Chapter XIII
It was inevitable, really, if only from the mathematical tide of probability against them. Fluttershy and Dash were both loners, but not by nature, so they spent as much time together as possible. Yet not with any pony else. Never mind the fact that no pony else would have them. Fluttershy’s ‘event’ and subsequent breakdown were well-established lore at the school now, along with Dash’s fighting skills and short fuse. And to top it all off, fewer creatures have longer memories than bullies.
So the next day, when Fluttershy and Dash arrived for lunch, they had no idea the maelstrom waiting, about to test their bond to the brink. Dash had long since given up looking for a spot at the popular table, resigning herself to sit in the back corner with Fluttershy. It was simply easier. Except for today. Their table wasn’t empty.
“Well, well, well. If it isn’t Rainbow Crash and Klutzershy.”
“What do you want?” Dash threatened.
“‘What do you want?’” mocked Hoops.
Fluttershy sat down anyways. Dash would run them off momentarily. She just had to make herself as small as possible.
“You got a problem with the way I talk?”
“We’ve got a problem with everything about you.” Hoops still remembered the beating he’d received at the hooves of a girl half his size.
“Take a walk, dill weed, before I make you kiss my hind hooves again.” Dash tried to brush past him.
“It’s better than what I hear you like to kiss.” Dumbbell snickered.
Something about the comment perked Fluttershy’s ears. She’d heard this kind of verbal trap before, and Dash was about to walk right into it. They should leave; now.
“Huh? What kind of weak comeback is that?” Dash snickered. Bullies really were stupid if they couldn't come up with a better retort.
“You should know, with that rainbow mane of yours.” Hoops wasn’t laughing.
“What?” Dash was lost.
“Um, Rainbow Dash, I think maybe we should probably, if you want to…” Fluttershy started but trailed off as the eyes of her tormentors turned on her. The other tables were quieting down, attentions turning to the drama brewing at the freaks' table.
“See? Even Klutzershy gets it. I guess those rainbow roots really do make you dumb.”
“What are you talking about?” Dash sighed. She’d just about had enough of this. Coach should be along any moment to either shoo the bullies off or break up the fight that was sure to come.
“I’m saying you’re too dumb to even realize what kind of a dyke you are.” Hoops sneered. The lunchroom went deathly silent.
“What’s a ‘dyke’?”
Touchdown and Dumbbell howled with laughter. “Do you hear that? Even with that rat’s nest of a mane, she’s so dumb she doesn’t even know her own title!”
“I’m calling you a dyke, stupid. A filly-fooler.” Hoops’ mock good nature dissipated. This was his payback.
“‘Filly-fooler?’”
“Hey now.” Fluttershy jumped up. She couldn’t let this happen again. Not to Rainbow Dash. Names were hard to escape. You couldn’t just run like you could from a fight. “Leave her alone.”
“Oh, look boys. The pipsqueak squeaks. What are you, her mount?” Hoops glared hard at Fluttershy.
“Yeah, we heard she likes to ride your blank flank ever night!” Touchdown put in. “Every pony knows you love it from anything that moves because you can’t have Ace.”
So there it was. Fluttershy could stand firm and be smeared with horrible lies and names once again, or she could cut and run, throwing Rainbow Dash to the proverbial wolves. Hoops had it all figured out, and he also knew which side of the fence they would both land on. Dash would stand there and fight, taking everything they threw at her and spitting it back. That was her strength. It wasn’t Fluttershy’s. She couldn’t do it. Not again.
“What are you talking about?” Dash demanded, coming to Fluttershy’s aid. “What’s a ‘filly-fooler’?”
“They’re saying you like to kiss other girls, Rainbow Crash!”
The words themselves were not as shocking as their source. Fluttershy stood on the table, staring at her best friend whom she’d just sold out. By using the bullies’ moniker, she’d thoroughly sided with them, leaving Dash without any backup against an attack she didn’t understand. Fluttershy instantly regretted the words, but like Snowball once flown, they were impossible to take back. Fluttershy had taken the easy way out.
Comprehension slowly dawned on Dash’s face as the shock faded. She remembered Fluttershy’s story about Morgan, and all the fallout it had caused. She now understood that what happened to Fluttershy years ago, Hoops was insinuating Dash did every night.
And Fluttershy. Poor Fluttershy. Dash didn’t blame her for turning away. She was Fluttershy; it was perfectly understandable. But she could have at least given Dash a little warning before walking into a trap. She hadn't gotten it; she still didn’t really understand.
Dash looked around. All eyes in the cafeteria were on her. Fluttershy still stood on the table, shaking like a leaf out of fear and self-loathing. The bullies simply sat, watching her. Dash could deny the accusation, but what good would that do? Fluttershy had taken the one and only escape route, shifting the blame to another pony. There was no one left for her to shift blame to. She could straight up call the bluff, but then it would be her word against Hoops’. The cloud of suspicion would hang over her forever.
That was the real problem, wasn’t it? She couldn’t clear her name because she hadn’t done anything. It was simply a groundless accusation, but it stained. Dash could go to the Head Mare, but there was precious little she could do. After all, the Bullies were hardly out of line. They were at the table first. They weren’t fighting; they were using words. If there were a fight, Dash would be the one to start it and the one to be in trouble. Besides, it would make Dash look like a whiney cry-foal, which wouldn’t help her case at all.
So Rainbow Dash did the only thing she could think to do. She did what Firefly would do. She held her head high, turned, and simply strode from the lunchroom. Even in the hallway she didn’t gallop off. She left with as much dignity and poise as she could muster by thinking about her mother.
Fluttershy spent the rest of the period at the same table with the worst company in the world, pushing food around her plate with her nose. The bullies ignored her; their damage done. Fluttershy was no longer any use to them.
She longed more than anything to shout, to run, to do something! Flutershy needed to chase after Dash, beg her forgiveness. But any movement at all could be perceived as truth to the accusations. Every pony knew that if she moved, she was guilty of being a filly-fooler, just as every pony knew that every moment she didn’t move brought her best friend more pain, alone in the world that much longer. Fluttershy couldn’t take the withering glances and names again, so she saved her own hide at the expense of her friend’s, waiting till the lunchroom was entirely empty before running through the halls to find Dash.
And through it all, Hoops simply smiled.
~~~~~
How long was she going to just stare at the door? Fluttershy knew Dash was inside, but she just couldn’t bring herself to knock, even if it was her own room. How could she face her best friend after what she’d just done? She betrayed Dash by running, instead of standing strong together. The soft clip-clop of Rainbow Dash inside indicated she was doing something, but Fluttershy was once again too afraid to find out what.
Then a thought crossed her mind. What if Dash were trying to hurt herself? Certainly she wouldn’t, but when Fluttershy was bullied, she always hid. What if Dash couldn’t do that and had to find some other way out? Gingerly she eased open the door.
“Dashie?” Fluttershy squeaked.
The first things the shy Pegasi noticed were the colors. They were everywhere, as if a rainbow had exploded in their room, now drifting lazily to the floor. In fact, now that she looked down, the entire room was covered in nothing but colors. Every surface held a dusting of fine rainbow colored hairs, stirring up with the slightest movement.
The second thing that captured Fluttershy’s attention was the sound. What she had thought was Dash walking behind the door instead turned out to be a metallic snipping sound. Fluttershy cocked her head, trying to identify it. Where was it coming from? Dash? And where was her roommate?
Shutting the door behind her, Fluttershy turned the corner, letting out a small gasp. She immediately began coughing out colored hair. Dash stood before their mirror, a pair of scissors between her teeth, hacking away at her majestically long mane. Her tail was already nothing more than a bushy and careless memory of what it had been just an hour before.
“Dash!” Fluttershy coughed. “What are you doing?”
“Uuting nie hair. Ut ose it ook iike?” Dash managed around the scissors, craning her neck and trying to cut her own mane.
“Why, Dash?” Fluttershy slowly stepped forward, the tears welling up, trying to take the place of her walking.
“P‘tOOie!” Dash spit out the steel. “You heard those guys. They think I’m… I’m…But I’m not!”
“I know.” Fluttershy had given up on walking, simply content not to shiver. Her nerves were trying to shake her apart.
“Why would they think that?” cried Dash. “Just because of my hair? Yours is exactly the same length as mine.”
“It’s because your hair is rainbow colored.”
“So? I’ve got rainbow hair. My name is Rainbow Dash. Just because of that they think I’m a… a…”
“Filly-fooler?”
“I don’t even know what that means!” shouted Dash. “Why can’t they just let me be?”
“Oh, Dashie, I’m so sorry!” Fluttershy collapsed at her friend’s feet in abject sorrow. “I am so sorry. Please forgive me!”
“For what?” Dash’s tears would stop.
Fluttershy almost choked on the words. They came out at an almost indiscernible pitch. “I called you names. I sold you out instead of helping you.”
“Oh, Fluttershy, you feather brain.” Dash smiled. Pulling up her friend. “Of course I forgive you. There was nothing you could have done to help. If you hadn’t, other ponies would have gone back to saying horrible thing about you.”
“You really forgive me?”
“I wish you could have been able to give me some kind of warning, but that wasn‘t your fault. And like my dad says, ‘wish in one hoof, poop in the other, see which one fills up with manure first.’”
“I have no idea what that means.” Fluttershy was taken off guard for the absurdity of the statement.
“Me neither. But the point is that you’re my friend and I forgive you.”
Fluttershy found herself overcome with emotion. Here was her best friend, whom she’d betrayed for nothing more than an uneasy truce that would be broken the moment the bullies remembered that she was Fluttershy. And yet her friend forgave her just like that. Dash’s capacity for loyalty was unequal. As Fluttershy stood there, trying to dam the welling cascade of tears, she hugged her friend with all her tiny might, nearly collapsing them both.
“Woah!” Cried Dash.
“Thank you, Dashie. I love you. I am soooo sorry. You are my best friend, and you always will be.”
“Until you sell me out again.” Dash smiled teasingly.
She didn’t mean any harm, and Fluttershy knew that. Still, the words went deeper than even Dash could have foreseen, cutting Fluttershy down to her very core. She’d betrayed her friend terribly, and even if Dash had forgiven her, Fluttershy had yet to forgive herself. The words, thrown in jest, were just the right ones to cultivate the seeds of doubt already in Fluttershy’s heart about her own innocence.
“Why… Why are you cutting your hair?” Fluttershy wiped her eyes.
“You heard those jerks. They were teasing me because of my mane. So if I don’t have it any more, they can’t tease me.”
“They will always tease you, Rainbow Dash. It’s part of who they are, just like your beautiful hair is part of who you are. If you cut it all off, they will find something else to bully you about. Your hair will still be there; you just can’t see it.”
“Oh.” Dash stared at the rainbow colored floor. “Just like mommy. She doesn’t have any more hair, but she’s still the same.”
“Exactly.” Fluttershy nodded.
“Do you think ponies can change, Fluttershy? Are we creatures of habit, or can we change who we are? Can a dragon change its scales? Can I change my mane?”
“I don’t think so. We are who we are, not what we are. It’s the lessons that your mother gave you that make you who you are. Those lessons are with you forever, even if…”
“Even if my mother isn’t.” Dash nodded.
“What are you going to do, Dashie?”
“My mommy taught me to look out for smaller and weaker ponies. She didn’t say nothing’ about dishing out pain on bullies.”
“You can’t beat them up!” Gasped Fluttershy.
“Of course not. I’m going to beat them at their own game. Next time they mess with either of us, I’m going to challenge them to a race. And I’m going to win!”
“Oh, that would be marvelous!” Fluttershy grinned. “But wouldn’t that hurt their feelings?”
“After what they put US through you’re worried about THEIR feelings?” gawked Dash.
“Well, I just don’t like seeing any pony get hurt.”
“I’ll… try to go easy on them.” Replied a skeptical Rainbow Dash.
“Oh my, what are we going to do about your hair?” Asked Fluttershy as if the thought had just occurred to her.
“It’ll grow back.” Dash swished her bristletail. “Besides, I kinda like it.”
“Yes, but it looks funny.”
It did indeed look funny. Dash had managed to more or less get her tail under control, but there was only so much she could do with her mane without magic or at least another mirror. She studied herself sideways; some hair dangerously close to the scalp, others still as long as Fluttershy’s.
“Aww man. I look like a moose!”
Her yellow companion giggled. “Moose.”
“Here,” Dash picked up the scissors, handing them to Fluttershy. “You finish.”
“But I don’t know how!” she panicked.
“Use that freaky knowledge of fashion and at least make it all the same length. I don’t care if it looks like I got hit by lightning.”
“Well,” Fluttershy gingerly accepted the implements. “Alright. Here goes.”
The next several minutes were spent with nothing but the snip-snip of steel against hair. Fluttershy had never cut manes before, but she knew what she wanted. After months of combing her roommate’s hair, knew what she had to work with as well. Trepidatiously at first, she quickly found herself taking to the art form. Once finished, she brushed her friend’s hair one last time.
“Well? What do you think? Be honest.” she stepped back, cringing.
“Really? Well…I…” Dash cocked her head, studying herself in the mirror. Fluttershy just knew that she’d hate it. “I love it! I look so awesome!”
“Really?” Fluttershy’s jaw fell open.
“Yeah! I look just like my daddy! Now my hair won’t get in the way when I fly! It’s much more streamlined.”
“Oh. Well I’m glad you like it.” Fluttershy smiled.
“Huh.” Dash turned to her hairbrush. “I guess I won’t be needing this any more.”
“I guess not.”
“Come on, Fluttershy.” Dash picked up her most prized possession, headed for the door.
“Where are we going?”
“Out.”
They didn’t need to worry about other ponies; classes were in session and there wasn’t any pony around to bother them. Still, they snuck through the halls like they were in a 007 Bon-Bon film. Once they made it past the Airball field it was a mad scramble for the point.
They pair stood in the harsh light of afternoon, watching the clouds whiz by exceptionally fast. Rainbow Dash gingerly set her hairbrush on the cloud.
“You’re not going to…” Fluttershy indicated the vast expanse before them.
“Why not? I don’t need it any more.”
“But it was your mother’s!”
“She really doesn’t need it.” Dash stated sadly, studying the brush.
“But that’s no reason to get rid of it.”
“It’s just an object, Fluttershy. You can’t love an object. And every pony eventually dies. So why hang on?”
“Because they make us laugh. And laughter is what tells us we’re alive.” Fluttershy leaned into her friend.
And with that Dash kicked the tiny brush off the cloud, watching it spiral down off the point towards the ground far below. They couldn’t all get what they wanted, and Dash certainly wanted more than a hairbrush. So why bother with the small fry? From here on out, she was a shoot for the big dreams or die trying kind of girl.
Without a word she turned and trotted back inside. Fluttershy stood on the point and watched her friend’s laughter fall away.