With the arrival of Vinyl Scratch, the coronation party was in full swing. From my seat in the corner I could watch my friends dancing — though I was highly doubtful that Twilight could even refer to what she was doing as such. Geo was no better, and the two of them were making an example of themselves.

Not that anypony would ever dare to complain, of course, because the two of them were the newly crowned Prince and Princess of Equestria after all. Even Celestia, Luna and Cadence were fighting the urge to facehoof as they watched the spectacle before them.

I chuckled and rolled my eyes, watching as the rest of my friends got down with the beat. Pinkie was on stage with Vinyl, bobbing her head to the music. Rainbow Dash and Spark Plug were both in the middle of the floor, making various shapes with their bodies and not giving a shit about the looks they were getting. Even Fluttershy and Doctor Haywick were busting a move, though the former was doing so with her mane hanging over her eyes.

"Hey, John," a voice asked, "are ya not gonna dance? Ah'm sure everypony would love ta see yer moves."

I turned to face the owner of the voice and smiled. Applejack came up and laid her head against my chest, to which I responded by kissing the top of it and running my fingers through her mane. She joined me in watching our friends, stifling a laugh at Geo and Twilight's attempts, and the minutes ticked by.

Eventually though, I let out a sigh and tilted Applejack's head so that she was looking at me.

"You do realise," I said to her, "that we need to tell everypony about... well, you know what."

Applejack nodded.

"Ah know we do." she replied, "Let's get everypony together an' tell 'em now, while they're still sober."

I stood up and we walked through the dance floor, getting the attention of each of our friends and telling them that we had something to talk about. They responded with varying degrees of confusion and worry, although I could tell that Twilight and Geo seemed to have worked it out already.

With our friends gathered, we led them into a storage closet. Not the best place for a conversation, but at least it was private. They gathered around Applejack and I in a half-circle. I cleared my throat to get their attention and spoke quietly.

"The reason we have gathered you here," I said, "is to share with you some news. You may have noticed a slight change in AJ's demeanour over the last few weeks. There's a perfectly good reason for that, as she will now explain."

Applejack took a few steps forward, a sombre expression on her face. She was looking at the ground and trying to avoid eye contact with anyone. But just as our friends were getting worried, she turned her expression around and developed a mile-wide grin.

"Ah'm pregnant!" she exclaimed cheerfully, "We just wanted ta have a little fun 'fore we told y'all first."

Silence greeted her announcement as everyone processed what had just been said. Pinkie, of course, was the first to recover — and squealed the one thing that anyone would say in that situation.

"BABY SHOWER!"

This was followed by everyone crushing us in a group hug, although Geo opted to give me a manly pat on the back instead.

"I become a Prince," he said, "and you announce that you're going to be a dad. What's next, are Luna and Celestia going to get married to their respective partners?"

"That's not a bad idea, Geo." Celestia's calm voice said from behind us, "But I think we'll wait a while. Congratulations, Applejack, we couldn't help but overhear the conversation."

"Yes," Luna added from somewhere behind her sister, "many congratulations are in order. How long before the foal is due?"

"We've only known for a few days," I replied, "so we've got the full eleven months to wait."

"Be sure to come and see me for a scan then," Haywick interjected, "but I can tell you right now that you're not carrying a hybrid."

He nodded towards Twilight and Geo as he said this. The two of them stuck their tongues out at him cheekily.

"Ah knew that," Applejack said, "but Ah wouldn't care if'n Ah was. All that matters is that Ah'm gonna be a mother."

I picked her up and hugged her.

"And I'm going to be a father." I muttered, "I can't wait."

Applejack nuzzled me and we all returned to the party because, as Luna put it, the cause for celebration had been doubled.

Hours later and I was carrying my wife through the door of our house at Sweet Apple Acres. She was half-asleep and muttering about who was going to help Big Macintosh with the bucking when she started showing.

I chuckled and carried her upstairs to bed, making sure to cover her up so she was warm. I had no intention of joining her, as I suddenly had the urge to think. Heading back downstairs I poured myself a glass of brandy and sat in an armchair.

I was going to be a father. Only now did the gravity of the situation dawn on me. I found myself thinking about my brother, Derek, and how much I would love for him to be a part of this.

I wasn't the best brother where Derek was concerned. Like most siblings I opted to make his life hell. Unfortunately this, among other things, caused him to fall in with a gang as a teenager.

While robbing a shop one day, one of Derek's friends was shot dead by the owner. Witnessing this gave Derek nightmares for weeks. One night, when I went into his room to see if he was okay, he attacked me. He actually believed I was the shopkeeper who killed his friend. He then attacked our father and fled the house.

He was found three days later in that same shop, standing over the bloodied corpse of the man who killed his friend. When the police arrive, Derek said that 'Tom told me to do it'. They took this as a sign of schizophrenia, and so Derek was sectioned. He spent many years in a mental institution, but when he was released he found himself unable to fit back in with society. And so he fell back into his old ways. He found some new friends and started causing trouble. When I announced that I was joining MI6, he denounced me as a brother, saying that I was a 'disgrace'.

I forgot all about him and instead threw myself into my work with MI6. I was assigned to a team keeping tabs on a scientist by the name of Ace Sorou, who had applied for planning permission to build a nuclear reactor. This made the British government suspect he was up to no good, and so had him marked as a threat.

It turned out that Ace had been conducting experiments into portals which would allow travel between different universes. At first his results were messy, as portals would open in various areas around the city where we lived.

One night I was watching an area with my partner, Mick. Higher than usual energy readings had been reported, which implied that Ace's work was having an effect there.

After hours of waiting, we were just about to give up and go back to base when a man approached. This man was none other than Geo. We assumed he was an assistant of Ace's, sent to check on the results of the experiment, so we watched him.

Next thing we know, he's been beaten to a pulp and shot. We couldn't make out his assailants due to the shoddy lighting, but even if we could we weren't allowed to intervene as we were undercover. All we could do was watch as they left.

Suddenly, a flash of light appeared under Geo's body and he vanished. Mick and I stared dumbfounded at the area for a few minutes before there was another flash of light and Geo reappeared. We called an ambulance for him and left to report on what we had seen.

My superiors were convinced that Geo was the key to getting a result in the Sorou case, so I was assigned to become his friend, gain his trust, and find out what he knew. Geo told me all about his time in Equestria, but figured it was a dream until he got an item in the mail — an item given to him by one of the ponies in Equestria.

He vowed to return and so we set off to gather clues at the place where he was shot. We found nothing important, so Geo gave up there and then.

To cut an exceedingly long story short we saw an advertisement, placed by none other than Doctor Sorou himself, asking for labourers to work in his lab. I suggested that we give him a call, so we did. The next day we started work at his lab.

As luck would have it, Ace was trying to build a stabiliser so that his portals wouldn't open in random places all the time. Geo and I helped him to build it, and we went to Equestria using data Ace had from the night Geo was shot.

After Geo was reunited with his lover, Twilight Sparkle, I found myself in the company of Applejack. She gave me a room at the farm, which I was happy to take.

Suffice to say my ruse wouldn't go unnoticed for long. I reported back to my superiors, who informed the Prime Minister of my findings. He shit himself with panic and deployed the Army to the area, seizing the portal and making sure nothing got through.

This was when I revealed myself to Geo. He wasn't happy and neither were the rest of my friends. In my time there I had come to see them as more than mere tools to help me do my job. I apologised to them all and they accepted, but I was still keen to show Geo that I cared a lot about our friendship.

I got my chance a few months later. I had just told Geo about my feelings for AJ when another human stepped out from behind the trees. It was Derek. I was shocked to discover that he was the one responsible for sending Geo – and by extension, me – to Equestria.

Derek was furious that Geo had him sent to jail and threatened to kill him. I stepped forward and told Derek that if anyone was to blame for how he felt, it was me. After all, I had been such a jackass to him all his life.

He agreed, and he attacked me. The fight was brutal, and it only ended when Geo killed Derek. I had lost a brother, which hurt, but at the same time I had kept a friend — as well as my new life.

Fast forward to the present. I had been visiting Derek's grave every day since his burial, in the hope it would go some way to alleviating the intense guilt I was feeling. As I finished the last of the brandy I remembered a conversation I had had with AJ about the afterlife.

She had told me that, in Equestria, an afterlife does indeed exist — and that she had been taken there by Princess Luna, who was responsible for the souls there. AJ had asked to see her parents, and Luna had obliged.

With this in mind I ran back upstairs with an idea forming in my mind. I needed to know once and for all how my brother felt, and there was only one pony who could help me...

Author's Notes:

I've had this idea for a while and finally got round to doing it.

I felt that explaining the backstory between John and Derek here was better than making you read through a few other stories... although reading the rest of them will be required to understand future references.