When I wake up, I expect Dash to be standing there in her windbreaker, ready to get into the best shape of my life for a fight that's quickly approaching. What I got, instead, was Pinkie Pie in her Flashdance inspired workout clothes, holding a tray with both roughly the same breakfast I had our first day together(the eggs are well cooked and not in a glass this time, thankfully!) and a note from Dash. As I noshed on my cinnamon oatmeal, the semi scribbled handwriting said, "Alright, I know your body is primed and ready for Las Pegasus, so take it easy this week and work on getting your mind right. I don't want you wasting 3 months of gym time, puke bucket intensity and who knows how much research because you got the jitters, got me? Don't go slacking on me, now, or I will deck you"
That in mind, we got to work maintaining my peak conditioning, this time using Pinkie's more relaxed and festive style of training. Most of time, it felt like one big party with her, more so when we got into some retro choreography, and actually started attracting a crowd of people, all of them following along, and turning it into an impromptu exercise class. Miss Cheerilee, especially, was quite into the groove, if the neon colored leotard and black tights mean anything, and asked Pinkie if she was teaching a class later on, after we all got done, and it was time to move on to the next part of our regiment. I wonder if Pinkie will take her up on it, and find a way parlay the desire to sweat and party into how she'll fill her bit bag.
Speaking of which, because her style is less intense and Dash's, we got in a lot of chit chat that Dash would normally greet with a stare colder than the wind during Winter Wrap. I was very surprised at the range of Pinkie's knowledge on stuff like hair care, relationships and world politics, of course explaining it all in very rosy terms-or about as rosy as you can explain one kingdom slowly taking over the world and having them adapt to its laws and precepts. What really caught me off guard, though, was how much Pinkie was willing to open up about her time before she got to Ponyville, along with all the heartache and struggle she had to put up with to get where she is today. Dash only spoke of briefly beforehand, so hearing her go into the depth she did made me realize how much her travels have shaped her.
If memory serves, over the course of the week, she said, "I was actually considering if I was ready to live on my own, when my dad told me the family business was going under, and we were about to lose our home. After speaking with the family, I decided that even though I didn't know how, I was going to make my own way in the world, throwing one last party with them before we all went our separate ways. I slept on benches, in barns, and under the stars, busing for bits the second after I woke up and rustled up some grub from the trash. You wouldn't believe the stuff people throw out, like sweaters, shoes, sandwiches with one bite taken out of them, even an entire roll up mattress!
"Anyways, it was during one of my busing acts that I ran into the Cakes, who asked me about what I was doing, and if, after a bit of cleaning up, I would be willing to work in their shop. They said if I did well enough after my trial period, they would also let me stay in the area above their shop, so I worked my tail off those first two weeks, giving it everything I had to bring some fun and bring in some customers! Sure, 2/3rds of my paycheck is paying for essentially living in an attic, and I only have about 100 bits a week to spend on food and other stuff, but it sure beats being on the streets! Besides, they've been great to me in my time there, and the money we'll get from this fight would not only go a long ways towards giving back to the shop, but maybe to my family, too, who I heard are trying to set the old business back up. Win or lose, we'd still get a lot from the purse Celestia put up, but if you won, we could do a ton more, maybe even throw a better afterparty. I mean, it's not like you plan to lose, right?"
It was very heart warming to hear her story, but at the same time, the more we talked, the more I started having nightmares about everyone involved, slowly congealing into a consistent narrative involving my trainers being kidnapped and taken to the Crystal Palace. Each time I thought I was able to get to who I thought was responsible, something kept defeating me before I could, and before they could finish me off, I awoke in a cold sweat, often well before Pinkie got there in the morning. The one moment she saw me wake up this way, she recommended I headed to the cave that dragon was sleeping in to go clear my head, even making a fun regiment out of the journey-I don't know how you can call climbing a mountain fun, but with her, it was less unbearable. By the time I got to the cave, though, I was ready to sit down, catch my breath, and meditate on what was haunting me all these nights. The deeper I got into it, the clearer the dream became, eventually becoming as clear to see as a photograph, a moving one that put me right back where I started, with Pinkie and Dash being kidnapped by a mob of Rarities and Fluttershys.