Mommy carries you to the dining room, where the chefs are starting to bring out platters of food. Spike is already seated at the long table, shooting you a quick scowl as you trot past before quickly returning to his normal cheerful demeanour as Twilight smiles at him.

You didn’t even know there were chefs in the castle, you simply figured that Spike did all of the cooking seeing as he always made you food back when you were a human. Mommy must have told the chefs not to cook for you as one of your many punishments.

You breathe in the delicious scent of the food. A pony’s sense of smell was much better than a human’s, letting you fully enjoy the delectable scent of roasted veggies. Mommy sets you next to her as she sits between you and Spike, you notice that your seat has had some kind of padding on it to raise you up so you can see the food placed in front of you.

The chef places in front of you a unique set of cutlery, taking away the metal knife and fork and replacing it with a plastic, rubbery set made for foals still learning how to grip and use cutlery without the potential to hurt themselves.

You blush a little and glare up at Mommy, “I-I don’t need these!” you tell her, prompting her to giggle softly.

“It’s okay to need a little help, I’m sure you’ll grow out of them before long!” she says. “Now, eat up!”

Huffing, you turn to your plate and pick up the knife and fork in your hooves. Upon closer inspection, you can see that the food has been cut up for you, the long roasted carrots chopped into neat, bite-sized pieces and the potatoes into quarters. You inspect the rest of the vegetables available to you, finding pumpkin, broccoli and silverbeet had all been made filly-sized upon what you can only assume was Mommy’s request.

The only thing stopping you from complaining is your ravenous hunger, driving you to quickly stab one of the gravy-coated carrot chunks and pop it into your mouth.

Like your previous meal made by Spike, the taste explodes on your taste buds. The taste of the rosemary-roasted carrots sends shivers down your spine. You greedily gobble down more and more of your meal, scattering specks of stray food around your mouth as you clumsily shovel food into your face, basking in the ecstasy of having each bite taste even better than the last.

Mommy smiles at you, “Somepony was hungry!” she says as she paces herself to eat her food respectfully and princess-like. You smile up at her, your plate totally clean of every morsel of food. She wipes your face with a cloth, making sure your mouth is cleared of the debris from the attack on your plate. 

The taste of gravy still lingers on your tongue, letting you savour your wonderous meal as much as possible as you sat back in your chair and let your food settle in your stomach.

After both Mommy and Spike finish eating, the chefs return and remove the dirty dishes for cleaning. A pony with a very large ‘head chef’ badge stitched into her white uniform approached the three.

“Now, what would we like for dessert, Princess Twilight has instructed us that the newest member of the royal family is to choose whatever she wants,” the pony tells you, giving you a soft, kind smile.

Anything you wanted? Your first instinct is to order a Scottish cream affogato, but you know Mommy would never allow you to indulge in alcohol, and you aren’t sure that your filly body can handle any sort of liquor.

“I want a banana split with caramel ice cream and cherries on top!” you say. Mommy shoots you an expectant look, prompting you to think about what you said and add a quick ‘please’ to your statement, making Mommy nod approvingly.

The mare hangs her head a little, “I suppose you got a lot of time to look at the other colts and fillies in Manehattan with their desserts, huh…” she mutters, her tone sorrowful and apologetic. 

Her expression brightens as she looks back up. “Then that is what you shall have! Three banana splits with caramel ice cream and cherries on top, coming right up!” she exclaims, turning and holding her head high as she trots out of the room.

“Poor filly…” she mutters again as she rounds the corner and heads to the kitchen to prepare dessert.

You recall the story Mommy had told to explain your sudden appearance, remembering that you will have to play along at school tomorrow to make sure nopony gets suspicious. You hope you can pull it off, yet one more thing to add to the stress of starting school all over again.

It isn’t long before the chefs return with your requested dessert, they made the banana split almost exactly as you had imagined it, with as many large rolls of caramel ice cream stuffed into the banana as was possible without having it break. On top of the impressively-sized dessert is a squiggle of chocolate sauce and a few shiny weird cherries.

“Please enjoy, Princess,” the head chef says as she personally sets the split in front of you. You get a better look at her badge, which has her name written on it. It seems she is called ‘Gourmet Palette’

“What do we say, Hornet?” Mommy prompts.

“Thank you, Miss Palette!” you say, smiling up at the mare, who beams back at you with pride.

“Don’t thank me yet, you don’t know if it tastes good or not yet!”

You intend to find out, taking the spoon (which again wasn’t a real spoon but a plastic training spoon) that came with the split and digging into the soft dessert. As soon as you feel it on your tongue, you know that you’re in for the best dessert of your life.

It bursts with flavour, making you instinctively squeal with happiness as you gulp it down. You quickly ruin Mommy’s work cleaning your face of your main meal, your green facial fur taking on a slight orange tint as stray ice cream drips from around your mouth.

You let out a quick burp as you finish off the split, letting Mommy clean your face once more.

“Alright, let’s get you ready for bed, and then you can play until bedtime, alright?” she says, lifting you from your seat and setting you down before trotting off in the direction of the bathroom.

You follow behind, stepping up on the stool that Mommy placed in front of the sink to allow you to access the basin. The regular toothbrush you used to use has been replaced with a pink one with a grip much like the cutlery you were forced to use in the dining room.

Mommy squeezes a slither of ‘candy-flavored’ toothpaste onto it before letting you pick it up and begin scrubbing your teeth. Your pony mouth is still unfamiliar to your human-trained hoof, making you somewhat fumble to really reach all of the nooks and crannies of your maw.

Noticing you struggle, Mommy gently takes the toothbrush from you in her magic and tilts your chin up a little. You stare into her eyes as she carefully brushes your teeth for you. She smiles down at you kindly, humming a little tune as she works.

After she finishes polishing your teeth, she lifts you into a bath she’s run for you. The warm water is just the right temperature and instantly causes you to relax. Tension melts away from your muscles as Mommy begins to scrub you clean.

“Are you excited to go to school tomorrow?” she asks you.

“Yeah!” you lie.

“If you ever feel like it’s too much, Mommy will come pick you up, okay?”

You nod in understanding, lounging in the water. A rubber duck bobs in front of you, and your growing filly side spurs you to giggle a little as you start pushing it around in the water.

Mommy giggles with you, working shampoo and conditioner into your tail and making it shiny again after the long day you had.

She finishes with you just as the water starts to cool, lifting you from the water with her hooves and letting you drip dry onto the tiles below for a moment before wrapping a towel around you with her magic. The towel thoroughly dries your body, making your coat fluffy and your mane softly settles on the back of your neck.

It feels good to be cared about for once, years of being a lonely NEET with no family has meant you don’t remember the last time someone did anything for you, let alone clean and care for you.

Mommy sets you down on the floor and pats your rump affectionately. “What do we say?” she prompts.

“Thank you Mommy!” you say, making her nod proudly at you.

“Good girl, now you can have some free time before bed at 8:30”

You step out of the bathroom, checking a clock on your way to your room. It’s 7:45 already!

Back in your bedroom, you see that your playset is still set up and ready to have your story continued.

You reach for one of the dolls, but stop yourself. You won’t sink that low yet, you might have accepted your fate as a horse, but doing something like that for FUN is just too much.

Instead, you resolve to grab a book from one of the many bookshelves and read, may as well get learned for school tomorrow.

You pick out ‘My First Spellbook’, the title is written in a foalish font and various foals casting spells are pictured on the front lifting things like feathers and books.

Cracking it open, you notice that you aren’t the first owner this book. Its pages are covered in hastily scribbled notes and certain words are circled to indicate important points.

This was Mommy’s book!

You eagerly read her notes, they seem to be much more in depth than the book itself which seemed to only explain spellcasting in the most basic of ways.

Time races by as you read page after page, the possibilities of magic seem endless, and you can’t wait to try it out!

It’s strange having a desire to do anything other than sleep, shit and eat, but the prospects of magic are just so expensive!

At 8:30, you hear a soft knock on your door before it opens a crack, revealing Mommy’s face looking in at you. She swings the door open and trots over to you.

“It’s time for bed, sweetie.” she says, pulling you into a tight hug.

You yawn, sleep does sound good around now, you’ve done a lot today and you should probably be rested for school.

As you go to fold the page of your book to remember where you’re up to, Mommy hastily slides a bookmark into the book’s spine.

“Green Hornet!” she exclaims. “We do not disrespect books in this castle!”

You giggle, Mommy can be so silly sometimes, it’s just a book! Regardless, you respect Mommy’s wishes and shut the book without bending the page, placing it on your bedside table and hopping up into bed.

Mommy uses her magic to pull the sheets up around you and tuck you in, smiling down at you.

“I love you,” she says.

“I love you too, Mommy,” you mutter, slowly drifting off into the land of dreams.