The Last Thing on Her Mind

(A/N: Another short chapter, I am going to be away visiting a friend for my birthday the next week. I promise the next few will be longer and I will get into the romance stuff soon. I am just setting the scene right now.)

When the late morning sunlight woke Twilight the next morning it felt as though Pinkie had been setting her party cannon off inside her skull. Twilight quickly used magic to close the curtains in her room and pulled her pillow over her head for good measure. She was dreading having to move again, but she was amazed she wasn’t repeating Dash’s performance of bucket worship from last night. She peeked out from below her pillow and saw the cyan pony fast asleep on the spare bed in her room. Rainbow looked so peaceful when she slept; Twilight smiled and tried not to move too much. Last night after Dash had gotten sick Twilight had helped her up to her spare bed to sleep off the rest of the booze. The party wound down not too much later, Rain went to stay with Fluttershy, Applejack had to work in the morning and Rarity ‘needed her beauty sleep’ as she put it. Pinkie stayed and helped Twilight and Spike clean and finish off the party punch. It was rather late when the pink pony finally wobbled out the door and made her way back to Sugar Cube Corner.

Twilight had almost fallen back asleep when her nostrils caught the smell of food being cooked. She slowly managed to lift her head up and saw that Spike was not in his basket, she guessed that he was behind the smell. Twilight got out of bed very carefully, trying not to wake Rainbow and so not to agitate her hangover too much, and made her way down to the kitchen.

“Good morning Twilight,” Spike said in a rather loud voice. He was messing with her; his dragon metabolism meant the alcohol in his system was processed faster than in hers.

“Just give me some damn pancakes,” Twilight growled, her hangover flaring up. “Or I swear to Celestia you will regret it.”

Spike laughed and set a plate in front of her, this was their normal routine after one of Pinkie’s parties. Twilight heartily dug into the warm food and felt slightly better. Spike and Twilight were going over the days schedule when a very off balance Rainbow Dash wandered into the kitchen.

“Note to everypony, never challenge Pinkie Pie in a drinking game.” A slightly hoarse Dash smiled.

“How are you feeling this morning?” Twilight asked as she used her magic to slide over a chair for her friend.

“Not so hot,” Dash said as she massaged her magenta eyes. “Mind if I stay here until I feel slightly better, I should be out of your mane by tonight.”

“Of course,” Twilight smiled at her friend. “Rain said she’s drop by sometime today to check on you, she’s staying with Fluttershy right now.”

“Here you go Rainbow,” Spike set a plate stacked with pancakes in front of the cyan pony who readily dug in.

Spike finally sat down with a stack of pancakes of his own and opened their copy of the Ponyville Times.

“That was fast,” Spike chuckled. “They already have an article on Rain Twirl. The cutie mark crusaders must’ve been hard at work last night.”

“Really, I thought they gave up newspaper reporting?” Twilight leaned over to look at the article over Spike’s shoulder.
“Nah,” Spike showed the article to Twilight. “They just don’t use pen names anymore. It says here she’s worked on some of the biggest video games of the past few years; apparently she’s a pretty big name in the industry. She just finished working on Equestrian Effect 3.”

“Never heard of it,” Twilight shrugged.

Rainbow Dash and Spike just gaped at Twilight.

“You’ve never played Equestrian Effect?” Rainbow Dash just gaped at Twilight.

“Should I?” Twilight looked confused. “What is it about anyways?”

Rainbow Dash jumped up from the table, all trace of her hangover gone.

“It’s so much easier to show you, I’ll be right back.” The cyan pony zoomed out the window.

Twilight had never seen Rainbow act that way, but she had never brought up the topic of video games. It wasn’t more than ten minutes later when Rainbow Dash zoomed back in, Twilight had just finished up helping Spike with the dishes. Rainbow carried a rather heavy saddlebag, she quickly unpacked what Twilight guessed was a Ponybox 360 and plugged it into a TV that Twilight almost never used. Rainbow beckoned Twilight over. Twilight sighed and walked over, the things she’d do for that pony.

“This’ll be great,” Dash laughed. “I get to teach the egghead something new, prepare to be wowed.”

Twilight watched as Dash navigated the menus creating her character; it looked quite like her minus the rainbow mane since the game didn’t support it. It was a good ten minutes before she actually started the game.

“Well,” an unknown voice said from the TV. “What about Shepard? She was born on Euqestria; her family was part of the royal Canterlot army. Her parents were killed during the griffin war when she was just a child.”

“She’s grown into a great soldier,” a second unknown voice replied. “She’s learned to look after herself.”

“She saw her whole unit die on Akuze,” a third unknown voice added. “She has to have some serious emotional scars.”

“She’s a survivor,” the second unknown voice said.

“Is that the kind of pony we want to protect the galaxy?” The first voice retorted.

“That’s the only kind of pony that can,” the first voice trailed off.

The camera pulled back to show Dash’s character looking out a window onto a planet below. At that point there was a knock on the door.

“I better get that,” Twilight sighed.

She opened the door to Rain Twirl and Fluttershy, both looking better than Twilight felt. The hangover still plagued her; the food had only dulled it slightly.

“Good morning,” Rain said rather cheerily.

“Morning,” Twilight said as cordially as she could. “Come in, I am pretty sure there is still breakfast if you would like any.”

Twilight moved aside for the two ponies.

“Thanks,” Rain smiled. “How’s Dash doing?”

“See for yourself,” Twilight said accompanied by the loud sound of gunshots from the TV.

Rain walked over to Rainbow Dash as Twilight greeted Fluttershy.

“Ah Equestrian Effect,” Rain smiled. “I never worked on this game; I was finishing up work on Mares of War at the time.”

“I was showing Twilight,” Rainbow paused the game and turned to Rain Twirl. “She had never heard of the game before. She keeps to books mostly.”

“There is nothing wrong with that,” Rain chuckled. “Books can take you some places that we can’t take you with games just yet.”

“It never hurt a pony to branch out,” Rainbow Dash smiled at Twilight who was deep in conversation with Fluttershy.

Twilight and Fluttershy walked over to join the other two ponies.

“Oh yea,” Rain said as the other two ponies joined them. “We ran into your friend Rarity on our way over here, she wanted us to collect you and come by her shop. She said she has some new dresses that she wants us all to try on.”

“Not again,” Rainbow Dash moaned. “We’ll be there all day.”

“How bad can it be, really?” Rain Twirl laughed.