Rainbow Dash awoke to the sound of her alarm clock beeping.
She grumpily moved her hoof out from under the covers and pressed the ‘off’
button, and crawled out of bed. She mumbled to herself, “I hate mornings...”.
But then, she remembered what day it was. Today, she was going to Cloudsdale
with Fluttershy for a school reunion event that would last several days,
and so they had decided to stay a whole week, and use the opportunity to go see
old friends, family, and places. Among other things, they had planned to go out and
eat at The Thunder Cloud, a small but very good pizzeria in the outskirts of Cloudsdale.
They used to go there when they still lived in Cloudsdale, before moving to Ponyville.
Nowadays, they took the chance to go there whenever they visited Cloudsdale,
if they had time for it. This time they’d have a week there, so they would have
lots of chances. Rainbow got her Tank-shaped slippers on, and walked down o her
kitchen, and started brewing coffee and putting some fruits in a mixer, added a
small glass of juice, and started the noisy machine. In just 10 seconds flat, the machine
had turned the fruits into a smoothie. perfect breakfast. Coffee, smoothie, and some
toast with a thick layer of Granny Smiths zap-apple jam. Which, she thought to herself,
it was only a month left until they’d appear again, so in about five weeks, it was time
to go buy her usual (literal) pile of jars. And some of the Zap Cider, of course.
and some regular apple too, while she was at it.
After breakfast, she took a final look at her packing, to make sure she had what she
needed for the week. She was going to live with Fluttershy and her parents, since
her own family had moved away from Cloudsdale and now lived in Las Pegasus,
because her father, Rainbow Blitz, had gotten a job there, as assistant manager
over the local weather teams. She didn’t need much packing, just some hygiene articles,
her special pillow (A personalized, custom-shaped ergonomic cloud-filled tension-relief
pillow she needed because she got a stiff neck otherwise), her Tank-slippers and bathrobe,
some candy for the train ride. Food she would get from Fluttershy’s family,
and any other stuff she might need she could borrow from them too,
or buy in Cloudsdale. No need to drag along any unnecessary packing. One set of
saddlebags would be enough. She finished her packing, and left her house.
Tank had already been taken to a Pet Daycare center, run by a friend of Fluttershy’s,
who was also taking care of Flutters army of pets, and Pinkie’s and Rarity’s pets too,
since the two of them were going to Manehattan.
When she was satisfied with everything, she left the house, locked the door, made
sure twice it was really locked, and took off, flying down to the station where she
was meeting Fluttershy.
* * *
Fluttershy woke up early, and decided she might as well get up. She was leaving for
Cloudsdale today, so she didn’t want to risk being late, or forgetting anything important.
She had some oatmeal and a large cup of herbal tea for breakfast, and then checked
her packing twice, to make sure she had everything. Mane products, brushes, tooth brush,
money, a couple of books for the ride. Both she and Rainbow was staying at her parents
house, so she’d have everything she needed there. All of her pets had been sent to
Abigail, a friend and colleague in the animal care business, who had a pet center in town.
Abigail was a Griffin, who had moved to town just a few months ago, and quickly
became friends with Fluttershy due to their common love for, and interest in,
all sorts of animals. Her Pet center worked kinda like a hotel, where ponies
could leave their pets for a few days (anywhere from an hour up to 14 days)
if they were going on vacations, meetings, or whatever, where they could not bring
the pets with them. Fluttershy had helped Abigail set up the business, and sometimes
volunteered as extra help when needed. Abi also studied part-time, to finish up
her incomplete studies to become a licensed veterinary.
Fluttershy made sure to triple-check all windows and doors twice, to make
sure everything was closed and locked, before grabbing her saddlebags and
walking to the Trainstation, where she met Rainbow Dash, already waiting.
* * *
“Mornin’, Flutters!” Rainbow said happily when Fluttershy arrived at the station.
“Good morning.” Fluttershy replied, equally happy, with her gentle smile.
“Sleep well?” Rainbow asked.
“Well.. mostly.. I had a strange dream, where I was walking through a forest of
tiny trees.. or maybe I was a giant and the trees were normal... in any case,
as I walked, I heard a distant voice, almost like a whisper.. saying some strange
word I didn’t understand, but it sounded foreign. It wasn’t Equestrian.”
Fluttershy said, with a somewhat confused look, but it faded into a smile again
as she added, “But other than that, I slept very good even though I’m nervous
about today... I mean, it’s been years since I met everypony from school..”
“That’s really weird... I had the opposite dream! I was flying just above ground
through a forest, but everything was much bigger than normal. Grass blades
as tall as me, trees so tall I could barely see the tops, gravel looked like boulders...
And as I flew, I heard voices calling out strange words.” Rainbow said.
“How could we both have dreams with so similar stuff happening?”
“I... I don’t know... Maybe we can ask Twilight sometime if she knows anything
about phenomenon like this, or maybe Luna can help if we ask her...”
“Yeah, I guess.” Rainbow replied.
“Anyway, the train should be here soon. I was thinking, uhm.. would it be okay if..
I’m not very social during the ride? I, uhm, was really looking forward to get some
reading done, I have this book on exotic animals, and...” Flutters said, but was interrupted
by Rainbow.
“Shoot! I forgot books! I have nothing to read during the train ride! I’m gonna be sooo
bored!”
“Well, uhm.. I have a book about rain forests too, if you want to borrow it...”
“Thanks for the offer, but I have a better idea. That kind of book isn’t really my style,
I prefer Daring Do. How long before the train arrives?”
“Uhm...” Flutters began, and turned her head to check the large clock on the station wall.
“A few minutes, and then it’ll stay here for about 15 minutes before it departs...”
“...Which leaves me more than enough time to go to Twilight and grab a Daring Do
and be back here long before it leaves! I’ll be right back, keep an eye on my saddlebags!”
Rainbow said as she unhooked her bags, and took off to the sky, flying toward the castle
at high speed. She landed in front of the doors, and since she rarely knocked
anyway, she simply burst in. “Hey, Twilight! You in here?” She yelled,
since she didn’t see Twilight in the main room when she entered.
“I’m in the kitchen, Rainbow.” She heard Twilights voice reply.
“Want some tea? The water just started boiling.”
“No time, I’m in a hurry.” Rainbow said. “I just came by to see if you had any of the
‘Daring Do’ books available. Me and Fluttershy are going on a trip to Cloudsdale,
and we decided to take the train most of the way and just fly the last bit,
so I need something to do on the train.”
“Oh right, the school reunion, right?” Twilight asked.
“Exactly, and the train’s leaving in 15, so I need a book, like, right now.”
“The Daring books are all placed in the shelf marked ‘800’, just check along the wall.”
“....800? What kind of label is that for a bookshelf?” Rainbow asked with a puzzled
expression on her face.
“It’s standardized book sorting, of course! I use the ‘Dewey Decimal System’,
in which the number 800 corresponds to ‘Literature’, which in turn includes fictional works.
I WAS planning to have Daring sorted in shelf 900, for History and Geography
due to being real-life events, but since Yearling wants to keep it secret that she’s
actually Daring Do for real, I decided to sort them as fiction.”
“Dew-whatimal system? You’re going egghead on me again, Twi.
Anyway, I’ll just grab a Daring book and then I gotta leave.”
“Okay, most of them should be available.”
While talking, Twilight had prepared a cup of steaming hot liquorice tea.
She lifted the teacup with her magic and carried it over to the desk where
the two black orbs lay resting next to a pile of parchments, a quill and a small ink bottle.
Rainbow Dash looked over at the table. “What you got there? New paper weights?”
“No, these are unknown objects. Spike found one, and the Crusaders found the other.
I’m spending my day examining them to see if I can find out what they are.”
“Okay... Have fun with that. I gotta go. I’m taking ‘Daring Do and The Iron Throne’.”
“Sure. Have fun on that reunion. See you in a few days.”
Twilight and Rainbow both waved goodbye at each other as Rainbow
trotted out the door, and took off into the air, flying toward the train station.
As she landed, the train was just coming to a full stop, doors slowly opening and
ponies exiting, filling the station with talk, some laughter, and the sound of hundreds
of hoofs walking on the concrete platform. Once everypony from the train had left,
the few ponies who was getting on started moving, including Rainbow and Fluttershy.
“Told you I’d make it in time.” Rainbow smiled and grabbed her saddlebags.
“I know how fast you are, Rainbow.. Did you find a book?”
“Yeah, I got a Daring book, like I said. ‘Daring Do and the Iron Throne’.”
“I thought you already read that one? Isn’t that the one you and Twilight got
from that Daring convention several months ago?”
“I’m amazed you can remember that, but yeah, the convention was actually
a release event for it. Anyways, I’ve read all the Daring books multiple times,
this one is just the one I’ve read the least times so far. Most of them I’ve read
three of four times each, but ‘The Iron Throne’ I’ve only read twice, and also,
it just happens to be one of the longest books in the series, almost twice as
long as most others. So it’s kinda like two Daring books, which is good,
‘cause that means it’ll last longer, and then I can buy some new book in Cloudsdale
for the return trip. I’m sure I can find something similar to the Daring books if I ask
the bookstore owner.” Rainbow smiled.
“Oh, I’m sure you can. adventure stories are very popular among teens and young adults,
like us, so a lot of those are published these days.”
“Really? How do you know?”
“Newspaper. There was a small article on the subject...”
“Oh, I see.. I usually just skim through and focus on the big news and the comic strips
on the last page, and the weather reports.”
“Why would you need to see the weather reports? You make the weather...”
“Exactly. I check to make sure they get the weather schedules right.
There has been times when the papers have printed the wrong schedules,
and since I’m the local team leader, it’s my duty to make sure they’ve printed
the correct one.” Rainbow said with a hint of pride.
The train started moving, and the two pegasi both grabbed their books,
planning to spend most of the trip in silence, reading.