Infinity

Rainbow Dash was napping. She lay on a puffy cloud above the town square of ponyville. She was exhausted and wanted to rest badly, however, a disturbing noise kept distracting her: a strange cheeping that wouldn't go away. Eventually, she opened her eyes, trying to locate the troublemaker.

She wanted him to leave and had the words already halfway out, but she paused. There was nothing there, only a small, yellow light, hovering in front of her at eye level. It vibrated strangely and kept humming out its annoying tune.

"What are you? Why are you here?" Dash asked, confused and furious at the same time. It didn't answer, but it changed its movement: instead of just hovering in place and vibrating, it picked up a steady pace, floating away from her. Dash didn't know why she did it, but she followed it without hesitating. They flew away from ponyville into a dark and calm night sky and although Dash had never flown this high before, she wasn't afraid or cold. Eventually, the light came to a halt, forcing Dash to stop and look around. There was nothing, nothing but blackness and in an instant flash of light, the light disappeared. She was alone.

Then, in a never-ending stream, hundreds of them came from everywhere: tiny, yellow bulbs surrounded by a coat of lightness, so bright that it hurt her eyes. Laying in a sea of stars, Dash raised her voice.

"What do you want? Why did you bring me here?"

A whisper came, not from one, but from all stars alike, speaking to her.

"We didn't - you came yourself."

"That's not true," Dash shouted accusingly, feeling betrayed. "You lured me."

"..."

Dash paused, awaiting a response.

"...yes. Yes we did. We apologize..."

"Why did you do it?"

"... do you want to leave so badly? We don't mean you any harm."

"Why did you bring me here?"

For several seconds, there came no answer. The stars kept glowing, kept vibrating, kept floating around her.

"... we have been alone so long. We wanted somepony to accompany us."

Dash had wanted to shout at the stars, shout until they brought her back, but now she couldn't. Lost for words, she just said nothing.

"Can't you feel it? Can't you feel our loneliness through our cold light, searching for somepony to share some time with? We have been here for an eternity, waiting for you and now you are here and you want to leave so soon. Did we never mean anything to you? Was it all a lie?"

"I don't know what you're talking about." Dash cried, carried by anger and fear. "I never met you. I didn't know you until now."

"So you even deny us? Did we never mean anything to you? All this years we tried to come close to you and you made us gain false hopes. So was it all a lie? Everything you said? Everything you've done?"

"NO! I DON'T KNOW YOU! STOP IT!"

"Rainbow Dash!"

"NO! GO AWAY!" Dash shouted, not hearing anything anymore, not realising that the black sky had disappeared, replaced by the blue, sunny sky above ponyville. She lashed out, trying to fight off the stars, but the whisper was gone and the cold, unnaturally bright light had been replaced by the darker, warmer light of the sun, whose rays bounced brightly on the roofs of the grounded buildings and shone tharough the clouds above. It took Dash several seconds to realise that she had been dreaming and that she had just shouted at a gray mare who was now on the retreat, flying slowly and seemingly without a clear path, but away from her.

"No! Ditzy! I'm sorry. I had a bad dream. Please, come back!"

Ditzy stopped in mid air, turning around slowly. A single look on her face told Dash that she had been close to tears.

Instantly, Dash jumped off her cloud, flying towards Ditzy and taking her in a tight embrace. "I'm so sorry," she said again. "I was having a nightmare and I didn't realise that it was you and I still thought that it were these things from my dream and I wanted them to go away. I'm sorry."

"It's ok," Ditzy replied in a soft, slurry voice. She waited until Dash let go, then grabbed something out of the bag she was carrying, using her mouth. "I have something for you," she mumbled.

Dash took the letter and put it under her wing, holding it with magic. "Thanks," she said, trying to smile encouragingly. "Are you gonna be ok?"

Ditzy nodded. "I'm fine," she said, returning the smile. "I just had a rough day." She turned to leave.

"Bye Rainbow Dash."

"See you," Dash replied, trying to hide her concern. As the greatest flyer there was and the element of loyalty, she felt responsibility towards every pegasus in ponyville. This had increased significantly as she'd become the leader of the local weather team, regardless of Ditzy being the mailmare and therefore not part of it. Plus, she kind of liked the mare. Sure, Ditzy had her physical disabilities and she was overly sensitive, but a great pony aside from that. Dash knew that many thought of her as mentally disabled, but that just wasn't the case.

She flew back, heading not towards her napping cloud but towards her home, knowing that she wouldn't be able to sleep anytime soon. Entering the doorway, she lay down on one of her extra soft clouds, pulled the letter from under her wing and unfolded it, using her teeth. As she caught first glimpse of the written lines, she gasped in shock.

She knew this mouthwriting. She still had a certain piece of paper, which she had spent hours staring on. She would always recognize it.

Dear Rainbow Dash,

We are sending you this letter to invite you to Cloudsdale for the fifth of November.

As you know, we are always looking out for rising talents. The Best Young Flyer Competition is our yearly opportunity to keep track of all the flyers that we think have potential and to look out for newcomers. Given that you won the last one in such dominating fashion, we feel that we have to apology for not contacting you sooner. We want you to know that the problems we have to overcome are in no way related to your physical abilities. In fact, as far as we know, there has been no pony within the last century who had had a comparable amount of flying capability at your age, except for myself. We also think that you as a pony would fit in nicely.

To be straight, the main problem is that you are one of the elements. You may not be aware about the full extent of this problem, but ponies all over Equestria would take notice if you became a part of our team. We can assure you that political influences will not stop us from choosing the best of all participants as our newest member, but there are things we have to talk to you about in person. We await your response soon.

And Dash - I am really sorry about how things have gone so far. I never meant to upset you, please believe that I was not able to write you sooner. I am looking forward to meet you again.

In friendship,

Spitfire

Still holding the letter in her hooves, she sat up and tried to figure out why she didn't feel happier. She just got what she always wanted. She had been invited to Cloudsdale and although she probably wouldn't become a Wonderbolt right away, she had just come a lot closer to her eternal dream. So what was it that was bothering her? What did she feel?

She tried to look inside her. At first, she couldn't find anything clear in the muddle of different emotions, but then, she realised that one thing stuck out. Pride.

...no pony within the last century who had had a comparable amount of flying capability at your age...

She wasn't stupid. She had always known that she had a great amount of talent, but hearing it from her idol was something else. It was similar to what she often felt when she talked to Scootaloo, but 100 times stronger.

Also, there was relief. She knew that, in the past, most ponies who had won a Young Flyers Competition had at least been contacted soon after. In her case, however, it had yet been over half a year and she hadn't been able to help wondering if she'd been forgotten. Now she finally had the counter proof.

So why wasn't she happy? She did feel nervous, but that wasn't it either, neither was it a surprise. After all, she was going to meet Spitfire. And Fleetfoot, of course, and Soarin' and Silver Lining and Misty and Rapidfire and Blaze and all of the others...

No - there was one more thing. It was...

... fear.

But what was it that she was afraid of? This was her dream. She could become a Wonderbolt. Hundreds of ponies would cheer for her. She would be known as the fastest flyer in Equestria. So what was the problem?

She tried to listen to her feelings, to relieve her past in her memories and find whatever was causing the trouble. She tried to imagine everything she might become to see whichever aspect of it would make her unhappy. Finally, she gave up.

She never thought much about such sensible nonsense. In the past, she wouldn't care how exactly she felt about anything. If it had to be done, she would do it - sometimes after taking a nap first. But now... she couldn't just accept the offer without knowing why a part of her was behaving so cowardly. She had to figure this out. And if she couldn't do it by herself, she would have to ask for help from somepony else.

Rainbow Dash was standing in front of the entrance to the library, the letter in a small pocket she was carrying around her neck. She slowly raised her front hoof to knock on the door, but hesitated.

Twilight was smart. She would be able to help her, but still...

At first, she had wanted to talk to Fluttershy, whom she had known for years and who would almost certainly be able to help her, but then she decided otherwise. It was foolish, but she still wanted to look invincible towards Fluttershy. Back in Cloudsdale, when they were both fillies, she once helped Fluttershy standing up against Hoops and Dumb-Bell, two male pegasus bullies, which resulted into her challenging them into a race and her and Fluttershy both getting their cutiemarks.

Ironically, even though Fluttershy fell of a cloud while Dash won the race more than convincingly, they switched places shortly after. Rainbow Dash became Rainbow Crash - her countless crashes and her enormous pride shaped out to be something suited to make fun of.  In exchange, Fluttershy was being left in piece after her accident, for one because she almost died and secondly because she earned her cutiemark relativley early, which often helped for such matter, sadly not so for Dash. Being as kind and grateful as she was, however, Fluttershy never forgot Dashs help and supported her during their whole time in Cloudsdale as best as she could. Even after she returned the favor more than enough to be even, she never stopped caring about Dash and was always there to help when Dash received unwanted attention after one of her regular accidents or when she needed somepony to talk to, usually the latter.

Years later, as both of them moved to ponyville together, Dash tried her best not to show emotions to other ponies, creating the image she was now known for in Ponyville: an invincible and loyal hero. Of course she knew that Fluttershy knew her way too well to fall for it. Given what had happened between them in the past, Fluttershy almost had the right to spoil the image or at least use it to tease Dash, yet it was Fluttershy, who instead chose to continue being as supportive as a friend could possibly be; always offering help when needed and never even mentioning anything about the way Dash approached her new life.

And now, she just couldn't bring herself to confessing a weakness like this to her. As she still stood in front of the librarby, she knew that she'd made the right decision to talk to Twilight instead, with her being the thinner barrier for her pride to break - which didn't mean that it was non existent. Even towards Twilight she felt the need to look invincible, although Twilight probably was too smart to be fooled anyway.

It didn't matter, really. Thinking too long about stuff had never been her forte, and it certainly wouldn't get her anywhere now. She just had to get over herself. She had to do this.

She swallowed, then placed her hoof on the door and sent three magical pulses through it. Just a few seconds later, Spike opened.

"Oh, hey Dash!," he greeted her, looking surprised. "Didn't see you here since you borrowed the last Daring Doo book. Need something else to read?"

"Uh, no," Dash said, slightly embarrassed. "Daring Doo was an exception. They were awesome books, but reading is still for eggheads. Boooring."

"Uhu," Spike said sarcastically. "Have you actually tried any other books?"

"Well - no, but..."

"So how do you know that there aren't other stories out there which are just as good as the Daring Doo novel?"

Dash thought about it for a few seconds.

"...look, this is not why I came, ok? I need to see Twilight, is she here?"

"Yup, she's upstairs, practising some weird magic. Doesn't seem to work too well though. If you ask me, she could use some distraction."

"Good," Dash said, entering the doorway. "Twilight?"

A frustrated groan answered her.

"Uhm, I need your help with something. It's kind of important."

"One moment," Twilight answered, then she came down the stairs, looking highly annoyed about something.

"What's up Twi?" Dash asked. "Studies not going well?"

"Urg, I have been working on the same thing I have been at for almost a month now. I haven't made any improvements there yet. But that's okay," she added quickly. "Princess Celestia told me it would take a long time before I accomplish anything in this exercise. It's just frustrating."

"What kind of exercise?" Dash asked curiously.

"Something Celestia told me to do after the wedding of my brother. Do you want something to eat? I haven't had lunch yet."

"Yea, lunch would be nice. Haven't eaten in a while."

"Great," Twilight said. "I think Spike already made some hay fries for me. It's not enough for two but I could make some sandwiches if that's ok. You can have either, I don't mind."

"Hay fries sounds good," Dash said. "But why do you make lunch for yourself? Don't you have enough bits to go eat someplace else?"

Twilight gave her an inflictive look. "I'm not supposed to talk about how much money I get from Celestia, Dash."

"So it's a lot. Hah, I knew it."

"Well, I have no financial issues." She walked in the kitchen, Dash followed her.

"How much?"

"Enough."

"Oh come on, tell me."

Twilight chuckled. "I can't tell you, it would not be honest."

"So you promised not to tell anypony?"

"Well - no, but I promised not to make it public."

"So than where's the problem? I'll keep it a secret. I'm the element of loyalty, remember? No danger in telling me."

Twilight levitated two plates with some sandwiches and the hay fries on the dining table and set down.

"Do you promise not to tell anypony about it?"

"Yea, no problem."

"Pinkie promise!"

Dash groaned. "Oh come on. That's silly."

Twilight giggled. "Well, if you don't want to, we can just forget about it. No problem."

"Yeesh. Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye." She rolled her eyes. "Now tell me."

"Good enough," Twilight said amused. "I get 1200 bits per month plus I can live in the library for free.

"Wow!" Dash had expected a high number, but not that high. "I get merely half as much and I'm captain of the weather team. So why don't you just always go out to eat?"

"Only because I have a lot of bits does not mean I have to throw them away."

"Uh, maybe. But then what are you doing with all the money?"

Twilight shrugged. "Not much, really. Keeping it. If one of our friends gets into financial problems it might become useful."

"But you're working so much," Dash insisted. "Don't you think you deserve a little bit of luxury?

"If any sort of emergency happens, I might regret spending too much on things I don't really need. And I don't mind cooking myself."

Dash paused. It was so typical for Twilight to pass on luxury and comfort just to provide reserves for some unknown problem that might occur in the distant future - or not at all.

"Well, don't you forget scheduling for the next years library cleanup in time," she mumbled fuzzily.

"Anyway, what is it now that you're practising?"

"Princess Celestia told me to try levitating water," Twilight answered. "She said it's a way of practising magical skill and focus, because levitating things becomes harder the more elusive the subject is." She gulped. "She said whether you manage to learn it or not tells a great deal about how talented you really are."

"Well, I'm sure you'll make it," Dash said with an encouraging smile. "Who has more magical talent than you?"

Twilight blushed slightly.

"But I've seen Rarity levitate tea once, as I knocked over my cup. Tea can't be that much easier than water and Rarity spends much less time with magic than you do. So how comes she can do it?"

"She used a spell for it, I guess. Did she tell you that she did it with ordinary levitation magic?"

"Huh? What's the difference?"

Twilight sighed. "Seriously? Do you know anything about magic?"

"Well, I know unicorns can do all kinds of things and pegasi and earth ponies can only push and pull stuff."

Although she didn't know why, she felt curious about the topic. "Can you tell me the basics? You know, a quick runthrough."

"Of course, if you're interested." Twilight sounded positively surprised. She took a large bite, swallowed and then began to explain.

"So, there are 5 different kinds of magic. The first kind is alicorn magic, which only two beings in Equestria are able to perform. The second one comes from the spell that lies on all 3 ponykinds. It allows pegasi to fly, earth ponies to feel a special connection to the earth and their surroundings. That opens up for advanced agriculture, which is why earth ponies, other than pegasi, are necessary for all three tribes to survive..."

"Hey, pegasi are also necessary to survive," Dash protested. "Who else is supposed to make it rain?"

Twilight groaned. "You are leading a weather team, and yet you don't know how rain works?"

"Of course I know. You take a cloud, then you pull it where you want to have it and then..."

"That's not what I meant. What I'm saying is that weather works on itself. If we had no weather team, it would still rain and snow and all, we just had no control over it."

"Really? But we make clouds in weather factories. And only pegasi can run them."

"Weather factories only speed up the natural process. You are making clouds out of water. If you didn't do that, water would just transform into clouds on itself, and then it would rain somewhere randomly."

"Huh. That would be so weird." Dash chuckled. "But doesn't a controlled weather system help with agriculture?"

"Yes, of course." Twilight said quickly. "All three tribes benefit from each other. I never meant to say that pegasi are less important or anything..."

Dash made a dismissive gesture with her front hoof.

"I know you didn't mean it like that. Keep going. What exactly does the spell for unicorns?"

"Well, unicorns are able to extend the cast range for the third kind of magic - which is what everypony can do, you just apply physical pressure on something..."

"So, if I grab things with my hooves, it's the same kind of magic that you are using to levitate stuff?"

"Yes. Our horns are used to cast magic through. I could also pull with any other part of my body, but it's far less effective. And the horn also allows us to perform refined spells, that's the fourth kind of magic. These spells can do almost anything, but we can't use them instinctively, like levitation, we have to study them. Most unicorns only know very few, some to levitate a lot of things at once without having to focus on every one of them, some to apply a lot of pressure on a small area to lift heavy things, and usually several ones related to their special talents."

"So for Rarity it's that gem finding spell which you copied as we rescued her from those stupid diamond dogs?"

"Exactly."

Dash thought about it for a second. "So... that explains pretty much everything ponies do. What's the fifth kind?"

"It's phoenixes. Every other creature in Equestria performs a kind of magic similar to the unicorns, the fourth kind, with the one difference that most other animals are less intelligent and use it instinctively, but pheonixes are entirerly different. Nopony knows what they are capable of, but they can do things that are impossible for even alicorns to accomplish..."

"Like what?"

"Like avoiding death and being reborn." She groaned. "That is scientifically impossible, yet they do it. And they can do much more. Celestia keeps her own pheonix as pet, to study them first hoof."

Dash remembered an orange bird in a small cage. "Oh yea, I saw it on one of her visits in ponyville."

For the next minute, they just sat quietly, Dash thinking about what she had just learned. As they finished lunch, Twilight grabbed the dishes and levitated them towards the kitchen. Dash followed.

"So now. You said you needed my help. What's the matter?"

"Oh..." Dash had completely forgotten why she came to visit Twilight in the first place. She felt unwell about the topic, maybe that was part of the reason why she had been so eager to learn about magic: just to delay the moment she had to talk about what really bothered her.

But she was not going to run away from it now. She needed to know why she felt the way she did.

"I..." She hesitated, swallowed, and then just grabbed the letter out of the pocket, which she had put beside her chair.

"I got this," she said, offering it to Twilight.

Looking curious, Twilight grabbed the letter, unfolded it and started reading.

Dash nervously chewed on her lips. It was almost as if she wrote something and asked Twilight to preread it. Not that she ever would, of course.

After an impressively short time, Twilight lowered the letter and placed it on the table.

"That's... good news," Twilight said. For a brief moment, Dash thought to hear something weak and fragile out of Twilight's voice, but then it was gone and she continued, sounding normal. "Sure there are unsolved problems but they invited you to talk about in person." She hesitated, now seemingly irritated by the lack of excitement Dash was showing. "Did you... just want to show it to me or do you need my help with something?"

"Uh, yea, kind of, I..."

For several seconds she just stood there, fighting with herself.

"Come on Dash," Twilight said. "What is it?"

She winced and hesitated for one last moment, only to finally accept heir faith and spill it out.

"I don't want to go."

"To Cloudsdale?"

"To the meeting. I don't want to become a Wonderbolt. Gosh, I can't believe this. My whole life I dreamed about joining the Wonderbolts and now I don't want it. I have no idea why I don't, but I don't. If I think about that I... go there and they tell me that they take me, I... I don't want it. I just feel scared about it. As I read that letter, I hoped I'd read that they wouldn't take me. I didn't realise it then but I really did. What is wrong with me, Twilight? Why am I scared of living my dream?"

She turned away to hide her tears.

"Rainbow..."

What made Dash turn back around was not defiance or courage, but surprise. There was no doubt, Twilight sounded relieved - even for Dash, who was bad at reading other ponies it was obvious, just from the one word she had just spoken. And as she faced Twilight, she could see relief and... happiness being written all over her face.

Her surprise and rapidly rising anger made her forget about her sadness. "What the hay? Can't you at least pretend to be sorry? Even I would know to be that sensitive. I just told..."

"Rainbow!" Twilight interrupted, now sounding a little bit concerned, but still full of relief. "Listen to me! Please. I can explain everything."

"Oh yea?" Dash said feisty. She could feel a tear running down her cheek which only heightened her anger. "Explain. I am dazzled to hear."

"Rainbow, you..." Twilight had to swallow a giggle. Dash felt her anger go away for some reason, now she just felt endlessly confused. It could not have been more awkward.

"Rainbow, you don't want to leave because you'd miss your friends. You would miss us."

"What? No way! I am Rainbow Dash!"

Twilight burst out in laughter. "Yes, ... you... are," She managed to say between her laughing, which she clearly tried to shut down. "You... " She let out another giggle, then brought herself under control again with obvious effort.  Still with gaps, but without laughing, she continued. "You were... not even realising that you would miss us and that's why you didn't talk to us about... it. It's... it's incredible! I know you for one and half a year now but... gosh, how can a pony be as intelligent as you but doesn't get at all what's happening at the same time? What's happening around you and even to yourself?

Rainbow, since the best flyer competition we all have been waiting for something to happen. We knew you would probably have been offered a Wonderbolt spot soon. You have broken the sound barrier, for Celestia's sake. You've performed a Sonic Rainboom, something generations of flyers weren't able to accomplish. We knew we would miss you but we thought that you would probably want to go anyway. We were ready to let you go.

But then you never talked to us. And we started to think that we might mean so little to you that you wouldn't even tell us whether you would leave Ponyville or not. And then months passed by and you were still living in Ponyville like nothing had changed and we started to think that you might have rejected the offer, but you also never stopped talking about joining the wonderbolts. We never brought the topic up cause we thought it was obvious that you didn't want to talk about it, for whatever reason.

And now..." She giggled again. "Now you are telling me you didn't think about it at all? Like, ...." She stopped, panting. Dash already felt her face turning red as she was realising where Twilight was going. "... like not at all? You didn't even realise anything was going on? My. Celestia. That's so... cute." She let out another giggle, just to burst out in laughter again the next second. By now, Dash just was just staring down at her hooves, her cheeks burning like fire. She was back in flightschool all over again and just crashed into something, with dozens of ponies laughing at her - only that it was even worse for some reason.

"I'm so dumb," She mumbled to the rug. It had somehow just become the most beautiful thing in the entire room.

Twilight seemed to have noticed that Dash was not just joking but really down. She walked over to her and lifted Dash's head with her own hoof.

"No, you're not," she said, to Dash's relive now with a completely calm voice.

"Then how comes I didn't realise..."

"Cause you are Rainbow Dash," Twilight said. "You didn't realise it cause you never even thought about it, am I right?"

Thinking about it, she knew Twilight was right. Everything was so obvious now that she knew. She nodded.

"So that's not stupidness, that's laziness. It's... well, it's you. The same pony who broke into a hospital to get the first Daring Doo book instead of asking me for it, although it couldn't have been more obvious that we'd know eventually anyway. You are smart, surprisingly so, if you take your time to think about stuff, but that rarely ever happens. Usually you just do things. And that's ok." She smiled. "It's what we love you for."

She looked up. "You really think I'm smart?"

"Yes. Come on, Dash. I thought I'd be send back to magic kindergarten just because I didn't learn anything about friendship for seven days. Everypony else knew that I was freaking out over literally nothing. And then I thought if I made a friendship problem and then solved it it would... oh well. You know." She blushed. "Anyway, the point is, sometimes we all are just blinded. You don't think I'm stupid cause of it either."

Dash thought about it. It did not only make her feel better, but it was also true.

"Yea. You're right. Thanks, I guess."

For a few seconds, they just said nothing. Dash thought about herself, about the wonderbolts and..."

"Oh Celestia. The day after the meeting. I talked to you about the day I spent with the wonderbolts and... oh. Gosh, I really was blind."

"Yea, well, that was the main reason why we all thought it was so obvious that you didn't want to talk about leaving us."

"I..." She bit her lip. She remembered the conversation very well, she had still been in excellent mood from the day before. They had been having their weekly picnic which they had rescheduled so Dash could tell them everything. She could remember that she'd been wondering why everypony seemed to be in twisted mood, almost depressed. To be fair, it was hard to judge Fluttershy, she had only behaved even shyer than usual, but Rarity, Fluttershy, Twilight, Applejack and even Pinkie had seemed nervous about something. She groaned. How could she not have realised something was up when Pinkie wasn't happy?

But she hadn't. She had told them everything: about her time with the wonderbolts and how much she hoped they would invite her soon. How awesome they all were, especially Spitfire. She remembered that she had talked about how she would see Spitfire every day. See Spitfire every day - and not once did it cross her mind that she had to leave Ponyville. Leave her friends.

"I'm going to change this," She suddenly said. "In the future, I'll think about stuff that I do and what consequences it can have. Not as much as you probably, but I'll not miss such obvious things."

"Sounds like a plan," Twilight said. "Now come on. Don't get all worked up over this. You are not leaving us. This is a happy day. Do you have any idea how much we would miss you?" She walked over and nuzzled Dash. "You'll stay now, you hear?"

Dash blushed at the sign of affection, but could not help to smile.

"I don't even deserve friends like you," She mumbled. "You all worried because of me. A fine Element of Loyalty am I."

"Dash, you are loyal enough to let go of your dream because you don't want to leave your friends. Even if you didn't realise it. You are the most loyal friend we could ever ask for, just not the most thoughtful one. And if you think about joining someday, you will talk to us about it, right?"

"Yea." She swallowed. "Yea, if I want to join. But I can't even imagine it, now that I know what's keeping me here."

Realising what she just said, she groaned.

"I never thought this would happen. But it's true."

"Now come on," Twilight said encouragingly. "Let some time pass. You still have time to reconsider and someday you might get used to the thought of leaving us. We won't all live in Ponyville forever. Eventually, things have to change."

"Yea," Dash said despondently. "I don't want to think about it much. I like things as they are now."

"I know," Twilight said with a hollow voice, sounding almost scared. "I know. I've never been happier in my live than I was since I came to Ponyville. I don't want things to change either."

For some time, they just said nothing, each of them lost in her own thoughts. Dash's mind was drifting to Rarity and how she would like to have a big career in Canterlot. She winced. It had to happen eventually. It was going to happen eventually. Rarity simply had too much talent to not become popular. On a contrast, Applejack had a farm to take care of, she would never leave Ponyville. Fluttershy wouldn't want to move and settle in someplace else, for she had to get along with lots of unknown ponies. Fluttershy liked the familiar, she was happy here where most ponies where kind and understanding and she could be around her boring animals the whole day. And Pinkie was even less likely to ever leave, given that she was friends with everypony in town.

Twilight broke the silence.

"So... I think I'm just going to tell Pinkie something nice happened, then she will throw a party and we can tell the news to all our friends."

"Uh, sure. I'll be off 'till then. Still have stuff to do. Thanks for everything."

What about Twilight? She could easily move in somewhere else, every town would be happy to have her. But she was here for her friends. As long as the other five stayed here, Twilight was not going to leave either. Dash left the library and took off instantly. She painted some loops in the air, then headed higher, where there would be less obstacles.

If Twilight was going to tell Pinkie soon, the party would probably be today. She better made good use of the time she had left.