NaNoWriMo2015 Oneshot Colletction

Winter stood in the sewers of Canterlot, a small smile on her face. It was almost a decade ago today, that she’d met Stormy. He was out on patrol at the moment, leaving her to herself. She’d gone for a walk and her hooves had led her to here. It was an unremarkable stretch of sewer, with nothing more than memories to set it apart.

She smiled as she began to retrace the original route she’d taken after meeting him. It was a funny meeting, that day. Storm hadn’t even wanted to be around her at first. Winter giggled. Oh, how quickly he’d changed his tune. She smiled softly, shaking her head.

Nothing bothered her as she walked. Everything down there knew better than to attempt anything. Even with foal, she could still take anything that tried to attack her apart. She whistled softly, coming to the place she was looking for. She reached up to the wall and poked the brick. The door melted from the wall as the illusion broke. The sign was in disrepair, but it was still perfectly readable. “Maintenance personnel only. Keep out,” Winter read. She knew that beyond the door was no longer the bottom of a duct system. Now, all that was beyond the door was a brick wall. Somepony had gotten wise several years ago to that and fixed it up. Winter turned and kept moving, retracing those steps she’d made so long ago as a little filly.

It wasn’t long before she reached the exit she was looking for and slipped out of the sewers. The white mare not seeming to have picked up any stray dirt or debris from her time down there. She shook her spiky, messy blue mane out, and kept moving. She paused in front of the shop, smiling. Still there, just like for as long as she could remember, was Mteja Chambo Apothecary, her aunt’s traditional Zebrican Apothecary, carrying all manner of alternative magic, potions, alchemy, and non-unicorn magical items.

That first day had been fun. She’d found a new friend—and special somepony, though she didn’t know it at the time—she’d met a Princess, and she’d gotten Stormy to loosen up. She let out another giggle as she began to walk again, not caring what the average Canterlot citizen might think of a full grown mare giggling. She could have her fun if she so chose.

As she walked, she looked around. Down she went, to the Lower Westfall District. The district wasn’t nearly as run down and dirty as it had been ten years ago, though the demographic hadn’t changed at all. Instead, Winter still remembered the legal war that had taken place between her honorary cousins and the dirty business pony that had tried to buy up the place. Winter grinned, looking at one of the few buildings that had been replaced, rather than upgraded or repaired. Even if they hadn’t ended up together, Winter delivering Shadow to Tesla in a crate had done a lot of good for the community.

She passed through without trouble, wondering whether Tesla was even there at the moment. Maybe Static could tell her. She’d have to find out later. She kept walking, slowly moving through Canterlot once more, beginning to hum tunelessly to herself. It wasn’t long until she was through the district and onto her next random destination. She turned and began to head towards the edge of the city. Her wings rippled slightly as she did so. Winter was not a changeling, nor was she a Pegasus, but something in between the two. Due to that, her transformation was severely hampered and her mental magic would never be that of a full changeling’s. Her alteration had simply moved her wings from those of the styling of a humming bird to that of a normal Pegasus.

Winter reached the edge of the city and jumped off, spreading her wings as she did so, grinning as she turned the free fall quickly into a controlled dive, altering her heading as she went out over into the outlying plains and valley. She passed over the cloud storage facility for Canterlot, grinning as she thought of all the times her and Storm had broken in there in their youth. It had always been so much fun. She soon altered her trajectory once again, heading off in another direction, seemingly at random.

It took a while, but soon, Winter was flying over a set of marshlands outside Canterlot almost opposite from the cloud facility. She drew her wings in close and dove down, soon coming to a hidden entrance to a crystal cavern. Though they were grown up, Winter had always found time to keep coming down here, or found an excuse to bring Storm with her.

She slipped down the hole in the ground easily, found the stash of thunderstones, rebreathers, and heat potions. Quaffing a potion and pulling on a rebreather—a sort of snorkel that went around in a circle around the head and somehow recycled the air—Winter jumped into the water, altering her night vision so that she could see properly. The cavern was made of pure crystal that sparkled, even in the absence of light, so that Winter didn’t even need a lantern or glowstone. She paddled through the underground cavern, still finding it just as mesmerizing as the first time she’d seen it with Stormy almost ten years back.

She reached the other end of the cavern, soon entering into the large chamber beyond. The chamber was about the size of a modest size living room, with two offshoot rooms. Winter smiled, remembering when the little cave beyond had held barely enough room for two foals. It had been a lot of painstaking effort to excavate the cavern, but it held so many special memories. It had been where Stormy had asked her to the Junior Guardians Graduation Dance. It had been where she’d first told him she loved him. It had been where they’d shared their first time truly together. It had been where Storm proposed.

Winter sighed happily. This little cave held so many memories. So many things she’d done, so many things she never wanted to forget. Her secret grotto, just her and Storm. She went into one of the rooms and lay down on the cot, just losing herself in the memories. Before she knew it, she’d fallen asleep.

A hoof shaking her shoulder awoke Winter from her nap. She blinked awake blurrily, working hard to see as the blurry grey blob came into focus. She smiled as she saw Stormy’s grey coat and charcoal black mane. “Hey,” she said smiling up at him happily.

“Hello to you too,” he said with a laugh, slipping onto the bed with her and pulling her close. “I thought I’d find you here.”

“I always seem to end up back here, don’t I?” Winter asked softly, looking over at Storm, a soft smile on her face at the strong stallion.

“Yeah, you do. I’m not sure whether I should be worried at all this reminiscing,” Storm admitted, some worry seeping into him. Winter might not be the best at Mental magic, but she had a high level of empathy, and she was right up next to him, regardless, so it didn’t take much for her to sense the worry.

“I’ll be fine,” she assured him with a little laugh. “You don’t need to worry. I guess I’m just reliving the memories. The present is all fine and good, but the past had so much in it.”

Storm laughed, the rumble of it carrying though Winter’s back, causing her to giggle with him. “That it did,” he said. “I still don’t know how you managed to get a hold of that cheese, but I think that one sticks out the most.”

Winter burst into laughter. “Of course that one does,” she said softly. “That’s one of the only ones I never managed to actually drag you into. Which is probably a good thing, with how much trouble I was in.”

“And yet you tell me it was worth every minute,” Storm said with a laugh.

“Totally worth it,” Winter agreed. “Totally worth it.” She snuggled up a little closer to Storm. “Can you believe we’ve come this far? That life has brought up to where we are?”

Storm chucked. “Don’t go getting philosophical on me, but no, I can’t believe it at times. Sometimes, sometimes I worry I’ll wake up and it’ll all have been a dream.”

Winter nodded. “But it wasn’t. I’m here with you, and you with me. And we’ll get to go into the future together,” she said softly.

“Together,” Storm agreed. He tightening his hold just a little, before reaching a wing down and grabbing the comforter from the end of the bed to pull up over them. “I’ve got tomorrow off. What do you say we stay in the grotto? For old time’s sake?”

Winter nodded. “Yeah. It won’t be long until we can’t come back here anymore, will it?” she asked him.

“No. Pretty soon we’ll have a beautiful bouncing foal taking up all our time,” he agreed.

Winter giggled once more, before snuggling just a little deeper into Storm’s arms. There was nothing in the world that could beat it. Nothing was better than falling asleep next to her special somepony, and feeling the caring he felt for her. The caring he would continue to feel for her. A peaceful, happy smile settled over her face as she fell asleep. Storm wasn’t far behind.