Rainbow Dash swept up the last bit of dust and breathed a sigh of relief. Despite her superior stamina, agility, and overall physical conditioning, cleaning up not only a fairgrounds but also the Wonderbolt’s barracks took it out of a pony.
The worst part was definitely the cotton candy. She didn’t know how the poor pony had made so much, but she had found him buried under a pile of the stuff. It was just lucky she had gotten him to the Canterlot General Hospital, or Pinkie Pie might have been charged with Negligent Homicide.
Again.
As she stowed the broom and dustpan away in a closet, Rainbow Dash sensed that she wasn’t alone in the barracks. She turned, and saw Spitfire leaning against one bed in her classic resting pose.
“Nice work, Rainbow Crash,” the Captain of the Wonderbolts said. “Good to know that you can clean up all the things you knock over.”
Dash grinned and flew over to Spitfire. Together, the two ponies trotted out of the barracks. “Hey, if you’re going to make a mess, go big or fly home is what I say.”
Spitfire laughed, and Dash laughed with her. It felt good to finally stop worrying about her stupid nickname – Dash actually thought she enjoyed it now that she knew everyone else had their own story of messing up.
“Well, at least no pony got hurt,” Spitfire said, “which is the main reason you’re not in that much trouble. If you had hit another pony, well, let’s just say not even your ability would have saved you from some serious punishment.”
Rainbow Dash shuddered at the thought. “I’m just glad I learned that it’s fine not standing out,” she commented. “If I hadn’t learned that, well, I’d hate to think of somepony getting hurt because I messed up.”
“That’s the kind of thinking I like in a Wonderbolt.” Spitfire slung one hoof around Dash’s shoulders and Rainbow Dash tried not to freak out. Play it cool, play it cool. “But you gotta admit, hitting that trashcan was a pretty embarrassing display. I think you set another academy record for being the fastest goof-up as a new Wonderbolt. Heck, you even beat my time!”
“Well, what can I say?” Rainbow Dash scratched her head as a thought struck her. “I just never knew that the Wonderbolts had trashcans this high up. I always thought you guys chucked everything over the edge like everypony else. I guess that’s Wonderbolt rule number fifty three or something, huh?”
Spitfire halted mid-step and looked at Rainbow Dash. “Wait a second. You’re right. We don’t have trashcans up this high.”
Rainbow Dash stared at Spitfire. Now that they were outside, she could see that Spitfire was right. There were no trashcans in sight, and now that she remembered, the barracks hadn’t had any trashcans either. She’d just dumped the dust off the side of the island without thinking about it. But…
“You don’t have trashcans?”
“No, why would we?” Spitfire frowned. “I mean, on the ground trashcans are useful since we can use trash-carts to empty them every week, but how would you do that in the air? Flying garbage-carts? I don’t think so.”
Now Rainbow Dash was really confused. She pointed to the runway and said, “but I hit a trashcan when I was dodging those two Wonderbolts. Where did it come from and,” her eyes widened in surprise, “where did it go?”
Spitfire looked around. The trashcan that had caused Rainbow Dash so much humiliation was in fact, missing from the Wonderbolt’s training grounds. Her eyes narrowed, and without a word, Spitfire shot into the air.
Rainbow Dash flew after her as Spitfire did a quick search of the entire island. When she landed, the Wonderbolt’s Captain was wearing a familiar scowl on her face.
“You’re right, the trashcan is gone,” Spitfire said to Rainbow Dash. “And don’t remember seeing it after you ran into it, either.”
“Is that a bad thing?” Rainbow Dash scratched her head. “I mean, it was embarrassing, and smelly, sure, but what’s wrong with a missing trashcan?”
“What’s wrong is that it shouldn’t have been there in the first place.” Spitfire began pacing back and forth in front of Rainbow Dash. “You were right – we haven’t used trashcans in Cloudsdale ever. We just toss the stuff to the ground and have a team pick it up every night. You’re on that duty as well, by the way. But even if that were the case, why would a trashcan suddenly appear – right next to the Wonderbolts runway where it could make fliers taking off and landing crash into it and break a wing – and why is it gone, right after it coincidentally happened to get in your way? I smell a rat.”
“I didn’t see any of them when I was clearing out the barracks,” Rainbow Dash said, “but do you mean some pony was pranking me?”
“It sure looks like it,” Spitfire said grimly. “I’m not against pranks in the Wonderbolts in general, but that’s going too far. You were a rookie, so you’re easy game, but a trashcan could seriously hurt someone if they hit it at speed. Have you ever seen what a few pounds of metal does to a pony going over a hundred miles an hour?”
Rainbow Dash winced. “So uh, what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to keep my ears open, and look into the matter,” Spitfire said. “Privately.” She clapped Rainbow Dash on the shoulder, causing the younger pegasus to stagger. “Good eyes, rookie. Don’t worry about the culprit. I’m sure it was just an overzealous prankster, and I’ll give them a few weeks of sweeping out the barracks when I catch them. Still, all’s well that ends well, right?”
“Yeah.” Rainbow Dash looked at the empty patch of ground where the trashcan had been. Her eyes narrowed slowly. “Right.”
Trashcans. Rainbow Dash hadn’t even payed much attention to them before. What was the point? You tossed your garbage wherever, and if Tank didn’t eat it, somepony else would pick it up. Maybe they yelled at you for a while, but hey, at least you weren’t the one who had to deal with it.
But now Rainbow Dash thought of it, really thought of it, she realized that trashcans had played a pretty important role in her life. Twice now, they’d embarrassed her in front of ponies she’d really wanted to impress. And both times, they’d turned up right at the exact moment when they were needed, then they’d disappeared just as fast.
It was as Spitfire had said. You don’t use trashcans in the clouds. They’re too heavy, and they’re a danger to fliers. Moreover, why had a trashcan been right next to a runway and right smack-dab in the middle of flight training camp? Wouldn’t it make more sense to put them by a building instead?
No, the more Rainbow Dash thought about it, the more sinister the trashcans seemed to become. Both times she’d landed in them, they’d been filled to the brim with disgusting slop as well. Like, unnaturally full. With her keen memory, Rainbow Dash remembered rolling through several moldy apples, rotten pears, and even bits of half-eaten mushrooms. And a lot of brown stuff. The same as when she’d been in Flight School. In fact, even the smell was hauntingly familiar.
Rainbow Dash didn’t know a lot about trash, but she wondered why in a trashcan where everypony tossed everything, how it had miraculously not contained anything sharp or dangerous. And also, for that matter, what the brown stuff had been. Dirt? Why would you put dirt in a trashcan? And if it wasn’t dirt, there was only one thing it could be, and Rainbow Dash didn’t want to even think about that. She thought about some of the brown stuff she’d swallowed by accident, and her stomach rolled.
But now was not the time to throw up. Rainbow Dash flew through the sky, searching for the location which would help her out. Spitfire had assured her she’d look into the prank, but Rainbow Dash wanted to know who’d played that prank on her, and she wanted to know now.
So how did you find a prankster? Well, the logical conclusion was to find out where the trashcan had come from. Rainbow Dash had investigated—well, she had asked Twilight to look it up—and there was only one place in Equestria that dealt with trash and trashcans.
The company in charge of trash management for all of Equestria was based in Manehatten. On the outskirts of the city. On the far outskirts of the city, in fact. It was so far outside of the city that Rainbow Dash wondered how bad the place smelled.
Her answer hit her in the nose as Dash flew closer to the massive grey building. She gagged, fell out of the air, and barely managed to pull out of a nosedive in time. Dash landed on the ground, coughing and gagging. The smell was…beyond heinous. She had no words for how terrible it smelled, but she imagined that if an Ursa Major ate ten thousand hayburgers, had massive diarrhea, and then puked all over the resulting mess, it would still smell ten times better than the smell invading her poor nose right now.
Dash briefly debated turning back, but she’d come too far now to stop. And besides, she really wanted to know who’d played that prank on her. It might not solve her earlier childhood trauma, but at least she could get a bit of revenge on prankster who’d given her that nickname.
As she trotted towards the featureless building, Rainbow Dash pondered who it could have been. Obviously, only a Wonderbolt would have known where Rainbow Dash would have been. It could be Spitfire, but Rainbow Dash doubted the Captain would have done something like that.
Was it Soarin? She wasn’t about to jump to conclusions. But if it was Soarin, she was going to kick his rear end all the way to Canterlot.
Rainbow Dash reached the building and looked around. The doors were closed, and she couldn’t see anypony in sight. Odd. It wasn’t too late in the evening, so she would have assumed the place would have been packed with working ponies collecting trash and…doing whatever they did to trash. Burn it? Bury it in the ground? Eat it? Whatever the case, no pony was doing it.
“Hello?” Rainbow Dash was reluctant to open her mouth and inhale any more of the foul scent, but no pony was coming to help her. “Is…any one here? Hello?”
No response. Rainbow Dash looked around, but there were no windows leading into the building, and no ways in apart from the one, solitary door. That was weird. Didn’t trash stink more when it was inside a confined space? Maybe it was so closed off so the smell wouldn’t escape? Rainbow Dash didn’t know, but the hairs all over her body were beginning to stick up.
Cautiously, Dash tried the door and found it was unlocked. The door opened with a loud creak that totally didn’t seem scary, and Rainbow Dash found herself looking into a very dark hallway. She gulped.
She could always turn back. No pony was watching her, so she could go away, and never come back. But no matter how creepy this abandoned building seemed, Rainbow Dash felt like she was at the precipice of learning something big. The stupid idea of the missing trashcan didn’t seem so stupid now, and if this company had records of any kind, they could help her pinpoint where the trashcan had come from, and maybe who had taken it.
All she had to do was walk through a dark hallway. Easy, right? Rainbow Dash stepped through the door and flinched as the total darkness enveloped her. Okay. Not so easy.
It took her eyes a few minutes to adjust, in which time Rainbow Dash had to try hard to avoid ruining her new Wonderbolts flight suit. But after a while, Rainbow Dash could make out the faint outlines of the hallway, and in the distance…
Light?
Rainbow Dash began to walk down the long, dark hallway. She glanced from side to side, but the faint light from the door behind her didn’t illuminate much. But what she could see only made Dash more and more confused.
This hallway was long, straight, and narrow, just wide enough for two ponies to walk next to each other. But what it didn’t have were such details Rainbow usually expected of hallways, like intersections, picture frames, weird potted plants or doors. The entire length of the hallways was unilluminated and unbroken, and that only made Rainbow Dash more and more uneasy.
She finally reached the end of the hallway and saw the light again. It was coming from underneath a door at the end of the corridor. Rainbow Dash walked quickly over to it, hyperventilating a tiny bit. Okay, now or never.
As her hoof touched the doorknob, the door at the entrance of the hallway suddenly slammed shut. Rainbow Dash jerked in alarm as she was plunged into near-complete blackness. Suddenly afraid, she fumbled at the door and found the doorknob after a few panicked moments. She yanked the door open and ran inside.
And stopped dead in her tracks.
The room was plain and empty, save for a single table and two chairs. A naked lightbulb was the only source of illumination. Rainbow Dash had seen lightbulbs before, but usually in streetlamps and never this…exposed. The light it cast was harsh and bright upon Dash’s dark-adjusted eyes. But that wasn’t the only feature of the room. No, Dash’s attention was immediately drawn to the being, or rather, pony that sat in the chair facing her. It was hard to make out the pony’s face or Cutie Mark as it sat in the shadows.
Warily, ready for any sudden movements, Rainbow Dash stepped forwards. She peered at the pony, but it was still in the shadows, unmoving. Another step and Rainbow Dash could barely make out the pony’s mane. Just as she realized the pony was female and not male, the pony moved forwards and into the light.
Rainbow Dash froze as the pony’s face came into view. No. It couldn’t be. It couldn’t be. But it was.
“Hello Rainbow Dash.” Starlight Glimmer said, calmly resting her hooves on top of the table. “Have a seat. Let’s talk.”
Rainbow Dash stared. Rainbow Dash gaped. If her mouth could have opened more, it might have been possible to fit her entire Wonderbolts flight jacket into it.
Starlight Glimmer at the plain wood table, calmly watching Rainbow Dash. “Sit down, Rainbow,” was all she said.
The door behind Rainbow Dash swung shut with a click, making the pegasus jump. She half-turned, and saw the door was closed. But locked?
“Rainbow.” Starlight’s voice made Rainbow turn. The unicorn gestured to the other chair. “Sit. You’ve come all this way, so you might as well find out what this all about, right?”
Rainbow Dash stared at Starlight, and then took the chair. She checked to make sure it wasn’t booby-trapped or anything first. With exploding firecrackers or fart pillows or…she wasn’t sure why she was checking the chair when she was in a dark room in a mysterious building, but she checked anyways.
“That’s better,” Starlight said when Rainbow finally sat. “Now, let’s talk. I assume you’ve come all this way with questions. Maybe I can shed light on a few answers.”
Starlight sat back in her chair and placed her hooves together. Rainbow Dash stared at her for five whole seconds before she finally burst out with, “what the hay is going on here!?”
Starlight raised one eyebrow. “Good, speech. For a moment there I thought the famous Rainbow Dash had run out of things to say.”
“Oh, you want me to say something?” Rainbow Dash’s confusion and fear were suddenly ignited into anger. “What the heck are you doing here, Starlight? Is this come kind of trick? Or are you going evil again? How the heck did you know I would be here, and why is there an abandoned building in the middle of Equestria? This place is supposed to deal with trash, but there’s just a long, dark corridor and a weird unicorn in here! What’s going on?”
Starlight calmly wiped a bit of Dash’s spit off her face. “Sit back down, Rainbow Dash.”
Rainbow Dash held her ground. “If you think I’m going to—”
“Sit.” Starlight’s eyes flashed.
Rainbow Dash sat.
“Better.” Starlight nodded in satisfaction. “I understand you’re confused, so I’ll try and be as straightforward and honest as possible. Too bad it’s not my strong suit, but we’ll do the best we can. Now, you came here for a purpose. What was it?”
Rainbow Dash blinked. “I uh, I came here because I was wondering who put the trashcan in my way,” she said, feeling foolish. “It was um—”
“Right when you were about to show off to the other Wonderbolts?” Starlight finished the sentence. “Yes. And when you ran into it, you not only embarrassed yourself in front of all the Wonderbolts, but they started calling you Rainbow Crash, didn’t they?”
Rainbow Dash stared, mouth open. “H-how do you know that? You weren’t there, were you? And—and I know you weren’t even there when I told the others about going to fly with the Wonderbolts, so how—?”
“Oh, but I was there.” Starlight smiled briefly. “I was there right when you crashed into the trashcan. I was there when the others laughed at you and gave you that nickname. And to answer another question I know you must have, yes. I was also there when you crashed into the trash can…for the first time.”
Rainbow Dash stared. Rainbow Dash gaped. And Rainbow Dash would have leapt at Starlight Glimmer if the unicorn weren’t holding her in place with magic.
“Sorry about that,” Starlight said as Rainbow Dash’s eyes rolled in her magical prison. “I know you’re upset, but I wanted to explain things before you went off the hook. Give me a chance to talk, and then you can start screaming, alright?”
Rainbow Dash’s eyes rolled angrily. Starlight smiled. “Good. Glad we’re on the same page.”
She got up from her chair and began walking around Rainbow Dash as the pegasus sat, helpless. A notepad appeared with a slight pop of displaced air and Starlight read from it.
“Flight camp. Rainbow Dash’s first interaction with other ponies in a large group. Her first chance to learn how to fly properly, too. But right as she makes her big introduction, she hits an unusually strong gust of wind. That propels her up until she hits a solidified cloud, bounces off a few more clouds, and lands in a trashcan full of disgusting – not to mention smelly – trash. I’m sure you remember.”
Starlight stopped pacing and eyed Rainbow Dash. “Then, far more recently, Wonderbolts training camp. A similar setup, but this time Rainbow Dash dodges two Wonderbolts coming in to land. She trips, hits another trashcan and ends up ridiculed. Again. In both cases, she earns the nickname ‘Rainbow Crash’, which damages her ego and makes it harder for her to shine in front of her fellow ponies. All according to plan.”
Rainbow Dash twitched. That was all she could do, held in place by the magic. Starlight nodded once.
“Exactly. It was my doing, or should I say, ours. I wasn’t alone back there, although I coordinated the effort. In fact, it took no less than six ponies to set up the initial event. Two ponies to change the air currents at the right time, a pony to maneuver the clouds into place, another two ponies to place the trashcan in the right position, and me, providing the time travelling capability to make it all happen. The second time was easier – we just need to put the trashcan in place and let you do the rest. But we made it happen. My organization.”
Starlight gestured with her horn and Rainbow Dash felt the magic surrounding her ease, but not completely dissipate. She could move her head and mouth, but no other parts of her body.
“Your thoughts?” Starlight inquired.
It took Rainbow Dash a moment to make her mouth work. When it did, she spat at Starlight Glimmer.
“You—you jerks!” Rainbow Dash shook with rage. “Do you know how much teasing I had to go through back at flight camp? Do you know how much that nickname scarred me, how no pony would ever let me live it down? I had nightmares about crashing every week until I was sixteen! How dare you? How could you? Do you have any idea how much pain you’ve caused me?”
“Yes, actually.” Future Starlight looked down at her notepad. “We calculated the shock of running into a trash can at around 14 Freudums, with a possible plus/minus of 2 points depending on how hard the others laughed. That fell well within our acceptable range of your calculated mental limit.”
“What? What are you talking about?” Rainbow Dash struggled to move. “You planned for me to be laughed at? Why? Is this some kind of evil plan of yours?”
“Evil plan? Oh, please.” Starlight shook her head and laughed softly. “You have no idea. Honestly Rainbow Dash, why would that be my evil plan? If I wanted to be evil, I’d have gone back in time and blasted Celestia when she was just a filly rather than mess with you.”
Rainbow Dash blinked. “Then why—”
“Why do something so mean? Well, why do you think?” Starlight teleported the notepad away and took her seat facing Rainbow Dash again. The pegasus found she was suddenly able to move once more. “You tell me.”
For a millisecond Rainbow Dash considered knocking her chair over and punching Starlight Glimmer in the face, but she refrained from doing so. Not least because Starlight’s raised eyebrow made Rainbow Dash pretty sure what would happen if she tried, and also because this conversation wasn’t going any direction Rainbow Dash had anticipated.
“I—this is so strange.”
“Take your time,” Starlight said calmly. “I know it’s disorienting. It always is, the first time. Focus.”
“So…so you’re saying you and other ponies put a trashcan in my way as a filly and when I joined the Wonderbolts to humiliate me. To mess with me?”
“Correct. And incorrect,” Starlight said. “We certainly wanted to humiliate you, but not out of any hatred for you. It was simply necessary.”
“Why?”
“Well, what would have happened if we hadn’t?” Starlight inquired mildly. “Think about it.”
“Think about what?” Rainbow Dash snapped, getting angry again. “If you hadn’t messed up my life, I would have been the coolest pony in flight camp ever! And I’d have been the best rookie Wonderbolt! They’ve have loved me! I would never have gotten in so many fights as a filly, and—”
Rainbow Dash stopped.
“—And you never would have stuck up for Gilda when she joined flight camp,” Starlight finished. “Neither would you have protected Fluttershy, and in the doing so, learned how to perform a Sonic Rainboom. Instead, you would have been one of the bullies, berating the two for not being a good enough flier rather than helping them and learning valuable lessons about being a friend.”
Rainbow Dash’s mouth open and shut. “Then, when you did the same to me at the Wonderbolts…”
“We helped you learn that working together is better than showing off.” Starlight nodded. “And that humility is better than arrogance. Another important lesson, and without it, you wouldn’t be, or rather, become the cautious flier we need you to be in the future.”
Rainbow Dash sat back in her chair and nearly fell over. Her mind was reeling, but all she could think to say was, “but why? Why do that? Are you from…the future? Is me not learning those lessons really that bad?”
Starlight’s smile faded. “Let’s just say I’m from a future. A future I’d greatly like to avoid happening twice. And yes, those two lessons were very important for you. Would the world change greatly if you didn’t learn them? Well, think about it. What would have happened if you and Fluttershy never made friends, or you never learned the Sonic Rainboom?”
Rainbow Dash thought. Twilight had told her how the timeline had messed up each time she hadn’t performed it when Twilight had been going through the time loops. Every time Rainbow Dash had failed or been distracted, Equestria had suffered some kind of major disaster. And the pony that had been preventing her from performing the Rainbooms was—
Dash looked up. Starlight nodded. “A little bit of indiscretion from my past self,” she said. “I’d apologize to Twilight if I could, but the past me is making amends, and it was another necessary event. It’s just lucky I was such an idiot back then, or we’d have had to intervene to prevent me from destroying the time stream.”
“So you’re time keepers?” Rainbow Dash didn’t know whether she wanted to laugh or cry. “You guys control time? You go back and forwards and make everything happen? Just like that?”
“Make everything happen?” Starlight snorted. “No. We’re not gods. No, not even close. We’re not here to dictate every small event. We let things happen, we just prevent the really bad things from happening.”
“Like what?” Rainbow Dash challenged Starlight. “We’ve had some bad things happen, and I didn’t see you guys then. We’ve fought off a changeling invasion, defeated Sombra and Tirek—”
“Please.” Starlight rolled her eyes. “I’m not talking about second-stringers and posers with a few spells. I’m talking about the death of nations and the destruction of all life – or worse. You though Chrysalis was bad in your time? You never saw what she might become if left to be truly evil. Believe me, putting a bunch of ponies in a cocoon is nothing compared to laying eggs in their brains and eating fillies for breakfast.”
Rainbow Dash gulped. “She does that?”
“Not in this timeline, thank Twilight.” Starlight shook her head. “But in other times, when we haven’t intervened or somepony does something that changes things? Sombra’s a lot more dangerous when he starts bringing back the dead, and as for Tirek, be glad he never learned what pony flesh tastes like.”
Rainbow Dash’s stomach roiled, but she tried to keep a straight face. “Okay,” she said, “okay. I get it. You guys make the bad events go away by making us learn lessons. So me not learning to be humble as a Wonderbolt…”
“…Is bad thing,” Starlight said. “Yes.”
Rainbow Dash waited, but Starlight didn’t seem inclined to comment. “Mind telling me what goes wrong?”
“You don’t want to know.” Starlight said, and then sighed. “And saying that means you’ll want to know even more. Fine. But I warn you, you really don’t want to hear it.”
“Tell me,” Rainbow Dash challenged her. “I can take it.”
Starlight hesitated, but then seemed to make up her mind. “Your first flight goes well. Too well, as without any distractions you really do master the flight performance the Wonderbolts perform in one day. You’re confident – overconfident – and that leads to a disaster at the performance. Scootaloo is so impressed by your performance that she tries to do her own stunts afterwards. She tries to do a quadruple back-flip off that hill and makes a mistake. You’re so caught up in congratulating yourself that you don’t notice in time, and the other Wonderbolts are too slow. She doesn’t make it, and you blame yourself until the day you die.”
Rainbow Dash sat in her chair, stunned. Starlight’s voice continued speaking, piercing her soul.
“Haunted by her death, you quit the Wonderbolts that day, despite it being ruled as an accident. You leave Ponyville, abandon your friends…and that’s all I need to say about it. Without the Element of Loyalty, the others cannot overcome the obstacles that face them, and Equestria is lost.”
Starlight finished speaking and looked at Dash’s face with sympathy. “I’m sorry. I did warn you.”
Rainbow had to fight to speak normally. “And that’s…what happens every time you don’t intervene?”
“Not always.” Starlight shrugged. “But in all honesty? Yes. Small events can lead to big events if left unchecked, but we also manufacture misfortune sometimes, if a pony needs to learn a lesson or take a certain course of action. What do you think? Are you mad that’s what we do?”
She had to ponder that question for a long moment, but at last Rainbow Dash looked up and said, “what, are you crazy? If that’s the future that happens if I don’t get called Rainbow Crash, I’d be happy if I had to roll in a thousand trashcans! It’s fine if that happens to me – I can take it.” Starlight nodded in satisfaction, and Rainbow added, “but it was still pretty cruel to do that to a filly, you know. Wasn’t there some nicer way to teach me back then?”
You think you’ve had it bad?” Starlight shook her head slowly. “Believe me, you got off lightly. Just think about your other friends and all the bad experiences they had. Transformative events, the lot of them but it wasn’t fun, was it? We gave you a 14 to 16 Freudum traumatic event, not even close to the worst we’ve done.”
“Freudum?” Rainbow Dash wrinkled her nose. “What’s that?”
“Our unit of measurement for how painful, humiliating, and potentially scarring something is,” Starlight explained. “As I said, we evaluate each pony to see how much they can take before it starts to alter their personality. You can take almost twice as much humiliation if you have to – and you will – so consider yourself lucky so far. To make Pinkie calm down even a bit we had to put her in a rock farm for her early life. That’s at least 60 Freudums of repressed trauma right there, but she bounced out of it with a smile and a giggle.”
“Wow.” Rainbow Dash stared at Starlight. “Does it…does it hurt to do stuff like that?”
Starlight flinched a bit. “Slightly. But it has to be done. And it’s not easy, either. Do you know how hard it is to repress Twilight’s magic when she’s doing her best during her magic exams? Or Fluttershy – it is not fun trying to train butterflies to catch a filly falling at over eighty miles per hour and not let her splat into the ground. And let’s not even get started on finding enough diamond to cram them into a boulder.”
“And you’re doing this by yourself? No, wait. You said you had others.” Rainbow Dash looked around the empty room. “You’re part of an…organization? Where are they?”
“Somewhere else. Not geographically, but chronologically.” Starlight shook her head. “They’re all on assignment, but believe me, we keep Equestria safe, and we have to fight battles on scales you can’t even fathom to do so. Every time a villain gets ahold of time travel magic, or a portal opens up into another world…it’s a fight Rainbow Dash, and one we’ve got to win or everypony dies.”
“Then why tell me?” Rainbow Dash stood up from her chair and paced around the room. “Is it because you need me? Is this some sort of recruitment? Am I going to be a special agent or something?”
“No, no, and no. Sit back down.” Starlight waited until Rainbow Dash was seated again. “…Well actually, that first part is a yes. We do need you, but not to work for us like I do.”
“But why?” Rainbow Dash asked. “We’re both the same age – okay, you’re a bit older than I am but—”
Starlight laughed again. “You really need to start thinking outside the box, Rainbow Dash. I may look like Starlight from your time, but that’s only because all our agents drink immortality potions whenever we get recruited. In truth, I make Celestia look like a filly. No, you’re brave, but you need to fulfill your role in your timeline. Believe me; you’ll have plenty to do. We just need you to do something special for us while you go about your daily life.”
“What?” Rainbow Dash said excitedly. “I’m ready, what is it?”
“Watch this, and you’ll understand.” Starlight moved slightly, and suddenly the entire wall behind her lit up. Rainbow Dash was nearly blinded by a flash of light, and then a familiar face appeared.
“Hello Rainbow Dash.” An older Rainbow Dash looked at the seated Rainbow Dash without smiling or blinking. Her face was the same, but there were scars above her left eye, and her wings…
“Pay attention!” Future Rainbow snapped at herself and Rainbow Dash sat straight in her chair. “I’m only going to tell you this once…”
…
Rainbow Dash jerked upright in her seat and Starlight caught her. “Easy, easy,” the unicorn said.
“Huh? Who, what, where—” Rainbow looked around frantically. “I-I was staring at myself, and I was saying stuff, and then—”
“Memory spell,” Starlight explained. “You’ll know what to do when the time comes. But until then you won’t remember. I’ll drop you off back at Ponyville and cast another spell, and it’ll be like nothing ever happened.”
“That’s it?” Rainbow Dash stared at Starlight incredulously. “After all this, after everything I’ve learned – you’re just going to wipe me and put me back?”
“Afraid so.” Starlight patted Rainbow on the shoulders. “It’ll all make sense someday, but for now, I’m sorry. Just know that what you’re doing is essential.”
Starlight stood up and motioned Rainbow to her hooves. Together, the two ponies began walking down the dark corridor, only this time, Starlight’s horn illuminated their way. As they walked, Rainbow noticed the dark walls weren’t really plain stone as she’d thought. The light shone into them and…through them?
Rainbow Dash could see darkness past the wall, but interspersed in the darkness were more corridors, and sometimes in them she could see ponies walking to and fro, and in the distance, a large series of rooms, filled with strange machinery and ponies walking backwards, sidewards, interwards and…Rainbow had to look away.
“I still don’t know anything,” she complained to Starlight. “Come on, you can tell me a bit more, can’t you? If you’re going to mind-wipe me, what’s the problem?”
“It’s not an exact science,” Starlight said. “It’s not science at all, in point of fact. That would be far easier. No, you’ll remember bits and pieces, so it’s important to keep some secrets secret.”
Rainbow Dash sighed, and Starlight relented. “ I guess I can tell you a few things. What do you want to know?”
“Well…what are you guys called?”
“We have many names, but we call ourselves the Watchers. We’re sort of like your Wonderbolts, I guess.”
“Do you have a motto?” Rainbow Dash said excitedly. “Ours is Altius volantis!”
“Ours is Stercus accidit,” Starlight said mildly. “We live by it.”
They were coming to the end of the hallway. Rainbow Dash searched for something else to ask.
“Who’s your leader? Is it Twilight? Or Princess Celestia?”
“It’s Derpy.”
“Derpy!?”
“Don’t underestimate Dr. Hooves’ inventions, or the power of muffins.”
“And…and…there’s just so much I want to ask!” Rainbow Dash grabbed Starlight’s hooves. “Oh come on, please don’t mind wipe me!”
“Sorry, it’s for the best.” Starlight ineffectually tried to shake Rainbow Dash off. “Look, we can’t have you remember everything. You’d be way too insufferable if you remembered stuff like you and Daring Doo hooking up those times—aw ponyfeathers.”
“What!?”
And then the light flashed and Rainbow Dash forgot. She woke up an hour later, outside of Ponyville and severely disoriented. As she stumbled, Rainbow Dash’s hoof caught a loose stone and she tripped – right into a waiting trashcan full of smelling garbage.
“Aw, no!” Rainbow Dash said in disgust, pulling a moldy banana peel off of her head. “Who keeps putting these things here, anyways?”
