Chapter 3: Unexpected Behavior
After that kiss, the rest of Rain Flare’s day was a blur, as was the next week. The only things he could remember clearly were the few kisses that had followed the first over the past several days. Currently, he is hoping to get another as he trots happily towards the library. As he raises his hoof to knock on the door, it swings outward and narrowly misses his snout. Rainbow Dash notices who she almost hit with the door and turns her head away, chin up, trotting by her former friend. After recovering from the initial shock, Rain Flare shakes his head and walks inside.
"What was that all about?" he asks as he enters the main room.
"Humph, why don't you tell me?" Twilight responds, angrily rearranging the library.
"Ummm... Did I miss something?" he approaches his mare-friend cautiously.
"She told me what you said to her the other day. How you think she can't fend for herself and needs your help to get by."
"What!? That's not what I meant at all! I felt bad for not being in contact with her. I only said that maybe I could have helped if I hadn't been so wrapped up in my own life," Rain Flare says defensively.
"You, of all ponies, should know that she hates needing help. You've known her nearly as long as Fluttershy."
Rain Flare lets out a sigh and hangs his head.
"You're right, it was a stupid suggestion. I'm sorry..."
Twilight turns toward the stallion.
"It doesn't matter if I forgive you, you didn't hurt me. Not directly at least. You need to go talk to her."
"I will, but maybe I should-" The unicorn cuts him off.
"Now, Rain Flare."
The guard bows to the powerful mare.
"Yes ma'am. As you command," he turns back the way he came and exits the library. Once outside, the stallion looks around for any sight of the cocky pegasus. When no signs of her presence arise, he spreads his wings and flies up to the clouds.
After several hours of searching around Ponyville and Cloudsdale, and getting thoroughly soaked by multiple cloud crashes, Rain Flare finds the rainbow-maned mare resting on a low flying cumulonimbus just big enough for her to lay on. The guard shakes himself to dislodge some of the stubborn droplets before floating down beside Rainbow Dash.
"The hay do you want? Here to offer me a place in Celestia's court?" the mare greets coldly.
"I do believe I owe you an apology... I didn't mean to upset you when I offered to help, I felt terrible for abandoning you the way I did. I never even thought to check on you to see how your life was going, I was too immersed in my own perfect world... I can only hope that you will forgive me for not being a better friend..." Rain Flare spills his guts to the obstinate mare, hanging his head lower and lower with each mention of his failure and selfishness.
Rainbow Dash snorts and rests her head on her hooves.
"Hey, it's not like I made any attempt to keep in touch with you either. It just bugs me that you got everything you wanted, and I'm stuck here in Ponyville..." catching what she just said, her cheeks flush slightly and she sits up, "not that there's anything wrong with Ponyville. I mean, sure it's not perfect, but it's pretty darn close. I've got awesome friends, I can fly between here and Cloudsdale, I'm head of the weather team, and everyone loves me. I'm a local star."
Rain Flare smiles at his old friend.
"Do you really think you could leave all of this for the Wonderbolts? Even if Spitfire herself asked you to?" Rainbow Dash smiles back at the stallion.
"No way, no how. Now, how about a race?"
That was the Rainbow Dash he had grown up with. Her cocky tone was back, along with that challenging gleam in her eyes.
"You're on."
"Sweet! Alright, from this cloud to Town Hall and back. On my go," both ponies get into ready positions, their wings poised for takeoff, their legs bent to give them an initial boost, "GO!" they shoot off like a cake from one of Pinkie Pie's canons.
Both flapping as hard as they can, the Town Hall soon comes into view. Rain Flare stretches his body flatter to make himself more streamlined, allowing him to pull ahead of Rainbow Dash by a few inches. Seeing this, Rainbow Dash does the same and closes the gap, she then banks hard around the tower of Town Hall, sending the wind gauge whirling. Rain Flare takes the turn too loose and loses ground, he flaps hard to make it up and closes on the mare ahead of him. The pair is wing to wing as the finish comes into view. Rainbow drops into a thermal draft, giving her a speed boost and shooting her ahead of Rain Flare. The stallion drops down behind her, cursing himself for forgetting that trick, and flaps with all his might to catch up. They come out of the current going quite fast, the sudden, thicker air slows Rainbow Dash down some, causing her opponent to rocket into her as he exits the thermal stream. They both tumble through the air and land entangled on the small cloud. After recovering from the event, they both burst into joyful laughter.
Twilight passes under a lone cloud and hears the pleasant sound of ponies enjoying themselves emanating from it. She looks up, lifting a hoof to shield her eyes from the sun, to see who it is. She spots a familiar Rainbow mane and recognizes the throaty chuckle of her special somepony. Smiling, the unicorn trots on, glad her friends are getting along once again.
Rainbow Dash smiles up at her leather winged friend, her cheeks dark in part from their race but mostly from the awkward position they landed in with him on top of her. The grey pegasus blushes lightly as well as he picks himself up off of her. It doesn't make much difference though, given the small dimensions of the cloud they had crashed onto. The rainbow maned pegasus rubs the back of her neck and clears her throat to try and break the awkward silence.
"Sooo... I don't have any plans for today, if you don't either did you want to hang out or something? I kinda flew off the last time we tried to catch up so I guess I owe you." Rain Flare chuckles softly.
"You had good reason to, so you don't owe me anything, but I wouldn't mind spending the rest of the evening with you."
The blue pegasus smiles.
"Awesome, you want to go hang out by the lake? The sunset looks stellar from the top of the hill."
"Watching the sunset, huh? Isn't that a bit romantic for a couple friends who are just catching up," the guard teases his old friend, earning him a punch in the shoulder and a blush.
"Sh-shut up! I didn't mean it like that! Jeez, your still the same old flirt, aren't you? I would have expected guard training to beat that out of you."
He laughs heartily, rubbing his shoulder absently.
"Oh believe me, they tried, but I held out longer than any of my commanders could."
Rainbow shakes her head and rolls her eyes as she flaps off of their cloud perch.
"You better ask Twi how she feels about a herd before you try your charms on any of our friends or the other townsponies."
Rain Flare cocks his head as he takes off next to his friend.
"I thought there was some social law against herds, which I personally find to be rather stupid."
Dash flips upside down and begins flying underneath her companion in order to continue their conversation on the way to the lake.
"Turns out you aren't alone, there was a pretty big movement a little while ago officially legalizing it and creating special ceremonies so ponies in a herd can get the same benefits and stuff as ones that get married. Do you guys not get news on the Changeling front or something? It was a pretty big deal, got a ton of media coverage."
"Umm, no actually. The only news we hear from the kingdom is military related, anything else is considered irrelevant, we only hear about it if someone gets a letter or something. Does that mean the homophobia is more or less gone as well?"
The mare scowls.
"No, which is stupid. You would think same-sex marriage would come before polygamy, but nope, they just skipped right over us gays."
Rain Flare cocks his head, curious about his friends choice of pronoun, but decides not to push for an explanation, instead choosing to change the subject, politics aren't exactly the best topic to rekindle a friendship on.
"So, um, nice weather we're having lately," Insert hoof into mouth, so much for you still being a flirt.
The blue pegasus laughs.
"Thanks, I spent all day yesterday setting it up," craning her neck back to see where they are, she sees the lake a few hundred yards in front of them. She flips back upright and flies up next to her companion, "Follow me, I know the perfect spot," she glides down to a spot on the slope of the hill under a large oak, it offers a perfect angle of the sun setting over the still water.
The grey stallion lets out an impressed whistle as he comes down next to Rainbow Dash.
"Damn, that is one spectacular view."
The weather mare smiles.
"It is pretty awesome, isn't it? Come on, we can sit up here under the tree and watch, try not to nod off though, the grass is super soft. Not as good as a cloud of course, but still sleep inducing."
Rain Flare follows her up the slope a few feet and lays next to her in the grass. A contended sigh escapes his lips and the lids of his eyes immediately grow heavy and close. The next thing he knows there is a hoof under his chin turning his head followed by soft lips being pressed against his. He pauses for only the briefest moment before returning the gentle kiss. Opening his eyes slowly to meet the eyes of his friend, the guard is rather confused when he gets a view of the grass instead, a puddle of drool beginning to form under his slightly agape jaw. A fit of giggling over head causes him to sit up and look over to his rainbow maned companion.
"Wha... What just happened?"
Upon regaining her composure, Rainbow answers with an amused smirk.
"You conked out as soon as you sat down, and not five seconds later you began drooling and your wings started getting stiff. Do I even want to know what you were dreaming about?"
He blushes and rubs the back of his neck, debating in his head whether to tell her the truth, deciding that lying wouldn't be the best way to start up their friendship again he decides to go for it.
"You, actually. I dreamt that I closed my eyes and then you turned my head towards you and kissed me."
The cyan pegasus' cheeks turn red and she averts her gaze.
"O-oh... um, I don't really want to get involved in a herd, at least, not right now. I'd have to talk to Ap- uh, my partner about how they feel about it. You should talk to Twilight about it too, and you probably don't want to mention the dream, I'm not sure how kindly she'd take to you fantasizing about other mares."
The guard nods in agreement.
"You're probably right. We haven't been together too long, so asking to add some ponies to the relationship wouldn't go over too well I imagine." There is a short silence between the friends as they watch the setting of the sun, pondering their possible future together. The stallion breaks the silence when his curiosity gets the better of him, "who is your partner, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Hmm?" the mare turns her gaze away from the horizon towards her comrade, "Oh, uhh... they're a local, an earthpony, really kind and honest, a hard worker, like myself," this earns a snort from the grey pegasus which in turn earns him a punch in the shoulder and a poorly concealed smirk. He chuckles, rubbing his shoulder absently.
"Do they have a name?"
"Yes."
"Do I get to know what it is?"
She bites her lower lip, thinking.
"Later, it's not like I don't trust you, it's just..." she trails off and the grey pegasus nods in recognition.
"I understand. Can you tell me how you got together at least?"
"Yeah. We've been friends for a while, well, friendly rivals, like you and me. Anyway, we were hanging out on one of h-their, days off. It started off like any other of our times together, talking about nothing, arguing about who was better at what, and then a race or some other competition. But when I was walking them home, they all of a sudden pulled me off the path behind a tree and, after looking around for anypony else, asked me if I could like them as more than a friend. I would have said yes immediately except that I was too surprised and happy to answer right away. When I didn't respond they started to look worried, so I... I kissed them, and they kissed me back, after getting over their own shock that is. Sooo, yeah, now we're dating, but it's kind of a secret. Their family is rather... traditional, so they're worried about how they might take it, mostly their grandmother."
"How long have you two been more than friends?"
"Ummm... a year? Year and a half?"
The guard deadpans.
"And you still haven't told their family? Jeez, are you waiting for the grandmother to die?"
"Wellll..."
"Rainbow!"
"I'm just kidding! Sheesh, you really need to loosen up, I'd say by about-"
"I swear, if you make a 'twenty percent' pun..."
"Pffft, it would take a hundred and twenty percent to make you even close to -GAH!" the leather winged pegasus tackles the mare and sends them both sprawling down the hill. They pull their wings in close to their bodies in order to avoid injuring them in their long roll down the grassy slope. Once they finally stop at the bottom, Rainbow Dash once again finds herself underneath the stallion, she promptly fixes this, much to his chagrin, but can't help but ask a question.
"Why is it that you always seem to land on top?"
"Ummm... lower center of gravity?"
The weather pony giggles softly and helps her friend to his hooves.
"Come on, I should probably get you home."
As she prepares to take off, the guard gently cups her chin in his hoof and turns her violet eyes towards his turquoise gaze.
"I'm already the luckiest stallion alive having Twilight as my marefriend, but if I can have you as well..." he can't find the right words, but the feathered pegasus seems to understand as her cheeks turn to crimson and she places a soft kiss on his cheek.
The blush quickly fades however and she regains her usual demeanor.
"Come on you romantic shmuk, I'll race you back to the library."
********
Chrysalis smiles, her pointed teeth gleaming in the sickly green light of the bioluminescent lamps in her chamber of the hive. A scene outlined in an undulating border of green magic shows Rain Flare and Rainbow Dash by the lake. When the guard passes out on the grass, the Changeling Queen quickly casts a spell, a warped form of Princess Luna's dream walking spell. She targets the unconscious bat-pony and warps his dream to reflect his inner, more carnal desires. The immense range prevents her from being able to stir up too much, but she manages enough to make things more interesting. Upon pulling out, Chrysalis watches the awkward scene that follows, cackling and rubbing her front hooves together.
"Yes... spread your love, make more food for me and my children. Soon I will have this little trick perfected, and then... then I will have my revenge, and I will feast on your unhindered love and infatuations."
Her shadow ceases to follow her movements and grows off of the ground, becoming semi-solid, purple eyes glowing from an amorphous face.
"You mean our revenge, my dear Chrysy..." a voice emanates from the shifting form of the shadow, or rather, a mixture of feminine and masculine voices acting as one, giving it an unsettling echo affect and no clear gender.
The Queen smiles at the Nightmare.
"Of course, my love. Without the knowledge you gave me, I would never have been able to even start this spell. Together, we shall defeat the Princesses and Celestia's infernal nuisance of a student. Then we shall rule Equestria in an eternal night, where creatures let loose their most carnal desires," Chrysalis grins a shark's grin as the Nightmare saunters towards her, gaining a more definitive shape as the lights in the chamber wink out.