For all that Fluttershy hated words—

Not that she did hate them, of course. Not really. She realized that they were good and useful tools. Very much like hammers, in fact, she found herself thinking.

Especially since, well, whenever she tried to use either words or hammers, it seemed, she just ended up hurting herself or somepony else.

But for all her mixed feelings about words—yes, that was a nicer way of putting it—the silence in the library right then? It was hundreds of times worse than any words could ever have been. Even compared to the other silences that had fallen over the group this evening, this current silence was in a horrible, horrible class by itself.

Those earlier silences had followed Applejack and Twilight explaining everything about Fluttershy's biology to their other three friends—quite clearly and calmly and completely, Fluttershy thought. And yes, Applejack had called it 'her condition,' which Fluttershy thought made it sound like she was sick, while Twilight had called it that whole long name she'd discovered during her research, the name that Fluttershy didn't much like because it had the word 'insensitivity' in it and Fluttershy had always thought of herself as being overly sensitive if she was anything—

But they were just words, she kept telling herself. Just big, heavy, hammer-like words.

Still, the silence that had immediately followed all those words hadn't lasted long enough to become unbearable. "Wow!" Pinkie had piped up, her eyes spinning like pinwheels in the glance Fluttershy had dared to raise from the surface of Twilight's table. "You mean all this time, Fluttershy's been hiding a—?!"

"Wiggler," Applejack had said quickly and firmly, Fluttershy huddling against her and trying not to fall over. "We calls it her li'l wiggler."

Pinkie had squealed. "I'll just bet you do! And how cute is that?!"

That had led into another bit of silence, Fluttershy's breaths getting raggedier and raggedier. Then she'd heard Rainbow say, "OK," and just that tiny word had sent Fluttershy's insides spinning till she'd thought she was either going to faint or throw up. "This is gonna sound weird, Fluttershy," Dashie had gone on, "and I wanna say I'm, like, totally happy that you and Applejack are together. But, I mean, c'mon! If you'd told me about this dick of yours back when we were in school, think of the fun we coulda had!"

From the end of the table, Twilight had cleared her throat. "Not entirely appropriate, Rainbow."

"I'm just saying!"

The silence after that had stretched long and deep, broken at last by Rarity coughing, a sound as delicate and brittle as spun glass shattering. "Yes. Well. I find that I have nothing to say at the present time."

Fluttershy had darted a glance over, but when she'd seen the white rim around Rarity's eyes and smelled the sour stink of panic worming through her friend's usual honeysuckle scent, Fluttershy had been completely unable to stifle a cry; turning, she'd buried her face in Applejack's chest, her marefriend's strong forelegs closing around her.

"But I'll be all right!" Rarity's exclamations had sounded muffled, like Fluttershy's ears had suddenly become stuffed with cotton. "I merely...merely need to think, to digest, to comb through—" Her words had choked off before returning rougher and with a higher pitch to them. "Tell me you're joking! Please, somepony tell me this is a—!" Another choke had brought Rarity's voice somewhat closer to normal. "I'll be all right! I will! I just— Fluttershy, you and Applejack must come by the shop tomorrow afternoon, say, fivish. I...I'll be all right by then, I promise, but right now, I...I just need to...to—" Hoofbeats against the wooden floor, the creak and crash of the library door bursting open, then faster hoofbeats off down the street and away.

And that? That was when the current silence had fallen, the thickest, awfulest silence Fluttershy had ever heard.

Twilight's sigh drifted over to her. "She'll be all right. I mean, she said so, didn't she?"

A ruffle of Rainbow's wings. "Well, you gotta admit: it's kind of a lot to take in."

Pinkie gave an unmistakable giggle. "Though I'll bet it's not too much for Applejack to take in!"

Fluttershy heard Twilight gasp, but a tickle in her own middle made Fluttershy cough out something almost like a laugh.

"Hey!" Rainbow was shouting. "I totally didn't mean for it to come out like that!"

"Really?" Pinkie's giggles got bubblier. "'Cause that's exactly what Fluttershy said, too!"

"Pinkie!" Twilight started, but Fluttershy couldn't contain that tickle, had to let it out, had to let herself laugh at what actually was kind of a funny joke.

"Honeycomb?" Applejack asked above her. "You OK?"

Not wanting to pull away from Applejack's solid warmth, Fluttershy put her front hoofs around Applejack, pushed with her back hoofs, and slid herself up Applejack's chest till she was looking straight into those beautiful but startled green eyes. She leaned forward to give Applejack a kiss, then turned so she could see her other friends, Twilight's expression concerned, Rainbow's confused, and Pinkie's just as silly and joyful as always. "It's why Applejack calls me her honeycomb," Fluttershy told them, love and pride giving her strength. "'Cause I've got this sweet little stinger tucked away just for her."

What little silence had a chance to form then was quickly smashed to pieces: Dashie snorted; Twilight gave a hicuppy sort of snicker; Pinkie let fly a full-throated guffaw; and Applejack's gorgeous deep chuckle ran through Fluttershy's body as refreshing as a glass of cold milk on an empty stomach.

"There we go!" Pinkie waved her hoofs, confetti scattering from them. "That's what I wanna hear!"

The air seemed less solid in Fluttershy's lungs, her three friends smiling. Then Applejack was shifting behind her. "You girls gonna be OK with this? 'Cause soon as we have this wedding in two weeks, me and Fluttershy are gonna start working on getting me in a family way, if y'know what I mean, and, well, we didn't want it taking y'all by surprise...."

"Family?" Rainbow's eyes were as wide as her grin. "Since it means we getta be aunts, then yeah, you better believe I'm all right with this!"

Fluttershy couldn't keep from glancing at the door, though, and Applejack's hoofs moved to hold her tighter. "Rarity's tough," Applejack said quietly. "She needs to have her tizzy fit, but she'll be back to her good ol' self when we call on her tomorrow."

The other girls were nodding, but Fluttershy shivered when she noticed how the silence had crept back into the room. Still, she swallowed and made herself nod, too.

From his perch atop the city hall flagpole, Discord watched Rarity gallop through the door of the Carousal Boutique, felt the air slosh around him like so much water when she slammed that door behind her, and cocked his head at the cacophony of voices that always echoed around inside him.

Most were singing variations on the same theme: It's not our problem. But that even a few of his voices were forming a counter-melody about being interested in the prissy little marshmallow—a few were even radiating concern, a concept Discord had only recently discovered and still wasn't sure he approved of—just intrigued him too much to ignore.

A snap of his lion claws, and he was straightening to his full height on Rarity's doorstep. He considered for a moment donning full evening wear—tuxedo, opera hat, gloves, spats, bouquet of posies, et cetera—but opted for the direct approach instead: pulling his eyeballs from his head, he thrust them and his paws between the vibrating molecules of the door's atomic structure till he had popped them out on the other side and was able to get a view of the shop's interior.

Rarity was lying disheveled as a dishrag over one of her several sofas, her hoofs across her face though she didn't seem to be crying. Not stopping to think—when had he ever, after all?—Discord shoved his head through the door, squished his eyes back into place, and called out, "No, no, Purity, darling! Don't get up! I'll show myself in!"

He oozed around the whizzing electron orbits and stepped more-or-less complete onto the carpeting, the seamstress snapping him a startled look. "Discord?! What...what are you doing here?!"

All the smart-mouthed answers that began cascading through his brain, he suddenly felt, wouldn't be nearly as much fun as telling her the truth. "I was hanging from the roof of city hall," he said, flicking his talons in that general direction, "when I saw you run out of the library with fluids leaking from you. I assume this has to do with the fluids that occasionally leak from Fluttershy?" He touched a claw to his chin. "Though 'spurt' would likely be a better word, wouldn't it?"

"Stop!" She reacted as if some of those fluids were pooling on the floor, he thought, her eyes squinching shut, her hoofs convulsively drawing up to curl her into a shivering little pile of pony. "Of all the grotesque abominations I've been subjected to today, you, sirrah, are the most of both!"

"Grotesque abominations?!" Several of Discord's inner voice set up a ferocious howling. "Are you referring even obliquely to my dear friend Shutterfly?"

Rarity made a sound very nearly as ferocious as the ones in his head. "Get outta my house!"

"What?!" He swooped to her side, delicately set his eagle claw on the nearest of her hoofs that he could find. "I shall certainly not abandon you in your hour of need! Especially since what you seem to need is a good kick upside the head!"

"You vile monstrosity!" She whirled on her sofa and thrust her snout into his face as sharply as a dagger. "You dare bring your foul self into my presence when I've just discovered that one my best friends in the world is...is—?!"

"The exact same pony you've known for all these years?" He decided not to plant a kiss between those narrowed eyes in such a way that a small cherry tree would take root and grow there; instead, he leaned back into the hammock that had sprouted from his tail. "And while I certainly don't find any real enjoyment in all the sameness around here, you ponies seem quite partial to it." He fixed his gaze on hers. "Or am I mistaken, Miss Purity?"

The rage radiating from her seemed to make her hover above the sofa, and if her head had been a pot of cabbage soup—a transformative idea Discord discarded almost immediately—said pot would've been close to boiling. Everything cooled as he watched, however, each breath she took settling her till she was merely simmering. "The name," she said, her voice still tightly clenched, "is Rarity." She flopped backwards onto the cushions, her front legs folded across her chest, her glare focused so white-hot on him, Discord was sure he could feel it. "And you can leave at any time, you know!"

"Oh, but Charity!" He batted his eyelids at her, even let them become actual tiny bats for a moment so they could swoop around his head and plunge into his ears. "I'm supposed to learn more about proper behavior, aren't I? And how can I possibly do that without observing the way all my new pony friends behave?" He settled deeper into the hammock, summoned up a quill pen and a piece of parchment. "Now, would you say that this new knowledge you've gained about Fluttershy's anatomy: a) disgusts you, b) activates your latent penis envy, c) makes you realize you're madly in love with her, or d)—"

"None of the above!" The keen-edged yet wrinkled look she was giving him, he wanted to tell her, was really a great deal more becoming than the usual plastic phoniness she reveled in. "And if you knew the first thing about friendship, you'd understand what I'm going through!"

"Well?" He spread his front paws. "Teach me tonight!"

For an instant, he was sure she was going to refuse even this appeal to the generosity that had made her so attractive to her now-departed Element. But then—

Something almost appeared to deflate inside her, her eyes going dark and focusing on nothing, her words coming out as more a whisper than anything else. "From the moment I first glimpsed Fluttershy drifting through the skies above Ponyville, I saw her as...an ideal, I suppose. She was grace and poise and gentleness and beauty: femininity incarnate, if you will. She became my template, the target toward which I could aim."

She rolled her head to look at him, and the honesty Discord saw in her face almost made him shrink back for fear that it might be contagious. "The layers of spackle in which I cover myself each day are my attempts to replicate the appearance that comes so naturally to Fluttershy, and while I know I shall never attain that look, having her before me as an example just reinforced the idea that such perfection was indeed possible." She turned to face the emptiness in front of her again. "And now..."

Her words trailed away, so Discord decided he'd better jump in. "And now, you don't have to worry about it anymore! The wonderful mixture of odds and ends that constitute our friend Stuttercry is entirely her own and unique! All that pressure you were feeling is finally off!"

Yet another expression came over her, another layer of her veneer stripping away and showing Discord a creature he was suddenly very glad no longer had the ability to turn him to stone. "But I want the pressure, don't you see? I want to face the impossible and bring it to heal with nothing but the sweat of my brow and the skill of my hoofs! I want Fluttershy above me as an unreachable goal! Although..." Rarity chuckled, and most of her previous layers seemed to close back in around her. "Learning that it's her mysterious biology that makes her look the way she does perhaps just serves to raise the goal even higher." She actually smiled. "And that's something I always want..."

Discord couldn't keep from snorting. "Want." He rolled the word around on his tongue like a frozen chunk of salt-water taffy. "Since my reformation began, I've all too often been confronted with the idea of wanting things that I just can't have, and I must say that I don't care for it."

"You?" Rarity gave a snort of her own, and Discord felt quietly pleased: he couldn't imagine her daring to make such a noise around any of her pony friends. "What about this vaunted chaos magic of yours? Are you no longer able to snap your claws and make anything appear?"

Cocking an eyebrow, he snapped and settled them at a small wicker table, sand on one side, water on the other, an umbrella of palm fronds between them and the blue, blue sky. A sturdily-built earth pony in flowered shorts stepped up beside them, the tray balanced across his back holding two coconuts with straws sticking out. "Any other questions?" Discord asked while the waiter placed the coconuts on the bamboo coasters in front of them.

He watched Rarity's blinking eyes glance around at the tropical splendor till they came to rest on the hindquarters of the departing waiter. "Well, now!" She reached for the nearest coconut. "Quite the charming spot."

"So there's this sort of thing, of course," Discord went on, ignoring the way that every voice in every corner of his entire body began shouting No! in a lovely dissonant squall. "And then there's something like, oh, I don't know, let's say—completely hypothetically, of course—something like me falling in love with Twilight Sparkle."

Rarity, sipping at whatever amber-colored fluid filled the coconut, suddenly went all bulgy-eyed and bulgy-cheeked, choking and spraying liquid across the table. "You what?!"

Sighing, Discord snapped them back to the tailor shop. "Honestly! I can't take you anywhere, can I?"

She was staring at him like he was, well, like he was a semi-mythical being who'd just flipped her back and forth from one pony realm to another. "You?!" Her voice cracked and squeaked. "In love with Twilight?!"

"So I've been told." The screaming all up and down his interior made him slump a bit; the constant shriek of it just got so wearying at times... "I'm not sure myself, but Applejack's convinced, and I must admit that, when our latest pony princess and I are spinning along through the more abstruse aspects of reality, there's something going on between us. It's almost as if being with her—" He shuddered, his bones clattering like he'd swallowed a barrel of castanets, something he'd sworn long ago never to do again. "—almost as if she makes me happy."

"All right, now." Rarity was sitting very still on her sofa. "Let's not fly into a panic. After all—" Her eyes narrowed. "This might just be a trick you're playing to focus my attention on something other than Fluttershy, mightn't it?"

And for the first time in his long and convoluted life, when Discord said, "I never thought of that," he actually meant it. It was such a cheering idea, he grabbed at it like the ponies he used to watch drowning in whipped cream would grab for the giant floating cherries he would lob at them as they were going down for the third time. "Could I really be making this whole embarrassing situation up just to help my dear friend Clarity with her problem that isn't really any sort of a problem at all?"

"My name—" she began, but then she stopped, her mouth going sideways. "You're stickier and more intricately-spun than a spider's web, aren't you?"

He fluttered his eyelashes at her, but his heart wasn't in it, a phrase he'd never before had occasion to float across the hot and fetid morass of his mind. He almost reached into his chest to see if his heart was actually still there, but Rarity continuing to speak distracted him.

"I'll say thank you, though, for reminding me that things can not only change while staying the same but can also stay the same while changing." She blinked. "Which made a great deal more sense in my head than it did when spoken aloud."

Blowing out a breath, Discord waved his arms. "Yes, yes, yes! But how does this help me with my problem that is actually a problem?!"

She pressed her front hoofs together. "You just leave that to me, darling." And the half-lidded look she gave him over the top of her steepled hoofs made his wings turn to stone and crash to the floor behind him.

There were tears at Rarity's the next afternoon, but like Applejack had figured, they were the good kind insteada the bad kind. In fact, the first couple minutes had so much hugging and crying and apologizing flowing back and forth 'tween Fluttershy and Rarity, AJ finally had to put a little bit of a hoof down. "Reckon I oughtta call in the weather team here? Maybe get these durn cloudbursts cleared up?"

Like Pinkie'd showed the night before, humor seemed to get ev'rypony back in more productive spirits, and pretty soon, Fluttershy was all ooos and ahhhs over Rarity's final dress designs, both gowns way frillier'n anything Applejack woulda wanted, but, well, if it made her honeycomb light up the way she was right now, then it was altogether fine with AJ.

"Although..." Rarity said, her ears folding a mite before springing back into place. "Last night after Discord helped shove me from the puddle I was wallowing in—"

"Discord?" Applejack asked the same time as Fluttershy; Fluttershy then went on: "He helped you?"

Rarity nodded. "Quite substantially, to tell the truth." She reached across the dress drawings and patted Fluttershy's hoof. "You're doing a marvelous job with him, you know."

A little frown inched over Fluttershy's face. "He's been so moody lately, I was afraid he'd been getting into mischief."

"Not at all." Rarity shot a cocked-eyebrow look at Applejack. "We had quite an interesting talk on friendship and the ways in which it can change without changing."

Blinking at her, AJ suddenly realized what she was talking about: Discord musta told Rarity something about how he was feeling toward Twilight.

Of course, in all the wedding hubbub this week, Applejack hadn't actually gotten 'round to telling Fluttershy about any of that, which got an ice-wedge of guilt jabbing into AJ's stomach. But the next minute, Rarity was waving it all away with a flick of her hoof. "The important part here is that after he left, I couldn't stop thinking about...well, about the two of you. About Applejack, the sturdy, rough, and plain-spoken farmer pony, and Fluttershy with your...your..." She shook her head, her horn glowing, another roll of paper sliding across the table. "Well, I'll not apologize for the designs because I think you'd look simply smashing in them!"

They were sketchy, of course, two figures in these fitted, white swallow-tailed coats with kinda poofy shirts underneath. "A light cotton weave for the jackets," Rarity was saying, "buttoned over ruffled silk tunics dyed to match your partner's coloration. Simple, elegant, and chic." Another smaller piece of paper floated over to rest above the picture of the pony wearing the yellow shirt. "With a matching hat in one case, of course."

"Sold," Applejack said without even thinking. 'Cause it was pretty near perfect, plain and fancy at the same time and so much more her than the gowns Rarity had been showing 'em this whole time, Applejack could already see herself wearing it.

She looked over at Fluttershy, though, and every good feeling inside her crumbled at the quivery look on that gorgeous face. "But...," her honeycomb squeaked, her hoofs coming up to clutch at the first drawing. "My beautiful, beautiful dress..."

Applejack sprang forward to nuzzle her neck. "Will still be your dress, darling. When I think of you done up in that outfit, I can't hardly keep my heart from busting out and zipping 'round the room like a starling. But—" She stepped back, took a stance on Rarity's carpet, her spine straight, her chest out, her head held high. "Can't you see me in that jacket, honeycomb? In that swell white hat with your perfect yellow-colored hatband and shirt?" She fixed as smoldering a gaze on Fluttershy as she could manage. "Can't you?" she muttered.

Fluttershy's eyes went wide, then began shifting back and forth from the drawing to Applejack and back again. "Oh, my," she said with a blush, and Applejack could barely keep from asking Rarity to excuse the two of them for an hour or so.

Still, she managed to keep herself under control, and they agreed: the dress for Fluttershy, the jacket and hat for Applejack. "Perfect!" Rarity clapped her hoofs together. "Pinkie and I, then, will be your bridesmares, Applejack, but we shall wear variations on Fluttershy's gown while Rainbow Dash and Discord, standing at Fluttershy's side, will have jackets similar to yours but with rose-colored waistcoats instead of tunics!" The glint that came into her eye then, well, AJ had learned long ago to steer clear of her when she was looking like that. "This will be the finest work I have ever created!"

"Well, all righty!" Applejack put a hoof on Fluttershy's shoulder. "We'll leave you to it."

Of course, it took another bushelfulla minutes to even get to the door what with them thanking Rarity and her thanking them and Fluttershy and Rarity coming all over teary-eyed and huggy again. Still, AJ eventually managed to herd her honeycomb outside into the early evening, Fluttershy all floating smiles and clouds of joy, her hoofs hardly touching the ground once the whole way back to Sweet Apple Acres. "Oh, Applejack!" she all but sang more'n once along the road. "We have the most wonderful friends! And this is the most wonderful town! And you are the most wonderful marefriend any girl has ever had!"

"I won't have you selling yourself short in the marefriend department, honeycomb," AJ kept saying, and it musta been the right answer 'cause it got her a giggle and a kiss ev'ry time.

They had early Sunday supper with the family, Apple Bloom and Mac hurrying a bit as the one had a date with the Crusaders and the other a slightly different sorta date with Cheerilee. Then Granny shuffled off to her knitting, and after AJ and Fluttershy did the dishes, Fluttershy swooping from cabinet to cabinet to put ev'rything away, they retired to the sitting room and their task for the evening: wedding invitations.

AJ had tried to talk Fluttershy outta this whole rigmarole last week: "We ain't got time, honeycomb! We gotta let folks know quick as we can, else they might not be able to make it out here!"

"We'll have my bird friends carry short notes and reply cards to everypony on our list right now," Fluttershy had answered, her adamant tone more'n a little sexy, AJ'd thought. "Then we'll do the proper invitations."

All Applejack could do, of course, was grin and agree. So the birds had gone out, had been flooding back steadily all week, and now, looking at them fancy parchment and tissue paper doo-dads stacked on the sideboard, Applejack had to sigh away the guilt that rustled across her belly. 'Cause ev'ry name on their list, ev'ry name they'd sent birds to visit, ev'ry name they were gonna spend the next few hours inscribing onto those funny little envelopes, they were all Apple or Orange in one way or another. "It ain't fair," AJ couldn't help mumbling.

"Hmmm?" Fluttershy looked over from where she'd settled at the table, a quill pen in her teeth.

Applejack wanted to just shake her head and forget all about the cesspool of Fluttershy's immediate family, but— "You're positive there ain't cousins or great-aunts or anypony of yours we should be letting know about this?"

"Ummm..." Fluttershy blushed and tucked the quill back into the inkwell. "I...I actually have a confession to make, Applejack."

Panic replaced the guilt. "You—" She knew it weren't possible, not after ev'rything she'd seen during their trip to Manehattan. "You ain't telling me you sent invites to your folks, are you?"

"Oh, no!" A sour stink of fear wafted up, Fluttershy's wings pulling tight against her sides. "Not to Mom or Dad! I wouldn't! But..." She trailed off, her gaze dropping to the floor. "I...I've been sending letters to Burr every few days for the past couple of months, and I...I might've mentioned that we...that I wouldn't mind if...if he wanted to come."

"Burr." Part of Applejack wanted to start yelling, but she knew that wouldn't do one single bit of good. "Silver Burr. Your brother. The feller who near to called security on us when we went to see him."

Fluttershy's ears fell. "He hasn't answered a single one of my letters, but—" She looked up, her eyes wavering their perfect liquid aquamarine in the parlor light. "He's my brother, Applejack."

Which was all she needed to say; AJ rushed forward, pressed her cheek against Fluttershy's. "You're right, honeycomb. You're absolutely right." She scooped one invitation from the pile and set it aside. "Even if he ain't gonna come, we're by gum gonna invite him."

A happy little sigh, and hoofs wrapped around Applejack's barrel. "I love you," Fluttershy whispered, and the kiss they shared then, well, Applejack wouldn't've minded taking things a mite further along if'n she hadn'ta had her own piece of news.

"Actually," she managed to say when she and Fluttershy came up for air, "I reckon there's something I shoulda told you last week, too."

"Hmmmm?" Fluttershy was doing the most lusciously distracting things with her lips along Applejack's neck.

"It's just...about Discord. He—" AJ's voice dissolved as Fluttershy's teeth nibbled that sweet, sweet spot above her shoulder, but she persevered. "Reckon he's falling for Twilight."

The gorgeous fog of sensation bathing Applejack vanished like mist on a sunny morning, and she blinked, turned, found Fluttershy staring back at her, the fine hairs at the base of her mane standing on end. "Discord? In love with Twilight? Is...is that even possible?"

It took AJ another few seconds to make something sensible come outta her mouth. "Don't know as how Discord's got much to do with the word 'possible,' but if'n he was talking to Rarity, I reckon we'll all find out sooner rather'n later." She took a breath, the thunder of her blood filling her ears, the vision of her marefriend filling her eyes. "Gotta ask right now, though, honeycomb: we gonna be doing these invites, or we gonna be fooling around? 'Cause I'm leaning pretty far away from that first one right this minute."

A sly, sweet smile flowed over Fluttershy's lips; her wings folded open slowly, and Applejack found that she didn't quite remember how to breathe anymore. "Maybe," she heard Fluttershy say, her voice tickling Applejack's nerves like a summer breeze through wind chimes, "we could do the second one first and the first one second?"

Unable to stop a growl rumbling at the very bottom of her throat, Applejack leaped forward, scooped Fluttershy up in her front legs, and flew like no earth pony ever had across the room to deposit her on her back on the sofa. Fluttershy gave a giggling gasp, and her wings spread out beneath her in ways that stopped Applejack from thinking about anything else. "Sweet Mother of Mercy," she breathed out, then she slipped herself atop Fluttershy, tucked her snout into the crook of her neck, and began kissing as much of that gorgeous yellow hide as she could reach her lips to.

"Applejack!" Fluttershy's voice was getting a little breathy, too, AJ was excited to hear. "But...what if somepony comes in?!"

Hoisting herself up so she could grin at her shivery-eyed marefriend, Applejack shook her head. "They wouldn't dare."

Blushing and panting, Fluttershy had never looked more ravishing, and AJ gave another, more groaning sort of growl as her lacinia pulled open, so hot in there, she wouldn'ta been surprised if a cloud of steam had puffed out from between her hind legs. The familiar musk of her own arousal filled the air, and AJ almost squealed to hear Fluttershy gasp, to see her pupils go all big and black. A damp crinkling noise, and the gentle little prod of Fluttershy's wiggler against her nethers made Applejack's whole body twitch in wonderful anticipation.

She caught Fluttershy's lips with her own, poured ev'ry ounce of her love and her lust out over her marefriend, and had to groan again as Fluttershy returned her passion two or three times over, those hoofs closing tight around her back and those wings—oh, great blue sky above, those wings!—wrapping their warm, downy softness all up and down along her flanks. The prodding around her vulva got bigger and bigger, less and less gentle, and Applejack couldn't think, didn't have to think, didn't want to think: she shifted her hips, planted her back hoofs amongst the sofa cushions, raised herself up, and practically slammed herself down around Fluttershy's perfect hardness.

Fluttershy filled her—just filled her—everything inside Applejack opening to embrace her marefriend. Deeper and deeper she seemed to slide, Applejack locking her lips to Fluttershy's, plunging her front hoofs into that cascading mane and cradling her dearest, most wonderful darling. Then Fluttershy moved beneath her, pulled herself back along the walls of Applejack's interior, and AJ lit up like a starry sky after sunset, so many pure sensations flooding her.

'Cause there was nothing else but Fluttershy, wouldn't never be nothing else but Fluttershy. In her and around her and beside her, AJ's heart and mind and body all got to singing the same song, a song she hadn't ever heard so much as a note of before the stammering yellow pegasus had showed her her deepest, darkest secret and had brought such rays of sunlight into AJ's life, she was still stupidly, giddily happy all these months later, happy in ways she'd never suspected a pony could be.

Love, it was. And love it would be, a love that crackled now along her spine and sent her pumping herself faster and faster over Fluttershy, her honeycomb panting those gloriously enticing little gasps into Applejack's mouth. AJ sucked those breaths in eagerly, wanting to catch ev'ry mint and alfalfa scented puff, wanting to fill herself to the brim with ev'ry emanation from her lover's body, all of them adding and adding, growing and growing, rocketing her skyward in a tightening spiral with each up-and-down movement.

Higher and higher and vaster and vaster till Fluttershy cried out, hot and damp against Applejack's chin, her front hoofs and wings clenching. The thunderclap inside AJ took her completely over the edge, a rolling sea of ecstasy swallowing her and all her aches and all her pains, a cloudburst of joy washing her away with a laugh and a cheer and piercing, rending pleasure that said it to her in ways more profound than any words ever would:

This. Right here. Right now. With Fluttershy. All she would ever need.

Floating, then, no room left in her head for a single thought, she just felt all the Fluttershy ev'rywhere. Till some of that Fluttershy finally shrank from her insides and vanished with a tiny crinkling sound, and the breath against her cheek turned into soft little words: "Ummm, Applejack? We should probably get started on the invitations now...."

Which made her chuckle and nod, her forehead rubbing against the soft depths of Fluttershy's mane. "Always the practical one, ain'tcha, honeycomb?"