Paralyzed
Rainbow Dash grinned in sheer ecstasy as she soared through the air at blistering speeds, the wind whipping behind her and crackling for all on the ground to hear. They gazed up into the air and saw her, but only for a fraction of a second.
She would break the all-time speed record from Manehattan to Ponyville, for sure!
Rainbow Dash always loved to fly. She loved everything about it, from the feeling of complete and total freedom, to the weightlessness when dive bombing towards the earth, to the slight terror and sheer elation from pulling up at the last minute before hitting the ground.
She checked her stopwatch, which was on her hoof. She was making decent time, but was about two seconds behind the record. Maybe she could speed up just a little bit more and beat Fleetwing Frank, the fastest pegasus to ever have lived.
“Not for long, Frank!” she cried, her wings straining and aching under the pressure. But she didn’t care; she even enjoyed the pain of exertion and pushing herself farther than she thought she could.
Rainbow Dash glanced down at her stopwatch and looked at the time. She was now a second ahead! As long as she kept up this speed, she’d break the record for--
She collided into the side of a house while she wasn’t looking, just on the outskirts of Ponyville.
“I’m afraid that I have some bad news, Rainbow Dash,” said the caramel-coated unicorn doctor.
He levitated some X-rays in front of Rainbow Dash. “It appears that you have fractured your spinal column just below the neck. I am sorry to say this, Rainbow Dash, but you will never walk, fly, or use your hooves again.”
Rainbow’s mouth gaped open in shock.
“Is there anything that you can do to help me? Is there a procedure? A magic spell?” asked Rainbow Dash.
The doctor shook his head. “We’ve been doing research on how to help quadra- and paraplegics for years, but, unfortunately, haven’t come up with anything. Of course, if there are any promising developments, you’ll be the first to know.”
“W-w-what comes next?” asked Rainbow Dash.
Doctor Stable sighed and shook his head. “There’s no easy way to tell a patient this, particularly one who is as physical as you. You will require constant care for the rest of your life. You will need help moving, eating, drinking, and using the bathroom. The medical bills may be high, and we can try to work something out with your insurance provider, but you may have to take money out of your savings and ask your family for what will likely be hundreds of thousands of bits over the rest of your life.”
Rainbow Dash didn’t say a word. Instead, she just sat with her eyes staring off into space.
“I know that it’s a lot to process, Miss Dash,” said Doctor Stable, putting his hand on her chest consolingly.
A week had passed. Rainbow Dash would often fall asleep and dream of the crash into the house, of her last ever flight, and wake up, and attempt to jump out of bed and avoid the house, only to realize that she couldn’t. Her wings and her hooves were as unresponsive to her desires as the hospital curtain or the shades.
The nurse couldn’t be in the room all the time, and Rainbow realized how much she needed her for. Every time she needed her pillow adjusted, or the shades of her room opened or closed, or even had an itch that she needed to scratch, she might or might not get it.
Her friends all came to visit her one by one. Pinkie baked her a cake. Fluttershy sang her lullabies. Rarity made her a hat.
None of it helped.
Nothing could help Rainbow Dash's cold, hard realization that she would never fly again. Every day she would gaze restlessly outside of the window, watching the other pegasi fly around, change the weather, play air tennis, and do any number of things that she would never be able to do again.
She spent many hours a day crying her eyes out. She spent the rest of her time reading, but every time that she picked up a Daring Do book and read about the brave adventurer flying away from danger or swinging on a rope, it simply reminded Rainbow Dash of that which she had once known, but now knew no more.
Twilight Sparkle researched every magical spell that she could find. A lot of the books had been destroyed in her library when Tirek attacked, but that didn’t stop the princess, who was determined to help her good friend. She went to Canterlot every single day and researched every spell in the Canterlot Archives.
After a few months, though, Twilight simply gave up.
She arrived in the long-term care facility where Rainbow Dash was now living and delivered the bad news.
“I’m sorry, Rainbow Dash, but not even magic can restore a broken spinal cord. It’s one of the few things that magic can’t do.”
Rainbow Dash shook her head. “It’s okay, Twilight. You did your best.”
“But there’s always science, Rainbow Dash. They’re making great strides in stem cell research, and in brain-computer interfaces. And, of course, I’m always discovering new magic spells. I’m sure that somehow, you’ll walk again someday. You might even someday fly again, and--”
Rainbow Dash frowned. “No, I know. It’s really unlikely. I’ll never be back to normal. The doctors have all told me.”
Twilight blushed sheepishly as she sat down in the chair in Rainbow’s room. She tried to make small talk with her friend, but Rainbow Dash just wasn’t interested. Finally, Twilight left.
Over the next few months, Rainbow’s friends visited her less and less. Her normally rambunctious demeanor had been replaced by a melancholy depression, and try as they might to cheer her up, they simply couldn’t. Even Pinkie Pie eventually gave up.
Two years passed, and Rainbow Dash sat in her bed, reading a book. She had burned through all of her life savings. She didn’t know how she would stay here. Who would take care of her? Would her friends even want to? They hadn’t been to see her in six months. She didn’t blame them. She was a worthless pile of bones and fur that could never amount to anything anymore. The best days of her young life were behind her.
She didn’t cry anymore. She didn’t scream. She didn’t even shrug. She did the one thing that she still could do, and could do rather well. She closed her eyes and went back to sleep, to dream of soaring through the sky once again.
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I was
hoping direlywondering when this would happen. Good for her.Yes, it's amazing what a different tone can do for a story. This throws into light what I'm sure it would be like irl.
2 greens in 5 minutes for you. Good show, sir.
4614619 Thanks, glad that you liked 'em both!
Hilarious!
Good story. Can't stop laughing.
Interesting contrast. Also, apparently friendship and loyalty are a one way street where Dash is concerned.
4614634
Hate to say it, but me too.
I think it was because it's so over the top.
I do have a question: If Rainbow was trying to break a flying speed record, then why was she flying at such a low altitude that she hit a building? Was it a skyscraper?
4614864 Well yeah, you know how much technology has progressed.
I felt a feel somewhere in there
Didn't feel a (negative) thing here, and I couldn't...
for two reasons:
Read the "comedy" one first, so I knew half the lines and associated them with something funny, and also this was way over the top
in so many ways that I could not take it serious even if I tried...
So many mistakes too... for example: Sure Dash did not even shrug anymore, it is pretty hard to shrug when you can't move your shoulders
in that condition... Twilight just giving up? Her friends leaving her completely for over half a year after just two years?
Oh yeah... and Rarity making her a hat after the accident? really?
I see what you wanted to try/ do here... not down-voting but not up-voting either
Puncturing the spinal column wouldn't really do anything. That is pretty common in medical practice these days. Epidurals, spinal taps, etc. You would actually need a partial or total severance or compression on the spinal cord to cause paralysis easily.
Just a FYI
Not a bad short though.
4615352 Thanks!
Fixed the error.
4615480 No problem
Keep up the good work.
> Just read the Twilight version before this.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2014/3/16/576679__safe_solo_pinkie+pie_meme_idw_reaction+image_feels.png
In a more serious note, this shows the effect of how twisting ideas to suit a certain tone to be a very alluring and clever idea. I like it.
Fantastic job.
What, no Scootaloo moment in this one ?
I mean this would be a unniuqe time for a Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash moment, considering Scootaloo ccannot fly.
I definitely liked the other one more, but I think that was more of because I read the comedy first and I prefer funny to sad any day of the week.
I still felt sympathy for Dash but considering that this story brought nothing really new to the trope of RD hurting herself I really can't bring myself to up vote this.
What's the opposite of Christopher Walken? Christopher Reeve!
Pegasi UP. Hasbro plz buff.
Good story, but can't say I felt much from reading it. I thought the paraplegic idea was pretty unique, I've seen Dash injury herself from concussions to losing limbs in fan fiction, but never to this length and I applaud you for the plot. It was also deliciously sad, but it still felt like it needed another factor to make it... complete.
4617400. That was in terrible taste! ;)
~Dollars.
4619830
4614619 Hey, are you that rich CEO from Yip's new story?
4625655
I'd like to be a rich CEO
Alas, I am not.
4625669 What an odd coincidence, then.
So no magic can help? Maybe no normal magic... but there is one that might be able to help... if they could convince him...
I always wondered what happen to people who becomes paralyzed from the neck down. I really don't want to imagine the hardships though
That was beautiful....
4633677 discord.... i think they tried chaos magic first i doubt she would ever move more then her head ever again anywere but her dreams.......
The contrast between the two stories is about as large as it could possibly get. Great job.
make more what happens next who takes care of her now that she's broke
The feels in this... it hit so hard
.