The Wait
The storm had been building for most of the day; weather teams distributed flyers to the entire town earlier that morning warning of the “Storm of the Decade”. The Everfree Forest was a wild, uncontrolled place, feared by ponies both for the myriad wild and ravenous creatures dwelling there and for its unpredictable weather. Storms and clouds uncontrolled by pegasus weather teams, unplanned and unscheduled, were a concept alien to the blissfully naive ponies of Equestria. Everypony assumed the ragtag but generally skilled Ponyville weather team could handle the occasional unusual weather pattern which rolled out of the Everfree. If something truly freakish happened, then surely with help from Cloudsdale’s pegasi they could corral and control any storm which dared rear its thunderhead.
A typical uncontrolled storm could be dispersed within one hour and forty minutes, assuming the high and low outlier times were discarded in the calculation. A storm of highest magnitude had never taken greater than four hours nineteen minutes to bring under control, with an average time-to-dispersal of three hours forty six minutes. Twilight Sparkle knew this with absolute certainty because she’d calculated it herself.
With equal certainty she knew that Rainbow Dash, head of the Ponyville Weather Team, had been fighting this storm for five hours and twenty two minutes.
She lay on the floor of the Golden Oaks Library, her back warmed by the crackling blaze of a well-stoked fireplace and surrounded on all sides by crumbling towers of books. Pegasus Aerodynamics lay to her left, Adverse Flying Conditions and You to her right, A History of Weather Management, Volume Three in her hooves. In the last five hours and forty one minutes she’d learned every fact, every facet, every iota of knowledge ever recorded about weather control, or at least, all of them available in her own little small-town library, however impressively stocked she’d kept it.
Six hours and six minutes earlier Dash had taken off in a spectral blur, her brilliantly sky-blue form lost almost immediately in the growing charcoal-black darkness of the gathering clouds. Six hours and seven minutes earlier she’d promised Twilight that she’d be careful and that she’d come back in one piece, holding Twilight so tightly it hurt and not daring to let go. Six hours and eight minutes earlier she’d dried Twilight’s tears and kissed her on the forehead for what felt like would be the last time.
Six hours and thirty five minutes after the skies went dark and the first lightning strike illuminated Ponyville in a flash of brilliant light and crashing violence, the librarian found herself chest-deep in ancient texts and dusty forgotten tomes, furiously digging through runes and glyphs and incantations the way a desert-trapped pony might dig for water buried under shifting sands. Bend Nature To Thy Will offered no solutions and Elemental Mastery stopped short of its promise. Still she dug, faster, deeper, desperation etched in her furrowed brow and quivering lips.
Water for a pot of tea boiled at the seven hour mark. The sudden whistle was jarring and terrifying, standing out harsh and shrill against the steady drive of rain on windowpanes and the wail of wind through swaying branches. Twilight sat at her kitchen table, a single lantern and the distant fire picking out wisps of steam rising from her cup and from the saucer which held a pool of spilled tea. She held the little mug in trembling hooves, thankful for the opportunity to hold something warm, solid, and real again.
She’d been staring at the dancing flames of the fireplace for half an hour, unmoving. A cold pot of tea lay forgotten on the table behind her, next to a shattered mug and an overflowing saucer. The firelight cast waving shadows on the bookcases lining her walls, each as still and silent as their source. Red-rimmed eyes stared out from under a disheveled purple mane. She had no more tears to cry, no more books to read, no letters to send. She had only the wait, hollow and stabbing, empty and crushing.
Lightning struck nearby, too near, and for a moment the pounding rain seemed louder and echoed through the library. Twilight woke with a start to the feel of something heavy, wet, and panting collapsed against her side. “Rainbow?” she whispered, trembling, “I was sure you’d - I thought - Dash, you were gone so long…”
“Eight hours,” mumbled the soaked and bloody pegasus, her chest heaving as she curled up by Twilight and her fire. “Eight hours and five minutes. I know. I was counting too.”
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*grabs The Power*
"A bunch of baby ducks, send them to the moon, a soda machine that doesn't work, send it to the moon..." BrunnenG made me cry, send him to the moon!
(Still. Best chapter yet.)
Daww. I know this is a generic comment, but I really loved that ending. Twilight's angst here is very... Twilight.
Damn. That's all I can... just... damn.
Almost cried a bit there. x_X
So much
Nice job with how Twilight freaks out, feels very true to her character.
Could have used a little more dialogue/cuteness at the end there, but great read as usual!
Damned good chapter, damned good story. More at your earliest convenience, if you'd be so good.
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Many thanks! I know this one wasn't a cutesy fluffy feelgood chapter, but every relationship will have these moments - especially when the lovers are both BDH's.
superb! and i agree, every relationship has these moments, so they should be incorporated into the story. maybe next you can have dash sustain an injury while she was fighting the storm that keeps her grounded for a couple of weeks and twilight has to go out of her comfort zone (as in no lists or schedules to plan the day.) to take care of her until she gets better. just a suggestion. anyway, keep up the good work!
I literally couldn't breath for a second there when Twi was worrying. Those hours probably felt like years.
Wow all I have to say is wow... glad RD is alright but now I foresee Twi going all nurse on her now lol well done and very cute I could imagine Twi being like that and how slow those hours were to her.
i1297.photobucket.com/albums/ag40/Shanenator777/capnfeels.gif
The emotional response you got out of me was impressive for such a ridiculously small amount of words. Well done.
I'm also a huge sap. So much as a sad face turns me into this.. but usually only if I'm emotionally invested already.
1831407
the only problem I have is my head cannon getting in the way... because twilight is a BDH I feel like she would be out there helping with her magic.
*ignoring my head cannon* great chapter, can't wait for more
1831592
I'll keep that idea in mind, thanks!
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Thanks! See my latest blog for more info on what went into writing this short chapter.
1831931
I agree. In this case, though, she knows she's out of her league. If she'd had time to study weather magic, weather patterns, Everfree storm history, etc. for hours beforehand, she'd be out there in the thick of it, guaranteed, giving 110%. I may revise the story later: part of Twilight's angst here is that she's been dating (okay, she's totally in love with) a weather-team pegasus, and she's kicking herself for not learning all of this months ago so that she could help Dash in just this kind of emergency. Now she turns to her books for comfort, but it's hollow because she knows she's too late. All she can do is wait and hope.
*thump up*... wait... i already don that... but i want to give it at least two thumps up!...
1831407
Like I said, the chapter itself works perfectly with the fic. Just because they're in a relationship doesn't mean the world stops, as some lesser authors would have us believe. The world keeps going.
I must admit, I need to see your Twilight and RD as a Battle Couple; Twilight's magic combined with a Sonic Rainboom would probably be just shy of the full-blown Elements of Harmony in terms of Earth-Shattering Kaboomness. Ah, the look on the villain's face... and the slight tinges of jealousy and third-wheelness from the other Mane 6. That'd be interesting to watch unfold as well...
1835252
Oh, they'd be deadly, alright. As long as they don't forget that they aren't invincible, and then of course, we'd have to find a Rainboom- and magic-resistant Big Bad to knock them down a few pegs. Remember Dragonshy?
this is good can't wait for more.
oh my chest hurts from the sad
I like this. Twi might be a BDH herself, but she's basically dating a firefighter or a cop here, and these moments are part of that no matter how badass you are.
This is wonderful stuff.
One minor style nitpick—book titles are normally set in italics when possible. Underlining is for handwritten work or old-school typewriters.
2778880 it really doesnt matter
1835252 shhhhhhhhh. Currently working on badass twidash fic. You saw nothiiiinnnnggggggg....