Dash's Secret Diary

Chapters

Prologue: Rainbow Dash's Secret
Chapter 1: Take Off
Chapter 2: Shy Love and Special Talents
Chapter 3: Traditions
Chapter 4: Audition
Chapter 5: New Life
Chapter 6: Training
Chapter 7: Hearth's Warming

Prologue: Rainbow Dash's Secret

Dash's Secret Diary

by Twippledash

Prologue: Rainbow Dash's Secret

Scootaloo was soaring trough the clear skies of a warm summer afternoon, Ponyville behind her shrinking into a tiny dot against the landscape as she was gaining altitude and heading towards Cloudsdale, Equestria's only aerial city. She was already well beyond her middle age, but that didn't slow her down as she was going to visit her long time friend Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow Dash had moved into an apartment in Cloudsdale to spend her retirement days a few years prior. She had sent a letter to Scootaloo inviting her to visit today—apparently she had some important personal matters to discuss. Scootaloo would have accepted the invitation anyway as she hadn't seen the cyan pegasus for several months, even though they have been constantly exchanging letters for years.

She arrived to Cloudsdale and wandered around for a few moments, looking around for familiar landmarks—it has been a long time since she last visited the city and due to the easy-to-reform cloudy building materials, many of the public areas were rearranged and reshaped quite often. Despite that she soon recognized the place where she was and made a beeline toward Rainbow's apartment, dodging a few pegasi and cloud pillars on her way. She landed by the front door of the apartment and knocked, listening as she heard some movement from the inside. Soon the door was opened and she was faced by an old, rainbow maned pegasus. Her mane didn't have as vivid and bright colors as it used to have, but despite the somewhat dull shades it still had the distinctive rainbow colored stipes.

"Hi Rainbow!", Scootaloo greeted and gave the elder pegasus a smile. "How's it flying?"

Rainbow looked at the younger yet still already quite old orange pegasus in front of her and chuckled, "Well hi Scoots. 'How's it flying', eh? You know, I don't fly that much anymore, seeing that my wings get sore if I just fly around leisurely for a few minutes. I guess my flying days are finally nearing the end, as awesome as it all have been." Her voice wasn't as lively as it used to be, but it still had the same distinctive tone the younger Rainbow Dash always had.

"Oh, yeah..." Scootaloo looked aside lamenting her slight faux pas, but then looked back at the elder mare. "So, you asked me to come? You had something to say in person?"

"Right, come in," the cyan pegasus said as she stepped aside making room for Scootaloo to step inside. Rainbow walked towards her kitchen and asked, "Would you like something to drink?"

"Tea would be nice," Scootaloo answered and turned to the living room. She had started to appreciate some tea and relaxing moments with her friends more and more as she got older. She slumped onto a sofa, looking around the living room. There were a lot of photos of various familiar ponies on the walls. One section was filled with pictures from Rainbow's fillyhood, featuring her parents and some of her flight school friends, as well as Rainbow herself as a filly of course. Scootaloo noticed that Fluttershy was shown with Rainbow in quite many of those also, more than any other filly from the flight school. Despite their clashing personalities they had really been best of friends ever since they first befriended with each other at the beginning of flight school.

Other section of that same wall was filled with pictures of Rainbow Dash and her five best friends when they all were still relatively young mares, next to those were some photos of the former Cutie Mark Crusaders, still without their cutie marks. Scootaloo chuckled at those memories, how silly they all had been trying to get their marks no matter what.

Then there was a few more pictures of the three of them, this time as young mares, showing their special talents: Apple Bloom was seen fixing the old barn of Sweet Apple Acres, Sweetie Belle was singing for almost the whole Ponyville—it had taken a lot of coaxing to get her in front of the audience but it had paid off eventually—and Scootaloo herself was doing some performance dancing.

Dancing. That is something Scootaloo would never have guessed was her special talent. She had always thought dancing was just a girly thing, and even though she actually was a girl, she always preferred more tomboyish approach. But once she had given it a try, she found out that she actually liked dancing. Not only liked, she loved dancing. Not the type where you go do some slow waltzing with a stallion, but the other type where you perform some awesome dance moves for the audience. Reminiscing the good old times she sighed and looked around the room some more.

There was a section on another wall dedicated solely for the Wonderbolts. Dash had eventually made it into the team and there was a plenty of photos and posters featuring the distinctive rainbow maned pegasus in a blue Wonderbolt suit. In front of the wall there was a table filled with various trophies she had won before and during her career: several medals from races, a cup she had won once she was officially proven to be the fastest currently living pegasus in Equestria, framed acceptance letter to Wonderbolts... And as a centerpiece was the first major trophy she had won, a golden headband with wings on sides and a lightning bolt on front—the first prize of the Best Young Flier Competition from decades ago.

As the orange mare sitting on the sofa shifted to look around some more, the rainbow maned dweller of the apartment came into the living room carrying a tray with two cups, a teapot and a plate of cookies. She put the tray on a table, poured some tea into both of the cups, picked up her cup and sat on an armchair next to the sofa Scootaloo was sitting on. "So, how have you been? It's been so long since we last met."

"I've been fine," Scootaloo answered as she picked up her cup and took a sip of the almost scalding hot beverage. "Still doing my dance performing and living peacefully with my husband in Ponyville. I'm not at my prime of life anymore but I can still perform, and I'm going to do that until I get cramps bad enough to force me to stop," she chuckled. "Though I gotta admit, I'm not that much to look at anymore—nopony really wants to watch an old mare performing when there are ponies in their mid-twenties as an alternative."

"Yeah, I guess the age has already taken its toll from both of us," Rainbow said a little downheartedly and sighed before continuing, "I wish I could still perform for the Wonderbolts, but my days as a stunt flier ended over a decade ago. And look at me now, I can barely lift myself off the ground with my wings anymore. I'm not even sure if I would be able to fly back up here anymore without help if I was brought on the ground." She weakly flapped her wings a few times for emphasis, but then perked up. "But enough of talking about myself. I have seen one of your foals up here in Cloudsdale occasionally past few months, she even visited me once and she told she's on a weather scheduling duty in the weather factory. But I haven't seen your younger foal Wind Breeze for ages, how is she doing nowadays?"

"She has a coltfriend living in Fillydelphia so she moved there from her former apartment in Ponyville. They have been together for quite some time already, and I have a strong feeling I'll soon become a grandmother..." Scootaloo smirked. "He had arranged a place in their local weather patrol for her, so that was one more reason for her to move seeing she was only as a backup in Ponyville weather team." She paused for a moment. "I always knew both of my foals would likely leave Ponyville some day, but it is still not easy to see them go..." Scootaloo sighed and looked into nothingness for a moment. She then looked back at the former stunt flier, raising an eyebrow questioningly. "Say, you never had any foals yourself. Why's that? I mean, there is nothing wrong with it but I'm just asking out of curiosity."

Rainbow laughed lightheartedly. "What, you haven't figured it out yet? I thought you knew me better..." She looked at the orange pegasus and continued with slightly more serious tone, "I never really was into all that romance stuff, never finding a stallion to settle with, and I doubt I would have been a good mother anyway with my brash attitude and a constant craving for stunt flying. I had some very short-living relationships back when I was younger, but it was never nothing serious—I never seriously considered settling down with anypony. Besides, I never really had time for any of that once I was performing with the Wonderbolts, and after finally retiring I was already too old to start any kind of relationships anymore."

"I see. Now that I think about it, it actually makes sense. Not every mare is destined to settle down and start a family themselves after all."

They sat in silence for a few moments sipping their tea and nibbling the cookies. Soon Rainbow got up and said, "You know, I didn't call you here just for some idle chat, but I actually had something to show you. Stay here, I'll be right back." With that she put her almost empty cup on the table and headed towards her bedroom. She came back a minute later carrying an old, somewhat yellowed and tattered book and put it on a table in front of Scootaloo. The book's covers were cyan—almost the same shade as Rainbow's coat—and it had a picture of her cutie mark glued on the front cover. The orange mare looked at the book with a questioning look as she read aloud the title, hoof-written into an empty space on the top of the front cover.

"Rainbow Dash's Personal Diary?" she questioned, looking at the elder mare. "I never knew you had a diary. Or that you were into that kind of stuff at all."

"No wonder you didn't know. Nopony beside me knew, not until today," Rainbow said. "It is not like those diaries ponies like Rarity would have been writing into every day, but it had become more like a collection of the most important moments of my life over the years I have written into it."

"You have been keeping this concealed for decades, judging by the looks of that book." She glanced at the tattered book with faded covers and yellowed pages. "So why are you revealing it now, and to me of all ponies?"

"I know my time to leave this world is inevitably coming closer and closer, and I just wanted to share it with somepony who I trust before passing away," the cyan pegasus answered with surprisingly calm tone. "And you are the one I trust more than anypony, even more than any of my other friends... of those who are still alive..." She sighed sadly before continuing, "I trust them also, don't get me wrong. But I just always felt some special connection between us, like a sisterly affection towards you ever since you started idolizing me as you were just a foal," she chuckled. "And I have felt that connection growing even stronger and stronger as the years have passed."

"Yeah, I never had any siblings myself either and I always felt that you were the closest I ever had to having one for real. Besides, you have always been my role model even if I didn't end up being a stunt flier like you did." The younger pegasus looked back at the diary lying on the table. "So you want me to read through that with you, right?"

"Right. Just promise that this will stay between the two of us. I don't want any other ponies to know about this, I still have an image to keep up you know," Rainbow laughed.

"I promise," Scootaloo said, also laughing a bit with Rainbow.

"Okay, so I guess we should start from the beginning. It's been so long since I first opened this book and wrote the first entry..." Rainbow opened the diary on the first page and laid it in front of them both so Scootaloo could be able to read too. The ink on the page was already quite faded, but it was still easily legible. Scootaloo leaned forwards and started to read along with the cyan pegasus.

Chapter 1: Take Off

Dash's Secret Diary

by Twippledash

Chapter 1: Take Off

Dear Diary

Nah, that beginning sound so sappy. I'll just leave it away from all the future entries and go straight to the point. If there's going to be any entries in the future that is. It's not like anypony else would ever be reading this anyway.

So, Rarity gave me this empty diary a few months ago as a part of her birthday present to me (I wonder if Twilight had some influence in it—I mean, a book as a present?) and I just dumped it into a corner of my bedroom to gather dust. I'm not the type to write diaries, that is so uncool and suited for prissy ponies like Rarity. But then again, I thought reading was uncool too before Twilight persuaded me to try those Daring Do books, and now I can't help but eagerly wait for the next part to be released! Since then I have been a little more open minded to try new things my friends have suggested.

So when I was cleaning up my bedroom today—yes, I do that sometimes—I found this diary buried under all the other junk I've gathered during past few months. And so I decided to give it a shot and try to write something about my own life, I heard that is supposed to help relieve stress and vent your feelings. Don't know about that, but I just felt like trying to write something here today. And no, it's definitely not to procrastinate the cleaning of my bedroom, no way!

I think I'm supposed to write something about what happened today, or maybe during last week? Well, here goes...

...

Nothing really interesting happened today or the last few days either. Today I was just having my regular flying practice, made some surprise visits to Rarity and Twilight (nope, definitely didn't crash into their houses, those were surprise visits and I'm going to stick with that), and almost had a mid-air collision with Scootaloo as she had flung herself into the air from a ramp with the help of her scooter. And later I got my nap interrupted by being bucked down from an apple tree by Applejack. Being woken up rudely I headed back home, and here I am, writing into this diary.

I guess that's enough for now, the room isn't going to clean itself. This writing thing isn't actually as boring as I had expected. Maybe I'll try writing some more when I've got actually something interesting to write.

—Rainbow Dash, the most awesome pegasus in Equestria

"'Most awesome pegasus in Equestria'? I see you're being quite modest here..." Scootaloo grinned as she raised her head to look at the elder rainbow maned pegasus next to her.

"You know how I was back then," Rainbow Dash said with a wide grin. "Always wanting to be the best in everything. Besides, like I wrote, I didn't expect to ever show this to anypony. I changed my mind later though, wanting to recall my life story with a close friend once more."

"So," the younger pegasus continued. "Rarity gave this to you?"

"Yep."

"And you never told her you started actually using it?"

"I didn't want it to be public information," Rainbow said nonchalantly. "Do you realize how much she gossiped about others' personal lives back then?"

"Good point." Scootaloo looked back at the open page. "So you actually liked writing—even after all these decades I still learn something more about you. I always thought that you thought you were too awesome for that... Say, did you write anything else besides this diary?"

"No, not really," the cyan pegasus said. "Except for those letters I still keep sending to you and my other friends. Well, there is nothing that interesting on this first entry, so we should probably just move onto the next one. I think you'll like it..." She put a little smile on her lips.

"Sounds good to me," Scootaloo said as she turned the page to show second entry, longer than the first one.

It's been almost three months since I wrote that last entry and I had almost forgotten about this diary once again, so I thought maybe I could add something now. At least I have something more interesting this time. Actually, two things worth mentioning happened earlier this week.

First, three days ago, my number one fan Scootaloo finally got airborne! I'm so proud of her! And she wasn't just hovering for a few seconds or gliding in the air after scooting off some ramp like before, but she was flying for real! Granted, she is still quite clumsy with her flight, but she was actually able to fly up to my cloud house (no more peace and quiet hiding in here...). I had promised on a whim some months ago that I would invite her to a tour in my house once she was able to get there all by herself, and since I didn't really have any good excuses, I had to invite her to come in.

She was so enthusiastic, like she hadn't seen a cloud house before. On a second thought, maybe she really hadn't seen a cloud house before from the inside? As far as I know she has been living in Ponyville for her whole life and she probably hasn't ever been in Cloudsdale, and cloud buildings outside the city are few and far between.

Anyway, she was running around the house so fast that even I couldn't keep an eye on her. One moment she was in the living room, next she was in the kitchen, and suddenly she had disappeared upstairs. I went after her and saw her looking around my bedroom (doesn't she respect anypony's privacy?). I noticed she had locked her widened eyes at something. As I followed her gaze, I realized what she saw and immediately took action. I had left some magazines with... questionable contents... lying next to my bed. I zoomed past her almost breaking the sound barrier, snatched away those magazines and tossed them into a closet where this diary was lying already, hoping that as they were out of sight they would also be out of her mind. Luckily that seemed to be the case, or at least she didn't ask any awkward questions about why I had that kind of magazines lying next to my bed...

And it went like that for a few more minutes: she rushed from one room to another and I tried to keep up with her. As she left I watched her flying back down to the ground—she was flapping her wings quite awkwardly and wobbled back and forth as she descended. I could probably give her some proper flying lessons now that she has got past the initial threshold of getting her wings to carry her. I haven't given her lessons before for the simple reason that I really know nothing about teaching the very basics of flying to somepony who had never flown before, seeing that it came to me naturally at a very young age without any assistance.

Well, enough about Scootaloo. There was this other thing that happened just yesterday I wanted to mention here. It is about my first and best friend Fluttershy. And about my other friend's big brother. No, not Shining Armor. Of course I mean Big Macintosh.

During a break between my training sessions yesterday I was lying on a cloud hanging over Sweet Apple Acres, near Fluttershy's cottage. I saw both Big Macintosh and Fluttershy out from my vantage point, and I think neither of them saw me. Fluttershy was staring at Big Macintosh with a blush on her face, and once Big Mac turned his head and noticed Fluttershy's staring the blush on her face intensified as she suddenly tried to look anywhere but at the red stallion. Judging by how he shuffled his hooves awkwardly, I bet Big Mac blushed also even if it was practically invisible against his red coat.

That was all, Fluttershy soon returned to her cottage and Macintosh continued bucking apples. It wasn't much, but it still was an obvious sign there might be something going on between the two, even if they don't probably realize it themselves yet. I just can't help but wonder how that relationship would work, seeing that Big Mac is almost as shy as Fluttershy is. I would definitely encourage Fluttershy to go on though, should she someday confess her feelings to Big Macintosh.

I'm looking forward to see more of the two later, but now it's once again time for my evening training session. Maybe I'll even see Scootaloo flying out there too, she just can't keep her hooves on ground once she got into flying. Somehow that reminds me of myself and how I was once I learned to fly...

—Rainbow Dash, still as awesome as ever

Scootaloo smiled widely as memories of those days flooded her mind. "I was quite the energetic filly back then, wasn't I?"

"You sure were," Rainbow answered, also reminiscing those times. "Before that I usually could have taken naps in peace on high altitude clouds, but once you started to fly up there also, I didn't really have any place left in Ponyville where I could have been in peace and quiet," she said with a mock scolding tone.

"I think you would have been just like me had Spitfire lived in the same town where you lived your fillyhood," the orange pegasus countered.

Rainbow glanced aside. "Touché. I still get your point even though Spitfire wasn't in the Wonderbolts yet back when I was a filly—she was just about eight years older than I am after all."

Scootaloo glanced back at the diary entry, stopping at the part describing her raiding her idol's house and grinned evilly. "By the way, I didn't forget those dirty magazines you had left there on plain sight. I just didn't mention them afterward in fear of you becoming angry to me. I had already forgot that little detail about that special day, but now I have a vague memory of that coming back... thanks for the reminder."

Rainbow looked away muttering something inaudible, but then looked back at the other pegasus. "There was this one question I never got to ask you before." She pointed near the beginning of the entry on the third paragraph and continued, "Had you ever been in a cloud house before that one time?"

"No," Scootaloo answered shaking her head. "You got you guesses there right. I had lived my whole life in Ponyville and my parents hadn't ever taken me into Cloudsdale. Your house was the only cloud house I had ever seen until I was able to fly up into Cloudsdale myself."

Rainbow nodded. "Yeah, as I thought."

"About those two," Scootaloo said pointing at the latter part of the diary entry. "You didn't mention to Fluttershy that you had seen her eyeing Big Macintosh that day, did you?"

"Of course I didn't!" the elder mare exclaimed. "That's Fluttershy we're talking about here, remember? She would've probably got a heart attack or something if I'd told her I'd noticed her crush on Big Mac before she was ready to admit it. I could have gently nudged her to make the next move towards him if they had been stalling for too long, but that never became necessary."

"I guess you're right, she was the shiest pony I'd ever known after all." Scootaloo thought back at the time she got flying the first time and tried to recall what had happened around that time. "They started dating just a few weeks later, right?"

"That's right. The next entries actually have a little more about that. Among with some more of you and your old friends," Rainbow smirked.

"I have a pretty good idea what the next entry would be about..." The orange mare grinned and flipped the next page of the diary open.

Chapter 2: Shy Love and Special Talents

Dash's Secret Diary

by Twippledash

Chapter 2: Shy Love and Special Talents

Wow, this has been quite a week.

First of all, I was totally right! It even happened faster than I thought, I would have expected it to take a few months at least.

But no. It has been just like three weeks since I first saw Fluttershy eyeing Big Macintosh, and yesterday she already asked him for a date! And he totally accepted! Seems like some of those assertiveness lessons actually stuck to her—the Fluttershy I knew from flight school would never have been able to confess her love to anypony.

So they are having their first date tonight. I'm sure they'll do well, if a little awkwardly, both being so shy and all. In fact I couldn't have found a better mate candidate for Fluttershy even if I looked for a hundred years, they just seem to be a perfect match for each other. I really got to ask Fluttershy tomorrow about how their date went. I'm not myself into all that romantic lovey-dovey stuff, but I'd still do anything to help making Fluttershy happy and to assist her in her romantic endeavors whenever she needs any help.

But now I'm getting all sappy here, bleh! So let's move on to the next thing, something that happened earlier this week, four days ago.

Ponyville elementary school was having a talent show once again, this time only for solo performances. And believe it or not, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle both got their cutie marks that day! What about the third Crusader, Apple Bloom then? She got her cutie mark just a few days earlier while she was assisting in building the new outdoor performance stage for said talent show. Her cutie mark is a toolbox, indicating her talent in building and fixing things. And there is also an apple emblazoned on the side of the toolbox, as would have been expected due to her being integral part of the Apple family.

But back to Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle. First was Sweetie Belle who—after some coaxing to get her on the stage—sang a song to the crowd. And she sure can sing! Her singing voice was just heavenly, even I was in a trance the whole time she sang and just couldn't resist listening through the whole song! I had never heard anything like that, she was just... No words could really describe how outstanding a singer she was. And sure enough after finishing her song, a cutie mark appeared on her flank; a silver bell surrounded by two black notes.

After Sweetie there were some other performances by various fillies and colts. Most of the performances were about average, nothing special, but at least there was quite much variety: magic show, some more singing, small-scale flight show, roller skating... And then finally it was Scootaloo's turn.

As she entered the stage, somepony in the backstage turned on some music and Scootaloo started her show. Solo performance dancing. At first her moves were a bit clumsy and awkward—likely due to nervousness—but as she went on she soon really got into it. She was doing fast spins, hops, balancing on one of her forehooves, even some tight aerial loops. All of her moves synchronized perfectly with the music playing on the background. It was very captivating, almost hypnotic, to just watch her dance around. As the music neared the end she made a loop, and then slowly descended during the final long note, landing on her hooves precisely as the music ended.

Loud cheers filled the audience once again, and like with Sweetie Belle, there was a flash of white light on Scootaloo's flanks. And there it was, her cutie mark; a pair of winged ballet shoes.

There was this hint of disappointment nagging at the back of my head, seeing her special talent didn't turn out to be anything flight related. Oh well, guess I can't get everything. Her performance was amazing so I shouldn't really complain, and I am still very proud of her!

Her performance was the last one, so I went to the backstage to congratulate both Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, their Cutie Mark Crusading finally reaching its conclusion (maybe Ponyville could finally be free of their mischief? I don't think so, but one could always hope). Rarity was already there hugging her little sister. I was soon followed by my other four friends and Apple Bloom, all coming to congratulate the two newly marked fillies. Pinkie somehow managed to stretch her forelegs to impossible lengths and pulled us all in one big group hug. And then she zoomed off to prepare a party, leaving a bunch of written invitations for us in her wake.

Speaking of parties, Pinkie had already held four parties this week, counting the one mentioned above: one for Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, another one for them as one party apparently wasn't enough for two fillies getting their cutie marks, one for Apple Bloom so she wouldn't feel left out, and one without any apparent reason just because Pinkie felt like partying. And tomorrow she's going to have a party celebrating Fluttershy and Big Macintosh's first date. I think I'll never understand how that pink pony always has so much energy, it seems like she's somehow managed to get herself into a permanent sugar rush or something. Which I think is totally possible explanation, seeing how much candies and confectionery she eats every day.

This has been quite a long entry already, so I think now is a good time to wrap it all up. Besides, I just came from Pinkie's last party and I am quite tired. I'll probably write next entry tomorrow after Pinkie's party for Flutters and Big Mac, regarding their first date.

—Rainbow Dash

"I remember that day as clear as if it was just yesterday," Scootaloo sighed and glanced at the photos of her and the two former Crusaders on one of the living room walls.

"Like I and my old friends all remember the day when we got our cutie marks. It is really something you never forget," Rainbow said, also looking at where the orange pegasus was looking, then drifted her gaze over to the photos of her taken on the Summer Flight Camp where she got her own cutie mark.

"Yeah. It is the turning point in your life that quite much defines the direction you will be going for the rest of your life," Scootaloo said as she looked back at the cyan pegasus still sitting next to her. "I mean, it doesn't restrict you from doing whatever you like, but quite sadly many ponies think that to be professional in something one must have an appropriate cutie mark."

"That's just stupid, anypony can do anything they want despite their special talent. Take my old fashionista friend Rarity for example." She looked at the photos of her and her five friends on one wall, seeing the alabaster unicorn among them as she continued, "Her special talent is gemology and finding gems, but she isn't a gem miner or jeweler or anything like that. No, she had decided to become a fashion designer at a young age even before getting her cutie mark. She just utilizes her special talent in improving some of her dresses."

Scootaloo nodded approvingly. "Sure there is some exceptions, but usually the cutie marks actually match with what one pony likes to do and what they are good at. Me, Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom all readily embraced our special talents, and I know you and most of your old friends did too."

"That's right," Rainbow said, stopping for a moment before asking Scootaloo, "Speaking of my old friends, have you seen Applejack lately? She's still living in Sweet Apple Acres with her extended family, right? I'm not in a shape of visiting Ponyville on a regular basis anymore like a few years ago, but the village is still close to my heart. Maybe you could tell if anything noteworthy have happened there?"

"Sure I can," the orange mare replied. "Though I don't think anything worth mentioning have happened since we last met. It is still just a quiet little village after all. About Applejack, she is still bucking apple trees in Sweet Apple Acres and living with her foals and grandfoals there. At least with those who have not moved away. There isn't really any visible sign of aging showing on her yet, except for a slightly slower pace and her taking breaks a little more often that before." Rainbow just looked at her, slightly amazed by her friend's endurance and willpower. Scootaloo noticed that and said, "Her age isn't really comparable with yours though, even if she is about the same age. You remember that pegasi have about ten years shorter lifespan than earth ponies?"

Rainbow blinked her eye a few times and put a hoof on her forehead. "Oh, yeah. Forgot about that for a moment, it's about the whole faster metabolism thing and such. And unicorns live even longer than earth ponies, having a few years longer lifespan on average due to their passive ability to channel way more magic than other races. I've heard apples are also quite healthy food, which would further explain her staying young and lively for that long."

"I guess so." Scootaloo looked back at the diary still lying open on the table and said, "How did this discussion sidetrack into pony lifespans and healthiness of apples anyway?" She shrugged and continued, "Oh well, guess we could move on the next topic. If I recall correctly, Fluttershy and Big Macintosh's first date wouldn't have gone much better than it did."

"Yep. As I wrote in the end of that last entry, there is more about that coming next. I hope that will refresh your memories like it have been refreshing mine."

"I'm sure it will," Scootaloo said as she turned on the next page.

Hopefully Pinkie will not find a reason to have a party for at least a few days... I'm sure Pinkie herself enjoys each and every one of her parties, but if you ask me, five parties in a week is way too much.

Anyway, about that date of Fluttershy and Big Macintosh...

It was a success! From what I've managed to get out of Fluttershy—which isn't really much more than just a few sentences—they first went for a dinner to a little restaurant in some secluded part of Ponyville. I didn't really get the name of that restaurant as she was more like squeaking than speaking, but I guess that doesn't really matter anyway. So after their dinner they went for a walk around the lake—just like I'd imagine any sappy romance novel would go like—and once the sun had already set they finally got back to Ponyville. Big Mac even escorted Fluttershy to her cottage like any gentlecolt would do.

And then comes the best part—they totally kissed at the end of their date! I mean, Fluttershy didn't outright say that they kissed, but once I asked about it I could see the answer from her fierce blushing and sudden awkwardness. I didn't press her further, but I got all the information I was looking for. Their date went well as a whole and I'm sure that one day they'll be living happily together as a couple.

I wonder when we'll see their offspring and what will they be like? Maybe it will take even a few years before they are ready to go that far with their relationship, but I'm sure it will happen eventually.

That's all for now. For some reason Scootaloo is calling for me at my front door... Oh, right! I forgot I had promised to give her some flying lessons today. I can't disappoint my number one fan, so I guess I got to go now.

—Rainbow Dash

"How come I always pop in somewhere in every one of these entries?" Scootaloo inquired the other pegasus.

Rainbow smirked. "That's not entirely true, there are some entries ahead where I don't mention you at all... But as I've said before you have always been important to me, like a sister I never had. Even if I didn't realize it back when I was writing these, it surely has always been somewhere in my subconscious."

"Anyway, I'm glad their date went well and they could be happy together at the time." Scootaloo then looked a little downcast as she continued, "I wish I could say they were living happily ever after, but, well... You know as well as I do what happened, and I'm sure there is something about that very unfortunate incident later in this diary as well."

"Yeah, we'll get back to that later... I don't really want to think about it more than what is necessary," Rainbow replied with a sad tone. She then put her smile back on and said, "Let's just move back to some happier memories for now."

"Well, I don't think there is much more to discuss about this entry, so maybe we should just continue reading?"

Rainbow just nodded as she turned the page once again, revealing the next entry for them to read.

Chapter 3: Traditions

Dash's Secret Diary

by Twippledash

Chapter 3: Traditions

If anypony else told me this, I would have thought they were joking. But I know it is true, hearing it straight from Fluttershy herself.

Long story short, Fluttershy is expecting a foal.

She once again shows me that I have been underestimating her assertiveness. Or maybe I have been underestimating the deepness of her love to Big Macintosh? Anyway, I thought it would take her and Big Mac at least a full year before they would even think about having sex foals together. But no, they have been together for just about two months now, and she is already pregnant! Way to go Fluttershy!

As an entirely different topic, the Cutie Mark Crusaders are still together even if they obviously don't try to get their cutie marks anymore. Last week they even did a rerun of their old group performance (the one that ended catastrophically and practically ruined the stage in the process), just swapping their roles and making a little changes here and there. Or maybe not so little changes—they practically reformed the whole show. Now that I think about it, this one was completely different from their old performance, so I guess I shouldn't really call this a rerun... Anyway, Scootaloo was the one performing choreographies, Sweetie Belle was the main singer, and Apple Bloom was in charge of all the props, lighting, and special effects. Sweetie Belle had managed to get Rarity to make their dresses, so those were actually good looking this time instead of the garish rags they had back then.

And I guess it is needless to say that their performance was as amazing as their solo performances I mentioned here earlier. Except that isn't exactly true—their talents combined in one single show made it even better! Sweetie's singing was as heavenly as ever and Scootaloo's moves were just amazing, and she had apparently got rid of that little bit of nervousness she had earlier, too. Once again words can't really describe how awesome their performance was, so I'm not even going to try to do that. Let's just say that I would almost be willing to skip a Wonderbolt show to see them performing again. But just almost—Wonderbolts are still my top priority and they are professional performers after all. Oh, and I shouldn't forget Apple Bloom either; she didn't have any part in the show itself, but she sure did a great job in building the scenery and managing lights and special effects during the performance of the other two fillies.

However, they are still just fillies and hence still studying in the Ponyville elementary school. Which means they are not building a career themselves yet, but I'm still waiting to see more of their performances in the future.

And I just can't wait to see Fluttershy and Big Macintosh's first foal! It would still be almost a year before that, but I'm sure the wait is worth it in the end.

—Rainbow Dash, soon to be an aunt?

"Before you say anything about that signature," Rainbow said to the orange pegasus next to her after she had finished reading the entry. "I knew that Fluttershy having a foal wouldn't technically make me an aunt. But she was almost like a sister to me and her foals ended up calling me their aunt anyway, so I guess that was accurate enough."

"My foals also called you their aunt, even if you technically are not," Scootaloo replied. "I'm not a psychologist, but I guess it has something to do with you visiting me so often when they were still just little fillies, so that they subconsciously associated you as a part of my family or something. Or maybe it is just convenient to use 'aunt' whenever referring to your parent's close friends. It's quite funny and strange how those little ponies' minds work sometimes."

"Like how a certain trio of fillies had decided to get their cutie marks no matter what—and usually breaking something or getting into a trouble in the process," Rainbow smirked.

Scootaloo coughed. "I have no idea what you're talking about," she said looking around and avoiding the other mare's gaze, but still smiling nevertheless. "Besides, it was always all for good fun even if we never got our cutie marks while crusading."

"Well, I'm not so sure about that 'fun' part in every case... Sure it was usually funny in the hindsight, but there were several not-so-harmless cases and close calls," the elder pegasus said with a wry smile on her lips. "Remember the time you almost got petrified by a cockatrice for example? Or the time you almost got Big Mac mounting Cheerilee? Does Foal Free Press or Gabby Gums ring any bells, when the whole Ponyville turned against you for a while? Or how about—"

"Yeah, yeah, I got your point already!" Scootaloo interrupted, her face flushed. She continued with a slightly calmer tone, "So our crusading was not that harmless always, but in the end no permanent damage was ever done, so it was really no big deal."

Rainbow still had a smile on her face, holding in her laughter. "I was just playing with you a bit, no need to get all flustered about it."

"Anyway..." Scootaloo coughed again and looked back at the diary. "It all was entertaining and nice as long as it lasted, including those performances with Sweetie Belle and with Apple Bloom giving backstage support." She sighed before continuing, "However, nothing good last forever. Eventually our paths had to separate and our trio started to gradually drift apart. But even nowadays we still keep in contact with each other, sending letters now and then."

"I know that feeling," Rainbow said compassionately. "I and all my friends separated our paths eventually, too. As you know, the only one of my good old friends still living in Ponyville is Applejack. But I too still keep exchanging letters with them, and occasionally meeting with some of them in person." She glanced back at her diary and added, "By the way, sorry to cut the conversation this abruptly, but if we sidetrack with our conversations after every entry, we will be sitting here well past midnight. So maybe we should just move onto the next entry?"

"Works for me, I've got nothing more to add on that subject at the moment anyway. Besides, I'm sure we'll have more to talk about our friends later, especially Fluttershy. I'm sure there will soon be an entry regarding her first foal," Scootaloo smirked as she flipped to the next page.

The winter is starting to get closer and the traditional Running of the Leaves was held yesterday. Pinkie Pie was once again chosen to be the official announcer and she picked Spike as her co-announcer again. Talking of Spike, he has grown quite a bit since last year, being about half the size of a grown up mare at the moment.

Anyway, back to the race. This time I and Applejack managed to stay out of fighting—well, mostly at least—and thus we took the first and second places of the race this year. Twilight was once again in the fifth place, I guess trotting at a slower pace until the very end really pays off—if you are content with decent ranking and are not trying to get to the winning positions I mean. But to win in a race like this one must train hard like me or Applejack.

As for how I did against Applejack, well... she won. There, I admitted it. But she won just by an inch, I swear! Still the second place is for losers, and I hate losing. I'll just show her during the next competition we have together...

Well, enough of that. As for other news, there isn't really any news. The Crusaders held another show last week (as awesome as before) and Fluttershy is still waiting for her foal, on her second month now.

—Rainbow Dash

"Nothing interesting here really," Rainbow said nonchalantly. "Guess it was more like a filler entry when I didn't have anything else to write about but wanted to write something anyway. We could as well just move onto the next entry."

"Or you just don't want to be reminded of you losing the race to Applejack," Scootaloo smirked. Rainbow didn't answer and just turned open the next page of the diary.

Winter Wrap Up, Winter Wrap Up!
Let's finish our holiday cheer.
Winter Wrap Up, Winter Wrap Up!
'cause tomorrow spring is here...

So, yeah, spring officially started today and I haven't written anything for months. This year's Winter Wrap Up was just yesterday and that song is once again playing on repeat in my head. Winter was as boring as usual, nothing really interesting happened during it. I just wonder why do we even have winters, what good are them for? I mean, Winter Wrap Up is a fun annual event and I even get to be in a leading position during it, but the winter itself? I just don't get it. Oh well, I guess it is just an Equestria-wide tradition from back when ponies didn't control seasons or something. Not that I really care that much, seeing that pegasi are somewhat more cold resistant than other ponies, and the snow doesn't bother either when I can just fly over it.

As for this year's Winter Wrap Up, Twilight once again did a great job in organizing the whole event so that instead of spending half of the time arguing we actually got our work done in time. And what you know, for once even Ditzy actually went to the right direction to get the southern birds! We even broke our last year's record, already finishing our work by early afternoon!

So we still had most of the day left. Pinkie Pie decided to have a "Winter wrapped up in time" party in the town hall and invited everypony to join the celebration. How she managed to decorate the whole town hall interior and get all the snacks in there in less than five minutes really baffles me (there wasn't anything in there before that, I checked), but anyway the celebration itself was as great as Pinkie's parties always are!

The party lasted long into the night, even though there were only a few ponies left by the time Pinkie finally wrapped up the party and started cleaning up the place. It's really quite amazing how much mess a bunch of partying ponies can do in a few hours; the floor was practically covered with ripped streamers, cake crumbs, crushed paper cups, popped balloons, and such. I helped Pinkie out by collecting the streamers and balloons attached to the ceiling and walls. Once she assured she could handle the rest, I flew back home and fell asleep almost immediately—I was really tired due to having to wake up way earlier than usually because of the Winter Wrap Up traditionally starting by sunrise.

As a completely unrelated note, Fluttershy is starting to get slightly rounder around her belly. It has been about half a year now, so just about five months of waiting left.

—Rainbow Dash

P.S. Two old Wonderbolts quit during the winter, so I guess this could be my chance to get in if they soon start looking for replacements.

Rainbow looked at the younger mare and asked, "Regarding these last two entries, I guess they still have Running of the Leaves and Winter Wrap Up as a part of the season-change traditions in Ponyville, right?"

"Yes, and them are just like before, nothing is really changed about them," Scootaloo answered. "They still insist Winter Wrap Up to be done without any visible magic at all and Running of the Leaves still gathers dozens of participants every year. And the race route is still exactly the same as it has been for as long as I can remember. Also, the Winter Wrap Up song hasn't changed either, they still sing it exactly the same way as several decades ago."

Rainbow chuckled. "Yeah, I guess those traditions are an integral part of the Ponyville community, and nopony ever dares to try to change anything which has been there longer than they have lived."

"Well, there are those anti-traditionalists who try to change everything, but they are always overshadowed by the other ponies still following old traditions," Scootaloo said. "I myself prefer these traditions though. As a younger mare I took part in Running of the Leaves every year but stopped doing that a decade or so ago, and now I just watch from the sidelines as younger ponies do the racing. As for Winter Wrap Up, I still do my best to help in it as a part of the ice cutting team—skating is almost like dancing on ice."

Rainbow nodded and looked thoughtful. "I haven't really had time or motivation to come watch Winter Wrap Up since I moved away, and I was just wondering..." She looked at the orange pegasus. "How well are those organized nowadays now that Twilight doesn't live in Ponyville anymore?"

"We still do have an All-Team Organizer as the leader every year, going trough every single task with a checklist like Twilight used to do. Nopony has been quite as good in that task as Twilight was—she is almost like the embodiment of organization whenever she really gets into it—but having a single leader really helps out nevertheless. Despite occasional conflicts, we've still managed quite well. At least the Winter Wrap Ups have been finished on time every year ever since Twilight introduced the All-Team Organizer position."

Rainbow smiled, remembering Twilight's crazy accurate checklists and her obsession for planning everything ahead. "Twilight did indeed have quite an influence in Ponyville, being one of the most powerful unicorns alive—maybe even the most powerful, not counting the princesses—in addition to being Princess Celestia's personal student."

Scootaloo nodded. "Yeah she did. But so did you and your other friends also. Not everypony can claim to be the bearers of the most powerful artifacts known in Equestrian history. Not to mention that you saved the Equestria and Ponyville several times."

"Heh, yeah, guess that's true," Rainbow said smiling meekly.

"Well, enough of that for now I guess." Scootaloo glanced at the last paragraph and the postscript of the latest entry. "Did you get into Wonderbolt audition before Fluttershy's foalbirth, or was it after it? I can't really remember clearly what happened and when. It all happened several decades ago and I was still technically a filly back then after all."

"I got invitation to the Wonderbolt audition about two months before the birthday of Fluttershy's first foal, and the audition itself was a month after the invitation. So there is a bit of writing regarding Wonderbolts before we get back to Fluttershy," Rainbow answered smiling and opened the next page.

Chapter 4: Audition

Dash's Secret Diary

by Twippledash

Chapter 4: Audition

Oh. My. Gosh!

I'm so excited I can barely write this!

Okay, so what happened today... Early this afternoon I was resting in my house, having a little break after disposing of the clouds from last night's downpour as I heard somepony knocking at my front door. I was quite surprised, and a little bit worried—I rarely get any unexpected visitors, and even then those visitors are usually bringing bad news like telling me one of my friends had gotten hurt or that I had forgotten something important or whatever—but I went to answer the door anyway.

Whatever I expected, it definitely wasn't this. There was a fiery-maned yellow pegasus mare standing at my house's entrance. She was one of my idols and I'd recognize her anywhere, even though she wasn't wearing her usual outfit that time.

That's right. The captain of the Wonderbolts, Spitfire, was on my doorstep just to meet me!

I think I lost my ability to think coherently for a few moments, only thing I could say at the moment was just blurting 'Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh!' like a brainless idiot. Luckily Spitfire was used to that kind of behavior from her fans and didn't think any less of me because of it, saying that it was a perfectly normal reaction for any fanatic Wonderbolt fan unexpectedly meeting their idol.

The best part is yet to come still. She wasn't just on any casual visit; she said they were looking for new members for the Wonderbolts and she actually had an official invitation for me to perform in their audition in Cloudsdale a month from now! Though she reminded me that I am not guaranteed to be a Wonderbolt yet as there will be dozens of other candidates too, and only a maximum of four or so can get in. Despite that Spitfire also mentioned that I actually had really good chances to pass the test judging by my earlier performances she had been witnessing! But she also warned that I shouldn't let overconfidence to take over myself, that had apparently ruined the attempts of many promising fliers in the past.

I got to stop for a moment, I'm too excited to even write anything!

Okay, took a little break squealing like a fanfilly and flying a few loops around my house to expel the excess of my excitement. Much better now.

So, after the formal matters Spitfire had an hour of free time to just hang out. Not as a fan and an idol, but as friends. We had met several times before, but that was actually the first time I really got to hang out with her personally for more than just a minute or so. Yes, she was there with the other Wonderbolts after I won the Best Young Flier Competition, but I didn't really get a chance to talk with her much that day. She was also in the Grand Galloping Gala and the Royal Wedding, but in both of those cases she was constantly being pulled away by some attention hogs as well as her being surrounded by other ponies most of the time, so I didn't get any opportunity to talk with her long enough to really get to know her.

But now I had a full hour with her without any other ponies constantly interrupting! And she was just as awesome as I have always thought she was! We also had a common interest in stunt flying, so starting a conversation was really no trouble at all. After sharing some awesome tricks with each other she even challenged me for a race! I would never turn down a challenge—especially since she was one of the few pegasi who could actually have any chance against me in a flying race—so a race we had.

Since I was the one being challenged, I got to set the race route. I ended up choosing a long, straight line from my porch to a hilltop about three miles from Ponyville. I knew the simple route without any sharp turns would likely be in my favor, and I'm sure Spitfire noticed that also even if she didn't mention it. But then again, for me stunt flying is still just a hobby, while she has already been a professional full-time stunt flier for years.

So we set on the start line on my porch next to each other, ready to take off. She counted down from three to zero and then we were off. The first thing I noticed was that she was already speeding way ahead of me when I had barely lifted my hooves off the porch—she somehow managed to accelerate to her top speed in a flash! I could see air resistance building in front of her, but she wasn't accelerating anymore, she seemed to be stuck with subsonic speeds. Very soon I managed to match her speed, but I was still way behind. But unlike her, I still kept accelerating and soon noticed the very familiar cone of air resistance forming around my body, getting thinner and thinner as my velocity was steadily increasing. It tried to push me back with incredible forces, but I refused to give up and still accelerated...

Until finally the barrier perished—creating a sonic rainboom as a side effect—and I was flying at supersonic speeds once again! Spitfire was still ahead of me, but the distance was now quickly getting shorter and shorter. Just a few hundred feet from the finish line I managed to bypass her, and less than a second later I crossed the finish line as the winner!

It's still hard to believe that I won the captain of the Wonderbolts in a righteous race! Sure I set the rules, but it was still impressive even if I say it myself!

The fact that she lost a race against me doesn't make me think any less about her though, I still admire her skills as a flier. She was fast. And by fast I mean really fast. And her ability to accelerate so quickly was outright amazing! If the track had been slightly shorter or if it had any sharp turns, she would have beaten me without a hitch. She has been a professional stunt flier for years after all. Anyway, she was a good sport and didn't hold any grudges, even congratulating me for my victory.

Soon after our race she had to leave, and I immediately went to tell my friends that I'm going to have a Wonderbolt audition in a month. As expected, they all congratulated me and Pinkie threw a 'Rainbow Dash is a Wonderbolt candidate' party.

That's everything for now, this morning has been totally awesome! Now I'm off with my afternoon training session. I have to keep myself in a good shape for the Wonderbolts after all.

Oh, did I already mention I'm truly excited about this all? Because I totally am!

—The soon-to-be-Wonderbolt Rainbow Dash

P.S. The invitation letter says that I can also bring up to six other ponies to watch my performance. Fluttershy will be just about a month away from giving birth by the time of the audition, so she'll likely have to stay home. But I'm sure my other friends will gladly be there (with the help of Twilight's cloud walking spell of course), and Scootaloo would definitely like to be there too. Then there would still be one place open... Oh well, I'll see if I can find somepony to fill that spot.

"Seems like you were quite excited about that whole 'meeting Spitfire and getting into Wonderbolt audition' thing," Scootaloo said jokingly.

"You bet I was!" Rainbow exclaimed. "That was probably one of the best days of my life I had lived so far, soon overshadowed by actually getting into the Wonderbolts of course. You didn't get a visit from the captain of the Wonderbolts and get invitation to the Wonderbolt audition every day. And for me it was like a dream come true, they had been my idols and I had been determined to join them ever since my parents brought me into one of their shows when I was just a little filly."

"Yeah, your obsession of Wonderbolts was really common knowledge among Ponyville," Scootaloo smirked rolling her eyes. "Whenever somepony even mentioned Wonderbolts withing your earshot, you were immediately there praising them and blabbering about how you would become a Wonderbolt one day."

Rainbow chuckled embarrassed. "I guess that's quite true, I was probably a bit too enthusiastic about them back then. But then again, I did get into the Wonderbolts eventually. And on my first audition, to boot."

The orange pegasus nodded. "I'm not arguing with that. About that audition, I guess it is coming next in the diary?"

Rainbow nodded and said before turning the page, "Yup. And I got a little carried away while writing it, so it will be quite a long entry."

Woohoo!!!

This is so awesome! The Wonderbolt audition was yesterday and I passed the test! That means I am now officially a Wonderbolt! Just a rookie though and not a full-fledged Wonderbolt yet. But once I pass the mandatory Wonderbolt training period, I will finally get into their performance team!

I can't really express my feelings on a paper well enough, so I'll just move onto describing what happened yesterday.

First of all, I could barely sleep the night before that day, being so nervous about the upcoming audition. Luckily I managed to get some rest nevertheless, so I wasn't like a few of the Wonderbolt candidates who were practically sleepwalking—or maybe sleepflying in this case—and likely failed their performances because of that. I can tell from personal experience that stunt flying and sleep deprivation together just does not work and never ends well.

The auditions started early afternoon and everypony had to be there by the noon, so I woke up a few hours prior to make sure I would be fully awake on time. I had also told the ponies accompanying me to get up early enough too. Rarity didn't want to join us, something about her having had enough of heights for at least several years—I can actually understand that, having been the one to save her from a free fall twice—so I could still take two ponies with me in addition to Twilight, Applejack, Pinkie, and Scootaloo. Fluttershy, as much as she wanted to come to cheer for me, had to stay home. So next I asked Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle whether they'd like to come, and while they were not as enthusiastic as Scootaloo, they were still glad to be of emotional support to me.

Once we all gathered together at the library, Twilight put cloud walking spell of each non-pegasus pony present and they packed together into Twilight's hot air balloon, which was already inflated on the backyard. The balloon's basket was crowded enough with the five earthbound ponies in it, so I and Scootaloo decided to fly by their side. We flew up to the Cloudsdale, still having more than an hour to get to the stadium. The cloud city wasn't really designed with non-flying ponies in mind, so Twilight steered the balloon close to the stadium and landed on a large cloud platform attached to it.

We secured the balloon so it wouldn't get caught by the wind and headed towards the stadium entrance. There was a long line of ponies already, and a pair of Wonderbolts—Soarin' and Fleetfoot—stood by the entrance to maintain order, check invitations, and allow ponies in one group at a time. In most cases it wasn't really hard to tell which ponies were here to perform and which were just as an audience; the nervousness and anxiousness was clearly visible on some ponies' attitude, me included. We got to the end of the queue and started waiting, chatting idly as the line slowly moved forward.

Our group got a few strange looks as we waited, it wasn't every day you got to see earth ponies or unicorns in Cloudsdale after all. I also noticed some ponies nearby talking about me and glancing at my direction now and then. One of them even came to talk to me and asked for an autograph! And she was followed by two other ponies who were apparently too bashful to take the initiative. Heh, I didn't know I already had some fans outside Ponyville! I guess being the only pony alive to perform sonic rainboom really gives me some reputation.

Anyway, about twenty minutes later we were at the entrance facing the pair of Wonderbolts standing there. They both immediately recognized and greeted me. Fleetfoot checked my name in a list of invited pegasi as Soarin' asked for the invitation letter with some additional info about me filled in. Twilight levitated said letter out of her saddlebag (I had given it to her for safekeeping as I myself tend to lose any loose papers lying around) for him to scrutinize. He nodded approvingly and allowed us to go in.

As we were passing the entrance Soarin' took a look at my company, stopping as she noticed Applejack. He suddenly looked a bit surprised asked her something like "Say, weren't you once selling apple products at the Grand Galloping Gala?" Applejack answered nodding and added bitterly that the one pie he bought was the only product she sold the whole night. His eyes brightened as she mentioned that pie, and he enthusiastically asked where he could find her to buy some more. Fleetfoot just chuckled at her comrade, it apparently was no secret within Wonderbolts that Soarin' had an obsession for pies. And he apparently occasionally talked about "that one apple pie" at the Gala. It seems like Applejack's got a new committed customer.

We couldn't really have any long chat as there was still some ponies in line behind us, so we walked into the entrance hall of the stadium. There we were greeted by Rapidfire, who directed us to the box seat reserved for our group. I could also stay there with my friends until they'll call for the contestants to gather together for the last-minute guidance before they start the auditions.

While we were waiting in the box, I recalled all the flying techniques and such I would probably need during the audition while listening to my friends' encouragements. About half past twelve Spitfire flew to the middle of the stage with a megaphone and announced all the contestants to come to the entrance hall. My friends gave me a good luck wish once again before I left the box.

In the entrance hall there was quite a crowd of pegasi, like forty or so, all about to try and impress the Wonderbolts trying to get accepted in. That was the time I really realized how much competition I had, and that only one tenth or so of that group would be accepted. Not to mention everypony there was hoof picked by the Wonderbolts themselves, hence each and every one of them would be at least a decent flier and the competition would be really tough. Even though I managed to fight the building anxiousness quite well, I'm sure it still showed if somepony looked close enough.

Spitfire gave us all general information about the audiences and gave us our randomly selected queue numbers. I was number 18. She asked us to stay there in the hall until our number was called up so we couldn't see each others' performances. With that she gave the first contestant fifteen minutes to prepare and exited to the main stage.

Soon they called for the first contestant, and a very nervous looking brown pegasus mare flew towards the stage and disappeared there. Even though the walls of the entrance hall were somewhat sound resistant, I could still easily hear roaring cheers greeting the first contestant entering the stage.

The cheering subsided, but raised once in a while for a short moment to encourage the current performer, until it finally reached its crescendo—the first performance had reached its end.

They soon called in the next one, and for each contestant the routine was repeated with just a slight variance now and then. I watched as the crowd got smaller and smaller, my nervousness growing as the amount of ponies performing before me decreased. As only about half of the pegasi were left, it was finally my turn.

I swallowed hard, exited the waiting room, and flew into the stage.

I was greeted by nearly ear deafening cheers from all around the stage. I looked around and noticed my friends cheering loudly in the same box seat I was with them before. There were two Wonderbolts sitting in the judges' booth on the other end of the stadium, and four other Wonderbolts scattered around the edges of the stage to get better view of each performance. From what I was told before either in the invitation letter on in person, they had three tests for each contestant. The first two were designed to test our speed, agility, and precision, while the third one would be a short freeform performance.

First was slaloming through a line of cloud columns, that was familiar routine for me back from the Best Young Flier Competition. Luckily it went better this time, and I passed the route without a hitch and with a great time to boot. Roaring cheers greeted my ears as I finished, shaking away most of the nervousness I still had in my mind. Glance back at the box holding my friends increased my confidence even more, seeing them all practically jumping up and down cheering for me really warmed my heart.

But that was just the first task. Next I had to fly trough a zigzagging race course they had marked with cloud rings. It had some nasty turns and curves, and I'm quite sure I accidentally touched one of the rings with my left wing while doing a sharp turn. I knew that was definitely going to count against me in the end, but I let it slide and continued doing my best hoping that my freeform performance would counter it well enough. Crossing of the finish line made the crowd erupt into roaring cheers once again.

Next was the final task—freeform.

I think it is needless to say that my performance includes sonic rainboom as a part of it, that being my signature trick and all.

So, I started by flying up several hundred feet and stopped. I looked down to the stadium deciding that was enough distance, and then started accelerating back towards the stage. Breaking the sound barrier had really become a routine to me already, so I felt totally confident that I could pull it of. Hardest part was to get the timing right and to steer once flying with supersonic speeds. I felt the familiar feeling of air resistance building in front of me, and once I was about fifty feet above the stadium, I broke the sound barrier with a thundering boom creating a horizontally expanding rainbow colored ring above the audience.

But I didn't end there. I kept spinning in vertical circles below the initial sound barrier breaking point, tilting my angle a bit between each round. With the rainbow trail behind me I formed a giant rainbow colored sphere in the middle of the stage.

Once I finished my trick, I flew on place right above the glimmering sphere I had just created, feeling truly relieved that my last trick had worked out as intended. As I mentioned, the audience's cheering earlier was loud. But it was nothing compared to what I got after finishing that last trick, I should probably consider myself lucky that my eardrums were still intact after the cheering subsided.

Once the rainbow sphere had already vanished, I was asked to move to another waiting room for the rest of the performances as the next contestant was called in. We who had already finished our performances couldn't watch the rest performing simply because it would be unfair for the last ones not to see any performances, and also because it would make following performers more nervous because of other competitors watching.

Once I arrived to the waiting room, the first question one of the competitors asked me was "What was that huge explosion we heard?" Before I could say anything, another competitor already answered that it was a sonic rainboom. When I asked how she knew, she just said that she'd seen me before in the Best Young Flier Competition.

A chatter filled the waiting room. One group was lamenting that they had no chance against that, some other group was cursing that they had missed a legendary sonic rainboom, some were still confident that their performances were better, and the rest were just indifferent.

The talking subsided quickly and silence fell over the place once again, with just occasional question asked from others and such. I waited there with the ever growing amount of pegasi for hours, not really knowing how the Wonderbolts would grade our performances, and how well I managed against the others. And I could tell that most of the others seemed to be thinking about the same thing.

Finally the last contestant finished, and twenty minutes later Spitfire came in to call us all back to the stage to hear the results of their evaluations. Everypony complied silently, too afraid to say anything anymore until hearing the results. We arranged on a row facing the judges' booth onto a cloud platform set in the middle of the stage.

Spitfire started by saying that all the performances were well above average and that nopony should take rejection personally, for they all were still great fliers. But due to the Wonderbolts being an elite stunt flier team, they could only accept the best of the best into the Wonderbolts. She said that after intense and hard time evaluating and comparing our results they had finally come to the decision to take four new members into the Wonderbolts.

She announced the names of those accepted pegasi one at a time, each time a roaring cheer was heard from the audience as the said pegasus stepped in front of our row to accept a diploma from Rapidfire who was standing next to Spitfire carrying said diplomas.

As three other pegasi had already been announced—I can't remember their names off the top of my head, but I'm sure to get to know them later—I could feel sweat running on my face, fearing that I might have not passed. That was until Spitfire finally announced my name! My mood brightened instantly and I stepped forward to take my righteous place as a new Wonderbolt. I took my diploma from Rapidfire and walked next to the the other accepted candidates to add myself into their row.

Spitfire dismissed the rest of the pegasi still standing in the row I was standing in just a moment ago, reminding that they could still try their skills in future auditions and that they all were still capable enough to join other stunt flier groups with slightly lower admission requirements. She also mentioned that Soarin' would be at the exit giving out free tickets to future Wonderbolt shows as a consolation prize to brighten their mood a little.

After the others had left, we were introduced to our new teammates—that is, all the Wonderbolts who took part in the audition event. We were also given some general information of when and where they will start our training. First meeting was scheduled two months from now in the Wonderbolt headquarters, in Canterlot.

After that we were also dismissed and free to go, so I fetched my friends and we walked at Twilight's balloon together. We flew back to Ponyville, chatting happily as my friends were practically burying me in praises. Once we landed, Pinkie immediately arranged a 'Rainbow Dash is a Wonderbolt!' -party in the Sugarcube Corner. Before attending the party I had one more important thing to do though; tell the great news to Fluttershy and Rarity! And as expected I received congratulations from both as a response.

Nothing really interesting happened during the rest of the day, Pinkie's party was just like they always are; exhausting, but fun. It was already quite late as the party started and it lasted long into the night, so after leaving the party I flew straight to my cloud house and despite my excitement fell asleep almost immediately.

Phew... That was a lot of writing...

—Wonderbolt Rainbow Dash

"Wow, that was quite a long entry," the orange mare deadpanned.

"Like I said." Rainbow grinned.

"And practically all you said here was that you were accepted into the Wonderbolts," Scootaloo said.

"Well... Yeah, I guess you're right. But once I started with my long descriptions of that day I just couldn't stop. Besides, I remember that writing it was actually quite fun."

"It was also enjoyable to read it, to see that day from your viewpoint. And I'm really glad you made it into the Wonderbolts that day," Scootaloo said glancing at the wall with numerous posters and photos featuring a rainbow maned pegasus in a blue Wonderbolt outfit. Her face drifted on the framed paper on Rainbow's trophy stand. She nodded at that direction and asked, "By the way, is that the original diploma you mentioned in the diary?"

"That's the one." Rainbow nodded and looked up at said diploma. "Even if it is quite much worthless by itself being just a general acceptance diploma template with my name written on it, it is still the only thing I have left from that life-changing day. And it holds many wonderful memories, so I decided to frame and preserve it."

"Yeah, I also have kept some things reminding me of my past, but you already knew that anyway," Scootaloo said and looked back at the diary. After a moment of silence she smirked and said, "You did mention yourself being nervous quite much the whole time, but I think you are still understating it a bit here..."

"Huh? What do you mean?"

The orange mare just shrugged and said, "If I recall correctly, you were shaking like a leaf in your nervousness the day before the audition. Not to mention the time we arrived to the stadium the next day, you looked like you could collapse any second there."

The cyan pegasus blushed a little and cleaned her throat. That was true of course. Before joining the Wonderbolts she always had a bad case of stage fright whenever she knew her performance was being judged closely, and that combined with her anxiousness that one day made her really nervous. "I wasn't the only nervous pony there though. You should have seen the other ponies in the waiting room before their performances, some of them were practically curled in a corner and shaking uncontrollably."

"Like you were before in the Best Young Flier Competition, if what Rarity had told me was right?"

Rainbow's blush deepened as she cleared her throat once again and looked away. "Um... let's change the subject, shall we?"

"Aw, can't you take a little teasing? Besides, I guess we are now even in terms of making each other embarrassed," Scootaloo quipped but complied anyway. "So, anything you liked to add on your audition, or should we just move on?"

"I guess that is quite much covered for now," Rainbow said getting back to a cheerful mood. "I think you already guessed what is coming next?"

Scootaloo smiled. "If it has something to do with a certain yellow pegasus mare who is not a Wonderbolt, a big yet gentle earth pony stallion, and some cute little filly, then I think I have a quite good idea what it is about..."

Rainbow gave a short laugh and said, "Seems like you got it right." With that she turned the page.

Chapter 5: New Life

Dash's Secret Diary

by Twippledash

Chapter 5: New Life

Okay, I didn't even know it was possible for me to feel this emotional...

I mean, Fluttershy gave birth to her foal yesterday, and I can't nearly express how delighted I was for her. And I am still so happy that I feel like... honestly I don't really know how to describe these feelings, but it sure feels strange and amazing at the same time!

Anyway, in the yesterday afternoon Fluttershy was in the Ponyville hospital, in maternity ward, and the foal delivery was estimated to be from just a few minutes to several hours.

I, Applejack, Pinkie, Rarity, and Twilight were sitting in a waiting room, only sound being ticking of a clock on a wall—and yes, even Pinkie was sitting silently for once. The silence was only broken by regular reports from a nurse saying everything was still fine with Fluttershy. We all had quite mixed emotions; on one hoof we were all nervous of Fluttershy's well being, but on the other hoof we were also excited to see our friend with her soon-to-be-born foal. The silence was really getting on my nerves, but I still managed to stay calm and just waited.

Big Macintosh was there also, but he was in there with Fluttershy to give her emotional support. On principle only the mare giving birth, her husband, and the birth attendants were allowed in there, so we had to wait outside. Not that we would have really wanted to be in there invading Fluttershy's privacy anyway. All we really could do was to sit in the next room and hope for the best, leaving all the work for the professional birth attendants.

It was common knowledge that foalbirth can be really painful even if one was using painkillers, so I was obviously really worried about how Fluttershy would be able to endure it. I tried to calm down by convincing myself that every mother have been through it, and that any serious complications were really rare nowadays. That didn't really subside my worries though. I just can't help but feel a bit overprotective of Fluttershy sometimes.

Finally after a few hours of waiting one of the nurses came out to inform that Fluttershy's foal delivery was just about to begin. She then went back in to help the other nurses, closing the door behind her. The maternity ward rooms were magically sound-proofed so the screaming of laboring mares inside would not disturb any other hospital patients. That meant we wouldn't be able to hear anything from Fluttershy during the foal delivery either. Which was probably for the best, as I don't know how much of her screaming in agony I would have been able to take before my instincts to protect her would have taken over my rational thoughts.

We couldn't hear anything, but we knew that Fluttershy would be giving birth as we were sitting there waiting. But as I said before, we couldn't really do anything else at the moment.

So we waited in silence, listening to the persistent ticking of the clock on the wall...

And we waited...

And waited...

Every second seemed like a minute and every minute was like an hour. It felt like we had been waiting for several hours, even though it was just a few dozen minutes until the same nurse came out with the news regarding Fluttershy. We all released a breath we had been holding as she told that the foal was born, and both the foal and Fluttershy were in good condition.

Rarity asked whether we could go in now, but the nurse insisted in giving her some more time to recuperate before letting any friends in. I complied grudgingly, waiting for fifteen more minutes with my other friends before the nurse allowed us to enter the room holding Fluttershy, Big Macintosh, and a pair of nurses who were still there to monitor the health of Fluttershy and the foal. Oh, and of course the foal was there too, curled in Fluttershy's hooves sleeping. I got to admit that seeing Fluttershy lying on the bed with her own foal wrapped in her forehooves was the most adorable thing I have ever seen. The sight almost made me burst into joyful tears on the spot, but I simply refused to be all that emotional in front of all my best friends.

The foal was a pegasus filly with bright yellow coat—slightly brighter shade than Fluttershy's—and she had a tuft of light brown mane on the top of her head as well as a tail of same color. I didn't initially see her eyes (she was sleeping as I mentioned), but she woke up for a few moments during our visit and I found then to be bright green just like Big Macintosh's. Fluttershy and Mac decided to give her name Sunshine, which I think actually fits quite well for her yellow color and for her being a pegasus—maybe she could even live up to her name someday, becoming a weather pegasus and bringing sunshine to the others.

I don't really know how long we all stayed there just chatting cheerfully. We didn't leave until after hospital's visiting hours were already over. Even then I tried to persuade the nurses to let us stay but they wouldn't take any of that, reasoning that the foal and the mother would both need a lot of rest. Fluttershy would have to stay for at least a night or two more in the hospital to be sure there wouldn't be any unexpected complications. Big Macintosh was allowed to stay for a while longer than the rest of us, but even he had to leave for the night eventually.

So we—I and my friends, save for Fluttershy obviously—walked out of the hospital to see it indeed was already quite long into the evening, but there were still a few hours of daylight left. As we walked down a road without any specific destination, we met with Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, and Apple Bloom who were driving the road with Scootaloo's scooter; she mostly flew everywhere these days, but still used her scooter to carry her friends when they were together. They knew Fluttershy was just about to have her foal and that we were with her at the hospital, so obviously they immediately started asking about her situation.

Once we had told them everything we knew, they wanted to see the foal themselves. But for the same reason why we had to left the hospital, they wouldn't be able to go in and see the foal until tomorrow. They understandably looked downcast, but cheered up quickly and soon zoomed off with the scooter to... do whatever they did that evening. I don't really know what they do together nowadays, seeing that they are not crusading to get their cutie marks anymore.

We all parted our ways briefly after that, and I flew over to a nearby field to do my routine evening flight training as usual. Nothing really interesting happened during the rest of the evening or this morning.

Anyway, hospital visiting hours are just starting and I'm going to leave now to see whether everything is still all right with Fluttershy and Sunshine.

—Aunt Rainbow Dash

Rainbow sighed as memories started flooding into her mind. "Sometimes I wish I could live those times again. All that joy and those feelings I felt back then... now it all seems to be just a distant dream."

"Yeah, I miss the old times as well," Scootaloo said. "And this diary just brings into mind so many wonderful memories from the past. Though not everything from those days is gone. For example, I get to see Sunshine at least once a week as she still works as a part of the weather patrol in Ponyville. However, even though I know the Sunshine now living in Ponyville and the Sunshine in your diary are one and same pegasus, it is still really hard to imagine her as a small filly," she said laughing.

"Actually, I have something that may help with that," Rainbow said. "I'm quite sure I have a photo album with some old photos of Fluttershy and her foals stashed somewhere in my bedroom. Would you like to check it out?" Rainbow asked as she already stood up, ready to walk off to fetch said album.

"Sure, why not," Scootaloo answered. "Do you need any help searching?"

"Nah, I've got a pretty good idea where it could be. Just wait here and I'll be back in a minute or two," the elder pegasus said and walked off to her bedroom.

Scootaloo nodded and just sat on the sofa waiting for Rainbow to come back. She glanced back at the diary and tried remember anything from those days. All she could come up with was a hazy memory of her going in the hospital with Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, Rainbow, and all her friends to see Fluttershy with her newborn foal. Sunshine was indeed quite fitting name for her, not only because of her looks, but as they later found out her personality was quite sunny also. She was—and still is—always beaming, her smile almost never faltering and she always tries to bring smile on the other ponies all around her. But that is where her similarities with Pinkie Pie end. On every other aspect she is quite much like her parents. She's not as shy as Fluttershy was or as taciturn as Big Macintosh, but she's still very meek and quiet compared to most other ponies.

Scootaloo's thoughts were interrupted as she heard Rainbow approaching the living room. The elder pegasus returned carrying a white photo album in her mouth. "Found it," she said with a muffled sound and put the album on the table next to the diary. "It contains some other photos from around that time, too. Oldest ones here are from a few months before Sunshine's birth, while the latest ones are several years after that," she said as she flipped through its pages. "So, Sunshine's birth... here!" She set the album opened on the table and said, "These photos were taken about a week after her birthday."

Indeed, in the first photo out of the four photos on the open page, there were Fluttershy and Big Macintosh sitting together with a bright yellow pegasus foal sitting at their hooves. There were various animals around them also as the photo had been taken in front of Fluttershy's cottage.

"Aww..." Scootaloo smiled as she looked at the picture. "They are so adorable together. Though I got to admit I wouldn't have recognized Sunshine from that photo if I didn't know it was her, even if her colors are the same as nowadays."

"Heh, yeah," Rainbow said, also smiling. "Then again, I guess you wouldn't immediately recognize yourself either if you looked at some pictures of you as a week old foal."

"Guess you're right," Scootaloo said and looked at the other photos on the open page. Next one was similar to the first, with the exception it was taken in the cottage rather than outdoors. Third featured Fluttershy and Sunshine again—Big Macintosh was absent from that one—but this time Rainbow and her other four friends were gathered around Fluttershy. Fourth photo was just a close-up of Sunshine sitting on the floor of Fluttershy's cottage, her bright green eyes looking towards the camera.

Rainbow sighed looking at the group photo of her and her friends. "I think that was actually second to last time our whole group—me, Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie, Rarity, and Twilight—had been together for a photo shoot, the last time being a few months over a year later when we were together with Fluttershy's first two foals. We just didn't spend much time together after I left for Wonderbolts. And just a few months later Rarity already moved to Canterlot, separating our group even more."

Scootaloo nodded understanding and said, "Yeah, like me, Apple Bloom, and Sweetie Belle eventually chose to follow different paths. Apple Bloom moved to Appleloosa to help expanding their ever growing frontier town and Sweetie Belle moved to Canterlot where she quickly became quite a famous singer. And as you know, I was more like a freelancer, constantly on a move while performing here and there for many years. That is until I finally settled down and moved back to Ponyville, eventually starting my own family. I never stopped my performing though, except for when I was pregnant or on a maternity leave of course, just had most of my future performances in Ponyville or the towns nearby."

"Anyway," Rainbow said, "there is still a plenty of entries left and we'll get back to our friends later. Let's just move on to next entry, written just about a month after the last one." She pushed the photo album aside and flipped open the next page of the diary still lying in front of both of them.

So the time has finally come. Tomorrow I'll have to leave Ponyville to get into Wonderbolt training.

I have quite mixed feelings once again. On one hoof I want to get into Wonderbolts as soon as possible, but on the other hoof I don't want to leave my friends or Ponyville. I know I am not leaving permanently, but for what I've been told about the training, the next time I'll be back in Ponyville will be weeks or maybe even months from now. And even then it will be just for a weekend or so until I have to leave again.

I have already done everything I need to do here before leaving; I have signed off from my weather job, informed town hall and post office about my long-time absence, packed all my necessary stuff, and so on. This diary is not in those things I'm packing to take with me, as keeping this hidden in the shared living quarters would be near impossible, and I doubt I'll have much time or motivation to write into this there anyway.

I'll have to leave tomorrow before noon, so Pinkie is having a farewell party for me tonight. That will be the last time I'll have any time together with my friends before leaving, so I'm going to take everything I can out of it. Sure my closest friends will almost definitely be out there to say goodbye and wish good luck as I leave tomorrow morning, but it will likely be just a very short get-together to send me on my way.

Anyway, enough of that. Here are some more or less interesting things that have happened during last month.

Fluttershy was soon enough released from the hospital, and now she is once again living in her cottage with Big Macintosh and their foal Sunshine. I haven't seen Fluttershy out of her cottage too often lately other than feeding and taking care of her animals. That is quite understandable though; from what I've heard taking care of little foals can be really demanding. Also, Sunshine is getting to the age when she might just start flying all over the place any day now. That phase luckily never lasts long and she'll soon be unable to fly until years later, but I still hope Fluttershy will manage to keep up with her.

As for my other friends, last week Rarity mentioned that she has been saving some bits lately to buy a new boutique in Canterlot. She still apparently needs some thousands of bits more—Canterlot housing is quite expensive—but she seemed to be determined to finally expand her fashion business. I don't really know why she has such and obsession of Canterlot, as all I see in it is just a bunch of prissy and self-centered ponies. Then again, she herself is quite prissy too—or "refined" as she would describe herself—so maybe she just feels like she belongs to Canterlot, similar to how I feel like I belong to the Wonderbolts. And actually I got to agree fashion business would be more profitable in Canterlot that here in Ponyville, seeing that not too many ponies around here wear clothes save for some special occasions.

Oh, one more thing I actually forgot to mention in the last entry. I have seen Soarin' visiting Ponyville several times after my audition, specifically he has been here to visit Applejack's farm to buy some more apple pies. He had apparently been craving for those ever since the Grand Galloping Gala, but didn't know where to find the mare who had been selling them. And now that he finally found that out, he had become a regular customer to the Sweet Apple Acres visiting them about once a week. It also seems that he and Applejack have become quite good friends together, as sometimes they just have a friendly chat in addition to Soarin' just buying and eating some pies.

Guess that's all. I'm sure I'll miss all my friends when I'm away, but then again I knew all along that we couldn't all stay together here for the rest of our lives. We all have our own desires and our group was bound to break apart at some point. I mean break apart physically, as in going our own ways, but despite that I wish our friendship will last forever.

—Rainbow Dash

"At least you got that last wish," Scootaloo said. "As far as I know you all are still on good terms with each other."

"Yeah," Rainbow said. She glanced at their group photo in the photo album, her lips turning into a sad frown. "And we all still consider Fluttershy a close friend too, even if she hasn't been around for decades. Sometimes I still feel like blaming somepony, even myself, for her passing away so young even though I know it wasn't anypony's fault."

Scootaloo's mood also fell a bit. "I miss her also, even if I didn't know her as well as you or your friends did. But grieving doesn't bring her back, no matter how much we do it, so we should probably just move on. We'll sure to get back to that later anyway."

Rainbow sighed. "You're right. I have mostly got over it, but reading this diary and looking at these photos really bring back a lot of memories. Mostly good ones, but also the painful ones like Fluttershy's death." She put a slight smile—albeit a somewhat forced one—back on her face. "But like you said, we should just move on for the time being. There is time for grieving, and there is time for recalling some happier memories. And I'd prefer this moment to be the latter."

"Right," Scootaloo said, looking back at the diary to find something else to talk about. "I guess Applejack and Soarin' didn't realize back then that him visiting her farm on a regular basis was a beginning of a strong relationship between the two."

"Nor did I," Rainbow said. "In all honesty, I think at that point it was nothing more than a friendship building up. But little did they, or anypony else for that matter, know that would eventually develop into a loving relationship."

"They were sure quite a dynamic couple, always having competitions with each other," Scootaloo said laughing. "It seemed that in addition to eventually becoming her husband, Soarin' also replaced you as her main competitor in sports, seeing you were not around that much anymore."

Rainbow shrugged. "Well, what can I say? Wonderbolts just took almost all of my free time for years. I really took all their training seriously, unlike Soarin' who sometimes seemed to be quite indifferent about attending any training. And he did quit Wonderbolts to live with Applejack in Ponyville, just a few years after I joined." She looked down at the diary and added, "And speaking of training, next entry has something about my first months of training in Wonderbolts."

"Well, what are we waiting for then," Scootaloo said and turned on the next page.

Chapter 6: Training

Dash's Secret Diary

by Twippledash

Chapter 6: Training

First two months of Wonderbolt training passed, and finally they gave us the weekend off.

And by Celestia's sun-emblazoned flanks that training can be really intensive and exhausting sometimes!

I mean, I practiced a few hours every day even before getting into the Wonderbolts, but now it is on a completely new level; on most days my schedule is filled from early morning to long into evening with just a few breaks in between to get something to eat. Luckily it is not all just flight practice—though that still usually takes majority of the time—but there is also various lessons and some non-physical training. They also have almost as strict discipline as royal guards, which actually makes sense as the Wonderbolts were originally established as Celestia's personal army—and we would actually still serve that purpose if some serious conflicts with foreign countries would arise, though that hasn't happened in centuries. I think they are pushing us trainees to our limits on purpose to see how we manage under pressure, and to show us that being a Wonderbolt is really serious business and not just some hobby.

Our instructor has emphasized several times that we are here on our own accord, and that we could quit anytime we want. Hah, like I was going to ditch my life-long dream of being a Wonderbolt like that just because of a little inconvenience! Apparently not everypony think alike though; one of the trainees couldn't take it and quit just after six weeks of training, so now there is just three of us left.

Anyway, here is an example of a somewhat typical day of our training:

6:00 ~ Wake up
6:05 - 6:15 ~ Short morning flight
6:15 - 6:45 ~ Breakfast
6:45 - 7:30 ~ Warm-up
7:30 - 11:30 ~ Endurance flying
11:30 - 12:15 ~ Lunch break
12:15 - 13:45 ~ Wonderbolt history lesson
13:45 - 15:30 ~ Formation flying
15:30 - 17:00 ~ Stunt flying
17:00 - 17:45 ~ Dinner break
17:45 - 19:00 ~ Autograph writing practice
19:00 - 20:30 ~ Strength training
20:30 - 22:00 ~ Free time
22:00 - 6:00 ~ Nighttime, forced silence

And like I said, that amount of training every day is quite typical. On weekends they were usually slightly easier on us, and we had more time to just hang out and to get know each other better. And I got to say those other recruits seem quite cool, too! But a bit more about that later, and back to that schedule for now.

I'll use that example timetable to go through a few of our daily activities. The first thing almost every morning even before breakfast is a short flight, just to get the blood circulating and to make sure everypony is awake when day's training starts.

Next on the list after breakfast is warm-up. That usually consists of some sports, non-strenuous flying, or something similar to prepare for following training. In this case that is endurance flying, a long distance flight on a steady pace with just short breaks now and then to increase our endurance. Those always last for many hours due to the nature of training; you can't really train endurance by just having short flights now and then.

Next item on the list is Wonderbolt history lesson. Those are actually quite fascinating, even if I don't usually like studying history at all. But if the subject is interesting enough—as it is in this case—even I am willing to learn some history. This training is also quite imperative for all Wonderbolts since fans usually tend to ask loads of questions after each show, many of them falling under Wonderbolt history.

Next two items in that example show two other flight training types: formation and stunt flying. In formation flying we have to fly various flight patters while keeping our formation intact. During those we are often accompanied by other Wonderbolt members to fill our squad, since there is only three of us trainees. Stunt flying is my personal favorite, as we got to try out new stunts and practice the ones we have already learned—so basically the same thing I did every day before joining the Wonderbolts.

And then comes one of the most ridiculous trainings I have ever even heard of—autograph writing. That is exactly what it sounds like; we just sit on place the whole time and write our autographs on pieces of paper, while simultaneously answering the occasional random questions our instructor asks us. That is supposed to simulate real-life situation when the Wonderbolts put on a table for autograph writing. When they do that, there will always be hundreds of fans lined up to get the autographs and to throw in a few words for their idols, so the signing Wonderbolts would have to do practically the same thing as we do during these practice sessions. And that is really way more exhausting than it sounds. I actually feel quite bad for being one of those fanfillies getting the autographs back then; I didn't realize what the Wonderbolts had to go through just to provide a few autographs for their fans.

Anyway, next item in the list is strength training. Unlike endurance flying—which was slightly strenuous flying over a long period of time—the strength training consist of a few short, but very strenuous exercises to strengthen our muscles. That training mostly focuses on wing muscles as those are the ones we use the most, but there is also some training for the other parts of our bodies too.

Finally there was always—or at least almost every day—about one or two hours of free time at the end of the day for relaxation. And then there is eight hours of enforced silence during night to let everypony have a well deserved good night sleep before next day.

I guess that was enough ranting about my daily schedules, but there is something more I'd like to mention here also. Those last two months were the longest I've ever been with the Wonderbolts after all.

I think it would be logical to start with the time I got there on the first day. When I arrived at the Wonderbolt headquarters, Spitfire was already waiting at the door to welcome us new recruits. I was the first one to arrive—I arrived well in advance just in case—but the other three came in soon after I had arrived.

Spitfire took us for a guided tour in the headquarters, and we met a few other Wonderbolts there also, including some already retired veteran members. We were then given a few contracts to sign. The contracts contained mostly the usual stuff like not acting foolishly whenever representing Wonderbolts in public, accepting to be at the Princesses' service whenever needed, agreeing with the Wonderbolts' general rules, and the like.

Next Spitfire guided us to a representative of their official flight suit makers to take our measurements, so they could start working on our flight suits as soon as possible. The suits were finished and given to us by the end of our first week, and from that point on most of the flight trainings we had were with the flight suits on. Despite the skin-tight aerodynamic design, those suits were actually more comfortable than I had thought before. And I look absolutely stunning in my suit!

Anyway, after that Spitfire introduced us to our flight instructor, a sturdy pegasus stallion, who would be working with us through the whole training period—which lasts for a full year, so still ten months to go. He gave us our schedules for the first week; that first day was left without any training so that we could get used to the place and the other Wonderbolts, but rest of the week was filled with lessons and evaluative strength training.

There was just a medical examination left before we got the rest of the day free to relax and prepare for the following day. Nothing much to say about that; we were scrutinized by two unicorn doctors, and once they were sure that none of us had any medical disorders or diseases that would hinder our training, we were free to go.

So I got to know my fellow recruits better that day, and during the next two months too. There were three of them, though one of them already quit two weeks ago as I mentioned before.

First was a mare with light red mane and an off-white coat with just a hint of yellowish tint. Her name was Firestorm. Before joining the Wonderbolts she had been a few years in one of the less recognized stunt flying teams in her hometown Fillydelphia. Her experience of flying in a team really shows in our training; she has been performing in the formation flying sessions almost flawlessly from the beginning, while I still have a little trouble keeping in sync with the others—though I've become much better lately.

Second was Lightning Blaze, a stallion with dark blue coat and an unkempt silvery mane with a light stripe across it. He lives in Cloudsdale and has been attending some competitions now and then, usually winning the first place, or at least getting on some good positions. He tends to boast with his achievements quite much and it can really become irritating sometimes, but when he's not boasting he's actually quite nice and encouraging. I have learned a few really awesome tricks from him, too. As a whole I have come along with him well enough.

And lastly the one who quit already; a mare with light blue coat and short black mane, named Blizzard. I guess I'm not going to see her much anymore, which is actually a shame—she seemed quite nice and I think we could have become good friends if she hadn't left. And she was a good flier to boot, though that was quite obvious since she passed the audition a few months back like we all did. Oh well... I still have my old friends in Ponyville, as well as Firestorm and Lightning Blaze as my new friends. And of course there are the other Wonderbolts, too.

So, the first two weeks were mostly lessons and some strenuous training sessions putting us to our limits to evaluate our initial skills and physical condition. For the rest of that two months the training gradually had less and less theoretical lessons to give more time for actual flight training. By the end our schedules were mostly filled with physical training, with just a few various lessons here and there. Nothing much to say about that—I already produced an example of my typical day.

Most of our training was around the Wonderbolt training grounds at the base of the Canterlot Mountain, just a few minutes flight from our headquarters. Some of our lessons were still in the headquarters though, and that was where our living quarters were also situated.

Well, that's enough about that training for now.

As for my return to Ponyville yesterday, Friday evening... I expected my friends and maybe a few other ponies to welcome me back to Ponyville. I had my flight suit on as I arrived—yes, we were allowed to wear those on our vacation trips even if we were just rookies still—and turned out that I really underestimated the effect that being a Wonderbolt has to other ponies.

I mean, I got quite a warm welcome, not only by my friends, but by a horde of other ponies too. There is a plenty of Wonderbolt fans living here, and seeing me—a former weather mare of Ponyville—being one of them made some of those fans absolutely crazy! Even if they have seen Soarin' around Ponyville now and then lately, I was still crowded by the ponies. Luckily my best friends were there also to help me out and to organize the crowd. And that was when I realized why we have that autograph writing as a part of our training; there were literally dozens of ponies in a line to get my autograph, and writing those was actually quite mechanical work—just like in those practice sessions. Then there were those who wanted to have pictures of them taken with me standing by their side. And all that just because I was a Wonderbolt in my official flight suit!

After the crowd finally subsided, Pinkie dragged me into a "Welcome back, Dashie!"-party she had already prepared in Sugarcube Corner. I didn't inform about my arrival in advance, but somehow she had a fully decorated party with punch, all kinds of snacks, and a giant cake topped with a marzipan figure of me in my flight suit. Though knowing Pinkie I should have been expecting a party the moment I arrived.

Enough writing for now though. I've got friends to hang out with here in Ponyville, and I have less than two days of free time left until I've got to go back to Canterlot. Not that I wouldn't like to be with the Wonderbolts, but I would be lying if I said I didn't miss my old friends during those two months; we've had so much good time together in the past that I don't really know how I could live without them.

—Quite exhausted Wonderbolt Rainbow Dash

Scootaloo looked up at Rainbow after finishing reading. "I never really got to ask you about that training, even if I was always around you whenever you were in Ponyville," she said. "But I see you covered it quite nicely here, so I don't have to ask about it now either."

Rainbow smiled and said, "Yeah, and I could have written a lot more than I did. But I also wanted to spend as much time with my friends as possible, so I tried to keep it short."

"Well... I wouldn't exactly call this short," Scootaloo said looking trough the entry, which filled almost two full openings in the diary. "But granted it's not overly detailed either, unlike the entry about your audition from a few pages back," she said and smirked at Rainbow.

"Like I said, I didn't really have time to write this entry to be that detailed even if I would have liked to," Rainbow said. "Trust me, if I had more time off, I likely would have filled at least a dozen of pages just describing those first two months in the Wonderbolts. It was really awesome to finally be able to live my dreams, and to actually be one of those who I had idolized ever since I was a little filly."

She turned her gaze towards the part of the room filled with various Wonderbolt-themed photos and posters, as well as the table containing her trophies. Her lips turned upwards into a smile as she felt like a younger mare for a moment, living those times again in her head—the excitement she felt before, after, and during every show, the feel of air rushing through her mane, the awesome feelings after every successful performance... those were really great times from the very beginning of the training to her retirement decades later.

She sighed slightly before turning her head back towards the table in front of the two pegasi, and noticed the photo album she had brought earlier. "By the way, I have a few photos in that album taken at the beginning of my training, if you'd like to look," she said to Scootaloo.

Scootaloo had been following the elder pegasus' gaze, and she was now looking at the Wonderbolt posters on the wall. She quickly turned her head back and glanced at the album. "Huh? Yeah, sure," she said.

Rainbow turned a few pages on the album and leaned back to allow better sight for Scootaloo. On first photo there were four pegasi in a row, posing to the camera. Those were Rainbow Dash and the three other Wonderbolt recruits: Firestorm, Lightning Blaze, and Blizzard.

"That first one was taken on the very first day right after we had arrived," Rainbow said, looking at the photo. "I'm sure you have seen my pals several times at Wonderbolt shows, but I think I also personally introduced you to them once, didn't I?"

"Yes you did," Scootaloo said. "If I remember correctly, it was right after your very first public performance. Obviously that last one"—she tapped on the light blue mare at the right side of the photo—"wasn't there though, since she quit before that. I didn't actually know anything about her, save for you mentioning her a few times. What was her name again?"

"Blizzard," Rainbow answered. "She had all the necessary skills to become a Wonderbolt, but she just couldn't handle the stress—or at least that is what she said before leaving. I haven't seen her after those few weeks she was with us, save for a few times when I've noticed her in the audience of some of our shows."

"Anyway," Scootaloo said, "I don't know much about the other two either, but at least I know something about them. Mostly they were just two Wonderbolts among the others to me, though."

Rainbow shrugged nonchalantly. "For me they were, and still are, close friends. Then again I usually don't know that much about my friends' acquaintances either, like those Rarity's high society friends or Twilight's academic colleagues. And I bet I don't even know most of your friends down in Ponyville either, despite you being my closest friend out of those who are still alive."

"Yeah, and neither do I know most of your friends you've met during your career," Scootaloo replied.

They fell silent for a moment and decided to look trough rest of Rainbow's early training photos. There were a few pages of them, every one featuring Rainbow Dash, and most had either some of her fellow recruits, or some older Wonderbolts flying with her. In later photos she had her blue flight suit on, covering most of her lighter blue coat and highlighting her rainbow colored mane—Rainbow was right, she really looked quite stunning in her suit. The two pegasi didn't talk much, exchanging just a few words now and then and looking through a dozen or so photos.

Finally Rainbow pushed the photo album aside and said to Scootaloo, "Well, I guess that's enough of that for now. We can check more photos later when they come relevant, but I'd say we move to the next entry now. It's quite short one anyway, at least compared to the last one."

"Works for me," Scootaloo said as Rainbow was already turning the page on the diary.

I'm still in Ponyville, leaving tonight to get back to training. I just wanted to write briefly something about what my friends have been up to during my absence.

Fluttershy is still living in her cottage with Big Mac and their now three-month-old filly Sunshine. The filly has grown quite a bit since I last saw her, and as I suspected, she's been flying all around the place ever since her wings started working just a week after I left. It's actually quite cute seeing her buzz around the cottage while Fluttershy tries to keep up with her, though despite that it seems Fluttershy's been doing just fine in taking care of her. Anyway, it should be up to a few months until Sunshine's flying phase should pass and she'll settle down once again, until she learns to fly properly much later, presumably around the age of ten or so.

I mentioned two months ago that Rarity has been saving bits to buy a new boutique in Canterlot. Well, her business has been running quite nicely; with all the good contacts and retailers already in Canterlot, she had managed to earn enough to afford a small boutique. But she's not content with just any boutique, and is looking for a somewhat larger one with more visibility. To afford that she would still have to save for a few months. She also seemed quite hesitant to leave her friends and Ponyville, having been living here ever since she was born. But she has wanted to live in Canterlot for so long that she'll definitely move sooner or later—probably sooner, I'm actually quite surprised she still lives in Ponyville.

I have nothing much to say about Pinkie or Twilight. Pinkie is still as random as ever, and Twilight is still an egghead. Twilight mentioned that she would eventually move back to Canterlot to have some advanced studies in magic, but that wouldn't be until after a few years. For now she's still living in the library, periodically sending friendship reports to Princess Celestia.

As for Applejack, she won this year's Running of the Leaves—that was a few weeks ago—by a landslide as I was not there to give her competition this time. She's been working on her farm as hard as ever, still living in the farmhouse with Apple Bloom and Granny Smith—Big Mac is also still working on the farm, but as I mentioned he lives in Fluttershy's cottage nowadays. Granny Smith is still alive, though it seems her time to leave is coming soon; she's apparently been getting more and more of her cramps, and her health is steadily degrading. That's not a surprise though, her being the oldest living citizen of Ponyville as far as I know.

And now that I mentioned Applejack, it brings to my mind her regular customer and my fellow Wonderbolt Soarin'. He's still been visiting Applejack almost every weekend, including this one. Even if his main reason to visit is to buy some of his favorite pies, they have become quite good friends too. While we three were there together, we had a few competitions like me and Applejack used to do regularly. At one point I couldn't help but overhear Soarin' complimenting on Applejack's looks. While it may have been just him being a gentlecolt, I'm not going to rule out the possibility that he was maybe hitting on her. It may be quite far-fetched, but hey, they are both single and—as far as I know—straight, so I can at least imagine them being together. And I'm sure Granny Smith would also appreciate another one of her grandfoals finally finding a special somepony.

Well, that about covers it. I have still a few hours before I have to leave, so I'll go and check what my friends are up to now.

—Rainbow Dash

"I know this comes out of nowhere and is completely unrelated to the current topic," Scootaloo said to Rainbow, "but I just wondered why did you put your name to the end of each entry? It's not like anypony else would have ever written into this, right?"

Rainbow just shrugged and said, "I don't really know myself either. I guess it just felt like an appropriate conclusion to sign them with my name. And once I had decided to sign the first entries, I just continued doing that till the end."

"Okay, not that it really matters, just asked out of curiosity," Scootaloo said. "Anyway, back on the current topic." She glanced at the diary before looking back at Rainbow and said, "It seems like you really kept an eye on your friends' love lives. I mean, first you noticed Fluttershy and Big Macintosh before they admitted their love themselves, and now here you noticed Soarin' eyeing Applejack." She smirked at the elder pegasus.

Rainbow flushed a bit. "Fluttershy and Big Mac having feelings for each other was quite obvious; all it took to notice it was to be in the right place at the right time. As for Soarin' and Applejack, it was just a lucky guess. As I have made clear many times, I never really cared about that romance stuff myself, I just happened to notice those is all."

"Yet you seemed to write quite much about it in your diary," Scootaloo said teasing Rainbow. "Are you sure you're not just lying to yourself saying that you didn't care about romance at all?"

Rainbow thought for a moment before answering, "I guess you're right. I think I actually did care about my friends' romantic relationships, even if I never seriously considered being in one myself." She looked aside, a slight blush creeping on her face. "Or, well... To be honest, I did give it a shot once by the end of my school years before even moving to Ponyville. It was just some silly adolescence crush though, and it didn't really work in the end; we went for a few dates and even kissed a few times, but I left him once I found out he didn't actually care about me for who I was—all he wanted was just some filly to screw."

Scootaloo nodded slightly. "Yeah, I remember you mentioning that sometimes before. And that actually brought another question to my mind. Uh..." Her face felt slightly warmer as she contemplated whether it would be appropriate to ask the question she had in mind. "Did you ever... you know..."

Rainbow raised an eyebrow questioningly. "Did I ever what?"

Scootaloo let out a short sigh and rolled her eyes. "Oh, what the hay? We're both grownup mares, so why am I stammering?" she said mostly to herself, then turned at Rainbow and asked, "Did you ever have sex with anypony?" Her face flushed red right after asking that, and she added hastily, "Uh, I mean, you don't have to answer if you don't want to. I was just wondering since you never had a special somepony..."

"Oh..." Some red color crept on Rainbow's cheeks once again. She hung her head down a bit, closed her eyes, and shook her head. "No I didn't." She looked back at the younger pegasus and said, "I know it is one of those things that they say every mare is supposed to do at some point of their life, but it was also one of those things I just procrastinated in my life endlessly as I didn't want an accidental pregnancy or anything like that getting in the way of my career in Wonderbolts." She looked away, face still quite red. She cleared her throat once and said, "Anyway, this is getting a bit too personal already. Maybe we should just move on?"

"Well, this whole meeting is quite personal, you sharing your diary with me and all," Scootaloo said shrugging. "But yeah, I think we should just read the next entry already." She turned on the next page of the diary.

Chapter 7: Hearth's Warming

Dash's Secret Diary

by Twippledash

Chapter 7: Hearth's Warming

Another two months of training in Wonderbolts passed, making it a total of four months now. Yesterday they gave us five days free to spend the Hearth's Warming holidays with our own families or friends. The Hearth's Warming Eve is tomorrow, and I'm going to spend it with my closest friends—just like we've done ever since Twilight moved here into Ponyville a few years back.

We're going to watch the Hearth's Warming pageant in Canterlot once again. Sure they have set up a show here in Ponyville too, but ever since we ourselves performed in Canterlot's pageant once, it has pretty much become a tradition for us to go watch the show there. It would be boring to watch the same performance again and again, but since they always select a new set of volunteer actors for the play it always has slight variations from last years' performances, making it worth to go see the performance every year. I'm eagerly waiting to see this year's performance too, even though as far as I know there is nopony familiar to me performing this time.

Oh, and once we're going to Canterlot, Rarity is going to invite us to see her new boutique and home she'd bought just a week ago. Her winter clothing line was very successful this year, earning her the remaining bits she still needed to afford that boutique. She is still living in her old Carousel Boutique here in Ponyville, but she's planning to move into the new boutique in Canterlot once she starts her business there, presumably in just a few weeks. She's not selling Carousel Boutique, but instead she's going to hire somepony to work there and use it to continue selling her clothing here in Ponyville too—once she gets the business running smoothly in Canterlot first, that is.

There's a bit of news concerning Fluttershy, too. Despite her first foal, Sunshine, having been born just about five months ago, she is already expecting another foal. She's been pregnant for about a month now, so it is still a long wait until the second foal sees daylight. That's not stopping her from coming to Canterlot with us though. Bigger concern for her was whether she'd be able to leave Sunshine for the day, but I'm sure Big Mac will take care of her well enough, even if he may have some problems catching her when she flies all around the cottage.

Nothing else interesting have happened here really—wintertime is always quite boring in Ponyville without anything interesting ever happening.

The training in Wonderbolts have been going just fine, and I've already become quite good friends with the other new recruits, Lightning Blaze and Firestorm. We've had several races together also, sometimes with older members too. I think I've mentioned before that Firestorm had already been in a professional stunt flying team for a few years before, and I gotta admit she's a damn good flier; she isn't really quite as fast as me or Lightning, but what she lacks in speed, she makes up with amazing control. Due to that she's usually the one who wins the races between the three of us—but that is going to change soon; I will not rest until I can beat her fair and square on any race track, anywhere, anytime.

That said, I've already become much better in high-speed maneuvering during these four months of training. But like I said, I still can't beat the more experienced fliers in a race if the track has too many sharp turns. On the other hoof, I am clearly the fastest one if I have time to accelerate to full speed since I am still the only pegasus alive who is able to break the sound barrier and fly supersonic. And with enough training I will no doubt become the star flier of the Wonderbolts in no time!

Anyway, I'll just stop writing now and go see my friends. I'll probably write something more after returning from the Hearth's Warming pageant tomorrow, before leaving again to continue training in the Wonderbolts.

—Rainbow Dash

Scootaloo chuckled after finishing reading the entry. "Being a bit arrogant here, aren't you?" she said to Rainbow Dash. "Just being one of the Wonderbolt wasn't apparently enough for you, but you wanted to be the best of the best."

Rainbow also chuckled a bit at her arrogant goals she had back then. "Well, yeah," she said. "Becoming the best flier in Equestria had been one of my dreams ever since I was just a filly. Though later on I gradually started realizing that I couldn't be master in every aspect of flight, no matter how hard I trained. That was one of the most important lessons I passively learned during the first years in the Wonderbolts—I learned not to underestimate my pals, I learned to accept my flaws, I learned the importance of team effort, and I learned that nopony was, and never could be, perfect. In short, I learned some humility there." She put on a wan smile on her lips and continued, "Sure Twilight and my other friends tried to bash that into my thick skull many times even before me getting into the Wonderbolts, but their attempts never had any lasting effect. No, it was being in the Wonderbolts that finally drove the point home."

Scootaloo hadn't expected that kind of long-winded reply to her simple quip, and didn't know what to say next, so she just nodded in response. She turned her eyes from the other pegasus back towards the diary, looking for something more to say or ask. After a few moments Rainbow Dash broke the silence again.

"Anyway," she said, "the next entry is from that same vacation, only two days after that last one. So we could just read it now and continue discussing after that."

"Sure." Scootaloo awoke from her stupor and opened the next page in the diary.

Yesterday we—I, Fluttershy, Applejack, Pinkie, Twilight, Rarity, Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo—were in Canterlot like we had planned. We arrived a few hours before the Hearth's Warming pageant to have some time together in Canterlot; the pageant itself would be later in the evening, so we would take the train back to Ponyville right after the festivities.

Anyway, when we first arrived in Canterlot, Rarity took us to see her new boutique like she promised. There wasn't really much to see though; it was just an empty store with a small housing attached. There were no furniture or anything in the boutique yet, except for an empty counter on one wall, a few sets of her latest fashion creations on display by the shop windows, and a few posters on the windows advertising that her boutique would be opening there soon.

The boutique happened to be just a few blocks away from the Wonderbolt headquarters and we still had a few hours to spend in Canterlot, so I decided to take them on a quick tour in there. The place is not open for public, except for the entrance hall and a showroom, but visitors are allowed on regular office hours as long as they are accompanied by a Wonderbolt—a rookie like myself works too. So I checked us in for the receptionist—I must wonder how much extra she's paid to do her job on Hearth's Warming eve—and took my friends for a tour, just like Spitfire did to us recruits a few months back.

There were nopony else in the whole building save for the receptionist and a single guard, so I got to show them around freely without interruptions. I would have liked to introduce them to the other Wonderbolts though... oh well, guess that'll have to wait for another time then.

First I showed them the living quarters I shared with Lightning and Firestorm; it was a quite barren room with four beds and a few lockers around the walls, and a table under a window on other side of the room. Rarity immediately pointed out a few improvement suggestions to make the room more colorful and comfortable. I countered with the fact that we used that room almost exclusively for sleeping at nights, and we didn't spend much time there awake. She wouldn't take any of it and continued her ranting. I just shrugged it off and moved on.

Next I took them to the break room—a room where me and the other recruits didn't have much time to spend apart from an hour or two in the evenings. Unlike our bedroom, this room got even Rarity's approval. There were several comfortable sofas around the room, a thick fitted carpet covering entire floor, a few glass tables, a fireplace on one wall, a fridge with various cold beverages, a small kitchen separated by a bar counter, and a glass wall facing the edge of the Canterlot. The building was situated on the outer layer of buildings in Canterlot, so there was a breathtaking view towards northern parts of Equestria. Ponyville was not visible—it was on the other side of Canterlot—but we could see Cloudsdale up in the sky, vast amounts of snowy plains, and the Crystal Mountain ranges far away marking Equestria's northern border.

We sat there together for several minutes, chatting idly. Scootaloo had a lot to ask about how it felt to be a Wonderbolt, what I did on a daily basis, and stuff like that. She's still my first and most avid fan, even though she has already decided not to become a stunt flier herself like I am. I didn't pay much attention to the others' discussions, so I don't know what they were talking about. All I know is that soon enough we stood up and left the break room.

I didn't have much else to show, as I'm quite sure my friends wouldn't have been interested in seeing our bathrooms, gym, showers, or anything like that... So I just led them back to the entrance hall, and into the public showroom in the next room. There were photos of all former and current Wonderbolts on the walls in chronological order with a short biography attached to each of them, starting from the founder of the Wonderbolts and ending to the current members. I and the other two recruits were not there yet; we would be added into the gallery by the time we finish out training and get promoted from rookies to full-fledged Wonderbolts. So Just eight months more and I'll be featured there too.

Aside from the gallery, there were several diplomas and trophies in showcases, all donated by various Wonderbolts. On other side of the room there were a few old Wonderbolt flight suits fitted on some dress forms; the coloring has been the same thorough the Wonderbolt history, and the biggest differences in old suits compared to the current ones are the material—oldest suits were made of cotton, while the current ones are made mostly of spandex, making the suits skin-tight and elastic—and that the oldest suits didn't cover the flier's head or hooves.

That was quite much everything I had to show to my friends, so as we got to the entrance hall once again, I checked our group out for the receptionist. Before we left, I bought a little souvenir—a small Wonderbolt figurine depicting Spitfire—for Scootaloo from a small gift shop also run by the receptionist. I would have bought one depicting myself, but they didn't make any merchandise of rookies... oh well, maybe later then. She seemed to enjoy the little gift nevertheless. She didn't have saddlebags with her, so I put it into mine to carry until we arrived Ponyville later in the evening.

I was supposed to write in general what we did yesterday, but it seems like I got a bit carried away writing about Wonderbolts again... doesn't matter though, as it's not like anypony else would ever be reading this anyway. I'm just writing this to relax, and maybe also to put down some memories to remember years later if I still have this diary then. And I actually enjoy writing this; I don't even know when I started to enjoy writing, but I really do enjoy this!

Anyway, it was still almost two hours until we'd be going to the pageant. Twilight suggested that we could go pay her parent a visit if they were home. And so we did, since none of us had any other ideas at the moment. As expected, they gave us a warm welcome and asked us to come in. No formal introductions were needed either, as we had already met them a few times before—twice when they had visited Ponyville to see how their daughter have been doing, and three times when we've been in Canterlot for whatever reason. They were very hospitable and even had some little snacks to offer, even though we came in unannounced.

Soon after we thanked them for their hospitality, and continued on to go do what we were doing in Canterlot in the first place—to go see the Hearth's Warming pageant. The pageant was as awesome and heartwarming as every year before. Though I think the Commander Hurricane's actress was a bit bland and didn't really get into her role quite as well as the others. Oh well, can't really expect everypony to be as awesome actress as I was.

Like I mentioned at the beginning of this entry, we took the first train back to Ponyville after the festivities following the pageant. The train travel went without anything noteworthy happening. We spent the rest of that evening in Twilight's library together—or five of us spent the evening there anyway; Fluttershy wanted to go home to check on Sunshine, while Scootaloo and her friends went on their own adventures somewhere.

There's still two days of my vacation left until I have to get back to training. I still haven't completely got over the fact that I'll be spending less and less time with my old friends, but I've been faring better the last two months than during the first two. It is still not easy to leave them again, but it's made easier now that I have made quite good friends in the Wonderbolts, too.

Besides, it's not like I'll be on the moon or anything, and I could visit Ponyville any evening whenever I have two or so hours of free time. It's just that the flight to Ponyville takes almost an hour on steady pace, leaving only a maximum of ten or twenty minutes to spend in Ponyville until I'd have to return already. Because of that I've decided it's better to just relax with my new Wonderbolt friends, and to gather energy for the following day's training. Though now that Rarity is about to move into her new boutique soon, I'll probably get to see her more often—I admit I like her the least out of my friends, but it will still be nice to see some of them more often than just once in a few months.

Speaking of Rarity, she invited us all over to Carousel Boutique for a Hearth's Warming dinner today. So I guess that's it for now. As much as I like writing this, I still like being with my best friends a lot more—not to mention that even thinking about the food Rarity's prepared for us is making me quite hungry already.

—Rainbow Dash

P.S. Let's just hope Sweetie Belle hasn't been helping her sister with preparing the dinner again. I've got nothing against Sweetie, but her cooking skills are just as horrible as her singing skills are heavenly...

Scootaloo gave a laugh at the last lines. "Yeah, that point about Sweetie's cooking is quite accurate," she said. "Sweetie Belle in a kitchen tended to end up with catastrophic results. I mean, I still don't know how she managed to carbonize and liquify that toast once, or how she managed to burst cereal into flames by just adding milk to it..." She chuckled at the memories of her friend's failed cooking attempts. "Though she did get a lot better later on."

Rainbow Dash chucked a bit as well. "Well, I think that was just some random afterthought I had at the time," she said. "And I know I shouldn't probably have made fun of her cooking skills, seeing I was a lousy chef myself."

"Anyway, back on topic..." Scootaloo looked back at the diary, trying to piece her hazy memories together, and trying to connect her own memories with what Rainbow Dash had written in her diary. "I don't remember much details about most of those days," she said, "but I do actually remember you giving that tour in the Wonderbolt headquarters. I don't remember any specific details though, and I'll just have to take your word here."

"Well, yeah," Rainbow said. "I'm actually surprised you remember as much as you do from back then; I doubt I would remember anything if I didn't write it down here."

"I guess I just have pretty good, yet quite selective long term memory," Scootaloo said, shrugging nonchalantly. "I've noticed that I seem to remember things from my past slightly better than most of my old friends do. It's probably just something in my genes that give me better than average memory. But I don't know anything about that for sure, that's just what I've made myself believe."

Rainbow snorted. "Well, I don't know anything about that neurophysiology, or genetics, or anything. It seems to be more like Twilight's forte; knowing her, she has likely developed several spells just to find out what goes on in our brains."

Scootaloo laughed. "Yeah, I guess so," she said. "By the way, jumping back to that Hearth's Warming eve you wrote about, it's quite funny you should mention that Spitfire figurine you gave me that day. Just last week I went through some of my old stuff, and found that exact figurine among with loads of other old Wonderbolt merchandise I've bought or you've given to me over the years."

Rainbow Dash seemed quite surprised to hear that. "Wow," she said, "I thought you'd have thrown it away or sold it ages ago."

"No I didn't," Scootaloo said, smiling. "While it's not in a showcase or anything like that, it still has some sentimental value for me. Besides, you know I have always been a fan of Wonderbolts, and I would have never thrown away anything related to them—especially so as it was a gift from you."

"Yeah, guess I should have known that," Rainbow said, chuckling. "Though I'm still quite amazed to find out there are still some concrete things left from those times." She looked around her living room, noticed her trophy table, and added nodding towards the table, "In addition to those cherished prizes I've won during my career, I mean."

"And this diary you've been keeping almost your whole life," Scootaloo pointed out, tapping a hoof on the diary they've been reading for the last two hours.

Rainbow looked back at her old diary. "Yeah, that too," she said, shrugging. "Actually, now that I think about it a bit more, there are in fact quite a lot of keepsake items from our past. For example, I've kept all of those letters I've been receiving from you and my other friends ever since we separated; there are like hundreds, maybe even thousands of them. And I'm glad I did save them—reading those bring back wonderful memories, and sometimes when I've felt down I just re-read some of them to cheer up."

"I wish I had saved my oldest letters from my friends too," Scootaloo said, "but I started stashing them just about a decade after we—Sweetie, Apple Bloom, and I—started walking down separate roads towards our destinies." She sighed and paused for a moment, but then put a smile back on her face and continued, "Nevertheless, I still have something to remember the old times with them, mostly some memorial items from our cutie mark crusading times. And I know it sounds silly, but I never dared to throw away my old, trusty scooter. Though I haven't actually used it ever since I first left Ponyville and started performing all around Equestria; flying was just so much more effective way to travel when I was not carrying two other ponies with me."

Rainbow smiled at the younger pegasus. "Hey, stashing your scooter isn't that silly. You were amazing on that thing, long before you could even fly!" She jabbed her lightly on the side of Scootaloo's ribs, and added with a wink, "I wouldn't have been surprised to see you get a scooter as your cutie mark back then."

"Well, I wasn't really that good..."

"Yes you were," Rainbow countered. "I have seen several fillies and colts—and some older ponies too—driving scooters, but nopony else I've seen was even close to being as talented as you were."

Scootaloo thought back for a moment, and she neither had really seen anypony else ever doing the kind of stunts she herself used to do with her scooter. She shrugged and said, "Okay, I guess you're right."

"Of course I'm right. Whenever have I ever been wrong?" Rainbow said. She saw Scootaloo was about to answer and quickly added, "No, don't answer that; I know I've been wrong so many times I've lost count myself... though that's not important now."

She then glanced at the clock on a wall, then back down at the diary lying open on the table. They had spent over two hours already, and they had read just a few dozen pages of her quite thick diary. "Anyway, I think we should just move on. If we keep up this pace, I highly doubt we'll make it to the end of that diary today. But what you say we still try to read as much through it as we could now, and then read the rest tomorrow or later this week?" she asked Scootaloo.

"Yeah, I guess I can arrange some hours free for tomorrow also," Scootaloo said. "But we still have several hours left today. So, what's coming up next?"

"Well, it's a somewhat sadder one," Rainbow answered with a hint of sadness in her voice, remembering the contents of her diary by heart. "Written about four months after this... it's about the oldest member of Apple family at the time—about Granny Smith. About her death and funeral." Without another word she flipped open the next page.