A Dash of Inspiration

Rainbow Dash walked slowly along the path leading from Sweet Apple Acres into Ponyville. She and Applejack had parted ways at the farm’s gates after the earth pony had given her some painkillers from Granny Smith’s store – a small flask of black, foul-smelling liquid. This brew was apparently a powerful enough remover of pain to allow Dash to fly, and Applejack had intended it to help Dash get back to her cloud house for a proper night’s sleep in an environment more suited to a pegasus than hardwood planks.

Dash had initially been skeptical of its alleged pain-reducing qualities, but Applejack had spoken from personal experience, and vouched for the liquid’s effectiveness. Dash had gulped down as much of it as she could manage before her taste buds could rebel completely (it tasted like evil, they told her) and recovered with only a couple of coughs, walking off with the flask cradled under her left wing. She took a measure of comfort knowing that despite the recent strain, they weren’t completely useless.

Currently, she planned to walk back through Ponyville to get as close to her house as possible, then down a measure of the liquid and fly up once it took effect. After that, she would crawl into bed and let her wings heal back to top shape before she bothered venturing out the door. She wouldn’t give the world another opportunity to render her flightless, oh no.

The pegasus cast a glance around her absentmindedly while reviewing her plan, seeing the world around her but not truly registering it. There were fields, mostly, dotted with copses of trees here and there, and forests off in the distance. The sky was, in a break from Ponyville form, mostly grey and overcast. As she completed the walk back into Ponyville and the road transitioned from packed dirt to cobblestone, Dash felt the slight pat of a raindrop against the back of her neck.

Annoyed, the blue pegasus cast a look up at the sky again, trying to see where the main body of clouds was. What she had dimly seen on her walk had told her more of a light rain than a torrential downpour, so Ponyville proper likely wouldn’t get anything worse than a small spitting – presuming, of course, that the cloud formation wasn’t planned to move.

After a minute of this, Dash gave an aggravated sigh and trotted off in the direction of the town billboard. Rounding a corner into the town square (which was in front of the library), she caught sight of it across the way from her. With a nervous glance at the library, Dash quickly cantered over to the raised rectangle of cork that provided Ponyville with general announcements, news and weather schedules. In previous times, the board had done much more than that, but newspapers and generally more open lines of communication had lessened its role in the daily life of the average pony.

Truth be told, the board did nothing that newspapers didn’t, but was kept around for tradition’s sake and for the old-timers who hadn’t taken much of a shine to newspapers. Dash herself had never needed the board much, as the weather schedules were generally her responsibility to announce and help plan. Her recent occupations, however, had provided her with a less involved role in weather-based activities. More than once, she had glanced at the board on her way back into town after teaching Scootaloo and been thankful for the notification of an impending weather pattern.

Coming to a stop squarely in front of the board, Dash looked up at the upper-right corner reserved for the week’s weather schedule. Before the pegasus could register the symbols and their meanings, she was interrupted by a gasp.

“Rainbow Dash, is that you?” cried a voice from a good distance behind her. Dash recognized that voice, and grimaced ever so slightly as she turned around.

Drat. I didn’t want to get her involved in this.

“Ah, hi Twilight,” Dash replied, turning to face the unicorn. As Dash did so, she noticed that Twilight looked better than she had in the hospital lighting. Her complexion seemed smoother and the purples of her body more vivid and pronounced – her coat, for lack of a better word, glowed, and her mane and tail seemed to be a study in contrast. Her eyes in particular could have been mistaken for gateways into some crystalline dimension of stars and clear black water. In fact, they seemed to be getting closer-

“Oof!” Dash exclaimed in surprise, interrupted as Twilight crashed into her and drew the pegasus into a tight hug.

“Ohmygoodnessohmygoodness!” the unicorn squealed, hopping up and down as much as her position would allow her. “You got out of the hospital and everything!”

“Um, Twilight,” said Dash, struggling to inhale.

“Well, I guess not everything, since you still have the bandages and whatnot, but still.”

“Twilight,” Dash croaked, swatting at Twilight’s shoulder with a hoof.

"What is it, Dash?"

“Can’t breathe . . .” Dash’s voice gave out, her words turning into a dry exhalation.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” Twilight cried, releasing Dash from her grip. The pegasus fell back onto all fours, relishing the sensation of cool air flooding into her lungs. Twilight’s enthusiasm was great, but it could be a little much sometimes. After regaining her composure, Dash raised her head and looked Twilight in the eye. Twilight returned the look with one of her own, laced with worry and a touch of guilt.

“So, Twilight-”

“Rainbow, how did you-”

The two ponies abruptly stopped, each willing to let the other go first. After a moment, Twilight sat back on her haunches and motioned for Dash to speak first. Dash nodded quickly, then spoke.

“Um, Twilight,” said Dash with a wave of her foreleg and a distinct lack of certainty to her tone. Perhaps it was just the natural sunlight as opposed to the fluorescent tubes of the hospital, but Dash couldn’t remember Twilight ever looking so . . . pleasant. “Did you do something with . . . this?”

A slight pause, then:

“Dash, you just gestured to all of me.”

“Hmm? Oh, so I did. Well, um, what I meant to say was that you look, uh . . .” Dash searched for an appropriate word. Twilight leaned forward a bit, unsure of where the conversation was going.

“You look nice,” finished Dash after a moment, “and I was wondering if you’d done anything differently.”

Twilight, seeing the inquiry to be harmless, if a bit odd, looked up pensively and tapped her chin with a hoof, trying to remember what she’d done earlier that day. Nothing seemed to jump out at her as being particularly different. Except . . .

“Well, I did get a good night’s sleep – I can’t really think of much else.” Twilight shrugged, returning her hoof to the ground. “I’m not really one for makeup.”

“Well whatever it was, you should do it more often,” said Dash. “You really look nice.”

“Oh, thanks,” Twilight said, blushing and averting her eyes. Suddenly, Twilight jumped with a sudden realization. “Oh, but here we are talking about my appearance when you’ve gotten out of the hospital! How did you manage that?”

“Oh, well I, um . . . I uh, I . . .” Dash struggled to articulate her thoughts – why was she having such difficulty with this? It was plain as day: the ponies at the hospital had let her out because she’d healed up, simple as that. All she needed to do was say as much.

“I, uh . . . I got better.”

Twilight was silent for a good ten seconds, expression unreadable as she waited for Dash to continue. When it became apparent that she did not intend to do so, the unicorn spoke. “You . . . got better?”

Godsdammit, why can you never articulate yourself properly when it counts?

Dash started to say something several times, but couldn’t quite get going. Eventually, she composed herself, took a deep breath, and spoke.

“The doctors said that whatever healing I had left to do couldn’t be helped in the hospital, so they let me out to start re-exposing myself to society. Walking around town, talking to people,” Dash coughed awkwardly, her voice turning into a mumble. “Doing the rest of my community service hours . . .”

“Ah, I see,” Twilight said, nodding. “But you really recovered that quickly?”

Dash shrugged. “The doctors were just as surprised. Being struck by Rainboom-lightning isn’t really an everyday thing, so they didn’t know quite what to make of it. I’m sure the hospital would keep that kind of stuff on file if you’re interested.”

Twilight nodded, deep in thought and medical theory. “I might have a look at that, actually. Medicine’s been kind of hobby of mine and that would be an interesting detail to study.”

Dash chuckled. “Glad I can be interesting.”

“No, that’s not- I mean, I didn’t mean-” Twilight gasped, eyes wide with embarrassment.

“Relax, Twilight,” Dash said, chuckling good-naturedly and making a calming motion with her hooves. “I was just joking. It’s great that you can find some ray of light in this whole mess.”

“. . . This whole mess?” asked Twilight. “You got out of the hospital and are on your way to recovery – what else is there?”

And now you express yourself all too well. Great job, Dash.

“Well, um, my community service kind of changed . . .”

“Changed? Changed how?” Twilight leaned forward, eyes carrying concern. It was now Dash’s turn to feel embarrassed, and she shied away from Twilight’s question, unable to properly answer it at the moment.

“Uh, do you mind if I explain as we walk? I kind of have to be somewhere.”

Twilight agreed, and the two set off in the general direction of Rainbow Dash’s cloud house, following the street that went most directly. Twilight couldn’t help but peek at Dash’s bandages, appraising them with the eye of a concerned amateur and thus seeing more faults than there were. The bandages had loosened and hung from Dash’s frame more than wrapped around it, but the pegasus gave no indication that she noticed or cared.

As they walked, Dash explained the events of the previous day, starting with seeing Scootaloo’s missing filly poster.

“It’s just terrible that happened,” said Twilight, downcast. “Some Guards came by and asked if I could scry her location, but I just couldn’t get a bead on her. Too much residual magic in the air, I think – from that Electric Rainboom and all.”

“Don’t worry too much about it, Twilight,” Dash said reassuringly, “I found her out at the CMC treehouse. She was more upset than scared.”

Twilight was surprised, to say the least. “You just found her out there?”

“Well, I figured she ran away because she felt guilty about what happened to me, and that she’d be at some place she knew. The treehouse just happened to be the first place I checked.”

Twilight listened to this worriedly, but calmed after she processed what Dash said. “So she’s with her father again?”

“Yes – unfortunately, that’s where things get a bit messy.”

Twilight’s head tilted in confusion. “How?”

“Well, y’see- hang on, we should turn here.”

The two ponies took a right at the intersection, walking along a cobblestone road between two rows of houses. Ponies passed them every now and again, but the majority of the activity took place in and around the town square, and this part of Ponyville was largely empty. As they moved towards the countryside outside of Ponyville proper, this only became more so. The rain had picked up slightly, but was still just a heavy spitting. A single drop spattered heavily on Dash’s nose, and she snuffed in irritation before completing the turn and setting off.

When they had finished reorienting themselves, Dash continued speaking.

“The thing is,” she started with a sigh, “Mr. Nimbus came by to visit the treehouse the morning after I’d found Scootaloo, and he didn’t take kindly to what he saw. Can’t say I blame him, really.”

“What? You found his daughter – how could he not take kindly to that?” Twilight’s tone was shocked.

Dash continued as though she hadn’t heard Twilight, head slumped, tone bitter, and eyes taking in the fine detail of the rocks beneath her hooves. “I probably would’ve reacted the same way if I’d trotted up the ramp to see my daughter sleeping peacefully under the wing of the idiot who’d given her the idiot idea to try lightning wrangling in the middle of a huge storm.”

Twilight didn’t know what to say. “Dash . . .” she managed, hoofsteps slowing and with a voice little more than a whisper.

Again Dash seemed not to hear her. The pegasus’s breathing came more raggedly now, and her chest shook with emotion as she spoke. “This was, of course, after the Royal Guard had swept the treehouse and found nothing worth reporting, and after that same idiot had been reassigned to picking up trash and been replaced with a trained professional because she posed a threat to his daughter’s safety.”

“Rainbow Dash,” Twilight finally interrupted, “what happened?”

“Well, it’s pretty much like I told you, except I haven’t gotten to the part where he explained all of this to me.”

“. . . So, um-”

“Who the hell do you think you are?”

“ . . . Nice to see you too, Mr. Nimbus. Scootaloo’s safe and sound, don’t worry.”

“I’m surprised, considering her company for the last eight hours.”

“Look, is there some sort of problem you have with me?”

“You endangered family. I would think the problem is self-explanatory, though I suppose I can’t expect a fillyfooler like you to understand.”

“. . . Excuse me?”

“You heard me. I should have known that the stress of caring about somepony for more than a single drunken night would have been too much for you to handle.”

“You- . . . You are very lucky that I am being rational about this. Look, I’m sorry about how Scootaloo was endangered. Do not think for a second that I wanted anything to happen to her.”

“And yet you give her the bright idea to try lightning wrangling.”

“We talked shop once, two weeks before that storm was scheduled to roll in! The short-term weather schedules are only drafted a week in advance – how was I supposed to know that she’d try to tame the biggest thunderhead in the sky?”

“Funny, hearing you talk about unexpected consequences.”

“Listen, would it kill you to give me a straight answer- AAAAAAGH!”

“And that’s when I overextended my wings – it’s mostly a blur of pain past that point, and the next thing I remember, AJ’s helping me to my hooves and we’re walking back towards the farmhouse. Scootaloo had disappeared, and I guess her father took her back to their house.”

Twilight fell softly back onto her haunches, mouth open and eyes wide in shock. She hadn’t imagined that Mr. Nimbus could be capable of such actions or words – she herself had spoken with him on several occasions when he was delivering her mail, and he had always seemed to be a level-headed pony. But this . . .

This was insane. Twilight couldn’t process the sheer contrast of the two images warring in her mind’s eye for dominance – one of Mr. Nimbus the mailman, family man and all-around nice guy, the other of Mr. Nimbus, the pegasus-terrifying fury. It didn’t make any sense for him to act that way, she dimly realized. Not without good reason.

Dash, in the silence that had followed her recounting of events, managed to work up the nerve to look up at Twilight and see her reaction to all this. It seemed that the shock of the information had rendered the unicorn unable to speak for the time being.

Your social skills are off the chart, Dash.

“Well, I suppose I’ll just head on home, now,” Dash said, turning away and looking skyward. She could see her house, a small point of colour against the grey clouds. It wasn’t terribly far, but neither was it close. Dash sighed resignedly and took a quick swig of AJ’s herbal medicine and crouched down, preparing to launch herself up into the sky.

Twilight was dimly aware of Dash doing something in front of her, but she couldn’t make out the specifics.

If what Mr. Nimbus said is true, then . . . oh, it can’t be true, it just can’t! I’ve known Dash for months and she’s never been mean like that.

Of course, she’d known Mr. Nimbus for months as well, and he wasn’t the type to lie.

Twilight’s mind had just about tangled itself into a thicket of circular logic when an idea occurred to her. It was stupid and kind of awkward, but it propelled itself to the forefront of her mind like an award-winning gymnast. If she did it correctly, Dash could feel better – that was good, right? Helping Dash? Of course it was. Dash was her friend, and it was terrible to see her like this.

Something must be done.

Twilight snapped back to reality just as Dash uncoiled the energy in her legs and sprang upward.

“Wait!” she cried, propelling herself forward and tackling Dash to the ground with an athleticism she didn’t know she had. The two ponies landed heavily a metre to the left of where Dash had crouched, Twilight partially on top of the pegasus with her forelegs wrapped around Dash’s neck in a hug and her eyes closed tight with emotion.

Dash was understandably confused. After a quick glance to see that AJ’s flask was still intact (it was, a short distance off in a small puddle), she managed to gather herself enough to speak.

“Um, Twilight, what are you doing?”

No response. Dash poked Twilight in the shoulder and repeated the question. “No, seriously – Twilight, what are you doing?”

Twilight seemed to notice this, and drew herself up into a sitting position with a small cough of embarrassment. She hadn’t meant to act that dramatically.

“Oh, right, sorry about that,” she said, blushing. “I just had something to say that I think could really help and I wanted to make sure that you didn’t leave without hearing it.”

A pause.

Dash rolled herself onto her side facing Twilight, propping up her forward half with her forelegs. “Could I hear it, then?” she asked.

“Oh! Yes! Um,” Twilight said, unsure how to properly articulate herself. Eventually, she settled on a course, setting herself before speaking.

“Dash, I just can’t stand to see you like this.”

Dash winced, pulling herself into a proper sitting position. Wallowing in self-loathing was bad enough, but upsetting Twilight jerked at her heartstrings in a deeply painful way.

“Twilight, I-” she began.

“I am certain,” Twilight continued, not letting herself stop for fear that she wouldn’t be able to start again, “that Mr. Nimbus’s . . . behaviour is just him worrying about Scootaloo, and that he’ll snap out of it once he sees that she’s safe.”

“And that excuses him calling me a fillyfooler?”

“No! No. Of course not,” Twilight continued, putting a hoof on Dash’s shoulder reassuringly. “What I mean is . . . What I mean is that I’m sure he regrets saying what he did, and that he’ll come apologize to you personally about it soon enough.”

Dash looked back at the increasingly damp and cold cobblestones beneath her hooves, mulling over Twilight’s words. It didn’t seem like a terribly appealing way for things to play out, but it seemed to be the only one she had open. Her eyes shifted back to Twilight, sitting reassuringly next to her. Somehow, just knowing that she was there made Mr. Nimbus’s words cut a bit less deep.

“. . . Better than nothing, I guess,” Dash said after a moment, beginning to stand. “Thanks, Twilight-”

“Furthermore,” Twilight said, applying a slight downward pressure to keep the pegasus seated. Dash plopped back onto her rear, a bit startled. “This whole doom and gloom attitude you have – look, I don’t know who that is, but it is most definitely not Rainbow Dash!”

Dash looked herself over dully, seeing no changes apart from the bandages that hung about her. “Who am I, then? Spike?”

Twilight shook her head, continuing to speak. “It’s not important who it is – what’s important is getting back Rainbow Dash.”

“Aw, Twilight . . .” Dash said, blushing and rubbing her foreleg nervously.

“No, listen. I saw you like this in the hospital last time, and . . . and it’s just not you.”

“So . . .”

“So we need to get you back!” Twilight exclaimed, poking Dash in the shoulder to emphasize her point. “Whatever you want, we’ll do!”

“Twilight . . .” Dash said, voice falling.

“We’ll go see a movie, we’ll eat tonnes of junk food!”

“Twilight.”

Twilight stopped her rousing motivational speech and looked at Dash, unsure of where her idea had failed. “Y-yeah?”

“Twilight, look,” Dash said, putting her hooves on Twilight’s shoulders in a gesture of thanks, “I really appreciate the offer and everything, but it’s not that simple. Right now, I don’t feel like doing much of anything except crawling into a bed and sleeping for a year.” The pegasus managed a small smile. “So, thank you, but no thank you, okay? Just talking has helped a lot – you don’t need to kill yourself trying to make me happy.”

Twilight deflated. Rainbow was right, obviously – ponies were far more complex than math or, science, or history, or any of the other things she read about in her books.

“ . . . Right. Of course. Foolish to think it was that easy . . .” she mumbled, staring at nothing.

Suddenly, Rainbow Dash hugged her.

The warmth of Dash’s body was a marked contrast to the cold of the air and rock around her, and jolted Twilight out of her sudden depression. Twilight came back to her senses and returned the hug, resting her head on Dash’s shoulder and taking comfort in the pegasus’s gentle strength. She closed her eyes, wanting time to slow, to stop.

Dash seemed fragile to look at, all hot air and posing, but she was an athlete through and through, and one of the best in Equestria. No-one made it that far without being able to take their fair share of adversity, and Dash was an example of that. She had an inner strength to her, a persistent flame that would never extinguish, no matter how tough the going got. It might flicker, sure, and it might dim, but it would always go on.

And so would Dash.

Eventually, the two ponies had to end the hug, and did so with reluctance. Both had enjoyed it, and neither was sure what to say afterwards.

At length, Dash coughed awkwardly and mumbled something about wanting to get back to her house before the weather had a chance to worsen. Gathering up Applejack’s flask, the pegasus bid Twilight goodbye flew up and towards her cloudy abode.

Twilight sat where she was for a minute, watching Dash’s figure diminish into the distance. In time, Twilight picked herself up and trotted back to the library with a lot on her mind.

There must be something I can do – something not so simple, something complex. Well okay, maybe not complex, but something that would help . . .

Twilight pursued this manner of thought all the way back to the tree where she made her home, but still hadn’t managed to come up with an idea. Shivering slightly from the cold damp, Twilight opened the door and trotted into the tree. There were noises coming from the kitchen, and Twilight walked over to it to see what Spike was up to.

Spike, it turned out, was cooking up a stew. He stood on a stool at the stovetop, wearing a chef’s hat and sipping a sample of the concoction from a spoon. Twilight walked over, inhaling deeply – the stew smelled delicious and heady, and the warmth it gave off was a welcome change from the watery air outside.

“Hi Twilight, what’s up?” he said, putting down the spoon he was holding and stirring the mixture with a wooden one propped up against the inside of the pot.

“I saw Rainbow Dash on my way home from the market,” Twilight responded, eyes still glued to the cuisine before her.

“She’s out of the hospital already? That’s great!” Spike said, hopping from his stool to another one by a cutting board. He picked up a knife and started chopping up a cucumber, being careful not to hit his own digits – not because he would be hurt, but because blades had a tendency to dull when exposed to dragon scales. “How was she?”

“She seemed a bit down, but I talked to her for a bit and it seemed to help,” replied Twilight, dragging her gaze away from the stovetop.

“That’s good to hear – you’ll have to tell me over dinner, I think. I can’t really afford to divert too much attention away from the stew.”

“Of course, of cour- is that oregano I smell?”

“Yep!” Spike chirped happily. “The recipe doesn’t technically call for it, but I know how much you like it, so I figured I’d add some anyway.”

“Spike, that's . . . that's a very nice touch. Thank you.”

“Ah, it’s no problem,” Spike responded, hopping back to his original stool and adding the cucumber slices to the mix. “I just figured that you’d been so out of it lately that you needed some cheering up, and food seemed like a good place to start.”

And suddenly, Twilight had an idea.

After a few moments, Spike turned, looking to see why Twilight hadn’t said anything.

She wasn’t there.

She was, however, upstairs, furiously scribbling out a letter.

Of course! It’s simple, yet complex enough to work! Oh, I’ve been going about this all wrong – Rainbow’s blues aren’t an intellectual matter, they’re a matter of the heart, and the fastest way to anyone’s heart is through their belly!

Rainbow Dash, meanwhile, was comfortable and warm underneath her covers, and just about to fall asleep when a scroll materialized overtop of her in a puff of smoke and green flame. The scroll promptly fell, booping her on the nose.

Confused and slightly irritated, Dash unrolled the scroll and read the contents.

Dear Rainbow Dash,

It would be a great pleasure if you could join me for dinner tomorrow night. I know that you said not to overwork myself trying to cheer you up, but I can’t just sit around and do nothing. The way I see it, you wanted to have dinner together to pay me back for helping you, right? Just think of it like that. I mean, my house isn’t exactly a fancy restaurant or anything, but it’s the thought that counts, isn’t it?

I’m aware of your recent wing injury, but I could teleport us back to your house afterwards, and you could mostly just glide back down to ground level to begin with. I checked the weather, and all of tomorrow seems pretty nice.

It would mean a lot to me if you could come over. If you decide to, please show up at my place at 8:00, or some time close to that.

- With love, your friend Twilight

Dash pressed the letter to her face, frustrated at how the whole thing had snowballed into involving Twilight. Her invitation was touching, sure, but she wasn’t sold on it. Mr. Nimbus’s actions maybe being understandable (if not forgivable) had been enough to mull over for one evening – she didn’t need this. She didn’t need Twilight . . .

I don’t need her what? Being a nice person and a good friend?

With an exasperated grunt, Dash flung the scroll at her bedroom wall. It bounced lightly off of the clouds and fell to the floor, which was strong enough to support small objects. The scroll game to rest next to a pile of bandages and a similar piece of parchment, which bore the seal of the Equestrian Courts. Written upon the second scroll was her reassignment of community service, which started tomorrow.

Dash fell back onto her side, brow furrowed and glaring daggers at the papers. She was . . .

Angry?

Sad?

Well she certainly wasn’t happy, that was for sure. Dash sighed, running through the emotional spectrum in her head, trying to pin down how she felt. Eventually, she decided that she was frustrated. Not frustrated at Twilight, of course, but frustrated at the world that everything was happening at once with no consideration whatsoever for her, caught up in the middle.

Dash sighed and rolled over in bed, looking out the window at Luna’s night and trying to fall asleep. Things would be clearer in the morning.