It was a rare sight, seeing Rainbow Dash awake before the sunrise. Applejack looked Dash over as she forced her hair into its usual ties. Dash looked crisp in her dress uniform, her hooves buffed to a slight sheen, her medals and awards and rank pins square across her chest. Her hair, now regulation length, had been tamed with a comb over who-knew-how-many minutes. Her eyes … Applejack blinked sleepily and trotted across the bedroom to take a better look. Dash’s eyes were sadder than Applejack had seen in a long, long time.
“Sugarcube, what’s wrong?” Applejack asked. She reached out a foreleg and stroked Rainbow’s neck just above the collar. Rainbow’s face twitched and she swallowed, her ears drooping slightly.
“Listen, AJ,” Dash started nervously, cautiously, “This tour I’m going on …” Her eyes flicked away from Applejack’s for a moment, and her shoulders squared slightly before she once more met Applejack’s eyes. “I’m worried,” Rainbow admitted in a rush, before she swallowed again.
“What’s to be worried about?” Applejack frowned and shifted closer. “You tol’ me it was a diplomatic envoy deal.”
“Look, I don’t actually know, AJ!” Rainbow yelped. “Spitfire’s not telling me anything. I thought I’d get briefed in before I left, but I’m guessing everything’s need-to-know and there’s nothing I need to know yet. We could be doing espionage, special ops, training … I don’t know.” For a tense eternity, all Applejack could hear was the pounding of her own heart. Rainbow cringed toward the ground, studying it intently.
“I don’t know,” Rainbow muttered. “I didn’t want to worry you, but I had to say something.”
Applejack stroked the leading edge of Rainbow’s left wing and watched the muscles twitch and shift. Rainbow let one tiny whimper out of her clenched jaws and leaned in to Applejack’s touch, hard enough that Applejack nearly toppled over. Eventually, Rainbow went to her saddlebags and pulled out something hastily wrapped in brown paper. She set it at Applejack’s feet with a look that made Applejack open it right away.
One of Rainbow’s feathers floated in a jar half-full of liquid rainbow and half-full of a misty cloud. Applejack stared at it for a few seconds before her eyes met Rainbow’s. “What’s this for?” Applejack asked. Her mouth dried up as Rainbow winced, barely visible.
“It’s called Fortune’s Favor. The tradition, at least. Dates back to Commander Hurricane and all that.” Every clipped sentence fell heavily from Rainbow’s trembling lips, as if the words physically hurt her. “It’s … It’s a part of me, Applejack. It’s a little part of me that I’m giving to you. For safekeeping.” Rainbow’s feathers rustled from tremors that ran through her entire body, tense and tight. “Keep it close to you for me, alright?” Rainbow’s eyes were burning into Applejack’s, as focused as a laser, hot as dragonfire. “Take good care of it, to help me stay safe.” Applejack nodded dumbly.
Rainbow pointed at the jar as it sat, many-colored raindrops and tiny thunderbolts flying around inside it. “That’s my heart, Applejack,” Rainbow said, smiling a little. But just barely. “That’s my heart, to stay here with you. That’s my heart, and it’s yours until I come back for it, and for you.”
Applejack could barely force the question past her dry-rot tongue, but the words had to be said. “...And if ya don’t come back?”
Rainbow cringed again and gave a horrible, twisted little smile. “Then you have something to bury,” she whispered.
Applejack threw herself into Rainbow and their lips met in a desperate, clingy, teary kiss. She stroked Rainbow’s damp cheek, nuzzled into Rainbow’s hair and breathed in her stormcloud-and-pepper scent, memorized the contours of Rainbow’s skull with her mouth, the sound of Rainbow’s soft sobs with her ears, and finally, finally stepped back.
“You be careful now,” Applejack commanded. Her voice sounded like she’d drowned, all wavery and full of bubbles. “I’m expecting this to be a loan.”
Rainbow saluted and flew out her bedroom window. Applejack watched her until the rising sun made her impossible to spot. Then she picked up the little jar full of rainbow and cloud and watched the miniature storm rage on until Apple Bloom threatened to break her door down.