It was a delightful fall day, the colors warming towards dusk, as Applejack cantered along the path toward home, alongside the borders of the Everfree Forest. It would be nice to settle down and unwind, she thought, after (o’ course) taking out the trash, feeding the chickens, checking on the watering troughs, moving a couple sacks of grain from the barn to the larder, and making dinner for Granny Smith. The sturdy earth pony sagged a bit, but didn’t slow her pace—this was usual, after all. Every day was like this, and she insisted to herself that it was soothing, and not just wearying…

Her ear twitched. Was that—a shriek? It was real faint, but…

Applejack slowed her pace, coming to a halt. The air whispered through the foreboding trees. The stillness settled, the breeze moaned—and then, again: a shriek.

Fluttershy!

Applejack didn’t hesitate. She turned and began cantering into the forest, slowly at first, listening with her ears perked and twisting this way and that—casting back and forth, staring into the spooky shadows.

Another sound! But this time, not a shriek. It was like Fluttershy, but it was more of a moan—perhaps she was imagining things? Applejack cantered forward, hesitantly, peering around trees.

She entered a clearing—and froze, horrified, discovering the cause of the mysterious sounds as another soft breathy shriek wafted through the air.

Fluttershy stood in the middle of the clearing, her legs braced forward and her stance wide, and upon her was an unmistakable pony—the light-blue, rainbow-tailed pony of Applejack’s dreams—Rainbow Dash.

Dash, straddling the shy yellow pegasus. Dash, whose lean hips worked rhythmically, whose wings flapped, beating the air with excitement. Dash, whose body contorted in orgasmic spasms, who shoved something deeper in the paroxysm of her release, provoking a wild squeal from the apparently lust-maddened Fluttershy—Dash, acting out one of Applejack’s darkest, most impossible fantasies before the earth pony’s horrified, fascinated eyes.

Yet how could this possibly be? Applejack watched them shudder to a halt—and choked back a sob.

Fluttershy’s head hung limply in post-coital dazedness, but at the sound, her ear flicked up in her panicky way, and before Applejack could think what to do, the yellow pegasus had looked around, and her huge fearful eyes caught Applejack’s and held them.

“Oh, NO!”

“Now what?” panted Dash. There seemed to be something in her mouth. “Uh, srrry if it got a lil’ lively, mmkay? I just felt like…”

“No!” cried Fluttershy. “We have… company…”

At this, Dash’s head shot bolt upright, and she glanced around and quickly spotted Applejack, her eyes going wide—and indeed, there was something in her mouth. It looked like a little bit, as one would find in a harness, and it glowed. It was a familiar glow, too, a glow not easily forgotten by residents of Ponyville. The glow said, Great And Powerful Trixie, to anyone who had seen the color—in other words, to all residents of Ponyville.

“…’pplej’ck!” stammered Rainbow Dash, the bit still in her teeth.

Applejack’s eyes flooded with tears. “Ah’ll be going now, don’t you mind me…”

“No, wait!” managed Rainbow Dash. “L’k… look, y’ gotta look!”

She hopped off Fluttershy’s back, and swung around. Applejack didn’t know whether to flee or stare. Stare won… as Dash reared, grinning around the bit, kicking the air with her forehooves as a stallion’s pride swung and bobbled under her, glistening with Fluttershy’s pleasures.

Applejack’s heart nearly stopped. How many times had she stayed up too late, done with her chores at last, needing to sleep for the next day’s work but unable to rest, clopping until she was exhausted with that one thought—what if her secret love, Rainbow Dash, was a boy? She’d even managed it more than once, just imagining them together while both still mares—but the big fantasy, the one she’d never confess, was this and this alone. It had doubtless colored her everyday times spent with Dash. She’d fawned over the trim little athlete as if she WAS her stallion, something Dash had never objected to. But she’d known all along that it couldn’t be more than yearning and adoration, and that had always sufficed.

And now this?

Dash had stopped prancing. The gleaming blue ponycock drooped under her, and she stared hard at Applejack, picking up on the horror, the dismay, and not liking what she saw.

“You’re s’POSED to LIKE it,” she said, petulantly.

“Oh, gawd, Dashie, you really are gay…” managed Applejack.

“What?” squeaked Dash, around the bit. “Doesn’t count! Wings weren’t touching! It’s just fun! You know—FUN?”

Applejack leaked tears. “Ah will be going now…”

“No! I don’t want you to! I need you to be here!”

Fluttershy had seemed to shrink in on herself. “I think it’s me who needs to be going… th-thank you, Rainbow Dash, I really did need that though I’m afraid I only caused a lot of trouble…”

Dash turned on Fluttershy. “You WERE a lot of trouble! Why wouldn’t you do anything for me? You think I like being like this, huh? You think just because I can kick ass like a boy, I must just be a boy?”

At this, Fluttershy bridled. “I am so sorry. I couldn’t. No! It wouldn’t be safe, at all.”

“Says you!”

Fluttershy was totally unpersuaded. “It wouldn’t! You were being unreasonable. And it was horrible, just horrible! Don’t ever mention it to me again, okay? I just want to pretend that never happened.” She shuddered, her eyes haunted. “That shouldn’t even be possible.”

Dash looked frustrated. “I still think I could’ve…”

“NO, Rainbow Dash,” said Fluttershy, in her no-arguments voice.

Applejack hadn’t left. In part it was seeing her friends in conflict—and part of it was the powerful and unfair craving that flooded her body, being so near Stallion Dash. It was unbearable to think that it was Fluttershy who got to take him for a ride, and not the earth pony who’d fantasized about that moment for years. Applejack’s hurt pride was crumbling, weakened by an onslaught of erotic pressure that had been pent up with no outlet, and she considered fleeing as fast as she could gallop, for she could feel deep between her legs that she would soon be begging Dash for a taste, on any terms, whether she could live with her shame or not.

Dash’s gaze flicked back to Applejack, and her eyes widened, reading all too well the conflict and hurt. “Uh, yeah, so Applejack, I really wanted you to be here. I’ll show you why. I bet you’re wondering what this thing in my teeth is?”

Applejack didn’t answer. She stared out of the corner of her wide, panicky eyes, on the verge of flipping out.

“I’ll just leave you girls alone with this, okay?” said Fluttershy. “I am so, so sorry, in every way… well, not in every way, but you know what I mean? I’ll… I’ll just be going…” With that, she slunk off, her gait a little unsteady and dreamy, as if she’d been left awfully satisfied. Applejack’s eyes took in every detail, and returned to Rainbow Dash, full of hurt and shock.

Dash didn’t hesitate. “Hey AJ—catch!”

Before Applejack could think, the little cylinder was flying through the air at her. She had no time to do anything but snap at it—and she caught it in her teeth, biting it out of the air just as Dash had intended. And if her eyes had been wide before, they just about popped out, then.

A surge of magic flooded her, that seemed to grab at her insides and seek out every bit of quivering yearning she had for Dash’s stallion-ness, and change it. Applejack couldn’t breathe as she felt her body transforming, a turgid mass gathering, extending, swelling in a flow of herself outward into something that responded to the sight of Rainbow Dash by urgently hardening and projecting hungrily under her belly.

Applejack’s eyes were frantic. “Oh, sweet Celestia, Ah’m a dude. Dashie, what the hell is this?”

Dash pranced up. She frisked around in a circle, and Applejack could see, smell, just about feel her femaleness—the bit was gone, and Rainbow Dash was all tomboy and no boy now. She smirked, and faced Applejack, body low, rump wiggling as if to pounce, tail swishing the air.

“Trixie was a little pervert. I dug through the wreckage of her cart, and you wouldn’t believe the stuff I found. I’ll never look at a rope the same way again, I’ll tell you that—and the pictures, wow! And then there was this. Trixie was a lesbian!” sang Dash, playfully. “Betcha didn’t see that one coming!”

“But…” said Applejack, flushing red.

“And when I picked up this little toy, whoa! I never clopped off like THAT before! It was crazy! But I knew what I wanted. Except dumb Fluttershy chickened out on me!”

“Seem like she DIN’T…” snapped Applejack.

“Oh, that! I told you, wings weren’t touching…”

“And what was the problem? Seems like you weren’t havin’ no problem!” Applejack huffed in exasperation, and then her eyes went from annoyance to shock as her erection bounced up and slapped her lightly on the belly.

Dash’s wings quivered, and she bit her lip and tried to peek under Applejack’s body. “Whoa, do that again…”

“I am waitin’ for an ANSWER,” stated Applejack, her quick anger gratefully embraced as a refuge from the embarrassment and awkward questions that might be asked of her.

“I told you! I wanted to take it for a test-fly, and Fluttershy happened to be around…”

“And you screwed her six ways from Sunday, din’tcha?”

“She wouldn’t do me,” grumbled Rainbow Dash. “That’s what I wanted. I was being nice. And she was good enough to come out here, all this way. Come on, haven’t you ever had her pleading with you? It’s like impossible to say no.”

Applejack blinked. “I seem to remember somethin’ about that. Y’all got in each other’s grills pretty good there, I don’t usually see Fluttershy insist. What the hay was her problem?”

“Remember the Poison Joke that we got?”

“Ah do… Oh! You mean it was…”

“It was.”

“Y’all wanna give me a lil’ hint about it?” said Applejack, ears coming forward in full attention. There were stallions, and then there were STALLIONS, after all. The idea of a nearby super-stallion gave Applejack a quiver, even in her artificially male form.

Dash’s expression was sulky. “She might have been right. I guess there’s no way she wasn’t right. Whoof! I’m still insulted. She said I was too little! I am a mare, dammit! I am not a filly! Seriously—is THAT too little?”

With that, she frisked about, and presented Applejack with her taut, trim rump—and the earth pony’s shocked gaze was suddenly taking in Rainbow Dash’s pert vag, right up close. “Dashie! Y’all stop that!”

“Oh, no! Not you too! You are NOT going to leave me hanging here, not you!”

“But it’s… lady parts, Dashie!” Applejack’s heart pounded, and her eyes were wide again. She’d protested automatically, but her heart was in her throat, because there was one thing she could not deny—the close look at excited Dash’s treasure had hit her harder than she would have believed. Her stallionhood responded, going achingly, numbingly hard under her, and she could not tear her eyes from the prize, as much as she desperately wanted to tell herself she had no interest in such fillyfooling. Dashie looked exquisite.

Dash looked around, then frisked in another half-circle and peered under Applejack again. “Whoof!”

“Y’all cut that out!” sobbed Applejack. “It’s confusin’!”

“What’s so confusing?” said Dash. “Look at you. Or, well… okay, you take MY word for it, because I looked at you. Come on, you’ve got to give that to me. Ya chicken? Ya don’t think I’ll feel good?”

“It ain’t that…”

Dash flicked her tail under Applejack’s nose. “Don’tcha love me?”

“PLEASE stop!”

At that, Dash froze. She turned, to look first skeptically, and then with concern, at her friend. “Applejack… it’s not that at all, huh?”

Applejack shook her head, eyes glistening, and Dash moved up to nuzzle her chin.

“Tell me. Come on. It’s not that you don’t love me, it’s that…?”

Applejack’s eyes were stricken. “It’s that… Ah do love you.” She spat the bit out upon the ground. “An’ I’m a mare!” And, she was, again, just like that.

Dash’s eyes were closed as she nuzzled her friend. “But you silly, I knew that part already. I knew you were a mare. Never stopped me before.”

“But… oh, Dashie! How can I face myself? Y’all don’t hate me? I am so ashamed, and so sorry…”

“Hey!” squeaked Dash. She glanced around, and whispered, “I love you back. Numbskull.”

“But… the gaaay, Dashie! The gay.”

“Hel-LO! No wings, so wings aren’t touching. So it can’t be gay. Ha.”

“But… but Dashie, I love you so hard, how can it not be gay? I’m a damn fillyfooler. I… I liked the look of you, there.” Applejack gulped, at that admission.

“Then why’d you hold out on me? Do you know how horny I get? Trixie’s magic thing is right there, you know what to do!”

“Well…” said Applejack, and just blushed redder, and redder, and redder.

Rainbow Dash’s face fell. “You wanted what I gave Fluttershy. Didn’t you?”

“Oh, lord, Dashie, yes. Oh, please?”

Dash sat, staring levelly at Applejack, as the larger pony shuffled from hoof to hoof, cherry-red, her eyes imploring and pleading. Finally, with a flutter of her wings, she spoke.

“I do love you, Applejack. I love you as much as I love ANY pony… no, more! And I promise, I’m going to take care of you. I will turn into a stallion for you, and I will ball you until you beg for mercy and trot funny for days.”

Applejack’s face lit up—and Dash’s forehoof came down in a fierce stomp.

“And you’re still gonna do me FIRST!”

“Oh my gosh, Dashie! You will? Uh… I gotta?” protested Applejack. “You looked to be awful good at it…”

Rainbow Dash’s expression was petulant. “I’m good at everything. It’s athletic. That’s why I want you. In Cloudsdale, I played around, and guys just don’t have the stamina. Sometimes it takes me a long time to get off… I want a stallion who doesn’t spurt in five seconds, no matter what I do. I want one who doesn’t want to be somewhere else five seconds after that. I’ve been with you for years, and I know what you’re like. I want you. But with a cock. Trixie’s magic thing is right over there.”

“Don’t y’all need to warm up a little? Should I… I dunno… be doin’ anything, romantic-like? Ah ain’t exactly an expert on fillies…”

“Oh, please, Applejack—why do you think it’s you I want? Why do you think it’s you I love? I don’t want any of that filly crap! Is it me that you love, or some fluff-brain weakling that just LOOKS like me?”

“It is you! It’s only you!”

“Fine,” said Dash, challengingly. “Show me.”

Applejack’s eyes were wide, vulnerable—but then, the expression slowly changed, as a smile crept onto her face, turned into a grin, then a mad gleeful grin that Applejack couldn’t stop making.

“You’re on. Oh, Dashie… you are SO on. Y’all come HERE, girl, right now.”

Dash hopped up and pranced over, unhesitatingly, to nestle against Applejack, her slim body pressing against her in all its supple aliveness. She pawed at the ground, and not randomly—the magical bit rolled over, deftly summoned by the cerulean pony’s clever hoof.

“Why, you greedy thing,” chuckled Applejack, stroking Dash’s elegant flank and embracing her. More than ever, Applejack marveled at the feel of the blue pegasus. Dash never entirely relaxed—her coltish body held an endearing awkwardness, a slight tenseness as if she was always about to leap away in some direction, even as she nestled against Applejack and quivered with desire.

“I told you, AJ,” said Dash. “Do you know how long it’s been?” She playfully butted her pert rump against Applejack’s belly, causing a gasp. “I could take you right now, I’m so horny.”

“Ain’t either of us horny,” teased Applejack.

“Am too!”

“You’re wingy, not horny. An’ I’m clingy—but for you I’ll be jes’ dicky.”

“Get oonnn with it!” moaned Dash, and wriggled lewdly against Applejack, who drew in a startled breath. “Y’all fixin’ to get me off even without a dick, pony girl!”

“For the love of Celestia get ON with it!” begged Dash. Applejack felt twitches of pegasus rump against her, and her eyes widened as she realized her beloved was ‘winking’ spastically while still pressed to her body.

“Oh my. That what I think it is?”

Dash groaned, eyes crossing, and began to pant.

Applejack raised her chin proudly. “To the rescue!” she proclaimed. “Mah precious love! Ah knows what you need!” She flipped the bit up into the air and clamped it between her teeth in one fierce bite. Dash squealed, feeling something thrust against her—and Applejack rolled away, and leapt to her feet, rampant.

“Git up! Assume the po-sition, pony girl!”

Rainbow Dash stared for just a moment, frozen in shock like all her fantasies had come true at once, and she couldn’t even breathe… her pupils insanely dilated, her face all eyes and dropped jaw… and then with a squeal of “ohmygoshohmygoshOHMYGOSH!” she bounced to her feet, and rushed to stand directly in front of Applejack, facing away, her body quivering and her pert vag winking in frantic staccato.

Applejack strode forward a step. She reached out with a forehoof, and thumped Dash’s butt right behind the cutie mark, rewarded by the immediate reaction of the blue pegasus—a strangled squeal, more shuddering, the lovely rainbow tail flicking urgently to the side, and a delectable glisten springing out from that cute vagina.

“Y’all ready?” teased Applejack, her breath coming hard and heavy as well. A maddened scream of pegasus lust was the only reply—and Applejack reared, came forward, and her forelegs went around Dash’s body and held.

“Stop saying ‘yay’ and FUCK me!” pleaded Rainbow Dash. Applejack blinked. “But I din’t… oh, never mind, hold on!”

With that, her powerful hips began to shift, the magical stallionhood sticking rigidly out from between her legs, waggling around madly as the earth pony tried to do what even natural males sometimes found tricky—in the height of passion, find that spot on a frantic, wriggling filly, with no hands to direct—and with more than a foot between the base of the waggle, and the end of the hard-on.

“Pleeeeeease!”

“I got it!” protested Applejack, gritting her teeth on the bit and struggling to aim. She butted against Dash’s rump, rammed her mons firmly and provoked a dizzy shriek—and then, on the third try, Applejack felt something she had never imagined feeling before.

She felt the end of her cock wedge into the deliciously taut, silky-slick vag of Rainbow Dash, whose body stiffened instantly in utter shock. Dash was tight as hell, what with her agitation, and what she’d seen of Applecock had been bountiful—but now, Dash felt it, and her heart leapt to her throat. AJ made for a big boy, and Dash knew instantly she had been a foolish, foolish mare.

Applejack snorted. “Course I’ll be careful, my precious love! Who do you think Ah am?”

Dash couldn’t speak, even to protest that she hadn’t said anything. She felt Applejack’s forelegs hug her more tenderly, stroke her sides, felt Applejack’s nose nuzzling her wings—how could she know what that did to a pegasus? Dash’s heart pounded as that nose, exhaling passionate hot breaths, traced out all the way to nuzzle the very pinions of her wings lovingly, and just as that arousal began to fill her senses—she felt the powerful hips against her, felt that stallion cock sliding and wedging with deliberate slowness more and more deeply into her quivering body.

All Dash could do was squeak, hoarsely, as her eyes rolled back in her head, and the strong forelegs held her firmly as the stallionhood thrust deep.

“Ohhh, my…” breathed Applejack. “Oh, my…”

Dash fought for a proper breath. She felt like her eyes were popping out, and no wonder—she’d been aching for stallion, but this was something else. Applejack throbbed inside her like she’d taken one of the surrounding trees, and was about as hard, and wasn’t backing off in a hurry—she carefully pressed with firm judiciousness until she felt that she had penetrated her pegasus lover to her very uttermost depths, and then lingered, with gentle, insistent pushes, caressing Dash’s body with her forelegs as those powerful hindquarters did their tender work.

Rainbow Dash just about fainted, right there. Her wings flapped madly, her hooves kicked the ground, and she stared up at the trees with wild, mad eyes, unfocused on anything beyond the sensations that flooded her, the massive loving force that transfixed her yearning body and gave such powerful, sweet nudges to her insides, in a steady, unhurried rhythm, and Dash got a breath and gave tremulous voice…

“Oh goooood…”

Applejack’s eyes were half lidded, her attention split—a huge part of her was simply blissing out, caressing Dash’s tense little frame, still feeling that adorable coltish awkwardness and overcome with emotion to be fondling her love so openly. Then, there was another huge part of her, that never was meant to be a part of her but suddenly was—and Applejack found that overwhelming as well, that strange hard urgent thing, that felt so damn good plunged deeply into Dashie. It felt so right, so very right. She wasn’t sure what the hell it meant, or how much you were a fillyfooler if you were a dude—surely vag worshipping counted differently if you were doing it with a cock? Whatever—Applejack felt swept along by the sensation, and with delight, she felt a growing ease and suppleness to the tight little vagina she explored.

She could feel it on her new stallionhood—those tender nudges (or perhaps she didn’t know her own strength—yes, best watch out for that!) were causing beloved Dashie to melt and croon, the cerulean mare’s pussy softening and grasping with less teeth-gritting tightness, slickening around her new appendage. It was becoming so easy to move. Dash was shuddering with pleasure, panting.

“Goooood, oh gooood…”

Applejack hung onto the magic bit, and shifted her feet a mite. Seemed like it was safe to take it up a notch—surely Rainbow Dash expected it of her. Applejack began to withdraw further, the motion covering more inches, always ending with that firm, determined nudge up to the farthest she could reach. She felt that there was still length to her that hadn’t been wettened in Dashie, but not being a real stallion, she wasn’t sure what you did about that. Memory stirred—oh, right, ram it in like a colt’s first fuckin’ and blow your load in ten seconds. To hell with that! Dashie deserved so much more than that.

Dash heaved great shuddering breaths as she felt Applejack’s thick stallionhood begin to move in earnest, tugging almost halfway out, then shoving urgently to her depths again, and again. It was just like getting a wild ride from an excited stallion—but slower, so much slower and more tender, and yet there was a strength there—oh, how there was, the stallionhood kept plunging with deliberate pace as if nothing could ever stop it.

“Oh, Applejack, goood, goood!”

The earth pony gritted her teeth on the bit. Her eyes flared. Her hat had fallen off, and her blonde mane spilled disheveled over her neck as she clung to Dash’s body and worked her new prize in Dash’s increasingly frantic marehood. And Applejack’s eyes widened more—as she felt her body, impossibly, release.

“Goooood, oh good, don’t stop ohhh!”

Applejack’s eyes were wild and panicky as she felt something pump between her legs, squirting through the stiff appendage she’d never been born with, and into her beloved. She gritted her teeth harder, and let her thrusts grow a little wilder, her head filled with the silent plea, ‘Don’t you give out on me now!’

Dash was losing her pony mind. She could no longer see straight, and couldn’t tell if Applejack had blown a load into her, or if it was just the way her insides felt while the earth pony churned her into pegasus butter, in maddening, ecstatic slow-motion. Dash kicked at the ground again and shrieked.

“Goood! Oh good! Yes!”

Applejack clung to her frantic lover, hanging in there, and not slackening her thrusts even as her body threatened to wobble, or fall over. It was beyond pleasure or pain, for her—had she pulled out upon orgasm, it would have been pleasure unmatched, but while she persisted, her body somehow continued to orgasm, the sensations climbing up the scale to the indescribable, just as they seemed to be doing for Dash, who was on the verge of howling with lust and whose wings flapped madly as if invoking a tornado around them.

“AH!”

Dash’s body jolted, her pert vag delivering a sharp clench against the inexorable thrusting Applejack continued to deliver.

“YES!”

Again, the little pegasus was rocked with a bolt from the blue, again the earth pony didn’t let up or alter her pace in the slightest. Sweat dripped from her nose, and her eyes were fierce as she kept herself going.

“GYAAAAH!”

A circular flash burst forth as Dash’s body bucked under Applejack’s. It was just a small one, dissipating quickly, and it had rainbow colors. Applejack managed a “The…?” with the last remnants of her breath, and then just hung on to her beloved, pressing the stallionhood deep and savoring her reward—for Rainbow Dash cried out breathlessly and her body jolted and shook, her pegasus vag convulsing on Applejack’s member in a sustained madness of clenches and shocks that amazed the simple earth pony.

My heavens, thought Applejack—I don’t think I ever did come that hard—my sweet darling… and she hung on as the orgasm peaked, sustained, and began to subside, only to be totally shocked, for rather than going limp and sated her beloved Rainbow Dash kicked and bucked underneath her—crying out inarticulate joys—and bolted forward, leaving Applejack to thump to the ground!

The bit fell out of Applejack’s mouth when her mouth fell open in shock, and the hard stallion cock that had been first yanked from pegasus vag with a quick slurp and then scrunched against the dirt, evaporated as if it had never existed, leaving only a wet patch on Applejack’s belly and the ground. She looked up in disbelief, to see a series of blue streaks that whipped the tree branches of the forest, mad arcs of over-energized flight that took shapes and curlicues she’d never seen, and she heaved a deep, wavering breath. Some forest creature fled with an ‘oh my!’, but Applejack didn’t spare a thought about that.

If this was love, so be it—she could watch her beloved make pretty pictures in the air—prob’ly was her own fault for fuckin’ too good, and it surely meant that Dash was happy.

Then, before she could draw another breath, the streak rocketed towards her, and suddenly there stood Dash, lit up like Applejack had never seen, panting, her eyes luminous and a bit crazy, her smile likewise, and Applejack felt her own grin coming on to match it.

A grin that doubled, painfully, as Rainbow Dash jumped on her and cuddled like a puppy, trembling with obvious joy and adoration and trying to press her whole coltish body against Applejack’s.

“I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you…”

“You… you did whut? A sonic rain-gasm? That whut that was?”

“I love you I love you I love you I…..” Dash gasped in a huge breath. “love you I love you I…”

“Whoa, Dashie! Breathe! Funny, I was just thinkin’ the same thing…”

Dash dutifully took a few more measured breaths, her eyes dancing and gleaming with delight. She resumed, half as loud and half as fast, “love you I love you I love you I…” and then burst out into peals of squeaky, adorable laughter.

“Ah love you more,” teased Applejack.

“I love you most!”

“Y’all love JUST only me?” challenged Applejack.

This stopped Dash for half a second. “I love you best!”

“Hmmm. I love you faithful. What do you say to that, missy?” said Applejack.

“I love you always!” squeaked the quivering, ecstatic rainbow pegasus.

“Well… I love you for ALL my heart. Hmm?”

Rainbow Dash drank in the sight of the exhausted, loving earth pony once more—and then snuggled up against her, smaller awkward coltish pegasus body pressed against her best and most cherished lover—the one who’d seemed impossible to ever have.

“I love you forever,” she breathed, her eyes closing in complete trust, her body finally melting against Applejack’s with complete ease.

Applejack was silent for a moment, holding Dash to her, and then a tear came to her eye, a sweet tear, for what was there to be bitter about—really?

“I love you for yourself,” she said. “An’ I always will, no matter what.”

Rainbow Dash—and then Applejack—slept.