Chapter 44

Tea Over Advice

What the fe-fu-fe-fuck. Fuck is wrong with me? Why the flip did I almost feel like I should have stayed at the hospital? Why did nearly getting frozen by something as a sliver feel so... less than terrifying?!

Like you could have just curled up on that heating vent, fell asleep and never woke u-

A flash of Pinkie is about to touch my nose, but this time I react before contact is reached!

“Not. This. Time. Pinkie?” Oy. Maybe turn the gothy down!

“But! I’m just trying to be helpful!” Pinkie protests.

Oh, yeah, you remember how you decided to give the doctor she picked a chance, resulting in a VR chat with me and then nearly getting turned into a heartcicle? Yeah, helpful.

Pinkie Pie's face twitches and I can see her mane slightly deflate and there’s a watering in her eyes. Thanks a lot, Goth Bunny.

“Is there sumthin’ the matter there, Pinkie?” Cream Puff noticed. Fet. Again. Thanks a lot Goth Bunny, Maybe you should apologize, Goth Bunny.

“Everything is fine! I-I-I just remembered that I was scheduled to clean out my freezer!” Her voice is belying that she’s not being honest. Come on you, bright pink pain in my brain! Can’t you say something nice for once!?

“Why’s that got ya all teary eyed?”

“Beeecause I’ve got some stuff that’s been in there sense generation one! I’m really gonna miss it!”

Nothing Gothy? Fine! I’ll do it!

“Pinkie, I-” But it’s already too late, she’s already poinking away.

“Don’t worry, H.B.! I’ll be back in time for the after-letter after-party!” She calls out waving and smiling a smile with a slightly deflated mane. Fuck... I hope that doesn’t come back to bite me in the backside when it comes time for her to teach me about lau-

“After-letter after-party?” Cream Puff asks.

Oooooh boy, how do I spin this?

“Uhm, yeah, it’s kind of sorta traditional at this point... I write a letter once a month and send it to Celestia and then we have a little party with cake. Right, Fluttershy?”

Fluttershy absentmindedly nods but doesn’t say anything.

This feels so wrong, telling Cream Puff this stuff, letting her in on something we’ve been doing... I’m not sure what emotion is bubbling up or why it’s there... It can’t be because of what that little colt of a ‘doctor’ said, right?

‘Your testosterone and estrogen levels are normal for a mare of your age’ or something like that... I don’t fully remember.

What I do remember is him just so openly saying-

“H.B...?”

“Huh...?”

“What’s... functionally sterile?” Yeah... that... Fuck. Every offspring of every species, it seems, has a steel trap of a mind when it comes to the most... awkward of things...

I don’t know how not to be looking around without it seeming awkward as all get out... good there are only a few ponies around and they don’t look like they are within ears- ope spoke too soon, they are turning their head and giving the ‘nope, don’t wanna be part of that conversation’, and really, I don’t blame them... and really wish they’d take me along with them.

“Well... Uhm...” Fluttershy has actually pulled herself out of whatever swamp of silence is going on in her head to say something. “It means that... uhm...”

Ugh. Pinkie and her, ‘we were so willing to explain the Heartbreak has to write letters to Celestia’ thing but this is too much!

“It’s like… Well... you see...”

I mean I get it. Reproduction related matters are uncomfortable explaining to anyone or anypony for that matter.

Fluttershy looks to the side, there’s a flush on her cheeks. “When two beings love each other- and want to start a family...”

Just shoot me and put me out of my... I would expect this from any other pony, but this is Fluttershy we’re talking about! The nature pony, the literal bird and bees pony! The pony I am sure has seen her animal friends doing...

“Sometimes things don’t quite... uhm...”

=========

“It means that I can’t have foals,” Heartbreak bluntly said with an irritated hissing sigh.

“Oh...” Cream Puff said softly looking at Heartbreak as if any further questions were the equivalent of a pot of water about to boil over. “H-how’s that any different from... uhm.. Normal sterile?” she asked, trotting along the very same path that, not only the other day was filled with laughter because of a hiccup.

“I don’t know...” Heartbreak replied, a growly, grumbling, rumbling further deepening in her voice. “Maybe it’s like... all the parts are there, but nothing works, the lights are on but no pony’s home. Normal sterile, but with extra steps.” she muttered, trying her best to keep moving forward with the cast on her leg.

“D-does it have sumthin’ ta do with that there them, ah shoot, what was it?” Cream Puff tapped her hoof on the dirt ground, trying to remember. “Jeans drift?”

“Genetic drift?” Heartbreak asked, showing a bit more interest in the term because it wasn’t about her.

“Yeah! Gene-neck-rick drift!” Cream Puff paused and looked baffled. “What’s pants gotta do with not bein’ able ta have foals?”

Heartbreak chuckled at the little filly’s innocence while pushing up her glasses. “Genes are different from jeans. Genes are like... the instructions inside living cells on how to make that something.”

Cream Puff’s head only tilted in confusion. “Say what now?”

“Ugh... I wish Twilight was here. I’m just so spent on everything I’ve been through to explain it...” Heartbreak admitted, still struggling to move forward, her left front leg moving in circles like a paddle boat oar.

“It’s like a recipe for making a cake... but instead it’s a living creature, so instead of a cake, you get a cat...” Fluttershy explained, her wings fliting excitedly.

“Yeah... That’s what I said...” Heartbreak grumbled, her ears drooping. “Genetic drift would be like... I don’t know... changing the ingredients in your recipe one by one over a long period of time until it no longer resembles the original recipe.”

“Oh...” Cream Puff said, still looking a bit lost.

“It’s like... um... Changing the color of a frosting with food coloring, drop by drop for whatever reason.” Heartbreak said, a little less grumpy.

“So that colorin’ gets all smooth an ain’t all streaky or the ingredients don’t go an’ separate on ya?” Cream Puff asked.

“Yeah, with the addition of every drop of color there’s just that much more difference between, let’s say white and purple. By the time you’ve finished adding the final drop, if you were to put the original frosting next to the new frosting, they would contrast against each other and wouldn’t be the same hue.” Heartbreak said, the look on her face being one of disappointment how poorly she felt she had explained the subject.

“So... cause we’re white frostin’ an’ yer purple frostin’ that’s why ya can’t have foals?” Cream Puff asked.

Heartbreak’s whole body, sans her casted up leg dropped at the question. “Yeah... something like that...” she said staring forward, her head hung low and her tail dragging in the trail dust.

“Ah’m awfully sorrah fer askin’ all these questions, H.B....” Cream Puff apologized once she saw how uncomfortable Heartbreak had become. “Ah didn’t mean ta make ya feel all outta sorts fer not bein’ able ta have foals...”

Heartbreak let out a ‘pffft’ before rolling her head and eyes. “I’m fine with that part.”

“You are?” Both Cream Puff and Fluttershy said in unison.

“Uh, yeah... Not like I ever want to have foals... That’s just too much work and responsibility,” Heartbreak scoffed and shook her head. “I mean can you even imagine me as a mother? Like, ever? Not a good idea...”

Cream Puff’s little ears drooped and she chuckled as she swallowed her feelings.”Ha... yeah... that would be... uhm... silly ta think.”

“Are you sure about that, H.B.?” Fluttershy asked, peering over the tan mare to see Cream Puff’s dreams crumpling before her very eyes. “What if one day you happen to change your mind and decide that you want-”

Heartbreak let out a visible shudder and her face twisted into disgust before she looked up with a whinnying snort of disgust and confusion at Fluttershy.

“I don’t think that there’s any kind way of saying this, Fluttershy, but ew. Can we please drop the subject?” she shook her head and rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe Dr. Hoofer just... said that right in front of... all of you!” She fumed. “Ugh... I don’t have the energy for this... I just want to go home and not think about anything!”

A hot summer breeze blew through the air, making the grass and trees dance and sway across the gnolls and tuffets that made up this lonesome landscape.

Cream Puff noticed an aching emptiness that she had not before, an eire quiet only broken by an errant cricket or the irritating buzzing of a cicada.

“Yeah...” The filly distantly said. “Ah... ah oughta go... back ta the orphanage...”

Heartbreak turned and looked at her questioningly. “You sure about that, Cream Puff? There’s still a lot of daylight left, it’s only what?” She turned her head to try and rummage in her saddlebags only to struggle and give up by squinting at the Ponyville clocktower then failing that, back at the clock on the hospital spire. “Uhm...”

“Half past four...” Cream Puff said. “Ah... got some chores ta do, ya know, work an’ responsibilities...”

“Are you sure you’re sure?” Heartbreak asked, once more.

“Yeah... Ah’m sure... Gotta make sure supper’s ready fer them there orphans an’ that Jeepers has some help takin’ a bath an such... besides...” She looked up at Heartbreak with pleading eyes. “With all the kneedin’ an’ punchin’ ya’ve been takin’ taday, ya outta have a good restin’...”

Heartbreak looked a little lost before it hit her. “Oh, haaa... bread pun... would that be a ‘bun pun’?” she asked, trying to make a joke.

“Y-yeah... Ah guess...” Cream Puff said, a small disheartened smile on her face.

“Guess... I’ll... see you tomorrow then...” Heartbreak said, a twinge of discomfort in her voice as Cream Puff took the path to the left.

“Yeah... see ya tamarrow, Hhhache.B...” She said, a false smile and damned eyes only breaking once she had passed a grove of willows and fragrant pink cyclamen flowers, the last bare remnants of what marked somepony’s homestead.

=========

Walking down the path that leads back to Ponyville and eventually to my house, I am finding myself to be a mess of emotional baggage that I just don’t have the proper tags to sort through.

Yeah, I know I said that I had some semblance of an idea of a letter back in the hospital, but that was before I nearly became whatever Ice themed character meme you want to mish-mash together before my narcissistic self loathing bunny drove Pinkie Pie away, before I was told that I need to go suck on a lemon, and before I was told that I have the proper hormones of a mare my age!

I know I just brought this up with Fluttershy and Cream Puff, but it’s troubling me on more than one level!

‘I mean, when this lesson started out, I was being told that I had too much testosterone! And that freaked me out cause I was afraid that would ‘out me’, now they’re telling me I have enough estrogen to pass as a mare and it’s freaking me out! Why?!’

You know exactly why, Mari Lwyd

‘What does that even mean?! Also just because Equestria practically runs on horse puns, songs, and tropes; Does not mean that my story is going to end up like... like... like...’

Every single gender swap, gender bender, rule sixty-three, transgender transformation-tg tf, story, comic, novela, short short, cartoon, or anime you’ve ever read, watched, perceived, or consumed where in which-

Shut up... Goth Bunny...

The main character gets turned into a girl

‘Stop talking, you ill-created thought-form!’

Almost right away does the nast-

‘Please, stop!’

And ends up all preg-

I’m begging you!

And then they end up liking the result almost against their wills? Is that what you are afraid of?

‘I don’t need to be thinking or hearing about this right now... I don’t want to address it ever...’

And you never will! Because surprise! Your fear of not being ‘pony enough’ goes down to your very genes and prevents you from procreating and the fact the elevator button doesn’t light up when pre-

‘Can. You. Not?!’

Just feeds more into your ever conflicting conflicting feeling about wanting to be pony enough to pass but not pony or should I say mare enough to accept what that might entails or what consequences that might hve further down the li-

“H.B.?”

“Gah!” Both Goth Bunny and I jump at the all too soft voice that is the tiny pebble coming at the windshield of my mind called ‘Fluttershy’.

She jumps back, her ears are pinned down, her eyes are wide and worried, her wings are flapping, feathers frazzed, her mane is a mess. “S-sorry... I... uhm... just... wanted to know if you were alright...”

“Yeah... just... Peachy Keen, Fluttershy...” Yo, tone it down, H.B., she’s just asking a reasonable question.

“Are you sure?” She asks.

Here we go...

“Yes. I’m sure.” Less mutter, less gruff, H.B... Also, don’t ask- “Why are you asking?”

That especially with the side of sass...

“Well... uhm, because... it’s just...” She’s tiptoeing-is that the right word even?! Ponies don’t have toes after all- well, actually hives are just one big toe-Whatever! Pussyfooting? Floating? Whatever the fancy canter dancing-dancing-skirting... dancing around what she wants to say. Wait, is that what she’s doing?! Prancing?! Would that be right?! “Well...” She bites her tongue and then looks at me tearfully. “I’m sorry that I didn’t notice that you were suffering from an ice wood splinter!”

=========

Heartbreak paused as the two of them entered Ponyville proper. There was a splattering of mixed emotions resonating about her body. All of them confused and conflicted, manifesting in tight curls in her mane and tail.

Tight curls that looked as if they would snap at any moment, however finally they just relaxed into a ribbony mess as Heartbreak let out a long sigh.

“It’s fine, Fluttershy...” she said, attempting to sound as neutral as possible, her hooves making a disjointed clip-clip-clip-cloppity sound on the sidewalk due to the cast inhibiting her movements. “It was a small thing, not like anyp-pony else noticed.”

Fluttershy could taste the bitterness of that last sentence. “I... I should have... After all, I’m from Equestria and you’re not... Not to say that you don’t know a lot or things about Equestria... It’s just... I... I mean... I’m sorry....”

Heartbreak took a deep breath through her nose and let it out. “Geez, Cream Puff was right, it is pretty warm today...” She commented, brushing some sweat off her forehead. “Like I said, it’s fine,” she said, her head low and her teeth unclenching. “And I’m sure that I’m sure...”

Fluttershy pensively pranced in place, her voice catching in her throat as she struggled to keep a question in restra- “Are you really sure?!” She quickly covered her mouth with both hooves. “S-sorry...” she whinny-whined.

“Yes.. I’m sure. That. I’m sure.” Heartbreak replied, this time pushing her glasses up and rubbing the space between her eyes before replacing the frames back to their proper places with a tap of the tip of her hoof.

An awkward, cold, ill-placed silence proceeded to pass between the pair, persisting to push them into the ponderings of their own minds before Fluttershy finally broke the fell silence.

“You... you don’t hate me, do you?” she asked pensively.

The question caused Heartbreak to be stopped in her tracks and give Fluttershy a confused look.

“N-no!” she stammered out. “Why would you think that?!”

Fluttershy looked down, her hoof scraping the ground as if asking the question was a shameful act. “It’s just that-” she paused.

Heartbreak took another deep breath. “It’s just... what?” she asked with a small irritation in her voice.

“It’s just...” Fluttershy repeated, backing. “That...”

“Just. That. What?” Heartbreak said, growing impatient. “Please.” She took a breath and let it out. “Spit it out.”

Fluttershy nodded. “Alright, it’s just that when you were in that room, the door froze over...”

“...Okay?” Heartbreak asked. “I’m just assuming that was... normal? I get a splinter and get ‘ice powers because...” She rolled her eyes and sighed. “Potatoes or why not? Makes as much sense as anything here!”

“It... It wasn’t that...” Fluttershy said, cowering a bit.

“Then what was it?” Heartbreak asked, just wondering if this would ever lead anywhere.

“When... When I approached the door to try and help, the ice grew thicker and Dr. Stable said that the magic was feeding off your emotions and...” She bit her hoof. “And you were telling us to go away!”

Heartbreak looked down. “I... just didn’t want any of you getting hurt. I mean, I already accidentally cut Cream Puff with one of her own tears... and I...” she let out a sigh. “I couldn’t think of anything else to do.”

“You could have let us help you, it’s not like strange things like this don’t happen in Equestria all the time...” Fluttershy saw a ripple of irritation run through Heartbreak’s coat. “I don’t mean that you don’t know that that happens- I mean I do know that you know that is something that happens but I-”

“Fluttershy, you sound really stressed. Maybe you should go back to your cottage and take care of the animals.” Heartbreak said, once again sighing.

“What about the lesson?” Fluttershy asked as a shot of anxiety shot through her “You said that you thought you might have had enough for a lesson to write!” she said her voice pleading.

“... Yeah... I might... but then that whole... freezing thing happened and now...” Heartbreak sighed. “I don’t know, I’m just really drained and just don’t have the spoons. I... I need a break.”

“But...”

“Fluttershy, please, how about we try again... tomorrow? You go take care of your animal friends...” Heartbreak said fumbling about. “I’m sure they would be more than happy to see you and just you.” she attempted to hide an embittered frown behind a smile.

“I... but how are you going to get home?” Fluttershy fretted. “You really shouldn’t be out on your own after everything that-” she suddenly found a tan hoof at her lips, if the jarring appendage being in her face wasn’t enough to put her on pause, the unnerving spiraling hole drilled into it was.

“Flutters, I’lll be alright, I promise. I can still walk. It might take some time, but I’ll make it. If it’ll help, I’ll send you a letter when I get back letting you know I got there safely. Okay?” Heartbreak asked, pulling her hoof back and running it through the tangle that was her mane.

“O-okay...” Fluttershy said, nodding nervously. “You’ll send a letter right when you get home, right?” She asked, turning around not only a few paces away from her charge.

Heartbreak cringed and turned her head back to the mare. “Yup! Totally will do. Right when I get home, then tomorrow morning, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, nice and fresh, we’ll work together in scraping together a lesson from...” she assured her while making a sweeping grand gesture with her good hoof. “Everything that’s happened that I’m sure will be good enough for sunb- Celestia. Princess Celestia.” She corrected herself.

“Are you-” Before Fluttershy could finish her question, H.B. raised her hoof and pointed it in the direction of her cottage.

“Tomorrow, I’m sure of it.” She said, hiding her teeth clenching, once again with a smile. “Now. Go. I’m sure Angel will be thrilled to see you...”

“Okay...” Fluttershy said, worry still in her voice before she reluctantly flew away.

=========

“Yeah... Angel will be thrilled because I’m not there,” I mutter to myself once Fluttershy is out of range.

Triggers, triggers everywhere, and all of them reminding me that I don’t belong.

“Not to mention that I’m such a fetting hypocrite. What was it? A couple of hours ago I was bemoaning that I couldn’t be alone and here I am now alone, nearly having chased off all the ponies that were just trying to help!”

Ugh, stop beating yourself up. That’s my job and it’s pathetic

That’s it. I’m imagining you in a little rabbit hutch.

Hey! Stop that I-

No more out of you! Into the imaginary rabbit hutch!

You ca-

I imagine the slamming of a door and then the jingling of metal growing distant. Then... quiet. Wait. Did that really work? No way that really worked. Goth Bunny, you gonna protest or anything? Huh? Nothing?

I sigh and look around, just then, I realize what street I’m on by the wafting smell of tea leaves... Glancing up, I see something that’s becoming a safe haven for me.

Lah-Tea-Dah. The white tea leaf green exeter with a large red framed window, above which is an rather ornate sign that looks like a white cloud placed atop a blue cloud with a fancy teapot sat atop roses over a stylized La-Tea-Da in red lettering. There are Chinese style lamps on either side of this window.

The carved mahogany door with a small sign that has something that looks like kanji carved out of it and painted black and the door? It beacons me...

“Enough admiring the business of two ponies who obviously have their darjeeling together, H.B.” I mutter in front of the ornately carved red framed wooden door. “It’s hot and I need some refreshing iced tea... That won’t turn me into a pony-pop.”

Pushing the door open, I’m met with so many delightful aromas: earthy, citrusy, spicy, vanilla-y, herby, minty, lemony, just... all the smells. All of them have a deep, wonderful, heady complexity... Heh, complexi-tea, that is really indescribable.

‘It’s like being in Tea-Vana back in the Mall of America... would that be The Mall of Equestria?’

As I ponder this, jingle-jangle, the twinkling of the door chimes can be heard above my head.

Upon entering the... establishment? I hear the soothing sound of a running fountain and a small metallic zipping through the air. A glint catches my eye- a dragonfly- wait no... a mechanical dragonfly, darts around the room. It actually stops its wide sweeping figure eights and tiny vibrating wings holding it to hover in the air right in front of me.

Its green and blue golden iridescent shimmering little face tilts with the tiniest of whirs and clicks, it’s almost as if it's puzzling me out, waiting for me to do something...

Cautiously I lift my hoof up into the air.

‘You better not turn me into some sort of pony-dragonfly mech thing...’ I think to myself. What, me traumatized by all the magical things that I keep coming into contact with? Nooooo. That’s just silly. Silly filly, silly billy... goat. Sill-

Just then, I feel a small weight on the tip of my hoof and see that the magical meccanoid has taken my offer for a perch.

Inspecting it, I see the thousands of black jewel-like compound eyes, the thin pieces of quartz that make up its wings, the emerald and blue sapphire segments inlaid with gold that spare no detail in its almost organic design.

I say almost due to the fact that its thorax is a clock face whose numbers are vaguely japanese appearing and whose ‘hands’ are the thin dragonfly wings... A dragonfly on a dragonfly that tells time on the fly while it has a fly... Or something like that.

“Hello! We are to be clo-sing soon!” Come the musical voice from beyond behind the counter that makes me jump “Whoever juu are please be mak-king-”

That’s when Subtle Brew’s white face peeks out from just behind a corner that leads into the back, her black flowing mane down and covering half of her face.

“Oh! Achi-Bi!” she exclaims, ducking back into the door. “Let me- Oh! Sumimasen! Dame da! Oooone minute!” She practically sings, the sound of her magic and several spells going off.

I’m not sure how to describe the sound of the magic, most unicorns in Ponyville... their magic has a particular hum... somewhere between what you expect magic to sound like and a microwave oven...

S.B.’s magical... aura I guess you’d call it that, has a sound that’s more like those singing rock bowls they have in new aged stores and in random youtube videos with a touch of windchime.

“AAACHI-Biii!” Subtle Brew begins once more, trotting from behind that door, her mane flowing freely and unhindered. Unlike what it usually is, done up in a bun, held up by ... chopsticks? No... long tea spoons... I think.

“Uhm... Hey Subtle Brew... S.B.? Can I call you that?” Abbreviations, they’re my thing, methinks. Ugh, I think my arm is getting sore from holding it up for so long.

She lets out a very cutesy giggle and shakes her head.

“No! Not at all! Achi-Bi! ES-Bi! I am liking that! Oh, it has been being so long! How have juu been?! Juu has... uh no what is...” She looks frustrated and points at her face in the eye area- oh.

“Glasses?”

“Someponi call them.. Uhm...” She’s clipping her hoof on the counter, making a sharp almost ‘snappy’ noise. “Spe... spe...”

“Spectacles?” Please let that be it.

“Oh! Yes! Spa-eti-kuruzu!” She clumsily says.

That’s not a very fair descriptor to use. I’m sure she’s brilliant in her native tongue.

“Yeeeah... Turns out that I have problems seeing small lettering and stuff, no big deal.” I wanna rub my head, but I don’t want to disturb the dragonfly.

“Oh... Oh!” She gasps and raises her hooves to her face, the long, flowing green kimono with floral print, covers pretty much her whole body due to being tied at the waist. Its sleeves hang down like drapes that have gold trim on them. It’s actually pretty nice... “What is happening to jour leg?” she asks, pointing at it.

“Oh, ha... this? Just had a little accident this afternoon?” Slowly turning my hoof so as not to disturb the little time bug. “Just a little fracture.”

“There has been much that has happened to juu! Last I was hearing of juu, it was that juu were very ill...” Her eyes widen and she covers her face with her sleeve, her cloven hoof barely visible. “Juu is feeling better, yes? No more sick?”

“Aside from the occasional phlegm?” Great time to check the throat. All... sorta clear. “I’m fine. Hospital gave me this tea that cleared things right up.”

The curved horned unicorn gives me an uneasy questioning look and her ears droop a bit.

“Uh, I didn’t say something wrong did I?”

“Hmph... ‘Hospital tea’ is hardly tea...” She says turning her nose up.

I... kinda should have seen that coming.

“Well, it was only alright, nothing like anything that you could brew up, S.B... Plus it was prescribed by a very questionable nurse named ‘Robyn Goodfilly. So, who knows what’s in it...” Exhaustion is starting to hit me... “Ugh... she has been a pain in my backside all week... Literally because it seems that I can’t go a fetting day without Fluttershy taking me to the hospital...” My grumbling has sent the little dragonfly helicoptering off and away... aw...

“Oh... juu poor ting! Come! Sit and I make juu real tea and juu can tell S.B. everyting!” She pulls out a red seating pillow with white tassels to be placed near the ‘tea bar’. “Tell her all the troubles.”

“You don’t need to be troubled with all that.” Finally able to wave my hoof. “I’m fi-i-i-ine...” ... There was more of that little ‘distressed horse noise’ in that last word than intended... and Subtle Brew’s glance as she starts pulling out a fancy purple clay teapot from off the shelf says that she’s having none of it.

“No.. Noo... Nooo... Juu tell S.B. everyting...” she says, magical tendrils made of multicolored sparkly light that reminds me of a scene in... what was that movie? Johnny Darko... No... Danny Darko! Yeah. Only made of more than one color and not luring me to my demise. Anyway, they reach to different tea cabinets behind her and pull out little bits of leaves and dried flowers and perhaps fruit together.

I tentatively hobble over and try to figure out how to sit with the lilac cast around my leg...arm... whatever, before positioning my charred branded backside onto the rather... satiny, very comfortable, fluffy pillow.

“You sure? Didn’t you say that you were closing soon?” Just then I hear a massive ‘buzzzt!’ near my ear and feel a small added weight in my mane...

The dragonfly of time has returned and seems to want to call my tangled nest home for the moment being.

“Of course not! It is ‘just us girls’ tea time!” She says setting up the kettle on a little stand, siphoning water in with her magic tendrils, and then using those same wiggly tendrils of magic to heat the pot.

“Haaha... ha... yeah... ha...” I’m sorta conflicted about that phrase, but I can’t let it show! Quickly, change the subject jutsu! “This dragonfly has taken a shine to me...”

“Oh! Juu like? Her name is Hiko Jikan-chan! It means ‘Time Flies’ in Kirin!” She cheerfully pulls a hook handled teacup from high on the shelf. It’s an interesting little drinking vessel. Glazed with a lighter tan and on it is a black broken heart. Though the most interesting part are the golden cracks that seemingly are holding it together. Kinda like, fet, what was that tradition called again? Ugh... It’s gonna bother me.

“Oh... this is... pretty.” What? It is. I like the cracks... There’s something... about... them... Ugh, shake your head out from the sudden fixation, H.B... Lift your hoof up and let the hoof slip into the hole.

She smiles brightly. “I had dis specially made! For Juu!”

“Even the cracks?”

“Oh... no..” She giggles covering her mouth. “Dis one... it broke after being removed... Terra Cotta? She was going to be throwting pieces away, but I said I could be using them! So I repaired with kintsugi!” Is that the word? Must be. Otherwise she wouldn’t use it.

“Oh, what’s that?” As if you don’t know what that is, H.B. Just fake it. Fake not knowing so she can explain it. Fight that urge to use outside information. It’s easy seeing that you’re just so fetting tired.

“It is a tradition where in which we take broken tings and repair with racquer and gold! It shows dat we may be broken, but but dose tings are a part of us, dey should be shown off as a part of... how you say... our history! Not hidden away. It reminded me very much of juu, H.B. So I had Terra Cotta do dis.”

“Aw, that’s sweet of you.” I feel a chortle of a laugh that’s mixed with... warm emotions? Bubble up, as she puts in the tea mix and pours the hot water in before presenting it to me.

“Now, that I, S.B. have served the tea... it is H.B.’s turn...” She says leaning on the counter before crossing her hooves in front of her and then resting her chin on them.

“Well... I hope you have some time on your... hooves...” I go ahead, blow on the steam coming from the cup, and then slip the hook into my hoof hole. “Cause this is going to be one long story...”

Author's Note

Really putting the slice of life, or maybe 'a cup of tea' into all this! Old characters are really making their return here.

As always The Chapter Art is Here and I thank my editors Scared Ghost and The Psychopath for their work and readers like *you*. Yes You, for reading my work. Where is all this going?! You'll all soon find out... seeing that there are SIX MORE CHAPTERS! (at least.)