Chapter 1- Glimpse
And We Danced
Chapter 1: Glimpse
By iDash
“And we danced, and we cried, and we laughed, and had a really, really, really good time. Take my hand, let’s have a blast and remember this moment for the rest of our lives.”
-Macklemore (And We Danced)
“Come on!”
“No.”
“Yes!”
"No."
“Please?!”
"Um... no."
“Why is your voice getting quieter?!”
"...sorry."
“Aaaaagh!” With an irritated groan, the frustrated pony threw her front hooves up and fell back onto the cushioned couch that sat behind her. Her short, multi-colored pink mane fell over her face, covering half of it. She gazed at the vibrant pink and the lighter highlights that ran through it before blowing it out of her face.
With a sigh, the mare sat up and looked ahead at the pony in front of her, brow furrowed not in anger, but instead she wore an expression that was a mix of confusion and worry.
“I just don’t get it,” she said. “Why not, Fluttershy?”
The mare in question stood in front of her. Fluttershy’s long, pale pink mane was draped over her face as she hung her head low to the ground. Her eyes followed suit and she tried her best to avoid eye contact. She just shuffled her hooves across the carpet.
Finally, the pony spoke in her usual almost inaudible, hushed voice.
“I’m sorry, Candy. I just... I know you really want to, but... I just can’t.”
The other mare, Candy Mane, let out another sigh. “Fluttershy, you need to go out sometime. You can’t just stay holed up in your house-”
“-Cottage.”
“Whatever.”
This was Candy’s predicament: Fluttershy. For weeks, she’d been trying to get the shy mare to leave her home just for once and get out for a change, but so far she’d been unsuccessful. Candy worried for her. Often, Fluttershy was so insecure that she wouldn’t so much as leave her home to go to the market for food. At times like those, it would be Candy who had to care for her.
“Candy,” Fluttershy spoke again. “I know that you want to go out, but I-”
“Come one, Shy! It’ll just be the two of us, just... please,” Candy said desperately.
Fluttershy’s head sank to the ground again. Rather than say anything, she just pawed at the ground with her hoof.
Candy leaned forward on the couch. “Fluttershy... you’re my cousin, I’m just worried about you. All you do is stay alone in your home.”
“Oh, I’m not alone. I have my little animal friends, and Angel’s always here with me.” She pointed with her hoof to the baby bunny that sat on the table with a carrot as he watched their conversation in silence.
Candy just gave her a sullen look. “You know that’s not what I meant, Shy.”
The shy mare’s head sank once more as she sighed. “I know... but- it’s just that whenever I think of going anywhere, I just... I lock up. I can hardly leave the house to go to the spa with Rarity.
“Well, heh, you know me,” she said with a weak chuckle.
“Yes, I do know you, Fluttershy,” Candy continued persistently. She was standing up now. “And that’s the problem. I’m pretty much the only one that knows you, besides your other five friends, and you hardly ever visit them. You never even talk to anypony else!”
Fluttershy was sitting down now, her head even lower and her hair almost completely covering her face, except for one of her light blue eyes that gazed into Candy’s own rose ones.
“I... I know. I know that you really want to go out and that you’re trying to help. I know that you’re just doing this for me and...”
Fluttershy was starting to tear up now, but the sensitive mare kept her gaze on her cousin.
“I’m sorry, Candy. I’m so sorry for making you worry and making you try so hard just for me. I’m sorry, it’s my fault because it’s just the way I am, I-”
Before she could continue, Fluttershy was interrupted as she felt a pair of hooves gently wrap around her neck and draw her into hug.
“It’s okay, Fluttershy,” Candy spoke softly as she held the shy mare. “You have nothing to apologize for. None of it’s your fault.”
Fluttershy sniffled and raised a hoof to wipe away the beginnings of tears in her eyes. She gave a weak smile as she wrapped her forehooves around Candy and returned the embrace.
“Thank you, Candy,” she said softly.
“No problem.”
After a moment, Candy released the embrace and stood up with a small smile.
“Well, I guess I should go now,” the mare said as she turned to the door. “Do you think you’ll be alright? Do you need anything?” She cast a worried look at her cousin.
Fluttershy just smiled and shook her head. “I’ll be fine, thanks.”
“Okay then.” Candy began to walk out but stopped just before she reached the door. “Oh, and Shy?” she spoke as she turned her head around once more. “Just... promise me that you’ll at least think about it.”
Fluttershy smiled again. “I promise.”
Candy nodded and smiled back and with that, she opened the door and left, shutting it quietly behind her.
As soon as the door shut Fluttershy slumped back down and let out a sigh.
'Oh, why did I promise?' she thought to herself. She turned and sat down on the couch.
Fluttershy, as most ponies knew, had always been a quiet and secluded pony. She was always going out of her way to avoid contact with others and only really spoke to those lucky enough to have gotten to know her somehow. The mare rarely did anything outside of caring for her animals. This was mostly attributed to the fact that most things happened to intimidate her, which everypony already knew. What they didn't know was that she really just found no interest in them at all.
Fluttershy cared for her animals because she had a passion for doing so. Things like flying had never interested her. At one point in her life, she had been convinced that she should take an interest in flying. Hay, she had even enrolled herself into flight school- even though she had no idea how she ever got in. But still, it just never cliqued with her. So, she just stayed at home.
Her friends would often try to convince her to do something with them and she sometimes would, but it would just be for them instead of her actually wanting to go out.
Candy had been trying to get her out of the house recently, even if it were to just go out for a cup of tea. Fluttershy was doing her best to avoid it, but her excuses were beginning to wear thin. It wasn't really that she couldn't because she was so shy, but it was just that she didn't want to. She loved nurturing her animals and that was all she wanted to do.
Fluttershy felt something tapping at her hind hooves and looked down. Her personal pet bunny Angel was glaring back at her. The bunny's arms were crossed and his foot tapped repeatedly on the floor.
Fluttershy's face softened as she smiled gently, leaning in towards the bunny.
"Aw, what's wrong Angel? Are you hungry?"
Without averting his gaze, Angel shook his head pointed behind himself towards the front door of the mare's cottage.
"Um, do you want to go outside?"
Angel once more shook his head impatiently and pointed, stomping his little foot on the floor for emphasis. Fluttershy stared at the bunny in confusion for a moment while the gears turned in her head. She finally realized what the bunny was trying to convey and the gears clicked in her head.
"Oh Angel, I know you want me to go with Candy, but I just can't," Fluttershy said with pleading eyes to the bunny.
'Or won't,' she thought.
Chirp chirp chirp!
Fluttershy turned to her side as she heard the urgent chirping of one of her birds. As it turns out, it wasn't just one, but almost all of the little birds gathered in a small flock. All of them had the same determined expression as Angel.
The group flew together towards the front door and each bird found a perch around it. The small canary that had chirped at her stood on the door knob with its wings crossed in defiance.
"Oh no, not you guys too." Fluttershy started to sink back in the couch as far as she could go. "B-but I just don't know if I can-"
The mare was interrupted by a light tapping on her shoulder. She turned around and had to slowly look up at the massive form of the bear that stood in her living room... the bear with the same defiant look. Just like Angel, the bear unfolded his crossed arms to point resolutely at the door.
“Oh, come on, Gunther,” Fluttershy protested. She turned back to Angel. “B-but, who will take care of you while I’m gone? What if- what if the house catches on fire!?”
Fluttershy visibly shivered as the collective deadpan stare sent chills up her spine.
Fluttershy sighed, “Oh well,” she conceded. “I guess if I really have to... I’ll go. I’ll stop by her house later tonight.”
Angel smiled, victorious, as the birds simultaneously sang joyfully and flew off of the door and off to their normal perches. Even Gunther grinned and gave Fluttershy a pat on the back, which almost knocked her off the couch.
“Okay, okay, but only for one night, okay?” Angel nodded eagerly in response and hopped off to join his other critter friends.
Fluttershy sighed. “Well, I guess I should get ready then.”
It was late. The sun had already gone down by now and even Fluttershy’s animals were starting to hit the hay while the nocturnal ones woke up to a new morning. The shy mare didn’t mind, though. Knowing Candy Mane, it would probably still be okay to stop by now. She hadn’t originally meant to take so long- she’d had to be sure that all of her little friends were fed and cared for before she left- but hey, a little procrastination never hurt anypony.
The pony’s mane and tail were cleaned and brushed with a small white flower tucked behind her ear.
She had just finished double checking everything as she alighted in front of her door. She took a deep breath. “Okay, here I go.”
Fluttershy turned the knob on the door, opened it, then anxiously stepped out into the night air. The mare turned around again to face the bunny standing inside the doorway. “Okay, Angel, I already got everything ready. You know where the food and everything is, right?”
Angel nodded impatiently.
“Good... Are... are you sure you’ll be okay?”
The bunny rolled his eyes and slammed the door on the mare. “Eep!” Fluttershy yelped as she jumped back into the air. She hovered just above the ground for a moment before gently setting herself down and turning around towards the dirt path in front of her.
“Well, h-here I go,” she repeated nervously.
The trek to her destination was quiet. She had expected as much, considering the time and whatnot, but still, it was a little unnerving for a mare such as herself. The serene outskirts of the town slowly converted to suburban cityscape as she walked. She took lefts and rights past partially familiar houses. The closer she got to her cousin’s house, however, the more nervous she became. As her head came closer to the ground, she blew a wisp of hair out of her face that had fallen over.
What were they going to do, she wondered.
‘Nothing too crazy tonight. Just something nice and simple, Fluttershy,’ she spoke silently to herself.
Taking a breath to calm herself once more, Fluttershy rounded the last corner to Candy’s house. She began forward again, but stopped suddenly as she spied something something quite curious.
About a block away, a mare with a gray hoodie on trotted out of a house before looking around and starting forward. She came out of Candy Mane’s house. Fluttershy instantly recognized the multicolored pink tail and pale yellow coat.
‘What is she doing?’ Fluttershy thought. She tried to think, but didn’t recall Candy telling her about anything she often does in particular. At least not anything at this hour.
Candy was acting strange. The way she was placing her steps and how she was keeping her head low... it was as if she were trying to hide, or at least sneak past somepony.
Hiding... Oh no.
‘She’s not... doing something bad, is she?’ Fluttershy gulped.
Why else would she be sneaking like this? She hoped that Candy wasn’t getting into too much trouble. She took a step forward. If Candy really was getting into trouble, then it was Fluttershy’s job as the older cousin to get her out of said trouble.
‘I’ll... I’ll follow her and see what’s going on. Maybe I can talk her out of it?’
And with that, Fluttershy took a shaky step forward and began to follow her hooded cousin. The path that she was taking was strange. Candy wasn’t going anywhere that Fluttershy had been before. They traveled along back roads and grimy alleyways ways and into parts of the town that the mare had never taken the time to traverse.
Most of the structures around them were worn down or otherwise dilapidated. The roads were mostly dirt instead of the cobble stone that covered the other districts. Fluttershy struggled not to squeal every time an eerie noise appeared or a stray cat jumped out from a corner. She could hardly tell where she was going, too, the only thing keeping her on the right path this night being the dark form of Candy Mane ahead of her. The other mare seemed to know her way perfectly around the area.
‘Where could she be going?’
Fluttershy tried her best to remain silent and out of sight. She hid around the corners, hugged the walls, and tread as lightly as possible as the soft dirt crumbled beneath her hooves. She somehow managed to continue to go unnoticed by Candy. The flower that had once hung in her mane had long since fallen out, now allowing the hair to fall freely over her face again.
‘So far, so good,’ she thought as she blew another wisp of hair from her features.
After a little while their journey finally seemed to end as Candy trotted directly to a large brick building. Fluttershy cocked her head as she regarded it. The building was made completely of bricks. There were no windows and no outward decoration as far as she could see. The only thing the building had was a single rusted, metal door.
It was then that Fluttershy noticed Candy’s pink tail disappearing behind the door. The mare rushed forward, using her wings to push her through the air so as not to make too much sound, and caught the door just before it closed. With caution, she stepped inside and almost jumped with surprise as she heard the echoed clacking sound of her hoof making contact with a hard stone floor.
She paused to make sure Candy hadn’t heard her and breathed a sigh of relief as she confirmed that she was safe.
‘Seriously, how has she not caught me yet?’ It was most likely due to the fact that Candy’s hoofsteps masked her own.
With slow and soft movements, Fluttershy stepped inside and closed the door behind her. She looked around and made out the interior of the building in the dim lighting. It was mostly gray with only one white wall. the inside had no decor either. One thing did stand out, though. Rather than a big, dark room like she had been expecting, she was met with a set of stone stairs with guard rails placed on each side.
Fluttershy looked down the staircase and saw Candy’s form disappear once again below her. The mare made her way to the steps and began down, using her wings to lighten her stride. While she was walking, she realized for the first time that she could hear something other than Candy’s hoofsteps. It sounded like... music. And ponies, a lot of ponies.
‘Is it some kind of party?’ she wondered.
Fluttershy couldn’t hear Candy anymore, but continued anyways and was surprised slightly when she found out that it had only been a single flight of stairs she’d been descending. When she reached the bottom, she found herself looking down a dark and musty hallway. At the end of that hallway was a light, coming from a doorway of sorts. She looked around once to see if there were anything else, and started forward once more when there wasn’t.
She came closer and closer to the entrance and as she did, she began to hear more and more of the sounds. The music became louder and she could hear the beat. The voices became clearer and the sound of a crowd came into focus. When she got closer, she noticed that the doorway was covered by light and translucent curtains, blowing slightly from some breeze from the other side.
Fluttershy stopped a few yards away. The mare took a moment and a deep breath to steel herself. She was now going to find out what her cousin was so secretive about. The crowd was what really worried her. It was a well known fact, probably throughout Equestria, that the mare did not do crowds. They... intimidated her.
‘No, not right now Fluttershy,’ she inwardly scolded herself. ‘Alright, I can do this. I just have to go in, find Candy, and ask what’s going on. How hard can it be?...’
With one last breath, the mare valiantly stepped forward, brushed the curtains aside with her hoof, and trotted inside.
The moment she did, she was hit by a wave of sound. The steady drumbeat of the music flowed through the place. Though, instead of a dark room filled to brim with glow stick wielding, dancing party ponies, she was met with a large, lit up basement room.
There weren't nearly as many ponies as she had first thought. There were about thirty or forty and they were all in different spots around the room, hanging in little groups and talking and laughing together. The room itself wasn't as big as she thought it would be either. Fluttershy looked around the room and found the source of the music to be a decent sized stereo system and turntables being operated by an alabaster mare with a spiky, electric blue mane.
Fluttershy shifted her gaze, but couldn't find her cousin anywhere. She tried to process all the new information through her mind but couldn't figure out what this place was supposed to be.
"What the-" she started, but she was suddenly interrupted.
"Hey, everypony!" a colt shouted from one side of the room. "We got a battle over here!"
At that moment everypony in the room shifted and stood up with excitement before trotting over to a point in the room where a large group was starting to form. Unfortunately for our poor mare, she was caught up in the migrating crowd.
Fluttershy tried her best to navigate through the group, but her efforts were in vain.
"Um- excuse me? What- I- sorry. Uh- can somepony please tell me what's going on? Hello?" She struggled to get someponies attention, but was just stuck in the crowd.
She heard cheers and applause go up in the crowd. Something was going on in the center of the group. She tried to move around the other ponies to see. The space was too tight to use her wings and she was smaller than the ponies in front of her.
While she struggled, she heard some of the ponies talking to each other.
"Another battle, huh?"
"Hahah, this is awesome."
"Who is it this time? Redheart and Wisp?”
Fluttershy tried again to get attention. “H-hello? What is it? Somepony!?”
“Fluttershy!?”
Fluttershy’s head shot around in the direction of the familiar voice. There stood Candy Mane just outside of the crowd with a bewildered expression. Her mane had been brushed- though, not much- and her gray hoodie had been taken off.
“Candy!” Fluttershy felt a surge of joy and forced herself through the ponies until she reached her cousin and wrapped her in an unexpected hug.
“Eep!” She realized what she was doing and let go of Candy with a sheepish expression. “Oh my gosh, Candy, I’m sorry, b-but I...”
“Fluttershy, what are you doing here?” Candy’s voice was stern, though not mean or angry. “You really shouldn’t be here.”
Fluttershy lowered her head. “I-I’m sorry, Candy. I just... I thought about what you said, so I went out to your house, but I saw you leave and you came here and so I... I...”
“You followed me here?” Her tone was still stern, yet somewhat surprised.
The shy mare tried to defend herself. “I’m sorry! I saw you trying to sneak around and I got really worried and-!”
“Hey, Candy! What’s up?” A light-tan colored unicorn mare with a golden mane trotted up to them with a smile on her face. The mare spotted Fluttershy. “Oh? Who’s this little mare, Candy?”
“Oh, um, hey Chime. She’s... nopony-”
“Well well well.” Another pony came up to them. It was an earth pony colt this time, with a pale white coat and a black mane that had been neatly brushed back. “Aren’t you going to introduce us to your lovely friend here?” he said with a smirk.
Candy rubbed her forehead with a hoof in frustration. “Shut up, Simon.”
Simon and Chime both chuckled. “Aw, c’mon, Candy. You embarrassed?”
“Whatever,” Candy said, exasperated. “Alright, this is my cousin, Fluttershy. She just followed me here and I was about to show her out.”
Simon raised a brow. “Show her out? Why would you do that?” He shrugged. “Well, anyhow, it’s lovely to make your acquaintance, Fluttershy. I’m Simon.” He held out his hoof.
“And I’m Chime! Oh, that rhymed!” Chime said joyfully as she did the same.
“Um... hello. Nice to meet you,” Fluttershy said in her hushed voice and tapped her own hoof against the two outstretched ones. There was a short pause and Fluttershy asked, “Sorry, but... what is this place?”
“This is heaven, friend,” Simon said, then laughed. “I’m just kidding. Though, this is a sort of haven for ponies like us.”
‘Ponies like us?’ Fluttershy wondered.
“Heheh, yeah. It’s the most rockin’ place in Ponyville!” Chime chimed in.
“Hmmm... I don’t suppose it really has an official name, but we all call it the same thing, so I guess it’s good enough.” Simon walked up beside Fluttershy with a grin and gestured with a white hoof to the rest of the room. “Well then, my dear Fluttershy, welcome to The Spot.”
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I like this more than I expected.
you've caught my attention.
please, do continue.
Are you sure it wasn't inspired by
Edit: I'm a genius
Also "cliqued" should be clicked. Clique means a social group.
Edit part deux! I don't think this is a slow start at all, you do a great job of characterizing Candy and 'Shy so that even someone unfamiliar with the show I think could get into this. You immediately start the action of 'Shy sneaking after Candy and discovering the club and the cliffhanger is just perfect! Can I humbly suggest submitting this to EQD?
So, is this pre-Twilight Sparkle's arrival? Given the severity of Fluttersy's agoraphobia and Rarity being the only other Mane-Sixer referred to by name, that's the impression I get.
2395315 No, it's after Twilight arrived. It's just that we only ever see her out with Rarity.
Not bad...i'm tracking this.
I laughed so hard at this you have no idea. There's a club in my town live in called The Spot...
Mmm...I'll read on.
I just began to read that, when, i tumbled upon Shy's cousin's name. Seriously Candy Mane?
Is she gonna hook-murder her, or whatnot?
well this seems to be interesting enough^^ Onward!
Shy's my favorite of the Mane Six but gods does it piss me off how long she can do anything at all.