Cleansed, Silver was led by Twilight, wobbling and a little dizzy, back inside. Twilight set Silver down at the table and dinner was brought out for him to nibble on. Pinkie Pie sat across from him, staring. Silver perked an ear at her. "What's wrong? Did I say something while I was down?"

Pinkie shrugged softly. "You said a lot of things. You've said a lot of things." She tapped at her chin, then nodded. "Twilight?" Twilight looked over at Pinkie. "I don't want to be a big extra wheel."

Night Watch suddenly dropped in from above, turning gracefully and coming down into the chair beside Pinkie. "You've already been invited. Unless Silver doesn't like you, or you dislike us, there's no reason for you to say that."

Pinkie reached out and poked Night in the nose. "You're super sneaky. I thought I was good at sneaking, but you're really really good!"

Night smiled at Pinkie, then looked to Silver. "I have claimed Pinkie as a mate. Do you plan to challenge me?"

Silver tilted his head with surprise. He hadn't imagined Night would ever do such thing... "Of course not. If she makes you happy, then I'm very happy to have her around."

Twilight coughed softly. "Not so fast. I claim her as my mate. Do you challenge that?"

Silver squirmed. Was that even allowed? "What? No, of course not. If she's Night's mate, she's yours, and mine."

Night suddenly captured one of Pinkie's ears in her mouth, nibbling with sharp teeth. "Some nights I may want to do naughty things with her, and not you. Are you sure you don't want to challenge it?"

Pinkie flushed terribly. "Guys! You don't have to do this. I'll be--" Night folded a wing over Pinkie's snout, silencing her.

Twilight shook her head. "Pinkie, you are my friend. You've been one for a long time now, and have watched me struggle with great things. You were there when I grew these wings, and congratulated me when I returned with them. You've been there, beside me, behind me, always with me, never against me. You are a true friend. Pinkie, will you marry me?"

Pinkie squirmed in place and began to kick out her hindlegs a little. "T-Twilight, you're making me all teary-eyed... I don't even know if anything happened yet! Why are we going so fast?"

Night nuzzled into Pinkie's cheek gently. "Because we decided to keep you. Unless you deny us, turn us away and walk out the door, we're keeping you, foal or not."

Pinkie took a deep breath, inflating before she let it all out. "Oh you guys... I can't say no to that..." She threw out her hooves, then locked eyes with Silver. "But only if Silver wants me. He'll agree to anything to make his wives happy, but does he really want a pink party pony for a wife?"

Silver considered it with all due gravity. His memories of the past few days were mostly pleasant ones, but they were basically drug-addled ones. Would Pinkie, could Pinkie be as good a wife without the corruption that fogged his mind? He tapped his chin softly. "Why don't we leave it to fate? You're ours, and if you swell with foal, despite the odds, despite all the other failures, then it's meant to be, and I will gladly hold you as a wife, forever."

Pinkie smiled brightly. "Okey dokey lokey. One thing." She thrust up a hoof. "I'm not quitting my job! The Cakes need me, besides, I have fun. I'm going to bake like I always do."

Night nuzzled the top of Pinkie's head. "We didn't imagine you'd stop. You are a baker, and a party planner. If you stopped doing either of those things, you'd stop being the Pinkie we know so well. In fact, I plan to make use of your expertise. Party planning is not a strength of mine, nor baking." She ruffled her leathery wings. "Agreed?"

Twilight smiled softly. "I'm sorry you felt so sure I'd punish you for this. This wasn't your choice, and you did the right thing in the end. I'd call you silly, but I've been there before, imagining the terrible things Celestia's going to do to me once she found out about one of my silly errors." She leaned forward on the table. "We were friends before, we'll still be friends now. No matter how bad things look, I want us to talk first, and freak out after the fact, or with each other."

Silver considered interjecting himself, but this felt like a matter between mares, and they were all happy to have one another. Despite his decision to allow them it, Night Watch's keen eyes spotted him. "And you too, Silver." She smiled gently. "It's easy to forget at times, but you were a mare once, and you were even a very nice one."

Pinkie tilted her head and burst into giggles. "I remember that! You were pretty nice. I mean, not like you aren't nice now, but it's a slightly different kind of nice?"

Twilight coughed softly. "We've all been through some pretty major changes in our lives."

Pinkie waved off Twilight's statements. "I haven't changed what I am, or swapped girl and boy parts, uh, except that time I got some boy parts for a while?"

Night raised a brow. "Funny how you didn't mention that in your debriefing. Pinkie, you're worse than Silver at sharing what goes on in your adventures." She crossed her forehooves. "We really need a full accounting, from both of you. As if that was such a trivial part of the story it didn't matter."

Twilight shook her head with a creeping blush. "I've f-felt that, having stallion parts." She glanced up at Silver, then away. "That's how we became parents..." A thought came across her features as she shifted from embarassed to suddenly keen and curious. "Say, why is it, as a mare, your fertility seemed to be just fine?"

All eyes moved to Silver as if he had the answer, and he tried for one. "I have a few theories at least. For one, the strength and magical purity of the male is very important, I think. You have both of those. You are the very essence of magic. To put it bluntly, I think you could be the stud to rival all studs, if you wanted." Twilight colored, but she nodded, with her eyes focused on Silver. "I hadn't become quite as complicated yet. I wasn't a princess when we first 'met' that way, and... I think I really wanted it, with you. I really wanted to be your mare, which meant having a foal with you, and baring it, and doing all those things. I was wholly devoted and ready to be your mare. Most of the mares I was with were in love with the idea of being topped by a prince, but didn't love me, as me, just an idea. I don't mean to belittle them, or their emotions. If they didn't feel anything at all, nothing would happen, but sincerity, purity... There's that word again. When you were on me, it wasn't 'oh god, there's a princess on top of me!' it was 'Twilight Sparkle, that amazing mare, is claiming me, and I'm very confused, but I want that. I want to be claimed, and held, and kept safe forever, and...'" He trailed off, and shook his dark-blue snout. "I was being silly, a little, perhaps, but very genuine. It's just an idea. I can't prove it one way or the other, and the randomized control trials needed to make any scientific consensus sounds horrifying just trying to envision."

"Randomized what now?" Twilight tilted her head. "You're not slipping this one past me. Is this human science?"

Silver smiled and reached for her. He nestled with Twilight as he began to explain randomized control trials and how they helped with the scientific method like he was telling a filly a bedtime story. "So, you see, the idea is to test any given hypothesis without allowing confirmation bias in either direction to muddle the results. You also need to compare the results against a placebo slash non-answer. Placebos can have an effect, but if your hypothetical does the same, then it's not really doing anything a sugar pill wouldn't do."

Twilight peered across the table at Pinkie. "So what you're saying is that I needed to have several earth ponies, some with self-proclaimed sensitivity to particular events, and some not, and maybe some pegasi and unicorns, just to really mix things up, and then subject them to stimuli, like an hour with nothing falling over, or a few things being knocked over at once, without telling them, and record the results..."

Silver felt his expression brighten as Twilight grabbed onto the idea easily. "That's exactly it. The hypothetical would then either be proven or disproven, and may reveal where to test further. Ideally, the subjects would just have numbers for the test-takers, so they wouldn't know which earth ponies were sensitives, or not, since they could be biased, so why not factor that out as much as you can?"

Twilight clopped her hooves together with joy. "It makes perfect sense, but it sounds like to get anything done, you'd need a lot of ponies?"

Pinkie leaned towards Night Watch. "Do they do this a lot?"

Night smiled gently. "Not as often as they should. They're talking about you, you know."

Pinkie started. "They are?! What about?" She seemed to rewind through the conversation, trying to figure it out. "Are they calling me a 'sensitive'?"

Twilight nodded across at Pinkie. "According to this new data, I went about trying to analyze the Pinkie Sense entirely wrong. I didn't control for anything. I didn't adjust for bias. I didn't have a base line." She put a hoof to her cheek. "I'm embarrassed just thinking back on it, now. Will you let me try, one more time?"

Pinkie shrank a little. "Does that mean you're going to get all super upset again, cause I thought we got past all that after the doozy? You said you were OK with it now."

Twilight waved a hoof dismissively. "I had the wrong attitude. The idea is to prove, or disprove, a hypothetical statement. I win if I do either. I should be trying just as hard to prove you do have Pinkie Sense, which I do believe at this point, as I am trying to prove you don't. How sensitive is it? How reliable is it? Do other earth ponies share this sensitivity?" She clopped her hooves together. "The pleasure's in finding out, not being right from the start. Speaking of which." She looked over Silver. "You're an earth pony, currently. Have you felt any of this 'sensitivity'?"

Silver quickly shook his head as his tail flicked. "My tail hasn't given any sudden twitches, and I didn't notice any urges that felt like something was happening, but I'm new to being an earth pony. I could just be untrained. I don't know."

Night snorted softly. "You may not be a Pinkie Pie, but has anyone mentioned you are adorably innocent looking as an earth pony? I miss your lunar traits though. They're part of what binds us together." She spread her bat-like wings out wide. "After you're done with Rough Tumble, please?"

Author's Notes:

Phew, this chapter took a while. I'm still feeling under the weather, so typos, they happen.