Shining Dash

by Ianpiersonjdavis

Back in the Saddle

“Uh, Shining Armor…is everything okay?” Spike asked, alarmed at the stallion’s long silence.

At that point the door burst open with Rainbow Dash flying inside the library, holding a pinkish red potion above her head triumphantly.

“I got it!” she exclaimed before noticing the crestfallen Shining Armor, motionless on the bed with the letter lying beside him.

“Hey…what happened?” Dash asked, dropping to the ground before him.

“I got a letter from Cadance…she woke up in the hospital last night.” Shining replied slowly.

“So?” Dash pressed. “That’s a good thing, right?”

“She broke up with me because I got hurt when I tried saving her…” he continued, his voice barely above a whisper.

“Wait, wait, wait, wait-time out!” Dash exclaimed. “Let me get this straight, you’re dating Cadance-as in Princess Cadance-the niece of Princess Celestia herself!?”

“I was.” Shining confirmed miserably.

“Oh…yeah, sorry…” Rainbow Dash apologized, remembering what was going on.

“Did…did she say why?”

“Yeah,” Shining Armor sighed deeply. “She said that she feels guilty about me getting hurt for protecting her.”

“That’s stupid.” Dash commented, cocking her head to the side.

“I mean, Twilight told me that you’re Captain of the Royal Guard-so isn’t protecting royalty like your entire job?” she asked.

“It’s more complicated that that…” he replied, shaking his head.

“Originally I had little interest in joining the guard, but when I realized that most stallions in my family had been a part of it, so I kind of felt obligated…but, I still wasn’t entirely sure it was what I wanted to do with my life.”

“So, what happened?” Dash asked, taking a seat on the part of the bed next to him.

“Cadance.” He said simply.

“I’d had a crush on her since high school and when I realized she felt the same way, I couldn’t have been happier, but there was one problem; she was a princess.”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Spike asked, sitting on the floor across from them.

“Even though, Princess Celestia approved of our relationship-her royal duties would prevent us from being able to see each other very often.” Shining explained.

“And that’s what helped you make up your mind to enlist in the guard so you could see Cadance more often.” Rainbow Dash concluded.

“And protect people, but yeah…” he turned to Rainbow Dash, desperately wanting to change the subject.

“So what’s in the bottle?”

“Oh!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed, remembering the potion she’d brought in for Shining Armor.

“It’s a healing potion!” she replied, holding it out to him. “It’s supposed to heal broken bones super fast!”

“And you just happened to have it lying around?” Shining pressed, curiously.

“Nah, I got it from Zecora a while back…”

“I knew it.” Spike muttered, but Dash ignored him.

“Why did she give it you?” Shining wondered out loud.

“Because she crashes a lot doing her stunts,” Spike explained casually. “One time she even broke her wing and was stuck in the hospital for a week, but that hasn’t stopped her from being reckless.”

“You’re not really one to talk-remember when you’re greed leveled half of Ponyville?” Dash growled back.

“Oh, yeah?” he challenged. “I’m eight-what’s your excuse?”

“Are you sure this works?” Shining asked, eyeing the fluid carefully.

“Well, we’ve never really tried it.” Dash admitted. “But, Zecora hasn’t steered us wrong yet.”

“So if it really works, then why doesn’t everyone in town use it? Or the hospital?” Shining muttered.

“Zecora said it was for emergencies only, Twilight thinks that because it works so fast and unnaturally, that the healing is really painful...and something about it being too dangerous to be used on anyone more than once.” Spike replied helpfully.

“Good to know.”

Given everything that was going on, it definitely seemed like this qualified as an emergency-especially if there were Changelings as close as Cloudsdale.

Slowly levitating the bottle before him, Shining Armor pulled the cork out before looking down at its content.

Despite what he initially thought, pinkish red liquid didn’t seem to have any scent before he squeezed his eyes shut as he pulled his head back and poured it down his throat.

The taste actually wasn’t too bad-it was like slightly watered down red wine with a bit of something else…like mud.

Shining Armor opened his eyes as he levitated the bottle onto the nightstand.

So far all he felt was a slight tingling sensation in his chest, similar to when one of his legs would fall asleep.

“That wasn’t so ba-ahhhh!” he groaned.

All of a sudden the tingling turned into sharp pinpricks before those turned into a searing pain throughout his torso as if his insides were aflame.

Rainbow Dash and Spike both cringed as they could hear the bones in Shining Armor’s chest and ribs snapping and cracking back into place.

Shining Armor was now panting as he stumbled back onto the bed and collapsed onto his back, while clutching his chest and stomach with his hooves.

After a few moments of him lying there, trying to catch his breath he turned his head to look at Spike and Rainbow Dash.

“You guys wanna go get some ice cream?” he asked, surprisingly quick.

The two exchanged glances of confusion and concern.

---

The stallion, mare, and baby dragon were all sitting around a table outside of the Lucky Filly ice cream shop.

Rainbow Dash couldn’t decide between chocolate and vanilla, so she compromised with a swirl.

Spike had gotten a scoop of strawberry after becoming disappointed with the fact that gems didn’t come with the shop’s variety of sprinkles and toppings.

Shining Armor immediately grabbed a large banana split which he quickly began wolfing down in an attempt to soothe the dull burning he was still feeling in his chest after Zecora’s potion had done its work.

Once he had finished, his face became flushed once he realized that Spike and Dash had only just started on their desserts, but relaxed when he saw that they didn’t really seem to care.

“It just doesn’t make any sense…” he sighed. “I mean, why would she do this without at least talking with me first?”

“Well, it kind of does…” Spike replied, sticking the ice cream into his mouth before biting the top half of the cone off and swallowing it.

“In my ‘Power Ponies’ comic, all of the heroes had to break up with someone because they were afraid that any of their super villains would hurt their loved ones to get to them.”

“Spike has a point,” Rainbow Dash added, licking the edges of her ice cream cone as it began to drip.

“No matter how tough you are, there could always be jerks out there trying to get you so they could get ransom money or something from Cadance…how long do you think you’d be able to hold out-especially when you get older?”

Inwardly, Shining sighed.

He didn’t like what they were saying, but that didn’t change the fact that it made a lot of sense.

The letter hurt not just because of its content, but the from the fact that it just felt so impersonal…but, perhaps Cadance felt like talking to him face to face would be too difficult or painful for her to handle?

That definitely sounded a lot like Cadance…

He looked over at Rainbow Dash; it was surprising to him that she would go through so much trouble for someone she barely even knew.

At that moment, he caught a glimpse of what looked like a bulky grey stallion with what appeared to be a black mane that obscured his eyes behind a building, looking towards them-almost as if he were watching them.

Shining didn’t want to jump to any conclusions of course, it would be best to keep conversing with Spike and Dash for a while longer and see if he was still there.

“Hey, Dash?” he asked softly.

While she was licking it, the top part of her ice cream began sliding off the cone as she watched it fall and splatter onto the grass before returning her attention to him.

“’Sup?” she asked.

“I just wanted to thank you for bringing that potion to me…without your help I’d either still be lying around the library or struggling to get around town.”

“Don’t mention it.” She replied casually, “I know firsthand how much it suck to not be able to move around just because stupid doctors won’t let you get out of bed.”

“Actually, I don’t have any nurses or doctors here to monitor me…” Shining added thoughtfully.

“Seriously?”

“Yeah…I guess Princess Celestia trusts me enough that she doesn’t feel like I need it, now I’m starting to feel kind of bad for exploring town yesterday.” He sighed.

“Well, you shouldn’t be.” Dash chastised, chewing on the remnants of her ice cream cone.

“Why’s that?” Shining asked.

Rainbow Dash swallowed the chewed up pieces of cone before responding.

“First, you never would have met someone as awesome as me.” She explained, proudly. “And second, I probably wouldn’t have ran into someone as cool as you to hang out with.”

Shining Armor was more than a little flattered to hear this, since he hadn’t felt like he had done anything particularly impressive or noteworthy since coming to town.

“Oh, thanks…you’re pretty cool too, Dash.” He replied. “So, how did you meet Twily?”

Rainbow Dash gave him a strange look before snickering.

“’Twily’?” she repeated.

Mentally, Shining Armor facehoofed at what he had just said; the nickname their family had for Twilight was supposed to be kept as secret because of how embarrassing she found it-yet, somehow when he let down his guard he slipped up.

“Uh, yeah…that’s sort of a nickname I have for her because she’s my baby sister…y’know?” he added barely above a whisper.

“But, I promised her that I wouldn’t call her that in public because it really embarrasses her so could you maybe just keep that between us?” he asked desperately.

“Yeah…okay.” Dash agreed before leaning in close to him.

Shining Armor’s face flushed as his ears flattened, for one terrifying moment he thought that she was leaning in to kiss him, but she stopped halfway across the table and whispered to him.

“Do you that guy behind the building over there?” she asked.

He nodded, his heartbeat returning to its normal pace.

“I think that guy’s spying on us.”

“Yeah, so do I.” he agreed.

“Hey, what are you guys whispering about?” Spike asked, having finished his ice cream.

“Nothing,” Shining replied, “Just some grown-up stuff…we have to go take care of something real quick-I’ve still got a few Bits left in my saddlebag-you can stay here and get some more ice cream if you’re still hungry or take it with you back to the library and we’ll catch up with you.”

Spike put a claw to his chin as he thought about it before shrugging; “Okay, see you guys back at the library.”

He then threw one of the saddlebag’s straps over his shoulder and began walking back home.

As casual as they could manage, Dash and Shining slowly cantered towards the alley where the strange stallion was watching them from.

When he realized that they were walking towards him, the stallion tried to trot away from them in a futile attempt to make it seem as if he was just ordinary civilian that they mistook for someone important.

They weren’t buying it.

As soon as he realized this, the stallion broke into a gallop as he headed down the opposite end of the alleyway.

Thinking fast, Shining pointed his horn towards the end of the alleyway before a large magenta barrier appeared, tall enough that it matched the size of the buildings it was attached to.

At this point, the stallion turned around to face them as his wings began flapping to bring him up into the air.

Rainbow Dash, who had been taken off-guard from Shining’s barrier stunt, snapped out of it when she realized that the stallion they were chasing was a Pegasus and immediately put her own wings to use as she collided with him in mid-air.

All Shining say was a cyan blur before it collided with the stallion and sent him crashing into the barrier with surprising speed and force as the impact caused a spider’s web of cracks.

This was quite impressive as everyone who knew Shining Armor believed his shielding spells to be completely immune to harm, including Shining himself.

Dash flew back a bit as she released her grip on the stallion that fell to the ground, sending up a small cloud of dust as he hit it.

“Now that we’ve got your attention,” Shining began, magically pulling the stallion up. “Who are you and why were you spying on us?”

The stallion let out a few small coughs as Dash descended next to Shining Armor as her eyes widened in surprise.

“What? What’s wrong?” Shining asked, noticing this.

“I recognize this guy-his name his Score.” Dash explained. “He used to hang out with those other jerks all the time back in Cloudsdale.”

“Are you sure?” Shining asked.

“Check his Cutie Mark,” Dash replied, keeping her eyes trained on the stallion’s face, specifically the part where his eyes would have been if they weren’t obscured by his mane.

Shining did as instructed.

“There should be three hoofballs.” She added.

“Yeah, looks like it’s him.”

“So Score,” Dash challenged. “Why are down here in Ponyville spying on us instead of Cloudsdale hanging out with Hoops and Billy?”

“Dumb-Bell is no longer of any concern,” he growled, surprising Dash by using a word far beyond his own vocabulary.

“What about Hoops?” Shining pressed.

“He will be deal with soon enough, there’s not quite enough love to feast upon, yet.” Score replied, if it really was him-which Shining doubted more and more by the second.

Dash looked at ‘Score’ strangely as if she had just run into a particularly repulsive form of exotic insect.

“What do you mean by that?” she demanded.

‘Score’ just chuckled.

Shining didn’t like this one bit-he was divulging information to willingly-aside from the brief struggle they had catching him it seemed almost as if he wanted to get caught.

“Dash, let me handle this.” He cut in, before releasing ‘Score’ from his magical grip.

“This isn’t Score.” He explained, cantering towards him. “This is a Changeling, the fact that he’s telling us this much means that he’s trying to lead us into some kind of trap-but, he must an amateur-because he wasn’t too subtle about it.”

A look of shock appeared on the Changeling’s face as Shining Armor called him out before it turned into a frown.

“And that’s why we’re going to have him take us to wherever the real ponies they’ve been impersonating are being held captive and free them.”

Comments

[flyinggirl]

Post the next feathering 6 pages soon! Love Shining Dash stories, but their so few and far in-between!

[Ianpiersonjdavis]

3729199

I'll get to work on them, then.

If you are interested in this ship there is a group called Shining Dash which is all about these two.

I plan on submitting future stories about this ship there in the future.

[Dragon of Shadows]

I’d had a crush

I've

“Do you that guy

do you see

He will be deal with

dealt