//------------------------------// // Chapter Six: Morning Surprise // Story: Flying Without Wings // by FierceRainbow //------------------------------// Morning Surprise Applejack woke to the comfortable warmth of a heavy blanket atop her, and two ponies nuzzled up against. She sighed in contentment as one of the gentle brushed her muzzle along the length of her ear, a lock of hair tickling her chin. She chuckled good-humouredly at the fizzing feeling it sent through her, gazing up into the sparkling eyes of Rainbow Dash, before looking down lovingly at Twilight’s peaceful sleeping face. Wait a second… “What the hay are ya’ll doin’ here?!” Twilight visible flinched from her outburst, Dash also leaning back, ears flattened against her head, an unamused scowl etched clearly onto her features. “Calm down! Sheesh, this is how you treat a nice surprise? Remind me never to serve you breakfast in bed on your birthday.” Applejack ground her teeth together in annoyance, feeling the initial shock leave her. But the passion was still there, causing her to stand up abruptly, Twilight cowering as the two began to argue. “A nice surprise? This is what ya’ll call ah nice surprise, sneakin’ into my bed an’ scarin’ the livin’ daylights out of me? Oh yeah, very nice.” Rainbow snorted in annoyance, pounding her hoof against the floor. “Really? Well, maybe I’ll just leave and you can sit here all alone, crying into your little book about how your dream will never come true.” “My dream?” she faltered, glancing over her shoulder to see the book, discarded on the ground carelessly. “Ya’ll… ya’ll looked in my saddlebags?” “Yeah, we were worried, okay?” she growled, eyes glinting with anger, before she let out a sigh, dropping her head. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. It’s obviously important to you.” “Applejack,” Twilight said softly, coming up beside her. “You seem to have a wish, but why didn’t you tell us? We could’ve come with you. You just… left.” Applejack sighed, glancing down at her orange hooves, unconsciously beginning to scuff the ground beneath her. “I know,” I cain’t tell ‘em why. What’ll I do? “How’d ya find me?” “Twilight was chilling at my place,” Rainbow told her. “We just outside, and we saw you. You were singing something.” “Oh yeah. That.” “But that doesn’t matter,” the Pegasus grinned. “Now we can all go on an adventure together!” she sprang nimbly into the air, doing an excited loop before landing, beaming brightly. “It’s going to be so awesome.” Twilight giggled, pulling first Dash closer, then extending her other wing to bring AJ to her side. “I think Rainbow’s right. This could be a great experience for the three of us,” she smiled, and this time it was only for her. “And we’ll fulfill your wish at the same time.” Rainbow Dash frowned slightly. “What is it, anyway?” “Uh…” her mind raced to pull up an excuse. What’ll they think, if I tell ‘em? I gotta get there, for them. “That ain’t important. We shouldn’t be standin’ ‘round here like a bunch ‘a worms in an apples.” “Worms in an apples?” Dash wrinkled her nose disapprovingly. “How does that even make sense?” “It jus’ does.” she pulled herself lightly free from Twilight’s grip, who was giving her a suspicious look. “Now, let’s get a-goin’.” “Okey-dokey,” Rainbow smiled. “Which way, Captain?” “Hmm,” she picked up the book from where it had previously lain. “Well, we need to cross this here meadow, then there’s a forest, an’ a cave.The Wishin’ Stone should be roundabout there.” Applejack returned the book to it’s rightful place in her saddlebag, wrapped in the blanket. The trio then proceeded to to step out into the bright glare of morning sunlight, not a cloud to be seen in the clear blue sky. The heat hit her immediately, burning into her coat furiously. “Phew!” she took her hat off, fanning herself with the wave of cool air coming off it. “Well, I’ll be. Ain’t this gotta be the hottest day in a long time.” “This could be bad,” Twilight frowned at her. “If we get too hot, we’ll slow down. Too much exposure to strong heat could weaken us by a large degree, and we won’t be able to make steady rates of process.” Silence hung in the air, both ponies waiting for the expected scratch sound of a voice making a rude comment. Applejack frowned, speaking what was on both their minds. “Now is ‘bout when Rainbow should be callin’ ya an ‘egghead’ or somethin’ like that,” she glanced around furtively, realizing she wasn’t by her side. Then, she looked upwards, catching sight of a bright speck in the distance. “Rainbow!” she shrieked in annoyance. “Get yer feathered rear down ‘ere with us right this instance!” Slowly, Rainbow Dash fluttered back down to join them, and irritated look on her face. “What? There’s no need to yell at me.” “Ya’ll wouldn’t ‘ave heard me otherwise,” Applejack retorted with a snort, raising her eyebrow sceptically. “We need to stay together, Rainbow,” Twilight insisted, stepping forwards. “If one of us were to get separated we might not find you again.” “Alright, alright already,” she said sharply. “I just wanted to get some fresh air. It’s darn hot down here.” “So we’d better get a-goin’ before we burn our manes off,” Applejack said, taking the lead in firmly trotting ahead. “How far is it?” Dash floated lazily above her head, wings beating slowly. “If we keep this pace, we should be there in about two days.” Twilight said. “Well, that’s not too bad.” “No, I mean we’ll get to the end of this meadow in two days.” “What?” Rainbow Dash cried out. “That’s not fair!” “Life ain’t fair, sugarcube,” Applejack sighed, shaking her head. “It’ll take a while, but we’ll get there. Jus’ gotta make sure we ain’t gonna tire ourselves out.” “Fine,” Rainbow groaned, her head drooping. “But it’d better not get any hotter than this, or we’ll be boiled.” Applejack couldn’t help a chuckle from bubbling up out of her throat at Rainbow’s complaints. She undid the buckle of one of her saddlebags, digging around inside to grip the tip of her water bottle in her mouth. With a flip of her head, she tossed it to Rainbow, who caught it with ease. “Drink up, if yer that hot.” “Awesome,” Dash tipped her head back, guzzling greedily. “No!” Twilight wrenched the bottle from Rainbow’s grip with a burst of magic, tugging it down to place back in Applejack’s bag. “We have to save the water. You can’t just gulp it like that.” I sure how we ain’t gonna run low on supplies, Applejack thought with worry, a frown creasing her brow. After all, I only packed enough for one lil’ pony to get by. Ain’t supposed to last the three o’ us. ~~~~~~~~~~ “Are you absolutely sure I can have some?” Twilight said uncertainly, hovering between taking a sip from bottle she currently floated in front of her. “Because we’ve already drunk a quarter of it, and I’d hate to waste any. I could get by, I mean, I’m extremely thirsty, but you two are more important.” “Go ahead, ya’ll,” Applejack gave her an encouraging smile. “Ain’t no reason to be ashamed ‘bout wantin’ a lil’ drink. Jus’ as long as there’s enough to last, I’m as happy as pickled-pear.” “Thank you,” at last, she broke down, raising the lips and swallowing, before passing it back to her. “Really, I won’t have any more.” “Oh, chill out,” Dash complained from above, still opting to fly rather than walk though an hour had passed since they had first set off. “You don’t need to fuss so much over a little water, there’s plenty.” “We’re all very thirsty in this weather, Rainbow,” Twilight replied. “We can’t afford anypony having more than their fair share.” Applejack held back a groan. It seemed the temperature had only increased as the day dragged on, the bright sun steadily rising higher into the sky. Back at home, eveypony would be wondering why she up and left like she did. She wiped beads of sweat of her forehead, wrinkling her nose at the slight waft of the rank smell she could make out from it. “Twi’, do ya’ll know any weather spells, by any chance?” Applejack took a shot in the dark, pleading with the magical mare. Unfortunately, she was met with the shake of a head. “No, I’m sorry. Weather is normally managed by the Pegasus ponies. I have a few books on it back at the Library, but I don’t have them with me now.” “Well, don’t fret it none,” she put on a fake smile. “I can handle a bit of heat plenty fine.” ~~~~~~~~~~ Applejack was certain her throat had never been so dry before as it had been at that moment. Even the small action of breathing made it feel like somepony had stuffed a cactus inside of her, and it was scratching her all up. Her tongue was sandpaper, scraping against the roof of her mouth as she searched for moisture. Rainbow Dash’s wings had slowly grown weaker over the past couple of hours, gradually losing strength and drifting lower. At that point, her hooves were brushing against the long tendrils of grass, stumbling as she hit the dirt, succumbing to a simple weary trot. Twilight looked a mess, her mane clinging to the sides of her face, her forehead shining brightly with the rivets of sweat. Her breath came in shallow gasps, loud in the silence not one of them dared to break. She was slumped over, her wings limply stretched out by her sides. Applejack probably didn’t look any better. She was focused on moving her hooves in front of one another, not thinking about what kind of state she was in. Her thirst, however, was more important. With a great deal of fumbling, she wriggled out the water bottle, drinking from it, rapidly consuming the last bit. She placed back in her saddlebags. “Welp,” Applejack said. “That’s all the water gone.” “What?” Twilight and Dash both cried out at the same time, looks of utter shock plastered over both their faces. “Well, it was gonna happen sometime!” her voice cracked in the middle of her shout. “It jus’ so happened to be me who finished it.” “I’m not blaming you, Applejack,” Twilight said seriously, her shoulders tense. “But we’ll die of thirst if we don’t get a drink.” “Aw, man,” Rainbow moaned. “I don’t wanna die in such a lame way!” “Calm down,” the bookworm said sternly. “Although we may be thirsty now, it’ll take a lot longer for it to start taking effect on us. But lack of water in these conditions could be very dangerous to our survival.” “So we’ll die, and it’ll be totally lame!” Applejack tuned out their loud, distressed conversation, studying the blades of grass beneath her hooves. Her thought were elsewhere, churning with worry. Was this really the best idea? I mean, it tweren’t supposed to be all three o’ us, but they came along, an’ now I’ve gone an’ got ‘em in danger. If they do die, it’ll be all mah fault. Pain hit her hard in her chest, and for a moment she thought she was going to collapse. But no, she was still okay. Darnit, AJ! Stop thinkin’ ‘bout that. Ya’ll have to stay on track if ya wanna get yerself and them through all o’ this. Fer them. Jus’ remember that, and ya’ll be okay. Fer them. “Fer them,” she said aloud under her breath. “What?” she jumped as Twilight spoke. “You said something, didn’t you? I couldn’t hear.” “O-oh, er, nothin’ important,” she hurriedly excused herself, forcing a big grin. “If you say so,” her voice was laced with suspicion. “But if anything’s up, tell me.” I wish I could, Twi. But I cain’t let ya stop me. It’ll all be better I’m a Pegasus too, then I won’t hold ya’ll down anymore. ~~~~~~~~~~ Yet again the terrible thirst was clawing at Applejack’s throat, but she refused to voice her complaints. Sooner or later, they were bound to come upon some water. Sooner than she thought, apparently, as Dash let out a joyous cry, springing up into the air, wings buzzing into action for the first time in about an hour. “Water!” Applejack squinted in the direction Rainbow was pointing, making out a glimmering wet surface surrounded by stunted trees and bushes. “She’s right. There sure is some water over there.” Rainbow Dash prepared to shoot off to the cool resting spot, a look of pure excitement over her face. Narrowing her eyes, Applejack leaned forwards to firmly clamp the bright tail hairs between her teeth. “Whoa there, nelly! Ya’ll ain’t goin’ of without us.” “Aw, c’mon,” she smacked her lips together. “I need a drink so bad!” “Why not?” she blinked in surprise at Twilight’s smirk. “I say we should get there as quickly as possible, even if that means a race.” “A race? You’re so on,” Rainbow dropped to the ground. “Look, I won’t even use wings.” Applejack chuckled. “Bring it one.” They lined up, shoulder-to-shoulder, flashing glances at each. Twilight counted down from three in a loud, authoritative voice. And then they ran.