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1
A Chance & A Bargain
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“You need help gardening?” Rainbow Dash pushed to the front of the group and crossed her arms. Ignoring the six dismayed glances thrown at her by her friends, she smirked at Wallflower and rolled her eyes. This whole thing was a joke.
Wallflower winced and shied away from Rainbow. “No! I mean, not exactly. I just need help climb--” she stopped short as she caught the full brunt of Rainbow’s frown.
“Boring!” Rainbow was fast running out of patience for Wallflower’s presence. Couldn’t she tell she wasn’t welcome? “Don’t you have a whole club of nerds just for that? Why bother us?” she asked.
Before she could say any more, Sunset and the girls grabbed Rainbow’s shoulders and dragged her back into their midst. She struggled, but Applejack hugged Rainbow’s arms to her side and rendered her struggles mostly moot. “R.D., be nice!” she whispered, and squeezed Rainbow a little tighter for good measure.
“Aw, c’mon!” Rainbow complained, wriggling in Applejack’s grasp. She might as well have been wrapped in stone. Why is she so strong?
Applejack waited for her to be still, then let her go.
Sunset moved to the front and gave Wallflower a big and apologetic smile. “What Rainbow Dash means to say is that none of us are exactly accomplished gardeners. How do you think we could help?” Sunset asked, motioning for Wallflower to go on.
Rainbow kept Wallflower fixed with a cold stare. I wish you would just buzz off, already! Get on with your life! Rainbow had hoped she’d make a few friends stick with them. Instead, the flower girl lingered at the edge of their circle of friends like an unshakable stench.
Great. She’s talking again. Determined not to give Wallflower the satisfaction of her attention, Rainbow lolled her head back to stare at the sky. She imagined the moment that the girls had summoned their powers and obliterated the memory stone, and replayed it in her mind. Wallflower’s face when the memory stone exploded was just so soothing.
Her daydream shattered at a light touch on her shoulder. Rainbow looked up to see that the girls had parted, leaving an opening between Rainbow and Wallflower. “What do you think, Dash?” Sunset asked. “You’re our best climber.”
“Huh?” Completely lost, Rainbow just blinked at Sunset.
“Will you help Wallflower?” Sunset asked. Wallflower looked on, leaning forward with the hem of her sweater balled up in her hands.
Rainbow scowled. She didn’t know what Sunset was asking, but she had a feeling she knew what the right answer was. “Pass.” Keeping her gaze fixed on a point just above Wallflower’s shoulder, she shrugged. “I’ve got things to do.”
The girls--having swelled with friendly encouragement--deflated.
Wallflower sighed and slumped. She flattened the hem of her sweater against her legs and nodded. “That’s fine, I’ll give it a go on my own. Thanks, anyway!”
Rainbow watched her go, enjoying the rich taste of victory as the girl slinked away. Begone, witch. Whatever plots Wallflower had in store today were foiled, all thanks to Rainbow Dash.
She glanced around at her friends, smiling, and was met by six frustrated stares. Rainbow stared back. “What?” she asked after a moment of silence. “I’m not into gardening,” she said, a little sheepishly.
Sunset and Applejack’s stares hardened to the point of being withering glares, and Rarity let out an audible “Hmph!”. But before either of them could say anything, Sunset Shimmer ushered them both onward.
“We’ll meet up in one of the band rooms, girls,” she told them. Rainbow started to go, too, but Sunset threw out an arm to block her path. “Got a sec’, Rainbow?” she asked. Her face was neutral, but her tone was sharp and her shoulders were stiff.
Great. Now I get to hear about how I’m not nice enough to the memory thief. Rainbow huffed and stopped short of Sunset’s outstretched arm. She blew a lock of hair out of her eyes. “What’s up, Shimmer?” she asked, all wide-eyed innocence.
“You know what’s up, Rainbow,” Sunset said. She crossed her arms and gave Rainbow a worried frown. “Every time Wallflower’s within eyesight of us, you clam up and get all distant.”
Rainbow blinked. She’d talked the whole time Wallflower had been there.“I’m not distant--”
“If we’re lucky, that is. Sometimes--like just now--you’re downright rude. Mean, even.” Sunset reached a hand out to rest on Rainbow’s shoulder. “We’ve all forgiven Wallflower, Rainbow. We’re all trying to be her friend. All of us but you.” Sunset squeezed Rainbow’s shoulder lightly. “So, what gives? Why can’t you give Wallflower a break? Be honest with me, I won’t tell anyone else.”
Ugh. Here we go. Rainbow sighed and shrugged Sunset’s hand off of her shoulder. She did not want to have this conversation, but she knew it was only friendly respect that had kept Sunset from reading her mind about it. Better from my lips than from my brain.
She inhaled sharply. “She messed with our heads. She made us forget you. She made me not like you anymore. I didn’t just lose a friend--I was mean to you. How could I forgive that?” she asked.
She could feel her face growing hot, and her fists were clenched at her sides. “It’s not about what she did to us, it’s what she made us do to you. She’s a witch!” she spat. Her eyes widened and she pressed her hands to her lips, surprised at herself.
Sunset took a step back, wide-eyed at Rainbow’s sudden vehemence. She recovered quickly. “Hey, hey,” she spoke soothingly and settled back in closer. She nodded sympathetically as Rainbow’s rant carried on. When Rainbow paused for breath, she snagged Rainbow’s hand and held it.
Recoiling, Rainbow tried to brush her off. “What? No, no sappy stuff, c’mon--” Sunset held firm, smirking at her friend’s squeamishness.
“Thank you, Rainbow. It means a lot that you’re this upset about what happened,” she said. Rainbow tried to yank her hand free, but Sunset held on and cut her off. “But Wallflower’s not a bad person. She was just alone, angry, and a little jealous. She needed--she needs--friends. The same way I did.”
Rainbow looked away. “Yeah, but you didn’t--”
“I drove you apart from your friends, and I did that”--Sunset pointed to the large patch of off-color bricks that made up the school’s rebuilt entryway--”and I even tried to blow you all up with a fireball,” she pointed out. “You forgave me.”
Pausing for breath, she then spun Rainbow to face the plinth that had once held the Wondercolt statue. “Twilight did that, and almost blew up the world. You forgave both of us. What’s the difference?”
Squirming under the weight of Sunset’s arguments, Rainbow folded in on herself. Fine. The truth. “She got in my head, Sunset. I didn’t even know it. It feels so wrong. What if she took stuff and we never got it back?” She shivered, unnerved even to say it aloud. “It’s not like that night was the first time she ever used the stone,” she pointed out.
“We don’t know, Rainbow. We can’t really know. I asked her and she said she only used it on any of us the one time, but all we have is her word on that,” Sunset explained. “Because I want to help her--and because I did wrong once or twice--I want to take her word for it and give her a chance.”
Silence reigned, and Rainbow looked at the ground. She didn’t have a good answer, but she was loath to admit it. She frowned and opened her mouth to say something, but Sunset raised a finger to cut her off.
“If nothing else, consider this: the winner of three consecutive “Biggest Meanie” awards is telling you that you really should be nicer. Think about that,” she ordered.
Crap. Rainbow scoffed and rested her head in her hand. Sunset had good points. A really annoying number of good points. Worse, Sunset had maneuvered her to where she couldn’t keep arguing and not be the mean one.
“Fine! Fine. You’re. . . you’ve got a good point,” she finally admitted. “I’ll try to be nicer.”
Sunset smiled, clearly relieved, and gave Rainbow’s hand a squeeze before she let it go. “Attagirl! That’s more like it,” she said. Gesturing with her thumb, she glanced over her shoulder toward where Wallflower had gone. “So, Istill think you should offer to help Wallflower,” she said, not missing a beat.
Immediately shaking her head, Rainbow groaned and waved her off. That’s a big leap! Jeez. “Look, I’ll be nicer, but I meant it when I said I’m not into gardening. That really is boring!”
The last thing Rainbow wanted to do was waste a perfectly pretty day digging around in the dirt and planting flowers. Her eyes settled on the guitar case over Sunset’s shoulder, and she pointed at it. “Besides, we have band practice!” She added. There! That’s concrete! She won’t ask me to bail on friends for this nonsense.
“Do you ever listen?” Sunset asked, seriously, an eyebrow quirked over her left eye.
Caught off guard, Rainbow shrugged, held out her hand flat and tilted it from side-to-side. “Ehh. Sometimes,” she admitted. “Conversation takes too long. People are so slow! Hard for me to stay interested. Plus, I didn’t really want to listen to Wallflower,” she said. She brushed her fingernails off on her hoodie and avoided eye contact with Sunset.
With a roll of her eyes, Sunset patted Rainbow on the shoulder. “At least you’re honest,” she said. Then, she crossed her arms and raised one finger. “Well, while you were zonked out earlier, Wallflower explained that she doesn’t need help gardening, she needs help getting a flower for her garden.”
“What’s the difference?” Rainbow asked. “That doesn’t sound much more exciting to me. Besides, If the Rainbooms are going to get better, we have to practice. I can’t skip to pick flowers for the--” Rainbow stopped herself. She had been about to call Wallflower ‘the Witch’, and she doubted Sunset would find it funny. “--for Wallflower.”
“She also explained that the flowers she wants are out in the Everfree Forest, and that she wanted someone to go out there with her this weekend, not today.”
Rainbow rolled her eyes. “The Everfree Forest isn’t that scary. What does she need someone to walk her through the woods for? And why me?” She huffed and brushed her hair back out of her eyes. “That’s like an hour drive, and then we walk and pick some flowers. That’s so boring!” she whined.
Wincing at the sound, Sunset narrowed her eyes at Rainbow. “Can you not do that?” she asked. At Rainbow’s apologetic nod, she continued. “The flowers she wants are climbing vines. They grow up a cliff face, deep in the forest,” she said, and then dropped her voice into a dramatic undertone. “We suggested you, because you’re our best climber.”
“Well, that is true. I’m a pretty solid climber,” Rainbow preened. She couldn’t resist a direct stoking of her ego. She maintained an air of indifference and turned away from Sunset. “This whole thing still sounds pretty lame, though. . .”
Sunset had Rainbow nibbling on the bait. Now she just had to sink the hook. She dropped her tone a little lower and wrapped an arm around Rainbow’s shoulders. “Think about it, Rainbow: You can guide Wallflower through the depths of the forest, watching her back against the dangers of the Everfree. Then, you pull off a treacherous climb to collect rare flowers that only a few people even know about. After all that, you get her safely back out with the rare prize. You’d be just like--”
“Daring Do!” Rainbow interrupted, suddenly enthused. She grinned as she imagined herself scaling the cliff, triumphantly securing the flower while Wallflower looked on in helpless admiration. She was sold.
She started to nod, but paused and gave Sunset an odd look. Then, her face soured and she shook her head. “I hate how I know you’re playing me, and yet I’m still going for it,” she complained.
Sunset laughed and gave Rainbow a friendly shove. “Come on, you know it sounds cool.”
“It actually does. How do you do that?” Rainbow puzzled.
Sunset’s grin faded by a few teeth and she plucked at the collar of her jacket. “Uh. Well, convincing people to do stuff for me was kind of my schtick for a while,” she finally said.
“Uh. Yeah.” Rainbow glanced away. Momentarily uncomfortable, she seized back on the topic at hand. “Alright, I’ll do it,” she said. Sunset grinned and moved to hug her, but Rainbow held up a finger. “If, and only if, Wallflower brings a camera to take some sweet pictures of me climbing the cliff,” she said.
Sunset laughed and shook her head. “Well, that’s between you and Wallflower.” She turned and started to walk toward the school’s front doors. “Go work it out. We’ll get warmed up while we wait for you.”
“You’re not coming with me?” Rainbow called after her. I have to go now?
“So you can lean on me to make the deal for you while you give Wallflower grumpy looks? No, Rainbow, I can’t ‘be nicer’ for you. You kind of gotta do that yourself,” Sunset called back. She paused at the top of the stairs to give Rainbow an encouraging smile. “I really think you and Wallflower could be good friends, if you give her an honest chance. She’s fun and she‘s actually pretty cool, too.”
And with that she went inside, leaving Rainbow alone in the courtyard.
“Fun?” Rainbow asked the empty courtyard. “She’s all Equestrian witchcraft and bad attitude! How could that be fun?” She shook her head, disgusted, and stalked around the school toward the faculty lot.
As soon as she rounded the corner of the building, she could see the freshly laid stones that lined the garden path. They had been put in place just the week before by Wallflower and some of her club’s new recruits, and they still gleamed in the afternoon sun.
“She had help for that. None of those people can climb?” Rainbow grumbled. She kicked a crumpled tin can across the lot as she stepped down onto the asphalt.
The sun was high, and the heat radiating off of the pavement was enough to toast the bottom of her feet through her sneakers and make her eyes water. In spite of the heat, a few CHS students lingered outside and relaxed in the shade at the edge of the woods.
Rainbow paused near a handful of students--sitting in the shadow of an oak at the mouth of the path--and pointed at Micro Chips. “Hey, Chips. Did Wallflower head this way?”
Micro Chips jumped and glanced around--wide-eyed at being called on by Rainbow Dash--and then gave her a blank look. “Who?”
“Pfft! Exactly,” Rainbow rolled her eyes and kept walking. “Thanks anyway, Chips.”
Two months had passed since Wallflower’s incident (as Rarity preferred to call it), and very little had changed. As far as Rainbow could tell, Wallflower was still a nobody. She still kept to herself, and the only people she spoke to were Rainbow’s friends and anyone she could coax out into her garden.
If she was so lonely, why hasn’t she done anything to change that?
Rainbow followed the round stones as they weaved through the trees, leaving the chatter of the students in the lot behind along with the heat. It was cool beneath the boughs, and the breeze that rustled the leaves carried the scent of flowers from further along the path. Fanning her shirt, Rainbow lingered in the open areas of the path, eager to enjoy the breeze while it lasted.
The sound of soft conversation, barely louder than the whisper of the breeze that carried it, met Rainbow’s ears. She let go of her shirt and shook her head. Great. She’s talking to herself. Rainbow steeled herself for crazy and came around the last curve in the trail.
To Rainbow’s surprise, Wallflower wasn’t alone: She was kneeling beside Derpy, and they were scooping a small mound of dirt up around the base of a young rosebush. They both looked up at the sound of Rainbow entering the glade, and their conversation dwindled.
Wallflower leaned over and murmured something to Derpy, and Derpy stood up and brushed dirt off of her jeans. She smiled and waved at Rainbow, then walked past her to head back toward the school.
Still securing the rosebush, Wallflower glanced up as Rainbow approached. “Hi, Rainbow Dash,” she said. Her tone was light, but there was a touch of apprehension in the subtle raise of her eyebrows. She steadied the bush, then closed her arms over herself. “You’ve never come to my--”she stopped herself and started again--”to our garden before.”
“Yeah,” Rainbow stepped closer. “Like I said before, not really into gardening,” she said. She didn’t really know what else to say, so she rocked back on one heel and looked down at Wallflower.
“Right, I got that,” Wallflower said. She stood up, her arms still clasped like a shield. “Well. . . why are you here now?” she asked, and looked down at the rosebush at her feet.
There was a beat, then she frowned. “I mean-- you’re welcome here anytime, of course,” she hurried to correct herself. Her eyes flicked upward to keep an eye on Rainbow, but she kept her chin tucked.
The feeling is mutual, weirdo. Rainbow shrugged. “I came about the thing,” she said. At Wallflower’s blank look, she gave an aggravated sigh and gestured at Wallflower. “The flower. The one you want help getting? I came to help get it.”
“Uh. You said you weren’t interested, like, ten minutes ago?” Wallflower’s mild apprehension shifted into outright suspicion, and she eyed Rainbow like she would a coiled snake.
Rainbow nodded. “Yeah, I know what I said. I changed my mind.”She scratched the back of her head and looked at the sky, unwilling to explain any further. No need to clue Wallflower in on the chance she was being given. She might fake being nice, if she knew.
Wallflower lowered her arms and stuck her hands in her pockets. This was new. Rainbow Dash hadn’t been this civil since before she knew who Wallflower was. She dug lightly at the ground with one of her toes. “Can I ask why?” she asked. She wasn’t willing to be optimistic just yet.
Ugh. Hasn’t anyone ever told you about gift horses, witch? “I like to climb,” Rainbow answered, truthfully. Just not completely. “Aaand I want you to take some radical pictures of me climbing that rock face for the yearbook,” she planted her hands on her hips.“That’s the deal. What do ya say?”
Wallflower’s eyebrows went up, but she hurried to nod. “Oh! Well, that makes sense,” she said. “Yeah, I can do that. Deal,” she said. She held out her hand, noticed that it was still covered in dirt, dusted it off on her jeans, and then held it out again.
“That was easy,” Rainbow said. She took Wallflower’s hand and gave it a crisp shake. “You really want those flowers, huh?” Expecting a sweaty and delicate handshake like Fluttershy’s, Rainbow was surprised to find that Wallflower’s grip was firm and steady. Weird.
“I do! They’re something special!” Wallflower confirmed.
Rainbow tilted her head. “What’s so special about them?”
The large grin that spread over Wallflower’s face said that there was a lot special about them. “Oh! W-well, that’s just it: I don’t know! A hiker my dad knows described them to me. I’ve never heard of anything like them! They’re rare, or unique, or something!” she gushed.
She started to say more, but caught herself and stopped. Her cheeks tinged red, and she glanced down and picked at her sweater. “I, uh, I know lots of flowers. The fact that I’ve never heard of these is special, really.”
“What did he tell you about them?” Rainbow asked. She was curious in spite of herself. Daring Do wouldn’t go after an artifact without knowing what it was, anyway. Gotta do my research!
Wallflower clasped her hands in front of her and bounced on the balls of her feet. “They’re climbers. They grow on vines, up a cliff face out in the Everfree. They’re sort of like Morning Glories”--she gestured toward the blue-and-violet climbers that were clambering up a nearby arbor--”but apparently they’re bigger, and come in more colors!” She grinned toothily, apparently very enthused at that prospect.
She leaned in and her voice grew hushed. “He also said that they react strangely to storms, too: Apparently, they change colors and sometimes spark? I’m not sure I believe him, but I have to see. I want some for my garden!” Still smiling, she leaned away to wait for Rainbow’s reaction.
Well, if Rainbow had thought this was some kind of plot before, she didn’t now.
Wallflower’s enthusiasm was definitely real, so there was something out there she wanted. She was even getting Rainbow kind of excited; these flowers sounded exceptionally cool. Who ever heard of a plant that sparked?
“Yeah, I guess that’s kind of special,” she said, feigning indifference. She brushed at her shoulder, dislodging imaginary dust. “When do you want to go?”
The question hung in the air for a moment while Wallflower pulled her phone from her back pocket. She checked something on it, then looked up. “Well, early in the day on Saturday seems best. It’s supposed to storm in the afternoon, but if we leave around six or seven we should be done and back before then.”
Rainbow stopped listening after saturday and nodded. “Saturday morning works for me. Should I pick you up, or. . .?”
Wallflower grabbed her own left arm and shuffled in place, digging at the dirt with her toe. “I can drive us, if you want. It’s a bit of a drive, but my car does pretty good on gas, and. . . Well, we might get a bit muddy. It’s been raining out at Everfree most of this week.”
While not exactly a clean freak, Rainbow was none too fond of the idea of two muddy girls climbing into her little coupe. Not when someone else’s car could take the hit. She nodded with a little more enthusiasm than was necessary. “Yeah!” She blinked, dialed back her enthusiasm, and tried again: “I mean, yeah, good point. You can drive.”
“Where should I pick you up?”
“I’m going to get breakfast, first. You know the Sweet Shoppe?”
Wallflower raised an eyebrow, blinked slowly, then nodded. “Um, yeah.”
Ignoring the sass, Rainbow nodded back. “How about there, at a little after six. That sound good?”
“That sounds great! I’ll see you there, then?” Wallflower asked, taking a half-step back toward the rosebush. It wasn’t quite a dismissal, but her intent was clear. She was ready for Rainbow to go.
Rainbow was all too happy to oblige. This garden still gave her the heebie jeebies. She turned on her heel and followed the trail back out of the clearing. “Yeah. Bye, Wallflower.”
“Goodnight, Rainbow Dash!” Wallflower called after her in a too-late attempt to part on friendlier terms.
Rainbow’s puffed up bravado deflated as soon as she rounded the corner out of view. She had half hoped that Wallflower would refuse, so that she could be justified in bailing on this little mission. With no such luck, Rainbow was now condemned to spend most of a perfectly good saturday with Wallflower frickin’ Blush.
Yay, me.
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Back in the garden, Wallflower knelt down next to the rosebush and scooped a little more dirt in place on the stem’s side, where it had begun to lean a little.
She packed the dirt in place, grabbed her watering can, and thoroughly wet the area around it. She patted the wet dirt firmly into place. There, all settled in. I’ll check on you tomorrow, little guy! Content, she straightened up and emptied the last of her watering can on the surrounding plants.
With the can empty, Wallflower glanced at the path where Rainbow had disappeared. She had seemed. . . well, not earnest, but at least honest.
Wallflower walked over to the garden shed, stored the watering can, and clicked the padlock into place. Turning, she leaned against the shed’s door, and looked at the garden. Her garden.
It was that beautiful time of day again. The late afternoon sunlight streamed in between the tree trunks and caught the garden’s various blooms, lighting the garden up like so many colored lights. Motes of dust and pollen swirled and danced in the air, illuminated by the glare.
Wallflower smiled. This was why she always stayed so late in the garden. She spent a long time just looking at the garden, enjoying the peace and quiet, occasionally making mental notes on things that needed trimmed or straightened up.
Her eyes fell on an empty arbor--the prospective home for the strange climbing flowers from the Everfree--and her thoughts again turned to Rainbow Dash.
What was that all about? Nothing but the cold shoulder for weeks, and now this? Wallflower dug at the ground with the toe of her shoe, staring intensely at the arbor. She was worried.
She wasn’t displeased--she was thrilled--but she wished she knew why. Rainbow’s attitude had turned in minutes. In Wallflower’s experience, that was usually a bad sign. She almost wanted to call it off.
The urge took her so strongly that she fumbled at her pocket for her phone, only to remember that she didn’t have Rainbow Dash’s phone number. She couldn’t call it off if she tried. Stifling a frustrating groan with her palm, she straightened up from the shed and kicked at a stick.
It sailed through the air and tumbled end-over-end through the dirt next to a stand of zinnias that Sunset Shimmer had helped Wallflower plant. Wallflower watched the pretty batch of flowers dance in the breeze.
Sunset Shimmer gave you a chance. Maybe Rainbow decided to, too? Wallflower tucked her chin and balled the hem of her sweater up in her hands. That was a nice thought. She would go with that.
For better or for worse, she would find out on Saturday.
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2
Vines & Flowers
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Spring mornings in Canterlot tended towards damp and chilly, and that Saturday morning was no exception.
When Wallflower woke, all but her face was wrapped up in blankets, and her nose was pink from the chill. The world outside of her blanket cocoon was cold and unforgiving, and she was loath to hatch into it.
But before she could talk herself into going back to sleep, her phone erupted with the chirping of birds. Ugh. She finagled an arm free from her cocoon and blindly felt for her phone on her bedside table.
Squinting blindly at the screen’s brightness, she struggled to make out the bleary numbers on the screen. 5:53. One message from Mom. Oh, crap! Spitting curses,Wallflower unrolled herself from her tangle of bedding and shambled over to her closet. She rubbed at her eyes while she fumbled for something to wear, raking hangers aside in broad clumsy motions.
After much digging, she finally pulled on a clean striped sweater and a pair of battered jeans. She took a minute to run a brush through her tangled bedhead and then took the stairs two-at-a-time down to the kitchen.
She stopped off in the kitchen just long enough to wish her mom a “Good morning!” and to snag her keys and backpack off of the counter. Then, she was out the door in a hurry, leaving the storm door to slam shut behind her.
She flung her bag in the back of her black hatchback, clambered into the driver’s seat, and then pulled the car out of the driveway. She held the steering wheel straight with her knee while she buckled her seatbelt.
Wallflower had overslept again. She would still be on time, but she looked awful and hadn’t brushed her teeth. It was a very Wallflower way to start the day, and she cursed herself for the thousandth time for never setting alarms. Great start, really. This is going to be great. She sighed and flicked the lever for her turn signal.
She rounded the corner--only just within the confines of the speed limit--onto Sweet Street. Up ahead, the Sweet Shoppe’s pink-striped awning promised coffee and sweet confections, which she hoped would help prop her up this morning.
It also promised Rainbow Dash, and Wallflower was still undecided on whether that was a good thing or a bad one. She had a list of excuses ready, just in case she needed to abort the mission and come back. I just hope I don’t need to use them. Rainbow can be vicious.
She parallel parked in front of the cafe’s scattering of outside tables and climbed out of her car. Waiting out front, Rainbow leaned against the wall to the left of the doors.
She had sunglasses on and a large steaming to-go cup of coffee cradled in her hands. Her hair was an unkempt disaster sticking out in multi-colored tufts, her jacket was on inside out, and her socks didn’t match. The look on her face was of utter misery.
Wallflower’s concerns about her appearance evaporated. Thank goodness Rainbow wasn’t a morning person. “Good morning!” she said. She waved and gave Rainbow a big smile. Just like we practiced, Wallflower! Way to go. You could almost pass for normal!
Rainbow just grunted, sipped her coffee, and shambled toward Wallflower’s car. “I’ll wait in the car,” she mumbled, then stifled a yawn. She held the coffee close to her chest, cradling the precious cargo as she crossed the sidewalk.
Wallflower could relate. Her eyelids were still gummed with sleep, and her mouth tasted foul. She was not ready for today, either. “I’ll be right back. I need coffee.”
Rainbow just nodded, climbed into the car, and leaned the seat all the way back.
The cafe was busy, but the time in line gave Wallflower time to think about what she would say to Rainbow. Should I apologize? Do we talk about what happened? It’s been months. Maybe we should just ignore it and try to move on?
She mumbled her order to the clerk at the counter, not really paying attention. She handed over a few bills, took her change, and rested against the counter while she thought it over. By the time the clerk called her name, she had decided; Just focus on having fun today. We’ll work everything else out later! Smiling to herself, she made her way back out to the car.
She climbed into the seat, stuck her coffee in the open cup holder, and glanced over at Rainbow. “Seatbelt!” she said. She prepared to face an argument, but Rainbow complied and buckled her seatbelt without a word.
Wallflower set the car into motion and then took a big drink from her coffee. Road trip! Honestly, this will be fun!
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This isn’t fun. Wallflower kept her eyes forward, not willing to look at Rainbow Dash. The line of traffic inched forward, and Rainbow bristled at the lack of progress.
They had been fine up until they’d gotten on the road out to Everfree. Some big accident had happened on the only road that headed in that direction, and traffic was down to one lane only.
Which meant what should have been a brisk and enjoyable road trip had turned into a long slow slog, during which Rainbow complained incessantly about: the delays, Wallflower’s taste in music, her cold coffee, and many other things besides.
“There’s like, not even any lyrics to this. Are they playing instruments, even?” Rainbow asked wheedlingly, her chin resting in her hand. The topic apparently had swapped back to Wallflower’s music taste.
The song--a steady lo-fi beat from one of Wallflower’s study playlists--was one of Wallflower’s favorites. And, no, aside from a digitized snare, they were not playing instruments. “No, and no. It’s just for kind of relaxing to, you know? Lyrics would be too much of a distraction.”
“Right, but, what’s the point? How do you play along or rock out to this?”
“You. . . you don’t. You just kind of. . . listen.”
“That’s--”
“Boring?”
“Yes!” Rainbow nodded emphatically. “Exactly. I mean, it’s just like. . . background music in a video game. It doesn’t do anything,” she said.
“It keeps the quiet away,” Wallflower said in an undertone. She turned down the volume on the radio. Not that the quiet could even get close with you around. She glanced at Rainbow Dash and resisted the urge to sigh. This was not going well.
Rainbow didn’t say anything. She was poking at her phone. To Wallflower’s immense relief, she pulled out a pair of headphones and jacked them into her phone. side from singing under her breath, she mostly fell silent.
Wallflower inched the car forward again.
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The traffic thinned out as they drew nearer to the Everfree. Eventually, Wallflower pulled off of the main road and onto a thin gravel path that Rainbow recognized as the Camp Everfree drive.
The trees that lined the driveway were alive with fresh leaves and the bright morning sunlight lit the whole place up in a brilliant wash of gold. Showers of ‘helicopter’ seeds spiraled to the ground around the car as a breeze blew over.
“Wow. Pretty,” Rainbow said, startling Wallflower. She had been silent for an hour, just nodding quietly to her music. She was looking at a stand of dogwoods in full bloom, their white petals dancing in the breeze.
“Yeah, isn’t it?” Wallflower rounded a corner and pulled the car up to a closed metal gate. She put the car in park, killed the engine, and climbed out. “Camp’s closed for another week or two, but we’re okay to hike. I think.”
Rainbow stowed her headphones and climbed out of the car. “You think?” she asked. She leaned against the side of Wallflower’s car and looked at her across the roof. Her eyebrows drew together in suspicion. “What does that mean?”
Stooping down to grab her bag out of the back hatch, Wallflower shrugged. “I actually have no idea. I’ve done it before. I don’t know if it’s allowed or not, but I have to get plants from somewhere.” She shouldered her backpack.
“Have you tried, I dunno, a store?” Rainbow asked, grabbing her own hiking bag from the car’s floorboard.
With a scoff, Wallflower locked her car and turned to walk off the trail and into the woods. “Don’t tell me Rainbow Dash is afraid to break the rules a little,” she goaded, slipping between two trees.
“As if!” Rainbow stepped through the trees after her, determined not to be shown up by Wallflower Blush of all people. They traipsed through the woods until they came to a tall chain link fence.
Without a word, Wallflower started to climb the fence.
Rainbow came to a stop at the base of it, watching Wallflower climb up and over. Once Wallflower dropped to the far side of the fence, Rainbow crossed her arms. “You know, I think this is the difference between trespassing and not trespassing.”
Wallflower stopped and looked at her through the fence. “Seriously?” she asked. “Aren’t you supposed to be some kind of big daredevil or something? Because I have no problems climbing this fence, but if you do, we can go back,” she said. She grabbed a handful of the chain link, as if to start climbing back up.
Once again, Rainbow couldn’t back down from a goad like that. She could not--would not--chicken out about something that didn’t stop Wallflower. It couldn’t be that illegal, right?
She started to climb. “No, we’re good,” she said. “I just wanted to make sure we were on the same page, here,” she went on. The fence swayed back and forth as she clambered over the top, then dropped down to the ground. She turned to face Wallflower, dusted off her hands, and gestured through the trees. “Shall we go?”
“Yeah, the quicker the better. We’re behind schedule already, if we want to beat the storm,” Wallflower said. She led the way further into the forest, until they came to a thin trail that she then followed.
Rainbow stayed close on her heels. “Storm? What storm?” She asked, glancing at the sky between the gaps in the canopy. There was a lot of cloud cover overhead, but it was mostly fluffy white stuff.
Turning to face Rainbow again, Wallflower raised an eyebrow. “Didn’t you listen to me yesterday?”
Caught off guard, Rainbow held out her hand and tilted it from side to side. “Eh. Kinda.”
Shaking her head, Wallflower sighed. “At least you’re honest,” she said. She patted her back pocket, where her phone was tucked away. “Weather forecast said late afternoon thunderstorms for the Everfree area. I figure we probably want to be back in the car before then.”
Can’t argue with that. Rainbow Dash nodded and kept pace, keeping her eyes on the back of Wallflower’s head. She had yet to do anything shady, but she also hadn’t done much to prove she wasn’t a villain anymore. She was just kind of weird and boring. This sucks.
Unlike the sparse woods behind Canterlot High where Wallflower’s garden was built, the Everfree was dense and deep. The canopy overhead was thick, letting only thin trickles of dancing light shine down through the gaps in the leaves. What little light did filter through was dim and greenish.
The place gave Rainbow an uneasy feeling--the same uneasy feeling it had during their school trip here--and so she stayed close to Wallflower. The weirdness of this place didn’t end with us beating that plant-witch, Gloriosa, that’s for sure. She watched as a large grey centipede clambered along a rotten log and shivered at the sight of its many wiggling legs.
For her part, Wallflower was unbothered. Spring had come in full force to the Everfree, and the faint trail they followed was lined with fresh blooms of wildflowers. As they danced in the breeze, the flowers filled the air with bright floral scents and so much pollen as to be visible in the frail beams of sunlight.
“Gosh, it’s beautiful here,” Wallflower muttered aloud as she moved along the trail. “See, those primrose? Oh, wow, that’s a big stand of goldenrod. You’re not allergic, are you? No? Good, that stuff dumps pollen like you would not believe,” Wallflower went on, and on.
She kept a running commentary of what flowers they saw as they proceeded, pointing out her favorites and calling Rainbow’s attentions to the most colorful specimens. It was the most Rainbow had ever heard her talk, and she was surprised to find that Wallflower’s constant calm chatter was oddly soothing.
Sure, Rainbow still didn’t feel good about the Everfree, but it seemed less spooky with Wallflower there brightly babbling away about every last flower, fern, and ficus she saw
At least, at first.
But, as they proceeded, the trees pressed closer around the fading trail. They came to the top of a hill overlooking the path deeper into the forest. It descended into a stretch of forest that seemed to grow ever more claustrophobic.
The canopy--thick enough to dim the sunlight before--was now blotting it out entirely. While not truly dark, the forest ahead was gloomy and dense. The glint of eyes occasionally flashed in the treetops, and the branches moved with almost sinister slowness.
To make matters worse, the wind had changed. Darker cloud cover was rolling in, and the smell of rain was heavy on the breeze. Rainbow glanced at Wallflower, her eyebrows raised in worry.
Already looking back at her, Wallflower fumbled with her back pocket. “I, uh, guess the storm’s ahead of schedule,” she said. She checked her phone, which miraculously still had a trace of signal. The forecast had indeed changed. “We’ve got about an hour, according to this,” she showed Rainbow the screen.
Nodding, Rainbow read the forecast and then groaned. That was a lot of rain. “Yikes. How far are we from these flowers?” she asked. She glanced along the trail, but saw no cliff in sight.
“I think we’re pretty close. He said that when the forest starts getting thick and dark, we’re almost there. Just keep following the trail,” Wallflower said. She pulled at the hem of her sweater, glancing back the way they’d come, and then at Rainbow. “If you want to go back, though, I don’t mind. We can go back.”
Rainbow looked back along the trail, and then down deeper into the forest. The trail wound around corners in either direction, and neither destination seemed any kind of close. It was tempting to go back--Rainbow was a solid climber, but she doubted even she could make it to the top of a cliff in a rain storm--but Rainbow had made a deal. She swallowed, and then shook her head.
“No, I think we should keep going. A deal’s a deal, right?” Clapping Wallflower on the shoulder, Rainbow gestured once more for her to lead the way. “I’m right behind you. Let’s get this flower,” she said.
Wallflower smiled at her and nodded. “Right.” She turned and set a brisk pace down the hill, deeper into the forest. They both moved faster, and Wallflower left her chatter about the various flora they came across for another time.
Curving back and forth, the trail took them ever deeper into the forest. Soon, the plants lining the path began to give way to odd and unfamiliar new flora. The trees had a strange blue-ish tinge to their bark, and some of them had knotholes that Dash would have sworn looked like faces. The forest was weird, here, and growing weirder by the minute.
“Wow! I’ve never seen a lot of these species before,” Wallflower admitted, eying a strange violet flower that almost seemed to recoil as she drew near to it. She reached a hand out to touch it, and the flower withdrew entirely within a woody outer stem. “Oh!” The sudden movement startled her so badly that she bounced back against Rainbow Dash, who caught and steadied her.
“Careful,” Rainbow warned. She had a funny feeling about these plants. She hadn’t seen these before, but she had seen ones like them once or twice; first at the Friendship Games, and again on an island while on spring break. Equestrian plants. Great.
Caution wasn’t usually in Rainbow’s nature, but almost being killed by giant plants twice in a year leaves a funny mark on a person. “Try not to touch them, if you can help it,” she advised.
“Right,” Wallflower agreed, though her tone suggested she very much did want to touch them. She hesitantly turned back to the trail.
The trail curved to the right and soon opened up into a large clearing. The middle of the clearing was dominated by a large and roughly square patch of brilliantly blue flowers, planted so densely that they completely covered the ground.
Wallflower gasped with delight at the sight of them. “Oh, wow!” She walked right up to the edge of the patch, but Rainbow hurried to catch her shoulder to keep her from wading into them. “They’re gorgeous! They almost look like lilies! Bigger, though, and so much blue!” Leaning down, she reached out to pick one.
“Woah, there!” Rainbow grabbed Wallflower’s other shoulder and kept her upright. “What did we just say?” She pulled Wallflower away from the plants.
She didn’t know if they were dangerous or not, but she did not want to take any extra chances with these equestrian plants. Sunset and Twilight aren’t here to help this time, and Wallflower isn’t going to save anyone if things get crazy. I’ve gotta be the hardened adventurer, here, like Daring Do.
“Right! Yeah, no touching. . .” Wallflower looked suitably abashed, and she backed up onto the trail.
She glanced down, and saw that the trail went perfectly around the edge of the big patch of flowers. It outlined the square and moved out of the clearing on the far side. “Even the trail goes around,” she pointed out. “It’s like someone planted them here, like a garden.”
Unwilling to let Wallflower stop again, Rainbow ushered her along the trail. “Yeah, that’s weird. Let’s get a move on, storm’s coming,” she reminded her. They circled around the strange blue garden, and Rainbow stayed close to Wallflower to make sure she didn’t try to grab anything else.
The blue flowers glowed in the dim light, and small puffs of blue pollen occasionally issued from them like little spray bottles. The wind whisked the blue puffs away each time, carrying the pollen across the tops of the plants and back down the trail in a stream of glittering air.
They seemed entirely too alive for Rainbow’s comfort. She kept a close eye on them and a light hand on Wallflower’s backpack as they moved along. Ugh. They give me the heebie jeebies. Weirdo flowers.
Wallflower really wanted one. Entranced, she stared at them as they circled around. “I think they’re bioluminescent! You see the blue reflection on the ground? That’s a glow! And look: they spray their pollen, like Axinaea! There’s no birds or pollinators, though. I wonder what the stimulus is? Rainbow, we should stop and cut--”
“If we have time on the way back, Wallflower, we will. Let’s get what we came here for, first, and not waste any time. Storm, remember?” Rainbow cut her off and leaned against the flower-girl’s backpack to keep her moving.
It took a little leverage, but Wallflower yielded and kept walking. They rounded the last corner and left the clearing behind. Rainbow finally let go of Wallflower’s backpack and moved to walk alongside her.
“We close?” she asked, trying to catch a glimpse of the sky overhead. She couldn’t see much sky, but what she saw was grey and the treetops were dancing alarmingly in the wind. “Because the storm sure is.”
Wallflower didn’t answer at first, but then the trees up ahead thinned out and they moved into a looming shadow. “I think we’re here!” Wallflower pointed through the tree trunks.
Ahead, a grey wall of rock rose at a steep angle toward the sky, with the top lost somewhere not far above the canopy. A blanket of creeping vines covered the cliff’s face, hiding most of the stone behind leaves and tendrils. Various wildflowers grew at the cliff’s base. No flowers grew on the cliff face, though. Not as far as Rainbow could see.
Much to her annoyance. “Where are they?” Rainbow asked, breaking from the path to walk up to the cliff. “All I see are vines and regular old flowers, Wallflower,” she complained. “I thought you said they grow on the cliff?”
Wallflower walked up alongside her and shaded her eyes. Craning her neck, she pointed skyward. “Oh, crap. I think that’s them way up there.”
Far above, almost lost in the watery gray light from the overcast sky, were bright specks of color sprouting from the highest vines. There were dozens of them, but they all sprouted from within a few feet of the top of the cliff.
It wasn’t the highest cliff in the Everfree--Rainbow had climbed that one last summer--but it was a dizzying climb, and the way the flowers and trees were dancing in the wind didn’t fill her with confidence. The wind up there was strong already, and the storm hadn’t even started yet.
Not to mention that Jagged Bluff has permanent climbing protection in place. I bet there’s not so much as a rusty old piton on this sucker.
There was a cough to her left, and Rainbow glanced over to see that Wallflower seemed to share her concerns. She was wringing her hands as she stared up at the flowers. Glancing between the cliff and Rainbow, she shook her head. “I had no idea they were that high. This is too much. I’ll figure out something else, okay? Let’s just grab those blue flowers and--”
Any thought of backing off melted from Rainbow’s mind. She thinks I can’t do this? Pfft. “Too much?” she scoffed. She took a step forward toward the cliff and unshouldered her bag. She dropped it on the ground in front of the cliff and eyed a few paths up. The vines made it hard to see good handholds in the rock, but. . . “I can do this, no sweat.”
“Rainbow Dash, no!” It was Wallflower’s turn to grab Rainbow and hold her back. “They’re flowers. Definitely not worth risking your life over. Let’s just go!” She pleaded, trying to leverage her backwards. This is not how to make friends! Images of Rainbow dashed against the rocks danced in her mind, and she shook them loose with a fierce shake of her head.
Rainbow was stopped and spun around by the force of Wallflower’s grasp on her shoulder.
She steadied herself against a tree, and then she grinned devilishly at Wallflower. “Take it easy! I got this. You just get that camera out, because this is going to be so awesome!” she said. Then she shrugged out of Wallflower’s grasp and turned back toward the cliff.
She made it three steps before Wallflower caught up to her and stopped her again. This time, though, Wallflower had her backpack off her shoulders and open. “Fine, if you’re going up there, you’ll need this stuff,” she said. She pulled her camera out, then handed over the whole bag.
Inside the bag were a handful of gallon-sized ziploc bags and a big pair of old-fashioned gardening shears. The cutting edge of the clippers gleamed, razor thin and freshly sharpened.
Rainbow blinked, and then slowly looked up at Wallflower. “You realize this bag is like, really creepy, right? You didn’t bring me out here to harvest my organs, or something, did you?” she said, grimacing.
Wallflower stopped cold and stared intensely at Rainbow with her eyes wide and her face blank, but said nothing. Then, she took an ominous step forward.
“Um,” Rainbow’s stomach grew tense, and she took a step back. Crap. She is a witch! “Look, Wall--”
Wallflower burst out laughing and shook her head. “Ha! No, but you should’ve seen how big your eyes just got! Oh my gosh, I wish I could’ve got that for the yearbook!” She looked down and flipped the power ‘on’ for her camera. She pointed the camera at Rainbow Dash, who was now glaring at her. She laughed again, and snapped a picture. “That’ll do, too!” she teased, lowering the camera.
Rainbow shook her head, her cheeks red, and waved the camera away. “Not funny, psycho,” she grumbled. “Seriously, though,” she reached into the bag and picked up the shears. “What’s with these?”
Wallflower’s face straightened, but she kept smiling. “They were my grandmother’s. They work really good on tough vines and rose bushes. I thought we might need them to cut the vines, and I figured you were less likely to fall off the cliff cutting flowers than trying to snap the stems.”
“And the bags?”
“Uh, to put the flowers in? Rainbow, are you serious with this?” Wallflower crossed her arms. She had egged on the joke, but she wasn’t really amused at the suggestion. “If I were out to harvest your organs, why on earth would I give you the shears? Why would I use shears? I’d never get organs out in one piece like that.” Leaving Rainbow behind, she moved back away from the cliff and got the camera ready.
Good points. Rainbow opened and closed the shears experimentally. The rasp of the steel-on-steel made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. They were very sharp. She stuck them back in the bag, zipped it shut, and shouldered it. “Alright, I’m going up!” she called after Wallflower.
Rainbow spotted a clear spot at the base of the cliff, where the shrubbery was sparse and there were gaps in the vine cover.
She could see a vertical crack that ran up the cliff for much of the ascent, though it stopped about halfway up. Branching off from the crack were numerous ledges that looked to be good handholds. Where the crack ended, some thick vines clung to the rock face. They looked strong and well-anchored enough to hold her, if she shimmied along them.
“I see a way up!” she called, and then stepped forward.
The early stage of the climb was easy enough. She bouldered up the rubble that had fallen at the cliff’s base, then clambered short stretches of five-to-ten feet up to a short rock-shelf.
The camera clicked below, and Rainbow glanced down to see the pale green oval of Wallflower’s face staring up at her. She flashed a thumbs up and a big cocky grin, and Wallflower took another picture. Good job. Hold up your end of the bargain.
Rainbow looked up. The crack she needed was another five feet up, but there was a good-looking handhold at head height. She grabbed hold, planted her foot on a cluster of vines, and pushed off.
She snagged her free hand in the bottom of the vertical crack, brought her foot up to a thick vine, and gave another shove to push herself up. Repeating that routine, she clambered up the face of the cliff.
Wallflower called out from below, her voice growing fainter as Rainbow ascended. “You’re doing great, Rainbow! Be careful!” She followed it up with a chorus of camera clicks.
She’d never admit it, but Rainbow found the encouragement helpful.
As she drew near to the top of the crack, the vines encroached on the handholds in the rock, squeezing into every little crevice and taking up valuable finger-space. More than once she had to stop and peel vines loose so she could fit her fingers on a ledge to keep climbing. “Hate you, vines,” she grumbled.
Eventually, she reached the halfway point. The crack came to a narrow end, and a clump of thick vines--almost as big around as small tree trunks--crowned the crack and blocked her ascent. They covered the rock so closely, she couldn’t even see it.
Rainbow secured her footing, locked one hand in place, and leaned back from the crack to check out the stretches of wall on either side of her. To her left was a sheet of rock, acutely angled and worn smooth by wind and water without a handhold in sight. To her right, a bowl-shaped indentation in the cliff face where a chunk of rock had long-since broken free to leave an open void.
She reached in vain for the nearest visible handholds, but her arms weren’t long enough. Crap. Heck. Crapping heck. She settled back into a safe position and rested up against the rock. Craning her neck around to look down at Wallflower, she took a deep breath. “I’m stuck,” she hollered down.
“What?!” Wallflower shouted back. The camera slipped loose from her fingers and fell down to dangle around her neck. “What do you mean ‘stuck’?” Staring up at her, Wallflower rushed up closer to the cliff’s base.
“There’s no easy way up from here, and I can’t see any way over either,” Rainbow said. “Can you see anything from down there?”
Wallflower picked up the camera, again, and adjusted the zoom. She could see the large dark green vines just above Rainbow’s head. A few feet above them was a small ledge, maybe enough for Rainbow to stand on, if she could just get to it.
“What about the vines above you?” she called out. “Can you use them?”
I was hoping you wouldn’t say that. Rainbow eyed the vines with distaste. She had good reason not to trust vines, beyond the simple rock climbing reason of ‘don’t trust plants to hold your weight’. “I don’t know. It’s just a plant! I’m pretty heavy!”
Wallflower shrugged. “Well, those vines are huge. They can’t be light, either! Just pull on them and see if they feel sturdy. If they’re not safe, I think you’ll have to come back down.”
“Well, I’m not doing that,” Rainbow muttered to herself. Sighing, she reached up to grab hold of the vine. She recoiled immediately. “Ew! It’s kind of. . . warm? Gross.” She grabbed it again and pulled on the vine. Then, she yanked on it. Finally, she leaned all of her weight against it. The vine didn’t so much as shift.
“Well, it does seem sturdy,” she admitted. It just needs to hold me for a second. Just long enough to reach the next hold.
“I’m going to try them!” Leaning to her left, she bunched up her arms and knees and then pushed off hard. She launched herself up, snagged the vine in her right hand, planted her left foot against the inside of the crack, and quickly hoisted herself over the vines. The next ledge was narrow, but not too narrow for her to wedge her butt onto it for a rest.
The camera clicked down below, and Rainbow waved at Wallflower. “Good eye, Wallflower. You got me out of a jam!” she called. Then she relaxed back against the wall for a moment, panting to catch her breath.
The wind picked up and Wallflower’s reply was lost in the sound of the leaves dancing in the gale. Rainbow could see her mouth moving, though, and could see her pointing above Rainbow’s head.
She glanced up. The flowers she sought were only another ten or so feet above, whipping wildly atop their vines in the wind. Wallflower’s words might have been lost, but her meaning was clear; Almost there.
Rainbow nodded and held out a thumbs-up--which she only hoped Wallflower could make out from down there--and then clambered back to her feet on the narrow ledge. The stone up here was a mixed blessing--it was heavily cracked and pockmarked this high up, and handholds were everywhere. The downside was that many of the handholds looked to be in loose sections of stone, or were simply crumbling away.
Climbing more carefully now, she tested each hold to make sure the stone wouldn’t give away as she ascended the final stretch. The wind tore at her but it wasn’t strong enough yet to do much more than flap the hood of her jacket back and forth, so she paid it no mind other than to climb faster.
The smell of rain was heavier on the air now, and she could feel a static energy that set her hair on end. A faint rumble of thunder in the distance announced the storm was growing closer by the minute, and with each fresh complication Rainbow’s excitement grew. This really was pretty awesome, just like something out of a Daring Doo book. She better be getting good pictures down there.
With one last hoist, she pulled herself up a ledge and rested at face-level with the flowers.
They were large--about as big around as Rainbow’s palms--and they were all, to a one, closed. But as Rainbow looked on, the sky overhead rumbled faintly with thunder. The wind kicked up, carrying rain with it, and droplets of rain splashed across some of the blooms closest to Rainbow.
On contact with the rain, the flowers bloomed. Each of the six large petals unfurled--red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple--revealing three large green stamens and a beautiful rainbow pattern. Small sparks of what looked like blue electricity jumped between the stamens, as if they were charged with the same energy as the clouds far above.
“Wow.” She watched them, open-mouthed. Wallflower hadn’t been kidding. These plants were something special. She took a moment to take in the spectacle, transfixed. Until a thought occurred to her.
“Wow,” she said again, annoyed this time. She glared at the flowers. “Way to jack my freakin’ style, flowers. Seriously,” she grumbled and brushed her hair out of her eyes. She unzipped Wallflower’s bag, retrieved the shears, and started snipping flowers off of the vine. Tucking each of them into a separate ziploc bag, she sealed them all away and stuffed them in the backpack.
She glanced down once more to see Wallflower Blush’s face looking up at her. Unlike before, Wallflower was jumping up and down and pointing desperately at something, though her words were lost in the storm.
“What?!” Rainbow hollered.
A mighty gust of wind tore past and rocked her in place, but then the gale settled. In that second of calm, Wallflower tried again, shouting desperately over the sound of the storm. “Rainbow! Rainbow, look out! It’s moving!”
“What’s moving?” Rainbow shifted on the ledge so that she could look straight down, and immediately wished she hadn’t.
Below her, slithering up the rock face like some kind of horrifying gravity-defying snake, was the heavy green vine she had used to ascend earlier. It was still out of reach, but it was moving alarmingly fast.
“Oh, come on! I knew it!” She shouldered the backpack and stuffed the shears into her back pocket as she started to clamber down. Always with the vines! Equestrian vines are evil! How do they live with these things around?
Unfortunately, the tangle of hostile vines had home court advantage. She had scarcely scrambled ten feet down the cliff when the vines started to draw near. “Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap!” Rainbow babbled. Risking sketchy footholds, she dropped recklessly from one perch to another in order to keep up her downward momentum and stay out of the creature’s reach.
A particularly fast vine crossed a gap in the rocks to grab at Rainbow’s wrist, but a heavy rock thunked off of the side of the vine and knocked it loose just before it reached her. The vine reached for her again, but another rock hit the stone just in front of it and it recoiled with a sickening hiss.
Rainbow looked down to see Wallflower scooping up rocks to chuck at the vines in a desperate attempt to keep them at bay. Her aim was pretty good, and the delay as the vine fell back was just enough for Rainbow to clamber down to an easier section of the wall.
I owe her an apology. Maybe a bunch of apologies.. Eager to open up more space, Rainbow spotted a ledge some four feet below. She took a deep breath, shifted herself in line with it, and let go.
She slid down the rock face for a terrifyingly long second and then landed hard on the ledge. She twisted her ankle on impact, but she had gained a big chunk of distance from the vines.
“Ow! Oh, crap that hurt!” she shouted, clinging to the rocks to steady herself. She lingered briefly, clinging to the wall and keeping her weight off of her ankle, but she had to move. The vines were still moving overhead, and they were much better at climbing than she.
The crack that she had climbed up to get here was just to her right. Halfway! She clambered down to it and started dropping from handhold to handhold in a desperate scramble. She was moving dangerously fast, but her hands were practiced and she trusted her instincts as she almost slid down the wall.
But she wasn’t fast enough. She looked up just as one of the heavier vines dropped itself loose and swung wildly at her.
It slammed into her shoulder and sent her spinning against the wall, hanging on by one arm. Her backside bounced hard off of the rocks, knocking the shears out of her pocket and sending them tumbling to the ground. “I dropped the shears!” she shouted, absurdly, as she dangled above oblivion. Why? Why am I worried about the shears?!
She watched Wallflower dive to the side to keep from being impaled by the falling shears, and then grunted with effort as she hoisted herself back up against the cliff.
She glanced up, where the vine was coiling up for another strike. There would be no hanging on this time. She glanced down and groaned at the remaining distance. She was still too high to jump safely. No need to panic. We’ll just--
The telltale whiff! of the vine striking out came sooner than she expected. Guess I’m jumping! “Crapbaskets!” She pushed off from the wall and out into the open air.
The vine struck the wall with a meaty thunk and then deflected down the cliffside. As she started to fall, Rainbow shouted in defiance and grabbed at the only thing within reach that could slow her down--the vine.
She dug her fingers in and tore gouges into the vine’s flesh as she slid down it like a big thrashing fireman’s pole. Her fall slowed but she still hit the ground hard and rolled to a stop atop a pile of stones.
She wheezed and spluttered, seeing stars dance around her head, but she didn’t think anything had broken. Well, except for maybe all of her fingernails--they burned like fire, and she was afraid to look at them. “T-that sucked,” she gasped. She rolled off of her back and struggled onto all fours as she tried to get her air back.
“Rainbow, move!” Wallflower shouted, and Rainbow threw herself forward--a moment too late.
One of the vines had coiled around her ankle, and it jerked her backward like a fish on a line. She flopped hard against the rocks. “Oh, come on!” she wheezed, once again breathless. “Let go!”
Scrabbling for a handhold, her fingers caught the edge of a large flat slab of stone and she stopped the vine from dragging her any further. Desperate to loosen the vine’s stranglehold, she kicked wildly at it with her free leg. The vine simply entangled it, too, lashing her ankles together with terrifying strength. Okay, now we panic! “No, no! Wallflower, help!”
Wallflower dove past her and the shears gleamed in the light as she slammed them down on the thrashing green vine. The blade cut deep, but not through. Grunting with effort, Wallflower threw her weight against the blades again. With a sickening crunch--somewhere between breaking bone and snapping celery--she broke through the vine.
The creature thrashed and let out a horrific hiss as the end of its vine went limp. Kicking her legs, Rainbow wriggled out of the loosened coils and scrambled onto her hands and knees. She tried to stand, but she couldn’t put weight on her ankle; it buckled under her and sent her sprawling down the stones when she tried.
Wallflower slid down the rocks just behind her and hoisted Rainbow up. Her eyes were wide and she looked fit to panic. “Come on, run! It’s still coming!” she urged. She grabbed Rainbow’s hand and dragged her away from the cliff. Even with Rainbow’s limp, they made it to the treeline back just as they heard the heavy whumph! of an impact behind them.
The sound of the plant-thing moving behind them--its vines latching wildly onto trees to drag the heavy mass at its center along--was terrifying. Thwap! Thwap! Thwap! Skkshh. Thwap! Thwap! Thwap! And it was gaining fast.
They rounded the corner into the clearing where the field of blue flowers waited and sprinted toward them. When they reached the edge, Rainbow plowed straight into them. Remembering Rainbow’s earlier warning, Wallflower hesitated before she followed.
The moment of hesitation was all the plant-thing needed. A heavy blow slammed into Wallflower’s shoulders, knocking her forward. She fell hard against Rainbow’s back and they both collapsed as Rainbow’s ankle gave way. Tumbling together through the blue flowers, they landed in a tangle of limbs in the center of the clearing. The flowers nearest them sprayed pollen skyward, filling the air above them with blue dust while they struggled to separate.
A single tendril snaked through the air above the flowers and reached for Wallflower, but Rainbow was quicker. She staggered to her feet and pinned the grasping vine to the ground. Wobbling on her bad ankle, she managed to pin it long enough for Wallflower to get to her feet and start running again. As soon as Wallflower was clear, Rainbow leapt away from the pinned vine and ran after her.
The blue flowers sprayed their glittering pollen out in thick clouds as the girls ran through, filling the whole clearing. Clinging to their rain-wet skin like so much blue flour, the pollen had coated them from head to toe by the time they made it to the other side.
They crossed the edge of the clearing and Rainbow paused to look back while Wallflower ran on.
The plant-thing had stopped dead in its pursuit on the far side of the blue flowers. Its vines reached after them, blindly feeling in the air above the flowers, but it didn’t seem to want to cross the clearing. She glanced down at herself, coated in the blue pollen, and back at the hesitant plant-thing. Was it afraid of the flowers?
That’s probably not a good sign, is it? Rainbow grimaced. Still, content that the plant-thing wouldn’t be pursuing them, she turned and jogged to catch up with Wallflower. We’ll worry about the blue gunk when we’re safe at home.
Wallflower didn’t stop running until she reached the top of the hill that marked the border between the normal Everfree forest and whatever Equestrian nightmare they had just left behind.
She staggered to a stop there and leaned heavily against a tree, taking deep heaving breaths. Rainbow trotted to a stop just behind her, breathing hard, and threw out an arm to lean against the same tree. They stood there, silent but for their effortful breaths, until they were able to breathe easily again.
Thunder rumbled overhead, fresh rain trickled in from the canopy, and the leaves overhead sang a whispering chorus as the straight-line winds of the storm front buffeted over them. At last, the storm had arrived.
Rainbow Dash laughed--a soft giggle that built into a full laugh--and soon Wallflower joined her. Leaning into one another, the two of them broke out into riotous laughter. They both collapsed against the tree, gasping occasionally for breath as the rain intensified.
They rested against the tree, mostly sheltered from the water, until they were only occasionally quaking with aftershocks of laughter.
“That. . . that was. . .” Rainbow began, in a vain effort to find the right words amidst the laughter.
Wallflower was quicker. “Let me guess; Awesome?” Wallflower asked. She pushed off of the tree to stand up properly.
Rainbow nodded and pumped her arm in the air. “Frickin’ sick! That was like the coolest thing! We were like Daring Do! The way you slashed that vine, and I stomped that other one out!” she gushed. She slapped her hands to her cheeks and squished them together. “You were awesome! I was totally awesome!”
“Humble, too,” Wallflower said. She offered Rainbow her hand. Taking it, Rainbow let Wallflower help her stand up. She swayed on her bad ankle, but Wallflower steadied her.
“The most humble-est,” Rainbow agreed and moved to take the lead as they made their way back to the car. She paused after a few steps to give Wallflower a sincere smile. “Seriously, though: quick thinking with those shears back there. I think you saved my life.”
“Nah,” Wallflower said. Smirking, she motioned vaguely at Rainbow’s midsection. “Probably just your dignity. That plant seemed to like you,” she said.
“Oh, ew! Jeez!” Rainbow recoiled, but laughed all the same. “That’s gross!” She gave Wallflower a playful nudge in the ribs with her elbow, then scooted out of her reach. “Besides, it grabbed you too! Maybe you’re why it was after us! It could tell how much you love plants.”
Snorting, Wallflower swatted the air near Rainbow. “Okay, first of all, I don’t love plants romantically--”
“--And I quote; ‘I’m not lonely, I have plants!’”
“Oh, geez. Will you let that go? You’re making me wish for the memory stone back.”
Rainbow frowned. “Okay, that’s not funny.”
“It’s kind of funny,” Wallflower smiled and motioned for Rainbow to keep walking.
They made pretty good time back to the fence, but the storm pelted them with rain the whole way. They were soaked to the bone, and the blue stuff seemed to grow ever stickier the more it got wet, but their spirits were still high.
The fence was the last great obstacle. Rainbow’s ankle wasn’t strong enough to hoist her weight up the chainlink, so Wallflower climbed alongside her and helped her clamber over the top, then lowered her easily to the ground on the other side.
Ducking against the driven rain, they hurried back to Wallflower’s car and ducked inside. They shut the doors behind them and sat there, soaked, battered, and blue, for some time.
“What a trip,” Wallflower finally said, and then buckled her seatbelt.
Rainbow laughed. “Understatement of the year,” she shook her head and buckled her own seatbelt. “Let’s get out of here.”
Wallflower put the car in reverse and pulled it out onto the road.
❀ ❀ ❀
3
❀ ❀ ❀
“I hope this blue crap doesn’t stain my hair,” Rainbow complained, raking her fingers through her bangs and coming away with fingernails full of blue pollen.
Wallflower glanced over, equally coated in the stuff, and shrugged. “I’m surprised you’re worried about your hair. I didn’t think that was your thing,” she said.
Rainbow scoffed. “It doesn’t matter if it’s clean, dirty, brushed, or messy. But if it’s not rainbow, we have a problem.” She shook her head. “Can you imagine me with blue hair? What would you call me then? Blue Dash? No thanks, totally not awesome,” she said, still scraping at her head.
“It is kind of your trademark. Very eye-catching,” Wallflower agreed. She guided the car into a turn lane and tapped her chin. “I wonder if I would’ve had less problems being remembered if I had brighter hair, too.”
“Ha! Well, if you want me to help you dye your hair, I will. Not rainbow, though. Like you said, my trademark.”
Wallflower laughed and shook her head. “No, no that’s okay. Not gonna change my appearance for attention. I’ll figure it out the hard way,” she said. “I like me.”
“Me, too,” Rainbow said, softly. She glanced at Wallflower.
Wallflower heard, and they shared a smile. Then, Wallflower sighed. “Wish I could’ve got one of those blue flowers, though. They were pretty. Instead I just got enough pollen samples to kill a thousand allergy sufferers.”
Rainbow grimaced. “Well, I would say ‘next time’, but I’m hoping we don’t have another trip to Everfree for a while. That was. . . well, it was awesome, but that place is scary every time.”
“I feel like ‘scary’ doesn’t do it justice. I don’t know if I’ll ever trust vines again.” Wallflower shivered as the image of the plant-thing clambering up the cliff toward Rainbow replayed in her head.
“You won’t. I haven’t trusted vines since the Friendship Games, and it just keeps getting worse,” Rainbow confirmed. “This is like the third time I’ve run into evil vines. I’m cursed.”
Wallflower laughed as the car trundled to a stop in front of Rainbow’s house.
“Here you are, home sweet home,” Wallflower said, throwing the car into park. Rainbow started to get out. Seized by a sudden reluctance to see Rainbow leave, Wallflower pointed into the passenger side floorboard. “Wait, hold on, let’s look at these flowers we almost died for!”
“Oh, right!” Rainbow leaned down, unzipped the backpack and pulled one of the bagged flowers out. The large rainbow-petaled climber was still bright and colorful, though the sparks that had danced on the stamens had ceased. “Here ya go. They’re really pretty, aren’t they?” she asked.
Wallflower gasped and clapped her hands together with a grin. “Yeah, they are! Wow, they’re actually prettier than I even imagined!” she said. She glanced at Rainbow and pointed at the flower.“They’re not from around here, are they?”
“Probably not,” Rainbow confirmed. Most of the other plants that had been growing out there were Equestrian in nature, so the rainbow flower likely was too. Maybe there’s a portal out there, like there was out on the island? Before she could voice the thought, Wallflower shifted in her seat.
Grinning devilishly, she plucked the bagged flower out of Rainbow’s hands. “We should name them!” She looked too excited. “If they’re ‘not from here’, they probably don’t have a name here, so we get to pick!”
Rainbow grinned back. “How about ‘awesome rainbow zap flowers’?” she suggested, pulling another one of them out of the bag. “They got all sparky when the storm rolled in.”
Wallflower’s crafty grin didn’t fade. “We could. . . but I had an idea.” Her shoulders shook with a suppressed laugh, and if anything her grin grew.
Rainbow made a twirling ‘get on with it’ motion with her hand. “Lay it on me,” she said.
“Well, they’re rainbow flowers. . .” Wallflower began.
“Yes?” Rainbow raised an eyebrow at her.
“. . . and they grow on walls. . .”
Rainbow’s face fell. “. . .No.”
Wallflower’s grin was massive and utterly cheesy. She nodded once.
“Ugh. Ugh. I’m leaving. Let me out, I’m leaving, this is over.” Rainbow pulled the handle and pushed the car door open.
“Oh, come on! It’s perfect!” Wallflower protested, still grinning madly.“I’m absolutely labeling them that in the garden,” she insisted.
“Never speak to me again,” Rainbow joked. Stifling a laugh, she clambered out of the car. She paused before she shut the door, though, and leaned back in.“Um,” she lingered, leaning against the car as she searched for the right words. Crap. I hate sappy stuff. What do I even say?
Wallflower raised an eyebrow at her. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing wrong! Just--I did have fun,” Rainbow admitted, as much to herself as to Wallflower.“This was really cool. You’re cool. And I hope you like the flowers.”
Now, Wallflower beamed. Her whole face lit up in surprise and she gave the biggest smile Rainbow had ever seen her wear. “Thanks, Dash. And, I love the flowers. They’re awesome. Maybe even radical.”
Rainbow snorted, nodded, started to say something more, then shook her head and ducked out of the car. Enough sappy crap for one night. “G’Night!” She turned and jogged up to her front door, smiling the whole way.
“Good night!” Wallflower called after her.
The car door swung closed with a thunk!, and Wallflower couldn’t stop grinning as she shifted the car into drive and pulled away from the curb.
What a trip!
❀ ❀ ❀
Wallflower carried her backpack into the house and laid it out on her desk.
She pulled the flowers out, unbagged one of them, and lowered its viney stem into a vase filled with water. On contact with the water, the flower’s stamens flickered with a faint blue spark of energy, and the petals twitched and opened wider. These are amazing! She stared at it, awestruck.
Her phone buzzed twice in her pocket before she could walk away, and she pulled it out to check the message. It was from a number she didn’t know, but the message made it pretty clear who it was from.
She grinned at the sight of it, and had to press her knuckle into her mouth to keep from laughing.
Rainbow Dash had sent a picture of herself. She was still raking blue pollen out of her hair in front of the bathroom mirror, with a big pile of the stuff in the sink already. She had scraped it away from her eyes, too, creating two small circles of lighter blue skin in the middle of her face.
She looked absurd.
‘Hey, Wallflower!
This blue crap is like glue, I think the rain made it all sticky. Good luck with your hair, you’re gonna need it. I’m going to be here all *night*.
I got your number from Sunset! I just wanted to say that this was a *real* adventure! I’ll garden with you any time. If you have another job like that one--or you just want to grab a soda or something--give me a call! Don’t be a stranger!
Oh, and I totally left my freaking hiking bag at the base of the cliff. Bummer, right? I’m just gonna chalk that one up as a loss. The vines can keep it.
Talk soon!
-R.D.’
Wallflower pressed the phone to her chest and bounced on the balls of her feet, glowing with delight. She wasn’t sure, but she was pretty sure she had made a friend. A friend she very much wanted to see again, and soon.
She read the message and then re-read it, struggling to decide how best to reply. She wanted to sound cool, or at least clever, but she was drawing a blank. Glancing around the room for inspiration, her eyes eventually settled on the vase again.
She grinned, struck by sudden inspiration, and yanked open her desk drawer. She pulled out a roll of masking tape and a marker, then tore off a strip of tape. She scrawled the name she’d come up with earlier onto the tape and plastered it to the side of the vase.
Wallflower picked her phone back up, centered the vase in the camera, and snapped a photo. She added a quick caption and sent it to Rainbow Dash. With her job done, she shrugged out of her blue-stained sweater and made for the nearest shower, whistling a Rainbooms song.
‘Hey, yourself, Rainbow!
I named our flowers! I hope you like what I picked!
Call me tomorrow! We’ll hang out and see whose hair looks worse! :)
-W.B.’
❀ ❀ ❀
Rainbow Wallflowers
❀ ❀ ❀
