Even with all the planning that went into the weather around Ponyville, Dash couldn't remember a sweeter winter afternoon. The air just plain caressed her, cold and slick across her pinions, the sky crisp and blue, the hills of Sweet Apple Acres as she flew over them white and thick with last night's snowfall.
But better than that?
Landing in the shoveled-out space around Applejack's back door, Dash pricked her ears to AJ's unmistakable voice from inside. Twilight said something in reply, and then their laughter was mixing with Pinkie's full guffaw, Fluttershy's whispery titter, and Rarity's crystalline giggle.
Better than anything was the way she had the rest of the day off to spend with her friends.
Hooves on the knob, Dash gave one last flap and propelled herself into the perfect warmth of the farmhouse's kitchen, the cinnamon sweetness of apple pies in the oven flooding over her. "And that—" Dash breathed it in, blew it back out, and pushed the door closed with a little backwards kick. "—is what I'm talking about!"
"Well, now." AJ was standing by the sink, steam and bubbles rising from whatever she was washing. "Reckon that's the closest you've ever come to showing up in time to help out 'round here, Rainbow." Giving that low chuckle of hers, she shook her head. "Dunno if you're losing your touch or getting better at it."
"Hey!" Dash started.
But Pinkie cut her off: "Dashie's helping just as much as the rest of us!" She was hopping in place beside AJ, and she turned a big grin in Dash's direction. "'Cause Applejack wouldn't let any of us do anything! I can't even think of the last time I just sat and watched a pie getting made!" A shiver rippled over her like somepony had dropped a rock into a pink pond. "It was, like, triple grade-A weirdness!"
"Indeed." Rarity's horn glowed, its wavering light the same purple color as her sweater, and the cider mug on the table in front of her rose to let her take a sip. "It was quite the experience even for those of us who aren't especially connoisseurs of the weird."
Next to Rarity with her mug also floating at her lips, Twilight gave a coughing sort of laugh, and Dash almost leaped across the room to rescue any cider that might go spraying. Fortunately, Twilight managed to swallow her mouthful before she choked out, "Connoisseurs of the weird?"
At the end of the table, Fluttershy set down her mug, her eyes curling into little crescents. "That's something I'd say Pinkie Pie knows more about than all the rest of us combined."
"You bet!" Pinkie more flickered than moved, suddenly not across the room anymore but wrapping a hug around Dash's neck. "Just like Dashie here knows all the bestest ways to fly and run and jump and stuff, I know all the bestest ways to make ponies' mouths hang open and their eyes go buggy!" She leaped into the air and froze for a second or two, her legs sticking straight out, her mane puffing up like cotton candy, her face one big gasp. "Like that!" she said, dropping to the floor again. "It's really good for your cardiovascular system, too!"
Dash nodded, but most of her attention was focused sharp as a lightning strike on her three seated friends. 'Cause not even the drop-dead gorgeous aroma of baking pies could mask the heavenly scent of cider. "You know it, Pinkie," she said. The barest twitch of her wings wafted her to the one unclaimed mug on the table, and placing both her front hooves around it, she let all the Appleness around her carry her away. "But is there anything Applejack doesn't know how to do?"
In the sudden silence, Dash felt her ears fold at how dorky the words sounded; as quick as she could, she added, "Seriously!" so everypony'd know she wasn't being serious.
"Hold up, now." The suspicion dripping from AJ's voice got Dash's ears folding even further. "And just what in tarnation d'you mean by that?"
"Nothing!" Dash hated it when her stupid mouth didn't check with her before it started talking!
"Nothing?" Rarity repeated. "My dear Rainbow, I must beg to differ!" The smile that pulled at her muzzle was quirky and impish and not something Dash ever liked seeing there. "Why, I can't recall the last time I heard you wax so rhapsodically on a subject that didn't involve yourself!"
"Now, Rarity." Fluttershy looked earnest, but then Fluttershy pretty much always looked earnest. "I'm sure Dashie was just making polite conversation."
"Excuse me?" Twilight's wings ruffled, her smile almost as pointy as Rarity's. "Did you just use the word 'polite' in a sentence about Rainbow Dash?"
"Hey!" Dash narrowed her eyes. "I can be just as polite as the next pony!"
Pinkie giggled. "Maybe if the next pony's me."
And while it was bad enough that they were all staring at her like she'd had a horn come popping out of her forehead, the worst part was the awful lack of sloshing from the mug she'd picked up. Closing one eye, she peered into the thing, and, well, all the empty mugs she'd seen before, she couldn't think of a single one that'd ever been as empty as this one right here right now was. A quick look around showed her no jug of cider on the table, either, and no mugs other than those her friends were already using.
"Okay." Dash set the mug down and decided to glare at Pinkie since she was closest. "You wanna do polite? Then let's do polite!" She waved a hoof at the oven. "'Cause, yeah, Pinkie, you're the queen of baking, but AJ's, like, the princess, y'know?" Bringing the hoof back, she thumped it against her own chest. "And sure, I'm totally the Iron Pony Champion of all Champions, but who's always right there behind me? Applejack!"
"Behind?" AJ's voice was all thick like she was carrying something, and when Dash turned to look, she couldn't stop her wings from perking at the sight of the new and unopened cider jug AJ had clenched in her teeth. Moving to sit at the end of the table opposite Fluttershy, AJ set the jug down with a thump. "Might be I'm gonna hafta reconsider who gets summa this here cider and who don't."
Despite the warmth filling the kitchen, AJ's words struck a chill straight as an icicle into Dash's chest. "You wouldn't."
AJ gave her that way-too-familiar one-eyebrow-raised look and leaned forward so her crossed front legs rested on top of the jug.
"Fine!" Dash aimed her glare at AJ. "Maybe sometimes we're so close that from a couple angles, it might look like you're out front." She poked the table sharply enough to rattle the jug and all the mugs. "But only sometimes!"
"Hooray!" Pinkie pulled pompoms out of her mane. "Go, Dashie, go!"
"Fair enough." AJ motioned with her hoof, and Dash couldn't push her mug across the table fast enough. The pop when AJ's teeth wrenched out the cork made Dash want to start her own cheerleader dance, but she didn't want to move, either, didn't want to risk missing any of the sights and sounds and smells of the cider pouring into her mug. "Reckon that'll getcha 'bout a third of a fill-up." AJ raised the jug and tipped in barely a splash of cider.
"What?" Leaping into a hover, Dash waved her front legs. "I'm paying you a compliment over here!"
"Well?" AJ's drawl got as thick as the pie scent in the air. "Go on paying it, and we'll see how much more cider it gets you."
Her mouth hanging open, Dash couldn't make a sound. But she heard Fluttershy sigh and say, "Applejack..."
The wide-eyed innocence on AJ's face would've given a kitten a run for its money. "I'm just trying to be helpful, ain't I? I mean, how many chances does RD have to practice being polite?"
Planting her hooves on the floor again, Dash tightened her glare into a scowl. "That's blackmail!"
Twilight cleared her throat. "Actually, Rainbow, it's more like extortion."
AJ shrugged. "Half of one, six dozen of the other." She nodded toward the sink. "Grab my mug, will you, Pinkie? And bring one on over for yourself."
"Cider, cider, cider!" Pinkie chanted in a sing-song voice, and Dash couldn't look away as Pinkie trotted two mugs over and set them in front of Applejack.
"Much obliged." With the jug perfectly balanced in her front hooves, AJ tipped it over each of the other two mugs in turn, the golden elixir tumbling forth in all its splendor to gurgle and churn right up to the metal rim.
But the third mug didn't get one more drop. "No..." Dash managed to squeak.
"You're the one started this, sugar cube." AJ set the jug back on the table, folded her forehooves over the top of it again, rested her chin on them, and batted her eyelashes. "So tell me more about li'l ol' wunnerful me."
Wood clattered against wood to Dash's right, and she glanced over to see Fluttershy pushing her mug toward her, that normally smooth as butter face wearing something that might almost have been a frown. "Here, Rainbow Dash. You can have the rest of mine."
And as much as most of her wanted to jump at it, gather it to her chest, and drain it of its precious fluid, one tinier part, squirming in her head and buzzy as a mosquito, wouldn't let her. "Thanks, Shy." Slowly and carefully, she pushed the mug back toward Fluttershy and turned to face Applejack once more. "But if AJ wants to play, then we're gonna play."
"Go, Dashie, go!" Pinkie chanted again, her pompoms appearing once more.
"Now, girls." Rarity looked like a cat who'd stepped in something wet. "This isn't going to get rough-and-tumble, is it? This is one of my favorite sweaters, I'll have you know."
"No worries." Dash bent her neck to one side, then to the other just so it would crack in that way she knew Rarity didn't like. "One hundred percent dignified: that's us, right, AJ?"
"If'n you say so." The slow smile that spread over AJ's muzzle was one Dash had seen many a time during their various contests. "I'll be awarding points based on originality and sincerity." She pursed her lips, then, lowered her head, and took a noisy sip from her mug.
Which was when Dash decided that dignity was way over-rated. "Ev'rypony knows that Twilight's the big brain around here," she blurted out. "But the way you've been running this farm with hardly any help for all these years? That takes smarts!" She looked at Twilight and almost begged her: "Right?"
"Absolutely." Twilight thumped her mug against the table. "Applejack's business acumen is unquestionable!"
AJ blinked. "Huh. That's a good one, Dash: thank you." Tipping the jug again, she filled the mug to about the halfway mark before looking up through her eyebrows. "And?"
"And Rarity?" Dash waved a hoof at her, smirking and sipping her cider. "Sure, she winks and gets guys to pull her carriage or give her discounts at the market, but what's-his-name? That writer she had a total crush on? One look of you, and wham!" She smacked the table. "'Rarity who?' he's saying!"
Rarity's smirk vanished. "Rainbow Dash!"
"Well?" Torn this time between wanting to smack her mouth and give it a high-hoof, Dash somehow managed to keep from grinning. "That's what happened, isn't it?"
Various parts of Rarity's face twitched, but after a couple seconds, her eyes pulled closed and she blew out a breath. "Yes, that's what happened." Her eyes came open again, and her mouth went sideways. "Quite the fascinating creature, our Applejack, isn't she?"
"Reckon so." AJ's grin looked a little ragged around the edges. "Good thing that fella turned out to be such a jerk, ain't it, Rares?"
"Yes, yes." Rarity tossed her mane. "I've long since banished him from my thoughts, and I recommend we all to the same."
Pinkie pressed her hooves against the sides of her head and scrunched her face up. "And...there he goes!" She sat up and looked around the room. "Who were we talking about again?"
But the trickle of cider drew Dash's attention back to the mug. Her whole body quivering, she watched the level rising steadily toward the rim—
Until AJ tilted the jug back upright. "To be fair," she said, "we's forgetting somepony here, ain't we?" And she looked pointedly at the other end of the table.
Dash snapped her own gaze around to see Fluttershy blushing. "Oh, that's okay," she said with a little shrug. "Rainbow doesn't have to if she doesn't want to...."
For half a heartbeat, Dash considered slamming her own face into the table, but she didn't want to risk spilling the cider. So instead, she shouted, "Fluttershy may be good with animals, but all the cows and sheep and pigs you keep around here, you've gotta be nearly as good!"
"There now!" AJ filled the mug to the brim and slid it toward her. "Wasn't so hard, was it?"
With a pounce, Dash grabbed the thing, swigged it back, and let the sweet, crisp liquid wash over her tongue; puffing her cheeks, she filled her mouth near to bursting, closed her eyes, and concentrated her whole being on the flavor, the liquidity, the aroma. And when she finally let herself swallow, she did it slowly, the cool trickle of it smoothing down her neck, through her chest, and into her middle like nothing else ever did.
"Oh, yeah," she murmured with a sigh. "Totally worth it."
