A Place To Lay My Head

Applebloom, Sweetiebelle, and Scootaloo all trotted down the worn path towards Sweet Apple Acres. They had been to the hospital already only to find out that Pinkie had been discharged and put in the care of Applebloom's older sister. The three were quite sad given that they went through all of that trouble just to find out that they had to go right to where they were going to spend the night anyways.

"Stupid Pinkie Pie..." Grumbled Scootaloo.

"Stupid Applejack..." Growled Applebloom.

"Stupid....stupid..." Said Sweetiebelle intelligently. The pegasus and earth pony gave the unicorn a sideways glance. "What? I had nothing to hate..." Sweetie defended her statement with a head held down and ears laid back.

"So y'all got yer stuff for the sleepover?" Applebloom bumped Scootaloo in the flank. The orange pony, who was somehwere deep in thought, jerked her head up.

"Huh? Wha?" Scoots looked at Applebloom. "Um, yeah...my stuff is in the clubhouse. Sweetie?"

"Rarity said she was going to drop my stuff off...I hope she didn't forget." The poor scatterbrained unicorn got a worried look across her face. Rarity and herself had a very tumultuous relationship. The pair were constantly fighting, bickering, and just plain being loud. If Rarity forgot about Sweeite's sleepover materials,,,Celestia help the ears of all within range.

--

"Ya like that poem, little lady?" The shaky voice came from behind the two mares. Applejack just smiled, Pinkie turned around. It was Granny Smith. The old mare slowly walked in the room with the help of her walker, each step was measured and careful.

"It's nice, ma'am." Pinkie Pie might be a hyperactive, random, party animal, but she still knew that elders deserved every ounce of respect she could give them. After all, they were the ones who allowed this great land to be so...well...great.

"Ah wrote that when ah was nothin' but a filly..." Granny Smith slowly sat down in her rocking chair, her arthritis ridden bones cracking as she rested. "We wandered a lot when ah was young...it was either live on yer own, miles away from help...or live in cramped cities where ya couldn't afford help..." The old mare adjusted once more, Applejack slowly left the room and went to the kitchen, Pinkie politely sat down to listen to the story. "Ah read that poem every time ah felt homesick...or tired...or lonely. It was a little bit of good thought durin' times that were nothin' but bad. It was that there poem that convinced my pa to go to Canterlot and talk to the Princess..." She smiled at the old memory. "Ah suppose that sometimes ya just have ta listen to the innocent and listen to what they hafta say..."

Pinkie simply nodded. "Do you have anym-" Before the pink pony could finish asking for another tale, the front door opened and three little fillies walked in. Upon seeing her, the three Crusaders' eyes all lit up.

"PINKIE PIE!" In less than a second she was swarmed in yellow, orange, and white fur. Said balls of fur knocked Pinkie over and right onto her bad hoof.

Pinkie Pie, on her part, didn't cry or scream. she simply bit her tongue and gave the fillies the biggest grin she could manage at the time. She loved little kids, they were the ponies she connected with the most: they had nothing to worry about, they could still go up to somepony and say 'Hi, wanna be friends?' without coming off as weird....they had it all.

"O-Oh..hey...girls..." The injured mare gulped and fought back the urge to scream. "What's...what's up..?" Pinkie was hugged tightly, the little fillies assaulted her with 'get well soon's and 'how bad is it's. Before Pinkie could ask them to get off or even that she was in pain, Applejack came into the room.

"Hey! Y'all get offa her! She's still hurt!" All three fillies vacated the area on or around Pinkie Pie at the sound of the booming command. After the fillies got off, AJ trotted over and helped Pinkie up. "Are ya alright, Pinkie?" The pink mare nodded, flexing her hoof.

"I'm alright. They weren't hurting me. I promise." The orange workpony gave her friend a disbelieving look and then shot a glare at the fillies.

"Y'all go gather yer things. Sweetie, your things are in Applebloom's room." She shooed the CMC away, and the three started to trot away.

"It's okay AJ, honest. I mean, can't they stick around for another one of Granny Smith's stories..." Her sentence slowed down, then completely trailed off as she turned and realized that the old mare was sleeping in the rocking chair peacefully. "Oh..."

--

Applebloom and Scootaloo left the house to get Scootaloo's things from the clubhouse. Sweetiebelle had stayed behind and said she was going to help Pinkie cook dinner. The thought of the unicorn cooking almost made the fillies gag, but Pinkie accepted the help happily and insisted that the unicorn learn 'Pinkie Chef Pie's guide to cooking gourmet goodies'. Needless to say, two-thirds of the CMC were not looking forward to dinner.

"So does Ms. Tender Care know you're here? Or is this another escape?" Applebloom was one of the few ponies who knew about Scoots' situation other than Cheerilee. Scootaloo lived in a foster home, the only one in town. The young pegasus took great care in not allowing that information spill over into the general populace. She even went as far as saying her parents sent her to school in Ponyville from Cloudsdale.

"She greenlit this one, don't worry. After last time, I don't want to sneak out again,,," Scoots' voice didn't betray how bad the last time was. Ms. Tender Care grounded her for so long that the next time Applebloom saw her outside of school, three more foals had already gotten their cutie marks in class.

"Good, ya don't want her coming to get'cha again." Scoots nodded in agreement, once again....last time was bad enough.

After that reference, the two just started talking about random things, Mainly school, cutie marks, and colts. Both had decided long ago that colts had cooties and they were never going to get infected. especially after Pinkie told them that there was no known cure.

Within a few minutes of idle chatter, they came upon the old clubhouse resting in the middle of the orchard. they had spent a lot of time fixing it up and making it theirs. Sweetiebelle had even painted the Cutie Mark Crusader symbol above the door in bright gold. It truly was their Headquarters now. Scootaloo ran up the ramp and into the clubhouse, only to come out moments later with a rainbow dufflebag hanging around her neck.

"S'go."

--

Back at the house Sweetiebelle was standing on a chair, looking over Pinkie Pie's shoulder. The baker was cooking away, throwing seemingly random things into the pot on the stove. Sugar, potatoes, broth,  hot sauce, a cupcake, pie crust.

"Umm...Pinkie...I don't think some of those things belong..." Sweetie leaned over the pot in order to get a better look at the 'stew.' It looked fine...but Sweetie still wasn't sure about tasting it.

"Nonsense! Everything belongs somewhere in everything! You just have to figure out where." With a wide smile and a small pirouette, Pinkie threw some celery into mix. "But it needs something else..." Like an artist examining their work, Pinkie closed one eye and stuck her tongue out thoughtfully. "AHA!" With that, the  hyperactive pony disappeared.

"This can't be good..." Concluded the small white unicorn. she focused her green gaze on the door through which Pinkie left, only to be surprised whenever Pinkie appeared from out of the stew pot and dropped a whole bag of apple in.

"There we go! Now we just let it simmer." The mare hopped out of the pot and landed by Sweetie, watching the pot intently. "You know what they say, a watched pot always boils!" Sweetie was just about to protest that point with a raised hoof whenever the pot miraculously started to boil instantly. Sweetiebelle's hoof fell, as did her understanding of basic laws of the universe,

--

Big Mac had left Fluttershy's house about twenty minutes ago. The couple had dinner, snuggled, and watched a short movie before they had even realized that the CMC had gone from their care. They knew that reflected badly on them, but they were still in the 'honeymoon stage' of their relationship. As Twilight had told all of their friends when they screwed up at something, they weren't really responsible for their actions at this point.

But that didn't stop big Macintosh from being angry with his little sister and her friends. They were supposed to stay with them until Big Mac took them home for their slumber party. Of course the little trouble makers had to do things their own way though, and he knew Applejack wouldn't yell at Applebloom was around. That wasn't her style. Sure, she would get onto her and scold her a bit, but never truly get onto her. That was his job.

Without a thought he pushed the door open, he was just about to yell for Applebloom to get her flank in here, only to be surprised at the sight before him. Applejack, Granny Smith, Applebloom, her two friends were all at the table eating. but that wasn't the surprising part, that was the pink mare sitting at his spot at the head of the table. She was telling a story in a very animated fashion and didn't seem to be stopping any time soon.

"Ah'm full..." Said his little sister as she pushed the bowl of what seemed to be stew away from her.

"Now now, Bloomster." Chided the mare that sat in his spot. "Ya gotta finish your meal if you want to be big and strong like your brother there!" His little sister smiled at the cheery pink pony and pulled her bowl back to her and began eating again.

Big Mac could already tell that this mare and himself weren't going to get along.