On the other hoof...some things never change. Especially when it comes to Pinkie Pie...

These were Spike's thoughts as he made his way through the sea of ponies that had gathered in the town square. As promised, Pinkie Pie had invited what appeared to the be the entire town of Ponyville to his "Welcome Home Spike Party." It felt a bit strange to be his current size, and towering over everypony now, considering how he'd spent his entire life looking up at them.

To the their credit, none of the residents who came out that evening seemed outwardly uneasy or frightened that a large dragon was now making his way through the throng over to the stage. It had been set up in front of Ponyville's town hall, with a large "Welcome Home Spike" banner overhead. Spike was sure he would have never gotten through a crowd this large as easily back when he was small. His large frame cut a path through the assembled ponies until he finally made it up to the front and climbed the steps up to the stage.

As he got on stage and made his way to the center of it, Pinkie as the master of ceremonies, began to lead the crowd in a cheer welcoming him officially to his party. The pink Earth pony only managed to get about half the crowd into the spirit of the festivities. The rest did, however, at least gave him a polite round of applause. Spike wondered if that was because, even though they didn't show it outwardly, some ponies in town were a bit wary of him now that he was fully grown.

As Spike stood in the center of the stage, Mayor Mare was the first to make a speech. She welcomed him home on behalf of Ponyville, and spoke of how it was a great honor to have such a noble dragon choosing to live there. Spike appreciated the sentiments being expressed, but overall it felt like a typical politician's speech with lots of platitudes. Living in the Crystal Empire, Spike knew genuine expressions of gratitude when he heard them, considering he had saved their kingdom twice.

After the Mayor was done her speech, Twilight made her way up to the podium. She was making the speech as a member of royalty and also on behalf of the two Princess sisters who were unable to attend. Twilight promised to make the speech short, but knowing Twilight Spike figured that was pretty much impossible. Indeed, five minutes in and Rainbow Dash was heckling her from the back of the crowd to speed it up, with Twilight threatening somewhat jokingly to shave Rainbow's mane off while she was asleep on a cloud.

Spike barely paid attention to Twilight's speech though. He was too busy scanning the crowd for the one pony that hadn't seen him yet since he arrived yesterday. Fluttershy had told him before he made his way to the stage that Rarity was back from Canterlot and even though she had a guest with her, she had assured her at the train station that attending Spike's party was of the utmost importance.

Finally, Twilight ended her speech to scattered applause. Spike was so busy concentrating on scanning the crowd, he didn't notice Pinkie Pie step up to the microphone.

"ALRIGHT EVERYPONY!!!" her voice boomed over the loudspeakers. "TIME FOR ALL THE LAME, BORING SPEECHES TO BE OVER!"

"Pinkie, I don't think mine or the mayor's speeches were lame or boring," Twilight attempted to interject.

"WE'RE HERE TONIGHT FOR ONE REASON...AND THAT'S THE BIG PURPLE GUY STANDING NEXT TO ME! SO, LET'S CUT ALL THE CHIT-CHAT AND GET THIS PARTY STARTED!!!!!!"

On cue, Vinyl Scratch cranked up the sound system from her DJ booth off to the side of the stage. Pulsing beats emanated from the speakers that surrounded the square and broke Spike away from his crowd search temporarily. Since he didn't need to be on stage anymore, Spike hopped down to the ground and waded his way back into the crowd. Pinkie drastically altering the mood seemed to have the desired effect. Ponies were coming up to him from all directions welcoming him back and making small talk with him. The earlier nervous mood was gone and Spike began to feel at ease with his surroundings.

Finally, as he was engaging in conversation with Mr. and Mrs. Cake, Spike saw what he had been looking for the entire time. Directly in front of him, but on the edge of the crowd he spied two unicorns. One he recognized immediately. Rarity's curly purple mane and tail, her white coat, and the way she cantered was unmistakable. He felt his heart leap as he finally got see her after being away for so long. The old familiar feeling that he always got when he was around her before began to creep back inside of him.

He almost forgot what Fluttershy had told him earlier, and he felt a twinge of regret when he noticed the male unicorn with her. His coat was slightly off white compared to hers, and his mane and tail were coal black. Spike had never seen this stallion anywhere before. But from the way Rarity was acting around him, there was very little doubt in his mind that this was her new coltfriend that he'd heard about. He could see her chatting to her companion in a excited fashion, gesturing and pointing at various things, as well as giggling at whatever the stallion was saying to her in response. It must have been the stallion's first time in Ponyville, and Rarity obviously took it upon herself to be his tour guide.

Spike didn't want to blow off the Cakes to rush over to her, so he instead looked for an opportunity to slide away from the conversation. That came when Pinkie bounced over to ask Mrs. Cake to help her with putting the finishing touches on Spike's cake that she had made for the occasion. Mr. Cake offered to help as well, and that left Spike free to go talk to the unicorn he shared a special relationship with.

As it turned out though, he didn't need to find her. Because she was now heading directly towards him with her companion in tow. She must have spotted him as well...an easy task since he was the tallest object around.

"Spikey Wikey...!" she cried out. "Oh thank heavens...I finally get to see you again!" Rarity trotted up to Spike with a smile befitting somepony who had been gone a long time. Spike bent down so the alabaster unicorn could give him a hug.

"Hey Rarity," Spike returned her hug warmly. "I'm glad that I finally get to see you again too. I'm sorry I didn't see you earlier today, but you were still in Canterlot."

"Do not apologize Spike," she assured him. "If anything I should be the one apologizing for being away during your grand return to Ponyville."

She glanced at her stallion companion. "I was planning on coming back a full day before you were to arrive, but he can be very convincing when he wants to be..."

Rarity turned her head fully and admired her companion. The stallion in question just smirked at the two of them.

" Please accept my humble apologies Spike," she turned back to the dragon. "Had I known that you were coming yesterday, and Twilight keeping it a secret certainly didn't help, I would have rebuffed his request to stay in Canterlot an extra day." Rarity smiled sweetly at he the unicorn next to her.

Spike found this back and forth a bit strange but held up his claws to interrupt her. "Apology accepted Rarity...but only if you introduce me to the stallion standing next to you."

"Dear Celestia...where are my manners...?" Rarity shook her head. "Spike, allow me to introduce you to Black Marble."

Sapphire blue eyes scanned Spike up and down as Black Marble extended his hoof towards the dragon. "It's nice to finally meet you Spike, Rarity has told me a lot about you since I met her."

Spike extended his claw in return. "It's nice to meet you too Black Marble." He took a mental note about how Rarity hadn't referred to him with the "c" word, but at the same time it was clear he wasn't "just a friend" either.

Spike felt a bit uncomfortable trying to make small talk to a stallion he had never met before who was now apparently the coltfriend of the mare he used to...or maybe still did have a crush on. Luckily for him, Pinkie Pie interrupted their brief reunion.

"There you are!" she exclaimed. "I need you by the stage pronto...it's not your party if you don't have a piece of the cake I made for you!"

"Uh...ok Pinkie, if you say so." Spike gave Rarity a sad smile. "Now it's my turn to apologize to you..."

"Go, Spike." she replied, although he could hear the disappointment in her voice. "It's your day after all."

Spike nodded his head before turning to follow Pinkie.

"I promise that as soon as I have time, I'll make it up to you Spikey Wikey..." Rarity called after him.

I'll hold you to that Rarity, Spike thought to himself as he made his way back through the crowd.

Things calmed down for the next couple of days after the party. Surprisingly, Spike found himself with very little to do. He'd thought that Twilight would have had six months of tasks lined up for him upon his return, seeing that he had been her number one assistant at the time of his growth sabbatical. But as it turned out, Twilight had ended up hiring another assistant to help her with running the castle. The pony in question was named Peppermint Twist, a young, bespectacled Earth pony, who was a classmate of the Cutie Mark Crusaders and who also talked with a noticeable lisp.

Spike was also surprised at how well she did his old job. While he had a habit of being lazy and would find an excuse to get out of his chores, Twist was very motivated to serve her Princess employer. She couldn't do the job full time, as she was still in school, but when Twist had free time to spare she spent most of it at the castle. Twilight, in turn, loved the job she was doing. Twist organized books in the library, proofread speeches, made Twilight any sort of checklist no matter how long or redundant it was, and even went over important documents that needed royal approval.

Twist was so organized that Spike really had nothing to do around the castle anymore. Twilight had also hired a cleaning staff to keep the place tidy, so he didn't need to keep anything but his own room clean. He thought that he would enjoy all the newfound free time, but in reality Spike was becoming bored. That morning he practically begged Twilight to let him go with Twist on one of her errands to pass the time. Although, Spike found that being around Twist while she ran errands wasn't much more exciting than sitting in his room. They didn't really have anything in common, and her voice could really get on his nerves after a while. He ended up using the time to sneak out and buy the new copy of the Power Ponies comic while Twist was buying quills and scrolls.

It was this particular comic that Spike was reading, while lying on his bed, when a knock was heard at his door.

"It's open!" he called out.

"Hey thSpike..." Twist stuck her head in his room. "There's thsompony here to thsee you..."

Twist's head disappeared and was replaced by Fluttershy walking into his room.

"Hello, Spike." she greeted him warmly. "I hope I'm not disturbing you or anything. I was just on my way to the market and I thought I'd stop by here first."

"Not at all Fluttershy...what's on your mind?" Spike sat up on the edge of his bed.

"Well..." the yellow Pegasus began. "I want to sort of apologize for the other day when I ran off on you."

Spike arched his eyebrow but remained silent.

"I feel bad that I left you like that," she continued. "Especially since you've been gone six months! What kind of friend would I be if I didn't spend time with them when they came back?"

"Don't feel too bad Fluttershy," Spike assured her. "You did have your animals to attend to."

"Oh, I know..." she said. "But it still doesn't excuse my bad behavior. In fact I'd like to make it up to you by inviting you over to my cottage for lunch tomorrow...that is if Twilight doesn't have you doing a bunch of chores..." Fluttershy looked at him timidly.

"I can assured you Fluttershy, that I've had a distinct lack of duties to perform since I've gotten back," Spike admitted. "Which means I am more than free to have lunch tomorrow, and for that matter spend the afternoon with you if you'd like."

"Oh..." she remarked. "That's wonderful! I...I look forward to spending the time with you at lunch."

"I look forward to it as well."

Fluttershy bade Spike farewell and left him alone in his room again. Spike smiled as he lay back down with his unfinished comic book. While it was turning out to be another boring day in a string of boring days, at least he had concrete plans for tomorrow. Maybe the day hadn't been a waste after all.

Author's Note

Black Marble is an actual background pony in the series

Sorry if the chapters are a bit short. There will be longer chapters with more action coming soon!

Thanks for all the upvotes and favorites so far!