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// Happily Oblivious and Painful Realization 
// Story: Afterlife 
// by tut895 
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	I soared into my house, the clouds puffy and white, and the rainbow river flowing steadily, and phase through the door, yet again with a grunt. I land on the floor, stop,and fall, not being used to the lack of force since I’m not physically existent. I get up and dust myself off, upon looking around, I see some of the pictures of Scootaloo's recent achievements bent as if somepony hit them, she definitely had a rough day at school, as always.

I glide over and phase through her door, she's upside down on her bed, playing with a ball of yarn and balancing it on her hooves, juggling it between her two front hooves and keeping it over there with her back ones, her face seems distant though, as if lost in thought.

She rolls over, back on her stomach as the ball of yarn falls to the floor, and turns to look at Tank, who has on his flying equipment and is hovering about around Scootaloo's dresser, the top of which covered with her old filly hood toys and pictures of her with the bank vault full of Wonderbolts she's met coming to the shows that I go to preform in.

"When's Rainbow going to come back?" She asks Tank, and I choke up. She doesn't know, and Fluttershy will probably tell her first once she gets over it herself, which won't be for a few days.
Tank just slowly blinks at her, and slowly descends until he lands next to Scootaloo's bed, nuzzling her cheek with his face, and Scootaloo strokes his shell like she always does.

"Yeah, I'm sure she was just having trouble with her equipment, and had to fix it, so she had to take more time out of her day to get the practice in." Scootaloo says, turning her head so it looks at the floor, and then resting it on the edge of her bed. "I hope she gets back quickly, I'm getting kinda hungry."

Now that I'm dead. When I cry tears don't come out, but with so many people thinking about me, as if I'm alive and well, only to soon realize my life came to an end about an hour ago, I'm sure I will soon.

I turn around and spread my ghastly wings, With a powerful flap I take off, I fly from Scootaloo's room, and take a left into the front hall, I once again go straight through the front door into the open air. I don't know where I'm going this time, but it needs to be somewhere nopony will think about me, just somewhere.

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(Scootaloo)

I look up towards the hall as a dust ring expands and a cool breeze fills my room, making me shiver. I thought Rainbow payed the heating bill. I get up off of my bed and trot until I reach the doorway, then stop. I look over to Tank and nod my head in the direction of the doorway, silently telling him to come over here.
"C’mon, let's go make a sandwich or something." I say, my stomach grumbling as it has for the past few minutes.

Tank flies over to me and we trot to the kitchen, which is much warmer than my room, and open the fridge. In there is a half eaten watermelon, which Rainbow keeps calling watermeloan for some reason, a bowl of grapes, and some lettuce. I grab the lettuce, and get some of the watermelon, open the cupboard, get two slices of bread, avoiding the end piece like everypony else, and put the watermelon and lettuce in between the slices of the bread.

I take a bite and, much like putting vinegar on fries, it tastes surprisingly good. I smile a bit as I remember the multitude of strange food combinations that turned out to be good: yellow watermelon, all the milkshake flavors mixed together at Sugarcube Corner, and even unpasteurized milk at times. Don't ask about that last one, I did some weird things before Rainbow adopted me, after I got my cutie mark, which is a flaming hoop indicating my dare devil like personality I have at times, which has gotten me a junior scholarship into the Wonderbolt Academy, that made Rainbow very happy.

I eat the rest of the sandwich, leaving a few bites for Tank, and toss it to him. He catches it in his mouth and slowly puts the whole things in his mouth, and manages to swallow it whole, which is normal for me after being with him for a good 5 years. It's actually pretty cool how he does things you wouldn't expect a Tortoise to do, like he goes really fast if you strap him to a skateboard.

I walk back to my room, Tank hovering behind in his helicopter like contraption, which still boggles my mind, trying to think about how Twilight made something that works by magic, given Rainbow isn’t a unicorn, then again I have seen some magic tanks in the basement. I close the door behind me. 

Once we're both back in my room, I push my hoof on the red power button on my television, which works by technology instead of magic, which is something original in this country.

The news comes on and the news man, whose name always eludes me, was announcing the Wonderbolt performance that will be showing at the Summer Sun Festival next week.

"Yes, the Wonderbolt show has been cancelled," Upon hearing this, I twist my head in interest and stare at the television, waiting for him to explain why, which I don't have to wait long for.

"It seems one of the Wonderbolts has gone missing, a Search and Rescue crew has already started searching the Everfree forest for clues, we will inform you of any updates and within the next hour we will hopefully be able to announce the identity of the missing individual."

My stomach sinks to my heart as the thought of Rainbow being missing, if she's missing that means I'm going to be an orphan again, and I'll be homeless as well. "Rainbow couldn't let that happen though, she’ll be perfectly fine," I say to reassure myself, "but it's just better to go check and see. Yes, she'll be fine."

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My wings are tired and sore from so much exertion during flight. Rainbow taught me how to fly once she had adopted me so we could go to Cloudsdale when she has shows there, and so I could make it to her house back then. Now the worst I have to deal with when it comes to flying is my lack of stamina.

I turn my body so I'm in a position similar to standing on my hind hooves, and gives my wings a powerful flap to stop myself once I reach Rainbow's training course, and my jaw drops at the scene. The self detonating clouds have been displaced, which has only happened when a somepony messed them up and tried to put them back where they were. One of the trees at the treeline has an unusually large hole in the tree, and there's unsettled dust and a small crater where the hole in the tree leads, and one of the cloud obstacles is missing, but that seems to have just somehow made it's way to the bottom of the clearing.

I give my wings another flap and begin to descend towards the whole in the tree, and with a little precision, fly straight through it with no troubles. I land next to the small crater and look around. 

There was definitely a struggle here, the branches in the hole in the trees have been snapped and landed around the hole, a bush next to the crater has been flattened, as if something rather large had hit it, and a trail of blood puddles leading to the path everypony usually uses when going in and out of the Everfree, and taking the way out. Who's blood it is I intend to find out, but first I need to check the crime scene to see if somepony hid a weapon or anything that could be used as one around here.

I check the bush, but all that's in there is Rainbow's bag, which must have been torn off of her and landed in the bush, which would've flattened the bush like it is now. I hear a rustle from somewhere past the bush and decide that it would be a better idea to follow the blood trail and see where it leads.

I turn around and start to follow the drops of blood that lead out of the forest, and on top of a hill. When I reach the top of the hill I notice something unusual, the puddles here are bigger, and the blood disappears from here. I look around and the grass is flattened in the direction leading to Fluttershy's cottage, as if something was dragged.

I look at Fluttershy's house, and see her dragging in something too big o be any of her pets, but all I can see are cyan hooves. After a few seconds of thinking, a thought creeps into my head. Could she have killed Rainbow Dash? The thought nags at me and after thinking about the possibility, it seems to be the only logical answer right now. Nopony knew Rainbow well enough to know how to beat her in a one-on-one encounter except Fluttershy. 

I collapse on the ground, and cry. I thought she was supposed to be the element of kindness, not evil.

My tears come out like a stream, and my sobs like a baby struggling to breathe. Slowly, I embrace the two things that I've been with longer than even the CMC, things that have been my lifelong friends since my parents kicked me out of their house and out of Cloudsdale, the things ponies these days only associate with evil, but I know it's welcoming to outcasts like me: darkness. Darkness and loneliness. My heart aches knowing that my mother, in a way, is dead and my fillysitter when Rainbow goes to Las Pegasus for a show, she says it's more of a grown up pony place, was the one who caused her death.