First Meeting
Eggheads Anonymous
by Cynical
It was night time in Ponyville and the town was quiet, not a disturbance anywhere. Bar, that is, from the library where a light could be seen through the curtains. Past the curtains, the library was set up with a few cushions laid in a circle and all other furniture moved to the side. Two of the seats were occupied while the rest remained empty.
One of the occupants stood up after a while, “My name is Rainbow Dash… and I'm an egghead." she announced, her voice dropping off as she finished her statement. After speaking her part, she sat down and held her head in her hooves for a moment, almost not noticing the other voice in the room that followed her example.
"My name is Twilight Sparkle, and I am an egghead."
The lavender unicorn looked pleased with herself for a moment as she made her announcement before sitting back down gladly. She caught Rainbow's eye for a moment, and offered her a wide smile, trying to encourage the troubled pegasus to talk a bit more on her problem. However, Twilight wasn't an obtuse pony… well ok, not THAT obtuse… look, she knew when one of her friends was having trouble admitting to something.
"Would you like to elaborate on that Rainbow?"
Rainbow looked up at the sound of her name, nodded, and got to her hooves but did not speak as she realised she'd understood what Twilight had said. She heard no encouragement from Twilight this time; this was something that she had to face on her own four hooves. Twilight wouldn't always be there to support her… ways, and she needed this moment of independence to prove to herself that she was still Rainbow Dash, coolest pony in Equestria.
'I am Rainbow Prism Dash, coolest pony in Equestria'
'I am Rainbow Dash, the only pony to perform a Sonic Rainboom'
'I am Rainbow. A pony who can't admit she has a problem.'
Thinking about this certainly wasn't helping her. It only made her pride hurt more, and Rainbow Dash was nothing without her pride. But then, maybe she wasn't Rainbow Dash, she didn't deserve to wear the name of the pony who'd saved three Wonderbolts and a friend at once, she wasn't fit to bear the title 'Best Young Flier', and she certainly wasn't worthy of Rainbow Dash's friends. They were all amazing ponies. Rarity, always willing to hold out a helping hoof to her friends. Pinkie Pie, always putting other ponies’ happiness above her own. Applejack, the dependable rock and Fluttershy, who'd had her back more times than she'd dare to remember.
None of them would understand though. They'd just laugh at her, call her slow, call her an egghead. Maybe even call her uncool.
No. The stakes were just too high.
That's why she'd turned to a pony who'd probably committed social suicide the day she was born, who'd probably never heard of a party before she met Pinkie Pie and who'd instigated this whole damn mess. Wait… instigated? This was worse than she thought.
Still, the room remained silent.
‘Twilight would understand, she does understand. She's doing this to help me for crying out loud. How could she refuse a friend in need, she's one of the most understanding ponies I know. Forget what I said about her before, she's been kind and understanding to all of us, myself included, a fair few times already. She's the pony who everyone looks to when it all goes bad, and hey, she's practically the… the… the Me of Magic.’
No, that would mean that Twilight couldn't admit she had problems, that she hid her problems from other ponies, and snuck around whenever she facilitated them… this is going wrong again.
‘Maybe that's why I asked her for help too? She's been in my position before; she knows what it's like.’
No, don't be stupid Rainbow, how could her problems even remotely compare to your own. It's not like she has to keep up an image of power all the time. She doesn't get judged every second that she's on public view.
Rainbow's head drooped again.
Even her conscience couldn't think of a reason why she wasn't talking to the only other pony who would understand. It was simple, all she needed to do was open her mouth and start talking to Twilight. Her friend. The only other pony who knew what it was like to live in the spotlight, both onstage and off it.
Knowing that it would only end in disaster, Rainbow started to speak again.
"I… I have a problem."
A pause. Rainbow took a deep breath before continuing.
"I - I can't stop reading. I've had to hide this from everypony."
Another pause, another deep breath.
"I've had to sneak around behind their backs, keep this secret from them. They'd never understand it. They'd just call me… They'd call me… uncool…"
Dashs’ voice had almost faded into nothingness there, but Twilight still heard her. Dash had shared her darkest secret with her, and she'd do all that she could to make Dash accept this. She knew that happiness was a long shot, but acceptance was the start to this. Right?
Twilight nodded to Rainbow to show that she'd understood everything Rainbow had told her, and Rainbow herself took it as a sign of acceptance, that she was not going to be judged here. Even if she knew Twilight would never do such a cruel thing to one of her friends, it still helped to have that extra confirmation to know that her friend supported her in this.
Now it was Twilights turn to speak, except that her plan for speaking about reading was completely blown out of the water when Twilight realised that Dash needed someone who knew what she was going through rather than a pony who didn't see it as a problem and lived with it.
This left her in a tricky position.
Twilight didn't have a plan.
She hadn't compiled three separate projects about ponies feelings, cross-referenced them into a single document and analysed them so that they would become worthy of the next Canterlot Sciences Fair in a few weeks. But to do that, she'd have to create a checklist to list all the things she'd need to make this document a reality. But before that, she'd have to make a checklist on gathering the materials needed to make a checklist, and before Before that, she'd have to make a checklist telling her to make a checklist for gathering all the materials she'd need to make a checklist for making this project.
Twilight sighed in annoyance, which wasn't missed by Rainbow Dash as she wondered what could cause Twilight to freeze on the spot and simply sigh. Probably overthinking things again, that was Twilight.
"I over… I over- over organise everything."
Rainbow could hear a slight undertone of dejection in her friends’ voice. But she didn't speak; she would repay the favour, let Twilight work out why she had a problem on her own. Let her figure out what she had a problem with, and how to overcome it. Then she'd help. Or at least try to in any case.
"I - I just can't help myself. Organisation is the key to everything. Its law and order, without it there'd be chaos."
Twilight paused for a second, it was hard for her to rationalise why this was a problem, but she'd try.
"Without it, I'd be on my own…"
Rainbow looked up.
"I'd be stuck thinking on my feet, having to analyse everything… I - I wouldn't be able to stand it."
This was certainly a different side to Twilight than she usually showed ponies.
"And- And then I'd go and screw it up by not preparing for the bi-weekly friendship meeting we have, and - And ruin our friendships, then I'd be kicked out of Equestria by Princess Celestia for ruining our friendships and-"
At this Twilight set her almost manic gaze on Rainbow, and cried out
"How do you do it? How do you go around and make plans on the spot? It's just so counter-productive!"
Twilight continued to look at her friend with desperation in her eyes, but Rainbow had no idea how to help with that, hell, she'd not even know that Twilight had this problem. She always looked like she was on top of her game and wasn't scared of anything.
Was this all just, just a mask?
'Like yourself Dash?'
Rainbow shuddered slightly as her conscience brought up some less than pleasant memories.
'Always hiding away your true feelings, always afraid to show a part of your true self in public, never allowed to indulge in what you want to because the result would be unthinkable.'
It took Rainbow looking at Twilight's stunned expression to realise that she'd actually spoken out loud. She was about to cover herself when Twilight simply nodded and the words died in her throat. Twilight probably had her own experiences with losing the mask as her face was marred with an agonised expression for a few seconds before she caught herself.
"Because the result would be unthinkable." Rainbow thought she heard Twilight mutter to herself before she slumped back on her own chair, her eyes clearly troubled.
The silence lengthened for a while until Rainbow decided that she was ready to speak again. She got to her hooves and her damn memory caught up with her again, this talk taking more of an effect on her than she'd like to admit to anypony, even Twilight.
Flight camp, all those years ago. After the rainboom. She'd been popular for the whole of a week before it all went wrong. She'd been cool, happy, accepted for a short amount of time. Before she went and screwed it up by doing what she did.
"It's like my flying." She started.
"A potion and a poison, the upside of being known for your actions. Being famous and viewed by everypony as the best there is."
A bitter laugh. Black humour was all she found in her memoirs now, no more nostalgia.
"Except for when you slip up and it all comes crashing down. What is it you said before Twi? The higher you fly, the further you fall."
She paused a moment, then launched into her story.
"It was after I'd got my cutie mark, the sonic rainboom was all that was talked about for a week. I was famous, the only filly that my classmates knew who could perform such a feat. It might not have been true fame, but it was a start nonetheless."
Without realising it, Rainbow's mouth had twitched into a half-hearted smile as she remembered the best week of her life before Ponyville and her friends.
"I was the great Rainbow Dash… except I wasn't."
Her smile faded, the good times already forgotten as the bad swarmed around her head.
"I was never really me; I was always the Great Rainbow Dash, never Rainbow Dash. It was all a mask of being the best there is. Until I took off the mask and it all went wrong…"
She would not cry, she would not cry, she would not cry. It didn't matter whether Twilight would judge her about this or not, it was about personal pride. Rainbow Dash did not cry.
"I let them see the real Rainbow Dash, not the… the persona that I'd been wearing for the whole of the last week. That didn't go down well."
Rainbow Dash did not cry.
"They shunned me; it was like I was a stranger to them."
Rainbow Dash would not cry.
"I was cast out; the ponies that I called my friends turned their backs on me. Left me to drown again."
Rainbow Dash let a single tear make its treacherous way across her face.
"I left flight school a week later, Cloudsdale a month after that. Came to Ponyville and started building up a mask again. I- I didn't remove this one though."
Another tear joined the collection that was now gathering at Rainbow's hooves. She no longer cared. Sometimes it was nice to remove the mask, and for Rainbow, this time had coming for a few years now. She decided to leave it at that. She didn't think she could bear the memories of that last month. She sat back down on the cushion, granting herself some small solace in that she'd said her part and it was now out in the open. She could only hope that Twilight's memories weren't giving her as bad a time as they were her.
A glance across blew that theory out of the water straight away though. Twilight's face was completely straight. And not the straight passive face that Rainbow knew.
Twilight didn't bother getting up. When she started speaking, it was in a strangely detached tone, as if she didn't really care about what she was saying.
"Being the student of Princess Celestia. I bet I've always made it sound like a home away from home, a paradise?"
Twilight didn't bother to try and hide the bitter laughter that forced its way up her throat. Even to her own ears it sounded harsh and unforgiving.
"Look where it got me in the end. As a socially incompetent loner who only made friends when her Princess commanded it. I don't think she ever figured out why I was so unwilling to make friends."
At this, Twilight smiled sadly at something Rainbow could only guess at, it was so at odds with her dispassionate tone.
"A potion versus a poison you said? I thought of it as a noose versus a firing line. Each has their own benefits, but both would do the same job. On one hoof, I was the student of the Princess, and I needed to study, leaving very little of my time available for making friends. The other hoof? Even when I found time to go and meet new ponies, sometimes at the Princesses own request, I always had to be 'Twilight Sparkle, student of Princess Celestia Controller of the Sun and the Moon' rather than 'Twilight Sparkle, young filly who was way out of her league when it came to politics.'"
"Something I found out quite early on as a student, wherever I go, I represent Princess Celestia, which makes social interaction awkward in any case, ponies could never truly relax themselves around me, lest they bring my displeasure and therefore Celestia's down upon their heads. I always had to remain aloof, keep an air of importance around me, and act like I was representing Her Royal Highness Princess Celestia."
A strange bitterness entered her tone when she finished. She noticed it, but didn't act upon it, there was no point backing down now, she was already showing Rainbow the tip of the iceberg here, all that was left was for her to take the plunge and demonstrate just how far the iceberg had sunk.
"By that same hoof, I could never show any weakness, never show just how far out of my depth I was, lest it reflected badly on Her Royal Highness. I was just a filly, and there were those who were sceptical that I had ever lost control and gone into magical overdrive. I was never allowed to show weakness, I would prove them all wrong, that I would be the greatest student ever. And look how that plan turned out."
Her voice cracked slightly, Rainbow was starting to wonder how much Twilight kept underneath her own mask, and she was worried what she'd find under there. If Twilight had no option to start anew elsewhere, having to endure keeping a mask up in front of all those Canterlot ponies all the time. Then again, she would have at least had Celestia who Twilight would have trusted enough to remove her mask to.
"Their taunts and teasing led me to believe them, that ordinary Twilight Sparkle wasn't fit to be the student of a Goddess. So I decided that I should only show her Twilight Sparkle, student of Princess Celestia Controller of the Sun and Moon. I decided that I needed to prove myself to her constantly so that she wouldn't reconsider her mentorship of me and send me back from whence I came, or even to the wasteland. That's why I made checklists, so that I knew what was going to happen, what I was going to do, and how I would prove myself to the Princess. Without checklists, there would be chaos, there would be no plan. No way for me to prove to the Princess that I was always in control and worthy of her time."
"I locked myself away, confident that if I studied enough, I would prove them all wrong and become as knowledgeable as the Princess herself. Look where that got me. I even wore the mask when I was alone. I - I didn't… I don't think that I would be able to handle the repressed emotions, my magical control as it stands is already unstable."
Rainbow waited for Twilight to continue, but it seemed that Twilight had said her two cents and probably wouldn't be speaking again anytime soon. She wasn't sure that she wanted Twilight to continue for that matter, it sounded like Twilight hadn't even tried talking about it to anyone, like this was the first time that Twilight had ever exposed her emotions to anypony.
Rainbow thought back over the conversation, realising just how true her sentiment was. Twilight had exposed herself to Rainbow Dash, sure, it might have been in order to make Rainbow feel better about herself, but it seemed to be making her feel worse about Twilight for forcing her to go through with exposing her feelings and what she'd had to go through as a filly. Considering what Twilight had shared and what she'd had to endure, it made Rainbow realise just how much her friend had hidden from her over the time they'd been together.
All the same, she was emotionally exhausted, and couldn't deal with exposing any more of her feelings to anypony for tonight. Sure, tonight had helped amazingly, but there was only so much that Rainbow could talk about at once. Even after all she'd shared with Twilight, and the numerous uncool things that she'd done over the night, she still held onto what remained of her pride, and wouldn't let it be tarnished any more than it had.
Admittedly, there was a sour taste in her mouth from letting Twilight go through her own memories, reopening some scars that sounded pretty nasty, then just leaving her to recover on her own. In her defence, Rainbow wasn't a pony who went for all of that mushy, touchy-feely stuff that Twilight needed at the moment. Better to let her deal with this in her own time. If she wants to continue, then that's her own lookout. She looked up as she saw the purple unicorn raise her head to Rainbow, tear tracks plainly visible from where Rainbow was sitting. But she looked happy, well... happier.
"So, same time next week Rainbow?"
She wouldn't let her pride be tarnished any more.
At least not tonight.