The first thing she tasted gaining consciousness was dirt. Dirt? She thought. Why is it always dirt? Grumbling, Rainbow Dash slowly picked herself from the ground. She looked around and failed to meet anypony. “Where am I?” She whispered. Amongst the darkness, Rainbow Dash could see a huge florescent sign above the entry of the building. Cursing, unable to focus her eyes, Rainbow Dash proceeded towards the exit only to find the hinges of the door would not budge.
“Locked.” She mumbled. She turned to find a back exit. “Yes!” she cried. Instantly the rainbow maned Pegasus took off but as with the entrance the hinges of the back door would not work.
“Well it looks like-” she cut herself short eying two large panes of glass surrounding the entrance to the building.
She could not control herself. In a flash she was galloping and gaining speed, wings already spread out. With a powerful jump, Rainbow Dash travelled through the glass, almost like a ghost, but in the process sent thousands of pieces of fragmented glass shattered in all directions. Onlookers tried to dive for cover, either from the tiny glass fragments or from the fast moving Pegasus. Rainbow Dash disappeared from sight bolting off into the clouds.
~***~
The clouds hung over Ponyville quite low, almost low enough to touch. Throughout town, ponies of all types were rushing from point A to B, fearing that rain may have been imminent. One figure however remained still amongst the chaos. The figure had not moved since the moon rose the night before. Fluttershy hastily opened her eyes allowing in painful glints of sunlight even as they were covered by clouds. She shut them once more. Instead she moved her right front hoof hoping to gain balance. Struggling, she eventually managed to emerge on all fours. It wasn’t long before she took a look at the orange-yellow mixture still lying beside her.
Did I do that? Obviously not. She told herself. Unable to recall anything that had happened in the past 24 hours, Fluttershy proceeded into what she believed was her journey home. It was longer than expected.
SMACK!
Fluttershy walked straight into a lamppost. Immediately her head started throbbing again. Her sensation of nausea had come back and she wasn’t feeling herself again. Trembling, she fell upon the pavement once more.
“Fluttershy?” A voice said. “Are you…alright?”
Fluttershy looked up seeing a blurry face. “Yeah, I’m…fine.” She could hardly recognize the face.
“You sure?” The voice continued. “Because you’ve been walking around that lamppost for ages. Plus it’s pouring out here and you don’t even have an umbrella.” The voice was starting to sound a little condescending.
“Pinkie Pie,” Fluttershy hesitated, “Is that you?”
“No silly! It’s your aunty Pinkie Pie!” The pink maned, pink coated mare almost shouted. “Come on; let’s get out of this rain.”
It’s raining? How could I not know its raining? She was working up a storm of questions in her mind. If this “beer” is so nice, then why does it make you feel this way? Her thoughts were interrupted as she saw the face of Pinkie Pie staring at her again.
“Fluttershy? Why are you walking, like that?”
Fluttershy could not make sense of her friend’s question. “Walking like what Pinkie?”
Pinkie Pie looked on in fascination. She had never seen Fluttershy act this way before. As if in a trance, the Pegasus was always clinging onto a wall, head drooped and googly eyed. Every fifteen seconds Fluttershy knocked over a trashcan or two. Pinkie Pie, with no intentions whatsoever, decided to join in on the act.
“WOOOAAAHHH!” Pinkie Pie managed to let out as she purposely fell over. “Fluttershy! You’re a laugh!”
“No…! I need…to see…Rain-” Fluttershy’s eyes failed. Her body went limp and she forcefully came crashing down onto the cold sidewalk. Pinkie Pie however could not make sense of the sentence.
“You need to see rain? We are in the rain! Wow Fluttershy! Sometimes I think I’m weird but now YOU’RE just being weird!” Pinkie Pie had just begun one of her many pointless conversations. “Isn’t it weird that they say ‘i’ before ‘e’ except after ‘c’? Well that rule doesn’t apply when you spell ‘weird’ because the ‘i’ is after the ‘e’…”
Subconscious, Fluttershy could hear Pinkie Pie’s voice slowly disappearing into the distance. Pinkie Pie, without a care in the world, did not realise she had left her good friend unconscious, on the sidewalk being bombarded with rain.