Chapters
"No Pinkie, you've had enough cookies for today," you say as you pull the pint-sized, pink, party pony out of the kitchen and away from the cookie jar. Pinkie squirms about from within your hand, frantically trying to get back to her precious cookies, you have a little trouble keeping a grip on her. You know that she could break the laws of physics any second, so you made sure to never lose hold of her. When out of the kitchen, you put Pinkie down, stupidly hoping that she'll walk on her own. In the blink of an eye, she has left the floor and you hear her chewing in the kitchen. You sigh and remind yourself to lock the kitchen door. You walk back in and stare at Pinkie, nice and hard, she stares back at you with a look of pure innocence on her face and a cookie in her mouth. You try not to smile, but you can't help it.
"Come on Pinkie," you say, "you can't eat cookies all the time."
You once again carry her out of the kitchen and this time you carry her all the way into the dining room and to her high-chair, where you had already prepared her food, you knew that she had already had enough sugar today, so you decided that she should have only vegetables, something you fear might be the biggest mistake of your life. As you lower her into her highchair, you're suddenly stopped. You continue to try to push Pinkie into her highchair, but for some reason she just stops. You look down at what might be causing it, it's her tail. You try to push her down again, but her tail just bounces back up like a spring, she giggles the entire time. You stare at her smiling face for about a minute before you firmly tell her to stop. Her tail immediately loses it's hardness and you place her in her chair. You make a mental note for the next time you foalsit, "Talk to them sternly no matter how cute they are." Once the pink filly is settled in, you wrap a bib around her neck, she squirms a bit, but you get it on her in about 10 seconds. You then take the food from the dining room table and put it on her tray. She gives a skeptical look when you give her the plate of cooked carrots, this turns into an "are you crazy?" Look when you give her a bowl which then turns into a look of pure horror when she realizes that she's not getting dessert.
"Now now Pinkie," you say, "you can't have sweets all the time."
Pinkie looks up at you and pouts.
"Come on," you say, "I thought you liked cooked carrots."
Pinkie turns her head away from her tray-table.
"Okay," you think, "time to go to desperate measures."
You bend down and you pick up a pink balloon that had been floating against the belly of the table. You wave the balloon in front of Pinkie, she stares at it with a sparkle in her eyes and a smile on her face.
"You want the balloon?" You ask. Pinkie nods her head up and down real fast causing her poofed hair to wave willy-nilly.
"Then will you let me feed you?" Pinkie continues to nod. Perfect.
You take a spoon and place into the oatmeal. Pinkie opens her mouth with a slight grimace on her face. You wonder if her desire for the balloon can overpower her hatred for oatmeal. You slowly move the full spoon towards Pinkies face, you put it near her mouth with minimal fuss. Pinkie wraps her mouth around part of her spoon so that her lip is in her oatmeal. She then blows. A bubble or two erupt from the spoon and onto her table and on her face. You decide to take care of the tray later. After you wipe oatmeal of your face, you witness something amazing. Pinkie is licking the oatmeal from her face happily, she likes it. You pick up the spoon again and you give Pinkie more food. She happily eats it all. You're glad she likes it. She enjoys, for once, something without sugar. You wonder how happy she'd be if she tried it with maple syrup. After the oatmeal, you have to move onto the next trial. Feeding Pinkie the carrots. You place a few carrots on your spoon. Because of her experience with the oatmeal, she seems like she wants to try the carrots. You foalishly think that she'll enjoy them. When the hit her tongue, she nearly gags and is about to spit them out when you say,
"Do you want the balloon or not?"
That's the perfect inspiration for her. She immediately swallows the carrots, and bears a reluctant grin, that's fine enough for you. Next time though, you're probably going to try giving her peas. After the carrot fiasco is over, You give pinkie a glass of milk, which she sucks up through one of those funny, twisted straws. When Pinkie's done with her milk, you remover her bib and lift her out of her high-chair and you place her on the floor and give her the balloon. She grabs it in her mouth and a huge smile appears on her face. She happily skips off. Now that you're done with feeding her, you reflect on your job and situation. And you know what? You love it! You watch Pinkie skip out of the dining room. She then skips towards...
...The Kitchen! You run over to her, but then you remember, you locked the door. You breathe a sigh of relief until you hear nibbling. You run to the kitchen door to find it locked, but you can hear Pinkie on the other side. You confusion soon fades into laughter
"Oh come now," you say to yourself as as you unlock the door, "She's just being Pinkie Pie."
"No Fluttershy," you say as you pick up the yellow pegasus, "we can't go to the zoo right now, it's time for you to eat lunch."
You try to carry her gently, Fluttershy doesn't put up that big off a fight the way most fillies have, but she was also very fragile, you wouldn't want to startle her. When you're about to make your way into the dinning room, you notice that Fluttershy is emitting a soft whimper. You turn around and you notice that she dropped her bunny. As you walk back to pick it up, you wonder if her strong emotional attachment to it is a problem. That thought leaves your head when you're overtaken by the cuteness of her smile when you give the toy back to her. After that matter is settled, you walk back into the kitchen and place Fluttershy in her highchair. You then place a butterfly-patterned bib around her neck. You then hand her her plushie pal.
The yellow pegasus sits up, eager to know what's for lunch. You place a plate of cooked carrots and a bowl of oatmeal onto her tray-table. You grab a spoon and prepare to give her carrots. You're glad to know that Fluttershy likes them. the carrot-feeding process takes about 4 minutes and you move on to the oatmeal. Fluttershy tries some, she moves it around in her mouth for awhile, she seems to be trying to get a good feeling of what it tastes like. This is obviously the first time she's tried oatmeal. She swallows it and looks up at you slowly and a little frightened. She then slowly shakes her head.
You try to think of ways that you could convince her to eat it when you suddenly get a great idea. You make a quick trip from the kitchen, grab some strawberries (Fluttershy's favorite,) and you quickly return to the dining room. You are pleased to know that Fluttershy hadn't made even the slightest attempt to leave her highchair. You place the strawberries into Fluttershy's oatmeal and her face immediately lights up. You then resume giving her the oatmeal. The oatmeal is gone after about five minutes and Fluttershy's mouth and cheeks are covered with strawberry. You laugh at the silly-filly as you wipe it off with a napkin. Fluttershy bows her head a bit in worry.
"It's okay Flutters," you say as you pet her mane, "I wasn't laughing at you, I just thought you looked cute with strawberry on your face."
You hope that Fluttershy will understand, she does, and she starts to giggle a little herself.
"Well then," you say as you reach for a special treat you had placed on the dining room table, "for being such a good filly, you can have this as a reward."
You place a cookie in the shape of a rabbit on Fluttershy's tray, causing a huge smile to spread across her face.
"Go on," you say, "eat up."
Fluttersy's smile turns into a frown. You start to wonder why. You then realize that eating the cookie would mean hurting the rabbit. Fluttershy inhales deeply and you prepare to hear her bawl her eyes out, but instead, she just creates a barely audible cry, which, ironically, has a much bigger impact on you. You begin to think of a way that you could calm her down. When you get yet another great idea (great job, so far two today.) You take the cookie in your hand and begin to move it. You make it bounce up and down on Fluttershy's tray-table, causing her to stop crying a little.
"Hello Fluttersy," you say in a squeaky voice, "I'm...er...Angel the Bunny."
Fluttershy starts to smile.
"I'm looking for a nice hole that I could spend the night in."
Fluttershy continues to stare.
"But I'm having trouble, it's getting so dark. I wonder if someone could help me."
Fluttershy starts to look worried and feel empathetic towards the cookie.
"The wolves might come out at night. I hope I can find a home."
Without any second thoughts, Fluttershy grabs the cookie and stuffs it in her mouth. She immediately swallows it.
"Well," you think, "that escalated quickly."
"You might need something to wash that down with Flutters." You grab a juice-box from the dining room table, poke in it's straw, and give it to her. She immediately grabs it and eagerly sucks the delicious apple-juice. You giggle at the sight. The famous art fad is now a reality. Fluttershy really does like juice from a box, and you were the brony that proved it. After the last few drops were emptied, you remove Fluttershy and her rabbit from her high chair. All of the eating has made her sleepy and she falls into a deep slumber right in your arms. You decide not to wake her and instead walk to her bedroom, you lay her down in her bed and tuck her in. You look at Fluttershy sleeping so peacefully there and you start to wonder how you lived your life before you discovered ponies. You place Fluttershy's rabbit in her bed and she immediately hugs it in her sleep.
"Sleep tight," you say as you kiss Flutters on the forehead, "maybe we can go to the zoo after your nap."
You turn to leave the room, but you hear a noise, when you look behind you, you see Fluttershy out of bed. She is fully energetic and had already put on her sun-hat for going to the zoo.
"Well," you think for what is probably not going to be the last time, "that escalated quickly."
"Rainbow Dash?" You call while searching the house, "stop hiding, it's time for your lunch."
As you make your way up the stairs, a hoofstep on the ceiling tips you off. You quickly look up and come face-to-face with the rainbow maned pegasus standing on the ceiling and wearing the Wonderbolt costume you made her for her birthday. You're glad she likes it because you spent a whole week making it. Dash suddenly drops from the ceiling and onto your wide-eyed face. You stumble backwards for a moment before regaining your balance and pulling the silly filly off your face.
“Now then,” you say, “are you ready to eat?”
Rainbow immediately flies off away from you and to her bedroom, causing you to fall over when she leaves your grip. You stand back up and run after her.
“Dashie,” you say running down the hall, “come back.”
You swing the door open to be greeted by a cute sight. Rainbow Dash is poking her head out of a cardboard box with the words “Fort Dash” written in crayon, something you did for her.
You sigh and ask “Does this really have to be so difficult for both of us.”
Your reply is a foam building-block thrown at you from the fort. Which does absolutely nothing. You walk forward as the pegasus throws more and more blocks, each time more worried than the last. You eventually get to the box and pick her up.
“Now, now,” you say, “was that really necessary?” You make sure that you have enough sternness in your voice to get the point across.
Dash slowly shakes her head as you carry her downstairs and into the kitchen. You sit her down in her highchair and tie on her Wonderbolts bib. You then place food on her tray-table. As soon as you place the carrots on her tray, Rainbow tries to fly out of her chair, you have anticipated this so you grab her before her tail leaves the seat.
“No,” you firmly say as you put oatmeal on her tray.
Rainbow Dash turns her head up and away from you and the food.
“Come on Rainbow,” you say as you load some carrots onto a spoon, “you’re going to have to eat this eventually.”
No response.
“It’s not really that bad, you’ll probably like it if you try it.”
Still no response.
“Eat it,” You start to raise your voice, “just eat it!”
Rainbow just stays looking away in silence. You think that maybe you should change your approach.
“Your going to have to eat your vegetables if you ever want to make it onto the Wonderbolts.”
The moment the word leave your mouth, Dashie is sitting forward with a wide-eyed expression and her mouth open. She seems to be preparing for the torture she’s willing to take to fulfill her dream.
You bring the spoon to her mouth and she begins to chew. She seems to wince at the taste, but she’s not putting up any fuss. Well, that made it a whole lot better. You decide that you’ll try a different vegetable next time, but for now, you don’t have to worry about any debates, but you do worry about how much worse the debates will become when Rainbow learns to talk. The process of feeding takes about 2 minutes. When you’re done, you move on to the oatmeal. Rainbow points her small, blue hoof towards the spoon with an “I want it” look on her face. You hand her the spoon she holds it in her hoof and dips it into the oatmeal. She then lifts the spoon up, but instead of eating it, she flings the pasty spoon at you. It hits your cheek, it sticks there for a moment before you take it off. You feel that you’ve just about had enough. You can feel your frustration rising and eventually you flat-out yell.
“I’ve just about had enough of these battles young mare!” You yell, “Why do insist that you put up such a fight! You’re going to have to eat anyways!”
You inhale after finishing. You then get a glimpse of Rainbow Dash’s face. Rainbow looks up towards you with the sad look of a filly trying not to cry. Her mouth is trying not to frown, but you can tell she’s having trouble, her eyes are filled with tears that she tries to hold in. You suddenly realize what you just did.
“Oh my gosh, Rainbow,” you say, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to yell at you.”
Rainbow tries to settle herself down, you rub your fingers through her multicolored mane. She starts to calm down. She looks up at you and lets out a forced smile.
“Sorry Dashie,” you say.
You take the spoon and begin to feed her the oatmeal. Rainbow doesn’t like it that much, but she seems to be able to tolerate it. When she finishes the oatmeal. You grab a juice pouch from the dining room table and give it to her. Dash takes the straw and pokes at the pouch, she’s a little off with her aim and keeps missing and not getting the straw into it. Eventually she gives it back to you so that you can do it. She then happily slurps up the delicious juice. You wonder what it is about pegasi that makes them like juice in containers so much. After she sucks up the last few drops, you hand Rainbow a cookie. A huge smile appears on her face as she takes the treat and eats it in a couple seconds.
When everything is done. You lift Rainbow Dash out of her high-chair and place her on the floor. She then flies out the door, which reminds you that you should get the mail. You walk up to the front door and grab the assorted letters, but you something else in the piles, It’s a new issue of Rainbow’s favorite comic book, “Wonderbolt Adventures”. You call to Dash to tell her that the new issue is here. She flies up to you, ready to have it read to her.
“It’s no wonder you like The Wonderbolts so much,” you say with a smile, “trust me Dashie, you'll probably become one someday.”
She smiles back.
You know you’re going to get this right this time. You’re going to make sure that just like her bath, everything about Rarity’s lunch was going to be perfect. Sometimes, you question why you even humor her with her refined tastes the way you do, and then you remember, Rarity will refuse to cooperate otherwise. You tighten the bow tie on your tuxedo and fix the cloth napkin on your arm. You then walk up the stairs and into the marshmallow pony’s bedroom.
“Miss Rarity,” you say in a refined accent, “It is time for your lunch.”
Rarity happily hops from her bed and fashion magazine and too you. She sits down and spreads her arms out.
“No,” you say, “you can walk.”
Rarity sticks her head up and walks the other way.
“Fine,” you sigh as you walk over to her and gingerly pick her up.
You walk her downstairs and to the dining room. You cautiously lower the purple-haired filly into her high-chair. You place a plastic gem-encrusted bib around her neck. You then hand her a piece of paper folded to form a two-page book. The word “menu” is written in very fine cursive (it took you many attempts to get it perfect). Rarity looks through it. You had only written one thing, “Les Carrots Avec Le Oatmeal”. Rarity points to that, you worry that she might have put up quite a fuss if she could read and knew it meant vegetables.
When the menu fiasco is over, you place les carrots avec le Oatmeal on her tray table. Rarity doesn’t seem to approve that half the meal is vegetables and the other half is a strange whitish-brown paste that she’s never seen before.
“Will madame be wanting sauce with her carrots,” you ask as you take out a tiny cup that you had filled with melted butter. Rarity gives you an approving nod and you slowly drizzle it onto her plate. The delicious smell of the butter floats up. You make a mental note that you should try carrots with butter more.
You then put some carrots on the spoon and bring it to Rarity’s mouth. You brace yourself for whatever crazy reaction she’ll have, but to you surprise, she just takes them in her mouth, politely chews them, and then swallows. Well, thats an upside of feeding Rarity, she’s a whole lot less crazy then any other filly you’ve fed. At least that’s an upside to all of her high-class ways.
Feeding Rarity the carrots takes longer then it does most fillies, but you suppose that’s a small price to pay to avoid all the chaos. You are about to feed her the last bite of carrots when you encounter a major problem. A small drop of butter lands on Rarity’s coat, a few centimeters short from the bib. For a couple seconds, neither of you say anything. The two of you just stare at the yellow dot. After that, Rarity begins to frantically rub the stain, desperately trying to get the butter out of her coat. You decide that that’s a much better reaction than having Rarity be mad. You then quickly run into the bathroom, where you grab some soap. You rub it under some water from the sink. You then run back to the dining room and freeze in shock, with what then turns to a feeling of utter disbelief. Rarity had rubbed the stain so much that it had become about two inches wide. With a sigh, you rub the soap on the spot. It’s kind of fitting that you just gave her a bath.
When the stain is finally out after about two minutes, you resume feeding Rarity. This time the oatmeal. You are once again glad to know that she doesn’t put up any fuss, but after the first few bites, the white and purple pony decides that oatmeal is boring. She once again sticks her snout in the air in refusal. Well, it seems like there’s only one way to get her to cooperate. You walk into the kitchen and get a box of blueberries. You walk back to the dining room and you place the blueberries in the oatmeal and you then take the spoon and once again resume feeding Rarity.
After about 5 minutes, Rarity has eaten the last spoonfuls of oatmeal. You then place a small, plastic wine glass on her tray-table, and fill it with orange juice. And finally, you top it off with a mini toothpick umbrella, and a straw. The filly drinks the juice in a few short sips. Which takes another two minutes.
When she’s done with the juice, you give her her favorite dessert, a miniature eclair. Miniature is better since, like most ponies, even Rarity goes crazy after eating lots of sugar.
When she’s done with the eclair, you wipe crumbs of her face with a napkin, remove Rarity’s bib and lift her from the chair, when you place her on the ground, she elegantly trots back upstairs.
“Thank you Madame, come again,” You use your accent for the last time.
The whole process had taken about 12 minutes, which in your book, was quite a long time to be feeding a filly.
You are stopped in mid thought by a loud, filly scream, followed by tears. You run upstairs and start to worry about what could be wrong. What if Rarity’s hurt? What if broke a limb? What if...
“Oh, right, I’m dealing with Rarity,” you think as you grab an emergency sewing kit from your pocket, something you knew would prove useful for helping Rarity.
You then enter her room, where, as you expected, Rarity is crying over a tear down the seams of one of her favorite dresses.
“It’s okay,” you say as you pat her back and show her the sewing kit, “ see, I have a sewing kit, I can fix it right up.”
“You really shouldn’t scream like that over a small tear,” you say, “you had me worried there for a moment.”
Applejack (co-op with Lil Mac)
“Applejack, why do you have to put up such a fight about everything,” you say. You pull hard on the abdomen of the orange filly, but she’s got to strong of a grip on a table leg. Lil Mac is helping you, grabbing the pack of your shirt in his mouth to give you more pulling power. Applejack is just about to give in when she loosens from your hand and gallops off. You and the Mac take off after her, she runs jumping over small stools and skillfully avoiding obstacles until she gets to the door, she jumps at it and prepares to look like she wishes to push it open, but crashes into it. You and Mac wince at the sight, but Applejack seems to be okay. Applejack has completely given up and just sits down pouting.
“Will she be okay?” You ask Lil Mac.
“Eeyup,” he replies.
You then pick up the orange filly, but with a mighty kick of her small legs, she hits you right in the stomach, it takes you a while to focus after having the wind knocked out of you, but when you do, you see that Lil Mac has caught Applejack’s tail in his teeth.
“Thank you, Mac,” you say.
The two of you then drag the squirming filly into the kitchen. You then pick up Applejack and place her in her high chair, you place a bib around her neck.
“I hope you prepared enough food for her,” says Mac, “lil’ Applejack there has the appetite of a full-grown stallion”
“Don’t worry little buddy,” you say, “I’ve prepared enough food it’s all in the kitchen. Would you mind fetching them for me.”
“Nope,” says Mac as he walks towards the kitchen, “I don’t mind at all.”
While the red foal is in the kitchen, you make sure you always have an eye on AJ. You can tell by the look on her face that she’s trying to think of a way out, so the half a second that Lil Mac spends in the kitchen are the longest 30 seconds of your life.
Eventually, Mac comes back balancing five or so plates of food on his back. You don’t ask him how he did that, but you still compliment him. You take the plates of his back and set them on the table, you then pick up a plate containing applesauce and put it on the orange filly’s tray table. Applejack seems happy, which isn’t surprising because she only ever wants to eat apple related foods. You take a spoon and begin to feed her the apple sauce. When you start feeding her, she’s less tense and seems to be fine with sitting in the high-chair, which makes you wonder why she puts up a fight in the first place.
Giving her the applesauce takes about a minute and you move on to her next course. You brace yourself knowing that she’s not going to like it as you put a bowl of peas and a bowl of carrots on her tray.
Applejack seems to have decided that she doesn’t want to eat anymore and immediately pulls her legs from the chair and prepares to jump. This isn’t the first time you’ve fed a filly so you instantly grab her in mid-air. Being stronger than most ponies, she blows you back slightly, but you still feel slightly like a ninja.
You then put Applejack back in her chair. Luckily for you, she’s learned her lesson and isn’t going to try jumping again. She seems a little frustrated, but at least you can get her to eat now. You start with the peas, you take a spoonful of them and move them towards Applejack’s mouth, she refuses to open.
“Open wide,” you say.
Nothing happens.
“Applejack,” you say slightly annoyed, “open your mouth.”
She still refuses.
“Mac,” you say, “what do I do?”
“Here comes the apple truck,” says the red foal to Applejack, “open up to let it through.”
Applejack opens her mouth and you are able to feed her with ease.
“Thank you, Mac,” you say.
“Eeyup,” he says.
Giving her the peas takes about four minutes and you then move on to the carrots, you use the same “apple truck method” which allows you to finish with them in five minutes.
For a fourth dish, you give AJ some apple slices. Cut really small, of course. Lil Mac asks if he can help you feed her. You say yes and pick him up so that he can be at eye-level with his sister. Mac is pretty heavy put you manage. One he’s facing Applejack, Mac takes the apple slices in his hoof and feeds them to the orange filly one by one. looking at the cute act of brotherly love allows you to ignore how much he’s killing your arms.
You finish the apples in about three minutes and you then move on to dessert. You place a plate with and apple fritter on Applejack’s tray. Applejack squeals in delight upon seeing it and immediately starts to chow down on it. When she’s done, he face is covered in crumbs.
“That’s the only thing she knows how to say,” says Mac, “she makes good use of it.”
“That is so adorable,” you think. You wonder if ponies view stuff like that the same way. But it’s probably just you and the other Bronies.
You walk into the kitchen and grab another apple fritter, you give it to Applejack and she eats it all in three bites. She then thinks for a moment.
Once again, she says, “more apple fwitter?”
“Oh, clever,” you say to the cute filly, “but I’m not falling for that again.”
You manage to remain strong, but you know you want more than anything to give her another fritter, you instead give her the last part of her meal.
You hand Applejack a sippy-cup full of apple juice. She drinks that in about two minutes.
When that’s done you take a napkin and wipe fritter crumbs off the happy and full filly’s face. You then remove her bib and take her out of her high chair. When Applejack is placed on the floor, she runs off. It takes you a couple seconds before you realize that she’s doing the same thing Pinkie Pie did.
“Get away from the kitchen,” you call, “you’ve had enough apple fritters.”
you look towards Mac.
“can you help me get her?” You ask.
“Eeyup,” he replies.
Luna and Celestia (Double Trouble)
“And I don’t want to see you stealing your sister’s abacus again,” you say to Celestia as she nods slowly. You then pick her up along with Luna, who had been hugging her abacus. She drops it when you grab her and she’s not too happy about that. The two royal fillies squirm in your arms, the same way they did when you had them take a bath. You a confused at why they would put up a fight to eat food, probably because they don’t like vegetables. No, it’s probably because they don’t like being together even for such a short period of time.
After what seemed like an eternity, you finally make it to the dining room. You place the frustrated alicorns in their high chairs and put a bib around Luna’s neck, which gets a giggle out of her sister. You then place food onto their tray tables. You start off with two big plates of alfalfa sprouts. Luna sniffs the green leaves and pulls her head away, appalled. After seeing that, Celestia immediately stuffs some into her mouth.
“Well,” you say, “at least you’re going to cooperate.”
You feel a little more calm now that you know that at least one filly will have a calm lunch
“Bleah! Alfalfa monsta!”
The sound of Celestia’s voice makes you snap back to the cold, hard reality. Celestia is holding her hooves above her head and letting small bits of green alfalfa leaves hang from her open mouth.
“Ew, no!” Luna cries as she jumps out of her highchair, soon followed by Celestia.
The white filly begins to chase after her sister, who is laughing the entire time. You can’t help but smile and the crude, but effective form of sisterly “love”. The fun ends when the two royal sisters trip and bump into Luna’s high-chair. It falls over and the plate of Alfala flies through the air. Of all the places it could possibly land, it lands on the head of Celestia and small leaves fall all over her pink mane. She spends a couple seconds in a state of shock, and then she begins to cry loudly. Luna laughs, which makes her cry even louder.
You cautiously approach Celestia and then you kneel down and pat her on the back.
“It’s okay,” you say, “I’ll get it out of your hair.”
The she starts to calm down. You lift the plate off of the filly’s royal mane and are about to remove the alfalfa leaves when her horn lights up. In a quick flash, the leaves fly in all directions, some of them hitting you and Luna. When you look to see what happened, you see Celestia sitting on the floor laughing. Her mane has turned from pink, into a long, flowing, rainbow, aurora like mane.
“How did you do that?” You ask
Celestia shrugs and with another flash, her hair returns to normal. You’re glad she didn’t do that when you were giving her a bath, since that would have been pretty difficult.
You lift Clestia and Luna back into their highchairs and decide that you’ll take care of the alfalfa mess later.
“Now, you two stay right there,” you tell them as you walk into the kitchen.
You grab some cooked carrots from the refrigerator, which you were originally going to use in case another filly was to spew alfalfa in your face the way Twilight did. You walk back to the dining room and place the carrots on Luna’s tray-table.
Celestia, who is old enough to feed herself, does so. So you turn to luna, and place some carrots on the spoon you’re holding.
“Open wide,” you say, “here comes the pegasus.”
Luna opens her mouth wide and you give her the carrots. She happily chews them. After a couple more bites, Luna picks up one of the slices. You think that this means she wants to feed herself, but you’re once again mistaken. Luna throws the Carrot and it hits Celestia’s left cheek. Celestia stops eating. She looks over and gives her sister the evil-eye. She transforms her mane again, to protect herself from further problems, and throws a piece of alfalfa. This causes Luna to throw another carrot, which causes Celestia to throw more alfalfa. This goes on for a couple of seconds until you put a stop to it.
“Looks like some fillies might not be getting any dessert.”
You take the two vegetable plates away from the fillies tray-tables and say, “That was quite uncalled for. Luna, we don’t throw things at are sisters, and Celestia, we don’t throw things back either.”
The two of them nod their heads in shame. You’re glad you finally got them to listen to reason.
You then place a bowl of oatmeal on each of their trays. You brace yourself for the potential food-fight. Luckily for you, they values their desserts. You are able to feed Luna without fuss in about 3 minutes.
“Now then, you two can have dessert.”
The two ponies smile, excited for whatever treat awaits them. You give Celestia a piece of cake, with some banana slices on top. She eats it whilst minding her manners. When you give Luna a Moon Pie on the other hand, she quickly stuffs it in her mouth. When she finishes eating it, she has chocolate, crumbs and icing all over her face.
“Oh, Luna,” you say, “you look so cute right now.”
That causes her to giggle.
Celestia finishes her cake, so you wipe down hers and her sister’s face with a napkin. You then hand them both orange-juice filled sippy-cups. They drink those in about two minutes. You then lift them out of their chairs and they run off. You look towards them as they run to the all.
“It’s a hard job,” you think, “but the smiles from the fillies are worth it,”
You then turn around to see the mess of alfalfa and carrots that you’re going to have to clean up.
“I hope...”
Author's Note
Sorry about the fairly long delay.
You just finish putting the last plates on the tray table when you decide to call her.
“Derpy,” you yell, “It’s time for lunch!”
After a moment of silence you call again, “lunch time... there are muffins!”
As if like regular clockwork, you instantly hear the trotting of little hooves, which is then followed by a loud bang. You realize that you forgot to open the dining room door. You approach it and swing it opened, where you’re immediately met by Derpy. The gray pegasus trots between your legs and towards her high-chair, almost as if nothing has happened, her crossed eyes looking around the room for muffins.
“You’re gonna’ need help getting into the chair,” you say as you pick Derpy up and sit her down.
You then place a bib with a muffin on it around her neck. The first thing that Derpy does is try to eat the muffin, she starts to naw on her bib.
“Sorry,” you say, “that’s not a real muffin, it’s just a picture.”
Derpy seems upset by this, but you tell her that she can have real muffins all in good time.
You begin the feeding process by placing a plate of alfalfa sprouts on the mail-mare’s tray table. Derpy gives you a look that probably means “I thought you said there would be muffins,” but you continue anyways. You take a spoonful of leaves and then push them towards Derpy. She seems reluctant to eat them at first, but you tell her that being a good filly will get her muffins. You say that to her all the time, and it always works because you stay true to your word and she gets a muffin in the end. When she agrees to eat her vegetables, you continue to move the spoon towards her open mouth, causing her to move her head towards the left.
“I thought you said you were willing to eat,” you say, but then you realize that she is trying to eat it, but can’t see clearly enough. You decide to help her.
“No Derpy,” you gently turn the filly’s head toward the spoon, “it’s over here.”
she giggles a little at her mistake. You’re glad that she’s not embarrassed or or upset because of her “eye problem.”
“Here comes the pegasus,” you say as you place the spoon into Derpy’s mouth.
She excepts the green leaves because the acquirement of muffins is worth any sacrifice.
Derpy finishes off the alfalfa in about four minutes, so you move on to the oatmeal. When you place it on her tray, she stares at it with one eye for a couple of seconds, then, she plunges her face into it. You spend about twenty seconds trying to figure out what just happened, when you realize why she put her head in the oatmeal.
“No Derpy,” you chuckle, “the muffins are not in there.”
Upon hearing the words “no” and “muffins” in the same sentence, Derpy’s ears perk up and she lifts her face out of the bowl, you try not to giggle at her oatmeal covered face.
“You’ll get your muffins in good time,” you say. You then grab a napkin from the dining room table and wipe down Derpy’s face. You wonder why so much oatmeal is spilled in your line of work.
Feeding Derpy the rest of the oatmeal takes about 3 minutes. Derpy was slightly saddened about the fact that there weren’t any muffins, but she soon realized that she would have to wait.
When she finishes the oatmeal, you give her a sippy-cup full of apple juice, which she happily slurps down. Ponies always love juice, especially Fluttershy.
Soon enough, you move on to the most important part of her lunch. Muffins! When you place two blueberry muffins on her tray, Derpy’s crossed eyes go straight as they stare in awe at the delicious pastries. She has never had to whole muffins at one time before, except for the time you caught her raiding the pantry. You guess this is the first time she’ll eat multiple muffins without getting a really bad tummy ache. She immediately grabs the first one and speedily eats it. She does the same for the second one. Soon after, she wipes the crumbs from her face in one big, happy lick. She smiles at you for a second.
“Hic!”
Derpy jumps a few centimeters out of her high-chair, she then puts her hoof to her mouth apologetically.
“Hic!” Goes Derpy again. She gives you a confused look that signifies that she doesn’t know what’s going on.
“You have the hiccups, Derpy,” you say as you rub your hand through her mane again.
“Hic!”
You think about what hiccup cures you know. There’s scaring her, but that probably wouldn’t end well. You could have her drink water upside-down, but that might be hard for a pony to do. You soon remember what is the best one though.
“I know a way to cure your hiccups,” you say as you lift Derpy out of her high-chair. You then place her on the dining room table, she sits forward, propping herself against her front hooves.
“Hic!”
You then start to tickle her, Derpy laughs and falls backwards, exposing her tummy, which you start to tickle, Derpy laughs even harder.
“I’m a gonna getcha,” you say.
Derpy continues laugh and you continue to tickle her tummy, throwing a few rubs in there just for the heck of it.
When you stop, Derpy continues to laugh, but she soon calms herself down and her laughter turns into a just a smile as she sits herself back up.
“There, that was fun,” you say, “Are your hiccups gone?”
Derpy waits a few seconds before nodding really fast, which causes her to fall on her back again, the gray pegasus starts to giggles, than, no sooner had she started, she stops giggling and falls sound asleep, exhausted from all the laughing. You smile at the cute sight.
“Hic!”
It came from you this time, with a sigh, you walk to the kitchen to drink some water upside down.
Author's Note
Sorry about the delay, I was doing some deviantart work. Anyhoo, Derpy is here! I also have new cover art, drawn by me this time (hence the delay).
“Here you go,” says Derpy as she hands you her smiling daughter, “Remember to have Dinky eat all of her veggies, and don’t forget the muffins.”
“Yes, don’t worry Miss Derpy, I know what to do,” you stare down at the unicorn in your hands.
“How’s it goin’ Dinky,” you say as you rub your hand through her mane, “Are you ready for lunch?”
“I really appreciate your help with feeding Dinky as well as bathing her; somedays it can get very difficult.”
“It’s quite all right,” you place Dinky into her high chair and tie a bib with a muffin imprint around her neck, “It’s all in a day’s work.”
You decide that it’s time to get down to business. You place a bowl of oatmeal on to Dinky’s tray-table. Derpy shudders, her eyes momentarily going straight as she squints in disgust.
“What’s wrong?” You ask.
“Oh, nothing,” she replies, “It’s just that the last time I fed her oatmeal, she spat it everywhere. And it made such a large mess. Sometimes it’s just so hard to take care of my little muffin.”
“Yes.”
You stick the spoon into the oatmeal and bring it towards Dinky’s mouth. You try to remain on your guard incase Dinky decides to go ballistic with it. She doesn’t. She calmly takes it off the spoon and then smiles.
“See Dinky,” Derpy walks up towards the high-chair, “Oatmeal is good, especially in muffins.”
Dinky spits out the oatmeal. You cringe as the small beige glob hits your face. You quickly grab a napkin from the dining room table and wipe it off.
Derpy faces Dinky, “Now now, sweetie,” her voice is stern, but calm, “Is that the way we treat guests? Or any pony for that matter?”
Dinky looks downward towards the table and shakes her head slowly.
“It’s okay,” you say to both the filly and her mother, “That happens to me all the time. Actually, come to think of it, it’s been happening quite a lot recently.”
“And from an author who claims to be creative,” says a frustrated Derpy as one of her eyes looks upward.
“I’m sorry, what was that?” You ask.
“Oh...ummm...I don’t actually know,” she says.
You decide to move on and continue to feed Dinky. You tell her to not spit out the oatmeal again. She finishes it off after about 5 minutes.
When she’s finished, you put a plate of alfalfa on Dinky’s tray.
“Don’t forget the muffins,” Derpy reminds you.
“She’ll get them in good time,” you say, “You know, I remember when I used to feed you. You always wanted muffins. And one time, you put your face into the oatmeal.”
Derpy rolls her eyes; which is something that seems really hard to do because they appear to rotate in different directions.
You dip you scoop a spoonful of the leaves and give it to Dinky. She likes it, so that is a good thing. She also doesn’t plant her face into it either, which is also good.
She finishes the alfalfa in about four minutes.
“Will she be getting the muffins now?” Asks Derpy.
“Yes,” you say, Derpy had seemed to be getting impatient.
“Okay, let me go get them,” Derpy trots into the kitchen.
You hear tons of loud crashes. As well as what sounds like jackhammers, a saw against wood, other tools, and some assorted cat noises. You’ve always wondered how some ponies do that.
“Are you okay?” You ask as you stare wide-eyed at the mess.
“I’m fine,” Derpy replies, opening the side of her mouth to talk, “I guess I... I just don’t know what went wrong.”
“I could help you clean the kitchen up later if you’d like.”
Derpy has a huge grin.
“Really?” She says, “Thank you so much, I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
You bring the muffins back into the dining room. Dinky looks a little worried after hearing the loud noises, but her face immediately lights up upon seeing the delicious pastries.
“Like mother, like daughter,” you think.
You place the muffins on Dinky’s tray. She is able to eat them on her own, even if it is very haphazardly. She leans her head into the first one and starts to chew. She eats a hole directly through the first one, pushes herself up with her hooves, and then eats the two remaining pieces in two bites each. She does the same for the second muffin, except a whole lot slower since she appears to be savoring it.
Once she finishes the muffin, you procede to the final steps. You give Dinky a sippy-cup full of apple juice, which she quickly slurps down. When she’s done with that, you take a wet napkin and wipe the oatmeal and muffin crumbs off of her face. You then remove Dinky’s bib, pull her out of the high-chair and hand her to Derpy.
“There now,” says Derpy as she lifts her daughter up to her eye-level, “That wasn’t so bad, was it? There’s nothing wrong with alfalfa, or oatmeal”
Dinky sticks out her tongue and hangs it limp. “Bleh,” she says in baby-talk.
“Okay, maybe there is something wrong with it? But you still got muffins, right.”
Dinky nods happily and hugs her mother.
The cute little family moment lasts about a minute, then Derpy puts her daughter down and Dinky runs off to play.
“Thank you so much for helping me feed my little muffin,” the gray mare says to you.
“It’s nothing, really, babysitting foals is practically my job now,” you reply.
“But you’ve done so much for me all ready, helped give her a bath, helped put her to bed...”
“...promised to help you clean the kitchen,” you remember.
“Yes, and that,” she says amazed.
“No, it’s fine, I’ve taken care of you since before you could talk. Hey, remember when you were a baby and you put your face in the oatmeal?”
“Not this again!”
There are a number of reasons you love your job. Good pay, and the smiling faces of foals and getting to travel all over Equestria, to name a few. There are also a few things that make your job intensely stressful job. Dealing with troublemakers is one of them, and Discord is the king of causing trouble.
“Discord, this isn’t funny,” you call as he floats away from you.
You eventually corner him at the end of the hallway, where the closet is. Discord looks beaten for a second, until he snaps his fingers, opens the closet door from the hinged side, and runs through. You think that was a stupid move on his part at first, until you open the door. Before you is a vast landscape, filled with hills of purple checkerboard, winged clouds, and toy sailboats growing from pine-needle covered palm trees. A black and white double rainbow completes the setting. Discord’s equivalent of utopia. You wonder how such a small draconequus pulled this off; you did not think that he would have so much power as a baby. You then realize you’re trying to apply logic to Discord and forget the whole thing.
You spot discord riding a bumper car on a roller coaster; he goes over a jump and heads toward you. You try to run away, but the car, which turns to bubbles on contact, hits you. Discord lands in your arms, laughing madly.
You move the bowl of Gak from his plate. It vanishes in your hands and reappears on Discord’s tray. He grabs his spoon and points to it, he then points to the spoon, and the Gak, and finally, to his open mouth. He really wants to eat it. With a sigh, you give in and dip your spoon into the goo and feed it to Discord. You are grossed out at the sight, but he seems to enjoy it immensely.
It takes you about six minutes for Discord to finish the Gak, because he refilled his bowl twice. You now begin with the normal food. You put a bowl of alfalfa on Discord’s tray-table. He immediately turns to sand and falls to the floor. He then turns back to normal and flies off.
“Ok Discord, normally I’d object to that much chocolate, but from what I’ve seen, you probably can eat anything without any drawbacks” you say, “just please try not to overflow that bowl.”
Discord continues to pour the chocolate rain into his mouth, when it starts to overflow, the milk stays still and forms the shape of a pyramid. When the pyramid is complete, Discord vacuums the cloud into his mouth. After that is over with, you start up again with the feeding process; you take good care not to spill the alfalfa chocolate soup. Discord seems to really enjoy your concoction, which pleases you. You don’t want any more monkey business from him. Because you had to be more precise than usual with your spoon, you finish feeding discord after about four minutes.
You had planned on giving Discord some oatmeal, but you worry that he would probably turn it into a pile of feathers or something; he also ate Gak so he is already full. You were also going to give him some chocolate milk, but you think he has had enough already. Having nothing more to do, you remove Discord’s bib and lift him out of his highchair. Discord slides like butter out of your hands; he does not immediately run off though,
“Okay,” you say cunningly, “Now that were done with your lunch, you’re going to have to take some medicine, okay?”
Wait a second, where is your watch?
Spike (co-op with Twilight)
“Hey, Twilight, it’s me,” you call as you knock on the door on the top of the School for Gifted Unicorns library. The doorknob immediately glows purple and turns, the door swings open.
“Oh, hi sitter,” says Twilight, “It’s a little early for Spike’s bath time.”
“You said you wanted me to help you with feeding him during your finals week, right?” You ask.
The young unicorn thinks for a second or two before pulling a comically large scroll off her desk (Which is covered with books, notes and flash-cards). She unravels the scroll down to the floor and stops halfway down the middle.
“Oh, right,” she said, “I have that written down right here. Forgive me; I have a lot on my mind.”
“Quite all right,” you say as you walk through the door.
You help Twilight prepare Spikes highchair, she then calls for Spike. The baby Dragon waddles into the kitchen. Upon seeing you, Spike thinks he has to take a bath and tries to run away. Twilight pulls him back with her magic and brings him to her eye-level. She reassures him that he is not going to have to take a bath. The two of you seat him in his high-chair and place the bib around his neck. Spike looks around from his chair and tries to rock back a forth for a few seconds. He looks very cute, which is probably the cause of the following events.
You bring yourself to eye-level with Spike and say, “How’s my little dragon today, are you ready for lunchies now?” You pinch his cheek.
“Wait, don’t do that!” yells Twilight.
Before you can say anything, Spike puffs a tiny blast of fire at you, causing you to jump backwards and trip over a pile of books. When you stand back up, Twilight hands you another comically long list.
“Spike doesn’t like having his cheeks pinched, I learned that the hard way. Anyways, this list explains everything you need to know about feeding Spike as well as a checklist for all your supplies.”
It takes you about half an hour to read over Twilight’s notes; mostly because she insisted that you double-checked and then triple-check the checklist.
When you finish studying, you wake up Spike, who had dozed off during the study session, and place a bowl of alfalfa on his plate. You’re not sure why a dragon would eat alfalfa, but it was on the checklist and Twilight knows what she is doing. You grab some Alfalfa in a spoon and give it to Spike, who immediately rejects it.
“What’s going on,” you ask Twilight, “I thought you said he wouldn’t put up a fuss.”
“Your problem is that you’re holding the spoon at a 22 degree angle,” says Twilight knowingly, “Spike will only eat alfalfa if you hold the spoon at a 27 degree angle. Hold on, let me get a protractor.”
One awkward moment later, Twilight gives you a protractor and helps you measure the forks angle. You continue to feed Spike, trying as hard as you can not to change the angle of you fork. You are glad that Twilight did not say anything about decimals; you would probably be here all day.
You finish feeding Spike in about five minutes. Twilight hands, well, levitates a plate of what looks like a pile of dry hash-browns. She tells you that they are hay-fries; extra crispy, the way Spike likes them.
“Do I have to hold the spoon at a certain angle?” You ask.
“Of course not,” replies your purple unicorn friend, “that’s only for vegetables.”
“But isn’t grass a vegetable,” you say.
“Well, grass is a vegetable according to the definition of non-sentient life, but in the culinary sciences, grass is an herb, I learned that from somepony. I can’t remember who?”
“Zecora?” You clamp your mouth shut. You just broke one of the three rules of time travel; do not bring anypony back on their personal time line, do not interfere with major events and fixed points in time, and never reference an event of a pony’s life before it has happened to them.
“I don’t know anypony named Zecora,” says Twilight thinking.
You decide it is best to not say anything more and you place the hay-fries onto Spike’s tray table. Spike eats it quickly and ravenously, but he only manages to eat off the top seeing that he is in a high-chair. The purple dragon tries to reach downwards and tips the chair forward, luckily you catch him.
“Let me help you with that,” you laugh as you lift the hay fries closer to Spike’s mouth.
Spike gorges on the fries in about a minute, shortest time you have ever fed any pony or dragon something, so far that is. Spike has just enough room for dessert, a small plate of gemstones. You wonder why gemstones are so common, and why they can be dug up from the ground pre-polished, but you remind yourself that you are a time-traveller who babysits talking, magical ponies, so you guess that you do not need to ask these questions. You spoon the gems over to Spike, who eats them happily, somehow crunching them with his two only teeth. The happy-camper finishes his expensive dessert in 2 minutes.
Now that lunch time is over, you remove Spike’s bib and let him out of his high-chair, he waddles over to a book-fort and hides inside of it.
“That’s his cave,” says Twilight, giggling, “it has his nest, made of hay and a small pile of bits, he used to have gems too, for about a minute, until he ate them.”
“He was able to wait that long,” you laugh, “well I’ll be going now. I’ll be back in a couple of hours for Spikes bath.”
Upon hearing the word bath, spike digs his claws into the straw floor of his book-cave and scowls at you, exhaling small clouds of black smoke.
“Well, good luck with that.” says Twilight as she carefully uses her magic to pry Spike’s claws out of the floor, “Bye now,”
“Bye,” you say as you step outside.
Back on board your time-machine, you check your schedule. Trixie is next, you should get there soon, technically you have all the time in the world, since your time machine allows you to handle multiple jobs at once, but your boss does not agree. To satisfy your employer, it would be best to add another job to your list. You look toward your computer.
“Oh well, an hour of Minecraft won’t hurt”
The Great and Powerful Trixie
Trixie giggles as you run across the yard, pulling her through the grass on a sled; you think that a wagon may have been more practical but due to an “incident” involving a tricycle, this is all you’ve got. You are glad though that she settled for a toboggan and not a golden throne. Though the running around in circles may seem boring, it sure keeps Trixie entertained as she zooms across the lawn. She eventually gets bored and quickly hops off, you do not blame her, you were bored too. Trixie walks to the doorstep, where she puts her hat and her cape, both of which are a little big for her. She then picks up her wand and waves it at you, signifying that she wants to play her favorite game, for the third time today. Half reluctantly, you put your hands above your head and pretend that your fingers are claws.
“Rawr,” you say in a light, but scratchy voice, “I am the dreaded Ursa Major, and I’ve come to destroy this town! Nopony can stop me, I’m too powerful, and strong, and mighty! Rawr!”
You stomp around the “town” that is Trixie’s backyard; you occasionally stomp really hard in some areas, to give the idea of stomping on buildings. Suddenly, when all seemed lost for the ponies of “Hoofington,” a mysterious blue pony appeared, clad in a purple cape.
“You dare stand up to me?” You yell, “I’m far too powerful for the likes of you, filly, begone!” You laugh the best evil laugh you can.
Trixie has a look of bravery in her eyes as she readies her wand and points it at you.
“What? What’s this?” You grunt.
Trixie shakes the wand, you pretend to recoil in pain and fall over shaking you defeat. Trixie climbs on to you and gives you a look of victory before bursting in to laughter. You look at your watch while lying on the ground
“Well, my little wizard, I mean Great and Powerful Trixie, you seem to have defeated me,” Trixie laughs some more, but it appears to be time for lunch, what say you get off my belly and put some food into yours.” Dang, that has got to be the cheesiest thing you ever said. You mentally scold yourself.
Trixie gives you a look of defiance and sits her flank down on you when she hears the words lunch. Trixie’s mom had insisted on this strange fad diet of eating pinecones, and Trixie hates it, one of the reasons you were hired was to convince her. The convincing can wait, so now, you just pick her up while you right yourself. Trixie grumpily squirms as if to say “Put the Great and Powerful Trixie down, human!”
You carry her to the kitchen and prepare to lower her into her high-chair. You stop for a second and remember something important. You remove Trixie’s hat and cape much to her displeasure; you then pry the wand out of her hoof. You have no idea how that works, but it just does. You put a cape and hatless Trixie into her high-chair. You wonder why you have to go through that with her every time you feed her. You place a bowl of oatmeal on Trixie’s tray table. Trixie pouts at you.
“Come on, oatmeal is good for you, and besides, it has peanut butter in it,” you nudge the bowl closer to the blue filly.
Trixie looks up at you and regally nods in approval. You dip your spoon into the out meal and move it towards Trixie.
“Here comes the choo-choo train,” you say, “Chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga! Choo-Choo!”
Trixie flicks the spoon out of your hand with a look of fear and disgust. You catch it in mid-air in an epic act of foalsitter parkour. You forgot, trains have wheels.
“Alright then,” you say, “Here comes the weather pegasus.”
You make looping motions with the spoon before “Landing” it in Trixie’s mouth. This continues for about five minutes until Trixie eats every last drop of peanut-buttery goodness. You then put a plate of pinecones onto Trixie’s tray-table. Once again, Trixie pushes them away in disgust causing this same debate you have with her every time she has lunch to start up again.
“Come on,” you plead, “pinecones are good for you, at least that’s what your mom says. You’ll never become great and powerful if you don’t eat them.”
“Here let me show you,” you pick up a pine cone and take a tiny bite off the edge, “mmmmm, delicious.”
Trixie picks one up and takes a bite out of it. She manages to eat it without spitting it out, unlike the first seven times. It takes Trixie eight minutes to eat the pinecones because she hates them, you have tried talking to her mom about it, but she would not listen.
“Good job, oh Great and Powerful Trixie,” you say, “Here’s your reward for cleaning you plate.”
You place a plate of peanut-butter crackers (The square kind, not circular,) onto Trixie’s table. She gets super excited and begins to eat them really fast. When you first started foalsitting her, you wondered why here parents had a whole shelf packed with crackers, now you know. That little filly can go through a whole box of crackers a day. Though that is nothing compared to Derpy’s muffin-eating speed.
Trixie finishes the crackers, so you hand her a juice box, which you always remember to tell her are “Potions of Greatness and Power,” Trixie uses her fantastic magic ability to stick the straw into the box by herself, unlike most of the foals you take care of. Trixie slurps down the “potion” and then demands to be let down. You give her back her cape, hat, and wand. Trixie then starts to run around the room, occasionally stopping to strike a pose to show off. She then grabs her wand and heroically points it at you.
“Again?” You ask, “Fine then. Rawr! I am the dreaded Ursa Major!”
The Cake Twins (co-op with Pinkie Pie)
"Now then sitter, when waking them up from their naps, you have to do it nice and slow," Pinkie Pie put herself at eye-level with the edge of the crib and began to lightly tap Pound Cake, who immediately woke up. He started to cry, which woke up his sister, causing her to join in the fit.
"No! Wait! Don't cry!" Said Pinkie frantically, "Mr. and Mrs. Cake said I couldn't use the bags of flower anymore! You still like funny faces, right?"
“Now now, Pinkie,” you say, “it’s like you said, just nice and slow,” you pick up the two foals and begin to slowly rock them, their crying stops and they eventually go back to their normal, cooing state.
“Whoa, how’d you do that?” Pinkie stared in wonder at your miracle working.
“Trust me,” you laugh, “When I took care of you, I dealt with much worse, you used to always get to the cookie jar and gobble down all the cookies, it was so adora...”
“Whazzat you say?” Says the pink pony who somehow has just gotten a jar of cookies.
“Uhhh... nothing,” you look towards the foals, “Now then, it’s time for your lunch.”
You put the two foals in their respective high chairs and Pumpkin Cake immediately starts to chew on her tray-table, her teeth had begun to grow in, so her chewing left behind some bite-marks, to which she giggles. Pound cake pounds at his tray table, causing it to slowly move forward.
“I think we should give them their lunch soon,” says Pinkie Pie as she holds down Pound’s chair.
You put down a plate of alfalfa on each foal’s tray. You stop each of them before they perform their respective bad habits. You grab one spoon in each hand and attempt to feed both foals at the same time, which would have been a great idea if the foals were willing to eat their vegetables, they dodged the leafy spoons multiple times, and you couldn’t keep two in control while holding two spoons, you try to stretch your arms in odd ways in hopes of catching them off guard, this results in failure as you trip and fall, losing your grip on the spoons and sending them flying. When you hit the ground, Pinkie Pie catches the ends of the spoons between her teeth. For a brief second, you catch a glimpse of the words “Sweet Catch!” written in a green, pixelated font, but you decide it was just your imagination. You wonder why you did not have Pinkie help you in the first place, so you have her feed Pound cake while you feed Pumpkin. You both have a much easier time giving each of the foals their food, besides having to pry the spoon from Pumpkin’s mouth.
The two of you finish feeding the foals in about 4 minutes, so you move on to the next course, oatmeal. Pound gives the oatmeal a look of fear, remembering the time when it landed on his head, and Pumpkin wears an expression of concern.
“Don’t worry guys,” you say in the most comforting voice you can muster, “it’s just oatmeal. It won’t hurt you. Unless it lands on your head.”
“Or if it’s filled with oatmeal-sharks!” Pinkie Pie butts in, “or oatmeal-alligators.”
“What?” You say.
“Oatmeal-sharks and oatmeal-gators, or even worse, the rare oatmeal shark-gator!” Pinkie pie pulls gummy (who is sporting a fake shark fin on his back) out of Pumpkin Cake’s oatmeal, Pinkie giggles and Pumpkin makes a face of disgust.
“Okay,” you say awkwardly, “thank you for letting me know that I need to get some new oatmeal now.”
A short trip to the fridge later and you place new oatmeal on Pumpkin’s tray as well as some generic baby food for Pound since he made it quite clear that he was too scared to eat the oatmeal. You move the spoon towards Pumpkin Cake’s mouth, but suddenly the spoon glows blue. The spoon forces itself upwards until you lose your grip, it hovers for a second or two before it stops glowing and falls on the tray.
“Pinkie, how exactly can she do that?”
“It’s magic, duh. Think of it as a magic-spasm.”
You sigh, “Pinkie, Unicorn magic works purely off determination. Foals may not have developed ‘control’ over magic, which lets them amplify it greatly, but they pretty much run off of ‘drive’. That’s why foals can do magic, sort of a ‘noponys told them they can’t’ sort of thing. That said, Pumpkin’s got the most absurd level of control I’ve ever heard of.”
Pinkie completely skips explaining the situation, “Of well, at least foals lose their flying and magic at two months old.”
You lift the foals out of their high chairs and you and Pinkie carry them to their play-pen. Pound Cake immediately starts to mash some foam blocks and Pumpkin starts to chew on a plush cat. You move the toys away from the foals and you, once again, explain to them that they should not do those things. The foals give a happy nod, which is what they always do; they will probably go right back to pounding and chewing within the next half-hour.
Suddenly, your phone rings, startling Pinkie and making her literally jump ten feet in the air. The foals giggle. Your phone is making “TARDIS" noises meaning it’s from your boss.
“Hello?”
Your boss is quick in explaining to you the importance of studying for your next job. Your boss is right too, you have never dealt with changelings before aside from watching season two’s finale, so you don’t have that big of an idea what your up against.
“Sorry Pinkie,” you say, “but I have to be going now, see you around,” you walk towards your time machine and tell your boss that you are leaving now, but Pinkie jumps in front of you.
“Wait!” Pinkie Pie shoves a “Monopony” board in your face, “you promised we’d play!”
Pinkies worried face changes to an expression of suspicion.
“Wait a second,” she says, “Your tryin’ to shirk your work aren’t you? I take it you don’t want to take care of these two foals some more, well you have a job to do, and you’d better get too it buster!”
You hear your boss laughing on the other end, who then gives you permission to stay longer. Looks like you’ll be here for a while.g
After about four hours of studying the subject of how changelings eat, you are now ready. Feeding a changeling might just be your strangest job yet. Your plan, play with her, and let her feed off your own love, a strange plan maybe, but you can’t just pour a bottle of love on Cheerios now, can you?
When you enter Princess Chrysalis’ hive, you announce your presence to her, you immediately hear the pitter-patter of little cheese hooves as she runs towards you. You squat down and outstretch your arms, as one would do for a puppy. When she runs to you, you hug her and pick her up, she hugs back. then you hear a quick, but loud series of low whistles that almost sounded like a mix between a bird tweeting and a cat purring, indicating she is feeding, you’re off to a good start. Chrysie then runs over to her changeling toys and gestures some orders to them, she has somehow decided which ones have certain skills and qualities; you are not sure how she tells them apart. She picks up one and since she can’t talk yet, starts hissing “Orders” into its ear and holding it to her ear as a reply. She then nods to her toy, her strategist, you guess, and runs back to you, which would be really cute if it was not for her devious smile. She asks you to pick her up, which you cautiously agree to. She then touches your forehead with her hoof.
“Awwww, Chrysie," you say, "is this your latest evil scheme?” Your joking abruptly ends when all of a sudden, strange green energy flows from your forehead and into the holes in the heiress’ hoof. You nearly drop her out of shock.
“Chrysie… what… did… you...” you manage to gasp as you catch your breath, you get another shock when Princess Chrysalis’ surrounds herself with a small green flame, when it clears away, you are no longer looking at the queen-to-be, but…
“Pinkie Pie?”
The little pink party pony hops around you.
You finally manage to calm down and collect yourself.
“Did you… read my mind?” You ask. Followed by just more smiles from the faux Pinkie, who quickly nods and resumes hopping. You guess that’s what the holes in their hooves are for. You were not expecting such a young changeling to have such strong powers; last you saw her, all she could do was change her colour. She continues to bounce around you. You guess she figured out Pinkie’s personality when she read your mind. You remember what it was like the first time you foal-sat Pinkie. She would always try to get the cookies, and you had to give her balloons to calm her down, and she always hated oatmeal. You almost forget about Chrysie until you hear another purr, she then immediately takes the form of Fluttershy.
“Oh, I see your game,” you say, “You’re trying to feed off my love for the other ponies I’ve foalsat, I’ll have you know that I love you just as much so there is no need to do this.”
Chrysieshy cowers while you talk, you tell her that you’ve had enough of these antics young lady, and she backs up, cowers and starts to squeak, at which point you stop, because you do not want to make Fluttershy cry, even if it is not the real flutters. You hear another coo, she’s still at it. She turns to Rainbow Dash, she starts to fly away, but fails.
“Not used to feathered wings, are you?” You chuckle.
Before she can run away, you pick her up again and start to scratch behind her wings, it comes as a surprise to her, not having pegasus fur or wings, but she enjoys it, and you start to hear more purring from the Princess. She signals to be let down, and she transforms into Rarity once on the floor, she starts to parade around the room with her head up, she gestures for you to come along like you were her butler and commands you to carry her toys, you follow out of curiosity of the next thing she will do.
Her hive is like what you would assume most changeling hives were like, its floor was littered with a hardened, shiny, green slime, and the halls were dotted with lamps that looked almost organic, as if they had grown out of the walls of the hive. The two of you pass the bathroom, where you had bathed her during your last visit. Chrysalis leads you to her room, the most colorfully decorated space in the hive assorted crayon and slime drawings lined the walls, the pink playhouse you had given her had been overrun by her “army” the mane 6 toys that came with them sealed in small cocoons, something you try to dismiss as cute. A large mobile hung over a stuffed-animal-lined, slime-filled cocoon, which was her bed; it is called a “recuperacoon” or something like that. She gestures for you to give her toys, and she lines them up around the recuperacoon when you give them to her. She gestures for you to pick her up, upon doing so; she transforms into Applejack and kicks you in the stomach. You scold her, but almost call her Applejack, who has kicked you many times when you started foalsitting. Chrysiejack loves having strong legs and starts to kick at things around her room, block towers, stuffed animals and slime-filled tea sets. She kicks over a stack of books, which falls on her. You run to Chrysie and ask if she’s alright. Luckily she is, and she is holding her favorite book in her mouth, she has turned to Twilight Sparkle for the occasion. She thrusts the book out in front of you.
“Fine, Chrysie,” you say, “I’ll read to you if you stop transforming.”
The Changeling Princess turns back to normal and hops around gleefully. She then sits on your lap. You begin to read to her. The story is about a young changeling who goes on an adventure and learns an important lesson about friendship, just like the favorite books of most of the other foals, minus the changeling part. Once you finish the story, Chrysie lets out one last big purr; changelings absorb love on a vaster scale when given to them willingly, and you have a lot of love you are willing to give to her. Once she finishes, Chrysie jumps into her recuperacoon. You soon hear snoring.
Twilight Sparkle (co-op with Shining Armor)
“Smawty Pants,” the voice of a filly echoes down the hall, “do homework!”
In the kitchen, Shining Armor’s horn glows, the white foal is giggling to himself.
“Your idea seems to be working,” you say, smiling yourself.
Soon, a raggedy doll flies through the kitchen doorway, surrounded by a blue aura. Twilight Sparkle follows soon after chasing after her doll and shouting.
“Do homework!”
“Much easier than grabbing her tail,” says Shining as he starts to play with his little sister for a while. Moving Smarty Pants just within the filly’s reach and then pulling her back up again. He eventually puts Smarty Pants into Twilight’s high chair.
“Twilight,” you say, “it’s time for lunch.”
“Do homework!” She replies.
“She can do her homework later.”
“Do homework!” Twilight stands her ground
You think for a minute about what to say, you then reply, “eating lunch will earn her extra credit.”
Twilight’s ears perk up when she hears the words “extra credit”, and she starts to hop around excitedly, after calming her down, you pick her up and place her in her chair, she immediately hugs her doll with her left front hoof. You then place food on her tray. A bowl of oatmeal, as always, but you also something different this time. You’ve noticed that most fillies don’t like eating cooked carrots, so you have decided to experiment and see how Twilight likes alfalfa sprouts. She looks at the green leaves. You wonder if she knows what they are.
Now that you have everything set up, you take your spoon grab some alfalfa and give it to Twilight. Upon receiving it, the purple filly chews it slowly, trying to figure out if she likes it or not.
“I’m pretty sure that this is the first time she’s ever had alfalfa,” says Shining Armor.
Within a couple of seconds, Twilight spits out the Alfalfa. You quickly close your eyes and brace yourself to be hit, but nothing happens. You open your eyes to see a faint, blue disk floating between you and a disgusted Twilight trying to wipe remaining bits of leaves of her tongue. The blue disk has caught all the alfalfa that Twilight spit out. At first, you don’t know what the disk is, but then you figure it out. You turn to your left to see an exasperated Shining Armor, horn aglow, trying to maintain the blue disk.
“Thank you shining,” you say, “that’s enough.”
The foal’s horn immediately stops glowing and the alfalfa falls to the floor, Shining seems to feel woozy so he sits down.
You then turn to Twilight, who has a look of guilt on her face.
“Twilight,” you scold, “that was quite uncalled for young filly, look what you made your brother have to do. Now, are you going to eat the rest of this without any more fuss?”
“Okay”, says Twilight shyly, as she nods slowly. You begin to feed her again. This time, she doesn’t put up any fuss; at least she doesn’t show it. She manages to eat every bite without so much as making a peep. Finishing the alfalfa takes about three minutes.
“Can I feed her the oatmeal?” Asks Shining Armor.
“Of course,” you reply.
Shining walks up to the high chair and lifts the spoon with his magic. You’re glad he can do that, because after your experience with Lil’ Macintosh, you don’t think that you’d want to try lifting a colt of that age ever again.
“Hello Twily,” says Shining happily, “time for some oatmeal.”
Aa the spoon heads towards her mouth, Twilight moves her head to the sides, trying to not let the oatmeal enter her mouth, but shining remains resilient and eventually get’s the oatmeal into the evasive pony’s mouth. Upon receiving it though, Twilight seems to like it. You feel relief briefly. And then Twilight dunks her face into the bowl. A small splash is created and then she looks back up with her face covered in oatmeal. She happily licks her lips.
“Twilight,” you say, “why would you have to do that?”
Twilight shakes her head happily. You sigh and then ask shining to get a few napkins. He comes back in about a minute and then clean her face off, which takes about two minutes. After that’s over, you feed her the remaining oatmeal, which takes about three minutes.
Now that everything’s done, you remove Twilight’s bib and take her out of her chair. You then hand her Smarty Pants and a sippy-cup full of apple cider.
Twilight hops back a couple moments later, holding a notepad in her mouth and Smarty Pants on her back. You know that this can only mean one thing, she wants you to check over her dolls “homework.” You take the pad from Twilight, grab a red pen, and sit at the dining room table. You look through the problems, putting a big red check next to each of them.
After you finish the twenty problems that Twilight had written, you turn to her and say, “they’re all right, Smarty Pants get’s a one hundred, which is an A+”
Twilight cocks her head at you.
“What,” you ask?
“Extwa Cwedit!”
“Oh, that’s right, I’m sorry.”
You change the first score you wrote to one hundred and ten.
“There,” you say, “one hundred and ten, an A+”
Twilight looks at you with a know-it-all expression.
“A pwus, pwus!” She corrects while you hand the notepad back to genius pony.
Twilight runs off again, but stops when smarty pants floats above her.
“Come on Twily,” says Shining Armor, “it’s just within your reach. Come and get Smarty Pants.”
Twilight jumps at her doll, but it flies above her.
“Oh, you just missed it. Oh, now it’s back.”
“Come one Shining,” you say, “not this again.”
Shining doesn’t seem to hear you and instead continues to taunt his little sister. You quickly think of what to do about that. When an idea hits you, you turn towards an empty hallway.
“Oh, hello Cadence,” you say into it.
“What? C-Cadence,” Shining Armor drops Smarty Pants and turns to the hallway, trying to look as if nothing is wrong towards the filly he has a crush on.
Upon seeing that she’s not there, he turns towards you, ticked off.
You feel a rustling in your pocket, and your phone suddenly floats out of it. Shining starts to move it around your head and starts to giggle.
“Come on, it’s just within your reach,” he says giggling, “come and get it.”
This is going to be a long afternoon.
