More Than A Dream

by nanashi_jones

Chapter 1

Part 1: Earth, As We Know It

Aurora Amaryllis dreamed. She dreamed of a far-off kingdom, ruled by a kindly Princess. She dreamed of adventure far and wide, with the closest of friends. She dreamed of magic. She dreamed... Of ponies.

She woke to an alarm, a book left open on her chest, and the knowledge the alarm was her iPhone. The iPhone dinged quietly, which was Aurora’s way to ask if she would use ten minutes of laying in bed or get to her day and have ten minutes to spare later. The iPhone would ding again for a mid-morning check and a third time just before she silenced it for classes. After that, she’d go by her memory with only a post lunch schedule check and a late afternoon schedule check.

She opted to rise at the alarm. Placing the book next to the picture of her with her grandmother, on the bedside desk, she walked to the bathroom.

She brushed her teeth (two minutes- not one-forty, not one-fifty-five, but two) and stared into the mirror. Dark eyes, not-too-bad eyebrows, and sleep-rumpled, dark chocolate-black hair with an odd little light streak off to the side- a genetic quirk from her dad’s side. Everything in place alright, yet... The alien feeling came and she frowned around her toothbrush. The feeling usually came after the dreams. Like phantom limb syndrome except without an actual missing limb to account for, so it continued to frustrate her.

Much like the dreams.

It wasn’t the first time she dreamed of the kingdom. Or the Princess. Or the ponies. So frequent were the nightly visitors that she started seeing a campus counselor for stress. Most determined psychology students saw a counselor anyway, but Aurora at least had the pretense of being a double major (physics with a focus on quantum mechanical theory and psychology with a focus on group dynamics). Such a heavy, and diverse, workload allayed the notion that she was part of the herd.

Her counselor suggested that the dreams, which were very fanciful and loving, were possibly her brain sorting through her stress. They had gotten more persistent when she’d entered her dual doctorates, and she’d be lying to herself if she didn’t admit that she sometimes got overwhelmed.

As she continued her therapy sessions on top of her academic life, she realized the dreams went back even further than the start of her dual studies. She had been very young when they came to her in the form of stories she concocted and acted out with her dolls. But like most childhood things they went away.

Until recently.

She’d only been working at her doctorate for a month when they became a staple of her sleep cycle. But even before then, little bits of them had come unbidden.

“I think that connections are important,” Aurora had told her sponsor as she wrung her hands nervously in her lap.

It had felt odd, verbalizing it for the first time. She mostly kept to herself and her family, so she’d never really talked about why she’d picked both physics and psychology. Thanks to her studiousness, her family had accepted her desires would lead to a doctorate degree. With such an intelligent daughter, drive made sense, so why ask about her intentions?

“I want to... I want to see those connections in action. In people and in the universe. Get a better understanding.”

Perhaps if she’d spoken more about her desires with her parents, she wouldn’t have felt so awkward proposing her thesis topic to her freaking sponsor!

“I think those connections are just... Magical.”

The word had just popped out unbidden. Though her sponsor hadn’t said anything, she’d spent an hour downplaying it and assuring her superior she wasn’t some dreamy-eyed undergrad with delusions of sparkles in her notebook. Still, it had been the truest word she’d used in the whole interview.

Following that night, her dreams changed. They went from occasional, forgotten visitors to permanent residents. They troubled her with their clarity and how they hung with her in a way her own memories didn’t. Well, they mostly stuck with her.

For instance, there had been the one the previous night about a colorful birthday party and a herd. The party had been thrown with cake. Or was it pie? Why did that matter?

Then there was the spa with... Jewels? Gemma? She never could seem to remember names in these dreams, but the faces, they were always familiar. They stayed: colorful pony faces smiling at her.

If it wasn’t all so friendly and comforting, she would be downright spooked.

She shook her head and spit toothpaste. The dreams were silly things. They weren’t important. Really, they were distractions.

When she reached for her hair brush, the not-quite phantom limb feeling came again, more precise. Now she felt as if she wasn’t getting something right. As if she missed a step in an equation while just picking up a brush. She did her usual level best to ignore it. Aurora didn’t listen to her gut, she listened to reason, fact-checking, and her developed sense of logic.

Showered, fed for breakfast and ahead of schedule, Aurora pulled on a purple sweater vest to guard against the slight autumn chill. She’d always liked purple and violet. Her first sari, a gift from her nani, grandmother, had been a jeweled violet.

Fall had brought red and gold leaves, which were already losing their grip. As Aurora crossed campus, she noted the falling leaves and how they inexplicably made her want to go running.
~
“Hey Amaryllis.”

“Hi Mary.”

“Come to see how a real internship works?”

Aurora sighed. Mary Steenem was a bit competitive about her studies, but it was always in good fun. At least, that’s what the other girl always said to Aurora.

“Professor Langstrom gives me enough work,” Aurora said with an only slightly strained smile. “Is this a bad time?”

“Nah. You’ll just have to wait near the patients while I wrap up some stuff. They’re not a big deal. It’s the mild wing.”

“There’s a mild wing?”

“Functional disorders, delusions that just need monitoring. Nothing technically wrong with thinking you’re living in 1818, but if you’re problematic about it, your family can’t have you wandering around, yanno?”

Mary gestured for Aurora to follow her in, then had her stand near a mesh gate where some orderlies and a security guard nodded at her. Mary buzzed through the gate and en route to another door near the back of the room, passed people who were milling, muttering or just plain staring off into space.

Aurora looked through the gate at the assembled occupants. The patients weren’t all in institutional scrubs, so that told her a little of their condition and the facility’s policies. Yet, too many were and that depressed Aurora a bit. She thought that people did better in clothes they picked. Unless they picked the scrubs, then that was fine too.

As Aurora’s eyes wandered the room, her gaze caught on a blast of rainbow color hair amidst the eggshell blue walls and white formica floor. The hair belonged to a girl, looking out a window with, yep, a head full of bright color. It wasn’t like she had dyed it multiple shades, either. She looked like she had a literal rainbow flowing through her hair. Aurora stared at it.

Something deep, resonant, familiar twinged inside her chest.

The girl who had been staring out the window blinked, feeling the weight of Aurora’s gaze. She turned, noted Aurora and resumed looking out the window. After another blink, her eyes got wide and she turned slower, locking onto Aurora.

Aurora watched as she broke the stare, then rose, stretched, and strolled toward her, hands in pockets. The effect was that of failed nonchalance and her stride was too purposeful to believe she was just wandering the area. As she came closer, Aurora took a more inspecting look: vaguely Hispanic, possibly chicana, with a lithe, muscular frame and the kind of walk Aurora attached to fighter pilots.

Wait. Where had she got that?

“Hey,” the girl said, snapping Aurora into a conversation.

“Hi,” Aurora replied.

“New here?”

Aurora laughed a little. “Just visiting.”

One of the guards in the high visibility booth gave Aurora and the girl a hard look, but Aurora smiled at him and he settled.

“So I see,” the girl replied. She looked Aurora up and down, not a checking out per se, but... Aurora couldn’t tell. Perhaps, like Aurora, the other girl was just trying to place her? “What’s your name?”

“Aurora,” Aurora said. “Yours?”

The girl pushed air at her bangs, fluttering them away. “If I wanna get out of here, I gotta say Iris Speede.”

“That’s not your name?”

“Nope.”

“Can I ask what it is then?”

“Iris Speede” looked back and forth. She crooked a finger closer.

Aurora leaned in, prepared for Cleopatra or possibly a visitor from another planet.

“Rainbow Dash.”

She wasn’t prepared for that.

A jolt shook out from Aurora’s stomach and she straightened quickly. She felt like someone familiar had just called her name.

“Yes! I knew it!” Iris, nee Rainbow said, pumping her fist. She hung on the grate between them. “Twilight? Is that you?”

Aurora blinked, her gaze over the other girl’s shoulder. Still slightly unnerved and unhearing, it took her a moment to refocus.

Finally, she stuttered out, “I- I’m sorry, what?”

The guard started moving and Aurora caught it out of the corner of her eye. She turned, giving him a placating gesture. The girl with the rainbow hair flashed an easy, confident smile and shifted to lean against the grating into a more casual posture. Aurora could see her knuckles white in excitement though.

“Twilight. Sparkle. Sound familiar?”

A deeper jolt this time. Like she’d just heard a bell in her heart. She put a hand to her head and tears popped unbidden to her eyes. She tried to blink them away as her forehead itched suddenly. “I don’t- I-”

“Oh man, that’s gotta be you. Especially with that egghead look.”

Aurora looked even more confused. The girl made an apologetic smile.

“Sorry. But, look, Twi, you gotta get me out of here. These human guys think I’m nuts! Nopony here has even heard of Equestria! Not to mention a pegasus or unicorn outside a book! I tried finding the other girls, but I couldn’t before I got locked up. We gotta find ‘em Twi. If we’re here, it can’t be good news back home.”

The rainbow-haired girl had pressed into the grate as close as she could and Aurora realized that they were both breathing hard. With a shudder, she banished the fluttering that had sprung up deep in her belly. Or tried to. She put on a more composed face at least.

“Whoa, whoa,” she said, getting her counseling tones out. “I’m sorry, but, I’ve never met you.”

“Ughh...” The rainbow haired girl slumped and banged her head against the cage. Eyes coming back up to Aurora, the student flinched in surprise. The girl’s eyes were a rich maroon.

“Your eyes...” Aurora said.

The girl, Rainbow, blinked and smiled, rising again. “Like ‘em? Look... Familiar?” She blinked more emphatically, showing her eyes off.

“Hey!” The pair turned and a large man, heavyset and wearing orderly scrubs stood close enough to do something about Iris if needed, but far enough to give Iris the chance to do something herself. “Stop bothering her, Speede.” It wasn’t a request.

“I’m not bothering-”

The man stepped forward. “Go about your business or it’s back to your room.”

The girl looked at Aurora imploringly. Aurora just stared. She’d been knocked around too many times in too short a span. She couldn’t find her mouth. Her stomach was doing flip flops and she couldn’t get it under control. Part of her wanted to run. Another part wanted to reach through the grate and pull the other girl close enough to squeeze more information from her. She was locked.

“C’mon Twilight. You know something weird is going on here.”

A thick hand wrapped around the rainbow-haired girl’s upper arm. “You’re done. You can go peacefully or not.”

For a tense moment, Aurora thought she was about to see her first outburst from an institutionalized patient. The girl’s jaw set, her hips twitched and every part of her looked like she was ready for a fight. Then, with a roll of her shoulders, she was free of the orderly and turning away.

“All right, all right,” she muttered. “I’m goin’.”

The orderly kept his eye on her as she slunk away, hands jammed into her sweatpants pockets. Briefly, she turned her head and said, “Last time I was locked up, least I got to read that book you picked. What was it again?”

“Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone!” Aurora chirped automatically.

She brought a hand to her mouth. Where had that come from?

Rainbow Dash grinned, even when the large orderly moved her along.

“See ya ‘round, Aurora Sparkle.”
~
The rest of the day was a blur. Aurora vaguely remembered helping Mary, who took her silence as typical Aurora aloofness. Dinner, classes, they all felt like background noise. Except Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash and her rainbow hair.

Or was it Iris Speede?

Laying in bed back in her tiny dorm apartment, she stared at the ceiling. She couldn’t shake the feeling of clarity that had come when the rainbow haired girl had spoken.

“Equestria.”

“Nopony.”

“Twilight Sparkle.”

Even just thinking the name sent a shudder through her. Like she had suddenly caught a fragile, but powerful gem.

Then, as she thought on the name, she remembered Equestria. Or at least, she remembered the ponies.

When she was very young, Aurora remembered, she had thought she was different. Like something was off about her that made socializing hard. She kept it to herself, she read, and her closest friends were her parents and her nani. Back then, she only occasionally dreamed of ponies living somewhere and she’d tell her Mom about the land and its inhabitants.

Was it Equestria though? She definitely remembered ponies and talking with her mom, but...Time’s fog sprang up and she couldn’t grasp it. She remembered skinning her knee on the playground. She barely remembered Elementary School. She remembered the two girls she managed to make sort-of friends with- Alisa and Jennifer- But why couldn’t she fully recall those stories?

Pushing herself up and off the bed, she checked the clock and saw it was only 8:30 in the evening. She clicked on a light and picked up her cell phone. Hitting auto-dial, she waited. “Hey Mom. … Yeah, I know. Um, look, this may sound weird...”
~
Two days later, Aurora was going through a box of crayon drawings and awkward, youthful handwriting.

Equestria.

As she looked through it, clarity returned. How she lost a year or two completely to this... Imaginary place, this story. How she told her Mom she was learning magic under Princess Ce-les-tee-ya- she had sounded that out perfectly. How her pony big brother was going to be in the Equestrian guard. How her foal-sitter was the best in the world. Then, there was nothing.

“You just kind of stopped, dear,” Aurora’s mother said when Aurora called two days ago. Mrs. Pavra D’Angelo had then sighed. “Honestly, I worried it was because you heard your Dad and me fighting.”

That was when Aurora really remembered.

One day, Aurora had come home early from a visit with her grandmother and arrived to her parents shouting. Fleeing to the safety of her room and drawings, she started shaping a purple unicorn, drawing out a mane with a pink stripe and a mark on her rump- cutie something? -and as she drew, she realized how real it all felt. How her stories and dreams and make-believe land all felt realer than her own real life.

Aurora’s parents didn’t fight like that. They didn’t threaten to break up so loudly. They loved each other unconditionally. They were a team, not yelling adults. They didn’t keep talking about... Ending “it.”

But they were. They had been going at it so loud, they’d missed Aurora entirely, venting all manner of scary futures. Aurora had realized, at her precocious age, all those odd glances and strained faces between them weren’t headaches or little disagreements. Her parents were going to break up. They were getting... Divorced.

As tears sprang to her eyes, her hand gripped the purple crayon like it was a lifeline, and something in her treacherously whispered, “It’s okay. It’ll be okay. Those aren’t your parents.”

Aurora always felt she was so clever because she was sensible. She was practical. So, even though she was eleven, she knew, she knew that was crazy person thinking. Regular little girls pretended they were magical princesses, or in this case magical ponies, from another world. They didn’t believe it in their hearts. That’s how you got bullied. Locked up. Or worse- yelled at by your parents.

So she decided right then to stop. No more ponies. No more Equestria. She put the drawings away, picked up a book and knocked on her parents’ door. Aurora’s sudden arrival silenced the argument instantly. It wouldn’t silence it permanently though. Aurora knew this. If she was going to deal with what was to come next, if she was going to handle the divorce sensibly, she had to grow up.

She did. She showed an interest in the sciences and proved quite the physics and chemistry student in school. She excelled in the real world, its rules, its ways.

Still, a bit of fantasy and escapism was good for the soul and she didn’t completely give up her fancy. It just never gained that youthful traction again. She regarded anything from a book or media as no more than entertainment and relaxation. Maybe she’d spring for a leather-bound copy of Lord of the Rings or an anime series, but that was it. All just for entertainment and enjoyment. Nothing as serious as real life.

She’d gone to college on a scholarship. Her parents were beaming when she shared the letter detailing her full ride. Even her step parents praised her thoroughly with her stepdad going so far as to convince Aurora’s mom to let Aurora have a little celebratory champagne.

She forgot about ponies. She even forgot that she woke forgetting dreams about them.

Then, she started her doctorate. Then, she met Rainbow Dash. Then, she heard the word Equestria for the first time since she was eleven.

Aurora looked at the pictures she’d drawn. It was impossible. It was impossible in every way for some random girl in an institution to know about these stories, these ideas, these dreams. She’d just met her only a few days ago, so how could she have known about something Aurora had barely remembered herself?

While Aurora could feel confusion welling up all around her, she latched on to the nugget of certainty she held: she needed answers. And she knew just the girl to talk to.

Mouth set in a firm line, she picked up her phone.
~
“I can’t emphasize enough how much of a favor this is,” Dr. Westbrook said.

“I know and I really appreciate it,” Aurora said, looking crisp in a deep blue-purple suit with white blouse. Her hair was up in a bun, but her bangs hung down, her off-brown streak looked different somehow. For some reason, it looked too bright, too noticeable. It almost looked punk and Aurora couldn’t have a genetic quirk stealing her serious picture of assured competence. Styling it as best she could, she mentally tried to project Determined Doctorate Candidate.

“Maybe I can do some good?” she said, putting an air of authority to her voice.

Dr. Westbrook laughed as he guided Aurora down a hallway and to an empty room.

“Couldn’t hurt. Miss Speede has been quite the delusional case. She doesn’t break down or become incomplete when we ask how she’s here as a person when she insists she’s a pegasus. She admits to ignorance, which only reinforces the delusion. And I have to admit... It’s not a bad one.”

Aurora cocked an eyebrow at the hospital’s director.

“Ponies that live in peace with a benevolent, immortal pair of diarchs to guide them? When you get to where I am and hear your thousandth alien abductee or paranoid monster-chased patient... People like this are so refreshing you almost want to make a case that they’re living in the better world.”

He stopped before a seemingly random door, opened it, and gestured inside. Aurora entered to a bare place without even a two-way mirror for observation. The table was wooden and old, and the chairs were nice enough, but the clinical atmosphere couldn’t be banished. Not even by the high window, which let in cheerful sunlight.

Aurora took a seat and Dr. Westbrook took the other one across from her. He ran a hand over a smooth, shaved head. She wondered how he’d look with even a fine fuzz and decided he probably kept it shaved for the same reason she styled her potential punk lock out of the way: to project authority. She probably had an ally in this man who no doubt saw the same carefulness in her own appearance.

“Still, she’s agitated,” he said, unaware of Aurora’s assessments. “Apparently, after she dyed her hair, she tried to look for her ‘pony friends’ and her roommates and parents became concerned. She abandoned her classes, her athletics and wandered around the city calling their names.” He shook his head, removing his glasses to give them a quick polish.

“Then she ended up here? For calling out names?”

“No. She ended up here for trying to sneak into a military base and steal a jet to ‘get a better view.’”

Typical Rainbow, Aurora thought. She clamped down on that thought, holding it for later.

Dr. Westbrook leaned against his chair. “Look, Miss Amaryllis. You’ll get some time. I’ll have Millar outside in case it gets hairy. And it probably will. You’re the first person she talked to and got excited about. She actually spoke during group therapy last week. So, I’m willing to go with Dr. Langstrom’s favor. But only so far.”

Aurora nodded, the picture of the understanding student.

Dr. Westbrook unclipped a radio from his belt and raised it to his lips. “Okay, bring her down.”

They waited in amicable silence as Aurora brought out a pad and notebook. When the door opened, she rose with Dr. Westbrook.

The rainbow-haired girl came in, wary. When she saw Aurora, her eyebrows went up.

“Okay, Iris,” Dr. Westbrook said in a soothing voice. “I believe you know Aurora here?”

“Yep,” ‘Iris’ said. She raised her chin in greeting. Aurora waved back with a smile.

“We’re trying something new. If this works, maybe it can happen more often.”

‘Iris’ nodded, watching Dr. Westbrook’s shoulder.

“Okay,” he said. Turning to Aurora, he nodded. “I’ll leave you two to it.”

The door clicked behind him and the two girls were left alone.

“So...” Rainbow said, shifting from foot to foot.

“Air Force base, huh?”

Rainbow Dash laughed softly. “Yeah, well... I wanted to find you guys.”

“Let’s talk about that,” Aurora said, sitting. She pulled her briefcase onto the table and looked at Rainbow. “Let’s talk about... Equestria.” She flipped a piece of white paper onto the table. On it was a crude drawing of a castle with mountains in the distance and little colorful ponies in front.

Rainbow smiled.

At first, Aurora didn’t take notes, as she wanted to engender trust. Just absorb the patient, see if they’re being honest. She couldn’t help it though. Everything Rainbow said was True somehow. True in a way she hadn’t felt since she looked through her first microscope.

“And you beat us. Without even trying! Man, did I feel lame. Applejack was cool about the after-race though.”

“Applejack,” Aurora said, flitting up through her notes. “She’s the- The farm pony, right?”

Rainbow sighed and dropped her head to the table. “C’mon Twilight, this isn’t hard. Just- You know, just remember already!”

Aurora shook her head as she flipped through her notes. She was on her third page. “It’s all very compelling and I’m most fascinated that we would be so synchronized-”

Rainbow slammed her hand on the table, making Aurora start.

She rubbed it, looking grouchy. “Sorry, but if you kept going you’d be in full egghead mode and we don’t have time for that.”

“We don’t?”

“Twilight, you’re the smart one. I went to bed on a cloud and woke up under a feather comforter on a dorm-room mattress and didn’t remember who I was for a month! A month! That can’t be good. That’s like... Discord’s gone wrong again. Or- or Crystal Empire stuff! Big time magic. Maybe even as big as Celestia.” She snapped her fingers. “Oh man, that’s right. This could all be a Changeling Queen thing couldn’t it?”

As Rainbow looked at her expectantly, casual and certain, Aurora realized that she was running on faith. Not answers. Not real Truth. The microscope of her youth verified and clarified. What this Rainbow girl offered was... What was it really? Validation? Justification for her eleven year old self? And what justification was that?

No. No. Something this girl said hit her in the gut and Aurora didn’t listen to her gut. She had lost her objectivity on this. She hadn’t lost the cold, absolute clinical objectivity some in her community advocated. She had lost the subtle distance that let her see where her desires ended and the patient’s began that let her empathize while still being able to help. Just because it was good for Aurora to hear these stories again, to make her feel like she wasn’t as lonely...

She blinked. This was turning out to be more than she could take. “No. I’m sorry, but... No.”

“Twilight?” Rainbow said.

Aurora started flipping her notepad back into order and gathering the pictures. “This was just... Just the stress. I am very sorry Miss Speede. I think I did more damage than-”

“Don’t call me that!” the rainbow-haired girl snapped.

Aurora froze. The rainbow-haired girl took a few deep breaths and reached out, taking Aurora’s hand. “I don’t care if you look like this. I don’t care if you think you’re crazy and I’m crazy, but don’t call me by somepony else’s name. You know who I am, Twilight. I’m your friend. All the way through, no matter what.”

Aurora looked down at the hand that held her. She looked into the other girl’s eyes. And she Remembered.

Loyalty. If it was in her power, Rainbow Dash never left another pony behind. When Nightmare Moon tried to get her to leave the other ponies at the bridge, she laughed at the act. When Discord tried to corrupt her, the worst he could do was shift her loyalties- sending her home to Cloudsdale to “save” everypony else. She stood by her friends when Gilda tried to drag her away. She searched harder than anypony in the group when Applejack had disappeared after that storm. Rainbow Dash was loyal to a fault.

Aurora blinked. She felt dizzy and put her free hand on the table. Where had all that come from? She was insightful and creative sure, but... She turned, looking at Rainbow and saw her maroon eyes, shining with hope and familiarity.

“Rainbow?” Aurora whispered.

The human pegasus grinned broadly. “Hey Twi. Welcome back.”

“It’s... It’s a lot,” Aurora said, sitting down. Her hand was still in Rainbow’s, who had moved to sit on the table near Aurora. Or was it Twilight now? She felt a chasm open up that she hadn’t gazed into since she was a child.

“Yeah. I only got my blue first. Took me another day or two to get my full mane back.”

“Huh?”

Rainbow sighed and with no regard for Aurora’s personal space, reached behind her head and undid the simple bun. Aurora’s hair cascaded down and Rainbow grabbed a bit and brought it around for Aurora to see better.

It was a dark pink sitting next to an almost imperceptible dark indigo as it faded into Aurora’s natural black locks. Aurora blinked rapidly.

“I don’t know much, but I do know as soon as I remembered who I was, I stopped looking totally like this Iris girl.” She released the the hair. “Didn’t get my wings back though,” she added with a derisive snort.

Aurora reached a hand up to her forehead and thought she felt something. She was supposed to have something on her forehead...

“I had a horn,” Aurora whispered.

“Yeah, so I bet Applejack and Pinkie Pie are gonna be the hardest to convince. Earth ponies have a lot in common with these human things.”

Aurora just stared. Rainbow started to move, but felt her hand snag. The grip that held her was iron tight. Looking back to Aurora, she saw the girl’s face was stricken, but determined.

“Don’t. Don’t let go of me,” Aurora said quietly, hotly. “That’ll bring in the doubt and I can’t have that right now.”

“Okay,” Rainbow said, moving back to be near Twilight.

Brow furrowed, Twilight sank into thought. Rainbow noticed, like she had her own new human form, that Twilight didn’t look bad. Dark hair, brown skin (not as dark as Dr. Westbrook’s though), and angular, elegant features. If Twilight was going to look like a human, this seemed like a human she could be. She wasn’t as cool looking as Rainbow’s human, but Twilight was more for thinking anyway.

After a quiet minute, Twilight’s eyebrows rose and Rainbow smiled. She knew when the egghead had an idea.
~
Aurora Amaryllis left the institute shortly after.

Iris Speede went to the public space. She stared out her window. She was quiet, save for a song she hummed under her breath. It wasn’t from Equestria, it was from here on Earth, but she liked it all the same.

“We are the champions,” Rainbow Dash whispered in melodic tones. “My friends... And we’ll keep on fighting, till the end.”
~
One week after she’d spoken with “Iris Speede,” Aurora Amaryllis appeared in Dr. Westbrook’s office with a casefile and a bright expression. She wasn’t wearing her best this time, merely in gray slacks and matching jacket over a pale violet blouse. She didn’t need to be wearing her best clothes because her best efforts were in Westbrook’s hands.

“I’d much prefer she stay here, where she can be monitored,” Dr. Westbrook said, looking over the file.

“Look, her mandatory evaluation was up two weeks ago,” Aurora said, pointing to the line in the file. “You reported she was healthy but couldn’t sign off on her as she was ‘agitated.’ She seemed fine with me.”

Dr. Westbrook frowned. Aurora could tell he didn’t like this. The knit between his brows said he didn’t like this a lot. But, Iris had opened up since Aurora’s last visit. Aurora had called in a favor with Mary and found out Iris interacted more and was definitely more outgoing now.

She understood his hesitation. Under normal circumstances, she’d share them. These weren’t normal circumstances though. His concerns weren’t going to matter.

“I can’t sign off on this Miss Amaryllis,” Dr. Westbrook said with finality.

“Actually, you don’t have to,” Aurora said, maybe just a little too brightly.

He looked up, his eyes sharp.

“You just have to sign off on my monthly reports of her condition. I have my master’s and my counselor’s license. I can handle someone of Miss Speede’s condition. I cannot make medication or lifestyle calls, but I can be overseen by a doctor familiar with her condition. I can do that with my department’s head, Dr. Prenderghast, who spent last week on this case and said he could pick up where the hospital left off... Or I can do it through you.” Aurora settled in her chair and shared a friendly smile. “Frankly, I’d prefer it be you.”

Dr. Elias Westbrook looked over his glasses at Aurora. Friendly smile holding, Aurora ignored the flare of ego that told her she had just outmaneuvered not only an adult, but a doctor. She could see the gears turning in his head and they were gears that turned to Aurora’s favor.

Dr. Westbrook could be thinking: Iris should have an opportunity outside these walls.

Or if he was just being pragmatic: One less mouth to feed was one less worry on his plate.

Eventually, he leaned back, taking off his glasses to clean them. Resetting them, he said, “If I may be frank, Miss Amaryllis?”

“It’s your house, sir.”

“You are a very frightening woman and I mean that as a compliment.”

“I’m just being thorough, Dr. Westbrook.”
~
Outside the institute, Rainbow Dash leaped into the air, punching a fist triumphantly.

“Whoo!” she crowed out. When she landed, she spun on a heel and embraced Aurora firmly. “Twi. You’re a genius! I thought I was gonna be in there forever!”

“I was just thorough,” Aurora said with a blush.

“Whatever. What’s our next move?” Rainbow said, releasing the other girl, who wobbled a bit. Aurora wasn’t used to such... Exuberant displays of physical contact.

“We get in the car, go home, and think about our next move,” Aurora said, approaching her dark blue Kia hatchback.

“Oh. Uh, yeah, that works. Gonna be long?”

“We’re still going to look for your friends. Don’t worry.”

Rainbow cocked her head, then a smile. “They’re your friends too, Twilight. You’ll see.”

Aurora made noncommittal noises as she opened the doors and got into the driver’s seat. She still was sorting out how much she was sold on all this.

After their meeting, a lot of the certainty she’d had while holding Rainbow’s hand had faded to trepidation and worry. Was she doing the right thing? Then she’d look at the pink hair in the mirror. She tried dying it back that night, but she couldn’t get it to bleach right and at best only lightened the shade of pink and purple.

Such evidence suggested Rainbow’s story was true and she and Aurora shared something. It also suggested Aurora didn’t know the first thing about dying her hair properly and was stressed out. Still, she went through with the plan because, well, because Rainbow Dash, or Iris Speede, or whoever she thought she was, just needed some guidance, at most.

She definitely didn’t need institutionalization. Aurora was very certain of that much.

Rainbow certainly looked healthier now that she was out from behind the facility’s walls. The institute hadn’t been oppressive, per se, but someone like Rainbow Dash needed to be outside. She needed to have her freedoms to feel like she was healthy. She certainly looked better in the jeans and sky-blue t-shirt covered by a brown leather jacket that looked like it had seen better days. Her sprawl of rainbow hair glistened in the sun, though still a little damp from a brief shower.

As Aurora started the car, while she was dubious of some of her reasons, she couldn’t argue with the results. Just getting Rainbow out of the institute was a good move.

Idling at the intersection that cut through the small college town near the institute, Aurora spoke up, breaking the amicable silence. “While we’ll work out a plan back at my dorm, I was wondering- do you have any more information on the other people- er, ponies?”

Rainbow arched an eyebrow. “Well... What did you wanna know?”

“You couldn’t have been serious about flying to find them, right?”

“You know a better way to cover ground and see a bunch of people than from the air?”

“But you said they were ponies. If I’m anything to go by, you probably wouldn’t even recognize them.”

“I recognized you.”

Aurora went silent, her momentum fizzling. “Ah, hrm.”

“Anywho, I got you now so it shouldn’t be a big deal now.”

“What?”

Rainbow reached down and reclined the seat back. Folding her arms behind her head, she shot Aurora a confident smirk. “C’mon Twilight, you’re like... The center or something. You found us all before. I’m sure you’ll do it again. Just gotta... Speed it up. Somehow.”

Aurora’s brow knit in consternation. She was getting a little tired of Rainbow’s presumptiveness. Glancing over at the girl, she said, “Look, finding people is a tricky business. Especially when you don’t have a name, description or anything but vocation and general attitude to go on. While I may be like Twilight in many ways, we can’t guarantee this will be the same for the others.” She took her eyes off the road to stare down Rainbow. “This will be a lot of work, Rainbow. I don’t want you to think we’re just going to run into all your friends again.”

“Pedestrian,” Rainbow said casually.

Aurora looked up and slammed on the brakes just as an Amazon of a woman passed through the crosswalk. She hopped back and scowled at Aurora and Rainbow.

As Aurora gazed at her, the strange sense of familiarity she’d gotten off of Rainbow slammed into her full force again.

The girl was easily over six feet. And from the way she held herself to the look of her arms rippling beneath rolled up sleeves, every bit of it was muscle.

Her face was more characteristic than attractive with a stubborn jaw and a nose that had been broken a few times. Her eyes snapped with fire and her long, dusky brown hair was kept under a brown stetson, which she angled up to better glare at the girls. Dressed in a brown/orange-plaid work shirt and jeans, Aurora wouldn’t have been surprised to see cowboy boots beneath those jeans.

“Y’all should watch where you’re goin’!” she hollered in a thick Southern accent. Slamming the car with a callused hand, Aurora worried she may have dented the hood.

Aurora mouthed her apology and the girl walked on, confident in her stride.

“Follow that cowpoke,” Rainbow said with a wicked grin.

“Sorry?” Aurora said.

“The girl who just hit your car. Follow her.”

“Why?”

Rainbow turned to Aurora, her excited grin still in place. “‘Cause I think you almost ran over Applejack.”

Comments

[Sarikano]

The story is good so far, but can I ask how deeply you plan to go with psychological element? Not that I mind it, it's just that I hate when the ending (of the story) is left too open. It's good to know if the persons have truly gone mad or it is actually truly happening because of magic.

[nanashi_jones]

2329903
Each chapter expands on what the girls are going through as well as ties into some overall themes. There are answers, but I don't want to go any further without spoiling too much.

How's this- if you have any questions after the end, I will happily answer them because that means I didn't do my job or I've at least sparked your curiosity.

[Ulti Shadow Lord]

Yes! Best Mane human 6 ever! This is the first time I've ever done this in a comment before, buuuuuuut;

MOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[nanashi_jones]

2331059
Many thanks for the mo-ar. And there will be mo-ar. I promise. The story is set to update one chapter every Sunday really late/Monday squirrelly early for the next few weeks. Hope it continues to please.

[Pinklestia]

Now that's a coincidence.

[kpatkoch]

you should have a chapter soundtrack

[kpatkoch]

she is the one i'am kidding but yes i'am getting matrix vibe

[kpatkoch]

If I had a world of my own everything would nonsense.

Nothing would be what it is.
because everything would be what it insnt.

[ferret]

(two minutes- not one-forty, not one-fifty-five, but two)

There are people who don't precisely time their tooth-brushing sessions?

[Sozmioi]

Pursuing one doctorate is roughly one and a half full time jobs. Two doctorates at the same time with no overlap, unless you have cloning tech like Dr. McNinja (or at least Naruto), is beyond inadvisable. Most programs would simply refuse to let you try. If you mean for us to read that she's completely crazy, it'd be nice to be explicit about it; if you merely mean for us to read that she's very academically impressive, maybe back one of them off to a masters' degree while also getting the first as a doctorate.
Master's degrees are substantially less onerous. I could imagine getting a master's degree while pursuing a doctorate in an unrelated field; double doctorates would probably be best pursued one after the other.