//------------------------------//
// 6 Years 
// Story: My Little Rainbows 
// by The PatioHeater 
//------------------------------//

“I want to go home,” Shine whined.
“Quiet Shine, I have had enough of your moaning for one day.”
“But I don’t want to do this!” she screamed, on the brink of throwing a tantrum. “I want to go home!”
Rainbow growled quietly to herself and stopped walking. She turned and looked down to Shine.
“Shine. Listen to me and listen well. This is Dash’s day, so I won’t let you ruin it.”
“But air shows are boring!”
“Shine. One more word out of you and I will make you come back here tomorrow as well.”
Shine opened her mouth and took a deep breath, about to start screaming.
“Shine!” Rainbow shouted before she could start. “We do this every year. On you and your sisters’ birthday, we have a little party together.
“Then the first Saturday afterwards is Swirl’s day, and we went to the cinema like she wanted.
“Then the next Saturday is your day, and we went to the zoo like you wanted.
“And the third is for Dash, and she wanted to come here. And she didn’t like the zoo either, she found it boring, but she didn’t moan all day, she at least tried to enjoy it. So you WILL do the same.”
“But Mummy-!”
“NO! I don’t want to hear another word out of you for the rest of the day. Just try to enjoy yourself and you won’t be as bored, okay?”
“Bu-.”
Rainbow glared at her.
Shine receded, knowing she had been defeated.
Rainbow sighed with relief. She couldn’t handle another tantrum.
“MUMMY! MUMMY!” Dash shouted excitedly. “We’re here!” She started pointing frantically to the entrance gate.
Rainbow chuckled at her excitement. “Yes we are, Dashie. Are you excited?”
“YEAH!”
“Good. Enjoy your day, Dashie. It’s going to be awesome!”
“YEAH!” Dash charged forward into the crowd queuing to get in. “C’mon Fluttershy!” she shouted back, beckoning with a waving hoof.
Fluttershy smiled and ran after her best friend.
“Dash! Wait!” Rainbow ran after her.
“Fluttershy! Wait!” Airheart, Fluttershy’s mother, ran after her.
Sass sighed. “This is going to be fun,” she said sarcastically.



Rainbow and her six year old fillies walked through the surprisingly small commotion of the air show, with Rainbow and Fluttershy leading the pack. Sass and her family had split off from the group to go see some other attraction.
Rainbow watched her slightly youngest walking side by side with Fluttershy, her best friend since the start of school.
“You know, Airheart, it makes me smile those two together.”
“Really? Why?” Airheart replied curiously.
“Well, I don’t know, they’re just really good friends, aren’t they. As soon as I mentioned coming here for her birthday she asked if Fluttershy could come. That was her first question.”
“Really? That’s nice. I'm so glad my little Fluttershy made a friend, but for that friend to be Rainbow Dash is fantastic.”
Rainbow tittered. “Thanks, but why, exactly?”
“As you probably can guess, Fluttershy is very shy. But it used to be worse; she would only talk to me or her family, and never anypony she didn’t know. She would sort of cease up and freeze completely around strangers, and especially in crowds. But to be friends with Rainbow Dash, one of the most popular kids in her year, it gave her a huge confidence boost. Just look at her! She wouldn’t have dared to come to a place like this before Dash.”
“I'm glad Dashie had such a good influence on her then. And I must say Fluttershy’s been brilliant to Dash as well.”
“Really? How’d you figure?”
“She was really energetic before, and I mean really energetic. I was getting slightly worried, if I'm honest. I was even thinking of going to a doctor’s to see if she had that hyperactivity thing.”
“ADHD is what you’re thinking of. I was thinking of having Fluttershy tested for that!” Airheart laughed slightly.
Rainbow smiled and shook her head. “Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah. Well, then she became friends with Fluttershy, and she calmed down massively. I mean, if Fluttershy hadn’t come about, do you know how hard I would have to be working to keep her under control here?”
Airheart shook her head.
“I wouldn’t be able to let her walk by herself, for a start.”
Airheart laughed slightly. “I'm glad they’re such good friends. They work well together, don’t you think?”
“Yeah. But I don’t know WHY?! I'm mean, Dashie is an energetic little speedster, Fluttershy a timid, shy Pegasus; they shouldn’t work at all.”
“I know what you mean, but I guess that’s why they do work.”
“I'm not even sure how they became friends.”
“Really? Dash never told you?”
“Of course not. She’s not like that; she’s too awesome, as she says, to go into detail. She just told me she made a friend called Fluttershy and that she’s awesome, that’s all.”
Airheart beamed at Dash’s compliment to her daughter. “Oh, you should have said earlier. Fluttershy told me all about it.”
Rainbow sighed. “It’s gonna be cute, isn’t it?”
“I think so. But then again, I may be biased, as she is my daughter…


Fluttershy always stayed at the back of the classroom, trying to avoid all attention. Even if she knew the answer she wouldn’t dare put her hoof up.
And when it came to playtime, the only difference was that she was outside, still she avoided attention.
She watched from a distance, all the other fillies and colts play various games together. She envied them, but was too scared to ask to join in. But then Rainbow Dash appeared in front of her one day.
“Hey Fluttershy!” she chirped excitedly.
Fluttershy jumped and cowered slightly. “Hi Rainbow Dash,” her voice drifted off into a less than a quiet mumble.
“Wanna play tiggy with us?” Rainbow asked hopefully as she pointed to a gathering of five or so children standing around impatiently.
“Um… I don’t know.”
“Oh come on! It’ll be awesome!” she egged on.
“I-I don’t know how to play,” she whimpered sheepishly.
“It’s easy. I’ll teach ya!”
Fluttershy glanced shyly upwards at the filly; she seemed friendly. “Um… O-okay then.”
She hesitantly got to her hooves and started walking with Rainbow Dash. “H-how do you play then?”
“It’s real easy. All you have to do is run away from it so he doesn’t catch you, and if he puts his hoof on you and shouts IT you become it, then you have to chase everypony else and tag somepony else. Sounds fun, doesn’t it?”
“Err…” Fluttershy wanted to say no, but she had already arrived at the group and they were already running.
“Thunderlane’s it,” Rainbow instructed. “RUN!”
She bolted off, leaving a confused and terrified Fluttershy behind.
Fluttershy looked around, frozen with panic, trying to formulate a plan, when she decide that trying to keep up with Rainbow Dash was her best bet for safety.

Ten minutes had past. Rainbow Dash was currently trying to out-fly Spitfire, and not doing very good at it.
She was distracted as a thought came to mind. Her wings slowed and Spitfire crashed straight into the back of her. They fell in a heap on the ground.
“Hey! Watch it!” screamed the angry yellow filly, her voice breaking midsentence. “That hurt!” She rubbed her nose to get the pain away.
“Where’s Fluttershy?” Dash asked, ignoring Spitfire and her problems entirely.
“Who cares?” she said menacingly. “She’s no fun.”
Dash scanned her eyes over the field. She picked out the small, yellow Pony at the other end of the field easily. “What’s she doing over there?” she asked herself.
“Who cares?” Spitfire said impatiently. “I tagged you, you’re it!”
“No,” Dash insisted. “That’s not fair, I was distracted.”
“That’s not my fault,” Spitfire said pompously as she walked away, holding her nose ironically high up in the air.
“No. I'm not it. I'm not playing anymore.”
“Just because you’re it!” Spitfire teased.
“No, I want to see if Fluttershy’s alright.”
“Fine. But you can’t play later then,” Spitfire stated sternly, stomping her hoof on the ground to emphasise her point.
“Oh,” Dash frowned.
“Okay. You can play. But not her.” She pointed to Fluttershy with a threatening hoof.
“Why not?”
“Because she’s not fast enough to keep up.”
“So? Neither are you!” Dash teased.
“HEY!” Spitfire roared angrily. “I'm a billion times faster than you!”
“Oh yeah?!”
“YEAH!”
Dash stared blankly at her for a second. “I'm bored. I'm gonna see Fluttershy.”
“Fine. Suit yourself.” Spitfire turned back to her gang. “Okay, Soarin’ is it!”
Dash ran off towards the shy Pegasus as she heard the annoyed moans coming from a weak willed colt.

Fluttershy heard the sound of hooves landing in front of her and looked up. Seeing Rainbow Dash and not an unfriendly face comforted her.
“Um… hi Rainbow Dash.”
“What are you doing over here? We’re over there playing tiggy not over here!” Dash said with a hint of mockery in her voice.
“I don’t… I don’t like tiggy,” Fluttershy mumbled.
Dash gasped dramatically. “You don’t like tiggy?!”
Fluttershy shook her head.
“But… but everypony likes tiggy!”
“I'm not… good enough to play tiggy.”
“Oh,” Dash frowned.
Fluttershy hid behind a hoof to save herself the embarrassment. She was waiting for Dash to just shrug and walk away to rejoin her friends.
She jumped as she felt the ground beside her shake, for Dash had just landed beside her with a thud.
“What do you wanna do then?” Dash asked.
Fluttershy looked baffled. She stared blankly at the other filly for a little too long for comfort.
“Err, Fluttershy? Hellooo?” Dash sang childishly.
The yellow filly jumped back to reality. “Err… I don’t know. What do you want to do?”
“Well I wanna play tiggy, but you don’t.”
“You can play tiggy without me, I don’t mind.” She did really.
“Nope. Tell me, what you wanna do,” Dash ordered.
Fluttershy shivered a little. “Err… I don’t mind.”
Dash glared at her.
Fluttershy went into a mild panic and managed to say something. “Do you know any jokes?”
Dash shook her head.
“I do. Do you want to hear one?”
Dash smiled and nodded frantically.
“Okay then. This is one of my favourites. Err…

“A colt goes into a bar and sits next to another. He sees a spider on the top and turns to the colt and says, do you want to hear something interesting about spiders?
The other colt says, sure!
“So the first colt turns back to the spider on the bar and tells the spider to walk over there, and the spider does. Then the colt pulls off one of its legs and tells the spider to walk back over there, and the spider does. He pulls off another leg and repeats this until he comes down to the last leg. He pulls it off and tells the spider to walk over there. The spider doesn’t move. He tells it again, and it still doesn’t move.
“So the colt turns back to the other colt and says, so here’s my theory, when a spider loses all its legs… it goes deaf.”

Fluttershy turned to face Dash with a smile on her face to see how she reacted. She so hoped she hadn’t made a fool of herself.
Dash thought hard for a brief second to understand the joke. And then a smile broke out over her face and a small laugh came from her.
“I love it, Fluttershy!” she laughed. “Deaf spiders! HA!”
Fluttershy started laughing now, feeling much more confident after making the popular filly laugh at her joke.

The bell rang, signalling for the children to head back to class. Everypony moaned simultaneously.
Dash jumped up and started a quick pace back to the classroom.
Fluttershy was waiting for everypony else to get in front of her before she moved, she didn’t like being in crowds.
Dash stopped once she realised the yellow filly was following her. She went back to collect her.
“Hey Fluttershy!” she called out loudly as she ran she jumped to a halt in front of the Pegasus. “Wanna sit with me at my table?”
Fluttershy lit up and nodded excitedly, happy to have made a friend. But she quickly realised that this meant she had to interact with other Ponies, which she would still rather not do. She bowed her head away shyly and didn’t move any further.
Dash sighed. “C’mon, Fluttershy. It’ll be fun! And I think Soarin’ likes you,” she sang childishly.
Fluttershy couldn’t deny she liked that particular colt, and so hesitantly walked forward and toward school.
“Um, but Dash, is there room on your table for me as well?”
“We can give Spitfire the boot. I don’t like her very much.”



Rainbow considered the story, pouting her lips as she thought hard. “That’s not as cute as I thought it would be,” she sounded disappointed.
“Well I did say I might be biased because, you know, Fluttershy and all. I guess I was just proud of her making a friend with such ease.”
“Yes but, y’know, Rainbow Dash and all.”
“True.”
“But I must admit, I nearly cracked up at that spider joke,” she admittedly rather ashamedly.
“I know what you mean. I don’t even know where she heard it.”
“Maybe she came up with it all by herself?” Rainbow suggested, but doubted that from what she knew of Fluttershy.
“It’s possible, but I doubt she would voluntarily make up a joke about dismembering a spider.”
“I suppose.”
There was a moment of semi-awkward silence.
“Hey,” Rainbow started. “Whatever happened to that Spitfire filly? Dash used to talk about her quite a bit, almost like an idol really.”
“I heard that she and Soarin’ got accepted into that oh… what is it? That Gifted Wings Flight Academy, or something like that.”
“Wow! Really?” Rainbow was taken aback slightly. “That’s impressive. They’re only what? Six?”
“Yeah, but you saw them at sports day that one time. The other children didn’t stand a chance.”
Rainbow tutted and rolled her eyes. “Oh yeah, don’t remind me. Dash was throwing tantrums for a week afterwards. She hates losing.”
“I know, Fluttershy told me. You should have heard the language she used.”
Rainbow looked at Airheart. “Language?” she asked, already feeling angry at her daughter for using bad language.
“Yep. Nothing too bad, just something she shouldn’t learn until she’s a teenager.”
“Like what?” Rainbow insisted.
“Damn, I think.”
“Oh.” Rainbow looked away, she was disappointed for reasons she couldn’t explain, it was as if she wanted Dash to swear.
“I told you it was nothing bad. But don’t worry, Fluttershy told her off.”
Rainbow chuckled. “Really?”
“Yeah. Dash really listens to her.”
“That’s good to know. I could use that to my advantage one day.”
Airheart laughed a little. “Only if I can use Dash as an excuse to make Fluttershy be less shy.”
“Deal,” Rainbow said enthusiastically.
They shook hooves semi jokingly.

An announcement came over the sound system.
Dash lit up as she heard it. She spun round and talked at her mother.
“Mummy! Mummy! Can we see him?!” she asked excitedly.
Rainbow stumbled back a bit as her daughter was suddenly hovering mere inches from her face.
“Err… yeah, sure!” She composed herself quickly. “Who is it you want to see?”
“Jet Stream!”
“Who?”
“He’s an ex-Wonderbolt!”
“Really? I wonder how old he is?” she asked herself. Usually Wonderbolts only retire when they’re too old to fly or if the unthinkable happens.
Airheart pondered the question for a moment as well. “I think… I remember hearing about him a while ago. I don’t think he’s old at all.”
“Oh, alright.” Rainbow liked the sound of that.

They had managed to get a position at the front of the crowd, thanks to Sass, who had rejoined them, and her persuasive ways.
Dash hung on the rope barrier that separated a large portion of field. She would have been bouncing up and down if her hooves were on the ground.
“Shine, please, just stop looking so glum,” Rainbow pleaded once again as she saw the scowl on her daughter’s face.
Shine didn’t obey; instead she folded her forelegs and pouted harder, scowling at her mother with nothing but anger for dragging her there.
“You could at least pretend,” Rainbow suggested hopefully.
“Hmph,” Shine frowned, contorting her face angrier.
“If you keep pulling that face it will stay like that.”
“No it won’t,” Shine mumbled under her breath.
“A-ha! You finally spoke!” Rainbow celebrated sarcastically. “Now tell me, why aren’t you enjoying this?”
Shine looked away. “I don’t know,” she mumbled.
“Well, maybe, just here me out here, maybe… if you try to enjoy it, you will. How does that sound?”
Shine didn’t falter in her expression, she knew her mother was right.
“I thought as much, Shiny. So, will you try? For me?” Rainbow asked, smiling sweetly in the hopes to sway the moody filly.
Shine didn’t respond.
“I’ll take that as a yes then.” Rainbow turned back around triumphantly. She saw the stallion that got Dash all excited.
Her pupils dilated slightly as she saw she him and a tiny smile curled to her lips.
Sass noticed and tried her hardest not to laugh.

The stallion in the field looked up and shot a charismatic smile at everypony, none of whom felt anything, except Rainbow, who melted on the inside.
He looked back with a dramatically determined expression, looking up to the sun into which he was about to fly.
He raised his dark brown wings and ruffled them. He stepped a hoof back and leant back on it. He launched himself upwards and forwards with great speed.

He flew through the air at tremendous speeds, performing death defying stunts.
Rainbow almost jumped over the barrier to rescue him at one point as he rocketed towards the ground, nose pointing straight down. Rainbow thought he had fainted.
Her heart raced as she watched him plummet to the ground, but in at the perfect moment, he opened his wings and brought himself parallel to the ground and just over the crowds’ heads.
Rainbow dived to the ground as he nearly hit her head, but she looked back up to see him fly off again. She couldn’t help but think he looked good flying.

He continued to toy with Rainbow’s panicking heart for the next ten or so minutes. He so often looked as if about to crash, but he never did. Obviously this was because he was a Wonderbolt.
One particular move that impressed her was his high speed trot. She couldn’t believe he wasn’t breaking his legs with each step.
She could hear her daughter’s awestruck “whoa” over the roar of the crowd, which made her smile.

Jet Stream looked down to his adoring fans, managing to just hear their cheers and whoops over the rushing of wind past his ears.
He looped to a halt, showing off his strong winds proudly. He could get a proper look and listen of the crowd now, and he was slightly disappointed.
“I guess the wind made it seem louder then,” he mumbled to himself.
He looked down for a second longer, at all the faces looking back up at him, with mouths hanging agape and cheers falling from them, as was the norm. But one face caught his eye. It didn’t match the others, it wasn’t excited at all. It was just smiling at him, staring at him with the most beautiful eyes of rose.
He couldn’t help but smile back.

Jet Stream turned after another second of admiring the Pegasus mare below and rocketed off again.
He needed speed for his next trick, and a lot of it. He needed speed to break the sound barrier and, if he was lucky, the light barrier as well.
He flew rather lazily, he would admit, as if he couldn’t really be bothered anymore. He was so tired, but he couldn’t leave his fans with a half hearted performance, so he kept speeding up, deciding that the length of time it took would heighten the anticipation.
He looked down to his side and to the crowd, just to see if he could see her anymore. His attention, however, wasn’t focused on finding her amidst the Pegasi anymore, for a small filly was flying beside.
He looked away again to give the apparition a chance to disappear, and looked back. It was still there. A small, blue filly with a short mane of rainbow.
“Err… hi?” he said rather awkwardly, doubting she could hear him over the wind. But apparently she did, as she smiled at him.
“What are you doing up here?” he asked with both curiosity but mainly confusion.
The filly didn’t respond. Instead, her smile faded and her eyes drooped and shut lightly. Her wings stopped flapping and she started to fall from the sky.

Rainbow was dreamily watching the stallion in the sky, barely questioning why he had stopped. It wasn’t until she saw the faintest movement of blue against the equally blue sky when dread shot into her heart.
She looked down at the rope at where Dash was holding on.
Her eyes widened as panic flooded her system. She wasn’t there.
Rainbow looked back up at the sky, and could now make out the slight colour of a rainbow plummeting towards her.
“DASH!” she shouted as she erupted from behind the barrier, mustering all the speed she could to catch her child in time.

Jet Stream stared in wide eyed horror as the filly fell from him in slow motion.
It didn’t take him long to fly after her.
A series of vortex rings formed in his wake thanks to his huge burst of acceleration. He caught up with the falling filly in a matter of seconds.
He barely noticed the audience gasp.
He flew beside her, matching her speed before rolling into her and catching her, holding her tight against his chest so she wouldn’t slip from his grasp.
He beat his wings hard to slow his descent, coming to a gentle halt a few feet above the ground.
He landed on the field and fell to his haunches, cradling the child in his foreleg.
“Are you alright?” he asked her, but got no response.
“Dash!” shouted a mare.
Jet looked up and saw the beautiful Pegasus flying over to him a great speed. He braced for impact, making sure to shield the child.
Rainbow landed clumsily beside him. She quickly gathered her bearings and looked at her daughter. She could feel tears almost starting to fall.
“She’s okay,” Jet reassured her. “She’s just passed out.”
Rainbow started crying slightly.
“That wasn’t the best thing to say, was it?” he said to himself, practically calling himself an idiot. “What I meant was she’s tired. She was easily keeping up with me up there in the sky, so I imagine she’s just exhausted.”
Rainbow sniffed and dried her eyes. She carefully took her daughter back and held her gently in her forelegs.
“Thank you. Thank you so much,” she said in a teary voice.
“There’s no need to thank me. I wouldn’t have just let her fall now, would I?”
Rainbow didn’t pay any attention to what he just said as Dash had started to stir.
Dash wearily blinked her eyes half open and turned her head slowly to face her mother.
“Sorry… Mummy,” she whispered, her exhaustion slowing her talking to a snail’s pace. “Are you mad at me?”
“Of course not, Dashie. Of course not,” she whispered back and kissed her forehead.
Dash’s eyes drifted shut again as she fell back asleep.
“I think you should take her home,” Jet instructed. “I seen first hoof what that kind of exhaustion can do to a Pony. Plenty of bed rest is what she needs.”
“Thank you err… Jet Stream? Was it?” She didn’t really care if she was right at that moment, just as long as Dash was okay.
“That’s right. And you are?” he asked politely.
“Rainbow Swirl. Call me Rainbow.”
“That’s a nice name. And what about this little Pegasus?”
“Rainbow Dash.”
Jet snorted. “How very fitting. I must say, though, she is quite the flyer for a… six year old?” he guessed.
Rainbow nodded.
“Very impressive indeed,” he reiterated.
“Not unlike yourself,” Rainbow accidentally blurted out but didn’t care in the slightest
“Thanks.” He looked to the filly. “Y’know, I have a little girl like that.”
Rainbow frowned slightly. “Oh…”
“My niece Fleetfoot is always begging me to take her flying.”
Rainbow looked up again. “Your… niece?” she asked hopefully.
“Yeah. She’s over there with my sister, who is her mother of course.” He looked over to the crowd and waved at a small Pegasus filly.
Rainbow glanced over and saw a blue filly with a white mane, wearing flight goggles on her forehead, waving back enthusiastically. Behind her was a tall, cream mare, who just happily nodded in reply to Jet’s wave.
“So… do you have any kids of your own?” Rainbow asked curiously.
“Nope.”
“Ah… What about a wife? Or marefriend?” she asked, trying to sound cool and nonchalant, but not doing too well.
He sighed. “No.”
“Oh,” Rainbow sounded a little too happy for her liking, making her blush slightly.
Jet Stream looked back to Dash. A serious look spread over his face, which had a hint of relief in it as he was glad to move away from this topic.
“Can I just take a look at her for a second?” he asked.
Rainbow became worried and she looked at him with panicked eyes. “Why?”
“Her breathing looks a little slow. I just want to check her pulse.”
Rainbow nodded before slowly lessening her grip on her child in a jerky motion.
Jet lifted Dash’s foreleg out of the way and placed a hoof on her chest.
There was a short moment of silence as he counted to himself.
He pulled his hoof back and allowed Rainbow to take her child again. “It seems a bit low.”
“Is that bad?” Rainbow asked worriedly.
“No, not at all. She just needs some proper rest, in a bed and everything.”
Rainbow nodded and stood up so she could place Dash on her back. “Thanks for saving her. I owe you one.”
“You don’t owe me anything.”
“Trust me, I do.” She turned to leave. “I’ll hopefully see you around.”
“Yeah, you too!”
Rainbow shot him a smile before starting off walking at a careful pace, so as to not disturb her Dashie on her back.

Rainbow trotted back over to the rest of her entourage.
“C’mon girls,” she said to her remaining daughters. “We have to go now.”
“YES!” Shine celebrated. Swirl didn’t really care.
“I'm glad you’re finally in a good mood,” Rainbow jested as she ushered them through the slowly dissipating crowd.
Fluttershy looked up to her mother. “Mummy?”
“Yes, Fluttershy?”
“Can I go with Rainbow back to her house? I want to make sure Dash is okay.”
“I think you better ask Rainbow. Dash looks like she needs some rest.”
“Okay,” she said sadly, knowing that it was unlikely, but she asked Rainbow anyway.
“R-Rainbow? C-can I come round and look after Dash?” she asked nervously.
Rainbow considered it for a second. “I suppose you can, yes. But you have to let her rest, which means no talking or anything to her.”
“Okay, I promise I will be quiet.” Fluttershy smiled and trotted excitedly beside her.
“I better come too then, I guess,” Airheart decided.

They all flew back carefully. Sass had to part ways with her family at some point leaving Fluttershy and Airheart flying back the Rainbow’s house.
Rainbow landed delicately on the path by her house and quickly went to unlock the door. She fumbled around with her head in her bag for a second before pulling out a set of keys. Once inside she quickly flew up stairs and put Dash to sleep in her own, big bed.
She placed her down on the bed gently, and pulled the quilt ever her. Dash stirred slightly but Rainbow placed a hoof on her forehead and calmed her down.
“Ssh, now, Dashie,” she whispered tenderly. “You get some rest. You did some good flying today, and I dare say you’ll ache tomorrow. Sweet dreams.” She finished her words with a kiss on her cheek before standing to close the curtains and leaving the room, closing the door behind her with a gentle click.

Rainbow jumped slightly as Fluttershy had been waiting on the landing, with nary a sound coming from her, as usual.
“Oh, hey, Fluttershy,” Rainbow said quietly as she calmed down. “Are you okay?”
“Yes, thank you,” Fluttershy replied politely. “Can I see Dash? I want to make sure she’s okay.”
“Err… sure. Just make sure you don’t make a noise.”
“I’ll try.” She stepped forward to the door, but paused and looked up to Rainbow. “Could I nap with her? I'm very tired.”
Rainbow considered it for a second. “Okay. But remember, do not disturb Dashie.”
“I promise I won’t.”
“Good girl,” Rainbow praised with a little smile. She pushed the door open quietly and let Fluttershy tip-hoof in before shutting it again.
She let out a little titter as she heard the almost silent rustling of quilt as Fluttershy climbed under it with Dash.
She headed downstairs.

Airheart was sitting on the sofa, waiting for Rainbow to return, watching the other little Rainbows play in the living room.
She looked round as she heard hooves coming from the hallway. “Hey, is Dash alright?”
“Yeah, she’s fine. She’s asleep.”
“Good. And what about Fluttershy? Didn’t she follow you up there?”
“She did, but she said she was tired and wanted to nap with Dash.”
“And you let her, right?”
“Yeah, I hope you don’t mind.”
Airheart sighed contemplatively. “Nah, it’s fine,” she said, but was obviously unsure. “She usually naps in the day, when she’s not at school I mean.”
“Same with my Dashie.” Rainbow moved to sit on the sofa, but paused. “Can I get you a drink, or anything?” she asked after suddenly remembering her manners.
“Oh, err… I’d love a cup of tea, if that’s alright.” She smiled sheepishly.
“Of course, I’ll go make us some.”
Rainbow trotted into the kitchen. Swirl followed her.
“Mummy?” she asked, elongating her words childishly.
Rainbow could tell that she wanted something. “What?” she replied in the same childish manner.
“Can I have a milkshake?” she asked with a convincing smile only children could pull off.
Rainbow sighed slightly and hung her head. “Okay,” she said in defeat. “What flavour?”
“Err… banana!”
“Okay. Ask Shine if she wants one.”
“What about Dash?”
“Leave her. She’s sleeping.”
“Okay,” she said as she started to skip merrily out of the kitchen.

Rainbow watched her daughter leave before turning to fill the kettle up.
She started to prepare to big mugs for her and Airheart, as well as the milkshakes. She knew full well that Shine would want banana as well.
She dropped the spoon with a loud clatter into a mug and waited, leaning on the side as she thought.
She began to think about her parenting that day. She couldn’t believe she got so distracted that she didn’t realise that her daughter had flown off and put herself in danger.
She felt a heavy shame press down on her, but this quickly dissipated as curiosity slowly filled her mind.
She looked up into the corner of the room as her mind pondered the question she was thinking. Her mouth fell open as she thought harder, and only became more puzzled.
“How long was she actually up there?” she asked herself out loud.