Flash Sentry tapped out a speedy rhythm with his heel. To the untrained ear, he had to assume it sounded like impatience or inattention—and in all fairness, he’d seen Rainbow Dash off her Ritalin; the resemblance was striking—but that’s because the untrained ear didn’t hear him counting out measures or inventing lyrics in his head. On any given day in class, he had at the very least one song stuck in his head, begging to be let out, but on days spent steeped in stress, days like today, the music all but performed a prison-break.
Amnesty Hospital’s waiting room wasn’t the worst place to be trapped indefinitely. The ultra-modern renovations made reception seem more like the lobby of a fancy, upscale hotel, the kind Flash dreamed of checking into and out of while on tour. Ambiance could use some work, but the staff was five stars.
A muscle-bound colossus of a nurse pushed an empty stretcher through the waiting room, but stopped to give an entirely too specific series of fist-bumps to Rainbow Dash. “Daring Dash! Ey, how’s that shoulder holding up?”
Despite herself, Dash snickered and reciprocated their secret handshake. “Heh! Still makes that weird clicking noise!” All the same, her enthusiasm dimmed at high speeds. The stitches slicing through her left eyebrow made it difficult to furrow her brow. Instead, she leaned to look past him and palmed her fist, as if breaking in a catcher’s mitt. “Uh, hey, Thalamus, do you know how my friends are holding up back there? Can I see them yet?”
The nurse shook his head and clapped her shoulder. “Sorry, Double D. Gonna have to wait.”
As he wheeled the empty stretcher through some swinging double doors, Rainbow let loose a blustery sigh culminating in a thundery grumble. “Sure. Wait. Right.”
She slumped down in the upholstered seat next to Flash and he knew exactly how she felt. A weight had been hugging his chest for somewhere over an hour, when it became just the two of them. That didn’t mean he wanted her to have to feel it. “Hey. You want to go find Pinkie? I can stay here and text you when we can see the others.”
“No... maybe.” Rainbow’s head lolled over the back of the chair so she could give him a suspicious look. “What’s she doing?”
“Last I checked, stress-cheering up kids. It would probably really make their day to hang out with two real-life superheroes. Plus it would give you something else to do besides wait for hours on end.” He raked his hand through his pomade-coated hair, which was better than testing out the kick-drum beat in his head on the nearby potted ficus.
For a solid moment there, she looked like she would raise up out of her seat and go chasing after Pinkie Pie and the kids (who she would no doubt make honorary Rainbooms), but then something solid resolved in her bright pink eyes. Rain pattered against the window by her head. “Thanks for the offer, but I think I’m gonna chill here. This might sound kinda crazy, but I don’t want to be anywhere else right now.”
He shared a smile full of meaning. “Yeah. We’re crazy.”
Passing the time was a bit easier with the flatscreen running the news, but Flash wished they’d change the channel. Local newscaster, Good Tomorrow, prattled on in a deeply resonant, well enunciated voice as if he had every authority on the shockingly major and majorly shocking developments out of the downtown core today: a group of ne’er-do-well, vigilante girls incited a fellow bad actor to attack their fair city, to disastrous results.
B-roll footage of the city park razed and in ruin underscored his voiceover. Twin ruts burned into the mud, originating from the footprints of a pair of name-brand sneakers. A statue of town founder Apple Seed sank into the grass, as if it had been tossed aside by the indent of what looked like handprints at the head. Shaky-cam that had clearly been taken on a bystander’s phone caught Twilight sprinting and panting as she fiddled furiously with a high-tech, geode-powered gauntlet. Before she could use it, a blast from off-screen forced the camera-person to whip away their phone.
The next shot of Good Tomorrow had him reporting live on scene, because the sky above the town had a startling new feature. A jagged crack marred the city skyline where a portal had been torn open. The girls had managed to close it, but the sky still looked like a stitched-up wound in space-time that hadn’t fully healed yet.
Good Tomorrow stood camera-left to show off the rift behind him on camera-right. “As you can see, we’re experiencing quirky weather patterns that produce an optical illusion that the sky is broken. If you ask this reporter, a fitting coincidence on the day our fair town has been criminally vandalized. Resilient as ever, onlookers have gathered to take pictures under this beautiful wonder of nature.”
Flash nearly cursed out loud. The good thing was this was only local news, and asking his dad to do him a solid could easily get the story off-air. Being the son of the Canterlot City police chief Flash Magnus occasionally had its advantages. But the photos? The phone footage of Twilight? This was getting dangerously out of hand. Out of their control. All it would’ve taken would be for that kid with the phone footage to go to any major network, or spread it online before they could put in an anonymous copyright strike, and boom. The whole world would know magic existed.
Sunset Shimmer would be the world’s first otherworldly invader. The girls would have their normal teenage lives taken from them by force. That is, if some shady, clandestine government operation didn’t take them in for questioning first. Assuming they hadn’t been seriously hurt today. Assuming they’d be in class on Monday. Assuming he was worried over nothing right now.
He shook his head. One problem at a time.
A whistling from the entrance thankfully caught his attention. A young dude swaggered in with his hands in the pockets of a woodsy, sheepskin bomber jacket. He hadn’t even bothered to put on pants and instead chose to rock flannel PJ bottoms with little green alien heads patterned all over them. When he leaned over the reception desk, he dug a small candy packet out of his pocket. “Good evening, ma’ams! Word on the street is someone here might have a bit of a sweet-tooth. Anybody like gummy griffins?”
As the receptionists giggled, Rainbow Dash sat up beside Flash and grinned. “Timber Spruce? Dude! Took ya long enough!”
Flash frowned as she raced over. “Did he stop on his way to get snacks?”
Timber’s easy-breezy summertime smile brightened when he saw Rainbow coming over. “Hey there, hero! Heard you girls had a tough day in the office.”
Rubbing the back of her neck, which was no doubt whiplashed from the sheer velocity she’d been racing at earlier that day, Dash let out a sigh of a laugh. “Uh, yeah, you could say that. They won’t let us see the rest of the girls yet.”
“We’ve been waiting for hours now,” Flash informed him, guarding his expression. Mostly for Timber’s sake. The last thing Flash wanted to do was pick a fight when their friendship experts were supposed to be getting their rest, but at least internally, he had to admit he didn’t like the vibes coming off this kid. So… casual.
“Well, great. It sounds like I haven’t missed anything exciting then.” He left the gummy candies on the desk, then tapped on the bag with a wink. “That’s Sparkle with one k. Make sure she has the best room, okay?”
He turned back to Dash and assumed a sergeant's stance, with his posture straight and his hands behind his back. “Alright, soldier. What's the status update?”
From her time in the air force cadets, Dash clearly knew how to give a proper salute. “Last I heard, Applejack’s getting patched up. Mostly just a sprained ankle, but she also has a wicked shiner I’m maybe a little jealous of. Pinkie’s off warming up her cheer-up skills until she can see the others. Not a scratch on her. Kinda freaky. Same with Flutters, so she volunteered to go tell everybody’s ‘rents ‘cause she can probably break it to them the best without getting us all grounded. I kinda think she offered so she could go hug a bunny or something.”
Timber nodded. “The Fashionista?”
“Out cold when I carried her in,” Dash muttered. Dark storm clouds drifted in over her gaze and Flash couldn’t blame her. “Doc told me she’d be just fine. No head trauma or anything, so that’s good, it just looked scarier than it was. I’ve seen Rarity fake fainting all the time and I know she’s always pale, but… wow, you know? Turns out she’s a super bad actor. All that is nothing like the real thing.” She grunted, shaking her head. “It all happened so fast. If I hadn’t rushed in like a total idiot, she’d be fine. Maybe everybody would…”
Flash grimaced, and not just because he sat back down in a stiff waiting room chair. “Yeah, it’s… it’s pretty bad. But you don’t have to worry. I mean, the girls are in good hands now, so everything’s going to be alright? When all this is over, we’re all going to have a good laugh, right?”
Saying something he didn’t entirely believe didn’t feel as reassuring as he’d hoped. He’d never been a particularly compelling public speaker; anything he could put together paled in comparison to the friendship speeches Twilight, Sunset, or, heck, even Rainbow Dash could give.
But at the moment Rainbow Dash didn’t seem to have many inspiring pep-talks. She clutched her side again, a move he kept catching her do when she thought it wouldn’t get noticed. It was like today had beaten the fight out of her, and she was doing everything she could not to let it show, but then, there was only so long she could hide.
That was why Flash didn’t get how Timber couldn’t see that. He didn’t get Timber. He should’ve known these girls almost as well as Flash did by now, right? Couldn’t he feel it in the air? Couldn’t he see the defeat in Rainbow’s eyes? And yet the guy strolled in, hair all windswept and wild like he’d just come back from a day of surf and sand at the beach.
It wasn’t like Flash had any problem with handsome guys. The not-quite-rugged mountain man handsomeness wasn’t even the problem here, nor the lithe and tall swimmer’s bod. He just didn’t trust anyone who only pretended to care about the girls. After what happened, he had every reason to get protective, and yeah okay, he’d never be able to protect them from the scary stuff. Today made that abundantly clear. But he could at least ward off jerks who made jokes in hospital waiting rooms.
Timber hooked an arm around Rainbow’s shoulders, because of course he hadn’t picked up on how tender her side was. “Hey. How fast you think you were going on your way in here? Bet you broke some kind of record, huh?”
Seriously? Flash thought. That’s what you heard from all that? Dude.
Dash grinned, a laugh bucking out of her. “Hey, yeah! I blasted across the whole city! I ran so fast I probably phased through an ambulance on the way! It’s sorta hard to tell when I go fast enough.”
Timber pointed at her. “Terrifying, but that’s the single coolest thing I’ve ever heard. Dangerous beyond all belief, but cool.”
“Only way I roll when my friends need me,” she said, smirking. At least Rainbow Dash knew how to deal with this clown, but Flash wasn’t sure he wanted the other girls to have to put up with Timber’s comedy routine when they were still recovering.
The loud crackling of a plastic package caught his attention as Timber chewed on some more of his gummies and offered them to Dash and Flash. “Hungry?”
Flash frowned, holding up a hand. “Nah, man. I’m good.”
Dash chomped her way through some innocent gummy griffons as if they’d personally been disloyal to her. Flash did have to admit, it was probably good for her to eat something, even if Timber literally couldn’t have picked anything with less nutritional value. Ironically, Spruce was technically taking better care of his friends than Flash was. Great. Insult to injury—an injury he couldn’t even help heal.
The sound of combat boots dragging across the floor interrupted their late dinner.
Sunset Shimmer stumbled into the waiting room looking like she’d challenged the sky to a fist fight and lost to a lightning bolt. Her signature leather jacket was singed and frayed, angry red marks criss-crossed the skin he could see, and she stared ahead in a shell-shocked daze.
Rainbow Dash erupted to her feet and Flash followed suit. Unlike him, Dash seemed to know what to do, and took Sunset’s arm around her shoulders, as if a solider helping her injured commander. “Whoa! Hey, earth to Sunshim. You okay? You don’t look like you’re doing so hot.”
Flash held out his arms awkwardly, thinking it might be helpful in case she fell over, but not quite sure what direction she would fall even if she did. “Do you wanna sit down? Maybe you should sit down. You look like you wanna sit down.”
Timber raised an eyebrow. “Is that supposed to be subliminal messaging?”
Sunset held her head and groaned, which made Flash’s heart drop in his chest. If Sunset hit her head—if this time she’d done some serious damage—he didn’t want to think about all the ways she could be hurt or worse, and it didn’t help that she was swaying to stay on her feet.
She opened her shallow teal eyes and grimaced. “Sweet Celestia, I screwed up.”