Between Chaos and Creation

Chapters

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5

Chapter 1

“Between Chaos and Creation”
by Donny’s Boy

“There is a long way between chaos and creation
If you don't say which one of these you're going to choose.
It's a long way, and if every contradiction seems the same,
It's a game that you're bound to lose.”
--Paul McCartney, “Fine Line’”

Chapter 1

The sun--it was big and beautiful and bright. It warmed you up, and it made you smile. It gave life. It made the plants grow. That was what most ponies thought of, when they thought about the sun.

But the sun could also exhaust you, could make you shaky and weak, if you stayed outside for too long on a hot summer’s day. And if you stared directly into the sun, if you got all caught up in its beauty and forgot to look away, it would blind you. It wasn’t the sun’s fault, of course, if any of that happened. The sun couldn’t help what it was or what it did. It would just keep on shining, lovely and lethal, no matter what the consequences might be.

Pinkie Pie was Fluttershy’s sun.

As the party raged throughout Sugarcube Corner, Fluttershy sat hunched in a dark corner and kept her eyes trained on the hypnotizing blur of pink that dashed here and there. The pegasus’ fillyfriend truly was a sight to behold--one moment the earth mare was over by the refreshments table, refilling punch, then across the room a half-second later, flipping over the record on the phonograph. And smiling all the while, of course, just beaming, beaming, beaming. Fluttershy felt tired just looking at her. Happy, too, of course, but ... tired.

Fluttershy sipped at her drink and tried to ignore how the thumping bassline of the music made her teeth rattle in her skull.

She tried. She always tried. She tried to ignore how the music jangled her nerves, and she tried to keep a smile on her face. She tried to see what Pinkie saw in these parties, and she tried to have fun. But Pinkie Pie had always been more observant than at first she seemed. When the pink pony glanced over, immediately she frowned, and there was a glint of disappointment in her eye.

Fluttershy allowed her smile to drop away, then. There wasn’t any point in continuing to pretend.

She sighed, but the sound was lost underneath the rumbling bass and drums of the music speakers. She knew exactly what came next. Pinkie would mope for the rest of the party, all the while denying that she was moping. Fluttershy would try even harder to enjoy herself, to convince Pinkie she was having fun, and the harder she would try, the more tired she’d get. And then the night would end the way that they always ended. Fluttershy would finally reach a point of such exhaustion and frustration that she would snap, would say things she’d immediately regret, and that terrible, terrible hurt would surface in Pinkie’s eyes.

She winced just thinking about that look, which she knew so very well. She had so many memories--too many memories--of those soft blue eyes turning dark and watery, cracking apart like a mirror shattering on the floor. If she never saw that look again, it’d be too soon.

“No,” Fluttershy whispered. “Not again.”

With sudden determination, the pegasus stood up, and she began threading her way through the crowded bakery. She ignored Rarity’s smile, and she ignored Rainbow Dash’s wave, keeping her eyes firmly on her goal. Pinkie was by the punch bowl, and the earth pony cocked her head as Fluttershy approached.

After a moment’s hesitation, Fluttershy leaned forward and gave Pinkie a soft peck on the cheek. Then she lifted her mouth to Pinkie’s ear, so she could be heard over the music. “I’m going to go up to your apartment and rest for a bit. Um, if that’s okay?”

Instantly Pinkie Pie nodded in reply, but her smile was too wide, too anxious. Fluttershy had to quickly look away, for fear that she’d change her mind, that she’d stay and try to provide reassurances she couldn’t provide. Instead, she quickly trotted off toward the stairs and felt her shoulders slump in relief once she successfully made her way to the apartment that sat atop the bakery.

It was much quieter here, although she could still hear and feel the thumping bass from the party below. Gummy came waddling over, and Fluttershy leant down to give him an affection nuzzle.

As Gummy wandered off after his greeting, Fluttershy glanced around the apartment. Her eyes greedily drank in every nook and cranny despite the fact she knew this place almost as well as she knew her very own cottage. She loved this apartment. She loved how warm and bright it was. She loved how it almost always smelled of freshly baking bread. She loved how it perfectly matched the personality and appearance of the pony who lived here, almost as much as she loved that pony herself.

And she did love Pinkie Pie. She loved Pinkie Pie so much that she was going to do the only loving thing she could do, at this point. She was going to break up with her.

Ten years ago, almost to the exact day, Fluttershy was having the worst day of her entire life.

All that afternoon, she’d battled her way through the enormous crowds of ponies that teemed along the streets of Manehattan. The pegasus had never been a fan of crowds, but growing up in Cloudsdale had acclimated her to them. A little, anyway. Sort of. Even so, Manehattan’s size and population made Cloudsdale look like a tiny village by comparison.

Eventually, though, Fluttershy had managed to slip through the throngs of ponies to reach her goal--the Manehattan Weather Control Bureau. That had been an ordeal in and of itself, too. Just working up the nerve to walk through the front doors of the massive and imposing building had taken ten minutes, and then it’d taken another ten for her to finally approach the bored-looking clerk who sat at the reception desk.

Only to be told that he’d never heard of a pony named Rainbow Dash nor seen a pony matching her description.

Fluttershy’s shoulders had slumped even lower than they had before. After quietly thanking the clerk, she’d reached into her saddlebags, taken out a tattered and much-folded piece of paper, and crossed Manehattan off the list of names written there.

After that, Fluttershy hadn’t had the energy or inclination to do much in Equestria’s largest city. Now, she slunk past all of the street vendors and food carts with her head down, ignoring the rumbling of her empty stomach as she made her way back to the train station. She paid for a ticket to Los Pegasus, the next city on her list, and then trudged over to the train platform to wait.

She tried hard not to think about how Los Pegasus was nearly as big as Manehattan was or how unlikely it was that she’d find Rainbow Dash in that city either. Mostly she failed.

“All aboard! All aboard, train #909 to Los Pegasus!”

As the crowd on the platform surged forward, Fluttershy found herself pulled along towards the train’s doors. She didn’t even bother to resist. Once inside, she managed to find an empty seat on a bench, and she leaned tiredly against the wall of the train car. As the car continued to fill up with ponies, chatting and laughing and jostling and shouting, Fluttershy shut her eyes.

There were days that she wished she’d never left Cloudsdale. Days that she wondered why she ever had. Then she remembered the whistle in her saddlebags.

It had been a present from Rainbow Dash--the only present ever given to her by her fellow pegasus, in fact. Years and years ago, during the worst of the bullying, Rainbow had shown up at school one day with the whistle held between her teeth.

“Here, take this,” she’d said, while unceremoniously tossing the cord of the whistle around Fluttershy’s neck. “You’re pretty quiet, ‘Shy, and I might not hear if you yell for me. So if you ever need my help, you can just whistle, okay? Then I’ll hear it, and you know I’ll be there in ten seconds flat.”

And Rainbow always, always had.

Cracking open her eyes, Fluttershy leaned over to unbuckle her saddlebags and take a peek inside. It was silly, and it was superstitious, but she always felt a little better, a little less frightened, whenever she held Rainbow’s whistle between her hooves. But as she poked her snout around in the saddlebags, she found that Rainbow Dash’s whistle was nowhere to be seen.

Her first instinct, as always, was to panic. And she did, for the first fifteen seconds or so--her mind went dark and fuzzy, her heart sped up, and the sounds in the train car roared like thunder in her ears. But then she took a deep breath. She had to control herself. She had to be strong, like Rainbow Dash.

After a second breath and then a third, she felt a little better. Enough that the screaming in her mind quieted down just enough that she could actually think again. Okay. The whistle had been there earlier in the day. She had checked. Which meant the whistle had to be somewhere in Manehattan. Immediately she blanched at the very idea of trying to search such a huge, sprawling metropolis as Manehattan. It was a struggle to swallow down that surge of fear, that sickening jolt of adrenaline, but as she did so, she remembered. She remembered that, during her entire day in the city, she’d only opened her saddlebags once.

“The weather control office,” she whispered to herself.

Just then, the train gave a jolt, as it began rolling along the tracks. Quickly Fluttershy jumped up and and rushed to the door of the train car. The conductor pony stationed there seemed surprised to see the yellow pegasus heading directly for her, to say the least, but Fluttershy knew there wasn’t any time to stop and explain. Instead, she simply dashed past the conductor and headed directly for the still-open door. Her heart was beating wildly in her chest again, so fast and so out of control that she almost feared it might explode.

But she ignored that. She ignored everything except the fact that Rainbow’s whistle was gone. Rainbow’s whistle was gone--Rainbow Dash was gone--and she had to get them back.

As soon as she reached the train car’s door, Fluttershy squeezed shut her eyes and jumped. She tried to extend her wings, to glide safely to the platform, but her wings had other plans. They stayed stubbornly glued to her sides, and she hit the train platform hard, rolling head over hooves until she finally slammed to a stop. Once the ringing in her ears had subsided a bit, she gingerly lifted her head and flexed each of her six limbs to check for breaks or other injuries. Fortunately, although there were some aches and pains, everything seemed mostly fine.

Fluttershy was just pulling herself back onto her hooves when the train station’s large clock began tolling the hour. Glancing up, she saw, much to her horror, that it was now four o’clock in the afternoon.

The weather control office, like most government agencies in the city, closed at four thirty.

She flew faster than she’d ever flown before, desperate to make it across town in time to reach the office before it shut its doors for the day. She weaved in between the other pegasi who crowded the airspace above Manehattan’s gridwork of streets, and she tossed out quiet apologies right and left as she bumped into ponies along the way. Finally, five minutes before the half-hour, Fluttershy found herself back outside the Manehattan Weather Control Bureau.

There was no hesitation this time, because there was no time for hesitation. Fluttershy burst through the doors of the building and rushed right up to the counter--only to find that the reception desk clerk’s attention was already occupied, by a bright pink earth pony.

“Ma’am, as I’ve already explained,” the clerk was saying, sounding almost as exhausted as Fluttershy felt, “I’m afraid we can’t hire you.”

“Well, how come? I promise to work super, super hard and to do my very best and not eat the snowflakes even a little bit! Well, I won’t eat many of the snowflakes …”

The clerk’s wings drooped as he peered over his wire-rimmed glasses at the pony in front of him. “Ma’am. I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but … but you’re not a pegasus.”

The earth pony gasped loudly. “You take that back!”

Fluttershy shuffled her hooves and stared down at the linoleum floor of the building lobby, feeling awkward. There was an unbearable tightness pulling in her chest, making it hard to breathe, hard to keep herself together, all but demanding that she ask the clerk about her missing whistle. But interrupting would be rude and mean and just awful.

She bit her lip and, despite her best efforts, a low, keening whine escaped her lips.

Meanwhile, the pink pony in front of her stomped a hoof on the floor. “Well, fine! If you’re gonna be a big old meany-pants about it and accuse me of things like not being a pegasus, I’ll just leave!”

Fluttershy’s head popped up, and she took a step forward, ready to approach the desk clerk next. But as the earth pony whirled around, her nose lifted disdainfully into the air, Fluttershy suddenly came face to face with the other pony. The very first thing Fluttershy noticed was the bright, bright blue of the other pony’s eyes, almost exactly the same shade of blue as she remembered Rainbow Dash’s coat being.

The second thing Fluttershy noticed was the rainbow-colored whistle that hung on a cord around the pink pony’s neck.

Fluttershy froze stock-still, for the slightest of moments. And then, with a mighty shout, she lunged forward and tackled the pink pony to the floor.

Chapter 2

“Pinkie, I think we should break up.”

There were a lot of words that had come before those particular words, and there were a lot of words that were still being said after those particular words. But for Pinkie Pie, the only words that mattered were the ones that meant that Fluttershy didn’t want to be dating her anymore.

Those simple few words, spoken so softly and yet without a hint of a stutter, were doing strange things to Pinkie’s chest. She almost felt as though she was drowning. Maybe she was, in a way. She just stood there and stared into those two soft pools of teal, and she was drowning in them, slowly but surely going under. The air in her apartment above Sugarcube Corner was, even at the best of times, overly hot and stiflingly thick--a consequence of the constantly baking ovens below--but right now it was positively unbearable.

“I’m sorry,” said Fluttershy. Her voice was barely audible over the sound of blood roaring through Pinkie’s ears. “I’m so sorry. I never wanted to hurt you. I never wanted … never wanted any of this, Pinkie …”

Biting her lower lip, Pinkie squeezed her eyes shut and began gently shaking her head. Fluttershy was still speaking, her tone as soft and soothing as it ever was, but the earth pony wasn’t listening anymore. She concentrated, instead, on trying to control her breathing and on fighting down that awful drowning sensation.

Then she felt a hoof touch her shoulder, warm and tender. Pinkie almost wept at how good that hoof felt, at how much she needed this physical contact. She opened her eyes to find Fluttershy staring at her with a sad smile upon her lips.

Quietly Fluttershy said, “This is why. This is why we can’t work. We just … hurt each other. All the time.”

“No!” The word exploded out of Pinkie before she even realized she intended to speak. “No. That’s not true, ‘Shy! You don’t … I mean, we don’t …”

Fluttershy’s terrible smile stayed firmly in place. “Yes, we do.”

“But … but I love you!”

At that, the pegasus’ trembling smile fell apart. Fluttershy quickly ducked her head, and her mane obscured her face. Pinkie Pie felt a jolt of panic as soon as she lost sight of the other pony’s eyes--it felt as though she’d had something stolen away from her, something important, something precious.

“It’s not about that, Pinkie.” Fluttershy shook her head, and still her eyes were hidden behind that curtain of long pink hair. “It’s never been about that.”

“How can it not be about that? That doesn’t make any sense!”

Fluttershy sighed, a long sigh that seemed to come from somewhere deep inside. The pegasus slowly turned around--slowly turned her back to Pinkie Pie--and began walking towards the door of the apartment. Still her head hung low to the floor, and her wings drooped on both sides.

Pinkie felt her heart stop. This was real. This was really happening. Fluttershy was … leaving.

Leaving her.

Ten years ago, almost to the exact day, Pinkie Pie was having the worst day of her entire life.

It hadn’t started out that way. On the contrary, the day had started out with great promise and immense hopefulness. Early that morning, before the sun had even peeked over the horizon, Pinkie had bade her family goodbye with many songs and much hugging. Her parents had just smiled at her, while her sisters had shooed her on her way. Certainly she didn’t want to miss her train to Manehattan, they’d suggested, as they’d waved their good-byes. The very thought of Pinkie wanting to miss the train was silly, of course--she’d been saving up all her bits for months now in order to afford this trip out to the big city--but she knew what her family meant. So without further delay, she’d bounded off down the road that led from the Pie family farm all the way down to town.

The village of Rockton wasn’t much more than a few houses, a municipal building, and a train station no larger than a shed--but that morning, as the sun finally had risen and bathed the land in its warm, orange light, the entire town had positively glowed. Pinkie hadn’t been able to keep still as she’d waited by the train tracks. She had danced on the very tips of her hooves and hummed any number of songs to herself as she waited for the train. Finally she was going to Manehattan. Finally she was going to realize her lifelong dream.

Finally she was going to work for the Equestrian Weather Control Bureau.

She hadn’t stopped bouncing on the train, either, as she’d stared out the windows in rapture and watched the scenery whizz by as the train rattled down the tracks. First, there had been endless fields of rock, flat and gray, but those had passed quickly enough. After the fields had come the much more colorful and much larger Ponyville. Then, after Ponyville, there had been still more fields, much greener than those that surrounded Rockton, followed by dozens of more villages and even a few actual, honest to goodness cities.

Pinkie Pie had loved seeing each and every one. Eventually, after hours confined in the train car, they had pulled up to Manehattan’s huge and ornate train station, and Pinkie Pie had been so excited that she’d nearly exploded out of the train car before it had rolled to a complete stop. But that was right about when things had started to go wrong.

She’d swam in a sea of stallions, mares, and foals as she walked along Manehattan’s teeming streets, and she’d smiled and said hello to as many ponies as she could. But instead of smiling back, those ponies had merely glared in her direction and grunted. In fact, no matter how brightly she smiled or how cheerfully she greeted ponies, none of those ponies ever smiled back. It had been truly perplexing.

Still, Pinkie Pie had persevered, as she always had and always did. She had gotten lost more than a few times along the way--somehow ending up on the campus of the University of Manehattan, where she’d given an impromptu lecture on quantum mechanics until the thaumaphyics department chair had realized she wasn’t actually a visiting professor--but, after some twists and turns, she’d found herself in the bright and shiny reception lobby of the Manehattan branch of the Weather Control Bureau. The key to all of her hopes and all of her dreams.

Where she’d promptly been told it was all for naught. She wasn’t a pegasus. She wasn’t a pegasus, and that meant they wouldn’t hire her.

Her hopes and dreams? Gone, in the blink of an eye.

It was at this point that her shoulders finally slumped and her step finally lost its bounce. Defeated, she turned around and prepared to trudge off to find some dinner or maybe a balloon factory--and instead was hit by a ton of bricks. Or, at least, it felt like she’d been hit by a ton of bricks.

By the time her head had stopped ringing, Pinkie found herself firmly pinned under a yellow pegasus with huge, desperate eyes and a surprisingly firm grip. Pinkie blinked a few times, just to double-check that all of this was actually happening, and once she’d confirmed that it was, she put on a grin.

“Hi! I’m Pinkie Pie!”

“My whistle!” exclaimed the pegasus, her voice high and tight. “You … you found my whistle!”

Pinkie glanced down at the whistle that laid nestled in her chest fur. “Oh, is this your whistle? It was on the floor when I came in, and it was really shiny and pretty and rainbow-colored, and I like rainbows a whole lot, you see, so I--”

“Give it back!”

Pinkie’s head snapped up again and, as soon as it did, the pegasus stumbled backwards as if suddenly frightened. The yellow pony scooted back a few feet, but her eyes never left the whistle around Pinkie’s neck. Still grinning, Pinkie Pie stood back up and shook out her mane.

“Oh, my gosh.” The other pony’s voice was soft now, nearly inaudible. Her wings were shaking a little, too. “I’m … I’m so sorry. That was so mean of me, and--and--and I didn’t mean to shout, really I didn’t …”

“That’s okay!” Pinkie quickly dipped her head, low enough that the whistle slid down over her head and onto the floor. She lifted the whistle by its cord and held it out for the pegasus to take. “Here’s your whistle back! Thanks for letting me borrow it.”

The pony’s teal eyes ping-ponged between the whistle and Pinkie Pie’s face. Pinkie just kept on grinning. She didn’t really know what was going on, exactly, but a big, bright smile had never done her wrong before. After a few tense moments in which neither pony moved, the pegasus reached out with a faltering hoof and gently pulled the whistle from Pinkie’s grip.

The pegasus’ long, pink mane fell into her face as she draped the whistle’s cord around her own neck and fidgeted with its positioning. When she finally looked back up, there was a hint of wetness in her eyes.

“Thank you,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

Pinkie giggled. “Aww, it was no biggie! It’s not like--”

She was interrupted by a pair of yellow forelegs suddenly wrapping around her and squeezing her tightly, almost possessively. Pinkie blinked in surprise, just for a moment or two, before she put her legs around the pegasus and hugged her in return. The other pony was warm and soft, and she smelled a little bit like lavender. Maybe, Pinkie Pie decided, today wasn’t such a bad day after all.

A second later, a loud cough drew both mares’ attention, and they both glanced over to see the weather bureau clerk pointing to a nearby wall clock while shooting them a pointed glare.

Pinkie gave another giggle as the yellow pegasus quickly disentangled from their hug. “I think Mr. Grumpy-puss over there wants us to leave so he can lock up, so why don’t we go get some dinner? I dunno about you, but I’m hungry enough to eat a whole hay bale!”

Feeling much more cheerful about her lot in life than she had just a few minutes ago, Pinkie Pie went bounding out the doors of the weather control office and happily skipped down the street. She hadn’t made it more than a dozen steps, however, before she realized there was something missing. Or, rather, somepony missing.

She looked over her shoulder and spotted the pegasus mare back by the front doors of the weather control building, scuffing a hoof along the sidewalk as she stared at Pinkie with uncertain eyes. Pinkie felt her chest seize, and she struggled to keep the smile on her face. Her heart pounded in her chest as she returned the other pony’s nervous gaze. Some mean, nasty corner of her mind whispered that her brand new friend was going to turn around, walk away, and leave her all alone again.

That couldn’t happen. Pinkie Pie wouldn’t let it happen. As cheerfully as she could, Pinkie called out, “C’mon, I found a really great pizza place a few streets over! It’ll be my treat!”

Still the pegasus didn’t budge. “Um. I … I don’t know.” She bit her lower lip. “It wouldn’t really feel right, accepting dinner from a stranger …”

“Nuh-uh! We’re not strangers!” Pinkie rapidly shook her head, fast enough to send her curls bouncing wildly around her face. “I told you my name, don’t you remember? So we can’t be strangers.”

At that, the other pony frowned thoughtfully. “But I still haven’t told you my name. I don’t think.”

“Oh. Huh. I guess you’re right.”

“I’m sorry.”

Pinkie wasn’t sure why her new friend was apologizing, yet again, but she waved a hoof dismissively anyway. It seemed like the thing to do.

“Don’t you worry your pretty little head about it!” And then Pinkie grinned, the grin that had always gotten her out of trouble with her parents and the grin that had always won her sisters’ forgiveness after she’d pulled a prank or two too many. “So! What’s your name?”

The pegasus opened her mouth but, with a furrow of her brows, closed it again. She returned to worrying her lower lip as the seconds ticked by. But then, finally, she smiled, a smile that was tiny but undeniably there, and she came trotting up to join Pinkie Pie.

“It’s … it’s Fluttershy,” she said in a voice louder and stronger than Pinkie had expected. “My name is Fluttershy.”

Chapter 3

Fluttershy’s legs felt as though they were made of liquid, shaking with every step she took, but Fluttershy forced herself to keep walking. She had to keep walking. She had to make it to the door, then outside the door, then outside the bakery, then back to her cottage on the outskirts of town. If she could do that, she would be okay.

Well, no. No, she wouldn’t be okay--none of this was okay, not at all, not even a little bit--but if she could make it to her cottage, she could finally allow herself to cry those tears burning in her eyes and to release those sobs lodged in her throat. She could just let go and break down, the way she so desperately wanted to.

But nothing ever went that easily for Fluttershy. Especially not since a certain highly-excitable earth pony had entered her life.

She saw a flash of pink out of the corner of her eyes, but she wasn’t fast enough to react--had never been fast enough to react, truth be told. Before Fluttershy could even blink, a pair of pink hooves were on her chest and a pair of huge blue eyes were right in front of her face. Fluttershy tried to look away, tried to resist, but those eyes had always called out to her like a siren singing to unwary sailors on the sea. There was no way of resisting. Not really.

“Don’t go.” Pinkie’s voice didn’t dance and didn’t sing, the way it usually did. It hung quietly in the air, thin and reedy, just a sigh on the breeze. “Don’t leave me.”

“Please, Pinkie. Please don’t make this harder than it already is.”

But those blue eyes narrowed in response, slightly but perceptibly. “I love you. I love you. If … if you don’t love me anymore, then … then okay. I can handle that. Um, more or less.” She took a deep breath. “But if you still love me … then you need to say that. Okie dokie? Because if you still love me, that means everything. That changes everything.”

Fluttershy said nothing for several long moments. She knew what she had to say. Knew what she had to do. From her years of helping her animal friends, she knew that sometimes you had to cause a tiny bit of pain in order to prevent even more pain later on. Like putting a stinging antiseptic on an open cut. Sometimes you had to hurt someone to be kind, even if you didn’t want to and even if the very thought of it made you a bit sick to your stomach. She knew the kind thing to do right now would be to tell Pinkie Pie that she wasn’t in love with her anymore. To give Pinkie a nice, clean break, without any lingering doubts or festering wounds or frustrating “what if?” questions.

“Pinkie Pie,” Fluttershy said at last, willing herself to not flinch away from those accusing blue eyes, “of course I still love you. I will always love you.”

Fluttershy was reasonably certain that she’d just been abducted by a crazy pony. Although it wasn’t really an abduction, per se, if you went along voluntarily, was it? In that case, Fluttershy reasoned, it was less of an abduction and more of a plain old bad idea.

Except … except it didn’t really feel like a bad idea. The Manehattan pizzeria to which she’d been led was small and relatively empty, and Fluttershy and Pinkie had grabbed a cozy little booth in the back. The pizza was warm and filling, making up in quantity for anything it lacked in quality, and Fluttershy found that she’d been hungrier than she’d realized. All in all, dinner had proven to be a very pleasant affair.

And then there was the company.

The earth pony who sat across the table from her was talking a mile a minute, so loud and so fast that Fluttershy’s head nearly swam. It was a little overwhelming. Actually, to be perfectly honest, it was a lot overwhelming. But Pinkie Pie was smiling at her the whole time, a smile that was bright and warm and friendlier than anything else she’d yet seen in Manehattan, and Fluttershy found herself almost involuntarily smiling back.

Finally, Pinkie paused to take a few huge gulps from her glass of soda, and Fluttershy sighed in relief at the sudden, blessed silence. As Pinkie guzzled her drink, Fluttershy took a moment to study her dinner companion. The earth pony was wriggling around in her seat, as though it physically pained her to stay still, and her huge blue eyes were bright, confident, happy, and absolutely, unmistakably crazy.

It was very much similar to a certain brand of craziness that the pegasus had known before, in eyes that were a deep pink instead of a deep blue. And it was remembering Rainbow Dash that led Fluttershy to suddenly blurt out, “Why were you applying for a weather pony job, anyway?” Then, wincing at how forward and aggressive that sounded, Fluttershy blushed and added, “Um, that is, if you don’t mind sharing. You … you don’t have to tell me.”

Pinkie Pie finished off her soda with a loud smack of her lips. “Sharing is caring, and that’s what friends do!” She leaned across the table, and her eyes narrowed. “But it’s kinda a secret, so you gotta promise not to tell anypony, okay?”

“Uh, okay. I promise.”

“Nope, nope, nope!” Pinkie shook her head, which sent her curls bouncing in an almost gravity-defying way. “That’s not how you promise something, silly filly. Here, I’ll show you … cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye!”

There were a series of hoof gestures that accompanied the earth pony’s little chant, and Fluttershy frowned in confusion as she watched. But then, after Pinkie finished and stared at her expectantly, Fluttershy lifted her forelegs and haltingly fumbled through a poor imitation of what she’d just seen while reciting the odd words of the promise. Some back corner of her mind wondered why she was hoping to fly when she was a pegasus and already could fly, but she figured it was probably better to keep that thought to herself.

As soon as Fluttershy finished the promise, Pinkie beamed. “Okie dokie lokie, then! I was applying at the weather bureau ‘cause that’s my dream!” Her eyes went soft, unfocused, and her thousand-watt grin dimmed to something more muted. “When I was just a filly, things weren’t always happy on the farm. Well, actually, things weren’t really ever happy down on the farm. Until the day I saw my first rainbow!”

Pinkie slammed both forehooves on the booth’s table, apparently to accentuate this part of her story, and Fluttershy gave a jump. The drink glasses teetered back and forth precariously, and only a quick yellow hoof saved the entire booth from a sudden flood of soda.

“I never felt joy like that before,” Pinkie continued, still speaking in a dreamy tone. “It felt so good I just wanted to keep smiling forever. And I wanted everyone I knew to smile too, but rainbows don't come along that often. I wondered, how else could I create some smiles?”

“Join the weather control bureau?” Fluttershy offered.

“Yeah! I mean, no!” Pinkie shook her head and laughed. “I threw a party, and it was a super fantastic party! And then I threw a bunch more parties, and those were great too! But parties cost lots of money, so I needed to get a job to pay for all of them, and that’s when the most super-duper fantastic idea ever hit me.” Pinkie’s small grin exploded back into a huge, broad smile. “I could be a weather pony! I could be the pony who makes all the rainbows that make everypony happy!”

Instead of replying, Fluttershy simply ducked her head to take a sip of her own soda. She didn’t want to be the one to tell this obviously well-meaning mare that she had roughly the same chance of working for the Equestria Weather Control Bureau as Fluttershy had of becoming a member of the Royal Guard. So Fluttershy didn’t say anything at all, instead focusing intently on her water glass and on drinking very, very slowly.

She felt bad, though. Surely, if any pony deserved to get the job she longed to have, that pony was Pinkie Pie. And yet …

“So, how ‘bout you, Fluttershy?” Pinkie’s voice caused Fluttershy to lift her head. The earth pony was leaning on her elbows, her chin in her hooves. “What’s your dream?”

Fluttershy bit her lip. Then she fiddled with the straw in her glass for a bit. Then she went back to biting her lip.

Her face felt warm--uncomfortably so.

Pinkie reached across the table to give the pegasus a gentle nudge. “C’mon! I told you my dream, so now it’s your turn! I can Pinkie promise not to tell anypony what it is, if that makes you feel better?”

Fluttershy bit down on her lip a little harder. It hurt a little, but that was okay. The pain helped distract her from the way her pulse suddenly sped up and from the way her mouth suddenly felt dry. From the way she suddenly felt very small and very afraid.

“Oh, I’m sure you don’t want to hear about all that, Pinkie. My dream isn’t anything that big or special, really. It’s just …” She paused as she tried to remember the exact phrase her father had used, in their last conversation before she’d left Cloudsdale. “ … just a foolish whim.”

“What, are you kidding? Foolish whims are the best whims!”

Pinkie was still smiling, and Pinkie was still leaning forward. For the first time since they’d met, the earth pony sat absolutely motionless, a perfect pink statue perched on the other side of the booth. All of Pinkie’s attention was on Fluttershy, and instantly Fluttershy felt the heat return to her cheeks.

It was uncomfortable, having that much intense scrutiny upon her, and yet it was also flattering. In a way. Almost pleasing, to have somepony care that much about what she had to say. Nopony ever really listened to Fluttershy, except for Rainbow Dash. Even then, Dash could sometimes be … easily distracted.

And so Fluttershy found herself answering Pinkie’s question. She found herself talking about Rainbow Dash, her only friend from fillyhood. Her only friend, period. She talked about the times Rainbow had rescued her from the bullies and the times Rainbow had tried to teach her to fend for herself. She told stories about sneaking out of the house so that she could wait in line with Rainbow for tickets to a Wonderbolts air show, about baking cookies to take to Rainbow at the hospital after a stunt gone wrong, about giving tutoring help to Rainbow in their social studies classes.

She told Pinkie all about Rainbow’s whistle. Finally, she told Pinkie about the day Rainbow Dash had just disappeared, dropping out of school without warning and without a word to anyone. She sniffled a bit, at that, and told Pinkie about how she’d immediately set out to find Dash the day after she herself had graduated from school. About how she had nothing more than what little she carried in her saddlebags from city to city, all across Equestria.

By the time she stopped talking, they were the only ponies left in the pizza restaurant except for the wait staff.

Surprised, Fluttershy glanced up at the clock that hung above the pay counter and did a double-take when she saw how late the hour had grown. “I’m so sorry,” she said to Pinkie. “I really didn’t mean to take up so much of your time …”

Pinkie Pie dismissively waved a hoof. “Aww, don’t be sorry! This has been tons of fun!”

“Thank you for inviting me, Pinkie. I … I had a good time, too.” Fluttershy frowned in puzzlement as she glanced around her side of the booth. “I insist on paying for dinner, though. You’ve been so very nice, and it’s the least I can do to replay you. I just need to find my saddlebags so I can get my purse--”

Her saddlebags.

Her saddlebags.

Her saddlebags had been left on the train. She’d been in such a hurry to get back to the Manehattan Weather Control Bureau office, to find her lost whistle, that she’d left her bags behind. Her saddlebags were probably in the Los Pegasus train station’s lost and found by now, if they hadn’t been outright stolen. Her saddlebags, and everything that was in those saddlebags.

All of which meant … she was alone in the largest city in Equestria without a single, solitary penny to her name. Alone without a single bit and with nopony for company but a crazy earth pony who wanted to work for the weather control bureau.

Chapter 4

“I will always love you.”

The words raced all around Pinkie’s brain, in ever-tightening circles, causing her temples to pulse and throb. Slowly, carefully, she removed her hooves from Fluttershy’s chest and took a step back. She felt almost dizzy from how fast her heart was pounding, and she drew in a few deep breaths as she struggled to calm herself down and to clear her head.

Fluttershy still loved her.

Fluttershy still loved her, and that meant there was still hope. There was still something to hold onto, something to fight for, something to believe in. And whatever else she was, good or bad, Pinkie Pie was a pony who believed. She was a pony who believed deeply, with all her heart, with all her soul.

But even so, she knew she probably only had one shot at this. One chance to convince Fluttershy that this could work, that they could work, and she needed to make that one chance mean something. Briefly Pinkie considered attempting to work out some sort of game plan--considered rehearsing in her head just what exactly she wanted to say--but almost immediately she tossed out that idea. Planning and organization were not her areas of expertise, she well knew. No, spontaneity and perseverance were where her strengths resided.

So Pinkie went with what she knew and what she was good at. She opened her mouth, and she let out whatever words might come. She simply opened her mouth and started talking, trusting that somehow she’d say whatever needed to be said and needed to be heard.

“Do you remember when you first came to Ponyville, ‘Shy?” Even Pinkie was surprised to hear these particular words come tumbling out, but with a tiny mental shrug, she pushed onwards. “You told me that you were surprised at how small Ponyville was. How quiet and peaceful it was. Remember?”

Slowly, gracefully--always, always gracefully, with Fluttershy--the pegasus sat down on the floor. “How could you … do you honestly think I could ever forget the day I moved to Ponyville?”

Pinkie grinned in reply. “Nope! I know you’d never, ever forget something important like that, silly filly! It was just a rhetorical question.” She leaned forward and whispered, in a conspiratorial tone, “Twilight told me all about rhetorical questions. She says they’re good for when you wanna make a point about something.”

Fluttershy simply blinked back at her and looked confused.

Sneaking forward just a tiny bit closer, Pinkie continued on. “And I laughed when you told me about Ponyville being small and quiet, and you thought I was trying to be mean, but I wasn’t trying to be mean! I was just laughing because I thought it was really, really funny to hear somepony describe Ponyville as small and quiet.”

“Because it wasn’t small or quiet. Not to you.” Fluttershy glanced down and smiled, very slightly. Her eyes twinkled in a way that made Pinkie Pie’s heart skip a beat. “You said that you’d never lived anyplace as big or as loud as Ponyville. Or, um, anyplace as friendly.”

Pinkie grinned even harder. Fluttershy did remember. Not that she truly thought that the other pony might have forgotten, of course, but … but it was good to hear Fluttershy say it, nonetheless. It was good to hear the words in Fluttershy’s own voice.

“And do you …” Pinkie faltered here, just a bit, just for a moment, before she was able to force her tongue and her lips to keep moving. “Do you remember what we said after all that? Do ya?”

“Yes. I … I remember.”

Pinkie Pie couldn’t sleep.

It was only partly because she’d drank at least five glasses of soda back at the pizza restaurant. That certainly didn’t help, by any means--nor did the omnipresent neon lights outside the window, so oddly bright compared to the pitch black night she was used to back at the rock farm. But truth be told, none of these things were the primary cause of Pinkie’s restlessness. The softly snoring yellow pegasus beside her was.

Fluttershy could be such a silly pony, really. She had apologized to Pinkie all night. She’d apologized as Pinkie had paid their dinner bill, and she’d apologized as she reluctantly accepted Pinkie’s offer to stay with her in a hotel room after much hemming and hawing. Then, she’d apologized when they arrived at the tiny, cramped room and she’d seen it contained only one small bed and a dresser much too large for the claustrophobic space. And when Pinkie had laughed at her and told her to stop apologizing, Fluttershy had blushed and apologized for apologizing so much.

It really was silly in the extreme. Fortunately, Pinkie liked silly ponies. She was, after all, a silly pony herself.

It had been ages, however, since she’d shared a bed with anyone else--not since childhood, back when she and her sisters had all huddled under a pile of blankets during the bitter cold of winter. She’d forgotten how distracting it could be. Instead of sleeping, Pinkie simply lay in bed and watched the gentle rise and fall of Fluttershy’s chest. She listened to Fluttershy’s rhythmic snores, and she smiled at the peaceful expression on the other pony’s face.

It was nice seeing Fluttershy look so relaxed for a change. With any luck, sometime she’d get to see Fluttershy look this peaceful in the daytime, too.

Pinkie Pie yawned.

Come the morning, she’d have to think of a plan. Or she’d have to pretend to think up a plan, which was pretty much the same thing. Successful plans were really more about style and presentation, anyway, in Pinkie’s opinion. As long as she kept up hope--as long as she believed--she knew that she and Fluttershy would be just fine. They had to be.

She yawned again, a yawn that was longer and louder than the one before, but she didn’t bother fighting it. She was warm, and she was safe, and best of all, she was with a friend. All was well. Finally, lulled by the snoring from her companion, Pinkie drifted off into an easy, dreamless sleep.

When she awoke, she awoke to dull gray light filtering in through the curtained windows and to the unpleasantness of a cold and empty bed. She blinked for a few moments, as a frown tugged down on her lips, and she tried to figure out why the coldness of the bed cut through her life a knife. And then, all at once, she remembered. She remembered that she was in Manehattan, and she remembered the weather control bureau office, the whistle, the pizza parlor. She remembered a pegasus with shining, huge eyes and a heartbreakingly timid smile.

Instantly Pinkie leapt to her hooves. She turned her head this way and that, frantically searching the hotel room for any sign of Fluttershy. But all she could see was a small envelope that had been placed on the edge of the dresser.

She took the envelope gently between her teeth and ripped it open. Then, just as gently, she pulled out the paper inside and laid it flat against the top of the dresser.

Dear Pinkie,

Thank you so much for buying me dinner and for giving me a place to spend the night. It meant a great deal to me, and I’ll never forget your kindness. I’m very sorry I didn’t stay to say good-bye in person, but I didn’t want to impose on you any longer.

I hope you’re able to make your dreams come true.

All the best,
Fluttershy

Pinkie Pie swallowed as she took a step backwards, her rump hitting the edge of the bed. Her heart pounded in her chest, a wild, out-of-control rhythm. Fluttershy had left. Her new friend--her only friend--was gone.

It wasn’t until she was bursting through the front doors of the hotel and charging down the crowded Manehattan streets, her saddlebags banging against her sides as she ran, that Pinkie Pie even realized she’d made the decision to track down Fluttershy. She made it nearly halfway across the city before she realized further that her hooves were taking her, almost of their own accord, towards the Manehattan train station.

The train station looked exactly as it had the day before and yet somehow utterly nothing as it had the day before. Yesterday it had been large and open and full of promise, an architect’s marvel of carved stone columns and polished tile, while today it looked imposing and almost hostile. It was strange, Pinkie reflected, how things could change so much and in such a short period of time.

But this was no time for philosophizing. Quickly, eagerly, she scanned the long rows of benches, filled to overflowing with ponies of every shape and size. Finally she spotted a familiar pink mane over by the station’s ticket counter, and she galloped over without a second thought and pushed her way to the front of the line.

“Hi, again!” Pinkie Pie gasped out, as soon as she skidded to a stop beside Fluttershy.

“Excuse me, ma’am,” said the pinch-lipped mare behind the ticket counter, “but you’ll have to go to the back of the line and wait, like everypony else.”

Meanwhile, Fluttershy’s mouth hung open, and her eyes went wide. “Oh! Oh, h-hello, Pinkie. I, um, I guess you found my note?”

“Yep, yep!” Pinkie nodded. “So, where we goin’?”

The ticket counter mare loudly and pointedly cleared her throat, momentarily drawing Pinkie’s attention. “Nowhere, I’m afraid. As I was explaining to your friend here, we aren’t able to accept I.O.U.s as a form of payment.”

Pinkie glanced back over to Fluttershy. The pegasus was staring down at the plain wood of the ticket counter with the saddest pair of eyes that Pinkie had seen in a good, long while. It hurt seeing Fluttershy like that almost as much as it had hurt to wake up in an empty room earlier this morning.

Clearly, something had to be done. And, just as clearly, Pinkie was the mare to do it.

Whipping her head around, Pinkie Pie reached into her saddlebags and pulled out her purse. She dropped it onto the counter and grinned triumphantly as all of her bits spilled out of the bag with a loud, happy clatter.

“There! Two tickets, please! To, um, wherever we can go for those many bits, I guess!”

Fluttershy frowned and gave a subtle shake of her head. “No, Pinkie. You’ve already done so much for me, and I couldn’t--”

“This isn’t very many bits,” the clerk interrupted, in a brisk tone. “This could get the both of you to Ponyville, I suppose, but not much farther.”

Still grinning, Pinkie hopped in place. “Ooh, Ponyville! I know where that is! I bet Ponyville’s a super, duper great place to go.”

“I’m sure Ponyville’s very, very nice, but ...” Fluttershy bit her lip. “But I was hoping to go to Los Pegasus next. To keep looking for Rainbow Dash.”

The ticket mare squinted at the bits spread across her counter and hummed thoughtfully. “Los Pegasus, eh? This would be enough for one ticket to Los Pegasus, but only one way.”

Fluttershy’s eyes lit up at that, sparkling more brightly than Pinkie had seen yet, even as the pegasus kept on slowly shaking her head. “Oh, no, no. Like I said, I couldn’t take Pinkie’s money.”

“We could go to Ponyville first,” suggested Pinkie, feeling her grin crack at the edges, reaching out to grab Fluttershy with a shaking hoof, “and then we could get jobs and earn more money, and then we could get train tickets and go to Los Pegasus and look for Rainbow Dash together!”

Fluttershy didn’t reply. Instead, wincing a bit, the pegasus gently pulled herself free from Pinkie’s grasp.

“Doesn’t that sound like lots and lots of fun, Fluttershy?” The earth pony stood perfectly motionless, her foreleg still outstretched even though she had no one to hold onto. She felt cold deep down in her belly. She didn’t know why. “I mean, don’t you wanna stick around and hang out with me some more and have tons of great adventures?”

The other pony wouldn’t meet her eyes. Fluttershy simply stared down at the train station platform and shifted her weight from hoof to hoof.

Finally, after several moments of terrible silence, the ticket counter clerk spoke up. “If neither of you is going to buy a train ticket, I’m going to have to ask you to move along.” She gestured to the line of grumbling ponies behind them, which seemed rather a bit longer than it had been when Pinkie had first arrived. “Now, ladies, if you’ll be so kind?”

The glares from all the grumbling ponies waiting in line cut into Pinkie Pie like tiny little daggers, but even so, they were nothing in comparison to the sheer ice that flowed through her veins. Trembling all over by now, Pinkie reached out to lay a hoof on Fluttershy’s shoulder. If only she could get Fluttershy to look at her, that terrible coldness creeping through her bones would finally go away. She was certain of it.

“I’m sorry, Pinkie.” Fluttershy lifted her head, but her eyes were closed tightly. “I’m sorry, but I just ... I can’t. I can’t.”

And then Fluttershy slowly turned around, Pinkie’s hoof dropping from her shoulder as she did, and Fluttershy slowly walked away. Pinkie Pie watched numbly as the pegasus trudged off, and she felt the ice rise up in her throat, choking her, drowning her.

The ticket clerk groaned. “Ma’am, can’t you see your friend is gone? Will you please just leave?”

Surprised, Pinkie turned her head toward the clerk, having almost forgotten that the other pony was even there. As she did so, she caught out of the corner of her eye the almost painfully bright glitter of her spilled coins on the counter. She stared down at them for several long moments, her brow furrowed, before suddenly putting on her very best smile.

Nodding towards her bits, she declared, “Will do! But first, I wanna buy a train ticket.”

The clerk merely raised an eyebrow.

“Yep, you heard me right!” Pinkie just kept on smiling. It was what she was good at, after all. It was what she knew how to do. “I’ll take one ticket to Los Pegasus, please!”

Chapter 5

“Do you remember what we said after all that? Do ya?”

Yes. Yes, of course Fluttershy remembered. She remembered that first day in Ponyville as clearly as if it had happened just last week. She wasn’t the kind of pony to miss important things simply because she wasn’t paying attention, nor was she one to mistake what was worth remembering for what wasn’t. For something that was meaningless or frivolous.

But Fluttershy would have been lying if she’d said that her heart didn’t skip a beat when she realized that Pinkie remembered--that Pinkie both remembered and wanted her to remember, too. Very quietly, the pegasus replied, “We both said that Ponyville felt like … like home.”

Those blue eyes lit up in response. “It totally did--and it still does! I mean, the Cakes are super great, and there’s Pound and Pumpkin, and of course I have all of you girls and Spike too! You guys are my family, no ifs, ands, or buts, and Ponyville is where I belong. I know it is.”

There was a “but” lurking somewhere, even though Pinkie didn’t actually say it, and Fluttershy nodded for her to continue.

“But there’s something I maybe never told you, ‘Shy. About the day you moved to Ponyville.” Pinkie crept forward a little nearer, close enough that Fluttershy could now feel the soft, enticing warmth emanating from the other pony. “When I said Ponyville felt like home, it wasn’t ‘cause of Applejack or Rarity or Dashie, because I hadn’t even met any of them yet. When I said Ponyville felt like home, it was because … because ...”

Fluttershy held her breath. She could feel a blush burning on her cheeks, but for once she didn’t care. For once, it didn’t matter. As Fluttershy sat and held her breath, the very air between she and Pinkie seemed to crackle and hum with an energy so tense that it almost hurt.

“It was because of you, ‘Shy. You felt like home.” Pinkie smiled, then, a smile as fragile and as beautiful as a hummingbird’s wings. “And I know we were friends for a really long time before we ever started going out on dates, but I think I always kinda sorta wanted to kiss you? Especially that day. I think I wanted to kiss you a whole, whole bunch that day.”

Fluttershy swallowed over the thick lump in her throat. Her heart beat so loud in her ears that she feared it might actually, finally explode.

Glancing away, Pinkie began fiddling with her fore hooves, like a nervous foal. “Kinda like I really want to kiss you a super, duper lot right now. But I know you don’t wanna kiss me right now and--and even if you did, I know you don’t like it when I grab you and hug you without asking, so I’m not gonna--”

And suddenly Fluttershy was kissing Pinkie Pie. Her forelegs were around Pinkie’s neck and clutching the earth pony tightly, so tightly that Fluttershy was almost afraid of hurting her, and it was warm and it was wonderful and it was perfect. Fluttershy held on for all that she was worth. She held on as though her life depended on it. In a way, she supposed it did.

Because she was drowning, and drowning was a scary thing, scarier than any dragon--but she didn’t let go. She dared not let go, because she knew she wasn’t drowning alone.

Only after long minutes did Fluttershy finally lean back and pull away from the kiss. Even as she did so, her forelegs still rested loosely around Pinkie Pie’s neck. “Oh, Pinkie,” she whispered, her eyes huge and wet with tears. “That’s why Ponyville felt like home to me, too. Because of you.”

She wasn’t entirely sure what she’d been expecting of Ponyville, but it wasn’t this. It actually proved to be almost overwhelming, how very not overwhelming Ponyville was. Behind the train station’s ticket counter there sat a drowsy stallion, snoring softly, and nearby there was a young unicorn mare exchanging hugs with an earth pony who’d just stepped off the train. Beyond the tiny station stood rows of cozy cottages and quaint little shops, with a handful of ponies trotting to and fro along dirt-paved roads.

This place could hardly be more different from Manehattan or from Fillydelphia. That much was certain. There were far too few ponies and far too much greenery.

Almost despite herself, Fluttershy smiled.

Meanwhile, the mare standing beside Fluttershy, who’d been shifting uneasily from hoof to hoof while Fluttershy took in the sights, suddenly took off. The other pony seemed aimed for the tallest building in town and was shooting through the air like an arrow from a bow. Startled and more than a little flustered, Fluttershy hustled to follow after. Nearly every pony along the way grinned and waved as the two pegasi sped by. While Fluttershy mumbled greetings in return, the mare ahead of her merely nodded as she tore through Ponyville’s streets.

Finally, Fluttershy caught up enough to to call out, “Rainbow Dash! Where are we going?”

“You see that big building up ahead?” The other pegasus briefly glanced over her shoulder, just long enough to point to their destination. “That’s gonna be the town hall, and that’s where we’re gonna find out about this place’s weather pony.”

Fluttershy frowned. “It doesn’t really look like a weather control bureau office ...”

“Yeah, that’s ‘cause it’s not!” Dash laughed and shook her head. “A town this size? They’re not gonna have their own entire bureau office, ‘Shy. Cloudsdale probably does oversight or something.”

“Oh,” said Fluttershy, blushing. Rainbow Dash had always known so much more about Equestria’s Weather Control Bureau than she had. It was the one part of their schooling that Dash had consistently liked and been good at, to tell the truth, and it was the reason Fluttershy had always assumed Dash dropped out of school. To go be a weather mare.

But it seemed as though Fluttershy had been wrong about that. About that and about a lot of other things, actually.

Rainbow Dash slowed down as they approached the town hall, and Fluttershy reached out to her friend with a hesitant hoof. Dash’s shoulder tensed as soon as Fluttershy made contact.

“Rainbow? I just wanted to say again how sorry I am that you and Gilda--”

“Oh, hey, would ya look at that? We’re here!” Dash turned to face Fluttershy, a shaky grin on her lips and a hint of pain in her eyes. “C’mon, let’s go find out just who runs this two-bit town.”

The answer to that question, as it turned out, was a very frazzled-looking earth pony sporting a brown coat and light gray mane. The two pegasi found her in a sparsely decorated room inside the building, pacing back and forth in front of a giant oak desk far too large for the tiny office that housed it. Fluttershy glanced over to Dash, biting her lip, but Dash simply shrugged in reply.

“Um, excuse me?” Fluttershy offered, in a voice barely above a whisper..

Nothing. The earth pony mare seemed not to hear, as she continued pacing and muttering to herself. Reluctantly, Fluttershy cleared her throat and tried again. “Excuse me, ma’am? I’m very sorry to interrupt, but we--”

At that, the older mare’s head whipped around. “A pegasus!” Then her eyes narrowed, in a way that reminded Fluttershy, rather uncomfortably, of the way a fox might look at a chicken. “Two pegasi, even!”

Rainbow Dash snorted. “Uh, yeah. That’s us. Two pegasi. Anyway, we’re here because we were wondering if you have any info on a--”

“You’re perfect! You’re perfect, and you’re hired!” The mare chortled a bit and reached out to grab one of Dash’s fore hooves. “Let me tell you, after our last weather pony, a pegasus is a real sight for sore eyes! Town nearly flooded completely. Utter disaster. Almost wiped out the entire orchard down at Sweet Apple Acres, and you know what that would mean for cider season.”

“N-not really?” replied Fluttershy, who watched with increasing concern as Rainbow Dash got dragged away.

The older mare chortled a bit. “Never again, I say! Never again will Ponyville hire an earth pony as weather mare, no matter how good her references are.” Suddenly she leaned in close to Dash, stage-whispering, “Though just between you and me, I think some of those references might have been faked.”

Instantly, Fluttershy snapped to attention. An earth pony. An earth pony who’d been weather mare.

“Where?” she blurted out. “Tell me!”

Both Dash and the other mare whirled around to stare at her. The earth pony looked startled, while Dash’s expression teetered somewhere between surprise and admiration.

“That is, if you don’t mind.” Almost involuntarily, Fluttershy began worrying her bottom lip. “I was just wondering where ... where that weather pony might have ... might have ...”

Rainbow Dash grinned, a grin that Fluttershy had seen many a time before and had come to know almost as well as she knew her own name. With a gleam in her eyes, Dash turned to the earth pony. “Look, lady, here’s the deal. You want a pegasus for a weather pony? You got yourself a pegasus weather pony--if you tell us what happened to the earth pony who got fired.”

“Oh, her?” The mare shrugged and took off her glasses, wiping them with the ascot that hung around her neck. “Well, there’s no need to feel guilty, if that’s what you mean. I hear she’s doing quite well as the Cakes’ new apprentice down at Sugarcube Corner.”

Fluttershy sucked in her breath.

Still grinning, Rainbow Dash draped a foreleg around the other mare. “You hear that, ‘Shy? She’s doing just fine. Down at Sugarcube Corner.” She glanced over and gave Fluttershy a wink. “Now, me and the lady here have to talk some business about my new job, so why don’t you go grab a cupcake or something from the bakery?”

Fluttershy swallowed nervously. “Are you ... are you sure?”

“Yeah. Everything’s cool. Get outta here.” Rainbow’s grin softened a bit. “And don’t worry too much, okay? After all, you’re pretty good at this whole ‘finding ponies who need finding’ deal.”

With a grateful nod, Fluttershy spun on her heel and went charging out of the town hall and into the bright sunlight beyond. Once outside, she quickly glanced around in order to locate a pony who looked friendly enough to approach for directions. But instead, she spotted a huge, towering cupcake--or, at least, a building that had been built to look like a huge, towering cupcake. For a few moments, Fluttershy just stood and stared in awe at the ridiculously giant pastry. And as she stood there and stared at its terrible majesty, she knew. She knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that if Pinkie Pie was to be found in Ponyville, she would be found in that absurd cupcake.

She galloped through the streets of the town, doing her very best to ignore the curious stares from the myriad ponies she passed, as she kept her eyes locked on the gloriously pink spire of the cupcake building. When she reached the building at last, a sign above the door informed her in cheerful lettering that this was, indeed, Sugarcube Corner.

Fluttershy skidded to a halt just outside the building, her heart hammering in her chest--whether from sheer nervousness or from the exertion of all that running, she couldn’t quite tell. She licked her lips and stared hard at the door. Maybe this wasn’t where Pinkie Pie worked. Maybe there was a second earth pony mare, somewhere in Equestria, who’d wanted to be a weather pony. Maybe ...

Maybe she was stalling.

But she couldn’t back down now. Not after making it this far. Besides, she owed it to Pinkie Pie to at least try, and she owed it to Rainbow Dash. And perhaps, whispered some quiet, hidden corner of her mind, she owed it to herself, too.

Setting her jaw and straightening her shoulders, Fluttershy stepped up and pushed open the door to the bakery. Inside she found a riot of different colors and sounds and smells. The entire room, from floor to ceiling, had been decorated to look like pastries and candies, just as the outside of the building had been. Her gaze kept bouncing from one corner of the bakery to the next, as she struggled to take it all in. Eventually her eyes fell upon the bakery counter.

Pinkie Pie was standing eerily still and looking straight at her, almost straight through her. Only now and here did it occur to Fluttershy that her sudden appearance in Ponyville might not be the welcome surprise that she’d hoped. It took nearly all of her willpower to not flinch away from Pinkie’s unforgiving and unblinking stare, to not turn tail and flee the bakery.

“I-I’m sorry,” Fluttershy stammered, struggling to fight down the urge to vomit. “I should have written to you. Or, um. Something. I should have done something. And ... and this was a very silly idea, and I’m so sorry that I--”

At that point, she was interrupted by a sudden blur of pink that knocked her right onto her back. The world turned soft and sugary and overwhelmingly pink, as Pinkie Pie crushed her in a hug as strong as a pegasus tornado.

“Fluttershy! You … you came to Ponyville!” Pinkie’s voice cracked, just the tiniest bit, before she burst into booming laughter that felt as warm as sunshine. “You’re here! You’re really, really here!”

Now that they were this close, Fluttershy noticed that there was a rainbow-colored whistle dangling from Pinkie’s neck. Fluttershy sucked in a breath. The whistle had been her payment for that train ticket out to Los Pegasus. It wasn’t worth the price of a ticket, of course, not in terms of pure money, but it had been all she’d had to give. The most valuable thing she’d had to give.

Slowly Fluttershy smiled, a smile nearly as big and as warm as the laugh of the bubbly earth pony atop her. “Yes, Pinkie. I’m really, really here.”

“So ... what now?” It wasn’t a question Fluttershy wanted to ask, but it was a question that had to be. “What do we do now?”

Pinkie didn’t answer for a moment. “I dunno. But we’ll figure something out.”

“You always say that,” Fluttershy murmured, but there was no real heat to the complaint, no edge.

“That’s ‘cause we always do!” Pinkie laughed, loud and pure, and Fluttershy enjoyed the gentle rumbling she could feel through the earth pony’s entire chest. “Maybe we just gotta … gotta remember what it was like when we first moved here. Just gotta remember how Ponyville was big enough for me and small enough for you, y’know?”

Fluttershy turned that over in her mind for a bit before replying, in a soft voice, “You mean we should remember what we have in common and why we fell in love with one another in the first place?”

“Yeah! Something like that!”

Another laugh followed, a patented Pinkie Pie laugh that seemed to fill up the entire room, to fill up the entire world, and Fluttershy couldn’t quite help but giggle right along. That was one of the best and the worst things about Pinkie’s laughs, how infectious they were. They always made you laugh, too, whether you wanted to or not.

It felt good, though, to laugh after all that crying. There was no denying it. As Fluttershy’s giggles faded away, leaving behind a warm, bright glow in the center of her chest, the pegasus nuzzled her nose into the other mare’s mane.

“It’s not that easy, you know. I still ... I still don’t like big parties, and I still don’t like scary surprises, and ... and ...”

“I know, ‘Shy. I know.” Pinkie Pie nuzzled her back. “But it’s a start, right?”

Fluttershy supposed it was. She supposed it wasn’t a bad start, either, at that.

“Just trust your good old Auntie Pinkie Pie,” the earth pony continued, in a gently wheedling tone, as she pulled Fluttershy up against her chest. “Sometimes, you just gotta believe a little. You gotta take a leap of faith.”

Fluttershy smiled into the softness of Pinkie’s mane. “Just a hop, skip, and a jump?”

“Exactamundo!”

It still wasn’t an answer. It still wasn’t a plan or a solution. But in that moment, as she breathed in the slightly sugary scent of Pinkie’s mane, as she felt herself relax against the warm chest of the pony she loved, Fluttershy found herself relenting. She found herself believing--perhaps not in all of the mysterious things that Pinkie believed in, perhaps not in the idea that love could conquer all, but she found herself believing in something even bigger and something even better.

“I believe,” she whispered into Pinkie’s hair. “I believe in you.”

THE END