I very quickly determined that it wasn't ok. I had next to no right to posess the affection of one mare, let alone more than that. Of course it was a ridiculous idea, looking back I wondered why I had even given it any thought. Once I reached the library, I opened the door and walked in instead of knocking. There was nopony to be seen in the living area, but Spike's head popped into view from the kitchen doorway.

"Hi Spike." I greeted distantly, still lost in my thoughts a little.

"Hey Sharky!" he returned my greeting with a broad grin. "Where were you dude? Twilight made some great waffles for us!"

"Oh, I was out with a friend. I'll join you in a bit; I gotta take a shower first."

Spike nodded understandingly and I walked upstairs to the bedroom. I slipped in and closed the bathroom door behind me as I entered. About ten minutes later, I had finished bathing, used the bathroom, and slipped on my last new pair of pants/armor and boxers. I left and went back downstairs for waffles, but Twilight, Unity, and Spike had all moved into the main area already. Twilight was laying down in a corner and reading with her legs curled up under her body. Unity was lying on her back contentedly, batting at something in front of his face that only he could see. Spike was on the other side of the room on the top of a ladder, re-arranging the books on the shelves.

"Hey guys." I called out, alerting everyone to my presence. They all turned to look at me at once. Spike nearly fell off the ladder, Unity smiled and reached out towards me, and Twilight smiled before turning back to her book. I ran downstairs and caught Spike before he actually got to have a meeting with gravity and the floor.

"T-thanks." he sputtered nervously. I grinned at him.

"No problem. You need some help?"

"No thanks. I got it." he assured me before turning back to his work.

"So, I'm wondering... why are you always moving books around?"

"Because they never seem to be in the right places. When we first moved here, we just put the books on the shelves because we didn't want to bother with sorting them and unpacking everything else. Since then, ponies have been borrowing and incorrectly shelving the books almost every day. So, no matter what, the books always seem to be out of order."

"Huh... I haven't seen anypony borrow books though."

"Yeah, since you started living here, a lot of ponies have stopped showing up all the time. At first, it was because they were all scared of you. Now it's because Twilight doesn't let most ponies in, 'cause she's worried they'll be nosy reporters just pretending to want books."

"So you should be close to catching up on sorting, right?"

"Actually, I am! It'll be nice to have totally organized books."

"If you say so." I muttered indifferently, bored with the conversation. I left Spike to his work and walked over to Twilight and Unity. I sat down next to Twilight and scooped Unity off of her back.

"You smell much better." Twilight noted with a pleased tone.

"Good, good. Glad I finally got to take a shower." I looked down to Twilight as I spoke and saw a bright green patch of her coat right in the middle of her back. Where Unity had been laying. I covered my mouth with the hand not holding Unity and tried not to burst into laughter. Twilight seemed to hear my stifled snickering though, and she turned away from her book to look at me.

"What's so funny?"

"Oh, n-nothing!" I managed to squeak out between chuckles. Twilight shrugged and turned back to her book. "So, w-what are we gonna do today?" I asked as soon as I had my laughter under control. I might have freaked out about her green-stained coat, but I figured it was temporary like most of Unity's tricks. Twilight lowered her book and rasied a forehoof to her lips in thought.

"Hmmm... How about we stay here where it's nice and quiet and just read? I don't feel like dealing with going out into crowds of reporters today."

"Alright, sounds fine to me. Oh, maybe I can finish that third Daring Do book." I stood up to go get the book and Unity gave me a big pout. "What?"

"Outside!" he demanded.

"What? No, mommy and I want to stay inside."

Twilight's ears twitched at the word 'mommy'.

"I want outside!" Unity shouted back.

"Look, you can't have what you want all the time. No outside." I stated firmly. Unity looked angry.

"Yes outside!" he declared with a fitful flail. Without warning, we were both suddenly in the air over Carousel Boutique. Upside down.

"Waaa!" I shouted as we fell towards the roof of Rarity's home. I clutched Unity tightly and tried to position myself to slide down the curve of the roof. I'm fairly sure it would have worked. Had I not crashed through the roof instead of sliding down it.

*CRACK* *BOOM*

I arrived on the top floor of the boutique in a pile of rubble and a cloud of dust. Luckily, the floor below me didn't give out as well. I coughed a few times and waved my free hand in front of my face to clear some of the dust.

"What in the name of Celestia was that?!" Rarity screeched from somewhere in the store. I heard her hoofsteps approaching.

"Uhhh... hi Rarity!" I called out. The dust was still pretty thick, so I couldn't see her even though I heard her steps stop somewhere nearby.

"Sharky? Is that you dear?" Rarity yelled as if the dust was going to keep me from hearing her.

"Yeah! It's me..."

"This still no outside!" Unity whined.

"I'm sorry about your roof! Unity is being... difficult."

"Oh dear... oh dear..." Rarity muttered. She sounded very unsure of what to do.

"D-don't worry, I'll pay for it." I promised weakly as Unity began to thrash in my arms again. "Uhhh... I think I've got to go." before I had even finished the word 'go', I was in a new place. I ended up saying the word 'go' to a dirt wall. I turned to see my new surroundings and discovered that I was in a cavern. The Diamond Dogs' gem cavern to be exact. I remembered it from the time I had been here to get gems for Esmerelda. However, I noticed something a bit odd about the cavern full of gems.

There was a huge statue right in the middle of the pile of gems. It was bipedal and humanoid, but it didn't look exactly like a Diamond Dog. Its legs didn't bend like theirs, its head wasn't large and didn't stick out like a snout, and it didn't have huge ears.

"Not outside!" Unity shrieked before I could comment on the statue or see if we were alone in the chamber.

"Did you hear a child-so--" A voice, which I assumed belonged to a Diamond Dog, started to say. Unity and I were gone again before it could finish speaking. The newest place we popped into was somewhere in a large grouping of trees. I realized almost instantly that they were apple trees, and we were in the orchard.

"Yay! Finawy outside!" Unity cheered. I breathed a heavy sigh of relief and thanked Celestia that Unity had finally gotten it right.

"That was very naughty Unity!" I scolded him now that I had time to actually talk. He ignored me and seemed to be totally absorbed in the happiness of getting what he wanted. I sighed and began to walk back to the library.

At least, I tried to.

I took a step forward and hearly fell over because my left leg hadn't followed me. I regained my balance and looked back at my leg to see what the problem was. My entire left leg up to my thigh was stuck inside a tree Unity had teleported us next to.

"Oh crap!" I cried in fear. For all I knew, my leg was now part of the tree! After trying to move it around for a little bit, I began to think that my leg wasn't part of the tree, just inside it. "Great... just great. Unity, stay close. Daddy has to fix his leg because you were being naughty." I ordered sternly as I placed Unity on the ground.

"Ok da-da." he giggled as he began to roam around the trees nearby. I sighed and reminded myself that he was still too young to understand completely. I turned my attention back to the tree and decided to take the easiest path to getting my foot out of the tree.

Cut it out. Sure, it wasn't the most brilliant plan ever concieved, but I wasn't seeing a whole lot of options. Besides, my armor would likely protect me for the most part should I swing too hard. I reached back for my sword... only to find that it wasn't there. I had left it at the library after I showered.

"You left without your weapon you moron! Awww crud! I can't believe it!" I shouted at my tree trap. I sighed and changed my plan to trying to break the tree with my bare hands. Were I still a normal human, I would have simply started screaming for help. I was pretty sure I could at least break a tree now.

I placed both of my hands on the sides of the tree and braced myself. With a grunt, I put all of my strength into trying to break the tree off sideways like a twig. For a long time, nothing happened. I couldn't put much force into it because I only had one foot to brace myself with. I could feel my face turn red as the exertion brought blood to my cheeks. Finally, a crack rang through the orchard. Then another, which was quickly followed by more. With a cascade of cacophonous crackles, the tree broke off right where my leg had been sealed into it.

"What the buck was that?!" Applejack's voice rang out from somewhere in the orchard. She didn't sound very close, but that would likely change soon. I quickly pulled my leg out of the tree and stood up normally. I put the tree down as much as I could, which wasn't much since it leaned on other trees no matter where I placed it, and started looking around for AJ. I did have to take responsibility for breaking the tree, after all.

"It was me, AJ! I'm over here!" as soon as I shouted, I could hear hoofbeats rapidly approaching. AJ found me in only seconds, and gazed in wide-eyed horror at the jagged stump left by my destruction of the tree.

"What did you do?!" she nearly screamed. I flinched and twiddled my thumbs like a shameful child that had just gotten caught drawing on a freshly painted wall.

"I broke the tree... I'm sorry! Unity had trapped my leg in it on accident!"

AJ slowly stopped looking so horrified, but she began to look incredibly sad.

"Ya killed Woodsworth.... he was mah second favorite tree..." AJ trotted over to the actual tree that I had leaned on the other trees and began softly stroking it. "Awww.... A-Ah can't believe it..."

"Oh geez... I'm sorry AJ, I didn't know it--"

"He." AJ corrected.

"--he was so special. I was stuck... I didn't want to break it, honest!"

AJ nodded solemly. "Ah understand...." she sniffled softly. "Ah won't say Ah ain't mad, but Ah won't yell at'cha."

"I'll uh... I'll pay for it, ok?" I offered. When she heard my offer, AJ's expression became a little angry.

"Ya can't just pay for it! He was like mah kin! All the trees are..."

"So... you don't want me to pay for it?"

"What Ah'd like is fer you to show Woodsworth a little respect instead of just passin' him off as somethin' to pay for." she snapped firmly. I scratched my head and looked at the strange scene with a bit of confusion. It was odd to see such attachment to a plant, of all things. I sighed and figured it was best to just do as she said. I knelt down next to the tre and placed a hand on it.

"I'm sorry Mr. Woodsworth. I really didn't want to hurt you, honest! I was just stuck. You know, in you."

AJ nodded appreciatively. "Thanks fer apologizin'. Do y'think you could get Unity to apologize too? Can he talk yet?"

"I can try I suppose." I turned to look at the spot I had left Unity in. "Unity, you need to say sorry to..." Unity wasn't there. I walked around and looked around a few trees. My pace increased drastically as my panic grew. He wasn't there. Nowhere. I couldn't find him. "AJ! Unity is missing! Help me!" I shouted desperately as I began running around the trees in search of my son. I could only imagine what kind of havoc he could wreak on his own in the orchard. Even worse, what would happen if somepony found him before I did and blabbed about it.

Most of all, I was worried I might never see him again. With his magic, It wasn't impossible for him to be halfway across the world already. I didn't want to lose my son.

It scared me even more that I may not have a choice in the matter.