Still Not Ginger

“She’s awake!”

Sparkler leapt to her hooves at once, her ears shooting straight up. Her eyes wildly flew around the room before settling on her younger sister, who was lying in the hospital bed. The Doctor stood next to her, looking relieved.

“Dinky!” Sparkler exclaimed, lunging toward her and scooping her up into her arms. “Are you okay? Are you in any pain? Talk to me!”

Dinky made a face and squirmed away from her. She rolled her eyes. “Since when have you been so…lovey-dovey?” Then she giggled. “I’m fine, but I don’t remember what happened.”

“It’s a long story.” Once again Sparkler threw her arms around her sister, nuzzling her cheek. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”

“You’re creeping me out.”

The Doctor laughed. “She’s creeping me out, too. I never knew you could be so nice, Parker.”

“It’s Sparkler.”

“Right, that’s what I said.” He tapped a hoof to his chin. “Anyway, I had the doctors scan her for any unnatural occurrences, but they didn’t find anything. ‘Unnatural occurrences’ include magic surges, by the way, which means whatever was inside her is gone now.”

Sparkler snorted. “You don’t seriously believe it would just leave, do you?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. That’s why I was going to talk to your mother. I wanted to get her opinion before I decide what the next move should be. Where is she, anyway? Don’t you think she’d want to be here when her daughter woke up?”

“I’ll find her. While I do that, you can tell Dinky what happened, because that’s going to take a while.”

A look of horror flashed across the Doctor’s face. “There’s no way I’ll be able to explain it all before you get back!” He buried his head in his hooves and added, “Besides, do you expect me to be able to sit still for that long?”

“I’ll stall,” she said simply, already heading out the door.

After Dinky—or, rather, the monster inside Dinky—had finished destroying the changelings, Dinky had stumbled out of the crumbling building and collapsed at their hooves. Sparkler had been sent ahead to get help, and Derpy and the Doctor took turns carrying the unconscious foal. Just outside the Everfree Forest there was a team of ponies waiting to bring them to the hospital. As it turned out, Vinyl Scratch and the others had made it out as well, and met up with them at the hospital. Dinky had been unconscious for the last twelve hours, but thankfully, she hadn’t been injured too badly.

Sparkler scanned the hallway before tapping one of the nurses on the shoulder. “Excuse me, have you seen a gray pegasus with a blonde mane anywhere?”

The nurse nodded and pointed toward the stairs leading to the roof. “She said she was going up there.”

“Thank you.”

It wasn’t too hard to locate Derpy on the roof. She was sitting near the edge, her head tilted back and her wings rustling in the breeze.

“Mom?”

Derpy’s ear twitched, but she didn’t turn around. “Hey, Sparkler.”

Sparkler trotted over and sat down next to her. For a moment she watched her cautiously. Then she leaned her head on her mother’s shoulder and closed her eyes. “Are you okay, Mom?”

“No.”

She blinked. “…Okay, do you care to explain?”

“My life is a lie.” Pain contorted her face.

“How?”

“My husband never loved me, he was just pretending to so he could feed, because he was a bucking changeling. One of my daughters is half-changeling and has some weird monster inside her, and my other daughter is adopted and doesn’t want anything to do with me. The only reason my boss hired me is that he felt sorry for me, and now I’m fired. Not only that, but now I have a friend who’s a thousand-year-old, time-traveling alien.” A single tear slid down her cheek. “I’ve basically just been told that everything I know is wrong. I…I’m so confused.”

Sparkler drew away, her eyes wide. “Who said I don’t want anything to do with you?”

“Nobody did, but the way you were acting before…”

“Look, Mom, it’s not that I don’t love you, I just…don’t know how to show it. I mean, I never really had a mom before, and you’re really busy, so I don’t get to spend a lot of time with you. So then I don’t get to tell you how awesome you are. You’re a great mother.” She folded her ears back. “I’m just too stubborn to admit it sometimes.”

“How am I a good mother? I don’t spend time with you two, I’m never home, and tell me, Sparkler, what’s one time I’ve sat down and had a heart-to-heart talk with you?”

“Well, you’re doing it now.”

“That doesn’t count.”

Sparkler rolled her eyes. “Okay, so maybe you don’t talk to us as often as you’d like to. But you work really hard to keep us happy, you’re always there to pick us up from school and stuff, and we know that you love us more than anything in the world.”

“But—”

“No buts. Stop beating yourself up, okay, Mom? It doesn’t matter that we’re as poor as dirt. It doesn’t matter that you’re not home very often. What matters is that you try. You’re not home very often because you’re busy working your flank off to keep us happy! You love us more than all the muffins in the world, and you tell us that. You’re always there for us. And you know what?”

Derpy sniffed, wiping her eyes. “What?”

“You’re the best mom in the whole universe, and I love you.” Sparkler hesitated, and then pulled her mother into a huge hug.

Derpy gave a small smile and returned the hug. “Sparkler, how did I end up with such amazing daughters as you and Dinky?”

“I don’t know, but I’m glad you did.”

For a few minutes they sat there like that, wrapped in a warm embrace, just enjoying each other’s company. Then Sparkler cleared her throat. “Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention that Dinky’s awake.”

“Dinky’s awake?!”

Before you could say “muffins” Derpy was inside and racing toward Dinky’s room, leaving Sparkler scrambling to keep up.

As the two drew closer to the room, they could hear giggling.

“Hee, hee! Stop it, that tickles, hee, hee!”

“What? You’re laughing too much! I can’t understand what you’re saying.”

“Please, hee, hee, stop it! I-I can’t breathe! Hee, hee, hee!”

They exchanged an amused glance and made their way inside, expecting to see Dinky rolling around in laughter. Instead, they saw Dinky dangling a feather over the Doctor’s neck, darting it down and tickling him every so often.

The Doctor kicked his legs out and snorted. “Okay, okay, you win! Ha, ha, okay, you can stop now!”

Dinky continued tickling him. “What was that?”

“Stop! Dinky, hee, hee, you win!” He yelped as the feather brushed over the back of his neck. “Please!”

“Sorry, I can’t understand—” She cut herself off abruptly, her eyes widening as she saw her mother and sister watching her. “Uhh,” she said, dropping the feather. “Uhh, I was just…”

The Doctor wriggled away from her, still giggling despite himself. “She was just showing me how she defeated the changelings. Apparently she tickled them to death.”

“Nuh uh!” she pouted. “That’s not what I said. I said I used magic, and I was showing you that. You can’t kill changelings by tickling them, silly.” A mischievous gleam flickered in her eyes. The feather, enveloped by a golden glow, lifted up slowly. “But I could probably kill you by tickling you. You’re really ticklish!”

Derpy’s jaw dropped. “Dinky, you can use magic now?”

“Yeah! See?” The feather darted over and waved in the gray mare’s face. “It’s fun.”

The Doctor ruffled Dinky’s mane and stood. “Derpy, I know you probably want to see how Dinky’s doing, but there’s actually something I needed to talk to you about. Could you come with me for a moment?”

“Um, sure.” She cast a long glance toward Dinky. “It won’t take too long, will it? I don’t want to leave her all alone here.”

“I’m sure she’ll be fine. After all, she’s got Sparkler with her. And now that she’s able to do basic magic, if anyone tries to hurt her she’ll tickle them to death.”

“Okay, then. Where to?”

He held the door open for her, exchanging a sorrowful look with Dinky before joining Derpy in the hallway. “I need to show you something in one of the rooms. It has all of Dinky’s scans and x-rays and whatnot.”

As they walked, Derpy found herself thinking about how strange this was. Though she had just met this stallion less than a week ago, she trusted him with her life. Why was that? What had he really done to make her trust him?

Or maybe it wasn’t what he had done, but what he hadn’t done. Not once had he lied to her or tried to hurt her in all the time that she’d known him. In fact, his top priority had been to protect her and her foals. When the changelings had captured her, he risked his life to save her. And somehow she knew that if a killing blow had been sent her way, he’d have jumped in front of her and took the pain instead. The same went for her foals.

Once they were inside the room, the Doctor pointed toward one of the pieces of paper. “Look. It says that there’s nothing out of the ordinary inside Dinky, but we know that whatever was inside of her wasn’t just in our imagination. That leaves only one solution; it’s gone.”

Her eyes widened. “But it intended to kill us. It practically swore it would. It wouldn’t just leave, would it?”

“You catch on quickly, Derpy. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. What’s going to happen next?”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you think it would be better to assume that it’s going to come back, or to assume that it’s not?”

“…I still don’t get it. We know it’s going to come back.”

“I know, but…” He sighed and stared at his hooves. “Derpy, I don’t usually stay in one place for very long.”

“But we’re in danger. Don’t you usually save ponies? Isn’t that basically your life’s purpose?”

“Yes, I suppose.”

“Then stay here.”

“Okay, but what if I do stay? Who knows how long it’ll take the creature to return? And during that time, I’d be sitting there on my rump while creatures all over were dying without me. Besides, it’s not like I could get a house and a normal job and just fit in. And what if it didn’t come back? I’d have to stay here until all of you died, and you know I’d get attached, so then I’d probably break the rules and go back in time to before we first met, which would cause a paradox, and then there would be another thing I’d have to fix.”

Derpy’s ears drooped. “But if you don’t stay, tons of ponies will die.”

“I know.” He frowned. “And that’s where the dilemma resides. If I do leave, a lot of people—sorry, ponies—will die. If I don’t leave, even more ponies will die. What am I supposed to do?”

“Well, maybe you could visit a whole lot.”

“But what if it returned in between visits?”

“Maybe we could find a way to contact you when you’re gone.” She shook her head furiously as soon as the words left her mouth. “Never mind, you’d be in the past and we’d be in the present and it wouldn’t work.”

He thought for a moment before a light bulb went off over his head. Figuratively, of course. “That’s not necessarily true. If ponies are able to use phones… Never mind. Hooves.”

“Phones? We have those. Why wouldn’t we?”

“But…hooves!”

“What about them?”

“How do you press the buttons?”

She flapped her wings. “Unicorns use magic, earth ponies use their nose, and we pegasi use these babies!”

The Doctor pondered that, running a cautious hoof over his nose as if pondering how that worked. Then he said decidedly, “Right. Magical ponies. Of course they use their noses. Anyway, do you have a phone?”

“Yeah, it’s at my house. But still, how would the whole past-present-future communication thing work?”

“Well, since you’ve met me, you’re now a part of my timeline. That means, if you call me in the TARDIS, no matter where or when I am, I’ll always have met you, and therefore you’re able to communicate with me.”

“Huh?”

He gave a smirk. “Hey, if your excuse is ‘magical talking ponies,’ my excuse is allowed to be ‘Time Lord.’ Does that seem fair?”

“Sure.”

“Okay, then. It works because Time Lord.” He clapped his hooves together, his grin growing wider by the moment. “Ha! I love it! It works because Time Lord. But in all seriousness, now I’m able to travel the universe, and you’re able to, well, not die because of that weird creature thing inside Dinky. That’s splendid!”

“Wait, Doctor, isn’t your TARDIS broken?”

His smile vanished. “Aw, ponyfeathers. Hey, did I use that right, by the way? I heard your friend say it before.”

She rolled her eyes, laughing. “Yes, you used it right.”

“And about the TARDIS, it might take a while, but I can fix her.”

“Her?”

“Yes, the TARDIS is alive.” Seeing her befuddled expression, he added, “It’s a long story that I don’t feel like explaining right now. Now, since that little problem is fixed, shall we head back to your foals?”

“Wait.” Her brow furrowed. “You said the TARDIS had a bunch of dangerous smoke and gas inside it that made you feel dizzy. Where are you supposed to stay?”

“What, you’re saying I can’t stay in the TARDIS? That’s rubbish. I stayed there before and I was fine!”

“You told me you had to use some of your leftover regeneration energy to get rid of the stuff from the TARDIS.”

“Oh. So I did.”

She rubbed the back of her neck. “Well, we do have a guest room that we never use. You could stay there. Just until the TARDIS is fixed, you know? I’m sure Sparkler and Dinky would love it if you stayed with us.”

“I suppose I could stay with all of you until it’s safe to sleep in the TARDIS. If it’s not too much trouble, that is.”

“No, no, it’s a pleasure!”

“Then it’s settled. I’ll drop by the TARDIS, get the universal communication thing to put on your phone, and then I’ll head back to your home. You’re sure your foals won’t mind?”

Derpy nodded. “I’m sure. They think you’re great!”

The Doctor reared onto his hind legs, nickering happily, before dropping back down and chuckling. “I didn’t know I could make that noise.” Just as he opened his mouth to speak again, his eyes grew as wide as saucers. “Oh, snap. Sparkler cast an immobilizing spell on that orange-maned friend of yours.”

“And?”

“We never went back to undo it. She’s been standing in the same place for the past day and a half!” Before Derpy could respond, he galloped out of the room. “Don’t worry, Derpy, I’ll be back! Allons-y!”

Her laughter could be heard all throughout the hospital.

A/N: Sorry for the long wait! School's been SUPER busy for me, so I haven't really had time to write. This chapter's a bit short, but I'll try to get Chapter Eleven out as soon as possible. Maybe even by the end of today, if I'm lucky.