This fanfiction is intended to be a proof-of-concept for ideas that could be used for in the future for Hasbro's My Little Pony franchise; therefore, the author of this work hereby grants Hasbro Inc. and its affiliates and licensees, including but not limited to DHX Media, express, written permission to use, create derivative works of, sell, claim as their own intellectual property, and in general take any action they see fit with all and any content of this fanfiction, including, but not limited, to narration, dialog, story elements, story events, names of characters, names of fictional locations, names of fictional objects, fictional properties assigned to objects that exist in real life, character traits and backstories, worldbuilding elements, lyrics, and fictional magic spells. The author of this work relinquishes all and any intellectual property rights for all and any content of this fanfiction work to Hasbro Inc. and its affiliates and licensees, including but not limited to DHX Media.
Twilight finished writing her foreword just as Shining Armor finished his letter to Fluttershy. She was shaking a little.
Shining Armor gave her a hug. "Are you cold, sis?"
She nodded. With a wavering voice, she explained, "It's that...and I'm giving up a piece of my heart to help Fluttershy!"
Shining Armor gave her a nuzzle. "Something I've learned from the last few days...you can do what you know is right, but still feel weird or even terrible about it. But I know you're doing the right thing, here."
"I know it too, but..." Twilight couldn't finish the sentence. She just buried her face in her brother's shoulder and sobbed.
For his part, Shining Armor held her and gave her a few minutes to cry while Rarity emptied her purse into her coat pockets, slipped two emeralds and one diamond into her purse, and gave the purse to Zephyr. Zephyr shouted up to the pegasus ponies, and the brash rainbow pegasus few down, took the journal and the purse as Twilight watched with watery eyes, and flew back to the distant cloud where Fluttershy was hiding.
Twilight sobbed, "I guess there's no turning back, now..."
Shining Armor gave her another nuzzle. "We should head back to Ponyland. Mom and Dad must be worried sick by now, and we've done all we can, here."
Rarity walked up to Twilight and put a hoof on her shoulder. "Zephyr and I can't thank you enough for all you've done for us. You've made us very, very rich, and you've given us a chance at getting our sister back!"
Twilight wiped her eyes and made an effort to smile. "You've made us rich, too. I don't even know what we'll do with all the money, and...and we've been living under a crushing debt for so long...I'm not even sure what it'll be like to live free!"
Zephyr picked up her hoof and gave it a light kiss. "You're going to love it. There are opportunities to grow and expand and chase your dreams; it's wonderful." He added, "Thank you very much for lending us your journal for this; if my sister comes back with it, we'll be sure to keep it safe for you. Please do visit us again."
Shining Armor nodded. "We'll be back with more rainbow diamonds, probably after a few days-we'll want to rest up a while after this adventure!"
Rarity smiled. "I'll be sure to get more mountain rubies to trade you for them, in that case. I'm almost worried about what being the sole purveyor of rainbow diamonds in Canterlot will do for us, but...well, I'm sure I'll find a way to enjoy it!"
"We know exactly what you mean! Mountain rubies are so rare in Ponyland that we'll be about their only source, too!"
Applejack put a hoof on his shoulder. "We should probably get moving."
"She's right," Zephyr agreed. "It's been a long day for all of us. We'll see you again soon."
The unicorns stood some distance away from the earth ponies. Rarity pulled a diamond out of her coat pocket and began to say the spell, and Twilight did the same while holding a mountain ruby from her saddlebags:
Magic gem with magic might
Unleash your lovely magic light
Through airless space be safely hurled
My party to another world!
With that, they left Cumuland behind. For the third time, Twilight found herself in suspended animation, not breathing, hardly thinking, hurtling at impossible speeds while feeling like she wasn't moving at all. Pretty soon, the blue, tan, and green orb of Ponyland exploded at her, and she found herself sitting on the ledge on Rainbow Mountain that overlooked Ponyville. It was very late at night, but the sight of their home after more than 48 hours away from it was very welcome. Twilight fished her lantern out of her saddlebag and held it up, hoping that her parents would see it and signal back with a light of their own. To her delight, she saw the light of a candle shining from the window of their treehome in Ponyville-it flashed twice in response. Twilight shone her light twice, and the candle answered twice again.
"YES!" Twilight shouted, "Mom and Dad know we're safe! We're home free! YES! YES! YES!"
At that moment, a thunderclap interrupted her.
"No...NO...NO!" she howled as the drops started to splatter down. "Oh, why didn't I ask for my poncho back!? There's no shelter!"
"Sure there is," Applejack answered.
"Where?!" Shining Armor asked, offering Twilight his rainsuit.
Applejack pushed his rainsuit back to him, pushed Twilight down into a lying-down position, and stood over Twilight with her huge duster hanging open, shielding Twilight from the rain. "You're talking to her!"
Shining Armor quickly put his rainsuit on over his slightly-damp fur and zipped it up just as the rain turned into a torrential downpour.
Applejack turned her collars up and tilter her head down, and she was looking straight at Twilight. Twilight was looking straight up at her, too. For a few moments, they just stared at each other, unsure what to say.
Finally, Twilight smiled and said, "Thanks, Applejack."
Applejack smiled back. "You're welcome, Twilight."
Shining Armor cocked his head. "It's like you two are friends, now...two days ago, I couldn't stop you two from fighting! ...What's changed?"
"Applejack stole my journal," Twilight explained.
Shining Armor only cocked his head the other way. They could only guess what his mouth was doing under the flap that protected his snout from the rain. "And THAT made you friends?!"
Applejack blushed. "It's a...long story."
Shining Armor sighed. "I think we've got time." A thunderclap shook the mountain. After their ears stopped ringing, Shining Armor continued, "We're going to be here a while."
"Well..." Applejack stammered, "It's kind of hard to know where to begin..."
"Applejack...she's spent the last few years assuming that you and I are...well, lazy..." Twilight explained.
"Lazy?!" Shining Armor scoffed. "Twilight, you're the most diligent pony I know!"
"Thanks a lot!" Applejack growled.
"Hey!" Twilight spat, "You don't know what it's like to-"
"Twilight, you're fighting again!" Shining Armor shouted.
There was a long pause where Twilight bit her lip. A very close thunderclap made them all jump.
After a moment, Twilight croaked out, "Sorry...sheer force of habit!"
Applejack chuckled. "We're both going to have to get used to not-being-enemies!"
"Yeah," Twilight agreed. "But...shoot...where were we...?"
"Uh...something about assumptions?" Shining Armor asked.
"Right, assumptions..."
Applejack agreed, "Right..."
"Ooo...how do we explain this...?"
"Well...it wasn't just the assumptions about you being lazy that made me hate you; it was assuming everything Twilight did was to make me miserable."
"I think I started assuming that about you first," Twilight thought aloud, "When you gave me just a tiny taste of ice cream, and Shining Armor and I still hadn't saved up enough money to start exploring the mountain, so I knew we couldn't take the chance to spend any of our money on ice cream...I thought you gave me just a tiny taste just to be mean to me."
"And when you didn't react the way I was expecting, I figured you were just being a jerkface, too."
Shining Armor was confused. "Just one incident with ice cream was enough to make you hate each other?"
"It wasn't just that," Twilight answered, "But that's how it started. There were times when one of us really did try to be nice to the other and make peace, but...it was kind of too late at that point..."
"Each of us assumed the other was trying to hurt us...if that makes any sense," Applejack explained. "Twilight invites me to ice cream, I assume she's just guilt-tripping me, because our family had just started falling behind on the mortgage right then. I offer her some apple seeds that're still in the core, Twilight assumes I'm just giving her garbage to be mean-that kind of thing."
"It was years of that that made us hate each other."
Shining Armor asked, "But what changed during this adventure? Was it your journal?"
Twilight sniffled. "Yes," she answered with a wavering voice.
"If...you don't want to talk about that, we can talk about something else," Shining Armor offered.
"It's okay," Twilight sobbed. "Applejack stole my journal while you and I were crying so that we didn't notice her. She read it while she was keeping watch that night in the cave. But while she was reading it...she got to see the world the way I saw it. That made her lower her defenses and finally what she looked like to me."
Applejack nodded, sending raindrops splattering on the ground very near Twilight's face. "I wrote a letter to her in her journal before I gave it back to her-I couldn't keep it, not after all I'd read. It felt like...like the Twilight that was in the journal, just by opening up her heart to me, was trying to be my friend. And then I felt like I couldn't betray the Twilight outside the journal by keeping it."
"When I read that letter, Applejack showed me how the world looks to her...and showed me that we're not all that different...that's the reason why I thought my journal would help Fluttershy. If she could see past her own expectations that every pony who saw her would hate her, then maybe she'd be able to be a family with Zephyr Breeze and Rarity." A tear rolled down Twilight's cheek. "I...I hope I get it back."
"Don't worry," Shining Armor assured her. "In a few days, we'll take another trip to the cave to get more diamonds, then we'll travel to Unicornia and get more rubies. When we get to Rarity's dealership, you'll find your journal waiting for you. I'm sure of it!"
"But what makes you so sure?" Twilight sobbed.
"Because if there's one thing this trip has taught me," Shining Armor explained, "It's how important family is to everyone. I mean, at the start of this whole thing, Applejack hated coming with us. She was afraid of what you'd do to her, she couldn't stand being around you, and eye contact with you was enough to wipe a smile right off her face. But she still went with us, because her family needed the money. And you felt the exact same way about her, but you still went with her, because our family needed the money and couldn't get it without her help. You both knew your families were counting on you, and you refused to let them down, even though you really, really didn't want to come on this trip together."
"That's all true," Applejack agreed gravely, "But...I don't see what that has to do with Fluttershy."
"Simple: family is important to her, too. You remember how she was so scared of other ponies that she really, really didn't want to bring us to Canterlot?"
"Uh-huh."
"As soon as Canterlot was in sight, she could've asked to leave us-she could've said 'This is as far as I go, here's your poncho back,' but she didn't. She stuck with us, because her heart was hungry to be part of a group of ponies that could count on her, and that she could count on, too. She wants friends, she wants a family. And now that she's finally got a chance to get one permanently, I don't think she's going to pass it up."
"I sure hope so," Twilight sniffled. "And not just because I want my journal back someday soon, either: Rarity and Zephyr and Fluttershy-all three of them are good ponies. They deserve to be happy."
Another thunderclap interrupted them. Twilight shuddered against the cold. "This is the second time in the last week that I've lost my poncho! I swear to Celestia that when we get back down to Ponyville, I am going to buy a brand-new poncho AND a full rainsuit and take them both with me every single time we go up on this mountain!"
"That'll mean less space in our saddlebags for carrying back diamonds," Shining Armor cautioned her.
"I don't care!" Twilight answered, teeth chattering.
Applejack lay down so that her belly was resting on Twilight's back and pulled her coat closer in, trying to keep the drafts out. "Now you're not just wearing something I've worn; you're wearing ME!" she chuckled. "Now you're REALLY going to need a bath!"
Twilight giggled and stopped shivering.
Suddenly, the wind shifted, and Twilight felt a huge, cold raindrop go splat on her nose. "UGH!" she groaned, wiggling her nose to try to dry it off. "I sure hope that doesn't happen again!" she muttered. That cued another drop to drench her nose, and another, and more in rapid succession. Twilight groaned in exasperation.
"Not on my watch!" Applejack declared. She withdrew her hoof further back into the huge sleeves of her father's coat and pushed the sleeve so that it completely covered Twilight's snout. Applejack had to stand on three legs to do this, and it wasn't very comfortable, but it kept Twilight's nose dry.
"Yep, you're definitely friends, now!" Shining Armor observed.
"Listen..." Applejack hesitated a moment, then continued, "I know this is kind of weird, especially coming from me, but...if I can get away from my work at the farm, is it...okay...if I come with you in a few days when you go to Canterlot, again?"
"Absolutely," Shining Armor and Twilight said at the same time.
"Get away from work on the farm?! Who are you?!" Twilight joked. All three of them laughed. Twilight added, "You can come with us to the outfitters once we've gotten a check from Amethyst Star for the gems...and paid off the mortgage at the bank. We'll get you better raingear, a lantern, a towel, a pick and shovel, some huge saddlebags, a bedroll-"
"Whoa, whoa-!" Applejack stopped her. "Is all that really necessary? I didn't say I wanted to stop being a farmer and start being an explorer for a living!"
"Oh...well, we'll just skip the compass and map, then!" Twilight giggled.
At that moment, the rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun. The sun peeked over the horizon, and even from the mountain, the three earth ponies could see the glorious triple-rainbow lighting up the sky. After a few chilly minutes, the rocks became dry enough to walk on again, and without even taking off their raingear, the three ponies put on their saddlebags and galloped at full speed toward Night Light's treehome. Long before they got there, they saw Night Light, Twilight Velvet, Bright Mackintosh, and Buttercup all rushing toward them.
The next few minutes were a blur of hugs and kisses and nuzzles and tears of relief; none of them had gotten a wink of sleep that night: the parents had been up all night worrying, and the children had been up all night chasing Fluttershy.
The whole town must have heard this tearful reunion, because house after house opened up, and earth ponies of every description were coming out and staring at them. Some scowled, others smiled, still others didn't know how to react.
After a few moments, Twilight looked up and saw their reactions, and she knew why some of them were scowling at her whenever their eyes met-it was because she'd spent ten weeks' worth of a pony's wages just to be cruel, and had done this in a town where nearly everypony was crushed by poverty and debt.
Oh, no-I didn't just hurt Applejack when I did that, Twilight thought to herself, I hurt half the town! They might even think I'm even worse than Filthy Rich...! Ooo...if only there was some way I could make it up to them all!
Something interrupted Twilight's thoughts: the cry of the auctioneer at the auction block mentioned a name she remembered: "For the crime of accepting a bribe, we have former judge of Ponyville, Swift Justice, sentenced to a term of indenture not to exceed fifteen years!"
Twilight swallowed hard. She knew that this was the very same judge who'd given her the mineral rights. The strange thing about the laws of Ponyland was that offering bribes was perfectly legal, but accepting them was a crime. Twilight had thought that this one bribe would be the end of her business with this judge, but now that she saw this kindly, aged stallion on the auction block, she knew she had to do something to help him.
"Please!" Swift Justice howled, "I'm not going to live that long! Oh, my wife-my grandchildren, my-!"
"Shut up, you doddering old fool!" the auctioneer bellowed, cracking a cruel whip just by his ears. The terrified groan Swift Justice let out was heartbreaking to hear.
Satisfied he'd be quiet, the auctioneer yelled, "Where shall our bidding start?"
Twilight stepped up, slipped two rubies out of her saddlebag, and shouted at the top of her lungs, "My opening bid is two mountain rubies in exchange for him, all his worldly property and possessions, and his whole family!"
The entire crowd gasped. They knew how valuable those rubies were. For a few moments, there was silence.
Twilight stared at the auctioneer with a steely scowl. Finally, she asked, "Do you accept my bid or not?"
Immediately, the auctioneer pounded his hoof on the block. "Sold to the lady with the rubies!"
Twilight threw the rubies at him and he dropped his whip and dove to catch them.
Just as the slavedrivers were about to shove the judge and his wife and grandchildren at her, she said to them, "STOP! Don't lay a hoof on them!" After another pause, she asked, "I believe this is the part where I get the keys to their chains?"
Without a word, they threw the keys to her, but she batted the keys to Swift Justice without even trying to catch them. She softened her expression, looked at him, and said, "You're free-you, and your family. And your home and your things are yours again."
She stared at the ground, realizing exactly what she had to do, now, if she wanted Ponyville to forgive her. She heard the noise of locks being undone and chains hitting the dirt-perhaps the most wonderful sound in the world-and felt the tearful embrace of the second family that day. She closed her eyes and nuzzled them back, but her mind was on the speech she knew she had to make, right there and then...
After a moment, she lifted her head up, took a deep breath, and shouted, "Everypony...I'm sorry. I've been a horrible jerkface, and I should've known better than to use money to be cruel, when almost everypony in town is struggling to make ends meet. There were about a thousand better ways I could've used that gold coin..." She swallowed hard. "I want you all to know that I am done using money for anything cruel. And...if I have to, I'm going to use the money from my share of my family's new diamond mine to free this town from debt."
The town gasped at this, but Twilight kept talking.
"In my exploring these past two days, I've seen what a town looks like when it's not crushed by poverty. Ponies are free to pursue their dreams, build up their homes and businesses, and the rewards for their hard work and skill go to them, not to anypony else. I want that for Ponyville, and I honestly can't think of anything else that I'd want to spend money on...besides some new raingear," she shuddered. The crowd chuckled a little.
"...But..." Twilight looked at Applejack. "You might not need my help to be free of Filthy Rich. He's committed a crime: attempted murder, and if I know the laws, then that means his assets are frozen-including your debts to him!"
Applejack stepped up next to her old enemy and new friend, and shouted to the crowd, "Filthy Rich knew that if Twilight and Shining Armor came back with diamonds, they'd be able to pay off their family's mortgage...most of you probably already know this, but he'd slapped Section 63 on Night Light and Twilight Velvet, because then if they didn't pay up, then he'd get the mineral rights to the whole cave system. He knew his chances of getting those mineral rights were shot unless he stopped us from coming back, so he had his crony Silver Spoon put a bear musk patch on my back!"
Shining Armor stepped forward and held the patch up, still covered with Applejack's torn-off fur.
"He tried to attract a bear to kill us! He tried to kill three ponies and make slaves of two more, just so he could get richer! He's a murderer, and we officially denounce him here and now!"
The whole town seemed to change in that moment. Their faces grew cold, even distant and machine-like, but one by one they turned towards Filthy Rich's office, picking up anything they could use as a shield or a weapon. Security guards who'd heard Applejack's speech lowered their weapons, or even gave them to other ponies in the mob-perhaps because they knew they were outnumbered, perhaps because they were horrified at their boss's evil and wanted no part of it. Every time Twilight thought about this in the years to come, she could never quite figure out whether what the townsponies did was good or evil, but she knew that good came of it.
At that moment, Silver Spoon looked out the office window and saw the mob forming outside, and saw that Applejack, Shining Armor, and Twilight Sparkle were alive and back with heavy-looking saddlebags-and as soon as she saw the bear musk patch that Shining Armor was holding up, she knew their secret was out. Her face went pale, and she rushed to Filthy Rich's office.
"Sir!" she shouted. "There's a lynch mob forming outside! They know about the bear musk!"
He gave a small sigh and reached for a bottle under his desk. "I knew this might happen someday," he said, setting the bottle on the desk, and reaching for another two glasses, "So...I prepared a little means of escape."
Silver Spoon looked at the bottle, and saw that its label clearly said "Strychnine, Poison" and had a skull and bones on it. She swallowed hard.
He looked up at her and smiled. "Having a means of escaping when things go wrong is how you win," he began to explain, but loud pounding on the other side of his office door interrupted him. "Sorry, no time for our usual banter," he quickly said, pouring the brown liquid into the two glasses. He raised his glass. "Cheers," he said with a grin, and drank it down in one draught, closed his eyes, and slumped in his chair, unmoving.
Silver Spoon was shaking with fear; she knew that the ponies of Ponyville absolutely hated their creditor, and even if they didn't, she'd be facing an attempted murder charge, time in jail awaiting her trial, and most likely a hanging. She had no hope for anything better if she kept living, so she picked up the other glass and drank it down. It certainly tasted like death; it was so horribly bitter. Her last thought was that she was glad she didn't have to live with the awful taste in her mouth for long. As darkness painlessly closed in around her, the last thing she heard was the shattering of her glass on the floor.
The mob found those two seconds later: cold, breathless, and unmoving, with a half-empty bottle labelled as poison on the desk. After several minutes staring at their bodies, the mob slowly walked away with mixed feelings. As sad as it was they hadn't gotten a chance to make their oppressor suffer for everything he'd done to them, they knew: they were free at last! After they left, the servants carried out instructions for what to do with their bodies if this ever happened and carried their bodies to a dark storage room on the ground floor, leaving them in caskets for others to take care of later.
While these things were happening, Twilight wasted no time and took no chances: immediately she and Applejack and Shining Armor took their rubies to Amethyst Star's gem dealership. Amethyst Star didn't have anything like enough money to pay for them all that day, but her vault was the safest place to keep the gems, just the same. She gave Shining Armor the biggest check he'd ever seen in his life, and he knew it was much more than enough to pay what was left of the mortgage. They immediately brought it to the bank and deposited it, paying off the rest of the mortgage (they made sure to get a receipt to prove it had been paid), putting the rest of the money on account-half of it in Night Light's account, and opening an account for Bright Mackintosh to store the rest.
After that, they walked out with pouches full of silver coins to spend on gear at the outfitters. Twilight knew what she wanted, and got another bright tomato-red rain poncho just like her old one, and a bright tomato-red rainsuit to match it. Applejack, despite her tiredness, tried on poncho after poncho, saddlebag after saddlebag, rainhat after rainhat, and rainsuit after rainsuit: bright neon orange, electric blue, deep royal purple, slate gray, deep maroon. Finally she settled on deep forest green raingear with dun-colored saddlebags.
When they saw Shining Armor again, they saw that he'd bought a pair of goggles to keep his eyes dry the next time it rained, an extra poncho, and an impressive military-grade crossbow loaded with paralyzing darts. "The next time I see a bear, I don't want to be helpless," he explained with a grin.
Then, it was, on to a huge celebration lunch at Sweet Apple Acres; they'd earned it!
They carried Big Mackintosh down to the dinner table, and spread it with grilled and sautéed vegetables, steaming rolls fresh out of the oven dripping with butter and honey, fruits and flowers of every kind imaginable, and for dessert, another fresh apple pie, this time served with ice cream! Over this huge lunch, they told their story-a tale of three worlds, four families, broken hearts given a chance to heal, assumptions shattered, friendships allowed to form for the first time, and the bonds of family holding fast, though stretched by years of time and millions of miles of space.
After their tale was done, Big Mackintosh hugged Applejack. "I'm so proud of you, sis! It took a lot of courage to give Twilight back her journal and admit that you'd taken it in the first place!"
Night Light hugged Twilight. "And I'm so proud of you for giving up your most prized possession to help another pony! And for finding a way to make it up to the town for what you did with that gold coin!"
Twilight sighed. "I've spent the last few days wondering what we're going to do with all that money, and I'm still not sure...but I do know one thing: I don't want the money to make me into a cruel pony!"
Twilight Velvet frowned a little. "We've always believed in you, honey, and in your research, but...it's always been in the back of my mind how having a lot of money might change us..."
"If I'm being honest, I don't really want to change," Shining Armor admitted. "I like the way we've been living-exploring in the great outdoors, finding things...even though it'd be normal for Twilight and me to have different rooms or at least different beds if we hadn't been too poor to afford them, I actuallly like being in the same bed with her. It's warmer and...well, you're not alone, so it feels safer."
"Well, then," Night Light grinned, "I hope you won't mind one of the changes me made to it while you were away: there's a brand-new mattress, pillows, sheets and a down comforter."
Twilight's jaw dropped in delight. "Down?! Ohhhh, so warm and cozy! Aw, dad, you shouldn't have!"
He nuzzled her. "Sweetie, you're more than worth it!"
Twilight Velvet kissed her forehead. "You're going to have to get used to having nice things like that, now that you're the richest mare in Ponyville!"
Twilight blushed and hugged her parents back.
Shining Armor blushed a little and looked at Bright Mack and Buttercup. "Please tell me you got a new bed for Applejack and Big Mack, too-I wouldn't want Twilight's rivalry rekindled because Applejack gets jealous!"
They laughed. "The new bed should arrive later this afternoon," Buttercup answered with a smile. "A little more comfort should speed up Big Mack's recovery."
"With the money you gave us for Applejack helping with the carry," Bright Mack explained, "We'll be able to hire some more help around the farm. There's no shortage of ponies looking for good work, and no shortage of good work to be done around here, either."
"About that, dad," Applejack chimed in. "Would it be...okay...if I took a day or two off of work later this week? I know this'll sound weird coming from me, but I'd like to help Twilight and Shining Armor carry more diamonds to Rarity, and get more rubies back."
Their eyes widened. After a moment, Big Mack asked, "More rubies?! Don't you have enough money as it is?!"
Applejack laughed. "Everypony knows there's no such thing as enough money!"
Bright Mack took Applejack's face in his hooves, looked her in the eye, and with a smile and a laugh, said, "Now, don't get this windfall turn you into Filthy Rich!"
Applejack laughed back. "It's not just for the rubies," she admitted, "I'd...like to know what happened to Fluttershy. I'd like to know how Rarity and Zephyr Breeze are doing. I'd even like to know more about Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie; we barely found out anything about them when we went to Cumuland, but we saw enough to know that they're good ponies-I feel like we got off on the wrong hoof with them, but like we should be friends with them..."
Twilight cocked her head. "You know, I had the same feeling..."
"All right; we'll let you go, but only if Twilight and Shining Armor are your guides," Bright Mack insisted.
"Don't worry-we brought your daughter back in one piece once, and we'll do it again!" Shining Armor promised.
"Try not to come back two days late, this time!" Buttercup warned him with a laugh.
Shining Armor blushed again. "Sorry about that...I'm not proud of making you worry-"
"Well, if you're not, I am," Night Light cut in. "You did right by a brave young mare who saved your lives and walked with you to what was the scariest place in the world for her, and you did it right when she most needed your help!"
Shining Armor smiled. "Thanks for seeing it that way, Dad."
Twilight involuntarily belched from her huge meal. She covered her hoof with her mouth and looked around in embarrassment.
After a moment, they all laughed. "Yeah, I can see why you'd be embarrassed by a belch like that," Applejack chuckled. "It wasn't very impressive; you have to project. Like this:" Applejack then belched even louder, and the whole company laughed until it hurt!
Finally, when they couldn't laugh any more, Twilight, Shining Armor, and Applejack went to the bathhouse for a much-needed bubble bath. The steaming hot water felt so good as it carried away all the sweat and dust they'd picked up on their long adventure, and they felt so fresh coming out that they almost weren't tired, anymore...almost.
Shining Armor saw that Twilight had turned her back to Applejack, and was letting Applejack scrub her back. "Hey!" Shining Armor shouted, half-joking and half-indignantly, "I was the one who always scrubbed your back, Twilight!"
At this, the two mares looked at each other, grinned, and forced Shining Armor to turn his back to them, and they vigorously began scrubbing his back. "WHOA!" he shouted. "It's like I have two sisters, now!" he groaned, knowing what would come next. "Watch the sides-WATCH THE SIDES!" he howled, as both of them began scrubbing him at the exact spots on both his sides where he was the most ticklish.
After that, it was a mess of laughter, water, and bubbles, but all three of them came out of it clean as whistles. They said their goodbyes to each other, and trotted home.
Exhausted, they all went to bed early, while it was still mid-afternoon. The brand-new down comforters, brand-new sheets, and soft, brand-new mattresses felt luxuriously warm and soft and clean against their freshly-washed fur, and after almost thirty straight hours of adventuring, it felt like an excellent ending to their muscles.
But it didn't quite feel like an excellent ending to Twilight's heart. "Shining Armor?" Twilight asked.
"Hmm?" Shining Armor groggily answered.
"You think we'll need to pay taxes on all those diamonds and rubies at some point?"
"Probably."
After another pause, Twilight asked, "What do you think is going to happen to Fluttershy?"
"She'll come back. Don't worry. We already talked about this!"
"I know, but I can't stop thinking about it."
"Thinking about it won't make her come back. It won't make you feel any better, either."
Twilight let out a wavering sigh. "Do you think...I should buy another journal?"
"You can if you want."
"I don't know if I want to-!"
"Shhhh," Shining Armor hushed her. "Maybe your mind will be clearer in the morning. Try to sleep."
Trembling, Twilight asked, "Can you...hold me?"
"You don't even need to ask," Shining Armor reminded her.
For a few minutes, that's just what he did. It occurred to him that Fluttershy had needed to be held just as much as Twilight did, and he tried to remain awake for her.
Finally, Twilight said, "I...I just don't know what the future holds, now!"
"Me either," Shining Armor whispered, "But I do know one thing: you won't have to face that future alone. You have parents who care about you and believe in you, and not just parents, but a brother, too." After a pause, he added, "And I think now you've also got a sister."
Seconds after this, Shining Armor felt Twilight's muscles relax, and heard her breathing become slower and much more regular. Knowing that his sister was asleep next to him, he finally allowed himself to fall asleep, too.
It was a dark and stormy night that night in Ponyville. Twilight and Shining Armor slept right through the storm, and didn't even know until morning that it had even been raining. But they never learned that the storm was not a natural one: just as they were falling asleep, there was an awakening elsewhere: Silver Spoon found herself waking up in an open casket that was sitting in a storage room in the basement of their office.
For a brief moment, she wondered whether this was her afterlife-but then it had occurred to her that any poison Filthy Rich would provide for himself would also serve his purposes. Shaking off the feeling of the poison, she asked, "That wasn't really strychnine, was it?"
"No," he answered matter-of-factly, "No, it most certainly wasn't, but I couldn't let the townsponies know that, could I?" He grinned at her.
She couldn't quite bring herself to smile back. "What do we do now?"
"Well...for now, we need to get out of Ponyville."
"Won't somepony recognize us?"
"What makes you think that situation could ever happen?" he asked, rising from his coffin and moving toward a small closet. He unlocked it with a key from his suit-coat pocket, and inside was an assortment of gray raingear. "Shining Armor and his sister aren't the only ones buying from the outfitters," he smirked, handing her a rainsuit with a flap that went over her snout and handing her a huge hooded rain poncho.
"Aren't two layers of raingear overkill?"
"Not for our purposes. The rainsuits hide our faces, the ponchos hide our profiles. We'll want both hidden to conceal our identities."
"But won't these make us even more conspicuous?" she asked, still reluctant to put them on.
"Trust me," he answered as he slipped his hooves into his own rainsuit's sleeves, "Nopony will take much notice of two ponies dressed heavily in raingear-not this afternoon. You see...I'm aware that there are certain...properties of gemstones and crystals. Say the right spell holding one, and you can get some startling effects." He took a cloudy quartz crystal out of the closet, held it in his hoof, and began to recite a spell:
Magic gem with magic might,
Unleash your magic, lovely light!
Let thunderclouds above us form
To drench us with a thunderstorm!
A loud thunderclap shook the bank building, and even in that basement, they could hear lashing rains pounding against the roof and siding. Not missing a beat, Filthy Rich continued, "Actually, one reason why I wanted their diamond mine was so that I could see what effects those diamonds could have..."
"I suppose it's too late for that," Silver Spoon lamented, pulling the first hood up over her head.
He looked at her and smirked. "You underestimate me." He began working at his poncho.
Silver Spoon's jaw dropped. "How can a dead stallion get his hooves on a former creditor's property like that?!"
"My last will and testament bequeaths all my worldly possessions to my identical twin brother Stinking Rich, living in Phillydelphia."
"I didn't know you had an identical twin...brother..." Silver Spoon's jaw dropped.
The last facial expression Silver Spoon saw on his face before he snapped his faceguard flap in place was his biggest smirk yet.
"...You're bequeathing it all to yourself?!"
"Essentially."
Silver Spoon was absolutely speechless for a few moments. Seeing that she wasn't moving, he began to dress her in her rain poncho, apparently still smiling under his hood flap. Finally, Silver Spoon asked, "But...but what about me?!"
"Unfortunately, this is where you and I need to part company. My twin brother is plausible enough, but if you had a twin sister too, working for him-well, it'd look too suspicious, I'm afraid. Fortunately," he added, opening a hidden safe inside the closet, "You won't be going away empty-hoofed." He produced two sacks of gold coins-Silver Spoon knew that each coin was work ten weeks of a blue-collar worker's wages, and with dozens, if not hundreds of coins in the sack, knew she'd be well-provided-for. She could probably even start her own company with that money.
She slung a sack over her back underneath her poncho, out of sight. "But what happens when somepony sees that the caskets are empty?"
"They won't," Filthy Rich assured her closing the caskets and locking them with another key. "The instructions I left the staff here in the event that something like this happened were to leave myself and any other deceased employees in caskets in this room, and told them there would already be arrangements made with a mortician. With the caskets shut and locked, they'll think our bodies are inside, ready for a swift, quiet burial-I made sure they were heavy caskets, even without bodies inside them. Even the pallbearers won't realize they're empty."
"There are still a few things I don't get," she persisted. "Now that you've been denounced as a murderer, won't your assets be frozen-won't Stinking Rich have nothing to inherit?"
"My attorneys will see to it that isn't a problem. You placed the patch, after all-I would have plausible deniability in court."
Silver Spoon swallowed hard, wondering whether she had only been a patsy all along-but quickly decided that, even if she was, he was compensating her well. "But...you'd still be an accessory to murder, wouldn't you?"
"Not really. An accessory to murder stands to gain something from a murder. Since they came back with their diamonds and paid down the debt, what did I actually gain?"
"...You are good!"
"Thank you."
With that, Silver Spoon set out to seek her fortune somewhere in the wide world of Ponyland, and Filthy Rich to regain his own fortune, both of them trudging out into a dark and stormy night.
It was also a dark and stormy night in Canterlot that night. In the foyer of a gems dealership and jewelry studio stood a damp open umbrella, drying. On a peg above this umbrella hung a dripping beige trench coat, and next to it hung a dripping tomato-red rain poncho. On a small desk nearby sat a shiny journal, sitting open. In it there was a letter:
Dear Twilight Sparkle-
Thank you.
I never felt myself connect with another pony like I did when I read your journal, and Applejack's letter in it. I've been able to connect with lots of animals, but never another pony!
After I read everything-your experiences, the letters from you and Rarity and Shining Armor...I knew I wanted to come back home. It took all my courage to do it, just like it took all your courage to go back up on the mountain after your brother almost died, and like how it took all his courage when you almost died. But here I am.
Thank you for teaching me that I always wanted a family, and I hope I get to see you again soon.
Oh-and before I forget, Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie are the pegasus ponies who helped me while I was in Cumuland. They say they're sorry for threatening you, and that we all got off on the wrong hoof, and that they hope that they can be friends with you someday.
This is Zephyr Breeze; Fluttershy dictated her letter to me, as she's entirely forgotten how to write since she ran away from home.
Words fail me. I can't thank you enough! You've not only made this household one of the richest in Canterlot, but also one of the happiest!
Fluttershy's journey to recovery is likely to be as difficult and long as your journey to find your diamond cave; I expect there will be false leads, dead ends, frightening moments, and many treasures found sporadically along the way, just like your adventure has been. But it's a journey she's finally begun, and it will finally lead her right back to where she started: home!
I can't wait to return to you your most prized possession; you've more than earned it.
The rest of the pages in that journal remained blank, still waiting for ink to touch them and tell more stories.
It was also a dark and stormy night in Cumuland. Two figures sat on a mountain, hunched over with their backs to the rain. One wore a large rubber raincoat and a rainhat with a large brim that caught the rainwater and held it, looking like an overflowing fountain. The other wore nothing.
Teeth chattering in the cold as rivers of ice-cold rainwater flowed over every inch of her, with one wing fruitlessly trying to shield her head from the deluge and another wing fruitlessly wrapped around her sides to keep herself warm, Rainbow Dash complained, "Let's become explorers ourselves, you said! Nimbus Mountain is just like Rainbow Mountain, you said! I bet there's diamonds inside, you said! Let's trade take them to Rarity and trade them up for emeralds, you said! We'll be even richer, you said!"
"I also said you should take a rain slicker!" Pinkie Pie answered.
"I told you before: I wouldn't want to be seen dead in a rain slicker!"
"And I told you that the whole point of a rain slicker is so that you don't catch pneumonia, and then you live!"
"I...refuse...to be...cute!" Rainbow Dash growled through gritted teeth.
"But we could've gotten you a rain slicker that looks awesome! How about a black one?"
"I told you before: I wouldn't want to be seen dead in a rain slicker!"
"And I told you that the whole point of a rain slicker is so that you don't catch pneumonia, and then you live! ...Is it just me, or is this whole conversation going around in circles?"
"GRAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!"