Newbie Dash (Alternative)

True to Fluttershy’s word, Rainbow was doing better after sleeping for a few hours. When she was awake again, Twilight helped her with taking a much needed shower — once again with the lights as good as turned off, since she still couldn’t handle the sight of her own body. This also means that Rainbow is now sporting another one of Rarity’s designed outfits to be able to cope.

But both Twilight and Rainbow felt the tension once they were all back together for the next meal.

“Why didn’t you tell me that you get sick like that? I can’t help if I don’t know what’s going on.” Twilight starts.

“Neither did I.” Rainbow replies pointedly, her voice still weak and scratchy.

Twilight blinks. “…what do you mean?”

“What I mean is that that hasn’t happenedbefore. When I told you that I only get stomachaches, I really meant it. That, earlier, completely caught me off guard, too.” Rainbow defends, her voice cracking more times than it stays stable.

That’s when Twilight remembers Fluttershy remarking that it’s never happened solely because of food before.
This… was bad. A bad development. And hopefully not a recurring one, because if it is, then they’re really, truly screwed.

For weeks, Twilight had feared that Rainbow would decide to take drastic measures, like she’d read in her book. But she never thought that Dash’s own body could prevent her from recovering.

And from the looks of it, the pegasus seems just as scared as Twilight feels.

“Today was just too much.” The alicorn repeats her earlier statement.

“Maybe…” Rainbow mumbles, but in her head, she’s afraid that her own, stupid decision with the dare from decades ago, is now going to ruin all the progress they’ve made. Her growing distrust in her own body is not helping her feel positive about this whole recovery thing.

It was bad enough that she still gets sick when she’s under a lot of stress. But because of a small bite of something she used to love, and used to eat every day? It feels like a sick joke.

“I had it under control.” Dash grumbles angrily, and Twilight realises what this is really about.

Dash ‘figuring out how to prevent it from happening’, was actually more so her rebellion, a way to reclaim control. In more ways than one.

“Right…” Because you’ve been restricting for Celestia knows how many years now.

She didn’t have to say it out loud. Rainbow knows exactly what the alicorn is getting at.
“Can you blame me? For doing the one thing that works?” She challenges.

Twilight sighs. “No. You just did the best you could, with the knowledge you had. I just don’t like how quickly it escalated, earlier. Or that it returned, in the first place.”

“Yeah… Me either…” Rainbow mumbles. She finally turns her attention to the food in front of her, visibly debating. It’s a simple carrot soup, which should be easy on her stomach.

Twilight notices the look of apprehension on her face. “…do you think you can handle it? I figured that soup would be better for now, but I won’t force you if you still feel ill.”

“It should be fine.” Rainbow replies, though she doesn’t sound very convincing. “There’s still some nausea, but I think it’s just because I’m-….” she hesitates for a moment, “..hungry.” She admits, before awkwardly clearing her throat. “My throat’s just a bit sore.”

“Well, if you do feel like you’re going to get sick again, I found a spell that we can try.” Twilight reassures her.

The next morning, Rainbow is surprised to see a chocolate chip cookie with her breakfast serving.

“Uhm… what is that?” She asks curiously.

“A cookie.” Spike replies cheerfully, eating one of the cookies himself while reading a comic book.

“Yeah I got that, but why-”

“We have to get you used to more foods.” Twilight supplies, entering the room.

Rainbow frowns. “Really? Cookies for breakfast? What’s next, cotton candy for lunch?” She deadpans, sounding unimpressed. On the inside, a newfound anxiety was slowly building up at the very idea of having to eat something so sugary so early.

Twilight throws her a stern look for a moment, until she realises that Dash is just deflecting. “No. We want to build up on food freedom, not turn you into another Pinkie Pie.”

“Food freedom?” Dash raises a dumbfounded eyebrow.

“You’ve been eating the same things every day, for months now. I’m surprised you’re not sick of that, at this point.” Twilight points out.

“I don’t mind. It’s… safe.” Rainbow offers, for lack of a better word. She knows what to expect from the meals and daily snacks. She knows that they’re not going to make her gain a ton of weight. She can almost eat them without wanting to rip her hair and feathers out afterwards.

“And that’s part of the problem. My meal plans have become the only safe foods you’ll accept. You can’t go the rest of your life eating the same things every single day.” Twilight elaborates.

“Why not? They give me everything I need. You calculated everything, down to the smallest details.” Rainbow argues.

Twilight sighs. “This isn’t just about nutrition. What if we have to go on a mission, on the other side of Equestria?”

“Then I’ll just pack the-… okay, I see.” Rainbow says, quickly realising that the way they’ve been doing this whole recovery thing is not exactly how it works out in the world. She looks at the cookie again, still grimacing at the thought of eating it. Her mind is telling her a solid No. It’s not allowed.

“Complete food freedom is the end goal for a full recovery. Being able to eat whatever you want, whenever you want it, is what we’re striving for.”

“That sounds impossible.” Rainbow says in a high pitched voice. Then she startles when there’s a sudden THONK! of an object being thrown against one of the windows. “What in the-”

More things are being thrown, and they could hear angry shouting of many ponies yelling over one another, making it impossible to make out individual voices.

They all get up and check, only to find an angry mob right outside the castle, flinging rocks and what looks like newspapers at the windows.

“What is going on out there?!” Dash exclaims, ducking out of instinct when another object hits the glass, right in front of her face.

Spike throws Twilight a glare and goes against her wishes. “You’re.. kinda the talk of the town.”

“Spike!” Twilight protests.

“She would have heard about it one way or another! And with what’s happening outside, we owe her an explanation!”

Rainbow frowns at her friends, and dares another glance outside. “I don’t understand. Why are they so mad?”

“Honestly.. I’m not sure. They must have written more garbage in today’s paper.” Spike offers helplessly.

Before they could react, Rainbow gallops through the castle and to the front doors, where thankfully she doesn’t get instantly run over, due to the angry ponies surrounding the right hand side.

She picks up the newspaper with a hoof, inspecting it until she finds an unmistakable picture of herself, and for a moment, everything pauses as she stares at her picture.

She understands now, why ponies say that the camera adds ten pounds. In her mind, it may as well have added a hundred. She couldn’t see even a hint of her ribs, and her toned abs may as well not even exist.

No wonder they all hate her. This just proves that she’s not Wonderbolt material, and she never will be. Ruining the show like she did, is just the cherry on top.

She hasn’t even managed to read the title, or even a single word on the entire page, before someone shouts “there she is!” and the angry mob comes running to her, and this time, she could make out what they were saying.

“You’re a disgrace!”

“Selfish brute!”

“And you call yourself a ‘friend’!”

“You’re no better than us!”

“Some ‘hero’ you are!”

“I always knew she was trouble!”

“She can’t even fly right!”

“Rainbow Crash!”

“We don’t want you here!”

“Go back to Cloudsdale!”

Instead of fleeing, Rainbow stays perfectly still, her ears pinned back when she looks at the many scowls. “I’m sorry, everypony.” She says in a broken voice, fighting back tears. The ponies who heard her, pause in their accusations and just look confused.

Before it could get any worse, Twilight grunts from the effort of creating a force field that shuts the other ponies out and pushes them back, as well as moving Rainbow inside with her magic, and shuts the doors.

“Rainbow…” Twilight starts when she gets her breath back, but doesn’t know what to even say. The pegasus is just standing there with her back to the others, ears back, head hanging low, refusing to look at anyone.

Spike puts a hand on Dash’s shoulder. “Don’t listen to them. Most of them don’t even know what they’re talking about.”

“They’re all wrong.” Twilight says matter of factly, stepping next to her. “They-”

“No… they’re right…” Rainbow barely manages to whisper, her eyes still not leaving that god-forsaken picture, which now contains blurry circles of smeared, bleeding ink from her tears landing directly on it. “They have every right to hate me…”

“No-one hates you!” Twilight argues. “These ponies just have nothing better to do than to stir up drama.” She grumbles. This is definitely not the first time that the town’s ponies have turned against the Elements of Harmony, although they have never been this cruel to just one of them before.

“And I did a good job at giving them a reason for it.” Dash grumbles before walking off to her room.

Twilight just sighs in frustration at the whole situation. She doesn’t follow the pegasus, indecisive on what to do and what she could even say right now.

“Twilight…” Spike speaks up, reading today’s lies and accusations.

The alicorn notices. “Oh, what now?” She asks anxiously.

“They’re saying that you guys had a fight right before the show, and Dash tried to attack the crowds because of it.” Spike summarises, cringing at the very idea.

Twilight facepalms. “Are you kidding me?”

Spike shakes his head, reading on. “And the way no one has seen her since, they’re seeing it as proof that she’s guilty and too cowardly to face anypony.”

“First they say she tried to kill herself, now she tried to kill half the town?” Twilight asks mockingly in utter disbelief. “Do any of them actually know us? I mean, hello?! We only saved their ungrateful flanks a hundred times!”

“Maybe we should all move to the Crystal Empire. At least there, no pony would ever accuse the friends of Spike, the Brave and Glorious of something like this.” Spike remarks ruefully, pointing to the newspaper.

Twilight doesn’t laugh, or react to his joke at all. She just walks past him, down the corridor to Dash’s room. She only opens the door an inch when she hears the pegasus talking to herself- no, talking to Tank.

“-just can’t stop ruining everything, apparently. And now the whole town hates me.” She sighs. “I don’t know why I still bother…” she admits, before breaking down in quiet sobs.

Twilight debates going inside, but then Rainbow speaks again.

“I know… I love you too, bud… *sniff* I don’t know how I’m supposed to make it through winter without you.” Her broken voice half-whispers in a high pitch. “Hm? Where are you going?”

A moment later, Twilight hears the magical propeller coming closer, until Tank’s shell bumps into the door, shutting the door and hitting the alicorn in the muzzle. “Ow-!” She cries out before she could stop herself.

“Twilight?” Rainbow calls, sniffling for a moment as she tries to rub her eyes dry.

Now that her cover is blown, the alicorn opens the door and comes inside. “Even if all of Equestria hated you, you would still have all of us. What happened was not your fault, and one day they’ll realise how stupid they were for believing everything they read.”

“I never should have become a Wonderbolt.” Rainbow says, completely convinced of that.

Just hearing her say that, makes Twilight feel like she just got hit with a powerful spell right to the heart.

“Of course you should have! What makes you say that?” Twilight asks, jumping next to Rainbow, up on the bed. Her heart feels even more broken when the pegasus leans away from her, just to put distance between them.

“Haven’t I messed up enough?” Dash asks, glaring at her friend, because Twilight has personally witnessed many of her failures. Tank manages to fly back onto her lap, offering the emotional support through physical contact that Dash has refused from Twilight.

“And you think I haven’t?!” Twilight asks her in reply, flaring her wings. “How many times have my mistakes almost caused a war to break out? Does that mean I shouldn’t be a princess?”

“You gotta admit, that’s a lot worse than messing up at a show.” Spike remarks from the doorway. No one knows how long he’s been there, listening to them. Apparently, eavesdropping seems to run in the family.

Twilight only rolls her eyes, knowing that he doesn’t mean it in a bad way. “The point is: I’ve endangered many lives by making the wrong decisions, or not having all the answers. But we always found a way to make things right, and defeat evil kings and queens.”

“Did they ever write lies about you, and form angry mobs because of it?” Rainbow asks in a flat tone.

Twilight sighs. “If it doesn’t stop, then we’ll pay the writers a personal visit.” She promises darkly. “But for now, we have breakfast waiting.” Before Rainbow could complain, she looks at the pegasus pointedly, telling her, “don’t think that I’ll let you starve yourself because you’re upset,” before getting up and trotting out of the room. Maybe it’s a bit harsh, but she does not want another relapse, just because other ponies believe the most ridiculous lies.

Rainbow sighs in defeat. She’d completely forgotten about breakfast, and knowing what she really looks like under the clothes that cover her body, thanks to the picture, she isn’t sure she even wants to eat anything anymore.

Spike comes over to her front, holding up the necklace that Twilight had made for her.

She looks at it in surprise, not having seen it since the Summer Sun Celebration. “Where did you get that?” Dash asks, gently taking the meaningful accessory from his claws.

“Twilight was hiding it in a small chest in her room. She thinks that it’s what gave you the idea for the Sonic Rainboom, so she blames herself for what happened.” Spike explains. The distraught alicorn had spent a long time telling her friends how she was blaming herself, while they waited in the hospital waiting room for some news on the unconscious Rainbow Dash.

All of their attempts to make her see reason have failed. Spike is sure that the only pony she will finally listen to, is Rainbow Dash herself.

“What?” Rainbow’s eyes widen. “No, it wasn’t.” She looks down at the image in the crystal. After a lifetime of being bullied, ridiculed, called names, and getting unwanted attention from a certain pegasus, one would assume that she’d be used to the way the town’s ponies are treating her right now.

Then, determination fills her, and she puts the necklace around her neck, hiding it underneath the clothes so Twilight wouldn’t know.

This is just like that day at the Best Young Flier’s Competition. Ponies trying to bring her down, but she’d shown them all.
She will show them all how wrong they are.

Spike grins when he sees her confidence returning.

Rainbow throws the dragon a grateful smile, before jumping off the bed. She may not face the crowds right now, but she has a challenge she needs to tackle for now, waiting for her in the dining room.

Come on. I’m Rainbow Danger Dash. I have defeated enemies, saved Equestria, became a Wonderbolt, and pulled off a number of Sonic Rainbooms in my life.
I can damn well eat a little cookie. She tells herself as she trots through the hallway.

Twilight is positively surprised to see the pegasus practically strutting in proud strides to her spot. When Spike comes inside, she raises an eyebrow at him. “What did you do? She was in tears a moment ago.” She whispers in confused awe.

“Let’s just say I gave her a little… confidence boost.” Spike offers cryptically.

They’re interrupted by Rainbow suddenly spitting out the bite she took from her cookie, coughing like she’s choking, looking just as alarmed as the others.

Never mind…

Instead of getting upset at her sudden failure, Rainbow simply closes her eyes as she takes a deep breath, feeling the crystal pressing slightly against the front of her chest. When she opens her eyes again, finding the concerned faces of her friends watching her, she offers a calm but confident “I’ll get there.”