A Dash of Inspiration

“Bet this isn’t where you thought we’d be having our big date, huh?” said Rainbow Dash, her voice gravelly. Her voice had yet to recover from her incident.

She was seated at a long, utilitarian table opposite Twilight Sparkle in the cafeteria of Ponyville General Hospital. The fluorescent lights above cast a pall of grey light over everything in the room, which somehow managed to make the hospital food even less appealing. Dash and Twilight each had a plastic tray with several coloured blobs of vegetable matter set on it. The ponies were not alone in the room, but they sat isolated at a corner table away from the counter and the other ponies spread out around the tables. The room was quiet, except for the soft murmurs that are used to speak in hospitals and the occasional clip-clop of hooves on the tile floor.

A week had passed since Dash had borne the fury of a lightning storm and a Sonic Rainboom. The doctors had been surprised at how fast she had recovered. Dash was still bandaged in many places and wore casts that kept her wings at full mast, but she had done her best to put on a happy exterior.

“Dash, I would hardly call these ‘dates’,” said Twilight. “Besides, didn’t the doctors say you were supposed to rest?” Dash snorted and flicked a foreleg in dismissal. She instantly regretted the gesture, clutching at her ribs and inhaling through clenched teeth. Twilight gasped and started to reach across the table. Dash shook her head, putting both front hooves on the table for balance and letting her head hang. After a moment, she looked up with a weary grin.

“Well, somepony has to, right? And as for the doctors, none of them has dealt with Rainboom lightning before. Their opinions can only be so accurate.” Twilight chewed on her lip in concern before responding.

“Dash, does it hurt? Even to move?”

Dash looked blankly at her friend before shifting her expression to a toothy smile.

“Nah, not really. It’s just sudden movements that set things off. I’m supposed to take it slow whenever I do move.” Dash broke Twilight’s gaze and looked down at the vegetable blobs in front of her. She sniffed, but they had no smell. “Besides, Twilight, what would I do instead of moving around or walking? Lie around in bed watching soap operas? I can’t put any stress on my wings yet, so it’s either that or read, and I can only look at so much text on a page before I start going cross-eyed.”

Twilight’s brow furrowed in worry.

“Dash, I know that it’s a chore, but please: you have to let yourself recover.” Dash snorted and looked away sullenly.

“Please, Dash. I worry about you.” Dash looked back at Twilight, who had leaned forward over the table. Through the fluorescent light, Twilight looked pale and fragile. Dash could see that she was blinking back tears. The pegasus’s expression instantly softened.

“Look, Twilight, if it means that much to you, sure.” Dash’s voice was earnest. The two looked into each other’s eyes for a while, taking a simple happiness in it. Dash was first to break the look.

“I suppose I am feeling kind of tired,” she said. “Walk me to my room?” Twilight nodded, levitating on her saddlebags.

Their walk was a slow and quiet one, as Dash methodically put one hoof in front of the other. The pegasus was focused on the ground for much of the walk, only lifting her head when the two came to an intersection or a corner. Dash’s wings, forced to spread by the casts, occupied almost half the hallway, and twice she and Twilight were forced into single file in order to let a pony with a cart pass. Twilight saw how small Dash looked under the sterile lighting of the hospital, and was saddened by it. This was not the brave, brash filly she had known, not the seasoned veteran acting as a mentor. This was a sad, tired pony, and neither adjective fit the Rainbow Dash that Twilight knew. Twilight wanted to move closer, to press herself against the warm comfort of the pegasus’s body and know that everything was going to be okay, but she was kept away by Dash’s wings.

They reached Dash’s room. There was a window on the opposite wall, which had a small bed near it. There were a couple of floor pillows on the bed’s closest side. There was a bedside table with a pitcher of water and a couple of glasses on it. Across from the bed, an inexpensive television rested on its own table.

“Well, this is me,” said Dash, turning to face Twilight and offering a small smile.

“I brought you some books.” Twilight levitated out a few paperback novels from her saddlebags and placed them on the bedside table. “I didn’t really have much to go on, so I kind of had to pick from intuition. I hope you like them.” She giggled nervously.

“. . . Twilight, if I’m going to rest and recuperate for you, I want you to do something for me, okay?”

“Oh. Uh, fair enough, I suppose.” Dash walked over to Twilight so that they were standing almost nose-to-nose. Twilight shivered a bit at the proximity, but focused on what Dash was saying.

“Have fun.”

Twilight’s expression turned to one of confusion.

“What do you mean?”

“Twilight, it’s been a week since I- since the accident. I’ve only been up for a few days, and you’ve been in here for hours on every one.” Twilight looked away, smiling awkwardly.

“I- I want to make sure you’re recovering.”

“The nurses told me that you didn’t leave the room the entire time I was comatose. They had to force you to eat and drink.”

Twilight’s face fell at this. She stuttered out a few syllables and tried to look Dash in the eye, but was interrupted by the pegasus’s hoof on her face. It came back tipped purple.

“Twilight, is this makeup? Have you been covering bags under your eyes?” Dash asked. She intended the questions as honestly concerned, but the timbre of her voice made them seem angry.

“I . . . You’d worry. . .” Twilight’s voice cracked when she spoke, and her eyes were shiny with the added weight of tears. Seeing what she had done, Dash instantly moved forward and embraced Twilight with a foreleg, apologizing softly. Twilight returned the hug with both of hers. Behind her, Dash’s face contorted with pain as Twilight’s hoof clipped one of her wing casts and sent lances of pain shooting through her spine and wing. The pegasus bit down on her lip to keep from crying out and continued with the embrace. After Twilight had stopped shuddering (and Dash had mastered her own shakes), the two ponies drew apart.

“Twilight, when was the last time you had a good night’s sleep?” Rainbow Dash did not wait for an answer, continuing. “I don’t want you running yourself ragged because you’re worried about me. I’ve had worse than this – I will make it through, but it’ll be difficult if you’re in here fretting about me the entire time. Please, just go out and enjoy yourself.”

Twilight was silent for a moment, then nodded. The two said their goodbyes, and the unicorn left.

After Twilight’s hoofsteps had receded into silence, Rainbow Dash cringed and exhaled. She tried not to put pressure on any part of her body, lest the dull, omnipresent ache grow into something she couldn’t ignore.
Good thing I’m not the element of honesty. Twilight has enough on her mind worrying about my recovery. Wouldn’t be good to tell her about the pain. She wouldn’t understand that it’s minor.
There was a knock from the door. Dash looked over to see a Royal Guardsman standing in the doorway. He was everything she remembered the Guards as being – white-coated, armoured in gold, built like the kind of pony capable of punching out a manticore. The one deviation from the Guards that Dash had seen were the saddlebags he wore with the emblem of the Equestrian courts stamped on them.

“Rainbow Dash, of Ponyville?”

Twilight worried to herself as she walked in the midmorning sun. It had only been minutes since she had left the hospital, and her thoughts were fixated upon Rainbow Dash.
Is she eating enough? Is she enjoying the books I got her? Are the staff treating her well? She’s a hero, after all, they can’t just lump her in with all the other-
Twilight stopped and squeezed her eyes shut. She tried to clear her head, but her thoughts were a jumble of worries and concerns. She clenched her teeth and hunched up. Questions about the hospital’s treatments flew through her head like a swarm of bees, rebounding off the inside of her mind, their buzzing echoing and amplifying.

Twilight made a noise of frustration, anger and sorrow and took off at a full gallop. She didn’t know where she was running, just that she had to run. Some forgotten pony instinct, rendered obsolete by laws and good behaviour, took hold and guided her through the streets. The buildings seemed like a labyrinth of masonry and wood, hemming her in everywhere she went. Her heart pounded, and she dodged around startled ponies, only narrowly avoiding accident.

Time passed, and Twilight found her head clearing. She slowed down and took stock of her surroundings. She was surrounded by trees in a dense forest, walking on a hard dirt trail. The trees were showing the first signs of autumn, with a few orange leaves here and there among the otherwise green canopy. Twilight realized with a start that she was in Whitetail Wood.
Did I really run all this way? I’m certainly out of breath enough, but still . . .
Twilight knew that part of the trail that wound through Whitetail wood curved around near Sweet Apple Acres, so getting back into Ponyville would be easy enough. As the unicorn walked along the path, she realized something.

Her head was clear. The crisp forest air was a welcome coolness in her lungs – the air in Ponyville was laced with the undertones of ponies, work, and the occasional flower garden. Out here, Twilight realized, few ponies must take the path – there was nothing but the pleasant, metallic taste of air mixed with the calming half-scent of trees.

Twilight looked up at the sun, which was just past its zenith. She realized that she had been out for several hours. This fact didn’t bother her. She had no duties at the library, aside from personal ones. Twilight looked down as she recalled the appearance of her study: books about Rainbooms and lightning had lain strewn around a writing desk covered in drawings, notes and crumpled scraps of paper when she had last left it. There was no reason for them to have changed positions, as Twilight had forbidden Spike from entering the room, even to clean.
“Spike, this is my private room! You are not to enter it!”

“Spike! Where’s that book on Sonic Rainbooms?!”

“I don’t need to sleep! I have reading to do!”
Twilight realized with a pang that Spike had probably been affected by Rainbow Dash’s near- . . . by Rainbow Dash’s incident as much as the unicorn had. Literally every day since the . . . incident, Twilight had been gone from the library for hours at a time, mostly visiting Dash. Spike had been pulling double duty both running the library and carrying out Twilight’s increasingly sleep-deprived demands for food at all hours of the night. Twilight’s posture sunk even lower with shame, now that she thought about the consequences of her actions.
I need to apologize to Spike for everything. He’s been a saint through all this.
Twilight returned her posture to normal and started trotting along the path. She didn’t want to delay the apology – Spike deserved it.

When Twilight did finally stagger back to the library, legs aching from exertion, evening had set in and was almost beginning to evolve into night.
Never again. Never again will I sprint onto a marathon trail and then run the marathon. By the goddesses, how did AJ and Dash manage to keep pace at the Running of the Leaves last year?
Twilight entered and shut the door quietly, just then realizing that there were no lights on. All was quiet. There was enough moonlight streaming in through the windows to see by, but much of the main room was gilded with shadow. What the moon did light was a messy space, with books occupying almost every horizontal surface. Some even lay open with their spines up.

“Spike?”

A purple-scaled, green-spined head poked up from over several stacks of books. It blinked tiredly before speaking.

“Who is- Oh! I, uh, that is, um,” Spike stuttered, looking around in panic. “Twilight! Hi!”

“Ah, Spike, there you are. Just the dragon I wanted to see.” Twilight walked over, carefully stepping around books as she did.

“I . . . I am?” Spike’s voice was a note away from terror.

“Yes. I wanted to talk to you about something.” Twilight felt sad. She hadn’t realized that the mere sight of her was enough to cause such fear.

“Y-y-you did?” Spike’s voice had now firmly hit the ‘terror’ register.

“Yes.” Twilight sighed. “Spike . . . I’m sorry.”

Spike cringed away. He had expected many things – being pelted with books, Twilight yelling at him, an insane request for freshly-picked pears – but an apology had not been among them. Twilight continued.

“I’m sorry for the way I’ve been treating you since Dash was put into the hospital. I . . . You were very supportive of me through a tough time, and I responded with hostility. Instead of berating you for not performing exactly as I would have liked, I should have been thanking you for your help in running the library and keeping me fed. I’m so sorry. Can you forgive me?”

Spike was silent for a long moment. He returned to a normal stance, then reached up and hugged Twilight around her neck.

“Aw, Twilight, of course I forgive you.” Twilight sighed, returning the gesture. “You were going through a lot. I understand that. I’ve had my fair share of difficult times too, and you were always there for me. I was just returning the favour.”

“But, Spike, it’s not that simple.” Twilight’s tone was pleading. “I treated you like garbage – I yelled at you, I . . . I threw things at you, I left you to take care of the entire library-”

“Twilight, you don’t have to tell me twice. Let’s not dwell on what happened. I’m just glad to have the real you back in charge.”

Twilight smiled and wiped a single tear from her eye.

“Thanks, Spike.” Spike disengaged himself from the hug.

“Thank you, Twilight. Now, would you mind terribly if we went up to sleep? All this mushy emotional stuff has made me kinda sleepy, and I’d like to have an actual bed.” Twilight giggled.

“That’s the best idea I’ve heard all day.”

The two of them walked up the stairs to Twilight’s room. For the first time in a week, Spike slept in his little basket at the foot of Twilight’s bed.

Rainbow Dash read the documents for a fifth time.

They couldn’t be right. They just couldn’t be. Who would do that? Why?

The words had long since lost meaning, now appearing as nothing more than scribbles on a page. Dash forced herself to concentrate on them – maybe they had changed, maybe the whole thing was a trick by her subconscious. As she read, her heart sank with the knowledge that it wasn’t.
. . . formal complaint lodged . . . reckless endangerment . . . no longer require your service . . . transferred . . . less stressful position . . . final decision . . .
Dash buried her face in the hospital bed and wept, great heaving sobs that wracked her entire frame. The pegasus took out her anger on the mattress, pounding her front hooves down upon it again and again and again. She didn’t care about the pain her bones sent her, she didn’t care that she wasn’t supposed to exert herself, she didn’t care that any injuries would likely hurt her chances of getting the job back. Her thoughts were an incoherent mess of grief and rage.

After the pain grew too great to bear, Dash stopped hitting the bed and pulled her head up from it, leaving an impression slightly damp with tears and mucus. Her breathing was ragged, and punctuated with sniffs and near-sobs. She had to clench her teeth to keep from screaming out.
They can’t do that! They just can’t! I was teaching her, I was her mentor! You . . . you . . . you bureaucrats can’t just replace somepony’s role model like that! IT JUST DOESN’T WORK! IT’S NOT FAIR!
“Um, Miss Dash?”

Dash looked up at the door. Part of her wanted it to be the guard, come back to apologize for the mix-up. Part of her wanted it to be Twilight, for a shoulder to cry on. Part of her wanted it to be something she could punch.

Instead of any of these, the figure at the door was Nurse Redheart. She looked concerned.

“Is everything alright? I heard yelling, something about something not being fair.”

Dash realized that she must have screamed her last few thoughts with her lungs and mind. Some civilized section of her brain said that she ought to be apologetic, that hospitals were supposed to be quiet. The more primal, angry side of her (which was quickly growing in influence) said that she ought to start screaming obscenities at this nurse, this intruder. In the end, Dash compromised.

“Yeah, everything’s peachy,” Dash sighed heavily, lowering her head. Her already gravelly voice was not helped by the recent outpouring of emotion. If Redheart noticed anything amiss about Dash’s tone, she did not show it. “Now izzat all, or . . .?”

As it turned out, it wasn’t all.

Dash walked slowly out of the hospital, her wings now free of their casts and folded up against her sides. Her bandages had been replaced and the ones on her head and face removed entirely. Dash had been skeptical of her release, but the doctors were adamant that any more time in the hospital would detract from her recovery. The muscles and bones needed stimulation, they said, and Dash needed fresh air. That, combined with Redheart’s lobbying (“You just seemed so upset, dear.”), had given Dash a clean bill of health.

Despite her determination to feel bitter towards the entire world, Dash couldn’t help but be inwardly thankful for the painkillers they had given her. Instead of every step on hard cobblestone being a lance of electricity, it was nothing more than a slight prick. It was also nice to be free of those accursed wing casts. Dash’s wings were still tender, but she could move them around a little bit. She knew better than to stretch them as she had tried during their removal, though – that had managed to hurt even through the painkillers.

Dash looked around her now, the pleasant sensation of a cool evening breeze flowing across her cheek. She was standing just outside the entryway to Ponyville General, the town spreading out around her. She started walking nowhere in particular, just because she could. Her anger had faded in the time it had taken the doctors to remove the casts and replace the bandages, and she now had nothing but a vague veil of depression hovering over her frame.

As Dash wandered, the hours ticked by. She eventually found herself in the middle of Ponyville Public Park, a large expanse of greenery in the middle of an otherwise mostly urban landscape. Dash was wandering down one of the more popular paths, fields stretching away on either side of her. It was dark enough to warrant the streetlamps now, and Dash passed through a pool of illumination every so often. The next bright circle was accompanied by a bench.

Feeling tired, Dash lay herself down upon it. She realized that she couldn’t fly up to her house. Dash sighed, listing off the ponies who could give her a place for the night.
Pinkie Pie? No, she’d never stop asking me about hospital life. Rarity? No, she’d probably faint if I showed up on her doorstep in the middle of the night looking like this.
Applejack, Fluttershy and her own home were all so far away as to be inaccessible, so that left Twilight. Dash inhaled with hope, but forced the breath out when she considered the facts.
No, I told her to go out and have fun, not nurse me back to health.
Dash sighed. The bench was likely the best bed she’d find tonight. She looked around once, making sure there was nopony in sight.
It’s not illegal to sleep here, right?
Dash lay her head down, too tired to care. As she did so, a small spark of a thought made itself known in the back of her head. Dash tried to quiet it down and fall asleep, but it was incessant. Exhaling in annoyance, Dash raised her head and looked around. The thought had been about seeing something, but hadn’t specified.

Dash looked around, eyes coming to rest on a missing filly poster on the lamppost.

Scootaloo’s orange face looked back.