//------------------------------// // Epilogue: A Rainbow in the Sky // Story: Guardians of Many Hues // by TadStone //------------------------------// Epilogue: A Rainbow in the Sky Rainbow’s couch had been too huge to fit into one single room in the somewhat smaller flat, but even the part that did, was big enough to make for a comfortable place to sit together in the living room. They had made a habit out of it to meet on the soft cushioning at least half of all evenings, cuddling and spending time together right there, reading Daring Do, playing games or simply talking. Two new pieces of metal had joined the impressive collection aligning on the wall right next to it, shining silver and golden respectively as brightly as the rest of the polished medals. The only difference was that they hadn’t been earned for athletic flying or even by Rainbow. They were the proud result of Scootaloo’s very first Equestrian Junior Championship in scooting, besting at least two dozen other ponies equally distributed in gender and kind, all of them older and sporting a scooting cutie mark. Oh how they had hated to be owned by a blank flank. It had taken Rainbow some work to convince her protégé to participate and to train her for the event, but just the look at the faces of the other foals combined with the orange filly’s joy had more than made up for all of it. The qualification in the local tournament had been a breeze. Having your own small skate park in the front lawn, authorised by Aegis and provided by Celestia as a thank you for great and fearless services to the country, really paid off and showed in the ever increasing repertoire of spectacular tricks. Great things were waiting for Scootaloo in this world. Rainbow was sure of that. Her persistent lack of a cutie mark could only be explained by the notion that it was connected to some kind of scooting equivalent of the Sonic Rainboom. Once she had been gifted the ability to fly she was sure to get it. Two and a half months had passed since Rainbow had received the crystal from Celestia and half of it had changed from dark blue to a cyan only slightly lighter than her own coat. The doctor’s prediction had been the doubled timeframe, even assuming a smaller stone. No pony could beat Dash. Another three month and they would be soaring through the sky side by side. She had played through that scenario many times in her head, sometimes even dreaming of it, ticking off the days in her calendar in happy anticipation. The stone handed to Dash was second in size, only losing to one single other crystal, the yellow mineral encased into Commander Hurricane's armour, although it had probably not been yellow when the Commander had worn it. All history books described her to have been a mare as black as her armour. As many history books liked to point out, only the golden gleam of the ornaments of the plating could have been seen at night, spreading fear by mere sight. After the birth of Hurricane’s first daughter, the whole country had been searched for a crystal rivalling the size of her mother's. Rainbow was wearing the result of this work around her neck. Written in letters not used anymore for many hundred years, a message had been etched into the sturdy metal collar by a very skilled unicorn smith. Twilight had helped to decode them, detecting an ancient but still present protective spell worked into the material: “Take this part of me, as you are mine to protect beyond death.” As opposed to her mother, Hurricane's daughter had indeed died of old age despite serving in the first lines during the great war against the invading gryphon empire. It was more than fitting. “I nearly did the triple flip.” Scootaloo’s voice echoed through the flat, perfectly in time as it was getting dark outside. Not once had she been late so far or even argued with the small set of established rules forcing her to fixed bed and dinner times that could only be excused on special occasions and beforehand approval. Rainbow got up from the couch and trotted to the corridor, a big smile adorning her face. The “nearly” showed on her daughter in scrapes that hadn’t been there when the filly had left in the morning, but nothing too serious. Dash was only thankful for the fact that nopony knew the little pegasus without sporting this kind of injuries, otherwise they might have come to her, accusing her of being a bad parental figure. Instead, she had received nothing but praise of how well Scootaloo was doing thanks to her. “You will make it tomorrow, I’m sure. Dinner is already set Scoots. I will wait in the kitchen until you’re washed up.” “What did you make?” Only now Scootaloo opened up her helmet, hanging it up on the assigned wardrobe hook. “Grilled aubergine filled with wheat grains,” Rainbow answered, leaning against the doorframe to the kitchen. “Sounds great!” echoed from the bathroom followed by the drizzling sound of water running over hooves. Dash used the time to help both of them to a big serving of the freshly prepared food. It didn’t take long for the filly to follow her. “You know I never asked you why you went to Ponyville and stayed here? You had so many possibilities to flee to much farther away from Trottingham.” Scootaloo sat on the free chair next to Rainbow and took the plate that was hooved to her. She didn’t need time to think about this: “I saw a rainbow guiding me towards it.”