//------------------------------// // Chapter 7 // Story: Echo // by Valley Fjord //------------------------------// A soft pressure nudged into Rainbow Dash's back, pressing right between her wings. “Rainbow – Rainbow Dash?” Hearing her name, Dash turned her head over looking for the source. The movement sent a twinge of pain shooting down her exhausted body. As Purple eyes stared into hers, Dash shifted where she lied “Twilight, you need to get your bits back for this bed, it's a piece of cud.” Twilight looked over the disheveled sheets of her spare bed, and smiling said “I'm sorry Rainbow, but after your landing last night it was this or the hospital.” she set a hoof on the mattress and took the cover in her mouth. When Twilight pulled the sheet it stopped half way off the bed its other end snagged in Dash's teeth. “Hey! I'm not done with this.” Dash said through her gritted teeth while flipping her end of the cover backwards. The movement made Twilight let her end go which caused Dash to cart wheel onto her back and be bared under the blanket. “Are you planing to sleep forever, Pinkie's going to be bringing us breakfast and I thought we would all eat together down stairs." Twilight reached for the sheet again but only pulled enough to uncover Dash's head. "She's most likely been up for quite a while now and she may be half way done with getting everything together for today.” “Yeah your right.” Rainbow Dash said. She craned her neck towards the wall clock to see what time it was. “but if she's only half done - that still leaves twenty to thirty minutes, right?” her hooves shoot out from under the covers and took hold of Twilight. “Come-here you egg head.” “Wait Rainbow what are you doing?!” All Dash could think of was the last two days she spent hauling Twilight around on her back and that this was as good a time as any for some payback. Their experiment the night before had a perfect outcome and both ponies plus Spike agreed that all three of the recordings they got gave it justice. And they even gave a cheer as they woke up the next morning and saw the blizzard had moved on. With a slightly smaller load then the day before they strapped themselves together at record speed and readied to take off. The reason for Twilight saying Dash nearly needing to visit the hospital was from her swollen pride. Everything was going so well that she had pushed herself even harder on the return flight until she had passed out on Twilight's doorstep. If not for the returned strength of Twilight's magic they both might have spent the night on the door step. She used her magic both to unstrap herself and to carry Dash up to her bedroom loft. Twilight had known that she was just as travel worn and she wanted to drop into her own bed but there was one pony she had to talk to first and of course it was Pinkie Pie. The reason was that she was the only one of her friends that could get all her other friends together at a moments notice and have an entire party planed out at the same time. She figured she could also order some breakfast so neither Dash or herself would have to do much first thing in the morning. Twilight had trotted over to Sugar Cube Corner and managed to get pass the door just before Miss Cake closed it and with Pinkie helping clean up at the time it took only a second for Twilight to be tackled. The laughter of her friend however did little to the exhaustion that Twilight felt and as the jubilation of their meeting wore out, Twilight brought the purpose of her visit to bear. The morning long party that Twilight planned out was far from her mind as the sensitive spots on her hooves were prodded by the tips of Dash's feathers. The excited voices of the ponies made the top of the library tree ring with sounds of laughter. When the group of their four friends approached Twilight's house, they stop just outside. Pinkie Pie, with a small cart of food strapped to her back, looked up to the top window, smiled, and told the others “It sounds like we might be too late for the start of the party.” To Pinkie's right, Apple Jack mirrored the grin “Non-sense Pinkie. This here party started the moment you said they got back. All that's going on up there is them two celebrating getting back safe and sound.” Fluttershy and Rarity were the first to enter, followed by Apple Jack then Pinkie pie and finally the cart. The first two went about spreading the food out with Pinkie while Apple Jack headed up stairs, half way up though she stopped. Spike had dragged himself part of the way down and with his blanket in hand he had passed back out in the stair way. She stepped over the dozed dragon and as she reached the top of the stairs she was greeted immediately with screaming laughter and a plead. “Apple Jack, Help me!” Twilight shirked out between giggles while her head hung out from under her covers and off the side of the bed. “Rainbow won't let me go!” The center of the blanket on top of Twilight rose up with the shape of a ponies head. “Well hey AJ, when did you get here?” Dash said with a sheepish tone, she pawed a hoof at the edge of the cover and reveled her head; A pink tint and tear tracks coated her cheeks. “Only a moment ago Dash. Me and the girls showed up just when Twi there told us to.” Twilight breathed a deep sigh at the relieve coming from her hooves. She rolled herself out of the bed “That was fun and all but,” she stumbled once while trying to get to the loft stairs then looking back to Rainbow Dash. “Come on Rainbow, we have an adventure to show our friends.” The three quickly came down stairs to the party that had been set up on the main floor. It looked like it was another Pinkie Pie original party with the only exception from the bright happy style being that the entire main floor was dark as night. The only light in the room came from the projector that had been set up in the center of the room with snacks and drinks surrounding it. The projector’s screen was also ready to go, it was stretched up next to the stairs and covered in streamers. Twilight and Dash were expecting the decorations but Twilight did not expect the room to have been darkened and the projector to have already been set up. Confused and distant expressions held to Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie's faces. Fluttershy was the first to pull away from what had caught all of their attention to speak; with a concerned tone. “Pinkie thought we could set everything up. Since – since you and Rainbow Dash sounded like you were having fun...” her voice lowered even more as she added a quick “Sorry.” “There's nothing to be sorry about,” Dash boasted with her prideful spirit. “You all just couldn't wait to see how awesome I really am.” she leaped into the air and flew around to face the screen from above her friends. Twilight's image was frozen in the picture, again adjusting the lens. When the real Twilight walked over to the proper side of the screen a similar distant look crossed her face. With a soft clearing of her throat she backed up to the projector, stood next to Pinkie and looked at it with forced concentration. “Pinkie, are you sure you have it all set up right?” Pinkie swallowed deeply, her eyes darting between Twilight and Rainbow Dash twice before she nods her head. “Of course, When I saw it laying by the door where you left it I thought.” she pauses to take a dramatic deep breath and a glimmer crossed her eyes. “'I'll just pull that all out so that Twilight can get it going quicker' but then I found a book on top of everything and it said how to put it together and I did that so you wouldn't have to worry about anything...” “Yeah yeah, you got it working, great job Pinkie. Now lets watch and see how awesome I am.” Dash blurted out, waving a hoof towards Pinkie while not taking her eyes off the screen. A tentative purple hoof pressed the play button on the projector. Twilight's face held on the screen for a moment before it blinked off to be replaced with Rainbow Dash flying away. She bulged in and out of focus several times and when they all saw the silver whistle on her back Apple Jack began to snicker. A indignant glare from Dash stopped it before spike let off his bletch of fire. When the pitch of the whistle started to grow throughout the room Rainbow Dash shouted “Twi!? Can't you skip this part?” All six ponies flinched from the sound as Twilight fumbled to pause it, when she finally managed to hit it Rarity curtly complained “That was certainly an unpleasant sound.” “Sorry girls, that was from when I was trying to tune everything in. I'll just move it forward some.” A loud whirling sound came from the projector and when the picture comes back Rainbow Dash was again shown flying away from the screen. The group stayed silent as Dash's image faded into nothing but a blue pin prick that lifted out of the white valley walls and toward the top of the screen. She then dropped down, merging with the distant walls that took up most of the screen. “Aw yeah, this is my big moment.” Dash cheered while grabbing hold of Apple Jack and shaking her with excitement. “Just you all wait and see how great I am!” “Twilight, she's ready.” Spike's voice came from the recorder accompanied by the rumble of his stomach. Next from the machine came Twilight shouting “Not yet!” a short moment later the bright green flare came from behind where the recorder was set. All six watched the screen with intent glee as a blue speck once again lifted high into the air then began to dive. Dash grinned broadly at the memory of what she had done and at finally getting to see what others saw when she did her thing. The white cloud formed behind Dash as she came more and more into view, her flapping wings growing just as intense. The same anticipation Twilight felt then was now visible in all her friends as the air around Dash contracted into a funnel shape. The explosion of color lit up the valley with intense hues. All six faces started to glow with excitement as they watched the ring of burning color spread out. The sound and color of the shock wave quickly reached the edge of the valley and as they began hitting the walls and floor they spread like ripples in water. The room was radiated in the colorful light as a fiery rainbow miasma began to form in the valley. The first cheer went out “Spike, that's it...” Twilight's voices yelled. It came from the projector in stammering bursts. “Rainbow Dash really did it... RAINBOW DASH!” She yelled just as Dash streaked by, above and to the left of the screen; her speed made the machine behind all the ponies howl and the image shudder. “She's passed, get ready Spike.” the recording said as the arcs of racing color closed the distance. “Everypony, you might want to cover your ears!” The real Twilight said before folding her's back. The image of rainbow clouds blotted out the night sky and as a wave of the color broke over the edge of the mountain and into the lens the library tree-house thrummed with a sound that resonated again and again. Its strength even from just a recoding was enough to knock several leaves from the branches outside and cause half its listeners to cover their entire heads from the volume.