Opportunity Cost

by Future Regret

Futures Market

Rainbow Dash dragged a sloven foreleg across her muzzle, wiping it somewhat clean before releasing a belch and dropping her skull to the bar like she’d been dead lifting it for days. A loud moan passed her lips and she smacked her hoof against the polished wooden surface.

“Another one!”

She felt Princess Cadence’s eyes on her, and she slowly rolled her head to face her. Their gazes met and Rainbow Dash couldn’t help but feel a tinge of guilt as the bartender poured her soon to be seventhish drink in the last hour and a half. The alicorn was delicately nursing a gin and tonic, and things were already getting too hazy to tell if it was her second or her third. Rainbow Dash thought she saw Cadence’s eyebrows raise a few millimeters and she closed her eyes again.

“So… ready to talk about it?”

“Getting there.” The instant the bartender left the shot unattended, Rainbow Dash snagged it with the crook of her hoof, dumping it down her gullet. It tasted like poison and apples: fitting. She stifled a bristle and rested her chin on the bar. The fire roasting her throat, belly and face contrasted with the numbness that was seeping into her extremities.

“You know, I’m surprised you can still drink like that at your age. I know impressive isn’t the word I want to use, but it is definitely something,” Cadence said before retreating back into her drink.

Rainbow Dash turned to her with a drunk, sarcastic grin slathered across her face. “Gee, thanks. You’d be super impressed by all the things I can still do at my age.” Her expression crumbled and returned the same downcast position it had been in originally. “Flying solo, for one.”

“There’s nothing wrong with being single, Rainbow – at any age. Some wait a long time before they meet the one right for them. Others find that they’re just happier without romance being a part of their lives.”

“But I’ve found the one!” She blurted, sitting up right and looking to shadowy oaken ceiling for justice. “More than once! It’s awesome, that’s why I keep flying into this emotional wood-chipper over and over even though I know it always ends the same way: with me, on the other side, ground into glue. Maybe I should’ve just had drinks with Queen Chrysalis and had her suck all the love right out of me – assuming you aren’t her already.”

Cadence smiled. “That’s colorful… and sweet. This probably won’t comfort you right now, but the fact that it’s tearing you up so much inside means that those feelings you have are genuine.”

“No, that’s fantastic. Great. Happy to hear it. Sounds like a reason to celebrate.” She motioned the bartender towards her glass and he nodded, preparing her another shot. “Cheers.”

“Always happy to help,” Cadence said, rolling her eyes. She winced as the pegasus snapped the alcohol into her mouth and whipped her rainbow mane side to side as if she had been momentarily possessed. A few rogue drops flicked onto her pink coat and she scooted back an inch. “So you said the same thing happens every time, right?”

“Uh-huh.” The words were carried by the air of Rainbow Dash deflating, once again slumped on the edge of the wooden surface. “Should I just ask for another drink now or pretend like I’m not going to need one for the next five minutes?” The bartender overheard and shifted his weight back and forth with an unsure expression, but the princess waved him off with a hoof.

“If it gets that bad, you can have the rest of mine. So, what happens?” Cadence set her drink aside and gave Rainbow Dash a gentle, attentive look.

“Well, it starts off with meeting somepony, maybe through work, sometimes at a bar… occasionally through mutual friends. They think I’m awesome -”

“Naturally”

“And sometimes I think they’re awesome. So I’ll ask them out, do some sappy stuff at the cost of my dignity, and things are great… for a while.” The booze in her blood caused her brain to skip like a record, and for a second she just stared. “Then when things start to get serious for a bit, poof, there it goes, the magic of love. I’m an idiot. I should’ve guessed AJ would be just like the others. Now Twilight is probably gonna me deal with this mess like one of her-” she interrupted herself with a dry heave. “-Friendship problems.”

She heard a muffled chuckle. She turned to glare at the princess who quickly morphed the sound into that of a clearing throat. “Excuse me,” she said, putting a hoof up against her chest. Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes and Cadence sighed. “I’m sorry, Rainbow, it’s a problem a lot of ponies have. Seeing an Equestrian hero as esteemed, experienced, and awesome as yourself struggle with it is just – humbling.”

“Hmph. Nice save. Now I don’t know whether or not to kick your flank. I guess that’ll depend on how helpful whatever you say next is.”

“Romance can take many shapes and forms, and while two ponies might seem compatible, the vision of what they want regarding a life partner long term can make or break a relationship. When things “get serious”, this comes more heavily into play, whether explicitly stated or not. It doesn’t have to be said, it can be seen – or even just perceived.”

“Great, but I didn’t come here for a college credit. Why should I care?” She said, gruffly.

“I’ve been in this business a long time-”

“Sucks to be you.”

“Thank you. I know what to look for. You’re an ambitious pony. A legendary athlete, and I know you see a bunch of records waiting to be broken in your future, like being the oldest mare to fly across Equestria,” A scowl. “And that can happen, through hard work. The only problem with that is that the main ingredient in hard work is time. Opportunity cost.”

“So what, I should just quit being an athlete? Abandon my identity for the sake of propping up a relationship? Awesome idea.” She fenced herself off with a sullen cross of her forelimbs.

“I would never say that because it would cheapen the love between two ponies, making it pointless in the first place. I’m saying take a step back from being a world renowned athlete. Your legacy as a Wonderbolt stands perfectly well as it is. In the past.” She placed a hoof on Rainbow Dash’s shoulder. “If you want to spend your life with Applejack, you’ll have to fly forwards. You have to make dreams together, and as sad as it is to say, that comes at the cost of your own. Nopony gets two futures.”

Rainbow Dash looked down at herself. She didn’t see wrinkles but she couldn’t deny the loosening and wear of the skin that clung to her body. She wasn’t getting younger. She wasn’t going to be readmitted into the Wonderbolts, and even if she was she could never chase her dreams again, achieving the visions of success that had haunted her relentlessly. As cruel as it made the world, the fact remained. It was gone. It had vanished the second each of those moments of glory had arrived, and then those too disappeared just as quick. The empty vacuum left behind was what pulled her endlessly forward. Only now that chase was coming to an end she could feel herself starting to drift.

She took a shaky breath. Those brilliant dreams had faded into memories, floating further and further down some unfeeling current. They had burned brightest moments before realization, and were afterwards quickly discarded as the dull husks they had become, replaced by the next supposed impossibility.

Those dreams were gone, they had been for a long time, but she had others. Dreams of her and Applejack – making each other laugh, playful competitions, helping raise Big Mac’s kid and maybe, someday, even having a foal of their own. They weren’t the dreams of the Rainbow Dash she thought she knew, but they were hers nonetheless. Time had subtly been working the landscape of her soul, and though before she had thought nothing had changed, from her current vantage point it seemed almost alien – smoother and gentler.

She caught herself on the edge of sniffling, having lost track of how long she’d been staring into space. Her face jerked out of sight of the princess, and she heard those soft chuckles again. Rainbow Dash couldn’t help but smile herself. She cleared something out of throat and tried to blink away the moisture.

“Thanks, Cadence. I really needed to hear that. I gotta talk to AJ.” She struggled to removed to get off the bar stool, but her petite frame was making it a difficult task. It teetered back and forth. She shifted her weight to the side in an attempt to slide off. “What would I have to do to get just the height part of being an alicorn?”

“Uh, Rainbow-”