The Art of Falling

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.