The first reader pony

by Booker Longlegs

Useless

Rainbow Dash looked around at all the loose clouds around her, sighing inwardly. Work was always the worst part of the day. Worst, of course, being subjective. She was still out and about, going fast, and flying, but that didn’t make the cloud gathering any less boring. She was chasing one particularly unruly cloud when it just froze in mid-air. Confused, Rainbow looked at it closely and noticed a faint magical haze around it. Looking around, she saw Booker standing on the ground, horn glowing and pointed at the cloud.

“Hey!” Rainbow called down, “I didn’t need any help!”

“Really?” came the reply, “Because where I’m standing it certainly looked like it.” Angrily, Rainbow prepared to dive-bomb Booker, but then he looked up and she saw he was grinning from ear to ear. She rolled her eyes.

“You know sarcasm isn’t funny, right?” Rainbow asked.

“Maybe not to you,” Booker said, “but I find it absolutely hilarious. Now could you please finish off that cloud? My brain is starting to hurt from holding it still.” Rainbow flew over to the cloud and bucked it into oblivion. Booker exhaled, his horn dying out. “Thank you. Cloud manipulation is my sister’s area of expertise, not mine.”

Rainbow flew down, landing lightly beside Booker. “So, if it isn’t your strength, why did you decide to help out?” she asked

Booker grinned. “Well, you’d been chasing that cloud around for about fifteen minutes. I thought you needed some assistance.”

Rainbow was dumbstruck. “Fifteen minutes? I was chasing that thing for fifteen minutes?!”

“Yeah, well, time flies,” Booker said nonchalantly, “Either way, I helped you out. You’re welcome.”

“I didn’t thank you.” Rainbow said flatly.

“I know. Do you need any more help?” Booker asked.

“Well, I don’t need any help,” Rainbow said, “but I think with you here this’ll go more quickly.”

“True enough,” Booker said, “Now, let’s get started!”

---

For the next few hours, Rainbow and Booker cleared away all the clouds loose in Ponyville’s skies. As they did so, Rainbow noted that Booker made work a lot more enjoyable. His inherent sense of sarcasm led him to say things that could have been mean or downright insulting if anypony else said them. His carefree nature, coupled with the fact that he made himself the butt of his jokes just as often as others, somehow made it work, though. Despite what she’d said earlier, Rainbow liked dry humor as much as the next mare, and Booker’s constant ribbing at the both of them always got her chuckling.

Her opinion only increased when they took a break. Booker said so much unfamiliar magic had given him a splitting headache. Coincidentally, it was also when Rainbow had just gotten her stride, and she didn’t want to settle down. “Hey,” Rainbow said, “let’s race!”

“Isn’t one of your selling points that you’re the fastest flier in Equestria?” Booker said with his ever-present grin.

“I’ll just run,” Rainbow said dismissively, “Now come on! I wanna see how fast you are!”

“Isn’t the point of a break to, you know, rest?” Booker said.

“You only need to rest your brain,” Rainbow pointed out, “Now let’s race!”

Booker, seeing that he couldn’t squirm his way out of it, sighed and stood up. He took a ready position, as did Rainbow. “To that rock,” Rainbow said, pointing to a boulder about seventy feet away. “Ready…Set…GO!” Rainbow shot off, looking behind her to see how far behind Booker was. To her surprise, he was pretty close. She watched for a bit, and his initial speed quickly wore off. She reached the boulder and waited for Booker. He walked up, breathing heavily.

“So…how’d I do?” Booker panted.

“A lot better than expected, actually.” Rainbow said, “You kept up with me…for about five seconds.”

Booker laughed. “Yeah…well…you clearly…haven’t seen me…when ice cream goes on sale.” Rainbow laughed at that, and they made their way back to the starting position, albeit at a more sedate pace.

---

After Booker’s head felt better, they mopped up the last of the clouds easily. Booker cast a look around the horizon, checking for any that had slipped through the cracks. Rainbow landed beside him, saying, “There aren’t anymore.”

“Well, that’s good to know.” Booker said.

“Hey, thanks for all the help today,” Rainbow said, holding up her hoof, “I had a blast.”

Booker returned her hoof-five. “Well, at least one of us enjoyed themselves. I spent all day wrestling with weird magic.” He said it in a mocking tone, but he couldn’t quite hide his smile.

“Yeah, you did a good job,” Rainbow said, “Especially for a reader pony.” Booker froze. Rainbow cocked her head. It was the sort of banter they’d had all day; it usually got him laughing, and he always had a comeback. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

Booker was silent for a moment, then he said in a disturbingly calm voice, “You want to know something funny? That’s the first time anypony’s ever said that to me. Not because they weren’t blunt, or they didn’t like sarcasm. It’s because nopony’s ever asked me to help them out, so nopony’s ever had the chance to say that.” He drew in a shaky breath, and Rainbow realized with shock that he was close to tears. “All my life, ever since I got my cutie-mark I’ve been nothing but a waste of space. Everypony looks at me, and they can’t see beyond my talent. I’m just a joke; a sideshow act and nothing more.” He started blinking rapidly, somehow holding back a lifetime’s worth of sadness.

“Hey, you did a great job today,” Rainbow said gently, “and according to Applejack you’ve done a great job at other things, too.”

“Maybe. That didn’t stop you from judging me, now did it?” Rainbow couldn’t really say anything to that. Booker shook his head. “Everywhere I go it’s the same thing! Every time I’ve moved, it isn’t because I want to. No, I always end up leaving because I can’t take the way everypony looks at me like I’m nothing. With the way things have been going, I thought things would be different here, but I guess I was wrong.” So saying, Booker turned away and made his way back towards his home. Rainbow just stared after him, feeling awful that she’d drudged up such a well of pain.

Author's Note:

Still on spring break boredom. So, how about that ending? On a related note, only two chapters left.