Sunlight seeped across the horizon, bringing its subtle glow to the nearby orchard treetops, a reprieve of warmth to the land after a cool night. With autumn just around the corner, the summer winds were being traded with chillier ones as pegasi across the nation prepared. Yet, in the shadows of the apple trees and unnoticing of the cold, Rainbow Dash huffed and puffed.
“Pony feathers, why isn’t this working?” she asked herself aloud for the umpteenth time. Narrowing her eyes, she stared across the dew ladened grass. Flexing her throat muscles, she inhaled once again, paused for some moments, and then exhaled sharply, seeing only her faint white breath for all her efforts.
“Flapping pony feathers! How does she do it?”
With a fierce determination rising within her, she inhaled and exhaled rapidly in search of the unknown power. The way the cool air filled her lungs was noticeably different than before. She could hold more, if only seemingly a small amount, but the force she exhaled made her feel as if she could even blow out one of Pinkie Pie’s matriarch cakes and all one hundred of its candles.
But try as she might, no matter how she pursed her lips or flexed her throat, she couldn’t produce a lick of flame.
“Uraagh!” Rainbow Dash grunted. “Fine!” she then said before rolling her neck. “Time to do this.”
Inhaling deeply again, she closed her eyes, and with an exhale, she unfurled her wings.
The missing sensation of feathers sliding across one another sent a twinge through her chest from the feeling of loose leathery skin becoming taut. Standing rigidly, she flexed her wing tips and clawed thumbs, imagining the bones of a hand as Spike had shown her. She found her limbs becoming more responsive with practice, and they felt even more dexterous than before.
Furrowing her brow, she curled her wings open and closed. Whilst moving her wing thumb claws in a circular pattern, she tested the limits of her appendages. Rainbow Dash suppressed the urge to grimace from the strange movement of bone and muscle beneath her scaled flesh, and so she mentally reaffirmed herself to ease the tension building in her face. With a somewhat more relaxed stance, she drew out her focus on the alienly familiar physical sensations.
After another quick breath in preparation, she flapped her wings earnestly, sending out a soft reverberation that reached the nearest trees, and the wind she cupped and thrusted forward swished the grass and scattered the dew droplets all around her. She flapped again, still haphazardly in comparison to the synchronized precision her feathered wings used to move with. Yet, she tightened her jaw before her feelings of remiss could dwell further, and so she swung her wings wider and wider.
Opening her eyes, Rainbow Dash craned her shoulders up as her uncoordinated wing flaps fell into steady strokes. Thwump, thwump, thwump, went her wings, sounding as if a large drum were softly being played here in this secluded part of the orchard. But the sound did not reach her ears as wind and focus drowned out the beat, for she was too lost with gritted teeth in search of that gravity defying feeling of flight.
“Come on,” she rasped while beginning to flap harder. The tips of her wings breaking her peripheral vision caused the smallest sense of vertigo, but she steadied herself as she became accustomed to their sight, and she quelled her thoughts of a gargantuan claw slamming her out from the sky.
Focusing on the physicality of her limbs, Rainbow Dash emptied her mind to take in all of the sensations she could.
She felt the resistance in her wings fighting the natural bias her mind wanted to move them, finding that her upstrokes were now harder than with her feathered ones. But soon she found the motion that felt more natural, and she began to flick her wings upward with each rise using her now more powerful shoulder muscles. The motion seemed wasted to her, but her limbs had yet to ache as they usually did before, and so she kept it up.
As her wing strokes fell into a comfortable precision with one another, and the world around her began to bleed out from her focus, a sense of weightlessness slowly trickled into her. With only a few strokes more, the feeling lurched forward and she finally felt her front hooves leave the ground.
Rainbow Dash’s eyes went wide in surprise at the brief lift, and she began to flap more furiously as the deep pitted yearning for flight filled her again without quam. Her cheeks pulled back as she looked up, gnashing her teeth and stretching her neck all while straining her shoulder muscles to lift her upwards. Though she threw all her strength into the motion, the process quickly became a dull and repeated task to her mind, and her remaining focus could at last begin to drift undistractedly inward in search of that familiar sensation of flight, of that pegasi magic that felt as seamless as the air itself.
The weight of her body lessened from her back hooves as lift began to overtake gravity, and she blindly grasped at the odd but new feeling behind it, internalizing it with all her senses and committing it to mental and physical memory. But try further as she might, she could raise herself no higher.
“Come on! Come on, come on, come on!” she exclaimed between swift breaths, but to no avail, and eventually, she ceased her flapping. Falling onto her front hooves, she panted lightly.
Rainbow Dash then jerked her head about in frustration, finding her hooves walking on their own as she paced about mindlessly. “Just great!” she exclaimed while cocking her head. “Can’t breathe fire, can’t even fly! How in Celestia am I supposed to do anything if I can’t even fly!?” Flicking her tail, she circled a tree twice before stomping away from it. After a few dozen paces more, she let loose a growl, and turned sharply to storm off in yet another direction. Her eyes were narrow as tension filled her limbs, and her attention became more jagged on the troubles circling her thoughts.
With no destination in mind she marched forward on, resisting the growing temptation to kick at the passing orchard trees lest she add more trouble to her worries. I can break an Everfree tree. The thought had popped into her mind, and she found herself quickly agreeing to it in her attempt to escape this growing frustration and pent up energy.
Swiftly turning towards the forest's direction, Rainbow Dash hastedly stomped through the orchards. It was just as she was imagining herself karate kicking a tree the size of a house straight in half that she came to a screeching halt from the sight of Tailwind ahead of her.
He sat at the base of a tree on the property’s edge, with the town and Everfree both in the distance beyond the farm's wooden fence line. He was looking away from her, seemingly watching the brightening sky with a pile of apples and cored stems beside him.
The fire all but vanished within Rainbow Dash as she curiously raised an eyebrow, and with a calmer demeanour, she approached him.
“Hey,” she announced when she came close by.
“Oh, h-hey,” Tailwind replied in surprise as he looked up to her while sitting more upright.
“Whatch’a doing here?” Rainbow Dash asked. “I figured you’d be with the others at the castle still.”
“About that,” Tailwind said as he sheepishly turned away. “I… couldn’t seem to bring myself to enter that spooky forest. And then I got a little hungry...”
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes, but then sighed as she guiltily remembered the first time she and her friends entered the forest, back when Nightmare Moon appeared. Plopping herself beside him and grabbing an apple, she gave him a shoulder pat. “Don’t worry about it. Those woods are spooky. And no pony can blame ya for being scared. It has timberwolves, manticores, constellation beasts, hydras, cockatrices, and more.”
Tailwind whipped his head towards her. “It has WHAT?”
“Eh, forget I mentioned it,” Rainbow Dash replied and she busied herself with an apple. With a mouthful, she spoke, “You'll be fine shticking on da main pash. It’sh not dat bad.”
Tailwind nervously clopped his front hooves together as he looked back to the forest's direction. Reaching for an apple himself, the two of them munched together in silence for a time as the sun steadily rose.
“It’s silly, isn’t it?” Tailwind eventually asked.
“Hm?” Rainbow Dash replied while munching.
“Even though I’ve become a drake, I’m still scared of things like the woods.” His eyebrows fell as he eyed the distant treeline. “I… I went through fire, and I’m supposedly going to be as tough as a dragon. But… I still get scared.”
He turned to Rainbow Dash and looked at her face as though there might be an answer. “It’s… It’s okay to still be scared, right?”
Rainbow Dash gulped the rest of her apple, and sat a little more upright. With a straight gaze, she replied, “Being scared isn’t ever going to go away. You gotta’ face it head on every time.”
Tailwind didn’t reply at first, instead thoughtfully pondering her answer while holding an apple, but eventually he asked, “W-What scares you, if I may ask?”
Rainbow Dash looked down at the grass, and she shuffled her wings in thought. “I guess, if I had to say, it’d be losing my friends.” Nodding to herself, she looked back up at the sky. “Yeah, that’d be it. Whatever happens to me in the end, sure it’s important, but… not as important as they are.”
Watching the sun steadily climb into the sky as its light began brightening the world, Rainbow Dash blinked as she momentarily reflected on herself, noticing her feelings of ire towards her manifestations lessening as time passed. Though the burned woods still felt like only a short while ago, its troubling ramifications paled in comparison to the terrible possibilities that could befall her friends.
Twilight had become a vampony, and more than one pony at that. Rarity had her own ordeal, though managed it was. Now with herself on the line, Rainbow Dash felt strange being in a similar predicament despite her exposure to such similarly natured matters before. It was as if all sense of preparation had suddenly been lost, and yet, for all intents and purposes, Rainbow Dash felt worse off than Twilight or Rarity.
That feeling was short lived due to the pit of guilt in her stomach for even having formed the comparison, but even with all of the care she had been left with for her situation unlike her two friends, she couldn't yet quell the hollow contemptment that buzzed at the edge of her thoughts. Although it paled comparison to the worry for herself, and more importantly, her friends, its existence oddly tickled within her.
However, premature to further reflection on the matter, Rainbow Dash blinked as more sunlight slid into her vision, and she remembered her surroundings. Looking back to Tailwind, she saw him staring at her in awe.
Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes. “What’s that grin for?”
“J-Just admiring the magic of friendship,” Tailwind replied, though his cheeks reddened at the inanity of his statement. “I-It’s just that… it sounded like something I’d expect the Element of Loyalty to say.”
Rainbow Dash let out a chuckle as she leaned back, stretching her forearms behind her to prop herself up. “Look dude, my name’s Rainbow Dash, this isn’t a war room.”
“Oh! S-Sorry,” he quickly replied while looking away. “I’m sorry, I just got so caught up with-” Stopping himself suddenly, Tailwind blinked, and took a quick breath before replying, “A-Alright, Rainbow Dash.”
Rainbow Dash gave him a smirk of approval, and she absentmindedly reached for another apple. To her surprise, however, she discovered the pile was already gone. After a moment of eye contact between the two of them in recognition of the matter, and with neither willing to spend the effort to fetch more just yet, the two of them simply remained seated as they watched the rest of the world waking around them.
The birds were in full chorus as they sang their morning songs, the insects were lazily starting their flower runs, and the rabbits were emerging to nibble on the dew laden grass. Rainbow Dash and Tailwind watched with silent appreciation as the world became alive.
"It's weird," Rainbow Dash quietly said. "Even though I've seen three sunrises now, I still feel like it's the first morning for me."
"Y-Yeah, I know what you mean," Tailwind replied. "I thought I'd take a nap earlier tonight, but… I just still don't feel tired."
Rainbow Dash nodded in understanding, and a silence passed over them as they took in the waking world.
The foremost of it all at their attention were the bunnies slowly hopping onto the property. Their small furry forms were like marshmallows scattered across the field, bouncing now and then to nibble on the fresh salad that they sat upon.
The idyllic breakfast for the bunnies was then disturbed by a low rumble echoing across the orchard. All the bunnies raised their heads in panic, immediately spotting Rainbow Dash and Tailwind watching intently from under a distant tree. Their whiskers twitched once, twice, then became rigid. After a heartbeat's pause more in locked eye contact, the bunnies scattered from the field, avoiding the orchard's property entirely as they fled into the nearby woods or the dense shrubbery of the town.
With red cheeks, Rainbow Dash jumped up from her spot. “I… I think I’m going to go get some breakfast at the library.”
“I-I think I’ll join you,” Tailwind replied, also looking to where the bunnies had vanished with shameful eyes.
And without another word, the two of them hastily made their way into town.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"One bowl of oatmeal sprinkled with almonds for you," Spike chimed as he slid a piping hot bowl in front of Rainbow Dash. "And another for you," he added while sliding one to Tailwind. "And I'll get started on both of your omelettes now."
"Thanks, Spike," Rainbow Dash replied appreciatively, while Tailwind nodded his thanks.
Digging into their meals with slight hesitation, their gazes were locked on the white slurry of oatmeal before them. Still they scooped bite sized portions with their spoons into their mouths, finding it suitable but not quite filling in a manner of speaking. Though, neither of them had words for the feeling as they soon became lost in the consumption of their meals. They now shoveled spoonfuls of their steaming food into their mouths without care to its scalding temperature, and by the time Spike returned, they both had emptied their bowls.
“Here’s your omelettes,” Spike announced, scooting the plates towards them and pulling his hand back faster now. “Do uh… Do you guys want some more oatmeal?”
“Fyah,” Rainbow Dash said between bites. “Mwoe almungs thish tyme, pweash.”
Tailwind wiped his mouth before replying, “No, I’m good. But could I get some orange juice?”
“Hmpf!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed midchew.
“Two cups of orange juice,” Spike replied while raising his fingers, and he pitter pattered back into the kitchen before shortly returning with their glasses.
Rainbow Dash reached for her cup and immediately used it to help down the large portion of food in her mouth. “Ah, that’s hitting the spot,” she said while leaning back into her chair. Sitting idly as her stomach gurgled her portions, her nose twitched, and she momentarily asked. “Hey, Spike?”
“Yeah?”
“Breezy Lace here?”
“No, she left a few hours ago for the farm.” After answering, he hopped himself onto his chair and began to stir his spoon in his cold, rigid porridge.
“Huh, must have missed her then,” Rainbow Dash replied. Glad the farm’s big enough. But I guess I should find a better practice spot. Digging back into her meal, she frowned at seeing only two bites left. “Hey, Spike?”
Spike paused mid bite, “Yeah?” But before she could reply, he saw her remaining portions, and placed his full spoon back into his porridge. “I gotcha’, one moment!”
Rainbow Dash gave him a thankful nod while he quickly dashed off into the kitchen, and as swift as the little dragon always seemed to be, he returned with a piping hot and much larger bowl of oatmeal.
“Thanks,” Rainbow Dash replied as she greedily eyed her meal. After rubbing her hooves together in anticipation, she reached her arms out to grasp her bowl, lifting its edge to her lips while tilting her head back slightly. The ensuing slurp from the edges of the large bowl filled the room like a mile long sheet of paper being cut by scissors.
While the noise ripped through the air without end, Spike hopped back into his chair and quickly busied himself with his porridge with a happy smile. Tailwind, on the other hoof, paused mid drink as his body locked, and he stared incredulously at the noise machine. Seconds continued to pass, and his appetite continued to wane exponentially. After the first full minute ticked by in his mind, Tailwind swiftly scooted himself out from his chair, gave Spike a thankful nod, and retreated into one of the alcoves deep within the library.
Rainbow Dash, meanwhile, kept sipping from the bowl as if it was soup, finding herself unable to pull her happy cheeks back down from the texture the mess of oatmeal and almonds sliding down her throat made. She gently bit at its slurry mush while it passed her teeth, crunching the almonds to her delight.
It’s scalding temperature was like a comfort unknown to her ever before while eating. Although the heat in her throat starkly contrasted with the heat in the rest of her body, the temperature didn’t reach a point of discomfort. If anything, it made the meal feel more full than it was. It was like a comfortable weighted and heated blanket was wrapped around her throat while she swallowed. She couldn’t quite form the words to self describe why she was so enchanted by it, but she found it more enjoyable by the moment.
As the second minute passed, Rainbow Dash finally gulped the rest of her meal, and with a resounding thud, she placed the bowl back onto the wooden table. Leaning back, she craned her head upward with closed eyes. “Ah, that was good,” she announced with a happy smile before declaring, “From now on, that’s how I’m eating oatmeal.”
Spike nodded in approval as he placed his spoon back down into his half eaten bowl. “I totally get ya. Though, the only time I can get away with it is when I have the place to myself.” He sighed. “Our family was pretty strict on etiquette.”
Opening her eyes lazily, she replied, “Well, you're dining with me, so have at it.” Rainbow Dash kicked herself back into her chair with a satisfied grin and brought her hooves behind her head. Closing her eyes again, she sat contently while the hot meal churned in her gut.
She could hear Spike scuffling to stand on his chair. After hearing him inhale and exhale lightly, a slurping noise began to fill the space. After a time passed while she sat contently, Spike did eventually finish and was beginning to wipe the remnants from his face with a napkin, when suddenly the front door to the library opened.
“We’re back!” Sea Drop proclaimed.
Rainbow Dash opened her eyes and turned her head. “Hey, welcome back.”
Sea Drop trotted into the room while Dust Cloud went to set his hat on the coat rack.
“Hmmm!” Sea Drop said while sniffing the air. “That smells good. Any breakfast left?”
Spike hopped off his chair. “I can whip some up. What do you want?”
After eyeing the messy table, Sea Drop replied, “A big bowl of oatmeal and an omelette, please!”
“Same for me and appreciated,” Dust Cloud added.
“Coming right up,” Spike replied, and moved to collect some of the dining ware.
“I’ll get some,” Rainbow Dash said. Sitting up right, she gathered hers and Tailwind’s bowls and made her way into the kitchen after Spike.
Walking to the sink, they both deposited their loads. Spike quickly stepped away to start making more food, while Rainbow Dash tended to the dishes. She turned on the faucet and began rinsing the remnants from the bowls. Her ears twitched at the sound of Spike cooking, and she gave him a curious glance. She wasn’t quite sure how she failed to notice on entering, but with a second look, the kitchen had almost become a bakery.
A row of full bags of flour were piled against the wall, and two were already empty while the third rustled about from Spike having climbed in to scoop the rest out. Scattered around the rest of the kitchen was an assortment of ingredients in waiting covered bowls and dishes. Among them was a bowl of cranberries, of which Rainbow Dash’s eyes immediately zeroed in on.
Swiftly washing her hands and turning off the faucet, she made her way to them and began to chew on them one by one idly while she asked, “So, Spike.”
“Yeah?” he replied without looking back, preoccupied with cracking eggs onto the burner plate.
“What do you think about-”
Rainbow Dash froze as a green gout of flame erupted in the corner of the kitchen, and the sound of sizzling eggs filled the space. Spike stood atop a stool, happily shuffling a steaming pan while reaching for spices with his free hand. “What was that?” he half shouted over his shoulder.
Rainbow Dash took a deep breath, and stilled her quivering limbs. “I-I said…” The sounds of cooking were louder than she could muster, and so she hesitantly stepped to Spike’s side.
Half slamming herself sideways onto the kitchen counter in a cool fashion, she looked Spike straight in the eye. “What do you think about them?”
“The other drakes?” he asked, now looking back and forth between her and the food he prepared. With a flurry of motion, he flipped eggs, filled plates, cracked more shells, and prepared bowls of oatmeal to be heated. “They eat a lot.”
“I mean beside that. Although,” Rainbow Dash said as her eyes passed over the messy kitchen, “I gotta hand it to ya, it’s like you're a chef at a small restaurant or something.” She looked back at him and said, “I’ll help out more with kitchen clean up.”
Spike nodded appreciatively while he wiped his brow. “Thankfully you’ve all been picking the same thing. As long as it's simple stuff I don’t mind so much. It’s kinda nice getting back to basic cooking again.”
Rainbow Dash laughed and gave him a playful nudge. “Well, when you decide to kick the food up a notch I won’t be complaining. But I was asking, what do you think of them?”
“Well,” Spike said as he thoughtfully looked up, watching the steam fade into the dark vent above. “I’d guess I’d say they’re all pretty different, but like… I feel that they're starting to fall into the same beat?"
Rainbow Dash raised her eyebrows. "How so?"
"Well, for starters, it's pretty easy to ignore me," Spike replied with a half smile. "But I was expecting it. After writing your guy's book, I've learned a lot about dragons. Baby dragons just happen to be at the bottom of the hierarchy. Breezy Lace is pretty good at listening, though."
"Wait, you wrote all of our books?" Rainbow Dash asked incredulously. "And second, dude, you shouldn't ever be ignored!" She gave him a playful shoulder push with her hoof. "Aside from being an amazing chef, you're our best source of how to be a dragon. Don't be afraid to flaunt it."
Spike's cheeks raised at the words, and with a renewed fervor he flipped the ommealates onto awaiting plates and grabbed the two bowls of oatmeal. Holding them in each palm, he took a deep breath, and exhaled, engulfing his hands with green fire. The flames spilled over the brick wall that was the stove section of the kitchen and upwards to the vents that magically sucked in up and away at the detection of heat.
With a proud smile Spike admired the steaming bowls and their bubbling contents, and he turned to Rainbow Dash. "Here, hold these."
Without a word Rainbow Dash's hooves automatically lifted up, and Spike deposited both bowls onto her raised hooves. "Let me just make a few more bowls. They’ll probably want them, but I can just heat them up later. Alright, and the ommelates are done! I’ll get them." Grabbing the two plates he hopped off the stool and began walking away. However, as he rounded the kitchen island corner, he paused to lean and look back at Rainbow Dash's rigid form. "You okay?"
"Eh-Yup!" Rainbow Dash retorted while dislodging herself from the counteredge. "Just wondering how you wrote all those books!"
Spike sheepishly looked away to hide his red cheeks. "Well, it wasn't that bad. All I did was compile everything Twilight already had prepared. And a duplication spell meant I only needed to write just one book, but yeah, it was a pretty tough assignment." Spike nodded to himself as he continued walking to the other room. "But I'm not Twilight's number one assistant for nothing. Even the royal typeset in the meetings can't scribe as fast as me!"
Rainbow Dash cradled the two hot bowls in one forearm as she slowly followed Spike. "Well if I need to write a letter I'll be coming to you, then."
"Oh! Speaking of," Spike said as he looked over his shoulder. "We sell postage stamps now."
Rainbow Dash tilted her head. "Why's that?"
"It was the only form of payment Twilight would accept after ponies kept wanting to donate money, especially all the tourists. We're paired up actually with Ponyville's mail branch."
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes in humor at hearing Twilight finally start accepting bits in the library. "Let me guess, all proceeds go to the royal mail service?"
"She was eventually convinced half would stay as funds for the library's needs," Spike replied as he and Rainbow Dash exited the kitchen. "If you want, you could probably get Derpy to make some stamps of you."
Rainbow Dash paused as she looked upwards. "My fans would probably like something like that."
While Spike continued forward to set the plates before their owners, Dust Cloud asked with a curious smile, "You got fans? Aside from the Elements of Harmony business, I mean."
"Heck yeah," Rainbow Dash replied with a grin. Approaching the table she slid the two bowls of oatmeal to Sea Drop and Dust Cloud. "My stunt flying is the best show outside of a Wonderbolts event."
Dust Cloud leaned forward in interest. "You wouldn't happen to be a racer, would ya?"
Rainbow Dash leaned against the table as she crossed her front legs. "Pick a where and when and I'll show ya how good I am."
"Ha-hah!" Dust Cloud guffawed. "You don't know how nice that is to hear. An attitude like that would have done ya real well in the Dust Bowls."
"Well, we don't have a proper track," Rainbow Dash replied smugly. "But we do have one of Equestria's best obstacle courses. I finally got it rated a few months ago, triple diamond."
Dust Cloud whistled. "What kind of critters does it got to deserve that?"
"The Quarray eels," she replied casually. "They really don't like it when you fly past their holes."
"Wait, there's eels on land?" Sea Drop asked, having already devoured her omelette and well on her way into her oatmeal.
"Yup, they're mean, red, and big enough to eat two ponies in a single bite," Rainbow Dash replied while flicking her eyebrows in the end.
"Oh, whew," Sea Drop replied in relief. "I'm glad to hear they're so small and easy to see. The blue ones in the ocean blend in so much and are HUGE!" She extended her hooves as far as she could. "Like, almost eat a boat in a bite huge!"
"It's true," Spike added, now halfway through with his second bowl of finally piping hot oatmeal. "The Alamoor Eels have a jaw length of fifteen feet."
"Well, these eels aren't that big," Rainbow Dash replied nonchalantly. "But they're still pretty mean, so you should be careful going by them. One of these days I should show ya all where it's at and we can do a fly through. I'll warn you though," she added with a smirk. "Nobody has shown me up on my track, not even Gale."
Dust Cloud's smile fell as he stared incredulously. "You… You beat him? In a race?"
Every eye in the room locked to hers, and after two heartbeat's of a moment passed, Rainbow Dash coolly replied, "That's right."
"Well then," Dust Cloud replied in newfound respect. "I guess you're a better racer than me."
Rainbow Dash's brows softened while they raised. She looked at the retired legend more keenly now, at the worn brown in his coat and the chipped tarnish of his hooves. But beneath this exterior laid defined bone and muscle, thin as it was but all the more vibrant. "By the sound of it, I take it you didn't beat him?"
"Not even close. There were moments where I caught up and I thought I'd pass him, but in the final stretch… it was pretty clear he was going to win before we crossed the line."
"Was it at the Dust Bowl track?" Rainbow Dash asked as she pulled up one of the chairs near him. "I've always wanted to race there someday, ever since my dad took me to the 65th."
A gleam came to Dust Cloud's eye as he leaned back in his chair. "If you were at the 65th you must have been just a little tike, then."
Rainbow Dash smiled. "Yeah, it was only a year after I got my cutie mark. My dad thought I should see a race besides the ones in Cloudsdale, so he took the family to the Dust Bowl."
Dust Cloud gave a small laugh as he stroked his white beard. "That race was a close one. Had the dangest time trying to wrestle first from Pebble Kick."
"More like Boulder Kick," Rainbow Dash replied loudly with a nostalgic grin. "I thought he was part earth pony with how he leapt off those rocks. I swear, I thought I saw cracks afterwards."
"Oh, you did," Dust Cloud answered with a sly smile. "And he's a terror in the caves. Leapt like a timber wolf!"
"Hah, no way!" Rainbow Dash replied as she propped an arm on the table and leaned into it. "How'd you get out in first?"
"A trait I've never failed to neglect," he said while turning to his meal. "Running on the ground."
"Huh," Rainbow Dash replied in an impressed tone. "Go figure."
"Does that track have eels, too?" Sea Drop asked in hope.
"Nope," Dust Cloud responded. "The worse you'll deal with is a grumpy bat and prickly cacti. And the whily rabbit and road runner now and then. Oh, and scorpions, but they're not so bad. The rattlers are the meaner ones of the two. But they generally stick off the course when it's being used."
"We should go some time!" Sea Drop replied as energetically as she had asked.
"Sure," Dust Cloud replied as he grabbed his silverware and stirred his meal. "We'll have a barbecue afterwards, too. I can grill a good veggie stick."
While Sea Drop and Spike nodded eagerly at the notion, Rainbow Dash remained still. The smell of the burning forest's inhabitants, coupled with the gut churtling desire from her stomach earlier this morning, sent a wave of dissociation through her body. It was only after some moments before she could lift herself up with a sense of trailing vertigo, minor as it was.
"Well… now that I'm full," Rainbow Dash said as she moved away from the table. "I think I might head out." After a few steps, however, she paused, and looked back. "Do uh… Do any of you want to come?"
"I do!" Sea Drop replied as she shoved her chair back, and with not a crumb left on her side of the table.
“S-Same!” Tailwind suddenly announced as he quickly trotted out from the library’s depths to join them. “L-Let’s get outside!”
Rainbow Dash nodded and turned to the door. However, as Tailwind passed her, she paused and gave him a scrutinizing glare. “Were you always taller than me?”
Tailwind shifted his eyes as he sunk his posture. “J-Just a bit energetic with my steps, must be the meal,” he replied with a mumble. With a flurry of motion that left even Rainbow Dash blinking, Tailwind opened the door and jumped from out of the library.
“Let’s go!” Sea Drop proclaimed as she chased after him.
“Hey!” Rainbow Dash nearly shouted, and she found her legs soon giving chase.
The library door slammed shut, and Dust Cloud and Spike were left smiling at the table.
“They sure are lively,” Dust Cloud said before slowly lifting his spoon to his mouth.
“Well, if they’re anything like teenage dragons,” Spike said cheerfully while he hopped off his stool to collect Sea Drop’s dishware, “Then they’re only going to get livelier.”
“Thanks for being patient with us,” Dust Cloud said with an appreciative nod.
Spike paused as his cheeks reddened, and he waved a claw. “It’s just fun being with all of you, seeing that I don’t hang out with dragons all that much.”
Dust Cloud gave Spike a silent nod, and continued to eat his meal quietly. Then, the bell to the library door rang, and two of them looked to the opened front door.
“Excuse me,” a unicorn mare asked while holding her guard helmet to her side. “I was wondering if I could check out a copy of Snow Petal’s book on crystallization?”
Spike beamed her a smile. “Of course, one moment,” he replied, and with great pride to his librarian duties, he dashed off into the alcoves of books. While he couldn’t say he read every single word in all of their books, he was second only to Twilight on the whereabouts of the books available in the diverse collection.
With a practiced weaving, Spike made his way to the arcana section, already preparing himself to leap upwards and grab the blue bound book upon the fourth shelf. But when he turned the corner, he skidded to a halt from the sight of a pile of books before him. The nearby shelves had all but been ransacked, and he stared incredulously at the pile of tomes with the pony sized depression in the center of the pile. Spike sighed as he slumped forward with free hanging arms, and began to slowly restock the shelves.