For the second day in a row, I was woken up earlier than I liked to wake up, this time by knocking on the side of the house. “Mornin’, Yang!” And Applejack’s friendly greeting. “We’re here to build for ya!”

I slowly made my way out of bed and over to the window, yawning on the way. Down on the already green grass was Applejack, Big Mac, and Apple Bloom, along with a pile of lumber on a wagon. “Oh, right.” I yawned again before opening the window. “I’ll be down in a moment or two.”

I reflexively started to reach for the closet with the winter clothes, but the air outside was already warm and tolerable enough that I didn’t need them. After a moment, I went over to the dresser, where my warmer weather clothes were. For the first time in a number of months, I saw the lighter clothes in my possession. Part of me wanted to put on one of the exercise outfits, but another part said it wasn’t quite warm enough yet. I wound up going with a white t-shirt and black jeans. After grabbing the clothes and my daily shoes, I went over to the bathroom to preemptively take care of business and get changed.

After a few minutes, I leapt out the bedroom window and landed next to the warm colored Apples with their loaded saddlebags. “So, what’s the plan?”

“Actually, we were going to ask you that” Applejack said. “We need to know where and how big you want this to be. We could do something as simple as a lean-to on the side of the building, or build a whole shed off to the side.”

“Ah’ve already come up with some designs myself.” Applebloom reached into her saddlebags and pulled out some rolled up papers. “Habe ha lhook.”

I accepted the papers from Apple Bloom and unrolled them. Each paper had a different design on it, some being built onto the building, others being standalone shelters. “Hmm.” I glanced over at Bumblebee, which looked no worse for wear, despite having gone through winter with no care or cover, and back to the designs. “Okay, I think I’ll go with a standalone building. And let’s put it close to the house so I can just jump out of my window and walk right in.”

“So about three feet from where you’re standing?” Applejack asked. “That’s right behind the smoker.”

I looked between the wall, my window, where I was standing, and a spot that looked to be three feet from me on the backside of the smoker. “Maybe?”

“Let’s run some tests” Apple Bloom suggested. “Ah brought some stakes with me to help with the layout, but we can use them for this too. Yang, could you jump out of your window ten times? That’s how many stakes Ah brought, and it should give us a good idea of where to build.”

“Well, that sounds reasonable.” I jumped up to my open window and went back inside.

“Ready!” Applebloom called. On that cue, I leapt out of the window. She put a stake down off to the side, and I went back to the window when she said to. We repeated this a few more times, and part way through, I started feeling both better and more energized from the exercise.

After the final one, Apple Bloom looked over the stakes. “Alright, your furthest jump was here, and if we allow a bit of extra space for possible further jumps, and room to go around the smoker, we should have a door right about here.” ‘Right about here’ wound up being six feet from the furthest stake. “Alright. Gimme a couple minutes, please.”

While Apple Bloom looked over her plans, pencil in mouth, Applejack came over to me. “You know, Ah’m glad Bloom’s as brainy as she is.”

“Hm?” I was interested in what Applejack might have to say.

“When she was younger, before she became friends with Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo, she often tried to talk us into building at different locations and in different directions than we were planning. Of course, we built where we were planning anyways, and we worked with it. Sometimes, while we were putting rafters together, she would take the long way around the building instead of going under. Then, during one family reunion, while she was walking around the barn we were building, well, we learned why she did it.”

“Some rafters fell?”

“Yep. A whole bunch of them fell at once. Wound up hurting thirteen Apples, four of which needed to go to the hospital. Mac was one of them. Couldn’t properly talk without coughing up a storm for six months after that. Anyways, Bloom was spooked something fierce by the noise, but she was one of the first to go in to start moving the mess and tryin’ to get everyone else out. Construction was stopped for the next few days, and Apple Bloom took that time to show us a bunch of her building ideas. There were some we couldn’t do, since we didn’t have any cranes like they do at construction sites, but there were some good things in there as well, like temporary supports for rafters, and framing the walls before raising them. We were all surprised that she didn’t get a cutie mark from that.”

“What would a mark in safety, engineering, and planning even look like?”

“No idea, but she’s good at it. The Apple family has been using some of her ideas since then, and injuries have gone way down.”

“Ah’ve got it!” Apple Bloom announced. “How does a partial barn style sound?” She showed me a sketch that showed a shed in the shape of a classic barn, though with a quarter of it gone and replaced by a wall with a door in it. Part of the roof also extended out to cover the smoker and provide a shelter for the wood for it.

“I like it” I said. “Just let me get my nail shells and I’ll be back out to help.” My stomach let out a growl at that moment. “Would you mind if I made myself a bit of breakfast first?”

“Go get some food in ya” Applejack said. “It don’t do nopony no good to be working on an empty stomach. Right, Big Mac?”

“Eeyup” the sole stallion said.

“A good point” I conceded, for it was a good point. “See ya in a few.” I jumped back up to my room, got the nail shells, and put them in the Ember Celica on the way downstairs.

Breakfast was a quick affair, consisting of a peanut butter, banana, and honey sandwich with a glass of milk. Nothing really fancy or involved. After I cleaned everything up and put it all away, I went out through the back door and saw the Apples already starting their work on digging some holes. “So, what can I do to help?” I asked.

“You can move the posts to the sides of the layout” Applejack said. “Four to the front and back, four on the side facing the house, two more by the smoker, and two to the side away from the house.”

“On it.” I found the posts and started taking them out, taking them two at a time to their respective destinations. While I was doing that, the Apples finished the holes and started putting the posts in their places.

After the posts were all in place, we began framing the walls. As they got higher and started turning into roof frames, I was doing more of the nailing, since I had an easy way to shoot them in and I could climb. Big Mac sent the boards up to me, Applejack directed me on where to put the boards, and Apple Bloom collected the empty shells as they fell.

In a matter of what was probably just an hour, we had the whole thing framed. Apple Bloom inspected it and deemed it structurally sound before calling a five minute break. “Yep, this is definitely big enough for your bike” she said partway through the break.

“I dunno, it seems a bit too big” I said. The whole thing looked big enough to hold one and a half cars, and we were sitting in the middle of it.

“No, it’s just right. The bike may not take up much space, but the rest of it can be filled with things like workbenches, storage, or displays. Hobby stuff, you know? We always build our barns really big for just that reason.”

“Oh. That makes sense.” Looking around, I could easily imagine what she was talking about. I could envision Bumblebee in the middle of the completed shed, a corner dedicated to painting or sketching, and some tools along one side for whatever purpose they might be used for.

“Break’s over, everyone” Applejack said. “Mac, let’s get started on the wall pieces. Yang, Bloom, you two start building the doors.”

“Alright!” Apple Bloom lead me over to the lumber pile and we started getting pieces we needed from it. Really though, it was more like Apple Bloom was telling me which pieces to get for her while she laid out and shaped them. I wanted to help put the pieces in place, but Apple Bloom had a plan, so I let her do her thing.

“So, would you say everything hinges on these doors?” I asked after the last one was built.

Construction ground to a halt. “Yang. No.”

“Should I have framed the question differently?”

“Yang. No puns, please.”

“But I put a lot of thought into that pun!”

“It was still bad. Now let’s get these doors in place.”

As we were getting the doors in place, I found a place that the nail shells wouldn’t have been good for without accuracy that I was sure I didn’t have with the Ember Celica: securing the hinges. Those were done with a traditional hammer and nail, and as I was holding the doors in place, Big Mac acted as a stool for Apple Bloom while she drove the nails in. It certainly wasn’t something I’d come up with, but it worked for them.

Construction continued smoothly after another brief break. The walls went up first, both inside and out. They were just simple plywood sheets nailed on, but they kept out the water very well, as demonstrated with a bucket of water. The roof went on after that, and it amazed me how the earth ponies did it with no hands, wings, or spells. As with the walls, they kept water out very well.

After building a few counters in the shed and the smoker shelter, the Apples and I were done. Amazingly, we finished before noon rolled around. “So, no paint?”

“Nope” Applejack said. “We had no idea what kind of colors you’d want, so we didn’t get any. That, and we need to save the bits.”

“Fair enough. I guess I could save it for something to do on my own later.”

“Ah’d say that’s a good idea. It can’t be healthy to stay cooped up in that kitchen for most of the week. And you can make it look how you want it to as well.”

“Good points there. Where do you get your supplies from?”

“Hammer N’ Nail’s. They’re a bit outside of town, between the edge of the city and the Diamond Dog territory to the South East. It’s not a big place, but they can get what you need if they don’t have it. They always have paint on hoof though, so you’ll be fine there.”

“Sounds good. Well, I’d better go get ready for work. I’m already up, anyways. Thanks again.”

After we bid each other our farewells a few minutes later, I rolled Bumblebee into her new home. Before leaving the shed, I got on to see how it felt to just sit on the bike, where I started thinking about language of all things, mainly about how I was starting to refer to Bumblebee as female in my thoughts simply by her having a name.

While I was thinking, I idly noticed that Bumblebee was pretty comfortable. The handlebars were perfectly positioned, the seat was soft, despite having been outside all winter and probably not built for such a purpose, and my feet fit in the foot control things quite nicely. I had no idea what they were called, but they weren’t pedals as I knew them.

After a while, I got off Bumblebee, made a mental note to look more closely at her later on to figure out the controls, and then made the ten second walk home to get ready for work.

Author's Notes:

And that's the last of Yang's Hearth Warming presents.