Growing Up Fast

                    “I hate being small.”

                    Rumble glowered out the window in the direction of life in general. The sun and summer breeze were held away from him by a pane of glass and he felt trapped like an insect in a jar. In the distance he could see fillies and colts playing innocently and paying little regard to anything beyond the focus of their amusement. Rumble stuck his tongue out in disgust to no one in particular.

                    Closer to his house than the frolicking kids, Rumble’s brother Thunderlane was standing with a pair of silver and lilac pegasi. All three of them were laughing intermittently, and occasionally one of the pegasi would take a moment to give Thunderlane a pat on his shoulder as if to compliment him for a particularly ribald joke.

                    Rumble was supposed to be doing his homework. Instead, he was staring out at the world and feeling the haunting ache that had tortured him all summer long.

                    He wanted to grow up.

                    The bitter irony of a yearning for age and responsibility despite little or no regard for obligation (like the summer book report he’d left languishing in his backpack since last month) didn’t trouble Rumble in the slightest. The feeling of youthful malaise had been growing in the back of his head since the last bell of spring classes had sent him home to two months of supposed child-like frolicking. Instead he’d spent the first few weeks sulking and taking every opportunity solidify his resentment of the other ponies his age.

They’re so young, and stupid. I’m way more mature than any of them… it’s not fair that I have to wait to grow up.

                    Rumble directed the focus of this particular bout of ire towards his brother and his two friends – Flitter and Cloudchaser. The two pegasi seemed to never be far away when his brother left the house, and for some reason Rumble’s resentment burned brighter every time he saw the slender fillies hanging off his brother’s shoulder. Cloudchaser (the one with the swirly sheen of sparkling silver hair) let her hoof rest on Thunderlane’s back for a minute, and Rumble snorted loudly before yanking the curtains closed.

                    Being a kid, he decided, was the worst possible thing. Older ponies tried to tell him that the years of his youth were the most precious – that this was the only time he’d have to play and ignore responsibility, and of course he should appreciate it while he could, or he’d look back regretting growing up too fast… Rumble consistently shrugged these admonitions off as the testimony of sanctimonious adults blinded to the perfection of the lives they had grown into. Even if just to stay up late and have ice cream whenever he wanted, Rumble was sure that being grown up was better than being a kid.

                    Plus… it meant hanging out with other ponies that were grown up. Ponies like Flitter and Cloudchaser.

                    Rumble’s classmates always told him he was funny. He wondered what it would be like to tell a joke and have Cloudchaser’s slender foreleg rest on the back of his neck.

                    The two pegasi, being good friends of Thunderlane’s, were always the first choice to babysit when Rumble’s older brother was out at night. Rumble caught himself feeling ill at the thought of the word ‘babysit’. So juvenile. He wasn’t a baby – he was a kid, and that only through constraints of necessary biology. But that was how Flitter and Cloudchaser treated him: like a baby. They tried to play stupid games with him and feed him kid food like peanut butter and hay sandwiches, and they always made him go to bed before his brother came home.

                    Of course Rumble played along, most of the time. He could still get the pair to laugh with his antics, and while he might not get rewarded with a literal pat on the back, he felt warm inside when he managed to elicit a laugh. He also felt a strange tingling he couldn’t quite describe, that seemed to plague him every time his pegasus neighbours were around.

                    “I’m tired of this!” he shouted to no one in particular.

                    The empty house paid him no attention.

                    Snorting again in frustration, Rumble turned his head towards the clock hanging in the living-room. A quarter past four, which meant his brother would be in for dinner soon, most likely.

                    Rumble parted the curtains and peeked outside. His brother and babysitting pair were still standing in each others’ company, laughing and ignoring the throngs of ponies moving past them on the way to somewhere more important.

                    Maybe he had time before dinner after all.

                    The dense foliage of the Everfree was the least inviting site imaginable. Even before setting hoof inside, Rumble could feel the eyes of a million unspeakable creatures leering at him from the darkness. He knew that plenty of ponies from town had made their way into the Everfree at one point or another, and most of them had returned unscathed.

                    It was the ‘most’ that worried him though.

                    Rumble swallowed loudly and took one step forward, his hoof landing loudly on the dirt covered broken-looking path. A nearby tree-branched jostled in accompaniment to his movement, and Rumble almost jumped, catching himself just in time.

I’m not ready to be older if I freak out at some stupid tree.

                    For its part, the tree waved lazily in the remnants of the breeze swaying throughout most of Ponyville.

                    Rumble swallowed again, lowered his head, and began his walk.

                    The knock on the door startled Zecora almost enough to make her drop the beaker she was holding. She fumbled with it for a minute, locking her teeth tightly onto the edge of the container precariously, and breathed a sigh of relief when the vial of liquid remained in place. After a moment to collect herself, she set the beaker down on a nearby countertop.

                    Company wasn’t something she was used to. The occasional visit from Twilight was enough of a regular occurrence that she had taken to marking it in her mental calendar – but unsolicited visitors were so rare as to be almost completely nonexistent. In fact, the only other time she could remember was the day she’d gotten involved with a yellow pony bearing a bright red bow whose sister and friends showed up shortly thereafter…

                    Zecora braced herself for the worst and opened the door.

                    A pair of bright violet eyes and an eager grey face stared up at her from in front of the door.

                    “Um,” they said.

                    Zecora considered her greeting carefully.

                    “Hello, my unexpected guest. What concern of yours might I address?”

It’d do for now.

                    “Um,” said the pair of eyes again, or rather the accompanying mouth attached to the grey body holding them aloft.

                    Zecora smirked and leaned forward slightly to peer down at the colt standing nervously on her front step.

                    “Is there a reason for your visit today, or have you simply lost your way?”

                    “I, uh…” Rumble had built up the words in his head, but somehow forgot them instantly upon knocking. The fact that he had made his trudge through the forest in one piece was enough to make him feel perpetually disarmed – and to be honest, he hadn’t expected the rhyming. It was just a tad disconcerting.

                    But, he had come here for a reason, and he wasn’t about to miss an important opportunity due to nervousness.

                    “…is, uh… is it true you do magic? Like… potions and spells and stuff?”

                    Zecora smirked, though inwardly she was a bit taken aback that a small colt had wandered through the Everfree by himself to ask her such a question. No doubt her reputation in Ponyville was steeped in rumours of witchcraft and voodoo magic.

                    Not that the rumours were untrue necessarily… but she certainly didn’t encourage them.

                    “Before I answer might I ask in return, what about my magic you came to learn?”

                    Zecora slid sideways against her doorframe, catching Rumble’s gaze half-way through leering into her shack and exploring Zecora’s residence entirely with his eyes. Rumble jolted at the sudden movement, and then blushed.

                    “I was… I was wondering, just, if you did magic stuff, is all.”

                    Zecora waited patiently for the rest of the explanation.

                    After several seconds of silence, Rumble shifted his eyes from side to side and kicked a hoof at the ground nervously.

                    “I mean… I wanted to know, ‘cause, I, uh… I had a magic, uh, thing, I was wondering about.”

                    “The chance of explanation remains bleak, unless you tell me the type of magic you seek.”

                    Rumble swallowed loudly. He reminded himself why he had made the trek through the forest in the first place. He thought about glaring out his window, Flitter and Cloudchaser draped over his brother and giggling uncontrollably.

                    “I wanna be big!”

                    Zecora raised an eyebrow.

                    “I mean… I wanna be older. A grown-up. I’m tired of being a kid.”

                    Zecora couldn’t hold back her grin.

                    Rumble managed to match her smile, hoping any kind of positive reaction might lead to what he had stumbled through the forest for.

                    “Growing older is quite the request. What about youth do you so detest?”

                    “I just hate it!” Rumble surprised himself with the force of his response, but the emotion was caught in his mind now, and he saw no reason to restrain his explanation if Zecora was asking for it. “Being a kid is miserable. Grown-ups treat me like a moron, I can’t do anything exciting, everyone else my age is immature and stupid, and I don’t think it’s fair I should have to wait for so many years to have other ponies treat me like I matter.”

                    Zecora nodded knowingly, surprising Rumble with her consideration.

                    “A fair complaint to have indeed. And so, what is it you feel you need?”

                    “I want to be older! Or bigger! Or, just… not a kid anymore.”

                    Zecora stepped away from the side of her doorframe and backed inside her rustic shack. She held her tongue, simply beckoning inside with one hoof.

                    Rumble couldn’t believe his eyes. He considered pinching himself to check for potential hallucinations, but reconsidered with the understanding that even if he was hallucinating, that he’d be doing himself no favours by coming to. He almost jumped inside the hut, giving a tiny flap of his wings as his hooves touched the woven mat flooring.

                    The interior of Zecora’s house was everything he’d expected – tribal paintings and masks were hung on the walls, and the countertops were littered (in a tidy fashion, however) with vials and strange clay containers, racks of bottles and wooden holding devices for bowls and other utensils. And in the center of the room, a giant cauldron; just like he’d imagined.

                    “Before I help with your youthful depression,” began Zecora, drawing Rumble out of his revelry and snapping his attention away from a bubbling container of something inches from his face on a nearby countertop, “I need the answer to a simple question.”

                    Rumble nodded absentmindedly, staring at Zecora with an almost deity-like reverence.

                    “I can indeed give you a potion to change your morphology… but if I do, will you use it responsibly?”

                    Rumble’s head bobbed up and down too fast to monitor. His eyes became a blur as he nodded repeatedly.

                    “Oh, yes yes yes, I promise. I know I’m already ready to be a grown-up – if you help me I’ll be the perfect adult, I’ll be responsible and respectful and not miss being a kid for a second.”

                    Well, he certainly had his proposal prepared.

                    Zecora leaned her head toward the counter and grabbed one of the many vials at place in her wooden shelving unit. She popped the top off with her teeth and emptied half the contents into a nearby bowl with a cavernous rim. It was too tall for Rumble to see inside, so he contented himself with peering up from below.

                    Zecora replaced the vial and select several more, pouring careful amounts of each into the bowl. After the second or third addition the mixture began to froth audibly, and Rumble could smell a pungent aroma creeping out from the confines of the mixing container. He kept his eyes glued to Zecora, watching her mill about for more ingredients and utensils. He was sweating from nervousness – and for some reason, when Zecora bent over to reach into her cupboards, he felt a familiar tinge, the same one he felt when Flitter and Cloudchaser were around.

                    After more ingredients than Rumble could count, Zecora grabbed a nearby wooden ladle and stirred the mixture vigorously for a moment. Rumble gasped as he saw her face glow with a green aura, emanating brightly enough from the bowl that even he could see it from his vantage point near the floor. Zecora hummed something to herself as she set the ladle down. Rumble followed her movement with his eyes as she grabbed a nearby empty flask and, with deft usage of her mouth, poured the mixture inside. It was bright, green, and bubbling.

                    Rumble caught himself already holding out his hooves as Zecora lowered the vial into them. His eyes beamed so wide and bright they looked like they might burst.

                    “I will impart to you a tale from my homeland, a country marred with jungle and sand.” Zecora closed her eyes as she spoke, and opened them to Rumble holding the flask in his hooves and staring at it eagerly. She cleared her throat, and the pegasus colt blinked for a moment before jerking his head up, staring up to show he was paying attention. Sure that he was listening, Zecora continued.

                    “Things are not there as in Ponyville – there is no burden of age to fulfill, before one can be judged and live their life. From youth there is every chance for boon and strife.”

                    Rumble nodded along, following every word but showing a lack of understanding with the blankness on his face. All he could think about was the potion in his hooves, and how this could finally mean no more being treated like a kid…

                    “The solution I have given will give you what you ask, a dose of adulthood contained in a flask. But consider carefully what growing up means, and what you might lose in your youth and your teens.”

                    Several seconds of silence passed as Rumble tried desperately to digest what Zecora was trying to tell him. After what felt like an eternity, the zebra waved her hoof towards the door, and Rumble’s eyes lit up excitedly again.

                    “Thank you, thank you, thank you so much! I promise I’ll be careful, thank you thank you thank you!”

                    Rumble couldn’t help but slam the door in his enthusiasm. The leaves of the Everfree kicked up with the speed of his gallop back to town.

                    From behind her door, Zecora’s smirk was so wide it threatened to take her head off.

                    She remembered the feeling of wish her youth away. Sometimes, a taste of adulthood was enough to present some much needed perspective.

                    In the back of her head, Zecora wished she had given him just a taste before letting her go. The way the colt’s eyes had hung on her backside when she bent over reminded her she had been without some proper ‘company’ for a good while.

                    Well… given Rumble’s behaviour, she could consider that outcome when he came back for a refill.

                    "Wow."

                    Rumble held the glowing green flask between his hooves. He peered through the glass in an attempt to discern the behaviour of the repugnant looking liquid inside – it burbled and swished back at him, acting as though it might try to escape at any moment.

                    It didn't look as though it would be particularly tasty.

                    Thunderlane hadn't even batted an eye when Rumble snuck in well after dinner was over - whether he guessed the young colt to be out playing with his friends (which he had spurned in interest of further his maturity), or whether he simply didn't care, Rumble couldn't be sure. His brother had been playing video games in the living room when Rumble had crept back from his excursion into the forest, and had only managed a half-attention 'hey' as Rumble headed up to his room. He'd barely even needed to conceal the vial as he went up the stairs.

                    The solution looked grim. Even though Rumble had every trust in Zecora to concoct something that wouldn't send him into the throes of a terrible mutation, the ingredients she'd thrown into her pot hadn't looked even remotely familiar; besides which, for some reason Rumble had felt himself having trouble focusing on anything other than Zecora as she moved about her shack. He’d ended up staring at her backside most of the time… and that fuzzy feeling had come along too.

                    Zecora’s hips were wider and rounder than most ponies, he decided. They had just gotten in the way, that’s all.

                    In any case, he still had the final plunge to make. Going to Zecora’s through the Everfree by himself was one thing, but forcing himself to swallow the bizarre concoction he’d received was another entirely.

                    But… it was supposed to change things.

                    Was he just a kid trying to avoid swallowing his medicine?

                    Rumble pulled the stopper off the glowing flask. The smell of hit him like a ton of bricks, somewhere between a spice cart at the market and a grimy puddle filled with Celestia knows what. He gagged, but only kept his head turned away for a second.

                    He swore he saw the mixture burbled.

Time to grow up, he thought.

                    With a toss of his head, Rumble drew the beaker to his lips and drank.

                    Two seconds.

                    “Blehh!”

                    Rumble yanked the flask away from his mouth and spat. He’d managed to swallow most of his mouthful, but a few green drops flew across the room.

                    The taste was indescribable. Rumble wondered if Zecora had slipped a dead rat into the mixture.

                    He’d only manage to take half a swig – there was still almost all of the concoction waiting for him.

I can’t do this…

                    Rumble held the drink between his hooves, staring at it forlornly like a colt at the window of a chocolate shop.

                    Maybe he really didn’t deserve to grow up. He couldn’t even stomach this terrible tasting medicine, the final step between where he was and what he really wanted.

                    Out of the corner of his ear, Rumble thought he heard something other than the noise of his throat trying desperately to force out the remainder of the drink that had gotten through.

                    A giggle coming up the stairs.

                    Rumble carefully set the beaker down on the carpet and walked to the door. He peeked outside as though someone might be watching him before walking down the hallway to the stairs. The giggling was louder, interspersed with conversation he couldn’t quite make out.

                    Just past the bottom of the stairs, he could see his brother sitting with the pegasus twins, Flitter and Cloudchaser draping themselves over the couch and laughing.

                    The door had barely creaked shut before Rumble took up the drink again.

I’m going to grow up even if it kills me.