“Is that . . . seriously the first thing you brought up?” Tavy asked. Vinyl set a massive set of speakers down in front of the feature wall in the largest room, and placed her turntable unit between them. “. . . And there’s no way those are going there,” Tavy finished, as she opened another box from the stack to unpack.

“Buck you they aren’t. Priorities, my good mare!” said Vinyl, grinning as she appraised the placement of the hardware. She rolled her eyes as she caught the look Tavy was giving her. “What, you got something better to put there? This’ll be awesome!” Tavy didn’t look convinced. “Come on . . . you can stand your bass up right beside it!”

Tavy smiled, a bit reluctantly. “Maybe.” She stuck her chin up in the air. “Bribe me.”

“Well if that’s all it takes . . .” Vinyl moved up close to Octavia. She put her mouth next to the grey mare’s ear, and whispered a few things. Tavy blushed, despite herself, and a shiver of delight passed through her.

“. . . I accept your terms.” Both mares giggled as they came together in a kiss. Tongues began passing into each other’s mouths.

“Gah, get a room” said a cream coloured mare, with a pink and blue mane, as she stepped into the apartment and set a box on the ground.

Tavy and Vinyl broke apart, and shared a quick glace.

“It’s for you, really,” Tavy’s look said.

“No, you go ahead, I insist,” Vinyl replied without words.

“If you happen to take a quick look around,” Tavy said, turning to Bon Bon, “you will notice that that is literally exactly what is happening this very moment—and is also entirely the only reason you’re here.”

Vinyl caught her eye. “Most approved!”

“Right,” said Bon Bon. “I’m out of here.”

“No you’re not. Because helping friends move into their new apartment is what friends do, Bon Bon,” a green unicorn replied as she came in the door, levitating in several large boxes.

“Speak for yourself—they’re not my friends.”

“Well,” said Lyra, “if you ever make friends of your own, let me know—and I’ll come do friend things with them and we can call it square, okay?” Bon Bon made a sassy huff. “Anyway,” Lyra continued, arranging the boxes on the floor as she set them down, “remember how we were also thinking of moving into a new place? It’d sure be handy if we had ponies that didn’t hate us when that time comes along.”

“No need for two bedrooms, anymore, hey?” cut in Vinyl. Both her and Tavy grinned at the synchronized facial expressions of the two other mares. “Oh come on, you’re among comrades, here! No need for your half-flanked charades!”

“I have no idea what you’re—” began Lyra.

“What?! How did you know—?!” exclaimed Bon Bon at the same time.

There was a pause. Lyra’s brow fell straight. “Way to hold up under pressure, Bon Bon.” The mare’s mouth hung open, as she looked back and forth between the other ponies. The unicorn sighed. “And you were the one who wanted to be all hush-hush about this, too.”

Bon Bon took an indignant gasp. “Oh, as if you don’t totally freeze up when we’re in front of others! You won’t come within five paces of me unless we’re alone, inside, with the curtains drawn!”

Lyra’s face flushed a bit. “Hey that’s just . . . well, it’s because—”

“Because what?” Bon Bon closed her eyes and faced away. “Choose your next words carefully here, pony dearest.”

There was a moment of silence while Lyra’s mouth took a few experimental shots at forming phrases. She then stopped, going into a deeper blush, and took a step forward. Bon Bon’s gaze fell back to Lyra, and their eyes met. They hesitated a moment, then began to draw slightly closer.

“Make out!” said Vinyl. A grey foreleg jabbed her side. “What? It’d be hot!” A swat on the side of the head followed.

“Whatever,” said Bon Bon, turning away from Lyra, a bit flushed. “Vinyl, you brought up your ridiculous stereo thing—did you happen to consider bringing up any records? Being forced into unpaid hard-labour would be marginally more bearable with some music happening."

“You know,” replied Vinyl, “I’m gonna skip right over that implied insult to the part where I actually somewhat agree with you. Tavy, which box were the records in?”

“Uh, I don’t think we brought it up yet. Actually, I think—”

Tavy broke off as a stack of boxes appeared in the doorway, which seemed to be preparing an attempt at entering—almost as if it somehow thought it might have the height clearance to do so. Such presumed thoughts soon proved to be a moot point, however, as boxes suddenly shot in various directions as the core of the stack began to topple forward with an “oops!” before making it any further.

In a snap, two horns lit up and the boxes were caught in a split of two different glows. After a second—and as it became clear no boxes had been harmed—the two unicorns floated the boxes down to the floor, smiling.

“Maybe just bring a few at a time, hey Derpy?” said Vinyl.

The pegasus pony smiled sheepishly as she apologized. “I didn’t drop this one though!” she said proudly, presenting the sole box that had remained in her hooves.

“Hey, it’s the records!” Vinyl floated the box out of Derpy’s hooves, and brought it over to her turntables.

Derpy alit, and walked over to begin helping unpack the boxes. She solidly knocked into Lyra from behind, along the way, shooting out an apology as she did. Lyra stumbled forward, bumping against Bon Bon. The cream coloured pony’s face turned bright red.

“This is why I don’t stand close to you, you know,” Lyra said to the heavily blushing mare.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Bon Bon replied, looking away.

“Oh, so now you can suddenly keep a straight face.” With a glint in her eyes, Lyra moved in closer, nuzzling against the mare’s neck. Bon Bon looked as if she were about to pop, squinting her eyes shut in embarrassment. “You can see how this would be a problem if I so much as brush up against you when we’re in public.”

“It’s not my fault,” Bon Bon managed to eek out. “You’re just so . . .”

“Yes?” Bon Bon clammed back up, wrenching her head away from the unicorn. “. . . Choose your next words carefully,” Lyra said with a smirk. Bon Bon elicited a small noise that was somewhere between a squeak and a huff, and spun around. She hooked her forelegs around the green pony’s neck, pulling the mare’s lips to hers. Lyra’s smirk vanished as her eyes went wide, her cheeks instantly flushing.

“Okay,” said Tavy to Vinyl, without looking away from the two mares, “this is pretty hot.”

“Oh, watch out, a little more to the left!” said Tavy. The futon mattress floated through the air, the two unicorns focusing their magic on it while Octavia directed. “Vinyl, I think your sides too high!”

“Maybe move a few degrees to the north!” suggested Derpy.

“North? Really?” said Bon Bon, who was lying on the floor, watching the other ponies work. “Which way’s north, then?”

“That way!” said Derpy without hesitation, and gave the mare a look which seemed to be questioning why she’d asked something so obvious.

“Cool, you’re like a pigeon!” Bon Bon replied, suddenly amused. “Close your eyes, spin around ten times and tell me which way is south-west!”

“Really not helpful guys!” said Lyra, struggling under the weight.

“It’s fine you’re just about there . . . alright, set it down!” The unicorns deposited the mattress onto it’s wooden frame, and they both heaved a sigh.

“Earth ponies are supposed to be the strong, hardy ones. The hay are you making us do the heavy lifting for?” said Vinyl, with a half-smile, as she tried to catch her breath.

“Stamina comes in many forms, you know,” Tavy said, and gave Vinyl a very specific look. “You should know that, better than most.” Her lover met her look and gave her one back.

“So what’s your excuse, then?” said Lyra, her eyebrows straight.

“Hmm?” Bon Bon looked up from a magazine she had uncovered from one of the boxes she had almost started unpacking. “Oh come on, I’m way too pretty for that,” she said, giving a measured blend of confident disinterest.

“Yeah, you’re pretty something, all right” said the green mare, rolling her eyes.

“South-west!” said Derpy, pointing. and nearly toppled over as her eyes spun around in opposite directions.

Bon Bon clapped her hooves together with a cheer, suddenly abandoning the harsh glare she had been forming. “Do it again!”

“No, don’t do it again Derpy,” said Lyra. The pegasus stopped herself halfway into another spin, flaring her wings out and nearly toppling over.

Bon Bon let out a huff. “Fun-killer,” she said.

“You guys are so cute!” said Vinyl, and flopped herself onto the futon. She closed her eyes as she put her front hooves behind her head. Most of her and Tavy’s belongings had made it up into the apartment, and now lay in various stacks in the rooms which the items contained were to inhabit. Vinyl let out a sigh. “If I’d known moving into a proper sized place was going to be so much work, I would have made more friends!”

“Yes,” said Octavia, “because with your winning personality, you have to beat off hordes of ponies just dying to be friends with you, right?” She lay down beside Vinyl.

“It’s good to know there’s a pony who understands my struggles,” said Vinyl.

They lay for for awhile on the futon, neither of them saying anything more. Both of them were content at simply gazing up at their new roof that belonged to the two of them. Not even the constant bickering between two of the other mares in the room—which had continued and intensified—could detract from the moment. Nor whatever Derpy was doing. Vinyl reached over and put her foreleg around Tavy.

“I still can’t believe you’re so insistent on getting a ‘real’ bed. I love this futon!”

“It’s not like it’s going anywhere . . . there just happens to be more than a single room in this place. And this is way too hard to be comfortable for me,” said Tavy.

“Aw.”

“Hey, it’ll still come in handy,” the gray mare said, her eyes closed as she lay with her head on Vinyl’s arm. “Like when you leave your records everywhere and refuse to clean them up. Or continually neglect to do any dishes whatsoever. I mean, at least you’ll have somewhere to sleep.”

Vinyl spun her head around where she lay to stare at the pony beside her. Tavy laughed. “I’m just kidding!” Vinyl laughed, too. Then Tavy opened her eyes and turned, locking to Vinyl’s gaze. “Probably.” Octavia got up from the futon, laughing again. Vinyl followed her, giving a single uneasy chuckle.

“Come on,” Tavy said, “we’ve got to unpack our stuff.” She turned around to face Vinyl as the unicorn got to her hooves. “. . . In our place.” She took a step closer to Vinyl. “Where we live together now.” Tavy put a hoof to the side of Vinyl’s face, and brought her into a kiss. They parted, smiling, then they kissed again.

Octavia broke away and turned to the other ponies in the room. “Thanks so much, everyone, I think that’ll about do it.”

“But we hardly unpacked anything yet,” said Derpy, suddenly ceasing the twirling she had been doing in the air.

“That’s alright,” said Tavy, “we can take it from here.”

“You sure?” asked Lyra, and Bon Bon rolled her eyes.

“Yeah, no problem,” Tavy assured her. “You’ve been a great help, but I need to make sweet love to my mare now.”

“Yay!” said Vinyl.

The ponies made their way towards the door. “Glad we could help out,” said Lyra. “It was actually kind of fun. We should all hang out every now and then.”

Tavy smiled. “Yeah, alright!”

“Are we going yet?” asked the other earth pony.

“Yes, alright. Sweet Celestia, Bon Bon,” said Lyra. Bon Bon walked out the door. The unicorn turned back to Tavy and Vinyl. “Sorry about her,” Lyra said quietly, “I don’t know what’s up with her right now. I . . . it’s not you guys. I think she generally likes you two, it’s just—”

“It’s alright,” said Vinyl. “I get it. I got lots of experience dealing with mares who have ridiculous issues, and who go deciding things on their own without bothering to tell the ponies being screwed over by it. Totally know where you’re coming from.” Tavy blushed, and opened her mouth, but was stuck speechless.

Lyra gave a tired smile. “Thanks. See you around.” She turned and hurried after the other mare.

“Bye!” said Derpy from across the room, halfway out the window. Vinyl and Tavy stood and blinked. They waved as Derpy left.

Tavy turned back and closed the door. Faint voices could be heard from the hall.

“Bon Bon, what the hay’s up? You’ve been acting—”

“. . . I wish you would say things like that.”

“. . . What? What’s all this about? You mean—wait you mean like . . . the bit about ‘make sweet love to . . .’ seriously? You . . . well I—really?”

There was silence for a few moments.

“Okay. Yeah. I . . . I could say things like that.”

The voices trailed away.

“Finally alone!” said Vinyl.

Tavy turned to the mare, and moved together until their noses were almost touching. “But not really.”

“As alone as we’ll be, from now on.”

“. . . I think I could get used to this kind of alone.” Tavy fell silent for a moment. “Vinyl, about what you said—”

“I know,” said Vinyl.

“I thought we agreed not—”

“I know.”

Tavy just looked at her for a moment, and it was quiet between them for a while. Finally Tavy opened her mouth to speak. “So wh—”

“Because it doesn’t matter now.”

Their mouths met, and they moved across the room, and then they were lying on the futon. They embraced and kissed in the place where they now lived together. The walls were were bare, and boxes sat in piles on the floor, but it had already become their home.

Tavy lay underneath Vinyl, breathing heavily as she looked into her eyes. “Vinyl, I think . . . I may want it to always be like now. Is that . . . can I ask for that?”

“Yeah. And . . . I think I’d probably say, ‘okay.’ ”

And then they had sex.

The end.

(I don’t know... did I wreck it by ending with that last gag? Well, **points to comedy tag, puts on glasses**)

That’s the end of it, thanks for reading!

Now, before anything else, check out psp7master’s song he did inspired by the fic! Octavia - Mercy, Mercy, Mercy!

Can’t even begin to say how completely fantastically amazing that is! Thanks so much!

I got a few (spoiler: a super ton of) things that I want to sort of go through about the fic, mostly about the music and stuff. It’s all strictly an ‘in case you happen to care’ type thing, so check it out if you want. Also I’ll mention why I did some things that kind of actually seem ridiculous now, or whatever. Like why ‘Tavy’ instead of ‘Tavi’ and stuff.

So, if you want to check it out, do so here: Bonus Features or something

Feel free to post any comments you have about it or whatever here in the comments for this chapter!

(I secretly think it is some kind of attempt at me getting a form closure as I come to the end of my very first pony fic—about which I may suddenly be feeling all kinds of something-something about having finally finished. So I apologize in advance?)

And thanks to all you awesome readers! I can’t believe how much support and positive feedback I’ve gotten from this, and, like everyone always says, it’s definitely what makes it worth it! I was happy to bring maybe a few feels and maybe a few laughs (and hopefully some proper music!) to your various days.

I got more ideas for more fics, so stop by again sometime!