“We’ll miss her. I don’t think I can say any more or any less for such a remarkable mare. Rainbow Dash touched a million lives in her brief time in the sun. We will never find a way to replace her in our hearts.”
Twilight paused, gazing out upon the crowd of ponies. There must have been a thousand of them, most were pegasi but a few enchanted earth ponies and unicorns dotted the clouds. Her friends were front and center. Applejack, wringing her faded hat and trying not to cry. Fluttershy, sobbing, clutching Rarity like she was the last rock in the ocean. Pinkie, her eyes dead.
“The world will remember her for her crowning achievements. The Rainboom; the air speed record; saving the world time and time again as an Element Bearer. We’ll remember her as a friend.”
Scootaloo, resplendent in the Wonderbolt blue, hung limp between Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle, like a puppet with her strings cut. Twilight sighed, before continuing.
“We don’t get to spend enough time with our friends. Rainbow Dash was always on the move, always working towards the next goal, and it’s to my great regret that this took her away from us far too often. Still, whenever we needed her, Rainbow Dash would be there. I don’t think I will ever stop expecting her to be stood at my shoulder.”
Twilight gazed over at the casket. Closed, of course. Rainbow Dash had gone out in a blaze of glory, just as everypony had expected. She'd always said she’d be proud to die for the Wonderbolts’ blue.
“We’ll miss you,” Twilight echoed. “Goodbye, Rainbow Dash.”
Twilight wasn’t sure why she volunteered to clear out Rainbow Dash’s house. There was a certain logic to it she supposed. Besides Fluttershy she was the only one with wings, and Fluttershy was a wreck after the funeral. Filing always calmed her down, anyway, and somepony had to go through Dash’s things.
The cloud door opened with a tired squeak, revealing the grand hall. Dash had filled it to the brim with trophies, blue ribbons and newspaper articles. Not to mention her own promotional posters. It brought a smile to Twilight’s face, she could always trust Rainbow’s ego to dominate all else. Picking her way through the shrine to speed she passed Dash’s record plaques. Speed; endurance; youngest Wonderbolt Captain. Twilight smiled as she spotted the empty place where Dash’s ‘Oldest Active Wonderbolt’ award was missing. Rainbow had never been keen to admit she’d broken that particular record.
Shaking her head, Twilight made her way up towards the tiny cubbyhole Rainbow Dash called her office. Waiting for her were bills still to pay, long lost friends to notify and Equestrian Revenue to scream at. She found it strange the mundane detritus a pony had to deal with when one of their friends died. Still, somepony had to, and Dash had no family beyond an on and off sisterhood with Scootaloo.
Rainbow Dash’s office was just as she remembered. A desk, a couple of filing cabinets spilling their contents out onto the floor below, a huge calendar of events and a wall full of photos. Twilight’s face lit up upon seeing the image in pride of place. It was the recreation photo, twenty five years on from the first she’d ever sent to Celestia, but in exactly the same pose. Oh sure, it had taken nearly a month to gather them all together. Not to mention Spike was five times bigger, Pinkie was round in the middle and not from sweets and you’d could see the grey in Dash’s hair. It still brought little spark of joy when she saw it. It was remarkable how much it hurt that Twilight was the only pony who still looked like she was in her twenties, though.
There’d never be another photo. It wouldn’t be the same without Rainbow.
She sighed, sitting on the cushion before the desk and began to pick her way through the scattered papers. Reading Dash’s hoofwriting was an acquired skill but at least most of it was from other ponies. The top layer of papers were a near random assortment of scrolls, letters and forms. An expense report from shortly after Nightmare Moon’s return blended into fan letters and pages ninety-one through a hundred and sixteen of Dash’s memoirs. The third, long aborted draft if Twilight remembered correctly.
An opened letter on Wonderbolts’ stationary caught Twilight’s eye. She stifled a giggle as she skimmed through the chiding letter from the base psychologist for dodging her monthly screening. The huge calendar revealed more than a few ‘headshrinker’ appointments. Twilight sighed, smiling to herself, it was strange how Rainbow’s stubbornness was now a fond memory.
Twilight dug deeper, her magic reaching into the strata of misfiled paperwork with surgical precision. Stunt folios and official Wonderbolts communicates sorted themselves into a neat piles. Fan Mail and personal correspondence dropped into another. Bills and other such legal grist fell into one huge stack for her to pore through for anything important. Twilight almost laughed at the bitter irony as she came across Rainbow Dash’s receipt from her solicitor for a new will. It was less than a week old. And Twilight thought Pinkie Pie was the prophetic one.
At last the desk was bare, save for a few tattered scraps of paper. Twilight frowned. After decades after she’d resigned as a librarian, she couldn’t stand to see any piece of paper defaced. In a burst of magenta light, the slip reassembled itself.
Dear Captain Rainbow Dash,
I’m sorry to say but the board must insist. While we respect your skills above all else, your performance of late has not been to the standard that the Wonderbolts requires in our Lead Flyer. Rest assured that the Wonderbolts Academy will welcome you as our new Lead Trainer. However, at the beginning of the month you will be off the active service list.
There will be no further arguments.
Yours Sincerely,
Golden Dawn,
Chairman of the Board,
Wonderbolts
A terrible creeping suspicion welled up in Twilight’s belly. She hadn’t known Rainbow Dash was retiring. The mare hadn’t mentioned it once in their monthly meet up. With a flash Twilight teleported in front of the rest of the Wonderbolts files and her magic scattered the whole mass into the air. Pages and files flashed before her eyes as she scanned through with frantic haste. It was a stupid theory. A disservice to the bravest and most loyal pony she’d ever known. A pony who’d always said she would be proud to die in Wonderbolt blue.
Twilight had to check. It took just moments to find the folio containing Rainbow’s final stunt and she ripped the plans free, laying them out of the desk.
The daredevil dives. The dizzying rolls. The impossible turn which had claimed Rainbow’s life were all there in dispassionate white on blue. There was nothing beyond that fatal turn, nor a clue to how she would have survived to fly another day.
Twilight’s breath caught in her throat as she stared, horrified, at the page.
Rainbow Dash’s stunt had gone just as planned.
