"One for you, one for you." Fluttershy repeated to herself as she pulled out carrots for each of the bunnies. This was one of her favorite moments of the day, where she gets to feed all the animals for the night.
"Angel, you get the same as the rest of the bunnies." Angel looked at Fluttershy while tapping his foot on the ground, he clearly expected more.
"Don't look at me like that, I can't give you special treatment because it's not fair for the other animals." Fluttershy turned to walk up to her bedroom but was stopped by something pulling at her leg.
"Angel stop that, you alwa-"
"EEEEEEEEE!" Fluttershy jumped into the air and crashed onto the ground, the loud thud coming from the storm outside had terrified her. She was so busy feeding her animals the pegasus forgot about the awful storm outside.
"Goodness me!" Her eyes welled up as she tried to hold back tears, Fluttershy HATED storms, they frightened her ever since she was a young filly.
"Oh dear it's a really big storm outside..." Fluttershy whispered to herself. She knew what she had to do, often times when a storm was too scary for her she would fly over to Rainbows home only a minute away, in which Rainbow would usually do something to comfort her. She opened the door to her cottage and spread out her wings. "I hope nothing goes wrong out in the storm." She gulped and then took off the ground.
Meanwhile...
Rainbow Dash walked through the door to her bedroom and flicked on the light. "I need to start sleeping sooner than this, I'm beat." She spoke to herself. Closing the door behind her Dash sat down on the side of her bed, dreaming about how good her sleep was gonna be. Dash loved sleeping, it's always been one of her favorite activities.
It was gonna be exceptionally good tonight thanks to the scheduled thunderstorm by the weather team. The sound of rain was so soothing, in Dash's mind atleast.
Tucking herself under the sheets she began her endeavor for sleep. The warmth of her sheets, the cozy feeling of the bed, oh how she loved her bed. "Nothing will ever replace this." Rainbow thought to herself. She thought about what she had done today, some flying practice, more practice, sleeping and more sleeping. "Well today was very productive." As she started to doze off to dreamland...
"AHHH!" A thunderbolt had struck Rainbow's cloud home. The lamp inside Dash's bedroom had suddenly turned off.
"Oh Celestia oh Celestia oh Celestia." Dash started hyperventilating, the power in her house had gone out leaving the pegasus in the darkness. Dash would never admit it to anypony, but she had an irrational fear of the dark her entire life.
Ever since she was a little filly her parents would always leave the light on as she went to bed. Dash never grew out of this.
"Okay okay okay, stay calm Dash there's nothing scary about this." She continued to tell herself, unfortunately this did nothing to calm her. There she layed, paralyzed in fear and quietly sobbing to herself, Rainbow's literal worst nightmare had just become a reality.
Unable to react she just cried, not daring to move and hoping the power would come back on. During all of this she had her eyes closed, not daring to see the pitch black around her, it couldn't get any worse.
Then she heard the door to her house open downstairs...
If Dash wasn't panicking before, then she most certainly was now. Somepony was in her house, everytime she read that thought in her mind the more and more she realised how terrifying that was.
"Oh celestia, wh...what am i supposed to do?" She asked herself, Dash scrambled her hooves over the nightstand to her right searching for something, anything that could produce light.
"Buck!" Dash cursed, no item there could help, nothing but a photo frame and some toothpicks.
"Please, why did the power have to go out, please come back!" She begged with tears dropping from her eyes.
Then she heard hoofsteps on the stairs...
"No no no no no no, stay away." Dash muttered. She could hear each hoofstep individually, one by one. Each step getting louder, until whoever was there was directly in front of the door to Dash's bedroom. Dash froze, her heart must have stopped beating at that moment.
Then she heard three loud knocks in an equal rythm. Rainbow was about to pass out of fear.
"Dash?" The voice behind the door called out. Wait she knew that voice...
"F...Fluttershy?" The pegasus enquired. The door to her bedroom slowly creaked open, revealing the one and only Fluttershy.
"Fluttershy you scared me to death!" Dash yelled in quite the annoyed tone.
"S...sorry, I'll just go, sorry for scaring you..." The timid mare barely mumbled.
"No! Rainbow quickly cut off. "Stay here, are you scared of the storm again?"
"Y...yes."
"Aw come here." Dash reached out her hooves to hug the other pegasus. To which she quickly trotted over.
"Sorry...for bothering you again..." Fluttershy embraced the hug.
"It's okay Flutters, I don't mind, the last thing I'd want is for you to be alone and afraid." This was perfect, Dash felt much less afraid of the darkness when she had other ponies around.
After 30 seconds filled with emotions they both pulled away. Fluttershy who was now sitting beside Dash started fidgeting with her hooves.
"Would you like to spend the night here with me Shy?" Dash asked and signalled towards the empty side of her rather large cloud bed.
"I would love to!" Fluttershy exclaimed as her eyes lit up. "Err...I mean I would like that." She now said as her cheeks turned as red as a tomato. Rainbow probably didn't notice though because of the lack of lighting, she thought to herself.
"Great! Hop in!" Dash cheered gleefully.
Fluttershy moved over to the opposite side of Dash's bed. "A...are you sure it wont be...weird?" She gulped.
"Not if you don't make it a weird thing, we've shared a bed together more times than I can count in flight school, unless you don't want to of course..." Dash said the last part with her tone saddening.
"Of cou-BOOM!" Another lightning bolt struck the ground frightening poor Fluttershy again.
More tears began to form in the buttery pony's eyes.
"Flutters...don't cry, I hate seeing you cry. Look, come here, I'll keep you safe because thats how cool I am. No thunderstorm is gonna hurt MY Flutters!" Fluttershy only nooded in response as she laid down beside her friend and now protector.
"Thanks Dash, f...for always helping me feel better." Fluttershy said with great appreciation, as she curled up beside Rainbow.
Dash just stared at the sweet little mare with a smile on her face. Suddenly, her heart skipped a beat. Due to all the distractions she completely forgot about the dark that surrounded her. Fluttershy had completely washed her worries away. "But why?" She asked herself.
"W...what's wrong?" Fluttershy asked meekly, confused by why her fillyhood friend was sitting up and staring into nothing.
"Oh uh...I was just...thinking." Dash wasn't quite sure what she was doing herself.
"Oh ok...can I ask what you were thinking about. Fluttershy grew curious.
"Oh well, nothing much, flying and all. Why do you ask?" Dash lied, she was still thinking about why she stopped feeling fear merely by the presence of Fluttershy. It was even happening right now!
"Umm...it's just that you only think about things like that when something is bothering you.
"I do? Well nothing is bothering me right now, let's just get to sleep." Dash lied again. She didn't feel this calm even when around her other friends, did she trust Fluttershy more than the rest of the girls?
Whatever it was she was going to sleep it off, she then proceeded to lay back down, with Fluttershy following seconds after.
Unfortunately for Rainbow Dash sleep would not come, her fears were beginning to return the more her brain had time to think. Dash started to toss and turn slightly, it was all going wrong again as she began to panic.
Suddenly, Rainbow felt a hoof on her shoulder causing her to stop and turn around. Fluttershy gave her a concerned look before breathing in.
"Dash... what's bothering you." Fluttershy stated with as much confidence as she could muster.
"I... nothing, why do you think something is wrong?" Dash almost hissed.
"Umm... your breathing is irregular." Fluttershy deadpanned.
"Uh Flutters, I think you're imagining things." Dash tried to play it off.
"Dash now I'm really worried." The yellow pegasus pleaded. "Please tell me what's wrong, y...you can tell me anything... you know that right?"
Rainbow stared at Fluttershy, not really knowing how to respond. Eventually she breathed in. "I'm s..." She tried to speak but her voice would shrink and become inaudible when she tried to say it.
"Could you umm... say that again?" Fluttershy enquired.
"I'm scar..." Dash couldn't say it out loud, she turned away from Fluttershy in shame.
"You're scared?" Fluttershy asked almost not believing what she heard, of all things she wouldn't expect Rainbow to be telling her that.
Dash lightly nodded while looking down, Rainbow didn't want to look at Fluttershy in the eye, not after she lost all her dignity.
"A...are you afraid of the storm too?" Fluttershy was certain this must have been it."
"No." Dash muttered while still looking away.
Slightly surprised, Fluttershy thought of the next best thing. "A...are you maybe umm... perhaps a tiny bit afraid, of the dark?"
Rainbow cringed when she heard Fluttershy say that. She silently nodded her head, all amounts of dignity were gone now. Fluttershy finally knew the truth.
What Rainbow Dash did not expect now was to feel the loving embrace of her fillyhood friend.
"That's okay Dashie, there's nothing wrong with having fears. Everypony is afraid of something... even big strong ones like you."
"I...um I..." Dash couldn't formulate a sentence, she was much too taken aback by what was happening.
"Shhhhh..." Fluttershy hushed the frightened pegasus and began ruubbing the back of her mane.
Rainbiw Dash had an unbelievable amount of emotions surging through her right now, she let some tears flow and it was clear now why Fluttershy calmed her.
"Flutters?" Dash whispered.
"Mhmm..."
"I...I lov..." Dash's throat croaked.
"I love you too Dashie." Dash's heart melted upon hearing this.
"I love you as well Fluttershy."
"I know."
Both ponies laid down, still snuggling to each other. Together they would help the other overcome their fears as Rainbow and Fluttershy, drifted off into an exhausted slumber.
