“You know, life is a funny thing,” Sparkler began, talking to Rising Star and Loch Skimmer. “You can go through life and you meet hundreds of ponies. You meet them and nothing changes. Life simply goes on as it always does,” Sparkler paused briefly in the middle of her spoken thoughts and tried to choose her next words carefully. “But then you meet just one pony, just one, and life changes forever. You meet all of these ponies throughout life, and none of them really mean anything to you in the bigger picture, so you meet them and you sort of forget them, and life goes on. But then you meet one pony and everything changes. You can’t live without them. And everything in your life changes because of them,” she finished.

Sparkler looked at Loch Skimmer, who was looking at her quizzically, her head cocked slightly to the side in the typical pegasus “I don’t understand” look and Loch Skimmer’s wings fluttered slightly.

Sparkler gestured over at Bucky who was with Thistle and Berry in the tall grass nearby. “My mother goes out one day and bumps into him. Just one little bump. She comes home and acts like a spooked teenage filly… you should have seen her. And then he came to see her and I had to do something so I shoved mom outside and locked the door behind her so they could talk. So she met him, and by extension I met him, and then life became a whirlwind of changes for all of us. Mom fell in love. Berry fell in love. Dinky started to hope that she would have a father… I fell in love. I guess I had to see my mother fall in love to know what was right. But I discovered that what I needed was right under my nose. And then all of this happened. And I met you,” Sparkler stopped speaking and looked directly at Loch Skimmer. “You were one of those sorts ponies that changed everything when I met you. It felt like I had known you all my life.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Loch Skimmer said in a subdued voice.

“Sometimes nothing can be said about life, it can only be experienced,” Rising Star stated.

“So now, here we are. A herd. Short one member because she is tuckered out and sore,” Loch Skimmer summarised. “I never thought my life would be like this. I actually feel excited about the future,” she admitted.

“So do I,” Rising Star agreed. “I have two really hot mares to sleep with me,” he teased.

Loch Skimmer narrowed her eyes at Rising Star but said nothing. Her lips were pressed together and her ears folded back against her skull. Her tail swished from side to side for a moment, and her wing feathers became a bit ruffled.

“You still have some trouble being told you are attractive, don’t you?” Sparkler asked.

Loch Skimmer looked down at the cast on her front leg and her posture became submissive. “Those things were never of much importance before,” she said in a low voice. “It was more important that I had a strong back and wide hips”

“Oh, it is still very important that you have wide hips,” Rising Star admitted.

“Rising!” Sparkler chided, her scolding tone interrupted by an ill timed case of the giggles.

“What? It is…so very important for her to have big wide foal bearing hips. Because I have plans for you Loch Skimmer,” Rising Star said teasingly.

Loch Skimmer’s eyes went wide and she let out a nervous giggle.

“Rising Star, be careful,” Sparkler warned. “She’s laughing, but she’s still a bit spooked.”

“She should be spooked. Because I have plans. Plans I say,” Rising Star said with a chuckle ending his words. “Dastardly plans that involve me being a father. Someday. When I am grown up and move past my dastardly plan phase.”

Loch Skimmer’s nervous giggles turned into guffaws of laughter and Sparkler relaxed as she too fell apart with riotous laughter.

“I have plans for both of you,” Rising Star confessed. “As soon as I can figure out this dreadful conundrum of how to bed both of you without the other feeling left out or jealous I plan to set my plan in motion. The plan is foolproof, which is good really, because I am a fool. Thankfully, this is a fool’s venture. All I have to do is what fools have been doing since time beg-”

Rising Star was cut off as a pair of lips pressed into his and kissed him deeply. He hadn’t been expecting it at all. The kiss was slightly waxy and oily and he knew that it had to be Loch Skimmer. All of his words left in his mind departed, every witty phrase now gone. All he knew was that right now, he wanted the plan to move ahead a bit, and more than anything he wanted to give Loch Skimmer a roll in the grass. Finally, the kiss ended with Loch Skimmer pulled away breathlessly.

“I am going to make my own plans,” Loch Skimmer whispered breathlessly.

Rising Star nodded, too flustered to say anything in return.

“That was kinda hawt,” Sparkler said. “I have to admit, it sort of turns me on to watch you two.”

“I am going to make this easy,” Loch Skimmer offered. “When the time comes, you and Sparkler are going to have a go at one another first, because you and her were together before I came along and you had to save me. I am not going to be upset about it. I am sorry Sparkler, but I don’t think I am into doing things with you. But I want to watch,” the filly said nervously.

“Alright, but I get to watch when you and Rising Star get together. I am open to trying things but I understand if you aren’t Loch… after watching my mother be so happy with Berry and Bucky I am sort of hoping I will find a bit of that myself,” Sparkler replied.

“So you are into other mares?” Loch whispered, her voice suddenly becoming hushed.

“Well, I am curious. You and I have kissed a few times and I liked it,” Sparkler confessed.

“Left me feeling a little weird but I didn’t want to complain or say anything because of all of the kindness you have shown me,” Loch Skimmer said in reply.

“You need to always always always be honest and upfront if something makes you feel a little weird,” Rising Star instructed.

“You’re right, if we are going to make this work, I do need to be honest,” Loch Skimmer agreed. “You know Sparkler, there is my sister. When she gets older,” Loch Skimmer suggested. “I think I would feel comfortable with her being involved with you, if she was agreeable to it of course. I would never want her forced. Things are going to be complicated if she isn’t interested in you Sparkler or if you find that you are not interested in her. She is going to want to fall in love with somepony and we are going to have to look after her needs.”

“All of that will be dealt with later. For now, can’t we just enjoy this happy moment?” Rising Star asked in return.

“This is a happy moment,” Loch Skimmer agreed.

“Even with all of this trouble and the fight that I know is coming, I do feel happy,” Sparkler confessed.

“I don’t want to talk about that,” Loch Skimmer begged. “I know the fight is coming, but I can’t bear to talk about it.”

“We don’t need to talk about it, what we need to talk about are these uncontrollable boners that Loch Skimmer causes me to have,” Rising Star interjected.

As the midnight hour approached, Bucky found that he could not sleep. He felt energised. Awake. Alive. His muscles twitched and his horn had an odd tingle that he had never experienced before. His whole body felt strange and unfamiliar sensations traveled through his flesh.

That, and he was horny as all get out.

He looked up from the book he was attempting to study and focused his remaining eye on the two mares sleeping in the bed with one another. He heaved a sigh and snorted. Lyra was going over a lesson with Sentinel and Ripple. Ripple’s long afternoon nap had left her unable to sleep once the night had fallen. Bon Bon was organising a future lesson.

And all he could think about was his own terrible need.

He didn’t need to be reading, he needed to be doing something. If not one of his mares, then a more physical task. “I am stepping out for a bit,” he announced in a soft whisper. “I will be downstairs in the lab working on some stuff.”

“Want me to join you?” Lyra asked. “Bonnie could take over for me.”

“No Lyra, but thank you. You, uh, would be distracting at the moment,” Bucky replied.

“Distracting?” Lyra asked.

Bucky sighed and thought about total honesty. “Right now I am the horniest unicorn that has ever existed. Period. I am going to go distract myself and try some experiments,” he said.

Lyra giggled. “I couldn’t help you with that,” she said teased.

Bon Bon looked up from her book and tittered. “Poor thing,” she murmured.

Bucky quietly slipped off of the couch, crossed the room, and exited the door, taking with him a stack of several books. It was time to do more than just plan.

The laboratory had been stocked over time. There were candles now, some lanterns that burned bog oil, fine sand had been brought from the glassworks at Bucky’s request, and a large wooden table had been placed in the center of the room.

The barrels of sand were recent and most welcomed. Bucky pried off the lid and examined it. All of the glassware on the isles came from the fine white sand found on the beaches. The Shetland Isles produced glassware that was almost as famous as its liquor. Glass beads, glass bottles, drinking glasses, Bucky had been given quite the rundown when he had requested some sand. Far more information than he needed to know.

He planned to make spell jars, something he had never attempted before but was confident he could do. Small glass globes, carefully created with a stasis bubble infused into the glass, and magic permeable from the outside. The magically infused glass would allow a unicorn’s horn to phase through it, a spell could be cast, the spell would be contained inside of the globe, and then released at a later time.

Bucky had first encountered them in Celestia’s school. Certain spells were contained within the jars but were not labeled. Students had to take readings of the magic and try to figure out what sort of spell was contained in the jar. It was also in Celestia’s school that he had seen what would happen if a jar was shattered. A student, angry over failure, had hurled a spell jar at a wall after being told that she had failed in her task. Thankfully, the spell was harmless, but the memory now gave Bucky ideas.

Nothing like a few fireballs or a shock orb contained in a jar and lobbed about a battlefield Bucky reckoned. He would need to make sure that he protected himself from the destructive blasts, but the wolves would have no such defenses. They would be blown to meaty chunks all around him.

He pulled up a small measure of sand, willed his magic to come forth, and began his first attempt to create a spell jar. The sand melted readily, and he applied his magic to make the now liquid glass to form a bubble. He infused it with magic, creating a temporal stasis bubble, and wove the magic into the glass. The hot molten glass orb was directly in front of his face, and he felt a moment of distraction as he thought of Keg Smasher coming near with the hot iron. He pushed the distraction from his mind and continued his task. There was too much to do and too much at stake to allow for such petty distractions to become a problem. Instead, he thought of the foals that he had already had, the foals that he would have, and how he was going to provide for them. The thoughts smoothed out his mind and leveled out the nervous undercurrents of his psyche.

He would need to be careful and methodical to get through this. Not reckless and brash. He had been reckless and brash when he had gone out to face the wolves on that fateful night, and now he was missing an eye.

Smoke poured from his horn as he worked, shaping the glass bubble, trying to get a feel for just the right thickness. It needed to be solid enough that it could be transported without too much trouble, but fragile enough to break when hurled. There was a faint smell of burning hair in the laboratory.

Sweat poured from Bucky’s body as he continued to exert effort. The laboratory was bone chillingly cold, but Bucky found that he did not mind. He welcomed the cold.

After much effort, Bucky eyed the fruits of his magical labours. He leached the heat from it carefully so it wouldn’t shatter. He had done a good job, or so he felt. The glass was mostly clear, only a bit cloudy, and it practically thrummed with magic, which was a good sign. He remembered that the spell jars vibrated somewhat. He levitated it over to a waiting box that was lined with straw and placed the now cooled glass orb into the box. He would have to test the magical permeance later, once the magic had settled and become stable, a process called curing.

Bucky hesitated, unsure of what to do next. Making more spell jars was a bad idea, not until he could determine if the first would work properly.

He focused instead on the gemstones collected from Sparkler. He selected one and examined it. He would need to modify the sunstone spell. He needed a light source that produced powerful light, but not heat. He thought about the intensity of light needed and figured that he would err on the side of overkill. Two hundred million candlepower should suffice he reasoned. Maybe two hundred and fifty million just to make sure. He wanted the wolves to combust when the light hit them. He would also need to build reflector dishes so he could construct a spotlight. That would require some metal work. Metal work would have to come later.

Bucky carefully studied the orange gemstone by hornlight and began his long night of hard work.

Derpy awoke and realised that something was missing. Her husband. A faint grey light shone through the window, and she knew that dawn was breaking. The room was almost too warm once again. She nosed Dinky and then Piña, kissed Berry just behind her ear, and then looked around blearily, trying to find Bucky. She closed her bad eye, peered around some more just to make sure, and then realised he was nowhere to be seen.

“Where is Bucky?” she asked in alarm, her loud voice waking the rest of the sleepers. “He didn’t do something stupid like go out and face the wolves again did he? Where is he?” she cried.

“He went downstairs to the lab. He’s fine. It’s okay. He just couldn’t sleep, that’s all,” Bon Bon said soothingly.

Derpy grumbled wordlessly in reply as her fear slowly flowed out of her.

“He’s been up all night?” Berry muttered, her eyes still closed.

“He said he was the horniest unicorn in existence and then left to get some work done,” Lyra said.

Derpy started to say something in reply but was tackled by Ripple, the pegasus filly’s forelegs tight around her neck. The mare enjoyed the enthusiastic affection of another pegasus and the last of her irritation was smoothed away.

“I was up all night too,” Ripple said. “And it was a wonderful night,” she mentioned. “Lyra and Bon Bon are the nicest ponies.”

“They talked about girly stuff all night,” Sentinel complained. “Well, after our lessons were completed.”

Berry groaned. There was entirely too much activity already for such an early hour. Ripple squashed up against her as the filly continued to hug Derpy and more than anything, Berry wanted Ripple to stop bouncing up and down so she could go back to sleep. She was forced to take matters into her own hooves. She rolled on her side, snatched Ripple in her forelegs, which made the filly squeal in alarm, and then pulled her close, crushing her against her barrel. Berry yawned and then tried slip into a half awake half asleep snooze that always felt so good early in the mornings.

Ripple grunted and then realised she had no chance of breaking free of her prison. Berry’s embrace was as solid as iron. She sighed and settled against the earth pony, resigned to her fate. Ripple, feeling Berry’s warm body against her, began to hear the siren’s song of sleep and yawned, the long night finally over and a need for slumber finally overtook the filly.

Berry settled her snoot into the filly’s mane, breathing in her scent, and enjoying the growing bond that was forming between the two of them. She drifted into that half awake and half asleep phase that she so loved.

Derpy meanwhile was overcome by nausea and quickly fled the bed.

Author's Notes:

I must admit, I am enamoured with the mental image of Bucky tucked away in a room making bombs.