Twinkle/TOCP's Thirty Minute Ponies Stories

by Twinkletail

Prompt #49: Five Years Later

The Prompt: One of the Mane Six has left and the rest miss her terribly.

"I mean it! I'm leaving and I'm not coming back!"

"Fine! You always say that and you always come back, so I'll be waiting!"

"FINE! You'll see! Ponyville's gonna miss me, and it's gonna be your fault that I'm gone!!"

"FINE! You're not actually leaving anyway so I'll just see you when you come back, like you always do!"

"I'm not coming back! This is for good!"

"Yeah right! See you soon, Dashie!"

"Goodbye, Pinkie! This is your fault!"

------

That argument took place five years ago today. Of course Pinkie Pie didn't believe Rainbow Dash when she said she was leaving. She couldn't even count the number of times that Dash had made that threat, then come back not long after. Usually it'd only be about 5 or so minutes. Sometimes it wouldn't be until near the end of the day. One time, she didn't come back until the next day. Pinkie cried that night, because she thought that was the one time she actually meant it, but she woke up to Dash sleeping next to her. Since then, every time she made the threat, she was only gone for a very short while. Pinkie never would have expected her to keep true to her word never to return, but she should have.

Rarity dealt with Dash's disappearance as best she could. She kept business going at Carousel Boutique, as she couldn't just stop working because one of her closest friends had up and left. Rarity's heart hurt with the knowledge that she wouldn't see her dear friend again, but she had to continue on. It was work that kept her going, both financially and emotionally. Soon she stopped showing up to her weekly spa trips, citing a need to continue her work. Then she would shorten her breaks so that she could get back to sewing. "A busy mind does not have time to mourn," she would say. And her mind was indeed kept busy, as she slowly turned into a recluse. As time went on, her friends saw less and less of her. She would attempt the occasional outing, but her visits always ended early. She would welcome them to speak to her while she was working, but would always end up losing track of conversations, too embroiled in her latest creation, most of which tended to have very colorful, rainbow-like themes to them.

Twilight Sparkle tried to take an analytical approach to the situation, as she always did with any situation that came up. Once it was clear that Dash was not coming back, she began researching every single possible path she could have taken, every single place she could have gone to. All of her searches came up fruitless. Contacts in Cloudsdale had not seen a trace of her rainbow-maned friend. She kept tabs on every single Wonderbolts appearance around Equestria, but Dash's face did not show up at any of them. It hurt Twilight that research could not solve this problem; not as much as the pain from Dash's disappearance, but a lot nonetheless.

Applejack tried to stay strong. It was what other ponies expected of her. She was the one that many ponies would go to for emotional support, for an ear to lend towards their troubles. She was the rock, the tough earth pony who always stayed strong, no matter what the situation. It was no surprise to any of her friends that they rarely saw her too upset over the matter. Sure, she was saddened that her close friend and sometimes-rival had vanished, but she kept herself as calm as possible, and made sure to listen quietly and patiently whenever the others needed somepony to talk to about the situation. Rarity once thought she saw her cry, maybe two weeks after Dash had left. AJ insisted it was something in her eye.

Fluttershy had a very difficult time coping with Dash's departure. It struck the poor pegasus deeply; ever since they were fillies, Dash had always told her that she would be there for Fluttershy, no matter what. She was there to defend her against bullies, to back her up and provide support when they needed to make the hurricane in Ponyville...she was always there. But now she wasn't. Fluttershy's reclusion made Rarity look like an extrovert. Her friends would stop by Fluttershy's cottage and occasionally manage a few sentences with her before she would retreat back into her shell.

Pinkie, however, took it the worst of everypony. Every single day, those last words from Dash rung in her ears. "This is your fault." Four words that completely turned Pinkie's life upside-down. Not only was her love gone, but it was because of her. Her main goal in life was to make everypony smile, and she was bad enough at it that it drove one of the most important ponies in her life away. She would look at her other friends and see their grief, and the fact that the burden rested right on her shoulders was too much for the poor pony to bear. She made them stop smiling. They would insist that they didn't blame her, that it wasn't her fault, but she would have none of it. It took a while before she would even speak to anypony again. When she did, her friends couldn't help but notice the ever-present plush toy that she would carry around, colored to resemble their lost friend. She would only smile if it was by her side, and once she began speaking to it and treating it as if it really were Dashie, her friends began to become more and more uncomfortable. She didn't mind, though. Dash was still there, and she would always smile for her. The smile sewn onto her face guaranteed that.

Nothing was the same for the five friends ever since that day, five years ago.

So what would happen if Rainbow Dash returned?

As the rainbow-maned pegasus took her first step into Ponyville in five years, she wondered the same thing.

Comments

[Crimson Dawn]

Curses and now we want to know how things will go and we may never know. NOOOOOOO! lol

[Twinkletail]

956054

Yep, I'm one of the three or so people who doesn't watch it, it seems

And the lyrics are a parody of "Freeze Ray" from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog.

[Makokam]

Oh...oh my god...
This is, I think, the best thing you've written. Here at least. I don't know what else you've wirtten(maybe I should). This demands expansion. Because this was just...wow. yeah. And you wrote this in thirty minutes? Damn.
Please expand on this?

[Makokam]

956140
I don't watch it either, but I've seen it, and even if I hadn't I've heard enough about it...and that's not counting the old episodes before the revival.
So...-shrug- bad prompt, I guess for making it dependent on another fandom.