Rainbow made a discouraged frown and tapped her palette apprehensively. She glanced at the clock, back at the unfinished face on her painting's subject, then back at the clock. Fifteen minutes til pickup. This type of inefficiency was horribly out of character for her.
She was normally completely unflappable in her work. Her brush would hit the canvas and the only thing that kept it from leaving scorch marks were frequent whips through the air to be dunked in a new color of chilled paint. Speed. That was the gift with which Rainbow had been created, and it had served her masterfully time and again. This was the first work order in which it was failing her.
Then again, this was also the first work order that demanded a detailed depiction of her Source.
Rainbow set down her supplies and began pacing her tiny home apprehensively. If she shared her Source's wings, she'd no doubt be flying apprehensively instead. But she didn't. Rainbow tried not to think about whether being comparatively less was a good or bad thing. Most days she tried not to think about herself at all.
Work orders. Those were more comfortable things to give attention. The mail delivered the requests one day and left with Rainbow's work the next. Payment usually followed a few weeks afterwards. Auction proceeds, maybe? Her cut of the appraised final work? Rainbow was never sure, and she didn't ask. Canterlot ponies needed their portraits, the gazette needed to sell ad space, and Rainbow needed a way to make money without showing herself to anyone. The setup had worked well for her going on two years now. It had just so happened that yesterday someone finally requested a picture of Rainbow Dash.
A picture that the mailmare was going to be here to pick up in ten minutes.
Sighing, Rainbow crossed back across the room, but didn't pick up her palette again. Not right away. Instead she prodded a drawer open with her nose and very gingerly rummaged around for something she hadn't used in awhile, but was glad she kept: a small vanity mirror.
She'd dug it out of a dumpster not long after fleeing to this small town. It was a robust little thing with a small prop on the back. Perhaps it was originally meant to help a strapping young stallion trim his stubble. Rainbow had gotten it to help comb the messy mane she’d inherited. Today though, its job would be giving Rainbow the reference she needed to finish a certain face.
Palette firmly back on her hoof where it belonged, Rainbow chomped the end of the brush and gave her reflection a false but cocky grin. Cockier. Cockier. Nah, too cocky. Drop those eyebrows. Look more self-assured than arrogant. Look like you're the most athletic pegasus in Equestria and you know it. Like you're the untouchably best, coolest, most one-of-a-kind...
Rainbow's expression wavered slightly.
Like you think you're the most one-of-a-kind pony there is. Yeah, there you go. There's the bold, confident aura of Rainbow Dash. Hold that pose. Just for a minute. Just for one more second. And....
"Done!"
Rainbow exhaled for the first time in what felt like minutes. Her breath rippled the paint on the canvas, but only slightly. She used fast-drying acrylic because of course she did. Only the speediest of supplies for the speediest of artists. Rainbow was a young professional, and young professionals always delivered. Even if the work's subject was the single most unsettling thing in the world to the one making it.
A tentative knock sounded on Rainbow's door and this time her responding smile was genuine. That'd be the mail, right on time. The worker who serviced Rainbow's neighborhood was an older sort. A stoic griffon who said so little that Rainbow didn't even know his name. He'd never asked hers either though, nor did he seem to recognize her copied face. All he ever did was occasionally grunt in greeting.
Rainbow considered him her closest friend.
"Got another outgoing piece," Rainbow announced jovially as she pressed a stamp onto the upper corner of her commission and balanced it on her withers. "But what else is new, right?" She crossed her studio with the prize in tow, then fumbled to push open her front door.
Rainbow blinked.
Spike the dragon blinked too.
"Dash? What the hay are you doing all the way out here in Rockville?"
Rainbow let out a panicked shriek. Or would have, if the air hadn't immediately left her lungs after seeing the drake loitering on her doorstep. Spike. The personal assistant of Princess Twilight Sparkle. The real Mane Six had finally found her.
Rainbow's forgotten painting clattered to the cheap tile floor, though that noise was overtaken by the overwhelming thud of Rainbow slamming her door in the dragon’s face and throwing her entire weight against the flimsy rosewood. Unfortunately for Rainbow, her existential terror robbed her of the awareness that her home's door opened outward, so in an instant she was sprawled on the front porch. Too terrified to be embarrassed or even register Spike’s dumbfounded staring, Rainbow scrambled back inside, slammed her door again, and bit back bile rising in her throat.
How in Tartarus had this happened? Rainbow had always been so careful. She only sent typed letters so no one ever saw her hoofwriting. She never went out shopping for art supplies unless it was past sundown and she had on her thickest overcoat and widest-brimmed beret. She even made sure to rent this place from a batpony landlord she was certain had poor eyesight. Had he caught on and decided to sell her out? The thought of that happening hurt. It hurt Rainbow very deeply. She’d originally been created to be somepony’s trophy, and now here she was being collected like one by the toady of ponies she’d prayed she’d never meet.
Everything Rainbow did in life, she did fast. Right now, she was cycling through all the stages of grief and when she finally got to acceptance, she blew out mournfully and slumped to the floor. Rainbow wasn’t a flier. She couldn’t escape. All she could do was surrender and hope Twilight disposed of her more gently than she had Pinkie’s old Mirror Pool copies. Rainbow should’ve known that being tasked to paint her Source was a bad omen.
“Dash?”
Spike’s voice was muffled, but still audibly annoyed. Or wait, no. Not annoyed. Rainbow was a really rusty conversationalist, but even she could tell the dragon didn’t sound hostile. Or was he just trying to lure her out? The least he could do was be honest with the pseudo-pony he was apprehending.
“Dash isn’t here!” Rainbow cringed at how badly her voice cracked, but soldiered on. “Go away.”
“Somepony in there sure sounds like her. Looks and moves like her too.”
“I said go away! You’re looking for someone else!”
Rainbow wished her Source had been a smarter pony who could come up with convincing lies on the spot. As it stood, the only thing Rainbow had was bluster. And bluster didn’t banish dragons.
“For Faust’s sake,” Spike’s voice pleaded “I don’t even want to be here. Pinkie made me fly all the way out to the Pie Family rock farm to fetch the stash of streamers hidden under her floorboards, and right before leaving Twilight told me to pick up your birthday present from the artist in town on my way back.” There was a pause before Spike continued with far less energy. “Look, I don’t care if you found out about the portrait and decided to grab it yourself to hold it over the rest of our heads or something, I just wanna know if the mail griffon gave me directions to the right place or not.”
Rainbow didn’t know what to say, so she didn’t say anything at all. She looked down at her painting and it grinned emptily back up at her. Outside, Spike blew out heavily.
“Whatever. If the artist is around, at least give them their pay, will ya? I’m leaving it here.” There was the sound of something leather hitting the ground and the receding patter of clawsteps down the stairs.
Rainbow pressed her muzzle to the keyhole and peered through. Nopony on the porch. Just a drawstring bag lying unattended. She eased the door open, leaned out cautiously, and scooped the bag up with her hoof. Then Spike, who’d been hovering directly above, divebombed and tackled her.
The two of them tumbled inside, barely missing the painting. Rainbow had Earth Pony strength, but Spike was fueled by a burning, excited curiosity about the identity of this Dash doppelganger. As they wrestled, Spike knew his boring, chore-filled afternoon had turned into something actually kind of interesting. Was this creature a Changeling? A Mirror Pool copy? Something else? Either way she was finally securely pinned and done struggling, which admittedly made Spike’s heart beat with pride. Baiting her out with Pinkie’s bag of streamers had felt like a total longshot.
“You fly?” The imposter gasped.
“You don’t?” Spike regarded Fake Dash’s wingless barrel and felt his confidence evaporate on the spot. “Oh my gosh, you really are just some random lookalike. Oh jeez, I messed up. I messed up big time!”
Rainbow had hit her head during the ambush and was only vaguely aware that the suddenly sorry dragon had rolled off her stomach. He propped her up to sitting position and was babbling apologies as she slid her work order over to where the two of them had landed.
“Finished on time,” she slurred. “One portrait of my Source doing a Sonic Rainboom, as requested.”
Spike picked up the painting in his sweating claws, looking between the artist and the creation. The more he did, the more he wondered which was which.
“Source? So you’re a clone of Dash after all?”
The sound of the C Word cleared Rainbow’s head in an instant.
“I am not just a clone! I’m my own pony!”
Rainbow knew she was a sorry sight with her concussion-dilated eyes and mane still ruffled because she hadn’t used her combing mirror for its original purpose today. But they were her eyes and her mane. They had been all her life. No one had called Rainbow a clone going on two years now, and it’d be a cold day in Saddle Arabia before she let anyone do it again.
A gentle claw massaged the lower left nape of Rainbow’s neck and her head involuntarily lolled with sudden relaxation. Spike allowed himself a modest smile as he continued to comfort the copy of his friend. He’d been Dash’s post-workout masseuse enough times to know exactly where her stress spot was. Never in a million moons would he have thought that knowledge would actually matter. He was really on a roll today.
Rainbow pulled the dragon close and laced her forelimbs around him. She hadn’t hugged anyone in a long time. A very long time. All pretense of dignity gone, she nuzzled the spines on Spike's head and breathed deep.
"What's your name?"
"Hm?"
"You said earlier you don't want to be called Dash."
"Oh." The familiar stranger finally let go of Spike and rubbed her hooves self-consciously. "I call myself Rainbow. No last name. I'm most but not all of Rainbow Dash, so I can share most but not all of her name, right? Or does that sound really dorky?"
"I've heard dorkier. From the mouth of the real Rainbow Dash even, but I guess that makes sense. You called her your... uh, shoot. You called her..."
"My Source."
"Yeah, that was it. You were made from her then?"
Rainbow shifted so uncomfortably that Spike reflexively backpedaled.
"I mean, you don't have to tell if you don't want. I won't blab. I won’t even tell anypony I met you. Cross my heart and hope to fl-"
"It's fine squirt, it's fine. I’ve just never had anyone I could talk about it with before.” Rainbow picked up the painting and traced her hoof over the outline of her work.
"Rainbow Dash. She has lots of fans all over Equestria, doesn't she?"
Spike nodded cautiously.
"Yeah,” Rainbow continued. "Some are super fans. Some are psycho fans. Some are super psycho fans who steal clips of her hair from the barbershop trash bins to keep in their journals." Rainbow's voice was wavering, but she wouldn't stop. She was finally telling her story. Every word was another grain out of some spiritual sandbags she hadn't felt until now.
"A few pieces of hair are all it takes. For a unicorn so obsessed with Rainbow Dash that she taught herself the alchemy to make a little Dash of her very own. Without any wings though. Wouldn't want her awesome new Rainbow Dash to be able to fly away from her." Rainbow's eyes were wet for some reason, so she blinked them.
"So the new Rainbow Dash couldn’t fly. But she could still run. And the first chance she could, she did. She ran all the way to the other side of Equestria and didn't stop til she got to the little Amish town where her Source's memories knew no one would bother her. And all alone in the grey each day, she picked up painting so her new life could have some color in it.”
Spike didn't know what else to do, so he reached up for Rainbow's stress spot again. She gently shooed his arm away and presented the work order. "I've kept you long enough," she insisted. "Thanks for letting me say my piece, squirt."
"I... I promise I won't tell anypony about you," Spike repeated. Rainbow gave a mirthful chuckle and reclined.
"Ya know what? You can if you want. Maybe this is the head bonk talking, but today was actually pretty exciting. I don't get out much, but with Dash's birthday coming up, I might work up the nerve to stick a bow in my mane and show up to the party as a gag gift. I'd find that really cool if I were her. And I am."
Spike ruffled his wings thoughtfully. He wasn't particularly close to Rainbow Dash. Not any closer to her than any of Twilight's other friends, anyway. It was weird to have a copy of her trust him so much.
"I think it's like you said and this is just the bump on your head talking. You ought to lay down for awhile. Wait til you're thinking straight again."
The clone stuck her tongue out impishly, but nodded and crossed the small studio to her sleeping hammock in the corner.
"I'll be back in a couple days with your pay," Spike announced. "Twilight was planning to mail it, but I can probably come up with an excuse to bring it myself. Maybe we can talk then about..." he trailed off as the sound of Rainbow's rhythmic breathing filled her home. Respectfully as he could, Spike bowed out and shut the door behind him.
"Don't look at me like that," he huffed at the goofily grinning painting tucked under his arm. "She gets her personality from your side of the family."
Grateful nopony was around to hear that absolutely awful joke, Spike beat his wings and took off for home.
Author's Note
Rainbow’s story will continue in the Snippet Series Season Finale. It’ll be the next upload, and I thank you all for being patient these past few weeks while I've worked on it.
Edit: It's out.
EThe Snippet Series Season 1 Finale
After fifteen fics spanning many mini-arcs, several storylines converge for a cooperative payoff.
Casketbase77 ·
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