//------------------------------// // 22: Chatting Between Friends. // Story: I Dreamt to Fly // by MrDynasty //------------------------------// “So, what books are you reading? They must be pretty important if they’re all you’ve focused on for like a week and a half,” Rainbow Dash said, sitting down on the throne that had her cutie mark engraved on it. Twilight levitates over some of the books that were in a pile on the table, glossing over their titles as she spoke. “Head Injuries, Bone Injuries, A Pony’s Guide to Organs and all sorts of books similar to that,” she said, putting the books down on the table again and looking over to Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash was leaning on the table as she looked at the large amount of books resting on it. “Am I going to go to the doctors one day and just see you standing there in a nurse uniform or something? If that’s not the case then why are you reading all of these books?” She asked, leaning over and picking a book up off the table to skim through the pages. Twilight rolled her eyes as she spoke. “Just because I’m reading books about injuries doesn’t mean I want to become a doctor, or a nurse. Biology is quite the important subject Dash, even if you don’t think it is.” She said as she came off of her throne and levitated all the books into a singular pile, including the one that was in Rainbow Dash’s hooves. As the book was pulled out from her hooves she gave a small shrug to Twilight. “I know biology is important, at least the basics anyway. I just don’t see the need to go so far into something that most likely isn’t going to be useful, especially when you could be doing something else that further advances a skill you already have,” she said as she hopped off of her throne as well then going over to Twilight. Twilight glanced over and cocked her head to her. “Knowledge, Rainbow Dash. While I agree with you that it most likely isn’t going to be that useful, it’s still worthwhile having the knowledge. You don’t lose anything by learning more,” she said, levitating the pile of books out into the hallway to put away later. Rainbow Dash let out a ‘pssh’ sound in response, having a cocky grin on her face. “You lose time,” she said snarkily, obviously not having much of a rebuttal against Twilight’s point. Meanwhile, Spike was hanging out with Scootaloo. They were in his bedroom, which was for the most part clean and tidy. There was of course an obligatory bookshelf, which every room in the house had to have it seemed. There weren’t many books on it though; probably just books that Spike would have been interested in. “So, can you do any tricks?” Spike asked Scootaloo as he was carrying a bowl of gems. Scootaloo had to think for a second before shaking her head and shrugging. “Not from what I can tell. I probably couldn’t twirl or do any sort of fancy trick in the air, it’d probably just knock me off balance,” she said as she fluttered her small wings, letting off a light breeze. Spike picked up one of the gems from the bowl and threw it into his mouth, beginning to speak as he started chewing. “You never know until you try, but it’s still great you can fly like a pro!” He said as small chunks of the gems in his mouth spluttered out and onto the ground. Scootaloo gained a nervous smile from his comment. “Like a pro? N-Nah… I feel like I just got really lucky with the league. I don’t imagine I have any talent for flying, because if I did, I should have been able to fly quite a while ago,” She said, suddenly looking a little bit sad where she sat. She didn’t seem to pay much attention to Spike’s messy eating. Spike swallowed the remaining gems he had in his mouth and smiled over to her. “What are you talking about? Of course you have talent! You just needed a little push to get up and off your hooves. What type of luck would you need to pass all five elimination courses? Since the courses are built around being a skilful flier, you’d need some mind blowing sense of luck to pass as well as you have,” he said, suddenly grabbing some more gems from the bowl and throwing them into his mouth. Scootaloo’s ears perked up as she looked back over to him. “…I’ve passed four so far, still not sure about the fifth. And I’m not sure what type of luck I’d need; maybe all the other contestants were beginners like me?” She said, continuing to have a nervous look on her face. Spike shook his head. “No way were they all beginners; the colt that hit you said he had been flying for over three years right? I’m pretty sure that proves that they weren’t all beginners. What you have is a lot of talent! You’re a quick learner!” He said with a gleeful smile. Scootaloo’s ears flopped back as she sighed. “If I’m such a quick learner, then why didn’t I learn how to fly three years ago? I tried and tried and tried but I could barely get myself off the ground! Then I heard that Pound Cake started flying at the young age of zero, which didn’t help my self-confidence at all. I felt like a dolphin that couldn’t swim, like a spider that couldn’t spin a web…” She said as her head dipped down at the end of her speech. Spike noticed her sudden change in mood, deciding to put down the bowl of gems and try to comfort her. He walked over and rubbed her back, continuing to smile to her. “That’s because all you needed was a little push from somepony else. Pound Cake had Pinkie Pie, one of the, if not thee, most motivating ponies in all of Equestria. But that shouldn’t matter now, should it? I mean, you can fly now, and you’ve pushed yourself all the way to the final elimination course of the filly league! Trust me, it takes talent to do what you can do, especially in the time-frame you’ve done it in,” he said, smiling softly. Scootaloo’s mood seemed to lift from his words as she let her view drift over to him. “Thanks, I suppose. I still think I had some form of luck or something that carried me to the finish line, because I never knew what I was doing half of the time,” she said, her ears coming back up as she raised a hoof. Spike shrugged to her. “Maybe you’re just very adaptive! You’re definitely a quick thinker, since you’d have to be to ride that scooter of yours as fast as you do. I think you’re a natural flier; you just had weights on your wings that needed the help of somepony else to cut off before you could lift off,” he said, stopping rubbing her back then going over to pick up his bowl of gems again. Scootaloo smiled and nodded slightly. “Again, thanks. You’re such a great mood lifter, Spike,” she said, sitting up and looking over to him directly again. Spike cocked his head and raised an eyebrow. “You think so? I always assumed I was just a very skilled rambler, you know? Either way, you’ve still got a lot of talent for flying, Scootaloo,” he said as he began to shove more gems into his mouth and chew. Scootaloo would have replied to him, but she was interrupted by Rainbow Dash who stuck her head through the door and spoke. “Hey, Scoots. If you want to head back to our place, you can. I’ll be heading back soon, after I’m finished talking with Twilight and stuff, so I’m just telling you in case you’d want to stay here some more,” she said, suddenly pulling her head out from the room and trotting back over to where Twilight was. Scootaloo had shifted her view over to the entrance to the room and waved. “Okay! I’ll think I’ll stick around for a bit longer!” She said loudly before she looked back over to Spike again and then down to the bowl of gems. “…What does that taste like for you? I’m going to guess it’s very crunchy and dry or something.” Spike shrugged again. “Sort of, they do have a flavour, but I think it’s dependant on the type of gem. But yeah, it’s pretty crunchy. Luckily my teeth are built to eat this stuff, since I think they’d shatter yours,” he said, crunching down on some more gems as she spoke. Scootaloo put a hoof on her chin. “…If you can chew through them like they’re cookies, then have you ever tried a jawbreaker?” She asked, tilting her head. Spike nodded before swallowing down the last of the gems in his mouth. “I have, and it was quite easy to break through. The only problem with a jawbreaker for me was its size, since you’re supposed to put it entirely in your mouth I think. But I’m pretty sure I could chew through one like an apple,” he said, lifting the bowl to his mouth and tipping it upwards, allowing the remaining gems to slide into his mouth. When he put the bowl down, his cheeks were puffed slightly as a bunch of loud crunching noises came from his mouth. The cracking and crunching made Scootaloo’s ears twitch slightly. She looked to the ground to see small fragments of multi-coloured gems all over the floor, quite sharp fragments too. “…Do you clean this up or do you just walk around on what could be classed as shards of glass?” She asked, touching some of the fragments and running her hoof across them. Spike continued to crunch the gems in his mouth, all the way until he was able to swallow the rest. “I usually clean it up, but these wouldn’t hurt me anyway, since I have quite strong feet,” he said, suddenly leaning his leg over and stepping on the gem shards, barely even reacting from it. It made Scootaloo half panic for a second, almost wanting to push his foot off. “Jeez, warn me when you’re going to do something dangerous, even though it isn’t particularly dangerous for you,” she said rubbing her own hoof slightly in thought of the pain she would have gotten from doing what he did. Spike just smiled and nodded, taking his foot off of the gem shards and brushing off the excess ones stuck to his foot. While Spike and Scootaloo were chatting and having fun, Rainbow Dash had left and gone back to her cloud mansion. Upon entering through the front door and closing it again, Rainbow Dash noticed a small envelope lying on the floor. She picked it up with one of her hooves and tried to determine who might have sent it. The decorative button sealing it gave quite a big clue as to who sent it, as the button had the iconic lightning bolt and wings of the Wonderbolts logo engraved on it. She put the envelope in her mouth, trotted over to her couch and sat down on it. She held the envelope with both her hooves and her mouth, suddenly ripping off the entire top potion to gain access to its contents. With some small shaking, a letter fell out of the envelope and landed on the floor, meaning she had to reach down to pick it up again. Upon opening the letter and reading the first couple sentences, a wide grin was plastered over her face. “Wow! Now that’s an impressive score if I ever saw one! Squirt is going to be absolutely ecstatic about this!”