Author's Note

By: Ragabash

Gold by Ragabash

"Cutie Mark Crusader Miners! Yay!" three fillies shouted, two considerably more enthusiastic than the other one. Actually, she barely raised her voice at all and the skeptic look on her face made obvious that she wasn't very thrilled over their newest plan.

"I don't know... Are you sure, this will work?" Sweetie Belle asked. "I don't think they ever found anything here." At least, she was pretty sure that this cave was never used as a mine. It certainly didn't look like it.

"Of course, they didn't!" Scootaloo replied, a bit annoyed. "They didn't look well enough! And with such an attitude, you won't find anything either!"

Sweetie was a bit daunted by that retort. "I just thought, what if there isn't anything here and we're just wasting our time?"

"No way! All that rock and nothing there? There has to be something. It might not be much, it might be rare and might take a while to find it, but there is something, I just know it! Just think of all the stuff that might be buried in the rock: Iron, copper, aluminum, silver, gold, maybe even diamonds!" The pegasus' optimism is unwavering.

"Ah don't think that aluminum is mined," Apple Bloom threw in.

"Whatever. The point is that something must be here. And we are going to find it!"

"Why do ya have a problem with us mining here?" Apple Bloom asked, turning to Sweetie Belle. "It can't hurt to try it out, even if we don't find anything." The last part earned her a scoff from Scootaloo.

Sweetie Belle looked around the cave. It was dark, they probably wouldn't be able to see anything, if they didn't bring a lantern that now sits on the ground. The rough, rocky interior gave the cave a very uninviting appearance. If her friends weren't here, she'd probably be scared. The thought of spending a good part of her life working in such an environment was highly unappealing. "...Whatever cutie mark we can get here, I don't think I want it."

"Fine, if that's what you want, I won't force you to anything," Scootaloo said, still a bit annoyed at her friend's reluctance. "But don't come crying to us when we have awesome cutie marks and your flank is still blank."

"It's alright," Apple Bloom was considerably nicer. "Just sit here and wait for us to finish."

With that, she and Scootaloo grabbed the pickaxes, they brought with them, with their mouths and went to the end of the cave, while Sweetie sat down as told. This was going to be boring, she knew that. There was nothing to do here, aside from waiting for the others. Since they had their mouths full, she couldn't even talk with them. For a moment, she considering joining them after all. Maybe even doing it with her horn, seeing if her magic was strong enough to do harder tasks already. She had a good feeling about it, too, since she didn't have much trouble lifting her own heavy pickaxe with it.

But she was serious, when she said that she didn't want a cutie mark in mining. So, she rather avoided anything that could give her one.

As there was nothing else to do, she just sat there and watched her friends. In itself, that was pretty boring too. It was monotonous just seeing them hacking at the rock with the pickaxes, apparently without making any progress but certainly without finding anything. She could only hope that it was too boring or exhausting for them, so that they would give up soon.

But somehow, after watching them for a bit, there was something enticing about it. The sheer boredom made Sweetie Belle focus on things she never thought about much before. In that case, she noticed that both her friends had some really nice butts. Their work never got more exciting, but their backsides sure did. They complemented each other well, the one yellow, the other orange, and both together were especially nice too look at. The unicorn didn't know why, but she liked the little movements they made while they were working, swaying their hips a bit. Especially when it was a bit more and their tails swung aside, revealing the little holes underneath. Sometimes, when they were working on the lower part of the wall and raised their butts, she could even see their cute little slits.

It was nothing special, nothing out of ordinary and nothing she hadn't seen before. And yet, seeing that all made Sweetie Belle feel funny, in a rather pleasant way. Especially between her hindlegs. The more she looked at her friend's rumps, the stronger that feeling got, soon turning into a craving. For some reason, she wanted to go over there and touch them. She didn't know what she hoped for, but somehow felt that it would be nice. As she contemplated it, she subconsciously moved one of her front hooves between her hindlegs...

"Ah!" A shout by Apple Bloom startled Sweetie. As if she was thrown back into reality, she moved her hoof away and looked over to the earth pony. "D-Did something happen?"

"Oh boy, did it ever!" Scootaloo said, looking at the ground near Apple Bloom, who picked something off the ground and trotted over to Sweetie. "I told you, didn't I?" the pegasus added with a big grin.

Apple Bloom dropped something in front of the unicorn, which she thought was a rock at first. But it was quite shiny for one. Also, she never saw something that had such a yellow color. "Is that..."

"Gold!" Scootaloo shouted. "Pure gold, found here by us. We're finally getting our cutie marks."

"Um, Scotaloo," Apple Bloom, looking at her own flank. "Ah don't have one, though."

"What?" the pegasus looked at the same empty spot too. But no matter how long she stared, it wasn't getting any less blank. "Seriously? Do you have to find Celestia's treasury worth to get a gold mining cutie mark?"

"Ah guess it just didn't work," the earth pony replied. "Maybe Ah was just lucky."

Scootaloo snorted in frustration. "Fine. Then it was a failure. Again." With that, she went back to fetch her pickaxe.

Turning back to Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom said with a smile: "Ah give it to you. Sorry, that we dragged ya here, even though ya didn't want to."

"I-It's alright," Sweetie found it strangely hard to look into her face. It felt like... guilt. "I should have said something earlier."

The earth pony followed Scootaloo. Sweetie Belle tried to not look at her rump again. In hindsight, she felt uncomfortable with it, maybe because she didn't know what it was that she felt. Instead, she focused on the gold on the ground. It was tiny, but still quite an achievement for Apple Bloom, even when it didn't give her what they hoped for.

And for better or worse, it would be a reminder of this day.