I Am Not Afraid

I Am Not Afraid

Story 2

Chapter 1: The Fire Starter

By: FluttersIsAwesome

I always loved taking walks in the morning. The birds were chirping, the morning mist was just beginning to clear, and the dew shone on the leaves and grass like crystal. These walks were also one of the few times where the forest was genuinely quiet, as most of the animals were either still asleep or just beginning to wake up. I made my way up to Ponyville at a slow, peaceful trot, taking in the fresh morning air. Everything was always so calm, so how could anypony have not have freaked out at the booming voice shouting “He’s coming to visit! He’s coming to visit!”

Before I could even reach the town, Rainbow Dash rushed up to me looking more excited than I’d ever seen her before. “Fluttershy! He’s coming! He’s coming! He’s coming to visit!” She was acting very oddly for so early in the morning; normally she’d still be asleep right now.

“W-who’s coming, Rainbow Dash?”

She let out an energetic squeal. “Nova! My brother, Fluttershy, remember him? I just got a letter from him saying that he’ll be here in Ponyville this afternoon to visit!”

As quickly as my worry had come, it was gone again. I was very fond of Rainbow’s brother, and he was always nice to me. The last time he was here was when he moved down from Cloudsdale with her, but it wasn’t a very happy time for him. See, right now he was a famous racing pegasus, but when I first met him he had a lot of trouble fitting in because of a rather frightening problem he had that made him almost dangerous. However, he was always sweet to me, and even helped me take care of my animals. I felt bad for him back then, I really liked him, but because of his problem he had a lot of trouble making friends.

“What about his, um, issue?”

She smiled and nodded. “He said he even found a way to get that under control as well! It’s gonna be awesome!” Like a flash of lightning, she rushed into the town, shouting “He’s coming to visit!” to everypony she possibly could.

I was actually kind of eager to help spread the news as well, so I quickened my pace and was quickly met by Twilight. “Oh, good morning, Twilight.” (I should mention that this takes place just a little bit before the princess coronation)

Twilight smiled sweetly at me. “Good morning, Fluttershy. Say, do you have any idea why Rainbow Dash is flying around like a lunatic? She’s normally not even awake at this hour.”

It took me a few moments to process the question. My new friend had been here so long that I forgot she hadn’t always lived here. “Oh, yes! Her brother, Nova Dash, is coming to Ponyville for a visit.” I returned her smile, trying to hide my excitement as I let out a small giggle.

She tilted her head a bit. “Isn’t Nova Dash that pegasus that’s been winning a lot of big-time races recently? I didn’t know they were related, I thought the names were just coincidence. Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

That was a question I was really hoping she wouldn’t ask, but, she was my friend and I felt it right to tell her. I motioned for her to follow me as I turned back the way I came. “Well… he doesn’t have that great of a reputation around here.”

“Why? Did he do something wrong?”

Nova wanted to keep his issue secret, but Twilight deserved to know. In fact, I thought she might be able to help since she was so smart. “He used to cause fires.”

Another head tilt. “Excuse me? You said he caused fires?”

“That’s right, Twilight. Almost burned up our orchard once.” Apparently Applejack had already heard the news and us as well, as she walked up and joined our conversation. “At first we all thought it was some kind of bad magic, but we finally began to notice that he was there every time one started. Now, I’m not saying I don’t like him, he’s a really nice guy, but a lot of folks are afraid of him because of this weird thing he does.”

Twilight backed away from both of us just a bit. “Okay, okay, hold on. You two say he started fires without even knowing it?” We both nodded, and she looked up to the sky for a moment. “That’s very strange. I’ve never heard of something like that before. Do you have any idea what triggers them?”

I shook my head. “He should be here in a few hours. Maybe you ought to ask him yourself. I’m sure he’d love the help, seeing as how it has kept him from making a lot of friends.”

She nodded and headed back into town. I had to go down to the river and help the beavers find a new place for their dam, so I said goodbye to Applejack and went off to do so. The river was a decent ways away, but I stayed at the same pace I had been walking anyway. It was kind of disappointing that Twilight had never heard of Nova’s problem before, but I guess it was pretty uncommon. At least he apparently had it under control now, that was good.

* * *

The issue with the beavers took a decent bit to work out. There weren’t many other good places in the river, and we had to move up at least half the forest to find a spot wide enough for their new home. Eventually, though, they got nestled in and were happy once again. It was almost noon, so I decided to make my way back to Ponyville as quick as I could. There was a large crowd gathered around the center of town, and all heads were pointed at the sky.

I found Pinkie Pie in the crowd and tapped her shoulder. “Um, Pinkie, is all this for Nova?”

She began jumping up and down ecstatically. “Yeppie! You bet! Everypony’s super excited to see him again! We even heard that he’s taken care of his special problem now! We’re gonna throw a SUPER party for him! I’m so excited, I can’t stop bouncing!”

At once ponies began chattering and some even shouted. I looked up and there he was: bright orange coat, dark orange stripes, and red, spikey mane and tail with yellow ends that made it look like fire. He looked around for a moment, smiling bashfully as Rainbow Dash sped through the crowd and gave him a big hug.

“Nova! I missed you so much! It’s so great to see you!”

He smiled and put his wings around her. “I missed you too, Bow. Wow, is all this… for me?” He had little nicknames for everypony, even those that didn’t really like him. “This is… amazing. Thank you all for the warm welcome!”

Everypony crowded around him to say their hellos, compliment him on his career success, mention how much bigger he’s gotten, things like that. Some just had to ask about the fires, but he chuckled and tried to get them all to calm down.

“It’s alright, everypony. I can assure you that I’ve found a way to stop those from happening, and it really works.”

Applejack piped up and patted his shoulder. “If that’s the case, then you’re welcome back at the farm anytime.” They hugged for a quick moment before Nova looked up and scanned the crowd.

“Hm… looks like somepony’s missing.” Nova jumped up and landed, striking a pose like a sniffing dog. He sniffed around playfully, making many ponies giggle. “Where is she? I know she’s here somewhere.” The crowd parted for him, and I felt a jolt as he pulled me into a tight hug from behind. “There she is! Were you hiding from me, Flutters?”

I smiled and hugged him back. “Of course not. I just didn’t want to get in anypony’s way is all.”

Rainbow Dash rushed back up to him, tapping his wing. “Come on, bro! Ponyville’s changed a lot since you were last here. Let me show you around!”

He seemed a little startled, but nodded. “Okay, sure.” Before taking off, he turned back to the large crowd of ponies. “I’ll be back later, and we can all catch up! Thank you all again for the nice welcome!” With that, they were off.

“He doesn’t seem very bad.” Twilight watched them fly off with me until they were too far to see.

“Oh no, nobody ever said he was bad. One of the nicest ponies that we know. It’s just, we all know the fires were because of him. As much as I don’t want to admit it, he is at fault for a lot of damage. He’s really not scary, but still ponies are afraid of him.”

She looked back at the sky. “No offense, but that really is saying something if you said you’re not afraid of him, Fluttershy. I’m going to do some research on this, tell Nova to come by the library later.”

“Okay Twilight, and no offense taken. Thank you.” I smiled again, and she turned back to me, returning my smile.

“You really like him, don’t you? It’s really not well-hidden.” She let out a small giggle while awaiting my response.

I felt my face heat up a bit, and I’m sure it was a bit red. “I do, but… please don’t say anything. I’m really too scared for him to know.”

She nodded again and turned toward the library. “Your secret is safe with me.”

I smiled again, heading toward the lake the river emptied into. It was a quiet, open part of the woods that was a good place for me to sit and think. My feelings for Nova had been very strong for some time. He was such a kind and gentle stallion, and sometimes I felt like the only one who actually saw the kindness in him. He was kind of shy and a little jumpy too, but I knew he was brave, too, at least with me. There have been many times where he put himself in danger to help me, like one time when I fell into a chasm picking flowers, he was the first one to rush down and catch me. This other time he led a team of pegasi into a tornado to move it away from town. He did so many courageous things, but he scared easily, too. It was very odd, he could fly into a tornado but freaked out when Pinkie blew a noisemaker behind him one time. In fact, I think that was an instance of one of his fires, as well.

Despite his shyness, slightly bad temper, and of course, his spontaneous combustion issue, he was still very near and dear to my heart. I sighed and stared at my own reflection in the water for a moment, reminiscing all our fun times. Nova always told me I was pretty enough to be a model. Oh, if only he had been there when Photo Finish had forced me into actually being one.

“So, have you taken up modeling yet?” I jumped as Nova’s reflection landed behind mine, turning to face him quickly. It brought a chuckle out of him as he nuzzled his head against mine. “I missed you, Flutters. I missed you a lot.”

He put his wings around me, and I pressed myself closer to him, closing my eyes. “I missed you too, Nova. More than you can imagine. Nothing’s been the same since you left, and it’s wonderful to have you back.” Being held by him made my heart skip a beat, and I would have been content like that forever. Something tells me he would have been as well, but he finally let me go.

“How has your life been? You look great.” He smiled and nuzzled me again.

I felt myself blushing again. “Thank you… I’ve just been taking care of the forest creatures, like we used too. It’s a lot of fun. I’ve heard all about your career; it’s nice to see you succeeding in what you love.”

Suddenly he stretch his wing out and covered my eyes. “Speaking of creatures,” he put his wing down, and I was face-to-face with a small red fox, floating in front of me with beautiful red wings. “You remember Velvet? I had a really powerful unicorn give her wings so we could fly together.”

The fox perched herself on top of my head, lying down and rubbing against me. “Aaaw, she’s gotten big. Hey there, sweetie.” I rubbed under her chin with my hoof, feeling her tail swish my mane back and forth. “Oh! Speaking of unicorns, have you met my friend Twilight Sparkle yet? She said she wanted to talk to you.”

Nova shook his head quickly. “Nope. If I have, then she didn’t give her name.”

I smiled again and pushes him forward. “She should be in her library, follow me.”

* * *

After a quick knock on the door, Twilight opened it and smiled at us. “Good afternoon, Fluttershy. Nova Dash.” She bowed courteously at the stallion, and he returned the gesture. She closed the door after we were both in and trotted over to a stack of books. “I know you wanted your… ‘problem’ to stay private, Nova, but Fluttershy told me about it. I decided to do some research on the subject, and I’ve come up with some surprising results.”

Nova looked at her and shook his head. “I appreciate the gesture, but you didn’t need to do that for me, I told everypony I already found a way to stop-“

Before he could finish speaking, Spike threw open the door, causing it to slap into the wall with a loud thud. His loud, excited shouts only added to the volume as well as he carried a jewel-filled bucket through the door.

“AAAAAAAH!” Nova yelled out in fright. To make matters worse, to everypony’s fear, a burst of flame appeared on one of Twilight’s bookshelves. He began to panic as he flew up to it and attempted to put it out. However, two more were now burning nearby by the time he had put the first out. “No no no no no no no no!” he cried, trying to take control of the situation.

Twilight, however, remained calm and used a bit of magic to dispel the flames. “You found a way to stop it, right?” She winked at him in a friendly way, beckoning all of us over as Spike began to apologize.

“Sorry, Nova, I-I didn’t know you scared easy.”

He sighed and turned to the baby dragon. “It’s okay, Scales. You didn’t know, but I’m actually pretty freaked out by loud noises, at least ones I don’t see coming. But, please, none of you say anything. I haven’t had anypony run in fear yet, and I’d kind of like to keep it that way.”

I nuzzled him gently. “It’s okay, we won’t say anything. We promise.”

Twilight nodded in agreement, turning back to her book. “Look here, Nova.” She pointed to a page with a picture of three pony silhouettes. There were two on top, one had two boxes inside of it and had a horn on its head, and the other had wings with no boxes inside. They were both connected by a horizontal line, and a vertical line going down branched off of it and connected to the bottom one: a pony contour with wings, but instead of boxes, there were jumbled arrows pointing in all sorts of directions. “Nova, do you have any unicorns in your family?”

He rubbed his chin and thought for a moment. “Well, my dad is actually one of the first males in the family not to be. His dad was, and his dad was, and his dad was, and so on. However, both my great grandmother, my grandmother, and my mother are all pegasi. Why, exactly?”

She pointed to the unicorn at the top right. “Okay, look here. Think of magic in a unicorn as being stored in two wells. I won’t get into the specifics, but basically that’s what gives a unicorn spell casting abilities. Since their bodies have a place to create and keep magic energy as well as a source to cast spells from, that being the horn, they are the most adept at magic, obviously. Now here,” she put her hoof on the pegasus at the bottom, “is you. You have magic power, but nowhere to keep it. Because of that, the magic is constantly dashing around your body trying to find a way out. By the looks of things, it appears that those fires you cause are actually this power’s way of getting out, and the catalyst that allows the magic to be expelled is your fear. Whenever something scares or startles you, that releases magic in the form of these flames.”

I looked over the page and the next one that explained what she had said. “Wow, Twilight, you really are smart. You seem to have a book for everything.”

Nova furrowed his brow. “Wait, if that’s the case, then how come Bow doesn’t have the same issue?”

Twilight’s eyes lit up like a teacher who had just been given a correct answer. “I’m glad you asked. My theory is that Rainbow Dash, since she’s a female, took more genes from the female side of your tree as opposed to the male, which would also explain why you and her look so different. That being said, since there are three generations of female pegasi before you two, that means the magic line has gotten slightly weaker. Of course, it’s gotten weaker on the male side as well, but just one more generation can make a world of difference. You know that Rainbow Dash got her cutiemark in a race where she performed a Sonic Rainboom, and I believe that this event was her catalyst. The intensity of the Rainboom allowed most, if not all, of her magic power to be expelled. If there’s any remaining, it’s nowhere near enough to be dangerous.”

It was my turn to interject. “But, Twilight, Nova had a similar experience when he stopped a meteor from hitting the flight academy. Go on, tell her.”

She turned to Nova with intense interest. He cleared his throat and recounted the tale.

It was quite some time ago, back when all of us were still young. Rainbow and I were in our second year of flight school, and he was in his third and final year. It was actually during the graduation test that it happened; Nova had just gotten the highest score for the speed track. The acrobatics portion of the test was underway, and Nova wasn’t doing as well. Just as he had gotten the bare minimum score to pass, and he still had half the obstacle course left, a loud rumbling echoed through the sky. All heads turned up as a large meteor was seen headed straight for the school. The entire area erupted in panic and screams. The instructors looked around, waiting for somepony else to do something about it so they wouldn’t have to.

After about six minutes, I shouted to him “Nova, use you power! The one you showed me!” He stood up from the place he had been curled up and hiding at and looked from me to the meteor and back. After a quick nod he took off toward it. The meteor was still far off, but at the speed he was going Nova would reach it rather quickly. I saw him look back down at me for a moment before he began to reach his top speed, and he was still accelerating. Before everyone’s eyes, flames began to burst forth around his body before they finally encased him completely. With a loud, resound bang, he blasted forward with so much force that he shattered the meteor into small, harmless chunks.

He was barely conscious as he fell back toward the track, but luckily the Wonderbolts had been attending, and Thunder Dash, his father, rushed up to catch him. Smiling down at his son, he held him up for everyone to see the red circle with the yellow trail on his flank. The burning comet that was Nova’s cutiemark.

“So there you go, that’s how I got my mark. I don’t know how I did that move, and I know it wasn’t a Sonic Rainboom. I called it the Burning Lance since it was basically a giant flame that came to a point in front of me.” He looked at Twilight inquisitively.

Her ears fell flat a little. “Wow, I’m not really sure. I haven’t come across anything that would explain that. Such a strong release should have surely emptied out your power as well. I’ll get right back to work.”

A sniffle was heard behind as Nova opened the door. “No, that’s fine. I get what you’re saying.”

I turned to him worriedly. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him like this before. “Nova, what are you doing?”

He turned to us for a moment. “I’m just a freak, I guess. No need to worry yourself with studying what’s wrong with me. I’m just a weirdo who was born too different to fit in… I understand if you don’t want me around. Don’t want to have anything else burn down because of me!” He took off before either of us could get to the door.

I felt my eyes tear up at his words. He made it sound like all our friendship was just a ruse, but we all knew it wasn’t. I chased him; of course he was much faster than me, but I couldn’t let him feel like this. “Nova! Wait! We really do like you! We all do! I do!” I paused for a moment, slowing myself down and whispering. “I love you….”