//------------------------------// // Rainbow's Reminiscience // Story: The Cutie-Marky Tales // by CrowMagnon //------------------------------// The Cutie-Marky Tales by CrowMagnon "Sooo... does this have something to do with how you got your cutie mark?" Sweetie Belle asked, tilting her head in confusion. She sounded uncertain. They had been ready to follow the adult pegasi back out of the woods while listening to Rainbow Dash's tale, but just as they were about to move on, Rainbow Dash had stopped suddenly in her tracks. Instead of answering Sweetie Belle's question, Rainbow raised a hoof to her lips and made a shushing sound while she surreptitiously slipped a few wing feathers into one of her saddlebags. When she drew them out again, the tips were coated with green dust, which trailed along the path her wing made as she flapped it once to create a breeze. Fluttershy and the confused fillies all watched as a line of the powder was carried along by that breeze, winding through the forest like a serpent until it drifted out of sight. Moments later, the young shaman's actions were answered by the sound of a mare's startled shriek coming from above. The Cutie Mark Crusaders jumped in surprise as another pegasus mare, this one in Ranger armor, came tumbling down. They winced as she hit several branches on the way down, but she managed to spread her wings open just in time to come to a safe--if not particularly graceful--landing. Seeing the Ranger make her rather undignified entrance, Rainbow Dash snickered and asked, "'Sup, Sunburn? Having fun spying on us?" The blond-maned, burnt-orange mare flushed a bit and indignantly retorted, "I wasn't spying..." To that, Scootaloo looked at her with a dubious expression and said, "Let me guess. Mom wanted you to keep tabs on us." "... Okay, yeah, but I was just doing a quick fly-over to make sure you girls hadn't set the woods on fire. Then I saw you hanging out with these two," she said, pointing a hoof at the other pegasi, "and figured I wouldn't butt in." "But then why'd ya scream?" Apple Bloom asked, to which Rainbow Dash snickered to herself. Sunburn gave the young shaman a nasty look while she answered the filly's question. "Let me tell you something, kid. When you get married, the scariest thing in the world is seeing your wife's face looking at you like you forgot her birthday." Fluttershy giggled at that. "This is true. There've been so many times where I got Will to do my bidding just by making him think I'm going to do The Face." "'The Face?'" Sweetie Belle asked, her ears perking up in curiosity. Fluttershy hopped up into the air and hovered over them with a serious look. "Yep! Just watch, but remember, girls... only use this power responsibly. If the secret of The Face spread too far, it could shift the balance of power, and bring ruin to Equestria! So first, I need you all to close your eyes, and count to three before opening them." The three fillies gulped and looked between each other, but they did close their eyes and made the count. When they opened their eyes again, Fluttershy was right in front of them, her eyes crossed to the point that they were even more skewed than Derpy Hooves, and her cheeks puffed out with a hoof in her mouth as if she were trying to blow it up like a stubborn balloon. * Startled, the fillies yelped and jumped back, but Fluttershy continued to hover in the air and follow after them, letting out a menacing growl muffled by her hoof while she made her eyes spin around. The Crusader's squeals quickly morphed into giggles, though, as Fluttershy chased them around. While this was going on, Rainbow Dash and Sunburn leaned against each other while guffawing at the fillies' plight. After this went on for a little while, and Sunburn's laughter died down enough to get words out, the Ranger turned to Rainbow Dash and asked, "So, Dash, uh... weren't you gonna tell a story or something before you made that freaky dust of yours look like Spot Light when I haven't taken the garbage out?" This pulled the fillies' attention away from trying to escape, and a giggling Apple Bloom skidded to a stop in front of them. "Oh yeah! Y'all were gonna tell yer cutie mark story!" Apple Bloom's sudden stop caused her friends to run into her, knocking all three of them to the ground. Stopping her chase, Fluttershy let her face go back to normal and started helping them back onto their hooves. "Oof... yeah, can you tell us now, Rainbow Dash?" Sweetie Belle asked. Scootaloo just stared at her, waiting expectantly. "Okay, okay, but let's get back on the road." Dash relented with a mocking grin toward the Ranger. "Sunburn can play bodyguard while we head home instead of acting like a stalker." ----- Rainbow Dash's Story For most of the fillies and colts attending Flight Camp, it was a regular day. Some were playing, others were doing their daily exercises to build up their wing strength and stamina. But then something shot past them so quickly that they barely saw anything but a pale blue streak that left rainbow-colored contrails in its wake. Back then, I was the hottest thing on wings, and every day was a blast. Rainbow Dash shot a cocky smirk at the other pegasi, who all seemed to be in slow motion compared to her. Seeing a particular trio of colts, she zoomed past them so quickly and so close that they were sent spinning. Dash couldn't help but let out a guffaw as she looked back over her shoulder to see them drilling themselves down into the cloudbank. Unfortunately, this kept her from noticing the cloud that she was shooting straight toward until she punched through it, coming out the other end completely covered in cloudmass except for her wings and tail. I... may not have had the best control, but let me tell you, I was fast. Before Rainbow Dash could shake the fluffy clouds off of her, a brown blur suddenly shot past her, sending the pegasus spinning while bits of cloud flew away from her body in all directions. As she slowly came to a stop, the very dizzy filly held her head to regain her bearings and glared at a nearby griffoness who was laughing her head off. Her angry expression didn't last long, however, and soon shifted into a competitive smirk as she flapped her wings and zipped toward another nearby cloud. Once there, Rainbow carefully lined up her shot, wiggling her hindquarters to get it just right before her hind legs shout back, shooting a chunk of the cloud away from her and straight into her friend's laughing mouth. Gilda chocked and sputtered a bit until she spat it out, but once that was done, the two of them shared in their laughter as they flew off together. And I had an awesome friend who always pushed me to be my best. But then, one day there was a storm that put all that to the test. ----- A month ago, her dad had taken her and Gilda down to a movie theater in Fillydelphia. She couldn't really remember much about the movie itself thanks to having trouble sitting still that long, but her dad had painted the posters for it, so that was cool. What she really remembered, though, was that before the film, they showed a cartoon about a mischievous rabbit turning the tables on a dimwitted griffon hunter. Gilda's heckling had been as hilarious as the cartoon itself, which ended when the rabbit tricked the hunter into slamming into a mountainside with a cave painted on it. The dopey griffon had wobbled around with a goofy, gap-toothed grin and little tweeting birdies flying around his head. At the time, she had thought it was so funny that she had nearly snorted juice out of her nose. Rainbow Dash hurt. She hurt in places that she didn't even know she had places. She could vaguely remember tumbling out of control and crashing into something, but she had always had clouds to crash into before, and those rarely hurt much more than her pride. It was funny, though. As much pain as she was in, she could swear she heard birds tweeting, just like in that cartoon. Slowly cracking an eyelid open, Dash looked around and began to panic. Darkness was a foreign concept to the little pegasus, as it was for most creatures who lived their entire lives above the clouds. Even at night, when only the moon and stars shone down, the cloudstuff that their homes were made of diffused and filtered the light throughout the room so that she was never blind to her surroundings. Even in the movie theater, her father and friend had been there to distract her from the absence of light in the brief moment between the dimming of the house lights and beginning of the show. This was darkness. Everywhere she looked, her vision was blinded by shadow. The few tiny, frail flickers of light shining down like little stars only served to accentuate the fact that there was a wall between her and the sky. A wall of shadow keeping her trapped in an unfamiliar and hostile land. Dash wasn't going to stay there any longer than she had to, though. Fighting the pain with every movement, every breath, Rainbow Dash planted a hoof against the bizarrely solid ground beneath her and rolled herself upright. She tried to stretch her wings out and give them a few test flaps, but the instant she tried to move them, she screamed in agony as she felt the pain of a hundred daggers jabbing into her spine. She looked back over her shoulder, and as her eyes slowly adjusted to the grim dark of her surroundings, she shrieked at the top of her lungs when she saw the way one of her wings hung uselessly from its joint, the limb shattered and twisted almost beyond recognition. ----- "Holy hay, Rainbow! That's how you busted your wing?! How are you even alive?" Sunburn stared at Rainbow with wide, horrified eyes. She and Fluttershy both had their own wings clenched protectively against their sides. By contrast, Scootaloo just looked like she was mildly annoyed. "And what's with this storm? It crippled you, but you skipped right over it! Same with that friend you mentioned. What about them?" "Hey, it's my story, and I'll tell it the way I want," Rainbow testily replied as they reached the edge of the woods. The dirt road leading them back to Ponyville was nearby, so she led the way to it. "Besides... Gilda's a whole other story completely. As for the storm, it didn't matter how I broke my wing. I'm just sticking to the important stuff, like the bird." "What bird?" ----- As Rainbow Dash's horrified screams faded, they were replaced by the sounds of her gasping for breath as she hyperventilated, her eyes locked on the mangled limb. She was trapped. Trapped on the ground, in the middle of the Everfree Forest. Even up in the clouds, they told horror stories about the monstrous, pony-eating monsters that lurked in the darkness created by the thick canopy. That the trees themselves would scoop up and devour little ponies who got too close. In the sky, she had been all but fearless. Now, she knew what true terror was, and she felt like she was drowning in it. She was a wounded little pony, stuck in the most horrifying place in Equestria with no way out. A helpless snack for whichever carnivorous monster found her first. She needed to get out! She needed to fly away and escape back to the sky, where her mom and dad and best friend would be waiting for her! Somewhere where the trees weren't so thick that they were suffocating her while that constant chirping rang in her head over and over and over... Clutching her hooves to her head, Rainbow Dash threw herself to the ground and sobbed, "Stop! Stop it! I don't wanna be here! I wanna go home! Daddy...! Gilda...! Mom...! Somepony help meeeeee!" Despite her pleas, nopony came to her rescue. There was no grand fluttering of wings or beams of blessed sunlight shining down on her from above as her parents, Gilda, and the Wonderbolts themselves spread open the leafy canopy to carry her back home. Instead, what she got was the continued sound of frantic tweeting, and the feeling of something weakly beating against her hoof. With a start, Rainbow jumped and shook her head frantically as she realized that something was moving in her mane! The sudden movement easily dislodged it, and she raised her hoof to stomp on whatever hideous bug might have been crawling in her mane, just seconds away from sinking its venomous fangs into her head and paralyzing her so the rest of its family could come out and eat her alive! But it wasn't some disgusting little creature with too many legs. Instead, Rainbow Dash found herself looking down at a small yellow bird. It was just a chick, really, tweeting in distress as it flapped its tiny wings in vain, one of which looked bent the wrong way, much as her own was. That the first animal she saw was such a cute, harmless little thing took Rainbow by surprise. She just stood there, watching it struggle for a few moments before lowering her hoof. "Wh-what are you doing down here? Don't you know how dangerous it is?!" As if to answer her, the little chick momentarily stopped its tweeting and looked up at the filly with pleading little eyes. It then pointed its wing upward. Tilting her head up, Rainbow Dash's found her eyesight had adjusted more to the darkness of the forest, allowing her to see a path of bent and broken branches that she had struck during her fall. One of them held the scattered remnants of a nest. Rainbow felt a chill in the pit of her gut when she realized what must have happened. "You're hurt and trapped down here, too... because of me. I--" "Monster! Run!" Rainbow nearly jumped out of her skin, jolted out of her thoughts by what she could swear was a pony's voice! A search party? But it sounded like a filly's voice. Nopony would let a bunch of fillies fly down into the Everfree Forest. Oh no... oh, sweet Celestia! What if Gilda flew down alone to look for her?! ----- "W-w-wait! You actually heard that?" Sunburn interrupted. Rainbow sighed and stopped walking for a moment to look back and the Ranger. "Look, I know it's crazy. There wasn't anypony or griffon it could've been, but I swear I heard a voice at the time. Voices, actually..." ----- "You have to carry her! Get her out of here!" Just as Rainbow Dash was about to push her battered little body toward the source of the voice and try to help what she assumed was her friend, a second voice interrupted her. This one was higher and more girly than the other, but as confused as she was, the words 'carry her' struck a chord in the wounded filly. Looking back over her shoulder at the chick, which was still trying in vain to hop and flap back up into the safety of the tree branches above, she quickly realized how helpless it would be if anything came across it. And it would be Rainbow Dash's fault that it was crippled and stuck on the forest floor in the first place. Doing her best to jostle her broken wing as little as possible, Rainbow Dash hurried over to the chick and ducked her head down beneath it when it hopped up, letting the tiny bird land in her colorful mane. "Come on, we've gotta get outta here! I'll... I'll bring you back, I promise," she told it, meaning every word with all her heart. Surprisingly, the baby bird actually seemed to understand what Rainbow was saying. Or maybe her messy mane just felt enough like a nest. Either way, it held onto her hair with its tiny wings and talons. Rainbow Dash didn't have much time to let the chick settle in, though, as she heard a twig snap nearby. She immediately turned her head to see who or what was approaching. Just as immediately, she wished that she had taken the mysterious voice's advice and fled the instant she had the chance. Two orange eyes glared at her from the darkness as paws that seemed as large as the filly herself stalked toward her, bringing the monstrous form of a hungry manticore into view. It kept its body low to the ground, but its scorpion tail was raised as it prepared to pounce on its weak and wounded prey. Rainbow Dash felt her body stiffen with terror as her eyes locked on those of the huge predator. Death was creeping toward her, and she couldn't fly away from it. She was trapped as surely as if her hooves were bolted to the forest floor. ----- "That would have been the end of me, and everything I ever dreamed. But it wasn't as hopeless as it seemed," Rainbow told the Crusaders, pausing to lean in close. Despite it being the middle of the day, her face seemed to be cast in shadow as her voice took on an ominous tone. "Just as the monster was about to make me its lunch, there was a weird grinding, growling noise that sounded like something even bigger wanted to beat it to the punch! Maybe the voices I'd heard were just in my head, but the manticore sure heard this, and the instant it was distracted, I fled!" With a flourish of her good wing, Rainbow darted away and vanished from sight. The fillies and pegasi then spotted her living up to her last name as she dashed and darted between between the trees, even as she continued telling them, "I was more a flier than a runner back then, but I knew I'd do whatever it took to survive! But I didn't know where I was running to until I finally arrived." A flick of her wing into her dust pouch sent the green powder flying in front of Dash. The breeze she created made it take the form of a gnarled tree surrounded by frightening masks as she skidded to a stop in front of the group once more. "I didn't stop running until I caught sight of a dwelling far away from civilization. As scary as it looked, all I could do was hope it would be my salvation." ----- Rainbow Dash gasped for air, even when it felt like every breath brought a stabbing pain. Her little legs were on fire, but she kept pushing herself forward. Even when it felt like she was about to collapse and simply give up, though, the chick in her mane would tweet or clutch at her head, reminding her that it was there. That she had to keep going, even if she didn't know where to go. Still, determination alone could only take her so far. While the rest of her body hadn't suffered as badly as her wing, she was still hurt and exhausted beyond anything she'd ever felt before, and her young mind was overtaxed with the fear that the manticore she had narrowly escaped from might catch up to her at any moment. She was on a path, though. The ground beneath her hooves was marked with adult-sized hoofprints here and there. That meant that there was somepony who actually traveled safely through this terrible place. Or maybe it just meant that there had been somepony walking through at some point, and maybe they were killed and eaten ages ago. It wasn't like in the clouds, where hoofprints rarely lasted long. For all Rainbow knew, the hoofprints could be years old. Still, she followed them, dragging her tired body along until she saw a strange sight. The trail that she was following led straight to an old, gnarled tree. By itself, Rainbow wasn't surprised to see a tree in the middle of the forest. What did surprise her was that there was a door and windows built into the side of it, and the inside looked hollow from what she could tell. She had never seen a house built into a tree before, but the fact that there was a house at all meant that somepony did live out in the middle of the wilderness. What made this less than reassuring was the foreboding mask above the door. In the general shape of a pony's head, its eyes seemed to glare out at the little filly like a big 'Do Not Enter' sign. Not that she'd ever considered such things much more than guidelines in her reckless past, but it was desperation, not curiosity that led her to stagger and stumble toward the tree. Unfortunately, that was when her hoof decided to catch on a rock in her path, causing her to trip and fall on her face. Rainbow tried to pick herself up. To push herself those last few yards to get to the door and maybe... just maybe find some safety. But her body had chosen to give up instead. She could barely scratch at the ground in front of her, let alone support her weight. To top it off, her vision was swimming and she could barely even see in front of her as exhaustion came to claim her like a dark shroud. The last thing she was aware of before her consciousness slipped away was the sound of the chick in her mane tweeting frantically, then the door slowly creaking open to allow a dark figure hidden in a thick cloak to peer out at her. ----- When Rainbow awoke, it was to the sound of a mare's voice. For a moment, her tired mind almost thought that it was her mother. That she had been found, carried back up to Cloudsdale, and now she was about to be greeted by her friends and family. There were a few things that immediately gave away that this was not the case. For starters, she couldn't remember the last time her mom had sounded so calm. Then there was the indecipherable chant the mare was doing that sounded like alien gibberish to the little filly. And then, of course, there was what she saw when her vision came back into focus. She was inside the tree house, which had the layout of a small one-room shack. The bed she was resting in was on the side of the house opposite the only door, and all around her she could see more of those creepy masks looming over her, along with colorful bottles filled with things Rainbow couldn't even guess at. She wasn't alone, either. There in the middle of the room was a firepit with a large iron cauldron bubbling away while a robed figure faced away from her and slowly stirred its contents. "H... hello...?" Rainbow whispered. She then eeped in fright when the mare actually turned to look back at her, half-revealing a grey face with two large eyes that almost seemed to glow from beneath the shadows of her hood. Suddenly (and most certainly without wanting to) Rainbow's mind returned to a time just a few weeks ago, when the other fillies and colts had been telling scary stories in the dim light of the new moon. Letting out a loud and very uncharacteristically high-pitched "eep," Rainbow clutched the blankets covering her tiny body and stammered, "A-are you the... the O-ol-olden P-pony...?!" There was a brief pause, and Rainbow gulped as she saw the glowing eyes narrow at her. "Ha... haha... hahahaha!" The robed mare started to laugh, and the easygoing, mirthful tone of it contrasted sharply with her intimidating attire. "Neigh, little one, it is not at death's door that you did fall," she told the filly while reaching up to pull back her robe's hood. When she did, Rainbow saw that the grey mare had a striped coat, and her mane was a stiff mohawk while large golden rings decorated her ears and neck. "... Nor am I a pony at all. Zecora is the name by which I'm known. What is yours, and how did you come to wander the Everfree all alone?" Despite her somewhat unusual look, Rainbow felt herself growing more at ease upon seeing her rescuer's face. "It's Rainbow Dash," she replied before remembering something. "Wait! I wasn't alone...! There was a bird, and..." Zecora interrupted Rainbow by raising a hoof and placing it against the filly's muzzle. "Now, now, no need to worry yourself sick. I've also tended to that little chick." She then pointed to a nearby shelf where some bottles had been moved aside to make room for a small, makeshift nest. Zecora turned her attention back to Rainbow and smiled warmly. "I promise you that as long as you are with me, you have nothing to fear. Now, child, why don't you tell Zecora how you came to be here?" ----- By this point, the small herd of ponies had left Whitetail Woods and were walking past some of the farms surrounding Ponyville. "So, I told her my story. My best friend, Gilda, dared me to fly into a big storm over the Everfree. By the time we realized just how dangerous it really was, it was too late. She tried to pull me to safety, but a bolt of lightning knocked me out of her grip and sealed my fate. When I was done, Zecora told me about where she came from. That she was a shaman from Zebrica before making the Everfree Forest her home." Shifting her walking stance into a three-legged gait for a bit, Rainbow Dash reached back to feel her twisted wing. "She had balms to soothe my cuts and bruises, and helped me recover my strength with some nutritious juices. For my wing, though, all she could do was ease the pain. But she still did more for me than I can easily explain." ----- "Whattaya mean you can't fix it?! You have to! I can't fly without it," Rainbow Dash all but screamed. Now that she wasn't afraid of being pounced on and eaten at any second, the reality and consequences of her injuries was given time to truly sink in. "I am sorry, Rainbow, but pegasus wings are delicate. I do not think that I can properly set all the bones in it," Zecora apologized as she gently bound the twisted appendage to a makeshift splint. It was tight and uncomfortable, but it kept her from moving her broken wing by accident and causing herself further pain. "A doctor of your own kind will be better suited to treating your condition. Until then, helping you to regain your strength is my mission." Despite the zebra's kindness, Rainbow protested, "You don't understand! I live up in the sky... if I can't fly, I can't do anything!" "And you may do so, yet. No need to shout," Zecora patiently replied. "The future is unknown and you still need to heal, but for now there is still something you can do to help me out." Zecora walked over to the shelf where she'd placed the chick's substitute nest, and used her mouth to carry it over to the bed. With the chick presented to her, Rainbow could again see that one of its wings wasn't working right. Despite the herbal painkillers Zecora had given her, she still winced in sympathy pain at the sight. "What can I do? I'm no vet. I don't know how to..." "Without our help, this bird will never achieve flight. I must ask you to help me set things right," Zecora replied. "I know it is not an easy thing of you I ask, but only your small hooves can perform this delicate task." Rainbow Dash's body tensed up as the chick looked up at her and chirped plaintively, filling the young pegasus with a who new kind of fear. She was just a little filly! A flying prodigy and embodiment of awesomeness, sure, but... but she'd never been responsible for another creature before. Especially one that was so small and fragile. And now she was being asked to do something that would determine the rest of this bird's entire life. What if she screwed up? Rainbow was grounded now, but she'd been flying for as long as she could remember. That feeling of absolute freedom. The rush of wind in her face as she beat her wings in defiance of a world trying to pull her down. But here was a creature that was depending on her, and if she failed, it would never know that feeling. It would be her fault all over again. "I can't... I-I can't," she protested, trying to squirm back away from Zecora. "If I do something wrong..." "Then it will be no worse than if you did nothing at all," Zecora gently interrupted. She reached out a hoof to reassuringly touch Rainbow's shoulder, but minced no words as she explained, "It cannot heal properly so long as you stall. Do as I say and I will tell you how, but if this creature's wing is to be saved, it should be done now." Rainbow Dash swallowed and looked down at her hooves. They were trembling. Her whole body was. No more than a few hours ago, she had been afraid for her life. This was different. Here she was, with another creature's future in her hooves, and here she was so weak and frightened that she wouldn't trust herself to hold so much as a ball of cloud. But there was Zecora, looking at her with calm blue eyes and face that betrayed no hint of any doubt whatsoever. "Try something else, then. Close your eyes and allow yourself to give in to the fear, but only until the count of ten. Fear is a warning which tells us when we must run, but never let it keep you from what must be done." Rainbow looked back and forth between the kind zebra and the bird she'd hurt. The bird who was depending on her to make things better. Taking a deep breath, Rainbow closed her eyes and began to count. "One... two..." Flashes of terrifying things played out when she shut her eyes, like a movie being projected against the inside of her eyelids. "Three... Four..." It seemed like it was playing backwards. The nervousness of approaching Zecora's dwelling. The terror of fleeing from certain death into the unknown. Finding herself alone in the darkness of the forest. But even before that... "Five... Six..." When she got down to it, it was all her own fault. Gilda had dared her to play chicken with that wild storm. If she hadn't been so concerned with looking cool to her friend, none of this would've happened. She didn't have the right to think that she could just fix things like she wasn't the one who'd messed up in the first place. "Seven... eight..." But she didn't have the right to do nothing, either. Not if there was anything that she could do that would give the bird at least a chance at a life. "N-nine... ten." Rainbow inhaled again and opened her eyes. She looked at the bird, then to Zecora and asked, "So... what do I do?" ----- Rainbow Dash paused in her tracks and turned to look back at the fillies following her. "She could've done it herself, y'know," she told them. "Whattaya mean?" Scootaloo asked, cocking her head. "Zecora. She didn't really need my help, but she could tell that I did," Rainbow replied, slipping back out of rhyme. "Maybe she didn't know just how badly my wings were hurt, but it's like I told her; I'd lived in Cloudsdale my whole life. Not being able to fly up there means you can hardly do anything. It means being completely helpless, relying on other ponies just to get around. When she got me to help save that chick's wing, she was telling me that no matter what happened, I could keep living without just being a load. "More than anything else she did for me, helping another broken creature get their life back gave me the strength to keep going. Even when..." Rainbow Dash trailed off for a bit and turned her head, looking up to the clouds. "She helped me get out of the woods and into Ponyville so I could send a message to my folks. They picked me up and took me to a hospital in Cloudsdale. The whole thing's kind of a blur, but after the docs looked me over, they told us... it wasn't just the broken bones. Those could've been put back together if I went through the surgery for it, but there was massive nerve damage. Thanks to Zecora, I was in as good a shape as I possibly could've been, but my body's pegasus magic just couldn't get into that wing again, and there was no way to fix it. "When they told me that, I was so stunned that I didn't even realize it until my parents started freaking out, and I saw that these had appeared." Rainbow turned her body to give everypony a clear view of her cutie mark. A cracked rainbow with wraps of gauze holding it together. Scootaloo and Sunburn both winced at the thought. Fluttershy, however, became a yellow and pink blur that nearly tackled Rainbow to the ground while delivering a crushing hug. "Ack! Hey, Fluttershy, it's okay! Seriously!" Fluttershy sniffled. "I'm sorry, Rainbow! It's just so sad..." Apple Bloom sullenly added, "Yeah... it'd be lahk gettin' mah cutie mark fer losin' mah buckin' legs." "Or getting my horn snapped off before I get to learn any spells," Sweetie Belle squeaked fearfully, bringing a dainty hoof up to cover her horn. "No... no, that's not what it means," Rainbow interjected, pushing Fluttershy to arms-length before she could start sobbing on her. "That's what my folks and best friend thought, too, but they were wrong. It's not about me being crippled. Yeah, I went into shock when the Doc said what I was afraid of; that I'd never be able to fly right again. For a little while, I tried telling myself that he was a quack and my parents would find somepony else who could fix my wing. Deep down, though, I was thinking something else. 'I can still live!' "That's what my cutie mark means. Maybe I'm not mint condition anymore, but I held together, even when I should have broken, and the kindness of a stranger helped me do it. More than that, I could help other creatures do the same. That's why I went back down to live with teach. I mean... if I'd been smarter about it, maybe I could've gone and become a regular doctor, but at the time, things happened that made me feel like I had to leave. Plus, I wanted to learn what I could from the mare who'd helped me." Rainbow looked around, hoping that the others would understand what she was trying to say. Fluttershy's eyes were still a bit watery, but was looking at her with a proud smile on her face. Sunburn looked like she didn't know what to think, but as for the fillies, Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle seemed to be thinking it over while Scootaloo looked down at the ground. Fearing that her story might have inadvertantly struck a nerve about Scootaloo's own trouble with learning to fly, Rainbow asked, "Scootaloo? You okay there, squirt?" "You know, Rainbow Dash..." The little pegasus was quiet for a moment before tilting the brim of her hat back so she could look up at Rainbow Dash as if for the first time. And if the sparkle in her eyes was anything to go by, she liked what she saw. "You're actually really cool!" Jumping up onto her hind legs, Scootaloo flapped her wings to make her cape billow dramatically behind her. "Not as cool as Mare-Do-Well, of course, but that's one hay of an origin story! A flying prodigy crippled in her youth, who ventures deep into a forbidden forest to learn the ways of an exotic mystic from a far-off land! You're practically a superhero!" Rainbow snorted in amusement and reminded her, "Whattaya mean 'practically'? You forget about the time I... what was it again? Oh right. Saved Equestria." "Yeah, that's cool," Scootaloo admitted with a shrug. "But that was a team effort. Mare-Do-Well could've done it solo." "Oh come on, an army of vamponies, an ancient labyrinth and Eclipse? Nope, no way. Now, maybe Daring Doo could've pulled that off, but--" Fluttershy let out a giggle, her spirits returning upon seeing Rainbow and Scootaloo engaging in playful bickering. "You know, I was there too," she reminded them before adding, "... and the Power Ponies would've had to rescue both of them." "WHAT?! She never needs rescuing," both pegasi simultaneously snapped back in defense of their personal heroines. Before they could get in Fluttershy's face about it, though, she squealed with laughter and pranced off into Ponyville, having reached the edge of town. "Hey, get back here so we can tell you how you're wrong," Scootaloo shouted while Fluttershy led them down the street toward the Bean There, Done That.