Under The Blue Sky

Alfred pushed the door open to reveal his new home. It was very basic, barely featuring any furniture or decorations, but Alfred didn't mind. He didn't see an empty and old house, he saw an opportunity. He dropped his bags and started to observe his surroundings. The house split into three as he entered. There was a staircase in the middle that was sandwiched between two doors. The one on the right led to the main room, which Alfred thought about using as a normal lounge, and the one on the left led to a small kitchen and dining room. The house also had three rooms upstairs as well as an attic. One was a master bedroom that featured a small balcony. The balcony had a very cinematic view of the hill that was so special to them. The balcony was the real part that sealed the deal for both of them. There was also a small room upstairs, which would be the bathroom, but there was one room that really puzzled Alfred. The last room upstairs was relatively big, and Alfred had no idea what he was going to do with it. He was just about to move upstairs to investigate when he heard someone enter the house behind him.

"Oh, hey! How's it going?" It was Rainbow Dash of course. She was also carrying her belongings in a few cases.

"Good. Everything's fine. Let me get that for you," Alfred said moving towards her and taking the cases from her hands so she could actually get inside.

"Thank you, I didn't expect to move in so soon."

"Well, what can you do?"

"I don't know. Let's look around the place, you know, get a feel for what kind of style we want," Rainbow Dash said as she began to walk through the door on the right. Alfred soon caught up with her and they both started to look around the empty room. They weren't looking for anything in particular, but just a basic idea of what it was going to look like. "I ...don't know, what do you think?"

"You know what, I haven't got a clue."

"Are you serious? I thought you would have some pretty slick ideas."

"I guess not...... Hey, maybe we shouldn't worry about this now, we'll get it sorted out. If we really need help I suppose we should go see Rarity."

"Oh right! That's great, Rarity will know exactly how to glamour this place up. Good call. Hopefully it won't bother her too much."

"Are you kidding? I'd bet she'd love to do it."

"I'm still not sure, do you think you could convince her?"

"I probably could, I'm full of surprises." Rainbow started to laugh as she made her way out of the room and upstairs.

"You're right about that!" Rainbow shouted as she hurried up the stairs. Alfred just walked out of the first room and stood at the base of the stairs, looking up at Rainbow. He began to smile to himself and chased her upstairs. He found her on the small balcony so he crept up to her side and leant over the edge, gazing at the hill in the distance. The sun was setting over it beautifully, casting a bright orange light above their heads. Rainbow stood there, amazed at the incredible view. She then looked to Alfred who was doing the same and he began to speak.

"Isn't this just perfect?"

"I'd love nothing more than to stare at this for hours."

"Really? Nothing more?"

"Hehe......well I could think of a couple of things that I'd love more."

"Soon, babe. First we need to get this place fixed up."

"Fair enough, it'll be good, to finally live together."

"Everything's gonna be fine. I'm sure that...," Alfred slowly turned to Rainbow who hadn't stopped staring at him. Their eyes met and Alfred suddenly lost his train of thought. He was too mesmerised by Rainbow, standing there with the sunset gleaming over her. It was like a dream that he had suddenly fallen into. As time slowed down, a small thought popped into Alfred's mind. It only started as a small thought, but the more he looked at her, the more it grew, and soon it was all he could think about. He was so obsessed over this one idea that he had slipped out of reality.

Rainbow stood there waiting for him to finish until she realised what kind of state he was in. He often would slip into a short period of deep thinking. He would just stare blankly at an object or in a direction and forget everything around him. Rainbow figured that it was something from his past that caused this but she wasn't so sure. He could easily snap out of it when someone got his attention, so Rainbow tried to speak.

"Uh, what were you saying, Alfred?" Alfred started to blink repeatedly and remembered where he was.

"Sorry, I was doing it again, wasn't I?"

"Yeah, a little bit."

"I'm sorry, I do that way too much. I don't know why, I just do."

"Don't worry about it, Alfie. Everyone's got that one little thing about them. I actually like it, I think it makes you more interesting."

"Oh really?"

"That, and it kinda tells if you're actually paying attention," Rainbow said smirking. Alfred just simply sighed.

"Yeah sure. You said everything has that one little thing about them. Your's must be that you're so goddamn cute." Rainbow started to chuckle.

"Oh shut up! You're making me blush."

"Isn't that what I'm supposed to do?"

"Well, no, maybe, sometimes."

"There you go," Alfred said, returning a smile towards Rainbow Dash. "C'mon. Let's find Rarity and get this thing started, since we can't do it by ourselves."

"Alright." Rainbow said, after taking one last look over the balcony to the peaceful hill.

It took a few days to set everything up. Rarity felt honoured to help Rainbow and Alfred settle into their new home. Alfred was also happy that they were on good terms with each other. She really did a wonderful job decorating the place. The walls were a bright blue colour, which reminded Alfred immediately of Rainbow's soft fur and the blue sky. Each room was filled with various furniture that looked perfect. Both Rainbow and Alfred were extremely pleased with the final result. Alfred was especially impressed by an old rocking chair that was placed on the balcony. Rarity had remembered from one of his stories that he used to cradle Luke while sitting on a rocking chair, so she decided to include it and an additional one on the balcony for Rainbow Dash. Rainbow and Alfred finally unpacked all their belongings, which took a while. As Alfred was bringing multiple things up to his room, he noticed his red backpack. He picked it up and thought about placing it up in the attic. He figured that he wouldn't need it, especially since it contained such horrific memories. Alfred took one last look at his precious backpack before he put in in the attic to be forgotten.

After all was said and done, Alfred and Rainbow found themselves laying in the same bed together on a warm night. They weren't doing anything, they were just laying there with each other. Alfred suddenly sat up and put his back onto the side of the bed. Rainbow looked up at him, a little nervous.

"What's up?"

"Oh, nothing, I was just thinking about something."

"Oh yeah, what's that," Rainbow said, beginning to sit up beside him. Alfred suddenly noticed that she was interested, so he tried to change the subject.

"It doesn't matter, forget I said anything. What do you think of the house?"

"I love it. I think we ought to thank Rarity again tomorrow for doing such a great job."

"Yeah, it's pretty cool."

"Pretty cool?"

"Alright, it's pretty awesome."

"That's more like it," Rainbow said giving Alfred a small kiss on the cheek. He began to blush a bit, feeling relaxed now that he was alone with Rainbow again.

"What do you wanna do tomorrow?"

"Well, I don't know if you've heard, but there's gonna be a small tryout session tomorrow."

"Tryouts? What for?"

"Oh they want a small flying team to represent Ponyville. I don't think it's as big as the Equestria games, but apparently it's all the rage. Everyone's gonna be there."

"Wow, I'm still surprised that you even need to go to the tryouts. I mean, you'd think they'd know to sign you up immediately."

"Everyone has to tryout, it's not fair if I was just put on the team."

"Yeah, but it's you," Alfred said sweetly, making Rainbow Dash shake her head while laughing. Alfred started to laugh too.

"Yeah, alright, enough with this. I guess I should hit the hay. Goodnight."

"Goodnight," Alfred said as he turned off the lights and began to lay down. He was just about to drift off when that thought crossed his mind again. Rainbow had already somehow managed to fall asleep by his side. Alfred rolled himself over so he was staring up to the ceiling. He couldn't sleep now, not after recalling that idea. He stared up at the ceiling for a couple of minutes, and then down to Rainbow who was laying beside him. She looked so peaceful while she was sleeping. Alfred couldn't help but play with her mane while he thought things over.

He truly loved Rainbow Dash. He wanted to spend every single second with her. Rainbow had taken away all the pain from his life and replaced it with love and kindness. There was nothing that could separate the two, and Alfred wanted to make it official. He laid there, watching her sleep comfortably being with him. A smile was brought to his face as he thought about marrying Rainbow.

How would he do it? When would he do it? How would he propose to her? All of these questions started to fill up his mind, but he didn't have an answer for any of them. He wanted to marry her, but he wasn't sure how. Back home, marriage was represented by a ring, but since Rainbow didn't have any fingers, he figured that wouldn't work. He thought about the idea of buying a necklace or something like that. That could work, he could easily go and buy one. It was settled, he would go into a store within the following week and purchase a necklace for Rainbow.

Now he needed to figure out the perfect time to propose. He was really stumped by this. He had no idea where or when he would do it, until he remembered what Rainbow had said. The tryouts, of course, she would succeed in the tryouts and make it to the big games. Hopefully she would win, and on that night, or at that moment, he would propose. It was perfect. Rainbow would have the best day of her life.

Alfred, being extremely pleased with his little plan, gave Rainbow a small kiss before falling asleep.