//------------------------------// // Chapter 1: The Beginning // Story: Recurring Nightmare // by SaintAbsol //------------------------------// At times, it was easy to forget just how big Ponyville actually was. It was rather large as far as towns went- maybe not as big as a city, but still bigger than you’d expect a town like this to be. At least a third of that was taken up by Sweet Apple Acres’ orchard admittedly, but that fact made the town no less impressive. But what really made a pony forget the size of this not so small town was the fact that eveypony was just so neighborly to one another. People would just come up and talk to you out of the blue, like it was the most ordinary thing in the world. It had been something of a shock to Rarity when she’d first moved here. Coming from the city as she had, she was used to ponies either ignoring people around them or ‘socializing’ in parties were everyone had to put on an air of being far more important than they actually were. For all her complaining about the rural life and the general lack of culture, she enjoyed that lack of- as Applejack put it- ‘Frou-Frou’ attitude. That said, when she found times that she could find a way to relive some of the benefits of city life, she would gladly accept. “Mmm, oh! Ah yes, right there.” The white unicorn moaned as Lotus kneaded her between the shoulders with her hooves. “Oh Lotus, you always know exactly how to work out those hard to get kinks.” “My pleasure.” The teal-colored Earth Pony smiled at one of her more regular customers. “You really should get some of your friends in here more often; I’ve seen them around town, they could use a good massage.” “Don’t I know it.” Rarity sighed out. “But between Twilight being cooped up in that library of hers, Dash and AJ refusing to act even a little like ladies and Pinkie being... well, Pinkie, Fluttershy’s the only pony I can even get to come in here on a semi-regular basis.” She glanced over at her companion; the yellow pegasus was currently sitting in a mineral bath, dozing from the heat and her own tiredness. Rarity had requested that the sisters leave her alone for the moment; since she was always working herself far beyond her limit to care for all the animals in Ponyville, she needed all the rest she could get. Aloe soon came to take over for her twin sister, as they had just received a delivery of some soaps and she needed to sign for it. Though it was only for a short time, as the wall to the spa suddenly shook from an impact. Fluttershy started awake while Rarity merely sighed through her snout. That mare had an incredible ability to crash when she was either wanted, or just mentioned. “Sorry!” The sky-blue pegasus sheepishly poked her head in through one of the windows as Aloe just stared, dumbfounded. “Yeah...” She rubbed at her rainbow-colored mane with her hoof as her eyes made sure not to actually look at anypony. “I was trying a new trick and I sorta... messed up the third barrel roll.” She gave a nervous chuckle and a highly forced smile as the pink spa pony glared at her, joined by Rarity. “Ohhhhhhh-kay then,” she said as she started to slowly hover away. “I guess I’ll just be going now.” “w-wait.” Fluttershy’s voice was barely above a whisper, but her friends had learned to compensate to the point that it was less careful listening than a subconscious habit. The timid pegasus lowered her gaze to the water she still lay in as the eyes of those present turned to her. “Are... are you going by Twilight’s house?” Rainbow Dash tilted her head slightly in confusion, then simply nodded. Her house was mostly on the edge of town, and Twilight’s library was more or less in that direction. “I have to return a book to her; it’s over there in my saddle bags.” Her ears went low as she tried to appear even smaller than she had been trying. “I mean... if it’s not too much trouble.” In a flash, Dash was by the appropriately marked bags and looking through them. Not more than two seconds later, she pulled out a fairly thick book. “‘Pet Care and Pampering by Ceaser Manelan’?” Both the rainbow maned pegasus and the fashionista unicorn looked at their friend with slightly confused expressions as she blushed in embarrassment. “Well, you know; sometimes, it’s nice to get a second opinion.” There was a bit of a silence, coupled with Fluttershy trying to shrink away into nothing to the best of her ability, before Dash finally shrugged. “Whatever, I’m off. Later you two.” There was a streak of rainbow out of the open window and a slight breeze in her wake, and the room suddenly lacked any sign of the pegasus ever having been there. That streak of multicolored light- that only she could pull off- tore through the skies over Ponyville. Clouds that got in her way were either left with holes in their center or outright poofed out of existence, she could multitask with doing her job and running an errand like any good weather team pegasus. Though she made sure none of the water that came from those dissipated clouds soaked into the book she carried; though Twilight Sparkle could give the most boring lectures about stuff that held no interest to her, Dash knew how she was when it came to books and couldn’t do something like that to her friend. The rainbow finally stopped in front of the library, Dash knocking on the door as she hovered in place. “Hey, Twilight!” She called as her hoof tapped. “Got a book for ya from Fluttershy!” After that, she just waited. ...and waited. ...and waited. Never being one who stood still if she had a choice, Rainbow Dash tried the handled then grunted in frustration when she found it locked and shot around to one of the windows. Glaring inside, her violet eyes scanned the room for her unicorn friend, or at least her dragon assistant since the owl was asleep by now. I KNOW you’re in there. She angled herself to try and get as full a view of the library as possible. You’re never anywhere else at this hour. Finally, the pegasus set her eyes on her bookish friend; and- ironically enough- the unicorn was mirroring a pose she’d often had in school: Face flat against a book, passed out. “Twilight! Hey, Twilight!” She tried to get her attention by shouting through the window, but to no avail. Tapping on the glass with her hoof only made her friend stir slightly and she didn’t want to break it by hitting any harder. So she inhaled deeply, and let out her loudest bellow. “HEY, EGGHEAD! WAKE UP!!” The Unicorn jumped to her hooves in a second, flailing wildly and knocking over several books in the process. She looked around with eyes that were glazed from sleep and unfocused in fright. It was only after several moments of incessant tapping on her window that Rainbow finally brought her to her senses. The pegasus pointed toward the door that had impeded her earlier, still outright glaring at Twilight over the incident. As she trotted sleepily over to the door, Rainbow Dash shot around the side in the blink of an eye and was there to greet her before the door opened. The unicorn barely managed to get the ‘w’ out of the ‘what?’ she had been about to say before she found a book stuffed into her mouth. “That’s Fluttershy’s, she asked me to return it on my way home.” If her expression had gone over Twilight’s head before, it was now painfully clear that Dash was exceedingly miffed over having been made to wait. The pegasus turned to leave in a huff, before she was held up in a much more gentle manner than usual. “Wait.” Twilight Sparkle sighed, holding in a yawn from a body that hadn’t been sleeping well for a while. “I’m s-sooooor-ah.” Apparently, that yawn was a particularly persistent one. “Sorry,” she finally managed to say clearly. “I knew Fluttershy was going to return the book today, but I didn’t expect her by until a lot later.” The unicorn looked up to see that her friend still had her back to her and her ears lowered, afraid she might have done something that Dash just wasn’t going to overlook for a while. Only to suddenly find herself swept up in a noogie from her not a moment later. “Okay, Egghead; I forgive you.” She said with a chuckle as she let her go. Twilight joined in with the laugh, levitating a comb over to fix her mane as Fluttershy’s book was placed over in the section of shelves dedicated to animals. “Thanks for returning it, and I’m sorry I didn’t open the door when you knocked.” Waving a hoof, Dash brushed off her friend’s concern. “Nah, don’t worry about it. Just try not to do it again.” She jumped off and was zipping away with one final comment left hanging in the air behind her. “Enjoy your beauty sleep, Egghead.” Chuckling almost the entire way home, the pegasus finally settled down as she alighted on her self-made cloud home. Though she had nothing against Earth Ponies and Unicorns, or even other pegasi like Fluttershy who preferred to live on the ground, she could never have gotten used to having something so utterly unyielding under her hooves as she slept. Clouds bounced with each step, rocked in the breeze and had a life all their own even on the calmest of days. It was why she’d be so adamant about building this thing and even spent much more than a pretty bit on ordering some cloud architecture all the way from Cloudsdale. And it was worth all the time, money and effort she’d put into making it. Sighing as she flopped onto her couch, Dash looked around at the various Wonderbolt posters that she’d stuck to her walls with a proud smile. Her dream of joining them just seemed to grow ever more likely as the days went by; her skills in the sky were getting better, to the point that she hardly crashed on a regular basis. Not to mention that her tricks were getting ever more complex each time; and she’d even recruited some of her Weather Team friends to try some formation work. It wasn’t as awesome as it could have been, but she was reasonably confident in the results she was seeing. Her gaze panned over to her- rather crowded- trophy case and she could almost feel the sensation of her ego growing. Trophies that were even taller than herself dominated the display and at least thirty medals with varying places- nothing less than third- were haphazardly placed around them. But the things that Rainbow considered some of the best pieces on this display case: The various pictures of herself and her friends. It wasn’t that she considered her friends trophies, it was just that she considered them just as important as her own achievements; they were something to be proud of in her mind, and she was very proud to call these crazy ponies her friends. An image of Pinkie Pie and herself posing with an Applejack who had various designs and colored streaks covering her brought a slight laugh from Rainbow, the mere memory of the incident still amusing. Another photo was her and Rarity, the latter wearing the ‘helmet’ of her attempt at trying to make something for the Gala and the former wearing the unicorn’s glasses while gesturing pompously. It still impressed her that Rarity had agreed to this, even had a sense of humor about the whole thing when the creation had been part of her lowest point in fashion. Then there was her and Fluttershy, the picture taken back when they were both fillies. Just the pair of them on the cloud equivalent of a beach, complete with pails and shovels; Ditzy Doo- another old friend of hers- was sticking her head through a tiny cloudcastle and saying ‘Your Princess is in another castle’ if she remembered correctly. She didn’t know what that meant, but it was par for the course with Ditzy. Next came one of the more recent pictures, one of her and Twilight in a bookstore. This one had just been Pinkie messing around and taking one by accident, but she’d decided to keep it anyway. It showed a very bored looking Rainbow Dash leaning against a while while Twilight did a spot on impression of the town party pony, hopping around with glee at all the new books that she was finding even as she held five with her telekinesis. She was about to start laughing at the memory when something clicked. She’d seen how Twilight was around books, been chewed out by her from time to time when the books she’d borrowed came back a bit worse for wear and nearly seen her burst into flames when it looked like she’d lost the unicorns favorite book. If there was one thing you could say about miss Twilight Sparkle, it was that she treated books like Fluttershy treated animals. So why had she been asleep on one when Rainbow Dash had showed up? For that matter, what was she doing asleep anyway? That mare had gotten up with the sun for as long as Dash had known her, even earlier sometimes when she had stuff to do. She kept a tight schedule about everything, sleeping included; there was no reason for her to have suddenly stopped sticking to it. There wasn’t anything planned that she’d heard of, and Twilight would have excitedly told them about any late night events that Princess Luna had set up. Yet the unicorn had been silent about anything that she was doing and hadn’t given much of an explanation when Dash had dropped by. Something was up, that was the only thing that made sense. But Twilight hadn’t seen fit to tell them anything; but what could be so important that she had to keep it a secret? Rainbow Dash couldn’t even begin to guess, so she’d go to the source herself and directly ask her. But when she left her home again, it wasn’t to speed off toward the library again. She had to make a quick stop to visit another friend first. Who better to tell if someone was lying than the Element of Honesty herself?