Unsure

Unsure

Chapter Six - Deadline Looms...

Twilight blinked several times as the light of dawn broke through her window and shone upon her. She yawned tiredly and rolled out of bed, rubbing her eyes clear of that stuff that always showed up every time she woke up in the morning. She silently cursed it for being such a nuisance and went on with her life.

She walked groggily up to Spike's bed and lightly kicked it, attempting to pull him from his slumber. As expected, this impact brought no response from the snoozing dragon. She sighed and shook her head and shuffled over to her dresser and looked at herself in the small, round mirror. Her mane was a mess and she had dark shadows under her eyes.

She magicked her hairbrush over and began her attempt to control the unruly mass of hair attached to her head. After several minutes of mindless brushing she checked again. It looked better, but not as good as usual. She sighed and continued brushing. When she finally decided that her hair looked decent enough, she checked herself out again.

"Hmm...," she muttered, squinting her eyes to look at her reflection. "I guess I look fine. Not like I have to do anything big or important today, right? Library's closed and everything."

"Morning, Twilight!" a familiarly tired voice called out from behind her. "What'cha up to?"

Twilight turned and smiled at her small draconic friend. "Morning, Spike. Just getting ready for today."

"You mean your little 'date' thingy with Fluttershy?" Spike asked.

He could have sworn he heard the record scratch fade when he saw Twilight's smile drop and her eyes widen.

"That's today?" she whispered, seemingly in shock.

"Uh, yeah. Yeah it is. In about, uh...," He looked at the clock to check the time and turned back to Twilight. "Two hours. Give or take a few minutes."

Twilight silently turned around and went back to work on her mane and coat and sighed. "Great. Just great. I don't even have a schedule for today or anything. Of all the times I could forget to schedule something, it had to be this. It just had to be today!"

Fluttershy gave her reflection a small little smile as she stood in front of her bathroom mirror admiring herself. She had done up her mane in the same style she had worn it to the Grand Galloping gala, minus the small flowers and the butterfly earpiece. She had decided she wanted to be fancier than usual without being too gaudy or flashy.

Her ears perked up and her eyes widened as she heard a sudden thud come from what she could probably guess was her bedroom. She was frightened at first and ended up hiding under the sink, but then she heard it again. it was some sort of tapping sound.

Like a hoof on glass.

Fluttershy exhaled a sigh of relief as she realized she had nothing to fear. She walked out of the bathroom and over to her bedroom window, where she found a certain blue pegasus mare knocking her hoof on the glass, looking at her rather irritably. Fluttershy unlocked the window and stepped back to make room for Dash as she swooped in and glared at her.

"You left me out there for like, ever," Dash said flatly. "You know I hate waiting."

"Well, you could have always just used the front door," Fluttershy replied. "You know where I keep the spare key and everything."

"Well, yeah, but flying in through the window's more fun!" Dash reasoned.

"If you say so, Rainbow Dash," Fluttershy consented. "So what did you need to come over here for again?"

"Oh, come on, Fluttershy, you really don't know?" Dash asked as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "I'm here because I'm gonna tag along and make sure everything goes smoothly with you and Twilight!"

"And you... you think that's a good idea?"

"Best idea ever, yeah. Why?"

"Uh, no reason. Thanks, Rainbow," Fluttershy said, faking a smile. "I'm sure you'll be a big help."

"Heck yeah, I will be!" Dash agreed, smiling enthusiastically. "It's gonna be so awesome that when I tell people about it later, I'll have to make up a new word for how totally awesome it was!"

Fluttershy giggled at how excited Dash was getting, then turned to look outside of her window towards the direction of Twilight's library home.

"... 'Shy?" Dash asked, walking up beside Fluttershy. "You still nervous about this?"

Fluttershy nodded and sighed. "Yes. I mean, I'm much less nervous about it then I was before, but... I'm still scared that something will go wrong and that I'll... I'll lose her forever."

Dash put a wing around her friend and pulled her in for a quick hug. "Don't worry, 'Shy," she said, grinning. "This is Twilight we're talking about here. You know, the mare who's here studying the 'magic of friendship' and all that stuff? I'm sure that no matter what happens, you won't lose her forever."

Fluttershy returned the hug and smiled back at her friend. "Thank you, Rainbow. I needed to hear that."

"It's what I do, 'Shy. It's what I do."

"So...lemme get this straight...," Applejack said, quirking her eyebrow at the white unicorn who may or may not have completely cracked sometime in the last five minutes. "Me an' you are gonna hide out somewhere while Twi' and Fluttershy go on their, uh... date... and we're gonna step in and... fix it... should things go south?"

"Exactly!" Rarity exclaimed. "Oh, poor Twilight was a mess when she came to me for help! Darling, if things don't go smoothly, then I just don't know what I'll do!"

"Uh, well, you could maybe just let them both work their own problems out and keep your nose outta their business?" Applejack suggested, shrugging.

"But Applejack! Don't you want to make our friends lives that much happier? Think of all the good we could be doing!"

"Rarity!" Applejack sighed, exasperated. "Think of all the harm we could be doing if we mess with 'em! What if you try to 'fix' whatever problem you think they're havin' and you just make everything worse?"

"Well! Well, I... but... but Applejack!"

"Rarity. Look, I know that you mean well an' all, but you can't just go an' mess with ponies' lives because you want a certain something to happen to 'em. If Twi' and 'Shy're meant to be together, then we'll see them get together today, won't we?"

Rarity blinked and looked at Applejack,letting the words sink in. "Huh," she said finally. "Applejack... I didn't know you were such a romantic."

"Ah dunno' bout being a 'romantic' or anything...," the orange earth pony said, fiddling with her hat. "Ah just don't like messing with other ponies' personal lives."

Rarity sighed. "Well, guess I'll just have to wait for Twilight's personal report when she gets back later tonight."

"Don't you worry, none, Rarity. Ah'll wait with you 'til she shows up."

Rarity gasped. "So you're saying we could maybe go to the spa!?"

"Ah have no idea how you came to that idea, but if it'll keep you preoccupied, Ah guess Ah ca--"

"Well then what are we waiting for?" Rarity squealed with glee as she grabbed Applejack and headed toward the Ponyville Spa. "Let us be off!"

"Oh, brother...," Applejack sighed. "What have Ah gotten myself into?"

"Spike! Spike! Come here for a second!" Twilight called from her bedroom.

Oh geez, Spike sighed, removing his favorite apron. "All right, Twilight, I'll be right there."

The baby dragon made his way to Twilight's room and found exactly what he was expecting to find. A wound-up purple unicorn freaking out over pretty much everything ever. Oh how he loved days like this.

"Spike!" Twilight called again, louder than before. "Spike, where are you? I need your opinion on something!"

"Twilight, I'm right here, no need to yell or anything."

"Oh, good, you're here! I need you to help me make an extremely important decision."

"I'm not helping you pick out an outfit."

"But Spike!" Twilight whined. "This is important!"

"To you, maybe," Spike deadpanned. "But not to me. Why don't you call Rarity over or something? I'm sure she'd be glad to help you with an outfit or something. You know, as long as you're not still freaking out or anything."

"Oh, I was going to try Rarity, but earlier I noticed that she ran by here dragging Applejack off somewhere. Something about some kind of 'appointment' somewhere, from what I gathered."

"So that's just, you know, totally normal, right? Nothing about it seems off?"

"Spike, everypony in this town is crazy. You know that, I know that, they know that. Now, back to--"

"Oh, look at the time, I got places to go, ponies to see, yada yada, and all that nonsense!" Spike called, already halfway across the room. "Good luck,Twilight!" he shouted as he slammed the door.

Twilight stared at the door for a moment, then looked back to where Spike had been standing mere minutes ago. "What... but... how did he... oh, forget it. I'll just stress myself out even more, won't I?" she asked.

Unsurprisingly, there was no response.

"Great. Now I'm talking to myself. Again. I do that a lot, don't I?"

Still nothing.

"Was this what I did before I had friends?" Twilight shouted, banging her head on her dresser. "Ow. Ugh, this day could not get any worse," she mumbled into the hard wood surface.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

Twilight's ears perked up as she caught the sound of her clock ticking. She turned her head slowly, almost nervously, afraid of the time.

11:47 AM. Well, that was just fantastic. Twilight now had less than 20 minutes to calm down, finish preparations, and leave to meet Fluttershy. The clock was ticking and the deadline loomed. It felt like the Smarty Pants incident all over again. Well, except this time, she didn't need a Want it-Need It Spell.

Twilight sighed and turned once more to look at herself in the mirror. She had her mane in its normal style, not wanting to look too fussy about it, though she had worked extra hard to make sure she had the perfect amount of eye shadow and blush to make her features stand out without making her look like a clown.Her coat was clean and shiny, and her teeth were nice and pearly-white.

After a few minutes of sifting through all of her assorted outfits and clothes, she gave up and just decided to ditch the idea entirely. I'm sure it'll just make me look like I'm trying too hard anyway..., she thought as she turned toward the main room of the library. Well, I guess I'm as ready as I'll ever be... so I suppose it's time to go. Look out, Fluttershy. Here I come!

"Rainbow Dash, what time is it now?" Fluttershy asked, peeking out her window again.

"Fluttershy, it's still 11:57, just like it was, like... 4 seconds ago," Dash deadpanned, lying down on Fluttershy's couch. "Can you just calm down? I'm sure she'll be here exactly at noon or something. This is Twilight, you know."

"Yes, yes, if you say so...," Fluttershy sighed, looking out the window again. "I just wish she'd be a little early for once... for me."

Dash rolled off of the couch and walked over to Fluttershy, flipping her hair out of her face. "Sweet Celestia, Fluttershy, you're technically not even dating Twilight yet, and you're already afraid she's gonna dump you or something."

"Well, Rainbow Dash...,"

Ding-Dong

The two pegasi's ears perked up and their eyes shot to the door.

"Maybe that's her," Dash ventured, moving to hide behind the couch. "Don't let her know I'm here!"

"Um, okay, Rainbow Dash. Uh, hold on, uh, whoever it is!" Fluttershy called.

Fluttershy walked over to the door and opened it cautiously, but instead of meeting the lovely violet eyes of the pony she was expecting, she instead met a certain pair of wall-eyed amber eyes, belonging to a certain gray pegasus, equipped with a pair of saddlebags.

"Hiya!" she said, smiling happily at Fluttershy.

"Uh... hi!" replied Fluttershy. "Um, you're the, uh... the mailmare, right? Derpy?"

"Yeah! That's me! And you're Fluttershy, the animal caretaker!" Derpy responded.

Dash appeared from behind the couch and popped up behind Fluttershy, quirking her eye at the gray mailmare. "Uh, Derpy? What are you doing here?" she inquired.

Derpy tilted her head at Dash, confused. "Rainbow Dash? Huh, that's funny. Twilight only said anything about Fluttershy being here."

Dash and Fluttershy looked at each other and blinked. Fluttershy turned back to Derpy, confused. "Um... Derpy? What exactly are you, um, you know... talking about?"

"Oh! Right! I was probably supposed to give you this note at some point!" Derpy exclaimed, pulling a letter out of her bag and handing it to Fluttershy.

"You should probably lead with the letter next time, Derpy," Dash suggested. "You know, might make things easier for other ponies to understand what you're talking about."

"Sorry, Rainbow Dash."

Fluttershy opened the envelope and quickly scanned the note inside, before walking inside and placing it carefully on a table near the sofa.

Dash and Derpy looked at her for a minute, expecting some sort of a response. The response never came, however, as Fluttershy began giggling happily and sprinted out of the house, leaving them both behind.

They stared after her in confusion for a few moments before Derpy turned quickly to Dash, smiling. "Well, I guess I'll be going now. Bye, Rainbow Dash!"

Dash waved goodbye to Derpy and watched her fly away for a few minutes and sighed. Well, I should probably go and find 'Shy and Twi' now. You'd think she'd remember that I was gonna help her out since we were talking about this not *two Celestia-forsaken hours ago!***

~Fluttershy,

Unfortunately, I knew that I was going to be late, so I sent Derpy to you with this note with the hope that she'll get it to you as soon as possible. I just wanted to let you know that, as you read this, I'll probably be patiently waiting for you at the local cafe. I can't wait to see you Fluttershy. It's been so long since we've spent any proper amount of time together, so I'm sure today will be fun. See you when you get here, Fluttershy! Don't keep me waiting!

~Twilight Sparkle