud enough for him to hear.
“Sorry… th-thanks, Shiny.” She slinked over to mom, who picked her up and sat her down onto her lap. Shining Armor’s heart swelled with a sense of accomplishment, if only for a moment, but as soon as he saw the nurse levitate the first needle up from the tray, his stomach tied itself into another knot.
No problem, sis, he said in his mind. His eyes were riveted to the needle, which the nurse was doing a secondary inspection of. No problem at all…
“Alright,” the nurse jolted him out of his own thoughts. “Now, I’m going to need you to lie flat on the table, aaand…” She set the needle down gently before gesturing to a specific spot to his right. “Just put your front hooves right about there. Okay?”
Hearing her request, Shining felt his larynx constrict, trapping the breath in his lungs. From that position, he and his mother and sister would be face to face. Any tears, or any fear… Twilight would see it. And if she saw him, her brave big brother, afraid…
The realization paralyzed him for a moment. Faint sweat stains formed on the crepe paper where his hooves lay. But rather than allowing himself to give in, Shining mustered up all the courage he had and did what the nurse said. He shuffled his hooves clumsily over until he was on his belly, and then placed his two hooves at either side of his head, lying flat as a board with his hind legs extended behind him.
Well, at least it’s better than laying down the other way… he thought with a morbid sense of humor. He set the side of his face down on the paper and looked toward the wall. Out of his periphery, he could see Twilight… and she was looking right at him. Behind him, he felt rather than saw the nurse approach.
“Yep! Just like that,” she approved. Shining dug himself in, willing away the shakes as he imagined the needle hovering over his skin…
He forgot about the alcohol wipe. The sudden chill nearly made him jump up from the table, but he held his place with a lot of effort. The nurse’s gentle voice also helped to put him (relatively) at ease.
Alright, Shining. You can do this. Show no fear. Don’t let ‘em see you sweat…
He gulped.
“Okay. I’m going to do it on the count of three,” said the nurse right behind him. “Just don’t move.”
Shining did not reply. He doubted he could have moved even if he had wanted to. He closed his eyes, and waited. His own voice continued the playback in his head.
Twily’s watching, stay cool…
“One…”
Stay coooool…
“Two…”
Stay c—yowch!
“…Three.”
Shining was about to brace himself when he felt the sharp pinch on his backside. It took him so off guard that he registered the pain a full second afterwards. It was followed by the nurse’s voice yet again.
“Aaaalright, that’s it. All done.”
Shining’s eyes snapped open. His head did a full one eighty to look at Nurse Tenderheart, who smiled with a glimmer of mischief in her eyes. In a practiced motion, she unpeeled a blue bandaid from its wrapper and placed it over the tiny hole where the needle had gone. He gawked, which only made her eyes twinkle all the more.
“W-Wait a sec. You… you…”
He let the question trail off, remembering just in time that another filly was still in the room. His own voice in his head finished the question for him.
You tricked me? But… Nopony had ever done that to him before. In the past, he always had time to brace himself just before the shot, but this year, he hadn’t been given any time at all. He almost felt betrayed.
But at the same time… he never remembered it being that easy before. Ever.
Tenderheart nodded. “You took it very well. Wasn’t so bad, was it?”
She winked. Shining Armor had to close his jaw with a hoof before he could talk. Reeling a bit, he nodded.
“No… uhh, I mean, o-of course not.” He looked over to where his mother and sister were sitting. Twilight huddled deeper into the embrace for safety, but her eyes were riveted on him. She asked him the same burning question she’d been asking since they’d arrived.
“So… it really doesn’t hurt that much?” Her drooping features seemed to lift a little the longer she stared. “Are you really, really sure?”
Her eyes inquired as loudly as her voice. In response, Shining felt something unlike anything he’d ever experienced before: an odd wave of euphoria, like a rush of warm air on a winter’s day which made him feel like he was ten feet off the ground. He had to suppress a laugh, opting to give her a cheeky grin instead as the butterflies in his belly intensified.
“Uhh… yeah, Twily. Really, really sure.” He and the nurse communicated a mutual understanding without saying a word. “All you gotta do… is just relax.”
He was saying it just as much to himself as he was to her. Twilight pursed her lips together, appearing to be in thought. She examined him, scanning him over like a detective scans a suspect. Shining heard his mother chuckle.
“Alright, Twilight. Your brother went first, and now it’s your turn,” she cooed. “I’m going to set you down, now. Then, I want you to go over and do whatever the nice nurse tells you to, okay?”
From Twilight’s raised ears, she was clearly listening, but her gaze never strayed away from her brother, and Shining, for the first time, found himself in a place where he no longer had to act like everything was fine.
She was only forced to look away when she was lifted by the shoulders and set down onto the tile. The contrast between her mom’s warm lap and the cold floor made her shiver, but with a surge of newfound bravery, she marched over to the stepping stool and hopped onto the table.
And with that, the roles were reversed. Following all of the nurse’s directions, Twilight soon found herself in the same position as her brother had been. Her mother also had left her chair to stand right beside the table, where she placed a hoof over Twilight’s outstretched foreleg in an effort to console her.
However, as more tears sprang to the girl’s eyes, it soon became apparent that whatever bravery had gotten her to this point… it was leaving her. Fast. Whether it was from the vulnerability of her position or from something else unknown, she began to cry all over again.
“Mo-o-om…” she sobbed. Her mother looked down on her sympathetically, gripping Twilight's leg tighter while the nurse advanced around to the other side.
“Shh, sh, it’s alright! Calm down, it’s not gonna be bad!” she reassured. Unfortunately, Twilight only began to cry harder, pressing her muzzle into the crepe paper where a couple of the tears formed a puddle. Mom winced. “You can do it…”
Shining Armor, of course, heard the whole thing. Separated from the scene by a few hoofsteps, he sat on his slightly aching rump while listening to his little sister break down. A sharp pain hit him in the gut, and it was worse than any needle.
And with it, he felt another call to action. Shining did not hesitate. He ran over to the exam table and stood directly in front of Twilight, and got her attention with a wave of his arm.
“Hey, hey Twily!” he called out. “I’m right here, too, okay? Look at me!”
He pointed to himself with both hooves. Twilight, through blurry eyes, managed to raise her head and stare directly ahead of her. Her cheeks were puffy, and she had to squint to see him clearly. Shining Armor smiled encouragingly.
“Yeah, that’s it! Just look at me, sis!” Imitating his mom, he stretched his foreleg over the table and took a hold of Twilight’s other hoof. She responded to it by grabbing it right back and holding it tight enough to make his white hoof turn light violet. He grimaced, but did not pull away. “Relax, sis! Relax, everything’s fine…”
Shining had no idea what he was doing. Though, as Twilight’s eyes darted between them, a sob that had been threatening to escape her lungs died before it could get out. With a shuddering breath, she exhaled, runoff from her nose dripping onto the paper. Her head bobbed up and down with understanding, and her vice-like grip loosened around their legs.
“O-Ok—Okay,” she stuttered. Twilight’s head and neck sagged forward, and she pressed her face into the now very wrinkly paper. Another isolated heave of her chest conveyed her lingering misery, but at long last, she gave in. After all the struggling, she resigned herself to being held down and simply awaited what was coming. She sputtered. “Okaaay…”
It was the signal they had all been watching for. When Shining Armor looked up, he saw the silent eye exchange between his mother and Tenderheart and, without wasting any more time, she raised the needle and scurried over. Being a professional, she regarded the poor filly with an admirably neutral expression; Twilight was doubtless not the first crier she had ever worked with. Shining Armor saw her approach, and his ears folded back upon seeing the syringe hovering beside her head. Mom continued to whisper soothing things into Twilight’s ear while Shining watched the needle.
“Alright. On the count of three…”
The needle lowered in the air. Shining Armor cringed slightly, turning to look away. He didn’t have the stomach nor the heart to watch. Instead, he leaned further onto the table until his face was near to Twilight’s.
“I’m right here,” he said again. “Relax, little sis…”
The count began. Twilight remained courageously still. “One…”
Shining Armor knew full well what was about to occur. The next second on the clock felt like it moved one frame at a time, suspended for a short while in midair. He knew full well that the nurse was not going to wait until three.
“Two…”
He squeezed his eyes shut. Any second now…
“OoooOW!”
Shining reflexively squeezed her hoof tighter as the yelp of pain rang out. His teeth gritted together out of empathy; in a weird way, he could feel the sharp pinch all over again.
“…Three.” The nurse withdrew the needle completely, and with great haste, placed a bandaid gingerly over the tiny hole. “That’s it, all done!”
The revelation, however, did not seem to be absorbed by Twilight right away, who suffered a renewed bout of tears from the pain. However, odd as it was, she was crying a whole lot less now than before, and pretty soon they devolved into mere sniffles. Her mother ran a hoof down her head.
“You did wonderful, Twilight. You were very brave.” She wiped away some of the moisture on her daughter’s cheek. Her other foreleg extended over to Shining, wrapping it around his withers. “You both were.”
Shining’s white cheeks showed the redness behind them all too clearly. He turned his head away, clearing his throat. Twilight’s chest rose and fell at a slower rate as her mother tended to her, calming down until the tears stopped entirely. The nurse walked over to the table with a box of tissues.
“You can sit up now, sweetie,” she said. Twilight nodded, and with help from her mom, got to her hooves. The nurse floated one of the tissues over, which Twilight gratefully accepted. “There you go. So, was it really so bad?”
Twilight blew her nose noisily. When she was done, her mother took away the used tissue in her magic and discarded it in the trash bin by the door. Twilight, while at first appearing hesitant to answer, at last, shook her head.
“Well…I guess…N-Not really,” she admitted. “It hurt, but… not really bad…”
As if on cue, she turned over to look at Shining Armor. He gave her big, wide, toothy grin of ‘I told you so.’ Twilight smiled sheepishly.
“See? What’d I tell ya?” the nurse said with a chuckle. “You did great.”
Twilight’s sheepish smile broadened into a blushing, toothy grin. The nurse brought over the jar of lollipops and hovered them in front of her, which quickly drew Twilight’s undivided attention.
“So… Grape, cherry, mango, or strawberry?”
…
Shining decided that day that he liked the taste of tropical fruits.
Twilight, on the other hoof, had opted for cherry. After all, red was her favorite color this week, and the redder the red, the better. The two of them had left the doctor’s office with the stems sticking out of the corners of their mouths, features which they proudly showed off to the other fillies and colts in the waiting room as they strolled out.
Unlike the ride there, the one on the way home felt triumphantly short. By the time they’d gotten back home, however, Shining’s tongue had melted away the last of the mango lollipop until only the white stem remained. He threw it away in his bedroom garbage can when he made it back upstairs, and with a sigh, plopped down onto his bed.
He lied on his back and stared at the ceiling, deep in thought. For a little while, he did not move, and as his eyes slid closed, he began to fall asleep…
Somepony knocked on the door. Shining’s eyes snapped open.
“Who is it?”
A demure voice, one he knew quite well, answered. “Twily.”
Shining Armor sat up on the bed. He raised an eyebrow. “Oh. Yeah, what’s up?”
Twilight turned the knob and cracked the door open. Her head poked through, and seeing him there, she opened the door all the way and slipped inside. Shining Armor’s brow furrowed slightly.
“Something wrong?” he asked.
Twilight shook her head. She started to talk, but her voice was quiet. “Hey, Shiny. I, uh…”
There was a pause. Then, rather suddenly, she did something unexpected: she galloped over to him, jumped up, and wrapped her hooves around his neck in a tight hug.
“Whaa…” Shining Armor reared his head back with the surprise. Fortunately, he quickly regained his composure and let her down to the ground softly, all while returning the hug around her withers. “What’s up, Twi? What’re y—”
“Thanks for going first, Shiny,” she said before he could finish. She let go and stared up at him gratefully, pupils wide as marbles. “You… you and mom really helped me not be as scared. Th-Thanks…”
Shining gazed back down at her with unblinking eyes. An odd feeling of warmth coursed over him, which made his heart and lungs swell.
Then, he reached out his hoof toward her.
“Alright, c’mon.”
Twilight accepted the invitation right away. He set his cheek against her withers and nuzzled her affectionately.
“No problem, sis,” he spoke softly into her ear. “No problem at all.”
Author's Note
I hope this one was good, guys and gals. I'm kinda on the fence about it, but I figured I'd stop trying to be a perfectionist and just see what you all thought. I was inspired to write this story by the fact that I had to get my first flu shot in about six years a few days ago... let's just say I have a slight fear of needles.
Jeez, I gotta say that I love this brother and sister pairing. Thought I'd try my hand at it and see how you all liked it.
Thanks for reading!
~Arwhale
