"Are we there yet?" Twilight Sparkle asked with a yawn.
Rainbow Dash stopped a few feet ahead of Twilight, turning to look back over her shoulder. "Actually, yeah, we are."
"Huh?" Twilight pitched her head upward, blinking a few times to fight off the morning grogginess that still refused to leave. They appeared to be in a wide-open field with not much other than grass and trees to be seen. "Oh. Where are we?"
"About a mile west of Ponyville." Dash spread her wings, flexing them a few times and beginning her warm-up stretches. "I like to practice my moves here, since there's usually nopony around to see if I crash."
"But what if you got hurt all alone out here?"
Rainbow rolled her eyes. "That happened once, Twilight. Let it go. My wing bones aren't made of toothpicks."
Twilight didn't push any further. She just inhaled the cool morning air as she took in the sight of the gently waving branches on the trees littering the field. She could easily see Canterlot's shining white towers in the distance to the northwest, and the treeline of White Tail Woods nearby, too. "Well, it's a beautiful place, Rainbow."
"Whatever," Dash scoffed. "I didn't bring you here to look at the scenery."
"Oh?" Twilight asked as she lazily raised an eyebrow. "What did you bring me out here for, then? You've been awfully secretive about it, which I wouldn't expect if we were just going to get in some regular flying practice."
Rainbow put a hoof on her friend's shoulder. "Buddy, I'm gonna show you one of the best things about having wings, that's what. Now, follow me." With no other warning, Dash flared her wings and then shot off into the sky. Twilight took a few seconds longer to prepare herself, but then she was flying after her friend.
The cool air flowing over her coat and through her feathers did a nice job of waking Twilight up, edging out the grogginess that had plagued her. As she ascended past a low-hanging cloud, she reached a hoof out, feeling the soft matter flow around her. Ever since getting her wings a few weeks back, she couldn't help but be fascinated by clouds, especially the unique texture of the fluffy stuff. Now that she could really manipulate them, it opened up so many new experiments for her. If only she could find the time in her schedule to really study them firsthoof.
Twilight looked back toward the pale blue sky, losing sight of Rainbow as she zipped past a layer of clouds some distance above them. She flapped her wings a bit harder, flying after the pegasus. Twilight was panting by the time she finally passed the cloud layer and caught sight of Rainbow again.
Dash was sitting atop a cloud, watching Twilight land on a spot of white fluff nearby with a little smirk. "Heh, took you long enough."
The alicorn opened her mouth to respond, but her comment died in her throat as her eyes fell on the picturesque sunrise visible beyond Rainbow's head. She hopped and hovered sideways, getting a better look. The light of the rising sun filtered through the lumpy floor of clouds beneath them, turning the white to a faded yellow. "Gosh, I've never been up here this early before. It's really beautiful, Rainbow."
Rainbow furrowed her brow and glanced over her shoulder. "Pfft, the sun? That's there all the time." She turned back around. "That is so not why I brought you out here."
Twilight frowned. "Well, if that's not it, what else could be so great about being up here? It can't be the thinner atmosphere."
Dash's little smirk grew. She jumped up from the clouds and hovered closer to Twilight. "You trust me?"
Twilight responded with a nod, only to draw in a sharp breath when Rainbow wrapped her forelegs around Twilight, pressing their bodies together. She was about to ask another question when Dash's wings abruptly stopped their flapping. Rainbow dropped out of the air, taking Twilight down with her. Twilight's held breath came out as a long, drawn-out scream as the two plummeted toward the cloud layer, slipping through a gap in the dense fog.
"Rainbow Dash, what are you doing?!" Twilight shrieked. Dash didn't answer, and gave a little flap of her wings to turn them over. Rainbow directed her muzzle at the ground, eyes almost shut against the rushing air. Twilight tried to use her own wings, but Dash’s hooves were clamped around them.
"Are you—" but Twilight fell quiet as the two exited the ceiling of clouds with a little burst of fluff and the ground came into view. She gasped at the sight below her, watering eyes wide and mouth hanging open. It was a sight she'd seen mere minutes before, but from so high up, it looked almost nothing like it had then.
Stretching out below her was a massive expanse of green fields, speckled with a smattering of tiny little trees and coated in a fog she was never far away enough to see until now. There was Canterlot Mountain, looking like a purple anthill with white toothpicks stuck in one side. White Tail Woods stretched out to the west, looking like nothing more than a leafy carpet. The shag thinned smoothly, transitioning to the lumpy, blue rocks that were the Unicorn Mountain Range. It was no small distance from Canterlot to Smokey Mountain, but it looked like no more than a long jog.
Twilight tried to concentrate, to focus her mind, but her heart was thumping like mad within her chest and through her ears. She felt... excited? Nervous? Terrified? All of the above and more. She knew what this was: a rush of chemicals going to her brain, ignited by the terror of being in free fall. Simple biology. Knowing did nothing to calm her heartbeat, however, nor cure the shaking in the limbs wrapped around her friend. Her whole system was in overdrive. All she could think about was just how huge Equestria was, and yet how small it all looked from so far away.
Twilight leaned her head forward a little ways, coming to rest her chin against Rainbow's shoulder. From so high up as they were, she could even see the curve of the planet as she looked out to the sparkling ocean beyond the western edge of Equestria. Drifting over the water was a white, feathery blanket, rays of gold pouring in through the spaces between the clouds. A ship was sailing just ahead of the horizon, barely more than a dot of white sails above a speck of brown wood.
Twilight swallowed, bringing her gaze back to the ground she was surely still approaching, though it didn't seem to be getting any closer. All sense of weight had left her body, and the only thing to remind her that she was still falling was the air that rushed past her, running her mane and tail out behind her body and whipping them about.
Her breaths were short and rapid, despite her attempts to steady them. She finally wrenched her stare away from the ground as the dull rumble of thunder rolled over them. There was Cloudsdale, a mighty wad of white currently hovering over Appleloosa to the south and dispensing a surely-needed rainstorm to its fields and orchards. From the floating city flowed masses of inky fluff, ripples of lightning flashing and coursing through the storm clouds. Twilight's grip on her companion involuntarily tightened as another crackling thunderclap reached her. Even Cloudsdale, as high up as it was, looked barely bigger than Ponyville at this distance.
Twilight's violet eyes then landed on Rainbow Dash herself, and the alicorn's open mouth finally slid shut. Rainbow's globes of rose were half-lidded, flitting this way and that slightly as they seemed to scan the ground below. There was no fear on her face. No anxiety. Just a wide smile that only a daredevil like Rainbow could pull off and really, truly mean it. Her multicolored mane billowed behind her flattened ears, as unkempt as it had been since the day Twilight had met her. Far from detracting from her looks, somehow the mess of rainbow hair had always seemed to suit Dash, even enhance her appearance.
She'd always been an attractive mare; strong and toned muscles, a smooth and symmetrical face, and boundless confidence. Twilight had never given it more than a passing thought before, but Rainbow really was quite pretty. Not pretty like Rarity's carefully-managed mane and makeup, or like Fluttershy's natural glow and flowing hair. Rainbow had a different kind of beauty. A sort of wild and untamed allure. And those eyes...
Rainbow's wings spread, her feathers fluttering in the wind, and she shifted her hooves to a lower spot on Twilight's back. The two ponies turned over again and began to slow as the pegasus flapped away. Twilight shook her head, looking back toward the ground. The trees that once looked like barely more than blades of grass were now much bigger to her eyes, and the ground was now obviously getting much closer. Twilight turned back to Rainbow, who glanced at her just before asking, "Are you gonna flap too, or what?"
Twilight unfurled her own wings and joined Dash in slowing their descent. It wasn't much longer before they reached the ground at low speed, and Rainbow deposited the alicorn on the grass. Twilight immediately sat back on her rump, her glazed eyes still focused on Rainbow Dash as she landed a few feet away. Twilight's heart was still beating hard and fast, though her breaths were slow and steady.
"Pretty awesome, huh?" Rainbow said with a smirk, running a hoof through her frizzled mane.
Twilight licked her dry lips and swallowed once before saying a single word. "Beautiful."
"Heh, yeah, I know."