Imminence: A Bittersweet Tale of a Mare's Last Days.

Chapter 4: Promise Me

It was like the entire world had crashed on her at once.

Rainbow Dash's eyes widened when she saw that Twilight was not where she'd left her. Sure, she hadn't expected Twilight to sit there the entire time, but she would've come back to meet Rainbow Dash when she returned. Right?

She's just out and about, Cloudsdale is a pretty big place after all. Rainbow Dash thought, planting herself firmly on the spot to wait. After an hour of waiting, she was fed up with it. She shot back and forth throughout Cloudsdale in search of the violet unicorn, only to be disappointed.

Fearing the worst, she flew back to the spot where she and Twilight had parted ways, and broke through the clouds to fly towards the ground below. She searched the entire area that the Unicorn could be as flashes of fear ran through her panicked mind.

What if she's dead? What if she was hit with a sudden burst of weakness and fell through the clouds? Oh Dash you featherbrain, you should have never brought her into the sky to begin with. Rainbow Dash just couldn't shake the fears, mentally berating her self with every image that flashed through her head.

Twilight couldn't be dead,she assured her self, not now, not before everything was finished. She wouldn't let herself die like that.

After searching for another hour, she decided she was gonna get nowhere this way. The fears still flashed in her head, but now she was telling herself that her friend must have gone home, back to the library.

Dawn would be coming soon. She didn't want to waste another second.

***

It was late in the day when Twilight finally finished her meeting with Trixie. The moon had risen and Twilight had grown tired throughout her oddly cheerful conversation with the Show Mare.She hadn't the strength to magic her self back to Cloudsdale to meet back up with Rainbow Dash, and didn't realize the state that her absence would bring upon the pegasus.

She washed up, had dinner, and then went to her room upstairs to tuck herself away for the night, and went to sleep.

It felt like no time at all before Rainbow Dash was crashing through the downstairs library. Causing a loud enough ruckus that it probably could' have woken up half of Ponyville, let alone Twilight.

The unicorn woke up to the sounds of crashing books everywhere and audibly groaned as she stepped out of bed, her mane disheveled from sleep, and trotted downstairs to greet her noisy intruder. As she came downstairs, she heard Rainbow Dash's voice and sighed, that pegasus sure could be excited over that list. Then as Twilight neared the bottom of the stairs, where she could hear the voice more audibly, she froze.

Rainbow Dash's voice was full of something that Twilight had not expected. Panic. The memories of the night before hit Twilight harder than one of Zecora's sleeping drafts. She had thought her friend wouldn't panic over her like this. That Rainbow Dash would've simply brushed off her disappearance and realized that she had simply returned to the library for the night. She hadn't accounted for this reaction at all.

Twilight shuddered silently. Rainbow Dash's temper was surely going to be hostile, but at the same time it was unavoidable. If Twilight were to go back up to her room, the pegasus would be upstairs to see her waiting and be even more furious.Twilight's followed the panicked cries to the kitchen to see Rainbow Dash frantically searching throughout Twilight's cabinets for Twilight her self. If it hadn't had such a scary undertone to it, the scene would have been quite laughable.

"Rainbow Dash?" Twilight asked nervously. The pegasus, startled by Twilight's interruption of her frantic search, quickly started up, smashing her head upon the top of one of the cabinets she was searching through and falling over in pain.

"Owwwwww." Rainbow Dash started, rubbing the sore spot on her head with her hooves before shooting up wide-eyed with realization. She dashed over to Twilight and tightly wrapped her hooves around the unicorn.

"Twilight I-I," Rainbow Dash started, the panic in her tone replaced with relief. Then suddenly she stepped away and galared at her friend. "Where were you? Why did you leave me like that? Do you know how long I've been out searching for you?!" The pegasus started upon the unicorn, glaring at her.

Twilight grimaced, "I was off doing my half of yesterday's trial." Twilight poked her hoof at the ground and pointed her head down. "I know you wanted to be there when I did it, but. . .I just couldn't, you'd think I'd got off easy."

Rainbow Dash looked at Twilight curiously, "Who could you possibly have been talking to that made it look easy."

Twilight's frown grew, and she looke at Rainbow Dash solemnly. "I was talking. . .to Tixie," she finally said.

"That's getting off easy?" Rainbow Dash inquired remembering the very brass blue showmare that at numerous times had shown up and caused trouble among Ponyville.

"It's not who I was talking too, it's who I had to forgive. You see, when I made this list, I realized something, that there were some things that I hadn't been able to forgive about myself, and I felt like Trixie would be able to help me."

Twilight turned her head back to the floor, letting the thought float on the air. Finally she sighed and looked back up to Rainbow Dash. "Are you still mad at me?"

Rainbow Dash hugged Twilight close in response. "I'm not mad, just. . .from now on, we stick together, I'm not leaving your side until the end OK."

Twilight smiled, hugging the pegasus back. "OK, I promise."

They stayed like that until they suddenly heard a door slam in another room, which caused Rainbow Dash to break the hug and turn towards the source of the sound.

"What was that," the pegasus inquired.

Twilight sighed,"It's just Spike, he's not taking this whole cancer thing the best. I think he's angry at me."

Rainbow Dash's eyes narrowed, "why that little, want me to set him straight." The pegasus made a gesture with her hoof as she spoke, almost as if she were playfully knocking some pony over the head. Twilight chuckled at her friends playful gesture and gave her another hug.

"I don't think there's much we can do to help him Rainbow Dash, not much at all." Rainbow Dash only blushed and chuckled, returning the hug and sighing with content.

A week had passed, but Rainbow Dash knew that every little second counted as the clock they were watching could never be trusted. They still had a lot to do before everything they were working towards was complete. She wished she could say she'd miss this, but in all honesty she knew she would never say that.

Because the clock that was ticking for Twilight, was also one that was ticking for her.