With both her talons on the sides of the dilapidated cardboard box, Ember pulled, but it wouldn’t budge. Ember wasn’t one to give up that easily. In fact, it irritated her to rather high amounts. The offending box contained the pieces for a large artificial Hearth’s Warming tree that she was planning to use for tonight’s Hearth Warming Eve party. That is, if the box would come down through the hatch leading to the attic, which it was fighting really hard to not do. Ember gripped and pulled harder, twisting her face in exertion. It upset her to such a degree that the tips of her talons pierced the cardboard. Glaring daggers at the box, Ember had had enough now. She gathered all of her strength for a final pull. That’s when the box gave in.

“I’m telling you, I’m fine!” Ember said.

“No, you’re not. Not if you keep wincing like that,” Blue said, holding the ice pack against the back of Ember’s head.

“It’s just gonna be a bump, ok?” Ember said, wincing again as Blue moved the cold compress against her head.

Blue shook her head. “You hit the side of that attic hatch pretty hard.”

“It’s not my fault the box decided to give just at that time…”

Blue removed the ice pack, examining the red skin. “You look fine now. Just be careful.”

“Don’t worry, I will,” Ember said, getting up and walking out of the bathroom. “I got Hearth’s Warming decorations to get.”

Ember climbed back up the ladder, entering her attic. She looked around and sighed. Piles and piles of paperwork lay built up in countless boxes alongside other miscellaneous stuff she acquired over the years.

“I’m so glad we have email now…” she said to herself, looking at a years old bill. “Honestly don’t even know why the hell I still have these things. Like I’ll ever need an electric bill from four years ago.” She tossed the piece of paper aside. Somewhere behind all these boxes were her Hearth’s Warming decorations; fancy lights and more, just waiting to be hung up… If she could find them. She sighed and started her search.

Box after box, bill after obsolete bill, she finally found two boxes tucked away in a corner filled with a wreath, garland, glass balls, lights… all the things needed to spruce up a house. A short search yielded another large box containing a huge line of lights, enough to line her entire roof outside in lighting. She grinned as she took one of the boxes.

“Blue! I found them! Can you give me a hoof with them?” she said, raising her voice so Blue could hear her downstairs. Blue came up the stairs and climbed up the ladder a few steps to levitate a box down.

“These look nice, Ember. Where’d you get them?”

“I got them when I first moved here. Only used them the first year, stopped putting them up ever since. I didn’t see the need…” Ember sighed, then smiled. “I’m glad I get to bring them out again.”

“It’s nice that you’re happy, but I only asked where you got them,” Blue said, sticking her tongue out at Ember before she got a chance to be angry. Ember rolled her eyes and carried the box downstairs. Blue followed closely after her, carrying both of the other boxes in her magic.

“Showoff,” Ember said.

“I’m just perfect, that’s all,” Blue said with her nose in the air.

“Pfft, let’s just get started,” Ember said in an exasperated tone, grabbing some pieces of the tree from the cardboard box she pierced earlier and putting them onto the stand. It took about fifteen minutes to build it up, but now the lights and the garland could be hung on it.

“Soooo…,” Blue said, levitating the lights out of their box. “How are you… feeling now?”

“About what exactly?”

“Well, you know, everything, really…” Blue said, putting the lights on the tree, having a bit of trouble with some branches.

Ember looked away before answering. “I don’t know, does ‘fine’ cover it?” Blue gave her a skeptical look. “A lot has happened in just a few days so I guess it’ll take a while to process and, well, ‘accept things’.”

“That’s understandable, I just...“ Blue sighed. “I just feel a bit guilty for some reason…”

“Don’t really see why you would, unless you knew about how I felt about you before you did that, but we both know you didn’t,” Ember said, pulling the lid off a box of glass ornaments and looking at her distorted reflection in the convex surface.

“I just can’t help but feel… like I caused all this,” Blue said. She shook her head, “No, I’m not going to keep thinking about this and feeling down about it… Celestia knows I feel bad enough about myself when I do that…”

“Mmm,” Ember replied. She knew how quickly Blue could fall into one of her pits, mainly from the fact that she was prone to these pits herself before Blue came around.

Blue was now standing up on all fours, using her magic, walking around the tree to see if the lights were all right. Satisfied with her work, she sat down. Instantly she went wide-eyed when she felt something jabbing her hindquarters.

“Ouch!” Blue yelped. “A star in my ass!” She immediately jumped up and, looking behind her, saw the multi-pointed star still protruding from her flank. Ember immediately covered her beak with a talon to hide her laughter but couldn’t help snickering out loud, receiving a sharp glare from Blue as she plucked the star from her behind with her magic and tossed it towards Ember. She simply caught the star and flapped her wings a few times to get it on the top of the tree where it belonged.

“Look, why don’t you get started on the food and I’ll finish the decorating in here so nothing else finds its way inside you,” Ember smirked. Blue just stood there with a sour look on her face, rubbing the spot where the star made contact.

“Don’t be so calm, I just got Super Nova’d in my ass. What if I’m bleeding back there?”

“Aww woo want me to kwiss the wiw boo boo on your poowr bloo butt,” Ember said in a mock-baby tone, nearly falling backwards laughing. Blue gave her a flat look and turned her snout up in the air and huffed.

“You’d want that, wouldn’t you,” Blue said, glaring at Ember. “My ass is my own, thank you very much.” Ember just rolled her eyes and smirked as Blue turned and trotted towards the kitchen. The flick of her tail that Blue did just before disappearing beyond the door didn’t go unnoticed.

Ember went back to unpacking the various other decorations and laying them out on the coffee table and couch. Working her way around the room, she put them up in their respective places: wreath in the center of the mantle, garland draped over and around it, some holly mixed in for color. Several candles were placed around the room and lit, eliciting a pleasant aroma of cinnamon that filled the room in a matter of minutes. Ember smiled as she stepped back into the center of the room and looked around, admiring her work. It had been many years since she ever decorated for anything and seeing the room all decked out and festive gave it a very warm and inviting feel. Walking back over to the pile of boxes left over, she saw one more wreath sitting to the side with a tag on it that read ‘front door’. Grabbing it, Ember walked over the pile of boxes and went to her front door. Pulling it open, her happy mood vanished as she found herself face to face with Apple, his hoof mid-air, clearly about ready to knock. Ember could feel a burning in the back of her head but decided to keep it in check.

“Ugh, it’s you…” she said in place of the colorful expletives that flashed in front of her mind. Apple just wore a nervous grin and looked down, gently prodding the doormat.

“Hey, Ember. Just thought I’d come early since I agreed to help Blue prepare the food for tonight,” Apple said. “Am I… doing something wrong? You seem upset for, well, I can see why you’d be angry at me, of course, me and Blue sort of ruined your couch, but, I… uh… She fixed that, right?” Apple stopped talking, instead just looking at Ember with a face that expressed a certain form of fear, the pained expression that flashed across Ember’s face the previous day still fresh in his mind. “Can I… come in?” he asked finally.

Ember moved aside, “Sure… Blue’s in the kitchen already,” she said, with some hidden undertones that Apple didn’t notice. He was still not the type who easily picked up on social cues.

“Thanks!” he said, smiling, something that greatly annoyed Ember for a reason she understood, sadly, all too well. Apple trotted past her to the kitchen. Was it just Ember, or was there a certain… skip in his trotting? Just the thought alone made her feel sick. She decided to sit down just outside the kitchen where she couldn’t see the two ‘lovebirds’, but still be within hearing distance. Grabbing a book with a green marker in it from where she had left off the last time she read it, she got comfortable in her armchair and hoped those two wouldn’t distract her too much from her reading.

“Hey Blue…” said Apple’s voice from the kitchen. Already Ember found herself mildly distracted and annoyed. If this was how he was going to be the entire time, then she couldn’t be held responsible for what she might do.

“Hey Apple!” Blue replied in a cheery voice.

“How… how are you feeling now?” Apple asked, with a lot of implication in his voice. Ember assumed Apple referred to that lunch (she hesitated to call it a lunch ‘date’) he and Blue went on yesterday.

“I’m doing fine, thanks for asking,” Blue replied.

“Good, good… Because we need to talk, Blue,” Apple said, suddenly in a very serious tone that seemed somewhat unlike how the stallion usually was.

“About what?” Blue asked, though Ember guessed she probably knew the answer.

“About everything. About that… night. About you and me, about ‘us’,” Apple replied. “It’s important we talk about this. I feel…” he trailed off. Ember almost wanted to walk out and let the two talk alone so her ears would be spared, but she couldn’t walk away. She had to stay and listen, like some exterior force was driving her.

“Do we have to do this now?” Blue said, the sound of an oven being opened and something being slid into it came from the room.

“Oh, let me help you with that… and yes, we do need to talk about this now. We put it off at lunch yesterday because you didn’t want to, but I think that every day we don’t talk about it is a day I’m going to live in uncertainty about you and me,” Apple said, surprisingly mushy, even for him, and enough to make Ember gag just a tiny bit.

Blue sighed, “Alright… here we go then… Let’s talk.” There was a distinct sound of an oven closing, and the tick-tick of a dial being turned along with the near-silent hiss of an oven heating up.

"Well, when you told me, at the end of... our, well, our intercourse... you said you loved me... and you meant that, right?" Apple asked. Ember could clearly hear the uncertainty in his voice. She almost felt bad for him… almost. Ember could hear a bit of a wheeze following that question. It sounded vaguely like a laugh, or a snicker, and she assumed it came from Blue. Ember laughed to herself. ‘Poor Apple,’ she thought. ‘So delusional…’

“Well… It’s complicated, Apple. Or maybe it isn’t. You see, I didn’t have sex with you because I was attracted to you, or loved you,” Blue said. Ember had to really struggle to keep in a laugh. This was too rich!

“Oh… Ok… If that’s the case, then why did you agree to have lunch with me? Or was that just a friend thing?” Apple asked. Ember could almost see the disappointment and sadness on his face just by listening to his voice and she couldn’t lie, she was loving this just a bit too much.

“I wasn’t finished… You see, I loved you after we did it, and since then… so I guess, to answer your question, it’s yes. And that’s why I went to lunch with you. It all goes back to what I told you that night, that I feel comfortable around you… with you,” Blue said, with a tender tone in her voice. Ember’s good mood evaporated like a snowball in Tartarus. This wasn’t really what she had hoped for at all. Perhaps she should have expected it, after all Blue seemed quite pleased with herself after the whole ordeal, but this still left a very sour taste in her beak.

“R-really?” Apple asked in a quite dumbfounded tone. Like Ember, he was surprised, but unlike Ember, he was far more excited. “Because, you should know, I’ve… I’ve had a crush on you for a while. Heh, you probably already knew…”

The next words that came out of Blue’s mouth weren’t shocked, but merely surprised. “Really Apple? I… I had no idea… You were…” Blue attempted to say, but Apple interrupted.

“Yes… I was… well, I am, in love with you…” Apple said hesitantly, though Ember felt there were many things he said in a hesitant manner. “Hehe, oh boy, I must sound so silly and sickening…” Finally something Ember agreed with. She might go as far as to say it was the first time tonight Apple sounded like a sane individual. She mentally facetalon’d in expectance of Blue’s reply.

“You… are? Apple, I had no idea… So I suppose that’s why you wanted to talk all serious-like,” Blue said, her volume increasing, while there was a lot more rumbling of kitchen equipment and cutlery.

“Shh, Blue! Ember will hear us, are you crazy?” Apple said.

“Yes I’m crazy, I fucked you!” Blue said, followed by a laugh, and probably Blue sticking her tongue out, Ember thought. This whole conversation was getting annoyingly vivid in her mind. “Besides,” Blue said, “Why would Ember mind?”

“Oh… nothing, just, forget about it, Blue…” Apple said. “But I was going to ask you… do you… uhm…”

“Yeah? You can ask me,” Blue said.

“Would you… um… go on a date with me? You know, soon?” Apple asked, with that eternal tremor in his voice when he asked a question like that.

Blue’s reply came surprisingly quick. “Yes, yes of course! I’d love to!”

Ember could swear she heard Apple jump with all four hooves in the air, quickly followed by a shuffle, and a weird noise Ember could only describe as… She got up and walked to the kitchen doorway, peering around to see the most dreadful sight so far; Blue and Apple sharing a romantic kiss. ‘Blegh,’ she thought. She huffed and quickly walked away, trying to get rid of her anger by saying to herself that she wasn’t into Blue anymore.

Ember quickly made her way to the front door when the doorbell rang.

“I got it!” she shouted. As much as she wanted to interrupt Apple and Blue’s courtship, they were still preparing dinner. Also, she has a suspicion who might be knocking.

“Hey Ember,” said a familiar pony, who, after being wreathed in green flame for a second or two, revealed himself to be Marcus.

Ember smiled. “Hey Marcus. You got my invitation then?”

“You bet I did! Though, what was that scribbled mess you put on the back of it though? Something about a box and a surprise… Well, anyway,” he stopped talking and pulled a neatly wrapped gift out of his saddlebag, “For the grab bag.”

“Oh, that message on the back? Just a little prank I plan on pulling...” Ember said.

“A prank? I like pranks! Mind telling me what it’s about?” Marcus asked, his green eyes lighting up a bit with excitement, “Because I can help, with my shapeshifting and everything…”

“Oh, well, I did actually have you in mind. You see… Well, why don't you follow me inside, I'll show you,” Ember said, moving aside for the Changeling to enter.

“Uh, alright. Lead the way,” Marcus said, coming inside and following Ember upstairs after she’d closed the front door. “Why are we going to your bedroom?” Marcus said, a small blush forming on his black cheeks that really did look out of place.

“This is where I planned on wrapping my gift for the grab bag, of course,” Ember said, opening the door.

“Oh…” Marcus said disappointingly, following her into the room.

Ember’s bedroom was spacious, with a large bed where she could almost fully stretch her wings out without reaching out of the bed. Also in the room was a large cardboard box that was already wrapped, but had a separate lid that could fit over the top.

“There’s… nothing in there,” Marcus said.

“That’s because, well… Uhm… You’re the gift. You see, imagine the surprise on a pony's face when a Changeling pops out of a gift? It’s going to be hilarious!” Ember said, trying to give the Changeling her most convincing smile.

“So let me get his straight,” Marcus began, raising whatever functioned as a Changeling’s eyebrow, “You want me to…”

“To sit in this box when the guys arrive, and then to pop out at whoever opens the gift,” Ember said. The thought that she wanted Blue to be the one to get this little surprise, she kept to herself.

“You have a strange and cruel form of humor, Ember. Is that a griffin thing or… You know what, nevermind,” Marcus said, sighing. “I guess I’ll do it… I’m sure I’m going to regret it, but whatever. I guess I owe you for giving me the opportunity to be normal.”

“That’s the spirit! Now, why don’t you stay up here until my friends come?” Ember said.

“Sure…” Marcus said, prodding the box.

Ember smiled. “Ok. I’ll go downstairs and-” getting interrupted by the doorbell, “I’ll go and get that,” she said, and went downstairs.

“Everypony’s here,” Ember said, looking around the well-decorated room. All her friends were sat in a circle, except for Blue who was lounging on the couch. In the middle of the circle were six gifts, wrapped in fancy Hearth’s Warming Eve colors.

“Nice decorations, Ember!” Sunny said. “Did you do that yourself?”

“Nah, I did it all by myself,” Blue said with a flick of the front of her mane, and sticking out her tongue towards Ember yet again. Ember rolled her eyes, sighing. Would Blue ever change?

“Uh, actually I put most of them up while Blue was preparing the dinner,” Ember said.

“I thought as much,” Apricot said, “This place definitely has the Ember touch right now, I can see it!” She smiled warmly at her feathered host. Ember smiled back. Something about the orange earth pony was very appealing to the griffin. She couldn’t pinpoint exactly what, but it made her happy she was here. Suddenly, Melon, who was sitting beside Apricot, poked her and smiled a wide smirk. What followed was the kind of quick conversation only two ponies who had been best friends forever could have. Ember simply shook her head.

“Alright, everyone! So, before we get started, are there any of you that don’t know how grabbags work?” Ember asked, looking around the group gathered in the living room. Apple, Melon and Sunny raised their hooves. Ember nodded, “Ok, let me start from the beginning then. First pony, or me, takes a gift and goes back to their seat, feeling all smug about getting the first pick,” Ember began, looking at Blue while saying that. “The second participant can either take a new gift from the pile or take the first pony’s gift, in which case the first partaker has to take another one from the pile. Third guy can do the same as the second and if they take a gift from one of the others, then they can either take a new one or take it from someone else and the cycle repeats until everyone has a gift. It can get kinda convoluted if you don't set it up right from the start, and you don't have to make it extremely confusing with a ton of back and forth stealing, but that's what makes it a fun game. So, everyone got it now?”

“I have no clue Ember,” Apple said, looking at all the exciting gifts, “But let’s get started and see how it goes anyway.”

“Right. Well, Blue, would you like to do the honors?” Ember asked, looking at the blue mare in question.

“You’re damn right I’ll do the honors,” Blue said, eyeing up the biggest gift in the pile. Was it just Ember, or was she salivating? Blue was really weird sometimes...

“Well, go ahead then,” Ember said, even though she didn’t need to. Blue was already making her way to the big box, levitating it up and taking it to her seat with her snout in the air.

“Apple, you’re up next. You can either take Blue’s gift, or take a new one from the pile,” Ember said, repeating the rule. Apple took a new gift from the pile. Typical, Ember thought, he doesn’t want to take his ‘sweetheart’s’ gift. The turn passed on to Sunny Blitz.

“Hm, nice gift Blue. I’ll have that, thank you!” Sunny said, walking over to Blue, who at first tried to weakly hold onto the gift like a cat whose toy was being taken away.

“But that was mine…” Blue said, pretending to tear up.

“It’s how the game works,” Ember said, “But at least you get to take a new gift now. Remember, you can’t immediately steal back from the pony who just stole from you.”

“Right right… Hmmm…” Blue looked around. Eventually though, she settled for a new gift from the pile. Then it was Ember’s turn. Without a doubt, she went straight for Apple’s present.

“Sorry Apple. Finders keepers!” Ember said, smirking at the unicorn stallion. Apple merely sighed, and opted to once again get a new present from the pile. Melon smiled when it was her turn.

“I’ll take that gift of yours, Ember,” she said, walking over and taking it. “Very mean to take that from Apple, you know.”

“Yeah, yeah, alright. I’ll take your gift again, Apple,” Ember said.

“Again? Why, Ember?” he asked while levitating the present over to her. “It’s like you’re just out to get me.”

“It’s just coincidence, alright? You just happened to have something I wanted. Now, don’t be sad and pick another gift. Or steal one,” Ember said.

“Hmpf, very well. That big gift, Sunny… Can I have that please?” Apple asked, but he was already levitating the gift over to himself.

“I thought we were friends, Apple,” Sunny said, in a feigned cold tone.

“We are. But this is war, and I must play the game tactically. I hope you understand,” Apple said, in an equally feigned haughty voice. Sunny then picked a new gift from the pile, leaving only one gift in the middle, and moving the turn to Apricot.

“Hmm… You haven’t really been stolen from, Ember… Can I… just, if you don’t mind…?” Apricot asked. Ember didn’t know why she was unsure, or why she would be so scared to take her gift, unless… no, that would be ridiculous. Not that she’d have any issues with it, of course… Or would she? This whole thing was so confusing to her.

“Well I have been stolen from, Apricot…” Ember said, giving the gift to the mare.

“Oh, well, do you want it back? You can have it back!” Apricot said, followed by a hesitant giggle.

“Oh no, it’s fine. It’s the game. Apricot, are you feeling ok?” Ember asked, looking at her with a raised brow.

“Oh, yea, I’m fine, I really am. I’ll have that gift, thanks…” she said, taking the gift from the griffin’s claw. Apricot’s odd behaviour left the griffin wondering, but she was now without a gift. She could end the game now by taking the last gift in the middle, but she wasn’t one to abruptly end the fun.

“Blue… your gift please,” Ember said, making a ‘give it to me’ gesture with her right talon, “It looks nice.”

“Fine,” Blue said, “I’ve always thought that huge gift was mine. Apple… the big gift, pretty please,” she said, giving him her puppy eyes. The response was just as Ember expected.

“You can have it Blue… I wouldn’t have said no…” he said, floating the gift to Blue.

“That’s because it’s the rule, you can’t say no even if you wanted to,” Ember said.

“Yes, I know that Ember, I’m not stupid,” Apple said.

“Sure, sure…” Ember mumbled, and then in a normal voice, “Get a new gift, Apple. Don’t keep us waiting.” Apple smirked a smile that gave Ember the urge to gag.

“That uh, that gift of yours, Ember,” he said. Blue giggled, and Sunny smiled too, while Melon and Apricot were whispering to each other about something Ember could only guess at.

“Come on Apple,” Sunny said, “Leave her be.”

“A grave injustice was dealt here… Ember, your gift please,” Apple said. Ember frowned.

“Sure, here you go. Was all that theater really needed?” she said.

“Well, yeah, of course! Come on, couldn’t you play along?” Apple said with a slightly disappointed tone in his voice. Ember merely rolled her eyes and then looked at Apricot.

“Can I have my present back?” she asked, “I kind of like its shape...”

“Oh, sure, sure, Ember. Here you go…” Apricot said, hoofing the gift over to Ember. Ember once again noticed that weird tone in her voice.

“It’s just a game, Apricot. Are you ok?” Ember inquired.

“Yes, I’m fine, Ember, don’t worry about me. I’m one hundred percent completely undoubtedly not losing my shit right now,” she replied, giving Ember a smile that made the griffin feel only somewhat satisfied.

“Oh… ok then,” Ember said in a tone that clearly showed she didn’t really believe Apricot, but she just let it go. Now Apricot had to take the last gift and the game would be over. Or not...

“Melon, gimme,” Apricot said, turning to Melon beside her and making an inward gesture with her hooves. Melon raised a brow at her and hoofed over her gift.

“You know I won’t forget this you backstabbing bitch,” Melon jokingly said to Apricot as she grabbed the last gift from the middle and brought the game to a close. Apricot just grinned and hugged her newly stolen gift to her chest.

“I know, but it was worth it. You haven’t really been stolen from so who better to do it than the last pony you’d expect?” Apricot giggled. Melon smiled and rolled her eyes, turning back towards Ember.

“Ok, so we all have a gift, now do we just all unwrap them at once or go in a circle or… what?” Melon asked.

“Well, since Blue picked first, you open first since you’re sitting next to her and we’ll go around and Blue will open last,” Ember said.

“Works for me,” Melon said as she started ripping the paper off with her teeth. “Oh! It’s, uh… whipped cream?” she said with a questioning look into the box. Blue covered her mouth with a hoof to suppress a giggle. “I didn’t even know they made whipped cream tubs this large,” Melon said as she pulled the sizable container of the whipped dessert topping out of the box, sporting a large picture of Mrs. Cake on the side with a slightly manic grin. Apricot snickered next to her.

“I can think of a few things you can put that on besides food,” she said in a suggestive tone. Melon just shot her a glare, but looked back at the tub of whipped cream with a curious look in her eyes. Apricot just smirked. “My turn!” she yelled as she started tearing the wrapping off her gift. “Oooo, what’s this?” she said as she reached in and pulled out a corkscrew-shaped beaker. There was a slightly green glow coming off of the liquid inside as Apricot swirled it around to look at the label. “‘Twilight Sparkle’s Butterfly Wing Potion. Impress your pegasus friends with only a 1.75% chance of falling to your death…’ Ooooh, and it’s sour apple flavor!” Apricot smiled excitedly as she popped the cap off and tilted her head back to drink it, but Ember reached over and grabbed the beaker from her hoof before any spilled out.

“Woah woah woah, are you crazy?! You don’t just chug the whole thing! See all the lines on the side? It has doses you use depending on how long you want the wings to last,” Ember said as she pointed to the markings on the side of the bottle.

“Ehehe… guess I should read the instructions first, huh,” Apricot said sheepishly as Ember handed the beaker back to her. “Sorry, I just heard that it gave you wings and immediately wanted it cuz, you know, that way I could be more like you…” she trailed off as she turned her head away from Ember.

“Hey, we can try it out sometime later and maybe get to go flying together, but for now lets just put it over here so you don’t start buzzing around the room tonight,” Ember said as she took the bottle and put it under the table behind her where it wouldn’t get knocked over. “Sound like a deal?” Apricot gave her a huge smile and nodded. “Good. Well then it looks like it’s my turn,” Ember said as she started tearing the paper off of the box on her lap. Her expression immediately went from excited to just flat out unamused as she reached in and lifted out a ‘FlimFlam OopsieWhoopie Cushion’. Blue and Apricot both immediately burst out laughing and fell to the floor in tears while the others tried to politely cover their laughs behind their hooves but soon began laughing out loud as well. “You all suck so hard,” Ember grumbled as she threw the ‘gift’ to the ground in front of her, only to have it emit a loud ‘pttttbbbb’ sound as the air was forced out of it. Everypony lost it again.

“Oh sweet Celestia I’m gonna piss myself!” Blue choked out in between her hysterical laughing on the floor, kicking her legs around in her fit. The laughing continued for another solid minute before everypony was able to slowly breathe normally again and wipe the tears from their eyes. “I don’t know who brought that, but I freakin’ love you,” Blue said as she climbed back onto her spot on the couch, still having trouble hiding her smirk. Ember just gave her an unamused look from across the circle.

“Well, now that you all got that out of your systems, Sunny, I believe it’s your turn,” Ember said, turning to Sunny.

“Ah, yes,” Sunny said as he tore the paper off his gift. He pulled out a small sphere with a dark little window on one end and a question mark stamped on the opposite end. He turned it around puzzlingly in his hooves, not sure what it was before noticing some words appear in the dark window. “‘Whatever’?” he said questioningly, reading the words in the window. He shook the ball and the words ‘get a life’ appeared. “What the…?” He shook it again.

“It’s a Sarcastaball,” Ember spoke up. “You know those Magic 8 Balls? Well, this is the same thing, except it gives smart ass answers instead,” she chuckled. Sunny shook it again and the words ‘oh cry me a river’ appeared.

“Wow, now I’ve seen everything,” he chuckled. “I’ll use this whenever a customer complains about their drink at the shop. Let’s see what you got Apple.”

“Right, well then,” Apple said, lifting his gift up and shaking it gently. “Hmmm, I wonder what it could be…” He put his ear up to it as she shook it some more, then pulled it away from his ear and sniffed it.

“Oh would you just open the damn thing you fruit,” Ember said in an annoyed tone, crossing her arms. Apple paid her no mind and began to carefully unwrap the paper, trying his best to avoid ripping it. “What the hell are you doing? Are you gonna reuse it or something? Come on already!” Ember heckled yet again.

“For your information, yes, I do reuse wrapping paper if I can. It’s very wasteful to just rip it to pieces when it can be saved,” Apple replied in a matter-of-fact tone. Ember shook her head and put her face in her talons and groaned. Apricot smiled gently and stroked her right wing with a hoof. After what felt like an eternity, Apple got the paper off the gift and pulled out what was inside. “Oh my, that’s a big chocolate bar,” he said as he levitated out a bar of chocolate that resembled a large brick rather than a standard candy bar. The picture on the wrapper of a mare sporting a huge grin with chocolate all over her face ensured that the consumer of this oversized treat was in for both an oversized stomach ache and a trip to the dentist.

“Bet if you melted a few of those down you could bathe in chocolate,” Blue remarked as she took the bar from Apple with her magic and looked closer at it. “Mix this with that whipped cream over there,” she gestured to Melon holding the tub of whipped cream, “and you got the makings of a fun night,” she said with a wink as she floated the candy back to Apple, who stared at her with wide eyes for a moment.

“Yes, uhm, that does sound like fun, Blue. I’ll keep that in mind,” he stuttered out as he made it look like he was reading the label. “285 servings… Sweet Luna…”

“My turn!” Blue bellowed as she dove on top of her box in front of the couch. “Ohoho I’ve waited long enough to get into you, you giant gift you,” she cooed as she enveloped the top of the box in her magic and began ripping the paper off. Once the paper was clear, she slowly began to pull the lid off. Across the group, Ember had a grin from ear to ear and was rocking back and forth in her chair in anticipation for what was about to happen. Blue pulled the lid about three inches up and…

“Surprise, bitches!” Marcus yelled as he burst up out of the box, his forelegs spread wide and a big smile on his face.

“Sweet Luna’s explosive ovaries! What the fuck is that thing?!” Blue screamed as she backpedaled and flipped over the backside of the couch. Apricot jumped out of her chair and grabbed Melon in an embrace and they both shrieked while Apple shot out of his chair and dove behind the couch where Blue landed. Sunny quickly turned around and took cover behind his own chair. Ember was in absolute hysterics and didn’t notice the green magical aura enveloping the cast iron fire poker as it floated from its place next to the fireplace and began heading towards the back of Marcus’s head. “Die you mutant zombie bug thing!” Blue yelled from her defensive position behind the couch as she swung the poker in her magic. Marcus caught sight of it out of the corner of his eye and managed to dive out of the way just as the poker came down and smashed the side of the box. This loud bang brought Ember out of her laughing fit enough to realize what was going on and she immediately jumped up.

“Wait! Blue, stop! It was a joke!” she yelled as Blue readied another hearty swing. Marcus was laying on the floor, still recovering from his leap out of the box and didn’t see the second swing headed straight for his back. The whole scene seemed to go in slow motion in Ember’s eyes as she saw the poker heading straight for Marcus. Without thinking, she thrust her wings as hard as she could and dove towards him, grabbing a hold of his right foreleg and pulling as hard as she could before they both tumbled against the wall as the poker smashed down, taking a sizeable chunk of wood out of the floor not two feet from where they now laid. Blue readied a third swing as soon as she realized she missed again but brought it to a screeching halt mid air once she saw Ember in the path. Ember cringed and put up her arm instinctively to block the blow that would no doubt shatter her arm bone, but fortunately didn’t come. She slowly unclenched her eyes and looked towards Blue, who was now out from behind the couch and in a full fighting stance, breathing heavily, the fire poker still gripped in a sparkling green aura beside her. The others slowly peeked out from their hiding spots now that the fight seemed to have stopped and looked on with wide eyes.

“Just put the poker down, Blue. I can explain everything,” Ember said in between deep breaths. “He’s not a monster, or a bug, or a zombie, ok?” Blue’s harsh glare lessened and she slowly lowered the fire poker, but didn’t put it down completely. Ember took note of this and made sure to keep herself in between Blue and Marcus as she helped him up from the floor.

“Well that sure as hell wasn’t part of the plan I hope,” Marcus said, rubbing his side as he stood up and winced.

“Agh! It talked!” Apricot shrieked as she latched onto Melon even tighter and continued to shake. Ember pinched the bridge of her beak. This was not how she imagined things playing out.

“What the hell is going on Ember? What plan is he talking about?” Sunny asked, slowly stepping out from behind his chair.

Ember let out a deep sigh. “Look, this is Marcus. He’s a Changeling I found asleep in my shed out back a little while ago. I nearly killed him when I found him in there so I guess I should have seen this reaction coming,” she said as she nodded her head towards Blue and the floating poker. “Anyways, once I found out he could talk, he explained to me how he’s not a part of that whole ‘hive mind control’ thing anymore since that shit that happened in Canterlot however long ago, and now he’s on his own free will and just trying to make a living for himself. So I figured I’d help him out a little and introduce him to you guys in what I thought would be a funny way, but clearly I was very mistaken on my approach here.”

“So, he’s not gonna suck out our souls or whatever it is that Changelings do to survive?” Apple said in a shaky tone, still mostly hiding behind the couch. Marcus rolled his eyes.

“No, we don’t ‘suck out your souls’... I am so tired of hearing that rumor,” Marcus said as he stomped his hoof on the floor. He sighed before continuing. “Ember is the first pony, er, griffin, that saw me without being in my disguise, so I don’t blame her for trying to kill me at first, but I’m very grateful she took a second to actually listen to me and see that I’m not like those Changelings you may have heard about attacking Canterlot that day. You see, whenever we got blasted out of the city and far enough away from Chrysalis, it broke her connection to us and that resulted in any of us that were thrown far enough out to gain free will of our own. I’ve been wandering around Ponyville disguised as this pegasus named ‘WP’ just doing bullshit cleaning jobs, trying to make enough bits to live on my own.”

“Oh, well, that’s a relief then,” Apple said while he slowly climbed over the couch and onto its cushions next to Blue, who had in the meantime put the fire poker back into its holder next to the fire. “And here I thought my love was going to get sucked away,” he said while giving Blue a look. Ember looked away in disgust, Sunny coughed, Apricot didn’t quite understand what was happening, Marcus, looking questioningly at Apple and Melon, looked away as well, for similar reasons that Ember did, though with less disgust. Suddenly, Apple looked at Ember with a questioning face. “Uh, Ember? Where’s my gift? You know, the one with the 2-bit bottom-of-the-bin wrapping paper?”

“Oh, of course. I was saving that, because, well, obviously Marcus isn’t Blue’s real gift.” As she was saying that, she grabbed a rectangle-shaped present from one of the shelves, where it had been this whole time. “Here you go Blue,” she said, giving it to the blue mare. She smiled and quickly began opening it. The gift turned out to be a spell book of sorts, not one of those ancient tomes one would find in the Canterlot Library of Magic, but rather a modern adaptation of one such tome. Blue began to read the first page out loud.

“‘Hello there, and thanks for purchasing this revised version of Spectacularly Special Spells and Enchantments, originally written by Clover the Clever, and adapted for the modern pony by Buck Brandy and Took Off. We hope that you’ll find all kinds of useful spells for use in daily life.’” Blue looked at the group. “‘If you like this, perhaps you’ll be interested in the following books… blah blah blah…’” Blue grinned. “I’m gonna have fun with this. Thanks Apple,” she said, blowing a kiss to him over her hoof. Ember wanted to crush something in her talon.

“I believe you two have some final preparing to do with the food, so why don’t you two go and do that,” Ember said, giving Apple and Blue a sharp glare. “Besides, the fact that you got Apple’s gift was actually all random chance.”

Blue jumped up from the couch, coercing Apple to jump up too. “Yeah, okay Ember. We’ll get right on that,” she said, walking to the kitchen like she didn’t even hear what Ember just said, with Apple following closely behind. Ember had a desire to vomit when she thought about what the stallion’s eyes were currently focusing on.

Ember looked at the remaining guests. “Well, anyway, everyone has their gifts now, so now I guess we’ll just wait for the food to come along. Until then, do what you want I guess.”

“Haha, like getting naked? I mean, that counts as everything, right? Right?” Apricot said, smiling nervously at everyone, but Ember in particular. She promptly got a harsh poke from Melon.

“We’re usually naked anyway, Apricot.”

“Oh yeah, of course, haha! Guess I just derped!” Apricot said, followed by more nervous laughter and awkward coughing from everyone else in the room. Ember, however, had to hold in a chuckle, and smiled warmly at her. “I’m… going to the bathroom now. Be right back!” she said, then ran off to the bathroom.

“Uh, Ember?” Marcus said, being the first to speak up after an uncomfortably long period of awkward silence following Apricot’s retreat. “You said everyone had their gift, but… I didn’t get anything. Come on, even I brought a gift.” Ember frowned and threw the whoopie cushion at him.

“Enjoy,” she said, with the most unamused facial expression she could muster.

“Thanks, Ember. Much appreciated,” Marcus said dryly.

“You’re welcome,” Ember said, finally letting all the tension from what had just happened with the fire poker drop. “I need a fucking drink…”

Ember walked into the kitchen where Blue and Apple were doing final preparations for the dinner. There was a lot of sizzling and the clattering of cutlery and plates, and also the giggling of two ponies. Seriously, what was up with these two? Ember opened the the refrigerator to see if there was any soft drinks she could help herself to when suddenly she felt something bump against the other side of the fridge door, accompanied with a soft ‘Oomph’. Ember closed the door, and on the floor was Apricot, rubbing her forehead with her right hoof. In her mouth was some mistletoe.

“Ouch… fuck… That did not go as I hoped…”

“What were you even trying to do?” Ember asked with a slight frown on her face.

“In my mind I was a lot more graceful but… heh, I guess I just let myself go… Sorry, Ember.” Apricot quickly got up and fled to the living room, leaving Ember confused, but eventually she shook her head and got a can of soda from the fridge.

Ember stepped back into the living room, sat down in one of the armchairs, and popped open her can with a soft hiss. It was not until after a few minutes had passed that she noticed the unusual silence. She looked around, and saw everyone holding their breath and looking at something behind her. Ember slowly turned around.

“Hehe… Hi Ember… again…” Apricot said, balancing on her two hind hooves, on a chair, trying her utmost to attach mistletoe to the ceiling to where it would be right above Ember.

“Apricot, seriously, why are you even… what you are doing right now?” she asked.

“Oh, me, I’m just... “ she attempted, but finally failed her precarious balance act and fell off the chair and hit the floor with a solid thud. “Ow! …Figures. I was just… you know, stirring up drama? Yeah, let’s go with that,” she said before skittering off to Melon, where they softly started whispering and giggling about what just happened. How could she just shrug off falling off a chair? Ember sat back in her chair and watched Sunny engage in conversation with Marcus. Sunny probably had all sorts of questions to ask the Changeling, and come to think about it, so did she. Ember got up from her armchair and started walking over to join in their conversation.

“You’d better not have added an overload of saltiness to the pasta.” Blue said.

“Haha,” Apple said, shaking his head. “I hope you didn’t accidentally add any coffee beans or caffeine to the soup.”

“That wasn’t even a good one, oh salty one,” Blue replied in a semi-joking manner. Apple couldn’t help but feel a warm, pleasant feeling. Is this what properly being in love felt like? If it was, then he certainly enjoyed it. He was about to reply to Blue when Apricot entered from the living room.

“Hey you two,” she said in a hushed voice. “Can I ask something? Like, it’s something small.”

“Uh, sure,” Blue said. “Go ahead.”

“Well, I’ve been trying to get me and Ember under this mistletoe, but I’ve failed a couple times… But now I think I came up with a plan, a plan so amazing not even my best friend knows about it!”

Apple frowned. “Are you sure that she doesn’t know because you came up with it five minutes ago?”

“That could be it, but that’s not the point. Want to help me with my plan or not?”

“Yes, let’s get you and Ember kissing!” Blue said with a big smile on her face that weirded Apple out just a tiny bit.

“I like that attitude Blue,” Apricot said, looking behind herself and towards the living room. “I’m going to hang this mistletoe up on the top of the door frame. Then you two call Ember in and then I’ll handle the rest. This’ll work you guys, you’ll see.”

“...and that’s how the hivemind works. Sort of,” Marcus said.

“That was some of the most confusing shit I have ever heard,” Ember said. Changeling society was still a mystery to her, and most of Equestria in general really.

“That’s fascinating,” Sunny said. “I don’t quite understand everything, but… it was good.”

“Uh, Ember, could you come in here for a sec?” Apple said, peeking his head around the corner of the kitchen door. “It’s for a… something. We need your help, ok?” Ember grumbled something about Apple not being very ‘able’ and got up, but was stopped when Melon Drop spoke up.

“It’s alright Ember, I got it,” she said. “I’ll give an update on the food situation too. It’s taking forever.”

“Thanks Melon,” Ember said, sitting back down.

“Don’t mention it,” she replied, and started walking towards the kitchen. Just as she pushed open the door, she was tackled by Apricot and flipped over, ending up on her back with Apricot on top of her. Apricot had her eyes closed and didn’t wait a second to lock their mouths together. Melon blushed heavily when she realized what was happening, but didn’t know quite how to react, causing Apricot to resume kissing until she softly broke off the kiss and opened her eyes to gaze upon her prize. Her joyous expression washed away as she realized who exactly she was in this position with. Everyone turned to look.

“Uhm…” she began, trying to hold her panting in. “I can explain.”

Melon looked at her friend with a mixture of anger and kindness, a weird combination. And she was blushing too. “What the… why?” she said in between her panting.

“I… thought you were Ember and uhm… you’re under the mistletoe so I think I’m in the right here,” Apricot explained as she shrugged and grinned down at Melon beneath her.

Melon sighed. “I know you were messing around with mistletoe. I just didn’t think you’d be so violent with it… although, I also know you can be impulsive sometimes. Now, can you please get off me? We’re being stared at.”

“Oh, right, sorry,” Apricot said, getting out of their compromising position. “Sorry again,” she said, heavily blushing. “But don’t say it didn’t feel nice!”

Melon turned red. “Whether I enjoyed it or not is besides the point. I’m not… you know, never mind.”

“Yeah, okay, sure… Uh, Ember, when’s the dinner coming? I’m getting pretty hungry,” Apricot asked.

“Yeah. What’re Blue and Apple up to?” Sunny asked. “Can you check on them, Ember?”

“Yeah, sure. At least I won’t get tackled by somepony…” she said, and walked over to the kitchen. She raised an eyebrow when Apple and Blue were nowhere to be seen. “Hmmm,” she murmured and walked back into the living room. “They’re not in the kitchen. I’ll have a look around the house, why don’t you all put the food on the table for when I come back?”

“Sure boss…” Marcus said. “Damn, it’s like being back in the Hive around here.” Ember shrugged and walked into the hallway to go up the stairs and check the bathroom, where she supposed at least one of them had to be. Halfway into the hall, however, she stopped when she heard a peculiar sound. It sounded like… gasping and ‘Mmmm’-ing. It came from the cupboard under the stairs.

“Please don’t be what I think it is…” she mumbled and opened the door. Immediately she was filled with disgust when she saw the scene in front of her. Granted, it was not as bad as she thought it’d be, but it was still pretty bad. What she saw was Blue and Apple in a tight embrace, making out with tongue and everything. “Guys. Guys! Stop it!” she said to them forcefully. Both turned their heads towards her with frightened expressions on both their faces, though perhaps less on Blue’s.

“Hehe… Hey Ember…” Apple began, but Ember cut him off.

“Just don’t even…” she sighed. “Go help the others bring the food to the table.”

“Uh, yes Ember. Right away,” Apple said, and galloped off after giving Blue a meaningful look that probably said ‘We’ll continue this later’ or something, Ember thought to herself, and shook her head. She hoped things would get better during dinner. The smell coming from the kitchen was rich with flavor, so she hoped it’d raise her spirits.

“And now, I present to you… Apple and Blue’s special pasta-lasagna surprise!” Blue said as she removed the large silver food cover with her levitation magic from the platter. A collective ‘Oooooh’ went through the group as they observed the dish.

“I hope you guys like it. We spent a good amount of time on this little masterpiece,” Apple added while he sat down on a chair at the end of the table next to Blue, who was starting to divide the dish into equal pieces for everyone with a large knife and levitating the individual pieces to everyone’s plates. Apple looked on with a cheerful smile on his face, hoping that his friends would love it. He saw it as a big moment, even though he realized that’d be a bit silly, it was just a dinner party after all.

“Wow… this is big you guys,” Melon said. “Did you two like, plan this?”

“Well, it actually just sort of happened spontaneously. It came from an argument of what we were going to make. Blue wanted to make lasagna and I wanted to make pasta… eventually we came to an agreement to mash it all together, and this, as you can see, is the delectable result,” Apple said with a big grin on his face. “Bon appetite!” he said, and sat down, watching everyone as they started eating. Soon the room was filled with the sounds of clinking silverware and noises that expressed delight.

“This is good stuff,” Marcus said. “I’ll say it’s better than love.”

“I second that,” Melon said. “It’s certainly a treat. Can you give me the recipe afterwards, Apple? I’d like to make this myself.” Apple smiled and nodded. This was going exactly as he had hoped. Now for the next part on his agenda: Conversation.

“So Ember… how’s business?” he asked.

“Hm?” Ember replied, her beak full of food. She quickly swallowed. “Business is fine. Parcel delivery is more lucrative than you think, and business has been increasing. In fact, I’m looking for a new employee. The workload has just been increasing for a while now, so I kind of want a second somepony to help me out. Been keeping my eye open for more warehouse space too.”

“Ah, really. Interesting. The same applies to my brother, though I’m pretty sure most of you know that by now, how much I despise him and all that,” Apple said.

“Speaking of your brother,” Sunny asked, “Is he ok? I haven’t seen him in a while.” Apple could feel the tension building inside him.

“Pippin? Pippin’s fine. Fucking fine, as always. Drinking, raking in money, getting a new mare over every night… Using all of that to boss me around, it’s crazy…” he said, looking down.

“Well, I’m sure he’s not that ba-” Apricot began, but Apple continued his tirade.

“Well, you should have seen this one night. He had that pink pony from the baking shop over, they went all fucking night!” He looked up. “All fucking night! Try sleeping through that and then see if you still think it’s not that bad, because it is that bad.” He looked back down again.

“Well... We… care for you…” Melon said, followed by varying degrees of nods, the least of which came from Ember; more of an eye roll really. Conversation fell silent after that, and the only sound that still filled the room was the mind-numbing sound of cutlery making contact with plates, which was on occasion a noise that felt like it pierced your brain. Then Blue spoke up.

“Sooo… Anything interesting happen to anyone lately?” she asked, to which the group shook their heads, Melon and Sunny saying ‘Nope’. “Well… Y’know what we need?” and gave everyone a look.

“More food?” Apricot said.

“Somepony to do the dishes,” Ember replied after swallowing.

“Cheaper drinks at the bar?” Sunny said.

“More police on the streets?” Apple suggested.

“Our dreams to come true?” Melon said.

“Love?’” Marcus said with a giggle.

Blue looked a bit annoyed. “Yes, yes, all of those things too… But I got some happier topics for us to talk about,” she said, smiling. Everyone looked at each other in confusion.

“Like what?” Apple asked.

“It’s about something that happened two nights ago,” Blue said. Apple’s eyes went wide and he dropped his fork and knife on the plate with a loud clang when he realized what Blue was referring to, earning him some weird looks. He looked directly at Blue, trying to give her some indication that he thought she should leave it there, but his panicky behavior had already gathered enough attention.

“Oh? What happened?” Marcus asked. Ember made a disgruntled noise that went largely unnoticed. The others nodded at Marcus’ question.

“N-nothing happened… nothing at all! We had a… good day, yes, a great day, that’s all… We went to the… park?” Apple said, trying hard to come up with a diversion.

“Come on, tell us,” Apricot pushed.

“Sounds like a fun time, tell us,” Sunny said. Ember let out a ‘hmph’ again.

“Yes Apple, you should tell them,” Blue said with an evil grin playing around her muzzle. Apple started tapping his forehooves together while one of his back hooves repeatedly tapped the floor.

“We… we had a great time… out at that park I mentioned… oh the fun we had…” he began, when he immediately got interrupted. This had really taken a turn for the worse.

“What park?”

“What did you do at the park?”

“Was it a water park?”

“The park… uhm,” Apple struggled, unprepared. “It was Ember’s couch…” He went wide eyed again. “No, no, Climber's Dao Tsj... Foreign… National Park,” he said quietly to correct himself, but it was too quiet and already there were whispers about ‘Ember Park’. He was really feeling like he was botching this up. ‘Dammit,’ he thought, ‘Why must this happen to me?’

Blue’s grin got bigger. “I was lucky enough to see some geysers.” Apple wanted to bury his head in the floor. “It was quite a sight to behold.” Ember let out a huge sigh while everypony else looked at Apple and Blue with confusion.

Melon wondered. “Is that park near here? I didn’t know we had geysers.”

“I’ve never heard of ‘Ember Park’… sounds like fun, I’d like to visit it…” Apricot said quietly.

Sunny looked at Ember. “Was there a park named after you?”

“No,” Ember replied stiffly, unable to smile, and then sighed. “They weren’t at a park.”

“Blue, why'd you lie,” Sunny asked with a chuckle. Apple looked at Blue, and saw that her face looked akin to how she looked at him during that night. He didn’t know what to think, whether he should be proud that she enjoyed it so much that she was reliving it in her mind, or that he should be disgusted. ‘Why now…’ he thought. Suddenly Blue started shoving her chair in his direction and leaned in uncomfortably close to him.

“Tell them,” she whispered to him in a sultry tone.

Apple swallowed and looked around at the group. “Well, b-basically me and Blue uh… we… we met at the soup store.. you know, that soup store… anyway, we met up there when it was snowing that evening… and then uh… we talked a bit about random stuff… Y’know, Blue’s job search and my… brother…” Apple stopped talking and looked around.

“That’s it?” Sunny asked.

“No…” Apple said, mentally preparing for the inevitable. Ember cringed.

“Then what happened?” Melon asked.

“Yeah Apple,” Blue said with that grin, looking really pleased with herself. “What happened?” Ember gave her a look.

“So uh, we walked home… the weather was snowy, like I said… then we ran into Melon,” he said, giving the pony in question a look, “And we fell… I thought I dislocated my jaw but, well, I didn’t… and uh…” He looked at Blue again, whose tail was swishing back and forth through the gap between the cushions, while she also had the same weird, lecherous look on her face. “So then we got up and Melon said some.. stuff, and we uh… the trees were nice…”

“Come on Apple, get to the meat of the story,” Blue said in that weird tone. Her tail was swishing faster and faster.

“We went to Ember’s house and uh… ate soup,” he said, hesitating to go any further with this. Why was it always him who got into situations like this? He couldn’t see this night getting any worse. “Then afterwards we uh… did some stuff… together.”

“What kind of stuff?” Marcus asked.

“Oh, you know… ‘it’. Stuff. A lot of stuff. It. Stuff. Y-yes. S-St-tuff. Then after we… uh the stuff happened and uh… Yeah, ‘it’ was fun, we had fun doing stuff and ‘it’...” Apple was panicking now and Blue’s tail was now at full revs, and the others started to notice it too.

“Her tail’s going like mad,” Marcus stated. “Like a…” he gulped, “Fly-swatter.” This provoked Apricot to giggle.

“Stutter-horse and a fly-swatter,” she said in between her laughter. “It’s just… the best.” Marcus, Melon and Sunny joined in on the giggling, but suddenly scrunched their noses when a weird smell started to fill the air around the table. Ember let out a big sigh again, imagining herself anywhere else but here.

“What’s the weird smell?” Melon asked, sniffing and looking around. “It smells like… cinnamon and… and…” She blushed and stopped talking.

“Arousal,” Apricot said. “You’re thinking of arousal.” Melon covered her eyes.

“Yes, that’s what I meant,” she said and quickly stuffed her mouth full of food to escape any further embarrassment. Blue’s eyes went wide, and she quickly grabbed hold of her tail and kept it still.

“Just tell them, please…” Ember said. “End this horrible conversation.” Blue was also impatient.

“Yeah Apple, get to it already! Everyone is dying to hear it!” Then she whispered to him, “me especially. Go on, tell them in great detail.”

“W-well… uh… We… Blue decided… and then we… physical sports… licking… And uhm…” Apple tried, but Blue interrupted.

“We fucked,” she said bluntly. “And holy shit what a fuck it was. You should have seen it!” Everyone at the table looked at Blue weirdly, even Apple, who was there. “No, really, you guys should see this guy’s dick,” she said, pointing at Apple. Melon spit out all her food, looking a bit sick. “It’s huge, and the feeling I had when he was thrusting it up,” she said, slowing down when she realized what she was actually saying, “into my juicy… wet…” She shut up. Everyone had stopped eating, except for Marcus.

“Well, there goes my appetite…” Melon said, looking sadly down at her plate. Apple noticed that Ember has a similar expression on her face, which Apricot was glancing at.

“Well, Blue?” Marcus asked. “Keep going, I was loving the story.”

Everyone shook their heads, Sunny saying ‘No, just no!’

“I’m not hungry anymore…” Apricot said.

“I guess they’re… leftovers…” Apple managed to get out. “For another time…” Another awkward silence fell over the group, or rather it would have been silence if not for the sudden loud and grating noise of a wood chipper turning on outside. Immediately, Ember’s face went from sad and disgusted to furious.

“Oh no… not today, you little red bitch!” she said, getting up and charging out of the front door. Blue also looked angry and ran after her. Apple looked around and sighed.

“You guys go outside and watch, I’ll… clean this up,” he said, gesturing at the plates that still had food on them. Everypony (and Changeling) got up and followed Blue and Ember outside, with a sigh a couple muttered ‘Thank you’s’.

Ember was furious. Sure, eventually she should probably make up with Scotch, but not now. Now she had crossed the line. This was her evening, her first Hearth’s Warming Eve with friends in absolutely forever, and Scotch would attempt to ruin it like she ruined everything, and Ember wasn’t about to stand for that. Ember grabbed her scarf, put it on, and stormed outside into the snow. Scotch was standing on the line between their two properties, or as far as somepony could tell due to the snow covering everything. As soon as Ember ran outside, Scotch turned the wood chipper off and fumbled for a note and two little gift-wrapped… things she had standing on the wood chipper, levitating them to her side. Blue ran after Ember from the house and caught up to her and they were now standing next to each other facing Scotch, while the other guests came up from behind. Scotch levitated the note in front of her and started reading it before Blue and Ember could even say anything.

“Hey Ember and Blue,” Scotch began, her voice trembling ever so slightly. Blue and Ember raised their eyebrows, and Sunny gave a little smile, encouraging her to keep going. “So… this is my ap-apology to you, from… me. I’m… sorry.” Ember and Blue did not look any less upset, but at least they didn’t look like they were going to do something violent anymore. “Let’s b-be real here… I’m n-not… the nicest pony. In fact, I’m a horrible… No, wait, that’s not right…” She stopped talking to reread her note. “Ah, ok, I’m going to continue now… It’s obvious. The… the things that I do sometimes can’t be… they can’t be... controlled by my whacked out brain.” She made a silly ‘I’m crazy’ gesture with her hoof, which went without response. “So yeah, I’m sorry…” She took a moment to read more things from the note quickly before saying them out loud. “In fact, I have a good idea! Let’s be friends!” she said, but the tone in her voice didn’t make it sound very reassuring. “Yeah! That sounds f-fun. We can go out and... have a fun party time down at Sunny’s apartment.” Sunny’s eyes went wide for a bit while everyone but Ember and Blue looked at him for a second. Scotch kept going and seemed to be getting more and more desperate as the note went on. “Or get a nice cold cider during cider season,” Scotch continued. Apple, who just came out of the house and joined the rest of the group, didn’t read the mood very well.

“But cider season isn’t for another like, seven months…” he said. Scotch started nervously shifting from her left hooves to her right hooves, and read the note through another few times.

“Or head down to P-Princess Twilight C-Castle and t-trash the place. Dear Celestia that thing is ugly, am I right?” she looked around. “Or am I right?” Everyone looked at her, Blue and Ember with annoyance, some with confusion, others with a form of pity, but no one laughed. Scotch looked around, and suddenly trotted to the right a bit, where they noticed a rake lying in the snow, obviously placed there just recently. Scotch lowered her head a bit, stepped on it, swinging it upwards and hitting her square between the eyes. She took a moment to hold her head. Everyone could see she was holding in tears and a scream. “S-so… so… yeah,” she kept going, despite the pain. “I-if all of those… things sound fun, I’d be up for… n-no, down to clown.” There were some whispers of ‘That’s just bad’ and ‘No…’ from the group. Apple’s right eye twitched just slightly, and Sunny was starting to look slightly panicky. Scotch, still teary-eyed, kept going. “W-we’ll… all be laughing about this in the morning… right?” She looked around, but Blue and Ember’s expressions had not changed. “Right. T-thanks for your time, Pigeo- Phoenix and Coffee Buns! Love, Scotch…, No wait, fuck me, not love,” she gave a slight chuckle and shut up and looked at Ember.

“Laugh about this in the morning…” Ember said. “You’re right I’ll be laughing about this pathetic excuse of an apology.” The tears in Scotch’s eyes became more clear.

“Is this some kind of trick,” Blue said, “because it feels like it.”

“No, no, it’s not! I’m for real, really!” Scotch said, a bit loud. She sidestepped and pretended to slip, landing face first into the snow, and looked up. “Look, I have gifts!” She levitated the two small, crudely wrapped gifts to Blue and Ember.

“I can already tell what that is, Scotch. It’s barely wrapped,” Blue said.

“Just… just open it…” Scotch said while she got up and looked around nervously. Inside Ember’s gift was a small plushie of Charcoal, the same character she already had. It was distinctly lower quality than the bigger one Ember already had. Her mouth did not so much as twitch. Blue’s gift was a coffee mug, of equally low quality and made of plastic.

“What is this cheap shit?” Blue asked.

“It’s a coffee mug! I thought you’d like it…” Scotch said, with that tremble still in her voice.

“Well I don’t. And as for your apology, I don’t believe for a second that this is your best effort. It’s quite simply the worst apology I have ever seen, along with the worst gift that has ever been given. This is just another one of your stupid ways to try and ruin our lives, isn’t it?” Blue started. Ember looked at the plushie with a facial expression that was a bit unclear as to what she was feeling. Then she looked up.

“Yeah, Scotch. Get out of here. I don’t want to see you again. Not for a long time,” she said coldly. The tears that had for a long time been in Scotch’s eyes finally started spilling out of her eyes and rolled down her face.

“I j-just… I just wanted…” she covered her eyes with her hooves. “I-I’m s-s-sorry…” Scotch sputtered out as she started running away in tears, dropping her note in the snow. Sunny shot into action and ran after her. Ember reached out and picked up the note before she and Blue turned around without saying anything, though there was a look of uncertainty on Ember’s face while she was looking at Scotch running off. Apple and the others soon started making their way back inside too after giving each other some weird looks. Once inside, Apple sat down with Blue while the others gathered in the living room once more.

“So how are you feeling?” Apple asked Blue.

“I feel fine, Apple…” she said. “I just really need a bit of respite from this… everything. I need to relax…”

“You can watch some TV… drink some tea… lie down and sleep…” Apple went on to suggest relaxing things, including but not limited to ‘sleeping potions’, ‘mowing the lawn’, ‘stare out over the savanna’ and ‘be free’, but Blue had stopped listening. The slightly cinnamon-ish smell had returned, along with the odd look on her face as she concocted a plan in her head. She suddenly stopped Apple from going any further by blocking his mouth with one of her forehooves. “Mmph?”

“So I was thinking, I still need to get back at Ember for that hilarious Changeling-In-A-Box joke, and we, you and me, still need to… how do I put it, cement our uh… relationship. So I thought, why not combine those two things in one?” she said, removing her hoof from his mouth.

“Right. So what’s your plan then?” Apple asked.

“Well…” Blue began, “Ember has a really nice, plush bed upstairs that she’s very fond of and doesn’t let anything near. I was thinking we uh, ‘use it’ for our own purposes.”

“Right? I don’t get it.”

Blue sighed and got really close to him, their fur touching. “I meant…” she moved a hoof to his chest and started rubbing it slowly, “we put your uh,” she moved her hoof down his body, “skills to the test.” Apple finally got it.

“Oooohh… so you want us to…” he blushed and made a quick ‘thrusting’ gesture with his hips. Blue nodded and licked her lips. “In Ember’s bed?”

“Oh of course… it has nice springs too so we’ll be bopping up and down like crazy,” Blue said to him.

“But won’t Ember… you know, not like that?” Apple replied cautiously. Blue shrugged.

“That’s the point, I’m trying to get back at her.”

“Well ok Blue, if you say so…” Apple got up, as did Blue, and together they started making their way upstairs. Halfway up the stairs Blue turned her head around.

“And I’m on bottom this time,” she said in that lecherous tone. Apple smirked as even he was getting in the right spirit. Blue opened the door to the bedroom and both of them entered, then she closed the door behind them.

“Are you not going to lock it?” Apple asked.

“No, no, we want Ember to see this, right?” Blue said while she climbed onto the bed and got into a sexy position and gave Apple some intense bedroom eyes. “Now come up here…” she said, slowly and sensual. Apple climbed onto the bed, and Blue rolled onto her back and spread her back legs immediately, where Apple once again was presented with that wet sight. Blue could see his member growing between his legs from where she was lying and smirked. Apple, however, decided to not come forward immediately but decided to do something that he now understood was called foreplay, which he found out after one quick search on his computer. He lay down on his belly, wincing as his stallionhood got stuck between his body and the bed in its currently half-hard state. “What are you doing, Apple,” Blue asked, even though she knew exactly what. Apple moved his head forward, stuck his tongue out and gave Blue’s wet marehood a long lick, top to bottom. Blue made a couple pleased noises as she squeezed her eyes shut and shivered, urging him to go forward. “Oh,” she said while Apple licked her wet pussy slowly, even moving his tongue inside at some points, “I can tell you and I are going to have some fun.”

Ember was sat in an armchair, reading the note Scotch dropped, her other talon playing with the small Charcoal plush. Strangely enough it made her feel… sorry, as weird as that was. She read the note out in her head.

Hey Ember & Blue,

So this is my apology to you, from me. I’m kinda terrible at apologising so we’ll great at apologising so sorry. Let’s be real here. I’m not the nicest Pony. In fact I’m a horrible piece of shit that should It’s obvious. The things that I do sometimes can’t be controlled by my whacked out brain. Ember being partly to blame for all the So yeah, I’m sorry.

Infact, I have a good idea. Let’s be friends! Yeah! That sounds fun. We can go out and have a fun party time down at Sunny’s apartment. Or drink our lives awa- Or get a nice cold cider during cider season. Or head down to Princess Twilight’s castle and trash the place. Dear Celestia that thing is ugly, am I right? Or am I right?

(Note to future Scotch, if no one laughs, locate conveniently placed rake and stand on it and try to remain conscious when it hits you)

So yeah, if all of those things sound fun. I’d be up for doing these things down to clown. (This is cooler) We’ll be laughing about this in the morning, right? Right. Thanks for your time, Pigeon & Mocha Arse Phoenix and Coffee Buns! (Cool nicknames. The hours worth of thought I put into these has to be worth it)

Love, Scotch

(Note to future Scotch. If faces remain unimpressed and hugs aren’t given, improvise! Just not with the rake if rake was already used.)

Ember placed the note on her lap and stared into the fire in her fireplace, letting out a long sigh.

“Hey… You ok? Looks like you got a lot on your mind,” Apricot said as she came up beside Ember and sat down. Ember let out another long sigh before responding, keeping her gaze on the fire.

“I don’t know. I have so much going through my mind right now it’s hard to just pick one thing and try and sort it out. I have a shit ton of stuff going on at work with business picking up, all the bills and things here, trying to get my mind in order about my feelings towards Blue, and now this.” Ember turned towards the plush she still had in her talon, looking at it with a mixture of irritation and uncertainty. Apricot nodded and scooted a little closer to Ember.

“Well, I don’t know what good I’d be in regards to the stuff going on at work, but I’m more than happy to try and help you sort out the other stuff,” she said with a slight smile, unsure how Ember might respond to the offer. “You seemed to feel a lot better after we talked in the market that day, right?”

“Mmm… that was nice, yea,” Ember said with a slight smile, remembering the laughs they shared over their drinks.

“You know I’m more than willing to help you if I can. It’s what friends do,” Apricot said.

“What was that?” Ember said, turning to her with a raised brow.

“What was what?” Apricot replied, mentally kicking herself for adding the inflection to ‘friends’.

“The way you said ‘friends’. Why’d you say it like that?”

Apricot shifted back and forth a bit, looking up towards the ceiling for some kind of distraction. “Umm… Heh, no reason, just me being weird I guess. I mean, you saw the mistletoe stuff earlier so you know I can be a bit kookie. Heh…”

Ember turned towards Apricot and rested her chin on her talon. “Apricot, I’m far from stupid. I know you meant something by that, so just tell me and get it over with.”

“You’ll think it’s stupid…” Apricot said as she looked down and pawed at the floor to avoid Ember’s stare.

“Try me,” Ember said as she kept her position and smirked a little. Apricot continued to shift back and forth nervously.

“Mmmmm… Ok, but in private. I don’t want the others to overhear and make fun of me or something,” Apricot said, gesturing to the others on the other side of the living room, engrossed in some conversation that seemed to be about political stability of the country should Luna be in power rather than Celestia. It seemed Sunny was getting rather heated at the topic and Ember was glad to get away from political talk, so she nodded and pointed towards the kitchen. Apricot nodded back and they both got up and made their way into the kitchen and shut the door behind them.

“Wanna drink?” Ember asked as she went and opened a cabinet and got two glasses out.

“Just water would be fine, thanks,” Apricot replied as she took a seat at the kitchen table. Ember laughed a little and rolled her eyes.

“Come on, how about a real drink?”

“Ehhh… I’m not a big alcohol fan. If you have something light I’ll have some,” Apricot said as she played with the napkin holder on the table. Ember nodded and opened the freezer for some ice cubes, picking a few out and plopping them in the glasses.

“Sounds like Sunny is getting kinda pissed out there, heh,” Ember said, nodding towards the living room where Sunny’s voice was getting louder, accompanied by Marcus and occasionally Melon. “See, that’s why I keep my beak out of political matters. They lead to nothing but arguments.” She opened a small cabinet beside the fridge and took out a few ornately-shaped bottles with amber-colored liquids inside, pouring them in set amounts in one glass and noticeably lesser amounts in the other.

“Mmm, me too,” Apricot mumbled, glancing towards the door. “I don’t like yelling all that much. Even if it’s something I’m really passionate about, I back down pretty damn quickly if it turns into an argument,” she said, turning back towards Ember who was setting the glasses on the table in front of them, taking a seat across the table from her. Apricot took her glass in her hooves and took a small sip, testing the strength of the alcohol inside. It felt warm on her tongue and tingled her throat as she swallowed. “Hm, nice. Not strong at all. Thanks.” Ember smiled across at her.

“You said light so I made it light. I’m not gonna try to get you drunk and fuck you or something,” Ember said jokingly. Apricot’s eyes went wide and she started coughing on the next sip she had taken while Ember was talking. She quickly put the glass down and coughed to the side several more times, trying to regain her composure. “Relax, I was kidding. Here, have some water.” Ember handed her a bottle from the case she had on the floor beside the fridge. Apricot slowly drank some and calmed her coughing down to where she could talk again.

“Heh, I knew you were kidding, just caught me off guard is all,” Apricot said as she took a few more sips of water.

“Is that why your cheeks are bright red?”

“That’s from the coughing!”

“Mhm, sure it is,” Ember said as she smirked and took a sip of her own drink. She found she got a certain amount of amusement making Apricot squirm.

“Whatever,” Apricot said as she crossed her forehooves and turned her head to the side with a ‘hmph’. “Why are we in here again?”

“You said ‘friends’ with that tone to it that I can tell you meant something by it and I wanna know what,” Ember reminded her.

“Oh, that… I was hoping you’d just forget it if we talked about other things…” Apricot said as she looked down into her glass and swirled it around a bit. Ember put her glass down and folded her arms on the table.

“If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years of living alone, it’s that holding things in and not dealing with them only makes things worse in the long run. So tell me, what’s going on?” Apricot let out a sigh but continued to look down at her drink.

“You know how Melon and I have been friends since high school?” Ember nodded. “Well… The other half of that is she was really my only friend there. I’ve always been shit at making friends so when I somehow got to talking to her in one of our classes, it made me happier than I ever was before. As the year went on we got closer and closer and when summer came around, we got to spend nearly every day together, talking, laughing, sharing our secrets… We got really close to the point where I started feeling this weird feeling whenever I saw Melon at first period during school. Kinda like butterflies in my stomach I guess you could say. The second we left school, I missed her. This feeling kept getting more and more frequent the more time we spent together until something happened one night that still hurts me to think about honestly.”

“Oh, well, if it’s something that personal, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to Apricot,” Ember said, not expecting the conversation to take a detour towards Feel City.

“No no, it’s about time I told someone about this. It happened a few years ago now and I think it needs to be let out finally.” Apricot paused for a moment before continuing. “I trust you won’t tell anyone else about what I tell you here, right Ember?” she asked, looking up and making direct eye contact with the griffon across the table from her. Ember froze for a moment as she looked straight back at her.

“Of course not. Whatever you tell me stays between you, I, and Charcoal over there,” she gestured towards the plushie sitting on the shelf by the fridge. Apricot smiled and nodded.

“Thank you. Anyways, so this one night, Melon and I were over one of our places, I don’t remember who’s, watching a movie, laying together on the couch. This big mushy romantic scene comes on and before I even knew what I was doing, I was leaning in to kiss Melon.” Ember’s eyes went wide as she listened with full attention. Apricot let out a sigh and looked back down into her glass. “The part that hurts to think about is how she responded. I mean, we’re best friends and all so I know she tried to hide it, but I could tell she was pretty upset over the whole thing judging by how fast she squirmed off the couch to avoid me… Naturally I tried to apologize and play it off like I was kidding but she saw right through that bullshit and just asked me to leave. So I did, walked home crying my flank off, and didn’t talk to anyone for nearly a week afterwards.”

“I’m so sorry…” Ember said, reaching across the table and putting her talon on Apricot’s hoof. Apricot wiped the beginning of a tear away with her other hoof and smiled a little. “At least you two were able to sort this out though obviously.”

“Yes, we were, but it was anything but easy. She wouldn't talk to me for over two weeks and when we finally got together to talk, I didn’t even know what to say so I ended up bawling my eyes out into her chest like a damn filly for like ten minutes straight.” Apricot took a drink before continuing. “When I was finally able to talk in coherent sentences, I told her everything. About how I felt, the butterflies, the feeling of being completely alone whenever she left me, how much I looked forward to seeing her next… I said that I loved her, and I’m sure you can guess how she replied.”

“That she didn’t feel the same way…” Ember said grimly, knowing she was right. Apricot nodded solemnly across the table at her.

“Mhm. She said she loved me as a friend, but she wasn’t into loving mares that way. Broke my heart obviously.”

“So what’d you do to get over her then?” Ember asked.

“Well, honestly, part of me still hasn’t I don’t think. I mean, you saw what happened with the mistletoe where it ended up being her instead of you. Sure I played it off like an accident, and in all honesty it was, but those damn butterflies were riled up when I opened my eyes and saw her beneath me. I’ve fantasized about that for years… Mmm…” she trailed off.

“Uh, little too much info there, Apricot,” Ember said, snapping her out of her little fantasy she was clearly reliving in her head.

“Ehehehe… yeah, sorry,” she said, turning her head and blushing.

“So back to why we’re in here…” Ember said, gesturing towards Apricot with her talon to pick the conversation back up.

“Right, yes, well… After Melon and I got back to a mostly normal friendship again, I clearly realized that I was into mares over stallions. There were a few in school that got my juices flowing, if ya know what I mean,” she said, winking to Ember who smiled and rolled her eyes. “I never got that feeling towards any stallions I saw before so I settled on that’s how I am and just came to accept it and enjoy it. But there’s one thing that I never felt even once when looking at any of those mares.”

“The butterflies... “ Ember said, her brain putting the pieces together as to where this was going.

“The butterflies,” Apricot repeated, nodding. “When I first saw you Ember, I got a feeling inside me I haven’t felt for years, ever since the whole Melon fiasco. I honestly didn’t think I’d feel that way again towards anypony.” Ember raised her brow as she spread her wings out beside her. Apricot blushed. “Ok, I especially didn’t plan on a griffin making me feel that way, or even meeting one for that matter. So long story short, that’s the reason I’ve been acting so weird around you lately. I’ve been trying to figure out if this feeling is something that could be real, or if I’m just setting myself up for heartbreak again, because I’d really like to not go through that if I can avoid it…” Ember sat across the table, silently regarding Apricot for several moments, not exactly sure what to say. She had a slight idea that this was what was going on, but some things you just can’t plan a reaction for. Apricot shifted in her chair nervously, playing with her tail between her hooves, doing her best to avoid eye contact. “Look, I know this whole thing was stupi-”

“It’s not stupid,” Ember interrupted her. “I appreciate you feeling comfortable enough to tell me this, Apricot, but-”

“Oh here it comes… The part where you tell me you’re not into mares either and don’t want to be anything more than ‘friends’. Stupid fucking Apricot. Stupid, stupid, stupid!” she said as she knocked herself in the forehead with her hooves.

“Would you stop that?!” Ember said, reaching across the table and grabbing a hold of Apricot’s hooves, keeping her from smacking herself more. “You didn’t let me finish.” Apricot stared straight back at her, holding her breath without even really realizing it. “What I was trying to say was I don’t know how I feel about all this; it’s a lot to take in at once obviously. But, to make you feel better, I am into mares more than stallions myself, as you could gather by the stories Blue will be more than happy to share, so I wouldn’t be against a relationship with you on the grounds of that.”

“So… Does that mean we can go on a date?” Apricot asked, hope building on her voice.

“Heh… Slow down Apricot, we barely even know each other really yet. Let’s focus on becoming better friends before we talk about anything more, ok? Then we can see if a more serious relationship would work for us.” Apricot was absolutely beaming.

“Oh of course! I’d love to get to know you more! Griffons have always fascinated me ever since I was a foal. I have so many questions! Like what do you like to eat, how do you fly... Oh! Do you lay eggs?” Ember gave her a flat look. “Ehehe… Right, I’ll stop now.”

“Look, I’m sure you know how swamped I am with work getting busier and busier, but let's make a point of getting lunch sometime this week and we can start talking about stuff. Y’know, get the ball rolling,” Ember said as she got up from her chair and went over to the sink to rinse out her glass.

“Sounds like a plan to me. I’m still on break for the next week from school so I’m free pretty much whenever,” Apricot said, bringing her glass over to Ember at the sink. “Hey, um, thanks for listening… It really did help me. I know we didn’t talk about anything going on with you, but I promise I’ll make it up to you and listen to you bitch about whatever you want for as long as you want when we’re at lunch.”

“Heh, ok deal. I’ll try not to put you to sleep with all my ‘adult problems’,” Ember said jokingly as she poked Apricot in the side with her tail.

“Hey watch it with that thing or I’ll tie you to the fridge,” Apricot said, sticking out her tongue .

“You don’t know, maybe I’d like it,” Ember winked back at her, causing Apricot to turn a bright red. “Haha, oh that never get’s old…” Apricot scrunched up her snout and turned away from Ember with a huff.

“I’ve always heard griffons were into kinky shit,” Apricot mumbled under her breath as she headed back towards the living room.

“You don’t know the half of it,” Ember said, still facing the window above the sink. “Oh yea, we also have really good hearing.” Apricot smiled and shook her head as she pushed open the door and went to see if the game of sun versus moon had died down yet. Seeing them all still talking and nopony dead, she assumed the debate smoothed itself out.

Back in the kitchen, Ember stared out the window into her back yard, watching the snow slowly fall in the beam of the spotlight by the door. Her mind was reeling from the torrent of emotions flying through it, only escalated by the conversation with Apricot just now. She looked to the right at the fence near her garage and noticed two robins huddled next to each other on one of the posts to keep warm. She couldn’t help but smile to herself at the sight.

‘Maybe a relationship wouldn’t be such a bad thing…’ she thought to herself.

‘Oh who are you kidding? Why would anypony love you?’ said a rather harsh voice in her head. ‘What the hell do you have to offer to somepony else? You work way too damn much and you’re cheap as all hell. You wouldn’t give them the time they need or loosen up on those damn bits to have a good time.’

‘Well… that doesn’t mean I can’t maybe change if I found somepony worth changing for, right? I mean, I didn’t have any issues spending more on things when Blue came into the picture.’ she thought back.

‘Blue is just a friend.’ the voice shot back.

Ember furrowed her brow. ‘Yes, I don’t need reminded of that.’

‘Just saying. If this thing with Apricot goes the distance, you’re gonna be playing a whole different ball game. One, might I add, that you have no experience playing.’

‘I don’t need experience. I can learn as I go just as she can I’m sure.’ Ember continued cleaning the glasses they just used as she thought.

Her inner voice shrugged, leaving her questioning how that was even possible. ‘Hey, I’m not saying it’ll work, and I’m not saying it won’t. I’m just saying you gotta really make some changes to this shitshow you call yourself before you even think about it.’

Ember put the two glasses back in the cabinet and stepped back into the middle of the kitchen. Closing her eyes tight and spreading her wings out wide, she let out a big sigh before fluffing them and folding them back at her sides. ‘Why is this kind of shit never easy…’ she asked herself, relieved when she didn’t get a reply from her inner voice again. Shaking her head, she pushed open the door and went back into the living room to rejoin the others and to see how the argument turned out. When she entered the room, she found that everypony was looking at the ceiling with intrigue. Sunny was the first to notice that Ember had come back in.

“Hey, Ember, do you have mice or something upstairs?” he asked, still looking up after shooting Ember a glance.

“Forget just ‘some’ mice, there’s a whole freaking hive up there,” Marcus said. “Is that the right word? A hive?”

“No, Marcus, it’s called a colony,” Melon replied.

“A colony? Wow, ponies are weird…” Marcus said as he looked up again. Melon shrugged and looked at Ember.

“So like Sunny asked, do you have mice? A really strange breed of mice that makes odd squeaky noises?” Suddenly, the squeaking was interrupted by high pitched ‘Fuck’ and ‘Oh fuck’, along with the occasional groan and yelp.

“Oh… no, that’s not mice…” Marcus said. “I was wondering what the strange influx of love was. I thought it was just Apricot…” Apricot caught Ember’s glance and quickly turned away, hiding her blushing cheeks as best she could.

Sunny looked around. “Uh, has anyone seen Apple and Blue since we came back inside?” Everyone else looked around too, as pointless as that was. Ember knew all too well what was going on. What really made her mad was when she realized where exactly this was happening.

“You little motherfucking salty son of a…” she began, but stopped and starting sprinting to the stairs, ascending them at a high speed. Some violent thoughts sped through her mind and she had every intention of enacting them as she opened the door, to her bedroom. On the bed were Blue and Apple. Apple was on top, thrusting down into Blue, who was on bottom, moaning that high-pitched moan that the others heard downstairs. But just as Ember was about to announce her presence, Blue climaxed in a relentless fashion, a large amount of liquid forcing it’s way past Apple’s member and splashing all over his lower body. Most of it, however, landed on the bed. Something inside Ember just snapped. She walked forward. Blue’s eyes were still clenched shut, as were Apple’s as he continued to thrust. His eyes suddenly snapped open as Ember grabbed his torso with both of her talons, digging them into his skin slightly, and lifted him up, pulling him out of Blue in the process. A few splashes of Blue’s juices landed on Ember’s fur, but she didn’t care. Apple was startled to say the least.

“W-wha- Ember?” he began as he realised what was happening. Blue’s eyes were now wide open too, as was her mouth as she watched Ember lift him up, but she was unable to bring out a word. Ember started to swing him up and down as she prepared to throw him against the wall. “Wait wait wait, what are you doing? Ember-” he tried to say, but he was too late. With one smooth motion, Ember threw him, but too far to the right. The wall where she was planning to throw him against was the same wall with the window that looked out over the front yard. Apple sailed right through, smashing through the glass and frame of the second story window with a loud scream, followed by a thud and a rustle when he landed. Ember walked forward to the broken window and looked out. Apple had landed in a bush, but he was barely moving.

“What the actual fuck Ember?!” Ember heard Blue yell out behind her. She could hear Blue rushing out of the room and towards the stairs. Outside, Ember saw the others rush out the front door to see what the noise was and immediately saw Apple upside down in the bush, not moving. Ember rolled her eyes and turned back inside, making her way to the stairs and headed down with no sense of urgency in her step. Walking out the now open front door, she stood on the porch and watched Sunny and Marcus pull Apple from the bush, branches and leaves sticking out of his mane and tail and a considerable amount of blood coming from a gash on his left side. They laid him down on the yard and Melon and Blue rushed towards him.

“Ooooh… He doesn’t look good at all…” Melon said as she brushed some of the leaves and branches away.

“Move! Get away from him! Let me do it!” Blue yelled, frantically pulling things off of Apple with her magic.

“We need to stop that bleeding like, now,” Sunny said, pointing to the gash. Blue apparently hadn't noticed the gash until now and began to sob a little as she continued picking broken glass and sticks off of Apple, who was still unresponsive.

“I know I’m not a pony per say, but are legs supposed to bend that way?” Marcus said, pointing with a slightly queasy expression to Apple’s right front leg. Blue and Melon both let out a collective gasp as they noticed the right angle the leg was bent at right below Apple’s elbow.

“I’m calling an ambulance right now,” Melon quickly said before running back inside the house, right past Ember on the porch. Blue had steady tears running down her face now as she picked the last few pieces of glass that she could see off of Apple. Sunny had ran inside and grabbed a towel that he applied to Apple’s side to stop the bleeding for now, from the biggest cut at least. Blue looked at Apple’s oddly bent leg once more before a tiny spark went off in her eyes. She immediately turned and got into a fighting stance, facing Ember directly and bearing her teeth as she seethed with anger. Ember returned the gesture with a flat look, unamused by this little display.

“What? He’s not dead. I can see him breathing still,” Ember said, shrugging and pointing to Apple’s chest going up and down very slowly, almost unnoticeable.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?! Why the hell would you throw somepony out the damn window?! You could have killed him!” Blue screamed.

“Hey! I meant to throw him against the wall for your information. Maybe I slipped on the puddles of your cum and he ended up going to the right more. Maybe if you could keep your damn legs shut for a few hours this wouldn’t have happened,” Ember yelled back, pointing a talon in Blue’s face.

“Are you seriously trying to blame this on me? Are you fucking nuts?!” Blue yelled back in an incredulous tone. “I’m not the one who threw him out a damn window!”

“You were fucking on my bed! And even worse, you were fucking him on my bed! I don’t want that fucking fruit touching my bed!” Ember yelled, her wings spread out at her sides now. Blue was right up in front of her now, her horn glowing and a scowl on her face.

“What’s stopping me from just casting any number of spells on you that would paralyze you or make your feathers just fall off? Or even better, I’ll paralyze you, then take you upstairs and fuckin’ launch you out a window!”

“Oooo I’m so scared,” Ember said in a mocking tone, holding her talons up in feigned fear. “You ain’t gonna do shit and you know it.” Just as Ember finished saying that, Blue’s horn began to glow a brighter green before Sunny interrupted.

“Uh, guys? I think we need some more help over here. I think he might have stopped breathing,” Sunny said, his ear on Apple’s chest. Blue’s eyes went wide in fear and her horn immediately stopped glowing as she whipped around and rushed back to Apple and grabbed his face, shoving Sunny aside.

“Don’t you die on me you fuckin’ salty bastard!” Blue yelled as she pulled his face to her chest and began to cry bitter tears once again. Ember, looking at the sight had mixed emotions. There was a very, very tiny part that knew she overreacted, but that part was being stomped on by the other part that remembered vividly seeing them doing it on her bed. Her personal space. The only place she had to really look forward to being able to stretch out and be alone, and now it was soiled in the worst possible way. Next she replayed Apple soaring through the window in her mind and a slight smirk came over her face, which she quickly hid, not wanting to have Blue do something crazy with her magic out of anger, even though it was still a strong possibility.

Melon rushed back out of the house. “The ambulance will be here in five minutes,” she said in a shaky voice with a worried look on her face and signs of some tears. “They said to keep pressure on the gash and try not to move his leg.”

“He’s barely breathing! What do we do?!” Blue wailed as she still held Apple’s head in her lap. “I’m gonna fucking get you for this Ember. You better fucking sleep with one eye open for the rest of your damn life.”

“Oh just shut up already. He’s not dead, relax. It’s just a broken leg and a cut. Few weeks in a cast and he’ll be back to fucking you in the ass just like you apparently like so much,” Ember said with a roll of her eyes and a brushing motion of her talon. No sooner did Ember finish her sentence, Apple let out a loud moan and started shaking in Blue’s lap. Blue looked down at him with a look of pure fear, at a complete loss for what to do. His eyes were clenched shut and he was clearly writing in pain as he continued to moan louder before coughing up blood into the snow and then going quiet and limp. Sunny and Melon both put their hooves to their mouths and had a very worried look on their face while Blue just stared at Apple in shock, tears streaming down her face. For a split second, even Ember felt remorse for doing this to him, honestly not wanting this to happen.

Silence filled the air around them, the only sounds were Blue muttering ‘no, no, please, no…’ under her breath as she held Apple close, rocking back and forth. In the far distance, the wail of an ambulance siren could be heard, piercing through the freezing night air.

Author's Notes:

Well here it finally is, chapter 15. Took much, much longer than I would have liked, but I hope you all are happy with the results

With any luck, 16 won't take as long but it's barely in the planning phases right now so we'll see how it goes. Hang in there!

As always, feedback is appreciated