The change in the air hit Rainbow like a brick as she opened the door to her apartment that evening. While she wasn't entirely used to Fuyu living there quite yet, the woman in black made things as easy to deal with as she could have hoped. Besides not having to eat, she was very quiet. It constantly reminded her of the way Fluttershy acted, if a little more chilly.
Therefore, she didn't know what had changed, but she knew it was something. There Fuyu sat, on the couch, in the dark, staring off ahead of her with her arms crossed. She wasn't reading a book, she wasn't watching TV, she wasn't doing anything. The scene made Rainbow's skin crawl.
“H-hey Fuyu,” she greeted, flipping on the light near the doorway before she shut the door itself. She realized she'd been unable to mask her uncertainty, but still tried to put on a nonchalant smile. “What are you doing in the dark?” She recoiled almost instinctively as Fuyu turned her head, a motion that was slow and deliberate.
“I am angry,” was all she said. Her eyes glittered with the emotion; Rainbow's uncertainty was beginning to shift into something closer to outright fear.
She couldn't help but gulp as she walked closer, despite her urge to make an excuse and depart the apartment posthaste. “Angry? About what?”
“Twilight is not telling me everything.” Those words weren't so much angry as they were disappointed, but they certainly bore a hard edge. “If I am to believe Rarity, at least.”
This was news to Rainbow as well, and her fear made way for confusion as she sat down on the other end of the sofa. “What did she say?”
Fuyu took a short breath rested her hands in her lap, tracking Rainbow with her gaze until the woman seated herself. “Bon Bon came over, looking for you.”
Rainbow made a face. “Oh, damn. I forgot to tell them I was working. What does that have to--” She was silenced by those chilly blue eyes for a moment. “Oh...there's more. Right, sorry.”
“I volunteered to help in your place, so I went with her.” Fuyu looked away briefly and frowned. “We went to her shop. I rearranged furniture. I listened to them argue. I liked it. I liked being outside, amongst everyone. Then Rarity sees me from the sidewalk.” A hard frown yanked at her lips. “She insisted I go with her.”
“But...why?” Rainbow asked, leaning into the corner of the couch and facing the woman in black. “Because of Twilight?”
“Yes. She doesn't think it is safe for me to be wandering about in town.” Anger was creeping back into her tone, and she looked away from Rainbow. “Does she not trust me? Do...do you trust me?” Her head snapped back so she could gauge her friend's body language.
“If I didn't, I wouldn't let you stay here,” she affirmed, sitting up straight. “I don't get it, neither of them mentioned anything like this to me.” Fuyu could see some unhappiness appear in her eyes as she retreived her phone from her shorts pocket. She thumbed for a moment through her contacts, dialed a number, and set the phone to speaker. A few rings passed before her call was answered.
“Hey, Rainbow.” It was Twilight. “What's up?”
Fuyu stared at her as she spent a split second to collect her thoughts. Once she did, she had to pace herself to prevent the whole thing from spilling out all at once. “Did you and the others talk about not letting Fuyu out in town, or something?” She made a face as a noise came from the librarian; it was surprised and slightly unhappy, and after she emitted it there was a nervous laugh.
“Well, um...” A pregnant pause inserted itself, and an impatient Rainbow began tapping her fingers on the armrest. “Rarity and I just thought it would be best for her to keep to herself for now. Until we're sure she won't do anything.”
“But it was okay for her to stay with me?” Rainbow exclaimed, standing up and perching her free hand on her hip. “What was I, a test run?” She didn't see the displeased look that was beginning to appear on Fuyu's face as she ranted. “Did you put Applejack up to that?”
Twilight hastily refuted that notion, her voice taking on a higher pitch with the anxiety. “No! Not at all! I didn't have anything to do with that, that was all her!”
Fuyu dropped her head, but Rainbow didn't catch that, either. Her anger was mostly gone, replaced instead by a strange sort of unhappiness. It was directed both at herself, and at her friends. More so the former, though, and by a long way; she felt at fault for the rather heated back and forth the athlete was now having with Twilight, but she couldn't make herself speak and interrupt it. She was limited to watching Rainbow pace around the room, listening to her voice get louder, and angrier.
It all reached a head in short order. “I'd appreciate it if you weren't keeping shit from us!” Rainbow growled, holding the phone so tightly Fuyu thought she would break it. “I thought we were gonna be together on this?”
Somehow, it seemed very familiar. The tone of the conversation was identical to many Fuyu had heard before, when she were the subject. Whether or not she were being directly addressed didn't matter. The undertone, at least the vast majority of the time, was as if she were being spoken of as a concept. A thing. Like she weren't there, or didn't have an opinion herself. Pinkie never did it, and Applejack only did it rarely, but the dressmaker and the librarian made a nasty habit of the thing. While Fuyu might not have cared one way or another during her days out there, that time had long passed.
And being referred to as if she weren't there annoyed her to no end. She stood up, which was the first motion Rainbow reacted to, and held out her hand. “Give me the phone. Put it on speaker first.”
The way she said those words rattled Rainbow enough to stop mid-sentence and stare. “Uh, Fuyu wants to talk to you,” was all she could squeak out before tapping the screen and handing over the phone.
Twilight's nervousness was now audible to the woman in black. “She wants to...oh boy...”
Her first question was simple and directly to the point. “Do you trust me or not?” No reply came, and as the moments went by she started to glare at the phone in her hand. “Answer me,” she demanded, flat and calm, after a minute had passed.
“Yes! I mean, as much as we can. You've got to understand, you're...” A heavy sigh came from the phone. “Fuyu, you're a killer. I'm risking a lot by hiding you. We all are. If the Princess found out, we could all go to prison. I'm not trying to say we don't trust you, I just don't know what I'm dealing with yet.” Silence arrived again, this time briefer and a little less heavy as Fuyu contemplated her reply. “Rainbow, listen. I didn't mean to shut you out of this, but Rarity and I decided we might be the only ones strong enough to stop her, in case...you know. That's why we kept it amongst ourselves.”
“I would have appreciated some kinda heads up,” she shot back, arms folded and a cranky frown pulling at her lips. “Or you could have asked before imprisoning her in my damn apartment!”
“You're doing it again!” Fuyu blurted out, her displeasure drawing shocked noises from both women. “Why do you keep talking past me like I am not here? Pinkie and Applejack don't do it!” She allowed her eyes to dart between the phone and Rainbow. Even though she could only see one, somehow she knew both of them had the same surprised looks on their faces. “Nothing is going to happen. Not as long as I am fed. I like being outside, amongst everyone.”
“I bet. How long were you alone?” Twilight asked, subtly trying to defuse the situation.
She would have none of it, glaring down at the phone again. “Long enough. I would prefer if I were allowed to be left to my own devices outside of feeding. If something were to happen, I will come to one of you.”
“I don't know if that's such a good idea, Fuyu. Not until I have some time to study that gunk...and, to be honest, you. Before we can let you roam around, we need to know what you're capable of, too.”
“You don't trust me, then.” Fuyu couldn't decide which emotion needed to leak out more badly, so she let them all come at once. She sat down on the couch – although it was more a falling motion – and dropped the phone beside her. “I'm not going to do anything...” she droned sadly. “If I say I won't, I won't.”
Rainbow's first inkling was to go over and hug her, but she couldn't make herself move. In fact, she withdrew a couple of steps, unsure how to handle the sudden outpouring. Twilight was the one that spoke first. “Fuyu, look,” she began, drawing in a sharp breath as she tried to steady her nerves. “I don't think any of us know how to...how to come to terms with you just yet. It doesn't mean we don't care, it's simply a lot to deal with all at once.”
“It doesn't seem to bother Applejack or Pinkie,” Fuyu retorted. Tears were clinging at her eyes. Rainbow finally found the gumption to move, sitting on the other end of the sofa and shooting an awkward look down at the woman in black. “Didn't you tell me that it didn't matter what I did before? That you would help me?”
An eternal pause arrived, broken only in sections by Twilight clearing her throat as she tried to collect the appropriate thoughts to reply. This action took her a full minute to complete. “I didn't know then what I know now. Still...you're right. I guess I should try looking at all of this some other way.”
“What other way?” Rainbow spoke up at last, hunched over with her elbows on her knees. “It's not like we can ask for help. We'd end up in jail.”
“I think that may depend on who does the asking, but you're right, at least for now. Listen, I have to go. I need to think. I promise not to hide anything else, okay?” Rainbow emitted a grunt in reply, but that was all the answer she got from the two of them. “Right. Fuyu...I'm sorry.”
“That doesn't help much.” The tears were trickling down her cheeks.
Twilight was almost whispering by this point; it was difficult for either of them to hear her. “I'll do better. We'll do better. I'll talk to you tomorrow, okay?”
“Very well.” Her voice was unhappy and curt. The screen flashed a message about the call being over, and Rainbow took up her phone again. Neither of them were willing to speak for several minutes afterward, and Rainbow only opened her mouth in an attempt to get the uneasy feeling off of her chest.
“You, uh, okay down there?” she asked awkwardly.
“I'm fine.” She wasn't; the way she spoke made it bitterly obvious. For a passing moment she obscured her face with her hands, and when she revealed it again her tears had stopped flowing. Her cheeks still shone with previous ones in the light of the entryway. “Perhaps not,” she admitted at length, pinning a sigh to the end. “I never hurt anyone unless I had to eat. As long as you all provide me a steady source of food, I have no reason to cause harm.”
Rainbow was wearing that face again when Fuyu glanced over at her silence. It was the mask of seriousness she put on whenever something truly bothered her. “Twilight's got a point. I keep thinking of what I saw you do in that field, then I see you on my couch every morning reading a book and waving hello. The two things are hard to...hard to...” she fell quiet, rolling her eyes and waving a hand as she searched for the appropriate word. “Reconcile, I guess.”
Fuyu thought on that for a long while, perching her chin on an upraised fist and staring off to the side. Suddenly, she nodded. “I think I understand what you mean. You're the only one that's seen me feed.” Worry began to worm its way into Fuyu's tone. “I am sorry you had to see it. I...”
Rainbow's frown was replaced by a vague smile, and she cut Fuyu off. “I had incredible nightmares the first night you stayed here. You busted through the door and tore me apart. When I woke up that morning and saw you asleep, I figured I'd gotten through the worst of it. And, if I'm being totally honest, if anyone but Applejack had asked me to let you crash here, I'd have told them to fuck off.”
That vague smile perched on Fuyu's thin lips as Rainbow talked. “Love, again?”
“Yeah. You could say that.” Rainbow emitted a relaxed sigh as she felt the tension finally break. “Are you mad at Twilight? She's probably just doing what she thinks is best for everyone. She's like that. Probably some crap she picked up from being the Princess' favorite student.”
She tilted her head. “I suppose I understand where she's coming from. I just feel a bit left out of the process.”
“Welcome to being friends with her,” Rainbow snickered. “I swear, she goes off on all sorts of stuff on her own. Gets in trouble for it too. I guess that's just how she is. If you ask me, I kinda think she's OCD.”
Fuyu blinked, placing her hands in her lap. “What is that?”
“OCD? Obsessive compulsive disorder. It's...” she trailed off, her face dropping as she suddenly realized she had no quick way of defining it to someone who didn't already have an idea of what it was. “Um...I dunno how to explain it, really. It makes people act weird.”
Instantly, she recalled Twilight and Stormy's exchange in the farmhouse, but her mind said voicelessly that it was probably not what Rainbow spoke of. She shrugged off the memory and smoothed down her hair. “Perhaps I will ask her later.” Abruptly, she gazed down at her stomach.
“Oh hell,” Rainbow gulped, pressing herself against the armrest again. “What's it doing?”
“Nothing, yet.” She pulled her eyes away and glanced at the other woman. “I'll let you know.”
“Right. Damn it, that's still freaky.” After digging around in the cushions for a moment, she produced the remote and turned on the TV. “Hey! You've been here for a while now, what do you like to watch?” she asked, tossing the remote to a surprised Fuyu. “And don't cop out by saying 'nothing', either.” She changed the channel straight away to a cable news network. Rainbow stared at it briefly, then unleashed a long groan. “Awwwww, you've gotta be kidding me, Fu...”
Another faint smile appeared on her thin lips. “I've found I like to know what's going on these days.”
Morning dawned, and a few hours after its arrival Fuyu was awoken from her brief nap by a cackling Rainbow Dash, who was on the phone with someone. As the athlete made herself comfortable on the sofa, she sat up and tilted her head at the tone of the conversation. It was constructed almost entirely of silly grins and inane, lowly spoken banter, interspersed with bursts of giggling. It was a Rainbow Fuyu had never seen before. This went on for roughly ten minutes before she hung up, red faced and smiling.
“Hey, Fu,” she said, turning to the woman. “I've got an idea. A trust-building exercise, in fact.”
That word piqued her interest. She shifted around on the couch until she was able to sit cross-legged and gazed at Rainbow. “What is it?”
“I wanna go to Applejack's for the weekend, like, really badly.” She meant to add more onto that, but the look on Fuyu's face gave her pause. “What are you looking at me like that for?”
It was her version of concern, and like many things about her it was awkward and unpracticed. “Did something happen to her?”
“What?” Rainbow blinked. “No, no, it's just I almost always go over every weekend so I can...you know.” She punctuated her explanation with waggling eyebrows, but the insinuation flew right over Fuyu's head.
If she had learned anything about Rainbow in her time there, it was that she had a tendency to beat around the bush. The woman in black had finally lost her patience with it. “Just say what you want to say,” she demanded, folding her arms.
Rainbow's face went blank, and she downshifted into the bluntest terminology she could think of. “I'm bored and horny and I wanna go see my girlfriend.”
“Oh. Very well.” Fuyu nodded once, reached over and picked up a book from the coffee table, and started reading, figuring the conversation was at an end.
Rainbow thought the same, smiling widely and starting to get up off the couch, but a flash of realization struck her and she sat back down. “Wait. You know what horny is?”
“Yes,” she replied, not removing her eyes from the page.
She couldn't shed the curiosity no matter how hard she tried, but she did manage to stand up before asking the question. “...how?”
Fuyu still didn't bother to look up. “Context,” she replied plainly, turning a page as she spoke. A confused Rainbow stood there, scratching her head, until she noticed the cover of the book in the woman's lap. She bent down to peer at it, and Fuyu blinked at her, raising the book almost automatically so she could look at it. When Rainbow burst out with peals of laughter and hid her eyes, she blinked. “What?”
She had to push the words out through her amusement, gasping slightly for air and resting a hand on the back of the couch. “Where in the hell did you get that sleazy novel?!”
“It was in the books Twilight gave me to read.” Those words drew a renewed explosion of laughs from Rainbow, so powerful that she doubled over and had to brace herself more fully with her hand. “Why is that funny?”
“I can't even believe she reads that shit!” Rainbow said, wiping away the tears with the back of her right forearm. Immediately afterward, she was seized by another round of laughter. “This is awesome, she's never gonna hear the end of it.”
Fuyu, at this point, was beginning to frown. She closed the book and looked up. “Do you think she'll be angry if you leave me here alone for two days?”
The chuckling died almost instantly, and a suddenly nervous-looking Rainbow rubbed her head and stood fully. She thought in silence for a moment, then allowed a confident smile to appear. “You're fine when I'm at work. I don't see why she'd throw a fit.” She peered down at her phone on the table and her eyes lit up. “Hey, I can leave you my phone, it's got all our numbers. If you need something, you can just call her.”
“Very well. I might need to eat before you get back,” she advised, opening her book again. Just as Rainbow was getting ready to go into her bedroom and get dressed, the woman called her back. “Wait. I...” she trailed off and frowned. “What are things I can do in town? I'm still not sure about how life here really works.”
Rainbow snickered again, turning her back and entering her bedroom. “Look around for yourself. Take a walk.” With that, she vanished, and Fuyu was left staring confusedly at the doorway.
“I suppose it wouldn't hurt,” she shrugged, and went back to reading her book. Rainbow was dressed in a flash, and walked out of her room with a white gym bag in hand.
“I'm out!” she called. “See you tomorrow night!” Before Fuyu could even issue a goodbye, the door was shut and she was gone.
“Oh.” A minute passed before she grew wide-eyed and looked around. “Hmm. Now what?”
Her mind had no answer for her, so she kept on reading. In an hour, she had demolished the romantic novel and set it on the coffee table, allowing the contents of it slosh around in her brain for a period before realizing she felt something new and unusual.
“I'm bored,” she muttered, rising from the couch and looking around on the floor for her sandals. Just as she found them, a knock rang out from the door. Something about the noise made her tilt her head as she shuffled over to open it.
“Hello!” A smiling Twilight greeted her, first with a wave, then by holding out a black bookbag. “This is for you!” She looked past the woman in black and blinked at the empty couch. “Where is Rainbow Dash?”
“She went to stay with Applejack for the weekend.” Fuyu examined the bag and tilted her head. “What is this for?”
Twilight swallowed hard as she moved by and entered the apartment. “Um...I wanted to ask you about staying with me at the library. If you said yes, then I wanted to have something on hand for you to carry your books with.”
“And if I said no?” she asked, peering at the librarian's back as she walked, not entirely sure of her motives.
“Then you can carry your books wherever.” She turned around and smiled again, although this one was somewhat anxious. There was a long, low sigh as she seated herself and fussed for a moment with her blue pleated skirt. “I would like it if you stayed at the library.”
Fuyu walked over and sat down beside her, the black bag in her lap. She was not completely trusting of the sudden offer, but she couldn't figure out what it was exactly that bothered her. “Why?”
Twilight's shoulders slumped a little. “I would be lying if I said it weren't partially to keep an eye on you, but that's not the biggest reason. You must have a lot of questions about...well, about everything. Rainbow isn't exactly the most patient person with that sort of stuff. I know you like reading,” she said, smirking at the stack of books, then totally losing her train of thought when she saw the romance novel. “Wh-where did you get that?!” she exclaimed, her face turning tomato red.
“It was in the stack you sent me last week,” she replied, wishing to get back to the topic at hand. “Do you want me there so I will be easier to...” she paused, her face twisting into an unsatisfied frown, “...study?” The concept made her feel uneasy, much like the word 'doctor' did.
Twilight saw how uncomfortable Fuyu had become, so she abandoned her embarrassment and placed a hand on the woman's shoulder. “No. Not without asking. You said stress makes you hungry faster, and I don't know anywhere more relaxing than the library. You can read all day, or you can talk to me, or you can...” she hesitated for a moment, but smiled, “Or you can wander around town, if you like.”
The look on Fuyu's face said she still wasn't entirely convinced. “Is that all? You want to help me stay calm?”
Twilight shook her head firmly. “There's something else. I talked to Pinkie last night, and besides being a bit miffed at me, she thinks I need to get to know you so I won't worry as much. Not to say I'm worried that you'll...” she frowned, leaving the words unsaid, and moved on in her explanation, “It's not you. I worry about almost everything. Besides, you hardly seem to get rattled. Maybe you could help me stay calm.” She chuckled lightly to herself and scratched at her ear. “So, what do you say? Plenty of space in my bedroom for another bed.” She blinked at that thought and tapped her chin. “Which, if I'm understanding Rainbow correctly, you'll only need for about an hour a day. We really do need to make some kind of list with all the ways you're different.”
Fuyu made a face at the word 'different', but shrugged it off. She had a problem with the arrangement, and she uttered it just as soon as the librarian gave her a chance. “Won't Spike notice things like that?”
“i told him.” Twilight looked up at the lack of response, and found something she could only assume was surprise on Fuyu's face. “It's all right. He won't tell anyone else. I wouldn't have asked you to come if he didn't know.” She dropped her eyes to the carpet and sighed. “He didn't take it as badly as I thought he would. Certainly not as badly as Rarity did.”
Fuyu regarded the librarian with vaguely chilly eyes as she stood up. “I am still not sure.”
“Well, Rainbow ditched you for the weekend. Why not give it a try for a couple of days? Unless you still prefer the solitude,” she offered, also getting to her feet. “If you don't like it, you can come back here. A trial run. What do you say?” She accidentally allowed the inflection of her question to take on a nervous squeak, and tried to cover it with a wide smile. That became a frown when Fuyu turned her back and folded her arms.
“Very well,” she said abruptly, turning around and shrugging. “I suppose it would be all right to try.”
Twilight clapped her hands rapidly and nodded. “Yes! Great! It'll be like a sleepover, just slightly weirder!” She blinked at the frown that appeared on Fuyu's face. “Sorry. Um...I'll help you pack!”
She watched with amazement as Twilight gathered and sorted the books on the coffee table, stuffing them into the black backpack. Once it was full, she handed it over and started for the door. Fuyu watched her go for a moment until realizing she had another question. “Will there be rules?”
“Rules? What do you mean?” she asked, pausing to turn as she reached the entryway.
“Be quiet after midnight, don't use the glasses in the cabinet to the left of the refrigerator, don't drink my beer,” Fuyu recited, sliding Rainbow's phone from her pocket and placing it on the charger in the kitchen before meeting up with Twilight. “Things like that.”
She titled her head and blinked with confusion. “Why would she say not to use certain glasses? Oh, never mind. For one thing, I don't drink. For another, I'm a really heavy sleeper. And I don't have any qualms about glass usage.”
“Qualms,” Fuyu droned, rolling the word over her tongue like a sip of fine wine. They left the apartment with Twilight in the lead.
“This is exciting! I haven't had a roommate since the Academy!” she chirped, emitting a strangely excited mixture of happiness and nerves that caused Fuyu to gaze at her questioningly. “What?”
“Spike?” was all she replied with, shifting the backpack on her shoulders.
Twilight shook her head. “He doesn't count. He's more like a...it's complicated. Never mind.”
“Hmm.” They descended the stairs with Twilight doing all of the talking, and by the time they reached her car she was chattering at length about her collection of reading material. “Wait,” she interrupted. “Shouldn't you call Rainbow and let her know where I'll be?”
“I will,” Twilight said, using her key fob to unlock the car. “When we get there. This is so exciting! I'm going to have a reading buddy!”
Fuyu blinked at her enthusiasm and rubbed down her hair, wondering what exactly she'd gotten herself into as she entered the librarian's car.