It wasn't that Rainbow wasn't aware of air path traffic regulations: she just saw them as having been written by ponies who didn't know her. Sure, Cloudsdale and Canterlot would have signs posted along cloud-bordered off-ramps which would say things like Maximum Speed 0.25 GPH and that was just because whoever had posted them hadn't seen her fly. The average pegasus would need to drop speed as they maneuvered around that kind of spiral, but Rainbow? She was just better than that! So she could totally take the ramp at half a gallop per hour, maybe even a full gallop and now that she thought about it, accelerating to something over that while still staying within the bounds of the ramp just represented an impromptu challenge. And that wasn't just for her own skills, because there were usually other pegasi using the ramps and anypony who couldn't get out of her way in time clearly needed some extra practice.
So when Rainbow saw a posted air path sign, she tended to subconsciously add a few extra words: Except For Rainbow Dash, Who's Just That Good. It was an editing process which mostly occurred when she was visiting home or the capital, because Ponyville had a fairly low pegasus population and lacked local air path regulations accordingly.
(Unbeknownst to her, the mayor had been speaking with the city council. There were laws on the way, the majority would be accompanied by signs, and just about every last one would have an addendum printed in a font which came up to her knees: Because Of Rainbow Dash.)
It was unusual to get any sign postings in Ponyville, and she hadn't been expecting this one at all. Most of what she registered about the cloud-mounted wood was that it looked new and clearly had no reason to actually be there, because it was making a really stupid claim of Flight Hazard Ahead: Dangerous Obstacles. Take Detour and Rainbow knew what was ahead. On the town's usual early spring weather map, it was a region of designated morning atmospheric calm on the western border and if you were so bored by that as to look down, there wouldn't be much of an improvement. Just a pasture: something kept fairly clear in case the town decided to expand a little more.
The ground was kept clear. The air matched it. So there weren't supposed to be any obstacles ahead, the sign had been misposted, and she was just going to keep flying in a straight line because that was the fastest route to her napping destination. Simple.
Still, she squinted as her wings pushed a little harder, just in case. And she couldn't see anything in the way --
-- all right, there were a few odd specks of color: things which struck her as possessing non-pegasus outlines, moving in strange ways through the atmosphere. Dancing. But they weren't on her altitude level, and none of them looked like monsters. It was more like multiple pieces of oddly-regular scrap which had been caught in the wind, except there wasn't supposed to be any wind here --
-- and then she was speeding above the pasture (while almost fully ignoring the sudden shouts of alarm which came up from below, one of which was familiar), and there was wind: something which made Rainbow narrow her eyes all the more, until she could see the magic which had been laced into the atmosphere's weave. It was a mess of strands: a cross-current here, a dip there, updrafts next to downdrafts and she didn't understand what that one jetstream was doing there. It was enough to make her start reviewing her weather team's assignments, trying to figure out who had most recently been assigned to the area and therefore been the one to screw things up this badly. And she was thinking about that while trying to navigate the twisting layers, keeping watch on the patches of color just in case --
-- Sun shone through one of those patches. The altered light hit her foreleg, briefly dappled it with translucent red --
she shouldn't be here, she shouldn't be doing this, this is supposed to be me and
-- and at the instant before the hated memory began to release her, the first obstacle slid across the outer edge of her left wing.
She yelped, because she'd gone by at high speed and it had slid, something small and so thin as to be effectively invisible, but stretched taut enough that the slide had felt very much like a friction burn. It also knocked that wing slightly out of alignment, she tried to adjust, darted left, and that put her into the next four strings.
There was a brief, rather odd sensation of being held back: some of that came from the strings, while a downwards pull indicated she'd just picked up a slightly-mobile, rather surprised drag weight. This was added to the feeling of having suddenly turned into the center of a rubber band, which made her wonder if they could actually feel when they were being stretched out. If so, they definitely didn't like it.
And then one colorful scrap of cloth, which no longer had the direction of its strings, had been on the high end of the pull, and was held into its configuration by some surprisingly solid wood, crashed down into the small of her back.
She started to drop. And then she had to look down, there were shouting, scrambling ponies in the pasture and they all had what looked like reels (some with mouth cranks, others without) in front of their sternums, something which had been hung from their necks and there were legs going in all directions, she aimed for what looked like a clear spot, bled off momentum, flared out her wings for an air scoop to allow a dignified landing and that put her marginal coverts into the next set of strings --
-- Rainbow believed herself to understand wing anatomy as well as any living pegasus: after all, you had to understand what the normal biological limits were before you tried to break them. But when it came to the rest of her body, she frequently concentrated on how her physiology was supposed to interact with the air. Ground rules were completely different, mostly boring, and generally didn't need to be applied. Necessary information was usually more or less acquired on the spot, usually about ten seconds too late.
So when you're skidding headfirst on your barrel through the grass, the chin is supposed to be the brake.
Good to know.
It left her looking at a pair of white forehooves.
Instant and urgent, because there were priorities which needed to be attended in order. "Are you all right? Do you require a doctor?"
Expertly hoofticured forehooves...
...oh no...
Rainbow automatically performed a time-honored self-diagnostic: the outer manifestation of this was the systematic testing of all joints, followed by a quick examination for actual wounds while trying to see if any of her fur felt oddly wet. "No." There weren't any injuries on that scale -- but just trying to shift her wings had discovered --
"Very well," the accented voice declared with relief. "So in that case..."
Rarity snickered.
Rainbow, still chin-down in the dirt at the end of the fresh furrow, glared up at her. It took a little extra work to get around the reel of string which had been slung in front of the unicorn's sternum.
"...nice accessory," Rainbow muttered. "Goes really well with your fur. This isn't funny..."
Somewhere behind her, there was yelling. It was starting to die down, though. The herd was generally quick to recognize when one Bearer was going to deal with another, and most ponies were willing to let that happen. It was easier to back off and start counting your losses, especially when the alternative was remaining in close proximity to a pair of the mares.
Any single Bearer had the potential to create chaos. Larger gatherings started by having the odds go geometric and never looked back.
"A lack of injury is cause for relief," Rarity smiled. (Rainbow hated that she was smiling, how smug the unicorn looked.) A flicker of soft blue plucked at the rising taut string coming off the reel: a guide trench of wood stretched it safely out away from the white snout, and then a single strand partially unwound into four slightly-branching paths, all heading up into the air. "And laughing off one's own misfortune is an excellent way to reconcile it."
Laughing at me.
"Still not funny," Rainbow muttered. "What was that? What did I even hit?"
The unicorn's expression inverted. "You didn't know? I thought you were simply testing yourself against a temporary obstacle course --"
Something briefly overshadowed Rainbow, high in the air. A patch of purple dappled her snout.
"-- what did I hit?" snapped up from the ground.
"The pasture was designated for kite-flying today," Rarity carefully explained. "Variable wind currents, confined to this area. Some softer patches for those who simply wish to watch the drift, with more complicated sections to entice ponies who enjoy a challenge. And the weather team had to set up the conditions overnight, so I assumed that if you hadn't done it yourself, you would have at least assigned the pony who did." The smile returned. "Unless we are once again looking at your standard management style of glancing at portions of the schedule sheet and calling out 'Not it'?"
Silence. Silence was good for thinking of comebacks, which meant Rainbow needed some silence right now. Any second, and the perfect response would just show up on its own.
"What's a kite?"
That hadn't been it.
Rarity slowly, carefully looked down at her. It was the expression of somepony who'd just realized that the pony she'd known for years was actually from another country, it suggested a cautious search for terms which could be translated into the native tongue, and Rainbow was usually on the receiving end of it at least twice per moon.
"...I suppose pegasi don't often use them," the unicorn eventually said. "Fabric stretched across wood, or very light metal, to catch the wind. A toy, Rainbow. For flight. Controlled with strings."
Which arrived in Rainbow's mind as A really small hang glider without a minotaur under it, shortly followed by That's just stupid.
"So you hit kite strings, Rainbow." Rarity's head came forward a little, and blue eyes squinted over the pegasus' back. "And took out one kite, which is currently being repaired. You didn't see any of the warning signs around the border?"
Which wasn't worthy of a response. "Kite strings," Rainbow muttered. Tripwires. The atmosphere was meant to be laced with magic, not rope. "Whatever..."
"So since you are not injured," Rarity continued, "and there is no need to take you to a doctor, you may wish to leave the area before Brasstacks tries to add another small claims suit to your ongoing total --"
Wings automatically expressed their owner's irritation through a rustle. Rainbow bit back most of the wince.
"-- you said you weren't hurt."
"I don't need a doctor," the pegasus half-spat through the suffocating concern. "It's just wing strain."
"...ah," Rarity eventually said. "And how is that treated?"
"I can't fly."
"Sorry?" White ears carefully curved forward. "Didn't catch that."
"I can't use my wings for a couple of hours," Rainbow muttered. "I have to stay where I am until the feeling of strain goes away. There's nothing else which works."
"Are your legs --"
"-- I can't fly."
The blue eyes blinked.
"Very well," the unicorn shrugged. "Then stay with me. Until you recover."
Rainbow slowly pushed herself upright. Took a few careful steps, turned, plopped back down into the grass, leaving a gap between her body and the unicorn's left flank. Enough space to test her wings every so often without hitting the other mare's full saddlebags, and also what felt like enough to set up a border. As body posture went, Rainbow felt she'd put up a clearly-posted sign reading Do Not Cross.
The next few hours would see a number of lines crossed, and the physical border was the least of them.
"Did you even see the warning sign?"
"What's the point of a sign?" Rainbow muttered. Signs weren't supposed to apply to her -- and it was more than that. "Besides, it just got put up. It'll get taken down after this 'kite' stuff is over. If it was something important, something worth attention, it would have always been there."
Silence for a moment.
"Rainbow?"
"What?"
"That memorabilia shop in Canterlot. The one you keep talking about, where most of your salary seems to have wound up of late --"
"-- yeah! The new place with all the great Wonderbolts stuff! Do you finally want to go? I can brief you on the basics, and then you can sort of hagg -- negotiate a little --"
"-- the new place," Rarity repeated. "Well, if it was something important and worth attention, I suppose it always would have been there. You'll just have to return every last purchase."
It took a few seconds for Rainbow to get her lower jaw out of the grass.
"...oh, you just think you're so smart..."
With an open smirk, "Intelligence means seldom wasting time in thinking about things which are self-evident."
"...I hate you."
"No," the unicorn decided. "You do not."
And there was a second where Rainbow wasn't sure.
All she could do was watch. And watching the kites was just boring.
...sure, she had the option to trot out of the pasture at any time, but that was exactly the problem. Any crash you could fly away from didn't need to be counted as a crash at all. So if Rainbow rested her wings until she could get into the air again, then it was exactly like the encounter with the strings had never truly happened: any witnesses speaking to the contrary were just trying to make her look bad. It meant she needed rest, the only activity available while stuck in the grass on the dumb ground was watching the kites, and the kites were stupid. Rainbow didn't see the point of kites.
Being permanently ground-bound was a horror. She acknowledged that, had the occasional nightmare about being forced out of the sky for the rest of her life, and longed to find more ways where her friends could join her in the air. It meant she respected the efforts made by those forever stuck on land to change that status. Some pegasi resented the intrusions on their self-assigned domain: Rainbow called it ambition and eagerly awaited the next advancement.
Balloons were fine, although she occasionally became annoyed by ponies who'd decided that their only option for steering the thing was to shout at her until the wind started moving the right way. By contrast, pedal screws had great control, but they were too slow: their top speed wasn't, and a mere hour in the air could exhaust an earth pony for the rest of the day. And hang gliders... you usually only saw minotaurs using them. It was possible to rig one for a pony, but the underwing body sling didn't exactly help with control. And no matter who was steering, the ultimate direction remained 'down'.
Kites, though -- what was the point of sending a bit of cloth up? Not ahead of the operator: instead. It was a mindless representative which swooped and curved and danced through the layers. Not the pony. All the pony could do was watch and as far as Rainbow was concerned, it was boring.
And for Rarity to do this, of all ponies... Rarity, who knew there was a better way --
-- no.
The unicorn's corona plucked on one string of the divided four, lightly tugged on another. A construct of fabric, wood, and wasted time dipped accordingly.
"This is boring," Rainbow muttered.
"You keep saying that," Rarity observed. "It does not change my appreciation of the experience."
"Why are you even doing this?" was the next challenge. "You could be --" Rainbow quickly ran down the internal list of all the things Rarity usually did with her personal time, and was horrified to find that all of them were boring. "-- making sales!"
"The Boutique is closed," the unicorn calmly said. "Leaving the shop every so often is necessary for inspiring creativity, along with the maintenance of sanity."
"And you're doing this? There's shopping! And spas! And..." It wasn't a very long list. "...Opal -- maybe needs brushing..."
"It is meditative," came across as unusually sharp. "Admittedly, there is something of a challenge to it, in working with the wind. A portion of ongoing intellectual exercise."
She dealt with the wind on instinct. Thinking took too long.
"But for the most part," Rarity finished, "this is meant to relax. To focus the mind upon nothing more than the kite, the strings, and --" a little more softly "-- the dance, Rainbow. To simply watch it dance in the sky above. I'm sure you understand that."
She tried looking up again. The kite danced, and did so without awareness. Nothing was looking back.
"The kite can't understand anything," Rainbow decided. "So what's the point of sending it up there?"
The unicorn's next breath was pulled in between polished teeth.
"Can't you simply appreciate the moment?"
One more second of inspection. It was one more than the kite strictly deserved.
"The moment's over."
The unicorn's corona flared slightly near the horn's base. Portions of the light shifted into small spikes, and the next tugs on the strings came with a little more force. This seemed to exaggerate the overhead results somewhat. Just not enough.
"It amazes me, sometimes," Rarity darkly said. "How little we have in common."
"That's what we've got in common," Rainbow immediately decided.
"Your pardon? Are you saying that you too are amaz --"
"Having just about nothing in common."
Soft blue spiked again and in doing so, seemed to lose some of the softness.
Rainbow tried to look around the pasture, in the hopes that anything interesting was taking place. Saw nothing more than an earth pony adjusting strings by mouth, careful to keep the cord against her lip guards.
Back to Rarity.
Four points of control. You could do a lot with that, and yet the kite was just sort of -- drifting up there. Close to another kite, until the unicorn pulled it back before any interesting collision could take place.
You could do a lot with that.
"Rarity?" And for the first time since she'd been grounded, the pegasus was starting to feel a trill of excitement. She could see the possibilities now, she didn't understand why nopony else had done the obvious yet, but it wasn't too late to start...!
Which produced a distracted "Hmm?" as a twist of energy rotated the reel a little.
Happily, "Ever try sharpening the strings?"
The white head slowly, slowly turned left.
"Sharpening. The. Strings."
"Diamond dust! I read about that. In a Daring Do story. There was this trap, and in order to get out of it, she had to -- oh, right: you just do the sappy books." With a snort, "Can't even get a good pirate story off your shelves unless there's a mare with a dress ripped over her mark and the pirate is holding her for ransom. 'The Ransomed Heart.' A real pirate would sell off one limb at a time." Thoughtfully, "Maybe that's why they've got the peg legs. Somepony caught them first -- anyway, diamond dust! If you put it over string in a really fine layer, you can sort of sharpen it! Make the string cut. And you've got all those other kites in the sky, you've got some control, you could send your kite after another pony's before they did the same to you!"
"As a prank," the unicorn tightly said, "that seems somewhat too destructive --"
"-- I said, before they did the same! It's not a prank, it's a sport! Kite combat!" She looked up again, and told herself she was seeing the future. "How much weight can those carry? It's important! Because you don't have to stop at diamond dust! I mean, that's easiest for you, because you've got the diamonds. But if they can take a little more up with them --"
"-- no." It had been a statement.
Statements were easy to ignore. "Rarity! Just listen! Obviously that's too small to send Spike up. But that's the idea! Or the --" with the unicorn, it was a magic word "-- inspiration. If you can mount a canister of liquid, something flammable --"
"NO."
Rainbow's disgruntled expression sank lower into the grass, taking her body with it. Both had to stop there. Soil was dumb. A cloud would have let her go all the way in, but soil just stuck her on the surface...
"You're no fun," the pegasus muttered.
"I," the unicorn declared, "am extremely fun. Simply not for your value of 'fun,' which now appears to require flames --"
"-- Luna understands fun better than you do."
The corona spikes came back.
"I am having fun now," Rarity stated, and did so as a shift of white fur against its natural grain gave it the lie. "Regardless of how you may feel about it, this is fun for me. A challenge. Something which normally helps me relax."
The deliberate bite-down on 'normally' was also easy to ignore.
Rainbow's wings stretched out a little. Shifted, testing the strain. Nowhere near ready to fly yet, and she darkly muttered a little more.
Then her wings shifted again.
Again...
"What are you doing?"
"Sorry?" Rainbow lied.
"I will rephrase," Rarity crossly declared. "Why are you doing that?"
"I'm not doing anything --"
"-- your wings are moving and the wind abruptly shifted. I barely regained control of the kite in time, and I know it's you, Rainbow."
"I'm bored!"
Sharply, "Then entertain yourself."
"I was."
"In a way which leaves me in peace!"
The soil still refused to let her pass.
Eventually, "...how did you know it was me?"
The unicorn frowned.
"I'm... not certain," she admitted. "There is the minor clue of your being the only pegasus here, but... it's more than that." With volume dropping, "It started after the mark switch was resolved. There were... residual memories, as I mentioned in the cave that night. Something less than dream. There are times when I almost feel it helps me to gauge the wind..."
Her corona tugged on one string, tried to put some slack in another. Rainbow, who was almost thinking about the last words, watched.
"Four points of control," the pegasus observed. Maybe, just maybe, if she could get the unicorn to listen...
Primly, "It allows for fine adjustments."
"You could do stunts that way."
A little too quickly, "I am simply trying to work with the currents. Small movements suffice --"
"-- but then you never find out what you can really do!" Rainbow's legs started to push at the dirt. "If you don't test the limits, you won't know how to break them! If those strings each go to a corner, then all you'd need for a really good loop is to --"
"-- I am content with --"
The pegasus was standing, because that was what dirt was good for: basic support. And even when she didn't have her wings working at full capacity, there were always teeth.
"Just watch!"
Rainbow lunged. And before Rarity could move, the pegasus' jaw clamped down on three of the strings and yanked.
The fourth fabric patch was carefully, silently placed against the largest tear. A fresh glowing needle began to weave in and out.
Rainbow watched, and did so from a somewhat increased distance.
"Good thing you carry all that repair stuff," felt vaguely complimentary.
Rarity's head slowly turned left again. A passing cloud put blue eyes into shadow.
"In Ponyville," the unicorn's fast-slipping accent declared, "one learns to prepare for certain recurring disasters. Wild magic. Discord. My sister's cooking. You."
Rainbow's head tilted slightly.
"That's insulting," the pegasus decided.
"Good," the unicorn muttered. "You perceived the surface insult. We can move on to something underlying --"
"-- you put me last on that list?"
The stitching paused.
"Is that a joke?"
A hard magenta glare did its best to drill into white fur.
"Not the best category in which to be competitive," Rarity darkly considered. "In any case, a mare who mooches most of her meals under the pretense of visiting friends during those times may not be in a position to recognize truly bad cooking. Since she hardly ever indulges in any of her own. If you'd had Sweetie try to serve you breakfast so much as once --"
"-- I'm just trying to have fun," Rainbow shot back. "And visit friends. And get to know them better over a meal, which is supposed to be one of the best ways." And it also put aside more money for Wonderbolts collectibles, plus it kept her from having to clean out the sink. Whatever had recently taken up residence in her sink didn't seem to like any attempts at cleaning and Rainbow was willing to give it a little space to itself because she wasn't all that fond of the process either. "Get to know everypony. You've never had me over --"
"-- your pardon?" shot into the tiny gap on a giant gust of disbelief. "You try to get in at least once per fortnight! I had entertained thoughts of a wall menu --"
"-- at your parents' place!" Rainbow rushed.
The unicorn's mouth opened slightly. Closed.
"I fail to take your meaning," Rarity slowly said. "Or any significance therein."
"I've met all of the Apples --"
"-- poor Applejack cooks for six nearly every night, you practically have a reserved bench --"
"-- and we all know the Cakes. But Fluttershy's parents travel, Twilight's are out by the west coast and we hardly ever see them... you've got the only other family living in town, Rarity. And your mom's got to be a great cook, because Sweetie's such a bad one."
A little too tightly, "Your logic?"
"When somepony else is doing all the work, you never need to learn how until you're on your own," the pegasus reasoned. "And you've never had me over to meet your parents. Not once. Not when your father's --"
"-- this is not about my father!" came with its own corona spikes.
"-- practically famous! I'd like to meet your dad, did you ever think about that? I bet a lot of ponies would! And to taste your mother's cooking, since it's got to be great --"
Which was where she stopped, because she had to stop. Being an athlete meant knowing something about pony anatomy. The wings, mostly, but you had to factor in where the muscles were in the rest of the body. It was easier to figure out when something was going wrong. And it also made it easy to see how Rarity's entire body had just gone tight.
"I am no longer under their roof," the unicorn hissed, and rib cage muscles stretched to the point of snapping. "I live alone, Opal notwithstanding. I do not feel the invitation is mine to offer --"
A flare of blue arose from the kite.
They both looked. Neither had a choice, and so each mare saw where the gaps had widened.
Rarity's corona forced its way into the saddlebags. Pushed and pulled, until multiple points of sharpness were strewn in the grass. Furiously looked away from Rainbow and began the repairs again.
(Across the width and breadth of the pasture, two dozen kite-flying ponies spontaneously decided to give the two Bearers some extra space.)
"Relax," the unicorn muttered. "I came out here to relax. Simply watching a dance in the sky..."
"There's something better than watching," emerged without thought.
"I wouldn't know," thudded into the grass.
You know...
"Relaxing." The words were almost subvocal: sentences flowing as a dark current under Rarity's breath. "But then, you so often seem to interfere, do you not? With my attempts to relax, and so much more besides. With my work, with what I love --"
There were times when the pegasus favored instinct over thought, because instinct was simply faster. There were a few side effects to the practice, and one of the more troublesome was that there were also times when her words arrived ahead of the memories.
"Since when have I ever interfered with the dumb dresses?"
And then a dozen fragments of internal filmstrip assembled themselves into the lowlight reel, at the same moment when the glowing needle broke in half.
She got one more instant, a fraction of a second where she almost wished to be a minotaur, a dragon, or at least to have wings which curved differently. Clamping hooves over your own mouth didn't do much. Palms seemed to have an edge. And then the unicorn was standing. Glaring down with furious eyes illuminated by a corona which was nothing but hard spikes.
Rainbow had barely seen her move. She didn't know that Rarity could move that fast for a short-term burst, wondered if it was something inherited from the father --
"Let us start with the crashes," Rarity hissed. "Through the front door, a few times. A number of windows. I am still convinced that you aimed for my storeroom --"
"-- look, I thought it made sense!" She'd never seen the unicorn this angry, not with a corona on the verge of going double and forehooves scraping at the stupid soil while the tail beat at the air as if seeking belated vengeance, she had to say something... "I was coming down fast, I only had a little steering room left, you had the windows open to air things out already and I just said 'Fabric bolts, soft landing!' I didn't know about those stiff tubes in the center!"
"-- and oh yes, what was that standard you asked me to exceed for your Gala outfit?" The tail curls were beginning to come apart under the force of the accelerating lashes. "Twenty percent cooler. I wound up at the tree, trying to discover if there was a relevant measurement system! Time after time, you have interrupted me in the midst of waking dream, forced me to try and reconstruct sketches after my head was unwillingly filled with Wonderbolts statistics, and that is presuming that the actual dresses don't wind up serving as a crash site! I don't interfere with the things you love --"
She hadn't known Rarity could move that fast.
She was rather more sure about herself.
She was standing.
"Best. Young. Fliers. Competition."
And the surging corona winked out.
All four of the unicorn's knees buckled. The lashing tail slammed to a stop, and did so as the curls in the mane wilted.
"I..." Rarity whispered as the horror saturated her features. And perhaps if Rainbow had left it at that, the unicorn would have said nothing more.
But there were just so many more of Rainbow's words to come.
"Oh, you remember that now?" Her wings had flared to their full span, pain was radiating back from tips to scapulars and it felt like the pain was giving her strength, providing a mounting fire where she could just ride the updraft forever. "I spent my whole life getting ready for that! Winning means being recognized, because it's just what the title says! Best. Young. Flier." Her volume was dropping, and she could feel the wind surging around her hooves. The distant shouts of ponies trying to regain control of caught kites were simply ignored. "It's not a ticket into the Wonderbolts, because there's years when weird stuff happens. Bad judges. One-stunt wonders --"
The unicorn immediately latched onto the phrase. "You're going to say that about somepony else? With a straight face --"
"-- and you," the pegasus hissed. "A unicorn entry. Who came up when nopony asked for it, nopony wanted, who just kept showing off, who interfered --"
There seemed to be some degree of rallying in progress, as least as indicated by the straightening of white legs. "I came up because you needed us! We hadn't been together all that long, not as a sextet, and I could still spot how nervous you were! That you were scared, Rainbow, you were actually scared enough that I could see it. You --" and the word momentarily caught in the unicorn's throat "-- you even admitted it when we got there! You admitted to being worried, you of all ponies --"
"-- and look what happens when I do that!" The grass was bowing outwards from her in waves, pressed flat against the stupid soil, and the anger was pushing away more than mere vegetation. Rarity had just taken a step back, ponies were retreating all over the pasture, privacy was increasing by the minute and Rainbow didn't care. They were words which were going to be said no matter who was around, they were words which had been building and she realized she'd been thinking about it since the first patch of color had dappled her fur.
Thinking about one of the worst days of her life.
"I tell somepony I'm nervous! I admit I'm scared, even if it's just to myself! And look what happens! You all show up --"
"-- you needed support!" The unicorn had raised her volume: something which Rainbow didn't see as being necessary because the pegasus didn't care how much the wind howled. The wind was just the backup voice.
"I didn't --"
"-- we'd barely spent any time together as a group, it was clear to me that you needed somepony there in your corner, and Fluttershy... she'd known you the longest, she said you might not expect --" the unicorn hesitated "-- with your parents out of town, there might not be -- much of a welcome at home --"
"-- the first three ponies!" Rainbow shouted. "The first three I got, and it was those jerks! The ones from the race, the race where you wouldn't even have a mark or a life without it, the ones who must have hit Fluttershy and knocked her down, they've never admitted it, we nearly all got expelled from flight camp for having that race away from the safety counselors, but what happens to them? Factory positions, they're stuck at the Factory, they'll never go anywhere else or be anything else and they're still smug little horse apple smears who never worked for anything in their lives --"
"-- so we followed you up! And I even volunteered for the wing spell --"
The wind vanished. High overhead, scant clouds began to go dark.
"The wing spell," Rainbow softly said.
"...yes," Rarity verbally stumbled. "Really, just being the first test subject when Twilight is learning something -- not that we knew it at the time, but retroactively... and I'm still sure she didn't quite get it right."
"Really." Barely a whisper.
The shaking unicorn pushed on. "Were they light-sensitive? I don't think it was the heat. It wasn't as if it got hotter up there. Perhaps it was air pressure? They needed a certain amount around them to remain intact, so gaining altitude over Cloudsdale --"
Light streaming through the fake wings, dappling my coat.
Dappling the city.
The city was looking at her.
"-- so you could show off for everypony!" All of the decibels had come back at once, and they had brought company. "You and those fakes! You never trained a moment in your life! You had fakes which responded to your thoughts! Didn't have to steer or glide or feather, they did it all for you! And then the swap hit, the stupid mark swap, and you wound up in my job! You couldn't even stop interfering with me then! It's like you want to be me --"
The pegasus seldom felt entirely at home with words, preferring action and the quickness of movement over carefully-assembled phrases. The unicorn knew how to spot an opportunity, turning a slip of the tongue into an opening for a wound, and the horn pierced the last words.
"So you want to be Fluttershy?"
"NO!"
"Are you aware of how quickly you said that?"
"When something's that stupid, you have to get rid of it fast! Don't change the subject, Rarity! You said you came up to support me, that you brought everypony up for me? Then why did you make it all about you?"
A little more weakly, because the attack hadn't worked and there didn't seem to be anything else, and Rainbow liked that. "They... were paying attention. To things I was doing. As if it was a talent, something they could appreciate, which they hadn't seen before. They loved the new..."
The clouds were clustering now. Becoming thicker, flushing towards black.
"And I'm in the waiting area, passing off my number over and over, sending ponies out ahead of me because most of them were so nervous, they didn't remember what their own places were," Rainbow hissed. Hissing was good. Hissing was what you did when there was poison coming. "I don't even know what the postpony was doing there: she's decent enough in the air, but there's supposed to be a maximum age limit on entries. Best Young Fliers! How old was she when she had that kid? But they were all pegasi, Rarity. Pegasi who'd at least had the dream a few times in their life, who pushed for it. All pegasi -- and then there's you. You, with your --" and she knew it would hurt "-- stupid makeup, stupid outfit, and stupid wings. Wings that work by wishing. You put yourself into that flock, you hadn't worked for it, you didn't earn anything, one shortcut spell and you were there --"
"-- I..." What was left of the purple tail had gone between the unicorn's legs now. Seeking shelter from the storm. "I thought you'd... feel better, being out there with company..."
"LIAR!"
The blue eyes closed.
No words. No gestures. No protests. Just a futile attempt to block out the world --
-- no. The white ears were still up. It gave Rainbow a target.
"What was your routine, anyway? 'I'll show up and look different!' You didn't do the work! I had to create my routine, I had to master it, and you just wished! You changed the music, your finale was showing off at altitude for a whole city --"
"-- it wasn't even my idea to enter." Weak words, barely audible. "Somepony said --"
"-- and you didn't say no! You had me doubting my own wings! I called them plain!" (They curled inwards, and the pain flared again.) "My dream, not yours! You're the one who's always so protective about your designs, taking pictures of the sketches next to newspaper mastheads so you'll have a record, so nopony can steal your dreams, and then you stole mine! Why can't you -- why couldn't you just --"
Part of her was aware of the darkening sky. Ion levels shifting, and moisture clustering in the air. Perhaps the true storm had already started. It was an acceptable reason for her eyes to be wet.
"-- do you want to be me or something?" Rainbow half-whispered. "What's so wrong with your own dream that you had to take mine?"
Sun vanished.
There was light. You always got a little light, even under the heaviest of clouds. But Sun was gone, and the pasture was covered by shadow.
"...you weren't there."
It had emerged on a level below whisper, and yet Rainbow had heard it perfectly.
The counter was much louder.
"What do you mean, I wasn't there? It was my competition --"
"...the Talent Search," Rarity softly said, and her head began to lift as the blue eyes slowly opened. "My competition. The annual gathering of the new designers in Canterlot, the hopeful of an entire nation assembled in the capital. Renting booths, putting out our wares, our creations, hoping for notice. I was noticed, certainly. By the mare in the booth next to mine, who saw somepony too young to be there, too naive, and she did her best to protect me throughout that horrible day. They found my wares, all right. And one tried to steal my designs, and became the reason for those pictures. Another offered to hire me, with a contract which let her own my dreams. And then another pony put on her show, hers wrecked mine because we had outdoor spaces and she thought her gauze was best set off by high winds. My goods, and those of a friend I had for one day... they merely came within seconds of destruction."
Rainbow didn't consider herself to be good with words, not when it counted. She just had to find one, and do it before the expert hoofticure scraped any deeper into the dirt --
"I had to pack up early," the unicorn forced herself to continue. "And because there was a rule about not leaving before the official close, my somewhat ironic punishment for wishing to depart? Was being made to leave. Permanently." Her head raised a little more, with eyes seeking tentative contact. "I apologized to you after the competition, Rainbow. You said it had all worked out --"
Which gave the pegasus an opening. "You don't know what it was like --"
And it slammed shut on her snout. "-- I don't understand what it's like? I was rejected at the Search, with all further chances stripped away. I told myself that I could make my own place in Ponyville, show them all... but that has yet to truly work out, has it not? And in Cloudsdale... Rainbow, they paid attention to me. To something I could do, as if it was a talent. Even if it was temporary, artificial, it was attention. Recognition. It was everything I hadn't experienced. You wish to discuss feelings, you of all ponies?"
The unicorn's shoulders and hips squared, and did so at the same moment her head lowered and the horn began to ignite.
"You don't know what it's like to be me! To know I can create something perfect, but it doesn't matter because only the judgment of others will determine whether my efforts are worthy! A perfect fashion line which is only good for a single season, and then to start again, over and over! To be trapped in a lifelong struggle just so somepony, anypony in the world, will remember my name -- !"
Magenta eyes closed.
"I'm taking it back," Rainbow said.
Rarity's head came up. The forelegs stopped moving.
Carefully, "Taking what back?"
"The 'smart' part," Rainbow clarified.
The clouds hadn't broken open. There was wind, and there was shadow. But there was no rain and yet, her dumb eyes felt wetter than ever.
"I suppose," the unicorn darkly said, "we are at the point in the fight where you would feel the need to insult my intelligence --"
"-- you talk a lot," Rainbow cut in. "And I know you can always hear yourself. I just don't think you listen."
"-- so before this goes any further, Rainbow..."
The corona winked out. Blue eyes squeezed shut, and the first drops fell onto thirsty soil.
"...I was caught up in the moment. It was your dream, but it was also the one I never had. It was being recognized, and -- it was for something which wasn't me, but my own visions had been rejected. I just wanted to bask in it, just the once --"
The pegasus' wings painfully flapped, just the once, and the little gust went under the unicorn's chin. Got her eyes open, and raised her head just enough.
The words were in her head now. They hurt. And because they hurt, they had to be shared.
"Doing everything you can, dedicating yourself to creating something perfect, just so somepony will remember you?" Rainbow whispered. "And you think I don't understand that? Rarity, that's my whole life..."
The unicorn didn't say anything.
Rainbow was waiting for her to do so, because Rarity always talked. But it didn't happen. They just stared at each other, through wet new eyes.
And when they nuzzled under dispersing clouds, their tears soaked each other's fur.
The last two mares in the pasture were resting in the grass under a clear sky, on opposite sides of the wounded kite. Rarity wanted to finish the repairs before they left.
"You did tell me it had all worked out," the unicorn said as the seam line went back together. "At the time. I thought... that meant we were okay."
Rainbow's head dipped. "I was mostly thinking about you not having died."
"...oh."
"That reminds me," Rainbow playfully offered. "Way to go, Combat Princess. Stunned three Wonderbolts. One after the other, in mid-plummet. Why can't you ever pull that off on a mission?"
The glowing needle paused. "Lack of plummet." White fur rippled across the full length of the shudder. "I understand what they say about drowning ponies now. How they can bite their rescuers, trying for support without thinking about what they're actually doing. Wound deeply enough so that more than one slips under the waves... Rainbow, I could have killed them --"
"-- I caught them." The pegasus managed a smile. "Instinct." She still wasn't quite sure how to replicate that part. She'd just moved.
"I suppose three dead Wonderbolts would have hurt your admission chances."
"A little," Rainbow understated. "But that's what I was thinking about, when I said it worked out. That you weren't dead, and they were okay, and... did you ever get out of the basket?"
"No more than I've asked Twilight to recast the wing spell on me." This was more of a shiver. "There was a cloudwalking effect tied to the wings, but it dispelled when they did."
"You should have had Twilight do a backup casting. For safety."
The light tone made it clear that the words were mostly a joke. "You of all ponies are suddenly concerned about safety?"
Rainbow snorted. "You didn't see enough of Cloudsdale. There's platforms scattered through the tourist areas, wooden ones. Just in case somepony's cloudwalking spell starts to wear off. You get a few minutes of stepping too deep before it goes. I knew what that working was, Rarity: we get ponies coming up every so often. I just didn't realize Twilight could cast it. And you see somepony stepping onto vapor for the first time -- you get scared. It's a reflex."
The unicorn nodded. "I could have asked for a separate casting, but... the basket's floor felt real. I earned that phobia."
"So now you send a kite up," Rainbow decided, "because you're afraid to go yourself."
In a mutter, "Oh, you just think you're so smart..." The seam was pulled back together.
"Sometimes."
This snort was much softer. "Rainbow, I do see your point. But you have your accomplishment, where I do not. Something unique, a place in the history books. The Rainboom --"
The words hurt. And because they hurt, they had to be shared, just to see if it would make the pain go away. "-- will be done by somepony else within three years."
Rarity blinked.
"...what?"
"It's not like unicorn tricks, Rarity," There was a little regret in that. Rainbow had earned regret. "Any pegasus could learn any technique: it's just about having the power and skill to keep them under control. There's pegasi on my level. Nationally, that's dozens. More worldwide. If somepony's interested, if they watch me doing it a few times, if they practice enough to figure it out and put in the work... the Rainboom will spread. And the more I travel with the Wonderbolts, the faster that'll happen. A couple of them already joked that the only reason they haven't gone for it is because there's a minimum number of required crashes. I'll always have the Rainboom -- but I won't have it to myself."
"A duplicated style," Rarity breathed. "Good for only a few seasons, and then..."
Cyan forelegs pushed at the grass as they gestured to the sides. "...what's next? I have to find something else. I've been looking into shadowfounts. That's a lost technique. I managed the first stage by accident once. But there's at least three, and nopony knows what the last one looks like." A little mournfully, "Not even the Princesses: I asked. They've seen it -- the results, anyway, starting from when the light inverts. But Luna said they were sort of on the receiving end."
"The light inverts," Rarity carefully prompted as she started on the kite's tail, "and then...?"
"I'll tell you over dinner," Rainbow offered. "It's more of a dinner story, anyway. Let's just say the best place to watch one is from way back."
The unicorn grumbled for a while. "Dinner," eventually emerged as a discernible word.
"After this kind of fight, you owe me dinner," the pegasus expertly logicked. "Rarity, why haven't you introduced me to your parents?"
The pause lasted long enough for the corona to flicker away from the kite's tail, going to work on restoring the purple curls.
Just a little too steadily. "I'd rather not have my father meet the daughter he wished for. Rather than the one he got."
I don't get it --
-- I don't want to get it...
"Rarity?"
The unicorn's lips twisted and so on the most technical level, it could be said that she was smiling. "He's a professional athlete, Rainbow. Well, a coach now, in his latter years. But... famous, as you said, although seldom recognized. Most ponies just know the uniform, and he wears that hat on the sidelines. It gives his features a touch of shadow. A professional athlete. With two daughters, neither particularly athletic. I can push for short periods, but -- no more than that. And Sweetie... I think I can safely say that she's meant for sports on the same level as her being meant for cooking. He loves us both, he tries to understand, but... I have considered that if he had been offered a choice in what his children would have been like, he would have chosen somepony more like you. I haven't introduced you to him because I was afraid that you would love each other at first sight. Connect -- in a way he and I never have." Wryly, "So to that extent... yes, there are times when I have wanted to be you."
And all Rainbow could say was "I'm sorry." The strangest part was meaning it.
"Hardly your fault." Rarity sighed. "That phobia is somewhat less earned. And is this when you tell me if you have ever wished to be Fluttershy? Presuming that was an influence. I know that Pinkie has longed for a normal farm life, but how Applejack ever wound up in the Boutique --"
To Rainbow, it felt like a really good time to refocus the subject. "-- and... your mom?"
"Oh, that's just sparing you from the experience. But if you can tolerate the chance of battling a social nightmare, I'll set something up for next week." Glowing supplies began to put themselves back into the saddlebags. "Is there anything else to resolve before we set out?"
"You mean 'any more fights'."
Rarity nodded.
They both thought it over.
"I think we were always gonna have that one," Rainbow decided. "Sometime."
The kite frame started to dissemble itself. "We probably should have had it years ago --"
And with perfect neutrality, "-- wanna date?"
There was a sound. It was a little like a gasp, something like a four-legged resting scramble backwards in the grass, and rather a lot like a kite frame nearly snapping in half.
"Rainbow!"
Who blinked with perfect (and perfectly faked) innocence. "What? What's wrong with the two of us dating?"
"Apart from our having shown no mutual attraction whatsoever prior to this? I think we just demonstrated why putting two egomaniacs and yes, before you finish opening your mouth, I said two, in the same relationship, wouldn't be a good idea -- and you're smiling. And that was your idea of a joke. Rainbow Dash..."
The exasperated unicorn removed her reel, packed up the last of it, stood up. The pegasus followed suit, tested her wings and confidently went into the hover.
"It's funny."
"I suppose for those who chronicle disasters, it would be hilarious."
"It's a great joke! You've got to admit that much!"
Placidly, "Do I?"
"If we're friends!"
With a smile, "Are we?"
And there was a moment when Rainbow was sure.
They started to make their way out of the pasture. One steadily trotting, the other flying and occasionally getting ahead, waiting for the unicorn to hurry up and reach her. Rainbow felt that pausing was the polite part.
"Come on, Rarity -- can't you just enjoy the moment?"
One looked up. The other looked down. The understanding met in the middle.
"Yes. But the moment's over," Rarity offered. "Shall we see what comes next?"
