It took them very little time to decide that all of the humiliation had actually been the Weather Bureau's fault, because in the aftermath of a disaster on that scale, the most important thing to do was finding somepony else to blame.
When you really thought about it (as they would ultimately argue in front of those who were about to pronounce sentence, with increasing desperation), the Bureau just shouldn't schedule days like that. Not in late spring, so deep into the season that you could smell summer approaching through the windows which had been cracked open to let a few more daydreams drift in and out. It was warm, and the air in the classroom was almost completely still. Rest on the benches while lunch slowly soaked through your form and you would feel the atmosphere settle over you like a blanket. Thoughts became slow, then disorganized, and finally broke up in favor of the lesser chaos imposed by fantasy. And to have those conditions exist in the very last hour of school before the weekend began, in spring verging into summer...
It was the sort of day for which the word 'logy' had been invented, and spending it cooped inside a schoolhouse was a crime against childhood. That was part of why so many students had already drifted away, their bodies left behind as a means of both demonstrating gravity and keeping the benches in place at all costs, while their minds set sail for stranger shores and, in the case of Cotton, the Games, where she was in the middle of winning every ribbon there could ever be. Including the ones for the unicorn and earth pony events, because she was just that good.
Learning anything in those conditions required friends and, with Apple Bloom, the bad luck to have bitten the shortest grass stalk out of the patch behind the schoolhouse.
It was the kind of day where you needed incentive to learn. And that was why Cheerilee had waited for exactly these conditions before introducing the next topic, because it was covering a subject so important as to bring all attention back to the real while pulling a few students in from the edge of astral projection.
She had made a good choice, in just about every way. Her teaching instincts rose from her mark, and so she knew when to strike out for those waters.
But she was also hosting a class which included the Cutie Mark Crusaders.
"As I'm sure everypony recalls," their instructor pleasantly said, resting on her own bench, "we had our spring health examinations last week."
A few general nods and nodding-offs indicated at least a rough acquisition of memory.
"Checking up on all of you, once per season," she added. "Medically. I know you all have your own family doctors, but the school board likes to have the information in one place. And as you just had those examinations, with spring so very much in the air -- I thought this would be a good time to cover pony sexuality."
Cotton's neckload of ribbons evaporated. Truffle's head jerked up and in doing so, abandoned the phantom feast of a lifetime. Snips and Snails glanced at each other, then mutually shrugged and faced forward again. Diamond's upper lip curled, while Silver's left eye went through something of a half-scrunch -- followed by, noticed by nopony at all, the shortest of all possible glances through her glasses to the right.
But when it came to three of the fillies in the room, who had all been far too busy after school on the previous day...
Sweetie was staring at something which might have been the chalkboard and, for all the focus she could currently manage, stood just as good a chance to be Canterlot. Scootaloo had tried to spit-anchor her upper eyelashes to her mane, with the usual amount of success. And Apple Bloom, who'd lost the draw and been assigned as designated note-taker, was supposed to stay awake and alert and write down what the other two would copy later in the name of not having everypony flunk, but...
Her body was present, and there were times when it moved. But her mind was in a realm of fantasy which she barely wanted to acknowledge. It was a level of dream which was at best half-formed, something which only lightly intruded upon the conscious levels because they were thoughts she didn't know how to have. There were strange glints of light within those dreams, as if all illumination was reflecting off something important.
Another kind of momentary glint reached her eyes, coming in from her left. Apple Bloom blinked, then took up her quill between her teeth and, mostly from inertia, scribbled Pony Sexuality upon a fresh page.
"Now," Cheerilee continued as powerful legs began to push away from the bench, "this year is going to be a little different. The school board's level of skittishness about this topic varies with the ponies who serve on it --" the usual smile was briefly replaced by the flash of deep irritation "-- and since our last election apparently took place in the late 1100s, you were all issued textbooks which contain no information helpful to the topic. I found this lacking, because it's information which everypony needs to learn."
She was on her hooves now, and they ground against the floor with every step.
"The current board made it very clear that they're not happy about me teaching this at all -- but after a very long discussion, they agreed to let me teach one lesson. Under the condition that I could only present the information I-will-put-anypony-who-snickers-into-detention-for-the-rest-of-the-moon orally."
There were, at most, two abruptly choked-back silences, and it told Cheerilee just how much the most basic information would be needed.
"So to begin with," their teacher instructed, "there is some faint evidence which suggests that we have changed across the centuries. Some believe that prior to the Discordian Era, ponies would sometimes go into a state called estrus, also known as heat."
The mare took up the chalk between her teeth and scribbled on the blackboard. Apple Bloom, whose attention was already being called back by the more insubstantial kind of glint, didn't bother looking. She simply, sleepily decided that one of those words sounded like it was too hard to spell, and so only wrote down the other.
"This means that, like the species of non-sapient animals which experience the same kind of cycle, they would have no interest in sex at any other time. But biology can alter over time, and now --"
More scribbling, and then the glints took her down into a world which mostly existed as a half-resolved soft grey blur. Exceptionally soft and comforting, the kind of place which was all fluff and warmth and the gentle pressure of something a little more solid than air...
She daydreamed, and didn't really want to acknowledge what those dreams were about. The quill mostly moved when her tongue absently lolled, even as nearly all of those around her carefully wrote down exactly what Cheerliee was talking about. Words which might be the most important of their lives. And because those words were so important, Cheerilee spent most of her time explaining them to those who were listening, and proudly watched as comprehension passed into now-alert minds.
But Scootaloo's eyelids ungummed, and began to sag shut. Sweetie's focus was now in the rough vicinity of Baltimare. And Apple Bloom was listening to the gentle whispers which came from a voice within. A voice she'd heard in the true world, memorized tones to which she could assign any words she liked. Words which would never truly be said at all --
-- the thought brought her partway out of the warmth: the state of a dreamer who knew the waking world was calling and wanted to hang on the dream for just a few more precious seconds. But that which had come even a little bit back returned just in time to hear the wrong things, because the lesson was over.
The horror was about to begin.
"-- Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, and Sweetie Belle." One of the three partially focused at the sound of her own name, perhaps due to the tiny portion of energy granted by consumed grass. "Yes, I'm speaking to the three of you. In front of the class, just once." Cheerliee's smile was an exceptionally gentle one. "Because I think it's something everypony needs to hear."
The quill moved.
"I had letters privately sent to all of your guardians," the teacher went on, and that gentle smile never faded. "I'm going to be collectively meeting with them tomorrow, from ten to eleven-thirty. In the morning, of course."
Again.
Proudly, "And the topic of discussion will be how much the three of you have improved. That's why I'm comfortable telling you in front of the class, because all we'll be talking about is how much better you're all doing. One conference to talk about how you're all getting better, which may even wrap up early because there's more for laughter than worry. You don't even have to be here. Just enjoy your weekend. And then the ideal number of conferences to have with them from then on will be 'never again'."
She tilted her head slightly to the right as an expression of true caring saturated her features, ears assuming a position of perfect calm while her tail lightly swayed with hope: two states which were less than a day from being shattered.
"That's all for today, everypony," Cheerilee declared. "Because I know I've given you a lot to think about." (Scootaloo began to very slowly inhale and, given any extra time in which to do so, the last part of the reverse would have emerged as a snore.) "But even when the school board is allowing me only one lesson, you can still approach me with any questions you might have. I'll even host an answer session. After the weekend is over, of course, on our next school day." Both forehooves casually stomped. "Class dismissed!"
The last two words were ones which no student could ignore, and so three fillies began to come all the way back to reality, blankets of air dissipating as their bodies spontaneously convulsed into a waking state. All around them, students were beginning to mill away from benches and desks, moving in tight clusters of low-pitched conversations: Snips with Snails, Diamond saying something to Silver...
There was a glint of reflected light, and Apple Bloom blinked. Looked up at a blackboard which had already been wiped clean, and then saw Cheerilee loading the lesson plan into a rather basic saddlebag. The school day was over.
They were the last three out, and the rest of the students were moving much more quickly: by the time they exited the building, their classmates were nothing more than the thoughtful swish of tails near the peak of a climbing road.
"I was out!" Scootaloo half-yawned as the trio made their way up the incline, with everypony still feeling somewhat dulled by the air. (Regardless, the words had come out in a way which stated the pegasus felt she'd accomplished something.) "How about you two?"
"I think... I was sort of sleeping with my eyes open," Sweetie abashedly admitted. "Because I know what I was seeing and we don't have school underwater. I was waiting for Princess Luna to swim by and tell me I had math homework." The two-tone mane dipped slightly with the weight of residual exhaustion. "We should stop somewhere and copy out Apple Bloom's notes."
The little unicorn blinked.
"Um," Sweetie tried. "You did take notes, right?"
"Yeah," Apple Bloom replied. Her forelegs and hair bow felt as if they were still covered in soft grey. "Ah wrote some stuff down. Let's jus' get over the crest, an' then we can use the first little hollow between the trees t' copy out. Ah'd rather do it before we get t' the Acres." She shuddered a little, because there was a group sleepover scheduled for that night and having the copying happen at home risked having Applejack discover that one had been learning for three. "Hope it ain't on anythin' with a test attached, though. Not sure Ah got much." Now that she thought about it, she wasn't even sure what the lesson had been about...
"We can look at the book if we have to," Scootaloo suggested in the same tone which suggested that in the absence of ways to go around, it might be necessarily to clear dog feces from a path. "Let's see what it was. Probably something boring. Just like nearly everything in school..."
They slowly crested the ridge, reached the hollow and waited until Apple Bloom had extracted her notebook from rugged saddlebags and placed it upon new grass.
The earth pony nosed it open.
Pony Sexuality
ponies go into heat
no interest in sex at any other time
the three of you (us)
just once
tomorrow from ten to eleven-thirty in the morning
never again
It had taken them some time to reach the little hollow, long enough for teacher and classmates to get out of range. But for whatever it was worth, the tripled scream served as the most horrified sound any local birds had ever heard.
The sleepover had been moved to the clubhouse. It was something which granted them privacy, cut the chances of eavesdropping to near-zero, and meant Applejack could no longer ask if there was a reason why the three of them were just barely picking at their food.
They were miserable. They hadn't so much eaten their dinner as tried to absorb it through osmosis, using the chins which kept sinking into their plates. They were downcast, dejected, and staring ahead at a tripled existence which contained a ninety-minute window, something which was due to open tomorrow -- followed by nothing.
Nothing at all.
It was a state which induced a certain level of desperation and, caught in something very close to ultimate panic, unwilling to speak with the available elders about this because Sun and Moon, this... they had turned to the last resort.
"There's nothing in the textbook," Scootaloo angrily declared as her snout flipped it closed with a slam which declared all books to be equally complicit in the crime. "Nothing." And so books were proven worthless forever.
"...how did Miss Cheerilee even know?" Sweetie weakly whispered, the little white body pressed so tightly against the floor as to suggest gravity had doubled for her alone. "And that it's once, just once? I mean... I have a big sister, Apple Bloom's one of three... there have to be ponies who get more times, better times..."
They all thought about it.
"We jus' had those health examinations," Apple Bloom morosely remembered. "Saw some testin' stuff come out that the doc ain't used before. Maybe it's stuff they only use at our age, right? An' that's how they knew. Things which can tell 'em when it's comin', down t' the minute."
The other two nodded, and a trio of fillies collectively went through the rarest thought of their lives.
"Ah wish Ah'd paid more attention t' what they were doin'," one sadly voiced for all. "So Ms. Cheerilee told us, once the results came back. So we'd know in time t' do something 'bout it."
Within her imagination, glinting light vanished, just before the surface it had been reflecting from dulled. Yellow fur sank deeper into reclaimed cushions, and the bow approached total collapse.
"Ah dunno," she admitted. "Maybe we can still do it, after... it passes. But..."
"But we won't be interested." There was moisture covering Sweetie's green eyes. "We won't feel anything. We can probably do it after, we can even still have foals when we're old enough. We just won't -- care..."
"I don't know if I care now!" Scootaloo angrily declared as her wings flared out, buzzing her upright all the faster just before hooves slammed into the clubhouse floor. "Sex! What's sex, anyway? I'll tell you what sex is! It's something so stupid and pointless, you can't even get a mark for it!"
The other two nodded. Everypony in the world agreed that it was absolutely impossible to get a mark for having sex, which was why their previous level of collective research regarding the topic had been slightly lower than that on the things you could manifest for: 'nearly zero' vs. '...are negative numbers available?'
They knew less about sex than they did regarding any markworthy skill. It was, from a certain point of view, something of an accomplishment.
"No mark, so it can't have any point!" the furious pegasus ranted, tail lashing with ever-increasing speed "It's something where you obviously can't do any stunts! It's got to be stupid, the stupidest thing there is...!"
"But we only get one chance," Sweetie whispered. "One, to find out for real, Scootaloo. And that's tomorrow, for ninety minutes." Her own tail was trying to sink through the floor. "Just ninety minutes..."
Inside Apple Bloom's mind, the dulled surface shattered.
Scootaloo took several deep breaths.
"It's still ninety minutes," the pegasus pointed out, tones and posture now having shifted to 'I still think this is pointless, but my friend is in pain and I need to support her.' "We've done a lot with ninety minutes before, when it came to marks." (All three carefully failed to think about how those previous time limits had ended -- or rather, given the typical results, expired.) "And we've got all night to plan, Sweetie. Tomorrow's the first day of the weekend, too!" She exhaled. "Can you imagine if this hit on a school day? Anyway, we can be in town. And..." Thinking faster now. "...Ms. Cheerilee said it in front of the class, so they'll know we're on the lookout. We each just have to pick a pony who's good enough to be with. Who's special. Since it's just the once."
They all thought about that.
"In our class?" Sweetie asked.
"Yeah. Or our age. Younger is babies and older is gross," Scootaloo stated, because she'd been holding those opinions regarding age for the whole of a lifetime and the current situation presented no reason for change.
"Most of the ponies in our class don't talk to us much," the unicorn pointed out.
"Because they know we're cooler than they are!"
Apple Bloom, still deep in misery among the invisible cuts inflicted by virtual shards, privately thought it was because they had spent several years with a mandated Minimum Safe Crusade Viewing Distance and nopony was completely sure the All Clear was real.
In our class...
"It's still jus' ninety minutes," the earth pony said, because dreams you could fully acknowledge were too stupid and painful to exist, especially when she'd spent the time of their sentencing dreaming about...
Maybe that's why. Because the heat was coming, and it had sent a wave of dreams ahead as first notice. Stupid, pointless, agonizing dreams.
She sighed, and let the pressure of the exhalation push the pain down deeper. "Lot t' ask of ninety minutes. An' that includes the searchin' --"
"-- not if we get into town early," Sweetie pointed out as the faint bell tones of Hope rose in her musical voice. "We could split up. We each pick a pony, head for where they should be --"
"-- but what if we can't find 'em?" Apple Bloom asked, at least on the outside. What if there's no point, what if -- don't want, because... never want... when it's me, when it's jus' me...
Just a little of that made it out.
"An' what if we do?" she quietly asked. "An' they say no?"
Scootaloo squared herself, which took a while: the shoulders went first, then the hips, and finally the wings mostly settled down: some of the pinions were still vibrating.
"It's us," she stated. "We can do it. We're worth it. Apple Bloom, do you remember anything else Ms. Cheerilee said about sex?"
The earth pony sifted her legs through the mire of misery, and one word drifted to the surface.
"...'orally'?'
They all thought about that.
"Nuzzling," Scootaloo sagely decided. "Only more around the mouth than usual. Got it."
"I think we still need a backup plan," Sweetie quietly told them. "Just in case we can't find anypony at all."
"Like what?"
"Well..." The little unicorn took an exceptionally deep breath: given the way her belly and barrel were flatted against the floor, this produced the very brief illusion of a failed levitation. "There's always -- you know... each other..."
It was not their first experience with instantaneous herdthink: it could be argued that the Crusade never would have originally continued for so long if the trio hadn't been prone to finding themselves on the same erroneous page. But this singular moment was accompanied by a true rarity: abrupt insight accompanied by a self-blindness which contracted inwards at the same speed the other was expanding. Because in that moment, each one thought of what it would be like for the group tendencies of the other two, something where complete lack of skill and knowledge was falsely compensated for with raw enthusiasm and a tendency to wind up in the emergency room -- to be applied to sex. And in that same instant, none of the three considered that same insight as applying to herself.
"...Ah think," Apple Bloom just barely managed to voice as the group's collective trembling finally faded to the point where the walls were no longer threatening to vibrate apart, "this is one of those cases where we all love each other t' much t' -- y'know -- love each other the other way."
Everypony nodded, and did so as if their lives depended on it. Most of the scenarios they'd pictured in that instant suggested a life-saving level of agreement was necessary, especially when their own lives were the ones being saved.
"So let's plan it out," Scootaloo said as the last of the burning clouds was kicked away from inner vision. (She knew it wasn't possible for clouds to burn, but she also knew it was Apple Bloom plus Sweetie and given that, she'd also kicked in a few explosions.) "Start talking, everypony! We've got all night!"
And so they talked, even as the swamp of misery rose past Apple Bloom's knees, threatened to cover her hips. Making plans which the earth pony only half-listened to, with no part of her truly agreeing because the world was cruel, and every dream was no more than broken glass.
Deep into the night, much later than they usually stayed up. It was just that important.
On and on, as Moon moved across the sky.
"-- wake up, Apple Bloom! You've got to wake up!"
A weary body, one where even a lifetime of becoming accustomed to farmer's hours hadn't been able to fight back the exhaustion which came from being awake too long and sad too deeply, forced its eyes open.
"...wha...?"
"We overslept" a frantic Sweetie yelped, with wildly-sparking horntip less than a hoofwidth away from the earth pony's eyes. "We were up too long, we slept too late..."
It woke her all the way up, got her head raised to the point where she could look past those fast-flying bits of light and spot Scootaloo frantically mouth-tossing things into her own saddlebags. "What? Why didn't anypony -- ?"
"Because Applejack decided it was a day off!" Scootaloo shouted, having just decided a lack of chores was the greatest offense in the world. "They know we stay up late when we're sleeping over, they probably figured we'd just grab our own breakfast when we got up, they let us sleep in --" Sweetie had already pulled back, was desperately going for her own possessions, showering sparks failing to lift any of them more than a few tail strands before they dropped again.
"-- breakfast! We're gonna need --"
"-- no time!" A wing flared out towards the clock on the left wall, the one Apple Bloom had managed to get back into working order. "We've barely got enough to reach town, and that's if we stay off the main road, because that winds too much! We're gonna need every shortcut, and we need them a lot more than food! Get up, get anything you think you'll need! And then get ready to gallop!"
She moved. It didn't leave her with enough time to dismiss the dreams.
They were all, at a minimum, frazzled by the time they crossed the bridge, and that was just on the physical level. Going off the road had left Apple Bloom as the fastest: the scooter couldn't be asked to navigate through long grasses and over tree roots without having the other two stop every other minute to nudge Scootaloo back up. But that was the fastest after a night when they'd all stayed up too late, after the earth pony had suffered through endless dreams of opportunities which could never be, things she didn't want to remember -- and there had also been a lack of breakfast.
She was the fastest of the three, when it was rough ground. But the group could only move at the rate of the slowest and poor Sweetie Belle, the least physical among them, was panting heavily. The white coat was half-soaked with sweat produced by the combination of a too-long gallop and a quickly-warming day. She looked exactly as rough as Apple Bloom felt, and that was very rough indeed.
Scootaloo, who occupied the middle ground while on hoof, wasn't doing all that much better: pegasi tended to have the fastest metabolisms, and not even the presence of grass on the path had allowed the chance to eat and run.
"Keep pushing!" the pegasus yelled as they all went across the arch. (Several adults in the rough vicinity pulled back because even with a time of peace, you could never be sure what the trio was pushing for.) "Almost there --!"
And then they were on proper town cobblestone.
"-- we're in!" Scootaloo gasped as she rapidly came to a stop and saturated fur dripped sweat all over the road. "Everypony, synchronize your timepieces!"
The other two looked at her.
"We ain't got timepieces!" Apple Bloom frantically indicated. "How are we gonna know how much time we've got? Ah don't even know what time it is right now! If'fin we can't keep track -- !"
Which was when the first sound of ten sounds reached them, ringing out across the landscape to serve as Ponyville's timer.
"That's how!" Sweetie laughed -- or at least, it was almost so: the nervous giggle of near-terror. "The bell tower at Town Hall! It rings every half-hour! Just listen for that!"
Which meant they had markers, but they would seldom know where they were within those temporal ranges -- and something else had just occurred to Apple Bloom. "Does anypony know if it's the first bell which marks it, or the --"
"-- takes too long to ask the question!" Scootaloo immediately decided. "Ninety minutes! You know where you're going! Everyone, break! We'll meet in front of Town Hall when time's up!"
They turned to face different directions. They galloped for their lives, for there was only one chance and that was now.
One of them was less than ninety minutes away from the moment which would define her life.
Scootaloo was still trying to work out exactly what being in heat actually felt like, and being in the middle of it didn't seem to be helping. She was certainly hot, because she was sweating, and in terms of being interested in sex, she was certainly thinking about it. That currently seemed to be it.
She tried a flap-and-glide as she closed in on her target, just to see if being in heat helped with flying. The results were inconclusive.
When it came to her own primary target... well, the truth was that the majority of her night had been spent in supporting the others. Scootaloo wasn't completely sure she cared about sex, because sex seemed to have endless potential for boredom. After all, you supposedly did it in a bedroom most of the time, which meant there was a bed right there, and how exciting could anything be if doing it made you want to sleep?
She was interested right now, because she was in heat. But just like nearly everything else in her life, the goal couldn't come fast enough. Scootaloo wanted to stop being interested and spend the rest of the day doing something which was actually interesting. She was, for the most part, getting involved out of solidarity, because her friends had certainly done stupider (okay, as stupid) things for her and so she felt obligated to occasionally indulge in a total waste of time on their behalf.
But that still meant getting involved. So she'd done some thinking, and it had seemed to Scootaloo that the most important part about having limited time available was spending the majority of it on the activity itself. When you asked somepony a question, they had the option to do something horrible: saying no. She was in a situation where 'No' wasted time by forcing her to look for somepony else.
Not that she could really picture anypony saying no to her because clearly if it was Scootaloo doing the asking, any sane pony had to say yes. Unfortunately, Ponyville was filled to overflowing with crazy ponies. It was something which frequently became annoying.
So the problems which could be caused by denial had to be neutralized. It wasn't really a matter of whether Scootaloo wanted that pony, because she'd just discovered that being interested in sex still meant a complete lack of interest in her classmates: this was blamed on none of them being cool enough for her. Gender currently wasn't a factor. She didn't really care about personality when a time limit was involved. Instead, she just needed those who would cooperate, and that meant targeting the ones who never said no.
Initially, she'd considered Truffle because he would do just about anything for a free meal -- but he also tended to be light on physical activity and when it came to being light, that was it. Scootaloo had a vague impression that there were times in sex when one pony was on top of the other -- this naturally had to involve standing, although she wasn't certain whether that was centering hooves on somepony's back or trying to use wings as an extra support point -- and if that somepony was Truffle, then eliminating him early was saving her from a critical mistake and multiple stress fractures.
And once she'd eliminated Truffle, considered the reason why -- then the thing to do had clearly been to go in the exact opposite direction.
"Hey, Featherweight!"
It had been easy to predict his location (at least within a relatively narrow category), because it was spring. Photography was the sort of thing which operated as a treadmill: you took pictures in order to sell them, you spent the money you got on a better camera, and then you took better pictures which you could sell for an even better camera. The process apparently stopped shortly after your death, when the final camera was used to take a picture of you in your coffin and then donated to a young photographer, who would immediately start figuring out how to upgrade it.
Featherweight, like many of the students in their class, had a part-time job. However, most of the kids worked for their parents: Snips often grumbled about getting stuck (often literally, thanks to the glue) at the bookbinder shop, and Cotton was starting to put in some hours on helping her parents mold cloud homes. Featherweight was the only freelancer in the herd, and a beautifully warm spring day meant he would be at the edge of a pasture, taking pictures of birds which he would sell to nature magazines. Ideally, he would earn just enough for another camera, and possibly some new film because for some reason, it didn't seem to transition between models.
Scootaloo, who wasn't sure if she wanted marriage or foals (although she internally admitted that teaching one to first ride and then fly would be some level of cool), had already rejected Featherweight as a prospective lifetime partner. She didn't want to be in a position where she sent her spouse out with the bits to make a mortgage payment and see him return to the about-to-be-lost home with a zoom lens. But when it came to this...
He looked up, and the first expression on the thin face was annoyance at her having called out to him: it was something which disturbed the birds. But then he nudged his snout under the projecting shelf of the camera's back, raised it, and took a picture.
"You look interesting today," he observed. "Very athletic. Tired, though. But I'm getting some nice glistening effects off the sweat, which contrasts with the darkening on the saturated fur and feathers. It's photogenic. If you came in again, this time a little more from the west --"
There were certain problems in dealing with Featherweight, and somewhere near the top of the list was that he often tried to get everyone else living through the same moment three different times, generally while trying for better lighting. But he also had his good points and for Scootaloo's purposes, the very first entry was this: he had the willpower of a mayfly. He did just about anything he was asked, with very little thought as to who was asking or why. Mentally, he could be pushed around like -- well, like a feather, and in the event that he ever did dig in, physically shifting him took even less effort.
Not that she was planning on manipulating him, or making him say 'Yes' when he didn't want to. Anypony who didn't want her wasn't good enough to be with. But when it came to Scootaloo, he'd taken plenty of pictures, and that seemed to indicate some level of base interest. She was figuring he'd be willing to help her capture another moment. Without the film.
Didn't take that long to get here: only had to check three pastures before I reached this one, and I haven't heard the bell go off yet. I've got time...
"I want to play a game with you," she firmly said, because that was going to be enough to start with.
The camera was carefully slipped off the end of his snout. It bounced against his chest twice, and it took him a moment to establish his new hoofing in the dirt.
"I could play for a while," he decided, shortly after he was no longer being being driven backwards. "The light's going to be better later anyway. What are we going to play?"
In absolute terms, Scootaloo's total knowledge regarding all things sexual could be said to approach zero, and there was a chance that it was doing so from the wrong direction. But when it came to the things which she'd told herself she knew, she self-rated at the same level she'd assigned to so much of the crusade: two hundred percent.
"Five Minutes In The Wonderbolts Stable," Scootaloo announced as she closed in, sleek legs quickly shifting through the grass.
He thought about that.
"It's a five-minute game?"
"That's just what it's called," Scootaloo quickly decided while crossing the ten-body-lengths-away line, because she had at least something over sixty minutes and she might want to use some more of them. Admittedly, it was probably a good idea to leave some time for getting back, especially if she wanted to be the first at Town Hall. There was probably no need to use all of her time on sex, especially if it turned out to be as boring as anticipated.
Sex, and then she would meet the others. It was even possible that she'd finish early enough for ice cream.
"But what if it takes more than five minutes? Shouldn't it be called something else?"
She knew it was a game, she knew it had something to do with sex because she'd heard older adolescents giggling about it, and she was now becoming annoyed that he didn't know. The literal-mindedness wasn't helping either. "Do you want to play or not?"
He was right in front of her. It gave her a very good view, although with a colt who was both shorter than her and often seemed to be about eighty percent head, it didn't give her much of it.
"Okay," he said, and just like that, she had consent.
"All right," Scootaloo agreed, because it was. She'd known she could get him, it had been proven, and that was part of why she was now wondering if she should have tried for somepony else. "But if you want to stop, just say so. And we'll stop playing, right there."
"So I can stop if I'm losing?" Featherweight mulled. "That's a really weird game. But okay. How do we play?"
She came a little closer, because they were the only ponies in the pasture. Scootaloo was vaguely aware that a closet was usually involved, or a stable if you could actually get into one -- but there was nopony around to watch, and the only closet she had access to was her own. Bringing him home would just take too long on hoof and when it came to flight, he could stay in the air for a little while -- but he was far too small to carry her.
Scootaloo, already feeling somewhat disgruntled about the whole thing, considered that when it came to bringing somepony you liked home to meet your family, the 'bringing' wasn't supposed to be the hard part. "Just stand there."
He obeyed. She stepped closer --
-- there was a bump. Four cream-colored hooves slipped backwards in the dirt.
"Take off the camera."
"Sorry?"
"I can't get close enough because it projects too much! Take off the camera!"
With utter confusion, "But what if I want to take pictures of us playing?" Which was followed by openly-received insult. "And that's my zoom lens. It's supposed to stick out! I can even make it get longer. Don't say bad things about my zoom lens. I'm the only pony allowed to do --"
She was starting to fume. "-- it's in the way!" Telescoping objects clearly just didn't work with sex! "So take it off!"
He stared at her for a few seconds. But then he did as she'd told him, carefully setting it down in the grass.
"Good Featherweight," Scootaloo declared, because some positive feedback seemed to be required.
"Don't step on it," he reproachfully told her. "You still haven't said how we're supposed to --"
It was nuzzling: she'd been thinking about that all the way into town. There was a nuzzle which was meant for family, another you used with friends, and then she'd seen some stupid adults doing a really sickening-looking one when they were on dates. She didn't want to use that last one, because its purpose was obvious and this wasn't dating. She didn't want to date Featherweight, in large part because he would probably spend the whole time arranging for the commemorative photo album.
Three known kinds of nuzzling, and she was supposed to start orally. So that meant whatever was both left over and took place in the general vicinity of the mouth had to be right.
She focused all of her attention on that contact, because it was something she would only do once and so even when it turned out to be boring, she wanted to remember the exact reason why. What she mostly registered was that his snout went tight at the contact, and she hadn't been aware snouts could do that. Then she adjusted her position because positions were probably important and keeping her mouth over his nostrils was just going to suffocate him. Scootaloo was reasonably sure nopony had ever been stupid enough to asphyxiate somepony else during sex and really didn't want to be the first.
The position, once adjusted, was held against him. Some rubbing of snouts also got involved.
Then she started wondering when he was going to do something.
...well, that was a lesson for her: just like nearly everything else in life which had her putting up with colts, sex was clearly a task where the mare wound up doing all of the actual work.
Scootaloo leaned in a little more. Her weight collapsed his back legs, and it was the only movement he made. He just... stayed there.
...two ninety-eight, two ninety-nine, three thank-you-Celestia hundred!
She pulled back. He fell over on his right side.
"Ow," came up from the grass.
Immediately, "Is your wing okay?" Because she knew how to sort out priorities.
"...yeah. Scootaloo?"
"What?"
"Who won?"
...she didn't know. She'd nuzzled him, she'd kept it up for what she was sure was a properly-timed duration at the one time in her life when she would be interested in sex, and now she wanted to...
...find her friends, get a meal, go back to the Acres, get her scooter, and spend the rest of the day doing something fun.
Well, that settled it: riding a scooter was better than sex. In fact, so far, just about anything was better than sex and when Scootaloo thought of that comparison in terms of 'anything', the majority of the memories included tree sap. But she'd come this far, and after nuzzling, you were supposed to...
...to...
...well, it was obvious, wasn't it? Ponies had been having sex since the world had been made, however that was done. Clearly the initial partners had wound up figuring it out from first go and since those had been primitive ponies, they had obviously been stupid. When you were stupid, you could only figure out simple things. This meant sex was very simple and Scootaloo, as a modern, more complex pony, would be easily capable of working it out. She just needed to try again and see if any next steps appeared in her head.
"I won," she declared, because anything else was unacceptable.
"Okay," the colt readily agreed. There was a frankly incredible amount of sweat in his coat now, and Scootaloo didn't understand why. It wasn't as if he'd been doing anything. "What happens when you win?"
"It means we have to play again."
Somewhere in the distance, a bell began to toll.
"...okay," Featherweight eventually decided. "Can I set the timer on my camera and set it up on that flat-topped rock? To get a picture of us playing?"
She had to have sex once in her life, even when the only time of interest seemed to feel like not very. She was doing it to support her friends.
But the nuzzling had felt -- stupid. Pointless. Like there was nothing there at all. And she wasn't going to put any part of that on the record.
"No."
The unfamiliar youths in the ice cream shop looked up when they heard Sweetie come in. This was partially because there was a very small bell above the door, and it rang when somepony came in. Another aspect came from the much larger bell near the center of town, because her opening the door had let some of that sound in. But some of it was just because she nearly fell in and a unicorn stumbling into a shop headfirst had to be watched very carefully, mostly because safety could depend on knowing exactly where the horn was.
The weary filly recovered quickly: just being in the coolness of the shop helped, and her hooves found centering long before any forward momentum would have presented a risk. She slowly made her way towards the long group bench on the customer side of the counter, motions weighted with concern. And something else, which was slowly dripping onto the floor.
Of the three, Sweetie was the most willing to admit that there were certain flaws in the plan (and had stayed up after the others had fallen asleep, thinking about them): it was just that she had trouble admitting it to anypony but herself. She was sure they were lacking at least one crucial aspect, because her big sister had a fondness for novels which were rather repetitive in nature and, because Rarity knew there was a little sister in play, had also developed an equal fondness for bookcases with shatterproof glass doors and unpickable locks. All Sweetie ever saw was the covers, and that still told her there was a missing piece to their puzzle because when it came to the books, it was everywhere.
Of course, the same could be said with some of the titles, such as The Forbiddenly Romance Of Pirately And Ninja. But Sweetie was guessing that was just a printer's error which hadn't been corrected. Across three dozen different books. (The current theory was that the 'ly' box was stored next to the press and vibrations made it spill easily.)
Those of roughly her own age watched her as she came closer, and Sweetie didn't feel it was due to attraction. She'd overexerted herself on the way into town, because it was hard to keep up with the others and... she'd done her best, but there had been sweat in her coat, her mane had been coming apart, she didn't think her tail had been doing any better and...
She hadn't want to do anything while stinking of sweat, and so there had been a choice. The first had been -- the place she'd wanted to go if they'd reached town earlier, but she'd wanted to go there with her friends and anyway, heading into it with a sweat-soaked coat would just lead to questions. So she'd diverted home. The shower hadn't taken very long, but... there hadn't been any time to dry off, she'd already heard the bells sound again and that meant she needed to use her remaining time...
Spring Sun had done what it could. But her mane and tail were still hanging from her in wet, surprisingly long curtains, and she had to be careful not to slip in her own drips.
Colts and fillies watched her closely, as she took a place on the bench. She was just hoping not to waterstain it (although a bench in an ice cream shop almost had to be stain-resistant). Not being kicked out by the owner would also be a plus.
She was tired. It was her one time to think about sex, to be interested, and most of what she seemed to be thinking about was how tired she was. Sweetie didn't know how to feel about that. It didn't feel like she was missing out on an opportunity, with every second that ticked away impossible to replace. She didn't feel much of anything except tired, because she'd been up later than anypony, she wasn't good at running fast and...
Tired, and there hadn't been anypony at home. She wasn't sure where her parents were. But it would have taken too long to make breakfast for herself or rather, too long to scrub away any scorch marks produced by the attempt. She certainly hadn't had time to deal with the biohazard team which always seemed to spontaneously appear in the presence of juice. So she'd showered, she was still wet, and... she needed something to eat, so she could stop feeling so tired. Ice cream had sugar, and sugar might help.
The proprietor peered over the counter at her.
"You're soaked," Twoscoops declared.
"...I'm sorry."
Not without sympathy, "Rainbow playing pranks again?"
It was a weekend in spring. Sweetie nodded.
"The floor's slip-resistant," the stallion smiled. "Are you ready to order?"
"In a minute." One from what was now much less than ninety. "I have to get my bits out first. See what I can get."
He nodded, and moved away to help somepony else.
She was supposed to be interested in sex, right now, and for the only time in her life. But she just... wanted to rest. And to have some ice cream. Both of those felt more important, and -- Sweetie didn't know if it meant something was wrong with her.
There had been magazines, because Rarity liked to read about what high-society ponies did. Some of the pictures showed some very attractive ponies. Sweetie liked looking at those pictures, and sometimes she thought about what it would be like to attend a party with those ponies. She thought about that before she went to sleep, and it made her feel warm. It also made her feel old, because she had to picture herself at their age and size in order to make everything fit.
But when it came to those around her, classmates, those who attended the schools in the other parts of town because there were too many kids her age for one classroom... she didn't feel anything.
Nothing at all.
It's my one time.
It's the only time and...
...I'm still not ready.
That was it. Her body might be saying now somewhere, but that message had been lost in a louder one: that of her heart calling out not yet. And if the two didn't line up -- the heart had to be the one which had the final say.
So it was over. And she couldn't even seem to really regret it. She just felt... tired.
I want ice cream. At least that was normal enough.
Her horn ignited, and did so unevenly. A case where her body wasn't ready, but... you only found out if it was time for magic if you kept pushing. And in this case, the sparks actually managed to open the lid of her left saddlebag before the scatter became too extreme to work with. It was progress, enough that she didn't mind sorting through the contents by mouth --
-- she stopped.
Her head moved right. Teeth carefully flipped the other lid, she searched...
I don't have money.
She was tired. She'd left the clubhouse in a hurry, rushed in and out of her own house... and somewhere along the way, she'd neglected to bring or recover any bits. She was supposed to be wanting sex right now, all she wanted was ice cream and now she couldn't even have that.
Her head drooped. The wet mane fell in front of her face.
"Excuse me?" asked a colt.
She looked at him, at least once she'd shaken some of the manefall away from her eyes. A pegasus of just about her own age, sleek and trim, all light reds and oranges, like a fire which hadn't gathered any real heat yet. Just like her.
"We don't know each other," he awkwardly said. "I go to North, and I'm pretty sure you're in East. Most of us here are in North together. But... you just look sad. And I was wondering... if there's anything we can do?"
The filly, whose mane and tail were hanging straight in a perfect demonstration of the wet look, half-closed beautiful light green eyes. Sniffed.
"I forgot to bring bits," whispered an almost musical voice. "I'm tired..." And because she was also too tired to truly think about what she was saying, "I was just thinking about having sex and I forgot all about bits..."
Every youth was now staring at her.
"Sex," said a earth pony filly, because the sheer depths of her stun meant three letters was the limit.
"Today," the exhausted, extremely pretty unicorn filly said. "Only I think I'm not going to now, because I'm so tired and it isn't the right time. And I just wanted to have some ice cream, so I wouldn't feel tired any more..."
Seven heads, all attached to ears which weren't quite sure which words to work with, leading to brains that were frankly being told to get out of the way, whipped towards saddlebag lids.
The earth pony didn't so much hear the second set of bells as feel them. The vibrations produced by the clapper going into metal should have had no true way of reaching her fur, and yet it felt as if they rippled across every strand. Setting them all to the poorest kind of dancing, movements which could only end in collision and tripping and --
-- failure.
Or perhaps it was simply that she continued to shake, as she hid in the shadows at the far end of the alley. The same place she'd been for nearly an hour now, the one she refused to leave even as time continued to run out. Because there was one chance, only one chance for her whole life, and so there was no chance at all.
It was the time when she was supposed to be interested in sex. The only time. But it wasn't what she was thinking about. Because sex meant...
...there was so much she didn't understand about it. Nearly everything. But she knew it was being with somepony you cared about, in a very special way. Her parents had loved each other enough to have sex and that was why Apple Bloom existed, why there was a brother and sister waiting for her to come home. Sex was about -- being with the right pony, and wanting them to stay.
So she didn't think about sex, as her body curled up within the darkness. She thought about a pony. The one she'd never truly let herself think about it all. The one which proved that just being curious (or worse, interested) was the most agonizing thing in the world.
won't
won't ever
not with me
the glint an'
stupid
Ah'm stupid
dreams don't know what Ah want
dreams jus' hurt
would never
Ah can't
don't even know where an' if there's one chance, jus' the one, Ah would
but
wouldn't
wouldn't ever
not with me
an' after
bland
like trying to make a cake by eatin' flour
Ah'm scared
Ah can't ask when Ah know what the answer is
Ah can't look for yes when all there could ever be is no
but it's today
jus' today
Ah don't even know what sex is
an' Ah couldn't tell the others 'cause they'd jus' laugh an'
if Ah had t' ask, mah dreams made it feel like
won't work
can't work
time's runnin' out an'
The bow trembled. Tears soaked into the fur beneath her eyes and in the darkness of the alley, it felt as if Sun would never reach her.
Ah can't
Ah can't
Ah can't
Naturally, Scootaloo was the first one there (and that status even held true after the annoying detour she'd had to take). She reached the sunlit area in front of Town Hall before anypony else, and had to find a place where she could safely stand. It wasn't that far away from noon on a beautifully warm spring day with a light breeze, and so there were ponies of all ages out and about. Some of them were locals whom she recognized, others refused to make eye contact with her because the process of forgiving Crusades past was an ongoing one, and others just looked her over long enough to wonder why all the fur around her snout was pressed down.
She stood, waiting in place before the bells could go off, because there just hadn't been any point in going on. And even worse, she'd kept at it so long that there was no chance at what she now saw as the important part. Because if a mare was supposed to suffer through the agonizing boredom of sex, there should clearly be a reward waiting on the other side. She'd thought of one for herself, before she'd started, and now there wasn't time for it.
Heat couldn't end soon enough, especially when she was already fuming. She lowered her head, all the better not to be caught up in her own steam.
Ponies milled past her. Some trotted, while others flew overhead. To be this close to Town Hall, near the heart of Ponyville on a spring day, was to be reminded that the town was home to several thousand ponies. Scootaloo presumed most of the adults in that number had experienced sex, and wondered how they lived with themselves.
"...you look tired," a soft, almost musical voice told her. "Would ice cream help?"
Scootaloo immediately looked up, and the rising nature of that gaze meant she saw the neck-slung tray first. "Yes! Sweetie, I want ice cream more than anything! Thank you --"
-- which was when she saw all of the other colts and fillies, standing about eight body lengths behind Sweetie. Most of them looked confused. A few seemed anticipatory, but in a very confused way: ponies who were waiting, but had no idea what they were waiting for. And then her attention went back to the heavily-laden tray.
"That's a lot of ice cream," Scootaloo decided, because that was the important part. "How did you get that much? I didn't think you had this much in bits." And then looked a little closer. "Did somepony dump a cloud on you? You're kind of damp."
"They... bought it for me," Sweetie awkwardly stated. "They were very nice about it. But they kept buying it, and..." She hesitated. "I can't eat this much ice cream."
"Nopony can eat this much ice cream," Scootaloo decided -- and then realized it was a challenge. "I bet nopony's ever eaten this much ice cream." Which meant she had to, just to see if it could be done --
-- but Sweetie was just standing there, with her entire body radiating awkwardness. And even with the ice cream slowly melting, that indicated a need for priorities.
"How did it go?" the pegasus softly asked.
"I..." White facial fur was now being underlit by a rising tide of red. "...I didn't do it."
Scootaloo blinked. "You --"
"-- they were nice," Sweetie said. "They were all nice, especially when they knew I needed ice cream. But nice isn't enough, because my heart isn't ready. And..." Her volume dropped. "...I realized, last night... I didn't even know what I was supposed to do. If we'd woken up earlier, I was going to try and get us to the library. But I tried to figure it out, after you two fell asleep. I thought about the covers of all the books which Rarity keeps in the locked cabinet..."
The orange head tilted to the left. "Oh?"
"I couldn't find anypony who was dressed when it's this nice out," the unicorn softly confessed. "So I can't rip the fabric to expose their mark anyway. I think that's an important part."
With open shock, "You have to be dressed to have sex?"
Sweetie thought about that.
"It has to be true," she decided. "Rarity locks those books away because they have sex in them, and she doesn't want me reading any. All the covers have dressed ponies with ripped fabric exposing their marks. And Rarity hates torn clothing. So you have to be dressed for sex. With rips."
And the fury was instant. "So that's why it didn't work!"
It had been an admission of failure, and so the first thing she did was glance at everypony around them: moving adults, waiting kids. But nopony seemed to have heard her except Sweetie, and all the little unicorn did was step somewhat closer.
"It didn't work? You tried, and..."
"Featherweight," began the disgruntled confession. "I tried it with Featherweight. But we were both undressed, so..."
Curiously, "How did it go?"
"We nuzzled."
"Oh?"
"For a while. Until he couldn't any more."
"...oh."
Open frustration. "The doctor said he should wake up before Sun-lowering. But he didn't know how anypony could get that dehydrated." A little more softly, "I swear, Sweetie, it was nothing but boring, and if that's what you have to do even to start sex, I'm glad to be somepony who only goes into heat once. Because there's better things to do. Like anything --"
-- they'd had so much time together. A significant fraction of their fillyhoods had been spent in each other's company, and so unicorn and pegasus knew it was the earth pony approaching by the sound of her hoofsteps alone. And for those who'd been in close proximity after so many failed Crusades, the half-repressed sound of weeping was also a clue.
They immediately turned, called by the sound of a friend's pain. And so they saw Apple Bloom, head down and bow crumpled, tail dragging across stone, forcing herself forward step by step. Those who had followed Sweetie automatically parted to let her through, and confused adults paused in their own paths. For there was a filly in visible pain, and it created a helplessness within all those who shared the road with her. A desperate pause as a significant portion of the population tried to figure out what they could do.
She was approaching her friends: they could all see that. They knew it would help. But they still hesitated in their travels, just in case. Watching from a distance, while they very carefully did their best not to listen. If it was bad enough, they would be told, and -- listening in was wrong.
"...Ah," the filly half-sobbed as she came close to the only ones who might understand, and those she still couldn't make herself tell, "...Ah..."
They were flanking her in an instant: a move which caused Sweetie to lose some of the ice cream: shallow cups rolled unevenly down the street, and came to a stop with their contents melting into cobblestone hollows. Close enough to comfort, while they both tried to figure how to end their friend's pain.
"What happened?" was Scootaloo's opener. "Did somepony hurt you? Tell me who they are and I'll --"
"It's okay, it's okay," came from Sweetie. "We'll make it okay..."
And Apple Bloom could only say "...Ah couldn't..."
They nuzzled her. The one meant for friends, although the tray made it especially awkward for Sweetie.
"It's nothing special anyway," Scootaloo told her. "No great loss." With an open snort of derision, "No small one, either."
"I don' t think we had the right equipment," Sweetie pointed out. "I never got to say --"
"-- Ah didn't even ask," Apple Bloom sobbed, and it was a true one now, with the tears pattering onto stone. "Ah -- Ah didn't even look, not when Ah knew what the answer was gonna be, one time, one time for mah whole life when Ah've had dreams an' Ah didn't act on 'em, one chance an' it's gone, there's no more time, no more, no more ever --"
They pressed tighter, as adults and children watched. Waiting to see if there was something they could do.
"-- there's time!" Sweetie whispered. "The bells haven't gone off! You've still got a chance! Even without clothing! You could at least say something! Tell a pony that you wanted to, with them. They might appreciate that..."
"But it's jus' the one pony!" the yellow filly softly wailed. "One, jus' one, an' Ah couldn't say, Ah wasn't brave enough, Ah --"
"You're the bravest pony I know," Scootaloo firmly stated -- and then smiled. "Tied, anyway. If that pony was here, I bet you could do it. Because my friend does brave things."
"Ah --"
You learned how to recognize hoofsteps, after a while. Pick up on just who was approaching by sound alone. There was a moment of silence between breaths, as the world waited for whatever might come next, and it was the instant in which the friends heard two ponies approaching.
One set of hoofsteps landed with a weight which outdid their owner's mass. It was the solid, self-announcing tread of a pony who didn't necessarily own the ground being covered, but who had the right reserved to put in a bid for perpetuity. And the other was softer, a little more hesitant. It tended to fade into the background of the other, but there was a rhythm there all its own, something completely separate if you were just willing to listen for it...
And there were other hoofsteps behind those, ones which were perhaps ten body lengths back, not quite in sight range yet. If the desperate filly's focus had shifted, even for a second, she would have recognized them, because that learning period equaled a lifetime. There was even laughter, merry, bright, and true, along with being accented here and there. Adults in a good mood, trotting together in mutual celebration because things were going so well.
She would have recognized that, given so much as a second. But all she'd truly heard was the first octet or rather, half of it. Because she hadn't looked, she hadn't been able to make herself look when she knew what the answer would be, not then, not even as the clock was running out, because it wasn't her and it couldn't be her and it would never be her. She could not, and so she had not.
But her friends believed in her, as the bravest pony they knew. And in all her life, there was no moment left but this one.
Her head whipped up. Strengthening legs surged into motion, she pushed through her friends and ice cream went here and there and everywhere, some of it was in her fur and it didn't matter because this was the only time there could ever be, she pushed through startled adults and nearly bowled over two unicorns, she pushed and pushed and then there were two ponies in front of her when the one on the left didn't matter. She went right at what was nearly a charging speed, lost the sound of gasps as she reared up and came down with sugar-sticky forelegs across the soft grey shoulders, resting her weight on a pony who was too startled to move as she stared into the deepest purple which could ever exist. Purple which lay behind glints of glass.
There was but one moment and so Apple Bloom, completely unaware of who else was already within or coming into the area, used it.
"FUCK ME!"
A significant fraction of a town stopped breathing.
Several earth ponies, one of whom was wearing a hat, froze in their approach. The deep red stallion had his legs lock up so quickly as to dump himself into the road. Parents and guardians of assorted sizes and species saw their charges, and then found their stares drifting back to the center tableau, drawn by the gravity of horror. A teacher automatically started to work on her first question, and then moved on to her next five hundred. Several pegasi landed on the spot, insofar as having one's body coming to a stop on the ground could be described as 'landing': some spent an initial moment in a slowed descent, because there was only so fast they could slide down an impacted wall. Two recently-elected members of the school board, both of whom had run on the Protect Our Children's Innocence platform, found it collapsing under their weight and resolved the issue through passing out. The light spring breeze died, which served as a sneak preview. The complete absence of phonograph needles dearly longed to scratch. And as her best friend's jaw failed to gather itself in, the pony who was bearing the weight looked up, blinked twice behind those glasses, and felt the end of her braid start to come apart.
"Er," Silver Spoon said. "Here?"
The bell in the clock tower tolled.
It tolled for them.
"Pass me the next book," Scootaloo yawned.
Sweetie Belle tried to focus, and sparks got the tome to slide about half a hoofwidth across the library table: nosing did the rest. "You finished with the last one already?"
"I want to see if this one's any better. She flipped through a few pages, and then decided it wasn't. "Oh, ow..."
"Y'facehoof too hard," Apple Bloom told her. "Y'know that."
"It's the only way I can stay awake!"
There had been a number of consequences which had followed the hours of post-evacuation questioning, and the one their teacher was still occasionally smirking about was Cheerilee's personal victory: the next year of school would see a textbook bearing the correct information in print, because there had to be something available for immediate sleepy student review. But that was next year, and so another consequence was that the trio had been assigned to spend far too many beautiful, warm, logy spring weekends in the library. Reading all about sex, so that nothing like the scene in front of Town Hall would ever happen to them again.
However, in the absence of a school curriculum, their reading material had been chosen by the librarian.
A number of effects had already arisen from the dry medical texts. For starters, all three could now spell 'corpus cavernosum', which was noted as not being particularly easy to do. Additionally, the friends had learned that once they reached the proper age and their hormones had finished at their work, whether they had any interest in sex would be entirely up to them. Scootaloo had been particularly gratified to learn that, because it had allowed her to swear it off forever.
(She reserved the right to change her mind. But she didn't see any way it was going to happen, because the whole thing was so clearly boring.)
"We could be outside right now," the pegasus groused. "But no... we've got to learn stuff..." She wearily nosed to another page and in doing so, skipped over three. "What's a G-spot?"
"No idea," Apple Bloom admitted. "Ain't got that far yet."
"I bet it doesn't even exist."
Reflected light glinted into their eyes, and they all looked up just in time for its source to duck behind a high shelf.
"There goes Silver again," Sweetie whispered to Apple Bloom.
"Ah know," the earth pony calmly stated as her head went low.
"She keeps coming around here," Scootaloo noted. "It's not like she's being punished, and she keeps showing up at the library. In spring. On weekends."
"Saw that," a too-neutral voice replied.
Sweetie gently cleared her throat.
"Apple Bloom," the unicorn softly said, "she keeps looking at you. And... I've been thinking about it. I think -- there were times when she sort of looked before. In school, and during recess. I think if you went over there and just -- asked her if she wanted to see something at the cinema with you..."
Instantly, "Not today."
Gently, "What's better than today?"
Yellow fur, underlit by red, fully buried itself in the book.
"Any day when Ah can look at her an' mah face don't radiate heat for ninety minutes. Oh, this word can't be right. Spell 'orgasm'."
