After the storm

Rainbow Dash squirmed in her bed.

She had been so stupid. What was she thinking, flying through storm clouds like that? The storm she had built herself, of course she had to play around with it.

Everypony, including her, had seen it coming. Still, Rainbow didn't care and executed trick after trick inside the cloud. Before too long, the storm turned against her.

The lightning had hit her in the spine, right where her wings started. Rainbow Dash had crashed so often that she was almost as good at crashing nicely as she was at flying.

What she hadn't calculated that she was used to landing on soft clouds, or wettened grass at best. That time, she had been over Ponyville.

The crowd below her had moaned in shock, but nopony could have done anything to break her fall. The only pony to blame was herself, Rainbow knew it.

Recovering from a lightning strike wouldn't be too hard. Rainbow had done more to her wings than anypony she knew. They ought to fall off of her at this rate, they said.

It was the landing that damned her. The rock covered road refused to give way for her to break the fall.

There was a terrible crunching noise, and even if Rainbow Dash could have opened her eyes, she wouldn't have. She knew what was wrong with the foreleg she had stretched out in desperation.

The mind numbing pain coming from it, the weird angle it stood out in during her transport to the clinic. At least her right one was still good, so she still had her main duty foreleg.

For what she could do when tied to a bed, of course.

"When are those painkillers gonna kick in? I can't stand this!" Rainbow quietly said to herself. There was nopony in the room with her, so there was no reason not to speak out her thoughts.

That was only her second day there, counting the one when she got hurt. It was not really a day as much as her staying awake into the night because the pain prevented her from sleeping.

Fortunately for Rainbow Dash, the pills kicked in minutes later, relieving her of staring into the dark ceiling, thinking about her life.

She was woken up by a purple unicorn with a blue mane. There was little more her sleepy eyes could make out, but Rainbow Dash figured it'd be a nurse checking her status.

"Good morning. How are you?" The nurse asked.

"Nnngh. How late is it?"

"Bit after noon. No solid food for you, though. Sorry!" The nurse smiled. Could she not see Rainbow was not in the mood for smiles?

"I don't think I could eat. Not with this buckin' leg here."

"Well, it won't be bucking for some time now. But it looks like it's starting to heal nicely. Before I leave, do you have any questions?" She intentionally misunderstood Rainbow Dash, who had to admit that some of the nurse's positive attitude seemed to rub off.

"When do I get outta here? I'm not made to lie around all day, I'm made for flying! My wings will start to decay by the time I can use them again, I'm sure of it..."

The unicorn's smile faded a little. "I'm afraid you won't be flying for some time now. Even if you managed to take off, it's simply not safe. But we've got wing therapy to compensate for it!"

Rainbow Dash was confused. "Wing... Therapy? What's that?"

"Don't worry, it's nothing bad. Massages. Simple exercise. Just something to ensure you won't lose your talent while you're here. If I am reading this right, it's on a three day base, starting today."

"Can't say I'm not interested..."

"Great. Unless there's anything else, I'll be off. If you need anything, here's the call button."

Rainbow Dash didn't answer. Instead, she felt incredibly tired again. When the nurse left, she was already half asleep again. After all, she was used to sleep through half the day anyway, and her current situation didn't help it.

When she woke up, she saw an Earth Pony working to roll her bed off to another room.

"Hello Nurse. Where are we going?"

"Oh, uh, hello. It's time for wing therapy. Your nurse should have told you all about it, right?" The surprised pony answered.

"Yeah. Can't I just go outside and fly for some time? I'll be more careful this time, I promise!"

"No can do. You would just land on that leg of yours and make it worse. I'm not sure you could even fly like that. Don't you remember what happened?"

Rainbow Dash tried to spread her wings to disprove the Nurse. They obeyed, but Rainbow couldn't spread them out all the way due to a sudden pain taking hold of her. "Oh yeah, the lightning part. Well, I was more focused on the landing, you know? Not like it worked, though..."

"I can see that. Alright, there we are. Enjoy yourself."

At least wing therapy was acceptable, Rainbow Dash thought. The spot where she was hit by the lightning still hurt, but they worked on that too. Even more pleasurable was what happened afterwards, back at her room.

A meek knock announced the ponies at the door. More ponies doing more boring examinations with me, Rainbow Dash thought.

"Come on in!" She tried to force herself to a smile, but only succeeded partially. Upon seeing who was visiting her, it turned into a big, real smile.

"Girls! I was starting to think you had abandoned me!"

"Aw, sugacube, tha' been one day an' ya're already missin' us?"

Rainbow Dash realised how silly she acted. But she didn't want to think about such things now, not when her friends had come to visit her.

Fluttershy spotted a moth at the ceiling and flew up to examine it. "Ugh, Fluttershy, would you please stop that? The no flying part already is bad enough without you reminding me of the freedom I'm missing out on."

The healthy pegasus quickly dropped to the floor and muttered an excuse, even more quietly than she usually spoke. "Didn't mean it like that, 'Shy. I'm just frustrated."

Twilight spoke, pulling out books from her saddlebags. "You're terribly bored, I can imagine. Well, that's why I brought you those."

"Books? That's nice of you, but I'm really not that kind of pony."

"They're not the kind of book you'd expect. Give them a read, they're about adventures and hidden treasures and pirates. Whatever the last are... Look, I even enchanted them so that you can read them with one hoof."

With that, she nudged one of them over. It slowly floated over, like a leaf floating over water. It sparkled slightly from the magic cast onto it.

"They'll stay where you put them. Literally. And if you accidentally pushed one up to the ceiling, just call it. Robinson, come over here!"

Rainbow watched with a fascinated look as the book that was above her a second ago made its way back to Twilight.

"Sweet. I might try them, if it stays as boring as it is now." Rainbow Dash turned over to grab the books. Before she could even reach them, Fluttershy gasped on Rainbow's left.

"Oh, you're hurt even worse than I thought! Show me that back!"

Rainbow Dash was surprised by the sudden outburst, but quickly recovered and mumbled words of denial. Twilight and Rarity exchanged a look, both knowing that Fluttershy wouldn't give up, and levitated the struggling pegasus, exposing the burnt spot on her back to Fluttershy

"Oh, you poor thing. They're treating that too, right? They should totally rub it in with Greenthorn every day and then bandage over it."

"... yeah. It's not too bad here, don't worry. They've even got special wing treatment for flight-deprived pegasi." Rainbow struggled against the magic holding her in the air. "And they're taking care of that spot too. Could you please let me down now?"

The unicorns floated her back into position. "Thanks."

When Rainbow Dash looked around, Pinkie Pie looked like she'd be ready to burst from all the talk she had to hold back while the others were talking. "Oh! Look Dashie, I figured you'd be all like, super duper bored and stuffs and totally not happy, so I made THIS just for you."

She held out a big cupcake, frosted multiple times. Somehow, she'd managed to put a sonic rainboom on it, with a little Rainbow Dash performing it. Rainbow chuckled, gladly accepting the cheerup.

"That's... Awesome. I don't think I want to know how you made it, right?"

"Don't ask and I won't lie. Although I can hardly remember myself..." She pulled back, deep in thought. As deep as a Pinkie could, at least.

Rainbow Dash had recovered well. She was still unbearably bored, though. So bored that she even took one of the books Twilight had left, shrugged, and began to read in it. Not more than a way to pass time when there was literally nothing else to do, she told herself and her friends.

Rainbow found out that she was lying fairly quick. Animating the adventures the books detailed with her fantasy was sometimes even more fun than having some herself. But that was SO uncool, so she kept it to herself.

What happened at her friends' next visit was the more surprising. Twilight stayed back when the others left, with the excuse to finish a talk with Rainbow.

"How long until I'm out of here again?"

"Not that long actually. Given that you and your leg behave. It doesn't look like you're as bored as you want to be, am I right?"

"How?"

"The stack's in a different order every time I come. Coming to think of it... Alphabetical formation, descending." The books quickly reordered themselves. "You tried reading, didn't you."

"Uh, yes. When there's nothing else to do." Why was Twilight so good at dismantling lies, Rainbow asked herself.

"Thought so. It's always nice to show somepony the power of their own imagination."

"You won't tell anypony, right?"

"Afraid your fanclub won't think reading is cool enough for you? Ah, don't worry, your 'secret' is safe with me."

Rainbow Dash was released from her prison soon indeed. She could control her wings without pain again. She still had to wait for her leg to heal, but at least she could move around by flying and using a stick for balance when she had to walk.

She never told anyone, but from that day forward, the bookshelves in her cloud home were never empty again. An attentive pony might even notice different books from time to time.