I crested the small dune with a smile on my face. The girls were already set up and frolicking on the sand and in the surf. Fluttershy was playing with Pinkie in the water, while Dash and Applejack hit a beach ball back and forth. Rarity was sunbathing -- something I had expected her to do -- and Twilight was building her scale rendition of Canterlot in the sand, which was actually fairly impressive. None of them seemed to notice my approach, and so I decided to take the time to simply enjoy watching all of them be so happy.

This whole vacation had been Celestia’s idea, and I had encouraged them all to go, claiming that it’d do them some good after all the stuff that they had to deal with over the past few weeks. I had only heard about most of it second-hand, from one of the girls telling me about what had happened, but that didn’t lessen the impact any. Even after taking out all the embellishments that they all added they had still managed quite a bit in a short time. After the whole Crystal Empire fiasco they had spent several days rooting out the last small pockets of King Sombra’s influence.

After that... Well... It had been hectic for all of them, to say the least.

Now, though, they were all relaxing. Or, to be more accurate, they were all enjoying themselves. Dash, I knew, would spend quite a while enjoying some games on the beach, before she’d grab one of the recliners that they had brought down -- or, possibly, a cloud in the area -- and take a nap. Applejack would probably do something quite similar to Dash, and after growing tired of the games she’d probably go for a run on the beach, or something of a similar strain. It wasn’t really all that surprising, though. Vacations and the Apple Family were strange bedfellows.

Pinkie, being the ball of energy she is, would probably keep playing for most of the day, always wanting somepony to join her in her fun. I knew better than to be the one to volunteer for that position. The last time I did that I had to spend a day sleeping just to get back on my feet. Still, I enjoyed her company, and she never let a moment pass in a dull fashion.

Fluttershy, on the other hand, could spend each and every day sedately spending time with her animals. I could do the same, but I had always felt like there was some tension in the air whenever I hang out with her, so I didn’t do it quite as often as I’d like. I’m pretty sure she knows more about me than she lets on, but she’s never said anything.

Rarity was, like usual, worrying about how she looks, and so her sunbathing was filled with constant adjustments to how she was lying on the recliner, these adjustments working to give her skin an even glow. Twilight, I saw, had a small stack of books near her recliner, and I already knew that they all had to do with the beach, and all the possible ways to enjoy it. A part of me really wanted to take those books from her and tell her to just enjoy the day, but she’d find herself unable to do so without some handy reference for just how much time to spend working on a sandcastle.

Or, you know, whatever. Twilight and books. Can’t have one without the other.

I’d been a bit slower to get ready up at the beach house, and so the girls had gone ahead without me. I’d volunteered to carry the fairly hefty cooler, though. I sincerely doubted that they’d work up an immense hunger or thirst in the half hour that I took to finish getting ready after they’d all left. What was I doing, you ask?

Well, think about who I’m with, and what they’re all wearing. Yeah, it’s a pretty picture. Go ahead, be jealous.

Anyway, that’s why I took a bit longer. I wanted to try and avoid any awkward scenes during the trip down to the beach. Now, though, it was going to be a challenge, but it was a challenge that I’d gladly endure.

Pinkie was the first to notice my arrival, and so she gave me a big wave when she saw me atop the dune. I couldn’t hear quite what she was saying, but I’m pretty sure that she was shouting out my name. All the other girls looked my way at Pinkie’s exclamation, and soon they had all given me a quick wave before they turned back to their tasks. They’d carried down a recliner for me, and I soon had the cooler planted in the sand next to where I’d be lying down. While it was still fairly early, I decided that I’d take a brief nap and get a tan at the same time. Risky for some, but I’d learned at an early age that I don’t burn, I just get a nice even tan, and then I’d stop. I wasn’t going to question it, but I did think it was peculiar.

The recliner sagged gently beneath my weight, and it was with little extravagance that I pulled off my white t-shirt, exposing my less than spectacular chest to the air. I’m not out of shape, but I didn’t have quite as much definition to my muscles as I’d like. There’s a faint hint of a six pack where my abs are, but unless you really looked they’re hard to make out. Still, I knew better than to worry about things like that when I’m around the girls. I let my eyes close slowly as the sun beat down upon me, and soon enough I was dozing gently.

A drop of cold water fell down onto my chest as I dozed gently, and opening my eyes revealed the hunched over form of Pinkie Pie looking down at me with wide eyes. Her mane drooped around her head as she looked at me, and, for just a moment, she had the weirdest sparkle in her eyes. It vanished quickly, though, as she bounced back and looked me straight in the face, giving me one of her bright smiles.

“How was your nap, Icarus?”

I sat up and gave a little stretch of my arms. “Nice, actually. Not enough to really give me any more energy, but it was a nice way to pass the time. And how’s the water?”

Pinkie looked over her shoulder for a moment before she turned and looked back at me. “It’s really nice since it’s not too cold and not too warm it’s really just the perfect temperature for taking a refreshing dip and it’s crystal clear, too. Anyway, the girls and I were talking and we wanted to know if you wanted to join us on going for a walk along the beach.” I tuned out Pinkie Pie’s babbling and looked past her. The other five girls were all looking over at me, expectant looks on their faces. I started listening just in time to realize that Pinkie was talking to me. “... and we all know that you have the best luck when it comes to finding seashells and sand dollars.”

As much as I hated to admit it, she was right. Whenever we did take a day off to go to the beaches nearer to Ponyville I would usually find myself coming back from my long walks with half a dozen different shells and things of the like.

I gave a quick shrug before I responded. “Yeah, I suppose I can join you all. It’s not like I’ve got anything else to do. Just don’t expect me to be some shell finding savant. It’s always a matter of luck, and patience.” Pinkie barely listened to me past my affirmation, and she quickly whirled around and bounced over to the others, her usual smile plastered to her face. I followed her after a moment, the simple act of getting out of the seat taking long enough for Pinkie to make it to the others.

No words were needed on my behalf as I reached the Elements, and soon enough we were walking along the beach, the gentle sound of the waves lending the walk a calming atmosphere. I scanned the sand from time to time as I walked, the girls around me offering up plenty of other noteworthy sights. All of them looked stunning in their assorted garmentry, and I often had to keep myself from staring.

Rarity had the most exotic bikini on that I’d ever seen. The top -- if it could even be called that -- barely concealed anything, yet it somehow exuded an air of elegance. It was just enough to hide what it had to, without doing anything more than that. Her purple hair cascaded down her back in its usual curling fashion. Only Rarity would take the time to style her hair so intricately just for a trip to the beach. Then again, it added to her appearance in a big way, so I can understand it. Twilight, almost as if in opposition to Rarity’s revealing attire, had gone with what looked like a wetsuit. It was striped, horizontally, with alternating white and lavender stripes. It hugged her form admirably, though, and my eyes were drawn to the curves that were accentuated by her chosen attire.

Pinkie was wearing her favorite frilly bikini, the ruffled fabric almost making it seem like she was wearing a very small dress on the bottom, while the top drew the eye towards her assets like a shaving of iron to a magnet.

Shut up, I like science.

Fluttershy, who was walking a bit separate from the others, including myself, had on a front tied bikini. She also had a fairly large flower in her hair that was a darker shade of pink than her hair was. An appealing picture to watch as she occasionally bent down to pick up a shell.

Rainbow had a pair of short shorts on, along with a strapless sports bra. I honestly didn’t expect her to have a bikini, or even a one piece, since those would all be far too girly for the adventurous and awesome Rainbow Dash. Still, she looked good in what she had, and I knew that if I had the chance I wouldn’t turn her down. Applejack also looked quite good in her swimsuit. She had a top similar to that of Fluttershy’s, but instead chose the orange, compared to the faint yellow color scheme of the shy pegasus.

In contrast to their flawless forms, there was me -- average, dull, and not the most appealing thing to look at. As I’ve already told you, I don’t have the most buff body around, and my messy brown hair is impossible to tame, oftentimes seemingly acting like it has a mind of its own as it defies my every attempt at managing it. And then we come to my most defining attribute, for those who know me. My wings. Or, to be more accurate, my lack thereof. Save your pity, though, I don’t need it. I get more than enough of that the first time most ponies meet me. None of the girls know the real reason why I lost my wings, and none of them have asked since the first time they all tried to find out. I’m not really all that ashamed of what happened, but that doesn’t mean that I’m thrilled to talk about it.

We spent almost an hour casually strolling along the beach before we stopped and turned back, heading back to where we’d set up our stuff. As with the first half of the trip, I lagged behind the others, simply enjoying the beauty of the exotic paradise that we’d all be enjoying for the month.

As I finally reached the spot we’d set up in, almost five minutes slower than even Fluttershy, I saw that the girls had all started getting the food and drink out. For some reason, -- they had put me in charge of preparing the food, so I simply went with what I knew I could do well: prepare some fruits for our snacking pleasure. There was a large bag of grapes, some various melons, and some oranges as well -- not to mention the Apple Family apples.

The girls all tore into the fruit, consuming nearly all of it within just a few minutes. I took only what I really wanted to eat, content to let the others have their way with it. Frankly, it wasn’t really that big of a deal to head back to the beach house if I got hungry, so I contented myself with an apple, and a few pieces of the watermelon that I had cut up. As the girls all continued talking amongst themselves I decided that I’d try walking in the opposite direction from where we had gone before. I gave them a casual wave before I started my walk, and soon enough their voices had faded into silence.

A faint sound did catch my attention, and when I turned to see what it was I saw Pinkie running to catch up to me, her typical wide smile in its normal spot. “I thought that it seemed kinda boring if you were going to just walk on your own, so I decided that I’d join you so that it wouldn’t be quite as boring since having someone to talk to would make it a lot more fun.”

I didn’t answer right away. While I would probably enjoy the company in the long run, part of this walk was just to let me clear my head. I’d been thinking about the girls -- all of them -- quite a bit over the past few hours, and now I just wanted to be able to think about something else.

It was only after a moment of pointed silence that I realized that Pinkie had stopped talking. She only continued when I looked back at her after letting my gaze wander. “I mean, if you really want to go alone that’s okay, but I thought that maybe you’d like someone to talk to.”

“No, it’s fine, Pinkie.” I hesitated, looking at the ground a little nervously. “I just wanted some time to think, but I suppose I can do that later.” I looked back at her and for just a moment she looked like she was frowning, but the moment was so brief that I was pretty sure that it was just a trick of the mind. “Well, let’s get going, then. I’m going to be walking slowly, though. Shells and stuff don’t find themselves, after all.”

Pinkie just nodded before she started following me. I was walking relatively slow as I went along, and Pinkie, being Pinkie, took the time to look at every interesting thing she saw, or thought she saw. It seemed like she was trying to find more shells than I could, even though I wasn’t honestly looking. What surprised me more than that, though was the fact that she wasn’t bouncing about like she usually does -- she was just walking calmly. Finally she grew bored of trying to find interesting things to look at, so she matched my pace and started walking beside me, inching ever closer to my side.

As we continued our trek, and she grew closer to me, she decided that it was time to shatter the silence. “So, have you invented anything new, recently?”

“Not really, no. Not that I haven’t been trying, but it’s just been a slow couple of weeks for me. I’ve got some ideas for things, but the particulars never seem to work out…” I delved into all manner of specifics for all the various devices that I’ve tried to make, and Pinkie listened to it all, always asking questions, and trying to get me to think differently about the problems that I had been finding. While some of her questions were incredibly basic, they gave me some new ideas to think about, and it helped me to see what I was doing wrong with some of my newer ideas.

As we kept up our pace, we soon stumbled on a small river that fed into the ocean. I leapt across it after a small running start, but Pinkie looked down at it with a childlike smile on her face. She seemed so thrilled at this small discovery that I figured that I’d see what she would do.

“We should build a dam, or something!” Pinkie started bouncing in place as she took in the seemingly innocuous stream, her eyes shining with childlike delight. “There’s so many possibilities for fun with this little stream of water!”

“Pinkie, there’s an entire ocean right there. Why do we need a stream of water?”

“Because, silly, this is more fun!” And with that she leapt down into the stream, throwing up a spray of water that shimmered in the sunlight. Pinkie, for her part, got a nice sheen of water all along her body, giving her an even brighter glow than she had a moment ago, and it made my jaw drop. Pinkie, like all the girls, was beautiful. Her pink hair and bubbly personality always gave her a certain appeal. It was like she’d never be happy if others around her weren’t happy. I knew for a fact that she wasn’t always this happy, but I find it hard to imagine Pinkie Pie as sad as she claims to have been during her time on the rock farm. It’s just difficult to imagine her being anything other than the bubbly girl that I’ve come to know.

Her joyous laughter as she began piling up sand to thwart the progress of the water was infectious, and soon I was down there in the water with her, desperately trying to divert the flow of the stream using nothing but some sand, some rocks, and a handful of sticks. We spent almost an hour simply trying to alter the flow of the stream before we changed tactics. I ran into the jungle many times to bring larger and larger rocks, along with sticks, and soon we had a small functional dam built. It didn’t hold back all the water, but that was never our real goal. We just wanted to divert the flow of water, and have it carve a new path through the sand of the beach.

The vertical sides of the stream bed, about twenty inches tall, often collapsed into the newly formed channel, and so Pinkie and I went about clearing it every time it filled in. There was never an idle moment as we played in the sand and surf, and the conversation that we shared was probably one of the most enjoyable ones I’ve ever had. Sometimes we swapped jokes and stories, sharing long bouts of laughter after each punch line -- other times we would just fall silent, just so we could enjoy the sound of the ocean a few dozen yards away. I ventured into the jungle once again, telling Pinkie that I’d find a rock to help the alteration of the water flow.

When I returned, though, the normally bubbly girl had subtly changed in her demeanor. It took me quite a while to notice it, but when I finally picked up on it I stopped what I was doing, and I just watched as Pinkie continued. It only took a few moments for her to realize that I had stopped and was watching her, and when she noticed she stopped as well.

“Pinkie, I may not be the most observant person around, and I don’t claim to be the best at reading people, but even I can see that there’s something off about you. Just a short while ago, you were having the time of your life. But now...” I hesitated, trying to come up with the right words. “Now there’s something wrong... I can feel it.” I watched as she sat down on the small ledge of sand, and then she looked over at me, the usual smile on her face absent. She wasn’t frowning, but there was an obvious sadness present. I moved to sit in the stream in front of her, and she smiled at the little gesture. I’d always been taller than her, and I never failed to point it out. Now, though, she had the advantage of height, and it made her a bit happier.

“It’s nothing, really. Just…” She trailed off as she looked at me, and then she averted her gaze, looking out to the ocean, and to the sky. She looked everywhere that wasn’t me. I simply sat there as she let her gaze wander. She wouldn’t just leave the sentence hanging like that. I knew her well enough to know that she was just trying to figure out what she was saying. Finally, she gave a long sigh and looked back at me. “Do you remember when I told you all about what happened when I thought the others were all ignoring me?”

I nodded quickly. “Yeah, you kind of went crazy for a bit.” I leaned back for a moment, spreading my hands out behind me in order to stabilize myself. “You claimed that the others were all ignoring you because they had better things to do than spend time with you. In the end, though, they were simply planning a party for you. A party that you had completely forgotten was supposed to be held.”

“Yup.” She gave me a quick smile before she continued. “And AJ told you about what happened when she tried to take care of the entire orchard on her own, right?” Pinkie paused for a moment as she looked at me expectantly. I nodded an affirmative before Pinkie continued. “Rarity, Dash, and Twilight all did the same, right? Telling you all about times when they’ve struggled, or when we had difficulty with something as a group?”

“Yeah, I’ve heard quite a bit about everything that you girls have done. Kind of makes my accomplishments seem a bit... insignificant.”

Pinkie just frowned as she looked down at me. “No Icarus -- that’s not what I’m trying to say.”

“Then what are you trying to say?” I stopped for a moment, trying to figure out where she was going. “I’m not slow to understand things, but this is beyond my scope.”

“I’m not trying to say something, I’m trying to ask something. And that something that I’m trying to ask will probably take quite a while for you to explain.” I looked out towards the ocean, a hand rising to block the sun. It was still quite a distance from the horizon, so there was still plenty of time before we headed into town for dinner.

“Shoot, Pinkie. I’ll try to answer, but you do know that I won’t talk about what happened before I moved to Ponyville.”

She just shook her head. “That’s just it, Icarus. I want to know why you don’t trust us. Not just me, any of us.” Pinkie paused for a moment while she thought. She tried to speak a few times but each time she faltered, the words coming in a halting fashion.

Eventually she managed to put together what she wanted to say, but it was still spoken slowly. “We’ve all shared our moments of weakness with you, and yet you won’t do the same for us. Are we just so... so... I don’t know what the word is, but Twilight would. Why can’t you tell us what happened? What’s so bad about it that you can’t share?”

Okay, well, I suppose now would be a good time to confess. I’m not actually comfortable with what happened. Not even a little. It was all my fault, and it cost me, and my father, quite a bit. After the... accident... I had spent a few months recovering, and then I moved out. But rather than have me tell you, I’ll tell you what happened between Pinkie and I.

“I trust you, Pinkie! I trust all of you! But...”

“But what?”

Before I could respond the sound of voices caused me to turn in place to look back the way Pinkie and I had come from. “Tonight. My room. After the others go to bed. I... I’ll tell you what happened.” Pinkie just nodded in response, and with that nod her frown vanished, a smile taking its place. The approaching girls quickly spotted Pinkie and I as we sat in our relative positions, and soon after they spotted us they were standing there and looking at what Pinkie and I had done.

“You two do know that it’s been almost two hours since you walked off, right?” Twilight sounded a bit perturbed, and when I heard how long it had been I was a bit shocked that they hadn’t come earlier. Hell, after just an hour of one of the girls missing I would have gone looking. Before Twilight could continue I jumped in, eager to cut this off before it could become a lecture.

“Sorry, Twi. Neither of us really noticed how time was flying, since we were having fun with this small stream that we found.” I motioned around myself at the stream I was sitting in as I spoke. Twilight’s shoulders slumped just a bit as I headed off the rant she doubtlessly wanted to go on. “Anyway, we were going to head back to all of you soon since we still need some time to get back to the house, clean up, and get ready for dinner.” I let a small, knowing smile come to my face as I continued. “And I know how long you ladies take to get dressed up for going out.”

Author's Notes:

This is a story I've been cooking up for quite some time now, and I think that it's going quite well. Let me know what you think, and I'll do my best to respond to all feedback, good or bad.