The Dream Series

by GhostofSandwich

2 - Title [Tags - Comedy, Random] (Characters - Rainbow Dash, Discord); Rating - E

Rainbow Dash looked down over the town of Ponyville, her muscles burning from exertion. She had just completed a set of intense training, one that pushed even her to her limits. The cloud she sat on was particularly comfortable to her, but perhaps that was just the exhaustion talking. She rested her chin on her front legs which were hanging over the side of cloud and continued to gaze down at the town below. She had grown quite fond of watching the ponies below go about their lives and had learned to recognize each and every one by what they looked like from above.

“I’ll just rest my eyes for a minute,” she mumbled to herself, the effects of sleep already falling hard upon her. She began trying to justify her sleepiness, but fell asleep before even getting the chance to. As she snoozed, the town below her continued on with their day, unaware of the sleeping mare well above them.

Unfortunately, they were also unaware of something that lurked underneath the rainbow mare; a barely noticeable distortion below the cloud that was about the size of two bits. As Rainbow slept, the abnormality twisted and all color in the center of it seemed to absolutely cease to be. If one were to get close to it, they’d feel an overwhelming sense of dread while staring at it. If one also paid close attention, they'd see that it was barely growing. Most disturbing, however, a small guttural growl, only audible in absolute silence, seemed to permeate from it.

---

Dream

Rainbow stood proudly on the pedestal, a medal with a large ‘1’ etched onto it around her neck. All around, ponies cheered and whistled and cheered her name. She gleamed proudly and smiled wide enough that the sun reflected off her white teeth. Somewhere in the crowd, somepony screamed “My eyes!” She completely ignored the cry of pain.

“Thank you! I really am great, aren’t I?” she happily exclaimed. The pony in the second spot next her was standing with his arms crossed. When asked his name at the entrance, his only response was “Hi, I’m grump.” As the crowd continued to cheer, the announcer began to dismiss everybody from the Cloudsdale stadium, and much to her displeasure, everypony quickly began to leave. “Hey, wait! Where’s everypony going?” she asked.

“Show’s over, Rainbow,” Twilight responded. She stood in the third place pedestal; she had apparently become quite the flyer. Why she entered that contest, however, nopony would ever know.

“But, I- they...” Rainbow protested.

“It’s over, dude.” Grump replied before walking away. Rainbow and Twilight watched as he walked to two other ponies, one (for some odd reason) in a ninja outfit, the other with quite possibly the best mane they’d ever seen.

“Come on, Rainbow; let’s head home,” Twilight said as she tapped Rainbow, who was still obviously upset about her cheering crowd disappearing.

“Fine,” she grunted as she flew off the pedestal. “I’ll meet you back in Ponyville. I’m gonna go around the track a couple more times; I messed up at the same spot twice.”

“Alright, but remember that you don’t have to be perfect,” Twilight reassured. “You did great today.” Rainbow waited for Twilight to leave before she hovered over to the starting line of the track. In her mind, she could still hear the cheering crowd and it served to inspire her to try her hardest. For five minutes she flew around the track, avoiding the clouds that served as obstacles. By her fifth lap, she had mastered the part she had messed up on and managed to shave two seconds off her time. To her, two seconds was a large improvement. Content with mastering the course, she decided it was time to return to Ponyville. It only took her a few minutes to get there. She landed on the outskirts of the town and began to walk into it, before a raspy, guttural voice called out to her.

“Young mare, would you kindly give spare a few bits?” the pony asked. Rainbow turned and looked at the beggar and was immediately taken back by its appearance. The pony was ancient looking; his eyes sunken and almost hidden behind an old leather face. His lips were almost completely nonexistent, revealing naught by greening teeth. In comparison, he made Granny Smith look like a filly. But what was worst was his muzzle; it had appeared to have basically rotten away.

“Agh! What in Tartarus are you?” Rainbow yelled, not even thinking about the pony’s feelings. She immediately regretted her outburst, for the ancient pony’s reaction was for his wrinkles to all fall downward, signifying he was frowning. No matter her speed, she was unable to react as the pony stood and put his face in front of hers.

“You dare mock me? I’ve lived hundreds of years only to be disrespected by some mare?” the pony angrily said, his voice more of a croak than anything. His breath smelled of rotting onions. Or really good cheese.

“Hey, I’m sor-“

“Popular!” the pony yelled before stroking Rainbow’s cheek.

“Ah, what the hay, man?!” she yelled, jumping back. “Get away from me!”

“I see what your heart most desires. From this day forth, it will be the one thing you wish you could get away from!” the pony croaked, spittle flying and hitting Rainbow, much to her absolute horror and disgust. Instead of trying to argue, Rainbow immediately turned and dashed away, leaving the crazed, rotten piece of beef jerky pony alone.

“What a creep,” she mumbled to herself, unable to get his creepy face out of her mind. She shook her head and slowed to a canter, then a walk. It was then that she noticed that her cheek where the pony has caressed her felt icy cold, as if he had applied a cream made of ice to her face. She pressed her hoof to the spot so as to warm it, but found that her cheek was actually not cold at all. “What...?” she muttered completely confused at the situation. Her confusion was short lived, however, as she heard her name shouted from behind her.

“Rainbow Dash!” it yelled, prompting her to smile and turned around. The moment she did, her pupils shrunk at the shock of the site before her. Hundreds of ponies were sprinting at her full speed, a ravenous horde all shouting her name and sporting pictures of her. She was both in awe at the site and oh so absolutely horrified. From her end it was but a small horde. But from above, one could see that the oncoming group of crazed fan-ponies stretched on for nearly a mile.

“Whoa, calm down!” she yelled, a nervous laughter following shortly. Before she could fly, so as not to be completely trampled by the mob, she felt herself being tackled from behind.

“Rainbow Dash!” Twilight yelled as she tackled the rainbow pony to the ground. The two rolled for a moment, concluding with Twilight having Rainbow on her back, Twilight towering over the confused mare. “I love you!”

“Twilight? What?” Rainbow puzzled, bewildered by Twilight’s sudden confession. “I mean, you’re great and all, but-“

“Sign my book!” Twilight interrupted a giant grin on her face. The book in question was but an empty journal. On the front was a picture of Rainbow Dash, obviously glued to the cover just a couple seconds prior. In fact, a bit of glue dripped off and fell onto Rainbow’s chest.

“Ew, Twilight! Get off me!” she yelled as she shoved her friend away. “What’s gotten into you?” she asked while standing up. She wiped the glue off of her and flung it away before glaring at Twilight. “Since when have you wanted my autograph?” Twilight blinked twice in confusion before responding.

“What? I’m your biggest fan, silly! Now, sign here!” she happily exclaimed. Rainbow began to protest, but was unable to as Twilight used her magic to spawn a quill in between Rainbow’s teeth and pointed at a blank page in her book. Meanwhile, the ever-growing group was still dashing at them at an alarming pace.

“I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but could we, you know, do this later maybe? I’ll sign whatever you want,” Rainbow said, glancing back at the advancing ponies. “Maybe in the cast-“she continued, but instantly stopped as her scenery changed. She was no longer in the middle of a road; she was now in Celestia’s castle. “...le...” she finished.

“Rainbow Dash!” Celestia yelled in a very authoritative voice. Rainbow turned to see Celestia and Luna standing in front of her.

“Oh thank Cele- I mean, am I glad to see you two. Something seriously strange is going on in Ponyville,” Rainbow groaned. “Twilight has, like, gone totally bonkers as well.”

“We’re glad you’re here, Rainbow,” Luna said, a smile growing on her face.

“Okay, now that’s just creepy,” Rainbow admitted. She didn’t like where this was going one bit. She began to back up slowly as the two smiled at each other, then looked back at her.

“We’ve decided that you’re obviously the best pony in all of Equestria, so we want to give you the throne. But first,” they continued as they both pulled out scrolls, “sign these!”

“F-fine,” Rainbow agreed, defeated by the insanity that was following her. She cautiously walked up to the two of them who just stood there with smiles plastered on their faces. Somehow, she still managed to keep the quill in her mouth and, with increasing hesitation, began to sign both of their scrolls. After doing so, she slowly backed away and observed the two, who had begun to shake with excitement.

“Oh... my... gosh,” Celestia said, her voice going an extremely high pitch. Finally, just as Rainbow was sure the two would explode, they turned and hugged each other and began to squeal at such a high pitch that she was sure the windows would shatter. She covered her ears and tried to shut out the noise to no avail. Fortunately for her, there existed one being that wasn’t under whatever magic she was cursed with. And he was clad in a leather jacket and sunglasses.

“Come with me if you want to live,” Discord said, extending his hand to the pony.

“Discord?” Rainbow quizzed. “There is no way I’m touching you. For all I know, you did this to me!” she yelled, backing away from him. He lowered his hand and sighed.

“You just ruined a perfectly good moment, Dashie,” he responded, tossing the glassing at the two sisters and knocking Luna out. “This jacket wasn’t cheap,” he continued.

“Who even tailors your clothes?” she asked. And he would have answered had the lights dimmed in the room. The two looked around at all the windows to see that hundreds of pegasi were now trying to bust into the windows. The dashie-pocolypse had begun.

“Oh screw it,” Discord mumbled and stretched his arm towards rainbow, grabbing her and teleporting the two away from the castle. Moments later, the pegasi busted in through the windows and found that Rainbow was no longer there. However, Celestia, with her signature in hand, still stood next to her unconscious sister. They all surrounded her and began to advance on her, demanding the scroll.

Now, I wish I could tell you that Celestia fought the good fight and the pegasi let her be. I wish I could tell you that. But Equestria is no fairytale land.

---

“Alright, tell me what’s going on,” Rainbow demanded, her brow furrowed.

“You’re famous, Dashie,” Discord replied, his arms crossed. Rainbow glared at him and he sighed. “You’re cursed. Something with great magic has taken ahold of you and made every single living being in Equestria absolutely infatuated with you. It’s actually quite hilarious,” he admitted.

“Then why are you helping me?”

“Simple; nopony is paying attention to me,” Discord said with a shrug. “What good are you ponies if you don’t notice when I switch the gender of every pony in Canterlot? It’s no fun without there being mass chaos!”

“That’s- wait, you can switch the gender of ponies?” Rainbow inquired, her brow rising. “Once we fix this, I’m gonna need you for a prank.”

“I’ll take you up on that offer. Now, do you remember doing anything that would cause anypony to want you to be the most obsessed over pony in Equestria since Twilight became a princess?”

“Not really. I mean, there was that old pony-“

“Old pony?” Discord interrupted. “Tell me more of this old pony,” Discord continued, using his fingers to quote ‘old pony’.

“Well, he had this rotten nose and this really, really rancid breath. Plus, he looked like a really dehydrated grape,” she described.

“Sounds like you met a gypsy. You see, there exists a very rare form of magic in this world, one born of hatred. You must have done something horrible to him to gain his wrath,” Discord explained.

“Actually, I just screamed in horror and asked what he was.”

“Oh, well that was kind of an overreaction on his part.”

“So,” Rainbow started, growing impatient with the situation, “how do we fix this?”

“Simple; we find the gypsy and ask him nicely to remove the curse. Or, you know, just wait it out. I have scrabble,” Discord pointed out, revealing he did indeed have a box of scrabble. What scrabble was, Rainbow didn’t know, but she strangely wanted to play it.

“I like option one. Where are we anyways?”

“My closet.”

“Oh. Why am I not surprised?” Rainbow responded, looking around the room that she was now noticing was filled sky high with various outfits, most of which were completely unorthodox. She couldn’t help but notice that there was a set of six outfits that had the color scheme of her and her friends which disturbed her for some reason. “Can we go?”

“Can I wear my jacket?”

“I’d rather you didn’t.”

“Fine,” he grumbled, tossing the jacket aside, where it was magically caught by a hanger and taken away. “Let’s go. Grab my tail.”

“W-why? Can’t you just-“

“Grab. My tail,” he commanded. Rolling her eyes, Rainbow agreed. Instantaneously, the two were teleported to Ponyville, which now lay barren and devoid of life. The two looked around and saw who they were looking for. He was still sitting in the same place, looking like a deflated balloon.

“Hey, you!” Rainbow yelled, walking angrily towards the old pony. He looked up and frowned.

“Oh, you again,” he growled. “Come to laugh at me again?”

“No, I came to kick your butt,” she replied. This only served to anger the pony more.

“How dare you! You insul-“

“Save the act, buddy,” she snarled. “You did some mumbo jumbo and cursed me. I want you to lift it right now!”

“I what now? Curse? What in the blazes are you going on about?” he quizzed, his anger turning to confusion.

“Yeah, you touched me with that icy hoof and said ‘popular’! Now I’ve got ponies drooling over me. My own friend confessed her love for me and started asking me to sign her book.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand,” the old gypsy replied, obviously unaware as to the situation. “I merely put glitter on your face, you silly pony.” Rainbow stopped, started to reply, and then stopped. She slowly reached up and touched her face again and looked down at her hoof. There was indeed glitter on her face. “Ha! Take that!” the old gypsy laughed.

“You- but...”

“What is your name, Gypsy,” Discord butted in.

“McGuffin,” he replied. Discord and Rainbow looked at each other before face-palming.

“Of course it is,” the two said in unison. McGuffin dashed forward and touched Rainbow’s other cheek, leaving more glitter before cackling madly and dashing off into the distance, never to be see again. Some say he is still running to this day. Some say he never existed in the first place, but those ponies need to be hit. With a stick.

“You have the most adorable cheeks!” Discord exclaimed, taking his chance to pinch Rainbow on either side of her face.

“H-hey! Back off!” she protested, her cheeks turning a rosy pink, which only served to compliment the glitter. “I am not ‘adorable’,” she voiced, gritting her teeth on the final word.

“Really? What happened to ‘Rainbow Dash always dresses in style’?” he asked? Rainbow decided to completely ignore the question and instead deemed it much more important to figure out who had cursed her.

“Alright, so if the old gypsy didn’t curse me, who did?”

“I’m not sure, but you have problems, Dashie,” Discord answered, pointing in the distance. In the distance, coming over the horizon, were thousands upon thousands of ponies charging in her direction, a cloud of dust from the dirt being kicked up. The setting sun glowed through the dust and the shadows of the charging ponies loomed all the way towards her, stopping just at her hooves.

“Discord, get us out of here!” she commanded.

“Nah, I’m good. I helped all I could,” he replied. “You’re on your own. Oh, but I can do this!” he happily exclaimed. Rainbow looked back and forth between him and the oncoming wall of destruction. Her jaw dropped when she saw him duplicate into multiple versions of himself, all sporting a different instrument. “Wha...?”

“This is going to be an epic fight. You need music! I just finished a new song a bit ago; I call it ‘The Eye of the Griffin’,” he said, much to Rainbow’s dismay. “By the way, it’s dangerous to fight alone; take this!” Discord concluded, handing Rainbow a pen. Needless to say, she didn’t take it.

“I really hate you, Discord,” she growled.

“I know.”

Rainbow stepped backwards as the horde finally reached the edge of Ponyville. She had considered flying away, but that idea was cut down by the sight of a giant mass of pegasi flying in from Canterlot. She could easily outfly them, but where would she go? She decided to make a final stand.

“Rainbow Dash!” roared the masses, causing the very ground to shake. Mountains were moved, and moves were mounted. Discord began to play an epic guitar riff. As much as she hated his guts at the moment, she couldn’t help but appreciate the music input. She walked forward and stood proudly as the ponies began to surround her.

“Listen here, whoever did this to me. I don’t know who you are, or what you want. But rest assured that I will find you, and I will kick you,” she loudly said. Nopony replied. Everypony stood around her, waiting for her to make a move, yet she didn’t do anything but look around. By then, a large bubble of pegasi had formed above her. There was no escape anywhere. The drums kicked in on Discord’s song.

Not a single pony moved, for they knew that one movement would cause the advance on their beloved Rainbow Dash. They would get their autographs. Finally, when the stalemate seemed like it would have no end, somebody from the crowd yelled: “JUST DO IT!”

With that, the battle started.

“Me first!” a voice yelled, as the pony charged forward. Rainbow wasted no time in dodging and responding with a kick in the ponies’ back, sending her flying into the wall of ponies opposite of where she’d charged from. Another followed suit, but met with a similar fate. As two charged full speed at her, their parchment in their mouths, Rainbow flipped over them and smacked their heads together causing them to both fall unconscious. She did feel bad; they were, after all, under the control of a curse. However, she knew that if she didn’t fight, she’d fall prey to the horrible fate of having to sign her name an equal amount of times to all the ponies in Equestria, a fate surely worse than death. So she fought bravely on.

Another pony charged at her; the ponied was dodging every swing, he parried to the left, she countered to the right, she caught him in the head. Three charged at her, causing her to become overpowered. With a great exertion of force, she pushed all three off of her, sending them flying. She flapped her wings and hovered out of reach of the ground ponies. The pegasi took their chance and began flying towards her, but they were no match for the skilled ace pony. One stallion charged her, clipping her wing, causing her to spin out of control, but she managed to regain her composition. The fight carried on; the unconscious count of the crazed ponies was in the double digits. Her strength beginning to wane, she once more dropped to the ground to catch her breath. That was when Discord decided to step in.

“You fight well, Dashie,” he praised, clapping his hands together.

“You... gonna... help?” Rainbow panted, her eyes scanning all around, looking for her next challenger.

“No, I was just going to ask a question,” he replied. She scoffed and turned to face him, keeping her hind legs ready to strike if anypony came from behind.

“Heck a time for that,” she snarled, her breath slowing.

“Trust me; it’s important. Where, pray do tell, did you get that medal around your neck?” he asked, pointing the golden medallion in question. He had been eying it since the battle started and had noticed it had a barely noticeable yellow aura surrounding it.

“The race I won this morning,” she replied. Another pony charged but was met with a body slam.

“I’m detecting magic from it,” he revealed. “But it’s fairly young magic; it certainly was cast on it a short while ago,” he explained. He rolled his eyes and lifted his hand over his shoulder just in time for a charging pony to ram face-first into it. “Didn’t your mother teach you that it’s rude to interrupt a conversation? For shame,” he scolded.

“Do you mean...?”

“Yes, that medal may well be the cause of your problems. Take it off,” he advised, brushing the pony he had just incapacitated towards the growing pile of unconscious ponies with his foot. Rainbow began to comply, but not before she was tackled by Big Mac. His brute force proved too much for her to handle and she found herself pinned. She struggled to get free, but he was an incredibly heavy stallion. Exhausting all other options, she growled and head-butted mac square in the muzzle, causing him to retract, allowing Rainbow the perfect chance to spin, jump from her front hooves and buck him across battlefield, causing a shockwave through the wall of ponies on the other side.

That was the final straw. Every pony surrounding her charged at the same time. The battle was over. Or, at least, it seemed that way. A bright yellow light began to emanate from the center of the massive ball, culminating in a giant explosion of magic, sending ponies flying every which way. Rainbow stood; she had managed to remove the medal. As the ponies stood, they all appeared to be absolutely muddled. However, they had come to accept these random happenings as life. After all, chaotic stuff happened in Ponyville, like, once a week.

“Well, that was epic,” Discord admitted, clapping loudly.

“Yeah, thanks for the help,” Rainbow grumbled. Her legs were shaky and she couldn’t seem to catch her breath. Her left wing had been injured and she knew she’d not be flying anytime soon. But she was just glad the ordeal was over.

“You know, we still don’t know who did this,” Discord pointed out.

“Rest assured; I’m going to find them,” Rainbow panted.

“I’ll go with you. I hate to leave a story unfinished,” Discord offered. Rainbow sighed and smiled; she had grown to like the guy.

“You know, Discord? This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship,” she admitted, extending her hoof towards Discord. He smiled and tapped his closed fist to hers and the two began to walk off into the sunset.

Big Mac stood and, somehow managing to remember everything, began to follow the two, but was stopped by a nearby stallion who said: “Forget it, Mac, this is Ponyville.” He blinked and nodded slightly and walked away.

As Discord and Rainbow were walking away, Discord began to sing.

“Don’t stop-“

Time To Wake Up

---

Rainbow snapped awake, gasping. The dream was mostly gone, but she could still feel the pain on her wing. It slowly faded as she tried her hardest to recall what the dream had been about, but kept drawing blanks. That was strange; she could usually recall her dreams. Also, she had a strange want to visit Discord. She shook her head and smiled; the day was still young. She stretched and flew off from the cloud.

Below the cloud, the strange entity had once more grown. It had also begun to turn a slight red, which was enhanced by the fact that no color seemed to exist while looking through it. As it began to move away from the cloud, moving to locations unknown, it left a separate version of itself which immediately began to move towards Celestia’s castle; specifically, Celestia’s bed chambers. This entity was only the size of a bit.

All over Equestria, life continued as normal. Nopony noticed these two mysterious orbs and indeed, if they even did, they wouldn’t raise suspicions. The day passed and, as the sun began to set, Celestia moved to her chambers, unaware of the colorless orb that sat in her room. When morning came, the orb emerged, growing as the rays of the sun touched it, reflecting off, showing that the orb had begun to glow a very dull red. But most importantly, it was moving towards where it’s other half was, and that other half had grown as well.

But that’s another story for another time.

The Dream Series

Popular

Next time on The Dream Series: Shadowfall

"...the two combined and began to glow a bright crimson. But this was too noticeable [...] seven purple orbs came from the magnificent orb and went to the skies. The orb was now but the size of a bit once more and practically invisible."

Author's Note:

Disclaimer:
I wrote this story based on the canon universe. Any events in the "waking" (frame) part of the story take place during the current point of the show. I try my hardest to not let my writing be "corrupted" by other fanfics, and indeed I write my stories based on how I view the characters in the show if they were living beings. Rainbow has a great flank. I'm a creator and I enjoy fleshing out characters, so to me, each and every one of these fictitious ponies is a conscious character, albeit in a universe seperate from ours. Any and all canonical contradictions as of now, or in the future as the show is updated, are entirely accidental. If I have anything wrong, that can be supported with evidence, please feel free to let me know. I wrote this with the idea of it being able to be integrated into the show through our minds. As such, all events will continue on with the show and indeed, may even take place during any episodes henceforth.

Props to anyone that gets all the references in the dream segment. I'm writing this before writing that segment, but I'm sure there will be a lot! Also, I apologize for this chapter not being as long; I don't like to draw out my comedy because it starts to lose meaning easily. Comedy just isn't my strong suit, but I still like writing it from time to time.

Also, can I get props for using a Macguffin, Chekhov's Gun, and having some Deus Ex Machinama? No?

Dream Explanation
You know, it has the random tag for a reason, yeah? Fine... We all know that Rainbow does indeed have a bit of an issue with wanting to be noticed and praised. Heck, her friends had to create a superhero to stop her ego once. So I though, why not have that be her worst nightmare? Originally, I was going to make this a serious story, but I decided to go a more lighthearted 'comedy' route with it. Plus, I needed to throw some Easter eggs in there! I mean, that second half... can you even? (I may have went a bit overboard, but I was admittedly running out of ideas)

Also, a note on the waking world: this really is just the beginning. I've already got every single thing planned out. And that spoiler at the very end... oh if only you knew. One more thing: Next chapter will explore the waking world a bit more. I know some people are here for that, and I respect that.

Fun facts: I was going to make this 'chapter' about Rarity, but I'm basically avoiding the living hell out of her, since she is going to have an episode focused around her in a few weeks. And as a reward for those of you that are bothering to read this author note, have one last "spoiler": "Stand behind me; this is going to be..."

Random Info
I'm including this segment in case anybody wants it. Basically, it's just factual information about random things relating to the story.
Total time spent: About 5 hours
Times re-written (drafts deleted): 3
Favorite song while writing: "Eye Of The Tiger" and "They Don't Care About Us"
Times I smacked my head against the keyboard: 2 1/2
Times I busted out laughing: 4
Time story was finished: 4:20 A.M. (Blaze it)
Current MLP:FIM episode as of writing: S9, E13
Favorite quote: He was still sitting in the same place, looking like a deflated balloon.
Favorite character: Discord