It's a Wonderful Dashie

by Sparky Brony

Chapter 1. Scootaloo

Author's Note:

I was inspired to write this story after reading a comment on Equestria Daily in what people wanted for season 5, the commenter fleshed out a pretty good outline, and I really liked the direction he went, so after obtaining permission to use his ideas, I'm writing this story. I hope you like.

"Hey Scoots, watch this!" Rainbow Dash called from the cloud she was standing on. She looked down and saw the orange pegasus filly with the purple mane buzz her wings and hover a bit as she cheered on her idol. Rainbow Dash used the cloud as a diving board to take off. As she fell she spread her wings slowly to let them catch the air. At full extension, she angled her wings and took off. Flapping for all she was worth she climbed straight up. After several loop the loops and rolls, she decided to dive for the ground. The sound of cheering from her number one fan was ringing in her ears. She dived, faster and faster. She wasn't trying for a sonic rainboom, she just wanted to go fast. She deftly avoided the clouds in the sky on her descent, and skimmed the ground at breakneck speed. She zoomed around the excited filly, letting her rainbow trail curl around the pegasus filly as Scootaloo jumped up and down.

Finally she angled her wings to climb, and in moments she blasted through the cloud she had taken off from. Climbing a bit more, she landed on a higher cloud, taking a moment to rest her wings, and of course, to bask in the cheering of her one pony cheering squad.

"Hooray, Rainbow Dash, you are so cool!" The small filly jumped up and down excitedly. "Do some more, Rainbow Dash, do some more!"

Well, I can't disappoint my number one fan, Rainbow thought to herself as she launched off the cloud. Not as much climbing this time though. She had been performing for most of the afternoon, and she was starting to really feel the burn in her flight muscles. As she tipped over and started her dive, she thought about this wonderful day. No crazy monsters attacking Ponyville, no journal entries to make, just a day to enjoy the beautiful sun and sky.

She was startled out of her reverie by hitting a cloud, spinning out of control as she headed to the ground at a furious pace. She angled her wings to control the spin. In moments she was orientated the way she needed to be. She looked ahead and saw she was way too close to the ground, flaring her wings to pull out of this mad dive. She finally pulled out, flying nearly fast enough to make a sonic rainboom only a foot from the ground, she looked back for a moment.

"Whew, that was close." Any further words died in her throat as she felt a horrible impact and her world went black.

***

Rainbow Dash awoke to the sound of beeping. She flattened her ears at the harsh sounds. She groaned and opened her eyes. Blinking a few times to let her eyes focus, she looked around. Feathers, she was in the hospital. She took a moment to assess herself, her head hurt, so did her neck. She looked at her wings, they seemed fine, no pain from them, her legs all seemed fine.
"Oh great, I'm in the hospital for a bump to the head…ouch." She put her hooves on her head, discovering bandages. And a very tender place on her skull. She slowly leaned back in the bed. "Ugh, I hate being in the hospital," she sighed as she closed her eyes and tried to sleep off the pain in her skull.

She awoke some time later to the sound of hooves on the hard tile floor in her room. Again, slowly opening her eyes, she was face to face with Twilight Sparkle, the newest princess of Equestria and one of her best friends. Twilight's face was a mask of pain and sorrow, tears were leaking slowly down her face.

"Hey, Twilight, I'm okay, it's just a bump on the head. And it feels like I pulled a muscle or two in my neck," she chuckled, trying to bring a smile to her friend's face.

Twilight jerked in response, "It was far more than a bump on the head, when Cheerilee found you two, I had to heal a skull fracture on you Rainbow Dash. I've been spending the last several hours healing both of you."

Rainbow frowned, "What are you talking about Twilight, I wiped out, probably hit a rock or tree that I didn't see, honestly."

Fresh tears started pouring from Twilight's eyes, "No, Rainbow Dash, you didn't hit any rock, or any tree."

Rainbow's eyes shrank to pinpricks, "No."

Twilight sobbed as she nodded her head slowly.

Rainbow grabbed the leads connecting her to the machine, yanking them, she grimaced as she tore out some of her fur as she yanked them off her body. The monitor started a long beep, indicating an emergency. She yanked the IV out of her foreleg and jumped out of the bed, and immediately landed squarely on her face. She had no energy.

"How long was I out, Twilight?"

"Around thirty hours," the purple alicorn said between her sobs.

Well, flying is out of the question, Rainbow thought to herself as she tried to stand on all four legs. They didn't want to hold her, but after gritting her teeth and focusing, she was able to make it to a shambling trot. She crashed through the door to her room, looking back at Twilight questioningly, Twilight pointed. Rainbow Dash shot down the hall as fast as she could. She heard another monitoring machine beeping down the hallway, following her ears, she pushed the door to another patient room open, and was greeted by a horrible sight. Scootaloo was in the room, her eyes closed, she looked to be peacefully resting. But her heart rate was way too low, and she could see on the monitor, her breathing was also perilously close to zero. She slowly moved up to the bed, heaving her front half onto the bed she placed a cyan hoof on the orange one.

"Scoots?"

No answer.

"Scootaloo?"

Again, no response. Rainbow Dash felt the tears start to fall down her face as well. She buried her face into the covers on the bed.
"Scoots, I'm so sorry, I must have gotten mixed up during my spinout and gotten you. I'm so sorry," her words ended in a whisper as she sobbed into the bed.

She had no idea how long she lay there when she heard soft hooves behind her.

"Will she recover?" she asked Twilight.

A long sigh, "I don't know, Rainbow Dash. Your skull impacted her spine, shattering three vertebrae."

"Twilight, you healed my fractured skull! A few small bones should be easy."

"Those few small bones protect the spinal cord from damage. Your skull wasn't shattered like them, it had a few hairline fractures which were pretty easy to heal. This…" she trailed off for several seconds and looked at the sleeping Scootaloo, "is several orders of magnitude worse."

"No, Twilight, you need to heal her."

Once again, tears were renewed on Twilight's face, "I've done what I can, it's entirely up to Scootaloo to heal the rest of the way."

"Will she be…" Rainbow Dash asked barely above a whisper.

"I don't know, Rainbow. Her spine suffered a severe shock, it isn't severed, but it is damaged, and very badly inflamed. The next day or two will determine if she can ever walk again. She is lucky, though, Rainbow."

That earned a glare from the multi-hued pegasus, "Lucky?"

Twilight firmed up, "Yes, lucky, had you hit her a matter of inches forward on her body, we wouldn't be wondering if she was going to recover, we would be planning her funeral. I've already sent a message to her parents,it took the staff a while to track them down, they were out of town, they should be here any time. Though it's a long trip from Baltimare. We need to get you back to your room."

"No! I'm not going back to my room, I'm staying right here." Rainbow sat down and crossed her forelegs, only to be wrapped up in Twilight's magic.

"You need to heal just as badly as Scootaloo does. And I'm not taking no for an answer," she said as she trotted down the hall to Rainbow's room. After placing the cyan pegasus back in her bed, she turned to her friend. "I will let you know when she's awake, and I will bring you back. But until then, if I see hide or hair of you near her room, I'm going to put restraints on the bed and you won't be able to move at all, understand?"

Rainbow crossed her forelegs again and refused to look at her friend.

"Well?"

Rainbow finally grumbled, "Fine."

When Twilight exited the room, Rainbow Dash laid back in her bed. "Oh, Scoots, I'm so sorry." she sobbed to herself. She let her eyes rove all over the room. She felt fine, for the most part, except for her head and neck. She looked at the monitoring machine, its lights all red from a lack of input. She closed her eyes.

***

"How could you do that to mah friend?"

Rainbow jerked awake from the rage in the voice. She looked at the yellow earth pony with the huge bow in her red mane. Fresh tear tracks lined her face, and the rage in her voice was duplicated in her expression.

"It was an accident."

"Ah know it was an accident, but you should have been paying attention to where yah wus goin." The filly stepped forward aggressively. Rainbow couldn't do anything but lean back into the mattress. She saw how much pain the filly was in, it mirrored her own.

"I'm sorry."

"Sorry ain't good enough, is it. And my friend may never fly, and now she may never walk again. Because of you."

Fresh tears fell from Rainbow's eyes as she looked at the lone cutie mark crusader standing in the doorway.

"I thought I wanted to see you, but now that I have, I can't look at you," the filly said as she whirled around and left the room.

Sobbing consumed Rainbow Dash as she did the only thing she could think of. She flapped her wings, lifting her abused body off the bed, and she shot towards the window, crashing through and taking off with a howl, not noticing Applejack coming into the room after her sister had left the room so abruptly. She wailed as she flew over Ponyville in the dusk sky. She didn't know where she was heading, she just had to get away. Her endurance wasn't what it needed to be, so just outside the small town, she landed on a cloud and lay down.

"I'm so sorry Scoots, I'm so, so sorry." She said as she sobbed. "I wish this had never happened, I wish I had never been born, to do this to you," she said as her energy failed and she fell asleep, unknowing how her misery had turned the cloud she rested on black as night.

Comments

[Rainbow87dash]

filly with the hot pink mane

purple

Also when it comes to thought 'put it like this' it'll help the reader to distinguish between thought, speech and description.

Other than that, this is pretty well written, kinda flew by pretty quick though

[Raincloudboom]

It's off to a promising start. I look forward to seeing the rest of it. (I'm the one who wrote the comment by the way)

[Raincloudboom]

Tiny nitpick, why were Scootaloo's parents not told until 30 hours after the accident?

[Sparky Brony]

4406770 Well, thank you for finding the story, I'm going to work on it, I'll try to keep to a weekly update cycle like I do with the rest of my stories, I've only got this and a New Teacher running right now, so two stories, updating once a week, not a problem. Though I'm working on youtube scripts right now, but I've got all week to get more on this done. I hope you enjoy the way I'm going to go with this story.

[Sparky Brony]

4406784 I can edit on that, the were told immediately, but they were away from town, and taking a while to get in.

[Sparky Brony]

4406832 Edit done. Thanx for finding the error.

[Charles Spratt]

Just a heads up: when Rainbow was examining her wings, it said that they, and I quote, 'seemed find'. I think you meant to say fine. Either way, solid start. Keep up the good work!

[Magic Mixer]

Such a powerful start. All the feels.

[Inferno demon Dash]

Gods....this is going to be a powerful and emotional story, you have my full attention.

[Fluttershyisacutegal]

damn that was a good start to the story