Flare of Love

Ponyville, 2:02 P.M., March 20th, 2012

“Hey Rainbow Dash, I’ve got an idea.”

“Oh yeah? And would that be?”

“Instead of just heading back to your place, why don’t we head to Cloudsdale and go visit the places we grew up?”

“Why? I don’t see why we just can’t head back to my place, and have a little fun in private.”

“Oh come on Rainbow Dash. It’s been so long since we’ve been together in Cloudsdale. Why not go and explore some of our memories?”

“Hmm...Alright. I guess that sounds fun.”

“Good, let’s go.”

“Right now?”

“No time like the present!” He took off into the sky, leaving Rainbow Dash on the ground. He looked back as he soared upward. She sat there stunned for a second before she gave chase. She loved races; so he thought he’d surprise her with one. “Maybe I caught her a little too off guard.” He turned his head once more to see a rainbow trail coming from some invisible point. She blended in with the sky from this far away, all except for her rainbow mane, unmistakable at any distance. She was catching up, but Midnight still had the lead by a long shot. “I can’t let her lose.” He thought,  “I know how competitive she is.” He tilted his wings back, catching the air, and it slowed him down like parachutes. Rainbow Dash came speeding up from behind.

“What are you doing? I thought this was a race!”

“It is, I just thought it should be a fair one, seeing as I kinda left you in the dust back there.”

Even though they were talking, they still were flying at breakneck speeds over the land beneath them. Midnight had been gone from Cloudsdale for so long he had almost forgotten what the surrounding landscape looked like. They continued forward as he looked around, noticing they had just passed the edge of the forest that started outside Ponyville.

“So are we gonna race, or are you tired?”

“That should get her going. She definitely won’t let me win now.” Midnight would let her win, but he didn’t want to make it too obvious, she would have to put in some effort to earn this victory. She looked like she was about to hit him with a witty comeback line when she broke away and soared on ahead. You never quite knew what you’d get with Rainbow Dash. He let her go on ahead for a few seconds, so sure of her victory, before he caught up to her. She looked surprised for a moment, then she looked at him. Cloudsdale was just up ahead, Midnight could see, when he looked ahead again. They were coming in fast, and when he looked over to Rainbow Dash again, she was gone, she had pulled ahead of him and all he could see was the end of her rainbow trail vanishing into the cloud below them. “So, she wants to make it hard? Okay.” He dove headlong into the cloud, chasing her. He could hardly see anything around him. He had been away from this place for so long, he didn’t know what he would run into here. He made himself slow down, but only the slightest amount. Rainbow wouldn’t get off that easy; one little trick wasn’t going to be enough to make him give up. Before he knew it, the cloud faded away and the clear sky ahead of him revealed a victorious Rainbow Dash. She was too far ahead for him to catch up now. “Good.” he thought, she got what she wanted, and it made him smile.

Rainbow Dash landed on the cloudy edge of Cloudsdale just a few seconds before Midnight landed down. “Ha, I totally smoked you Midnight. Victory is mine!”

“Yeah, you did. I’ll admit that you beat me fair and square. Come on, let’s go back to Sky High. You remember the amusement park that we visited with Fluttershy, right?”

“Of course I do. I still have the picture in my bedroom.”

“Perfect, let’s get going.”

Cloudsdale Sky High Amusement Park, 2:13 P.M., March 20th, 2012

Rainbow Dash and Midnight stared at the amusement park from the gate. But the place wasn’t what they had expected. It was abandon, run down, destroyed, “Wow, what happened to this place?” Rainbow Dash said.

“It looks like a wreck here. I can’t believe this happened.”

He looked over to see Rainbow Dash reading a sign that was posted on the left side of the gate. It certainly didn’t look new, there was some rust at the edges and it was quite weather-worn, but he couldn’t remember it being there the last time he had visited the park.

The sign read: Sky High Amusement Park condemned by City Council of Cloudsdale for unsafe attractions.

“Unsafe attractions? We never had anything go wrong when we came here.”

He walked up beside Rainbow Dash, “It’s been years since we’ve come here. Something probably went wrong then. I guess we’ll never know.” The front gate was locked and rusting. The rides were falling apart. The walls were covered in graffiti. All of the games were closed. All of the store tents were gone. The sky above the park was beautiful and blue, but the park itself was gray and dark. It was nothing left but a hollowed shell of memories. “I guess we could go over and see the place for what it is now. How about it?”

“Sure, that sounds like it would be fun.” The two flew over the fence. “Gross! This place is disgusting!” As they stepped in, they could see the place was covered in filth from corner to corner.

“Come on, I’ve got a place I’d still like to see.” Midnight ran ahead, over to the games area.

“Hey, wait for me!” Rainbow Dash quickly flew and caught up to him. He had stopped right by the horseshoes game.

“Remember this?”

“Of course I do. I beat you that day we took that picture together.”

“Exactly, but now this place looks terrible. I don’t think this game looks very playable.” The place was covered in grime and rust. A hook that had been on a wall to hold up the horseshoes has broken loose, and fallen off. All of the horseshoes that were below where the hook once was were scattered across the floor covered in rust.

Rainbow Dash didn’t look too fond of the place. The memories were good ones, but that’s all they were now; memories. “Ew, let’s go over to the roller coaster. I’ve gotta see what happened to that.”

“Alright, I that sounds good to me.” They walked out of the gaming area only to see the roller coaster was worse. The tracks were cracked and falling apart. Support poles were rusted and fractured in places, ready to break. The loop that had been the highest point in the entire place was collapsed to the ground. The beginning of the loop had remained held up by a guide cable in the middle of the track, and was still connected by the right rail folding into itself. The rest of the loop had collapsed to its left and had broken in multiple places, but still lay down in the shape of the loop. At the end of the loop, the roller coaster car was partially on the track as the rest was had come off the track and crashed into a pole. The track just after the loop had collapsed to the cloudy fair ground as it was still connected to the tracks in the air. It trailed up the tracks and had been disconnected in many parts, but still held in the air by the guide cable.

“Oh my gosh.”

“I can’t believe how much things have changed since the last time we came here. It’s kinda sad to see such a place of strong memories looking like this. I think now is a good time to go. I’ve got a surprise on our next place. I think this one will be much better.”