Dreamstrider

by OkemosBrony

Chapter 30

I pull the hood of my UEC sweatshirt over my head and turn slightly so I can try and not get all this wind and snow in my face. Just wearing this to go meet Dew Drop was a terrible idea, in all honesty. I didn’t think about that until it was too late to turn around and head back to the castle, but this was what I was wearing and figured it would protect me enough from the cold.

I hope Dew Drop comes out soon. I always knew she wasn’t good at showing up when I tell her to, but I also for some reason keep thinking that this’ll be the time she changes and isn’t late. Joke’s on me for that now, because my shivering is so bad that I’m practically shaking. Sitting on a metal bench doesn’t help, but it somehow was better than standing up. Maybe because now I can make it so only my back is getting shredded by this wind instead of my butt and hind legs.

“Aurora!” I can hear Dew Drop call through the virtual wind tunnel that this small collection of dorm buildings is creating. “Cold out here, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” I nod as I turn around to look at her. “Where were you? I’ve almost frozen my tail off!”

“Sorry! Was getting all my stuff together.” She opens one of the pouches on her saddlebags. “See? Got all my makeup, accessories, and everything for tonight. I don’t know what you have, but knowing you, you’ve got nothing. Tell me I’m wrong?”

“Well...I kinda can’t.” We both laugh at that. “But don’t tell me you brought all your makeup, right? Because I’ve seen how much you own.”

“Oh no, I brought all of it. Now come on, you look like you’re about to freeze to death. Let’s get back to the castle.”

As I hop off the bench and start walking back towards the castle, I can feel my hood get pulled down and get replaced by the hat. Shooting a quick look behind me confirms that it was the one she was wearing, and she now has nothing covering her head and ears. “Aren’t you going to be cold now?” I ask.

“I at least dressed for the weather,” she winks as she motions her head towards her jacket. “Cold ears will be the worst of it. Besides, you had to have been outside for ages before I got there. Not only did you walk here, but you probably showed up on time. Way more time than I have to spend outside.”

The rest of the way back to the castle, she’s basically just going on and on about how excited she is for tonight. I’m excited too, I’ll admit: I’m not really one for parties, but I’ve heard the Grand Galloping Gala is just so much more than a regular party. What exactly that means I’m not entirely sure, but it has to mean something.

Eventually we get back to the castle and while Dew Drop seems more comfortable being in here than she was the first few times, I can still tell this is an overwhelming experience for her. Moonlight is reading something next to the orrery as we walk in, and he gives us a little wave as we walk into my room and shut the door.

“Who’s he?” she asks quietly so he won’t be able to hear us.

“He’s Moonlight, another Dreamstrider. We both live in this wing, and when more Dreamstriders come, they’ll be here as well. Just makes it easier to have us all in one place.”

“Is he the one you thought was cute a few years ago? He your boyfriend now?”

“No!” I respond much quicker than I should while also turning much redder than I want. “He’s two years younger than me. Besides, I don’t really want to date him.”

“What happened to the cute little colt, then?” she coos. “Is he your boyfriend?”

“He wasn’t interested. You really remember that? It was like, three years ago.”

“Of course I remember it!” She puts her saddlebags by my dresser, then starts taking out all sorts of different things of makeup. “Don’t exactly forget when your little sister comes to you for advice about colts for the first time ever. Why wasn’t he interested, by the way? That’s really weird, since you said you two had already kissed. And like, at that age, that’s super serious relationship territory.”

“He’s not interested in fillies,” I shrug before walking over to my closet. “Sure I was kinda upset at the time, but I got over it. We stayed friends.”

“You two were only eight, give him time and he’ll be interested in fillies. If you still think he’s cute, then you two could try and make something work again.”

“No, he’s not interested in fillies…” I pause, and she just looks at me in confusion. “As in, he’s interested in colts…”

“Oh.” She just kind of stands there, looking a little embarrassed she didn’t pick up on that when I said it. “I guess he won’t be liking fillies anytime soon, then?”

“Guess not,” I laugh. After a few moments of us both staring at each other, not really sure of where to go from here, I decide to speak up and stop this awkwardness. “So, uh, you should go shower first. You’ll need more time to do makeup and jewelry and whatever than I will, so you can get started on all that while I’m in the shower.”

All of a sudden, her eyes grow wide. “You don’t happen to have extra towels, do you? I thought to bring all my product, but completely forgot about a towel.”

“There’s a linen closet in there,” I tell her as I start pulling out both Moonlight and Luna’s Dreamstriding reports. I still don’t know why Luna writes me these, to be honest. I have Moonlight do them because I then report to her, so her writing these for me just seems like a waste of time in my opinion. Still, I do find it a little funny that I have a princess report to me.

After getting almost all of the reports read and filed into unimportant because nothing really big has happened recently, I hear the shower turn off. How long was she in there? I had been letting these reports pile up for a while now, so she had to have been in there for a really long time. Good to know Dew Drop hasn’t changed, I suppose. We’ve got plenty of time anyways, so it’s not like this is really going to make us late or anything.

“Wow,” she giggles as she walks out of my bathroom, an enormous smile on her face. “I don’t think I’ve ever taken a shower that great before in my life! You’ve really got it made here, don’t you?”

“It is pretty nice,” I admit. I don’t really like to think about how nice it is, honestly, because it’s so much better than what anypony else I know has. And I only got it because I just happened to be the oldest Dreamstrider after Luna, not because I really did much above and beyond what everypony else did to earn it. Mom and dad always told us that we need to work hard if we wanted to get nice things, so just being given this is such a weird feeling.

“Come on, go get in the shower,” she says as she walks up to my dresser and starts inspecting all the different makeup she’s brought. “I’ll help you out when you’re done, because I imagine you’ve still never opened the beginner’s makeup kit Snowy and I gave you when you were seven.”

“Well, I did...but it was to empty all the makeup out so I could use it to hold pencils.”

“Just go shower,” she laughs. “By the way, with Snowy and I as your sisters, how did you end up not liking any girly things? You don’t use makeup, you don’t like clothes shopping, and I don’t even know if you really ever had a true slumber party. Sure you and Cressie had sleepovers, but that’s nowhere near the level of the slumber parties Snowy and I used to throw. We always wondered why mom still let us have them, because she always would come downstairs around 2 in the morning and tell us we had to go to sleep. And I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it, but mom at 2 in the morning is not a very pleasant mare.”

“Probably told you that she needs her beauty sleep,” I laugh as I take my towel in my magic and put it on my back. “That’s what she always would tell me when I was little and would wake her up at night.”

“After you were born, it was always ‘You’ll wake the baby.’ Even when you were like, three and I was having quieter slumber parties because Snowy outgrew them and her friends didn’t know how to shut up, you were still ‘the baby’ that couldn’t be woken up. We all knew it was a total lie, since you’re the heaviest sleeper I’ve ever met. You once dozed off on dad’s lap in the family room when you were a baby and I dropped a glass in the kitchen, and he was able to move you, help me clean up, and talk to me throughout the whole thing and you didn’t even notice.”

“Or like when Snowy tripped over me at Aunt Misty Meadow’s while I was sleeping on the floor, and I didn’t know about it until she told me the next morning?”

She laughs, then grabs a few bottles of what I think are foundation and starts inspecting their labels, letting me go into the bathroom and turn on the shower. I don’t know why, but it’s always nice to walk into the bathroom and be able to smell her shampoo. It reminds me of home. Unfortunately, picking long strands of hair out of the drain before actually taking the shower also reminds me of home and it’s not something about home I've ever been a big fan about. Seriously, would it kill her to just check the drain after she’s done in the shower?

After getting what I think is all her wet, slimy hair out of the drain, I get to work washing myself off. I hadn’t showered this morning because I knew I would be showering before getting ready for the Gala, so it feels really nice to get nearly two days’ worth of stuff off me. It’s also nice to walk into a bathroom that’s already nice and steamy again, because it’s just so nice and warm in here. As it’s been getting colder, I can tell that the heat in my bathroom isn’t very good. Winter isn’t going to be fun.

After a few minutes of just letting the hot water run all over me, I grab my soap and shampoo and start getting all nice and clean. I even open up the bottle of tail shampoo I have and use it, which I don’t normally do because it’s the same kind of hair as on my head, so why would I need a separate type of shampoo? Still, for a very nice occasion like tonight, I feel like I should use it. There’s probably some reason it exists instead of having mane shampoo be used for both, so I feel like if I’m trying to look nice tonight, I should use the correct types on the correct hair. At least I’m not a pegasus, because then I’d need to add an entirely new type just for my wings in addition to my mane and tail. Horns luckily don’t need anything special to wash them, I just have to be very gentle because it’s a very sensitive part of the body. Thanks to my second year at Princess Celestia’s, I now know that’s because of all the nerve endings in it. I have no idea when I’ll ever need to know that, but I do know it now at the very least.

Once I rinse the last few suds out of my tail, I turn off the water and dry my body off before stepping out and drying off my legs and hooves. Dew Drop said she’ll help me with my mane, so I just dry it off as best I can and put my towel on the rod so it can dry before walking back out into my room.

When I walk back out into my room, Dew Drop is still applying makeup in the mirror but now is wearing her dress. Just her dress, though, not any of the jewelry she brought, and her mane still isn’t done yet.

“Go get your dress on,” she says, not even looking my way. “I should be done with my makeup by then, so I'll be able to help with yours. Then, just jewelry and manes and we’ll be all ready for the Grand Galloping Gala.” With a big smile, she squees like a schoolfilly. “I can’t believe I just said that! We’re really going to the Grand Galloping Gala! You cannot believe how excited I am right now!”

“I think I can guess,” I tell her. She sticks her tongue out a little playfully and then goes back to her makeup, allowing me to go grab my dress from my closet. Mine is in a few pieces unlike hers, and is also unlike hers in the fact that it’s just normal fabric instead of the shimmery, wavy one that Canterlot Carousel Boutique was having a special on.

Very carefully so I don’t rip them or get them dirty by dropping them on the floor, I take my shawl and dress off the hangar before starting to put them on. I’m so used to all my dresses being hand-me-downs from Snowy and Dew Drop who always grew more than I did, so putting on a dress that was measured to fit me perfectly and not be a size too large is really weird.

Once I get it over my head and put my front legs through the sleeves, I take the opportunity to look at the mirror in my closet. The dress I got is pale purple, which even I’ll admit looks really nice with my light blue coat. Ruffles cover the cotton blouse half, which goes around my hips but then goes down in a V shape a little towards my back legs on my underside. The skirt is made of some thicker material I can’t quite put my hoof on but it’s a little bit of a darker purple than the blouse, really giving my pale coat some color. The shawl is the same color as the skirt, and when I put it around my shoulders, you can hardly even see the blouse except for the part right over my stomach that's hard to see when I’m standing up anyways. I’ve never really been one for dresses, but I will say that I look really nice in this. Too bad I’m going to grow out of this eventually, because otherwise I’d use it for all sorts of fancy occasions. Maybe if I ever have a daughter, she could use it. But that would be a really long time in the future, so I’d have to hold onto it until then. And even then, she’d need to be my size, which would take another long time. I’m sure I’ll think of something so this doesn't just go to waste after tonight.

When I walk out of my closet, Dew Drop is just finishing up with her mane. She’s gathered almost all of it on her left side and is making one enormous braid, and when she finishes up and turns around, her dress seems to almost...move with her is the best way I can describe it. Like, the fabric on it is shimmering with a mind of its own, and it feels like the dress I’m looking at now isn’t exactly the same dress she was wearing just a moment ago.

“Looking pretty adorable,” she coos. “Now come on over here, I know exactly what to do with your mane. Trust me, it’ll look amazing!”

“Alright,” I shrug before walking over to my dresser and sitting down, allowing her to get to work on it. After much less time than I would have expected, she picks up my hoof mirror and uses it to show me the back of my head. “How’s it look?”

I look in the dresser’s mirror and see that she’s put only part of my mane into a ponytail in the back, so the tail is resting over the rest of my expertly-brushed mane. She’s also made two small braids between my temples and my ears, leaving them to just hang down. “Well?” she asks.

“It actually looks really nice,” I admit. “Nothing fancy, and still looks really beautiful.”

“You’re not—” She stops in mid-thought, then puts the mirror back on the dresser. “I want to say you’re not really that fancy, but not in a rude kind of way. But like, that’s just not who you are. When you dress yourself nice, you just brush your mane and tail and put on a fairly plain dress. It’s why I steered you towards that dress you have and why your manestyle isn’t very complex tonight, because otherwise it wouldn’t really be who you are. Your beauty comes from your simplicity, not in spite of it. I figured you should demonstrate that, because otherwise your true beauty wouldn’t come out tonight.”

“Thanks,” I manage to say. To be honest, I don’t think anypony’s ever called me beautiful before. Beyond the adults who have to like mom and dad and our grandparents, I guess. And when they say I’m beautiful, they never really point out specific reasons why I am. It’s nice to know that I really have beauty, because everypony’s always just seen me as the cute little filly or sister and not a mare who’s beautiful in her own unique way.

“Now come on,” she says, changing tone, “time for your makeup. Again, nothing too crazy, but enough to make you look really nice. Like with your dress, I’m trying to go for modest and simple, but beautiful all the same. You get what I’m saying?”

“Mhm,” I nod, still unable to get over the fact that somepony called me beautiful. And not just because of how I look, but for who I am, as well. Sure it was just my sister, but I always thought she was beautiful so it’s nice to hear her say that about me.

“Come on, wipe that smile off your face, it’s hard to apply makeup when you don’t have a straight face. What’s so funny, anyways?”

“Oh, funny?” I clear my throat and try to make a straight face. “Nothing. I guess I’m just excited.”

“Excited for the Grand Galloping Gala?” she asks as she starts putting foundation all over my face. “Maybe there’s a little bit of your sisters in you, yet. I would’ve guessed that you’d think tonight will be super boring and would rather stay in your room reading.”

“I think it’ll be fun.” To be honest, though, staying home and getting some reading done would be really nice. Dew Drop’s always wanted to the Gala, though, so when Luna told me she could get me tickets I figured I might as well get a couple so we can spend the night together. And even though it sounds a little mean, it’ll be nice to be able to hold this over Snowy. As Luna tells me, younger sisters need to stick together. Dew Drop may be my older sister, but she still technically is a younger sister as well.

“‘Fun’ is just the start of it! All the most important ponies in Equestria and beyond, and we get to meet them all! The Princesses, all the Elements of Harmony, the Wonderbolts, Sapphire Shores, Photo Finish, Songbird Serenade, I can’t list them all!”

“I don’t know who any of those celebrities are,” I admit while laughing nervously. “Obviously I know the Princesses, the Elements of Harmony, and I know of the Wonderbolts, but don’t know any of the actual pegasi.”

“Rainbow Dash is both an Element of Harmony and a Wonderbolt. There you go, now you know one. Have you ever met her, by the way? Or any of the Elements?”

“Nope. I’ve met Princess Luna obviously, and I’ve met Princess Celestia on a few occasions. I had breakfast with her and Princess Luna not long after I got here, and she comes to our department head meetings sometimes so she can hear everything first-hoof. But other than that, I haven’t met many big or important ponies. Outside of the other department heads, I guess. My job’s generally pretty uninteresting, honestly.”

“Oh, to think breakfast with the Princesses is uninteresting. And meetings with Princess Celestia’s closest advisors, free tickests to the Grand Galloping Gala, a suite all for yourself in the castle...most ponies would kill for your life of glamor and importance.” With a few final strokes of the mascara wand, she puts everything aside and stands up. “How’s it look?”

“Does look kind of nice.” I slowly wink my eyes one after the other to see how the mascara looks.

“Just make sure to have me help you take it off tonight, okay? Last thing you want is it staying in your lashes and then getting in your eyes. Now, come on!” Without so much as a warning, she gets me onto my hooves and starts walking to the door. “We’re going to have to get there early if we want to talk with the Princess and all the other famous ponies, otherwise it’ll just be too crowded.” She puts her foreleg out and smiles. “Now, I believe I’m technically your plus one, so do you need an escort, Miss Aurora Borealis?”

“Why thank you, Miss Dew Drop,” I reply with the fanciest accent I can make. “Shall we have a wonderful evening at the Grand Galloping Gala?”

“It shall be a most splendid night.” We both laugh as I take her hoof in mine and we begin walking out of the castle.