The Art of Falling

Chapters

Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Part Five
Part Six
Part Seven
Part Eight
Epilogue

Part One

Rainbow Dash was dead. She knew it for sure this time, though she couldn’t remember the how of it or the when of it. She hoped it had been an explosion. A big one. She couldn’t tell exactly what she was right now, either, except that she wasn’t alive. Stinking, mangled flesh raised from the ground by some foul power, or the lingering, disembodied memories of a pony who was simply too awesome to fade away like all the other dead losers, probably. All she could really tell was that she hurt, and that she hurt everywhere. Her head especially, if she even had a head anymore.

She waited for whatever was supposed to happen next, but nothing happened except the stinging, aching hurt, so she opened her eyes.

Glaring white light blinded her, and she groaned and shut her eyes again.

“I think she’s waking up!” a much-too-loud voice said nearby.

Dash eased her eyes open again, little by little. She saw a white room and a bright window. She blinked slowly. When she opened her eyes again she saw Fluttershy’s face, her friend’s eyes wide.

“Am I dead?” Rainbow Dash asked. Her throat felt coarse like gravel, and her voice came out a dry whisper.

“No,” Fluttershy answered.

Liar.

“Water, please,” Dash whispered.

“Here.” Fluttershy pressed a cool glass to Dash’s lips. Dash drank, and beautifully cool water spilled down her dry throat. She drank until she choked and sputtered water onto her chest, and Fluttershy pulled the glass away.

“Where am I?” Dash asked.

“The hospital,” a second voice answered.

Dash looked around and saw Twilight’s face next to Fluttershy’s. The world began to become clearer. Dash saw Applejack, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Spike’s faces, too, all gathered around her. Dash quickly looked down and saw that their faces were, in fact, still connected to their bodies.

“Oh, that’s good,” Dash said. “I thought you guys were dead, too, for a second. That would have sucked.”

Fluttershy and Twilight exchanged a look.

Dash leaned back and looked around. She lay in an ordinary hospital room. Small, white room, one window, bedside table with lamp, single bed, stiff mattress, scratchy blankets, wooden pillow. Dash tried to move, but sharp pain shot down her legs, and she cried out.

“Don’t move!” Fluttershy held her down.

When Dash caught her breath, she examined her legs. Each leg had been bandaged, wrapped in a sling, and hung suspended in the air so she lay spread-eagled on the bed. Her legs hurt every time she tried to move them. She saw the bases of her wings had been bandaged, too. None of her friends looked hurt, though. Just her. Which meant she had either done something totally awesome or something totally stupid.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Well…” Twilight hesitated. “What’s the last thing that you can remember?”

Rainbow Dash closed her eyes. It had been the day of the aerial relay trials for the Cloudsdale Games. She and her team, still Fluttershy and Bulk Biceps, had finished all of their preparations. They were just about to begin the qualifying round, and Fluttershy stood crouched and ready at the starting line, waiting for the call to take off. Then… nothing.

“We were about to start the relay, but I don’t remember anything after that.” Dash’s eyes widened. “We qualified, right?!”

“Well, almost,” Rarity replied slowly.

“What do you mean?”

“It looked like you were going to qualify,” Twilight explained. “But at the last second, you attempted to perform a trick I’ve never seen you try before while going through the final hoop. Some kind of corkscrew and loop. Your wing hit the edge and you lost control.”

Dash sighed and leaned back. Something totally stupid, then.

Applejack wrapped a leg around Fluttershy and pulled her close. “Fluttershy here picked ya up and carried you all the way here before the rest of us even knew what’d happened, quicker than I’ve ever seen her fly,” she said, and kissed Fluttershy on the cheek.

Fluttershy blushed, but didn’t pull away.

Rainbow Dash started to ask Applejack why she was putting her mouth on Fluttershy’s face, but closed it again when she remembered. She kept forgetting that Applejack and Fluttershy were marefriends now. About time, too. Fluttershy had been whining to Dash about it for years.

“Must’ve been one of the worst flyin’ accidents I’ve seen, and I’ve seen ya bang your head into more things than I can count,” Applejack continued with a small smile. “It’s lucky you’ve got such a thick head, or you might’ve actually gotten hurt.”

Suddenly, Rainbow Dash remembered it all. She had been far ahead of qualifying time, so she decided to show everyone what a real stunt flyer could do. At the last moment, she tried a trick she had only practiced once before—the Monsoon. ‘Corkscrew and loop’ was about right, except she had performed it at far higher speeds than most normal stunt flyers would have dared, and performing it through a small relay hoop left almost no room for error.

She had pulled it off, though. Nailed it, really. Ponies had been impressed, she knew that much. But just as she had gone through the hoop, something went wrong. The next thing Dash knew, she had been rocketing headfirst at the ground.

Rainbow Dash hadn’t practiced the stunt at all beforehand. All stunt flyers knew it was idiocy to attempt to perform a complex stunt in front of a crowd without practicing first. It was the first lesson every stunt flyer learned. Practice, practice, practice. Dash had only successfully performed the Monsoon once or twice before. She should have known not to try something so risky. But she got cocky, and she tried it anyway, and then she ruined her team’s chances of qualifying.

Dash sighed again. “Thanks for carrying me, Fluttershy. And sorry I screwed up you getting qualified. I messed up the trick, and… I’m sorry.”

Fluttershy didn’t answer, and Dash looked up at her. Fluttershy stared down at her, looking… hurt?

“Fluttershy?” Dash asked.

Fluttershy closed her eyes and turned away.

Before Dash had a chance to ask what was wrong, the door opened, and a tall stallion wearing a white coat and stethoscope walked in. Dash wondered why doctors wore stethoscopes all the time. Checking heartbeats couldn’t have been more than, like, five percent of their job.

“So, my new favorite patient is finally awake?” he asked.

“Yes, doctor,” Twilight replied. “Rainbow Dash just woke up.” She and the rest of Dash’s friends stepped aside for him. Fluttershy moved to the far side of the room.

“Well then, may I be the first to welcome you back, Miss Rainbow Dash,” the doctor said as he trotted up to the bed. “You’ve just won me twenty bits!”

“What?” Rainbow Dash asked, not really paying attention. She watched Fluttershy. The other pegasus stood by the wall, back turned away. Applejack walked over and nuzzled her, looking concerned. They whispered to one another, and Dash strained to hear what they said.

“Yup.” The doctor examined a chart and chuckled. “You’re here so much, we decided to start a running lottery. We’ve been betting on what you would be admitted for next.” He looked up, grinning. “And I won!”

Twilight frowned. “Is that… ethical?”

He shrugged.

Dash bit her lip. Applejack had returned to the side of her bed, but Fluttershy still stood by the wall. Dash hadn’t even realized Fluttershy cared so much about the relay. The only time Fluttershy cared about sports was when Rainbow Dash was competing. Or at least that’s what Dash had thought.

“What about Rainbow Dash?” Rarity asked. “Is she going to be okay?”

“Well, you took quite the little tumble,” the doctor answered, looking down at his chart again. “Luckily, only your extremities, your hooves and wings, suffered any acute injuries. With magical treatments, you should make a full recovery.”

Pinkie Pie blew a noise maker and threw confetti on the floor, and all of the rest of Dash’s friends visibly relaxed. Even Fluttershy trotted back over.

Rainbow Dash didn’t feel relieved. She was still too busy watching Fluttershy.

Fluttershy hadn’t accepted her apology. Rainbow had screwed up a lot of times, but Fluttershy had never outright refused to even accept one of her apologies before. Dash’s throat began to feel very dry again.

“When do I get out of these?” Dash asked, gesturing her muzzle towards the slings. “Tomorrow?”

The doctor frowned. “Not quite. As I said, your hooves and wings have sustained very acute injuries. They will require a specialized restoration spell to heal. I’ll need to keep you here with us for a while longer so I can administer the treatments myself at daily intervals.”

“Well, I don’t have to sit in these slings the entire time, yeah?”

“I’m afraid you will,” the doctor answered. “You will need to remain in your slings and in that position for the entire duration of your stay here, or else you’ll risk prolonging the treatment time, or worse, further injuring yourself.”

“I at least to get roll over every now and then, right? You can’t make me sit on my back like this for an entire day without moving. I’d go insane!”

The doctor frowned down at her.

“I don’t have to sit like this for an entire day, right?” Dash repeated.

“Yes, you do,” he said slowly. “You must remain in that position.”

“Ugh.” Rainbow Dash groaned and knocked her head against the pillow. “This is gonna be the worst.”

“And you’ll have to stay that way for much longer than a single day.”

Rainbow Dash’s head shot up again. “How long?!”

“Well, considering the sensitive nature of the treatment…” The doctor scratched his chin. “I’d say a week, at least.”

Rainbow Dash’s stomach did a somersault and the whole room flipped upside down and all her friends’ concerned faces spun over top of her. Not a day, or even days, but a week of lying in bed, not able to use any of her hooves or even her wings. How would she practice? How would she read? How would she eat?!

“No,” she said. This must have been a prank. She was Rainbow Dash, and things like this didn’t happen to Rainbow Dash. She tried to get up.

“Stop!” Twilight said. “You’ll hurt yourself."

Rainbow Dash gritted her teeth and fought through the pain, but she began to feel dizzy, and the bed seemed to have flipped up onto the ceiling, and pain pounded up her hooves along in time with her quickening heartbeat.

She felt something sting her neck. “I’m administering a light sedative,” she heard the doctor say, his voice muffled like it had come through a wall. “Just so you don’t hurt yourself, all right?”

Rainbow Dash suddenly felt very tired. The world seemed such a delightful, pleasant place, she wondered how she had ever gotten upset over anything. When she thought about it, scratchy blankets were the very best sort of blankets. She snuggled down beneath them, feeling delightfully itchy all the way. Then she blacked out.

_________________________________________________

The room was dark when Rainbow Dash woke. The only light in the room came from the bedside lamp. Fluttershy sat in a small chair by the bed, reading a magazine.

Dash tensed when she saw Fluttershy. The rest of her friends seemed to have left. Fluttershy probably still hadn’t forgiven her. Dash tried to think of something to say before Fluttershy noticed that she had woken. Or maybe it would have been better to pretend to be asleep until Fluttershy left.

But Fluttershy looked up over the top of her magazine before Dash could decide. She quickly dropped the magazine and flittered to the side of the bed. “Oh, how are you feeling?”

Rainbow Dash sighed. Her whole body felt stiff and achy. She began to stretch, but pain shot down her legs. She looked up and saw that each of her hooves were still bandaged and slung up in the air. She groaned.

“You need to try not to move,” Fluttershy chided her.

“Gee, thanks,” Dash muttered. Her mouth tasted awful and her lips were dry.

“Do you need anything?”

Rainbow Dash desperately wanted a drink of water, but she shook her head. She had bothered Fluttershy enough. “Where did everypony else go?”

“They went home.” Fluttershy grabbed a glass of water off the bedside table and held it to Dash’s lips. Dash gladly accepted, wondering how Fluttershy had known. “I said I would stay for the night to help you.”

“Why?” Dash asked when she finished drinking.

“Well…” Fluttershy placed the glass on the table. “I want to make this as easy for you as I can. I know this is going to be hard for you, because of the…” She hesitated, then gestured to Dash’s bandages and blushed.

Dash looked up at the slings holding her hooves and down at the bandages on her wings. She looked like she was half mummy. Or at least a quarter mummy.

And she would stay quarter mummy for one whole week, at least. She would lie on that bed, with her legs held stuck over her head and her wings useless, for a week.

Mummies were the worst. Rainbow Dash hated mummies.

Looking down at herself, Rainbow Dash realized why Fluttershy had blushed. The slings spread her legs apart in the air, openly displaying Dash’s most intimate parts for anyone and everyone to see. She would be that way, totally exposed to the whole world, all week long. Actually, it reminded her of a picture she had seen in a magazine once. More than once, actually. Any other time, it might actually have been sort of hot. But right now, it was just stupid. Stupid like mummies.

She screwed her eyes shut and swallowed a frustrated scream. “Ugh, this sucks so much. This is seriously the worst thing that’s ever happened to me.”

“Oh, it’s not that bad.” Fluttershy smiled. “You, um, you don’t have to work!”

“I like my work. Being weather captain is awesome.”

“Oh, well…” Fluttershy bit her lip. “Um, you’ll have plenty of time read.”

“Without my hooves?”

“I could hold the book for you,” Fluttershy suggested,

Rainbow Dash sighed.

Fluttershy sat down on her haunches, her wings sagging to the floor. She wrung her hooves. “Well… we all decided that we would visit you every day, so you’ll never be lonely, and you’ll always have one of us here with you.”

“Thanks,” Dash said, and tried to mean it. She did mean it, but she didn’t see how it made much of a difference how many ponies came and ogled at her. Mummies were so lucky. No one ever ogled at mummies. Well, except for the ones in museums. But those didn’t count.

“And there are so many things we can do together!” Fluttershy said, brightening.

Dash snorted. “Like what?”

“Well, we can play games, not games like hoofball, but board games or word games.” Fluttershy smiled again. “We could listen to music you like, and I’m sure I could ask the doctors if they would let me bring Tank here to spend time with you. We could set up a little picnic in here Applejack might bring over some of the leftover cider. And we could turn out all the lights and you could tell all of your best ghost stories. And we’ll have so much time to spend together! More time than we’ve had in years! We don’t have to do anything but talk. About anything you want. Not just me, but all of us. I bet Rarity could even give you a makeover, if you wanted.”

Rainbow Dash chuckled. “Is that last one really supposed to make me feel better?”

“Maybe not.” Fluttershy giggled. “Being stu—um, lying in bed like this, you could nap all day, and never do anything else, and no one could complain about it.”

“All right,” Dash conceded with a smile. “You’re right. That part could be pretty awesome.”

“I bet we can have a lot fun, and I’m sure Pinkie Pie will think of something if you ever get too bored.”

Rainbow Dash tried to hold on to her sour mood, but she couldn’t keep back the smile. Pinkie could throw a party in a desert with nothing but suntanned rocks and venomous scorpions to use for party supplies. Who knew what she could do with an entire hospital to work with.

“We can start now,” Fluttershy said. “If you want to.”

“Start what?”

“Talking. We haven’t had time for just the two of us in while. At least not since I started dating Applejack.”

“Sure.” Dash shrugged, or tried to shrug. All she really managed was to swing her forelegs a little. “What do you wanna talk about?”

“Oh… Um… How are your flight practices going?”

Dash looked between her friend and her bandaged wings. “Are you serious?”

“Oh!” Fluttershy covered her mouth. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t think—”

“It doesn’t matter,” Dash said quickly. “Uh, how are things going with Applejack?” Not that Dash cared. Mummies didn’t care about dating.

Fluttershy flared her wings and blushed a little. “It’s going so well! Applejack is so understanding. I’m usually nervous about marefriends, but not at all with her, because she’s always patient with me. You were right all along, and I never would have talked to her about it if you hadn’t made me. I know that must have been hard for you. Thank you.”

“Uh, sure.” Dash tried to scratch her neck, but felt a sharp nip of pain in her hoof instead. “Any time.”

“It really is going well. Sometimes I think, but only very quietly, and I haven’t said so to anypony yet, but sometimes I think that I might want to be with her for the rest of my life.”

“Yeah…” Dash’s smile slowly faded.

“Is something wrong?”

“No, it’s just—” Dash stopped herself. As she thought about Applejack and Fluttershy, she remembered how Applejack and Fluttershy had whispered to each other. And how just before that, Fluttershy hadn’t accepted her apology. “Hey, Fluttershy?” she asked hesitantly.

“Yes?”

Rainbow Dash swallowed. “Um, I’m sorry about the relay. I know I screwed up your chances for qualifying, and it was all my fault, and I’m really sorry about that.”

Fluttershy froze. Then, for only a single moment, Rainbow Dash could have sworn Fluttershy glared down at her, but the other pegasus quickly looked away again before Dash could tell for sure.

Rainbow Dash waited for Fluttershy to do something else, utterly confused, but Fluttershy didn’t speak again. She only sat on her haunches, shaking her head.

When Dash thought about it, it made a certain kind of sense that Fluttershy would be upset about not qualifying in the relay. Fluttershy never won anything. She was good at some things—a lot things, really. But she wasn’t good at anything that ponies held competitions for. She wasn’t athletic, or strong, or a good flyer. Their relay team wouldn’t compete again. Probably for the last time in Fluttershy’s life, she could have qualified in a professional tournament. Rainbow Dash had seen for herself how hard Fluttershy had worked and trained for the relay, and how far she had come since their first practice. They had gotten close, too. Right up to the last relay marker, before Rainbow Dash messed it all up.

To get so close that you actually believe you’ve won, and then lose it all at the very last moment, right when you should have been celebrating…

Rainbow Dash scowled.

Of course Fluttershy would be angry with her, and she had every right to be. Fluttershy had done everything right, and Rainbow Dash had screwed it all up for her forever. Rainbow Dash didn’t want to imagine what she would have done to a pony who did that to her. If Dash could have flown straight instead of trying to take all the glory for herself by being a show off, Fluttershy would have been celebrating with her friends right now. Instead, she had wasted her entire day in the hospital, hovering over some crippled, selfish jerk. Rainbow Dash guessed it would be a long while until Fluttershy could forgive her.

“Are you hungry?” Fluttershy asked suddenly.

“What?”

“You haven’t eaten anything all day,” Fluttershy said. “Applejack left some applesauce here for you. Do you want to eat some of it?”

Only then did Rainbow Dash realize how hungry she felt. She didn’t think she had ever gone that long without food before. It was probably a new mummy record, or something. “Yeah, definitely.”

Fluttershy picked a covered glass jar off the table. As she unscrewed its top, the smell of apples filled the room. If Dash closed her eyes, it almost felt like she was napping on a tree limb in Sweet Apple Acres. Almost.

“Hey, wait,” she said, opening her eyes. “How am I supposed to eat?”

Fluttershy hovered close to her, holding a spoon in one hoof and the jar in the other. “Well…”

“No,” Dash said, shaking her head. “No, no, no, no.”

“Please—”

“No. No way. I am not doing that.”

Fluttershy leaned forward. “There isn’t any—”

“No!” Dash shouted. “I’m not going to let you hoof feed me like one of your stupid little sick rabbits.”

“It isn’t—”

“I said no! Just put it on my stomach, and I’ll eat it like that.”

Fluttershy leaned back and sighed heavily. Her expression hardened. “That won’t work.”

“Whatever,” Dash retorted. “I’ll make it work.”

“No. You’ll make a mess and you could hurt yourself,” Fluttershy said simply.

“No I won’t! I know how to feed myself. I’m not a little foal!”

“You need to eat if you’re going to get better, and this is the only way. But if you don’t want to, I won’t make you.” Fluttershy smiled softly. “But I promise that if you let me help you, it won’t be anything like a foal or any of my rabbits. I’ll just be a… a friend helping another friend with something she’s having trouble with. That’s all.”

Dash bit her lip. She was hungry. And she wasn’t keen on spilling apple sauce all over herself. “You can’t tell anypony else about this.”

Fluttershy nodded quickly. “I promise.”

“Never.”

“Of course.”

Rainbow Dash sighed and slowly nodded.

Fluttershy smiled again and hovered close to her. She dipped the spoon in the jar and brought it back out, covered in ginger-smelling applesauce. “You can close your eyes if you want.”

Dash’s face and ears burned like they had been lit on fire, and she became uncomfortably aware of how close Fluttershy had come to her. Her friend leaned far over the bed, her chest pressing against Dash’s stomach. Dash gritted her teeth and shook her head.

“Okay.” Fluttershy slowly brought the spoon to Dash’s mouth. She held it there, just in front of Dash’s closed lips.

Dash stared at the spoon. Mummies were so lucky that they were dead when they got wrapped up. Mummies never had to get hoof fed by anyone. Especially not their friends.

“Um, do you still want it?”

Dash sighed again and leaned forward. She closed her mouth around the spoon, then quickly leaned back again, never once daring to look into Fluttershy’s eyes. If there was any silver lining at all in that damned situation, it was that Sweet Apple Acres’ applesauce always tasted wonderfully sweet.

Fluttershy dipped the spoon in the jar again and brought it Dash’s mouth, which Dash silently accepted.

“Rose and Lily visited me before we left for the relay, and they talked about you,” Fluttershy said as Dash continued to eat. She spoke normally, as if they were just out for a walk or having lunch, and not smack in the middle of the most embarrassing moment of Dash’s life. “They saw one of your practices in the park, and they were very impressed. They told me about a new trick you did, something about flying upside down and ice cream, and they said it might be even better than the sonic rainboom.”

Rainbow Dash smiled in spite of herself as she ate. Of course they would talk about her. Ordinary ponies had a weird habit of talking about awesome ponies.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t able to see it,” Fluttershy continued, frowning slightly. “I’m sorry I haven’t been to as many of your practices recently. I’ve just been spending so much time with Applejack, I guess I haven’t been seeing my other friends as much as I should. Are you finished?”

Rainbow Dash nodded, feeling comfortably full.

“I hope you’ll show me that trick as soon as you’re better,” Fluttershy said, leaning back.

“Sure… and thanks,” Dash said quietly.

Fluttershy smiled. “Of course!”

Rainbow Dash didn’t know how Fluttershy did it, how she acted so nice to her. Rainbow Dash couldn’t have. She wouldn’t have been able to speak to a pony who had just lost her so much, and in such a stupid, pointless way, too. Not unless that speaking involved a lot of shouting and bucking.

“Fluttershy,” Dash said carefully, “I know you probably can’t forgive me yet, but I really am sorry about the relay. I can probably pull some strings and get you on one of the other teams as a sub, or something. You wouldn’t get to actually compete, but at least you would still get to go to the Cloudsdale Games. You really deserve it.”

Fluttershy’s smile dropped. She said nothing at all.

Rainbow Dash began to become worried.

The room fell silent. Fluttershy leaned over and dropped the jar on the table with a resounding thud that seemed so loud that it could have been a tombstone falling in a hollow grave.

Fluttershy sat down by the bed and closed her eyes. “You’re just so selfish,” she whispered.

“I—you—but—what?” Dash sputtered all at once. “What?

Fluttershy shook her head and sniffed. “You just don’t understand…”

Rainbow Dash wholly agreed with that. She didn’t understand at all. “Fluttershy, I get that you’re mad about the relay, but—”

“I don’t care about the relay!” Fluttershy shouted. Then her eyes went wide as if she were surprised by the force of her own voice, and she drew back.

“But… why are you so upset then?”

“Because I care about you!” Fluttershy cried.

Dash frowned. “But I’m fine.”

“This time!” Fluttershy retorted. “This time, you’re fine. But it won’t be the last time. It’s never the last time. You heard the doctor, you’re here so often, they bet on how you’ll hurt yourself again, because they know you’ll always hurt yourself again. What’ll happen the next time?” Fluttershy took a deep breath, her wings trembling behind her. “When I saw you hit the ground, I was so, so scared...”

A horrible, hard lump had formed in Dash’s throat, making it hard to get a clear breath. She tried to swallow it down, but the lump stayed put. “Fluttershy…”

“Please just tell me one thing,” Fluttershy said, her eyes shimmering and red. “When you decided to try that trick, even though you hadn’t practiced for it at all and you knew could get you hurt, did you think—even for one moment—did you think about any of us? About your friends? About me?”

Rainbow Dash didn’t answer, but they both knew she didn’t need to.

Fluttershy wiped at her eyes. “You never think about us. You never think what it’s like for us to see you fall. You never think what it’s like for us to see you broken, to carry you to the hospital. You never think what it’s like for us to wait for you to wake up, to wonder if you’ll wake up. You only think about yourself.” She sniffed. “And the worst part is that you never even realize it. You never see how much you’re hurting us.”

Rainbow Dash lay silent on the bed. Fluttershy stood beside her, breathing heavily, her wings unfurling and folding in time with her breaths. Rainbow Dash opened her mouth, but she realized she didn’t have any idea what to say, so she silently closed it again.

Fluttershy quickly shrunk back away from her, as if recoiling from all she had just said. “I need…” She took a step beck. “I need some air.” She turned and ran out of the room. The door closed loudly behind her.

As Rainbow Dash lay on the bed, she tried to remember. How many times had she hurt herself? How many times had her friends watched her fall? How many times had her friends carried her to the hospital? How many times had she lain in a bed like this one while her friends waited nearby?

How many times had she hurt her friends, without ever once realizing it?

Dozens of times, maybe more. She couldn’t be sure. She thought of all times she had woken up after a fall, in the hospital, on the street, in the dirt. Each and every time one of her friends had been there. She thought of their faces. They looked scared.

She noticed that her wings hurt. She looked down at her bandages and her face darkened. She hated them. She tried to move her wings and her hooves, and they hurt more, enough to make her grimace. She imagined herself tearing her bandages apart with her teeth and ripping her hooves out of their slings. She would roll over the side of the bed. She would scream when her body hit the hard floor below. Her wings and hooves would never fully heal without their bandages. They would become misshapen and useless. She wouldn’t be able to fly, and she would never hurt anyone again.

Fluttershy rushed back inside and flew straight to Dash’s bedside. “Oh, I’m so, so sorry!” she said, her eyes wide and watery. “I never should have said that. I was just feeling upset because I was so worried about you—Oh, but that’s not any excuse.”

Rainbow Dash blinked up at her, uncomprehending.

“I’m sorry,” Fluttershy said again. She reached forward as if to embrace Rainbow, but then hesitated, looking at the bandages. “That wasn’t fair to you. Of course, this is much harder for you than it is for me. I know you don’t hurt yourself on purpose, and this is just a part of what you do. I just get so frustrated—no, that’s no excuse for what I said. I’m sorry.”

Fluttershy’s words washed over Rainbow Dash like a cloud full of freezing, morning rainwater. It took her a long time to realize that Fluttershy was apologizing, and it took her longer to realize what she was apologizing for. Neither realization made sense. “No… It’s all right,” Dash finally said.

“No it isn’t,” Fluttershy replied firmly. “That was wrong of me, and I shouldn’t have said it. You’re already going through such a difficult time.”

Rainbow was quiet for a while. “No… It’s all right.”

Fluttershy frowned at her. “I—Do you need anything? Maybe some more water?”

“No.” Rainbow Dash looked away from Fluttershy. “I think I’m gonna go to sleep now.”

“Oh, are you sure?”

Rainbow Dash nodded, still not looking at her. “Yeah.”

“Okay.” Fluttershy hesitated, biting her lip. “I’ll turn out the light then.”

Rainbow nodded again.

Fluttershy moved to the bedside and turned off the lamp. She looked at Rainbow Dash for moment, then went to the door. “Good night,” she whispered.

“Good night.”

Fluttershy went out of the room and quietly closed the door behind her.

Rainbow Dash lay in the dark alone. Mummies were so lucky. Mummies never hurt any of their friends. She closed her eyes and fell into a fitful sleep.

Part Two

Twilight stared down at the little plastic clouds and weather ponies that stood in orderly patterns on her game board. She stole a quick glance up at Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy, then quickly looked back down at her pieces again.

She kept accidentally glancing between Rainbow Dash’s spread-apart hindlegs. It wasn’t as if she had never caught glimpses of her friend’s more intimate areas before. Rainbow rarely wore clothing, and she had a habit of hovering above everyone else. But Twilight had never seen them so openly on display. Her friend’s position invited surreptitious gazes, and Twilight couldn’t keep herself from looking.

She tried to focus on the game. The game was something Twilight understood. The board, which she had set on the foot of Dash’s hospital bed, consisted of a rigid, square grid pattern made up of vertical and horizontal lines and a partition to hide her pieces from her opponent's view. The lines were drawn at specific, set intervals, and each square in the grid was exactly equal in size and shape to all the other squares.

Except for one. One of the squares was crooked, and it threw the entire board into chaos. Twilight didn’t understand that at all.

Twilight also didn’t understand ponies. There had been a time when she was so socially isolated, she couldn’t have explained the behaviors of other ponies any better than she could have explained why kinetic energy wasn’t conserved in inelastic collisions. But now things were different. Twilight had become an expert on the transference of energy in inelastic collisions. She should have been an expert on ponies, too. She had studied friendship far more than she had studied theories of energy transference. At the very least, she should have understood her closest friends.

However, both Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy seemed to be actively (and successfully) proving that she, in fact, knew nothing about friendship at all.

Twilight glanced up again, and her eyes settled on Rainbow Dash’s bandages. For an instant, Twilight watched Rainbow Dash fall again, saw her body hit the ground, and heard the crowd scream again.

Twilight shook her head. She didn’t need to think about that now. Later, but not now. She looked to Rainbow Dash’s chest instead. Dash had an identical board to Twilight’s lying on her stomach, which both Dash and Fluttershy frowned down at. Neither of them had smiled since they had started playing.

No, that wasn’t true. Fluttershy had tried to smile. More than once, actually. But, every time, her smiles had withered away almost as soon as they had started to bloom on her face. Rainbow Dash hadn’t smiled once since Twilight and Fluttershy had arrived that morning.

Twilight didn’t understand ponies. Sometimes, when she expected something was wrong with one of her friends, she could simply ask them what was wrong. Sometimes, though, being blunt was considered rude. Sometimes she was expected to ask in a subtle, roundabout sort of way. And sometimes she was expected to patiently wait for her friends to ask for help themselves. She had trouble knowing which approach any given situation called for. Even when she thought she had figured it all out, catalogued all the possible scenarios with neat and orderly notes in her scrolls, there would always be one more crooked square left she could never understand.

Twilight didn’t know what kind of situation this was. It felt a lot like a crooked square. Something was wrong, but Twilight didn’t know what it was or how to fix it. Twilight looked back up at Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy again. They were both still frowning, but now they were frowning at her.

“What is it?” Twilight asked. “Is something wrong?”

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes.

“It’s your turn,” Fluttershy said quietly.

“Oh.” Twilight blinked down at her pieces. “Sorry. I forgot. Uh, cloud six?”

Rainbow Dash sighed.

Fluttershy bit her lip, leaning down across Dash’s chest and peering at their board. “You got our stormcloud.” She picked it up in her mouth and dropped it with the rest of the discarded game pieces. “We only have one piece left.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Twilight said.

Rainbow Dash winced, then looked away. “Don’t say sorry.”

Fluttershy winced, too, when Dash said that. She looked at Dash, but the other pegasus stared mutely the other away.

Twilight frowned. She didn’t understand ponies. She especially didn’t understand Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy.

Twilight could understand why Rainbow Dash would be upset. She had spent her first night in the hospital, and it wouldn’t be her last. She couldn’t walk, she couldn’t fly, she couldn’t even feed herself. A little nagging voice in the back of Twilight’s whispered that it was Rainbow Dash’s fault. She had acted rashly, and she had gotten herself hurt. It hadn’t been the first time, either. Maybe, finally, Rainbow Dash would learn from this accident and stop hurting herself.

Twilight decided right then that she would speak to Rainbow Dash about it. Sometime soon. She refused to continue sitting idly by while one of her closest friends destroyed herself. But now wasn’t the right time. No, for now, Rainbow Dash had every reason to be upset.

Rainbow Dash didn’t seem like that kind of upset, though. She wasn’t complaining or expressing any irritation. She wasn’t angry or flustered. She was simply lying quietly in bed, not saying much of anything, never smiling, and never looking at Fluttershy.

That was the part that really confused Twilight. The entire time they had been at the hospital, Rainbow Dash had never once looked Fluttershy in the eyes. She didn’t have any problem looking at Twilight, or out the open window, or at the wall, or at the ceiling, or anywhere else that wasn’t in Fluttershy’s general direction. Fluttershy had noticed it, too. She kept trying to smile and catch Rainbow Dash’s attention, but Dash always looked obstinately some other way. Each time, Fluttershy’s smiles withered faster.

“What do you want to do?” Fluttershy asked softly, looking at Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow Dash sighed down at the board. “Sky seven.”

Twilight examined her own board. The space labeled ‘sky seven’ was empty. “You got my weather pony!” she said. “Good job.” She levitated the little plastic weather pony off sky three, silently thanked him for his sacrifice, and dropped him with the others. Twilight smiled at Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow Dash still didn’t smile back. “It’s your turn.”

“Okay.” Twilight’s smile fell. “Cloud four?”

Rainbow Dash sighed.

“That was our cumulus,” Fluttershy said. “Our last one. You win.”

Surely, there had never been a more subdued victory in all the history of board games. Fluttershy dropped the cumulus down with all the other fallen plastic figures. Then Twilight, Fluttershy, and Rainbow Dash all sat in silence.

“I’m sorry, Rainbow,” Twilight finally said, cleaning her throat. “I guess I’m better at this game than I thought.”

“Don’t say sorry,” Dash shot back, her eyes narrowed. “You shouldn’t say sorry for things when I’m the one who screwed up.”

Twilight blinked. “Oh…” She didn’t know what to say to that. Twilight was discovering this morning that there were a lot of things she didn’t know.

Fluttershy looked at Rainbow Dash, her eyes wide and wet and shimmering.

Rainbow Dash shook her head. “Sorry, never mind. I’m acting stupid. I think this hospital bed is getting to me. I’m just not used to sitting around this much.”

“It’s okay.” Twilight smiled. “I understand. I think I’d be a little testy if I couldn’t read, too.”

“Yeah…”

“Do you want to play again?” Fluttershy asked.

“We have time for at least one more,” Twilight said, checking the clock. It would be time for Rainbow Dash’s first treatments soon.

“No, I’ll let Twilight enjoy beating me at something for once.” The barest hint of a smile appeared on Dash’s face. “It doesn’t happen much. Probably never will again.”

Twilight laughed. “You’re too generous.”

“Do you want to play something else?” Fluttershy asked, smiling a little, too.

“Nah.” Dash shook her head. “I’m pretty tired.”

“What do you want to do, then?”

“I’m just tired,” Dash said again.

Twilight looked between them. She saw Rainbow Dash, looking sullenly down at her empty game board and pretending to yawn, and Fluttershy standing just beside her, a worried frown on her face.

Twilight didn’t understand ponies, but this seemed more like the ‘don’t pester anypony and patiently wait for her friends to ask her for help’ kind of situation. She kept her mouth firmly shut.

Fluttershy reached over and lightly touched Dash’s shoulder. “Do you want me to get you some more water? You’re out.”

Rainbow Dash turned and looked at her, actually looked Fluttershy in the eyes, for the first time that morning. They looked at each other for a long moment. Twilight looked away. Somehow, it seemed impolite to watch.

“Sure,” Rainbow Dash replied after a long silence.

“Okay.” Fluttershy gave Dash the smallest of nuzzles, then trotted away. “I’ll be right back.” She closed the door behind her, and left Twilight and Rainbow Dash alone together.

Twilight set about cleaning up the game. She picked up the boards and pieces in her magic, then neatly arranged them all inside the box and placed the lid on top with a tidy precision that would have made Rarity proud. When she finished, Twilight waited for Rainbow Dash to say something, but Dash only quietly stared at the wall. After a time, Twilight straightened the already straight bed sheets.

“Can I stay over with you?” Rainbow Dash asked suddenly.

“What?”

“When I get out of here,” Dash said, “do you mind if I stay over at the library for a couple nights?”

“Of course I wouldn’t,” Twilight answered. “I’d be glad to have you over again. You can stay with me whenever you want.”

“Thanks,” Dash murmured, looking down again.

They fell into another long silence.

Fluttershy had opened the window when they first arrived, and it was still open now. The sound of fluttering birds’ wings drifted inside along a cool breeze. The wind ran across the floor and up to the bed, then curled around Dash’s bandages and rustled her mane and feathers.

Rainbow turned and looked out the window.

Twilight’s heart ached, watching her. Rainbow Dash was meant to fly, just as flowers were meant to bloom. When Rainbow Dash lost her wings, the world lost that much of its beauty. Rainbow Dash must have known. Maybe not explicitly, but she must have been able to feel that deficit in the beautiful.

“I know a week must seem like a long time,” Twilight said, trying to talk like Celestia did all the times the Princess had helped Twilight with a soothing voice and a light touch. “But it’ll be over sooner than you think. A week really isn’t very long. You’ll be flying again in no time.”

“Should I?” Dash asked, still turned away.

“Should you what?”

Rainbow Dash shook her head. “This is so stupid.”

“Um…”

Rainbow Dash turned to Twilight. “Are you mad at me? You’re not, right? And neither is anypony else, right?”

“I—what? Of course I’m not mad at you,” Twilight answered. “Why would you think I was?”

“It’s just…” Dash looked at her bandaged hooves. “This is so stupid. You’re not mad at me for what I did at the relay? I messed up and I hurt myself, and I didn’t even need to do that trick, and I hadn’t even practiced it at all. I could have just kept flying straight. We would have qualified. It was stupid and I could have gotten really hurt.” She turned back to Twilight, eyes wide and questioning. “You’re not mad at me, though, right? It’s not a big deal?”

“Oh, well…” Twilight hadn’t wanted to have this conversation now. She would have preferred Rainbow Dash have time to heal and rest first. Hurt and confused were likely the worst conditions under which a pony could receive criticism, and Rainbow Dash had never been a pony particularly good at receiving criticism anyway. But Rainbow had asked… “I’m not angry with you,” Twilight began carefully. “I’m just upse—no, I’m disappointed. And worried.”

Rainbow Dash watched her closely.

“You said yourself,” Twilight continued, “you could have gotten really hurt. You did get really hurt. I’m scared when I think about how much worse it could have been. The way you looked in the grass yesterday… And you’re right, you could have simply kept flying straight. It was a needlessly reckless stunt with a frighteningly low chance of success.”

Rainbow lowered her head and closed her eyes.

Twilight hesitated, but it needed to be said. She had waited too long to say this. “You scared me, Rainbow. You scared all of us. The worst part is, not only is this not the first time, but I know for a certainty that it won’t be the last time. That’s what scares me more than anything else. It’s going to happen again. It’s just a matter of waiting—waiting and wondering how bad it will be next time.”

“I… I didn’t know,” Rainbow Dash whispered, her head still lowered.

Twilight leaned down and wrapped Rainbow in a gentle hug. “I know you didn’t. But you do now. Please don’t do this to yourself again.”

Rainbow Dash sniffled and shook her head.

“I brought the water,” a voice said from behind Twilight. “I’m sorry I took so—oh.”

Twilight leaned away from Dash and glanced backwards. Fluttershy stood halfway through the open doorway, a pitcher of water balanced on her back.

“I’m sorry,” Fluttershy said quickly. “Am I interrupting? Should I leave? I’ll leave.” She began hurriedly backing out of the room, and water sloshed over the pitcher’s sides.

“No, it’s okay,” Twilight replied, using her magic to catch the spilt water and balance the pitcher. “Rainbow Dash and I were just talking.”

“Oh, okay…” Fluttershy timidly walked inside and set the pitcher on the bedside table. “Is everything all right?”

Rainbow Dash’s eyes were still closed. She sniffled again.

Twilight frowned. “Well—”

The door opened and a mare wearing scrubs stepped inside. “Visiting hours are over. We need to begin preparing the patient for treatment now.”

“Can you give us just one more minute?” Twilight asked.

The nurse shook her head.

“I’m sorry,” Twilight said. “But we’re in the middle of something very important. Could you please wait just one more minute?”

“No.” The nurse rolled her eyes. “The doctor has a busy schedule. No time for delays. You’re welcome to come back when her treatment is done.”

Twilight briefly considered imposing royal privilege, but stopped herself. Celestia had warned against inappropriate use of her titles. “Is it possible that we could stay during the treatment? It’ll only take a minute, and I promise to be quiet.”

“No. The room must be clear of all non-staff. Hospital policy.”

“Oh.” Twilight looked down at Dash and smiled. “Well, we’ll finish this talk soon. Rarity and Pinkie Pie will be coming by later to see you, okay, Rainbow?”

Dash nodded, eyes still closed.

Twilight gave her a small kiss on the forehead. “Everything will turn out okay. Your wings and hooves will heal sooner than you think. Just get some rest,” she said, then walked towards the door.

Fluttershy hesitated by the bed. She leaned down close to Rainbow Dash and whispered, “I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right,” Dash said quietly. “I’m fine.”

Fluttershy nodded and gave her a small hug, then she walked away and joined Twilight by the door. They left together.

“How are we feeling today, Rainbow Dash?” Twilight heard the nurse say, just as the door closed behind them.

Twilight and Fluttershy walked down the hospital hallway, passing busy orderlies and bored nurses.

Twilight silently scolded herself. Rainbow Dash hadn’t taken it well. Not at all. Twilight had a terrible habit of lecturing first and asking questions later. Celestia had warned her against that, too. Twilight should have waited. Rainbow Dash had looked bad all morning. Acted strangely, too.

“She was too quiet,” Twilight said, more to herself than to Fluttershy. She had seen Dash go through at least two dozen similar accidents, and each time Dash had shrugged off her injuries with the same practiced nonchalance with which she shrugged off punctual weather duties. “Rainbow Dash is never quiet. She didn’t enjoy the game at all, either, and that was one of her favorites.”

Fluttershy didn’t reply.

“I’ve never seen her react so poorly to an accident before,” Twilight continued, looking to Fluttershy. “Do you think something else could have happened that upset her? Last night, maybe?”

Fluttershy looked down at the floor, and said very quietly, “It was me.”

“What?” Twilight asked. “What was you?”

“It was me,” Fluttershy said again, sniffling. “This is all my fault.”

“How could this possibly be all your fault?”

“I never should have said anything at all! It wasn’t fair to her. I should have just let her rest,” Fluttershy said in a rush, beginning to walk faster. “I just got so angry, and now look what I’ve done!”

Twilight quickened her pace to keep up with her. “What do you mean? What did you say?”

Fluttershy walked faster still, nearly charging right through several annoyed-looking orderlies who stepped out of the way just in time. “It’s all my fault. This was the worst possible time I ever could have said anything. All she needed was rest.”

“I don’t understand,” Twilight said between apologizing to the orderlies and trying to keep pace. “What did you do?”

“I yelled at her!” Fluttershy cried, stopping suddenly and whirling around to face Twilight. “I just got so angry, and I was so scared for her. Did you see her fall? I really thought she might have been… And she didn’t care at all!”

Twilight stopped short, breathing heavily. “Fluttershy...”

“She only cared about that relay,” Fluttershy continued, “I just got so angry, I yelled at her. I apologized right after, but I think I really hurt her feelings. You saw how she looked. I’ve never seen her like that, and I don’t know what to do.”

“It’s all right,” Twilight said, finally catching her breath. “Everypony makes mistakes. And as far as mistakes go, this one doesn’t sound so bad.”

“But I—”

Twilight held a hoof to Fluttershy’s mouth. “First, I think we should go somewhere a little more private.”

Fluttershy looked around, as if realizing where she was for the first time, and that she was in either full view or earshot of an entire hospital floor of ponies. Fluttershy’s cheeks reddened, and she smiled at a pair of doctors who had been watching them. “Oh my,” she said quietly. “You’re right. Let’s leave.”

Twilight quickly led Fluttershy through the hospital and towards the entrance. Twilight tried to walk like Celestia, stately and elegant. Twilight had always taken some comfort in the way Celestia walked. Even in the most desperate situations, Celestia always looked so sure of herself. “This explains why Rainbow Dash asked me that, though,” Twilight said as they walked through the entrance and outside.

The hospital had been built away from Ponyville proper. Open spaces, green grass, tall trees, and blossoming flowers could be seen in every direction.

“What did Rainbow Dash ask you?” Fluttershy asked.

Twilight trotted towards one of the benches that lined the road to the hospital. “She asked me if I was angry at her. It was while you were out. After you yell—talked to her last night, she must have been worried we were all upset with her.”

Fluttershy hurried to Twilight’s side. “And what did you say? You said you weren’t, right?”

“Well…” Twilight sat down on the bench with a small sigh. “I explained to her that I wasn’t angry, but that I was worried. I told her that what she did was reckless. I told her how much she scared me—all of us—yesterday, and every time she does this.”

Fluttershy frowned at Twilight the same way she would have frowned at Angel Bunny after he had done something particularly mischievous. “You shouldn’t have said that.”

“I don’t think I should have lied. Yelling isn’t the right way to go about this, but I think we all knew this was a conversation we needed to have with her eventually. I’m glad you finally tried to talk to her about it.”

Fluttershy sighed. “I feel so sorry for her. After what I said to her yesterday, and now you, too. She must think all her friends are angry with her, and just when she needs our help more than ever.”

“I told her I wasn’t angry with her.”

“A pony can say she isn’t angry, and still be angry.”

“Fluttershy,” Twilight said, running a hoof through her mane. “I know the timing was bad, especially after what you said to her last night. If I’d known about that, I probably wouldn’t have said anything. But what I said was true, and you know it. Somepony needed to tell her. She can’t keep hurting herself like this.”

“Oh, I know…” Fluttershy sighed again and sat down next to Twilight. “We could have waited until she felt better.”

“I know, but she asked me. She’s never asked me anything about it before. I didn’t know if I’d have another chance.”

Fluttershy stared down at the ground. “I shouldn’t have yelled at her.”

“I’m sure she’ll forgive you. Rainbow Dash is never angry at anypony for long.”

“I just…” Fluttershy leaned down and dragged her hoof through the dirt. “This must be so hard for her. I just wish I could do something to make her feel better.”

“Me, too,” Twilight said. They couldn’t let Rainbow Dash lie in that bed, doing nothing but soaking in scratchy, sweaty blankets and guilt all day. The game had been a good idea, but they needed more. “What if we went to her house tomorrow and grabbed some of her things, her Daring Do novels, some more of her games, anything else she might want? It could help her feel better.”

Fluttershy raised her head and smiled. “Oh, and we could get some of her posters and other things from home to decorate her room with. She would feel more comfortable, then!”

“That’s a great idea.” Twilight nodded. “I’ll get Rarity to ask Rainbow Dash if there’s anything in particular she wants when she visits today.”

“I do hope this helps,” Fluttershy said quietly.

“I’m sure it will. It’ll distract her, at least.” Twilight looked up at the sun, then groaned. “Oh no, Cheerilee is supposed to bring her students to the library today for a field trip, and I’m already late.”

Fluttershy eased herself off the bench. “I’ll walk with you, if you don’t mind.”

“Of course not.”

“Is Tank at the library?” Fluttershy asked as they began trotting away. “I went to Rainbow Dash’s house to find him, but he wasn’t there. I know she’s been staying the night with you a lot recently.”

“No,” Twilight answered, shaking her head. “I think she’s been sleeping over with Rarity and Pinkie Pie, too. You might want to try asking them. I think bringing Tank over is a good idea, though.”

Fluttershy looked down at the ground. “She doesn’t sleep over with me anymore…”

“Does she ever stay with Applejack anymore?” Twilight asked.

“No,” Fluttershy said. “Not since we started dating.”

“Maybe she thinks it wouldn’t be polite.”

“I guess so,” Fluttershy said quietly.

They trotted together away from the hospital, Twilight in a hurry and Fluttershy following slowly behind.

Part Three

The doctor stepped away from Rainbow Dash’s bed and wiped his forehead. He looked down at Dash through a pair of oversized safety goggles and grinned. “Whoo, it’s been a while since I’ve had to do such acute bone restructuring. You hear all that cracking?”

Rainbow Dash winced. “I tried not to.”

“Almost sounded like we were making popcorn in here, didn’t it?” He looked at Rainbow like he thought she should have something to say about that.

She didn’t.

He cleared his throat noisily. “So, how do your hooves feel?”

Rainbow Dash glanced up at her bandaged hooves and wrinkled her nose. “They feel… tingly.”

“Yeah.” The doctor chuckled and took off his goggles. “That would be the anesthetic. If it wasn’t for those doses, you’d probably be screaming in agony right now.”

Rainbow Dash blinked at him.

“You might feel some slight pain when it wears off, but that’s normal. I’ll be back to begin your wing treatment in, eh, let’s say an hour. That should give you enough time to see those friends you said were coming. See you then!” He trotted out and closed the door behind him, chuckling to himself all the way.

Rainbow Dash sighed. Her friends. Her friends who were pushing everything else aside to make time to come see her. Twilight and Fluttershy had both gotten up extra early so she wouldn’t be alone when she woke up. Afterwards, they had spent the entire morning playing that game with her, while she lay in bed and acted grumpy and ungrateful. Fluttershy had stayed with her almost the entire night before. Fluttershy had carried her all the way to the hospital.

Fluttershy wasn’t a good flyer. That must have been difficult for her.

Rainbow Dash’s friends did a lot for her. Even when she wasn’t in the hospital. They came to her practices, they cheered for her, they listened to her brag, they told her she did a good job, they reassured her that she was going to be a Wonderbolt someday. And what did Rainbow Dash do?

She crashed. Again and again and again. She crashed into rocks, and trees, and walls, and her friends just kept coming back to watch her do it again.

Her friends were mad at her. Even Fluttershy was mad at her. Fluttershy never got mad at anything, and Fluttershy was mad at her. It wasn’t just Fluttershy. It was everyone. Twilight had said as much.

No, that wasn’t right. It was worse. Twilight said they were disappointed. Rainbow Dash knew what that meant. She had heard it enough from her parents while growing up. Disappointed was what happened when someone was angry for so long, they stopped being able to feel anger. They became numb. And so they were just disappointed from then on instead, because they couldn’t feel anything else.

It hurt when Rainbow Dash crashed. It usually hurt her head the most, but it hurt her back a lot, too. Crashing hurt. Everyone knew that. But she had thought it only hurt her, and she could handle that. She had felt a lot of hurt, after all. She had gotten pretty good at it. But if she hurt other ponies when she crashed? Rainbow Dash would never crash again if crashing meant hurting someone she cared about every time she did.

Her friends got hurt when she crashed. Rainbow Dash hurt them. She didn’t mean to. She didn’t know. But she still did. It didn’t matter what she meant or what she knew. It only mattered what she did, and what she did was hurt her friends.

The solution seemed simple enough, though. She just needed to stop crashing. That was all. If she didn’t crash, her friends wouldn’t get hurt. If she never crashed again, she would never hurt her friends again.

But there was a problem. Every pegasus knew what that problem was. Rainbow Dash had only ever learned one thing in flight school. Well, maybe some other things, too, but only one important thing.

If you fly, you crash.

Nothing could stay in the air forever. The world didn’t like for things to be in the air. It wanted everything down stuck on the ground. It didn’t even like tall buildings much. It would tear every pegasus down out of their clouds, or it would kill them all trying. A lot of times, it did. It never gave up, it never got tired, it never took a break. It was the ever-present adversary of the entire pegasus race—gravity.

If you flew, sooner or later you crashed. It was inevitable. Just like if you walked, sooner or later you stubbed your hoof. If you wanted to be a stunt flyer, you crashed even more. If you wanted to pull off the kind of tricks Rainbow Dash did, you crashed even more than that, and you crashed hard. If you wanted to be a Wonderbolt, you crashed harder than anyone else. Even Wonderbolts crashed. Not during shows, obviously, but in practice they did. Fleetfoot wrote an entire book about it. Rainbow Dash had read it three times. It was her favorite book. She wished she had it now. Some ponies called stunt flying a form of art. Fleetfoot said that if it was an art, it was an art of falling and looking cool while doing it.

Crashing was a part of flying, a part of her life, and it would be for a long time yet. Flying meant crashing, and crashing meant getting hurt. She had accepted that.

But her friends hadn’t. Rainbow Dash had never given her friends any choice in the matter. They had never chosen to crash with her, they had never been given a chance to accept it. Rainbow Dash just threw it in their faces every time she asked them to come watch her practice. Either they came and hurt with her, or they refused and let her hurt by herself.

She couldn’t stop crashing unless she stopped flying. It was still simple. She could either fly, or she could be with her friends. She could become a Wonderbolt, or she could live safely on the ground in Ponyville.

“This sucks,” Rainbow Dash said to no one.

And it did suck. A lot. She heard a low rumble outside and looked out the window. The clouds were low and dark. She wondered if the weather was trying to match her mood. The weather was pretty nice like that sometimes, being sunny when she felt sunny and getting all stormy when she felt all stormy. It always looked just how she felt. Her being the pony who made the weather probably had something to do with that. Her eyes widened as she looked out the window.

Weather.

Weather ponies flew. They flew all of the time. You couldn’t be a weather pony and not fly. But weather ponies never crashed, either. Well, sure, they crashed sometimes, but they never got really hurt. Unless they were making a tornado or a hurricane, but, seriously, when did that ever happen?

Weather ponies flew. They didn’t do the kind of flying Rainbow Dash liked to do, unless Rainbow Dash was the weather pony, but still, they flew. It wasn’t real flying, like Rainbow Dash did, but it was a kind of flying. A not as much fun kind of flying. No one ever cheered weather ponies on, or knew their names, or cared about them at all unless they screwed up and everyone wanted someone to complain at. No one remembered weather ponies. Weather ponies didn’t have any fans, or shows, or ever stay in fancy hotels. But Rainbow Dash bet that weather ponies never hurt their friends, either.

The best part? Rainbow Dash was a weather pony. Right at that exact moment! And all the other moments before that. She probably would be for a lot of moments afterwards, too.

Rainbow Dash had never taken being a weather pony seriously before. It had never been anything more than a stepping stone to becoming a Wonderbolt. All the Wonderbolts used to be weather ponies. Rainbow Dash always got the job done, though, and she got it done right, even if she slacked off some. The Cloudsdale Weather Office had even put her in charge of the rainwater funnel a few seasons back. Afterwards, they sent her a letter saying they thought she had a bright future in the Weather Office, if she kept working hard. Rainbow Dash hadn’t kept working hard, at least not any harder than usual, but she could. If she wanted to. And now she did want to!

Rainbow Dash could be the very best weather mare those whitewashed Weather Office walls had ever housed. It wouldn’t be like being the very best Wonderbolt, but who cared about Wonderbolts? A lot of ponies, really. Especially Rainbow Dash. She cared a lot about the Wonderbolts and becoming a Wonderbolt. But she was done with that now. She might even run the entire Cloudsdale Weather Office someday. She wrinkled her nose at the thought of being stuck in an office all day, but if it meant that she could both fly and keep her friends, it would be worth it.

Never being a Wonderbolt might suck a little, though. Actually, never being a Wonderbolt would suck more than anything.

She would never be a Wonderbolt. The full weight of that realization fell on her. Rainbow Dash had known her life that she would be a Wonderbolt. That dream had driven nearly every decision she had made for as long as she could remember. She could hardly imagine a life without the Wonderbolts. But what would she rather have, the Wonderbolts or her friends?

She forced her mouth to curve into a smile. Everything would be okay. She had it all figured out. She would be a weather pony, and her friends would never get hurt again.

The door burst open in an explosion of confetti and Pinkie Pie tumbled inside. “Rainbow Dash!” she cried. “I’m here!”

“No kidding,” Dash said.

Pinkie Pie ran forward and hurled herself at Rainbow’s bed, then abruptly hesitated. “Oh wait, I’m not allowed to hug you, yet, am I?”

“You can hug me, just be careful with—”

Pinkie threw both her forelegs around Dash and entombed her in a sugary smelling, crushing, full-body hug.

“—my wings,” Dash finished lamely, getting a mouthful of pink mane, and a little mouthful of pink pony, too, when Pinkie started nuzzling her. Even if she hadn’t been literally unable to escape, Dash didn’t think she would have wanted to go anywhere. Pinkie squeezed her so tight her chest started to ache, and Dash didn’t usually go for the mushy stuff. Right then, though, she thought she might not mind lying there and feeling that happy, friendly warmth pressed up against her chest forever. There was something stupidly comforting about being held after spending a night alone in the hospital. Not that Rainbow Dash cared. It was just nice, was all.

Rarity stepped inside the room and frowned down at the confetti. “Pinkie Pie, while I do recognize the value of a making a big entrance, I don’t think you should be making messes in here.”

“Whoops! Sorry.” Pinkie let go of Dash and hopped away. For a bizarre moment, Dash considered asking her to come back. Maybe if Rarity hadn’t been there. Pinkie Pie began cleaning up the fallen confetti by sweeping her mane over the floor like a broom.

“How you are feeling, Rainbow Dash?” Rarity asked, walking up to her bedside.

“Pretty good,” Dash answered with a smile that didn’t feel much like a smile.

Rarity looked surprised by that. “Really?”

“Uh, yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Twilight said you were being a grumpy pants,” Pinkie replied, appearing beside Rarity, mane now (much to Rarity’s dismay) full of sparkling confetti.

“Those weren’t her exact words,” Rarity said. “But she did mention you seemed to have taken your latest… misadventure with the ground rather poorly.”

Dash’s ears began to feel warm. She hated when other ponies talked about her when she wasn’t around. Well, no, she loved when other ponies talked about her, just not when they were talking like that. “Yeah, maybe. I’m feeling a lot better now, though.”

“Was it the hug?” Pinkie asked, leaning down over top of her. Little bits of confetti fell out of her mane and rained down on Dash’s muzzle.

Rainbow Dash sneezed, shooting the confetti back up into the air. It quickly began falling back down on top of her. “I was just thinking about something. And maybe it’s a little bit because of the hug, too. Or a lot bit. I don’t know.”

“Aw, I told ya!” Pinkie said, bopping Rarity on her nose. “A good hug can fix almost anything.”

Rarity picked the confetti off of Dash and out of Pinkie’s mane with her magic and dropped it in the wastebin. “Would you mind telling us what it was that you were thinking about? It certainly does seem to have turned your mood around.”

Rainbow Dash considered telling them about her decision. Pinkie Pie would probably be disappointed, though. She loved watching Dash fly. Sometimes, Dash thought Pinkie liked her a little too much. Of course, Dash didn’t mind the attention. Pinkie just seemed a little weirdly affectionate sometimes with all the hugs and nuzzles and compliments. “Just the weather,” she answered.

Rarity glanced out the window. “That’s all?”

“Yup.”

“I think about the weather every day!” Pinkie said. “Sometimes Mr. Cake even calls me a walking tornado.”

Rarity laughed. “I wouldn’t doubt it. Oh, before I forget, Twilight wanted us all to go to your house tomorrow and pick some things up for you, to make your hospital stay easier. You won’t mind, will you?”

“No.” Dash shrugged. “I guess not. Just as long as you stay away from under my bed.”

“What’s under your bed?” Pinkie asked.

“Uh…” Dash blushed. She shouldn’t have mentioned it. Telling Pinkie not to look somewhere usually guaranteed that she would go poking her pudgy, snuggly flanks right in that exact spot. And what did Dash care if they saw the collection under her bed, anyway? She was an adult mare. She didn’t have anything to be embarrassed about. If anything, Pinkie Pie was the one who should have been embarrassed, being all pink and bouncy all the time. “Never mind. Forget I said anything about it.”

“Is there anything particular you want from home?” Rarity asked. “Some mane products, perhaps? Lying in bed all day is no excuse to neglect proper mane care, after all.”

Actually, as far as Rainbow Dash was concerned, lying in bed all day was the perfect excuse to neglect proper mane care. Any excuse was a good excuse to neglect proper mane care. “No—oh, yeah. Could you bring me that book Fleetfoot wrote? It’s in my room.”

“Which one is that?”

“Ooh!” Pinkie cried, hopping in place. “I know which one. I know right where you keep it, too. In your bedroom, in the dresser, second to top drawer from the right, third book down the pile!”

“Weird,” Dash said. “Why do you know that?”

“I know, right?” Pinkie agreed. “Who keeps their books in a dresser?”

Rarity primly cleared her throat. “Is there anything else we can bring you? I can bring over your mane products, if you’d like. I’m sure the nurses wouldn’t mind if we arranged a little homemade spa in here one day this week.”

“Nah, I’m good.” Rainbow Dash wasn’t sure if she even had any mane products. Not in her house at least. She had left most of hers at Pinkie and Twilight’s places during sleepovers, and she always used Rarity’s when she stayed the night at Carousel Boutique. She hadn’t really been showering at home much, because of all the sleepovers.

“I’ll bring some of my mane products, then,” Rarity decided. “The same ones you’ve been using all these times you’ve slept over at the Boutique. I assure you, I use only the best. I don’t buy a bottle of anything if it hasn’t been spoken for by one of the Canterlot models. The doctors will be swarming and swooning over your bed when I’m finished with you. Oh, this will be so much fun!”

Rainbow Dash sighed.

“You really do have one of the most lovely natural mane styles I’ve ever seen,” Rarity continued, pressing closer to Dash’s bed. “Have you ever considered modeling? Your physique is simply gorgeous, and those wings—!” Rarity shivered “Exquisite! But you’re always flapping away whenever I try to style your mane or coat.” She leaned down over Dash’s chest and grinned. “But I suppose you won’t be flapping off anywhere this time, now will you?”

“Whatever,” Dash replied, leaning away from her. Now that Rainbow Dash thought about it, with the way Rarity was always complimenting her, and begging to do stuff to her mane or wings, and trying to stick her in sexy-looking dresses, Rarity might have liked her a little too much, too. Rarity had even given her lingerie for her last birthday. Twilight probably would have said something about repressed feelings. But with the way Twilight kept staring between her legs that morning…

“Oh, right!” Pinkie said. “You left Tank with me the last time you slept over, and he’s still there. Do you want me to bring him here? I think he misses you.”

“Nah,” Dash answered. “I don’t think I’m allowed to keep pets in my room. And he likes you and Gummy.”

“We still have plenty of time left,” Rarity said, looking out the window. “It’s a shame we can’t get started now, but I didn’t think to bring any of my products. Is there anything else you’d like to do while we’re here, instead? I don’t suppose you’ve heard any good hospital gossip, have you?”

“Actually,” Dash said, “could I ask you guys something?”

“Anything,” Rarity replied.

Rainbow Dash bit her lip. Second opinions on the whole ‘total change in life direction’ thing would have been helpful. And Pinkie Pie could get over her not being a stunt flyer anymore. The problem she had found with second opinions, though, was that her friends didn’t always have the opinions she wanted them to. They had an annoying habit of being right, too.

“What do you think about me as a weather pony?” Dash asked. “Not just temporarily, but forever. If I spent my whole life being a weather mare? That’s something I would be really good at, right?”

Rarity and Pinkie Pie exchanged a look.

“What?” Dash asked.

Pinkie turned that look onto Dash. “Is this a prank? It’s not a very good prank.”

“No, it’s not. I think I could be a really good weather pony.”

“Surely you can’t be serious,” Rarity said.

“Why not?” Dash’s throat began to feel uncomfortably tight. Her decision had been perfect. She even thought it through before making it this time. She almost never did that while making decisions.

“You can’t be a weather pony!” Pinkie said, pointing a hoof at Dash like she was accusing her of something.

“I am a weather pony.”

Pinkie Pie rolled her eyes. “Yeah, but you’re not really a weather pony. You’re a Wonderbolt. Everypony knows that.”

“But I don’t have to be a Wonderbolt, right?” Dash asked, looking to Rarity.

“I say again,” Rarity replied, “surely you can’t be serious. Pinkie Pie is right, you are a Wonderbolt, not some common country weather pony. You wouldn’t last one more day as a weather mare if you weren’t able to look forward to being a Wonderbolt.”

“How does that make any sense?” Dash asked. “I’ve been Ponyville’s weather mare for years and I’m lasting just fine.”

“You only chose to become a weather pony because you knew every other Wonderbolt has once been a member of the weather service,” Rarity said. “The Wonderbolts are the only reason you ever joined. Really, now, what’s gotten into you? Give up stunt flying? You wouldn’t know what to do with yourself.”

Rainbow Dash scowled. “I like being a weather mare, okay? What do you do you know about it? I could be a great weather pony.”

“But you’re not a weather pony!” Pinkie Pie repeated.

“I think I know what this is about,” Rarity added, more quietly this time. “Dear, you’re worried about this accident, aren’t you?”

Dash looked up at her bandaged hooves. “Maybe.”

“As I thought.” Rarity nodded. “Rainbow, you could be a good weather pony, but you will be a great Wonderbolt. I know as well as anypony how distressing these sorts of setbacks can be. Believe me, I’ve felt my fair share of heartbreak while pursuing my own career, even if mine has never left me in the hospital. But you can’t let them discourage you. They should embolden you. You will be a Wonderbolt, someday. I promise you that.” Rarity rested a hoof on Dash’s shoulder and smiled. “You can never be a weather pony because your heart would never truly be in it. You were born to be a Wonderbolt. You were born to perform stunts that would make lesser pegasi tremble. You were born to leave those of us forever trapped on the ground in slack-jawed silence. You were born to cause entire stadiums to erupt into roaring applause. You feel it every time you fly, don’t you? It would be an affront to ponykind itself for you to be anything other than a Wonderbolt.”

Rarity reach over and gently touched one of Dash’s wings. “You have the most gorgeous wings of any pegasi who has ever lived. If nothing else, you must be a Wonderbolt just so that as many ponies can witness their splendor as possible.” She blushed and quickly pulled her hoof back, then drew herself up and stood straight. “No. You, Rainbow Dash, are a Wonderbolt. Nothing lesser will ever be worthy of you.”

“Duh,” Pinkie added, rolling her eyes. “I just said that.”

As Rarity’s words echoed in Dash’s head, her bandages fell away, the scratchy sheets and hard pillow dissolved, the bed plunged into nothing, and the walls crumbled to dust. Rainbow Dash spread her wings and flew through the night sky. She felt the burning heat of exploding fireworks and the air lit up in a dozen bursting colors. Below her, hundreds—no, thousands of ponies looked up at her, their eyes wide with awe and jealousy. To her left and to her right, Wonderbolts flew with her. Rainbow Dash grinned and dove. The Wonderbolts—her Wonderbolts—followed her, and each and every one of those thousands of ponies below cheered her name.

Then Rainbow Dash was in the sky over Ponyville again for another lazy afternoon. She pushed a storm cloud through the air. No one watched, no one cheered, no one cared. She set it in place, then flew back and grabbed another. She didn’t loop or spin or dive, she simply flew over and grabbed it. She pushed that one into place, too, and not a single pony noticed.

Rainbow Dash sighed, and the bandages, and the bed, and the hospital returned.

Her friends were right, of course. Rainbow didn’t know how she had ever tricked herself into thinking she could live as a weather mare. She was a Wonderbolt. There was nothing else for her.

“But maybe,” Pinkie said, sounding unusually quiet, “if you feel grumpy when you get hurt like this, that means you should stop getting hurt like this.”

“What?”

“I think what Pinkie Pie means,” Rarity said, frowning slightly, “is that you must stop getting into these kinds of foolish accidents. I know Twilight said something similar to you, and I’d like to say that I agree. For your own sake, please stop doing this.”

“Oh.” Rainbow Dash was sure the whole room had just gotten darker, and the blanket on her chest felt heavier. “You guys are mad at me, too?”

Pinkie Pie drew her hoof quietly along the floor. “No. I just really like watching you fly. It’s my second favorite thing in the whole world. But when I saw you crash at the relay, and when I think about all those other times...” She frowned a very tiny little frown. “That’s my most least favorite, because then I think 'What if you never flew again?' and how sad you and everypony else would be.”

“You can become a Wonderbolt without being so reckless,” Rarity added, still frowning. “However, you can’t ever become a Wonderbolt if you’ve been maimed, or worse.”

That was where Rarity was wrong. Not about the Wonderbolts not being maimed. Obviously they weren’t maimed. Why did that even matter? Rarity was utterly wrong about them never crashing, though. Fleetfoot wrote an entire book about it. Rainbow Dash couldn’t become a Wonderbolt and never crash. It was impossible. That was an absolute fact.

Just as Dash opened her mouth to say so, the doctor stepped inside.

“Sorry, everypony,” he said cheerfully. “But it’s time for me to break those wing bones back into place!”

“Oh, I hadn’t realized that so much time had passed,” Rarity said, glancing at the clock. “I suppose we should go. Applejack will be here this evening. And I’ll be back tomorrow with those mane products.” She leaned down and gave Dash a gentle hug. “Don’t let this accident keep you down, and please think about what I said.” She let go and trotted away.

“See ya!” Pinkie gave her a not-so-gentle hug, then hopped after Rarity.

With a final wave goodbye at the door, they left together.

“They seem nice,” the doctor said.

Rainbow Dash nodded.

Rarity and Pinkie Pie felt the same way as everyone else then. There had been a small possibility that Fluttershy and Twilight had just been acting too sensitive. Neither of them had especially strong stomachs. They couldn’t handle more than a few drops of hot sauce, for example. Rainbow Dash could take a cup-full, at least. But Rarity and Pinkie Pie were angry, too. Pinkie Pie could down entire bottles of the stuff without breaking a sweat, and Rarity could hold her own, too. If they were angry, it meant Rainbow Dash must have really messed up.

Pinkie Pie got angry even less than Fluttershy did. A pony really had to work at making Pinkie angry at you. It couldn’t happen by accident. Pinkie Pie only got angry at somepony was if that pony was a really terrible pony. And Pinkie Pie was angry at Rainbow Dash.

What else could Dash do? Rarity and Pinkie Pie had said it themselves. She couldn’t be anything other than a Wonderbolt. She was a Wonderbolt, and Wonderbolts did crash. Rainbow Dash had a whole book that could back that up. But crashing hurt her friends, and Dash had at least four friends to back that up, too. Friends were probably worth more than books.

Being a Wonderbolt meant crashing, and crashing meant hurting her friends. So what did that mean?

Suddenly, Rainbow Dash wished again that she had called Pinkie Pie back for that hug. A hug wouldn’t have been so bad right then. Not just from Pinkie Pie. Rainbow Dash would have taken one from anyone, really.

“And here we go,” the doctor said, grinning and strapping on his goggles.

Part Four

Rainbow Dash heard something clatter on the floor and opened her eyes. Her room was blurry and dark. She moved to rub her eyes, but a sharp pain in her hoof jolted her awake. She groaned as she remembered the relay and the hospital. She didn’t remember falling asleep, though. She saw Applejack beside her bed, leaning down and picking a tray off the floor.

“Oops, sorry,” Applejack said when she stood up. “I didn’t mean to wake ya.”

Dash mumbled something so incomprehensible, even she wasn’t sure what it had been supposed to be. Her mouth tasted dry and moldy, like that bread she had found underneath her couch the week before.

Applejack switched on the lamp. “I was just gettin’ your supper ready.”

Rainbow Dash turned away from the harsh lamplight and groaned again.

“You won’t be moanin’ once you see what I brought you.” Applejack set something Rainbow Dash couldn’t see on the tray. “On second thought, though, maybe you might,” Applejack added with a chuckle.

In the light, Rainbow Dash noticed that her wings were folded against her sides. Their bandages had stopped her from closing them before. She carefully extended her wings and inspected them. Nearly all the bandages had been removed and, aside from being in desperate need of a good preening, they looked healthy. Dash experimentally folded and unfolded them. They felt achy and stiff, but she could move them easily enough.

“Doctor said he fixed up your wings,” Applejack said, ever the glorious proclaimer of the obvious. “Just need some exercise.”

Rainbow Dash grinned and flared her wings to full span. After some test flaps, she was a pegasus again. She didn’t need her hooves, only her wings. She could do anything as long as she had her wings.

But then her smile fell and her wings sagged. She thought about what Fluttershy had said, and Twilight, and Rarity, and Pinkie. And what Applejack would say next.

Applejack set a tray with a bowl of applesauce and a cup of water on her chest. “Try not to spill this.”

“Thanks,” Dash murmured. She didn’t see anything on the tray worth moaning over. Applejack probably thought anything apple-related was worth moaning over, though. This looked the same as her previous night’s dinner. Nothing special. And Dash didn’t look forward to having to be spoon fe—her eyes widened “Wait!” she cried. “You’re not gonna—”

Applejack dropped a straw in the applesauce, then another in the cup.

Rainbow Dash had never imagined a straw could seem such a marvelous blessing. She could have married that straw. And then had little straw children whom she would love and raise to be the best little sucking straws they could be.

“Thought you might appreciate that,” Applejack said. “I brought somethin’ more for ya, too.”

“Yeah?” Rainbow Dash hoped it would be more straws. She would have gladly moaned all night if it meant getting a bucket full of straws.

Applejack grinned and dropped a mug full of something frothing and golden and smelling heavenly sweet on the tray.

Rainbow Dash’s eyes nearly rolled into the back of her head. If there was one thing more worth moaning for than straws, it was apple cider. She teared up a little as she stared down into that mug. She felt as if she were staring into the soul of Love and Beauty herself. It was an emotional moment. “Applejack! Oh my gosh, thank you so much!” she finally squeaked out.

Applejack laughed. “I thought you’d appreciate that, too.”

“Hey, you told me you were out of cider,” Dash said, throwing a half-hearted glare somewhere in Applejack’s direction. Or maybe not in Applejack’s direction at all. She couldn’t tell, because she went straight back to sniffing her cider. Smelling it was the best part. After drinking it, anyway.

“We keep some private stock every season,” Applejack explained. “For special family occasions.”

Rainbow Dash tore her attention away from the cider to look at Applejack. “Thanks. This is really awesome.”

“It’s nothin’. Fluttershy said you’ve been feelin’ pretty down lately, and I thought this’d help.”

“Yeah…”

Rainbow Dash thought about Fluttershy and what she had said again, and then about her newly healed wings, and then about the cider.

Applejack didn’t seem angry with her. She actually seemed sort of happy. She had even brought Dash some of her reserve cider. Applejack wouldn’t have done that if she was mad at her. Applejack knew about getting hurt. Farming could be dangerous work. Maybe she understood better than the others. Maybe she knew that Rainbow Dash had to crash to be a Wonderbolt.

“Ya gonna eat?” Applejack asked.

Rainbow Dash blinked down at her applesauce and cider. “Uh, yeah. Thanks.” She clenched the cider straw in her teeth, then sipped. The cider spilled onto her tongue like a victorious king marching triumphantly back into his castle, clad in golden armor and carrying the extraordinary riches of plundered kingdoms over his shoulder while troubadours sang songs of his heroic conquests and all the mares swooned in his glorious wake.

This was the good cider. This was the stuff the Apple family kept hidden away for themselves. Applejack wouldn’t have given her something this amazing if she had been angry with her. No, Applejack must have understood.

Rainbow Dash smiled and slurped some at the applesauce. She had always liked Applejack. Applejack was smarter than most ponies gave her credit for, and she was pretty good at hoofball, too. Dash decided she should start spending more time with Applejack. Applejack could be a lot of fun when she wasn’t working. She could invite Applejack to her practices more often, and Applejack could support in a way her other friends never could.

Yeah, she thought as she swallowed down a mouthful of applesauce, Applejack was pretty all right.

“So,” Applejack said casually, sitting on her haunches by the bed, “Fluttershy told me you and her used to be marefriends.”

Rainbow Dash choked on her applesauce. “Uh, n-no,” she sputtered between coughs. “We only went on, like, one date, and it wasn’t even a real date. And that was forever ago. And we never did anything. And we weren’t marefriends.”

“Fluttershy told me it was when you went to school together,” Applejack said.

“Flight school, yeah.” Rainbow Dash cleared her throat and sipped at her cider. “Why?”

Applejack shrugged. “I’m just curious is all. You remember anything ‘bout it?”

Rainbow Dash stared obstinately down at her cider. “Why don’t you ask Fluttershy?”

“I did. I’m just wonderin’ what you’ve got to say about it.”

“It’s not like I’m gonna steal your marefriend or anything,” Dash said, glancing sideways at her. “That was forever ago, and it wasn’t even a real date. And we weren’t marefriends.”

Applejack laughed. “I know you’re not gonna steal her away from me. Not that you ever could. I was only askin’. You don’t have to talk about it if it bothers ya.”

“It wasn’t even a real date,” Dash said, taking another long drink. She remembered sitting on a picnic blanket with Fluttershy, in the park near halfway between both their Cloudsdale homes. Fluttershy was tall and gangly. Rainbow Dash was so short that even while Fluttershy was sitting, Dash had to stand to look her in the eyes. They spent the afternoon blushing and looking at everything in the park but each other and talking about stupid lame things like the weather and their homework.

“It wasn’t even a real date,” Dash said again. “I didn’t ask her out, or anything, I just wanted to try it out because everypony else in our class was going on dates, and Fluttershy felt left out. We were just gonna see what happened.”

“And what happened?”

Dash wrinkled her nose. “Nothing happened. We were friends. We didn’t need to be marefriends. We didn’t need to be anything except friends.”

“And,” Applejack said slowly, “you two never kissed?”

“When did you get so possessive?” Dash asked, squinting over at her. “Did you go ask every other one of her marefriends about everything they ever did together?”

“When did you get so antsy?” Applejack asked, laughing again. “I’m only curious. I’ve never heard you talk about it before, and you’re the only other pony she ever went on any dates with ‘sides me.”

Right. Fluttershy had told Rainbow Dash that. It was partly why it took Fluttershy so long to ask Applejack out.

Rainbow Dash had kissed Fluttershy five times. Or, at least, on five different occasions. For practice, for fun, after drinking, on a dare, and for practice again. Because they were friends. Rainbow Dash had never kissed anyone else, anyway. It didn’t mean anything, and Dash didn’t see how it was any of Applejack’s business.

She sipped at her cider. The mug was almost empty.

“I wanted to thank you,” Applejack said, finally taking the hint that Dash wasn’t saying anything else.

“For what?” Dash asked, sipping at her cider again.

“Fluttershy mentioned that she never would’ve told me how she felt if you hadn’t encouraged her to first. That was real nice of ya, and I’m glad you did.” Applejack rested a hoof on Rainbow Dash’s shoulder and smiled. It seemed like ponies had been touching her shoulder a lot recently. Maybe she just had nice, touchable shoulders. “Thank you.”

“No problem.” Dash took one final drink of her cider, and her straw made that squealing sound straws always make when they want to announce to the whole world that someone’s cup is empty. “Fluttershy’s been talking to me about you for years. About how strong, and nice, and smart, and gentle you were.” Dash rolled her eyes. Applejack was about as gentle as sandpaper on an open wound. Or sandpaper on anything, really. “I thought she was never going to work up the nerve to actually do something about it.”

Applejack was quiet for a while. She chewed on the inside of her cheek and looked out the window.

Rainbow Dash took the opportunity to eat some more applesauce. She hoped Applejack had brought more cider.

Applejack turned to her suddenly. “Is that why you turned me down? Because of Fluttershy?”

Rainbow Dash choked on her applesauce again. Applejack had the worst sense of timing for asking abrupt, personal questions. Dash nodded and cleared her throat. “Yeah, I knew Fluttershy was into you. She wouldn’t have said anything, Fluttershy never says anything, but it would’ve killed her.”

“What was that? A year ago?” Applejack smiled, but only a little. “I thought about that a lot afterwards. I couldn’t ever figure out why you said no. Bugged the hay out of me for a while. I thought we would have been really good together. Everypony said so. I still sort of think about it sometimes.”

“It didn’t matter.” Rainbow Dash shook her head. Too bad. Applejack could be pretty cool sometimes, and a lot of fun, too. She still remembered it. Rainbow Dash had almost said yes. But Fluttershy had called Applejack first. “Fluttershy would have freaked out. Or maybe gone out into the wilderness and had tea parties with that bear every day for the rest of her life. She’s liked you since forever.”

“We could’ve just had some fun,” Applejack said, the barest hint of a smirk playing at the edges of her mouth. “I don’t think Fluttershy wouldn’t minded that.”

“I don’t know,” Dash said. “She can get really sensitive, and I knew she liked you.”

“Well, thank you.” Applejack touched her shoulder again. Rainbow Dash figured she really must have just had some nice shoulders. She would have to try touching them some once her hooves were healed. “You’re a good friend to her, at least when you’re not actin’ like such a blockhead.”

“Uh, thanks.”

Applejack’s hoof dropped away. She looked at Rainbow Dash like she expected her to do something, but Dash didn’t know what, so she ate some more applesauce.

Applejack was right. When Rainbow thought about it, she decided she was a good friend. Crashing didn’t make her a bad friend, and Applejack knew that. Rainbow Dash had helped Fluttershy learn how to kiss and Dash had put off having fun with Applejack for her. Dash wasn’t a bad friend. It wasn’t her fault working towards her dream hurt her other friends. It wasn’t her fault they were so sensitive. Applejack probably knew that, too.

“Ya got anything you want to ask me?” Applejack asked.

“I don’t think so.” Dash shrugged. “Why?”

“Fluttershy told me you’re askin’ everypony if they’re mad at ya,” Applejack said. “Aren’t you gonna ask me?”

Rainbow Dash looked up. “You’re not, right? You’re not even disappointed. You brought the cider.”

“Why don’t you ask me?”

Rainbow Dash watched her closely. Applejack didn’t look angry. Actually, she didn’t look much of anything, not happy, sad, or angry. At that moment, her face was about as easy to read as a tree stump’s. And tree stumps didn’t have faces.

“You’re not, right?” Dash asked.

“Ask me,” Applejack said simply.

Rainbow Dash slurped noisily at her applesauce. She was almost out. “Are you mad at me?”

“Yes.”

The applesauce soured in Rainbow Dash’s mouth. “No you’re not. You brought me the cider.”

“I think I’d know better than you whether or not I’m mad,” Applejack replied.

“Oh.” Rainbow Dash suddenly felt very sick. She burped and the cider came back up into her mouth, tainted and burning. She swallowed it back down.

“I’ve held my tongue for a long, long time, because I thought it wasn’t none of my business. If you wanted to slam your head into the ground, I figured that was your choice. But, now, Fluttershy is my business,” Applejack said. Now she did begin to look angry, Rainbow Dash noticed. The way she always looked when Dash did something she didn’t like. “And when Fluttershy is gettin’ hurt, that’s really my business.”

Rainbow Dash sighed. None of her friends understood, then. Not even Applejack. Dash pushed the rest of the applesauce away from her. She didn’t feel like eating anymore.

“Do you got any idea how worried Fluttershy gets every time you do this?” Applejack asked. “She hasn’t slept any. She gets up out of bed every two minutes, shakin’ and snifflin’ like she’s havin’ nightmares, then she trots in circles in front of the bed all night. It’s the same way every time you do this. You know why she does that? You know what happens in those nightmares that’s keepin’ her awake?”

“I get it, Applejack,” Dash grumbled. “Everypony already told me. I’m a stupid idiot jerk who hurts all her friends all the time and doesn’t even care and then does it again, okay? I get it.”

“You don’t get it at all,” Applejack said, her face twisting into something half-scowl and half-glower. “No pony’s ever been willin’ to say it straight to your face, but we all know it, and we all think it. It’s what makes that poor girl afraid to sleep, ‘cause she can’t stop thinkin’ about it. So I’ve gotta be the one to say it to ya, or you’re never gonna stop.” Applejack stood up and stepped closer to the bed. She looked down at Rainbow Dash, towered over her. “You’re gonna kill yourself, and everypony knows it.”

“N-no I’m not,” Dash said quietly.

“Yes you are. How many times do you think you can knock your skull against a rock before your head breaks open?”

Rainbow Dash snorted. “I think I’ve done pretty good so far.”

“Shut up!” Applejack spat, and Rainbow Dash cringed at the force of her voice. “Just shut your mouth. Don’t give me one more of your cocky, smartaleck remarks. I’m trying to make you see somethin’ important. Fluttershy doesn’t sleep because she knows it’s gonna happen. You’re gonna keep pullin’ stupid, foolhardy stunts like the one you did at that relay, but you’re not gonna keep gettin’ this lucky. You’re gonna do somethin’ you shouldn’t, then you’re gonna hit your head on a rock, and you’re gonna be dead, and you’re gonna make all of us watch. That’s the worst part of it for her, for all of us. We all know it’s gonna happen, but there’s nothin’ any of us can do about it. You just keep on doin’ this, and we just keep on watchin’.”

Rainbow Dash tried to shrink away from her, but she didn’t have anywhere to go. Her wings twitched. The window was open. She wished she could fly away.

“You’d think you’d stop on your own. You’ve gotta know how awful this is for ya. You can’t enjoy getting hurt like this. You don’t want to kill yourself, do ya?” Applejack asked.

Rainbow Dash quietly shook her head.

“I wonder sometimes.” Applejack snorted. “But you don’t care enough for yourself to stop. I know you care about Fluttershy, though. Maybe you don’t care about you, or me, or any of the rest of us, but I know you care about her. So I’m tellin’ you, for Fluttershy’s sake, to stop doin’ this. Stop hurtin’ yourself like this.”

Rainbow Dash’s chest ached. She actually hurt at the suggestion that she didn’t care about her friends. And something burning and mad spilled into her throat that she wanted to spew in Applejack’s face for saying she didn’t. “I can’t,” Dash said. “It’s not like this is a choice. I can’t do anything else. Rarity even said so.”

“Oh no you don’t,” Applejack growled through gritted teeth. “Don’t you dare try to blame this on somepony else like you do every other time. This is you. You’re doin’ this. Just for once, take responsibility for yourself and what you’ve done.”

Rainbow Dash stared wide-eyed at her. “What are you talking about? I’m not blaming anypony. I never said it was anypony else’s fault. I’m just saying I don’t have a choice.”

“The only pony who’s ever told you what to do is you,” Applejack retorted. “You’ve never listened to anypony else. You’re the only one who decides what you do. It’s only your choice.”

“What am I supposed to do?” Rainbow Dash asked, her nostrils and wings flaring. “What else can I do?”

“You can stop!” Applejack cried, as if that was the simplest thing in the world. As if that was an option at all. As if Rainbow Dash could just give up on her dream easy and lickety-split and be home in time for supper. “I’m not askin’ you to shuck the whole corn harvest, I’m asking you to be safe. I’m asking you to stop gettin’ yourself hurt.”

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “So what? Just give up on ever being a Wonderbolt? Stop flying? Just sit around on my flanks forever in Ponyville and take care of butterflies or something?”

“What?” Applejack gaped at her. “No pony ever said you had stop tryin’ to be a Wonderbolt. Why would you?”

“Because that’s exactly what it means! That’s why I fly. That’s why I do everything. If I wanted to stop crashing, I’d have to stop wanting to be a Wonderbolt. I’d have to stop flying. You can’t fly and never crash!”

“Do you really think you have to break your neck to become a Wonderbolt?” Applejack asked, squinting down at her. “Even you can’t be that thick.”

“It’s not thick!” Rainbow Dash retorted. “You don’t know anything about being a Wonderbolt. You don’t have any idea what it takes, or what I have to do, Applejack. These aren’t apples. Fleetfoot wrote an entire book about it, and she’d know better than you would.”

“I’m trying to help you,” Applejack said, sounding almost pleading. “If you keep on hurtin’ yourself like this, keep puttin’ yourself in the hospital, keep goin’ out of your way to put yourself in the hospital, you’re gonna break your neck, or lose your friends. I’m just tryin’ to help you.”

“You’re doing a pretty crummy job of it,” Dash muttered. “Because you don’t know anything about it. The next time I want to bake an apple pie, I’ll ask you. But if I want to become a Wonderbolt, this is how I’m gonna do it, because this is the only way.”

Applejack glowered down at her, her face twisting between scowls and glowers so quickly that Dash worried she might sprain something. “You’re the thickheadedest, densest, most aggravatin’ pony I ever met.”

“Well, you’re a jerk,” Rainbow Dash replied.

Applejack opened her mouth as if to retort, then shoved a hoof in her own mouth, and glared at Dash instead. Then, she turned away and took a long, deep breath.

Dash glared back. “If you—”

Applejack spun on her in an instant. “You listen to me real close,” she said, leaning down so far that Dash could feel Applejack’s breath on her face. “If you want to keep doin’ this to yourself, then fine. If you want to keep actin’ thickheaded till you finally crack your head open, then that’s fine, too. I can’t do anythin’ to stop ya. But I’m not gonna sit by and watch anymore. You hear me? I’m done with this. I can’t care about you. None of us can. We can’t care about you, because it’s gonna hurt too much. I will not care about you anymore. When it happens, I won’t care then, either. Because I just can’t. Neither will anypony else. And one last thing.” She leaned down further, so her muzzle was pressed to Rainbow Dash’s. “I won’t let you hurt Fluttershy again. If that means me grabbing her by the tail and draggin’ her away from each and every one of your practices, from your shows, from this hospital, that’s what I’m gonna do. It just ain’t fair for you to keep doin’ this to her. You think about that.”

With a final snort, Applejack turned and stomped out of the room, too quickly for Rainbow Dash to think of anything to say. The door slammed shut behind her.

Rainbow Dash stared at the closed door for a long time. So this was it then. Her friends couldn’t understand, not even if she tried to explain it to them. More than that. They didn’t just not understand. They would fight with her. They would yell at her. And Rainbow Dash would yell back, because she couldn’t help yelling back. She always yelled back. They didn’t understand. They refused to understand. Rainbow Dash didn’t do any of this by choice. It was just like Rarity had said. There was nothing else in this world for her except the Wonderbolts. She couldn’t be or do anything else. But her friends wouldn’t listen. They thought she was just being stubborn.

No, it was even worse than that. They thought Rainbow Dash didn’t care about them, and that thought was like a knife wrenched in her gut, like her wings being twisted off, like her tongue getting ripped out. Rainbow Dash loved her friends. More than anything. But somehow (how, she couldn’t fathom) they didn’t know that. No, it was even worse than that, too.

Applejack didn’t care about her anymore. That’s just what she said. The others wouldn’t either, soon. They would stop going to her practices and stop visiting her in the hospital. Rainbow Dash tried to imagine a practice without a single one of her friends to watch. It was unimaginable. She literally couldn’t do it. Because they thought she was crashing to spite them. In spite of them. They just wouldn’t understand. To fly and not to crash was a contradiction in terms. It was a paradox. So her friends didn’t care anymore.

Maybe that was the problem. None of this would have ever happened if Rainbow Dash didn’t care about them. If she didn’t love them. Maybe she should just stop. If they could, she could, too. A pony didn’t reach the top by making friends. Rainbow Dash had read that once. Not in the book Fleetfoot wrote, but somewhere else. It still made sense. Caring about her friends would keep her down. It would keep her grounded. She would never become a Wonderbolt.

At first, the thought was so repulsive, she shoved it away. But she and she thought, and she thought, and she thought, and her anger simmered and smoldered and she thought some more.

The longer she thought, the more that particular thought crept into her head.

Her friends didn’t care about her. Why should she care about them? What had she ever done to them to deserve being condemned and spurned like this? She only ever wanted to follow her dream. What kind of friends would give up on her for something like that? She could give up on them, too. She could give up on them before they even gave up on her. She was Rainbow Dash, after all. She was faster than anybody.

She looked down at the tray. Applejack had left it. Stupid Applejack. Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, dumb Applejack. What did Applejack know? She was just as not-smart as everyone thought she was and she wasn’t good at hoofball at all. If she didn’t care about Rainbow Dash, over something as small as an accident, Rainbow Dash didn’t care about her either. She didn’t even like her.

Rainbow Dash flipped the tray off her chest, and it went spinning down to the floor, and the bowl and the cup cracked, and the water spilled every way, and the mug went bouncing under the bed.

Rainbow Dash looked at the mess and breathed heavily. Her vision went dizzy. The room started to spin. She didn’t care about them. She didn’t like any of them. She didn’t like how Pinkie Pie went pranking with her, and she didn’t like how Twilight sent her copies of new Daring Do books as soon as they arrived at the library, and she didn’t like how Rarity made new sexy-looking dresses just for her, and she didn’t like how Applejack played horseshoes with her, and she didn’t like how Fluttershy came to each and every single one of her practices. Dash’s eyes went blurry and moist. She didn’t like any of them.

She was going to be a Wonderbolt, and no one would stop her. No one had ever stopped her from doing anything. She was too fast, too strong, too tough. If she had to get rid of them to do that, she would. It was better anyway. If she hurt them by being a Wonderbolt, she should just get rid of them, for their own sakes. She would, too. If they didn’t care, then she didn’t care. She didn’t care at all. She didn’t, didn’t care. She didn’t even care that they didn’t care. Rainbow Dash sniffled. She would just get rid of them. And that was how it was, and that was what she would do.

It took a long time for a nurse to come to in and clean up the mess. Rainbow Dash pretended to be asleep, and the nurse turned off the light and walked out. Rainbow Dash pretended for a long while afterwards. She didn’t know who she was trying to fool, but she fell asleep eventually anyway.

Part Five

The doctor grinned at Rainbow Dash over his clipboard, and Rainbow Dash scowled at the wall. Her legs still felt numb and tingly, the doctor was still an idiot, her friends were still being jerks, and her chest still ached every time she thought about them. Rainbow Dash made sure to keep scowling so she wouldn’t have to think.

“I don’t mean to toot my own horn,” the doctor said, tapping the clipboard against his horn. “But I did good.”

“Cool,” Dash said.

“Thank you.” The doctor nodded graciously. “Your hooves are responding to treatments much faster than I expected.”

“So I can leave, then?”

The doctor laughed. “No, we’ll leave you in those slings for now. You still have a ways to go. But feel free to wiggle around some, if you’re feeling bored.”

Rainbow Dash tried wiggling, but her legs were asleep, and horrific tingling ran up and down them with every little movement. She scowled at the wall some more. Stupid doctor and his stupid wiggles. He probably did that on purpose.

“You could even wrestle with some of your friends if you wanted, so long as you stay in the slings and don’t move around too much,” the doctor continued. “That’s something the young mares still do these days, right? Wrestle with each other?”

“I don’t think so.”

The doctor shrugged. “Probably for the best. Stuck in those slings, you’d lose anyway.”

Rainbow could have explained to him that she had never lost at anything, especially not to her friends, but it would have been a waste of breath. And she didn’t want to talk about her friends, anyway. All she wanted was to scowl at the wall. So that’s just what she did.

Like everything else she did, she did it awesomely. That wall had probably never before been on the receiving end of such an imposing facial expression. Rainbow Dash was so busy perfecting her scowl, she didn’t think about her friends at all. Not even once. She definitely never ever imagined talking or joking or laughing with them, either.

“Well, I have other patients I need to tend to. I’ll tell the nurse to check up on you later.” He nodded and stepped out the door. “Let me know how the wrestling match goes.”

“Yeah.”

Rainbow Dash wouldn’t wrestle with her friends. Or do anything else with them. It would have been pretty fun to punt Applejack into a wall, though.

She scowled harder. She needed to stop thinking about them with that word. Friends. They weren’t her friends anymore. Couldn’t be anymore. And she had to stay angry and scowling, too. Rainbow didn’t care. She stared at her bandaged hooves. She tried to wiggle them again, but they were still too numb. But numb was good, she decided. She tried to make herself numb all over, just as numb as her hooves. Nothing could ever hurt if she made herself numb enough.

She noticed that her wings still looked awful, and she set about preening them.

They were not-friends, Dash thought as she mouthed feathers back into place. She accidentally glanced at her bandaged hooves, and it didn’t hurt at all, because she was numb now. Numb enough that it wouldn’t, couldn’t hurt. Her eyes felt wet for some stupid reason.

The door opened. Applejack and Rarity stepped inside, then Fluttershy followed hesitantly behind.

Rainbow Dash scowled at them over a half-preened wing in her mouth.

“Good morning, Rainbow,” Rarity said with a wide smile.

“What do you want?” Dash demanded, still preening.

“We came to check up on ya,” Applejack said with a chuckle. “And, well, I figured I ought'a apologize for what I did last night. I got angry, and there was no call for that. Said a lot of things that weren't true, too. I only wanted to help, and I just made a mess of it instead.”

"Okay," Dash said.

"Uh, that square, then?" Applejack asked.

"Sure," Dash muttered.

Applejack glanced at Fluttershy, then at Rarity.

Rarity approached the bed, then stopped short, looking at Dash’s eyes. “Dear,” Rarity said quietly, “have you been crying?”

“No,” Dash said quickly and wiped at her eyes with one of her wings. “It’s just allergies. You guys keep leaving the window open.”

Rainbow Dash didn’t bother to look, but she knew the window was closed.

“Oh,” Rarity said. She frowned, then abruptly brightened. “Oh my! Your wings are healed!” She trotted up to the side of the bed and smiled widely. “They look beautiful.”

Rainbow Dash scowled some more and went back to preening her wing. “No they don’t,” she said around a mouthful of feathers. “I’m not done preening them yet.”

“Oh,” Rarity said again. “Well I still think they look very nice.”

Rainbow Dash grunted, not looking up.

A long silence followed. Rarity and Applejack exchanged looks, then small, quick gestures. Fluttershy stood quietly behind Applejack, not looking or gesturing at anything. Rainbow Dash preened her wing.

When they finished, Applejack cleared her throat.

Rarity said, “Have you had any breakfast, Rainbow?”

“I’m not hungry,” Dash mumbled.

More silence. Applejack and Rarity stood and watched Rainbow Dash preen, then looked at each other, then at Rainbow again. Rainbow wished they would leave, and a little bit that they would stay, and mostly that they would leave. But no one did anything for a long while.

Finally, Fluttershy stepped around Applejack and carefully approached the bed. She rested a hoof on the blankets.

Rainbow Dash looked up sharply.

She saw something in Fluttershy’s eyes. Dash had seen that same something in that same place before. Once, she and Fluttershy had found an injured little animal while on a walk together, a squirrel or a gerbil or something. It was hurt and scared, and hid itself in a burrow. Fluttershy, with a gentle voice and that something in her eyes, coaxed it out, brought it home to her cottage, and helped it heal. Rainbow Dash thought it would be sort of nice to be a squirrel or a gerbil or something.

“Rainbow Dash, what’s wrong?” Fluttershy asked, that something still in her eyes.

“Nothing,” Dash lied, and they all knew she lied. They all knew exactly what was wrong. “I’m fine.”

Fluttershy hesitated, then reached out a hoof to her.

“I said I’m fine!” Rainbow Dash batted Fluttershy’s hoof away with her wing. “Stop trying to touch my shoulders. You can’t just touch them whenever you want, you know.”

Fluttershy squeaked and drew back. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

Dash looked away, swallowing the urge to say sorry. Sorrys would only drag it out longer, like a novice’s first flight routine that everyone in the audience knew was terrible, but kept clapping for anyway to be polite. Fleetfoot had written about it in her book. The audience would clap, and so the novice would keep on performing terribly, and the audience would keep on suffering through it. Quick and clean was best.

Dash noticed Applejack and Rarity exchange a long look. Rarity shook her head, and Applejack nodded, and Rarity sighed.

“Rainbow Dash,” Rarity began slowly, “there is something we wanted to speak with you about.”

Rainbow Dash silently preened her wing, and Fluttershy cringed.

“It’s about what Applejack said to you last night,” Rarity continued, stepping closer to the bed.

“Leave me alone!” Rainbow Dash shouted. She flared her wings, and Rarity, Applejack, and Fluttershy all stumbled backwards away from her. Dash felt a little surprised at the outburst herself, but, like with any other fall, there was nowhere to go but down. “Are you guys going to come here and yell at me every day, all day, every single day? I just broke my damn hooves! Can I have one morning just to relax and finish preening my wings before somepony comes to tell me what a jerk I am?”

“Dear,” Rarity began, “that isn’t—”

“I know!” Dash cried. “I already know, okay? How many ponies do you think have to tell me what a stupid jerk I am before I figure it out? I know. Stop telling me. I’m a stupid jerk who hurts all of her friends and doesn’t care about anypony but herself and sucks at flying!”

Applejack stepped forward. “Nopony ever said—”

Rainbow Dash glared at Applejack. She did. She did. It was a glare, not a look of pitiful, hurting anger, and she didn’t let out a pathetic whimper, and her eyes didn’t burn or become moist, and her vision didn’t blur. She glared at Applejack, while Applejack frowned sadly back. Dash felt numb all over, and didn’t hurt at all. Not one little bit.

“I get it, Applejack. I really get,” Dash said, breathing slowly, breathing steadily, blinking quickly. Quick and clean, she told herself. Quick and clean. “I’m not as thick as you think I am. I’m going to get myself killed, and I’m a jerk, and I’m selfish. I get it. I totally get it. So just back off, already.”

“You need to calm down,” Applejack said.

Rainbow Dash could have cried. She didn’t, obviously. But… “Why can’t you just leave me alone?”

“Because we’re your friends,” Rarity replied, reaching a hoof out to her.

“Maybe that’s the problem,” Dash shot back at her.

Rarity gasped, only a quiet little gasp, a pitiful imitation of the grand, theatrical gasps she so often employed. Her hoof dropped. “Rainbow, whatever do you mean?”

“I’m going to be a Wonderbolt,” Rainbow Dash declared. The same declaration she had made on a thousand other occasions, but now without any of her usual excitement or fervor. This time, it was only a simple, quiet statement of fact. “I am. I have to be a Wonderbolt. I can’t be anything else. I can’t be a weather pony. I have to be a Wonderbolt. That’s what you said, right, Rarity?”

“Well, yes it is—”

“This is what happens to ponies who want to be Wonderbolts,” Dash said, gesturing to her bandages with her wings. “This is what happens to ponies who fly, and who do the kind of tricks I do. We fall. This is going to happen to me. It’ll hurt, and it’ll suck, but I’m still going to be a Wonderbolt, and I’m not going to let anypony stop me.”

“When did anypony say ya couldn’t be a Wonderbolt?” Applejack asked.

“You all did!” Dash cried. “All of you did. Seriously, every single one of you. When you yelled at me just for messing up, and when you got angry at me just for trying. All I’m doing is trying to be a Wonderbolt. I’m not going out of my way to hurt anypony. It just happens, because that’s what happens to Wonderbolts. I’m going to be a Wonderbolt, and this is how I’m going to get there!”

Dash’s looked over at Fluttershy, and Fluttershy shrunk back behind Applejack.

Applejack gave Fluttershy a quick nuzzle. “It’s all right,” she whispered to Fluttershy.

Rainbow Dash felt so, so thankful for that. Fluttershy would have somepony to hold her up when Rainbow Dash was gone, somepony stronger than Rainbow Dash ever could have been. She could have cried. She really could have cried. It was crazy.

“We all want you to become a Wonderbolt,” Rarity said, drawing her attention. “Even as much as you do, I suspect. Very few things would make me as happy as finally seeing you wear one of those flightsuits. However, we want you to be safe just as much. We want you to live to become a Wonderbolt, not maim or cripple yourself on your way there.”

“The Wonderbolts aren’t safe!” Rainbow Dash half-growled, half-shouted back. “That’s what none of you get. Flying, stunt flying, isn’t safe. That’s the whole point! No pony would even watch if it was safe.”

Rarity shook her head. “It isn’t. That is why the Wonderbolts make every effort to eliminate possibilities for injury. They perform their shows in the safest manner they are able.”

Rainbow Dash laughed, an exhausted, mirthless laugh that made her feel sick. She couldn’t think of anything to do but laugh and feel sick about.

“What’s so funny?” Applejack asked.

“Do you really think the Wonderbolts never get hurt? That they never go to the hospital?”

“Of course they do, but only through accidents,” Rarity said.

“What? How is that any different than what happened to me?” Dash asked, her wings flaring behind her again.

“It isn’t the same at all,” Applejack said. “They try not to get hurt. They do everythin’ they can to keep from gettin’ hurt. You didn’t just get into an accident, you went out of your way to get into an accident. Fluttershy told me you hadn’t practiced that stunt at all before. But you tried it anyway, when you knew you didn’t need to, and when you knew you hadn’t practiced it enough yet, and when you knew you could get yourself hurt.”

“Whatever, Applejack,” Dash said. “You don’t care. Why are you even here?”

Fluttershy winced.

“I—what?” Applejack blinked. “‘Course I care. Why would you say somethin’ like that?”

“Last night.” Rainbow Dash sighed and folded her wings. She lowered her head. “You said you didn’t.”

“You know that isn’t—”

Dash’s head shot back up, burning and angry. “You said you didn’t care and you said no one else would soon, too! But I don’t care, either. It’s better that you don’t. I’m glad you don’t. If you caring means that you’re going to yell at me every time I mess up, and you’re going to hate me just for trying to become a Wonderbolt, then I don’t want you to care. I don’t want any of you to care, and I don’t care about any of you.”

“Rainbow Dash…” Rarity sat back on her haunches. “That isn’t what we mean at all.”

Fluttershy, looking as if a too-heavy bag of birdseed had been dropped on her back, slumped to the ground.

Rainbow Dash hated herself, and hated them, and hated everything. But she was too numb, she reminded herself, too numb to hate anything.

Applejack shook her head. “You don’t—”

“Stop!” Rainbow Dash said, feeling absolutely tired, like she had just spent a long shift on weather duty and didn’t want to do anything but take a nap. “Just stop. Go away and leave me alone, please. You said you were gonna give up on me. So just give up on me already and leave me alone.”

“Rainbow Dash…” Rarity whispered.

Rainbow Dash turned away.

Applejack opened her mouth to say something, but, miraculously, Fluttershy reached out and touched Applejack’s back.

“She asked us to go,” Fluttershy said quietly. “We should go.”

“But, Fluttershy, we can’t,” Applejack said.

Fluttershy blinked quickly, her eyes glistening. “She asked us to go.”

Applejack looked at Rainbow Dash, who stared obstinately at the foot of her bed, then at Rarity, who looked helplessly back. Applejack sighed and nodded to Fluttershy.

Fluttershy looked to Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow Dash didn’t look up.

Fluttershy silently turned away and walked out of the room. Applejack and Rarity soon followed.

Rarity stopped at the door and glanced back. “I'm sorry. I promise you that we didn't mean to upset you. Please think about what we said again, that’s all I ask. And I hope you'll be healed soon.” She left, and the door closed behind her.

Rainbow Dash cried. But just a little.

Think? All she had done for the past couple days was think. Thinking was what had gotten her into this. Well, not thinking during the relay, and then thinking too much afterwards. She had thought about this. She had heard everything her friends had said, thought it all through, made her decision. What more did Rarity want from her? Dash couldn’t have missed anything.

She thought back to what Rarity and and Applejack had just said to her moments before to make sure.

And then she kept on thinking. And she thought and thought and thought, about her friends, about what Rarity and Applejack had just said, and the Wonderbolts, and herself, and the stunt at the relay, and Fleetfoot’s book, and what Applejack had said the night before, and the hospital, and what all of her friend’s had said, and she tried to make herself numb, but she just kept feeling more and more.

Part Six

Twilight sat down in the grass under the shadow of Rainbow Dash’s floating cloud home and listened while Rarity and Applejack explained what had happened with Rainbow Dash earlier that day. Fluttershy sat behind Applejack, looking down at the ground and not saying anything. Pinkie Pie bounced and then stood and then sat by Twilight, becoming quieter and quieter as they talked.

“And then she asked us to leave,” Rarity finished. “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen her so upset.”

Applejack nodded. “I’ve seen Rainbow mad plenty of times, but this… she wasn’t just mad. She's hurt, says we don't care about her anymore.”

Fluttershy drew her hoof along the floor, but still said nothing.

Twilight frowned and thought about what she herself had said to Rainbow Dash just the day before. She wondered how it was possible that she had communicated so poorly. Twilight thought she should understood friendship by now. But even with all she had learned, she was still making mistakes. And now Rainbow Dash had suffered for one of those mistakes. “This does seem pretty bad,” she finally said.

“Yup,” Applejack said with a chuckle. “I was hopin’ you’d have somethin’ more to say than that.”

They were all quiet for a while.

Pinkie Pie opened her mother mouth and then closed it again and then opened it again and then said, “Rainbow Dash is wrong.”

“‘Bout what?” Applejack asked.

“I still care about her,” Pinkie said. “And so does Gummy! He asks about her, like, every day.”

“We all still care,” Rarity said. “And I’m sure she knows that. She’s only upset.”

Pinkie was quiet for another moment, and then asked, “Is now one of those one in a million times Twilight told me about when I shouldn’t throw a party? Because I’ve always wanted to throw a ‘Hey, Rainbow Dash, We All Think You’re Really Awesome But We Just Wish You’d Stop Hurting Yourself But We Still Love You Anyway’ themed party. I mean, I haven't always, but at least for the last five minutes.”

Rarity let out a shallow chuckle. “I believe it is one of those times. Rainbow needs space now, not parties.”

“I agree,” Twilight said. “We should give Rainbow Dash an opportunity to calm down and think things through, and we should take this opportunity to do the same.”

“I guess I don’t really feel like throwing a party anyway,” Pinkie said, and she poked at the grass underneath her hoof.

“All right,” Applejack said. “We can give her all the space she wants, but it don’t solve anythin’. What do we do now?”

“We don’t do anything,” Twilight said. “At least for now. We’ve all been working at cross purposes, talking to her separately instead of working together as a group, like friends, like we should have done from the beginning. We can go together tomorrow and talk this out with her.”

“Are you certain she’ll listen to us?” Rarity asked. “I don’t think you realize how upset she is. I just feel awful for laughing at her…”

“Yup,” Applejack said. “I can’t talk to her. That girl won’t listen to anythin’ I have to say. She’s too sore with me, not that I can fault her for that.”

Twilight noticed Fluttershy wince when Applejack said that. Fluttershy hadn’t spoken since she, Applejack, and Rarity had arrived. Twilight didn’t know what to make of that. “We have to try,” Twilight said.

“And I’ll bring her book to her!” Pinkie said, smiling again. “That’ll make our sorry even more extra special.”

“Book?” Applejack asked.

“I’m not sure it’s such a good idea to go to her house now,” Rarity said. “It wouldn’t be polite with her already upset with us.”

Pinkie Pie folded her hooves over her chest. “I promised Dash I would bring her book to her, and friends don’t break promises.”

“Actually,” Twilight said with a growing smile, “Pinkie, that’s a great idea. We’ll bring Rainbow Dash some of her things tomorrow morning, just like we said we would. It wouldn’t be much, but at least we could have something to give her other than excuses.” She looked up at Dash’s house above them. “Why not now?”

“Well,” Rarity started to say.

But Twilight’s horned glowed and then darkness swallowed them all.

__________________________________________________

Twilight, Rarity, Applejack, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie all reappeared in a jumble on the floor of Rainbow Dash’s living room.

Rarity picked herself up with a huff. “Twilight, dear, I would thank you to warn us the next time you do that.”

“Sorry,” Twilight said, smiling sheepishly. “I didn’t think about it. I guess I thought you were used to it by now.”

“How does one ever ‘get used to’ abruptly disappearing from existence?” Rarity asked. “But I suppose as long as we are here we might as well carry on.”

Before Twilight could reply, Pinkie Pie bounced between and past them both, over a couch, across the floor, and up a spiraling staircase in the corner, humming to herself all the way. Twilight wondered how, or even if, Pinkie knew where she was going.

“I’ve never been in Rainbow’s house before,” Applejack said, looking around the room. “It looks… normal.”

Twilight laughed, though she had only been inside Rainbow Dash’s home once or twice before herself. “What were you expecting?”

“I dunno.” Applejack shrugged. “A few more big portraits of herself hangin’ off the walls, I guess. Or at least some mirrors.”

Twilight glanced around. ‘Normal’ was an accurate enough description. Dash’s living room looked about the same as it had the last time she had seen it. The might-have-been-nice-once couch and coffee table still stood in the same spots, posters still cluttered the walls, and bits of refuse still littered the floor.

“My word,” Rarity said. She flipped over an empty pastry box with her hoof and cringed. “Now I suppose I know why she asks to sleepover at the Boutique so often. This is a mess. How can she live in such filth? It’s no wonder she spends so much time sleeping outside. I would as well if this were the alternative. ”

Applejack kicked at a dusty magazine on the floor. “I’d be more surprised if it was clean. Rainbow never struck me a the spring cleanin’ type. So, what are we lookin’ for here?”

“Anything that’ll help make Rainbow Dash’s hospital stay easier,” Twilight said. “I think Pinkie went up to her bedroom to find that book. Maybe you and Fluttershy could look around upstairs, too?”

Applejack looked to Fluttershy and smiled. “That fine with you, sugarcube?”

Fluttershy looked away. “I’d prefer to go by myself.”

Applejack stopped smiling. Applejack didn’t do anything else for a little while. “Okay,” she finally said.

Fluttershy stepped meekly around her and then towards the same staircase Pinkie Pie had gone up.

“Wait, dear,” Rarity said, carefully sidestepping several bits of refuse and giving Applejack a significant look that said, Don’t worry. “Would you mind showing me to the washroom? I promised Rainbow I would bring her some of her mane products.”

“Okay.” Fluttershy nodded and continued walking towards the stairway. “It’s this way.”

“Let’s meet back here once you’re all finished,” Twilight called after them.

Rarity nodded and followed Fluttershy up the stairs, leaving Twilight and Applejack alone with the trash and the dust. She heard Rarity’s voice overhead, but couldn’t make out the words. She sounded concerned. Twilight looked to Applejack.

Applejack looked down at the floor but didn’t seem to find whatever she was looking for there.

“Is something bothering Fluttershy?” Twilight asked carefully.

Applejack sighed. “Just me is all.”

“Maybe I can help?”

“Nah,” Applejack said. “Sorry.”

Twilight bit her lip. She hated this. She hated all of this. Normally, when they had arguments, as all friends will, Pinkie would throw a party or Rarity would invite them all out to the spa, and they would talk it out and everything would be fine. But that didn’t seem like they were enough now.

Twilight didn’t say anything. If Applejack didn’t want to talk about it, Twilight wouldn’t force her. One problem at a time. Rainbow Dash first.

She looked around the room for anything Rainbow Dash might want and wrinkled her nose at the mess. Twilight knew Rainbow Dash could be something of a slob, but this was just excessive. With so much untouched dust, it almost seemed more like no one lived here at all. Rainbow did seem to have been sleeping over at the library more often recently, though.

Twilight saw some magazines strewn about, sports magazines and one copy of Canterlot Fashion, but Twilight checked and found that none were less than six months old. She didn’t see anything else useful.

“I don’t see anything here,” she said to Applejack. “I’m going to look in the kitchen. It’s right over here, if I remember right.”

Applejack nodded.

Twilight turned and walked towards the door that lead to the kitchen. Rainbow Dash would probably appreciate having something to eat other than applesauce for a night. She heard Applejack walking behind her.

Twilight pushed open the door, and the cloying, sweet stench of rotting fruit hit her full in the face. She gagged and staggered inside.

“Land’s sake,” Applejack murmured.

It was good that Rarity had gone upstairs. If she had thought the living room a mess, she would have called the kitchen a catastrophe on a scale that was nearly as impressive as it was foul-smelling. Old dishes filled the sink and trash piled high over and around the wastebasket.

Twilight did her best to ignore the smell and went about looking through the cupboards. Applejack did the same. They both remained silent for a while. Most of the cupboards were empty except for dust.

“You don’t gotta say it,” Applejack said from the other side of the kitchen.

Twilight looked back. Applejack faced away from her, looking into a cupboard. “What?”

“You don’t gotta say it,” Applejack repeated, not turning around. “I already know.”

“Say what?”

Applejack sighed and closed the cupboard. “This is my fault. I screwed up.”

“Applejack—”

“Don’t try'n tell me otherwise, either,” Applejack said. “I made a mess of everythin’, and now I’m gonna fix it.”

“Applejack, I messed up, too. We all did. We’re all just a little stressed about Rainbow Dash, is all. And worried.”

“And I’m still the only one who decided to get into another stupid shoutin’ match with her,” Applejack said. “But it doesn’t matter. An Apple cleans up after herself. Whatever I gotta do, I’m gonna do it. That’s a promise.”

Twilight didn’t know what to say. It was her fault, just as much. It was Rainbow Dash’s fault, too. But fault didn’t matter anymore. Friendship wasn’t about figuring out who to blame. It was about figuring out how to help and how to show that you care.

“Doesn't seem to be much food here,” Applejack said.

“No,” Twilight agreed.

“Rarity and Pinkie Pie told me Rainbow’s over at their houses most nights. I guess she doesn’t come around here much.”

“She sleeps over at the library a lot, too,” Twilight said.

“She used to stay at the barn a lot,” Applejack said. “She stopped doin’ that after me and Fluttershy got sweet on each other.”

“Maybe she doesn't want to intrude.”

“Maybe,” Applejack said. “Or maybe she was sweet on Fluttershy or maybe she was sweet on me, and maybe she just doesn’t want be around either of us anymore.”

Twilight mulled over that for a moment. “You asked Rainbow Dash out on a date once, right?”

“Yup.”

“And she said no?”

“Yup.”

“And… do you still like her?” Twilight asked. “Like that?”

“I guess I do,” Applejack said. “It's not the kind of thing that just stops or starts when you tell it to. But I’m with Fluttershy now, and Rainbow doesn’t come by but once every so often anymore. I wish she’d stay over like she used to. But I guess she stays over with you other girls now.”

“Do you wish you were with her instead of Fluttershy?”

“Not for a minute. And I’d thank you kindly to never ask me that again.”

“I’m sorry.”

“But I do wish…” Applejack chewed on the inside of her cheek and looked at the messy countertop. “What I’d wish for is impossible, so it don't matter. Wishin’ never did anypony any good, anyway. It’s time for doin’. It’s time for fixin’ this.” Applejack started towards the door. “Let’s see what everypony else found.”

Applejack walked out of the room before Twilight had a chance to say anything.

She followed Applejack out. Rarity and Fluttershy were standing by the couch, and they looked up at her when she came in. Pinkie must have still been upstairs.

“Did you find anything?” Rarity asked.

Twilight shook her head as she trotted over. “No. There’s almost no food in the kitchen at all. How about you?”

“You wouldn’t believe it,” Rarity said with a somber shudder. “She doesn’t own a single mane product. Not a one! And I searched as thoroughly as I could. I didn’t find so much as one bar of soap, and her bath looks like it hasn’t been turned on in weeks.”

Applejack nodded. “Sounds about right. There’s dust all over everythin’. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say no pony even lived here.”

Pinkie Pie came tumbling head over tail down the stairs and yelling, “I just found the most cheerupRainbowDashific thing to cheer up Rainbow Dash ever! You have to come see!”

“You found her book?” Rarity asked.

Pinkie Pie, incredibly, landed on all four of her hooves at the bottom of the stairs. “Even better! But yeah, I did find the book! And a lot of other stuff, but none of that matters, because I found it.”

“It?” Applejack asked.

“You just have to come see,” Pinkie said with a little hop, and then turned and began bouncing back up the stairs. “You won’t even believe it!”

Twilight glanced at the others, shrugged, and followed Pinkie up the stairs. The rest stepped in line behind her. They went up to the very top of the spiraling staircase, passing several floors that appeared to be in just as poor condition as the first on their way, before reaching Rainbow Dash’s bedroom.

Dash’s bedroom was a circular room at the very top of the house with several wide, airy windows. It reminded Twilight of a roost at the top of an aviary. Actually, the entire house seemed designed like one great, oversized birdhouse—the messy ground floor being used for feeding, platforms in between for recreation, and the roost at the top for rest and safety. She wondered if all pegasus homes were designed similarly to birdhouses. Or perhaps all birdhouses were designed similarly to pegasus homes? Twilight made a mental note to research the subject later.

The bedroom looked cleaner than the rest of the house. It was still messy, but it was a lived-in kind of mess, the sort Twilight would have expected to see in most ponies’ homes. She noted that each of the bedroom windows were more than large enough to easily fit a pony. Rainbow Dash could come and leave through those windows without ever stepping hoof into any other part of the house.

“Look!” Pinkie Pie shouted, shoving something at Twilight’s face.

Twilight stumbled backwards, bumping into Applejack and Rarity behind her. Before her, Pinkie held up a magazine with a double spread picture of two mares who appeared to be either playing or fighting. Twilight couldn’t tell which. One mare lay on her back, while the second leaned down in between the first mare’s spread hind legs. She seemed to be doing something with her tong—

Burning, red warmth spread into Twilight’s face and ears and her eyes widened.

“Oh my,” Rarity said.

Fluttershy squeaked.

“Pinkie Pie,” Twilight said, pushing the magazine away, “why are you shoving an adult magazine in my face?”

Pinkie Pie dropped the magazine and grinned. “It’s Rainbow Dash’s. I found a whole bunch of them under her bed. Look!”

Pinkie moved aside and revealed a pile several dozen magazines high on the bedsheets.

Rarity laughed then and walked around Pinkie and up to the stack. “Well, Twilight, I hope you are happy with yourself,” she said, a dainty smirk on her face.

“Why would I be happy?” Twilight asked, walking up beside her and frowning down at the collection. Judging by the variety and quantity of publications present, Rainbow Dash had a both extensive and diverse taste. Twilight hadn’t so much as ever imagined the possibility of some of the things she saw ponies doing on those magazine covers.

Rarity winked at her. “Look at all the reading you've inspired Rainbow Dash to do.”

Twilight sighed.

“Pinkie Pie,” Applejack said, “didn’t Rainbow Dash ask you not to look underneath her bed?”

“Yup,” Pinkie answered. She bounced over to the bed and picked up another magazine. She opened it and waggled her eyebrows. “But then she told me to forget about it. So I did!”

“Well," Rarity said, prodding at the stack, "whatever a mare chooses to do behind closed doors is her own business. If this is how Rainbow Dash prefers to spend her free time… well, it’s really not my place to judge. However, I’m not sure I understand how these can be of any use to us.”

“Oh, right,” Pinkie said, throwing her magazine over her shoulder. She began digging through the stack, tossing discarded magazines left and right. She giggled and grabbed a magazine with a picture of a mare bound by ropes on the cover. She opened it and held it up for the rest of them to see. “Here! Doesn’t it look just like Rainbow Dash?”

Twilight, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Applejack leaned forward together. The picture showed a blue pegasus mare lying in bed, each of her hooves bound with ropes and slings. They held her in a position markedly similar to the slings that currently held Rainbow Dash in her hospital bed. Around the bound pegasus stood five other mares, each of them performing a different… act on the bound pegasus.

“Um,” Twilight said, blushing. “I guess it does.”

“The resemblance is striking,” Rarity agreed. “But I’m still not sure how this is relevant.”

“Wait,” Pinkie said. “There’s more!”

Pinkie Pie flipped between the pages, and, sure enough, there was more. The magazine featured an entire series of images portraying the six mares in a variety of indecent positions, all of which Twilight thought might make even Celestia herself blush. Pinkie flipped through page after page and Twilight felt warmer and warmer with each turn.

“Could you get to the point already, sugarcube?” Applejack asked, drawing her hat down over her face. “Or did you just think it would be funny to show us off-color pictures?”

Fluttershy let her mane fall over her eye, but stayed quiet.

Rarity fanned herself with a dropped magazine, her face flushed. “Yes, dear. Could you please hurry along to the point?”

“Aw, we were almost to the best part,” Pinkie said, lowering the magazine. “Rainbow Dash had a bookmark in this spot, so she must really like these pictures.”

“So?” Rarity asked. “Are you suggesting we bring the magazine to her? I don’t believe the hospital staff would approve of that.”

“No, silly. That would be crazy.” Pinkie Pie giggled and rolled her eyes. “I think we should reenact this for her.”

Twilight, Applejack, and Rarity went quiet, and Pinkie Pie grinned at them.

“Uh, just so I’m clear,” Applejack finally said. “You mean reenact this on her? As in, you want us to do this to her?”

“Exactly!” Pinkie Pie said, bobbing her head up and down.

Twilight looked at the pictures again and imagined the bound pegasus as Rainbow Dash, and then picked out a cute purple earth pony in the pictures to be herself. It was utterly absurd and impossible, of course, but she tried anyway.

Well, she didn’t only try. Twilight succeeded, and with an aplomb and enthusiasm that would have made her parents swoon. Her mouth suddenly became very dry and her tail wouldn’t stop twitching and the room seemed unusually warm and when had she started sweating so much?

“Sugarcube…” Applejack put a hoof to her face and shook her head. “You’re jokin’, right?”

“I never joke about cheering up my friends.” Pinkie stamped her hoof on the floor, then giggled. “Oh wait, unless I’m cheering them up with jokes. But not this time!”

Rarity began fanning herself with her magazine again. Her face appeared much redder than before. “What makes you think Rainbow Dash would acquiesce to something like this? I can only imagine how embarrassed she would feel if we suggested it to her.”

“Because we all love her,” Pinkie said simply. “And she loves all of us.”

Twilight frowned. “That’s a sweet thought, Pinkie Pie, but I don’t think that’s what Rarity meant. Rainbow Dash probably won’t want to do this.”

“Then we’ll ask her first,” Pinkie said. “And she’ll say yes. Because she had a bookmark on that page, so she must really like it, and if she really likes it, it must mean she really wants to do it. But she never could before, because she would be too embarrassed to ask us. Now is the best chance she’ll ever have of getting to do it, because there’s a blue pegasus tied up in bed in the picture, and Rainbow Dash is a blue pegasus tied up in a bed right now, and there are five mares in the picture, and there are five of us! And we’re mares!”

“But why would we do this?” Applejack asked. “It just don’t make any sense.”

“Because we love her, and, well, maybe…” Pinkie lowered her head and frowned a tiny little frown before continuing in a quieter voice, “Maybe Rainbow Dash thinks we might not love her right now, because we’ve all been yelling and laughing at her a lot. But if we give her something that she’s always wanted, it’ll make her happy and she’ll know we’re sorry.”

“We can give her lots of things to show her we’re sorry,” Applejack said.

Pinkie shook her head. “We can give her lots of things, like cakes or tambourines or pet giraffes, but anypony can give her cakes or tambourines or pet giraffes. If we give her one of those, she might not know for sure that we still love her.”

“I’m not sure I follow,” Twilight said.

“If we give her something that only friends who are really, really special to each other,” Pinkie said, “that only ponies who love each other can give to each other, Dash’ll know for certain and forever that we love her.” She smiled up at them again. “And I want Rainbow Dash to know that I love her.”

“Pinkie, dear,” Rarity began slowly, “I know your heart is in the right place, but this is simply too... obscene.”

Pinkie huffed. “Why can’t I show her this way?”

“Um, can I see the pictures, please?” Fluttershy asked quietly from behind Twilight.

Twilight had forgotten Fluttershy was present altogether. She wondered at how easily and how often Fluttershy managed to fade into the background. Pinkie Pie handed Fluttershy the magazine, and Fluttershy carefully examined its pages.

“This is foolish,” Applejack said.

“Why?” Pinkie asked.

Applejack sighed. “Because it just isn’t somethin’ that ponies do.”

“Yes it is,” Pinkie said. “Ponies do it all the time.”

“But not friends,” Twilight pointed out.

“We’re more than just friends!” Pinkie cried.

Twilight opened her mouth to retort, then paused. Twilight couldn’t bring herself to disagree with that. For a long time, she had thought that they had developed a closeness and understanding together that transcended being friends. She wouldn’t call it more or less than friendship, and she wouldn’t call it romantic, either. They had something else altogether. Twilight didn’t know what it was or what to call it, but she knew it wasn’t simple friendship.

“That very well may be,” Rarity replied. “But physical intimacy isn’t something you give to another pony in passing or without thought. It is meant only for those ponies who are in passionate love.”

“I do love Rainbow Dash,” Pinkie said. “And I know you do, too.”

“Well, yes, of course I do, but—”

“And if Rainbow Dash thinks we don’t love her anymore, we should do anything we can to show her that we still do, right?”

“Well, yes,” Rarity admitted. “But that isn’t the point.”

“What else matters?” Pinkie asked.

“I’ll do it,” Fluttershy said.

They all turned and stared at her.

She stared back, the faintest hint of a blush on her cheeks. “I’ll do it,” she said again.

“You’ll do what?” Applejack asked.

Fluttershy swallowed and held up the magazine. “I’ll help Pinkie Pie, um, reenact this for Rainbow Dash.”

“Darling!” Rarity cried. “What’s gotten into you?”

Twilight didn’t know if she should scold Fluttershy or cheer for her. She could expect Pinkie Pie to do something like this. Pinkie’s unexpected was the expected. But Twilight had trouble even picturing Fluttershy being intimate with anyone, unless said intimacy quickly ended with Fluttershy screaming in equal parts embarrassment and terror and running in the opposite direction.

Before Fluttershy could say anything else, Pinkie Pie rushed at her and wrapped both her hooves around Fluttershy’s withers and squeezed tight. “Aw, thanks so much, Fluttershy! I knew you’d help. Rainbow Dash is gonna be so much happier if you’re there, too.”

“You’re welcome,” Fluttershy replied, returning Pinkie’s hug with a small one of her own.

Applejack trotted up to them both, and Pinkie disentangled herself from Fluttershy and stepped aside. “Fluttershy?” Applejack asked. “Why would you do this?”

“Because I want to show Rainbow Dash that I still care about her,” Fluttershy answered, without any hesitation.

Twilight chewed the inside of her cheek as she listened. Could that really be all the reason Fluttershy needed? Twilight wondered at how much Rainbow Dash must mean to Fluttershy, and how close Fluttershy must have felt to her to be able to consider doing this. Then Twilight thought about what Rainbow Dash meant to herself and how close they had become.

“And what if she doesn’t want to?” Applejack asked.

“I’ll ask her first.”

Applejack shook her head. “But you don’t have to do this.”

“I don’t have to,” Fluttershy said. “That’s what will make it special.”

Applejack looked deep into Fluttershy’s eyes, as if searching for the answer to a problem she didn’t understand. Fluttershy looked firmly back. They stayed like that for a long time, Applejack staring silently and searchingly at Fluttershy, and Fluttershy staring back, never once dropping her gaze.

Finally, Applejack asked, “Are you sure this is the right thing to do?”

“I think it is,” Fluttershy said quietly.

“And…” Applejack paused and took a deep breath. “And this is what you want to do?”

Fluttershy nodded. “Yes.”

“Okay,” Applejack said, leaning forward and giving Fluttershy a small nuzzle. “Okay, then. I think I get it. I’ll help, too.”

“You don’t have—”

Applejack silenced her with a hoof. “I want to. For you and for her. If this is what you think we should do, then I think so, too.”

“Thank you,” Fluttershy said, so quiet it was less than a whisper, and pulled Applejack into an embrace.

“Aw!” Pinkie exclaimed, wrapping her hooves around both of them at once. “Rainbow Dash is gonna be so happy!”

Rarity turned to Twilight, a worried frown on her face. “You wouldn’t imagine participating in something like this, right, Twilight?”

“Well…” Twilight bit her lip. She loved Rainbow Dash, and she had said before that she would do anything to show Rainbow Dash that her door would always be open to her. Why not this? Maybe this wasn’t absurd or impossible at all. “I think I will,” she decided.

“But, Twilight!”

“I think Pinkie Pie is right,” Twilight said. “I want to show Rainbow Dash that I still care, too.”

“But friends simply do not do this with one another,” Rarity said.

Twilight shrugged. “I don’t think you can say something like that, you can’t ever say definitively that friendship has to be one thing but can’t be another. I’ve been studying—well, trying to study—friendship for a long time now, and I keep discovering that there always more expressions of friendship. I think this might just be one more way to show a friend that I care. And, well...” She blushed slightly. “I think Rainbow will enjoy it, and I think I will, too. It’ll be something special that we can share together.”

“And fun, too!” Pinkie added.

Twilight’s blush deepened. “And yes. Fun, too.”

Rarity frowned and pawed at the ground. “When you say it like that…”

“So?” Applejack asked. “Are ya in or aren’t ya?”

“Oh…” Rarity sighed. “I don’t know.”

“You know you’re gettin’ to do this with Rainbow Dash, right?” Applejack said with a smirk and a chuckle. “I’m surprised you weren’t the first to sign on board.”

Rarity looked up, her eyes narrowed. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Don’t pretend.” Applejack winked. “We all saw that lingerie you gave her for her birthday last year to wear during your—”Applejack loudly cleared her throat and grinned—”your sleepovers.”

Rarity’s cheeks glowed a brilliant red. “Just as I explained to you all then, that was not lingerie! It was avantgarde nightwear. I simply thought if she was going to sleep over so often, she might as well look presentable while doing so.”

Applejack laughed, but Fluttershy cut her off with a hoof. “Don’t tease her,” she said. “She doesn’t have to if she doesn’t want to.” She turned to Rarity. “We understand if you’re uncomfortable. You don’t have to.”

“Oh, Fluttershy,” Rarity said, frowning again. “I suppose I can help if you all think this is the right thing to do. But I just don’t know… We’ll ask her permission first, yes?”

“Of course,” Fluttershy said. “If she says no, we won’t do anything at all.”

Rarity nodded. “All right. In that case, I suppose I can help.”

“Yes!” Pinkie Pie cried. “I knew everypony would want to! This is going to be so much fun!”

“How are we going to do this, though?” Twilight asked. “We can’t just walk up to her and say, ‘Hey, Rainbow Dash, we were thinking about sexing you up, would that be okay?’, right?”

Fluttershy giggled. “We could, but I think we should follow the story in the magazine. I think she would really like that.”

“Oh, yeah!” Pinkie said, bouncing in circles around them. “That’s the best idea ever! We’ll do it just like in the story. The story was the best part!”

“Uh, what story are we talkin’ about?” Applejack asked.

“I don’t remember a story, either,” Rarity said.

They looked to Twilight, and she shrugged. “I didn’t see one.”

“Didn’t any of you look at anything other than the pictures?” Fluttershy asked.

Twilight, Applejack, and Rarity looked between each other for moment. Then Applejack voiced what they were all thinking, “There was somethin’ to look at ‘sides the pictures?”

Fluttershy smiled and trotted over to the bed. She spread the magazine out on the sheets and pointed underneath the first picture. “There are captions.”

The rest of them gathered around her. Twilight saw underneath each picture a string of descriptions explaining the ‘story,’ if it could even be considered accurate to label it as such. Twilight had seen foals’ school assignments with higher quality writing. The more she read, the less it made sense..

“What is the story?” Rarity asked.

“This pegasus, her name is, um, well, Hot Flanks,” Fluttershy said, blushing and pointing at the bound pegasus in the bed, “hurt herself in an accident, so the rest of her friends surprise her at night with a game to cheer her up.”

“Surprise her at night?” Rarity repeated with a frown. “That sounds… indecent.”

“We don’t have to do it just like in the magazine,” Fluttershy said and turned to the next page. “We’ll ask her if she wants to play along first. The important thing is that we show her that we still care, and that we explain to her that we’re worried she’ll really hurt herself if she keeps getting into these kinds of accidents.”

“Oh! Let’s do it tonight!” Pinkie said with a bounce.

Rarity shrugged. “I suppose we could.”

“It’s up to Fluttershy,” Applejack said. “I can do it anytime.”

“Tonight is fine,” Fluttershy said. Then she bit her lip and resettled her wings on her back. “And, um, thank you all so much for doing this with me.”

“Of course,” Applejack said.

“Definitely!” Pinkie added.

“Sure, and we should probably look at this magazine some more,” Twilight said, and they all looked up at her. “So we can learn our roles!” she added quickly.

Rarity cleared her throat. “Yes, I agree. We should give this a thorough examination. To learn our roles, of course.”

“Okay,” Fluttershy said with a giggle, turning back to the first page.

They all gathered closer around her and inspected the magazine. To learn their roles, Twilight reminded herself. No other reason at all.

Part Seven

Rainbow Dash didn’t move. The floor didn’t move. The walls and the ceiling didn’t move. The bed didn’t move. The lamp shone with a dull, static, fluorescent glow. The window stayed closed so no breeze could drift in to stir the curtains or rustle her mane. The sheets moved, but only barely, in an almost imperceptible rhythm of rises and falls along with her chest. The room kept utterly still and quiet. No one talked, no one laughed, no one flew, no wings fluttered, and no wind blew. Trapped in that emptiness of sound and movement lay Rainbow Dash. Her broken hooves had shackled her to the silence. Her wings ached.

Dash heard hoofsteps outside the door. Her body froze and each of her muscles tensed. She perked her ears, straining to listen. She scarcely dared to breathe for fear of covering the sound of the hoofsteps.

The steps began far away. They came closer, grew louder, and then louder still. They came to her door. Dash’s heart stopped. Her breath caught.

But the door did not open. The steps did not stop. They continued on, away, fading and quieting.

Rainbow Dash sighed. Stupid doctor ponies. They shouldn’t have been allowed to prance in front of her door like that, like it was some kind of hilarious game, laughing at her all up and down the hallway.

She turned and looked out the window. It was dark out. Rainbow Dash scowled. She hated the night. Everyone went away and stole into their homes together as soon as the sun went down. The streets and parks and restaurants became quiet and empty. If Dash stayed out at night, she couldn’t talk to anyone or even just sit up on a cloud and hear them walking by below her. The only way to stave it off was to stay the night with a friend, but even they lay in bed and went quiet sometime, and she couldn't come over every night.

She heard hoofsteps again. She froze and her ears perked. The steps came to her door. They stopped. The door handle turned. Dash’s eyes widened as she watched the door swing open into the room.

A nurse stepped inside.

Rainbow Dash slumped down against the bed. She made herself very small underneath the covers, so maybe the nurse wouldn’t see her at all and just go away. Dash’s eyes were wet for some stupid reason. She wiped at them with her wings before the nurse could get a good look at her.

“Would you like me to turn out the light?” the nurse asked. “Most of the other patients are going to bed now.”

“Sure.”

The nurse walked up to the lamp, but stopped again and looked down at Rainbow Dash. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.”

The nurse lingered. “Your friends didn’t come over tonight?”

Rainbow Dash sniffled.

“Well, good night, then,” the nurse said. She turned off the light and walked back out of the room.

Rainbow Dash lay alone in the dark.

No, none of her friends had come back, even Fluttershy. Rainbow Dash had told them not to come back, and they had listened. Dash said the dumbest things sometimes. She wished no one would ever listen to anything she said. She had just been acting stupid and angry, and no one ever meant anything they said when they were stupid and angry.

But her friends still left and they didn’t come back. Rainbow Dash didn’t blame them. She couldn’t get angry at someone for doing something she told them to do. But she just couldn’t stop thinking. Dash thought, and she thought, and she thought. Not much else to do while strapped down to a bed for hours and hours and with hours and hours still to go. Particularly, she thought about what Applejack and Rarity had said to her that morning when she had been too angry to listen. She thought about the Wonderbolts, too.

No Wonderbolt had ever sustained an injury during a live show. Throughout the whole multi-century history of the Wonderbolts, it had never happened. Not once.

Rainbow Dash injured herself during her shows all the time. Not all the time, obviously, but often enough for ponies to notice. Often enough for her friends to worry.

Like Rarity had said, the Wonderbolts only hurt themselves when they had accidents, and they never had accidents outside of practice, when mistakes were allowed. Fleetfoot’s book said they practiced for hours. Every day of every week. They would practice a new routine again and again and again, starting with the simplest maneuvers and slowly working their way up to the advanced ones. They practiced a routine so many times they all got sick of it, Fleetfoot said. They practiced until each member could perform every stunt and maneuver flawlessly. Not just flawlessly, but safely. They practiced until they eliminated nearly all possibility of risk during their shows. They couldn’t ever eliminate all the risk. That simply wasn’t possible. But they still tried, and they didn’t get into accidents during shows.

When Rainbow Dash learned a new routine, she started with the most dangerous possible maneuver first, because those ones were the most fun. She showed off her new stunts to other ponies as soon as she could, because showing them off to other ponies was even more fun. She didn’t try to be safe, and she got into accidents. She hurt herself while her friends watched.

None of that was in Fleetfoot’s book.

She couldn’t blame it on flying. Flying did mean falling, but the Wonderbolts flew, too. They did the same kind of flying she did, sometimes even more dangerous. They didn’t fall, and she did.

Her friends had seen. It scared them. They tried to tell her, and she told them to go away. And worse than anything else, they had listened to her. Because that’s what good friends were supposed to do. They listened.

If Rainbow Dash really wanted to be a Wonderbolt, she couldn’t get into these kinds of accidents. The Wonderbolts weren’t reckless. They were controlled. A Wonderbolt couldn’t spend weeks at a time in the hospital, or they would never practice with the team. A Wonderbolt who never practiced couldn’t perform. A Wonderbolt who didn’t perform with the team wasn’t a Wonderbolt at all.

Rainbow Dash understood now. Once again, like she had so many times before, she had spoken and acted without thinking things through, and it was her friends who had to tell her that she was being an idiot and embarrassing herself in front of everyone. And once again, Dash still hadn’t listened. And now, once again, Rainbow Dash would have to tell them sorry and do whatever she had to do to make it up to them.

Except this time, she was strapped down to a hospital bed. Places to go and no way to get to any of them. She couldn’t go tell her friends sorry, because she couldn’t go anywhere. This time she had to sit and wait and hope.

She looked around the empty, quiet hospital room. She didn’t hear anymore hoofsteps outside her door. No one came back for her.

Rainbow Dash pulled the cover up over her eyes with her wing and tried to sleep, feeling the stillness and the quiet heavy on her chest.

Part Eight

Flitting between restless dreams, Rainbow Dash felt a soft warmth envelop the tip of her ear, tugging softly. It let go and drifted down her cheek with pleasant tickles, and she murmured contentedly. It finally rested lightly on her lips and then pressed ever so gently down. Rainbow Dash sleepily giggled at the feeling and opened her eyes. She saw Fluttershy, her eyes wide and earnest, and her face so near that Dash could feel Fluttershy’s warm breath tickling her chin.

Fluttershy leaned forward, closed her eyes, and kissed Rainbow Dash on the lips. Still in a sleepy haze and halfway dreaming, Rainbow Dash accepted, cooing appreciatively. Fluttershy molded comfortably and easily with her. Rainbow didn’t understand or try to understand, she only welcomed the pleasant dizziness it brought to her head.

Fluttershy pulled away, and Rainbow Dash licked her lips. The kiss had only lasted a moment, but Fluttershy’s taste still lingered.

“I’m sorry for waking you,” Fluttershy said quietly. “But we have something very important we want to show you.”

Rainbow Dash sat up and blinked the fog from her eyes. Behind Fluttershy, in the dark around her bed, she saw Applejack, Twilight, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie all smiling at her. Their smiles looked strange, though. Dash saw small hints of worry and uncertainty in their faces. All except Pinkie Pie, who grinned as brightly as ever. She waved over at Rainbow Dash when their eyes met.

Dash chuckled and waved back. “What’s going on?”

“Well… we wanted to…” Fluttershy bit her lip and patted at the bedsheets.

Rainbow Dash squinted at her, and then at the rest of them. If it wasn’t strange enough that all of her friends had appeared in her room at night without—

Her eyes widened and darted over each of them to make sure. All of her friends were in her room! They came back!

“I’m sorry!” Dash blurted. “I’m really sorry. I acted stupid and reckless at the relay and a whole bunch of other times I don’t remember and I didn’t even think about it, but I thought about it now and I’m sorry,” she said as quickly as she could, so they wouldn’t have a chance to leave before she made them understand. “I’m sorry I scared you guys, I really didn’t mean to. I know I act really stupid sometimes, and even if everypony who flies falls sometimes, I fall way too much, and a lot of times I don’t even try hard not to because I never thought about how it would affect you guys, but now I did, and even though falling is flying and I’m going to fall sometimes no matter what, I’m going to do my best to fall as little possible.”

“It’s okay,” Fluttershy said.

“It’s not okay!” Dash tried to sit up. “I hurt you guys and then I yelled at you just because you tried to tell me. I know you must be really mad, but I really am sorry. I can be more careful, I really can. I don’t know if can stop myself from ever getting in an accident again, but I’ll do better, and I’m really sorr—”

Fluttershy put a hoof to her chest and smiled. “We’re not mad, and we forgive you.”

Dash swallowed as Fluttershy lowered her hoof. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Fluttershy answered. “We all do.”

“Totally!” Pinkie Pie said, jumping up behind Fluttershy.

Applejack chuckled. “‘Course I forgive ya.”

“Me, too,” Twilight said.

“All we ever wanted was to see you safe,” Rarity added. “And I do forgive you.”

“So, uh, we’re cool, right?” Dash asked hesitantly.

Fluttershy’s smiled dropped, and her friends exchanged sad glances. Rainbow Dash’s throat tightened as she watched their expressions change.

“That’s why we came tonight,” Fluttershy finally said. “We wanted to show you that no matter what you do and no matter what happens, we’ll always be your friends. We wanted to show you that we’ll always love you.”

The tightness in Dash’s throat dissolved and she let out a relieved sigh. “Heh, okay. Whatever. So, what’s up?”

“Well, we wanted—if you,” Fluttershy stuttered, wringing her hooves in tight circles. “We just, no, if I could—” Fluttershy shook her head and looked down at the floor. “Oh, I don’t think I know how to do this.”

Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to ask what was wrong, but then Applejack rested a hoof on Fluttershy’s shoulder and whispered something into her ear.

Fluttershy immediately brightened. She giggled and turned back to kiss Applejack on the cheek. “Thank you,” she said quietly.

“Any time,” Applejack said, stepping back.

Fluttershy took a deep breath and turned back to Rainbow Dash. “Rainbow, can I kiss you again?”

Rainbow Dash blinked. She only just then realized that Fluttershy had been kissing her when she woke up. Fluttershy had kissed her. And Applejack had been standing right there! Dash looked nervously at the farm pony. “But what about Applejack?”

Applejack smiled. “It’s fine.”

Rainbow Dash turned to Fluttershy, who smiled so earnestly and kindly back at her that Dash heard herself saying without even thinking, “Okay.”

Fluttershy nodded, then slowly leaned forward, a pink tinge on her cheeks, and closed the already small gap between them. Rainbow Dash watched her come closer and closer, unable to move or blink or think, as if hypnotized. She could only squeak in embarrassment and surprise as their lips met.

She had forgotten how wonderfully soft Fluttershy’s lips were, and how much she enjoyed feeling them pressed to her own. She closed her eyes and pushed back against Fluttershy as a familiar warmth spread through her face and ears and chest. Kissing Fluttershy had always felt like napping on a cloud on a sunny afternoon or rolling down a dewy, grassy hill in springtime—silky and delicate and refreshing and pleasant. Rainbow Dash could have played with Fluttershy’s lips for hours and done nothing else at all and never gotten bored.

Fluttershy slid a hoof around her neck and pulled her closer, and Dash felt Fluttershy’s tongue pass over her closed lips. Dash opened her mouth more out of surprise than understanding. Fluttershy’s tongue slipped tentatively into her mouth, moving in slowly, as if ready to retreat at any moment. Rainbow smiled and met Fluttershy’s tongue with her own, reassuring and encouraging her friend. Fluttershy tasted just like the lilies that grew around her cottage this time of the year. She and Fluttershy fell into an unhurried rhythm together. Even as the kiss deepened, Rainbow Dash didn’t struggle for dominance or lose herself to passion. She simply enjoyed the quiet intimacy as she rediscovered Fluttershy’s lips.

She felt something in that kiss she had never felt in any other. It was a feeling she couldn’t quite place, a fluttering in her chest that was almost familiar, and a tenderness in her friend’s tongue that seemed to hint at something more. Rainbow didn’t know what that something was. She knew only that it felt both strange and wonderful, and she pushed herself deeper and deeper into the kiss to understand it.

Fluttershy suddenly pulled away. Dash’s eyes drifted open, half-lidded, her head swimming. Fluttershy pressed their foreheads together, breathing warmly and shallowly, their mouths still close enough that their breaths intermingled. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I shouldn’t never have yelled at you, and I know you never meant to worry anypony. I’m sorry I didn’t talk to about this before, and no matter what you do, I’m going to keep coming to your practices and cheering for you everytime I can.”

Rainbow Dash nodded, her head beginning to clear. “Thank you.”

Fluttershy kissed her one last time, then pulled away altogether.

Rainbow Dash started to complain, but Pinkie Pie cried, “Oh! Oh! My turn!” and dove forward onto the bed and threw their lips together, while Fluttershy giggled and stepped back.

Dash heard Rarity say something about respecting the common courtesy of waiting one’s turn, but she was already too consumed by Pinkie’s lips to listen. She had forgotten that her other friends were there at all while kissing Fluttershy, but now Pinkie Pie reminded her with a bubbly, giggly vengeance.

The first thought that struck Rainbow Dash was how utterly different Pinkie Pie’s lips felt from Fluttershy’s. She had to be careful with Fluttershy. Their kiss had been slow and gentle. But Pinkie threw herself at Dash with a frenzied energy that instantly overwhelmed her. If kissing Fluttershy was napping on a sunbathed cloud, kissing Pinkie Pie was plunging straight into a broiling storm cloud while lightning flashes seared Rainbow’s wingtips and wind gusts spun her upside down. Those sorts of wild, unpredictable storms were Dash’s favorite kinds of storms, though, and she quickly fell into the rhythm of this new hectic kind of intimacy. Pinkie lay over top of Dash’s chest, practically smothering her, and her lips were everywhere, all at once, on Dash's lips, her cheeks, her forehead, her nose, her neck, her ears, an inescapable whirlwind of moist, warm kisses.

Pinkie abruptly pulled back. “Oh, wait,” she said, spittle still hanging from her chin. “I forgot to tell you sorry.”

“Wha…?” Dash murmured.

“I’m sorry for laughing at you,” Pinkie said, looking at her seriously, at least as seriously as a pony can look while grinning from ear-to-ear. “And I really hope you don’t stop flying, because I really, really like watching you fly, and I know you have a lot of fun doing it, and you should never stop doing something that makes you happy. Oh! And I brought you your book, too!” She beamed and held a book up to Dash’s face

Dash glanced at it. “Uh, thanks.”

“Ok, let’s go!” Pinkie cried, then mashed their lips together again, and Pinkie’s tongue charged into Rainbow Dash’s open mouth. But Dash was ready this time. Pinkie had caught her off guard before, but no pony got the best of Rainbow Dash twice. She matched Pinkie’s spastic energy and threw herself crazily into the kiss.

Pinkie laughed, and Dash felt the vibrations of it in her mouth and all the way down her throat. She forced her way to and then past Pinkie’s lips, and felt a flush of pride at taking control. She explored her friend’s mouth, her tongue, the very top of her throat, marveling at how familiar and, at the same time, unfamiliar it felt. Pinkie tasted deliciously sugary, almost overpoweringly so, like she had just eaten a whole of box of cupcakes (which she probably had) Pinkie never once let up. Her tongue danced over and under and around Dash’s own, in an exhilarating game whose rules changed every second. Rainbow Dash had never thought kissing another pony could be this exciting, this frantic, this fun, and she lost herself ever more in Pinkie Pie’s lips.

Somewhere deep in that frenzy of movement and heat and fervor Rainbow Dash felt that same almost-familiar feeling she had with Fluttershy. Beneath Pinkie’s manic kissing and biting lay a soft tenderness. It confused Dash as much as it fascinated her. Again she delved deeper into the kiss to discover what it was.

“Come on now,” she heard Applejack say. “Ya can’t have her all to yourself all night.”

“Aw, fine,” Pinkie whined, her voice muffled in Dash’s mouth. She gave Dash one last deep, feverish kiss, then hopped back away.

Rainbow Dash slumped back against her pillow, panting heavily and seeing stars. “Whoa.”

“You ain’t seen nothin’ yet,” Applejack said, grinning and stepping towards her.

Dash refocused on her, her vision clearing again. “Hey,” she mumbled.

“Hey,” Applejack said with a chuckle as she took off her hat and began undoing her hair tie.

Rainbow Dash bit her lip as she watched. “You’re, uh, not mad that I kissed your marefriend, right?”

Applejack laughed as her straw-blond hair fell down about her face. She laid her hat and hair tie aside, then walked Dash’s bedside. She smirked down at her. “Nah, not at all.” She grinned and drew a hoof along Rainbow’s side. “But I sure bet I can find some way for you to make it up to me, if you’re feelin’ guilty.”

Rainbow Dash trembled at the touch. She didn’t understand how this had happened, but she began to realize how incredible it was. She had totally just made out with both Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie, and now it looked like she would get to snog Applejack, too. She glanced over at Twilight and Rarity, and they both smiled back. Rainbow Dash silently cheered. It was as if her friends had baked half of all her greatest fantasies into a big plate of strawberry pies and then served them all to her at once in the most awesome breakfast in bed that had ever been breakfasted while in bed. And then let her make out with all them afterwards. This might have been the greatest night of her life.

“But first,” Applejack said, her smirk turning into a small smile, “I wanted to say I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have gotten mad at ya, and I definitely never should said I would stop carin’ about you, because it wasn’t true and it was just plumb asinine, too. I won’t ever stop caring ‘bout you, no matter how big of a blockhead you’re actin’. You’re my friend and nothin’ will ever change that.”

“It’s okay,” Dash said, and looked down at her bed. “I said some stupid stuff, too, and I’m sorry.”

“Apology accepted.” Applejack’s grinned returned. “Now that means I finally get to do this.”

Dash smirked. “Finally, huh? I always knew you wer—”

Applejack rushed forward and kissed her, and Rainbow Dash squeaked in spite of herself.

Again, Rainbow Dash was struck by just how different Applejack felt from anypony else she had ever kissed. While Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie were different in how they went about it, they were both undeniably soft. Their lips had a pliable, flexible quality to them that Dash could easily overcome.

Applejack’s lips were tough, hard, and harsh in the most delightful way. She didn’t give in to Dash in the slightest, but easily held against her. After the first, Applejack switched to short but insistent kisses, firmly in control. The kisses deepened, growing longer, more passionate. Dash marveled at how even through a kiss, she could feel Applejack’s solid strength and will. Dash wanted to challenge that strength, conquer it, take it as her own, and she pressed back against Applejack more and more fiercely.

At some unspoken signal, they both opened their mouths, and their tongues met. Rainbow Dash pushed forward, but Applejack didn’t give any ground. Dash grinned and thrust forward ever more fervently, her heart beating louder in her ears and her breath coming heavier. Applejack responded in kind, and they both struggled to outpace and overcome the other. But Dash could tell Applejack was holding back. The apple farmer never used her full strength, and Dash began to gain an edge. She felt as if she had been cheated somehow. Applejack was being too gentle, like she thought Dash needed to be coddled. But Dash enjoyed the heady rhythm of tongues and lips too much to complain openly, and instead focusing on exploring Applejack’s mouth.

Even there, Dash still felt it. The same intangible something she had felt with Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie. The same tenderness underlied every movement of Applejack’s lips. Dash thought it felt like being in love. Or like being loved. But before she could make sense of it, Applejack drew back.

She leered down at Dash with half-lidded, drunken eyes through the darkness. “You don’t know how long I’ve wanted to shut you up like that.”

Dash smirked. “Yeah, well, you didn’t put up much of a fight. Bit off more than you could chew?”

Applejack half-chuckled, half-panted, grinning back. “Oh, sugarcube. We haven’t even started yet. I’m gonna make you eat those words before this night is over.”

Dash’s opened her mouth to retort, but her voice caught. Haven’t even started yet? She stared at Applejack, her eyes widening. Applejack couldn’t possibly mean…

Dash shook her head. There was no way. No matter how awesome her friends were, that just would have been too awesome. She tried to shake the thought from her head. It was too crazy to even consider. But… this was pretty crazy awesome already, right? But it couldn’t be. It just wasn’t possible.

While she thought, Applejack backed away, and Twilight sidled toward her.

Rainbow Dash grinned, as she noticed Twilight. No, she decided then, this was totally, definitely the greatest night of her life, no ‘might have been’ about it. She always knew her friends were cool, but this was downright incredible. They might have even been cooler than her now.

Well, no. They obviously weren’t. But still...

“This is so awesome,” Dash said as Twilight trotted up to her. “You have no idea how awesome this is. Thank you so much.”

Twilight laughed. “You should thank Fluttershy.”

“Oh, no,” Fluttershy said, shrinking back. “It was Pinkie’s idea.”

“Nuh huh,” Pinkie Pie singsonged. “It was Rainbow’s idea.”

Dash frowned at that. “Uh, what?”

“It was in your magazines!” Pinkie smiled obliviously. “So that makes it your idea.”

“Wait…” Dash’s eyes widened. “You don’t mean… those magazines, right?”

Applejack grinned and nodded. “Yeah, I’d be willing to bet my two hind legs those’re exactly the magazines we mean.”

Uncomfortable warmth flooded Rainbow Dash’s face and ears, and she screwed her eyes shut. “Ugh, I can’t believe you saw those.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Fluttershy said. “We didn’t mean to pry. Um, or we did, but we didn’t mean it in a bad way, I think. I’m sorry.”

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Rarity said. “Every mare has, well, cravings on occasion. Some of us simply have more cravings than others. Or perhaps simply less control over ourselves.”

“It’s not like I look at them everyday!” Dash said quickly. “Just, you know… sometimes…”

Twilight cleared her throat loudly. “Rarity is correct. It’s a natural biological function of our bodies. I’ve read studies, and it’s been indisputably proven that all mares masturbate by the time they’ve reached our age. It’s science!”

Rainbow Dash sighed. “Twilight…”

“Oh, but this is so exciting!” Twilight said, smiling and walking nearer to her. “I’ve wondered for years what it would be like to kiss another mare, but I could never find an accurately objective description in any of the books I ordered. I never thought to ask one of my friends. I should have done this months ago. We’re going to learn so much!”

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Happy I could help.”

“I wish I’d remembered to bring my notebook,” Twilight continued, clapping her hooves together, “I’m going to have to get back to the library as soon as I can so I write all this down before I forget. This is so exciting! I’m going to be up for hours analyzing all of the raw data I’m going to collect tonight.”

“Hey, Twilight,” Dash said, carefully unfolding her wings.

“Yes?”

“Shut up,” Dash said, and then curled her wings behind Twilight’s neck and pulled her friend down to her bed. Dash had played the helpless, bed-ridden pony long enough. Rainbow Dash didn’t sit in bed and listen to somepony babble on about notebooks for anypony. Except Twilight. But only on her birthday. And maybe holidays.

Rainbow Dash pressed their lips determinedly and stubbornly together, with the same intense fervor as Pinkie and Applejack had kissed her. Twilight mewled happily in response, and Rainbow pushed her tongue past Twilight’s lips. Twilight tasted just like those daisy sandwiches she ate every day for lunch. And coffee. Black. When their tongues touched, to Dash’s surprise, Twilight didn’t hesitate or shy away. Instead, Twilight experimentally caressed Rainbow’s tongue with her own. Twilight didn’t relinquish herself to Dash’s ministrations, but slowly took the lead, studying and searching, and Dash soon felt Twilight’s tongue move carefully past her own lips. Twilight explored her, running under and over her tongue, along the roof of her mouth, poking and prodding, stroking and kneading. Rainbow Dash couldn’t escape the feeling that she was being experimented on, but being Twilight’s test subject turned out to be oddly pleasant. Dash eased back and allowed Twilight to freely study her from the inside out. Their kiss became a delightful game of trial and error as Twilight tested and examined. Rainbow Dash purred appreciatively to let Twilight know when she had hit one of her sweet spots, and Twilight then focused more intently on those spots in response, their kiss growing more and more passionate in turn.

Rainbow Dash still felt that same tenderness she had felt with all her other friends. She felt it in every little twitch and curl of Twilight’s tongue over her own. It did feel like being loved. It was her friends’ love for her, she realized. Rainbow could sense their affections, all they felt for her, and how badly they wanted her to know. Her friends had showed her how much they cared for her in the closest, clearest, most intimate way they knew how. Rainbow wanted to return their affections, to show them that she understood and that she cared for them, too.

Twilight broke the kiss. She leaned forward, breathing heavily into Dash’s neck. “I can’t believe I forgot my research notebook.”

Rainbow Dash chuckled and stroked Twilight’s back with her wing. “Hey, if you want, we can do this again anytime. You know, if your memory needs refreshing.”

“I think I’ll have to take you up on that.” Twilight pulled away from her and then kissed her lightly on the cheek. “I want you to know that I never meant to upset you. I only wanted you to understand why we were scared for you. You should never stop flying. No matter what anypony says. Please just try to be a little less reckless.”

“I know, and I’m sorry, too.”

“Thank you.” Twilight gave her one last nuzzle and stepped away.

Rainbow Dash smirked and turned to Rarity. Dash waggled her eyebrows in what she was certain must have been the most seductive waggling of eyebrows that unicorn or even the hospital room had ever witnessed.

“Oh, stop that,” Rarity said, rolling her eyes. “With that vulgar grin on your face, you look like some sort of highway ruffian who’s just spotted an afternoon snack. I’m not that kind of mare, you know.”

Rainbow Dash kept smirking. “You totally want me.”

“Well,” Rarity said, smiling and levitating something Dash couldn’t see out of the darkness and onto the bedside table. “I certainly won’t deny that.”

Rainbow waited, but instead of coming to her bedside, Rarity went to the table. “What are you doing?” Dash asked.

A soft glow of candlelight appeared on the table, and Rarity stepped back. “Setting the atmosphere.”

“Uh, I don’t think you’re allowed to have candles in here.”

“I’m certain you, and the hospital staff, will be able to forgive me for having standards,” Rarity said, now levitating a small bag of rose petals alongside her. She sprinkled them about the bedsheets, letting some fall down over the side.

“Seriously?” Rainbow Dash munched on the nearest petal. “I appreciate the snack, but aren’t rose petals sort of… corny?”

“They most certainly are not,” Rarity said, standing back and examining her work. She nodded in satisfaction and then leaned over Rainbow Dash, holding a bottle of something in her magic. “Now for the final touch.” She lowered the bottle, and something wet and cold dusted Rainbow’s neck.

A flowery, sweet smell hit Dash full in the face. She wrinkled her nose. “Did you just spray me with perfume?”

“Of course,” Rarity answered, turning away and levitating the bottle away. “As I said before, for all of our sakes, I have standards.”

“You’re so weird,” Dash said with a chuckle. Right as Rarity turned towards her again, she darted up towards Rarity’s lips, hoping to catch her friend off guard.

But to her disappointment, Rarity turned out to be more spry than she looked. Rarity pressed a hoof against Dash’s chest as soon as she started leaning up off the bed, easily stopping her in place.

“Ah, ah, ah,” Rarity tut-tutted, smiling. “Patience, dear. Let me look at you first.”

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes, then settled back down. “Whatever.”

Rarity gazed across the small space between them, candlelight flickering in her eyes. Her face softened, and she reached a hoof out to touch Dash’s cheek. Finally, she whispered, “Dear, do you have any idea how extraordinarily beautiful you are?” and then leaned forward and kissed her.

Rarity moved in slowly and elegantly, brushing her lips first along Dash’s cheek, then lightly biting and suckling along her jawline, and finally ending with a caress on her lips. Dash might not have cared about any uppity standards, but she found that there was something enchanting about being a kissed by a gorgeous mare in the unsteady orange and yellow glow of candlelight while the overpoweringly sweet, but not at all unpleasant, smell of Rarity’s perfumes swam about her head and Rarity’s moist lipstick spread onto her own lips.

Their lips parted together and their tongues met. Pinkie Pie had been a game, Applejack a challenge, Twilight an experiment, but kissing Rarity was something altogether different and new. Rarity danced with her. Their tongues moved together in a rhythm that felt intricately choreographed. Rarity could do with her lips what Rainbow Dash did with wings and hooves in the air—she performed magnificent, sweeping loops and spins and twirls. Rainbow Dash lay transfixed, captivated by Rarity’s movements. Kissing Rarity felt just like flying. Slowly, Rarity taught her, showed her the steps, how to swing and when to spin, and soon let Rainbow take the lead. With lips and tongues and shallow breaths and low moans, they flitted and fluttered together.

Her friends’ love for her was an everpresent cadence now, flowing beneath every tremble of their lips and each stroke of their tongues. Rainbow Dash felt even more than just love, now. She began to feel all she and her friends had experienced together, all the time they had spent together, all they had learned together, all the growing they had done together, every adventure walked, every obstacle overcome, every foe defeated—Rainbow lived through it all again in that kiss. It was something more than friendship and more than love. She accepted it, and did all she could to pass that feeling back through Rarity’s lips, to show her friends that she understood and that she cared too.

Rarity pulled away, little beads of sweat slipping down her face. Still breathing heavily, she leaned beneath Dash’s chin, then grazed Dash’s neck in a series of gentle, deep kisses. Each lasted shorter than the one before, until finally Rarity stepped back altogether. Rarity smiled contentedly down at her and moved a strand of hair away from Rainbow’s face. Dash looked up at her—at her wide, blue eyes, at her brilliantly white coat, at her now-disheveled mane—and wondered how she had never noticed how stunning her friend was before that moment.

“I, uh, I think you’re beautiful, too,” Dash said quietly.

Rarity laughed and kissed her again before stepping away. “You really are a sweetheart, do you know that?”

Dash grunted. So it was over, then. She tried not feel disappointed. It had been too incredible for that.

Fluttershy moved closer, smiling. “How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Are you kidding me?” Dash said, immediately brightening, her wings flaring behind her. “This is the most awesome thing that’s ever happened!”

Fluttershy giggled. “I’m really glad. I was a little worried you might not understand. So, um…” She bit her lip. “Um, do you want to keep going now?”

“Keep going?” Dash repeated.

Fluttershy nodded.

“Wait,” Dash said, her mouth going dry. “You mean…?” She couldn’t say it. It was too crazy. It was simply too awesome to be possible. Things that awesome never happened, or the whole world would probably explode from all the unrestrained awesomeness getting contained in just a single room. And a hospital room at that. It’d be like trying to fit Jupiter into a restaurant cupboard, and only a family restaurant. Not one of those big franchise restaurants.

“What do you want to do?” Fluttershy asked softly. “It’s your choice, and we won’t do anything if you don’t want to, but, um, I, or uh, we would really like to do this with you.”

Rainbow Dash stared at her, then looked at each of her friends. They grinned back at her, their faces red, their breaths quickening, and their eyes eager. Rainbow Dash would have fainted if she had been any less awesome. She turned back to Fluttershy, swallowed slowly, and nodded.

“We need to hear you say it,” Rarity told her. “So that we can know for absolute certain what you want.”

Rainbow Dash hesitated, then answered, “Y-yeah, I want to keep going.”

Fluttershy smiled and nodded. She leaned in very close and tentatively kissed Rainbow’s cheek. “If there’s anytime you want to stop,” Fluttershy whispered, “or if we do anything you don’t like, all you have to do is say so, and we’ll stop, okay?”

Rainbow Dash nodded, and then grinned. She thrust her muzzle forward to catch Fluttershy’s lips in a kiss. Fluttershy hesitated at first, but soon giggled into Dash’s mouth and returned the kiss. Rainbow Dash marvelled again at how sweet and soft Fluttershy tasted, even more so now in comparison to her other friends, but she didn’t have the patience to be gentle anymore. She threw herself at her friend—her lover, she realized—and past her lips.

“Oh! Oh!” Pinkie Pie cried. “I call her fufu!”

The whole bed bounced as something heavy fell on its far end, and Dash felt something warm and wet on her thigh. She gasped and looked down. Pinkie Pie lay on the far end of the bed, her muzzle between Dash’s still spread and restrained hindlegs. She grinned over Dash’s stomach, her eyes joyous and hungry, and bit down into Dash’s thigh. Rainbow Dash gasped again, from both pleasure and pain. She tried to close her legs by instinct, but the bandages held them tight and kept them open.

“Do you want her to stop?” Fluttershy asked.

“No,” Dash breathed. “No—nng—it feels good.”

Fluttershy nodded and leaned back in to kiss her. She reached a hoof up, passing it through Dash’s messy mane, just as Applejack appeared on her other side.

Applejack smirked and bit down on Dash’s ear, just hard enough to hurt. Dash mewled into Fluttershy’s mouth, and Fluttershy let go and kissed at her neck instead. Applejack began moving down from her ear, biting and suckling, while Fluttershy moved up from her neck, kissing and caressing. Rainbow purred between the two opposing sensations, rough at her ear and soft at her neck, while Pinkie’s tongue and teeth sucked and bit at her inner thigh, closer and closer. Rainbow arched her neck and spread her legs further, giving them all easier access to herself. A heat of familiar lust began to build deep down inside her. Applejack and Fluttershy finally met halfway, and then both stopped to lean across Dash and kiss each other.

Dash gazed up at them, eyes half-lidded. She had never thought it possible that watching two of her closest friends together could be so incredibly hot. She felt Pinkie Pie trace her hooves up across her stomach as she lapped from one thigh to the next, and Dash’s mind raced at the feeling of somepony’s else’s hooves reaching along her body, sliding up and down her sides and chest. Applejack and Fluttershy finished with each other, and then turned back to her. Fluttershy leaned in and nibbled beneath her chin, but Applejack leered down at her.

“I just realized,” Applejack said, a smirk forming on her face. “I never did thank ya properly for helpin’ get us together.”

Rainbow Dash tried to answer, but between Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie’s ministrations, her voice came out only a squeaky rasp.

Applejack didn’t wait. She dove straight at Rainbow’s mouth. She didn’t hold anything back this time. She kissed Rainbow ferociously, almost violently. Rainbow Dash’s mind was a desire-filled haze, overcome by competing, contrasting sensations, and held in bed she couldn’t move away or put up any real fight even if she had wanted to. And she didn’t want to. Applejack’s ferocity threw her deeper into freeing lust. She lay on her back, restrained, her legs bound in slings, fully at the mercy of the five hottest mares she had ever seen. All she could think in that moment was how desperately she wanted Applejack and the rest of her friends to overwhelm her and make her scream.

Applejack’s tongue rushed into her panting mouth. It grappled with her own, pushed hers aside, reached further in, and took Dash’s whole mouth as her own. Applejack reached her hooves around her neck, and suddenly there were three sets of hooves running over Dash’s body—one gentle, one wild, and one strong—exploring and reaching, finding all her most intimate areas, and laying them bare. The heat and pressure between Rainbow Dash’s legs grew until she could think of little else, a heat and pressure that Pinkie drew nearer and nearer to with each lick and bite.

Something warm and tingling, like electricity, prickled Rainbow Dash’s coat. It started at the crook of her neck and worked its way down, brushing along her stomach, tickling her side, and massaging her abdomen, leaving behind a trail of charged, staticy pulses as it went. Dash looked down and saw a magenta glow on her coat, then looked past Applejack’s straw-blonde mane to see Twilight, her horn aglow and her face scrunched in deep concentration.

“Do you like that?” Fluttershy asked, pulling back slightly.

Twilight’s electric touch reached her cutie marks, and Rainbow let out a long, low moan that was quickly muffled again by Applejack’s mouth. Fluttershy giggled and began nipping and suckling at her neck again. Twilight stroked her flanks in tight circles in a literally magical touch that for the unicorn might have been even more intimate than a kiss. She caressed Dash’s cutie marks with pure, unfiltered magic, and its embrace sent wonderful sparks traveling up and down Dash’s legs as the heat within her body lit into a sweltering and burning flame.

Rainbow Dash could smell the musky, honeyed scent of her own arousal, and the sheets beneath her felt warmly damp on her flanks and back. But she didn’t only smell her own. Every time Applejack pulled away from her to take a gasp of air, Dash tasted the tangy lust of six different mares, all intermingling in the air, before Applejack’s mouth clamped around her own again. Rainbow heard her own excited whines between Applejack’s deep moans, over Fluttershy’s barely perceptible squeaks, the wet sounds of Pinkie’s tongue and lips between her legs, and the panting breaths of six mares.

Rainbow Dash’s wings flared behind her at full span, flapping and fluttering and twitching along with her lovers’ ministrations. Rarity drew alongside them and nuzzled her feathers. “Your wings are so lovely,” she purred, her voice low and lascivious. “Would you be a dear, Rainbow, and allow me to play with them for a while?”

With Applejack’s tongue in her mouth, Rainbow was in no position to answer, or even fully understand the question. She mewled into Applejack’s mouth, and Rarity, apparently taking that as a yes, reached her hoof up and ran it along the full length of Dash’s outstretched wings. Rainbow Dash trembled and gasped at the touch. It had been so long since any mare other than herself had touched her wings this way, she had forgotten how beautiful it could feel.

Rarity grinned. “Oh, you enjoy that, do you?” She ran a hoof along Dash’s feathers again, up and down, stroking harder and harder, sending waves of pleasure cresting up her wings to break and crash in her head.

But Rarity abruptly snagged a feather, and Rainbow Dash jerked away and cried out in pain.

It all instantly ceased. Rarity’s hoof dropped, Applejack’s lips fell away, Fluttershy pulled back, Pinkie Pie jumped out from between her legs, and Twilight’s magic disappeared.

“What’s wrong? What happened?” Fluttershy asked.

“My wing,” Dash said, breathing heavily. “You were doing it too hard. I think you almost ripped that one out.”

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize,” Rarity said quickly, her face reddening. “I suppose I got a little over-excited. I’ve just been waiting for so long, and they felt so beautifully soft…” She reached a hoof up to Dash’s wings again, but she kneaded them gently this time, slowly working along the outward direction of the feathers, in a pleasant, stirring massage. “Is this better?”

“Mmm,” Dash purred, closing her eyes. “Yeah, that’s great.”

“Do you want us to keep going now?” Fluttershy asked.

“Oh my gosh, yes.”

Just as quickly as they had stopped, each of her friends rushed in again. Applejack’s lips met her own, Fluttershy’s teeth grazed her shoulder, Twilight’s magic took a hold of base of her tail, Pinkie’s tongue lapped just above her ever-moistening slit, and Rarity leaned down and sucked at the tip of one of her longest primaries, all together, all in a chaotic rhythm, all taken by lust, all at once.

Rainbow Dash arched her back and cried out again, from pleasure this time. She felt and heard and smelled so much, so quickly, the sensations crashed through and broke in her mind. She couldn’t think or talk or act, control her body in any wave at all, only relinquish herself to her friends and to the feelings they were working inside her. She felt Applejack’s tongue dance with her own, and both heard and felt Applejack’s moans shake down her throat. She felt Fluttershy’s mouth around her ear, sucking gently. Rainbow smelled the cool sweat on her head, felt her friends’ sweat run down onto her coat, felt her friends’ warm bodies pressing and rocking against herself. Hooves ran all across and over and under her, in her mane, on her neck, along her wings, up her thighs, until she couldn’t tell who touched her where anymore, only that she was being touched everywhere and by everyone. She heard Pinkie suck and lap around her soaked mound, and the sharp scent of her and her friends’ arousal burned in her nose. Sparking magic ran up her sides and elegant lips tugged at her feathers.

Through it all, Rainbow had never felt more cared for in all her life, and she had never been so keenly, physically aware of her friends’ love for her. She had always known they did, but it had never been so distinctly, clearly demonstrated to her before.

And she had never felt more turned on. The burning pressure inside her had become a fiery, throbbing need. Her lust soaked her thighs, and she ached for release.

“Pinkie, please,” she breathed out around Applejack’s mouth.

Pinkie Pie giggled a reply, then slid her tongue down and slid it directly across Rainbow’s mound, and it was warm and moist and soft. Dash cried out again as another surge of pleasure struck through her body. Pinkie stroked her tongue clear from one end of her dripping slit to the other, then dove down inside without a moment’s hesitation. Her long, twisting tongue felt beautifully cool on Dash’s desperately burning sex. Pinkie slid in deeper, filled her up from the inside out, stroked and lapped and sucked at her slick inner walls.

At the same time, Twilight ran her magic up Dash’s thighs and settled on and around and in her slit, prickling and tingling. She slowly massaged Dash’s folds, exploring and experimenting, discovering every inch of Rainbow’s sex, while Pinkie slipped deeper and deeper inside. Twilight finally found Dash’s stiff nub and enveloped it in her electric embrace. Rainbow Dash cried out into Applejack’s mouth, while Fluttershy sucked at her neck and Rarity ran her tongue between and over and along her feathers.

Pinkie Pie giggled, and Rainbow Dash felt laughs vibrate deep inside herself and squeaked and shook at the feeling. Pinkie frantically rutted further in, her tongue moving crazily inside, as Dash felt pleasure everywhere and all over, her hips bucking without any rhythm and her hooves pulling at her bandages, while Twilight’s magic worked in and around her sex, touching everywhere Pinkie’s tongue didn’t.

Rainbow Dash’s eyes rolled into the back of her head. Her vision blurred. Her head clouded. She couldn’t think or see anything past the unbelievable feelings her friends were working between her legs, into her mouth, along her wings, up her neck, down her thighs, in every part of her body.

She gasped past Applejack and ground hard into Pinkie Pie’s mouth.

Rarity used her tongue, her hooves, and her magic to massage the whole of Dash’s wings at once, and Dash twitched and flapped her wings madly. The smell of sex and arousal and sweat and perfume burned her nostrils. Her breaths came as shallow, hoarse, burning gasps. Applejack’s mouth consumed her own and Applejack’s tongue reached the back of her throat. Hooves touched every part of her, gripped her, held her, caressed her. Sounds of bodies grinding against each other, gasps, moans emanated all about her.

Applejack abruptly moved down and bit sharply at her neck, and Pinkie lapped at her whole sex at once, and Twilight’s magic wrapped around her clit and hummed, and Rarity sucked on the tips of her feathers, and Fluttershy caressed her softly and Rainbow Dash screamed as the fire and pressure inside her exploded and ripped up and down her limbs with her heartbeat and her inner muscles clenched and pulled at Pinkie’s tongue and her gasps hurt her throat as Applejack’s teeth sunk into her coat and she came a second time and her vision went dark.

She breathed heavily and slumped against the bed. Her whole body tingling. She squeaked and moaned with the aftershocks that rumbled up her spine. Her friends’ bodies pressed close against her, and everywhere she was wet with sweat and spittle, and teeth and tongues and hooves lightly caressed her coat. “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” she heard herself say, only half realizing it was her own voice.

Her friends wrapped legs around her and held her close, nuzzled her neck and chest, whispered sweet nothings in her ears. She felt warm, and satisfied, and loved. “Thank you, thank you…”

“You’re welcome,” Fluttershy said, somewhere very near.

“Rest now,” Rarity murmured by her ear.

Rainbow sighed contentedly. “So awesome… thank you, thank you…”

A blanket was wrapped snuggly around her. “Just sleep now,” Fluttershy whispered.

Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and fell asleep while all of her friends held her.

Epilogue

A gust came in through Rainbow Dash’s hospital room window, gently upsetting the curtains. It passed along her bed and rustled the sheets and pulled at the pages of her book bed and her mane and rushed into, through, and up her feathers. She absentmindedly flapped her wings into the breeze. It had been a long time since she had flown. A whole week, at least. Pegasus wings weren’t meant to stay out of the air for so long. Even if she went only a day without flying, which she never did except when complying with another of Applejack’s dumb dares, they’d start flapping on their own, no matter what she was doing. In bed. In the shower. While playing horseshoes. Made a hassle of everything. Applejack thought it was funny. Rainbow Dash didn’t.

Dash ignored the wind and kept reading her book, which she held in unbandaged hooves. The last of her bandages been off for a full day now. Her hooves seemed healed. She had taken a few practice trips around the hospital already, including one just that morning with the doctor. They had walked all the way to the hospital entrance together. Her hooves still ached a little while she held up the book, but Dash had never let something as measly as a sore fetlock come between her and a good book. And it was a good book. One of the best—Daring Do and the Dastardly Drafty Door. She had read it before, but she figured, like a good trick, any Daring Do novel was worth doing over and over. Just not in front of ponies. And usually while lying down. The analogy was admittedly pretty thin.

She wasn’t alone in the room. Fluttershy sat in a chair by the bed, knitting or sewing or something else equally lame. Rainbow Dash didn’t mind. It could be nice sometimes when other ponies just sat back and acknowledged her as the most awesome pony in the room by not trying (and then obviously failing and embarrassing themselves in front of everypony) to do something as cool as what she was doing.

Fluttershy didn’t say anything to her, and Rainbow Dash didn’t say anything to Fluttershy. Rainbow thought they were both okay with that, though. It wasn’t an uncomfortable silence. It was more like the kind of silence where both ponies aren’t talking because they don’t have anything they need to say, and they just like knowing the other pony is nearby. All of her friends had been coming by all week, and they had all been like this. Well, they didn’t all knit or sew, but every visit had felt the same. It felt like they were all in on some big secret, like they all knew something now that no one else knew, and it was something they never needed to say out loud. Saying it out loud might have even spoiled it. So they went back to doing all the same things they had done before, but none of those things were really the same, because now they did them knowing this new thing that they didn’t have to say. Rainbow Dash didn’t even think about it. She just knew that she had awesome friends who could do even awesomer things with their tongues, tongues they had all agreed they would readily begin to take advantage of together on a regular (and probably scheduled, if Twilight had any say) basis as soon as she got out of the hospital, and that was more than enough for her. Coming up with a name for it wouldn’t make any difference, so why call it anything? They were friends, and that was that.

The door opened and the doctor walked in. He wheeled a stretcher behind him, on which lay an earth pony stallion with a plunger sticking out of one ear and a pained expression on his face that denoted very serious inner contemplation of his life’s circumstances and the choices he had made that had brought those circumstances about. Dash thought it looked familiar.

“Hey, doc!” Dash said.

The doctor stopped when he noticed her. “What are you doing here?”

“Reading with Fluttershy.” She held up her book.

Fluttershy smiled and waved.

The stallion on the stretcher waved back.

“Please try not to move,” the doctor told him before turning back to Rainbow Dash. “No, what are you still doing here?”

“Uh…” Dash held her book up again. “I’m still reading with Fluttershy.”

Fluttershy smiled and waved again.

The stallion on the stretcher didn’t wave back.

Fluttershy looked disappointed.

The doctor did, too. “But you were discharged hours ago!”

That was news to Rainbow Dash. “I was? When?”

“This morning! Why did you think I walked you all the way to the lobby?”

“Excercise?”

The doctor groaned and turned around and pushed the stallion on the stretcher back out the door. “We’ll find you another room. And you,” he said, glancing back at Dash. “Get out.”

Dash looked at Fluttershy. “Huh.”

Fluttershy giggled, but stifled her mouth with a hoof and became more serious. “I think we should go. I don’t want to make him mad. He was really nice.”

“Yeah,” Dash said, already rolling out of the bed and landing on her hooves. Her ankles stung with the tiniest bit of pain, but she just stretched and yawned.

Fluttershy made the bed and helped her gather her things, which wasn’t much, and they went out the door. Rainbow didn’t look back, and the door closed behind them. She had already promised herself and her friends that she wouldn’t see that room again anytime soon.

They went through the hospital, to the front lobby, and then after a quick discussion with and apology to the receptionist, they went out the door.

Rainbow Dash stepped out into sunlight. The first thing she noticed was that it was warm. The second thing she noticed was that there was a lot of sky. Like, a lot of sky. Sky was big. She had forgotten how crazy big it was. Looking at it, her wings twitched and tail swished and her heart thumped and she knew that she could fly anywhere at all anytime at all. And she could, and would, fly through it all in the fastest, most incredible, and sexiest way possible. She crouched down, ready to launch herself into the air for the first time in a week. But she paused mid-crouch and looked to Fluttershy first.

Fluttershy nudged her shoulder. “Go ahead.”

Rainbow Dash kissed her on the cheek and let her lips linger and said, “Thank you.”

Fluttershy nodded and smiled.

Rainbow Dash grinned and spread her wings wide in a pose as dramatic as it was (she was certain) breathtaking. Ponies nearby probably gasped. They almost certainly gasped.

A single susurrus, resounding beat of her wings so strong it sent leaves and flowers and loose grass every way around her, and Rainbow Dash was already high and away.