Comet pulled me through the shadowy tendrils and out of its stony chest. We galloped through the twisting cave as fast as we dared, scraping over jagged rocks and fumbling around stalagmites. The glowing aura from our bounding bodies lit the way. Those things chasing us had no eyes, so it wasn’t light they were chasing. They could feel us over their own tumbling grinding bodies made of stone. Discord didn’t chase but his laughter followed us all the way to our cavern.

When we came into the antechamber, I could see into the larger one and see most of the ponies had already taken off, having obviously heard all of the noise coming down the tunnels. I saw Roseluck’s tail disappear down the other end of the tunnel, telling me how we were escaping. We still had a chance.

The one pony I didn’t want to see hanging back though, was waiting right in front of me.

“Mom!” Ruby called out and tried running to me before Minuette stopped her. Comet and I came barreling up to them. I didn’t stop, I didn’t talk, I ducked, stuck my head under her and slid my little filly down the back of my neck onto my back.

Minuette took our cue and chased after us until I heard her skid to a stop.

“Carrot! Come on!” she shouted.

“Okay, okay!”

The back exit did a sudden turn and I slipped several body widths down smoothed rock. There was a drop two ponies tall waiting at the end. I plopped down into some new cave vein surprisingly gracefully.

I looked behind me and then in front of us; the light from Comet’s spell was the only light around us.

“It’s Discord,” I heard Comet inform back as he fell down next to me. “He’s taken Twilight and the Princesses. I bet he even unleashed those ash creatures.”

“Does this go anywhere?” I called out, frustrated and looking both ways.

“The Oscura forest!” I heard Carrot’s voice echo down to me, soon after followed by Carrot herself. She was burdened down with sacks and bags draped around her neck and body, most clearly not her own. Comet caught the over-encumbered Carrot as she fell. Minuette landed relatively gracefully. “Go down!” she pointed forward.
Carrot took off down the way and I followed, Ruby still clinging around my neck.
“But isn’t the fire there?” I asked, wary of our destination.
“The fire’s on top!” Carrot called out, sounding exhausted from the extra weight she carried. “Cloud Kicker said… this leads out… near the valley floor…”
We all caught up to Carrot easily but kept pace with her, not wanting to lose her. We rounded a corner and then Carrot skidded to a stop without warning. I plowed right into her and Comet Tail and Minuette crashed into me. Supplies spilled everywhere and Minuette managed to roll right over me and land on a sack of flour.
“Other way! Other way!” Carrot shouted as she climbed back to her hooves and took off back the way we came. By that time I saw what she had spotted.
It was Discord standing before us in a large opening, smiling sinisterly yet waving casually.
We all turned and galloped back up the tunnel we came through. The path the other way eventually winded down as well. Once again Carrot Top stopped suddenly. This time we were more ready and collapsed into each other a little easier.
“What? No no no,” Carrot said. We peaked around her.

Discord was standing there again, facing the other way, impatiently tapping his foot. He looked down at his arm of his eagle claw, shook it, held it up to his ear, then twisted his clawed arm around several times, as if winding it up.

He turned around and made a show like he just now spotted us. “Oh there you are! You’re late. It’s not nice to hold up a date, you know.”

Without waiting any longer we all turned and fled back the way we came again. The tunnel didn’t go up at all this time. As we rounded the corner we all stopped once again. There was Discord standing there in the chamber again.

“Nonono,” Carrot stammered. “This isn’t right. This is impossible.”

Discord heard her and brought his arms out wide, presenting himself like a showman. “My dear, I am the impossible.”

I heard hoofsteps take off behind me and looked back. I saw Comet Tail bound out of sight without warning. This time I didn’t follow. After a few seconds I heard the hoofsteps again, this time in front of me. Comet Tail appeared on the other end of the chamber. I saw the color drain from his illuminated face and his light from his spell dim a little.

“Mom, where do we go?” Ruby asked from my back. I looked at my friends standing with me, at Discord standing expectantly to the side then at Comet Tail ahead of me. I bolted across the chamber past Discord to Comet Tail. Discord watched as I passed with Ruby, Minuette and Carrot Top.

We took off down the tunnel again. Only for it to end shortly back where we started. There weren’t nearly enough turns for us to be back here again. Discord grinned down at us with his shark teeth and yellow eyes.

“Before you run off again, can I interest you in a drink, Barry? You look like you could use one,” Discord said as he brought a bottle of wine out from behind him. For some reason I didn't like the way he said my name. But that wine bottle. I recognized that label immediately. It was the one Comet Tail and I were drinking earlier. He brought it to his mouth, took a short sip and then let out a long belch. He tapped his tongue to the roof of his mouth, trying to assess the taste. “You know…” he started, a drip of venom entering his voice. “I think... it needs something!”

Discord let go of the bottle. As it hung there suspended in air he snapped his claw. My world drowned in a dark red liquid. I gasped and wine flooded my lungs. My head exploded into an asphyxiation of colors. My eyes stung and my limbs went rigid as I felt my world turn upside down on me. The weight of the wine crushed down on me, washing me down a glass funnel. My hooves tried to find a surface to grab onto inside the slippery glass walls. I pushed against the inside of the glass tunnel with all my strength, staring down into the dark abyss waiting below me for just one slip.

The force of the last of the wine rushing past me made me slide further down. I took another instinctive gasp and I felt air again. I coughed and gasped and used my regained strength to lodge myself more in place.

“Let her go!” I heard Comet Tail say from far away, the sound of his voice resonating inside my glass tomb. Just as I started to catch my breath I felt my world turn upside down on me again. I plummeted to the other end of the glass tank and a fresh torrent of wine pounded me against the glass bottom.

Ponies were shouting but they sounded underwater. I heard explosions and saw lights and then suddenly felt weightless.

My world exploded into a sticky mess of glass, rocks and pain. Before I could figure out which way was up again a yellow light grabbed me and dragged me after it. My legs full of glass and pebbles tumbled under me until I felt them regain a familiar rhythm. The world was a blur of light and shadows and then the shadows disappeared. I fell into the light and crashed muzzle-first into a stone wall. I lay on something sharp and sticky. There was an explosion and the world threatened to collapse in on itself. I couldn’t tell what was going on anymore.

I lay there in shock as I heard a cave-in and manic laughter echoing off the walls around me reverberated in my bones.

“Mom! Please get up!”

“Pinchy, No! We’re going now!”

“No! What about Mom?! Mom!”

I crawled towards where I thought I heard the voices. My legs rolled out from underneath me and then someone caught me. I recognized his smell. I clung to him.

“Where is she?” I asked into his neck.

“Sssh,” Comet shushed me and pressed a hoof to my mouth to keep me quiet. If we were hiding it didn’t last.

“Well aren’t you an interesting family,” echoed the draconequus voice around us. “I got just the idea for you! Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.” He cleared his throat before beginning:
“Five score divided by four!
Your memories removed, your body confused!
For your insolence you must pay,
Cast off to a land far, far away.
I've scattered the six, and that's just the start of my tricks!
Your mind shall be weak, your outlook bleak.
Forgetting everything and living like a fool.
You have all lost, now no one can stop my rule!”

And then reality burned out.

I gasped for breath and startled myself awake. I woke up and looked around at the unfamiliar room. Where was He? The world was painfully bright. I rolled onto my stomach to look around the sharply contrasted and defined space. The room smelled like dust, sunshine, aged wood and horse.

It took me a moment but I figured out where I was. I was at Carrot Top’s.

I scanned the room looking for signs of Him. There was a pile of bed covers in the corner next to the bookshelf. Open blinds appropriately blinding me, casting dusty sunbeams across the room. Picture frames full of people I didn’t know were on the wallpaper-covered walls and in frames sitting on the heavy wooden dresser. I checked the corners where the walls met and scanned the floor for cracks in reality. I dared a peek towards the mirror on the dresser: its world looked appropriately mirrored.

He wasn’t here. I was alone. Why was I alone? Where were my friends? I sat there quietly just trying to breath. I was getting dizzy. I held my breath. And then let it out slowly. I took one more breath and forced it deeper, held it, and then let it out slowly.

I forced myself to take several more deeper, slower breaths to try to calm my racing heart. In the quiet concentration my mind picked up the slack.

The bedroom looked different in the daylight. Sadder. Sober.

I didn’t know where my friends were. I tried to figure out where I saw them last. Comet Tail was holding me and then…

No. That was a long time ago. Before I died. And before I was reborn. Back when we were cursed out of Equestria just because.

I didn’t want to be alone right now.

I crawled to the edge of the bed and slid off. I landed with an ‘oof’ and my forelegs just about gave out under me but I forced myself to walk forward. They were trembling with each step, a bit like my arms did in the morning.

...arms?

The old muscle memory of walking on two legs kicked in and I fumbled and fell. I shook the phantom sensation that I was missing digits out of my head and got back up to all four limbs. There was a dizzying head rush when I did. My first several steps were very manual and self-conscious until my legs seemed to slowly start taking over again. I clip-clopped unsteadily out the bedroom and down the hallway.

When I finally got to the living room I spotted a friend. My stallion friend was laying on the rug in front of his laptop. My beautiful pony friend. Alive. I couldn’t hide the relieved look on my face any more than I could hide the shakiness in my legs.

“There she is,” he said to no one else in the room. I felt surprisingly irritated he was apparently going out of his way to test the pronoun again. I didn’t want to think about that right now.

I quickly stumbled over to him and he looked up at me, confused at my speed and off steps. I collapsed my forelegs around his neck, nearly knocking him over and rubbed our fuzzy faces together. When I felt how real he was I started tearing up more and sniffling.

“Are you okay?” he asked when he eventually recovered. I was. We were. We survived that horrible nightmare. Even if our survival from it was just for a cruel, unfunny joke dragged out for a twenty-five years punchline. I had a more urgent issue.

“Where is she?” I asked instead, exactly as I said it last.

“...she’s with Carrot and Minuette out in-” Comet stopped himself. He recognized what I said. “Oh.” He put his own forelegs around me. His fur was soft but there was a comforting strength underneath it. “You had the dream?” I nodded my muzzle into his neck.

“You... could have run,” I said while I held the sobs back. “But... you didn’t.”

“You’ve always stayed with me,” Comet reassured me.

“Not always-” I started, thinking about our fight as teenagers. Or more accurately, the time I decked the shit out of him.

“That doesn’t count,” Comet seemed to realize exactly what I was thinking. “I never held that against you. ...you’re always worth forgiving, Berry Punch.”

I choked up. I felt I really wasn’t. I sniffled. When I did I couldn’t help but notice he smelled really nice. As I calmed down and he petted my neck I nuzzled into him a little deeper. He didn’t mind. I gave a few unnecessary extra sniffs. It made my heart race. There was something incredibly comforting and… virile to his scent. I arched my back to push into him and I felt my tail lift.

Oh.

A pang of shame struck me and I pulled away from my friend. Comet looked at me a little confused but I wouldn’t meet his gaze. I tried to calm myself and told myself I was just relieved and emotional. We sat in silence for a moment.

I told myself I was just relieved and emotional.

“So, are you hungry?” Comet started a new conversation. I swallowed the saliva that was built up in my mouth. My mouth felt too wet.

“I think I need a drink,” I declared. Comet’s ears faltered with surprise but recovered to face me again.

“How about some food and water first?” he suggested.

Over a bowl of oatmeal and applesauce he explained to me Minuette and Ruby were out with Carrot in the garden. Carrot got up just before sunrise, like she always does apparently, and everyone else got up with her. He was in here keeping an eye on me.

Comet took the time to pore over international news to look for any sign of more ponies. The Seattle bookstore explosion was obvious enough after they discovered the only missing merchandise was the show bible. He said he didn’t think any other news would be so obvious.

Not wanting to think about what was going on in my head or potentially under my tail I humored him.

“So, what’s going on in the world?” I asked with an untimed mouthful of soggy oatmeal. The mixture was soft, mild and just sweet enough. It set heavy in my stomach but in a good way, like it would keep my insides right-side up.

“Well, organized crime in Chicago spiked... There’s still war in the Middle East… that novel coronavirus is still spreading… and the US is on high alert because there was another explosion in Seattle last night. But the real kicker is they think it’s related to an apparent cruise missile that flew over the Canadian border a few hours earlier. Set off a ton of alarms and scared everybody then disappeared right off the radar. Then a few hours after that there was a huge explosion in some sketchy neighborhood in downtown Seattle.”

I licked some oatmeal off my muzzle in contemplative silence. Things were getting serious out there.

“Can… can cruise missiles do that? Just... disappear and explode hours later?”

Comet shook his head. “I don’t think so. Says this one wasn’t even supersonic neither.”

I tilted my head and looked at him patiently. He chuckled awkwardly when he got why I was looking at him funny.

“It didn’t go faster than the speed of sound. Like most modern missiles do,” he explained. “‘says it was going around five hundred miles per hour.”

He was obviously telling me more about this one for a reason and I didn’t think it was because of an interest in missiles or acts of war.

“...you think it was a pony?”

Comet did the closest thing to a shrug he could laying on his stomach and legs. “Maybe. But five hundred miles per hour is fast. Real fast. Like faster than anything alive.”

An impossibly fast pony… that can make an explosion.

“...Rainbow Dash?” I guessed. I wanted to believe. “Could the explosion have been a Sonic Rainboom?”

“Maybe,” he repeated.

“What the hay do you think she’s doing up there?”

Comet Tail shook his head.

“I got no idea,” he admitted before looking down at his mug and igniting his horn in his blue aura. I saw his mug get wrapped in that same aura and slowly rise. Unsteadily, like a child holding a cup too big for their hands, his mug floated up to his muzzle. He sipped it carefully and sat it back down a little closer.

Here I was talking to a telekinetic unicorn about a pegasus that can travel cruise missile speed and make explosions.

I stuck my muzzle back into my bowl again for another mouthful of oatmeal. I mushed it a little and swallowed it down. I eyed his mug. I couldn’t smell any but I thought I’d ask anyway.

“That’s not coffee, is it?”

“Just water,” Comet admitted. That was for the best, coffee wasn’t the same without a cigarette. I decided to distract myself from that thought too.

“So, I didn’t make the news, did I?”

“Should you have?” Comet asked, confused. “...do you mean as Brian or something?”

I was impressed how weird that name already sounded to me. Twenty-five years… I shook my head and flung a bit of applesauce somewhere.

“No, the other night in Lawson. When I left Nathan’s there were a bunch of people in the trailer park who definitely probably saw me leave,” I explained. Comet’s eyes grew wide before he looked back to his laptop. His horn lit back up and I saw random sparkles on the keyboard while some keys pressed down. It took a moment for it to register to me as typing.

After a minute of scrolling and a few clicks he shook his head.

“Nothin,” he declared.

“Not even a mention of a giant purple dog or something?” I asked, not able to hide the hint of bitterness in my voice. I knew I wasn’t a cruise missile but you’d think someone would have said something.

“Nope. Guess it didn’t make the cut,” Comet said. I saw the gears in his head start turning. “But you think people saw you?”

“I ran right by them!”

Comet started typing again. When he stopped I saw Facebook load onto his screen. I watched silently as he clicked around and opened up neighborhood watch pages and local groups. Apparently the trailer park had its own page even. He didn’t have to scroll far.

"Why didn’t I check social media more,” he chided himself. He pointed at the screen. “They’re literally talking about you specifically. Not even about Nathan or the police showing up. Under the new post about the pet policy, people are saying they saw a weird purple pony.”

“Huh. You think you could find more ponies on Facebook?” I asked the obvious question. Comet gave this some thought.

“I only found mention of you ‘cause I knew where to look; I can’t just search everywhere. This is narrow searching at best.” He paused. “...I could check nearby though.”

I quietly watched Comet scrub social media while I lapped at my morning ration of alcohol. Apparently Carrot poured it earlier just for me. She had set some pot of black beans on the stove top to cook as well. She always seemed to be planning. That pony had everything figured out. The alcohol was more generous and less watered down than I would have expected from her, but not enough for me to get a buzz.

“Creighton has a few pages. Looks like there was a break-in at the Country Mart the other night. And someone’s looking for their daughter, a ‘Meredith Tolley,” Comet shared what he discovered. I heard an audible click and after another page loaded I heard another. His horn stopped glowing. “...her twenty-fifth birthday was this weekend.”

“Well, that was easy,” I remarked. Our conversation quieted, knowing the next part. “...how do we find her?”

“Well, if I was trying to find you from your post I’d prolly interview the people in the trailer park. Find out it was Nathan’s home you came from, interrogate him…” Comet trailed off. I could hear a ‘but’. I knew what it was. ‘But we can’t do that because we’re ponies’.

Comet Tail got up onto his hooves. “I’ll ask Carrot Top. She knew the locals, right? Maybe she’s got an idea.”

It was too bright outside for me so I sat on the porch while my eyes watered and Comet went to go talk to her. Even with my pony ears I didn’t catch much of the conversation. I did catch one word though.

“Merry???” Carrot asked as she stepped back in repulsion. Apparently we had a lead.

Everyone washed up and gathered around the laptop to look at the discovery. My little ruby greeted me with a hug. Minuette, seeing the hug and not wanting to be left out, gave me a hug too. It was nice they cared about me.

Carrot Top skipped the hug altogether. Instead she looked over the Facebook page Comet Tail had pulled up. Comet pointed out the last tip off he found, the last message Meredith posted to her page, the day after her birthday:

Haha. Very funny guys.

Carrot Top let out a low snort of dissatisfaction. When she stood up she nodded.

“Yeah, I know Merry,” she nearly spat the name out. “She’s like a hornet’s nest: you mess with her, you're going to get stung. She was with the boys when Braeburn threatened me with that gun. ...she told him to shoot.”

“Oh. ...Braeburn?” Comet checked if he heard right.

“I meant Ben,” the orange-haired mare corrected herself. I saw her emerald eyes search for something until it registered and she sighed. “Braeburn’s too good for her…” she mumbled with a shake of her head before continuing. “I bet they were out that day buying supplies for her party. She always overdid it.”

“Do you know where they’d be hiding?” Comet asked. Carrot Top put a hoof to her muzzle in thought.

“Diamond and all their friends live in town… except Braeburn, I think. I’m not sure where he lives.”

"Did you say Diamond?” my precious ruby noticed first. “As in Diamond Tiara?” Carrot put two and two together and her irritated expression relaxed into an amused smile.

“That’s... appropriate. I think she could use a second chance to grow up. ...um, no offense?” she said looking down at the filly next to me, who shrugged.

“None taken.”

“So,” Comet started to bring the conversation back on track. “With your history and all, are you alright with trying to contact’em?” Comet asked. Carrot didn’t hesitate to nod.

“We should. I don’t know what their circumstances are but with the world the way it is right now, if they need any help we should offer it.”

After digging for clues on social media about Braeburn and Diamond Tiara’s whereabouts for a bit, Comet switched gears and found the equivalent of a phone book online. After begrudgingly paying a nominal fee, we found the geographically closest name match for Braeburn’s human name.

“Oh! That’s just on the other side of town,” Carrot perked when she saw the address. Our yellow stallion switched tabs and poked in our current address and the one we found for directions. Carrot was right. The home was pretty secluded too. Comet Tail looked around the room, made brief eye contact with Minuette, then quietly checked the ‘walking’ directions and we saw it was right under three hours of walking.

All gardening plans for the day were put on the backburner as my friends started discussing our options. I remained quiet and impartial. I hoped the other ponies were okay but I was wary of the danger of making contact, not knowing if humans found them first. Also I knew if our group got bigger I would just become that much more useless by comparison.

Carrot tried calling Braeburn from her phone and then after looking it up too, reluctantly tried calling Diamond Tiara too. Frustratingly, neither phone seemed to ring.

“I’m surprised they didn’t try to contact you,” Minuette wondered. “Like after they saw their own ears come in.”

“I am too... and here I was scared they were going to show up to hurt me. That’s one of the reasons I wasn’t answering my phone. A lot of people in town knew about my grandparents, they were an eccentric pair, but maybe Diamond and Braeburn just didn’t know where they lived. Might have just been the older folks who knew them that well.”

“Well, let’s go say ‘hi’ then!”

“It would be the pony thing to do,” Carrot Top agreed. “Can we get Chad to give us a ride?”

“He won’t be off work until 8. And… I think he still needs some time,” Minuette worded carefully. “We could try driving your car?”

"Maybe..." Carrot said, sounding hesitant. "I'll warn you: it drifts to the right a little."

“I dunno how safe driving with magic is anyway,” Comet admitted, looking up from the laptop. “Like that’s a long while to hold it. I’m worried if we don’t get caught driving around we’d manage to put it in the ditch."

Carrot nodded in agreement. "Agreed. I think we should only use it in case of an emergency."

“What if I helped?” Minuette asked Comet, sparking her own horn a bit for display. “I could work the pedals and you work the wheel?”

“I mean, I just don’t think it’s a viable option at all for this. A car means we gotta stick to roads. If we use the roads we gotta cross through the middle of town.”

“We could go at night then?” my little filly spoke up.

“Exactly. But if we’re gonna go at night we might as well just take the woods. Less chance of running into people. And if we do run into people, it’ll be easier to get away,” Comet reasoned. “If we did have to abandon the car it’d get tracked back to Carrot Top. And I just... I don’t know. That can’t be good. Walking will take longer but I think it’ll be safer. ...are you sure we couldn’t get a ride from Chad?”

Minuette frowned. It didn’t look right on her face. “I don’t want to call him. Not for this.”

“Okay, but you’re gonna talk eventually, right?” Comet asked.

“Of course! We will. Just, not today. Unless he calls first,” Minuette explained. Comet nodded in acceptance. “Anyway! I still want to go meet the other ponies. Even if we have to walk.”

“It’s my plan so I’ll go too,” Comet suggested.

“I want to go too,” my foal volunteered.

“What?” I questioned her. “You’re not going. This could be dangerous.”

“What? Why can’t I?” she asked, shocked. Ruby wasn’t a child, but I wasn’t sure if I could still treat her like she was still twenty-five. Maybe I was overprotective.

“What if something happens? What if... you need to run?” I pointed out.

“Then I’ll run,” Ruby countered simply. I was left momentarily at a loss for words, not used to being at the receiving end of defiance or sure how to respond to it.

“Pinchy, ...you still have trouble walking,” I reminded her.

“And I couldn’t walk at all a week ago! But I could run now! If I really had to,” she insisted, her stubbornness surprisingly aggressive.

She spelled it out for me and it finally clicked: I was telling her she couldn’t physically do something. The most talented human I knew didn’t get that way because she let things stop her. Instead she became great at things by throwing herself into it. That was something I loved about her. Looking at this filly now, I didn’t know how I could tell her ‘no’. I didn’t think I could put my hoof down, not on her spirit.

“It ain’t far, but it’s still a bit of a walk,” Comet spoke up for me. “It’d be three hours there and three hours back. At night. Through hilly, rocky woods. And your legs are shorter, Rubes. That means way more steps for you. Are you sure you’d be up for that?”

Ruby frowned and cast those beautiful green eyes downward. We had to switch tactics.

“Stay with me? Please? So I don’t have to worry?” I begged. I wondered if this was selfish of me. She sighed.

“...fine. But I get to go if there’s a next time,” she bargained.

“...if the circumstances are right,” I agreed hesitantly. Ruby reluctantly nodded in acceptance.

“Well, I guess the party’s set then?” Carrot said looking around the room, seemingly not volunteering herself. In her defense this was her home and it wasn’t like Comet Tail and Minuette would need any more direction than what their phones could provide. “If you two are going to be walking all night you should probably get in a nap first. We’ll start supper earlier and pack some supplies.”

With mild disdain for the sun, I joined the rest of the bunch outside to help wrap up. I recognized the radishes, there didn’t seem to be a ton of those though. Instead there was a large pile of flat pea pods on Carrot’s little garden wagon that I learned were snow peas.

The first thing Carrot did was wash and dry her tools with religious care and put them up immediately after drying them. Then at the water pump we washed the vegetables as well as we could and threw them into a tall bucket as we went. With five sets of hooves and a couple of horns it was quick work.

Comet took the bucket inside, Minuette put the wagon up in the shed and Ruby and I followed Carrot into the food shed to grab empty Mason jars and bring them into the house. Mercifully, the Mason jars were in nice bottle carriers with round handles.

Apparently the rest of the process could wait though. Instead we had switched to starting dinner. Which was black bean chili and black bean brownies. I was a little hesitant about the latter.

It was interesting to be a part of a kitchen of ponies at work though. It reminded me of working in the kitchen at the retirement home. Carrot divided the beans and had me mash my half with a masher. Minuette was grinding spices with some kind of hoof-cranked grinder with a spinning handle and helped move the chopped vegetables. Carrot held a knife handle in the side of her mouth and held the other end down with a hoof while she chopped vegetables on a cutting board laying on the ground. Comet and Pinchy were measuring things out and added them to my bean mash. I recognized the cocoa powder, chocolate chips, oats, applesauce and some other little things. The odd ingredients to me were the ‘beet sugar’ and ‘flax seed’ sludge.

I was waiting for more ingredients to show up, but Comet and Pinchy were done reading through the recipe. I expected some normal things like eggs and flour. I had never made brownies from scratch before, but I could have sworn at least flour should have been involved somewhere. I actually didn’t know if Carrot even had eggs and butter. I tried my best to stir it all with the big spoon provided. I didn’t want to strain my neck or get my mane in it so I just held it between my hooves and awkwardly stirred. To my surprise, it started to look about right after I got it all stirred through.

“Hey, Carrot?” I spoke up. “Is this right? Shouldn’t there be… flour and stuff? Eggs?”

Carrot looked at me, but had her mouth full with a measuring cup full of some thick grain. With a tilt of her head, Carrot poured it out into the black beans still simmering on the stove. She sat her utensil down to answer.

“It’s a plant-based recipe,” she answered simply before going on. “Even if we could have raised our own animals with love and care, they’re noisy and require a lot of resources and time. It just wasn’t worth it. So, I’m vegan.”

“Oh,” I stated dumbly. “But ...flour?”

“I try to ration out the ingredients I can’t grow here,” she elaborated.

I looked down at the brownie batter I just stirred. We had chocolate last night as well.

“Oh really? Do you have a chocolate chip bush around here somewhere?” I asked, fairly sure of the answer.

Her ears fell flat and a sheepish grin grew on her face.

With the chili ingredients ‘getting to know each other’ and the brownie batter cooking in a skillet in some ‘oven’ door set into the stove closer to the fire, we went back to the canning process.

Cleaned vegetables went in jars with water. Some got spices, pickling salt and apple cider vinegar. Carrot had some kind of pressure cooker looking thing she sat on the stove next to the chili. That was filled with water and brought to a boil. Then the jars went inside that. It was sealed up and the right pressure for the right amount of time had to be maintained. It was simple, but a little time consuming. While waiting for all the boiling and pressurizing we cleaned up. We weren’t going to eat for a little while yet, but chili was one of those things that got better with simmering anyway. To my disappointment, with our group activities momentarily done, we split up.

Minuette and Comet Tail went to go try and get a mid-afternoon nap in and Ruby wanted to go out onto the porch to ‘practice her magic’. I volunteered to watch but she insisted she didn’t want an audience. Respecting her wishes, I was essentially left alone with only Carrot to talk to.

Feeling awkward sitting alone doing nothing in the living room I sat with her instead in the kitchen. She seemed to enjoy the silence, almost transfixed by the wood burning stove. She’d occasionally feed it another log or check the cooking food but otherwise just sat on the floor. I saw my opening.

“So, do you always stay in the kitchen?” I asked her with a wry smile on my face. To my relief the joke landed and she giggled a little.

“I think it’s relaxing to keep an eye on things. It’s a bit like gardening that way. But faster and a little more hooves on,” she mused. “Do you do much cooking?”

“Not really. I can make a pretty mean grilled cheese though.”

She gave a pleasant smile and hummed an acknowledgement but didn’t really comment on that. She probably wasn’t one for grilled cheese, I realized after the fact. The silence returned for a bit until she politely broke it this time.

“How are you doing by the way?” she asked. I was starting to get tired of that question. I was only here because ponies cared about me, not because of what I could provide, maybe I was just a charity case. I thought back to my last ration this morning and then to Comet Tail. Then my pony dream. I was just a furry pile of feelings and exhaustion today.

“Mostly just tired,” I responded, not elaborating further.

“Oh, good? Any more shaking or fever?”

“A little,” I admitted. “That basically went away after breakfast.”

“Oh. That is good then,” She said then looked up at the clock on the wall. “Do you… want any more now?” Moonshine. Of course I wanted some, but I wasn’t sure if I could actually say yes or not. And if she went and got it now, would I get to see where she kept it? No. She would tell me to stay put. And that display of her controlling nature was what I really wanted to avoid.

“I… think I need a cigarette more than anything,” I deflected.

“Did you smoke a lot?” she asked me. I imagined she was going to silently judge an honest answer so I leaned into it.

“Only when I drink,” I said with a grin, wallowing in the terrible implication. She humored me with a dry chuckle.

“I’m sorry. I can’t really help with nicotine withdrawal,” she said, assuming I would want her to. “Have you felt irritable? You seem alright.”

I was technically a little irritable at Carrot Top right now. I thought back to Comet going out of his way to call me a ‘she’ this morning and how that irritated me. That didn’t bother me yesterday. ...then the way I reacted to his smell and then pushed him away. I sighed.

“Even without the drinking problem I’m still such a mess,” I said into my forehooves.

“Maybe you don’t have a drinking problem then, Berry? Maybe you started drinking because of a life problem?”

That sounded uncomfortably similar to something my dad once said about himself.

“...Yeah,” I said and nodded in agreement. I placed my forehooves back onto the floor. “Maybe that’s it.”

There was another silence which she broke with her hoof coming to rest on my side. I looked up from the floor at her.

“You want to get more involved with the cooking? I could teach you some recipes. It’s great stress relief,” she offered. That almost sounded nice. I was really lacking there. If I wanted to be the parent in my relationship with Ruby I probably did need to learn how to cook better than I did now.

“...are all the recipes going to be vegan?” I teased her.

“Unless you’re hiding a chicken somewhere,” she shot back with a dry smirk.

Ruby was the first one to rejoin us. There was a rattle with the front door and some soft hooves pattering as she came in. I thought I made out a long sigh in with the pattering. Carrot talked cooking with me by first explaining cooking rice and beans to me. When Ruby stepped into the kitchen Carrot had been gushing about the culinary value of onions.

“Is it time to eat yet?” our youngest asked. I couldn’t help but notice she seemed to be eyeing the skillet full of brownie more than the chili pot.

“It is. But we’ll wait for Minuette and Comet,” Carrot explained.

“How’d magic practice go?” I asked my little filly, expecting to hear some progress.

“Tiring,” she stepped around my question the way I would.

“Do… you want to talk about it?” I asked her.

“No,” she shot me down rather quickly. “Mom? Can I take a bath before dinner?” She changed the subject. I was a little confused by the question and why she was asking me for permission. I looked to Carrot Top for an answer.

“It’s fine by me. There’s towels under the sink. Just flip the middle switch and give it about twenty minutes to heat up,” Carrot reminded us.

“Right. Okay,” Ruby agreed before turning to me. “Mom? Will you… help me? With the bath?”

“Oh, right, our buddy system! Of course,” I said, realizing why she was asking me. “Should I take it with you? I probably smell bad, don’t I?” I asked, expecting the ponies who had been gardening for two days to be worse off. To my embarrassment, Ruby agreed with me.

“You do. You kind of smell like a horse-scented marker.”

Bath time was a good way to kill an hour. The tub itself was rather equine-friendly. According to what Ruby had been told, ‘Meemaw’ had arthritis. In addition to the shower mat, handheld shower head and flat handles for the shower knobs, there was a less useful shower chair and a too-personal-to-use shower brush stored away in the bathroom.

The shampoo, stored in an easy-pour bottle in an easy-grip rubber koozie, eventually got everywhere but at least it didn’t taste too bad. If we weren’t doing our buddy system the shower brush might have been tempting to get our backs. Instead we did our best to lather each other up with our hooves then rinse each other by holding the shower head in our mouths.

I thought maybe this would have been awkward at first but the innocence and relaxation we had washing each other gave me a similar feeling to when we took baths together as little kids. Except now, to Ruby’s brief giggling terror, I found she was ticklish on what used to be her ankle down and that old lady couldn’t stop me from playfully harassing her a little with it.

The bath itself didn’t take long. The long part was the drying process. I gently patted her face then ruffled her coat dry and then did my best to get her mane and tail dry. We started to use the same towel on me, for conservation’s sake, but my greater surface area quickly made it clear an already damp towel wasn’t going to cut it so we used up another.

I offered to carry my soft little unicorn back to the living room but she wanted to walk. I assumed it was a reaction to not getting to go out tonight. I wouldn’t squash her independence, even if she still needed someone to wash her back and help her rinse her tail.

Leaving the bathroom and returning to the regular scent of the house, my nostrils were filled with an intoxicating smell of warm, spiced and extremely inviting food. To Ruby’s disappointment, Minuette and Comet Tail were still out. They needed all the sleep they could get for tonight, so we didn’t wake them. However, showing some compassion for the hungry filly, Carrot Top relented and said we could go ahead and eat without them.

Dinner was almost uncomfortably hearty. What felt like ground beef at first in the chili turned out to be bulgur wheat. The spices in the chili were deep and earthy. There was a lot of texture and flavor from the parsnips, carrots, tomatoes and whatever else she put into this. There were some chewy green things that turned out to be the leafy tops of carrots and parsnips. They were slightly bitter but soaked up everything else well. I wasn’t sure if humans could digest those, but I kind of liked the texture and they went down fine.

“Sorry we’re basically having another stew again,” Carrot apologized without any need. “It’s a little easy to set it and go about your day. And I wanted to use up the ingredients I opened yesterday.” Ruby and I insisted it was fine because it was quite good.

When I was getting Carrot’s cooking crash course she explained that’s why the applesauce was in the oatmeal this morning: she used it to moisten the baked food yesterday. It was also why she felt she could use the chocolate more liberally: there was still an open can. She said, ideally, she didn’t want to open more than one more thing each day. I trusted her logic; she was more used to rotating out food to make it last than I was. In confidence, she told me her chocolate cravings are what made her put the black beans on for the chili, just so that she could make her brownies too.

The brownies, despite the slightly unusual ingredients, tasted almost imperceptibly normal. Rich, moist and incredibly chocolatey. I didn't even perceive beans. My favorite little filly, who had a little filly-sized portion of chili, seemed to be perfectly fine with an adult-sized serving of dessert. There was plenty left over after the three of us had a crude chunk of it. Carrot set a few pieces aside and put the rest in a storage container.

"They can give some to Diamond Tiara and Braeburn when they see them," our host suggested. "Or eat them on the way if they need a moral boost."

To kill time waiting for our sleeping unicorns we watched some more Friendship is Magic on Comet Tail’s laptop. Ruby started us on Season 2, understandably after the season premiere.

I loved all of the episodes I saw. The highlights to me were Twilight mind-controlling the town with a doll, a Halloween episode with an old-fashioned speaking Princess Luna returning to the public eye (I dressed as a safari explorer), and a “Sisterhooves Social” where I apparently won the sister race with some random little filly.

I thought entering a sister race with my daughter would be something I would do. I think I could pass as her older sister too, I didn’t feel old. In the middle of our debate on whether or not I actually won the race and whether it was with Ruby or some filly aunt of hers, the familiar sound of hooves on wood came down the hall from the bedroom. Comet Tail and Minuette came around the corner, looking well-rested.

“It’s about time you two woke up! It’s almost dusk,” Carrot pretended to chastise the unicorns before she stood up. “Come on, let’s fix some bowls.”

Comet and Carrot headed into the kitchen but Minuette held back for just a bit with me and my daughter. She stooped low to whisper to me and a mischievous grin appeared on her face.

“Just between you and me, Comet smells really good,” she whispered a little louder than necessary. I saw Ruby jerkily look away from both of us and flatten her ears, clearly embarrassed to hear this conversation and wanting to pretend she didn’t.

“What? D-did you… ?” I asked, slightly disgusted and feeling slightly betrayed. My face and something else grew warmer.

“Cuddle? We totally did,” Minuette said with a happy, unsuggestive smile. I let out a sigh of relief for the sake of our bedsheets. She giggled at me, clearly getting the reaction she wanted. She booped me right on the end of my muzzle before heading into the kitchen, the bounce in her step a little more back to normal.

While they were eating, Carrot Top fashioned them two more ‘styluses’ like hers so they could operate their phones. This time with two of her metal straws and a tiny torn piece of her washing sponge she poked into one end. Then she heated the end with the sponge near her fire and stomped hard and quick on it to squeeze it in place. They were crude like hers but worked as long as they were wet with some saliva first.

By the time Comet and Minuette ate and we finished packing it had been dark for hours. The packing was understandably light for the simple journey but Carrot Top managed to make things complicated. Instead of just tightening a backpack around our middle and hoping for the best about it sliding, she turned Comet Tail into a pack animal.

She put her gardening apron on him so it laid on his back, like a cape. Then she looped the handles of two backpacks together with a belt and laid that on top. Then Minuette crudely tied the ends of the backpacks’ straps together underneath him. Those bags weren’t going anywhere now.

Into the bags went both of their cell phones with the homemade styluses, a thermos of water, a thermos of something Carrot called “switchel” that tasted vinegary and, of course, the brownies. Minuette, in return, offered to carry the electric lantern as their non-magical source of light.

We promenaded our prepared pony pals to the property’s perimeter.

"I want you calling every hour if you can," Carrot insisted, instructing the ponies that would be getting away from her. "I'll stay awake until you get back. If anything is dodgy or iffy then turn around immediately, okay?"

"Of cwourse!" Minuette said lantern hanging from her mouth. For emphasis she saluted with a hoof.

"It'll be fine,” Comet reassured us. “‘Got a pretty straight shot cutting through the woods and just a hoof-full of roads to cross in the middle of nowhere. We'll make good time.”

We all exchanged hugs with our travelers. It would only be one night and it was a fairly safe plan but we all knew this wasn't entirely without risk. Despite the risk though, they went and we stayed.

Chapter 1 had grapes in moonshine which was a reference to Ponies Anonymous. An unfinished Berry Punch Five Score story. Just a little something only the author would catch, probably.

The way Discord assault's Berry in this chapter was inspired from Summer Break With Much At Stake. The other unfinished Berry Punch Five Score story. Imitation is flattery, after all!