I Dreamt to Fly

by MrDynasty

8: One Hoof At A Time.

Rainbow Dash was standing in front of Scootaloo, somewhat far away but still close enough so that she could be heard normally talking. “Changing directions while flying is actually less complex than when you’re changing directions while hovering, but at the same time it’s actually more complex. Most of the time you fly, you’ll be dodging things more than actually changing directions. All you need to do to do that is tilt your body,” Rainbow Dash said, standing still where she was.

Scootaloo realized that Rainbow Dash wanted her to fly around her, which made Scootaloo feel slightly nervous at the thought of bumping straight into her carer. Rainbow noticed the filly’s hesitation, prompting her to say more. “Hey, don’t worry about it! It’s alright if it doesn’t work out the first time, I know that it might be tough to do. Just have at it and if you make a mistake then that’s okay, we can just try again.”

The filly felt much more comfortable than she did at the thought of making a mistake now, since she didn’t want to end up disappointing Rainbow Dash. Scootaloo trotted back a bit to have a small build up so that when she started flying, she wouldn’t just idly hover. Her movement suddenly accelerated as she jumped into the air and stretched her legs out, beginning to fly towards Rainbow Dash.

It seems she made a mistake before she even reached the first hurdle, as it didn’t take long before she lost her balance and her nose went straight into the grass. She pulled her head back up and cleaning her nose slightly, feeling embarrassed from the small misstep. Even with her impressive display of flying before, she hadn’t exactly mastered the take off part yet.

She trotted back to her starting position and decided to give it a second try. Rainbow Dash didn’t want to say much about the small mistake the filly made. Inside she wanted to laugh, but she knew that it wouldn’t be a good thing to do in front of her right now. When she had recomposed herself Scootaloo gave it another try. She started galloping before jumping into the air, spreading her wings and stretching out her legs.

This time she didn’t crash into the ground however, making it over to the statue-like Rainbow Dash acting as an obstruction. Scootaloo tried to tilt herself as best she could when she neared Rainbow Dash, but it wasn’t enough as she clipped the side of her shoulder and then lost her balance again, falling to the ground.

It was still a pretty good attempt for a first time flier though. Rainbow Dash came out from her statue like state and trotted over to the filly lying on the ground. “You did pretty well! Better than I did my first time trying to dodge something, except I bumped into a wall and not somepony else. Still, I’m very proud of you Scootaloo,” She said, sitting down in-front of her and pulling her up off the ground.

When Scootaloo was helped up, she immediately scooted over and gave Rainbow Dash a small hug; to which Rainbow Dash immediately hugged back. While the two pegasi were in a warming embrace, Twilight was writing down notes in the blank pages of the book that she had taken with her. She had been lying down the entire time the two pegasi had been training, mostly staying unnoticed and quiet.

Rainbow Dash pulled out of the hug and stood back up again, her view gazing around the open field as she said, “I think we’ll give it a break for now, Scoots. You’ve made a ton of progress in the last hour and I think you deserve one.” Her view peered over to Twilight, who still seemed to be distracted. “Hey Twilight, you coming with? Me and Scootaloo are going to go head into Ponyville for a bit, see what we can dig up,” Rainbow Dash said.

Upon hearing her name, Twilight’s view had perked up towards the two pegasi, snapping out of the small trance she had been in from her reading. “Huh? Oh… yeah. Sorry I wasn’t paying attention, I guess I just got too caught up in my thoughts,” she said vaguely with a small nervous laugh afterwards. She picked up her book with her magic and began to trot over to the two pegasi.

Rainbow Dash had noticed the vague response Twilight had given, deciding to think nothing of it and that it was just Twilight being Twilight again. She continued to trot alongside Scootaloo as they all went over towards Ponyville. “So, did you get enough info this time? Since I saw you writing down stuff in that book,” Rainbow Dash said with a passive aggressive tone.

Twilight nodded in response to Rainbow Dash as she followed her shortly behind. “I guess I did. But truthfully I only really wanted to watch Scootaloo progress! But what I saw reinforced some of my theories, which of course I had to write down. Spike seems to think what I’m talking about is bogus but-” she said as she cut herself off, suddenly remembering something she had forgotten about. “Oh shoot! I forgot about Spike! I hope he’s okay all alone in the castle. I’ll talk to you two again later, I need to go and see if Spike’s okay,” she said as she suddenly flew away from the two pegasi in a rush.

While Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo had just continued to head casually into Ponyville, Twilight didn’t take too much time in getting back to the friendship castle. Upon reaching her destination, she trotted inside and kept a look out for Spike. Soon enough she reached the main table she always sat at when reading, noticing that all the books scattered around it previously were now cleaned up and put back in their rightful location.

“What’s with the rush, Twilight? Don’t think I’m old enough to take care of myself?” Spike said, crossing his arms as he was behind Twilight. She turned around and laughed nervously at Spike, prompting him to raise an eyebrow to her.

Once Twilight had recollected herself, she cleared her throat and shook her head slightly. “No! I do know you can take good care of yourself when you’re alone. I was more worried that maybe something might have happened while I was gone,” she said, adjusting her mane with her hoof.

Spike seemed to accept her explanation, giving a small shrug in response. “Okay, but it’s fine if you think I can’t handle things on my own,” he said as he started walking into the nearby kitchen.

Twilight followed him close behind, wanting to reiterate with what she said. “It’s my responsibility to look after you, Spike. It’s why I rushed home to see if you were okay. It’s not that I don’t think you’re responsible enough to handle things on your own,” she said as Spike opened one of the cupboards and reached inside, pulling out a small bag of crisps.

He opened the bag and started eating as he spoke. “I know, I know. Anyway, what did you end up doing at Rainbow Dash’s place? You were there for at least an hour from what I could tell.” He continued to eat as they both walked out from the kitchen.

Twilight pulled up the book she had carried back with her that had some notes in them, opening it and skimming over what she wrote. “Actually, Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo were training in the middle of a field. I finally got a chance to see how Rainbow Dash was teaching her upfront, which was nice. Surprisingly, what I saw reinforced my theory that pegasi need a lot of emotional support for them to fly! Pound Cake was flying from an extremely early age, which doesn’t make sense if we compared her to Scootaloo. But Pound Cake was around Pinkie Pie at the time she started to fly, and she’s probably the happiest pony in Ponyville!” She said with a gleeful smile as she looked to Spike.

He was still eating, still seeming sketchy of the idea. “But don’t you remember? Pinkie Pie said that she got very upset and angry that day because of the two foals, doesn’t sound too emotionally supporting to me,” he said, munching down on some more crisps.

Twilight nodded to Spike, closing her book and placing it on the table as they got over to it. “Well you know how everypony has that sort of… aura around them? Not a physical aura of course, the type that you feel more than see. Well I think that might have something to do with it!” She said with another happy smile.

Spike had finished eating the bag of crisps he had, scrunching up the bag in his hands. “So what you’re saying is that pegasi learn to fly faster depending on who they’re around? Well obviously, Twilight. Un-supportive parents would obviously put their foal in a bad mood if they’re un-supportive,” he said as he threw away the scrunched up bag in his hands, making Twilight glare at him for making a small mess.

She nodded again to Spike, pulling one of her hooves up and motioning it with her speech. “That’s true, but I think it may affect them subconsciously more than just emotionally. Kind of like an emotional inhibitor! But this also means something else. It means Scootaloo had un-supportive parents.” While Twilight seemed happy with her discovery, Spike just rolled his eyes.

“Twilight, her parents don’t matter anymore. Remember what Luna told you two years ago? She said to just put all of that behind us and forget about it. Scootaloo is happy with Rainbow Dash now, so I’m sure that whatever we could dig up about her parents isn’t needed anymore,” Spike said, crossing his arms again. Twilight ears flopped back as she looked away.

“Yeah, I know that. But it’s just a question that was bugging me back then and is still bugging me to this day! How her parents just magically disappeared without anypony lifting a feather,” Twilight said, turning around and rubbing the cover of the book she had previously placed on the table. “But I suppose you’re right, Spike. I should listen to what Luna said and just forget it again. After all, it’s still her future that matters the most.”