That Sunlit Glow

by Tiger|Pony

Chapter 3: Synthesis

After she messed up a Misty Flip and broke her right avian humerus, Rainbow Dash's friends rallied round admirably to get her to the hospital without hurting her any more. Rarity and Twilight Sparkle carried her with magic, while Pinkie Pie cleared the streets ahead of them, and between the three of them they set a new town record for the 1000m sprint.

Fluttershy stayed by her side with characteristic sympathy all the time she was unconscious. The normally-timid pegasus stroked her head, kept her from rolling onto her broken wing, even hummed quietly to her when she murmured in her sleep. She seemed to glow when she tended to her injured friend, as if she was happy to be able to do something. Watching Applejack chew her bottom lip and Rarity pace the hallway in powerless frustration, Twilight understood why Fluttershy was happy that she could do something - but that seemed too simple.

When Rainbow Dash began to move and whimper as if she was having a bad dream, Fluttershy sent Twilight to fetch the others into the room. It would be good for her to see all her friends there and waiting. Besides, someone had to check that Pinkie Pie wasn't going to roll in the party cannon for a 'Welcome Back (to Consciousness)' party.

When the doctor explained what had happened - a slight fracture, but nothing serious, and a few days in bed - Fluttershy argued first with his methods and then with his decision to keep Dash in the hospital. She would be much better taken care of in the company of a friend, she argued, and there were tears in her eyes as she argued it.

With the others gathered around the bed, and with Fluttershy's considerable fringe obscuring her from them, Twilight was pretty sure she was the only pony who spotted that.

They came back to visit the very next day, and for the first time, Twilight Sparkle noticed how different were the two versions of Fluttershy that she saw. Around Rainbow Dash, the pegasus didn't seem to be able to keep a smile from playing about her lips. Out in the waiting room she had preened her wings, nibbling off a couple of loose feathers, and when she'd noticed Twilight staring she'd first blushed, then hidden behind her that bright fringe as if worried.

Was it hero-worship, as Rarity had said the last time they'd sat down to tea and the conversation had turned to their pegasus friends? Was this tangible warmth radiating from Fluttershy really just that?

If it was something more, there was no way that Rainbow Dash reciprocated her feelings. The two were dismissed on the flimsiest of excuses, their game ignored, their company unwanted. Maybe the pegasus didn't like anypony seeing her injured and unable to move; that was certainly all that Twilight Sparkle could think of.

In any case, Fluttershy had taken to the sky before the unicorn even made it out of the front door. And though Twilight wasn't an expert in the physics of pegasus flight (yet), nonetheless, from the way she was shaking on her flight path, she could have sworn her friend was crying.

-----

Twilight Sparkle sighed in exasperation at the mess on the floor before her, and, in Spike's absence, added "Tidy Up" back onto the short-term mental checklist. She'd just gotten rid of it, too, when Rainbow Dash barrelled through her front door and right into her carefully-organised research pile. She knew she shouldn't have given the dragon the day off; now her Coat-Colour-Changing spell would be set back a day at least.

Several clues immediately gave away the fact that something was seriously wrong. Firstly, it wasn't an athlete's run that brought the pegasus in through her door, but a panicked run, that of a mare being chased by something big. Then there were the sore and sleepless eyes, the listless mane, the way she didn't even seem particularly eager to scramble to her hooves as if nothing had happened. But what worried her the most was simply this: why was Rainbow Dash, of all ponies, running when she could be flying?

"Rainbow?" she just about suppressed the urge to shout at her for ruining her notes, but the words still came out a little too loud. "What the hay is this all about?" Rainbow Dash, swaying slightly, cringed under the unicorn's glare, and told her that if she wanted to know, she might have to provide coffee.

-----

"Anyway, Pinkie Pie was just so cheerful; it's like she doesn't remember what it felt like to feel rejected!" Rainbow Dash finished her coffee at about the same time as she finished her story. Twilight Sparkle didn't look happy. "I mean, that time when-"

"-Rainbow, are you sure Pinkie Pie's really the pony you're annoyed with right now?" Twilight said, as if she were stating the obvious. It worked, too. The pegasus' head fell, and her eyes lost all of their aggression. "It sounds like you're angry with Fluttershy. And I'm not sure you should be angry at all."

Rainbow Dash was momentarily stunned. Having never confided in anypony before, nopony had ever told her before that she might be in the wrong about this. "I... but... whaddaya mean? I'm just trying to make her see how awesome it could be if we could, y'know, go places together. And do stuff. I wanna take her to the Cloudsdale Aviary - I just know she'd love it! My cousin Spin works there, monitoring the bird migrations as they go through Equestria, and trust me, those two could talk for hours. But she's so afraid that anypony might catch on... that it feels like she's ashamed of me." Dash's voice lost its edge, and as it did, some of the colour seemed to leave her fur. "She's even started finding excuses not to come to my races now."

Twilight Sparkle took a moment to run that through her head. She'd have to talk to Fluttershy, clearly. If there was one thing in all the world that would upset Rainbow Dash, it would be that. But she didn't get the chance to be sympathetic before the pegasus piped up again; "And y'know what's really ticking me off? I bought her flowers the other day and she got all quiet 'cos 'What if someone asked who they were for?'" Dash's imitation of Fluttershy was neither accurate nor flattering. A little shocked, Twilight's frown deepened.

"Hey, you hold your horses; you know she's shy and she's your marefriend! We all know that Fluttershy could do with lightening up a little, but that's no need to get angry when she's just being a little sensitive."

"Exactly! So I'm trying to help her be not sensitive! Unsensitive! Insensitive? She'll have more fun if she's not looking over her shoulder all the time." Rainbow Dash rolled her head out of long-learned habit, and something in her neck quietly went 'crack'. "Anyway, it really messes up your flying," she added, as an afterthought.

Twilight Sparkle stood up, and without looking, telekinetically fetched a thin magazine from the top of a bookshelf. Its front, mostly taken up with a picture of two ponies Rainbow Dash didn't know, bore the name Fillyfooler in deep blue text. Dash's eyes bulged. "Twilight?!" she choked.

"I was curious," the unicorn deadpanned. "Besides, it had a five-page interview with Clockwork, who're pretty much the world's foremost experts on magical music. Not that either of them had much to say about music," she added sourly. Her horn glowed, and the pages flipped through until she reached a page titled 'Coming Out in the Sticks'.

"'So you're young, fit, and up for anything with sexy curves and sensible horseshoes, but you're finding it hard to come out of the hayloft.' Twilight, who writes this stuff?" Rainbow Dash frowned, but kept reading. "I'm not gonna get my mane cut short... I'm not telling friends and family I'm secretly a superhero... I'm definitely not moving to Sopo - it's full of flanksters! And can you see Fluttershy doing any of this stuff?" The idea of a buzz-cut Fluttershy in a beret was briefly hilarious, and for a brief and sparkling moment the pegasus' heart lifted like it had always used to.

"Alright, maybe it isn't that useful." The unicorn blushed and flipped the magazine shut. "More coffee?" she said, changing the subject. Wait a minute. "Rainbow?"

Rainbow Dash didn't respond. The unicorn, uncharacteristically tactful, retreated.

The pegasus' heart seemed to have fallen down a well into which no light penetrated. For a moment, she'd remembered that affection she'd once felt daily, that wordless, heart-deep warmth that made the world explode into colourful song. Just for a moment.

Once upon a time she'd helped Fluttershy high enough to see the curve of the horizon. They had travelled for hours slowly upwards, flying diagonally to rest atop nearby clouds, and the sky above had darkened and darkened to a deep, pure blue as they fought their way higher. She had taken her marefriend by the hoof to helped her climb higher and higher, to the highest clouds it was safe to sit on - and there, Fluttershy had unrolled the sandwiches and poured the water-canteens full of fresh, delicious juice, and they had picnicked as only pegasi know how.

Their cloud had blown fast across the lonely vastness of a sky they seemed to own. Fluttershy had lain naming the clouds below, sending her marefriend to buck them back into shape when they disobeyed her naming. Rainbow Dash had shrieked and laughed and performed some of her best stunts for her adoring audience of one. Her heart soared, and the love of her life had never looked happier.

Had they really confessed their heartfelt adoration to the sky and the sun, snuggled tight beneath the same blanket for warmth? Was it a trick of memory, that Fluttershy had cheered her on in the clouds, up there where nopony could hear her? Was the sunburst of joy when their lips had touched?

What was that place, filled with so many wonders? Was it ever real at all, or was it just a rose-tinted trick of the memory?

"Why would you hide it if you really loved me? Why would you be so afraid? Am I just the secret little shame you think you're gonna grow out of?"

"Rainbow?"

The night before echoed in the cloudy hall of memory. Lost in that thin mist, unsure which way was up, Rainbow Dash hadn't noticed the passage of time. Nor had she noticed her face getting wet. Twilight Sparkle stood frozen, a tray with a coffee-pot hovering in front of her.

"Oh Rainbow, I didn't know it was this bad."

It's worse, the pegasus thought, before she could stop herself. The thought rippled through her hollow heart like a single cold wave of shame. "It's fine," she lied, her voice wobbling. "The only problem I got is that Fluttershy's so stubborn." She couldn't let Twilight see how shaken she was. She'd come here to... ask, not to plead. Rainbow Dash didn't beg. And if Twilight saw how upset she was...

Twilight arched an eyebrow. "If stubbornness could get you this upset, you'd have bucked Applejack in the jaw years ago. And probably me." She wafted the coffee down to one side of her friend, and moved in to offer her a hug. "C'mon."

To her surprise, the pegasus flinched away. "D-don't! I don't want any of that mushy stuff!"

Twilight facehoofed. "Rainbow Dash," she said sternly, in a passable imitation of Cherilee. "You're just going round in a circle. If she says she doesn't want anypony to know about the two of you, then she must have a reason for that. Being Fluttershy, she's almost certainly worrying more than she needs to, but - have you tried asking her why she's so afraid?"

"She's not afraid," Dash insisted. "She always used to say she'd let me-" brag about her. But she knew I meant it as a joke. She knew.

"She used to say she wanted to tell everypony about us. Usually just after-" Usually just after I woke up, and she said my mane was the cutest thing she'd ever seen. She wanted to tell people that. She actually wanted to tell other ponies that my bed-mane was cute.

"...but it's been ages since she's said any of that. She just goes quiet now when I talk about going out. Whatever it's about. If I just wanna go for a walk, she's got something else to do. I wanna come out, Twilight! I want ponies to look at me and say 'There goes the best damn fillyfooler in town!' And I can't just come out myself or everypony'll put two and two together and come up with Fluttershy. I wanna do it together, 'cos it's not fair if I just do it on my own, but every time I try she never gives me the signal!" Teary frustration cracked the edges of her voice.

"Well, duh, you've gotta wait for the signal," Twilight said, rolling her eyes. "But you're not going to get the signal with that attitude, Rainbow." That was when realisation hit. "Wait - when have you tried to arrange for this signal?"

"...Pinkie Pie's birthday party, Pinkie Pie's birthday after-party, the Grand Galloping Gala, the night we cleared the Apple orchards, Summer Sun, Nightmare Night..."

The unicorn sighed. "Every time everypony was going to be in one place?"

"Well, yeah," Rainbow Dash said. "How else do you want me to get the news out to everypony at once?"

Twilight Sparkle had to stop herself from banging her head on the pile of books to one side. "When everypony's attention was on her at the same time?"

There was a long silence. Rainbow Dash thought back to the times when she'd been fit to burst with the need to shout the words imprisoned behind her tongue and her promise. Parties. Gatherings. Nightmare Night - the disguises wouldn't matter when the point was to let ponies know who they were and how they adored one another. The bigger the better, she had always thought; Fluttershy's worth it, and so am I.

"So... thanks to you bugging her to give her the signal in public, she now thinks you want to make this huge thing of her, with the eyes of everypony she loves and respects on her, when for all she knows they might laugh at her or throw things at her or talk about her behind her back or ostracise her forever?"

She just said she was scared. And then she just stopped saying anything at all. The awful wrongness of her strategy now seemed like the most stupid thing she'd ever thought. Shame slapped her face; her cheeks burnt suddenly. And it was... it was Twilight who'd said these things.

"I knew you'd take her side," Rainbow Dash growled, suddenly right back where she started.

"I'm on both sides," the unicorn looked nonplussed. "I want both of you happy with who you are, and with each other. I wouldn't be a very good friend if I didn't."

"Horseapples!" Shame fuelled rage, and it had to go somewhere. "I came to you 'cos you're the smartest pony around and maybe you could help. But you won't help. You're just like her - and both of you just wanna make me like her too."

Cold crept down Twilight's back. "What do you mean, like her?" she asked quietly.

"You know exactly what I mean!" Dash yelled. "Shy and timid, and staying in the house all the time, and never telling me what she wants, and preferring animals to ponies 'cos there's never any danger they'll say anything she won't like!"

"Dash!" Twilight's temper was fraying, and her horn was itching to give the pegasus a snap-out-of-it slap. "I don't know if she's trying to make you like her. If I know Fluttershy, then you're being ridiculous. But by trying to make her the centre of attention, it sounds like you're trying to make her more like you. And anyway, if you really think all this, and it's not just your temper talking, then why in Celestia's name are you with her?"

'cos she glows in the sunlight. 'cos she warms me at night. 'cos I can't get her out of my head.

"...shut up!" Rainbow Dash all-but screamed. She stood hastily and flared her wings, and to Twilight's eyes, seemed to resemble Gilda the Griffon. But she had no rant prepared, and she wasn't a bully. She was just confused, and frightened, and far above her cloud. And that question had been hanging over her like the shadow of a roc for months. "I knew you'd be on her side!" she sobbed.

And before Twilight could do anything about it, she had burst out of the window in all-but-grey rainbow. "Come back, you... idiot!" Twilight called after her, impotently. "I've got an idea! I've got books full of them!" She banged a hoof on the window-ledge in punctuation, but the sound came back strangely muted.

But Dash was gone, and the greyish rainbow trail she had left faded like a shadow before a candle-light. Absently, Twilight Sparkle added "Investigate Optics of Pegasus Flight" to her long-term If-I-Get-Time-To-Do List, and sighed as she considered what she should pack to cheer Fluttershy up.