"You know, Twilight posed an interesting question to me the other day," mentioned Rarity, breaking the silence.
Rainbow Dash peeked one eye open to shoot her a sly grin. "Heh. She's full of 'em, isn't she?" She looked up, beginning to gesticulate with her front legs. "When I showed her my hovering trick... I can't believe I would ever get sick of showing off, but I had to tell her to stop asking me to do it every time we saw each other."
She turned back toward Rarity... who seemed to be all but impressed.
"Heh.. sorry, uh, go ahead with your thing," she emphasized with a flick of a hoof.
Rarity giggled. "It's quite alright, Rainbow. I like your tendency towards tangents. I am 'playing with you', as it were." A light blush coloured Rainbow Dash’s cheeks. "In any case, I think you might find Twilight's question interesting as well. I told her I would give her a response later, as I required some time to think about it."
A scoff. "What, really? Geez, d'she ask you if you want to marry her or something?" Rainbow Dash beat the cloud beneath her with a hoof as she laughed at her own joke.
Rarity tittered. "No, that's an easy question. Obviously, yes." Rainbow Dash slowly went silent, grasping what her friend had just said.
"W... wait, for real?" she asked, her voice cracking on the last syllable.
More tittering. "No, you silly filly." She tapped Rainbow Dash on the nose. "I mean... goodness, there are many ponies I would at least date, Twilight likely among them. But to marry? That's an exceedingly big commitment."
Eager to get back on top, Rainbow Dash dove in. "Oh, but you were SO ready to kiss all over that dumb, stuck-up foal of a prince at our first Gala," she exclaimed, to Rarity's chagrin.
"I was... naive, I must admit. Stars in my eyes, full of excitement, ideas, and not much else," she spoke, the words flavoured with nostalgia as she stared off at the other clouds around them. Then, she refocused on Rainbow Dash anew. "But! That was some time ago, was it not? I think that I have... no, that we all have changed, very much so."
This statement was met with an emphatic nod. "No kidding. I used to be kind of a jerk. Did you know that one of the first things I told Pinkie... like, when we were first really getting to know each other, I'm not joking, I think I said something like... 'You know, you aren't even that annoying, Pinkie. You aren't as annoying as I thought.' " She gave Rarity a big dumb grin, practically yelling, "Who in the hay just says that to a pony's face?!"
They both laughed generously, heads dipping down into their front legs. "Yes, I-, I recall when I-, hehe-, I made Applejack go out into the rain-, haha-, to wash her-, her hooves clean with a garden hose!" Rarity squeaked out between giggles.
The laughter turned absolutely raucous, each pony kicking their hooves into the cloud and sending out little puffs in all directions.
As it died down, with tears in their eyes and forelegs clutched to their stomachs, Rainbow Dash was almost wheezing as she said, "You know, I-, I'm really glad I met you girls. Really glad. I don't even wanna think about what I'd be like if Twilight never came to Ponyville."
"Yes, quite," responded Rarity, now laying her head down in her forelegs. "I still am not sure how to answer her question, though."
Rainbow Dash sat patiently, waiting for her to continue.
"She asked how I would respond, given the choice of immortality."
Rainbow Dash's face scrunched up. "That's like... oh, right. She told us about that, right? She's immortal, so she can't die from old age or whatever."
"Mhm," murmured Rarity, deep in thought.
Rainbow Dash wore a rare face of contemplation, staring up at nothing in particular. "Any time I have to make a decision, I go with my gut," she punctuated by tapping her belly, "and my gut is telling me, absolutely!"
Grumble. She chuckled sheepishly. "Well, it's actually telling me that we've been up on this cloud for a few hours without a snack."
A sweet smile graced Rarity's lip. "You could surely swing by Sweet Apple Acres in a dash if you're soo hungry. I give you my word I shan't fall off before you return."
"I can handle it!" she swore, crossing her forelegs indignantly. "Besides, we're nearly done the survey anyways, right?"
Rarity peered over the edge of the cloud, lighting up her horn. "Mmm... yes, very nearly. I must thank you, Dash. It would have been awfully dreadful checking all of this land on hoof," she said, sticking a foreleg out straight.
Rainbow Dash poked the hoof of aforementioned leg. "Wouldn't want to chip it, huh?"
She only received a side-eyed grin in return. "Of course not."
A comfortable silence passed between them as Rarity continued her spell.
"On second thought," Dash piped up, suddenly, "The whole immortality thing is kind of scary, huh?"
Rarity listened, eyebrows raised, her head propped up on her hooves.
"I mean, you've gotta watch everypony else get old and pass on, which stinks. That stinks a whole bunch! But..." She rubbed her cheek nervously. "...it's not like you're all alone. The princesses will always be around. Discord too! ...even though that guy is a few strands short of a haystack." She took off into the air, staying close, drawing lazy circles around the slowly drifting cloud. "And you get to spend forever practicing the stuff you love, or learning new crap! That's AWESOME!"
Rarity put a single hoof up and out. "But what about when you've learned everything there is to learn?"
"...geez, you really thought a lot about this, huh? That's what I was thinking too." She hovered there, a hoof resting on her chin in a pose of contemplation. "But it isn't like you can't die at all, right? You just don't age. If you ever got bored of living, couldn't ya just... y'know..." She made a neck snapping motion, and mimed falling over flat.
Rarity's awfully powerful grimace drew laughter from the faux-dead Rainbow Dash, peeking out of one eye. "Eugh,” Rarity groaned. “Must you force me to visualize it like that? What a morbid thought."
Rainbow Dash elegantly flipped out of her fake death, twirling back into a spot next to Rarity on the cloud, landing with a gentle puff and mirth twinkling in her eyes. "Well, I think it makes sense."
Rarity found herself tittering again. "I suppose it does, in a manner of speaking."
Another comfortable silence flowed between them. Rarity’s horn continued to glow.
"I think," Rainbow Dash's spoke, softly, "that I would say no, unless all the girls said yes."
An inquisitive look from the unicorn. "Whyever is that?"
She rubbed the back of her head. "I dunno! It feels wrong to get to, to live forever, if the rest of you don't. Or, I guess, if uh, only me and Twilight would. Or even if all of you said yes, except for, like, Fluttershy." She shrugged. "It'd feel like I was leaving somepony behind. Not. Cool," she said, tapping the cloud twice on the final two words.
"Hm," Rarity hm'd.
"Well, what about you, Rares?" She gestured towards her, "I told you what I thought. It's your turn, now!"
She un-lit her horn, but otherwise didn't move.
She remained that way for a little while, at the mild concern of the pony accompanying her.
"I like how you articulated it. Only if we are all together." She nodded. "Then I would say yes."
Blap! Rainbow Dash dropped a heavy leg around Rarity's withers and pulled her close, laughing. "Attagirl! Us Elements ought to stick together!"
"It's not that simple, though," exclaimed the unicorn. Dash's grip relaxed marginally, as she directed a questioning look towards Rarity. She took that as her mark to elaborate. "One must also consider the possibility of death by other means. Yes, it's... a scary fate, I must say, for your obligate nature to be to outlive all those around you. Yet, that is mitigated by the accompaniment of others as long lived as yourself."
Rainbow bit her lower lip. "I can feel a but coming."
"But, indeed. Those ponies... we may only have known them for but a small fraction of our lives. We will only have built up a single life time of experiences with them. Ultimately, we know that they will.. die. We can prepare ourselves, and we can move on.
She paused, gulping.
"But... what if one of us dies," she accentuated with a wave of her hoof, "by some means or another?
Another pause.
"We would not be invincible. Just ageless."
She looked deeply, bitterly, into Rainbow Dash's eyes. "I'd hate to get so used to the idea that we might stand side by side forever, and have one of you taken from me like that." She looked away. "After maybe thousands of years together, expecting more. I'm not sure if I could handle it."
Yet another.
"And we've already changed so much since we first met, like you said... so who knows how different we'll be in a hundred years? In a thousand?”
Her pace began to pick up as she grew more panicked. “Will we still be friends? Will we even like each other?! What if-"
Her increasingly frantic diatribe was cut off by a crushing hug. A gentle voice rang from right next to her, "Bogus."
"W-what?"
"Bogus, Rares. I'll never leave your side. Or Twilight's. Or any of the girls. Not in a hundred years. Not in a thousand. Not in a million."
"B... but you're the Celestia-damned Element of Loyalty! What about the other girls...?"
"What, you think they haven't learned a thing or two from me?" She placed a hoof on Rarity's cheek, pulling a little away from the hug to look at her. "You all showed me what I was missing. I've always been loyal, but..." She looked to the side. "I definitely haven't always been very generous, or kind." She put her hooves back beneath herself. "I think I've taught you girls a bit about loyalty, too."
Rarity stared, slightly slack jawed, before pulling into the hug tighter than before.
They stayed there for a little bit, comfortable in each other's embrace.
"Look at me... getting an emotional pep talk from Rainbow Dash," she said, her voice quavering and exasperated.
Rainbow Dash snorted. "Hey, I'm the best at pep talks. Doesn't matter what kind!"
Rarity drew out of the hug with her face scrunched up, and bapped Rainbow Dash on the nose.
"Hey!! What was that for?!" she exclaimed, her voice cracking and hoof rubbing her face.
"THAT'S for almost making me cry," she stated, her hooves crossed and eyes closed in not-so-righteous indignance.
"Pleeease," the pegasus replied, "you cried yesterday because Applejack left a muddy hoof print on one of your coattails."
"That coat will take weeks to fully wash out! WEEKS!"
"Then you shouldn't have worn it to the farm, you goof ball."
She bapped Rainbow Dash on the nose again.
"Ouch! You know, I could just pop this cloud and let you fall, you turd!"
Bap. "Ouch!! Okay, that's it!"
Counter-bap! "Ow! Oh no you don't, Rainbow Dash! This is not a battle you will win!"
Their nearly-completed surveying mission ended in a war of laughter and hits. And in the depths of that joy, Rarity thought back to her worries from earlier... and compared to what she felt now, those worries all seemed that much further away.
No further work was accomplished that day.