• Published 30th Mar 2019
  • 4,503 Views, 875 Comments

Little Memories - Skijarama



When Twilight Sparkle awoke from a coma with amnesia, the first pony to greet her back to the world of the living was Rainbow Dash. They were close, once, and Twilight knows that she can trust Rainbow Dash to help her through her life in Ponyville.

  • ...
13
 875
 4,503

Flight

Several months have passed since Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash returned to regular life in Ponyville. As difficult as times may be with her Amnesia, Twilight has managed to get settled and comfortable in the Golden Oaks Library.

With the passage of time comes the passage of seasons. The lush greens of summer have washed away. In their place, the myriad golds and reds of autumn have swept across the world.

As colorful leaves drift and dance their way through the air for the dirt below, Ponyville prepares for an annual event, and Twilight struggles with her wings…


“Huh. Maybe I’m really in a relationship with the dirt,” Twilight absently mused as she pulled her muzzle out of the soil with an audible pop for what felt like the millionth time that day. “It would sure explain why I keep kissing it.”

Twilight shook her head back and forth, clearing out the cobwebs and scaring off the proverbial pegasi flying in circles around her skull. She then let out a very undignified and frustrated groan before loosely rolling over onto her back to stare up at the afternoon sky. She took a few breaths, and her eyes locked onto a passing leaf as it drifted by.

She couldn’t help the brief twitch of a smile that came to her lips as she recalled her amazement at seeing the leaves steadily turn orange and fall from the trees. She had known about the seasons, of course - being one of the few bits of knowledge she had retained upon waking up - but, much like every other part of her life, she had no image in her head to go with it.

She idly wondered if winter would bring about similar amazement when it came rolling around...

Sadly, she was pulled from her daydreaming when she heard a pair of hooves touching down behind her head. She pouted, already knowing what was coming. Sure enough, a certain cyan pegasus with a rainbow mane entered her field of view from above, cringing sympathetically at her crash. “Ooooh… you alright down there?” Rainbow asked through her clenched teeth.

Twilight gave her a flat look, then rolled over onto her belly. “I’m alive,” she mumbled before forcing herself to stand. Rainbow reached out and helped her up. Twilight might have been grateful if Rainbow hadn’t been giving a weak chuckle at her disheveled state as she got back to her hooves.

“Well, hey, at least you’re getting better,” Rainbow tried, patting Twilight down to get rid of some of the dust. “Let’s keep at it, okay? One more try.”

Twilight’s deadpan expression deepened before she made eye contact with Rainbow. “Thirty-nine,” she snarked before flaring up her nostrils. “I’ve crashed and kissed the ground exactly thirty-nine times since you started teaching me how to fly. I know - I’ve been counting.”

Rainbow smirked and rolled her eyes. “Heh. Of course you did,” she stated dismissively before lifting a hoof to her chin. “But, I mean, you’re not wrong, those are numbers you just said. But it’s taking you longer and longer to crash each time, so…” her smile returned, this time with reassurance rather than teasing. “You’re getting better.”

Twilight paused for a moment, running through her five most recent crashes in her mind. In the end, she was forced to concede, however begrudgingly, that Rainbow had a point. “Ugh, fine, I am improving,” she groaned before wincing as her poor, abused nose throbbed in protest to the use of her facial muscles.

Rainbow chuckled and went to poke Twilight on the nose. She thought better of it at the last second, though, and pulled her hoof back. Her decision had probably been spurred on by the warning glare Twilight had sent her way. “Aaaanyways... you’re just grumpy that you keep crashing, right?” she surmised, and Twilight pouted at her.

“Well, I mean, wouldn’t you get kind of irritated if you kept slamming into your front yard from the sky at high speeds?” Twilight questioned in exasperation. Her wings ruffled and twitched on her back, and she lifted her own hoof to gently massage her brutalized face.

Rainbow looked down at the grass beneath her hooves with an inquisitive look on her face. She stomped the ground a few times, as if to test its durability, then shrugged her shoulders. “Meh. I’ve crashed at higher speeds through tougher stuff than this,” she dismissed casually before looking at Twilight again.

Twilight paused and tilted her head, her mind coming to a blank. “You have?” she asked, baffled.

“Several times,” Rainbow confirmed immediately as if it were no big deal that she had crashed through hard substances at high speeds before.

Twilight, not fully able to wrap her head around this, opened her mouth to ask another question when a new voice cut her off.

“Rainbow, Twilight! Howdy!”

Twilight jumped slightly at the call and turned to look. She saw Applejack walking towards them with a friendly grin on her face and a pair of saddlebags hanging off of her back. Rainbow took a few steps towards the farmer and grinned. “Hi Applejack! What are you doing here? I thought you were working on the farm?” she called over with a wave.

Applejack came to a stop a few feet away from Rainbow. “Ah was, but Ah got done early. Not as much to do when the Apples aren’t growin’ ya know?” she explained before turning to look at Twilight. A small, marginally more playful smirk appeared on her face, making Twilight feel just a tad uncomfortable. “Flyin’ practice goin’ good?” she asked knowingly.

It was at about that moment that Twilight realized she still had some dirt clinging to the fur on her muzzle. She quickly wiped the dirt away and shook herself before puffing up her cheeks at Applejack. “About as good as usual,” she quipped, glaring daggers into the back of Rainbow’s head.

Applejack’s smile brightened up, and she chuckled at Rainbow. “Hoo-wee, yer really puttin’ her through it, aren’t ya?”

“Putting me through the dirt, maybe,” Twilight grumbled under her breath.

Rainbow puffed up, oblivious to Twilight’s remark. “Hey, if Twilight’s gonna fly, she’s gotta learn from the best.

“And that’s you, right?” Twilight asked with a roll of her eyes, trotting forward to stand beside her.

Rainbow gave her wings a quick flap while shooting Twilight a smug smile. “You know it.”

Applejack nodded along. “Yer the best flier Ah know of, that’s fer sure” she agreed before her expression turned a touch competitive. She leaned forwards a little, a challenging look on her face. “But how are ya on yer hooves these days…?”

Rainbow’s expression hardened into a similarly competitive grin. “Ooh, you challenging me, cowgirl?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Sure am. Or rather, Ah’m askin’ if yer plannin’ on takin’ a part in the runnin’ of the leaves this year. Last time, we wound up tied. If yer runnin’ again, Ah wanna know so we can settle the score.”

Twilight’s muzzle scrunched in thought, and then she winced when it reminded her of how much pain it was in. Relaxing her face, Twilight cleared her throat to get their attention, and both of the other mares turned to look at her. She briefly shied back from the attention before speaking up. “Oh, sorry for cutting in, but uh, what’s the Running of The Leaves?” she asked, brushing her hoof through the grass.

Rainbow’s ears perked up and her eyes widened in realization. “Oh yeah, you don’t know what that is,” she reminded herself before turning to Applejack. “You wanna tell her? I mean, you’ve lived here a lot longer than I have.”

“Sure thing, Ah’d be right happy to,” Applejack said happily before taking a few steps closer to Twilight. “The Runnin’ of the Leaves is an annual tradition in Ponyville where a bunch of ponies from ‘round town get together and go on this long race. The course takes ‘em by pretty much all the trees in the area, and all of them hooves pummelin’ the dirt shakes things up. All that shakin’ makes the leaves fall off the trees. It’s part of our process for gettin’ ready for winter.”

Twilight’s eyes lit up with fascination, her previous shyness forgotten. “Oh, I see! That sounds fascinating!” she exclaimed before some curiosity seeped into her face. “But, wait... why do it like that and not just use magic or pegasi to pull the leaves down?”

Applejack shook her head. “Maybe we could do it that way, sure, but Ponyville was founded by earth ponies. There weren’t no magic nor wings in them early days to do that, so the locals had to get creative.”

“Even after pegasi and unicorns moved it, the tradition had already kinda stuck, far as I know,” Rainbow chimed in. “I ran in it last year to compete with Applejack, to see which of us was the faster mare on our hooves.”

Twilight nodded along, her mind moving along at a pretty brisk pace to connect this new information to what she already knew. “Wow... So, who won?” she asked, her eyes shimmering as she looked between her two friends.

To Twilight’s confusion, though, both of them began to look more than a little sheepish. Applejack looked away and lifted a hoof to fuss with her hat, while Rainbow’s eyes began glued onto a stray pebble sticking out of the dirt.

Twilight tilted her head, her mouth forming an ‘o’ when she recalled what Applejack had said just a minute ago.

“Last time, we wound up tied.”

“Wait… you tied?”

“Er, well…” Applejack began, scratching the back of her head with a tiny red tint appearing on her cheeks.

Rainbow kicked the stone she had been staring at, sending it tumbling through the grass. “We kinda… both came in last place.”

Twilight blinked and pulled her head back. “Er… wait, hold on, what?” she asked, completely confused. “I’m willing to believe you two tied for first, but for last? How did that even happen? What?”

“We were both awful sports,” Applejack admitted shamefully. She tilted her hat down to hide her face from the world. “RD and Ah were so wrapped up in tryin’ to one-up each other that we totally lost sight of the race, and came in last together.”

“And the egghead came in fourth,” Rainbow grumbled with some vestigial irritation, her tail swishing about behind her.

Twilight frowned at the word ‘egghead.’ She pondered it for a second before her eyes widened somewhat as it clicked. “Wait… you mean I ran last year?” she asked, lifting a hoof up to her chest to signify herself.

Applejack smiled at her, leaving her shame behind for the moment. “Sure did. Ya paced yerself and schooled us both,” she acknowledged before giving Rainbow a sinister smirk. “And as Ah recall, ya held it over Rainbow’s head fer months.”

“Yeah yeah,” Rainbow groaned with a pout, looking away. “I got my just desserts, I had it coming. Rub it in a year later why don'tcha?.”

Applejack gave some kind of witty follow up, but Twilight’s mind was starting to lose track of the conversation as it went over this new information. Thoughts danced through her mind, making her brow furrow and her lips curl into a frown.

She had run in the race last year, and she had come in fourth place. She had even come out on top of Rainbow Dash and Applejack, the two strongest and fastest ponies she knew. She’d paced herself and done well…

...Should she run again? She ran last year, after all, and even done quite well. What reason did she have for skimping out this time? She lifted her eyes back to the still bantering Applejack and Rainbow, her gaze settling on the latter. Maybe if she ran in the race, it’d be a good way to get closer to these two?

“And who knows?” she thought, her mind wandering back to those early days when she first came here after waking up. “Maybe doing it again would jog a few memories?”

“Twi?” Applejack suddenly said, bringing Twilight out of her trance with a start.

“Wha? Huh?”

“You kinda zoned out on us,” Rainbow pointed out with a worried frown before hopping into the air and hovering in place with her wings. “What were you thinking about?”

Twilight paused for a moment, hesitant. However, it only took her a second to push her doubts aside and nod her head. “Sorry, but I was just thinking that maybe I’d run, too,” she announced with a small smile.

Applejack and Rainbow paused and shared a curious glance. A silence hung in the air for a moment before Applejack nodded her head and offered Twilight a smile. “Well, that sounds fine by me, sugarcube. Ah gotta admit, Ah’m kinda curious about them new alicorn legs of yours.”

Rainbow swooped over to nudge Twilight in the ribs with her elbow, giving her an encouraging nod and cocky grin. “Same here. Just don’t expect me to go easy on you because we’re roommates, Twi. I race to win.”

Twilight rolled her eyes. “I’d never ask you to hold back. If I know anything about you, it’s that you don’t like holding back, and you hate losing.”

“Oooh, you’re learning,” Rainbow complimented before shooting up into the air with another beat of her wings. “Speaking of learning, I think that’s a long enough recess. Let’s get back to flying!”

The smile on Twilight’s face fell away as soon as she heard those words, and she let out an almighty groan of defeat. “Do we have to?” she whined in as pathetic a voice as she could manage, scuffing a hoof on the floor. Maybe if she looked miserable enough, Rainbow would take pity on her and let her off the hook?

No such luck. Rainbow’s expression hardened. “Do you wanna learn how to fly, or not?” she asked in a stern voice while crossing her forelegs over her chest.

Twilight went to retort, but nothing came out when she concluded it was no use. Rainbow was just too stubborn. Twilight sighed in defeat, hung her head, and nodded. “I do…”

From the side, Applejack laughed merrily at their banter before turning in place. “Well, Ah gotta get a move on. Ah really just wanted to see if Rainbow Dash would be racin’,” she explained before sending an encouraging wink in Twilight’s direction. “Go on, Twi. Good luck with the lesson!”

And with that, Applejack turned and started to walk away, leaving Twilight all alone with her trainer. Sighing, she slowly unfolded her still stiff wings from her side and gave them a few tentative flaps before looking up at Rainbow.

“Okay, so, first thing’s first,” Rainbow noted before flying down and coming to a stop next to Twilight, her hooves hovering just a few inches off the ground. “You started flapping way too hard when you lost some altitude. You overcompensated, went too high, and started to fall because you lost control.

“Thing is, you could have pulled out of it if you’d had good posture, which is the second problem,” Rainbow reached out to poke and nudge at various parts of Twilight’s body, shifting them around. “You’re way too stiff and rigid. When in the air, you gotta be flexible and loose if you wanna pull out of a spiral. Try to relax.”

“I’m sore all over,” Twilight pointed out tiredly. “And I’ve hit the ground several times. It’s easier said than done to relax when I’m like this.”

“Point taken,” Rainbow admitted before coming to a landing right in front of her. She studied Twilight for a few seconds, her muzzle scrunched up in thought, leaving Twilight to her thoughts.

And those thoughts more or less amounted to asking Rainbow to put off any more lessons until tomorrow. She was sore, she was stiff, she had a book she wanted to get back to, a dinner made by Spike she was eager to eat, and now she had to do some research on the Running of The Leaves. She knew there was a book on Ponyville’s history somewhere inside.

Before she could voice that opinion, though, Rainbow suddenly shifted so that her side was facing Twilight. “Okay, so, let’s try this,” she said before lifting up one of her hooves. “This is an old breathing exercise that Princess Cadance taught you a long time ago. It’s supposed to help you relax and clear your head, and I kinda picked up on it by seeing you do it.”

Twilight perked up at the mentioning of Cadance. “Oh, uh, okay? How do I do it?” she asked, her eyes locking onto Rainbow’s hoof.

“Just watch,” Rainbow replied before closing her eyes and putting the hoof to her chest while taking a long, deep breath in through her nose. She held it there for a second, and then let the breath out through her mouth while pushing her hoof out as if she were throwing something away from her. She then opened her eyes and looked over at Twilight. “It’s that simple. I dunno if there’s a mental part to it or not, though.”

Twilight slowly nodded and lifted a hoof to look at it. It seemed way too easy… but what harm was there in trying? She slowly closed her eyes and repeated the same motions. Breathe in, hoof on the chest. Breathe out, push the hoof away. Breathe in, breathe out. Pull in, push away.

After a few repetitions, she smiled with relief as her muscles slowly began to relax, even if only a little. Still, progress was progress. After a few more repetitions, she opened her eyes to see Rainbow staring back at her expectantly. With a small smile on her face, Twilight nodded. “Okay… I think it worked, a little.”

“I can tell,” Rainbow noted, her eyes sweeping up and down Twilight’s body for a second. Satisfied, Rainbow stepped back to give Twilight some space. “Okay, try to lift off. Let’s see if we can get you hovering for a minute. Try to keep yourself close to the ground this time, we don’t want you breaking your nose or something.”

Twilight nodded, then squared her stance. She took one more deep breath, unfurled her wings, and kicked off from the ground with a mighty flap.

The ground fell away beneath her hooves, and her chest tightened with the instinctive belief that she was about to fall. She pushed through it though, flapping her wings hard and gaining altitude. Soon, she was hovering about five feet in the air, and so she began to decrease the strength of her flaps to slow her ascent.

It was still a foreign sensation, flying under her own power. She tried not to be distracted by the lack of anything beneath her hooves, though, concentrating on her wings and maintaining a steady flapping pattern to keep herself aloft. Her altitude fluctuated wildly as she tried to find a good balance, though. She bobbed up and down in the air like a fishing lure thrown about by ocean waves, emitting wordless vocalizations every time she fell.

“Steady, steady…” Rainbow urged her quietly from the side, hovering along and observing her like a hawk, and Twilight felt a small hint of envy in her chest. Rainbow made it look so easy. “You’re too stiff, try to loosen up.”

Twilight, grunting with strain, looked sideways at Rainbow for a moment before forcing herself to focus on her flying. Her joints were starting to burn from the effort, and if nothing else, she could be thankful that this would probably be their last attempt for the day.

She lost another few inches to a sudden drop, and involuntarily yelped as the world lurched up towards her. She could just make out Rainbow telling her to calm down and relax from the side, and oh, was she trying. It wasn’t that simple, though. She was about ready to give up hope and let herself drop to the ground when an idea came to her.

Moving slowly so as to not disrupt her flight, Twilight lifted up her hoof and held it to her chest before taking in a deep breath through her nose. She then let it out through her mouth while pushing her hoof away. Much to her relief, breathing while airborne was about as effective as it was on the ground, if not more so. She repeated the technique and had to resist the urge to sigh in relief as her muscles began to relax, and her altitude began to even out.

Off to the side, she heard Rainbow give a low whistle. Twilight turned to look at her and saw an impressed look on the pegasus’ face. “Huh. Never woulda thought to do that,” she praised before nodding her head. “You’re doing good. Keep it up.”

Twilight smiled and nodded, encouraged by Rainbow’s words. She looked ahead and resumed her breathing pattern while maintaining her altitude. She was able to keep it up for a solid ten minutes before, at last, the strain became too much on her wings. Short of breath, Twilight slowed her flaps and lowered herself back down to the ground to land.

There was one problem, though.

Rainbow hadn’t taught her how to land yet.

Twilight realized her error in judgment only a few seconds too late as her hooves crunched into the dirt at an awkward angle. With a yelp, she pitched forwards and smashed face first into the grass.

“Hello again, dirt. Fancy meeting you here. Do you want a hug?”

Rainbow set down next to her a few moments later with a quiet sigh and a shake of her head. “Yeah… landings are tricky when you’re starting out,” she acknowledged before reaching out and helping Twilight pull her face out of the dirt. “You okay?”

Twilight nodded her head with a tired mumble, her eyes rolling around in her skull. “Uh huh… I think I’m done for the day,” she moaned in a dazed and almost sleepy voice.

Rainbow couldn’t help but laugh quietly before helping the alicorn back up to her hooves. “Yeah, I think so, too. But hey, you did good. I’m impressed.”

Twilight shook her head to clear the haze and looked at Rainbow hopefully. “Really?”

“Yup,” Rainbow confirmed before affectionately smacking Twilight on the back, making her wince in pain. Rainbow cringed the moment she realized her mistake. “Sorry…”

“It’s fine…” Twilight sighed before standing upright and taking a deep breath. “I’m the one who should be sorry. I’ve been grumpy at you since we came out here.”

“You’re learning how to fly,” Rainbow reminded her simply. “It’s not the easiest skill to pick up. You’re getting better, though, so take some pride in that.”

Before either of them could say anything else, one of the many windows on the first floor of the library swung open, and Spike stuck his head out to look at them. “Hey, you two! Dinner’s ready! Come get it!”

Rainbow’s expression lit up like the sun itself. “Oh, sweet! On our way!” she called before looking back at Twilight. “So, shall we?”

Twilight, her mouth already watering, nodded her head. “Oh, absolutely! I’m starving!”

“Heh, ditto,” Rainbow agreed, the two of them trotting side by side into the library.

Twilight sighed in relief as she felt her sore muscles relax from the warmth of home washing over her. The smell of one of Spike’s fantastic dinners swam up her nostrils, making her stomach grumble in anticipation. Twilight smiled, ready to relax for the rest of the day as the door swung shut behind her.

Author's Note:

And so begins the
Falling Leaves Arc