//------------------------------// // Totally Optional Epilogue // Story: Everypony Loves Rainbow // by WaferThin //------------------------------// A/N: Chapter 6 ends this story precisely how I wanted it to. The tale was always just a day-in-the-life, a quick glimpse into a world filled with improbable shipping partners and even more improbable events. This little epilogue is a completely optional little snippet, bringing the Equestria I've cruelly thrown Dash at into the folds of 'canon' Equestria, because I found it funny. Here's hoping you do too! *** At their weekly Pony Pet Playdate, five friends gathered with their beloved animals for an afternoon of fun. It wasn’t long before all five of them, and their pets, were happily playing and talking, filling Ponyville Park with the sounds of laughter and joyful voices. This really was a great time for them all; it brought these very different personalities together, for a few hours of carefree interaction.    There was a sixth pony, however, who was once again conspicuously absent.   After they’d gotten pleasantries out of the way and left the pets to play together, the girls sat down for a picnic. Twilight felt it was a good time to get down to business. “Girls, I know we’ve talked about this before…” she started, standing up and glancing across the faces of her friends. “…But I seriously think that we need to do something about Rainbow Dash.”   “Twilight, dear…” Rarity began, her half-eaten sandwich floating before her. “We’ve been over this, haven’t we? We all agreed that we can’t do much more than just let this run its course. Why are you bringing it up again?”   Twilight raised an eyebrow before pointing a hoof upwards. The group panned their heads back and spotted a single cloud, hovering just above them in the otherwise clear sky, which had somehow managed to gain a rainbow-coloured tail.   “Oooh! Hi, Raincloud Dash!” Pinkie called, waving wildly with her forehooves before falling backwards, snorting with laughter over her own pun.   The cloud suddenly sprouted a pair of eyes, narrowed in anger. “Oh, come on!” The cloud yelled back furiously. “Can’t you guys just leave me alone?!” With that, a pair of blue wings emerged from the cloud, and it flew away at speed.   Twilight sighed, raising a drink to her lips. The farmer lying next to her snorted, pushing her hat out of her eyes so that she could glance up at Twilight wearily. “Sugarcube, we’ve been over this more times than ah can count,” she drawled. “That pony’s ego is bigger’n a buffalo’s behind! Ah don’t think there’s nuthin’ we can do.” Applejack rolled her eyes. “Celestia knows we’ve tried.”   Twilight frowned at both the defeatist attitude and the affront to grammar in her friend’s speech. “I know that, AJ, but there’s got to be something we can do! There must be something we haven’t tried yet! Doesn’t anypony else want to try again?” she asked pleadingly, meeting the eyes of her other three friends individually, hoping that at least one of them would back her up. “Well I, for one, am beginning to tire of her dramatics,” Rarity admittted, wiping her mouth daintily with a levitating napkin. “Why, just the other day I happened up on her in a café, wearing the most…” the unicorn paused, shuddering at the memory. “…revolting get-up, as some form of crude disguise! Honestly, I was almost glad when she crashed through the wall and got drenched—at least it washed out the worst of that abominable colouration!” Her eyes narrowed. “And what she did to that delightful cook! Such a gentlecolt, and she knocked him unconscious and destroyed his wonderful café, without a single word of apology! How very uncouth.”   As the unicorn sniffed dismissively, and before Twilight could question how Rainbow ended up demolishing a wall, Applejack sat up, a look of disbelief on her face. “You. Tired of somepony bein’ dramatic.” She didn’t sound convinced.   Twilight intervened quickly to both refocus the conversation and to head off the argument she knew was about to follow. “It gets worse! I even called in Princess Celestia to try and talk to Dash, but Rainbow didn’t even wait to hear what she had to say! She just flew away.” Twilight sighed dejectedly, sinking to her haunches. “The Princess was even kind enough to bring some of her royal guards along with her, to clear out all the fans hanging around outside her house. I hoped that would give her some breathing space, but apparently she just thought the guards were after her, too.”   Applejack sighed wearily, raising an eyebrow. “That fan club o’ hers is still givin’ her trouble, huh?”   Twilight nodded. “Personally, I think it’s the real source of this whole issue. It’s become much more of an issue recently, and especially since the wedding. After she pulled off the Rainboom there, the press have been calling her the ‘next great Wonderbolt’, and ever since that, they’ve been sitting outside her house.” Twilight smiled a little. “Along with the regulars, of course. Scootaloo practically lives on Dash’s porch nowadays.” She looked at Applejack questioningly. “I thought your sister was gonna talk to her about that?”   Applejack grunted. “Ah did ask her. She said she tried, but that whole club ain’t listening.”   Rarity nodded in agreement. “According to Sweetie Belle, there’s been quite a number of ponies from further away that have come to Ponyville purely to join that silly little appreciation society.” Rarity laughed derisively. “Honestly! Glory hounds, the lot of them! Hopping onto the latest bandwagon and riding it for all it’s worth!” Applejack turned to Rarity once again, a smirk on her face. “Followin’ a trend, huh? Ain’t that, like… the main point o’ yer job?”   Rarity spluttered indignantly, her blush prompting Applejack to laughter. “Well! I… that is, ahem… it’s completely different!” She insisted. “I adhere to—and set, I’ll have you know—the latest trends in fashion, whereas these attention seekers merely wish to leap on the coattails of a rising star, and claim they were there at the beginning!”   Pinkie raised her head from the bucket of candies that she’d somehow gotten to the picnic without anypony noticing—and, wisely, nopony chose to question it—to add in, “C’mon Rare, can you blame them? She is pretty awesome!”   The fashionista stopped her rant to consider that, before breaking into a small smile. “Well, I suppose.”    After a moment of silence, Fluttershy cleared her throat—as much as squeaking counted as clearing the throat—before piping up and bringing the topic back to point. “I’ve, uh, tried talking to… her… as well, but she just thinks that I’m… uhm, you know…” her face was suddenly bright red.   “We know.” The other four ponies spoke in unison. They’d all had their share of conversations with the pegasus, and they’d all ended the same way.   “It just doesn’t make sense!” Twilight groaned, slapping a forehoof on her head. “I mean, sure, plenty of ponies admire her, but where did she get this idea from?” She kicked out at a rock in powerless frustration. “Every time we try to help her, she just assumes we’re part of… that we’re thinking about…” Her voice trailed off and she blushed slightly. “…you know, that.”   Applejack snorted, collapsing back to the ground and lowering her Stetson over her eyes. “Twi hun, that pony’s just in a world of her own these days,” she said, chuckling dryly. “Ah reckon that we need ta just give her some space, ‘til her ego dies down a little.”   Twilight sighed again. “You’re probably right… I just hate not being able to do anything.” She muttered. “We’ve tried everything, though! I’ve done all the research I can into psychology, but when I tried to discuss it with her, she kicked me out of her house! You tried a more… ahem… ‘forceful’ approach, Applejack, and it had the same result; Rarity’s spoken with her too… heck, even Fluttershy gave it a go!” As a hoof was jabbed in her direction, Fluttershy hid her face behind her mane and cowered on the ground, meeping. “Oh…uhm, well, I haven’t really tried to talk to her since that one time I mentioned, since she gets all angry and scary whenever any of us try…” the shy pony mumbled, before braving a glance up at her friends and giving a small smile. “Oh! But I did help the Wonderbolts after Rainbow…well, you know…” She drifted off again, looking sad, before shaking her head slightly and giving the gathering a genuine, strong smile. “And I got them to promise not to hold this whole thing against her, and to give her a second chance when she’s ready. They said it’s the least they could do after I… uh, well… you know, the stitches and all.”   Twilight winced slightly; it was true that some of the ace fliers had been a little worse for wear after Rainbow had finished with them. Still, she gave Fluttershy a thankful nod; it was only through her pleadings—and Dash’s own famous flight skills, of course—that the pegasus still had the chance to join the stunt group.   A pink ball of energy suddenly sprang up mere inches from Twilight’s nose, an enormous smile on its face. “Oh, pick me next! I helped too!” Pinkie Pie cried, bouncing up and down. “I threw a sink at her!” she announced in a sing-song voice.   Twilight nodded absently. “Oh yeah, and Pinkie threw… a…” the unicorn’s voice faded as her brain started processing what her friend had just said. “A what?” she shrieked.   Pinkie nodded enthusiastically at the dumbfounded group. “Uh huh!” she beamed. “I figured, ‘wow, Dashie sure is being silly about all this, and nothing normal like talking or, y’know, being brilliant friends with her is working!’” The beam shifted into the kind of devious smile that gave the Cakes nightmares. “So I thought, if ‘normal’ ain’t working, why not try something ‘super-duper-not-normal’? And what’s more not-normal than a flying sink? Nothing, I tell ya!” The pink pony sat back proudly, not even stopping to take a breath after that monologue. “It was the perfect plan.”   Silence reigned for a few moments as everypony tried to process the logic being used.  Unfortunately, since it was Pinkie Pie logic, it didn’t really fit into their own minds very well. The closest anypony came was Applejack, who managed a stunned “…Guh?”   As the others came to terms with her thought process, Pinkie’s exuberant smile slowly faded into a muted frown, and she sank down on her haunches slightly. “Well, I thought it was the perfect plan,” she admitted. “I even wrote ‘NOTICE ME’ in great big pink letters, so she’d be sure to see it and know it was from me!” Pinkie glanced around the group earnestly. “I thought Dashie would be so curious, she’d have to look on the bottom of the sink and read the other message there—the one that said ‘stop being such a dumb moody pony and just be friends with us all again, you silly filly!’” She sighed dejectedly. “At least, that’s what I’d do. I always check the bottom of the sink for hidden messages. I mean, that’s what it’s for, right? And then, she came into Sugar Cube Corner later, and I totally thought it had worked! I mean, sure, I had to tie her up a little, to stop her from running away all over again... but after that, I was totally friendly and stuff! I even tried to put together a quick ‘Hurray You’re Back To Normal And Now We Can Be Bestest Friends Forever Again’ party!” she shuffled uncomfortably. “But no, it was more of that silly sappy stuff she’s always going on about these days.” Pinkie sniffled sadly, looking to be on the verge of tears. “She asked me why I liked her, and then there was something about us making cupcakes, and then when I went to check on the twins and make us some snacks, she fired herself out of my party cannon, just to get away from me! Why would somepony do that?!”   Twilight could think of several reasons why anypony forced to spend too much time in Pinkie Pie’s presence would want to be fired out of a cannon, but she felt this wasn’t the best time to present such evidence. Instead, she opted for the old friendship standby: a compassionate hug. She reached towards the party pony and embraced her, awkwardly patting her back with a hoof.   “Don’t worry, Pinkie,” Twilight promised. “Like Applejack said, it’s probably just a phase. There might not be anything we can do about it now, but I’m sure she’ll be back to her normal self again soon enough, and then everything can go back to how it was.”   Moments later, Twilight felt a loving warmth surround her, as the other three ponies present joined in on the compassion. Trapped within the group hug, Pinkie had no choice but to feel better. She giggled slightly, glancing around at the smiling faces of her friends. “Yeah, I guess you girls are right,” she admitted softly. “It’s just Dashie being silly. I’m sure she’ll snap out of it soon.”   Twilight let go of Pinkie, sitting back and giving her an encouraging smile. “Exactly!” she agreed. Her eyes softened slightly as she turned to stare after the cloud-shrouded pony in question, who had long disappeared into the distance. “She’ll snap out of it soon,” Twilight repeated quietly.   “She’s got to.”   THE END.