A Rainbow in the Dark

Chapters

Chapter 2. What happened? (edited)
Chapter 3. Waking up in a New World (edited)
Chapter 4. Time to Get Situated (edited)
Chapter 6. Moving On
Chapter 7. Encounters
Chapter 8. Leavetakings
Chapter 9. Cross Country
Chapter 10. Them Again?
Chapter 11. Reunion
Epilogue
Chapter 1. The Storm (edited)
Chapter 5. The Difficult Life of Rainbow Dash (edited)

Chapter 2. What happened? (edited)

"What happened to her?" Twilight shouted at the weather team. They all were huddling under the pavilions set up earlier to eat. With the loss of the weather manager, her two lieutenants, Blossomforth and Cloud Kicker, simply could not keep up with what the storm was doing. After another hour of fighting the storm, they had given up, and let it roll in and rage where it wished to. All of Twilight's friends, with the heart rending exception of Rainbow Dash, were under the largest pavilion, with those two lieutenants there with them.

"I…I…don't know," the de facto leader in Rainbow Dash's absence replied.

"I've never seen anything like that," Blossomforth chimed in, then immediately cowered down as the enraged alicorn turned her gaze on her.

Cloud Kicker moved in front of Blossomforth. "Twilight Sparkle, this is no pony's fault. We all felt the magic of this storm, that's why it was so ferocious. Every member of the team did their absolute best."

Her words were lost on Twilight as she looked at the storm. Her rage didn't stop, it was only compounding itself with every word. Tears fell unbidden from her eyes. She could feel the magic herself from this storm. It was mocking her with its strength. Well, she would show it. Her eyes glowed white and her wings spread. With a mighty flap she was off the ground and flying at the heart of the storm. She knew where it was because of the magic emanating from it, and from the lightning flashing around it. She didn't have any words for the storm as her horn lit and she pushed as hard as she could with her magic. It wasn't an organized spell, it was simply power, she was seeking to drain the storm of its magic. In moments she had established an unconscious link with the energy in the storm. She started to drain the power, dissipating it. The storm fought back, great bolts of lightning flashed at the enraged alicorn. She shrugged off each impact and jolt, instead using the energy the storm was trying to fight her with to drain it further. In seconds the storm imploded. The moon shone down on a quiet but very wet Ponyville.
She wasn't done, not by a long shot. Every bit of pent up rage, sorrow, grief, and yes… she had to admit to herself, guilt, was thundering through her. With her expanded abilities since her ascension she held on to the power she had absorbed. But she couldn't for long. It was too much. The storm had covered square miles, and all of that energy in her body was threatening to overwhelm her. She pointed her horn skyward and screamed. This was far more than a normal scream, it combined the strength of the Royal Canterlot Voice, and every bit of emotion and power she contained. As she screamed she shot a bolt of energy towards the uncaring heavens, the bright light ascended and lit the entire area as bright as day for a few seconds. As the energy left her, she lost consciousness, her wings folded and she fell. Only to be caught by Cloud Kicker and brought to her friends. She woke on the ground, cradled by Fluttershy with her friends around her.

"She's dead," she sobbed.

"No, she isn't Twilight!" Pinkie Pie piped up. "My Pinkie sense would have told me. I didn't get any nosebleed. Dashie's not dead."

Twilight couldn't control herself, even as exhausted as she was, she sprang up and pinned the pink pony to the ground.

"How can you be sure?"

Tears formed in Pinkie's eyes. "I've had a friend die before I met you. I know what that Pinkie Sense felt like, I got a bad nosebleed and felt like I was going to be sick, at the same time, my entire body vibrated. I know the signal for a friend dying, it's horrible, and I didn't get that with Rainbow Dash."

"What kind of signal did you get?" Twilight panted.

Pinkie squirmed underneath Twilight's hooves. "I really don't know how to explain it, it's more like I was super dizzy, and the fur on my back stood on end. I don't know what that means, but I do know that Dashie isn't dead."
Twilight let Pinkie up. The tears had continued unabated, but now she had hope.
"We need to get to Canterlot!"

***

"Ugh, what happened?" Rainbow Dash lifted herself up off the surface of the roof she landed on. She looked at it. It was shiny metal. Just next to her was a fan in a shroud. The electric motor starting up shook her from her impromptu nap. She jumped reflexively. Coming down her rear hooves slipped off the cooling condenser and she fell heavily to the asphalt surface of the roof.

"Where am I?" She looked around. A quick trot to the edge of the roof and she looked down. Her eyes grew huge, she had never seen anything like that in her life.

"What are those things?" she asked as she gazed down at the humans celebrating the new year. The sounds of singing and reveling assaulted her ears. They were still ringing after the long fight with the storm. She stopped for a moment and rubbed her eyes with her hooves. Her ears rotated back as she heard a new sound. A door opened behind her and two of those creatures stumbled onto the roof with her.

"Shhhhh, are you sure we won't get caught?" a feminine voice came from one of them, her voice slurred.

"I told you, Mike lives here, there's no problem with us coming to the roof," a masculine voice responded, slurring his words as badly as the woman. The door gaped open as they moved away from the roof access toward where Rainbow Dash was cowering by the edge of the roof. They embrace, oblivious to the cyan pegasus trying to keep as still as possible. In moments the wet sounds of their kissing float to Rainbow.

Ugh, do they have to do that here? Rainbow thinks to herself, I need to get out of here now. She flares her wings, and discovers that her right wing has cramped up. She's able to stifle a moan as she clamps her wings to her sides. She looks over at the two humans. They are now completely occupied with each other. Perhaps she can sneak past them. She starts to move, and her hoof crunches down on the roof.

"Wha, what was that?" the woman asks.

"Shhh, it was nothing." The man responds, and distracts her with a kiss. She quickly forgets the sounds Rainbow makes as the pegasus slowly slinks to the open door. Once in the clear, Rainbow trots down the stairs, alert for any more of those huge creatures as she finds more stairs.

"How big is this building?" she asks to herself as she descends her twentieth staircase. She freezes in shock as a door opens in front of her. A tiny head sticks out of the door. Red curly locks on the pale face of a little girl sway as she looks back and forth. She stops as her gaze falls on Rainbow. Rainbow, for her part, stops breathing. The little girl gasps and pulls her head back through the door. Rainbow decided to put on a burst of speed to the next staircase, inside the apartment as she runs by she hears the little girl screaming happily about a little horse outside. Luckily she made it halfway down the next set of stairs before the door opens again. As she gets to the bottom of the stairs, her hoof steps ring out loudly. She looks back, she was on carpet, and it's given way to white marble. Her thin pegasi style horseshoes ring loudly on the marble. She freezes once again.

"Is there any one there?" A deep masculine voice rings out from the front of the building. She turns away and scrambles towards the back of the building. She comes upon a door. It doesn’t open when she pushes on it. She looks at it, heavy, metal, no knob.

"Hey, listen, no pets in this building, it sounds like you've got a horse there," the voice says. Rainbow rears up, pushing on the door. She didn't notice the crash bar in the middle of the door, she slams her hooves on the door. Nothing. In desperation, she whirls around and bucks the door, once. Twice. Again for a third time, she turned to look at it. It shows three sets of deep impressions of her horseshoes, but the door hasn't moved.

"Hey, whoever you are, you are making a lot of noise." Rainbow really starts to panic. The voice is moving closer. She whirls around again and places her front hooves on the door.

"There has to be some trick to this door." She murmurs to herself as she presses all over the door.

"Whoever you are, you are going to be in big trouble…" the voice peters out as the owner of the voice comes into view. Pegasus and man are frozen as they look at each other. And it's hard to tell which is more surprised. Cerise eyes gaze into blue. Her hooves are still moving around the door and the door opens suddenly as she finally finds the crash bar. With a shout Rainbow Dash tumbles out of the door, rolling and ending up on her head against the alley wall. In moments she's on her hooves and galloping as fast as she can. Ignoring the shouting behind her.

"C'mon wings, I need to fly!" She shouts as she's running down the alley. Her right wing is responding better now, but it still hurts, and she can't get full extension. She tries to flap as she's running, and is only rewarded with more pain shooting down her wing. The alley ends and she's in the middle of Times square. Tens of thousands of people have converged for the annual celebration of the death of an old year and beginning of a new. The hard concrete doesn't allow for the best traction as Rainbow slips and slides as she tries to scramble among all the humans. She darts into another alley, only knocking down a few people in her rush. She hides behind a dumpster for a minute to get her breath.

"Where in Tartarus am I?" She looks around at all the people visible at the end of the alley. The adrenaline is still running through her veins as she's looking. She has graduated from terrified to something way beyond reason. Not moving has done nothing to calm her. She keeps working on her wings, and finally they decide to listen to her.
"Finally!" she sings to herself as she flared her wings and takes off straight up. In moments she's hundreds of feet above the crowds. She looks around as she continues to climb.

"This place is bigger than Manehattan!" She picks a direction and decides to head northwest. She keeps it under the speed of sound, though her panic could probably allow her to perform a sonic rainboom, she simply wanted to get away.

After a surprisingly long time, the signs of civilization start to fade, she finds a forest and lands in a tree. She's exhausted. Looking around, there isn't even an errant cloud to take a nap in. She finally finds the crook of a couple of branches of the tree to get comfortable in. She finally is able to drift off to sleep.

Chapter 3. Waking up in a New World (edited)

The sun lances bright light through Rainbow Dash's eyelids. She wakes up with a yell and falls from her branches. Hitting every other branch on the way down and landing with a thud.

"Owww." She moans as she rubs everywhere where an errant branch has hit her on her impromptu descent. Her low grumbling is interrupted by a soft knicker. She finally looks around. To find a brown snout in her face.

"Oh, hi there." There is no response. The horse sniffs her and knickers again.

"Hello, anypony home?" She waves a hoof in front of the horse's face.

"Come on, I'm lost, I'm so glad to find a fellow equine." The horse just looks at her.

"Can you talk?" The horse seems to lose interest and starts cropping grass next to her. She flares her wings and hovers just off the ground. The horse whinnies and shies away from her.

"What is with these ponies?" She hovers and looks closer at the horse. In moments she realizes what it is. Far larger than she is, and yet, somehow incapable of speech.

"Oh my Celestia, horses are extinct in Equestria. As if those weird creatures were bad enough, we've got horses here, and they can't talk." She flies a bit higher to look around. There's a small herd of the horses around the grove of trees that she had sheltered in the previous night.

She takes off, as she's evaluating her surroundings she sees a bank of clouds, ah, a good place to gather my thoughts she thinks as she zooms off towards the cloud bank. In moments she's laying on fluffy whiteness, the best place for Rainbow Dash to think. She looks down at the ground.

"Okay, I remember the storm. I got hit by lightning, but I didn't die, I ended up in that city." She looks back in the direction she had flown from the previous night, and shudders.

"There are weird ape-like creatures here. They talk, but they also have horses here. And horses haven't been in Equestria for thousands of years. But the crazy thing is, the horses here don't talk." She puts a hoof to her chin as she tries to puzzle everything out. She slams her hoof down on the cloud. "I've got it. I'm not in Equestria anymore." In moments what she just said dawns on her.

"Oh no, I'm not in Equestria anymore!" With a flash of cyan she spreads her wings and tears back the way she had flown the previous night. In a few minutes she notices how hungry she is, she sees a bale of hay. Well, beggars can't be choosers. She lands on top of the bales. She's too hungry to care about it just being hay, she's starving. She's tearing into a bale and eating as fast as she can. She feels a presence near her, but again, she's too hungry to care.

"And what the hell is this?" The voice jars her from her feeding. She freezes in place, only allowing her head enough movement to look for the source of the voice.

Please be a pony, please be a pony, please be a pony, she desperately thinks as the source of the voice comes into view.

"Oh buck," she moans as one of those crazy looking creatures sits up. She can smell it from ten feet away. Her nose crinkles at the pungent smell of alcohol and sweat wafts to her. She looks around, the creature is surrounded by cans, and a box with more cans is lying next to him, another box is empty and has blown some distance away.

"Now, I usually have hallucinations." He pauses to belch loudly. His voice is surprisingly steady despite his obvious drunken state. "But I've never seen a blue horse while I've been drunk."

"I'm a pony, you idiot, and not just a pony, I'm a pegasus." She briefly flares her wings, and is gratified by the very inebriated creature falling over. She edges closer to him, has he passed back out? The answer comes quickly as he starts wheezing heavily, she's alarmed until she finally realizes that wheezing is him laughing.

"Well, Merle, you've finally gone and done it. You've fallen off the wagon, and ended up in crazy town." He continues his wheezing laughter.

"Mister, are you okay?" she asks tentatively. Her question causes him to stop laughing. He slowly levers himself up.

"Damn, Merle, you are getting too old for this shit," he mumbles to himself. He reaches into the box next to him and comes away with another can. He pulls the ring off the top and brings it towards his face. His eyes fall on Rainbow Dash. With a muttered curse he stops and looks at her closely. She's close enough for him to touch her. He slowly extends a finger gently pokes her.

"Are you real?"

"Are you?" she snaps back.

He looks at her, at his can, back at her, back at the can. After a moment he makes a decision. "Never again," he says as he dumps the beverage on the ground. Once the can is empty he crushes it and throws it away from him.

"You know, drinking too much is bad for you," she says in a matter of fact tone.

"Don't I know it," the old man says. He starts, "You still here?" He looks at her through his blurred vision.

She can't help it, she's amused by the very inebriated human. Surely a creature that drunk can't do anything to harm her. She sits and ponders the incapacitated human in front of her for several very long minutes. He's very drunk, is her first revelation, and the most obvious one. Upon further inspection, she takes in the rest of his appearance. His hair is white, and there isn't much of it. His face is covered by fine white stubble. His skin is wrinkled, and his eyes are sunken into his skull. There wasn't very much of him. He is extremely skinny. His legs ended in dark brown, very scuffed boots, he was just wearing a pair of overalls with a thin white t-shirt underneath. His jacket was hanging loose, and he was shivering in the cold. As a pegasus, she could ignore the cold better than any other type of pony. And it was pretty cold this morning. She looked around, she had no experience in anything here. Maybe if he could get used to her being so different than him, maybe she could get used to his being different than her. She trotted up to him. It was time to take a huge chance.

"My name is Rainbow Dash. Can you help me?" She was never one to mince words.

Her words slowly penetrated the fog in his mind. "Huh?"

A flash of irritation. "My name is Rainbow…"

He cut her off irritably, "I heard you, I just don't understand. You are a talking horse, with wings."

"A talking pony with wings," she corrected.

"Why would you need my help?"

She sighed. She quickly launched into her story of what happened before she met him. He listened as best as he could.

"So, again, I am Rainbow Dash, and can you help me?" She gingerly held out a cyan hoof to the human. He stared at it, bemused.

"I have seen some weird shit in my time, miss Rainbow Dash, but you take the cake." He ponders her outstretched hoof for a moment and hesitantly takes it and shakes it. "But if you need help, I'll help you. But first I need a little bit of help myself."

Uh oh, not a good way to start. "What can I do?" She asks timorously.

A low chuckle from the inebriated human. "I need help getting to my home. It's just over that hill." He points.
She smiles. "I think I can do that." She moves over next to him so he can stand up, he does so. Swaying slightly as he finally works his way to his feet. He puts his hand on her head as she slowly guides him towards the indicated direction. And they start off. They get to a barbed wire fence, and after a few moments of him trying to figure out how to get through the fence on his own she gets irritated with the situation. She picks him up in her hooves and flies him over the fence. Her powerful wings getting him off the ground fairly easily. To make it easier for both of them, she decides to carry him the rest of the way. With her flying, they are at his house fairly quickly. A rundown farmhouse, she places him gently on the front doorstep.

"You actually can fly?" he asks incredulously.

"Fastest flier in all of Equestria," she says proudly as she lands next to him. In moments he's started a pot of coffee and sits heavily in an old overstuffed recliner in the living room. Rainbow Dash prances around the room, looking at everything.

"So, Merle, I've told you how I got here, why don't you tell me about you?"

"What? Huh?" he says, apparently the alcohol is still making everything fuzzy for him. She bounces in front of him.

"Hello, Merle. You in there?" she asks as she waves a hoof in front of his face. He leans back and seems on the verge of passing out.

"Ugh, you are a lost cause," she grumbles as she moves back to the kitchen. Despite the initial run down appearance of the house, it's actually very well taken care of. It's just very old. The furniture is in excellent shape, and the appliances, while they are old, even though Rainbow has no idea how to tell, she can tell they are well maintained. In moments the coffee maker is done with its cycle, and she finds a couple of coffee mugs, she carefully pours a couple of cups of coffee, the lack of sugar or cream near the coffee maker says he likes his black, but she was able to find the sugar and pours a generous amount in her cup. She couldn't find any kind of tray, so she takes the cups one at a time, turning her head sideways to carry them into the living room. In moments there is a steaming cup next to him, and one on the floor in front of her. She takes the cup in her hooves and takes a sip.

"Merle, wake up. There's coffee."

The aged human jolts awake at the sound of her voice. He looks around and notices the cup next to him. He picks it up and takes a deep sip, sighing in relief.

"Ahhh, that's good coffee." His voice is sounding a bit better.

"Yes, it is. Now, are you going to tell me about you?"

He stops and looks at her. "You know, I'm going to have to get used to talking to a rainbow maned pegasus," he says with a smile as he takes another sip.

"Yeah, well, I have to get used to talking to a bald monkey myself, so we are even."

A chuckle, "We are called humans."

Well, one question down, about a million to go. "Are there earth humans, magic humans and flying humans?"

That question apparently throws him for a loop. "No, there are just humans."

Her brow furrows in thought. "You don't have magic? You don't fly?"

"Oh, we fly, but we have machines to help us fly, we don't have wings like you do."

A hard shake of her head. "No magic." This world is certainly odd.

"No. No magic."

"So, tell me your tragic story."

Another chuckle from him. "Well, my story is a bit tragic, but probably not as tragic as yours." And he launches into some of his life's story. He was an ironworker. He retired some years before back to his old family homestead in western New York state. He served in the first world war, being twenty one when it started. At eighty two years of age, he lived in the house alone, surviving his wife of thirty years, children he rarely saw, and grandchildren he knew of, but had never met, and God knows how many great-grandchildren. He confessed he drank a lot, admitted more than just a lot. He was basically just waiting for death. He didn't feel he had much left to live for. And dying while drunk didn't seem like too bad a proposition.

"Well, we both have pretty sad stories." The rainbow maned pegasus said somberly to the aged human. "I do have a question though."

"Shoot."

"Are you humans the only ones that talk here? Where I come from, the cows, the pigs, many of the animals talk. Then we have the small critters, only Fluttershy is able to talk to them, but I talked to the horses here, and they acted as though they didn't understand me."

The human smiled. "No, none of the farm animals talk. Though it would be pretty nice if they did. Sometimes gets kind of lonely out here with no one to talk to."

Rainbow Dash thought furiously for a minute. "I've got a favor to ask."

"Sure, ask anything."

"Well, actually a couple of things. First off, could you not tell anypony… uh, sorry…" she rubbed the back of her head with a hoof, "anyone that I'm out here. Also, can I stay here for a little while, so I can get my bearings, and try to figure out what to do next?"

"Done, and done. Miss Rainbow Dash, welcome to Merle's place. You can stay as long as you want. Nobody visits me here. I'm glad for the company. Now, if you will excuse me, I need to get some actual sleep." He pointed towards the hallway. "There's a spare bed down that way, I know it's still morning, but when you need to sleep, go ahead and sleep there. I never bought one of those silly televisions, so if you want, you can listen to the radio, or you can read one of my books. You can read right?"

"Of course I can read, do you have any Daring Do?"

"Uhh, Daring what?"

"Heh, heh, never mind, I'll see about reading. But before dark, I want to fly around and get a lay for the land so I can try to figure out how I'm going to get back home."

The old man levered himself out of the chair and shuffled slowly down the hall to his room. And Rainbow Dash was left alone with her thoughts.

Chapter 4. Time to Get Situated (edited)

For quite a while after Merle decided to sleep, Rainbow Dash rattled around his house. She understood most of what was there, so cleaning up after the coffee was a snap. She opened the refrigerator, noticing a distinct lack of greens, she decided to finish up eating at the hay bale she met Merle at.

Upon returning to the house, she leafed through his selection of books, finding nothing interesting to her. She fought with the radio for a while, but was unable to figure out how to get a station to come in without a massive amount of static. She did take a nap for a little while. Pegasi need to rest to be at top physical form ya know. In the early afternoon she was woken by Merle stumbling around the kitchen, preparing a new pot of coffee, she had finished off the previous pot. Merle did buy good coffee. He finishes preparing a new batch.

"What a night, I don't know…" he turns around and sees Rainbow. He barely suppresses a scream as he jolts back, banging painfully into the counter.

"Heh heh, hi."

His eyes get as wide as they can, and he puts his hand to his chest. "Oh my God, you're real?"

"Duh, dude. We've been over this before."

"Yeah, but I thought…" he trails off. After a moment he shakes his head, "That wasn't a dream?"

He gets down on his knees, and sits eye level with her.

"It's past time for proper introductions, I'm not certain what we talked about earlier, I do remember talking to you, vaguely. But let's start again, I'm Merle Baker." He holds out his hand.

She happily places her hoof in his hand and they solemnly shake. "I'm Rainbow Dash."

"Nice to meet you Miss Dash." She surprises him and jumps into his arms and hugs him. The surprised human takes a moment before he returns her hug. In moments he feels her sobbing, and his shoulder starts to feel wet as his shirt absorbs her tears. He starts to pat her back awkwardly. Her wings spread to add to the hug.

"I don't cry. I really don't. I don't get scared, I'm cooler than that. But why am I here? Why did this happen?" She sobs into his shoulder.

"Miss Dash, I nearly wet my pants in the trenches of France as a young man. You are going through something that's probably worse. At least I had fellow soldiers to lean on, I had friends. I helped build buildings after the war. I've had a hard life. But it seems as though you are having it even worse. You lost all of your friends. You lost everything that is important to you. And it's not like you can go back. For all we know, you are stuck here. If it's any consolation, you can call me your friend."

The sobbing stops for a moment. "Really? You will be my friend?" She pulls away and gazes at him. Tears are still flowing freely, but he can see that his words really touched her.

He pulls her back into a hug. "Yes, Miss Dash. I am your friend. I haven't had any friends in a long time. But I think I'll need a friend too. I've decided to stop drinking. And that is not something easy to do alone, so I hope you'll help me with that. And I will help you with anything I'm able to."

"Why do you keep calling me Miss Dash? I'm Rainbow Dash."

He chuckles. "Because that is how you address a young lady."

She pulls away again. "I'm not ladylike, I save that for Rarity."

He leans back and smiles at her. "You are plenty enough of a lady, Miss Dash. What was that saying? Oh yeah, dirt in the skirt. I have a feeling that you are more rough and tumble than most ladies." His eyes drift off to a framed picture on the wall. A much younger Merle and a woman a few years younger than him. "And by your attitude, you remind me of a woman I miss terribly."

She looks at the picture, and back into his eyes. "Your wife? Seriously?"
A sad smile. "Yes. She was no holds barred. She was undefeatable. She was always the best at what she put her mind to. The main reason I fell in love with her. She never lost that independent streak. Our relationship was stormy, but there was never a more loyal, wonderful woman in existence than her."

Rainbow Dash ponders his words. "You are an amazing po-person Merle."

"You are an amazing person yourself Miss Dash."

***

Rainbow Dash flew through the air. Wings pumping furiously as she dived towards the old farmhouse. It has been a month since her fateful appearance in this strange world. She had been spending plenty of time with Merle. He made sure to buy more greens for her to eat, and since pegasi can eat a limited amount of protein due to their requirements to have a lot of calories for their flight, she's developed an appreciation for his fried chicken. Fluttershy would faint if she saw Rainbow eating a chicken leg, but that is the way of pegasi, Fluttershy does know that, even though most pegasi don't talk about such dietary habits much. Then again, while Rainbow was not much of a cook, she does know how, and has taught Merle a few things and gotten him to eat more plants himself. She considered it a fair trade off. She had spent most of this day taking advantage of the cloudy day, hiding in clouds and learning more about the area she had, at least temporarily, begun to call home.

"Alright, Merle, watch this," she called out as she pulled out of her dive. She saw the old man watching her flying from his front porch. He had an old rocking chair he would use to sit outside for a good portion of the day. With Rainbow Dash's help in the mornings, the farm chores were done early, giving them time for fun. He always enjoyed watching her fly. But the bulk of their days were spent talking. He told her stories of his life. And he had lived a long time. She now knew a lot about his family, his wife, his kids. And he knew everything she could tell him about Equestria, especially how much she missed her home, and her friends. She finished her dive, and leveled out. Zooming by the farmhouse she did several loops, and rolls, ending in a dive that landed her gracefully on the front porch. She pranced around to his clapping. A big smile on both their faces. She pulled him into a hug then helped him up to go in the house. It was time to start cooking supper, and she was due a late nap. With a sigh she fell asleep on the couch, waiting for him to call her to eat.

Rainbow Dash snapped awake, not sure what had interrupted her nap. Lifting her head she saw Merle puttering in the kitchen. No, he hadn't done anything to wake her up. Must have been nothing. She laid down her head.
Knock, knock. Her head snapped up and she looked at Merle. It was the door. She froze, seeing that Merle had heard the door as well. He walked into the living room.

"Better get in your room Miss Dash," the old man murmured to her as he headed towards the front door. He didn't have to repeat himself as she flew towards the room, barely able to close the door before she heard the front door open. She pressed her ear to the door to hear better.

"Great grandpa!!!" A small feminine voice said.

"What are you doing here?" That was Merle.

A masculine voice responded to Merle. She couldn't make out what he was saying. But he sounded unhappy.
After a few minutes of quiet conversation, the voices raised as the front door closed.

"Well, if you are going to be spending some time here, there are some rules. You don't follow them, I will boot you out, understand William?" Okay, that was his youngest grandkid, all Merle knew of him was his name and he lived in Pennsylvania somewhere.

"Anything, Granddad. We are in pretty desperate straits."

"First, this is my house, you will help with the chores."

"Second, you will get a job, and help provide for everyone. I'm not paying your bills, got it?"

A murmured response.

"Third, you are not the only visitors I've got. You will respect my other visitor, and you will not tell anyone of her presence here."

"Her? Granddad, I never knew you were that type." William's voice turned sly, only to be cut off harshly by Merle.

"Nothing like that Bill. She's just not the typical houseguest, I'll introduce you in a few minutes, but I want you to get your stuff in the house. This old house has a few extra rooms, we'll get two ready for you and your beautiful daughter."

Oh, crud, thought Rainbow Dash, new humans. She shook her head then listened back at the door. She heard the sound of people moving heavy items in the room next to hers, and the room across the hall. She doubted they knew how sensitive pegasi hearing was. After a few minutes she heard movement heading to her door, she moved away from the door before a soft knock announced Merle.

"Come in, Merle," she called softly and the door opened for him, and was swiftly shut. He had a pained look on his face. She hopped up on the bed and he sat down next to her. He looked at her, his face unreadable. She used her wing to pull him into a hug.

"I heard some of it, Merle. We have visitors?"

A long moment of silence. "Bill… William that is, he goes by Bill, was kicked out by his wife. He had nowhere to go, with his daughter. She's six. And adorable. I can't believe I've just met my great-granddaughter. And under these circumstances. I can't turn them away. If you want, I can get those saddle bags I made for you, and pack them with food and stuff you need if you want to not meet them, but I can't turn them away, they are family."

This presented Rainbow Dash with a problem, she didn't want to leave her friend, at least not yet. She was trying to figure out how to get a message back home, with no success as of yet. She wanted to have a base so if she was able to get a message back to Equestria, there would be a place for her friends to start looking for her if they could find a way to get to this world. On the other hoof, she really didn't want her presence here to be common knowledge. With what Merle had told her, if enough humans found out about her, they would most likely have her locked up, and tested, and other horrible things done to her if the authorities got their hands on her. Leaving and finding a new place would be a good idea if that was a possibility.

"What do you think Merle?"

He was quiet for a minute, "I don't rightly know, Miss Dash. I don't know my grandchildren. I don't know how they would react to you. But I really want you around. You are a friend, Miss Dash. I'll help you however I can. I have to leave the decision up to you."

She looked into his eyes. After a moment, her mind was made up. "I'll stay, at least for now. They are your family, they will be okay."

This elicited a smile from the old man. He levered himself off the bed. "I'll go and tell them, I'll call you in a moment."

He exited the room and Rainbow resumed her place at the door, ear pressed to the wood.

"Well, I consulted with my other house guest, and she's consented to remain while you are here. She is not nearly what you imagine her to be. In fact, she's not human. I'll let her explain when she gets out here. I will remind you that you are not to tell a single soul of her existence, or her presence here. You understand Bill? Maddie?"

A moment's pause, then she heard Merle call out loudly. "Miss Dash, if you would come out here and meet our new houseguests."

Taking a deep breath, Rainbow Dash opened the door. She had decided that her flying out there would probably be compounding trouble, she kept her wings tightly folded on her sides. In moments she was emerging into the living room. As her rainbow colored mane and cyan fur became visible to the two new humans on the couch she was greeted by two loud gasps. Maintaining every bit of control she had, she hopped up on the second overstuffed chair she had previously claimed as her own next to Merle's chair.

"Hi, my name is Rainbow Dash."

This was greeted by silence at first from the little girl and her dad. The dad looked like he was about to pass out, his breathing was very rapid and shallow. The little girl, on the other hoof…

"It's a pony!!!" The little girl screamed in delight as she hopped off the couch and jumped to latch her arms around Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow Dash, for her part, was nearly bowled over by the little girl. In the back of her mind, Rainbow noted that this Maddie sounded a lot like Scootaloo. She couldn't help but hug the girl back. Without thinking, she enfolded the girl in her wings as well.

"Holy shit, it's got wings too!" Bill screamed in a high pitched voice. "Maddie, get away from it!" For all his screaming, he didn't move towards Rainbow or his little girl. He looked completely rooted in place. The original relatively dark skin tone he had was being quickly replaced by a sickly white color.

Maddie looked at her father, "Daddy, she's not going to hurt me." Bill's mouth opened and closed with no words coming out, looking like a fish out of water. The little girl hugged Rainbow Dash even tighter. "I've never seen a pony with wings. You are so cool Rainbow Dash."

All Rainbow Dash could do at this point was chuckle, "Yes, Maddie, I am cool. Thank you for recognizing it." She looked at Maddie's father. "I don't hurt fillies, mister. I may not have any of my own, but I've got Scootaloo, and she's like a little sister to me." She rubbed the little girl’s head as the little girl finally let go. "I like kids."

Bill shook his head, rubbed his eyes, then shook his head again. "I don't know what I've done to get this." He looked at Rainbow Dash, then back at his grandfather, and back at Rainbow Dash. "Grandpa, you are saying you are harboring an alien here?"

"An alien, as in from outer space?" A nod from Bill, Merle continued. "No, she didn't come here on some spaceship. Her world has magic in it. And she said magic from a storm she was fighting zapped her into this world. Well, on thinking about it, yeah. She's an alien, an alien to our world. But she's lost, she's scared, and she's alone. And you may not have ever met my wife before she passed, but I'll tell you, Bill. She would have been the first to help anyone, no matter what they looked like, the color of their skin, their private bits, if they needed her help. I guess some of that rubbed off on me. I'm helping her Bill. And she's no danger to you, or to me, and especially to your daughter. You understand me?"

Bill seems to be trying to wrap his head around these developments. He nods slowly.

Merle continues, "She's been here a month. She says she arrived in our world just as the year started. She's been helping me with the chores. Oh shit!" He tries to get up out of the chair. Rainbow Dash noticed some smoke coming from the kitchen. She responded faster, flaring her wings, she jumped over the couch to the kitchen. Quickly turning the knob to shut off the burner and then putting the pot lid over the pan that had started burning to extinguish the flames. She turned back to Merle as he finally made it into the kitchen.

"I guess dinner's ruined." She chuckled at her friend.

"Those are some fast reflexes, Miss." This from Bill.
She turned to the young man standing at the entrance to the kitchen. "Can you keep my secret? Please?"

Bill looked at Rainbow Dash, looked at his grandfather, then at his daughter, who was giving her best puppy dog look at her father. He finally smiled. "I guess I can. Pleased to meet you Rainbow Dash."
"Well, let's get some food in everyone." Merle said as he opened the fridge and started pulling out more food for two new hungry souls.

Chapter 6. Moving On

"Are you sure you can't stay Rainbow Dash?"

"I'm sure, Bill. Thank you. But with Merle gone…" She still was close to tears every time Merle was brought up, though it's been two weeks since he was laid to rest. She took a deep breath and then continued, "I need to…" she trailed off again. She simply wanted to get away from this house.

"I'll try to visit, but this isn't my home, it's yours now. I heard you talking with Maddie about Merle's will. I can't believe he made one shortly after you got here. I'm glad you have this farm. I promise, I will be back, but for now,"

Her voice cracked, tears flowed, "I have to go," she was able to choke out. She ambled out to the front yard. As she spread her wings to take off, she heard a small voice scream.

"Rainbow Dash!" Maddie's scream took Rainbow's concentration away. She turned just in time to catch Maddie as the girl full on sprinted into her hooves. Her thin arms wrapped tightly around Rainbow's neck.

"I know you have to leave. But please, don't forget us. Great Grandpa loved you, but we love you too."

"I never forget my friends, Madison. Trust me, I'll never forget you." Rainbow hugged the child back as hard as she was being hugged. After a moment Madison pulled away. Rainbow Dash adjusted the saddlebags that she was carrying with her. Bill had even included a generous amount of cash, just in case he had said, in addition to a few mementos from her time at Merle's house, and some food to supplement the foraging she was going to have to do. She finally spread her wings and took off away from the rising sun.

***

Rainbow's takeoff and flight were being watched electronically. In a dark room in Colorado a radar operator looked intently at his screen. Over the last few months, there have been some odd signals coming in from western New York state. This time, though, the blip was heading west at a rapid rate, and couldn't be discounted as a bird, way too big, and way too fast. The operator looked around.

"Sir."

An Air Force colonel walked over to the young sergeant at the screen.

"Yes, sergeant?."

"Another odd blip, I was ready to dismiss it as being too small, but look at the speed."

"Dear God, almost three hundred miles an hour. The Russians haven't been testing our air defenses in a long time, I wonder if they are up to something. What do we have in the area?"

The sergeant looked at one of his screens, "We have two F-15 Eagles on patrol eighteen minutes of flight time away."

"Send them to find out what that is. If it's some private pilot flying without a flight plan, I'm going to yank his ticket." The colonel turned away as the radar operator got on the radio.

"This is Crystal Palace to CAP 45."

In moments, two F-15A's were being routed to western New York.

***

Rainbow, for her part, was flying west. Taking note of landmarks as she flew, and feeling the magnetic field of the planet that all pegasi have the innate ability to do, to her determine her direction and location. What use is it being able to fly without the ability to navigate, right? The sun was heading to its noontime height, and she decided she was thirsty. Looking down, she noticed a stream flowing through some trees. A good place to drink, she thought as she banked and landed a few feet from the water.

She looked around and noticed the place was deserted, the nearest road was about a mile away, and this copse of trees was pretty dense. She wouldn't have any problems resting here for a bit. She shrugged off her saddlebags and hung them on a nearby branch, then trotted over to the stream. The clear water was refreshing. She drank deeply then sat down to think for a moment.
This land wasn't as colorful, especially the cities, as her home, but the land had a beauty that did remind her of the rolling fields near Ponyville. She suppressed her homesickness, that was getting easier to do, and she was getting worried about that. What if the time came and she decided she didn't want to go home? No, that would never happen, she missed her friends too much. This world was too weird for her. Her thoughts were interrupted by a building roar. Taking to the air, she poked her head out from the trees. Two airplanes flew by the copse of trees, the roar of their engines shaking the air. They banked hard next to the copse of trees and flew off, only to return in a few moments.

"So, they seem to be looking for something," Rainbow said to herself. Then a thought occurred to her. They had to be looking for her, nothing else would attract airplanes to this particular patch of forest. She thought furiously, should she stay and wait for them to lose interest, or should she fly away. She dithered on it for a moment, looking back at her saddlebags hanging on the branch by the stream. Well, she can retrieve the bags later. She made her decision, flying out of the trees, heading north, she decided to test her thoughts, in moments, the planes banked hard and headed her way. After a few minutes the airplanes were close to her. She could see the pilots in their canopies as they moved closer to her.

"Oh, so you want to play." She smiled as she accelerated.

***

"Crystal Palace to CAP 45," sounded in Raven's helmet. He clicked the button to talk back to Crystal Palace.

"This is Raven, go ahead."

"Raven, the bogey has reappeared, it's one mile to the east of your position, heading north. Speed two hundred fifty knots."

"Roger."

Raven called to his wingman, Spook, to follow him, as both brand new F-15 aircraft banked hard and headed in the indicated position.

"Crystal Palace, we are coming up on the coordinates now. Activating radar," he said as he flipped the switch, bringing his powerful APG-63 radar from standby to on-line, in moments it displayed a slow moving blip. They pulled back on their throttles to match speed with the bogey. Shortly they were in visual range.

"Spook, are you seeing what I'm seeing?" he called over to his wingman.

"Uhh, if you are seeing a winged horse that just happens to be blue, then yes," came Spooks voice over the local radio frequency.

"Holy shit! Look at it move!" Raven said as the pegasus banked hard and doubled her speed.

"Following bogey." Raven said over his link to Crystal Palace. As the two F-15's banked, and accelerated to follow the blue pegasus.

The blue pegasus happened to be extremely agile. Raven and Spook were huffing and puffing as they yanked and banked their airplanes trying to follow where the rainbow maned pegasus was taking them. They blew through a cloud bank the pegasus had flown into.

"Raven, do you see the bogey?"

"That's a negative, what the hell happened?" Both decelerated so they could search, helmets swiveling around as they searched the sky for their target. Spook almost jumped out of his chair hearing a bang behind him, he twisted his neck around as he heard hoof steps walking on his canopy. The blue pegasus walked in front of him, standing on the nose of his airplane. How was she sticking to his airplane? He rolled his airplane quickly to try to dislodge the creature on his nose, it didn't help. It was laughing at him.

***

Rainbow Dash, for her part, was having a blast. The jerking in surprise of the pilot of the airplane was amusing. She found herself able to hold onto the airplane, it felt like she was using her ability to walk on clouds but different. She trotted to the front of the airplane, clambering over the cockpit and turning to look at the pilot. The pilot apparently didn't like her being there, he rolled his airplane several times, trying to throw her off. She easily held on with her magic. She just had to laugh at the pilots antics. She brought her face right up to the glass of the canopy. Then stuck her tongue out at the pilot, and was gratified to see him flip back the sun visor of his helmet.

Cerise eyes gazed into blue for a moment, then she turned around. She swished her tail back and forth in front of him. He couldn't hear her, but she was certain he would get her message. Come and get me, if you can. She jumped off the airplane and dived. Letting her speed bleed off as she fell. Gazing at the planes banking hard to try to follow her, she decided to see how fast these mechanical airplanes could fly, she spread her wings and took off, waiting for a moment for the pilots to get on her heading, she accelerated, in moments she was above the speed of sound, feeling the mach cone around her as she continued to accelerate. She looked back. They were getting close.

***

"Christ, did you see what that thing did?" Spook screamed at Raven.

"I saw it was on your plane, how come you couldn't shake it off?"

"I don't know, it stuck to the plane, then after taunting me, it jumped off. And dude, I think it's a female, she shook her tail at me. I think she wants to play. This is all a game to her."

"Well, she's accelerating, let's see if we can catch up to her. Ladies man, even the flying horses are attracted to you."

"Shut up!"

The followed the blindingly fast pegasus. Raven was watching his airspeed indicator, they were approaching mach one as they tried to catch up to the pegasus.

"How fast can she go?" Raven asked as the pegasus looked back at them and then passed the sound barrier. They both lit off their afterburners to keep up with the accelerating pegasus.

"Holy Christ, she's still speeding up," Raven said as the pegasus passed started to pull away from their planes.
"I'm at top speed, I can't go any faster. It'll rip the wings off."

"Same here."

The pegasus was going even faster. A rainbow trail following behind her as she continued to accelerate. Both pilots were concentrating on their radars, they could see the pegasus only because of the miles long rainbow trail she was leaving as she continued accelerating.

"She's doing mach 2, 3, 4, oh Christ, how fast can she go?" They both watched in wonder as the pegasus became hypersonic and a bright rainbow explosion expanded from her as she continued her mad rush of speed. The rainbow trail becoming a full on rainbow as she reversed her course, still flying at impossibly high speeds.

"How many G's was that turn?"

"I have no idea, but no airplane can ever make a turn that tight at that speed, hell, only rockets can even go that fast."
Raven said as the impossibly fast pegasus blew between them, the shock of her passing nearly causing them to lose control, they reefed their airplanes in hard turns to follow.

"Where did she go?"

"I have no clue," Spook replied to his wingman.

"Raven to Crystal Palace."

"This is Crystal Palace."

"You are never going to believe us."

***

Rainbow Dash was in a cloud, watching the airplanes searching futilely for her. Rolling back and forth as she laughed her flank off. She sobered as a thought occurred to her.

"Hold on, they found me without seeing me. They have to have some technology to find things flying." She sat and remembered things Merle told her about humans. They had technology to do things for them, the same way ponies used magic. He did mention something called radar, perhaps that was what saw her. She would have to keep flying low, but if she flew low, she would be seen from the ground. She tapped her chin with a hoof. Then it came to her.

"Oh, crud, I'm going to have to become nocturnal. Ugh, the night's for sleeping." Well, she had to retrieve her saddlebags that Merle made for her. Taking a chance, she allowed herself to fall from the cloud, hopefully the radar can't see an object just falling, in moments she was just a few hundred feet from the ground, she leveled off and flew back to where she had left her bags. Ears rotating around, listening for the sound of jet engines.

After about an hour flying, she landed on a low cloud near the copse of trees, scoping out her resting place.
"Uh oh," She said to herself as she noticed vehicles on one side of the group of trees. And people milling about. They were all wearing multi hued green outfits, and carried black rifles. Oh crud, the military is here! She dropped out of the cloud and landed among the tree canopies. Staying well above the ground, she quickly used all of her hide and seek skills, keeping silent as she jumped from branch to branch. She got into the tree where her saddle bags were hanging. She looked around. The humans were there!

"Damn, those air jockeys couldn't find a small plane, so they have to send us out to search," she heard a voice. A man walked around with a half dozen others. All of them in the same outfit, but his had a black eagle embroidered on the shoulder. The men with him all spread out and looked around. She heard them report they weren't finding anything. It was curious to her, they didn't ever look up, they were all searching the ground.

"Oh, what do we have here." One with six stripes embroidered on his shoulder picked up Rainbow Dash's saddle bags. A couple of the other soldiers gathered around the other man.

"They look like small saddle bags." The one with the black eagle joined them, he held out his hand and the saddle bags were placed in his hands. He flipped up one side and looked inside.

"Hey, that's mine!" Rainbow Dash screamed as she dropped out of the tree on top of the man with her bags. All four hooves landing on his shoulders. He dropped with a scream as he let go of her saddle bags, she snatched them up as she used her wings to jump over the rest of the men and landed about twenty feet from them. She quickly shrugged into her bags, making sure to re-close the clasp that the man with the eagle had opened.

"You leave my stuff alone!" she yelled at the humans.

"Holy shit, is that a blue horse?" one of them asked.

"It talks!" another one answered.

"We need to catch it, grab it" the one with the six stripes on his shoulder shouted.

Half the soldiers jumped at Rainbow Dash. The trouble was, she wasn't there anymore. She took to the air as the last man was shouting and took off as fast as she could. She was tired from the encounter with the airplanes, so she was unable to go as fast as earlier, but she got away from the humans. Flying over their vehicles, she took off to the east. She wasn't going back to Merle's farm, but she needed to find a place to camp out and rest, and she remembered seeing a nice place. Keeping below the tree line she made it there in a few hours, just as the sun was setting. She landed in a large tree, and got herself comfortable for a night of sleep. She would have to stay there all the next day and take off the next night, but those were problems for later, all she immediately needed was sleep.

Chapter 7. Encounters

Night after night, Rainbow had been moving from place to place. The days had blurred together for her, summer had faded to fall, fall fell to winter, and spring is fully here now. She's explored up and down the east coast of the United States and Canada. Keeping away from population centers and people, she has been able to keep away from any more encounters with the military. She's found ways to buy food. Humans will stare incredulously at a pony walking into a grocery store, buying things, and getting out quickly. They usually think it's some kind of joke. Even as they take her money. She loved that.

Early in the afternoon she's sleeping in a wooden house in a tree. She had arrived in the outskirts of Annapolis, Maryland that morning, and upon finding this house in the middle of a copse of trees, she fell asleep. It's been a long night. She feels a poke, she shifts away. Another poke in her side, she moves a hoof to push it away. Another poke. She opens her eyes and sees a pair of blue eyes intently looking at her.

"Hey!" she screams as she scrambled back from the little girl poking her. The girl withdraws her finger.

"You're a pony."

"Yeah, and you're a little girl."

"Hey, I just turned six!" the little girl pouted at her.

Rainbow Dash couldn't help but smile. The little girl had plenty of spirit, she could see that. Not a drop of fear in the kid's eyes, and a strong defiant tone in her voice.

"Yes, you are a little girl, and yes, I'm a pony." She struck a pose. "I'm Rainbow Dash!" The girl giggled in delight.

"You have wings!"

"Yup, I'm the fastest flier in Equestria, and apparently Earth too."

"Really?"

Rainbow puffed out her chest. "Yeah. Do you want to hear about some of my adventures?"

The little girl sat cross legged in the tree house with Rainbow Dash as the latter talked to her. She told her stories of Equestria, of Cloudsdale, of Canterlot, the city on the mountain. As the sun finally started to set, her sharp ears heard a woman calling the girls name.

"I think you need to go, your mom is calling I think."

The girl made a face, "I want to keep talking to you Rainbow Dash."

Rainbow Dash rubbed the child's head, "Tell you what, you go home, and tomorrow, after school, you come here, and we can talk more."

"But tomorrow's Saturday, I don't have school."

"Okay, then come here when you can in the morning, and I'll tell you about all my friends. Sound good?"

"Oh yes, please. Do you like apples?"

"I love apples."

"I'll get my mommy to give me some apples, I like them too."

The next several weeks passed quickly with her regaling the little girl of stories about Equestria. She hadn't talked to anypony in such a long time, it felt good to talk to her. Ponies are social by nature, for crying out loud, they form herds because no pony likes to be alone. And Rainbow Dash wouldn't admit it to any pony, but she was lonely on Earth, especially after Merle's passing. She had managed to not break down in front of her new little friend, with her dark red hair and piercing blue eyes, she reminded her a lot of Madison, though Madison's hair was blonde. Her new friend kept bringing her fruit and other foods, and it made for tastier fare than just cropping the grass with the other farm animals nearby.

"So, we finally went to the Grand Galloping Gala, it was held in Canterlot, in the castle itself. Though it wasn't the first time I'd met either the Wonderbolts or the Princess, it was totally amazing. Poor Fluttershy, all the animals in the Canterlot Gardens were afraid of her. She dashed around the entire gardens, scaring the poor creatures, and messing up the beautiful dress that Rarity had made for her."

The little girl was rolling on the floor of the tree house, laughing while holding her sides.

"And then she burst into the main ballroom, her dress was half hanging off of her, half the animals in the Gardens had gotten through just ahead of Flutters, and she screamed loud enough for all of us to hear, "You're going to love me!"

"Stop, please stop, I can't take any more." The girl was panting so hard she was having trouble breathing.

Rainbow wasn't letting up though. "So, the entire ballroom was destroyed, the Princess and Twilight had just entered the room, and Fluttershy had just screamed. And what did the Princess say? She leaned her head down to Twilight and said 'Run' and boy, did we run, we ended up in a nice little doughnut shop in Canterlot near the castle. That was where Spike had spent the entire evening himself."

Rainbow paused for a moment to let the girl get her breath.

"Well, Princess Celestia ended up following us to the doughnut shop. We were sitting there, all sad because of what had happened. And the Princess wasn't mad at all."

"Really?"

"Yeah, she said that the Grand Galloping Gala had been a boring party for so many years, she had invited us because she wanted the element bearers to spice it up. She was actually expecting there to be something besides the old same old same old, but I don't think she expected quite the chaos that we caused though."

Rainbow Dash was surprised to find the little girls arms around her. She patted her back awkwardly.

"What was that for, kid?"

"You looked sad, and my Daddy always the best cure for a frown is a hug."

Rainbow Dash started to have trouble keeping her tears from falling, "Yeah, Pinkie Pie has said that many times."

"Lauren," an adults voice rang out clearly. The little girl stuck her head out the window of the tree house.

"Coming, Mom." She turned to Rainbow Dash. "See you tomorrow?" she asked quietly.

"You bet you will squirt," Rainbow responded.

In moments the little girl was standing in front of her mom. Rainbow Dash crept next to the window and listened, they were talking quietly, and she couldn't make out the words at first. Then she paled as she heard the final thing the woman said, "Well, I would love to meet your imaginary friend up there."

As quietly as she could, Rainbow gathered up her saddlebags and strapped them on. She could hear the woman climbing the tree, Rainbow stuck her head out of the window and found she was stuck. With her saddlebags, she was too wide to get through the small window. She put her hind legs on the edge of the window and pushed hard, crashing to the floor of the tree house.

"What's up there?" The woman's voice sounded more than a little concerned.

Oh drat, only one way out, and it's past the woman. Rainbow Dash was trapped. She tried to hide in the corner as the woman's head popped above the level of the floor, her head slowly rotated from side to side, maybe she wouldn't get noticed in the shadows.

"What the hell is that?" Drat, Rainbow Dash did the only thing she could do, she rushed the door, leaping lightly over the woman, ignoring her shout as Rainbow Dash glided to the ground in front of her friend.

"I guess we'll have to take a rain check squirt." She looked up at the very frightened woman climbing down the tree house ladder, jumping the last ten feet she bounded to her daughter and picked her up, Rainbow, for her part, was long gone, she took off straight up through the trees as fast as her wings would take her.

"Well, it might be a long time before I get back here," Rainbow said to herself as she turned west and brought her altitude to just above treetop level. She was scared of flying in daylight, but she didn't have a choice at that point. In a few minutes she found a westbound cargo train, landing on the top of one of the rail cars, she sat down and looked around. This might be a good idea. She curled up and laid down and kept an eye out ahead of her for anything low hanging. West might be a good idea for now.

***

Bill looked over at his daughter. Maddie was sitting in her seat, seat belt buckled, bouncing up and down in her seat as they turned off the paved road onto the dirt road heading to his grandfathers old farm. The last half year he had been able to connect with his grandfather were some of the best times of his life. And with Merle's unexpected generosity, Bill found himself the owner of a farm, one that was actually debt free, and fairly prosperous. Bill had been learning to be a farmer, first from Merle, then on his own. With the profits from the farm, he had been able to hire a few farm hands. He knew they had spent most of the day working on the combine he had been able to pick up third or fourth hand. His first harvest that he had been entirely responsible for was coming up soon. It's been slightly over a year since his grandfather had passed. And their very unusual friend, Rainbow Dash, had decided to leave. He looked around and noticed the only vehicles near the house were the farms, so his guys had gone home.

He missed the rainbow maned pegasus, and so did Madison. There were times he heard her crying in her room about the cyan pony. The only thing Bill could do was hold his daughter and whisper that he missed her too. He wondered every day what his friend was going through, though she did visit a couple of times while she was heading up and down the east coast. She had told him about her encounter with military airplanes, of course she covered her fear by telling him they couldn't take her, and apparently she was right, she had out flown the F-15's easily. But that encounter had disturbed Bill greatly. He was thinking about that as he parked the old truck and got out. His daughter grabbed his hand as they walked to the door of the house. An odd sound perked his ears though, he turned and looked. The wind had changed, as a new farmer, he had learned to keep track of the weather, especially because of what it meant to his crops. So, watching the wind swirl in front of the house riveted his attention. They both turned and watched the wind start whipping harder, swirling, kicking up dust in front of the house.

"What the hell?"

Any other words died unuttered as, with a huge clap of thunder, a form emerged from a bright magenta flash. Bill rushed over to the form, and saw a pegasus like Rainbow Dash, oh wait, she had a horn too, so she must be Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow's friend. The young alicorn's eyes were closed, apparently the shock had knocked her out. Bill reached down and picked up the surprisingly heavy alicorn and brought her inside. Fending off his daughter for a moment, she really wanted to help, so he sent her off to get a wash cloth wet with hot water. He set Twilight down on the couch. School had just started, so Bill sent Madison off to start on her homework, with a strict promise to the 8 year old that he would get her when Twilight awoke.

A few hours later, he was startled from his book by a low groan from the couch. He moved off and got to his knees next to the couch, grabbing the wash cloth, he passed it over the forehead of the lavender alicorn. The touch caused her to move and mumble.

"Rainbow Dash?" He could finally make out her words. A pang of sadness hit him at her words, she was looking for her friend, he knew that, but hearing the tone of her voice… well, she was going to be disappointed when she fully regained consciousness.

"She's not here, but you are with friends." His quiet words caused her eyes to open wide. When the focused on him, she gave a yelp and her horn glowed, another bright flash of magenta and she wasn't in front of him anymore, she all of a sudden was ten feet back, behind the couch next to the front door.

"Daddy?" He heard Maddie's voice from her room.

"Maddie, Twilight is awake." He called to her.

Twilight got a confused look on her face. "You know me?"

Bill smiled. "Yes, after a fashion, I'm Merle's grandson, and his great granddaughter is about to bowl you over." He said as Madison appeared from the hallway and tackled Twilight in a huge hug.

"You came, you came, you came, you came! Rainbow Dash said you would come, and you came!" The little girl gushed excitedly.

Twilight, for her part, was utterly confused. "Where is Merle? Where is Rainbow Dash? I don't remember anything about Bill or Maddie in her letter."

"Twilight, Rainbow Dash has told us all about you. You, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Applejack, Princesses Celestia and Luna, your brother, Shining Armor, she's told us how you are her friends, and she told us how much she missed you. My grandfather, Merle, passed on last summer. He would have loved to meet you Twilight," Bill informed Twilight. Her eyes moved from Bill to Madison, who had attached herself to Twilight's side, hugging her as hard as she could.

"Where is my friend? Where is Rainbow Dash?" Twilight repeated herself.

Bill all of a sudden looked nervous. "I don't know, exactly, where she is. She hasn't left me a way to get mail to her. She calls from time to time, and..." He walked over to Merle's old desk, opening a drawer and pulling out a sheaf of envelopes, all addressed to him. He handed them to Twilight. "Rainbow sends us letters when she can. She said that if one of her friends shows up, to get the letters to her."

Twilight opened the letters, one by one with her magic and scanned them, committing each one to memory. After a quick look at the dates on each one, she reread the most recent one. "Hmmm, Big Sur, California, she's living on the beach. She hasn't talked to any humans since she left Maryland. Is this the correct date? September fourteenth, nineteen seventy nine?" He nods assent. "Where is California?"

Bill was ready for her questions, he had grabbed an atlas while Twilight was reading Rainbow's letters. He opened the book and set it in front of her.

"This is a map of the United States of America. We are here." He pointed, "New York state," he moved his finger, "and California is here. It's over two thousand miles from here."

"Well, I had better get started. I have a lot of flying to do." She got up and headed to the door.

"Can you please stay a little bit? We really miss Rainbow." This came from Madison. Twilight looked at the little girl. Maddie was giving her the little puppy dog look that she knew always made her dad melt when she really wanted something. Twilight looked at the little girl, at her dad, and back. Then she sighed. "I guess I can stay the night. The interuniversal teleportation really took a lot out of me." No sooner had the words escaped her lips as she was bowled over, for the second time that day, by a overenthusiastic eight year old.

Chapter 8. Leavetakings

Twilight was only planning on one night, not the weekend. But that was how it turned out. Madison, it turned out, was an excellent friend, and she missed Rainbow Dash just as fiercely as Twilight did herself. Though finding humans in this world who loved her friend as much as she did was very refreshing. Twilight spent hours telling the young lady about events in Equestria since Rainbow Dash had disappeared. Maddie was especially interested in Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. She was even able to secure a promise that when Rainbow Dash returned, that would not be the last they saw of each other. It was a tenuous promise at best, she made that clear, but knowing that Rainbow Dash wasn't going to be gone forever without any warning really made the little girl happier. But the Monday morning was here, bringing school around for Maddie. Twilight made sure to give the young girl a hug before she ran down the road to the bus stop. After her blonde curls bounced out of sight, she turned to Bill.

"Well, that was a fun weekend, thank you, Bill, for putting up with me this weekend."

"We were glad to have you Twilight, don't be a stranger now."

Twilight smiled as she responded, "I'll try not to be Bill."

Twilight adjusted her saddle bags, once again, thanking Celestia that she had brought them with her. Maddie had shown her the primary feather than Rainbow Dash had given her to remember her by, and after getting to know the young lady over the weekend, a lavender feather was added to Madison's collection. She understood perfectly how Rainbow felt for this small family that she was getting ready to leave. Her mission was why she was here. And after some research at the Bill's family farm, she had determined the best route to avoid people. Bill had cautioned her to keep her altitude low in deference to the radar keeping an eye on the sky. Twilight spread her wings and took off, looking back at Bill waving at her as the farm receded behind her. She looked forward and concentrated on covering distance. She had learned quite a bit from Rainbow's letters to her friends here on this Earth. In a short while she had found the train tracks heading west to east. After a bit, she found a westbound train and settled in for the trip. Better to let a train take her west than to fly the whole way. She was well rested, but the movement of the train, and the clickety clack of the metal wheels on the rails lulled her into sleep within a few hours.

***

Twilight woke up, the train was slowing down. She looked around. This wasn't the first time she had to deal with changing trains. She remembered the map that Bill had shown her. This must be Chicago. She was thankful for the dark night as she took off from the roof of the train as no one could see her. Heading west, she found another train, this one looked like it was carrying vehicles, all of them mottled green, most had tracks and the tops of the vehicles were very oddly shaped to Twilight's eyes. She finally found a regular freight car to land on. After a while, she was drowsy once again, she lay down her head.

"Hey, what's that?" a faint voice interrupted her slumber. She raised her head and looked around. Behind her were to men in green uniforms, they were walking on the tops of the train car. Twilight froze. She noticed that the train had slowed down. She slowly looked around using only her eyes, they were in the countryside, though behind the train she could see the lights of the city.
Please don't come closer, she thought desperately to herself, and of course, her silent prayers went unanswered.

"It looks sorta like a dog," the first voice said.

"How did a dog get on top of the train cars?" the second human responded.

Twilight's eyes went wide. They couldn't see her very well, and they thought she was a dog. Time to get away from them.

"Here boy," one of them called, then he whistled. She got up and started trotting away from them.

"It's going to hurt itself, let's get it." The two men started moving faster on the rail car. Twilight picked up the pace, looking back at her pursuit. She risked a glance forward just in time to jump over the gap between the rail cars, she rushed down the next rail car. The two men behind her started to run, calling out for her to stop. Twilight had no intention of stopping and letting them get a good look at her though. She bumped up to a canter, only to smack into something near the end of the next rail car. She landed on her rear and looked forward. Another man was there, he turned around and she was blinded by a bright flashlight.

"What the hell?" a new voice said as a pair of arms encircled her.

"Let me go!" she screamed in panic. The flashlight didn't move off from her, and she wiggled enough to see the face of the creature that had her in its arms. It turned out to be another one of those men.

"Holy shit, it talked!" the man with the flashlight said. "Hold on to it." The man holding her tightened his grip on her. She tried to wiggle free, but he was too strong. She thought of teleporting away, but she would likely accidentally take him with her, and she would be in the same situation. She decided to reason with these humans.

"Please, I'm sorry to be on your train, but could you please let me go?"

The man with the flashlight considered her for a moment. "I'm having trouble believing my eyes here. But you talk?"

"Yes, and I'm just trying to find a friend. Please, I'll leave, just let me go."

The man considered her for a moment. "I'm sorry." He looked at one of the men who had been chasing her as they came up. "Tase her."

The man holding her let her go, but she didn't have any time to move before thousands of volts of electricity coursed through her body, knocking her out.

***

"Wake up."

Twilight heard the voice, it was different than the ones on the train. She also noticed the lack of movement, she either wasn't on the train anymore, or it was stopped. She slowly opened her eyes. She was chained up. She had chains around her hooves and neck. With difficulty she was able to shift around and stand up. Her initial panic had passed, so she simply looked around calmly. She focused on the man in front of her.

"What are you?" A man in front of her said. She took a minute to appraise him. He was tall, a bit older. He had a different set of clothes on than the others. His jacket was green. He had a plastic name badge that said Sheppard on it. On the other side of the jacket was four different bars, they had many little ribbons on them, what their meaning was, Twilight had no clue. She looked at his shoulders, he had a golden leaf on each side of his shoulder. His hair was short and gray, though he didn't look that old. One other man came in the room and sat a chair down in front of the young alicorn. He sat down and continued to study her as much as she was studying him. She looked around, several other men were sitting in chairs around the edge of the room, but the man in front of her, he seemed to be in charge.

"Are you going to answer me?"

She thought about his words for a moment, being quiet wasn't going to help. "Yes, what I am is an alicorn."

He grunted. "So, it's true, you do talk. So maybe you can answer my questions."

"I would be happy to answer your questions sir, but could you please remove these chains? I promise I won't run anywhere."
"Perhaps in a short while, miss. You were found on top of a train that was transporting nuclear weapons. Do you know what that means?"

She shifted a bit. Nuclear weapons, she knew nuclear theories, but she had never heard about nuclear weapons. "No, sir, I don't."
"It means no matter what you are, you were on United States Government property, and you have made yourself a national security issue."

Her eyes went wide, he noticed.

"Yes, you are in a lot of trouble."

"I'm so sorry. My friend is lost, I'm simply trying to get to her, she traveled by rail a few months ago…" Twilight trailed off. Unsure of how much to tell this man. "Where am I?"

"You were removed from the train and taken to the nearest Military installation. You are in Fort McCoy, in the state of Wisconsin."

Twilight looked down, remembering the map, she still had a ways to go. "As I said, sir. I'm very sorry that I was on your train. Could you please let me go?"

He considered her for a moment. "I don't think I can let you go, but I can let you out of those chains. I remember you promised not to run away. Does that include you using those wings of yours? In return, I promise you will not be harmed while you are in my custody."

She slowly nodded. Fighting the sense of dread rising in her throat.

He nodded his head and one of the soldiers rushed forward and unlocked the chains, in moments she was free. She spread her wings to stretch them.

"That better?"

"Yes, thank you, sir."

"Now, what are we going to do with you?" He tapped his chin thoughtfully.

She decided to take matters in her hooves.

"You are holding royalty against their will, I would think that would be considered an act of war."

His eyes widened at her words, and she momentarily thought she had made a mistake. Well, nothing to do but press on. "My name is Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria. I have no desire for our nations to be at war. If you let me go so I can find my lost friend, we will leave your nation in peace and never return."

He was silent as she wound down. He simply continued scrutinizing her.

"If you release me, I will make sure that our crown Princess, Princess Celestia, will know of your mercy and will look kindly upon you."

After several tense seconds, Twilight noticed the sweat trickling down her body, still he didn't say anything.

"Princess Twilight Sparkle, huh?" He said after several agonizing minutes of silence. She nodded.

"Of Equestria, you say?" Again, she nodded at his words.

He looked at the soldiers in the room. "Leave us." They saluted and left the room.

"First off, I must remember my manners, my name is Major Sheppard. And, about your friend, does your friend have wings like yours and a very bright, multicolored mane?" Her eyes widened at his words, "Ahh, I see that I'm right. Well, Princess…" He shifted in his chair.

"Some months ago, our radar detected a fast moving object. We dispatched some aircraft to investigate, as well as some ground units to investigate. Our pilots reported a truly unbelievable story. They were lucky that a camera on one of the airplanes captured a single image of a winged horse that happened to be blue, with a Technicolor mane flying ahead of them. They reported that the horse…"

"Pony," she interrupted him. His face grew dark and she cringed, but still stood her ground, "We are ponies, not horses, horses are extinct in my home."

He growled a bit, "Fine, the pony accelerated faster than a rocket, literally. And actually went hypersonic. And when it did, it produced an explosion of color."

"That's a sonic rainboom, my friend has performed that several times."

"Well, that is interesting."

"That sounds like my friend, I've come here to get her, and bring her home. She's been missing for over a year now. Her friends, myself included, miss her very much. And I came here to bring her home."

He sat back. Apparently pondering her for several moments. After a bit, he reached behind his chair and brought out her saddle bags. He opened them.

"Well, we went through the bags you had on you when you were brought in. I am happy to say that their contents corroborate what you are saying to me. There were no weapons, no bombs, nothing but food, some gold, paper, quills, and a couple of bottles of ink."

"Can I have my bags back please? I really need to get going."

"I'm sorry, Twilight Sparkle, but you are not going anywhere for the foreseeable future. I was appointed after the first incident to investigate, so imagine my surprise when I was called very early this morning and brought to the first transport out of DC to be brought here. I am glad you have been found and I was able to interview you. But you are going to be joining me on the next plane to DC, where you will be interviewed further by our civilian leadership. I have superiors that I must answer to."

Twilight stood up again. "I'm sorry, sir. But that's not acceptable. I promised to not run, nor fly away. I made no promises about using other means though." With those words she lit her horn and used her telekinesis to grab her saddlebags and brought them to her. The major yelped and jumped back. She smiled as she concentrated her magic again and teleported, one thousand feet straight up. She was all of a sudden in the pre-dawn morning, spreading her wings as gravity took hold she used her telekinesis to strap her saddlebags to her body. Then she took off, heading west, thanking Celestia the whole time that she didn't take the letters to Bill so these soldiers couldn't find Rainbow's location from them.

"Well, I guess I had better avoid the trains from now on," she said to herself as she leveled out a hundred feet from the ground, powering west as fast as she could fly. In the distance behind her, she could hear sirens howling from the base she had just vacated.

Chapter 9. Cross Country

Twilight flew for hours after leaving the base. West, always west. She was physically exhausted, but she had no choice, she had to keep going. Looking down, she looked for road signs to help her decide the direction she needed to go. She was heading to northern California, but a good portion of the southwest part of this huge nation was heavily populated, unlike up in the north-western parts where there were less people. Knowing this, she continued on the northerly route. And below her was nothing but prairies and rolling hills. She knew that the mountains would come up, and offer her an opportunity to head south to get closer, but all this rolling farmland, nothing. She despaired as she didn't see trees for miles, her wings were burning, she had to land soon. She didn't have Rainbow Dash's endurance. The afternoon sun was heaving its way towards the horizon, but there were some hours to go.

Oh no! she thought as her right wing decided to cramp. She was able to recover, but no more flapping for a while. She was able to glide to the ground, landing on the road, she looked back and forth, not a vehicle to be seen. She checked both sides, not a single tree, just harvested land, nothing above knee level. She lay down on the road for a bit, just a little bit to rest her tired body. Of course, inevitably, her ears picked up the sound of tires on pavement. Frantically looking around she noticed a car coming down the road. After a moment of indecision she dived into the ditch, crouching down she was able to hide most of her body in the low grass. She tried not to pant to hard with the amount of pain she was in. She cowered down, silently praying to Celestia that they wouldn't stop. She clenched her wings to the sides as hard as she could, ignoring the protesting pain from the abused appendages.
Her prayers to Celestia again went unanswered. As the car approached, she heard the sounds change as it slowed down, then a sharp squeal as the brakes brought the vehicle to a stop. Both doors opened.

"Dude, I'm telling you, it was a deer in the middle of the road. But it looked weird," One of the voices said.

Oh, great, thought Twilight, first I get mistaken for a dog, now a deer, can this get any more humiliating? First a dog, and now a deer?

She shifted her eyes, the sun was bright on her back, it wouldn’t be long until they…

"It's over here, it looks like it's hurt," the voice said. She was able to see him. He was male, about as young as most of the soldiers that she had already met. Both of them had long hair. She didn't know why she noticed that. All she could do was freeze in terror. The human kept coming closer. He was almost able to touch her.

"Please don't hurt me," she wailed as she flared her wings and jumped back. The human, who was in the process of bending down jumped back. He landed hard on his rear and looked at the alicorn.

Tired, she was just so tired. Almost no sleep the night before, and flying most of the day, exhaustion was the only thing she felt. She felt her consciousness slipping. And she collapsed to the ground, the world going dark around her.

***

Movement, the sound of the wind, the dull roar of an engine. The sounds assaulted her ears. Then the smells pushed themselves upon her, a faint acrid tinge, the smell of dusty cloth, and the undeniable smell of the humans. She slowly opened her eyes and looked around. She was in the back seat of the car. She could see the backs of the heads of the two humans.

"Oh man, wait till we get to town. We've got to find a university, they will flip out," the driver said. He was the one whom she had startled.

"Are you sure we should take it there, what if they want to dissect it or something like that? Remember, it talked to you."

"That had to be our imaginations, animals can't talk."

"Dude, I know I heard it, and it sounded like a girl."

"Whatever, you've smoked too much weed today."

"You smoked as much as I did."

They both laughed a bit.

"Well, I did talk. And I really don't want to be dissected," Twilight piped up.

"Wha?" the driver said as he looked over at Twilight. Seeing her conscious and looking at him, he did the only thing he could think of. He slammed on the brakes, throwing Twilight into the seat in front of her as the car screeched to a stop. He turned to look at her, then squawked as the car started rolling again, he shoved the transmission into park then again turned towards Twilight.

"Seriously? You just talked?"

"Yes, I did."

He looked at his passenger then back at Twilight. "I haven't smoked anything in hours. This can't be a hallucination."

His passenger finally got over whatever was tying his tongue in knots, "What the hell are you?"

She looked over at him, "I'm a pony."

They looked at each other. "Dude," they said in unison.

She remembered Cadence's calming exercise, she brought a hoof to her chest as she inhaled, then exhaled as she pushed her hoof out. She did it a second time, then a third, her wildly beating heart finally decided to slow down. These weren't the same humans as the soldiers that had captured her earlier. Maybe she could reason with them.

"My name is Twilight Sparkle. I came here to retrieve a friend who is lost."

Both humans looked at each other then at her. The driver spoke up. "I'm Michael, that is James."

Alright, first step accomplished, they had names. On to step two. "Can you let me go?"

James opened his door and got out, turning around he crouched down and pulled his seat forward and allowed her to hop out. She trotted a few steps before turning around. She was free and clear, she spread her wings, and then fell down as they cramped up, the pain from them shooting around all of her extremities.

"Hey, hey, you're hurt." Michael said as he wrapped his arms around her and picked her up. "Some coyote will get you, or something worse. Where are you going?"

She could only moan in pain. He looked at his friend. "There's something wrong with her, we need to get her to the hospital." He put her in the back seat of the car once again and they climbed in. All Twilight could do was lie there. She heard everything they were saying. The car accelerated again.

"Ugh." The tightness of every muscle in her body was finally relaxing.

"It's okay Twilight Sparkle, we are about an hour from Williston, North Dakota, we can find a vet, or a hospital for you."

"No, no hospital, I've had as much as I can handle of humans already today."

"Huh?"

They listened attentively as she gave an abbreviated recounting of her train adventure of the night before.

"Heavy." Michael said with James nodding his head in agreement. After a moment of thought, he reached into a cooler that was sharing the back seat with Twilight, after rooting around in the ice for a moment, he pulled out a plastic bottle and handed it to her, he was paying attention to the road and didn't notice her use her magic to twist off the top.

"What is this?" she asked after a big gulp of the sweet and salty drink.

"It's Gatorade, it's a sports drink. I think you are suffering from a combination of heat exhaustion and dehydration. If this makes you feel better in about ten minutes, then we won't need to go to the hospital." She eagerly gulped down more of it, relishing the citrus flavor of the unusual drink.

"It's pretty good." She smacked her lips. Then she sat back and thought for a minute. The first humans she met were Rainbow Dash's friends, then she had that horrible experience with the military people, and now these men. Boy, humans were certainly an odd species. As she continued drinking from the plastic bottle, her muscles slowly loosened. She couldn't fully spread her wings inside the car, but she was able to ruffle them a bit and let them hang a bit, it felt wonderful.

"Thank you," she murmured to the two humans. They started talking as he turned on the headlights as the sun was heading to the horizon. She learned that they were both college students. They were on their way back to school after summer break. Michael was pre-med, and James was pre-law. They were on their way to Seattle. Which she learned was on the west coast, that much closer to Rainbow Dash. She told them some about Rainbow. It boggled both their minds that there was a pegasus there.

They also didn't seem very surprised about her encounter with the military.

"For the last couple of decades we've been in what's been called the cold war with the Soviet Union. We are afraid they will use nuclear weapons on us, they are afraid we will use them on them. So we've been talking peace while preparing for war," James was saying.

"Why don't you're leaders just talk about your differences?" Twilight asked.

"Well, I think the main reason is we are afraid that they will lie." He then spent several minutes talking about the history of the Soviet Union.

"Wow, they don't sound very trustworthy do they?"

"No, Twilight, they don't. But the problem with setting all of them in that stereotype is the vast majority of the Russian people have no interest in harming anyone in the US, and the reverse is true. It's only a very small number of people who not only think war will actually happen, but think the other side will strike first. The trouble is, those that think that way, tend to be the ones in power."

Twilight leaned back and then looked at the lights of the small town they were passing through. She finally looked back at the two humans. "You have had a lot of wars haven't you?"

James sighed, "Too many."

Twilight sighed in sympathy, "We have had some wars in our own times, the three tribes have fought off and on for centuries, that was until the founding of Equestria, and then the Royal Sisters established their rule. We have finally had peace among all ponies for a long time because of them."

"Well, I'm glad that ponies have been able to enjoy that peace, I wish humanity could have something to pull us all together like that."

"It's not perfect in our world though, James. There are threats to our world from outside our borders. The changelings have made life difficult for ponies, the Griffon Kingdom is mostly at peace with us, but that had to be rather strongly enforced by Princess Celestia. There are a few other places that would do us harm, but we have the princesses, and they ensure the peace."

"I would love to see your world, Twilight."

She had to smile at that. "I wish I could show it to you. But the spell I used to get here took a lot out of me, and my priority has to be finding Rainbow Dash so we can get her home."

Michael finally spoke up after quite a long time of being quiet. "We are just about to pull into the hotel. We need to get some sleep."

Twilight stifled a yawn. She sat patiently as Michael went into the office to get a hotel room. After parking on the other side of the hotel near their room, she followed them into the room. She looked around.

"There are only two beds, and three of us."

"I could order a trundle bed from the office," John piped up.

She smiled at her new friends. "It's alright, I noticed there were clouds outside. I'll sleep on a cloud tonight, I'll meet you back here just after sunrise, sound good?"

Both of the humans' jaws dropped.

"Sleep? On a cloud? You are aware a cloud is just water vapor right?" Michael said.

"Of course, all pegasi can walk on clouds…" She was in her element now, she was teaching them about cloud walking, to both of their stunned expressions. She rather felt proud of herself, though it baffled her how this world could exist without magic.
Both of the humans looked at each other after she was done. "Wow," James said for both of them.

Twilight smiled at them as she spread her, now rested, wings and took off for the cloud. She settled into the cloud and closed her eyes. This was a long day, and she was glad for a good night's sleep.

Chapter 10. Them Again?

Twilight had a good sleep. She stretched before standing up on the cloud. Looking around, the eastern sky was starting to lighten. She took stock of her location, the cloud she had slept on had drifted through the night. She was about fifty miles away from the hotel. Not a problem for her though. She hopped off the cloud and took off. After flying for a few minutes she noticed something out of place. More green painted vehicles, she angled her wings and banked to check out the scene. In a field, several tracked vehicles were sitting there, men all around. Oh, no! The military had found her. She banked again and accelerated. In moments though, a flying machine rose up near her. It was green, just like all the others. She didn't know it, but it was a Bell UH-1 Iroquois helicopter, commonly called a Huey. In moments it was following her.

"Attention Twilight Sparkle, land now or we will open fire, " she heard from loudspeakers mounted on the helicopter.

Oh dear, she thought, I need to get away from them. In moments, she concentrated and teleported as far as she could in her line of sight, ending up under a copse of trees a few miles away. She turned and looked at the helicopter flying, in moments, it turned and headed towards her. She looked at the rising sun, why did they have to follow her?

"How are they following me?" She shrugged off her saddlebags and opened them. Frantically pulling things out of them, at the very bottom, she found a small device that she had not noticed before. It was metal, about a hoof long, half a hoof wide and less than that thick. She looked at the helicopter coming closer, then took the device with her magic and teleported it about a mile away from her. The helicopter immediately changed course towards where the device had gone. She smiled.

"You found a way to track me. Let's make this interesting,” she said to herself. She still had a magical hold on it. She took off and teleported to the device. Picking it up and letting it hover next to her, she waited until the chopper was close, then teleported with the device again. Dutifully, the chopper altered course to her new location. She teleported again. Again, it followed her. She focused on the chopper itself and teleported it into the chopper itself. In moments smoke started belching from the helicopter.

"Oops, I guess I accidentally put it in their engine," she laughed as the helicopter flared and landed, the roar of its engine becoming more of a cough. Four soldiers jumped out of it as it continued to smoke. She teleported to the landing site of the chopper.

"There she is, grab her," one of the soldiers shouted.

In response she spread her wings and hovered above them. "Now now, I disabled your machine easily." She was interrupted as one of the soldiers pulled a device off of his hip. He pointed the device at her. She was ready though, she took it in her magic. She could feel how the device was put together, so she disassembled the device in front of the astonished human. "I wouldn't recommend that." She was getting mad. These humans had decided they wanted to capture her. James and Michael had told her about much of the paranoia that was in the military. But this was ridiculous. She looked at the other humans. In the distance she noticed a wheeled vehicle bouncing over the terrain towards her. She looked at the human that had pulled his weapon on her. "I'm guessing you are in charge of this craft. I want you to tell your superiors, leave me alone. I have magic that you cannot counter. I know you are after me, and any further attempts will only make me angry. You don't want to make me angry, do you understand?"

The man looked at her dumbfounded, he slowly nodded. She smiled and teleported back to the trees from earlier and grabbed her saddle bags. Using a combination of line of sight teleportation and flying, she was on the roof of the hotel in minutes. She took a moment to assess the situation. In front of James and Michael's hotel room was a white vehicle with lettering on the side, she read it…Tribal Police. She heard a commotion, her friends were being led out by men in a blue uniforms, their hands were being restrained behind their backs. These men had helped her, they were kind to her, they didn't deserve this treatment.

"What would Rainbow Dash do here?" she asked herself. After a moment, it came to her. She hopped off the roof and glided to land in front of the door of the police car and faced them down.

"Leave my friends alone!" she shouted at them in her best Royal Canterlot Voice.

The men holding her friends stopped in shock. It only took a moment for her to wrap them up in her magic and hold them there. Trotting around to her friends, she looked at what was restraining them. They had a simple catch and a quick burst of magic made them fall at her friends feet.

"I'm so sorry you had to go through that because of me. Let's get going," Twilight said to them as she levitated the men in blue into their vehicle. With a crunch she pulled the steering wheel off of the vehicle and dropped it on the hood. She looked to Michael, "Will that disable their vehicle?" Michael's mouth dropped open, he looked at the police car and back to Twilight. He nodded, then yelped as Twilight grabbed both of them in her magic and pulled the doors open on their vehicle. Hopping in the back she put them in gently and closed the doors. Michael took a moment to fish for his keys. In moments the car was started and they were on their way.

She turned to her friends. James was sitting there looking stunned.

"What are you?" he asked.

"I'm a pony, James."

"Yeah, but ponies can't pick up people and then pull a steering wheel off the column, then crush it. It can't be done."
She had to chuckle, she indicated her horn. "I'm an alicorn James. I have magic, didn't you see me using it yesterday?"
He shook his head.

Twilight was about to launch into a lecture on magic, but then thought better of it when Michael spoke up.
"Magic or no, this car is hot now, those police have probably got a description out on the radio right now, any cop in Montana is going to be searching for us."

Twilight smiled, "I can take care of that. Magic can be very useful." She concentrated and enveloped the car in her magic. In moments it changed from the light blue it was to a dark brown. "Now the car looks different."

"Well, the license plates are the same, can you change how they look?"

Twilight concentrated again. "I scrambled the numbers on them, will that work?"

Michael finally started to calm down. "I think so, oh crap!" he shouted as he pulled his car over to the side of the road as a half dozen more police cars screamed down the road, lights flashing and sirens blazing. They passed without a second look at the dark brown car. In moments he was back at cruising speed.

They drove for a few hours until the mountains came into view. Then Michael pulled off in a scenic overlook spot. He stopped the car and turned off the engine. Then he turned to look at Twilight.

"So, apparently we had an eventful morning. I'll tell you what happened to us, then you tell us what happened to you."

"Deal."

"We were woken up by a pounding on the door. I answered the door, and there were two police officers there, saying they had a warrant for our arrest for harboring a fugitive. They arrested us, went through all our stuff, then they were taking us God knows where when you showed up."

Twilight swallowed, then related what happened to her.

"So, you found a funky device in your bags?"

"Yes, I know I didn't bring it from Equestria."

James thought for a moment, "Some kind of tracking device, it must have had pretty good range. I wonder why they let you sleep until morning."

Michael answered that question. "They had to have had a single vehicle following us, just where we couldn't see them, but close enough to read the signal from the tracking device. Then they had to call for reinforcements, and it looks like you woke up just in time to spoil their plans. You are a lucky pony Twilight Sparkle." He put his hand on her cheek, "And thank you for saving our bacon back there."

She nuzzled his hand, "I would never leave my friends hanging, you saved me. If you hadn't come along yesterday, they might have been able to pick me up, and I wouldn't have had the strength to stop them. I owe you as much as you think you owe me. Thank you, my friends."

He smiled at her. "Well, I think our planned road trip back to school has been derailed, let's get to California and find your friend, this is the United States Military, they aren't going to give up so long as you are here. He turned back to face the road and started up his car again. "Now this is what I call a road trip."

***

In the White House, just after a turbulent re-election campaign, culminating in a failure, the President of the United States sat down to read a memo that had just been delivered to him.

Attn: President Carter
Fr: Major Jeremy Sheppard
Re: Unknown Alien Life Forms
Executive Summary
On September 14th, 1979, NORAD air defense radar picked up a fast moving signal that was not transmitting IFF. Crystal Palace dispatched two F-15 Eagles to investigate. The pilots reported an encounter with a winged horse, later identified as a pegasus. Their story was literally unbelievable, until an examination of camera footage of the incident showed a blue bodied, rainbow maned flying pegasus.(photo enclosed). On august 12, 1980, another pony was discovered hitchhiking on top of a train carrying nuclear weapons along with an order of tanks for delivery to the US Army. The pony was detained then brought for interrogation.

She identified herself as a Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria (photo enclosed) and said that if we let her go it would prevent war between her ponies and our people. I discounted her words as bravado. I interviewed her for a short time. When I told her that she was going to be brought to DC for civilian leadership to interrogate, she said that was unacceptable, then used unknown means to take her bag and then she disappeared from the interrogation room. Films were taken of the encounter via one way mirror, and can be viewable at your discretion. She apparently did not notice that we had put a tracking device in her bag, as she took the bag with her when she left. We followed her signal and a helicopter was dispatched to retrieve her off the cloud she had decided to sleep in.

She apparently discovered the tracking device, then used it to damage the pursuing helicopter. She confronted the crew and said that any further attempts to apprehend her would be met with "magic that we couldn't stop" and that we "didn't want to make her angry." Then she apparently released two humans that she apparently had befriended and they escaped Tribal Police, in the city of Wolf Point, MT, which is in the Fort Peck Indian reservation. Attempts to locate the vehicle they escaped in have been met with frustration. The search is ongoing at this time.

The President looked at the pictures included in the folder, one of a flying, pale blue pegasus with a muticolored mane, and the other of an apparently sleeping pegasus with a unicorns horn lying in chains on the tiled floor of a building. He thought about what he had seen, after a moment he pulled out a letterhead stenciled with the Presidential Seal.

To: Jeremy Sheppard, Major US Army

Cease and Desist all activities searching for the alien life forms. We might be able to find them at some point in the future, but at this time, we will need to study the information presented before anything else is done. Attempting to capture them with military equipment is apparently a futile effort. If we are able to find them, all well and good, but as of now, this entire encounter is being designated SP/SAR eyes only to the President and yourself. Any soldiers are to be sworn to secrecy and all information you have gathered will be placed in my personal files, not to be released for a minimum of one hundred years.

The President looked at what he had written. Would he give this information to the upstart actor turned politician who was to be his successor? He didn't think so. This information could rot for all he cared. He signed the memo to go to his personal secretary and then turned in his chair. What would he do afterwards?

Chapter 11. Reunion

Rainbow Dash liked the beach. It was quiet, with autumn being in full force, she didn't have to hide from people nearly as much. Winter was on its way, but given how nice the autumn had been, she wasn't worried about a harsh winter here. She would catch fish, or she would fly inland a little bit and enjoy some of the foraging available there. California, as this state was called, had some pretty good farmland. Though she'd been chased off a few times by farmers irate about an unknown animal eating their feed, but she usually laughed about that. But then again, ponies are naturally social creatures, she missed social interaction. Almost every night, she cried herself to sleep. Twilight, Fluttershy, Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie Pie. She cried for Merle, Maddie, Bill. It was too long.

"I'm going to go crazy," she said to herself as she slammed her hoof into the sand. The sun had finally gone down for another day. Her stomach was full, the few people walking along the beach have completed their daily circuits. She lay down in the sand, looking out at the sky. Maybe I should find a candle and try to send some more letters, she thought. She trotted over to where she had hidden her saddle bags and dug them up. She sent letters every so often, but it was tiring for her to do it. Her magic was meant for flight, it was meant for speed, not performing actual magical spells. It was very draining. She pulled out a pen and a notebook. She needed to write her letter. For the next hour or so as the sun sank below the horizon she focused on the paper in front of her, not noticing what was going on around her.

All of a sudden, her attention was pulled away from the letter she was writing. She heard a car. Trotting up the sand dune she crouched down and looked at the parking area. A dark brown sedan pulled into a parking space. The doors opened and two humans got out, both with long hair and beards. She could faintly hear their voices.
"Well, this is the sixth beach we've looked at today. Are you sure this is the one?" The man on the passenger side of the vehicle reached back and pulled the front seat forward. A very familiar face stepped out of the back seat of the car.

"Well, she's got to be around…" She was interrupted by a cyan blur crashing into her.

"Oh my gosh Twilight, you made it!" Twilight had her air supply completely cut off by the crushing hug of Rainbow Dash. In moments both were in tears, just happily hugging each other.

"I missed you."

"I missed you too."

"It's been horrible. I've been here so long. Is everypony okay?"

"They are all fine, and terribly worried about you."

"Did you get to meet Bill and Maddie?"

"Yes, and…"

James and Michael were standing there awkwardly as Twilight and Rainbow Dash chattered at each other. After a moment, Michael cleared his throat, jarring both ponies out of their conversation. They separated and turned to the two humans. Twilight stepped forward.

"James, Michael, this is my misplaced friend, Rainbow Dash."

Rainbow Dash folded her wing around her friend. "And now we get to go home!" She started bouncing up and down as Twilight got back into the car. Rainbow looked at her quizzically but followed her in, in moments the car was tooling down the road.

"I don't understand, Twilight, why don't we just go home?"

Twilight hid her yawn behind a hoof. "The spell I used to get here was very difficult. And to do it again I have to be in the place I appeared when I got here. It's a matter of the resonance frequency of the portal I opened when I came here. We have to head back to New York. I've already told our friends here, and they are willing to take us cross country back to New York." She looked intently at Michael and James, "The gold I gave you, it is enough for your expenses for this long trip?"

James looked at Twilight and Rainbow Dash. "I don't care how much money this is costing, the gold is more than sufficient Twilight, but we are doing this to help our friend, especially after you helped us."
Rainbow looked quizzically at Twilight, Twilight blushed and said, "It's a long story, I'll tell you as we travel."

"Oh." Rainbow couldn't keep the goofy grin off of her face. She was going home.

After several hours driving, they pulled into a hotel, Rainbow Dash and Twilight got their own room and continued catching up. They talked until very late that night, ending up sprawled out on the same bed, neither one wanting to be too far from her friend.

***

Eight days, Rainbow Dash thought, we've been traveling for eight days. She started hopping up and down as they turned down the dirt road heading towards Merles farm. The trip was, for the most part, uneventful, Twilight and her had gotten to catch up and spend time together, for the first time in a long time, she was happy. She couldn't wait. The old farmhouse finally came into view. It looked like it had gotten a new coat of paint, and some other work done, it didn't look nearly as old as before. She yelped in happiness as she saw two smiling faces as the car pulled in to park next to Bill's old truck.

"Rainbow Dash!" a young voice screamed as Rainbow exited the car. She sped forward and bowled the 9 year old girl over in a huge hug. Twilight was more reserved, but Rainbow Dash was nuzzling the girl and just giggling.
The men all exchanged handshakes.

"Thank you, Michael. Thank you James, for bringing our friends back here." Bill decided that handshakes were insufficient as he pulled the two men into a hug. "Maddie here was worried sick for both Twilight and Rainbow Dash. And, well." He stopped for a moment, reluctant to show the emotions he felt, "I was too. But they are back, and they are going home."

Tears shone in everyone's eyes as the greetings eventually concluded.

Bill once again spoke up, "Well, when you guys called and said you would be here today, we've been getting ready. I sent the help home early, and gave them the day off tomorrow. Maddie isn't going to school tomorrow. I know Twilight needs to rest before this spell. And I have a home cooked supper ready to go.
Before long everyone and everypony were sitting before a large spread of food. After a quick prayer from Maddie, everyone ate. Twilight discovered that she liked Merle's recipe for fried chicken nearly as much as Rainbow Dash did. The entire evening was filled with laughter and general merriment. Maddie finally brought out her surprise, she had baked a chocolate cake, with her father's help, in celebration. And after taking a bite, Rainbow Dash declared it to be nearly as good as Pinkie Pie's cakes, very much to the young girl's happiness. Eventually, everyone had to find their beds. Rainbow Dash crawled into the bed she had stayed in for a while when she lived here with Merle and sighed. "I'm going home."

***

"Good morning sleepyhead," Twilight whispered into Rainbow Dash's ear. The sun was just peeking over the horizon. Twilight had been meditating since she had woken up a few hours earlier. She was as ready as she could be. The normally hard to wake up Rainbow Dash jumped out of bed and hugged her friend. Together they went to the other rooms to wake up their friends to say good bye. In a matter of minutes they were all standing outside.
"James, Michael, Bill, Maddie. I'm so glad I was able to meet you. I wouldn't have survived if it weren't for your help. Thank you my friends." Rainbow Dash turned to Twilight who was drawing a circle in the dirt with a stick, "I'm ready Twilight."

Twilight closed her eyes and her horn lit up. The magenta glow intensified, then got even stronger, Rainbow Dash had to close her eyes at how bright the light from the young alicorn was. She waited for the feeling of teleportation, but after several seconds, nothing happened. After a few more seconds she heard the glimmering sound of Twilight's magic cease.

"Are we there?" She opened her eyes, Maddie's big eyes were riveted on her. She turned and looked at Twilight, who was slumping to the ground. Twilight moaned as she passed out.

Rainbow, for her part, sprang to her friend. Lightly slapping her face, and fluttering her wings in front of Twilight's face, in moments she came to. Twilight's eyes went wide. "I can't do it."

"What?" Rainbow was incredulous. "What are you talking about Twilight, you were able to get here."

The purple alicorn hung her head. "It knocked me out for hours when I got here Rainbow. I overextended myself just coming here by myself, I can feel the portal starting to open, but when I reach out to bring you with me, the entire spell falls apart.

Rainbow Dash shook her head. "What are you saying?"

Twilight shook her head. "I'm going to try something. I'm going to send just you, I'll follow in a few days when I can perform the spell again." Without waiting for an answer, she charged her horn and enveloped Rainbow Dash in a magenta glow, freezing the pegasus in place as she tried to send her friend home. The spell she was held in wouldn't even allow her to close her eyes, she watched her friend grunt in pain as she poured more magic into the spell. Twilight opened her eyes for a quick glance at her friend, and Rainbow Dash was shocked to see her eyes glowing white as brightly as she had ever seen. Seconds later the alicorn let go of the spell, panting, "I can't do it, the spell won't form around you without me in it." She stopped to catch her breath, panting like she had just run twenty miles at a full gallop.

Rainbow Dash looked down for a moment, then back at her friend, "What if I use my magic to help you, Twilight?"
Twilight shook her head, "No, Rainbow. You don't have enough conscious direction of your magic to be able to help."

"Are you saying we can't get home?"

Twilight just looked down, tears falling from her eyes. "Not both of us, no, Rainbow."

Rainbow Dash looked at her crying friend, and her new friends. This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening. She slowly collapsed to the ground, tears falling freely from her eyes. In moments they were both surrounded by their friends. After several minutes, Rainbow had cried herself out. She was depressingly familiar with that cried out feeling. Finally she shrugged her friends off and moved over to Twilight.

"Twilight, I want you to go home."

Twilight sniffled and looked at her. "I just got you back, I'm not leaving without you."

Rainbow Dash slammed her hoof to the ground right in front of her friend. "That is exactly what you are going to do, Twilight. You are going to go home, and you are going to tell our friends that I'm okay, and that I miss them." She reached out and took Twilight's face in her hooves. "You are going to go back home, Equestria needs you, Princess. You are going to give all of our friends a hug from me. And you are going to cry, just as I'm going to cry. We will miss each other, but I can't have you getting stuck here. One pony in this world is enough." She had thought she was out of tears, it turned out not to be the case, as her eyes clouded with tears once again. "You will go on, without me, and you will have a long life. I just ask one thing of you, my friend."

Twilight was beyond words.

"Just remember me. Remember your friend, Rainbow Dash." She let go of her friend and walked slowly to the farm house. She opened the screen door and looked back at Twilight. "And please, give Tank to Scootaloo, she would love to have him." With that she let the door shut as she went to her room and shut the door, locking it. She needed time alone.

***

Hours later Rainbow Dash was still crying. She only thought she had hit bottom, but now she was still falling. Life was dark and horrible. She would never see home again. She cried for one of her first friends in the world, poor sweet Fluttershy. She cried for Pinkie Pie, she cried for all of her friends. A soft knock sounded at her door.

"Go away," she sobbed at the door.

She heard the door knob rattle as it was tried.

"Can't you hear me? I said go away, I need to be left alone." The rattling ceased. Then smoke poured through the gap underneath the door, she shrank back from it, it was rainbow hued, just like her mane, stripes of every color in the rainbow, her eyes grew wider and wider as she watched it billow into her room, in moments it resolved into a familiar shape.

"Well, now. I would think you would look upon your rescuer with more favor Rainbow Dash."

Rainbow fell off the bed in shock at the mismatch of animal parts standing in front of her. She could only say one word.

"Discord."

The draconequus stepped forward and spread his arms. "The one and only."

Rainbow shook her head. "You can't be here, you’re back in Equestria."

He shook his head and leaned down to face the cyan pegasus, "Oh, I'll admit, I'd much rather be home than in this dreary place. Too much gray, such an ugly part of the multiverse. But Princess Celestia demanded I help after receiving the letter Twilight sent home just a short while ago. So, I'm here. And I'm going to take you home, Rainbow Dash."

Anything else he was going to say was stopped by her jumping onto him and hugging him. At first he had a look of disgust, but then he finally relented and smiled at her, and hugged her back just at tightly.

"I will admit, without you pranking everypony, it hasn't been as chaotic as I like in Ponyville for the last couple of years."

She couldn't talk, she was crying, but these were tears of joy.

After finally disentangling herself from Discord, they walked into the living room, where Rainbow Dash received the second shock of the last few minutes. A party horn sounding in front of her, and her eyes were filled with big blue eyes and pink mane. "Oh Dashie, I missed you."

"Pinkie Pie! How did you get here?"

The pink party pony looked at Discord, "Oh, that meaney pants couldn’t tell you? Well, fine. I will." Pinkie sat in front of Rainbow Dash, "When the letter came from Twilight, Celestia summoned Discord. But he said he couldn't find you guys with the feather she sent. Something about it not having enough of an imprint of the place she was to be able to lock onto with his magic. So Celestia looked at me and floated the feather at me. The whole time you've been gone, my pinkie sense has been going crazy, I knew you were okay, and it was like you were just out of sight, like just over a hill, or just around a corner. Princess Celestia asked me to focus on you and the feather at the same time, and I was able to feel where you were. So Discord grabbed me and we appeared here. Then he went to go get you, then he came back with you, and then I told you how Equestria was founded." She finished with a loud squee. Then she hopped over to Maddie and gave her a big hug.

Rainbow Dash looked at Pinkie, then at Discord, then at a beaming Twilight. "So, we can go home?"

Twilight couldn’t stop smiling, "Yes, Rainbow Dash. We will provide the direction, and Discord will provide the power."

After giving her human friends one last hug, Rainbow trotted over to Discord and her pony friends. "Let's go."
In moments Twilight lit her horn and encompassed all of them in a magenta glow. Then Discord snapped his fingers. The world faded to black and silence for a moment. Then with a rush, they were standing in the Royal throne room. Rainbow Dash only had a moment to look around before she was mobbed. All of her friends were hugging her, Twilight, Pinkie, Fluttershy, Rarity, Applejack, Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo. She was home. She was laughing and crying at the same time. She was finally home.

Epilogue

"Twilight, did you ever find out what was with that storm?" Rainbow Dash was lounging on a cloud she had pulled into the library. She never understood why Twilight didn't like her doing that, she made sure the clouds behaved themselves and never rained on her precious books. Well, except for that one time.

Twilight looked up from her writing. "I told you after you were hit, I pulled the energy of the storm into myself and dispelled it. Well, by doing that, I destroyed any way to tell the origin of the storm. I was able to track it to the west side of the Everfree forest. But I have no idea why it was magically charged the way it was. It almost felt like chaos magic, but it wasn't Discord." Twilight put down her quill and looked at her friend, "I don't think we will ever know what caused that storm, it's not the first time we've had a magically quickened storm crash into us from the Everfree."

"I think I know why, Twilight."

Rainbow heard Twilight grumble under her breath, it sounded like her saying, "This ought to be rich." but her friend looked at her expectantly.

"While I was on that Earth, I noticed they had city names similar to ours, Baltimore to our Baltimare, the city of New York was on Manhattan Island, compared to our Manehattan."

Twilight looked utterly shocked, Rainbow continued. “We know there are literally an infinite number of different worlds in different universes. What if the barrier between those realms gets thin or frayed from time to time, and energy from one universe bleeds off into another, as long as the two universes are similar?"

Twilight spent a moment picking her jaw up off the floor. She lit her horn and magicked her glasses off of her muzzle. "I never expected to hear magical theory from you Rainbow Dash."

Rainbow Dash grinned at her friend, she jumped off the cloud, dispelling it at the same time and landed next to her friend. She grabbed Twilight's reading glasses off the desk and put them on. "Maybe I should apply to be a student at Celestia's school for gifted unicorns…hey!" she shouted as the glasses were whisked off her face and placed quite firmly back on the desk.

"You wouldn't last a day."

"Oh yeah, try me. I could do it. I was able to perform magic over there."

"Channeling magic to send a letter is simple."

"Not for pegasi!"

Rainbow Dash noticed that they were muzzle to muzzle, growling at each other. She smiled, then had to laugh. She laughed so hard she ended up on her back kicking her legs feebly.

"Oh, Twilight, I can't tell you how much I missed arguing with you!"

She found herself being picked up with Twilight's magic, and brought to the purple mare's arms. She hugged her friend back. She heard Twilight sniffle into her mane, "I did too."

Twilight pushed her friend away and galloped over to a drawer. "I almost forgot, I was supposed to give these to you when you got back. I kept them here for safe keeping." Three envelopes whisked from the drawer into Rainbow Dash's hooves, she recognized Merle's handwriting. Her face fell.

"I miss him, Twilight. He was a good friend."

"I know he was, and you should read his final words to you."

With a practiced flip, she opened an envelope and drew out the piece of paper.

Dearest Rainbow Dash,
Not too long after you sent these to your friends, I would eventually have had to tell you my horrible secret, that I was dying. Pancreatic cancer is never an easy diagnosis, according to my doctor. And I would have drank myself to death if it weren't for you. But for this letter, I can tell you what I could never tell you in person.

I have never had a friend like you, Rainbow Dash. I had buddies, I had comrades in arms, but never a close, true friend. You told me about those elements of harmony that you guys used to defeat your foes. And you told me you bore the element of loyalty. In the time I have known you, I have never known anyone who was so perfect to carry such an honor.

I know you miss me, and every day without me will cause you pain. My only consolation is that time heals all wounds, the pain will lessen. Wherever I am when you get this, just know that my heart is in as much pain as yours for missing you. Cherish your friends Rainbow Dash, every one of them you told me about, Pinkie Pie, the crazy party pony, Fluttershy the kind hearted lover of everything, Rarity, the lover of all things beautiful, Applejack, the honest, hard worker, and Twilight Sparkle, the bookworm princess. They have always been, and will always be, the source of your strength. Never forget that. Though I know you won't. I know you will never forget me as well. And I consider myself lucky to be included in your list of friends.

You are an exceptional pony, Rainbow Dash, and I will always love you.

Your friend,
Merle Baker

Rainbow Dash put down the letter and sat there, not looking at anything. Her mind was reeling from what Merle had written to her. She looked over at Twilight, who had just finished reading another copy of the letter. Twilight looked back at her.

"You met a very special person, Rainbow Dash."

"I know." She was able to hold back tears. The ache was there, but she could live with it. She placed the letter back in its envelope and hoofed it over to Twilight. "Please keep these for me, Twilight. I don't want them to ever get lost."

Twilight silently complied.

Rainbow Dash sat and watched her friend get back to her writing, but was interrupted by the door to the library slamming open. All of their friends poured into the library along with all of their pets. Rainbow Dash perked up, seeing Tank hovering above their friends, he quickly zipped over to her.

"Are you ready to go play with our pets girls?" Applejack said.

With a loud hoot, Owlowiscious flew down from his perch in Twilight's room and joined the rest of the pets. Twilight moved to join them, she looked back. "Are you coming Rainbow?"

Rainbow Dash nuzzled her tortoise. Since she had gotten back, he was nearly a constant companion, although today was the exception. Fluttershy had been getting him all cleaned up for playing at the park today. She was happy to see Tank again. "You bet!"

And Rainbow Dash went and did what it turns out is her favorite thing in the world, spend time with her friends.

Chapter 1. The Storm (edited)

Chapter 1. The Storm.

Rainbow Dash wasn't having a good day. A freak storm had decided to make its presence known from the Everfree forest, and as the leader of the Ponyville weather team, she was in the thick of it. Lightning was flashing around her. Her ears were ringing from the claps of thunder. And to top it off, she could feel the sharp tingle of magic from this storm.

"Blossomforth, keep the north clouds corralled," she hollered in a voice only a pegasus could manage. She saw the pale pink pegasus move further north. Rainbow moved to a somewhat tamer part of the storm, she needed a moment to breathe, and keep an eye on the rest of her team. Swiveling her head around, she saw her team wasn't getting into the clouds, but pushing them away from Ponyville. That earned a smile from her, they were well trained. Celestia's sun was just setting. Rainbow growled as she noticed the rest of the storm was advancing. It was like it had a will of its own, she was missing a get together with her friends because of this damned storm. But with Flitter finding her at the Golden Oaks library while she was talking to Twilight, the urgency in the blue gray pegasus' purple eyes said that this storm was a bad one. And those eyes weren't lying. This storm didn't want to dissipate.

She shook her head, and flew back towards the brunt of the storm.

"Rainbow!" She barely heard the voice as she was heading back to do battle, the voice gave her pause. She turned to see a lavender form with wings and horn fly up to her.

"Twilight, this is too dangerous for you," she snapped at her friend as Twilight reached her.

"Too dangerous for me?" the young alicorn asked rhetorically. "And what about you?"

Rainbow flipped around and bucked an errant cloud, it promptly dissipated, but not without discharging a lightning bolt. "I'll be fine Twilight, this is my job. You haven't been trained in weather work. Head back to the library. With my team, we'll get this storm whipped quickly." She had to duck quickly as another bolt of lightning stabbed between the two fliers. "Please Twilight." Rainbow's normal bravado was replaced with cold determination.

"Do you want me to use my magic to help you Rainbow?" Twilight pressed.

"No, Twilight, there's already magic in this storm, something bad might happen if you mix your magic with it. Just let us do our jobs. Please, Princess." Twilight looked at Rainbow Dash, shocked. Not only was Rainbow Dash begging her, but she used her title. This was serious. The alicorn folded her wings and dived towards the ground without another word.

"Thank you my friend." Rainbow Dash whispered as she got back to her work. This was not an evening for a Princess. Her extremely fast reflexes allowed her to avoid a near hit by another lightning bolt.

"Turns out, this isn't a night for your friendly neighborhood Rainbow Dash either." She said grimly to herself as she bucked another cloud into nonexistence.

"Flitter, Cloudchaser, the southern fringe of the storm is getting out of control," she yelled over the general noise.

The sisters moved to corral the clouds. There was no pony near Rainbow Dash. She flitted north a bit, pushing a large thunderhead into another larger cloud, her instincts telling her they would cancel each other out. She was right. The two formations came together for a moment before exploding into mist. She was in the clear for a few moments.
She hovered for a moment. She then saw something that made her curse.

Flashing forward she started yelling. "Thunderlane, you idiot. You are going to make that formation double in size!" She wasn't fast enough, one of the youngest weather stallions in her crew had pushed two compatible clouds together, they melded together to the young stallion's surprise, and emitted several blasts of lightning, hitting the stallion and stunning him. He started to fall from the sky. Rainbow Dash redoubled her speed trying to get to him. Coming up from under the main formation of the storm, a grey pegasus mare caught the falling Thunderlane. Her mismatched eyes caught Dash's cerise eyes for a moment.

"I'll get him to the ground safely," the mailmare that had been drafted into helping with this storm yelled at Rainbow Dash as she adjusted her course to blast the newly strengthened storm.

"Alright everypony, let's push this storm back where it came from," she yelled at her team. Over two dozen pegasi started pushing parts of the storm back towards the Everfree forest. They had finally gotten a handle on it, despite the setbacks by Thunderlane's mistake. Three hours of fighting this storm were finally paying off.

The storm was still being stubborn. It wouldn't dissipate, and pushing it back where it came from wasn't a perfect solution, but better for it to rage over the forest than over Ponyville was the next best solution. Unfortunately, it meant hours more work, making sure it wouldn't head back. Every flier in the weather team was exhausted. And if Rainbow Dash was being honest with herself, she was just as tired. They all headed back to the meadow near Fluttershy's house to keep an eye on the storm. Fluttershy was there, tending to an injured Thunderlane. Rainbow Dash landed heavily and trotted up to her friend.

"How is he?"

Fluttershy smiled at her friend, "He is going to have to take a few weeks off. The lightning didn't do much except singe off half the feathers on his wing. Nothing permanent, but over half of his primaries are in no condition for flight. He'll have to wait for them to regrow before he spends any time in the air." Rainbow trotted with her friend over to the stricken pegasus stallion.

He turned his head to face her. "I'm sorry Rainbow Dash, I thought they would cancel out."
She bit back the words she wanted to say. A member of her crew was hurt on her watch, she just wanted him to be okay. "It's alright Thunderlane, I'm glad you are going to be okay. But Fluttershy tells me you are going to have to be on desk duty for a while." This earned a pained groan from the dark grey pegasus. Everypony hated desk duty.

She turned around and almost tripped over another of her friends.

"Twilight, I thought I told you to go back to the library."

Twilight had an impish grin on her face. "You aren't going to the library any time soon, not with that storm still threatening. So, I had Spike bring dinner here." She gestured with her wings, all of Rainbow Dash's friends were there, joining the Ponyville weather team. The genius alicorn apparently had Spike busy, enough food for every pony was ready. "So we can all eat, and I know your team is probably very hungry after hours of flying like that."
Rarity was using her magic setting up places to eat comfortably, while Applejack rode herd on the CMC as they bounced around, every pony trying to be helpful. All Rainbow Dash could do was smile at her friends.

"Thank you everypony." She moved towards one of the hastily set up pavilions and sat down as a large salad was placed in front of her. She was famished. So she ate quickly with her friends.
Just as she was finishing her meal one of her weather team landed quickly and trotted up to her.

"Boss, we've got a problem." Cloud Kicker said as she panted. She apparently had been still in the air keeping tabs on the storm.

"Go ahead." Rainbow Dash said with a frown.

"The storm is gathering strength. I don't think it was a good idea to push it back. It's heading back towards us, and it looks nastier than ever."

With a curse Rainbow Dash gathered up every pegasus she could get. Taking a moment to hug her friends and thank them for the meal, she took off and led her team back into the fray.

She had Cloud Kicker and Blossomforth on each side of her as they headed back to the renewed storm. She shouted instructions to them before they peeled off to handle the perimeter of the storm, leaving Rainbow Dash and a few others on the weather team and some of the drafted pegasi to handle the main body of the storm. They were just about to hit the storm hard when an errant lightning bolt slammed into Rainbow Dash. Though unlike Thunderlane, she didn't start falling. She was simply gone. A few cyan feathers fluttered down as the pegasi that were flying with her stopped in shock.

"What happened?" Derpy asked. Every pegasus looked at each other. Rainbow Dash was gone.

***

For Rainbow Dash the experience was horrible. It felt like she was being squeezed through a hole way too small for her. She felt electricity jumping across every nerve ending as she screamed. In moments it was over. And she was falling. She only had moments before she saw that she was going to crash. She desperately tried to flare her wings, somehow to slow her mad decent. It worked, to a point. She crashed into some kind of building. But this was no building in Ponyville. Through her haze of losing consciousness, she could hear chanting of thousands of voices.
"Eight…Seven…Six…Five…Four…" She looked around groggily, wherever she was, there were a lot of large buildings, she didn't know of any city in Equestria that looked like this. There was a large glowing ball slowly descending in time with the chanting. "Three…Two…One… Happy New Year!" The chanting gave way to wild screaming and celebrating. She couldn't move far enough to see the source of all of those voices. But she was able to focus on the glowing orb a few buildings away from her as it landed and new lights came on. She was able to make out those lights formed a set of four numbers. One…Nine…Seven…Eight. She had no clue what that meant as her consciousness fled.

Author's Note

Trying to do it a little different with this story. Yes, RD is on our Earth, yes, it's in the year 1978. I think she's going to have an interesting, and probably not a very fun time though.

Chapter 5. The Difficult Life of Rainbow Dash (edited)

"Happy Birthday, Dear Madison, Happy Birthday to you," chorused Rainbow Dash, Merle, and, of course, Maddie's father, Bill. Slightly over a month had passed since they had taken up residence with Merle and Rainbow Dash. Bill had really warmed up to the cocky pegasus. And he had also connected to his grandfather. Something both men were grateful for. The excited, newly minted seven year old happily blew out her candles.
A few minutes later, after opening her presents from her great-grandfather and her dad, Rainbow Dash came up to her.

"Maddie, I've talked it over with your dad, and with Merle. And they have approved, so would you like to go flying with me this evening?" Those words caused the little girl to freeze in place. Her eyes got as big as they could as she slowly rotated her head towards her dad, who nodded with a big smile. She slowly looked back at Rainbow Dash who was beginning to think her offer of a gift would be rejected. Her smile became brittle as the silence stretched for way too long for her taste.

"Really? Rainbow Dash? You would let me fly with you?" She screamed.

Spirits lifted, the cyan pegasus flared her wings and smiled. "Hop on kid."

Maddie didn't need to be told twice. Her slight weight didn't bother Rainbow Dash at all as she hopped on. Her knees falling right behind Dash's wing joints, allowing her to move them freely. She folded her wings and they covered up the little girl's legs as she trotted outside. As they exited the building, Bill tossed Maddie her jacket and gloves, it was early March, still pretty cold in the evenings. The sun was low in the western sky as she turned and faced the house. She took one last look at Bill before flaring her wings again. Bill's smile all of a sudden seemed wooden. She thought for a moment. "Bill, she's about to have the time of her life." Rainbow Dash called out as she took off gently.

Wings pumping hard to gain altitude. The little girl leaned forward and put her thin arms around Rainbow's neck. She adjusted for the shift in her balance easily as she accelerated. Maddie was screaming in delight as Rainbow banked gently, always keeping mindful of her load. She could actually fly better by holding the girl, but she wanted the girl to have the most freedom as she flew. She wasn't going to be doing anything too exciting this flight. She finally got to the altitude she desired, and then the acceleration really started. Maddie's arms tightened around her neck as she flew faster and faster. Banking from side to side in gentle S curves, then she decided to surprise the little girl further. She flared her wings and landed on a low cloud. Maddie screamed for a moment as Rainbow's wings stopped and folded next to her legs.

"You like Maddie?"

"Oh my gosh, we are standing on a cloud!"

"Yeah, it's something we pegasi can do. Don't get off," she said as the little girl shifted her weight as though she was trying to get off, "My friend Twilight could cast a spell to allow you to walk on clouds, but she's not here, so please stay on my back okay?" The arms around her neck tightened further as Maddie hugged her.

"Thank you, Rainbow Dash. This has been the best birthday present ever!"

Rainbow Dash chuckled as she took off from the cloud again. She kept flying as she heard her little charge keep screaming, "faster, faster Rainbow Dash." So… she did. Zooming around the sky, always keeping the old farmhouse in view. After a while, she noticed that Maddie wasn't holding on so hard.

Poor thing, she must be getting tired. She held her wings level to glide towards the farmhouse. Coming in for a landing, Rainbow Dash let her hooves touch ground and trotted up to the porch. After dismounting, Maddie came to stand in front of Rainbow Dash.

"Thank you so much for that, Dashie. It was wonderful."

Rainbow Dash had to suppress tears, "It was a pleasure Madison." She was able to keep her composure until Madison and her father disappeared inside. After the door closed she let the tears flow. She slowly collapsed to the ground. In moments arms folded around her, picking her up and bringing her into a hug. Merle may have been an old man, but he certainly was strong. His strong hands held her gently.

"What is it, my friend?" he asked the sobbing pegasus. She kept crying, he held her until she was able to speak.

"One of my best friends, Pinkie Pie."

"The crazy one?"

She was able to laugh while crying she found out. "Yes, the crazy one. She often called me Dashie. And for a moment, I saw her in my head, as though she was searching for me." She buried her face in his chest. "I miss them, Pinkie Pie, Twilight Sparkle, Rarity, Applejack, and Fluttershy. I miss Tank." She couldn't talk any more. The tears threatened to overwhelm her, and they had already demolished her defenses. She just let herself cry.

Merle, for his part, could only pat her back and whisper to her that everything was going to be okay. Eventually Rainbow Dash was done with her crying. She pulled back and wiped her eyes with a fetlock.

"I hate crying."

He chuckled. "Sometimes you have to, Miss Dash. Tears are lubrication for the soul."

She smiled at him. "Maybe, but I still hate it."

"So, are you going to try to send a letter home tonight?"

She looks at him. "How did you know what I was doing?"

He stops for a moment. "I've seen you with a pen in your mouth off and on for the last three days. There's no one on this world that you would want to write to. What exactly have you been writing?"

She urged him into the house. "Well, I've been trying to figure out how to send mail by flames. Twilight once talked about it for a good hour. And I've been writing down what I remembered from the egghead's lectures. Every time I write something, something else came to mind. It helped me think. I don't think I remembered everything, but I hope I remembered enough. She told me that any pony with magic can send messages by burning them with magic. Even pegasi and earth ponies can do it, but they usually have to use a candle or other flame to actually do the burning. Pegasi magic is centered around our wings. So, I'm pretty hopeful that including a feather when I burn the paper, and bringing as much magic as I can into it, I can send it."

She ruffles her wings. "I know I'm on a different world, probably a completely different universe. But the flame takes it out of our world for the traveling. So, what I hope is that it can come out in my world. The biggest problem I see is that pegasi use our magic without thought. We don't have conscious control of our magic. I don't know if it will work. I've preened out three primaries to attempt. I'm going to send all three tonight. Could I borrow a candle?"
"You most certainly can. If you'll hold on a few minutes." She appropriates her chair and waits for the old man to return. True to his word, he's back with a candle in an antique candle holder. He takes a match and lights it.

"Do you have your messages made?"

She trots to her room and is back quickly with the small rolls of paper. Each tied to a long primary feather with a lock of her mane. He takes them from her, and picks up a small stack of envelopes he had brought with the candle.

"What is that?"

"Oh, it's a message from me, to your friends. And no, you can't see it." He smiles as he slips his envelopes in with the rolled paper that Rainbow Dash had prepared. He repeats with the other two rolls. "Are you ready?"

Burning with curiosity she almost stops him so she can read what he wrote. But looking in his eyes, she decided better. "Fine." She huffed.

Gently taking the first scroll in her teeth, she flares her wings. Closing her eyes, she focused her energy, as one of the fastest pegasi in Equestria, she already knew her magic was stronger than most pegasi, stronger than most ponies. But she's never consciously controlled her magic. But the last few weeks of practice has shown her that she can channel her magic, to a limited extent, through her wings. She begins to feel the now familiar feel of vibration, starting at her primaries and moving forward along the surface of her wings. In moments her wings are vibrating all over. She hears a gasp and opens her eyes. Merle's eyes have gone wide. She's ready. She can't think of anything else, but to push that feeling forward as she touches the wing and feather to the flame. After a moment it catches. The flame slowly starts to eat the paper, then with a bright flash of green, it disappears.

"Oh, my Celestia, I think it worked." She smiled, and hopped up and down in her chair. "I think it worked, I think it worked! Oh my Celestia, thank you!!" She trotted around the room.

"Who did you send it to, Miss Dash?"

"Well, I was concentrating on Spike when I touched the flame, so, I'm pretty sure it went to him."

He looks thoughtful. "Why don't you try to send the other two, but to your princess and to your friend Twilight. Might as well cover all our bases."

"Good idea, it's better for them to get three letters rather than not get one."
In a matter of a few minutes, the other two had followed the first in a flash of green flame.

"What are we doing? Holding a séance?" A new voice comes from the entrance to the living room.
Rainbow Dash jumped over the chair and started prancing around Bill.

"I got a message home, my friends are going to know what happened to me!" She can't help it, she's prancing around the room as fast as she can.

"Well, Maddie just fell asleep, if you could keep it down," Bill chided the overexcited pegasus gently. She got the hint though.

They all end up sitting down. But after a short time, the adrenaline wears through Rainbow Dash's system, and she decides to turn in for the night. As she falls asleep, she has a huge smile on her face.

***

"Twilight, she's been gone for nearly three months. If Pinkie says she's okay, then you need to believe her," Spike says as he slams a book down on Twilight's desk, jerking her awake.

"You have to be forced to eat, you barely sleep, and…" the purple dragon pauses for a moment, "and we all are worried about you."

Twilight Sparkle, the youngest alicorn Princess in Equestria looks over at her number one assistant with bloodshot eyes. "My friend is missing, we need to find her."

"I know that, Twilight, but I know you haven't gotten a good night's rest in at least a month, you just nap a bit when you can't keep your eyes open any more. Come on Twilight, I used to make your bed in the morning, and you haven't slept in it since Rainbow Dash disappeared. Please Twilight."

"I know, there's something in the restricted wing I need to check." She jumps off her chair and places a hoof on Spike. "I know you don't like the long distance teleportation spell, but I need to find this book!"

Spike rolls his eyes as a burst of magenta light enfolds both of them, and they are all of a sudden in the Canterlot library. Thank Celestia he was fireproof, smoke emanated from his scales from the stress of such a long distance teleportation.

"Twilight, you really need to calm down. You will find out what happened to her, but you aren't making things go faster by killing yourself!" Spike yelled in Twilight's face. His words finally seemed to penetrate through her fog of exhaustion, stress, and worry. She hung her head.

"Maybe you are right, Spike. I should listen to my number one assistant once in a while, right?" She smiled at him and pulled him into a hug. He suddenly pulled away, holding his stomach and his cheeks puffing. A letter from the Princess? In moments he emitted a loud belch, and in the flames a rolled piece of paper appeared and flopped to the ground.

"I don’t think that's from the Princess," Spike said. "That felt really weird."

Both of them looked down at the roll, two pairs of eyes went wide.

"That's Rainbow's mane, and a feather!" Twilight eagerly picked up the paper with her magic, gently untying the lock of hair, she let it unroll, two envelopes fell out of the roll, she ignored them for a moment as she unfurled the paper the rest of the way. Quickly reading the paper she was interrupted by the sound of flames above her head, another identical roll appeared above Twilight's head and dropped in front of her.

"By Celestia, she's making sure we get the message. How wonderful!" She untied the second message, scanning it to see if there were any differences with the first one. Satisfied that they are identical, she reads aloud for Spike.

Dear Twilight,
If you got my letter, you'll know that I did listen to your lectures. See, I can follow the egghead's talking.
I'm writing to you from my new friend's house. I've been here since the day after I arrived in this strange world. After the lightning hit me, I ended up in a world that is so different from ours it's scary. I haven't seen any ponies here, but there are strange, ape-like creatures, and they call themselves humans. I was able to find a human that didn't freak out on seeing a blue pegasus. Him and I have become friends, his name is Merle, and I hope you get to meet him some day. But, seriously Twilight, you need to make some kind of magic and come get me. I miss all of you so much, and while things are stable here, I want to come home. If this works, I will try to send you a letter when I can. Also, they have horses here, but they can't talk. I'm hoping that you, Twilight, can somehow trace where this came from, and maybe use it to find me. Please guys, hurry. This world is dangerous, from what Merle told me, if I'm found out, they might try to do bad things to me. So, I'm staying low. I don't know how long that can last, though Merle did say that I can stay here as long as I need to. But all this is nothing your friendly neighborhood Rainbow Dash can't handle.

Your misplaced friend,

Rainbow Dash

P.S. I hope somepony is taking care of Tank while I'm gone, and please play with him, he worries.

Twilight rubbed a tear from her eye as she set down the paper. Pinkie was right. Her thoughts were interrupted by a loud belch from Spike, a scroll appeared in front of her, this one obviously from Princess Celestia, as she unfurled it, another copy of Rainbow Dash's letter fell out. Twilight smiled through her tears as she read the new missive from Celestia.

My dearest Twilight,
I am so happy to see that Rainbow Dash has found a way to send a message to us. I suspect she's tried multiple times to make sure the message made it to us. At your earliest convenience, please see me in Canterlot so we can attempt to decipher how to get our missing pony home. Also, you may want to read the letter addressed to you from Merle.

Celestia

From Merle? What? She looked on the floor, now six envelopes were laying there. Three were labeled Twilight Sparkle, the other three were labeled Rainbow Dash.
She opened the ones addressed to her and read with wonder.

Dear Miss Sparkle,

You don't know me, but we have a friend in common. Miss Rainbow Dash. For the last two months, I have gotten to know your friend very well, and she has told me a lot about you and her other friends. I am writing to urge you to do everything you can to retrieve your friend as soon as you can. My world is completely alien to her, and she is a smart, and adaptable pony, but I don't think my world is at all suited for the likes of any talking ponies. If she were found, our government, or even some very ambitious scientists would do everything they can to find what makes her tick, and I'm certain she wouldn't survive the experience. I worry for her on a daily basis, and I know how much she misses you. As far as I'm concerned, she's welcome to stay as long as she pleases, but I'm afraid circumstances will be out of our control before too long. I am enclosing as much information about how to find my farm. And I've also enclosed a note to her, if, and when, she returns to her home. Please pass my love on to her when you see her next. Thank you, Twilight Sparkle.

Merle

At the bottom of the letter, latitude and longitude coordinates were written, along with a hand drawn map with a star labeled "farm".

"Wow," Spike said as he held the note from Merle. "He really cares about her."

Twilight, for her part, was deep in thought. After a moment, she shook her head. "Come on, Spike, we need to see the Princess.

***

Rainbow Dash was asleep on a cloud, enjoying a nice midsummer day. Seven months have passed since she had ended up in this crazy world. Finally she opened her eyes and looked around. It took her a moment to orient herself. The cloud had drifted farther than she had anticipated. Shaking herself she stepped off her cloud. Letting herself fall, she thought about her time in this world. Slowly she spread her wings and allowed them to catch the air. With all the difficulties, and missing her friends so badly that she started crying every time she let herself dwell on them, she was not exactly happy. But she really loved her new friends. Merle especially, even Bill and Maddie. It was early afternoon, Bill was at work, and she knew that Maddie was having a sleepover with a friend in town. She had passed most of the morning, after the daily chores, napping. Merle was tired the last few weeks, so she let him rest. Most days it was out in his rocking chair. He was in the chair when she took off earlier to fly for a while. She needed some alone time though. Just enjoying the blue sky, the wind, and the clouds. She noticed that the clouds were pretty sparse during the summer, so when she found this nice cloud bank, she took the opportunity for a nap. She actually felt pretty good.

Shortly she found the farmhouse. Landing on the porch she noticed Merle wasn't in his rocking chair. She pushed into the house.

"Merle?" No answer.

She trotted down the hall towards her room. She called out again. "Merle?" a bit louder this time. Still, no answer.
Starting to get worried, she went to the door to his room, it wasn't locked. She took the knob in her teeth and opened the door. The room was dark. "Come on sleepyhead, time to get up. We need to get supper ready." Merle didn't stir.
Now really concerned, she jumped up on his bed. Her movements jostled the bed, and he moved.

"Rainbow." He was able to whisper.

"Merle, what's wrong?"

He smiled at her. "I'm going to tell you something you need to know. I didn't tell you before this because I didn't want you to worry. The reason I was so drunk when you found me is because on that new years eve, I went to the doctor." His voice failed him, she hopped over him and grabbed the cup of water that he always kept next to the bed, she hoofed it over to him and he drank. After a moment, he continued.

"He gave me bad news. I'm not going to bore you with all the long words he used, but he said I was dying, and that with medicine, I would have a few years, without, well." He went silent. After a moment, he gathered himself, "I wouldn't see the next new year. I bought two cases of beer on the way home, and was intending to drink myself to death. Then you came in my life. And I quit drinking. But I still couldn't make myself go through with the medicine, the doctor said I would live a bit longer, but my quality of life, as he said, wouldn't be that good. I would be in pain the whole time. I've still been in pain, but it wasn't that bad, until a few days ago. And now." He went silent again as tears formed in his eyes. "And now, my time here is nearly over."

"No. You can't die Merle. I need you."

"You silly pony, you did need me, but you don't now. I've sobered up, I lived my life as best as I could with you here. You gave me purpose for my time left on this world. And now, you need to find a way to live without me."
"No, no, no, no, no, no." Tears fell freely from her eyes. "I don't want to lose you. You are too important to me Merle."

"And you are just as important to me. Just listen to me, young one." He stopped for a moment, he sighed, "Thank you, Rainbow Dash. You have brought love back into my life. The love of a best friend. I wouldn't trade those months for years of pain and constant medicine, and constant doctor's appointments. I'm glad to have had you in my life. Please. Just stay with me. Please, my friend?"

"Please don't leave me," she pleaded him.

He laid his hand on her cheek. And petted her head as she lay down with him, her wings spread out over him, holding him in a hug.

"I don't have a choice, my friend. It won't be long now."

She lost track of time as Merle fell asleep. After a time, his breathing slowed. And then became uneven. The old man had a lot of spirit, but eventually, his breathing stopped and his body relaxed. Still she didn't get up. Her body jerked with every sob.

Author's Note

The hardest chapter I've ever written. I liked Merle, but in my outline, he died after meeting her, so I wrote it. Well, I'm not going to stay dark and sad, things will liven up, but our heroine is still not having an easy time in the real world.