All five of Fluttershy’s friends agreed to help the dragon move into her cottage. Rarity went back to her beauty shop and made a bed for the dragon. Its design was based on Spike’s bed, but was a bit more fashionable, of course. Not being content with just that, she had put together some outfits for the small orange dragon. Applejack, despite her still-burning distrust, gathered up some apple treats for the dragon so Fluttershy would have some extra food for her new guest for at least a couple of days while she figured out a budget. Pinkie Pie, on the other hoof, was nowhere to be found.
Though of all the ponies, it was Twilight that seemed the most excited. She helped Fluttershy set up one of her rooms in the cottage for the dragon, and started researching all she could. This was proving to be difficult, as there were no books on dragon's found in her library, but she certainly didn't let that stop her. It was safe to say that this new dragon was becoming an obsession of hers.
Rainbow Dash had, in her opinion, the most important job of all—official Ponyville Guide. “Ok, so here's the library, of course, and over there is Sugarcube Corner. That's where Pinkie Pie lives. It's a bakery, in case that wasn't obvious,” Rainbow Dash gestured wildly as the little reptile clutched fearfully to her back. Oblivious to his suffering, she continued her tour. “Over there it the place you found first, Applejack’s farm, and up there is my cloud house.” She pointed up as the dragon stared in awe, his terror momentarily forgotten as he wondered how it was even possible to make home made out of clouds floating in the sky. “Down there is the Carousel Boutique where Rarity lives and works, and there is the school, and finally, here we are back at Fluttershy’s cottage.” Rainbow Dash landed and the dragon fell off. He nuzzled the ground affectionately, and promised to never leave it again.
“Hey, what’s with you? You barely said a word the whole time,” Rainbow Dash asked in her usual up-beat manner, but meaning to be sincere to the dragon.
“I’m sorry, it’s just... I’m not really used to ponies or... um... towns.” The orange dragon looked away towards the town, not wanting to tell the truth and upset the bigger pony.
“Well, we really are nice here. You just have to get to know us!” Rainbow Dash said to the dragon, holding some emotions back. She certainly had never been in a situation like this before. The whole thing made her feel awkward; she knew from Twilight that pony-filled towns were not the friendliest place for Spike at first.
They both walked up the Fluttershy’s cottage as Rainbow Dash half expected Pinkie Pie to jump out with one of her parties, but as they opened the door they only found Twilight and Fluttershy preparing the dragon’s room.
“Oh, hey, guys. We're just about finished here. Do you like it, little one?” Twilight asked still unsure what to call the dragon.
“Y- yes… I like it.” The dragon did not really know what a likeable room was, and decided it was best to just play along. He did, however, notice a bed like Spike’s that he was not looking forward to sleeping in. He noticed lots of little things that he was sure that the ponies had previously owned that they just gave to him without asking for anything in return, and it made him feel weird.
“Well, good! Ok, I’m done here Fluttershy. I’m sorry I have to leave so soon, but I have some... uhh... research to do.” Twilight really did need to do some research, but it was about their new friend. Her obsessions were difficult to hide. Fluttershy was thankful for the help, but a bit nervous to be left alone again. Twilight looked back one last time at the dragon, and a worried look crossed his face as she turned finally left.
“Well, little one, I hope you enjoy your new room and house.”
The dragon smiled again. Every time Fluttershy spoke, it just sent an amazing feeling through the dragon’s heart. It wasn’t love, but he decided that it was not far off. Her cottage was full of various critters from birds to mice that she all communicated with on some level, and as she showed the dragon around, he started to relax. That is, until a white bunny came right up to Fluttershy, brandishing a pocket watch. The orange dragon noticed that this bunny was clearly her friend, and assisted her with certain tasks.
“Oh, little dragon, this is my friend Angel and Angel, this is our new friend.” Fluttershy mentioned to the dragon.
The bunny turned around and waved with an impatient looking face, and practically ignored the baby dragon. The orange dragon stared at the bunny in disbelief. For reasons known only to the dragon, he was starting to feel extremely guilty and torn apart inside. He simply waved back at the bunny awkwardly, lost in his own thoughts. That white bunny drudged up memories in the dragon, long since past, and he was lost in his mind for a while until Fluttershy spoke again, disrupting his thoughts.
“Oh dear! I’m late again! Little dragon, I need to go take care of a few things at the lake. Please wait here and get settled in, ok?” Fluttershy asked him as she ran off, not waiting for a response as the bunny followed her out.
The dragon had heard the term 'settled in' twice now, and still did not know what it meant, but that bunny was really driving him insane. As he got lost in his thoughts again, he started to feel worse and worse, so finally he decided to put it out of his mind and look at his new room, as the ponies put it. On his new bed were some apple-related treats that Applejack had brought over. In a slightly-used wooden chest of drawers, there were several outfits from Rarity that the dragon wasn’t too sure about. Twilight had brought over some books to read from the library on the history of Equestria and Ponyville, along with several stories. Fluttershy had decorated his room all over with lots of knickknacks that the dragon had never even seen before, including some snow globes that simply made him stare, almost hypnotized, when he shook one for the first time. He still was not sure about that bed, but he did not want to disappoint Fluttershy. For some reason, the thought of doing that filled him with disgust. But no matter what else he did, his thoughts kept landing on that white bunny.
He was told to stay in the cottage, so he did. He pulled out his amulet that was waiting in his pouch and stared at it, running a claw along the jewel. He remembered finding it in the Everfree Forest one day. He never found out where it came from, but he had been extremely young when it appeared. All he knew was when he wore it, or when it was close to him, he could feel a bold feeling inside of him, almost like the amulet was making him stronger. The guilt from the bunny was a little easier to suppress as he read through some of the books that Twilight left. After two hours of reading, the door to the cottage was flung open, and in walked an exhausted Fluttershy.
“Sorry, little one, there was a lot to do today. I'm glad to see you're using your room.” She closed the door and walked closer to the orange dragon. To his relief, the bunny Angel was not there.
“Uh, yeah. It's a very neat room.” The dragon was starting to feel more comfortable with Fluttershy, but not enough to just talk regularly.
“Right. So now that you are living here, we need to find your purpose,” Fluttershy explained, trying to explain their ways.
The dragon simply blinked a few times, unsure of what she meant. “Huh?” he simply asked.
“Oh, well, everypony here in Ponyville has something that makes them special, and all serve a useful purpose. I’m sure we can find one for you.” She smiled at him, hoping that he would take to their ways as she had.
The dragon didn't respond right away, and an awkward silence filled the air.
Fluttershy coughed awkwardly. “Well, how about we go out into the town and try a few things, to see what you are really good at?”
“I’m good at surviving,” he said, gesturing to end of his tail that clearly showed others that he would not go down easy.
“Oh...” Fluttershy paused, trying to think of a good way to word her next sentence. “Well, that is a nice skill to have, but I’m not quite sure how that can help others.” She gave a nervous smile. “It's pretty safe in this town, little one.” Even though Fluttershy was giving bad news, her voice simply succeeded in relaxing the dragon even more. “I’m very sorry, but we can go out and I can help you find your way.”
“Ok, Fluttershy, we can do that.”
The two began to walk out of the door, when Fluttershy looked at the necklace he wore. “You could leave that here, you know. It's quite safe.”
The dragon drifted a claw protectively over his things, clearly indicating that he wanted to do no such thing. Seeing that he would be most comfortable with the amulet on, Fluttershy decided to let it slide.
After looking around town, Fluttershy noticed that Spike was very good at being Twilight’s assistant. Maybe this dragon would be good at assisting the school teacher? Fluttershy asked Cheerilee if the dragon could be her new school assistant, and after some begging and some worried looks from the teacher, she agreed to give him a chance. However, after half a day of the dragon working, Cheerilee noticed that the dragon was not as well educated as Spike would have been in this situation. The orange dragon was forced to quit; this caused Fluttershy to ponder if the dragon should be enrolled in the school since he was so young and unlearned, but she was not even sure if that was allowed.
“I’m sorry things did not work out, but we are just going to keep trying until we find your place, little one.” She smiled, this time in confidence, to the dragon. The orange creature gave a weak nod, feeling slightly guilty over letting her down.
Their next stop was Rarity’s beauty shop. Rarity was not all too pleased at the thought of anypony else touching her materials, let alone a dragon; but for her friend, she decided to give the dragon a chance. However, after mere hours, it was clear that the dragon had, as Rarity so deftly put it, 'no sense of fashion' and 'could not be gentle enough' with her materials. So the dragon was let go and led back to Fluttershy again.
“Don’t fret!” Fluttershy tried to comfort him. “We've only tried a few things, and there are plenty of issues in this town in need of extra attention so we just need to stay positive little one.” The dragon still was unsure how the pony could not only stay so positive but cheer him up so easily, and as he clutched the amulet again he felt determined to not let Fluttershy down.
Their next stop was to Sugarcube Corner, with Pinkie Pie promptly and happily giving him the title of “my new bakery assistant and also junior chef and also assistant in babysitting when my workload becomes too much to handle.” The dragon wasn't entirely sure how she had managed to say all that in one breath, and even less sure of what it meant, but he was ready to try anyway.
Pinkie Pie remained positive throughout the whole experience, but after a few hours it was clear that the dragon did not know any recipes and was not used to any of the tools in the kitchen. He was also not very good with babies, either. Well, he might have been, but he never found out, because Pound and Pumpkin took one look at him and cried, and they repeated this performance each time he got close. Pinkie Pie almost never frowned, but it was a smaller smile than usual when she decided that it was best if the young dragon tried something else in town. So, the young dragon soon found himself jobless. Again.
“Perhaps Rainbow Dash has something you can help her with!” Fluttershy seemed awfully stressed as she tried to find something that this young dragon could help out with in the town.
Soon, they arrived at their destination—an empty spot of land. The dragon was confused, until he saw the large house apparently made of clouds, floating in the air.
He looked back to Fluttershy, wondering how that even worked. Fluttershy gave a reassuring smile. “Stay here,” she said, as she flew up to Rainbow Dash’s cloud home. She knocked gently on the door, and it took a few tries before Rainbow Dash heard.
Finally, though, Rainbow did answer her door. “Hey, Fluttershy,” she greeted her friend.
“Um, Rainbow Dash?” Fluttershy started, “I have been trying to help the orange dragon find a purpose in the town and I was wondering if you needed some assistance.”
Rainbow Dash scratched the back of her mane with a hoof, then quickly put it down as she realized she still held a book in that hoof. “Well, I want to help him out, but most of the things I do require the ability to fly Fluttershy.” With that one sentence, Rainbow Dash had eliminated herself and dashed Fluttershy’s hopes of helping out this dragon, but she was not going to give up.
“Well, that didn't go so well,” Fluttershy said, looking extremely downcast as she continued to think in front of the young dragon.
The dragon noticed that there was one pony they hadn't asked yet. “What about you, Fluttershy?”
“Oh, well, I suppose since you lived in the forest you could be good with small animals... Ok, we can try it out.” Fluttershy smiled weakly, trying to hide her hesitation. She was hoping it would not have to come to this; she really wanted to help this dragon, but was unsure if he could be gentle enough to her animals.
As they walked towards the small pond where Fluttershy spent most of her time, she tried to explain to the dragon what his duties would be. The orange dragon seemed a bit more confident doing this stuff while Fluttershy was near, and by the time they arrived at the pond, the dragon felt extremely confident and ready. At first, to the surprise of both parties, the dragon seemed to be doing well. Every time Fluttershy gave him an order, he did it easily; but as soon as the bunny Angel showed up, the dragon’s extreme guilt and confusion came back fivefold. Suddenly he was making mistakes, and again it seemed like he was not going to be a very good assistant, Fluttershy noticed the problem, but she didn't seem to notice that it was caused by Angel. When he gave the wrong food to her friends for the fifth time, though, she had to say something.
“Are you ok, little one? I... uh... don’t want to upset you, but you’re making a lot of mistakes, and you also don’t look so good.”
The dragon lied and said he was fine. He kept trying to do what he was told, but the more that bunny hung around, the worse he felt. After about thirty minutes, they were done with the day’s tasks, a little bit later than usual, mostly due to Fluttershy needing to help fix his constant mistakes.
“Well, um, ok... How about you go get some rest? We're done for today, and you really don’t look so hot.” Fluttershy distinctly “forgot” to mention how he had done for the day, and the dragon noticed. He sighed, then ran off to his room so he could be away from Angel. Fluttershy shrugged, hoping that this was just a fluke for today. “I wonder what his talent really is?” she wondered aloud.
The dragon waited patiently for Fluttershy to leave the cottage, and made sure the coast was clear before setting out back towards town. He had to tell someone what had happened, but he only trusted two living beings in this crazy town. His first stop was the library; but, not seeing Spike, he wandered the town looking for him, while trying to avoid the stares of the ponies. Somehow, he ended up back at the library, and noticed Spike inside, helping Twilight doing some research. This irked the dragon slightly—hadn't he checked here earlier?—but he needed to talk now, and so he entered the library. Twilight was so lost in her books that she did not even notice the orange dragon coming in, but Spike did.
“Oh, hey, little dragon. Listen, I can’t talk much, we're extremely busy…hey!” The orange dragon took this opportunity to grab Spike and drag him outside the library with his odd strength. Twilight continued reading, oblivious to the kidnapping of her assistant.
“What’s the big idea?” Spike asked, annoyed at being dragged away.
“Look, I just need to talk, alright?” The orange dragon’s tone sent shivers up Spike’s spine. Spike could tell something was really wrong.
“Are you ok? You look like a wreck! Why don’t you go lay down at Fluttershy’s…”
“NO!” the other dragon shouted, earning him some strange looks from the surrounding ponies. Looking around in embarrassment, he dropped his voice. “Can you please just meet me near the entrance to the forest where no one is around? I have something important to say.” The orange dragon’s tone left no doubt that this was serious, and Spike agreed to meet him.
He quickly ran over to the edge of the forest, making sure no one was following him and especially avoiding Fluttershy. He hid in a small group of trees that formed a bit of a cylinder-like shape that shielded his orange scales and waited impatiently for Spike to show up. Finally, after ten minutes, Spike did arrive.
“Finally! You’re here.”
“Yeah, sheesh! I’m here, what's this all about?” Spike asked as the orange dragon grabbed his claw and shielded him too from the other ponies off in the distance.
“It’s about Angel the bunny that Fluttershy hangs out with.”
“What about him?” Spike asked. “He’s just a bunny; I know he can be a bit annoying and all, but that's it, really.” Spike raised one of his eyebrows, curious as to what the dragon was getting at.
“There is nothing wrong with the bunny, it’s… well... Spike, have you ever done something really bad before?”
That was something that caused Spike to worry a bit more. “Well, once I accidentally burnt one of Twilight's favorite books by sneezing, and I lied about it,” he said, hoping that the dragon’s story was similar in severity.
The dragon tapped his feet nervously, anxious at what he was about to reveal about himself. “What I did happened when I was younger. I was still learning my way in the forest, and I would often go days without food, but most of the time I would eventually find enough to keep going, and that was how I lived.”
“Look, you don’t have to worry about that stuff anymore; no one in Ponyville will let you starve,” Spike said comfortingly, placing a claw on his shoulder for more support.
“I wasn’t finished with my story, Spike,” the dragon said, shrugging off Spike's claw. Spike could detect a more sinister voice as he continued, “I… well... one day I was extremely hungry. I had gone days without eating before, but this felt different. It was at least two in a half weeks since I had eaten anything, and I was having trouble staying awake, I kept blacking out. I needed food! Anything would do! Eventually... eventually I found a bunny, lying in the forest that was very much not… um... alive.”
Spike knew where this was going, but he wasn’t angry. Instead, he felt extreme pity on what this younger dragon had to go through in order to survive.
“So… I took what little strength I had left and started a fire; I cooked the bunny and ate it. At the time, it felt weird. It wasn’t until I saw Fluttershy’s companion that I started to think about it again. I did not know that bunnies could be friends too,” the dragon said as he turned his face to notice Spike’s blinking reaction.
“I’m so sorry you had to do that, that’s awful.” Spike said, truly unsure what else he could say or do. “Have you been feeling guilty about this?”
“Yes. Every time I see Angel, I’m brought back to that time, and it just makes me feel worse.” The dragon simply looked down at his feet, not wishing to look his friend in the eyes.
“I know this might be hard, but the only way to get rid of the guilt is to come clean with Fluttershy … I can hardly imagine her being mad…”
“NO!” the dragon interrupted again. “Please! You must not tell Fluttershy a thing!” Spike recognized the expression on the dragon's face. It was similar to Spike's own, when he was shyly admitting his love for Rarity. Spike now knew the orange dragon was feeling something for the yellow pony, he didin't know if it was love like romance or love like a sons love but did not push anything.
“Ok, I won’t; but that’s the only way to remove your guilt for good,” Spike said simply, and then turned and walked back to the library, leaving the orange dragon staring back at his previous home.
The dragon stared at the Everfree Forest and knew that the simpler option to his guilt would be to just leave all the ponies and go back; but every time he thought of Fluttershy it hurt him inside, even more than the guilt he felt over that one bunny. The orange dragon sighed and slowly walked back into Ponyville, resolving to never tell the truth to anyone else.
Back in the library, Spike slowly reentered and saw Twilight in a state of panic. She was reading through book after book to try and find something about that dragon; or any dragon, really. She was in such a rush she had not even noticed Spike's disappearance. To make matters worse, it was obvious that she was quickly starting to run out of books in her massive library.
“Spike, did you find anything at all? I can’t believe we don’t have one book even mentioning any dragon, let alone one that can blow out ice breath!” Twilight looked down at Spike from the upper floor of the library.
Spike put on what he hoped passed for an honest smile. “Umm, no. I’m sorry Twilight, I…couldn’t find anything. Nope, nothing at all. It’s certainly a mystery.” Technically, this was not a lie—Spike really had found nothing in the books. Twilight raised her eyebrow at Spike’s odd tone, but her desire for answers overwhelmed her suspicions.
“Well, that’s it... Maybe somepony in Canterlot will know. Perhaps even the princess,” she mused.
“We can write a letter to her and I can send it like usual right away!” Spike suggested, happy to have gotten off the subject of the other dragon for a second.
“NO!” Twilight shouted.
Spike blinked. He sure had been yelled at a lot today.
“I mean... I only want to bother the princess if we really need to, Spike.” Twilight brightened. “They have a massive library in the castle! Remember?”
“How could I forget? That was, like, your life,” Spike laughed as he rolled his eyes, remembering their previous life living in the castle as the princess tutored Twilight.
“Just get packing, please. If we hurry, we can be back later tonight, I hope.” Twilight knew this was a long shot, since the library in question was massive in comparison to hers.
They packed a few things and quickly set off for the castle, not even alerting any of her friends as they locked the library. Twilight hoped that no one in the castle would be too worried by her showing up unannounced, but this was very important to her.
The orange dragon noticed that Spike was nowhere to be found, leaving Fluttershy as his only confidant in the town. She also happened to be the pony whose mere sight now filled him with guilt; and the longer he stared, the larger it grew, even though he was quite far away. The dragon knew he could not avoid her forever, and he wasn’t about to try. As he headed into town, he still looked around nervously, still not quite used to being surrounded by so many ponies.
“Oh little one, there you are.” She smiled, hoping that the mistakes he made while helping the animals was just a fluke.
The orange dragon smiled as he noticed the bunny was missing. “Hey, Fluttershy.”
“How about we both get some sleep, ok?” To be honest, she did feel tired, and assumed he was too, based on how often Spike had to sleep at his age.
“Alright, if you want to,” he said, blushing a bit. He, on the other claw, was not feeling the least bit tired, but he wanted to do anything that Fluttershy suggested.
Fluttershy noticed the odd comment, which led her to believe he probably wasn’t even tired, but the dragon was listening to her. Spike was a great friend, but he had never followed her like this. Like the kind mother she was, she could notice something was really bothering this dragon. She made note to study him from a distance as she had often done with her woodland friends, but for now she led him back to her (or, more accurately, their) cottage. The dragon felt calm as he followed her closely until she opened the door, but at that squeak of the door, his heart nearly stopped. Inside was Angel, finishing up some small chores and clearly hoping to quit and go to bed soon The dragon tried to hide his emotions, but it was clear that he felt horrible inside; the look on his face made that quite obvious.
Fluttershy, of course, noticed this right away. “Are you alright, little one? You’re shaking, and you look awfully sad.”
“I’m fine, Fluttershy, just... uhh... really tired, can I go to bed now?” The dragon felt silly asking permission to do something that comes so natural, but did not wish to face her questions.
“Umm... s- sure, you can. Just climb into your basket over there and I will head off to bed soon,” she said, pointing to inside his room.
The dragon looked with disgust at the bed, which was just a clone of Spike's. He slowly climbed into his bed, feeling extremely uncomfortable at being forced to sleep in a basket again, but since he did not want Fluttershy questioning him, he merely forced a smile and closed his eyes.
Fluttershy smiled back. “Good night, little one,” she said quietly as she walked upstairs with Angel.
The dragon pretended to sleep, but he did cock his head at that. He had never heard the term “Good night” before. He sighed quietly as he tried to force himself to get comfortable. He tossed and turned, knowing that he couldn’t climb out until Fluttershy went to bed, but that light remained stubbornly on and he could not fall asleep. Finally, after twenty of the longest minutes of his life, her light shut off and he could hear her breathing slow down as she slept. He got out of the basket and grabbed the pillow (the only good thing to come of the whole basket thing) and blanket. He put the pillow down on the floor near one of her windows so he could gaze up at Luna’s night, and finally he felt comfortable enough to fall asleep. “Good night, Fluttershy,” he whispered, still unsure of what it meant, but knowing that she had said it with care.
The following morning, Fluttershy woke up bright and early, only to find a dragon on the floor where there had not previously been one. After some deliberation, she gave him a gentle nudge with her hoof, bouncing back in surprise as he awoke.
“Um... little one, are you ok?” Fluttershy asked hesitantly.
“Uhhh…Yes, I was just... well…” The dragon trailed off as he realized he had been caught sleeping outside the bed they had made for him.
Fluttershy, not understanding the source of his trauma, looked quizzically at the dragon, waiting for him to say something.
It didn't take long for the dragon to confess. “I’m sorry Fluttershy but I don’t like that thing.” The dragon pointed to the basket. “I had to sleep in Spike’s on that first night and I’m just used to sleeping under the stars, so I moved to the floor like I’m used to and slept near the window.” He felt terrible, thinking he was going to upset Fluttershy, but she did not seem the least bit mad.
Instead, she was smiling gently. “Well, why didn’t you just say so before? I would have understood. You just need to be honest. I bet we can set up a bed for you somewhere where you can watch the stars at night.” Fluttershy was internally pleased that she was finally getting somewhere with this dragon and his honesty.
“How about I could sleep on the roof outside?” The dragon was pleased that she was not upset, and it made him feel good coming clean about his feelings, so he decided to test the waters.
“On the outside?” Fluttershy was taken aback. “But you would be freezing out there at night!”
The dragon shrugged. “I never get cold, Fluttershy; I've slept outside my whole life. I think my skin has something to do with it.” He rubbed his scales, and Fluttershy noticed they did indeed seem different from Spike's.
“But you slept with a blanket all night,” Fluttershy pointed out, unable to wrap her mind around never being cold. Personally, she loved snuggling deep under layers and layers of blankets, kind of like a cocoon. But that wasn't important now.
“Well, they are very comfy, I can’t believe I went this long without a blanket.” He grabbed the blanket and rubbed it against his scales and smiled. “But yeah. I never get cold. I bet I could stay warm in a snowstorm.”
Fluttershy raised an eyebrow. “Oh yeah? Well, we will just see about that.” She typically did not get cocky, but was curious if this dragon was just being playful as young ones often are. She grabbed a bucket and filled it with ice. Then, without warning, she picked up the baby dragon and placed him into the bucket and told him to stay. She smirked as she waited for him to beg for mercy, but the dragon just looked at her like she had lost it. After twenty minutes of this, the ice started to melt a bit and the dragon had shown no indication that he was getting the least bit cold, Fluttershy watched his skin closely to look for shaking, but nothing happened. She was, to put it mildly, shocked.
“I can’t believe this! You're not cold at all!”
The dragon shrugged, as this was not news to him. “Yeah. Maybe it has to do with my cold breath.”
“What are you talking about?” Fluttershy was dumbstruck.
“You saw the giant spider, right? And the ice that stopped him? That was me!” he said, smiling broadly. He conveniently forgot to mention that it was difficult to use without heavy concentration.
“I thought that ice came from Twilight Sparkle... You did that?” Fluttershy remembered back as she was frozen in fear at the massive creature.
“Sure! I can show you. I, um, I think it should work this time, it helps when I’m excited.” He took a few deep breaths and concentrated, and blew out a gentle stream of frost that landed on her floor and melted to water.
“Wow! You're amazing, little dragon!” She gave him a hug; Fluttershy now knew why Twilight was so obsessed with him.
This made the dragon feel great inside, but also brought him back to his guilty feelings towards her bunny. “Can’t Spike do that? I thought some dragon's could,” he asked, hoping that the more he talked the less guilt he would feel.
“Oh, no. Most of the dragon's I have seen... well, all of them, really... breathe out fire. Spike does it all the time,” Fluttershy said hoping she made him feel special.
Unfortunately, this statement only made him feel like more of an outcast, like he was a one-of-a-kind freak. “Fluttershy... If I told you I did something bad, would you be mad?” The extreme guilt was really getting to the orange dragon, and he decided then and there that he would try and make her understand.
“You did something bad? Well, nopony's perfect, but what is it that you did?” Fluttershy asked, her awesome moment cut short by this confession.
The dragon slowly started to explain the story. The more he said, the better he felt; but the worse Fluttershy felt. As he was finishing his story, both Angel (who had approached unseen from behind) and Fluttershy looked disgusted, and a little bit angry. The silence in the room just made the dragon feel worse inside, but he was glad the guilt could not get him anymore. Fluttershy was lost in thought at the desperate act the dragon admitted to doing, and took a long while to compose her thoughts.
“Dragon… I want you to leave my cottage... Please.” Fluttershy was not sure how to feel, but she did not want this dragon near her bunny friend at the moment.
The dragon started shaking, but quickly ran outside of the cottage as he saw Fluttershy’s eyes. No longer full of life, they were blank, as she stared off into the distance, looking into nothing. He shut the door and ran into the town looking for his dragon friend. He felt awful that he had upset one of his few friends, and especially that it was Fluttershy. He started running into the middle of the town, blinded by panic, when suddenly a white pony came into his view. Too late to stop, he crashed into her. Rarity was too big to be knocked down by the small dragon, but he went sprawling into the dust. She looked down in surprise.
“Oh, dear! Are you alright... um... Dragon, is it?”
“Have you seen Spike? Please, I need to find him!” the orange dragon said, feeling frustrated.
“Of course. He and Twilight went up to the castle over in Canterlot.”
“Canterlot?” The dragon had never heard of such a place. “How do I get there?”
“Well, it is way up there on the mountain, most ponies get there by chariot, or wings if they have them. But without, it takes half a day to get there; and it’s not like you can climb the mountain by yourself, little dragon,” Rarity said, suddenly interested in what was plaguing the dragon.
“I can climb a mountain,” the dragon said dismissively. “I need to go find Spike.” He turned and started to run off, but quickly found himself suspended in a light blue magic aura.
“Not so fast, now. I can’t let you go to the castle uninvited, and you’re so young you most certainly can’t climb a mountain!”
“Oh yeah?” the captured dragon challenged, “Watch me!” He breathed in and concentrated as hard as he could, aiming for Rarity's glowing horn. His ice breath encased her horn perfectly, breaking her concentration and dropping him. Not waiting for her to recover, he sprinted off in the direction of the castle.
“How did he do that? Oh my, this hurts! Which way did he go?” Rarity asked herself as she looked around, worried that she had lost the young dragon and harmed her horn in the process.
The dragon quickly ran out of town, earning himself some more strange looks, but he did not care. His only goal was to reach Canterlot. Looking up, he could see a small castle off in the distance seemingly growing out of the mountain and knew that was his destination. He also knew that it might take all day and all night to reach it and he would probably have to climb a mountain, but he didn’t care. He ran as quickly as he could, glad that he brought his brown pouch which held the amulet that he still believed brought him strength. His clear goal kept him going all day as he started to slowly get closer to the castle, it grew bigger in the distance. Finally, he ended up at the edge of a very large tall mountain with a large castle on the top with huge protective walls... and no clear way to get in except to climb up or fly.