You Will Never Be Like This
Rainbow Dash landed softly outside of Twilight's home. She sighed to herself, plodded a little closer and gave three swift, hard knocks on Twilight's door. Rainbow Dash hung her head a little and looked more at the floor than the door, though situational awareness allowed her to notice that Twilight had opened the door to her home.
"Good afternoon, Rainbow Dash." Twilight greeted, smiling to see her friend arrive.
"Hey Twilight ... have you got a minute?" Rainbow Dash asked, most of the usual energy and vigor gone from her voice, leaving it sluggish and a little lower than normal.
"I've always got time for my friends Rainbow. Come in." Twilight invited, entering herself. Rainbow followed soon after, though once again the normal liveliness had gone from her movements and her advance was a little slow, her hoof-steps heavy. "Would you like anything to drink?" Twilight asked, preemptively moving toward her kitchen.
"Sure ..." whimpered Rainbow Dash, the indifference to it in her head being reflected in her tone. "Hey, you're the smart one, right Twilight?" Rainbow Dash, her voice raising itself a little for Twilight to be able to hear her from the other room.
"I've gotten a reputation for it, I suppose," Twilight called back. "Why do you ask?"
"I ... I need to talk to you about something. Something personal." Rainbow Dash answered, taking a seat on Twilight's floor, the house itself having few furnishings. Rainbow Dash had never really noticed that before, but the floor wasn't exactly uncomfortable.
Twilight returned in moments with two steaming mugs levitated before her. "I hope you like tea." Twilight said, the sheepish look on her face saying more than the tones of her voice ever could.
Rainbow Dash took one of the cups in her hoof, and watched Twilight sit down opposite her. Looking into the steaming, light brown liquid, all Rainbow Dash could see was a reflection of herself - a sullen face, ears down to their sides and eyes heavy with lack of sleep. If Rainbow hadn't of known this was her, she could have mistaken it for a completely different pony. She took a sip of the liquid, but the taste didn't even register to her - she was too busy trying to keep so many other emotions and senses in check. The warmth was felt though - all the way down her throat, even into her stomach.
"Anyway, what did you want to see me for?" Twilight asked, upbeat in her words and a small smile on her face. She was evidently having a good day, and Rainbow Dash knew her friend well enough to know that it was an attempt to cheer her up, but some part of her mind kept screaming at her that Twilight enjoyed seeing her like this. Kept shouting that all of her friends would smile at the sight of her in such a state. Kept crying that all ponies did this behind her back as it was, and this was just a long line of events.
Rainbow Dash shook her head with some force, silencing the paranoia ... at least for a while. "Well ..." Rainbow began. She clutched her stable foreleg with the one holding the mug and rubbed it slightly. "You know how ..." she continued, swallowing as her throat went dry. She took another sip of tea, attempting to try and stave off her symptoms. "You know how ... Fluttershy has a marefriend now ..." she eventually spat out, feeling incredibly stupid for even doing this.
Twilight nodded, taking a sip of her own tea. "Yes, I met her a few days ago. Kinda sprung that one on us - leave a straight mare to go see some endangered animals, come back with a marefriend." Twilight joked. "Nice girl, all things considered." she added. "Why?"
Rainbow's chest felt like it was contracting, her lungs being pressed together and was having trouble forcing air into them in the short, rapid bursts that she could manage. She found, before she began to try and speak, that her tongue had attached itself to the roof of her mouth and she had to forcibly remove it from there to be able to formulate words. "It's not that I like Fluttershy. Not like that, anyway!" Rainbow Dash spluttered out, a few syllables malformed in her speech and the phrases themselves rushed. "I just ..." Rainbow Dash trailed off, putting her head down once again to play at the floor with her free hoof. She swallowed hard again and resisted the temptation to begin panting, her body starved off the oxygen it would normally have through her breathing, which was now even harder than previously, as Rainbow Dash now had to consciously think and remember to take breaths.
"You just ...?" Twilight asked, getting an inquisitive look to her features and the smile disappearing, her eyes full of concern for her friend.
"Every ... time ... I think about the two of them ..." Rainbow began again, taking pauses to breath out. She turned her head up to look Twilight in the face. "I start getting these weird reactions. Whenever I think about the two of them doing something, like taking a walk on a beach or anything else equally stupid and romantic," Rainbow spat out, her tone shifting from slow and methodical as her eyes darted around the room to try and collect her thoughts to a sort of spite, coming to a barbed head on the word 'stupid'. "I start to itch. Like, everywhere. My legs, my chest, especially my head. My head under my mane itches so bad, like there's tiny bugs crawling inside my brain, or that my mane is suddenly made of wool or something. My stomach starts doing somersaults - but not in the same way I get when I'm doing a stunt when I'm flying." Rainbow Dash explained, taking pauses every so often to think a little as her eyes went down and to the left, watching Twilight give encouraging nods for her to continue. "I can't stop thinking about it either. Every time I close my eyes, I get images of them together, and my eyes force themselves to squint shut. Like they're trying to close themselves again so they don't have to see it." Rainbow continued, closing her eyes in reality too and squinting them moments later, before forcing them open to reveal more of her eyes than she intended - they were bloodshot ever so slightly around the edges, and never sat still, always jittering a little in their places. "I start sweating, and every time I try to do something strenuous my muscles start to twitch." Rainbow Dash sighed and hung her head as low as it would go. "And it makes me ..." she stopped, taking another sip of tea to wet her throat. "Well, like this." she concluded, a wry chuckle escaping her.
Twilight nodded and closed her own eyes for a moment, a thoughtful disposition visibly overtaking her. "Are you comfortable in your own sexuality?" Twilight asked, opening her eyes again to look at Rainbow Dash with the understanding only years of friendship can bring.
Rainbow Dash looked up and nodded twice. "I ... I don't really like either one. What's that word you used? Platoo ... Playto ..." Rainbow Dash stammered, unable to remember Twilight's phrase. "Platonic." Twilight finished off for her, knowing the feeling herself. "Yea. Or, somepony said it was ..." Rainbow dash thought to herself, scratching at her chin. "A ... Ase ... something. But, isn't that plants and snails and stuff?" Rainbow asked, a slightly puzzled expression overcoming her.
"It's a developing field. We're still coming up with words to describe how we feel about other people. And about ourselves." Twilight noted. "But yes, I get what you're trying to express."
Rainbow Dash nodded in response. "I ... I don't know why I feel like this. I feel constantly heavy, like there's something pushing down on my shoulders and my back." Rainbow Dash added, her chest now feeling as if it had been compacted down to half its usual size and was pressing down on her diaphragm. "I keep biting at my hooves, and ... and and and ..." Rainbow Dash started, but found herself unable to finish. She froze up, unable to talk or move. One of her eyelids began twitching ever so slightly, and she didn't take her eyes off Twilight.
Twilight opened her mouth to speak, only to see the Pegasi sprint off out of her door, throwing her cup on the floor and smashing it to shards. She followed after, not worrying about the mess just yet. "Wait!" she called to Rainbow, but the mare had already taken off into the sky. Twilight closed her eyes and lowered her head ever so slightly in a sort of defeat that she felt. Turning around to go back into her library and clean up the mess, Twilight thought to herself about all she had heard - and how she could try and make things better.
Rainbow Dash flew through the sky, the wind in her mane and on her skin cooling her relatively hot, panicked body. She had to get out of there, the walls were closing in. Twilight was mocking her, she just knew it! She had to go somewhere safe, somewhere quiet, somewhere ... somewhere ...
Rainbow's train of thought began to falter. The world around her grew darker, the colours fading from it. "It's ... night-time already ...?" Rainbow asked herself aloud, turning only to see the sun behind her still high in the sky. Her vision grew blurred, she could feel her body slowing down ... until everything went dark and her muscles ceased to function. Falling through the air, Rainbow's mind used the last of its energy to relax the muscles Rainbow still had control over, and put herself into a state of complete senselessness. She had suffered enough falls to know what to do to prevent most injury. But, through all the darkness of unconsciousness and panic, the image of Fluttershy and her marefriend remained. Then, it was joined by another couple. And another. Rainbow's mind's eye filled with all different sorts of ponies, all of them happy and content. Deep down, in her gut, Rainbow Dash told herself one thing before her feinting kicked in fully.
"You will never be like this."
