Missing Books, Found Love
Rainbow Dash jerked awake. "What a weird way to end a dream," she grumbled, looking up at the skylight in her room and squinting. She tried to push the memory of the very odd dream from her mind. Why would I even dream that? Nopony I know even has… that. What that was began to fade quickly and she glanced at her clock.
It wasn’t even noon yet. She pulled a piece of fluff from her wall and stuffed it over her eyes. Maybe she could dream up something that actually made sense this time.
Then there came a rap tap-tapping at her door. Groaning, she ignored it and turned over to stuff her head under a larger fluff of cloud.
Whomever was at her door knocked again.
"Go 'way!" she shouted. Well, mumbled anyway. The day was still too young to be up and about yelling. There was the afternoon for that. And hollering, and arguing.
She blinked. Why would I think that? I don't argue, much, with my friends.
"Delivery for Rainbow Dash," the mail pony yelled in through the front stoop window.
"Just leave it at the door..." she mumbled again. "Get it later..." There was a thump, bump and then the sound of ... several sets of flapping wings? Something to think about later, Rainbow. You're missing quality nap time.
She started to fall back asleep in the dank gloom of her cloudy night mask. Images of ponies arguing began to percolate through her mind again, and some of the faces were familiar.
Crash!
"What the what?!" Rainbow jerked to her hooves, wings snapping open and looked around for what had caused the crash. Nothing in her room had done it. The sound of arguing began to filter through again, and this time she was certain it wasn't just in her head. So much for waiting until the afternoon to start shouting.
Outside, there was a commotion and she heard three different ponies yelling at each other, right on her doorstep.
"What in the hay is going on out... here?"
Pandemonium would have been a polite term for what greeted her. A large crate had been broken open and three pegasi were now arguing amid the wreckage of broken wooden planks over the contents; themselves, apparently.
"What are you all doing on my doorstep?" She asked, incredulous. "It's Hearts and Hooves day. Shouldn't you be, I don't know, with your loved ones or something? And why, in the light of the sun, are you... Why are you standing in a crate?" She paused to consider what was left of said crate, "What's with the..." She prodded one of the objects that had been thrown clear. "Are these chocolate tins?"
Thunderlane tried to hide two mares behind his wings, but not before she saw both Blossomforth and Flitter's distinctive manes. "I can explain, Rainbow Dash," he started, blushing and trying to keep the two mares from her line of sight.
Neither Blossomforth nor Flitter were willing to be sidelined apparently and shoved past his wings to address Rainbow Dash directly. Both of the mares had smears of chocolate on their faces, and elsewhere, and smelled faintly of… liquor?
"Let us talk, dear. You need to clean some chocolate off your face,” Blossomforth said, apparently ignorant of the huge smear of chocolate running up her cheek.
“You're one to talk,” he grumbled under his breath, loud enough for all three mares to hear. Two shot him a glare that would have set Rainbow's tail ablaze. Sighing, he obediently sat down to scrape at his face with the edge of a hoof and lick it clean.
"Our sweetie, Thunderlane, thought it would be sweet if we shipped ourselves to some romantic location." Flitter looked about the front stoop and obviously found the location far from romantic, "No offense, Rainbow Dash, but we had a beach in mind or something like that, but it was up to Blossomforth to pick the destination. I didn't think she'd choose a suburb of Cloudsdale."
"I didn't choose this place!" Blossomforth objected, swatting down the accusing hoof Flitter pointed her way. "You said you'd take care of all the shipping details!"
The hoof came right back up. "The details! Not the destination!"
“The destination is a detail!”
The two mares squared off against each other, growling, in the remains of the crate with wings raised and locked. Tails lashed and teeth were bared.
Not wanting to get involved, Rainbow Dash began to back away before the two mares could drag her into what looked like would be a knock down drag out sort of brawl. The last thing she wanted, or needed was a full scale battle on her stoop.
"Ladies," Thunderlane tried to interject, pointedly not to look at Rainbow Dash. "Ladies... Let's argue somewhere else."
“Thunderlane-” She tried to stop him even as hoof strikes on her cloudy front porch struck sparks and threatened lightning if things got any more tense. To her surprise, both mares actually calmed down.
"We're not arguing," they said in unison, turning as one pony to glare at their mutual love interest. "We're deciding."
"Sure sounds like arguing to me," Rainbow Dash quipped, then flinched away from the glares she got from the pair of riled up mares. She put her hoof down after a moment, "Whatever it is... do it somewhere else. I need to get my rest!"
They listened, but not before tossing fluffs of cloud and still melting chocolate at each other. Still arguing over whether they were arguing or deciding, the love triangle took off and flew unsteadily away with a downcast looking Thunderlane getting guff from both sides while trying to act as mediator.
Rainbow Dash tried to think of what they would even be doing in a crate that size. And with that much chocolate. After less than a moment of pondering, she decided she didn't want to know. "Just the mess alone would be..." She shuddered and looked at her wings, "and how..." She filed those images away in a "NEVER OPEN" section of her mind.
She trotted back inside and closed her door. "At least I can-"
A thump outside announced the arrival of another oversize package. This time the mail carrier didn't even bother to knock.
"Hey!" she shouted up at the rapidly retreating backside of a stressed looking mailmare. "Come back here!" Never stopping, the mail carrier fled the scene as fast as she could.
She slapped a hoof to her face and pulled at her mouth. Two crates in less than an hour. Who in the hay was shipping things to her? “Isn't it supposed to be a holiday? No mail service?”
She stepped up to the crate and peered at the stamp on the side.
“Twilight?” Who would be-
"Rainbow?" The crate asked her.
Oh. Twilight’s in there. Wait… What?!
Rainbow Dash slapped her muzzle with a hoof and shook her head. Sometimes, this town…
“Uh... Twilight? What are you doing in that crate?"
"Um.” There was a significant pause, then a purple light shone through the cracks in the crate. “Where am I?”
“My house. Still doesn't answer my question. Why are you in a crate?” Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes at the crate.
“Oh. I am tracking down a lost shipment of books." The light shifted about inside the crate. She could hear her friend trying to move around in what must have been a very confined space,"I asked and asked at the mail station, but nopony there knows what happened, so now I'm taking things into my own hoof.”
"You lost me. You're looking for a shipment of books... in a shipping crate? What does shipping yourself to...” Where would she ship herself to to look for lost books? “Well, anywhere, do to help you find books?"
"Well, you see, they haven't been lost... except they have. I think.” The light stopped moving.
“You didn't time travel again, did you? I thought you learned your lesson the last time.”
“Oh, I have. I’m not time travelling. I’m anticipating. You see, this year’s book shipment hasn't been lost yet. But they will be! Just like last year! But this time!” Twilight laughed. It wasn't a happy laugh, but deeply unsettling and approaching the very edge of sanity. “This time I’ll get my books!"
The note of hysteria in Twilight's voice was a warning. Danger! Danger! Craziness inbound! She wanted to flee, to escape before… memories of a doll fluttered through her mind, along with a full scale riot.
But she couldn't. Even the thought of her friend going through such mental anguish again, no matter the frivolity of the cause, strengthened her resolve to stay.
"Are you okay?" The light inside the crated started to shift again, and Rainbow heard the stamping of hooves as her friend moved around again. She walked around the crate, pausing here and there to try and get a glimpse of her friend's situation inside the crate.
"Fine!" There was a pause, "What am I doing at your house? I was supposed to end up where ever my books have ended up."
A memory sparked in the back of Rainbow's mind. Memories of a certain crate of books she'd received about, oh, exactly a year ago from what she'd thought at the time was a not so mysterious admirer. "What... kind of books? For the library?"
"Oh no. Not for the library. Definitely not. And I'd rather not say what they are," Twilight answered, almost inaudible through the walls of the crate. Rainbow could almost hear the blush in her friend's voice.
Suspicion and a dream long buried drifted up to the surface of her thoughts. The memory of the books and what they had been percolated up with them. She tried not to think about a certain shelf in her bedroom.
"They're not... Romance novels, are they?"
"How did-" Twilight gasped. There was a purple flash from within the box and then Twilight was outside of it and facing her, mane all in a tangled mess and matted from what she could only assume was the last night’s rain. Scattered all around her where food wrappers and drink containers from Celestia only knew how many cold dinners and long mornings.
Not seeming to notice the detritus brought with her on the sloppy teleport, or the state of her coat and mane, Twilight scanned the skies and ran to the edge of the cloud Rainbow's house sat on.
She came back moments later, a furious blush lighting up the insides of her ears, "How did you get my books? Nopony else can know!"
"Know what? That you were crazy in love with me?" It just came out. Rainbow covered her mouth with a hoof and hung her head. Hoof, say hello to mouth. Looks like you're staying a while.
There was no laughter; no jarring, dream shattering laughter. It'd been so long since she'd buried the dream that even she'd almost forgotten it. But now that it had come back, the thought of Twilight, laughing at her for having it stabbed at her. But she had to know why she wasn't laughing.
Ignoring the hurt, she looked up to see Twilight looking back at her, a curiously puzzled expression pulling her muzzle into a scrunch and the blush in her ears competing with purple for dominance.
"No," she said finally, "about my books. Why would you think-" she cut herself off, realization dawning in her eyes. "Oh." She looked down at her hooves and kicked a tuft of cloud over a candy wrapper.
"Yeah. A crate full of romance novels every Hearts and Hooves day with 'Twilight' stamped on the side. It wasn't exactly subtle.” She pointed a hoof at the crate, with the same stamp she recalled from the last time. “What was I supposed to think?"
Twilight considered the box for a long moment, then Rainbow Dash. "Shipping mistake?" she offered finally, shrugging in what she probably thought was a nonchalant manner.
A distinctly awkward silence filled the air between them. Rainbow Dash looked down at her hooves. Say something!
What? another part of her demanded to know. I'm still in love with you? She couldn't let herself get her hopes up. Twilight was taking this far better than she would have expected, but she could feel the rejection coming. She should leave, before it got more awkward.
Twilight was the one who finally broke the silence and stepped towards her. "So... All this time, you've thought that I was in love with you?” Her friend’s question sounded earnest. “Why didn't you say anything?"
"Like what, exactly?” She sat down on her haunches and pointed a hoof at her friend, “You didn't act like you were, and I guess maybe you aren't. What was I gonna say?" Rainbow smacked her head with a hoof and mimicked her own voice poorly, "Hey, Twilight, wanna go out on a date sometime? I got all those steamy romance novels you sent me!" She slumped back to her haunches, feeling all of her energy drain away, "Come on. I would laugh at me."
Twilight didn't seem to have an answer to that. Her friend was quiet for a long time, she looked shocked; ears flat back, eyes wide and mouth agape.
Why'd you have to put her on the spot like that? It dragged at her heart to see a pony she'd loved as a friend for so long appear hurt, especially as close as they had gotten as instructor and student.
Her heart demanded that she say something, anything. Even if Twilight didn't love her back, she needed to say something to soothe the hurt she thought she saw there in her eyes. She looked up again, seeing Twilight still standing there, looking speculative.
"I'm sorry, Twil-"
"Why didn't you ask me?" Twilight clapped a hoof over her muzzle as soon as the words came out.
"I- What? I-" What could she say? This wasn't something that she'd spent a lot of time obsessing over. It was just a fantasy she'd already laid to rest. She felt the dream again, a spark in her heart. Could Twilight actually mean what she thought she meant?
Rainbow Dash looked aside, then back at Twilight. She wanted to say something, but what if she was wrong? What if all of the leadup to this was just her reading too much into a simple question.
Seeming to be able to read her thoughts, Twilight ducked her head, took a step forward, and pressed her nose up under Rainbow Dash's chin. "Why don't you say it now?" she asked more quietly.
Why she hadn't should have been obvious; to Twilight at least. It was something that she didn't like to think about, a part of her that she was ashamed of. Brave Rainbow Dash would have jumped at the opportunity and not looked back or cared what other ponies thought. That was the side of her that everypony knew.
Everypony except Twilight Sparkle. Her friend had seen her in the worst states: disloyal, uncertain, afraid... and been there to see the other side of her; frightened Rainbow Dash, the Rainbow Dash that didn't know what to do.
Maybe it was obvious to Twilight, and this was her roundabout way of saying it was okay, that there weren't two different Rainbow Dashes; not to her.
There was just one pony that she loved.
"I was afraid," Rainbow Dash whispered back and tilted her head to catch Twilight in a kiss.
But not anymore.
