May 23rd, 1001 Post-NMM.

As Spike swept the floor of the Golden Oaks Library's reading room with his trusty broom, he paused in his tracks when he felt a familiar warm sensation in his chest. He quickly set the broom down against the nearest bookshelf and turned away towards the more open center of the room when he realized what it meant. His cheeks bulged, before with a belch a burst of green fire flew out and coalesced into a scroll in midair.

Spike caught the scroll as it fell before it could hit the ground. He unfurled it and glanced at the royal seal embossed at the bottom of the letter before he called out to his sister. "Twilight! You've got a letter from Princess Celestia!"

"I'll be down soon!" Twilight called from her room upstairs.

Spike picked up the broom and sat down on one of the nearby chairs to rest from his morning chores while he waited for Twilight to arrive. He leaned the broom against the table and made sure the handle didn't jostle or damage the wooden unicorn head decoration that rested in the center.

A few minutes later, Twilight reached the bottom of the stairs. A book floated in the air next to her, fully enveloped in her magic aura.

Spike caught a glimpse of the cover. "'Canopy Camper's Essential Guide For Camping'," He read to himself. He looked up at Twilight questioningly. "Are we going camping soon?"

Twilight shook her head and sat down in the other chair next to him. She floated the book over to Spike as she began to explain. "No, I'm just reading through this book for the spells. Even outside of a camping situation, these spells are very useful to know." She opened the book to a page marked with a bookmark and excitedly pointed to a spell on it with a hoof. "My favorite so far is the food preservation spell! Just one quick cast on whatever food I have with me to eat while reading, and I no longer have to worry about it going bad just because I forgot about it!"

"Wow, that does sound useful," Spike said.

Twilight nodded. "There's several other spells in here that are all very useful in day to day life. Honestly, I'm thinking about asking Princess Celestia to make learning these spells a mandatory part of the curriculum for the School Of Gifted Unicorns."

Spike snapped his claws and got down from his chair as he remembered the letter still held in his other hand. "That reminds me, Princess Celestia sent a letter!"

Twilight chuckled. "Sorry, Spike. I didn't mean to distract you by talking about this book. Let's hear what the Princess has to say."

Spike unfurled the letter once more. He cleared his throat, then began to read aloud.

To my faithful student, Twilight Sparkle. I am very pleased to tell you that the warp pipe hub you requested in your previous letter be built in Ponyville has been approved.

I have an architect and a warp pipe engineer on their way to Ponyville to scout out an area suitable for the hub, and builders will be sent out to build it once they have finished scouting and creating the necessary blueprints. I have already taken the necessary measures to acquire the permits needed for this project.

If all goes well, the architect and engineer should be arriving Monday morning to start the process.

Spike lowered the letter. "Wow Twilight, that's great news! Now we won't have to take the train every time we want to visit anypony back in Canterlot!"

Twilight clopped her hooves together excitedly. "I know, I'll be able to surprise Shining Armor with a visit during his next leave! I can't wait to see the look on his face!"

Spike looked back down at the letter. He noticed that the letter wasn't fully unrolled. "Oh hey, it looks like there's more in the letter!" He said, before he unfurled it and read it aloud.

In other related news, we have received a letter from Queen Bean of the Beanbean Kingdom accepting our most recent invitation to host ambassadors from her kingdom, officially opening diplomatic relations between our two kingdoms.

The set date and time for their arrival is the morning of next Wednesday, on the 28th of May.

I would appreciate it if you and your friends would be here for the duration of their initial meeting, as I feel that, as the current bearers of the Elements of Harmony, you all would be best suited for showing them the best of what Equestria has to offer.

Twilight jumped out of her seat and paced across the floor of the library in a panic. "A meeting with ambassadors?! Next Wednesday is only five days away, I have so much to prepare before then!"

Spike got up and placed a hand on her leg to stop her from pacing and spiraling. "Woah, Twi. Just take a deep breath and calm down, I'm here to help you after all."

Twilight closed her eyes and took multiple deep breaths. Once she had fully calmed herself down, she opened her eyes again and took one last deep breath, which she exhaled slowly. She then turned towards Spike. "Thank you for keeping me from freaking out too much, Spike. What would I ever do without you?" She asked as she grabbed him and pulled him into a hug.

Spike returned the hug. "Probably fall apart completely, spiraling down a dark path of madness and endless book sorting," he said with a chuckle.

Twilight chuckled. "Probably."

The two then separated. Spike grabbed a quill pen and a parchment from the table. "Alright, so what's the first thing on the list?" He asked as he got ready to write.

Twilight put a hoof to her chin and thought. "Well, we definitely need to tell the others about this, so that they can take care of their own preparations and get ready for the trip. After that, we need to make sure that you have enough supplies here to last while we're gone."

Spike paused in his writing. "You mean I'm not coming with?"

Twilight shook her head. "We're only going to be meeting with the ambassadors while we're there, and maybe even stay the night if the meeting goes on long enough," she explained. "The meeting itself will easily take multiple hours since there's so much that would need to be discussed. Do you really want to have to sit through a several-hour long meeting in silence, not able to do anything or else risk upsetting the diplomats? We have no idea if they're the kind of ponies-" she paused in thought. "Er, well, they're not really ponies, so people I guess, that would take interruptions well or if they'd completely freak out. Honestly, I have no idea how we're going to keep Pinkie Pie from either going insane from the boredom or driving all of us insane while we're there as is."

It took less than a second for Spike to have his answer. "I'll pass, that sounds incredibly boring. Also, a bored Pinkie is a terrifying Pinkie, and the one time I saw a bored Pinkie was enough to know that I do NOT want to be in an enclosed room with her that I can't get out of."

Twilight paled and shuddered at the thought. "Great, now I'm going to be scared of that, too. Thanks, Spike," she mumbled sarcastically with an eyeroll once she'd recovered.

"You're welcome sis!" Spike said much more enthusiastically, which made the stressed mare chuckle.

Twilight shook her head to refocus herself. "Anyways, let's get started on telling the others. How about you go visit Rarity and let her know what's going on? You could even see if she needs help with any of her preparations, since you'll already be there."

Spike gasped. "I shall gladly go aid my fair lady Rarity!" He declared as he pounded a fist against his chest.

Twilight chuckled at his antics. "Just go, Spike. I can take care of everything else here. While you're gone, I'll take care of telling the others, so don't worry about trying to find them."

Spike set his written list and quill pen down on the table and turned to leave. "Bye Twilight! I'll see you later!" He said with a wave as he left the library.

Spike made his way through Ponyville at a brisk pace. He arrived at Carousel Boutique not even ten minutes after he left the library.

He knocked three times on the door and waited.

Several minutes prior, inside the boutique, Rarity was in deep concentration as she worked on a dress order from the Rich estate.

Sweetie Belle squirmed on the modeling stage as the inner stitching scratched uncomfortably at her coat. "Rarityyy, why am I the one modeling for this dress?" She complained to her older sister. "You know Diamond Tiara isn't our friend. In fact, she hates us!"

Rarity tsked. She scribbled something on her design notepad as she made adjustments to the design based on her observations. "Because Scootaloo's wings make her modeling only work with dresses intended for other pegasus foals, and somepony," she said with a pointed look towards Scootaloo next to her. Said pegasus filly whistled innocently. "Crashed into my only foal-sized ponnequin the other day, and I haven't been able to take it in for repairs yet. And besides, despite his daughter's awful behavior, Filthy Rich is a good stallion, and a customer on top of that. Who knows, maybe if you give Diamond Tiara her ordered dress personally once it's done, she'll warm up to you three, at least a little bit."

Scootaloo scoffed from her spot next to Rarity where she had been watching her sister work instead of hanging out with Rainbow Dash since she and Fluttershy had left for their monthly weekend trip to Cloudsdale earlier that day. "Yeah right, I doubt anything short of us saving her life would make that happen."

"And even then, she'd probably just scoff at us and say something like, 'Oh, I can't believe I was saved by those, those AWFUL Blank-Flanks! Oh, I could just positively DIE from embarrassment!'" Sweetie Belle said in a high-pitched mockery of Diamond Tiara's voice.

Rarity glanced down at her younger sister in concern. "I'm sure it's not quite that bad. Right?"

Both Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle nodded. "She treats us like we're less than her just because we don't have our Cutie Marks yet. She makes sure to only do it when nopony else is around, though, so she never gets caught, and anytime we try to tell an adult that isn't Miss Cheerilee they don't believe us. They always say that she's 'such a beautiful little angel,' bleh," Scootaloo said with her tongue stuck out in disgust.

Rarity frowned. "Does she ever... hit any of you?"

Both of her sisters shook their heads. "No, she knows that Apple Bloom is stronger than her, and that if she tried anything like that, she'd make her regret it fast," Scootaloo said.

"I have seen her sometimes get a little physical with her friend Silver Spoon, though," Sweetie Belle added.

Rarity's frown deepened into a scowl. "Once we're done here, I'm going to have a talk with Cheerilee about this. Behavior like that cannot be allowed to just keep happening unchecked."

Scootaloo shrugged. "You can try, but the last time we did that, she just said that she couldn't do anything because she'd get fired from her job, and I don't want to even think about who we'd get stuck with to replace her if that happened. I actually like Miss Cheerilee, she makes sure that I don't fall behind in class and that I actually understand her lessons each day."

Rarity gave her pegasus sister a hug, which Scootaloo leaned into.

Before any more could be said, a knock on the door echoed throughout the room.

"I'll get it!" Sweetie Belle called out as she ran off the stage. The unfinished dress she still wore trailed behind the filly as she ran to the door.

Rarity broke away from her hug with Scootaloo. "Get back here, Sweetie Belle! That dress isn't finished yet!"

Sweetie Belle ignored her sister and opened the door. "Hi Spike!" She greeted her dragon friend. "Are you here to help Rarity again?"

Spike half-nodded, but turned it into a shrug halfway through. "Eh... Sort of, I'll explain inside."

Sweetie Belle nodded and stepped aside. "Come on in."

"Thanks, Sweetie Belle," Spike said as he stepped over the trailing dress and walked over to Rarity.

Rarity pulled him into a quick hug to greet him. "Hello Spikey-Wikey, what brings you here today?"

Spike returned the hug and relished the soft touch of his crush with a smile.

Scootaloo rolled her eyes and pointed her hoof towards her mouth with a fake gag at the dragon's antics, which caused Sweetie Belle to giggle.

Spike blushed in embarrassment and quickly pulled away. He awkwardly cleared his throat. "Twilight received a letter from Princess Celestia that said the ambassadors from the Beanbean Kingdom will be arriving in Canterlot next week, and she wants all of the Elements present for the initial meeting!"

Rarity gasped and giddily stomped her hooves on the ground in excitement. "Ooh, I can't wait! I have to get ready, I need to pack EVERYTHING!" She declared as she ran off and left Spike behind with Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle.

Spike stared awkwardly in the direction Rarity had disappeared in. "Well... that didn't go quite as I expected."

Scootaloo snickered. "Let me guess, you thought she was going to ask for your help again, lover boy?"

Spike blushed and looked away. "...Yeah," he admitted. He then did a double take. "Wait, how do you know about my crush?"

Both Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle just stared at him for a second. "You have literally never been even slightly subtle, mister 'My Fair Rarity, is there anything I could POSSIBLY do to help you? Your every wish is my command!'" Scootaloo said in a low-pitched parody of Spike's voice as she tucked her forehooves under her chin and fluttered her eyelashes.

Spike grumbled and batted at her hooves. "Just wait, Scootaloo. One day you'll fall in love, then you'll understand."

Scootaloo scoffed as Sweetie Belle removed the unfinished dress and took it to Rarity. "Sure, yeah, I'll let you know when that happens. In fact, I promise that you'll be the first to know."

Spike just stared deadpan at Scootaloo for a second, before a question came to his mind. "By the way, I was curious. Rarity and Sweetie Belle are both unicorns, and if those two unicorns I saw the three of you with a while back were your parents, do you have a pegasus somewhere further back?"

Scootaloo giggled. "No silly, I'm adopted. Sweetie Belle's parents adopted me two years ago on my tenth birthday, about a year before you and Twilight moved here to Ponyville. It was the best birthday I've ever had, in fact."

Spike's eyes widened. "Oh neat, I'm adopted too! Twilight's mom and dad officially adopted me about four years ago once Celestia felt I had my fire breath under control. She didn't want to risk me accidentally burning Twilight's house down before then."

Scootaloo snickered before she offered her hoof for a hoofbump. "Awesome! We adopted ponies need to stick together!" She then paused. "Er, adopted pony and dragon, that is."

Spike snickered and met her hoof with a fist. "I know what you mean Scootaloo. We're kinda like siblings, in a way!"

Scootaloo nodded. "Yeah, exactly!" She then gave him a smirk. "So, brother, you do realize this makes Rarity your sister too now, right?" She teased.

Spike's face turned completely ashen at the thought. "On second thought, let's just stay friends, Scootaloo."

Scootaloo giggled at his expression and waved a hoof. "I'm just kidding, Spike, although you should have seen the look on your face! It was priceless!"

The color returned to Spike's face, although he still looked visibly uncomfortable.

Scootaloo saw his discomfort and pulled him into a hug. "I'm sorry Spike, I didn't mean to make you that uncomfortable. I just thought it would be a funny joke, is all."

Spike wrapped his arms around Scootaloo and returned the hug. "It's alright, I know you didn't mean anything bad by it. Just, please don't make fun of my crush again, alright?"

Scootaloo pulled away and made eye contact with him. "I Pinkie Promise," she said before she sat down. She began to motion with her hoof. "Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye," she vowed.

Spike put a hand to his chest and gave a sigh of relief. "Thanks Scootaloo. That means a lot to me."

Scootaloo smiled at him. "Not a problem, Spike. If it helps, us being brother and sister does not make Sweetie Belle and Rarity your sisters."

A contemplative look crossed Spike's face. "Eh..." he started with a side to side wiggle of his hand. "It does help make the idea a bit easier to swallow, but I'd still rather we just be close friends, if that's fine by you."

Scootaloo nodded. "Close friends it is! Now, let's go see if we can go help Sweetie Belle and Rarity, I'm sure they need it considering how long they've been gone at this point," she said as she turned and headed in the direction her sisters had disappeared in moments before.

Spike followed behind her. "Now that's an idea I can get behind!" He cheered with a fist pump.

Several hours later, the exhausted Spike, Scootaloo, and Sweetie Belle exited Rarity's room, their faces red from exertion.

The trio panted as they sluggishly made their way over to one of Rarity's fainting couches in the main room, where they flumped down onto it in a pile of limbs, each of them too tired to untangle themselves.

"Why does she need to pack so much for this trip? And why now, it's not for five more days!" Scootaloo complained from her spot at the bottom of the pile. Her wings twitched from the exertion of balancing luggage containers on her back for so long.

"At least she wasn't being literal about packing everything, no way would we have been able to do all of that today," Sweetie Belle said as she rested her head on the arm of the couch.

Spike looked towards where Sweetie Belle lay. "Speaking of, Sweetie Belle, you've gotten pretty good with your levitation lately. I was impressed with how well you held all that stuff in the air at once!" He praised.

Sweetie Belle blushed from the praise. "Thanks, Spike. I've been practicing a lot lately, and levitating multiple things at once has always been easiest for me to learn for some reason," she said with a shrug. "Rarity's constant multi-tasking rubbed off on me a bit, I guess."

Spike looked impressed, but Scootaloo just stared at her sister with suspicion in her eyes. "You've been using my missing wing weights, haven't you?"

Sweetie Belle blushed. "Only the ones you aren't using."

Scootaloo scowled. "I'm not using them because they're missing!"

Spike frowned. He rolled off of Scootaloo and hefted himself off the couch to go find something to eat while his friends continued to bicker on the couch behind him. He let out a sigh with a soft shake of his head. "I hope Apple Bloom is having a better time right now," he said to himself under his breath.

Inside the Apple Family's barn on Sweet Apple Acres, various well-used training equipment and weights of varying sizes lay scattered about one of the otherwise unused corners of the ground floor. Apple Bloom stood next to a tall punching bag that had been set up in the corner on the floor. The very same punching bag Rainbow Dash had her use to try to earn a martial arts Cutie Mark ten months prior.

She glared at the punching bag. "You may have bested me almost a year ago, but today, it's finally mah turn!"

Apple Bloom turned away from the punching bag and took a deep, calming breath. She then reared up and focused all of her strength into bucking the punching bag as hard as she could with a shout. "Hiyaah!"

The filly's buck completely knocked the punching bag over onto its side with a resounding thud, a large gash torn into its side from the filly's strength. Some of the cloth material that had been used to fill it spilled out onto the wooden floor of the barn.

Apple Bloom opened her eyes, spun around, and just stared in awe at her achievement for a moment. "Ah, Ah did it! Ah finally got back at this stupid thing! Ha ha!" She cheered. She began to jump around the barn in celebration.

On one of her jumps, her hoof caught on the edge of one of the bales of hay that was being stored in the barn, which resulted in the frolicking filly falling flat on her face. "Oof!"

She got back up and rubbed her nose. "Ow... dumb hay bale..." She mumbled. She felt something wet on her hoof and took her hoof away from her nose to check it. "Aw, really?"

"Ya okay in there, Bloom?" Applejack called from the entrance of the barn, the mare having heard her sister's cry of pain as she was on her way to prepare for her upcoming trip to Canterlot next week.

Apple Bloom turned to her approaching sister with a hoof now pressed up against her nose to stem the bleeding. "Yeah, Ah'm fine. Just had a bit of a fall, that's all," she responded with a nasally voice.

Applejack frowned and gently pulled Apple Bloom's hoof away from her nose. She tsked as the filly's blood slowly dribbled out. "Land's sakes, sugarcube, what are on earth were ya doing to cause this?"

Apple Bloom perked back up. "Ah finally beat that stupid punching bag! See?!" She said as she pointed her slightly bloody hoof towards the corner where the punching bag lay on its side, surrounded by its cloth stuffing that had leaked out of the gash she'd made.

Applejack whistled when she saw the filly's handiwork. "Ah must say, all that working out ya've been doing this past year is actually paying off! A lot too, from the look of this damage!" She exclaimed before she looked back down towards her sister with a slight frown. "Now, what are ya going to tell Rainbow Dash? She was kind enough to lend ya one of her dojo's punching bags for ya to train with before she left, after all."

Apple Bloom's ears drooped as she remembered. "Oh, right. Um, maybe Rarity can patch it back up?" She asked with a hopeful glance towards her sister.

Applejack tousled Apple Bloom's mane with a smile. "Ah'll ask her next time Ah see her. For now, let's go get that bloody nose taken care of. Don't want it to drip all over the place, now do we?" She asked as she got up to head towards their house.

Apple Bloom quickly put a hoof to her nose again to stop her blood from dripping out and shook her head. "Nope, definitely not!" She called as she took off after her sister. The filly balanced carefully on three hooves as she ran.

Once inside their house a minute later, Apple Bloom caught a glimpse out of the corner of her eye of a picture of her parents that was hung on the wall to the side of the entrance.

Five-year-old Apple Bloom watched as her parents Pear Butter and Bright Mac fought back against their mysterious assailants in the orchard.

The young filly had taken cover behind an apple tree her mother had hidden her behind when the attack had suddenly started. Multiple nearby thin bushes had been hastily cannibalized by her father to create the more solid cover she was now better hidden under while her mother held the attackers off. She had carefully poked her head out from the side of the tree when she heard noises a few minutes later, her curiosity getting the best of her.

She watched in teary-eyed terror as her mother dodged to the side as one of the blurry, hazy figures swiped an unclear limb at her. Her mother spun around and counterattacked with a solid, powerful buck that hit the figure directly and sent it flying into the tree behind it, where it impacted with a massive thud and the resounding crack of shattering bones that echoed deafeningly throughout the orchard.

Not even a minute later it had gotten back up and rejoined its brethren, no worse for wear than when the battle had first started.

Apple Bloom sniffled as the painful memories hit her. "Mama, Papa, Ah promise that Ah'll be strong enough that what happened to you back then will never happen again. Ah'll protect everypony. That's a promise," she vowed to herself as the determination to protect her loved ones burned deeply within her.

Applejack grabbed a tissue from the box on the living room table. "What was that Apple Bloom?" She asked as she turned around, the mare having heard her little sister mumble to herself behind her.

Apple Bloom gave her sister a teary eyed smile. "Just making a promise to Mama and Papa, Applejack."

Applejack pulled her sister into a hug with a smile and watery eyes. "Ah'm sure they're just as proud of ya as Ah am, little Bloom."

Apple Bloom's eyes also watered from her sister's usage of her parents old nickname for her as she leaned into the hug.

After a few seconds, the sisters broke away from each other, and Applejack gave the tissue to Apple Bloom, who carefully stuffed it in her nose to stem the bleeding. "Now, take care of yerself a bit better, Apple Bloom. Ah can't always be there to help ya when ya get hurt."

Apple Bloom nodded. "Ah know. It was an accident anyways, but Ah'll make sure to be more careful from now on," she said, her voice nasally due to the tissue plugging up one nostril.

Applejack smiled and patted her sister on the head. "That's a good start," she said, before she pulled her into a less mournful hug. "Ah love ya, little Bloom."

Apple Bloom returned the hug with a smile. "Ah love you too, Applejack."

Author's Note

This story was very heavily inspired by Lucar's works: A Sweetie Dream Land, the Apple Bloom's Mansion series, and The Phantom Filly.

If you're reading this Lucar, thank you for writing some of my favorite works of fiction of all time, including my actual favorite, A Sweetie Dream Land.

Thank you.

To everyone else, I heavily recommend checking his stories out. They are more than worth the time it takes to read them, in my opinion.