The Incredibly Embarrassing Parents of Rainbow Dash

Chapters

Seeing Double
Panic, Parties, and Pinkies
In Which Rainbow Dash Doesn’t Fight a Hydra (Or I Hope I Never Have to Type Cool or Awesome Ever Again)
Epilogue- Parents are Magic
Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling.

Seeing Double

The Incredibly Embarrassing Parents of Rainbow Dash

Chapter 1: Seeing Double.

It all started when my parents knocked on my door.

I’d finally gotten a day off after all the Tornado Day craziness. A lot of stuff that happened leading up to it made me rethink a few things. But Pinkie Pie had been there for me, and it looked like everything was going to turn out pretty cool now. Luckily, the Ponyville weather team was on light duty for a little while. The whole ‘partly cloudy and plenty of sunshine’ type of deal, nothing crazy. I’d pushed my team pretty hard for the last couple of weeks to get everything ready for Tornado Day, so they deserved the break. Plus, some of the members of my team had come down with the feather flu and needed time to recover from that nasty bug. Not that I was going to complain about getting some off time myself to practice some sick flying moves or do some awesome pranking with my fillyfriend Pinkie either.

But any plans I had were quickly ruined when I heard that knock and opened my front door. I looked at who was at my doorstep and my heart plummeted. I looked at the mare on the right. “Cool-Mom?” my mouth said as my brain tried to catch up to what my eyes were seeing. I turned to look at the at the mare on the left. “Awesomom? What are you two doing here?”

Cool-Mom wrapped a cerulean foreleg around my neck and gave me a warm hug. “Oh darling, it’s so wonderful to see you!” She released the hug and ran a hoof through her rainbow-colored mane. You’d swear the two of us were clones of each other or something by looking at us. Well, Cool-Mom didn’t have a pair of radical wings like me, the only reason she was even able to stand on clouds was because of the thunderforged steel horseshoes she always wore, and she does spend a whole hay lot more time on her mane than I do—but yeah.

Awesomom nearly drove me to the ground when she tackled me with a hug that would make some bears jealous. She always was the huggy type. For a while all I could see was the white of my other mom’s coat as she slowly crushed the life out of me and spun us in the air. “Oh-Dashie-it’s-so-good-to-see-you-I’ve-missed-you-so-much!”

I struggled in Awesomom’s grasp. “Om! Ah reed toh reath!”

“Oh! Oops, sorry.” Awesomom released her grip and I was allowed to breathe again. “You know I’m always just so happy to see you.” She gave me a loving nuzzle to the face that gave me a faceful of her poofy yellow mane.

I pulled my face back so that I wouldn’t get her hair in my mouth. “Yeah, yeah, that’s fine.” I took a couple of steps out of the doorway to let my parents into my home. “But what’re you two doing here?” I was still trying to get my thoughts organized. I hadn’t expected either of them to just show up in Ponyville out of the blue. Even as spontaneous and unpredictable as Awesomom was, she would at least tell me if she was coming to visit. Or at least, Cool-Mom would tell me—usually by writing a letter when they were already halfway here.

Cool-Mom walked through the doorway and started to look around my living room. “What do you mean? We wrote to you over a week ago saying we were coming over to visit. Your last letter did seem to suggest you were having a rough time of it as of late, and your mother and I thought you could use a little support to help get you through this.”

“Yeah, you know we love our little Dashie!” Awesomom flitted into my living room and gave me another rib-crushing hug. Thankfully, this one didn’t last quite long enough to leave me in danger of suffocation.

I pushed Awesomom to the length of a leg and I blinked a few times as I thought over what they had just told me. “What letter? I didn’t get a letter.” If I had gotten a letter saying my parents were coming, I would have raced over to Cloudsdale to visit them first. It’s not like I didn’t like seeing my parents now and then. Just ... not in Ponyville ... where everypony could see them. I had reasons. Good reasons.

“Here’s your mail, Rainbow Dash,” I heard from the open doorway. I turned to see Derpy standing outside my door. She gave me a smile, reached into her mailbag and pulled out a small bundle of letters. “‘’Ere ah ‘eatter roum ‘our ‘arents.”

“You don’t say?” I said. I grabbed the bundle of letters and jerked my head to motion towards my parents.

Derpy leaned her head to look around me and saw my parents. Her face twitched with recognition and she gave them one of her bubbly smiles. “Mrs. Surprise—Mrs. Rainbow Dash! Hi! It’s nice to see you two again!” She gave the two of them a friendly wave.

Cool-Mom trotted up to Derpy and gave her a quick hug. “Oh, Derpy darling, it has been forever since we have seen that lovable smile of yours.”

Derpy let out a pained groan when Awesomom ran up to her and gave her a crushing hug. “It’s so good to see you again! It’s been like forever and ever since last time! I mean you were all big and pregnant when we last saw you!”

“Yes ... It’s been forever ... hasn’t it?” Derpy was trying to hold back tears as Awesomom threatened to squeeze the life out of her with sheer affection. “Can you ... let go ... had enough ... oxygen please?”

Awesomom smiled apologetically at Derpy and slowly released her. “Oops, sorry. I just get so excited seeing one of Dashie’s old friends.”

Derpy tried to catch her breath before speaking in a strained tone. “Don’t worry about it. It’s always nice to meet you two.”

I glanced at the bundle of letters Derpy had given me, and I noticed that one of the letters was in terrible shape. It looked stained, had crumbs all over it, and the writing was badly washed. I could only barely make out that it had been from my parents. “Derpy, why does this one letter smell like muffins?”

Derpy gave me a goofy grin and rubbed the back of her head. “Oh, sorry ‘bout that. I think I accidently dropped that into the batter at Sugarcube Corner. I didn’t notice till sometime later when a muffin I bought there came out tasting papery.”

I suppressed a growl as I put the group of letters to the side. “It’s okay, Derpy.” That would explain the mystery of my parents’ missing letter. Why couldn’t Derpy lose letters I didn’t care about? Well, she probably did. I just didn’t care enough about those letters to care about them now that I thought about it. But losing my parents’ letter was a bit of a big deal.

“Will you stay and visit?” asked Cool-Mom. “We would just love to sit down and talk with you, considering it has been so long.” She put on a frown that said she would be disappointed if Derpy didn’t accept.

Derpy sighed and shook her head. “I’m sorry, but I’m on the clock.” She patted her mail bag a couple times and the letters and pages within rustled around. “Lots of deliveries to make.”

Cool-Mom nodded and gave her another quick hug. “You’re a working mare now, and you have a pair of children to care for—we understand. We plan on being here all weekend, so we really must find the time to visit one another. Surprise and I would simply love to see Dinky and Sparkler. We’ve heard so much about them from Dash, and now just seems like the perfect opportunity to see them.”

“Yeppers,” Awesomom exclaimed. She hopped up to stand on her rear legs and gave Derpy a friendly noogie. “We need to talk, and eat, and drink, and all sorts of fun stuff.”

Derpy ran her hoof through her mane to try and straighten it back to normal. “I’d love to, considering it’s almost the weekend.” Derpy gave her wings a few flaps to lift herself into the air. “See you all later then?” We all agreed, and Derpy flew off to continue with her deliveries. Hopefully she didn’t lose anypony else’s mail today. To be fair, the mail usually got delivered ... eventually.

I closed the door and turned to face my parents. So they were here to visit me for the weekend. Not cool, but I could work with that. As long as they didn’t go into town and didn’t see anypony else I think everything should be good.

“So where’s this new fillyfriend of yours?” Awesomom got right to the point. “We just couldn’t wait to meet her!”

“Oh, um...” This wasn’t good. Not five minutes in and my parents were already shooting my plan in the hoof. I had to think fast. “It’s just ... she’s busy, working, doing baking stuff. She’s an apprentice baker and all that. And the weekends are busy, so we probably shouldn’t bother her.” I gave the best reassuring smile I had.

Cool-Mom rubbed up against me with a loving nuzzle. Great, she was getting into one of her touchy-feely moods again. “I’m sure she won’t mind if we visit as customers, and I doubt she will be busy all day. Surely she must get off sometime today or during the weekend.”

Awesomom was busy hopping around my house and getting into and looking at everything, as was her way. “Yeah! Your fillyfriend didn’t sound all super-duper-serious and no fun from your letters.”

I could feel the sweat gathering on my brow. “No, it’s not like that. It’s just ... I haven’t spent much time with just the two of you is all.”

Cool-Mom gave me an unconvinced frown as she stared at me. “Is there some reason you don’t want to introduce us to your fillyfriend?”

Yeah, this wasn’t looking good now. “It’s not that, it’s just—”

“Are you worried we won’t approve of her?” Cool-Mom started running her hoof through my mane. She never did like how I don’t do any of that silly stuff she does with her hair. Like combing my hair even matters; all that work just goes to waste the moment I go flying out the door. “You know that if you love her, we’ll do our best to love her too.”

Where was this coming from? I shook my head to reset my mane. “What? I know that.”

Awesomom pulled her head out of my closet and her lips started to quiver. “It’s not that you’re worried she wouldn’t like us?”

“Huh? No, I’m sure she’ll think you’re both cool.” I couldn’t imagine Pinkie not liking anypony. That was like—anti-Pinkie. ‘Like’ wasn’t the issue here.

Now Cool-Mom was pouting at me. “Is that it darling? Are you--perish the thought--ashamed of us?”

And now they were double-teaming me. I’ve never once been able to say ‘no’ to them when they do that. “Aaugh! No! That’s not what I mean at all.”

Awesomom hopped over to me and wrapped her legs around my neck. “Oh, so you’ll show us your fillyfriend then?”

There was no winning this for me. I couldn’t help but have my hoof connect with my face. “Okay, okay! I’ll take you to Sugarcube Corner and introduce you.”

Cool-Mom started herding me towards the door outside. “Spectacular, darling, I can’t wait to meet the mare that captured your heart.”

I opened the door for my parents. “Jeez, do you have to put it in such a ... unradical way?”

“Aww, isn’t that precious?” Awesomom nuzzled my face. “She’s still embarrassed to show affection. I bet you she still has trouble saying the L-word.”

I groaned with irritation. “I can say the L-word just fine. I just don’t wanna.”

Awesomom kept nuzzling me as I closed the door behind us as we exited my cloud-house. I swear, it’s like she doesn’t believe in personal space. “If you say so. We’re just happy to find out you finally found a special somepony to do special somepony things with.”

“Pinks is alright,” I said with a shrug. “We just like to hang out and stuff.”

“Yes, you can’t believe how happy we were to hear about the news.” Cool-Mom jumped me too. Gah, it was another Momwich with me in the middle. It was like my first day of school all over again.

Looking outside I saw that my parents had parked their sky-carriage out in front of my cloud-home. Awesomom must have flown Cool-Mom here from Cloudsdale. “Yeah, whatever, just please don’t embarrass me in front of her—okay?”

“Now why would we do that, darling?” Cool-Mom climbed into the back of the sky chariot and looked back at me.

Awesomom hopped in front of the carriage and started to tie herself to it. “Yeah, we just want to meet her, and talk to her, and tell her childhood stories about you, and show her your foalhood album—”

“Could ... we not show everypony the albums?” I pleaded. I looked into the carriage and saw a pair of saddlebags. I think I saw a corner of one of those albums poking out of one of them.

“But why not?” Cool-Mom’s lips scrunched up as she looked down at me. “Everypony you know seems to love looking at your old photo albums.”

Yeah, there were really good reasons for why I didn’t want anypony in Ponyville to see them. “Cool-Mom, Awesomom—ya do know I'm head of the weather team, right? Kinda have a public image to maintain.”

Awesome beamed at me with pride. “Of course we know, silly, and we’re so proud of you.”

“To think our little filly now runs the weather of a whole town.” Cool-Mom wiped a hoof along her eye as though to brush away a tear.

“So are ya gonna take that job soon?” Awesomom asked expectantly.

I couldn’t help but groan. “I have a job, Awesomom.”

Cool-Mom couldn’t help but throw her two bits in. “She means the one in Cloudsdale. We just want to see more our precious widdle filly!” Ugh, did she have to break out the foal-talk and pinch my cheek?

“Mooom!” I protested.

“Yes?” they both asked with a smile.

Yeah, there was no way my parents visiting Ponyville was going to end well for me.

***

We landed on the busy streets of Ponyville by Sugarcube Corner. Awesomom untied herself from the carriage while Cool-Mom hopped out the back. We had gotten into another argument over taking that desk job in Cloudsdale. As if. That job would be major snoozeville, and spending eight hours a day behind a desk would ruin all the work I'd put into getting in shape for the Wonderbolts.

Cool-Mom was busy slowly scanning the area we had landed. “I simply adore this town! It’s easy to see why you like it here, darling. It’s so charmingly rustic. I love Cloudsdale, but all the white does get to be a bit monotonous after awhile.”

“Yeah, it’s alright.” Moving to Ponyville had just kinda happened for me. After getting out of school, I wanted a job away from home that would let me practice my sick moves. I saw the job ad for a weather pony in Ponyville and jumped on it.

I suddenly felt hooves on my back and looked up to see Awesomom’s head turning in weird directions as she tried to look in every direction at once. “I think it’s super-duper-riffic! I can’t believe we didn’t visit sooner!” She backflipped off of me to land on the street.

I trotted up to the entrance of the Sugarcube Corner. “Come on, Pinkie should be working inside.”

My moms followed me into the bakery as I walked to the front counter. As usual, the place smelled like baked goods and frosting, and other customers were either sitting at tables or waiting in line to be served. Mrs. Cake was working the desk. We got to the head of the line after waiting for a few minutes. “Hey, Mrs. Cake, is Pinkie around?”

She gave me the warm smile she usually did. “Oh course dear, she’s right—”

“Behind you!” yelled Pinkie from where she had snuck up on me. I couldn’t help but jump in surprise. Even after all this time I had known her, she could still get the drop on me. But what could you do with a pony who could just jump out of nowhere?

She gave a short laugh and a snort before turning to my parents. She nearly went muzzle to muzzle with Awesomom. “And who are you?” She jumped over to Cool-Mom. “And ... huh?” Her eyes narrowed and her head tilted as she stared at Cool-Mom. She looked back and forth between the two of us a few times before she smiled again and did an excited bounce. “Ohmigosh! Two Dashies!”

I tried to stop Pinkie before she got too crazy. “Pinkie, she’s–”

Pinkie steamrollered right over my attempt to talk. “I-can’t-believe-it! Dashie, did you use the Mirror Pool! Granny Pie told me about the Legend of the Mirror Pool, but I didn’t know it was true!” Cool-Mom smiled with amusement as Pinkie ran around her.

“Pinkie,” I tried to warn her.

Pinkie continued to chirp away. “Though I think the Mirror Pool’s broken. I mean look, she doesn’t have wings like you, and her mane’s all prettied up, and she looks older and–”

“Pinkie! She’s my mom!” Pinkie was cool to hang out with, but sometimes you needed to put your hoof down with her. Cool-Mom had frowned a bit at Pinkie’s last little comment.

“Oooohhhh,” she said with sudden understanding. “That makes sense. It would have been great to have more Dashies, but it’s super duper to meet your mom too!”

“Yeah, super,” I said with considerably less enthusiasm. I motioned towards my moms. “These are my parents, Pinkie.”

Awesomom stepped up to Pinkie and started looking her over with a big grin on her face. “I like her! I think she’s a keeper.”

“What’re your names?! Dashie, introduce me to your parents!” Pinkie hopped excitedly in place. “I’ve wanted to meet you two so badly!”

Might as well get this over with—considering we were fillyfriends now, it was kind of inevitable. I pointed to Awesomom as she and Pinkie were busy mirroring each others’ movements. “Pinkie, this is my Awesomom, Surprise.” Next I pointed to Cool-Mom. Pinkie turned her head to face her, and Awesomom mimicked the movement. Weird. “And this is my Cool-Mom, Rainbow Dash.”

Pinkie sat down and crossed her forelegs as she rubbed her chin. Awesomom copied Pinkie exactly. She could be odd like that sometimes. “Wait, you’re both named Rainbow Dash? That’s just silly.”

Cool-Mom gave an amused chuckle. “Yes, well that’s a bit of a story. I was absolutely exhausted after foaling and asked my dear Surprise to name our foal. When asked what I would like, I told her to surprise me--and true to her name, she did just that when she filled out all the paperwork and named our daughter Rainbow Dash.”

Awesomom nodded her head quickly, and Pinkie did the same. I was starting to wonder if I was seeing double. Miscolored double. “Yep, totally didn’t get lazy or bored with all that boring paperwork at the hospital and just filled in the same name on most of the lines to get done quicker.”

“Your diligence in filling out our daughter’s paperwork only resulted in both of her parents being Rainbow Dash on the first draft of her birth certificate.” Cool-Mom only sounded a little bitter. It had been a bit of a pain to get that fixed from what I had heard.

“Hmm.” Pinkie rubbed her chin again. She actually seemed to be thinking a lot harder about this than she usually did. Maybe names were just serious business to her? She turned to face Awesomom, who did the exact same thing. “But how do you keep them straight? You can’t just call them both Rainbow Dash without both of them comically answering you each time, and you can’t overplay the same joke too much.”

“Oh, that’s easy.” Awesomom jumped up from her sitting position and twirled around to wrap her forelegs around Cool-Mom’s neck, and Pinkie did the same thing to me. “I call my dear sweetie-rainbow-honey-wifie Rainie, and—” Awesomom and Pinkie stood up and the two of them cartwheeled past each other. Awesomom landed next to me and gave me a hug while Pinkie copied her to hug Cool-Mom. “This here is Dashie. See? Simple.”

Pinkie’s mouth opened with a surprised smile. “Wait! You call her Dashie too?” Yeah, that was kinda weird now that I thought about it. Meh, only so many nicknames you could have for Rainbow Dash that didn't sound dumb. I swear, if I had to hear Rainbow Crash one more time...

Cool-Mom cleared her throat and squirmed her head out of Pinkie’s grasp. “Ever since she was a little filly she’s been our Dashie.” She nuzzled me affectionately. I heard a few chuckles from the tables in the Sugarcube. I glared at the direction of the laughs, but when I did so everypony seemed to be trying hard to be looking somewhere else.

Pinkie nodded. “Okie dokie lokie then! Sounds superiffic to me!”

“It’s worked superiffically for me thus far!” Awesomom reached out and wrapped her forelegs around Cool-Mom and my necks to hug us. Years of experience with this had taught me how to position my head so that I could still breathe when she did this. “I love my Rainie and Dashie!” I heard more stupid chuckles from the peanut gallery, but I totally kept my cool and didn’t do anything like blush when my mom hugged me in public.

Pinkie gasped and her eyes widened. “I just realized something. I’ve never met either of you before, and you’ve never been to Ponyville before either. I need to throw each of you a welcome party! But I’m not ready!” Pinkie started walking in place and turned every-which-way as though unsure where she was going. “I want to give both of you a super-duper party, but I don’t have supplies ready, the invites haven’t been sent, a location set, or anything else super important to a party! Dashie, why didn’t you tell me your parents were coming?!”

“Derpy lost the letter,” I grumbled. Great, now Pinkie wanted to throw a party—and given how excited she was, she was going to invite everypony in Ponyville. This was seriously not cool.

Pinkie grinned and giggled. “Oh Derpy, she’s always dropping letters and stuff into the batter. She’s a silly pony.” She tapped her chin and looked up at the ceiling. “Though it does result in a lot of the baked goods coming back all papery tasting. And let me tell you, a papercut on the tongue is no fun.”

“Don’t I know it, sister.” Awesomom gave Pinkie a friendly punch to the shoulder. “I got so bored on a train ride once that I tried to eat a pamphlet. Biiigg mistake. And band-aids don’t really work on your tongue.”

“Oh yeah,” Pinkie agreed. “They just slide right off when they get all wet in your mouth, so you just get this icky band-aid taste. After that everything just starts to taste weird and—no-no-no!” Pinkie smacked the side of her head a couple of times. “What am I doing!? I have a welcoming party to do! Concentrate you silly filly!”

“Oh, oohhhh!” Awesomom flitted around Pinkie a couple of times before landing in front of her. “Can I help! Can I, can I? Plleeeaase, I’ve never helped with my own welcome party before. I’ve ran birthday parties, weddings, other ponies’ welcoming parties, housewarming parties, surprise parties, graduation parties, award ceremonies, celebration parties, parties for all the holidays—and I mean all of them—and all sorts of other parties. But never a welcome party for myself!”

Pinkie clapped her hooves together with excitement. “And I’ve never had a pony help plan their own welcome party before. Well that’s kinda because most of the time they’re also surprise parties, and it wouldn’t be a surprise if they helped plan it. Unless they helped plan it, and we used a spell to make them forget about the party, but Twilight’s said I wasn’t allowed to do that for some reason that I was too bored to listen to.”

Awesomom lowered the front of her body near the ground and shook her tail. “So you wanna do it together, party filly!?”

My fillyfriend nodded enthusiastically. “Nothing to do but to do it!” Awesomom and Pinkie hoofbumped each other and they started to dance in place, giggling like madponies.

Great, just great. Awesomom and Pinkie were chatting up a storm about party plans. I could see this getting out of control real quick with those two encouraging one another. I love Awesomom and Pinkie, but if they started working together ... yeah.

I would really prefer to keep my parents from meeting everypony in Ponyville. I’d spent way too much time making myself the coolest pony in town for that to get messed up now, even if Pinkie and Awesomom didn’t mean to. Maybe I could try and head this off? “Hey, Pinkie, Awesomom—think we could keep this from becoming some big thing? Maybe just invite the ponies in Ponyville my parents already know? Don’t want to overwhelm my parents considering they just got to town.”

“Oh, don’t you worry about us Dashi-coons.” Awesomom patted me on the head. “You know I love meeting lots of new ponies.”

Cool-Mom nodded. “Yes dear, we have been waiting for years now to meet all of your friends and acquaintances in Ponyville.”

That was what I was afraid of. “No, really—I mean—There are just so many ponies I know in Ponyville and it would be such a hassle to invite them all.”

Pinkie waved a hoof to dismiss my objection. “Don’t worry about that, I’ll take care of all the invites!” She turned to smile at my parents. “I know everypony in Ponyville, and I mean everypony. And by the end of the day you’ll be meeting all of them!”

Darn it, Pinkie. If it wasn’t for the fact that she didn’t have a mean bone in her entire body, I’d swear she was trying to sabotage my rep.

Awesomom clapped her hooves together with excitement. “And I want to meet all of them! This trip is going to be everything I could’ve hoped for!” She wrapped a leg around Pinkie’s neck and pulled her closer so that their faces were scrunched up against one another. “So you know where all the good party supplies are in this town?”

Pinkie grinned. “Do I!? Follow me Awesomom! We are going to have so much fun!” The two of them started to quickly hop down the street, plotting the end of my awesome reputation in Ponyville, and there wasn’t a single thing I could think of to stop them without hurting their feelings. And let me tell you, doing anything to make Awesomom or Pinkie cry made you feel totally not cool.

I’m doomed.

***

After Pinkie Pie and Awesomom had run off to plan their “Destroy Dashie’s Reputation Party,” Cool-Mom said she wanted to visit Ponyville’s market. Unfortunately, I couldn’t convince her to return home with me to wait for the party. It didn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out what Cool-Mom wanted. Partially because she told me right then and there as we walked into the market.

“So darling, where is this good friend you talked about in your letters? Applejack was it? I’ve simply been dying to meet her.” Cool-Mom looked back and forth across the busy Ponyville market. As always, ponies were in their stalls or by their market wagons trying to sell their stuff to ponies walking around looking to buy things.

I considered lying or coming up with some excuse to leave the market. But I could never get a lie past Cool-Mom. She just ... knew things. Mom things. It’s like being a mom gave you some kind of sixth sense. Celestia knows Derpy always seemed to know when her kids were up to something. I knew Cool-Mom would know instantly if I tried to hide anything from her. My best hope was that AJ was just not in town today--Big Mac at least wouldn’t be much of a talker. Less chance for something embarrassing could be said then. Cool-Mom could be a chatter-box, but even she couldn’t do much with Mac’s eeyup’s and nnope’s.

I resigned myself to whatever fate the universe had for me. “AJ’s usually sellin’ stuff over here.” I pointed in the general direction we had to go to find Sweet Apple Acres’ selling wagon. Cool-Mom followed me to try and find AJ. It was bit of a pain to have to walk everywhere, but what can you do when your mom is an earth pony? It didn’t help that Cool-Mom and I looked so much alike. The two of us walking together was turning a lot of heads. So much for playing it cool.

We found AJ selling apples and stuff you made out of apples in her usual spot in the market, and my heart sank a bit. Maybe I could keep this short and sweet? AJ finished up with a couple of customers ahead of us, and I walked up to AJ with Cool-Mom. “Hi, AJ,” I said less enthusiastically than I could have.

AJ smiled at me. “Heya, RD and...” Her face twisted in confusion as she turned to Cool-Mom. “RD?”

I sighed and frowned. Might as well get this done and over with. “AJ, this is my mom, Rainbow Dash. Cool-Mom, this is Applejack. She’s cool and all. She’s the second most athletic pony in Ponyville. But what can you do when I’m in town?” I leaned down to whisper into Cool-Mom’s ear. “Please, please don't embarrass me in front of AJ?”

Cool-Mom leaned in to whisper back. “Don’t you fret, I just want to talk to your friend for a bit. No harm in that.”

I could think of plenty of ways for how AJ talking to my parents could be harmful. In fact, I couldn’t see any way this could turn out cool for me at all.

AJ smirked at me. “If that’s what you need to tell yourself, RD.” She offered a hoof to Cool-Mom. “Pleasure ta meet ya, ma’am. Been lookin’ forward to the day Ah could finally see RD’s folks.”

Cool-Mom took AJ’s hoof and shook it. As was her way, AJ shook Cool-Mom’s hoof a bit harder than what she was probably used to. “The pleasure’s all mine.” She shook her leg out a bit before gingerly putting it back on the ground.

“So wait...” AJ shifted her hat to the side and scratched the top of her head. “Yer both named Rainbow Dash?”

This really got lame to have to explain over and over again. “Yeah, Awesomom isn’t really original with names.”

AJ smirked at us. “Well ah can certainly see the family resemblance ‘tween the two of yah. They say us Apples look a lot alike, but this is just uncanny.”

Cool-Mom nuzzled me again. Did she really have to do that in public? “Yes, she did take after me quite a bit. Our darling here only got her other mother’s wings at the end of the day.”

“So is yer other mom around?” AJ turned her head to look around the market. I remembered that AJ knew a little bit about my parents. Given how important family is to her, it kinda came up when we were racing or something. I don’t think I told her much more than that they lived in Cloudsdale, and what their jobs were. More than what most ponies in Ponyville knew.

“Awesomom’s in town somewhere.” I looked to see if she was anywhere nearby. Mentioning her did always seem to cause her to show up. True enough, I saw Awesomom walking up to a coffee stand. I pointed a hoof her way for AJ. “There she is.”

Awesomom smiled at the bored looking stallion running the stand. “Hiya! Can I have a cup of coffee?”

The cream-coated coffee salespony sighed. “I’m not selling you a cup of coffee, Pinkie.” He slapped a crossed out picture of Pinkie stapled to the inside wall of the stand. It stated in bold letters, Do Not Sell To This Pony. “You know the law, can’t sell you the stuff since The Incident. The mayor came by a few months ago to remind us coffee sellers about the law when your librarian friend gave you some. Seems nopony told her about the law involving you and anything with caffeine in it, and now the government is all cranky about it.”

The Princesses were not happy to have to come down to Ponyville to fix the mess Pinkie caused. Very not happy. Twilight giving Pinkie a cup of espresso and causing The Incident II: Pinkie’s Caffeinated Revenge didn’t exactly change anypony’s mind about the law. Though I did have to wonder what tipped him off to make him think that my mom was Pinkie. As far as I knew he had never met Awesomom. Maybe Pinkie had been especially fast with giving out her party invitations?

Awesomom frowned at the coffee vendor. “But I’m not Pinkie. My name’s Surprise, that’s completely different than Pinkie.”

The coffee salespony rubbed his forehead. “It’s not happening, Pinkie. As far as disguises go, this isn’t even a particularly good one. You look like you just dumped some flour on yourself and put on a wig.”

Awesomom’s eyes widened. “What?! No I didn’t! Even if I disguised myself as Dashie’s mom, I would put more effort into it than that. She’s my fillyfriend’s mom for pony’s sake!”

The salespony crossed his hooves in front of his chest. “No means no.”

That’s when a second Awesomom walked up to the coffee stand. “So did you manage to get a coffee?”

The first Awesomom looked down at the ground and frowned. “No, stupid law won’t let me have any after the whole ‘Incident’ thingy. I already said I was real sorry, and it was only a couple hundred thousand bits of damage. I even offered to pay for that one colt's therapy sessions!”

“Too bad then.” Awesomom (probably) gave the vendor a smile. “Can I buy a coffee?”

The salespony looked back and forth between the two of them, and settled on giving Awesomom a disapproving scowl. “I’m not sure I know what’s going on right now, but I’m going to play it on the safe side, and not sell either of you coffee.”

That was probably a good call, and not only because he shouldn’t be selling Pinkie coffee. Cool-Mom had forbidden Awesomom from having anything with caffeine in it too. I would never forget the night when Cool-Mom was away on a business trip, and Awesomom got herself a cup of coffee. That was hooves-down the wildest night of my life as a filly. Though Cool-Mom was not the least bit happy when she had to post bail for Awesomom, and picked the both of us up from the Guard Station. At least I got a sucker from one of the Guards while we waited for Cool-Mom to show up, so it wasn’t all bad. Still, I guessed that some ponies just can’t hold their caffeine.

The first Awesomom pulled on a zipper on her back and removed the freakishly-good costume, revealing Pinkie underneath. “But that’s not fair, she’s not even me!”

Awesomom—the real one, apparently—stomped a hoof on the counter of the stand. “Yeah, I’m me, who's not her, but who is me, who is not her because I’m me! Don’t be a big meanie pants.”

The vendor rolled his eyes. “Listen, I just can’t sell either of you a cup of coffee. It's just not worth the risk of losing my business. Sorry.”

The first Pinkie threw her hooves up. “Oh come on! You can’t sell either of us any coffee? Even if I do this?” Pinkie pulled on a zipper and unzipped herself, revealing Awesomom underneath.

“No,” said the coffee salespony. Yeah, he wasn’t going to budge an inch on this, I could tell that much.

The second Awesomom unzipped herself and revealed what might have been a Pinkie costume or the real thing ... I really had no idea by this point. “How about now?”

The vendor narrowed his eyes at the mare who was probably either my fillyfriend or mom. “Hay no!”

“Rraagh!” The first Pinkie/Awesomom let out a frustrated growl and ripped off the Aweomom costume to reveal another pink coat and mane. I was starting to wonder if wearing that many form fitting costumes was hot. I’d have to ask Pinkie that later. “This is impossible!”

“I really don’t need this.” The vendor dipped below the counter of his stall and pulled out a small sign that read ‘Out On Break, Be Back Shortly.’ He placed it on his counter and glowered at the two ponies trying to buy coffee from him. “I’m going on my lunch break. See you two later.” He walked out of his stall to leave the two Pinkies to do whatever they were going to do.

That’s when a third Pinkie popped her head out of a nearby potted plant. “All right girls, time to pack it in. I don’t think we’re going to win this one.” The two other Pinkies grumbled and slowly walked away from the coffee stall while the third one pulled herself out of the potted plant.

AJ managed to pick her jaw off the floor and get her mouth working again after watching ... whatever we just saw. “So, um, that was yer mom? Maybe?”

“Here I am!” AJ nearly jumped when Awesomom flipped herself over the apple cart and landed right next to her. She grabbed AJ’s hoof and shook it harder and faster than even AJ was used to. “I’ve been waiting forever to meet one of Dashie’s very best friends!”

AJ had to steady herself to keep from falling over from the vigorous hoofshake. “Pleasure to meet ya too ma’am.”

A second Awesomom hopped up to us. “I know, right? I’ve been waiting to meet Dashie’s parents since forever also.”

AJ looked back and forth between the two Awesomom’s. “Um, could tha’ real Pinkie please step forward? Ah can’t tell tha’ two of you apart when one of ya is dressed up as the other.”

“Oh, oops.” The second Awesomom unzipped her costume and showed herself to be Pinkie. “Sorry, I forgot I was wearing that.”

AJ gave Pinkie a grin. “That’s ‘lright Pinkie. We all forget about something sometimes.”

“Talkin’ about forgetting things.” Pinkie reached into her mane and pulled out an envelope and hoofed it over to AJ. “I nearly forgot to give you this. You’re invited to Dash’s parents’ ‘Welcome to Ponyville’ party!”

AJ placed the party invitation on her cart. “Ah’ll try an’ show up then. Can’t say Ah haven’t been lookin’ forward to greetin’ RD’s parents.”

Pinkie was grinning with barely contained excitement. “We’re planning on having a super duper party! I’m pulling out all the stops!”

Awesomom wrapped her leg around Pinkie’s neck to pull her into a hug. “Girl, you better be careful about what you’re saying. I don’t want you getting my hopes up only for me to be disappointed. I’ve already told you, I’ve run many a party in my lifetime, so I have some pretty high standards for what a great party is.”

Pinkie slid out from Awesomom’s grasp and gave her a slight frown. “I can do it,” she said with a hint of desperation. “I’ll show you a great party. I even have a great new mixture for my party cannon I’ve just been dying to try out for the right occasion.” She pulled out her party cannon from ... wherever it is that she pulls out a cannon about her own size. “It’s super confetti-ie now!”

“You have a party cannon too?!” Awesomom pulled out her party cannon from someplace equally improbable. Heh, that’s right, I nearly forgot Awesomom also has a party cannon. Odd, I guessed it was just one of those thing ponies who ran a lot of parties picked up sooner or later.

Pinkie rubbed her chin as she looked over Aweomom’s cannon. “Ooh, nice! One of the old Party-Buster models, I didn’t know anypony still used these things.”

Awesomom gave her party-based artillery a loving pat. “You can’t beat the classics.” She pointed at Pinkie’s cannon. “What you got there? One of those new-spangled Kersplosion-Spectacular’s?”

“Yepperie!” Pinkie sent her cannon into a dizzying spin. I really had to wonder if something like that was safe. It didn’t look like it would be fun to get blasted by that thing. “Just bought it a couple of months ago. Isn’t it neat?”

“Hm, I don’t know.” Awesomom started to give Pinkie’s cannon a good look over. “You start playing around with those newer models, and you never know if they work right or will last long. I prefer something reliable myself.”

“But you don’t get super streamer options like with the brand super new cannons,” Pinkie countered.

My hoof was unable to resist meeting my face. “Please don’t start comparing sizes.”

The two of them started to get into what I guessed was a indepth discussion about party artillery--and like a lotta conversations with Pinkie, it all started to sound like blah, blah, blah to me after a certain point. It’s not like I didn’t try and pay attention, but sometimes you just have to tune out whatever she’s saying or go bonkers. She once held a entirely one-sided conversation for four hours.

AJ lifted her hat to scratch the top of her head as she watched Pinkie and Awesomom. “So ah guess Pinkie an’ your mom are really hittin’ it off then? Seems they have a lot in common. A whole hay of a lot if ya ask me.”

My ears shifted to face AJ. “What do you mean? I mean I guess they both do the party thing, but every town has a pony like that, right?”

Cool-Mom giggled. “Oh yes, the two of them seem to quite enjoy each other’s company. So good to see that your fillyfriend is getting along with her potential in-laws.”

In-laws? That word and its potential meaning starting along the racetrack in my mind, and after a few seconds crossed the finish line. My eyes widened. “Mom! Pinkie and I aren’t plannin’ on getting married!” Where is the world was she even getting that idea? I liked being with Pinkie and doing stuff together, but getting married? That was the furthest thing from my mind.

“Don’t you fret, darling.” Cool-Mom gave me one of those smiles that told me she knew more than she was letting on. That smile was rarely good for me. “I understand you two have only been dating for a couple of months now; there’s no need to rush things. But trust me, that’s love in her eyes when she looks at you. I’ve seen it more than once while making wedding dresses, and I’m quite familiar with the look.”

I tried to think of a response to what Cool-Mom was telling me. “B-but we aren’t thinking of anything like that. I mean I like her—but it’s not like that ... type of thing.”

“Aw, but y’all’re such a cute couple,” teased AJ.

I glowered at AJ with slanted eyes. “It’s not cute, it’s ... cool, like totally awesome. Yeah, me and Pinks are like totally radical together.” What we had together was cool. Don’t know where this marriage thing came from.

Cool-Mom continued to smirk at me. “I’m sure you two will figure it out sooner or later.” She nuzzled me again, and I saw AJ pucker in her lips to suppress a smile and laugh. I could already hear months’ worth of teasing coming my way. My glowering seemed to have no effect on her. Then Cool-Mom really dropped a lightning bolt on me. “It’s just your mom and I were hoping to have grandfoals someday.”

My head snapped over to look at Cool-Mom. “F-f-foals!? M-mom, I’m not ready for foals! They’re like ... a lot of work, and I was wanting to become a Wonderbolt and stuff.”

“Oh, don’t say that,” Cool-Mom said disapprovingly. “You’ll do just fine. We can help you when it comes time for that. And Pinkie can carry the foals if you’re worried being pregnant would disrupt your career plans. She seems like the type of pony who would love to have children.”

AJ gave me a jab in the shoulder. “Plus ah’m sure your little tikes will be cute as buttons.” Stupid AJ egging my mom on. She was enjoying this way too much.

“No doubt,” Cool-Mom said approvingly. “Now I’m not telling you to start trying now, but you don’t want to get too old before you start to have children. Also your mom and I would like to be young enough to enjoy being grandparents.”

Yeah, no pressure or anything. Jeez, I get a fillyfriend, and suddenly Cool-Mom was bringing up marriage and kids. Not cool, not cool at all. Can’t I just enjoy goofing around with my fillyfriend?

I let out an exasperated sigh. “Fine, I’ll think about it.” I took a whole half a second to think about it, and rejected it. I didn’t say I would think about it long.

Cool-Mom nodded at that. “That’s all I’m asking for, darling.”

“So would either of ya like ta buy anything while you’re here?” AJ waved towards her stand.

AJ trying to sell apples and apple based products came as a welcome interruption. “Sure,” I said. “How about some of those apple fritters and a couple apples?”

“Sure thing, RD.” After haggling over the price for a bit, AJ scooped up the apple fritters and apples and placed them in a couple of bags for us. “Here ya go.”

“Thanks.” I grasped the bags under my wings, and passed over one the bags holding the fritters to Cool-Mom. “Here, they’re pretty good.” That was true, hay, they tasted pretty fantastic when AJ made them. Hopefully they would also help to keep Cool-Mom from giving AJ any more teasing material.

I looked around, but I didn’t see either Awesomom or Pinkie anywhere. Both of them could kinda do that. Here one moment, gone the next. Shrugging, I dipped my mouth into my own bag and chomped down on the couple of the fritters. As I ate, I got brown sugar all over my snout. I forgot how messy the things could be.

Cool-Mom tisked and frowned at me. “Now you’re making a mess of yourself. Here, let me help you clean up.” She reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a handkerchief.

I move my head away from my mom as she tried to wipe at my snout. “Cool-Mom, you don’t need to—” My objections were cut short when she started rubbing around my mouth. AJ snickered and placed a hoof over her mouth as she watched us. Several other ponies were also looked at us with amused grins.

I groaned with annoyance. “I’m not a filly, I can clean myself off.”

Cool-Mom placed her handkerchief back into her bag. “Now don’t be like that. I just wanted to clean off the worst of that meal. I swear, when you were a foal you got more of your food on yourself then into your mouth.”

“Sounds like she was quite the messy eater.” AJ smirked while looking at me through the corner of her eyes.

“Oh, you wouldn’t believe it. Here, let me show you.” And so Cool-Mom pulled out her weapon of mass humiliation from her saddlebag, an old album that she placed on AJ’s stand. I felt a cold sweat start to form on my brow.

I placed a hoof on the album to keep it closed. “You know, we really don’t need to be looking at that old thing. I’m sure AJ would just be all bored looking at it.” I gave a chuckle that totally sounded one hundred percent confident.

AJ gave me a wicked grin. “Oh, Ah doubt Ah’ll be bored. Let’s have’a look at that thing.”

I placed a second hoof on the album. “Nah, its fine, we’ve already wasted way too much of your time. I’m sure you have apples to sell--lots of apples.”

“Now Dashie, I think she wants to see at least a couple pictures,” Mom said with a hint of annoyance. “Now be careful, you’re putting too much weight on the album.” She brushed my hooves off the album and opened it up. Oh this was not good.

Cool-Mom turned to one of the first pages and pointed to one of the pictures. It showed me as a foal sitting in an eating chair designed for foals. I was absolutely covered in what I guessed was mashed carrots and putting on a ridiculously happy smile.

AJ chuckled as she looked at the photo. “My, RD, weren’t ya a cute little thing once?” She started to scan more of the photos and chuckled some more.

“Alright, I think you’ve had enough now.” I tried to close the album but AJ firmly put her foreleg down to keep me from doing that. Stupid earth pony strength.

“Now don’t act hasty there.” AJ’s tone of voice dripped of her enjoyment. “Not everyday ah get ta see one of mah pal’s foal pictures.”

Cool-Mom smiled warmly as she looked down at the photos. “Yes, those days seemed to just fly by. One day you’re changing your foal’s diapers, the next you're sending her to school, then Flight Camp, and then you’re sending her off into the world.”

AJ looked up at Cool-Mom and adjusted her hat. “Yeah, ah think ah understand. My little sis, Apple Bloom, seems ta be growin’ up so fast sometimes.”

Cool-Mom smiled sadly at the album as she flipped to the next page. “Enjoy those days while you can, because once they’re gone, they’re gone.”

“Ah’ll keep that in mind ma’am.” AJ looked back down at the album. “So ... think ah could git a copy of all this? Ah’ll pay you fifty bits up front.”

Cool-Mom tapped her chin. “I suppose I can arrange for that. What were you wanting all this for?”

“Oh.” AJ turned to give me the most evil smile I had ever seen on her face. “Ah just thought it would be nice ta share some memories with RD. She was such a cute little filly.” Somehow that smile became even more wicked. “Don’t ya think?”

Oh hay no! I did not need AJ getting a lifetime supply of blackmail on me! I tried to keep my cool and think of something to get out of this. Somehow I didn’t think talking AJ or dragging my mom away by force would go well. Burning the album seemed like it would have been an option ... except it would have made my mom cry, so that was a no-go. She probably had the negatives anyways, so there wasn’t much of a point in the long term. I needed a way to get Cool-Mom away from AJ and fast. I was going to be lucky to keep any of my pride at this rate. I thought through my options for trying to run damage control. It would be best if I could keep my parents from meeting anypony else in Ponyville. Especially my friends, given how well having Cool-Mom was going for me right now. Well, unless one of my friends already knew my parents...

“Hey Cool-Mom, would you like to see Fluttershy again?” I pointed off in the direction of Fluttershy’s cottage. “She’s just a little bit out of town.”

Cool-Mom’s face brightened. “Oh yes, it has been forever since I last saw her. Let’s go see the dear.” She gave AJ a nod. “As long as you don’t mind.”

AJ waved off Cool-Mom’s worries. “Nah, go ahead. Like RD said, got apples to sell.” She tapped the party invitation she had gotten earlier. “Ah’ll probably see ya at the party later anyways.”

“Yes, see you then.” Cool-Mom scooped up the blackmail-worthy album and slipped it into her bag.

AJ nodded. “See ya two later.”

“Bye AJ,” I said without any enthusiasm. AJ just smiled at me, the jerk. I was never going to hear the end of this.

***

I was flying towards Fluttershy’s cottage while towing my parents’ carriage and Cool-Mom sitting within. Overall I was pretty happy to just get Cool-Mom out of Ponyville, though Awesomom was no doubt running amok in town with Pinkie, but nailing her down was going to be impossible anyways. No sense trying to fight a fight I couldn’t win. I hate losing—or not winning for that matter. Same thing really. Maybe she would just gravitate towards me eventually, and just enjoy spending time with Fluttershy instead of throwing some big party. I doubted I would be that lucky, but I could hope. I helped defeat two crazy gods with rainbows--anything was possible.

At least I might be able to keep Cool-Mom out of Ponyville for most of the day, and Fluttershy had already met my parents. Whatever damage that could be done had already been done, and besides which it was hard to imagine Fluttershy using what she knew about my parents to embarrass me.

Being tied to the carriage was a pain though. The extra weight of the carriage slowed me down, magical pegasus-friendly charms or no. I couldn’t pull off any sick moves either—it’s generally a bad idea to do stunts when tied to a carriage. I usually got off with nothing worse then some broken bones if I happened to crash, but that’s when I didn’t also have a big old hunk of wood to crash on me too. Besides which, Cool-Mom didn’t like going really fast, or having me do things like turn the carriage upside down in an aileron roll. She made that clear when I was trying to get my carriage licence and I nearly tossed her out of the carriage while trying to fly like I normally did. Telling my mom she was fine because she was wearing the seat belt didn’t do anything to keep me from being grounded at the time. I didn’t think Cool-Mom could ground me anymore, but I prefered not to risk it.

I landed near Fluttershy’s cottage and slowly brought the carriage to a slow stop. Or at least, I tried to. I may have had a licence to own and operate a carriage, but that didn’t mean I worked with one on a day-to-day basis. I just didn’t have much need for one most of the time,and the hoofful of times I did I just borrowed Fluttershy’s. As a result, I didn’t have a ton of experience steering a carriage, and I realized I made a mistake when I landed on the grass instead of on the dirt path. I tripped on something, probably a rock or dirt clump. I managed to keep from landing face first in the dirt, but the momentum of the carriage drove me forward. I lost my footing, and my right-forward knee skidded along the ground painfully for a few steps.

Ow.

“Dashie! Are you okay!?” Cool-Mom quickly unbuckled herself from her carriage seat and ran over to me.

I stood up unsteady. “Yeah, I think so.” I looked myself over to see if any damage had been done. I tried to flex my right-forward leg and then hissed in pain when it started to sting. My knee had been scrapped up. It didn’t look like anything real serious, but it was bleeding and it didn’t feel comfortable to mess with. “Looks like I just scraped up my knee, no big.”

Cool-Mom raised a hoof up to her mouth and gasped. “Oh Dashie darling, we need to get that taken care of right away!”

“It’s nothing to worry about,” I grumbled. Cool-Mom was always fussing whenever I hurt myself as a filly. I really didn’t want to tell her about my eye condition or the fact I was going to be getting surgery to fix it, because I knew she'd make a big deal about the the whole thing. But on the other side of the bit, it was a little too big to just hide from my parents. A broken bone and hospital stay here and there were one thing; eye surgery was another.

Cool-Mom frowned at my knee as she raised it up to get a better look. “But you’re bleeding, and look at that, you don’t even want to put your weight on it.” She started to pull me towards the cottage. “Come, let’s see if Fluttershy has a first aid kit.” I let her pull me along; not like we weren’t going to be visiting Fluttershy anyways.

She knocked on the door, and after a bit Fluttershy slowly opened her door. “Oh, hi Rainbow Dash, and...” Fluttershy took a moment to look between the two of us before I saw the spark of recognition in her eyes. “And Mrs. Rainbow Dash! I wasn’t expecting you today.”

Cool-Mom played with a her hair a bit to puff it back up. Flying probably didn’t do her fancy hairdos any favors. “Yes well—it would seem our letter got lost in the mail, and our dear daughter didn’t know we were coming.”

Fluttershy looked back and forth as though looking for something. “Oh dear, I would have prepared something if I knew you two were coming.”

“I understand. Think nothing of it darling.” Cool-Mom pointed at my injured knee. “But please, Dashie hurt herself landing just a minute ago. Can we come in and get the wound cleaned up and have a bandage put on it?”

Fluttershy looked down and saw my scraped knee and her eyes widened. “Rainbow Dash, you’re hurt! Come inside right now.”

Why were they making such a big deal out of my knee? They both know I’ve been through a hay of a lot worse. “It’s not a big deal, it’ll heal in—”

My objection was stopped when Fluttershy entered one of those rare super-assertive moments she sometimes had. My initial resistance was barreled over as she pushed me into her home. “Now you just sit down on my couch and rest. We’re going to take care of that nasty scrape.”

I didn’t so much sit on the couch as much as get pushed into it, gently. I groaned in frustration. “I said I’m fine. Don’t make such a big deal out of this.”

“Injuries are always serious, Dash.” She looked me in the eyes and gave a frown. “Please, I just want to make sure you’re alright.”

Cool-Mom fluffed up a pillow for me to lean against on the couch. “Yes, no sense letting that get infected.”

I leaned back into the couch and the pillow mom had set up and crossed my forelegs over my chest. “Fine.” I could tell I wasn’t going to get away without my little scrape getting taken care of. I knew that Fluttershy was going to fuss until she got her way. I’d tried to keep her from bandaging up some stupid scratch a couple of years ago, and I’d made her cry. Seeing her cry hurt more than any minor injury. And Cool-Mom was Mom—there was no arguing with Mom.

Cool-Mom turned to Fluttershy. “Is there a rag I could use to get wet and clean Dash with while you get some bandages?”

Fluttershy nodded towards her kitchen. “Oh yes, just under the sink in the kitchen. Feel free to use whatever you need.” Fluttershy trotted over to one of her closets and started to rummage around. Cool-Mom made her way to the kitchen, and I heard cabinets open and close from within. I tried not to bleed on Fluttershy’s couch; that would’ve been rude.

Cool-Mom came out of the kitchen holding a wet rag in her mouth. “‘Noew ‘fow me ‘er ‘eg,” she said through the rag. I rolled my eyes and extended my leg out to her. She started to dab and wipe at my injured knee carefully and deliberately. Once again, she was treating me like a little filly; at least this wasn’t happening where everypony could see us.

Fluttershy closed her closet door and walked over to us with a small metal container under her wing. She placed the metal box down on a low lying table by the couch. When she opened it, I saw bandages, bottles holding different types of medicines, and other things you would expect in a first aid kit.

She pulled out one of the bottles and a few cotton balls. She placed one of the cotton ball at the end of the bottle and overturned the bottle to get the ball with the liquid that sloshed around inside it. “Now let’s make sure that doesn’t get infected.”

Cool-Mom stepped back from me to give Fluttershy room to work. She gave the now slightly bloodied rag a shake. “‘Err ‘an ah ‘ut ‘his?”

Fluttershy had been carefully examining my knee when she blinked at Cool-Mom’s question. She turned her head to look at Cool-Mom. “Oh, just throw that thing out. I didn’t really need it anyways.” She turned back to me and started to move the cotton ball towards my knee. “Now hold still please.”

She dabbed the cotton ball on my knee and it started to sting from the disinfectant. I was a big mare. I totally barely flinched. Fluttershy didn’t have to hold my leg still or anything. Really. At least I hadn’t gotten hurt at Sweet Apple Acres. Granny Smith believed in the power of iodine.

Cool-Mom threw away the stained rag into a trash can in the kitchen. She craned her neck took a long look around Fluttershy’s living room. “My, I simply love what you have done with this place. Such a cozy and earthy feel to the place. You even managed to include little homes for your animal friends in a way to make the whole room seem organic.”

Fluttershy gave Cool-Mom an appreciative smile. “Thank you, I really like my home. It’s everything I wanted.”

“I’m happy to hear that.” Cool-Mom gave a comforting pat along Fluttershy’s shoulders. “You seem a lot more comfortable out in the country than you did in Cloudsdale.”

Fluttershy continued to hold my hoof in an iron grip. She didn’t really need to. It wasn’t like I was flinching ... much. “Yes, it’s a lot quieter than in Cloudsdale, and I get to make so many wonderful animal friends out here.” It was a little hard to miss all the birds chirping and flying around the ceiling of her home, and the small critters hopping around the floor and in and out the windows.

Cool-Mom stepped up to look at my knee again. It was like they were doing complicated surgery or something. “That sounds wonderful, darling. It’s good to hear you have carved out a niche for yourself.”

“So, how have you and Mrs. Surprise been doing lately? It’s been so long since we last saw each other.” Fluttershy pulled out a bandage roll out of her first aid kit and started to wrap it around my knee. I just groaned and looked away from Fluttershy.

Cool-Mom picked up a pair of scissors to cut off the end of the bandage. “We’re doing quite fabulously. Surprise’s party and joke shop is doing as well as always, and my fall lineup looks like it will be another smashing hit in Cloudsdale and Canterlot.”

“That’s good to hear.” Fluttershy finished her work by taping up the end of the bandage. “There, how does it feel now?”

I stretched my leg to make sure it could flex. “It’s fine.” That’s when I noticed that the bandage was covered in cutsie-looking bunny rabbit heads. “Fluttershy, what the hay?!”

Fluttershy started to frantically dart around to look at the bandage from different angles. “What’s the matter!? Is the bandage too tight? Is it too lose? Is the material uncomfortable? Does it still hurt?”

“It’s covered in bunnies,” I grumbled.

“Oh, is that a problem?” Fluttershy asked as though nothing were wrong. “I thought it looked cute.”

I pointed at the bandage again, and tried to find a way to get my point across without hurting her feelings. “Don’t you have anything cooler and not so ... cutesy? This is – I mean it’s not bad or anything, but it’s really not my kinda thing.”

Fluttershy flinched and backed a step away from me. “I’m sorry, I liked the bandages with the bunnies, and I ran out of the plain ones.”

I was about to complain some more when Cool-Mom cleared her throat and stepped next to Fluttershy. “Dash, that is quite enough. Your friend is just trying to help you out of the kindness of her heart.”

Fluttershy had lowered her head and was looking at the floor. “No—really, it’s alright Mrs. Rainbow Dash, I should have—”

Cool-Mom put a hoof to Fluttershy’s lips. “Not another word, you have nothing to apologize for, it’s my daughter who should be apologizing to you for her rudeness.” She looked at me with a scowl. “Don’t you think so?”

“But Mmooomm!” I protested. “Have you looked at this—”

“I said apologize, young lady,” Cool-Mom said without a hint of her usual laid-backness. Crap.

I flattened my ears against my head. One look at Fluttershy as her lips quivered told me that I had hurt her feelings. Years of being her friend told me that much. Given that fact and the stern gaze Mom was giving me, I knew I’d bucked up.I took a moment to breath. “Okay, Fluttershy, I’m sorry. I know you’re just trying your best, and the bandage is fine, really.” I had already messed up one apology big time this month, and I didn’t need a repeat. Fluttershy was one of my very best friends.

Fluttershy scraped a hoof along the floor. “I know you didn’t mean to hurt my feelings, Rainbow. It’s okay.”

Cool-Mom nodded and put on her usual light hearted cheer. “That’s better.” She smiled at Fluttershy. “Now enough of that, we have so much catching up to do.”

Fluttershy relaxed and returned her smile. “Yes, that sounds nice.”

“How about you do it at a party!” yelled Pinkie through one of the living room windows. “Because I have an invitation for Dashie’s parents welcome party with your name on it!”

Fluttershy and Cool-Mom jumped at Pinkie’s sudden appearance. I of course kept my cool, and in no way fought Fluttershy for a hiding spot behind my mom.

Fluttershy stepped out from behind Cool-Mom and let out a calming breath. “Nice to see you Pinkie. When were you planning on having the party?”

Pinkie rubbed her chin. “The stage should be set up by six if nothing goes wrong, so if Vinyl’s band can get set up by seven ... we should be good to go by then.”

“You mean bands!” yelled Awesomom from the opposite living room window. This caused everypony who wasn’t me to jump again. “I pulled in a favor with my friend Octavia to get some classic rock going on at this party!”

“Wait, two bands?” Whatever thinking thing Pinkie had between her ears went to work as she thought that over. “But if we have two bands at one party...” She started to rub her forehooves while in deep concentration. “Then that can only mean one thing...”

“A Band War!” Awesomom and Pinkie yelled at the top of their lungs. The rest of us couldn’t help but flatten our ears to the top of our heads to protect our eardrums. I swear, Pinkie was going to leave me deaf. Awesomom had already done enough damage to my hearing growing up.

What was worse, my earlier fear that Pinkie and Awesomom were going to be playing off one another seemed to be coming true. Already they had made plans for a stage and two bands. Who knew how out of control this was going to get by the time of the party? Not that there was much I could do but ride out the storm.

Pinkie pointed at Awesomom. “You just wait, this is going to be the best welcome party ever!”

Awesomom gave Pinkie a confident grin. “You sure about that party girl? I’ve ran quite a few welcome parties in my day. You’re going up against a veteran party animal here. A connoisseur of confetti. The bubble-master of balloons. The...” She stopped and crossed her forelegs on the window frame. “Hm, I really should have thought of where I was going with this.”

Pinkie waved her hoof. “Don’t worry about it. I forget what I’m talking about all the time. So what were we talking about again?”

Awesomom pointed her hoof at Pinkie with renewed confidence. “The point is that I’m awesome at parties!”

Pinkie slammed her hooves on the windowsill. “So am I, awesome-cool-ridiculously-radical-mom! You haven’t been to a party until you’ve tried my special party cupcakes and muffins!”

“Yeah, well let’s see how your decoration skills stand up to mine!” Awesomom pulled up a couple of bags filled with glitter and confetti. “Rainbow-sweetie, which do you like better? The Party Times Inc. mix, or the one done by All We Do Is Parties Co.?”

Cool-Mom walked up to give each of the bags a examinatory glance. “I would pick the one on the left, the color scheme works much better in my opinion.”

Pinkie stomped her hoof a few times more on the windowsill. “Hey, no fair asking for advice!”

“We were playing by rules to start with?”Awesomom asked.

Pinkie took a moment to consider that. “Hm, good point.” She launched herself through the window, rolled on the floor, and came up to her hooves in front of me. “Dashie, you absolutely gotta tell me which of these cupcakes tastes better! It’s super important!” She reached behind herself and showed me a cooking sheet with a pair of frosting-covered cupcakes on it.

One nice thing about dating Pinkie was that I got a lot of free treats out of the deal. One bad thing about thing about dating her was that I had to play taste tester to a lot of her treats. Most of her stuff turned out pretty good, but every once in awhile ... well, usually they just tasted bad. Usually. Of course, when something didn’t turn out so well I had to try and break it to Pinkie without hurting her feelings, which was always a pain. I also had to work to keep off the pounds from all those treats, which just adds more work to my schedule.

I tentatively picked up each cupcake and took a bite out of each. “They each taste fine, really good actually.”

Pinkie frowned at me. She pouted at me. “But which do you like more?”

Uh-oh, this looked like one of those times when Pinkie was fishing for a specific answer. “Um, they’re both good.” Which was true; I liked both of them, but I’m not kinda expert on baking.

Pinkie started stomping both of her front hooves up and down. “But which one do you like more? They can’t be equally as good, I used completely different recipes for them, and I want the best one for the party.”

Really, I couldn’t tell a difference between them. I didn’t know what Pinkie wanted out of me. “They’re both fine. You can use both.”

This didn’t seem to be the answer Pinkie wanted as her frown deepened. “Okie dokie loki.” Pinkie turned on Fluttershy and smiled at her as she pulled out another cooking sheet out of her mane and presented a couple more cupcakes to her. “Give them a try and tell me what you think considering Dash can’t seem to tell a difference between the two different batches of cupcakes I put so much work into.”

Fluttershy smiled as she examined the cupcakes. “Thanks Pinkie, I’d love to try them...” She picked each cupcake and tried them in turn. She licked the crumbs off her lips and took a moment to think. “I think I like the first one a little, it had a fluffier taste. They’re both really good, though.”

Pinkie smiled wider and nodded her head appreciably. “Thanks Fluttershy, you’re a pal.” She gave me a glance with slanted eyes. “Nice to know I can get a pony’s honest opinions about my cooking.”

Something about the way Pinkie was holding herself told me I might’ve just goofed up. She seemed to be making it a point not facing me all of a sudden. Maybe this was one of those fillyfriend things I just didn’t get yet. Or maybe it was a Pinkie thing? I could never tell the difference at times. Maybe I could just change the topic? That always worked with Pinkie.

“Hey Pinks, how many ponies are you planning on inviting to this party?” I asked.

Pinkie’s ears perked at that and she grinned at me. “Lots and lots of ponies!” Nuts, exactly what I didn’t want to hear. She sat down and started to rub her chin in deep concentration. “But have I invited enough ponies? This is supposed to be a super duper party for Dashie’s parents. But how many ponies is enough for something like this?”

“All the ponies?” Awesomom offered helpfully.

Pinkie gasped. “All the ponies! I’ll invite all the ponies! Of course, why didn’t I think of that?”

That did not sound good. “Uh, Pinkie, what do you mean by ‘all the ponies?’”

Pinkie hopped to her feet. “Exactly what it means silly-willy. I’m going to invite all the ponies!”

My brain was trying to wrap about what Pinkie was saying. It wasn’t very safe to try and figure out what Pinkie was thinking, I know, but there I was doing it. Sooner or later, it just happened no matter how hard you tried to not think about how crazy everything she did was.

I scratched the top of my head. “Err, you mean everypony in Ponyville?”

“No, all the ponies!” Pinkie said as though explaining something simple to a small child. “You need to do a better job of paying attention.”

“Wouldn’t all the ponies be a lot of ponies?” asked Fluttershy.

Pinkie nodded enthusiastically. “You’re right! I better start working on those invitations now!”

With that she ran to the window and leaped out of it. Sometimes Pinkie doesn’t believe in doors. I wasn’t big on them either, but when you lived in a cloud-house you didn’t even really need a door. Plus it was just a lot more convenient to just fly in through the window.

“I better get going too, lots of partying to plan.” Awesomom pointed at the stupidly cutesy bandage on my leg. “Nice bandage by the way.”

“Thanks, Mom.” I deadpanned.

Awesomom saluted us. “I’m off.” With that, she closed the window.

Cool-Mom let out a sigh and gave a loving smile. “I do so adore seeing Surprise in action. Such passion in that one. And I must say, your fillyfriend must have quite a bit of energy to keep up with her.”

“Yeah, I guess the only other pony I’ve seen with as much energy as Pinks is Awesomom.” Some ponies just seemed to have a ton of energy. Good thing I’m so awesome or I wouldn’t be able keep up with either of them.

“Indeed, they are both quite exhausting.” Cool-Mom let out an exhausted sigh and sat down on Fluttershy’s couch. “Especially after the trip from Cloudsdale. The flight always messed up my mane, and I always feel I need a trip to the spa.”

Fluttershy sat down in a chair opposite of Cool-Mom. “You could always go to the Ponyville Spa if you’d like. Aloe and Lotus are really good at what they do.”

Cool-Mom clapped her front hooves together. “A wonderful idea, darling. Why don’t we all go and enjoy ourselves?”

I rubbed my hoof through my mane a couple times. “Do we have to? Couldn’t we do something cooler together?” I didn’t exactly want to head back into town. Sure, Fluttershy and Cool-Mom making a big deal out of some scratch was embarrassing, but at least it was just in front of them and not in front of a crowd.

“Oh pish-posh.” Cool-Mom dismissed my complaint with a wave of her hoof. “There is nothing as luxurious as a couple hours spent at the spa. It will give Surprise and Pinkie time to set up their party, and we can go looking and feeling our best. You should come too Fluttershy—my treat.”

Fluttershy gave a slight shake of her head. “Thank you, but I’d hate to intrude—you and Rainbow must have a lot to catch up on.”

Cool-Mom hopped off the couch and walked over to stand next to Fluttershy. “It’s not a bother at all. It’s been so long since we spent any time together, and a friend of my daughter is a friend of the family. Besides, it will make for a wonderful time.” She wrapped a leg around Fluttershy’s shoulders and started to pull her along.

Fluttershy let herself be moved along by Cool-Mom. “If you insist, then I wouldn’t mind.”

Cool-Mom gave that smile she always had when she got her way. “Marvelous. Dashie, would you mind tying yourself to the carriage while we ride? I want to have a chat with your friend about a few things during the trip.”

I walked to the front of my parents’ carriage and I started tying myself to the harness. “Yeah, whatever.”

Cool-Mom and Fluttershy both hopped into the carriage. “So have I ever showed you Dashie’s foal pictures?”

Fluttershy considered the question for a moment before shaking her head. “I don’t think you have, no. I’m sure she was such a cute filly.”

Cool-Mom started to pull out one of those blackmail material albums. “Absolutely adorable. Though admittedly a bit of a hoofful--it took us forever to potty train her. Why, I had to stop going to my favorite boutique for months because Dashie mistook a dressing room for a lavatory—”

“Mooomm!” Oh. HAY. No. I knew I was in for embarrassing stories, but that was just—gah! I was burning brightly enough that I’m kinda surprised the chariot didn’t catch fire as I turned to look back at the two of them. Fluttershy covered her mouth with a hoof and was suppressing a snort. All I could do was sit down and hide as much of my face as I could under my hooves.

My moms hadn’t even been in town for a whole day yet and I was at risk of dying from embarrassment. And it sounded like they were gonna be here awhile. I’m so doomed.

Author's Note

I would like to give a big thanks out to Chengar Qordath and Comma-Kazie for all their help in making this story possible.

I would also like to give a big thanks to my prereaders Infinion, droplet739, fizzlefist, notMurphy, Garbo802, mrjerrio, q97randomguy, Pav Fiera, roflkneif, Vhett, and Swiftest Shadow.

Panic, Parties, and Pinkies

The Incredibly Embarrassing Parents of Rainbow Dash

Chapter 3: Panic, Parties, and Pinkies

The world had gone crazy. I didn’t understand, everything had been fine this morning. I had my job that was cool enough, my awesome friends, a radical fillyfriend, and my parents were nicely all the way back in Cloudsdale. But then... I don’t know what happened. My parents visited and then everything went horribly wrong.

I was the coolest, most radical, and awesomest pony in Equestria. How’d I come to date a pony who was exactly like one of my moms!? This wasn’t happening. I would’ve said it was a nightmare, but even my nightmares couldn't have come up with something as terrible as this. How did I not see it earlier? Pinkie and Awesomom... They were almost the same pony. How was that even possible?

I blasted over Ponyville, screaming at the top of my lungs. I wanted to go ... somewhere, anywhere, just someplace that made sense. A place where I wasn’t dating one of my moms. Maybe if I flew fast enough I could smash my way into a universe that made sense and wasn’t filled with mom-dating madness? I wondered if I could actually do that. Could I be so awesome that I could just smash through the walls between dimensions?

Then it dawned on me, about by the time I had flown high enough to feel the chill and it was starting to become hard to breathe. Of course, Twilight! She was the pony to talk to! She was an egghead and she had lots of magic. That was like the perfect one-two combo for fixing my problems. Eggheads and magic were good at making things better. Maybe good enough to fix whatever the hay was wrong with my life.

I flew towards the library as fast I could, dodging all the other pegasi on the way down with my awesome flying. There was no sensation that could replace the feeling of the wind whipping through my mane, my muscles burning from intense effort, or the exhilarating thrill that came with going at top speed. The problem was that I was going pretty fast, considering I was flying almost straight down towards the earth, a little too fast. The ground and I weren’t on speaking terms half the time. I blame the ground, it kept hurting me. It’s not my fault I kept crashing into it, the blame for that fell on gravity’s shoulders.

My issues with gravity and the sudden stops that're associated with it aside, I really was approaching the library way too fast. Not that I didn’t want to get to Twilight as fast as possible—I was a busy pony trying to make sense out of a mad world—but breaking bones wasn’t exactly fun. Plus, Nurse Redheart had put me on a strict “no crashing” regimen due to my eye issues. Really, she never liked to hear about me slamming into things at high speed, go figure, but she was going to chew my ear out if I hurt myself now of all times.

On reflection I should’ve just turned, circled around, and took more time to land at the library instead of taking the direct line, point to point approach. But I had my reasons for not thinking thing through as well as I should’ve—I was dating my mom! You try thinking straight if you find out something as uncool as that.

To my credit and flying skills, I did fly through an open window instead of crashing against the side of the library like I had a couple of times. Unfortunately, I did collide with one of the bookshelves and I bounced off painfully. The shock of my hit caused most of the books to fall off the shelves. The books and I tumbled to the floor and landed among the ponies in the library.

“Rainbow Dash!” I heard Twilight say in a scolding voice. “What in the world do you think you’re doing?” She and the other ponies stood up from the literary avalanche and started to grumble.

Once the world stopped spinning quite so fast—it had been doing that ever since I put the Pinks-Awesomom puzzle together—I jumped to my hooves and grabbed Twilight to start shaking her. I saw no reasons to dance around what had brought me to the library, so I did what I always did and jumped right in. “Twi! I’m dating one of my moms! Make me unthink things! Help me! Help me now!” I might’ve been yelling just a tiny bit. Can you blame me?

I kept trying to shake answers out of her when she didn’t immediately answer. I guess that didn’t work, because she didn’t say anything I could understand between the vigorous shakes. She slapped my hooves away and glared at me. “Upstairs! Now!” The other ponies in the library were looking at the two of us now and were muttering as they pulled themselves from the piles of books.

I couldn’t wait that long. That would have taken a ground-pounder like Twilight at least a whole minute to get up the stairs. “But I need eggheady-magicky answers five minutes ago! This is an emerg—” I was cut off when a zipper suddenly zipped shut over my mouth. I was then surrounded by Twilight’s magenta magical aura and I was lifted into the air.

“We’re going upstairs,” she said with finality. “Spike! Watch the library, I’ve got something important to deal with.” With that she walked up the stairs to the second story of the library. Once we got to the private section of the library she dumped me onto the floor.

I tried to talk through the zipper, but it did a pretty good job of muffling what I tried to tell her. Stupid unicorn magic. It was supposed to be solving my problems, not make things harder.

Twilight put her hoof on my mouth. I guessed she really wanted me to shut up. She leaned in towards me and spoke in an annoyed whisper. “Okay, considering you’re probably going to blather whatever comes to your head first, we’re going to try a different method. I’m going to ask a series of questions to help make sense of whatever you were screaming about downstairs. I just want you to nod or shake your head to say yes or no. Do you understand?” I nodded my head. I thought this was silly and I couldn’t help but look at Twilight with narrowed eyes. But there wasn’t much I could do if she wasn’t even going to let me talk. “Here we go then. Are you still dating Pinkie?”

I nodded my head.

Twilight took a slow breath. “Okay, are you dating anypony else besides Pinkie?”

I fixed Twilight with a scowl of my own and shook my head. What, did she think I would fool around Pinkie’s back?

Twilight closed her eyes and started to rub the side of her head. “Did Pinkie somehow go back in time to become your mom and is your fillyfriend in the present as part of some sort of convoluted time loop?”

I shook my head. At least I didn’t think that is what happened. Well ... there were those pretty convincing disguises Pinkie was wearing earlier. No, no, that was crazy talk. Right?

Twilight rubbed her chin. “Has Pinkie Pie somehow been cloned, resulting in one of the clones giving birth to you and another becoming your fillyfriend?”

What? That couldn’t happen, could it? What mad science pony or mage would come up with the stupid idea of cloning Pinkie? I don’t think Equestria could handle more than one Pinkie. Maybe Twilight was being weird again. I shook my head.

She gave me a level stare as she continued to rub her chin. “Is Pinkie in any way mocking the laws of gods and ponies—anymore than usual, I mean?”

I shook my head as I growled at her with annoyance through the zipper.

Twilight let out a frustrated breath. “Okay, so it sounds like Pinkie isn’t threatening to destroy all of reality today, so it sounds like we are dealing with something more mundane.” She looked me in the eyes intensely. “I’m going to remove the zipper, but—but—I don’t want the first thing out of your mouth to be a series of incoherent ramblings. If you start screaming your head off I’m putting the zipper back on. And—” she pointed a hoof at me, “—no grabbing me. That isn’t polite behavior.”

I rolled my eyes and nodded.

Twilight gave me a pleased smile and her horn glowed. “Good.” I reached up to my mouth and found the zipper to be gone. “Now let’s try this again, calmly and rationally.”

I reached out to grab Twilight, but I managed to stop myself short of her. Her glare might have helped me with that. I swallowed as I tried to force down the terror and madness that was threatening to overwhelm me. “Twilight, I need your help. I’m dating a pony exactly like one of my moms.”

She raised one of her eyebrows at that. “Exactly the same how? Remember, you said they weren’t clones.”

“They’re just...” I rubbed my hooves together as I tried to think of a way to explain how weird and wrong everything was. “The both of them are super similar. They both snort the same way when they stop laughing, the fact they both like to put hot sauce on cupcakes, the bone-crushing hugs...”

Twilight rubbed the side of her head. “That doesn’t sound so bad. You sure you aren’t getting worked up over nothing?”

You’re one to talk about not getting worked up over nothing, Twilight. “No! You don’t understand. Pinkie and Awesomom are almost exactly the same in ... everything!”

She cocked her head to the side. “Wait, Awesomom?”

I let out a frustrated growl. This wasn’t important! Why couldn’t Twilight just tell me how to fix all this? “Yeah, that’s what I call one of my moms.”

“Ah, you have two of those.” Twilight nodded in a sage manner. “Magic of Love or adoption, if you don’t mind me asking?”

I facehoofed. How many times did I have to explain this to ponies? “Magic of Love. You know, when two mares love each other very much and then the magicky stuff knocks one of them up and...”

“I know how the Magic of Love works,” she cut me off. “I wrote an essay on it during sex ed.”

I resisted the urge to grab Twilight again. I needed to do something. I was a doer, not a ‘sit around and talk’ pony. “Twilight, we need to focus. Point is they’re almost exactly alike, and I need help.” My mind desperately tried to think of explanations of how things could have gone so wrong. I tried to think what an egghead would come up with. That kinda hurt my brain, but I did think of something. “You didn’t mess up a spell that threw me into an alternate dimension where this type of thing could happen, did you? Some kind of zone of Twilight?”

Twilight looked at me as though I had grown two heads. “What? No. I haven’t done anything with space and time for a couple weeks now. Not since I somehow created a stable time loop ruining an attempt to warn myself not to worry, but instead only causing myself to worry myself sick for a week. But that doesn’t make sense considering what caused me to start worry and go back in time to warn myself not to worry, was what caused me to start worrying in the first place. So—”

I clapped my hooves in front of Twilight’s face to snap her out of it. She was getting that far off look she sometimes got when she started doing some sort of egghead rambling that made my head hurt. Twilight was cool and all, but it could be annoying when she went off into egghead land. Population: Twilight Sparkle. “Hey, can we focus here?”

Twilight blink and shook her head slightly. “Oh, sorry. It’s just that I somehow caused a time paradox and I’ve been trying to figure out how it happened to start with. Would you like to see my chart and notes? It really is quite fascinating stuff.”

“No,” I said firmly. I stomped my forehooves on the floor out of frustration. “Look, can you help me with my problem or not? I really need you right now.”

She rolled her eyes and let out a frustrated breath. “Right, back to your issue. But really, how similar could they be?”

“Hiya, Twilight!” Awesomom said as she popped out from where Twilight blocked my line of sight. I’m not quite sure how she got there considering I had been looking right at Twilight almost this entire conversation. Her poofy mane alone should have made it impossible for her to hide there, but it was my understanding that Awesomom had a messy divorce with making sense a long time ago. “Nice to meet you. Want a pre-party dessert before the party starts?” Awesomom pulled out a tray filled with cookies and muffins from my blind spot behind Twilight’s back.

“Yeah, sure Pinkie, sounds good,” said Twilight in a droning tone she usually used when she wasn’t really listening to what Pinkie was saying. Everypony needed a defense against Pinkie’s ramblings, and this was Twilight’s. It probably said something that Twilight had become so numb to Pinkie suddenly appearing that she didn’t even bother looking back at my mom. I decided to cross my forelegs over my chest and let what was going to happen happen.

Twilight put up a hoof without looking at Awesomom, and my mom placed a cookie onto her offered hoof. “Here you go,” Awesomom said happily. “So many ponies arrived early for the party, and who knew there were so many ponies in Equestria? So Pinkie and I thought it would be best to give out some treats to all these ponies so that they don’t get grumpy.” She leaned in to whisper in Twilight’s ear, but more than loud enough for me to hear. “Don’t tell her, because I don’t want to hurt her feelings, but Pinkie forgot to account for time zones on the invitation lists and it’s confused a lot of ponies. It’s a rookie mistake, so tell everypony not to hold it against her.”

Twilight took a bite out of her cookie before she blinked a few times. Her chewing slowed and she slowly turned her head to look Awesomom right in her grinning face. She couldn’t have been more than a step away from Twilight. “Ah!” Twilight let out a surprised scream and teleported behind me. “Who are you and what are you doing in my home!?”

Awesomom giggled and snorted. “This is a library, silly. Anypony is allowed to come into a library.”

“But not my bedroom!” Twilight objected, one of her ears twitching.

I let out a little bit of a snicker. It was kinda funny to see Twilight be surprised like that. I decided to jump in before this got out of hoof. I pointed a hoof at mom. “Twilight, this is my Awesomom, Surprise. Awesomom, this is my friend, Twilight.”

Awesomom hopped over and grasped Twilight in a big hug. Twilight grimaced in Awesomom’s vice grip and managed to put on a strained smile. “I always wanted to meet Dashie’s friends here in Ponyville! But we never seemed to get out here for some reason. Whenever Rainie and I said we were coming to Ponyville, Dashie always said that she was already planning on visiting us, or that there was a big storm or tornado over Ponyville, or that she needed to save the world.” She tapped her chin as she looked up at the ceiling. “It’s almost like she didn’t want us to come to Ponyville... But that would be silly—of course Dashie would want us to see her friends and show us around town.”

Okay, that one kinda hurt on reflection. It’s not like I didn’t want them coming to Ponyville and meeting everypony I knew. It’s just ... I didn’t want them to embarrass me to the point that I would be afraid to stick my head out of my front door.

Twilight gave me a level look. “It’s a mystery, I’m sure.” Darn it, Twilight. Don’t you turn up the guilt on me too.

“But we’re here now! And boy has it been a great day!” Awesomom let go of Twilight, and Twilight staggered from the sudden release of pressure and toppled to the floor. “We’re going to have a massive party, it’s going to be so fun, and Rainie and I are going to meet everypony!” She offered the tray of cookies to Twilight again. I’m not sure where or when she put the tray down to hug Twilight or picked it up again. Maybe Awesomom was really good at hoof tricks and I just never noticed because she was just that awesome at them? “Want another cookie?”

Twilight stood up from the floor and picked a cookie up with her telekinesis. “Sure, why not?” Her eyes widened when she took a bite. “Mmm, these are pretty good.”

Awesomom gave a quick nod. “That’s what I like to see, a smile on a pony’s face. You’re plannin’ on coming to the party, right?”

Twilight finished swallowing her cookie before speaking. “I think Pinkie would come in here and drag me out of the library if I didn’t.”

Pinkie Pie opened one of the windows to the library and poked her head in. “Righty-dighty I would. I’m not letting one of my bestest friends ever miss out on my biggest, bestest party ever that I’m throwing for my fillyfriend’s parents.”

Twilight glowered at my fillyfriend. “Pinkie, remember that talk we had about how you are supposed to come in through my front door when you want to come into the library?”

Pinkie tapped her chin and then shook her head. “Not really.”

“Right, par for the course.” Twilight facehoofed. “I don’t know why I bother sometimes.”

Pinkie lept through the window to land right next to Twilight. “Ooh, don’t feel bad.” She patted Twilight on the head. Twilight gave her a look that made it pretty clear she was quickly reaching her daily quota for Pinkieness. “We all know you try hard.” Pinkie suddenly swiveled in place to face Awesomom. She actually frowned at my mom. “And what do you think you’re doing?”

Awesomom tilted her cookie tray for Pinkie to see. “Hoofing out treats to make everypony happy.”

“No you’re not!” Pinkie threw her forehooves up in the air. “You’re talking to Twilight. That’s not like passing out cookies! That’s not like passing out cookies at all!”

“I gave Twilight a couple of cookies.” Awesomom gave Pinkie a strained smile.

“But then you stopped giving out cookies,” pouted Pinkie. “And now you also met Twilight ahead of schedule! I wanted me and Dashie to introduce you both to everypony at the party, but now that’s ruined! Everything was carefully choreographed for the party and now everything is already starting to come apart.” Pinkie eyes had widened and she started trotting in place. “What if the cakes aren’t ready in time? The food, not Mr. and Mrs. Cake and the foals. That’s always a bit confusing when I have the Cake’s making the cakes for a party." She put hoof under her chin while she looked up. "Though come to think of it, they need to be ready too! What if the Cakes need me to help with Pumpkin and Pound and I'm too busy planning the party? I'm supposed to be their go-to foalsitter! What if they can’t come to the party because they don’t have anypony to watch the twins because I’m running the very same party!”

“Um, Pinkie—” I tried to interject. Big surprise, Pinkie could get herself worked up sometimes.

Pinkie gasped. “And what if Tight Line’s ankle really isn’t healed enough for the trapeze act, or some ancient evil gets released again and becomes a party pooper who refuses to smile and makes everypony all sad?!” She pulled a paper bag out of her mane and started to breath heavily into it.

Awesomom started rubbing Pinkie’s back. “Hey, don’t worry. Everything will be fine. You’re doing a super-duper job.” She motioned with her head for me to come over. Oh yeah, I guess comforting your fillyfriend is one of those things you’re supposed to do when dating.

I wrapped a wing around Pinkie. “Hey, don’t worry. We can always just wing it.”

Pinkie perked up and grinned. “Oh right, silly me, that’s what I always do anyways!” She tossed the paper bag to the side. “Enough of all this saddy-waddy stuff. I’ve got a party to finish preparing for.” She stood up and gave me a peck on the cheek. “Thanks for being the bestest ever fillyfriend, Dashie.”

“Um, you’re welcome?” I wasn’t sure what else to say. I’m not good at the touchy-feely thing.

“Okie dokie lokie, I’m going to keep working at the party.” With that she ran back towards the window she had come in and lept out of it. Most earth ponies I would be worried about leaping out of windows, but this was Pinkie Pie.

“And I’ve got more cookies to give everypony.” Awesomom tossed the cookie tray into the air and it landed perfectly onto her back, cookies intact. Maybe that’s where I got some of my athleticism from? She gave me a kiss to the forehead before walking away. That kiss went running right past embarrassing to creepy now that I had discovered that Awesomom and Pinkie were so similar. It just wasn’t right anymore.

After Awesomom went back down the stairs, I turned back towards Twilight. “See that right there?” I pointed a hoof after my mom. “Did you see how similar those two are? They’re all but the same pony. Do you have any idea how wrong this is?”

“Now calm down, Dash.” Twilight sat down on a cushion by the desk that was in the room. “Let’s think this one through.”

I slammed my forehooves on the table. “What is there to think about? I’m dating my mom!”

Twilight put her forehooves up in motion to tell me to calm down. “Okay, so they are similar. Remarkably so, but this isn’t the end of the world.”

I paced back and forth and I fought the urge to go flying off. I need to make Twilight understand and fix all of this. “How can it not be? This is so ... weird and wrong. I can’t look at either of them without seeing the other one. It almost made my skin crawl when the two of them kissed me a minute ago”

Twilight rolled her eyes. “You probably just have an oedipony complex.”

I blinked at her for a moment. “First, I’ve no idea what that is, and second, I’m pretty sure you made that word up.”

Twilight let out an annoyed huff. “It’s a real word, I assure you.” She used her telekinesis to pull a book off a shelf and levitated it in front of me and opened it. I looked where she jabbed her hoof and saw that oedipony was really a word. I guess I shouldn’t have tried to call an egghead out on whether a word was real or not. “An oedipony complex simply means that you use one of your parents as a template for desirable traits in a partner. The term originates from an old grecopony play where a pony killed his father and married his mother.”

Leave it to Twilight to say that many words without making much sense. I moved my hooved in a circling motion with one another. “Could you de-egghead that for me?”

She stared levely at me for a good, long second. “You want a fillyfriend who is like one of your parents.”

My jaw dropped at that. “Wait, you’re saying I want to date my mom!?”

Twilight put a hoof up to stop me from ranting on. “That’s not what I’m saying. What I’m trying to tell you is that you probably see some positive features in your mom that Pinkie also has.”

I set myself down opposite of Twilight and cross my forelegs in front of my chest. “It’s more than a few, Twilight. You saw them. It doesn’t help that I have the same name as Cool-Mom, and—” I stopped when a terrible thought struck me in the head. “Oh no! We have both the same name and look almost exactlyalike. I’m my mom dating my mom! How does this keep getting worse!?” I found myself shivering on the floor. This was way too much for anypony to handle, even somepony as awesome as me.

Twilight walked over to me and started waving her hoof in front of my face. “Dash, are you okay there? Look, you aren’t really dating your mom. Pinkie and your mother are two completely different ponies. You were just surprised by how similar they are. Lots of ponies are fairly similar to others.”

I did not whimper on the floor. If Twilight says otherwise she’s lying.

Twilight sat down next to me and sighed. “Look, I don’t know what else to tell you. But I can assure you there is nothing wrong with either you, Pinkie, or your parents.”

I looked up at Twilight. “Can’t you just magic all this away or something?”

She shook her head. “Speaking as a pony who has studied magic for most of her life, magic doesn’t solve everything. Not everything can be made better by looking up a spell in a book and casting it. And like I said, there isn’t anything wrong with you. You’re as you as you’ve always been.”

I pushed myself up into a sitting position. “You really think so? There isn’t anything weird or unnatural about me?”

Twilight gave me a big smile. “I know so. As wary as I am to suggest asking Pinkie for advice, why don’t you go talk to her? I’m sure once you take a little bit of time to think about it, you’ll realize there isn’t anything to worry about.”

I flapped my wings to lift off into the air. “Yeah, I think I might do that. Thanks, Twilight.”

“Not a problem,” she said, giving me a nod of her head. “And one final thing.”

“Yeah?” I asked. I had started to move towards the window, but I turned around to face Twilight again.

Twilight pointed at me. “Why are you wearing a dress?”

I looked down at myself and facehoofed. I was still wearing the very, verypink dress Rarity and Cool-Mom had made me put on. In all the madness I had completely forgotten I had it on. Rarity probably wasn’t going to be happy that I had probably kinda-sorta stolen her dress ... and broken down her front door, now that I thought about it. I guessed my bit purse was going to be a little lighter this month. “It’s a long story. Look, I need to go.” I gave her a salute and flew out through the open window.

“And what did I tell you about using my windows as a door!?” I heard Twilight yell after me. I smirked. If ponies didn’t want pegasi flying through their windows, then they shouldn’t build them big enough for a pony to go through.

***

I flew towards the giant curtain Pinkie and Awesomom had set up to hide whatever super-party they were cooking up. I figured that would be the best place to find Pinkie. At least I guessed so, considering Pinkie must have been spending some time getting the party ready between all the times she had been popping in on me. It wasn’t as easy as it normally would have been, given I had to keep slowing down to maneuver around groups of pegasi to get around. I couldn’t think of any other time it was this hard to fly around Ponyville. Even Cloudsdale only got this bad around stadiums during sporting events.

I slowed as I approached the curtain wall. I didn’t want to get caught up in the curtain, or worse, crash into something I couldn’t see on the other side. Crashing once into the library had been enough, and hopefully I wouldn’t get an earful from Nurse Redheart over it. Plus I didn’t want to make my bad eye any worse than it already was. Not when I had that surgery coming up.

Despite being a couple of stories off the ground, Pinkie popped her head out of the curtain right as I nearly reached it ... but given I couldn’t see on the other end of the curtain, this was far from the least possible thing I had seen from her today. She gave me quite the unwelcoming glower and jabbed a hoof towards a pony sized sign hanging from the curtain a few paces away from her. It read: “Party at 6pm, Please Wait Patiently. Yes, even you Dashie.” I could see similar signs hanging here and there on the periphery of my vision. It looked like Pinkie didn’t want anypony to see what she was up to until she was ready.

I rubbed my face as I hovered in front of her. “No, I’m not trying to sneak in, Pinkie. Honest. I just need to talk with you.”

Pinkie’s demeanor immediately went from a fierce glower back to her usual cheerful smile. “Oh, okay.” She looked back behind the curtain for a moment before looking back at me again. “Can it wait, or be real quick? I still have a ton of things to do to get this party ready. Like, a literal ton. Or several.”

“Watch it with the crane!” I heard Awesomom yell from behind the curtain. There was a loud crash and Pinkie winced.

Pinkie looked behind the curtain and her face came back with a grimace on it. “We’re having a bit of a crisis here.”

I didn’t particularly like taking Pinkie away from her party stuff, but this was super important. I looked behind me and at least a couple dozen ponies were looking our way. I was sure plenty of them were close enough to eavesdrop on us. “Listen, can we go someplace private? It’s kinda important.”

“Oooh, I see.” She gave me a conspiratorial wink. “‘Private.’”

“Yeah, as in just you and me.” I pointed back behind me at the ponies taking interesting our conversation. “Without everypony watching.” I would really prefer not talk about my platy-pony issues out in the open.

Pinkie covered her mouth with a hoof as she let out a delighted giggle. “I’ve got just the place. Just close your eyes and I’ll take you there.”

I hesitated and hovered in place. This sounded a bit fishy. It was hard to think Pinkie doing anything malicious (thank you Daring Doo for that nifty word), but you never really knew what she was up to sometimes. “Where exactly are you planning on taking me?”

Pinkie giggled in a conspiratorial manner. “You’ll see,” she said in a sing-song tone. “You trust me don’t ya?”

Crap, she pulled the “trust” word out. I’m not relationship expert, but even I was pretty sure that was a big one with a fillyfriend. I felt my resolve slowly eroding as Pinkie looked at me with expectation. I didn’t really want to upset her by telling her no. “Um, alright then. I trust you, Pinks.”

I closed my eyes and Pinkie grabbed onto my shoulders. She did that giggle that made me uncomfortable again. “You eyes are closed, right?”

“Yeah, they’re closed. Trust kinda comes with the Element of Loyalty th—” I was cut off when I felt ... I don’t know. How do you describe feeling like you are suffering vertigo and being turned inside out at the same time? Though it might have just been another symptom of the world spinning I’d been suffering from since I learned I had a what-you-call-it complex.

“You can open your eyes now,” Pinkie said seductively.

Fighting the urge to empty the contents of my stomach, I opened my eyes. Looking around, I saw a plush room dominated by a large, heart shaped bed at its center. Red and pink pillows lay all over the floor, and black curtains with red lining circled the room. Pinkie was lying on the bed with a rose in her mouth and was giving me one of those looks. I think this might’ve been one of those times Pinks and I had a bit of a miscommunication.

“Sooo, what’s the deal with all this?” I kicked one of the pillows over.

“An emergency make-out room,” Pinkie said in a tone that told me that she was pleased with herself. “Mr. and Mrs. Cake said they didn’t want us doing extreme cuddling where the twins could hear. Which I thought was kinda weird considering they’re always talking about needing their personal space and ‘us time,’ but I’m pretty sure they’re just having sex.”

“Ya don’t say?” I said with more than a little sarcasm in my voice. Luckily, either my sarcasm went over Pinkie’s head, or she just never cared enough to be bothered by it. Even Twilight’s level of sarcasm rarely affected her.

Pinkie nodded her head enthusiastically. “Yepper-depper-roonie. So I set up this room just for the two of us.”

I wasn’t sure I liked where this conversation was going. I liked Pinkie and all, but this was something else. “So this is all for...”

Pinkie hopped up and started jumping on the bed. “Banging, doing the horizontal and the vertical, kissing the muffin, playing patty-cake, shagging, going for a happy ending, enjoying an eclai—oh wait, that one doesn’t work for us, does it? No wait! We can use an actual eclair!” Pinkie’s brow furrowed as she tapped her chin. “We should probably make sure that one doesn’t end up back in the shop after we’re done.”

I found myself rubbed the back of my neck. “Uh, yeah, that.” This whole subject of banging made me uncomfortable. Especially when it started involving things I normally ate. “So you were wanting to do ... that?”

She stopped her bouncing on the bed and gave me a concerned frown. “Is something wrong? I thought you wanted to...”

“Bwah?” I took a couple steps back away from the bed. “I don’t remember saying anything like that!”

“But I thought the reason you wanted to meet in private was to be with me?” Pinkie sat down on the bed and looked downcast as she looked down at the floor. “I figured you were just having that problem where you have trouble saying what you really mean again.”

“What? No, I don’t want to bang you.” My ears fell flat on my head. I immediately regretted how that came out.

“Oh.” Pinkie looked down at the bed and started scraping her hoof along it. “I was hoping I was finally going to get the gold under the rainbow.”

“No—it’s not that, it’s just...” I let out a frustrated groan. “I’m just bad with words sometimes.”

Pinkie let out a long, remorseful sigh. “I know, and ponies keep telling me I should do a better job listening.”

“You’re fine, I lo-love you for who you are.” Dangit, I messed up again on the L-word. I’ve said it to her before! I walked over and sat next to Pinkie on the bed. I just sat there staring at the floor for awhile before I could bring myself to talk again. “Listen, I said that all wrong. I didn’t mean I never wanted to have ... to do that with you.” I took a moment to think about what I was trying to say. “I guess what I meant was that I didn’t really want to do it now. I’m just not comfortable with doing things down there because of ... you know, what happened at Flight Camp.”

Pinkie leaned against me and wrapped a leg around my shoulders. It felt nice, having her right there. “I understand. You’re just having some trouble, that’s all.”

I swallowed as it felt like something was catching in my throat. “I’m just so tired of hurting you and everypony else for something stupid I did. You all deserve better than that.”

She slowly leaned in her head to rest against the side of mine. “We talked about this. You need to let it go if you want to get better.”

I leaned against Pinkie so that we supported each others weight. “I know, it’s just so hard.” I started rubbed at my face with a hoof. Old, stupid memories started coming back. “I got really messed up at Flight Camp, but that wasn’t the worst of it. I’m tough, I can deal with pain. What really hurts is what I did to Cloud Kicker, Fluttershy ... my parents, everypony. And now you.”

Pinkie kept rubbing around my shoulder and hugged me closer.

“When I was at the hospital, that was the worst.” My eyes started to sting making it hard to see. “When my parents came in to see me, all hooked up to those machines keeping me alive ... I don’t like thinking about it. You’ve seen them, they’re normally so happy, supportive, and stuff, even if they drive me up the wall sometimes.” My chest seized up when I thought about what happened. “I don’t think I’d ever seen Awesomom cry, not like that. She was just wailing and crying and begging the doctors and nurses to make her little filly better. Cool-Mom ended up having to drag her away even though she wasn’t in much better shape.”

My eyes and cheeks were wet and I rubbed at them to get the moisture out. “And I did it to them. It wasn’t like it was an accident. I did it to myself, to them. All because I rushed ahead and did something stupid without thinking.” I closed my eyes and covered my face with my hooves. I didn’t want to see how Pinkie must have been looking at me. “Then I saw them after they heard the news about what I had done. I saw it in how they looked at me, and they knew that I knew. Could you imagine what they must have thought? About their innocent filly beating another filly halfway to death and nearly killing herself in the process? First they had to worry about me surviving, and then me possibly going to jail... I made my moms cry, Pinkie.” I couldn’t go on, it hurt too much. I just sobbed while Pinkie held me.

“Shh, it’s okay.” Pinkie rocked me comfortingly. “It’s all in the past now. It’s all turning out alright, and your parents still love you. Anypony can see that.”

I sniffed as I leaned my head against Pinkie’s shoulder. “I know, it took a long time to get that through my thick skull, but I never wanted to hurt them to start with. They deserve better than that.”

Pinkie gave me a shake. “Now don’t you say something dumb like how they deserve a daughter better than you, because I’m going to tell you right now that they love you and wouldn’t have anypony else as their little filly.”

I slowly wrapped my forelegs around Pinkie for comfort. “Thanks. That means a lot to hear it. Um, Pinkie?”

“Yeah?” Pinkie asked.

I nuzzled against Pinkie’s shoulder. “Can I just have a bit more time before we ... do stuff? Like that? It’s just that everything’s been happening all at once, and I think I just need a little more time to get my head on straight. I want to make you happy instead of messing this up.”

Pinkie rested her head against mine. “That’s fine, I understand. I don’t wanna rush you.”

I smiled while we sat there next to each other. “Thanks, you’re the best.” Perhaps I could talk to Cloud Kicker about the whole banging thing? I’m sure she would just love that. But I think a little bit of awkwardness would be worth it to make Pinkie happy.

Pinkie gave me one of her goofy smiles. “No, you’re the best.” She started to tickle me in the ribs, and I reflexively jerked away.

“Well, yeah. I just thought I’d be modest for once.” I flapped my wings to get some air and distance away from Pinkie and her tickling. I had a feeling I was going to have to deal with random tickling assaults from now on thanks to Awesomom letting the secret of how ticklish I was out. I felt my ears lower as I remembered what had brought me to Pinkie to start with. “So, um, Pinkie, can I talk to you about something?”

Her eyebrows rose inquisitively. “Sure you can, you know you can talk to me about anything.”

I rubbed my forehooves as I tried to bring myself to talk. “So have you noticed that you and Awesomom are ... kinda similar?”

Pinkie rolled her eyes and smiled. “Well duh. Why do you think we get along so well?”

I stiffened at that response and landed on the floor. “And you don’t think the whole thing with Awesomom is all weird and stuff?”

Pinkie gave me an amused snort. “We’re still two different ponies, Dashie. I mean sure, there’re lots of things similar between us, but there are plenty of things that set us apart. For starters, she likes to put pineapple on her cupcakes, and I’m like, ‘eww, that’s gross.’ And don’t even get me started on how different our philosophies are on birthday parties. She says my parties are way too immature for adults, but I keep telling her everypony loves the games I set up for them.”

“Hey, I like your games,” I said encouragingly. That was true enough. Even if they could be kinda silly and foalish at times. But I’d rather be able to let loose and have some fun rather than be all uptight. Not that there was anything wrong with Awesomom’s parties either. I can like both.

Pinkie nodded appreciatively. “Thanks, that means a lot to hear that from you.” She leaned in whisper conspiratorially into my ear. “And don’t tell her I said this, because I do like her, but she can be a bit overbearing at times. She’s been all, ‘Pinkie, you need to bake the cookies at three hundred and twenty-five degrees, not three hundred and fifty.’ And, ‘Pinkie, you need to color coordinate your table decorations and streamers.’ And I’m all like, ‘yeah-yeah, Awesomom, I hear ya.’ And she’s all like, ‘honey, if you want to call me that you need to put a fancy piece of jewelry on my daughter.’” She let out a short, frustrated scream. “That pony can drive me crazy sometimes, and I’ve only known her for most of a day.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Yeah, Awesomom can be like that at times. Part of the reason I moved out here to Ponyville was so that I could get some space. You know how hard it is to do some crazy stunt training when your mom will pop out of nowhere to lecture you about not doing anything dangerous? I know she just doesn’t want me to get hurt, but I’m never going to get into the Wonderbolts if I let her smother me and keep me from practicing as hard as I can.” Plus I didn't like the idea of Awesomom or Cool-Mom having to see me in a hospital again. At least out here in Ponyville I can keep hospital visits for the minor stuff like sprains and broken bones from becoming big dramas. “I think she understands why I do what I do, both of them really. But I wanted some space to be my own mare.”

“I think they understand.” Pinkie nuzzled me on the cheek. “They let you move out to Ponyville, didn’t they?”

I smiled when I thought about my parents helping me get a cloud-home and everything else I would need when I packed up to move out. There had been a lot of crying—by my parents, that is. “Yeah, I know it hurt them a bit to not have me home all the time like when I was a filly, but they supported my decision in the end when I explained all my reasons for wanting to move out to Ponyville. They’re kinda cool like that.”

“I really like them.” Pinkie bounced happily in place a couple of times. “We should have a party to—oh, right, already working on that. Sorry, this party really has me all frazzled out.”

“It’s fine, Pinkie.” I scrapped my hoof on the ground. “So you really don’t think this it’s super weird how much you’re like Awesomom?”

Pinkie giggled and poked me in the ribs. “Don’t be a silly-willy. I already told you’re two different ponies. Besides, you’re parents are cool, right?”

I ran my hoof through the back of my mane. “Yeah, I guess they’re cool enough. For parents that is.”

“And you think I’m cool, riiight?” she asked, batting her eyes at me.

“Well, yeah, of course.” I thumped myself with confidence in the chest. “I couldn’t have just anypony as my fillyfriend, right?”

She bumped my flank with her own. “So if we’re all cool, then what’s the problem?”

That made sense in its own way. Which was kinda scary considering Pinkie and making sense normally didn’t go with one another. Maybe she was starting to rub off on me? “Yeah, if everything is cool, then there isn’t a problem.”

Pinkie ruffled my mane with a hoof. “Righty-o, now are you done being all saddy-waddy and silly-willy?”

I ran a hoof through my mane to put it back in place. “Yeah, s’cool. Talking with you always seems to help.”

She gave me one of her patented silly grins. “What can I say? I’m good at putting a smile on a pony’s face.”

“You can say that again,” I said, giving her a playful push.

“I’m good at putting a smile on a pony’s face,” she parroted herself. I facehoofed. “Oh come on, you know you walked right into that one.”

I sighed and slowly lowered my hoof from my face. “Yeah, I guess I did.”

Pinkie gave me a friendly nuzzle to the cheek. “Loving the dress, by the way.” She rubbed her chin as she gave me an appraising look. “Though Rarity was a bit mad that you kinda stole her dress ... and broke her door down. She was yelling a lot of very unladylike words when you left.”

Looking down at the dress, I was kinda already starting to run it ragged. Which Rarity was not going to like when she saw it again. I reapplied my facehoof, I seemed to do that a lot around Pinkie. “Yeah, I think Rarity’s going to kill me.”

Author's Note

I would like to give a big thanks to my always faithful helpers, Chengar Qordath and Comma-Kazie.

I would also like to thank my prereader staff Infinion, droplet739, fizzlefist, notMurphy, Garbo802, mrjerrio, q97randomguy, Pav Fiera, roflkneif, Vhett, and Swiftest Shadow for all the great work the do.

In Which Rainbow Dash Doesn’t Fight a Hydra (Or I Hope I Never Have to Type Cool or Awesome Ever Again)

The Incredibly Embarrassing Parents of Rainbow Dash

Chapter 4: In Which Rainbow Dash Doesn’t Fight a Hydra (Or I Hope I Never Have to Type Cool or Awesome Ever Again)

Pinkie escorted me out of her weird banging room thing the same way she brought me there—with more questions than answers. She ran off to keep preparing for her crazy party, leaving me alone to figure out what I wanted to do next. That left me flying around Ponyville trying to find my parents, or really, anypony I knew. Both of those things sounded a lot easier than they were, as the town was more crowded than I had ever seen it. I really had no idea how I was supposed to find my parents in this mess.

Just as bad, I was in a very pink, very frilly, very frou-frou dress that everypony could see me in. I considered just dumping the monstrosity somewhere, but then I would have to explain to Rarity, Cool-Mom, and Pinkie what I had done with it. I could give them a story about how I had wrestled a hydra to save Ponyville and the dress had been tragically destroyed in the process, but I’m a terrible liar. Though looking at how much I was tearing up the dress with my awesome flying, it wouldn’t be much longer before everypony would buy that I had wrestled something big and nasty.

After flying around a bit and failing to find my parents in the streets, I decided that the best place to go was Carousel Boutique, considering that was the last place I’d seen them. I was on my way there when I heard somepony yelling my way. “Hey, Rainbow Dash!”

I looked around until I spotted a familiar grey mare with a smaller grey filly on her back. Both of them were waving at me. “Hi, Derpy, Dinky!” I called out, flying over the two of them. I could put off giving the dress back to Rarity for a little bit. Not that I was worried about Rarity yelling at me, but I wasn’t exactly looking forward to it. Talking to the Doos was always fun anyways.

“So, what are you up to?” Derpy motioned up and down along my body to point out my dress. “You know, with that geddup?” She gave me a pretty evil smirk. I could tell she was getting ready to launch a salvo of teases my way.

“Oooh, pritty!” Dinky gave me that look of childish, wide-eyed amazement. “I rilly like your dress!”

Aaand there's one of the few ponies whose opinion mattered. I mean, really, really mattered. Not that anypony's really didn't, 'cuz I'm me, but ... well, Dinky is a pretty cool, adorable little kiddo in her own right. She’s one of those ponies who can dress me up in tail-bows and a sunhat and still make me look cool. The fact that she's also my goddaughter has nothing to do with that.

Totally. Honest. For serious.

“Err,” I rubbed the back of my neck. “It’s for the party ... Pinkie likes it.”

Derpy cocked an eyebrow at me. “Being a bit hard on it, don’t ya think?” She reached down to the skirt of the dress to show me where I had managed to create a good-sized tear. “When did you get this?”

“Earlier today,” I said defensively. “I’m just breaking it in.”

Derpy scoffed. “I’ll admit you’ve done a good job at that.”

“I think you look pritty in it!” Dinky reached out to stroke the fabric.

I found myself softening a bit. “Yeah, but I would prefer the word ‘awesome.’”

“You can be pritty and awesome at the same time,” Dinky offered happily. It was hard to argue with her child-like logic. Her smile could melt a glacier. “Though you should take better care of your things. Mommy gets all mad if I start playing in the mud when I wear a dress.”

I crossed my forelegs over my chest. “Well, Rarity should have made it a bit tougher if she didn’t want me to mess it all up. She knows I’m always flying around and doing sick stunts.”

Derpy gave me a playful poke to the chest. “In a dress?”

Okay, so maybe my logic for this wasn’t holding up. Like I said, I’m a bad liar. “Whatever.” I waved a hoof to dismiss the subject. I really wasn’t going to hear the end of this dress as long I was wearing it. I decided just to change topics to something that wasn’t going to give everypony ribbing material for the next few years. “So, what’re you two up to?”

Dinky lifted up a rainbow-colored wig and placed it on her head. Had to say, she did look pretty cute and awesome in it. “We’re goin’ to the Rainbow Dash Fanclub meeting!”

Ah, yes, my fanclub. It was pretty cool to have a group of ponies admire how radical I was. I always liked the looks on their faces when I did a bunch of sick tricks for them. Being naturally awesome was one thing, but being awesome with an audience was way cooler. I puffed out my chest. “Oh yeah? What’re you all going to be meeting about this time?”

“Scootaloo called for an emergency meeting.” Dinky straightened her wig. It took a bit of work, considering she had put it on backwards first. “She said your parents were in town, an' they were gonna come over an' tell us how cool you are!”

I couldn’t help but wince at that news. “Oh, did she?” It could only be a complete disaster if my parents told my fans every embarrassing story they could, and my parents would. Dear Celestia, they would. I’d be lucky if my own fans didn’t start calling themselves the ‘Let’s Laugh At Rainbow Dash Fanclub.’

Dinky smiled and nodded enthusiastically. “Yah-huh! I’m really lookin’ forward to meeting your parents! Mommy says they’re great ponies.”

Before I could think how to reply to that, Derpy hovered closer to me. “Hey, Dash. Would you mind taking Dinky to the meeting and staying with her? I want to find Sparkler in this big old mess—” Derpy pointed down at the mass of ponies that now clogged Ponyville’s streets “—before it gets even crazier. It looks like Pinkie has really outdone herself this time.”

I chewed that one over. On one hoof, I wasn’t wild about the idea of taking Dinky to a meeting where my parents were no doubt going to do everything in their power to destroy my reputation. I could probably offer to just take her to someplace for ice cream or something, though that would be a hard pitch. On the other, Derpy was giving me a smile that was one part hope that I would help her and one part expectation I would do the whole godmom thing.

Derpy had met my parents about seven years ago, a little before Dinky was born, but Dinky hadn’t met my parents. That did sound kinda lame to me as I thought about it, especially when I looked into Dinks’ big, round eyes as she smiled at me expectantly. I decided to bite the bullet and go with the option that would at least let me to do some damage control. Hopefully this wouldn’t ruin my rep with my goddaughter.

I gave Derpy and Dinky what I hoped was a confident smile. “Sure, I can take over with the kiddo.” I reached out and carefully picked Dinky up, placing her on my back. “All aboard the Awesome-Train.”

Dinky wrapped her hooves around my neck. “Yay! Let’s go rilly fast, okay? I like to see the ground zoom by.”

Derpy gave me a firm stare and slight shake of her head that promised doom by way of maiming, killing, burning, and destroying if I went as fast as I could with Dinky riding. I winked at her and then craned my neck to smirk at Dinky. “This is me we’re talking ‘bout—you know we’re going to get there in record time.”

Dinky gave me a big, happy grin. “Because you’re cool, an’ awesome, an’ radical, an’ everything, right!”

“You know it.” I gave her a noogie, making her giggle and reach up to keep her wig from falling off.

“Just be careful, you two.” Derpy gave me a stern look. “Keep an eye on her, okay?”

I waved off Derpy’s worries. “Don’t worry, I got this covered. Go ahead and find Sparky before Pinks gets her crazy party started.” I tried not to think too hard about what Pinkie might be planning with her party for my parents. Especially with Awesomom driving her on like she had been. One reputation-destroying crisis at a time.

Derpy put on one of her patented bubbly smiles. “Okay then! You two have fun.”

I saluted and flew off towards the Cutie Mark Crusaders’ tree house and to whatever doom awaited me there.

***

I flew as quickly as I felt was safe with a passenger on my back—which by most ponies’ standards is really quick, though it was pretty casual by mine. Such are the sacrifices of being an awesome godmom. At least Dinky enjoyed the trip as we sped along and I did the occasional (safe) trick to make the journey more fun. My aerial stunts might have given Derpy a heart attack, but I knew what I was doing.

We quickly reached the Cutie Mark Crusaders’ headquarters and, much as I feared would be happening, I heard laughter inside.

Dinky pointed at the tree house. “Hurry up, we’re gonna be late.”

“Hey, you always show up just in time when you’re flying with me.” I hoped that really was the case here. My parents did have the ability to go from zero to humiliating in ten seconds flat. If I didn’t know better, I would say it’s their special talent.

I landed at the entrance of the treehouse. Looking inside, I saw that Scootaloo had dragged out all the ‘me’ posters, plushies, and other stuff she usually had out for the Rainbow Dash Fanclub meetings. I had to admit that it was kinda impressive how much ‘me’ stuff she had managed to collect. The dozen or so fans of mine wearing rainbow colored wigs were testaments to that.

“Rainbow Dash!” I heard the familiar voice of my number one fan yell when I stepped inside the treehouse. Scootaloo pushed her way through her fellow club members and stopped in front of me. “You came to the meeting!”

I stood up straighter and gave a confident smirk. “You know I’ll always make some time for my fans.”

“Well yeah,” she said as though that were the most obvious thing in the world. I saw her look me over. “Um, not that it isn’t cool when you do it, but why’re you wearing—” she pointed at the tattered dress I was wearing, “—that?”

I felt some of the confidence in my stance slowly deflate. Great, no way Scootaloo was going to be able to unsee me in the frilliest thing Rarity could imagine. I sighed. “Don’t worry about it. I’m just ... holding onto it for Rarity until I see her next.”

“Oookay then,” Scootaloo said, her frown seemed to say that she wasn’t exactly convinced by my excuse. “Then why don’t you have it in a bag instead of wearing it?”

Naturally telling her it was because I had a whatever-Twilight-called-it-complex and had panicked when I found out would be totally uncool, so I couldn’t tell my number one fan that. “For reasons,” my sharp wit came up with.

“Uh-huh.” Scootaloo stared at me for a few, long moments before shaking her head and went back to smiling. “Anyways, I wasn’t sure you were coming because I couldn’t find you in time to tell you about the emergency meeting.”

Cool-Mom managed to work her way through the small crowd to me and Scootaloo. “Yes, I’m afraid I managed to confuse this poor darling.” She gave Scootaloo a friendly pat on the head. “She nearly went into a panic when she saw that I didn’t have wings. Another case of mistaken identity, I’m sorry to say.”

“I wasn’t panicking,” Scootaloo protested. “It’s just you really look like Rainbow Dash. You know, minus the wings ... and you’re a lot older.”

Cool-Mom coughed, and her smile grew strained. “Darling, this is something you will understand better when you get older, but it’s not polite to comment about a lady’s age.”

Scootaloo rolled her eyes. “Yeah, whatever. But that’s not what’s important.” She looked at me and beamed excitedly. “I just found out your parents are in town, that’s so cool. One of your moms looks just like you, and your other mom was giving everypony a bunch of cookies and stuff, and now she’s doing all sorts of awesome magic tricks for us.”

I looked up over the other ponies in the treehouse to see Awesomom doing what I guessed was her stage magician routine, given she was pulling a bit out from behind one of my fans—a lanky colt named Snails, I think. She knew a bunch of sleight-of-hoof tricks in addition to using some of her novelty items from her shop back in Cloudsdale. She was always happy to show off a few tricks to make everypony happy, especially kids. With a few balloon animals and a couple coin tricks, she could have a whole room of children wrapped around her hoof.

I internally breathed a sigh of relief as I watched Awesomom tying up a few balloons together to create a draconequus. It looked like everypony was laughing at Awesomom’s antics rather than at me—thus far. I might just be able to make it out of this meeting of my fans without being utterly humiliated.

“Yeah, Awesomom’s pretty good at that type of thing,” I told Scootaloo.

I felt Dinky stand up on my back. I guessed that my passenger was getting a bit impatient to meet my parents. “I got somepony I’d like you to meet, Cool-Mom.”

Dinky put her forelegs on my head to stand up even higher. “Hi, my name’s Dinky Doo! Rainbow Dash is my godmom! Um...” She scrunched up her face in concentration. “I guess that makes you my godgrandmom? Yay, I have more grandparents!”

Cool-Mom walked up to Dinky and gave her a warm nuzzle to the face. “D’aw, aren’t you the most adorable little thing?”

Dinky giggled as Cool-Mom nuzzled her. “Can I get a hug?”

Cool-Mom chuckled. “I don’t see why n—” She was cut off when Dinky leaped off my back and hit the ground with an admittedly cool roll (that I probably taught her at some point), then nuzzled Cool-Mom as she wrapped her forelegs around her neck. My mom staggered a bit from the extra weight that had latched onto her but regained her balance. “Well, aren’t you an enthusiastic little hugger?”

I gave Dinky a light noogie. “She’s pretty hugariffic.”

Cool-Mom sat down so that she could properly hug Dinky back. “You know, your mom and I always have wanted at least one grandfoal.” She gave me a rather pointed look.

“Um, yeah.” I avoided direct eye contact with her. I get a fillyfriend and suddenly talk of having a foal comes up. That on top of my talk with Pinkie earlier about banging. Ugh, this was getting way too complicated way too fast.

Cool-Mom affectionately ran her hoof through Dinky’s mane. “Yes, she’s just like how you were as a little filly. You were always walking around enthusiastically giving other ponies hugs.”

I flinched when she mentioned how I may or may not have been a bit like Dinky at her age. “Gah, Cool-Mom!”

Cool-Mom closed her eyes and seemed to concentrate on enjoying the hug from her grand goddaughter. “Oh hush, you always were a passionate pony. Nothing wrong with hugging somepony you care about. Isn’t that right, Dinky?”

“Yah-huh.” Dinky nuzzled Cool-Mom’s neck. “I’ve rilly, rilly, rilly wanted to meet you.”

“And I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.” Cool-Mom craned her head Awesomom’s way. “Surprise, come over here and see your godgranddaughter.”

Awesomom leaped over the other ponies to land next to Dinky and Cool-Mom. “Dinky, is that you? Come here and hug your godgrandmother-thingy.” She pulled Dinky and squeezed Dinky with enough force to make her squeal.

“I need to breathe,” Dinky wheezed. I guessed Awesomom was too much of a hugger even for Dinky. That was a first.

Awesomom relaxed some of the pressure of her hug. “Oops. Sorry.” She chuckled apologetically. “I was just so happy to finally see you! You weren’t even born when we last saw you—you were just a big bump in your mommy’s belly.” She tickled Dinky’s stomach, and my goddaughter let out a high-pitched squeal of delight.

Dinky covered her belly from Awesomom’s tickling assault. “So if Rainbow calls you Awesomom an’ Cool-Mom, can I call you two GrandAwesomom an’ GrandCool-Mom?”

Cool-Mom let out a short, snorted laugh. “I don’t see why not.”

“Only if we get to spoil you like a grandchild.” Awesomom blew a raspberry into Dinky’s stomach, making her laugh even more.

Dinky curled up to try and keep Awesomom from tickling her quite so easily. She looked up at Awesomom and smiled widely. “Does that mean I can get presents from you too?” And there’s Dinky trying to use her cuteness and adorability to extort more presents out of ponies.

Awesomom shook with a big old belly laugh at Dinky’s extortion. “Is that the angle you’re playing?” She leaned in to place her face only a couple of inches from Dinky’s and gave her a stern look. “You know, someday, you’re going to get older, and you’re not going to be able to use that cuteness of yours to get everything you want anymore.” Her sternness disappeared when she smiled a wicked grin. “But that’s not today!” She tossed Dinky into air and caught her when she fell back down.

Dinky laughed and hugged Awesomom. “So that means I will be gettin’ presents?”

A light-hearted chuckled escaped Cool-Mom’s lips. “I don’t see why we can’t find something for you and Sparkler for your birthdays and Hearths Warming Eve.”

Dinky spun around to give Cool-Mom another hug. “Yay! I love you both.” Dinks once again proved that she was a manipulative little ball of huggable cuteness. Celestia and Luna help us all if Dinky ever learned how to use her adorableness for evil. That might very well put Discord and Nightmare Moon to shame with the mischief she could get into.

Cool-Mom lovingly nuzzled Dinky’s face. “We love you too. As I already said, Surprise and I already wanted a grandfoal to cherish.”

I saw Awesomom leaned in to my side to whisper into my ear. “In case your mom’s subtlety isn’t getting through to you, she’s saying she wants you and Pinkie to do the business and make us a grandfoal.”

“Gah! Awesomom!” I jerked away from her.

Awesomom’s mouth curved into a huge smile. “Or you could adopt; we aren’t picky. As long as we get to spoil the kid rotten. That’s all we care about.”

A irritated growl worked its way into my voice. “Could you at least leave that type of thing for when we’re in private?”

“Well yes, I was hoping you two would do that type of thing in private.” Awesomom gave a serious nod. “Don’t want to get arrested by the Guard for public indecency.” I wondered if Awesomom and I even talked on the same wavelengths sometimes.

I was trying to think how to respond when Scootaloo stepped up. “So, Rainbow Dash,” she said, with all the grace and subtlety a child trying to work her way into an adult conversation could bring to bear. Which is to say, none at all. “Isn’t it cool that I managed to get your parents to come to a meeting?” Her strained smile made it pretty obvious that she was trying to get my approval once again. It wouldn’t be the first time she tried that.

I smiled while gritting my teeth. “Yeah, ‘cool,’ that’s the word.” I didn’t want to put down Scoots when she didn’t realize the potential disaster to my reputation she had set up. No way she could’ve known I had the most embarrassing parents ever. “Good job finding my folks.”

Scootaloo hopped in place, her wings buzzing furiously. “Yeah, I can’t wait for them to get around telling everypony the awesome stories they have of when you were a filly. They said they had a bunch of great stories and even a couple photo albums to show everypony.”

Gulp.

“D’aw, isn’t that adorable?” Cool-Mom said, passing Dinky the Huggable back to Awesomom. “I can tell already she’s grown quite attached to you. She just couldn’t stop talking about how great you were the entire way here. She’s almost like a little sister to you.” That comment caused Scootaloo to smile up at me.

Yes, Cool-Mom. Make my relationship with Scootaloo more awkward, why don’t you? Even I could tell that comment lit up a fire behind the squirt’s eyes. It’s not like I didn’t like the kid or anything, I did kinda like Scoots, but I don’t know. Kids aren’t really my thing.

I ruffled Scoot’s wig in a—dare I say it—sisterly manner. “Yeah, Scootaloo is my number one fan after all.” What else could I say? I didn’t want to put down Scootaloo or come across as a big jerk to my parents. I was being boxed into a weird place between ponies thinking I should treat Scootaloo more like a sister and my parents’ oncoming humiliations.

“It would be so cool to be your little sister,” Scootaloo said. “Then we could do all sorts of cool things together.” I could just hear the gears turning in her head.

“Yeah, maybe we can look into doing something together later,” I said before I really thought it through. I wasn’t really sure what else to say.

Cool-Mom ran a hoof through the wig to straighten it. “I really do adore these darling wigs. You never mentioned them in your letters to us.”

Scootaloo proudly patting at her wig. “Rarity was totally cool about helping us get a bunch of them.”

Dinky let go of Awesomom to walk over and join the conversation. “Yeah, they make us look just like Rainbow Dash. And that makes us cool, right?”

I could only say one thing to all the bright and cheerful faces looking at me. “Yeah, you all look way cool wearing those.”

“But not quite as cool as my full-body Rainbow Dash suit.” Awesomom reached back behind her neck and pulled down on a zipper, revealing a costume that looked so much like me that I got creeped out looking at it. She was even wearing an exact copy of the dress I was wearing, wear and tear and all. I felt my jaw drop and all I could do was stare at the not-me facing me. I think she had finally done it; she had finally broken my brain. It had taken a lifetime of work on her part, but she had finally done my brainmatter in.

Dinky looked back and forth between me and Cool-Mom. “Oooh, you look just like her.”

Awesomom puffed out her chest and stood confidently. “Oh yeah, don’t I look super cool, awesome, and radical?” she asked in a pretty convincing copy of my voice. My voice didn’t sound that raspy, did it?

Scootaloo ran around Awesomom to look at the suit. “That’s ... so ... awesome! Can I get one?”

“Oh, oooh!” Dinky started energetically jumping up and down. “Can I get one too!”

“Wait, what, huh?” my mouth stumbled out. My brain hadn’t exactly sorted out the clone I was looking at. Okay, I didn’t like where this was going as I watched one pony after another say they wanted one of the creepy suits also. The idea of a bunch of ponies walking around in one of Awesomom’s me-suits was just waytoo creepy.

“Hm.” Awesomom rubbed her chin as she considered. “I guess I could make more to sell. Though it might be a bit hard to make look convincing if you have that—” she gave a gentle prod to Dinky’s horn, “—poking out your forehead.”

Dinky looked dejected for a moment as she frowned before she grinned again. “Oh, can I just have a alicorn Rainbow Dash suit instead! That would be really cool, right?”

“What? You can’t just do that, the original is way cooler,” Scootaloo objected. “You can’t improve on perfection.”

Dinky stomped one of her hooves. Admittedly, she was cute even when she was trying to be angry. Though it did make it kinda hard to take her being mad seriously. “Nuh-uh, new alicorn Dash would be cooler.”

“I think an earth pony Rainbow Dash would be pretty radical,” I heard a third me from behind me. I span around and saw another pony who looked just like me, worn in dress and all, though minus the wings. I jumped in surprise. But only a little bit, I’m too cool to be surprised too much.

“Pinkie, is that you?” I asked, a little bit more of a growl in my voice then I’d intended.

Pinkie smiled hopped up and down. It was really odd to see myself so ... perky. “Yepper-deppers, how did you know?”

I rolled my eyes. “Because you’re you. You’re pretty much the first pony I would guess would do something like this. Maybe after her.” I pointed at Awesomom.

Pinkie rubbed her chin and did a thoughtful hum. “Yeah, I guess I am pretty crazy, aren’t I?”

I sighed. “That’s putting it mildly. So would you mind taking that geddup off? It’s kinda weirding me out.”

“I’ll get around to it,” Pinkie said dismissively. “The zipper makes this one a little hard to get out of.”

Scootaloo poked at one of Awesomom’s legs experimentally. “Where’re you even getting these?”

“Around,” Pinkie answered with what wasn’t a real answer at all.

“Still think the pegasus version is the best,” Scootaloo said bitterly.

“I think they’re all great,” Awesomom interjected before Dinky and Scootaloo could get into it with one another. I was far from convinced about the suits. The rainbow wigs were pretty cool, but what Awesomom and Pinkie were wearing was just taking it too far.

Cool-Mom nodded. “Quite, but how about we discuss something else?” I guessed that she wanted to keep the kids from fighting too. “Oh, I know! How about we look at some of Dash’s old fillyhood photos?” She pulled out a photo album and placed it on a table in the center of the room.

“Nah, we don’t need to do that.” I ran a hoof through my mane to play it cool. “How about we watch me do some awesome tricks outside instead?” Just about anything would’ve been better than having everypony look at what was in that album.

Scootaloo looked back and forth between the old photo album and me with indecisiveness. “I don’t know. No offense, but we can watch you fly all the time. But this might be a one-time opportunity, and as the club president, it’s my responsibility to offer a variety of programming to my fellow club members.” The other members of the fanclub murmured agreements with her.

“And I wanted to see some photos of when you were a filly, like me,” Dinky pouted. She frowned and looked up at me with sad, pleading eyes. My resolve quickly evaporate to Dinky’s weapon-grade adorableness. I was worried I was becoming soft.

“Come on, Dash.” Cool-Mom opened up the photo album for everypony to see what was inside. “What’s the harm in showing your fans some of your own photos?” I could think of plenty of harm, but I couldn’t think of a way to get out of it without coming across like a complete jerk to everypony.

“Fine,” I grumbled.

Everypony started to crowd around Cool-Mom and the photo album. Dinky pointed at one of the photographs. “Why’s Rainbow’s head stuck in the clouds here?” Looking at the photo, I could see about half my body was stuck in the clouds, my rear legs sticking into the air. I had a pretty good idea when that one had been shot, and I found myself mentally wincing.

“Oh dear.” Cool-Mom did a light hearted chuckle. “I’m afraid that’s from my little Dashie’s first attempt to fly. We had just come from the doctor’s, and she had confirmed that Dash’s wings had developed enough to fly. Which of course, my daughter being the little daredevil she is, she attempted right away. So when Surprise and I weren't looking, she somehow managed to climb onto the roof of our home and jumped off. As you can see here, she didn’t quite get it the first time. Next thing my wife and I knew, we heard our daughter crying for us outside, so we ran out and found her in this predicament. Luckily, given this was Cloudsdale, she just landed on clouds and hadn’t really hurt herself.”

Awesomom wrapped a leg around my shoulders to pull me closer. “Yep, so Rainie took a picture while I went and got my elbow grease to pull her out. Somepony learned not to try flying without her mommy, didn’t she?”

I looked down. “I almost got it the first time. It’s just the wind that threw me off.” The fact I plummeted straight down didn’t have anything to do with my own flying.

Dinky giggled, and she wasn’t the only one. “You look funny.” And so my pride took another serious wound. I was curious if it would just die all at once or from a thousand cuts.

Scootaloo stepped in to defend my pride. “I’m sure Dash picked up flying really super quick.” She looked up to me hopefully. “Right?”

My mouth curved up in an assured grin I didn’t really feel. “You know it, squirt. I was flying like I owned the skies in no time flat.”

Awesomom nodded firmly. “Yep, just like how the ground owned her. Dashie got the whole take off and flying thing down pretty quick. But her landings on the other hoof...” She shook her head and made a series of clicking noises with her tongue.

“I didn’t crash that much,” I said defensively. I noticed that everypony was looking at me. “I didn’t.”

Cool-Mom snickered. “I assume that isn’t why we had to get you all those band-aids to fix you up after you had been playing outside? I don’t think a week passed when we didn’t have to put an icebag on you where you had crashed into something. You were fortunate that Cloudsdale is so crash-friendly for intrepid fillies such as yourself.”

“I wasn’t that bad,” I said. “I only crashed now and then.”

“You kinda were,” Awesomom whispered loudly enough that I’m pretty sure everypony heard.

“And kinda still are,” Pinkie added unhelpfully. “Twilight was wondering if she was going to need to add padding to the library given how often you crash into it.”

I rolled my eyes at that. “She was probably just being sarcastic again. You know how she can be sometimes.” I only crashed into the library now and again, and it usually wasn’t my fault. Applejack had catapulted me into the library that one time. Yeah, so not my fault. I was about to talk about how I needed to push my limits if I was ever going to get into the Wonderbolts when I heard more laughing by the album.

Dinky slowly flipped through the pages, her eyes wide and in rapt attention. “Look at all the pritty dresses!” I craned my head to check out what Dinky was looking at. It was as much as I feared. I saw photos of myself when I was a filly wearing all sorts of dresses and other outfits.

Cool-Mom ran her hoof over one of the pages of the album. “Oh yes, those are our photos of when I had Dash try on some of my children’s clothing line. I must say, she was so photogenic. I did so love to have her trying on my latest designs.”

I sure remembered spending so many boring hours having to try on Cool-Mom’s new outfits. She just loved dressing me up, having me pose, taking pictures, and showing me off to her friends and customers. She was enthusiastic about it, there was no doubt about it. That was just Cool-Mom for you.

“I like that one,” said a pudgy orange-coated colt. He pointed at a photo with me wearing an embarrassing plaid sweater. “Dash sure is dressin’ in style.”

Dinky looked up at Cool-Mom with a big grin on her face. “I wish I could be like my godmom and try on some pritty dresses like these.”

Cool-Mom gave Dinky a quick nuzzle. “That’s so precious of you to say. Oh!” She wrapped a leg around Dinky to squeeze her closer. “We simply mustarrange with your mother to have you and your sister come to my shop and dress the two of you up. It would be a simply divine bonding moment between a mare and her godgrandchildren. Don’t you think?”

“Yah-huh!” Dinky nodded enthusiastically. “Will Dash come too?”

“Um,” I started, trying to think what to say to that idea. “I don’t know.” I could think of things I would really prefer doing other than trying on a bunch of dresses for Cool-Mom. Something that didn’t send me into Snoozeville.

Cool-Mom gave me a pouty frown. “Come now, Dash. Don’t you want to bond with your goddaughters and your mother? We could make a weekend of it.”

“Don’t you wanna spend time with me and Sparky?” Dinky looked up at me with her big, sad eyes.

“Course I want to spend time with you two,” I immediately responded. I just wanted to make her stop looking at me like that. Nopony could take the amount of guilt Cool-Mom and Dinky were shooting my way.

Dinky smiled a big, happy grin and started hopping around me. “So you’ll try on pritty dresses with us?!”

I sighed and rubbed my forehead. “Yes.”

“Yay!” Dinky grasped onto my leg in a circulation-cutting hug.

“Oh, that’s absolutely darling.” Cool-Mom nuzzled me in front of everypony. “It will be just like old times.”

Scootaloo stuck her tongue out and made a face that made it look like she was going to be sick. “Ick, count me out. It’s bad enough when Sweetie Belle’s sister tries to get us to all play dress up.” I’m right there with you Scoots.

“But dressin’ up is fun,” Dinky protested.

“Is not,” Scootaloo shot back.

Dinky scowled at Scootaloo. “Is too.”

“Girls, girls.” Pinkie walked up, probably to keep the two fillies from arguing. “Don’t be mad, because you know what time it is?” Both of them shook their heads at Pinkie’s question. Pinkie pulled a small clock out of her mane and showed its hands to the fillies. “It’s Party Time!”

Awesomom gasped and ripped off her me-suit. “Really?! I nearly forgot! There isn’t any time if it’s party time! Quick, everypony to our cart. Nopony wants to be late for this party!”

I looked outside and saw that somehow my parents’ cart had found its way outside of the treehouse despite how I had left it back in town. It also had a bunch of streamers and balloons attached to it now. Go figure.

Everypony filed out of the treehouse quickly. Given that this was a bunch of kids, that meant I had to jump out of the way to keep from being run over by the brightly-colored stampede. I was about to follow after them—nopony beats me in a race after all—but I heard Cool-Mom clear her throat to catch my attention. Some part of my brain reflexively twinged. It was the type of thing she normally did when she wanted me to slow down and talk to her. I waited as everypony else left the treehouse, leaving me and Cool-Mom to talk alone.

“Rainbow Dash, what happened to that dress?” Cool-Mom asked primly, and I felt my heart sink a little bit. It was going to be one of those types of talks.

“Um.” I found myself scraping my hoof on the ground like I was a little filly. I straightened up to quit looking so guilty. “I was just flying around, and it kinda just ... fell apart.”

Cool-Mom stared at me with a deep frown that screamed disappointment. “The dress you didn’t pay for? The dress you put on and then started screaming as you charged right through your friend’s door?”

I looked away from my mom’s piercing gaze. “Yeah. I mean, it wasn’t like I did it on purpose. I just didn’t—”

“Think?” Cool-Mom finished. “You know that is the type of thing that gets you into trouble.”

I sighed, just wanting this talk to end. “I know.”

“Dash, look at me,” Cool-Mom demanded. I did so. “Now your friend Rarity was quite upset by your behavior and the damage you caused to her property, and frankly, she has very good reasons for being so. I can assure you, from a lifetime of sewing, that your friend put a lot of work into that dress for you to destroy it in a couple of hours.”

I strained to speak calmly. “Hey, something just surprised me is all. I just haven’t been able to find Rarity to return the dress yet ... and pay to repair the door.”

Cool-Mom tapped her hoof on the floor. “And what else do you think you need to do?”

I thought about it for a moment. I did kinda treat one of my friends pretty badly. I know I wouldn’t like it if somepony just went a punched a hole in my house and messed up my stuff. I let out a long sigh. “I guess I need to apologize too.”

Cool-Mom nodded. “I think that would be for the best.”

My ears flicked in irritation. “Can we just go to the party now? Rarity will probably be there, and I can talk to her then.”

“As long as you promise to apologize, and I mean reallyapologize.” Cool-Mom made for the door. I guessed she had said all she wanted to say. Jeez, that took a while. I hated apologizing. I was going to do it because Rarity is my friend, but it doesn’t mean I’d have to like it.

“Yeah, I’ll do it,” I said, following her as she stepped outside. I hopped over the treehouse’s railing and glided down to the ground next to my parent’s carriage, the last of the stragglers climbing into it. It was just about as full as it could get, with everypony crammed in and just about on top of one another.

Awesomom was beginning to strap herself to the cart when I walked up to her. “You ready to party my silly-filly?”

I grinned. “Yeah, looking forward to it.” A party was starting to sound real good right about then. Granted, I had no idea what Pinkie was up to for the party itself, but I doubt it could go much worse than the rest of my day. “Why don’t you let me drive the cart, Awesomom? You already flew all the way from Cloudsdale, so let me take care of it. Just enjoy flying next to the cart.” I didn’t want to say it to her face, but she was probably getting to be a bit old to be flying a bunch of kids. She’d probably be okay, but I’d feel a lot better dragging the cart myself.

“Well, if you really want to.” Awesomom slowly stepped away from the cart.

“Sure, this will be great strength training.” I made my way to the front of the cart and started to tie myself to it.

“Sounds good then.” Awesomom flapped her wings and lifted off.

With a powerful downstrike, I lifted the cart off the ground. “Let’s get going then.” I flashed Awesomom a playful smirk. “Think you can keep up?”

“Dash, don’t you turn this into a competition,” I heard Cool-Mom from behind me. “We have children in this cart, and I don’t want you going too fast and risking a crash.”

I groaned deep in my throat. “Fine, Cool-Mom. I won’t race or anything.” Like I was going to do anything reckless. I know better, really, I do.

Awesomom pulled ahead of me. “Come on, Dash. You don’t want to be late.”

Slow down, speed up—I was getting it from both sides by my parents. “Coming.” I grunted with exertion as I pulled the cart forward.

Cool-Mom clapped her forehooves together. “Excellent. Now, who would like to hear a story about how Dash got herself stuck in her grandparents’ closet?”

I facehoofed as everypony in the cart asked Cool-Mom to tell the story. Why me?

***

Pinkie Pie had outdone herself. For Pinkie, that’s saying something. Fireworks were shooting off the entire time we approached Ponyville. The children stared, wide-eyed, at the sparkling explosions. As I looked around, I could see that a sea of ponies covered the ground all around the town. I’d never imagined that there could be that many ponies in a small place like Ponyville.

The closer we got, the more the party looked more like a full-blown county fair, rather than some little friendly get-together that was Pinkie’s usual thing. Stalls serving food and games had been set up all over the place. There were a hooffull of rides, with a ferris wheel being the most prominent of them. But the frosting to this cake of partying extravagance were big clouds shaped like my parents’ heads, with the cloud-banner “Welcome to Ponyville: Bestest Parents Ever” floating under them.

Pinkie leaned over the front of the cart. Thankfully she had taken that suit off by now. “Do you like it? Huh-huh-huh?!”

I tried to keep from getting too distracted by Pinkie as I weaved my way through the pegasi flying about. “Yeah, it’s really something.”

Cool-Mom leaned on the opposite side of the front of the cart as Pinkie. “I think it’s absolutely darling. I can tell from the amount of work you put into this.” A crazy amount of work if you asked me, given everything that had been set up in a single day. Never say Pinkie can’t do something when she puts her mind to it, at least anything relating to parties. She’s pretty awesome that way.

Awesomom rubbed her chin as she gave the party a critical look. “Well, it could have used a few more balloons here and there. Also, I’m not sure I’m wild about how the traffic is going to flow.”

“Ponyville doesn’t really have a huge reserve of balloons,” Pinkie pointed out. “The town isn’t super-huge like Cloudsdale. There’s only so much room I have to work with here.” She was starting to sound increasingly more frantic, and not in the happy-go-lucky type of frantic either. More like the panicked type of frantic. “There’s only so much space in the streets. I mean I can’t just move ponies’ houses around. I could, but they would get really cranky if I did that. Then the mayor and all the ponies would start yelling at me, and start to complain that I’m messing up the local property and tax structure of the town, and how the town looks. Nopony understands when you want to rearrange the town just to make it more party-friendly and—”

“Pinkie!” I yelled trying to get her off the rails of whatever crazy thought process she was on. It’s the only way I could figure out to stop her ramblings without me putting a hoof to her mouth. Not that it ever seemed to bother her. Maybe Pinkie just felt she needed to fill in the silence with somepony speaking and was happy to step aside when somepony interrupted her? I don’t know, trying to apply any logic to Pinkie is a dangerous thing.

Pinkie turned to look at me. “Yes, Dashie?”

My brain tumbled for something to say before Pinkie went off another ramble. “Err .... I’m sure everypony will enjoy the party.” Pinkie gave me an appreciative smile.

Cool-Mom nodded confidently. “Yes, I’m sure the party will be quite enjoyable. Pinkie put a lot of effort into this party for us. Don’t you think, Surprise?” I could hear the extra emphasis she put into that last part. It kinda felt like they were doing that thing where they try to say something without saying it to one another. But I wasn’t sure.

Awesomom hovered over to the cart and rubbed Pinkie’s hoof assuringly. “I’m sure everything will be fine. You did the best you could.”

“Thank you,” Pinkie replied with a lot more strain than I was used to when somepony complimented her parties. She narrowed her eyes at Awesomom in an expression I wasn’t used to seeing on Pinkie. Cool-Mom was also frowning at Awesomom. I couldn’t give my full attention towards figuring out what was going on, considering I was also had to pay attention to where I was flying.

“Um, where are we supposed to land?” I asked Pinkie. Everywhere I looked there were just crowds of ponies clogging up the streets.

“Oh, I setup a designated parking spot for us earlier.” Awesomom pointed down to a roped off spot in the street large enough for the cart. “It’s the little things you need to remember sometimes.”

“I had a lot of things to remember to do to set up this party.” Pinkie pulled out a scroll and unfurled it. It fell and—a few seconds later—hit the ground. Twilight would have been proud. “Look at the list! Look at it!”

“Maybe you should get an understudy or something to help you keep track of all these things,” Awesomom suggested helpfully. “Never hurts to have another pony double check these things.”

“How about we just enjoy the party as it is,” Cool-Mom interjected.

Dinky squirmed her way up to the front of the cart also. “Oooh, are we gonna have a lotta fun?”

“You better believe it, Muffy-duffy!” Pinkie scruffed up Dinky’s mane. “There’s music, and games, and food, and everything else a super-duper fun party is supposed to have.”

I maneuvered through the crowd to land in the parking spot Awesomom had set aside for us. Luckily, nopony had decided to be rude and stand on the parking spot, so I brought the cart in for a landing. I probably could’ve pulled off that landing during a lightning storm with zero visibility. Though I probably wouldn’t try something that reckless pulling a bunch of kids around.

Everypony jumped out of the cart and I worked at untying myself from it. I looked back and saw Dinky looking around in wide-eyed amazement. I felt a pang of worry when other ponies started to block my line of sight to her. “Dinky, stay by me,” I called out. I really didn’t want to lose track of her in this crowd.

Dinky trotted back to stand next to me. “Okay. Can I climb onto your back?”

I shrugged. “Sure, jump on.” I bent down to make it easier for her to get onto my back. It would be simpler to keep track of her if she was riding me. I didn’t even want to think of what Derpy would do to me if I lost her baby daughter in this mess. Even Imight not be able to fly fast enough to escape her wrath.

Scootaloo ran up and barely stopped herself from slamming into me. “Hey, can I hang out with you too?”

I considered it a moment as Dinky got herself settled up around my shoulders. “Sure, why not?” It would probably be best if I kept track of Scootaloo too, given how crazy this party was. No sense letting anything happen to the squirt.

“Can I jump onto your back too?” Scoots gave me a hopeful smile as she looked up at me.

“What?! No way!” Dinky objected before I could say anything. She hugged me around the neck. “She’s my godmom, so I get to pegy-back ride with her!”

Scootaloo stared down Dinky with a scowl. “Yeah, well I’m her number one fan! And have been since forever. So I should get some time with Rainbow Dash too!”

“Girls,” Cool-Mom said in that firm voice that always got me to shut my trap whenever I got into an argument with somepony. She was really good at that. It also saved me the trouble of having to try it myself. I was still trying to get the godmom thing down, and as awesome as I was, I didn’t like the idea of trying to get between two arguing fillies. “Don’t you two argue. Pinkie Pie and Surprise put a lot of effort into making a party for everypony to enjoy.”

“Besides.” Awesomom threw a foreleg around my neck and gave me a quick squeeze. “There’s always plenty of Dashie to go around. Can’t we all share?”

Dinky chewed on her lower lip. “Yeah, I guess.” She reach down a hoof to help Scootaloo get onto my back. “Wanna be riding buddies?”

Scootaloo stared at Dinky’s hoof for a long moment. “Sure, Dash is plenty cool to carry the both of us.” She grasped Dinky’s hoof and jumped onto my back behind Dinky. It might have been too much for some ponies to carry two fillies at once, but I was more than strong enough to handle it. I’d carried Rarity and three Wonderbolts at the same time after all. This was nothing in comparison.

Pinkie hopped over to all of us, wearing a party hat with lit sparklers attached to it. “You all ready to have a super-grand-partyriffic time!?” Dinky and Scootaloo both bobbed their heads up and down. “Well let’s get-a-going-ronie! Follow me.” Not seeing anything better to do at the moment, I followed Pinkie as she bounded through the crowd, my parents following just behind me.

Dinky poked her head around mine to get a better view of Pinkie. “What’re we gonna do first, Pinkie?”

Pinkie spun around on one of her rear hooves to come face to face with Dinky, nearly making her fall off of me when she jerked back in surprise. “What would you like to do? Play some games? Eat some sweets? Groove to some tunes?”

Scootaloo and Dinky were discussing what they would like to do first when I heard a familiar rumbling sound above me. I looked up to see the familiar black contrails of the Wonderbolts as they flew over us. They looped around and performed one trick after another in the sky above us. My head snapped back to look at Pinkie. “You got the Wonderbolts to come too?!” The Wonderbolts had a pretty tight schedule with all the shows and other events they had to do, and the idea they would come out to one of Pinkie’s parties was almost crazy.

Pinkie gave me a goofy grin. “Well duh! How many times do I have to tell you? I invited everypony to this party.”

“Everypony indeed,” said Princess Celestia. She and Princess Luna moved through the crowd with ease towards us, as everypony moved out of their way and bowed to the co-rulers of Equestria. I bowed myself, though it was a bit tricky to pull off with two fillies on my back. “Pinkie was quite thorough when she broke into the royal census records and acquired the addresses of all the citizens of Equestria.” My eyebrows raised at that. What type of trouble had Pinkie gotten herself into?

Pinkie giggled uncomfortably and rubbed her forehooves together. “Okay, so I kinda lowered myself from the ceiling by a cable, and bypassed all the security. But I had good reasons for doing so!”

Celestia gave Pinkie a amused smirk. “You do realize that most of those records are available to the public? There wasn’t any reason to break in and have an as-of-yet unidentified pony dressed as myself serve as a distraction.” Awesomom whistled in a way that was one hundred percent inconspicuous.

Pinkie gave Celestia a strained smile. “Well yeah, I saw that on my way out the door, but by then we’d already gone that far.”

Luna stepped up and looked down at Pinkie with a grim faced scowl. “And that is why you were last seen running from the Canterlot Guard?”

Pinkie wilted under Luna’s firm gaze. I didn’t particularly envy her. “I thought we were playing tag.”

Luna cocked an eyebrow at my fillyfriend. “Aye. Perhaps we can see what games you like to play in the palace dungeon?” Pinkie’s smile became very nervous before Luna’s scowl softened and she grinned. “That was a joke.”

Pinkie wiped her brow with a forelegs. “Oh, good.” She chuckled nervously.

Luna grabbed Pinkie with her telekinesis and pranced in a circle, swinging Pinkie around with her. “We would not imprison one of our subjects for inviting us to a festival! Tell us, do you have that wonderful game where we toss the spiders? We had much fun last time with that game last time we graced Ponyille with our presence.”

Pinkie’s ears flattened. “I’m real sorry, but that’s kinda only a Nightmare Night type of thing.” Luna frowned and her shoulders sagged slightly. “But we have plenty of other games where you can throw things at other things!” Pinkie quickly said.

Luna clapped her hooves together. “Excellent! We look forward to hurling projectiles at defenseless targets.”

“That’s the spirit!” Pinkie pointed off in one direction. “All the games are in that direction, Your Highness. Have all the fun you can stand.”

Luna turned to face Celestia. “Sister, may we make our way to where the games are and see what fun can be had?”

Celestia nodded. “I see no reason why not. Let’s see what mischief we can get into.”

“Huzzah!” Luna motioned for her sister and their guards to follow. “Let us proceed then.”

Celestia moved to follow her sister towards where all the games were supposed to be. “Thank you for inviting us to this party. I’m sure it will give the two of us an opportunity to enjoy ourselves.”

Pinkie waved as they left. “Have fun! Don't forget to try some of the food too.”

I turned to Pinkie as they left and whispered sharply to her. “You invited the Princesses too!?” I was more shocked than anything. I mean, I’m not one to get all stuffy about the rules and stuff, but they’re the Princesses for feathers’ sake!

“Well yeah.” Pinkie snorted amusedly. “Celestia and Luna are ponies too. Super big ponies with horns and wings, but still ponies. It would have been super rude not to at least invite them too.”

That did make its own sense as I thought it over. “Yeah, I guess so.”

Pinkie pulled out a couple of party hats to put on Dinky and Scootaloo. “Besides, everypony likes to come to a party and just have some fun now and again.”

“Even a princess should get to have fun, right?” Dinky asked.

Pinkie gently patted Dinky on the head. “Of course they should.”

I remembered what we were talking about before we were interrupted by a measly little thing like the diarchs of Equestria showing up for a short chat. “And you invited the Wonderbolts too?”

Pinkie nodded vigorously. “Yep, I pulled a couple favors to have them do a bit of an impromptu performance. The promise of free food was a deal-maker.” She started tugging on one of my forelegs. “Come on, let’s go talk to them.”

I almost stumbled as Pinkie dragged me along. “What? Right now, just like that?”

“That’s what I’m sayin’.” Pinkie abandoned trying to drag me and moved around to push me with her head.

I felt Dinky kick my sides excitedly. “We’re goin’ to get to see the Wonderbolts!”

Scootaloo hopped up to stand on my back. “This is going to be sooo awesome! Right Dash?”

I nearly facehoofed when I thought of the obvious. Of course I wanted to talk to my idols! “Yeah! Let’s go!” I started walking on my own, so that Pinkie didn’t have to keep pushing me.

Cool-Mom nodded in agreement. “Yes, lead the way, Pinkie.”

I nearly stopped in my tracks when I realized that Cool-Mom was going to be following us. “Heh, you’re coming too, Cool-Mom?” I could feel beads of sweat forming on my brow. I couldn’t see much good come out of Cool-Mom meeting the Wonderbolts with me. There were just way too many ways that could turn into a disaster.

“Why, of course.” Cool-Mom gave me a loving nuzzle. “The entire reason your mother and I came out here was to spend time with you.”

“An’ me too?” Dinky, being the manipulative little ball of cuteness she was, puckered her lips in a pout.

“Perish the thought we would forget you or your sister.” Cool-Mom gave Dinky a nuzzle too, making her giggle. Scootaloo looked liked she was going to gag.

“Are we going or not?” Pinkie asked anxiously. “We don’t have forever ya know! So much partying, so little time.”

This whole day had been completely nuts. My world had been turned upside down and sideways by my parents, they had humiliated me in front of everypony, apparently I had a whatever-Twilight-called-it-complex, I hadn’t had a nap all day, and I was pretty sure Rarity was going to kill me when she caught up to me for tearing up her dress. On top of all that, I had two fillies on my back who wanted to spend time with both the Wonderbolts and my parents. There was no cool way I was going to avoid whatever was to come if we met the Wonderbolts.

I let out a resigned sigh. “Sure, Pinkie.” I tried to put on the most confident smile I could. “Show us where they are.”

“Okie dokie lokie,” Pinkie said and started bouncing away to where I guessed the Wonderbolts were. Cool-Mom and I, Scootaloo and Dinky in tow, followed her through the crowded streets until we reached a brightly colored tent. There were even a pair of guardponies standing outside. “Hiya!” Pinkie greeted them and hopped right on into the tent. I was a bit worried that the Guards would stop me as I walked past them, but they let me and Cool-Mom right on through.

I quickly spotted a couple of Wonderbolts inside. The two of them were still wearing their show uniforms and seemed to be enjoying a spread of food that had been laid out on a couple of tables. Having seen them a few times in the past, I recognized Spitfire and Soarin immediately. Being able to say that was about the most radical thing ever.

Spitfire looked our way and I saw the spark of recognition in her eyes. Her mouth curved into a smirk. “Rainbow Dash, figured you’d be turning up sooner or later.”

“Loving the party, by the way,” Soarin said, taking another bite out of the pie he had claimed for himself.

I snorted. “Well yeah. You think I wouldn’t come to see you when I heard you guys were around?”

Spitfire gave me a friendly punch to the shoulder. “It’s almost like you’re angling to get into the Wonderbolts or something.”

I let out a nervous chuckle. “Well you know, building a rep. Gettin’ to know everypony on the team.”

Spitfire cocked an eyebrow at that comment. “I see how it is.”

Dinky poked out from around my head. “Whoa! The Wonderbolts’re rilly here!”

“This is so cool!” Scootaloo jumped off my back and walked up to stand before Spitfire.

Spitfire smiled down at Scootaloo. “A couple fans, I take it?”

“Well, yeah,” Scootaloo said confidently. “You’re like the super best fliers ever! At least once Rainbow Dash joins you anyways.”

Spitfire snorted. “Is that so?”

Scootaloo’s wings fluttered. “Duh, she’s only the best, fastest, and most awesome flier ever. She’s totally going to get into the Wonderbolts.”

Dinky hugged me around the neck. “Yeah, Dash is the bestest ever!”

Spitfire looked up to grin at me. “We’ll make sure to keep an eye on her.”

I grinned sheepishly. “What can I say, the kids know living awesome when they see it.”

“Uh-huh, is that why you’re wearing that tattered old thing?” Spitfire pointed at what was left of the dress I was wearing. “You just trying to bring a measure of your awesomeness to that dress? Or is that just the latest thing in the fashion world, and I’m just behind the times?”

My ears flattened at the mention of the torn mess of a pink abomination that barely clung to my body. I couldn’t believe I was wearing the thing in front of my idols. “Oh, this thing.” I bent down to let Dinky jump off. “I’m just holding onto it for a friend, and wearing it is just the easiest way to do that.” Seeing that the dress was barely hanging onto me anyways, I took a mouthful of the dress and ripped the tattered thing off of me.

I heard a familiar scream from behind me. “My hard work!”

Cool-Mom placed a hoof over her mouth and gasped. “Her hard work!” Gah! Bad enough I have one mom that's a clone of my friend!

“Oooh, you’re in trooouuuuble!” Dinky smiled at me with the smile of a very devious child who gets to watch one of the adults get in trouble for once.

I turned around to see Rarity standing at the entrance with slack-jawed horror on her face as she looked at the murdered dress in my mouth. Yep, she was probably going to kill me here in about a minute. After tossing what remained of the dress over my shoulders, I gave Rarity a smile that sure as hay didn’t feel genuine. “Um, I tore up the dress fighting a hydra?” I said lamely. Rarity’s eyes narrowed as her glare slowly intensified in my direction. “It was a necessary sacrifice. To defeat the hydra—that I was fighting” My head lowered as my voice lowered to a whisper. “And the ongoing assault against my superawesoradicool image.”

Scootaloo’s eyes widened with amazement. “Whoa, you fought a hydra?”

Cool-Mom cleared her throat to cut off that line of discussion. “Dash, darling, did I just see you rip off that very nice dress your friend made?” If her tone had been anymore icy when she had said that, I might very well have been frozen on the spot.

“Um—” was all I got out before Rarity stomped over to me, grabbed me with her forehooves, and gave me a bone-shaking jerk.

“So tell me,” Rarity said, she wore a smile that told me she was not the least bit happy with me. “What made you think it was a good idea to steal my dress and destroy my front door? Oh, and tearing up the dress also while you were out gallivanting around the town?”

I squirmed around until I managed to get out of Rarity’s grip. “Hey, it’s not like that!” I felt my anger rise as Spitfire and Soarin tried to keep from laughing out loud.

One of Rarity’s eyebrows raised. “What is it like, pray tell? I hope you know you’re going to be paying for both the door and dress now.” She lifted her nose smugly. “Otherwise I’m not sure I will ever be able to forgive you.”

Words came out of my mouth before my brain could process them. It’s kinda a bad habit for me. “Well sorry if I freaked out over finding out that I was dating my mom!”

Rarity blinked several times after I smacked her with that thought. “Excuse me, could you say that again?”

“Eww, Pinkie’s your mom?” Scootaloo asked in horror. “But ... I thought Mrs. Surprise was your mom?”

I facehoofed. “No, it’s just…” I trailed off with a frustrated growl. Trying to come up with a way to explain the odi-something-complex that didn’t make me sound like a weirdo was hard. This type of thing was a lot easier when Twilight was around to do it for me.

Pinkie wrapped her foreleg around my neck and giggled. “Silly Dashie, I already told you we were only super-duper like one another. Not completely alike.”

Spitfire snicked. “Now what’s this about?”

“This might be gettin’ good,” Soarin piped in.

I put a hoof up to stop my idols from getting the wrong idea. “No! Awesomom and my fillyfriend are only kinda alike.”

Spitfire grinned wickedly. “Ah, you’re one of those types of ponies that likes her mom?”

“No—” I gave Cool-Mom a glance as she frowned at me. “I mean yes, no, let me explain!”

Awesomom popped up from behind me, causing me to jerk in surprise. “Dashie’s just suffering from one of her usual crises of confidence.” She leaned in to whisper to Soarin. “She really does need to have her ego stroked every once in awhile, or she gets really upset.” She frowned at me as she brushed a hoof through my mane. “Isn’t that right?”

“What’s this, Rainbow Dash has confidence issues?” Spitfire gave me a good, long, hard look.

Soarin snorted. “Yeah, can’t have somepony who doesn’t have confidence in herself get into the Wonderbolts.”

My wings flared out and I puffed out my chest. “Hey, I have confidence by the boatload! Just give the word and I’ll do a ton of awesome stunts for you.”

“Calm down there.” Spitfire elbowed me in the chest. “We’re just ribbing you a bit.”

“Oh.” I chuckled unsteadily. “Right, just ribbing. I’m always up for a good prank or ribbing.” That was actually pretty good if they were ribbing me for the fun of it. That meant that they were starting to treat me as one of the gals. Granted, that meant I was going to have to take it for awhile at least, and I prefered to be doing the pranking instead of being on the receiving end.

Spitfire whispered to me. “Though what’s this I’m hearing about you liking your mom?”

“Err.” After a moment of thinking it over, I decided the best way to handle this was to just try and blow the whole matter off. “It’s just my fillyfriend and one of my moms are kinda similar—not in any weird way. They just like some of the same things.”

“I getcha.” Spitfire gave me a conspiratorial wink. “I can get why some ponies might be into that type of thing.” I smiled back at her, hoping she was just still ribbing me.

Soarin walked up to Cool-Mom and rubbed his chin. “Hey, haven’t I met you somewhere before?”

Cool-Mom snapped her head up to make her mane bounce. “I would hope so, darling. I did design those uniforms you’re wearing after all.”

Soarin clapped his hooves together. “That’s where I remember you from!”

“So you’re the one who saved us from those awful, retro uniforms we were wearing a few years ago?” Spitfire asked, approaching Cool-Mom. I remembered what the old uniforms looked like. They had been hideous. I don’t think there was a pony other than the owner at the time who had liked them. “Have to say, the new uniforms are a whole hay of a lot snazzier.”

Soarin spread his wings and flexed. “Fit pretty nicely too.”

“Oh stop.” Cool-Mom waved her hoof stop the compliments, but my finely toned Cool-Mom-senses told me that she wanted them to continue with the flattery. “I was just lucky that I managed to beat all the other contestants.”

Rarity looked Soarin over as she examined his uniform. “They really are quite, if you don’t mind me using such an obvious pun, dashing.”

I looked back and forth between Cool-Mom and the Wonderbolts. “Wait, you designed the uniforms for the Wonderbolts?! You never told me this.”

Cool-Mom frowned at me. “Of course I did. I talked all about it in a letter I sent to you when I won the contest.”

I cocked an eyebrow at her. “I don’t remember getting any letters on that.”

“Hmm, perhaps it got lost in the mail,” Cool-Mom said whimsically. I had a pretty good idea how such a letter might have been lost. It started with D, and ended with -erpy. Or maybe I had just gotten sloppy and lost the letter. It was always a pain when I did that with the bills. So maybe it was fifty-fifty either way. “A shame really. I so do like the idea of you performing in one of my designs in front of everypony.”

“Heh, I guess that would be pretty co—” What I was about to say was cut off when a single, horrible thought crossed my mind like a burning train filled with puppies, kittens, and fireworks heading for a brick wall. “Wait! So even when I get into the Wonderbolts, my mom will still be dressing me!?”

“Why yes, exactly.” Cool-Mom nuzzled me in the face. “Isn’t that wonderful?” I was too horrified by the idea to even think about it. I would never be able to think of that uniform and not think about how my mom had made it. Doomed, doomed to always be dressed by my mom even when I got my dream job.

“GrandCool-Mom is goin’ to be dressin you in pritty things forever an’ ever,” Dinky piped in happily. She looked up at Cool-Mom. “Can you make me a Wonderbolt costume so that I can look just like Dash when she becomes a Wonderbolt?”

Cool-Mom patted Dinky on the head. “I don’t see why not.”

“And me too?” asked Scootaloo.

Cool-Mom smiled down at my number one fan. “Oh, of course. I’m sure you would look absolutely adorable dressed up as a Wonderbolt.”

Scootaloo lowered her stance and pawed at the ground aggressively. “Nah, I would be super awesome. Just like Dash.”

“Seems you’re building quite the fanbase,” Spitfire whispered to me. “They even want to dress like you. That could make some of us jealous.”

I grinned back at her. “Scootaloo and Dinky are cool. They know a radical pony when they see one.” It looked like things were about to get settled and become a pretty awesome conversation with the Wonderbolts, of all ponies. This was totally goin’ to help my rep with them.

Cool-Mom cleared her throat and tapped my shoulder. I turned to her and watched as she pointed towards the entrance to the tent. I looked and saw Rarity stomping her way out of the tent. “I think you might have something to take care of, darling.”

I looked between my mom, Spitfire, and Rarity. Things had been going so well there for a second. I was totally hanging out with my idols here, despite all the problems that had been cramping my style all day. But now Rarity was leaving the tent and she didn’t look happy. She had good reasons not to be. On the other hoof how often was I going to get to hang out with one of my idols? You don’t get to just hang out with celebrities everyday. Rarity could forgive me this once for wanting to shoot the breeze with Spitfire and Soarin just this once, right?

I sighed and rubbed at my face. “Spitfire, look, I have something I need to take care of. You don’t mind, do ya?”

“Nah, go ahead.” Spitfire picked up one of the club sandwiches. “We’ll just be here enjoying the free food. Do what you need to do.”

I nodded. “Okay, cool.” I took off and flew through the tent doorway. Rarity was stomping her way through the crowd, but I was able to catch up pretty quickly by flying over everypony’s head. “Rarity! Wait up, I need to talk to you!” Rarity lifted up her nose and turned away from me. She kept walking as though I wasn't even there. I landed in front of her to stop her. “Can you just stop so we can talk?”

Rarity kept her nose turned up and wasn’t looking at me. “I’m not so sure I want to talk to you right now.”

“And why not?” I asked testily.

Rarity humphed. “Because you all but ignored me in there. You obviously prefer to hang out with your new Wonderbolts friends to your old friends.”

I scowled at her. Why couldn’t she make this easy for me? “It’s not like that.”

“Isn’t it?” Rarity asked. “You seemed more concerned with looking good in front of the Wonderbolts and everypony else then apologizing to me.”

“But they’re the Wonderbolts!” Shouldn’t that be explanation enough?

“If that’s how you feel about it...” Rarity moved to walk past me.

I jumped in front of her to stop her. “No! Wait! Please, just give me a minute!”

Rarity stopped and narrowed her eyes at me. “I’m starting to think I’ve given you plenty of opportunities to do the right thing already.”

I facehoofed. I really didn’t want this to turn into one of those types of situations again. That time I’d fumbled apologizing to Cloud Kicker had been more than bad enough. “Okay, look. I’m really bad at this, the whole apologizing thing.” I took a long breath as I collected my thoughts. “I apologize. There, I said it.”

“Apologize for what exactly?” Rarity asked primly.

I bit down on my frustration and anger. This was not the time to let those emotions screw this up. “I apologize for stealing the dress, messing it up, and smashing your door.”

The edge in Rarity’s voice softened. “And?”

I had to think for a moment to try and think what she was getting at. As I said, I’m bad at apologizing. “And for ignoring you earlier. And lying. Okay, for anything I did to you, happy?” I was starting to hit the end of my patience. How much more did she want from me?

Rarity frowned at me. “And how you do plan on correcting this?”

At least I was making progress now. It looked like we were at the doing part of the apology. I was good at doing things. “I’ll pay for the dress and the door. I got that covered.” Rarity just stood there for a moment before making a ‘go on’ motion with her hoof. “Fine, if you need anypony to help try on any of your frilly dresses, I’m there.” She made the motion. “I’ll ... clean your gutters. Alright, I’ll use one of my days off as a you day. I just want to make this right.”

She didn’t respond for a long moment. For a second I worried she wasn’t going to accept my apology when she smiled and nodded. “That will do. Apology accepted.”

I let out a relieved breath. “Okay, good. Want to head back into the tent then?” I smiled at her. “There’s free food and stuff.”

Rarity shrugged. “I don’t see why not. I do enjoy conversing with your mother.”

We started heading back towards the tent and moved to walk past the guard again. “Wait, how did you get past the guard last time?” I asked.

“With style and grace, darling.” And by that, she meant flirt with the guard until he let us pass.

So it finally looked like things were going to turn out great for me. Things were straightened out with Rarity. I was going to get to hang out with the Wonderbolts. And that’s when I saw Awesomom tip-hoofing towards Pinkie.

“Hey, guess what I got us?” Awesomom eyes looked back and forth across the room.

“Oooh, I love guessing games!” Pinkie scratched the top of her head. “A purple polka-dotted accordion that sounds like a full symphony orchestra?”

Awesomom giggled. “No, guess again.” Pinkie was about to give another guess when Awesomom interrupted her. “I can’t wait! Let me show you!” She pulled out a pair of cups of what looked like steaming black liquid. Pinkie squealed in delight and jumped up and down in place. My heart sunk at what I thought I was seeing as Awesomom gave Pinkie one of the cups.

“Pinkie,” I growled a warning. “That isn’t what I think it is, is it?”

Pinkie avoided eye contact with me. “Maaaybe.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “Is it something everypony has told you you shouldn’t have?”

“Um, nooo?” Pinkie’s poker face could have given Applejack’s a run for its money—for how bad it was. I started to consider if I could close the distance between Pinkie and I fast enough to get the cup away from her. I could probably catch her, but getting the coffee away when Pinkie could be Pinkie...

Rarity chewed her lower lip. “Pinkie, please put the cup down. You know what happened last time.”

Pinkie sniffed at the aroma of her coffee. “That was just the last time ... and the time before that ... and that time none of you know about. I can handle coffee, really.” I don’t think any of us who knew Pinkie were convinced for a second. Not even a fraction of a second.

Cool-Mom noticed that something was up. She glanced at the cup Awesomom was holding and started to glare at her. “Dear, you aren’t about to drink that, are you?”

Awesomom looked back and forth between the cup and Cool-Mom. “What? No, nooo, no, maybeprobablyyes.”

“You know I don’t like it when you drink coffee,” Cool-Mom warned in a tone she usually reserved for me when I was about to do something I wasn’t supposed to do when I was a filly.

Dinky looked up at me with pleading eyes. A hint of fear worked into her voice. “Dash, Pinkie doesn’t have a cup of coffee, does she?”

“Everything’s going to be okay,” I assured her, feeling none too confident myself.

“Can I hug you?” Dinky asked.

“Yeah, go ahead kiddo,” I told her. She wrapped her legs around one of my own and squeezed tight.

Scootaloo put on a mask of cool confidence that her quivering voice betrayed. “I’m not scared or anything, but—”

“Just go ahead and hug my leg too, Squirt.” She did so. No sense beating around the bush.

Soarin raised an eyebrow at the suddenly tense scene. Then something flashed behind his eyes when he looked at Awesomom. “Hey Spitfire, does she look familiar to you?”

Spitfire gave Awesomom a good, long look before nodding. “The Caffeine Fiend of Cloudsdale? The mare who it took all the Wonderbolts and the Cloudsdale Gendarme to finally catch a few years ago?”

“The one and only, if I’m not missing my guess.” Soarin spread his wings and entered a combat stance, and Spitfire did the same after him. “Ma’am, put down the cup and step away. No reason this needs to go bad.”

“It’s just a cup of coffee,” Awesomom protested sourly.

Spitfire scraped her hoof on the ground. “Not in your hooves.”

“It’s fine.” Pinkie slowly moved to drink from her cup. “Nothing super-ultra-bad will happen this time. I promise.”

“Pinkie, don’t you dare,” I warned her.

“Aw, you’re a bunch of grumpy pants.” Awesomom was slowly backing away from Spitfire and Soarin while slowly bringing the coffee cup to her mouth. “It’ll be fine.”

“Surprise, I’m warning you.” Cool-Mom gave Awesomom a fierce glare. “You’re looking at couch time the way you’re going.”

Pinkie and Awesomom looked each other in the eyes and nodded. They grinned at us and brought the coffee cups to their lips.

“Nooo!”

***

I woke up sometime later. I rubbed at my eyes, the taste of too many sweets and strong drinks creating an odd aftertaste in my mouth. It was night now, or at least I was going to guess so, given the moon was out. Of course that was assuming Luna and Celestia hadn’t gone crazy over the course of the party. Vague, blurry memories came back slowly. Things had gone wild after Awesomom and Pinkie had drank that coffee. All the crashed tents around me showed that clearly enough. Everypony looked like they had enough and were working at picking themselves up and going home. I stood up slowly, an unfamiliar weight on my back. I looked and saw Dinky and Scootaloo sprawled there. They both moaned from my movements. I guess the double sundaes had been a bit much for them after everything else.

There was movement besides me, and I turned to see Derpy slowly walking my way, fatigue obvious from her slouched shoulders and hanging head. “Hey, Dash. I think I’ll be taking my Muffin now.”

Dinky groaned loudly. “Mommy, I’m tired an’ wanna go home. Pinkie and GrandAwesomom are too hyper.”

Derpy snorted. “They actually managed to wear you out? I’m impressed.” I helped Derpy slide Dinky onto her back.

Sparkler walked up to stand besides Derpy. She blinked in a way that spoke of how tired she probably was too. “Hey, Mom.” She nuzzled Derpy.

“And where have you been?” Derpy asked. Now that I thought about it, I didn’t even remember seeing her all day. I wondered what she had been up to all day.

Sparkler smiled lazily. “Oh, just hanging out with some friends. Enjoying the party. You know.”

Derpy stared at her older daughter for a moment before shaking her head. “Let’s just head home. Your sister needs to go to bed—and I do too, for that matter.” She nodded to me. “Thanks for watching over my Muffin in this mess.”

I stretched my shoulder, causing them to pop in response. The party had taken a lot out of me. “Yeah, sure thing. Ya know you can always count on me.”

We made our final goodbyes right as Applejack walked over to me with her own little sister on her back. Apple Bloom seemed content to sleep right there, and AJ had even draped her hat on her sister’s head. “Hiya, RD. Holdin’ up there?”

I gave her a confident smirk. “Pff, please, I’m a veteran at Pinkie’s and my mom’s parties.”

Applejack shrugged. “If ya say so. We’re headin’ home ‘bout now.”

I stretched my wings, being careful not to cause Scootaloo to fall off. “Hey, have ya seen Scoot’s parents anywhere? I didn’t see them at the party, and this filly looks like she needs a bed.” I honestly had no idea what Scootaloo’s parents looked like or where she lived now that I thought about it. It made it a bit awkward now that it was probably time for her to head home and turn in for the night.

AJ walked up to stand next to me. “If ya want, I can drop Scoot there back home considerin’ it’s on the way. Wouldn’t be the first time Ah’ve taken her home.”

After thinking about it for a moment, I nodded. AJ would take care of the squirt. Besides, I had something else I wanted to take care of. “Thanks, you’re a pal.”

Applejack took Scootaloo from my back. “Gotta keep my reputation as the most reliable pony in Ponyville somehow. Ya goin’ to be alright headin’ home yourself?”

I let out a big old yawn. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. Just need to find my parents and Pinkie. Ya know, the usual post-party clean up kind of stuff.”

“Don’t Ah know it.” AJ nodded to me and moved to leave. “See ya later, RD.”

“You too.” I took to the sky as AJ walked off to take care of her sister and Scootaloo, flying around the town for a bit before I found the ponies I was looking for. I glided down and landed back in the street. Pinkie and Awesomom were asleep, leaning against each other back-to-back in the street. Awesomom had a lampshade on her head while Pinkie looked like somepony had gone to town on her face with a permanent marker. I may or may not have known who had done that, and that’s all I’m saying about it.

“Are you doing alright, dear?” Cool-Mom asked. She was sipping on something in a mug while sitting near my fillyfriend and other mom.

I plopped down next to her. “I’m doing good. Holding up better then those two.” I pointed at our sleeping company. “How about you? Been a long day for you and all.”

Cool-Mom waved a hoof to dismiss my worries. “Oh, I’m doing fine. I’m a bit used to all this, you know.” She let out a long sigh. “Though I do have to admit I am getting a bit old to be going to parties quite this wild. Especially when your mother is all wired up on coffee. She is so impossible at times.” She poked me in the foreleg. “And I don’t want to hear any comments about my age, young lady.”

I wrapped my hooves around the back of my neck and leaned up against a post that had somehow survived the party. “Hey, you said it, not me.” I took in a long breath as I thought about the topic I needed to bring up with her. “Cool-Mom, there’s something I’ve been wanting to talk to you about.”

Cool-Mom’s ears swerved my direction. “Oh?”

“Yeah, um.” I closed my eyes as I thought through about how I wanted to say it. “Ya know how I got banged up at Flight Camp?”

“I do,” Cool-Mom said simply, giving me room to explain things.

“Yeah, and...” I had to take another long breath to steady myself. “My right eye was a bit more hurt then the doctors originally thought. Um, it’s been getting slowly worse. Over time.”

I felt Cool-Mom’s forelegs slowly wrap around me in a hug. I leaned into her, I’m sure it made her feel better. “How bad is it?”

I looked away from her. “I’m kinda partially blind in it.”

A pair of white legs hugged me from the other side. I guess she had gotten over her caffeine binge quicker than Pinkie. “Oh, Dashie,” Awesomom said. I could see tears dripping down her cheeks. “Why didn’t you tell us sooner?”

I moved a hoof slowly through the dirt under one of hooves. “I ... I don’t know. I didn’t want you two getting all worried about me. I thought I could just work through it. Didn’t want to get banned from being in the Wonderbolts because I had eye problems. But then a lot of stuff happened, and ... Pinkie and I talked about it. Talked to some doctors about it. I’m planning on getting surgery. Should fix the eye. But the docs said—” My throat seized up as I thought about it.

I felt a tremble work its way through my body as I thought about what the doctors had told me. It took me awhile to bring myself to continue. “They said I could go blind too.”

My parents hugged me more firmly from each side. Cool-Mom nuzzled my cheek. “Oh, Dash. You should’ve come to us sooner. We’re your parents.”

“I know, it’s just...” I trailed off. I hated talking about stuff like this. It was so much easier being awesome and making everypony proud of you. This? This sucked.

Awesomom pulled the lamp shade off her head to better look at me. “Don’t worry, we still love you. No matter what, we’ll always love you.”

Cool-Mom rubbed one of my forelegs. “And whatever happens, know that we are and always will be proud of you.”

“Thanks, that means a lot to me.” I took a moment to just let the two of them hug me. They were always good at the hugging thing. “So, I’m not scared or anything, but it would be nice if you two were at the hospital when—you know—I would just like...” I rubbed at the stinging sensation in my eyes. It was making my eyes all watery.

Cool-Mom gently shushed me and ran a hoof through my mane. “Don’t worry, we understand. We’ll be there for you, like we always have been.”

Awesomom placed a hoof on mine. “We love you, Dashie.”

I nearly choked up. “I love you too.”

Author's Note

I would like to give a big thanks to my always faithful helpers, Chengar Qordath and Comma-Kazie.

I would also like to thank my prereader staff Incidental Pegasus No. 5, Infinion, droplet739, fizzlefist, notMurphy, Garbo802, mrjerrio, q97randomguy, Pav Fiera, roflkneif, Vhett, and Swiftest Shadow for all the great work the do.

Epilogue- Parents are Magic

The Incredibly Embarrassing Parents of Rainbow Dash

Chapter 5: Epilogue- Parents are Magic

The first thing I noticed when I woke up was that I couldn’t see out of my right eye. I was blind. I couldn’t see. My heart raced as I shot up and put a hoof to my right eye in a panic. I fumbled at the bandage, trying to tear it off. Had I lost the eye? Were all my dreams over? Just like that? Did my stupid mistakes cost me everything? This wasn’t supposed to happen; it wasn’t supposed to be this way. A pair of hooves tried to gently pushed me back down. I resisted, fighting against the pressure. More hooves pressed against my body and keep me from flailing.

“Dashie, it’s okay!” a familiar voice said. I relaxed and stopped fighting the hooves that were trying to push me back into the bed. My left eye was still trying to blink away the blurriness from waking up. “Just relax, you’re okay. You’re just at the hospital, like you’re supposed to be.”

I sluggishly processed what was going on. I recognized the sterile rooms of the Ponyville Hospital. I’d seen enough of them to recognize them pretty quickly. Had I been in an accident? No. I was here for a reason. Right, the surgery for my eye. My hoof shot to my bad eye by reflex, but somepony kept me from doing so. “Careful,” said another familiar voice. “You don’t want to injure yourself.”

My good eye finally cleared, and the first ponies I saw were my parents. They looked down at me with concerned smiles. My brain eventually managed to work out something to say. “Awesomom? Cool-Mom?”

Awesomom rubbed my foreleg. “We’re here for you. You’re just waking up from the surgery. You remember?”

“Um, yeah,” I said through the haze. I tried to blink away the blurriness. “How did it go?”

Cool-Mom’s smile became warmer. “The doctors said it went well, but they will have to do tests to see if it actually worked. We sent Pinkie to get the nurse to remove that bandage, so we will see soon enough.” She ran a hoof along my cheek. “You’re being very brave right now, and we love you for that.”

Awesomom kissed me on the forehead. “Yeppers, you're our super-duper, awesomest, radical-cool daughter, and we wouldn't trade you for the world.”

“So I’m going to be able to see again?” I swallowed.

Awesomom and Cool-Mom exchanged a quick glance with one another. “Like I said, we’ll have to wait for the doctors to know for sure.” That wasn’t exactly the answer I wanted to hear. This was my life we were talking about here. If I would be able to join the Wonderbolts. If I would be able to see with my right eye again at all.

My concern must have shown, because Awesomom started nuzzling me. “It’ll be alright. You have your family and friends here to support you.”

I leaned back back into the bed and closed my good eye. “I know.”

We sat there for a while waiting for someone from the hospital to come. My parents kept assuring me that everything was going to be okay while I lay there waiting. It was nice to have the support of my parents, but I was still nervous. This just mixed two things I hated: waiting and hospitals.

My head snapped towards the door of my room when it opened. Nurse Redheart and Pinkie walked into the room and close the door behind them. Redheart picked up a chart sitting at the end of my bed and looked it over. “How are you feeling, Rainbow Dash?”

I shuffled around on the bed. “Um, okay I guess.”

She nodded and marked something on the chart. “Feeling any pain?”

“No, I’m fine.” I felt my patience wearing thin. “Listen, can we just cut off this bandage and see if I can see? I just wanna know.”

Redheart let out a patient sigh. “Very well. If there isn’t anything immediately wrong, we can skip ahead for now.” She pulled out a pair of scissors. “But I want your full cooperation from now on.”

I crossed my forelegs. “Fine, just get this bandage off of me!”

“Dash, please respect the fine nurse,” Cool-Mom chastised me. “She’s just doing her job.”

I rolled my eye, but decided that shutting up would get me the results I wanted faster. Luckily, Redheart went to work cutting off the bandage. I kept my eye closed as the bandage was slowly removed. Awesomom, Cool-Mom, and Pinkie looked on, with a mixture of hope and fear.

I felt Redheart pull the last of the bandages from my eye. “Now if you’ll slowly open your eye.”

I slowly opened my right eye. I blinked in reaction to the sudden light, my vision blurry. For a long moment, I was worried that there was something wrong with my eye before it finally focused. Everything seemed fine, normal even—better than normal, great! I could actually see clearly out of my right eye again! No stupid blind spot that caused me to crash into things.

Redheart watched me as I blinked and looked around. “So how does it look?” Everypony in the room focused on me, waiting for my reply.

I put on a big, happy grin. “I can see again, Nurse!” The next thing I knew, I was being buried under a pile of ponies and hugs. Everypony was talking at once and I couldn’t make out what anypony said.

“Okay, everypony off of my patient.” Redheart’s smile didn’t quite fit her serious tone. “I have some quick tests I want to run to make sure everything is alright. There will be some follow-up tests later, but we can get the basics out of the way now.”

I groaned. “Do we have to?” She gave me a glare that brought up a lot of bad memories of where being stubborn over hospital stuff had gotten me. I put my hooves up in surrender. “Okay, okay, fine. Let’s just get all this out of the way.”

Redheart gave a quick, firm nod. “Good. First let’s try the eye chart. And yes, we did get a new one just for you.” I rolled my eyes. Okay, so I had kinda cheated on this test for a few years. No need to rub it in. I bit down on my complaints and did as Nurse Redheart told me while we went through a variety of tests to make sure my eye was alright. With the final test she made another check on her clipboard. “Everything looks good with your eye. We’re going to hold you for a day just to make sure everything is fine, and I’m going to want you to wear an eyepatch for at least a week to help protect the eye from harm and minimize the risk for any complications.”

At least I would get to look like a pirate for a while. That was pretty cool. I looked up at the clock to see how long the stupid tests had taken. I swear, that thing was broken given how slow it moved. “Do I really have to stay at the hospital?” I groaned.

Redheart’s stony frown didn’t suggest she was going to give on this. “Surgery is a serious matter, Dash. We don’t want to risk any complications with your eye, now do we?”

Cool-Mom patted my foreleg. “They just want to hold on to you for a day. It’ll be over before you know it, and then you will be back out and doing your regular thing.” I crossed my forelegs and grumbled, but I decided not to argue about it. It wasn’t going to do me any good.

Pinkie nuzzled me. “Hey, all your friends are waiting outside. You want them to come in? That’ll get rid of that grumpy mood of yours.” She looked up at Redheart. “If that’s okay, that is.”

“Yeah, let them in,” I said. Anything that cut down on my boredom was a good thing.

“It’s fine, Pinkie.” Redheart opened the door leading to the hallway. “We’re still well within visiting hours.” She called out into the hallways, and my friends filed into the room. The hospital bedroom had seemed good-sized. That is, until about a half dozen ponies had been shoved into it, and everypony had to work their way around the bed to keep from being on top of one another.

Scootaloo, on the other hoof, had decided she couldn’t wait any longer and came bounding into the hospital room. “Rainbow Dash!” She narrowly crashing into the wall and jumped up. placing her forehooves on the bed. Words tumbled out of her mouth as she tried to ask every question she could all at once. “Are you okay? Can you see? Will you still be able to do tricks? Join the Wonderbolts? How about—”

I placed a hoof on the squirt’s mouth to stop the barrage of questions. “Whoa there, Squirt. One question at a time there. Ya gotta give even me a little bit of time to answer questions.”

Scootaloo blushed slightly. “Oh, right.”

Applejack gave me a reassuring smile. “So how ya doin’, sugarcube?”

I flashed her a confident grin. “Awesome as always; I can see everything with my right eye again.”

Rarity let out a relieved sigh. “That is wonderful news. We figured everything would be fine, but that didn’t keep us from fretting all the same.” Rarity and I had worked out our little issues where I had wrecked some of her stuff earlier. I’d paid for all the damages, and in the end agreed to try on some of her outfits. Then I cleaned out her gutters, went to the spa with her, and a bunch of other stuff to make her happy. Sometimes keeping a friend is hard.

“It certainly makes me feel better,” Derpy said. “Maybe I’ll finally secure the title of klutziest mare in Ponyville without you crashing into things as often.” She stuck her tongue out at me.

I couldn’t help but smile. “Ha-ha, Derpy. Real funny.”

Dinky hopped off of Derpy’s back and onto my bed. “I’ve been savin’ you a get-better hug aaall day.” She wrapped her forelegs around my chest and smiled up at me. “There. You feel better now?”

I ruffled Dinky’s mane. “Way better. Thanks.”

Sparkler worked her way to me and nuzzled me on the cheek. “I thought you were supposed to be super-fast or something? We've been waiting in the lobby forever.” I noticed the bags under her eyes as she yawned. Guess Sparky had been really worried.

I wrapped my right foreleg around her neck to add her to my hug with Dinky. “Hey, buck up, Sparky. I’m all good now.” She smiled and accepted the hug. It was kinda goofy and probably not really cool for either of us, but it seemed to make Sparky feel better.

“We’re just happy to hear that you’re okay.” Fluttershy said, giving me a hug as soon as Dinky and Sparkler was done. I had the feeling she wanted to hug me sooner, but didn’t want to push anypony out of the way, given she had to ask a few ponies if they would kindly move so she could get closer.

I gently pushed Fluttershy back. “Come on girls, you’re embarrassing me.”

Fluttershy took a step back away from me. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”

I resisted the urge to facehoof. “It’s fine, Fluttershy, really. I’m glad you’re all here.”

Twilight levitated a basket filled with flowers, candy, and a couple books over to me. “We got you a care package to keep your spirits up while you get better.” She levitated on the books towards me. “We got you the first couple books of the Young Daring Doo adventure series.”

I grabbed the book and looked over its cover. “Aren’t these a bunch of kids’ books?”

“Yes, but they’re still good books,” Twilight quickly defended. “Just because a book is written for children doesn’t mean an adult can’t enjoy it too. Just try the first book out. You’ll like them, trust me. Besides, you already read through all of the main books.”

That was true. You would think it would take awhile to go through a dozen or so books, but next thing I knew, I had read all the Daring Doo books available. Even the book filled with nothing but short stories. I shrugged and put the book back in the basket. “Eh, sure, I’ll give them a shot once visiting hours are over.” They had gone through the effort of buying me the books to start with. Not to mention the boredom would get to me eventually.

Cloud Kicker carefully put another care-basket on the small stand next to my bed. Have to admit, free stuff was really nice. I guess that was one positive thing to the whole surgery. “Got you a little something from the weather team too.” She gave me a light jab in the shoulder. Nothing that really hurt. Cloudy probably didn’t want to freak out my parents so soon after I got out of surgery. “Turns out that they’re all worried Blossom and I are going to launch some sort of coup with you gone and want you to get better as soon as possible.”

I returned the light punch. “Hey, you tell them I’m going to be back in action in no time flat.”

“Just make sure you’re all better when you do,” Blossomforth said. “Oh! And I have this for you.” She reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a rubber duckie and placed it on my bed.

“RadiQuack!” I grabbed my favorite bath toy and hugged it to my face, causing it to let out a long squeak. “You’re all better!” I was then suddenly very conscious of a whole room of ponies looking at me. There might have been a little bit of chuckling going on. I put RadiQuack down in my lap and played it cool. “I mean, um thanks, Blossomforth. For fixing RadiQuack. I know its just a silly fillyhood toy and stuff...”

Cloud Kicker punched me in the shoulder again. “Oh, just be happy to have your toy back. You’re in the hospital, nopony cares if you look dumb. We’ll only tease you relentlessly about it once you’re out of here.”

I fixed Cloud with my best glare. “I can really feel the love, ya know that?” I smiled as I gave Radiquack another squeeze. “But yeah, thanks, Blossomforth. This means a lot to me.”

Blossomforth snapped off a quick salute. “No problem. Took a bit of doing, but he’s good to go now.”

“Didn’t know you were the type who liked bath toys, RD.” AJ elbowed me gently. “Ah wonder what other things we don’t know about you?”

As if on cue, Cool-Mom pulled out on her albums. “Oh, I know, how about I show you some of Dash’s old photographs? We have quite a few of her playing in the bath. She was so precious, we had to all but pull her out of the bath to get her to stop and go to bed.”

“Mooom!” I probably would have tried to reach out to keep Cool-Mom from opening the album at the base of the bed for everypony to see, but Dinky was standing right between me and the embarrassing photographs.

“You got anything that shows how awesome Rainbow Dash is?” Scootaloo asked, wings buzzing.

Cool-Mom’s response was to pull out yet another album and place it on the bed. “Why yes, I just happened to have brought the album where we keep everything from all the competitions Dash has been to.”

Scootaloo took about a whole two seconds to open that album and start looking for it. “Wow, now this I have to check out.”

Awesomom ruffled my mane with a hoof. “Yes-siree! We’ve been to everything Dash has been in. Races, stunt competitions, athletic events, talent shows, you name it. Well, except for last year’s Best Young Flyers Competition. Rainie and I got super sick eating some way bad tacos once. Dashie wanted to rush over and stay at the hospital and skip the whole event, but Rainie and I agreed that it was super important to her and demanded she go ahead and compete. Besides, not like Rainie and I were getting far from the nearest toilet in the hospital anyways.”

Yeah, that was true. My parents had been to ... well, everything, now that I thought about it. I’d nearly panicked at the idea of them not coming to the Best Young Flyers. There had been a little bit of performance anxiety on my part as a result. Fluttershy and my other friends were cool and all, but they weren’t my parents. It was comforting to know that no matter how much I might screw up, they would still be there for me. Not that I ever screwed up, usually, but it’s still nice to know they had my back. Awesomom and Cool-Mom had always been there for me, for whatever I needed. Even now when I wasn’t at my best. Especially now.

Okay, so they'd pulled out the photo albums and passed them around and shared every. Last. Goofy. Story. From my fillyhood with my friends. All of them. But really, now that I think about it, it's not too different from me laughing at somepony I've just pranked—it's my way of saying 'check it out, I did this.'

And if that's their way of saying that about me, well ... y'know what? That's okay.

Author's Note

I would like to give a big thanks to my always faithful helpers, Chengar Qordath and Comma-Kazie.

Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling.

The Incredibly Embarrassing Parents of Rainbow Dash

Chapter 2: Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling, Darling.

I was sure of it now, Cool-Mom was trying to embarrass me to death.

“...and then poor Dash crashed face first into the clouds. Needless to say, her first attempt at flying didn’t turn out very well for her.” Cool-Mom covered her mouth as she let out a soft laugh. “Aw, but she was in such a miserable state. Only her cute little rump was sticking out of the clouds and she was crying for anypony to pull her out—she managed to bury herself so hard into the clouds Surprise had to dig her out.”

“Aw, that’s so sad.” Fluttershy didn’t sound that upset by my stupid first attempt to fly. “I hope she wasn’t hurt.”

Fluttershy giggled at my past misery as Cool-Mom gave a dismissive wave of her hoof. Yeah, I'm sure those were just her concerned giggles. “She gave us a bit of a scare with her stunt, but the worst she suffered were a few bruises. Not that you could tell by the way she was crying for her mommies to kiss her better.”

“Moomm! I did not!” I almost stopped flapping my wings at that. That was a bit of a problem considering I was currently pulling my parents’ cart with Cool-Mom and Fluttershy in it. But I got my wings working again and the cart only jerked enough to get a slight scowl from Cool-Mom.

Cool-Mom gave me a reassuring smile. “Oh now dear, you were still a filly at the time. Of course you wanted your mommies when you got a boo-boo. You were always getting into some sort of trouble as a child.”

Fluttershy gave another little laugh. “I think Rainbow Dash was being cute when she wanted her mommies.”

Ugh! Now Fluttershy was calling me cute! Cute! This was—something not cool. Like... negative coolness. A black hole of coolness.

I just wanted to get to Ponyville and get this flight over with.

Cool-Mom leaned my way and braced herself on the side of the cart. “Dashie, you’re going too fast again,” she said for what had to be the thousandth time. “Slow down, will you?”

I craned my head back towards my mom. “C’mon, Cool-Mom! We could’ve flown to Ponyville a dozen times by now if you’d just let me fly faster.”

Cool-Mom gave me that look of hers. The 'you're getting on my nerves, darling,' look that always comes out whenever I start complaining about her wanting to go too slow. “We’re not trying to win a race. Just learn to relax and enjoy the view for once. You’ll enjoy life more if you just take a few moments to sit back and reflect. Besides, Fluttershy and I are enjoying an absolutely delightful chat.”

Yeah, one filled with stuff about me that could in no way be used for blackmail. Not that Fluttershy would actually ever use those stories to tease me, but she might tell some of them to the other ponies in Ponyville... Nah, Fluttershy would never do anything to hurt anypony... on purpose...

“But—” I started to object.

“Daaash,” Cool-Mom said warningly. I slowed down.

Cool-Mom nodded to me and turned back to Fluttershy. “Now where were we? Oh yes, how about I tell you about Dash’s first day in school? Oh, the dear was so heartbroken to be separated from her mommies. She was just holding onto our legs crying, the poor thing.”

Fluttershy looked my way and smiled. “D’aw, you really do love your mothers, don’t you?”

I failed to suppress a groan. Why wouldn’t this day just end?

***

Mercifully, our trip to Ponyville finally ended. I don’t think I ever wanted to reach a destination more in my entire life. My wings had nearly seized up on a few times on the trip when Cool-Mom told Fluttershy a couple of things I didn’t want anypony to know about. Which in turn caused Cool-Mom to complain about the flight suddenly becoming bumpy. Today was just a no-win for me.

I circled the streets around the Ponyville spa to find a place to park the carriage. The streets were filled with a lot more ponies than usual and it was difficult to find a spot I could easily fly into and land.

Cool-Mom looked over the side of the cart and saw us pass by the spa. “Dash, don’t park too far from the spa.”

I tried to keep the annoyance out of my voice. “Alright, Cool-Mom.” The cart made a slow turn back towards the spa. I hated being unable to make a quick turn and flip like I normally would, but that would’ve been klutzy as hay with the cart, and would probably have made Cool-Mom mad. Flipping upside-down had already messed up her mane, and if I got scraped up again in town she’d make Fluttershy ‘help’ me again. In front of everypony there.

I finally found a place to set down next to some shop that sold furniture and quills. Cool-Mom looked down and frowned. “Don’t park here. It looks like it’s busy here, and I don’t want ponies bumping into the cart and scratching up its finish.”

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “Okay, fine.” After taking forever looking for another spot to land, I ended up having to settle for hovering over a spot near the spa long enough for everypony below to take a hint, and open up a spot for us to land. Now I was starting to remember why I’d never bothered with getting a cart of my own: the things were way too much of a hassle for me to want to deal with everyday.

Cool-Mom hopped out of the back of the cart and started to stretch out her limbs. “Oh, it’s so wonderful to be able to just fly around and enjoy the scenery. Do you two not think so?” Cool-Mom had of course insisted on taking the boring and slower scenic route to Ponyville. As if the trip hadn’t taken enough time already.

Fluttershy hopped off the cart and landed next to me. “Thanks for the ride.” She gave me an appreciative nod.

“Yeah, it’s cool.” I jerked at the straps tying me to the cart. My parents really needed to buy new straps. These old ones didn’t release right anymore.

Fluttershy tilted her head and frowned at me. “Are you okay? You look flustered.”

With a final hard pull I released myself from the stupid cart. “I’m fine.”

Fluttershy stepped up to stand right next to me. “Is it because your mom was telling me all those stories? I’m sorry if she embarrassed you, but she really does love you. She cherishes those memories of you. You should know that.”

I rolled my eyes and looked away from Fluttershy. “Yeah, yeah.”

Fluttershy walked around to look me in the eyes. Great, she was having one of her rare assertive moments. “I’m serious, Rainbow Dash.”

I rubbed at my face with a hoof. “I know, I know. Look, I just... wish she didn’t embarrass me so much.” Or Awesomom, though she at least hadn't broken out the photo albums. I think.

Fluttershy gave me a sympathetic smile. “That’s what parents do sometimes.” She moved besides me so that we could both look in Cool-Mom’s direction. “She just wants to spend some time with her little filly. Could you just try and enjoy yourself while they’re both here? I’m sure it would mean a lot to them both.” She gave me one of those sickeningly sweet smiles. Even a pony as awesome as me wasn’t immune to them.

I let out an exasperated sigh. It’s hard to say no to Fluttershy. “Okay, okay, fine. I’ll try. Can we just drop it already?”

“I just wanted to make sure you were alright.” She gave me a friendly, but totally not cool nuzzle.

“Hey! Not like—when we’re in public and stuff.” I grimaced and took a step away from Fluttershy. She put on a pained frown at my reaction. “Sorry—You know I don’t like the touchy-feely stuff out where everypony can see. It’s just... Look, it’s not your fault.” I decided that it would be best for me to put my hoof in my mouth instead of digging any deeper and hurting Fluttershy’s feelings anymore. “Let’s just head into the spa and relax. I promise to just try and enjoy myself. We cool?”

Fluttershy smiled. “We’re cool.”

“Are you coming, girls?” Cool-Mom stood by the entrance of the spa. “I must say, I’m looking forward to little pampering.”

“Coming, Cool-Mom.” I trotted up to the door and opened up the door for the two of them.

Who knows? Maybe a trip to the spa would actually be relaxing.

***

Okay, so the backrubs at the spa were kinda nice. The ponies on the weather team were always talking about how great it was to get a nice back rub after a tough day of cloud-pushing. Lying there on a table while one of the spa sisters worked all the tension out of my back and wings, I could feel what they meant. I might have to make this a regular thing. The Wonderbolts were supposed to have their own physical trainers who did stuff like this for them, so maybe there was something to this.

Cool-Mom sat neck deep in a mud bath while the other spa sister gave her a hoofacure. She smirked at me as I let the pony work out the various tensions in my back. “Aren’t you enjoying yourself?”

I gave a slight shrug. “Meh, I guess it’s alright.”

Fluttershy leaned against the side of the hot tub. “I think it’s wonderful. Thank you for paying for us, Mrs. Rainbow Dash. You really didn’t have to; I would have paid for myself.”

Cool-Mom gave a dismissive wave of her hoof. “Don’t you worry your head about it, darling. It’s my pleasure to treat the two of you. Surprise and I don’t get to see Dash nearly enough, and it’s been ages since we last saw you. Spending time with the two of you is as much of a treat to myself as anything, and well worth the cost of a measly little spa visit.”

“I really do appreciate it,” Fluttershy said.

I let out a content sigh as another knot was worked out of my back. “Yeah, thanks, Cool-Mom.” It was kinda nice for Cool-Mom to pay for everything.

I was really starting to relax, my eyes began drifting shut when I heard a familiar voice. “Hey Rainbow, how ya doing?” I felt a rough slap on my back and my eyes snapped open. I raised my head to see a lavender pony standing over me.

My eyebrows rose at seeing my friend and co-worker. “Cloud Kicker, what’re you doin’ here?” Quickly scanning around, I also saw that Blossomforth was standing to the side of Cloud Kicker. I guess they had come to the spa together.

Cloud Kicker looked back at Blossomforth. “We decided to come to the spa to relax a bit. After being down with the feather flu, Blossom’s ready to start feeling like a pony again.”

Like a bunch of the pegasi around Ponyville, Blossomforth had been put out of action by the feather flu at pretty much the worst possible time: right as we were getting ready for Tornado Day. It had been a major bummer to say the least. I’d hoped to break the Tornado Day record, but so many ponies like Blossomforth getting sick pretty much shot that in the hoof.

Blossomforth gave me a friendly wave. “Good to see you, Rainbow Dash.” Looking at her, it was pretty obvious that she was recovering from the feather flu. She was still regrowing a lot of feathers and she had the whole tired look you usually saw in ponies bouncing back from getting sick.

Fluttershy smiled warmly at Cloud Kicker and Blossomforth from her bath. “It’s nice to see you two.” The two of them also nodded and greeted Fluttershy.

“Hiya, Blossomforth.” I gave her a friendly nod. “Nice to see you on your hooves again. If you’re up to it I can drop some paperwork off for you to work on. That way you can get paid for some work while you finish getting better.”

Blossomforth put on a wry smirk. “And I’m sure this has nothing to do with how much you hate paperwork?”

I grinned back at her. “Nope, just pure, one-hundred-and-twenty-percent me lookin’ out for you.” Yeah, okay, I hated paperwork. It’s the big reason why I kept turning down that desk job in Cloudsdale. I just wanted to get out and do what I was awesome at: flying. “You up for it?”

Blossomforth gave a light shrug. “That sounds good. I think I’ve just about used most of my sick days getting over that stupid flu, so I’d appreciate any hours you can spare.”

“Cool. I’ll drop the stuff off at Cloud Kicker’s when I get the chance.” Her hanging out at CK's house while she recovered was totallyjust because Blossomforth didn't have any family nearby, I’m sure. She was still too sick for anything... else.

Cloud Kicker gave me another friendly pat on the back. “So, what brings you to the spa house, boss? You aren’t exactly the type who normally enjoys the whole pampering thing.”

I gave a slight shrug. “My moms are visiting Ponyville, and Cool-Mom wanted to come to the spa.”

“Yoohoo, Cloud Kicker.” Cool-Mom waved to get Cloud Kicker’s attention. “It’s a pleasure to see you again, darling.”

Cloud Kicker gave me a mischievous grin and winked at me. “Hello, ma’am,” she said while she trotted her way over to Cool-Mom. She lifted her hoof up and gave it a kiss. “You’re looking as lovely as ever.”

Cool-Mom giggled like a schoolfilly. “And you’re a flatterer, as always.”

“Cloud Kicker, please stop hitting on my mom.” She always did this whenever she met my parents. Well, ever since we patched things up a few years ago. Things had of course been strained between her and them after the whole Flight Camp incident, but they had become more comfortable around one another since them. Too comfortable, sometimes.

“Don’t get all upset, Dash.” Cloud Kicker gave Cool-Mom a sultry smile. “I’m just complimenting a lovely mare.”

Cool-Mom made a slight shooing motion. “Oh stop, you’re embarrassing me.”

Cloud Kicker continued to lay on with the sweet talk in a seductive tone. “But I’m serious, you take such great care of yourself. I swear you look more like Rainbow’s older sister then her mother.” She raised her eyebrows. “Her sexy, older sister.”

I felt my anger stir as Cloud Kicker continued to push. That’s my mom for goddess’ sake! “Hey, don’t make me kick your flank, cloud-butt.”

“Rainbow Dash!” Cool-Mom’s voice cut through the air and made me flinch. “I will not hear you use such language with another pony!”

Awesomom burst forth from the mud Cool-Mom had been lying in. “Yeah! We told you not to get into any more fights!” Her sudden entrance caused Cool-Mom to flinch and back up against the far side of the pool. I guess even after all these years, Awesomom could still get the drop on her. I suppose that shouldn’t be a—well, surprise, given her name.

And then I realized that I had, once again, screwed up. I, of course, hadn’t been serious about really getting into a fight with Cloud Kicker, and I’m sure Cloud Kicker knew that. We were always joking around with one another. But... Awesomom and Cool-Mom were probably still sensitive about me having to spend a couple of days on life support. There wasn’t much to do other then backpedal hard to avoid upsetting my parents anymore.

“Hey, um...” I tried to get my brain to form the words to apologize. I suck at apologies. “Cloud Kicker, I didn’t mean it. Ya know that, right?” I looked over and still saw my parents looking at me with disapproval. Crap, not good enough yet. “So, um, I don’t really want to kick your flank. Sorry... is what I’m trying to say.”

Cloud Kicker glanced at my parents before smiling at me. “Hey, don’t worry about it. We’re cool, right Rainbow?”

She extended a hoof to me and I bumped it. “Yeah, we’re cool.”

Cloud Kicker turned back towards my parents and rubbed the back of her neck. “So, Mrs. Surprise, I didn’t know you were there.”

Awesomom crossed her forelegs over her chest. “Well duh, of course you didn’t. I was trying to catch you off-guard there. And did you think you could hit on my lovely Rainie without giving me an equal amount of non-serious flirting?”

“Um,” Cloud Kicker stumbled while trying to think of a reply to what Awesomom considered logic. “You’re—um, you look great in mud?”

Awesomom moved her hoof in a circular motion to encourage Cloud Kicker to continue. Given how long it was taking for Cloud Kicker to do her thing, I guessed Awesomom’s sudden entrance had broken the part of Cloud Kicker’s brain that was focused on banging. Which was probably most of it. Zing!

Cloud Kicker finally seemed to get over the derailment of her brain, because she gave me that evil smirk of hers again as she made some mental calculations about… how close… Awesomom had been to Cool-Mom... Oh no. “Now that’s what I call getting down and dirty.” I just know she was egging me on when she stepped a bit closer to them. “Room for one more in there?”

Awesomom firmly nodded her head at Cloud Kicker. “That’s better.” Then like the flip of a switch, she tossed aside her serious expression and jumped out of the mud to grasp Cloud Kicker in a rib-crushing hug. “Howya doin,’ Cloudy?”

“Pretty good,” Cloud Kicker wheezed out. She smiled painfully when Awesomom intensified the hug with another squeeze. She also got more than a fair bit of mud on Cloud Kicker’s coat. “You know me, kicking clouds, banging, the usual stuff.”

Awesomom let go of Cloud Kicker, who nearly fell to the floor after being released from her deathhug. “Good to hear.”

Fluttershy’s jaw had been hanging for a bit before her brain clicked back into place. “How long were you in that mud? I never even saw you come in.”

Awesomom gave a nonchalant shrug. “I don’t know. I lost count at a number and got bored, so instead I started playing with this rubber duckie.” She reached into the mud and pulled out said rubber duckie that looked somewhat familiar. She looked at the toy with a disappointed frown. “Bath toys don’t work as well in mud though. Just kinda makes them really dirty.” She squeezed on the toy, but instead of making the usual squeaking noise, it just kinda pathetically burbled as some mud squirted out of it.

Cool-Mom frowned at the Awesomom. “Dear, that isn’t one of Dashie’s old bath toys, is it?”

Awesomom quickly hid the rubber duckie behind her back and gave Cool-Mom an apologetic smile. “Um, oops?”

I cringed when I finally recognized my rubber duckie. I jumped to my hooves. “Awesomom! Did you mess up one of my old toys?!” I flew over and swept my toy from Awesomom’s hooves. “RadiQuack, are you okay!?” I gave him a squeeze, and he let out another sad, slurpy wheeze. Some little part of my fillyhood died right there in my hooves.

Cool-Mom somehow managed to stare at Awesomom with even more disapproval. “Surprise! You ruined one of our sweet Dashie’s favorite toys!”

Awesomom’s ears fell flat on her head. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to! It just happened!”

Cloud Kicker covered her mouth and snickered. “Really, Rainbow? RadiQuack? That’s cheesy even for you.”

I gave Cloud Kicker a death glare that should have killed her on the spot. “Hey! RadiQuack is cool, and awesome, and...” Cloud Kicker snickered again. I sat down and looked away with indifference. “Not that I care, because it’s not a huge deal... Because I’m a grown mare now... And it’s just a silly toy...” I’m too old to care about this type of thing. Obviously.

Blossomforth walked up and gave RadiQuack a quick once over. “I might be able to fix it for you, if you want. It wouldn’t be a problem if it means a lot to you.”

I rubbed the back of my head. “Um, yeah, I guess that be cool. Not that it’s like a huge deal or anything. But it would be awesome if you did that. You know, as awesome as fixing some rubber duckie can be.” Yeah, I totally sounded cool. I’m a grown mare and could have thrown the dirty thing away. Really. It’s just... I didn’t want to throw away RadiQuack. For reasons.

“It’s not a problem, Dash.” Blossomforth reached out and I reluctantly let her pull RadiQuack up out of my hooves. She put him away in her saddle bag. “Don’t worry, he’s in good hooves. I’ve fixed worse.”

I shuffled a bit on my hooves. “Yeah, thanks. Just—you know—be careful. Because... I don’t want you to hurt yourself... fixing RadiQuack... or something.”

Blossomforth put on an amused smirk. “I’m sure I’ll be fine. It’s just rubber.”

I ran a hoof through my mane in a way that showed how cool and unconcerned I was. “Yeah, right, no biggie. Just had RadiQuack since I was a filly. So—”

I was interrupted when a white blur sped at me. “Oh, Dashie, I’m so sorry!” I barely had time to react before Awesomom wrapped her forehooves around my neck in a deathhug. “I’m really sorry I broke one of your favorite toys!” The sudden weight around my neck caused me to lose my balance, and I fell headfirst into the mud that my parents were in. After a few seconds of disorientation, I managed to figure out which way was up and resurfaced.

I hacked and coughed as I tried to get the mouthful of the wet dirt out of my throat. “Oops, sorry,” I heard Awesomom say. I wiped the mud from my eyes and saw her giving me an apologetic smile. There really wasn’t anything I could think of to say to her.

Cool-Mom let out a huff as she rubbed off a fleck of mud that she must have gotten hit by when I fell in. “Really you two—this is a spa, not a gymnasium.”

I pointed a hoof at Awesomom. “She started it.”

Cool-Mom rolled her eyes. “Aren’t you a little old to be doing that?”

“Like she’s ever going to grow up,” said Cloud Kicker. “I think she’s going to be a hundred and be talking like she’s still in school.”

I hefted myself out of the mud. “Hey, if you want to grow old, crusty, and uncool, then that’s your choice.” I slammed a muddied hoof onto my chest. “I’m goin’ to be awesome ‘til the day I die.”

“Speaking of growing up,” Cool-Mom interrupted. “I have to say, Cloud Kicker, you and your friend Blossomforth do seem to be getting along quite well.”

Both of them stiffened at Cool-Mom’s comment. I didn’t understand all that was going on between Cloud Kicker and Blossomforth... and Derpy... and Fluttershy too, but I knew it was a bit of a complicated mess right now.

Cloud Kicker rubbed at one of her forelegs. “Um, yeah, thanks. Blossom and I have been good friends for years.”

Cool-Mom gave the two of them a knowing smirk. “Good to hear, darling. Are you finally starting to domesticate now? I must say, your friend would make quite the catch if that is so.”

“What?! No, I mean—” Cloud Kicker looked back and forth indecisively between Blossomforth and Fluttershy, and then back to Cool-Mom. Blossomforth seemed to be trying way too hard to not look at Cloud Kicker and Cool-Mom as they talked.

Cool-Mom put on a concerned frown. “Is everything okay? You look flustered.”

Cloud Kicker cleared her throat with a loud cough. “Oh, we’ve just been PFF’s for a long time.”

“Yeah, we’re just friends,” said Blossomforth with less than total enthusiasm.

“Cloud Kicker really is a good friend.” Fluttershy’s face took on a light blush as she smiled. “You can tell by how she helped take care of Blossomforth while she was sick. She really looks out for her as a friend.”

Blossomforth opened her mouth as though to say something, but she stopped before any words formed. Instead she looked down at the floor before speaking. “Right, she’s a good friend.”

Cloud Kicker looked at Blossomforth and bit her lower lip. It looked like she wanted to say something, but her usual confidence seemed to fail her here.

Jeez, looking at Cloud Kicker and Blossomforth, it’s like Cool-Mom had just asked the two of them about a recently-deceased grandmother.

“I see,” Cool-Mom expressed without conviction. “That’s good to hear. I know how nasty that feather flu can be, given I’ve had to take care of my darlings more than once because of that nasty bug.”

“Yeah, that’s me. Always looking out for my friends.” Cloud Kicker gave Blossomforth a strained smile, but Blossomfoth didn’t return it and just looked away.

The unwelcomed tension was thankfully reduced when one of the spa sisters stepped up to me. “Madame, would you like to have your hooficure now?”

While I was happy for the distraction from whatever it was that was going on between Cloud Kicker and Blossomforth, I didn’t like what I was being offered. “Nah, I don’t really want one.”

“Come on, Dash,” Cool-Mom pleaded. “You really need to let these wonderful ponies have a go at your hooves. You simply won’t regret it.”

The other spa sister stepped up to me with a file in her mouth and gave me an expectant look. I cringed slightly away from her. “I’m good. Besides, I don’t like ponies touching my hooves.”

Cool-Mom let out an exasperated sigh. “This isn’t about your hooves being ticklish is it? Really, darling, you need to get over such silly fillyhood things.”

“Ticklish hooves you say?” Cloud Kicker gave me a smile that screamed of all sorts of bad intentions. She started to stalk my direction. “Dash, you never told me you had ticklish hooves. Now this I have to try out. ”

“Wh-what? No I don’t!” I slowly backed away from Cloud Kicker and looked around for an exit. I spun towards the main door to the spa’s entry lounge, but Cloud Kicker quickly rushed forward block my line of sight to it.

Awesomom blew a raspberry. “Of course you do, Dashie. You’ve always been ticklish all over the place since you were a foal.”

Cloud Kicker continued her slow stalk of me as I tried to back away to find an escape. Unfortunately, there weren’t many places where I could easily fly to get away from her. “Oh really? Tell me more.”

“Okay!” Awesomom was being irritatingly bubbly for giving away my ticklish secrets. “She’s ticklish in the leg pits, along the upper half of the sides of her neck, all along her belly, and—”

My head snapped to face Awesomom. “Awesomom! Stop telling her everywhere I’m—”

Cloud Kicker took advantage of me being distracted to pounce on me. She was lucky. If I had been paying attention she never would’ve caught me. Never in a hundred years. But she was stupidly lucky, and we both wrestled on the ground as Cloud Kicker tried to tickle me. Cloud Kicker’s stupid Guard training meant she had a pretty good idea of how to pin a pony down. That and because of ... reasons, I was suddenly very aware of now that she had me pinned down in a very compromising position. A position I probably shouldn’t be in with another pony now that I had a fillyfriend, or, y’know, in front of my moms.

Cloud Kicker finally rolled me around on the floor so that she could yank at one of my forelegs and use its leverage to keep me pinned facedown to the floor. “There! Now let’s see how ticklish you are!” She ran her hoof along the flat of mine and I exploded with laughter.

I found myself paralyzed by the tickling. “Stop! Stop! Somepony help me!”

My vision was suddenly filled with a mass of pink. “Ohh! That looks like fun! Can I join?” Pinkie Pie looked down at the two of us with a expression of pure, foalish joy.

Cloud Kicker grinned wickedly at Pinkie’s question. “Sure.” While I was distracted by Pinkie—and I really needed to stop being distracted by other ponies when Cloud Kicker was up to something—Cloud Kicker flipped me onto my back while still holding my foreleg and scissored her rear legs around my leg and across my chest. “You want to get her stomach and anywhere else you can find while I get her hoof?”

“What!? No!” I protested loudly. I redoubled my struggle to get out of Cloud Kicker’s grapple.

“Okie dokie lokie!” Pinkie chirped happily. She pulled a giant feather from someplace I couldn’t see and the both of them started to tickle me.

I laughed uncontrollably thanks to all the tickling. “Pinks! I’m your fillyfriend, not her! Get Cloud Kicker!”

Pinkie slapped herself along the side of her head as though she had just forgotten something. “Well duh! C’m’ere Cloudy.”

She waved her feather threateningly at Cloud Kicker, and her eyes widened as we turned the tables on her. Her grapple, while it held me down, left her almost completely defenseless against Pinkie. Pinkie quickly moved across Cloud Kicker’s body as she tried to find some part of her that was particularly ticklish.

Cloud Kicker fought against giggling as Pinkie worked her over. Cloud Kicker tried rolling me around to use me as a shield against Pinkie.“You're not getting me that easily, you turncoat.”

I started to work my way out of Cloud Kicker’s grapple. “Get her Pinks! Don’t let up!” I finally managed to get my forelegs around Cloud Kicker’s head to get her in a headlock, and I used the leverage to hold her still for Pinkie. Pinkie happily took the opportunity I gave her to tickle Cloud Kicker like crazy.

Cloud Kicker started to laugh uncontrollably and I held her down on the floor. Despite the fact I, well we, were winning, Cloud Kicker smiled up at me. “Hey Dash, if I knew it was this easy to get you two to pin me down, I would have done this a long time ago.”

“Gah!” I jumped off of Cloud Kicker and hovered in the air away from her. She just had to go and be weird again. “No fair doin’ that!”

Cloud Kicker gave a sultry smirk. “All’s fair in love and tickle wars.” In a flash, she rolled over and made a grab for Pinkie’s feather, but my fillyfriend quickly hopped out of her reach. Yeah, good luck to anypony trying to get the drop on Pinkie Pie.

I watched as Cloud Kicker stood up, and the three of us faced one another. We each eyed each other warily. Well, Cloud Kicker and I were eyeing each other warily. Pinkie was her usual happy self as she wagged her rump and tail excitedly. Looked like we were in a standoff.

I was considering my next move when I noticed another pony enter the spa. I turned my eyes but not my head so that Cloud Kicker wouldn’t jump me again (see, I can learn eventually!).

I saw Rarity give the three of us a disapproving frown. “Really, what is all this roughhousing going on? This is an establishment intended for primping and pampering, not such—” she let out a disgusted groan— “uncultured activities.”

“C’mon, we’re just havin’ some fun, Rarity,” I protested. The Ponyville spa really could stand to be a bit cooler, now that I thought about it.

“She does have a point,” Cool-Mom chastised. “The spa is supposed to be a place to relax, not someplace where you can wrestle around like a couple of barbarous Diamond Dogs. I mean, really.”

Rarity nodded in firm agreement. “Exactly right, Rainbow Da—Wahaha!” Rarity nearly jumped out of her skin when she got a good look at Cool-Mom. She frantically looked back and forth between me and my parent. “I—you—both of you—”

I gave Rarity a grin. “What’s the matter, seeing a double Rainbow?” Okay, so sometimes I liked to play with other ponies’ heads with how much Cool-Mom and I looked alike. It’s either that or just get frustrated. So I might as well go with the option that causes the most fun when I can.

“My word...” Rarity paused for a moment as she looked between Cool-Mom and I. “The similarities are uncanny. Between you and...” She stopped and waved her hoof in a circle.

“Rainbow Dash, darling,” Cool-Mom offered. She gave that knowing smirk for when she played this game. We’ve played it more than once since I was born. That’s for sure.

Rarity shook her head. “No, I mean your name. Rainbow Dash and I are good friends, and have known each other for years now.”

Cool-Mom nodded her head. “Right, my name is Rainbow Dash.”

Awesomom put her hoof by her mouth and whispered conspiratorially to Rarity. “They have the same name. Because, you know, I wasn’t lazy when filling out the paperwork at the hospital when Dashie was born. Nope-eriee”

Rarity blinked a couple of times as she processed that information. “Oh, I see. Well far from me to say how a pair of proud parents should name their foal.” She stepped up to give Cool-Mom a look over. “Just look at her. I mean sure, she obviously takes much greater care of her mane and coat. Actually uses makeup, and quite well if I do say so. And oh... her hooves do look quite well-manicured and feature quite the nice pair of horseshoes. But besides the cosmetics, it’s quite obvious the two of you are related.”

Cool-Mom played with her mane smugly and smiled. “Our Dashie really does take after her mothers. Isn’t that so, Surprise?”

“Yepper-deppeers!” Awesomom rocketed out of the mud to land besides me. She wrapped her forehooves around my neck, caking on another layer of mud onto my coat, and gave me a big nuzzle on the cheek. “She got my wings,” she said proudly. She gave her own wings a couple of flaps, showering everypony with flecks of mud. “In case you didn’t notice. Because Rainie is an earth pony, and I’m a pegasus, so you know... genetics.”

“Oh yes, the similarities between your wings are quite obvious,” Rarity offered. Were our wings that similar? Never really thought about that type of thing. Seems weird to look at another pegasus’s wings like that. Not that ponies like Cloud Kicker would ever shut up about that type of thing sometimes.

Rarity’s eyes widened as the other horseshoe dropped. “Oh my word, two mothers! Rainbow Dash, you never told me you were a love foal!”

I shrugged. “It’s not a big deal.”

“Not a big deal!?” Rarity pouted. “Of course it is a big deal. To think your parents love one another enough to inspire the Power of Love and give birth to you. Nothing wrong with a stallion and a mare doing what needs to be done to create a foal of course. Or the other ways, but how you came to be is quite special. Don’t you think?”

I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. “It happens.” Jeez, why did Rarity have to make such a big deal about the whole Power of Love thing? The way she was going on about it, you would think its some big, huge thing.

Rarity puckered her lips at my response. “Oh Dash, you really don’t appreciate how special and lovely this is. I simply don’t understand why you never told me about your parents.”

“Yes, why didn’t you mention us to your friend?” Cool-Mom asked, with more than a hint of disapproval.

“Um, yeah, about that...” I rubbed the back of my neck. I couldn’t exactly tell my parents that they embarrassed me to the point I didn’t want to be seen in public with them. I didn’t want to hurt their feelings. It wasn’t like I was ashamed of them or anything. They just tended to make me look uncool. “It just never came up in conversation with Rarity.”

“Oh, now that just isn’t true.” Rarity gave a vigorous shake of her head. “You could have told me at any time we were together or with our other friends.”

“I guess I just didn’t think about it,” I said in a way that sounded weak even to my ears. Crap, I’m never good with talking my way out of stuff like this.

“Well then.” Cool-Mom stood up in the mud. “I’m afraid this is simply a matter that we are going to have to correct right away. We must simply spend some time together... I’m sorry, what was your name?”

Rarity proudly put a hoof onto her chest. “Rarity, a pleasure to meet you, darling.”

“Rarity...” Cool-Mom rolled the name off her tongue as though testing how it sounded. “A pleasure to meet you too. This is my wife, Surprise.” She waved a hoof toward the mud bath, but she turned to see that Awesomom was no longer there. She looked at the last spot Awesomom had been and frowned. “Well this was where she would have been if she hadn’t scampered off to somewhere. She is quite prone to do such things. One of those little things I’ve grown to love her for. Even if it is a bit annoying.”

“It’s quite alright,” Rarity said primly. “No need to apologize. I’m sure I’ll get the opportunity to meet with her later if I’m with you long enough.”

“Quite.” Cool-Mom tapped her lips with her hoof. “Hm, Rarity, would you happen to be the Rarity of Carousel Boutique?”

Rarity stood up and took up a pose that screamed sophistication. “Why yes, I don’t suppose you have heard of my work?”

“Of course I have, darling.” Cool-Mom almost laid a hoof on Rarity’s shoulder but stopped when she saw that it was still covered in mud. “Oops, sorry.” She giggled and gave Rarity an apologetic smile. “Anyways, you’re an up-and-comer in the fashion world. I’ve been following your work for a couple of years now, and I must say, I was absolutely in love with your last fall lineup. ”

Rarity put on a smile that looked pretty darn smug to me. “That’s very flattering to hear. It is always rewarding to hear one’s work being appreciating.”

Ugh, I forgot how similar Cool-Mom and Rarity were. Both being pretty, frou-frou dress makers, obsessed with fashion, and talking in that way you don’t hear anypony talk like outside of the fancy-nobly types in Canterlot. Thank Celestia there's nopony who's exactly like Awesomom. I don’t think Equestria could take two of her.

“Please, I must see your boutique.” Cool-Mom motioned to her mud covered body. “If you will just grant me the time to clean up, I would like to leave without too much delay.”

Rarity primly ran her hoof through her mane. “Of course. I’ll just get a raincheck for my appointment here at the spa.”

Cool-Mom trotted over to one of the baths to clean off the mud. “If it’s not too much trouble, I would really appreciate it.” She jumped into the bath and started to wash the mud off.

I finally saw my opportunity to get away and get a few minutes to just fly around to clear my head and maybe take a nap. It was always a good time to take a nap. “So I guess it would be cool for me to go while you hang out with Rarity then?”

Cool-Mom climbed out of her bath, now clean of mud, and smiled at me. “Of course not. I was hoping to see how your friend’s dresses look on you. It has been ever so long since I was given the opportunity to see you in a proper dress.”

Rarity suppressed a little squee. “That does sound wonderful. It’s so rare I get to try new designs out on a pony with such a unique mane.”

I tried to think of a way to get out of playing dress up at Rarity’s for Celestia only knows how many hours. Cool-Mom’s marathon dress-wearing sessions could last forever when I was a filly. “No, really, I’m good.”

“Oh, don’t be like that.” Cool-Mom said while drying herself off with a towel. “This is an opportunity for some mother-daughter bonding we haven’t had in forever.”

Rarity started walking around me and giving me a cursory look-over. “And really, you do clean up quite nicely when you let me give you a makeover.” I could just see her dressing me with her eyes. It was kinda creepy.

“There’s no getting out of this, is there?” I whispered to Rarity.

“You make this sound like a bad thing.” Rarity nuzzled me on the cheek. “Just you wait, we’ll fix your mane right up into something stylish.” I flinched away from Rarity’s nuzzle. I had enough trouble with Pinkie and my parents touching me like that, much less Rarity. Why did everypony have to be so touchy as of late?

Now dried off, Cool-Mom walked up to add her own opinions on how to bore me over the next few hours. “Oh, and it’s always divine to try and find an outfit that matches her mane and eyes.”

As the two of them started going into how to dress me up, I couldn’t help but groan and rub my face. It looked like I was doomed to face hours of tedious boredom.

***

It’s kinda hard not to notice a five-story-tall curtain wall that had suddenly blocked off a fifth of Ponyville. Especially when it blocked some of the streets to the Carousel Boutique. It didn’t help that the streets were almost completely filled with ponies as Cool-Mom, Rarity, Fluttershy, and I tried to navigate through them. Cloud Kicker and Blossomforth had decided to stay at the spa considering that was what they were out in town to do in the first place while Pinkie and Awesomom had ran off to continue preparing for their party.

I would normally have said that flying would have been an easier way to get around Ponyville, but when I looked up, the sky was starting to look like rush hour in Cloudsdale. I could see a big difference in how much traffic there was from even an hour ago.

On a guess, I stopped by some mare who I didn’t recognize. “Hey, what’re you here for?”

The mare’s ears perked when I spoke to her. “Oh, I’m here for the party. I got this invitation the other day for what’s supposed to be a great party.” She looked around at the mass of ponies surrounding us. “And based on how many ponies showed up, it should be great. I tried to peek under the curtain earlier, but a creepy, pink mare poked her head at me and gave me one of the meanest stares I’ve ever seen. She just glared at me and pointed to a sign saying ‘Party at 7 pm, Please Be Patient.’ I decided it was just best to wait out here until it’s time for the party.”

“Yeah, great,” I said with less than perfect conviction. What exactly were Pinkie and Awesomom up to? Besides the obvious. It seemed the two of them had been serious about inviting a lot of ponies over for this party for my parents. “Thanks for the info.”

Fluttershy looked around nervously at all the ponies surrounding her. “Oh my, there’s so many ponies here all of a sudden.”

I wrapped a wing around Fluttershy to comfort her. “Hey, you okay there?”

Rarity trotted up to the other side of Fluttershy and gave her a reassuring smile. “Yes, this isn’t too much for you, is it?”

She gave a slight nod of her head and leaned up against me. “Yes, I think I’ll be alright once we get to Rarity’s. Ponyville just usually isn’t this busy.”

I swiveled my head around slowly at the mass of ponies to look for the best way to work through them. “Yeah, looks like Pinks has really outdone herself if all of these ponies are here for the party later today.”

Rarity bumped into the side of a stallion as she tried to make a bit of headway through the crowd for Fluttershy and quickly apologized to him. “I would say so. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many ponies in town.”

We finally managed to work our way through the streets to get to Rarity’s house and place of business. Rarity opened the door and invited all of us inside. “There, is that better, everypony?”

Fluttershy let out a sigh of relief. “Oh yes, much better. But shouldn’t you be keeping your doors open for business instead of entertaining your friends? There are so many ponies in town right now.”

“That’s very thoughtful of you, darling, but I’ll manage. I figure most of the ponies visiting today would just want to spend time window shopping instead of actually looking to buy anyway. Besides, it’s a rare opportunity when I get to meet one of my very good friend’s parents.”

Yeah, I know for a fact Rarity was looking for an opportunity to put another one of her dresses on me. Just like she always did for everypony. Cool-Mom was kinda the same too. I can’t tell you how many times I had to try on outfits as a filly and let Cool-Mom take pictures of me. Either for her family albums or to help advertise for her shop.

Cool-Mom was walking around the Boutique and looking at everything. “I must say, I find this place absolutely darling. The colors, the architecture, it all flows together and makes for a rather lovely atmosphere.”

Rarity trotted up to Cool-Mom and gave her an appreciative smile. “You really think so, darling? I put more than a fair share of thought and bits to get it all quite right, and I always worried that it was a bit much.”

“Oh, no-no-no, darling, it is quite wonderful.” Cool-Mom put a hoof on Rarity’s withers. “You should see some of the shops in Canterlot and Manehatten. Now there are some gaudy affairs. Some look like they would fit better in a circus rather than a place for ponies to buy outfits. They are clearly trying too hard.”

Rarity let out a haughty huff. “Don’t I know it. They try so hard to be noticed that they sacrifice style for substance. It becomes more about presentation and fanfare than actually making ponies look their best.”

Cool-Mom started looking at one of Rarity’s dresses that was on display. Some purple thing with lots of frills. “I see the two of us are oflike mind on the topic, darling.”

Rarity arched her head up to look at what Cool-Mom was looking at. “Do you like that darling little number?”

Cool-Mom picked up the hat and turned it around in her hooves. “Oh yes, I find that this darling hat really compliments the whole thing.”

I applied my hoof to my face and let out a groan. The sheer number of uses of ‘darling’ was starting to give me a headache. This always seemed to happen whenever Cool-Mom got into a talk with other fashion-obsessed ponies. I remember having to go to a couple lame dinners with Cool-Mom in Cloudsdale: after a certain point all I could hear was an endless echo of ‘darling.’ It was like it was mandatory for them to use that word.

Unfortunately, my groan drew the attention of my dress-crazy mom and friend.

“Oh my, sorry girls,” said Rarity. “We didn’t mean to go on and exclude you two.”

Fluttershy gave Rarity a warm smile. “It’s fine, I like hearing the two of you talking so passionately about fashion.”

I decided to look at the wall and play it cool. “Meh, I’m not interested in all that frou-frou stuff.”

“Now don’t be like that.” Rarity used her magic to float over an outfit that seemed to be more frills than dress. “Try this on. I think it goes quite well with your coat, but I’m not sure about your eyes.”

I tried to think of an excuse to try and keep me from having to spend boring hours in dresses. “Why don’t you try and find something for Fluttershy instead? She, you know, likes trying on dresses and stuff.”

Cool-Mom yelled over from a clothesline where more dresses were hanging from. “Please, Dash, you make it sound like the both of you can’t dress up at the same time. Your friend has a darling selection here, and more than one changing room. No need for either of you to feel left out.”

Fluttershy walked over to Cool-Mom to look at the dresses she was going through. “That does sound nice. Rarity always makes the nicest dresses.”

Shoot, it looked like I wasn’t going to get out of this that easily. I looked at the doors and windows and considered making a break for it. If I was fast enough they wouldn’t even notice that I had actually left.

“Please, Dash, it has been forever since I’ve seen you in a dress with my own eyes.” Cool-Mom selected out a dress and started to walk my way. “I adored those pictures of you and your friends in your gala dresses. It did my heart good to see that you hadn’t given up completely on your looks.” She looked me in the eyes. The look of a mom who just wanted to relive some happy moments with her daughter. My plans to bolt evaporated.

I let out a resigned sigh. “Yeah, okay Cool-Mom. I’ll put the dress on for you.” I took the dress from her without really looking at it and started to put it on.

“Dash!” Cool-Mom said in that tone of voice that told me I had done something wrong, and I flinched. “Don’t dress in public! That’s indecent and you know it! How many times do I have to tell you? Put on the dress in the dressing room.”

I never really got the whole why dressing in public was such a big deal. But for some reason it made ponies like Cool-Mom uncomfortable. Maybe it was a high society thing?

Rarity shooed me towards the dressing room. “Yes, we have the dressing rooms for a reason, darling. Use them already.” She turned to face Cool-Mom and shook her head disapprovingly. “I take it you have never been able to do much to smooth out those rough edges on your daughter?”

Cool-Mom let out an annoyed huff. “I’m afraid not. She never did grow to understand fashion or the like. I could barely get her to use makeup growing up. I don’t think she uses any cosmetics anymore.”

“Because makeup runs when you’re pushing clouds or getting sweaty exercising,” I groaned irritably. Really, how many times do we have to have this stupid argument?

Cool-Mom shook her head vigorously. “Now that isn’t quite true. There are cosmetics now that are water resistant, and they really would help you look quite lovely.”

“Whatever, Cool-Mom.” I entered the dressing room to put on the dress.

I heard Cool-Mom walk up to the dressing room door and speak through the door. “Don’t you ‘whatever’ me young lady. This is important. You want to look lovely for your fillyfriend, don’t you?”

“I would like to see you all lovely and pretty, Dashie!” Pinkie said as she popped out from under the bench in the dressing room.

I was of course calm and played it cool when Pinkie suddenly appearing in the dressing room, and didn’t let out a high pitched scream as I jumped onto the bench. I was just trying to get a better view by standing on it, is all. “Pinkie! What’re you doin’ in here?!”

Pinkie smiled up at me with a huge, oblivious grin. “Watching you dress of course, silly.”

Okay, that was kinda creepy for some reason.

I heard a series of loud knocks on the door to the stall. “Pinkie! Get out of there this instant!” Rarity yelled through the door. “You’re being absolutely scandalous in there. That is a dressing room, not a make-out booth!”

“Aww, but I wanted to see Dashie dress,” Pinkie pouted.

“I could stand out here and guard the door if you girls want to make me a grandmother,” I heard Cool-Mom say.

“I wouldn’t mind making a foal!” Pinkie stood up from the floor and gave me a smirk that I was more used to seeing on Cloud Kicker’s face. “Hey Dashie, wanna make out?”

I was suddenly very aware of just how close I was to Pinkie, and how little room there was to move around. “Gah! Cool-Mom, don’t encourage her!”

Rarity knocked on the door a couple more times. “Absolutely not! You are not doing that type of socializing in my dressing room! Get out of there this instant!”

Pinkie sighed. “Fine.” She opened the door and walked outside. “You can be a real party pooper sometimes. We got dressed together with our gala dresses you know.”

“Yes, well that was different, Pinkie dear.” Rarity closed the door after Pinkie has exited. “I’m sure you and Rainbow Dash will have plenty of opportunities to... socialize, in private.”

“How is this different?” Pinkie asked.

“It just is,” Rarity replied simply. “It’s just how ponies are supposed to act in civilized society.”

I wasn’t quite sure how this was supposed to be different than when we put on our gala dresses either. Like I said, I don’t understand clothes. But then, I didn’t understand a lot of things—like how Pinkie could be here and still be getting work done for that party later. Seemed better to leave the thinking to the eggheads.

I finished putting on the dress and walked out of the dressing room. Might as well get this over and done with.

Cool-Mom clapped her hooves. “Wonderful, darling, wonderful. It is quite becoming on you.”

I probably should’ve done this when I first took the dress from Cool-Mom, but I finally looked down at what I was wearing. It was pink. Like Pinkie Pie pink. With lots of frills and other things I didn’t really know the names of. Point is, it wasn’t very cool.

I tried to think of something positive to say. I knew from past experience that complaining would only drag the whole process out. “Yeah, um, it’s pink alright.”

Rarity walked around me, and I could feel her judgmental stare. “Yes, you really could use some variety in your wardrobe. As nice at it is to sew up dresses that mimic your natural mane color, it wouldn’t hurt you to switch things up now and again.”

Cool-Mom nodded in agreement. “She’s quite right. You get quite finicky sometimes about your dresses being ‘cool.’”

“Because I don’t really like dresses that aren’t cool.” I tried to keep the bitterness out of my voice.

“There isn’t anything wrong with pink dresses, is there?” Pinkie asked tentatively.

Uh-oh, I think this might be one of those fillyfriend moments I have a tendency of screwing up. I scrambled to think of what would make Pinkie happy. “No, uh, pink is a cool color. In fact this dress is really cool because it’s pink.” Looks like that was the right thing to say considering that made Pinkie put on one of those big, goofy grins of hers.

“Oh, so you do love it then?” Rarity asked hopefully.

I’d already dug myself in too far to back out now. “Uh, sure. I think it’s cool enough to wear.”

Jumping out from the dressing room I’d just been in, Awesomom grasped me in one of her big bear hugs. “Of course the dress is cool! It’s because my little Dashie is wearing it!”

I couldn’t help but struggle in Awesomom’s grasp. Little hard not to be uncomfortable when you mom was squeezing the air from your lungs. Jeez she could be clingy. “Gagh! Awesomom!”

“Ohh, let’s all hug Dashie! Hug pile!” Pinkie jumped in from the other side and added to my discomfort with her own hug. The both of them hugging me made me worry I was going to break in half. I really hoped nopony else got in on this.

“Ah, there’s my wife.” Cool-Mom walked up and gave Awesomom a peck on the cheek. “Rarity, this is my wife, Surprise.”

“My pleasure, madam.” Rarity gave Awesomom a respectful nod of her head.

“Hiya, want to get in on hugging Dashie halfway to death?” Awesomom emphasised her offer by giving me another squeeze that caused me cough painfully.

Rarity gave a strained smile. “No, I think I’m alright. Besides, I don’t think Dash can take much more.”

“Your loss,” said Pinkie. “She’s just so huggable.”

My vision was starting to be covered with stars from the two of them hugging me. A lack of oxygen will do that to ya. “Awesomom... Pinkie... you’re both killing me here...” The both of them finally let me go, and I fell to the floor, gasping for breath.

Pinkie gave me a rough series of pats on the head. “Don’t worry, I’d never hug you to death. Because then I would never be able to hug you again. So I’m always careful.”

Awesomom rustled my mane as I recovered. “Hugging in moderation is what I’ve learned over the years. It’s like hot sauce.” She pulled a cupcake and a hot sauce bottle out of her mane. “Too much and you overwhelm the flavor of what you are putting it on.” She poured the hot sauce on the cupcake and then ate it in one, big bite.

Heh, that’s right. I nearly forgot. Awesomom likes to put hot sauce on her cupcakes, just like... Pinkie... does... A horrible, terrible realization was overcoming me as I watched while Pinkie pulled out a cupcake from her own mane and Awesomom poured on the hot sauce.

Oh... my... goddesses... I'M DATING MY MOM!

Upon this realization, I did the only thing anypony would do in this situation: I panicked.

I let out a high-pitched scream and without waiting for anypony to react, I flew right through Rarity’s front door and outside into a world that no longer made sense. Flying erratically to... somewhere... anywhere. Anywhere that would let me unthink the things I just thought.

My life was ruined!

Author's Note

I always, I would like to give a big thank you to my darling editors, Chengar Qordath and Comma-Kazie, who have helped make this story everything it can me.

I would also like to give a big thanks to my darling prereader staff Infinion, droplet739, fizzlefist, notMurphy, Garbo802, mrjerrio, q97randomguy, Pav Fiera, roflkneif, Vhett, and Swiftest Shadow.