Monday Morning
Twilight Sparkle studied the parchment sitting on the table before her with narrowed eyes.
Dear Princess Celestia,
Is there any way to help Princess Luna without
The interloper looks just like a foal, and I’m having trouble believing that
There’s something about the interloper that I think you should
I know you must have your hooves full, but if the interloper isn’t dangerous, should we still
Are you sure you trust me with this?
She groaned and scratched out her newest failed attempt at an opening line. The walls around her groaned and rumbled as the rain poured down outside, drumming on her home’s leaves in torrents. Her magic flickered and blinked out as she replaced her quill in its holder.
Ugh, she thought to herself as she rubbed her temples, there has to be some way to say this right.
The whole situation seemed simple on paper. A dangerous creature was on the loose, and she was supposed to get rid of it. Not that I have much of a choice with a princess depending on us.
It still felt surreal. How could Princess Luna be in danger? She was an alicorn! One of the most powerful magic users in Equestria! It seemed far too absurd that she would be in mortal danger, but it had been right there in the letter. She was injured, and she wouldn’t be getting better until Twilight and Looking did their job.
Anima Thaumaturgia had been explicit in its description of combating interlopers, and Twilight had worked hard on enchanting the bindings. Soon the rest of the items she and Looking had sent for would arrive, and then all they would have to do is actually carry out the plan, well-camouflaged and pleasant-mannered interlopers notwithstanding.
So why do I feel so… off? Twilight looked back at her scratched-up letter, a mess of anxiety flipping around in her gut. Princess Celestia’s own sister was in danger, and she probably had a lot on her mind—was it really a good idea to tell her every misgiving she had? Should she say that she wasn’t confident at all?
What good would a letter do? she thought. It still has to be done either way. She groaned again and reached out for the quill with her magic.
Knock knock knock!
Twilight jumped in her seat with a yelp and tumbled backward, meeting the library's unyielding wooden floor with a fantastic thud.
“What was that? Is everything alright?” a voice called from upstairs.
“Um, nothing, Looking!” Twilight called back, extremely thankful that the stallion wasn’t present. “Somepony’s just at the door!” She groaned as said door continued to produce impatient knocks. "Coming! Coming! Just hold on, you darned–"
She yanked the door open and instantly was buffeted by a blast of freezing rain. It blew around the hooded pony standing in the doorway with ease, who didn’t wait before stumbling her way inside. Twilight slammed her front door shut the moment she was able, and the howling rainstorm outside was relegated to a faraway grumble.
The mare wiped her hooves free of mud on the welcome mat and used her wings to clumsily maneuver a simple box off her back and onto the ground. Then she drew her rain-slick poncho's hood back and shook out her pale yellow mane, sending water droplets everywhere.
Twilight cringed. The books!
"Whoof!" Derpy Hooves said, giving Twilight and the wall to her right a wide, thankful smile. "That's one heck of a storm out there! The weather team really went all out on this one!"
The librarian eyed the inconspicuous brown package. "Erm, to be perfectly honest, I didn't expect it to arrive until after the storm."
"Well, it was marked 'urgent', and us mailmares know that's no joke, 'specially when it's got a fancy stamp." She tapped the red mark on the top of the package, inked right beside the address. "I hoofed it here right away!"
"Well, thank you for going to the trouble." Twilight gave her a frazzled but thankful smile. Her horn lit and she lifted the box, levitating it behind her in a smooth, orderly arc and setting it where she knew the table would be.
The mailmare stood ramrod straight and saluted and stuck out her tongue. "Shine or rain, we always deliver! Well, time to get back at it!" She tugged her hood back over her head, turned, and walked headfirst into the wall. "Oof! Where'd that come from?"
Twilight pulled the front door open, gritting her teeth and turning her head away from the rain and growling wind. "Over here, Derpy."
The pegasus closed one eye and carefully ventured through the doorway and out into the cold before turning and giving Twilight a wave and a smile that seemed entirely too friendly for a mare about to walk through a thunderstorm. Then she was gone.
Shivers wracked her body for a moment as the unicorn shoved the door closed, eager to return the library to a more bearable state of muffled but frantic rhythmless tapping and slowly returning warmth. That's better. Now for that package...
Twilight spun and returned to the table, lighting her horn and correcting her chair as she walked.
“Was that the delivery?” Looking Glass called again.
Twilight's magic made quick work of the seals, popping them off the package's sides. “Yes, it’s early!”
“Great! I’ll be down in just a moment!”
“Okay!” Twilight turned back to the package, but her hooves paused as they moved towards its lid. She bit her lip and stared at the bright red stamp emblazoned on the top of the box: the shield-and-scepter insignia of the Royal Bureau of Investigation.
Her stomach flipped. With this, they had everything they needed. With any luck, the plan would work, and no pony would have to get hurt. I don't have a choice. It's for the princesses. We do it today.
She pulled off the lid, but she already knew what was inside. A dusty-smelling manila folder that held a copy of the records of one Councillor Sandy Hills, a summons form, and a gleaming golden badge that bore a different crest than its packaging.
Twilight's muzzle screwed up as she read the words pressed into the metal: 'Equestria Ministry of Public Health and Family Services.'
The unfinished letter lay underneath the box, quietly forgotten.
For a split second, a pale yet incredibly bright light flooded the room, followed by an echoing, bone-shaking crack of thunder. The walls shook, the lights flickered, and Rainbow Dash's heart seized a little.
"Woo!" Thunderlane let out a cheer. "That was a good one!" He laughed and flopped back onto the couch.
Dash bit her lip. "Uh, yeah, it was." Rain drummed against the Weather Office break room's window with what seemed like an exceedingly unnerving beat. Try as she might, she just couldn't find it in herself to sit down.
"This sucks, though. I hate emergency storm duty." The stallion rolled over onto his stomach, his chin resting on one of the couch's questionably clean cushions. "It's so dumb! Do they think this is some Everfree squall? We spent forever building this storm, it's not gonna go haywire."
Rainbow began to walk back and forth in front of the window, only half-listening to her coworker as he continued to complain.
"For Celestia's sake, I'd rather be running forest patrol instead of this! And it looks like you've got somewhere you'd rather be, too."
"Huh?" Rainbow blinked. "Oh, it's just―it's Gabe. I'm a little stressed."
Thunderlane sat up and leaned forward, looking attentive. "Oh, that kid of yours! What about him?"
She raised an indignant eyebrow. "I've told you, dude, he's not my kid, but it's just..."
Rainbow looked out the window, even though there wasn't much to see except dark roofs and heavy rain. "He doesn't have a great track record with lightning." A bolt lit up the sky as if to punctuate her point, casting the thatch rooftops in stark shadow. The window rattled with its boom.
Thunderlane whistled. "We really charged this one huh? And hey, didn't he say that he'd be alright?"
"Yeah, but he dove off a frickin' cloud the last time he heard thunder." He had seemed so confident before she took him to school, even as the first droplets began to fall. How had she let that little squirt talk her into this? Damn it, why does he have to be so good at words?
He raised an eyebrow. "So?"
Rainbow fixed a stinging look on him. "So, he can't fly."
"Oh." The stallion coughed into his hoof. "Well, uh, if half the stuff you say about the little dude is true, he's one tough cookie. He'll be alright."
She huffed. "I guess you're right, but it's killin' me not to know... Maybe I should–" She stopped, her ears twitching.
A faint cacophony of hoof-on-wood clomping—almost inaudible, but growing louder. Thunderlane cocked his head, but his ears swiveled towards the door too. The steps were growing louder now, wild and uncoordinated. Coming up the stairs. At the end of the hall. Thundering towards the door.
Cloudchaser burst into the room in a flurry of hooves and water. Her goggles were pushed up into her frazzled mane, her pupils were the size of pinpricks as they frantically scanned the room. She'd practically left a small river behind her. Did she fly here?
The new arrival's head popped up when she saw Rainbow. "Dash! I–" She gasped, fighting for breath. "I gotta... You need to..."
"What? What?" Rainbow said as she cantered up to the panting mare. "Come on, spit it out!"
"It's your kid!" Cloudchaser finally managed, sending a spike of ice into Dash's lungs. "At the school, something's wrong!" She gulped air. "They need you there right away!"
Rainbow whipped her head around to look at Thunderlane. "Or, uh, maybe he's not alright?" He offered up the most pathetic, awkward grin she had seen on a stallion in a long time, which was really saying something. "Oops?"
She snorted and galloped out the door.
Sweetie Belle squirmed in her seat. She swallowed and shuffled in her desk chair and tapped her hooves together. Another bolt of lightning painted eerie white shapes on the walls and she jumped. A second later, its thunder threatened to tear the windows out of the building, and a colt made a muffled cry.
At least she wasn’t the only one. Apple Bloom had her eyes locked on her desk. Scootaloo kept glancing around as if she was waiting for a cue. Every foal sat in silence. Well, nearly every foal.
Silver Spoon snickered from her desk. Cheerilee's head popped up like a submersible's periscope and scanned a sea of faces, but none of the fillies or colts must have looked guilty enough to draw her away. She lowered herself back down to the ground, cooing softly.
"It's okay, Gabe, it's going to be okay."
Sweetie craned her neck and leaned as far out of her desk as she dared, just enough to see underneath that desk right in the middle of the front row.
"It's not real, it's not real, it's not real, it's not real..."
Gabe had crammed himself underneath his desk as best he could and wrapped his forelegs over his head, one across the base of his skull, and the other over his muzzle, covering his eyes. His ears were pinned back as he muttered nonsensical mantras to himself over and over with a faint, weak, and frankly insane-sounding voice.
"It's not real, it can't hurt you. It's not real, it can't hurt you. It's not real, it–"
Another flash of light, another ear-splitting crack of lighting, another grumbling barrage of thunder. He made a sound halfway between a yelp and a growl and spasmed, banging his head on the underside of the tiny desk.
Sweetie craned her neck to get a better look. Thunder rolled and the colt made a low whine.
Cheerilee's muzzle screwed up and her eyes watered as she pressed her hoof against his side. That cackling snicker came back, followed shortly by a snooty whisper that, unfortunately, was within earshot.
"Look at that little baby, Diamond!" The stuck-up filly scooted her desk closer to Diamond Tiara's and stuck out her neck. "What kind of kiddie is afraid of a thunderstorm?"
Sweetie couldn't see Diamond's face, but she knew the predatory 'I win' grin that would be there well enough. Her chest got cold just thinking about it.
Another flash, and another roaring boom. "Head down, don't forget—cover your neck, cover your eyes, count to seven. Don’t hold your breath. It's not real, it's not real.” The sound of thunder from a strike further away began to rattle the roof’s shingles. “Ngh! One, two, three..."
Silver Spoon chuckled like it was all a pleasant surprise.
Sweetie felt her face grow hot and she had to hold back a snarl. Apple Bloom still had her eyes locked on her desk, but now she wore a deep, dark frown, Scootaloo was rubbing her hooves together and eyeing the back of 'Spoon's head like it was the world's most tempting hoofball, and Ms. Cheerilee was still lying on the ground next to Gabriel! Couldn't she hear? Wasn't she going to do anything?
Flash. Boom. Venomous giggle. "What a weenie. Hiding under a desk and counting? He sure isn't so tough now, huh, Diamond?"
Diamond turned to her partner in crime, but her face was completely clean of its usual conspiratory sneer. Stranger still, the filly wore nothing in its place.
"It's not the thunder," she said, completely deadpan, apparently not caring that the whole class heard her.
Sweetie's eyebrows attempted to climb to the top of her head, and Silver’s twisted grin evaporated. "W-what?" she said.
DT stared at her, then held up her foreleg and examined it with precisely zero emotion. A clean white cast encased her limb from hoof to elbow like a partial exoskeleton, free of any mark or blemish save for a single poorly-penned signature.
"Thunder's just noise. He knows that." She stared directly at Silver Spoon. "He's the scariest pony I've ever seen, so what’s so horrible could make him do that, huh? What's he really so afraid of?"
Silver opened her mouth as if to respond, but no words came. The rain pounded on the roof. Ms. Cheerilee made shushing noises from the floor. Flash. Boom. Sweetie heard the colt groan through tightly-grit teeth.
"Nnngh, stay calm, s-stay calm... stay calm, you’re not the target, it's not real, it's not real. One, two..."
Not the target? Sweetie Belle thought. Who would be targeting him?
The schoolhouse doors slammed open and every other foal jumped in their seat. A few of the ones closest to the door let out squeals of their own. Immediately, the wind went from an unnerving whisper to a howling roar, filling the space with sound and clawing at the posters on the walls.
Rainbow Dash turned and shut the doors behind her as fast as she could, returning the storm to nothing more than an unhappy but external presence for all but one pony present.
Flash. Boom. Louder this time—enough to make the walls groan.
Gabe groaned into his foreleg and Rainbow Dash rushed down the nearest aisle between the desks, racing to the front of the classroom. She crouched down next to Ms. Cheerilee as the teacher tried to get the colt's hoof out from between his teeth.
"Hey, hey, Gabe. I'm here, I'm here." The colt didn't do anything but keep his eyes squeezed shut, so the sopping wet pegasus mare reached out with a hoof and placed it on his shoulder. "Kid, can ya hear me?"
The colt opened his eyes for the briefest moment, passing his vision over Rainbow for a split second before squeezing them shut again. "Nngh. Rainbow."
"Yeah, it's me."
Flash. Boom. Sweetie swore she felt the whole building shudder.
"Gah!" the colt cried out again. "It's not real, it's not real, cover your neck, cover your eyes, count to seven. Rainbow, I–" He grunted and bit his lip, keeping his eyes closed. "I'm sorry, I thought... I just... nngh. Sorry."
"It's alright, dude, I'm not angry. Don't worry about it." She wrapped her hoof around his, and he held it to his face, over his eyes. Rainbow scooted closer. "You wanna go home, dude? Where it’ll be quieter? Could you do that?"
"...don't know that I can." He muttered. "Loud." This time when the lightning struck, he squeezed Rainbow's hoof hard enough to make her softly hiss. “Can’t stay here.”
"I can make the flight in a minute flat. If you can close your eyes and cover your ears, I can take care of the rest. Can you do that, kiddo?" Gabe didn't move for a long while, then nodded once, sharp and quick. "Alright, c'mere."
The whole class watched as the colt crawled out of the desk towards the encouraging sound of Rainbow's voice. The two adults guided him, step by inching step, into Rainbow's forelegs, where he pressed himself to her soaked coat. He kept his eyes squeezed shut and curled into a twitching lump of fur and mane and clamped-down wings at the next fantastic crash of thunder, but he didn't dive back under the desk like before.
Rainbow hugged the foal tight and began to beat her wings, lifting the two of them off the ground. Ms. Cheerilee followed them to the door. The mares paused within hoof's reach of it and talked to each other in hushed voices that Sweetie couldn't quite overhear.
After a few tense moments, Rainbow spoke up. "Alright. Thanks, Cheerilee. I mean it,” she said with a nod.
The teacher tried to smile. "Of course. He's one of my students now."
Still hovering, Rainbow looked down to the foal huddling close. "You ready? Cover your ears." He did, one with each hoof, as she spread her wings. Then a stony-faced Ms. Cheerilee stepped to the door and pulled it open. Rainbow Dash launched the two of them out into the roaring wind with a single flap and they disappeared.
The teacher slammed the door shut and once again sealed the storm outside. It complained in a throaty, rumbling roar, and nopony made a noise. Then she sighed and began to make her way back to the front. Sweetie Belle's gut felt twisted and empty, and her heart hurt.
Once Ms. Cheerilee reached the front of the class, she turned towards the foals and put on the same smile as Rarity did when a customer came in two minutes before closing after a busy day with a torn dress and tears running down their face.
"Alright, everypony, I know that we've just started, but I don't think we'll be getting much learning done, so I'm giving us all the rest of the day off. Now, if anypony wants a buddy to walk them home, please raise your hoof..."
The colt had curled himself into a tight, shaking ball by the time Rainbow arrived at her cloud home. It was still floating low, so it got to endure the storm the same as any other house in Ponyville. She shoved open her door with her shoulder and hurried in, still hovering, only letting herself pause once she kicked it back shut again with her hind leg.
Unlike the schoolhouse, with its large, empty space and thin walls, the cloudominium didn't function as a massive drum. Here, the rain harmlessly fell into the clouds or onto the stone. The structure itself acted as a giant muffling pillow. Even the thunder didn't seem so bad in here, reduced to an annoyed grumble, but Gabriel twitched and muttered anyway.
She flew them upstairs with aching wings. Flying with a colt was normally taxing, but doing it through a storm while both of them were soaking wet? They practically screamed at her to stop. She paused in front of Gabe's room, then decided against it and went straight to her own. We gotta get some posters or something. That place is just too depressing.
Rainbow crossed the home stretch out of breath and reached her bed just as her wings gave out. The two flopped onto the gloriously soft cloud mattress with a whump. I'll deal with wet sheets later.
Another clap of thunder rolled through the air outside, and Gabe shivered, sopping wet, his eyes still shut tight and his hooves over his ears. Rainbow raised her hoof and tentatively reached out, carefully pressing her hoof against his and moving it off his ear. "Hey, kid, I'll be right back." He didn't respond.
Rainbow ignored her legs’ stiff complaints and hauled herself off her bed before wobbling her way to the bathroom, letting her wings hang limply at her sides. Then she grabbed her biggest, fluffiest towel, and wobbled right on back. Gabe hadn't moved, but he’d gone back to covering his eyes and the back of his neck. His breaths came deep and measured, but she could tell he was forcing it because of the way he shuddered as he sucked in air.
She climbed back onto the bed and shuffled up next to Gabe, throwing the towel over the little green foal's back.
The mare dried the little green ball of foal as best she could, careful to work around his wings and thoroughly rubbing the worst of the water from his mane and tail, but he still didn't move when she tried to untuck one of his legs. "Gabe, you gotta work with me here, I'm tryin' to help ya."
He didn't open his eyes, but one forest green hoof extended itself. Rainbow dried it, then the next, and the next, and the next, and then was faced with the puzzle of drying off a little colt's underside. She frowned, set down the towel, and hooked a leg under his belly. "Hup!"
"Whuh–!?" Gabe flailed halfheartedly as she lifted him up and plopped him down on the towel. He splayed his legs out in all directions, his eyes still shut but a perplexed look on his face nonetheless.
"There ya go. That better?"
Gabriel gulped a breath of air, then another, then a bunch of quick breaths, and in one go, snapped his eyes open. He blinked a few times and looked at Rainbow, then around the room, examining each and every Wonderbolts and Daring Do poster on her walls.
"...your room?" he eventually said.
"Yeah." She gave him a sheepish smile, "yours was kinda bummin' me out. Sorry."
His red-rimmed eyes stopped, focused on some part of her wall. Rainbow blushed when she followed his line of sight to the picture he had drawn of her, hung up next to her Soarin and Spitfire poster. “If you want me to take it down, I can–”
"No, no, it’s fine, I... I, uh... You're good." He stared at her until thunder rumbled outside, and his chin immediately dropped to the now-damp towel. He looked completely ragged. The fur on his face was mussed up like crazy, sticking in every direction, and his mane was no better. Deep bags hung under his bloodshot eyes.
At least he's not still squeezin' em shut, she thought.
"You, uh, you don't... I mean, sorry, Rainbow," he said, mumbling into the sheets. "I... I thought I could handle it."
Rainbow frowned. "How is that your fault? You didn't ask to be so scared of that sort of thing, dude."
He stayed silent, and the mare mentally kicked herself.
Stupid! That was the wrong thing to say. Think! What would Mom do? "Um... do you want to talk about it?"
"I–..." he rubbed his cheek with a hoof, missing up the still-damp fur on the side of his muzzle. "I don't know."
"Well, uh," Rainbow said, frantically wracking her mind for the right words. "Why don't we, um... give it a shot? And see how it works out?"
"...okay." Gabe tapped the tips of his hooves together and winced at the sound of the storm outside.
How do egghead therapists talk, Rainbow? Ugh, I wish Sandy was here. She shook her head, blinking hard. Come on! You can do this. Use your noggin! "Uh... how are you feeling right now?"
Gabe continued to study the wet bedsheets. "Exhausted," he decided after a few moments. "I'm tired of being... put on edge by this."
"What's putting you on edge?" He fixed an incredulous look on her and Rainbow coughed into her hoof. "Uh, I mean, what about the thunder and lightning and stuff? Is putting you on edge, I mean."
Real smooth, Rainbow. Perfect. What a bang-up job you're doing.
The colt rubbed his hooves together but didn't speak.
Rainbow tried again. "It's something to do with your homeland, isn't it?"
He looked at her, gave a tiny nod, and took a deep breath.
"We only ever called 'em 'new bombs', 'cause we never found out what they actually were... but, uh, they sounded just like that. Like rolling thunder. Even when they were right on top of you. And they could... really mess you up." He had a far-off look in his eyes when he spoke. Thunder grumbled outside.
Rainbow grimaced. How could such a natural, normal noise become a harbinger of something so terrible? "I'm sorry, kid. That sounds awful."
"Just another scar, I guess." He rubbed at the one on his foreleg, which had now grown a peach-fuzz type layer of fur. He stared at the gnarled knot of twisted skin underneath its sorry disguise. "I'm such an idiot."
"What?" the mare tilted her head.
"I keep getting this idea that I can fit in here. Like, I dunno, like eventually I could be a real Ponyvillian, or whatever." He flopped his forelegs down on the bed. "But I’m, uh, worried that I can't. Not if this keeps happening. I keep trying, but–"
Rainbow snorted. "So you're saying that you can't get over this? Come on!" She jabbed a hoof at him, poking him gently. "You've come this far and you're giving up now?"
"I–, huh?" The little colt gaped up at her.
"Listen, kid, if this is anypony's fault, it's mine. I'm the one who got put in charge of you, and I'm the one who’s been screwing that up, not you, so you better not just tap out."
"What?" Gabe frowned. "How've you been screwing that up?"
She fixed a flat look on him. "On my very first day, I made you jump off a cloud trying to impress you."
"Oh, um... right."
“And I really shouldn’t have let you go to school.” Rainbow looked down and bit her cheek. "Dude, if I'm being honest with you, your counselor was the one who convinced me to take the job.” She huffed. “I didn't even want it at first. I never even thought about having a kid!"
"So, uh, what changed?"
"...you're a pretty tough dude." She smiled a little. "You've gone through a lot and you're still here. How can I not like somepony with a fighting spirit like that?" The smile grew to a grin. "Even if it does mean you can be a smartass sometimes."
He huffed a not-entirely-mirthless laugh. "I've just been in the right place at the right time long enough to still be around. It's mostly dumb luck."
"Life is mostly dumb luck. But I just..." Come on, Rainbow, get your shit together! Use your words! "I wanted to be in your corner, you know? A dude like you needs somepony holdin' him back, so he doesn't beat everypony else." Her eyes instantly widened at her incredibly poor choice of words. "Uh, I mean, to give everypony else a chance."
Nice one, Rainbow. Well done.
Instead of getting upset or annoyed, Gabe actually laughed. "No, it's alright. I get what you're trying to say, and thanks. Feels good to have somepony in my corner. Real good."
Those final two words filled Rainbow's chest with a feeling she couldn't describe, and she swept the foal into a tight hug.
"Augh! My ribs!"
She set him down in a tangle of limbs. "Oh, shut it, it wasn't that bad." He smirked at her.
Rainbow's ears swiveled towards her room's shuttered windows and she grinned. "Hey, kid, you hear that?"
"Hear what?" he turned towards the windows. "Rain?"
"Rain and...?"
"And... nothing else?" She could practically see the light spark to life behind his big brown eyes. "Ohhh."
"Sounds like the storm finally burnt itself out." She grinned. "Nothin' but water from now on. A lot of water."
"Whoof. What a relief." The colt flopped onto his side. "Also, you smell like a wet dog."
"Just means I get the first shower, kiddo." She gave him a bump with her wing and promptly stumbled off her bed, landing in a heap. "I meant to do that."
"Yeah, I could tell you rehearsed."
The mare smirked. "Whatever."
Ding-dong!
"Gabe! Can you get that?" Rainbow shouted from the bathroom. Why did somepony have to show up now? It was still pouring, after all. What were they, crazy? Well, they were crazy loud knockers. "GABE, YOU LITTLE–!"
"Yeah, I got it, hang on a fuckin’ second!”
She heard his hooves clatter past the bathroom door and down the stairs. Hopefully, it'd just be Derpy with the mail or something, and she wouldn't have to leave the perfect comfort that was a warm shower right after being freezing cold and soaking wet.
"Rainbow!" Of course. Why not? "You had better get down here!"
The pegasus growled and stepped out of her bath, grabbing the nearest towel and giving herself a speedy dry-off.
She trotted out the bathroom door a few minutes later feeling both refreshed and intensely annoyed. "Alright, what's got you so riled—oh."
Twilight Sparkle, Sandy Hills, and a black-and-white unicorn stallion with a cutie mark of a magnifying glass over a book that Rainbow had never seen were all dripping rainwater in the middle of her foyer next to Gabe. Is that the guy that Twi mentioned was staying with her?
“Hello, Rainbow,” Sandy said, without her usual gentle confidence. She and Twilight both seemed extremely nervous for some reason, and the look on the newcomer's face put a funny feeling in her stomach. Something wasn't right.
"Uh, hey, Sandy. Hey, Twi," Rainbow said cautiously. "What's up?"
The stranger stepped forward and flashed a very shiny, very golden, very official-looking badge. "Miss Dash, my name is Looking Glass. I’m with the Equestria Ministry of Public Health and Family Services. Your charge and his personal counselor have been summoned to the Canterlot office immediately. They are to have an official appraisal this afternoon."
Twilight gave her the most embarrassed, sheepish grin Rainbow had ever seen. "Um, surprise?"
Ponyfeathers.