//------------------------------// // Falling into Place // Story: Wings of Friendship // by DemonBrightSpirit //------------------------------// "All right! Are you ready, Applejack?" Twilight asked as she floated a pair of blue wings over to Applejack's sides. "Are yah sure it's good enough?" Applejack asked as she nodded. "I mean, my cousin says he'll have that Mist Teak back here in a few days. I think Pinkie's gettin' close to gatherin' all those crazy ingredients for her taffy." Twilight concentrated as the wings attached to Applejack's sides. "If past experience has anything to say about it, there will be more complications. Now that we have the poplar bones from your cousin and some taffy from Sugarcube Corner, we can start working them out." Applejack shook her hide, just to make sure the wings wouldn't fall off. "I guess so," she relented. "And sorry again about leavin' yah there in the Everfree Forest all day the other day. In my defense, it was Rarity that lost the fireworks spell to signal yah." "You've both already apologized to us," she assured, checking the wings over. "How about it? Can you move them?" Applejack stared at one of the wings as she concentrated. It twitched. Then, it moved. The wing drew open. "Hey! I did it!" she excitedly claimed. "I can move it! Just like a pegasus!" "We'll just see about that," Twilight said. "Now, can you fully extend them, like this?" she requested, spreading her wings straight out. Her tongue stuck out a bit as she extended both wings. "Now, this is progress!" she asserted, looking at her wings. "Yah got a mirror?" A flash of magenta summoned a full mirror from some other room in the library as Twilight looked over the wings. "Rarity's done much better on the feathering. I think she has it down perfectly." "It it weren't for the color, I'd look just like a pegasus," Applejack said, staring at her reflection. "This is amazin'!" "Here, try to raise your wings up like this," Twilight urged, raising her wings straight up in an almost-threatening manner. Applejack's faux wings opened and closed a couple of times, but she failed to raise them up at all. "I-I don't think I can." "Can you...flap them?" Twilight suggested, giving her own wings a couple of lazy flaps. The wings opened, closed, and opened again. Applejack shook her head. "All I can seem to do is open 'n' close 'em. I can't get them to move up 'n' down for some reason." "That's fine. It's probably something wrong with the spell," Twilight dismissed, again taking a wing in hoof to closely examine it. "See? This is why I wanted to keep on testing the spell." Applejack shuddered under Twilight's touch. "I gotta say, it feels a lot more...real than the previous wings yah made." Twilight nodded, her attention never leaving the wing. "That's good. We want them to be as real as can be." Pulling the wing, she held it straight up. "Do you feel anything like tugging or resistance?" "Nope, can't say that I do," Applejack denied. "Then what's stopping you from lifting it?" she asked, looking back to one of her own wings. She raised her own wing up once more. "Oh! I get it!" Twilight announced her eureka moment aloud. "You don't have the muscles!" "Yah forgot to put it some of the muscles?" Twilight shook her head, stepping back. "Not at all. You see, it's not only the muscles in the wing that allow a pegasus to fly. There are lots of other muscles." "Other muscles?" "When I first got these things, I tried to fly and learned very quickly of several new, very sore, muscles the next morning," Twilight explained. "There are all kinds of accompanying muscles in pegasi's backs and shoulders that they use to flap. You're an earth pony, so you don't have any of them." Applejack raised an eyebrow. "So...now we gotta figure out how put more muscles into a pony's back?" she warily asked. "Not at all!" Twilight asserted, waving a hoof. "Rainbow Dash, and any other pegasus for that matter, already has all the muscles she needs. But! We will have to find another way to test these wings, so magic it is!" She lowered her head, pointing her horn at Applejack. "Ready to fly?" Applejack swallowed, nodding. "Y-yeah, I guess so." "Here we go!" Twilight smirked, firing a magenta ray of magic into the wings. The wings unfurled and began flapping. "Wh-whoa!" Applejack exclaimed as her hooves left solid ground. "This-Twi! I ain't on the ground!" she shouted, flailing her legs. Twilight laughed. "That's...one way to put it," she joked, flapping up next to Applejack. "You're flying." "I-I'm stuck!" she said, uselessly struggling. "Put me down!" Twilight stared quizzically at her panicking friend a moment before purging the spell from the wings. Applejack's wings stopped flapping and she fell like a stone. Twilight flinched as Applejack crashed into the ground. "Uh, sorry," she apologized, swooping down to help her up. "Are you all right?" "F-fine," Applejack said, dusting herself off. "I just-I freaked out a little there." "It worked! The wings—they got you off the ground," Twilight excitedly said. "What happened?" "It was like I was trapped," she said with a shudder. "I couldn't control the wings at all, and it was just… It spooked me." "You're all right now?" Applejack nodded. "Yeah. So long as my hooves are on the ground, I'm fine." Twilight smiled as she put the wings aside. "Well, at least now we know the wings are functional." Applejack let a smile set in as she looked to the wings. "Let's go tell Dash! Even if my cousin' ain't got the Mist Teak wood back yet, she can still fly with these, right?" Twilight rubbed her neck. "Well...no." "Pardon?" "Right now they're still too heavy. I actually need to go talk to Rarity about making a lighter skin," Twilight explained. "Well, I can tell yah that the Mist Teak wood's a lot lighter than that poplar." Twilight shook her head. "I'm afraid that might not be enough. Honestly, I don't know how much heavier than a normal wing it can be. Maybe Rainbow Dash can fly with one of these, but I'd rather not give her a wing that's too heavy. It could crush her spirit. "Besides, we don't know how resilient they'll be, either. With your Mist Teak bones due in a few days, I should have just enough time to test out several wings for endurance and strength stresses. Rarity's crystalline cloth might be nigh on invincible, but that doesn't mean that the muscles or tendons will hold up under pressure or that the bones won't snap." "Well, yah got me there," Applejack said. "I gotta say, yah sure are puttin' a ton of thought and effort into this." "I'm going to do whatever it takes to make this work for Rainbow Dash, and work right," Twilight affirmed, gathering up several wings with her aura. "Yah really think the Mist Teak ain't gonna be enough?" Twilight shook her head. "It's hard to tell. But we need to make sure it works," she said, setting the wings back down. "It might help if you would tell me a little more about this mystery wood." Applejack shook her head. "Nothin' doin'. I gave my word that I'd keep quiet about it." Sighing, Twilight shook her head. "Not even a hint?" Applejack rubbed her chin a moment. "Well…there is somethin' I've been rather curious about. Completely unrelated, mind you." Twilight smiled. "Of course." "Would you happen to anything about a creature called a 'dryad?'" Twilight's eyes widened. "Are you kidding? A dryad?" "A simple yes or no'd do," Applejack deadpanned. "Applejack, if you're telling me you encountered a dryad—th-they're extinct! Nopony's seen one in centuries!" Twilight excitedly explained. "I ain't tellin' yah nothin'," Applejack asserted, poking Twilight in the chest. "I'm askin' yah what yah know." After a long sigh, Twilight recited what she knew, "Dryads are—were—tree spirits. Unlike most creatures, their spirits and bodies were separate, but still connected. The spirit, the dryad, looked kind of like ponies. Their actual bodies, however, were seemingly normal trees. "They went extinct a long time ago because ponies found that the wood of the trees had special, magical properties. All their trees were cut down, and when the tree dies...so does the dryad. It was a very sad chapter in pony history. Applejack, if you found one...!" Applejack shied away from Twilight's stare. "I know yer a princess an' everythin' now, Twilight, and yer probably eager to really make a difference. But this… I think this would best be left as just some legend. That way nopony even knows to go lookin' for it." Twilight's ears flopped back as she deflated. "If-if you really think that's best…" she said, resigning. "I do," Applejack asserted. "And I'd really appreciate it if this here conversation never happened, okay?" "Yeah." Sighing, Twilight gathered the wings in her aura. "Well, I still need to go see about Rarity making a lighter cloth," she said, changing the subject as she approached the door. The instant Twilight's door opened, Pinkie Pie bounded in. "Heya Twilight!" Pinkie shouted. "Lookie at what I brought!" she announced in a sing-song voice as she set down an enormous tub. Twilight set the wings down and joined Applejack as Pinkie opened the tub. It was filled with a bright pink substance. "It's my super-secret secret patented Pinkie Pie taffy! You wouldn't believe how many favors I had to call in to get all the ingredients." Twilight raised an eyebrow. "It looks like normal taffy," she noted, tugging a chunk free with her magic. Pinkie's maw suddenly engulfed the chunk. "Jus' try it! Youh'll see how speshal it is," she mumbled as she gnawed on the candy. "I'll take your word for it," Twilight said, smiling. She capped the tub and packed it up with the wings. "We can try it along with the normal taffy and see how well they do in the stress tests." "I remember yah collectin' mushrooms in the Everfree for it," Applejack said. "How'd yah come up with this secret recipe, anyway?" After swallowing her mouthful of taffy, she drew a deep breath and explained, "Well, when I was a filly, I took all my worldly possessions to the Rainbow Falls Traders Exchange. There, I traded away everything for the most exotic and yummy-looking ingredients from all over Equestria and beyond. With those I made my first-ever batch of taffy! But here in Ponyville, it's really hard to get a lot of what I needed. I was so excited that everypony around town helped me to get them. I haven't tasted this awesome taffy since I was just an itty, bitty Pinkie filly!" Applejack blinked a couple of times before pointing to the large tub. "There's more than enough there for the wing, right? Mind if I take a bite?" "Of course not!" Pinkie assured, grabbing a hoofful and shoving it into Applejack's mouth. After recovering from the initial shock, Applejack gave an earnest smile. "Ish good!" "Right, well, I need to get this stuff over to Rarity's. Hopefully, we'll be good to go by the time we get that shipment from your cousin, Applejack," Twilight said as she made her way out of the library, the wings and taffy floating along behind her. "No, not there!" Rarity exasperatedly scolded. "I swear, Spike, I think you might be doing this on purpose to eat more of this cloth!" Twilight giggled as she watched Rarity struggle with Spike. "Having a rough time?" she jovially asked, floating all of the wings in. Rarity breathed out an exaggerated sigh. "It's so much more difficult to make an elegant dress with this cloth than I had imagined," she confessed, motioning to a half-finished dress on a mannequin. Spike groaned as he held his bulging belly. "I'm really trying my best, ugh," he said, flopping over onto his back. "I never thought I'd say this, but I think I'm too full to eat any more gems." "Is there something I can assist you with?" Rarity asked as she watched all the wings start to float in. "We're getting close," Twilight announced with a smile. "I got Applejack off the ground with these." "Oh! That's wonderful news!" Rarity enthused. "That's the good news," Twilight said. "There is still some bad news. First of all, these wings are considerably more heavy than a normal pegasus wing. I was hoping you could make a lighter version of your cloth?" Rarity glanced through the floating wings before pointing to one. "This one was the one made from mostly diamond filament. It's the thinnest, lightest one," Rarity announced, shaking her head. "I simply cannot make a lighter crystalline cloth." Twilight sighed. "I was afraid you might say something like that. We've tried several other materials, right? Which of those worked best?" "The, uh, the spider silk," Rarity said, not bothering to hide the disappointment in her voice. "I may still have it around here somewhere." She disappeared from the room a few moments before returning with the silken skin in her aura. "Here it is. Are you absolutely certain the crystalline cloth won't work?" "I haven't a clue," Twilight admitted. "I have no clue what the limit for weight might be. Maybe Rainbow Dash can handle it, maybe she can't. Either way, I'd rather at least start her with a wing that's the right weight, just in case." "Right," Rarity muttered, dumping the cloth onto a nearby table. "Well, I still have a dress to finish, so—" "Actually, I had another favor or two to ask of you." Twilight dumped the rest of the wings on the table along with the tub of Pinkie's special taffy. "I want to rearrange some of these wings and ingredients. Then, I need to stress test them—to make sure that the wing won't fail if...when Rainbow Dash tries something 'awesome.'" Rarity tentatively poked the near-comatose dragon. "I suppose a break from this project certainly couldn't hurt. I'll be happy to give you a hoof." "I appreciate it," Twilight said, offering Rarity a smile. "But as far as the stress testing goes, I was hoping for one last favor." Rarity cleared her throat. "I certainly hope you're not going to ask me to fly around until I fall. I've already experienced that once, and I have to say that I would certainly rather not go through that again." "Oh, no. Nothing like that," Twilight assured. "I just wanted to borrow some of your mannequins. I can attach the wings to them and use a spell to make them flap. If we anchor the mannequins, then we can simulate prolonged or vigorous flight without ever leaving the ground." Looking over to her half-finished dress, Rarity gave a nod. "Yes, I suppose I can do without some of them. I fear this dress may take some time to complete." "It already looks amazing, Rarity," Twilight said. "Is it for a special client?" "Oh, you could say that," Rarity cryptically replied. "If this dress turns out well, I can start to make them for us and our friends." "Ooh, that'd be nice," Twilight marvelled, running a hoof over the unfinished dress. "Do you think you'll have them ready in time for the next Grand Galloping Gala?" Rarity raised an eyebrow. "You aren't considering going to that travesty again, are you?" "Well, I am a princess now. My presence there is virtually mandatory," Twilight said with a meek smile. "I was hoping you girls would come with me. It should be fun if we all just hang out and try to enjoy it together." "Right, well, I should be able to get them done in plenty of time," Rarity assured. "So long as Spikey-Wikey here can keep up." Spike held his bulging belly as he let out a burp. "U-ugh, 'scuse me," he groaned. "Why don't you give me a hoof with these wings while Spike takes a break?" Twilight suggested. "Of course, darling," Rarity said, joining Twilight in front of the table covered in wings.