Chapters There weren’t that many clouds to bust in the summer. And since Rainbow was paid by the dispersed volume, her mortgage would put her squarely into the red in those few months. As much as she’d love to lay about and bleach her coat a bit, she had to admit that it wouldn’t hurt to get an odd job now and then.
Or so she thought. Some jobs, it turns out, are more odd than others.
“Fogging hail! ” Rainbow swore as she stumbled through the air, wrestling with her new outfit. The suit covered her hoof to neck, tightened around all the wrong kinds of places, and chafed like an expletive that would be very much unsuitable for any kind of audience. After all, she was on the cusp of becoming a Wonderbolt cadet this autumn. She'd have to learn to keep appearances.
The forest clearing she was supposed to be landing on was just ahead, and she wasn’t keen on making another pass. On any other day, she’d be there in a jiffy, maybe even landing on a copper bit. Possibly with a flashy pirouette in case anypony was looking.
Today, she just slowed down, swore as the weight of her clothes pulled her down, compensated to pull up, lost air speed, almost tripped over the treetops, swore again, desperately flapped her wings, swore for the third time as the base of her wings tangled in the suit, and landed with all the grace of a particularly foul-mouthed brick.
Rainbow Dash climbed out of the short furrow she’d dug, decided that her schedule would allow for additional fifteen seconds of swearing, and let out a deluge of sounds some could possibly consider to be words.
Her immediate ire spent, she took a deep breath. You’re a professional, Dash, she reminded herself, still huffing and puffing. Just like a Wonderbolt. You want to get into the Wonderbolts, don’t you?
“Right!” she agreed with herself and set out for the task at hoof. “Now where is that…” she patted her new ‘uniform’ and grumbled. From her neck down to her hooves, the outfit was all straps, pockets, zippers, patches, or combinations thereof. “I look ridiculous,” she muttered as she finally found a small pouch in a triangular pocket across her left thigh.
She’d put it there five hours ago as she was leaving Tall Tale. She’d been absent-minded as always, and only had herself to blame for it missing. “Unwashed unicorns!” She blamed her employer, and bit her lip. Swearing at the clouds was cool, but swearing at ponies wasn’t. She nodded to herself and walked to the middle of the clearing, pulling her goggles down to her neck.
Inside the pouch was a large, semicircular gemstone in an ornate setting. She placed it on the ground and took a quick step away. Nothing happened. “Stupid magic!” Rainbow swore again and tried to remember the instructions. Twilight mentioned gem flares once, but apparently, they were illegal near settlements. According to her, they gave unicorns horrible headaches.
In a minute or two, Rainbow remembered there were two parts to the flare. She groaned, and patted herself down, finally finding the other gem-in-a-pouch. This one was blue, and the setting was the mirror image of the first one. She put the two side by side, and they snapped together. Rainbow’s hair stood up with some unseen force, and she stepped back just as the gems began producing a harsh, multicolored light.
Rainbow shielded her eyes as the gems hovered into the air and flashed brighter than the sun. A loud crack! and a spray of wet dirt later, the now-coughing pegasus blinked the blindness away.
A pony stood in the middle of the clearing, surrounded by several large bags. He wobbled, smiled uneasily, took a step forward, and began to topple forward. Without thinking, Rainbow rushed forward and caught him, before setting him down.
“Hey, don’t die, you gotta pay me first!” she slapped his cheek. She didn’t remember if he was always this pale, or this gaunt. Just put on a few pounds, she thought as the unicorn coughed, then pushed a curl of his hair out of his eyes.
“Oh, the prototype!” he was staring down at her, eyes glistening.
Rainbow rolled her eyes and let him fall onto the ground. She stood up and took a step back. “In all its glory,” she stated mockingly, stretching.
The unicorn nodded, and positively jumped to his hooves, still staring at Rainbow’s body. “Good, good! How did it go?”
Before she could say anything, the unicorn was on her, staring at various places with intent that was positively unseemly under the circumstances. “Hey!” Rainbow yelled. “Eyes up here!”
The unicorn locked eyes with her, and Dash froze. He was smiling – grinning ear to ear, in fact, as genuine as Pinkie Pie got. But his eyes were different – that stare was that of a hawk. Those green eyes bore into Rainbow’s, filled with some deep, inner fire. “How did it go?” he repeated, almost whispering.
Rainbow blinked, and shook her head, turning to the bags to hide her discomfort. “It sucks for flying,” she stated bluntly. As he got his bearings, she walked to one of the bundles the unicorn came with, and started unwrapping it.
“Oh, tell me all about it!” the pony walked beside her, and she could feel that stare on her again.
“It’s loose in all the wrong places,” Rainbow enumerated as she undid the straps and freed the tent out of its bag. “It’s uncomfortable, and tight around my—” she paused, and coughed. “In the wrong places. Are you gonna pitch a tent?” Phrasing, Rainbow. “I mean, the sun’s going down.”
The unicorn nodded absently and his horn hummed. The other tent began unfolding by itself, and assembling into a vaguely triangular shape. “I’m sure I can adjust the dimensions,” the unicorn muttered, and Rainbow felt a hoof touch her side.
“Hey!” she protested as a strap tightened across her midsection. “Is this really—” Another tug made the suit rub around the base of her wings in a way that made her bite her lip. Good thing, too, since the next few adjustments mostly concerned her thighs, and—
“Okay, stop,” she stepped away.
The unicorn looked up, then down, his eyes widened, and a blush put some color to his in sunken cheeks. “Oh! I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“I am not sleeping in this thing,” Rainbow said icily. “So unless you want your ‘prototype’ torn up, you better start unstrapping it.”
The tent fell to the ground. “Of course!” Tendrils of magic hummed across her body, straps and zippers vibrating in ways the pegasus found unusual and strangely pleasant. Or maybe it was the sense of tightness disappearing. Whatever it was, Rainbow sighed in contentment when it was done.
“Finally,” she grumbled, and shook the now-opened layer off of her. As she did, the underlayer squeaked, and she groaned again. “Is that necessary?” She poked at it. The whole surface was covered with a network of tubing, filled with some sort of liquid and moving slightly.
“I’m afraid so,” he replied, “unless you want to get a heatstroke.” A long zipper across her chest opened, and the tubing disconnected, with the underlayer opening like the petals of a plant.
Rainbow Dash stepped out of the front hooves of the suit, then out of the back. “It chafes a lot,” she complained. “And all those tubes…” She decided not to mention the tubes had a bad habit of bunching up in various crevices, and seemingly moving on their own.
“Right,” the pony nodded and coughed. “Right!” his smile came back on. “I know what to do about that I think! I’ll have it ready by the morning.”
“Focus, Twily,” Rainbow sighed.
“Twily?” the unicorn blinked.
“She’s a friend,” Dash smirked. “She’s a nerd, too. Let’s set up those tents, I need some shuteye.” And a backrub, she realized, but that ain’t happening.
The pony nodded, his magic hummed, and the tent began to pitch itself again. Yeah, that's how those usually go, Rainbow thought, and chuckled at her own joke.
Rainbow had the satisfaction of finishing long before the unicorn, and helping his fancy magic with her good ol’ hooves. “You don’t go out on a lot of hikes, do ya?” she asked as she grabbed his tent, and turned it the right side out.
“Not since school, no,” he replied, hovering sticks to her. “I’m way too busy.”
“With the suit?”
“Yeah!” he nodded vigorously. “I’ve been working on that thing a year now. Enchanted the tubes and everything.” He paused, and rubbed his neck. “Just gotta test it, you know? Even if it’s not… uh… you know. Finished.”
Rainbow laughed. “At least you admit that,” she looked at it again. “So why a flight suit, of all things?” She frowned, remembering the various ponies who had made suits for the Wonderbolts throughought the years. “There are plenty of those out there.”
“Not like this one!” the unicorn smiled. “Environmental control, resilient materials, excellent aerodynamics…”
“I take it that those are still on the drawing board,” Rainbow raised an eyebrow. “All those zippers and stuff make an awful lot of wind noise, you know?”
“Right! I’ll keep it in mind, thanks!” For a moment, he stood, and stared off into space, then nodded quickly. “I… have a few ideas.” He smiled. “You can do a lot with the right material.”
“Right…” Rainbow replied uncertainly. “So… what’s the rush? Can't you just work on the thing for a month or two?”
“I’m… uh…” the unicorn blushed again. “I’m kinda running out of bits…”
Rainbow stopped and set down the tent cord. “And you were going to tell me when ?”
“Oh, I still have enough to pay you!” the unicorn waved his hooves defensively, before wincing. “Just, uh, not much after that, you know? Once we get to Canterlot,” he shrugged. “Well, the plan was to hope I’d have enough to get the suit dry-cleaned, patch up any holes, and present it to the Wonderbolts.”
Rainbow blinked. “The Wonderbolts?!” she said awed surprise. “That’s… uh… a bit ambitious, isn’t it?”
“They are the best,” the unicorn said matter-of-factly. “If they think I’ve done well enough, well, then it’s the truth.”
Rainbow just nodded, remembering her own continuing attempts to get into the ‘bolts good graces. “Good luck,” she said, and meant it.
They finished pitching the tents, and Rainbow quickly disappeared inside hers. It had really been a long day, first flying all the way to Tall Tale and then north after meeting with the unicorn. And it would be a long day tomorrow. As she chewed on a protein bar, she listened to the distant hum of magic, snipping of scissors, and gentle tinkling of metal mixing in with the evening sound of the forest. It was almost like relaxing in the spa, listening to Rarity’s shop across the street.
The sounds sent her off to sleep before she knew it. She had dreams she would not remember, filled with warm embraces, leaving her to wake with a heart racing and cheeks blushing, for reasons she could not place.
She stretched, and headed out. The unicorn, covered with layers of cloth, lay on an impromptu workbench he’d made from some suitcases. He was drooling over his own prototype. Literally, this time, Rainbow thought with a smirk and a chortle that woke the other pony up.
“Morning,” she said. “Did you bring any coffee?”
He yawned. “It’s in there somewhere…” he blinked the sleep out of his eyes and stood up shakily. Rainbow’s eyes inadvertently glanced down, and widened at a purely male byproduct of an expeditious awakening, now dangling impressively between the gaunt unicorn’s legs. A second later, he was blushing, sitting, and pointing at a duffel bag by Rainbow’s tent.
Rainbow turned quicker than would be cool and collected, and made sure to pay as much attention to the bag as possible, hoping the unicorn would make himself presentable. Not all of him is thin, a voice in her head noted as she rummaged through the bag. Apparently, the unicorn's idea of travel food was canned mushrooms. In a side pocket of the bag, Rainbow found a can opener, a fork, and a large, ugly knife with serrated edge and a tacky pink handle. The thought of breakfast made her stomach grumble, but she wasn’t keen on turning around just yet.
“I can't find the coffee,” Rainbow said instead. "There's a brook nearby," she continued, remembering her flyover. “I’ll… uh… go fetch some water.”
Wordlessly, the unicorn hovered a water bag to her. She grabbed it in her mouth, and flew off without as much as a glance back. She didn’t know how much time guys needed for that morning issue to get fixed, so she was in no hurry.
The water was pristine, and a small pond glistening in the sun seemed positively inviting. After a moment, the pegasus thought why not , and dove in. The morning water was cool and refreshing, chasing the memories of yesterday’s foam out of her matted fur, and the twinge of the morning’s surprise out of her nethers. She swam across a couple of times to warm herself up, and dove occasionally to wash herself properly. Once she was done, she climbed out and filled the water bag, heading back to camp on hoof.
The unicorn had already set up a small campfire, and took the bag with a thankful nod. A few minutes later, the smell of coffee and mushrooms filled the clearing, and soon enough, they were breakfasting in silence.
“So, what next?” Rainbow asked after a few minutes, playing with an empty can. “We’re at least a day from Canterlot.” With a frown, she pointed at the flight suit prototype. “Or more if I’m wearing that thing,”
“I’ve made some modifications,” the unicorn said, swallowing his food. “And I think I can configure it better for the next leg of the journey.” A tinge of magic brought in a rolled up parchment, which turned into a surprisingly detailed map north-western Equestria.
“You’re going to fly north,” the unicorn indicated, “as far as you can to the mountains.”
“North?” Rainbow asked. “But Canterlot is east of here.”
“I need the suit tested in a cold climate,” the unicorn explained, and smiled. “You are paid by the day, aren’t you?”
Rainbow nodded. “You’re the boss. So, you want me to take the gem thingamagicks again?”
He nodded. “Yes, same as before – just find a clearing, set up the flare, and I’ll teleport in the supplies. I'll prepare things on this end while you're en route.”
She nodded, and stood up. “Alright. Let’s go – time’s a wastin’.”
“First off, the thermoregulation layer,” the unicorn said. Rainbow sighed, and fitted her back hooves into the legs of the suit. Magic hummed, and pulled the suit up. “Hey, a good idea, taking a bath,” the unicorn commented. “The suit was actually kinda smelly—”
Her stern look silenced him before he could finish. Magic pulled the layer over her rump and her tail got pulled through the appropriate hole. Thankfully, she had fastened the quick release zipper that went across her crotch, herself. Something about letting that task to the unicorn, with all the gently humming and vibrating magic, filled her with less apprehension than she’d care to admit. “It feels tighter than yesterday,” she commented.
“I shortened some of the tube runs,” the unicorn explained, connecting portions of the cooling system. “And I hemmed it in a little. Excuse me.” She felt something smooth and gently vibrating slide over her neck and her chest, flattening the fur, like a gentle hoof caressing her all the way down to her navel. “I don’t want it to be caught in the zipper,” he muttered apologetically before she could object.
“Y-yeah,” Rainbow cleared her throat as the last hints of a tingle disappeared from her midsection. The zipper hissed, and the layer tightened around her. She stretched, and to her surprise found the layer fitting much better than yesterday. “Hey, nice!”
“I’m still working on it,” the unicorn said, with just a hint of pride in his voice. “I think the suit is too absorbent for long stretches of flight. We might have to go with an underlayer.” He smirked and coughed. “I… uh… I have some ideas. I’ll figure something out while you’re in transit.”
“Hey, don’t forget to sleep,” Dash chuckled, and shook her rump. The tubes shook and wriggled. “How about the laces and stuff?”
“The protective layer, yes,” the unicorn nodded, his face crimson for some reason. “That one's put on from your back down, let me just give you a hoof.” He hovered the mess of cloth, zippers, and straps onto her back, and let go. It slumped over her an exhausted jellyfish. “Lift up your front left hoof.” She did, and he began fastening and tightening various parts of the suit, until it neatly enveloped her whole appendage. “Now your hind right.”
They continued the suit-up procedure for a few minutes. The pressure steadily mounted across Rainbow’s body – not entirely unpleasant, but certainly unusually restrictive. “You know,” she commented as she stretched, “if you want anypony to actually use this, it’ll have to be easier to put on.”
The unicorn nodded, and tightened a series of straps around Rainbow’s midsection. “I just put this together to test it,” he explained. “I've had some punctures before.” He went on as he made minor adjustments. “The final version will be a single suit, but it has to be made to size for each individual, using a memory fabric I made...” He went on explaining as Rainbow’s mind drifted off, considering every new tightness and the overall comfort. “There,” the unicorn broke her out of her stupor.
Rainbow tried up a couple of stretches in earnest, and gingerly unfolded her wings. “Could you move the wing holes lower? “A tightening across her midsection, and a release of pressure across her back, then a couple of straps getting adjusted in other places. “Good enough,” she said, moving about.
The two layers slid across each other, and to her disdain, she felt the tubing move about again. She opened her mouth to comment on it bunching up in places , but decided against it. She could just tell him in the evening. Instead, the pegasus flapped her wings, and hovered up.
“It’s... better than yesterday,” she decided. “So far. I’ll put it through its paces.”
He nodded and smiled. “That’s all I'm asking for. I’ll make sure to refill the supplies and prepare the camp for transport,” he agreed, and yawned. “...and maybe have a nap.” The two gems she’d used yesterday flew into view, and placed themselves in two of the other pockets of the suit. “There you go. Don't forget anything!”
“Got a lunch for me, too, mom?” Rainbow asked sarcastically.
The unicorn chortled, and clapped his hooves. In a surprisingly good imitation of an elderly mare, he said: “Of course, dearie!” His magic hummed, and a couple of protein bars hovered towards Rainbow. “Now, you stay safe out there!”
Rainbow burst out laughing, and gave him a salute. “Don’t oversleep!” With that, she was off.
The flight was uneventful at first. The suit was stiffer than Rainbow would have liked, putting more stress onto her muscles. After an hour or so, however, Rainbow got used to the increased strain and got into the zone. She just flew north, enjoying the endless forest below and the cool wind in her mane.
A few hours later, she realized she wasn’t foaming at all. In fact, she was surprisingly comfortable – cool as a cumulus, possibly owing to those churning pipes snaking all across her body. As the sun began climbing steadily up to its zenith, Dash hummed, idly thinking about one day being a Wonderbolt.
The sun beat down on her, but thanks to the suit, she felt almost nothing of it. Usually, the wind would be enough for a couple of hours, but not much longer. Pegasi were built for bursts of speed, not so much for endurance flight. Today, however, she found herself in a steady climb thanks to the hot currents, and steady glides when those currents disappeared, all without breaking foam.
Around mid-day, Rainbow started to feel her wing muscles ache, and decided to make a brief stop. Underneath her, the forest had slowly shifted into a sea of evergreens, and the brook had grown into a substantial river flowing towards the mountains now clearly visible beyond the northern horizon. The pegasus glided down, careful to mind the suit’s added mass. She landed next to the river and took a breather, sitting down on the ground and massaging some life into her stiff back muscles.
Even the pointy rocks didn’t feel so bad through the suit’s multiple layers. The water churned and bubbled through the pipes as Rainbow chewed on her protein bar. When she was done, she stood up, stretched, and took a long and refreshing drink from the river. She headed north, feeling lighter than ever, leaving behind a small trail of silvery mist.
For some reason, that was when the suit started giving her trouble. Maybe an hour after her stop, she’d started feeling a warmth at her sides, which she first attributed to soreness. But just a couple of minutes later, she realized her back was growing hotter as well, and the churning of the suit was growing louder and more gurgly. She landed again, inspecting her sides, unbuckling some of the top layer, and found the network of tubes flat and soft to the touch.
“What the…” she started, before she realized she was feeling a strange moisture around her cutie mark. Looking down, she spotted it – a small jagged gash in the fabric, surrounded by a shrinking stain of liquid seeping out, and down her right leg.
“Buck!” she swore again. The tubes – no doubt enchanted in some way – wriggled as though in acknowledgement of her frustration. For a moment, she considered her options.
“Okay,” she told herself out loud. “Think, Rainbow. You can make camp here,” she looked around the forest. “You could use that magical thingy to call the dude to fix his stupid suit…” She pondered it, frowning. The idea of giving up in the middle of her journey didn’t sit well with her, but she lacked the self-awareness to realize that was her ego talking. “Or,” she continued, “you could go on flying. Take a few more stops maybe. Yeah.”
The picture of the map appeared in her mind, and she added: “Just follow the river. That way, you can cool off whenever you wanna.” She briefly considered leaving the suit behind. That wouldn’t be very professional, Dash, she chastised herself.
Rainbow nodded resolutely. She walked to the river, and washed her face and her neck, then drank thirstily, and finally, flew off. With a determined frown, she headed north, climbing up quickly in hopes of finding cooler air.
The pegasus quickly discovered two things: one, the suit was an excellent insulator. Two, her muscles apparently produced a lot of heat. Not only an hour later, she was foaming like a mare in estrus. With a defeated groan, she dove again, seeking the river beyond her. As she pierced the hotter air close to the ground, she decided to expedite the process, and simply dove into the cool, refreshing water.
Her muscles immediately cramped, the suit took up twenty pounds of water, and Rainbow found herself gurgling and fighting for air. After a panicked scuffle in the shallow rapids, somehow, she made it to the riverside, coughing and cursing at crap-stained cirruses . Now that she was out, the water and air cooled her down too quickly, and she shivered. With more cursing, Rainbow Dash stretched her wings, did a couple of quick stretches, and took flight again.
She knew not to climb up too far at least, until she dried up. What she didn’t realize was how the wet suit would wrap around her, how its layers would brush against each other, and how annoying all those still-wriggling tubes would end up being.
Oh, the tubes. Especially the tubes.
Half an hour later, the suit chafed and itched, and those darn tubes had somehow managed to coalesce into a wriggling, undulating rope running right through her crotch area. The pegasus muttered and tried to push the tubes out of the way at first, but wrestling with them in flight, through the layer above, was a lost cause. In the end, she just decided to suffer through it.
And suffer, she did.
Back when she was younger, one day Rainbow found a magazine filled with muscular mares and stallions in cheap-looking Wonderbolt uniforms. And mostly out of these uniforms, or in various levels of disrobing. That was one of those times when she’d found her dream affirmed, and her loins itchy with hereto unknown excitement.
Rainbow had discovered a lot about herself that afternoon alone behind a cloud, and in the following few weeks. Now she was older, of course, and a bit more used to being a bit hot and bothered. But she wasn’t exactly used to a near-constant wriggling and rubbing of tight fabric across her nethers, her stomach, around the base of her wings, across her chest…
“B-buck!” she swore again, and landed quickly. There, by the brook, she jostled for the relief zipper in the crotch of her suits, until she froze with the memory of a certain wiry unicorn, mentioning the smell the suit took on after she’d worn it. She considered how doing what she was about to do would add to that, and what the unicorn would say, how big he would get in the morning, how it would make her feel to grab—
No, no, no! She’d have to live with it for the time being. The cool air around her exposed lap was a blessing, at least. Through the hole, she tried her best to rearrange the forest of the still-undulating tubing, biting her lip as her hoof slid to the usual good places.
No. She was a professional, and she wouldn’t let some unicorn weirdo smell her juices on a frigging flight suit!
As if to tempt her further, the tubes closed like a curtain, and Dash gasped.
“Stringy... stratus…!” she moaned, and bit her lip. Then, mustering her willpower, she closed the zipper and stood up. Stretched now, the tubes’ teasing reduced somewhat.
“Good…” Rainbow said breathily, and looked at the skies. “Gotta... just... get going.”
After a brief drink, she flew up, and did her best to ignore the everpresent stimulation as she continued north.
The afternoon was hell. Time passed about as slow as it did in class, especially during those weeks after she'd find that magazine, before she could fly to a cloud and chase all the itches out of herself again and again.
"I'm a professional!" Rainbow grunted through gritted teeth and tried to distract herself by identifying the steely clouds which began gathering on the horizon. But for whatever reason, all of them seemed vaguely phallic to her.
"A professional!"
Evening found Rainbow by a small lake at the edge of the forest. She wasn’t upset, or twitching, no siree. In fact, she even had the presence of mind to wash herself – suit and all – in the lake. The water was positively freezing this far north, but she welcomed the numbing sensation of it.
Once she got a grip, Rainbow stood up, then placed the two gems on the ground, and waited for the magical transport to happen.
It did, a bit later than before. The unicorn stumbled but didn’t faint this time, simply looking around and blinking. “You made it pretty far—”
“Shut up and get this stupid thing off!” Rainbow snapped at him.
He was taken aback, but nodded, and started unbuckling and unzipping with his magic. Relieved, Rainbow almost tore the suit off of her, then the underlayer, and splayed herself onto the ground, sighing. “Thank Celestia…!”
The unicorn’s magic hummed again and he hissed. “You pierced the tubing.”
“Well duh!” Rainbow mumbled into the ground, still unwilling to move. “You call that layer ‘armor’? All I did was sit on a pointy rock!”
“I told you was just improvised,” the unicorn grunted, and frowned. “Wait, did you try to… swim in it?”
“Do you even know how hot it was?!” Rainbow rolled onto her back and spread herself wide.
He nodded, and frowned. “Didn’t it get… uh… itchy?”
Rainbow just burst out laughing. When he kept staring at her, waiting, she continued. “Look, it got super hot. I didn’t want to call it in early.”
He scoffed, and struck the ground with his hoof. “You should have!” He shook his head and inspected the suit. “I could probably have patched this up in a few minutes, and you'd be on your way again.” He pulled out a bit of the tubing, showing it to the pegasus. “See? It’s just a small hole. Huh.” He smiled when he realized the tubing was still wriggling. “I see my peristaltic enchantment is still working...”
Rainbow groaned in exasperation, and fell onto her back again. She stared up into the darkening skies, and tried to not imagine splitting this nerd into two. Or being split into two herself. She huffed. When she rose again, she found him staring absently in her direction. Moments later, she realized her spread-eagle position and the day’s excitement probably gave him an ample look at her—
“Hey! Eyes up here!” she bounced up, crimson with embarrassment.
His eyes shot up, and despite the expression of terror in his face, they held the same excited fire from before.
“Stop staring at me!” Rainbow commanded. “Fix the stupid suit. And make it not… wriggle, if there’s no water in it.”
“It’s actually a mixture of alcohol and—”
“Save it, nerdlinger!” Rainbow called, spinning around and heading for the lake again. “Ugh! I need a bath!”
He was smart enough not to speak, and wise enough to make hot cocoa for her when she came back. He even had a towel ready, made warm by the fire, hanging right next to the two suit layers. Rainbow pierced the suit with an angry glare and took the towel, giving the unicorn a nod of thanks. She sat by the fire and dried her mane up, sipping the hot beverage in peace.
“Sorry about the suit,” the unicorn said after a while.
“Nah,” Rainbow replied, having cooled off physically and emotionally. “Sorry about being all...” she shrugged. “It's not your fault… uh…” She blinked. “What’s… uh… what was your name again?”
For some reason, the unicorn blushed, and ran a hoof through his mane with a laugh. “I guess never told you. I… uh… It’s kinda embarrassing.”
“Your name is embarrassing?” Rainbow cocked an eyebrow. “Dude. I just spent an afternoon getting fondled by—” she stopped herself, and took a deep breath, then laughed to hide her blush. “Is the name, like… silly?”
“Hm…” he thought. “More like… suggestive? I guess?”
“Well now you definitely have to tell me,” Rainbow laughed in earnest. “You know," she leaned in conspirationally, "one of the pegasi from my class was called Chad Thundercock? ”
The unicorn burst out laughing, spraying cocoa into the fire. “Is that— Is that even legal?! ” he asked between bouts of coughing.
“Nah,” Rainbow replied, “I made that up.” That was just what us girls called him, she didn’t say. And according to his filmography, what he decided to call himself later in his career.
“Well, my name is not that bad,” the unicorn said. “It is kinda ironic though.” He gave one last laugh, then stood up, wiry and pale, and offered his hoof. “Hello, my name’s Fit.”
She shook his hoof, still curious. “Just ‘Fit’?” She looked him up and down. “I can kinda see the irony…”
He sighed.
“It’s Fit,” he repeated, and added: “Tight Fit.”
As if to add insult to injury, the suit took this exact moment to fall from the impromptu drier.
Rainbow burst out laughing. Tight Fit – another burst of laughter – joined her after a moment. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” she tried to control herself. “I’m just glad you’re not—” another laugh “—a mare!”
“Now, that would definitely not be legal,” Tight replied with a chuckle, putting the suit back. “But I do have a sister…”
She looked at him expectantly.
“She’s called Just Fit ,” he snickered.
“Is that—” Rainbow forced herself not to laugh again, “Is that real, or are you pulling my leg?”
“Oh, it’s very real,” Tight nodded solemnly. “She’s a judge, back in Tall Tale.”
“At least she’s not a por— uhm— a movie star.”
“Like Chad Thundercock?”
Rainbow Dash chortled as she turned crimson.
“Oh yes,” Tight nodded solemnly. “I know of the legendary Chad Thundercock. He was great with Jolly Rump and Lightning Gash.”
“I didn’t even see that one…” Rainbow said under her breath. She eyed Tight and shook her head. “At least you have other hobbies beside making wetsuits.”
“Hey!” the unicorn objected with a laugh. “You're the one who makes them wet!”
Silence fell on the camp as Rainbow blushed, looked away, and sipped the cocoa.
“I should… I should see if I can fix that puncture,” Fit muttered. He stood up, and quickly departed, the suit flying after him.
Rainbow sat staring into the fire. By the time she stood up, Fit was already hard at work fixing the suit’s hole. She wanted to say something, but didn't really know what. So instead, she departed into her tent, and zipped herself up in a sleeping bag. The sounds of cloth being cut, metal clinking, and rubber groaning failed to sent her off to sleep like it did yesterday.
She still felt the day’s ordeal in her muscles and her lap. Her hoof traveled between her legs absently, and she bit down on her other hoof. The sounds of work from just outside the tent deterred her as much as they excited her. A trickle of moisture stained her hoof and a moan escaped her lips.
The work outside paused. “Ouch!” the unicorn’s voice came clear as day. “Friggin’ needles!”
Rainbow stopped herself, despite her aches, pent-up desires, and beating heart. Slowly, she managed to drift off into uneasy sleep. She dreamed of an old classmate and an old magazine, and of a morning wood she’d never imagine on a wiry nerd like Tight Fit.
Chapter 3: Racing Weather
Rainbow Dash woke up early. There was something in the air; a familiar ionic scent of changing weather. She crawled out of her tent, staring at the skies. Clouds shifted and moved above the northern mountains in ways she didn’t like at all. They didn't look as funny to her as they did yesterday.
To her surprise, she found Tight Fit at the campfire. He was stoking the last of the embers, drying up some wood around them.
“I don’t like the look of those clouds,” Dash said. She paused, and remembered her rash decision yesterday. “We...” she swallowed her pride. “We should call this thing off.”
Fit looked to the mountains and nodded. “We should,” he agreed, his voice flat.
“What happens if we do?” she asked.
“No cold weather testing data,” Fit said simply, and sighed. “No testing of the new separation layer. No testing of the new waterproof layer.”
Rainbow raised an eyebrow. “You work fast.”
He shrugged. “I couldn’t sleep.” He forced a chortle. “I must have been thinking of Jolly Rump or something.”
She shook her head. “So what if you don’t make those tests?”
Fit didn’t say anything for a while. Then he stood up and shrugged again. “It’ll be a hard sell, I guess. But since I pay you by the day, I’ll have enough to take you out to lunch once we get to Canterlot.”
Rainbow blinked, but Fit had already unrolled the map.
“You can start eastward, along the edge of the forest,” he pointed. “Then stop when you reach the great river. We set up camp there. Then we can make Canterlot by tomorrow.” The map rolled back up and flew back towards its pouch.
Rainbow snatched it mid-air and unrolled it with her hooves. “Or,” she said, “I could go north-east,” she moved her hoof across the map, then shook her head and pointed to the mountains. “See that pass over there?”
Tight squinted, and scanned the horizon. She pulled him to her, and indicated with her other hoof.
“There,” she pointed and he nodded. “That’s where the northern train line goes,” she explained, before she realized she was still holding him close to her. She let go, and slicked her hair back. “So, yeah. My friends and I went there a couple of months ago. Fought an evil king, freed a country, you know. It’s a long story.”
He nodded.
“When those clouds reach that pass,” Rainbow motioned with her hoof, “All that moisture coming up will crystallize into what we call ‘snow’”. She nodded resolutely, and eyed him. “What? I took a semester in Wild Cloud Formations and Movements at school.”
“So…?” the unicorn seemed lost. Rainbow rolled her eyes.
“So,” she explained, “if I start now and fly north-east, I can make it into that pass before that, and up those mountains when the cold air displaces the warm air from the south.” I think? She took the subject, but she never said she'd attended any of the lectures.
The unicorn frowned. “You sure? I don’t want you to take unnecessary risks.”
“Hey! ‘Unnecessary Risks’ is my middle name,” Rainbow ‘Unnecessary Risks’ Dash replied with a wave of her hoof.
“That’s actually two—”
“Come on, it’ll be fine! Now strap me into that contraption of yours, Tighty.” Rainbow slapped him over the back. “I got a cloud front to beat.”
“Okay, first on, the underlayer.”
Tight Fit produced a roll of black material. Rainbow eyed him as he unrolled it – surprisingly, it was shaped a bit like a pony.
“It’s a non-vulcanized rubber made from an emulsion of polymer microparticles—”
“Yeah, I know,” Dash stopped him. “Rarity showed it to me once. She called it lay-tex.”
The unicorn paused and blinked. “Huh.”
“You know – it’s a textile that gets people laid.”
“It’s technically not a textile—”
“And I’m not here to get laid.” She grabbed the suit and eyed him. “You sure this is my size?”
He chuckled nervously. “It’s a bit floppy on me, but I admit, for you…” he looked her up and down, “it might be a tight fit.”
Rainbow rolled her eyes, and put the first layer on. Surprisingly enough, it was her size. “Huh,” she pinched a bit on her rump and let it snap back into shape. “It's pretty okay.”
“A lot of ponies have a similar body plan,” Fit noted and zipped her up. He paused. “And hairstyles, come to think of it. Different colors, though.”
“Alright, what’s next?” Rainbow asked, eyeing the clouds on the horizon.
“The cooling layer.”
“I’m well-acquainted,” she sighed, and slipped it on. “Did you fix the wriggling?”
“No, but I filled up the loop. It should be fine unless you sit on any rocks.”
“The tubes bunch up in—” Rainbow cleared her throat. “You know. My crevices and creases?”
Fit took a sharp breath. “Ah.” He said after a few moments.
“Yeah… I wanted to tell you yesterday, but…”
“Right. Uh…” he glanced around. “Let’s… uh… hope it’s not so bad?”
She gave a nervous laugh. “Not unless they move about too much.”
“They shouldn't, unless you pierce the loop again. I’ll fasten them down better in the evening,” the unicorn offered.
“Yeah, let’s just get this done.” The pegasus stepped into the tube-covered suit, and felt a familiar rub of magic running from her neck down. “Hey! There’s a bottom layer now!”
“Sorry!” the unicorn blushed. “Force of habit!”
“Habit after just one time?” she cocked an eyebrow.
“It made… a strong impression?”
Rainbow scoffed and rolled her eyes, then chortled despite herself. “Just zip me up, Tighty.”
He did, and the tightness increased. “Did you size this down again?”
“I think the cloth layer shrunk when you washed it,” Fit replied. “Is it okay?”
Rainbow stood up and moved her hooves, then rolled her wings. “It’s…” she glanced at him, suppressing a smile. “A Tight Fit.” It was his turn to roll his eyes as she laughed. “I think it’s fine. Unless it shrinks more.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t,” Fit replied. “Third layer is a waterproof one…” He pulled out a familiar black, rubbery, pony-shaped suit.
“How many of these do you have?” Rainbow asked, giving him a curious look. “Are you in one of Rarity’s weird clubs?”
He coughed and turned red, which seemed an answer enough. “This one is a size bigger,” he said after clearing his throat. “Let’s hope it's enough.”
It was. So far, it worked, but the layers had the tendency to slide against each other.
“Finally, there’s the armor layer,” the unicorn pulled out the suit-of-many-straps.
Rainbow groaned. “Oh come on, do I have to?”
“Do you want anypony to see you like that?” he took a step back, and looked at her. Then, for some reason, he coughed again.
Rainbow looked down at herself. Funnily enough, the three layers, alongside the tubes’ tendency to slip around and flatten, gave her a bit of a bulk she didn’t really dislike. Other than that, she was as slick as an otter, and as black as Luna’s proverbial pu— She shook her head. “See me? Out here? What pony?”
The unicorn nodded, still staring. “R-right...”
“But it might be better for the weather,” she capitulated. “I think that lay-tex thing cuts really easily.”
“Yeah,” the unicorn replied with a hint of sadness in his voice.
Rainbow smirked, and donned the final layer. He had to help her fasten all the zippers and whatnot, of course, but by the end of it, she felt pretty fine. She jumped up and the zipper jingled. “Now I look like one of the other friends of Rarity,” she chuckled at the memory. “They wear gas masks, though.”
“You have to introduce me to this ‘Rarity’,” Tight Fit noted, tightening some last straps by hoof. And taking his time.
For some reason, Rainbow didn’t dislike that, but she still felt a pang of something in her chest. “Eyes on the prize,” she said, pointing to the horizon. The clouds were gathering.
“Right!” he said, staring forward, right past her rump. His eyes might have waived a bit, and for some reason, Rainbow felt a smirk on her face.
The pegasus did up one last buckle. All of those layers creaked a bit, but seemed to hold right. She didn’t feel warm, or cold. “What’s the trick with the heat?” she asked while she loosened up her muscles before the flight.
“There’s an array of heat-accumulator gems along your sides,” Fit explained. “They’re small beads in those pockets. The peristaltic motion of the tube circulates the cooling liquid, which spreads across those, like blood inside lungs. Anything higher than body temperature gets absorbed, but if the liquid gets colder, the gems warm it back up.”
“Huh, cool,” Rainbow understood some of it, at least. She spread her hind legs and bent forward until her chest touched the ground. It wasn’t a traditional stretch per se, but she liked how it put some crimson in Tight’s pale cheeks.
“Yes... cool...” he muttered, before clearing his throat. “And warm,” he continued in a tone of an academic. “The same reservoir that absorbed that heat in the last few days will make you warm today.”
“Good,” Rainbow nodded and flapped her wings. “Well, time to go.”
“If there’s anything wrong, just set up the flare.” Tight said, his voice serious all of a sudden. “Just... Stay safe out there.”
She nodded. “Don’t worry, dadd—” Luckily, she stopped herself there. “I’ll be careful.” With a crimson face, not glancing back, Rainbow put her goggles on, and took off to race the clouds.
There are times for action, and times for subtlety. Rainbow Dash had rarely considered the latter.
She was in her element now. No more teasing, no more weird feelings – it was just her flying as fast as she could. She would just have to fly to a mountain on the horizon, before some clouds get there.
Easy.
The clouds loomed menacingly, and the horizon neared slowly. Rainbow pushed herself, ignoring the occasional chafing of the suit layers against the base of her wings. The tubes churned like a hungry stomach, and started to warm up despite whatever magic they used.
But she pushed on. Dash wasn’t really good at maths, like Applejack, but she had a lot of practice with estimating the motion of things. As she barrelled across the tundra and stared unblinkingly at the clouds, she’d realized she was not going to make it in time.
So she pushed harder. She gritted her teeth, feeling her body stretch into an arrow that cut through the wind. Her wings and the pegasus magic carried her forward, faster and faster, until she saw a cone of air form against her front hooves.
Every time before, she always saw the cone first. It would only happen after that. But before it did, what would follow would be the feeling of her trying to slowly push a hole through a wall; a force against her hooves that would not yield until she made it yield to her.
But not today. Instead, she saw the top layer of her suit flap around wildly, chafe, and begin to tear. Before she could react – as though there was anything she could even do – the cloth and zippers and laces and whatever else tore in front of her, and peeled off of her like she was a banana.
And banana she was. Sleek and aerodynamic, with rubber skin wet with moisture from sky around her. Somewhere behind her, a unicorn with a stupid name saw a rainbow explode across the sky, and maybe heard a distant boom! as she went supersonic. But that was all behind her – she didn’t hear it, nor did she realize just how fast she was going. For once, the suit actually worked, and then some.
The ground underneath blurred into a gray smear, errant water droplets bombarded her face like needles. As she tore through the mist at the edge of the cloud front, she felt her hooves getting warmer and warmer. The white cone narrowed, and she hid behind it as it started glowing red. The air in front of her turned red, than separated outwards, forming into a scintillating shield of fire around the tip of her front hooves. The thermal accumulators singed her sides – and the mountain grew ahead faster than she’d ever seen anything grow.
She screamed, but the air was torn out of her lungs. Her wings were useless now – she was flying by her magic alone, a crimson streak across the sky; a star falling sideways, right into a mountain. Rainbow desperately pitched up, the blazing plasma searing her stomach, her ears popping, and then, she finally lost all control.
Rainbow was falling through the air.
“Uh,” she grumbled stupidly. “What—”
A set of jagged white teeth loomed in front of her, with clear blue behind it. As she tumbled, the jagged teeth moved up, biting into the blue. Underneath, the white was broken by the gray of stone, flying by so fast she barely realized it was a mountainside at all.
A mountainside?
She tumbled on. Behind her, a distant cloud form was slowly crashing against a mountain side. Above it, the sky was steel, and then once again, blue, until it was bit by the mountain's peaks again.
They were much bigger now.
“Aah!” Rainbow screeched— and then took a hold of herself. She was breathing, flying, and not panicking. That’s how you stayed alive.
The mountainside grew ever closer.
“AAAH!”
Rainbow forced her aching muscles to motion, snapping her front hooves together. Be a spear, she reminded herself of the old lesson from Advanced Flying at Ridiculous Speeds lectures. With every moment, the disorientation passed, and the dread turned into ice.
It was hard to breathe. Little dancing lights zipped across her vision. But more importantly, her wings had precious little air to push against. I'm not gonna make it, she realized, watching the mountain close in fast. She spread her wings wide, and closed her eyes, thinking of her friends.
There was a rush of air, wild motion, then, nothing.
Dash was sitting on a cloud, watching other clouds go by. They were shaped like male genitalia, and gradually turned into them, each with their own flapping wings.
“Pricks don’t fly,” Rainbow said sagely.
“Yes, we do,” the flying penises answered her.
“Where do you fly, pricks?”
“Where do you want us to fly?” they asked in turn.
Rainbow looked at the horizon where all the pricks were flying to. There was a beautiful pink rose opening ahead, warm and moist, rimmed in light blue fur, the color of the summer sky. The genitalia sank into the flower, and as they did, Rainbow felt a corresponding, incessant, ever-present wriggle.
“Not this shit again!” she groaned, and looked down at her crotch.
Rainbow Dash coughed and sat up straight. Snow fell off of her head, and the too-thin air did its best to fill her lungs. She tumbled forward again, planting her face into the snow, pushed herself up, groaned, and coughed again.
“At least the suit is warm,” she wheezed and stumbled. It was, from her sides to the tips of her hooves. Which, she realized as she stared at them, were singed. “Huh.” After a moment, Rainbow blinked to make herself stop staring, and tried to stand up. She managed, in the end, and looked around. “It could use a c-cowl or s-something,” her teeth chattered.
She was standing in the middle of a snow-filled basin. Ahead and below, she saw gray clouds gathering in a valley. To her right, far white fields of the northern ice sheet stretched to the horizon. Behind her, above, loomed a steep cliff side covered in more ice and snow. To her left, below, lay a vast tundra, and at the very edge of it, a forest of evergreens. And somewhere out there, a unicorn was, hopefully packing hastily.
“H-huh,” Rainbow’s teeth chattered again. She took a deep breath.
“S-so,” she recapped. “I m-made it before the clouds, and flew into a mountain.” She sighed, and jumped up and down to warm herself up. She stretched her wings— and winced at a sudden pang of pain.
“Ah, crap.”
She’d been in this boat before. Last time— Rainbow took a deep, hissing breath, trying to stem the panic. That was, what, two years ago? Before Twilight got her wings. Dash was showing off, broke her wing, and learned to love reading.
'Broke her wing' was the part that story that made her blood run cold.
Rainbow shook her head. None of this was helping her now. “Okay, D-dash,” she told herself, shivering now. “T-two options. F-freeze to death, or c-call for help.” She shook her head, but her lip, and groaned.
She patted herself down, and unzipped the top layer of her suit. Cold air rushed in, and she hurriedly pulled out the two gemstones. “M-maybe he won’t p-pick up…” she told herself. “Y-yeah. T-then I can f-freeze ang-gry…”
With shaking hooves, she put the two pieces together, and tossed them onto the ground. They fell into the fluffy snow and disappeared from sight. Other than that, there was nothing.
“F-figures…” Rainbow chuckled, and stood up on shaky hooves. The world swam. She’d lived through enough concussions to know the cause. “Joke’s on you!” she screamed across the tundra below. “I have your stupid prototype!” With that, the pegasus sat down, and coughed. “You prick,” she muttered.
There was a glint of light in front of her. She blinked, but it didn’t go away. In fact, it intensified, until a familiar gem rose from the snow and the light blinded her. A burst of snow hit her face, and Rainbow cackled, falling onto her back.
The sky above was a deep blue. A shape leaned over her, and something tingly pulled her.
“Hey! Help me out here! At least try to crawl!”
“Hey Tighty,” she croaked. “I think I broke something.”
“No, really? Come on! On your hooves!”
She leaned against him.
“T-the suit could use a cowl,” she muttered. Dimly, she saw an A-shaped object in front of them, then fell.
Chapter 4: Camping on a Mountainside
The world came back through a fading curtain of darkness. “H-hey, you. You’re finally awake.” Tight’s voice was close by, accompanied by breath on her shoulder.
“Why is it so dark?” Rainbow croaked hoarsely. As her head cleared – and began to hurt – she heard a distant whistle of wind from somewhere.
His breath was ragged. “‘C-cause we’re in a t-tent,” Tight’s teeth were chattering. “Under a p-pile of… w-whatever I could get my hooves on.” He chuckled and coughed. “M-mostly c-c-c-cutoffs.”
“It’s pretty cozy,” Rainbow noted with surprise. The suit churned, and Tight chuckled again.
“G-good for y-you...”
Rainbow shifted. The cloth above her was heavy and warm. There was a bundle in front of her. She prodded it.
“Ouch,” Tight coughed again. “L-look, I’m f-freezing my flank off here. H-how about you don’t add insult to injury?”
“Freezing?” Rainbow asked again. “But it’s warm.”
“T-the suit’s warm!” he spat angrily, then took a deep breath. “S-sorry. You must have hit your head pretty hard. You were out cold, and everything.” Rainbow nodded, and her head swam a bit.
“I’ve had a few tumbles in my life,” she said.
For some reason, Tight chuckled again. She felt him shaking.
How are you keeping warm? she wanted to ask, but she felt like she knew the answer. He wasn’t.
“S-so,” the unicorn asked, “h-how about a little flying?” His chuckles were getting annoying, mostly because each of them sounded more and more desperate. “Y-you know, glide off of the mountain or s-something. M-maybe fly to s-some hot springs…?”
Rainbow nodded. “Sure, just wait here.”
“Y-yeah… T-take your t-time…”
She wriggled out of the covers and groped for the tent’s entrance. It took her a few moments to find the zipper. She did her best to slide out quickly, hind legs first, and stood up, squinting. Her goggles were long gone, and the immediate surroundings were awash with cold, piercing snow, seemingly flying sideways.
The tent was sitting half-collapsed and at an angle. A couple bundles were laying half-buried in snow around it. One of them, she noted, was sliced in half, with cans of mushroom stew strewn about.
She stretched her wings, gingerly. There was some pain, but surprisingly not that much. A bit of swelling, but she could move everything. The pegasus let out a relieved sigh. Not broken, she thought. Sprained, maybe. She really could glide down the mountain. Once the weather clears, that is.
Rainbow remembered that cloud front and imagined it washing up the mountain. How long will the storm last? A day? Two?
How long would the unicorn last?
She shook her head, and crawled back inside. “We’re getting snowed in,” she reported as her mind went back to Survival in All-Too-Probable Scenarios lessons. “We should make an igloo or something, maybe? Get a fire going.”
No response.
“Tight?”
“Hum?” Coughing. “S-sorry. M-must have d-dozed off.”
Shit.
“I f-feel pretty warm now, though,” he reported. "Could you help me get these off?"
Fuck!
“Right!” Rainbow tried to make her shaking voice sound resolute. “Tight! Tight Fit!”
“P-present…” he muttered.
Rainbow crawled under the blankets and grabbed him by the haunches. “Stay with me, buddy.” She shook him.
“Yeah. What’s up?”
“The suit’s making me warm, right?”
“Yeah.”
“How can it make you warm?”
“I dunno, take it off and give it to me?” he chuckled again. “Sounds like a great idea to me. Especially the part where you take it off.”
She rolled her eyes. “You said there was some kind of magic gobbledygook that held the warmth or something?”
There was a pause. “Heat accumulator,” the unicorn’s indignant voice was clearer with each word. “Judging by the streak you made across the skies, it’ll probably be pleasantly warm for a week.”
“Will it work if it’s not connected to the suit?”
“Work?” He scoffed. “It accumulates and radiates heat. You could make it into powder and snort it and it’d still ‘work’. It’s just enchanted rock.”
“Mineral,” she corrected him absently. “Okay. Help me get this thing off.” He muttered something stupid, but Rainbow was already looking for the zipper on the top layer, then unpeeled herself down to her midsection. “Can you reach the accu– acc– the rocks?”
“M-minerals,” he corrected her. She felt his hooves reach around her barrel. They slid under the top layer of the suit and groped around.
Rainbow gasped. “H-higher, you dumbass…” she breathed.
“S-sorry.” Another one of those chuckles. “Hey, at least I’m not freezing to death without touching your flank.”
“You’re not freezing to death!” Rainbow snapped back. “Mind on the job! Can you pry the stupid thing off or something?”
“It’s sewn into the fabric,” Tight Fit huffed. “It’s like… a bag of beads. The capillaries go through around it and transport the heat…” his voice trailed off. “But hey, your sides are nice and warm, I guess.”
Rainbow cursed and thought. “Hold on.” She scrambled for the exit again. The unicorn said something, but she wasn’t keen on listening. She sprung out of the tent, and looked at her sides, and patted herself down. There was hardness there, for sure, but to get to it, she’d have to…
“Ah crap,” she realized, and thought. As she did, her eyes fell onto the eviscerated bag of cans. “The cans!” she gasped, and dug into the remains. The side pocket was still intact, and the utensils inside were still there. Along with that ugly pink knife.
“Okay, I can cut this off,” Rainbow told herself, fishing the serrated knife out. Yeah, and cut yourself into pieces, a voice in her head said. She inspected her sides as best as she could. The tubes entered a large pocket which held the firmness – the beads, no doubt. She nodded, and started breathing deeply. How long can you last? the same voice asked.
“I just need like, ten seconds, or something.”
The last bits of haze lifted from her mind as adrenaline started coursing through her veins.
“Now or never,” she stated, and tore the top, rubbery layer of the suit off. It flapped in the wind as she tossed it aside, and grabbed the second zipper. Before she could hesitate, her hoof already tore it open. Icy wind hit the bottom layer, but she was already stripping the suit off.
With shaky hooves, Rainbow pierced the cloth and sawed with desperate vigor, all the way around the pocket at the side of the suit. “D-don’t cut the s-seams,” she kept telling herself. The pipes cut surprisingly easily, spilling warm liquid all over her shaking hooves. Thankfully, she still had that last lay-text layer on.
Rainbow cursed, and continued cutting, ripped, and tore, until it was done. But when she tried to cut the other pocket off, she realized she couldn’t feel the tips of her hooves. She cursed again, and grabbed the heating pocket in her teeth, the cut-up suit in her hooves, and dove into the tent.
Luckily, she didn’t cut it up with the knife. Little miracles.
“H-hey,” Tight welcomed her. “H-how’s the weather?”
“K-kinda chilly,” she replied. “Y-you might wanna w-wear a h-hat.” She pushed the warm pocket against his chest. “H-hold onto this for me, will you?”
He didn’t say anything, but clutched the bag of warm beads desperately. Rainbow held onto the remnant of the suit until her hooves stopped being so numb. Then, with slow, measured strokes, she cut the warm patch off.
“I should have done this here in the first place,” she realized, and shrugged. “I’ll remember it next time I’m trapped on a mountain in a blizzard, trying to cut pockets of heated beads out of a prototype environment suit.”
The unicorn muttered something, and shifted as he clutched the warm bag of beads.
Finally, Rainbow was done. She tossed the cut-up suit to the corner of the collapsed tent, and slipped under the improvised covers. Her teeth chattered as she pressed against the warm bundle in front of her.
“H-hey, you,” Tight’s voice was clearer now. “Did you come to share the warmth?”
It was Rainbow’s turn to chuckle. “M-maybe? How much do ya got?”
“P-plenty, thanks to you,” the unicorn replied. “So w-what’s the plan?”
“We’ll wait until the storm passes,” Rainbow dug deeper under the covers, “and I’ll glide down the mountain. There’s enough snow to make water to drink, and I’m sure you can do something with your magic once your horn is not an icicle.”
“Sounds like a good plan,” Tight nodded. “How does the storm look?”
Rainbow thought, and sighed. “Not good. We could be here for a while.” She took a breath. “Why’s the thermal thing so cold?”
“It’s set to only go up to body temperature,” he explained apologetically. “It wouldn’t be much of a chiller otherwise.”
“Well, it’s too cold,” Rainbow complained. “I’ll freeze my ass off like this. Can’t you fix it? You enchanted it, didn't you?”
“Yeah, I did,” Fit huffed. “But I can't even feel my horn. Could you... I dunno, fix, like, one of those rainbow-pillars in Las Pegasus? Without using hooves?”
“...probably?”
“Ugh!”
Rainbow closed her eyes. “It’s gonna get cold,” she summarized. Another memory of Survival in All-Too-Probable Scenarios crawled into her mind, almost mockingly. She blushed and took a sharp breath.
“I... might have an idea how to stay warm...”
Chapter 5: They Screw in This One
“So,” Rainbow Dash started, “I had this subject in school, about survival.” Tight Fit waited. “And I think we should… uh… share body heat.”
“Alright.”
“Just ‘alright’?!” she bristled and scoffed. “Isn’t this weird to you or something?”
“Look, Dashie,” the unicorn muttered, “we’re dying of hypothermia, I think you’re pretty hot, so as far as I can tell, it’s win-win.”
Rainbow took a deep breath, thought of chiding him, and groaned instead. “Come here,” she muttered. “Just don’t make it weird.”
He shifted towards her, and planted one of the heated bags underneath them. She felt his hooves move around her, and hold her closer. “Excuse me…” a mutter in her ear that made her hair stand up for some stupid reason. She felt her legs get pushed apart by one of his, and the other wrap over that, until their lower appendages turned into a veritable twist roll. Meanwhile, his upper hoof held her close, chest to chest, while the other one supported under her neck. “Is this okay?”
“Mhm,” she mumbled into his chest. She felt his heart beating against her forehead. She returned his embrace, reaching her hoof over him and holding him tight. She tried to push her other underneath them, but he was just a touch too heavy.
“We might even get out of this alive,” he muttered.
“Maybe…” Rainbow replied. She still didn’t know what to do with her other hoof. She let it fall between the bodies and nudged something. He froze and she pulled back. “Sorry,” she muttered. “Was that your leg?”
“Uh—”
Rainbow realized, and took a sharp breath. There was something in the lectures about activities that made your heart race, she was pretty sure.
“Uh… You’re still…” the unicorn muttered.
“Y-yeah…?”
“Y-you know. Touching… uh…” his voice trailed off. He didn’t move away.
“Maybe?” She moved her hoof a bit, and smirked when he took a sharp breath. “Is that a problem?”
“Is this… is this in the survival manual?”
“Does it have to be?”
“...no?”
She moved her hoof again, and felt him tighten under her touch. She chuckled.
“Look, it’s mostly a panic reaction,” he assured her, his voice skipping.
“Mostly?”
He groaned, partly because she moved her hoof again. She quite liked the rings, ridges, and veins. And just feeling that pulsating thing grow under her touch, press against her… She shifted, and pushed it between their bodies. The unicorn sighed in relief, until she pressed her midsection against it, eliciting a gasp.
“Come on,” she whispered in his ear. “Don’t tell me this is just your body talking.”
“It is,” he stated firmly. “Me being turned on by you is a biological reaction. I mean, I do only barely know you, but—”
Rainbow's lips met his, and for a few seconds, she was trapped in a perfect moment. Under a blanket fort, with a throbbing dick pressing against her, a tongue exploring an eager mouth. When they parted, she sighed, and muttered: “Good enough for me.” Before he could say anything, she reached down again, and shifted her legs a bit. “Hmm…” Her wandering hoof slid across his side, his pelvis, between his legs—
Something grabbed her hoof. “H-hold on,” his hot breath caressed her ear. “This isn’t fair…”
“All’s fair in love and war,” she quoted.
“Oh yeah?” he asked, and suddenly, there was a pressure against her nethers. Rainbow gasped and bit her lip, and bucked towards his thigh. She felt herself slip unusually, and just a distant hint of the hardness she really wanted between her legs reached her. She groaned with disappointment.
“You left the suit on,” he realized. The pressure increased, and slid again.
She moaned.
“Fun…” he chuckled.
“Y-yeah?” she pressed against him, hard. She felt his member between their stomachs, and moved her hips side to side, grinding down. “How much fun is this? ”
“A lot…” his voice rasped, and he moved against her again. She felt his hoof glide across her side, distant and desperate, and stop at her rear. He tried to grasp, but the material slipped from under his hoof.
Rainbow chuckled. “Better luck next time,” she moved forward, and nibbled his ear. “Gotta try a bit…” her breath was warm in his ear, “...harder…”
She could feel the heartbeats in his shaft, and herself grin ear to ear. A moment later, a pair of hooves grabbed her ass, and pulled her towards him. She moaned as he groped her cheeks, digging in furiously as she slid from underneath him. She wrapped her leg around him, and helped him, dragging ragged breaths out of him to match her own.
There was only so much she could take. She grabbed him, and kissed him again, deeply, shifting over him. He gasped and fell onto his back as she straddled him, sliding up to his chest. As her rump passed his tip, she slowed down, almost losing herself with each ring and bump.
“That stupid wriggle,” she gasped, “of the suit, yesterday…”
She stopped, moving down across him stroking him, arcing forward to reach his mouth for another passionate kiss.
“I thought that’d make me go crazy…”
“Y-yeah–” he reached her, and caressed her, from her hips to the base of her wings. “I’ve had trouble with it, too,” he admitted.
She laughed, and then groaned as he pressed his hooves against her tired, strained muscles. Rainbow stretched back, and he lifted himself up to meet her, peppering her covered chest with his mouth, moving his way up to her neck. She propped herself up as he did, and moaned: “Those tubes just find their way to all the right places…” she teased him.
He chortled and she felt his tongue on her neck. “Yeah… And you don’t even have a dick. They just love to tangle around that.”
The realization hit her, and she slapped his chest playfully. “Did you do that on purpose?!”
Fit gave another peck to her neck, and muttered: “Maybe? I wasn’t really in a hurry to fix that feature, anyway.”
“Of course,” she gasped as she felt his teeth grab the zipper. “You should be ashamed of yourself, you know?”
“Ah’m noth…” he muttered as he leaned forward, opening the suit, sliding the zipper across her neck, her chest, her stomach. She leaned back to help him unzip her. By the time he reached her nethers, she was lying on her back, hoping he’d never stop. Instead, he spat out the zipper, and she felt his tongue caressing the freshly-revealed fur.
Rainbow propped herself up as he traced his way back to her neck, and tried to untangle herself from the suit. By the time his tongue made it to her collar bone, she managed to free her front hooves. Without a word, he grabbed her around the waist, and she felt herself spin onto her back. She wiggled, freeing her wings and spreading them, as he grasped the suit, and peeled it off of her.
His hooves shook in desperate lust, but somehow, he still managed to burrow his face deep into her barrel, suckling and licking and rubbing and all the other things that made the pegasus breathless. Finally, those same groping hooves grasped the rolled-down suit, and pulled up, along with her rear. She let herself be lifted, and felt the rubbery material peel off of her.
For a moment, Rainbow felt like a present being unwrapped.
Then, with a final wet snap, the suit was off. And with her hind legs up in the air, Tight Fit decided not to lose the opportunity.
Rainbow’s marehood, now exposed to the cold air of the tent, suddenly felt a gust of warmth. She gasped and looked, but his head was a blur, diving between her legs.
His tongue dove between her folds, and she gasped, grasping his hair instinctively. Those days of teasing, wriggling tubing, of the suit rubbing in all the right places, of the nights spent desperately wishing she could relieve herself… It all poured out of her in a guttural, desperate moan as she grabbed his horn and ground his face into her nethers. But the unicorn accepted the challenge – he plunged into her like a pony who finally found a pond of water in the desert; lapping, licking, suckling, and prodding until she wriggled underneath him, calling out whatever the pleasure put onto her tongue.
Finally, she could let it all go, giving into her lust as the unicorn's hooves joined his tongue. He hunted down every itch she had accumulated, until the frustration was torn into tiny shreds of fire that filled her entire body, from her lap to the tips of her hooves, pouring into her head and bursting into fireworks.
She was flying again, faster than her wings could ever carry her. The pleasure pulled her at the speed of light, carrying her in its warm embrace, until even it grew tired, and slowly spread out into a vast, warm ocean.
Rainbow bobbed in its ever-fading waves, hearing herself pant until she found herself on the ground again. She sighed, her thighs wrapped around the head of a unicorn she hadn't known a week ago. A muffled mumble escaped him, and she let go. Tight Fit sat up, and gasped for air. In the dimmed tent, she could see almost nothing but his silhouette. A hoof came up to his lips and she heard a deep intake of breath. Then he turned, and those burning eyes pierced her, overflowing with desire. She froze as that gaze tore right through her.
Her heart was racing and her breath was held, as he leapt onto her.
Dash felt his tip prod against her and guided it into position. He drove forward, impaling her, and she bucked against him. He retracted, and she whined, grabbing him with her hind legs, pulling herself onto him, himself into her, deeper. Again and again, inch by inch, until they lay there, stomach to stomach, breathing heavily.
“You’re pretty good,” she managed.
“Pretty… good…” he gasped, pulling out of her part way, and then slamming forward again.
Rainbow gasped in turn, and locked her legs around him. He pulled back again, then slammed into her, driving the breath out of her. She wanted to mock him a bit more, to make him show her, like how she usually riled her partners up. But for some reason, she found herself grabbing onto him and moaning instead as he split her in twine.
For some time, Rainbow Dash was simply getting smashed against whatever was underneath her, and loving every second of it. The wiry stallion proved surprisingly strong. Some of that leanness, she realized, was muscle, after all, grabbing her and holding her tight to him, letting her do nothing but moan and buck against his steady, relentless rhythm.
Eventually, getting tossed around and fucked into the ground got a bit old, and Rainbow laughed playfully. She grabbed onto Tight Fit’s haunches with her front hooves, before grabbing his pelvis tight with her hind legs, breaking his momentum. He grunted lustfully, and she giggled.
“My turn.”
She let go of his haunches, and pushed gently against his soaked chest. He fell onto his back and she swung up like how AJ showed it to her that one time. She didn’t give him a second – she just bucked down until she felt him fill her completely once more.
“Mh–hu–uuuh…” Rainbow closed her eyes, and ground her hips around, feeling him out. The thick, solid mass pulsated inside of her as she slowly gyrated her pelvis. Then, as he opened his mouth, she put her hoof over it, and lifted herself off of him a bit.
“Sssh…” she said, and slammed down again.
His eyes widened, and she chortled. “You like that, loverboy?”
With her hoof planted over his lips, the question was mostly academic. She lifted herself up again, and fell down onto him, then again, for the third time, stopping, and grinding against him again.
His gaze pierced her, filled with fire of desire. She fixed him with her own stare, and his hooves froze before they could ever touch her. Instead, as she impaled herself again, they hovered there, shaking. A groan escaped her as she repeated the motion. Finally, her stare could not stop him. He wrapped his hooves around her waist, groping hungrily, squeezing her rump. She moaned sensually, and he help her lift again, and fall again. His own pelvis moved up and down, meeting her part way, until she felt his family jewels slap against her bared flesh.
She wanted to taste him, she realized. Maybe some other time, though. Instead, she rode him; slapping rhythmically onto him, letting him fill all of her nooks and crannies, slowly increasing in pace until she couldn’t take it any more, and until he no longer could.
He sat up, and grabbed her hips. The eyes said it all, and what they didn’t say, the hooves did, forcing her down further, and himself deeper, deeper than she felt him before. She gasped as his dick drove air out of her, but he was still going; she was a ragdoll skewered by him, gushing, their heat filling the tent and their wetness mixing with each slap slap slap! of their unabashed fucking.
As she slammed against him, was stretched by him, she grasped at his body as he grasped her, fondled her, pulled her closer, until Rainbow climaxed again. She felt herself squeeze him like a vice, and heard him gasp. To her immense pleasure, he went on, groaning, his hips moving like a piston. She filled with a tingling fire again as they tumbled across the tent in a desperate dance of desire until Tight Fit let out a final grunt and hilted as deeply as he could.
Rainbow felt his hot seed pour inside her, and slammed against it for one last time. She clung onto him as he filled her, and her every heartbeat wrung him dry. After what felt like a millennium, Rainbow let out a satisfied breath, and collapsed onto her lover.
They lay there, in the midst of a storm, wrapped in cutoffs, simply breathing deeply. Rainbow listened to Tight’s heart as it matched hers, and slowed down. The exhaustion of the last few days slowly came washing in like the tide, clouding her mind, and overtaking her. In his grasp, with him still inside her, she felt herself drift off into sleep.
There were no more dicks in her dreams. Rainbow was swimming in a warm sea, pushing rubbery balloons out of her way. But there was no real hurry. She shifted, and a warm current of air heated her chilly back. A pair of soft tubes twisted around her, and she woke for a moment.
She felt his reassuring breath on her neck, and grabbed his hooves, pulling herself closer into his embrace, then fell back to sleep again.
Silence woke her. Rainbow’s companion shifted in his sleep as she slipped out of his embrace. After a moment, she stretched, shifted, and winced at her aching muscles. Finally, the pegasus sat up, and took a deep breath.
A moment later, Rainbow Dash realized she was not just happy not to be dead, frozen at some mountainside. She was happy, with the whole mountain scenario being barely a blip on her radar. She sighed contently, and savored that feeling. After some time, she moved again, opening the tent.
Snow had built up around the entrance, but most of it formed a dune underneath the tent's opposite wall. Rainbow stepped out, stretched, and took in the rarefied mountain air, turning back to the entrance.
To her right, the pristine northern ice shield glittered in the sunlight. Above, the mountain pointed to the heavens, urging her to take flight. Before her, the snowed-in valley stretched, cloudless and peaceful. And to her left, the tundra stretched on, as gray as ever. Rainbow almost didn’t want to go, until she realized she was trapped on the top of the mountain, running out of supplies, et cetera et cetera.
She laughed then, carelessly, and flapped her wings. They still ached, but not enough for her to care. Most of her body ached, after all; in all kinds of pleasant ways.
A curious, sleepy head poked out of the tent. “What’s up?” Tight Fit asked.
In lieu of an answer, RD laughed again, and landed. “Wanna get down from the mountain?”
The unicorn looked left and right, frowned, and replied slowly: “Maybe…?”
She laughed again, shook her head, and grabbed the twin pendants. “Pack up, loverboy,” she said. ”We’ve got to get back to Canterlot.” Something in his face gave her a pause; she pouted, tapping her hoof on her chin, and continued: “But you know, with how tired I am, maybe we should take it easy…” she shot him a mischievous glance. “It might take us a week to get back. Or more.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “I don’t think I have enough bits for that.”
She shrugged. “I guess you’ll have to pay me in some other way.”
With that, Rainbow dashed off, and slowly glided down the mountain, humming to herself.
They eventually got to Canterlot, and had that promised lunch. Tight’s prototype had been reduced to a bag of twitching tubes and some mildly warm gems. But as luck would have it, the two bumped into Rarity. She was very interested in his application of lay-tex, the wriggling tubes, his novel heat accumulator techniques, and once Rainbow had a few hushed words with her, she was interested in way, way more.
Dash left for her house with a few coins from her summer job, and memories that would warm her for many lonely evenings.
Author's Note
Thank you for reading!
This story was written for the 2024 Summer Sin Celebration . This is the prompt I got:
A female wears multiple layers of skintight jumpsuits (a jumpsuit is a skintight, one-piece suit that also covers all appendages).
Bonus points if it's: non-consensual, itchy, uncomfortable, constricting, claustrophobic, suffocating, chafing, binding, smothering, cramping, stifling, impeding, tight-fitting, flexible, unyielding, pressure-inducing, unbearable, pinching, irritating, hampering, squeezing, straining, compressing. hindering, encumbering, gripping, unrelenting, form-fitting...
I don't care about the characters or the settings. As long as the story involves a female wearing multiple layers of skintight jumpsuits, I don't care what it is. If the author's creative juices run dry, the bonus points words I provided should offer some inspiration.
And that, was how I chose to interpret it.
