> From the Hospital Bed > by toad180 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Chapter 1: Running > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- From the Hospital Bed Chapter 1: Running Rainbow dash couldn't run any faster. Time seemed to slow to a near stop whilst being in the hospital hallway. "Ya know you don't have ta do this for me sugar cube." "Na, it's fine AJ a little help couldn't hurt. Could it?" Applejack huffed a big sigh, "If ya say so" Running on the verge of tears and the brink of collapse. "Thank you very kindly Rainbow Dash, but it's late and you probably should head home. Maybe you will get better at apple bucking tomorrow, than just bucking three apples from trees." They both laughed a little as Rainbow Dash turned around to leave. Slamming the door open to find her friends huddled around the hospital bed. Applejack sighed, "You probably need to get better at cooking before we can make apple pies Rainbow." "I know I can't tell salt from sugar, but I probably could if you were to teach me." Applejack laughed at that, "OK then sugar cube. I guess I could teach ya. Come on." Charging over and pushing her friends out of the way. "Sug, you are supposed to take the contents out of the egg first. And also the flour is not the potted kind." Rainbow Dash frowned slightly, half jokingly, while Applejack face-hoofed. Hearing a loud, continuous noise coming from the small screen on her right. Tears started to well up in her eyes and her jaw tensing. "Sleeping in trees can't be the most comfortable of places in Equesria can it?" Applejack shouted up at a specific tree that had a rainbow tail sticking out of the foliage. Rainbow Dash was startled, falling from the tree face first into the ground. "Ow AJ, whaddya do that for?" Applejack laughed. "Come on sugar cube. Let's get ya to Twilight before that thing starts to bleed more." The doctor looked over to her, weakly smiling out of what seemed like sympathy. "Oh shush Rainbow, it couldn't have hurt that bad." Applejack chuckled, looking at her cyan friend with a face made of bandages. "It's not like it's broken or anything." "You saw how crooked it was. It couldn't not had been broken." "Run that by me again?" "It's broken." Hearing Fluttershy squeak before bursting into tears on Twilight's shoulder. "Just five more minutes AJ, please" yawned Rainbow Dash, swatting at the air. "Ya got a cute little snore Rainbow, and I thought you wouldn't sleep in trees anymore after what happened." "That's what this cloud's for, and what are you talking about, I snore like a mammoth." Said the cyan rainbow pony patting a white thing and turning back over and receiving a chuckle from Applejack. Walking slowly backwards. Receiving teary stares. "Ya just gotta lift one leg about this far away from the tree, and" Applejack kicked a tree, apples falling neat and orderly into the buckets. "It takes a little getting used to but trust me, you will-" She heard a loud thump and turned around to find a rainbow tail sticking out of a pile of red apples. "Great job! Just try to get them to fall into the bucket next time." Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes as she brushed apples off herself. Bursting trough the door and bolting toward the exit, friends running after her. "Are ya gonna just sit there and stare at the salt or are ya gonna eat your alfalfa?" Applejack said while poking Rainbow's hoof. Rainbow Dash snapped back to reality, "Oh, sorry, I was lost in thought again." "Sure ya were." Running until her legs burned. Running until she felt them no more. "See AJ? It's a 3D puzzle, you put the pieces together to make an apple shape." "I'm not really that good at doing puzzles, I like the challenge though. Thank you so much!" Pinkie Pie burst into the middle of them, "Cake time everypony! Because what's a party without cake!" Running through bramble. A steady stream of tears flowing behind her. "And remember that *hic* time that you *hic* got your hoof stuck under that *hic* rock with a *hic* giant monster chasing you?" "Sugar cube, that happened two weeks ago." Applejack rolled her eyes. "Come on, let's get you home, you're drunk." "Applejack, I live in the sky. You *hic* are an earth pony and have no wings as far as I can *hic* see. Unless you hid them, Applejack do you have secret *hic* wings that you didn't tell me about?" Rainbow dash started to poke and prod Applejack in the sides, suppressing a small squeak from her. "Hey, hey, be careful there. You know that I am ticklish there." "Oh yeah, sorry" Leaving a grounded sonic rainboom in her wake. "Hey sugar cube, wake up." Applejack poked Rainbow Dash. "Huh, wha?" Rainbow Dash looked around to see herself on an unfamiliar couch, having no recollection of the night before. "What exactly happened?" "You insisted upon us going to a bar. Soon after arriving you somehow got yourself drunk off of two ciders, me being a responsible mare, remained sober so you would have a way home. While walking out of the bar you stated that I could not get you home and soon after fell asleep on my back. I brought you home to the farm and let you sleep on the couch." "Oh, ok." Rainbow's head tilted back and she began snoring again. Greeting the face of a cliff with the crown of her head. "Dang AJ, how do you do all of these apples in one day?" "I do one side of the orchard and Big Mac does the other." "Still, that's a crap ton of apples, unless Apple Bloom does some." "We decide the halves into seven sections, one for each day. That lessens the amount of work that would need to happen in one day." "Oh pony feathers. Not again." Applejack turned around to see Rainbow Dash blow her bangs out of her face while being under a pile of apples. Applejack couldn't help but start to laugh uncontrollably. Falling unconscious. > Chapter 2: Decemated Dreams > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Chapter 2: Decimated Dreams Silence curtained Equestria, a heavy down fall coming from the skies. Black umbrellas surrounding a small hole in the ground. Listening to Fluttershy sob broke her heart as her other friends stood there silently. Princess Celestia walked up to the edge of the burial plot, seemingly giggling. Rainbow Dash looked at her, mortified, her other friends not seeming to notice. Slowly that giggle turned into laughs, turning into cackles as the casket opened up, leaving a steady stream of balloons coming from a seemingly infinite source. All of her friends and family started to laugh uncontrollably, forming into a circle around her, pointing, laughing. Saying things such as "Ahaha! She actually thought she died!" and "Oh Rainbow Dash, we fooled you good!" She stood there, staring with a look of pure terror on her face. Crying out for them to stop. Collapsing. --- Waking up. Rainbow Dash gasped for air but failed. "Doctor! The unconscious patient is awake!" All she could hear was the heart monitor beeping ever so faster, as doctors and nurses swarmed around her, making her feel quite light headed. Fainting. Zap-Apple season. Tastiest season of them all is the only thing that Rainbow Dash could think. Zap-Apple jam is the only thing that she could think of, next to Applejack of coarse. Awaking. "Mmmfhhmf!" Rainbow Dash was surprised to feel the bandages that mummified her face. "Hmmmfmmhfm?" "Ahh, Rainbow Dash, you're awake. You took quite a run in with that wall didn't ya. You some of your face and mouth, and with magical supports holding your bones in place you won't have to have those bandages on anymore, but will still have to stay in the hospital for a little while after. Oh, and you have some visitors." The doctor said flatly as if it had been gone over many times with other patients while levitating the bandages off her face. Rainbow Dash let out a sigh of relief after greatly inhaling from the difficulty of breathing while wearing bandages. She visibly brightened as her friends walked into the room. Fluttershy ran over to Rainbow Dash and embraced her in a hug, tears welling in her eyes. Pinkie walked over, her dark pink, deflated mane brushing the ground. As the rest of her friends walked over to her bed she started to frown, "Where's Applejack?" Fluttershy burst into tears. "Rainbow Dash, darling, she passed yesterday, don't you remember? Please tell me you remember." Rarity stared at Her, eyes puffy. Rainbow Dash stared in front of herself, nodding slightly. They all stood around her in silence. A short while after they started to hear snorting noises from Rainbow Dash. "It seems she has fallen asleep. You are advised to leave if you so choose." (-=-=-=-) She awoke to a scream coming from the west orchard, almost half way across the farm. Bolting upward. Leaving a trail of bright rainbows in her wake. Going fast enough to almost break the sound barrier. Making a dead stop as she tried to comprehend what she was witnessing. "You know, it doesn't take much to break a pony's sanity. All you have to do is kill their most loved one, or lose their most prized possession. Once one of those happened it's all down hill from there." Rainbow Dash said abruptly from a sound sleep; startling all her friends. An entity that was barely visible except for the faint lines outlining the terrifying thing. Destroying trees and leaving applesauce and a thick dust cloud behind it. She couldn't move. Helplessly watching what the effect of this thing that had been provoked somehow. "Rainbow, you're not going insane. Please don't go insane." Twilight pleaded. Hearing a dreadful cracking noise as Applejack rammed head first into a tree, body going limp immediately after. Rainbow Dash was frozen in fear, unable to watch what was happening. The monster picked her up, concealing her behind it's huge hand. Letting out a huge cry it started to walk back to whence it came. Rainbow Dash burst into tears. She took off at a bone shattering speed, tears forming in her eyes. "Ah, but you see everypony is going to go insane eventually. Especially me, with the fact that I am heavily burdened with Applejack's death and how I could have prevented it. I was there, guys. I watched her die in front of my very own eyes. I could have stopped it, but I didn't. I just stared and watched it happen." Rainbow Dash was now starting to chuckle. "None of you senseless ponies have ever witnessed death like that, so you can't say that I am not going to to insane." Rainbow Dash was now full-blown laughing uncontrollably. Her friends sat there, unmoving. Unable to move from being scared and also for their own safety. "I'm not going insane! I'm not going insane! I'm not going insane!" Rainbow Dash repeated, rocking back and forth, faster and faster, louder and louder. "I'm not going insane! I'm not going insane! I'm not going insane!" "Nurse, get the sedative!" the doctor shouted over the madness Rainbow Dash was spouting, and the sounds of her friends crying. The doctor injected Rainbow Dash with the needle. The sedative having immediate effects. "I'm... not going... insane." Rainbow Dash managed before falling unconscious. (-=-=-=-) Coming to. She opened her eyes weakly to see a white, padded everything surrounding her. She tried to move her arms, struggling, but failing after a short attempt. After a long while a little door slid open in the wall, revealing a pair of eyes. She heard a muffled voice through the door, having it open moments later. "Hello, Rainbow Dash! I am doctor Shine and I am here to make you all better so you will be able to go back out into the real world." The dark-brown coated stallion walked over to Rainbow Dash. She rolled her head back, and laughed. Producing a concerned stare from the doctor.