A cloaked figured hurried through the rain in the dense brush of Everfree Forest.
After arriving at her hut, the figure dropped her hood and cloak, revealing her stripes.
Zecora leaned against the door and sighed.
She had approached someone she had been close to. Very close, for some time now with some news.
Looking down, she caressed the lump in her abdomen. It wasn’t big, but the steady growth of the curve over the weeks couldn’t be ignored.
She fin tell him, that the two of them were more fertile than initially assumed, that thing’s would be changing soon, that they’d be starting a family. Together.
He wasn’t as enthused as she was.
Slowly, she slumped down to the floor on her rump and, her arms drawn around her knees.
The walls of her hut felt much smaller now.
She looked down at her midsection.
A tiny part of her wanted to blame the unborn child for her loss, but the rest of her knew better.
“Alone we may be,” she said. “But you will see…”
She cupped the bump with her hands
“I will show you care beyond compare.”
She stopped as she felt something very faint flutter inside her.
She smiled.
“My heart will never part from you.”
__
Two months had passed since Zecora had her quiet heart to heart with her unborn foal. What had had started as a small bump had bloomed into a healthy curve with the occasional kick assuring the zebra of her child’s wellbeing within. Her navel still flat, but threatening to surface soon. She had already made a few changes to the hut; a small wooden crib in one corner. Zecora was currently sitting beside the crib, hand stitching together a small doll. She paused her activity when her foal gave a small thump, prompting her to rub the spot on her belly. She had everything she could think of in preparation for this child.
But, something was missing.
“Even though I’d bore through the world for you, you are still alone,” She said sadly. She didn’t want to admit it, but even all the love in the world couldn’t give her child companions.
Sure, she was accepted in Ponyville, but what of her child? Would they be accepted, or would they be made fun off by the other kids? Stripes in a sea of colors.
She quietly sat there, subconsciously rubbing her swollen abdomen. But then, her eyes went wide as an idea hit here. A possibly foolish idea, but an idea none the less
“Perhaps,” she mused, “I can loan you more…”
__
The zebra rummaged through the shelves and cabinets, looking for something specific.
“Did I displace it? No, there are only so many places it would be based…Aha!”
Sure enough, under a potion bottle rested a small stack of old parchments from her native homeland. Each listing an old recipe for some particularly exotic potions she normally wouldn’t use. Some were mundane; extra hair growth, change one’s eye color, while others did unspeakable things. But one in particular had her focus, a fertility potion. But not any ordinary one, one that affected a pregnancy directly.
“With you, my progeny shall be a two!”
Wasting no time, she started amassing the ingredients around her cauldron and taking measurements.
“Let’s see...” She read through the list. “Two roots of motherwort…one shave of Shatavari…one bite of White Peony…one-“
She stopped as she read the list a bit closer.
1________phoenix feather
Zecora’s eyebrows furrowed at the faded spot of parchment. It wasn’t the question on having the ingredient, she already had three feathers, thanks to her close ties with Twilight. But how much exactly was called for? Zecora started tapping her hoof on the floor anxiously. It wasn’t wise to tamper with recipes that weren’t completely there and she knew it. But she was so close, she couldn’t turn back. For the sake of her child. She took an entire red feather and dropped it into the pot.
“One phoenix feather,” she declared.
The green sludgy brew frothed for a moment before settling and turning an almost neon pink. Zecora looked at the recipe one more time.
“A pink batch means it matched!”
The normally calm zebra was almost giddy. Carefully, she took a wooden spoon and scooped a small amount of the brew into a cup. Just enough for a single shot. She raised the glass in the air with one hand while looking down and caressing her belly with the other.
“May you never be alone.” And with that simple declaration, she downed the shot. For a minute, nothing happened, not that she had expected instant results.
Then slowly, she felt something warm in her chest slowly work its way down to her core. Her hand went from the top to splayed on the side of her belly. Her skin twitched as she felt the pressure in her abdomen shift. Slowly, her belly pulsed as its size increased.
“Yes, it’s working!”
Bigger and bigger it became until finally, the orb seemed to settle. She stopped and took a breath, feeling the side of her belly for a second. She felt movement on one side and a flutter on the other. She’d done it! She’d given herself twins! She took a second to look down and admire her handiwork.
“Now you have a sibling, but no quibbling or-“
She stopped and squinted. She felt her belly start to pulse again.
“It’s still going?” Her answer came in the form of her belly surging forward, more intensely that it had previously, causing her to gasp.
“Wait, Nononon Stop!”
But her pleas weren’t answered as her belly widened out further and further. Suddenly, she lost her balance from her center of mass shifting, fell on her rump, and sprawled on her back, unable to get back up. Her belly swelling even larger still. It all proved to be too much for the poor zebra as she went into sensory overload and her vision going white.
__
She wasn’t sure how much time have passed. It may have been a minute, maybe an hour, she couldn’t tell.
Slowly, her eyes fluttered open to the sight of her hut’s celling. She blinked for a moment. Was it all just a dream? Then, she noted a great weight on her midsection. She looked down at herself and gasped. Her belly was a massive! What was once an already sizable belly was now a huge mass bulging in all directions. The black stripes on it strained to the point of being almost faded against the taunt grey skin.
“I was not a planner, of a result of this manner!”
She gave the orb a tentative stroke and winced, still sensitive. She felt a few jabs within from seemingly random spots. She couldn’t tell for sure how were in there, or what happened! Maybe the potion had sent her twins to full-term already?
“Are these buns perhaps done thanks to the potion? A notion to put into motion!”
Carefully, she drew her legs underneath herself and slowly brought herself to her feet, almost stumbling to the floor again.
“A new weight thrust in my gut. A trait I must master later.”
Slowly, she waddled to one of her cabinets and started remanding through the seeminly random totems and knickknacks until she finally pulled out a pinard horn
With the desired tool in hand, she carefully sat down on a stool, the wood giving a slight groan.
Placing the wide end of the horn onto her belly she turned her head in placed, the narrow end against her ear to listen. She closed her eyes and focused intently. Initially, it was just a jumble of noises; her breathing, the occasional gurgle of her own stomach
But slowly, as she guided it to one side of the striped orb, she began to single out a very faint but particular sound.
Thump-thump Thump-thump Thump-thump
One heartbeat.
She started to shift it across her belly, the sounds of heartbeats overlapping as she singled out another.
Two, two heartbeats. She continued her sweep.
Three
….
….
Four
Zecora’s eyes slowly opened and went wide as she reached the other end of her belly
She was pregnant, not with twins
Not even three
But quads
“Four…?”
She raised her eyebrows as she looked down at her overly-swollen midsection.
“This will be quite a chore” She took a moment to look over her new shape, or what little of the top and sides she could see. Carefully, she brought her hand around to try and gauge how much bigger she’d gotten. She winced again as her fingers brushed over something. She couldn’t see it but she knew what it was. What was once an innie was now an outie, a very sensitive one at that. It wasn’t what she had aimed for, far from it. But part of her didn’t seem to mind, it felt almost like…pride?
“Though I suppose I should be proud to be so endowed.”
She rubbed the taunt orb for a moment, before trying to stand up. The old wooden stool finally gave up and broke with a CRACK, send the poor Zebra toppling down with a cry. Fortunately she didn’t fall far as she once again found herself on her back, staring up at the ceiling. She just laid there for a moment, making a slightly unamused face and idly drumming her fingers across the side of her belly.
“I said you wouldn’t be alone, though perhaps I got ahead of myself.”
Chapter 2
Despite the sudden jump in her baby count, Zecora took it all in stride. But despite her best attempts at managing, there was one thing that was getting on her nerves. Her belly, which was still unaccustomed to its three new extra occupants, was itchy. She tried her best to cope, but it was always there, never quite going away. It finally came to a head one evening while she was in her bed reading a book. Or rather, she was trying to read, and having to pause every few minutes to scratch the side of her belly. A few paragraphs later, another itch. Finally, after almost thirty minutes of this song and dance, she had had enough.
“This will not do!” she yelled as she hoisted herself up and off her bed, immediately going for her ingredients cabinet. She had a salve recipe she could make that’d hopefully sooth her itchy skin. Only, there was one problem…
“Juniper berries, cloves, and Aloe Ve-“
She stopped as she examined her cabinets again. She was completely out of the fleshy plant in question.
“I seem to have everything, up until I need a thing.” She grumbled. It seemed another trip to Ponyville was in order. Carefully, she slipped on her cloth chest binding, the old strips feeling a tad snug since her size jump.
“It may be a sign, but I should fine” she reasoned. With what little clothing she usually wore and her coin purse ready, she was out the door and on her way.
__
The Ponyville marketplace was its usual level of afternoon busy. Ponies going about their business and shopping. Some grabbing produce, others basic odds and ends. Zecora always enjoyed wandering the streets, taking in the sights and sounds, even if her first few visits were met with fear from the locals. But as she walked down the street this evening, she kept noticing ponies staring at her from out the corner of her eye. Now she’d admit, she had always dressed lightly compared to her pony neighbors with her simple loincloth and chest covering, but at most she’d get on aside glance from the occasional bachelor. Now, it was constant, and from almost everyone she passed by.
“All this gawk while I walk. Is my change so strange?” She mumbled to herself as she entered the herb shop
The shopkeeper was kind enough to keep a straight face while she picked out some Aloe Vera fronds, but she still noted her eyes drift down to her belly at least once while she was paying for the plants. It wasn’t annoying to her, but it was still…odd. She was met with more of the same treatment on the way. Was it because she was pregnant? Before she could contemplate it for long, something caught her attention that made even her stop and stare. In one of the shops was a mirror. It wasn’t unusual in any way, just a plain full body mirror.
It’s what it showed her that had her attention.
She hadn’t seen herself in the mirror since even before the start of her pregnancy, and she was massive! Not that she was small before with just one foal, but with four she already looked overdue with healthy twins. The stripes along her belly were visibly stretched compared to the rest on her body. Her breasts, swollen in preparation for the additional foals. And to cap it all off, a navel that was now jutting out proudly in front.
“My goodness, Zecora! You’ve gotten so big!” a familiar voice called from behind. Zecora turned to spot the always fabulous Rarity. The store Zecora stopped in front of was in fact Rarity’s boutique.
“Rarity. Always a pleasure.” She greeted the ivory pony before looking back her side profile in the mirror.
“Though I must say, I may need a tape measurer.” She said, still slightly mesmerized by the sight of herself.
“Darling! You talk as if you haven’t seen yourself before!”
“You are correct, I haven’t inspected myself. Even before I knew.” Rarity gasped before putting her hands on her hips.
“Well we can’t have that now can we?”
“What do you propose-“ Zecora started before noting some of the clothes in the window
“-besides clothes” she thought to herself. Rarity just smiled.
“Take the mirror, darling.” Zecora snapped her head back at her.
“What!? Just to stare at my gut?”
“Being pregnant is a special time in someone’s life! You need to see and enjoy all the little changes!” she looked down at Zecora’s belly. “Well, maybe big changes in your case.”
“Even still! To carry such a thing would be very-“ she stopped as she noticed Rarity had already walked into her store, and was in the process of levitating the mirror out with her. She just smiled as the mirror floated beside her. Zecora just shook her head.
“I see I cannot dissuade you and your aid. I will show you the way.”
“Just steer clear of the Poison Joke patches.” Zecora just chuckled.
“Of course.” They walked back down the market road. The stares were still there, but Zecora seemed less phased this time around.
“Though I have to ask; there was gossi- I mean, rumors that you were only pregnant with one. How did,” she gestured to her belly, “that happen?”
“The story is quite long and boring.”
“As well as the trip to your hut.”
That rewarded her a hearty laugh from Zecora.
__
After arriving at her hut, and a brief chat, Rarity went on her way; leaving Zecora to her homemade itch remedy. By the time she had managed to crush and mix the concoction together, she was left with a gelatinous turquoise salve.
“No matter how brief, I shall find relief.” Wasting no time, she scraped her fingers through the mix, and slowly began to work it into her taut skin. Her eyes slowly rolled in the back of her head as her lids drooped. The cool gel sooth her dry, strained.
“And found it I have, for my round mound.” She purred. Reaching for the bowl again, she took a more generous glob in her hand and plopped it onto her belly with a splat.
“Yes, I will caress, even if I do make a mess.” She cooed as she rubbed it all across her belly. Even her bellybutton seemed less sensitive after the ministrations. Still, it didn’t stop her babies from waking up and making a few ripples under her damp skin.
“Through my actions, I have one less distraction between me,’ she stopped to place a palm over where one of her foals moved, “and you.”
Author's Note
This one took a tad longer than it should have to put together, but here it is! If any gratuitous spelling errors still remain, let me know. As always, thank you for reading.
