Walking on a cloud is a very different experience from walking on, say, a hardwood floor. For one thing, and most obviously, your hoofsteps don't resonate – there's only so much echo and reverberation you can derive from thinly condensed water. The wide-awake pegasus couldn't decide whether this was a good or bad thing; she longed for some sound more substantial than her own breath and her bloodstream humming in her ears, but from the way she was pacing a constant clip-clop might well drive her mad. On the other hand, it might not be a good idea to leave the house for a quick zip around the town; she didn't exactly have night vision, and goodness only knew what kind of nocturnal creatures she might risk hitting in the dark skies.
Rainbow Dash was determined to do one of two things. Either she would stay awake all night, or she would tire herself out so thoroughly that sleep would be dreamless whenever it finally came to her. She had been awakened three times tonight by a troubling dream, and she did not intend to let it happen again.
The unnerving thing was that it had been the same dream every time.
Claustrophobia finally got the better of her. "I can't breathe like this," she said, her wings flaring wide with frustration. "Need fresh air."
She stepped out on the front porch of her cloud house and inhaled, deeply and with relief. Beneath and before her, Ponyville slept; Dash could only hope that most of them were getting a better night's sleep than she was. Although the streetlamps were faithfully burning – the Mayor might speculate as to spending the town's tax bits on eight-hour candles or those newfangled kerosene lamps, but nothing could yet beat the good old fireflies – there were almost no other lights on anywhere. There was a lamp burning in the back window of Turner's Time Shop; the village clockmaker, ironically for one in his profession, tended to keep very odd hours. Another light was on at the top of Carousel Boutique, but as Rainbow Dash watched, that one blinked and went out. Guess Rarity was working late again.
She stretched her wings again, preparing for takeoff. Okay, Dash, five times around the village, and keep it low and slow. And if anypony asks, just say you're doing a little nighttime patrolling, in case any stray clouds show up. What the heck, might as well actually DO a little nighttime patrolling... we're scheduled for eight clear nights in a row; a little extra vigilance never hurts. At last, she leapt off the porch and sailed out over the town, gliding quietly.
And it felt good to be flying again, even if she was having to keep a closer eye than usual on what might be ahead of her in the air. It always felt good to be flying. There were moments when she envied earth ponies for their strength or unicorns for their magic, but it never lasted very long; this was something she had that was denied to them. And while occasional contrary ideas might stray into her head – it was such a pity, after all, that neither of the other Great Races could share fully in this kind of physical freedom – she was, in the end, unconditionally glad to be a pegasus, glad to be in the weather service, glad to be useful to her fellow ponies, and downright proud to be Rainbow Dash.
She should have known better than to continue following this train of thought; as if in response, a mass of ugly feelings abruptly sprang to the forefront of her mind, ideas too amorphous to put into words but sinister all the same. The surge of negative emotion was enough to leave Dash genuinely disoriented for a second or two, and she felt a desperate need to drop down and find some solid footing. She set down on the nearest roof – quietly, so as not to wake the occupants – and took another deep breath.
Deep it was indeed, but there was a sense of weight, of restraint cinched tight around her ribcage, that one breath was not sufficient to dispel. What's happening to me?
She knew what it was, of course. It was that stupid dream. She squinted up at the sky again, looking for the telltale starless blotches of night that signaled the presence of clouds; there were none, but it did not put her mind at ease.
She had dreamt of a flood. Torrential rains, beyond the control of any weather pony, had swollen the creek that ran along the village's outskirts until it finally overflowed its banks. Beneath a sky of solid, ashen gray, ponies had been hurrying back and forth piling up sandbags to keep back the worst; above them had soared Dash, trying to punch holes in the cloud cover. But it was a thick, dull layer of nimbostratus, and infuriatingly resistant to breakup – every hole she tried to make disappeared in mere seconds; she couldn't even put a dent in it.
This is nuts, Dash had thought, looking down at the ponies running far below and recognizing the signs of incipient panic. You're the fastest flier in all Equestria. THINK of something!
Thinking had never been her strong suit, she would (grudgingly) admit, but she could still see what had to be done: get up above the top layer, into clear air, and try to tear it open from above. She gave her town below her one last glance, then rocketed straight up into the clouds, making a tunnel that she knew with bitter certainty was rapidly closing behind her.
It took her a few seconds longer than expected to break through into the clear, even at top speed. When her eyes had adjusted to the sudden assault of bright sunlight, she had a quick look around to assess the situation. She did not like what she saw – coming slowly on in the direction of the prevailing wind, she saw the low, gray stratus break up into the high and towering clouds of a thunderstorm. Great. Thunder and lightning. That's EXACTLY what we were missing. And they looked ominous as Rainbow Dash assessed them, in the abnormally stark light of the sun. Ponyville can't take much more of this pounding, she thought. I've got to break some of this up right now, or else...
Well, there was one sure-fire way of doing that. She climbed a considerable distance, then pulled a quick backflip and dived directly into the blanket of clouds. A quick thought struck her just before she plunged into them – where were the other pegasi, the other weather ponies? Never mind that. None of them can do what I do, she told herself. If it's an emergency, it's got to be me... Now I've got to get up some real speed.
On and on she fell, fogbound and blind, picking up momentum all the way. It alarmed her that this cloudbank was so thick; it seemed to be taking her longer to get through it this time, though she was going much, much faster. Hysteria gently grazed the surface of her mind, and in response she flapped her wings furiously, putting on even more speed – holy haystacks, I'm going to run straight into the ground if this keeps up – detecting the increasing warmth at the tip of her nose that was the telltale sign of...
CRAAACCKKKK. A coruscating ring of light burst out behind Rainbow Dash as she pierced the sound barrier. The clouds around her spun and shredded in her wake, at last admitting a shaft of light from the sky above. Unrelentingly, almost savagely, Dash attacked the dull stratus, trailing a shining, ephemeral rainbow through the darkness like a thread sewing a pattern into a piece of cloth. The crack grew, widened, and splintered off into many more cracks as she worked at it.
Job well done, she eventually thought. It'll stay broken until the cleanup crew arrives. Meanwhile, I gotta get back to town, see if anything else needs doing.
She looked down, grinning, ready for just about anything, and there was no town anymore.
On the titan river that now filled the valley, a few battered steeples defiantly breached the surface, and a few roofpeaks and treetops swayed unsteadily. A single overturned boat floated in the direction dictated by the brown muddy current. Not a pony to be seen anywhere, living or otherwise, and hardly a mark to show where Ponyville had once been.
Rainbow Dash almost fell out of the sky at that moment. She felt the blood draining from her face in shock. Wh-what?! HOW?! This can't be happening! I was only gone a couple of minutes! I – I stopped the rain! I did everything I could! This canNOT be happening!!
She heard herself speak the words, in a broken whisper: "I did what I could. I did my best." But in the face of the scornful silence of the waters, her argument failed. Not enough. Never enough. Never was. Never will be.
And it was at this point that she had woken up.
Now, up on the rooftop, Dash tottered uneasily. Her vision had suddenly gone blurry, and as she blinked it away she felt a sensation of moisture at the corners of her eyes. "Quit doing this to yourself, stupid!" she muttered under her breath. "It's your own fault, if you won't stop thinking about it!"
But what was she supposed to do? She had dreamed this dream three times in one night, and each time the ending had come as a bitter shock to her dream self. She had come to love Ponyville, not least because her friends were here. It was her home now. She could never fail her home, nor her friends – she would just about give everything she had for them, and still call that a bargain. To lose all of it, all of them, in a single swoop... it didn't bear much contemplation.
Dash shook the last vestiges of the dream out of her head. No. I'm NOT gonna let this eat at me. I've got better things to worry about than a lousy dream. She ran a hoof through her hair, then was off again with a flap of her wings. The town rolled on under her, and she could have laughed for relief as it spread itself solidly and reassuringly before her waking eyes.
She did not notice, as she passed the Carousel Boutique, that the light in Rarity's room had come back on.