Two small, pink fillies, both too young to even have their cutie marks, stared unflinchingly at each other. Each was so similar to the other that, excepting subtle differences in mane style and coloration, they could have easily been taken for twins. They shuffled their hooves, blinked, blushed, and did nearly anything else but talk to each other.
Minute after minute passed with not a sound exchanged between them until, finally, one spoke.
“H-hi. My name’s Pinkamena.”
A pause.
Pinkamena’s eyes flicked down, her tongue darting across her upper lip. Sucking in a deep breath through her nostrils, she met the other pony’s eyes once more.
“What’s yours?”
A sharp rap on the bedroom door raised an annoyed Rainbow Dash back to consciousness.
“Dashie, mail’s here!" a voice sung lightly from the other side
Rainbow Dash yawned, stretching her wings briefly before flapping out of bed. Halfway to the door, she spun around, and hastily piled the crumpled blankets on her bed before turning back to open the door.
“Geeze, I’m not a foal anymore,” she scowled, taking the assorted stack of envelopes from the older mare’s hoof and throwing them briskly towards the small table in the corner.
“Well, Dashie,” she said with a mischievous smile, “if you had your own place, you wouldn’t have to listen to me call you names you didn’t like, now would you.”
“Mooooooom!” Dash blushed, “I have my own place. Like I said, I just—”
“‘Need some space right now’, I know.” She smiled at her youngest daughter. “You know I’m just teasing you, Dashie. It wouldn’t hurt you to lighten up a little.”
The rainbow mare tried to lift her lips in something resembling a smile, but she couldn’t help but feel it more resembled a grimace. “Yeah, yeah,” she squeaked, pressing her hooves against the door experimentally. “Um, anyway, I think I’ve….uh….gotta organize all that mail over there! Talk to you later.”
Before her mother could respond, she’d pushed the mare out the door and latched it shut
Flapping over to the small table, her body slumped over as she deposited herself into a stiffly-bent chair made of pine, smelling slightly of mothballs and cinnamon. She ran her hoof absently through stack of unwanted catalogs, flyers, and bills, not really reading any of them as their colors flashed by her face.
It sucked.
Her mom’s house was just about the last place in Equestria she wanted to be right now.
Well, the second-to-last place in Equestria, at least. It beat Ponyville, at least until she could figure things out.
She rolled her eyes, unfurling and refurling her wings agitatedly.
“Stupid,” she muttered, “stupid Twilight. I’m sure everypony’s talked about it by now. Just like flight school…”
She trailed off, puckering her lips together firmly. Cloudsdale wasn’t the kindest place for ponies who….deviated from the norm; Fluttershy’s life was evidence enough of that for anypony. She didn’t have to maintain any kind of reputation, though. She could get away with telling everypony of her woeful foalhood as little-miss-scaredy-pegasus and they all felt bad for her, and that was that.
Being Rainbow Dash meant being better than that.
Even, she thought to herself, her tongue rolling uncertainly against her teeth, when you don’t really feel better than that.
"Everypony knows you're the biggest fillyfooler in Cloudsdale."
"I...I...Take it back!"
"So, what do two fillies do together...?"
She winced at the memory.
No. She kicked a chunk of cloud from the floor, forming into a ball with her hooves. No, she wasn’t a fillyfooler. She hadn’t been a fillyfooler back then and she certainly wasn’t a fillyfooler now. She looked back towards her flank, feeling the ghosts of young feathers brush against it, and with them, the calming memory of the soft, warm wing that had cocooned her.
“I’m so, so, so sorry…”
She frowned.
“Nope, not doing this now,” she growled, sweeping her foreleg across the table, sending the letters fluttering to the ground as she did. Her teeth gnashed together painfully, an audible squeak coming from between them, as she tried very hard not to think about the-thing-she-wasn’t-thinking-about.
She failed.
But, it just—she had to stay out for a little while longer, or somepony would get the wrong idea.
The wrong idea about why she hadn’t been seen for the last few weeks.
The wrong idea about the strange, sorta-pony-shaped bundle of clouds tucked into her bed.
The wrong idea about Pinkie Pie.
And, of course, the wrong idea about what happened at Rarity’s...whatever-it-was...party a couple weeks ago...
"Dashie!" Pinkie Pie shoved her way through a pair of mares, her usual wide grin splashed across her face, as she ran towards Rainbow Dash. Wrapping her forelegs tightly around Rainbow's neck, Pinkie added, "I'm so glad you could make it!"
"Yeah, Pinks," Rainbow replied as she attempted to peel her friend’s forelegs off her body, "Me too. But, uh...get off!"
"Oh, sure!" Pinkie said with a gleeful chirp as she pulled herself up onto Rainbow Dash’s shoulders.
“Um, Pinkie…” Dash commented, “This doesn’t look much like ‘off’.”
“Silly, I’m getting there!” Pinkie stood upright, climbing onto Rainbow’s head. “Catch me, Dashie!”
“Ow…er, what?”
“Whee!” Pinkie pushed off from the pegasus’ scrunched-up head, spreading her arms wide as she leapt, as if she could take to the skies with them.
“Pinkie!” Rainbow shouted, diving into the worn tile floor to catch the rapidly-falling pink ball of fluff.
“Aw...see, you do care!” Pinkie’s face brightened as she wriggled deeply into Rainbow’s forelegs. She turned and looked directly into the pegasus’ eyes, and proceeded to give Rainbow Dash a peck directly on the snout.
“Geeze, Pinkie!” Rainbow blushed furiously, unloading her burden gracelessly to the floor and taking to the air, “What the hay did you do that for?”
“Oh, I dunno. I guess I just felt like it!”
“Pinkie, sometimes you…”
Behind Rainbow, a bell chimed, telegraphing to the shop’s resident keeper that the door had opened again. Pinkie’s ears pricked, her eyes lighting up as she noticed the new arrival.
"Welp, I guess I gotta go for now. Hope to talk to you later, Dashie!"
Rainbow watched as her friend bounded across the room to greet the mint-green unicorn, who was still attempting to cross the threshold when Pinkie enveloped her in her typical jubilant embrace. Pinkie must have squeezed the poor mare with particularly excessive force this time, as Lyra’s face seemed to have turned a shade of light turquoise and her eyes were bulging out of their sockets.
Other ponies might have thought Rainbow’s laughter was uncouth, but she wasn’t really laughing at them. It...was just funny.
Seeing Pinkie's poofy tail swish across the floor gave her an idea, though…
"Hi, Rainbow Dash," the casual voice of Twilight Sparkle interrupted her thoughts, "Um, what...are you doing?"
"Uh, what, oh...hi, Twilight," her face simmered, a sheepish grin spreading across it, "I was just...planning a prank, is all"
"Uh huh..." Twilight rolled her eyes, "Well, anyway, I’d ask if you thought Pinkie outdid herself with this one, but I guess she always does, doesn’t she?”
“Heh. Yeah.”
“You know, nopony really thought you were going to make it to this one." She scratched her mane with a hoof as she continued, "After all, it is only the second Congratulations-Rarity-On-Your-New-Contract party we’ve had this month, and I’d heard there was some particularly big storm brewing over the Everfree that you had to take care of."
"Well, sure, there's that, but you think I'd miss a Pinkie Party? You kiddin' me? Cloudkicker’s got it under control."
"Right. Rainbow...you do know this party is for Rarity, right? White unicorn, about 30 hooves to your left."
Dash gulped, her mouth suddenly parched. She just couldn’t seem to get the right words out, and Twilight was taking every opportunity to misunderstand what she was saying. Even so, she opened her mouth to offer a reply, but a pink flash interrupted her before she could speak a single word. Pinkie Pie sprung onto the long, transparent counter in front of them, producing a platter that looked as big as the Cloudosseum, filled to the brim with exceptionally tasty looking treats.
"Who's ready for some cupcakes?" Pinkie offered enthusiastically.
Rainbow sprung upward, her forelegs swinging wildly in the air.
“Oooh, me, me, pick me!” she squealed, grinning broadly.
Pinkie returned the grin with one of her own.
“Looks like somepony reeeeeeally wants Pinkie’s cupcake…”
Had she really just…
SPLAT!
“Uh, Dashie,” Pinkie commented with a slight frown, “You know the cupcake’s supposed to go in your mouth, not all over it.”
Rainbow Dash blinked, hovering for a moment in stunned silence. For a moment, all she could hear was the heartbeat in her head as her face grew increasingly heated, but soon became aware of a wave of sound rushing up to her.
Uproarious laughter, of course. Rainbow hastily scraped the remains of the cupcake from her snout and shoved her hoof in her mouth, taking no time in licking the delicious mix of crumbled cake and frosting from her hoof. Shrugging her shoulders, she finished the job by wiping down her muzzle with her tongue, catching any stray crumbs in the process.
“Ooooookay...anypony else want a cupcake?”
Rainbow looked on at Pinkie as she performed her current task, her haunches quivering as she deftly tossed cupcakes across the store, ensuring everypony in attendance received at least one. Really, most ponies had the wrong idea about her. Sure, she seemed like the squishiest pony of the bunch of them—the way she packed pastries away didn't do much to help that image—but she had a strength that was all Pinkie Pie. Not just anypony could land a cupcake directly in the mouth of a pony standing twenty hooves away, and to repeat the feat flawlessly time after time took a special sort of skill. Even so, though, Rainbow hadn’t noticed before that below the layer of squishy cotton-candy pudge that most ponies saw was a thick layer of well-defined, sinewy muscles, which tensed up instinctively for each perfectly-timed toss.
Huh. Who knew that Pinkie Pie was such an athlete?
Her face suddenly grew hot again, and she quickly averted her eyes upwards, realizing that she'd been watching her friend just a little too closely.
Sure, it was only in admiration for a fellow athlete’s chiseled form—or, rather, her abilities—but if somepony was looking, they might have gotten the wrong idea. A cold chill began to creep up her legs, her hooves suddenly numb, and she twisted her head over her shoulder.
Horseapples!
Twilight was standing rigidly just a few hooflengths behind her, her quavering neck holding her head awkwardly facing 180º from Rainbow Dash, her wings ruffled and splayed against her barrel. Rainbow Dash’s cheeks burned, but there was nothing to be done but deal with it, she thought as she approached her friend, a frown carving its way across her muzzle .
“Hey! Twi’!” she called.
“Oh!” Twilight blushed, “I’m sorry...I mean, yes, Rainbow Dash...you just caught me...by surprise?”
Rainbow jabbed a cyan hoof deep into Twilight’s lavender fur. “I just wanted to ask why you didn’t just take a picture. You're a smart pony, you must know that it'd last longer that way.”
“Uh, excuse me?” Twilight protested, backing up a few hoofsteps.
“Don’t play coy with me, Twilight,” Rainbow said accusingly, gripping one of the alicorn’s wings between her teeth and tugging on it. “Pegasus, remember. I’ve know all about these things, and I know—”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Rainbow rolled her eyes. “Ya know what, forget it.” Turning to Pinkie, she added: “Hey Pinks, sorry, but I gotta fly.”
“Awwww…” Pinkie frowned, barely balancing the two bowling pins resting on her muzzle as she spoke. “But we’re just getting started! We haven’t even played Pin the Tail on the Pony yet.”
Pinkie bounded down from her precarious position atop the cash register, the pins clattering to the ground behind her, but Rainbow had already began making her way to the exit. Shaking her head rapidly, Rainbow pushed through the last few party guests and out the front door. “I’ll catch you later.”
In fact, she hadn’t caught her later. That was the last time she’d seen any of her friends, but most especially Pinkie Pie.
Actually, she was a little surprised that Pinkie hadn’t tracked her down yet. Usually her Pinkie Sense would lead her right to ponies trying to hide from something. It was one of her more annoying traits.
At least her letters had made it through, she thought, glancing at the small pile of pink paper beside her bed. She’d read each of them at least three times—but only because they were so sloppily written, of course. Especially the more recent ones. With each day, each letter that passed, Pinkie’s ability to write a readable sentence had seemed to fade more and more. Yesterday’s had been written in three different colors of crayon, layered one atop the other.
It didn’t matter. They all said the same thing.
I miss you.
I need you.
Why did you leave?
Do you hate me?
A heavy ball filled the back of her throat, and Rainbow clamped her eyelids shut with a shudder, salty liquid squeezing through the margins.
“Some element of loyalty I am,” she growled, smearing her hoof roughly across an eye. “More like element of jerkiness.”
Sniffling, she turned towards the small, porthole-shaped window that bulged out from her childhood bedroom, absently gazing out at the deep blue sky that hung over Cloudsdale.
Slowly, she shook her head.
When had Rainbow Dash become such a sissy?
With an uninspired flap, she alit from her seat briefly, landing beside the small table. Shuffling beneath it, she began to gather up the letters and other bits of mail strewn on the floor, creating a haphazard tower of unwanted advertisements and even-less-wanted bills in the process.
She swallowed nervously as she opened the first of them, hard steel in her guts as her eyes absently wandered over the red and black text.
40 bits.
Normally, she made that amount in a week, but she’d been out of vacation days for a week now, and was just sliding by on goodwill.
Her eyelids drooped; she’d have to go back to work soon.
Back to Ponyville.
She drew in a deep, shuddering breath, closing her eyes gently.
That’s not so bad, right? I mean, it’s not like I took off for three weeks to avoid anypony...or any one specific super-cool pony…
Her tongue darted across her teeth as her internal monologue continued, but she didn’t find any of her arguments convincing. No matter what, though, it was becoming clear she couldn’t keep ignoring her real life for much longer. As was typical for pegasi industry, Cloudsdale Rainbow Supply wasn’t exactly known for its leniency.
Strength, she remembered her homeroom teacher saying, Strength is the only virtue that matters up here. Down on the ground, earth ponies have their so-called dependability, and the unicorns their namby-pamby science, magic, and high-falutin society, but up here the only thing that matters is the strength to win. Pegasi are winners!
Yeah, kindness wasn’t exactly in the vocabulary.
She sighed, allowing the letter to flutter from her wingtips to start a new pile as she moved to the next. Shuffling through the remainder absent-mindedly, something that started as a small itch at the back of her mind slowly clawed its way to the front as the last piece of mail was deposited on the “read” stack.
Pinkie Pie hadn’t sent her a letter today.
She’d sent a letter every day since Rainbow left.
The pegasus floated upwards, scanning the room from above, but didn’t see anything she’d missed.
“Mooom..?” Rainbow called out, gliding across the room.
The chirpy voice answered immediately. “Yes, dear? Is something the matter?”
“I was just wondering if,” she started, when her eyes were drawn to the corner of the room. “You know what, never mind. I think I’ve got this one.”
She darted down, barely acknowledging the “Okay, Dashie.” that trailed behind her, and gently lifted a light pink envelope.
To say that it had seen better days would be an understatement. The thing looked like it’d gone through the cloudmaking factory and been pumped out the other side. Somepony would have to talk to Derpy about her handling of the mail. Nevertheless, she brought it close to her muzzle, and allowed herself a small smile as the faint odor of cotton candy and brown sugar filled her senses.
Pinkie Pie.
Bang! A sudden knock at the front door froze Rainbow stiff, and she hastily flung the letter towards her bed, where it buried itself in the still-crumpled bedsheets. She could hear the door creak open, and her ears swiveled forwards as she strained to hear the conversation taking place. Though she couldn’t quite catch the words, she could hear voices rising, and hooffalls that seemed suspiciously near her bedroom door.
“Well, alright, but I’d promised…”
Horseapples! Rainbow turned towards the window, spreading her wings for flight….
Only to be slammed to the ground by a sobbing yellow ball of fur and feathers.
“Rainbow Dash! I...I...I…” Fluttershy stammered, her hot breath flowing across Rainbow’s chest as she buried her muzzle deeper.
“Woah, woah, girl, hold on there.” Rainbow pulled herself upright, cocking an eyebrow as she noticed Twilight Sparkle standing in the doorway she’d herself occupied only moments ago. Turning back to the sobbing pegasus, she unfurled a wing and wrapped her shaking body tightly in it.
“What’s goin’ on, Fluttershy?”
Real smooth.
“Ahem,” Twilight coughed, “I think it’s better that I…”
“Oh, Rainbow, it’s just awful!” Fluttershy sputtered out between sobs, her emerald eyes streaked with red. “And...and, it’s all my fault! You….”
Rainbow’s cheeks began to burn furiously.
“Oh, uh,” Rainbow inched away, the contact suddenly feeling awkward, “It’s not...your...fault….”
“Oh,” the tears streaming down her cheeks seemed to double, “it is!”
“Nah; it’s not like that. I just needed to get away—”
“I know, that’s the worst part. I couldn’t even tell her that you-mrphlmr…”
Rainbow stood, looking Fluttershy directly in the eyes, her face an inscrutable mask. The squeaks stopped, she removed her hoof from her friends mouth.
“I think that’s about enough of that. Who’s ‘her’, though?”
“Pinkie Pie,” Twilight said, her eyes narrowing with annoyance, “which is what I’ve been trying to tell you since I showed up.”
“Uh…”
“Well,” she hesitated, her eyes darting anywhere that didn’t meet Rainbow’s gaze, “it’s...hard to say just yet. Pinkie...may be in danger.” Gritting her teeth, a whistle came from Twilight’s mouth like air escaping from a balloon. “If she’s not….then, well, she might have done something terrible.”
Twilight’s eyes darted upwards, and, noting the mixed looks Rainbow was giving her, hurried to continue before her friend could put the pieces together.
“But...we don’t know just yet. I’ll explain more when we get there.”
“There?” The cyan mare cocked her head cynically.
“Ponyville,” Twilight shook her head. “Speaking of which, we should be going. They’re waiting for us.”
Before Rainbow Dash could raise a hoof to protest, Twilight’s horn flashed, and they disappeared in a lavender sparkle.
“So, lemme get this straight, you’re telling me that Ponyville General was broken into last night, the hot air balloon was stolen, Town Hall was defaced, and you think…”
“That Pinkie Pie was behind it all!” Twilight beamed proudly.
“I, um, prefer to think that some nasty, nasty, evil pony might have taken Pinkie away,” Fluttershy squeaked from between her hooves. “Well, uh, I don’t, you know, want to think that, but, um…”
“Uh, yeah,” Rainbow’s eyes shifted towards Twilight, her voice dropping. “You do remember this is Pinkie Pie we’re talking about, right? She’s not exactly criminal mastermind material.”
“But,” Twilight sputtered, waving her foreleg furiously at the scene behind her, “haven’t you been paying attention to all the evidence I’ve been showing you?”
“All what evidence? All you’ve said is that Pinkie’s not around…”
“Exactly! What other evidence do I need?”
“You might want to think about those words again, Twilight,” Rainbow Dash snickered into a hoof, flapping a circle around her friend. “I mean, what if she went to visit her family on the rock farm or—”
“Checked it…”
“Or went to see Maud at—”
Fluttershy spun a hoof in the mud. “Oh, no, she’s not there either. We looked everywhere, Rainbow Dash.”
Rainbow’s hooves dug into the ground directly in front of Twilight, and she jammed her muzzle directly into the other mare’s.
“Look, Twilight, I don’t know why in Equestria you’re looking to blame this on Pinkie Pie—our friend!—but, I just don’t see it.”
A sharp hoof jammed itself into Rainbow’s chest, pushing her back several feet.
“You think I want to do this?” Twilight shouted, her eyes narrow and glassy, darting between her two friends. “Mystery ponies notwithstanding, It’s the only answer that makes sense.”
“Oh yeah,” Rainbow dug in, glaring at her friend, “how’dya figure?”
“Fine!” Twilight lit her horn again. “You want evidence, I’ve got evidence.”
With a pop, a variety of seemingly pedestrian objects appeared, all of which immediately fell into the churning mud beneath their hooves with a plop.
All, excepting a lock of curly pink hair suspended in a fuchsia aura.
“Okay, so it’s Pinkie’s hair, right?”
Twilight nodded vigorously. “And we found it right...there!”
A lavender hoof thrust itself directly towards one of the snapped beams suspended from the second level of the town hall building.
“Yeah, and?”
Beside the hair, a kitchen knife rose, slimy mud dripping from its entire length.
“And here,” she grinned smugly, “you can see the cupcake frosting embedded in the ridges—”
A snicker.
“Uh, Twilight, you might wanna check that again,” Rainbow pointed at the grime-coated implement.
“Augh! Well, earlier, you could see that, before a certain pony made me careless with my evidence.”
“Hey!” Rainbow placed her hooves on her hips scoldingly, flapping closer to Twilight.
Ignoring her, Twilight continued. “And the piece de resistance…”
A photograph lifted itself from the mire and thrusted itself straight into Dash’s cyan muzzle. The mare lifted a hoof, smudging the mud around for a few seconds.
“Hey Twilight, take a look at your picture.” Dash bit her bottom lip, a mischievous smile playing at the corners of her mouth.
The picture spun, Twilight’s eyes instantly rolling.
“A smiley face. Really, Dash, are you 5?”
A burst of light, and the picture was again facing Rainbow, this time cleaned of any residue.
“Hmm…” Rainbow scratched her chin, ”so, okay, you can tell me if I’m wrong here, but to me, this looks like a hoofprint.”
Twilight shrieked, and the “evidence” all disappeared, presumably back to where it came from.
“Anyway, I didn’t bring you to play detective…”
“Oh really, I could’ve sworn—”
Twilight teleported directly in front of her friend, flying in circles with her as though dancing. “I wanted to see if you knew anything about it.”
“Twi,” the rainbow-maned pegasus sighed, “You know I haven’t been around in, like, weeks. I haven’t talked to anypony.”
“Okay. That settles that then, I guess. I was only asking because every day for the past week, Pinkie’s been getting increasingly agitated about your absence. She woke me up before sunrise yesterday, just to see if I’d seen you. Before. Sunrise!”
Twilight’s eyes flamed, and the pegasus decided it would be a good time to put a bit of distance between herself and the angry alicorn.
“Woah, settle down, Twilight,” Rainbow held her hooves up passively. “I kinda figured Pinkie might go a little nutso someday, but I haven’t—”
The smile on Rainbow’s cyan muzzle melted as visions of a crumpled, twisted envelope filled her mind.
“Rainbow…?”
Whatever the end of Twilight’s sentence was, Rainbow hadn’t heard it, as she was halfway back to Cloudsdale before the words came out. Her heart raced, her mind going back through all the other letters she’d read.
Had she missed something? She wracked her brain, but couldn’t think of anything. Perhaps there’d be a clue in the new letter, though, the one that looked like it’d gone to Tartarus and back.
She pumped her wings harder, gulping in air as the pressure grew tighter around her. She couldn’t allow herself to make a Sonic Rainboom this close to Cloudsdale (it was a city ordinance, and she was already in enough trouble), but she’d ride as close as she could to one. The familiar condo right in front of her, she plunged a hoof out, shattering the glass of the window around her. Tucking her body into a tight roll, she spiraled across the floor like a tornado, flying through the small table and slamming into the opposite wall.
Shaking her head briefly to clear it, she lifted to the air, ignoring her mother’s cries from the other room as the edges of a concussion threatened her stability. Diving for the bed, she tore open the envelope, holding it in shaking hooves.
Dear Rainbow Dash,
I know I’ve been bugging you a lot lately. I’ve—we’ve all missed you around Ponyville, and I just wanted you to know that...before you forgot about us completely. I don’t know if you read all my letters. I’m sure you probably threw them in a pile thinking, ‘Oh, that silly-billy Pinkie Pie’, just like you might do to this one. But this letter is….going to be a little different from the rest. I wish you’d answered my other ones, but it’s too late now.
I hope you can forgive me.
These will be the last words I’ll ever say to you.