The Harder They Fall

by DJ Leftwing

Chapter VII: Confrontation

Author’s Note: This is probably going to be the chapter with the harshest language in it, due to the nature of it. I’m just giving this warning now just in case there are some ponies out there that are just really sensitive to it.

---

Bzzzzzzz

Bzzzzzzz

Bzzzzzzz

Bzzzzzzz

Bzzzzzzz

“OH FOR THE LOVE OF CELESTIA! I’M COMING!”

The dark blue stallion, who had been peacefully sleeping on a sofa until being rudely awakened, flipped off the couch and onto the floor below. He absolutely hated early morning visitors, especially ones that used the buzzer. He had asked for it to be muffled or even removed entirely, but the maintenance department for the complex always ignored him. They probably enjoyed his suffering, and ignored him for the purpose of their own entertainment. He trotted over to the door and pressed his eye to the peephole, only to remind himself that it was installed backwards and thus prevented him from seeing outside. Sighing, he opened the door to find himself with a light grey mare with blonde hair. It was his neighbor, Polixa Hooves, and she stood there with a huge grin on her face.

“Hello dearie! You don’t mind if I come in do you? Of course not,” the visiting pegasus said as she walked into the apartment and sat down on the chair across from the couch. “Oh, how wonderful, muffins!” she exclaimed as she grabbed part of her hosts’ breakfast and ate it in one bite.

“Polixa, why are you here?” the stallion asked, glaring at the intruding mare who had stolen his muffin.

“Oh isn’t it obvious Balder, gossip!”

Balder rolled his eyes, knowing he’d never get his unwanted guest to leave, and sat back down on the sofa. He quickly grabbed the rest of his breakfast before the mare could pilfer any more of it, and finally leaned back to listen to whatever news Polixa had come across this time.

“Okay, first things first my dear, have you heard anything from your daughter lately?”

“No, but what does she have to do with anything? Look, if you’re here to lecture me about my family life, you can just go now.”

“Oh no no no, I was simply wondering. This means you’re in for even more of a shock! Oh how lovely.”

Polixa reached into her bag and pulled out a muffin in a plastic wrap. She proceeded to unwrap the muffin and eat it before getting on with her story.

“Well, you’ll nev…”

“Why do you carry a bloody muffin in your saddlebag?”

“Oh, I carry more than just one. Derpy sent me one in the mail a while ago, and I just can’t get enough of them now. This friend of hers from Ponyville makes the most wonderful baked goods. Anyways, as I was saying, you’ll never guess who I saw in the streets yesterday!”

“George Hoovey?” Balder said sarcastically, rolling his eyes again.

“No, of course not dearie, he’s not a pegasus. No, I saw your daughter with that yellow filly she always used to hang out with.”

Polixa looked at Balder, waiting for some sort of reaction. She was expecting surprise, thinking that his daughter being in town without his knowledge would make him wonder. What she got though, was anger.

“What the hell is she doing back here? She goes and runs off without a word, and then, she bucking comes back for a competition where she shows off like the little bitch she is. Now, she’s got the nerve to come back, probably to brag about how successful she is. She better not show up at this apartment, because she’s not getting a warm welcome if she does.”

The look of surprise was worn by Mrs. Hooves, who was shocked at the apparent dislike of his daughter that Balder Dash showed. She had always known they had an iffy relationship, but she had never had any idea just how much the two despised each other. Now that she knew, she felt like it was her duty to add a little bit more drama to the situation.

“Oh I don’t think she’s here to brag, but I do think she might have come to introduce her new marefriend to you.”

Balder was already mad, but suddenly, he just lost it. He picked up the nearest vase and threw it against the wall. It shattered, leaving thousands of shards of green glass scattered around the base of his bookshelf.

“What…the…buck!” the blue pony yelled, probably loud enough for the whole floor to hear him. “That little faggot is going to get it now, the nerve of her, my own daughter. If she can’t give me a pretty damn good excuse for this, she’s gonna get it big time. And I know exactly what I’m gonna do too.”

---

Fluttershy wasn’t usually much of a late sleeper, but she also didn’t usually sleep on a cloud. In all her years living in Ponyville, she had forgotten how good it felt to sleep on the floating water vapors. The only reason she woke up when she did was because she had unintentionally rolled off the side of the bed and was now lying on the floor.

“Ow,” she said meekly, standing up and shimmied her head to remove the excess water.

“’bout time you got up sleepyhead, you actually slept longer than me.”

Rainbow watched as her friend rubbed her eyes and then went and tended to her mane.

‘Such a beautiful mane, even without brushing it still looks amazing. Maybe I should brush my mane for once, just to see if she notices.’

“Let’s go, I want to get this over with ASAP.”

“Yes, me too,” Fluttershy agreed, grabbing her bags as she followed her friend out the door. “But can we get breakfast first, if you don’t mind?”

“Of course!” Rainbow laughed, “What would I ever do without you reminding me to eat?”

---

“So this is where your parents live?” Fluttershy whispered, looking back and forth down the hall as if somepony were waiting to attack her.

“Last time I checked, yep; and stop being so nervous, the building may be old and in a rundown area, but that doesn’t mean everypony is going to jump you.”

“Maybe, but it’s still scary. Eep!”

“Relax Flutters, it’s only a breeze through a window. Now, should I knock, or hit the buzzer?”

Rainbow dropped into a deep psychological analysis of the pros and cons of each possible approach to announcing her presence, and eventually decided on the buzzer. This took all of two seconds.

Bzzzzzzz

‘Hey, that sounded annoying. I’ll press it again to get on their nerves!’

Bzzzzzzz

“NOT AGAIN! WHY CAN’T ANYPONY KNOCK FOR ONCE!” a voice shouted from the other side of the door.

‘Heh, better do it again before he gets to the door.’

Bzzzzzzz

The door swung open to reveal Rainbow’s father, still as annoyed as ever, and still without a cutie mark. He stood there and stared at Rainbow for a good twenty seconds, without blinking, and without changing facial expression whatsoever. He looked over at Fluttershy and repeated the procedure, and then, he slammed the door in their faces.

“Oh my… how rude.” Fluttershy took a step backwards, involuntarily bumping into a potted cloud and letting out another high pitched squeal of fright.

“He’s always been like that; we’ll just have to try again. I think I’ll knock this time though, that buzzer really is annoying.”

Knock Knock Knock

“THANK YOU, FINALLY SOMEPONY WHO KNOCKS!”

The door opened again.

“And of course, it’s you two again. Doesn’t slamming a door in your face sort of give you a hint; or are you just that dense?” the stallion asked as he attempted to mow them down with a stare that could rival Fluttershy’s. Fortunately, Dash was used to it, and Fluttershy was immune, for obvious reasons.

“Humph, what do you want?”

“Dad, I need to talk to you. It’s about those rumors.”

“Oh, I know plenty about the rumors, and I want you to come explain them to me, and I’ll tell you this now, you better have a damn good story about them.”

Rainbow entered the small apartment, but as Fluttershy tried to follow her in, she was stopped by Mr. Dash.

“Oh no, I want you to wait right here little filly. I need to talk to Rainbow alone.” He then slammed the door in her face for the second time that day.

“Oh my…how rude. Oh, I said that already.”

---

“I understand you not wanting Fluttershy in here for this, but that’s no reason to be so rude to her,” Dash commented.

“Shut up, okay. This is my house, and I’ll treat my guests how I see fit. Now, get to explaining.”

“First, where’s mom? If I’m going to explain this, I need both of you in here.”

“Humph, I should have known. You just threw that letter away when you saw it was from me, didn’t you? Well if you had actually bothered to read it, you’d know that your mother is dead. She died three months ago in prison from some sort of infection, and of course you didn’t show up at the funeral, disrespectful whelp.”

“Oh, okay then, I’ll just have to do without her.”

Rainbow honestly didn’t feel a single bit of sadness in learning that her mother had died, seeing as the mare had always seen her as just another mouth to feed. She deserved it anyway.

“First of all, Fluttershy is not my marefriend, despite anything you may have heard. Secondly, I’m not gay, the rumors only got started because I…”

“Saved that bloody unicorn, I know, I know. What I want to know is why you’re here, and with her,” he interrupted, pointing a hoof at the door as he emphasized his last word.

“Fluttershy’s my best friend, and I was going to introduce her to you guys since she’s never even met you. But of course, now you’ve gone and made the worst impression possible.”

“Just a friend, but you bring her all the way back to Cloudsdale just to introduce her to me. That’s bucking likely. Tell me, if she’s not your bucking marefriend, then why the hell did you even bother? Why the hell did you even bother even if she was for that matter?”

“I brought her because she wanted to meet you, not because I asked her to come meet you. How stupid do you think I am? I would never ask anypony to come meet you.”

“Oh, and so you agreed to introduce us? Just because she wanted you to? Then you come and claim you don’t have feelings for her. I don’t think you would bother unless you actually liked her.”

“SHE’S MY OLDEST FRIEND! OF COURSE I LIKE HER!” Dash sat back down, having stood up to lean into her dad’s face as she shouted.

“So you do have feelings for her?” Balder stated, and then slowly started clapping, “Whoopee for you, you just made your entire argument meaningless with that one statement.” The sentence was dripping with sarcasm, and it made Rainbow furious, furious enough that her mouth slowly, very slowly, started to get ahead of her brain.

“That’s not what I meant and you know it! I like her as a friend, not as a lover!”

“Not based on what I heard this morning. I’m pretty sure sharing a room with her makes it more than just friends.”

‘What? How does he know that? Oh well, at least I can explain that.’

“How the hell do you know that? Just for your information though, it was a two bed suite and they only gave it to us because there was a problem with our original rooms.”

“I have a source, and they said that you were sharing a room, you went out to eat together, and they saw you hugging outside the city when you arrived.” The stallion leaned back in his chair, confident that he had the upper hoof now, and smiled as the blue mare across from him attempted to reply.

“But…ah…you…You’re taking all those things out of context!” she finally managed to say. “We went out to eat together because we’re visiting the city together, and we got the room because we didn’t have a choice.”

“And the hug?”

“I was just comforting her because she was worried about my head after I crashed.”

“You were comforting her? After you crashed? Likely story you’ve got there. Why would you have to comfort her if you’re the one with the injury unless you simply wanted an excuse to hug her?”

This conversation was going nowhere, exactly as she had imagined it, just without the added arguments of her mother. Overall, she knew there would be no easy way to end it, since her dad would continue arguing until he got the answer he was looking for. The only two ways to end this were to either walk away, or give him what he wanted. Both ways he won and she lost. She hated to lose so easily, but she could feel that she was losing control of her arguments, and if she did that, she would let something slip. The best course would be to walk away, and not grant him the satisfaction of a confession.

“You know what, I don’t have to put up with this,” she said as she stood up and turned towards the door. She started towards the exit, only to be stopped by the mocking tone of the stallion behind her.

“Going to talk to your fillyfriend about how you’re going to try to prove me wrong next? Or maybe you’re going to go try her parents first. Go on then, just go and have a happy time, as bucking faggots.”

That was it. Rainbow couldn’t stand to hear him insulting Futtershy like that anymore. She turned on him, and before she could think what she was doing, she hoofed him in the face, hard.

“WHAT IF I DO LIKE HER YOU SON OF A BITCH? WHAT WOULD YOU DO ABOUT IT?” She hoofed him again, connecting with a good solid thwack. “I HAVE MY OWN LIFE, I CAN DO WHAT I BUCKING WANT!” Years of built up anger towards the stallion had been put behind those blows, and there was still more where it came from. She continued her assault for another minute, moving away from the face and trying to break a few of his ribs. When she finally stopped, she looked down at her father below her, and he was smiling, why was he smiling?

“You see, I was right,” he chuckled, “You are a filly-fooler. You’re a disgrace to me, and the rest of your family, you always have been. And now, I’m going to fix that problem. Rainbow Dash, you are no longer part of this family. I’m disowning you.”

With that, the blue stallion lost consciousness, as he lay bleeding on the floor of his apartment.

“Good riddance,” Rainbow muttered, turning towards the door. She couldn’t care less about the disowning, she had been thinking of seceding for years. The thing that bothered her though, is what she had yelled. If she remembered correctly, she had just yelled her love for Fluttershy across the entire floor of the apartment building, which included the pegasus sitting outside the door.

‘Did she hear it? How’s she going to react? I hope she doesn’t cry. Maybe she didn’t hear. Maybe I can just tell her I got disowned, and then she’ll feel sorry for me. She could comfort me, and then we could continue being friends just like usual. Of course, I didn’t really help the rumors, probably just made them worse. Especially since Derpy’s mom heard me, being the gossip hound she is. Oh my gosh, I bet it was her who told my dad, or my used to be dad, all those things. I’m going to kill her if I ever see her.’

By this point, Dash was at the door. She decided she better call an ambulance, more on the premise of wasting a little more time before confronting Fluttershy than from genuine concern. She did so, and once she had confirmed that the medics were on their way, she re focused her attention on the task at hoof. She raised her hoof and placed it on the door, pushed, and as the door swung open, she prepared what she was going to say.

‘Fluttershy, I don’t know how much you heard, but there’s something I need to tell you. I think that I have feelings for you, like romantic feelings.’

It would work, or so she hoped. Sadly, she wouldn’t get to find out, for as the opening door revealed the hall, there was absolutely no sign whatsoever of her yellow friend.

Comments

[SpyroFlame]

What a dick hope he dies.

[fabianguzman18]

841914 I know he's a prick but thats no reason to want him dead

[lillytheomegawolf]

And now were getting somewhere...
I hope Fluttershy is ok and hasn't been captured by some awful bad guys.
Apart form that... I like it a lot tis rather well written and quite brutal while keeping the characters true.

[PatRoison]

It was great to see Rainbow unload on her father, even if the smug bastard grinned like an idiot. I think Fluttershy just panicked and flew back to their hotel, and Rainbow will find her there. At least, I hope so.

[Paper Crease]

842271
Actually yes, that is all the reason to want him dead.

[DJ Leftwing]

844818
Yes, I am re-writing, but this chapter was not one that I was planning on revising.

Sorry if I ruined your expectations, but I'm still working out my writing style and didn't put quite as much thought into the plot as I probably should have. I'll work on that more in later stories once I figure it all out.

As for her parents, yeah, let's just go with they regained custody by default (she was still underage at that point, so I guess it makes sense?).

The money issue...is it really even important? If you want an answer though, I guess I could just say she very slowly saved any bits she found/earned form various jobs.

Cassandra is my OC, named after myself. And yes, she is bi.

My theory behind the 2/3 female thing...seeing as the mane 6 are all female, and originally the show was based entirely around the female ponies, they are the ones that we see the most often on screen. This doesn't mean that there are not that many stallions, it simply means we just don't see them. I believe that there are just as many stallions in Equestria as mares.

As for the severity of the prejudice, you would be surprised. There are places in the US, and probably around the world, that simply despise any sort of non-standard relationship. I myself grey up in such a town (highly religious) and was subjugated to such things when I revealed my orientation. I am envisioning Cloudsdale as one such town (not religious, seeing as they worship the princesses, but just highly disapproving).

I think that about covers that, now to see if there is anypony else I need to answer as well...

Nothing major, and I hope I didn't come across as rude in this post, I'm just a little tired is all. I started the revision of chapter 1 and just turned the first 480 or so words into over 1000. This is gonna be good...

[Makokam]

...ten bits says Fluttershy is with Derpy's mom.

Anyway, what Rainbowdash yelled is\lt as damnig as she seems to think, "so what if I was" simply implies that she doesn't give a damn what he thinks.

Anyway, this story has potential, so I'll alert it, and give it a thumb up.

[SpyroFlame]

842271 i meant it more jokingly then anything i dont really want him died. I would never really wish death on someone no matter how much the wronged me. Im sorry if my comment offended you in any way and i will remove it if you wish

[DianaWinters]

Please update :(

[DianaWinters]

Good job on 0 Dislikes ^_^

[Witchrblizzad]

aw who was it! who was that one person that had to go and dislike it.