Half Hour Horses: Legacy Prompts

by HoofAndQuill

LP55: Two Views [Slice of Life]

I'm not too fond of this one, mostly because of some very valid criticisms leveled at the ending feeling a bit off. Still parts of it are nice, though.

The Prompt: Some days, I just wanna take your big, dumb, dummy head and just... n-n-nyeahhhh!

Rainbow Dash sat on the little tuft of cloud, watching the three colts down below.

Yeah, they were heading right for her. Not for Rainbow Dash, they knew better than that. Nah, they were flying over toward lanky, quiet, weird little Fluttershy. Again.

Not that Fluttershy saw them. She was practicing, on her own. Trying to fly again. Rainbow had tried to help out with that a few times, but it didn't work. Back in Junior Speedster Flight Camp, she'd been hanging out with this griffon cub. Really cool, couldn't fly all that great to start, but when Rainbow went faster, the griffon would always catch up. They both thrived on it, they loved arguing and challenging each other and calling each other names, it made them both better! But, yeah, after all that mess, now that she wasn't going to be in Junior Speedsters anymore, Rainbow was back in Cloudsdale and around these ponies. Fluttershy was okay, she was nice to everypony, quiet, never got into fights or anything.

Challenging, name-calling, doing better than her... yeah. That stuff didn't work on Fluttershy.

But it was cool. They were still friends, kind of. Fluttershy was two years ahead of Rainbow in her classes, except for flying. Like, really except for flying.

Rainbow watched Fluttershy trip over the ring of clouds, slide down the side of a house, paff through a flag, and fall onto another patch. Rainbow slapped her hoof against her own face. It was painful to watch the filly be so awful at this. Yeah yeah, Fluttershy knew stuff, especially about plants and birds and other earth pony things, but flying was what pegasus ponies were supposed to do! And that was not flying.

Rainbow just wished she could find a way to prove to Fluttershy that she was being stupid, there was nothing to worry about, just flap her wings, get up there, and learn to do it! Stop crying about everything, every time anypony got fussy, and just go up there and learn to be the best, like Rainbow! Or, you know, second best!

Still, Rainbow stood up, and took flight. She knew she had to get there before those three colts made Fluttershy cry again. So yeah, she flew over, and then down, planting herself in front of the scared filly. Like a big hero! Like a Wonderbolt! Dashing in to save some little filly from jerks and monsters, yeah!

The next hour played itself out in a rush. Dash remembered that part perfectly for the rest of her life. Getting her first real, angry challenge, gathering witnesses, lining up at the start line, blowing by the startled Fluttershy, and then... WAM! Amidst all the jockeying for position, hairpin turns, dodging slaloms and threading rings, there it was! A sonic rainboom, blasting out over the treetops in a blaze of color. All the astounded faces on her classmates, all the speed, excitement, and a brand new, super-awesome cutie mark!

It was the best minute of her young life, followed by the most soul-crushingly panicked moment, as she saw the empty cloud where Fluttershy had been standing, and the long, long drop of empty air above the Everfree Forest.

---

Fluttershy's ears perked at a familiar sound.

It wasn't easy to hear particular sounds, down here. There was a lot more going on then there ever was up in Cloudsdale. Birds, bugs, critters and leaves, rocks tumbling, water running over earth and stone, the surface was so very busy, and so very noisy. Thankfully, not many of those noises sounded like ponies. It wasn't that Fluttershy didn't like ponies, exactly, but... she wasn't good with them.

Besides, she had plenty of friends now. All the animals had been so kind to her, and even now she was holding up a plank of wood as her beaver friends worked to help construct her new home. She wasn't quite sure where her new home was, other than being between a dark, scary forest full of monsters, and a bright, scary town full of earth ponies. Her home was on a little grassy hill, much closer to the forest than it was to the ponies, but that was okay. It was just near where she had fallen from Cloudsdale, only a few days ago.

But that sound had caught her ears. Wind over wings, but not bird wings. It really could only be a pegasus pony, and only one pegasus pony would be here to visit her. Again.

"Um, Mister Beaverteeth? I have to go for juuust a minute. Can you and your friends do this alone for a while?"

The beaver saluted sharply, in a gesture he must have seen a pony do, and chittered at the others around him, until all of the beavers were chattering and bouncing in excitement, splitting up duties for building the home. Fluttershy looked up into the sky, as she trotted her way down the little path near her home, to make sure the loud, blue pegasus wouldn't disturb her animals.

Fluttershy was thankful for Rainbow Dash. She really was. Rainbow had stood up for her when nopony else would, and that meant more to Fluttershy than Rainbow could ever know. Besides, without Rainbow Dash accidentally knocking her off a cloud and sending her falling down to the ground, she would never have discovered her special talent!

That last bit was a little less heroic. But it was still important.

But this was the fourth time in as many days that her friend from Cloudsdale had come down to try to convince her to come back home. It was hard for Fluttershy to say no to anypony, but she had already told Rainbow no, three times. Sometimes she wished, as much as she liked Rainbow Dash, that she could make the blue filly understand that this was her home now, and that she never really wanted to go back to Cloudsdale. Especially that flying was never something she really cared about, and that she didn't need to be taught.

Fluttershy just felt so frustrated that she could... well, not scream. More like... mutter to herself, as her friend swooped down and stopped a few feet above the ground. Fluttershy sighed, and smiled up at Rainbow, getting ready to say no, for a fourth time.