the Writing Gamesby ArtichokeLustChaptersthe story of Queen ForeverSilent Mouse: the mute, quadruplegic orphan that saved the worldSepiaSleepoverthe story of Queen ForeverRainbow Dash breathed heavily as she struggled to open the door. A puddle was forming from all the sweat rolling off her as she tried to grasp the doorknob with her shaking wing, and failed repeatedly. After several misses, she bit the doorknob and turned it. That's how she knew she'd gotten some good practice in. But as Rainbow trotted inside, she saw a pony sitting on her cloud-couch in the dark. No, an alicorn. The alicorn stared at Rainbow Dash with a strange look on her face; it was as if she thought all the goodness would be drained out of the world if Rainbow Dash didn't read her books or something. "Hey Twilight." Rainbow smiled, but tilted her head. "What are you doing in my house?" "This is an intervention, Rainbow Dash," Twilight said with a serious gleam in her eyes. Rainbow Dash blinked. "If this is an intervention—" She looked left and right "—shouldn't there be more ponies around? I thought those things were supposed to be done by—" "Semantics." Twilight waived her hoof, dispelling Rainbow Dash's argument with some word she had never heard before. "...I'm sure you know why I'm here?" Twilight raised an eyebrow. Rainbow Dash deadpanned. "No. No, I don't know. That's why I asked you what you were doing in my house." Twilight blinked a couple times. "Oh! Well—" She picked up a stack of papers sitting beside her on the couch and turned it so Rainbow Dash could see the cover "—remember this?" The cover beheld a red and black alicorn with a glowing blond mane discharging a blue ball of energy from its mouth. Several foals were clinging to the alicorn's back, crying, hoping beyond hope that they would be saved. In the background, several nuclear explosions went off, and planets could be seen exploding in the night sky. Rainbow Dash smiled slowly as she looked over the cover. "Oh yeah!" she said. "That's a copy of my 'Ultimate Pony Fighters, ultimate power'. You kept it?" Twilight blinked. "As an example." Rainbow Dash smiled even wider. "So my work is— is—" She frowned and rubbed her chin. “What’s that word you always use?" "Exemplary?" Twilight raised an eyebrow. Rainbow Dash nodded. "Yeah, that one. Thanks." "Well, in a way..." What did she mean by that? Rainbow Dash almost shrugged off the skepticism and smiled at the praise, but when she looked at her friend, she knew something was off. "What do you mean: 'in a way'?" Twilight sighed. "Rainbow Dash, your story is..." "Yes?" Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. "Well..." Twilight cringed. "It's not..." Rainbow Dash glared at her friend in annoyance. Why did she even come here if she couldn't say what she wanted? "Spit it out already!" "Your writing is horrible!" Twilight screamed. Rainbow Dash frowned. "...Oh..." Her voice cracked. Twilight hopped off the couch and galloped to her friend. "I'm sorry, I didn't—" "No, I get it." Rainbow Dash stared at the floor. "You're the princess of books. How could I make a book worthy of—" "Don't be like—" Twilight started to interrupt, but something caught her attention. "Princess of books? What?" "Discord came up with the name. It kinda stuck." Twilight blinked. She was blinking a lot, was something in her eyes? "Anyway, don't be like that: your book wasn't that bad." Rainbow Dash looked up and frowned. "You just said it was horrible." Twilight frowned and put a hoof to her mouth. "Well, you pushed me. Really it could just use a few improvements, and then it'll be great." "Really?" Rainbow Dash tilted her head. "You didn't make it sound like it could be saved." "Sorry." Twilight smiled sheepishly. "...okay..." Rainbow Dash squinted, then sighed. "So, what are these 'few improvements?" Twilight frowned. "Well, it's hard to explain, and if I just told you, you probably wouldn't understand any of it." Rainbow Dash deadpanned. "So how about we try making a story together?" Twilight grinned. "I'll ask questions that you should keep in mind later —to make sure your readers are better involved!" Rainbow Dash tried not to roll her eyes This was obviously going to take a while, but she didn't really have anything better to do, and she didn't want to disappoint her friend. "Sure. Sounds fun." Twilight smiled enthusiastically. "Great!" She clapped her hooves together. "You go first." "CHAPTER ONE!" Rainbow Dash stomped her hoof. Instead of a loud reverberating clash announcing the story, there was a soft *pomf*, because there was only cloud below her. She frowned, but really, it didn't matter: nothing could detract from the awesome that was about to come, because the awesome was infinite. And that gave her an idea… "Queen Forever held the villain against the wall by the throat ‘WHERE ARE THE KEYS!?' She screamed loud enough that the stallions ear-drums ruptured and gallons of blood shot out with enough pressure to annihilate his two associates. "The stallion laughed, 'I'll never tell you...' "'So you choose 'the hard way', huh?' The queen grinned. 'Good.' "Then she taps her head to the stallion, and all of his memories come flooding through. Of course, this is nothing to her. She finds what she wants in an instant! "'I know where the key is.' She smiles as she fires an energy ball at the stallion, finishing him off. 'But does anyone else think they can take me?' "A stallion shakes his head. 'No,' he says, 'But I think I may join you— "STOOOOOOOOOP!" Twilight held her head as she screamed. It took a while for her to notice she was now the only one making noise. Rainbow Dash stared back at her friend. Why was she all sweaty now? And was she paler than usual? "Just..." Twilight shook her hoof and looked at her friend with weary eyes. "Fuck." Rainbow Dash gasped with a wide smile. "I haven't heard you swear in... ever! Was it really that good?" Twilight glared back. She looked pretty serious. She was just staring like that, with that intense look... But then she sighed. Maybe she forgot something. "Rainbow Dash..." "Yes?" Rainbow Dash tilted her head. What was going on with her friend? Twilight must have remembered Cadence's breathing practice, because she was practicing it, and somewhat frantically too. "Rainbow… Well, first, you changed tense in the middle of the story.” “I what?” Rainbow Dash asked. Twilight shook her head. “Never mind. Who is Queen Forever?" "Oh!" Rainbow Dash smirked. "She's eternity; she's the guardian of the universe!" "Okay," Twilight said. "How did she get to be the guardian of the universe? What's her origin?" Rainbow Dash smiled wryly. What kind of question was that? "She was always the guardian of the universe. She doesn't have an origin. Queen forever?" Twilight face-hoofed. "Okay then, who are the villains? Where did they come from?" "Oh, they've always been there. They're always doing bad things, but Forever always stops them," Rainbow Dash said. "So," Twilight said. "Nothing ever changes?" Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to protest, but nothing came out. Twilight might have actually had a point there. After all, in all the Daring Do books there were always bad guys, but they weren't the same bad guys, and each side had chances that they took to gain and lose. Queen Forever... well, she had everything. She could do everything. And so there was no challenge... So maybe being able to do everything meant there was nothing left to do... Bah! Philosophical nonsense! Twilight must have infected her with her egg-headiness... It was like they said: Once you go egg, you'll be egg 'till you're dead. Just like syphilis. But when in Syphily... Rainbow Dash smirked. A game was always more fun when your opponent had a chance of winning, and Twilight's attack was surprisingly good. "Okay Twilight, I'll give you that one," Rainbow Dash said, still smirking. "But I think I've got something even better now." Twilight smiled warily. "Oh?" Rainbow Dash grinned even more competitively. "Today I'll tell you all about the rise of Silent Mouse, a deaf, blind, legless stallion orphan that nopony thought would amount to anything! But oh were they wrong..." She shook her head, still grinning. Twilight facehoofed. Author's Note I had a pony idea, so I had to relieve myself. I'm not sorry. I chose the song because baby noises. Did you know you can replace paragraphs in Microsoft Word by representing them as '^p'? It's great for getting the spacing right for FimFiction. Silent Mouse: the mute, quadruplegic orphan that saved the world"Silent Mouse was rolling around in the field like he normally does. I mean there's not much else he can do, having no legs and all." "Oh Celestia. Rainbow Dash..." "Hey! No interrupting the story!" "Fine..." "Silent Mouse was rolling around in the field when suddenly he stopped. Everyday he would do this. He would suddenly stop playing, and contemplate his lack of potential, how he couldn't do anything... He was a sad pony. "But this day was different. This day, the bodacious Queen Muscles found her lump of a subject crying in a field of grass from his blind eyes, on an otherwise happy day. She bent down, and almost tore out her own muscles to give to the poor pony, but then she realized something. She realized that she would need her muscles to power the city. "So she went over her body parts. Her muscles and body were obviously too important. And she couldn't get anywhere except the ground without her wings. But her horn was utterly useless except for levitating a few things!" Twilight gaped. "Unicorn horns aren't useless!" "Well, you can't move around with them well." Rainbow Dash shrugged. After all, what was the use in something if it couldn't move things? "I can teleport!" Twilight almost yelled. Really? When did she teleport? If Rainbow Dash could teleport, she'd teleport all over the place. Heck, she wouldn't even have to get up to go to the bathroom! "You can? Then why don't you?" "I do it all the time!" Twilight fumed. Rainbow smirked. Yeah right. "No ya don't." "Anyway, after figuring out which body part she could lose without hurting her ponies, Queen Muscles popped off her horn—" "Popped?" Twilight cringed and held a hoof over her horn, as if it could come off at any moment. Rainbow Dash had to chuckle at the sight. "Yeah!" Rainbow moved her hoof to where a horn would be. "Like: *shplup*" She moved her tongue past her upper lip and pulled her hoof as if taking off her own make-believe horn. Twilight shuddered. "It's okay horn, nothing's gonna happen to you, I promise..." She pet her horn. What was it, a symbiote or something? "Aaanyway, are you gonna keep interrupting me?" Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. "Sorry." Twilight grinned sheepishly. Rainbow Dash shook her head, smiling. "Heh, it's like teaching you the history of the Wonderbolts all over again, you just can't sit still and listen." "Yeah— Hey!—" "So Queen Muscles took off her horn and ploped it onto Lumpy's—I mean, Silent Mouse's—head. "Suddenly SM could see! With his unicorn sense! And the first thing he saw? The bodacious bod of the now Pegasus Queen. And the first thing he thought? He was glad her look wasn't tarnished by that silly horn sticking out of his head. "And with a kiss to the forehead similar to one given in war, the bodacious Queen left her subject to discover his new gift. After all, she had to deal with the mile long dragons that regularly attacked the city. "And discover his gift he did. But along with it, due to his only sense being unicorn or something, he also discovered something else: he discovered evil, villainry within the city he thought was perfect. However, now that he could see it, he had to do something about it..." Rainbow Dash beamed. She could tell that everything that just came out of her mouth was totally radical. Even Twilight, Ponyville Queen of Books (she's married to the books) had to accept its awesomeness! "And thus begins the tale of the lump that saved the world!" But Twilight wasn't smiling. "Well," Twilight shrugged and raised her eyebrows. Maybe she wasn't able to comprehend it. "Besides being completely racist, it's actually a huge improvement. I'm kind of amazed." "Really?" Rainbow Dash smiled. After all, the queen of books was praising her story! ...But something was wrong: Twilight still wasn't smiling. "...But?" "Well, I don't want to be harsh. Like I said, that was a huge improvement, and I don't want to discourage—" Twilight rambled. Rainbow Dash frowned. "Just spit it out. I can fly through trees, I'm sure I'm tough enough for some criticism." Twilight sighed. Was she not getting enough air? Maybe Rainbow Dash should have moved them to the ground to help her friend breathe easier. "Okay." Twilight sighed again. "Your story was pretty good for a beginner—" "For a beginner!?" Rainbow Dash shouted. She was more than just a beginner! She had been reading books for at least a year now! Twilight tried to say something, probably to calm Rainbow Dash down some more, but apparently she couldn't think of anything. Then she opened her mouth again, "Yeah, a beginner. You know writing books is different than reading them, right?" Rainbow Dash tilted her head. It was? "Well, it is," Twilight said. "And the thing you're missing is description—" Rainbow was about to protest. She had described everything well enough. But Twilight held up a hoof. "Think of it like this:" Twilight continued, "If you were watching the story you told, could you really describe Queen Muscles, Silent Mouse, any of the other ponies or creatures, or any of the locations they were in? Could you draw a picture after hearing your story? And could you understand and feel the feelings of the characters that you're focusing on? Because if your readers can't describe what should be important to them, then your story isn't descriptive enough. "Your story did portray some of Silent Mouse's and Queen Muscle's thoughts and emotions, but only barely." Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to protest, but then she thought about what Twilight said. What did Queen Muscles' city look like? She supposed it looked like a lot Canterlot, but really, it would have to be much cooler. And what did the fields look like? Were they sunny? Or was the weather cloudy there to reflect Lumpy's mood? And what was it like, really, to be a lump with almost no senses? What was it like to consider removing an important part of yourself to give to somepony with less fortune? It was hard to fathom either of those... And she was feeling a bit cross too! Her story was pretty good! What!? Was she supposed to describe every blade of grass? "Oh?" Rainbow Dash leaned forward, challenge etched into her features. "Can you come up with a better story then?" Twilight smirked, "Gladly." Author's Note If Twilight's acting more confrontational than usual, it's the wings. She part pegasus now, so she acts more pegasus-y. And yes, that's probably racist. SepiaTwilight paced randomly around Rainbow Dash's couch and looked about the room. It was like she was looking for something, but was too lazy to move more than a few feet. Yet she seemed too alert for laziness. No, the look she had on her face was much closer to a skilled soldier sharpening their sword before battle than the average couch potato. Suddenly, she braced her legs and leapt into the air, landing with catlike grace onto a very specific spot on the couch. The rightmost two of the three cushions—or, Twilight’s leftmost—shared her burden equally. She cleared her throat. Then she tilted her head and cleared her throat again. Something obviously wasn’t quite right, because she cleared her throat a few more times. And now she took notice of the couch, staring down at it. Maybe one cushion carried a little more of her weight than the other. So she crawled forwards a little, then backwards, then— Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow, bemused. “I thought we were talking about stories, but if you’ve chickened out to play charades… are you a cat?” she smirked. Twilight looked down and chuckled at herself a little. “Sorry.” She looked up, grinning slightly. “I just had to make sure I was in the perfect story-telling position.” There was an edge to her voice that told Rainbow Dash she wasn’t about to go easy. She smiled at the couch and patted it. “And here I am.” “Great.” Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Is your body finally ready for your perfect story?” Twilight grinned. “The question is: Is yours?” “Walked right into that one…” Rainbow Dash laughed to herself. “Chapter 1: the Abandoned Lair” Twilight spoke. It wasn’t quite the Canterlot voice—in fact, it was almost completely calm sounding—but her voice filled the room all the same. The Sepia pony absent mindedly picked up the wrench from a nearby surface and tapped it, needlessly adding to the symphony of rhythmic clicks and whirrs around him. The copper and golden shapes—touched with red—that spanned the massive chambers sang back as they moved through their given patterns in an incomprehensible dance, never sleeping, and only ever resting for a half a second. The Sepia pony felt small when he realized that he would never understand the blocks of metal regularly spaced around him. Even trying to would probably drive him as insane as the pony who built the place. So he was glad that wasn’t part of his job. No, instead, he trusted the finer details of the how to his good friend and partner, Silk P. Rose, or, as he liked to call him, Smarty Pants. The only thing Sepia needed—no, wanted—to understand, were the stains of red around him. Why did this incomprehensible machine look as if it were bruised and bleeding? “…So,” Sepia—for that was his name—began, “who beat up the clockwork?” Silk cracked a grin. “Very funny.” But he frowned as he looked off at the ‘bruised’ walls of the machine. “But I feel like I just laughed at a funeral.” Sepia frowned. He may not have known where all the red came from, but he wasn’t naïve. He knew a lot of ponies had to have died. He stared at the closest piece of metal. “But… How?” He asked. Silk looked around at different gears, doing that thing where he pieced things together in his mind, but it seemed like even he was at a loss. “More like what,” He said. “What could possibly be worth all this?” Sepia looked at his friend, worried, and he noticed a subtle squinting and hardening of his gaze. “Smartypants,” He warned. Silk looked over, glared, and shook his head. “I’m sorry, but I have to know.” He jumped atop one of the copper blocks and started scanning the room... Sepia jumped up and chased after him. “You know there’s never a good reason! Every time somepony askes a criminal why they did what they did, it’s always for a stupid reason. He was in the way! She didn’t pay up! He knew too much! She didn’t love him!” Silk looked back as he hopped across the labrynth, and Sepia could see the look on his face. There was a grimace, as if Silk regretted the blood around him; as if he were the reason it was there. “You’ve never created. A common criminal does things quickly for stupid reasons, but an engineer devotes his life for something. There has to be a reason behind this!” Sepia huffed as he chased after his friend. When did he get so lithe? “Then why don’t you ask him when we catch him. I’m sure you can wait a few days.” Silk hesitated for an instant before jumping again. “Because he’s dead!” ‘What?’ The question rang through Sepia’s mind. Steel was dead? Why was Silk informed before he was? He shook his head. He couldn’t let surprise cost him time. “When did this happen?” He asked. But Silk ignored the question as he dove behind one of the countless blocks. Strange, it was as if he knew exactly where he was going. Sepia dove and landed behind Silk on the ground. He was about to drag his partner back outside, slap him straight, and ask what in the world got into him, but something stopped him. Silk was crying. The always-smiling, happy-go-lucky genius Silk ‘Smartypants’ Rose was crying as he connected various wires together. It was just wrong. It was like seeing adamantium break. “I’m sorry.” Silk paused his work to wipe the tears out of his eyes. “I just have to know—“he connected one last pair of wires with alligator clips”—why would my brother do this?” With all the wires connected, he flipped a switch, indiscernible from the rest of the machinery. Sepia’s eyes widened and his pupils shrank. “What?” The machine whirred, and all went white Rainbow Dash gaped at Twilight. That couldn’t be the end of the story! “What? No! What happened to them?” She said. Twilight smiled. “Don’t worry, there’s more.” Her stomach grumbled and she smiled sheepishly. “But I think we should take a break first.” Rainbow Dash’s own stomach growled in response, as if it were communicating with Twilight's. She smiled wryly. “Okay Twilight, I guess you can take a break if you need to.” Rainbow Dash flew over to her kitchen, opened her cloud fridge, and pulled out the meal of heroes. “Leftovers!” She cried triumphantly. Twilight smiled and shook her head as she followed Dash into the kitchen. Rainbow Dash flew over and tossed the heroes’ meals into the microwave, entered the secret combination (3, 0, 0, start), and watched as lightning bolts cooked them to perfection. She tossed one meal to Twilight, who caught it in her magic as she hopped up to the cloud table. She threw her own meal to her own spot, opposite of Twilight. Twilight popped the lid off her soup container and sniffed. “Mushroom,” she identified it before taking a large sip. “So,” Rainbow Dash said, right before she stuck a straw into her soup to drink the excess fluids, “You think you can continue the story now?” Twilight smiled. Both of them knew she had already won, but it wasn’t about winning anymore. “Right.” Rainbow Dash smiled knowingly. It was never really about winning. As long as the game wasn't rigged, she preferred good competition to just beating everypony. Why else would she compete with Applejack so much when there was a good chance she would lose? “I said,” Silk repeated, “I have to know why my brother would do this.” He stared right at his long-time friend with wet-eyes. But his friend was looking past him. Sepia stared at the shiny, clean copper and gold walls and blocks of machinery. There wasn’t a drop of blood anywhere. “Well, I guess this was meaningless too.” Silk frowned. “Wipe your eyes, Smartypants.” Sepia said. And Silk did. When he could see again, he looked around in awe and disbelief. But the most amazing thing was right in front of him. “Steel?” He asked. “Steel!?” He repeated giddily. “What?” Apparantly Silk was wrong: Steel wasn’t dead. Sepia turned around and jumped on the pony not too far behind him, pinning him to the ground with a hoof to the neck. “WHAT DID YOU DO TO THEM?” He screamed. Steel stared back at him in shock, too scared to move. “WHERE DID THE BLOOD COME FROM?” He screamed again. Steel just stared back at him, now both scared and confused. “What?” “Why?” Sepia leaned in and was now muzzle to muzzle with Steel. “Why did you kill all those people?” He glared. Steel tried to crawl out from under Sepia, but the stallion was too strong. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!” “Liar!” Sepia stomped right next to Steel’s head. “Do you think I’m an idiot?” Suddenly, Sepia was pulled back, and he felt himself put into a headlock. “He’s telling the truth!” He heard Silk behind him. “Are you kidding me?” Sepia growled. He just saw this place filled with blood. Silk must have been more distraught than he thought if he believed his brother was innocent. “I just saw—“ “I know what you saw,” Silk said, “but it isn’t real.” He sighed. “Not anymore.” Sepia frowned. He knew exactly what Silk was talking about, but it was just too preposterous to believe. And apparently Silk knew that. “Steel,” he called, “how’s Silver doing?” Steel instantly went from pushing his back against a machine in fear and confusion to smiling dumbly. “Oh, she’s great!” Sepia’s body went slack. That was impossible! Silver died weeks ago! He remembered Steel at the scene with that hard gaze. Any mention of her after that would have him screaming and throwing things. Steel looked back and forth between his brother who was smiling and crying for some reason, and Sepia, who was staring at him in awe. “What?” Silk dropped his partner and wiped his eyes. “I think we should go for a walk,” he said, “we’ve got a lot to talk about, and I don’t know if I want to meet my double.” Twilight drank the last drop of her soup. “So, how was that?” Rainbow Dash stood on all fours with all limbs outward and breathed in. “That—“She grinned as she took a more nonchalant stance. “—was pretty good.” She tilted her head, “But I feel like I still don’t know what’s going on. I know they went back in time but…” “Yeah.” Twilight shrugged. “I’d say that was more like the first half of the first chapter.” Twilight stared at her utensils for a few seconds before yawning. “But I’m a bit tired after eating all that soup.” Rainbow Dash perked up. “Oh! You’ve gotta try sleeping on a cloud!” SleepoverAfter following Rainbow Dash through a dizzying amount of hallways (Why did she need a house that large?), Twilight found herself staring at a modest, but comfortable looking guest bedroom. All the clouds were tinted red, but it was a bright red that looked inviting rather than foreboding. Across the sixty square meter room was a glass window with a beautiful view of Ponyville. And just below that window was a nightstand, which was next to a very comfortable looking purple cloud bed. There were other furnishings and stuff placed neatly around, like a walk-in closet, a chest of drawers, and a desk with games on it... but none of those compared to the bed by the window. "Well..." Rainbow Dash nudged Twilight from behind. "Go ahead, try it!" Twilight didn't need any further encouragement. Sleeping on a cloud bed was one of the many things she wanted to try when she got her wings. It was like a whole 'nother world up in the sky, and there was just something whimsical about falling asleep in another world. So when Rainbow Dash nudged her, she bounced forward and then leapt into the air, dive-bombing the bed. *pomf* Several puffs of cloud rose up from where Twilight landed. Rainbow Dash smiled. "Well, have fun." She turned and closed the brown cloud door behind her. Rainbow Dash shook her head as she walked uphill through the winding hallways to her bedroom. "Have fun? Who has fun in a bedroom?" Her ears started to turn red at the implications, but thankfully she remembered the games she put there. "Okay so it's not that awkward." She said, relieved. Finally at the entrance to her room, she pushed open the massive double doors and walked casually into her enormous hundred and fifty square meter room, a room that was filled to the brim with Wonderbolts paraphernalia. There were even a few Spitfire plushies, which Rainbow would have to remember to put away in case Spitfire actually came to her house. (It wasn't so much that she had an unhealthy interest in the Wonderbolts as much as she couldn't pass up the hilarity of having Wonderbolts plushies. At least, that's what she told herself. Celestia help her if Pinke ever made it to her room...) She hopped up on her bed and tucked herself in, but not before picking up Tank off her nightstand and cuddling him. She normally found comfort in the loyal turtle, but now it just stared up at her, as if expecting more. "What do you expect? I've never written a book before. How do you expect me to compete with the goddess of books?" Rainbow Dash looked down and tilted her head at the turtle. 'Neither did Twilight.' She could practically hear his nasal yet wise voice buzzing through her head. 'And even Daring Do only recorded what she saw. Also, I'm a tortoise, not a turtle.' Rainbow Dash almost complained about the point on Twilight. Of course she had written books before. Heck, she'd probably gone back in time and written all the books so she could complete the legendary book continuum, a fundamental part of the universe only known to the masters of books. But that part about Daring Do... "Y'know Tank," Rainbow Dash said, "I think you might be on to something..." She grinned. If all Daring Do did was record what she saw, then she would just have to do the same. And what was more awesome than the dreams of the self-proclaimed inventor of awesome herself? Nothing, that's what. So it was simple, she would just record her dreams. "I just have to sleep." She grinned competitively as she tried to fall asleep, cuddling Tank against her. But you can't fall asleep while forcing anticipation. "Right." She yawned, giggling at her mistake. "Sleep..." Author's Note Rainbow Dash's room is larger than many peoples' houses. To imagine it, think of a large classroom or small stage area. Twilight's room is decent hotel size.
the story of Queen ForeverRainbow Dash breathed heavily as she struggled to open the door. A puddle was forming from all the sweat rolling off her as she tried to grasp the doorknob with her shaking wing, and failed repeatedly. After several misses, she bit the doorknob and turned it. That's how she knew she'd gotten some good practice in. But as Rainbow trotted inside, she saw a pony sitting on her cloud-couch in the dark. No, an alicorn. The alicorn stared at Rainbow Dash with a strange look on her face; it was as if she thought all the goodness would be drained out of the world if Rainbow Dash didn't read her books or something. "Hey Twilight." Rainbow smiled, but tilted her head. "What are you doing in my house?" "This is an intervention, Rainbow Dash," Twilight said with a serious gleam in her eyes. Rainbow Dash blinked. "If this is an intervention—" She looked left and right "—shouldn't there be more ponies around? I thought those things were supposed to be done by—" "Semantics." Twilight waived her hoof, dispelling Rainbow Dash's argument with some word she had never heard before. "...I'm sure you know why I'm here?" Twilight raised an eyebrow. Rainbow Dash deadpanned. "No. No, I don't know. That's why I asked you what you were doing in my house." Twilight blinked a couple times. "Oh! Well—" She picked up a stack of papers sitting beside her on the couch and turned it so Rainbow Dash could see the cover "—remember this?" The cover beheld a red and black alicorn with a glowing blond mane discharging a blue ball of energy from its mouth. Several foals were clinging to the alicorn's back, crying, hoping beyond hope that they would be saved. In the background, several nuclear explosions went off, and planets could be seen exploding in the night sky. Rainbow Dash smiled slowly as she looked over the cover. "Oh yeah!" she said. "That's a copy of my 'Ultimate Pony Fighters, ultimate power'. You kept it?" Twilight blinked. "As an example." Rainbow Dash smiled even wider. "So my work is— is—" She frowned and rubbed her chin. “What’s that word you always use?" "Exemplary?" Twilight raised an eyebrow. Rainbow Dash nodded. "Yeah, that one. Thanks." "Well, in a way..." What did she mean by that? Rainbow Dash almost shrugged off the skepticism and smiled at the praise, but when she looked at her friend, she knew something was off. "What do you mean: 'in a way'?" Twilight sighed. "Rainbow Dash, your story is..." "Yes?" Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. "Well..." Twilight cringed. "It's not..." Rainbow Dash glared at her friend in annoyance. Why did she even come here if she couldn't say what she wanted? "Spit it out already!" "Your writing is horrible!" Twilight screamed. Rainbow Dash frowned. "...Oh..." Her voice cracked. Twilight hopped off the couch and galloped to her friend. "I'm sorry, I didn't—" "No, I get it." Rainbow Dash stared at the floor. "You're the princess of books. How could I make a book worthy of—" "Don't be like—" Twilight started to interrupt, but something caught her attention. "Princess of books? What?" "Discord came up with the name. It kinda stuck." Twilight blinked. She was blinking a lot, was something in her eyes? "Anyway, don't be like that: your book wasn't that bad." Rainbow Dash looked up and frowned. "You just said it was horrible." Twilight frowned and put a hoof to her mouth. "Well, you pushed me. Really it could just use a few improvements, and then it'll be great." "Really?" Rainbow Dash tilted her head. "You didn't make it sound like it could be saved." "Sorry." Twilight smiled sheepishly. "...okay..." Rainbow Dash squinted, then sighed. "So, what are these 'few improvements?" Twilight frowned. "Well, it's hard to explain, and if I just told you, you probably wouldn't understand any of it." Rainbow Dash deadpanned. "So how about we try making a story together?" Twilight grinned. "I'll ask questions that you should keep in mind later —to make sure your readers are better involved!" Rainbow Dash tried not to roll her eyes This was obviously going to take a while, but she didn't really have anything better to do, and she didn't want to disappoint her friend. "Sure. Sounds fun." Twilight smiled enthusiastically. "Great!" She clapped her hooves together. "You go first." "CHAPTER ONE!" Rainbow Dash stomped her hoof. Instead of a loud reverberating clash announcing the story, there was a soft *pomf*, because there was only cloud below her. She frowned, but really, it didn't matter: nothing could detract from the awesome that was about to come, because the awesome was infinite. And that gave her an idea… "Queen Forever held the villain against the wall by the throat ‘WHERE ARE THE KEYS!?' She screamed loud enough that the stallions ear-drums ruptured and gallons of blood shot out with enough pressure to annihilate his two associates. "The stallion laughed, 'I'll never tell you...' "'So you choose 'the hard way', huh?' The queen grinned. 'Good.' "Then she taps her head to the stallion, and all of his memories come flooding through. Of course, this is nothing to her. She finds what she wants in an instant! "'I know where the key is.' She smiles as she fires an energy ball at the stallion, finishing him off. 'But does anyone else think they can take me?' "A stallion shakes his head. 'No,' he says, 'But I think I may join you— "STOOOOOOOOOP!" Twilight held her head as she screamed. It took a while for her to notice she was now the only one making noise. Rainbow Dash stared back at her friend. Why was she all sweaty now? And was she paler than usual? "Just..." Twilight shook her hoof and looked at her friend with weary eyes. "Fuck." Rainbow Dash gasped with a wide smile. "I haven't heard you swear in... ever! Was it really that good?" Twilight glared back. She looked pretty serious. She was just staring like that, with that intense look... But then she sighed. Maybe she forgot something. "Rainbow Dash..." "Yes?" Rainbow Dash tilted her head. What was going on with her friend? Twilight must have remembered Cadence's breathing practice, because she was practicing it, and somewhat frantically too. "Rainbow… Well, first, you changed tense in the middle of the story.” “I what?” Rainbow Dash asked. Twilight shook her head. “Never mind. Who is Queen Forever?" "Oh!" Rainbow Dash smirked. "She's eternity; she's the guardian of the universe!" "Okay," Twilight said. "How did she get to be the guardian of the universe? What's her origin?" Rainbow Dash smiled wryly. What kind of question was that? "She was always the guardian of the universe. She doesn't have an origin. Queen forever?" Twilight face-hoofed. "Okay then, who are the villains? Where did they come from?" "Oh, they've always been there. They're always doing bad things, but Forever always stops them," Rainbow Dash said. "So," Twilight said. "Nothing ever changes?" Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to protest, but nothing came out. Twilight might have actually had a point there. After all, in all the Daring Do books there were always bad guys, but they weren't the same bad guys, and each side had chances that they took to gain and lose. Queen Forever... well, she had everything. She could do everything. And so there was no challenge... So maybe being able to do everything meant there was nothing left to do... Bah! Philosophical nonsense! Twilight must have infected her with her egg-headiness... It was like they said: Once you go egg, you'll be egg 'till you're dead. Just like syphilis. But when in Syphily... Rainbow Dash smirked. A game was always more fun when your opponent had a chance of winning, and Twilight's attack was surprisingly good. "Okay Twilight, I'll give you that one," Rainbow Dash said, still smirking. "But I think I've got something even better now." Twilight smiled warily. "Oh?" Rainbow Dash grinned even more competitively. "Today I'll tell you all about the rise of Silent Mouse, a deaf, blind, legless stallion orphan that nopony thought would amount to anything! But oh were they wrong..." She shook her head, still grinning. Twilight facehoofed. Author's Note I had a pony idea, so I had to relieve myself. I'm not sorry. I chose the song because baby noises. Did you know you can replace paragraphs in Microsoft Word by representing them as '^p'? It's great for getting the spacing right for FimFiction.
Silent Mouse: the mute, quadruplegic orphan that saved the world"Silent Mouse was rolling around in the field like he normally does. I mean there's not much else he can do, having no legs and all." "Oh Celestia. Rainbow Dash..." "Hey! No interrupting the story!" "Fine..." "Silent Mouse was rolling around in the field when suddenly he stopped. Everyday he would do this. He would suddenly stop playing, and contemplate his lack of potential, how he couldn't do anything... He was a sad pony. "But this day was different. This day, the bodacious Queen Muscles found her lump of a subject crying in a field of grass from his blind eyes, on an otherwise happy day. She bent down, and almost tore out her own muscles to give to the poor pony, but then she realized something. She realized that she would need her muscles to power the city. "So she went over her body parts. Her muscles and body were obviously too important. And she couldn't get anywhere except the ground without her wings. But her horn was utterly useless except for levitating a few things!" Twilight gaped. "Unicorn horns aren't useless!" "Well, you can't move around with them well." Rainbow Dash shrugged. After all, what was the use in something if it couldn't move things? "I can teleport!" Twilight almost yelled. Really? When did she teleport? If Rainbow Dash could teleport, she'd teleport all over the place. Heck, she wouldn't even have to get up to go to the bathroom! "You can? Then why don't you?" "I do it all the time!" Twilight fumed. Rainbow smirked. Yeah right. "No ya don't." "Anyway, after figuring out which body part she could lose without hurting her ponies, Queen Muscles popped off her horn—" "Popped?" Twilight cringed and held a hoof over her horn, as if it could come off at any moment. Rainbow Dash had to chuckle at the sight. "Yeah!" Rainbow moved her hoof to where a horn would be. "Like: *shplup*" She moved her tongue past her upper lip and pulled her hoof as if taking off her own make-believe horn. Twilight shuddered. "It's okay horn, nothing's gonna happen to you, I promise..." She pet her horn. What was it, a symbiote or something? "Aaanyway, are you gonna keep interrupting me?" Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. "Sorry." Twilight grinned sheepishly. Rainbow Dash shook her head, smiling. "Heh, it's like teaching you the history of the Wonderbolts all over again, you just can't sit still and listen." "Yeah— Hey!—" "So Queen Muscles took off her horn and ploped it onto Lumpy's—I mean, Silent Mouse's—head. "Suddenly SM could see! With his unicorn sense! And the first thing he saw? The bodacious bod of the now Pegasus Queen. And the first thing he thought? He was glad her look wasn't tarnished by that silly horn sticking out of his head. "And with a kiss to the forehead similar to one given in war, the bodacious Queen left her subject to discover his new gift. After all, she had to deal with the mile long dragons that regularly attacked the city. "And discover his gift he did. But along with it, due to his only sense being unicorn or something, he also discovered something else: he discovered evil, villainry within the city he thought was perfect. However, now that he could see it, he had to do something about it..." Rainbow Dash beamed. She could tell that everything that just came out of her mouth was totally radical. Even Twilight, Ponyville Queen of Books (she's married to the books) had to accept its awesomeness! "And thus begins the tale of the lump that saved the world!" But Twilight wasn't smiling. "Well," Twilight shrugged and raised her eyebrows. Maybe she wasn't able to comprehend it. "Besides being completely racist, it's actually a huge improvement. I'm kind of amazed." "Really?" Rainbow Dash smiled. After all, the queen of books was praising her story! ...But something was wrong: Twilight still wasn't smiling. "...But?" "Well, I don't want to be harsh. Like I said, that was a huge improvement, and I don't want to discourage—" Twilight rambled. Rainbow Dash frowned. "Just spit it out. I can fly through trees, I'm sure I'm tough enough for some criticism." Twilight sighed. Was she not getting enough air? Maybe Rainbow Dash should have moved them to the ground to help her friend breathe easier. "Okay." Twilight sighed again. "Your story was pretty good for a beginner—" "For a beginner!?" Rainbow Dash shouted. She was more than just a beginner! She had been reading books for at least a year now! Twilight tried to say something, probably to calm Rainbow Dash down some more, but apparently she couldn't think of anything. Then she opened her mouth again, "Yeah, a beginner. You know writing books is different than reading them, right?" Rainbow Dash tilted her head. It was? "Well, it is," Twilight said. "And the thing you're missing is description—" Rainbow was about to protest. She had described everything well enough. But Twilight held up a hoof. "Think of it like this:" Twilight continued, "If you were watching the story you told, could you really describe Queen Muscles, Silent Mouse, any of the other ponies or creatures, or any of the locations they were in? Could you draw a picture after hearing your story? And could you understand and feel the feelings of the characters that you're focusing on? Because if your readers can't describe what should be important to them, then your story isn't descriptive enough. "Your story did portray some of Silent Mouse's and Queen Muscle's thoughts and emotions, but only barely." Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to protest, but then she thought about what Twilight said. What did Queen Muscles' city look like? She supposed it looked like a lot Canterlot, but really, it would have to be much cooler. And what did the fields look like? Were they sunny? Or was the weather cloudy there to reflect Lumpy's mood? And what was it like, really, to be a lump with almost no senses? What was it like to consider removing an important part of yourself to give to somepony with less fortune? It was hard to fathom either of those... And she was feeling a bit cross too! Her story was pretty good! What!? Was she supposed to describe every blade of grass? "Oh?" Rainbow Dash leaned forward, challenge etched into her features. "Can you come up with a better story then?" Twilight smirked, "Gladly." Author's Note If Twilight's acting more confrontational than usual, it's the wings. She part pegasus now, so she acts more pegasus-y. And yes, that's probably racist.
SepiaTwilight paced randomly around Rainbow Dash's couch and looked about the room. It was like she was looking for something, but was too lazy to move more than a few feet. Yet she seemed too alert for laziness. No, the look she had on her face was much closer to a skilled soldier sharpening their sword before battle than the average couch potato. Suddenly, she braced her legs and leapt into the air, landing with catlike grace onto a very specific spot on the couch. The rightmost two of the three cushions—or, Twilight’s leftmost—shared her burden equally. She cleared her throat. Then she tilted her head and cleared her throat again. Something obviously wasn’t quite right, because she cleared her throat a few more times. And now she took notice of the couch, staring down at it. Maybe one cushion carried a little more of her weight than the other. So she crawled forwards a little, then backwards, then— Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow, bemused. “I thought we were talking about stories, but if you’ve chickened out to play charades… are you a cat?” she smirked. Twilight looked down and chuckled at herself a little. “Sorry.” She looked up, grinning slightly. “I just had to make sure I was in the perfect story-telling position.” There was an edge to her voice that told Rainbow Dash she wasn’t about to go easy. She smiled at the couch and patted it. “And here I am.” “Great.” Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Is your body finally ready for your perfect story?” Twilight grinned. “The question is: Is yours?” “Walked right into that one…” Rainbow Dash laughed to herself. “Chapter 1: the Abandoned Lair” Twilight spoke. It wasn’t quite the Canterlot voice—in fact, it was almost completely calm sounding—but her voice filled the room all the same. The Sepia pony absent mindedly picked up the wrench from a nearby surface and tapped it, needlessly adding to the symphony of rhythmic clicks and whirrs around him. The copper and golden shapes—touched with red—that spanned the massive chambers sang back as they moved through their given patterns in an incomprehensible dance, never sleeping, and only ever resting for a half a second. The Sepia pony felt small when he realized that he would never understand the blocks of metal regularly spaced around him. Even trying to would probably drive him as insane as the pony who built the place. So he was glad that wasn’t part of his job. No, instead, he trusted the finer details of the how to his good friend and partner, Silk P. Rose, or, as he liked to call him, Smarty Pants. The only thing Sepia needed—no, wanted—to understand, were the stains of red around him. Why did this incomprehensible machine look as if it were bruised and bleeding? “…So,” Sepia—for that was his name—began, “who beat up the clockwork?” Silk cracked a grin. “Very funny.” But he frowned as he looked off at the ‘bruised’ walls of the machine. “But I feel like I just laughed at a funeral.” Sepia frowned. He may not have known where all the red came from, but he wasn’t naïve. He knew a lot of ponies had to have died. He stared at the closest piece of metal. “But… How?” He asked. Silk looked around at different gears, doing that thing where he pieced things together in his mind, but it seemed like even he was at a loss. “More like what,” He said. “What could possibly be worth all this?” Sepia looked at his friend, worried, and he noticed a subtle squinting and hardening of his gaze. “Smartypants,” He warned. Silk looked over, glared, and shook his head. “I’m sorry, but I have to know.” He jumped atop one of the copper blocks and started scanning the room... Sepia jumped up and chased after him. “You know there’s never a good reason! Every time somepony askes a criminal why they did what they did, it’s always for a stupid reason. He was in the way! She didn’t pay up! He knew too much! She didn’t love him!” Silk looked back as he hopped across the labrynth, and Sepia could see the look on his face. There was a grimace, as if Silk regretted the blood around him; as if he were the reason it was there. “You’ve never created. A common criminal does things quickly for stupid reasons, but an engineer devotes his life for something. There has to be a reason behind this!” Sepia huffed as he chased after his friend. When did he get so lithe? “Then why don’t you ask him when we catch him. I’m sure you can wait a few days.” Silk hesitated for an instant before jumping again. “Because he’s dead!” ‘What?’ The question rang through Sepia’s mind. Steel was dead? Why was Silk informed before he was? He shook his head. He couldn’t let surprise cost him time. “When did this happen?” He asked. But Silk ignored the question as he dove behind one of the countless blocks. Strange, it was as if he knew exactly where he was going. Sepia dove and landed behind Silk on the ground. He was about to drag his partner back outside, slap him straight, and ask what in the world got into him, but something stopped him. Silk was crying. The always-smiling, happy-go-lucky genius Silk ‘Smartypants’ Rose was crying as he connected various wires together. It was just wrong. It was like seeing adamantium break. “I’m sorry.” Silk paused his work to wipe the tears out of his eyes. “I just have to know—“he connected one last pair of wires with alligator clips”—why would my brother do this?” With all the wires connected, he flipped a switch, indiscernible from the rest of the machinery. Sepia’s eyes widened and his pupils shrank. “What?” The machine whirred, and all went white Rainbow Dash gaped at Twilight. That couldn’t be the end of the story! “What? No! What happened to them?” She said. Twilight smiled. “Don’t worry, there’s more.” Her stomach grumbled and she smiled sheepishly. “But I think we should take a break first.” Rainbow Dash’s own stomach growled in response, as if it were communicating with Twilight's. She smiled wryly. “Okay Twilight, I guess you can take a break if you need to.” Rainbow Dash flew over to her kitchen, opened her cloud fridge, and pulled out the meal of heroes. “Leftovers!” She cried triumphantly. Twilight smiled and shook her head as she followed Dash into the kitchen. Rainbow Dash flew over and tossed the heroes’ meals into the microwave, entered the secret combination (3, 0, 0, start), and watched as lightning bolts cooked them to perfection. She tossed one meal to Twilight, who caught it in her magic as she hopped up to the cloud table. She threw her own meal to her own spot, opposite of Twilight. Twilight popped the lid off her soup container and sniffed. “Mushroom,” she identified it before taking a large sip. “So,” Rainbow Dash said, right before she stuck a straw into her soup to drink the excess fluids, “You think you can continue the story now?” Twilight smiled. Both of them knew she had already won, but it wasn’t about winning anymore. “Right.” Rainbow Dash smiled knowingly. It was never really about winning. As long as the game wasn't rigged, she preferred good competition to just beating everypony. Why else would she compete with Applejack so much when there was a good chance she would lose? “I said,” Silk repeated, “I have to know why my brother would do this.” He stared right at his long-time friend with wet-eyes. But his friend was looking past him. Sepia stared at the shiny, clean copper and gold walls and blocks of machinery. There wasn’t a drop of blood anywhere. “Well, I guess this was meaningless too.” Silk frowned. “Wipe your eyes, Smartypants.” Sepia said. And Silk did. When he could see again, he looked around in awe and disbelief. But the most amazing thing was right in front of him. “Steel?” He asked. “Steel!?” He repeated giddily. “What?” Apparantly Silk was wrong: Steel wasn’t dead. Sepia turned around and jumped on the pony not too far behind him, pinning him to the ground with a hoof to the neck. “WHAT DID YOU DO TO THEM?” He screamed. Steel stared back at him in shock, too scared to move. “WHERE DID THE BLOOD COME FROM?” He screamed again. Steel just stared back at him, now both scared and confused. “What?” “Why?” Sepia leaned in and was now muzzle to muzzle with Steel. “Why did you kill all those people?” He glared. Steel tried to crawl out from under Sepia, but the stallion was too strong. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!” “Liar!” Sepia stomped right next to Steel’s head. “Do you think I’m an idiot?” Suddenly, Sepia was pulled back, and he felt himself put into a headlock. “He’s telling the truth!” He heard Silk behind him. “Are you kidding me?” Sepia growled. He just saw this place filled with blood. Silk must have been more distraught than he thought if he believed his brother was innocent. “I just saw—“ “I know what you saw,” Silk said, “but it isn’t real.” He sighed. “Not anymore.” Sepia frowned. He knew exactly what Silk was talking about, but it was just too preposterous to believe. And apparently Silk knew that. “Steel,” he called, “how’s Silver doing?” Steel instantly went from pushing his back against a machine in fear and confusion to smiling dumbly. “Oh, she’s great!” Sepia’s body went slack. That was impossible! Silver died weeks ago! He remembered Steel at the scene with that hard gaze. Any mention of her after that would have him screaming and throwing things. Steel looked back and forth between his brother who was smiling and crying for some reason, and Sepia, who was staring at him in awe. “What?” Silk dropped his partner and wiped his eyes. “I think we should go for a walk,” he said, “we’ve got a lot to talk about, and I don’t know if I want to meet my double.” Twilight drank the last drop of her soup. “So, how was that?” Rainbow Dash stood on all fours with all limbs outward and breathed in. “That—“She grinned as she took a more nonchalant stance. “—was pretty good.” She tilted her head, “But I feel like I still don’t know what’s going on. I know they went back in time but…” “Yeah.” Twilight shrugged. “I’d say that was more like the first half of the first chapter.” Twilight stared at her utensils for a few seconds before yawning. “But I’m a bit tired after eating all that soup.” Rainbow Dash perked up. “Oh! You’ve gotta try sleeping on a cloud!”
SleepoverAfter following Rainbow Dash through a dizzying amount of hallways (Why did she need a house that large?), Twilight found herself staring at a modest, but comfortable looking guest bedroom. All the clouds were tinted red, but it was a bright red that looked inviting rather than foreboding. Across the sixty square meter room was a glass window with a beautiful view of Ponyville. And just below that window was a nightstand, which was next to a very comfortable looking purple cloud bed. There were other furnishings and stuff placed neatly around, like a walk-in closet, a chest of drawers, and a desk with games on it... but none of those compared to the bed by the window. "Well..." Rainbow Dash nudged Twilight from behind. "Go ahead, try it!" Twilight didn't need any further encouragement. Sleeping on a cloud bed was one of the many things she wanted to try when she got her wings. It was like a whole 'nother world up in the sky, and there was just something whimsical about falling asleep in another world. So when Rainbow Dash nudged her, she bounced forward and then leapt into the air, dive-bombing the bed. *pomf* Several puffs of cloud rose up from where Twilight landed. Rainbow Dash smiled. "Well, have fun." She turned and closed the brown cloud door behind her. Rainbow Dash shook her head as she walked uphill through the winding hallways to her bedroom. "Have fun? Who has fun in a bedroom?" Her ears started to turn red at the implications, but thankfully she remembered the games she put there. "Okay so it's not that awkward." She said, relieved. Finally at the entrance to her room, she pushed open the massive double doors and walked casually into her enormous hundred and fifty square meter room, a room that was filled to the brim with Wonderbolts paraphernalia. There were even a few Spitfire plushies, which Rainbow would have to remember to put away in case Spitfire actually came to her house. (It wasn't so much that she had an unhealthy interest in the Wonderbolts as much as she couldn't pass up the hilarity of having Wonderbolts plushies. At least, that's what she told herself. Celestia help her if Pinke ever made it to her room...) She hopped up on her bed and tucked herself in, but not before picking up Tank off her nightstand and cuddling him. She normally found comfort in the loyal turtle, but now it just stared up at her, as if expecting more. "What do you expect? I've never written a book before. How do you expect me to compete with the goddess of books?" Rainbow Dash looked down and tilted her head at the turtle. 'Neither did Twilight.' She could practically hear his nasal yet wise voice buzzing through her head. 'And even Daring Do only recorded what she saw. Also, I'm a tortoise, not a turtle.' Rainbow Dash almost complained about the point on Twilight. Of course she had written books before. Heck, she'd probably gone back in time and written all the books so she could complete the legendary book continuum, a fundamental part of the universe only known to the masters of books. But that part about Daring Do... "Y'know Tank," Rainbow Dash said, "I think you might be on to something..." She grinned. If all Daring Do did was record what she saw, then she would just have to do the same. And what was more awesome than the dreams of the self-proclaimed inventor of awesome herself? Nothing, that's what. So it was simple, she would just record her dreams. "I just have to sleep." She grinned competitively as she tried to fall asleep, cuddling Tank against her. But you can't fall asleep while forcing anticipation. "Right." She yawned, giggling at her mistake. "Sleep..." Author's Note Rainbow Dash's room is larger than many peoples' houses. To imagine it, think of a large classroom or small stage area. Twilight's room is decent hotel size.
