The next day in school was pretty boring. Dash was passing notes with Applejack through Geography, slept through Math behind her book (to the displeasure of Twilight, who had tried to get her to focus since she knew her grades weren't so well but gave up ten minutes later) and sat with her friends through the break.

They were just waiting for the bell to ring to call them to their next lesson. Sports. While Fluttershy seemed to shrink behind her hair, Dash was practically beaming.

Finally the bell rang and Dash grabbed her bag and took off at high speed.

"Hey, wait for us, Speed Demon!" Applejack joked as she chased after the rainbow soccer wonder.

A few feet away from the gym door Dash had to stop as she was hit with a fierce coughing attack.

Applejack was surprised to say the least, those deep, dry coughs sounding nothing like normal "I'm-out-of-breath" or "something-went-down-the-wrong-pipe" kind of cough.

"Hey, you alright there, sugar cube?" She asked concerned and laid a hand on Dash's back.

When the coughing fit subsided and she could breathe in again, she straightened up like nothing happened. "Yeah-", she cleared her throat after realizing how hoarse she sounded, "I'm fine."

When the others were able to catch up they hadn't noticed a thing.

They quickly got dressed while talking about what game they were gonna play today. Spitfire, who was also in her schools soccer team, said they were playing football.

Oh the irony.

Before the girls left the changing room, Dash hesitated. Normally she would excuse herself in the lesson, saying she needed a drink, but the short run earlier had already been too much for her lungs and she thought of using her inhaler before the lesson.

"Dash, you comin'?" Applejack asked her.

"Uh yeah, coming." She said quickly and went with her.

The teacher quickly explained how they were gonna do warm up runnings around the hall first and whistled.

Dash and AJ were the fastest ones in the sports class so they were at the head, followed by their soccer team members and the rest of their friends. Sunset was with Twilight and Fluttershy at the far end, not wanting to leave their shy friend alone.

After the third round it got pretty difficult for Dash to breathe but she managed. It was only at the fifth and final round that she was wheezing for air, panting at a fast pace.

They finally ended their rounds and Dash was immediately bending over, holding herself up with her hands on her knees.

"You alright?" Applejack asked, getting seriously worried about her normally super athletic friend, who was in a similar position as Fluttershy was at her third round.

"Yeah... just... gimme... a sec..." she answered between pants.

Applejack didn't really know what to do, figuring it just wasn't her day or something. They all had bad days from time to time.

They were deciding the teams now.
Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Pinkie Pie and Twilight were in one; Sunset, Fluttershy, Twinkleshine, Moondancer and Lemon Hearts another; Spirfire, Fleetfoot, Skywishes, Vinyl and Octavia in the third and Lyra, Bon Bon, Derpy, Raindrops and Minty the last.

"Team One against Three! Go!" The teacher called and blew her whistle.

The girls got onto their positions. Dash found it getting harder and harder to get any air and knew that she had to use her inhaler now.

She went over to the teacher and made a motion with her hand, to which her teacher nodded and she ran to the changing room, leaving her team completely confused.

Dash was rummaging in her bag in a rush. She was coughing already but couldn't find her inhaler anywhere. She was close to panicking when she finally realized something important.

Something very important she had done the day before. She was close to suffocating and didn't have the one thing helping her breathe!

She rushed back out to the teacher. "I.. gotta.. nurse... no... inh...."

The teacher quickly nodded and called Sunset over. She was quick to come over. "Take her to the nurse. Hurry." The teacher said, leaving Sunset confused as Dash had another nasty coughing fit. Without hesitation, Sunset put a hand over her friend's shoulder and hurried her out of the gym.

Outside the sun was glaring. It was so hot, making it harder to breathe for Rainbow. She was wheezing desperately for air now, every few steps coughing painfully.

Sunset tried to make her stop, thinking that walking was only making it worse.

"Hurry..!" Dash forced out.

Sunset seemed to catch on and rushed her friend to the nurse office.
She didn't have to say anything.

"Inhaler... hurry..." Dash wheezed out and the nurse wasted no time in getting the wanted item in record time. Dash was evenly quick with opening it and taking one, two, three pushes while forcing deep breaths to allow the medicine into her lungs.

Sunset only stared, finally understanding what the problem was. She and nurse Redheart sat Dash on the bench while she was finally able to breathe again.

All her teachers and the nurse knew about her asthma problem. Two years ago, when Sunset had separated her from her friends, she's had a severe asthma attack at their final soccer game. She didn't know what was happening, and the fact that she couldn't breathe was scaring her. But she was too determined to win to just walk off the field to the medics. She'd put it off until the bitter end. Ending with her passed out in the middle of the field and paramedics rushing over to her with a nebulizer and reviving machines. After that she woke up in a hospital and the doctor explained to her parents that she was to take an inhaler with her at all times, especially when doing sports. Since it happened on school grounds, the teachers and nurse got informed and her sports teachers and coaches were extra sensitive about it.

Now that Dash could breathe again, she felt utterly humiliated. She held out the inhaler for nurse Redheart to take back, but she only shook her head and smiled gently. "I think you should keep it. You seem to be in need of it. But tell me, why is that?"

Dash gulped. "I.. kinda.. sorta.. lost mine." Kinda. Sorta. Totally.

Redheart nodded. "When you feel up to it you can go back. But please, take care."

Dash nodded and jumped up, not caring about anything anymore. She had to get out of here. Away from Sunset.

Because she knows.

Author's Note

Wrote this after I nearly suffocated yesterday. Like, holy shit I'm not even kidding. I'm in Italy again and we got new neighbors yesterday on the Camping and they all smoke. My hands were having this thousands of ants feeling than ran up my arms and I almost blacked out. Had to use my inhaler thingy of course but also needed sugar to get my body working again. I thought I was gonna cough up my lungs and fuck did it hurt

But yeah, so much about that xD