"Morning, AB!" Applejack called cheerfully from the counter, where she was brewing a cup of joe. The filly in question grunted noncommittally and sat down at her usual seat at the dining room table, silently starting on her eggs and toast. Unlike her older sister, Apple Bloom had no intentions of enjoying the morning.
Not that her sister understood. "C'mon, Bloom." She playfully punched the filly's shoulder. "It's Friday! School fer one more day an' then the weekend."
"Yeah, I know," Apple Bloom grumbled. "Still sucks wakin' up early, though."
Applejack chuckled. "Well, get used to it. You'll be getting up same time every mornin' even when ya graduate."
"Ughhhh." Apple Bloom bowed her head and groaned irritably. "Can it, AJ!"
Applejack remained unperturbed by her sister's bad mood- she was far too used to early morning AB. "Uh-huh, fine. Just eat yer breakfast. Don't want ta be late."
"Eeyup." Apple Bloom looked up in surprise to see her brother Big Macintosh enter the room. Applejack handed him a mug of coffee, which he took, giving his sister a nod of appreciation. Apple Bloom's tired face perked up a tad.
"Can I have some coffee too, AJ?"
"No way, no how. You got enough energy fer the whole of Ponyville once you meet up with the Crusaders, anyhow."
"Oh!" Bloom sat up a bit straighter. "That reminds me, the Crusaders want ta have a sleepover tonight! Can we? Can we?"
Setting her own mug down on the counter, Applejack hummed thoughtfully. "I dunno. It's awful short notice. I suppose Mac can drag out the ol' cot, though."
Apple Bloom shook her head. "No, no. We're gonna sleep over Scootaloo's!"
"Scootaloo's?" The orange mare frowned. "You've never slept over there."
"I know, ain't it cool? I've been in 'er house, but never slept over. It's gonna be a great cutie mark gettin' opportunity for shure!"
"And this is okay with Scootaloo's..." Applejack paused for a moment, only just now realizing a very obvious truth- who was Scootaloo's guardian? Her mom? Dad? Both? Maybe an older sister? Was the filly...an orphan? She finally guessed, "...mom?"
Apple Bloom hesitated, then shrugged. "Uh, I'm not exactly shure. I mean, Scootaloo said it was fine."
"Al....righty then." She looked towards her brother for confirmation. "Mac?"
Mac looked over the paper he had opened. "Eeyup."
Apple Bloom jumped up, energy already beginning to fill her little body. "Awesome! Thanks, AJ!" She grabbed her glass of apple juice, drinking it all in a couple big swigs. "I'm gonna go git ready!" She bounded up the stairs with such speed that she tripped with an audible "oof" before making it the rest of the way.
Applejack watched her go, mulling things over in her mind. Finally, she turned to Big Mac, her blonde tail swinging out behind her. "Mac, have you ever met Scootaloo's family?"
Big Macintosh looked up, and Applejack could see the gears in his mind turning. Finally, he shook his head, taking a sip of his coffee. "Eenope."
*****
"Thank ya kindly, Rares." Applejack carefully picked up the fragile cup of piping hot tea between her hooves. The delicate china held a dark liquid not nearly cool enough for sipping, but Applejack liked the warmth on her hooves anyway.
"Oh, Applejack, anything for you, my dear." The alabaster unicorn sat primly on the edge of the violet velvet loveseat. "It's not like you to be away from the farm in the morning. It must be quite dreadful."
"Er, I wouldn't say 'dreadful'. Just...somethin' that's been on my mind."
It was more than an understatement. From seven 'til nine, Applejack had tried to get down to business, to no avail. Baking pies, taking inventory, not even good ol' apple bucking could hold the orange country mare's attention for long. She just didn't understand. Apple Bloom had been tighter than kin with Scootaloo for about a year or so, yet Applejack had never met her mom. Or dad. Or big sister. Or any sort of family at all. She may not have been no Pinkie Pie, but she was the sister of Apple Bloom, who was 'bee ef efs' with the orange pegasus. Applejack just couldn't fathom having never met the parents before. Nor did she know why the parents had never asked to meet her- though in that regard, Applejack was just as much at fault.
"Oh! Oh, Applejack, please! You walked all the way here; don't put your dirty hooves on the china!"
Applejack blinked out of her train of thought, looking down at her hooves, then back at Rarity. "I'm not a unicorn. I have no choice," she deadpanned.
Rarity bit her lip. "Could you at least try?"
Applejack stared down at the cup and, after a few moments, was unsurprised to see it remain still. "Sorry."
Rarity sighed dramatically. "Really? Not even a little? This is my best china, you know."
The orange pony decided that enough was enough. "Okay, stop this nonsense. Listen, Rares. Y'see, I just got to thinkin', the Crusaders are about as tight as a firmly lassoed cow, yeah?"
Rarity blinked but eventually processed the overly-countricized idiom. "Well of course they are dear."
With a nod, Applejack continued, "But while I met you, and I met you and Sweetie's ma and pa, I ain't ever met Scootaloo's family. I'm...even starting to worry she ain't got one."
Rarity tittered nervously. "Don't jump to conclusions, Applejack!" She took a breath, then admitted, "Though you're right."
Applejack sighed. "So you never met her family?" The unicorn shook her head. "Shucks. I was hoping it was just random for me to not have met 'em."
"Now, now." Rarity reached over and patted Applejack's hoof. "This is not an issue! We simply have to go and ask Rainbow Dash. She and Scootaloo are practically family."
After taking a contemplative sip of her tea, Applejack nodded. "Yeah, that sounds good to me. But isn't today her day off? She'll prob'ly still be asleep."
This only stopped Rarity for a moment. "No matter! We shall have Fluttershy retrieve her."
*****
It was a beautiful day in the skies over Equestria. Not a single cloud dotted the sky, and better yet, not a single pegasus was in the air- except for one. A rainbow blur tore rough the wide open blue, making dashes and turns faster than any pegasus in Equestria- or any pegasus in history, for that matter.
But as she tore through, she felt a gentle tapping on her skull, like somepony poking her. When she stopped her flight, she felt nothing, and so shrugged and started again- and that was when the tapping resumed.
She stopped her flight once more, now a bit nervous. There was nopony in the air with her, and yet she was sure she was being tapped, by somepony keeping pace with her no less. And then, something was whispered on the wind.
"Rainbow Dash."
She screamed.
And then awoke, screamed in real life, and tumbled out of bed.
She heard something squeak in fear as the blue pegasus landed on her soft cloud floor. Groaning, Rainbow Dash looked up, right into a pair of worried seafoam-colored eyes. She blinked the sleep away, standing up as the yellow pegasus the eyes belonged to began to speak.
"Oh Rainbow, I'm so so sorry. It's just that you didn't hear me when I was knocking, but you gave me the key, so, I came in and..."
Rainbow Dash held up a hoof. "Relax, Shy. You never knock loud enough, so it's cool."
Fluttershy blushed slightly. "I know. I, um, didn't want to disturb you."
"Well, if you were coming to wake me up, you didn't really have a choice, didja?" Dash said, smirking at her friend's blush. She began to stretch and flex her wings, secondaries to primaries and back. "What's up?"
"Oh, well, actually, Applejack and Rarity have to ask you something. They asked me to come get you, that's all. Though to be honest, I'm a bit curious too."
Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "So what's it about?"
Fluttershy beckoned with a hoof. "Why don't you let them explain?"
The two pegasi walked companionably through Rainbow's fluffy mansion. When they got to the balcony, Rainbow could see two distinct dots on the ground; one orange and one white. Having no opportunity to stretch, Rainbow settled for a gentle drift downwards like her yellow friend to land gently in front of their two friends.
"Hey guys! What's shakin'?" She offered a hoof for Applejack to bump and Rarity to shake.
"Heya, Rainbow. Me and Rares-"
"You mean Rarity and I."
Applejack frowned at the unicorn's intrusion. "...Rarity and I were just thinking sbout somethin' important. Yer really close to Scootaloo, right?"
"Heck yeah I am! She appreciates my awesomeness more than anypony in Equestria. She's my right hoof!" Rainbow smiled in what she deemed to be a very awesome way and went to lean on Fluttershy nonchalantly, but misjudged the distance and fell into the dirt with a small thud. She grimaced at the chuckles all around.
"Well, RD..." Applejack said, talking down to the embarrassed pegasus without bothering to help her up. "Since yer close to Scoots, we were wondering, have you ever met her family?"
"Of course I....wait." Rainbow paused, tapping her chin with her hoof as she stood. "You know, I don't think I have. That's...really weird. I've introduced her to my dad, and I don't think I've done that for anyone except her and us girls. Plus Pinks and Twilight, of course." The pegasus scratched at her mane. "How'd you even think of it?"
"Well, Apple Bloom said she's going to a sleepover at Scoots's tonight. But it's startin' to seem to me that even though I'm AB's guardian, and Rares is close to Sweetie Belle, and you yerself are real close to Scoots, it just seems that nopony has met Scootaloo's family."
"Is she perhaps embarrassed of them? I used to feel so about my parents when I was her age."
"More than I am about mine now?" Rainbow scoffed. "Come on, Rarity. And hay, Scoots is, like, obsessed with me."
"Girls?"
"Perhaps all the more reason not to introduce her family?"
"Girls?"
"It just feels like, I dunno, like we all missed somethin' here. That's why I came to get all you girls, but we ain't gettin' nowhere!"
"Girls!"
"Well if she is hiding her parents, she won't be straight with us if we ask! I can't believe my number one fan would hide something, though..."
"Girls!!"
The three chatting mares turned to Fluttershy, who blushed. "Um, I'm sorry if this is a bad time, but isn't there a pony who knows everypony in Ponyville, regardless of which pony that pony is related to?"
The others met eyes, smiles lighting up their faces. "Pinkie!"
*****
"Welcome to Sugarcube Corn- OH MY GOSH! Rarity! Rainbow Dash! Fluttershy! Applejack! Twilight! Oh wait, there's no Twilight. Where's Twilight? Are we planning her a surprise party?"
"Good mornin', Pinkie Pie. No, we ain't plannin' no surprise party. Although..." Applejack looked around and chuckled. "We ended up getting almost all the gang together somehow. Funny, that?"
Rainbow Dash, ever impatient, flew right up to Pinkie. "Yo, Pinks! You know everypony in town, right?"
"Yepperoony!" The pink party pony booped Rainbow Dash on the muzzle at the same time she answered the question. "The super duper party pony of Ponyville needs to know everypony so she can plan them all super duper party pony birthday parties!"
"Alright then, who are Scootaloo's family members?"
"That's easy! That's-" Pinkie Pie froze. Her mother was still hanging open, still smiling as Pinkie was always wont to do, but the earth pony was completely and utterly frozen in place. A confused blue pegasus waved her hoof in front of the similarly blue eyes, but they didn't so much as twitch.
"We broke her," Rainbow Dash concluded.
"Consarnit! Even Pinkie Pie doesn't know! And now we broke her cause of that." Applejack turned her attention to the clock. It was eleven now, and important time for farm...stuff was getting wasted, but they'd come too far to give up now. "Alright, put Pinkie on my back. We're gonna see the pony who can settle this once and for all."
*****
"How should I know?"
Applejack turned to look at the glimmering crystals of Twilight's new shiny castle. "Uh. I dunno. You were just the last pony we hadn't asked, so I figured that you'd have to know. That's how these thangs usually work, right?"
Twilight shook her head. "We're not in a work of fiction, Applejack." She narrowed her eyes and looked at the frozen pony leaning against the wall. "Though Pinkie seems to think so. Stupid Pinkie, stupid breaking the laws of physics, stupid grumble grumble...."
"Ehh...whatever." Rainbow Dash said from where she hovered a ponytail length above the rest of the pack. "We should just go ask Scootaloo."
"Like we have said, Rainbow Dash," Rarity replied, "It appears that Scootaloo has been hiding her family from us. We do not wish to embarrass the poor dear." She them giggled. "And besides Pinkie freezing up, this has been quite fun."
"It is sort of like solving a mystery, or a riddle," agreed Fluttershy.
Twilight had, at some point, stopped grumbling about Pinkie's mischief and had turned to the castle's library shelves, which were already filling out quite nicely with donations from all over Equestria for their newest Princess. "I know the book the Mayor gave me is somewhere around here..." she muttered. Her pensive expression turned to one of glee when she pulled out a large tome from a shelf, her magenta glow surrounding it and unceremoniously dumping it on a nearby table. Her friends turned to face her in surprise when they heard the thump it made.
"Wooooah...." Rainbow Dash's eyes lit up. "Is that a book of magic spells? Like the Book of Magic Sorceress Emosie used in Daring Do and the Book of Magic?"
Twilight raised an eyebrow. "I know which installment the Book of Magic is from. The title makes it pretty obvious." She then smiled. "No, my dear pegasus friend, this is something quite different. This is a book full of facts and figures. This is a book that contains information on every single pony in Ponyville. It can tell you how they all link together; how all their lives intertwine. It is..."
Her friends leaned forward with bated breath.
"....Last year's census."
The collected party of ponies groaned. "Come ON, Twi! That's such an egghead thing!"
"But it's exactly what you need! We just need to find information on Scootaloo, and her family's information should be right there with her." She cracked open the book, which clearly had not been used since its formation the previous year, given the dust cloud that poofed into the air. "It shouldn't be too hard, even though it'll be under another family member's name. I'm sure I can find it." She started looking through the pages, but was interrupted by a dry cough behind her. The purple alicorn turned around to see Fluttershy coughing into her hoof.
"Oh, I'm sorry, Twilight. Please, go on."
Twilight waved a hoof. "Nonsense, Fluttershy! Let me get you a glass of water." She closed her eyes and her horn illuminated, and after a moment, a glass of water popped into existence.
"Oh, darling! Is that a new spell?"
Twilight puffed up proudly. "Yep. Summoning spell. It only does small stuff, though." She gestured with her horn a tad, and the water floated over to Fluttershy, who gratefully took it.
"Thank you, Twilight."
"No problem at all, Fluttershy!" replied Twilight Sparkle, who cheerily turned around... to see Pinkie beaming happily at her. "P-Pinkie?"
The pony in question bounced happily in place. "That's me! Look, I found Scootaloo's name!"
"What?" Twilight trotted back over, and found that, indeed, Scootaloo's name was written in fine print on the page. "How did you find this?"
"It was under 'S'!" Pinkie singsonged, bouncing over to Rarity. "Huh. That doesn't sound as singsongy as the last time I did it. Oh hey, Rarity! You didn't tell me your name wasn't Rarity Belle! I saw it in the census!"
Rarity raised an eyebrow. "I didn't tell you my name WAS Rarity Belle. Wherever did you get that idea?"
Pinkie shrugged. "It's Sweetie Belle's last name, isn't it?"
The alabaster mare groaned. "Pinkie, families don't share last names. Twilight Sparkle is related to Shining ARMOR, Twilight VELVET, and Night LIGHT, for instance. Apple BLOOM is sister to Big MACINTOSH and granddaughter to Granny SMITH. What, did you think Applejack's name was Applejack Bloom?"
Pinkie's limbs flailed in panic. "No, I thought she was Applejack Apple! And Apple Bloom Apple! And all the rest, cuz, yknow, they're from the Apple family!"
Applejack snickered. "I'm sorry, y'all, but seriously? Apple family's just a name for us. Nothing official like-" -snicker- "Apple Bloom Apple."
"Ugh. Of course."
"Hm?" Applejack turned to the lavender speaker. "What is it, Twi?"
"This thing. Apparently Scootaloo lives with her mother, but her name is smudged."
"That happens a lot lately," a pair of maybe-cousins muttered.
"But this is still good! We're looking for a mom." She turned to her friends with a broad smile. "And that means we finally know just who to ask."
The five mares around her shared a confused glance.
*****
"The school? I thought we weren't going to ask Scootaloo."
Twilight shook her head at the rainbow-maned pegasus and pointed at the schoolyard, which from this distance was filled with swarming little laughing pastel dots. "The foals are on break, so this is our chance to get the pony we want to talk to. Not Scootaloo, by the way. Come along, girls."
The mares obliged, following their lavender friend towards the one-room schoolhouse. Instead of heading towards the schoolyard to meet up with one of the foals, they headed for the building instead. It was entirely empty, aside from the schoolteacher Cheerilee, who sat at her desk grading papers. When she saw the gang enter, however, she immediately stood up.
"Hello, girls!" Her smile disappeared shortly afterwards. "Oh, my. All six of you are here? Is there another world-dominating evil on the loose?" Her smile returned, with a wicked glint to it. "Are my teaching skills finally going to be useful? I bet you want me to save the world! Oh, I've been waiting for this! I'll have that monster so educated it'll never know what hit it-"
Twilight shoved a hoof in front of Cheerilee's mouth unceremoniously. "Cheerilee, relax." She removed her hoof and when the berry-colored mare showed no indication of speaking, she continued, "We just had a question for you, considering you conduct parent-teacher conferences and all."
A murmur of understanding swept over the other five mares, amazed as usual at Twilight's intelligence, which admittedly was just one of many traits that made her just a tad overpowered. "Oh, I see. Go on, what's the question?" Cheerilee asked
The alicorn took a deep breath. "Cheerilee, who is Scootaloo's-"
"Mom!" a small voice shrieked into the room. The former Element bearers looked back at the doorway in surprise, where a small orange pegasus took deep breaths. "Mom! We need a new kickball! Snails caught it on his horn and it popped!"
Slowly...
....very, very slowly...
The six gathered mares' jaws dropped, from Twilight to Applejack, staring as Scootaloo trotted over to Cheerilee and retrived and outstretched bouncy ball.
"Thanks, mom!" Scootaloo chirped.
"That's Miss Cheerilee during school hours, young filly."
"Yeah, yeah." The filly turned back to the entranceway, only just noticing the standing mares. When she saw her hero, her eyes lit up. "Hey! Rainbow Dash! What are you doing here?!"
Rainbow Dash stood in shock, unresponsive until Pinkie, the first to reecover, reached over and propped up the blue mare's jaw. "Scoots? Cheerilee is your mom?!"
Scootaloo tucked the ball under one leg, giving her mentor a dubious look. "Yeah. Didn't you know? It wasn't a secret."
"Of course not! You never told us!" cried a purple princess.
"You never asked." Scootaloo's ears perked up. "Hey, I hear shouting! Guess they're getting antsy. See ya!" She dashed out to rejoin the game with the other foals.
"But...but...then..." Applejack bent over in shock. "How did nunna us ever know 'bout this?!"
"It really is quite shocking..." Fluttershy mumbled. "Though, I am curious." She turned to Cheerille, who was smiling sheepishly at the shocked group. "If you don't mind me asking...what happened to Scootaloo's father?"
Cheerilee sighed wistfully and looked to the side. "Our relationship was forbidden. He was, after all..."
"...A chicken."
Silence.
"So THAT's why she can't fly!" Pinkie Pie exclaimed.
After staring at the shocked faces, aside from Pinkie Pie who apparently found this tidbit completely normal, Cheerilee snicked. "I'm just messing with you girls! I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself."
Rarity exhaled in relief. "Thank the heavens. That would have been positively insane."
Cheerilee nodded. "I know. Actually, Scootaloo's father died a gruesome death at the head of Celestia's army in the Griffonian War. There wasn't even enough of him left to bury."
Silence pervaded the room again. Pinkie Pie's mane slowly deflated.
"Oh! It's time for class. This was fun, girls. Let's do it again sometime."
The shocked mares slowly left the schoolhouse.
*****
Applejack lay down on the living room couch at Sweet Apple Acres, cradling the girls' diary between her hooves, writing with pencil in mouth.
"Dear Diary,
Curiosity killed the cat.
Signed, Applejack."
Author's Note
Got this idea stuck in my head. Not quite happy with the results, but whatever.
Oh, and by the way, Scootaloo and Cheerilee are sisters in G3. I figured this wasn't too much of a stretch.
