"Heliotrope!" called Celestia, waving from the playground's entrance. Little Heliotrope stopped pumping her legs, bringing her swing to a stop, and her moms and older sister came over to meet her. Luna, standing beside the swings, gave Celestia a nod.

"Did you have fun with Auntie Luna?" asked Celestia, bringing Heliotrope into a hug.

"Yeah," said Heliotrope.

"And why wasn't she pushing you on the swing?" asked Celestia, giving Luna a suspicious look.

"Because I'm not a baby," said Heliotrope.

"I tried," said Luna, shrugging. "She wanted to show me how high she could go on her own."

"You get in any fights, Heely?" asked Silk Shine, looking up from her phone. Chrysalis and Luna shared a smile, but Celestia's expression darkened. Silk noticed her mother's displeasure, and said, "What? Weren't you going to ask her that?"

Chrysalis put her arm around Celestia's shoulder. "Your mommy's just worried that Heliotrope is going to end up like me," she said. "You know, the hardened criminal sort. Cheer up, Celly - Heliotrope doesn't start fights. She just finishes them. I'd say that's a good middle ground for our offspring." Unseen to either of her moms, Silk Shine raised an eyebrow. She'd still never gotten a straight answer as to where she came from, biologically speaking, and she was starting to suspect she never would.

"The playground bullies seem to be leaving her alone lately," said Luna. Chrysalis hummed musically - a tone that Celestia knew meant "I told you so" - and Celestia grumbled. The two of them had discussed Heliotrope's habit of tussling with bullies, away from their children's ears, and Chrysalis had always maintained that they'd leave her alone if she fought back. Celestia was increasingly dismayed to learn that this may in fact be the case.

"Well, anyway," said Celestia, "Thanks for looking after her."

"My pleasure," said Luna. "A lot of the parents assumed she was mine." This wasn't surprising; Heliotrope, with her deep purple complexion and black hair, bore more of a resemblance to Luna than to her pale-skinned sister. "So how did the conference go?"

"It was... briefer than expected," said Celestia. "We were expecting to have to come to Silk Shine's defense, but she had already more or less settled the matter with her teacher before we arrived."

"She's got a way with words," said Chrysalis. "Takes after you, Celly. I think you just have to accept that one of our kids is good, and the other one-" she ruffled Heliotrope's short dark hair, "is pure evil. Just like their mom and mommy." Heliotrope giggled. Her understanding of "evil," at her young age, was that it was an adjective that Chrysalis applied affectionately to her.

"You are quite a pair," said Luna. "When the two of you met, I didn't foresee that you'd end up a couple, much less speculate as to what your children would be like."

Heliotrope's ears perked up, her mind seized by a question that had never before occurred to her. She rarely gave much thought to what had happened before her birth, but her Auntie Luna had presented her with an intriguing mystery. "Mommy," she said, looking up at Celestia, "How did you and Mom meet?"

Author's Note

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