Saturn Sized Stripes and Stretchmarks

Chapter 4

Eddie rested. His head lay over the shoulder of his mare. All around them lay four sleeping foal's. The fresh air filled his body with a calmness that was not shaken by one of his colt's snoring. Beneath the shade of the tall tree's vibrant boughs nothing seemed to be able to disturb them. Until Zecora squirmed slightly against Eddie’s restful spooning.

He awoke in a tired fog, "What's the matter hun?"

She breathed deeply a few times, “I think I feel them, closer now than before.” Her eyes went to the starry sky above them, a few choice stars twinkling from her gaze. “There.” She announced with a point to the sky.

Eddie looked towards the groups of stars she singled out. Slowly, easily, four specks of light seemed to drift down from the heavens. Closer they came until their place of landing became clear, out in the tall grass where all the others had come from.

Zecora could already hear the frightened sobbing of her foals amidst the calming sounds of night. “Eddie-”

“Don’t worry, I’ll go get them.” He stated like he had done for all the others.

When he rose the sound of his hooves against the earth awoke the slumbering colts and fillies, but their mother kept them close. She did not want them to wander off after their father. Eddie ignored their questions to their mother, about where he was going, about the crying in the fields. He stopped at the precipice of the grass that grew taller than the obstructing field, then closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He still wasn’t used to it, to the feeling of a split mind, but something to focus on made it easier. When he took that step into the grassy forest it felt like his head went in four directions at once, yet at the same time he moved towards only one. The farthest one, the weakest one.

To him it felt like a straight line. A knowing where this new one lay, even as it panicked and cried. He found where it had started and followed its path of bent grass deeper into the thicket. By that time he could hear it, a filly by what his ears told him. She sobbed and sniffled until at last he found her. The form obscured by grass and darkness of night, but unmistakingly one who would be his daughter.

The poor thing had yet to notice him, and he had no intention of sneaking up on her, “hello little one.”

She jumped, her head snapping to face him. Big brown eyes pleaded with him as she just stared. “W-who’re you?”

He grinned, she was already taking to words, “I’m a friend.”

“That’s a good thing, I suppose.” She sniffled and rubbed her muzzle on her arm, “Where am I? All I remember is waking up and feeling lost.”

Eddie put a hoof to his chin, none of the others asked quite so many questions, they were drawn to him, drawn to Zecora. “I’m not quite sure myself. We are in a place between, a place of preparation and learning. A place of… family.”

“Family.” She rose to that word, like she knew it, tried and true, “Are you my family?”

Now he couldn’t help but smile, “Yes, me and many others. Are you ready to meet them?”

She didn’t seem to hear the latter half of what he said, instead looking at herself, “But. But I don’t look like you.”

She stepped forward into the moonlight and Eddie’s eyes went wide. She had the basics of the zebra down, the equine form, the mohawk, the tail, but her stripes. She didn’t have stripes. Instead there were splotches of brown smeared over her face, her chest, her haunches, and in those splotches of brown were dozens of white dots.

Eddie just looked at her for a time. For so long in fact that she started to frown. He caught himself in time before any waterworks could commence and shrunk himself down then trotted towards her. He wrapped a hoof around her and held her tightly to his chest, “you are mine, and we will always know that. Never doubt that everyone here is your family, and your family loves you no matter how different you are.”

She buried her head against him and wrapped her hooves around what she could of him. Grateful to no longer be alone.

“Now, you need a name,” he loosened his grip and looked her in the eye, searching for one, until it stared him straight in the face. “How about,” he lifted a hoof and booped her right on the nose, “Dot.”

{}{}{}{}{}

Eddie slumbered atop a living mattress that thankfully wasn’t squirming. The owner of said mattress dwarfed him at a ratio of about two to one without said mattress that was attached to her body. All was right in the world for the expectant couple as Eddie smiled and mumbled out a word.

“Dot.”

The peaceful smile on his face was attacked a moment later as his alarm went off, fully blaring that the real world had come calling for its tithe. He shouted slightly as his eyes popped open and he lost the careful balance of being on Zecora’s belly. Sliding off the side and flopping onto what was left of his old mattress laid carefully on the floor for just such an emergency.

“Crap crap crap,” He muttered as he went over to the alarm to turn it off, when he looked at the time he sighed a small bit of relief, “Oh i thought that was my second alarm, thank Celestia.”

He turned around when he heard Zecora waking up as well. The sight of his massive matriarchal mountain of motherhood staring at him from around its prodigious girth was something to say the least.

“Work already?”

He nodded. “Gotta earn my bits if we’re gonna keep feeding ya.” Then he muttered, “and maybe a raise or five if you’re gonna keep eating half the haul like you did yesterday.”

She pouted as she lay on her side, rubbing what she could of her womb, “The kids are going to miss their favorite hot water bottle.”

Now he smirked, “Is that all I am to you, an object for your girthy pleasure?”

She smiled at him, “Well it got them to stop kicking last night, and you seemed to pass out just fine compared to that mattress on the floor.”

He trotted over and smooshed his head against her womb, feeling the warmth of it that had sapped the aches out of his body last night, “You are one heck of a lay Zecora.”

She grinned with pure self-satisfaction, “I could say the same about you.”

He could feel it building in him already, “Do you have any idea how badly I wanna… wanna just-” He grunted as his necklace shimmered blue and he sprouted half a foot in the air.

There was a knocking at the makeshift ‘door’ to his room. A shower curtain hung over the blown open hole. The moment he heard it a cold shock ran down his spine and Eddie shrunk almost immediately. Thinking to himself why couldn’t he do that on purpose.

Saunter then poked his head in, “Hey Eddie, you gettin ready yet? It's the Luna-palooza sofa sale today and we gotta head in early to unload the extra wagons.”

Eddie groaned like a child told to eat his greens before dessert, “forgot about that. Thanks Saunter I’ll be right out.”

Saunter let the curtain fall shut, then immediately opened it again, “Oh yeah, before I forget.” He trotted inside and placed a letter on Zecora’s outstretched hoof, “An… owl… dropped this off. Marked for you and all that.”

Saunter left the room shortly after. Letting Zecora read the paper over herself.

When her eyes went wide Eddie opened his mouth, “Everything alright?”

She put the scroll down carefully, and spoke just so, “The summit at Twilight’s castle has been convened early.”

“Oh, well that’s good news. Get you a bigger pad to crash on, heheh.” He looked into her eyes and didn’t like the way she was looking back at him, “It is good news, isn’t it?”

“Twilight herself called for it to end early. For there was an emergency she felt was more important. She was called in the night by Doctor Megal who told her that something was wrong, very wrong. She is coming over at first light to move me into better quarters within her castle.”

“What… What, does that mean ‘wrong’? Is she going to quarantine you? What’s going to happen?”

“I don’t know,” Zecora’s eyes grew slightly misty, “I hoped to have a few more days with you before all of this started but it seems fate doesn’t want us together.”

“No, I won’t let that happen,” Eddie said with a confident stamp of his hoof on the floor, “I’ll be damned to tartarus before I let her split us apart. I’m staying with you through all of this and that’s final!”

“Eddie...”

Saunter then shouted out from the living room, “Yo Eddie hurry up you got like five minutes!”

Eddie looked at Zecora, so sure, so steadfast in his decision.

She hated to, but she had to say it, “Then who will help Saunter pay for the damages to the apartment?”

“Huh?” He said back as her words struck him.

“Who will help him pay rent? You cannot abandon your friends just for me Eddie… we have to let things happen as they are… Go to work Eddie, it’s where you are needed.”

“But… What about… I can't.”

Saunter shouted for him again while Zecora just looked at him heartbroken. His head hung low, and he turned to leave. One last goodbye over his shoulder as he went out of the room.

In the living room Saunter fussed with his work vest and looked at Eddie. “Woah, bad news?”

“You could say that.”

“It’ll work itself out, don’t worry about it. Now come on we got sofas to move.” He went for the door as Eddie opened the coat closet to grab his vest.

As Eddie was putting it on he felt himself stopping, “Hey Saunter you go on ahead I forgot something.”

“Alright.”

The door shut behind him as Eddie went to the center of the living room, looking towards the hallway to the bedrooms. “I’ll stay.”

He took two steps towards Zecora until her words hit him again and he cringed, looking back towards the door, “I’ll go.”

His heart slammed in his chest as he thought of the last time seeing her being that hurt face, “No, no, I should stay.”

His brain overpowered his heart and listed reason upon reason why he couldn’t just throw away everything he worked for just for this, “But...”

The warmth in his chest he felt for his foal bearing lover burned inside him, “I have to...”

His rump planted itself on the floor as his hooves went to his aching head, a war of feelings and logic storming about in his mind as he grunted as if in pain. In one eye he saw his friends, his life, all slipping away as he and Zecora were washed away down the crazy river of fate. In the other he saw her and a hundred thousand faces slipping away from him to be locked away and forgotten. All the while the air around him hummed, the necklace at his neck pulsed. His eyes opened, lighting arced down his back and sparked upon his plot, irises shining bright white.

“I NEED TO DO BOTH!”

The shining light in his eyes enveloped his entire form, lifted him into the air, scattered junkmail flying around in the air as a vortex consumed his body. Then in a blast of energy two bodies were thrown to either end of the room. One into the closet, another behind the sofa.

There was silence, for a time. Until Saunter poked his head in the front door. “Yo, Eddie, you coming or not?”

A moan came from the closet.

“Eddie? Dude what are you doing in there we gotta go, like now.”

“Oh geez, my head feels like I got bucked and hung over at the same time.”

“Not to be mean dude, but we gotta go, come on.” Saunter trotted over to the closet and fished his friend out of it. Dusted him and his work vest off, and looked his head over for a moment, “Probably just need a little water, I'll buy you one on the way, but come on we can’t dawdle anymore.”

“Right. Ugh,” He trotted after his friend who held the door open for him.

When it slammed shut a noise came from behind the couch. A moaning that trailed on as he fought to get himself out from behind the piece of heavy furniture.

Eddie pulled himself out eventually and groaned, “Why was I?”

The voice of Zecora came from his room, “Twilight was that you? I thought I heard the din of magic in the air.”

He looked around in confusion. What was she talking about? He got himself up and gave his body a good shake to dust off the blurry feeling in his head. Without a word he trotted over to the curtain that led to his room and halfway crossed it, the light of the hallway shining over his body as he looked a concerned Zecora in the eye.

“I’m staying Zecora.”

Why he felt so sure of himself, so resolute and confident that the other decision was handled, he wasn’t sure. All he knew was that he was with the mare he loved and that was all that mattered.

{}{}{}{}{}

“You want a what?” Saunter said with disbelief.

“Just… just one, to pick me up. Ugh I feel like I’m running at half a tank.”

“Did you get enough sleep Eddie? Or were you and Zecora getting to know each other half the night?”

A bit of annoyance shot across Eddie’s beleaguered forehead, “No. I slept well, really well. By tartarus it might be the best night of sleep I ever had but come on Saunter you know I have some level of self control.”

“Right. Like the last time you asked for a coffee and I turned around for five minutes to find out you had five and feel great. Then two hours later it hits your guts and you were debating on taking a sick day.”

“Okay ONE time, but MOST of the time i’m good. I’ll stop at one I promise I just need… I mean I want one.”

“Fair,” Saunter said as he placed the order for Eddie’s coffee alongside his own on their morning stop at the coffee shop before work, “I just mean. Once you start to get to know your marefriend, it's kinda hard to stop spending such quality time with her. Especially if you’ve had a dry spell for a few years.” He finished with a pair of wiggling eyebrows.

“I’ll have you know Saunter I was plenty satisfied in that department before me and Zecora… well, you know.”

“Slapping doesn’t count.”

Before Eddie could retort, the call out for their order came from the counter. A cute little barista, with a visor and apron, placed a disposable coffee cup tray for Saunter to take up in his mouth. He brought it over in short order and Eddie took his cup in hoof and sipped at it, a little too greedily, and then cursed as he pulled the cup back.

“Really?” He said before he began rubbing at his tongue for a moment, “how did I forget how hot this stuff is when it's fresh, ugh, gonna have this burnt feeling on my tongue for a week.”

“Not your day today huh?” Saunter said as he popped another creamer into his travel mug.

“Yeah well it better turn around. I still gotta figure out how I’m gonna pay for everything we’ll need.”

Saunter hummed for a moment, “Is it really that expensive?”

“Saunter, the food we bought yesterday? That might last to the end of today at the rate Zecora eats. I usually have to blow a third of my bits on feeding myself over the month, but now Zecora plus eight growing foals in her tum? I’ll need like, ALL the overtime in the world working at Sofa and Quills just to make due. And that’s until she grows again!”

That last bit made Saunter’s brow raise slightly, “What makes you think she’ll grow again?”

Eddie bit his lip knowing he had said too much, “W-well you know. My luck and all.” He took another long sip of his coffee and winced, “Agh, dammit! This is why I don’t drink coffee.”

“You know maybe if you waited and let things cool off a little it might go a little better next time.”

“Yeah I know, I’m not five and touching the stovetop… wait are you doing that thing with the advice layered over other advice?”

“Maybe, come on we’ll be late enough as it is,” He placed his travel mug coffee hat on his head and slurped deeply from the straw, “Also try iced coffee next time if you’re so impatient for a quick fix.”

“Ha ha,” Eddie replied in a stale tone as he awkwardly held his mug in a free hoof and tried to trot on three legs without spilling anything.

[][][][][]

“Are you sure you are okay Eddie?” Zecora said with her head dipped out of the hole that led to his room.

“Yeah just,” he jammed another ice cube in his mouth, “Just felt like someone dipped my tongue in hot soup all of a sudden.”

She thought for a moment as she watched him work the ice cube around in his mouth, “Do you think we should bring it up to Twilight and the Doctor?”

His eyes went wide, “No no no, the less weird they think this all is the better. I probably just bit my tongue or something.”

“Eddie.”

“Don’t use that tone-!” He stopped when he realized how much he was yelling, then sighed, “Okay, okay, we can bring it up, but what if it’s something to do with the magic between us? What will they do?”

Zecora looked downcast, her silence spoke well of what she was thinking.

“Zecora, do you really think we can keep this a secret?”

Before either of them could speak there was a bright purple light at the front of the apartment, followed by a series of short polite knocks. Eddie wasted little time in going for the door and opening it. Before him stood Twilight Sparkle, alicorn of legend.

“Oh, Eddie. I thought you’d be at work.”

“I took the day off to look after Zecora.”

That set a tad bit of worry into the purple alicorn’s face, her wings ruffling slightly, “is everything okay? The doctor sent me some worrying news this morning. If it's accurate then we’ll need to have Zecora under tighter watch than before.”

“Tighter watch?” Eddie said with a slightly defensive tone, “she’s not some prisoner of tartarus out to do wrong. She’s just pregnant.”

Twilight sighed, “I guess that is a bit of harsh language. It is precisely because she is pregnant that she needs to be moved somewhere that she can be watched over more closely. For her safety and the foal's safety. If the doctor is right, sometime last night the amount of magic in the sample he took from her system nearly doubled. She might be close to another growth event and if we can monitor her while she has one we might be able to pin down-”

“Well I think you’re a little late for that.” Eddie said not entirely meaning to interrupt.

Twilight’s forehead furrowed, perplexed, then realization dawned on her face, “Do you mean she?”

“See for yourself.” Eddie said while standing aside.

Twilight did her best to not gallop inside as she called out, “Zecora!?”

“Back here Twilight, I’m afraid I am a tad stuck in here.”

“Stuck?” Twilight called back as she trotted towards Eddie’s room, “A-are you mobile? Does anything hurt? Are you feeling overly stretched?” A half dozen other questions grinding to a halt as she peered into the demolished doorway to Eddie’s room and her head craned back and back to meet Zecora’s eyes. The zebra mare standing almost taller than the alicorn of the sun with a barreled belly that could be mistaken for a bed cushion royalty would lounge on. “Sweet Celestia...”

Zecora waited for her to say something, but the longer the gawking went on the more aware of herself she became. She just had to break the silence, “I feel fine, if you are concerned.”

The first words of the purple pony stammering out, “H-How… but… where...”

Eddie slowly came up behind her and then stood at her side, “Well I get the awe, but what’s so amazing about it? I mean her belly doubled and then doubled again at the clinic. What’s the big deal with her putting on some inches?” Doing his best to downplay what the magically inclined alicorn was gawking at.

She rounded on him almost immediately, “Do you have any idea the amount of magic that is necessary to alter the physical state of any given pony?”

Zecora did her best to cut in to try and calm her down, “Twilight, if I remember well, when you became an alicorn you grew a few inches.”

“Yes!” Twilight almost shouted, “and do you have any idea how much raw power accumulates within a pony before they ascend? It all combusts in the act of ascension and all we get is a horn or wings or a couple of inches to our stature. The rest takes years, decades even, but you!”

She trotted forward and placed a hoof on one of Zecora’s legs, casting a spell with her horn that glimmered deep inside Zecora’s leg bones, when it bounced back and displayed information in a series of runes floating in the air Twilight’s jaw almost dropped, “You didn’t just grow Zecora, you… but why would… unless.” Her horn shimmered for a moment and a notebook appeared seemingly out of thin air along with a quill and inkwell, “I need you to tell me exactly how this happened. We need to start predicting these sooner rather than later.”

Zecora was silent trying to think, then Eddie spoke up out of nowhere, “It started when we came home from the buffet.”

“Buffet?” Twilight said as she took down a note.

“Yeah Zecora’s womb started acting up, all the kids kicking, then she said she felt butterflies and was getting warm all over then-”

“Eddie.” Zecora said curtly, “I believe I am a tad better qualified to tell the tale than you.”

Eddie stopped and looked a tad embarrassed for a moment as he chewed on an ice cube. Zecora went forward from there, adding a few more embellishments to the tale. Such as how the doorway was damaged and a somewhat truthful recounting of what the growth was like. Even if Twilight’s insistence on every detail made the zebra go slightly red in the face as she told her every rather juicy tidbit.

The quill swirled as it finished a word and then harshly stabbed the paper as it punctuated the end of a sentence.

“Okay.” The notebook and supplies vanished back to whatever pocket dimension they were pulled from. “I can compare notes with Doctor Megal when we get you to the castle, but the initial outlook seems alright to say the least.”

“So she’s okay?”

“Well, yes and no Eddie. From what I can tell the intake of calories after a given threshold translates to a massive spike in some form of magic. The exact magic I am not sure of. There are several related to growth, and a few dozen beyond that related to fetal growth not to mention this rapid multiplication and growth of fetuses. For her to garner all that from just some cheap buffet food… I need to do more research but at this point I would garner we might have to limit her food intake to prevent anything more from happening.”

“L-limit?” Zecora said with a pout, as her tummy gave an ornery rumble that visibly shook its surface and sent the occupants kicking the surface in a tantrum.

“At least until we can pin down more accurately what is going on and I can’t do that from here. I need my facilities and I'm sure Doctor Megal would like to have some instruments from his clinic brought up as well.” She then trotted her way past Zecora and faced the outer wall of the apartment. “Say Eddie, what’s on the other side of this wall?”

He looked confused for a moment, “Just the alleyway, why?”

“Would it be big enough for Zecora to squeeze through?”

He scratched at the back of his head, “Maybe? What has this got to do with anything anyway?”

“Too much danger to teleport with that much fetal life, so...” Twilight planted her hooves down firmly and closed her eyes for a moment. When her eyes opened they flashed white and an intense aura flared around her horn, the air billowing from the power building, “we need to take a slower route.”

Eddie’s eyes went wide, “Wait, what are you-” his words unable to be finished as Twilight pointed her horn at one corner of the wall and a beam of pure arcane energy shot out. The wood of the wall sizzled and crackled as she started to cut an archway into it with her spell. Eddie meanwhile just screamed in horror as he bellowed out, “My Deposit!”

Zecora looked toward the destroyed doorway and felt it was a little late to be worrying about that. Twilight continued to form an archway that left a burning purple trail of energy in the wall while Eddie fell to his haunches and wailed to the ceiling about his savings. When the shape was finally cut Twilight let the beam fizzle out and sighed some relief, before she had to blow out the sparking sizzle at the tip of her horn.

She looked at Eddie, “Oh don’t worry, it’s just a dimension door. If I had known Zecora was this big before I came over I would have set up an exit at her room so I could cut the entrance here. But as it stands it’ll just pocket the wall section for a few minutes so we can pass through.”

With a flick of her head, and a snap of magic from her horn, the magically cut wall shimmered. Then in no short order a portion of it vanished to reveal the still somewhat dark alleyway to the assembled trio.

“Okay I’ll go in front just in case we have to bend some physics to make this work.” She trotted forward and out the hole that shouldn’t be, then turned to Zecora as the cool morning air rushed into the room, “whenever you’re ready Zecora.”

The zebra in question looked toward the magically created doorway. Ample room made for both her height and width. She took a deep breath then trotted forward only to find that once she exited the apartment things got a little tight in the alleyway.

Eddie followed close behind as they moved forward. The transition into the alley was thankfully easy, but Zecora couldn’t do more than slowly step her way forward. Whenever she moved too fast her womb would bob to the left or right and slap against the wall of the two buildings she was almost sandwiched between. Eddie almost did not believe how big she seemed to be from behind. Her stature that of a mature alicorn already making the buildings seem not made for her, but the fact her womb almost stretched the width of the alleyway that four ponies could stand shoulder to shoulder in was almost too much to believe. It only reinforced how utterly full of life he had made her, and he knew, deep down, that she wanted more. It sent the oddest flutter through his skin and a want in his loins that he had to curtail before things got… big.

He licked his lips and cleared his throat the moment she cleared the alleyway, swearing he heard a wet pop when she did so. Was she still growing? He picked up his pace as he managed to get around her as she seemed to visibly stretch now that she was out of his confining room. A part of himself knowing he had to be somewhere he wasn’t directly looking at her elsewise that hunger in his body was bound to grow. He had something to ask Twilight anyway and she was taking the role of parade lead as it seemed anyway. Everypony down the street gawking at Zecora and her sway.

When he got around to her she was standing in the street seeming to be taking mental notes on Zecora’s physiology as the mare stretched and her womb swayed.

“Twilight.”

“Hm?” She said in a half listening tone.

“I was wondering, I know your castle is private property and all, but will I be able to actually see Zecora at all when she’s staying there?”

“Of course. I wouldn’t dream of separating you two.”

Eddie tapped his hoof a few times, then decided to press his luck, “For any reason?”

“Any at all.”

“Promise?”

Her brow furrowed, “What are you getting at Eddie?”

He stiffened and then slinked away, “Oh, um, nothing just uh, you know insecure. First relationship in a few years. Gonna be a dad, haha, all that. Oh, would you look at that… welcome mat!”

Her eyes burrowed into him as he trotted away and she made a quick mental note, “Never get a coltfriend.”

Not one to waste time she decided to get the train moving. She had Zecora lead as she wanted to take some notes on her movements. Which Zecora would probably find weird coming from any other pony than Twilight. When everyone was settled into an even trot, which took Zecora a few moments given how her bulk had more than doubled since the last time she moved. Not to mention if she heaved her weight too harshly her womb would bounce and almost touch the ground. This went on for a good while, but by the halfway point things were moving somewhat smoothly.

It was at about this point that the silent march was punctuated by something other than a gasp by a passerby. Twilight spoke up, “She’s marvelous isn’t she?”

Eddie almost tripped, “What?”

“Zecora. All this change and she just soldiers on through it. Not to mention her gait. Look how she has the swing of her womb in step with her trot so it doesn’t impede her balance.”

Eddie did his best to look at his marefriend through the eye of something other than a lover. But all he saw was the curve of her plot, the plushness of her flesh, and the pure unadulterated fertility of her womb bulging out to the sides of her body. Impossibly big and daring anyone to outdo her. He couldn’t see her as anything other than the most beautiful thing in all of Equestria. He almost forgot himself in that moment, he felt the rush in his body, the press of his flesh trying to expand. He caught himself moments before he almost let loose.

“Yeah, she’s amazing.” He said while looking off in a different direction. A question then built up within him that he dared to ask, “Say Twilight, whatever is happening to Zecora. The magic. Is it possible it could… affect me?”

Twilight looked at him, carefully yet thoughtfully, “That depends. I don’t really know what we’re working with yet so I couldn't say for sure. Best I could do is guess based on any symptoms you might be showing. Assuming you’re having some?”

Eddie bit his lip and thought for a long moment, “Well, earlier this morning my tongue started burning, on two seperate but closely timed occasions.”

Twilight thought for a long period of time, “Well there are magics that could cause that but… you haven’t been sticking your tongue anywhere, um, on Zecora have you?”

For once, even though he had given the action great thought, Eddie could answer truthfully, “No.”

“Then you’re probably in the clear for interacting with Zecora, but if anything else happens like that let me know. It’s not probable but it could be some form of voodoo spell. Best to nip those in the bud.” She finished with a wink.

He felt the need to ask since the topic was there, “On that note, being with Zecora. If there is something… wrong. Will I still be able to see her?”

“You mean if whatever this is becomes dangerous?”

“More or less, yeah.”

Eddie watched as the Purple alicorn seemed to take on a more regal bearing, a seriousness to the way she held her head that spoke to the legend that she was, “You know. I’m not like my sister-in-law Cadence. I don’t know love very well, but I do know friendship.” She looked at him, and suddenly he felt very small, “I know that love is kind of like friendship. A doorway to something greater than what we can be on our own. So I promise you Eddie. I will do everything in my power to keep you two together.”

He felt like a colt, big eyed and given the world on his birthday, “Really?”

She smiled, the warmest smile he swore he had ever seen from a pony that wasn’t his love, and she said, “or I'll put a cupcake in my eye.” giving a wink and a playfully stuck out tongue in response.

Eddie pronked, only about five times, but it was perhaps the happiest he had felt in the last 24 hours. A load of worry lifting from him, for the time being, and letting him just be free of it all for a few precious seconds.

[][][][][]

He was smiling. Unsure of why the world seemed to have just faded away for a moment. All cares, all worries snuffed as a smile graced his lips.

“Eddie! Equestria to Eddie snap out of it we still have eight trucks to unload!”

“Huh?” Suddenly it all came flooding back, his name, his morning, the immense workload and tight time schedule of stocking the shop in preparation for the post holiday consumer frenzy on the shop. “Sorry, I don't know what came over me I just-” a crate full of quills came soaring at him from the back of the truck and he barely caught it in time before it hit his snout.

“Less sorry, more move-y, half of us took the frickin day off and left the other half of us with twice the work to do. Pull the anchor off your plot and get that stuff to the stockers!”

Eddie left his reasonably upset co-worker and grunted as he hauled the crate on his back. The amount of oomph he had to put into each step feeling wrong. He did this sort of thing all day most days of the week and now he was feeling tired before it even got started. He was sure he was coming down with something, probably a flu-bug. Just his sort of luck.

He went out into the store proper with it. The aisles were still empty as no business was allowed to open before noon on the day after the celebration. He found the aisle where his product went and was at least glad to see a friendly face. Flaunter was using his magic to gather up groups of quills, of varying length and plumage, and sorted them neatly in rows. When he looked over and saw Eddie coming he sighed graciously.

“Oh thank goodness, I was almost out and the last thing I want is idle hooves in front of a team lead on today of all days.” He smiled and watched as Eddie shuffled toward him mindlessly then grew a frown, “Eddie, are you alright?”

“I’m fine, I just, I need a minute.” He plopped down the crate, rather loudly, in front of Flaunter then sat on his haunches and huffed a few times.

Flaunter just looked at him for a moment, concern growing on his features, “Eddie. Do you remember that promise we made yesterday?”

Eddie grunted as he stood back up, “You’ll have to refresh my memory, sorry, head’s been a little… weird this morning.”

Flaunter eyed him, the worry in his heart growing, “Do you remember at Rosa’s when you were… feeling all big and strong? How you said you’d get some help if anything happened? Well, I think this is anything.”

Eddie scoffed, “How could… that be related to this?”

His friend frowned slightly, “I’m no mage mister, but I can guess. And I guess that whatever bulk up trick you pulled yesterday is hitting you today. Like a bodybuilder the day after weightlifting, you went all the way and beyond and now you’re footing the bill.”

Eddie just frowned and looked away. It made some bit of sense and he hated guesswork at the best of times. “So, what then? Take a sick day? I won’t get my holiday pay if I do that and you saw the way Zecora eats. I need to make this money or we’re going to be in deep trouble.”

Flaunter’s eyes dipped, and then closed. “I’m not telling you what to do Eddie. I’m just saying you need to start making smarter decisions. You’re going to be a father. You have to think about more than yourself.”

“I am thinking about more than myself, didn't you hear me!”

Flaunter turned on him and stared daggers into his sneering face, “By hurling yourself at a wall when you have a growing family that loves and needs you? Dammit Eddie I’m saying you have to consider more options than just handling it yourself! Zecora is counting on you to be there, your unborn foals are counting on you to be there.”

Eddie grimaced, groaned, and turned away. His head held low as the heat flared in his nostrils, then he spoke, “I’m sorry. I’ll… I’ll consider taking a sick day, but they need me to be here. I have to try.”

Flaunter watched Eddie trot off towards the back rooms to fetch another thing for the store’s many bare shelves. He idled for a time, long enough for a wandering team lead to notice him.

“Something wrong Flaunter, not like you to be idle.”

“No I’m fine it's just-” then an idea struck him, “Actually I wanted to run something by you. It’s about Eddie, the zebra who works here.”

[][][][][]

“-and this is where you’ll be staying, the east wing guest hall.”

The large double doors meant more for grand vanity than simple function swung open with a veil of purple energy around the ornate handles. All Zecora cared about was that it seemed ample in the department of width, easily able to withstand a girth twice or more her current size with plenty of headroom to boot. What greeted the eyes of the Zebras after they took in the sight of the doors was a massive hall, reconfigured from one meant to hold a feast or ballroom dance to that of a more homely interpretation. Furniture was sparse, and it was hard to shake the sense of it being a large castle hall, but there was definitely a possibility for improvement.

“Now I know it doesn’t look homey, but it's the best bet we have since we don’t know how big you might get. That and we can set up Dr.Megal down the hall in one of my spare labs.”

Eddie looked at her in disbelief for a moment, “You have SPARE labs?”

Twilight shrugged, “Eh, it's a big castle and sometimes I like the view of the mountains to the east while I run tests.”

“Twilight?”

She turned toward the above average sized mare, “Yes Zecora?”

“I remember you mentioning something about that crystal from the other day, the one Megal used to measure whatever latent magics are affecting me, and I was wondering what exactly happened with it that made you so concerned.”

Twilight bit her lip for a moment before speaking, carefully, “I don’t want to alarm you but all i could garner from him, without running my own tests, is that the magic in the crystal sparked high and then settled at a higher natural hum than before.”

“Who in the what now?” Eddie said.

“Basically, the density of magic in the crystal, and by extension Zecora, Spiked high then settled back down to a higher baseline. Whatever this is, it's… growing stronger.”

There was a silence in the hall, then Zecora spoke up, “But… what exactly does that mean?”

“Well that’s just it, it could mean several things if we can’t pin down what’s causing it to get stronger and figure out what we are dealing with. There’s so many academic hypotheses on how the ursa evolved to grow so large and well… this sounds close to several of them.” She continued before another question was asked, “So I guess what it means is that if we don’t figure this out we might have to carve a home for Zecora out in the mountains somewhere. That is if none of the other possibilities are true.”

Eddie didn’t like the way she said that last bit, or the way she looked away when she spoke of them, “So… how bad can this get then?”

Twilight shook her head, “We’re not going to worry about those until I can confirm them as an actual outcome, which is why I wanted Zecora here in the first place. When Doctor Megal gets here we can do some more accurate testing to rule out the nastier possibilities and I might be able to sleep again.”

A new voice broke out into the echoing halls of Twilight’s castle, “Hey Twi you back yet!?”

Twilight groaned and yelled back, “Yes Spike, didn’t you get my ping when I got back!?” She grumbled under her breath, “I swear that dragon can keep track of every note I've made for the last decade, but I give him one utility spell gem and it poofs in under an hour.”

A small purple and green figure appeared around the corner at the doorway leading into the hall, “Sorry Twilight i think i left it in the west wing dining area when i took a snack break… or was it the north wing? Anyway, how are things going with zecor-AGH!” The adolescent dragon’s jaw dropped into a shout as he saw the stretched blimp of a zebra standing in the center of the hall that looked like no more than a master bedroom to one her size, “Uh, she’s not going through some kinda puberty thing like dragons do and is turning into a rampaging monster is she?”

Twilight rolled her eyes, “I can’t rule anything out because I have yet to test anything, but since she isn’t trying to hoard anything I think we can safely say no.” The alicorn then alighted and landed near her attendant dragon so she could stop speaking at a tone that made an echo in the rather barren chamber, “Speaking of those tests have you heard from the doctor yet?”

“Oh yeah,” Spike pulled out a small piece of paper and analyzed it quickly, “To sum it up, over the phone he said he should be ready around four for the move, assuming you still want to do a dimension door hop from his lab to our lab.”

Twilight nodded, “I do, a little hop across town by bending space time is nothing to make sure Zecora is alright before the end of today.”

Zecora frowned, “Twilight, you do not need to overexert yourself on my behalf.”

“No, I want to do this, Zecora. Time could be a factor and I am going to take advantage wherever I can.”

Spike, not entirely taking in the seriousness of his friend’s tone, gained a wry smile and interrupted, “Hey Twilight, you’re never gonna guess who just showed up.”

Twilight turned about with an eyebrow raised, “Who?”

Spike took a few steps forward and gestured grandly to his entrance.

A clydesdale bigger than Princess Celestia herself, sporting a beard of champions, wandered through. “Hello little lassie, may i come in?”

{}{}{}{}{}

Eddie did his best to let the crate slide off his back, but it hurt to bend his legs while lifting such a weight. He hadn’t felt so eager for the day to be over since the end of his first week of endlessly lifting sofas and crates of quills just a couple of years ago. He took a load off for a moment and just sat on his haunches trying to not breathe too heavily. It was an odd sensation, like a weakness deep in his muscles, like had gotten a few months off work and was just… less than he used to be.

“Eddie?”

He almost jumped out of his skin as he scrambled to his hoof tips, “Clipper, oh i’m sorry i didn’t mean to sit down on the job i just-”

“That’s enough Eddie. You know we try to keep things like family here at Sofa and Quills and well, the family has been talking about you.”

Eddie swallowed hard, this sounded like the beginning of a speech someone gave before they offed someone from the company. “I’m sorry Clipper I just… I didn’t get enough sleep last night”

“Eddie, please, let me finish.”

“Yes, Clipper, sorry.”

“Word of a certain… situation has reached my attention, and I brought it up with mister Quill himself.”

Eddie’s eyes tried not to bulge too obscenely at mentioning the head cheese himself.

“Now you know mister Quill is quite the family stallion. Four already and a fifth on the way, so he knows what it can be like for a newly expecting father trying to get affairs in order before the big day, and well he believes some special exemptions are in order to help you along.”

Eddie’s eyes looked about in confusion trying to piece everything together, “Wait, what are you saying?”

“Mister Quill is willing to give you a week off now, and additional time off as needed in anything pertaining to you and your marefriends unique situation.”

Eddie felt like his heart should have soared to hear such a thing, but instead he was flabbergasted, “Wait you… and he actually believes what is happening to me and Zecora is real?”

“Eddie, I don’t know how long you’ve been in ponyville, but it's something of a hotspot for strange things. Ever since Nightmare Moon all those years ago it seems like trouble and mischief made a home for themselves here. A story of a pair of zebras going from lovers to expecting four foals overnight isn’t that far fetched around here.”

Eddie laughed nervously, “I think it's about eight now sir.”

The team leader’s eyes betrayed not a hint of surprise, instead he just lightly chuckled, “And I expect we’ll have a brood of newborn foals to put the parasprite swarm to shame before it's done.”

The zebra just tried not to sweat too profusely, “Please don’t joke sir I’m barely holding it together as it is.”

The pony just grinned, “Don’t fret too much about it, these works of mischief seem to have a way of working themselves out around here. Now the paperwork is already in order if you want to take time off.”

He sighed deeply, “That sounds good, at least for today and probably tomorrow.”

“If you need more let me or the big bossman know, he’s a family man and understands what it’s like for young stallions. Just consider all of this… paternity leave.”

Eddie smiled, "that sounds really nice actually." He looked around slightly before speaking once more, "so could I clear out now? Zecora, my marefriend, got moved today and I want to go see her."

The stallion speaking with him held out a hoof toward the door, "go ahead with all the blessings of the alicorns."

Eddie wasted little time and was off with a quick, "thank you." Somewhere deep inside him he knew of probably one other to thank, but right now he had to get home and find Zecora.

He fired out of the front door of Sofa and Quills so fast he didn’t see the mountain of a clydesdale that was patiently waiting outside and it felt like ramming into a magi-steel wall.

“Oh, sorry laddie didn’t see ya coming.”

Eddie slid off of him like some cartoon tomato thrown at the face of a prisoner of a stockade. He rebounded and apologized to him first.

“No, no sir, I’m just in a hurry I have to-” When his eyes opened fully and the stars disappeared he gasped audibly, “R-r-rockhoof! The pillar of strength!”

“Ah so you do know me.” A few hearty deep laughs leaving him over and over again.

“How can nopony know who you are!? You faced down the pony of shadows with the elements of harmony and-and… Oh it's an honor sir but I have to get going. I need to be with-”

“Zecora?”

Eddie froze, “Yes… how do you?”

“Oh uh…” He rubbed his chin for a moment, mumbling to himself, then smiled, “Got a message from Twilight Sparkle. I was in town after sensing a uh… need to be here. Sort of a Pillar thing that sixth sense. I think Pinkie Pie has it too, but that’s besides the point. Something has come up and we… uh they need you with Zecora pronto, little laddie.”

“Oh no, what’s wrong?”

Rockhoof smirked, “Well it seems somepony might be about to grow again.”

“What!? Oh geez if twilight sees that happen she might-”

“Do nothing!” Rockhoof sternly snapped at the worried little zebra, “She’s not that kind of pony. I know that for a fact, now come on, we don’t have a whole lot of time. And uh, I think you’re gonna wanna be there for this one.”

They started to leave and Rockhoof just followed at a distance, “Oh it's so good to finally find somepony like me. You were right, Starswirl, I just had to wait and see.”

END OF CHAPTER 4